Summary
- Senate minority leader Mitch McConnell said he would fight Joe Biden’s $2tn infrastructure plan “every step of the way”. The president has expressed hope that the proposal will attract bipartisan support, but McConnell said he expected Republicans to oppose the plan, given Biden’s suggestion to raise the corporate tax rate to help pay for the project.
- Biden held his first full cabinet meeting as president. Biden opened the meeting by announcing that he had asked five members of his cabinet – Transportation secretary Pete Buttigieg, Energy secretary Jennifer Granholm, Housing and Urban Development secretary Marcia Fudge, Labor secretary Marty Walsh and Commerce secretary Gina Raimondo – to take the lead on advancing his infrastructure plan.
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Biden has asked the Department of Education to conduct a legal review on the president’s authority to cancel student debt, his chief of staff Ron Klain told Politico. The president will make a decision soon on whether to act on Democratic lawmakers’ prompts to cancel up to $50,000 in debt for each borrower via executive order.
- Derek Chauvin’s trial continued in Minneapolis, where the former police officer faces murder charges over the killing of George Floyd. Courteney Ross, Floyd’s partner, testified this morning, and she acknowledged Floyd struggled with opioid addiction. However, prosecutors have said opioids did not cause Floyd’s death. They also argue that Floyd’s drug use does not justify Chauvin keeping his knee on Floyd’s neck for more than nine minutes.
- The rise in coronavirus cases has intensified fears of a fourth wave of infections in the US. Even as vaccinations ramp up across the country, about half of US states have reported an increase in new coronavirus cases over the past week. Public health experts have repeatedly urged Americans to remain vigilant about limiting the spread of the virus.
- The Virginia supreme court ruled Charlottesville can move forward with plans to take down two statues of Confederate generals. Charlottesville’s city council had voted to remove the statues of Robert E Lee and Thomas “Stonewall” Jackson, but a group of residents sued to block the city from doing so. A lower court had ruled in favor of the residents, but the state supreme court overturned that decision.
- Kentucky legislators have passed a measure to limit no-knock warrants, in the aftermath of the killing of 26-year-old Breonna Taylor last March. Lawmakers did not pass a more restrictive bill that would have ended no-knock warrants.
– Joan E Greve and Maanvi Singh
Updated
Analysis: Biden’s cabinet meeting proves the reality TV presidency wasn't renewed
Poor old Joe Biden. He might have won the electoral college and the popular vote but he’ll never feel the love of his underlings like Donald Trump did.
The former president’s first full cabinet meeting in June 2017 remains an unparalleled opera of oleaginousness. Secretary after secretary all but flung themselves at his feet, sang songs of praise and paid homage to the divine emperor of the universe.
Has any parent ever known such undying adoration from their child? Only King Lear from Goneril and Regan, perhaps. And most telling was the fact that the world was allowed to see it. Trump made sure it was one more chapter in his reality TV presidency.
Not really Biden’s style. His first cabinet meeting on Thursday was relocated to the East Room because of coronavirus restrictions – the 16 permanent members wore face masks and sat in a giant square with empty chairs between them – but was otherwise a return to the staid old way of doing things.
The main item on the agenda was not the American president’s sculpted handsomeness, nor his towering intellect, nor his indubitable virility, nor his ability to hit holes in one, but merely his freshly announced $2tn infrastructure plan.
Flanked by the secretary of state, Antony Blinken, and the defense secretary, Lloyd Austin, with the vice-president, Kamala Harris, opposite, Biden said he was asking five cabinet members to “take special responsibility to explain the plan to the American public”.
He took no questions from the media and, after less than two and a half minutes, reporters were ushered out. “I thank the press for being here, but I’ll talk to you all later.”
But even this brief glimpse behind the curtain spoke volumes about how much has changed. White men composed nearly three-quarters of Trump’s cabinet; they make up only a third of Biden’s.
On Thursday the East Room included Harris, the first woman and first woman of colour to service as vice-president; Janet Yellen, the first woman to lead the treasury department; Pete Buttigieg, the first openly gay secretary confirmed to the cabinet; and Deb Haaland, the first Native American in a president’s cabinet.
“This is the first in American history that the cabinet looks like America,” Biden said. “That’s what we promised we were going to do, and we’ve done it.”
If Trump represented a backlash against America’s first Black president, Biden’s cabinet represents a backlash against the backlash.
Read more:
Updated
Matt Gaetz, the Republican representative of Florida who is being investigated on sex trafficking allegations, gained a reputation for bragging about his sexual exploits and sharing nude photographs of women with his colleagues CNN reports:
Behind the scenes, Gaetz gained a reputation in Congress over his relationships with women and bragging about his sexual escapades to his colleagues, multiple sources told CNN.
Gaetz allegedly showed off to other lawmakers photos and videos of nude women he said he had slept with, the sources told CNN, including while on the House floor. The sources, including two people directly shown the material, said Gaetz displayed the images of women on his phone and talked about having sex with them. One of the videos showed a naked woman with a hula hoop, according to one source. “It was a point of pride,” one of the sources said of Gaetz.
