Evening summary
That’s all from me today. Here’s a rundown of the day’s biggest stories.
- US attorney general William Barr said the justice department has not uncovered widespread voting fraud in an interview with the Associated Press. “To date, we have not seen fraud on a scale that could have effected a different outcome in the election,” Barr told the AP.
- Barr also told the AP that he had given extra protection to the prosecutor he appointed to investigate the origins of the Trump-Russia probe.
- A CDC panel recommended that healthcare workers and long-term care facility residents should be the first to receive a vaccine.
- The justice department is investigating a potentially criminal scheme to lobby and bribe unnamed officials in exchange for a presidential pardon.
- One of Georgia’s top election officials, Gabriel Sterling, made an impassioned plea to the president to tone down his rhetoric disputing the election results because of fears he was inciting violence.
- President-elect Joe Biden announced his economic team, including former Federal Reserve chair Janet Yellen for treasury secretary and Neera Tanden for Office of Management and Budget director.
- Trump has discussed granting pre-emptive pardons to his children, son-in-law, and personal attorney Rudy Giuliani, according to the New York Times.
You can keep following the news with our global coronavirus blog here:
Updated
Donald Trump has discussed granting “pre-emptive pardons” to his children and son-in-law in addition to his personal attorney, Rudy Giuliani, the New York Times reports.
The lame duck president is concerned that Joe Biden’s justice department might prosecute Donald Trump Jr, Eric Trump, Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner, according to the report.
Pardons that pre-empt criminal charges are not common, but also not unprecedented, with the most famous example being Gerald Ford’s pardon of Richard Nixon.
Giuliani denied that he had discussed a pardon with Trump on Twitter earlier today.
Trump has used his pardon power to reward his political cronies, including Roger Stone and, just last week, former national security advisor Michael Flynn.
What is it about the French Laundry?
Another California politician, San Francisco mayor London Breed, is under fire after it was revealed that she attended a birthday party at the three-star Michelin restaurant in Napa Valley – just one night after governor Gavin Newsom did the same.
The party of eight met at the famed Thomas Keller restaurant on 7 November to celebrate the birthday of Gorretti Lo Lui, a local socialite whose husband, Lawrence Lui, is a major hotel developer, the San Francisco Chronicle reported.
Dining indoors was allowed in Napa county at the time, the Chronicle reports, though statewide guidelines discouraged gatherings with members of more than three households.
“Breed’s dinner at an opulent restaurant – amid an economic catastrophe that’s shuttered countless small businesses and stretched the lines at local food banks to new lengths – might not have technically violated the rules, but it isn’t a great look,” wrote Chronicle columnist Heather Knight, who broke the story.
The French Laundry offers reservations for a number of different dining experiences, including outside dining with a tasting menu for $350 per person, indoor dining for $450 per person, or a white truffle and caviar dinner for $1,200 per person.
As I mentioned just a few hours ago, California’s political leaders have made a frustrating habit of flouting the very public health guidelines they expect the public to follow.
Newsom’s night at the French Laundry brought together 12 guests to celebrate the birthday of a lobbyist, Jason Kinney. He eventually apologized, saying, “I need to preach and practice, not just preach and not practice.”
Earlier today, San Jose mayor Sam Liccardo apologized for attending a Thanksgiving dinner with family members from five households – more than state regulations which limited to three the number of households allowed for private gatherings.
Updated
CDC to shorten quarantine recommendation following Covid exposure
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention plans to shorten its recommendation for how long individuals should quarantine after being exposed to someone with Covid-19, the AP reports.
Since the pandemic began, the CDC has recommended that individuals quarantine for 14 days after exposure. The new recommendations, which could be released later tonight, will recommend that individuals quarantine for 10 days after exposure, or seven days if they test negative for the disease.
The AP cited an anonymous senior administration official, who said “the policy change has been discussed for some time, as scientists have studied the incubation period for the virus”.
Updated
Here are some more details about the DOJ investigation of a “bribery-for-pardon scheme” from CNN’s Katelyn Polantz, who broke the story:
At the end of this summer, a filter team, used to make sure prosecutors don’t receive tainted evidence that should have been kept from them because it was privileged, had more than 50 digital devices including iPhones, iPads, laptops, thumb drives and computer drives after investigators raided the unidentified offices.
Prosecutors told the court they wanted permission to the filter team’s holdings. The prosecutors believed the devices revealed emails that showed allegedly criminal activity, including a “secret lobbying scheme” and a bribery conspiracy that offered “a substantial political contribution in exchange for a presidential pardon or reprieve of sentence” for a convicted defendant whose name is redacted, according to the redacted documents.
Communications between attorneys and clients are typically privileged and kept from prosecutors as they build their cases, but in this situation, Howell allowed the prosecutors access. Attorney-client communications are not protected as privileged under the law when there is discussion of a crime, among other exceptions.
The heavy redactions in the “bribery-for-pardon scheme” court filing make it impossible to discern the individuals involved, but there are a few hints.
First, one of the individuals involved is an attorney, though the government is arguing that there is no attorney-client privilege because there was no attorney-client relationship.
Second, the proposed recipient of the pardon appears to be someone who has already been convicted and incarcerated, based on a reference to “the months leading up to [redacted’s] surrender to BOP [Bureau of Prisons] custody”.
The New York Times reported that Rudy Giuliani has discussed a “pre-emptive pardon” with Donald Trump, but the president’s personal lawyer has not been charged or convicted of any crimes.
Justice department investigates "bribery-for-pardon scheme", court filing reveals
The Department of Justice is investigating a potentially criminal scheme to lobby and bribe unnamed officials in exchange for a presidential pardon, according to a newly unsealed court document.
The heavily redacted filing relates to a search of various digital devices that uncovered potential evidence of both a “secret lobbying scheme” and a “related bribery conspiracy scheme” by individuals whose names are redacted.
Under the lobbying scheme, the individuals “acted as lobbyists to senior White House officials” without complying with disclosure rules “to secure ‘a pardon or reprieve of sentence for’” an individual whose name is redacted.
Under the bribery scheme, an individual whose name is redacted “would offer a substantial political contribution in exchange for a presidential pardon or reprieve of sentence for [redacted].”
The court filing relates to the government’s ability to access the communications, and dates back to August. It appears that one of the arguments being made to oppose the government’s access to the documents involves a claim of attorney-client privilege, which the government rejects.
Updated
Healthcare workers and long-term care facility residents should receive first vaccines, CDC panel recommends
A government panel on Tuesday formally recommended early doses of Covid-19 vaccines be given first to healthcare workers and long-term care facility residents in the US, generally seen as people who live in nursing homes and assisted living facilities.
Together, that group would represent roughly 23 million Americans, disproportionately including women, people of color and low-wage workers who makeup the healthcare labor force.
The recommendation from the panel at the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) hinges on a vaccine being approved for emergency use by the US Food and Drug Administration and later recommended by the advisory panel.
“I believe my vote reflects maximum benefit, minimum harm, promoting justice, and mitigating the health inequalities which exist in distribution of this vaccine,” said José Romero, chair of the committee, explaining his vote in favor of the recommendation.
