February 25, 2023

Marie: If you recall, Reagan-appointed former judge Michael Luttig advised mike pence, at pence's request, about the limited Constitutional powers of the President of the Senate. Luttig's advice is largely what discouraged pence from pulling a Trump and trying to overturn the 2020 election & place himself back in office. Well, it looks as if the humorless Judge Luttig still is not amused: ~~~

~~~ Michael Luttig in a New York Times op-ed: "The former vice president should not want the embarrassing spectacle of the Supreme Court compelling him to appear before a grand jury in Washington just when he's starting his campaign for the presidency.... Injecting campaign-style politics into the criminal investigatory process with his rhetorical characterization of Mr. Smith's subpoena as a 'Biden D.O.J. subpoena,' Mr. Pence is trying to score points with voters.... But Jack Smith's subpoena was neither politically motivated nor designed to strengthen President Biden's political hand in 2024. Thus the jarring dissonance between the subpoena and Mr. Pence's characterization of it. It is Mr. Pence who has chosen to politicize the subpoena, not the D.O.J.... We can expect the federal courts to make short shrift of this 'Hail Mary' claim [that he is protected from questioning by the Congress's 'speech or debate' clause], and Mr. Pence doesn't have a chance in the world of winning his case in any federal court and avoiding testifying before the grand jury.... The only question now is not whether he will have to testify before the grand jury, but how soon." ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: We should remember, BTW, that Luttig was among the few who stood up for American democracy in the face of a devastating national crisis. And as much as I mocked Dan Quayle over the years, so was he.

No Deed Goes Unpunished. Jordain Carney of Politico: "House Judiciary Chair Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) and former Senate Judiciary chairs Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) and Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) sent letters on Friday to Robert Bauer & Cristina Rodríguez -- the two former co-chairs of the Supreme Court reform commission that released its final report in December 2021 -- requesting documents and communications.... [President] Biden formally formed the commission in April 2021 with the task of providing an 'analysis of the principal arguments' for and against reforming the Supreme Court, after facing months of pressure to embrace expanding the size of the Supreme Court.... While the final report included endorsements for some more modest ideas, like new codes of ethics and increased court transparency, it steered clear of endorsing topics like expansion and term limits, instead largely weighing the arguments made on both sides."

Margie Has a Dream. Jamelle Bouie of the New York Times: You can probably tell, from the substance of Greene's comments, that this 'national divorce' [Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene envisions] is more paranoid fantasy than serious proposal. Even so, it rests on a set of ideas and tropes that are in wide circulation in the public at large.... There's the idea, underneath all this, that states are, or ought to be, the fundamental unit of representation in the American political system.... Although states play an important role in the American political system, they are not the autonomous, nearly independent units of either Representative Greene's imagination or the folk civics that shapes political understanding for tens of millions of Americans.... A 'national divorce' is possible only if the states represent singular political communities. But they don't."

The Media Revolt. Anumita Kaur of the Washington Post: "Scores of news organizations -- including The Washington Post -- on Friday demanded congressional leaders release a trove of surveillance footage from the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol that the House speaker provided exclusively to Fox News host Tucker Carlson, who has downplayed the violence. Attorney Charles Tobin sent a letter [to Speaker Kevin McCarthy] on behalf of CBS News, CNN, Politico, ProPublica, ABC, Axios, Advance, Scripps, the Los Angeles Times and Gannett.... 'Without full public access to the complete historical record, there is concern that an ideologically-based narrative of an already polarizing event will take hold in the public consciousness, with destabilizing risks to the legitimacy of Congress, the Capitol Police, and the various federal investigations and prosecutions of Jan. 6 crimes,' the letter stated.... Carlson has repeatedly cast doubt on official accounts of what happened on Jan. 6 and has claimed it was a 'false flag' operation." The CBS News story is here.

Here's an update to a story linked here yesterday: ~~~

~~~ Kyle Cheney & Josh Gerstein of Politico: "The chief judge of the federal district court in Washington, D.C., secretly rejected Rep. Scott Perry's bid to shield more than 2,000 messages relevant to Justice Department investigators probing efforts by Donald Trump to subvert the 2020 election, according to newly unsealed court filings. U.S. District Court Chief Judge Beryl Howell unsealed her extraordinary Dec. 28 decision on Friday evening, determining that the 'powerful public interest' in seeing the previously secret opinion outweighed the need for continued secrecy.... Howell said Perry had taken an 'astonishing view' of his ['speech or debate' clause] immunity that would effectively put members of Congress above the law and free of political consequences for their actions. She ordered him to disclose 2,055 of the documents he sought to withhold -- including all 960 of his contacts with members of the executive branch, which she said are entitled to no constitutional protection at all. Some 161 items, she said, were proper to withhold.... Last month, a three-judge panel of the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals agreed to stay Howell's ruling. On Thursday, those judges heard both public and private arguments about the dispute. The stay remains in place as the appeals court considers whether to leave Howell's ruling in place, set it aside or modify it in some way. The judges -- Karen Henderson, Gregory Katsas and Neomi Rao -- appeared skeptical of the Justice Department's position and the breadth of Howell's ruling, although they discussed her stance only in broad strokes...." ~~~

     ~~~ Howell's opinion is here. MB: Bush I appointed Henderson; Trump appointed Katsas & Rao.

Jacqueline Sweet of Politico: "George Santos lied to a Seattle judge about working for Goldman Sachs while speaking at a 2017 bail hearing for a 'family friend' who later pleaded guilty to fraud in an ATM skimming scheme, according to an audio recording of the proceeding and court records. 'So what do you do for work?' King County Superior Court Judge Sean O'Donnell asked Santos at the May 15, 2017 arraignment of defendant Gustavo Ribeiro Trelha. 'I am an aspiring politician and I work for Goldman Sachs,' Santos replied. 'You work for Goldman Sachs in New York?' the judge asked. 'Yup,' Santos responded.... A spokesperson for the bank told The New York Times in its original investigation into Santos' background that there was no record of him working there.... In a telephone interview, Trelha said Santos lied about their relationship, too. Trelha, through a translator, said he met Santos in the fall of 2016 on a Facebook group for Brazilians living in Orlando, Fla...." MB: Sweet does not make clear whether or not Santos was under oath when he lied to O'Donnell, but presuming that he was, we can add perjury to his growing list of (alleged!) crimes. ~~~

