Розділ: Політика
Long Lines Snarl Voting in Georgia’s Primary Election Amid Pandemic
Long lines snaked around polling places Tuesday, and some voters faced hourlong waits as Georgia held its twice-delayed primary election amid a shortage of poll workers and social-distancing precautions caused by the coronavirus. Widespread problems included trouble with Georgia’s new touchscreen voting system in races for president, U.S. Senate and dozens of other contests. Some voters said they joined the lines after requesting mail-in ballots that never arrived. One state lawmaker from Atlanta said there was a “complete meltdown” in Georgia’s largest county. Even before the trouble began, Georgia’s chief election officer warned that results may be slow to come in as poll closures and virus restrictions complicate in-person voting and counties work to process a huge increase in ballots received by mail. “I always vote in primaries, but the political times that we’re having right now, or the moment that we’re having, is scary,” Layla Cantlebary, 39, said as she waited to vote in Roswell, Georgia, outside Atlanta. “With all the civil unrest, it just underscores the importance of coming out and voting for somebody who you feel is going to lead the country to a better place than we are in currently.” The long lines were evident shortly after voting began at multiple polling places, including the elementary school where Cantlebary and about 60 people waited. Cantlebary said she arrived about 15 minutes before her polling place opened at 7 a.m. and waited more than an hour. The self-described liberal said she had planned to vote by mail but her absentee ballot never arrived. In Atlanta, a line of voters wrapped around the block. Several sat on the sidewalk as they waited. Most wore masks. State Rep. William Boddie said he visited two polling locations that had long lines in his district. He said lawmakers from other parts of Georgia told him of similar problems. Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms said voters in line at one of Atlanta’s largest precincts reported all the machines were down. She encouraged voters to stay in line and said poll workers should offer voters a provisional ballot if machines are not working. People wait in line to vote in Georgia’s primary election outside Park Tavern, June 9, 2020, in Atlanta.”If you are in line, PLEASE do not allow your vote to be suppressed,” the mayor said on Twitter. Among the key races Tuesday was a contested Democratic primary for the nomination to challenge Republican U.S. Sen. David Perdue. Democrats included former congressional candidate Jon Ossoff, former Columbus Mayor Teresa Tomlinson and former lieutenant governor candidate Sarah Riggs Amico. Perdue, a close Trump ally, is seeking a second term in November as Republicans look to hold the White House and a Senate majority. He drew no GOP primary opposition. The race has proved to be anything but predictable, with the candidates forced to do most campaigning online because of the coronavirus. In recent days, the contest was shaped by widespread protests and civil unrest following the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis. Criticism of the Trump administration’s response on both fronts has added fuel to Democrats’ ambitions of winning in Georgia, where Republicans dominate statewide elections but Democrats are making gains. If no candidate receives more than 50% of votes, the top two finishers will advance to an August 11 runoff. Other Democrats in the race include former ACLU of Georgia head Maya Dillard Smith, Air Force veteran James Knox and Marckeith DeJesus. Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger on Monday predicted long lines. He also said his office won’t begin to release results until the last precinct has closed. He predicted the winners may not be known for days. “To get a good concept of where we are with the election — who won, who lost, or who’s in the runoff, things like that — I would think that could take upward of a couple days in some of these really tightly contested elections,” Raffensperger said. Voters will also select party nominees for U.S. House races and for state House and Senate. Other state and local races are on the ballot as well. More than 1.2 million Georgians have already voted early, Raffensperger said Monday. A majority of those ballots were cast absentee by mail after the Republican elections chief sent absentee ballot applications to 6.9 million active registered voters, hoping to ease pressure on in-person poll operations. Georgia postponed the primary twice because of the pandemic. The state’s March 24 presidential primary was first moved to May 19, when voters were set to choose party nominees for other 2020 races. As coronavirus infections and deaths mounted, election day was pushed back again to Tuesday.
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By Polityk | 06/10/2020 | Повідомлення, Політика
Five US States Holding Political Party Primaries on Tuesday
Voters in five U.S. states went to the polls Tuesday for political party primary elections, but the balloting in the southern state of Georgia was slow, with voters reporting long lines and officials saying there were problems with voting machines not working.In the state’s largest city, Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms urged voters to be patient, saying the long lines and voting machine issues were widespread.”This seems to be happening throughout Atlanta and perhaps throughout the county,” Lance Bottoms wrote on Twitter. “If you are in line, PLEASE do not allow your vote to be suppressed. PLEASE stay in line.”A person stretches as voters wait in a line in Georgia’s primary election at Park Tavern in Atlanta, June 9, 2020.Georgia’s secretary of state, Brad Raffensperger, had warned ahead of the election of the possibility of long lines because of the continuing recommendations in many parts of the U.S. that people in public places maintain a two-meter distance from each other to curb the spread of the coronavirus.Jon Ossoff, a 33-year-old chief executive of an investigative TV production company, leads a large field of Georgia Democrats seeking the party’s nomination to oppose incumbent Republican Senator David Perdue, a close ally of President Donald Trump, in the November election.Ossoff faces six other Democrats in the party primary but needs 50% of the vote to avoid an Aug. 11 runoff election. Perdue has no Republican challengers in his bid for a second six-year term in the Senate.Elections also are being held in Nevada, South Carolina, North Dakota and West Virginia.The spread of the coronavirus pandemic in the U.S. has pushed state election officials to institute new measures to allow absentee voting by mail, even as Trump has contended, without evidence, that mail-in voting will lead to widespread voting fraud.On Tuesday, Nevada is staging an all-mail election, while North Dakota, Georgia and West Virginia sent applications for absentee ballots to voters to allow them to vote by mail if they desire.
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By Polityk | 06/10/2020 | Повідомлення, Політика
Georgia Democrats Face Off in Senate Primary After Delay
The Democratic candidates vying to take on Republican Sen. David Perdue of Georgia in November face off in a primary election Tuesday after weeks of delay caused by the coronavirus pandemic. But the state’s chief election officer has warned that voters could face long lines and results may be slow to be reported, as poll closures and virus restrictions complicate in-person voting and counties work to process a huge increase in paper ballots received by mail. Top Democrats in the Senate primary include former congressional candidate Jon Ossoff, former Columbus Mayor Teresa Tomlinson and former candidate for lieutenant governor Sarah Riggs Amico. Perdue, a close ally of President Donald Trump, is seeking a second term in November as Republicans look to hold the White House and Senate majority. He drew no GOP primary opposition. The race has proven to be anything but predictable, with election day postponed and campaigns forced almost entirely online because of the coronavirus and the final days seeing widespread protests and civil unrest following the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis. Criticism of the Trump administration’s response on both fronts has added fuel to Democrats’ ambitions of winning in Georgia, where Republicans still dominate statewide elections, but Democrats are increasingly making gains. If no candidate receives more than 50% of votes, the top two finishers will advance to an Aug. 11 primary runoff. Other Democrats in the race include former ACLU of Georgia head Maya Dillard Smith, Air Force veteran James Knox and another hopeful, Marckeith DeJesus.Courtney Parker votes on a new voting machine, Tuesday, Nov. 5, 2019, in Dallas, Ga.Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger said Monday that voters should expect to face longer lines. He also said his office won’t begin to release partial results until “the last precinct has closed” and predicted that the winners may not be known for days thereafter. “To get a good concept of where we are with the election — who won, who lost, or who’s in the runoff, things like that — I would think that could take upward of a couple days in some of these really tightly contested elections,” Raffensperger said. Voters will also select party nominees for U.S. House races and for state House and Senate. Other state and local races are on the ballot as well. Ossoff entered the Senate race in September with the endorsement of civil rights icon Rep. John Lewis, as well as some built-in name recognition from his highly publicized 2017 special election loss to Republican Karen Handel for an Atlanta-area U.S. House seat. The young media executive has led in fundraising and has made fighting inequality and corruption a core part of his message. Tomlinson, who was the first woman elected mayor of Columbus in 2010, has racked up a slate of endorsements of her own, including civil rights leader and former Atlanta Mayor Andrew Young. She touts her experience in office, saying she’s “the only one in this race who has ever won an election and governed,” and says that experience can help her cut through dysfunction in Washington. Amico previously served as an executive in her family’s car-hauling company. Best known for her 2018 run for lieutenant governor, which she lost to Republican Geoff Duncan, she often discusses the experience of helping to steer the company through bankruptcy, noting that executives fought to preserve jobs. Amico’s campaign has locked down the endorsement of several labor unions with a strongly pro-union pitch. More than 1.2 million Georgians have already voted early, Raffensperger said Monday. A majority of those ballots were cast absentee by mail after the Republican elections chief sent absentee ballot applications to 6.9 million active registered voters, hoping to ease pressure on in-person poll operations. Georgia postponed primary elections twice because of the pandemic. The state’s March 24 presidential primaries were first moved to May 19, when voters were set to choose party nominees for other 2020 races. As coronavirus infections and deaths mounted, election day was pushed back again to Tuesday.
