McConnell says impeachment of Biden is ‘not going to happen’
Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell said Wednesday that he’s confident about the GOP’s position in next year’s midterms — but dismissed the notion that President Joe Biden might be impeached after America’s much-maligned withdrawal from Afghanistan.
“Look, there isn’t going to be any impeachment,” the Kentucky Republican told a home-state crowd in Pike County, adding that the Democrats could still be in hot water. “I think they have a good chance of having a very bad election next year.”
Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., a close ally of the twice-impeached former President Donald Trump, said a week ago that he believed Biden should be impeached over his decision to pull U.S. forces from Afghanistan.
The president followed an exit blueprint etched by Trump, who made a deal with the Taliban promising that the U.S. would leave Afghanistan by the beginning of May.
Biden delayed the departure to late summer, and the U.S. watched in horror as the Taliban swiftly took back a country that American troops had seized nearly two decades ago.
Still, Biden has vigorously defended his decision, insisting that “it was time” to end the war, and that Trump dealt him a tricky hand. Republicans, in turn, have pounced.
McConnell has made full-throated criticisms of Biden’s withdrawal, but he seemed little interested in fanning far-flung conservative hopes that Biden could face impeachment.
“The president’s not going to be removed from office,” he told the Pikeville Rotary Club and the Southeast Kentucky Chamber of Commerce. “There’s a Democratic House, a narrowly Democratic Senate. That’s not going to happen.”
—New York Daily News
Trump endorses Parnell in Pennsylvania’s 2022 Senate race
PHILADELPHIA — Former President Donald Trump endorsed Sean Parnell in Pennsylvania’s critical U.S. Senate race Wednesday, giving the Army veteran a coveted prize in the competitive 2022 Republican primary.
“Sean bravely fought for our Country as a Captain in the U.S. Army and was awarded two Bronze Stars (one for valor!) and the Purple Heart,” Trump said in a statement. “Unlike our current administration, he never left anyone behind.”
The early endorsement is a blow to several other Pennsylvania Republicans who had been jockeying for Trump’s support, including Jeff Bartos, a Lower Merion real estate developer; Kathy Barnette, a conservative commentator from Huntingdon Valley; and Carla Sands, who served as Trump’s ambassador to Denmark. Just one major candidate — Craig Snyder, a Philadelphia lobbyist and former nonprofit executive — is actively running as an anti-Trump Republican.
The race to succeed retiring Republican Sen. Pat Toomey is seen as one of the most competitive in the country. It will help determine control of the Senate after the midterm elections and the future of President Joe Biden’s agenda.
Trump said Parnell will “make Pennsylvania very proud and will fight for Election Integrity, Strong Borders, our Second Amendment, Energy Jobs, and so much more.
“Sean Parnell will always put America First,” Trump said. “He has my Complete and Total Endorsement!”
Parnell, of Allegheny County, ran unsuccessfully for Congress last year against U.S. Rep. Conor Lamb, who’s now running in the Democratic Senate primary. After the election, Parnell filed a lawsuit that sought to throw out all 2.6 million mail ballots cast in Pennsylvania, arguing that a 2019 state law that expanded mail voting was unconstitutional.
—The Philadelphia Inquirer
13 Cuban migrants land in Florida as attempts to reach US rise
MIAMI — The U.S. Border Patrol on Tuesday took 13 Cuban migrants into custody after the group landed on a Key West beach in a homemade boat.
Border Patrol responded to Higgs Beach at about 6:45 a.m. to find 12 men and one woman who said they had left Cuba the day before, said Adam Hoffner, the agency’s spokesman.
They will likely be sent back to Cuba aboard a Coast Guard cutter.
It’s the second time in four days that people from Cuba have made it to shore in the Florida Keys. Migration attempts have spiked as the island nation remains mired in economic, political and health care crises.
Fourteen migrants made it to the Upper Keys on Friday morning in a rustic wooden boat. They told Border Patrol agents they were at sea for six days, a spokesman for the agency said.
On Saturday, the Coast Guard said a good Samaritan spotted a man floating on a makeshift raft near Fowey Rocks, which is a few miles from Key Biscayne. The man, who needed immediate medical care, said he left Cuba with three other people who had died, the Coast Guard said. He had been adrift for 10 days.
On Aug. 3, Border Patrol detained six men from Cuba after they landed in a makeshift boat in the small Middle Keys city of Key Colony Beach at about 3:15 a.m.
—Miami Herald
Purdue Pharma judge to OK bankruptcy plan pending changes
U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Robert Drain said he’ll approve Purdue Pharma LP’s sweeping settlement of opioid-related civil claims on Wednesday, paving the way for the company and its owners, members of the Sackler family, to pay billions of dollars to benefit places hit hard by the epidemic.
Drain, who has overseen a multiweek trial over the deal, began delivering his ruling on Wednesday morning, and later in the day approved a portion of the settlement dealing with estate claims. He said more than six hours into his bench ruling that he would approve the bankruptcy plan pending minor changes discussed during the trial.
Key portions of the plan would see members of the billionaire Sackler family that own Purdue pay about $4.5 billion and walk away from the pharmaceutical industry.
In exchange, members of the family would receive immunity from civil liability over their alleged role in the opioid crisis. Drain has signaled comfort with the releases, which were dramatically narrowed during the course of the trial.
Critics of the plan have set the stage for an appeal.
—Bloomberg News