The recommendation will likely be the basis of vaccine distribution for states and US territories, which carry out vaccination campaigns. States must complete their final requests for the leading vaccine candidate by the end of this week.
“In the time it takes us to have this meeting, 180 people will have died of Covid-19,” said Beth Bell, a member of the advisory committee on immunization practices, a US CDC group which made the formal recommendation.
More than 243,000 healthcare workers have had confirmed Covid-19 cases, and 858 have died, according to CDC data. A separate database run by the Guardian and Kaiser Health News is investigating the deaths of more than 1,400 health workers.
Further, while long-term care home residents represent less than 1% of the US population, they represent more than 40% of Covid-19 deaths.
More than 100,000 people living in care homes have died in the pandemic. The advisory panel also recommended vaccination campaigns specifically focus on nursing homes, where the most medically vulnerable live.
Attorney General William Barr has left the White House after a lengthy meeting.
Barr's meeting lasted over two hours. He just departed. https://t.co/vAypx3vVYy
— Kaitlan Collins (@kaitlancollins) December 1, 2020
This normally unremarkable chain of events has prompted much speculation, due to the timing of the meeting, which began shortly after the Associated Press published an interview in which the country’s top law enforcer admitted that, contrary to his boss’s baseless claims, there is no evidence of election fraud.
Throughout the time that Barr has been inside the White House, Trump’s Twitter account has been promoting conspiracy theories about election fraud.
Hi everyone, this is Julia Carrie Wong in Oakland, California, picking up the blog for the rest of the afternoon.
The San Francisco Bay Area, like much of the country, is bracing for an expected post-Thanksgiving coronavirus surge. Just yesterday, governor Gavin Newsom warned the Northern California ICUs could hit capacity by early December, with the entire state maxing out by mid-December.
This is the tipping point.
— Gavin Newsom (@GavinNewsom) November 30, 2020
CA has worked hard to prepare for a surge—but we can’t sustain the record high cases we’re seeing.
Current projections show CA will run out of current ICU beds before Christmas Eve.
Please stay safe & stay home as much as you can for next few weeks. pic.twitter.com/5NJYzHokhE
Which is why it’s so frustrating that many California political leaders have flouted their own advice when it comes to social distancing, masking, and following public health guidelines. Newsom has drawn considerable criticism for attending a birthday party at the fancy French Laundry restaurant; senator Dianne Feinstein has been photographed talking to people at the US capitol without wearing a mask; and now San Jose mayor Sam Liccardo is apologizing for attending a Thanksgiving dinner with members of his extended family.
Prior to Thanksgiving, the mayor had urged others to “cancel the big gatherings” and not let their guard down.
On Tuesday, he admitted that he had attended an event with members of five different households and apologized, saying: “I understand that the state regulations, issued on November 13th, limit the number of households at a private gathering to three. I apologize for my decision to gather contrary to state rules, by attending this Thanksgiving meal with my family. I understand my obligation as a public official to provide exemplary compliance with the public health orders, and certainly not to ignore them. I commit to do better.”
I apologize for my decision to gather for Thanksgiving with my family, contrary to the rules. I understand my obligation as a public official to provide exemplary compliance w/ public health orders, & not to ignore them. I commit to do better. My statement: pic.twitter.com/LFhX2LCUf3
— Sam Liccardo (@sliccardo) December 1, 2020
Evening summary
- US attorney general William Barr said the justice department has not uncovered widespread voting fraud in an interview with the Associated Press. “To date, we have not seen fraud on a scale that could have effected a different outcome in the election,” Barr told the AP.
- Barr also told the AP that he had given extra protection to the prosecutor he appointed to investigate the origins of the Trump-Russia probe.
- One of Georgia’s top election officials, Gabriel Sterling, made an impassioned plea to the president to tone down his rhetoric disputing the election results because of fears he was inciting violence.
- President-elect Joe Biden announced economic team, including former Federal Reserve chair Janet Yellen for treasury secretary and Neera Tanden for Office of Management and Budget director.
Updated
One of Georgia’s top election officials, Gabriel Sterling, made an impassioned plea to the president to tone down his rhetoric disputing the election results at a press conference this afternoon because of fears he was inciting violence.
Mr President, it looks like you likely lost the state of Georgia. We’re investigating, there’s always a possibility, I get it. You have the rights to go to the courts. What you don’t have the ability to do – and you need to step up and say this – is stop inspiring people to commit potential acts of violence. Someone is going to get hurt, someone is going to get shot, someone is going to get killed, and it’s not right. It’s not right.
Georgia election official @GabrielSterling addresses Trump directly and demands he stop inciting violence under false voter fraud allegations. pic.twitter.com/fckBKJY6mX
— The Recount (@therecount) December 1, 2020
Sterling, the voting systems manager for the Georgia secretary of state’s office, said last week that he has police protection around his home because of threats he received after election results were announced.
In the press conference today, Sterling described threats facing people tied to the election. He said technician in one county was told he should be hung for treason and that the secretary of state’s wife is getting “sexualized threats”.
Sterling said: “It has to stop.”
Tensions are high in Georgia, where two runoff elections in January will determine which party has control of the Senate. The state, which usually votes Republican, supported Joe Biden in the presidential race.
Updated
House majority leader, Nancy Pelosi, spoke with Treasury secretary, Steve Mnuchin, this afternoon – the first time the two are known to have spoken since before the election. They discussed a Covid relief proposal she and Senate minority leader, Chuck Schumer, sent the night before as well as a bipartisan proposal unveiled today.
Pelosi said they spoke about vaccine development and that the any proposal related to coronavirus must ensure the vaccine is free and accessible to everyone. “Additional Covid relief is long overdue and must be passed in the lame duck session,” Pelosi said.
Senate majority leader Mitch McConnell told reporters this afternoon that he had been in discussion with Mnuchin and the president’s chief of staff, Mark Meadows, about what the president would actually sign into law.
“And I think we have a sense of what that is,” McConnell said. “I laid that out in the call that we had a little while ago. We’re going to send that out to all the offices and get some feedback to see how our members react to a proposal that we can say for sure would be signed into law.”
Schumer won't reveal details of coronavirus proposal he and Pelosi sent to GOP ldrs. Says it was a "private proposal."
— Chad Pergram (@ChadPergram) December 1, 2020
Updated
It is not all bad news for the Trump-Barr relationship.
Barr also told the AP today that he had given extra protection to the prosecutor he appointed to investigate the origins of the Trump-Russia probe.
Barr told the Associated Press on Tuesday that he had appointed US attorney John Durham as a special counsel in October under the same federal statute that governed special counsel Robert Mueller in the original Russia probe. He said Durham’s investigation has been narrowing to focus more on the conduct of FBI agents who worked on the Russia investigation, known as Crossfire Hurricane.
The investigations grew out of allegations of cooperation between Donald Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign and Russians to help him defeat Democrat Hillary Clinton.
With the 2020 election approaching, Barr told the AP on Tuesday, “I decided the best thing to do would be to appoint them under the same regulation that covered Bob Mueller, to provide Durham and his team some assurance that they’d be able to complete their work regardless of the outcome of the election.”
Barr notified Congress about Durham’s appointment in a letter today, in which he also explains that he thought he actually appointed Durham on 19 October.
