Розділ: Політика
Zelenskyy to Deliver Virtual Address to US Congress
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy will deliver a virtual address to the U.S. Congress as the Russian war on his country intensifies.
Zelenskyy will speak Wednesday to members of the House and Senate, the Democratic leaders announced. The event will be livestreamed for the public.
“It’s such a privilege to have this leader of this country, where these people are fighting for their democracy and our democracy,” House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said Monday during an event at the Brooklyn Bridge with New York lawmakers.
Pelosi said that Zelenskyy asked for the meeting when they spoke at the end of last week, and lawmakers are “thrilled” to have him address Congress.
The talk comes as the Ukrainians are fighting for their country’s survival in the escalating war as Russian President Vladimir Putin intensifies his assault, including airstrikes on the capital Kyiv. Civilians in Ukraine are taking up arms to hold back Putin’s regime, but the war has launched a mass exodus of more than 2.5 million people from Ukraine.
“The Congress, our country and the world are in awe of the people of Ukraine,” said Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer in a statement Monday announcing the address.
They said all lawmakers are invited to the talk that will be delivered via video at the U.S. Capitol. It comes as Congress recently approved $13.6 billion in emergency military and humanitarian aid for Ukraine.
Biden is expected to sign a big spending bill containing Ukraine aid into law on Tuesday. During Pelosi’s call last week, Zelenskyy said his country would need help rebuilding from the war.
“We have to do more in terms of meeting the needs of some of the 2.7 million refugees,” she said.
She said of the Ukrainians: “They’re fighting for democracy writ large.”
In their statement Monday, the congressional leaders said Congress “remains unwavering in our commitment to supporting Ukraine as they face Putin’s cruel and diabolical aggression.”
Pelosi and Schumer said they intend “to convey our support to the people of Ukraine as they bravely defend democracy.”
Zelenskyy spoke by video with House and Senate lawmakers earlier this month, delivering a desperate plea for more military aid.
your ad hereBy Polityk | 03/15/2022 | Повідомлення, Політика
US Politics Amid The Rising Fear Russia May Use Chemical Weapons in Ukraine
Russia continues its unprovoked attack on neighboring Ukraine as the invasion rolls through a third week. On Sunday dozens of people were killed when Russia launched a missile attack on a military training base in western Ukraine near the country’s border with Poland. VOA’s Arash Arabasadi has more.
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By Polityk | 03/14/2022 | Повідомлення, Політика
Survey: One in Five US Election Workers May Quit Amid Threats, Politics
U.S. local election officials are increasingly concerned about threats and political pressure fueled by baseless allegations of voter fraud in the last presidential race, and one in five say they are somewhat or very unlikely to stay in their jobs through the 2024 contest, a national survey showed on Thursday.
In the poll of nearly 600 election officials, more than 75% said threats against election administrators and staff have increased in recent years. The percentage saying they are “very worried” about political leaders interfering in future elections has nearly tripled since before 2020.
Conducted by the Brennan Center for Justice at the New York University School of Law, the poll also found that more than three-fourths of local election officials say social media companies have not done enough to stop the spread of false election information.
The survey underscores problems identified in a series of Reuters reports on harassment and intimidation of election workers after the 2020 elections. The news organization has documented more than 900 threatening and hostile messages to election administrators and staff in 17 states, almost all alluding to former President Donald Trump’s false claims of a stolen election.
“We are at a really critical juncture,” said Al Schmidt, former Republican Philadelphia City Commissioner, who received death threats after refusing to back Trump’s false claims of widespread election fraud in the 2020 vote. “The consequence of this threat environment is that you have more people leaving and they’re replaced by less experienced election administrators or people who want to undermine confidence in our system of government.”
About one in six election officials reported in the poll that they have been threatened personally, and more than half those cases were not reported to law enforcement. Nearly a third of the respondents said they feel their local government could do more to support them; more than 75% said the federal government should do more to support them.
More than 40 percent were completely unaware of a task force set up last year by the U.S. Department of Justice to investigate and prosecute threats against election officials, the survey showed, and most of the rest said they’d heard of it but “don’t know much about it.” To date, the task force has made two arrests.
More than 80% of the surveyed election officials said social media bears “a lot” of responsibility for spreading false election information, and nearly two-thirds said that problem had made their jobs “somewhat” or “a lot” more dangerous.
Among the 20% of officials who said they are “somewhat unlikely” or “very unlikely” to remain in their posts through the next presidential election, about a third said a key factor in their decision is that “too many political leaders are attacking a system that they know is fair and honest.” Other common explanations included the stress of the job, reaching retirement age and the increasingly “nasty” tone of American politics.
The Brennan Center surveyed 596 local election officials across the country between January 31 and February 14. The survey had a 3.95% margin of error, the center said.
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By Polityk | 03/10/2022 | Повідомлення, Політика
Plane Carrying Trump Made Emergency Landing Over Weekend, Source Says
A plane carrying former U.S. President Donald Trump made an emergency landing in New Orleans on Saturday evening after experiencing engine failure over the Gulf of Mexico, a source familiar with the matter confirmed on Wednesday.
The plane, a Dassault Falcon 900, had gone about 75 miles from a New Orleans airport before turning back to the city, the person said. Other passengers included Secret Service agents, support staff and some of Trump’s advisers.
A Trump representative did not immediately return a request for comment on the incident.
The plane was returning Trump to his home in Palm Beach, Florida, from a New Orleans hotel where he was speaking to Republican Party donors at a private event, the person said.
The plane belonged to a donor who loaned it to the former president for the evening, the source said, and Trump advisers secured another donor’s plane to take him back to Florida.
The incident was first reported on Wednesday by Politico and the Washington Post.
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By Polityk | 03/10/2022 | Повідомлення, Політика
US House Lawmakers Urge Department of Justice to Investigate Amazon
A bipartisan group of lawmakers has written a letter asking the Department of Justice to determine whether online retailer Amazon engaged in obstruction of Congress during an investigation of the company’s competitive practices.
The letter said the company had “engaged in a pattern and practice of misleading conduct” that suggested it had sought to influence or obstruct an investigation into how it operates.
The House Judiciary Committee conducted a 16-month probe into how Amazon, Apple, Google and Facebook operated.
During the investigation, lawmakers focused on Amazon’s use of private-label products and collection of third-party data.
Amazon allegedly copied popular products in India and then manipulated search results to increase the sales of its own products, Reuters reported.
The committee’s letter to DOJ alleges Amazon made untrue or misleading statements when asked about those practices. It also said Amazon refused to provide evidence that would “either corroborate its claims or correct the record,” according to the 24-page letter.
“It appears to have done so to conceal the truth about its use of third-party sellers’ data to advantage its private-label business and its preferencing of private-label products in search results — subjects of the Committee’s investigation,” according to the letter, which was signed by House Judiciary Committee Chair Jerrold Nadler, House Antitrust Subcommittee Chair David Cicilline, and Democratic and Republican committee members.
“As a result, we have no choice but to refer this matter to the Department of Justice to investigate whether Amazon and its executives obstructed Congress in violation of applicable federal law,” the letter added.
Amazon told CNBC that “there’s no factual basis for this, as demonstrated in the huge volume of information we’ve provided over several years of good faith cooperation with this investigation.”
When Amazon founder Jeff Bezos testified to the committee in July 2020, he said the company prevents Amazon employees from using seller data but could not say it had never happened.
Lawmakers said investigations by news organizations like Reuters and The Wall Street Journal contradicted Bezos’ testimony, as well as testimony of other Amazon employees.
“Amazon attempted to clean up the inaccurate testimony through ever-shifting explanations of its internal policies and denials of the investigative reports,” the lawmakers said. “The committee uncovered evidence from former Amazon employees, and former and current sellers, that corroborated the reports’ claims.”
“After Amazon was caught in a lie and repeated misrepresentations, it stonewalled the committee’s efforts to uncover the truth,” the letter said.
Some information in this report came from The Associated Press and Reuters.
your ad hereBy Polityk | 03/09/2022 | Повідомлення, Політика
US Lawmakers Reach Agreement on Billions in Ukraine Aid
U.S. lawmakers reached an agreement Tuesday to send as much as $14 billion in humanitarian and military assistance to Ukraine. The bipartisan effort to confront Russia’s unprovoked invasion of the independent Eastern European nation follows congressional support for U.S. President Joe Biden’s announcement he will ban Russian energy imports into the U.S. VOA’s congressional correspondent Katherine Gypson has more from Capitol Hill.
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By Polityk | 03/09/2022 | Повідомлення, Політика
Venezuela Frees at Least 2 Americans After Talks With US, Sources Say
Venezuela released at least two jailed U.S. citizens on Tuesday, people familiar with the matter said, in an apparent goodwill gesture toward the Biden administration following a visit to Caracas by a high-level U.S. delegation.
One of the freed prisoners was identified as Gustavo Cardenas, one of six Citgo oil executives arrested in 2017 and convicted on charges the U.S. government says were fabricated, the sources said. The other was a Cuban American detained on unrelated charges, they said.
The weekend meetings focused not only on the fate of Americans held in Venezuela but on possibly easing U.S. oil sanctions on the OPEC member, a close Russian ally, to fill the supply gap once President Joe Biden banned Russian oil imports in response to Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine.
There was no immediate word on the whereabouts of the released detainees.
Washington has sought the release of at least nine men, including the so-called “Citgo 6,” two former Green Berets and a former U.S. Marine.
The U.S. delegation, the highest-ranking to travel to Venezuela in recent years, met with the detainees on Sunday in a Venezuelan prison. U.S. hostage envoy Roger Carstens was part of the group, and he was believed to have stayed behind to finalize the release.
Tuesday’s release followed talks in Caracas on Saturday as the Biden administration sought ways to stave off the impact of soaring U.S. gas prices spurred by Russian President Vladimir Putin’s war in Ukraine and the West’s efforts to punish Moscow for it.
Biden on Tuesday announced a U.S. ban on Russian oil and other energy imports, ramping up a pressure campaign on Moscow. It could further increase prices at the pump for American consumers, adding new inflationary pressures.
Engagement with Maduro, a longtime U.S. foe, was also aimed at gauging whether Venezuela is prepared to distance itself from Russia.
But the Biden administration faced strong criticism on Capitol Hill for its outreach to Maduro, who is under U.S. sanctions for human rights abuses and political repression.
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By Polityk | 03/09/2022 | Повідомлення, Політика
US Senate Approves $50 billion Postal Service Relief Bill
The U.S. Senate voted 79-19 on Tuesday for a bill that would provide the Postal Service (USPS) with about $50 billion in financial relief over a decade and require its future retirees to enroll in a government health insurance plan.
The action, after the U.S. House of Representatives overwhelmingly approved the measure in early February, sends the bill to President Joe Biden for his signature. USPS has reported net losses of more than $90 billion since 2007, and on Tuesday reported a net loss of $1.5 billion for the quarter ending Dec. 31.
USPS has been struggling with diminishing mail volumes even as it must deliver to a growing number of U.S. addresses.
“It has to be done because the Postal Service’s business model just doesn’t work,” said Senator Rob Portman, a Republican and one the bill’s primary sponsors. “Having to deliver more and more packages and fewer and fewer more profitable first-class mail pieces to more and more addresses.”
AFL-CIO President Liz Shuler, whose union represents postal workers, said the bill was the culmination of “15 years of efforts to fund and strengthen USPS.”
Democratic Senate Leader Chuck Schumer said the legislation provides “the Postal Service a much-needed reset and puts the agency “on a path to solvency.”
Postmaster General Louis DeJoy in March 2021 proposed some of the financial reforms in the legislation, which he said could eliminate $160 billion in predicted losses over the next decade. USPS also adopted new delivery standards in October that slow some first-class mail deliveries. DeJoy has called the legislation “vital to the United States Postal Service and the American People.”
One reason for the large losses is 2006 legislation mandating USPS prefund more than $120 billion in retiree health care and pension liabilities.
The bill eliminates requirements USPS prefund retiree health benefits for current and retired employees for 75 years, a requirement no business or other federal entity faces. USPS projects it would sharply reduce its prefunding liability and save it roughly $27 billion over 10 years.
It requires future retirees to enroll in Medicare. About 25% of postal retirees do not enroll in Medicare even though they are eligible, which results in USPS paying higher premiums than other employers. USPS estimates the change could save it about $22.6 billion over 10 years.
Postal unions support the bill as does the Greeting Card Association, Hallmark and Amazon.com.
