No. 2 Senate Republican praises election official for standing up to Trump
February 1, 2022
Senate Minority Whip John Thune (R-S.D.) on Tuesday praised former acting Deputy Homeland Security Secretary Ken Cuccinelli for rebuffing a request from former President Trump to seize voting machines following the 2020 presidential election.
Thune said he was relieved that Cuccinelli and other officials pushed back against Trump’s effort to seize voting machines in an attempt to change the outcome of the election, which President Biden won by 74 electoral votes and more than 7 million votes nationwide.
“I’m just glad that there were people in the right places and that the system worked,” he said. “People who had positions of responsibility held their ground even when being asked to do things that they knew they shouldn’t do. Things may have bent a little bit, but they didn’t break.”
Thune made his comments when asked about a story published by The New York Times reporting that Trump wanted his lawyer Rudy Giuliani to ask the Department of Homeland Security if it could legally take control of voting machines in key swing states. The report cited three people “familiar with the matter.”
The Times reported that Cuccinelli said Homeland Security officials could not take part in the plan.
It also reported that Trump asked Cuccinelli in another meeting about the idea of appointing a special counsel to investigate election fraud, with Cuccinelli replying that it was not a good idea. The report cited “two people briefed on the conversation.”
Thune was one of several Republican senators who pushed back against the former president’s reported actions and statements about the outcome and aftermath of the 2020 presidential election.
Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) on Tuesday broke with Trump’s suggestion made at a Texas rally over the weekend that people convicted of crimes related to the Jan. 6 storming of the Capitol may received pardons if he’s elected president again.
“I would not be in favor of shortening any of the sentences for any of the people who pleaded guilty to crimes,” McConnell told reporters when asked about Trump’s statement over the weekend that he would consider pardons for people who tried to stop the certification of President Biden’s victory in the 2020 election.
“The election of 2020 was decided Dec. 14 of 2020 when the Electoral College certified the winner of the election. What we saw here on January the 6th was an effort to prevent the peaceful transfer of power from one administration to another, which has never happened before in our country,” he said.
GOP Gov. Candidate: Rape Victims Shouldn’t Get Abortions Because Fetus Could Become POTUS
Lee Moran – February 1, 2022
Garrett Soldano, a Republican candidate for governor in Michigan, faced widespread backlash after he argued against survivors of sexual assault getting abortions, saying they didn’t know if their unborn baby could become president.
Soldano, citing a friend whose mother was the victim of a gang rape, claimed people who become pregnant from sexual assault were put “in this moment” by God and that the DNA of the fetus should be protected.
“And so what we must start to focus on is not only to defend the DNA when it’s created, but, however, how about we start inspiring women in the culture to let them understand and know how heroic they are? And how unbelievable that they are?” he told conservative commentator April Moss on her “Face The Facts” podcast.
“That God put them in this moment and they don’t know that little baby inside them may be the next president, maybe the next person who changes humanity, may get us out of the situation in the future,” Soldano added, per a video of the conversation that Heartland Signal tweeted Monday. “We must always, always protect that DNA and allow it to have a voice.”
Kyrsten Sinema courted Republican fossil fuel donors with filibuster stance
Peter Stone in Washington DC – February 1, 2022
Photograph: Michael Reynolds/EPA
With a crucial vote pending over filibuster rules that would have made strong voting rights legislation feasible, Democratic senator Kyrsten Sinema flew into Houston, Texas, for a fundraiser that drew dozens of fossil fuel chieftains, including Continental Resources chairman Harold Hamm and ConocoPhillips chief executive Ryan Lance.
The event was held on 18 January at the upmarket River Oaks Country Club. One executive told the Guardian that Sinema spoke for about half an hour and informed a mostly Republican crowd that they could “rest assured” she would not back any changes with filibuster rules, reiterating a stance she took several days before during a Senate speech.
The Arizona senator also addressed some energy industry issues according to the executive, who added that overall he was “tremendously impressed”.
The day after the Houston bash, Sinema voted against changing filibuster rules, thereby helping to thwart the voting rights bill.
The Houston gusher of fossil fuel donations for Sinema from many stalwart Republican donors underscores how pivotal she has become, along with West Virginia Democratic senator Joe Manchin, in an evenly divided Senate involving high-stakes battles for Republican and fossil fuel interests.
Campaign finance watchdogs say that the Houston fundraiser reveals much about Sinema’s aggressive efforts to capitalize on her Senate power on matters ranging from climate change to taxes to the filibuster rule.
