Live reporting on the coronavirus in the US continues on Thursday’s blog:
Summary
- Republicans released a list of officials of high-ranking Obama administration members allegedly involved in the “unmasking” of retired general Michael Flynn, in intelligence reports dating from the presidential transition. Joe Biden, former ambassador to the United Nations Samantha Power, and former FBI director James Comey were on the list. Democrats criticized the move as a ploy to distract from Trump’s handling of the coronavirus pandemic.
- A Republican took back the California congressional seat vacated by Katie Hill. Mike Garcia will replace Hill, who resigned amid scandal in 2019 after securing the first Democratic victory in the district in decades. The race gained national attention due to the circumstances around Hill’s departure and because Donald Trump waded into the debate about how to conduct fair elections amid a pandemic.
- The Wisconsin supreme court struck down the governor’s extension of stay-at-home orders through March. Republican legislators challenged the state’s Democratic governor’s decision to keep schools and businesses closed in order to limit the spread of disease, raising concerns about the economic toll. Lawmakers and the governor have until next week to come up with an alternative plan to mitigate the coronavirus crisis.
- New Mexico’s government mandated that all residents wear masks while allowing many retailers and faith centers to reopen as long as they adhere to certain safety measures. Retailers will have to keep the number of customers to 25% of the fire code limits and ensure that employees are wearing masks.
- Yellowstone, the Grand Canyon and Rocky Mountain national park will reopen later this month. The reopenings will be partial and phased according to the National Parks Service.
Updated
Analysis: Trump deepened 'Obamagate' conspiracy theory with Biden unmasking move
Donald Trump has ratcheted up his “Obamagate” conspiracy theory to implicate Joe Biden and other former White House officials in what critics say is a desperate attempt to distract from the coronavirus pandemic.
Ric Grenell, the acting director of national intelligence, on Wednesday sent Congress a list of high-ranking Obama administration members he alleged were involved in the “unmasking” of retired general Michael Flynn, in intelligence reports dating from the presidential transition.
Alumni of Barack Obama’s staff gave the move short shrift.
“Sideshow to distract from the shitshow,” tweeted David Plouffe, a former Obama campaign manager.
“Rather talk about unmasking than masks,” observed Matthew Miller, an ex-justice department spokesperson.
Trump’s aggressive tactic looks set to deepen fears that he will stop at nothing to damage Obama and his vice-president, Joe Biden, the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee.
It also provides a counter-narrative to criticism of Trump’s handling of the pandemic, which has killed more than 80,000 in the US. Fox News and Fox Business have mentioned Flynn and the FBI more frequently than the virus in recent days, according to data compiled by the Internet Archive and analysed by GDELT.
Former US congressman and Democratic US Senate candidate for Texas, Beto O’Rourke, has just hosted an online Q+A with leaders of the Students for Biden group.
The meeting, hosted on Zoom, saw O’Rourke talk about the importance of the youth vote in the November election, citing his 2018 senate run against Ted Cruz, which mobilized thousands of young people and bring O’Rourke within a small, 200,000 vote margin of claiming victory.
O’Rourke, who endorsed Biden just before the Texas primary on Super Tuesday in early March, ambitiously predicted that the former VP would win Texas in November and urged Democrats to prioritize the state along with other established swing states in the midwest.
“This will be the first since 1976 since a Democrat has won Texas,” he said, describing Trump as “the most corrupt president in history”.
The former congressman, who also ran a short and unsuccessful campaign for the Democratic presidential nomination, argued that Donald Trump would do “everything in his power to steal” the election. He said losing Texas would be a “cataclysmic event for the Republican party” and would signal categorically that Trump had lost.
The online event did not permit questions from reporters.
Updated
New Mexico's governor mandates all residents to wear masks
Everyone in New Mexico will be required to wear a face mask in public, starting this weekend, the state’s governor Michelle Lujan Grisham announced.
Retailers and faith centers will be allowed to reopen, as long as they keep occupancy to 25 percent of the fire code capacity, she said. Employees will have to wear masks and maintain physical distancing whenever possible, Lujan Grisham said. But these new guidelines will not apply in the northwest portion of the state, where “the risk of spread still remains too high,” she said.
Wholesalers and entertainment venues like movie theatres and concert halls will remain closed, for now.
Today's #COVID19 update:
— Michelle Lujan Grisham (@GovMLG) May 13, 2020
- 155 new cases, totaling 5,364 positive tests statewide
- 12 new COVID-19 deaths, bringing the total to 231
- 200 individuals currently hospitalized
Stay home. Don't gather with people. Wear a mask.
More info here: https://t.co/0kaiRnhCbR pic.twitter.com/pdUtREcCpN
Updated
Wisconsin's Supreme Court struck down the state's stay-at-home orders
The state’s highest court ruled that governor Tony Evers overstepped his authority by extending Wisconsin’s stay-at-home order through the end of May.
The 4-3 decision, written by the court’s conservative justices, chips away at Evers authority to slow the spread of coronavirus, and will force the Democratic governor to work with the Republican legislature as the state continues to grapple with the outbreak.
The sheltering orders will remain in place until May 20 to give lawmakers time to develop a new coronavirus plan.