The bill requires USPS to maintain six-day-a-week mail deliveries and develop an online weekly performance data dashboard by ZIP code, and expands special rates for local newspaper distribution.
USPS has said the legislative changes will largely eliminate an estimated $57 billion in liabilities over the next 10 years, without reducing the benefits received by employees or retirees.
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By Polityk | 03/09/2022 | Повідомлення, Політика
HOLD – Robert Palmer’s Path from Election Day to Prison
Robert Palmer was arrested two months after participating in the Jan. 6, 2021 Capitol insurrection in Washington. He talked exclusively to VOA about the events leading up to the riot and its aftermath. Here’s a timeline from Election Day, 2020, to Palmer’s incarceration.
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By Polityk | 03/08/2022 | Повідомлення, Політика
US Supreme Court Rejects GOP Redistricting Plans in 2 States
In a victory for Democrats, the Supreme Court has turned away efforts from Republicans in North Carolina and Pennsylvania to block state court-ordered congressional districting plans.
In separate orders late Monday, the justices are allowing maps selected by each state’s Supreme Court to be in effect for the 2022 elections. Those maps are more favorable to Democrats than the ones drawn by the states’ legislatures.
In North Carolina, the map most likely will give Democrats an additional House seat in 2023.
The Pennsylvania map also probably will lead to the election of more Democrats, the Republicans say, as the two parties battle for control of the U.S. House of Representatives in the midterm elections in November.
The justices provided no explanation for their actions, as is common in emergency applications on what is known as the “shadow docket.”
Inopportune time
While the high court did not stop the state court-ordered plans from being used in this year’s elections, four conservative justices indicated they want it to confront the issue that could dramatically limit the power of state courts over federal elections in the future. The Republicans argued that state courts lack the authority to second-guess legislatures’ decisions about the conduct of elections for Congress and the presidency.
“We will have to resolve this question sooner or later, and the sooner we do so, the better. This case presented a good opportunity to consider the issue, but unfortunately the court has again found the occasion inopportune,” Justice Samuel Alito wrote in a dissent from the Supreme Court’s order, joined by Justices Neil Gorsuch and Clarence Thomas.
Justice Brett Kavanaugh made a similar point but said he didn’t want to interfere in this year’s electoral process, which already is underway. The filing deadline in North Carolina was Friday.
The state courts were involved because of partisan wrangling and lawsuits over congressional redistricting in both states, where the legislatures are controlled by Republicans, the governors are Democrats and the state Supreme Courts have Democratic majorities.
Pennsylvania losing a seat
In Pennsylvania, Democratic Governor Tom Wolf vetoed the plan the Republican-controlled Legislature approved, saying it was the result of a “partisan political process.”
The state, with a delegation of nine Democrats and nine Republicans, is losing a seat in the House following the 2020 census.
Republicans said the map they came up with would elect nine Democrats and eight Republicans. State courts eventually stepped in and approved a map that probably would elect 10 Democrats, the GOP argued.
North Carolina is picking up a seat in the House because of population gains. Republican majorities in the Legislature produced an initial plan most likely to result in 10 seats for Republicans and four for Democrats. The governor does not have veto power over redistricting plans in North Carolina.
After Democrats sued, the state’s high court selected a map that likely will elect at least six Democrats.
Lawsuits are continuing in both states, but the Supreme Court signaled in Monday’s orders that this year’s elections for Congress in North Carolina and Pennsylvania would take place under the maps approved by the states’ top courts.
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By Polityk | 03/08/2022 | Повідомлення, Політика
Jury to Begin Deliberating in 1st Trial Over Capitol Riot
An armed Texas militia member led a “vigilante mob” that overwhelmed police officers and became the first group of rioters to breach the U.S. Capitol last year, a federal prosecutor said Monday at the close of the first criminal trial over the riot.
A 12-member jury is scheduled to begin deliberating on Tuesday for Guy Wesley Reffitt’s trial on charges that he stormed the Capitol with a holstered handgun strapped to his waist and interfered with police officers guarding the Senate doors. He also is charged with threatening his teenage children if they reported him to law enforcement after the attack on January 6, 2021.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Risa Berkower told jurors that Reffitt drove to Washington intending to stop Congress from certifying President Joe Biden’s electoral victory, to “overthrow Congress” and to drag lawmakers out of the building. Reffitt proudly “lit the fire” that allowed others in the mob to overwhelm Capitol Police officers, the prosecutor said during the trial’s closing arguments.
“They were in an impossible situation — outnumbered, and they feared, outgunned,” Berkower said of police.
Reffitt, 49, of Wylie, Texas, didn’t testify at his trial, which started last Wednesday. Defense attorney William Welch didn’t call any defense witnesses after prosecutors rested their case.
Welch urged jurors to acquit Reffitt of all charges but one. He said they should convict him of a misdemeanor charge that he entered and remained in a restricted area.
“That is what proof beyond a reasonable doubt looks like, but it ends there,” Welch said.
Reffitt faces five felony counts: obstruction of an official proceeding, being unlawfully present on Capitol grounds while armed with a firearm, transporting firearms during a civil disorder, interfering with law enforcement officers during a civil disorder and obstructing justice. The obstructing justice charge relates to his alleged threats against his children.
Welch denied that Reffitt had a gun at the Capitol and said there is no evidence that he engaged in any violence or destructive behavior on January 6.
“Guy does brag a lot,” Welch said. “He embellishes and he exaggerates.”
“Yes, Guy Reffitt brags,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Jeffrey Nestler countered. “And you know what he brags about? The truth.”
Reffitt was arrested less than a week after the riot at the Capitol. He has remained jailed in Washington for months.
Reffitt is a member of the “Texas Three Percenters” and bragged about his involvement in the riot to other members of the group, according to prosecutors. The Three Percenters militia movement refers to the myth that only 3% of American colonists fought against the British in the Revolutionary War.
On Friday, jurors heard testimony from a self-described Texas Three Percenters member who drove from Texas to Washington with Reffitt. The witness, Rocky Hardie, said he and Reffitt both had holstered handguns strapped to their bodies when they attended then-President Donald Trump’s “Stop the Steal” rally just before the riot erupted.
On Thursday, Reffitt’s 19-year-old son, Jackson, testified that his father told him and his sister, then 16, that they would be traitors if they reported him to authorities and said “traitors get shot.” Jackson Reffitt’s younger sister, Peyton, was listed as a possible government witness but didn’t testify.
On January 6, Reffitt had the holstered gun under his jacket, was carrying zip-tie handcuffs and was wearing body armor when he and other rioters advanced on police officers on the west side of the Capitol, according to prosecutors.
“Every step he took up the railing, the crowd came with him,” Berkhower said. “The crowd was energized and cheered him on.”
Reffitt is not accused of entering the building. He retreated after an officer pepper-sprayed him in the face, prosecutors said.
Berkower played surveillance video of the rioters who poured into the building while then-Vice President Mike Pence was presiding over the Senate. She said it was a dark day in American history, but not for Reffitt.
“He was ecstatic about what he did, about what the mob did,” she added. “What the defendant did was not just bragging or hype.”
Welch accused prosecutors of rushing to judgment. “Be the grownups in the courtroom. Separate the facts from the hype,” he told jurors.
More than 750 people have been charged with federal crimes related to the riot. A verdict in his case could have an enormous impact on many others. A conviction could give prosecutors more leverage over defendants facing the most serious charges. An acquittal could embolden other defendants to seek more favorable plea deals or gamble on trials of their own.
Over 220 riot defendants have pleaded guilty, mostly to misdemeanors. and over 110 of them have been sentenced. Approximately 90 others have trial dates.
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By Polityk | 03/08/2022 | Повідомлення, Політика
Momentum Grows in US for Russian Oil Ban
U.S. lawmakers stepped up calls Monday to ban the import of Russian oil, cutting off Russian President Vladimir Putin from a key source of revenue in retaliation for the unprovoked invasion of Ukraine.
“How can we possibly be importing Russian oil and gas and giving the profits of those transactions to Vladimir Putin to pay for his war machine?” Democratic Senator Dick Durbin said on the Senate floor Monday.
Dubin introduced bipartisan legislation Thursday along with 11 other senators that would temporarily ban Russian oil imports along with suspending U.S.-Russia trade relations.
He said that if passed, the result of the legislation would be that “the world, including the United States, will likely pay more to fill our tanks at gas stations and heat our homes. We have to be ready for that reality. But that is the price today of defending freedom and democracy. The Ukrainians are paying with their lives; we may end up paying some more at the pump.”
In a Sunday “Dear Colleague” letter, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi told lawmakers the House was at work on its own companion legislation banning imports.
With energy prices already rising in the United States due to the invasion, lawmakers face concerns that such a ban could put more pressure on Americans facing rising inflation.
“The United States need not choose between our democratic values and our economic interests. The administration and the Congress remain laser-focused on bringing down the higher energy costs for American families and our partners stemming from Putin’s invasion,” Pelosi said.
The bipartisan House legislation, co-sponsored by Democratic Representative Ro Khanna and Republican Representative Nancy Mace, would permanently ban Russian oil imports into the United States.
Secretary of State Antony Blinken is reportedly in talks with European allies to coordinate a ban on Russian oil and gas imports. Europe is even more dependent on Russian oil imports than the U.S. The White House said Monday there was an “active discussion” about the ban but that it could prove politically difficult for Biden domestically.
While there’s broad bipartisan support on Capitol Hill for the ban, some Republican senators have called for this opportunity to end American reliance on foreign oil and open up drilling in the United States to ease rising costs.
“Why would we be importing Russian oil, sending Russia $40-$50 million a day? That makes no sense. But choose our natural resources here in North America. We have the resources here. We should not be dependent on the Russian oil. We should not be sending them this blood money,” Republican Senator Rob Portman said on the Senate floor Monday.
Many Republicans have called on Biden to allow construction to resume on the Keystone XL Pipeline, the Canadian-U.S. oil pipeline system that was shut down over environmental concerns.
“We have the great fortune of living in a resource-rich country, and there’s no reason why we should rely on anyone else, let alone a power-hungry dictator for basic energy needs. Putin’s aggression has lit a fire under the U.S. and our allies. And we need to take concrete steps to end our reliance on foreign oil and continue our pursuit of energy independence at the same time, making sure that our friends and allies around the world have access to more than just one choice when it comes to their energy needs,” said Republican Senator John Cornyn, who represents Texas, a state that relies heavily on the energy industry.
The average cost of gas in the U.S. is over $4 per gallon, according to AAA, formerly the American Automobile Association.
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By Polityk | 03/08/2022 | Повідомлення, Політика
Republicans Make Headway in Texas’ Booming Latino Communities
Democrats have long dreamed of flipping Texas from a bedrock Republican state to one that elects more Democrats to Congress and awards its mother lode of electoral votes to a Democratic presidential contender, something that hasn’t happened since 1976.
That dream has been buoyed by dramatic demographic changes in Texas, where the population has grown at more than twice the national average for the last 20 years, and people of Latin American descent account for 60% of that growth.
But Democrats have a problem. Latino voters, regarded as a key Democratic Party constituency, are showing a greater willingness to vote Republican, even in Texas’ southernmost counties along the border with Mexico.
In 2016, then-Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump received less than 28% of the vote in Hidalgo County, the most populous of Texas’ border counties, and one in which Latinos account for 93% of the population. In his 2020 reelection bid, Trump scored almost 41% of the vote.
Last year, Hidalgo County’s largest city, McAllen, elected its first Republican mayor in 24 years.
Such results may serve as a warning sign for Democrats ahead of November’s midterm elections that will determine control of Congress for President Joe Biden’s final two years of his current term.
Texas has long been critical territory for the Republican Party. The state sends the country’s largest Republican delegation to the House of Representatives and hasn’t elected a Democrat to statewide office since 1994.
‘Exciting time to be a Republican’
But Democrats have historically dominated at the ballot box in the land between San Antonio and the Mexican border — a vast, sunny scrubland where Spanish-speaking cowboys founded the first Texas cattle ranches a century before English-speaking settlers arrived.
Political observers predicted for years that Latino population growth in other parts of the state would boost support for Democrats in Texas. But for the most part, it hasn’t happened. In fact, while South Texas still leans toward the Democrats, Republicans are making inroads.
“It’s an exciting time to be a Republican,” said Adrienne Peña-Garza, the Republican Party chairperson for Hidalgo County. “The new generation is much more bold than I was.”
Peña-Garza is the first Latina to head the Republican Party in Hidalgo County. She told VOA she has critics who maintain that a woman — especially a Hispanic one —shouldn’t be a Republican. Yet, she says she has seen many Latina and Latino Republicans enter the political arena and is encouraged to see the party grow in her area.
