Summary
- Joe Biden outlined his infrastructure plan in a speech in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. The president described his proposal as a “once-in-a-generation investment in America”. “It’s big, yes. It’s bold, yes. And we can get it done,” Biden said. The plan calls for spending more than $2tn to improve the nation’s infrastructure, which the Biden administration has said will create jobs and help combat climate change.
- Biden will hold his first full cabinet meeting tomorrow, as part of his infrastructure pitch. A White House spokesperson said the president will be “discussing the role cabinet members will play in advocating for the American Jobs Plan”.
- Derek Chauvin’s trial continued in Minneapolis, where the former police officer is facing murder charges over the killing of George Floyd. One witness who testified about Floyd’s final moments, Charles McMillian, broke down crying as prosecutors played a clip of Floyd calling out for his mother as Chauvin kept a knee on his neck.
- Two US Capitol Police officers are suing Donald Trump over his role in the 6 January insurrection. The two USCP officers, James Blassingame and Sidney Hemby, accused the former president of inciting the deadly insurrection, which resulted in physical and emotional injuries for the officers.
- A Democratic congressional candidate has withdrawn a challenge to the results of her House race. Democrat Rita Hart lost the race to Republican Mariannette Miller-Meeks by six votes, but Hart insisted there were 22 ballots that should have been counted, which could have changed the outcome of the election.
Georgia lawmakers have approved a bill to invalidate a Civil War-era citizen’s arrest law, in the aftermath of the killing of Ahmaud Arbery.
The state’s governor is expected to sign the bill into law, which would make Georgia the first state to mostly do away with a citizen’s arrest statute. The reforms enacted by the bill would still allow security officers, private investigators, and off-duty officers to detain someone they believe has committed a crime.
Arbery, a 25-year-old Black man, was chased and then gunned to death by three white men. His pursuers said they suspected him of robberies, and prosecutors cited citizen’s arrest when they initially didn’t charge the assailants.
Civil rights advocates have celebrated the bill’s passage, and are pushing for similar reforms in other states. All 50 states have some form of citizen’s arrest statutes.
Republicans have sided with Democrats in support of the law, but critics say state Republicans’ support for it serves to mask lawmakers’ recent moves to heavily restrict voting access and limit Black citizens’ ability to vote.
Americans largely approve of Joe Biden’s handling of the pandemic, and his Covid-19 recovery plan – but are more divided on his handling of immigration and gun control, a new AP-NORC poll found.
Biden’s overall job approval is at 61%, the survey found. Nearly three-quarters of the 1,166 adults surveyed approved of Biden’s handling of the pandemic response. About 60% approved of his healthcare policy and economic policy, and 42% of his immigration policy.
Read more about the poll here.
Chauvin trial: cashier tells of guilt over role in events that led to George Floyd's death
The cashier who served George Floyd in a Minneapolis store immediately before his arrest and death last May told a court on Wednesday of the “disbelief and guilt” he felt for allowing Floyd to pay with a suspected fake $20 bill when he later saw the police kneeling on him.
Testimony on the third day of former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin’s murder trial continued in an atmosphere of tense emotions and harrowing evidence about Floyd’s death.
The cashier, Christopher Martin, 19, said Floyd appeared to be high on drugs but was not threatening and was “very approachable, talkative”.
Martin said he noticed Floyd because “he was a big man” and that they had a long conversation about sport.
He did tell the court in Minneapolis, however, that he noticed the 46-year-old Black man’s speech was laboured.
“It would appear that he was high,” he said.
Martin worked at Cup Foods in south Minneapolis, where Floyd is alleged to have tried to buy cigarettes with a counterfeit $20 bill, which led to his detention by Chauvin, who was later fired from his job and arrested.
Chauvin, 45, who is white, has denied charges of second – and third – degree murder, and manslaughter, after he pressed his knee into Floyd’s neck for more than nine minutes on 25 May 2020, the Memorial Day holiday.
He faces up to 40 years in prison if convicted of the most serious charge.
Read more:
A mistake at a Baltimore facility ruined about 15m doses of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine, the New York Times reports.
From the Times:
The plant is run by Emergent BioSolutions, a manufacturing partner to both Johnson & Johnson and AstraZeneca. Federal officials attributed the mistake to human error.
The mixup has halted future shipments of Johnson & Johnson doses in the United States while the Food and Drug Administration investigates. Johnson & Johnson has moved to strengthen its control over Emergent BioSolutions’ work to avoid further quality lapses.
The mistake is a major embarrassment for Johnson & Johnson, whose one-dose vaccine has been credited with speeding up the national immunization program.
It does not affect Johnson & Johnson doses that are currently being delivered and used nationwide. All those doses were produced in the Netherlands, where operations have been fully approved by federal regulators.