Gaetz is being investigated over an alleged relationship with a 17-year-old child. My colleague Richard Luscombe reports:
The prominent Republican congressman’s reported relationship with a 17-year-old girl remained under scrutiny on Wednesday, despite his insistence in an appearance on Fox News that the allegation was “verifiably false”.
The Florida politician, a close ally of Donald Trump, claimed during the Tuesday night interview that he was the victim of an extortion plot by a former justice department official, and questioned the motivation behind Tuesday’s original reporting by the New York Times.
Gaetz, 38, claimed his lawyers had been informed that he was the subject of an FBI inquiry “regarding sexual conduct with women” and that the official was attempting to extort $25m from his family “in exchange for a commitment that he could make this investigation go away”.
Updated
Kentucky legislators have passed a measure to limit no-knock warrants, in the aftermath of the killing of 26-year-old Breonna Taylor last March.
Taylor died after police entered her home with a search warrant that did not require them to knock or announce themselves, and gunned her down after her boyfriend, startled by the forced entry, fired a warning shot toward the officers.
Several cities and states have sought to reform or ban no-knock warrants following Taylor’s killing. In Kentucky, the legislation – which is awaiting a signature from the state’s governor – limits but does not ban no-knock warrants. The bill would require officers to provide “clear and convincing evidence” that an alleged crime is violent, and assurances that not having a no-knock warrant would endanger lives in order to obtain the authority to break into a home unannounced. The measure would also ban no-knock warrants for searches conducted after 10pm and overnight.
Lawmakers did not pass a more restrictive bill that would have ended no-knock warrants. Attica Scott, a state lawmaker who introduced that bill called the legislation passed today that passed “an example of performative politics” that will fail to prevent what happened to Taylor from happening again.
Updated
An analysis by the Houston Chronicle has found that nearly 200 people died amid the February winter storm – double the state’s tally.
From the Chronicle:
The tally, which is nearly double the state’s official count, comes from an investigation of reports from medical examiners, justices of the peace and Department of State Health Services, as well as lawsuits and news stories.
The state count, which is preliminary, has yet to incorporate some deaths already flagged by medical examiners as storm-related.
The 194 deaths identified by the Chronicle so far include at least 100 cases of hypothermia that killed people in their homes or while exposed to the elements, at least 16 carbon monoxide poisonings of residents who used dangerous methods for heat, and at least 22 Texans who died when medical devices failed without power or who were unable to seek life-saving care because of the weather.
Read more here.
Updated
Joe Biden has asked the Department of Education to conduct a legal review on the president’s authority to cancel student debt, his chief of staff Ron Klain told Politico.
Biden will look at that legal authority, he’ll look at the policy issues around that, and then he’ll make a decision” on canceling debt, Klain told Politico. “He hasn’t made a decision on that, either way, in fact, he hasn’t yet gotten the memos that he needs to start to focus on that decision.”
Democrats are increasingly pressuring Biden to address the student debt crisis using his executive authority. Lawmakers lack Republican support to easily pass debt cancellation measures via congress.
Biden has said he’d support canceling $10,000 in student debt for borrowers, but lawmakers, student advocates, civil rights organizations and consumer protection groups have pushed on the president to go further, and cancel up to $50,000 federal student loan debt.
As my colleague, Lauren Aratanni reported earlier this year:
About 45 million Americans have student debt worth over $1.5tn. The Federal Reserve has reported that 43% of adults who went to college, about 30% of all adults in the country, took on debt to pay for their education. Race also plays a big role in who has debt: Black and Hispanic Americans with student debt are more likely to be behind on their loans than their white peers.
The pandemic has left even more Americans unemployed and without the means to repay their student debt. The $2tn Cares Act, passed during the Trump administration, put a pause on payment requirements and waived interest for some student loans – and Biden extended those provisions. But for millions of Americans, unless Biden acts, repayment will have to resume after September this year.
Updated
US may be in early stages of fourth wave as Covid cases rise, reports say
The US could be in the early stages of a fourth wave of the Covid-19 pandemic that is taking renewed hold across the country, with coronavirus cases increasing in 25 states, according to reports.
The US has tallied, on average, 63,000 new cases daily over the past week–an increase of 17% from the week prior, news website Axios reported. Only five states have recently seen declines in new cases. The third wave of the pandemic, which peaked in January, saw about 250,000 people daily testing positive for Covid-19, the Hill reported.
This new rise in cases is most pronounced in Michigan and New York but is becoming widespread across large swaths of the country. The threat of a fourth wave comes as many states have loosened Covid-19 restrictions – disregarding public health officials’ many warnings that doing so was premature.
Dr Rochelle Walensky, the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) director, said Monday that a fourth wave is all but guaranteed, remarking: “I’m going to lose the script, and I’m going to reflect on the recurring feeling I have of impending doom.”
“We have so much to look forward to, so much promise and potential of where we are, and so much reason for hope. But right now I’m scared,” Walensky also said during an emotional moment of a White House briefing.
