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Vox
What to expect from the January 6 hearings
The House committee investigating the January 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol is ready to revisit a day that has already faded from many Americans’ minds, using a series of splashy hearings this summer — the first is Thursday in primetime — to produce a full, public reckoning over the events that culminated in the attack.
The legal and political impacts the public hearings will have are uncertain. Even with all the attention they are sure to get, few expect findings will massively shake up public opinion or shift the political winds for Democrats, who currently face dismal poll numbers for midterms elections. There is no scenario in which the work of the select committee leads to Donald Trump being frogmarched out of Mar-a-Lago, or even with top Republicans publicly denouncing him in the same way they did in the immediate aftermath of the attack.
Instead, the test for many on the Hill is whether the hearings can, at the very least, produce sufficient momentum to ensure passage of reforms they hope would prevent efforts like the one taken after the 2020 election from happening again.
Rep. Adam Schiff, one of the Democrats on the committee, told reporters on Wednesday that the committee’s role is “not a prosecutorial one.” Rather, he said, its role is “to expose everything that went on that put our democracy at risk and propose reforms to protect our country going forward.”
Mother Jones
The January 6 Committee Doesn’t Need New “Bombshells.” We Already Know What Happened.
Sometimes one quote sums up a problem perfectly. As the congressional committee investigating January 6 prepared to begin its public hearings, Sunday show host Margaret Brennan of CBS posed a question to Rep. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) that encapsulates the political peril for the committee: “If you don’t deliver a bombshell on Thursday, don’t you run the risk of losing the public’s attention here?”
Brennan was channeling a dangerous narrative that has become conventional wisdom, not just for Beltway media types but also among many Democrats: the need for more. A violent coup attempt carried out in plain sight apparently isn’t enough. Donald Trump incited a riot. Several people died. In the run up to that horrific day, Trump plotted firing Justice Department leadership and installing a new attorney general who would help overturn the 2020 election. Trump and his advisers hatched plans to send in fake electors and for the military to seize voting machines. He cajoled election officials to “find 11,780 votes” and pressured the vice president to thwart the electoral count. He used outrageous lies to try to steal an election.
Schiff responded, appropriately, that the public already has bombshells. What Americans need now, he told Brennan, is to understand “how close we came to losing our democracy.”
The Atlantic
January 6 Is a Dangerous Shorthand
January 6 marked the first time an American president incited a lethal attack on another branch of government—but the second attempt to hold on to power through a coordinated and subversive campaign. Watergate was the first.
As the House January 6 Select Committee prepares for its slate of public hearings—coinciding, as it happens, with the 50th anniversary of the break-in—Representative Jamie Raskin, a panel member, has promised something akin to the “Watergate hearings … in terms of explaining to America what actually happened.” But given the failure of the Watergate affair’s true nature to take root in popular memory, perhaps we should hope for better. […]
The assault on Congress that afternoon represented a desperate and violent attempt to prevent the transfer of power after a months-long campaign to do so had failed. As with Watergate, the campaign was bracing in its scope…
It will be the task of the select committee to pull together the threads of grave misconduct it has exhaustively investigated into a coherent story with an already evident truth at its heart: Despite having lost the election, the former president and his associates embarked on a massive and galling expedition to maintain the presidency at any cost.
AP News
4th grade Uvalde survivor: ‘I don’t want it to happen again’
An 11-year-old girl who survived the mass shooting at an elementary school in Uvalde, Texas, recounted in video testimony to Congress on Wednesday how she covered herself with a dead classmate’s blood to avoid being shot and “just stayed quiet.”
Miah Cerrillo, a fourth-grader at Robb Elementary School, told lawmakers in a prerecorded video that she watched a teacher get shot in the head before looking for a place to hide.
“I thought he would come back so I covered myself with blood,” Miah told the House panel. “I put it all over me and I just stayed quiet.” She called 911 using the deceased teacher’s phone and pleaded for help.
The Washington Post
House passes tough new gun measures hours after wrenching testimony
The House on Wednesday endorsed some of the most aggressive gun-control measures taken up on Capitol Hill in years — including raising the minimum age for the purchase of most semiautomatic rifles to 21 and banning high-capacity ammunition magazines — as Washington seeks to mount a tough response to recent high-profile mass shootings.
The 223-to-204 vote took place just hours after a House committee heard searing testimony from a young survivor of the May 24 shooting in Uvalde, Tex., as well as the parents of a victim and a pediatrician who responded to the tragedy that left 19 elementary-schoolers and two teachers dead.