But all further shipments of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine – projected to total tens of millions of doses in the next month – were supposed to come from the massive Baltimore plant.
Those shipments are now in question while the quality control issues are sorted out, according to people familiar with the matter.
The doses of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine currently being administered are unaffected. And officials still expect that there will be enough doses to vaccinate all adults by May.
Updated
Senator Mark Kelly of Arizona – who as a former Nasa astronaut has the training to administer shots – is helping vaccinate patients in Tucson today.
The US is making fast progress on vaccinations, with a third of residents having received at least one dose. Track the progress here.
Today I joined nurses from @ElRioHealth to help administer vaccines to folks in South Tucson. Getting vaccinated is the most powerful tool we have in the fight against COVID-19, so be sure to get yours as soon as you’re able. Who knows — I might be there to give it to you. pic.twitter.com/TR7JkYplPs
— Senator Mark Kelly (@SenMarkKelly) March 31, 2021
Updated
Today so far
That’s it from me today. My west coast colleague Maanvi Singh will take over the blog for the next few hours.
Here’s where the day stands so far:
- Joe Biden outlined his infrastructure plan in a speech in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. The president described his proposal as a “once-in-a-generation investment in America”. “It’s big, yes. It’s bold, yes. And we can get it done,” Biden said. The plan calls for spending more than $2tn to improve the nation’s infrastructure, which the Biden administration has said will create jobs and help combat climate change.
- Biden will hold his first full cabinet meeting tomorrow, as part of his infrastructure pitch. A White House spokesperson said the president will be “discussing the role cabinet members will play in advocating for the American Jobs Plan”.
- Derek Chauvin’s trial continued in Minneapolis, where the former police officer is facing murder charges over the killing of George Floyd. One witness who testified about Floyd’s final moments, Charles McMillian, broke down crying as prosecutors played a clip of Floyd calling out for his mother as Chauvin kept a knee on his neck.
- Two US Capitol Police officers are suing Donald Trump over his role in the 6 January insurrection. The two USCP officers, James Blassingame and Sidney Hemby, accused the former president of inciting the deadly insurrection, which resulted in physical and emotional injuries for the officers.
- A Democratic congressional candidate has withdrawn a challenge to the results of her House race. Democrat Rita Hart lost the race to Republican Mariannette Miller-Meeks by six votes, but Hart insisted there were 22 ballots that should have been counted, which could have changed the outcome of the election.
Maanvi will have more coming up, so stay tuned.
Updated
Joe Biden said he hoped to work in a bipartisan fashion with congressional Republicans to get his infrastructure plan passed.
“The divisions of the moment shouldn’t stop us from doing the right thing for the future,” the president said.
Many Republicans have already signaled opposition to the plan, specifically Biden’s proposals to pay for the legislation by rolling back some of the tax cuts that Donald Trump signed into law.
The president said he was “open to other ideas” on how to pay for the proposal, but he added, “So long as they do not impose any tax increase on people making less than $400,000.”
Biden concluded his speech and walked away from the podium without taking any questions from reporters on the infrastructure plan.
Joe Biden argued that now is the time to pass this $2tn package because “our infrastructure is crumbling”.
The president said in Pittsburgh, “We have to move now because I’m convinced that, if we act now, people are going to look back in 50 years and say this is the moment when America won the future.”
Biden also defended his proposals to raise corporate tax rates to help pay for the package, saying that large companies need to contribute more. The president specifically named Amazon as a company that is not paying its proper share of taxes.
“I’m going to put an end to that,” Biden said.
During his infrastructure speech, Joe Biden removed a piece of paper from his pocket to read off the US coronavirus death toll as of today.
The paper also included the president’s private schedule, and it showed the president held an hour-long meeting on “national emissions” earlier today.
Biden held an hour-long meeting on "national emissions" today according to the private schedule he just held up on-camera during his speech in Pittsburgh pic.twitter.com/vBO0A7noHo
— Kevin Liptak (@Kevinliptakcnn) March 31, 2021
Biden praises infrastructure plan as 'once-in-a-generation investment in America'
Joe Biden is now delivering remarks on his $2tn infrastructure proposal at a union hall in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
The president noted he launched his campaign in Pittsburgh nearly two years ago, and now he has returned to explain how his administration will “rebuild the backbone of America”.
Millions of Americans lost their jobs last year.
— Joe Biden (@JoeBiden) March 31, 2021
Here’s the truth: We all do better when we all do well. It’s time to build our economy from the bottom up—and the middle out—not the top down.
Biden noted that nearly 500,000 Americans have now died of coronavirus, and millions of others lost their jobs as a result of the pandemic.
“Here’s the truth: we all will do better when we all do well,” Biden said.
