Summary
- The White House derided governor Greg Abbott’s pledge to “eliminate” rape in Texas amid widespread outcry over the state’s six-week abortion ban. “If Governor Abbott has a means of eliminating all rapists or all rape from the United States, then there’d be bipartisan support for that,” White House press secretary Jen Psaki said at her daily briefing. She added that the unrealistic nature of Abbott’s promise underscores “why women in Texas should have access to healthcare”.
- Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez similarly mocked Abbott for his “deep ignorance” of basic biology, after the Texas governor incorrectly said women would have a full six weeks to seek an abortion. (In reality, women are already four weeks pregnant by the time they miss a period.) “I find Governor Abbott’s comments disgusting,” Ocasio-Cortez told CNN last night. “He speaks from such a place of deep ignorance, and it’s not just ignorance. It’s ignorance that’s hurting people.”
- The city of Richmond officially removed a statue of Confederate general Robert E Lee. The statue, whose pedestal had become covered in Black Lives Matter graffiti to protest its presence in the city, had stood in Richmond for 131 years.
- Kamala Harris traveled to California to campaign alongside governor Gavin Newsom, who is facing the threat of a recall election. The vice-president headlined a Bay Area rally ahead of the election, which will be held on Tuesday.
- Joe Biden praised unions and reflected upon the loss of AFL-CIO president Richard Trumka at a White House event to mark Labor Day. Speaking two days after the country celebrated Labor Day, Biden thanked union leaders and members for consistently supporting him throughout his political career. “When unions win, workers across the board win. That’s a fact,” Biden said.
Texas abortion ‘whistleblower’ website forced offline
Troubles are mounting for a Texas website used to report violators of the state’s extreme anti-abortion legislation after the site was forced offline by two different web hosting platforms.
The site ProLifeWhistleblower.com was removed from its original web host by the provider GoDaddy on Friday before being suspended by its new host, an agency known for providing services to far-right groups.
“For all intents and purposes it is offline,” Ronald Guilmette, a web infrastructure expert, told the Guardian. “They are having technical difficulties. My personal speculation is that they are going to have trouble keeping it online moving forward.”
As of Tuesday, ProLifeWhistleblower.com redirects to Texas Right to Life’s main website.
Created by Texas Right to Life, an evangelical Christian group, the site allowed people to anonymously submit information about potential violations of the new law – which makes it illegal to help women in Texas access abortion after the sixth week of pregnancy.
Read more:
Revealed: LAPD officers told to collect social media data on every civilian they stop
The Los Angeles police department (LAPD) has directed its officers to collect the social media information of every civilian they interview, including individuals who are not arrested or accused of a crime, according to records shared with the Guardian.
Copies of the “field interview cards” that police complete when they question civilians reveal that LAPD officers are instructed to record a civilian’s Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and other social media accounts, alongside basic biographical information. An internal memo further shows that the police chief, Michel Moore, told employees that it was critical to collect the data for use in “investigations, arrests, and prosecutions”, and warned that supervisors would review cards to ensure they were complete.
The documents, which were obtained by the not-for-profit organization the Brennan Center for Justice, have raised concerns about civil liberties and the potential for mass surveillance of civilians without justification.
“There are real dangers about police having all of this social media identifying information at their fingertips,” said Rachel Levinson-Waldman, a deputy director at the Brennan Center, noting that the information was probably stored in a database that could be used for a wide range of purposes.
The Brennan Center conducted a review of 40 other police agencies in the US and was unable to find another department that required social media collection on interview cards (though many have not publicly disclosed copies of the cards). The organization also obtained records about the LAPD’s social media surveillance technologies, which have raised questions about the monitoring of activist groups including Black Lives Matter.
Read more:
US’s wealthiest 1% are failing to pay $160bn a year in taxes, report finds
The wealthiest 1% of Americans are responsible for more than $160bn of lost tax revenue each year, according to a new report from the US treasury.
Natasha Sarin, deputy assistant secretary for economic policy, said: “A well-functioning tax system requires that everyone pays the taxes they owe.”
According to the treasury report, the wealthiest 1% of US taxpayers are responsible for an estimated $163bn in unpaid tax each year, amounting to 28% of the “tax gap”.
