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Tag: U.S. Politics

  • Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, Inc. forms a political action committee

    Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, Inc. forms a political action committee

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    The first sorority established for Black women, Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, Inc., has filed paperwork to form a political action committee (PAC). The new PAC, titled the 1908 PAC, will allow the organization to create the runway in order to raise money in support of federal candidates.

    This announcement compliments AKA’s voter registration, education and mobilization campaigns. Harris recently spoke to crowds at the annual convention, Boulé, in Dallas in July. She was rocking the group’s signature salmon pink and apple green while championing the sorority’s impact on her career’s trajectory.

    “You are such an incredible part of my journey and I love you guys,” she said, as members shouted “skee-wee,” the sorority’s signature call.

    Four years ago at the Democratic National Convention, Harris extolled the virtues of AKA.

    “Family is my beloved Alpha Kappa Alpha, our Divine Nine, and my HBCU brothers and sisters,” Harris, a member of AKA, said at the time.

    The Vice President of the United States, Kamala D. Harris, waves to the crowd after arriving at Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport on Saturday, December 16, 2023 in Atlanta, Georgia. (Photo: Itoro N. Umontuen/The Atlanta Voice)

    After President Biden announced he would not run for reelection on July 21st, support quickly coalesced around Harris. Later in the day, a group of 44,000 women, largely made up of AKA members, raised $1.5 million for her campaign.

    The sorority network includes prominent Democratic donors like Wanda Sykes, Ava DuVernay, who have expressed support for Harris. 

    The powerful organization raised hundreds of thousands of dollars and “Strolled to the Polls” for Harris in 2020. Currently, AKA is poised to mobilize and organize millions of Black voters in key swing states across the country. 

    Vice President Kamala Harris pledged at the sorority’s Alpha Chapter at Howard University in 1986. Harris is part of a membership class, ‘The 38 Jewels of Iridescent Splendor,’ a line that consisted of thirty-eight women. Thirty-eight years later, the organization is preparing to participate in what they refer to as, “a serious matter.” 

    In 2023, Alpha Kappa Alpha created their own credit union, “For Members Only.” FMO is the first Black-owned, women-led, sorority-based digital banking financial institution in the United States. The reason being was to create economic health and financial stability for Black women and women of color.

    As far as the polls are concerned, they are reflective of the rising enthusiasm with the Harris campaign. Harris leads Michigan by two points, Pennsylvania by 1.1 points and Wisconsin by 1.8 points, according to the average of swing state polls by FiveThirtyEight. Former President Donald Trump leads in Arizona by less than half a point. He also leads in Georgia by half a point.

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    Itoro N. Umontuen

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  • Sen. Jon Ossoff sat down with The Atlanta Voice to talk about working for Georgia’s Black families

    Sen. Jon Ossoff sat down with The Atlanta Voice to talk about working for Georgia’s Black families

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    Photo by Kerri Phox/The Atlanta Voice

    Georgia Senator Jon Ossoff, in his trademark suit without the tie, walked over to a position in front of the new Ebenezer Baptist Church, where a group of people were waiting. Among the people waiting were school-aged Black children on a field trip, former U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations and Atlanta Mayor Andrew Young, and other local and statewide civil rights leaders.

    “I’m here to thank these distinguished civil rights leaders,” Ossoff said as he explained how he got the Federal Prison Oversight Bill, which he first introduced in 2022, passed. The bill was recently signed by United States President Joseph R. Biden. 

    Following the press conference on Tuesday morning, Ossoff dropped by The Atlanta Voice office to speak with newspaper leadership about other moves he is making to improve the lives of millions of Black families around the state.

    Photo by Kerri Phox/The Atlanta Voice

    The Atlanta Voice: What makes you want to fight for Black families the way you continue to do in the U.S. Senate?

    Sen. Jon Ossoff: When I ran for the Senate I focussed on health, jobs, and justice. When I think about the challenges faced by Georgia’s African American community, the health disparities in our state are vast, the gap in economic opportunity and empowerment are vast. The justice gap also remains vast, so I have focused legislative energy, both in terms of oversight and reform efforts and tangible deliverable resources appropriated to the state of Georgia on addressing those critical gaps.

    AV: What has some of that legislative energy wrought?

