Live reporting on the coronavirus continues on Tuesday’s blog:
Evening summary
Wrapping up our live coverage of US politics for tonight, but you can continue to follow updates on our global coronavirus liveblog. Key events today:
- The death toll from coronavirus in the United States has now reached 80, 087 people. Just two months ago, on March 11, the death toll was 38 people.
- In what some are calling a “racist temper tantrum,” Donald Trump abruptly ended a White House coronavirus press briefing after he told an Asian American reporter to “ask China that question,” and then faced pushback from that reporter, CBS News’ Weijia Jiang.
- Earlier in the press conference, another reporter asked Trump about his tweet Sunday accusing former president Barack Obama of the “biggest political crime in American history, by far!” The reporter asked Trump what exact crime he was saying Obama had committed. “You know what the crime is,” Trump said.
- Erratic billionaire Elon Musk announced he was opening his California-based electric car factory today in defiance of public health orders, and dared authorities to personally arrest him.
- In Michigan, a fierce partisan battle over coronavirus public health measures is not cooling down. A news investigation found “dozens” of calls for Democratic governor Gretchen Whitmer to be lynched, shot, or otherwise assassinated within private Facebook groups. Another armed protest at the capital is planned for Thursday.
‘Don’t ask me, ask China.’
Donald Trump abruptly halted a press conference on Monday after being challenged by an Asian American reporter whom he told: “Don’t ask me. Ask China.”
Read David Smith’s full account of the dramatic ending of today’s White House coronavirus briefing, which some are are calling “another disgraceful, racist temper tantrum.”
In private Facebook groups, calls to assassinate Michigan’s governor
“Either President Trump sends in the troops or there is going to be a midnight lynching in Lansing soon.”
“We need a good old fashioned lynch mob to storm the Capitol.”
“Drag that tyrant governor out to the front lawn. Fit her for a noose.”
Within private Facebook groups in Michigan, a Detroit Metro Times reporter found violent threats against Democratic governor Gretchen Whitmer. “Dozens of people have called for her to be hanged,” the paper reported.
As she has led Michigan’s response to coronavirus, Whitmer has faced volatile partisan protests, opposition from Republican legislators, and personal attacks and criticism from President Donald Trump.
The Facebook discussions about lynching and assassinating Whitmer are particularly concerning ahead of a new armed rally in Michigan’s capital planned for this Thursday.
Read the full investigation here.
Updated
Stark numbers
As a startling reminder of how quickly coronavirus ravages society once it arrives, here is a bald statistic.
CNN, using the data from the US’s Johns Hopkins University that they, the Guardian and many other outlets and authorities rely on, put up some numbers on the TV screen a little while ago.
On March 11 the death toll in the US from coronavirus was 38. Just two months later, on May 11, the death toll has now reached 80, 087.
Is $60.5 million good enough? Putting Biden’s fundraising in context
Biden announced today that he was able to raise $60.5 million in April. For Democratic voters, is that an encouraging statistic, or a discouraging one?
Some reporters are offering context. These fundraising totals are lower than the totals from March. But this was the first month were all fundraising was done virtually, and a month of extreme economic crisis and uncertainty for virtually everyone.
Biden campaign + DNC announce raising $60.5 million in April, the first full month of quarantine where all the fundraising was done virtually.
— Michelle Ye Hee Lee (@myhlee) May 11, 2020
In March, the campaign raised $46.7 million and DNC raised $32.5 million (and $18 million of that was from Bloomberg).
On the other hand: “not bad” may not be the same as “enough.”
.@JoeBiden and @DNC say they raised a combined $60.5M in April. That's down from the $80M they raised combined in March — even if you leave out the $18M @MikeBloomberg transferred. Not a bad # given the coronavirus economic meltdown, but latest evidence they won't catch Trump $
— Cameron Joseph (@cam_joseph) May 11, 2020
Tech investor compares ignoring public health orders to opposing discriminatory laws
Some tech investors think Elon Musk’s choice to open his factory in defiance of public health orders is a brave, important check on government power during a pandemic.
“Government power needs to be checked more than any other source of “power” and governments that abuse their mandate will lose jobs, revenue and influence,” investor Keith Rabois wrote.
if he was threatening to leave a Southern state over bathroom policy you guys would be the first one cheerleading.
— Keith Rabois (@rabois) May 11, 2020
Rabois compared Musk’s action and his threats to take his company out of California over the state’s public health measures to the companies that publicly opposed discriminatory laws that banned transgender people from using the public bathrooms that matched their gender identities.
The banner in the White House rose garden read: “America leads the world in testing”.
This accompanied Donald Trump talking about millions of coronavirus tests being performed and how, essentially, the numbers are bigger than anywhere else in the world.
A lot of testing will definitely be needed as the US attempts to go back to work before effective treatments or a vaccine are available to knock Covid-19 on the head.
But the problem is, widespread testing first needed to be available in March and into April when the US, and the west coast and New York in particular, were trying to perform speedy mitigation (the US having failed to contain the virus before it spread rapidly), and it wasn’t anywhere near sufficient then.
For many vital weeks, the US was far behind countries such as South Korea in the rate of testing, and the crisis in South Korea has been less severe as a result.
Trump visited the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) on March 6 and in a press conference for the ages (measured on how unjustifiably boastful and misleading it was), said utterly falsely that anyone who wants a test can get one.
Precious time was lost during March and April and thousands and thousands of lives could have been saved with more organization from the federal government then. There’s even a piece of art in New York about that.
Tech reporters: Elon Musk ‘knows he’s not going to get arrested’
Earlier this afternoon, an erratic billionaire tweeted that he was opening his California-based electric car factory today in defiance of public health orders.
“If anyone is arrested, I ask that it only be me,” Elon Musk tweeted. (Reminder: Musk has a new baby who was born exactly a week ago, an optimal moment to dare authorities to arrest you.)
Tech reporters were not impressed with this “Twitter arrest martyrdom,” as Buzzfeed News’ Ryan Mac put it.