     ~~~ Update: According to the CBS News story, by Graham Kates, "Santos appears to address the court without being sworn in." Too bad. Perhaps it is a crime to lie to a judge or other official during a formal federal proceeding. Plus, Kates writies, "The newly uncovered recording of his court appearance was also a reminder of how little is known about his connection to a man at the center of a wide-ranging credit card fraud case that involved stealing peoples' ATM card information and delivering it to Brazilian accomplices. Santos has declined to answer questions about the case.... Santos was not charged in the case, nor was he a suspect."

~~~ Dana Milbank of the Washington Post: In an interview with Piers Morgan, Rep. George Santos (R-Liar) "offered some insight into [his] ... strategy for political survival -- and why it may resonate with some in the MAGA crowd. True story: Santos claims he is the victim. His lies are everybody else's fault -- honest! This politics of victimhood, of course, is the essence of Donald Trump (who could, and did, claim it was sunny when it was raining).... Like Trump, Santos claimed to be the victim of a 'witch hunt' by 'desperate journalists' who are 'not interested in covering the facts.'... Yet there was one thing Santos said that rang true to me. 'If the media put the equal amount of efforts and resources,' he said, 'on all 435 members of the House and 100 members of the Senate, I think the American people would have more clarity of who represents them in Congress.'... The vast majority of House members ... never get a proper vetting because the parties can't be bothered and local media has been decimated.... How many others faked their way to high office with bogus claims or have backgrounds and associations that wouldn't hold up to scrutiny in the light of day? Maybe that's why so many of Santos's Republican colleagues refuse to expel this fraud." ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: Those of you who remember the old Stephen Colbert Show, which aired on Comedy Central, will also recall his "Better Know a District" segments [WashPo link] where Colbert interviewed & mocked MOCs. While the questions were sometimes humorously facetious, they also often revealed what complete dunderheads our representatives were. Local TV media should be so helpful.

Sara Boboltz of the Huffington Post: "Former Sen. Jim Inhofe (R-Okla.) attributed his decision to retire due to the long-term effects of COVID-19, telling local newspaper Tulsa World that certain symptoms were still affecting him day-to-day. Inhofe voted against multiple coronavirus aid packages meant to help Americans at the height of the pandemic, including the Families First Coronavirus Response Act approved overwhelmingly by 90 senators in March 2020, and the American Rescue Plan in March 2021."

A (Possibly Unintended) Consequence of Right-wing Racism. Erica Werner of the Washington Post: "The massive crush of layoffs washing through the United States tech sector is sparking panic among large numbers of immigrants, who are scrambling to stay employed or risk losing their right to live in this country. These workers, primarily Indian nationals, are in the country on temporary visas designed to help U.S. firms employ an exceptionally skilled and educated workforce. Many have been here for years, in some cases decades. But now that many have been laid off, their visas are set to expire in 60 days. They must leave the country unless they can find a new employer willing to navigate complex immigration rules and pay fees that can mount into thousands of dollars to hire them. The situation is becoming a crisis for families in the Silicon Valley and beyond, while exposing anew lawmakers' inability to fix the nation's immigration system, even on matters where there is broad agreement."

Ruth Marcus of the Washington Post: "... good for John Montenegro Cruz, an Arizona [death-row inmate] convicted in 2005 of murdering a Tucson police officer, and good for Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. and Justice Brett M. Kavanaugh, who joined with the court's three liberals to grant Cruz a new sentencing hearing. But read the facts of Cruz's case, and a less cheery, more chilling, reaction seems called for: How can it be that Cruz's life was spared by only a bare majority? Four other conservatives, in a decision written by Justice Amy Coney Barrett, would have stuck with a cramped rules-are-rules mentality to let an obviously unconstitutional death sentence stand." Read on. Justice Elena Kagan called Cruz's predicament "one that 'Kafka would have loved.'" MB: Yeah, Kafka & those Supremes who are all concerned about the lives of fetuses but not of us "born" people. Marcus suggests that those same Supremes lack "undamental humanity." She's got that right. If you are wondering about the ideas an AI right-wing robot would spout, check out Amy & Clarence & & Sam & Neil.

Pam Belluck of the New York Times: "The attorneys general of a dozen Democratic-controlled states sued the Food and Drug Administration on Friday, asking a judge to remove special restrictions that the federal agency has long applied to the first of two drugs used in medication abortion.... [At the same time,] a federal judge in Texas is expected to issue an order soon in a case filed by anti-abortion groups that seeks to overturn the F.D.A.'s approval of the same abortion pill, mifepristone, and have it taken off the market.... The judge, a Trump appointee who is politically conservative and wrote an article that was critical of Roe v. Wade, could issue an order effectively blocking access to mifepristone across the country. Such a ruling would immediately be appealed, but if it ultimately stands, it would have far-reaching implications, affecting states where abortion is legal, not just states where abortion is already restricted. The new lawsuit filed by the 12 states does not address the possible outcomes of the Texas case, but it requests that the judge's ruling in the Washington case include orders that would effectively contravene steps that might be imposed by the Texas judge."

News You Can Use. Christina Jewitt & Emily Anthes of the New York Times: "The Food and Drug Administration issued an emergency authorization for the first over-the-counter, at-home combination flu and Covid test on Friday, just two days after the company that makes the test announced that it had filed for bankruptcy protection based, in part, on the agency's lengthy approval timeline. The single-use test works with a self-collected nasal swab and provides a result in about 30 minutes, according to the F.D.A. The test is meant to be used by people 14 and older, or by an adult collecting a sample from someone age 2 or older.... Lucira Health [-- the developer of the test --] did not immediately respond to questions about its manufacturing capacity or how much the test would cost consumers."

Annals of Journalism, Ctd. Chris Quinn, Editor, [Cleveland] Plain Dealer: "Scott Adams, creator of the Dilbert comic strip, went on a racist rant this week on his Coffee with Scott Adams online video show, and we will no longer carry his comic strip in The Plain Dealer. This is not a difficult decision.... 'I would say, based on the current way things are going, the best advice I would give to white people is to get the hell away from Black people,' he says in the video. He says a lot more in the video, mostly hateful and racist, all viewable on Youtube.... Last year, according to The Daily Beast, 77 newspapers published by Lee Enterprises dropped it after Adams introduced his first Black character, apparently to poke fun at 'woke' culture and the LGBTQ community. We are part of Advance Local, and the leaders in all Advance Local newsrooms independently have made the same decision we did to stop running the strip.... In recent years, The Daily Beast says, Adams had gained attention for publicly embracing ridiculous right-wing conspiracies." MB: I had to sign in via Google to read the editorial.

Presidential Race 2024

Darlene Superville of the AP: "U.S. first lady Jill Biden gave one of the clearest indications yet that President Joe Biden will run for a second term, telling The Associated Press in an exclusive interview [in Nairobi, Kenya,] on Friday that there's 'pretty much' nothing left to do but figure out the time and place for the announcement.... The president himself was asked about his wife's comments just hours later in an interview with ABC News, and laughed when told of her remarks, adding, 'God love her. Look, I meant what I said, I've got other things to finish before I get into a full-blown campaign.'"

Jonathan Allen & Ali Vitali of NBC News: "Former Vice President Mike Pence said Friday that he will make a decision 'by the spring' about whether to seek the presidency and suggested that he would pledge to support the eventual GOP nominee if that's a condition of participating in primary debates. 'If I'm a candidate, I'm sure I'll meet whatever the requirement is for debates,' Pence told NBC News in an exclusive interview. As for his timing, Pence said he has a little while before he has to make a decision. 'We're listening, we're reflecting, we're talking to firms,' Pence said, adding that 'by the spring, our family expects to have a very clear sense of our calling.'" More on pence linked under Ukraine, et al., below.

Beyond the Beltway

Illinois. All the Pretty White People. Matthew Chapman of the Raw Story: "A viral Tiktok video shows a [MB: presumably White] woman calling the police on a Black man for clearing the snow on the sidewalk running near her property, reported The Daily Beast on Friday. 'Gregory McAdory, who uploaded the video to TikTok on Feb. 18, said in an interview with The Daily Beast that he and his friend have a snow removal business in Rockford, Illinois,' reported Brooke Leigh Howard. 'He explained that on Feb. 17 they finished clearing his friend's father's driveway, then moved onto the sidewalk in front of the neighbor's house. That's when the neighbor came out and "bugged" up on them, threatening to call the police, he said. "When the police is called on people of my color, just to be on the safe side, I just say, 'Record,'" McAdory said.'... On the phone call with police, which Rockford officers confirmed was lodged with them at half past noon on February 17, she can be heard saying, 'These two guys are African American, and I don't get along with them.... They are making fun of me. See, they don't have no respect!'" ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: I must say it irritates me when reporters describe an interaction between White people & minorities, & they don't identify the White person as White. We the readers are just supposed to assume that anyone who is a "person" is a "White person." "Other" people, however, are "Black" or "Asian" or "Hispanic." IMO, this does nearly as much to "otherize" people of color as does whatever bigotry the reports presume to highlight.

Montana. Matthew Chapman of the Raw Story: "A man from Kalispell has been arrested and charged with sending graphic death threats to Sen. Jon Tester (D-MT), reported the Daily Montanan on Friday. 'Kevin Patrick Smith, 45, pleaded not guilty to an indictment filed on Feb. 22 charging him with two counts of threats to injure and murder a United States senator, the news release said,' said the report.... According to prosecutors, Smith left a series of threatening voice mail messages for Tester, and continued after FBI agents contacted him and warned him to stop. 'There is nothing I want more than to have you stand toe to toe with me.... I rip your head off. You die...,' Smith allegedly said in one message. 'I will never stop.... And I would love to destroy you and rip your (obscenity) head from your shoulders. That is no problem. Call that a threat. Send the FBI. I would love to (obscenity) kill you. I would love to see your FBI at my door. I would love to see something in the news.'"

South Carolina. Nicholas Bogel-Burroughs of the New York Times: "After five weeks of trial, the murder case against Alex Murdaugh narrowed on Friday to the question of what happened in a critical few minutes after the prominent South Carolina lawyer went down to his family's dog kennels where his wife and son were found shot to death later that night. On the second and final day of Mr. Murdaugh's crucial testimony in his own defense, prosecutors aggressively challenged him about those key minutes, showing that his new account of his movements that night -- offered this week after more than 20 months of denying he was at the kennels at all -- is difficult to reconcile with the timeline of the murders. Armed with telephone calls, texts, videos, car navigation data and cellphone step counts, the lead prosecutor, Creighton Waters, showed that Mr. Murdaugh would have had to have left the kennels and returned to the house a short distance away only minutes before the killings -- despite his claims that he had heard no gunshots. [Waters] emphasized that Mr. Murdaugh had not admitted to being at the kennels until the crucial video, shot by his son Paul that night, emerged in court."

Way Beyond

Ukraine, et al.

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

     ~~~ The Washington Post's live briefing for Saturday is here: "President Biden ruled out sending F-16 fighter jets to Ukraine 'for now,' saying the U.S. military deemed other military support more crucial at this stage. Kyiv has ramped up pleas for fighter jets since the United States and European countries pledged to send heavy tanks, but as Ukraine's allies rallied to mark one year of war, Biden told ABC News that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky 'doesn't need F-16s now.'... Zelensky described Feb. 24, 2022 as 'the hardest day of our modern history,' in a news conference marking one year since the Russian invasion....

"Poland delivered four Leopard 2 battle tanks to Ukraine on the first anniversary, officials said, with Ukrainians troops having begun training in Germany.... Russian forces carried out more than a dozen airstrikes targeting Ukraine's east and south, the country's Defense Ministry said Friday on Telegram.... Marches, vigils and other actions against the war were held Friday around the world, including outside Russian embassies in cities such as London and Berlin.... Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) urged the United States and its allies to renew their resolve to help Ukraine, tacitly pushing back against members of his party who have become loudly skeptical of Ukraine's fight as the conflict passes the one-year mark.... The global watchdog for money laundering and terrorism financing has suspended Russia from its membership. It was the first time the Financial Action Task Force has taken such action, according to a statement from the U.S. Treasury Department."

A dictator bent on rebuilding an empire will never erase the people's love of liberty. Brutality will never grind down the will of the free. And Ukraine will never be a victory for Russia. Never. -- President Joe Biden, in a statement ~~~