The president described his infrastructure proposal as a “once-in-a-generation investment in America” that will help the US build the most innovative economy in the world.
“It’s big, yes. It’s bold, yes. And we can get it done,” Biden said.
Joe Biden has arrived in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, where he is already running about 10 minutes late to deliver his infrastructure speech. But that’s par for the course for this president, who rarely arrives anywhere on time.
Iowa Democratic congressional candidate withdraws House challenge to results
Rita Hart, the Democratic congressional candidate in Iowa who had filed a House challenge to the results of her race, has withdrawn that request.
“After many conversations with people I trust about the future of this contest, I have made the decision to withdraw my contest before the House committee on administration,” Hart said in a statement.
Running to represent the people of #IA02 in the U.S. House of Representatives has been one of the greatest honors of my life. I could not have done it without all of you. Read my statement from today here: pic.twitter.com/ustS72pWsq
— Rita Hart (@RitaHartIA) March 31, 2021
Hart added, “Despite our best efforts to have every vote counted, the reality is that the toxic campaign of political disinformation to attack this constitutional review of the closest congressional contest in 100 years has effectively silenced the voices of Iowans. It is a stain on our democracy that the truth has not prevailed and my hope for the future is a return to decency and civility.”
Results showed Republican Mariannette Miller-Meeks had won the Iowa race by six votes, but Hart insisted there were 22 ballots that should have been counted, which could have changed the outcome of the election.
After House Democratic leaders said they would review Hart’s challenge, Republicans quickly accused them of trying to overturn the results of a fair election.
Those allegations rankled Democrats, who spent months criticizing Donald Trump for launching several dozen legal challenges in an attempt to overturn Joe Biden’s victories in key swing states.
Hart’s announcement will likely come as a relief to many House Democrats, some of whom had already said they believed Miller-Meeks should remain in the seat.
Updated
Karine Jean-Pierre, the principal deputy White House press secretary, confirmed that Joe Biden will hold his first cabinet meeting tomorrow.
Speaking to reporters aboard Air Force One on the way to Pittsburgh, Jean-Pierre said the president will “convene his first full cabinet meeting just a day after rolling out his American Jobs Plan, which will be a key topic of discussion”.
Jean-Pierre added, “The focus of the meeting will be working together to continue implementing and communicating about the American Rescue Plan and how it continues to deliver for working families, discussing the role cabinet members will play in advocating for the American Jobs Plan and ensuring we accelerate our federal Covid-19 response.”
The meeting will be held in the East Room, rather than the Cabinet Room, in order to better facilitate social distancing.
Biden is scheduled to deliver his speech outlining his infrastructure proposal in Pittsburgh in about 20 minutes.
France's schools to close for three weeks amid coronavirus surge
France’s schools are to close for at least three weeks and travel within the country will be banned for a month after Easter in an attempt to curb a dramatic surge in Covid-19 cases that threatens to overwhelm hospitals, Emmanuel Macron has said.
In a televised address to the nation, the French president said the government had waited “until the last moment” to impose further restrictions, winning the country “precious weeks of freedom”, but that “we now have to make one more big effort”.
Macron in January rejected scientific advice to impose a strict lockdown, instead ordering an evening and night-time curfew but keeping schools and shops open in a “third way” intended to limit repercussions on the economy and mental health.
The government this month also shut non-essential shops and limited movement in Paris and 20 other hard-hit areas, measures criticised by many health professionals as insufficient to counter the more contagious UK variant driving France’s third wave.
But with daily infections doubling to 40,000 since February and more than 5,000 Covid patients in intensive care – the highest since October – tougher restrictions became inevitable, with many experts saying only a full lockdown would be enough.
Macron said the rapid spread of the more contagious variant meant restrictions already in place in 20 départements would be extended throughout the country from Saturday, with most shops closed, people barred from travelling more than 10km from their homes and working from home to be the rule.
Inter-regional travel will be banned from 5 April, to allow Easter journeys that were already planned, he said, but he added: “We must limit all contact as much as we can, including family gatherings. We know now: these are where the virus spreads.”
Charles McMillian, who tried to speak to George Floyd as officers arrested him, just broke down crying on the witness stand at Derek Chauvin’s trial.
Chauvin trial witness Charles McMillian, who spoke with George Floyd before he was killed, breaks down in tears after watching video of Floyd calling out for his mother and saying that he can’t breathe. pic.twitter.com/WCLu9KmH3K
— The Recount (@therecount) March 31, 2021
McMillian became emotional after prosecutors played footage of Floyd calling out for his mother as Chauvin kept his knee on Floyd’s neck.
One prosecutor approached the witness stand to give McMillian a bottle of water, and the court then took a short break.
