June 21, 2022

The Longest Day

Late Morning/Afternoon Update:

The officers had weapons; the children had none. The officers had body armor; the children had none. The officers had training; the subject had none. One hour, 14 minutes and 8 seconds. That's how long children waited, and the teachers waited, in Room 111 to be rescued. -- Texas Public Safety director Steven McCraw, Tuesday ~~~

David Goodman of the New York Times: "The head of the Texas State Police offered a pointed and emphatic rebuke of the police response to a shooting last month at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas, calling it 'an abject failure' that ran counter to decades of training. In his comments before a special State Senate committee in Austin, Steven McCraw, the director of the Department of Public Safety, said that just minutes after a gunman began shooting children inside a pair of connected classrooms on May 24, the police at the scene had enough firepower and protective equipment to storm the classroom. But, he said, the on-scene commander 'decided to put the lives of officers ahead of the lives of children.' Mr. McCraw, speaking forcefully, said the same commander had delayed confronting the gunman because he 'waited for a key that was never needed.... 'I don't believe, based on the information that we have right now, that that door was ever secured.'..." The Texas Tribune report is here.

The New York Times' live updates of developments related to today's January 6 committee hearing are here. More on the hearing liked below.

Lordy, There Are Tapes. Eugene Daniels & Ryan Lizza of Politico: "The House select committee investigating Jan. 6 sent a subpoena last week to Alex Holder, a documentary filmmaker who was granted extensive access to ... Donald Trump and his inner circle. Holder shot interviews with the then-president both before and after Jan. 6. The existence of this footage is previously unreported. A source familiar with the project told Politico on Monday night that Holder began filming on the campaign trail in September 2020 for a project on Trump's reelection campaign. Over the course of several months, Holder had substantial access to Trump, Trump's adult children and Mike Pence, both in the White House and on the campaign trail.... Holder is expected to fully cooperate with the committee in an interview scheduled for Thursday."

Adam Liptak of the New York Times: "The Supreme Court ruled on Tuesday that Maine may not exclude religious schools from a state tuition program. The decision, from a court that has grown exceptionally receptive to claims from religious people and groups in a variety of settings, was the latest in a series of rulings requiring the government to aid religious institutions on the same terms as other private organizations. The vote was 6 to 3, with the court's three liberal justices in dissent." MB: When Texas secedes, could we please donate 2/3rds of the Supreme Court to them? And you know which 2/3rds I'm talkin' about. ~~~

     ~~~ Update: I see where contributor Jeanne, in today's Comments, had the related idea of sending Trump & Greitens to rule over Texas as prez & veep. I second that.

~~~~~~~~~~

A hearing of the House January 6 committee is scheduled to begin today at 1:00 pm ET. You can watch on the linked page, which is a page of the committee's Website.

The Washington Post's live updates relating to today's January 6 committee hearing are here.

A Piece of the Plot Comes into Focus. Rosalind Helderman of the Washington Post: "... internal campaign emails and memos reveal that the convening of ... fake electors [in seven states on December 14, 2020,] appeared to be a ... concerted strategy, intended to give Vice President Mike Pence a reason to declare the outcome of the election was somehow in doubt on Jan. 6, 2021, when he was to preside over the congressional counting of the electoral college votes. The documents show Trump's team pushed ahead and urged the electors to meet -- then pressured Pence to cite the alternate Trump slates -- even as various Trump lawyers acknowledge privately they did not have legal validity and the gatherings had not been in compliance with state laws.... Committee members have said that Tuesday's hearing will focus on ... how the elector scheme was organized and the ways Trump pressured officials in swing states to go along with his false claims that Biden had lost.... The Justice Department and an Atlanta-area prosecutor are also investigating the elector scheme...." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ~~~

     ~~~ Aaron Blake of the Washington Post provides a timeline of events relating to the fake electors plots. Helpful. (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: As I recall, we heard bits & pieces of Trump's pressure on states more-or-less in real time, but it was not till some time later that we learned that Republicans in several states had fronted slates of fake electors for Trump. When this story first came out, only one or two states were mentioned, and the effort seemed ridiculous &, frankly, humorous. It took a while for the press to catch on to the central purpose of these fake slates of electors.

Zachary Cohen, et al., of CNN: "The House select committee investigating the January 6 riot is set to hear live testimony from four witnesses during Tuesday's hearing that will focus on how ... Donald Trump and his allies pressured state-level officials to overturn the 2020 election results. The committee will also show evidence that Trump was involved in a scheme to submit fake slates of electors in the 2020 presidential election, US Rep. Adam Schiff, a California Democrat and member of the panel who is expected to play a leading role in the presentation, said Sunday.... The witness list for Tuesday's hearing includes three individuals from Georgia: Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, his deputy Gabe Sterling and former election worker Wandrea ArShaye "Shaye" Moss. Rusty Bowers a Republican who is the Arizona House speaker, is also scheduled to testify, the committee formally announced Monday. Tuesday's hearing will ... detail how Trump, his former attorney Rudy Giuliani and then-White House chief of staff Mark Meadows pressured officials, as well as, how false election claims fueled death threats for those at the state level." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) The New York Times story is here. Yeah But ~~~