    JO: There’s a huge shortage of facilities and resources for Black Georgians. That’s on the southside of Atlanta, but also in rural communities across the state. That’s why I have appropriated funds for example, to Southern Regional Hospital. That’s why I appropriated funds to clinics in rural areas in Georgia, as well as to transportation services that help folks in rural and underserved areas get to their appointments, get to the pharmacy, get what they need.

    AV: There is a huge gap between Black and white women in maternal services in Georgia. What’s up with that?

    JO: The maternal health gap in Georgia, the racial divide is so extreme. Georgia has been at the bottom of the national rankings, basically last or second to last, in maternal health overall for over a decade. By some measures in recent years, maternal mortality for Black women in Georgia has been higher than maternal mortality in Iraq, a country that has been in a state of active conflict for more than two decades.

    Georgia Senator Jon Ossoff (above) with a copy of The Atlanta Voice inside a conference room at The Atlanta Voice office on Tuesday, August 5, 2024. Photo by Kerri Phox/The Atlanta Voice

    Editor’s note: Ossoff recently held a senatorial hearing highlighting the testimony of OBGYN’s and maternal health doctors from Georgia. During the hearing Georgia’s six-week abortion ban was the main topic of discussion.

    JO: We heard testimony about women who were miscarrying, who were unable to get health care until they became sicker, sicker, and sicker. We heard testimony about a Georgia woman who had to leave the state, fly to Massachusetts to get healthcare, lost the pregnancy while traveling, and then upon arriving in Massachusetts went into sepsis. The extreme laws in Georgia are criminalizing the practice of obstetric medicine and worsening our shortage of OB GYN doctors in Georgia, who provide that vital prenatal care.

    AV: Medicaid is very important to millions of American families, and particularly to the state’s Black families, so why do you think it’s not as equally important to some of Georgia’s leaders?

    JO: Georgians pay the same federal taxes as residents of every other state in the country, but we are one of just 12 who refuse to get those resources back to help working families access health care. It doesn’t just deprive working families of healthcare, it deprives our hospitals of revenue. Because of there being insured patients coming through the door, there are uninsured patients coming through and the hospitals have to foot the bill. 

    AV: That might be why hospitals like Atlanta Medical Center were so easy to close?

    JO: They don’t have an insured patient population, because the state still refuses to expand Medicaid. And really, the only reason is that the underline legislation was advanced by former United States President Obama. There are still those lingering petty political grievances over the Affordable Care Act from more than a decade ago. So we have to think about health and in particular maternal health and the health of Black women. 

    AV: Part of that health is eating right, correct? There are so many counties in this state that aren’t as fortunate to have supermarkets and farmers markets within minutes like we do in Atlanta.

    JO: I’m introducing legislation called the Fresh Foods Act to help incentivize grocery stores, whether they are local community family-owned grocers or big supermarkets, to open new locations in underserved areas where they will sell fresh fruits and vegetables. If you’re somewhere there’s no hospital, no health clinic, no grocery store offering fresh fruits and vegetables, the state hasn’t expanded Medicaid, so there’s a lack of access to health insurance, it’s not like it’s a mystery why health outcomes are so much worse. 

    AV: Why are organizations like Big Brothers Big Sisters of Metro Atlanta, for example, so important for you to get federal funding?

    JO: I look at my job as a legislator and I think about it in the context of an entire human life. I thought about how we can focus on mentorship to children and adolescents, so I delivered resources for the organizations that specialize in mentorship, but for organizations here [in Georgia] that are healing place mentors and mental health professionals in schools too. 

    Photo by Kerri Phox/The Atlanta Voice

    Editor’s Note: Mentorship and mental health resources, after school opportunities, community centers, and safe public parks are also things Ossoff mentioned were targets of his funding efforts. “These are all areas where I have delivered resources to upgrade facilities on the southside of town and in rural communities, and will continue to do so,” he said.

    AV: Lastly, I want to talk to you about the Federal Prison Oversight Act that you helped get to the president’s desk and now into law. How important was that bill to you personally, and to Georgia’s Black families that are so oftentimes most affected? 

    JO: My political upbringing and my first introduction to public life was working as a very young man for Congressman John Lewis. What’s happening behind bars across the country is a humanitarian crisis. It makes a mockery of the Eighth Amendment of our Constitution which prohibits cruel and unusual punishment. 

