"Germany in 1924 was a nation at odds with itself, divided in elections and factionalized in street fighting, by political arguments at taverns and dinner tables. Nazism was still in the future....and Berlin was the center of luxury and squalor, decadence and vice."
(Alfred Hitchcock; A Life in Darkness and Light", McGilligan, 2003.)
Sound familiar?
TrumpReich in action
Re: TrumpReich in action
No. I wonder what you could possibly have in mind. 
Re: TrumpReich in action
Brian, she is suggesting the US is decadent and corrupt like the Weimar Republic, that you are heading for open warfare on the streets and a dissolution of civil society until a modern Hitler (strong man) takes charge. Just faintly alarmist, perhaps?
Re: TrumpReich in action
Intimidate Black voters ? Well of course:
https://www.msnbc.com/the-reidout/reido ... -rcna74232
Lie? Of course:
https://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-sho ... -rcna74345
Put children to work?Of course.Arbeit Macht Frei:
https://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-sho ... -rcna74354
Work will help combat childhood obesity, per GOP Sen. Grassley:
https://washingtonmonthly.com/2012/01/1 ... aws-alone/
https://www.msnbc.com/the-reidout/reido ... -rcna74232
Lie? Of course:
https://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-sho ... -rcna74345
Put children to work?Of course.Arbeit Macht Frei:
https://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-sho ... -rcna74354
Work will help combat childhood obesity, per GOP Sen. Grassley:
https://washingtonmonthly.com/2012/01/1 ... aws-alone/
Re: TrumpReich in action
Pence remains a sick SOB ; of course,he’s had plenty of GOP role models:
https://www.yahoo.com/gma/white-house-d ... 00767.html
https://www.yahoo.com/gma/white-house-d ... 00767.html
Re: TrumpReich in action
Part of a NYT article today, another big liar:
WASHINGTON — House Republicans have quietly halted a congressional investigation into whether Donald J. Trump profited improperly from the presidency, declining to enforce a court-supervised settlement agreement that demanded that Mazars USA, his former accounting firm, produce his financial records to Congress.
Representative James R. Comer, Republican of Kentucky and the chairman of the Oversight and Accountability Committee, made clear he had abandoned any investigation into the former president’s financial dealings — professing ignorance about the inquiry Democrats opened when they controlled the House — and was instead focusing on whether President Biden and members of his family were involved in an influence-peddling scheme.
“I honestly didn’t even know who or what Mazars was,” said Mr. Comer, who was the senior Republican on the oversight panel during the last Congress, while Democrats waged a lengthy legal fight over obtaining documents from the firm.
“What exactly are they looking for?” Mr. Comer added in a brief statement to The New York Times on Monday. “They’ve been ‘investigating’ Trump for six years. I know exactly what I’m investigating: money the Bidens received from China.”
He confirmed the end to the inquiry into Mr. Trump after Democrats wrote to Mr. Comer raising concerns about the fact that Mazars, the former president’s longtime accounting firm that cut ties with him last year, had stopped turning over documents related to his financial dealings. The top Democrat on the panel suggested that Mr. Comer had worked with Mr. Trump’s lawyers to effectively kill the investigation, an accusation the chairman denied.
“It has come to my attention that you may have acted in league with attorneys for former President Donald Trump to block the committee from receiving documents subpoenaed in its investigation of unauthorized, unreported and unlawful payments by foreign governments and others to then-President Trump,” Representative Jamie Raskin of Maryland, the top Democrat on the panel, wrote on Sunday evening to Mr. Comer.
Mr. Comer on Monday denied knowledge of any attempt to coordinate with Mr. Trump’s lawyers to block the investigation, but he made it clear he did not plan to keep it going. His committee has issued no subpoenas concerning Mr. Trump’s finances.
Democrats fought in court for years to get financial documents from Mr. Trump’s former accounting firm, and only last year — after entering into a court-ordered settlement — began receiving the documents and gaining new insights into how foreign governments sought influence using the Trump International Hotel. The company has been delivering the documents to the committee in batches...."
WASHINGTON — House Republicans have quietly halted a congressional investigation into whether Donald J. Trump profited improperly from the presidency, declining to enforce a court-supervised settlement agreement that demanded that Mazars USA, his former accounting firm, produce his financial records to Congress.
Representative James R. Comer, Republican of Kentucky and the chairman of the Oversight and Accountability Committee, made clear he had abandoned any investigation into the former president’s financial dealings — professing ignorance about the inquiry Democrats opened when they controlled the House — and was instead focusing on whether President Biden and members of his family were involved in an influence-peddling scheme.
“I honestly didn’t even know who or what Mazars was,” said Mr. Comer, who was the senior Republican on the oversight panel during the last Congress, while Democrats waged a lengthy legal fight over obtaining documents from the firm.
“What exactly are they looking for?” Mr. Comer added in a brief statement to The New York Times on Monday. “They’ve been ‘investigating’ Trump for six years. I know exactly what I’m investigating: money the Bidens received from China.”
He confirmed the end to the inquiry into Mr. Trump after Democrats wrote to Mr. Comer raising concerns about the fact that Mazars, the former president’s longtime accounting firm that cut ties with him last year, had stopped turning over documents related to his financial dealings. The top Democrat on the panel suggested that Mr. Comer had worked with Mr. Trump’s lawyers to effectively kill the investigation, an accusation the chairman denied.
“It has come to my attention that you may have acted in league with attorneys for former President Donald Trump to block the committee from receiving documents subpoenaed in its investigation of unauthorized, unreported and unlawful payments by foreign governments and others to then-President Trump,” Representative Jamie Raskin of Maryland, the top Democrat on the panel, wrote on Sunday evening to Mr. Comer.
Mr. Comer on Monday denied knowledge of any attempt to coordinate with Mr. Trump’s lawyers to block the investigation, but he made it clear he did not plan to keep it going. His committee has issued no subpoenas concerning Mr. Trump’s finances.
Democrats fought in court for years to get financial documents from Mr. Trump’s former accounting firm, and only last year — after entering into a court-ordered settlement — began receiving the documents and gaining new insights into how foreign governments sought influence using the Trump International Hotel. The company has been delivering the documents to the committee in batches...."
Re: TrumpReich in action
I hate this sort of behaviour. People today seem to believe in free speech only for themselves, definitely not for opponents, and I fear this is true of both right and left. It was a fringe extremism, to try to sack and ruin opponents, but it is becoming more mainstream.
I am looking forward to Belle, who is red hot against left cancel culture, also criticising this right-wing version. I won't hold my breath.
I am looking forward to Belle, who is red hot against left cancel culture, also criticising this right-wing version. I won't hold my breath.
Re: TrumpReich in action
After teaching there for 20 years he doesn't have tenure? What idiocy is this?Rach3 wrote: ↑Fri Mar 17, 2023 5:30 pmDesantis' Nazis in action:
https://www.yahoo.com/news/florida-univ ... 54710.html
Oh, sure, cancel culture is only on the Left! Right!
Re: TrumpReich in action
From AxiosAM today:
"The bombastic, rambling speeches are still there. So are the insults and grievances. But there's something different about former President Trump's 2024 run: The underlying machinery is more organized than in past campaigns, Axios' Sophia Cai writes.
Why it matters: As Trump ramps up for '24 amid multiple investigations — and possible indictment — his team is no longer dominated by family members and hangers-on. It's staffed with political veterans who are building turnout engines in key states, starting with Iowa.
What's happening: Trump's team is led by two longtime GOP operatives — Susie Wiles, who helped DeSantis win the Florida governor's race in 2018, and Chris LaCivita, a longtime operative and former political director for the National Republican Senate Committee.
They're focused on building ground operations in early primary states — and on having Trump attack Ron DeSantis before the Florida governor enters the race.
Other senior advisers include three aides who were involved in the 2016 and 2020 efforts — Jason Miller, a longtime adviser; Steven Cheung, who heads communications; and Brian Jack, who was Trump's White House political director.
The advisers say they're steering Trump toward retail politics.
His early campaign has included informal stops at burger joints in South Carolina and Ohio, and a speech in Davenport, Iowa, where he took questions from the audience.
Trump aides are trying to discipline his policy discussions. On education, for example, they want him to talk about charter schools rather than "railing on wokeism."
At Mar-a-Lago, the advisers have had Trump taping scripts for "Agenda 47" policy videos to post on social media, in addition to his usual routine of golfing and hosting dinners.
Reality check: Trump is still Trump — and will do what he wants."
Hopefully , pride goeth before a fall.
"The bombastic, rambling speeches are still there. So are the insults and grievances. But there's something different about former President Trump's 2024 run: The underlying machinery is more organized than in past campaigns, Axios' Sophia Cai writes.
Why it matters: As Trump ramps up for '24 amid multiple investigations — and possible indictment — his team is no longer dominated by family members and hangers-on. It's staffed with political veterans who are building turnout engines in key states, starting with Iowa.