“Sinema isn’t up for re-election this year, but she’s fundraising full-tilt,” Sheila Krumholz, the executive director of OpenSecrets, told the Guardian. “By her comment to oil-industry attendees last week, she clearly knew her vote to protect the filibuster would please them.”
The Houston fundraiser, which was expected to raise tens of thousands of dollars for the senator’s campaign coffers, offers a stark example of how Sinema has been courting major Republican donors and special interests who, in turn, seem to be increasingly eager to help her.
Sinema’s drive to rope in more big Republican donors was also apparent at a September fundraiser in Dallas at the $18m home of G Brint Ryan, a prominent Republican donor and CEO of a global consulting company, who hosted another money bash last year for Manchin.
Senator Joe Manchin, Democrat of West Virginia. Sinema and Manchin were instrumental in whittling down Build Back Better. Photograph: Drew Angerer/Getty Images
Sinema’s stance against changing filibuster rules has also won her support from other top Republican donors such as Stan Hubbard, a Minnesota billionaire broadcaster who gave her $2,900 last September, which reportedly was the first donation he made to a Democrat since 2019.
Hubbard told the Guardian that her opposition to the filibuster was a crucial reason he donated, adding that it would “be terrible to get rid of the filibuster”, and that he thought voting rights were “just fine”, without passing a Democrat-backed bill to protect them.
Little wonder that voting rights advocates were dismayed by Sinema’s staunch opposition to any changes with the filibuster.
“We are very disappointed that Senator Sinema has put formalistic rules over protecting our democracy,” said Danielle Lang, the senior director of voting rights at the nonpartisan Campaign Legal Center.
Sinema’s position on the filibuster rule has sparked anger among liberal backers such as the powerful group Emily’s List, which endorses Democratic women who support abortion rights. One week after Sinema gave a floor speech indicating that she wouldn’t support altering filibuster rules, Emily’s List publicly stated that the group would no longer endorse her.
In her floor speech backing the filibuster rule, Sinema touted the need for more bipartisanship, stressing that she would not “support separate actions that worsen the underlying disease of division infecting our country”.
But Sinema’s vote and speech only spurred more criticism in Arizona where the state Democratic party issued a rare censure in the wake of her continued support for the filibuster.
Arizona’s Democratic party chair Raquel Teran has stated that the vote was a “result of her failure to do whatever it takes to ensure the health of our democracy”.
More broadly, Democratic angst about Sinema was highlighted by a January tracking poll before her filibuster vote that showed just 8% of registered Arizona Democrats had a favorable view of the Senator.
The recent poll reflects a steep drop from the 70% positive rating the Senator had in 2020. Her declining popularity also has been spurred by the senator’s voting against raising the federal minimum wage, and skipping a Senate vote to create a bipartisan commission to investigate the January 6 mob attack on the Capitol by Trump supporters.
Sinema has also drawn brickbats from Democrats for her unwillingness last month to endorse the House passed Build Back Better legislation that she and Manchin were instrumental in whittling down from the measure’s original size, while accelerating their fundraising outreach to rightwing donors and lobbyists.
Sinema told Democratic senators according to the New York Times that she was opposed to any tax increases in personal rates or corporate rates to pay for the bill, which included approximately $550bn for clean energy and climate change measures, a crucial part of President Joe Biden’s agenda.
Leftwing Vermont senator Bernie Sanders was especially irked when both Sinema and Manchin joined all the Senate Republicans in blocking the filibuster rule change, saying that they “forced us to go through five months of discussions which have gotten absolutely nowhere”, and indicating he might support primary challengers to both senators.
Veteran Arizona Republican consultant Chuck Coughlin noted that Sinema “clearly understands the electoral position she is in, and is using this opportunity to raise as much as she can in order to make challenging her a herculean task – whether she runs as a Democrat or an independent.”
Coughlin’s analysis seems on target based on the very robust $4.4m that Sinema’s campaign had in the bank at the end of September.
Charlie Black, a longtime Republican operative and lobbyist, added that “Sinema’s gotten a lot of support from the business community, including both Republicans and Democrats.”
Still, with Democratic attacks on Sinema increasing, the odds are good that if she opts to run again in 2024 she will have a primary opponent, perhaps Congressman Ruben Gallego, who has publicly suggested he might challenge her, and knocked the senator over her filibuster vote.
A group called the Primary Sinema Project that began last summer has raised at least $330,000, including $100,000 during the week after her filibuster speech.
