Russia election 2024: Voting begins in election Putin is bound to win
Laura Gozzi and Francis Scarr – BBC News – March 15, 2024
It was never in doubt but President Putin confirmed he would run during a Kremlin ceremony in December
Voting has begun in Russia’s presidential election, which is all but certain to hand Vladimir Putin another six years in power.
Ballots will be cast over three days, even though the result is not in doubt as he has no credible opponent.
Polling stations opened in the Kamchatka Peninsula, Russia’s easternmost region, at 08:00 local time on Friday (20:00 GMT on Thursday) and will finally close in the westernmost Kaliningrad enclave at 20:00 on Sunday.
It was at a grand military awards ceremony last December that Vladimir Putin told the Russian public he would stand for the presidency for a fifth time.
The solemn event, held in one of the Kremlin’s most opulent halls, Russia’s leader of 24 years had just handed out top honours to soldiers who had taken part in Russia’s “special military operation” in Ukraine.
He was chatting with a small group of participants when the commander of a pro-Russian unit in Ukraine’s occupied Donetsk region approached him.
“We need you, Russia needs you!” declared Lt-Col Artyom Zhoga, asking him to run as a candidate in Russia’s forthcoming presidential election. Everyone voiced their support.
Vladimir Putin nodded: “Now is the time for making decisions. I will be running for the post of president of the Russian Federation.”
His spokesman Dmitry Peskov later described the decision to run as “absolutely spontaneous”. But the Kremlin rarely leaves its choreography to chance.
Instead, straight away its well-oiled media machine swung into action.
On all state channels, 71-year-old President Putin was promoted as a national leader who stood head and shoulders above any potential rivals.
Vladimir Putin does not need to campaign – his face is rarely absent from state TV
“Support for the president transcends party support alone,” reported one correspondent on state TV news later that week. “Vladimir Putin is the people’s candidate!”
He has already been in power in Russia longer than any ruler since Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin.
He has been president since 2000, apart from four years as prime minister because of a two-term limit imposed by the Russian constitution.
He has since changed the rules to give himself a clean slate to run again in 2024 by “switching back to zero” his previous terms. That means he could also run for another six-year term in 2030, when he will turn 78.
During his time in office, Vladimir Putin has methodically tightened his grip on power so no real threat to his rule exists any longer. His most outspoken critics are either dead, in jail or in exile.
The only major opposition figure in Russia, Alexei Navalny, is now dead – his widow says he was murdered
Yet the Kremlin remains determined to give a semblance of legitimacy to Russia’s electoral process.
Although there can be no doubt about the ultimate election result, the authorities seem to care greatly about a high turnout, which will be presented as evidence of his popular mandate.
Turnout at the last election in 2018 was officially 68%, but international observers reported several cases of ballot-stuffing.
This year, voting will be easier than ever before, ending on Sunday.
In the parts of occupied Ukraine that Russia calls its “new regions”, polls opened 10 days before election day, and social media has been awash with ads urging people to go vote.
When they do, they will be faced with a choice – or rather a semblance of one.
Joining Russia’s leader on the ballot will be Nikolai Kharitonov, representing the Communist Party, which remains Russia’s second most popular party, more than 30 years since the fall of the Soviet Union. It draws its support from a small but loyal base of those nostalgic for their Soviet past.
Nikolai Kharitonov is portrayed in a campaign video walking to his imagined new job in the Kremlin
The other two candidates are Leonid Slutsky of the nationalist LDPR and Vladislav Davankov of the New People, ostensibly a liberal, pro-business party.
Despite their vastly different political standings, all three broadly back the Kremlin’s policies – and none stands a chance against the incumbent.
Another hopeful – local Moscow councillor Boris Nadezhdin – announced his candidacy last year, generating a rare moment of optimism for opposition-minded voters.
He was a frequent guest on talk shows on state TV and had been relatively critical of Moscow’s war in Ukraine.
But in a country where many have been jailed for speaking out against the war, he would never make the ballot paper.
Thousands queued up to offer signatures in his support, and perhaps spooked by the crowds, Russia’s election authorities rejected his bid, claiming that more than 15% of his collected signatures were flawed.
Boris Nadezhdin was barred from running more than a month before the election
Mr Nadezhdin’s exclusion from the race ended any possibility of a surprise.
Televised debates have taken place in the run-up to the vote, without Vladimir Putin taking part.
Instead, TV coverage has focused on his regular choreographed meetings with factory workers, soldiers and students while his state-of-the-nation address at the end of February was widely seen as a pre-election pitch aimed at burnishing his credentials as a man of the people.
Although some of the speech was devoted to the war in Ukraine, it was largely dedicated to domestic issues. Perhaps a tacit acknowledgement that many Russians are more concerned by problems closer to home than Russia’s supposed successes on the battlefield or its endless strife with the West.
Russia’s leader proposed a raft of social measures, including a modernised tax system that was “fairer” for Russian families and incentives aimed at increasing Russia’s dwindling birth rate.
The speech provided a glimpse into the many issues Russia is facing, including poverty affecting families and faltering education, infrastructure and healthcare.
For a man who has spent 20 years as president, Vladimir Putin has proven unable to solve many of these issues.
Instead, up to 40% of Russia’s budget in 2024 is being spent on the military and national security.
Many of his measures require considerable cash injections or investment, and Russia has a serious corruption problem that means funds often do not reach their intended destinations.
But that will hardly matter in an election that most international observers expect will be neither free nor fair.
In the absence of genuine enthusiasm for the vote, campaign videos from the poll’s also-rans have created a social media buzz, coming across as near-caricatures.
Communist hopeful Nikolai Kharitonov is portrayed angrily clenching his fist while listening to the latest news from volatile commodity markets. “We’ve toyed with capitalism and that’s enough!” he declares, marching across Red Square to take up residence in the Kremlin after his imagined election victory.
Of course, nothing of the sort will happen.
In another video, nationalist LDPR leader Leonid Slutsky is shown trying out the office of his late predecessor Vladimir Zhirinovsky, who led the party for 30 years until his death two years ago.
When an aide tries to switch name-plates on the desk, Mr Slutsky tells her forcefully: “No, leave it there!”
Leonid Slutsky is quite happy to remain in the shadows of his predecessor and Vladimir Putin
All it does is show how happy he is to remain a sideshow to Vladimir Putin’s main act.
The only potential intrigue so far has come from an initiative from Yulia Navalnaya, the widow of Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny, whose death in prison last month she has blamed on “bloody mobster” Vladimir Putin.
She has urged supporters to swamp polling stations at midday on Sunday and vote for anyone but him. “We need to use election day to show that we exist and there are many of us,” she said in a video message.https://syndication.bbcstudios.com/p0hfj1pv-processed.mp4
But Ms Navalnaya herself has said that the purpose of the campaign is mostly to allow supporters to silently identify one another at the polling station, rather than to wield any real change.
On 18 March, Russians will doubtless wake up to find President Putin has been re-elected.
When he appears at a victory rally in Moscow, he may even shed a tear – as he did after the 2012 presidential election – and profusely thank voters for the trust they have placed in him.
For the next six years, the illusion of democracy is all but guaranteed to continue.
Using coercion, Russia has successfully imposed its citizenship in Ukraine’s occupied territories
Lori Hinnant, Vasilisa Stepanenko, Samya Kullab and Hanna Arirova – March 15, 2024
An election commission official inspects the passport of a person who came to vote at a polling station, during a presidential election in Makiivka, Russian-controlled Donetsk region, eastern Ukraine, Friday, March 15, 2024. People in Moscow-controlled Ukrainian regions are voting in Russia’s presidential election, which is all but certain to extend President Vladimir Putin’s rule after he clamped down on dissent. (AP Photo)42-year-old Vyacheslav Ryabkov, an internally displaced person from Kozachi Laheri in the Kherson region of Ukraine, is pictured in Kolomyya, Ukraine on Feb. 13, 2024. Russia has successfully imposed its passports on nearly the entire population of occupied Ukraine by making it impossible to survive without them, coercing hundreds of thousands of people into citizenship. (AP Photo/Vasilisa Stepanenko)Natalia Zhyvohliad, an internally displaced person from Nova Petrivka in the Zaporizhzhia region of Ukraine, poses with some of her children at the IDP shelter in Kyiv, Friday, Jan. 19, 2024. (AP Photo/Evgeniy Maloletka)50-year-old Natalia Zhyvohliad, a displaced person from Nova Petrivka in the Zaporizhzhia region of Ukraine, is pictured standing outside her temporary modular house in Kolomyya, Ivano-Frankivsk region on Feb. 13, 2024. Russia has successfully imposed its passports on nearly the entire population of occupied Ukraine by making it impossible to survive without them, coercing hundreds of thousands of people into citizenship. (AP Photo/Vasilisa Stepanenko)42-year-old Vyacheslav Ryabkov, an internally displaced person from Kozachi Laheri in the Kherson region of Ukraine, shows in Kolomyya on Feb. 13, 2024 the scars on his arms caused by Russian soldiers who cut him with a knife. Russia has successfully imposed its passports on nearly the entire population of occupied Ukraine by making it impossible to survive without them, coercing hundreds of thousands of people into citizenship. (AP Photo/Vasilisa Stepanenko)Natalia Zhyvohliad, an internally displaced person from Nova Petrivka in the Zaporizhzhia region of Ukraine, fries fish for her children at the IDP shelter in Kyiv, on Friday, Jan. 19, 2024. (AP Photo/Evgeniy Maloletka)42-year-old Vyacheslav Ryabkov, an internally displaced person from Kozachi Laheri in the Kherson region of Ukraine, shows in Kolomyya on Feb. 13, 2024 the scars on his stomach caused by Russian soldiers who cut him with a knife. Russia has successfully imposed its passports on nearly the entire population of occupied Ukraine by making it impossible to survive without them, coercing hundreds of thousands of people into citizenship. (AP Photo/Vasilisa Stepanenko)50-year-old Natalia Zhyvohliad, an internally displaced person from Nova Petrivka in the Zaporizhzhia region of Ukraine, is pictured with her children, daughter-in-law and grandson in their temporary modular house in Kolomyya, Ivano-Frankivsk region on Feb. 13, 2024. (AP Photo/Vasilisa Stepanenko)Natalia Zhyvohliad, an internally displaced person from Nova Petrivka in the Zaporizhzhia region of Ukraine, fries fish for her children at the IDP shelter in Kyiv, on Friday, Jan. 19, 2024. (AP Photo/Evgeniy Maloletka)
KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — He and his parents were among the last in their village to take a Russian passport, but the pressure was becoming unbearable.