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By Polityk | 06/09/2020 | Повідомлення, Політика
Trump Slumping in Approval Polls and Against Biden
U.S. political polls are increasingly showing that Americans disapprove of President Donald Trump’s performance in office, and that he is trailing in his bid for another four-year term in the White House against former Vice President Joe Biden. In the latest poll Monday, CNN said voters it surveyed last week disapproved of Trump’s handling of the presidency by a 57%-38% margin, and losing to Biden by a 55%-41% edge five months ahead of Election Day on Nov. 3. Trump derided the CNN poll in a tweet, contending the poll was “as fake as their reporting.” Trump said he had the “same numbers, and worse, against Crooked Hillary,” his derisive moniker for Hillary Clinton, the former U.S. secretary of state he defeated for the presidency in 2016. CNN Polls are as Fake as their Reporting. Same numbers, and worse, against Crooked Hillary. The Dems would destroy America!— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 8, 2020Trump often touts his high standing among Republican voters, but Democrats are equally opposed to his presidency, polling shows. Meanwhile, the CNN poll showed 52% of independent voters say they favor Biden for the presidency versus 41% for Trump. Trump’s low approval rating comes as voters assess his handling of the coronavirus pandemic over the past three months and more immediately, the nationwide protests in the past two weeks against the death of a black man, George Floyd, held in police custody in Minneapolis, Minnesota. CNN said Trump’s approval rating had fallen seven points in the past month and was now the worst he had recorded since January 2019. The news network said Trump’s 38% approval rating was similar to two former U.S. presidents — Jimmy Carter in 1980 and George H.W. Bush in 1992 — when they both lost bids for second terms. The CNN poll said the effect of the protests against Floyd’s death on the American electorate is significant, with voters saying race relations in the U.S. are now as important a campaign issue as the economy and health care. Those polled said they think Biden would handle race relations in the U.S. better than Trump by a 63%-31% margin. Black voters favored Biden’s handling of race relations by an overwhelming 91%-4% edge. Biden also outdistanced Trump in handling the coronavirus pandemic, 55% to 41%, while voters favored Trump in overseeing the economy by 51% to 46%. National polls in the U.S. have consistently shown Biden ahead of Trump, all 40 of them in May and another nine so far in June. The Real Clear Politics website aggregation of polls has Biden ahead 49.9% to 42.1%. Its collection of recent polls shows voters disapproving of Trump’s presidency 54.2% to 42.8%.
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By Polityk | 06/09/2020 | Повідомлення, Політика
Biden Says He Favors Police Reforms, Not Defunding
Former U.S. Vice President Joe Biden supports the “urgent need for reform” of police agencies in the country, but not their defunding, Biden’s campaign said Monday. Biden, running in the November national election against President Donald Trump, “does not believe that police should be defunded,” campaign spokesman Andrew Bates said in a statement. Rather, he said, Biden “hears and shares the deep grief and frustration of those calling out for change.” Trump, a Republican, claimed Sunday on Twitter that his Democratic challenger and “Radical Left Democrats want to ‘DEFUND THE POLICE’” while he wants “great and well paid LAW ENFORCEMENT. I want LAW & ORDER!” Sleepy Joe Biden and the Radical Left Democrats want to “DEFUND THE POLICE”. I want great and well paid LAW ENFORCEMENT. I want LAW & ORDER!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 7, 2020Some civil rights activists are advocating the defunding of police agencies in the aftermath of the death two weeks ago of a black man, George Floyd, while in police custody in Minneapolis, Minnesota. The Minneapolis City Council has voted to defund the police department there, while the mayors of the country’s two biggest cities, New York and Los Angeles, say they plan to divert millions of dollars in funding from their police departments to community programs to improve the lives of impoverished people. The campaign spokesman said Biden believes funding is necessary to improve policing, including “community policing programs that improve relationships between officers and residents. “This funding would also go towards diversifying police departments so that they resemble the communities in which they serve,” Bates said. “We also need additional funding for body-worn cameras.” The Biden campaign last year released a criminal justice plan calling for a $300 million investment in what it called a COPS program (Community Oriented Policing Services). Biden has also called for Congress to ban police from using chokeholds to restrain criminal suspects, one provision of an overhaul of policing practices proposed Monday by congressional Democrats. Trump’s reelection campaign held a conference call with reporters Monday in which it contended that Biden, by not speaking out on defunding police agencies, implicitly endorsed the policy. “Where has Joe Biden been?” Trump campaign communications director Tim Murtaugh said shortly before the Biden campaign released its statement. “By his silence, he is endorsing chaos and anarchy and lawlessness.”
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By Polityk | 06/08/2020 | Повідомлення, Політика
Democrats Look to Counter GOP Vote-By-Mail Fraud Claims
Democrats are mounting a new effort to push back against a well-funded Republican campaign that seeks to undermine public confidence in mail-in-voting, which President Donald Trump has said, without offering proof, will lead to election fraud.
Fair Fight, an organization led by former Georgia gubernatorial candidate Stacey Abrams, has joined forces with Priorities USA, the largest Democratic outside group, and American Bridge, the party’s opposition research clearinghouse, to form a new effort called Voter Suppression Watch.
The aim is to not only counter Republicans in the courts but in public relations, too, while playing offense by providing opposition research that often forms the grist of critical news stories.
“The 2020 election is the most pivotal election that I can think of, and we have known for a while that there would be efforts made to suppress the vote,” Abrams said Sunday in an interview with The Associated Press. “We need to not only have a concerted effort to push back, but we need to raise awareness, too.”
Even before the coronavirus pandemic, a partisan fight over ballot access was playing out in a handful of state courts. But now that the virus has raised fears that in-person voting could be a threat to the elderly, those in poor health and people of color, whom statistics show have disproportionately borne the brunt of its effects, efforts to expand voting by mail have faced stiff opposition from Trump and his allies.
They argue, without offering evidence, that it will lead to increased voter fraud, even as they have encouraged Republicans to cast ballots by mail in a number of recent elections. Trump casts his own ballots by mail.
Democrats say the Republican opposition to mail voting is also a smokescreen being used to push for broader voting limitations.
“While everyone is focusing on the vote-by-mail argument, the architecture of their work is incredibly broad,” Abrams said. “One of our missions will be to raise the resources necessary to push back against their efforts across the country.”
Over more than a decade, Republicans have enacted laws at the state level that Democrats argue makes it harder for members of their base to vote. These include voter ID laws, efforts to limit polling locations in urban areas and rules that limit early voting. Republicans have argued that their efforts are aimed at limiting widespread voter fraud, though there’s little evidence to back those claims up.
Bolstered by a federal court ruling, for the first time in decades, the GOP will also be allowed to conduct poll monitoring on election day in November.
Historically, there is no evidence of widespread voter fraud through mail-in voting. But some social media users have pushed grandiose theories casting doubt on the method. Trump has encouraged the skepticism, saying during a televised briefing that “a lot of people cheat with mail-in voting.” Last month, he tweeted: “Don’t allow RIGGED ELECTIONS!”
Democrats and voting rights groups contend they simply want to protect the voting rights of all citizens, and they note that repeated studies have found no widespread fraud and no partisan benefit to expanded voting.
“We want to build a strong coalition to make sure that what’s happening on the Republican side doesn’t go unanswered,” said Aneesa McMillan, the director of strategic communications and voting rights at Priorities USA.
Thus far, the new Democratic coalition has not raised additional funds for the effort, though that could change. Abrams, who is among those being considered for Joe Biden’s running mate, said she aims to raise millions for the cause.
“I don’t think there’s a path for Trump getting reelected without voter suppression tactics,” said David Brock, a prolific fundraiser who is one of the founders of American Bridge. “While there’s an improbable path for Trump to get an Electoral College victory, donors should be paying attention and giving to the overall effort.”
His group has already unearthed evidence that Trump and his allies aim to limit ballot access.
A recording the group provided to the AP in December revealed a Trump adviser told Republicans in Wisconsin, a crucial battleground state, that the GOP was counting on voter suppression tactics to provide an edge on Election Day.
“Traditionally it’s always been Republicans suppressing votes in places,” Justin Clark, a senior political adviser and senior counsel to Trump’s reelection campaign, told Wisconsin Republicans at a November 2019 event. “Let’s start playing offense a little bit. That’s what you’re going to see in 2020. It’s going to be a much bigger program, a much more aggressive program, a much better-funded program.”
Democrats say Trump’s claims of voter fraud have morphed what was once a quiet focus of the party into a broader culture war issue.
“You can immediately see it is political,” said McMillan. “The bad thing about Donald Trump is that he says the first thing that comes to his mind; the good thing about Donald Trump is that he says the first thing that comes to mind.”