Hildalgo County remains Democratic
Texas Democrats insist that they are not sitting idly by. Manuel Medina, state chairman for Tejano Democrats, the Latino wing of the Texas Democratic Party, said Democrats picked four Latina women to run for reliably Democratic seats in the Texas State House in Tuesday’s primary elections. He said he was glad to see more Hispanic involvement in the Republican Party, as well.
“That more doors are open for people to participate in the political system is a good thing. In general, it’s positive,” Medina said. “Hispanic women will lead.”
But he cautioned against reading too much into recent voting trends in Texas, pointing out that Democratic primary voters in Hidalgo County still outnumbered Republicans more than two-to-one on Tuesday. Despite Republican gains, the area remains largely Democratic.
Even so, Peña-Garza is optimistic about the Republican Party’s future in South Texas. She credited Trump for Republicans’ growing popularity in the region and noted that a stream of high-profile Republicans has visited Hidalgo County, including Trump’s son, Donald Trump Jr., who drew 700 people to a local auditorium at 8 a.m. last year.
“It makes us feel included in state and national politics,” Peña-Garza said. “We have been voting Democrat for over 100 years. Has that helped us?”
Jason Villalba, chairman of the nonpartisan Texas Hispanic Policy Foundation, told VOA that a variety of issues have boosted Republicans’ fortunes in South Texas, including perceptions that Democrats are critical of law enforcement and want to restrict the fossil fuel industry — two major employment sectors in South Texas.
Villalba also contends that Trump’s “strongman” image played well among some Latino voters.
Villalba noted that until recently, turnout was often low among Hispanic voters.
“We were not able to be impactful,” he said.
Latino political clout growing
That is no longer true, as Latinos have grown in numbers and clout and are increasingly engaged in the political sphere. But they don’t vote as a bloc. Texas Hispanics include 2.5 million immigrants from Mexico, nearly 500,000 from Central America and 170,000 from South America — all of whom came with distinct viewpoints that influence the political leanings of their voting-eligible children.
According to Hector de Leon, a longtime political organizer and blogger in Houston, expectations for a wave of Democratic support amid the Texas population boom were based in part on incorrect assumptions from the national party that nonwhite voters would naturally vote Democrat.
“They just assume every person who is a person of color is going to behave the same electorally, and they got that completely wrong,” de Leon said. “That is continually driving their methods, and that’s why they may be losing more Hispanic voters.”
Those assumptions led to speculation as early as 2016 that perhaps Hillary Clinton, the Democratic presidential nominee that year, could carry Texas. She lost the state to Trump by nine percentage points.
Looking ahead, a redrawing of Texas’ congressional districts based on the 2020 U.S. Census may give Democrats little to cheer in this year’s midterm elections.
“You don’t see progress being made by Democrats up and down the ballot,” said Jim Henson, director of the Texas Political Project at the University of Texas at Austin. “The idea that Texas is turning blue (Democratic) has been abandoned by most people, given the results.”
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By Polityk | 03/05/2022 | Повідомлення, Політика
White House Disavows Senator’s Call for Assassination of Putin
The Biden administration is not advocating for regime change in Russia, the White House said Friday, after a U.S. senator called for Russians to assassinate President Vladimir Putin.
“That is not the position of the U.S. government and certainly not a statement you’ll hear from — coming from the mouth of — anybody working for the administration,” White House press secretary Jen Psaki told reporters in response to a question from Voice of America.
U.S. Senator Lindsey Graham, a Republican from South Carolina, suggested in a televised interview Thursday evening that “somebody in Russia” should assassinate Putin. He repeated his statement Friday in another televised appearance on Fox News Channel.
“How does this end? Somebody in Russia has to step up to the plate … and take this guy out,” Graham told Fox News host Sean Hannity.
Following the interview, Graham posted on Twitter, “The only people who can fix this are the Russian people.”
“Is there a Brutus in Russia? Is there a more successful Colonel Stauffenberg in the Russian military?” the senator wrote. Marcus Junius Brutus assassinated Roman ruler Julius Caesar, while German army officer Claus von Stauffenberg tried but failed to assassinate German leader Adolf Hitler in July 1944.
Russia’s ambassador to the United States, Anatoly Antonov, called Graham’s comments “unacceptable and outrageous” and said they expressed “off the scale” hatred in the United States toward Russia.
He demanded “official explanations and a strong condemnation of the criminal statements.”
U.S. lawmakers, both Democrats and Republicans, also criticized Graham’s comments.
Texas Republican Senator Ted Cruz called Graham’s proposal “an exceptionally bad idea,” while Democratic Reprepresentative Ilhan Omar of Minnesota tweeted: “I really wish our members of Congress would cool it and regulate their remarks as the administration works to avoid WWIII.”
Graham introduced a resolution in Congress condemning Putin and his military commanders for committing “war crimes” and “crimes against humanity” in Ukraine.
Some information for this report came from The Associated Press and Agence France-Presse.
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By Polityk | 03/05/2022 | Повідомлення, Політика
‘Drop the Hammer,’ Says US Lawmaker Urging New Russia Sanctions
President Joe Biden’s announcement that the U.S. would go after Russian oligarchs and close U.S. airspace to Russian planes in response to the Ukraine invasion drew Democrats’ praise, but some Republican lawmakers want even tougher action. VOA’s Congressional Correspondent Katherine Gypson reports.
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By Polityk | 03/04/2022 | Повідомлення, Політика
US Lawmakers Race to Agree on Russia Sanctions Legislation
Back at work this week following a holiday recess, U.S. lawmakers are feeling the pressure to agree on legislation sanctioning Russia for its unprovoked invasion of Ukraine.
While Democratic lawmakers praised the executive actions taken by U.S. President Joe Biden to punish Russian President Vladimir Putin for bombarding the independent Eastern Europe nation, some Republicans said the actions came too late and suggested harsher additional steps.
“It is time we dropped the hammer and completely shut down the economy in Russia and that we do more to assist Ukrainian defenses,” Senator Jim Risch, the top Republican on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, said in a press conference Wednesday.
Risch said his NYET Act, one of many Ukrainian aid and Russian sanctions proposals pending in Congress, would create a “resistance fund” for Ukrainians of at least $350 million.
In his State of the Union address Tuesday night, Biden announced the U.S. would follow its European allies and close its airspace to Russian flights, as well as create a task force to go after the assets of Russian oligarchs.
In the week since Russia invaded Ukraine, the U.S. and European allies have taken several unprecedented steps to personally sanction Putin and members of his government and cut off Russia’s access to the global financial system.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi praised Biden’s latest moves to punish Putin, saying in statement Tuesday, “Our nation and the entire world saw President Biden’s resolve that democracy will prevail over autocracy. America’s commitment to Ukraine’s sovereignty and to the Ukrainian people remains ironclad. The Congress stands behind [the] president’s determined leadership in strengthening the allied response against Russia’s premeditated, unprovoked war against Ukraine.”
‘A defining moment’
Several proposals in the Senate and House would build on sanctions legislation. Democrats and Republicans struggled for weeks in the lead-up to the invasion to agree on whether preemptive sanctions would deter Putin.
Lawmakers eventually passed a resolution condemning the possible invasion and left town without reaching a compromise. But returning lawmakers said the images of hundreds of thousands of Ukrainian refugees and the Russian bombardment of Ukrainian cities have changed the atmosphere on Capitol Hill.
“There’s a growing consensus, a consensus in the Senate, that this is a defining moment in the world,” Republican Senator Lindsey Graham said Wednesday while introducing a resolution calling on Putin and members of his government to be held responsible for war crimes.
“I hope we can find consensus around the package to help the Ukrainian people, but this to me is a layup,” he said. “This is maybe the most effective thing we can do is to let the generals in the army of Russia know you follow Putin’s orders at your own peril. There were 161 people prosecuted in the Balkans conflict, from privates to prime ministers, generals included. I want the world to rally around the rule of law.”
Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Bob Menendez announced Wednesday that the committee would hold a full hearing on Ukraine next week to assess the next U.S. steps moving forward. Menendez has praised Biden’s executive actions but suggested there is more to be done.
“The Biden administration’s actions to date to hold Vladimir Putin to account for his illegal and unprovoked invasion of Ukraine are a clarion call for the United States to continue reinvigorating our alliances; stand up to our adversaries; repair the State Department and other agencies; and renew American leadership on the global stage. For this, President Biden deserves immense credit for his adept diplomacy that has brought the international community together in a way we have not seen in decades; to stand for human rights, international law and a principles-based world order,” Menendez said in a statement Tuesday.
Democratic Representative Raja Krishnamoorthi told VOA the SUPPORT Act he co-sponsored with Representative Mike Turner, the top Republican on the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, and Democratic Representative Marc Veasey, would take steps “to prepare and assess ourselves to prepare for supporting an insurgency. That’s very important.”
If passed, Krishnamoorthi said, the legislation would supply “not only weapons, not only money, but also intelligence. So our partners are able to take advantage of any useful intelligence to defend themselves. Remember, at the end of the day, these people are fighting for their freedom. They’re fighting for their democracy. And so we need to be helping them as much as we possibly can … without crossing the line.”
US troops not an option
Biden has repeatedly said that no American troops will be committed to the conflict, and the Pentagon said earlier this week there were no plans to consider a no-fly zone over Ukraine, despite Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s request.
Public opinion polling shows Americans have little appetite for a ground conflict in Europe. In a public opinion poll conducted by the U.S. news network CNN, 42% of Americans said they would be in favor of military action if sanctions failed. Lawmakers on both sides of the aisle have reflected those views.
“I do think that it would certainly exacerbate the situation to put boots on the ground. I think the no-fly zone is something that we should consider. I know there are implications to that. I think that Vladimir Putin will perceive that as a major threat and maybe even a declaration [of war],” Republican Representative Jodey Arrington told VOA.
“We’re not going to go to war,” Republican Representative Victoria Spartz, the first Ukrainian-born member of Congress, told VOA. “You know, it’s not a NATO ally so we don’t have the Article 5 commitment. This is just something unfeasible.
“Now, we can do some other things. We can talk about providing maybe humanitarian corridor or safe passages so people who actually can get evacuated — not get killed there. So I think that is very legitimate, and we need to be proactive on this issue.”
But, she emphasized, the world should view Putin’s actions differently.
“It’s the genocide of a nation,” Spartz said. “It’s not a war.”
Jamie Moreno contributed to this report.
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By Polityk | 03/03/2022 | Повідомлення, Політика
Transcript: President Biden’s State of the Union Address
AS PREPARED FOR DELIVERY
Madam Speaker, Madam Vice President, our First Lady and Second Gentleman. Members of Congress and the Cabinet. Justices of the Supreme Court. My fellow Americans.
Last year COVID-19 kept us apart. This year we are finally together again.
Tonight, we meet as Democrats Republicans and Independents. But most importantly as Americans.
With a duty to one another to the American people to the Constitution.
And with an unwavering resolve that freedom will always triumph over tyranny.
Six days ago, Russia’s Vladimir Putin sought to shake the foundations of the free world thinking he could make it bend to his menacing ways. But he badly miscalculated.
He thought he could roll into Ukraine and the world would roll over. Instead he met a wall of strength he never imagined.
He met the Ukrainian people.
From President Zelenskyy to every Ukrainian, their fearlessness, their courage, their determination, inspires the world.
Groups of citizens blocking tanks with their bodies. Everyone from students to retirees teachers turned soldiers defending their homeland.
In this struggle as President Zelenskyy said in his speech to the European Parliament “Light will win over darkness.” The Ukrainian Ambassador to the United States is here tonight.
Let each of us here tonight in this Chamber send an unmistakable signal to Ukraine and to the world.
Please rise if you are able and show that, Yes, we the United States of America stand with the Ukrainian people.
Throughout our history we’ve learned this lesson when dictators do not pay a price for their aggression they cause more chaos.
They keep moving.
And the costs and the threats to America and the world keep rising.
That’s why the NATO Alliance was created to secure peace and stability in Europe after World War 2.
The United States is a member along with 29 other nations.
It matters. American diplomacy matters. American resolve matters.
Putin’s latest attack on Ukraine was premeditated and unprovoked.
He rejected repeated efforts at diplomacy.
He thought the West and NATO wouldn’t respond. And he thought he could divide us at home. Putin was wrong. We were ready. Here is what we did.
We prepared extensively and carefully.
