The Conversation -- June 26, 2024

How Ignorant Are Voters? Well, There's This: ~~~

     ~~~ Colby Itkowitz, et al., of the Washington Post: "In six swing states that Biden narrowly won in 2020, a little more than half of voters classified as likely to decide the presidential election say threats to democracy are extremely important to their vote for president, according to a poll by The Washington Post and ... George Mason University. Yet, more of them trust Trump to handle those threats than Biden. And most believe that the guardrails in place to protect democracy would hold even if a dictator tried to take over the country." Emphasis added. ~~~

     ~~~ And This. Claire Miller, et al., of the New York Times (May 15): "Nearly one in five voters in battleground states says that President Biden is responsible for ending the constitutional right to abortion, a new poll found, despite the fact that he supports abortion rights and that his opponent Donald J. Trump appointed three Supreme Court justices who made it possible to overturn Roe v. Wade. Trump supporters and voters with less education were most likely to attribute responsibility for abortion bans to Mr. Biden, but the misperception existed across demographic groups."

** Oops! John Fritze of CNN: "The Supreme Court appears poised to allow abortions in medical emergencies in Idaho, Bloomberg News reported Wednesday, citing a document that was inadvertently posted on the court's website in an astonishing breach of protocol. The opinion showed that a majority of the court agreed to dismiss the appeal, according to Bloomberg, which reported that it reviewed a copy of the opinion. The release was a stunning development at the Supreme Court, which usually safeguards the release of its opinions. The abortion case was considered among the most significant of the current term that is winding down ahead of the July 4 holiday.... A dismissal would let stand an opinion from the full 9th US Circuit Court of Appeals that sided with the Biden administration in the case. Such a ruling is a win for the Biden administration and will be a relief to Idaho women who fear medical complications from their pregnancies could jeopardize their hea[l]th.... The release of the opinion marks the second time a major decision dealing with an abortion controversy." ~~~

     ~~~ Abbie VanSickle of the New York Times: "It was unclear whether the document was final and a spokeswoman for the court declined to confirm what had been posted to its website.... According to Bloomberg, which did not immediately post the document online, the ruling indicated that a majority of the court had agreed to dismiss the case as 'improvidently granted.'" ~~~