Joe Biden has implored regional officials to keep or reinstate mask their mandates, because of the alarming trend in US case numbers.
“I’m reiterating my call for every governor, mayor, and local leader to maintain and reinstate the mask mandate,” the president said hours after Walensky’s comments. “Please, this is not politics. Reinstate the mandate if you let it down.”
Read more:
Updated
Mitt Romney, a Republican senator of Utah, has come out against the White House and Democrats’ plan to pass the $2tn infrastructure plan via the budget reconciliation process.
After Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell vowed to obstruct Biden’s infrastructure plan, Democrats signaled they’d pass it with or without Republican support. The Senate is split 50-50 between parties, with vice-president Kamala Harris serving as the tie-breaking vote. Through a process called reconciliation, Democrats can pass budget-related measures with just 51 votes – circumventing the 60-vote threshold needed to pass most other major legislation in the Senate.
Romney, who has been somewhat more willing to vote with Democrats than his other Republican colleagues, has killed any hopes that Democrats could pass the ambitious infrastructure proposal with bipartisan support.
A Senate evenly split between both parties and a bare Democratic House majority are hardly a mandate to “go it alone.” The President should live up to the bipartisanship he preached in his inaugural address.
— Mitt Romney (@MittRomney) April 1, 2021
Updated
Today so far
That’s it from me today. My west coast colleague Maanvi Singh will take over the blog for the next few hours.
Here’s where the day stands so far:
- Senate minority leader Mitch McConnell said he would fight Joe Biden’s $2tn infrastructure plan “every step of the way”. The president has expressed hope that the proposal will attract bipartisan support, but McConnell said he expected Republicans to oppose the plan, given Biden’s suggestion to raise the corporate tax rate to help pay for the project.
- Biden held his first full cabinet meeting as president. Biden opened the meeting by announcing that he had asked five members of his cabinet – Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg, Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm, Housing and Urban Development Secretary Marcia Fudge, Labor Secretary Marty Walsh and Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo – to take the lead on advancing his infrastructure plan.
- Derek Chauvin’s trial continued in Minneapolis, where the former police officer faces murder charges over the killing of George Floyd. Courteney Ross, the partner of Floyd, testified this morning, and she acknowledged Floyd struggled with opioid addiction. However, prosecutors have said opioids did not cause Floyd’s death. They also argue that Floyd’s drug use does not justify Chauvin keeping his knee on Floyd’s neck for more than nine minutes.
- The rise in coronavirus cases has intensified fears of a “fourth wave” of infections in the US. Even as vaccinations ramp up across the country, about half of US states have reported an increase in new coronavirus cases over the past week. Public health experts have repeatedly urged Americans to remain vigilant about limiting the spread of the virus.
- The Virginia supreme court ruled Charlottesville can move forward with plans to take down two statues of Confederate generals. Charlottesville’s city council had voted to remove the statues of Robert E Lee and Thomas “Stonewall” Jackson, but a group of residents sued to block the city from doing so. A lower court had ruled in favor of the residents, but the state supreme court overturned that decision.
Maanvi will have more coming up, so stay tuned.
Updated
Apple chief executive Tim Cook joined the chorus of business leaders who have come out in support of voting rights in light of voting restrictions Georgia’s governor signed into law last week.
“The right to vote is fundamental in a democracy. American history is the story of expanding the right to vote to all citizens, and Black people, in particular, have had to march, struggle and even give their lives for more than a century to defend that right,” Cook said in a statement to Axios.
“Apple believes that, thanks in part to the power of technology, it ought to be easier than ever for every eligible citizen to exercise their right to vote. We support efforts to ensure that our democracy’s future is more hopeful and inclusive than its past.”
Cook’s statement is just the latest from companies who, after calls from voting rights activists, are starting to speak out against a law that restricts voting access in Georgia that was passed last week.
Joe Biden has just wrapped up his first full cabinet meeting as president, after speaking to his team for about two hours.
The president opened the meeting by announcing that he has asked five members of his cabinet to take the lead on advancing his $2tn infrastructure package through Congress.
Those cabinet members are Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg, Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm, Housing and Urban Development Secretary Marcia Fudge, Labor Secretary Marty Walsh and Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo.
After he made that announcement, reporters were escorted out of the East Room, so the rest of the cabinet meeting was conducted privately.
A White House reporter spotted some senior officials leaving the meeting, and one of them said it “went well”.
NOW: First Cabinet meeting breaks up after two hours. Seen in the hall: @RonaldKlain, Merrick Garland and other cabinet members. “Went well” is only comment offered.
— Brian J. Karem (@BrianKarem) April 1, 2021
Updated
Paramedic describes failed attempts to resuscitate Floyd
George Floyd’s girlfriend has told the Derek Chauvin murder trial that the couple shared an addiction to opioid painkillers that they struggled to overcome in the weeks before his death.
Courteney Ross said that Floyd had been clean for a while after she took him to hospital when he overdosed, but that he started using again about two weeks before his arrest by Chauvin, a former Minneapolis police officer, last May.