~~~ Johnny, I Hardly Knew Ya. Sarah Burris of the Raw Story: "Rolling Stone is citing two people familiar with Donald Trump's plots around the Jan. 6 trials that the former president wants to throw legal adviser John Eastman under the bus.... After three public hearings from the House Select Committee..., Eastman has garnered a lot of negative 'attention,' which has perturbed Trump. Those who spoke to Trump about Eastman in the past several months say that he is adopting a strategy he has frequently used when he appears to be guilty. 'He has privately insisted he "hardly" or "barely" knows Eastman, despite the fact that he counseled Trump on taking a string of extra-legal measures in a bid to stay in power,' said the report.... Read the full report at Rolling Stone. Firewalled. ~~~

~~~ Also from the Alternate World of Donald Trump. Michael Luciano of Mediaite: Donald Trump called in to Eric Bolling's Newsmax show and "claimed evidence has arisen showing he actually won the 2020 election. 'We have so much proof,' he [said]. 'They don't want to play the proof.' Trump went on to blame Speaker Nancy Pelosi for the security breach at the Capitol despite the fact that, as commander-in-chief, Trump was in charge of the National Guard. He then claimed his supporters were 'well-behaved' on Jan. 6, 2021: '... And I'm talking about the people that went there and to, also listen to speeches. It was the largest group I think that I've ever seen or made a speech to. I've never seen anything like it and there they were well behaved. So many, so many people. Nobody ever talks about that.'" Emphasis added. ~~~

      ~~~ Marie: As Stephen Colbert points out in the video below, Trumpbots don't often see video of the insurrection, but surely they've seen some video & photos of their pals attacking Capitol police and running rampant through the Capitol. Yet Trump is so accustomed to lying, so confident that his lemmings will follow him no matter what, that he blithely declares these marauders were well "well-behaved." Frankly, I cannot imagine anyone's being stupid enough to say, "Oh, right." But that, apparently, is indicative of my lack of imagination.

Trump Notices the Hearings Are Going Well. Ken Meyer of Mediaite: "... Donald Trump called it a 'bad decision' by House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy to completely withdraw from the January 6 Committee.... 'This committee, it was a bad decision not to have representation on that committee,' Trump said [in an interview]. 'That was a very, very foolish decision because they try to pretend like they're legit, and only when you get into the inner workings you say "what kind of a thing is this?" Just a one-sided witch hunt.'" MB: So is a "two-sided witch hunt" is where we take a break every few minutes to listen to Jim Jordan harangue the assembly with counterfactual gibberish?

In his monologue Monday night, Stephen Colbert discussed the non-surrection:

Zach Montague of the New York Times: "President Biden said on Monday that he was considering seeking a gas tax holiday to ease high fuel prices, a major political dilemma for the White House as it struggles to address record inflation.... Suspending the gas tax, which is 18.4 cents per gallon, would require action by Congress. In February, when Democratic lawmakers explored the idea, Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the Republican leader, dismissed it as a gimmick."

Benjamin Mueller of the New York Times: "Nearly three months since an ultra-contagious set of new Omicron variants launched a springtime resurgence of [Covid-19] cases, people are dying from Covid at a rate close to the lowest of the pandemic.... Deaths have ticked up slowly in the northeastern United States, where the latest wave began, and are likely to do the same nationally as the surge pushes across the South and West. But the country remains better fortified against Covid deaths than earlier in the pandemic, scientists said. Because so many Americans have now been vaccinated or infected or both, they said, the number of people whose immune systems are entirely unprepared for the virus has significantly dwindled."

Beyond the Beltway

Missouri. Alan Feuer of the New York Times: "Eric Greitens, a Republican candidate for the United States Senate in Missouri, released a violent new political advertisement on Monday showing himself racking a shotgun and accompanying a team of men armed with assault rifles as they stormed -- SWAT team-style -- into a home in search of 'RINOs,' or Republicans in name only. 'Join the MAGA crew,' Mr. Greitens, a former Navy SEAL, declares in the ad. 'Get a RINO hunting permit. There's no bagging limit, no tagging limit, and it doesn't expire until we save our country.' The ad by Mr. Greitens was just the latest but perhaps most menacing in a long line of Republican campaign ads featuring firearms and seeking to equate hard-core conservatism with the use of deadly weapons.... By midafternoon on Monday, Twitter had hidden Mr. Greitens' new ad behind a warning.... Facebook removed the ad altogether. [Dylan Johnson,] Mr. Greitens's campaign, [said,] 'If anyone doesn't get the metaphor, they are either lying or dumb.'..." NPR's story is here. ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: Oh, it's just a "metaphor." And just when I thought it was okay to murder my Republican neighbors. I saw clips of the ad on the teevee. Greitens leads a team of about half-a-dozen men outfitted in military-style camo who break through the front door of a suburban-style house and enter, rifles drawn, in search of their prey. It could give a child nightmares.

Texas. Greg Sargent of the Washington Post: "The [Texas Republican party's] new platform, which thousands of GOP activists in Texas agreed to at the state party convention over the weekend, is a veritable piñata bursting with far-right extremist fantasies. It states that Texas retains the right to secede from the United States and urges the Texas legislature to reaffirm this. It describes homosexuality as 'an abnormal lifestyle choice.' It flatly declares that no validation of transgender identity is legitimate. It dismisses all gun regulations as a violation of 'God given rights.'... But the document might be most revealing in its treatment of voting and democracy. It declares President Biden was 'not legitimately elected' in 2020. It says Biden's win was tainted by voting in swing-state cities, furthering a GOP trend toward more explicitly declaring votes in urban centers illegitimate." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: When I first read about Texas's GOP platform a couple of days ago, I wondered what gay Texas Republicans had to say about the platform's odd declaration that homosexuality was "an abnormal lifestyle choice." Conover Kennard of Crooks & Liars discovered that they didn't have much of an opportunity to object. According to the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, "The Fort Worth Log Cabin Republicans is a new chapter of a national organization. The local group and the organization's state affiliate were denied booths at the event that drew Republicans from across the state, a spokesperson for the party confirmed." This seems like a good time for Texans who consider themselves to be "normal" Republicans to get out of the abnormal Texas Republican party. Right away. ~~~