     ~~~ Alice Ollstein & Josh Gerstein of Politico: "According to the posted opinion, four justices dissented from the court's decision to dismiss the Idaho dispute: conservatives Samuel Alito, Clarence Thomas, and Neil Gorsuch and liberal Ketanji Brown Jackson.... Jackson ... said the high court was wrong to back away from resolving the case. 'We cannot simply wind back the clock to how things were before the Court injected itself into this matter,' she wrote. 'It is too little, too late for the Court to take a mulligan and just tell the lower courts to carry on as if none of this has happened. As the old adage goes: The Court has made this bed so now it must lie in it.... Today's decision is not a victory for pregnant patients in Idaho. It is delay,' Jackson added." ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: Looks like John Roberts has lost the plot. The so-called Roberts Court is a flaming disaster. ~~~

~~~ And Now Hear This (as RAS puts it, "Making bribery great again again"): ~~~

     ~~~ Sometimes a Bribe Is Just a ... Birthday Present or Something. Lindsay Whitehurst of the AP: "The Supreme Court overturned the bribery conviction of a former Indiana mayor on Wednesday, the latest in a series of decisions narrowing the scope of federal public corruption law. The high court's 6-3 opinion along ideological lines found the law criminalizes bribes given before an official act, not rewards handed out after. 'Some gratuities can be problematic. Others are commonplace and might be innocuous,' Justice Brett Kavanaugh wrote.... The high court sided with James Snyder, a Republican who was convicted of taking $13,000 from a trucking company after prosecutors said he steered about $1 million worth of city contracts to the company. In a sharply worded dissent joined by her liberal colleagues, Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson said the distinction between bribes and gratuities ignores the wording of the law aimed at rooting out public corruption." ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: Anyhow, good news for Bribable Bob, the New Jersey Senator with gold bars in the closet and stashes of cash in his jacket pockets -- all previously owned by a fellow for whom Bob performed extraordinary constituent services. Of course, Bob is a Democrat, so maybe Bart, et al., won't be so anxious to help him out.

** David Smith of the Guardian: "Joe Biden has moved to correct a 'great injustice' by pardoning thousands of US veterans convicted over six decades under a military law that banned gay sex. The presidential proclamation, which comes during Pride month and an election year, allows LGBTQ+ service members convicted of crimes based solely on their sexual orientation to apply for a certificate of pardon that will help them receive withheld benefits.... 'Despite their courage and great sacrifice, thousands of LGBTQ+ service members were forced out of the military because of their sexual orientation or gender identity. Some of these patriotic Americans were subject to court-martial, and have carried the burden of this great injustice for decades,' [Biden said in a statement].... [The President's proclamation] grants clemency to service members convicted under Uniform Code of Military Justice article 125 -- which criminalised sodomy, including between consenting adults -- between 1951 and 2013, when it was rewritten by Congress." Thanks to RAS for the link. The New York Times story is here. ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: So far today, Biden's proclamation hasn't received a ton of press. The story is way down the NYT's online front page. Biden's proclamation does not automatically grant clemency & veterans' benefits in individual cases; as the Times story notes, "People who want their convictions overturned can now apply online for a certificate of clemency, which would help them receive benefits that may have been denied." So if you know someone you think may be eligible for clemency & military benefits as a result of Biden's proclamation, please give them a heads-up. It isn't exactly clear yet how this whole process (and it will be a "whole process") will work, so it sounds as if perseverance and patience will be among the attributes required to receive proper recognition and benefits due.

Adam Liptak of the New York Times: "The Supreme Court handed the Biden administration a major practical victory on Wednesday, rejecting a challenge to its contacts with social media platforms to combat what administration officials said was misinformation. The court ruled that the states and users who had challenged the contacts had not suffered the sort of direct injury that gave them standing to sue. The decision, by a 6 to 3 vote, left fundamental legal questions for another day.... 'The plaintiffs, without any concrete link between their injuries and the defendants' conduct, ask us to conduct a review of the yearslong communications between dozens of federal officials, across different agencies, with different social-media platforms, about different topics,' Justice Amy Coney Barrett wrote for the majority.... Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr, joined by Justices Clarence Thomas and Neil M. Gorsuch, dissented."

Ha Ha. House Speaker Mike Johnson tipped his big toe into the reality stream and told CNN that "No one expects Joe Biden will be on cocaine" during the presidential debate. He opined that Donald Trump & other were joking when they said Biden would be using performance-enhancing drugs. MB: I find Johnson to be a fairly amazing guy. He would have you believe he is so in the tank for Jesus and the MAGA Messiah that he must be delusional, yet he manages to occasionally communicate on quite a rational level with some Democrats & MSM personalities.

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The New York Times is live-updating primary results in New York, South Carolina, Colorado & Utah. ~~~

Nicholas Fandos: "The outcome was never really in doubt, but The Associated Press has declared Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez the winner in her Democratic primary against Martin Dolan in New York's 14th Congressional District. With about 40 percent of votes in, she is up by more than 60 points."

Chris Cameron: "Sheri Biggs has narrowly won the Republican primary runoff for South Carolina's Third Congressional District, according to The Associated Press, defeating Mark Burns, who had the endorsement of Donald J. Trump, by a margin of about 2 percentage points."

Carl Hulse: "Representative Lauren Boebert, the MAGA lightning rod who switched districts in Colorado to avoid being ousted from the House, won a crowded Republican primary on Tuesday in a conservative area of the state, all but ensuring that she will serve another two years in Congress."

Fandos: "Representative Jamaal Bowman of New York, one of Congress's most outspoken progressives, suffered a stinging primary defeat on Tuesday, according to The Associated Press, brought down by a record-shattering onslaught from pro-Israel groups and a slate of self-inflicted blunders. Mr. Bowman was defeated by George Latimer, the Westchester County executive, in a race that became the year's ugliest intraparty brawl and the most expensive House primary in history."

Claire Fahy: "John Avlon, a former CNN political analyst who helped found the centrist political group No Labels, won the Democratic primary in a House district in eastern Long Island in New York on Tuesday, according to The Associated Press. Mr. Avlon only entered the race in February but quickly built up support in the district, which he moved to in 2017. His critics, including his opponent, Nancy Goroff, used his recent move to the area to suggest that he was out of touch with locals, but he won more endorsements from party leaders and local elected officials than did Ms. Goroff, a retired chemistry professor who ran in 2020."