What's happening: Trump's team is led by two longtime GOP operatives — Susie Wiles, who helped DeSantis win the Florida governor's race in 2018, and Chris LaCivita, a longtime operative and former political director for the National Republican Senate Committee.
They're focused on building ground operations in early primary states — and on having Trump attack Ron DeSantis before the Florida governor enters the race.
Other senior advisers include three aides who were involved in the 2016 and 2020 efforts — Jason Miller, a longtime adviser; Steven Cheung, who heads communications; and Brian Jack, who was Trump's White House political director.
The advisers say they're steering Trump toward retail politics.
His early campaign has included informal stops at burger joints in South Carolina and Ohio, and a speech in Davenport, Iowa, where he took questions from the audience.
Trump aides are trying to discipline his policy discussions. On education, for example, they want him to talk about charter schools rather than "railing on wokeism."
At Mar-a-Lago, the advisers have had Trump taping scripts for "Agenda 47" policy videos to post on social media, in addition to his usual routine of golfing and hosting dinners.
Reality check: Trump is still Trump — and will do what he wants."Hopefully , pride goeth before a fall.
Re: TrumpReich in action
Michigan GOP tries to traffic off The Holocaust:
https://www.cnn.com/2023/03/22/politics ... index.html
https://www.cnn.com/2023/03/22/politics ... index.html
Re: TrumpReich in action
If you can't win, bury 'em!Rach3 wrote: ↑Mon Mar 27, 2023 9:25 amCensorship in Florida:
https://www.yahoo.com/news/removal-ruby ... 00339.html
Re: TrumpReich in action
Boycott everything Wisconsin, a little North Korea:
https://www.cnn.com/2023/03/28/entertai ... index.html
https://www.newyorker.com/news/the-poli ... MNYR062419
https://www.cnn.com/2023/03/28/entertai ... index.html
https://www.newyorker.com/news/the-poli ... MNYR062419
Last edited by Rach3 on Tue Mar 28, 2023 7:36 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Re: TrumpReich in action
From AxiosAM today:
Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin is raising alarms over one Republican senator’s bid to block the promotion of nearly 160 senior U.S. military officers in protest of the Pentagon’s new abortion policy, The Post’s Dan Lamothe reports.
Austin told the Senate Armed Services Committee yesterday that by impeding the promotions, Sen. Tommy Tuberville (R-Ala.) has caused a “ripple effect in the force that makes us far less ready than we need to be.”
Catch up quick: Tuberville, a member of the committee, said earlier this month that he would require the promotions to be approved one-by-one, rather than in batches, until the Defense Department rescinds its new policy, which provides paid leave and reimbursement for service members who travel out of state to obtain an abortion. While the nominations can still move ahead, they would require time-consuming steps by Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D.-N.Y.), who complained yesterday that Tuberville’s gambit was tantamount to “hostage taking.”
Tuberville fired back at his critics, contending that the Defense Department’s policy approves the use of taxpayer dollars to terminate pregnancies in violation of a decades-old law known as the Hyde Amendment. Tuberville told Austin that if the Pentagon wants to spend money on such initiatives, they should be included in the department’s annual defense policy bill.
Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin is raising alarms over one Republican senator’s bid to block the promotion of nearly 160 senior U.S. military officers in protest of the Pentagon’s new abortion policy, The Post’s Dan Lamothe reports.
Austin told the Senate Armed Services Committee yesterday that by impeding the promotions, Sen. Tommy Tuberville (R-Ala.) has caused a “ripple effect in the force that makes us far less ready than we need to be.”
Catch up quick: Tuberville, a member of the committee, said earlier this month that he would require the promotions to be approved one-by-one, rather than in batches, until the Defense Department rescinds its new policy, which provides paid leave and reimbursement for service members who travel out of state to obtain an abortion. While the nominations can still move ahead, they would require time-consuming steps by Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D.-N.Y.), who complained yesterday that Tuberville’s gambit was tantamount to “hostage taking.”
Tuberville fired back at his critics, contending that the Defense Department’s policy approves the use of taxpayer dollars to terminate pregnancies in violation of a decades-old law known as the Hyde Amendment. Tuberville told Austin that if the Pentagon wants to spend money on such initiatives, they should be included in the department’s annual defense policy bill.
Re: TrumpReich in action
GOP restrictions on gender affirming care now extending beyond teens:
https://www.axios.com/2023/03/29/transg ... stream=top
And now banning civil rights documentaries.Time to boycott Florida orange juice:
https://www.cnn.com/2023/03/29/us/ruby- ... index.html
https://www.axios.com/2023/03/29/transg ... stream=top
And now banning civil rights documentaries.Time to boycott Florida orange juice:
https://www.cnn.com/2023/03/29/us/ruby- ... index.html
Re: TrumpReich in action
Old men howl at the moon on CMG!!! Just a few whispers in the shell-like of Antifa thugs should do the trick for you.
-
jserraglio
- Posts: 11936
- Joined: Sun May 29, 2005 7:06 am
- Location: Cleveland, Ohio
Re: TrumpReich in action
Never send to know for whom the Belle trolls . . .
——————————————
What the world needs now,
Is Woke, sweet Woke.
No, not just for some,
But for everyone.
—Bacharach/David
Re: TrumpReich in action
jserraglio wrote: ↑Sun Apr 02, 2023 6:19 pmNever send to know for whom the Belle trolls . . .
——————————————
What the world needs now,
Is Woke, sweet Woke.
No, not just for some,
But for everyone.
—Bacharach/David
Re: TrumpReich in action
Not for everybody, but I'm allowing it!!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YG6UllZwj9c
Woke is the corollary of middle class poverty in rich countries, impressionable millennials and guilt-ridden corporates who want to pretend they're not making loads of money!! 
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YG6UllZwj9c
Woke is the corollary of middle class poverty in rich countries, impressionable millennials and guilt-ridden corporates who want to pretend they're not making loads of money!!
-
jserraglio
- Posts: 11936
- Joined: Sun May 29, 2005 7:06 am
- Location: Cleveland, Ohio
Re: TrumpReich in action
Woke. It's the only thing that there's just too little of.
——————————————
What the world needs now,
Is Woke, sweet Woke.
No, not just for some,
But for everyone.
—Bacharach/David
——————————————
What the world needs now,
Is Woke, sweet Woke.
No, not just for some,
But for everyone.
—Bacharach/David
Re: TrumpReich in action
Southern slug GOP Sen.Tuberville imperils national security over abortion:
https://www.cnn.com/2023/04/07/politics ... index.html
https://www.cnn.com/2023/04/07/politics ... index.html
Re: TrumpReich in action
Another hostile sicko.Rach3 wrote: ↑Fri Apr 07, 2023 12:12 pmSouthern slug GOP Sen.Tuberville imperils national security over abortion:
https://www.cnn.com/2023/04/07/politics ... index.html
Re: TrumpReich in action
WAPO Health April 25:
Florida’s surgeon general is in hot water again over coronavirus vaccines.
Florida’s Surgeon General Joseph Ladapo made changes to a state-driven study about coronavirus vaccines, which was later used to bolster disputed claims that vaccines were dangerous to young men, Politico’s Arek Sarkissian reports, citing a newly obtained document.
The details: The newly released draft of the study suggests that it initially stated that the shots posed no significant risks for young men — a finding that is in line with the broader medical community. But “Dr. L’s Edits,” as the document is titled, reveal that Ladapo replaced that language to say that men between 18 and 39 years old are at high risk of heart illness from Moderna and Pfizer-BioNTech’s coronavirus vaccines that use mRNA technology.
Ladapo defended the move. He argued that such revisions are a normal part of assessing surveillance data and that he has the appropriate expertise to make those decisions. Yet, the researchers who viewed a copy of the edits said Ladapo removed an important analysis that would have contradicted his recommendation, Arek notes.
The Tampa Bay Times first reported the changes, although the identity of the person that made them wasn’t public until now.
---------------
The Foundation for Government Accountability, a Florida-based think tank and lobbying group, drafted state legislation to strip child workplace protections, emails show.
Free article:
https://wapo.st/3L05xD
----------------------
NYT April 25:The North Dakota governor signed a bill banning abortion after six weeks of pregnancy, even in cases of rape or incest.
-------------------
The Texas Department of Agriculture has issued a dress code stating that employees must dress “in a manner consistent with their biological gender.”
The wording, which was not in the dress code previously, makes it “clear that the new policy is intended to single out queer and trans employees for censure,” the Texas Observer reports. The Observer notes that it “continues Governor Greg Abbott’s campaign of anti-LGBTQ+ oppression.” The code will also affect cisgender workers who favor gender-neutral clothing, the publication points out.
The new code is dated April 13 and was distributed to employees a few days later. It has the stamp of approval of Texas Agriculture Commissioner Sid Miller. It’s not clear if it originated with Miller, Abbott, or someone else in state government. Neither the Department of Agriculture nor the governor’s office commented to local media on the matter, which was reported by the Observer and The Texas Tribune Monday. But Miller has supported the anti-LGBTQ+ bills and policies put forth by other state officials.