Five Republicans joined most Democrats in backing the legislation. Two Democrats voted no.
The Texas Tribune
Federal investigation into law enforcement’s response to Uvalde shooting won’t be criminal, DOJ says
U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland said Wednesday that the Department of Justice’s investigation into the law enforcement response to the elementary school shooting in Uvalde won’t be criminal in nature.
Garland described the federal investigation as a “critical incident review,” which was done after other mass shootings such as in San Bernardino, California, and Orlando, Florida. The review will assess the law enforcement response and “give guidance for the future,” Garland said. The department will then produce a public report, which will include the investigation’s findings and recommendations.
NPR
Understanding the complaints from Simone Biles and others seeking $1B from the FBI
Dozens of women and girls who were sexually abused by the former gymnastics doctor Larry Nassar have filed administrative claims against the FBI over its investigation.
U.S. Women's National Team gymnasts Simone Biles and Aly Raisman and gymnast Maggie Nichols are among the more than 90 claimants who are seeking damages in excess of $1 billion from the bureau.
The group says the FBI failed to properly follow up on credible claims against Nassar in 2015, after which victims continued to face sexual abuse at the hands of the now-disgraced doctor.
The Justice Department announced in May that it wouldn't prosecute two FBI agents who, according to a government watchdog, lied and hid their missteps from authorities.
The New York Times
Trump Set to Be Questioned Under Oath by New York A.G. Next Month
Donald J. Trump and two of his adult children have agreed to be questioned under oath in mid-July by lawyers from the New York State attorney general’s office, unless the state’s highest court intervenes.
The agreement, filed Wednesday in New York State Supreme Court, says that Mr. Trump, Donald Trump Jr. and Ivanka Trump have agreed to appear for testimony that will begin on Friday, July 15, and end the following week.
The questioning will come as the state attorney general, Letitia James, concludes the final phase of her investigation into Mr. Trump and the business practices of his company, The Trump Organization. The agreement follows a number of legal setbacks for [Trump], whose lawyers had fought the attorney general for months, hoping to avoid questioning. […]
Another of Mr. Trump’s adult children, Eric Trump, was questioned under oath in October 2020, and invoked his right against self-incrimination in response to more than 500 questions.
Los Angeles Times
Did fed-up California voters really rebuke the left on election day? Not exactly
Going into election night, a talking point in the national media was whether California voters would rebuke the left and move a bit more to the center.
Central to this conversation was a ballot measure to recall progressive prosecutor Chesa Boudin, who became a lightning rod for controversies over crime and homelessness in San Francisco. If the famously liberal city ousted Boudin, and billionaire businessman Rick Caruso had a strong showing in the Los Angeles mayoral race, would that represent a shift in blue California?
Boudin was recalled by a wide margin, and Caruso advanced to a mayoral runoff, finishing ahead of Rep. Karen Bass (D-Los Angeles).
Both results underscore how much the issues of crime and homelessness — as well as housing affordability — have become major concerns in both deep-blue cities, with voters demanding change.
The Denver Post
Lauren Boebert’s mileage reimbursements under investigation, state officials say
Colorado officials are investigating whether the conservative Western Slope U.S. Rep. Lauren Boebert broke any laws by cashing in on large amounts of mileage reimbursements from her own campaign.
Boebert paid herself more than $22,000 from her campaign account in 2020, raising red flags for ethics experts, The Denver Post previously reported. While candidates can legally reimburse themselves for the miles they drive, those payments would have meant she drove nearly 39,000 miles while campaigning.
And in one four-month span of her campaign, Boebert had only one publicly advertised event.
Detroit Free Press
Michigan Supreme Court rejects Donna Brandenburg lawsuit seeking ballot spot
The Michigan Supreme Court rejected a lawsuit Tuesday filed by Republican gubernatorial candidate and Byron Center businesswoman Donna Brandenburg for a spot on the August primary ballot.
The court issued its order after the names of candidates for the upcoming were certified and sent out to county clerks last Friday to prepare ballots for printing.
Brandenburg was one of five GOP gubernatorial candidates whose nominating petitions to qualify for the ballot were riddled with fraudulent signatures, according to a review by the Bureau of Elections.
Redding Record Searchlight
Shasta County election officials say observers tried to 'intimidate' them during vote count
Shasta County elections officials said discussions with representatives of anti-establishment candidates became "contentious" and at least one worker said she felt "intimidated" by them.
Joanna Francescut, assistant county clerk and registrar of voters, said some of the people who showed up Tuesday night were trying to intimidate election officials by telling them to seal off a room where the ballots are kept. Francescut said the office's employees are following the law.