Sinema’s drive to raise big bucks early seems to be underscored by the jump last year in donations from fossil fuel interests, according to campaign finance data.
Last year, Sinema hauled in $24,310 from fossil fuel donors compared with just $7,522 the year before, according to OpenSecrets.
Although there’s no data yet on how much Sinema raised in Houston, a veteran fossil fuel lobbyist told the Guardian that donors at such fundraisers are often asked to pony up the maximum of $5,800 to the senator’s campaign committee, and write another check for as much as $5,000 to the senator’s leadership Pac.
For Krumholz of OpenSecrets, the Houston fundraiser offers a broader message.
“The timing of the fundraiser and Sinema’s filibuster-protecting vote really puts a fine point on the return on investment for her donors.”
Krumholz added that the fossil fuel fundraiser “seems well timed as Congress revisits the $550bn BBB measure focused on climate change provisions, where her vote could help industry minimize new regulatory and tax burdens.”
The US state that fought back after Republicans tried to rig its elections
Spenser Mestel – February 1, 2022
Photograph: Kent Nishimura/Rex/Shutterstock
In recent months, Michigan should have been a hotbed for attempts to rig elections, like it was in 2011. That year, the Republican-led legislature distorted the voting maps so that the GOP was able to win nine of Michigan’s 14 congressional seats despite never earning more than 50.5% of the vote statewide.
A decade later, as the redistricting cycle has come around again, the dynamics are just as toxic. The battleground state broke for Joe Biden by fewer than 155,000 votes, and the Republican-controlled legislature has fought endlessly with the Democratic governor about election “audits”, voter IDs and absentee ballots.
But this cycle, the state’s redistricting commission has pulled off something remarkable. Despite a flurry of legal action and very public disputes between members, it has produced some of the fairest maps in the US. How did it manage it – and will the maps survive?
Neither party was involved in drawing new maps, a process that is open to abuse if politicians are allowed to allocate particular voters to particular districts in order to guarantee a win there. Instead, the responsibility fell to 13 Michiganders – four Democrats, four Republicans and five independents – who were randomly selected by the state.
MICRC, and the approach it epitomizes, came about thanks to Katie Fahey, a Michigan resident and political novice who posted a message on Facebook two days after the 2016 presidential election. She said she wanted to take on gerrymandering and eventually recruited more than 14,000 volunteers to campaign for an amendment to the state’s constitution. It passed with 61% of the vote and created the commission, one of the most successful ways to unrig the redistricting process so far and a potential model for other states.
Combatting gerrymandering is no small feat. In 35 states, partisan politicians in the legislatures are mostly or fully in charge of redistricting, and of the maps that have been released and evaluated by the Princeton Gerrymandering Project so far, the average grade is a “D”. States led by both Republicans and Democrats – including Maryland, Texas, North Carolina, Oregon, Ohio, Wisconsin and Illinois – earned the lowest possible grade.
While Republicans haven’t gerrymandered as much as Democrats originally feared – in fact, the number of Democratic-leaning seats could increase by a few this year – both parties have nearly eliminated their competition. Of the 287 completed congressional districts, only 42 (14.6%) are competitive, and 13 states have passed maps with zero competitive districts, according to an analysis from the Princeton Gerrymandering Project and RepresentUs.
Part of MICRC’s success is that it’s almost entirely insulated from the legislature. In December of 2019, applications to MICRC were randomly sent to 250,000 citizens. The pool of respondents was then trimmed (at random) to 200, though 60 of the applicants had to self identify as Republicans, 60 as Democrats, and 80 affiliated with neither party. At this point, Democrats and Republicans in the legislature were allowed to strike up to 10 commissioners each, after which the final 13 were then chosen, again at random.
The results were nearly revolutionary. During perhaps one of the most contentious political processes of the decade, MICRC was able to find cross-partisan agreement. Their final congressional map was approved by eight of the commission’s 13 members – two Republicans, two Democrats, and four independents – and will go into effect before the primaries this year.
The congressional map was graded “A” by the Princeton Gerrymandering Project.
However, the process still has its critics.
Republicans filed a lawsuit claiming that the map arbitrarily “fragments counties, townships, and municipalities” and that it allows too much population deviation between congressional districts.
Meanwhile, good government groups were upset about the committee’s first closed-door meeting, and several media outlets sued to have records from the event released to the public. In late December, MICRC turned over documents showing that it was preparing for litigation about how it split Black voters across different districts, while previously they were geographically more concentrated.