Evers issued a stay-at-home order in March, and extended it in late April. Republicans asked the Supreme Court to block the extension, arguing that move required legislative approval.
Nearly seven out of 10 Wisconsin residents support the governor’s “safer at home” order, according to a Marquette University Law School poll. But Republican lawmakers in the state worried about the economic impacts of an extended shutdown.
GOB lawmakers have yet to offer an alternative outbreak response plan.The GOP has not offered any alternative plans. The state’s chamber of commerce proposed allowing all the state’s businesses to open at once, while asking high-risk establishments to take some safety measures.
But top health officials, including Dr. Anthony Fauci, have warned against reopening too quickly.
Coronavirus could sweep through camps where firefighting crews are stationed, ready to fight wildfires, according to a federal document obtained by the Associated Press.
The U.S. Forest Service’s draft risk assessment predicts that even in a best-case scenario — with social distancing followed and plenty of tests and protective equipment available — nearly two dozen firefighters could be infected with COVID-19 at a camp with hundreds of people who come in to combat a fire that burns for months.
The worst-case scenario? More than 1,000 infections.
Forest Service officials have declined to answer questions about the document other than saying it’s outdated and being redone. They didn’t immediately respond to additional questions Wednesday.
“The report is being reviewed and updated with the most current data and is not ready to share,” the agency said Monday in an email.
The Forest Service declined to release a copy of the draft or say what changes are being made. The AP obtained the document from an official who has access to it and didn’t want to be named.
Updated
After a bitter political battle complicated and constrained by the pandemic, Garcia’s win was a blow for Democrats who in 2018 had secured the suburban Los Angeles district for the first time in since 1990. But the candidates will soon have a rematch. Garcia will serve only five months before the seat is up for a vote again in November.
In the election based almost entirely on mailed-in ballots amid stay-at-home orders due to the coronavirus pandemic, the full results likely won’t be clear for days. Officials will accept ballots postmarked by election day, even if they arrive up to three days later.
Special elections are usually plagued with low voter turnout, though early numbers indicated that more people voted in this election than expected. All registered voters were automatically mailed a ballot, making this election a test case for November. California’s governor, Gavin Newsom, recently announced that all Californians would have the option to mail in their ballots during the general election, amid uncertainty over how long the coronavirus crisis will limit people’s ability to safely leave their homes.
But it is wise to avoid projecting too much about the November elections based on this race, said Paul Mitchell, with the campaign research firm Political Data Inc. “To do so would be like predicting the championship based on the results of two-on-two basketball game before the finals,” Mitchell said. He expects the same district will have 80% turnout in November, compared with less than half of that in the special election.
More on Republican Mike Garcia's win in California
As victory appeared assured in California’s special congressional election, Mike Garcia said his campaign’s “message of lower taxes and ensuring we don’t take liberal Sacramento dysfunction to Washington prevailed”.
This is Garcia’s first time taking public office. He ran unencumbered by a voting record, on a typically conservative platform. Though Democrats tried to paint him as a mini-Trump, Garcia more closely aligns with a new guard of young, moderate Republicans the party has sent out to woo the typically blue state. “California Republicans have to learn to adapt to the local climate,” said Bill Whalen, a Republican campaign strategist based in Sacramento. Garcia’s victory may not guarantee he’ll win a rematch against Smith in November, but it does give him a leg up, Whalen said.
Garcia’s opponent Christy Smith, a state assembly member, lost despite earning the endorsements of Barack Obama and the Congressional Hispanic Caucus. Hill’s unpopularity in the district, post-scandal, was a hurdle. Prior to the election, the Cook Political Report changed its assessment of the race from “lean Democratic” to a “tossup” as the pandemic shut down traditional campaigning through door-knocking and town halls. Despite the challenges of campaigning, Democrats are still hopeful about Smith’s chances in the general election. “The electorate will be very different then,” said Rose Kapolczynski, a Democratic strategist based in Los Angeles. “And I still think Smith will have a strong chance.”
Updated
Joe Biden’s campaign has responded to Republicans’ list of former Obama officials believed to be involved in efforts to “unmask” ousted national security adviser Michael Flynn.
Biden along with other officials, including the former FBI director James Comey and the former director of national intelligence James Clapper were included in the list that Trump’s acting director of national intelligence Richard Grenell sent Republican senators.
“These documents simply indicate the breadth and depth of concern across the American government – including among career officials – over intelligence reports of Michael Flynn’s attempts to undermine ongoing American national security policy through discussions with Russian officials or other foreign representatives,” said Andrew Bates, a Biden campaign spokesperson. He continued:
Importantly, none of these individuals could have known Flynn’s identity beforehand. These documents have absolutely nothing to do with any FBI investigation and they confirm that all normal procedures were followed – any suggestion otherwise is a flat out lie. What’s more, it’s telling that these documents were selectively leaked by Republicans abusing their congressional powers to act as arms of the Trump campaign after having them provided by a partisan official installed for this very purpose. The only people with questions to answer are Grenell, Sen Grassley, and Sen Johnson for their gross politicization of the intelligence process.