Noncompliance with the dress code carries penalties “up to and including termination,” the document states.
https://www.yahoo.com/news/texas-ag-dep ... 54060.html
-------------------------
Other GOP Governors not to be outdone.
Iowa Gov. Reynolds is anti-trans and proud of it :
https://www.axios.com/newsletters/axios ... are#story2
Florida’s surgeon general is in hot water again over coronavirus vaccines.
Florida’s Surgeon General Joseph Ladapo made changes to a state-driven study about coronavirus vaccines, which was later used to bolster disputed claims that vaccines were dangerous to young men, Politico’s Arek Sarkissian reports, citing a newly obtained document.
The details: The newly released draft of the study suggests that it initially stated that the shots posed no significant risks for young men — a finding that is in line with the broader medical community. But “Dr. L’s Edits,” as the document is titled, reveal that Ladapo replaced that language to say that men between 18 and 39 years old are at high risk of heart illness from Moderna and Pfizer-BioNTech’s coronavirus vaccines that use mRNA technology.
Ladapo defended the move. He argued that such revisions are a normal part of assessing surveillance data and that he has the appropriate expertise to make those decisions. Yet, the researchers who viewed a copy of the edits said Ladapo removed an important analysis that would have contradicted his recommendation, Arek notes.
The Tampa Bay Times first reported the changes, although the identity of the person that made them wasn’t public until now.
---------------
The Foundation for Government Accountability, a Florida-based think tank and lobbying group, drafted state legislation to strip child workplace protections, emails show.
Free article:
https://wapo.st/3L05xD
----------------------
NYT April 25:The North Dakota governor signed a bill banning abortion after six weeks of pregnancy, even in cases of rape or incest.
-------------------
The Texas Department of Agriculture has issued a dress code stating that employees must dress “in a manner consistent with their biological gender.”
The wording, which was not in the dress code previously, makes it “clear that the new policy is intended to single out queer and trans employees for censure,” the Texas Observer reports. The Observer notes that it “continues Governor Greg Abbott’s campaign of anti-LGBTQ+ oppression.” The code will also affect cisgender workers who favor gender-neutral clothing, the publication points out.
The new code is dated April 13 and was distributed to employees a few days later. It has the stamp of approval of Texas Agriculture Commissioner Sid Miller. It’s not clear if it originated with Miller, Abbott, or someone else in state government. Neither the Department of Agriculture nor the governor’s office commented to local media on the matter, which was reported by the Observer and The Texas Tribune Monday. But Miller has supported the anti-LGBTQ+ bills and policies put forth by other state officials.
Noncompliance with the dress code carries penalties “up to and including termination,” the document states.
https://www.yahoo.com/news/texas-ag-dep ... 54060.html
-------------------------
Other GOP Governors not to be outdone.
Iowa Gov. Reynolds is anti-trans and proud of it :
https://www.axios.com/newsletters/axios ... are#story2
Re: TrumpReich in action
Goober GOP Sen.Tuberville in action against our hard working military and national security:
https://news.yahoo.com/gop-sen-tubervil ... 33459.html
https://news.yahoo.com/gop-sen-tubervil ... 33459.html
Re: TrumpReich in action
Trumps attempt to torpedo the hidden documents case:
https://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-sho ... -rcna81760
https://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-sho ... -rcna81760
Re: TrumpReich in action
GOP losers Haley and Scott predict Biden will either die or become incapacitated before he would finish a second term and that the race is really with Harris:
https://www.cnn.com/videos/politics/202 ... ip-vpx.cnn
https://www.cnn.com/videos/politics/202 ... ip-vpx.cnn
Re: TrumpReich in action
NYT: "North Carolina’s Supreme Court, with a newly elected Republican majority, reversed its own 2022 ruling about voting district maps."
North Carolina GOP rigs its elections.
North Carolina GOP rigs its elections.
Re: TrumpReich in action
Objectivity of the courts has flown out of the window, hasn't it?
Chill in spine begone!
Re: TrumpReich in action
From WAPO Health today:
"The New Orleans-based appeals court panel that will handle the next stage of the ongoing legal battle over a key abortion drug is made up of three Republican appointees who have shown opposition to abortion in the past, Brendan Pierson and Jacqueline Thomsen report for Reuters.
On our radar: The Biden administration is expected to urge the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit panel on May 17 to overturn a lower court’s order that would have revoked the federal government’s decades-old approval of mifepristone.
“The administration will be appealing to Circuit Judges Jennifer Walker Elrod, who upheld a Texas law making it more difficult for abortion clinics to operate in the state; James Ho, who has called abortion a ‘moral tragedy’; and Cory Wilson, who supported abortion bans as a Mississippi state legislator,” Brendan and Jacqueline write.
Both Ho and Wilson were appointed by President Donald Trump, while Elrod was tapped to serve by President George W. Bush."
"The New Orleans-based appeals court panel that will handle the next stage of the ongoing legal battle over a key abortion drug is made up of three Republican appointees who have shown opposition to abortion in the past, Brendan Pierson and Jacqueline Thomsen report for Reuters.
On our radar: The Biden administration is expected to urge the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit panel on May 17 to overturn a lower court’s order that would have revoked the federal government’s decades-old approval of mifepristone.
“The administration will be appealing to Circuit Judges Jennifer Walker Elrod, who upheld a Texas law making it more difficult for abortion clinics to operate in the state; James Ho, who has called abortion a ‘moral tragedy’; and Cory Wilson, who supported abortion bans as a Mississippi state legislator,” Brendan and Jacqueline write.
Both Ho and Wilson were appointed by President Donald Trump, while Elrod was tapped to serve by President George W. Bush."
Re: TrumpReich in action
Oh, but it can't happen here!Rach3 wrote: ↑Tue May 09, 2023 8:52 amTrump ascendant:
https://www.axios.com/2023/05/09/trump-bad-news-2024
It already has, in 2016.
Never forget.
Re: TrumpReich in action
Yahooo News
Ben Blanchet
Mon, May 15, 2023, 1:35 AM CDT·2 min read
"House Oversight and Reform Committee Chair James Comer (R-Ky.) surprised Fox News host Maria Bartiromo with a wild update on his Biden family investigation in which he claimed an informant may have gone “missing,” something he suggested was linked to “spy business.”
Comer, who alleged that the Bidens took in millions of dollars from foreign sources prior to President Joe Biden’s administration, has talked of the family’s “influence peddling” despite a lack of evidence to substantiate the allegations.
The congressman, who has been questioned over his claims by multiple mediafigures including thoseon Fox News, told Bartiromo that the informant in the probe can’t be tracked down.
“We’re hopeful that the informant is still there. The whistleblower knows the informant. The whistleblower is very credible,” said Comer, who claimed that the FBI’s communication to his committee suggests “there’s been a cover-up” involving the family. (Rach3: So, the " whistle blower " is simply reporting hearsay !!)
He added: “No president has ever been accused of the things that the Biden family’s been accused of.”
Bartiromo, who has previously quizzed Comer on what his “Plan B” is regarding the investigation, chimed in to ask him about his remarks.
“Did you just say that the whistleblower or the informant is now missing?” Bartiromo asked.
“Well, we’re hopeful that we can find the informant,” he replied. “Remember these informants are kind of in the spy business so they don’t make a habit of being seen a lot or being high profile or anything like that.”
“Are there whistleblowers or informants missing right now?” Bartiromo continued.
“Nine of the 10 people that we’ve identified that have very good knowledge with respect to the Bidens, they’re one of three things,” he said. “They’re either currently in court, they’re currently in jail or they’re currently missing.”
“This is absolutely extraordinary,” Bartiromo responded."
(Rach3:Bartiromo of course too gutless to call out Comer for his fraud.)
Ben Blanchet
Mon, May 15, 2023, 1:35 AM CDT·2 min read
"House Oversight and Reform Committee Chair James Comer (R-Ky.) surprised Fox News host Maria Bartiromo with a wild update on his Biden family investigation in which he claimed an informant may have gone “missing,” something he suggested was linked to “spy business.”
Comer, who alleged that the Bidens took in millions of dollars from foreign sources prior to President Joe Biden’s administration, has talked of the family’s “influence peddling” despite a lack of evidence to substantiate the allegations.
The congressman, who has been questioned over his claims by multiple mediafigures including thoseon Fox News, told Bartiromo that the informant in the probe can’t be tracked down.
“We’re hopeful that the informant is still there. The whistleblower knows the informant. The whistleblower is very credible,” said Comer, who claimed that the FBI’s communication to his committee suggests “there’s been a cover-up” involving the family. (Rach3: So, the " whistle blower " is simply reporting hearsay !!)
He added: “No president has ever been accused of the things that the Biden family’s been accused of.”
Bartiromo, who has previously quizzed Comer on what his “Plan B” is regarding the investigation, chimed in to ask him about his remarks.
“Did you just say that the whistleblower or the informant is now missing?” Bartiromo asked.