On 5 January, members of the Michigan house of representatives representing Detroit and others challenged the commission’s maps, arguing that they dilute the voting strength of Black voters, particularly in and around Detroit.
However, proving that point in court will be difficult, expensive and time-consuming, says Michael Li, senior counsel for the Brennan Center’s Democracy Program.
Federal law dictates that minority voters have the opportunity to elect their candidate of choice, but it doesn’t set a specific threshold for what percentage of voters in a district need to be of that minority group.
Li suggested that even if the challenge succeeds, it will probably lead to relatively minor changes around Detroit, as opposed to the commission having to start from scratch.
Still, the pressure of drawing – and then having to defend – the map seems to be wearing on the commissioners. One accused the group’s chair of bullying her and introduced a motion to censure her, and members have even disagreed over whether to produce a “lessons learned” documentary about the process, with two refusing to participate at all.
Since at least early December, commissioners have also voiced skepticism of their general counsel, who resigned abruptly last week.
The episode underscores a potential lesson for states looking to adopt a similar style of commission: non-politicians may be better able to work across party lines but might must be prepared for the rancor, criticism and partisan lawsuits that follow.
If the goal is fairer maps, though, the trade-off may be worth it.
“On the whole, these maps are really good maps,” says Li, “and markedly different than what we’re seeing around the country.”
Biden made Putin wince; hopefully he meant what he said
Tim Rowland – January 30, 2022
An ex-spy to the core of his icy blue eyes, if you stuck a needle in his thigh down to the bone, it is assumed Vladimir Putin would not so much as blink. Yet he cut loose with an uncharacteristic squeal last week when President Biden said he was prepared to go after Putin’s personal assets should Russia invade Ukraine.
By the end of the day, Putin was back under control, the stony poker player showing no trace of emotion. But American diplomats certainly noticed the “tell.”
Putin’s spokesman was quick to say that such a move would be highly “destructive” to U.S.-Russian relations, and Americans with such designs were wasting their time because Putin doesn’t have any overseas assets.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said it has “long been prohibited for representatives of senior leadership and officials” to hold foreign assets. “Therefore, of course, such a formulation of the question is absolutely not painful for any one of the representatives of the top management.”
He went on to sniff that American politicians “who are not entirely familiar with this topic,” should defer to “those who are professionally engaged in Russia.”
Um hm. Now I’m just an old country journalist, but to me this sounds a lot like, “Putin doesn’t have any overseas assets to seize — and if you do seize them, you’ll be in real trouble.”
But OK, for sake of argument, let’s say Putin doesn’t have any foreign assets — you can bet that his oligarch cronies do, and they would be very displeased if these funds were jeopardized.
Russia’s wealthy cannot invest all their money in Russia, for the simple reason that there is not enough to invest in. You could multiply Russia’s GDP by 10 and it still wouldn’t be within $5 trillion of America’s. We produce a quarter of the world’s GDP; Russia produces 1.95%.
As massive as it is, Russia’s productivity trails nations such as Canada, Italy and Brazil. Its most valuable asset is not based in technology, medicine, industry or even petroleum — it’s trees. So what we are witnessing on the Russian-Ukrainian border is nothing more than the manifestation of a titanic inferiority complex.
We are told Putin is unpredictable, when in fact he is as predictable as a child whose brother is getting all the attention. For years now the world has treated Putin’s Russia like the afterthought he has made it into. Rather than lifting up his people he has lifted up himself and a few dozen of his closest and richest friends.
Now he is paying the price. By failing to spread around the wealth, by failing to invest, by failing to diversify beyond petroleum and weapons, he has relegated his nation to the back bench of world economies.
How it must steam Putin to see the U.S. and China clash angrily over intellectual property, monetary policy, markets and natural resources. No American president is starting a trade war with Russia, because Russia doesn’t have anything Americans want.
Feeling left out and ignored, Putin was bound to do something beyond his petty-thief equivalent of computer hacking and stirring up Americans on Facebook.
By invading Ukraine, Putin would hope to, one, take his people’s minds off of the miserable conditions he has created for them and, two, try to convince the world that he matters. If you seek parallels, look no further than North Korea, where little whatshisname, jealous of all the attention Russia is currently winning, began firing off a bunch of missiles over this past week. You wonder if Putin has enough self-awareness to see the similarities.
Unlike North Korea, Russia does have meaningful amounts of oil and gas to use as leverage — except that when petroleum is all you have to sell, cutting off supply to Europe is like drinking poison and hoping your enemy dies. Already, suppliers of liquified natural gas, including the U.S., seem to have enough capacity to compensate for any spigot Russia chooses to close.