Sarin said that tax gap – “the difference between taxes that are owed and collected” – amounted to “around $600bn annually and will mean approximately $7tn of lost tax revenue over the next decade.”
The Biden administration proposes closing the tax gap by empowering the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) to more aggressively pursue unpaid taxes, at a cost of $80bn and in the process helping fund the president’s ambitious domestic economic agenda.
Republicans in Congress and lobbyists for business are united in opposition to the proposal to shore up tax enforcement.
“The sheer magnitude of lost revenue is striking,” Sarin wrote. “It is equal to 3% of GDP, or all the income taxes paid by the lowest earning 90% of taxpayers.
Read more:
The Biden administration has asked officials appointed to military academy advisory boards by Donald Trump to resign, the White House said.
The 11 officials include former counselor to Trump Kellyanne Conway, former press secretary Sean Spicer and former national security adviser HR McMaster.
Biden’s goal “was to ensure you have nominees and people serving on these boards who are qualified to serve on them and who are aligned with our core values,” press secretary Jen Psaki said.
Former Office of Management and Budget director Russell Vought on the Naval Academy’s board said he would not resign, noting that appointees usually serve for three years. “No. It’s a three year term,” he tweeted.
Updated
Biden vowed to make racial justice the heart of his agenda – is it still beating?
Defying the punishing August heat, the Rev Al Sharpton recently led a gathering thousands strong through the streets of the nation’s capital on the 58th anniversary of the March on Washington, when Martin Luther King Jr delivered his immortal I Have a Dream speech on that day in 1963.
Now, as then, there was an urgency to their march. In statehouses across the country, Republicans are proposing – and passing – new voter restrictions that activists say amount to the greatest erosion of voting rights since the Voting Rights Act was passed in 1965, a crowning achievement of the civil rights movement.
Speaking near the White House, Sharpton recalled Joe Biden’s victory-night promise to lead the “great battle” for racial justice. The time to fight had come, the reverend told Biden.
“You said the night you won that Black America had your back, and that you were going to have Black Americans’ backs,” Sharpton said. “Well, Mr President, they’re stabbing us in the back.”
Since taking office, Biden has placed racial justice at the center of his governing agenda, embedding language that promotes equity into his executive orders, policy proposals and public speeches. “The dream of justice for all will be deferred no longer,” he vowed in his inauguration address. “We can deliver racial justice.”
Yet the escalating fight over voting rights underscores the difficulty Biden faces in his efforts to advance racial equity. It is an issue that is critical to his legacy but one that faces a myriad of political and legal obstacles. From voting rights to policing reform to helping Black farmers and other critical issues, Biden’s racial justice agenda has suffered a wide array of setbacks and delays during his first year in office.
Despite controlling the White House and Congress, Democrats have yet to pass a pair of federal elections bills that are the centerpiece of the party’s strategy for beating back the sweep of new voting restrictions in Republican-led states.
Read more:
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:
- The White House derided governor Greg Abbott’s pledge to “eliminate” rape in Texas amid widespread outcry over the state’s six-week abortion ban. “If Governor Abbott has a means of eliminating all rapists or all rape from the United States, then there’d be bipartisan support for that,” White House press secretary Jen Psaki said at her daily briefing. She added that the unrealistic nature of Abbott’s promise underscores “why women in Texas should have access to healthcare”.
- Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez similarly mocked Abbott for his “deep ignorance” of basic biology, after the Texas governor incorrectly said women would have a full six weeks to seek an abortion. (In reality, women are already four weeks pregnant by the time they miss a period.) “I find Governor Abbott’s comments disgusting,” Ocasio-Cortez told CNN last night. “He speaks from such a place of deep ignorance, and it’s not just ignorance. It’s ignorance that’s hurting people.”
- The city of Richmond officially removed a statue of Confederate general Robert E Lee. The statue, whose pedestal had become covered in Black Lives Matter graffiti to protest its presence in the city, had stood in Richmond for 131 years.
- Kamala Harris traveled to California to campaign alongside governor Gavin Newsom, who is facing the threat of a recall election. The vice-president headlined a Bay Area rally ahead of the election, which will be held on Tuesday.