     ~~~ MEANWHILE, you can't get more anti-American than a Texas Republican. Dana Milbank of the Washington Post: "The proposed platform (it's expected to be approved when votes are tallied) [reads]: 'Texas retains the right to secede from the United States, and the Texas Legislature should be called upon to pass a referendum consistent thereto.' It wants the secession referendum 'in the 2023 general election for the people of Texas to determine whether or not the State of Texas should reassert its status as an independent nation.' Yee-haw!... The Texas Theocracy ... would keep only traces of democracy. It wants the Voting Rights Act of 1965 'repealed,' and it would rewrite the state constitution to empower minority rule by small, rural (and White) counties. It would rescind voters' right to elect senators and the Constitution's guarantee of birthright citizenship."

Texas. Terri Langford of the Texas Tribune: "On Monday evening, the Austin American-Statesman and KVUE-TV revealed that the officers [loitering in the hall at Ross Elementary School in Uvalde], in effect, had more than enough firepower, equipment and motivation to breach the classrooms.... Current records and footage show a well-equipped group of local officers entered the school almost immediately that day and then pulled back once the shooter began firing from inside the classroom. Then they waited for more than an hour to reengage.... No security footage from inside the school showed police officers attempting to open the doors to classrooms 111 and 112, which were connected by an adjoining door.... Within the first minutes of the law enforcement response, an officer said the Halligan ... [-- a firefighting tool that breaks through doors --] was on site. It wasn't brought into the school until an hour after the first officers entered the building.... Officers had access to four ballistic shields inside the school during the standoff with the gunman, according to a law enforcement transcript. The first arrived 58 minutes before officers stormed the classrooms. The last arrived 30 minutes before." The Austin-American Statesman report, which is firewalled, is here.

Way Beyond

Ukraine, et al.

The New York Times' live updates of developments Tuesday in Russia's war on Ukraine are here. The Guardian's live updates are here. ~~~

     ~~~ The Washington Post's live updates for Tuesday are here: "On Monday, Ukrainian Deputy Defense Minister Hanna Malyar said Moscow's efforts to capture the besieged city [of Severodonetsk] would probably intensify after Russia's leaders set Sunday as the deadline for its military to reach Luhansk's borders. The coming week could bring some of the most decisive battles in the war, Ukrainian officials warned.... Tensions escalated in Europe after Russia threatened to retaliate against Lithuania over its move to restrict the transit of some goods.... The Kremlin's top spokesman said Americans captured in Ukraine would not be covered by Geneva Conventions' protections for prisoners of war."

Matthew Bigg, et al., of the New York Times: "The Russian blockade that has stopped Ukraine from exporting its vast storehouses of grain and other goods, threatening starvation in distant corners of the globe, is a 'war crime,' the European Union's top foreign policy official declared Monday. The remarks by the official, Josep Borrell Fontelles, were among the strongest language from a Western leader in describing the Kremlin's tactics to subjugate Ukraine nearly four months after it invaded, and with no end to the conflict in sight."

Yuliya Talmazan of NBC News: "... Vladimir Putin's spokesman wouldn't guarantee that two U.S. military veterans captured in Ukraine won't face the death penalty.... 'It depends on the investigation,' Dmitry Peskov told NBC News ... correspondent Keir Simmons when he was asked whether Alexander Drueke and Andy Huynh would 'face the same fate' as two British citizens and a Moroccan who were sentenced to death by Moscow-backed separatists in eastern Ukraine this month.... On Friday, videos of Huynh and Drueke were broadcast by RT, a Russian state-controlled international television network, which reported that the two were being held captive by separatists.... Peskov also denied that American WNBA star Brittney Griner, who was detained at a Russian airport in February after authorities there said she was carrying vape cartridges containing hashish oil, was being held as a 'hostage.'"

Kalia Richardson of the New York Times: "The Nobel Peace Prize put up for auction by the Russian journalist Dmitri A. Muratov to help Ukrainian refugees sold Monday night for $103.5 million to an anonymous buyer, obliterating the record for a Nobel medal. The proceeds from the auction will go to UNICEF to aid Ukrainian children and their families displaced by Russia's invasion of their country. Mr. Muratov is the editor in chief of the independent newspaper Novaya Gazeta, which suspended publication in March in response to the Kremlin's increasingly draconian press laws." The AP's story is here.

Israel. Patrick Kingsley & Isabel Kershner of the New York Times: "Israel's governing coalition will dissolve Parliament before the end of the month, bringing down the government and sending the country to a fifth election in three years, the prime minister said on Monday. The decision plunged Israel back into paralysis and threw a political lifeline to Benjamin Netanyahu, the right-wing prime minister who left office just one year ago upon the formation of the current government. Mr. Netanyahu is currently standing trial on corruption charges but has refused to leave politics, and his Likud party is leading in the polls." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

Israel. Raja Abdulrahim, et al., of the New York Times: "A New York Times investigation found that the bullet that killed a Palestinian-American journalist [Shireen Abu Akleh] was fired from the approximate position of an Israeli military vehicle.... The Israeli Army's preliminary investigation concluded that it was 'not possible to unequivocally determine the source of the gunfire.' A monthlong investigation by The New York Times found that the bullet that killed Ms. Abu Akleh was fired from the approximate location of the Israeli military convoy, most likely by a soldier from an elite unit. The evidence reviewed by The Times showed that there were no armed Palestinians near her when she was shot. It contradicted Israeli claims that, if a soldier had mistakenly killed her, it was because he had been shooting at a Palestinian gunman. The Times investigation also showed that 16 shots were fired from the location of the Israeli convoy, as opposed to Israeli claims that the soldier had fired five bullets in the journalists' direction." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