“Well, we’re hopeful that we can find the informant,” he replied. “Remember these informants are kind of in the spy business so they don’t make a habit of being seen a lot or being high profile or anything like that.”
“Are there whistleblowers or informants missing right now?” Bartiromo continued.
“Nine of the 10 people that we’ve identified that have very good knowledge with respect to the Bidens, they’re one of three things,” he said. “They’re either currently in court, they’re currently in jail or they’re currently missing.”
“This is absolutely extraordinary,” Bartiromo responded."
(Rach3:Bartiromo of course too gutless to call out Comer for his fraud.)
Re: TrumpReich in action
Indiana's neo-Nazis prosecute doctor who probably saved 10-year old's life:
https://apnews.com/article/indiana-abor ... =259809361
https://apnews.com/article/indiana-abor ... =259809361
Re: TrumpReich in action
Trump and his thugs in action ; Biden silent ?!
Rolling Stone today as reported by Yahoo News:
Asawin Suebsaeng and Adam Rawnsley
Tue, May 30, 2023, 8:00 AM CDT
Donald Trump just needs a few names.
In recent months, the former president has asked close advisers, including at least one of his personal attorneys, if “we know” all the names of senior FBI agents and Justice Department personnel who have worked on the federal probes into him. That’s according to two sources with direct knowledge of the matter and another person briefed on it.
The former president has then privately discussed that should he return to the White House, it is imperative his new Department of Justice “quickly” and “immediately” purge the FBI and DOJ’s ranks of these officials and agents who’ve led the Trump-related criminal investigations, the sources recount. The ex-president has of course dubbed all such probes as illegitimate “witch hunts,” and is now campaigning for the White House on a platform of “retribution” and cleaning house.
Separately, the twice-impeached former president has been saying for many months that on “day one” of his potential second term, he wants FBI director Christopher Wray “out” of the bureau, according to another source familiar with the matter and two people close to Trump. It’s an ironic turn, given that Trump appointed Wray in 2017.
(Florida governor Ron DeSantis, Trump’s 2024 primary rival, has also pledged to fire Wray, telling Fox News last week that he’d do so on “day one.”)
But in the years since, Trump came to deeply distrust Wray. By the end of 2020, Trump was venting to senior administration officials that he would make it a top priority to replace Wray “next year,” blasting the director for not wholesale purging the FBI of non-Trump-loyalists. Trump lost the 2020 election to Joe Biden, and thus didn’t get his chance to fire Wray in 2021.
During some of the conversations this year, including at Trump’s Florida club Mar-a-Lago, some of Trump’s close political allies told him that they are working on figuring out the identities of the FBI and DOJ staff and forming lists, two of the sources relay to Rolling Stone.
However, others have complained that the feds aren’t making it easy for them.
In December 2022, the conservative nonprofit Judicial Watch — run by prominent Trump ally Tom Fitton — filed a Freedom of Information Act request demanding information about “all employees hired by or detailed to the office of Special Counsel Jack Smith.” In April, the Justice Department denied the request on the ground that it was an “unwarranted invasion of personal privacy” and that it would “interfere with enforcement proceedings.”
“One can only conclude, after seeing the uproar over the anti-Trump, partisan Mueller operation, that the Garland Justice Department has something to hide about Jack Smith and his prosecutors again targeting Trump and other Republicans with unprecedented investigations,” Fitton said at the time.
On Friday, Fitton told Rolling Stone that the DOJ is still “stonewalling” him and his group on the identities: “I don’t understand why it is that the names of prosecutors involved in a criminal investigation are secret. The Durham report shows it’s important we know who’s working there. We don’t want social security numbers or personal phone numbers, but certainly senior leaders and others who are pursuing this need to be disclosed.”
“We were able to get hiring material for the Mueller investigations, interviews applications and stuff like that,” he added.
Fitton said his group is still seeking the information administratively, but that “this is the type of lawsuit we typically would pursue.”
Other developments have made it harder for MAGA allies to create a comprehensive list of whom to potentially fire. Prior to Smith’s appointment, full names — in official DOJ email addresses — would appear in emails sent by Justice Department lawyers working on the Trump-related probes, to attorneys for subjects and likely targets of the investigations. But in the time since Special Counsel Smith started overseeing the probes last year, such emails began at times only showing initials for multiple DOJ addresses, obscuring the names of certain lawyers or personnel working on the special counsel’s team, according to a source with direct knowledge of the situation.
The feds, including Special Counsel Smith’s office, are currently investigating Trump and his associates for their efforts leading up to the deadly Jan. 6 Capitol attack, as well as for the ex-president’s hoarding of classified documents after he left office. Trump remains the leading candidate for the 2024 GOP presidential nomination in various polls, and has already been indicted in a separate criminal investigation in New York. His lawyers are also expecting a federal indictment in the Justice Department’s Mar-a-Lago documents probe soon, and have already briefed Trump as such.
The identities of law enforcement personnel involved in the Mar-a-Lago investigation have been a flashpoint between Trump and the Justice Department since the FBI executed a search warrant on the former president’s residence in August 2022. Prosecutors unsealed a copy of the search warrant with the names of agents redacted but the former president posted a copy of the document with the names of two FBI agents involved in the search.
The search kicked off an “unprecedented” number of threats against FBI agents and an attack by an armed Trump supporter on the FBI’s Cincinnati field office.
Trump’s latest crusade against the FBI coincides with his plans for a complete remaking of the federal bureaucracy. That includes promises to install extreme loyalists like Jeffrey Clark and Michael Flynn, who aided Trump’s anti-democratic efforts to overturn the 2020 election outcome. Trump also has pledged to sign an executive order, dubbed Schedule F, that would make it easier to hire loyalists and fire nonpartisan civil servants.
Rolling Stone today as reported by Yahoo News:
Asawin Suebsaeng and Adam Rawnsley
Tue, May 30, 2023, 8:00 AM CDT
Donald Trump just needs a few names.
In recent months, the former president has asked close advisers, including at least one of his personal attorneys, if “we know” all the names of senior FBI agents and Justice Department personnel who have worked on the federal probes into him. That’s according to two sources with direct knowledge of the matter and another person briefed on it.
The former president has then privately discussed that should he return to the White House, it is imperative his new Department of Justice “quickly” and “immediately” purge the FBI and DOJ’s ranks of these officials and agents who’ve led the Trump-related criminal investigations, the sources recount. The ex-president has of course dubbed all such probes as illegitimate “witch hunts,” and is now campaigning for the White House on a platform of “retribution” and cleaning house.
Separately, the twice-impeached former president has been saying for many months that on “day one” of his potential second term, he wants FBI director Christopher Wray “out” of the bureau, according to another source familiar with the matter and two people close to Trump. It’s an ironic turn, given that Trump appointed Wray in 2017.
(Florida governor Ron DeSantis, Trump’s 2024 primary rival, has also pledged to fire Wray, telling Fox News last week that he’d do so on “day one.”)
But in the years since, Trump came to deeply distrust Wray. By the end of 2020, Trump was venting to senior administration officials that he would make it a top priority to replace Wray “next year,” blasting the director for not wholesale purging the FBI of non-Trump-loyalists. Trump lost the 2020 election to Joe Biden, and thus didn’t get his chance to fire Wray in 2021.
During some of the conversations this year, including at Trump’s Florida club Mar-a-Lago, some of Trump’s close political allies told him that they are working on figuring out the identities of the FBI and DOJ staff and forming lists, two of the sources relay to Rolling Stone.
However, others have complained that the feds aren’t making it easy for them.
In December 2022, the conservative nonprofit Judicial Watch — run by prominent Trump ally Tom Fitton — filed a Freedom of Information Act request demanding information about “all employees hired by or detailed to the office of Special Counsel Jack Smith.” In April, the Justice Department denied the request on the ground that it was an “unwarranted invasion of personal privacy” and that it would “interfere with enforcement proceedings.”
“One can only conclude, after seeing the uproar over the anti-Trump, partisan Mueller operation, that the Garland Justice Department has something to hide about Jack Smith and his prosecutors again targeting Trump and other Republicans with unprecedented investigations,” Fitton said at the time.
On Friday, Fitton told Rolling Stone that the DOJ is still “stonewalling” him and his group on the identities: “I don’t understand why it is that the names of prosecutors involved in a criminal investigation are secret. The Durham report shows it’s important we know who’s working there. We don’t want social security numbers or personal phone numbers, but certainly senior leaders and others who are pursuing this need to be disclosed.”
“We were able to get hiring material for the Mueller investigations, interviews applications and stuff like that,” he added.
Fitton said his group is still seeking the information administratively, but that “this is the type of lawsuit we typically would pursue.”
