That’s all from me today! Here’s a rundown of the day’s biggest politics stories:
- The Justice Department’s inspector general has launched an investigation into the department under Donald Trump seizing data records of at least two House Democrats on the House intelligence committee. Adam Schiff, the chairman of the House intelligence committee whose records were among those seized, said congressional oversight of the investigation would be necessary.
- Senate majority leader Chuck Schumer and Senate judiciary committee chair Dick Durbin said that Trump’s attorneys general, William Barr and Jeff Sessions, should be required to testify under oath about the affair.
- Attorney general Merrick Garland will double the number of DOJ lawyers working to protect voting rights. The announcement comes as Republican-led legislatures have passed a slew of new laws attempting to limit Americans’ ability to vote.
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Five bills that would dramatically rein in big tech were introduced by a bipartisan group from the House antitrust subcommittee.
- The Biden administration will roll back the Trump administration’s plan to allow road-building and logging in the Tongass national forest, a piece of Alaskan wilderness known as the “lungs of the country”.
- And finally, Joe Biden attended the G7 in Cornwall.
Updated
The Food and Drug Administration will require at least 60m doses of the Johnson & Johnson coronavirus vaccine to be discarded due to problems at a factory, the Washington Post reports.
The spoiled doses come from a Baltimore-area Emergent BioSolutions plant and come on top of 15m doses already discarded.
The factor was shut down in April when authorities discovered that the first 15m doses were contaminated. The shutdown has limited supply of the one-and-done vaccine, with repercussions around the world.
Ten million doses of the J&J jab from the plant are safe to use and will be sent overseas as part of the Biden administration’s commitment to share vaccines, according to the report.
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The Biden administration will “repeal or replace” the Trump administration’s plan to allow logging and road-building in Alaska’s Tongass national forest, the AP reports.
The Tongass is the country’s largest national forest, known as the “lungs of the country”. For two decades, it has been protected by a “roadless rule” prohibiting road construction and logging.
In October, the Trump administration announced a plan to exempt the Tongass from the roadless rule, prompting outcry from environmentalists and the general public.
BREAKING: Biden plans to restore roadless rule protections in the Tongass National Forest. This is a step in the right direction, but restoring full protections to roadless areas in this ancient rainforest is crucial for wildlife and our climate. pic.twitter.com/HEunN5bZGr
— Center for Bio Div (@CenterForBioDiv) June 11, 2021
Jerry Nadler, the chair of the House judiciary committee, has released a new statement regarding the reports of the Justice department’s targeting of members of congress and journalists in its leak investigations.
“My concern at this hour is that the corruption may run deeper than has already been reported,” he said, and questioned whether the justice department’s effort to gain information from reporters was connected to the seizure of information about members of the Intelligence committee.
Nadler also appears unwilling to wait for the inspector general’s investigation, saying that there is “a very short window” for the justice department to hold those responsible accountable before his committee will “have no choice but to step in and do the work ourselves”.
Here’s the full statement:
It is outrageous that the Department of Justice may have used a criminal investigation as pretext to spy on journalists, Members of Congress, their families, and Congressional staff. Sadly, after four years of Donald Trump’s corrupting influence at the Department of Justice, we have every reason to believe that these reports are true. Indeed, my concern at this hour is that the corruption may run deeper than has already been reported. We know that the Department, under Attorneys General Sessions and Barr’s leadership, tried to secretly seize data from the accounts of these reporters and of my colleagues on the Intelligence Committee—but we do not yet know how these two efforts were connected, or whether there were additional targets of this gross abuse of power.
I am grateful that Inspector General Horowitz has committed to investigating both cases. His work here will be invaluable. An investigation by his office is, however, no substitute for swift action by the Department of Justice.
The Committee has been in communication with DOJ, and we have made our position clear. The Department has a very short window to make a clean break from the Trump era on this matter. We expect the Department to provide a full accounting of these cases, and we expect the Attorney General to hold the relevant personnel accountable for their conduct. If the Department does not make substantial progress towards these two goals, then we on the Judiciary Committee will have no choice but to step in and do the work ourselves.”