    It is an issue that I care about, it is an issue where I’ve focused oversight and investigative resources. And now with passage of the Federal Prison Oversight Act, we have passed the most significant prison transparency and inspection legislation in many, many years. 

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    Donnell Suggs

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  • Trump in 2020 praised Tim Walz’s handling of George Floyd protests

    Trump in 2020 praised Tim Walz’s handling of George Floyd protests

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    (CNN) — Republicans are attacking Tim Walz’s response to unrest in Minneapolis in 2020, but at the time, then-President Donald Trump said he “fully” agreed with how the Minnesota governor handled rioting in the aftermath of George Floyd’s murder, undercutting a key line of GOP attack this week after Walz was named Vice President Kamala Harris’ 2024 running mate.

    “I fully agree with the way he handled it the last couple of days,” Trump said of Walz on a June 1, 2020, call during which he also described the Democratic governor as “an excellent guy.”

    The call was led by Trump, who was joined by then-Attorney General Bill Barr, then-Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Mark Milley and then-Defense Secretary Mark Esper, and included a series of governors as protests across the country, some of which devolved into violent rioting, were breaking out following the police killing of Floyd on May 25.

    Details from the call, during which Trump implored governors across the country to “dominate” protesters, have previously been reported, and CNN published the call’s full transcript the day it happened in 2020.

    It’s not uncommon for even the most bitter of political rivals to offer tempered praise toward one another in the aftermath of a natural disaster or serious nationwide crisis – especially ones that require cooperation in responses between state and federal governments. But more than four years later, Trump’s praise for Walz takes on new meaning as the GOP nominee and his allies have sought to jolt Americans’ memories of the nationwide unrest that summer, linking Walz to pictures of Minneapolis engulfed in flames and the aftermath of the destruction.

    “You’ve got a big National Guard out there that’s ready to come in and fight like hell. I tell you, what they did in Minneapolis was incredible. They went in and dominated. And it happened immediately,” Trump told the governors. “Tim Walz. Again, I was very happy with the last couple of days. Tim, you called up big numbers and the big numbers knocked them out so fast it was like bowling pins.”

    The call took place a week after Floyd was killed. At the time, and in the years since, Republicans publicly criticized Walz over whether he waited too long to call in Minnesota’s National Guard.

    Trump’s 2024 campaign, responding to CNN’s request about his 2020 praise for Walz and the details of the call, said that he was only complimentary of the Minnesota governor given that by June 1, Walz “had acted.” They argued, however, that Trump had always been frustrated that Walz hadn’t taken more action sooner.

    Walz first activated the Guard on May 28, three days after Floyd was killed, and the same day protesters lit the outside of the Minneapolis Police Department’s Third Precinct on fire.

    “The important thing here is the timing and context for these remarks. He was complimenting a governor that finally, after days of madness, had finally done something. So it wasn’t in real time. It was after Walz finally did something about it,” a senior Trump campaign adviser told CNN.

    A second Trump adviser reiterated the point, telling CNN the call came “in the context of what President Trump encouraged a lot of these governors and local leaders to do, in finally stopping or doing something about these riots. It had been seven days, or however long, days that Minneapolis had been burning, where President Trump, is essentially saying, finally, you guys, finally, the burning and looting and rioting have stopped.”

    Allies close to Trump echoed the adviser’s sentiment, noting the panic among government officials at the time on how to curb the riots, and the urgency to reach across the aisle to stop the violence.

    During the 2020 call, Walz also offered some words of thanks for the Trump administration’s response, thanking Esper for his “strategic guidance.” He also asked the Trump administration to help with messaging surrounding the role of National Guard troops.

    But in the hours after Walz was announced as Democrats’ vice presidential candidate on Monday, Republicans attacked his tenure as governor — with much of the criticism focused on the timing of his decision to call in his state’s National Guard. Trump’s running mate, Ohio Sen. JD Vance, told reporters earlier this week that Walz “allowed rioters to burn down Minneapolis in the summer of 2020.”