Cameron: "Jeff Hurd, a Republican who had challenged Representative Lauren Boebert before she moved east to a more conservative district, has won the Republican primary for her old seat -- Colorado's Third Congressional District. Hurd will now face the Democratic candidate who nearly defeated Boebert in 2022, Adam Frisch, in the fall."

Cameron: "Jeff Crank, a political consultant and conservative commentator, defeated Dave Williams, the Trump-endorsed chairman of the Colorado Republican Party, in the G.O.P. primary for Colorado's Fifth Congressional District by what is currently a 30-point margin, according to The Associated Press. Crank was once an executive at Americans for Prosperity, the Koch-backed conservative organization, and the group backed him in the primary."

Cameron: "Representative John Curtis, a centrist Republican, won his party's primary for U.S. Senate in Utah on Tuesday, according to The Associated Press, beating a more conservative candidate endorsed by ... Donald J. Trump."

Simon Levien: "Gov. Spencer Cox of Utah fended off a challenge from the right in his primary on Tuesday, according to The Associated Press, defeating State Representative Phil Lyman, who had the endorsement of the state Republican Party.... Mr. Cox has been openly critical of ... Donald J. Trump, and has not endorsed him...."

Grace Ashford: "State Senator John W. Mannion won the Democratic primary in New York's 22nd Congressional District in Central New York on Tuesday, according to The Associated Press.... The district, currently held by Brandon Williams, a Republican, is widely considered one of the Democrats' best opportunities for a pickup in the nation. In 2022, Mr. Williams, who has been a vocal champion of ... Donald J. Trump, was narrowly elected by just under one percentage point. Since then, the boundaries of the district have changed to favor Democrats...."

Presidential Race

Marie: With all the speculation about what each candidate will bring to Thursday presidential debate, my prediction for Trump is ... bubonic plague. Chris Hayes opened last night with a segment (not yet available online) on the 2020 Biden-Trump debates, and reminded viewers of something I had forgot because we learned about it well after the fact: Martin Pengelly of the Guardian (Dec. 2021) "Donald Trump tested positive for Covid-19 three days before his first debate against Joe Biden, the former president's fourth and last chief of staff has revealed in a new book. Mark Meadows also writes that though he knew each candidate was required 'to test negative for the virus within seventy two hours of the start time ... Nothing was going to stop [Trump] from going out there.' Trump, Meadows says in the book, returned a negative result from a different test shortly after the positive.... The host [of the debate], Chris Wallace of Fox News, later said Trump was not tested before the debate because he arrived late. Organisers, Wallace said, relied on the honor system." Trump was hospitalized three days later with a severe case of Covid.

Hillary Clinton, in a New York Times op-ed, has some advice for President Biden: "I am the only person to have debated both [Joe Biden and Donald Trump].... It is a waste of time to try to refute Mr. Trump's arguments like in a normal debate. It's nearly impossible to identify what his arguments even are. He starts with nonsense and then digresses into blather. This has gotten only worse in the years since we debated [in 2016].... Mr. Trump may rant and rave in part because he wants to avoid giving straight answers about his unpopular positions, like restrictions on abortion, giving tax breaks to billionaires and selling out our planet to big oil companies in return for campaign donations. He interrupts and bullies -- he even stalked me around the stage at one point -- because he wants to appear dominant and throw his opponent off balance. These ploys will fall flat if Mr. Biden is as direct and forceful as he was when engaging Republican hecklers at the State of the Union address in March." Read on. (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~

     ~~~ BTW, see Akhilleus' commentary on both-siderism in yesterday's thread.

National Crime Blotter

Perry Stein & Devlin Barrett of the Washington Post: "U.S. District Judge Aileen M. Cannon signaled Friday that Donald Trump's legal team had not convinced her FBI agents offered false information to justify searching Mar-a-Lago -- a potential blow to the former president's efforts to disqualify key evidence in the classified documents case against him.... The session capped three days of hearings in Cannon's courtroom. In the morning, she held a closed-door hearing on Trump's efforts to bar at trial the audio notes that investigators got from one of Trump's former attorneys, Evan Corcoran.... She did not issue rulings from the bench on any of the motions...." (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~

     ~~~ Kimberly Leonard of Politico: "Judge Aileen Cannon appeared highly skeptical on Tuesday of Donald Trump's bid to throw out evidence seized from his Mar-a-Lago estate. Trump's lawyers argued at a court hearing that the 2022 search warrant in the classified documents investigation was overly broad and violated Trump's rights. They said FBI agents took medical records and improperly entered the bedroom of his son Barron and the quarters of his wife, Melania.... [Cannon's] skepticism toward Trump's defense arguments was unusual for the judge, a Trump appointee who has issued many favorable rulings toward Trump and has often clashed with special counsel Jack Smith's team.... The medical records had been in boxes that also contained the documents they were looking for, but the government returned them promptly, prosecutor David Harbach said.... They only seized documents that contained government, presidential or classified records, and didn't seize anything from the rooms of Melania or Barron, prosecutors said." ~~~

     ~~~ Matt Naham of Law & Crime: In his rebuttal to Trump's claim that the prosecution had tainted the evidence by not preserving it in the precise order they had found it, Jack Smith called "Trump's latest motion to dismiss rife with 'newly invented explanations.'... Smith reminded the judge that the defendant earlier claimed he had declassified the documents, claimed that the feds tried to frame him, and further claimed to have designated them as personal records. Smith rhetorically wondered why the defense hasn't complained about the order of the documents within the boxes until recently." ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: Say, I think Smith's rebuttal just might explain Judge Aileen's "unusual skepticism" about dismissing the case: ~~~

     ~~~ ** Melissa Quinn & Robert Legare of CBS News: "Newly revealed photographs taken by the FBI during its August 2022 search of ... Donald Trump's South Florida resort shed further light on how the former president kept keepsakes from his time in office alongside documents bearing classification markings." MB: Do yourself a favor and scroll down the page to see how carefully Trump preserved the country's secrets. I'll bet even seasoned FBI agents gasped. Laughably, "Trump's legal team has claimed that the failure to keep the documents intact and the order maintained violated his due process rights." The Washington Post's story is here. ~~~

     ~~~ Marcy Wheeler recalls some testimony she read a while back from Person 81, probably one of Trump's White House valets. "Person 81 described how there was a cluster of boxes right next to Trump's bed at the White House: 'So if you walk into the room, his bed -- there's a nightstand, his bed, and then there's, like, a -- where another nightstand was but nobody ever slept on that side of the bed usually so he would have it all full of boxes.'" ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: One thing that strikes me here: the evidence shows what a disordered mind Trump had. Here he was the POTUS, whose time is as precious as anyone's on the planet. But instead of spending that time reviewing documents related to the pressing issues of the day, he was collecting and rifling through boxes of press clippings and clothing and classified docs (which I speculate he had separated out from his daily dose of docs to monetize later). Oh, and of course it's nice to know that the serial adulterer and Rapist of Bergdorf's is not getting any at home.