By his third beating at the hands of the Russian soldiers occupying Ukraine’s Kherson region, Vyacheslav Ryabkov caved. The soldiers broke two of his ribs, but his face was not bruised for his unsmiling passport photo, taken in September 2023.
In December, they caught the welder on his way home from work. Then one slammed his rifle butt down on Ryabkov’s face, smashing the bridge of his nose.
“Why don’t you fight for us? You already have a Russian passport,” they demanded. The beating continued as the 42-year-old fell unconscious.
“Let’s finish this off,” one soldier said. A friend ran for Ryabkov’s mother.
Russia has successfully imposed its passports on nearly the entire population of occupied Ukraine by making it impossible to survive without them, coercing hundreds of thousands of people into citizenship ahead of electionsVladimir Putin has made certain he will win, an Associated Press investigation has found. But accepting a passport means that men living in occupied territory can be drafted to fight against the same Ukrainian army that is trying to free them.
A Russian passport is needed to prove property ownership and keep access to health care and retirement income. Refusal can result in losing custody of children, jail – or worse. A new Russian law stipulates that anyone in the occupied territories who does not have a Russian passport by July 1 is subject to imprisonment as a “foreign citizen.”
But Russia also offers incentives: a stipend to leave the occupied territory and move to Russia, humanitarian aid, pensions for retirees, and money for parents of newborns – with Russian birth certificates.
Every passport and birth certificate issued makes it harder for Ukraine to reclaim its lost land and children, and each new citizen allows Russia to claim a right – however falsely – to defend its own people against a hostile neighbor.
The AP investigation found that the Russian government has seized at least 1,785 homes and businesses in the Donetsk and Zaporizhzhia regions alone. Ukraine’s Crimean leadership in exile reported on Feb. 25 that of 694 soldiers reported dead in recent fighting for Russia, 525 were likely Ukrainian citizens who had taken Russian passports since the annexation.
AP spoke about the system to impose Russian citizenship in occupied territories to more than a dozen people from the regions, along with the activists helping them to escape and government officials trying to cope with what has become a bureaucratic and psychological nightmare for many.
Ukraine’s human rights ombudsman, Dmytro Lubinets, said “almost 100% … of the whole population who still live on temporary occupied territories of Ukraine” now have Russian passports.
Under international law dating to 1907, it is forbidden to force people “to swear allegiance to the hostile Power.” But when Ukrainians apply for a Russian passport, they must submit biometric data and cell phone information and swear an oath of loyalty.
“People in occupied territories, these are the first soldiers to fight against Ukraine,” said Kateryna Rashevska, a lawyer who helped Ukraine bring a war crimes case against Putin before the International Criminal Court. “For them, it’s logical not to waste Russian people, just to use Ukrainians.”
CHANGING THE LAW
The combination of force and enticement when it comes to Russian passports dates to the annexation of Crimea in 2014. Russian citizenship was automatically given to permanent residents of Crimea and anyone who refused lost rights to jobs, health care and property.
Nine months into the Russian occupation of the peninsula, 1.5 million Russian passports had been issued there, according to statistics issued by the Russian government in 2015. But Ukrainians say it was still possible to function without one for years afterward.
Beginning in May 2022, Russia passed a series of laws to make it easier to obtain passports for Ukrainians, mostly by lifting the usual residency and income requirements. In April 2023 came the punishment: Anyone in the occupied territories who did not accept Russian citizenship would be considered stateless and required to register with Russia’s Internal Affairs Ministry.
Russian officials threatened to withhold access to medical care for those without a Russian passport, and said one was needed to prove property ownership. Hundreds of properties deemed “abandoned” were seized by the Russian government.
“You can see it in the passport stamps: If someone got their passport in August 2022 or earlier, they are most certainly pro-Russian. If a passport was issued after that time – it was most certainly forced,” said Oleksandr Rozum, a lawyer who left the occupied city of Berdyansk and now handles the bureaucratic gray zone for Ukrainians under occupation who ask for his help, including property records, birth and death certificates and divorces.
The situation is different depending on the whims of the Russian officials in charge of a particular area, according to interviews with Ukrainians and a look at the Telegram social media accounts set up by occupation officials.
In an interview posted recently, Yevgeny Balitsky, the Moscow-installed governor in Zaporizhzhia, said anyone who opposed the occupation was subject to expulsion. “We understood that these people could not be won over and that they would have to be dealt with even more harshly in the future,” he said. Balitsky then alluded to making “some extremely harsh decisions that I will not talk about.”
Even children are forced to take Russian passports.
A decree signed Jan. 4 by Putin allows for the fast-tracking of citizenship for Ukrainian orphans and those “without parental care,” who include children whose parents were detained in the occupied territories. Almost 20,000 Ukrainian children have disappeared into Russia or Russian-held territories, according to the Ukrainian government, where they can be given passports and be adopted as Russian citizens.
“It’s about eradication of identity,” said Rashevska, the lawyer involved in the war crimes case.
Natalia Zhyvohliad, a mother of nine from a suburb of Berdyansk, had a good idea of what was in store for her children if she stayed.
Zhyvohliad said about half her town of 3,500 people left soon after for Ukrainian-held lands, some voluntarily and some deported through the frontlines on a 40-kilometer (25-mile) walk. Others welcomed the occupation: Her goddaughter eagerly took Russian citizenship, as did some of her neighbors.
But she said plenty of people were like her – those the Russians derisively call “waiters”: People waiting for a Ukrainian liberation. She kept her younger children, who range in age from 7 to 18, home from school and did her best to teach them in Ukrainian. But then someone snitched, and she was forced to send them to the Russian school.
At all hours, she said, soldiers would pound on her door and ask why she didn’t have a passport yet. One friend gave in because she needed medicine for a chronic illness. Zhyvohliad held out through the summer, not quite believing the threats to deport her and send her brood to an orphanage in Russia or to dig trenches.
Then last fall, the school headmaster forced her 17-year-old and 18-year-old sons to register for the draft and ordered them to apply for passports in the meantime. Their alternative, the principal said, was to explain themselves to Russia’s internal security services.
By the end of 2023, at least 30,000 Crimean men had been conscripted to serve in the Russian military since the peninsula was annexed, according to a UN report. It was clear to Zhyvohliad what her boys risked.
With tears in her eyes and trembling legs, she went to the passport office.
“I kept a Ukrainian flag during the occupation,” she said. “How could I apply for this nasty thing?”
She hoped to use it just once — at the last Russian checkpoint before the crossing into Ukrainian-held territory.
When Zhyvohliad reached what is known as the filtration point at Novoazovsk, the Russians separated her and her two oldest boys from the rest of the children. They had to sign an agreement to pass a lie detector test. Then Zhyvohliad was pulled aside alone.
For 40 minutes, they went through her phone, took fingerprints and photos and questioned her, but they ultimately let her through. The children were waiting for her on the other side. She misses her home but doesn’t regret leaving.
“I waited until the last moment to be liberated,” she said. “But this thing with my kids possibly being drafted was the last straw.”
WEAPONIZING HEALTH CARE
Often the life-or-death decision is more immediate.
Russian occupation officials have said the day is coming soon when only those with Russian passports and the all-important national health insurance will be able to access care. For some, it’s already here.