The infrastructure plan that Joe Biden will announce on Wednesday is set to crystalize the US president’s vision of how to combat the climate crisis – hefty government intervention to retool America’s creaking systems, festooned with plenty of green, preferably union, jobs.
Biden opened his White House term with a cavalcade of executive actions to begin the gargantuan task of shifting the US to net zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050 and the new $2tn package, known as the American jobs plan, is the first indication of the scale of spending that will be required to reshape day-to-day life in order to avert disastrous climate change.
As well as huge investments in crumbling roads and bridges, the Biden plan takes aim at the emissions created by transport, currently the country’s largest source of planet-heating gases. There’s $80bn for Amtrak and freight rail, $85bn for public transit, $174bn to promote electric vehicles through various incentives, the electrification of school buses and 500,000 new plug-in recharging stations within the next decade. The federal government’s vehicle fleet will also be electrified.
“There’s a lot to like in this plan, it’s excellent in almost every way,” said Julio Friedmann, who was a climate and energy adviser in Barack Obama’s administration and is now an energy researcher at Columbia University.
“This is a generational commitment and it can only be applauded. The $2tn is half the price tag of World War Two, it exceeds the scale of the New Deal, it’s wildly larger than the Marshall Plan – and appropriately so. This is the hardest thing we’ve ever done. People generally don’t understand how much construction and reduction is required.”
But even the administration’s allies concede further, longer-term spurs to remodel the economy and alter behavior will be required on top of this plan.
Joe Biden has just boarded Air Force One to travel to Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, where he will deliver a speech on his infrastructure proposal in about two hours.
President Biden salutes at the top of the steps to Air Force One on his way to Pittsburgh to rollout his infrastructure and jobs plan pic.twitter.com/luBzi2Wh7N
— Jennifer Epstein (@jeneps) March 31, 2021
The president boarded Air Force One in the pouring rain moments ago, and he offered a salute at the top of the steps to the plane.
Biden is traveling to Pittsburgh with several senior advisers, including national climate adviser Gina McCarthy and principal deputy press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre.
Biden to hold first cabinet meeting tomorrow – reports
Joe Biden will convene the first cabinet meeting of his presidency tomorrow, according to multiple reports.
The meeting will be focused on promoting Biden’s infrastructure package, which he is introducing in Pittsburgh today, and it will look quite different from cabinet meetings of the past.
The AP has the details:
To begin with, the full Cabinet won’t meet in the room that bears its name, instead assembling in the more spacious East Room to allow for social distancing. All attendees, including the president, will wear masks. Also, the afternoon meeting probably will not include the over-the-top tributes to the chief executive that came to define Cabinet meetings held by President Donald Trump.
The timing of the first meeting was deliberate: a week after the full Cabinet was confirmed and a day after Biden was poised to release his infrastructure plan in Pittsburgh, which will likely to dominate Washington through the summer and shape next year’s midterm elections.
Several of the cabinet secretaries have reportedly been briefing members of Congress on the details of the infrastructure package today.
Updated
The Wisconsin state supreme court has struck down governor Tony Evers’ statewide mask mandate designed to curb the spread of coronavirus.
More than a year into the pandemic, the US has not once managed to get the virus officially under control and, with variants and vaccines in a perilous “race”, Joe Biden is urging the public to remain vigilant and his public health experts are warning of the “impending doom” of another surge of infections if restrictions are relaxed.
Nevertheless, Republican leaders at state level are rushing to lift restrictions, Florida, Texas, Arkansas, Tennessee among them and now Wisconsin, over the efforts of the Democratic governor.
The Associated Press reports:
The Wisconsin supreme court on has struck down governor Tony Evers’ statewide mask mandate, ruling that the Democrat exceeded his authority by unilaterally extending the mandate for months through multiple emergency orders.
The 4-3 ruling from the conservative-controlled court is the latest legal blow to attempts by Evers to control the coronavirus. It comes after Republicans in the Legislature voted to repeal the mask mandate in February, only to see Evers quickly re-issue it.
The court last May struck down Evers’ “safer at home” order, saying that his health secretary did not have the authority for such an order.
Evers’ attempts to limit capacity in bars, restaurants and other indoor places were also blocked by a state appeals court in October.
In the latest case, the court ruled that any public health emergency issued by Evers is valid for just 60 days and can’t be extended without legislative approval.
“The question in this case is not whether the governor acted wisely; it is whether he acted lawfully. We conclude he did not,” Justice Brian Hagedorn wrote for the majority.
Evers spokeswoman Britt Cudaback didn’t immediately respond to a message seeking comment.
Justice Ann Walsh Bradley, a member of the court’s three-justice minority, lamented in a dissent that the ruling hampers the ability of governors in Wisconsin to protect lives.