We spent months building a coalition of other freedom-loving nations from Europe and the Americas to Asia and Africa to confront Putin.
I spent countless hours unifying our European allies. We shared with the world in advance what we knew Putin was planning and precisely how he would try to falsely justify his aggression.
We countered Russia’s lies with truth.
And now that he has acted the free world is holding him accountable.
Along with twenty-seven members of the European Union including France, Germany, Italy, as well as countries like the United Kingdom, Canada, Japan, Korea, Australia, New Zealand, and many others, even Switzerland.
We are inflicting pain on Russia and supporting the people of Ukraine. Putin is now isolated from the world more than ever.
Together with our allies –we are right now enforcing powerful economic sanctions.
We are cutting off Russia’s largest banks from the international financial system.
Preventing Russia’s central bank from defending the Russian Ruble making Putin’s $630 Billion “war fund” worthless.
We are choking off Russia’s access to technology that will sap its economic strength and weaken its military for years to come.
Tonight I say to the Russian oligarchs and corrupt leaders who have bilked billions of dollars off this violent regime no more.
The U.S. Department of Justice is assembling a dedicated task force to go after the crimes of Russian oligarchs.
We are joining with our European allies to find and seize your yachts your luxury apartments your private jets. We are coming for your ill-begotten gains.
And tonight I am announcing that we will join our allies in closing off American air space to all Russian flights – further isolating Russia – and adding an additional squeeze –on their economy. The Ruble has lost 30% of its value.
The Russian stock market has lost 40% of its value and trading remains suspended. Russia’s economy is reeling and Putin alone is to blame.
Together with our allies we are providing support to the Ukrainians in their fight for freedom. Military assistance. Economic assistance. Humanitarian assistance.
We are giving more than $1 Billion in direct assistance to Ukraine.
And we will continue to aid the Ukrainian people as they defend their country and to help ease their suffering.
Let me be clear, our forces are not engaged and will not engage in conflict with Russian forces in Ukraine.
Our forces are not going to Europe to fight in Ukraine, but to defend our NATO Allies – in the event that Putin decides to keep moving west.
For that purpose we’ve mobilized American ground forces, air squadrons, and ship deployments to protect NATO countries including Poland, Romania, Latvia, Lithuania, and Estonia.
As I have made crystal clear the United States and our Allies will defend every inch of territory of NATO countries with the full force of our collective power.
And we remain clear-eyed. The Ukrainians are fighting back with pure courage. But the next few days weeks, months, will be hard on them.
Putin has unleashed violence and chaos. But while he may make gains on the battlefield – he will pay a continuing high price over the long run.
And a proud Ukrainian people, who have known 30 years of independence, have repeatedly shown that they will not tolerate anyone who tries to take their country backwards.
To all Americans, I will be honest with you, as I’ve always promised. A Russian dictator, invading a foreign country, has costs around the world.
And I’m taking robust action to make sure the pain of our sanctions is targeted at Russia’s economy. And I will use every tool at our disposal to protect American businesses and consumers.
Tonight, I can announce that the United States has worked with 30 other countries to release 60 Million barrels of oil from reserves around the world.
America will lead that effort, releasing 30 Million barrels from our own Strategic Petroleum Reserve. And we stand ready to do more if necessary, unified with our allies.
These steps will help blunt gas prices here at home. And I know the news about what’s happening can seem alarming.
But I want you to know that we are going to be okay.
When the history of this era is written Putin’s war on Ukraine will have left Russia weaker and the rest of the world stronger.
While it shouldn’t have taken something so terrible for people around the world to see what’s at stake now everyone sees it clearly.
We see the unity among leaders of nations and a more unified Europe a more unified West. And we see unity among the people who are gathering in cities in large crowds around the world even in Russia to demonstrate their support for Ukraine.
In the battle between democracy and autocracy, democracies are rising to the moment, and the world is clearly choosing the side of peace and security.
This is a real test. It’s going to take time. So let us continue to draw inspiration from the iron will of the Ukrainian people.
To our fellow Ukrainian Americans who forge a deep bond that connects our two nations we stand with you.
Putin may circle Kyiv with tanks, but he will never gain the hearts and souls of the Ukrainian people.
He will never extinguish their love of freedom. He will never weaken the resolve of the free world.
We meet tonight in an America that has lived through two of the hardest years this nation has ever faced.
The pandemic has been punishing.
And so many families are living paycheck to paycheck, struggling to keep up with the rising cost of food, gas, housing, and so much more.
I understand.
I remember when my Dad had to leave our home in Scranton, Pennsylvania to find work. I grew up in a family where if the price of food went up, you felt it.
That’s why one of the first things I did as President was fight to pass the American Rescue Plan.
Because people were hurting. We needed to act, and we did.
Few pieces of legislation have done more in a critical moment in our history to lift us out of crisis.
It fueled our efforts to vaccinate the nation and combat COVID-19. It delivered immediate economic relief for tens of millions of Americans.
Helped put food on their table, keep a roof over their heads, and cut the cost of health insurance.
And as my Dad used to say, it gave people a little breathing room.
And unlike the $2 Trillion tax cut passed in the previous administration that benefitted the top 1% of Americans, the American Rescue Plan helped working people—and left no one behind.
And it worked. It created jobs. Lots of jobs.
In fact—our economy created over 6.5 Million new jobs just last year, more jobs created in one year
than ever before in the history of America.
Our economy grew at a rate of 5.7% last year, the strongest growth in nearly 40 years, the first step in bringing fundamental change to an economy that hasn’t worked for the working people of this nation for too long.
For the past 40 years we were told that if we gave tax breaks to those at the very top, the benefits would trickle down to everyone else.
But that trickle-down theory led to weaker economic growth, lower wages, bigger deficits, and the widest gap between those at the top and everyone else in nearly a century.
Vice President Harris and I ran for office with a new economic vision for America.
Invest in America. Educate Americans. Grow the workforce. Build the economy from the bottom up
and the middle out, not from the top down.
Because we know that when the middle class grows, the poor have a ladder up and the wealthy do very well.
America used to have the best roads, bridges, and airports on Earth.
Now our infrastructure is ranked 13th in the world.
We won’t be able to compete for the jobs of the 21st Century if we don’t fix that.
That’s why it was so important to pass the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law—the most sweeping investment to rebuild America in history.
This was a bipartisan effort, and I want to thank the members of both parties who worked to make it happen.
We’re done talking about infrastructure weeks.
We’re going to have an infrastructure decade.
It is going to transform America and put us on a path to win the economic competition of the 21st Century that we face with the rest of the world—particularly with China.
As I’ve told Xi Jinping, it is never a good bet to bet against the American people.
We’ll create good jobs for millions of Americans, modernizing roads, airports, ports, and waterways all across America.
And we’ll do it all to withstand the devastating effects of the climate crisis and promote environmental justice.
We’ll build a national network of 500,000 electric vehicle charging stations, begin to replace poisonous lead pipes—so every child—and every American—has clean water to drink at home and at school, provide affordable high-speed internet for every American—urban, suburban, rural, and tribal communities.
4,000 projects have already been announced.
And tonight, I’m announcing that this year we will start fixing over 65,000 miles of highway and 1,500 bridges in disrepair.
When we use taxpayer dollars to rebuild America – we are going to Buy American: buy American products to support American jobs.
The federal government spends about $600 Billion a year to keep the country safe and secure.
There’s been a law on the books for almost a century
to make sure taxpayers’ dollars support American jobs and businesses.
Every Administration says they’ll do it, but we are actually doing it.
We will buy American to make sure everything from the deck of an aircraft carrier to the steel on highway guardrails are made in America.
But to compete for the best jobs of the future, we also need to level the playing field with China and other competitors.
That’s why it is so important to pass the Bipartisan Innovation Act sitting in Congress that will make record investments in emerging technologies and American manufacturing.
Let me give you one example of why it’s so important to pass it.
If you travel 20 miles east of Columbus, Ohio, you’ll find 1,000 empty acres of land.
It won’t look like much, but if you stop and look closely, you’ll see a “Field of dreams,” the ground on which America’s future will be built.
This is where Intel, the American company that helped build Silicon Valley, is going to build its $20 billion semiconductor “mega site”.
Up to eight state-of-the-art factories in one place. 10,000 new good-paying jobs.
Some of the most sophisticated manufacturing in the world to make computer chips the size of a fingertip that power the world and our everyday lives.
Smartphones. The Internet. Technology we have yet to invent.
But that’s just the beginning.
Intel’s CEO, Pat Gelsinger, who is here tonight, told me they are ready to increase their investment from
$20 billion to $100 billion.
That would be one of the biggest investments in manufacturing in American history.
And all they’re waiting for is for you to pass this bill.
So let’s not wait any longer. Send it to my desk. I’ll sign it.
And we will really take off.
And Intel is not alone.
There’s something happening in America.
Just look around and you’ll see an amazing story.
The rebirth of the pride that comes from stamping products “Made In America.” The revitalization of American manufacturing.
Companies are choosing to build new factories here, when just a few years ago, they would have built them overseas.
That’s what is happening. Ford is investing $11 billion to build electric vehicles, creating 11,000 jobs across the country.
GM is making the largest investment in its history—$7 billion to build electric vehicles, creating 4,000 jobs in Michigan.
All told, we created 369,000 new manufacturing jobs in America just last year.
Powered by people I’ve met like JoJo Burgess, from generations of union steelworkers from Pittsburgh, who’s here with us tonight.
As Ohio Senator Sherrod Brown says, “It’s time to bury the label “Rust Belt.”
It’s time.
But with all the bright spots in our economy, record job growth and higher wages, too many families are struggling to keep up with the bills.
Inflation is robbing them of the gains they might otherwise feel.
I get it. That’s why my top priority is getting prices under control.
Look, our economy roared back faster than most predicted, but the pandemic meant that businesses had a hard time hiring enough workers to keep up production in their factories.
The pandemic also disrupted global supply chains.
When factories close, it takes longer to make goods and get them from the warehouse to the store, and prices go up.
Look at cars.
Last year, there weren’t enough semiconductors to make all the cars that people wanted to buy.
And guess what, prices of automobiles went up.
So—we have a choice.
One way to fight inflation is to drive down wages and make Americans poorer.
I have a better plan to fight inflation.
Lower your costs, not your wages.
Make more cars and semiconductors in America.
More infrastructure and innovation in America.
More goods moving faster and cheaper in America.
More jobs where you can earn a good living in America.
And instead of relying on foreign supply chains, let’s make it in America.
Economists call it “increasing the productive capacity of our economy.”
I call it building a better America.
My plan to fight inflation will lower your costs and lower the deficit.
17 Nobel laureates in economics say my plan will ease long-term inflationary pressures. Top business leaders and most Americans support my plan. And here’s the plan:
First – cut the cost of prescription drugs. Just look at insulin. One in ten Americans has diabetes. In Virginia, I met a 13-year-old boy named Joshua Davis.
He and his Dad both have Type 1 diabetes, which means they need insulin every day. Insulin costs about $10 a vial to make.
But drug companies charge families like Joshua and his Dad up to 30 times more. I spoke with Joshua’s mom.
Imagine what it’s like to look at your child who needs insulin and have no idea how you’re going to pay for it.
What it does to your dignity, your ability to look your child in the eye, to be the parent you expect to be.
Joshua is here with us tonight. Yesterday was his birthday. Happy birthday, buddy.
For Joshua, and for the 200,000 other young people with Type 1 diabetes, let’s cap the cost of insulin at $35 a month so everyone can afford it.
Drug companies will still do very well. And while we’re at it let Medicare negotiate lower prices for prescription drugs, like the VA already does.
Look, the American Rescue Plan is helping millions of families on Affordable Care Act plans save $2,400 a year on their health care premiums. Let’s close the coverage gap and make those savings permanent.
Second – cut energy costs for families an average of $500 a year by combatting climate change.
Let’s provide investments and tax credits to weatherize your homes and businesses to be energy efficient and you get a tax credit; double America’s clean energy production in solar, wind, and so much more; lower the price of electric vehicles, saving you another $80 a month because you’ll never have to pay at the gas pump again.
Third – cut the cost of child care. Many families pay up to $14,000 a year for child care per child.
Middle-class and working families shouldn’t have to pay more than 7% of their income for care of young children.
My plan will cut the cost in half for most families and help parents, including millions of women, who left the workforce during the pandemic because they couldn’t afford child care, to be able to get back to work.
My plan doesn’t stop there. It also includes home and long-term care. More affordable housing. And Pre-K for every 3- and 4-year-old.