Musk knows he's not going to get arrested. Every local country enforcement agency is deferring to the other when asked if they're going to do anything. The Governor of California went out of his way to be deferential to him *after* he sued a county. https://t.co/CE1znvYSOQ
— Ryan Mac 🙃 (@RMac18) May 11, 2020
The Guardian’s California-based senior tech reporter agreed:
guess who is not going to get arrested today
— Julia Carrie Wong (@juliacarriew) May 11, 2020
“Musk is the perfect example of what happens when the checks against power are whittled down to vestiges,” Mac wrote.
Musk is the perfect example of what happens when the checks against power are whittled down to vestiges. His board is toothless and dependent on him. State and local officials believe their constituents are reliant on Tesla's jobs. Federal agencies have given up.
— Ryan Mac 🙃 (@RMac18) May 11, 2020
White House reporters must show solidarity against Trump's "racist" attacks, leading media correspondent says
CNN’s chief media correspondent Brian Stelter just demolished Donald Trump for the way he handled questions from CBS’s Weijia Jiang at the White House press conference in the rose garden.
Stelter said the president was clearly rattled by tough questioning at the end of the presser by Jiang. He tried to cut her off and turn to CNN’s Kaitlan Collins instead, but Collins deferred to her colleague to try to let her finish her questioning before Collins asked her question. Trump then tried to cut Collins off when she tried to ask her own question, and then abruptly ended the presser and walked off when Collins continued to try to ask hre questions.
“He didn’t want to hear the questions from Kaitlan and Weijia. It has racist overtones. It’s racist to look at an Asian-American correspondent and say ‘ask China’, it’s part of a pattern from the president,” Stelter just commented, live on CNN.
He continued: “He’s been rattled by Weijia Jiang’s questions in the past...he treats minority journalists in a very different way,” Stelter said.
He recalled how Trump dealt inappropriately with a question from correspondent April Ryan, who is black, when he asked her if she could arrange a meeting for him with the Congressional Black Caucus, in 2017.
Stelter continued, moments ago, that Trump “routinely targets women and minority journalists”.
Weijia Jiang describes herself in her autobiography as a Chinese-born West Virginian.
Stelter said: “The pattern [of Trump’s attacks] suggests a racial reaction...that’s deeply disturbing...normally you wouldn’t talk about her background.”
He called on all White House press corps journalists to support each other in solidarity against such targeting.
Updated
Joe Biden announced today that he has raised $60.5 million “between my campaign and the Democratic National Committee.”
“The average online donation to my campaign was only $32.63,” Biden’s campaign wrote in an email to supporters.
California governor speaks warmly of Elon Musk as he pledges to open Tesla factor in defiance local health orders
Some California officials have been blunt in their response to Musk and his frustrations with public health restrictions delaying the reopening of his electric car factory. “F*ck Elon Musk,” one state politician tweeted.
But California governor Gavin Newsom spoke warmly of both Tesla and Musk at Monday’s briefing, even as the company and Musk himself said he would be opening Tesla’s California factory today in defiance of local health orders.
“I have long been a strong advocate and supporter and an early adopter of the technology,” Newsom said. “I have not only known the company but I have known the founder for many, many years. I have great reverence for their technology, for their innovative spirit, for their leadership and I have great expectations that we can work through at the county level, the issue with this particular county and this company in the next number of days.”
While state regulators have gotten involved in some rural counties where businesses have reopened too early, Newsom said any issue with the Tesla factory’s purported reopening on Monday would be up to Alameda county to deal with.
This is a familiar move for California’s governor, who has previously punted difficult enforcement decisions to local authorities and local law enforcement, including decisions on whether to arrest protesters violating public health orders at large, sometimes chaotic protests.
Newsom also said he was not concerned about Musk’s threats to move operations to another state.
“I have more confidence moving forward in our ability to support a company that this state has substantively supported for now many, many years and in return we have been beneficiaries of their incredible growth, ingenuity and innovative spirit,” he said. “We look forward to many, many decades of that relationship.”
Report: Elon Musk’s factory appears open in defiance of health orders
After suing local California authorities and threatening to move Tesla’s headquarters to Nevada or Texas over coronavirus restrictions, it appears that Elon Musk’s electric car factory was in open and operating on Monday, in defiance of county health orders.
The parking lot of the plant in Fremont, located northeast of San Jose, was almost full, according to the Associated Press. “Tesla has started the process of resuming operations,” according to a statement posted on the company website Saturday, but what exactly that entails was not included.
Musk himself tweeted that “Tesla is restarting production today against Alameda County rules.”
“I will be on the line with everyone else,” Musk claimed. “If anyone is arrested, I ask that it only be me.”
Musk’s partner gave birth to their first child exactly a a week ago.
Tesla is restarting production today against Alameda County rules. I will be on the line with everyone else. If anyone is arrested, I ask that it only be me.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) May 11, 2020
Last week, Gavin Newsom, California’s governor, modified the statewide stay-at-home order, reopening 70% of the state’s economy and allowing some retailers and manufacturers to operate again under certain guidelines. Given the size and varied needs of the state, however, he gave localities the option to maintain more stringent measures than the state order. San Francisco, for example, will not reopen its retail businesses until 18 May, while much of the state opened 8 May.
Fremont is located in Alameda county, part of the set of Bay Area counties that became the first to enact shelter-in-place orders nationwide. The county has seen 2,101 cases total, and 71 deaths, but Fremont’s close proximity to San Jose means many from Santa Clara county - one of the state epicenters for the virus, and where the first recorded coronavirus death in the nation is believed to be - were likely commuting back and forth for work. In Santa Clara county, there have been 2,339 cases and 129 total deaths.
Updated
Trump abruptly ends press conference after clash with two reporters
Trump ends the briefing suddenly on a very sour note.
Asked by CBS White House Correspondent Weijia Jiang why he is so fixated on comparing the US’ testing capability to other countries as opposed to focusing on the lag that still exists here, Trump snapped: “Maybe that’s a question you should ask China. Don’t ask me, ask China that question, okay?”
Trump then called on CNN’s Kaitlan Collins, who allowed Jiang a moment to follow up.
Jiang, who is Asian-American, replied to Trump: “Sir, why are you saying that to me, specifically? Why are you asking me this?”
“I’m saying it to anybody who would ask a nasty question like that,” Trump told her.
“That’s not a nasty question,” Jiang said.
Then, as CNN reporter Collins started speaking, Trump abruptly cut her off with “No, it’s okay” and “next.”