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By Polityk | 06/08/2020 | Повідомлення, Політика
Democratic Party Lawmakers Push for Major US Police Reforms
Congressional Democrats called for the biggest overhaul of the country’s policing laws in decades Monday, setting up a new clash with President Donald Trump, who is demanding tough law enforcement. “The world is witnessing the birth of a new movement in our country,” Rep. Karen Bass, one of the co-sponsors of the legislation, told reporters, “People marching to demand not just change but transformative change that ends police brutality, that ends racial profiling and ends the process of denying Americans the right to have the ability to sue when they have been injured by an officer.” In the wake of the death two weeks ago of George Floyd, a 46-year-old black man held in police custody in Minneapolis, Minnesota, Democrats in both the House and Senate are aiming to broaden police accountability, track “problematic” officers through a “national police misconduct registry” and end the practice of transferring military equipment to police departments across the nation. Democrats have scheduled hearings beginning Wednesday in the House of Representatives and hope to pass what they are calling the “Justice in Policing Act of 2020” by the end of this month. To become law, the bill would also have to be passed in the Republican-controlled Senate, where a hearing on policing is scheduled for next week. Past congressional attempts at police reform and gun control legislation have failed, however, and the extent to which Republicans might join in the effort to approve policing reforms is unclear. Congressman Kevin McCarthy, leader of the minority House Republicans, says he believes the two parties “can find common ground.” But Republicans often take their cue on legislation from Trump, who said on Twitter Sunday, “I want great and well paid LAW ENFORCEMENT. I want LAW & ORDER!” Sleepy Joe Biden and the Radical Left Democrats want to “DEFUND THE POLICE”. I want great and well paid LAW ENFORCEMENT. I want LAW & ORDER!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) Items left by protesters to memorialize George Floyd, who died in Minneapolis police custody, are seen at the scene of his arrest in Minneapolis, Minnesota, June 4, 2020.Already, some local governments have banned police from using the type of restraint tactic that led to Floyd’s death. He was held down while handcuffed on a Minneapolis city street by a white police officer, Derek Chauvin, who pressed his knee on Floyd’s neck for nearly nine minutes even as Floyd repeatedly said he could not breathe. Chauvin has been charged with second-degree murder in the case, while three police colleagues who did not intervene to assist Floyd have been charged with aiding and abetting the killing.Demonstrators lie on the pavement facing the White House during a rally north of Lafayette Square to protest police brutality and racism, in Washington, June 7, 2020.Anger over Floyd’s death and police brutality against minorities have led to two weeks of demonstrations in the U.S. and around the world, some of them erupting into violent clashes between protesters and police. In in recent days, the protests have mostly been peaceful. The coast-to-coast protests have been some of the most widespread in the United States since the extended demonstrations against American involvement in the Vietnam War in the 1960s. “When the people are marching in the streets it’s because they’re fully aware of the history of this issue in America and they have had enough,” Senator Kamala Harris, a leading contender to be presumptive Democratic nominee Joe Biden’s pick to be vice president, said Thursday. Democratic leaders called on Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell to bring the legislation up for a vote on the Senate floor by the end of July. But Harris noted a measure making lynching a Federal crime failed in that chamber just last week. The Democrats’ legislative proposal seeks to make it easier to hold police officers accountable for their actions. It would change the legal doctrine of “qualified immunity,” which often shields officers from civil lawsuits brought by people who believe they have been wronged by police actions. In another provision, victims would need only to show that police “recklessly” deprived them of their civil rights, easing the current statute requiring them to prove that police action was “willful.” In the aftermath of Floyd’s death, some activists have gone substantially further than the proposed legislation, with calls to “defund the police.” Some activists say the goal is not to dismantle police forces entirely, but to redirect some funding from police departments to other providers of social, educational, housing and community services. FILE – Minneapolis police officers stand in a line facing protesters demonstrating against the death of George Floyd, outside the 3rd Police Precinct in Minneapolis, Minnesota, May 27, 2020.House Speaker Nancy Pelosi once again declined to directly answer if she supported defunding the police. Instead, Pelosi said House Democrats had several proposals in the works that would address some of the social issues protesters say should be funded instead of the money that now goes to local police departments. The Minneapolis city council says it is planning to eliminate its municipal police force, while the mayors in the two biggest U.S. cities — New York and Los Angeles — say they will cut police funding in favor of more community programs in impoverished neighborhoods. Trump disparaged the idea in a tweet Monday, saying, “LAW & ORDER, NOT DEFUND AND ABOLISH THE POLICE. The Radical Left Democrats have gone Crazy!”LAW & ORDER, NOT DEFUND AND ABOLISH THE POLICE. The Radical Left Democrats have gone Crazy!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 8, 2020Acting Homeland Security chief Chad Wolf, on the “Fox News Sunday” show, called the defunding idea “absurd.” “It makes no sense to me,” Wolf said. “It’s a political statement.”
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By Polityk | 06/08/2020 | Повідомлення, Політика
Mail Ballots From Tuesday’s Elections Push Biden Over the Top
After primaries and caucuses in 42 states and the District of Columbia, Joe Biden has won the last few delegates needed to clinch the Democratic nomination for president as states worked to tally a surge of mail ballots.Indiana, Pennsylvania and Rhode Island were among the seven states, plus the district, holding elections Tuesday. But a huge increase in vote-by-mail ballots, driven in large part by the coronavirus pandemic, meant election officials were still counting ballots late in the week.Democrats don’t hold winner-take-all contests in which the top vote-getter wins all the delegates. Instead, the delegates are split proportionally among the candidates based on their share of the vote — both statewide and in individual congressional districts.As the states that voted Tuesday updated their results, a team of analysts at The Associated Press parsed the votes into the correct congressional districts so the delegates could be allocated between Biden and Bernie Sanders.The process led the AP to allocate 21 delegates to Biden late Friday, after it completed an analysis of votes released by election officials in the three states earlier in the evening. The AP later added seven more to Biden’s total, after the release of additional results in New Mexico and the completion of Guam’s Democratic caucuses on Saturday.The former vice president now has 2,000 delegates. It takes 1,991 delegates to win the nomination on the first ballot at the Democratic National Convention. FILE – Former Vice President Joe Biden, left, and Senator Bernie Sanders greet each other with a safe elbow bump before the start of the 11th Democratic Party 2020 presidential debate in a CNN Washington Bureau studio, March 15, 2020.Biden became the party’s presumptive nominee two months ago, following decisive wins over Sanders in several March primaries and in Wisconsin on April 7. The Vermont senator, the final major challenger in the race, dropped out the next day.Biden would have wrapped up the Democratic nomination much earlier, if not for the coronavirus pandemic — 15 states, along with Guam and Puerto Rico, postponed their nominating contests because of the outbreak. The formality of reaching 1,991 was also delayed by a deal Biden’s campaign cut with Sanders in an effort to build Democratic Party unity and avoid the bitter feelings that marred the party’s 2016 convention and helped lead to Hillary Clinton’s defeat. The agreement allowed Sanders to keep about 300 delegates he would have otherwise forfeited under party rules after suspending his campaign.It’s not unusual for a Democratic nominee to clinch the party’s nomination in early June. That’s when Barack Obama in 2008 and Bill Clinton in 2016 reached the milestone. Both Obama and Clinton still had active opponents when they did so, although they were helped by superdelegates. Those are the Democratic Party leaders and elected officials who can vote for any candidate, regardless of the outcome of the primaries.While superdelegates have never overturned the will of primary voters, their power was greatly reduced ahead of the 2020 election in a concession to Sanders supporters who saw them as undemocratic.About 800 superdelegates can still participate in this summer’s convention, but they won’t be able to vote on the first ballot unless their votes would have no effect on the outcome.