The bulk of Ross’s often tearful testimony on the fourth day of the trial focused on the pair’s opioid use, as the prosecution sought to head off defense claims that Floyd was killed by drugs because he had opioids and methamphetamine in his system.
Paramedic Seth Bravinder testified that when he arrived on the scene, George Floyd didn't appear responsive and that his partner indicated Floyd was in cardiac arrest.
— CBS News (@CBSNews) April 1, 2021
"Cardiac arrest" indicates someone is not breathing, has no pulse and their heart has stopped, he said. pic.twitter.com/SApJ74hJOp
Seth Bravinder, a paramedic who treated Floyd at the scene of his arrest, testified that his ambulance was called to the scene for “someone with a mouth injury”. He said the call was a “code two” that suggested it was not a life-threatening emergency, which did not require lights and sirens. But less than two minutes later, the call was upgraded requiring a more urgent response.
On arrival, he saw Chauvin and other police officers on top of Floyd.
“I didn’t see any breathing or movement,” he said.
Bravinder said his partner checked for a pulse, did not detect one and said he thought Floyd had suffered a cardiac arrest, a term he said is used for anyone whose heart has stopped.
Bravinder said they tried to resuscitate Floyd but failed.
The trial was shown police body-camera footage showing that Chauvin continued to kneel on Floyd’s neck even as the paramedics attempted to revive him. The police officer only removed it immediately before is lifted onto a stretcher and moved to the ambulance.
During her weekly press conference, House speaker Nancy Pelosi also praised Joe Biden’s newly announced infrastructure plan.
“It’s really quite a remarkable and comprehensive plan,” the Democratic speaker said of the $2tn proposal.
Pelosi noted that lawmakers have previously been able to work in a bipartisan fashion to advance infrastructure legislation.
”In the past, we had always been able to work in a bipartisan way, because it was about a four-letter word: jobs, jobs, jobs, jobs,” Pelosi said.
But Senate minority leader Mitch McConnell has already said that he plans to fight Biden’s infrastructure plan “every step of the way”.
House speaker Nancy Pelosi said that Republican congressman Matt Gaetz should be removed from the judiciary committee if the sex-trafficking allegations against him are true.
“If in fact these allegations are true, of course being removed from the judiciary committee is the least that could be done,” the Democratic speaker said during her weekly press conference.
Pelosi added, “From what we have heard so far, this would be a matter for the ethics committee.”
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi says allegations against Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL) "would be a matter for the Ethics Committee." pic.twitter.com/TvdF4fUU9W
— The Recount (@therecount) April 1, 2021
Gaetz has denied he engaged in any illegal behavior, despite reports that the justice department is investigating him for allegedly having a sexual relationship with a 17-year-old and paying for her to travel with him.
Richard Luscombe reports:
The Florida politician, a close ally of Donald Trump, claimed during a Tuesday night interview that he was the victim of an extortion plot by a former justice department official, and questioned the motivation behind Tuesday’s original reporting by the New York Times.
Gaetz, 38, claimed his lawyers had been informed that he was the subject of an FBI inquiry ‘regarding sexual conduct with women’ and that the official was attempting to extort $25m from his family ‘in exchange for a commitment that he could make this investigation go away’.
On Wednesday, David McGee, the former justice department employee named by Gaetz, now a lawyer in Pensacola, Florida, told the Washington Post that the politician’s claims of an extortion plot were ‘completely false’.
‘This is a blatant attempt to distract from the fact he’s under investigation for sex trafficking of minors,’ McGee, formerly an attorney in the department’s organized crime taskforce, said.
‘I have no connection with that case at all, other than one of a thousand people who have heard the rumors.’
Pfizer vaccine has 91% efficacy for up to six months, trial shows
The coronavirus vaccine developed by Pfizer and its German partner BioNTech protects against symptomatic Covid for up to six months, an updated analysis of clinical trial data has found.
In a statement released on Thursday, the companies reported efficacy of 91.3% against any symptoms of the disease in participants assessed up to six months after their second shot. The level of protection is only marginally lower than the 95% achieved soon after vaccination.
The findings are the first to demonstrate that the vaccine remains effective for many months, an outcome that doctors and scientists had desperately hoped for because it suggests that people being vaccinated now should be protected at least until the autumn when boosters may be ready.
Jen Psaki was asked about Joe Biden’s comments to faith leaders today telling them to encourage their community members to get vaccinated.
Earlier today, the president joined the office of faith-based and neighborhood partnerships and the office of public engagement’s weekly faith and community engagement call.
Biden told the more than 1,000 faith and community leaders on the call, “We need you to spread the word, let people in our communities and your community know how important is to get everyone vaccinated when it’s their turn, and soon they’ll just be able to just line up and just get their name on a list.”
Psaki said she was not trying to “scare people” about coronavirus, but she emphasized that Americans needed to continue to be vigilant about limiting the spread of the virus.
“We are still at war” with coronavirus, Psaki told reporters.
The White House press briefing has now concluded.