The international organization Physicians for Human Rights documented at least 15 cases of people being denied vital medical care in occupied territories between February 2023 and August 2023 because they lacked a Russian passport. Some hospitals even featured a passport desk to speed the process for desperate patients. One hospital in Zaporizhzhia oblast was ordered to close because the medical staff refused to accept Russian citizenship.
Alexander Dudka, the Russian-appointed head of the village of Lazurne in the Kherson region, first threatened to withhold humanitarian aid from residents without Russian citizenship. In August, he added medicine to the list of things the “waiters” would no longer have access to.
Residents, he said in the video on the village Telegram channel, “must respect the country that ensures their safety and which is now helping them live.”
As of Jan. 1, anyone needing medical care in the occupied region must show proof they have mandatory national health insurance, which in turn is only available to Russian citizens.
Last year, “if you weren’t scared or if you weren’t coerced there were places where you could still get medical care,” said Uliana Poltavets, a PHR researcher. “Now it is impossible.”
Dina Urich, who arranges the escapes from occupied territory with the aid group Helping to Leave, said about 400 requests come in each month, but they only have the money and staff for 40 evacuations. Priority goes to those who need urgent medical care, she said. And Russian soldiers at the last checkpoints have started turning back people without the Russian passports.
“You have people constantly dying while waiting for evacuation due to a lack of health care,” she said. ““People will stay there, people will die, people will experience psychological and physical pressure, that is, some will simply die of torture and persecution, while others will live in constant fear.”
IMPORTING LOYALTY
Along with turning Ukrainians into Russians throughout the occupied territories, the Russian government is bringing in its own people. It is offering rock bottom mortgage rates for anyone from Russia who wants to move there, replacing the Ukrainian doctors, nurses, teachers, police and municipal workers who are now gone.
Half of Zhyvohliad’s village left, either at the start of the war when things looked dark for the Kherson region or after being deported across the frontline by occupation officials. The school principal’s empty home was taken over by a Russian-appointed replacement.
Artillery and airstrikes damaged thousands of homes in the port city of Mariupol, which was besieged by Russian forces for months before falling under their control. Most of the residents fled into Ukrainian-held territory or deep inside Russia. Russians often take over the property.
Russia also offered “residential certificates” and a 100,000 ruble ($1,000) stipend to Ukrainians willing to accept citizenship and live in Russia. For many people tired of listening to the daily sounds of battle and afraid of what the future might bring, it looked like a good option.
This again follows Russia’s actions after the annexation of Crimea: By populating occupied regions with Russian residents, Russia increasingly cements its hold on territories it has seized by force in what many Ukrainians describe as ethnic cleansing.
The process is only accelerating. After capturing the town of Adviivka last month, Russia swooped in with the passports in a matter of days.
The neighboring Kherson town of Oleshky essentially emptied after the flooding caused by the explosion of the Kakhovka Dam. The housing stipend in Russia looked fabulous by comparison to the shelling and rising waters, said Rima Yaremenko.
She didn’t take it, instead making her way through Russia to Latvia and then to Poland. But she believes the Russians took the opportunity to drive the “waiters” from Oleshky.
“Maybe they wanted to empty the city,” she said. “They occupied it, maybe they thought it would be theirs forever.”
Ryabkov said he was offered the housing stipend when he filled out his passport paperwork but turned it down. He knows plenty of people who accepted though.
By the time the Russian soldiers caught Ryabkov in the street, in December, everyone in his village was either gone or had Russian citizenship. When his mother arrived, he was barely recognizable beneath all the blood and the Russian guns were trained on him. She flung herself over his body.
“Shoot him through me,” she dared them.
They couldn’t bring themselves to shoot an elderly woman, and she eventually dragged him home. They started preparations to leave the next day.
It took time, but they made it out using the Russian passports.
“When I saw our yellow and blue flag, I started to cry,” he said. “I wanted to burn the Russian passport, destroy it, trample it.”
Hinnant reported from Paris. AP journalists Illia Novikov and Susie Blann contributed to this report.
Russia’s war machine is trying to turn Ukrainian teenagers into soldiers
Ivana Kottasová, Olga Voitovych and Svitlana Vlasova – March 15, 2024
Russian forces deported Bohdan Yermokhin from the occupied Ukrainian city of Mariupol in the spring of 2022, flew him to Moscow on a government plane and placed him into a foster family. He was sent to a patriotic camp near the capital where flag-waving staff praised Russian President Vladimir Putin and tried to teach him nationalistic songs.
The Ukrainian teenager was given a Russian passport and sent to a Russian school. And then, in the fall of 2023, not long before his 18th birthday, he received a summons from a Russian military recruitment office.
Yermokhin, who’s now back in Ukraine and recovering from his ordeal in Kyiv, told CNN he believed this was the last step in Russia’s attempt to bully him into submission – a bid to sign him up as a soldier to fight against his own people.
“(I was told that) Ukraine was losing, that children were used for organ donations there, and that I would be sent to war right away. I told them that if I was sent to the war, at least I would fight for my own country, not for them,” he said.
Yermokhin was part of a group of children known as the “Mariupol 31,” who were taken to Russia. Ukrainian authorities estimate that 20,000 children have been forcibly transported to Russia since Moscow launched its full-scale invasion of the country in February 2022. More than 2,100 children remain missing, according to official statistics, but the government says the real number could be much higher.
Bohdan Yermokhin, 18, in central Kyiv. – Ivana Kottasova/CNN
Last March, the International Criminal Court (ICC) issued an arrest warrant for Putin and the Russian Commissioner for Children’s Rights Maria Lvova-Belova, for their alleged role in abducting and deporting Ukrainian children. Russia has publicly acknowledged the transfer of Ukrainian children without guardians, despite some having guardians or parents.
Ukraine’s human rights commissioner Dmytro Lubinets said his office was convinced that Russia’s efforts to turn Ukrainian teenagers deported to Russia – or living in occupied areas of the east – into soldiers were part of a wider drive by Putin to erase the Ukrainian identity. It is also an opportunity for Moscow to replenish its forces on the front lines.
“It’s not theoretical,” he said. “We now have examples of forcible mobilization of Ukrainian people. All Ukrainian teenagers held in Russia, when they turn 18, they are put on a (recruitment) list of Russian military,” told CNN.
According to the International Committee of the Red Cross, it is illegal under the Geneva Conventions for an occupying power to compel or pressure the local population to serve in its armed forces. Human Rights Watch has said Russia is committing a war crime by doing so.
But Lubinets told CNN that Ukrainian authorities have seen Russian officials do just that in occupied areas, compelling Ukrainians to serve. The conscription efforts start with the opening of regional offices for various Russian government departments, including health and social services.
“Then comes education. All schools must use new books where the message is that Ukraine and the Ukrainian nation never existed and that Ukrainian children have always been Russian children,” Lubinets told CNN.
“The next step is forcing everyone to take Russian passports. If you don’t, you can’t access any services, you can’t get medical care in hospitals, for example… and the next step is mobilization. All men in the temporarily occupied territories of Ukraine are put in a special recruitment database for the Russian military.”
Yermokhin said he went through the entire process described by Lubinets — although he said the Russians didn’t seem very consistent at times.
“I was always told that I was from Russia and that I was born in Russia, that there is no Ukraine, and that it simply did not exist, that Mariupol was Russia. But in my Russian passport, my place of birth was listed as ‘Ukraine, the city of Mariupol,’” he said, smirking.
Lvova-Belova herself confirmed that Yermokhin received a Russian passport and military summons. In a statement posted on her Telegram channel in November she said that the summons was not unusual, because “all citizens of Russia receive” it. She said that since Yermokhin was still a student, he would be able to defer his military service until after finishing his education.
‘We are losing these children’
Many of the children deported to Russia came from socially vulnerable Ukrainian families. Some had been orphaned or were placed in foster homes when their birth parents became unable to care for them.
It’s these children that Mykola Kuleba is most worried about. He heads Save Ukraine, a Kyiv-based non-governmental organization that specializes in bringing deported children back to Ukraine.
“We are losing these children. Many of them will never come back because they are growing up with this poison, with this horrible propaganda, they are very vulnerable to it,” he said.
Yermokhin said he saw this firsthand. He spent years living with foster families and in group homes after losing his parents as a small child and was in a boarding school in Mariupol when Russian troops took over the city in May 2022.
“Many of us were abandoned by our guardians, abandoned by foster parents during the war… and then the Russians come in and they act in this hypocritical way, offering warmth and pretending that they care, and these children see this and think, well, this is better than it was there (in Ukraine),” Yermokhin said.
He said this happened to Filip, his best friend from Mariupol, who was reportedly adopted by Lvova-Belova. “His foster parents abandoned him in Mariupol during the war and he hadn’t seen any warmth since his (birth) mother died. Now he has it… but I want him to know that we are waiting for him here.”
“Out of the four of us mates from Mariupol, three are now here (in Ukraine) and we are waiting for him,” he added.