- Joe Biden praised unions and reflected upon the loss of AFL-CIO president Richard Trumka at a White House event to mark Labor Day. Speaking two days after the country celebrated Labor Day, Biden thanked union leaders and members for consistently supporting him throughout his political career. “When unions win, workers across the board win. That’s a fact,” Biden said.
Maanvi will have more coming up, so stay tuned.
Former Texas state senator Wendy Davis, who famously staged an hours-long filibuster in 2013 to protest another restrictive abortion bill, criticized governor Greg Abbott’s “absurd comment” that he will “eliminate” rape in the state.
“How in the world are you going to do that? And if you have a magic formula for it, why haven’t you done it already?” Davis said on MSNBC.
Gov. Greg Abbott (R-TX) suggested 'eliminating rape' as a solution to helping rape and incest victims who could be effected by Texas' restrictive anti-abortion bill. "If you have a magic formula for it, why haven't you done it already?" Fmr. Texas State Sen. @wendydavis responds. pic.twitter.com/bN1oJKKhcj
— Ayman Mohyeldin Reports (@AymanMSNBC) September 8, 2021
Davis also noted that Texas had the largest backlog of untested rape kits a few years ago, with more than 20,000 kits sitting on shelves.
She added that Texas juries are currently allowed to consider the behavior of the rape victim in determining the guilt of an alleged rapist, making it even less likely that victims will feel comfortable bringing criminal charges against their attackers.
“So the entire comment is just absolutely absurd and in no way should it deflect from the crisis that we have in our state right now,” Davis said. “Almost all of our providers have stopped providing abortions.”
Harris criticizes Abbott as she campaigns for Newsom in California
Kamala Harris criticized Greg Abbott’s defense of the Texas abortion ban as the vice-president campaigned for governor Gavin Newsom in California this afternoon.
Harris said she saw Abbott’s comments about the abortion ban while watching the morning news today, likely referring to the Republican governor’s pledge to “eliminate all rapists from the streets of Texas”.
VP Harris responds to Abbott: pic.twitter.com/9juO1dlGNo
— The Recount (@therecount) September 8, 2021
The vice-president condemned Abbott for “arrogantly” dismissing the concerns of rape survivors, who may now be forced to carry pregnancies to term because of the six-week abortion ban.
“And to speak those words that were empty words, that were false words, that were fueled with not only arrogance but bravado – that is not who we want in our leaders,” Harris said.
“We want in our leaders someone like Gavin Newsom, who always speaks the truth on behalf of all the people.”
Newsom is facing a September 14 recall election, although recent polls have shown a majority of California voters oppose removing the governor from office.
Updated
Florida governor Ron DeSantis has lost another legal battle in his campaign to prevent schools from implementing mask mandates.
The AP reports:
A Florida judge ruled on Wednesday that the state cannot enforce a ban on public schools mandating the use of masks to guard against the coronavirus, while an appeals court sorts out whether the ban is ultimately legal.
The Leon county circuit judge, John C Cooper, lifted an automatic stay of his decision last week that the Republican governor, Ron DeSantis, and education officials exceeded their authority by imposing the blanket ban through executive order and hitting pro-mask local school boards with financial penalties.
Cooper said the overwhelming evidence before him in a lawsuit by parents challenging the DeSantis ban is that wearing masks does provide some protection for children in crowded school settings, particularly those under 12 for whom no vaccine yet exists.
The case will next go before an appellate court in Tallahassee, and DeSantis has expressed confidence that his team will ultimately win the legal fight, despite widespread criticism over the mask mandate ban.
Jen Psaki was asked for the White House’s response to the World Health Organization calling for a moratorium on coronavirus vaccine booster shots through the end of the year to help get more doses to lower-income countries.
Psaki says the WHO's call to halt Covid booster shots is a "false choice," saying the U.S. will continue to donate vaccines to countries while providing a third dose to Americans https://t.co/LQiW1PKObS pic.twitter.com/ghj4HjJaHH
— Bloomberg Quicktake (@Quicktake) September 8, 2021
“Our view is that this is a false choice,” Psaki said, noting the US has shared about 140 million vaccine doses with more than 90 countries.