    Walz “sat by and let Minneapolis burn,” Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis wrote on X. Texas Gov. Greg Abbott echoed that accusation. Arkansas Sen. Tom Cotton said Walz “could have stopped” the rioting, “if he wanted to,” while the Republican Party’s research arm accused Walz of fleeing “like a coward” while Minneapolis burned.

    A spokesperson for Cotton’s Senate campaign said Walz “should have immediately sent in the Guard, the state police, and restored order instead of letting violent criminals destroy a huge portion of the city, before they were bailed out of jail by Kamala Harris,” alluding to a tweet Harris posted in support of a Minnesota bail fund.

    “As Tim Walz has admitted, his handling of the riots was an ‘abject failure,’” Cotton’s spokesperson said, referencing remarks the governor made about the city’s response to the riots. Spokespeople for Abbott and DeSantis did not immediately respond to a request for comment Wednesday afternoon.

    Even before Harris selected Walz, Trump criticized the governor on the subject.

    “Every voter in Minnesota needs to know that when the violent mobs of anarchists and looters and Marxists came to burn down Minneapolis four years ago … Remember me? I couldn’t get your governor to act,” Trump told the crowd at his rally in St. Cloud, Minnesota, last month, before falsely claiming that he, not Walz, activated the National Guard in response to the unrest.

    “I sent in the National Guard to save Minneapolis, while Kamala Harris sided with the arsonist and rioters and raised money to bail out the criminals,” Trump said.

    Walz, who first activated the Guard after peaceful protests had devolved into instances of rioting, looting and violence, said in 2020 he did so in response to requests from the mayors of Minneapolis and St. Paul.

    During the June 2020 call, Trump said he had directed Walz to call in the National Guard, before lauding the way the officers performed.

    “I said you gotta use the National Guard,” Trump said, referring to Minneapolis. “They didn’t at first, then they did, and I’ll tell you that’s true, I don’t know what it was … those guys, third night, fourth night, they walked through that stuff like it was butter. They walked right through and you haven’t had any problems since.”

    The governor faced some bipartisan criticism for the timing of his order to activate the Guard. Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey, a Democrat who was facing scrutiny over chaos in his city, said in August 2020 that he had verbally asked Walz on the evening of May 27 to send in the Guard but that the governor hesitated. Walz refuted Frey’s account at the time, saying the ask did not constitute an official request, which he said came the next day. (Any tension between the two seems to have cooled.)

    Some of the most notable instances of violence in Minneapolis, including the ransacking and burning of a city police precinct, took place the night of May 28 – after Walz had already activated a portion of the Guard. Walz and Trump spoke the same day. The governor activated the entire guard on May 30.

    In the June 1 call with Walz and the other governors, Trump seemed to acknowledge that he was satisfied with how the state Guard responded to the protests: “Yesterday and the day before, compared to the first few days, was just – never seen anything like it,” Trump said. Walz responded: “Absolutely.”

    “A lot of people don’t understand who the National Guard is and you need to get out there, from a PR perspective, and make sure that it’s not seen as a occupying force, but it’s their neighbors, school teachers, business owners, those types of things,” Walz said on the call.

    Trump said he believed that was a good idea, though he added he thought “that the people wouldn’t have minded an occupying force.”

    “I wish they had an occupying force in there,” Trump added.

    Later that day, federal law enforcement would forcibly clear peaceful protesters from a park outside the White House, making way for Trump to cross the park and pose for a photo op with a Bible outside St. John’s Church.

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  • Kamala Harris decides on Tim Walz as running mate

    Kamala Harris decides on Tim Walz as running mate

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    (CNN) — Vice President Kamala Harris has made a decision on her running mate, with four people close to the process saying Gov. Tim Walz of Minnesota is her choice.

    The selection caps the Midwestern Democrat’s short but swift ascent from a relative unknown to a leading driver of the party’s attacks on Donald Trump and the MAGA agenda.

    Harris had not formally called Walz to offer him the position, a source familiar with process told CNN.

    A former educator, Walz is currently in his second term as Minnesota governor and chairs the Democratic Governors Association. He previously served 12 years in Congress, representing a conservative-leaning rural district that, both before and after his tenure, has been mostly dominated by Republicans.