Trump Knew That Keeping the Docs Was Criminal. Katherine Faulders & Peter Charalambous of ABC News: "Donald Trump privately expressed concerns that turning over potentially classified documents in his possession after a May 2022 subpoena could result in criminal charges while repeatedly engaging in what prosecutors have described as an effort to enlist his lawyers to lie and destroy documents for his benefit, according to transcripts of audio notes reviewed by ABC News.... 'He raised a question as to, if we gave them additional documents now, would they, would they, the Department of Justice, come back and say well, why did you withhold them and try to use that as a basis for criminal liability or to make him look bad in the press,' according to [then-Trump-attorney Evan] Corcoran's notes.... Trump campaign spokesperson Steven Cheung, contacted by ABC News, accused prosecutors -- without providing evidence -- of lying and illegally leaking material."

Judge Partially Lifts Gag Order Against 34-Time Felon. Dareh Gregorian of NBC News: "The judge who presided over Donald Trump's hush money trial on Tuesday lifted some of the restrictions from his gag order. The ruling by Judge Juan Merchan comes two days before Trump is set to debate President Joe Biden.... Merchan's ruling lifted restrictions on Trump's ability to comment on the witnesses who testified against him during his trial, as well as a part of the order barring him from discussing the jury ... -- essentially finding the witnesses' and the jury's work had concluded so there was no fear of impacting the proceedings. The ruling left in place a part of the order barring Trump from going after court staff, individual prosecutors and 'family members of any counsel, staff member, the Court or the District Attorney.'... Trump ... is still prevented from talking about jurors by name or divulging their personal information under the terms of a separate protective order that is still in place." (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: You don't need to wait for Trump to "address the jury"; at the end of yesterday's thread, Patrick predicts (likely with pinpoint accuracy) Felonious Trump's "address."

Kaitlan Collins & Lauren del Valle of CNN: "Steve Bannon's upcoming criminal fraud trial in New York will no longer be overseen by the same judge who presided over Donald Trump's hush money trial, and instead a new judge has been reassigned to take the case. As the one time Trump adviser prepares to report to prison next Monday for defying a congressional subpoena in a separate case, Judge Juan Merchan will no longer handle his trial in the same courthouse where the former president was convicted. Merchan was not removed from the case, but has another case that conflicts with Bannon's trial, according to the office of court administration. The administrative judge for the New York County Supreme Court Criminal Term notified the parties in an email Friday saying the reassignment will 'best serve the needs of the Court.'"

Orlando Mayorquín of the New York Times: "The actor Jay Johnston, who voiced Jimmy Pesto Sr. on the animated Fox sitcom 'Bob's Burgers,' has agreed to plead guilty in the federal case against him over his participation in the riot at the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021. The authorities arrested Mr. Johnston, 55, in California last summer and charged him with four counts, including civil disorder and entering restricted grounds. Mr. Johnston agreed to plead guilty to a single count of civil disorder in exchange for the other charges being dropped.... A plea agreement hearing is scheduled for July 8 in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia."

Damien Cave of the New York Times: "Julian Assange, the founder of WikiLeaks, pleaded guilty on Wednesday to a felony charge of violating the U.S. Espionage Act, securing his freedom under a plea deal that saw its final act play out in a remote U.S. courtroom in Saipan in the Western Pacific. He appeared in court ... with his lawyer, Jennifer Robinson, and Kevin Rudd, the Australian ambassador to the United States. He stood briefly and offered his plea more than a decade after he obtained and published classified secret military and diplomatic documents in 2010, moving a twisted case involving several countries and U.S. presidents closer to its conclusion. It was all part of an agreement allowing him to return to his native country, Australia, after spending more than five years in British custody -- most of it fighting extradition to the United States." The story has been updated: Assange left for Canberra, Australia.

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Israel/Palestine, et al. The New York Times' live updates of developments Wednesday in the Israel/Hamas war are here.

Kenya. Abdi Dahir & Declan Walsh of the New York Times: "Thousands of demonstrators flooded the streets of Kenya's capital, Nairobi, and some broke into Parliament and briefly set fire to the entrance on Tuesday, after lawmakers approved tax increases that critics said would drive up the cost of living for millions. During the protests, the police fired tear gas and guns, plunging the capital into turmoil. At least five people were fatally shot and 31 others injured, according to Amnesty International and several prominent Kenyan civic organizations. The toll could not be immediately confirmed. The independent Kenya Human Rights Commission posted a video that showed police officers firing as protesters marched toward them.... The half sister of ... Barack Obama, Auma Obama, was among the protesters engulfed in tear gas on Tuesday, according to CNN footage."

Russia. Neil MacFarquhar & Milana Mazaeva of the New York Times: After nearly 15 months in Moscow's Lefortovo prison, Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich, a U.S. citizen, "went on trial Wednesday, facing up to 20 years in prison on an espionage charge that he, his employer and the U.S. State Department vehemently deny." Russia has not made public any evidence that Gershkovich is a spy, and the trial is secret.

News Lede

New York Times: "At least 11 Americans were among those who died while making the Islamic pilgrimage of hajj to Saudi Arabia this month in searing temperatures, the U.S. State Department said on Tuesday, adding that it was possible that more deaths could be confirmed in the coming days. In Maryland, the daughter of one couple was still searching for answers about the exact circumstances of her parents' deaths, and about the actions of the tour operator whom the couple had paid tens of thousands of dollars to help them make the trip."

The Conversation -- June 25, 2024

Hillary Clinton, in a New York Times op-ed, has some advice for President Biden: "I am the only person to have debated both [Joe Biden and Donald Trump].... It is a waste of time to try to refute Mr. Trump's arguments like in a normal debate. It's nearly impossible to identify what his arguments even are. He starts with nonsense and then digresses into blather. This has gotten only worse in the years since we debated [in 2016].... Mr. Trump may rant and rave in part because he wants to avoid giving straight answers about his unpopular positions, like restrictions on abortion, giving tax breaks to billionaires and selling out our planet to big oil companies in return for campaign donations. He interrupts and bullies -- he even stalked me around the stage at one point -- because he wants to appear dominant and throw his opponent off balance. These ploys will fall flat if Mr. Biden is as direct and forceful as he was when engaging Republican hecklers at the State of the Union address in March." Read on. ~~~