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Recent revelations about just how far the Trump administration went to uncover leakers is shining a spotlight on how tech giants respond to government demands for information about their users.
Apple was unaware that the subpoena it received for user data in February 2018 included members of Congress, their families and congressional staffers, the New York Times just reported. But it complied with the request as well as with a gag order preventing it from informing the customers information was taken.
Per the Times:
Fred Sainz, an Apple spokesman, said in a statement that the company regularly challenges government data requests and informs affected customers as soon as it legally can.
“In this case, the subpoena, which was issued by a federal grand jury and included a nondisclosure order signed by a federal magistrate judge, provided no information on the nature of the investigation and it would have been virtually impossible for Apple to understand the intent of the desired information without digging through users’ accounts,” he said. “Consistent with the request, Apple limited the information it provided to account subscriber information and did not provide any content such as emails or pictures.”
Other tech companies were also caught up in the dragnet. When the DOJ sought records for New York Times reporters, Google fought a gag order on the basis that the Times was a corporate client with which it had a contract. Microsoft also provided metadata and complied with a gag order, only finding out later that the individual involved was a congressional staffer.
Again per the Times:
More frequently than not, the companies comply with law enforcement demands. And that underlines an awkward truth: As their products become more central to people’s lives, the world’s largest tech companies have become surveillance intermediaries and crucial partners to authorities, with the power to arbitrate which requests to honor and which to reject.
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House lawmakers introduced a package of five antitrust bills aimed at reining in the big tech companies and increasing competition on Friday.
“Right now, unregulated tech monopolies have too much power over our economy,” said David Cicilline, the Democratic chair of the House antitrust subcommittee, in a statement. “They are in a unique position to pick winners and losers, destroy small businesses, raise prices on consumers and put folks out of work. Our agenda will level the playing field and ensure the wealthiest, most powerful tech monopolies play by the same rules as the rest of us.”
The proposal has bipartisan support, including from Ken Buck, the Republican ranking member of the antitrust subcommittee, who said: “Apple, Amazon, Facebook, and Google have prioritized power over innovation and harmed American businesses and consumers in the process. This legislation breaks up big tech’s monopoly power to control what Americans see and say online, and fosters an online market that encourages innovation and provides American small businesses with a fair playing field.”
The five bills are:
- The American Innovation and Choice Online Act
- The Platform Competition and Opportunity Act
- The Ending Platform Monopolies Act
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The Augmenting Compatibility and Competition by Enabling Service Switching (ACCESS) Act
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The Merger Filing Fee Modernization Act
They would address some of the behaviors and conditions that have allowed the tech giants to come to dominate the US economy, including banning the platforms from “self-preferencing” their own products (ie Amazon favoring its own products in search results) and limiting anti-competitive acquisitions.
The bills will be referred to the House judiciary committee.
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Darnella Frazier, the young woman who filmed the police murder of George Floyd, has been awarded a special citation by the Pulitzer prizes board – the most prestigious award in US journalism.
Frazier was just 17 when she filmed Derek Chauvin leaning on Floyd’s neck as he begged for his life. The 9-minute video went viral and helped to spark global protests and ensure Chauvin’s conviction.
In its citation, the Pulitzer board wrote of Frazier: “For courageously recording the murder of George Floyd, a video that spurred protests against police brutality around the world, highlighting the crucial role of citizens in journalists’ quest for truth and justice.”
Now 18, Frazier has shied away from press attention. On the anniversary of Floyd’s death, she released a rare statement reflecting on her role in history and revealing its personal cost:
A lot of people call me a hero even though I don’t see myself as one. I was just in the right place at the right time. Behind this smile, behind these awards, behind the publicity, I’m a girl trying to heal from something I am reminded of every day. Everyone talks about the girl who recorded George Floyd’s death, but to actually be her is a different story ...
If it weren’t for my video, the world wouldn’t have known the truth. I own that. My video didn’t save George Floyd, but it put his murderer away and off the streets.