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By Polityk | 06/07/2020 | Повідомлення, Політика
Native Americans Want to be Included in Race Talks
As protesters demand justice for George Floyd, a black man who died in police custody in Minneapolis, many Native Americans in Montana are showing solidarity for black Americans.Floyd, 46, died after pleading for his life as a white police officer pressed his knee into his neck. The incident sparked outrage, and protesters flooded cities worldwide, including Great Falls, Helena, Bozeman, Missoula and Billings, calling for justice and an end to systemic racism.Resulting anger and frustration are compounded by the coronavirus pandemic, which illuminates inequity, as it disproportionately ravages minority communities. Demonstrations for Racial Justice and Police Reform Resume Across AmericaNearly two weeks of demonstrations sparked by the death of an African American man who was restrained by white policemanA May report from the APM Research Lab found that the COVID-19 mortality rate for black Americans is 2.4 times higher than for white Americans. While the report acknowledged “limited and uneven data” regarding Indigenous populations, it stated that in New Mexico, which contains portions of the Navajo Nation, the Indigenous mortality rate is eight times as high as the white mortality rate.Rep. Barbara Bessette (D-Great Falls), a Chippewa Cree tribal member, said, like coronavirus, she views systemic racism as a public health crisis.”Minority communities have high health disparities, economic injustice and inadequate housing. This isn’t about just one incident but a myriad of things. What’s happening now is symptomatic of a much deeper ‘disease,'” she told the Great Falls Tribune.As Floyd’s death sparks an anti-racism movement, some Native Americans wonder if they will be included in conversations of injustice and change.Indian Education for All Instructional Coach Jordann Lankford said that while the growing movement provides an opportunity to discuss inequity, she is disappointed that other minorities have been excluded from the dialogue.”I fear people in Montana will see these things and see the riots and think, ‘Well, that really doesn’t affect Montana because we don’t have a big black population here.’ But it’s not just a black and white issue — racial inequity affects all minority groups, and it needs to be an open dialogue, including everyone,” she said.Craig Falcon, a Blackfeet tribal member who is running for council in Seville District No. 7, said that when it comes to conversations about racism, American Indians are often treated “like the forgotten stepchild of the family that no one likes.” “The African American population often gets the spotlight on racism, but our struggle is very similar,” Falcon said. “We also deal with racism on a daily basis, so this touches home for us, too. Native Americans are often dehumanized and portrayed as savages. It seems like we get forgotten because America is ashamed, or embarrassed about its treatment of us.”But, Ben Pease, an artist who, through his work, challenges cultural appropriation and confronts Indigenous stereotypes, said including Native voices in anti-racist movements “happens at a different trajectory and velocity.””This country is quite literally founded on stolen lands and the conquering of many peoples, thousands of tribes. But we have a small population; we don’t have a large representation in media. As individuals and culturally, we are not as vocal. We haven’t had a Dr. (Martin Luther) King or a Dr. Cornel West. We’ve had other scholars, activists and educators, but our voice is much smaller,” he said. Lance Morris, 62, a member of the Assiniboine and Sioux tribes and local activist, said unrest is a familiar story in America.He remembers the ransacking of the Bureau of Indian Affairs building, the burning of a courthouse in South Dakota and protests at Wounded Knee in the 1970s. He also attended Stewart Indian School, which, along with other boarding schools in the country, punished students for embracing their cultural identity. It’s hard for Morris to reconcile new anti-racist movements with past injustices. He often wonders where the protesters were when he was fighting for equality. “We’ve had the Indian Removal Act, Trail of Tears, ethnic cleansing and genocide. This man didn’t deserve to die, and it’s very tragic, but where were these people when we needed them to stand?” he said. “Indigenous women, men and children go missing and are murdered every day … where’s the outrage for them? Where’s the outrage for the generational trauma that people are still dealing with on reservations? We’re still being forgotten.”Lankford works with Indigenous youth and often talks with them about how to effectively incite change.She said she encourages students to confront, rather than confirm, stereotypes and worries that when people see riots and the destruction of property, it will be harder to have conversations about race. “Absolutely, people should stand for what they believe in. We have the right to protest, but we have a moral responsibility to uphold, and there’s a line between protesting and anarchy,” she said. “I don’t want to teach children that this is how you get your way. I’m trying to teach kids how to rationally look at situations and make room for dialogue. Reacting violently is not going to allow people to listen to you.”Artist Ben Pease disagrees. “Personally, I think, how loud do you have to be to be heard? How many times do you have to die? How many African Americans have to die at the hands of the police for there to be systemic change? Rioting does work. Looting does work. Protesting does work,” he said. “People are speaking up, and if no one is listening, it takes yelling.”While feelings of anger, frustration and exhaustion reverberate nationwide, many see the growing movement as a sign of hope. Lankford likened the new movement to the #MeToo movement, which supports survivors of sexual violence. “With the #MeToo movement, we saw a trickle-down effect that made a lot of room for conversation about missing and murdered Indigenous women. Even though the issue has been around for more than 500 years, that movement allowed Indigenous voices to be heard. It’s unfortunate that it takes a catastrophe for us to have an opening to talk about these things, but I hope the dialogue will stay open,” she said. Falcon said he is proud of Montanans for speaking up.”We don’t want these atrocities to happen to any person of any color, and it seems that people are finally fed up with racism,” he said. Pease wrestles with his emotions on the topic but ultimately takes solace in local activism. “This country was built to say that yes, white people are more valuable,” he said. “So, how am I supposed to feel? I’m angry, disappointed, scared and unsure of the future for myself, my children and their children. But there is hope. I am seeing a lot of beautiful things in our state of Montana, and I’m seeing people protest peacefully and race boundaries begin to dissolve.” Rep. Bessette offered advice for Montanans who want to support the movement:”Speak up if you see injustices, be a known ally for those who are disproportionately represented in these situations and, no matter what, vote.”
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By Polityk | 06/06/2020 | Повідомлення, Політика
Amid Protests and Pandemic, Evangelical Support Slipping for Trump
While liberal Christians were outraged by the photographing of President Donald Trump with a Bible in front of a church near the White House following his fiery Rose Garden law-and-order speech, many conservative evangelical Christians — Trump’s core religious constituency — hailed it as a victory against lawlessness. White House Correspondent Patsy Widakuswara looks at whether the president can still depend on their votes in November.
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By Polityk | 06/06/2020 | Повідомлення, Політика
Lauding ‘Force’ Against Protests, Sen. Cotton Raises Profile
Freshman Sen. Tom Cotton has risen to the ranks of potential 2024 Republican presidential contenders by making all the right enemies. By lining up behind President Donald Trump’s law-and-order recipe for controlling civic unrest, he’s making even more.”One thing above all else will restore order to our streets: an overwhelming show of force to disperse, detain and ultimately deter lawbreakers,” the 43-year-old Arkansan wrote this week in a New York Times opinion column.That infuriated Democrats and liberals, whom his column thumped by calling protests rocking cities “carnivals for the thrill-seeking rich as well as other criminal elements.” For good measure, Cotton lambasted the Times — a favorite conservative target — after it released a subsequent statement saying Cotton’s essay did not meet its standards. Times employees had rebelled, expressing shame and anger about the piece. Protestors march Thursday, June 4, 2020, in San Diego. Protests continue to be held in U.S. cities, sparked by the death of George Floyd, a black man who died after being restrained by Minneapolis police officers on May 25.With some protests over police killings of black men veering into violence in New York and elsewhere, Cotton took to Fox on Thursday to reprise his frequent role as one of Trump’s chief defenders.He disputed Defense Secretary Mark Esper’s comment that this week’s urban turbulence didn’t justify deploying troops in cities, saying that was Trump’s call. And to former Defense Secretary Jim Mattis’ stunning assertion that Trump was dividing the country and violating the Constitution, Cotton said, “He’s wrong on this one.”None of that went over well with Democrats.”I’m appalled that anyone, let alone a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, would advocate for the use of military force to silence dissent,” said Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., a fellow member of that panel.Representing a state that has turned increasingly Republican, Cotton faces reelection in November with no Democratic opponent. He plans to use some time helping GOP Senate candidates including Bill Haggerty in Tennessee and Joni Ernst in Iowa, which holds each presidential cycle’s first caucuses.In an ad that aired earlier this year in Ohio — a swing state in presidential contests — Cotton tied together two foes: China and Trump’s all-but-certain Democratic presidential opponent, former Vice President Joe Biden.”China is the greatest threat to America’s security and our values,” the announcer says, accusing China of running concentration camps and stealing millions of American jobs. “Career politician Joe Biden is weak on China.”As the spot ends, it shows a split screen of Cotton wearing his combat fatigues and Trump in a Make America Great Again hat. “Senator Cotton is standing with President Trump to take on China and keep America great,” the announcer says.”Sen. Cotton has taken the Trump approach of playing to the fears and darkest, most negative things that appeal to Trump supporters,” said Michael John Gray, chairman of the Arkansas Democratic Party. “His ambition’s been bigger than Arkansas from the moment he sought a seat in the House.”Cotton served six years in the Army in the early 2000s, leading a combat platoon in Iraq and being deployed to Afghanistan. He also spent time in the Old Guard, whose ramrod-straight members keep ceremonial watch over the Tomb of Unknown Soldier at Arlington National Cemetery just outside Washington.Cotton grew up on his family’s Arkansas farm and attended Harvard University and its law school.As a student in 1996, he wrote an article in the school’s paper, The Harvard Crimson, lauding the political skills of a fellow Arkansan: then-President Bill Clinton, whom he called “the most sincere campaigner of our time.” He also praised the intelligence of Hillary Clinton, later to become Trump’s vanquished Democratic presidential rival, saying Bill Clinton “would have never made it past county commissioner” without her.But what Cotton hailed as Bill Clinton’s “easy-going, affable” style has not seemed to rub off on Cotton’s manner in Washington.”He’s definitely accumulated the right national security and foreign policy experience to put him on track to run in 2024,” said Ron Bonjean, a GOP political consultant and former top congressional aide. He added: “He’s not a backslapper. He’s a really serious guy.”Cotton served one House term before being elected to the Senate in 2014. Within weeks of taking office, he incensed Democrats.He drafted an open letter to Iranian leaders, signed by 46 GOP colleagues, warning that a nuclear deal that President Barack Obama was seeking would not be binding and could be dismantled by the next president.Trump pulled the U.S. out of that agreement in 2018.
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By Polityk | 06/06/2020 | Повідомлення, Політика
New Mexico Governor to Appoint Racial Justice Czar
Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham is looking for policy fixes to prevent police violence in the wake of anti-racism and police reform protests that have swept across the nation and dotted her state.In a conversation with members of a yet-to-be-finalized council on racial justice, Lujan Grisham suggested deescalation training for state police. She also heard a proposal to bar officers from shooting at moving vehicles or choking citizens in their custody.As the leader of a multicultural state — New Mexico is half Hispanic and has a significant Native American population — she said it is difficult but essential to acknowledge structural racism.”We have a tendency to wrap ourselves in that particular cloak and pretend sometimes that we don’t have the kind of inequalities in institutional racism and hatred that in fact exists, and it is in the very fabric of our lives,” Lujan Grisham said.The governor pledged to name a racial justice czar and to let the council set an agenda for legislative reform in the 2021 legislative session. An emergency session starting in mid-June will focus squarely on the state’s budget fallout from the COVID-19 crisis.The New Mexico governor’s live video conference took place a few hours after a funeral service for George Floyd, the Minneapolis man whose death in police custody sparked the latest protests over longstanding grievances with police accountability.”There is another health crisis which has existed for far too long, which is the racism in our society,” said Alexandria Taylor, of the New Mexico Coalition of Sexual Assault Programs.Some of the answers, Taylor said, are already clear.”What has happened in the last six years since the Ferguson uprising, is we have a significant body of research that supports those policy changes,” Taylor told Lujan Grisham, referring to protest following the fatal shooting of Michael Brown by white police officers.As in hundreds of other cities in the country, unrest in that St. Louis suburb broke out again this this week. Nationwide, 10,000 demonstrators have been arrested and dozens of deaths have been reported.