Other developments have made it harder for MAGA allies to create a comprehensive list of whom to potentially fire. Prior to Smith’s appointment, full names — in official DOJ email addresses — would appear in emails sent by Justice Department lawyers working on the Trump-related probes, to attorneys for subjects and likely targets of the investigations. But in the time since Special Counsel Smith started overseeing the probes last year, such emails began at times only showing initials for multiple DOJ addresses, obscuring the names of certain lawyers or personnel working on the special counsel’s team, according to a source with direct knowledge of the situation.
The feds, including Special Counsel Smith’s office, are currently investigating Trump and his associates for their efforts leading up to the deadly Jan. 6 Capitol attack, as well as for the ex-president’s hoarding of classified documents after he left office. Trump remains the leading candidate for the 2024 GOP presidential nomination in various polls, and has already been indicted in a separate criminal investigation in New York. His lawyers are also expecting a federal indictment in the Justice Department’s Mar-a-Lago documents probe soon, and have already briefed Trump as such.
The identities of law enforcement personnel involved in the Mar-a-Lago investigation have been a flashpoint between Trump and the Justice Department since the FBI executed a search warrant on the former president’s residence in August 2022. Prosecutors unsealed a copy of the search warrant with the names of agents redacted but the former president posted a copy of the document with the names of two FBI agents involved in the search.
The search kicked off an “unprecedented” number of threats against FBI agents and an attack by an armed Trump supporter on the FBI’s Cincinnati field office.
Trump’s latest crusade against the FBI coincides with his plans for a complete remaking of the federal bureaucracy. That includes promises to install extreme loyalists like Jeffrey Clark and Michael Flynn, who aided Trump’s anti-democratic efforts to overturn the 2020 election outcome. Trump also has pledged to sign an executive order, dubbed Schedule F, that would make it easier to hire loyalists and fire nonpartisan civil servants.
Re: TrumpReich in action
Lock him up.
Chill in Brian's spine, begone.
Chill in Brian's spine, begone.
Re: TrumpReich in action
Texas Is Silencing the Will of Millions of Voters
June 3, 2023
By The Editorial Board
The editorial board is a group of opinion journalists whose views are informed by expertise, research, debate and certain longstanding values. It is separate from the newsroom.
Gov. Greg Abbott, Republican of Texas, is expected to sign a bill in the next few days that would make it immeasurably more difficult for cities in the state to govern themselves. The bill would strip cities of the ability to set standards for local workplaces, to ensure civil rights, and to improve their environments, trampling on the rights of voters who elected local officials to do just that.
The bill, recently approved by the Texas House and Senate, would nullify any city ordinance or regulation that conflicts with existing state policy in those crucial areas, and would give private citizens or businesses the right to sue and seek damages if they believe there is a discrepancy between city and state. That means no city could prohibit discrimination against L.G.B.T.Q. employees, as several Texas cities have done. No city could adopt new rules to limit predatory payday-lending practices. No city could restrict overgrown lots, or unsafe festivals, or inadequate waste storage. Cities would even be banned from enacting local worker protections, including requiring water breaks for laborers in the Texas heat, as Dallas, Austin and other cities have done following multiple deaths and injuries.
Business lobbyists and Republican legislators who have pushed the bill said its purpose was to rid the state of a patchwork of conflicting regulations. In fact, that patchwork largely exists only in three or four mostly Democratic cities in an overwhelmingly red state, and the bill is the latest effort by Republicans to rid the state of any policies that conflict with their hard-right agenda — even if those policies are fully supported by voters in those cities, who elect representatives to serve their interests.
Already the state won’t let cities ban discrimination against low-income renters, and it prohibits them from cutting their police budgets. Dozens of other bills have been introduced to restrict election reforms by Texas cities and counties, including one that would let an official, most likely a Republican, overturn election results in a single place: largely Democratic Harris County, which includes Houston. “The bill is undemocratic,” Mayor Ron Nirenberg of San Antonio told The Texas Tribune. “It is probably the most undemocratic thing the Legislature has done, and that list is getting very long. Local voters have created city charters, and I can’t imagine that they will be pleased to have their decisions usurped by lawmakers.”
By reducing the right of localities to make their own decisions, Texas has joined dozens of other states that have asserted their dominance over cities in recent years through a practice known as state pre-emption. One watchdog group has counted more than 650 pre-emption bills in state legislatures this year; the large majority have been introduced by Republican lawmakers to curb policymaking in cities run by Democrats.
It’s not a new phenomenon — city halls and state capitols have always jockeyed for authority, and in a legal showdown, the state usually wins, as the more supreme power. But conservatives used to champion ideas like local autonomy, devolution and even block grants as a way of weakening centralized control. The 20th-century movement toward “home rule,” letting localities handle most of their own affairs, was once supported by both Republicans and Democrats. What’s now become clear is that Republicans dislike local control if they are not in charge of it. The home rule movement has steadily faded in the last few decades as state lawmakers on the right have become more aggressive in invalidating the priorities of elected officials in cities, which have moved leftward in their voting patterns in recent years.
“We are seeing a real increase in the pre-emption of local authority,” said Clarence Anthony, chief executive of the National League of Cities, and former mayor of South Bay, Fla. “Local officials are elected by citizens to represent them, and they’re the ones who know what their citizens need the most. But we’ve been seeing state legislators trying to have control over local communities, and that’s not good governance at all.”
Many of the recent bills are particularly brazen in their disdain for local decision-making. The Florida Legislature passed a bill in early May allowing businesses to challenge municipal ordinances in court simply for being “unreasonable.” If they win, the businesses can collect $50,000 in attorney fees from the taxpayers if the ordinance is not withdrawn, but cities can’t collect attorney fees if they win. In Tennessee, Republicans were angry that leaders in Nashville blocked a bid to host the 2024 G.O.P. convention, so they passed a bill to shrink the size of the Nashville Metro Council and upend its voting district maps, which many residents say will dilute the political strength of minority groups. A local court put that law on hold for now, but the final outcome has not been determined.
Most of these legislative power plays follow the ideological patterns of the hard-right MAGA core within the Republican Party, which is often more visible at the state than the national level. The efforts tend to fall into the following categories:
Democracy and voting. Several states are trying to make it harder for citizens to enact laws or constitutional changes through the referendum process, after abortion-rights supporters won several ballot initiatives in 2022. In Ohio, Republican lawmakers put a measure on the August ballot that would raise the threshold for passing a constitutional amendment to 60 percent from a simple majority, where it has been since 1912, hoping to head off organized efforts to permit abortion in the state, as well as to raise the minimum wage and undo Republican gerrymandering. (They put the measure on a low-turnout election day, rather than the better-known day in November.) Arkansas now requires signatures from 50 counties (of 75) to get an initiative on the ballot, up from 15. Anyone can propose a ballot initiative, regardless of their ideology — recent measures in Kansas and Kentucky, for example, were proposed by anti-abortion groups. (Both were ultimately rejected by voters.) Restricting these ballot measures is fundamentally about depriving voters of a way to put a check on legislators, regardless of ideology.
In addition to the Texas bills, several states have tried to usurp the role of local election boards and officials, restricting attempts to expand voting and making it more difficult for voters in urban areas, who are often people of color, to cast a ballot. One study showed that there were 244 bills introduced last year in 33 states to interfere with election administration, 24 of which passed. Republican officials in Georgia, urged on by Donald Trump, are still trying to take over the election board in the Atlanta area, though a bipartisan panel recommended earlier this year that they stop.
Law enforcement and courts. Many rural legislators who live nowhere near urban areas are trying to capitalize on an exaggerated fear of crime to change the way cities enforce the law and prosecute criminals. In Mississippi, new laws allow the state to take over policing and the court system in Jackson, which is more than 80 percent Black, but nowhere else. The N.A.A.C.P. immediately sued the state after the laws were enacted in April, saying the laws discriminate against Black citizens and erode their political power. A new law in Georgia creates a commission with the power to remove local prosecutors. One elected district attorney there, Fani Willis of Fulton County, is investigating Mr. Trump over possible election fraud.
Guns. Only a handful of states — Connecticut, Hawaii, Massachusetts, New Jersey and New York — allow cities to regulate firearms. The other 45 have enacted either extreme or limited forms of pre-emption that reserve this power to the states. This effectively means that cities in those states must accept the same attitudes around the use of guns as rural areas, even if voters might have different attitudes and would prefer different laws. Some states, including Florida and Kentucky, have gone so far as to impose fines or criminal liability on any local official who violates the pre-emption rules.
Discrimination. Many Republican-controlled states have forbidden cities from banning discrimination against L.G.B.T.Q. employees in the workplace, and there are hundreds of bills now pending that would override local authorities in order to ban books on L.G.B.T.Q. issues and prohibit drag-queen shows, even if those communities want them. Arkansas and Tennessee already prohibit cities from enacting anti-discrimination protections for L.G.B.T.Q. people, and Texas is one of several states that appears to be heading in the same direction. Many states are also telling local school boards to change their curriculums to limit classroom discussion of slavery, racial prejudice and the civil rights movement.