The office of Lvova-Belova did not respond to CNN’s request for comment. However, in a statement posted to her Telegram channel in November 2022, Lvova-Belova recalled adopting a teenage boy called Filip from Mariupol.
“If you look at history, Russians have done this (before), they also took children out of Chechnya and now these children (now adults) are fighting for them,” Yermohkin said, referring to Russia’s wars to reclaim the breakaway republic of Chechnya in the 1990s and early 2000s.
Kuleba said there is no doubt that the deportations are part of a wider strategy. “It’s a Russian strategy to turn Ukrainian children into Russian children and militarize them. They are kidnapping children, and they are erasing their identity, because they want to destroy the Ukrainian nation,” he said.
Singing the Russian anthem, wearing Russian uniform
Sixteen-year-old Artem’s experience is eerily similar to that of Yermokhin. He too feels like he was being groomed to become a Russian soldier.
He was one of 13 children taken by Russian soldiers from a school in the Kharkiv region in 2022. “We had no choice whether to go or not. We were told we were being evacuated, boys, girls, and small children,” he said.
CNN spoke to Artem at a Kyiv center for children who have been returned from Russian captivity. His social worker was present during the interview but did not interfere in the conversation. Save Ukraine, which runs the center, asked CNN not to release Artem’s last name due to his age.
“The Russian soldiers asked us whether we were (supporting) Ukraine or Russia. And we did not answer anything. The younger children were crying, and we tried to calm them down. We were scared ourselves, but we had to comfort the small children,” he added.
Artem said the group was taken to several locations within occupied areas of Ukraine before being brought to the city of Luhansk, where they started school.
“All the lessons were in Russian, and we were always told that Ukrainians were killing Russians,” he said.
“It was clear they wanted us to turn against Ukraine, but we made a pact (with the other children from his school) that we would not give into the attempts to turn us into Russians and we did not speak Russian,” he said, adding that the smaller children in the group were more at risk of being influenced by the propaganda and were often kept away from the older Ukrainian kids.
“We went to classes every day and were told to sing the Russian anthem. We tried to stand back and pretended to sing, but we did not sing,” he added.
The worst part, Artem said, was the uniform.
He said he and the other older children from the cohort were made to wear a uniform that was very similar to the Russian military uniform and had the letter Z — a symbol of support of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine — on its sleeve.
“It was made of rough material, similar in color to the uniforms of the Russian military. We were given it and told that when there were holidays, we had to wear it,” he said. “I really thought that this was it and that they gave me the uniform because I might be sent to the Russian army. It was scary.”
Artem said it was impossible to refuse — the teachers threatened the children with severe punishment if they failed to wear the uniform. Yet even then, he felt horrible about putting it on – especially when he found out he was used by Russia for propaganda machine in nationalistic videos.
In one video, Artem is seen with a group of children receiving boxes of tangerines from uniformed members of the National Guard. The children are prompted by their teacher to say, “Thank you! Thank you! Thank you!” and give a thumbs up.
CNN has seen several images of Artem wearing uniform-like clothing at the boarding school in the occupied city of Luhansk. He is shown wearing a camouflage top and trousers with a black armband that prominently features a white letter Z in two photographs, one of which shows him sitting in a classroom during a lesson.
In another, he is in what appears to be a full replica of a Russian military uniform during what the school described as a celebration of the Russian national holiday known as “Defender of the Fatherland Day.” All the photographs were published by the school and are still publicly accessible.
“When I saw myself in the uniform in photos and videos on the Internet, I thought for myself that I was a traitor and that I betrayed Ukraine, I swapped Ukraine for Russia… even though I knew I was forced to do it,” he said.
Ultimately, both Artem and Yermokhin are among the lucky ones – they have managed to return to Ukraine.
Artem said he got hold of a cell phone and was able to reach his mother, who had spent six months not knowing what had happened to him. She was able to locate him and get him back home with the help of Save Ukraine.
Yermokhin tried to escape Russia twice, once through Belarus and once through occupied Crimea, but was caught and returned to Moscow on both occasions.
The Ukrainian authorities and his lawyer had been trying to get him out of Russia for some time before he received his Russian military summons, but those attempts were unsuccessful. He was only allowed by Russia to return to Ukraine upon his 18th birthday.
Ukrainian authorities do not reveal the details of negotiations that lead to the return of Ukrainian children. They said a number of international organizations and third countries, including Qatar, were involved in Yermokhin’s repatriation.
Thousands of Ukrainian children remain in Russia and, according to Save Ukraine, some of them have been enrolled in military and naval academies across the country. The charity says it has been able to return 251 children to Ukraine so far and is helping them to readjust.
Every Monday for more than a year, Yermokhin recalled, he was expected to sing the Russian anthem during a flag-raising ceremony at his school. He tried to avoid it but, when forced to attend, found a way to avoid listening to the anthem and the nationalistic lecture that followed.
“There is such a thing as headphones,” he said. “You put them on and sit there, and no one sees what you’re doing.”
Looking back at his experience, Yermokhin said he might not have realized at the time how much pressure he was under. “They tried to break me,” he said. “Thinking of it all now, I am shocked that I got through it.”
There is only one thing that matters about Donald Trump — and it’s not his crimes or mental decline
Brian Karem – March 14, 2024
Donald Trump Alexi J. Rosenfeld/Getty Images
I don’t know about anyone else, but I’m already tired of the presidential election campaign and it’s just mid-March. And I like politics.
Usually, by this time in the campaign season, we’re not even sure who the nominees are yet. This year we already know and most of us have already made up our minds. That doesn’t mean anyone has stopped yelling at us, of course. It just means if you’re covering politics you’re already tired because the divisive rancor in this country is headed for overdrive until November (and possibly afterward) and some of us would like to spend a little bit of time thinking about someone other than Donald Trump or Joe Biden. The wife. The kids. The family. Maybe that mime on the beach who nearly drowned. Whoever. Whatever.
To quickly recap, standing in the sewage and heaving his own political feces far and wide is the wild orangutan of the Republican, excuse me MAGA, party – Donald Trump. We know what he’s all about. Do I really need to go into great detail? What can I possibly say that hasn’t already been written, said, recorded or spoken about the man. He’s still chaos in a blender.
And his supporters? Most of them fall not too far from the poisoned tree of Trump. I spoke with one of his Midwest supporters this week; a used car salesman who believes all politicians are liars, but Donald is special. “They all lie. They’re all crooks. They’re all corrupt. The country was better under Trump though. We were at peace. He got us out of Afghanistan and Biden screwed that up. We were at peace with Russia and Biden screwed that up. There wasn’t a war in the Middle East. That’s Biden’s fault too.”
How do you dissect that nonsense? I didn’t even waste my time arguing with the guy. He’s like a bad SNL skit. It’s as bad as the morons who think God has chosen Trump to lead us to the promised land. If Joe Biden loses to this level of stupidity, he will have no one to blame but himself – and a Democratic Party that hasn’t effectively fought back.
Donald is busy slurring his way through speeches, calling other Americans “The enemy”, and creating campaign issues out of inaction, blame, deflection and fiction. You know, typical Trump.
On the other hand, we have Joe Biden. The MAGA party is falling over itself in befuddlement as it tries to impeach him for reasons they don’t understand, can’t articulate and don’t believe. It is all to support their own candidate, who many of them secretly loathe but are willing to support because . . . they’ve got no one else. Think about it. Who in that party, outside of Trump, has any national appeal? Matt Gaetz would lose a fistfight to Rand Paul’s hair perm. The only real challenger is Nikki Haley and Trump effectively destroyed her by Super Tuesday.
Meanwhile, special prosecutor Robert Hur showed up in Congress this week to answer questions about the investigation into Joe Biden and his handling of classified documents. Hur was the guy who described Biden as a well-meaning old geezer. Since the prosecutor admitted Biden did nothing illegal, all the GOP could do was try to parse his words for soundbites and faux political arguments making the airwaves at Fox, and in articles at Breitbart.
Hur was vilified by the left, lionized by the right and in the end, no one did anything – because, after all, this is a MAGA-controlled Congress and they can barely keep the lights on. That’s fine with Jim Jordan because he apparently operates best in the dark.
While the MAGA party has no real charges, so far, to level against Biden, that doesn’t keep them from calling him a degenerate, a corrupt criminal, a chronic bed wetter and a drooling dotard with dementia. It doesn’t matter if it’s true or not. Say it enough and the acolytes will believe. More importantly, they’ll start quoting you – that’s all the MAGA party wants. They say it here. It comes out there. Garbage in. Garbage out.
Meanwhile, over on the Meidas Touch video channel, a former Trump employee talked about Trump’s often explosive and violent bowel movements and his use of adult diapers.
But, even if Trump explosively evacuates his bowels on stage in front of thousands, you can’t count him out because remember those four jurisdictions with felony charges against him? Well, looks like that will never keep him out of the presidential race.