“At the same time, the president and this administration has a responsibility to do everything we can to protect people in the United States,” Psaki added.
“And as our health advisers have recommended additional booster shots, we are working to implement that. Our view is we can do both.”
The daily White House press briefing has now concluded.
One reporter asked Jen Psaki whether average Americans’ daily lives will be affected by the pandemic-related initiatives that Joe Biden plans to outline tomorrow.
“It depends on if you’re vaccinated or not,” the White House press secretary said. “There are six steps the president is announcing. There will be new components.”
The president’s speech tomorrow comes amid concerns that travel over Labor Day weekend may cause a surge in coronavirus infections in the coming days.
Psaki mocks Abbott's pledge to 'eliminate' rape amid criticism of abortion ban
White House press secretary Jen Psaki was asked for her response to Texas governor Greg Abbott’s latest defense of the six-week abortion ban in his state.
Asked yesterday why rape and incest victims should be forced to carry a pregnancy to term, Abbott pledged to “eliminate all rapists from the streets of Texas”.
“If Governor Abbott has a means of eliminating all rapists or all rape from the U.S. then there’d be bipartisan support for that.”
— The Recount (@therecount) September 8, 2021
— WH Press Sec. Jen Psaki responds to Gov. Greg Abbott (R-TX) defending 6-week abortion ban by claiming he’ll "eliminate all rapists” from Texas. pic.twitter.com/oY5D1c3ojN
“Well, if Governor Abbott has a means of eliminating all rapists or all rape from the United States, then there’d be bipartisan support for that,” Psaki said.
“But given there has never in the history of the country, in the world been any leader who’s ever been able to eliminate rape, eliminate rapists from our streets, it’s even more imperative -- it’s one of the many reasons I should say, not the only reason -- why women in Texas should have access to healthcare.”
Progressive congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez has similarly mocked Abbott’s comments, accusing the Republican governor of endangering Texans through his “deep ignorance”.
Updated
The White House press secretary, Jen Psaki, has now taken over the podium in the briefing room, and she kicked off her comments by previewing Joe Biden’s remarks on the coronavirus pandemic tomorrow.
Psaki noted Biden is meeting with members of the White House pandemic response team today in preparation for his speech tomorrow.
In the speech, Biden will lay out “six steps to stop the spread of Delta and increase vaccinations,” Psaki said. She noted the president’s latest initiatives will build upon policies he has enacted over the past few months.
Brian Deese, the director of the National Economic Council, noted that major poultry and beef suppliers saw record of near-record profits in the first half of the year.
Meanwhile, consumers are dealing with disproportionate price increases in those sectors, which account for half of the overall recent rise in grocery prices.
Deese said the Biden administration is looking closely at what may be motivating these price increases to ensure that companies are not taking advantage of consumers amid a global pandemic.
The White House press secretary, Jen Psaki, is now holding her daily briefing, and she is joined by agriculture secretary Tom Vilsack and Brian Deese, the director of the National Economic Council.
Deese discussed the recent increase in the cost of groceries, and he noted that much of the rise is due to the higher prices of beef, poultry and pork.
Due to the the level of corporate consolidation in those industries, Deese expressed concern about the possibility of “pandemic profiteering” by companies as Americans pay more at their supermarkets.
Texas: how the abortion ban empowers anti-choice citizens to sue
Marie Solis writes for the Guardian:
Last week, the most severe abortion restriction in the country became law in Texas. SB8 is a six-week abortion ban, which amounts to more or less an outright ban, since many people don’t know they’re pregnant until after the six-week mark. Abortion clinics in the state have estimated that the law bans somewhere between 85% and 90% of the procedures they provide.
But perhaps the most shocking part of the law is how it’s enforced: SB8 is enforced not by the state attorney general or other government officials, but by private citizens, who are encouraged to snitch on people who violate the abortion ban by filing civil lawsuits against them. (And they are promised a minimum of $10,000 in “damages” if they win the suit – what abortion rights supporters are calling a “bounty”.) The threat of litigation and financial ruin has forced clinics across the state to comply with the law, even though its core principle – banning abortion – is still unconstitutional.