Barr defended the more-than-six-week gap in notification by writing he had “previously determined that it was in the public interest to toll notification given the proximity to the presidential election”.
Updated
Donald Trump’s campaign responded to attorney general William Barr’s comments that there is no evidence of widespread voter fraud in the election in a statement from Trump attorneys Rudy Giuliani and Jenna Ellis.
“With all due respect to the attorney general, there hasn’t been any semblance of a Department of Justice investigation,” the statement said.
The statement goes on to say Trump’s justice department has not investigated the Trump campaign’s “evidence” of fraud, which Barr pointed out in the interview is not the role of the federal criminal justice system.
Those claims are meant to be tested in courts, Barr said, and they have been.
The Trump campaign statement continued: “Nonetheless, we will continue our pursuit of the truth through the judicial system and state legislatures, and continue toward the constitution’s mandate and ensuring that every legal vote is counted and every illegal vote is not. Again, with the greatest respect to the attorney general, his opinion appears to be without any knowledge or investigation of the substantial irregularities and evidence of systemic fraud.”
Updated
In an interview with the AP, attorney general William Barr disputed allegations made by Donald Trump and some of his allies that there has been widespread fraud in the election and said people were confusing the role of the federal criminal justice system.
Trump has attempted to undermine the election results by pointing to routine issues in an election – questions about signatures, envelopes and postal marks – as evidence of widespread voter fraud that cost him the election.
Trump and some of his allies have also endorsed more bizarre sources of fraud, such as tying Biden’s win to election software created in Venezuela “at the direction of Hugo Chavez,” – the former Venezuelan president who died in 2013.
“There’s been one assertion that would be systemic fraud and that would be the claim that machines were programmed essentially to skew the election results. And the DHS and DOJ have looked into that, and so far, we haven’t seen anything to substantiate that,” Barr said.
Barr said some people were confusing the role of the federal criminal justice system and asking it to step in on allegations that should be made in civil lawsuits and reviewed by state or local officials, not the Justice department. Barr said:
There’s a growing tendency to use the criminal justice system as sort of a default fix-all, and people don’t like something they want the Department of Justice to come in and ‘investigate.’
He told the AP first of all there must be a basis to believe there is a crime to investigate.
“Most claims of fraud are very particularized to a particular set of circumstances or actors or conduct. They are not systemic allegations and. And those have been run down; they are being run down,” Barr said. “Some have been broad and potentially cover a few thousand votes. They have been followed up on.”
Updated
Barr: no evidence of fraud that would change election outcome
US attorney general William Barr said the Justice department has not uncovered widespread voting fraud in an interview with the Associated Press.
“To date, we have not seen fraud on a scale that could have effected a different outcome in the election,” Barr told the AP.
Barr’s statement confirms what election experts, including those in the federal government, have been saying all along. It also shrinks the pool of Trump supporters continuing to standby the president’s erroneous and dangerous claims that the presidential election was fraudulent. Barr is one of the president’s most ardent supporters.
Last month, Barr authorized US attorneys to investigate “substantial allegations” of voter irregularities across the country in a stark break with longstanding practice and despite a lack of evidence of any major fraud having been committed.
The unusual move prompted the department’s top elections crime official to resign in protest.
Updated
Guardian US business editor, Dominic Rushe, has the full report on the $908bn bipartisan economic measures announced this morning.
The measure has not been written into legislation. Nor has it been embraced by the Trump administration, President-elect Joe Biden or leaders in the Senate or House of Representatives, all of whom would be needed for passage.
But it comes with the backing of a group of conservatives and moderates who claim it will appeal to a broad swath of Congress.
Lawmakers are hoping to wrap up their work for the year by mid-December but they still have a massive government-funding bill to approve or else risk agency shutdowns starting on 12 December. If the bipartisan coronavirus aid bill gains traction, it could either be attached to the spending bill or advance on a separate track.
Not so much warmth from the White House on this plan.
— Seung Min Kim (@seungminkim) December 1, 2020
From @PressSec: “The Trump administration has been in ongoing talks with Leader McConnell and Leader McCarthy about a targeted COVID relief plan. The $908 billion proposal has not been a topic of discussion.” https://t.co/7RaYdJoNxa
Updated
President-elect Joe Biden is holding a press conference to announce his economic team, including former Federal Reserve chair Janet Yellen for Treasury secretary and Neera Tanden for Office of Management and Budget director.
“It’s essential that we move with urgency,” Yellen said. “Inaction will produce a self-reinforcing downturn causing yet more devastation.”
I'm enjoying watching Janet Yellen react to @JoeBiden nominating her. pic.twitter.com/CNszTVMDSt
— Jeremy Art (@cspanJeremy) December 1, 2020
Over the weekend, Guardian US business editor, Dominic Rushe, and I wrote about how Yellen can help change course:
Teresa Marez has never heard of Yellen. But she and millions of other Americans have a lot riding on the decisions Yellen will make if and when she is confirmed next year.
The coronavirus has upended Marez’s life. Her savings are almost exhausted and she is worried about her unemployment benefits, which run out next week. “It’s so hard. It’s just such a mess,” said the mother of two in San Antonio, Texas. “We just need Congress to make a decision,” Marez said. “As long as they are in limbo, we are in limbo.”
...As treasury secretary, Yellen will have more power to act – in theory – than she did at the Fed, by setting tax policy, regulating banks and overseeing priorities as the nation tackles its huge debt repayments. The treasury secretary employs 87,000 people and has a budget of $20bn. Yellen will be fifth in line to the presidency and her signature will appear on the nation’s currency.
But the 2020 election handed Biden a divided Congress and Yellen will have to win Republican votes for any major initiatives. To date, the omens do not augur well.
Afternoon summary
- Donald Trump’s personal lawyer, Rudolph Giulani, discussed with the president as recently as last week the possibility of being granted a “pre-emptive pardon,” according to the New York Times, which cited two anonymous sources.
- Donald Trump’s niece Mary Trump will follow her bestselling exposé of her dysfunctional family life with a new book on “America’s national trauma”, her publisher has announced.
- The US treasury secretary, Steve Mnuchin, said he would be speaking with House majority leader, Nancy Pelosi, today by phone to discuss a funding bill to prevent a government shutdown.
- Last night, Scott Atlas resigned as special adviser to Donald Trump, after a controversial four months during which he attacked science-based public health measures and clashed repeatedly with other members of the coronavirus taskforce.
A bipartisan group of senators and congresspeople unveiled today a $908bn plan for new economic relief measures to respond to the Covid-19 pandemic and the resulting recession.
The host of proposals include:
- $180bn to boost unemployment insurance by $300 a week for 18 more weeks.
- $16bn for coronavirus testing, vaccine development and distribution.
- Extending the existing program to defer federal student loan payment.
- $288bn for the Paycheck Protection Program to assist small businesses.
The legislative framework has not been endorsed by either party’s leadership, or the White House, so it is unclear how it can move forward.
It was crafted by lawmakers including Republican senator Mitt Romney, of Utah; Republican senator Susan Collins, of Maine; Democratic senator Mark Warner, of Virginia and Independent senator Angus King, of Maine.
Washington Post columnist, Alexandra Petri, has written a delightful post: “Here are the top cats under consideration for role of White House pet.”