Long term, of course, fossil fuels are not a growth industry. Renewables are increasing exponentially, and it won’t be long before Russia’s last card has been played.
The danger to the world is that Putin has gotten himself into a fix that he can’t get out of without an untenable loss of dignity. That’s what makes him dangerous. The difference between war and peace may depend on diplomats’ skill in providing Putin with a “concession,” however meaningless, with which he can make a case to the people and the world that he has won the staredown.
The other hope is that there’s something out there Putin values more than dignity, namely money. Last week Joe Biden made Vladimir Putin wince. Let’s hope the president meant it. If there were ever a time to play hardball, this would be it.
Explainer-What is Congress doing to strengthen U.S. election laws?
David Morgan – February 1, 2022
FILE PHOTO: U.S. Senator Amy Klobuchar (D-MN) speaks to reporters after a Senate Democrats caucus meeting on Capitol Hill in Washington
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Democrats and Republicans in the U.S. Senate hope to prevent a repeat of the deadly Jan. 6 Capitol riot by reforming a 135-year-old election law laying out the roles that Congress and the vice president play in certifying presidential election results.
Democratic Senators Amy Klobuchar and Dick Durbin and independent Angus King, who caucuses with the Democrats, released a proposal on Tuesday.
A separate bipartisan group led by Republican Susan Collins is also working on the issue and is expected to meet later this week.
WHAT HAS CONGRESS DONE ON ELECTION REFORM UP TO NOW?
Democrats have pushed to strengthen voting rights in response to a wave of voting restrictions passed in Republican-led states following Republican President Donald Trump’s false claim that the 2020 election was stolen from him. Republicans opposed that effort as a power grab that undercut state and local control of elections, and the effort ran aground in the Senate last month.
However, Republicans have been more open to tightening the way the United States counts votes once they are cast.
WHY IS REFORM NEEDED?
Lawmakers want to clarify the 1887 Electoral Count Act so that Congress would have a harder time blocking the certification of elections and to make it clear that vice presidents cannot overturn them.
The law was used as a pretext for another false Trump claim that his vice president, Mike Pence, had the authority to overturn the 2020 election of Democrat Joe Biden. Pence concluded that he did not have that power, much to Trump’s frustration.
As Congress worked to certify the election results on Jan. 6, 2021, Trump criticized Pence at a rally near the White House for disagreeing with him and urged supporters to march to the Capitol. Thousands then stormed the Capitol in the worst assault on Congress since the War of 1812.
Trump was impeached in the House of Representatives but acquitted in the Senate on a charge of inciting the assault.
Since then, the former president has criticized Pence repeatedly for failing to interfere with the vote count.
WHAT ARE DEMOCRATS PROPOSING?
The Democrats’ draft legislation would make it clear that the vice president has no power to resolve disputes over electors or to determine the validity of electors or their votes.
It would limit the circumstances under which members of Congress can object to election results. It would require one-third of the House and Senate to sign an objection in order for it to be considered, and three-fifths of both chambers to vote to support an objection.
Currently, an objection must be signed by only one senator and one House member to be considered separately by each chamber. To succeed, an objection must then be agreed to by simple majorities in both the House and Senate. In 2021, Republicans objected to election results from Arizona and Pennsylvania. Eight senators and 139 House members — all Republicans — later voted to support either or both.
The proposal would establish Election Day in November as the time for choosing presidential electors and prohibit states from choosing electors on any other day — a response to the Trump campaign’s attempts to round up alternate electors in the weeks after the 2020 vote.
It also sets a Dec. 20 deadline for states to resolve controversies or contests involving an election outcome.
WHAT IS THE COLLINS GROUP CONSIDERING?
The Collins-led group of Democrats and Republicans is looking at similar reforms. But it is also weighing federal penalties for anyone who threatens an election official or a poll worker, protections from unwarranted removal from office for election officials, stronger election security measures and election management improvements.
WHERE COULD THINGS GO FROM HERE?
The involvement of Klobuchar, the Senate Rules Committee chair, and Durbin, the Senate’s No. 2 Democrat, is seen as a sign that Democratic leaders support the effort.
The White House has also said it is open to reform efforts but does not view them as a replacement for the more sweeping voting rights legislation that failed to win approval in the Senate.
The Collins group has drawn tentative interest from Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell.