     ~~~ BTW, see Akhilleus' commentary on both-siderism in today's thread.

Perry Stein & Devlin Barrett of the Washington Post: "U.S. District Judge Aileen M. Cannon signaled Friday that Donald Trump's legal team had not convinced her FBI agents offered false information to justify searching Mar-a-Lago -- a potential blow to the former president's efforts to disqualify key evidence in the classified documents case against him.... The session capped three days of hearings in Cannon's courtroom. In the morning, she held a closed-door hearing on Trump's efforts to bar at trial the audio notes that investigators got from one of Trump's former attorneys, Evan Corcoran.... She did not issue rulings from the bench on any of the motions...."

Judge Partially Lifts Gag Order Against 34-Time Felon. Dareh Gregorian of NBC News: "The judge who presided over Donald Trump's hush money trial on Tuesday lifted some of the restrictions from his gag order. The ruling by Judge Juan Merchan comes two days before Trump is set to debate President Joe Biden.... Merchan's ruling lifted restrictions on Trump's ability to comment on the witnesses who testified against him during his trial, as well as a part of the order barring him from discussing the jury that convicted him -- essentially finding the witnesses' and the jury's work had concluded so there was no fear of impacting the proceedings. The ruling left in place a part of the order barring Trump from going after court staff, individual prosecutors and 'family members of any counsel, staff member, the Court or the District Attorney.'... While the ruling now allows Trump to mention the jury broadly, he is still prevented from talking about jurors by name or divulging their personal information under the terms of a separate protective order that is still in place."

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Marie: Starting now, I will be mostly unavailable until quite late Tuesday. I may -- or may not -- be able to post some links early today, but I won't be doing much.

Alice Ollstein of Politico: "A new coalition of abortion-rights groups is marking the second anniversary of the fall of Roe v. Wade with a pledge to spend $100 million to restore federal protections for the procedure and make it more accessible than ever before.... Groups including Planned Parenthood, the ACLU and Reproductive Freedom for All are banding together to form Abortion Access Now -- a national, 10-year campaign that will both prepare policies for the next time Democrats control the House, Senate and White House, and build support for those policies among lawmakers and the public."

Nicole Narea of Vox: "... Dobbs has ... had a devastating effect on pregnant people in huge swaths of the country. While the number of abortions across the country actually increased last year -- thanks in large part to increasingly cheap and accessible medication abortion -- that has not changed the fundamental realities of post-Dobbs America. Large reproductive care deserts have emerged in which there are no abortion providers for hundreds of miles. Pregnant people are being denied necessary medical care as their doctors fear the legal repercussions of providing it. All of this has exacerbated long-standing inequities."

Presidential Race

There are lotsa stories about the Biden-Trump debate, to be held Thursday night. Here's one by Michael Scherer & Marianne LeVine of the Washington Post that's probably not much less worse than the rest. And here's Stephen Collinson of CNN: "... the policy meat of a presidential debate has rarely been so important as in this neck-and-neck White House race."

Isabella Ramirez of Politico: "A Donald Trump spokesperson got into a tense exchange with CNN's Kasie Hunt over debate hosts Dana Bash and Jake Tapper on Monday morning -- just days before the former president is set to face off against President Joe Biden on the cable network this week. Hunt cut Karoline Leavitt's mic after an interview with the national press secretary on 'This Morning' about Trump's prep for Thursday's debate spiraled into an argument.... Leavitt called Bash and Tapper 'biased' and said Trump is 'knowingly going into a hostile environment.'... 'Ma'am, we're going to stop this interview if you're going to keep attacking my colleagues,' Hunt replied as the two spoke over each other." (Also linked yesterday.)

Tom Sullivan of Hullabaloo caught up on a few of Trump's latest deranged musings. Thanks to RAS for the link. (Also linked yesterday.)

Lisa Mascaro of the AP: "Tom Jones and his American Accountability Foundation are digging into the backgrounds, social media posts and commentary of key high-ranking government employees, starting with the Department of Homeland Security. They're relying in part on tips from his network of conservative contacts, including workers. In a move that alarms some, they're preparing to publish the findings online. With a $100,000 grant from the Heritage Foundation, the goal is to post 100 names of government workers to a website this summer to show a potential new administration who might be standing in the way of a second-term Trump agenda -- and ripe for scrutiny, reclassifications, reassignments or firings.... The effort, focused on top career government officials who aren't appointees within the political structure, has stunned democracy experts and shocked the civil service community in what they compare with the red scare of McCarthyism." (Also linked yesterday.)

National Crime Blotter

Devlin Barrett & Perry Stein of the Washington Post: "U.S. District Judge Aileen M. Cannon dived into the minutiae of the Justice Department budget at a morning hearing about ... Donald Trump's indictment for allegedly mishandling classified documents.... Cannon showed a particular interest in how much special counsel appointments cost the government, at one point calling it a 'significant' amount of money, even though the totals represent a drop in the bucket of Justice Department spending.... Trump lawyer Emil Bove decried the proposal to limit Trump's ability to make such allegations, calling it 'a truly extraordinary effort to gag his ability to speak at a debate' and on the campaign trail.... Bove argued that the Justice Department had fundamentally erred by running a stand-alone special counsel investigation without sufficient oversight.... Cannon has shown an eagerness to delve into a host of legal issues raised by the defense, including some that are more commonly raised on appeal in other cases." (Also linked yesterday.) ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: Cannon's inquiry into DOJ finances is preposterous. It's as if the Supremes heard a ridiculous claim of presidential immunity in a specific case that could be easily dismissed -- and instead pulled their chinny-chin-chins & opined that their decision would be so far-reaching and consequential it would be "a rule for the ages." Oh, wait. ~~~

     ~~~ Alan Feuer & Eileen Sullivan of the New York Times: “At a contentious hearing in Federal District Court in Fort Pierce, Fla..., [Judge] Aileen M. Cannon seemed disinclined to impose new conditions on Mr. Trump that would limit what he could say about the F.B.I.... The judge ... questioned whether they could show there was a 'reasonable necessity' to impose the measures in order to protect the safety of the agents.... Judge Cannon ... seemed to have a hard time discerning a direct connection between Mr. Trump's messages ... claiming that federal agents were 'locked & loaded ready to take me out' ... and any palpable threats to agents working on the documents case." MB: I don't suppose Judge Aileen would be so cavalier about the safety of her own family, but I reckon her calculation is that if the agents had been as nice as she was to Donald Trump, he wouldn't sic his insane followers on them. ~~~