The humor column was written in response to future first lady Jill Biden saying this weekend that would like to get a cat after she and president-elect Joe Biden move into the White House.
Petri writes of potential first felines:
Olivia, Meredith, and Benjamin: Taylor Swift’s cats are unlikely to give up their current positions in the private sector, but it never hurts to ask.
For his part, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) has said he is unwilling to confirm any of these cats but has provided a list of cats belonging to the Federalist Society he would be happy to see through the Senate.
The Biden’s had previously confirmed that their dogs, Major and Champ, would be moving to the White House. For the past four years, the White House has been unusually pet free – Donald Trump is the first president since 1897 to not have a pet while in office.
Donald Trump’s niece Mary Trump will follow her bestselling exposé of her dysfunctional family life with a new book on “America’s national trauma”, her publisher has announced.
The Reckoning will be published by St Martin’s Press in July 2021. According to St Martin’s, it “will examine America’s national trauma, rooted in our history but dramatically exacerbated by the impact of current events and the Trump administration’s corrupt and immoral policies”.
Mary Trump is the daughter of Fred Trump Jr, the president’s older brother who died aged 42 in 1981, from illness relating to alcoholism. Much of Mary Trump’s first book, Too Much and Never Enough: How My Family Created the World’s Most Dangerous Man, was informed by her father’s treatment by his siblings and parents.
“I don’t think he has any political ideology,” she told the Guardian in July. “I would say he behaves like a white supremacist, certainly.”
Scott Atlas, the controversial coronavirus adviser who resigned Monday, had been repeatedly denounced by faculty at Stanford University for his “falsehoods and misrepresentations of science.”
Stanford is home to the conservative Hoover Institution, where Atlas is a fellow. He also used to teach at the university’s medical school.
In September, more than 100 faculty signed a letter saying Atlas’s “opinions and statements run counter to established science.
After Atlas announced his resignation on Monday night, faculty who signed the earlier letter said his resignation “is long overdue and underscores the triumph of science and truth over falsehoods and misinformation,” in a joint statement.
“His actions have undermined and threatened public health even as countless lives have been lost to COVID-19,” the statement said.
Giuliani seeking 'pre-emptive pardon' – reports
Donald Trump’s personal lawyer, Rudolph Giulani, discussed with the president as recently as last week the possibility of being granted a “pre-emptive pardon,” according to the New York Times, which cited two anonymous sources.
It is not actually clear what federal crime Giuliani would need the pardon for, though he was under investigation last summer by federal prosecutors for his business dealings in Ukraine.
Giuliani’s spokeswoman, Christianne Allen, told the New York Times: “Mayor Giuliani cannot comment on any discussions that he has with his client.”
According to the Times:
Such a broad pardon pre-empting any charge or conviction is highly unusual but does have precedent. George Washington pardoned plotters of the Whiskey Rebellion, shielding them from treason prosecutions. In the most famous example, Gerald R Ford pardoned Richard M Nixon for all of his actions as president. Jimmy Carter pardoned thousands of American men who illegally avoided the draft for the Vietnam War.
Last week, Trump pardoned his first national security adviser, Michael Flynn, who pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI about contacts with a Russian official.
And yesterday, conservative commentator Sean Hannity said on his radio show that Trump “needs to pardon his whole family and himself.”
Updated
Treasury secretary set to speak with Pelosi today
The US treasury secretary, Steve Mnuchin, said he would be speaking with House majority leader, Nancy Pelosi, today by phone to discuss a funding bill to prevent a government shutdown.
“That is the first priority and I’m sure we’ll also be mentioning Covid issues,” Mnuchin said.
Congress is under pressure to pass a coronavirus economic relief package with benefits from an earlier bill set to expire at the end of the year.
Mnuchin and Federal Reserve Chair, Jerome Powell, are testifying today before the Senate Banking Committee to talk about the federal government’s response to the global pandemic.
Mnuchin, who hasn’t spoken to Pelosi since stimulus talks broke down before the elections, says he will talk to her today about funding bill to keep the government open. “We’re going to talk about..the appropriations issue, keep the government running, that is the first priority”
— Manu Raju (@mkraju) December 1, 2020
Crystal Mason, the Black woman sentenced to five years in prison for unknowingly voting illegally in 2016, is asking Texas’ highest criminal court to overturn her conviction.
The new filing late Monday evening is the latest in a case that has attracted national attention and has been highlighted by many as an egregious example of voter suppression.
The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals has discretion over whether or not to take the case or not. Mason has been out of prison on an appeal bond since 2018 as her case makes it way through the courts.
In 2016, Mason was on supervised release, which is similar to probation, for a federal tax felony but no one told her she was ineligible to vote. Even though the officials supervising her at the time testified they did not tell Mason she was ineligible to vote, a Texas appeals court ruled earlier this year her lack of knowledge “was irrelevant to her prosecution.” In their Monday filing, Mason’s lawyers take issue with that finding, noting that Texas law says someone has to “know” they are ineligible to vote and do so anyway to commit a crime.
When Mason showed up at the polls in 2016, a student poll worker offered her a provisional ballot because she wasn’t on the voter rolls, something he was required to do under federal law. Mason filled out the ballot, submitted it, and it wasn’t ultimately counted. Mason’s lawyers say that because her vote was ultimately rejected, she didn’t actually vote, but the lower appeals court earlier this year disagreed.
Since 2014, at least 12,668 provisional ballots have been cast in Tarrant county, where Mason lives in Texas. More than 11,000 of them were rejected. Mason appears to be the only person who had a provisional ballot rejected and was prosecuted.
In the past hour, the president has shared a number of Tweets by unreliable sources.
One of the false posts accused Nevada governor Steve Sisolak of sharing a fake photo of a hospital, though it is real. The post came from a website called “networkinvegas,” where about half of the site’s posts appear to be generic things such as “best local teen hangouts in Las Vegas” and the other half appear to be crude, hyperbolic rants against Sisolak and Covid-19 restrictions. It is not a real news website.
Another post called into question the election results in Michigan and was from The Epoch Times, which the New York Times described as “a leading purveyor of right-wing misinformation.”
And he shared a video from One America News Network, which was suspended from YouTube last week after it promoted a sham cure for Covid-19.
A Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) panel is set to vote today on who will get first access to the Covid-19 vaccine in the US.
Two drug manufactures, Pfizer and Moderna, have requested emergency clearance from the Food and Drug Administration for the vaccine. Health officials have said the first distribution of vaccines is likely to begin in the next few weeks.
The panel, known as the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) is an outside group of medical experts that advises the CDC. They are scheduled to debate from 2 to 5pm ET about how the vaccine should be distributed.
Public health officials and medical experts have said health-care workers should get the vaccine first, followed by vulnerable Americans, including the elderly, people with preexisting conditions and essential workers. ACIP will send its guidance to the CDC. However, it will ultimately be up to states on whether to follow the CDC’s guidelines on vaccine distribution.
I encourage all students of public health to watch tomorrow’s ACIP mtg on priority allocation for COVID-19 vaccines. No registration needed; 2pm-5pm EST. Link on ACIP webpage. Listen not with cynicism, but an appreciation for the process and its difficulty. What would you do?