~~~ Michael Shear of the New York Times: "President Biden marked the start of a second year of war in Europe on Friday by announcing billions of dollars in additional military aid for Ukraine, imposing more sanctions on those helping President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia and delivering a grim warning about an alliance between Russia and Iran.... Mr. Biden joined the leaders of the other Group of 7 nations -- Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan and Britain-- in reaffirming his support for the beleaguered country and condemning Russia's invasion a year ago."

Jonathan Allen & Ali Vitali of NBC News:"Former Vice President Mike Pence on Friday rebuked fellow Republicans who have given less-than-robust support for America's defense of Ukraine -- a group that includes potential presidential campaign rivals like Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis. 'I would say anyone that thinks that Vladimir Putin will stop at Ukraine is wrong,' Pence said in an exclusive interview with NBC News when asked about DeSantis' position on U.S. efforts to help repel Russia in Europe. The interview came moments after a Pence speech at the University of Texas on the anniversary of the Russian invasion of Ukraine. 'While some in my party have taken a somewhat different view, there can be no room in the leadership of the Republican Party for apologists for Putin,' Pence ... said without naming names in his speech. 'There can only be room for champions of freedom.'"

February 24, 2023

Marie: This is another of those days on which the news reminds me that most people are either nitwits or criminals, though some are both nitwits and criminals.

Mark Walker & Emily Cochrane of the New York Times: "The crew of a Norfolk Southern freight train carrying toxic chemicals tried to slow the train moments before it derailed in the outskirts of East Palestine this month as an overheating wheel bearing set off an audible alarm on the train, an initial report from federal investigators found.... The crew then saw fire and smoke and reported a possible derailment to the dispatcher. Five of the derailed cars were carrying 115,580 gallons of vinyl chloride, a colorless hazardous gas. The report was released on Thursday as Pete Buttigieg, the transportation secretary, visited East Palestine." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ~~~

~~~ Sam Sweeney & Amanda Maile of ABC News: "Federal investigators on Thursday released a preliminary report into the derailment of a Norfolk Southern train carrying toxic chemicals in East Palestine, Ohio, earlier this month. Detailing the report at a Washington, D.C., news conference, chairwoman Jennifer Homendy said 'we know what derailed the train' and addressed the town's worried residents. 'I can tell you this much. This was 100% preventable. We call things accidents. There is no accident. Every single event that we investigate is preventable. So, our hearts are with you know that the NTSB has one goal and that is safety. And ensuring that this never happens again,' she said." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ~~~

     ~~~ The NTSB's preliminary report is here. (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

Carol Rosenberg of the New York Times: "The U.S. military released two brothers on Thursday who had been held as detainees in the war against terrorism for helping to operate safe houses where suspected operatives of Al Qaeda holed up after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. The Pentagon said that Mohammed Ahmed Ghulam Rabbani, 53, and Abdul Rahim Ghulam Rabbani, 55, who were never charged with any crimes during 20 years in U.S. custody, were flown to Pakistan in an arrangement with authorities there. The brothers were captured by Pakistan's security services in Karachi in September 2002. They arrived at Guantánamo Bay in 2004 after being kept at a C.I.A.-run detention site in Afghanistan for about 550 days."

Alan Feuer & Maggie Haberman of the New York Times: "The Justice Department has asked a federal judge to force former Vice President Mike Pence to testify fully in front of a grand jury investigating ... Donald J. Trump's efforts to overturn the 2020 election, seeking to cut short any attempt by Mr. Trump to use executive privilege to shield Mr. Pence from answering questions, two people familiar with the matter said on Thursday. The request -- amounting to a pre-emptive motion to compel Mr. Pence's testimony -- came before the former vice president had even appeared in front of the grand jury, and before any privilege claims had actually been raised in court.... Last week, people close to Mr. Pence previewed his attempt to fight the grand jury subpoena by saying that the former vice president planned to argue that his role as the president of the Senate meant he was protected from legal scrutiny by the executive branch -- including the Justice Department -- under the Constitution's 'speech or debate' clause. That provision is intended to protect the separation of powers. But the special counsel's motion to compel Mr. Pence's testimony ... did not address ... [those arguments]. Rather, it focused on the issue of executive privilege...." The CBS News story is here. (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

(Dimwitted) Trump Aide Uploaded Classified Docs to Her Laptop During Height of Classified Docs Scandal. Hugo Lowell of the Guardian: "Donald Trump's lawyers found a box of White House schedules, including some that were marked classified, at his Mar-a-Lago resort in December because a junior aide to the former president had transported it from another office in Florida after the FBI completed its search of the property, according to two sources familiar with the matter. The former president does not appear to have played a direct role in the mishandling of the box, though he remains under investigation for the possible improper retention of national security documents and obstruction of justice.... The junior aide initially kept the box at a converted guest bungalow at Mar-a-Lago called the 'tennis cottage' after Trump left office, and she soon took it with her to a government-leased office in the Palm Beach area."

So then. DOJ was not satisfied it had retrieved all of the classified files in Trump's possession, so contractors conducted a third search at DOJ's request in early December 2022, during which they found the classified schedules. "A few weeks later, Trump's lawyers started exploring whether they could get a better understanding of the sensitivity of the small number of schedules marked as classified...." At that point, the aide helpfully piped up, :Why, sure, I have copies of all the documents right here on my laptop!: She said she downloaded them because former top Trump aide Molly Michael told her to do so. MB: You can't help but wonder just how dumb these Trump aides are.

Josh Gerstein & Kyle Cheney of Politico: "A three-judge federal appeals court panel wrestled Thursday with tangled questions about Congress' immunity from criminal inquiries -- and whether it might apply to efforts by Rep. Scott Perry to aid Donald Trump's bid to subvert the 2020 election. Two of the three D.C. Circuit judges hearing the case appeared highly skeptical of the Justice Department's narrow view of the Constitution's 'speech or debate' protection for lawmakers, but it was unclear whether that disagreement would translate into a ruling that denies investigators access to the contents of a cell phone they seized from the Republican congressman in August. The complex dispute has enormous implications for Congress itself and the scope of protection that lawmakers enjoy from the speech or debate clause, which the framers intended to protect members of the House and Senate from coercion or intimidation by the executive branch." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

Spencer Hsu of the Washington Post: "A federal judge on Thursday rejected requests from news organizations to unseal the scope of Donald Trump's legal efforts to prevent top aides from testifying before a grand jury as the Justice Department investigates efforts to overturn the 2020 election. While expected, the ruling by Chief U.S. District Judge Beryl A. Howell of D.C. upholding grand jury secrecy rules deals a blow to long-standing efforts by journalists and historians to open such proceedings citing public interest in cases of historic importance. Politico and the New York Times had sought to unseal proceedings into what they called 'urgent matters of national significance' concerning Trump's attempt to prevent cooperation with the investigation into efforts to unlawfully interfere with the transfer of power from him to Joe Biden after the 2020 election." Politico's report is here.

Spencer Hsu of the Washington Post: "A federal judge on Thursday ordered that ... Donald Trump and FBI Director Christopher A. Wray can be questioned under oath by attorneys for two former senior FBI employees who allege in separate lawsuits that they were illegally targeted for retribution after the FBI investigated Russia's interference in the 2016 presidential election. The decision by U.S. District Judge Amy Berman Jackson of Washington came in consolidated lawsuits against the FBI and Justice Department by former senior FBI agent Peter Strzok and former FBI lawyer Lisa Page, who exchanged politically charged text messages criticizing Trump while they were having an affair. Strzok seeks reinstatement and back pay over what he alleges was his unfair termination. Page alleges officials unlawfully released the trove of messages to reporters." Politico's report is here.

Richard Fausset & Danny Hakim of the New York Times: "Lawyers for ... Donald J. Trump said late Wednesday that details divulged this week by the forewoman of a special grand jury investigating election interference by Mr. Trump and his allies had 'poisoned' the Georgia inquiry. As of Thursday afternoon, however, the two lawyers had not filed any motions in court challenging the inquiry. Nor would they discuss what form such a challenge might take, saying only that they were weighing their options." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ~~~