“This is no run-of-the-mill case,” she wrote. “We are in the midst of a worldwide pandemic that so far has claimed the lives of over a half million people in this country. And with the stakes so high, the majority not only arrives at erroneous conclusions, but it also obscures the consequence of its decision.
“Unfortunately, the ultimate consequence of the majority’s decision is that it places yet another roadblock to an effective governmental response to Covid-19.”
Here is a map from yesterday, that NBC created:
Several states, including Arizona, Iowa, Mississippi, Montana, Texas, Wyoming, and now Arkansas have dropped their mask mandates.
— NBC News Graphics (@NBCNewsGraphics) March 31, 2021
We're keeping track of statewide orders: https://t.co/P5MiVG5cq0 pic.twitter.com/NdbX0oDqi6
Updated
Donald Trump just put out a statement criticizing Joe Biden’s forthcoming bold legislative plan for infrastructure redevelopment.
Not known for his subtlety or accuracy, 45’s statement continues (from previous post):
This legislation would be among the largest self-inflicted economic wounds in history.
If this monstrosity is allowed to pass, the result will be more Americans out of work, more families shattered, more factories abandoned, more industries wrecked, and more Main Streets boarded up and closed down—just like it was before I took over the presidency 4 years ago.
I then set record low unemployment, with 160 million people working.
This tax hike is a classic globalist betrayal by Joe Biden and his friends: the lobbyists will win, the special interests will win, China will win, the Washington politicians and government bureaucrats will win—but hardworking American families will lose.
Joe Biden’s cruel and heartless attack on the American Dream must never be allowed to become Federal law. Just like our southern border went from best to worst, and is now in shambles, our economy will be destroyed!
Yes, the former president finished with an exclamation point!
Trump lays into Biden's infrastructure plan
In yet another break with presidential tradition, and before Joe Biden has even formally presented his infrastructure plan this afternoon, the immediate past president has weighed in.
Donald Trump has put out a statement. Here is the first section of it:
Joe Biden’s radical plan to implement the largest tax hike in American history is a massive giveaway to China, and many other countries, that will send thousands of factories, millions of jobs, and trillions of dollars to these competitive Nations.
The Biden plan will crush American workers and decimate U.S. manufacturing, while giving special tax privileges to outsourcers, foreign and giant multinational corporations.
Biden promised to “build back better”—but the country he is building up, in particular, is China and other large segments of the world. Under the Biden Administration, America is once again losing the economic war with China—and Biden’s ludicrous multi-trillion dollar tax hike is a strategy for total economic surrender.
Sacrificing good paying American jobs is the last thing our citizens need as our country recovers from the effects of the Global Pandemic.
Biden’s policy would break the back of the American Worker with among the highest business tax rates in the developed world. Under Biden’s plan, if you create jobs in America, and hire American workers, you will pay MORE in taxes—but if you close down your factories in Ohio and Michigan, fire U.S. workers, and move all your production to Beijing and Shanghai, you will pay LESS. It is the exact OPPOSITE of putting America First—it is putting America LAST!
Companies that send American jobs to China should not be rewarded by Joe Biden’s Tax Bill, they should be punished so that they keep those jobs right here in America, where they belong.
Today so far
Here’s where the day stands so far:
- Joe Biden will deliver a speech on his infrastructure package in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, this afternoon. The president has proposed spending $2tn to improve the country’s infrastructure, which the Biden administration has said will create jobs and help combat climate change.
-
Derek Chauvin’s trial continued in Minneapolis, where the former police officer is facing murder charges over the killing of George Floyd. The cashier who sold Floyd cigarettes shortly before his death testified that the man appeared to be “high” on drugs.
- Two US Capitol Police officers are suing Donald Trump over his role in the January 6 insurrection. The two USCP officers, James Blassingame and Sidney Hemby, accused the former president of inciting the deadly insurrection, which resulted in physical and emotional injuries for the officers.
The blog will have more coming up, so stay tuned.
Chauvin trial: store clerk describes drug suspicion before Floyd's arrest
The cashier who served George Floyd immediately before his arrest last May has described him as appearing to be “high” on drugs in testimony on the third day of Derek Chauvin’s murder trial.
Christopher Martin, 19, said he noticed Floyd because “he was a big man” and that they had a long conversation about sport. He said that the 46 year-old Black man’s speech was laboured.
“It would appear that he was high,” he said.
Martin worked at Cup Foods in south Minneapolis, where Floyd is alleged to have tried to buy cigarettes with a counterfeit $20 bill, which led to his detention by Chauvin, a Minneapolis police officer at the time.
Floyd’s official autopsy showed that he had opioids and methamphetamine in his system when he died.