June 20, 2022

Afternoon Update:

The next hearing of the House January 6 committee is scheduled to begin Tuesday at 1:00 pm ET. You can watch on the linked page, which is a page of the committee's Website.

A Piece of the Plot Comes into Focus. Rosalind Helderman of the Washington Post: "... internal campaign emails and memos reveal that the convening of ... fake electors [in seven states on December 14, 2020,] appeared to be a ... concerted strategy, intended to give Vice President Mike Pence a reason to declare the outcome of the election was somehow in doubt on Jan. 6, 2021, when he was to preside over the congressional counting of the electoral college votes. The documents show Trump's team pushed ahead and urged the electors to meet -- then pressured Pence to cite the alternate Trump slates -- even as various Trump lawyers acknowledged privately they did not have legal validity and the gatherings had not been in compliance with state laws.... Committee members have said that Tuesday's hearing will focus on ... how the elector scheme was organized and the ways Trump pressured officials in swing states to go along with his false claims that Biden had lost.... The Justice Department and an Atlanta-area prosecutor are also investigating the elector scheme...." ~~~

     ~~~ Aaron Blake of the Washington Post provides a timeline of events relating to the fake electors plots. ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: As I recall, we heard bits & pieces of Trump's pressure on states more-or-less in real time, but it was not till some time later that we learned that Republicans in several states had fronted slates of fake electors for Trump. When this story first came out, only one or two states were mentioned, and the effort seemed ridiculous &, frankly, humorous. It took a while for the press to catch on to the central purpose of these fake slates of electors.

Zachary Cohen, et al., of CNN: "The House select committee investigating the January 6 riot is set to hear live testimony from four witnesses during Tuesday's hearing that will focus on how ... Donald Trump and his allies pressured state-level officials to overturn the 2020 election results. The committee will also show evidence that Trump was involved in a scheme to submit fake slates of electors in the 2020 presidential election, US Rep. Adam Schiff, a California Democrat and member of the panel who is expected to play a leading role in the presentation, said Sunday.... The witness list for Tuesday's hearing includes three individuals from Georgia: Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, his deputy Gabe Sterling and former election worker Wandrea ArShaye "Shaye" Moss. Rusty Bowers, a Republican who is the Arizona House speaker, is also scheduled to testify, the committee formally announced Monday. Tuesday's hearing will ... detail how Trump, his former attorney Rudy Giuliani and then-White House chief of staff Mark Meadows pressured officials, as well as, how false election claims fueled death threats for those at the state level."

Texas. Greg Sargent of the Washington Post: "The [Texas Republican party's] new platform, which thousands of GOP activists in Texas agreed to at the state party convention over the weekend, is a veritable piñata bursting with far-right extremist fantasies. It states that Texas retains the right to secede from the United States and urges the Texas legislature to reaffirm this. It describes homosexuality as 'an abnormal lifestyle choice.' It flatly declares that no validation of transgender identity is legitimate. It dismisses all gun regulations as a violation of 'God given rights.'... But the document might be most revealing in its treatment of voting an democracy. It declares President Biden was 'not legitimately elected' in 2020. It says Biden's win was tainted by voting in swing-state cities, furthering a GOP trend toward more explicitly declaring votes in urban centers illegitimate." ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: When I first read about Texas's GOP platform a couple of days ago, I wondered what gay Texas Republicans had to say about the platform's odd declaration that homosexuality was "an abnormal lifestyle choice." Conover Kennard of Crooks & Liars discovered that they didn't have much of an opportunity to object. According to the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, "The Fort Worth Log Cabin Republicans is a new chapter of a national organization. The local group and the organization's state affiliate were denied booths at the event that drew Republicans from across the state, a spokesperson for the party confirmed." This seems like a good time for Texans who consider themselves to be "normal" Republicans to get out of the abnormal Texas Republican party. Right away.

Israel. Patrick Kingsley & Isabel Kershner of the New York Times: "Israel's governing coalition will dissolve Parliament before the end of the month, bringing down the government and sending the country to a fifth election in three years, the prime minister said on Monday. The decision plunged Israel back into paralysis and threw a political lifeline to Benjamin Netanyahu, the right-wing prime minister who left office just one year ago upon the formation of the current government. Mr. Netanyahu is currently standing trial on corruption charges but has refused to leave politics, and his Likud party is leading in the polls."

Israel. Raja Abdulrahim, et al., of the New York Times: "A New York Times investigation found that the bullet that killed a Palestinian-American journalist [Shireen Abu Akleh] was fired from the approximate position of an Israeli military vehicle.... The Israeli Army's preliminary investigation concluded that it was 'not possible to unequivocally determine the source of the gunfire.' A monthlong investigation by The New York Times found that the bullet that killed Ms. Abu Akleh was fired from the approximate location of the Israeli military convoy, most likely by a soldier from an elite unit. The evidence reviewed by The Times showed that there were no armed Palestinians near her when she was shot. It contradicted Israeli claims that, if a soldier had mistakenly killed her, it was because he had been shooting at a Palestinian gunman. The Times investigation also showed that 16 shots were fired from the location of the Israeli convoy, as opposed to Israeli claims that the soldier had fired five bullets in the journalists' direction."