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By Polityk | 06/06/2020 | Повідомлення, Політика
Republican Murkowski Says She’s Struggling With Supporting Trump
Alaska Republican Sen. Lisa Murkowski says she’s “struggling” over whether she can support President Donald Trump given his handling of the virus and race crises roiling the U.S.Murkowski said Thursday that she was “thankful” for retired Gen. James Mattis’ extraordinary rebuke of Trump for politicizing the military. Asked about her support of president, Murkowski replied, “I have struggled with it for a long time.” Murkowski retracted her endorsement of Trump in 2016 after the “Access Hollywood” tape revealed he had bragged about sexually assaulting women. She voted to acquit Trump of House impeachment charges earlier this year. She spoke Thursday to reporters at the Capitol.
“Perhaps we’re getting to the point where we can be more honest with the concerns that we might hold internally, and have the courage of our own convictions to speak up,” Murkowski said. Asked whether she can still support Trump, she replied, “I am struggling with it. I have struggled with it for a long time.” But she said she’d continue to try to work with his administration.
Murkowski’s remarks were an acknowledgment of the ongoing choice Republicans are forced to make about whether, and for how long, to support Trump when his words and actions so often conflict with their values and goals. Trump has responded to the police killing of George Floyd by calling for more “law and order,” rather than addressing at any length the racial injustice that lies at the heart of the unrest.
The nation is on edge, and Election Day looms, with the presidency and control of the House and Senate at stake. Trump has made clear that consequences for what he considers disloyalty can be steep. President Donald Trump stands outside St. John’s Church, June 1, 2020, in Washington. Standing with Trump are Mark Esper, from left, William Barr, Robert O’Brien, Kayleigh McEnany and Mark Meadows.For Republicans, the challenge peaked this week when federal forces abruptly cleared peaceful protesters from Lafayette Park near the White House so that Trump could stage a photo op in front of St. John’s, the “church of presidents,” holding up a Bible.
Saying little or nothing, a phenomenon that began before Trump was president, remained a popular choice for Republican members of Congress — even when asked one after the other whether it had been right for the administration to use the military to suppress peaceful protests.
“I’m late for lunch,” Sen. Rob Portman, R-Ohio, told reporters Tuesday when asked whether Trump’s use of force against peaceful protesters was the right thing to do. “Didn’t really see it,” said staunch Trump ally Sen. Ron Johnson, R-Wis.
Sen. Pat Roberts, R-Kan., who is retiring, said, “I don’t have any comment on that.”
Even now, most Republicans aren’t breaking with Trump. Murkowski, who has her own complicated relationship with Trump, suggested that’s because those in the president’s mostly-white party are looking for the right words and tone. Statements by former President George W. Bush and now Mattis, she said, help point the way.
“I think right now … questions about who I’m going to vote for, who I’m not going to vote for, I think, are distracting to the moment,” said Murkowski, who said she’d continue to try to work with the Trump administration. “I know people might think that’s a dodge,” she added, “but I think there are important conversations that we need to have as an American people amongst ourselves about where we are right now.”
Murkowski retracted her endorsement of Trump during the 2016 election when he could be heard on the “Access Hollywood” tape bragging about assaulting women. She also voted to acquit him of House abuse and obstruction charges earlier this year after Trump’s impeachment trial.
Other Republicans this week needed no help finding the words.
“There is no right to riot, no right to destroy others’ property, and no right to throw rocks at police,” said Sen. Ben Sasse, R-Neb., a frequent Trump critic who is up for reelection. “But there is a fundamental — a constitutional — right to protest, and I’m against clearing out a peaceful protest for a photo op that treats the word of God as a political prop.”Sen. Susan Collins of Maine, one of the most vulnerable Senate Republicans seeking reelection, said it was “painful to watch peaceful protesters to be subjected to tear gas in order for the president to go across the street to a church that I believe he’s attended only once.”
“President Trump’s walk to St. John’s was confrontational, at the wrong time of day, and it distracted from his important message in the Rose Garden about our national grief, racism, peaceful protests, and lawful assembly,” added Sen. James Lankford, R-Okla., who is not on the ballot this year. “The President’s important message was drowned out by an awkward photo op.”
The president noticed, and name-checked the trio.“You got it wrong! If the protesters were so peaceful, why did they light the Church on fire the night before? People liked my walk to this historic place of worship!” he tweeted Wednesday, suggesting that “Sen. Susan Collins, Sen. James Lankford, Sen. Ben Sasse” read a specific article.
He took no such aim at Sen. Tim Scott, R-S.C., the only black Republican in the Senate.
“If your question is, should you use tear gas to clear a path so the president can go have a photo op, the answer is no,” Scott told Politico.
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By Polityk | 06/05/2020 | Повідомлення, Політика
Google: Chinese, Iranian Hackers Targeted Biden, Trump Campaigns
State-backed hackers from China have targeted staffers working on the U.S. presidential campaign of Democrat Joe Biden, a senior Google security official said Thursday. The same official said Iranian hackers had recently targeted email accounts belonging to Republican President Donald Trump’s campaign staff. The announcement, made on Twitter by the head of Google’s Threat Analysis Group, Shane Huntley, is the latest indication of the digital spying routinely aimed at top politicians. Huntley said there was “no sign of compromise” of either campaign. Iranian attempts to break into Trump campaign officials’ emails have been documented before. Last year, Microsoft Corp announced that a group often nicknamed Charming Kitten had tried to break into email accounts belonging to an unnamed U.S. presidential campaign, which sources identified as Trump’s. Earlier this year, the threat intelligence company Area 1 Security said Russian hackers had targeted companies tied to a Ukrainian gas firm where Biden’s son once served on the board. No detailsGoogle declined to offer details beyond Huntley’s tweets, but the unusually public attribution is a sign of how sensitive Americans have become to digital espionage efforts aimed at political campaigns. “We sent the targeted users our standard government-backed attack warning and we referred this information to federal law enforcement,” a Google representative said. Hacking to interfere in elections has become a concern for governments, especially since U.S intelligence agencies concluded that Russia ran a hacking and propaganda operation to disrupt the American democratic process in 2016 to help then-candidate Trump become president. Among the targets was digital infrastructure used by 2016 Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton’s campaign. Moscow has denied any meddling. Commonplace attacksAttempts by foreign adversaries to break into presidential campaigns are commonplace. “We are aware of reports from Google that a foreign actor has made unsuccessful attempts to access the personal email accounts of campaign staff,” a Biden campaign spokesman said. “We have known from the beginning of our campaign that we would be subject to such attacks and we are prepared for them.” The Trump campaign, the Chinese Embassy in Washington and the Iranian mission to the United Nations in New York did not immediately respond to requests for comment. Charming Kitten, the group identified by Google as being responsible for the targeting of the Trump campaign, has also recently been in the headlines over other exploits, including the targeting of the pharmaceutical company Gilead Sciences Inc . Earlier this year, Reuters tied the group to attempts to impersonate high-profile media figures and journalists. John Hultquist, senior director of intelligence analysis with U.S. cybersecurity firm FireEye Inc, described the two hacking groups as “espionage actors” and said they were likely attempting to collect intelligence rather than steal material to leak online. The FBI and Office of the Director of National Intelligence both declined to comment.
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By Polityk | 06/05/2020 | Повідомлення, Політика
Snapchat to Stop ‘Promoting’ Trump Amid Uproar Over Tweets
Snapchat will stop “promoting” President Donald Trump on its video messaging service, the latest example of a social media platform adjusting how it treats this U.S. president. Last week, Twitter placed fact-check warnings on two Trump tweets that called mail-in ballots “fraudulent” and predicted problems with the November elections. It demoted and placed a stronger warning on a third tweet about Minneapolis protests that read, in part, that “when the looting starts the shooting starts.”Snapchat’s action is more limited. It means only that the president’s posts will no longer show up in the app’s “Discover” section, which showcases news and posts by celebrities and public figures. Trump’s account will remain active on Snapchat and visible to anyone who searches for or follows it.Twitter Adds ‘Glorifying Violence’ Warning to Trump Tweet Trump, a prolific Twitter user, has been at war with the company since earlier this week, when it applied fact checks to two of his tweets about mail-in ballotsThe decision, which Snap — the owner of Snapchat — says was made over the weekend, puts the Santa Monica, California-based company in Twitter’s camp after that company escalated its actions against Trump. Facebook, meanwhile, has let identical posts stand, although the company and CEO Mark Zuckerberg face growing criticism over the decision. “We will not amplify voices who incite racial violence and injustice by giving them free promotion on Discover,” Snap said in a statement Wednesday. “Racial violence and injustice have no place in our society and we stand together with all who seek peace, love, equality, and justice in America.”Snapchat has 229 million daily active users. Twitter, by comparison, has 166 million. Unlike Twitter and even Facebook, Snapchat is generally used as a private communications tool, with friends sending each other short videos and images and, to a lesser extent, following celebrities and other accounts.In a tweet, Trump campaign manager Brad Parscale said Snap CEO Evan Spiegel “would rather promote extreme left riot videos & encourage users to destroy America than share positive words of unity, justice, and law & order from our President.”