    In the time leading up to his selection as Harris’ running mate, Walz had first been an outspoken defender of Joe Biden following his disastrous debate performance as calls for the president to end his reelection bid escalated. When Biden did drop out, Walz endorsed Harris the next day and has since emerged as a reliable, energetic and cutting advocate for the presumptive Democratic nominee.

    Picking Walz also underscores the Harris campaign’s focus on a path to victory that puts a premium on the “blue wall” states of the Midwest. Minnesota is slightly outside that sphere, but Walz, once a high school football coach, has evolved during his time in office into something of a progressive populist folk hero – the exact kind of pugilistic voice that Democrats taking on Trump are keen to highlight.

    He has over the past week delivered a handful of memorable haymakers against Republicans, though his most notable contribution has been a determination to label the GOP, especially its presidential ticket of Trump and Ohio Sen. JD Vance. Walz has referred to the duo as “weird dudes,” before lighting into their political agenda.

    The phrase has stuck, becoming a central meme in the new, post-Biden version of the campaign, a development that is delighting Democrats and apparently frustrating many on the right.

    During recent remarks at a “White Dudes for Harris” fundraiser, Walz made a rough-and-ready case for the vice president before would-be small-dollar donors.

    “How often in 100 days do you get to change the trajectory of the world? How often in 100 days do you get to do something that’s going to impact generations to come?” Walz asked. “And how often in the world do you make that bastard wake up afterwards and know that a Black woman kicked his a**, sent him on the road?”

    The line was well received on the call and almost immediately grabbed headlines. For many Democrats, at least, the online virality – with apologies to Biden’s “Dark Brandon” meme – was the kind they have pined for over the past few years.

    Walz also has a personal story befitting the zeitgeist – a family history, as he discussed last month, of infertility troubles, with his wife of three decades, Gwen, which allows him to speak with some authority against opponents or skeptics of in vitro fertilization, or IVF.

    “My oldest daughter’s name is Hope. That’s because my wife and I spent seven years trying to get pregnant, needed fertility treatments, things like IVF – things (MAGA Republicans) would ban,” Walz told Harris supporters. “These guys are the anti-freedoms.”

    And to draw a bright, cheeky line under his own childhood experience, Walz – not for the last time – recounted that he “grew up in a small town: 400 people, 24 kids in the class, 12 cousins.”

    Prior to Congress, Walz was a high school teacher and football coach and served in the Army National Guard. Over more than a decade in Congress, he assembled a fairly centrist voting record. As a first-time campaigner, he opposed a ban on same-sex marriage and supported abortion rights. And once in Congress, he balanced that out with comparatively more conservative positions on gun rights, which resulted in scoring a National Rifle Association endorsement. Walz has since fallen out of favor with the gun lobby over his support for gun safety actions as governor.

    “I think he was a solid Democratic member of the House with a few twists – focus on ag, farmers, rural areas,” said Democratic strategist Jeff Blodgett, a longtime aide to the late Sen. Paul Wellstone. “I think that he wanted to protect rifles and things of that nature as a rural congressman.”

    Walz ran for governor in 2018, emerging victorious by a double-digit margin. He won reelection in 2022 with 52 percent of the vote. As governor Walz had to grapple with divided government and slim majorities in the state Legislature. But in 2022, the Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party (as the state’s Democratic Party is known) won control of both the state House and Senate giving Walz’s party a slim “trifecta” of legislative control.

    That allowed Walz to sign into law a raft of expansive social welfare programs such as free lunch for public school students, expansive access to Medicaid, increased protections that allow workers to unionize and expanded medical and family paid family leave.

    Through the trifecta, Minnesota Democrats were also able to codify abortion rights into law, increase transgender rights protections, pass a marijuana legalization bill and install new gun safety laws. Progressives hailed the work as an example of all that Democrats could achieve. Former President Barack Obama wrote in a tweet praising the most recent legislative session that it was a “reminder that elections have consequences.”

    Walz touted the trifecta’s work in a combative 2023 State of the State address.

    “There’s nowhere quite like Minnesota right now,” he told the audience of lawmakers. “Together, we’re not just showing the people of Minnesota what we’re capable of in delivering on our promises. We’re showing the entire American people just how much promise is contained in that progressive vision held by so many people.”