The first case to go to court, or maybe not, will be the Stormy Daniels hush money case in Manhattan. Even the fiercest prosecutors think that while the facts of the case are valid, it’s a stretch to charge Trump with a felony – it’s more likely just a misdemeanor. Former fixer Michael Cohen is waiting for a showdown with Trump – which Trump doesn’t want, so Trump has asked for a delay based on his claims of unlimited immunity – for actions that took place before he was president. That’s truly funny. I wonder if he’d claim immunity on stealing lunch money in fifth grade based on his “unlimited” immunity?
The Mar-a-Lago classified documents case is probably the strongest against Trump, but a Trump-friendly judge has prosecutor Jack Smith completely hamstrung, despite the fact that, as Ted Lieu so ably pointed out in the hearing with Hur, Trump lied, conspired to destroy evidence, shifted blame, lied again and then tried a Vulcan mind meld to say he could do whatever he wanted.
The D.C. insurrection case is so tied up in Supreme Court shenanigans it will be lucky to go to trial this fall. And in Georgia? The one case that Trump could not dismiss if he were re-elected? It may never get to trial. A judge dismissed six charges against Trump for lack of evidence. That prompted hoots, screams of “Deep State” (though it was the state that dismissed the charges) and of course, the inevitable plea by Trump for more money from his supporters. Meanwhile, the judge is still to rule on the tryst between Fulton County District Attorney Fanni Willis and special prosecutor Nathan Wade. That whole case sounds like a season of the old soap opera “All My Children.” Trump loves soap operas, so he’s munching popcorn and cheeseburgers waiting gleefully for that dustup to end so he can bilk his supporters for more money while screaming, ranting and raving (and perhaps suffering from explosive diarrhea) no matter what the outcome is.
What a presidential race this is turning out to be.
“We don’t have it so good in this country,” a Trump follower told me. “I don’t like either candidate, but I’ll choose Trump cause he can get things done.”
What, on God’s green Earth, or Trump’s scorched Earth, gives anyone the impression that Trump can get anything done? He never has. He couldn’t even run his own real estate “empire.”
He never got an infrastructure bill passed despite announcing “Infrastructure Week” nearly every week of his presidency. Members of his own party lament that they didn’t get border policy legislation passed when they controlled Congress during the Trump administration. The MAGA party claims immigration, the economy and national security are the main issues in the election – and while they may be right, they also haven’t done anything to contribute to solving any of the problems. They’ve only worked to exacerbate them and exploit them for Trump’s benefit.
Trump doesn’t care about solving the problems, and some of us don’t recognize the true problems we face. For example, the biggest fallout from prosecutor Hur’s testimony in Congress highlighted just how easy it is for our enemies to get access to classified and Top Secret information.
Don’t expect us to pay much attention to that salient point. Explosive bowel movements, hush money to hookers, and “illegal” immigrants who take all the jobs while sitting on their butts not working and getting unemployment are our biggest talking points.
Biden reached out to Trump to solve the immigration problem. “Let’s work together,” he said. Trump would have none of that. He just wants to dish out blame.
That leaves the “Thump them in the nose” approach the only viable alternative to Trump.
To hell with arguing about court cases. To hell with pointing out Trump’s foibles. Hillary Clinton lost because she didn’t go where she needed the votes in 2016. Concentrate on beating Trump at the polls. Make sure the election is secure. Make sure there’s no fraud. Make sure there’s no suppression. Concentrate on doing those things and then it doesn’t matter if Trump goes to prison. Just make sure the seditious ass clown never makes it back to the White House. Count every vote and everyone must vote.
Isn’t that the real goal? Personally, I do not care if Trump spends one day in prison – though he deserves to spend the rest of his days there. I also don’t care that he’s old, or that Biden is old.
These things are distractions. The die has been cast. For the next eight and a half months we have to listen to the most moronic, insipid, ridiculous presidential campaign of all time between one old geezer with explosive bowel movements, and another who suffers from sleep apnea and is nursing a broken foot.
The only thing to do is to keep an eye on the prize. Do not be fooled by trinkets, and baubles. It doesn’t matter what goes on in court. It doesn’t matter if Donald is demented. It doesn’t matter if he’s a fascist, authoritarian, a despot, a philanderer, a numbskull, a loon, or a spoiled brat who has mommy and daddy issues. It matters that the atavistic ass could be our president – again. So, don’t focus on the Depends. Focus on the end.
Donald Trump must never return to the White House. We know what and who he is. Don’t waste your time pointing out the obvious, or getting upset about it. Do something positive. Turn out the votes. It is not a time to be complacent. It is not a time to become bored or unamused. The next eight months will be a trial of everyone’s intestinal fortitude.
I read recently one reporter’s lament about suffering from PTSD following the 2016 campaign. Wussy. Buckle up buttercup. These are the times that try all souls. You’ve got a job to do. Report the facts. If we did that there might be fewer MAGA supporters as a result.
The voters have a job to do, too.
Quit whining. Don’t listen to the next eight months of gaslighting. Vote.
GOP nominee to run North Carolina public schools called for violence against Democrats, including executing Obama and Biden
Andrew Kaczynski and Em Steck – March 14, 2024
From Michele Morrow/Facebook
The Republican nominee for superintendent overseeing North Carolina’s public schools and its $11 billion budget has a history marked by extreme and controversial comments, including sharing baseless conspiracy theories and frequent calls for the execution of prominent Democrats.
Michele Morrow, a conservative activist who last week upset the incumbent Superintendent of Public Instruction in North Carolina’s Republican primary, expressed support in 2020 for the televised execution of former President Barack Obama and suggested killing then-President-elect Joe Biden.
In other comments on social media between 2019 and 2021 reviewed by CNN’s KFile, Morrow made disturbing suggestions about executing prominent Democrats for treason, including Minnesota Rep. Ilhan Omar, North Carolina Gov. Roy Cooper, former New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, Hillary Clinton, Sen. Chuck Schumer and other prominent people such as Anthony Fauci and Bill Gates.
“I prefer a Pay Per View of him in front of the firing squad,” she wrote in a tweet from May 2020, responding to a user sharing a conspiracy theory who suggested sending Obama to prison at Guantanamo Bay. “I do not want to waste another dime on supporting his life. We could make some money back from televising his death.”
In another post in May 2020, she responded to a fake Time Magazine cover that featured art of Obama in an electric chair asking if he should be executed.
“Never. We need to follow the Constitution’s advice and KILL all TRAITORS!!! #JusticeforAmerica,” she wrote.
CNN reached out to Morrow and her campaign multiple times but did not receive a response.
From activist to candidate
Last Tuesday, Morrow defeated Catherine Truitt, the incumbent North Carolina Superintendent of Public Instruction, in the Republican primary. Morrow, a registered nurse and grassroots activist who homeschooled her children, ran on a platform of supporting parental rights and opposing critical race theory.
As superintendent, Morrow would oversee the state’s public school system and help set educational priorities, manage the school system’s budgets, and work with the state’s Board of Education to set and implement curriculum standards. Her website lists endorsements by “conservative school boards” but remains light on changes she’d make if elected.
In a campaign speech in February, Morrow advocated for a constitutional amendment to abolish the state Board of Education, which sets policies and procedures for public schools in the state. Doing away with the board would put direct control over the state’s education agenda under the superintendent and the state legislature, which is currently controlled by Republicans.
“I’d like to see a constitutional amendment to get rid of the state Board of Education,”she said. “If the superintendent is elected and works under the legislature – knowing that they’re accountable to the legislature to oversee the DPI and to oversee and have impact into the superintendents in the 115 districts, I think we would be so much better off because you don’t have all these extra people right in mix.”
Morrow has espoused a wide range of extreme views on social media in recent years. Many of her past extreme comments were made on her now-dormant personal Twitter account — which is separate from her campaign account.
Morrow also promoted QAnon slogans and tweeted that the actor Jim Carrey was “… likely searching for adrenochrome” – a reference to a conspiracy theory shared by QAnon believers that celebrities harvest and drink the blood of children to prolong their own lives. Media Matters, a left-leaning publication, was first to report the QAnon tweets.
All together, Morrow tweeted “WWG1WGA” – the slogan that stands for “where we go one, we go all” and is commonly associated with the QAnon conspiracy – more than seven times in 2020.
Central to QAnon lore is the notion of the “Storm,” a belief there will be a day when thousands will purportedly be arrested, subjected to military tribunals, and face mass executions for their alleged crimes, with Donald Trump leading efforts to dismantle them alongside other QAnon “patriots.”
Violent fantasies about executing Democrats
Morrow’s post about publicly executing Obama was just one of numerous she has made espousing carrying out violent fantasies against Democrats.
On Twitter, the platform now known as X, and on the now-defunct conservative Twitter alternative, Parler, Morrow used the hashtag “#DeathtoTraitors” a combined 12 times – usually in relation to prominent Democrats.