Hello everyone, this is Julia Carrie Wong in Oakland, California, here to pick up the liveblog for the rest of the afternoon. Stay tuned for more news coming up...
Today so far
- The Justice Department’s inspector general has launched an investigation into the department under Donald Trump seizing data records of at least two House Democrats on the House intelligence committee amid the Russia investigation.
- Adam Schiff, who was the top Democrat of the committee at the time and one of the members whose records were seized, said public oversight by Congress will also be necessary.
Democratic California congressman Adam Schiff, who was the top Democrat of the House intelligence committee during the Russia investigation and one of the Democrats whose data records were seized by the Justice Department under Donald Trump in 2018, applauded the department’s inspector general investigation, but said more still needs to be done. “This incident must be viewed in the context of the systemic politicization of the department, and other flagrant abuses,” he said in a statement.
Adam Schiff applauds decision by DOJ's IG to probe department's decision to target House Intel Comm members, staff and family. But says that won't obviate need for a much broader investigation into what happened, including by Congress. pic.twitter.com/Joq6uHjKc0
— Laura Litvan (@LauraLitvan) June 11, 2021
The justice department will double the number of lawyers working on enforcing protections for the right to vote in the next 30 days, the attorney general, Merrick Garland, announced on Friday.
The announcement came as Republicans have launched an unprecedented effort to restrict voting access across the US. Under Donald Trump, the justice department did not file a single major case aimed at protecting voting rights. Many civil rights groups are closely watching to see how the department, which has unmatched resources and enforcement authority, will wield its power under Biden.
Garland also expressed concern about post-election reviews of ballots, a growing interest among Republican lawmakers, as well as escalating threats against election officials. The former appellate judge also condemned the supreme court’s 2013 decision in Shelby County v Holder, which gutted a core protection of the Voting Rights Act and, making it harder for the justice department to protect voting rights.
“Since that opinion, there has been a dramatic rise in legislative efforts that will make it harder for millions of citizens to cast a ballot that counts. So far this year, at least 14 states have passed new laws that make it harder to vote,” he said. “And some jurisdictions, based on disinformation, have utilized abnormal post-election audit methodologies that may put the integrity of the voting process at risk and undermine public confidence in our democracy.”
Garland also called for the passage of the For the People Act, a sweeping voting rights package, that has stalled in the US Senate in recent days as some Democrats express concerns about the bill. He also called on Congress to pass the John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act, which would restore the pre-clearance provision in the Voting Rights Act the supreme court struck down in 2013.
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Now knowing what we know of the Justice Department under Donald Trump seizing the data of at least two House Democrats, this clip of Vice-President Kamala Harris grilling former attorney general William Barr is now making the rounds on the interwebs.
Flashback: May 2019
— Kyle Griffin (@kylegriffin1) June 11, 2021
Harris: Has the president or anyone at the WH ever asked or suggested that you open an investigation of anyone?
Barr: Um.
...
Harris: Seems you'd remember something like that and be able to tell us.
Barr: Yeah, but I'm trying to grapple with the word suggest. pic.twitter.com/y8ewAgVAgE
DoJ inspector general launches investigation into Trump-era data seizure
The justice department’s internal watchdog announced on Friday that it was launching an investigation after the New York Times broke the news last night that the department under Donald Trump had subpoenaed Apple for data from the accounts of Democratic members of the House intelligence committee, Adam Schiff and Eric Swalwell.
Inspector General Michael Horowitz said that he would look into “whether any such uses, or the investigations, were based upon improper considerations.”
Schiff and Swalwell said they were notified last month that their metadata had been subpoenaed and turned over to the Justice Department in 2018, as their committee was investigating the former president’s ties to Russia.
In addition to Schiff and Swalwell, prosecutors retrieved the records of aides, former aides and family members, including one minor.
Schiff said the seizures suggested “the weaponization of law enforcement by a corrupt president.” Senate Democratic leaders immediately demanded that former attorneys general William Barr and Jeff Sessions, who both oversaw Trump’s leak probes, testify about the secret subpoenas, with senate majority leader Chuck Schumer and senate judiciary committee chairman Dick Durbin saying that “this appalling politicization of the Department of Justice by Donald Trump and his sycophants” must be investigated.