This legal mechanism has made it impossible for reproductive rights groups to pre-empt the law, since they can’t name the typical state enforcers as the defendants in their suits. The supreme court has failed to intervene, arguing in a Wednesday night shadow docket decision that abortion providers didn’t sufficiently address the “complex and novel antecedent procedural questions” in their emergency appeal.
The Guardian spoke with Rupali Sharma, senior counsel and director at the Lawyering Project, who explained the legal mechanism that has allowed SB8 to go into effect and, as a practical matter, ban abortion in Texas:
The US Capitol Police is bracing for potential violence on September 18, when far-right protesters are expected to arrive in Washington for a rally in support of the January 6 insurrectionists.
CNN reports:
Law enforcement officials are bracing for potential clashes and unrest during an upcoming right-wing rally in Washington, DC, as violent rhetoric surrounding the September 18 event has increased online and counter protests are being planned for the same day, according to an internal Capitol Police memo reviewed by CNN.
The latest intelligence report on the ‘Justice for J6’ rally — which aims to support insurrectionists charged in the Capitol riots — notes that online chatter in support of the event started increasing after the officer who fatally shot rioter Ashli Babbitt went public with his identity in a recent interview with NBC’s Lester Holt.
There’s been a noticeable uptick in violent rhetoric around the event and heated discussions centered on Babbitt’s shooting on social media and discussion boards, according to the memo. The document warns that many individuals may also see September 18 as a ‘Justice for Ashli Babbitt’ rally, which could be cause for concern, and it’s not unreasonable to plan for violent altercations. There’s also been additional discussions of violence associated with the event, with one online chat suggesting violence against Jewish centers and liberal churches while law enforcement is distracted that day.
Asked about Capitol security protocols in preparation for the rally, House speaker Nancy Pelosi told reporters earlier today, “We intend to have the integrity of the Capitol be intact.”
“Taliban government fails inclusivity test” seems a little bit like “Pope found to be Catholic” as news lines go, but there it is on the wires after comments from the secretary of state, Tony Blinken, today, the day the new government of Afghanistan was announced.
“We’re assessing the announcement but despite professing that a new government would be inclusive, the announced list of names consists exclusively of individuals who are members of the Taliban or their close associates, and no women,” Blinken told reporters earlier, adding that the Biden administration is “concerned by the affiliations and track records of some of those individuals”.
As Reuters reports, Blinken and his German counterpart Heiko Maas today “convened a virtual meeting of 22 foreign ministers plus officials from Nato, the European Union and the United Nations. Blinken said all those in the meeting agreed on the need to hold the Taliban accountable before giving the new government legitimacy.
“The Taliban seek international legitimacy and support. Any legitimacy, any support, will have to be earned,” Blinken said.
Here’s a report from Peter Beaumont:
Lee statue removed in Richmond
For 131 years it loomed over Richmond, once the capital of America’s slave-owning south, sending a chilling message about the resilience of white supremacy to generations that passed beneath.
But at 8.55am on Wednesday, daylight reappeared between a giant statue of Confederate general Robert E Lee and its granite pedestal, now covered with Black Lives Matter graffiti. In warm sunshine the towering sculpture was hoisted by work crews and lowered to the ground amid cheers, songs and whoops from a watching crowd.
No one believed that the final humbling of insurrectionist Lee or the removal of a bronze monument, albeit one of the biggest to the Confederacy, was going to fix systemic racism overnight. But in the moment there was elation after a decades-long campaign galvanised by racial justice protests that followed the police killing of George Floyd in faraway Minneapolis last year.
“It’s a beautiful day for democracy,” said a 47-year-old man who gave his name as Rig and carried a monochrome version of the Stars and Stripes that bore the words “Black Lives Matter and a raised fist.
“It’s time for us to be honest about our history. Germany has zero statues of Hitler or Rommel. They learned the lesson and we have not learn the lesson: we cannot coddle white supremacy in this country.”
Darren Soto, a Florida Democrat, announced this morning that he has tested positive for Covid-19.
In a tweet, he said he was “grateful to only have mild symptoms, which I credit to the vaccine. I am currently self-isolating and working remotely. I encourage everyone to #GetVaccinated to save lives!