“I just wanted to let my colleague finish,” Collins said. As Collins continued to try to ask her questions, Trump suddenly ended the press conference, saying “Thank you very much” and walked away from the podium.
Trump throws a fit when @kaitlancollins of CNN tries to ask him a question and abruptly ends the press conference pic.twitter.com/58AVZ9CABl
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) May 11, 2020
Updated
Trump spent Mother’s Day sending conspiratorial tweets about his predecessor. In one tweet he accused Obama of committing the “biggest political crime in American history, by far!”
Asked to name the crime he is accusing Obama of committing, Trump replied: “Obamagate. it’s been going on for a long time it’s been going on before I even got elected.”
The reporter followed up: but what is the crime you’re accusing him of?
“You know what the crime is,” Trump says.
Updated
Asked about the death of Ahmaud Arbery, Trump called his murder “heartbreaking.”
“He looks like a wonderful young guy,” Trump said, recalling a photo of Arbery, 25, in a tuxedo.
Arbery was shot and killed by two white men in February. The two white men, father and son Gregory and Travis McMichael, were charged with murder and aggravated assault on Thursday after video of a confrontation involving an unarmed Arbery, who was African American, was made public.
“It’s a very sad thing,” Trump said, adding that he had discussed the situation with South Carolina senator Tim Scott, the chamber’s only black Republican who has forcefully condemned the killing and called for “justice.”
Updated
Trump has just made some fantastic boasts about how well the United States has done on coronavirus testing, writes Guardian reporter Tom McCarthy.
It’s true that the United States has recorded more coronavirus tests than any other country and that the United States appears to be moving ahead in per capita testing. Those are great developments. But unfortunately they do not mean that America’s testing regime is on par with other countries.
For one thing, the United States is a huge country, with a population about seven times that of South Korea. Many more tests need to be conducted here. It’s also telling that the White House says that less than 10% of tests are positive. Does that mean that a smaller proportion of Americans are positive – or that the US is testing the wrong people?
Unlike South Korea, Vietnam, China and other countries that have had success at containing the virus, the United States has not, in most places, stood up consistent contact tracing for positive cases – meaning that the country has a blind spot to outbreaks, and that the selection of patients tested is relatively random.
As for the death rate in the United States versus Germany and other places – unfortunately, unlike Germany and other places, the number of confirmed deaths in the United States, a number the US appears to track less carefully than Germany, is still climbing.
If you go hunting you don’t brag about how many times you shot – you brag about how many ducks you bagged. Trump is bragging about shots fired. And his numbers of tests do not seem to represent numbers of people tested – repeat tests for certain people, such as health care workers and other people on the front lines (and people in positions of power in Washington) make the per capita number in the United States larger than it is in fact. In fact, most people do not have access to testing through the workplace, and quality daily testing is not in reach for most of America.
Finally, unlike other countries, the United States has not paired its testing program with a supported isolation program. That means that outbreaks can accelerate undetected, as health officials mostly are not searching the network of contacts of positive cases, and people in contact with positive cases, who could be asymptomatic carriers,
Updated
For a second time, Trump was asked why the White House staff is able to be tested daily when that is still not available for the American people. He balks at the framing of the question and tells the reporter that it’s a catch-22 and the White House would face criticism if senior officials weren’t frequently tested.
“You know what, if we didn’t get the test ...you’d be up complaining why aren’t you getting tests for the White House?” Trump said. “We can’t win.”
Trump to a woman reporter, who asked about testing: "I understand you very well. Better than you understand yourself."
— Todd Zwillich (@toddzwillich) May 11, 2020
He then told her: “I understand you very well – better than you understand yourself.”
Updated
Trump is now taking questions.
The first question was about the White House staff who tested positive for Covid-19.
“I don’t think the system broke down at all,” he said. He said the person who tested positive “will be fine” and will be “out of quarantine very soon”.
He says it is “shocking”, given the number of people who come in and out of the White House every day, how few positive cases there have been. He adds: “I’ve felt no vulnerability whatsoever.”
Asked when Americans can get tested every day like his senior staff can, Trump said it would be “very soon.”
“We’re leaving that up to the governors,” Trump said when asked how Americans should feel about going back to work without more testing capacity. He then argues that some governors are going too slow to lift their restrictions.
Trump says it was his decision to require all White House staffers to begin wearing masks.
Updated
Trump on coronavirus: 'We have met the moment and we have prevailed'
Trump declared victory over what he has called the “invisible enemy” as Covid-19 deaths surpasses 80,000.
“We have met the moment and we have prevailed,” Trump, flanked by ventilators and testing supplies, said during a briefing in the Rose Garden on Monday. He later clarified he was discussing testing.
He boasted that the US’s testing capacity is “unmatched and unrivaled anywhere in the world and it’s not even close.” He said the US has been running 300,000 tests per day but according to the COVID Tracking Project, the US has only administered more than 300,000 tests on four days since it began recording new tests on 28 February.
Trump and officials are boasting about how much more testing per capita the US has now done as compared to South Korea. The missing context: South Korea was much faster to get tests done, crushing its curve. Yesterday's *34* reported new cases in SK was the highest in a month.
— Daniel Dale (@ddale8) May 11, 2020
“We’re opening and we’re starting and there’s enthusiasm like I haven’t seen in a long time,” Trump said.
He also went on a little tangent about the wall, which he said is still being built.
Updated
The Guardian’s Vivian Ho sends this dispatch from the Golden State:
The California legislature and their counterparts in other western states have written the federal government asking for $1tn in relief, governor Gavin Newsom said Monday.
The ask comes after Newsom announced that California would have a projected budget shortfall of $54.3bn because of the economic devastation wrought by the pandemic. In California alone, 4.5 million people have filed for unemployment insurance and pandemic unemployment assistance since 12 March, with the state distributing $13.1bn.
“The challenge is enormous and it’s one that’s presented to us not just in the state of California, but is one that will be felt across the United States and all around the world,” Newsom said. “These are challenging times and they require a collaborative spirit.”
California joins the other states in the western pact - Washington, Oregon, Nevada and Colorado - in writing to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, asking for assistance.
Just 90 days ago, California had a projected $6bn budget surplus.