Jen Psaki was asked about the mass shooting in Orange, California, yesterday, which resulted in four deaths.
The White House press secretary described the attack as “yet another example of senseless gun violence” in America.
In terms of ways to address that violence, Psaki noted Joe Biden continues to urge the Senate to pass the two background checks bills already approved by the House.
Psaki also said the president is conducting an “ongoing review” of possible executive actions he could sign to help end gun violence.
Jen Psaki was asked about the news that a batch of Johnson & Johnson coronavirus vaccine doses cannot be used after they failed quality checks.
The White House press secretary said the department of health and human services learned about the issue at a Baltimore plant late last week.
Psaki emphasized that the plant was not yet authorized, so none of the Johnson & Johnson doses already shipped came from this site.
The press secretary expressed confidence that Johnson & Johnson will still be able to meet their production deadlines, despite this complication.
A reporter asked Jen Psaki about Mitch McConnell’s latest comments that he will fight Joe Biden’s infrastructure proposal “every step of the way”.
The White House press secretary noted that McConnell’s complaints center on how Biden intends to pay for the bill, namely the increase in the corporate tax rate.
Psaki said the president was open to hearing Republicans’ ideas on other ways to pay for the $2tn package.
“What are the alternatives? We’re happy to hear those proposals,” Psaki said.
The press secretary later added that the Biden administration hopes the infrastructure bill will be “passed by the summer”.
The White House press secretary, Jen Psaki, is now holding her daily briefing with reporters.
Psaki reiterated Joe Biden’s latest announcement that five of his cabinet secretaries will serve as “front-and-center voices” in dealing with Congress and selling the infrastructure proposal to the American public as negotiations unfold.
Pressed on Biden’s proposal to raise corporate taxes to help pay for the legislation, Psaki noted the infrastructure plan would raise the corporate tax rate to a level that is still lower than what it has been for much of the past 70 years in America.
Biden asks five cabinet secretaries to take lead on infrastructure plan
Joe Biden is now holding his first full cabinet meeting as president in the East Room of the White House.
.@POTUS leads his first cabinet meeting. pic.twitter.com/L4dsteX00h
— Meghan Hays (@MegHays46) April 1, 2021
The president began the meeting by highlighting his newly announced infrastructure plan, which proposes spending $2tn to improve the nation’s transportation networks.
Biden noted he has asked five members of his cabinet -- Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg, Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm, Housing and Urban Development Secretary Marcia Fudge, Labor Secretary Marty Walsh and Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo -- to take the lead on advancing the infrastructure package.
The president said these five cabinet secretaries, as well as senior White House staffers, will “represent me in dealing with Congress, engage the public in selling the plan and help work out the details” of the final bill.
Biden’s comments came shortly after Senate minority leader Mitch McConnell said he intended to fight the proposal “every step of the way,” predicting that congressional Republicans would not support the plan.
Joe Biden said yesterday that he hoped to work with Republicans to get his $2tn infrastructure plan passed.
“We’ll have a good-faith negotiation with any Republican who wants to help get this done,” the president said in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, yesterday. “But we have to get it done.”
Senate minority leader Mitch McConnell’s latest comments indicate Democrats will likely have to go it alone to get the plan passed, meaning they would have to use reconciliation.
Congressional Democrats also used reconciliation to pass Biden’s coronavirus relief package, and that legislation passed without the support of a single Republican lawmaker.
The use of reconciliation for coronavirus relief sparked Republican complaints that the president was abandoning his promise to govern as a unifier, and those critiques will likely intensify if Democrats use the same strategy to pass Biden’s infrastructure package.
Senate minority leader Mitch McConnell predicted that Republicans would not support Joe Biden’s $2tn infrastructure proposal.
“My view of infrastructure is that we ought to build that which we can afford and not either whack the economy with major tax increases or run up the national debt even more,” McConnell said in his home state of Kentucky.
The Republican leader argued that, given Democrats’ narrow majorities in Congress, Biden did not have a mandate to pursue a “left-wing” agenda.
But McConnell acknowledged that, with Republicans in the Senate minority, there is little he can do other than play defense at the moment.
“Problem is I don’t get to set the agenda anymore,” McConnell said. “But for one seat in Georgia, I would be setting the agenda.”
GOP's McConnell pledges fight over infrastructure bill
US Senate minority leader Mitch McConnell has said: “I’m going to fight them every step of the way” over Joe Biden’s $2tn “once in a generation” infrastructure bill, unveiled yesterday.
"He's a first-rate person," McConnell says of Biden. "Nevertheless, this is a bold left-wing administration. I don't think they have a mandate to do what they are doing"
— Burgess Everett (@burgessev) April 1, 2021
Biden will introduce his full cabinet for the first time in about half an hour, and expects to make a bit pitch for the bill to overhaul crumbling US infrastructure at the same time as creating jobs and tackling the climate crisis and entrenched racial inequality.
But with the US Senate divided 50-50 and most legislation needed 60 votes to avoid dying by filibuster, McConnell has predicted that the infrastructure plan will not get support from Republican lawmakers in that chamber, even if it passes the Democratic-led House.