~~~ Barbara McQuade in an MSNBC opinion piece: "A blabbing grand jury threatens to upend the whole enterprise. At some point, impropriety by a grand jury could be grounds for a claim of violation of the due process rights of the accused. And a successful claim could taint anything that occurred afterward, requiring dismissal of any indictments and a complete do-over, so long as the statute of limitations has not yet run.... The rule in Georgia appears to be somewhat more lax [than federal rules of criminal procedure]. It requires only that grand jurors protect the secrecy of 'deliberations.' What's more, the judge overseeing the investigation did not prohibit members of the special grand jury from talking to the media so long as they did not reveal their deliberations.... But acknowledging that the grand jury had recommended indictments against more than a dozen people sounds awfully close to revealing deliberations." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: I wonder where Emily is today. After speaking to every media outlet with a telephone or a camera on Wednesday, there was not a peep out of her Thursday. I'm guessing some official told her to STFU.

Ivana Saric of Axios: "Right-wing extremists committed every ideologically driven mass killing identified in the U.S. in 2022, with an 'unusually high' proportion perpetrated by white supremacists, according to a new report published Thursday. The high number of killings linked to white supremacists was 'primarily due to mass shootings,' the report released by the Anti-Defamation League found.... The report noted that 60% of the deaths stemming from extremist mass killings in 2022 came from two incidents: the racist mass shooting in a supermarket in Buffalo, New York and a mass shooting at an LGBTQ nightclub in Colorado Springs.... The number of mass killings linked to extremism in the U.S. in the past decade was at least three times higher than any decade since the 1970s, per the report."

Annals of "Journalism," Ctd. Paul Farhi, et al., of the Washington Post: "The disclosure of emails and texts in which Fox News executives and personalities disparaged the same election conspiracies being floated on their shows has greatly increased the chances that a defamation case against the network will succeed, legal experts say. Dominion Voting Systems included dozens of messages sent internally by Fox co-founder Rupert Murdoch and on-air stars such as Tucker Carlson in a brief made public last week in support of the voting technology company's $1.6 billion lawsuit against the network.... Some employees privately described [the false claims] as 'ludicrous' and 'mind blowingly nuts'-- but Fox kept airing them to keep its audience from changing channels.... Under New York Times v. Sullivan, a 1964 Supreme Court ruling that has guided libel and defamation claims for nearly 60 years, a plaintiff like Dominion must show that a defendant like Fox published false statements with 'actual malice' -- meaning that it was done 'with knowledge that it was false or with reckless disregard of whether it was false or not.' Based on the messages revealed last week, 'I think that Dominion both will and should prevail,' said Laurence Tribe, a former Harvard law professor." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

Lauren Herstik of the New York Times: "Harvey Weinstein, the movie producer whose treatment of women propelled the #MeToo movement in 2017, was sentenced on Thursday to 16 years in prison for committing sex crimes in Los Angeles County. The sentence in Los Angeles adds to the 23 years Mr. Weinstein is serving in New York after his conviction there in 2020. In December, jurors in Los Angeles Superior Court found Mr. Weinstein guilty on three counts: forcible rape, forcible oral copulation and sexual penetration by a foreign object. All three counts were related to one woman, referred to as Jane Doe 1 in court...." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

Robert Chiarito & Julia Jacobs of the New York Times: "A federal judge on Thursday sentenced R. Kelly to 20 years in prison for child sex crimes, after a jury found that he had produced three videos of himself sexually abusing his 14-year-old goddaughter. In a victory for the defense, the judge ruled that all but one year of the prison sentence would be served at the same time as a previous 30-year sentence that Mr. Kelly received after a jury in Brooklyn convicted him of racketeering and sex trafficking charges." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

Presidential Race 2024. Eugene Robinson of the Washington Post: "Apparently no one told Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis that if you're going to wade into the deep waters of foreign policy, you should at least know how to dog paddle.... Appearing this week on that GOP-friendly morning show ['Fox and Friends'], DeSantis tried to take a Trumpist 'America First' position about the war -- questioning the level of U.S. military and economic aid President Biden and Congress have given to Ukraine while there are problems that need to be addressed here at home. He ended up sounding weak, ill-informed and incoherent.... While what is left of the Republican establishment praised [President] Biden's bold gesture [and while the President was in a war zone], the ascendant faux-populist wing of the party complained about Biden supposedly ... caring more about Ukraine's borders than he cares about our own.... Perhaps the dumbest thing DeSantis said, though, was to imply that the war was basically no big deal." ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: To be fair, all DeSantolini knows is what TuKKKer says, and TuKKKer is a Putin-loving traitor.

Beyond the Beltway

Florida. Jessica Schulberg of the Huffington Post: "Florida on Thursday executed 59-year-old Donald Dillbeck, who was sentenced to death 32 years ago by a non-unanimous jury under a death penalty statute that has since been found unconstitutional.... The timing of his execution appears to be part of a push by Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) to bring back death sentences by non-unanimous juries. DeSantis, who is expected to run for president, signed Dillbeck's death warrant last month on the same day that he floated changing state law to allow non-unanimous juries to impose death sentences. 'Maybe eight out of 12 have to agree or something,' DeSantis suggested at a Florida Sheriffs Association conference, just before ordering the execution of a man with that exact jury split.... Shortly after DeSantis' jury suggestion, Republican lawmakers filed a set of bills that would replace the unanimous jury requirement with an 8-4 threshold and allow a judge to overrule a jury to impose a death sentence. 'I'm not minimizing what [Dillbeck] did to people,' Florida capital defender Allison Miller told the Tallahassee Democrat, 'but he is most definitely a political pawn.'"