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By Polityk | 06/05/2020 | Повідомлення, Політика
Ousted State Department Watchdog Confirms Investigations Into Pompeo
Ousted State Department Inspector General Steve Linick on Wednesday told members of three congressional committees that before he was abruptly fired, he was investigating Secretary of State Mike Pompeo’s use of government resources as well as the secretary’s decision to approve a multibillion-dollar arms sale to Saudi Arabia. Democrats are investigating President Donald Trump’s firing of Linick — one of several inspector generals he has recently ousted — and whether it was a retaliatory move. Pompeo has said he recommended that the inspector general be terminated, but insisted it wasn’t retribution. Linick was an Obama administration appointee whose office had been critical of what it saw as political bias in the State Department’s current management, but had also taken issue with Democratic appointees. House Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Eliot Engel, D-N.Y., House Oversight and Reform Committee Chairman Carolyn Maloney, D-N.Y., and New Jersey Sen. Bob Menendez, the top Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, said in a joint statement with other lawmakers that they still have many unanswered questions about the firing. “Mr. Linick confirmed that at the time he was removed as IG, his office was looking into two matters that directly touched on Secretary Pompeo’s conduct and that senior State Department officials were aware of his investigations,” the Democrats said. They said that Linick testified that he was “shocked” when he was fired. Their statement said Linick confirmed there was an ongoing investigation into “allegations of misuse of government resources by Secretary Pompeo and his wife.” Linick said he had informed officials close to Pompeo of the investigation, including by requesting documents from his executive secretary, the Democrats said. Pompeo, though, told reporters after Linick was fired last month that he was unaware of any investigation into allegations that he may have mistreated staffers by instructing them to run personal errands for him and his wife — such as walking his dog and picking up dry cleaning and takeout food. Thus, Pompeo said, the move could not have been retaliatory. Pompeo did acknowledge then that he was aware of the probe into his decision last year to bypass congressional objections to approve a multibillion-dollar arms sale to Saudi Arabia because he had answered written questions about it posed by Linick’s office. But he maintained he did not know the scope or scale of the investigation.Linick confirmed that probe as well, and told the investigators his office had requested an interview with Pompeo but that the secretary had refused. The Democrats said Linick testified he had been pressured by Brian Bulatao, an undersecretary of State who is an old friend of Pompeo. “Mr. Linick testified that Mr. Bulatao pressured him to act in ways that Mr. Linick felt were inappropriate — including Bulatao telling Linick that the investigation into weapons sales to Saudi Arabia was not a matter for the IG to investigate,” the committees said. Republicans questioned Linick on whether he had leaked information about sensitive investigations, which the administration has suggested played a part in his dismissal. In a letter to Engel this week, Bulato wrote that “concern over Linick had grown” concerning the handling of an investigation that was leaked in the media and later reviewed. The Democrats said Linick rejected that explanation, saying it was “either misplaced or unfounded.” In his opening statement, released before the interview and obtained by The Associated Press, Linick said he has “served without regard to politics” in his nearly three-decade career in public service and has always been committed to independent oversight.The investigation is part of a larger congressional efforts to find out more about Trump’s recent moves to sideline several independent government watchdogs. Engel and Menendez have been demanding answers and documents from the State Department on other matters for months, to little avail, and are now teaming up to try to force a complete explanation from Pompeo and the White House as to why Trump fired Linick. The committee has asked several other State Department officials to sit for interviews in the probe, including Bulatao, Assistant Secretary for Political-Military Affairs Clarke Cooper, Pompeo’s executive secretary Lisa Kenna and acting State Department legal adviser Marik String. The committees said they will release transcripts shortly after each interview.Democrats and some Republicans have pushed the administration for more answers about the inspector general firings, but the White House has provided few, simply stating the dismissals were well within Trump’s authority. Linick played a small role in Trump’s impeachment last year, an involvement that has added fuel to Democratic suspicions of retaliation. In October, Linick turned over documents to House investigators that he had received from a close Pompeo associate that contained information from debunked conspiracy theories about Ukraine’s role in the 2016 U.S. election. Democrats were probing Trump’s pressure on Ukraine to investigate his political opponents. He is the second inspector general to be fired who was involved with the impeachment process. Michael Atkinson, the former inspector general for the intelligence community, triggered the impeachment probe when he alerted Congress about a whistleblower complaint that described a call between Trump and Ukraine’s president last summer. Trump fired Atkinson in April, saying he had lost confidence in him. The president also moved to replace the chief watchdog at the Department of Health and Human Services, Christi Grimm, who testified that her office was moving ahead with new reports and audits on the department’s response to the coronavirus pandemic despite Trump’s public criticism of her.In addition, Trump demoted acting Defense Department Inspector General Glenn Fine, effectively removing him as head of a special board to oversee auditing of the coronavirus economic relief package. Fine later resigned.
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By Polityk | 06/05/2020 | Повідомлення, Політика
Former Trump Defense Secretary Mattis Accuses President of Wanting to ‘Divide’ US
Jim Mattis, Donald Trump’s former secretary of defense who had resigned to protest the withdrawal of American troops from Syria, accused the U.S. president of trying to “divide” America.”In my lifetime, Donald Trump is the first president who doesn’t try to bring the Americans together, who doesn’t even pretend to try,” he wrote in a statement posted online by The Atlantic on Wednesday.”Instead, he is trying to divide us,” said the former general of the Marines, who had so far displayed his reservations without ever commenting directly on Trump.”I observed the events of this week, angry and dismayed,” he continued.Since the May 25 death in Minneapolis of George Floyd, a black man who died in police custody, a wave of historic anger has risen in American cities, denouncing racism, police violence and social inequalities. Tens of thousands of protesters protested peacefully across the country, but looting and riots also marred the movement.Trump has used a martial tone and threatened to resort to the military to subdue the streets.”We must not be distracted by a handful of outlaws,” Mattis wrote. “The demonstrations are tens of thousands of principled people who insist that we live up to our values.””We must reject and hold accountable those in power who mock our Constitution,” he added.
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By Polityk | 06/04/2020 | Повідомлення, Політика
Obama Steps Out as Nation Confronts Confluence of Crises
Former President Barack Obama is taking on an increasingly public role as the nation confronts a confluence of historic crises that has exposed deep racial and socioeconomic inequalities in America and reshaped the November election. In doing so, Obama is signaling a willingness to sharply critique his successor, President Donald Trump, and fill what many Democrats see as a national leadership void. On Wednesday, he’ll hold a virtual town hall event with young people to discuss policing and the civil unrest that has followed the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis. Aides said Obama will call for turning the protests over Floyd’s death into policy change and will urge specific reforms to ensure safer policing and increased trust between communities and law enforcement. “We’re in a political season, but our country is also at an inflection point,” said Valerie Jarrett, a longtime friend and adviser to Obama. “President Obama is not going to shy away from that dialogue simply because he’s not in office anymore.” Obama was already beginning to emerge from political hibernation to endorse Joe Biden’s Democratic presidential bid when the coronavirus pandemic swept across the U.S., killing more than 100,000 people, and the economy began to crater. The crises scrambled the Biden campaign’s plans for how to begin deploying Obama as their chief surrogate ahead of the November election, but also gave the former president a clear opening to start publicly arguing what he has signaled to friends and associates privately for the past three years: that he does not believe Trump is up for the job. FILE – Former U.S. President Barack Obama speaks during an Obama Foundation event in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, Dec. 13, 2019.Addressing graduates of historically black colleges and universities last month, Obama said the pandemic had “fully, finally torn back the curtain on the idea that so many of the folks in charge know what they’re doing.” And in a nationally televised broadcast celebrating graduating high school seniors, Obama said many “so-called grown-ups, including some with fancy titles and important jobs,” do only what’s convenient and feels good. Floyd’s death, however, has drawn a more visceral and personal reaction from the nation’s first black president. Floyd, a black man, died after a white police officer pressed his knee into Floyd’s neck for several minutes even after he stopped moving and pleading for air. In a lengthy written statement last week, Obama said that while he understood that millions of Americans were eager to “just get back to normal” when the pandemic abates, it shouldn’t be forgotten that normal life for people of color in the U.S. involves being treated differently on account of their race. “This shouldn’t be ‘normal’ in 2020 America. It can’t be ‘normal,'” Obama wrote. Tensions across the country have escalated further in the days since the former president’s statement. His town hall on Wednesday will mark his first in-person comments since law enforcement officers aggressively cleared peaceful protesters from a park outside the White House so Trump could walk across for a photo opportunity at a nearby church. Trump has cheered harsh crackdowns on the protests, some of which have turned violent, and threatened to deploy active-duty military to the states if local officials could not get the demonstrations under control. He appeared to be backing down from that position this week, and Defense Secretary Mark Esper said Wednesday that he did not believe such action was warranted. Obama grappled with police brutality against minorities as president, including in Ferguson, Missouri, where clashes broke out after the death of Michael Brown, a black 18-year-old. After Brown’s death, Obama’s Justice Department moved to enact broad policing reforms, though most were halted under the Trump administration. Biden, who served as Obama’s vice president, called this week for restoring some of the previous administration’s actions in the wake of Floyd’s death and the killing of other black Americans. Biden also called for Congress to take immediate steps, including outlawing chokeholds.