In another post from July 2019, Morrow targeted Minnesota Democratic Rep. Ilhan Omar and other Democrats, suggesting their impending death for unspecified “treason.”
“@IlhanMN and her other law-hating Dems must be getting a little nervous. Are they just realizing the punishment for treason is death?!?” Morrow wrote.
In a post on Parler, Morrow used the hashtag #deathtotraitors in discussing the Democratic governors of North Carolina and New York, Cooper and Cuomo. Morrow publicized her Parler handle in a tweet and CNN found the deleted Parler posts on the Internet Archive’s Wayback Machine.
“Our Communist sympathizer, Comrade Cooper, has the same plans for NC!Expose them NOW!Can we we see the CCP list, @SecPompeo??? #PrisonTimeforFederalCrimes #DeathToTraitors #FreeOurCitizens,” Morrow wrote in 2020, discussing restrictions during the COVID-19 pandemic.
In other posts on Parler, Morrow shared posts from other users and a QAnon account about locking up Democrats at Guantanamo Bay and prisons.
Morrow’s ire also went beyond Democrats, including one post in December 2020 calling for putting Republican Gov. Brian Kemp of Georgia in prison after he certified Georgia’s results for Joe Biden in that year’s presidential election.
Shared conspiracies and made anti-Muslim comments
In other comments, Morrow repeatedlyshared the false claim that Obama was Muslim, called Islam evil, and expressed belief in a conspiracy theory that tens of thousands of Chinese troops were stationed in Canada to invade the United States to help Joe Biden become president.
“Tens of thousands of Chinese soldiers are already in Canada and probably Mexico waiting for orders to invade,” she wrote on January 8, 2021.
In another post from September 2019, Morrow said that Barack Obama (referred to as B.O.) was a puppet for the “Deep State” and the “Muslim movement” and suggested he pay the highest penalty for his alleged crimes.
“B.O. was a puppet for the Deep State and the Muslim movement to destroy our Constitutional Republic. We cannot give up until ALL the guilty pay the highest penalty for their crimes. We will lose our country #SAVEOURNATION #JusticeForAll #TraitorsMustPay
“The DEEP STATE globalists and Muslim extremists, intent on destroying America, placed Omar and MANY others into our govt. #WakeUpAmerica #IslamIsEvil #ToleranceIsDeadly,” she wrote in January 2020.
In one post, Morrow said Muslims should be banned from elected office in the United States and said Rep. Omar, who came to the United States as a refugee, should, “head back to Somalia.”
Vote against Trump, former supporters urge in $50m video campaign
Lauren Aratani – March 13, 2024
Donald Trump’s role in the January 6 insurrection is cited by many former supporters as a key factor in turning them against the former president. Photograph: Sam Navarro/USA Today Sports
An anti-Donald Trump group of Republicans is launching its second campaign against the former president, spending $50m and using testimonials from former supporters in an attempt to convince voters to turn away from Trump.
This week, Republican Voters Against Trump released 100 videos recorded by anti-Trump Republicans explaining why they no longer support him.
Sarah Longwell, president of Republican Accountability political action committee, which is behind the campaign, explained the logic behind the effort in a press release on Tuesday.
“Traditional Republican voters who have long supported the party but have concerns about Donald Trump proved decisive in the 2020 election. By targeting these voters and reaching them with credible messengers, the campaign will establish a permission structure for them to withhold their support from Trump again,” she said.
“This will help re-create the anti-Trump coalition that made the margin of victory in 2020 and holds the key to 2024.
The group ran the same unconventional ad campaign against Trump in 2020, when it ultimately received over a thousand homemade testimonials on its website.
“One of the reasons they are so compelling is because you can tell how authentic they are, how deeply they feel this – a lot of them want to get something off their chest,” Longwell told the Guardian in 2020.
Longwell told the New York Times in a piece published on Tuesday that she had raised $20m so far for 2024 and hoped to raise the rest of the $30m before the election in November. The group has received large donations from anti-Trump billionaires, according to Forbes, including the Democratic donor and co-founder of LinkedIn Reid Hoffman and John Pritzker, a member of the family that owns the Hyatt hotel chain.
In many of the videos, former supporters say that the January 6 Capitol insurrection turned them against Trump.
“January 6 was the end of Donald Trump for me. I could not believe what was happening before my eyes – watching what was an insurrection at the Capitol, which was, in my mind, unquestionably led by Donald Trump,” Ethan, a former Trump supporter from Wisconsin, said in one video.
Chuck, a supporter from Nebraska, similarly said that he “completely 100% hold[s] him accountable for the insurrection”.
“I will vote Democrat. I can’t believe I’m saying it. But I will not ever support or vote for Donald Trump ever. I’ll vote for Joe Biden,” Chuck said.
Many other supporters similarly express disbelief at Trump’s popularity with the Republican party, often saying that Biden is the first Democrat they have ever supported.
“Now, I understand that a lot of people say, ‘Oh, well look at maybe Joe Biden in his past,’ and you hear that ‘Oh, everyone’s corrupt and has got a torrid past,’” said Paul, a voter in North Carolina, in his testimonial. “Maybe Joe Biden does, something he lied about many years ago about his record, but he’s not even in the same league as Trump as far as all the different lies.”
Longwell said in the release this week that she believed “former Republicans and Republican-leaning voters hold the key to 2024”.
“Whatever their complaints about Joe Biden – Donald Trump is too dangerous and too unhinged to ever be president again,” she said. “Who better to make this case than the voters who used to support him?”
Trump Hit With Harsh Truth After Harsh Truth From Former Voters In Scathing Ads
Lee Moran – March 13, 2024
Republicans who have in the past voted for Donald Trump explain exactly why they will never do so again in a damning series of testimonials released this week by the Republican Accountability PAC.
The conservative political action committee is spending $50 million on its Republican Voters Against Trump campaign to spotlight “real former Trump voters making the case for why they won’t support him in November,” according to a news release.
In a video released Tuesday, one- and two-time Trump voters reel off a long list of reasons for not backing the former president as he seeks to retake the White House.
They condemn the twice-impeached Trump as the “biggest threat to our democracy,” “responsible for the violence” at the 2021 U.S. Capitol riot, and more.
https://youtube.com/watch?v=ahBKWQssQ5o%3Frel%3D0
In another video, a Virginia Republican named Beth explains how the Trump-instigated riot was “like a sucker punch” and made her realize “this is not the party that I thought we had.”
Trump’s 2021 decision to throw then-Vice President Mike Pence “under the bus and … to the wolves and the lions” for not helping him overturn the 2020 election result made Beth “sick to my stomach,” she says.
She says she’d back any rival if Trump’s “evil” is on the ballot, and acknowledges that President Joe Biden’s administration has been “a bit refreshing.”
“I’ll take kind, older man any day over the tyrant,” she says.
https://youtube.com/watch?v=Cxqw4wzkGOQ%3Frel%3D0
A third clip shows a man named Dennis, identified as a former service member, condemning Trump for reportedly making derogatory comments about U.S. veterans and war dead.
Trump only thinks about protecting himself, he says.
https://youtube.com/watch?v=NcC80GCSOVQ%3Frel%3D0
The Republican Accountability PAC is one of multiple conservative groups seeking to prevent Trump from returning to the White House.
Its campaign will particularly focus on states that are “‘blue wall’ battlegrounds,” per the news release, with the goal of re-creating “the anti-Trump coalition that won in 2020 by targeting soft GOP voters and Republican-leaning independents.”
“Former Republicans and Republican-leaning voters hold the key to 2024, and reaching them with credible, relatable messengers is essential,” read a statement from Sarah Longwell, the president of the Republican Accountability PAC.
“It establishes a permission structure that says that—whatever their complaints about Joe Biden—Donald Trump is too dangerous and too unhinged to ever be president again,” Longwell explained. “Who better to make this case than the voters who used to support him?”
The videos will air “on TV, streaming, radio, billboards, and digital media,” according to the group. However, while such ads attacking Trump (especially from conservatives) have gone viral in recent years, their actual effect on swaying voters remains up for debate.
“Obviously low IQ”: Former DHS official says “Donald Trump has apparent repeated memory lapses”
Chauncey DeVega – March 12, 2024
Donald Trump Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images
During last week’s State of the Union speech, President Biden fired a series of broadsides against Donald Trump and his MAGA movement. President Biden fired off this opening salvo and the Republicans in the audience, and more generally, never recovered from it.
Not since President Lincoln and the Civil War have freedom and democracy been under assault here at home as they are today. What makes our moment rare is that freedom and democracy are under attack, both at home and overseas, at the very same time.
Overseas, Putin of Russia is on the march, invading Ukraine and sowing chaos throughout Europe and beyond. If anybody in this room thinks Putin will stop at Ukraine, I assure you, he will not.