~~~~~~~~~~

Trump Knew He Lost. Sarah Al-Arshani of Insider, republished in Yahoo! News: "A former White House aide to ... Donald Trump said she heard Trump blurt out an admission that he lost the 2020 presidential election to Joe Biden. Alyssa Farah Griffin told CNN's State of the Union that she heard Trump blurt out 'Can you believe I lost to this guy?' while watching Biden on TV. 'I'm not of the mind that this is going to take down Donald Trump in a legal sort of way,' she told host Dana Bash. 'But I do think it's going to inform the public about a man who lost and couldn't do what we've done for the entirety of our history, which is allow a peaceful transition of power.'" ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: Unfortunately, I do think it's possible to interpret Trump's outburst as evidence that he believed it was impossible -- unbelievable -- that he lost to "this guy." From what we know so far, it looks as if the only way to prosecute Trump will be to demonstrate his "wilful ignorance." The committee has uncovered plenty of evidence for that.

Daniella Diaz & Veronica Stracqualursi of CNN: "The House January 6 committee will show evidence at its upcoming hearing [Tuesday] about ... Donald Trump's involvement in a scheme to submit fake slates of electors in the 2020 presidential election, US Rep. Adam Schiff, a member of the panel, said Sunday.... 'We'll show during the hearing what the President's role was in trying to get states to name alternate slates of electors, how that scheme depended initially on hopes that the legislators would reconvene and bless it,' he said, adding, 'We will show you what we know about his role in this.'"