Updated
Virus may never be eradicated – WHO
The coronavirus that causes Covid-19 could become endemic like HIV, the World Health Organization has said, warning against any attempt to predict how long it would keep circulating and calling for a “massive effort” to counter it. The organization’s emergencies expert, Mike Ryan, said:
It is important to put this on the table: This virus may become just another endemic virus in our communities, and this virus may never go away.
I think it is important we are realistic and I don’t think anyone can predict when this disease will disappear. I think there are no promises in this and there are no dates. This disease may settle into a long problem, or it may not be.
However, he said the world had some control over how it copes with the disease, although this would take a “massive effort” even if a vaccine was found – a prospect he described as a “massive moonshot”.
More than 100 potential vaccines are being developed, including several in clinical trials, but experts have underscored the difficulties of finding vaccines that are effective against coronaviruses.
Ryan noted that vaccines exist for other illnesses, such as measles, that have not been eliminated.
Updated
Are children less susceptible to coronavirus?
There is now a wealth of evidence that children generally experience milder symptoms when they are infected – although there have been rare cases of children becoming seriously ill or even dying. However, it is not yet clear whether they have a lower chance of catching Covid-19. Although fewer children have been picked up in national testing programs, this could be due to fewer being tested. During the early phase of the epidemic in Europe, adult travelers played a dominant role in seeding infections, which also meant, purely for circumstantial reasons, that children would have played a less significant role in spreading infections.
Studies on this question give a mixed picture. One analysis, in the Lancet Infectious Diseases, of households with confirmed Covid-19 in Shenzhen, China, found that children younger than 10 were just as likely as adults to get infected. However, there is other evidence from South Korea, Italy and Iceland suggesting lower infection rates among children. Some of the difference could also be down to differences in social mixing.
Why do children react differently to adults?
For many infectious diseases, there is a U-shaped risk curve, with the youngest and oldest in society being most vulnerable. Covid-19 does not follow this pattern – even toddlers and newborn babies typically only experience mild symptoms. One theory is that children’s lungs might contain fewer of the ACE2 receptors that the virus uses to enter cells. To confirm this, researchers would need to study tissue samples from children. Another possibility is that children’s immune systems respond in a more optimal way to the virus – mounting a strong enough response to get rid of the infection, but without going into overdrive and flooding the body with inflammatory proteins, which are known to sometimes cause problems in adult patients.
Are children invisible transmitters?
Asymptomatic transmission is known to play an important role in the spread of Covid-19 – studies have shown that in general people appear to be at their most infectious in the day or so before symptoms start. This raises the question of whether children are silent spreaders of the virus. A recent German study, which compared the viral load of nearly 4,000 people aged from one to 100 years old, added weight to this idea. It found that regardless of age, people appeared to shed a similar level of virus, suggesting they could be equally infectious. However, a caveat is that the study did not measure real-life transmission in children. As schools reopen and community transmission is tracked closely in some European countries, a clearer answer on this is likely to emerge in the coming months.
Updated
Per White House press pool reporters, the president also called Dr Anthony Fauci’s message yesterday cautioning against opening schools too soon “unacceptable”.
“I was surprised by his answer,” Trump said. “To me it’s not an acceptable answer especially when it comes to schools.”
Pres Trump: The "only thing" that would be acceptable is teachers staying home a bit longer bc the coronavirus "attacks age."
— Yamiche Alcindor (@Yamiche) May 13, 2020
Dr. Fauci yesterday: "I think we better be careful if we are not cavalier in thinking that children are completely immune to the deleterious effects."
Yesterday, the top public health official contradicted Trump, who urged schools and businesses to reopen and said the White House has set a target of having 100m vaccine doses by the autumn. Fauci disputed that timeline, indicating that neither a vaccine nor treatment could be developed and distributed in time to facilitate the reopening of schools in the fall.
“I think they should open the schools, absolutely,” the president said. “I think they should. It’s had very little impact on young people. And I think that if you’re an instructor, if you’re a teacher, a professor over a certain age like let’s say 65 or maybe even if you want to be conservative, 60, perhaps you want to stay out for a little while longer. But I think you should absolutely open the schools. Our country has got to get back and it’s got to get back as soon as possible, and I don’t consider our country coming back if the schools are closed.”
Updated
Hi there, it’s Maanvi Singh – blogging from the west coast.
Donald Trump told reporters that he’s missing Mike Pence.
“I haven’t seen Mike Pence and I miss him," Trump says during meeting in Cabinet Room with ND and CO govs. “I guess for a little while we’ll stay apart."
— Jennifer Jacobs (@JenniferJJacobs) May 13, 2020
"We speak a lot on the phone," he says of @VP.
Trump was speaking with the officials from North Dakota and Colorado in the White House Cabinet Room, where reporters were also present.
Updated
Summary
Here’s what has happened so far today:
- Republicans released a list of officials, including Joe Biden, who “unmasked” – a term used to describe the routine process of revealing an individual who took part of a conversation subject to surveillance – former national security advisor Michael Flynn.
- A Democrat candidate in a special House election in California conceded to her Republican opponent, flipping the district from blue to red.
- Though the politics of the day may suggest a feeling of normalcy, coronavirus is still in the news. Yellowstone National Park announced that it will experiment with a partial reopen.
- The New York attorney general announced an investigation into whether NYPD has been equally enforcing social distancing measures across the city after reports of racial discrepancies in arrests.