“This morning I also received monoclonal antibody treatment to further reduce potential symptoms. This treatment is helpful but not a substitute for the Covid-19 vaccine. I encourage everyone to get vaccinated as soon as possible.”
The running tally of members of Congress to have contracted breakthrough cases of Covid-19 after vaccination: six House members, four senators, according to CNN.
Breakthrough cases remain very rare. The vast majority of hospitalisations and deaths from Covid-19 in the US are among unvaccinated people.
Today so far
Here’s where the day stands so far:
- Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez mocked Greg Abbott for his “deep ignorance” of basic biology, after the Texas governor defended the state’s six-week abortion ban by incorrectly saying women would have a full six weeks to seek an abortion. (In reality, women are already four weeks pregnant by the time they miss a period.) “I find Governor Abbott’s comments disgusting,” Ocasio-Cortez told CNN last night. “He speaks from such a place of deep ignorance, and it’s not just ignorance. It’s ignorance that’s hurting people.”
- Kamala Harris is traveling to California to campaign alongside governor Gavin Newsom, who is facing the threat of a recall election. The vice-president will headline a Bay Area rally ahead of the election, which will be held on Tuesday.
- Joe Biden praised unions and reflected upon the loss of AFL-CIO president Richard Trumka at a White House event to mark Labor Day. Speaking two days after the country celebrated Labor Day, Biden thanked union leaders and members for consistently supporting him throughout his political career. “When unions win, workers across the board win. That’s a fact,” Biden said.
The blog will have more coming up, so stay tuned.
In his remarks on labor unions, Joe Biden noted that his wife, Jill Biden, is a member of the National Education Association, the largest teachers’ union in the US.
“And by the way, of course, I sleep with an NEA member every night,” Biden said.
The president then highlighted the first lady’s return to the classroom yesterday. Jill Biden had her first day back at Northern Virginia Community College on Tuesday.
After concluding his prepared remarks, Biden stepped into the crowd to say hi to some of the union leaders and members who attended the White House event. He did not appear to take any questions from reporters.
Joe Biden subtly mocked his predecessor, Donald Trump, in his remarks praising unions to mark the country’s celebration of Labor Day this week.
Discussing the health of the US economy, Biden said, “By the way, the stock market’s gone up exponentially since I’ve been president. You haven’t heard me say a word about it.”
Trump famously touted the strength of the stock market as an indication of the success of his economic agenda, but he insisted he bore no responsibility for the markets’ decline after the coronavirus pandemic started.
Biden praises unions and remembers Trumka to mark Labor Day
Joe Biden is now speaking at the event to honor unions at the White House, after the US celebrated Labor Day earlier this week.
The president asked for a moment of silence to recognize the essential workers and union leaders who had died in the past year and a half, including the late AFL-CIO president Richard Trumka.
President Biden holds a moment of silence at the White House honoring union and essential workers who died of COVID-19 and Richard Trumka, the AFL-CIO president who died last month https://t.co/Nj065CIsxp pic.twitter.com/tn1fALLOUp
— CBS News (@CBSNews) September 8, 2021
Biden emphasized that unions would “always be welcome” in the White House as long as he is president, and he thanked union leaders and members for their support over his political career.
“When unions win, workers across the board win. That’s a fact,” Biden said. “Families win. Communities win. America wins. We grow.”
Liz Shuler, who recently took over as the head of the AFL-CIO after the death of Richard Trumka, received a standing ovation when she spoke at the labor event.
Shuler called for the passage of the PRO Act to protect workers’ right to organize. The legislation has already passed the House, but it currently has no path forward in the evenly divided Senate.
Labor secretary Marty Walsh is now speaking at the White House event to honor union leaders, after the US recognized Labor Day earlier this week.
Walsh and Joe Biden received a standing ovation from attendees as they kicked off the event in the East Room.
Walsh told the crowd that Biden said to labor leaders backstage before the event, “This is labor’s house.”
“How often do you hear that?” the labor secretary said to more applause.
Joe Biden is expected to soon deliver remarks on labor unions at the White House, following the country’s celebration of Labor Day on Monday. Stay tuned.