    “As governor, he’s embraced the idea that it’s really important to invest in people and infrastructure to grow the economy,” Blodgett said. “And to do it in a way that really helps people in the middle and down below. To me, it’s just a huge focus on economic issues that are kitchen table issues that people care about.”

    When speculation began about who Harris would pick as a running mate, Walz started out as the darkest of dark horses. He did get support from a few members of Congress such as Minnesota Rep. Angie Craig and Washington Rep. Pramila Jayapal of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, as well as encouragement from labor unions. In the end, Walz’s background as a governor experienced in working with Democrats and Republicans and his roots in rural Minnesota made him an appealing choice for Harris.

    Walz was also a surprise to Republicans.

    “Tim Walz doesn’t even register on the fear-o-meter,” Minnesota Republican strategist Kevin Poindexter said before the announcement, adding that Republicans had been more worried about Harris picking either Arizona Sen. Mark Kelly or Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro. “Him joining the ticket as VP does not bring anything.”

    Walz’s selection means that both the Trump and Harris campaigns have vice presidential nominees who their backers hope will help rally support across the Midwest. Democrats hope Walz’s Minnesota roots will attract a wide swath of voters throughout the region, while Republicans feel that Ohio Sen. JD Vance’s history of growing up in Ohio, as documented in his memoir “Hillbilly Elegy,” will find appeal in blue states like Michigan or even Minnesota.

    Democratic strategist Raghu Devaguptapu, a former Democratic Governors Association political director, characterized Walz as a “real steady hand” more than anything else as a governor.

    “He’s not the most charismatic guy, but he’s a steady hand. He’s really thoughtful, very likeable. He’s done a really nice job of building a broad coalition of support. … That’s the center of strength around Tim Walz,” Devaguptapu said.

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  • Pelosi says she has not spoken to Biden since he dropped out of the race

    Pelosi says she has not spoken to Biden since he dropped out of the race

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    (CNN) — Former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi says she has not spoken to President Joe Biden since he dropped out of the presidential race last month.

    Asked by CNN’s Dana Bash on Monday whether she would like to speak with him in the future, Pelosi said, “Yes.”

    “Is everything OK with your relationship?” Bash asked.

    “You’d have to ask him, but I hope so,” Pelosi said. “Look, I love Joe Biden, respected him for over 40 years.”

    Last month, the president stepped down from the Democratic ticket and endorsed Vice President Kamala Harris.

    CNN previously reported that Pelosi privately told Biden that polling showed he could not beat former President Donald Trump, the Republican nominee, and his run could destroy Democrats’ chances of winning back the House. One source told CNN at the time that the president pushed back, telling her that he had seen polls that indicated he could win. Another source described Biden as getting defensive about the polls.

    A source with direct knowledge later described Biden as “seething” at Pelosi. This source said the sentiment only grew when California Rep. Zoe Lofgren, a longtime Pelosi ally, released a letter urging Biden to step aside. Aides to Harris also expressed unhappiness with Pelosi and her talk of a quick process to find a new candidate if the president were to step aside as the party’s presumptive nominee.

    Biden dropped out of the race and endorsed Harris days later.

    In an oval office address on July 24, Biden framed the decision as a matter of saving democracy and passing “the torch to a new generation.”

    “You know, in recent weeks it’s become clear to me that I need to unite my party in this critical endeavor. I believe my record as president, my leadership in the world, my vision for America’s future all merited a second term,” Biden said. “But nothing, nothing can come in the way of saving our democracy. That includes personal ambition.”

    He went on describe Harris as experienced, tough and capable.

    “She’s been an incredible partner to me, and a leader for our country,” he said.

    On Monday evening, Pelosi described Harris, who on Friday earned enough votes from Democratic delegates to win the party’s nomination for president, as “very politically astute,” pointing toward Harris’ experience winning a competitive primary for California attorney general.

    “She pulled that off because of her astuteness,” Pelosi said, “and I can go more into that but the fact is, you’ve seen in the past three weeks how she has managed the opportunity that is there.”

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  • ANALYSIS: What to expect in the sprint to Election Day – and beyond

    ANALYSIS: What to expect in the sprint to Election Day – and beyond

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    (CNN) — Far from the boring rematch that had many Americans tuning out politics, the 2024 presidential election has had wild twists and scary turns.