Updated
Republicans flips California House seat in special election
A Republican candidate just won a special election in California’s 25th Congressional District. The House district was formerly represented by Democrat Katie Hill, who stepped down after she was accused of having a relationship with a staffer and nude photos of her were published online.
Democrat candidate Christy Smith, a former school board member, conceded this afternoon to Mike Garcia, a former Navy pilot and defense contractor. Garcia will serve the rest of Hill’s term, which goes until the end of the year, and will have to run again in November.
The district in Southern California has flipped between Democrat and Republican over the last few years. The district voted for Republican Mitt Romney in the 2012 presidential election, but voted for Hillary Clinton in the 2016 election. Hill took the seat of a Republican incumbent in the 2018 midterm elections.
Whether this special election can be used as a litmus test for the possibilities of what’s to come in November is unclear as special elections tend to have lower turnout.
Updated
The Guardian’s Sam Levine reports:
Missouri Republicans have approved a new ballot measure seeking to undo significant gerrymandering reform voters overwhelmingly approved just two years ago.
In 2018, 62% of Missouri voters supported a constitutional amendment to put a non-partisan demographer in charge of drawing the districts for state legislators. The measure also established prioritized criteria for the demographer to follow, making partisan fairness and competitiveness one of the most important ones. The reform would likely weaken Republican control of the state legislature, an Associated Press analysis found.
The next round of redistricting won’t take place until 2021, and the demographer hasn’t even been chosen yet. But if voters approve the new Republican proposal, they would eliminate the position entirely and return redistricting power to committees picked by the state Democratic and Republican parties and the governor. It makes partisan fairness and competitiveness the least important criteria to follow when redistricting, instead prioritizing keeping districts compact and contiguous.
The U.S. constitution requires districts to have roughly the same number of people in each district and states have long used the all residents as the basis for drawing districts. But the Republican proposal requires districts to be drawn on the basis of “one person, one vote,” a change many believe would allow districts to be drawn solely on the population eligible to vote. Such a change would likely “benefit Republicans and non-Hispanic whites,” Thomas Hofeller, a top GOP redistricting expert wrote in 2015.
Updated
There’s already a rush of a split-screen response over the Republicans’ reveal of the “unmasking” list.
Republicans are repeating what Republican senator Rand Paul just said at a press conference, calling the list damning evidence that the Obama administration was using government resources to spy on Trump.
Members of the GOP are starting to call for hearings to investigate efforts to “unmask” Flynn.
Republican Senator Marsha Blackburn, an ally of Trump, said on Twitter that the list is proof that the Obama administration “had a history of using intelligence agencies to target political opponents”
The Obama administration had a history of using intelligence agencies to target political opponents, including members of @realDonaldTrump’s transition team, which I served as vice chair. https://t.co/mhgMPZOszP
— Sen. Marsha Blackburn (@MarshaBlackburn) May 13, 2020
🚨 And there it is. @realDonaldTrump has been right from the start.
— Steve Scalise (@SteveScalise) May 13, 2020
Will the media FINALLY hold the Obama Administration accountable? They owe President Trump an apology. https://t.co/f4x8AGq817
Meanwhile, Democrats are pointing out that “unmasking” is routine intelligence work, conducted by the federal government thousands of times a year.
So these senators want you to believe Flynn was unfairly unmasked because American officials used legal processes to find out which American citizens were conspiring against our democracy.
— Eric Garland (@ericgarland) May 13, 2020
Well, let's remember what Flynn was up to with those hostile spies: pic.twitter.com/dMtZSzaUuH
The unconfirmed, acting DNI using his position to criminalize routine intelligence work to help re-elect the president and obscure Russian intervention in our democracy would normally be the scandal here...
— Ben Rhodes (@brhodes) May 13, 2020
Biden included in list of Democratic officials who sought to ‘unmask’ Michael Flynn
Trump’s acting director of national intelligence Richard Grenell sent Republican senators a list of former Obama officials who are believed to be involved with efforts to “unmask” ousted national security advisor Michael Flynn. On the list is former vice president Joe Biden along with other officials, including former FBI director James Comey and former director of national intelligence James Clapper.
BREAKING: Acting DNI Richard Grenell releases list of officials who sought to "unmask" Flynn:
— Alex Salvi (@alexsalvinews) May 13, 2020
U.N. Ambassador Samantha Power, DNA James Clapper, CIA Director John Brennan, FBI Director James Comey, and former Vice President Joe Biden. pic.twitter.com/1m3Z2xJSvR
The list was released in a memo that was declassified Wednesday, according to the Wall Street Journal, and released by Ron Johnson and Chuck Grassley, two Republican senators.
“Unmasking” is the process national security officials use to reveal the identities of American citizens involved in conversations with foreign agents that have been subjected to government surveillance.
Reporters on Twitter have been quick to point out that “unmasking” is a routine practice in national security, done thousands of times a year.
Under US surveillance rules, unmasking an American's identity in a report derived from foreign-intelligence surveillance is routine when necessary to understand (e.g., who was the Russian ambassador talking to?). The NSA did so 10,000 times last year, nearly 17,000 times in 2018. pic.twitter.com/iThs9w15ZN
— Charlie Savage (@charlie_savage) May 13, 2020
But Republican lawmakers have already started to jump on the news, saying that it is evidence that Biden is “guilty of using the government to go after a political opponent,” said Republican senator Rand Paul.