~~~ ** That Time Trump Sneaked down to Mar-a-Lago. Katherine Faulders of ABC News: "A trip to Mar-a-Lago taken by ... Donald Trump that aides allegedly 'kept quiet' just weeks before FBI agents searched the property for classified materials in his possession raised suspicions among special counsel Jack Smith's team as a potential additional effort to obstruct the government's classified documents investigation, sources familiar with the matter told ABC News. The previously unreported visit, which allegedly took place July 10-12 in the summer of 2022, was raised in several interviews with witnesses..., as investigators sought to determine whether it was part of Trump's broader alleged effort to withhold the documents after receiving a subpoena demanding their return. At least one witness who worked closely with the former president recalled being told at the time of the trip that Trump was there 'checking on the boxes,' according to sources familiar with what the witness told investigators." (Also linked yesterday.)

Tracey Tully & Benjamin Weiser of the New York Times report on developments in the corruption trial of Sen. Bob Menendez (D-N.J.) Odd secrets, mysterious contacts and camel rides.

MEANWHILE, on an Island Far, Far Away.... The Strange End of a Strange Saga. Glenn Thrush & Megan Specia of the New York Times: "Julian Assange, the founder of WikiLeaks, agreed to plead guilty on Monday to a single felony count of illegally obtaining and disclosing national security material in exchange for his release from a British prison, ending his long and bitter standoff with the United States. Mr. Assange, 52, was granted his request to appear before a federal judge at one of the more remote outposts of the federal judiciary, the courthouse in Saipan, the capital of the Northern Mariana Islands.... He is expected to be sentenced to about five years, the equivalent of the time he has already served in Britain, according to a law enforcement official familiar with the terms of the agreement.