The White House began requiring all staffers entering the West Wing to wear a facial covering from today.
That’s according to two sources familiar with the decision, NBC reports, and aides have been asked to avoid going there “unless you absolutely need to conduct in-person business in the West Wing,” according to a memo sent to staffers.
Guidance from the Centers for Disease Control has been that any employees who are exposed to the virus should be wearing a mask in the workplace for 14 days after any contact with a person who tests positive.
White House staffers returned in the morning to a thoroughly cleaned West Wing and new protocols around testing and masks.
Meanwhile the president is not going to wear a mask while in the West Wing/Oval Office and he has avoided wearing a mask completely, while Mike Pence has avoided wearing one almost completely and they have done very little to promote the idea, Trump pouring cold water on it when first announcing that public health experts recommended it, saying he chose not to.
NBC adds that Secret Service members in close proximity to the president have begun wearing masks and visitors were asked additional questions before entering the White House grounds about whether they’d been experiencing any symptoms in addition to temperature checks. Staffers who are in regular, close contact with the president — roughly a dozen people — are also being tested daily.
Updated
The Mooch protests!
Here’s Anthony Scaramucci on Twitter. He was the White House communications director for 10 days in 2017 before being fired and has since become a popular pundit on TV critiquing the Trump administration’s performance.
THIS IS TYRANNY! LIBERATE THE WEST WING! https://t.co/NvHiHH2TId
— Anthony Scaramucci (@Scaramucci) May 11, 2020
West Wing staff to wear masks at work - though not Trump
The White House has directed staff working in the West Wing, where the daily operations of Donald Trump’s administration are carried out, to wear masks at all times in the building, except when they are at their own desks, a senior administration official confirmed on Monday, Reuters reports.
ABC News first reported that a new memo directed everyone who enters the wing to cover their faces.
With Trump’s valet and Vice President Mike Pence’s press secretary both testing positive for the deadly coronavirus last week, pressure is growing for the White House to take further steps in protecting the health of country’s 73-year-old president.
Trump was reported to be “lava-level” angry last week when White House staffers started testing positive. He has yet to be seen in public wearing a mask.
The president will be exempted from wearing a mask in the White House, the Washington Post reports, per aides.
Updated
Across the country, governors are lifting restrictions imposed to prevent the spread of coronavirus.
Here’s a round up of some recent action in the states:
.@GovEvers allows all Wisconsin retail stores to reopen, with no more than five customers inside at a time
— Scott Bauer (@sbauerAP) May 11, 2020
It is in effect immediately
NEWS: Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds will follow a "modified quarantine" after her visit to the White House last week https://t.co/IqDGC2TSfX
— Brianne Pfannenstiel (@brianneDMR) May 11, 2020
The four phases in Governor Baker's re-opening approach:
— WBZ NewsRadio (@wbznewsradio) May 11, 2020
1) "Start" (severe restrictions, limited openings)
2) "Cautious" (more industries open)
3) "Vigilant" (more with guidance)
4) "New Normal" (vaccine development/therapies enable this phase) #COVID19
Developing- @Jackie8News asks when will we know for sure that May 15 is reopen phase one?
— Kerri O'Brien (@Kerri8News) May 11, 2020
Northam: I suspect Wednesday I'll make a ruling if nothing changes. @8NEWS
Today we enter a new phase in the battle against COVID-19.
— Andrew Cuomo (@NYGovCuomo) May 11, 2020
We have established criteria for reopening based on 7 metrics: pic.twitter.com/Ar1QzxLUyl
Updated
US health officials identified more than 5,000 additional deaths in New York City between March and early May that may have been “directly or indirectly” caused by the coronavirus pandemic, according to a new report released by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on Monday.
New York is the center of the outbreak in the US, accounting for nearly a third of all the fatalities in the country. The report, which comes as allies of the president accuse officials and the media of exaggerating the death toll, strongly suggests that the official total is an underestimate of deaths attributable to the pandemic.
Between March 11 and May 2, New York health officials reported 32,107 deaths to the CDC, which is 24,172 more deaths than the seasonal norm.
Of these deaths, 13,831 were confirmed by a lab to have been caused by Covid-19 while an additional 5,048 were categorized as probable cases based on the patients’ symptoms and other factors, the report found.
That leaves an additional 5,293 deaths (or 22% of the total excess deaths) that were not previously identified as confirmed or probably coronavirus cases.
The total number of confirmed and probable Covid-19 deaths might not include coronavirus cases in which the person “did not access diagnostic testing, tested falsely negative, or became infected after testing negative, died outside of a health care setting, or for whom COVID-19 was not suspected by a health care provider as a cause of death,” the report said.
It adds that people with underlying chronic health conditions such as heart disease and diabetes are risk factors for severe cases of Covid-19, and thus their deaths may not have been recognized as resulting from the coronavirus.
Illinois governor JB Pritzker, a Democrat, says he will work from home after a senior member of his staff has tested positive for coronavirus.
A member of my senior staff who was not exhibiting any symptoms tested positive for COVID-19.
— Governor JB Pritzker (@GovPritzker) May 11, 2020
Following @IDPH guidance, the rest of our team – myself included – is working from home for the time being.
This virus knows no boundaries, and we must stay the course to defeat it.
In a statement, Pritzker’s office said all employees including the governor will work from home “for an appropriate isolation period,” in accordance with safety guidelines issued by the Illinois Department of Public Health. The statement, however, did not specify the duration of time Pritzker and his team would work from home.
The staff member was asymptomatic but tested positive last week, the office said. Pritzker, who had been in close proximity to the employee, and all other members of his staff have tested negative.
“I want to assure you that the governor’s office is very much still fully operational & all aspects of the executive branch will function as they have been,” Pritzker wrote on Twitter. “No matter what challenges come our way, the people of Illinois have the resolve to get through this—together.”
A majority of Americans do not support the protests against stay-at-home orders and restrictions aimed at stemming the spread the coronavirus, according to a new survey from the University of Chicago Divinity School and The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research.
The poll also showed that while support for such restrictions remains strong, the number has dipped in recent weeks. These findings match the results of another poll released today by Monmouth University.