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By Polityk | 06/04/2020 | Повідомлення, Політика
Protests Motivate US Primary Voters in Divisive Presidential Campaign
Eight U.S. states and Washington, D.C., the nation’s capital, held primary elections on Tuesday, in the midst of police brutality protests across the country and the ongoing coronavirus pandemic. The primary contests further solidified former Vice President Joe Biden’s status as the all-but-certain Democratic Party nominee for president, as protests against racism have taken center stage in an increasingly bitter and polarized race. VOA’s Brian Padden reports.Produced by: Barry Unger
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By Polityk | 06/04/2020 | Повідомлення, Політика
Veteran Republican Defeated as 8 US States Vote in Primary Elections
Amid an economic crisis brought on by a coronavirus pandemic and heated nationwide protests over the death of a black man in police custody, voters in eight states and the nation’s capital, Washington, D.C., stood in line Tuesday to cast their ballots in party nominating contests for U.S House and Senate seats Tuesday. One of the most notable races occurred in Iowa, where veteran conservative Representative Steve King was defeated in his bid for re-election by state Senator Randy Feenstra. King has gained notoriety since he was first elected to Congress in 2003 over his strident anti-abortion stance and his racist comments, especially towards undocumented immigrants. His political future was thrown into doubt after his defense of white supremacy led Republican leaders to strip him of his committee assignments in January 2019, a status which made him irrelevant. Valerie Plame
Another prominent figure who fell short was Valerie Plame, the former CIA agent whose identity was revealed by a top aide to then-Vice President Dick Cheney after her husband, Ambassador Joe Wilson, publicly raised doubts about the administration’s reasons for invading Iraq.Democratic congressional candidate Teresa Leger Fernandez flashes a thumbs-up to drivers at a polling station Tuesday, June 2, 2020, in Santa Fe, N.M. Opponents in the crowded Democratic primary included former CIA operative Valerie Plame.Plame was soundly defeated in her campaign for the Democratic nomination for a House seat in New Mexico by Teresa Leger Fernandez, a civil rights lawyer with deep ties to the district. Ferguson, Missouri makes history
Meanwhile, a local race that caught national attention was held in Ferguson, Missouri, where voters elected Ella Jones as the city’s first African-American and first woman mayor.
Ferguson became a flashpoint for race relations and police mistreatment of blacks in 2014 after the shooting death of teenager Michael Brown during a confrontation with a white police officer. Jones’s election comes amid nationwide protests over the death of George Floyd, a black man whose death while being arrested by white police officers in Minneapolis was caught on cellphone video. Biden inches closer to clinching nomination
And former Vice President Joe Biden moved closer to formally securing the Democratic presidential nomination after winning several state primary elections Tuesday. Biden has been the presumptive nominee since winning the South Carolina primary in February after winning the endorsement of prominent African-American Representative Jim Clyburn.
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By Polityk | 06/03/2020 | Повідомлення, Політика
Trump Announces Republicans will Pull National Convention out of North Carolina
U.S. President Donald Trump said Tuesday the Republicans will move this year’s national convention from the southeastern state of North Carolina because the governor is refusing to remove restrictions on large events aimed at preventing the spread of the coronavirus. As many as 19,000 people, including delegates and party officials, were expected to gather in Charlotte’s Spectrum Center, home of the city’s National Basketball Association franchise, in late August to nominate President Trump as the party’s candidate in the November presidential election. The president and Republican officials had demanded that Democratic Governor Roy Cooper allow the party to hold a typical full-scale convention, with an arena packed with delegates freely walking around without face masks. But Governor Cooper rejected those demands Tuesday, saying that “a scaled-down convention with fewer people, social distancing and face coverings is a necessity” because officials could not be sure of the status of the COVID-19 pandemic when the convention begins.FILE – North Carolina Gov. Roy Cooper speaks to supporters in Raleigh, N.C., March 3, 2020.Trump blasted Cooper as “still in Shelter-in-Place Mode” on Twitter late Tuesday night, and said the decision was forcing Republicans “to seek another State to host the 2020 Republican National Convention.” News outlets say Republican officials will visit Nashville, Tennessee, located more than 600 kilometers west of Charlotte, in their search for a replacement city. Other cities being discussed are the Florida cities of Jacksonville and Orlando; Las Vegas, Nevada; and sites in the southeastern state of Georgia. The Democrats have postponed their national convention, which was scheduled to be held a week earlier in Milwaukee, Wisconsin.
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By Polityk | 06/03/2020 | Повідомлення, Політика
Voters Go to Polls Amid Pandemic, Protests
Americans in eight states and the District of Columbia voted in primary elections Tuesday, including Pennsylvania, a battleground in November’s presidential election. Mike O’Sullivan reports, the party preference contests are taking place amid protests over the death of a black man, George Floyd, who died in police custody on May 25, as the country continues to struggle with the COVID-19 pandemic.
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By Polityk | 06/03/2020 | Повідомлення, Політика
India’s Modi Gets Trump Invite To Attend G-7 Summit, Ministry Says
India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi has received an invitation from U.S. President Donald Trump to attend the next Group of Seven summit, India’s Foreign Affairs Ministry said Tuesday. In a telephone call, Modi told Trump that New Delhi would be happy to work with the United States and other countries to ensure the success of the next G-7 summit, the ministry said in a statement. Trump said Saturday he was postponing until September the summit that had been scheduled for late June at Camp David, the U.S. president’s country retreat, and that he wanted to invite Australia, Russia, South Korea and India to the meeting. Trump conveyed his desire to expand participation beyond the members of the group of the world’s most advanced economies. “In this context, he extended an invitation to Prime Minister Modi to attend the next G-7 Summit to be held in USA,” the ministry said. The leaders exchanged views on the COVID-19 situation in the two countries, the India-China standoff at the border, and the need for reforms in the World Health Organization, it added. A White House statement said Trump and Modi discussed the G-7 meeting, the response to the coronavirus pandemic and regional security issues. Trump told Modi the United States would ship the first tranche of 100 donated ventilators to India next week, the White House said. U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and a senior congressional leader have reprimanded China for bullying behavior toward India during a military standoff on their disputed border. During the call, Trump recalled his visit to India in February. Modi said the historic visit had added new dynamism to the bilateral relationship.
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By Polityk | 06/03/2020 | Повідомлення, Політика
Chinese Officials Raise Tensions With US Over George Floyd Protests
Chinese officials – further escalating diplomatic tensions with the United States – are criticizing the U.S. government’s response to anti-racism protests across the country that have descended into violence.Chinese officials have compared the U.S. unrest to the pro-democracy demonstrations in Hong Kong and called racial discrimination in the U.S. a “persistent social ill.”In Hong Kong, where Beijing is in the process of eliminating political and speech freedoms though new national security initiatives that U.S officials have denounced, top official Carrie Lam told reporters Tuesday that the American protests are an example of a “double standard.”Lam said U.S. officials, “are very concerned about their own national security, but on our national security … they are looking at it through tinted glasses.”Lam appeared to be referring to U.S. criticism of the violent response by Hong Kong security forces to political demonstrations in recent months.China exercises tight control over its citizens. Peaceful assembly to protest the government is not allowed; government censors scrub China’s internet, which is set off from the rest of the world by “the Great Firewall” for objectionable speech; religious groups are subject to government monitoring; and there are no independent courts. That has made the country one of the least free in the world, according to FILE – An African restaurant is closed along with other businesses in Guangzhou’s Sanyuanli area, where a neighborhood is in lockdown after several people tested positive for the coronavirus, in Guangdong province, China, April 13, 2020.Last month, many Africans living in the southern Chinese city of Guangzhou A demonstrator addresses the crowd gathered in front of a fence surrounding Lafayette Park outside the White House in Washington as protests continue over the death in police custody of George Floyd, June 2, 2020.Footage of the current unrest in America has been widely disseminated in Chinese state media, which have long argued that the United States’ partisan politics make for chaotic governance. In a series of tweets, Hu Xijin, the editor of the state-run Global Times, was trying to ridicule U.S. officials and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, who on June 19, 2019, described the Hong Kong protests as a “beautiful sight to behold” 10 days after an estimated half million people marched in Hong Kong. “Now they can witness it by their home windows,” he wrote. “I want to ask Speaker Pelosi and Secretary Pompeo: Should Beijing support protests in the US, like you glorified rioters in Hong Kong?” For some analysts, China’s response to the protests sounds familiar to Beijing’s rhetoric on the coronavirus situation in the U.S. “As the relations are deteriorating between the two countries, China regards this as something they can take advantage of, something they can gloat [about]” said Ji Shuoming, a Chinese commentator now based in Hong Kong. National security adviser Robert O’Brien on Sunday said China is just one of Washington’s foreign foes trying to exploit tense race relations in the U.S. He told ABC’s This Week that he saw “a number of tweets from the Chinese today that are taking some sort of pleasure.” “There’s a difference between us and you,” said O’Brien, speaking of foreign adversaries. “When this happens, we’ll get to the bottom of it and we’ll clean it up.”