“I’m going to fight them every step of the way, because I think this is the wrong prescription for America,” McConnell told a news conference in Owensboro, Kentucky, adding that he does not believe Democrats have a public mandate to advance Biden’s proposal.
Updated
Court rules Confederate statues in Charlottesville can come down
Virginia’s highest court ruled today that the city of Charlottesville can take down two statues of Confederate generals, including one of Robert E. Lee that became the focus of the violent white nationalist - and ultimately deadly - white supremacist rallying in the summer of 2017.
The Associated Press reports:
The Virginia state supreme court overturned a circuit [appeal] court decision that had previously ruled in favor of a group of residents who sued to block the city from taking down the Lee statue and a nearby monument to fellow general Thomas J. “Stonewall” Jackson.
Charlottesville’s city council had voted to remove both.
White supremacist and neo-Nazi organizers of the August 2017 “Unite the Right” rally in Charlottesville said at the time they went to the city to defend the statue of Lee.
They clashed with counter-protesters in extraordinarily chaotic and violent battles before a man plowed his car into a crowd of people, killing a woman.
The Jackson statue was erected in Jackson Park in 1921 and the Lee statue was erected in Lee Park in 1924. In 1918, the city had accepted a resident’s offer to donate land for parks for both statutes.
In today’s decision, state supreme court Justice Bernard Goodwyn said both statues were erected long before the passage of a law regulating the “disturbance of or interference with” war memorials or monuments.
“In other words, (the law) did not provide the authority for the City to erect the Statues, and it does not prohibit the City from disturbing or interfering with them,” Goodwyn wrote.
S. Braxton Puryear, one of the attorneys for the residents who sued, said he hadn’t read the ruling yet and couldn’t immediately comment on it.
A spokesman for the city of Charlottesville didn’t immediately respond to a call and email seeking comment on the court’s ruling.
Updated
Today so far
Here’s where the day stands so far:
- Joe Biden will soon hold his first full cabinet meeting as president. The White House meeting comes a day after Biden introduced his $2tn infrastructure plan, which will be a main focus of the discussion with his cabinet members.
- Derek Chauvin’s trial continued in Minneapolis, where the former police officer faces murder charges over the killing of George Floyd. Courteney Ross, the partner of George Floyd, testified this morning, and she acknowledged Floyd struggled with opioid addiction. However, prosecutors have said opioids did not cause Floyd’s death. They also argue that Floyd’s drug use does not justify Chauvin keeping his knee on Floyd’s neck for more than nine minutes.
- The rise in coronavirus cases has intensified fears of a “fourth wave” of infections in the US. Even as vaccinations ramp up across the country, about half of US states have reported an increase in new coronavirus cases over the past week. Public health experts have repeatedly urged Americans to remain vigilant about limiting the spread of the virus.
The blog will have more coming up, so stay tuned.
The trial of Derek Chauvin is now taking a brief recess, following the testimony of Courteney Ross, the partner of George Floyd.
Ross told the court that she and Floyd both struggled with opioid addiction, and she acknowledged drug use was a part of their relationship.
Ross said she and Floyd were an example of the “classic story” of people who suffer from chronic pain becoming addicted to opioids after initially being prescribed them.
“We got addicted and tried really hard to break that addiction many times,” Ross said.
Courteney Ross, George Floyd’s girlfriend, details how they both dealt with opioid addiction and testifies says that drug use was part of the relationship:
— CBS News (@CBSNews) April 1, 2021
"It was something that we dealt with every day" but "we tried really hard to break that addiction, many times." pic.twitter.com/4yjz7lzovt
Chauvin’s defense team has attempted to argue that the former police officer was justified in pressing his knee on Floyd’s neck because Floyd was under the influence of drugs at the time.
But prosecutors have pushed back against those claims, saying the drugs did not cause Floyd’s death. They have also emphasized that Floyd’s drug use does not explain why Chauvin kept his knee on the man’s neck for more than nine minutes, as Floyd repeatedly cried out for help.
The Guardian’s Sam Levine reports:
There are now 361 bills to restrict voting pending across the country, an increase from the 253 that were pending in February, according to a new analysis by the Brennan Center for Justice.
A small portion of those bills, 55, are advancing through state legislatures, meaning lawmakers have taken some sort of action on them.
About half of those measures deal with new restrictions to voting by mail, which Americans used in record numbers in 2020. Eight deal with new voter ID requirements, while others deal with blocking same-day registration and putting new voter registration hurdles in place.
The new tally highlights measures in Arizona and New Hampshire, which it says have the highest number of restricting bills that are advancing.
A suite of bills in Arizona would impose new hurdles to voting by mail, making it easier for lawmakers to remove people from a permanent early voting list and requiring additional information on mail-in ballots. Another measure would prohibit voter registration drives off of government property.
New Hampshire also has 10 advancing restrictive measures, including efforts to make it harder for college students to vote and to place new hurdles for same-day registration.