All of these will lower costs.
And under my plan, nobody earning less than $400,000 a year will pay an additional penny in new taxes. Nobody.
The one thing all Americans agree on is that the tax system is not fair. We have to fix it.
I’m not looking to punish anyone. But let’s make sure corporations and the wealthiest Americans start paying their fair share.
Just last year, 55 Fortune 500 corporations earned $40 billion in profits and paid zero dollars in federal income tax.
That’s simply not fair. That’s why I’ve proposed a 15% minimum tax rate for corporations.
We got more than 130 countries to agree on a global minimum tax rate so companies can’t get out of paying their taxes at home by shipping jobs and factories overseas.
That’s why I’ve proposed closing loopholes so the very wealthy don’t pay a lower tax rate than a teacher or a firefighter.
So that’s my plan. It will grow the economy and lower costs for families.
So what are we waiting for? Let’s get this done. And while you’re at it, confirm my nominees to the Federal Reserve, which plays a critical role in fighting inflation.
My plan will not only lower costs to give families a fair shot, it will lower the deficit.
The previous Administration not only ballooned the deficit with tax cuts for the very wealthy and corporations, it undermined the watchdogs whose job was to keep pandemic relief funds from being wasted.
But in my administration, the watchdogs have been welcomed back.
We’re going after the criminals who stole billions in relief money meant for small businesses and millions of Americans.
And tonight, I’m announcing that the Justice Department will name a chief prosecutor for pandemic fraud.
By the end of this year, the deficit will be down to less than half what it was before I took office.
The only president ever to cut the deficit by more than one trillion dollars in a single year.
Lowering your costs also means demanding more competition.
I’m a capitalist, but capitalism without competition isn’t capitalism.
It’s exploitation—and it drives up prices.
When corporations don’t have to compete, their profits go up, your prices go up, and small businesses and family farmers and ranchers go under.
We see it happening with ocean carriers moving goods in and out of America.
During the pandemic, these foreign-owned companies raised prices by as much as 1,000% and made record profits.
Tonight, I’m announcing a crackdown on these companies overcharging American businesses and consumers.
And as Wall Street firms take over more nursing homes, quality in those homes has gone down and costs have gone up.
That ends on my watch.
Medicare is going to set higher standards for nursing homes and make sure your loved ones get the care they deserve and expect.
We’ll also cut costs and keep the economy going strong by giving workers a fair shot, provide more training and apprenticeships, hire them based on their skills not degrees.
Let’s pass the Paycheck Fairness Act and paid leave.
Raise the minimum wage to $15 an hour and extend the Child Tax Credit, so no one has to raise a family in poverty.
Let’s increase Pell Grants and increase our historic support of HBCUs, and invest in what Jill—our First Lady who teaches full-time—calls America’s best-kept secret: community colleges.
And let’s pass the PRO Act when a majority of workers want to form a union—they shouldn’t be stopped.
When we invest in our workers, when we build the economy from the bottom up and the middle out together, we can do something we haven’t done in a long time: build a better America.
For more than two years, COVID-19 has impacted every decision in our lives and the life of the nation.
And I know you’re tired, frustrated, and exhausted.
But I also know this.
Because of the progress we’ve made, because of your resilience and the tools we have, tonight I can say
we are moving forward safely, back to more normal routines.
We’ve reached a new moment in the fight against COVID-19, with severe cases down to a level not seen since last July.
Just a few days ago, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention—the CDC—issued new mask guidelines.
Under these new guidelines, most Americans in most of the country can now be mask free.
And based on the projections, more of the country will reach that point across the next couple of weeks.
Thanks to the progress we have made this past year, COVID-19 need no longer control our lives.
I know some are talking about “living with COVID-19”. Tonight – I say that we will never just accept living with COVID-19.
We will continue to combat the virus as we do other diseases. And because this is a virus that mutates and spreads, we will stay on guard.
Here are four common sense steps as we move forward safely.
First, stay protected with vaccines and treatments. We know how incredibly effective vaccines are. If you’re vaccinated and boosted you have the highest degree of protection.
We will never give up on vaccinating more Americans. Now, I know parents with kids under 5 are eager to see a vaccine authorized for their children.
The scientists are working hard to get that done and we’ll be ready with plenty of vaccines when they do.
We’re also ready with anti-viral treatments. If you get COVID-19, the Pfizer pill reduces your chances of ending up in the hospital by 90%.
We’ve ordered more of these pills than anyone in the world. And Pfizer is working overtime to get us 1 Million pills this month and more than double that next month.
And we’re launching the “Test to Treat” initiative so people can get tested at a pharmacy, and if they’re positive, receive antiviral pills on the spot at no cost.
If you’re immunocompromised or have some other vulnerability, we have treatments and free high-quality masks.
We’re leaving no one behind or ignoring anyone’s needs as we move forward.
And on testing, we have made hundreds of millions of tests available for you to order for free.
Even if you already ordered free tests tonight, I am announcing that you can order more from covidtests.gov starting next week.
Second – we must prepare for new variants. Over the past year, we’ve gotten much better at detecting new variants.
If necessary, we’ll be able to deploy new vaccines within 100 days instead of many more months or years.
And, if Congress provides the funds we need, we’ll have new stockpiles of tests, masks, and pills ready if needed.
I cannot promise a new variant won’t come. But I can promise you we’ll do everything within our power to be ready if it does.
Third – we can end the shutdown of schools and businesses. We have the tools we need.
It’s time for Americans to get back to work and fill our great downtowns again. People working from home can feel safe to begin to return to the office.
We’re doing that here in the federal government. The vast majority of federal workers will once again work in person.
Our schools are open. Let’s keep it that way. Our kids need to be in school.
And with 75% of adult Americans fully vaccinated and hospitalizations down by 77%, most Americans can remove their masks, return to work, stay in the classroom, and move forward safely.
We achieved this because we provided free vaccines, treatments, tests, and masks.
Of course, continuing this costs money.
I will soon send Congress a request.
The vast majority of Americans have used these tools and may want to again, so I expect Congress to pass it quickly.
Fourth, we will continue vaccinating the world.
We’ve sent 475 Million vaccine doses to 112 countries, more than any other nation.
And we won’t stop.
We have lost so much to COVID-19. Time with one another. And worst of all, so much loss of life.
Let’s use this moment to reset. Let’s stop looking at COVID-19 as a partisan dividing line and see it for what it is: A God-awful disease.
Let’s stop seeing each other as enemies, and start seeing each other for who we really are: Fellow Americans.
We can’t change how divided we’ve been. But we can change how we move forward—on COVID-19 and other issues we must face together.
I recently visited the New York City Police Department days after the funerals of Officer Wilbert Mora and his partner, Officer Jason Rivera.
They were responding to a 9-1-1 call when a man shot and killed them with a stolen gun.
Officer Mora was 27 years old.
Officer Rivera was 22.
Both Dominican Americans who’d grown up on the same streets they later chose to patrol as police officers.
I spoke with their families and told them that we are forever in debt for their sacrifice, and we will carry on their mission to restore the trust and safety every community deserves.
I’ve worked on these issues a long time.
I know what works: Investing in crime preventionand community police officers who’ll walk the beat, who’ll know the neighborhood, and who can restore trust and safety.
So let’s not abandon our streets. Or choose between safety and equal justice.
Let’s come together to protect our communities, restore trust, and hold law enforcement accountable.
That’s why the Justice Department required body cameras, banned chokeholds, and restricted no-knock warrants for its officers.
That’s why the American Rescue Plan provided $350 Billion that cities, states, and counties can use to hire more police and invest in proven strategies like community violence interruption—trusted messengers breaking the cycle of violence and trauma and giving young people hope.
We should all agree: The answer is not to Defund the police. The answer is to FUND the police with the resources and training they need to protect our communities.
I ask Democrats and Republicans alike: Pass my budget and keep our neighborhoods safe.
And I will keep doing everything in my power to crack down on gun trafficking and ghost guns you can buy online and make at home—they have no serial numbers and can’t be traced.
And I ask Congress to pass proven measures to reduce gun violence. Pass universal background checks. Why should anyone on a terrorist list be able to purchase a weapon?
Ban assault weapons and high-capacity magazines.
Repeal the liability shield that makes gun manufacturers the only industry in America that can’t be sued.
These laws don’t infringe on the Second Amendment. They save lives.
The most fundamental right in America is the right to vote – and to have it counted. And it’s under assault.
In state after state, new laws have been passed, not only to suppress the vote, but to subvert entire elections.
We cannot let this happen.
Tonight. I call on the Senate to: Pass the Freedom to Vote Act. Pass the John Lewis Voting Rights Act. And while you’re at it, pass the Disclose Act so Americans can know who is funding our elections.
Tonight, I’d like to honor someone who has dedicated his life to serve this country: Justice Stephen Breyer—an Army veteran, Constitutional scholar, and retiring Justice of the United States Supreme Court. Justice Breyer, thank you for your service.
One of the most serious constitutional responsibilities a President has is nominating someone to serve on the United States Supreme Court.
And I did that 4 days ago, when I nominated Circuit Court of Appeals Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson. One of our nation’s top legal minds, who will continue Justice Breyer’s legacy of excellence.
A former top litigator in private practice. A former federal public defender. And from a family of public school educators and police officers. A consensus builder. Since she’s been nominated, she’s received a broad range of support—from the Fraternal Order of Police to former judges appointed by Democrats and Republicans.
And if we are to advance liberty and justice, we need to secure the Border and fix the immigration system.
We can do both. At our border, we’ve installed new technology like cutting-edge scanners to better detect drug smuggling.
We’ve set up joint patrols with Mexico and Guatemala to catch more human traffickers.
We’re putting in place dedicated immigration judges so families fleeing persecution and violence can have their cases heard faster.
We’re securing commitments and supporting partners in South and Central America to host more refugees and secure their own borders.
We can do all this while keeping lit the torch of liberty that has led generations of immigrants to this land—my forefathers and so many of yours.
Provide a pathway to citizenship for Dreamers, those on temporary status, farm workers, and essential workers.
Revise our laws so businesses have the workers they need and families don’t wait decades to reunite.
It’s not only the right thing to do—it’s the economically smart thing to do.
That’s why immigration reform is supported by everyone from labor unions to religious leaders to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce.
Let’s get it done once and for all.
Advancing liberty and justice also requires protecting the rights of women.
The constitutional right affirmed in Roe v. Wade—standing precedent for half a century—is under attack as never before.
If we want to go forward—not backward—we must protect access to health care. Preserve a woman’s right to choose. And let’s continue to advance maternal health care in America.
And for our LGBTQ+ Americans, let’s finally get the bipartisan Equality Act to my desk. The onslaught of state laws targeting transgender Americans and their families is wrong.
As I said last year, especially to our younger transgender Americans, I will always have your back as your President, so you can be yourself and reach your God-given potential.
While it often appears that we never agree, that isn’t true. I signed 80 bipartisan bills into law last year. From preventing government shutdowns to protecting Asian-Americans from still-too-common hate crimes to reforming military justice.
And soon, we’ll strengthen the Violence Against Women Act that I first wrote three decades ago. It is important for us to show the nation that we can come together and do big things.
So tonight I’m offering a Unity Agenda for the Nation. Four big things we can do together.
First, beat the opioid epidemic.
There is so much we can do. Increase funding for prevention, treatment, harm reduction, and recovery.
Get rid of outdated rules that stop doctors from prescribing treatments. And stop the flow of illicit drugs by working with state and local law enforcement to go after traffickers.
If you’re suffering from addiction, know you are not alone. I believe in recovery, and I celebrate the 23 million Americans in recovery.
Second, let’s take on mental health. Especially among our children, whose lives and education have been turned upside down.
The American Rescue Plan gave schools money to hire teachers and help students make up for lost learning.
I urge every parent to make sure your school does just that. And we can all play a part—sign up to be a tutor or a mentor.
Children were also struggling before the pandemic. Bullying, violence, trauma, and the harms of social media.
As Frances Haugen, who is here with us tonight, has shown, we must hold social media platforms accountable for the national experiment they’re conducting on our children for profit.
It’s time to strengthen privacy protections, ban targeted advertising to children, demand tech companies stop collecting personal data on our children.
And let’s get all Americans the mental health services they need. More people they can turn to for help, and full parity between physical and mental health care.
Third, support our veterans.
Veterans are the best of us.
I’ve always believed that we have a sacred obligation to equip all those we send to war and care for them and their families when they come home.
My administration is providing assistance with job training and housing, and now helping lower-income veterans get VA care debt-free.