Ramon Vargas of the Guardian: "A Republican member of the congressional committee investigating the January 6 attack on the Capitol said on Sunday that he believes Donald Trump's actions surrounding the deadly riots amount to 'seditious conspiracy' and 'criminal involvement by a president'. Illinois congressman Adam Kinzinger's remarks on ABC's This Week came after three hearings held by the House January 6 committee presented searing testimony and mounting evidence about Trump's central role in a complex plot to overturn his defeat at the hands of Joe Biden in the 2020 presidential election.... Kinzinger also said that Trump's actions, as portrayed by the committee, show he 'definitely' failed to maintain his oath to uphold the US constitution." ~~~

~~~ Rosalind Helderman of the Washington Post: "One of two Republican members of the House committee investigating the attack on the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, starkly warned Sunday that his own party's lies could feed additional violence. 'There is violence in the future, I'm going to tell you,' said Rep. Adam Kinzinger (R-Ill.), on ABC's 'This Week.' 'And until we get a grip on telling people the truth, we can't expect any differently.' Kinzinger, who defied party leadership by serving on the Democratic-led committee, described an alarming message he received at home in the mail several days ago threatening to execute him, his wife and their 5-month-old baby.... Public officials have been inundated with threats in recent months, many spurred by former president Donald Trump's continued obsession with the baseless claim that his 2020 loss was the result of a vast conspiracy of fraud.... [Kinzinger] warned that the lies have not ended and could lead to a degradation of the democratic system, pointing to a county in New Mexico where Republican commissioners last week refused to certify the results of a primary election because they did not trust their voting machines. The commission reversed its rejection only after an order from the state supreme court."

E.J. Dionne of the Washington Post: "The hearings organized by the House committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection are getting high marks for calling public attention to new and damning information while also offering a compelling narrative of a frightening criminal effort to destroy our democracy.... In a semi-documentary style, neatly interspersing video with testimony, the committee has efficiently offered a coherent account, something that rarely happens when hearings are disjointed partisan talkfests.... Can't more congressional hearings be like this? The answer, unfortunately, is almost certainly no. In a perverse way, the country owes a debt to House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.). He made this refreshing presentation possible. In an astonishingly foolish decision, McCarthy withdrew all his appointees to the committee after House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) rejected two of his five nominees.... With none of [McCarthy's] allies there to throw sand into the gears, the committee was able to organize a seamless presentation."

Matthew Futterman of the New York Times: "The world governing body for swimming effectively barred transgender women from the highest levels of women's international competition on Sunday, intensifying a debate over gender and sports that has roiled state legislatures and increasingly divided parents, athletes and coaches at all levels. The vote by FINA, which administers international competitions in water sports, prohibits transgender women from competing unless they began medical treatments to suppress production of testosterone before going through one of the early stages of puberty, or by age 12, whichever occurred later. It establishes one of the strictest rules against transgender participation in international sports. Scientists believe the onset of male puberty gives transgender women a lasting, irreversible physical advantage over athletes who were female at birth." The Guardian's report is here.

Frederic Frommer in the Washington Post: "In a last-ditch effort to prevent Southern states from seceding on the eve of Abraham Lincoln's presidential inauguration in 1861, Congress passed a constitutional amendment that would have prevented Congress from abolishing slavery in states where it already existed. Had three-quarters of states ratified this proposal, it would have become the 13th Amendment to the Constitution -- which we know today as the amendment that banned slavery after the war. As the United States celebrates Juneteenth..., it's striking to look back at how supermajorities in both houses of Congress endorsed this pro-slavery 13th Amendment just four years earlier, with support from anti-slavery Republicans. In fact, Lincoln himself gave tacit approval to the amendment in his inaugural speech on March 4, 1861, just two days after the Senate passed it 24-12 -- meeting the two-thirds threshold without a vote to spare."

Beyond the Beltway

Indiana. Brandon Smith of WFYI Indianapolis: "Former Mike Pence aide Diego Morales upset incumbent Holli Sullivan Saturday to earn the GOP nomination for secretary of state. Morales's bid was viewed by many as a challenge to the governor and the so-called Republican 'establishment.' Morales, whose family immigrated to Indiana from Guatemala, has previously pushed the Big Lie that the 2020 election was stolen from Donald Trump. He's criticized Indiana's election security, arguing the state needs to do more to prevent non-citizens from voting. And he wants to cut in half the number of early voting days before each election, from 28 days to 14."

Way Beyond

Ukraine, et al.

The Washington Post's live updates of developments Monday in Russia's war on Ukraine are here: "The European Union's executive recommended last week that Ukraine be given candidate status for membership. The European Council will meet later this week to decide whether to ratify the decision." ~~~

     ~~~ The New York Times' live updates for Monday are here. The Guardian's live updates Monday are here.

Come Now the Barbarians. Danielle Ivory, et al., of the New York Times: "Reflecting a shockingly barbaric and old-fashioned wartime strategy, Russian forces have pummeled Ukrainian cities and towns with a barrage of rockets and other munitions, most of which can be considered relatively crude relics of the Cold War, and many of which have been banned widely under international treaties, according to a New York Times analysis. The attacks have made repeated and widespread use of weapons that kill, maim and destroy indiscriminately -- a potential violation of international humanitarian law. These strikes have left civilians -- including children -- dead and injured, and they have left critical infrastructure, like schools and homes, a shambles. The Times examined more than 1,000 pictures taken by its own photojournalists and wire-service photographers working on the ground in Ukraine, as well as visual evidence presented by Ukrainian government and military agencies.... The magnitude of the evidence collected and cataloged by The Times shows that the use of these kinds of weapons by Russia has not been limited or anomalous. In fact, it has formed the backbone of the country's strategy for war since the beginning of the invasion."

Colombia. Julie Turkewitz of the New York Times: "For the first time, Colombia will have a leftist president. Gustavo Petro, a former rebel and a longtime legislator, won Colombia's presidential election on Sunday, galvanizing voters frustrated by decades of poverty and inequality under conservative leaders, with promises to expand social programs, tax the wealthy and move away from an economy he has called overly reliant on fossil fuels. His victory sets the third largest nation in Latin America on a sharply uncertain path, just as it faces rising poverty and violence that have sent record numbers of Colombians to the United States border; high levels of deforestation in the Colombian Amazon, a key buffer against climate change; and a growing distrust of key democratic institutions, which has become a trend in the region."

Ethiopia. Abdi Dahir of the New York Times: "An Ethiopian rebel group massacred more than 200 members of the Amhara ethnic group on Sunday, according to officials and news reports, the latest atrocity amid a civil war that threatens to tear apart Africa's second-most-populous nation. Witnesses and officials told The Associated Press that at least 230 people were killed when members of the Oromo Liberation Army attacked Tole, a village in Oromia, Ethiopia's largest region."

June 19, 2022

Gillian Brockell, et al., of the Washington Post: "On June 19, 1865, Union Army Maj. Gen. Gordon Granger stepped onto a balcony in Galveston, Tex. -- two months after the Civil War had ended -- and announced that more than 250,000 enslaved people in Texas were free. President Abraham Lincoln had freed them two and a half years earlier in his Emancipation Proclamation, but since Texas never fell to Union troops in battle, they'd remained in bondage. The newly emancipated responded with cries of joy and prayers of gratitude -- a celebration that became known as Juneteenth. Black Texans marked the day each year with parades and picnics, music and fine clothes.... During the summer of 2020, amid the racial-justice protests following the murder of George Floyd, millions of White Americans became aware of Juneteenth for the first time. Some companies announced they would give employees the day off on Juneteenth, and momentum grew to make it a national holiday. Last summer, the U.S. did just that, as President Biden signed a bipartisan bill into law on June 17."

Michael Schmidt & Maggie Haberman of the New York Times: "As new questions swirled this past week about ... Donald J. Trump's potential criminal exposure for seeking to overturn the 2020 election, Mr. Trump issued a rambling 12-page statement. It contained his usual mix of outlandish claims, hyperbole and outright falsehoods, but also something that Trump allies and legal experts said was notable and different: the beginnings of a legal defense.... What happened at the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, Mr. Trump wrote, stemmed from an effort by Americans 'to hold their elected officials accountable for the obvious signs of criminal activity throughout the election.'... Successfully prosecuting .. potential charges ... could depend on establishing Mr. Trump's intent -- an issue that his statement ... appeared to address.... The question of intent ... can be muddy when the crime under investigation involves an action in which the defendant's state of mind can be hard to establish.... Given the challenge of showing what Mr. Trump actually knew, there is one other way prosecutors could show he had a corrupt intent: proving what is often called 'willful blindness.'" ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: Here's another "defense" Trump is trying out. After Thursday's select committee hearing, Trump wrote on his Liars Social account: "Such LIES & MISREPRESENTATION by the Unselects, and absolutely nobody allowed to challenge what is being said. As an example, I never asked V.P. Pence to 'overturn' the election (although Thomas Jefferson 'took' the Georgia votes), but that he send the votes back to the Legislatures so that they could determine if the irregularities and Fraud were as widespread and signficant as they seemed." So he did not seek to overturn the election; he merely wanted pence to send the slates of electors back to the states. What makes this new claim middling problematic, is what Trump wrote six months ago:

If the Vice President (Mike Pence) had 'absolutely no right' to change the Presidential Election results in the Senate, despite fraud and many other irregularities, how come the Democrats and RINO Republicans, like Wacky Susan Collins, are desperately trying to pass legislation that will not allow the Vice President to change the results of the election? Actually, what they are saying, is that Mike Pence did have the right to change the outcome, and they now want to take that right away. Unfortunately, he didn't exercise that power, he could have overturned the Election!

     ~~~ This does point to one of the difficulties prosecutors would have in trying to establish Trump's intent: he's a moving target; he makes contradictory assertions about the same subject. ~~~