Minnesota. "Archie Bunker Without the Charm." David Moye of the Huffington Post: "A Minnesota state senator is getting criticized after a speech where he claimed the state's Republican Party isn't bigoted ― and included a slur against Polish people in the process. During a hearing about potential legislation that would allow undocumented immigrants to get ID cards and Class D driver's licenses, Sen. Mark Johnson (R), the Senate Minority Leader..., [said] 'We're not calling groups any names.... Doesn't matter what your race, your color, your creed, Norwegian, Polack, Somalian, you name it..., and yet when we bring those concerns up on this floor, tonight we were called white national racists.'..." MB: Can't imagine why.

South Carolina. Ben Brasch & Timothy Bella of the Washington Post: "Alex Murdaugh delivered emotional testimony in a South Carolina court on Thursday, with the disbarred lawyer saying he did not kill two family members as financial pressures mounted and his life unraveled... Murdaugh said in court that he suffered from 'paranoid thinking' when he admittedly lied to authorities ... about his whereabouts the night of the killings. When asked by his defense attorney why he continued to lie to authorities, Murdaugh claimed he had no other choice. 'Oh, what a tangled web we weave,' Murdaugh testified. 'Once I told a lie [that] I told my family, I had to keep lying.'" (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ~~~

     ~~~ Update. Nicholas Bogel-Burroughs of the New York Times: "... on Thursday, [Alex] Murdaugh talked for hours. Taking the witness stand in his own murder trial, Mr. Murdaugh acknowledged that he had stolen from his law clients. He conceded that he had pocketed a check he was supposed to hand over to his law firm. And he admitted that he had lied to the police about his whereabouts on the night of the killings. Still, Mr. Murdaugh, who at 54 has spent decades representing clients in courtrooms like the one where he has been on trial for the past four weeks, was adamant that he had never harmed his family.... His most formidable challenge was to explain why he had claimed to be at the family house when a video taken by his son actually showed that he was with his wife, Maggie, 52, and younger son, Paul, 22, at the family dog kennels nearby, minutes before the murder took place. He lied, he said, because he feared that putting himself at the scene in the period before the murders would make the police consider him a suspect." ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: Uh, yeah. That's why most criminals lie about being at the scene of the crime.

Way Beyond

Ukraine, et al. The Anniversary of an Atrocity

The New York Times' live updates of developments Friday in Russia's war on Ukraine are here. The Guardian's live updates for Friday are here. The Guardian's summary report is here. ~~~

     ~~~ The Washington Post's live briefing for Friday is here: "Ukraine on Friday marks one year since Russia launched its punishing invasion, with leaders in Kyiv defiant against Moscow's push to overpower their nation. The full-scale attack, which started in the early hours of Feb. 24, 2022, violently ended decades of relative stability in Europe. Its ripple effects upended energy markets, increased global hunger and reinvigorated the NATO military alliance to face the Russian threat. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, hardened by a year in the trenches, has framed the conflict as a morally charged battle between autocracy and freedom, pledging that Ukrainian forces will fight on with the help of billions of dollars worth of Western arms."

AP: "China called for a cease-fire between Ukraine and Moscow and the opening of peace talks in a 12-point proposal to end the fighting that started one year ago. Beijing claims to have a neutral stance in the war, but China has also said it has a 'no limits friendship' with Russia and has refused to criticize its invasion of Ukraine, or even refer to it as an invasion. It has accused the West of provoking the conflict and 'fanning the flames' by providing Ukraine with defensive arms. The U.S. has also said China may be preparing to provide Russia with military aid, something Beijing says lacks evidence. Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Wang Wenbin has called the allegation 'nothing more than slander and smears.'" ~~~

     ~~~ Der Spiegel: "... the Russian military is engaged in negotiations with Chinese drone manufacturer Xi'an Bingo Intelligent Aviation Technology over the mass production of kamikaze drones for Russia. The revelations create a new urgency in the debate over possible Chinese military support for Russia. Bingo has reportedly agreed to manufacture and test 100 ZT-180 prototype drones before delivering them to the Russian Defense Ministry by April 2023. Military experts believe the ZT-180 is capable of carrying a 35- to 50 kilogram warhead. Sources believe that the design of the unmanned aerial vehicle could be similar to that of Iran's Shaheed 136 kamikaze drone. The Russian army has deployed hundreds of them in its attacks on Ukraine, where they used the Iranian drones to target residential buildings, power plants and district heating facilities, often resulting in civilian casualties."

News Lede

New York Times: "A prolonged winter storm that led to the death of at least one person and knocked out power for hundreds of thousands of customers in the Upper Midwest was continuing its assault on the region on Thursday, forecasters said. More than 900,000 customers were without power Thursday evening across Illinois, Indiana, Michigan and Wisconsin, according to PowerOutage.us, which compiles data from utilities. More than 815,000 of those outages were in Michigan, where significant ice had accumulated on trees and power lines. Wind gusts between 30 and 40 miles per hour were expected in the state on Thursday night, according to the National Weather Service in Grand Rapids."

February 23, 2023

Afternoon Update:

Mark Walker & Emily Cochrane of the New York Times: "The crew of a Norfolk Southern freight train carrying toxic chemicals tried to slow the train moments before it derailed in the outskirts of East Palestine this month as an overheating wheel bearing set off an audible alarm on the train, an initial report from federal investigators found.... The crew then saw fire and smoke and reported a possible derailment to the dispatcher. Five of the derailed cars were carrying 115,580 gallons of vinyl chloride, a colorless hazardous gas. The report was released on Thursday as Pete Buttigieg, the transportation secretary, visited East Palestine." ~~~

~~~ Sam Sweeney & Amanda Maile of ABC News: "Federal investigators on Thursday released a preliminary report into the derailment of a Norfolk Southern train carrying toxic chemicals in East Palestine, Ohio, earlier this month. Detailing the report at a Washington, D.C., news conference, chairwoman Jennifer Homendy said 'we know what derailed the train' and addressed the town's worried residents. 'I can tell you this much. This was 100% preventable. We call things accidents. There is no accident. Every single event that we investigate is preventable. So, our hearts are with you know that the NTSB has one goal and that is safety. And ensuring that this never happens again,' she said." ~~~

     ~~~ The NTSB's preliminary report is here.

Alan Feuer & Maggie Haberman of the New York Times: "The Justice Department has asked a federal judge to force former Vice President Mike Pence to testify fully in front of a grand jury investigating ... Donald J. Trump's efforts to overturn the 2020 election, seeking to cut short any attempt by Mr. Trump to use executive privilege to shield Mr. Pence from answering questions, two people familiar with the matter said on Thursday. The request -- amounting to a pre-emptive motion to compel Mr. Pence's testimony -- came before the former vice president had even appeared in front of the grand jury, and before any privilege claims had actually been raised in court.... Last week, people close to Mr. Pence previewed his attempt to fight the grand jury subpoena by saying that the former vice president planned to argue that his role as the president of the Senate meant he was protected from legal scrutiny by the executive branch -- including the Justice Department -- under the Constitution's 'speech or debate' clause. That provision is intended to protect the separation of powers. But the special counsel's motion to compel Mr. Pence's testimony ... did not address ... [those arguments]. Rather, it focused on the issue of executive privilege and advanced the proactive argument that Mr. Pence should not be permitted to avoid answering questions by invoking it on Mr. Trump's behalf...." The CBS News story is here.

Josh Gerstein & Kyle Cheney of Politico: "A three-judge federal appeals court panel wrestled Thursday with tangled questions about Congress' immunity from criminal inquiries -- and whether it might apply to efforts by Rep. Scott Perry to aid Donald Trump's bid to subvert the 2020 election. Two of the three D.C. Circuit judges hearing the case appeared highly skeptical of the Justice Department's narrow view of the Constitution's 'speech or debate' protection for lawmakers, but it was unclear whether that disagreement would translate into a ruling that denies investigators access to the contents of a cell phone they seized from the Republican congressman in August. The complex dispute has enormous implications for Congress itself and the scope of protection that lawmakers enjoy from the speech or debate clause, which the framers intended to protect members of the House and Senate from coercion or intimidation by the executive branch."

Richard Fausset & Danny Hakim of the New York Times: "Lawyers for ... Donald J. Trump said late Wednesday that details divulged this week by the forewoman of a special grand jury investigating election interference by Mr. Trump and his allies had 'poisoned' the Georgia inquiry. As of Thursday afternoon, however, the two lawyers had not filed any motions in court challenging the inquiry. Nor would they discuss what form such a challenge might take, saying only that they were weighing their options." ~~~