According to the AP survey, 55% of Americans disapprove of the protests that have popped up in some states while 31% approve of the demonstrations. Unsurprisingly, Democrats are more likely than Republicans to disapprove of the protests, which have been organized with right-wing groups and often feature Trump campaign insignia.
Meanwhile, the survey found that 67% of Americans are in favor of orders requiring bars and restaurants to close, down from 76% in the earlier poll.
The poll also suggested declining support for requiring Americans to limit gatherings to 10 people or fewer. Support to 75% from 82%. A similar trend was found for limitations on nonessential medical care, which dropped to 57% from 68%.
Nearly 2,000 former Justice Department employees are calling on Attorney General William Barr to resign, arguing in an open letter that he has “once again assaulted the rule of law” by moving to drop the case against Michael Flynn, the president’s former national security adviser.
In the open letter, organized by the nonprofit group Protect Democracy and published online on Monday, the lawyers assert that Barr’s actions are “extraordinarily rare, if not unprecedented.”
“If any of us, or anyone reading this statement who is not a friend of the President, were to lie to federal investigators in the course of a properly predicated counterintelligence investigation, and admit we did so under oath, we would be prosecuted for it,” they write.
The letter is signed by former justice department attorneys who worked for Republican and Democratic administrations, the vast majority of whom were former career officials and not political appointees. A February letter, which received more than 2,600 signatures, called on Barr to resign after he intervened to reduce the sentencing recommendation for Roger Stone, a longtime friend and political ally of the president.
“We continue to believe that it would be best for the integrity of the Justice Department and for our democracy for Attorney General Barr to step aside,” they wrote. “In the meantime, we call on Congress to hold the Attorney General accountable.”
The letter urges Congress must formally censure Barr “for his repeated assaults on the rule of law in doing the President’s personal bidding rather than acting in the public interest”.
“Our democracy depends on a Department of Justice that acts as an independent arbiter of equal justice, not as an arm of the president’s political apparatus,” they write,
Updated
Michigan commission delays decision banning firearms in capitol building
The Michigan capitol commission delayed a decision on whether to ban guns from the state’s capitol building, an issue that arose after members of an armed militia joined a demonstration against the governor’s stay-at-home order last month.
The commission was due to vote today but instead said they needed more time to consider the matter. During the meeting, which was held on Zoom, the videoconferencing service, the group decided to establish a committee to further study the issue, including any legal implications.
Capitol Commission votes 6-0 to create a five-member committee to review firearms topic with outside counsel. #mipol #mileg
— Nick Smith (@NSmithReports) May 11, 2020
Michigan Capitol Commission creates a special committee to study the issue of guns in the Capitol.
— Mikenzie Frost (@MikenzieFrost) May 11, 2020
Chairman Randall says committee will meet as early as next week if possible and commits to an “aggressive” schedule. #mileg
Updated
A little update on Michael Cohen, from The Guardian’s Martin Pengelly.
Exciting news from the Daily Beast – if you’re like me and find books about American politics under Trump exciting. If you’re not, look away now.
Former Trump lawyer and fixer turned federal-prisoner-not-released-during-the-pandemic-as-first-seemed-likely, Michael Cohen is writing a tell-all book about his former boss, which we knew already. But the Beast reveals that Rosie O’Donnell, one of Trump’s favourite targets for invective and misogynistic abuse, is helping.
“Michael and I talked a lot about how he got involved in Trump,” O’Donnell told the Beast, “how it’s a cult, and what role he played not only in Trump Inc but also Trump’s own family, including how much he dealt with Barron and Melania.
“One thing he said to me that was shocking was that one of the nicest people he’s ever met in his life is Melania Trump. He said, ‘I swear to you. She’s a great mother, she’s a great woman, and she’s in a predicament with him and doing her best to get through it.’”
Cohen has a lot to tell if he chooses and if Trump fails to stop him publishing:
Concern about contracting the coronavirus has fallen even as more Americans report knowing someone who has tested positive for Covid-19, according to a new Monmouth University poll.
The survey found that 42% of Americans are very concerned that a family member will get seriously ill from the coronavirus, down from 50% in April.
NATIONAL POLL: #COVID19 concerns drop even though more know someone who has had the virus:
— MonmouthPoll (@MonmouthPoll) May 11, 2020
42% very concerned family member will get seriously ill (down from 50% in April).
40% know someone who has gotten the virus (up from 26% in April).https://t.co/IzjBf4TGua
Cuomo on New York: 'We're on the other side of the mountain'
As parts of New York prepare to re-open on Friday, Governor Andrew Cuomo says the number of new infections has fallen to the rate it was on March 19, when he says the state “went into the abyss.”
New York, which was the worst hit state in the nation, will begin to lift its statewide restrictions on 15 May.
“This is the next big step in this historic journey,” Cuomo said.
“All the arrows are pointed in the right directions,” he said, noting that the number of hospitalizations and infection rates are in decline. The state is recording about 488 new infections per day, Cuomo says, which is “right about where we started before we went into the heart of this crisis.” There have been 161 new deaths in New York in the last 24 hours.
“We’re coming out of the other side,” Cuomo said. “In many ways, from my point of view, we’re on the other side of the mountain.”
To open, regions must meet the following criteria:
- 14-day decline in hospitalizations or under 15 new hospitalizations on average per day (across a three-day period.)
- 14-day decline in hospitalized deaths or under 5 new deaths on average per day (across a three-day period.)
- New hospitalizations - under 2 per 100,000 residents (across a three-day period.)
- Have at least 30% of hospital beds available in case of a surge in infections
- Have at least 30% of ICU beds available in case of a surge in infections
- Ability to administer 30 tests per 1,000 residents (across a 7-day average of new tests per day.)
- Presence of 30 contact-tracers per 100,000 residents
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Weeks after right-wing protests erupted in response to states’ stay-at-home orders, there is some evidence that attendees have now contracted the virus.
According to Up North News in Wisconsin, 72 residents who reported attending a large gathering in the past two weeks have tested positive for Covid-19. The state did not ask individuals to specify which event they attended. But two weeks ago, 1,500 people gathered at a rally at the state’s Capitol in Madison in violation of the state’s social distancing restrictions. Photographs of the event show mask-less participants standing next to each other in a large crowd.