There are cases where pre-emption laws are in the public interest: for example, when it becomes necessary for states to prevent their cities from creating or perpetuating injustices, to prevent discrimination and help citizens achieve fundamental rights like equal access to housing, employment and the ballot. New York State did the right thing recently by proposing a law to get cities and towns to build more housing for families that are being priced out by restrictive zoning rules, but backed down when suburban towns protested on infringements to their autonomy. California was more successful in acting to remove local zoning laws to foster more low-income housing and increase density around transportation hubs.
But the vast majority of the pre-emption bills and laws in the last few years do not meet that test. They undermine fundamental principles of equality as well as access to the ballot and fair representation.
Some cities, including Nashville, Cleveland and Coral Gables, Fla., have fought back and won in court; in Maryland, Florida and several other states, Democrats have joined Republican moderates to beat back some of these bills. But in many other states, the will of the people in these cities is being silenced. They and their representatives will have to use every legal means available to be heard.
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/06/03/opin ... -bill.html
June 3, 2023
By The Editorial Board
The editorial board is a group of opinion journalists whose views are informed by expertise, research, debate and certain longstanding values. It is separate from the newsroom.
Gov. Greg Abbott, Republican of Texas, is expected to sign a bill in the next few days that would make it immeasurably more difficult for cities in the state to govern themselves. The bill would strip cities of the ability to set standards for local workplaces, to ensure civil rights, and to improve their environments, trampling on the rights of voters who elected local officials to do just that.
The bill, recently approved by the Texas House and Senate, would nullify any city ordinance or regulation that conflicts with existing state policy in those crucial areas, and would give private citizens or businesses the right to sue and seek damages if they believe there is a discrepancy between city and state. That means no city could prohibit discrimination against L.G.B.T.Q. employees, as several Texas cities have done. No city could adopt new rules to limit predatory payday-lending practices. No city could restrict overgrown lots, or unsafe festivals, or inadequate waste storage. Cities would even be banned from enacting local worker protections, including requiring water breaks for laborers in the Texas heat, as Dallas, Austin and other cities have done following multiple deaths and injuries.
Business lobbyists and Republican legislators who have pushed the bill said its purpose was to rid the state of a patchwork of conflicting regulations. In fact, that patchwork largely exists only in three or four mostly Democratic cities in an overwhelmingly red state, and the bill is the latest effort by Republicans to rid the state of any policies that conflict with their hard-right agenda — even if those policies are fully supported by voters in those cities, who elect representatives to serve their interests.
Already the state won’t let cities ban discrimination against low-income renters, and it prohibits them from cutting their police budgets. Dozens of other bills have been introduced to restrict election reforms by Texas cities and counties, including one that would let an official, most likely a Republican, overturn election results in a single place: largely Democratic Harris County, which includes Houston. “The bill is undemocratic,” Mayor Ron Nirenberg of San Antonio told The Texas Tribune. “It is probably the most undemocratic thing the Legislature has done, and that list is getting very long. Local voters have created city charters, and I can’t imagine that they will be pleased to have their decisions usurped by lawmakers.”
By reducing the right of localities to make their own decisions, Texas has joined dozens of other states that have asserted their dominance over cities in recent years through a practice known as state pre-emption. One watchdog group has counted more than 650 pre-emption bills in state legislatures this year; the large majority have been introduced by Republican lawmakers to curb policymaking in cities run by Democrats.
It’s not a new phenomenon — city halls and state capitols have always jockeyed for authority, and in a legal showdown, the state usually wins, as the more supreme power. But conservatives used to champion ideas like local autonomy, devolution and even block grants as a way of weakening centralized control. The 20th-century movement toward “home rule,” letting localities handle most of their own affairs, was once supported by both Republicans and Democrats. What’s now become clear is that Republicans dislike local control if they are not in charge of it. The home rule movement has steadily faded in the last few decades as state lawmakers on the right have become more aggressive in invalidating the priorities of elected officials in cities, which have moved leftward in their voting patterns in recent years.
“We are seeing a real increase in the pre-emption of local authority,” said Clarence Anthony, chief executive of the National League of Cities, and former mayor of South Bay, Fla. “Local officials are elected by citizens to represent them, and they’re the ones who know what their citizens need the most. But we’ve been seeing state legislators trying to have control over local communities, and that’s not good governance at all.”
Many of the recent bills are particularly brazen in their disdain for local decision-making. The Florida Legislature passed a bill in early May allowing businesses to challenge municipal ordinances in court simply for being “unreasonable.” If they win, the businesses can collect $50,000 in attorney fees from the taxpayers if the ordinance is not withdrawn, but cities can’t collect attorney fees if they win. In Tennessee, Republicans were angry that leaders in Nashville blocked a bid to host the 2024 G.O.P. convention, so they passed a bill to shrink the size of the Nashville Metro Council and upend its voting district maps, which many residents say will dilute the political strength of minority groups. A local court put that law on hold for now, but the final outcome has not been determined.
Most of these legislative power plays follow the ideological patterns of the hard-right MAGA core within the Republican Party, which is often more visible at the state than the national level. The efforts tend to fall into the following categories:
Democracy and voting. Several states are trying to make it harder for citizens to enact laws or constitutional changes through the referendum process, after abortion-rights supporters won several ballot initiatives in 2022. In Ohio, Republican lawmakers put a measure on the August ballot that would raise the threshold for passing a constitutional amendment to 60 percent from a simple majority, where it has been since 1912, hoping to head off organized efforts to permit abortion in the state, as well as to raise the minimum wage and undo Republican gerrymandering. (They put the measure on a low-turnout election day, rather than the better-known day in November.) Arkansas now requires signatures from 50 counties (of 75) to get an initiative on the ballot, up from 15. Anyone can propose a ballot initiative, regardless of their ideology — recent measures in Kansas and Kentucky, for example, were proposed by anti-abortion groups. (Both were ultimately rejected by voters.) Restricting these ballot measures is fundamentally about depriving voters of a way to put a check on legislators, regardless of ideology.
In addition to the Texas bills, several states have tried to usurp the role of local election boards and officials, restricting attempts to expand voting and making it more difficult for voters in urban areas, who are often people of color, to cast a ballot. One study showed that there were 244 bills introduced last year in 33 states to interfere with election administration, 24 of which passed. Republican officials in Georgia, urged on by Donald Trump, are still trying to take over the election board in the Atlanta area, though a bipartisan panel recommended earlier this year that they stop.
Law enforcement and courts. Many rural legislators who live nowhere near urban areas are trying to capitalize on an exaggerated fear of crime to change the way cities enforce the law and prosecute criminals. In Mississippi, new laws allow the state to take over policing and the court system in Jackson, which is more than 80 percent Black, but nowhere else. The N.A.A.C.P. immediately sued the state after the laws were enacted in April, saying the laws discriminate against Black citizens and erode their political power. A new law in Georgia creates a commission with the power to remove local prosecutors. One elected district attorney there, Fani Willis of Fulton County, is investigating Mr. Trump over possible election fraud.
Guns. Only a handful of states — Connecticut, Hawaii, Massachusetts, New Jersey and New York — allow cities to regulate firearms. The other 45 have enacted either extreme or limited forms of pre-emption that reserve this power to the states. This effectively means that cities in those states must accept the same attitudes around the use of guns as rural areas, even if voters might have different attitudes and would prefer different laws. Some states, including Florida and Kentucky, have gone so far as to impose fines or criminal liability on any local official who violates the pre-emption rules.
Discrimination. Many Republican-controlled states have forbidden cities from banning discrimination against L.G.B.T.Q. employees in the workplace, and there are hundreds of bills now pending that would override local authorities in order to ban books on L.G.B.T.Q. issues and prohibit drag-queen shows, even if those communities want them. Arkansas and Tennessee already prohibit cities from enacting anti-discrimination protections for L.G.B.T.Q. people, and Texas is one of several states that appears to be heading in the same direction. Many states are also telling local school boards to change their curriculums to limit classroom discussion of slavery, racial prejudice and the civil rights movement.
There are cases where pre-emption laws are in the public interest: for example, when it becomes necessary for states to prevent their cities from creating or perpetuating injustices, to prevent discrimination and help citizens achieve fundamental rights like equal access to housing, employment and the ballot. New York State did the right thing recently by proposing a law to get cities and towns to build more housing for families that are being priced out by restrictive zoning rules, but backed down when suburban towns protested on infringements to their autonomy. California was more successful in acting to remove local zoning laws to foster more low-income housing and increase density around transportation hubs.
But the vast majority of the pre-emption bills and laws in the last few years do not meet that test. They undermine fundamental principles of equality as well as access to the ballot and fair representation.
Some cities, including Nashville, Cleveland and Coral Gables, Fla., have fought back and won in court; in Maryland, Florida and several other states, Democrats have joined Republican moderates to beat back some of these bills. But in many other states, the will of the people in these cities is being silenced. They and their representatives will have to use every legal means available to be heard.
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/06/03/opin ... -bill.html
Re: TrumpReich in action
So ugly.
Re: TrumpReich in action
Yes, and with our SCOTUS under firm Conservative control, even uglier.