"It was a fitting final twist in the case against Mr. Assange, who doggedly opposed extradition to the U.S. mainland. The islands are a United States commonwealth in the middle of the Pacific Ocean -- and much closer to Mr. Assange's native Australia, where he is a citizen, than courts in the continental United States or Hawaii. Shortly after the deal was disclosed, WikiLeaks said that Mr. Assange had left London. Mr. Assange is scheduled to appear in Saipan at 9 a.m. local time on Wednesday and is expected to fly back to Australia 'at the conclusion of the proceedings,' ... an official in the Justice Department's counterterrorism division, wrote in a letter to the judge in the case." The AP's report is here.

     ~~~ Mikhail Klimentov of the Washington Post has a timeline of key moments in Julian Assange's life.

Tara Bernard & Zach Montague of the New York Times: "Two federal judges in Kansas and Missouri temporarily blocked pieces of the Biden administration's new student loan repayment plan on Monday in rulings that will have implications for millions of federal borrowers. Borrowers enrolled in the income-driven repayment plan, known as SAVE, are expected to continue to make payments. But those with undergraduate debt will no longer see their payments cut in half starting on July 1, a huge disappointment for borrowers who may have been counting on that relief. The separate preliminary injunctions on Monday are tied to lawsuits filed this year by two groups of Republican-led states seeking to upend the SAVE program, a centerpiece of President Biden's agenda to provide relief to student borrowers." Politico's report is here. ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: This would all be part of the GOP Anti-American Dream Plan, where they lay obstacles in front of young people who want to educate themselves, improve their lives, contribute to their communities and boost the U.S. economy. The entire GOP project is to Make America Suck Again.

Abbie VanSickle of the New York Times: "The Supreme Court agreed on Monday to consider a Tennessee law that bans certain medical treatments for transgender minors, the first time the justices will decide on the constitutionality of such statewide bans. The move could have broad ramifications for about 25 states that have enacted similar measures. Republican-led state legislatures have pushed to curtail transgender rights in recent years, with laws that target gender-transition care and that regulate other parts of life, including which bathrooms students and others can use and which sports teams they can play on."

Dave Collins of the AP: “A U.S. bankruptcy court trustee is planning to shut down conspiracy theorist Alex Jones' Infowars media platform and liquidate its assets to help pay the $1.5 billion in lawsuit judgments Jones owes for repeatedly calling the 2012 Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting a hoax. In an 'emergency' motion filed Sunday in Houston, trustee Christopher Murray indicated publicly for the first time that he intends to 'conduct an orderly wind-down' of the operations of Infowars' parent company and 'liquidate its inventory.'" Thanks to RAS for the link.

Annals of "Journalism," Ctd. Jo Becker & Justin Scheck of the New York Times: "For years, reporters at News Corporation's best-selling British tabloid had landed scoops by paying public officials and illegally listening to the voice mail messages of royals, politicians, celebrities and even a murdered girl. [In 2011, Will] Lewis[, now the publisher of the Washington Post], was supposed to cooperate with the police, identify wrongdoing and help steer the company through the crisis. But confidential documents obtained by The New York Times and interviews with people involved in the criminal investigation show that, almost from the beginning, investigators with London's Metropolitan Police were suspicious of News Corporation's intentions, and came to view Mr. Lewis as an impediment.... Scotland Yard detectives were shocked to learn that the company had deleted millions of internal emails, despite notices from a lawyer for an alleged phone hacking victim and the police explicitly asking that any documents related to the investigation be preserved...."

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Louisiana. Rick Rojas of the New York Times: "A group of parents in Louisiana filed a federal lawsuit on Monday seeking to block a new state law requiring that the Ten Commandments be posted in every public school classroom.... The American Civil Liberties Union of Louisiana, one of the organizations representing the parents, has condemned the legislation as 'blatantly unconstitutional.'" The AP's story is here.

Maryland. Michael Laris of the Washington Post: "The Dali container ship departed Baltimore with a mostly new crew and eased under the Chesapeake Bay Bridge on Monday, sailing on its own power toward Norfolk three months after it veered off course and left a path of destruction that will take years to recover from."

New York Congressional Race. Michelle Goldberg of the New York Times has some thoughts about the most expensive House primary race in U.S. history. Today's election pits Rep. Jamaal Bowman (D) against challenger George Latimer. Both candidates are flawed.

** Texas. Kaitlin Sullivan & Jason Kane of NBC News: "A Texas law that banned abortions in early pregnancy is associated with a stark increase in infant and newborn deaths, a study published Monday in JAMA Pediatrics found.... Infant deaths in Texas rose by nearly 13% the year after SB8 was passed, from 1,985 in 2021 to 2,240 in 2022. During that same period, infant deaths rose by about 2% nationwide. Babies born with congenital anomalies also increased in Texas, by nearly 23%, but decreased by about 3% nationwide. 'This is pointing to a causal effect of the policy; we didn't see this increase in infant deaths in other states,' said Alison Gemmill ... of Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, who led the research." (Also linked yesterday.)