Some lawmakers and aides say there is a chance that elements of the two initiatives could be incorporated into a single piece of legislation that can draw enough support to win 60 votes, a threshold for most legislation to advance in the 100-seat chamber.
(Reporting by David Morgan; editing by Andy Sullivan and Jonathan Oatis)
Letters to the Editor: Republicans, how many more authoritarian rants from Trump will you tolerate?
February 1, 2022
Former President Trump speaks at a rally in Conroe, Texas, on Saturday. (Jason Fochtman / Associated Press)
To the editor: Former President Trump told supporters at a rally on Jan. 29 that if he runs for and wins the presidency in 2024, he will consider pardoning those arrested and charged with crimes associated with the Jan. 6, 2021 insurrection.
Does he mean the more than 700 rioters who injured nearly 140 police officers that fateful day, or just Trump insiders like Stephen K. Bannon, Rudolph W. Giuliani and Mark Meadows?
Pardon me for asking, but what happened to the rule of law? Wake up, Republicans. How much longer are you going to turn a blind eye to the former president’s every whim? It’s time that GOP electeds and the rank and file take a stand.
Simply put, are you for the country or for Trump? Because the future of our fragile democracy depends on you making the right decision now — and it really shouldn’t be a hard choice to make.
Denny Freidenrich, Laguna Beach
..
To the editor: Trump recently referred to himself as the “45th and the 47th” president of the United States. Is this a Freudian slip concession that even he doesn’t believe that he won in 2020?
Someone may truly believe that Jews are out take over the world, but we don’t allow that to be used as an excuse for killing people at a synagogue. The person may be sent to a mental hospital rather than prison, but we don’t let them walk free.
As for Litman’s analysis of whether his acts make him culpable regardless of his state of mind, with the current Supreme Court’s decisions making it clear it has become as polarized as society in general, I’m reminded of Humpty Dumpty’s comment in “Through the Looking Glass”: “When I use a word, it means just what I choose it to mean — neither more nor less.”
John Snyder, Newbury Park
..
To the editor: I have serious doubts about whether Trump will ever be convicted in a criminal court. Legal niceties aside, where might prosecutors find a dozen truly unbiased jurors to determine guilt?
Sure, the court might hear most prospective jurors avow their lack of political affiliation. But who would be surprised by a fan of the most mendacious president ever opting to conceal his political leanings for a chance to help Trump evade conviction?
Still, I’m confident that Trump ultimately will be convicted — by most if not all historians. But that assumes our democracy somehow survives the devastation he wreaked.
Explainer-What is Congress doing to strengthen U.S. election laws?
David Morgan – February 1, 2022
FILE PHOTO: U.S. Senator Amy Klobuchar (D-MN) speaks to reporters after a Senate Democrats caucus meeting on Capitol Hill in Washington
FILE PHOTO: Senators Klobuchar and Durbin depart the Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on Judge Barrett’s nomination to serve on the U.S. Supreme Court in WashingtonFILE PHOTO: Senate Democrats Caucus Leadership News Conference
FILE PHOTO: Committee Chairman Senator Dick Durbin, a Democrat from Illinois, delivers opening remarks as Merrick Garland, U.S. attorney general, testifies before a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing in Washington
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Democrats and Republicans in the U.S. Senate hope to prevent a repeat of the deadly Jan. 6 Capitol riot by reforming a 135-year-old election law laying out the roles that Congress and the vice president play in certifying presidential election results.
Democratic Senators Amy Klobuchar and Dick Durbin and independent Angus King, who caucuses with the Democrats, released a proposal on Tuesday.
A separate bipartisan group led by Republican Susan Collins is also working on the issue and is expected to meet later this week.
WHAT HAS CONGRESS DONE ON ELECTION REFORM UP TONOW?
Democrats have pushed to strengthen voting rights in response to a wave of voting restrictions passed in Republican-led states following Republican President Donald Trump’s false claim that the 2020 election was stolen from him. Republicans opposed that effort as a power grab that undercut state and local control of elections, and the effort ran aground in the Senate last month.
However, Republicans have been more open to tightening the way the United States counts votes once they are cast.
WHY IS REFORM NEEDED?
Lawmakers want to clarify the 1887 Electoral Count Act so that Congress would have a harder time blocking the certification of elections and to make it clear that vice presidents cannot overturn them.
The law was used as a pretext for another false Trump claim that his vice president, Mike Pence, had the authority to overturn the 2020 election of Democrat Joe Biden. Pence concluded that he did not have that power, much to Trump’s frustration.