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The US justice department will prosecute threats against election officials and aggressively scrutinize new state election laws to ensure they do not violate citizens’ voting rights, the attorney general Merrick Garland said today.
The pledge followed a special report by the Reuters news wire earlier about an ongoing problem of vicious threats by fanatical supporters of Donald Trump, against senior election officials in several states, especially in Georgia.
Updated
Summary
- The justice department under Donald Trump seized the records of at least two House Democrats as part of an aggressive crackdown on leak during the Russia investigation in 2018. Democratic Senate leadership has called for Trump-era attorneys general William Barr and Jeff Sessions to testify before the Senate judiciary committee. Meanwhile, the justice department has reportedly asked the department’s inspector general to open an investigation into the matter.
- Democratic Florida congresswoman Val Demings reportedly raised $1m in her first day after announcing she was running to unseat Republican Marco Rubio in the Senate
- The G7 summit is now under way in Cornwall.
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DoJ asks for watchdog investigation into Trump seizure of Dems' data
The justice department has asked for an internal investigation into the Trump-era seizure of phone data from House Democrats in 2018, the Associated Press is reporting.
Deputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco asked the department’s inspector general to open the investigation on Friday, a senior Justice Department official told the AP, after Senate majority leader, Chuck Schumer, and Senate judiciary committee chair, Dick Durbin demanded that Trump-era attorneys general William Barr and Jeff Sessions testify about the seizures.
The New York Times broke the news last night that amid the Russian investigation, the justice department under Donald Trump had subpoenaed Apple for data from the accounts of Adam Schiff, then the top Democrat on the committee, and California Democratic congressman Eric Swalwell. Adam Schiff, then the top Democrat on the committee, and the California Democratic congressman Eric Swalwell, In addition, prosecutors subpoenaed records from aides, former aides and family members, including one who was a minor.
“The reports of the behavior of the attorney general under Donald Trump are appalling,” White House comms director Kate Bedingfield tells @mitchellreports. “He obviously has a very different relationship with his Department of Justice than Trump did his” she says of Biden.
— Kaitlan Collins (@kaitlancollins) June 11, 2021
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A Republican lawmaker has become the first representative ever expelled from the Oregon state house for helping far-right agitators enter the capitol during a special session.
BREAKING: Oregon lawmakers vote to expel Rep. Mike Nearman, who helped far-right agitators gain entrance into the Oregon state Capitol in December. The expulsion vote was 59-1. Nearman himself was the only “no.”
— Brian Tyler Cohen (@briantylercohen) June 11, 2021
Finally, some accountability.pic.twitter.com/T4kEqSBFt4
Security footage from 21 December, when the state legislature was in special session and closed to the public, showed Republican Mike Nearman opening a door for demonstrators protesting coronavirus-related public health measures.
Some of the agitators skirmished with law enforcement officers, spraying them with bear spray and breaking doors. Outside, they assaulted reporters.
The Guardian’s Martin Pengelly has more here:
The state attorney generals of 22 states have asked the supreme court not to end the eviction moratorium put in place by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention during the Covid-19 pandemic, Reuters is reporting.
A group of landlords asked the supreme court last week to end the national ban on residential evictions, with the CDC order already set to expire 30 June.
The CDC director, Rochelle Walensky, declined to say this week if the agency will again extend the order.
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Schumer, Durbin call for Barr, Sessions to testify before Senate judiciary
The Senate majority leader, Chuck Schumer, and Senate judiciary committee chair, Dick Durbin, shared in the outrage over the justice department under Donald Trump retrieving data from from the accounts of at least two Democrats on the House intelligence committee, in addition to their aides and family members.
They said Trump’s former attorney generals, William Barr and Jeff Sessions, “must testify before the Senate judiciary committee under oath”.
“If they refuse, they are subject to being subpoenaed and compelled to testify under oath.”