~~~ Barbara McQuade in an MSNBC opinion piece: "A blabbing grand jury threatens to upend the whole enterprise. At some point, impropriety by a grand jury could be grounds for a claim of violation of the due process rights of the accused. And a successful claim could taint anything that occurred afterward, requiring dismissal of any indictments and a complete do-over, so long as the statute of limitations has not yet run.... The rule in Georgia appears to be somewhat more lax [than federal rules of criminal procedure]. It requires only that grand jurors protect the secrecy of 'deliberations.' What's more, the judge overseeing the investigation did not prohibit members of the special grand jury from talking to the media so long as they did not reveal their deliberations.... But acknowledging that the grand jury had recommended indictments against more than a dozen people sounds awfully close to revealing deliberations."

Paul Farhi, et al., of the Washington Post: "The disclosure of emails and texts in which Fox News executives and personalities disparaged the same election conspiracies being floated on their shows has greatly increased the chances that a defamation case against the network will succeed, legal experts say. Dominion Voting Systems included dozens of messages sent internally by Fox co-founder Rupert Murdoch and on-air stars such as Tucker Carlson in a brief made public last week in support of the voting technology company's $1.6 billion lawsuit against the network.... Some employees privately described [the false claims] as 'ludicrous' and 'mind blowingly nuts' -- but Fox kept airing them to keep its audience from changing channels.... Under New York Times v. Sullivan, a 1964 Supreme Court ruling that has guided libel and defamation claims for nearly 60 years, a plaintiff like Dominion must show that a defendant like Fox published false statements with 'actual malice' -- meaning that it was done 'with knowledge that it was false or with reckless disregard of whether it was false or not.' Based on the messages revealed last week, 'I think that Dominion both will and should prevail,' said Laurence Tribe, a former Harvard law professor."

Lauren Herstik of the New York Times: "Harvey Weinstein, the movie producer whose treatment of women propelled the #MeToo movement in 2017, was sentenced on Thursday to 16 years in prison for committing sex crimes in Los Angeles County. The sentence in Los Angeles adds to the 23 years Mr. Weinstein is serving in New York after his conviction there in 2020. In December, jurors in Los Angeles Superior Court found Mr. Weinstein guilty on three counts: forcible rape, forcible oral copulation and sexual penetration by a foreign object. All three counts were related to one woman, referred to as Jane Doe 1 in court...."

Robert Chiarito & Julia Jacobs of the New York Times: "A federal judge on Thursday sentenced R. Kelly to 20 years in prison for child sex crimes, after a jury found that he had produced three videos of himself sexually abusing his 14-year-old goddaughter. In a victory for the defense, the judge ruled that all but one year of the prison sentence would be served at the same time as a previous 30-year sentence that Mr. Kelly received after a jury in Brooklyn convicted him of racketeering and sex trafficking charges."