~~~ Peter Stone of the Guardian: "The searing testimony and growing evidence about Donald Trump's central role in a multi-pronged conspiracy to overturn Joe Biden's election in 2020 presented at the House January 6 committee's first three hearings, has increased the odds that Trump will face criminal charges, say former DoJ prosecutors and officials.... Trump could also potentially face fraud charges over his role in an apparently extraordinary fundraising scam -- described by House panel members as the 'big rip-off' -- that netted some $250m for an 'election defense fund' that did not exist but funneled huge sums to Trump's Save America political action committee and Trump properties."

Maureen Dowd of the New York Times compares Donald Trump's January 6, 2:24 pm tweet further inciting the insurrectionists to "hang Mike Pence" to Henry II's rhetorical question -- "Who will rid me of this meddlesome priest?" -- prompting his knights to murder Archbishop Thomas Becket. (Also linked yesterday.)

Jamelle Bouie of the New York Times is firmly in the Mike-Pence-Is-No-Hero camp: "Far from resolute against the president's scheme to overturn the election, Pence was originally inclined to help. He even contacted one of his predecessors, Dan Quayle, for advice on what to do.... Here's how [Bob Woodward & Robert Costa] describe the conversation: 'Over and over, Pence asked if there was anything he could do. "Mike, you have no flexibility on this. None. Zero. Forget it. Put it away," Quayle told him. Pence pressed again. "You don't know the position I';m in," he said. "I do know the position you're in," Quayle responded. "I also know what the law is. You listen to the parliamentarian. That's all you do. You have no power."'... It sounds like a man who did the right thing only after he couldn't find a legal rationale to do the wrong one." (Also linked yesterday.)

Manu Raju of CNN: "Rusty Bowers, a Republican and Arizona state House speaker, will testify at a Tuesday hearing focusing on ... Donald Trump's pressure on state officials to overturn Joe Biden's victory in 2020, a source familiar with the matter told CNN earlier Saturday. Bowers will join Georgia's election officials -- Brad Raffensperger and Gabe Sterling -- who will be part of a panel before the January 6 committee detailing Trump's campaign to force states to overturn their certified election results. Bowers, who supported Trump's reelection bid in 2020, refused to bow to intimidation and attempts to get him to back efforts in the legislature to decertify Biden's victory in Arizona. He previously described how Trump and ... Rudy Giuliani called him after the 2020 election to convince him to somehow involve the legislature in the state's certification process before sending its presidential electors to Congress."

Zach Montague of the New York Times: "President Biden fell off his bike on Saturday while trying to dismount in front of a small crowd of reporters and onlookers. The president said his foot had gotten caught in a toe clip, which caused him to tip over after coming to a stop. He quickly collected himself and stood up, saying 'I'm good' before answering a handful of questions from reporters." A Guardian report is here.

Mike McIntire, et al., of the New York Times: "Gun companies have spent the last two decades scrutinizing their market and refocusing their message away from hunting toward selling handguns for personal safety, as well as military-style weapons attractive to mostly young men. The sales pitch -- rooted in self-defense, machismo and an overarching sense of fear -- has been remarkably successful.... The number of guns is outpacing the population. Women, spurred by appeals that play on fears of crime and being caught unprepared, are the fastest-growing segment of buyers.... Working together, gun makers, advocates and elected officials have convinced a large swath of Americans that they should have a firearm, and eased the legal path for them to do so.... The recurrence of mass shootings has provided reliable opportunities for the industry and its allies." (Also linked yesterday.)

Tripp Mickle & Noam Scheiber of the New York Times: "Apple employees at a Baltimore-area store have voted to unionize, making it the first of the company's 270-plus stores in the United States to join a trend in labor organizing sweeping through retailers, restaurants and tech companies. The result, announced on Saturday by the National Labor Relations Board, provides a foothold for a budding movement among Apple retail employees.... Employees of more than two dozen Apple stores have expressed interest in unionizing in recent months, union leaders say." An AP report is here.

Julian Kim of NPR: "Mark Shields, the longtime PBS News commentator known for his weekly political analysis, has died Saturday morning at the age of 85, PBS NewsHour confirmed." (Also linked yesterday.) Shields' New York Times obituary, by Clyde Haberman, is here.