I'm reminded of the days when FDR threatened to pack the Supreme Court with liberal judges as they kept ruling against New Deal programs. After the election of 1936, they had to back down and finally supported Social Security and other New Deal legislation.
We can only hope. I'm not holding my breath.
Chill in spine begone!
Re: TrumpReich in action
Republicans, Escalating Attacks on F.B.I., Vow to Hold Director in Contempt
F.B.I. officials briefed lawmakers on an unsubstantiated bribery allegation against Joe Biden when he was vice president, but did not let them leave a secure area with a document detailing it.
By Luke Broadwater and Adam Goldman
Reporting from Washington
June 5, 2023
House Republicans said on Monday that they would move this week to hold the F.B.I. director, Christopher A. Wray, in contempt of Congress, escalating their attacks on the federal law enforcement agency as they grasp for evidence of wrongdoing by President Biden.
Representative James R. Comer, the Kentucky Republican who is chairman of the Oversight Committee, made the announcement after summoning F.B.I. officials to Capitol Hill for a closed-door briefing on a document containing an unverified allegation of bribery against Mr. Biden when he was vice president. The Trump Justice Department investigated the allegation, which involved his son Hunter Biden’s dealings in Ukraine, in 2020, but prosecutors could not substantiate the claims, according to two people familiar with the matter.
Yet Mr. Comer, who has said he is investigating whether Mr. Biden traded on his office for money, has repeatedly insinuated that there is more to it; on Monday, he asserted that the allegation “has never been disproven.”
At the chairman’s insistence, Mr. Wray’s team brought the document to a secure area of the Capitol on Monday and briefed Mr. Comer and Representative Jamie Raskin of Maryland, the committee’s top Democrat, on it for about 90 minutes. But Mr. Comer complained afterward that the agency, citing concern about protecting the identity of the informant, declined to allow other members of the committee to view it.
“We will now initiate contempt of Congress hearings this Thursday,” Mr. Comer told reporters on Capitol Hill, adding, “The ball is in the F.B.I.’s court.”
The surfacing of the unsubstantiated allegation against Mr. Biden is the latest bid by Republicans to undermine the credibility of the F.B.I., which they have sought to vilify after the bureau and the Justice Department began investigations into President Donald J. Trump’s role in trying to overturn the 2020 election and his handling of classified documents after leaving the White House.
Republicans have relied on former F.B.I. agents — some of whom have embraced Jan. 6 conspiracy theories and have even accepted money from a Trump ally — to provide information against the bureau.
Mr. Raskin said the document Mr. Comer sought, and Mr. Wray provided, contained an allegation from an informant relaying a conversation with someone else, which the informant could not corroborate. He said the Justice Department under former Attorney General William P. Barr “found no reason to escalate it from an assessment to a so-called preliminary investigation.”
“What we’re talking about is secondhand hearsay,” Mr. Raskin said, adding, “That confidential human source said that he had no way of knowing about the underlying veracity of the things that he was being told.”
Calling attention to the document is Mr. Comer’s latest effort to keep public attention on Hunter Biden’s business activities, which Republicans have made a focus of their investigations for years.
“We are not interested in whether the allegations against Vice President Biden are accurate or not,” Senator Charles E. Grassley, Republican of Iowa, said last week on Fox News. “We’re responsible for making sure the F.B.I. does its job.”
Republicans have long alleged that Hunter Biden used his seat on the board of the Ukrainian energy company Burisma — for which he was paid substantial sums — to influence his father. A career State Department official even raised concerns with a senior White House official in 2015 about the situation.
The attention on Hunter Biden from the right reached a high point in 2020, after Mr. Trump’s personal lawyer Rudolph W. Giuliani began circulating materials about the younger Mr. Biden, including photos and documents from a laptop he had abandoned at a Delaware repair shop.
In 2020, Mr. Barr asked the top federal prosecutor in Pittsburgh, Scott W. Brady, to examine any information Mr. Giuliani had on the Biden family and send anything that might be useful for other prosecutors to them.
One person familiar with the material who insisted on anonymity to discuss it said some of it was junk that was plainly not credible. The bribery allegation against Mr. Biden was never elevated to a preliminary investigation, according to people familiar with the inquiry, but Mr. Brady did forward some information from his work to other prosecutors.
Richard P. Donoghue, then a top official in the Trump Justice Department, agreed with Mr. Brady that the matter did not need to be investigated further, according to one of the people familiar with the matter.
Representative Dan Goldman, Democrat of New York and a member of the Oversight Committee who examined allegations against Mr. Biden and Burisma as part of a House impeachment team in 2019, said the Republican narrative had fallen flat because Mr. Biden sought to crack down on corruption in Ukraine, not enable it.
“The facts are actually directly contrary to any of the Republican allegations,” Mr. Goldman said.
After the briefing Monday, Mr. Comer claimed the informant’s allegation “is currently being used in an ongoing investigation,” but Mr. Raskin described Mr. Comer as “recycling stale and debunked Burisma conspiracy theories long peddled by Rudy Giuliani.”
The F.B.I. went to some lengths to make the documents available to lawmakers, first inviting them to bureau headquarters and then bringing the material to the Capitol to accommodate their schedules.
“The F.B.I. has continually demonstrated its commitment to accommodate the committee’s request, including by producing the document in a reading room at the U.S. Capitol,” the bureau said in a statement on Monday. “The escalation to a contempt vote under these circumstances is unwarranted.”
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/06/05/us/p ... tempt.html
F.B.I. officials briefed lawmakers on an unsubstantiated bribery allegation against Joe Biden when he was vice president, but did not let them leave a secure area with a document detailing it.
By Luke Broadwater and Adam Goldman
Reporting from Washington
June 5, 2023
House Republicans said on Monday that they would move this week to hold the F.B.I. director, Christopher A. Wray, in contempt of Congress, escalating their attacks on the federal law enforcement agency as they grasp for evidence of wrongdoing by President Biden.
Representative James R. Comer, the Kentucky Republican who is chairman of the Oversight Committee, made the announcement after summoning F.B.I. officials to Capitol Hill for a closed-door briefing on a document containing an unverified allegation of bribery against Mr. Biden when he was vice president. The Trump Justice Department investigated the allegation, which involved his son Hunter Biden’s dealings in Ukraine, in 2020, but prosecutors could not substantiate the claims, according to two people familiar with the matter.
Yet Mr. Comer, who has said he is investigating whether Mr. Biden traded on his office for money, has repeatedly insinuated that there is more to it; on Monday, he asserted that the allegation “has never been disproven.”
At the chairman’s insistence, Mr. Wray’s team brought the document to a secure area of the Capitol on Monday and briefed Mr. Comer and Representative Jamie Raskin of Maryland, the committee’s top Democrat, on it for about 90 minutes. But Mr. Comer complained afterward that the agency, citing concern about protecting the identity of the informant, declined to allow other members of the committee to view it.
“We will now initiate contempt of Congress hearings this Thursday,” Mr. Comer told reporters on Capitol Hill, adding, “The ball is in the F.B.I.’s court.”
The surfacing of the unsubstantiated allegation against Mr. Biden is the latest bid by Republicans to undermine the credibility of the F.B.I., which they have sought to vilify after the bureau and the Justice Department began investigations into President Donald J. Trump’s role in trying to overturn the 2020 election and his handling of classified documents after leaving the White House.
Republicans have relied on former F.B.I. agents — some of whom have embraced Jan. 6 conspiracy theories and have even accepted money from a Trump ally — to provide information against the bureau.
Mr. Raskin said the document Mr. Comer sought, and Mr. Wray provided, contained an allegation from an informant relaying a conversation with someone else, which the informant could not corroborate. He said the Justice Department under former Attorney General William P. Barr “found no reason to escalate it from an assessment to a so-called preliminary investigation.”
“What we’re talking about is secondhand hearsay,” Mr. Raskin said, adding, “That confidential human source said that he had no way of knowing about the underlying veracity of the things that he was being told.”
Calling attention to the document is Mr. Comer’s latest effort to keep public attention on Hunter Biden’s business activities, which Republicans have made a focus of their investigations for years.
“We are not interested in whether the allegations against Vice President Biden are accurate or not,” Senator Charles E. Grassley, Republican of Iowa, said last week on Fox News. “We’re responsible for making sure the F.B.I. does its job.”
Republicans have long alleged that Hunter Biden used his seat on the board of the Ukrainian energy company Burisma — for which he was paid substantial sums — to influence his father. A career State Department official even raised concerns with a senior White House official in 2015 about the situation.
The attention on Hunter Biden from the right reached a high point in 2020, after Mr. Trump’s personal lawyer Rudolph W. Giuliani began circulating materials about the younger Mr. Biden, including photos and documents from a laptop he had abandoned at a Delaware repair shop.
In 2020, Mr. Barr asked the top federal prosecutor in Pittsburgh, Scott W. Brady, to examine any information Mr. Giuliani had on the Biden family and send anything that might be useful for other prosecutors to them.