Waiting for President @JoeBiden to give remarks on labor unions before a masked audience at the @WhiteHouse today. pic.twitter.com/azYyGPL5pr
— Nikki Schwab (@NikkiSchwab) September 8, 2021
The US is convening an expanded group of western nations to set a framework for cooperation with the new Taliban government, amid fears that isolating the militant group could backfire.
The meeting on Wednesday, chaired by the US secretary of state, Antony Blinken, and the German foreign minister, Heiko Maas, faces an all-male, Pashtun-dominated caretaker government that has ignored calls to form an inclusive administration.
The virtual meeting, convening as many as 20 nations, will run through a familiar set of conditions for cooperation with the Taliban, including free movement for Afghan and foreign nationals who wish to leave, protection of rights for women and a commitment to protect aid workers.
The meeting is likely to discuss the terms for giving humanitarian aid, after the UN warned this week that the Afghan economy was on the brink of collapse.
Supreme court to return to in-person arguments next month
The supreme court intends to return to hearing in-person arguments starting next month, although the court is still restricting public access to the building.
The AP reports:
The high court announced Wednesday that the justices plan to return to their majestic, marble courtroom for arguments beginning in October, more than a year and a half after the in-person sessions were halted because of the coronavirus pandemic.
The court said that oral arguments scheduled for October, November and December will be in person but that: ‘Out of concern for the health and safety of the public and Supreme Court employees, the Courtroom sessions will not be open to the public.’
The court said that while lawyers will no longer argue by telephone, the public will continue to be able to hear the sessions live.
The court had been hearing arguments by phone since the start of the pandemic, leading to some very comical moments where justices forgot to unmute themselves for questioning.
"I'm sorry, Chief. I did it again." - Justice Sotomayor, after a silence in which she apparently forgets to unmute herself during the second telephone oral argument at the Supreme Court.
— Todd Ruger (@ToddRuger) May 5, 2020
House speaker Nancy Pelosi was asked about Capitol security ahead of the “Justice for J6” rally, which is being held in support of the insurrectionists who carried out the January 6 attack.
“We intend to have the integrity of the Capitol be intact,” the Democratic speaker said of the rally, which will be held on September 18. “I’m not going into any specifics in that regard.”
.@SpeakerPelosi on security measures for upcoming September 18th "Justice for J6” rally: "We intend to have the integrity of the Capitol be intact."
— CSPAN (@cspan) September 8, 2021
Full video here: https://t.co/IEDhE2Vp4k pic.twitter.com/WgTwEClUDF
Pelosi went on to criticize congressional Republicans who have downplayed the violence of the January 6 insurrection, which resulted in several deaths.
“Even after all of that, a majority of the Republicans in the House voted not to accept the certification of the electoral college,” Pelosi said.
“And now these people are coming back to praise the people who were out to kill -- out to kill members of Congress.”
House speaker Nancy Pelosi said congressional Democrats have “several options” to raise the debt ceiling and will not be including it in their $3.5tn spending package.
“We won’t be putting it in reconciliation,” Pelosi told reporters at her weekly press conference.
Democratic leaders have repeatedly said that Congress should be able to raise the debt ceiling in a bipartisan fashion, as lawmakers did when Donald Trump was president.
But Republicans have insisted they will not help raise the debt ceiling, despite the severe economic risk of not doing so. Senate minority leader Mitch McConnell has demanded that Democrats include a debt ceiling hike in their reconciliation bill, which will not require any Republican support to pass.
The debt ceiling is one of many issues that Congress will have to tackle when members return from their August recess later this month.
House speaker Nancy Pelosi is now holding her weekly press conference, as Congress prepares to return to session after its August recess.
The Democratic speaker began her comments by listing some of the country’s recent extreme weather events, including Hurricane Ida, and emphasizing the need to address the climate crisis through national legislation.
"Mother Nature is not happy with us": Pelosi calls for Congress to pass bipartisan initiatives addressing the climate crisis, but says "the fossil fuel industry weighs in very heavily with some of the people on the other side of the aisle" pic.twitter.com/vk4cxpmoKo
— CBS News (@CBSNews) September 8, 2021
“Mother Nature is not happy with us in terms of how we recognize that challenges face us,” Pelosi said. “Climate crisis is real. Human behavior has an impact on it.”