— Allison Chamberlain (@ATChambs) November 30, 2020
Abené Clayton has been in Richmond, California looking at how the pandemic has disrupted violence prevention efforts there.
The Bay Area had seen a considerable decline in deadly shootings in the past decade. Gun homicide rates fell in cities across the region, across all racial groups. The city of Richmond saw a 67% drop in gun homicide rates between 2007 and 2017, according to a 2019 Guardian analysis of homicide data. In Oakland there was a 44% decline.
Anthony Ramsey was Richmond’s first homicide victim of 2020. Since his death, 17 other people have been killed in the city, just one more than had been killed by this point last year. In neighboring Oakland, 101 people have already been murdered in 2020, 27 more than the total number of homicides in the city in 2019. Most of these killings involved guns, making 2020 a worrying and unprecedented period for gun violence in California’s Bay Area.
It’s a national trend. From Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, to Vallejo, California, in cities big and small, incidents of fatal and non-fatal gun violence are rising.
Experts say that it is too early to draw a definitive connection between the uptick and the tumultuous events of a historic year – the pandemic, the mass protests against police killings and racial injustice, the tense run-up to the presidential election. But community advocates in Richmond and Oakland agree that the loss of safe havens like schools and community centers plays a role in the rise of shootings among young Black and brown residents. And the strategies violence interrupters, police and non-profit service providers have successfully used to drive gun violence down – like targeted interventions and court-approved search warrants – have been reduced, disrupted and slowed by Covid-19.
Read more here: ‘A father, a brother, a son’: Inside the rise in gun violence in California’s Bay Area
A quick snap from Reuters here on foreign relations. The US State Department has accused China of a “flagrant violation” of its obligation to enforce international sanctions on North Korea, and said that Washington would offer rewards of up to $5 million for information about sanctions evasions.
Speaking to Washington’s Center for Strategic and International Studies think tank, Deputy assistant secretary for North Korea State Alex Wong accused China of “seeking to undo” the UN sanctions regime aimed at persuading North Korea to give up its nuclear weapons.
The US says it has observed ships carrying coal or other sanctioned goods from North Korea to China on 555 separate occasions.
Earlier, China had urged the US to ‘correct its mistake and lift all illegal sanctions’, after Washington had imposed Venezuela-related sanctions targeting a Chinese firm on Monday.
The US has imposed sanctions on Chinese firm China National Electronics Import & Export Corporation, accusing it of supporting Venezuelan president Nicolas Maduro.
The decentralised federal structure of the US is often cited as a strength in holding a country together over such a large geographical area and with a diverse population. However, it brings with it some disadvantages. ProPublica this morning have a report on how the lack of a central approach to tackling coronavirus is allowing the virus an opportunity to spread as states take very different – and contradictory – approaches to dealing with it.
Nowhere are these regulatory disparities more counterproductive and jarring than in the border areas between restrictive and permissive states; for example, between Washington and Idaho, Minnesota and South Dakota, and Illinois and Iowa. In each pairing, one state has imposed tough and sometimes unpopular restrictions on behavior, only to be confounded by a neighbor’s leniency. Like factories whose emissions boost asthma rates for miles around, a state’s lax public health policies can wreak damage beyond its borders.
“In some ways, the whole country is essentially living with the strategy of the least effective states because states interconnect and one state not doing a good job will continue to spread the virus to other states,” said Dr. Ashish Jha, dean of the Brown University School of Public Health. “States can’t wall themselves off.”
The piece includes a case study of Jim Gilliard. The 70 year old didn’t stray far from his home during Washington state’s strict restrictions, but was eventually tempted across the border to attend the annual Panhandle Bluesfest in neighboring Idaho. On his return, he fell ill, and died in October. His death certificate lists Covid-19 as the underlying cause.
Washington Gov. Jay Inslee recently called on Idaho’s leaders to show some leadership and he has blamed the virus spread in Idaho for causing demand and strain on Washington hospitals.
Read more here: ProPublica – States with few coronavirus restrictions are spreading the virus beyond their borders
Ronald Brownstein has this analysis at CNN of what is going on with the Republican party over their complicit backing of Trump’s repeated baseless claims that the election was stolen – and likening it to the party’s response to the McCarthy era.
In many respects, the congressional GOP response to Trump has paralleled the party’s response to McCarthy. Whatever their private concerns about Trump’s behavior or values, the vast majority of congressional Republicans have supported Trump since his 2017 inauguration at almost every turn, brushing aside concerns about everything from openly racist language to his efforts to extort the government of Ukraine to manufacture dirt on the eventual Democratic presidential nominee, Joe Biden.
That pattern of deference has continued since the election as Trump has raised unfounded claims that he lost only because of massive voter fraud; as an array of state and federal courts have rejected those claims as lacking any supporting evidence, Trump has only heightened his allegations.
In an interview with Fox News on Sunday, Trump broadened his claims to suggest that the FBI and Department of Justice were part of a plot to defeat him; after weeks of excoriating Georgia’s Republican secretary of state for failing to overturn the state’s election results on his behalf, Trump this week extended his criticism to the state’s staunchly conservative Republican governor, Brian Kemp. On Monday, Trump added a new Republican target when he fired a volley of attacks against Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey after the state certified Biden’s victory there.
Through it all, as Trump’s charges have grown more and more untethered and vitriolic, Senate Majority Leader McConnell, House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy and other top GOP legislators in both chambers – not to mention the vast majority of Republican governors – have raised not a peep of dissent.
Read more here: CNN – Ronald Brownstein – GOP silence on Trump’s false election claims recalls McCarthy era
Trump has raised more than $150 million with false election claims – reports
The Washington Post has this possible motivation for Donald Trump to continue the fight to overturn his overwhelming election defeat:
President Trump’s political operation has raised more than $150 million since Election Day, using a blizzard of misleading appeals about the election to shatter fundraising records set during the campaign, according to people with knowledge of the contributions.
The influx of political donations is one reason Trump and some allies are inclined to continue a legal onslaught and public affairs blitz focused on baseless claims of election fraud, even as their attempts have repeatedly failed in court and as key states continue to certify wins for President-elect Joe Biden.
Much of the money raised since the election is likely to go into an account for the president to use on political activities after he leaves office, while some of the contributions will go toward what’s left of the legal fight.
The surge of donations is largely from small-dollar donors, campaign officials say, tapping into the president’s base of loyal and fervent donors who tend to contribute the most when they feel the president is under siege or facing unfair political attacks. The campaign has sent about 500 post-election fundraising pitches to donors, often with hyperbolic language about voter fraud and the like.
“I need you now more than ever,” says one recent email that claims to be from the president. “The Recount Results were BOGUS,” another email subject line reads.
Read more here: Washington Post – Trump raises more than $150 million appealing to false election claims
Incidentally overnight Donald Trump was again pushing his baseless claims that the election was stolen from him, and suggesting that there will be an examination of election equipment in Nevada.