Chauvin’s defence contends that the officer’s use of force was reasonable because Floyd was under the influence of drugs at the time of his detention. Eric Nelson, Chauvin’s lawyer, has also told the trial that the drugs contributed to Floyd’s death.
The prosecution acknowledges the use of drugs but has said that it neither justified Chauvin continuing to press his knee into Floyd’s neck as the prone man repeatedly said he cannot breathe nor was a cause of his death.
Senate minority leader Mitch McConnell signaled he is not likely to support Joe Biden’s infrastructure package, due to the tax provisions the president has proposed to pay for the legislation.
Speaking in Kentucky today, the Republican leader expressed severe skepticism about a bill that included “massive tax increases and trillions more added to the national debt,” per NBC News.
McConnell in KY says President Biden called him about his infrastructure plan yesterday.
— Julie Tsirkin (@JulieNBCNews) March 31, 2021
On whether he'll support it: "It's like a Trojan horse called infrastructure... If it's going to have massive tax increases and trillions more added to the national debt, it's not likely."
Biden has proposed rolling back some of the tax cuts signed into law by Donald Trump to help cover the cost of the $2tn infrastructure package.
It should be noted that the Congressional Budget Office has projected that the tax cuts Trumps signed into law will add $1.9tn to deficits over the next 10 years, despite Republicans’ claims that the bill would pay for itself.
The Guardian’s Sam Levine reports:
Texas’ highest criminal appeals court said Wednesday it would hear an appeal from a Texas woman who was sentenced to five years in prison for voting while inadvertently ineligible in 2016.
The case has attracted national attention because of the severity of the sentence and the woman, Crystal Mason, said she did not know she was ineligible to vote at the time.
Mason was serving on supervised release – which is similar to probation – for a federal felony conviction at the time, and Texas prohibits people with felony convictions from voting until they have completed their sentences entirely.
Officials overseeing Mason’s supervised release testified at her trial that they never informed her she was ineligible to vote.
An appeals court in Fort Worth upheld Mason’s conviction last year, saying “the fact that she did not know she was legally ineligible to vote was irrelevant to her prosecution”. The Texas court of criminal appeals, the highest criminal appellate court in Texas, said Wednesday it would hear the case.
A reporter asked members of the White House coronavirus response team whether the Biden administration will soon alter its vaccine distribution strategy to focus on community demand rather than state population.
Andy Slavitt, a senior White House adviser, said the administration will “continue to watch where vaccines are needed”. He noted that the US is expected to have a surplus of vaccine doses in the coming months, but the country is not yet at that point.
Slavitt said the White House is committed to “making sure that we’re putting enough vaccines in all the places that they’re needed”.
It’s important to note that vaccine eligibility currently varies wildly across the country. Here in DC, only those 65 and older, as well as essential workers and those with qualifying health conditions, are eligible to receive a vaccine. But in states like Texas and Arizona, all adults are now eligible to make a vaccination appointment.
CDC director reiterates warning about recent rise in US coronavirus cases
The White House coronavirus response team is now holding a briefing to provide an update on vaccine distribution and case numbers.
Andy Slavitt, a senior White House adviser, announced that the Biden administration is establishing three more federally-run mass vaccination sites in Memphis, Tennessee; Milwaukee, Wisconsin; and Greenbelt, Maryland.
Despite that encouraging news, Dr Rochelle Walensky, the director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, reiterated her Monday warning about recent trends in coronavirus case numbers.
"We need to keep taking the mitigation measures, like wearing a mask and social distancing, as we continue to get more and more Americans vaccinated every single day," CDC Dir. Walensky says. https://t.co/89rGo4QEuG pic.twitter.com/NKD3SpZcB4
— ABC News Live (@ABCNewsLive) March 31, 2021
Walensky noted that the seven-day average number of coronavirus cases in the US has increased by 12% from the previous seven-day period. Coronavirus hospitalizations and deaths are also on the rise.
“This is a critical moment in our fight against the pandemic,” Walensky said. “We can’t afford to let our guard down. We are so close.”
The CDC director urged Americans to remain vigilant about limiting the spread of coronavirus by washing their hands, socially distancing and wearing masks.
Two Capitol Police officers sue Trump over Capitol riot injuries
Two officers of the US Capitol Police force have sued Donald Trump, accusing the former president of inciting the January 6 insurrection that resulted in them suffering emotional and physical injuries.
The two officers, James Blassingame and Sidney Hemby, filed the lawsuit today in the US district court for the District of Columbia, and they are seeking damages of at least $75,000 each.
“This is a complaint for damages by US Capitol Police officers for physical and emotional injuries caused by the defendant Donald Trump’s wrongful conduct inciting a riot on January 6, 2021, by his followers trying to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election,” the lawsuit said.
The lawsuit cites Trump’s actions in the weeks leading up to and after the November election, which the then-president falsely claimed was affected by widespread fraud.