Our troops in Iraq and Afghanistan faced many dangers.
One was stationed at bases and breathing in toxic smoke from “burn pits” that incinerated wastes of war—medical and hazard material, jet fuel, and more.
When they came home, many of the world’s fittest and best trained warriors were never the same.
Headaches. Numbness. Dizziness.
A cancer that would put them in a flag-draped coffin.
I know.
One of those soldiers was my son Major Beau Biden.
We don’t know for sure if a burn pit was the cause of his brain cancer, or the diseases of so many of our troops.
But I’m committed to finding out everything we can.
Committed to military families like Danielle Robinson from Ohio.
The widow of Sergeant First Class Heath Robinson.
He was born a soldier. Army National Guard. Combat medic in Kosovo and Iraq.
Stationed near Baghdad, just yards from burn pits the size of football fields.
Heath’s widow Danielle is here with us tonight. They loved going to Ohio State football games. He loved building Legos with their daughter.
But cancer from prolonged exposure to burn pits ravaged Heath’s lungs and body.
Danielle says Heath was a fighter to the very end.
He didn’t know how to stop fighting, and neither did she.
Through her pain she found purpose to demand we do better.
Tonight, Danielle—we are.
The VA is pioneering new ways of linking toxic exposures to diseases, already helping more veterans get benefits.
And tonight, I’m announcing we’re expanding eligibility to veterans suffering from nine respiratory cancers.
I’m also calling on Congress: pass a law to make sure veterans devastated by toxic exposures in Iraq and Afghanistan finally get the benefits and comprehensive health care they deserve.
And fourth, let’s end cancer as we know it.
This is personal to me and Jill, to Kamala, and to so many of you.
Cancer is the #2 cause of death in America–second only to heart disease.
Last month, I announced our plan to supercharge
the Cancer Moonshot that President Obama asked me to lead six years ago.
Our goal is to cut the cancer death rate by at least 50% over the next 25 years, turn more cancers from death sentences into treatable diseases.
More support for patients and families.
To get there, I call on Congress to fund ARPA-H, the Advanced Research Projects Agency for Health.
It’s based on DARPA—the Defense Department project that led to the Internet, GPS, and so much more.
ARPA-H will have a singular purpose—to drive breakthroughs in cancer, Alzheimer’s, diabetes, and more.
A unity agenda for the nation.
We can do this.
My fellow Americans—tonight , we have gathered in a sacred space—the citadel of our democracy.
In this Capitol, generation after generation, Americans have debated great questions amid great strife, and have done great things.
We have fought for freedom, expanded liberty, defeated totalitarianism and terror.
And built the strongest, freest, and most prosperous nation the world has ever known.
Now is the hour.
Our moment of responsibility.
Our test of resolve and conscience, of history itself.
It is in this moment that our character is formed. Our purpose is found. Our future is forged.
Well I know this nation.
We will meet the test.
To protect freedom and liberty, to expand fairness and opportunity.
We will save democracy.
As hard as these times have been, I am more optimistic about America today than I have been my whole life.
Because I see the future that is within our grasp.
Because I know there is simply nothing beyond our capacity.
We are the only nation on Earth that has always turned every crisis we have faced into an opportunity.
The only nation that can be defined by a single word: possibilities.
So on this night, in our 245th year as a nation, I have come to report on the State of the Union.
And my report is this: the State of the Union is strong—because you, the American people, are strong.
We are stronger today than we were a year ago.
And we will be stronger a year from now than we are today.
Now is our moment to meet and overcome the challenges of our time.
And we will, as one people.
One America.
The United States of America.
May God bless you all. May God protect our troops.
…
By Polityk | 03/02/2022 | Повідомлення, Політика
Texas Primary: O’Rourke, Abbott Win Nominations for Governor
Texas Republican Gov. Greg Abbott easily bested a group of conservative challengers to lock up his party’s nomination Tuesday and will face Democrat Beto O’Rourke in the November general election.
O’Rourke, who nearly ousted Texas Sen. Ted Cruz in 2018, will get the chance to try for an even bigger upset in November. He’ll be an underdog against Abbott, who began the campaign with more than $50 million and hardline positions on abortion guns and immigration.
Some of those casting ballots, however, said they were worried that new restrictions on abortion, the toughest in America, go too far.
“That’s where I think Greg Abbott and the current Republicans kind of crossed the line,” said Eric Medrano, 25, a longshoreman in Houston who voted for one of Abbott’s far-right challengers, Don Huffines. He added, “I don’t believe (abortion) should be banned at such an early, early stage.”
In the GOP attorney general primary, incumbent Ken Paxton is facing several challengers, including Texas Land Commissioner George P. Bush, the nephew of one president and grandson of another, and U.S. Rep. Louie Gohmert. Paxton led a failed lawsuit to overturn the 2020 election and has for years faced securities fraud charges and an FBI investigation into corruption allegations. He has broadly denied wrongdoing.
Democrats face challenges of their own. Nine-term U.S. Rep. Henry Cuellar is hoping to avoid becoming the first Democratic member of Congress to lose a primary this year. He’s facing progressive Jessica Cisneros and is contending with the fallout of a recent FBI raid on his home, though he’s denied wrongdoing.
Still, in America’s largest Republican state, much of the focus is on the GOP’s rightward lurch.
Texas’ rapid growth — driven by more than 4 million new residents — has shifted once solidly red suburbs away from Republicans. But the GOP has countered that with redrawn maps that left fewer competitive congressional districts along with dramatic new voting restrictions.
Thousands of mail-in ballot applications — and actual ballots — were rejected under the new requirements. Most of those were because voters did not include newly mandated identification, worrying local elections officials that many won’t correct problems to have their vote count.
Absent poll workers and technical hiccups also caused isolated delays in two major cities on Tuesday.
In Houston, morning voters were left standing in line or looking for polling places after a Harris County website that directs people to nearby voting sites went down temporarily.
Also, a handful of Democratic poll workers in Fort Worth did not show up as scheduled, delaying the opening of some party polling places in Tarrant County. New state law requires each party to have a separate setup at voting sites.
The primary is also a first test of the Republicans’ more aggressive courting of Hispanic voters — and even before polls closed, they were celebrating.
Counties along the state’s border with Mexico, long a stronghold for Democrats, were on track to smash Republican turnout levels compared with recent elections. It is the latest warning sign for Democrats who are trying to hold the line with Hispanic voters who swung toward former President Donald Trump in 2020.
After Texas, primaries in other states won’t resume until May. That means results here could be viewed for months as a measure of the nation’s political mood.
Republicans are betting that Texas’ primaries will be the first step toward them retaking Congress in November, pointing to President Joe Biden’s low approval ratings, spiking inflation and anger about the chaotic withdrawal of U.S. forces from Afghanistan.
History is also on the GOP’s side. The party controlling the White House has lost congressional seats in the first midterm race every election cycle this century except in 2002, after the September 11 terrorist attacks.
your ad hereBy Polityk | 03/02/2022 | Повідомлення, Політика
Many Capitol Riot Cases Could Hinge on 1st Trial’s Outcome
The Justice Department launched one of the largest and most complex criminal investigations in its history after a mob of Donald Trump supporters stormed the U.S. Capitol over a year ago. Now it’s time for a jury to hear some of the government’s evidence about the unparalleled attack on American democracy.
The first trial for one of the hundreds of Capitol riot prosecutions begins this week, with jury selection starting Monday in the case against Guy Wesley Reffitt. The Texas man is charged with bringing a gun onto Capitol grounds, interfering with police officers guarding the building, and threatening his teenage children if they reported him to authorities. Jurors could hear attorneys’ opening statements as soon as Tuesday.
Reffitt’s trial may be a bellwether for many other Capitol riot cases. A conviction would give prosecutors more leverage in plea talks with rioters facing the most serious charges. An acquittal may lead others to wait for their own day in court.
Reffitt “truly is the canary in the coal mine,” said Gregg Sofer, a former federal prosecutor who served as U.S. attorney for the Western District of Texas from October 2020 to February 2021.
“It’ll really be interesting to see how strong a case the government has and whether or not they’re relying on evidence that, when pushed and tested, stands up. It’s going to have a huge impact going forward,” added Sofer, now a partner at the law firm Husch Blackwell.
Reffitt is a member of a militia-style group called the “Texas Three Percenters,” according to prosecutors. The Three Percenters militia movement refers to the myth that only 3% of Americans fought in the Revolutionary War against the British.
On Jan. 6, 2021, Reffitt was armed with a handgun in a holster on his waist, carrying zip-tie handcuffs and wearing body armor and a helmet equipped with a video camera when he and others charged at police officers on the west side of the Capitol, according to prosecutors.
“This action caused the police line guarding the building to retreat closer to the building itself; soon after this, law enforcement was overwhelmed, and rioters flooded the building,” prosecutors wrote in a court filing.
Reffitt retreated only after an officer pepper sprayed him in the face, prosecutors said.
Prosecutors believe Reffitt took at least two firearms with him to Washington: an AR-15 rifle and a Smith & Wesson pistol. When FBI agents searched Reffitt’s home in Wylie, Texas, they found a handgun in a holster on a nightstand in the defendant’s bedroom. Prosecutors say photos and video of Reffitt during the riot show a handgun holster on his right hip, with what appears to be a silver object inside the holster.
On the morning of Jan. 6, Reffitt said he planned to “do the recon and then come back for weapons hot” and sent messages about meeting at a “rendezvous point,” according to prosecutors.
“These messages, along with the weapons that Reffitt carried and the gear he wore, make clear that the defendant did not come to D.C. with the intention to engage in peaceful activity,” prosecutors wrote.
The siege resulted in the deaths of five people, including a police officer. The Justice Department says more than 235 rioters have been charged with assaulting or impeding law enforcement, injuring over 100 officers. Rioters caused over $1 million in damage to the Capitol.
The Justice Department says its investigation has generated an unprecedented volume of evidence, with hundreds of thousands of documents and thousands of hours of videos to share with defense attorneys. Shared files total more than nine terabytes of information and would take over 100 days to view, the department says.
More than 750 people have been charged with federal crimes related to the riot. Over 200 of them have pleaded guilty, mostly to misdemeanors carrying a maximum sentence of six months’ imprisonment. More than 100 riot defendants have been sentenced. And at least 90 others have trial dates this year.
Philadelphia-based defense attorney Justin Danilewitz, who was a federal prosecutor in New Jersey from 2012 to 2017, said a conviction in Reffitt’s case may lead to a flurry of guilty pleas by other riot defendants.
“And that can benefit defendants on occasion because it’s better than the alternative if the alternative is a conviction following a trial,” Danilewitz added.
An acquittal could inspire other defendants to “dig in their heels” and either push for a better plea offer from prosecutors or gamble a trial of their own, he said.
Defense attorney William Welch has said there is no evidence that Reffitt damaged property, used force or physically harmed anybody. In a May 2021 court filing, Welch said none of the videos or photos shows a gun in Reffitt’s possession at the Capitol.
“In fact, neither of the police officers interviewed by the government said anything about a firearm,” he wrote.
Reffitt has been jailed since his arrest in Texas less than a week after the riot. He faces five counts: obstruction of an official proceeding, being unlawfully present on Capitol grounds while armed with a firearm, transporting firearms during a civil disorder, interfering with law enforcement officers during a civil disorder, and obstruction of justice.
The obstructing justice charge stems from threats that he allegedly made against his son, then 18, and daughter, then 16, after returning home from Washington. Reffett told his children to “choose a side or die” and said they would be traitors if they reported him to law enforcement, prosecutors said.
“He predicted future political violence in statements both to his family and to fellow militia members, bragged to fellow militia members about his involvement in the riot, recruited other rioters into the militia, and ordered bear spray and riot shields to his home to prepare for further violence,” prosecutors wrote.
Messages recovered from Reffitt’s cellphone indicate he planned to join an armed insurrection on Jan. 6 and intended to occupy the Capitol, prosecutors said.
“We had thousands of weapons and fired no rounds yet showed numbers. The next time we will not be so cordial,” he wrote, according to prosecutors.
Presiding over Reffitt’s trial is U.S. District Judge Dabney Friedrich, who was nominated by President Donald Trump in 2017. Friedrich already has sentenced nine rioters who pleaded guilty.
Friedrich individually questioned more than 30 prospective jurors on Monday, asking them how closely they have followed news coverage of the Capitol riot. Some said they had formed strong, negative opinions about the events of Jan. 6 but could strive to be fair and impartial.