But Ukraine can stop Putin if we stand with Ukraine and provide the weapons it needs to defend itself. That is all Ukraine is asking. They are not asking for American soldiers. In fact, there are no American soldiers at war in Ukraine. And I am determined to keep it that way. But now assistance for Ukraine is being blocked by those who want us to walk away from our leadership in the world. It wasn’t that long ago when a Republican President, Ronald Reagan, thundered, “Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall.”
Now, my predecessor, a former Republican President, tells Putin, “Do whatever the hell you want.”
A former American President actually said that, bowing down to a Russian leader. It’s outrageous. It’s dangerous. It’s unacceptable.
Everyone was expecting a historic train wreck of a State of the Union last night and they got it. But it wasn’t the one they thought it would be. President Joe Biden’s address was powerful and dynamic and no doubt put a lot of timorous Democrats’ worries to rest (at least for a day or so.) It was Donald Trump’s highly touted response that failed dramatically.
Biden came out swinging and knocked the Republicans so far back on their heels that they had to completely abandon the image of him they’ve been building since 2020 — a man so old and feeble that he can’t even feed himself — and instead hilariously whimper about his loud macho aggression….Biden gave a barn burner of a speech that wasn’t boring, which is highly unusual for any president but especially unusual for a president many people have been convinced has one foot in the grave.
At the end of the State of the Union speech, President Biden made a bold move, landing another salvo on his critics and enemies, who are advancing the lie of a narrative that he is somehow “too old” or perhaps even “senile” and therefore should not seek a second term in office.
In my career I’ve been told I’m too young and I’m too old.
Whether young or old, I’ve always known what endures.
Our North Star.
The very idea of America, that we are all created equal and deserve to be treated equally throughout our lives.
We’ve never fully lived up to that idea, but we’ve never walked away from it either.
And I won’t walk away from it now.
My fellow Americans, the issue facing our nation isn’t how old we are, it’s how old our ideas are.
Hate, anger, revenge, retribution are among the oldest of ideas.
But you can’t lead America with ancient ideas that only take us back.
To lead America, the land of possibilities, you need a vision for the future of what America can and should be.
Tonight you’ve heard mine.
President Biden was clearly implying that it is actually Donald Trump, and not him, who especially in these last few days and weeks, has repeatedly shown that he appears to be facing serious cognitive challenges in terms of his speech, thinking, and memory.
Sounding the alarm about Trump’s growing dangerousness, Dr. John Gartner explained to me in a widely read conversation here at Salon that, “Not enough people are sounding the alarm, that based on his behavior, and in my opinion, Donald Trump is dangerously demented. In fact, we are seeing the opposite among too many in the news media, the political leaders and among the public. There is also this focus on Biden’s gaffes or other things that are well within the normal limits of aging. By comparison, Trump appears to be showing gross signs of dementia. This is a tale of two brains. Biden’s brain is aging. Trump’s brain is dementing”.
Dr. Gartner’s colleague, Dr. Harry Segal, who is a senior lecturer at Cornell University and Weill Cornell Medical School, even went so far to suggest that Donald Trump should withdraw from the 2024 presidential campaign.
At several events last week, as predicted by Dr. Gartner and his colleagues, President Trump continued to manifest apparent challenges in speech, memory, and cognition.
In an attempt to make better sense of Donald Trump’s obvious cognitive challenges and related behavior in the context of the country’s democracy crisis and the 2024 election, and what may happen next, I recently asked a range of experts for their thoughts and suggestions.
Will Bunch is a national opinion columnist for the Philadelphia Inquirer.
Clearly, Donald Trump is struggling to hold a coherent thought or find the proper word, and I notice it seems to be increasing every time he gives a speech. Everyone ages differently, and I think of my dad who just turned 87 and it totally lucid in conversation although he does occasionally forget a name (as do I, at 65!), I’m not at all an expert on brain health, but based on what’s observable and also the folks who are experts whose analyses I’ve read I think there’s a real problem.
Voters should have serious conversations about what it means to be president, what the real issues are around presidential health, and how Trump and Biden might be different from each other. Generally speaking, I think the Ronald Reagan “charismatic actor” reinvention of the presidency makes people forget that we’re actually electing the CEO of a massive organization, with smart people in corner offices channeling the policies and morals of the boss. No one is bombing Barbados instead of Syria because an aging president said the wrong thing. That said, I think Trump’s mental struggles should be taken seriously by voters because in his case it seems to be linked to his moods and his temperament. He’s promised a presidency of “retribution” and to surround himself with aides who can act on his whims. That’s concerning. But will most voters care? Probably not.
It feels like the lessons the mainstream media have taken from the Trump years are exactly the wrong ones: a doubling down on a bland and ultimately phony interpretation of “balance and objectivity.” It seems that occasionally going out on a limb and calling out Trump for some of his lies from 2017-2021 means they were salivating for a chance to prove they can be just as tough on Biden – whether or not he deserves it. For a time, that stalking horse was “inflation,” but the price increases cooled, and Biden got four years older, so here we are. So much of this is journalists indulging voters by focusing on style when the substance in this election is life or death for America.
Miles Taylor is a national security expert who served under the Trump administration as chief of staff at the Department of Homeland Security. Writing as “Anonymous,” Taylor published the widely discussed 2018 New York Times op-ed “I Am Part of the Resistance Inside the Trump Administration.” Taylor’s most recent book is “Blowback: A Warning to Save Democracy from the Next Trump.”
Donald Trump is obviously a deeply troubled person. Strip away the politics and his biography, and any person who would spend time with the man would come to the same conclusion: he’s a sick person, devoid of any moral system beyond relentless self-aggrandizement. The self-interest colors his every interaction. The man’s eyes scan every room — and situation — opportunistically for leverage, for moments to advance himself at the expense of others. This has happened to the people closest to him … to his employees … and to the country.
On a more simple level, Donald Trump has apparent repeated memory lapses, difficulty synthesizing complex information, disinterest in nuance, and an obviously low IQ. He’s not a smart man, and some would say he shows clear signs of decline. If it were a screenplay, a wannabe gangster with dementia might be an oddball comedy. But on the national stage, it’s a civic tragedy.
Ultimately, the election is less about Trump than it ever was. It’s now about us. We elevated a man to the nation’s highest office, witnessed a truly innumerable string of incidents displaying his ineptitude and immorality, watched him attempt to subvert the Constitution and commit crimes, and now we are giving serious consideration to restoring him to that office. If that is what we are doing, one might say we deserve a second Trump presidency. Perhaps it will be enough to shock the conscience of our society that it’s time to renegotiate our social contract. Perhaps not.
Yes, Joe Biden has lost his step. It shows. But there’s no comparison between an elderly man and an authoritarian one.
Jared Yates Sexton is a journalist and author of the new book “The Midnight Kingdom: A History of Power, Paranoia, and the Coming Crisis.”
I see a deeply unwell person. I think sometimes we get lost in politics and forget to look at the situation as human beings. What we’re dealing with is an abusive, deteriorating man who is somehow even getting worse. Fascism feeds on that unwellness and accelerates the process until it leaves a husk, a host, and that’s what we’re watching in real time. Everything else stems from that and that, coupled with the rhetoric, tells a story we should all be listening to.
As I say all the time, a healthy political system and American society would have rejected Donald Trump in 2016 like so much bad food. That it didn’t betrays a sickness. What should happen is a complex series of legal consequences and systematic expulsions. On a political level, a complete rejection by the electorate and movement toward something reconciliatory.
Biden’s age is an issue. We should be concerned about the fitness of a president. The media obsession is simply the same thing that propelled the e-mail debacle. Lazy journalism mixed with the neoliberal refusal to wrestle with itself. They want a right-wing turn in their bones but aren’t even conscious about it. These cycles give themselves away after a while.
Investigative reporter Heidi Siegmund Cuda writes about US politics and culture at her Substack newsletter and for Byline Times, and Byline Supplement.
I do my best not to watch the spectacle of Trump. He’s an avatar for the destruction of our country and America as a reliable ally, and his “moth to flame” circuses have turned us into stock characters — the outraged or the devoted. But it’s impossible to not see the clips of his antics, and yes, the obvious sloppy, sweaty decline is notable. But always when we’re watching a propagandist in action — how much is organic and how much is miming Vincent the Chin’s ‘bathrobe shuffle’? It behooves him to be “losing it” when committing crimes, and this cat has had more than nine lives. He detonates narrative warfare wherever he goes, so it’s difficult to decipher what is planted to create spectacle to feed the mangy cult and what is a true trash fire of a human.
The more critical framing for me is what it says about us that a man who led an insurrection, is an adjudicated sex assaulter, a convicted fraud, an agent of Russian disinformation who engaged in a cover up of his own nefarious activity, and a likely superspreader of America’s most guarded secrets, is a political party’s frontrunner. I guess I don’t care if he mispronounces “Venezuela” while appearing to get high on his own supply, I care about the fascism. Project 2025 is a fascist endeavor.