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By Polityk | 06/03/2020 | Повідомлення, Політика
Trump Vows End to US Violence; Biden Says Country Needs ‘Leadership’
U.S. President Donald Trump has vowed to end “the riots and lawlessness” across the country, but clashes between police and protesters erupted for a seventh night Monday even as big city mayors imposed curfews to keep people off the streets and National Guard troops were deployed to quell the violence.
The often peaceful day-time demonstrations spawned by the death last week of a black man while in police custody in Minneapolis, Minnesota, degenerated as night descended into angry street confrontations between protesters and police in several cities.
But Trump on Tuesday morning declared on Twitter: Washington “had no problems last night. Many arrests. Great job done by all. Overwhelming force. Domination. Likewise, Minneapolis was great (thank you President Trump!).”D.C. had no problems last night. Many arrests. Great job done by all. Overwhelming force. Domination. Likewise, Minneapolis was great (thank you President Trump!).
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 2, 2020Former Vice President Joe Biden, Trump’s presumptive Democratic opponent in the November national election, attacked the U.S. leader’s response to the week of coast-to-coast violence, perhaps the most widespread civil unrest in the country since the extended protests against the Vietnam war in the 1960s.
“The country is crying out for leadership,” Biden said in Philadelphia. “Leadership that can unite us, leadership that brings us together. Leadership that can recognize pain and deep grief of communities that have had a knee on their neck for a long time.
“I won’t traffic in fear and division,” Biden promised.
Sorry, but your browser cannot support embedded video of this type, you can
download this video to view it offline.Download File Embed” />Copy Download AudioTear gas, rubber bullets
In Washington Monday, under orders from Attorney General William Barr, police fired tear gas and rubber bullets at peaceful protesters to clear a park across the street from the White House shortly before an early evening curfew took effect. A short time later, Trump took a short walk through the park for a photo-op in front of the nearby fire-damaged St. John’s Episcopal Church, often referred to as “the church of the presidents.”
Trump held up a Bible, declared the United States as the “greatest country in the world,” and said, “we’re going to keep it safe.”President Donald Trump holds up a Bible as he stands outside St. John’s Church across Lafayette Park, near the White House, in Washington, June 1, 2020.Earlier, at the White House, Trump vowed that “if a city or state refuses to take the actions necessary to defend the life and property of their residents, then I will deploy the United States military and quickly solve the problem for them.”
Trump said he was “mobilizing all available federal resources, civilian and military, to stop the rioting and looting, to end the destruction and arson, and to protect the rights of law-abiding Americans, including your Second Amendment rights.” The Second Amendment of the U.S. Constitution protects the rights of all American citizens to own firearms.
Church photo-op draws rebuke
Trump’s use of the church as a backdrop prop for a photo-op drew a sharp rebuke from the head of the Episcopal diocese of Washington, Bishop Mariann Budde.
She said Trump “just used a Bible and a church of my diocese as a backdrop for a message antithetical to the teachings of Jesus and everything that our church stands for. To do so, he sanctioned the use of tear gas by police officers in riot gear to clear the church yard.
“Everything he has said and done is to inflame violence,” she said.
Biden said, “He’s using the American military against the American people. He tear-gassed peaceful protesters and fired rubber bullets. For a photo. For our children, for the very soul of our country, we must defeat him.”He’s using the American military against the American people.
He tear-gassed peaceful protesters and fired rubber bullets.
For a photo.
For our children, for the very soul of our country, we must defeat him. But I mean it when I say this: we can only do it together. — Joe Biden (@JoeBiden) June 2, 2020Rubio blames ‘agitators’However, Republican Senator Marco Rubio of Florida voiced a different view of the police action in the park, claiming that “professional agitators” were posing as peaceful protesters and that the media fell for their “calculated” tactics.
“They knew the street needed to be cleared before 7 pm curfew,” Rubio tweeted. “But they deliberately stayed to trigger police action & get the story they wanted, that ‘police attacked peaceful protesters.’”Republican Senator John Cornyn of Texas called the clearing of protesters from the park necessary “for security purposes” since Trump was “walking over to the church.” But another Republican, Senator Ben Sasse of Nebraska, said, “I’m against clearing out a peaceful protest for a photo op that treats the Word of God as a political prop.”
On Tuesday, Trump, accompanied by first lady Melania Trump, visited another religious site, the Catholic Saint John Paul II National Shrine, a short drive from the White House. Again, though, Trump’s visit was not welcomed by a religious leader.
Washington Archbishop Wilton Gregory said in a statement, “I find it baffling and reprehensible that any Catholic facility would allow itself to be so egregiously misused and manipulated in a fashion that violates our religious principles, which call us to defend the rights of all people, even those with whom we might disagree.”
Gregory added, “Saint Pope John Paul II was an ardent defender of the rights and dignity of human beings. His legacy bears vivid witness to that truth. He certainly would not condone the use of tear gas and other deterrents to silence, scatter or intimidate them for a photo opportunity in front of a place of worship and peace.” What sparked protests
The demonstrations started a week ago in Minneapolis, where George Floyd, a 46-year-old African American man, died after being held face down on a city street by a white police officer who pressed a knee against his neck even as Floyd repeatedly said he could not breathe.
Minnesota’s Hennepin County medical examiner ruled Floyd’s death a homicide and said he died of “cardiopulmonary arrest complicating law enforcement subdual, restraint, and neck compression.” An independent autopsy commissioned by Floyd’s family concluded that he died of “asphyxiation from sustained pressure” after being pinned down by his neck and back.FILE – People are seen gathered at a memorial featuring a mural of George Floyd, near the spot where he died while in police custody, in Minneapolis, Minnesota, May 31, 2020.Another church visit
On Tuesday, Trump, accompanied by first lady Melania Trump, is planning another visit to a religious site, the Catholic Saint John Paul II National Shrine, a short drive from the White House.
The president, according to Defense Department officials, ordered the Army to deploy an active duty military police battalion for Washington, the single jurisdiction where the military can do so without first consulting the governor of a state.
National Guard mobilized
All 1,200 National Guard forces in the nation’s capital have been mobilized, and five states were quickly sending between 600 and 800 additional Guard troops, some armed with lethal weapons, according to officials.
Additional U.S. active duty troops, including military police and engineering units, have been placed on standby outside the District of Columbia but are poised to move in if necessary, officials say.
Late Monday night, a U.S. Army Black Hawk helicopter flew low over the rooftops of Washington’s historic Chinatown district in a “show of force” maneuver, sending protesters scattering to avoid the dust and debris kicked up by the helicopter’s rotors, which also snapped the branches off trees.
Earlier Monday, Trump rebuked U.S. state governors, telling them to get tough with protesters.
“Most of you are weak,” the president told them, according to an audio recording of the call. “You have to dominate. If you don’t dominate, you’re wasting your time. They’re going to run over you, you’re going to look like a bunch of jerks.” Protest response criticized
Trump is facing criticism for not adopting the traditional presidential role of “consoler-in-chief” since the death of Floyd, which has spawned a national outpouring of agony and anger.
The president, instead, has spent time on Twitter attacking Biden, other Democratic politicians and lumping them in with the far-left radicals he blames for the violence in recent days.
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By Polityk | 06/03/2020 | Повідомлення, Політика
Australia Investigates Treatment of Journalists at US Protest
Australia’s foreign ministery Tuesday said it would investigate an assault by U.S. police and security forces on two Australian television journalists outside the White House as U.S. President Trump had the area cleared for a photo opportunity.Foreign Minister Marise Payne said she has asked the Australian Embassy in Washington to investigate the incident in which the journalists can be seen on video being slammed with a riot shield, punched and hit with a baton while broadcasting from the protest.Video showed Australian TV reporter Amelia Brace being clubbed with a truncheon and cameraman Tim Myers being hit with a riot shield and punched in the face by police clearing Washington’s Lafayette Square of protesters Monday. The square is directly across the street from the White House.DC Episcopal Bishop: ‘I Am Outraged’ by Trump Church Visit Budde said the church was ‘just completely caught off-guard’ by the visit, with ‘no sense that this was a sacred space to be used for sacred purposes’ The incident was widely broadcast in Australia, causing consternation in a country that has been a close U.S. ally. The journalists said they were later shot with rubber bullets and tear-gassed, which Brace said left the pair “a bit sore”. Payne said wants further advice on how she would go about registering Australia’s strong concerns with the responsible local Washington authorities, indicating a formal complaint would follow.U.S. ambassador to Australia Arthur B. Culvahouse Jr. said on Twitter: “We take mistreatment of journalists seriously, as do all who take democracy seriously.” He said the U.S. stays “steadfast in our commitment to protecting journalists and guaranteeing equal justice under law for all.”Trump Threatens Wide Use of Military Force Against ProtestersDeclaring ‘acts of domestic terror’ have been committed by violent demonstrators, president vows to end ‘riots and lawlessness’ that has spread throughout countryLocal police — with support from military personnel — had forcibly cleared the square of peaceful protesters to allow U.S. President Donald Trump to conduct a photo opportunity.Trump has faced fierce criticism for his handling of days of protests over the death in police custody of an unarmed African-American man in Minneapolis.George Floyd died after a white police officer knelt on his neck for nearly nine minutes.
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By Polityk | 06/03/2020 | Повідомлення, Політика