At the rally, the paper notes, some speakers said “they were not afraid to die or afraid of the coronavirus, with many hosting signs calling the pandemic a hoax.”
Wisconsin, a battleground state in November, is governed by Tony Evers, a Democrat.
Later on Monday, the Michigan state capitol commission will vote on whether to allow firearms in the Capitol building, after demonstrators carried military-style weapons into the building at a recent protest against the governor’s stay-at-home order.
Michigan is also a battleground state led by Democratic governor Gretchen Whitmer,
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Trump makes vague claim 'coronavirus numbers are looking much better'
In between re-tweeting and amplifying conspiracies about his predecessor, Trump also remarked on the state of coronavirus spread in the US. Let’s unpack that Tweet.
Trump says “coronavirus numbers are looking MUCH better, going down almost everywhere.”
Here’s what we know. Nearly 1,330,000 people have been infected with the coronavirus in the US, more than any other nation on the planet, and at least 79,500 have died, according to a Johns Hopkins database.
Coronavirus numbers are looking MUCH better, going down almost everywhere. Big progress being made!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) May 11, 2020
Trump’s assessment is vague – “coronavirus numbers” could mean many things. But here’s what we know.
According to a New York Times database, new cases are decreasing in just 14 states of 50 states. Among them are densely populated states like New York and Michigan, which were among the hardest hit. The list also includes sparsely-populated states like Montana and Alaska.
New cases are still rising in nine US states, including states like Arizona that is pressing ahead with its re-opening on Monday. In the remaining states, the growth rate of new cases has remained relatively steady.
There is no national strategy for re-opening beyond general guidelines issued by the White House, which have largely been ignored by the president and Republican-led states that moved without meeting the requirements laid out in the guidance.
On Monday, Trump slammed Pennsylvania, a battleground state led by a Democratic governor, for not moving faster to reopen its economy. In the tweet, he broadened his attack to accused Democrats across the country of intentionally slowing their states’ return to normalcy to hurt his chances of re-election.
The great people of Pennsylvania want their freedom now, and they are fully aware of what that entails. The Democrats are moving slowly, all over the USA, for political purposes. They would wait until November 3rd if it were up to them. Don’t play politics. Be safe, move quickly!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) May 11, 2020
Trump has loudly pressured states to re-open, sparring with Democratic governors who are proceeding more cautiously. He has also encouraged support for right-wing protests against social distancing restrictions.
The Associated Press has reported that top White House officials for weeks suppressed guidelines for re-opening the economy drafted by the nation’s top disease control experts.
Public health experts at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reportedly spend weeks preparing guidance to help schools, child care centers, businesses, bars and restaurants reopen. Their plan featured a phased re-opening, that advised “communities as a whole on testing, contact tracing and other fundamental infection control measures.”
Robert Redfield, the CDC director, defended the decision not to release the guidance, saying in a statement that he had not formally approved the guidance. Redfield’s statement contradicts his own internal emails that were leaked to the AP.
Updated
The Trump administration is reportedly planning to publicly accuse China of attempting to steal coronavirus-related research.
According to a report in the Wall Street Journal: The administration is preparing to “issue a warning that hackers tied to the Chinese government are attempting to pilfer information from US researchers working on the race to develop a coronavirus vaccine, according to a person familiar with the matter.”
The alert, from the Federal Bureau of Investigation and Department of Homeland Security, is expected to accuse Beijing of working to steal from American institutions intellectual property and health information related to coronavirus vaccines and treatment through hacking and other illicit means and may come within days, the person said. The warning was not finalized and plans around its release could change, the person said.
Such a warning would increase tensions between the US and China that have already deteriorated at a rapid clip in recent months as the coronavirus has unfurled across the globe.
Trump has repeatedly blamed China for the spread of the virus, an effort his critics believe is an attempt to shift blame for the administration’s handling of the pandemic. Trump and Republicans have adopted a strategy of blaming China, and in turn hammering Biden and Democrats for their posture toward the world’s second largest economy, ahead of the 2020 elections.
Last week, House Republicans set up a China task force to develop legislation in response to the apparent threats posed by the country. In announcing the effort, House minority leader Kevin McCarthy cited Beijing’s failure to disclose information about the coronavirus after it was first discovered in Wuhan.
The Trump campaign has also released a number of ads hammering Biden for his past remarks about China, including opposing elements of the administration’s decision to impose restriction on travel from China in January. Biden’s campaign fired back last month with an ad attacking Trump for his relationship with China, highlighting his flattery of the nation’s president, Xi Jinping.
A fundraising email from the Trump campaign on Monday teased a coming onslaught of China-focused attacks.
“I’ll be honest with you - there are few things I enjoy more than watching the Left get TRIGGERED by Joe Biden’s CORRUPT past with China, which is why I’ve been looking forward to this week so much,” Trump wrote in the email to supporters, noting that the campaign is launching a $10m ad blitz to frame Biden as China’s “DREAM candidate.”
Updated
Bloomberg is reporting that Ezra Cohen, a former Trump intelligence aide who left the White House amid controversy in 2017, is returning to the administration as a top official at the Defense Department.
According to the report, which cites three sources with knowledge of the situation, Cohen, has been named deputy assistant to the secretary of Defense for counter-narcotics and global threats. His first day was Monday.
As a refresher on who Cohen is, and why he left, Bloomberg explains:
Cohen was senior director for intelligence in the early months of the administration under Trump’s first national security adviser, Michael Flynn. He was pushed out of the White House after clashes with Trump’s second national security adviser, HR McMaster, including over Afghanistan policy, according to two people familiar with the matter.
He was also the subject of reports he had helped then-House Intelligence Chairman Devin Nunes obtain classified documents revealing that members of the Obama administration had sought the identities of Trump campaign officials and associates inadvertently caught on government intercepts in a process known as “unmasking.”
His re-hiring comes after the Justice Department dropped charges against Flynn for lying to FBI agents about his conversations with the Russian ambassador ahead of Trump’s inauguration.
The position does not require Senate confirmation and has not been formally announced.
Read the full story here.
Updated
Politico is reporting that the House stimulus bill being prepared by Democrats who hold the chamber could be out as early as this evening.