A judge in Nevada has ordered Clark County officials to allow an inspection of the elections equipment and sealed containers used in the 2020 election by 1:00 P.M. tomorrow. @RichardGrenell @AdamLaxalt @mschlapp
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 1, 2020
This has left people somewhat puzzled. Attorney Sidney Powell – who has been distanced by the Trump campaign but who continues to pursue election-related lawsuits, told Fox News’ Sean Hannity about her former colleague Jess Binnall getting a “discovery order” in Nevada when asked if people had been able to examine voting machines. Binnall also retweeted the president’s message about equipment inspection.
Nevada has already certified its result. Biden won by a margin of 33,596 votes, and has the state’s six electoral college votes on 14 December.
Just a reminder: The claim the election was stolen is effectively that millions of fake votes were cast for Joe Biden across multiple states, and that this conspiracy – whether it was carried out by the Democratic party or the “deep state” or foreign actors or the ghost of Hugo Chavez or whoever is the bogeymen du jour – has left behind no evidence that can be produced in court and everyone involved has kept it a total secret.
The conspiracy against Trump, according to his lawyer Rudy Giuliani at least, also appears to encompass people in the Republican party. Yesterday he said corruption was “not all on the Democrat side”, while without evidence accusing Arizona’s Republicans in Arizona of election misdeeds.
It may be that the corruption is not all on the Democrat side?
— Rudy W. Giuliani (@RudyGiuliani) December 1, 2020
I've always believed there is an equal distribution of virtue and vice for both Republicans and Democrats.
With Donald Trump we’ve got used to an era of presidential decree via Twitter – and the commander-in-chief widely insulting his foes and colleagues alike. Indeed the New York Times still proudly displays an interactive database called the 598 people, places and things Donald Trump has insulted on Twitter: a complete list.
However it seems like it may be one rule for him, and one rule for anybody else seeking to get their appointment by Joe Biden confirmed by a Republican-controlled Senate. The Daily Beast has this on Neera Tanden’s disappearing tweets.
President-elect Joe Biden’s choice for budget chief does not pull punches online. So when some of her hits aimed at top players in Congress were removed from the Internet, it was clear something was up.
Neera Tanden, president of the Center for American Progress, has deleted over one thousand tweets from her personal Twitter account since the beginning of November. A number of them, since recovered by The Daily Beast, contain comments directed at powerful lawmakers on both sides of the aisle that could turn a relationship to ice before her Senate confirmation hearing to lead the Office of Management and Budget takes place next year.
Tanden deleted some, but not all, tweets from her account lambasting prominent lawmakers like Senate majority leader Mitch McConnell, Sens. Joni Ernst and Susan Collins, and praising their Democratic challengers. It’s unclear when exactly Tanden deleted them.
Sen. John Cornyn told the congressional press pool that he believed “maybe” Tanden was Biden’s “worst nominee so far. I think, in light of her combative and insulting comments about many members of the Senate, mainly on our side of the aisle, that it creates, certainly, a problematic path.”
Cornyn has previously likened his relationship with Donald Trump to a marriage, and said that he was “maybe like a lot of women who get married and think they’re going to change their spouse, and that doesn’t usually work out very well. What I tried to do is not get into public confrontations and fights with him because, as I’ve observed, those usually don’t end too well.”
Read more here: The Daily Beast – Neera Tanden mean-tweeted GOP lawmakers—until she needed their votes
A former head of US election security who said Donald Trump’s defeat by Joe Biden was not subject to voter fraud should be “taken out at dawn and shot”, a Trump campaign lawyer said.
Condemnation of Joe DiGenova’s remark about Chris Krebs was swift, including calls for his disbarment and the charge that he was behaving like a “mob attorney”.
Krebs was fired as head of the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (Cisa) on 17 November, not long after he said the election, contrary to Trump’s claims, “was the most secure in American history”.
Krebs also used Twitter to publicly debunk Trump’s conspiracy theories.
DiGenova defended the president in the Russia investigation and is now involved in attempts to overturn results in battleground states. The Trump campaign has won one lawsuit – and lost 39.
DiGenova made the remark about Krebs on The Howie Carr Show, a podcast shown on YouTube and the Trump-allied Newsmax TV, on Monday.
“Anybody who thinks the election went well,” he said, “like that idiot Krebs who used to be the head of cybersecurity, that guy is a class A moron. He should be drawn and quartered. Taken out at dawn and shot.”
Carr did not challenge the remark.
A day earlier, Krebs told CBS 60 Minutes Trump was trying to “undermine democracy … to undermine confidence in the election, to confuse people, to scare people”.
Trump called that interview “ridiculous, one-sided [and] an international joke”.
Read more of Martin Pengelly’s report here: Trump lawyer: ex-election security chief Krebs should be ‘taken out and shot’
Those scenes in Memphis, Missouri are quite a contrast to what we are going to see at the White House over the next few weeks, as the Washington Post reports that amid the pandemic, the president’s residence will be hosting a spate of indoor holiday parties. Josh Dawsey writes:
While many public health professionals have asked Americans not to congregate in large group settings and avoid travel over the holidays because of the coronavirus pandemic that has killed more than 266,000 Americans and infected 13 million more, the White House is expected to throw more than a dozen indoor parties, including a large congressional ball on 10 December, officials say.
The parties will be paid for by the Republican Party, a person with knowledge of the planning said, and will cost millions of dollars.
The president and the first lady are determined to have a final holiday season in the White House, officials said, and concerns about spiking cases and deaths across the country have not stopped the events. Many of the administration’s supporters have taken a skeptical view of the restrictions over the virus and are choosing to attend, officials said.
Read more here: Washington Post – White House planning a packed season of holiday parties
Jeff Roberson and Jim Salter have been reporting for the Associated Press on the Covid situation in Missouri. They spoke to Dr. Shane Wilson who works in tiny, 25-bed hospital in the rural northeastern corner of the state.
Wilson’s coronavirus routine may look similar to that in a big hospital in a big city – making his rounds in masks and gloves, with zippered plastic walls between hallways and using hand sanitizer as he enters and exits each room. But there’s one stark difference. Born and raised in Memphis, a town of just 1,800 people, Wilson knows most of his patients by their first names.
He visits a woman who used to be a gym teacher at his school, and later laughingly recalls a day she caught him smoking at school and made him and a friend pick up cigarette butts as punishment. In November, Wilson treated his own father, who along with his wife used to work at the same hospital. The 74-year-old elder Wilson recovered from the virus.
With the US now averaging more than 170,000 new cases each day, it is taking a toll from the biggest hospitals down to the little ones, like Scotland County Hospital. The tragedy is smaller here, more intimate. Everyone knows everyone.
Memphis is the biggest town for miles and miles and people come to the hospital from six surrounding counties. Scotland County Hospital’s doctors already are making difficult, often heartbreaking decisions about who they can take in. Wilson said some moderately ill people have been sent home with oxygen and told, “If things get worse, come back in, but we don’t have a place to put you and we don’t have a place to transfer you.”
Meanwhile, a staffing shortage is so severe that the hospital put out an appeal for anyone with health care experience, including retirees, to come to work. Several responded and are already on staff, including a woman working as a licensed practical nurse as she studies to become a registered nurse.
The hospital’s chief nursing officer, Elizabeth Guffey, said nurses are working up to 24 extra hours each week. Guffey sometimes sleeps in an office rather than go home between shifts.