According to the lawsuit, both officers have suffered emotional and physical injuries due to the Capitol attack. Hemby remains in physical therapy after receiving neck and back injuries and being sprayed by chemicals. Blassingame also received head and back injuries during the riot and has since struggled with depression.
“He is haunted by the memory of being attacked, and of the sensory impacts – the sights, sounds, smells and even tastes of the attack remain close to the surface,” the lawsuit says. “He experiences guilt of being unable to help his colleagues who were simultaneously being attacked; and of surviving where other colleagues did not.”
A 38-year-old man has been arrested and charged with felony assault in connection to the attack on an Asian-American woman in Manhattan earlier this week, the New York police department said today.
Thanks to assistance from the public and excellent investigative work by @NYPDHateCrimes Detectives, the individual wanted for Monday’s assault of a 65 year-old Asian female, at 360 West 43rd St, was arrested and charged with Felony Assault as a Hate Crime. pic.twitter.com/ZQRVGZEAb2
— NYPD Hate Crimes (@NYPDHateCrimes) March 31, 2021
The AP has more details on the arrest:
The arrest comes after the man was seen on video kicking and stomping the woman on Monday.
In a statement, police identified him as Brandon Elliot, 38, and said the New York City man was living at a hotel that serves as a homeless shelter a few blocks from the scene of the attack.
He faces charges of assault as a hate crime, attempted assault as a hate crime, assault and attempted assault, police said. It wasn’t immediately known whether he had a lawyer who could speak on his behalf.
Elliot was convicted of stabbing his mother to death in the Bronx in 2002, when he was 19. He was released from prison in 2019 and is on lifetime parole.
Third day of Chauvin murder trial gets underway
The third day of Derek Chauvin’s murder trial is now underway in Minneapolis, where the former police officer is facing murder charges over the killing of George Floyd.
Genevieve Hansen, a Minneapolis firefighter, has now taken the witness stand again.
Hansen told the court yesterday that she came across Chauvin with his knee on Floyd’s neck while she was off-duty. She said police officers blocked her from administering medical care to Floyd.
Chauvin’s defense attorney asked Hansen if she presented identification to the officers to prove she was a firefighter. She said she did not, and she told a prosecutor moments later that she did not have any such ID on hand because she was off duty.
Pfizer finds Covid vaccine safe and effective for children 12 to 15
Pfizer plans to seek emergency approval for its Covid vaccine in younger people after a US trial found the jab prevented the disease and was “well-tolerated” in 12- to 15-year-olds.
The US pharmaceutical company, which partnered with the German firm BioNTech to manufacture the vaccine, said it would submit the trial data to the US Food and Drug Administration in the coming weeks and to other regulators thereafter.
In a statement, Albert Bourla, Pfizer’s chairman and chief executive, said approval would pave the way for vaccinations to start in the new age group before the next school year. The vaccine is already approved for use in those aged 16 and above.
Researchers in the US examined the use of the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine in a trial of 2,260 children aged 12 to 15. Half were given the jab and half a placebo. The trial recorded 18 cases of Covid among 1,129 people in the placebo group, and zero cases among the 1,131 who received the vaccine.
“We share the urgency to expand the authorisation of our vaccine to use in younger populations and are encouraged by the clinical trial data from adolescents between the ages of 12 and 15,” Bourla added.
The US Chamber of Commerce has released a statement criticizing Joe Biden’s proposals on how to pay for his massive infrastructure proposal.
The lobbying group praised the president for recognizing the need to revitalize the country’s infrastructure, but the chamber argued it should be paid for over a longer period of time than what the Biden administration is proposing.
“We need a big and bold program to modernize our nation’s crumbling infrastructure and we applaud the Biden administration for making infrastructure a top priority,” the chamber said in a statement released this morning.
“However, we believe the proposal is dangerously misguided when it comes to how to pay for infrastructure. Properly done, a major investment in infrastructure today is an investment in the future, and like a new home, should be paid for over time – say 30 years -- by the users who benefit from the investment.
“We strongly oppose the general tax increases proposed by the administration which will slow the economic recovery and make the U.S. less competitive globally – the exact opposite of the goals of the infrastructure plan.”
The chamber encouraged Democrats and Republicans in Congress to work together to “avoid further partisan gridlock and provide productive solutions to get an infrastructure bill passed this year”.
Republicans have similarly voiced criticism of Biden’s proposals to pay for the $2tn package by rolling back some of the tax cuts that Donald Trump signed into law.