Schumer/Durbin: "The revelation that the Trump Justice Department secretly subpoenaed metadata of House Intelligence Committee Members and staff and their families, including a minor, is shocking. This is a gross abuse of power and an assault on the separation of powers."
— Craig Caplan (@CraigCaplan) June 11, 2021
Schumer/Durbin: "This appalling politicization of the Department of Justice by Donald Trump and his sycophants must be investigated immediately by both the DOJ Inspector General and Congress."
— Craig Caplan (@CraigCaplan) June 11, 2021
Schumer/Durbin:"This issue should not be partisan; under the Constitution, Congress is a co-equal branch of government and must be protected from an overreaching executive, and we expect that our Republican colleagues will join us in getting to the bottom of this serious matter.”
— Craig Caplan (@CraigCaplan) June 11, 2021
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In an attempt to split the Democratic vote in a number of close races, a digital marketing firm closely linked to a pro-Trump youth group ran a series of deceptive Facebook ads promoting Green party candidates during the 2018 US midterm elections.
A new Guardian investigation found that Facebook was aware of the true identity of the advertiser - Rally Forge, a group with ties to Turning Point Action - which used socialist memes and rhetoric to sway leftwing voters toward the Green party.
The Guardian’s Julia Carrie Wong has the story here:
Georgia election workers still receiving death threats
FBI director Christopher Wray reiterated yesterday that Donald Trump’s claims about a stolen presidential election were nothing more than a lie: “We did not find evidence of fraud that could’ve changed the outcome of the election.”
Yet seven months later, election workers in Georgia are still receiving death threats over the election results.
The continuing false claims of a stolen election have led to violent/death threats, intimidation, and claims of prison time coming for elections workers. They keep coming. Real leaders need to take steps to stop it. So far they haven't. https://t.co/L5gL5nrj4u
— GA Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger (@GaSecofState) June 11, 2021
The family of Brad Raffensperger, Georgia’s secretary of state who took a stand against Trump over the election results, told Reuters that the death threats started almost immediately and have continued ever since. The family had to go into hiding for almost a week after intruders broke into the home of their widowed daughter-in-law in late November – the same night people who identified themselves to police as Oath Keepers, a far-right militia group that has supported Trump’s bid to overturn the election, were found outside the their home.
“Vitriol and threats are an unfortunate, but expected, part of public service,” Raffensperger said. “But my family should be left alone.”
Updated
Let’s head west for a second. The Biden administration has restored the $929m grant for the high-speed rail project in California that Donald Trump revoked in 2019.
Gavin Newsom, California’s governor, said the action comes after months of negotiations to restore funding and is “proof that California and the Biden-Harris Administration share a common vision – clean, electrified transportation that will serve generations to come”.
To recap: California is a really big state, both land mass-wise and population-wise. In a state that big, transportation is a sticky topic. Because of high housing costs around the coastal hubs of San Francisco, Los Angeles and San Diego, residents were stuck in traffic, commuting hours a day for work from as far inland as the Central Valley before the pandemic.
High-speed rail has been a pipe dream for the state for decades, but years of protest, lawsuits, politicking and replanning have forced officials to rework plans.
Then as California set itself up as a resistance flagbearer against Trump, the former president withdrew its federal grant, with Trump calling the project a “green disaster”.
The restoration of the funding comes amidst a recall battle for Newsom, and is being viewed as a victory for the governor and his policies.
“Restoring nearly $929m in grant funding back to California’s high-speed rail project will continue to spur job creation, advance the project and move the state one step closer to getting trains running in California as soon as possible,” Newsom said in a statement.
Democratic Florida congresswoman Val Demings reportedly raised $1m the day after she announced that she was running to unseat Republican Marco Rubio in the Senate, the Hill is reporting.
For a Senate race in a year without any regularly scheduled federal elections, $1m in the first 24 hours is a huge haul – for context, Vice-President Kamala Harris raised $1.5m in the first 24 hours of her presidential campaign, while former Texas congressman Beto O’Rourke raised more than $6m and Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders raised $5.9m.
But Florida is known to be an expensive market for campaigns, and Rubio reportedly already has $4m on hand in his senate campaign war chest.