As Congress worked to certify the election results on Jan. 6, 2021, Trump criticized Pence at a rally near the White House for disagreeing with him and urged supporters to march to the Capitol. Thousands then stormed the Capitol in the worst assault on Congress since the War of 1812.
Trump was impeached in the House of Representatives but acquitted in the Senate on a charge of inciting the assault.
Since then, the former president has criticized Pence repeatedly for failing to interfere with the vote count.
WHAT ARE DEMOCRATS PROPOSING?
The Democrats’ draft legislation would make it clear that the vice president has no power to resolve disputes over electors or to determine the validity of electors or their votes.
It would limit the circumstances under which members of Congress can object to election results. It would require one-third of the House and Senate to sign an objection in order for it to be considered, and three-fifths of both chambers to vote to support an objection.
Currently, an objection must be signed by only one senator and one House member to be considered separately by each chamber. To succeed, an objection must then be agreed to by simple majorities in both the House and Senate. In 2021, Republicans objected to election results from Arizona and Pennsylvania. Eight senators and 139 House members — all Republicans — later voted to support either or both.
The proposal would establish Election Day in November as the time for choosing presidential electors and prohibit states from choosing electors on any other day — a response to the Trump campaign’s attempts to round up alternate electors in the weeks after the 2020 vote.
It also sets a Dec. 20 deadline for states to resolve controversies or contests involving an election outcome.
WHAT IS THE COLLINS GROUP CONSIDERING?
The Collins-led group of Democrats and Republicans is looking at similar reforms. But it is also weighing federal penalties for anyone who threatens an election official or a poll worker, protections from unwarranted removal from office for election officials, stronger election security measures and election management improvements.
WHERE COULD THINGS GO FROM HERE?
The involvement of Klobuchar, the Senate Rules Committee chair, and Durbin, the Senate’s No. 2 Democrat, is seen as a sign that Democratic leaders support the effort.
The White House has also said it is open to reform efforts but does not view them as a replacement for the more sweeping voting rights legislation that failed to win approval in the Senate.
The Collins group has drawn tentative interest from Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell.
Some lawmakers and aides say there is a chance that elements of the two initiatives could be incorporated into a single piece of legislation that can draw enough support to win 60 votes, a threshold for most legislation to advance in the 100-seat chamber.
(Reporting by David Morgan; editing by Andy Sullivan and Jonathan Oatis)
George Soros warns China is facing an economic crisis
By Charles Riley, CNN Business – January 31, 2022
London (CNN Business) China is facing an economic crisis after a real estate boom ended with a bang last year, according to investor George Soros. The billionaire said in a speech at Stanford University’s Hoover Institution Monday that President Xi Jinping may not be able to restore confidence in the troubled industry, which has been hit by a series of defaults by developers and falling prices for land and apartments. China’s real estate boom was based on an “unsustainable” model that benefited local governments and encouraged people to invest the bulk of their savings in property, Soros said.
Government policies designed to curb the boom made it difficult for indebted real estate behemoth Evergrande to pay its debts, he added.
The developer is reeling under more than $300 billion of total liabilities, including about $19 billion in offshore bonds held by international asset managers and private banks on behalf of their clients. Evergrande has been scrambling for months to raise cash to repay lenders.
Government officials have been sent into the company to oversee a restructuring, but there’s little clarity about what comes next. Evergrande has appealed for more time, but some lenders appear unwilling to wait. On Sunday, the company said that receivers had been appointed over a plot of land in Hong Kong, which it pledged as collateral against a $520 million loan last year.”It remains to be seen how the authorities will handle the crisis,” Soros said, during a panel discussion about developments in China and how the United States should respond. “They may have postponed dealing with it for too long, because people’s confidence has now been shaken.”George Soros looks on after delivering a speech on the sidelines of the World Economic Forum on January 23, 2020.Soros has in recent years emerged as a prominent critic of Xi and China’s ruling Communist Party. The legendary investor and chair of the Open Society Foundations said in September that asset manager BlackRock was making a “tragic mistake” by doing more business in China. He has criticized Beijing over its surveillance policies and a crackdown on private business.
The Chinese president now faces risks from the property market, according to Soros, who was speaking just days before the start of the Winter Olympics in Beijing. Falling prices will “turn many of those who invested the bulk of their savings in real estate against Xi Jinping, ” Soros said, adding that the current situation “doesn’t look promising.” “Xi Jinping has many tools available to reestablish confidence — the question is whether he will use them properly,” said Soros.An aerial view shows the Evergrande Changqing community on September 26, 2021 in Wuhan, China.Analysts have been long been concerned that Evergrande’s collapse could trigger wider risks for China’s property market, hurting homeowners and the broader financial system. Real estate and related industries account for as much as 30% of the country’s GDP.