The Senate must immediately hold hearings on this! Clapper, Comey, Brennan and even Biden owe it to the American people. They should testify under oath. What did the former president know?
— Senator Rand Paul (@RandPaul) May 13, 2020
Trump’s campaign manager Brad Parscale said in a statement emailed to supporters that “Americans have a right to know the depth of Biden’s involvement in the setup of Gen. Flynn to further the Russia collusion hoax”.
Updated
Yellowstone to partially reopen May 18
Officials announced Yellowstone National Park will begin a partial reopen on Monday, May 18, allowing visitors to access the park at two of the park’s entrances in Wyoming.
Wyoming lifted its out-of-state travel restriction last Friday, giving the national park an opportunity to experiment with reopening the park and how it will affect surrounding Wyoming counties.
Idaho and Montana, the two other states the park is located in, still have out-of-state travel restrictions in place. The entrances in those states will remain closed.
In a statement, park officials said they have three phases of reopening the park in mind: First is the reopening of the Wyoming entrances, allowing visitors to access trails, restrooms and self-service gas stations. The second phase would be the same, though with the rest of the park in Idaho and Montana. The third phase would see the reopening of hotels, tour buses and ranger programs. The park said it does not have a date set for the next two phases.
NY Attorney General to investigate NYPD enforcement of social distancing measures
New York Attorney General Letitia James announced this afternoon that her office will be looking into whether NYPD has been equally enforcing social distancing measures in the city.
NYPD has come under fire in recent weeks after it was revealed that 35 of 40 arrests for social-distancing violations made between March 17 and May 4 were arrests of black individuals. Four of the arrests were Hispanic, and one was white. All the while pictures were posted on social media of crowded parks in the more white, affluent neighborhoods in the city.
New York AG Letitia James calls on NYPD to equally enforce social distancing rules and to release full racial breakdown of arrests, after initial data indicating they're disproportionately arresting Black and Latinx New Yorkers https://t.co/nwmSKuwi5N pic.twitter.com/P1WlXyjD1E
— Marina Fang (@marinafang) May 13, 2020
“The apparent unequal enforcement of social distancing policies is deeply troubling, and deepens the divide between law enforcement and the people they are tasked to protect,” James said in a statement.
Rocky Mountain National Park to reopen soon
Rocky Mountain National Park in northern Colorado is scheduled to reopen near the end of May, two months after the park was closed in response to the coronavirus pandemic, park officials said today.
Recreational access and services at the park are scheduled to resume May 27, a day after Democratic Governor Jared Polis’s current executive order is set to expire, the Denver Post reports.
Rocky Mountain National Park, which closed March 20 amid the pandemic, is scheduled to reopen in phases.
Some shuttle bus operations will resume on May 27, officials said, and some campgrounds with limited numbers of sites available will reopen on June 4.
Park officials are still determining the timing and feasibility of park visitor center operations and other services.
The reopening is reportedly being coordinated with guidance from the White House and the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, as well as state and local public health authorities, although that must be quite difficult because, as is also being extensively reported, the White House and the CDC do not agree on the details of safely reopening American society and business right now.
Updated
Today day so far
It’s been a busy morning and there’s more to come in US politics and coronavirus news.
Here are the main developments so far today:
- Ousted whistleblower Rick Bright is expected to warn in opening remarks before the US Congress at a House committee hearing tomorrow morning that America is facing “the darkest winter in modern history” if it doesn’t get its act together to prevent a huge new wave of coronavirus.
- The US economy is facing a ‘highly uncertain’ future and is ‘subject to significant downside risks’, according to Federal Reserve chairman Jerome Powell.
- Former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort was released from prison, where he was serving seven years for fraud, to remain under home confinement amid heightened risk to his already-poor health amid the coronavirus pandemic.
- The gap between US top public health experts and the White House on the way to reopen US society and business safely has grown to a gulf, with a new report about the shelved CDC guidelines clashing with White House guidelines.
Updated
All eyes on Rick Bright
There will likely be some fireworks at 10am ET tomorrow when whistleblower Rick Bright testifies before the House of Representatives committee on energy and commerce.
Based on an advance copy of his opening remarks, he will excoriate the Trump administration and will no doubt be egged on by the Democratic-majority committee.
The Senate committee hearing with federal public health leaders Anthony Fauci, Robert Redfield and Stephen Hahn yesterday was a very calm, polite affair - but no less devastating for it.
When Dr Fauci quietly warns you that the coronavirus pandemic is not under control “by any means” in the US - you listen.
He was much more understated than in his warning via the New York Times the night before of “needless suffering and death” to occur if reopening is rushed ie before guidelines on declining cases, lots more testing and hospital capacity, etc, are achieved.
But Fauci’s cool testimony drew praise from Republicans.
Bright’s testimony tomorrow will be electric, for certain. A reminder of some of the searing things he’s said in recent days:
"The past few years have been beyond challenging. Time after time I was pressured to ignore or dismiss expert and scientific recommendations and instead to award lucrative contracts based on political connections."