The judge disqualified several members of the jury pool who said they would have difficulty setting aside their opinions or emotions about the riot. One of them, a man who lives near the Capitol, said the riot felt like “an attack on my home in some sense.”
“It was a very scary time,” he told the judge.
Jury selection is scheduled to resume Tuesday. The judge said she hopes to empanel a jury to hear opening statements later in the day.
Prosecutors expect to call about a dozen witnesses, including three Capitol police officers who interacted with Reffitt and an officer who was in charge of the U.S. Capitol Police command center.
Jurors will see videos that captured Reffitt’s confrontation with police. Prosecutors also have audio recordings of Reffitt talking about the riot inside his home after returning home.
“We made a point. That was a historic day,” Refffitt said during one of the recorded conversations, according to prosecutors. “And guess what? I’m not done yet. I got a lot more to do. That’s the beginning.”
Reffitt’s son, daughter and a fellow Texas Three Percenter group member also are listed as government witnesses. The group members traveled with Reffitt to Washington and back to Texas between Jan. 4 and Jan. 8, 2021.
“During the drive (to Washington), Reffitt talked about ‘dragging those people out of the Capitol by their ankles’ and installing a new government,” prosecutors wrote.
A court filing that refers to the other militia member by the initials “R.H.” says the man will tell jurors he was given immunity from prosecution in exchange for his testimony.
Welch has said Reffiitt worked as a rig manager and as a consultant in the petroleum industry before COVID-19 restrictions effectively shut down his business.
…
By Polityk | 03/01/2022 | Повідомлення, Політика
Capitol Ditches Mask Requirement Ahead of State of the Union
Face coverings are now optional for President Joe Biden’s State of the Union address Tuesday, as Congress is lifting its mask requirement on the House floor after federal regulators eased guidelines last week in a rethinking of the nation’s strategy to adapt to living with a more manageable COVID-19.
Congress’ Office of the Attending Physician announced the policy change Sunday, lifting a requirement that has been in place for much of the past two years and had become a partisan flashpoint on Capitol Hill. The change ahead of the speech will avoid a potential disruptive display of national tensions and frustration as Biden tries to nudge the country to move beyond the pandemic.
The nation’s capital is now in an area considered low risk under the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s new metrics, which place less of a focus on positive test results and more on what’s happening in community hospitals. The new system greatly changes the look of the CDC’s risk map and puts more than 70% of the U.S. population in counties where the coronavirus is posing a low or medium threat to hospitals. Healthy people in those risk areas can stop wearing masks indoors, the agency said.
Mask-wearing will still be a personal choice in Congress and special precautions will be in place for Biden’s speech, which unlike last year’s joint address will be open to all members of Congress. All attendees will be required to take a COVID-19 test before entering the chamber ahead of Biden’s address.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi announced initial guidelines earlier this month from the Office of the Sergeant at Arms that included a threat that violation of guidelines for social distancing and mask wearing during the event would “result in the attendee’s removal.”
The new policy eases the fears of some Biden allies who had been gearing up for potentially disruptive protests from Republicans to the policies. Some GOP lawmakers have racked up thousands of dollars in fines for violating mask-wearing mandates on the House floor.
The relaxed guidance comes as Biden aims to use his remarks to highlight the progress against COVID-19 made over the last year, including vaccinations and therapeutics, and guide the country into a “new phase” of the virus response that is not driven by emergency measures and looks more like life pre-pandemic.
Seating for Biden’s first address to a joint session of Congress, last April, was capped at about 200 — about 20% of usual capacity for a presidential presentation — and White House aides fretted that a repeat would be a dissonant image from the message the president aimed to deliver to the American people.
“I think you’re going to see it look much more like a normal state of the union than the president’s joint address,” White House chief of staff Ron Klain said Saturday. “It’s going to look like the most normal thing people have seen in Washington in a long time.”
The Capitol move comes just a day before Washington’s mask mandate expires on Monday, and as a host of states and local governments have begun implementing the new CDC guidelines and lifting mask-mandates indoors and in schools.
Caseloads across the country have dropped precipitously since their early January peak, with the omicron variant proving to be less likely than earlier strains to cause death or serious illness, especially in vaccinated and boosted individuals.
…
By Polityk | 02/28/2022 | Повідомлення, Політика
US Offshore Wind Rights Auction Generates Record Bids
The use of wind to generate electricity for the United States has been thrust forward with the largest-ever offering by the federal government of offshore development rights.
Three days of bidding, which ended Friday, for the 197,000 hectares of the New York Bight — an area of shallow waters between the coasts of Long Island (in New York state) and the state of New Jersey — attracted record-setting prices, according to the federal Bureau of Ocean Energy Management.
“This week’s offshore wind sale makes one thing clear: the enthusiasm for the clean energy economy is undeniable and it’s here to stay,” said Interior Secretary Deb Haaland in a statement after the auction concluded.
Europe is much further along than North America in developing lease areas for offshore wind farms.
There are two small offshore wind facilities in the United States off the coasts of the states of Rhode Island and Virginia. Two more commercial-scale projects were recently approved for development.
“We’re really just at the beginning of a process here. We hope to apply the lessons learned from Europe and take advantage of the cost savings achieved in Europe,” said Fred Zalcman, director of the New York Offshore Wind Alliance, speaking with VOA.
Officials say turbines erected in the set of six leases that went up for bidding Wednesday could eventually provide power for nearly 2 million residences. It was the first auction conducted during the administration of U.S. President Joe Biden.
Friday’s top provisional final bids totaled nearly $4.4 billion. The largest single lease area offered – totaling nearly 51,000 hectares and located about 50 kilometers off the New Jersey coast — attracted a record-busting $1.1 billion bid.
The previous auction was held in 2018 during the administration of former President Donald Trump. It was considered a success, with three leases off the coast of the state of Massachusetts bringing in a collective record-breaking $405 million for rights to develop 158,000 hectares south of Martha’s Vineyard, with a potential generating capacity of more than 4.1 gigawatts, enough to supply power to about 1.5 million homes.
Trump, a Republican, repeatedly expressed, at best, skepticism toward wind as a viable renewable source to supply America’s energy needs. He derided “windmills,” saying he had been told the noise from their blades “causes cancer” and “it’s like a graveyard for birds.”
Biden, a Democrat, has veered in a different direction, embracing wind as part of his clean energy ambitions and setting a goal of 30 gigawatts of capacity in the United States by the year 2030.
In his first week in office in 2021, Biden signed an executive order to expand opportunities for the offshore wind industry, predicting, according to the White House, the projects “will create good-paying union jobs” and “spawn new supply chains that stretch into America’s heartland.”
The area included in the ongoing auction, which began with 25 qualified bidders, was cut back by about one-fourth from what was initially proposed last year due to concerns about the potential impact on commercial fishing and military interests.
State and federal officials, according to Zalcman, have been addressing concerns of other ocean users, including recreational and commercial fishers, navigators and the shipping industry, and taking into consideration visual impacts to coastal communities, and concerns of environmental groups about migratory species, such as the North Atlantic Right Whale.
A group of residents of the New Jersey summer colony of Long Beach last month sued BOEM over the New York Bight leasing plans, contending the massive wind farm would permanently mar their beautiful view from the beach, hurt the area’s tourism economy and harm property values.
Bob Stern, the president of Save Long Beach Island, told VOA on Wednesday that the organization “is not opposed to offshore wind energy but believes that the federal government’s process of selecting ocean areas for turbine placement is flawed.”
Stern explained that the group’s lawsuit challenges the federal government agency’s selection of “wind energy areas” for offshore wind turbines which “should have been preceded and supported by a structured regional environmental impact statement process with full disclosure of impacts and public input.”
The Sierra Club is calling the New York Bight auction a historic major stride forward for clean energy.
“This lease sale is the first to include stipulations setting out responsibilities for project developers to report on their engagement with stakeholders to minimize conflicting uses, negotiation of project labor agreements, and the development of offshore wind-related manufacturing and supply chain services,” said Allison Considine, a senior campaign representative of the national environmental organization.
A preeminent concern is ensuring that these projects are done responsibly, said Zalcman of the New York Offshore Wind Alliance, of which the Sierra Club is a member.
How developers configure the wind farms will be subject to another rigorous round of environmental review before they are able to erect the huge structures.
The federal government plans as many as seven additional lease sales by 2025, including offshore the Carolinas and California later this year, to be followed by lease sales for the Central Atlantic, Gulf of Maine, the Gulf of Mexico, and offshore Oregon.
…
By Polityk | 02/26/2022 | Повідомлення, Політика
Experts Skeptical of GOP Claim that a Second Trump Term Would Have Prevented Ukraine Invasion
In the days since it became clear that Russian President Vladimir Putin was about to order a full-scale invasion of Ukraine, many Republican politicians in the United States have taken the opportunity to suggest that if Donald Trump were still president, Putin would not have taken such a cataclysmic step.
It’s an argument that some experts on Russia policy agree with – just not for the reasons being put forward by critics of President Joe Biden, a Democrat.
The dominant narrative among many in the GOP was articulated Wednesday by South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham, who said on Fox News, “If Donald Trump were president, none of this crap would be going on, because you’ve got to be strong. When you’re weak is when everything falls apart. And Biden is weak, and Trump was strong.”
In a similar vein, as news flashed that Russia had launched its assault on Ukraine, Northeastern University political scientist and international security lecturer Max Abrahms tweeted, “Democrats and NeverTrump Republicans spent four years saying that Trump invited Russian predation and that we needed Joe Biden to restore Russian deterrence.”
But Michael O’Hanlon, director of research at the Brookings Institution and the author of the book, “Beyond NATO: A New Security Architecture for Eastern Europe,” disagreed with the idea that Putin was somehow cowed by Trump.
“The only reason that Putin might not have wanted to do this, were Trump in office, wouldn’t have been out of fear of Trump,” O’Hanlon told VOA. “It would have been affection for Trump, and not wanting to do this on the watch of his fellow strongman.”
While noting that Putin bears “100% of the moral responsibility” for the conflict in Ukraine, O’Hanlon said that the roots of Putin’s security concerns about Russia’s neighbor and NATO’s eastward expansion run very deep. They extend through the administrations of multiple U.S. presidents, during which time the alliance grew significantly and absorbed multiple states of the former Soviet Union.
Trying to reduce Putin’s reasons for action to a change in U.S. administrations, he suggested, was at best an oversimplification.
American is back
“American policymakers have had lots of indication, for a very long time, that Ukraine was a red line for Moscow,” said Joshua Shifrinson, a fellow with the Woodrow Wilson Center and an associate professor of International Relations at Boston University.
A number of events that exacerbated Russia’s concern about the country took place while Trump, not Biden, was president.
In 2019, Ukraine amended its constitution to commit the country to ultimately becoming a member of NATO. When current president Volodymyr Zelenskyy took office that year, he laid out a plan meant to expedite the country’s efforts to join the alliance.
Shifrinson said that it is just as possible to argue that Putin felt driven to act – not by weakness on Biden’s part – but rather by his strong embrace of America’s NATO allies, a group that Trump tended to keep at arm’s length, and by signals early in his presidency that he was receptive to Ukraine’s desire to join the alliance.
“By proclaiming that ‘America is back’ and signaling that maybe NATO membership was on the table, or could be on the table one day, it may have given Putin a sense that this has to be addressed sooner than later,” Shifrinson said. However, he added, “I want to be very clear that this is not to say that Biden caused Russian activities. This invasion is entirely Russia’s choice, and immoral and illegal.”
Afghanistan as driver
Another narrative coming from many Republicans draws a straight line from the United States’ withdrawal of troops in Afghanistan last year to Putin’s decision to invade Ukraine this week.
In a news conference in his home state of Kentucky Thursday, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell said, “I think the precipitous withdrawal from Afghanistan in August was a signal to Putin – and maybe to Chinese President Xi as well – that America was in retreat, that America could not be depended upon, and was an invitation to the autocrats in the world that maybe this was a good time to make a move.”
“I definitely don’t think it has anything to do with Afghanistan,” said Jeffrey Edmonds, a research scientist with CNA, a national security think tank in Northern Virginia. “The vast majority of the drivers, to my mind, happened over the course of the last two years.”
This included a lack of progress on talks related to Russia’s ongoing occupation of the Ukrainian region of Crimea, its support of breakaway enclaves in eastern Ukraine, and U.S. and NATO security assistance to Ukraine.
“Things of that nature suddenly culminated to the point where [Putin] also decided to throw in all the other grievances he’s had for decades, and to go big on this thing at some point during the last year,” Edmonds told VOA.