Speaking of clean water, Ryan Felton and Lisa Gill of Consumer Reports and Lewis Kendall for the Guardian have this investigation of tap water in America:
In Connecticut, a condo had lead in its drinking water at levels more than double what the federal government deems acceptable. At a church in North Carolina, the water was contaminated with extremely high levels of potentially toxic PFAS chemicals ( a group of compounds found in hundreds of household products). The water flowing into a Texas home had both – and concerning amounts of arsenic too.
All three were among locations that had water tested as part of a nine-month investigation by Consumer Reports (CR) and the Guardian into the US’s drinking water.
Since the passage of the Clean Water Act in 1972, access to safe water for all Americans has been a US government goal. Yet millions of people continue to face serious water quality problems because of contamination, deteriorating infrastructure, and inadequate treatment at water plants.
CR and the Guardian selected 120 people from around the US, out of a pool of more than 6,000 volunteers, to test for arsenic, lead, PFAS (per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances), and other contaminants. The samples came from water systems that together service more than 19 million people.
A total of 118 of the 120 samples had concerning levels of PFAS or arsenic above CR’s recommended maximum, or detectable amounts of lead.
Read the full report:
As part of his infrastructure plan, Joe Biden is pledging to ensure that every American has access to clean water.
“Every single American has a right to clean drinking water,” the president said in a tweet this morning. “It’s just plain wrong that in the United States of America today, millions of children still receive their water through lead service pipes. It’s long past time we fix that.”
The tweet includes a video noting that as many as 10 million US homes still receive drinking water through lead pipes.
Every single American has a right to clean drinking water. It’s just plain wrong that in the United States of America today, millions of children still receive their water through lead service pipes. It’s long past time we fix that. pic.twitter.com/l6UpUOkErr
— President Biden (@POTUS) March 31, 2021
On a call about the infrastructure plan yesterday, a senior Biden administration official said the president’s proposal was “a bold but a very practical goal”.
“Today, 400,000 schools and childcare centers are serviced by lead pipes, even as our health experts say that there is no safe amount of lead in drinking water,” the official said.
“This is a national project which is urgent; it’s economically efficient and will create jobs. And it would help improve health and the health of our families.”
Chauvin murder trial continues in Minneapolis
The trial of Derek Chauvin will soon start its third day in Minneapolis, where the former police officer is facing murder charges over the killing of George Floyd.
Genevieve Hansen, a Minneapolis firefighter, will be back on the witness stand this morning. Hansen testified yesterday that she pleaded with Chauvin to check Floyd’s pulse, but she was blocked from administering medical care.
The Guardian’s Chris McGreal has more on yesterday’s court testimony:
The woman who recorded the shocking video of George Floyd’s death that prompted mass protests for racial justice around the world has told the Derek Chauvin murder trial of her feelings of guilt at being unable to intervene to save his life.
Darnella Frazier, who at times sobbed as she gave evidence on the second day of Chauvin’s trial in Minneapolis, said that she still loses sleep over the killing of the 46-year-old Black man.
‘I ended up apologising and apologising to George Floyd for not doing more,’ she said.
But, Frazier added, it is not about what she should have done.
‘It’s what he should have done,’ she said in apparent reference to Chauvin.
Frazier was 17 when she recorded the video as a bystander.
Biden to propose infrastructure plan to create jobs and combat climate change
Greetings from Washington, live blog readers.
Joe Biden will deliver a speech today in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, to lay out his $2tn infrastructure proposal, the next plank of his “Build Back Better” agenda.
The Guardian’s Lauren Gambino has more details on the proposal:
Biden’s plan ... includes ‘historic and galvanizing’ investments in traditional infrastructure projects such as roads, bridges and highways, as well as hundreds of billions of dollars to fortify the electricity grid, expand high-speed broadband and rebuild water systems to ensure access to clean drinking water, an administration official said on Tuesday. It also seeks to expand access to community care facilities for seniors and people with disabilities and invest in research and development and workplace training.
He will propose paying for the new spending with a substantial increase on corporate taxes that would offset eight years of spending over the course of 15 years, officials said. Among the changes, Biden will call for a rise in the corporate tax rate to 28% from 21% and measures to force multinational corporations to pay more taxes in the US on profits earned abroad. The tax plan would unwind major pieces of Donald Trump’s tax-cut law, which lowered the corporate tax rate from 35% to 21%.
Those payment proposals will likely deter most, if not all, congressional Republicans from supporting the package, given that many of them have already said they oppose rolling back the Trump-era tax cuts.
The White House has indicated it hopes the infrastructure plan will gain bipartisan support in Congress, after Biden’s coronavirus relief package passed without the assistance of a single Republican.
But Democrats appear to also be ready to go it alone if Republicans attempt to obstruct the the passage of the legislation, which administration officials are hoping to pass by this summer.
Biden’s speech will get underway this afternoon, and the blog will have more updates and analysis before then, so stay tuned.
