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Category: Politics

House managers are treating Trump’s enablers as his victims

House managers are treating Trump’s enablers as his victims

Michelle Goldberg writes: Because of the unlikelihood of Trump being convicted, it often seems as if this second impeachment trial is being conducted for the public, and for history. The managers took a chaotic, traumatic day and turned it into a coherent narrative, crosscutting between the rampage and the actions of the president who inspired it. The most powerful moments of their presentation were the temporal juxtapositions, like Trump tweeting, “Mike Pence didn’t have the courage to do what should…

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Riot squad cops open up about disastrous response to Capitol insurrection

Riot squad cops open up about disastrous response to Capitol insurrection

ProPublica reports: The riot squad defending the embattled entrance to the west side of the U.S. Capitol was surrounded by violence. Rioters had clambered up the scaffolding by the stage erected for the inauguration of President Joseph Biden. They hurled everything they could get their hands on at the cops beneath: rebar, plywood, power tools, even cans of food they had frozen for extra damage. In front of the cops, a mob was mounting a frontal assault. Its members hit…

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Black, Hispanic and female police use force less often than white male officers

Black, Hispanic and female police use force less often than white male officers

Science News reports: Black and Hispanic police officers tend to stop, arrest and use force against civilians less often than white officers do, and female officers of all races use less force than their male colleagues, a new case study of the Chicago Police Department suggests. Information on the demographics and behavior of thousands of Chicago police officers revealed how officers of different races and genders acted while on similar patrol assignments. While the results do not shed light on…

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Member of Oath Keepers conspiracy was ‘awaiting direction’ from Trump before Capitol attack, prosecutors say

Member of Oath Keepers conspiracy was ‘awaiting direction’ from Trump before Capitol attack, prosecutors say

BuzzFeed News reports: Hours before day three of former president Donald Trump’s impeachment trial was set to begin on Thursday, federal prosecutors offered new evidence that a member of the alleged Oath Keepers conspiracy charged with planning an assault on the US Capitol on Jan. 6 was “awaiting direction” from Trump. Jessica Watkins, an Army veteran and, according to court papers, a member of the Oath Keepers militia group, is accused of participating in a conspiracy to assault the Capitol…

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Tuberville says he informed Trump of Pence’s evacuation before rioters reached Senate

Tuberville says he informed Trump of Pence’s evacuation before rioters reached Senate

Politico reports: Sen. Tommy Tuberville revealed late Wednesday that he spoke to Donald Trump on Jan. 6, just as a violent mob closed in on the the Senate, and informed the then-president directly that Vice President Mike Pence had just been evacuated from the chamber. “I said ‘Mr. President, they just took the vice president out, I’ve got to go,’” Tuberville (R-Ala.) told POLITICO on Capitol Hill on Wednesday night, saying he cut the phone call short amid the chaos….

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Military officials were unaware of potential danger to Pence’s ‘nuclear football’ during Capitol riot

Military officials were unaware of potential danger to Pence’s ‘nuclear football’ during Capitol riot

CNN reports: Military officials overseeing the authorization process to launch nuclear weapons were unaware on January 6 that then-Vice President Mike Pence’s military aide carrying the “nuclear football” was potentially in danger as rioters got close during the violent Capitol insurrection, according to a defense official. The vice president is always accompanied by a backup of the “football,” which contains the equipment to carry out orders to launch a nuclear strike. It must be ready at all times and is…

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Republicans warned about Trump and violence … five years ago

Republicans warned about Trump and violence … five years ago

Steve Benen writes: As a Republican presidential candidate, Donald Trump went to unusual lengths to express his comfort with violence. Indeed, as House impeachment managers were eager to remind senators today, the Republican at times seemed to encourage violence toward protesters before he became president, and echoed the rhetoric while in office. But what’s easy to forget is that Trump’s GOP rivals in the 2016 race recognized the dangers posed by his style of politics. The Washington Post‘s Dave Weigel…

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Trump was sicker than acknowledged with Covid-19

Trump was sicker than acknowledged with Covid-19

The New York Times reports: President Donald J. Trump was sicker with Covid-19 in October than publicly acknowledged at the time, with extremely depressed blood oxygen levels at one point and a lung problem associated with pneumonia caused by the coronavirus, according to four people familiar with his condition. His prognosis became so worrisome before he was taken to Walter Reed National Military Medical Center that officials believed he would need to be put on a ventilator, two of the…