The press conference comes one day after Joe Biden toured neighborhoods in New Jersey and New York that have been severely impacted by flooding from Ida.
“We got to listen to the scientists and the economists and the national security experts,” Biden said in Queens yesterday.
“They all tell us this is code red; the nation and the world are in peril. And that’s not hyperbole. That is a fact.”
Updated
Harris travels to California to campaign with Newsom
Kamala Harris is traveling to California today to campaign with Democratic governor Gavin Newsom, who is facing the threat of a recall election.
Harris will headline a rally for Newsom in the Bay Area, ahead of the Tuesday election.
The vice-president had originally been scheduled to campaign with Newsom late last month, but she canceled her appearance because of the terrorist attack at the Kabul airport.
The White House press secretary, Jen Psaki, said yesterday that Joe Biden will also travel to California “early next week” to campaign with Newsom.
Recent polls indicate Newsom has mitigated the threat of being recalled since last month, when surveys showed Californians were evenly split on whether to remove the governor from office.
United Nations human rights monitors have strongly condemned the state of Texas for its new anti-abortion law, which they say violates international law by denying women control over their own bodies and endangering their lives.
In damning remarks to the Guardian, Melissa Upreti, the chair of the UN’s working group on discrimination against women and girls, criticized the new Texas law, SB 8, as “structural sex and gender-based discrimination at its worst”.
She warned that the legislation, which bans abortions at about six weeks, could force abortion providers underground and drive women to seek unsafe procedures that could prove fatal.
“This new law will make abortion unsafe and deadly, and create a whole new set of risks for women and girls. It is profoundly discriminatory and violates a number of rights guaranteed under international law,” the human rights lawyer from Nepal said.
The Guardian’s Kari Paul reports:
Troubles are mounting for a Texas website used to report violators of the state’s extreme anti-abortion legislation after the site was forced offline by two different web hosting platforms.
The site ProLifeWhistleblower.com was removed from its original web host by the provider GoDaddy on Friday before being suspended by its new host, an agency known for providing services to far-right groups.
“For all intents and purposes it is offline,” Ronald Guilmette, a web infrastructure expert, told the Guardian. “They are having technical difficulties. My personal speculation is that they are going to have trouble keeping it online moving forward.”
As of Tuesday, ProLifeWhistleblower.com redirects to Texas Right to Life’s main website.
Created by Texas Right to Life, an evangelical Christian group, the site allowed people to anonymously submit information about potential violations of the new law – which makes it illegal to help women in Texas access abortion after the sixth week of pregnancy.
In recent days, internet users have protested against the site by flooding it with false reports, memes and even porn in the hopes of rendering it less effective.
AOC mocks Abbott's 'deep ignorance' of abortion after defending six-week ban
Greetings from Washington, live blog readers.
Democrats across the country remain outraged by the Texas law banning abortion after six weeks of pregnancy, a point at which many women don’t even know they’re pregnant.
Asked yesterday about why rape or incest victims would be forced to carry a pregnancy to term, Republican governor Greg Abbott replied that women still had six weeks to seek an abortion and pledged to “eliminate all rapists from the streets of Texas”.
Responding to Abbott’s comments last night, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez noted that by the time a woman misses a period, she is already four weeks pregnant. So it is not true that a woman has six weeks to seek an abortion.
"He speaks from such a place of deep ignorance, and it's not just ignorance. It's ignorance that's hurting people."
— Anderson Cooper 360° (@AC360) September 8, 2021
Democratic Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez slams Texas's GOP Gov. Abbott for defending the state's abortion law by saying he's working to "eliminate all rapists." pic.twitter.com/lAGG731QGP
“I find Governor Abbott’s comments disgusting,” Ocasio-Cortez said.
The progressive congresswoman also noted that many rape victims are assaulted by people they know and often choose not to bring criminal charges against their perpetrators, underscoring the unrealistic nature of Abbott’s pledge to “eliminate” rapists.
“He speaks from such a place of deep ignorance, and it’s not just ignorance. It’s ignorance that’s hurting people,” Ocasio-Cortez said.
The blog will have more coming up, so stay tuned.