Mike Stobbe of the AP: "The U.S. on Saturday opened COVID-19 vaccines to infants, toddlers and preschoolers. The shots will become available next week, expanding the nation's vaccination campaign to children as young as 6 months. Advisers to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommended the vaccines for the littlest children, and the final signoff came hours later from Dr. Rochelle Walensky, the agency's director.... While the Food and Drug Administration approves vaccines, it's the CDC that decides who should get them."

Beyond the Beltway

Louisiana. Greg Hilburn of the Lafayette Daily Advertiser: "A federal judge will draw a new Louisiana congressional map with a second Black district after the Legislature failed to draw new boundaries of its own in a Special Session that ended Saturday without the passage of any bill. Louisiana Middle District U.S. Judge Shelly Dick will now draw her own map for the state from the bench. Dick, who ruled June 6 that the congressional map passed by lawmakers in February violated the Voting Rights Act because it kept just one majority Black district, had given the Legislature a deadline of June 20 to pass new boundaries or she would take over. Republican House Speaker Clay Schexnayder of Gonzales and Republican Senate President Page Cortez had unsuccessfully argued the Legislature needed more time to create a new map, a motion Dick denied in court Thursday."

Texas. Teresa Velasco of KNES TV: "According to a new report by the San Antonio Express-News, a surveillance video shows police never tried to open the doors at Robb Elementary leading to the classrooms where the shooter went inside. The report cites law enforcement close to the investigation as their source. That source reportedly told the Express-News that police may have assumed the doors were locked and the shooter could not have locked the doors from the inside. Pete Arredondo, the district police chief in charge of law enforcement's response at Robb, has said previously that he went through a ring of keys provided by a janitor in order to try and gain entry.... Meanwhile, dozens of requests have been made for surveillance footage and other records pertaining to the shooting, and Uvalde has hired legal assistance to try and keep those records private." The Express-News report, which is firewalled, is here. ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: The New York Times' David Goodman, appearing on MSNBC a few weeks ago, said it wasn't clear the classroom doors were locked as many of them appeared to be defective. An NYT report, written at about the same time, said that the teacher was fumbling with her keys, trying to find the right one to lock the door, when the gunman burst into the classroom. He could have ordered her to lock the door, or he could have locked it himself, but a crazed gunman who would murder little children does not seem like the type of person who would take such a precaution. ~~~

~~~ David Goodman of the New York Times: "A city police officer armed with an AR-15-style rifle hesitated when he had a brief chance to shoot the gunman approaching a school in Uvalde, Texas, because he did not want to hit children, according to a senior sheriff's deputy who spoke to the officer. The fateful decision, which has not been previously reported, represented the second missed opportunity for officers arriving at Robb Elementary School to prevent a massacre by intervening while the gunman was still outside the school." (Also linked yesterday.)

Marie: If you had wanted to spend your weekend meeting up with a real collection of dumbclucks, bigots & violent loons, your best bet might have been Houston, Texas: ~~~

~~~ Texas. Sewell Chan & Eric Neugeboren of the Texas Tribune: "Meeting at their first in-person convention since 2018, Texas Republicans on Saturday acted on a raft of resolutions and proposed platform changes to move their party even further to the right. They approved measures declaring that President Joe Biden 'was not legitimately elected' and rebuking Sen. John Cornyn for taking part in bipartisan gun talks. They also voted on a platform that declares homosexuality 'an abnormal lifestyle choice' and calls for Texas schoolchildren 'to learn about the humanity of the preborn child.' The actions capped a convention that highlighted how adamantly opposed the party's most active and vocal members are to compromising with Democrats or moderating on social positions, even as the state has grown more diverse and Republicans' margins in statewide elections have shrunk slightly in recent years." ~~~

     ~~~ Caleb Howe of Mediaite: "Rep. Dan Crenshaw and his staff were violently confronted at the Republican Party of Texas convention a short time ago, when far-right social media activist Alex Stein and others whom witnesses described as Proud Boys began shouting 'eyepatch McCain' at him -- an attempted insult coined by Fox News Channel's Tucker Carlson. A witness to the incident tells Mediaite that in addition to Stein and others being escorted out of the building, 'some arrests' were made at the scene.... 'They got physical with multiple people, including hitting them with cameras,' a witness at the scene said. 'His campaign manager was assaulted by being pushed aggressively into a pillar.'" ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: Crenshaw is a right-winger through and through, so I don't know what heresy he might have committed that has TuKKKer belittling him. But he wears that eyepatch out of courtesy to those who might not want to see the disfigurement caused by the loss of his eye during his third deployment to Afghanistan. People who bully & mock wounded veterans for their injuries are disgusting beyond words.

Way Beyond

Ukraine, et al., The Washington Post's live updates of developments Sunday in Russia's war on Ukraine are here: "No one knows how long the war in Ukraine will last, NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg said, though he cautioned that the world should be prepared for a war that stretch on for years. Stoltenberg's forecast, in an interview published Saturday in Germany's Bild newspaper, comes as the United States and its allies are preparing for a drawn-out conflict.... Russian forces now control most of Severodonetsk, a bitterly-contested town crucial to Russian hopes of advancing in eastern Luhansk region, governor Serhiy Haidai said Sunday morning.... U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland is expected to meet with his E.U. counterparts this week to discuss putting pressure on Russian oligarchs." ~~~

     ~~~ The Guardian's live updates Sunday are here. A Guardian summary of developments is here.