South Carolina. Ben Brasch & Timothy Bella of the Washington Post: "Alex Murdaugh delivered emotional testimony in a South Carolina court on Thursday, with the disbarred lawyer saying he did not kill two family members as financial pressures mounted and his life unraveled... Murdaugh said in court that he suffered from 'paranoid thinking' when he admittedly lied to authorities ... about his whereabouts the night of the killings. When asked by his defense attorney why he continued to lie to authorities, Murdaugh claimed he had no other choice. 'Oh, what a tangled web we weave,' Murdaugh testified. 'Once I told a lie [that] I told my family, I had to keep lying.'"

~~~~~~~~~~

Luis Martinez of ABC News: "A close-up photo of the Chinese spy balloon, taken mid-air from a U-2 spy plane, has been released by the U.S. military. The photo was taken on Friday, Feb. 3 as the balloon flew over the American Midwest at an altitude of 60,000 feet -- as the U-2 spy plane trailed it flew across the continental United States.... Visible in [the photo is] the balloon's white fabric ... and below it is the payload that carried reconnaissance sensors, antennae, and solar power panels." Includes photo.

"I Promised." Appeasing the Traitors. Luke Broadwater & Jonathan Swan of the New York Times: "Speaker Kevin McCarthy's decision to grant the Fox News host Tucker Carlson exclusive access to thousands of hours of security footage from inside the Capitol during the Jan. 6, 2021, attack was his latest move to appease the right wing of his party, this time by effectively outsourcing a bid to reinvestigate the riot to its favorite cable news commentator, who has circulated conspiracy theories about the assault.... 'I promised,' Mr. McCarthy said on Wednesday in a brief phone interview in which he defended his decision to grant Mr. Carlson exclusive access to the more than 40,000 hours of security footage.... After Mr. Carlson has had his way with the video, Mr. McCarthy said he planned to make the footage more widely available. His team has had internal conversations about providing the footage to other media outlets after Mr. Carlson has had his 'exclusive' first airing, according to a source familiar with the deliberations who insisted on anonymity to speak about them.... In a letter to fellow Democrats on Wednesday, Senator Chuck Schumer, Democrat of New York and the majority leader, said the speaker was 'needlessly exposing the Capitol complex to one of the worst security risks since 9/11.'" ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: McCarthy is no Neville Chamberlain. McCarthy is worse. By appeasing Hitler, Chamberlain was trying to keep his country out of a European war. By appeasing American traitors, McCarthy has to know he is doing nothing but aiding an abetting another American civil war. There is no upside.

Maggie Haberman & Michael Schmidt of the New York Times: "... Donald J. Trump's daughter Ivanka and his son-in-law Jared Kushner have been subpoenaed by the special counsel to testify before a federal grand jury about Mr. Trump's efforts to stay in power after he lost the 2020 election and his role in a pro-Trump mob's attack on the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, according to two people briefed on the matter. The decision by the special counsel, Jack Smith, to subpoena Ms. Trump and Mr. Kushner underscores how deeply into Mr. Trump's inner circle Mr. Smith is reaching, and is the latest sign that no potential high-level witness is off limits." CNBC's report, which cites the New York Times, is here. (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

Amy Gardner & Matthew Brown of the Washington Post: "The forewoman of a special grand jury in Georgia may have complicated an investigation into efforts by ... Donald Trump and his allies to overturn the results of the 2020 election by speaking bluntly about its findings in interviews this week, several legal experts said.... Several legal experts said they were surprised and concerned by [Emily] Kohrs's unusually candid commentary, which included evaluation of witnesses, tidbits about jurors socializing with prosecutors and a stated hope that the investigation yields charges because of how much time she and others invested in the case.... If Willis does indict Trump -- becoming the first prosecutor to bring charges against a former president -- Trump could use Kohrs's remarks to advance the argument he's made all along: that [Fulton County D.A. Fani] Willis's probe has amounted to a political prosecution and not a serious investigative inquiry." An ABC News story is here.

"An All-out Revolution." Zach Montague & Alan Feuer of the New York Times: "Appearing for a second day of testimony at the seditious conspiracy trial of five members of the Proud Boys in Federal District Court in Washington, [a former Proud Boys leader Jeremy] Bertino gave the proceeding a sudden burst of drama by taking the stand against his former associates.... As anxiety spread throughout the group after the Supreme Court declined to overturn Mr. Biden's victory in Pennsylvania in December 2020, Mr. Bertino said that he and the group's top leaders came to believe that 'time was running out to save the country.' The Proud Boys, he went on, would have to take the lead in galvanizing other Trump supporters who came to Washington into realizing an 'all-out revolution.'... In text messages during the riot, Mr. Bertino and other members appeared eager to whip other demonstrators in Washington into a frenzy, expressing hope that they would 'burn that city to ash.'" Bertino was not in Washington, D.C., on January 6 because he was "recovering from stab wounds he sustained during an earlier pro-Trump rally...." Politico's story is here.

Dareh Gregorian of NBC News: "A Jan. 6 rioter who threatened Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez on social media after participating in the attack on the Capitol was sentenced Wednesday to 38 months in prison. Prosecutors had asked for a sentence of 48 months in prison for Garret Miller, an unemployed Texan who, they noted, was wearing a T-shirt bearing ... Donald Trump's picture and the words 'I was there, Washington, D.C., January 6, 2021' when he was arrested weeks after the attack.... [Ocasio-Cortez] had tweeted the word 'impeach' after the Capitol riot, to which Miller responded, 'assassinate AOC.' In addition to the prison time, U.S. District Court Judge Carl Nichols ordered 36 months of supervised release...." Includes of photo of Miller in his fashionable incriminating T-shirt. (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) The Washington Post's story is here.

Katelyn Polantz, et al., of CNN: "A law firm that represented former Donald Trump strategist Steve Bannon ... is suing Bannon for nearly $500,000 in unpaid legal bills. The lawsuit states that Davidoff Hutcher & Citron LLP worked for Bannon from November 2020 through November 2022 and represented him on several high-profile cases, including investigations into Bannon's crowdfunding border-wall effort and the subpoena from the House select committee investigating the US Capitol attack on January 6, 2021.... While Trump pardoned Bannon in the federal border wall case, the Manhattan DA's office announced an indictment last year charging Bannon with state charges of fraud, conspiracy and money laundering related to the effort. Bannon has pleaded not guilty to the charges. The lawyers representing him in that case -- from a different firm -- have sought to withdraw from representing him and said there were 'irreconcilable differences.' Bannon is due in court next week to update the judge on his efforts to find new lawyers."

Annals of “Journalsim,” Ctd. Past His Prime. Monica Hesse of the Washington Post: "If you turned on CNN on Wednesday morning curious to see how Don Lemon would address his mini sexism scandal after his mini sabbatical and his 'formal training,' the answer is that he wouldn't address it, at least not on air. A few moments before his show began, the news anchor tweeted that he appreciated 'the opportunity to be back' and, to his colleagues and viewers, wrote, 'I've heard you, I'm learning from you, and I'm committed to doing better.'... 'Nikki Haley isn't in her prime,' he announced unbidden to CNN's viewers [last Thursday]. 'Sorry, when a woman is considered to be in her prime in her 20s and 30s and maybe 40s....' While his horrified co-host [Poppy] Harlow repeatedly tried to reel Lemon back in ('Prime for what?'), Lemon defiantly blundered forth, insisting that wasn't according to him, that he was just the 'messenger,' that this was according to common knowledge and 'Google.'... His error was unforced and repeated.... Lemon, by the way, is 56.... I don't know what 'formal training' could provide Lemon that living through the #MeToo era apparently did not."

Naomi Nix of the Washington Post: "Facebook parent company Meta is preparing for a fresh round of job cuts, deputizing human resources, lawyers, financial experts and top executives to draw up plans to deflate the company's hierarchy, in a reorganization and downsizing effort that could affect thousands of workers. Meta plans to push some leaders into lower-level roles.... The job eliminations arrive after [CEO Mark] Zuckerberg sought to reassure workers that he didn't 'anticipate more layoffs' after the company slashed 11,000 jobs -- roughly 13 percent of its workforce -- in November." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

David Folkenflik of NPR: "NPR's chief executive announced the network would lay off roughly 10% of its current workforce -- at least 100 people -- and eliminate most vacant positions. CEO John Lansing cited the erosion of advertising dollars, particularly for NPR podcasts, and the tough financial outlook for the media industry more generally.... On an annual budget of roughly $300 million, Lansing says, revenues are likely to fall short by close to $30 million, although that gap could reach $32 million." MB: How about getting rid of your GOP-friendly, both-sides reporters, "analysts" & producers first. (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) The Washington Post's story is here.

Presidential Race 2024. Meryl Kornfield, et al., of the Washington Post: "Donald Trump visited ... [East Palestine, Ohio] on Wednesday, escalating a political showdown in the wake of a fiery train derailment that left some residents fearful of contaminated air and water.... He was joined by East Palestine Mayor Trent Conaway, who earlier called President Biden's recent trip to Ukraine a 'slap in the face,' as well as Sen. J.D. Vance (Ohio) and other Republicans. Yet Trump has also faced criticism for his administration's rollback of rail safety rules and moves to downsize the Environmental Protection Agency, which Democrats have cited as they seek to direct some of the heat toward the 45th president in the aftermath of the derailment. And some residents of East Palestine -- including Trump supporters -- said they saw little value in his visit.... GOP leaders seized on Biden's surprise trip to Kyiv to suggest he was prioritizing a foreign conflict over the situation in Ohio.... EPA officials arrived at the site the morning after the crash, and administration officials have argued that an earlier appearance by senior officials could have interfered with emergency efforts." CNN's report is here. ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: BTW, no paper towels this trip. WashPo: "Instead, Trump said Wednesday he brought thousands of water bottles for residents -- 'Trump water, actually,' along with some other water of 'much lesser quality,' he added." ~~~

     ~~~ Guardian & Agencies: "Donald Trump's record of rolling back environmental protections was highlighted by critics on Wednesday as the ex-president visited the town of East Palestine, Ohio, and called the federal response to the toxic train derailment there earlier this month a 'betrayal'. Trump's administration, which rolled back more than 100 environmental rules in total, watered down several regulations at the behest of the rail industry. He withdrew an Obama-era plan to require faster brakes on trains carrying highly flammable materials, shelved a rule that demanded at least two crew members on freight trains and dropped a ban on transporting liquified natural gas by rail, despite fears this could cause explosions." ~~~

~~~ Put a Wick in It. Topher Sanders & Dan Schwartz of ProPublica: "Norfolk Southern allows a monitoring team to instruct crews to ignore alerts from train track sensors designed to flag potential mechanical problems.... The National Transportation Safety Board will be looking into the company's rules, including whether that specific policy played a role in the Feb. 3 derailment in East Palestine.... Norfolk Southern disregarded a similar mechanical problem on another train that months earlier jumped the tracks in Ohio.... Four miles [after the monitoring team gave the train a go-ahead to continue despite an overheated engine wheel], the train derailed ... and dumped thousands of gallons of molten paraffin wax in the city of Sandusky." ~~~

Corporations do stock buybacks, they do big dividend checks, they lay off workers. They don't invest in safety rules and safety regulations, and this kind of thing happens. -- Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio) ~~~

~~~ Chris Isidore of CNN: "Norfolk Southern CEO Alan Shaw pledged Tuesday the freight railroad will spend $6.5 million to help those affected by the release of toxic chemicals from its derailment nearly three weeks ago in East Palestine, Ohio. But in a plan released earlier this year, the company said it's planning to spend more than a thousand times that amount -- $7.5 billion -- to repurchase its own shares in order to benefit its shareholders.... It's not clear how much of the accident's cost will fall on Norfolk Southern. The company revealed Wednesday during a conference call with investors that it has as much as $1.1 billion worth of liability insurance coverage that it can draw upon to compensate third parties for losses caused by the accident. It also has about $200 million worth of insurance coverage to cover damage to its own property, such as tracks or equipment."

Beyond the Beltway

Arizona. GOP State AG Falsely Promoted the Big Lie. Yvonne Sanchez & Isaac Stanley-Becker of the Washington Post: "Nearly a year after the 2020 election, Arizona's then-attorney general, Mark Brnovich, launched an investigation into voting in the state's largest county that quickly consumed more than 10,000 hours of his staff's time. Investigators prepared a report in March 2022 stating that virtually all claims of error and malfeasance were unfounded.... Brnovich, a Republican, kept it private. In April, the attorney general — who was running in the GOP primary for a U.S. Senate seat -- released an 'Interim Report' claiming that his office had discovered 'serious vulnerabilities.' He left out edits from his own investigators refuting his assertions. His office then compiled an 'Election Review Summary' in September that systematically refuted accusations of widespread fraud and made clear that none of the complaining parties ... had presented any evidence to support their claims. Brnovich left office last month without releasing the summary....

"The records show how Brnovich used his office to further claims about voting in Maricopa County that his own staff considered inaccurate. They suggest that his administration privately disregarded fact checks provided by state investigators while publicly promoting incomplete accounts of the office's work. The innuendo and inaccuracies, circulated not just in the far reaches of the internet but with the imprimatur of the state's attorney general, helped make Arizona an epicenter of distrust in the democratic process, eroding confidence in the 2020 vote as well as in subsequent elections." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

Congress shall make no law ... prohibiting ... the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances, except in Florida. -- First Amendment, U.S. Constitution, revised ~~~