At one point, several people gathered around County Clerk and Registrar of Voters Cathy Darling Allen and confronted her. Darling Allen said later she spent more than four hours talking to observers in discussions that she said were at times "contentious."
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
January 6 committee to hear from Raffensperger, Sterling
[Georgia] Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger and his top deputy Gabe Sterling are slated to testify this month before the House select committee investigating the Jan. 6 attack, according to a person with knowledge of the situation.
The Republicans are expected to be witnesses before the panel in the weeks ahead, likely the week of June 20, as part of its public hearings designed to shed new light on the 2021 insurrection at the U.S. Capitol, according to the source, who was not authorized to speak on the record.
Reveal
She Helped Create the Big Lie. Records Suggest She Turned It Into a Big Grift.
Over the last two presidential election cycles, True the Vote has raised millions in donations with claims that it discovered tide-turning voter fraud. It’s promised to release its evidence. It never has. […]
A former PTA mom-turned-Tea Party activist, True the Vote founder Catherine Engelbrecht has played a pivotal role in helping drive the voter fraud movement from the political fringes to a central pillar in the Republican Party’s ideology. […]
A review of thousands of pages of documents from state filings, tax returns and court records, however, paints the picture of an organization that enriches Engelbrecht and partner Gregg Phillips rather than actually rooting out any fraud.
Des Moines Register
Mike Franken wins Democratic US Senate primary; to take on Chuck Grassley in November
Democrat Mike Franken will take on Republican U.S. Sen. Chuck Grassley in November, clinching an upset primary victory over perceived front-runner Abby Finkenauer.
Franken, a retired Navy admiral, entered the race months after Finkenauer, but quickly built up steam, overtaking her in fundraising and beating her to the television airwaves in April. […]
“Tonight, you’ve bestowed upon me a great honor,” he said. “Iowa has much to offer this country. And we have the leadership now to make it happen.”
He promised to support Iowa Democratic candidates "from the school board on up."
The Philadelphia Inquirer
Pennsylvania’s recount is over, and the results are clear: The vote count was accurate the first time.
Mehmet Oz beat David McCormick by 951 votes in the Republican Senate primary — roughly the same margin as after the votes were first counted.
The numbers budged ever so slightly in some counties. But they didn’t change in any significant way. The recount didn’t magically find new votes, or expose major errors or any fraud.
Elections officials and experts said the fact that the numbers barely shifted — in counties big and small, Democratic and Republican — should build public trust.
HuffPost
Senate Candidate Blake Masters Accosts Democrat Wearing BLM Shirt At GOP Mixer
Blake Masters, a Republican U.S. Senate candidate in Arizona, forcefully ejected a Democratic activist from a GOP mixer last weekend, according to video footage of the event.
The incident took place at a meet-and-greet for Republican candidates in Green Valley, Arizona, on Saturday night. Peter Jackson, a 73-year-old Democratic activist, went to the event wearing a “Black Lives Matter” T-shirt and a button reading “fully vaxxed”; he was immediately confronted by those at the meeting, according to video footage uploaded to YouTube.
Bolts
South Dakotans Refuse to Weaken Ballot Initiatives, Keeping Hopes Alive for Medicaid Expansion
South Dakotans rejected a constitutional amendment on Tuesday that would have drastically weakened direct democracy in the state. The measure, known as Amendment C, was defeated 67 to 33 percent.
The result is a stinging defeat for the latest conservative effort to shut down popular initiatives, which in recent years have been a rare tool for progressive policies in red states. And it salvages a path for tens of thousands of people to newly qualify for public health insurance this fall.
Republicans rushed to place Amendment C on the June ballot to thwart a voter-initiated referendum on expanding Medicaid, scheduled for November. If Amendment C had passed on Tuesday, it would have changed the rules of that upcoming referendum—raising the threshold for passage to a tricky 60 percent.
Instead, the Medicaid expansion now only needs to clear 50 percent in November.
Miami Herald
‘They are not going to shut us up.’ Cuban exiles vow to boycott if Radio Mambí is ‘silenced’
Promising boycotts, protests and strikes, Cuban exile leaders expressed their fear that two Miami stations, Radio Mambí and WQBA — which have traditionally advocated for Cuba’s freedom — would be silenced after being bought by Latino Media Network, a media company run by “social activists with a left-wing progressive political agenda.”