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The White House announced today that Joe Biden will be welcoming Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany for a visit on 15 July, to discuss ending the pandemic, the climate crisis and international security, among other things.
Biden and Merkel, of course, will meet today as the G7 summit officially kicks off in Cornwall. For all things G7, please check out our sister liveblog at the Guardian UK:
Democrats and Republicans may not be agreeing on much in Washington these days, but members on both sides were able to join together to attack Democratic Minnesota congresswoman Ilhan Omar for her remarks earlier this week.
To recap: Omar posted a tweet of her questioning Secretary of State Antony Blinken during a foreign affairs committee hearing about the international criminal court. “We must have the same level of accountability and justice for all victims of crimes against humanity,” she tweeted. “We have seen unthinkable atrocities committed by the US, Hamas, Israel, Afghanistan and the Taliban.”
Those attacking her apparently believe that she was equating the US and Israel to Hamas and the Taliban. The House speaker, Nancy Pelosi, and Democratic leadership have asked her to clarify her statement.
Omar pointed out that the reaction to her question - she has received death threats - just goes to prove that the systems in place aren’t enough for those who suffer the injustices of war crimes.
They also fail to acknowledge that these victims don’t trust the “well-established judicial systems” of Israel & the US to deliver justice.
— Ilhan Omar (@IlhanMN) June 11, 2021
Whether we agree on the legitimacy of the ICC or not, we have to support the rights of people to seek justice in the international courts. https://t.co/yQgrURCcS3
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President Joe Biden and the first lady, Jill Biden, are set to meet again with the British prime minister, Boris Johnson, and his wife Carrie Johnson shortly again in Cornwall, following a successful first encounter yesterday. Johnson, eschewing the usual “special relationship” descriptor – he felt it made the UK seem weak and needy – chose to go with the phrase “indestructible relationship”.
The Bidens and Johnsons will then go on to join with other leaders as the G7 summit officially kicks off today.
Updated
Democrats outraged over Trump's DoJ secretly seizing members' data
Greetings, liveblog readers. Happy Friday.
The New York Times broke the news last night that amid the Russian investigation, the justice department under Donald Trump had subpoenaed Apple for data from the accounts of at least two Democrats on the House intelligence committee.
As part of an aggressive crackdown on leaks, the records of Adam Schiff, then the top Democrat on the committee, and the California Democratic congressman Eric Swalwell, were seized. In all, the records of at least 12 people – aides, former aides and family members. including one who was a minor – were eventually shared.
“Trump repeatedly demanded the DOJ go after his political enemies,” Schiff tweeted last night. “It’s clear his demands didn’t fall on deaf ears.”
Trump repeatedly demanded the DOJ go after his political enemies.
— Adam Schiff (@RepAdamSchiff) June 11, 2021
It's clear his demands didn't fall on deaf ears.
This baseless investigation, while now closed, is yet another example of Trump's corrupt weaponization of justice.
And how much he imperiled our democracy.
The Democratic Florida congresswoman Val Demings, an impeachment manager in Trump’s first trial who is now challenging Senator Marco Rubio for his seat in the Senate, is calling for a “thorough investigation” that will “hold everybody responsible accountable”.
On tonight's DOJ news, it is outrageous but not surprising.
— Rep. Val Demings (@RepValDemings) June 11, 2021
We have a former president with no regard for the rule of law or for those who enforce the laws.
We need to conduct a thorough investigation and hold everybody responsible accountable.
Thank you @TheLastWord @Lawrence pic.twitter.com/BbVDPln691
Swalwell described the seizure of his records as “the weaponization of law enforcement”. He told CNN that he believed “they were targeted punitively, not for any reason in law but because Donald Trump identified Chairman Schiff and members of the committee as an enemy of his”.
Like many of the world’s most despicable dictators, former President Trump showed an utter disdain for our democracy and the rule of law. My statement: pic.twitter.com/Pvvb1xYiLn
— Rep. Eric Swalwell (@RepSwalwell) June 11, 2021
Read more here:
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