Prosecutors at Derek Chauvin’s trial questioned Courteney Ross, the partner of George Floyd, about the couple’s struggles with opioid addiction.
Ross said she and Floyd used opioids on and off during their relationship, and she noted she suspected Floyd had started taking pills again shortly before he was killed.
Senior CNN legal analyst Laura Coates said such questioning was necessary in order to “address bad facts and then demonstrate why they’re irrelevant” to the murder charges that Chauvin faces.
While seems like prosecution’s trying to cast #GeorgeFloyd in negative light by discussing opioid addiction, being under the influence or possibility of a counterfeit bill, remember strategy is to address bad facts & then demonstrate why they’re irrelevant. #DerekChauvinTrial
— Laura Coates (@thelauracoates) April 1, 2021
Yesterday in Minneapolis, another prosecution witness, Charles MacMillian, told the court that he spoke directly to George Floyd as he lay in the street under Derek Chauvin’s knee.
“Get up and get in the (police) car. You can’t win man,” he said to Floyd.
Floyd responds that he cannot get up.
MacMillian, in highly emotional testimony, said he appealed to Floyd to cooperate with the police because he was worried about his condition as he was pleading that he could not breathe. “I was trying to help him,” he said.
MacMillian broke down and wept in court as he was shown video of his interaction with Floyd.
Derek Chauvin murder trial resumes in Minneapolis
The fourth day of Derek Chauvin’s trial is now underway in Minneapolis, where the former police officer faces murder charges over the killing of George Floyd.
Courteney Ross, the partner of Floyd, has now taken the witness stand. Ross started crying as she recounted the story of meeting Floyd in 2017.
Yesterday, the court heard from the cashier who served Floyd immediately before his death. The young man, Christopher Martin, expressed guilt over his role in Floyd’s arrest.
The Guardian’s Chris McGreal reports:
The cashier who served George Floyd in a Minneapolis store immediately before his arrest and death last May told a court on Wednesday of the ‘disbelief and guilt’ he felt for allowing Floyd to pay with a suspected fake $20 bill when he later saw the police kneeling on him.
Testimony on the third day of former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin’s murder trial continued in an atmosphere of tense emotions and harrowing evidence about Floyd’s death.
The cashier, Christopher Martin, 19, said Floyd appeared to be high on drugs but was not threatening and was ‘very approachable, talkative’.
Hillary Clinton has joined the growing ranks of Democrats who have called for eliminating the Senate filibuster to advance voting rights legislation.
The former presidential nominee made her position known on a newly released episode of “Just Something About Her,” a podcast hosted by Jennifer Palmieri, who served as a senior adviser on Clinton’s 2016 campaign.
The Republican Party is doing all it can to bring back Jim Crow and stop Black people from exercising their voting rights.
— Hillary Clinton (@HillaryClinton) April 1, 2021
For the survival of our democracy, it's time to retire the filibuster for constitutional matters and pass the For the People Act. https://t.co/mIpXTnLBwA
“The filibuster stands in the way of a lot of legislation and whether or not it can be either reformed and amended or eliminated is what we will find out in next weeks,” Clinton told Palmieri.
She added, “It certainly should be lifted for constitutional matters, and I would put election law matters at the top of that list.”
Many Democrats have called on Senate majority leader Chuck Schumer to eliminate the filibuster, thus allowing bills to pass the upper chamber with 51 votes, rather than the 60 required with the filibuster in place.
But currently, Schumer does not have the votes to eliminate the filibuster, as at least two of his caucus members -- Joe Manchin of West Virginia and Kyrsten Sinema of Arizona -- have signaled opposition to the idea.
Democratic senator Tina Smith: 'I'd vote to get rid of the filibuster hook, line and sinker'
The Guardian’s Daniel Strauss reports:
It’s rare a federal lawmaker makes a complete about-face on an issue with major legislative consequences.
But for Senator Tina Smith of Minnesota, the need to shift her position on one of the most crucial issues facing the Biden administration – reform of the filibuster rule – has become too strong to ignore.
She now believes that without reform, the filibuster – a rule by which the minority party in the Senate can block legislation – will do serious “damage” to American democracy, she told the Guardian.
Smith’s move is crucial. Behind the loud voices of the Senate Democratic caucus calling to either dramatically scale back or gut entirely a tool used to obstruct legislation, there’s a usually quieter set of senators, like Smith, who are finally speaking out.
In an interview with the Guardian, Smith argued that contrary to how the filibuster is portrayed by its advocates – as a tool to make the minority heard – it simply gives a minority of lawmakers outsized power.
“I often thought that it’s important that the minority view is heard in the Senate, and that there should be an opportunity for people to come together across lines of difference to get things done. But that wasn’t happening either,” Smith said.
“The filibuster wasn’t encouraging compromise. The filibuster was making it easy for any member of the Senate to say no. And the more I looked at that, the more I looked at the damage it was doing to our democracy.”