— MSNBC (@MSNBC) May 6, 2020
— Ousted HHS official Dr. Rick Brighthttps://t.co/aUcfy6XHf2
And:
Dr. Rick Bright: "We see too many doctors and nurses now dying. And I was thinking that we could have done more to get those masks and those supplies to them sooner. And if we had, would they still be alive today? It's a horrible thought."https://t.co/ESCBWtSLCB
— Kyle Griffin (@kylegriffin1) May 9, 2020
Updated
Senate rejects data privacy amendment
The Senate just now voted down an amendment that would limit the federal government’s ability to obtain data without a warrant.
The amendment was introduced by a bipartisan pair of senators as one potential reform of the Foriegn Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), which gives the US federal government broad power to surveil individuals who are considered a threat to national security.
The amendment would prohibit the federal government from collecting information such as web browsing and internet search history without probable cause.
59-37, Senate rejects Wyden-Daines amendment limiting warrantless government Internet searches and browsing history
— Igor Bobic (@igorbobic) May 13, 2020
Rumors of Biden’s VP shortlist continue to circulate
As Joe Biden weighs his options for vice president predominantly in private, rumors of who the front-runners continue to float around.
CNN reported today that former presidential candidates and current US senators Kamala Harris and Amy Klobuchar are currently his leading contenders, according to sources close to the candidate.
Here’s more from CNN:
As the vice presidential search intensifies, Harris and Klobuchar are widely seen as two of the leading contenders, each with their own strengths and weaknesses. The vetting process will determine whether they remain in the top tier at the end of the search.
Since both ran for president, most aspects of their backgrounds are already well known, but the research for a vice presidential selection could be far more rigorous, invasive and different than their presidential bids. Teams of lawyers will be assigned to look into their histories, particularly focusing on their respective records as prosecutors in California and Minnesota, along with financial information and personal backgrounds.
Updated
Ousted government scientist to testify that Trump administration was unprepared for pandemic
Rick Bright, former director of a key office in the Department of Health and Human Services, will testify in front of the Senate tomorrow that the Trump administration was unprepared for the coronavirus pandemic and there will be dramatic consequences if the US fails to develop a national coordinated response, reports CNN.
Documents of the prepared testimony indicate that Bright plans to tell Congress that he fears “the pandemic will get far worse and be prolonged” without a response “based in science”.
“Without clear planning and implementation of the steps that I and other experts have outlined, 2020 will be [the] darkest winter in modern history,” Bright is expected to warn.
Bright was removed from his position as director of the Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority within the health and human services department.
Bright expected to tell Congress that he was removed because he voiced dissent to widespread use of the anti-malaria drug Trump touted in April, with no scientific backing, as a potential cure to the virus.
In a whistleblower complaint released earlier this month, Bright also said that he had urged dramatic action in response to the potential pandemic in January but “encountered resistance from HHS leadership, including health and human services secretary [Alex] Azar, who appeared intent on downplaying this catastrophic event”.
Updated
Bipartisan governors group calls for Congress to support state governments
Republican Maryland governor Larry Hogan and Democratic New York governor Andrew Cuomo released a joint statement today as the leaders of the National Governors Association asking Congress to deliver “urgent state fiscal relief” to address the soaring costs states are bearing because of the Covid-19 crisis.
Says the statement: “Each day that Congress fails to act, states are being forced to make cuts that will devastate the essential services the American people rely on and destroy the economic recovery before it even gets off the ground.”
Maryland Gov. Hogan (R) and New York Gov. Cuomo (D) urge Congress to send aid to states. “This is not a red state or blue state crisis. This is a red white and blue pandemic. The coronavirus is apolitical. It does not attack Democrats or Republicans. It attacks Americans.” pic.twitter.com/1kkSw3USey
— Sahil Kapur (@sahilkapur) May 13, 2020
The statement comes on the heels of a $3 trillion stimulus package House Democrats unveiled yesterday, a chunk of which would go to aid state and local governments that are facing the need to enforce massive cuts in their budgets due to the crisis and lack of tax revenue.
The association is calling for $500 billion to support state budgets and bolstered support in healthcare and emergency assistance costs.
Former Watergate prosecutors tell judge not to dismiss Michael Flynn case
Sixteen former Watergate prosecutors told the federal judge overseeing the case of former Trump national security advisor Michael Flynn that he should not dismiss the prosecution despite pressure from Trump’s justice department to drop it
The former prosecutors filed the brief explaining their view on Monday, CNN reported last night. They told the judge that they offer “unique perspective on the need for independent scrutiny and oversight to ensure that crucial decisions about prosecutions of high-ranking government officials are made in public interest, are viewed as legitimate and are not subsequently reversed by political intervention.”
Yesterday, Emmett Sullivan, the judge overseeing the case, said he would allow outside parties to make their case as to why he should or should not drop the case, showing a hesitancy to immediately agree to the justice department’s request to drop the case. Last Thursday, the department said it was dropping its case against Flynn, who is accused of lying to the FBI about conversations he had with the Russian ambassador to the US.
Updated
FEMA cancels $55m contract for N95 masks made by defense company
A defense company in Virginia signed a contract in April with the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) to create 10 million N95 respirator masks for $55 million – over $5 by mask – by May 1.