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Why thousands of Republicans are leaving the party

Why thousands of Republicans are leaving the party

The New York Times reports: In the days after the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol, the phone lines and websites of local election officials across the country were jumping: Tens of thousands of Republicans were calling or logging on to switch their party affiliations. In California, more than 33,000 registered Republicans left the party during the three weeks after the Washington riot. In Pennsylvania, more than 12,000 voters left the G.O.P. in the past month, and more than 10,000…

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Impeachment video reveals a true American horror story

Impeachment video reveals a true American horror story

James Poniewozik writes: Impeachment trials of American presidents are rare. They are almost by definition grave and serious. But the proceeding against former President Donald J. Trump was likely the first to include a parental advisory for graphic violence. Beginning Wednesday’s presentation, which included never-before-seen video of the Jan. 6 assault on the Capitol, Representative Jamie Raskin, the lead House impeachment manager, began with a warning: “We do urge parents and teachers to exercise close review of what young people…

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How right-wing radio stoked anger before the Capitol siege

How right-wing radio stoked anger before the Capitol siege

The New York Times reports: Two days before a mob of Trump supporters invaded the United States Capitol, upending the nation’s peaceful transition of power and leaving at least five people dead, the right-wing radio star Glenn Beck delivered a message to his flock of 10.5 million listeners: “It is time to fight.” “It is time to rip and claw and rake,” Mr. Beck said on his Jan. 4 broadcast. “It is time to go to war, as the left…

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Georgia prosecutors open criminal investigation of Trump phone call

Georgia prosecutors open criminal investigation of Trump phone call

The New York Times reports: Prosecutors in Fulton County have initiated a criminal investigation into former President Donald J. Trump’s attempts to overturn Georgia’s election results, including a phone call he made to Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger in which Mr. Trump pressured him to “find” enough votes to help him reverse his loss. On Wednesday, Fani Willis, the recently elected Democratic prosecutor in Fulton County, sent a letter to numerous officials in state government, including Mr. Raffensperger, requesting that…

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Trump Justice Department sought to block search of Giuliani records

Trump Justice Department sought to block search of Giuliani records

The New York Times reports: In the final months of the Trump administration, senior Justice Department officials repeatedly sought to block federal prosecutors in Manhattan from taking a crucial step in their investigation into Rudolph W. Giuliani’s dealings in Ukraine, delaying a search warrant for some of Mr. Giuliani’s electronic records, according to people with knowledge of the matter. The actions by political appointees at the Justice Department in Washington effectively slowed the investigation as it was gaining momentum last…

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What if we never reach herd immunity?

What if we never reach herd immunity?

Sarah Zhang writes: Let’s begin by defining our terms. Herd immunity is the hazy, long-promised end of the pandemic, but its requirements are quite specific. Jennie Lavine, a biologist at Emory University, likens it to wet logs in a campfire. If there’s enough water in the logs—if there’s enough immunity in a population—“you can’t get the fire to start, period,” she says. To be more technical about it, a population reaches herd immunity when the average number of people infected…

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Saudi release of prominent activist comes amid effort to rebrand for Biden era

Saudi release of prominent activist comes amid effort to rebrand for Biden era

The Washington Post reports: Saudi Arabia released Loujain al-Hathloul, one of the country’s most prominent women’s rights activists, from prison on Wednesday in the clearest sign yet that the kingdom’s leaders were taking steps to assuage President Biden’s complaints about human rights violations. Hathloul, 31, has been among the most visible faces of an unrelenting Saudi crackdown on human rights advocates, dissidents and civil society activists. Her imprisonment, which lasted 1,001 days, and her allegations that she had been tortured,…

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How the GOP allied itself with armed militias

How the GOP allied itself with armed militias

The New York Times reports: Dozens of heavily armed militiamen crowded into the Michigan Statehouse last April to protest a stay-at-home order by the Democratic governor to slow the pandemic. Chanting and stomping their feet, they halted legislative business, tried to force their way onto the floor and brandished rifles from the gallery over lawmakers below. Initially, Republican leaders had some misgivings about their new allies. “The optics weren’t good. Next time tell them not to bring guns,” complained Mike…

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