China’s economy expanded 8.1% last year, far exceeding the government’s own targets. But weakening growth in the closing months of 2021 suggests the real estate crisis, renewed Covid outbreaks and Beijing’s strict approach to controlling the virus are taking a toll. The International Monetary Fund expects economic growth to slow dramatically to 4.8% in 2022.
Some Republicans warn Trump’s latest Jan. 6 speech shows he would ‘do it all again’
David Morgan January 31, 2022
FILE PHOTO: Donald Trump holds a rally in Conroe, Texas
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – A handful of Republicans pushed back against former President Donald Trump’s weekend offer to consider pardoning people convicted of joining the deadly Jan. 6, 2021, assault on the U.S. Capitol, saying it showed he would “do it all again” if he regains the White House in 2024.
“Trump uses language he knows caused the Jan. 6 violence; suggests he’d pardon the Jan. 6 defendants, some of whom have been charged with seditious conspiracy; threatens prosecutors; and admits he was attempting to overturn the election,” U.S. Representative Liz Cheney posted on Twitter on Monday. “He’d do it all again if given the chance.”
Cheney is one of just two Republicans taking part in the U.S House of Representatives’ official investigation of Jan. 6.
Cheney and a few other Republicans spoke out after a weekend in which former President Trump at a Saturday rally in Conroe, Texas, offered to consider pardoning people convicted of joining the attack if elected to a second term in 2024 and called for protests against prosecutors in New York and Georgia investigating him and his company.
He followed up Sunday evening with a statement repeating his false claims that his vice president, Mike Pence, “could have overturned the Election” that Trump lost to Democrat Joe Biden.
He also lambasted a bipartisan effort led by Republican Senator Susan Collins to reform the federal law that allows Congress members to dispute presidential election results.
Representative Adam Kinzinger, the other Republican on the Jan. 6 committee, wrote on Twitter late on Sunday that it was “time for every Republican leader to pick a side … Trump or the Constitution, there is no middle on defending our nation anymore.”
Trump’s comments on targeting prosecutors led Fulton County, Georgia, District Attorney Fani Willis, who is investigating whether Trump tried to influence the state’s handling of the election, to ask the FBI for additional security for her office.
She noted in a Sunday letter to the FBI’s Atlanta field office that her concerns were driven by Trump’s comments in Texas attacking “radical, vicious racist prosecutors” and encouraging protests in Washington, New York and Atlanta.
Trump was impeached in the House but acquitted in the Senate last year on a charge of inciting the deadly Jan. 6 attack, in which thousands of his supporters stormed the Capitol in the worst assault on Congress since the War of 1812. Cheney and Kinzinger voted for his impeachment, and Collins voted to convict him.
Fueled by Trump’s false claims that his November 2020 election defeat was the result of fraud, the attackers sought to stop Congress from certifying Biden’s victory and threatened to hang Pence for refusing to overturn the results. More than 700 people have been charged with joining in the assault.
Other Republicans on Sunday also rejected his remarks about pardons.
“The folks that were part of the riots and, frankly, the assault on the U.S. Capitol, have to be held accountable. There is a rule of law,” New Hampshire Governor Chris Sununu told CNN.
Senator Lindsey Graham, a staunch Trump ally, voiced his own concerns about the potential for repeated violence.
“I don’t want to reinforce that defiling the Capitol was OK. I don’t want to do anything that would make this more likely in the future,” he told CBS.
(Reporting by David Morgan, additional reporting by Susan Heavey and Doina Chiacu; Editing by Scott Malone and Jonathan Oatis)
George Soros looks on after delivering a speech on the sidelines of the World Economic Forum on January 23, 2020.Soros has in recent years emerged as a prominent critic of Xi and China’s ruling Communist Party. The legendary investor and chair of the Open Society Foundations said in September that asset manager BlackRock was making a “tragic mistake” by doing more business in China. He has criticized Beijing over its surveillance policies and a crackdown on private business.
An aerial view shows the Evergrande Changqing community on September 26, 2021 in Wuhan, China.Analysts have been long been concerned that Evergrande’s collapse could trigger wider risks for China’s property market, hurting homeowners and the broader financial system. Real estate and related industries account for as much as 30% of the country’s GDP.