That doesn’t mean new checks are coming to American households hammered by spiraling unemployment – the bill hasn’t got a chance in hell of passing because, for one, the White House has been saying for weeks it won’t play ball. Trump aides including treasury secretary Steven Mnuchin spent Sunday pushing their own priorities, including a payroll tax cut (eg, cutting Social Security and Medicare) and concessions tied to hardline policy priorities on immigration, which Democrats … are not very likely to entertain.
But it’ll be interesting to see what’s in the Democratic bill nonetheless. Here’s more from Politico’s morning Playbook:
Since every corner of the House Democratic Caucus is vying for their priorities in this bill, it is subject to change even upon release. (Officially, the leadership says they are still working, and will release a bill when there’s consensus.)
[House Speaker Nancy Pelosi] also plans to muscle through a measure to institute proxy voting whenever the chamber officially returns to DC.
That’s a definite non-starter with Trump and Republicans, who do not, to put it lightly, like measures meant to make voting easier and to restrict voter suppression. Oh no.
Politico continues:
The Senate is taking a different approach: The Republican leadership is looking to pump the brakes on the next bill, while Majority Leader Mitch McConnell continues with other legislating. The chamber could be pushed into earlier action if the Paycheck Protection Program runs dry this week.
Here’s our business editor, Dominic Rushe, on the economic crisis:
Trump is tweeting this morning.
To begin, he re-tweeted himself re-tweeting a supporter whose Twitter bio describes himself as a “political animal” who has been “RT’d by @realDonaldTrump.” Trump added: “OBAMAGATE.”
Trump has been tweeting this phrase throughout the weekend, sharing memes and posts from rightwing talking heads claiming an anti-Trump conspiracy involving Barack Obama. This preoccupation with amplifying a baseless conspiracy about his predecessor comes as the US death toll nears 80,000.
He continued with the conspiracy-minded theme in a Tweet moments later in which he framed his re-election as a battle between himself and a “rigged media” vowing: “WE WILL WIN AGAIN.”
This is why it’s not really the Lamestream Media, it’s the Rigged Media....and it is what I’m up against. It was corrupt in 2016. Now it is much more corrupt, and what you are seeing is the least of it....but WE WILL WIN AGAIN! https://t.co/UXyOrQ7fXW
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) May 11, 2020
Updated
Former vice president Joe Biden, the Democratic nominee for president, penned an op-ed in The Washington Post this morning titled: “How the White House coronavirus response presents us with a false choice.” The editorial gives us a preview of how Biden intends to make testing – and the White House’s access to it – a major issue on the campaign trail.
In the op-ed, Biden accuses Trump of attempting to “split the country into dueling camps, casting Democrats as doomsayers hoping to keep America grounded and Republicans as freedom fighters trying to liberate the economy.”
“The Trump administration could focus on producing and distributing adequate testing and protocols that conform with the guidance of public health experts; doing so would speed up the reopening process considerably and make it a whole lot more effective. ...
“The administration is fully aware that this is the right path, too — after all, the president and his staff are now reportedly receiving daily tests. They knew exactly how to make the Oval Office safe and operational, and they put in the work to do it. They just haven’t put in that same work for the rest of us. If Trump and his team understand how critical testing is to their safety — and they seem to, given their own behavior — why are they insisting that it’s unnecessary for the American people?”
The editorial from Biden comes as the Trump re-election campaign is expected to unload a new series of attacks on their opponent after holding back due to the coronavirus pandemic.
Biden has been careful yet pointed in his criticism of Trump’s handling of the virus. But in recent weeks, the Democrat, who is waging a battle for the presidency from his home in Wilmington, Delaware, has stepped up his denunciations of the president’s response, blaming him for not taking preliminary measures that might have mitigated the virus’s deadly toll.
Read the editorial here. And read more about Biden’s home-brewed presidential campaign – and the technical challenges that come with it – below.
The head of a coronavirus research institute whose funding was cut by the Trump administration has spoken of his concern that the US could be ill-prepared for future virus outbreaks.
EcoHealth Alliance, a US group which studies coronaviruses in China, had its grant terminated at the end of April by the National Institutes of Health. The group has worked with the Wuhan Institute of Virology to research potential new viruses, and it seems EcoHealth Alliance may have suffered with input from false information peddled by the right.
“I’m really concerned about where this leaves us,” Peter Daszak, director of EcoHealth Alliance, told USA Today.
In the weeks before the funding was cut, prominent Trump cheerleader and Republican congressman Matt Gaetz falsely claimed the government had granted money directly to the Wuhan Institute, which the Trump administration and its supporters have sought, without offering evidence, to tie to the origins of the outbreak.
While EcoHealth worked with the Wuhan Institute, which is widely respected for its research, the government had not given money to the Wuhan Institute.
This is what our world affairs editor, Julian Borger, wrote on the Institute recently:
Most epidemiologists say that while it is possible the outbreak started in the Wuhan Institute of Virology, where coronaviruses have been intensively studied, it is a far less likely scenario than the theory that it was transmitted naturally from bats through an intermediary animal, mutating along the way to become dangerous to humans.
Daszak told USA Today: “Once we’ve overcome Covid-19, what about Covid-20? What about Covid-21? Who is going to go out and find those? Our grant was specifically designed to locate where these viruses are and to stop them from harming Americans.”
On Sunday night CBS News’ 60 Minutes ran an interview with Daszak and the epidemiologist Maureen Miller, who has worked with EcoHealth and the Wuhan Institute, on Sunday night. Both seemed baffled by the funding cut.
“I was shocked. I was really, really surprised,” Miller said. “It stops the research that’s essential to understanding where pandemics like the one we’re going through, where they start.”
The interview upset Donald Trump:
.@CBS and their show, @60Minutes, are doing everything within their power, which is far less today than it was in the past, to defend China and the horrible Virus pandemic that was inflicted on the USA and the rest of the World. I guess they want to do business in China!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) May 10, 2020
General tested positive before Trump meeting
There are a lot of reports around about Mike Pence, negative tests, Dr Fauci, self-isolation or not, and possible new White House guidelines for those who work in the inner sanctums. Sanctums? Sanctae? I think sanctums. Evidently I haven’t Googled it.