Smith said: “Well, I think that decisions about what we need to do, and how we need to change the rules – if we need to change the rules – are decisions that need to happen in their own way. But it happens in a particular place and time. So I’ve come to the conclusion that I would vote to get rid of the filibuster hook, line and sinker.”
Transportation secretary Pete Buttigieg pledged that he would work diligently to gain bipartisan support for Joe Biden’s $2tn infrastructure package.
“I’m not going to give up on earning Republican support for this because we know that Republicans and Democrats across America believe that this is a good idea,” Buttigieg told MSNBC this morning.
WATCH: @SecretaryPete tells @SRuhle he's not giving up on earning GOP support for @POTUS's newly-unveiled $2 trillion infrastructure package.
— Stephanie Ruhle Reports (@RuhleOnMSNBC) April 1, 2021
"Bottom line is, we've got to get this done."@MSNBC pic.twitter.com/1aL4tIH7tv
The former Democratic presidential candidate said he has had many meetings with lawmakers of both parties, and he noted Joe Biden has encouraged Republicans to offer ideas on the proposal.
But Buttigieg was tight-lipped when pressed on which specific members of Congress he has been talking to about the infrastructure package.
“Bottom line is, we’ve got to get this done,” Buttigieg said. “The American people can’t wait for good infrastructure.”
The transportation secretary will be attending Biden’s cabinet meeting at the White House later today.
Rise in US coronavirus cases intensifies fears of a 'fourth wave'
The fourth wave of coronavirus infections may have already arrived in the US, where case numbers are climbing in half of states.
Axios reports:
On average, roughly 63,000 Americans per day were diagnosed with coronavirus infections over the past week. That’s a 17% increase from the week before, and echoes the rising caseloads of the pandemic’s second wave last summer. ...
Because so many seniors have been vaccinated — 73% have gotten at least one dose — this fourth wave is likely to be a lot less deadly than the previous ones.
Many states have also prioritized vaccinating people with underlying health conditions, which will also help constrain the increase in severe illness and death.Yes, but: More coronavirus is always a bad outcome, and this fourth wave is a foreseeable, preventable failure that risks dragging out the pandemic and leaving more people at risk in the process.
The news comes days after Dr Rochelle Walensky, the director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, ominously warned that she had a sense of “impending doom” watching the numbers increase.
“We have so much to look forward to, so much promise and potential of where we are, and so much reason for hope. But right now I’m scared.”
Joe Biden has expressed similar concerns and asked state and local leaders to maintain or reinstate mask mandates to limit the spread of the virus. But many governors have ignored those warnings, instead deciding to move forward with relaxing restrictions.
The Guardian’s Kari Paul reports:
Joe Biden’s massive infrastructure bill will prioritize broadband expansion as a top goal, earmarking $100bn to bring affordable internet to “all Americans” by 2029.
The plan, details of which the White House released in a fact sheet on Wednesday afternoon, seeks to reach “100% high-speed broadband coverage” across the US. It will do so while prioritizing broadband networks “owned, operated by, or affiliated with local governments, non-profits, and cooperatives” in a clear rejection of partnerships with big tech firms.
After Covid-19 forced many Americans to work and attend school from home, the disparities between Americans with and without reliable access to internet have become more visible, the Biden administration said, citing “a stark digital divide”.
“The last year made painfully clear the cost of these disparities, particularly for students who struggled to connect while learning remotely, compounding learning loss and social isolation for those students,” the administration wrote.
Biden’s $2tn plan addresses four major categories: transportation and utility grids, broadband systems, community care for seniors, and innovation research and development. The proposal would be paid for by permanently raising the corporate tax rate from 21% to 28%, according to sources cited by Politico.
The administration seeks to bring broadband to the 35% of rural Americans who lack access to internet at minimally acceptable speeds, calling it the “electricity of the 21st century” and comparing it to the 1936 Rural Electrification Act, which sought to bring electricity to every home in the US.
Biden to hold first cabinet meeting as part of infrastructure pitch
Greetings from Washington, live blog readers.
Joe Biden will hold his first full cabinet meeting at the White House today, a day after introducing his $2tn trillion infrastructure plan.
Delivering a speech on the plan yesterday in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, the president described his infrastructure proposal as “a once-in-a generation investment in America”.
“It’s not a plan that tinkers around the edges,” Biden said. “Is it big? Yes. Is it bold? Yes. And we can get it done.”
The White House has said the infrastructure plan will be a focus of today’s cabinet meeting, as Biden’s senior advisers prepare to pitch the proposal alongside him.
But it remains unclear whether the plan can get through Congress, where Democrats hold narrow majorities in the House and the Senate.
Biden said yesterday that he hoped to work with Republicans to get the legislation passed, but many of them have already expressed opposition to the idea of rolling back Trump-era tax cuts to help pay for the plan.
“The divisions of the moment shouldn’t stop us from doing the right thing for the future,” the president said in Pittsburgh. “We’ll have a good-faith negotiation with any Republican who wants to help get this done. But we have to get it done.”
The blog will have more updates and analysis of the cabinet meeting coming up, so stay tuned.