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Israel/Palestine, et al.

The New York Times' live updates of develoments Tuesday in the Israel/Hamas war are here.

Tia Goldenberg & Samy Magdy of the AP: "The viability of a U.S.-backed proposal to wind down the 8-month-long war in Gaza has been cast into doubt after Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said he would only be willing to agree to a 'partial' cease-fire deal that would not end the war, comments that sparked an uproar from families of hostages held by Hamas."

The Conversation -- June 24, 2024

Marie: Starting now, I will be mostly unavailable until late Tuesday. I may -- or may not -- be able to post some links during that period of time, but I won't be doing much.

Isabella Ramirez of Politico: "A Donald Trump spokesperson got into a tense exchange with CNN's Kasie Hunt over debate hosts Dana Bash and Jake Tapper on Monday morning -- just days before the former president is set to face off against President Joe Biden on the cable network this week. Hunt cut Karoline Leavitt's mic after an interview with the national press secretary on 'This Morning' aboutTrump's prep for Thursday's debate spiraled into an argument.... Leavitt called Bash and Tapper 'biased' and said Trump is 'knowingly going into a hostile environment.'... 'Ma'am, we're going to stop this interview if you're going to keep attacking my colleagues,' Hunt replied as the two spoke over each other."

Devlin Barrett & Perry Stein of the Washington Post: "U.S. District Judge Aileen M. Cannon dived into the minutiae of the Justice Department budget at a morning hearing about ... Donald Trump's indictment for allegedly mishandling classified documents.... Cannon showed a particular interest in how much special counsel appointments cost the government, at one point calling it a 'significant' amount of money, even though the totals represent a drop in the bucket of Justice Department spending.... Trump lawyer Emil Bove decried the proposal to limit Trump's ability to make such allegations, calling it 'a truly extraordinary effort to gag his ability to speak at a debate' and on the campaign trail.... Bove argued that the Justice Department had fundamentally erred by running a stand-alone special counsel investigation without sufficient oversight.... Cannon has shown an eagerness to delve into a host of legal issues raised by the defense, including some that are more commonly raised on appeal in other cases." ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: Cannon's inquiry into DOJ finances is preposterous. It's as if the Supremes heard a ridiculous claim of presidential immunity in a specific case that could be easily dismissed -- and instead pulled their chinny-chin-chins & opined that their decision would be so far-reaching and consequential it would be "a rule for the ages." Oh, wait. ~~~

~~~ ** That Time Trump Sneaked down to Mar-a-Lago. Katherine Faulders of ABC News: "A trip to Mar-a-Lago taken by ... Donald Trump that aides allegedly 'kept quiet' just weeks before FBI agents searched the property for classified materials in his possession raised suspicions among special counsel Jack Smith's team as a potential additional effort to obstruct the government's classified documents investigation, sources familiar with the matter told ABC News. The previously unreported visit, which allegedly took place July 10-12 in the summer of 2022, was raised in several interviews with witnesses..., as investigators sought to determine whether it was part of Trump's broader alleged effort to withhold the documents after receiving a subpoena demanding their return. At least one witness who worked closely with the former president recalled being told at the time of the trip that Trump was there 'checking on the boxes,' according to sources familiar...."

Lisa Mascaro of the AP: "Tom Jones and his American Accountability Foundation are digging into the backgrounds, social media posts and commentary of key high-ranking government employees, starting with the Department of Homeland Security. They're relying in part on tips from his network of conservative contacts, including workers. In a move that alarms some, they're preparing to publish the findings online. With a $100,000 grant from the Heritage Foundation, the goal is to post 100 names of government workers to a website this summer to show a potential new administration who might be standing in the way of a second-term Trump agenda -- and ripe for scrutiny, reclassifications, reassignments or firings.... The effort, focused on top career government officials who aren't appointees within the political structure, has stunned democracy experts and shocked the civil service community in what they compare with the red scare of McCarthyism."

Tom Sullivan of Hullabaloo caught up on a few of Trump's latest deranged musings. Thanks to RAS for the link.

** Texas. Kaitlin Sullivan & Jason Kane of NBC News: "A Texas law that banned abortions in early pregnancy is associated with a stark increase in infant and newborn deaths, a study published Monday in JAMA Pediatrics found.... Infant deaths in Texas rose by nearly 13% the year after SB8 was passed, from 1,985 in 2021 to 2,240 in 2022. During that same period, infant deaths rose by about 2% nationwide. Babies born with congenital anomalies also increased in Texas, by nearly 23%, but decreased by about3% nationwide. 'This is pointing to a causal effect of the policy; we didn't see this increase in infant deaths in other states,' said Alison Gemmill ... of Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, who led the research."

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Lisa Rein of the Washington Post: "For decades, the Social Security Administration has denied thousands of people disability benefits by claiming they could find jobs that have all but vanished from the U.S. economy -- occupations like nut sorter, pneumatic tube operator and microfilm processor. On Monday, the agency will eliminate all but a handful of those unskilled jobs from a long-outdated database used to decide who gets benefits and who is denied, ending a practice that advocates have long decried as unfair and inaccurate. Commissioner Martin O'Malley's decision to jettison federal labor market data that was last updated 47 years ago follows a Washington Post investigation in December 2022 that revealed how the antiquated list of jobs was blocking many claimants who could not work from receiving vital monthly disability checks."

Drew Harwell of the Washington Post: "The U.S. Postal Service has shared information from thousands of Americans' letters and packages with law enforcement every year for the past decade, conveying the names, addresses and other details from the outside of boxes and envelopes without requiring a court order. Postal inspectors say they fulfill such requests only when mail monitoring can help find a fugitive or investigate a crime. But a decade's worth of records, provided exclusively to The Washington Post in response to a congressional probe, show Postal Service officials have received more than 60,000 requests from federal agents and police officers since 2015, and that they rarely say no.... The practice is legal, and the inspectors said they share only what they can see on the outside of the mail; the Fourth Amendment requires them to get a warrant to peek inside."

Presidential Race

Peter Alexander, et al., of NBC News: "The Biden campaign and its allies plan to hold 1,600 events and run a new slate of TV and digital advertisements ahead of Thursday's presidential debate, which they called 'one of the first moments ... where a larger slice of the American electorate' will tune in to the campaign, according to a new memo obtained first by NBC News. The events will include a nationwide mobilization of surrogates, events targeting groups the campaign sees as crucial to its coalition, like members of the LGBTQ community and college students, and 300 debate night watch parties.... [President] Biden is spending several days at Camp David preparing for Thursday's debate, including going toe-to-toe with his personal lawyer Bob Bauer, who is role-playing as Trump. Bauer also played Trump during debate preparation in 2020. Bauer is joined by a slew of Biden confidants who are working to prepare the president ahead of the debate, including former chief of staff Ron Klain, campaign chair Jennifer O'Malley Dillon and White House senior adviser Anita Dunn."

Jeffrey Sonnenfeld in a New York Times op-ed: "Recent headlines suggest that our nation's business leaders are embracing the presidential candidate Donald Trump.... That is far from the truth.... Mr. Trump continues to suffer from the lowest level of corporate support in the history of the Republican Party.... Not a single Fortune 100 chief executive has donated to the candidate so far this year, which indicates a major break from overwhelming business and executive support for Republican presidential candidates dating back over a century.... Their legitimate misgivings about [President] Biden are overwhelmed by worries about Mr. Trump, version 2024. Mr. Trump's primary conduits to the business community in his first term ... are gone, replaced by MAGA extremists and junior varsity opportunists.... Mr. Trump and his team are doubling down on some of his most anti-business instincts, including proposing draconian 10 percent tariffs on all imports; unorthodox monetary and fiscal policies, including stripping the Federal Reserve Board of its independence;... and devaluing the dollar -- all of which would drive inflation much higher."

Tom Boggioni of the Raw Story: "During an appearance on MSNBC on Sunday morning, a former executive vice president of the Trump Organization revealed that her former boss thought it was funny to make jokes about the Nazi ovens around Jewish employees. Speaking with host Ali Velshi, attorney Barbara Res, who worked for the former president for years before reportedly leaving because she refused to tolerate his 'explosive moods' any longer, was asked if the 'weird rants' he has been going on lately are something new.... [Res recalled] '... a time when we had just hired a residential manager, a German guy, and he [Trump] was bragging amongst executives about how great the guy was and he was a real gentleman and so neat and clean and then he looked at a couple of our executives who happen to be Jewish, and he said "Watch out for this guy, he sort of remembers the ovens," and then smiled.'" ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: There was always something terribly wrong with Trump.

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Fenit Nirappil of the Washington Post: "State legislators and law enforcement are reinstating dormant laws that criminalize mask-wearing to penalize pro-Palestinin protesters who conceal their faces, raising concerns among covid-cautious Americans. Republican lawmakers in North Carolina are poised to overturn Gov. Roy Cooper's (D) recent veto of legislation to criminalize masking. New York Gov. Kathy Hochul (D) said earlier this month she supports legislative efforts to ban masks on the subway, citing an incident where masked protesters on a train shouted, 'Raise your hands if you're a Zionist. This is your chance to get out.' Student protesters in Ohio, Texas and Florida have been threatened with arrest for covering their faces. Decades-old laws against masking -- often crafted in response to the hooded terror of the Ku Klux Klan -- are on the books in at least 18 states and D.C., according to the International Center for Not-For-Profit Law. Lawmakers in some areas passed legislation to create health exemptions during the coronavirus pandemic while other authorities vowed not to enforce the statutes."

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E.U. Adam Satariano & Tripp Mickle of the New York Times: "Apple is imposing unfair restrictions on developers of applications for its App Store in violation of a new European Union law meant to encourage competition in the tech industry, regulators in Brussels said on Monday. The charges further escalated a tussle between Apple, which says its products are designed in the best interest of customers, and E.U. regulators, who say the company is unfairly using its size and considerable resources to stifle competition."

Israel/Palestine, et al.

The New York Times' live updates of developments Monday in the Israel/Hamas war are here.

Michael Schwartz, et al., of CNN: "Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has defended his decision to go public about delays in the supply of weapons from the United States, saying months of private discussions did not yield any results.... Netanyahu claimed on Tuesday that the Biden administration was 'withholding weapons' in a video posted to X, claiming that Secretary of State Antony Blinken 'assured me that the administration is working day and night to remove these bottlenecks.' In response, US envoy Amos Hochstein told Netanyahu that his comments were 'unproductive' and 'more importantly, completely untrue.'... Amid the dispute, Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant on Sunday reiterated the importance of Israel's relations with Washington ahead of a visit where he is scheduled to meet his US counterpart, Lloyd Austin, Blinken and other senior US officials. 'The United States is our most important and central ally. Our ties are crucial and perhaps more important than ever, at this time,' Gallant told reporters, according to a statement from the Israeli defense ministry."

Russia. Anton Troianovski & Ivan Nechepurenko of the New York Times: "Gunmen attacked synagogues and churches in two cities in southern Russia on Sunday, killing multiple police officers and a priest, in an apparently coordinated assault that underscored Russia's vulnerability to extremist violence. Officials said six of the gunmen were killed after shootouts in the two cities, Makhachkala and Derbent, in the predominantly Muslim region of Dagestan on the Caspian Sea. Wielding rifles and Molotov cocktails, they attacked a synagogue and a church in each of the two cities, according to the authorities and religious organizations."