It’s not surprising this should be so, given that as Bloomberg News reports here, a senior general tested positive for Covid-19 at the White House on Saturday, shortly before meeting the president and his national security team. According to Bloomberg:
Pence didn’t attend [the] meeting … neither did two members of the Joint Chiefs of Staff who’ve had their own brushes with coronavirus, Chief of Naval Operations Michael Gilday and the chief of the National Guard Bureau, Air Force General Joseph Lengyel.
Gilday has had contact with an infected family member. Lengyel tested positive on Saturday, and later tested negative, a Defense Department spokesman said. He’ll be tested again on Monday.
A rapid-test screening at the White House ahead of Trump’s meeting with military leaders in the Cabinet Room caught Lengyel’s positive status, one person familiar with the matter said.
For further reading, two interesting tweets, one from ABC News and one from CNN:
New WH coronavirus procedures? @Santucci & I are told 1 measure under consideration is aides must maintain a 6 ft social distance during mtgs w/ Trump. There is a list of over a dozen people who will be tested daily before reporting to work in the west wing, per multiple sources.
— Katherine Faulders (@KFaulders) May 11, 2020
Per @JDiamond1, anonymous Trump admin official "says there is extreme sensitivity inside the White House right now at the current state of affairs — officials recognize the contradiction in telling states to reopen while the WH enhances protocols to prevent spread of the virus."
— Brian Stelter (@brianstelter) May 10, 2020
Stelter and Diamond get to the heart of the matter, of course.
As our chief reporter Ed Pilkington noted on Sunday: “News that three core members of the US pandemic task force were having to go into some degree of self-isolation could not come at a worse time for Donald Trump. The president is trying to project an image of confidence and resolution as he encourages states to reopen their economies, while his administration is proving unable to keep the virus at bay even within the White House.”
Trump, by the by, didn’t just tweet about Russia and Michael Flynn and Barack Obama on Sunday. He also mentioned Mother’s Day a couple of times, boasted about the coronavirus response, and attacked the media. Stelter was among his targets, as it happens, as was Chuck Todd of NBC and the whole of CBS 60 Minutes.
Updated
More from Pence. This is from Mike Allen of Axios, formerly of Politico and a pillar of Washington political journalism and/or gossip, which are of course in many forms basically the very same thing:
I ask Vice-President Pence whether people should wear masks in the White House, and he says he’d welcome former national security adviser Michael Flynn back.
On masks, Pence says “some people do wear masks” and “I think we’ll listen very carefully to the White House physician’s office”.
So that’s not a yes.
Pence, remember, toured the Mayo Clinic in Minnesota without a mask, against clinic policy, and got into whole lot of bother about it. In Arizona, Trump then one-upped him by touring a factory that was making masks and didn’t wear a mask. He also did so to the sound of Live and Let Die, thus proving my theory that we are in fact living in the Matrix but it isn’t being controlled by the Wachowskis – it’s being programmed by Armando Iannucci.
On Flynn. The retired general, remember, was fired as Trump’s national security adviser for lying to Pence about conversations with Russians, pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI about conversations with Russians (as Trump acknowledged) and co-operated with special counsel Robert Mueller in his investigation of lots of conversations about and with Russians before changing his mind and seeking to withdraw his plea.
All that, and last week the justice department said it would drop the case against him, prompting Trump’s Sunday Twitter tear-up.
Pence:
I think Gen Michael Flynn is an American patriot. And for my part, I’d be happy to see Michael Flynn again.”
Updated
An update on whether Mike Pence is self-isolating or not, via the New York Times:
Late Sunday, responding to scattered news reports that the vice-president was isolating himself, the White House issued a statement saying that Mr Pence would not alter his routine or self-quarantine. The vice-president “has tested negative every single day and plans to be at the White House tomorrow”, said Devin O’Malley, a spokesman for Mr Pence.
Good morning…
…and welcome to another day of coverage of the coronavirus, and the politics around it, in the US. I always start with the numbers from Johns Hopkins University:
- US cases: 1,329,631
- US deaths: 79,523
- New York cases: 335,395
- New York deaths: 26,641
As always, New York is singled out because it is by far the state worst hit. But others have it bad (New Jersey has more than 9,000 deaths, Massachusetts nearly 5,000, Michigan around 4,500) and many are having it worse, with confirmed cases increasing even as most attempt some degree of economic reopening.
Oliver Laughland, our southern bureau chief, has been writing and co-ordinating some fine coverage of such efforts. Here’s his report from Biloxi, Mississippi, and a story about Texas, co-written with Erum Salam there and Nina Lakhani in New York:
Politically, the main story of the weekend was an outbreak of cases in the White House and Donald Trump’s reaction. Aides spread across the shows to counsel calm but the New York Times reported that the president was “spooked”, as public health experts including Dr Anthony Fauci went into isolation.
He may have been – he will likely say he wasn’t, or isn’t – but Trump in part reacted by going on an absolute Twitter tear-up about Russia, Michael Flynn and, most saliently, Barack Obama. Here’s my write-up of what the president would like to call “Obamagate”, as he retweets conspiracy-tinged accounts about his successor’s supposed complicity in “the biggest political crime in American history”:
One would imagine that somewhere, Obama himself is laughing. And, as he told alumni of his administration on Friday in remarks that may have had something to do with the president’s mood, getting ready to hit the trail (virtually or otherwise) for presumptive Democratic nominee Joe Biden.
More to come, obviously.
One other thing now, which is that on Sunday Lamar Alexander, a Tennessee Republican who chairs the Senate health committee, expressed strong skepticism about Trump’s predictions for how soon a coronavirus vaccine will be found. Not long after that, it was announced that Alexander himself will be entering self-isolation, after a staffer tested positive for Covid-19.
So, in fact, in some form, will the vice-president, Mike Pence, who aides said tested negative on Sunday after his press secretary Katie Miller, who is married to Trump policy aide Stephen Miller, tested positive.
It all means many things, but here’s two. Alexander will chair a key Senate hearing on Tuesday remotely, just as Fauci and fellow doctors Robert Redfield and Stephen Hahn will testify before him remotely. To the symbolically minded, after so many weeks in lockdown, that may seem symbolic of how Washington has never really got a hold on this crisis.
Also, Trump’s scheduled Rose Garden press briefing on testing today at 4pm may seem more timely than ever.
Updated