Trump joins discussion
Expert assessments aside, Trump himself has not missed the opportunity to agree that the invasion of Ukraine would not have taken place if he were president and to tie it to his false claim that the 2020 presidential election was stolen from him.
On Wednesday night, after praising Putin’s decision to enter Ukraine as “genius” during remarks at his Florida mansion, Mar-a-Lago, Trump appeared on Fox News with the Russian assault underway.
Trump was asked by host Laura Ingraham if he believed that a perception of “weakness” in Washington was the cause of the attack.
“I think you are exactly right,” Trump responded. Speaking of Putin, he said. “He was going to be satisfied with peace, and now he sees the weakness and the incompetence and the stupidity of this administration, and as an American, I’m angry about it, and I’m saddened by it. And it all happened because of a rigged election. This would have never happened.”
your ad hereBy Polityk | 02/25/2022 | Повідомлення, Політика
Source: Biden Interviews Trio of Candidates for Supreme Court
President Joe Biden has interviewed at least three candidates for the Supreme Court, according to a person familiar with the matter, and the White House is reiterating that he remains on track to make a final selection by Monday.
White House press secretary Jen Psaki said Tuesday that Biden had not decided whom to nominate. But the president has interviewed Judges Ketanji Brown Jackson, J. Michelle Childs and Leondra Kruger, according to a person familiar with the matter. A second person familiar said Biden had interviewed at least three candidates for the post. The people spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss the process.
Biden has pledged to nominate the first Black woman to the high court by the end of the month to fill the vacancy being created by the retirement of Justice Stephen Breyer. It was not clear whether any additional candidates have been interviewed by the president.
Psaki declined to discuss whether Biden had conducted interviews but insisted the president was “on track” to make the selection despite rising tensions between Russia and Ukraine.
Jackson was nominated by President Barack Obama to be a district judge. Biden elevated her to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. Early in her career, she was also a law clerk for Breyer.
Childs, a federal judge in South Carolina, has been nominated but not yet confirmed to serve on the same circuit court. Her name has surfaced partly because she is a favorite among some high-profile lawmakers, including Representative James Clyburn, a South Carolina Democrat.
Kruger, a graduate of Harvard University and Yale University’s law school, was previously a Supreme Court clerk and argued a dozen cases before the justices as a lawyer for the federal government before becoming a justice on the California Supreme Court.
Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell is signaling he wants a fair fight over Biden’s pick, discouraging those within his GOP ranks who are eager to interject a broader debate over race into the confirmation process.
Speaking Tuesday in Kentucky, McConnell distanced himself from GOP senators and others who have criticized Biden for declaring his intent to nominate a Black woman.
“I heard a couple of people say they thought it was inappropriate for the president to announce he was going to put an African American woman on the court. Honestly, I did not think that was inappropriate,” McConnell said.
The GOP leader drew on history to remind people that former Presidents Ronald Reagan and Donald Trump both promised to put women on the court — when Reagan tapped Sandra Day O’Connor as the first female justice and Trump chose Amy Coney Barrett to replace the late Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg. “I’m not complaining about that,” McConnell said.
More to the point, Republicans are unable to stop Biden’s pick in the 50-50 Senate where Democrats have the majority with Vice President Kamala Harris’ tie-breaking vote. They want to allow the confirmation process to unfold without self-inflicted political drama so they can resume challenging the president on their preferred topics of the economy and the administration’s handling of COVID-19.
Republicans believe one way to show voters how they would govern is by drawing a contrast between this court battle and the controversy that exploded around Justice Brett Kavanaugh’s confirmation, when the Trump nominee was accused of sexual assault, a claim he denied. Republicans believe Senate Democrats suffered with voters after those highly politicized public confirmation hearings.
“This confirmation will not occur like that,” McConnell said. He said he expects a confirmation process that Americans can be proud of. “We believe a Supreme Court nominee ought to be respectfully treated, thoroughly vetted and then voted upon.”
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By Polityk | 02/24/2022 | Повідомлення, Політика
US Lawmakers: Russia Incursion Into Ukraine Is Assault on Democracy
Top U.S. lawmakers on Wednesday called Russian President Vladimir Putin’s incursion into the occupied regions of Donetsk and Luhansk in eastern Ukraine an assault on democracy.
“It’s stunning to see – in this day and age – a tyrant rolling into a country. This is the same tyrant who attacked our democracy in 2016,” House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said in a press conference, recalling Putin’s interference in U.S. elections.
Pelosi and other top Democrats returning from participation in the Munich Security Conference this week praised President Joe Biden for working with European allies to maintain a united front in deterring Russia.
“The decision to essentially cancel the process of moving forward with the [Nord Stream 2] pipeline, I think, is a very strong indication of the solidarity of NATO and our other allies to punish Putin for this naked aggression and the prospect of further devastating sanctions,” House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff told reporters of the decision to cancel certification of the key pipeline delivering Russian gas to Europe.
Biden announced Tuesday that the U.S. also would sanction Russian officials and banks in response to Putin’s speech claiming Donetsk and Luhansk were independent of Ukraine. The White House is expected to announce additional sanctions this week.
Sequence of sanctions
Despite significant bipartisan unity for deterring Russian aggression in Ukraine, Democrats and Republicans have struggled to agree on how to sequence sanctions to discourage and penalize Putin for incursions into the independent eastern European nation.
An estimated 150,000 Russian troops have massed at the border with Ukraine in recent weeks. Putin’s claim that Donetsk and Luhansk were no longer a part of Ukraine opened the door for so-called Russian “peacekeeping” troops to go into those areas. The U.S. and its allies called this mission a false-flag operation to allow further incursion into Ukraine.
Congressional Republicans have criticized the White House’s approach to the crisis, calling the Russian leader’s move an invasion and accusing the Biden administration of waiting until it is too late to deter Putin.
Republican Senator Ben Sasse, a member of the Senate Intelligence Committee, said the first round of sanctions was “too little, too late. First, these sanctions should have happened before Putin further invaded Ukraine — not after. Second, economic sanctions now need to more aggressively target Putin’s oligarchs to make sure they feel real pain. Third, we shouldn’t fool ourselves into thinking that today’s incremental sanctions will deter Putin from trying to install a puppet government in Kyiv.”
Republican Senator Lindsey Graham, a top Capitol Hill ally of former President Donald Trump, had a direct message for Biden late Tuesday: “You said a couple years ago that Putin did not want you to win because you’re the only person that could go toe-to-toe with him. Well, right now, Mr. President, you’re playing footsie with Putin. He’s walking all over you and our allies.”
Working with allies
Democrats praised Biden, though, for working in concert with European allies and avoiding escalating the crisis.
“I think the administration handled this, given the Russian intentions, as well as it could be handled,” Schiff told reporters Wednesday. “They telegraphed in advance the punitive sanctions that would be applied if Russia invaded. I think it makes sense not to enforce those sanctions before Russia invaded. If you do that, then Russia loses its disincentive and figures, ‘Well, we’ve already been sanctioned. We might as well move forward with it.’ ”
Small minorities within both the Republican and Democratic parties have cautioned against escalating tensions with Putin.
“While we work in coordination with our European allies to respond and impose targeted sanctions, we must continue to do all we can to de-escalate and utilize the full power of diplomacy to find a negotiated solution to this crisis,” Democratic Representative Barbara Lee – the only member of Congress to vote against authorizing the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq – said in a statement Wednesday.
“I am confident in President Biden’s repeated commitment to keep U.S. military personnel out of any conflict in Ukraine itself,” Lee continued.
Several members of the conservative House Freedom Caucus have expressed concern the U.S. could become mired in a ground war in Ukraine, despite Biden’s repeated statements that the U.S. would not commit troops to the conflict.
Senator Bob Menendez and Senator Bob Risch, the top-ranking Democrat and Republican, respectively, on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, have separately introduced sanctions bills that would end Russian access to international banking transactions, provide hundreds of millions of dollars in military aid to Ukraine, and cut off funding for the Nord Stream 2 pipeline.
Congress is in recess this week and will be back in session at the end of the month.
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By Polityk | 02/23/2022 | Повідомлення, Політика
Judge Rules Trump, Eldest Children Must Testify in Fraud Case
A New York State Supreme Court judge on Thursday ruled that former President Donald Trump and his two oldest children will have to submit to questioning by the state’s attorney general in a civil investigation into potential fraud at the Trump Organization.
Attorneys representing Trump, his son Donald Trump Jr. and his daughter Ivanka Trump had moved to have subpoenas for their testimony canceled. They contended that it was improper for New York Attorney General Letitia James to be pursuing both a civil and a criminal investigation at the same time. James is cooperating in a criminal case that was brought by the district attorney of Manhattan.
Judge Arthur Engoron said that the Trumps’ legal argument “completely misses the mark” and that the attorney general was within her rights to demand testimony from Trump and his children.
However, while the name of the court on which Engoron sits, the Supreme Court of the state of New York, seems to suggest the ruling’s finality, the outcome is not so certain. The state of New York has two levels of judicial review that are above the Supreme Court — first the Appellate Division of the Supreme Court, and finally the Court of Appeals.
This means that the Trumps have the right to appeal Engoron’s ruling, something their attorneys signaled Thursday that they planned to do.
Case background
The case James is pursuing against Trump has its roots in revelations dating to the closing days of the Trump presidency, when Trump’s former personal attorney, Michael Cohen, testified before Congress that he was aware of financial irregularities in the Trump Organization’s bookkeeping.
Specifically, Cohen alleged that Trump and Allen Weisselberg, the chief financial officer of the Trump Organization, systematically under-reported the value of the company’s assets when disclosing them for tax purposes, in order to minimize the firm’s tax liability. Additionally, Cohen said, they would overstate the value of the same assets when pledging them as collateral for bank loans and other financial transactions.
Last month, James submitted a filing to the court listing multiple instances in which the Trump Organization had provided information to different parties in different transactions that was contradicted elsewhere.
In the same filing, James referred to testimony from Weisselberg indicating that Trump kept paper records of his financial transactions, but despite requests from her office, none of those records had been disclosed to investigators.
A raucous hearing
The judge’s ruling on Thursday followed a hearing Wednesday in which the attorney representing Donald Trump, Alina Habba, complained that the investigation was political in nature and ought to be shut down.
More than once, Habba had to be warned to stop interrupting Engoron when he was speaking, and she was also criticized for directly addressing Kevin Wallace, an attorney working for James’ office, a breach of courtroom protocol.
“I want to know, Mr. Wallace, Ms. James, are you going to go after Hillary Clinton for what she’s doing to my client?” Habba demanded at one point. “That she spied at Trump Tower in your state? Are you going to look into her business dealings?”
Habba was referring to a debunked claim that former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton had somehow conspired to spy on Trump while he was president.
Unsparing ruling
The claims from Trump’s attorney that James’ investigation has a political taint are based pledges she made as a candidate running for attorney general. James regularly promised to investigate Trump’s business dealings.
In his ruling, Engoron acknowledged that fact, but said that in his view, the significant evidence suggesting potential wrongdoing by the Trump Organization meant that failing to mount an investigation “would have been a blatant dereliction of duty” on James’ part.
“Indeed, the impetus for the investigation was not personal animus, not racial or ethnic or other discrimination, not campaign promises, but was sworn congressional testimony by former Trump associate Michael Cohen that respondents were ‘cooking the books’” he wrote.
Engoron also dismissed the claim by attorneys representing the Trumps that, by forcing them to testify in a civil case, the attorney general would be collecting statements that could be used against them in the criminal probe.
Engoron noted that the Trumps would retain their “absolute right” under the Fifth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution to refuse to answer any questions that they feel might incriminate them. He reminded them that a third Trump child, Eric Trump, had invoked his right more than 500 times in testimony provided in the same case.
Trump, James respond
After the ruling was issued Thursday, Trump issued a rambling statement that repeated the claim that Clinton had spied on him while he was in the White House, attacked James for comments she made about him during her run for office, and insisted there was no basis for either her civil case or the criminal case being pursued by the Manhattan district attorney.
“It is a continuation of the greatest Witch Hunt in history—and remember, I can’t get a fair hearing in New York because of the hatred of me by Judges and the judiciary. It is not possible!” Trump wrote.
“Today, justice prevailed,” James said in a statement released by her office.
It continued, “No one will be permitted to stand in the way of the pursuit of justice, no matter how powerful they are. No one is above the law.”
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By Polityk | 02/20/2022 | Повідомлення, Політика