One person familiar with the material who insisted on anonymity to discuss it said some of it was junk that was plainly not credible. The bribery allegation against Mr. Biden was never elevated to a preliminary investigation, according to people familiar with the inquiry, but Mr. Brady did forward some information from his work to other prosecutors.
Richard P. Donoghue, then a top official in the Trump Justice Department, agreed with Mr. Brady that the matter did not need to be investigated further, according to one of the people familiar with the matter.
Representative Dan Goldman, Democrat of New York and a member of the Oversight Committee who examined allegations against Mr. Biden and Burisma as part of a House impeachment team in 2019, said the Republican narrative had fallen flat because Mr. Biden sought to crack down on corruption in Ukraine, not enable it.
“The facts are actually directly contrary to any of the Republican allegations,” Mr. Goldman said.
After the briefing Monday, Mr. Comer claimed the informant’s allegation “is currently being used in an ongoing investigation,” but Mr. Raskin described Mr. Comer as “recycling stale and debunked Burisma conspiracy theories long peddled by Rudy Giuliani.”
The F.B.I. went to some lengths to make the documents available to lawmakers, first inviting them to bureau headquarters and then bringing the material to the Capitol to accommodate their schedules.
“The F.B.I. has continually demonstrated its commitment to accommodate the committee’s request, including by producing the document in a reading room at the U.S. Capitol,” the bureau said in a statement on Monday. “The escalation to a contempt vote under these circumstances is unwarranted.”
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/06/05/us/p ... tempt.html
Re: TrumpReich in action
By: Karoun Demirjian
On the day Trump is being arraigned on criminal charges, House Republicans queued up a vote to censure Representative Adam Schiff, the California Democrat who ran the first impeachment investigation, and fine him $16 million. Representative Anna Paulina Luna, a first-year Republican member from Florida, filed the resolution to censure Mr. Schiff last month. Under the rules of the House, it will get a vote later this week. Mr. Schiff, who is running for California’s open Senate seat, previously dismissed the resolution on Twitter as a ploy by “MAGA extremists” to punish him for having “stood up to Donald Trump and his allies.”
https://www.nytimes.com/live/2023/06/13 ... =url-share
On the day Trump is being arraigned on criminal charges, House Republicans queued up a vote to censure Representative Adam Schiff, the California Democrat who ran the first impeachment investigation, and fine him $16 million. Representative Anna Paulina Luna, a first-year Republican member from Florida, filed the resolution to censure Mr. Schiff last month. Under the rules of the House, it will get a vote later this week. Mr. Schiff, who is running for California’s open Senate seat, previously dismissed the resolution on Twitter as a ploy by “MAGA extremists” to punish him for having “stood up to Donald Trump and his allies.”
https://www.nytimes.com/live/2023/06/13 ... =url-share
Re: TrumpReich in action
By: Annie Karni
Rallying behind Trump, Republicans defend keeping classified material in the bathroom. Image
A photograph released by the U.S. Justice Department shows boxes of documents in a bathroom in former President Donald J. Trump’s Mar-a-Lago Club in Florida in early 2021.Credit...via Department of Justice
Ahead of former President Donald J. Trump’s arraignment in Miami on Tuesday afternoon, Republican lawmakers on Capitol Hill were so eager to defend Mr. Trump and his conduct that they dismissed one of the most damning pieces of documentary evidence included in the 37-count indictment against him: a photograph of documents stacked up in boxes next to a toilet in a bathroom at Mar-a-Lago.
Their defense of Mr. Trump wasn’t just about what they claimed was the weaponization of the Justice Department against the right (although they hammered that point, too).
They also went so far as to defend the bathroom itself as a perfectly suitable storage facility for the nation’s most sensitive secrets. Some of the most powerful elected Republicans have gone to considerable lengths to excuse and play down the crimes Mr. Trump has been charged with.
Speaker Kevin McCarthy claimed a bathroom was far safer than a garage, where some classified documents were found at President Biden’s home in Delaware.
(A special counsel is examining Mr. Biden’s handling of classified documents, after the president’s team told the National Archives that they had discovered a small amount of such material at the Penn Biden Center and at his home in Wilmington, Del.)
“I don’t know,” Mr. McCarthy told reporters Monday when asked whether it was a “good look” for Mr. Trump to have kept sensitive documents stored in his bathroom. “Is it a good picture to have boxes in a garage that opens up all the time? A bathroom door locks.”
Most bathrooms lock from the inside, not exactly the industry standard for securing items of value.
On Tuesday, Representative Byron Donalds, Republican of Florida, also defended the bathroom storage strategy, suggesting that the facilities, such as they were, were plenty secure.
“There are 33 bathrooms at Mar-a-Lago,” Mr. Donalds said on CNN Tuesday morning. “So don’t act like it’s just in some random bathroom that the guests can go into. That’s not true.”
Mr. McCarthy and other leading House Republicans have rallied behind Mr. Trump since he was indicted last week, excusing his behavior even before the precise nature of the charges was known. They have doubled down since prosecutors unsealed 37 criminal counts against the former president accusing him of illegally retaining classified material, including highly sensitive military secrets, and showing it to those unauthorized to see it; lying to federal investigators; and obstructing the investigation.
The bathroom photo wasn’t the only one that Republicans sought to dismiss. They also said they had no concerns with photographs released by law enforcement that showed documents strewn across a carpet at Mar-a-Lago.
Representative Steve Scalise of Louisiana, the majority leader, said the Justice Department was using photographs to stoke outrage about the case.
“Look at some of the photos that were being sensationally shown over the weekend,” he said. “It was newspaper clippings and some personal items.” In fact, the spilled contents of the boxes included a document intended only for certain intelligence agencies.
As for the substance of the indictment, Mr. Scalise punted. “The courts are going to decide the substance,” he said. “I’m not an attorney.”
https://www.nytimes.com/live/2023/06/13 ... =url-share
Rallying behind Trump, Republicans defend keeping classified material in the bathroom. Image
A photograph released by the U.S. Justice Department shows boxes of documents in a bathroom in former President Donald J. Trump’s Mar-a-Lago Club in Florida in early 2021.Credit...via Department of JusticeAhead of former President Donald J. Trump’s arraignment in Miami on Tuesday afternoon, Republican lawmakers on Capitol Hill were so eager to defend Mr. Trump and his conduct that they dismissed one of the most damning pieces of documentary evidence included in the 37-count indictment against him: a photograph of documents stacked up in boxes next to a toilet in a bathroom at Mar-a-Lago.
Their defense of Mr. Trump wasn’t just about what they claimed was the weaponization of the Justice Department against the right (although they hammered that point, too).
They also went so far as to defend the bathroom itself as a perfectly suitable storage facility for the nation’s most sensitive secrets. Some of the most powerful elected Republicans have gone to considerable lengths to excuse and play down the crimes Mr. Trump has been charged with.
Speaker Kevin McCarthy claimed a bathroom was far safer than a garage, where some classified documents were found at President Biden’s home in Delaware.
(A special counsel is examining Mr. Biden’s handling of classified documents, after the president’s team told the National Archives that they had discovered a small amount of such material at the Penn Biden Center and at his home in Wilmington, Del.)
“I don’t know,” Mr. McCarthy told reporters Monday when asked whether it was a “good look” for Mr. Trump to have kept sensitive documents stored in his bathroom. “Is it a good picture to have boxes in a garage that opens up all the time? A bathroom door locks.”
Most bathrooms lock from the inside, not exactly the industry standard for securing items of value.
On Tuesday, Representative Byron Donalds, Republican of Florida, also defended the bathroom storage strategy, suggesting that the facilities, such as they were, were plenty secure.
“There are 33 bathrooms at Mar-a-Lago,” Mr. Donalds said on CNN Tuesday morning. “So don’t act like it’s just in some random bathroom that the guests can go into. That’s not true.”
Mr. McCarthy and other leading House Republicans have rallied behind Mr. Trump since he was indicted last week, excusing his behavior even before the precise nature of the charges was known. They have doubled down since prosecutors unsealed 37 criminal counts against the former president accusing him of illegally retaining classified material, including highly sensitive military secrets, and showing it to those unauthorized to see it; lying to federal investigators; and obstructing the investigation.
The bathroom photo wasn’t the only one that Republicans sought to dismiss. They also said they had no concerns with photographs released by law enforcement that showed documents strewn across a carpet at Mar-a-Lago.
Representative Steve Scalise of Louisiana, the majority leader, said the Justice Department was using photographs to stoke outrage about the case.
“Look at some of the photos that were being sensationally shown over the weekend,” he said. “It was newspaper clippings and some personal items.” In fact, the spilled contents of the boxes included a document intended only for certain intelligence agencies.
As for the substance of the indictment, Mr. Scalise punted. “The courts are going to decide the substance,” he said. “I’m not an attorney.”
https://www.nytimes.com/live/2023/06/13 ... =url-share
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