After the company, Panthera Worldwide LLC, has asked FEMA for multiple extensions, the agency cancelled the contract, the Washington Post reports.
The company was one of the third-party vendors the federal government made high-dollar contracts with in its scramble to shore up the mask supply in the country. The Department of Health and Human Services, a separate department, finalized a separate $100 million contract for 10 million N95 masks, meaning each mask would cost the government $10.
The Washington Post reported last month that the company had no history of manufacturing or distributing medical equipment. One of the company’s executives said in April he was working with his military contacts to get the masks
But after asking for a 10-day extension on May 1, and then asking for a second extension when their May 11 deadline passed, FEMA cancelled the contract.
Biden and Sanders unveil ‘unity task force’ members
Joe Biden and his former rival, US senator Bernie Sanders, unveiled the members of the “unity task force” the two men agreed to create in an attempt to mend policy divides within the Democratic party.
NEW this morning: Biden and Sanders roll out the members of the 6 Unity Task Forces that will offer recommendations to the DNC platform cmte and to Biden. Includes @johnkerry, @EricHolder, @vivek_murthy, @aoc, @RepJayapal, @rweingarten, @econjared, @StephanieKelton. pic.twitter.com/fGHHFJcUVE
— Jennifer Epstein (@jeneps) May 13, 2020
When Sanders announced his endorsement of Biden a week after he dropped out of the race, he said that the task force will work to find common ground among the moderate and progressive camps of the party.
“It’s no great secret out there, Joe, that you and I have our differences. And we’re not going to paper them over, that’s real,” Sanders said.
There are six subgroups within the task force, covering climate change, criminal justice reform, economy, education, healthcare and immigration. Each subgroup includes two co-chairs.
US representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez has been tapped to be the co-chair, along with former secretary of state and early Biden supporter John Kerry, to head the climate change task force.
Ocasio-Cortez, an early champion of the Green New Deal, has yet to officially endorse Biden and said last month that the process of unifying the party should be “uncomfortable for everyone”.
Fed chair: Future of economy is ‘highly uncertain’ and ‘subject to significant downside risks’
In a speech this morning, Federal Reserve chair Jerome Powell warned that Congress may need to approve more spending in order to prevent lasting damage on the US economy.
Powell said that while the US’ response to the crisis has been “both timely and appropriately large”, he noted that “the path ahead is highly uncertain and subject to significant downside risks”.
While he did not specify what measures he believes Congress should take to mitigate any potential downfall, he said: “Additional fiscal support could be costly, but worth it if it helps long-term economic damage and leaves us with a stronger recovery.”
He noted that the tradeoff is for elected representatives “who wield powers of taxation and spending”.
Fed Chair Jay Powell is screaming at Congress to get moving on more relief/stimulus
— Heather Long (@byHeatherLong) May 13, 2020
"Additional fiscal support could be costly, but worth it if it helps avoid long-term economic damage and leaves us with a stronger recovery," Powell said at @PIIE https://t.co/YAbdua4nxD
Powell’s speech comes in the wake of House Democrats unveiling a $3 trillion coronavirus relief package, which includes support for state and local governments, testing of the virus and another round of direct payments to Americans. The package is set to clash against Senate Republicans, who have already voiced opposition to the stimulus bill.
Leaders rush to affirm support of Fauci amid criticism
Leaders are starting to voice their support for Dr. Anthony Fauci after the epidemiologist was slammed yesterday by Fox News and a Republican Senator after testifying at the Senate’s hearing on the US coronavirus response.
Last night, US Republican representative Liz Cheney, daughter of former vice president Dick Cheney, tweeted that Fauci “is one of the finest public servants we’ve ever had.”
“He is not a partisan. His only interest is saving lives. We need his expertise and his judgment to defeat this virus,” she wrote.
Dr. Fauci is one of the finest public servants we have ever had. He is not a partisan. His only interest is saving lives. We need his expertise and his judgment to defeat this virus. All Americans should be thanking him. Every day.
— Liz Cheney (@Liz_Cheney) May 13, 2020
Democratic senator Kamala Harris similarly defended Fauci on an appearance on MSNBC last night. “God only knows what kind of repercussions he’s going to face for speaking the truth, but obviously he has the well-being of the American people as his priority, as opposed to the political patronage that his president thinks he’s due,” she said.
Yesterday, Fauci said during the Senate’s hearing that there are serious consequences if cities or states in the United States reopen too quickly: “There is a real risk that you will trigger an outbreak that you may not be able to control,” he said.
Fauci’s warning contradicts the stance of Trump and Republicans who have been gunning for a swift reopening to save the economy and took Fauci’s statement as a personal attack.
Rand Paul, a Republican senator from Kentucky, sparred with Fauci during the hearing yesterday when asking the epidemiologist why schools can’t reopen if children are seeing low virus-related death rate.
“As much as I respect you, Dr. Fauci, I don’t think you’re the end-all,” Paul said. “I don’t think you’re the one person that gets to make the decision.”
Later, on Fox News, host Tucker Carlson repeated Paul’s criticism of Fauci, saying: “He is not, and no one is, the one person who should be in charge when it comes to making long-term recommendations. This guy, Fauci, may be even more off-base than your average epidemiologist.”