If we were a healthy society, we would prioritize a return to decency and the rule of law. We would swiftly arrest Donald Trump and his co-conspirators for their complicity in an attempted coup, which somehow this country seems to have forgotten. I’m tired of limited hangouts — I’m tired of small sentences for big crimes, and convictions for minor players. I want to see this country standup against authoritarians and oligarchs, who are trying to remove all barriers to their unrestrained lust for power. From the moment Trump removed language to water down support for Ukraine at the 2016 RNC, his role has been to hand Ukraine to Russia, which he is now doing through his proxies like Mike Johnson. I bring this up because until we have a proper framework, we will be continually tilting at windmills. The proper framing is Trump, his proxies, and his handlers, are aiming to destroy the US as an international power. They are using narrative warfare as a battering ram, and we need to take back the narrative quickly. We need to bullhorn the stakes. Women will likely have to take the lead, because it’s our rights that are imperiled.
The media’s obsession with Biden’s age (“But His Age….”) is America getting caught in the trap of narrative warfare, yet again. “But His Age” is simply “But Her Emails” as we saw with Hillary Clinton — it’s a gaslighting mantra for simpletons who don’t want to think too hard about the fact that we are the targets of a global fascist criminal movement attempting to eviscerate democracy. The New York Times and cable news know this, and they’ve placed their bets on fascism. Big News is big business and big business has historically supported fascism. This is why we as independent members of the media must help shape the narrative. Our choice is literally good vs evil. We have a choice between decency and a vast criminal network — a choice between standing up for our imperfect democracy or succumbing to complete authoritarian capture. It’s not about age — by Biden’s side is a perfectly healthy vice president, who can capably handle the labor of democracy should he fall ill.
The 2024 election is not about anything other than decency — are we good people — is our President a good man — are we decent — do we know right from wrong. If we are decent, we will re-elect Joe Biden, we will do everything to help Ukraine defeat Russian imperialism. We will rebuke the cruelty of Trumpism and Putinism. We know that Trump is a cruel man. We knew that when he called immigrants ‘rapists’, called women “fat pigs”, “dogs”, and “disgusting animals”, mocked a disabled person, and ginned up violent rhetoric to encourage his MAGA base to kill Mike Pence. We must decide who we are. Are we decent?
Orbán says Trump won’t give ‘a penny’ to Ukraine after Mar-a-Lago meeting
BradDress – March 11, 2024
Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán said former President Trump would not give “a penny” to support Ukraine in its war against Russia after the two met at Trump’s Florida estate Mar-a-Lago last week.
Orbán told Hungarian news channel M1 that Trump wants peace in the Russian war against Ukraine, and the Hungarian leader said he backed his vision to achieve that.
“I don’t see any other person as determined and strong as Donald Trump,” Orbán told M1, saying Trump “will not give a single penny to the Ukrainian-Russian war, therefore the war will end.”
Trump has yet to publicly comment on the claims. In a Truth Social post, the former president praised Orbán for the meeting.
“Viktor is a Great Leader, respected all over the World,” Trump wrote.
Trump has repeatedly criticized spending on Ukraine, part of growing skepticism in the Republican Party. More conservative lawmakers in Congress have blocked Ukraine aid for more than a year.
Trump has said he would end the war between Russia and Ukraine in 24 hours, though he has remained ambiguous on how that would be achieved, sparking concerns that he would cede Ukrainian territory taken by Russian forces in the war.
Orbán added in the interview with M1 that “Trump has detailed plans for how to end the war, and they coincide with Hungary’s interests.”
Trump has also made a number of controversial comments about Russia. Shortly after the war began in 2022, Trump called Russian President Vladimir Putin “savvy,” echoing his often warm remarks for the Russian leader during his time at the White House.
And this year, Trump said he would let Russia do “whatever the hell they want” to members of NATO that did not pay enough in defense spending.
Still, Trump, who has no major challenger left in the Republican primaries and is headed toward a general election rematch with President Biden, has not publicly said he would avoid giving money to Ukraine.
Orbán, a far-right leader who has also received criticism for his close relations with Putin, met Trump at Mar-a-Lago on Friday and Saturday in a high-stakes visit.
Biden slammed Trump for meeting with Orbán, who he criticized as a leader “looking for dictatorship.”
Hungary, a NATO member, has not provided any arms to Ukraine throughout the war. Orbán, who has frequently called for an end to the Ukraine war and met Putin in October, also said it would be “bad” if Biden were to win the election in November.
Moldova faces multiple threats from Russia as it turns toward EU membership, foreign minister says
Stephen McGrath and Aurel Obreja – March 10, 2024
Moldova’s Foreign Minister Mihai Popsoi arrives for joint statements with Romanian counterpart Luminita Odobescu in Bucharest, Romania, Feb. 6, 2024. Moldova’s foreign minister says the past two years for his country have been the hardest and most tumultuous for European Union candidate Moldova in more than three decades as it faces threats from Russia in multiple spheres of public life. (AP Photo/Alexandru Dobre)
CHISINAU, Moldova (AP) — The past two years have been the hardest and most tumultuous for European Union candidate Moldova in more than three decades as it faces threats from Russia in multiple spheres of public life, the country’s foreign minister says.
Since Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022, its neighbor Moldova has faced a litany of crises that have at times raised fears the country is also in Russia’s crosshairs. These included errant missiles landing on its territory; a severe energy crisis after Moscow dramatically reduced gas supplies; rampant inflation; and protests by pro-Russia parties against the pro-Western government. Moldova has also taken in the highest number of Ukrainian refugees per capita of any country.
“This past two years without exaggeration have been by far the most difficult in the past 30 years,” Mihai Popsoi, appointed foreign minister in late January, told The Associated Press in an interview.
Moldova gained independence from the Soviet Union in 1991, but Russia continues to see the country — sandwiched between Ukraine and EU member Romania — as within its sphere of influence.
Moldovan officials have repeatedly accused Russia of conducting a “hybrid war” against the country — funding anti-government protests, meddling in local elections and running vast disinformation campaigns to try to topple the government and derail Moldova from its path toward full EU membership. Russia has denied the accusations.
Last week, Moldova’s national Intelligence and Security Services agency said it has gathered data indicating “unprecedented” plans by Moscow to launch a fresh and sprawling destabilization campaign as Moldova gears up for a referendum on EU membership and a presidential election later in the year.
“We know that the Kremlin is going to invest a lot of energy and financial resources through their proxies to try to get their way,” said Popsoi, a lawmaker from the governing Party of Action and Solidarity who also serves as deputy prime minister.
“They’re trying to bribe voters and use citizens to bribe them,” he added. “The Russians are learning and adapting, and they’re trying to use the democratic process against us … to topple a democratic government in Moldova.”
Tensions have also periodically soared in Moldova’s Russia-backed breakaway region of Transnistria — a thin strip of land bordering Ukraine that isn’t recognized by any U.N. member countries but where Russia maintains about 1,500 troops as so-called peacekeepers, guarding huge Soviet-era weapons and ammunition stockpiles.
Popsoi acknowledged that the situation with Transnistria is tense, and he worries that the speculation could adversely impact investment. “The situation will remain tense as long as the front line is 200 miles away,” he said.
The 37-year-old minister noted the testing period Moldova has been through has nevertheless also been transformative for his country, which has a population of about 2.5 million people.
“When we look at the energy security of Moldova, two years ago there was very little,” he said. “Now Moldova is quite independent or has alternatives and can choose where to buy gas and electricity.”
The same can be said, he added, for his country’s defense capabilities, the resilience of key institutions such as intelligence, police force, and justice reform. “Moldova is moving in the right direction despite enormous challenges.”
Cristian Cantir, a Moldovan associate professor of international relations at Oakland University, says Moldova has faced a “constant onslaught” of Russian tests to probe weaknesses that might undermine its EU trajectory.
“It feels like a geopolitical race in which Russia is trying to stop Moldova from moving toward the EU, while Moldova tries to fend off Russian influence until it joins the EU,” he said, adding that the authorities “have been much more open about acknowledging the danger Russia presents to the country’s democracy.”
In the wake of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, Moldova applied to join the EU and was granted candidate status in June 2022. In December, Brussels said it would open accession negotiations for both Moldova and Ukraine.
Although militarily neutral, non-NATO Moldova has boosted defense spending over the past year and recently approved a new national security strategy that identified Russia as a main threat and aims to raise defense spending to 1% of GDP.
“A significant number of Moldovans still live under the spell of Russian propaganda which has made a boogeyman out of NATO,” Popsoi said. “But that doesn’t stop us from cooperating with our NATO partners and building resilience in our armed forces.”
Since the war started, Moldova has received critical financial and diplomatic support from its Western partners but needs long-term investments, Popsoi said. The referendum later this year on EU membership aims to gauge where Moldovans see their future. Officials have an ambitious target of gaining full accession by 2030.
“We will do our utmost to make sure we get this message across that there is a better tomorrow and that is within the European Union,” Popsoi added. “No matter how hard Russian propaganda tries to convince our citizens of the opposite.”