“We’re in a surge capacity almost 100% of the time,” Guffey said. “So it’s all hands on deck.”
It’s especially difficult to watch friends and relatives struggle through the illness while a large majority of the community still doesn’t take it seriously, she said.
“We spend our time indoors taking care of these very sick people, and then we go outdoors and hear people tell us the disease is a hoax or it doesn’t really exist,” Guffey said.
Jonathan Swan, when he’s not busy being a meme, has been looking for Axios at the vexed issue of how best to roll out a coronavirus vaccine in the US. He writes:
Governors are preparing to face one of the toughest moral choices they’ll confront in office: how to allocate limited stocks of coronavirus vaccine among outsized shares of vulnerable Americans. Everyone agrees health care workers need to be at the front of the line. But after that things get tricky.
“It really is all going to depend how much vaccine are we going to have access to, and how quickly,” said New Mexico’s Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham. “If you can’t get it done quickly, it’s problematic.”
She described a nightmare scenario: The federal government gives her sufficient doses to initially vaccinate every nursing home resident and every hospital worker in her state, but not nearly enough to cover the one in three adults statewide with chronic disorders.
“So I’ve got 700,000 people I need to start getting the vaccine to, and I get 25,000 doses,” she said. “That will be hard, and what we’ll do is, we’ll allocate it per community in the same way we do flu.”
As Swan puts it, the Trump administration is leaving it up to governors to decide who gets the vaccine and when. It’s an ultimate test of federalism and of each state’s executive’s ability to act decisively.
Read more here: Axios – Governors in the vaccine hot seat
Tina Flournoy chosen as vice president-elect Kamala Harris’ chief of staff – reports
CNN report that Tina Flournoy, who is currently serving as chief of staff to former president Bill Clinton, has been chosen to be vice president-elect Kamala Harris’ chief of staff. Jamie Gangel and Caroline Kelly write that:
Flournoy will join at least two other women of color holding senior roles in Harris’ office. Symone Sanders, a senior adviser to the Biden campaign, will serve as a senior adviser and chief spokesperson for the vice president-elect. Ashley Etienne, another senior adviser on the Biden campaign, will serve as communications director for Harris.
Before her current role with Clinton, Flournoy, a graduate of Georgetown Law, served as assistant to the president for public policy at the American Federation of Teachers, a union representing 1.7 million members, according to her Georgetown University biography. In that role, she led the group’s work in areas including its political, mobilization, and human rights and community outreach departments.
Read more here: CNN – Vice president-elect Kamala Harris picks Tina Flournoy as her chief of staff
Richard Wolffe has filed his latest column for us: Trump’s legacy is the plague of extreme lies. Truth-based media is the vaccine
Whether he knows it or not – and all the evidence suggests he knows nothing worth knowing – Trump’s legacy is the toxic politics of lies: a permanent campaign of fabrications and falsehoods.
No matter that he clearly lost the 2020 election by landslide margins in the electoral college and the popular vote. What matters is the never-ending sense of grievance that someone or something, somewhere – liberals, minorities, judges, reporters – have conspired to wrong Trump and oppress his long-suffering fans.
This is the narrative of the fascist story forever: you are not to blame for your suffering because it was contrived by others – immigrants and outsiders, wielding wealth and power in the shadows.
Trump did not invent this story and likely has no idea where it came from, other than his own obvious genius. He did not invent the notion that brazen lies can buy you a delusional base. He wasn’t the first to put the bull in the bully pulpit of the presidency.
But he was the first to run a White House like a Joe McCarthy witch hunt, unleashing social media to cower an entire party into a posture of pure cowardice.
Trump’s Republicans will be with us long after the soon-to-be-ex-president succumbs to the overdue tax bills of the IRS, the calling-in of his massive property debts, and the long-brewing fraud cases of New York state’s prosecutors.
These Trumpist Republicans are his legacy, as much as a supreme court stacked against the popular vote, science and all good sense.
Read more here: Richard Wolffe – Trump’s legacy is the plague of extreme lies. Truth-based media is the vaccine
The Los Angeles Times editorial board this morning have published a very clear view on how they think the supreme court should rule in the case of the census that is currently before them: The Supreme Court should reject Trump’s cynical attacks on the census
Rather than count everybody in the country, as the constitution stipulates, the Trump administration is seeking to exclude people whose immigration status it disapproves of. The paper writes:
He’s trying to cook the final numbers sent to the states under a July memo in which Trump asserted that, when it comes to congressional reapportionment, “it is the policy of the United States to exclude from the apportionment base aliens who are not in a lawful immigration status under the Immigration and Nationality Act.”
If the president’s scheme is found to be lawful, California, Texas and Florida each might lose at least one seat in the House (with more than 2 million migrants living in the state without authorization, California could lose up to three seats) to which they otherwise would be entitled, while Alabama, Minnesota and Ohio could each gain a seat.
The supreme court judgement will also be an interest test of the extent to which Amy Coney Barrett’s originalist views compete with her conservative political alleigences. As the LA Times editorial board puts it:
While a change in administrations might make Trump’s effort moot, it would still be best for the Supreme Court to put this kind of chicanery to bed by affirming the Constitution’s clear language on the breadth of the census, and its use in reallocating House seats, and to reject Trump’s reasoning for ignoring historical precedent and clear constitutional language for political reasons. Just because Trump and the immigration hard-liners who support him dislike the Constitution’s requirement that apportionment be based on an enumeration of “the whole number of persons in each State” doesn’t mean they get to redefine as they see fit.
Read more here: Los Angeles Times – The Supreme Court should reject Trump’s cynical attacks on the census
The names have mostly been known since the weekend, but today president-elect Joe Biden will formally introduce his top economic policy advisers as his administration prepares to take power amid a slowing economic recovery hampered by the resurgent coronavirus pandemic.
Biden will appear at an event in his hometown of Wilmington, Delaware, alongside his selections for senior roles, including his nominee for US Treasury secretary, former Federal Reserve Chair Janet Yellen.
The event is expected to follow a similar format to the way that the president-elect introduced his national security team last week.
The team’s makeup reinforces Biden’s view that a more aggressive approach to the pandemic is required. The advisers have all expressed support for government stimulus to maximize employment, reduce economic inequality and help women and minorities, who have been disproportionately hurt by the economic downturn.
Other picks include Cecilia Rouse, an economist at Princeton University, as chair of the Council of Economic Advisers; economists Heather Boushey and Jared Bernstein as council members; and Neera Tanden, chief executive of the liberal Center for American Progress think tank, as head of the Office of Management and Budget.
Biden’s latest nominations would place several women in top economic roles, reflecting his commitment to increasing diversity at the highest levels of the federal government.
Rouse would be the first Black woman to lead the Council of Economic Advisers, which advises the president on economic policy; Tanden would be the first woman of color to run the OMB; and Yellen would be the first female Treasury secretary.
All three would require Senate confirmation though. Several Republicans, who currently hold a narrow majority in the chamber, expressed immediate opposition to Tanden. Some citied previous comments Tanden has made which were negative about Republican figures. Tanden’s supporters were not slow to point out that this seems a hypocritical approach after four years of Republican Senators publicaly backing a president who made insulting his opponents a key part of his leadership style.