TelevisaUnivision, Inc. reached an agreement to sell 18 stations, including Radio Mambí and WQBA, in different cities, to Latino Media Network (LMN), founded by Stephanie Valencia, who worked in the White House as a special assistant to the president and as director of public engagement under the Barack Obama administration, and Jess Morales Rocketto, who worked in the Obama and Hillary Clinton campaigns.
NBC News
Senate Democrats press Biden for executive actions on abortion
More than 20 Senate Democrats have signed onto a letter urging President Joe Biden to issue an immediate executive order directing his administration to develop a plan to defend reproductive protections, including the right to access abortion care, while also highlighting six specific steps the administration can take unilaterally to bolster access to abortion. […]
The senators seek six specific federal actions:
- Increasing access to medication abortion.
- Providing resources for people crossing state lines to access abortion care, such as travel vouchers and childcare services.
- Installing a reproductive health ombudsman at the Department of Health and Human Services.
- Enforcing Medicaid’s “Free Choice of Provider” requirements that let patient get family planning care from a provider of their choice.
- Re-defining language around data collection through websites and mobile applications.
- Increasing abortion accessibility, for example giving federal employees paid time off and reimbursement for expenses related to abortion care or having the Department of Justice assess what kind of reproductive services could be provided on federal property.
Recode
Why Joe Biden is invoking a war power to build heat pumps and solar panels
It looks like President Joe Biden is done waiting for Congress to do something about the country’s dependence on foreign energy. Through a series of executive actions announced on Monday, the president plans to use the Defense Production Act to boost clean energy in the United States by putting a two-year freeze on tariffs for solar panels coming to the country from Southeast Asia and simultaneously scaling up the domestic production of clean energy technologies.
This is the latest in a series of moves that show the White House is beginning to treat climate change and clean energy as national security issues. It’s also the kind of thing climate activists have been asking the Biden administration to do for months. The executive actions could bring thousands of manufacturing jobs to the country while also making the US less dependent on foreign oil and gas, particularly as the war in Ukraine continues.
The Daily Beast
Team Putin Dishes on the Moment They Could Win It All
[…] If Russian state TV is any indication, another reason Putin’s regime is now rejecting the idea of a diplomatic resolution has to do with the approaching midterm elections in the United States. […]
Across various state media outlets, the U.S. midterm elections have been mentioned as a potential saving grace that could halt American support of Ukraine and loosen the screws of sanctions against Russia. During Solovyov’s show, Andrey Sidorov, deputy dean of world politics at Moscow State University, asked: “Are we going to count on their electoral issues? Will anything change if Republicans prevail in November in the United States?”
The host, Vladimir Solovyov, responded enthusiastically. “Yes, yes, a lot will change. They will calmly say, ‘Why do we need to be involved and send so much of our own money?’” […]
Echoing popular Republican talking points on Ukraine…
The Kyiv Independent
In Sievierodonetsk, fierce urban battle ongoing to exhaust Russia
The Battle of Sievierodonetsk in Ukraine’s Donbas is an emotional see-saw, in which doom and gloom change to joy and hope constantly.
As Russia continues its massive offensive, there has been a seemingly inevitable possibility of the local Ukrainian grouping of nearly 10,000 troops being surrounded and defeated. […]
Contrary to expectations, the Ukrainian military opted to reinforce the Sievierodonetsk garrison and continue holding the ground in costly urban warfare, where Russia struggles to maintain its combat advantage over Ukraine.
According to experts, the successful Ukrainian counterattacks are a new indication of declining Russian combat power, despite the Kremlin’s massive concentration of forces in the area. But heavy fighting continues — and while Russia is running out of steam, the situation in the area remains very close to critical.
BBC News
Severodonetsk: Zelensky ties fate of east Ukraine to battle for city
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has said that fighting for the city of Severodonetsk may decide the outcome of the war in the east of the country. […]
He said his troops were inflicting major losses on enemy forces. But Ukrainian forces have been pushed back to the outskirts, according to the region's top Ukrainian official.
Serhiy Haidai, governor of the Luhansk region (which makes up the Donbas along with the neighbouring Donetsk region), said special forces had pulled back after Russia "started levelling the area with shelling and air strikes".
EuroNews
Ukraine's territorial integrity will never be up for negotiation, warns parliament chairman
Ukraine's territorial integrity will never be up for negotiation with Russia, warned the chairman of Ukraine's parliament, the Verkhovna Rada.
"Never, never the topic for negotiation will be the issue of Ukrainian sovereignty, independence and territorial integrity. Ukraine is an integral, sovereign country and will stay as such because it is recognised as such by the entire civilised world," Ruslan Stefanchuk told Euronews during his visit to Strasbourg, France, where he addressed the European Parliament.