~~~ Florida, the Sunshine Fascist State. Matt Dixon of Politico: "The DeSantis administration now requires events held at the Florida state Capitol to 'align' with its mission, a recent change that is sparking concerns that the governor's office is trying to censor events it doesn’t like. The Department of Management Services, the administration department that oversees state facilities, over the past few months has changed rules for groups or individuals who want to reserve space inside the Capitol.... The new rules specify that organizations must make their requests through DeSantis administration agency heads, the House speaker or any member of the Senate. The chief justice of the Florida Supreme Court can also ask on their behalf.... The new rules include language that allows DMS to request organizers 'reduce in size and scope' their event."

Marie: Many years ago, I had a job assessing essays that were part of state-run school tests. One year, Maryland required the students to write about the major problem in their towns. The kids who lived on the Eastern Shore wrote about the way some people docked their boats. The kids who lived in Baltimore wrote about street gangs killing their friends. What follows below is much more in line with Eastern Shore municipal "problems." The young people of Balto should be so lucky: ~~~

~~~ New Hampshire. Marisa Iati of the Washington Post: "In a small New Hampshire tourist town, the front of a roadside bakery is adorned with an image of the sun rising over a row of doughnuts, muffins and other pastries. Whether that painting is a mural or a sign will determine whether the high school students who created it will see it taken down. The Conway, N.H., community has been captivated for months by a dispute, previously reported by the Conway Daily News, over whether the art project is considered a sign under the municipal code. The town says yes, because the painting shows baked goods -- and that the image exceeds the legal size limit for signs. The owner of Leavitt-s Country Bakery says no -- and, in a federal lawsuit, contends the town ordinance violates the First Amendment." MB: BTW, to my mind, the story includes one student's opinion that suggests defeatism is a formative principle of conservatism."

Texas. Oops, I Left My Gun in the Boys' Bathroom. Christine Chung of the New York Times: "The superintendent of a Texas school district has resigned a month after a child found his gun in an elementary school bathroom, a school district official said. Robby Stuteville had worked for the Rising Star Independent School District for more than three decades, serving as its superintendent for about the last two years, said Monty Jones, the district's high school principal. On Jan. 20, Mr. Stuteville accidentally left his gun in a bathroom at Rising Star Elementary School, where it was found by a third-grade student, Mr. Jones said.... Mr. Jones said that both he and Mr. Stuteville had the district board's approval to carry guns and that all students had been informed about this practice.... 'If we are going to take care of our kids and make them feel safe, we have to do it in house,' Mr. Jones said." MB: Yes, because nothing makes little children "feel safe" like leaving a (presumably loaded) gun for them to play with. (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

Way Beyond

Ukraine, et al.

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

     ~~~ The Washington Post's live briefing for Thursday is here: "The U.N. General Assembly is set to vote this week on a resolution calling on Russia to leave Ukraine, with Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba calling on members during a special session to vote and preserve his country's sovereignty, ahead of the Russian invasion's first anniversary Friday.... Wagner Group head Yevgeniy Prigozhin said an ammunition shipment is on its way to his mercenaries, in a Telegram post on Thursday. It comes days after he launched a bitter tirade against the Russian military, claiming it was depriving his fighters of ammunition.... Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez arrived in Kyiv on Thursday, saying in a tweet that Spain will stand with Ukraine 'until peace returns to Europe.' There 'will certainly be consequences for China' if it sends lethal military aid to Russia for its war in Ukraine, the Pentagon said Wednesday, after China's top diplomat, Wang Yi, visited Moscow."

A New World Order: The West v. Everybody Else? Liz Sly of the Washington Post: "In the year since Russia's invasion of Ukraine, a reinvigorated Western alliance has rallied against Russia, forging what President Biden has trumpeted as a 'global coalition.' Yet a closer look beyond the West suggests the world is far from united on the issues raised by the Ukraine war. The conflict has exposed a deep global divide, and the limits of U.S. influence over a rapidly shifting world order. Evidence abounds that the effort to isolate Putin has failed, and not just among Russian allies that could be expected to back Moscow, such as China and Iran. India announced last week that its trade with Russia has grown by 400 percent since the invasion. In just the past six weeks, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov has been welcomed in nine countries in Africa and the Middle East.... U.S. officials point out that 141 of 193 countries at the United Nations voted to condemn Russia after the invasion and that 143 voted in October to censure the Kremlin's announced annexation of parts of Ukraine. But only 33 countries have imposed sanctions on Russia, and a similar number are sending lethal aid to Ukraine. An Economist Intelligence Unit survey last year estimated that two-thirds of the world's population lives in countries that have refrained from condemning Russia."

Christian Shepherd & Vic Chiang of the Washington Post: China "considers the United States -- not Russia -- the progenitor of global insecurity, including in Ukraine.... From the beginning of the war, China has tried to protect its rapidly deepening economic and political ties with Russia at the same time it tried to assure Western audiences that it wants peace and should not be a target for sanctions.... At the core of Xi [Jinping]'s priorities for promoting China's security is an effort to counteract the United States' influence in the international order, often by enlisting countries that share similar grievances. Chinese complaints about American 'abuse of hegemony' in global military, political and economic affairs were listed in a five-page document issued by the Chinese Foreign Ministry on Monday, which called the Ukraine conflict a case of the United States 'repeating its old tactics of waging proxy ... wars.'"

Israel/Palestine. Patrick Kingsley of the New York Times: "At least 10 Palestinians were killed and more than 100 others wounded on Wednesday, Palestinian officials said, in an hourslong gun battle between Israeli security forces and armed Palestinian groups in the Israeli-occupied West Bank. The Israeli military said the firefight occurred during an operation to arrest Palestinian gunmen. Three armed Palestinian groups said that six of the casualties were fighters in their movements. Others appeared to be noncombatants: Time-stamped CCTV footage from late Wednesday morning that circulated on social media seemed to show the shooting of at least two unarmed Palestinians as they ran away from gunfire.... The raid on Wednesday was the second in less than a month to end in the deaths of at least 10 Palestinians -- two of the most lethal such incidents in years. A raid in Jenin late last month killed 10 Palestinians." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

News Lede

Florida. New York Times: "A man who fatally shot a 20-year-old woman on Wednesday morning in Orange County, Fla., returned to the scene later in the day and went on a shooting spree, the authorities said, killing a TV news reporter who had been covering the original homicide and a 9-year-old at a nearby home. The gunman, Keith Melvin Moses, 19, also shot two other people in Pine Hills, Fla., the Orange County Sheriff's Office said in a news conference on Wednesday: the mother of the 9-year-old and a photographer who worked with the TV news reporter at Spectrum News 13 in Orlando. They were both in critical condition on Wednesday night. Mr. Moses was in custody by Wednesday evening and charged with one count of murder in connection with the killing of the 20-year-old; additional charges are expected for the other shootings in Pine Hills, about five miles east of Orlando, said the Orange County sheriff, John Mina." The story has been updated. The Spectrum News story is here.