One of the things that appears to have been hampering the US response to the coronavirus has been pushback by lawmakers against measures being introduced to try and control it – sometimes against people in the same party.
That is the case in Ohio, where several Republican state representatives have officially filed articles of impeachment against Republican Governor Mike DeWine.
Brooke Seipel reports for the Hill that the allegations claim DeWine’s administration implemented unconstitutional orders in response to the pandemic.
In a statement shared with local news outlets, Becker’s office blasted DeWine, alleging “mismanagement, malfeasance, misfeasance, abuse of power, and other crimes include, but are not limited to, meddling in the conduct of a presidential primary election, arbitrarily closing and placing curfews on certain businesses, while allowing other businesses to remain open.”
The group of state Republican lawmakers argues that DeWine violated Ohioans’ civil liberties by issuing a stay-at-home order and requiring them to wear masks. They have argued that the face covering rule “promotes fear, turns neighbors against neighbors, and contracts the economy by making people fearful to leave their homes.”
DeWine has previously responded to criticism by saying “As governor, my priorities are to keep people safe and to get our economy moving faster.”
Ohio has seen 421,063 cases of the coronavirus to date, with the virus infecting one in twenty-seven people in the state. There have been 6,429 deaths.
In order for DeWine to be impeached, a majority of the Ohio House of Representatives would need to approve the resolution, and then two-thirds of the Ohio Senate would have to vote to convict the governor.
Read more here: The Hill – Articles of impeachment filed against GOP Ohio governor over coronavirus orders
The Senate run-off races in Georgia in January will either cement a Republican Senate in opposition to Joe Biden’s presidency, or give the Democratic party a hold on the White House, the House and the Senate.
To underline the importance of the battle, president Donald Trump, who has made barely any public appearances save on the golf course since his 3 November election defeat, will be rallying there on Saturday.
Jon Ossoff, who is challenging incumbent Republican Sen. David Perdue, says he would in turn welcome a visit from the president-elect.
Ossoff told MSNBC’s The Last Word that he didn’t know what Trump would be bringing to offer Georgia. “He’s coming to Georgia empty-handed. I don’t think he’s bringing stimulus for families, I don’t think he’s bringing relief for small businesses. He’s just gonna come and spread Covid at one of his rallies.” said the Democratic challenger.
Both Perdue and the state’s other incumbent, Republican Kelly Loeffler, have been thankful for the president’s support. One Republican who you suspect may not be so welcome at the rally though is Georgia’s secretary of state, Brad Raffensperger.
He has been the target of constant attacks from the president over Trump’s defeat in Georgia. Yesterday he pushed back at groups “exploiting the emotions of many Trump supporters” and misleading Donald Trump himself over claims of election fraud in the state.
In his resignation letter, Dr Scott Atlas said “I always relied on the latest science and evidence, without any political consideration or influence.”
As Sheryl Gay Stolberg observes for the New York Times, this may come as news to some people. She writes:
Some of Dr. Atlas’s Trump administration colleagues would most likely contradict that assessment, citing views starkly different from those put forth by officials at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and by other government scientists. Dr. Atlas has argued, for example, that the science of mask wearing is uncertain and that children cannot spread the coronavirus.
Even more contentious was his libertarian vision of the role of the government in the pandemic. In Dr. Atlas’s view, the government’s job was not to stamp out the virus but simply to protect its most vulnerable citizens as Covid-19 took its course.
Dr. Atlas also railed against anything that smacked of a lockdown or business closure. “Protect the high-risk; open schools, society,” he tweeted in October. “Alternative? Confine healthy people, restrict business, close schools…kills people, destroys families, sacrifices kids. #RationalThinking.”
Public health experts were appalled and warned that his ideas were dangerous and would have disastrous results.
But that did not stop Dr. Atlas. In mid-November, he called on people in Michigan to “rise up” against coronavirus restrictions. The state’s governor, Gretchen Whitmer, who had faced death threats and a thwarted kidnapping attempt over the restrictions, denounced him as “incredibly reckless.”
There’s an election on today, as Georgia voters are choosing the short-term replacement for civil rights legend John Lewis.
Former Atlanta City Council member Kwanza Hall and former Morehouse College President Robert Franklin are contesting a runoff election. The men finished first and second, but no one won a majority in a first round of voting in September among seven candidates.
The winner out of the two Democrats will only fill the seat until 3 January, though. The 5th Congressional District includes most of the city of Atlanta, as well as some suburban areas of Fulton, DeKalb and Clayton counties. Turnout could be light, after fewer than 31,000 people voted in September.
Lewis died at age 80 from pancreatic cancer in July after 34 years in Congress. He was the youngest and last survivor of the speakers at the 1963 March on Washington, when Lewis led the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee. He was best known for leading protesters in the 1965 “Bloody Sunday” march across the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, Alabama, where he was beaten by state troopers.
The Associated Press report that Hall and Franklin both contend they can get something accomplished during a short stay in Congress. Voting on a temporary federal budget could be the most significant act that Hall or Franklin takes, although there are still fading hopes of additional Covid-19 relief legislation.
“It’s about moral leadership at a time of national crisis,” said the 66-year-old Franklin, who promises to call attention to Lewis’ legacy and to further Martin Luther King Jr.’s vision of the “beloved community.”
Hi, and welcome to Tuesday’s coverage of US politics. Here’s a catch-up of the main events from yesterday and overnight, and a little of what we might expect to see today.
- Donald Trump’s coronavirus adviser Scott Atlas has resigned. The Stanford radiologist had no expertise in infectious diseases or epidemiology and used his position to promote ideas that were both baseless and widely criticized by actual experts as dangerous to the public.
- There were 157,901 new Covid cases recorded yesterday. It is the 28th consecutive day that the country has recorded over 100,000 new daily cases. There were a further 1,172 deaths reported.
- President-elect Joe Biden announced a slate of nominees for various economic positions in his administration, including Janet Yellen as treasury secretary and Neera Tanden as director of the Office of Management and Budget.
- Arizona and Wisconsin certified their election results. Biden won both states despite the Trump campaign’s baseless attempts to overturn them.
- One unexpected transition effect: a study showed that Trump has been losing followers on Twitter while Biden has been gaining them.
- The president’s campaign attorney Joseph diGenova, a former federal prosecutor, called for the execution of the fired election cybersecurity head, Chris Krebs on Newsmax.
- The supreme court heard arguments in an important dispute over whether undocumented immigrants should be included in the census tally that determines the apportionment of congressional seats. The court appeared skeptical of the Trump administration’s arguments in favor of exclusion.
- Behind-the-scenes discussion will continue in Congress to try and put together a financial package to keep the government running. Government funding for nearly all federal agencies expires on Saturday 11 December.
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Joe Biden and vice president-elect Kamala Harris will get their classified presidential briefing again today. They will later introduce their nominees and appointees to key economic policy posts in Wilmington, Delaware. That’s at 12.30 ET.
- The supreme court debates whether the Alien Tort Statute can be used to sue US corporations.
- Treasury secretary Steven Mnuchin and Chair of the Federal Reserve Jay Powell will testify at a Senate committee hearing on the quarterly CARES Act report.
- The president of the United States has no public engagements in his diary today.