"There is space for negotiation, for diplomacy. But we have to understand that, with each Irpin, with each Bucha, with each Mariupol, the corridor for negotiation gets smaller and smaller."
Reuters
Russia attacking Ukraine food targets to scare world, says regional governor
Russia is attacking food and agriculture targets in Ukraine in order to scare the world into agreeing a deal to reopen the Black Sea on Moscow's terms, the head of the region where a major agricultural storage facility was struck on Sunday said.
Vitaliy Kim, governor of the Mykolaiv region, where Russian shelling destroyed the warehouses of one of Ukraine's largest agricultural commodities terminals over the weekend, said Moscow wanted to make global food shortages "look like a catastrophe".
"They want to do this because they are trying to trade about opening the Black Sea" in the hope of a deal that might allow Ukrainian and Russian grain to use the waterway, possibly in exchange for an easing of sanctions, Kim [said].
Deutsche Welle
Angela Merkel doesn't blame herself for the current situation in Ukraine.
Former German Chancellor Angela Merkel defended her legacy on Ukraine on Tuesday in her first major interview since leaving office.
She refused to apologize for her policies towards Moscow, but stressed there was no justification for Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
"It's an objective breach of all international laws and of everything that allows us in Europe to live in peace at all. If we start going back through the centuries and arguing over which bit of territory should belong to whom, then we will only have war. That's not an option whatsoever." […]
Merkel defended her opposition to Ukraine and Georgia joining NATO in 2008. At the time, NATO pledged that the two countries would join at some point in the future, but declined to trigger the "membership action plan" to let them join the alliance within five to 10 years.
El País
Russian prosecutor admits 600 recruits were illegally sent to Ukraine war
The sinking of the missile cruiser Moskva, the flagship of the Russian Black Sea fleet, cost Yegor Shkrebets his life in mid-April. The young man was doing his military service and therefore legally should not have been in a combat zone. After his death, his father began a crusade to break the silence of the Armed Forces and demand justice. Yegor had not been the only young Russian sent to fight in the offensive against Ukraine. This Tuesday, the Prosecutor’s Office of one of the districts in which the Russian army is divided has recognized that some 600 recruits have participated in the hostilities and are going to be withdrawn from service. The avowal was made by Artur Yegiyev, military prosecutor of the Western Military District of Russia, Disciplinary measures for this violation of the law will predictably fall on a dozen officers targeted by the public prosecution.
“The recruits are not participating and will not participate in the fighting. There will also be no additional recruitment of reservists,” President Vladimir Putin had stressed in a message on March 8. Two days later, the spokesman for the Ministry of Defense, Igor Konashenkov, admitted that they had detected “several cases” that contradicted Putin’s words, but that those recruits would soon return home. Some of the young people had been identified following their capture by Ukraine, according to Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu.
Military service is compulsory in Russia between the ages of 18 and 27, but only professional soldiers, who have signed an employment contract with the armed forces, can be deployed in a conflict.
The Guardian
‘It wiped us out’: history of US forest mismanagement fans the flames of disaster
The air smells of ash and the landscape is leached of color. Spots of green punctuate the valley floor in places. But along the ridges, the powdery residue of charred trees has fallen like snow, accumulating up to 4 inches deep. These are the slices of forest where the fire burned the hottest, scorching ponderosa pines from crown to root. Once titans, they are now matchsticks.
Pola Lopez gestures in their direction, southward toward Hermits Peak. Before a tsunami of flames ripped through this canyon in Tierra Monte, the canopy was so thick that it was impossible to see the nearby mountain. But two prescribed burns set by the US Forest Service (USFS) – one on Hermits Peak, the other in Calf Canyon to the south-west – have changed all that.
When the blazes merged to form the biggest wildfire in state history, flames engulfed nearly 160 acres (65 hectares) of riparian forest that once belonged to her father. “It wiped us out,” Lopez said.
Ars Technica
Feds seize SSNDOB marketplace that listed personal data of 24 million people
Federal law enforcement agencies say they shut down a group of websites that made over $19 million selling Social Security numbers and other personal data.
A Justice Department press release yesterday announced "the seizure of the SSNDOB Marketplace, a series of websites that operated for years and were used to sell personal information, including the names, dates of birth, and Social Security numbers belonging to individuals in the United States." SSNDOB apparently operated for about a decade, and the Justice Department said it listed the personal information of about 24 million US residents.