Updated
More from the key report on CDC gulf with White House
From the start, CDC staffers working on the guidance were uncomfortable tying it specifically to reopening, and voiced their objections to the White House officials tasked with approving the guidance for release, according to a CDC official granted anonymity because they were not cleared to speak with the press, the AP reports.
The CDC’s detailed guidance was eventually shelved by the administration April 30, according to internal government emails and CDC sources who were granted anonymity because they were not cleared to speak to the press.
After the AP reported about the burying of the guidance last week, the White House asked the CDC to revive parts of it, which were sent back for approval, according to emails and interviews.
On Tuesday, CDC Director Robert Redfield testified before a US Senate committee that the recommendations would be released “soon.” He provided no further details. Internal government emails show that Redfield had repeatedly sought White House approval for CDC’s guidance, starting as early as April 10
Both the CDC document and the White House’s published plan recommend communities reopen in phases as local cases of coronavirus subside.
One of many differences, however, is advice for when communities should allow for the resumption of nonessential travel.
The shelved CDC guide advises communities to avoid all nonessential travel in phases of reopening until the last one, when cases are at the lowest levels.
Even then, the CDC is cautious and advises only a “consideration” of the resumption of nonessential travel after 42 continuous days of declining cases of Covid-19.
The White House plan, by contrast, recommends that communities “minimize” travel in Phase 1, and that in Phase 2, after 28 consecutive days of decline, “Non-essential travel can resume.”
Details on shelved reopen guidance from disease control experts emerge
Advice from the nation’s top disease control experts on how to safely reopen amid the coronavirus pandemic included detailed instructive guidance and more restrictive measures than the plan released by the White House last month.
The guidance, which was shelved by Trump administration officials, also offered recommendations to help communities decide when to shut facilities down again during future flareups of Covid-19.
The Associated Press obtained a 63-page document that is more detailed than other, previously reported segments of the shelved guidance from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
It shows how the thinking of the CDC infection control experts differs from those in the White House managing the pandemic response.
The White House’s “Opening Up America Again” plan that was released April 17 included some of the CDC’s approach, but made clear that the onus for reopening decisions was solely on state governors and local officials.
By contrast, the organizational tool created by the CDC advocates for a coordinated national response to give community leaders step-by-step instructions to “help Americans re-enter civic life,” with the idea that there would be resurgences of the virus and lots of customization needed.
The White House said last week that the document was a draft and not ready for release.
It contains the kinds of specifics that officials need to make informed decisions, some experts said.
“The White House is pushing for reopening but the truth of the matter is the White House has just not had a comprehensive plan where all the pieces fit. They’re doing it piecemeal,” said Dr. Georges Benjamin, executive director of the American Public Health Association.
Such detailed advice should have been available much earlier, said Stephen Morse, a Columbia University expert on the spread of diseases.
“Many different places are considering how to safely develop return-to-work procedures. Having more guidance on that earlier on might have been more reassuring to people. And it might have have prevented some cases,” Morse said.
People wait in line to have their hair cut in front of the shop of Barber Karl Manke, who faces two misdemeanor charges for reopening his business despite state shutdown orders, on May 12, 2020 in Owosso, Michigan. The most defiant challenge of Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer’s pandemic-prompted restrictions on businesses has not come from a titan of industry but from a 77-year-old barber and occasional novelist in a small town between Lansing and Flint. Photograph: Jeff Kowalsky/AFP via Getty Images
Updated
Gap between White House and public health experts grows over safety of reopening
Good morning, US live blog readers, it’s a busy day ahead with all the developments in American politics and coronavirus news. Here are the main topics burning up the air waves, the news wires and the Twitterverse so far, it’s all on the Guardian’s radar, so stay tuned.
- The gap between the White House and America’s leading public health experts is fast growing into a gulf. Anthony Fauci, head of the coronavirus task force, and Robert Redfield, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, gave a bleak assessment at a Senate hearing yesterday of a pandemic that is still out of control in the US, as Donald Trump pushes the country to reopen – and some high-profile Republicans are siding with those experts. But also today, The Associated Press has put out more details about the CDC plan for safe reopening that was shelved by the White House – detailing how the guidelines from that top federal public health agency differ significantly from the guidelines issued by the White House. We’ll get into all that.
- Covid-19 cases are spreading in America’s heartland, affecting places that had been largely spared before. It’s alarming and it’s affecting many areas that are strongly behind Donald Trump. The Guardian reports.
- Paul Manafort, former Trump 2016 campaign chairman, has this morning reportedly been released from prison, where he was serving time for fraud, according to an ABC News scoop. ABC adds that he had been “serving out his more than seven-year sentence for charges related to special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation in a federal correctional institution in central Pennsylvania. He was found guilty of tax fraud and conspiracy and was sentenced by a federal judge in March 2019. He was slated to be released from prison November 4, 2024.”
- The US supreme court today will hear oral arguments in a dispute involving whether “electors” in the complex electoral college system that decides the winner of US presidential elections are free to disregard laws directing them to back the candidate who prevails in their state’s popular vote. If enough electors do so, Reuters writes, it could upend an election.
Updated