    Nobody expected President Joe Biden’s campaign to implode in less than a month, from the shock of his performance at CNN’s debate in late June to his decision to step aside in the race in late July. Democrats went from literally freaking out about his candidacy to a new excitement about Vice President Kamala Harris as his replacement.

    Nobody expected an assassination attempt against former President Donald Trump, an event that unified Republicans around him and has many in his party showing a sort of divine reverence for his near-death experience.

    So we don’t know specifically what will happen in the sprint to Election Day on November 5, or what could come after, when the country’s unique Electoral College process gets going. But we do have some idea of what to expect:

    August: Nominating Harris, picking a VP and a convention in Chicago

    Harris earned enough votes from Democratic delegates to win the party’s nomination in a virtual roll call August 2, a day after voting began and weeks before its convention. The early nomination process was a backstop maneuver to ward against ballot changes.

    Harris will also need to pick a running mate. Look for that to occur soon, according to CNN’s Jeff Zeleny, and not right before the convention, as frequently occurs.

    In late August, Democrats will convene in Chicago for their convention. Expect the most incredible reception for Biden. Democrats have pivoted from worrying over his election prospects to lionizing him as a hero.

    Early in the month, Sen. JD Vance, Trump’s running mate, turned 40. He’d be the third-youngest vice president in US history and the first millennial in nationwide elected office if the Republican ticket wins. With Biden out of the race, Vance is on the ticket with the oldest major-party nominee in history with Trump, a baby boomer.

    September: Debates, anyone? A Trump sentencing?

    Biden and Trump had agreed to a second debate, hosted by ABC News, to occur on September 10. But with Biden out of the race, Trump has suggested he might not take part in a debate sponsored by ABC. Instead, the Trump campaign suggested a debate on Fox News, and that network has suggested September 17.

    Both sides seem eager to debate, so look for details to emerge.

    The first early voting will also get underway in September. North Carolina is the first state to send mail-in ballots, on September 6, but other states will follow suit in the weeks after.

    Back in school and back to work, many Americans may start to pay more attention to the election in September. There will also be some touchstone moments in the cultural zeitgeist, such as when “Saturday Night Live” premiers at the end of the month with Maya Rudolph returning as Harris – and we find out who will play Vance.

    Trump also faces sentencing for his conviction on 34 counts of falsifying business records related to hush money payments before the 2016 election. That September 18 date could slip as the court reacts to new immunity granted to presidents by the Supreme Court.

    October: Voting is well under way

    Election Day isn’t until November 5, but most states allow some kind of early voting, either by mail or in person, and that process will kick into overdrive in October.

    Most Americans, nearly 70%, voted early or by mail in 2020, according to census figures, although that figure was affected by the Covid-19 pandemic.

    The campaigns will be focused on getting out the vote in the few key battleground states they think are up for grabs. In 2020, Biden won five states that Trump won in 2016. Those states – Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin – could again be the focus in 2024 when Harris, who turns 60 in October, takes on Trump.

    November: Election Day and beyond

    US law requires federal elections to take place on the Tuesday after the first Monday in November. This year, that’s November 5.

    People who don’t vote early will hit their local voting location. Polls will close at different times around the country. Due to the rise of voting by mail, if key states are close, like they were in 2020, we probably won’t know the winner on Election Day.

    Regardless, expect lawsuits in certain states and the potential for recounts in others. Election Day is far from the end of the election.

    Toward the end of November, Biden turns 82.

    December: Electoral votes are cast

    After questions about the election are settled, states confirm, or ascertain, their statewide results. Electors gather in their respective state capitols to cast electoral votes for their statewide winner.

    Nebraska and Maine also allocate some electoral votes by congressional district, and these could be pivotal in a close race.

    January: Someone will solemnly swear

    The new Congress takes the oath of office on January 3. It’s this new Congress that, in the unlikely event of an Electoral College tie, would settle the election. Each state would get one vote for president in the House of Representatives.

    In any event, lawmakers gather on January 6, as everyone should remember from 2020, to count electoral votes. Harris will preside. She could either be the fifth vice president in history to oversee her own Electoral College victory, or the fourth in history to oversee her own Electoral College defeat.

    On January 20, 2025, the next president takes the oath of office.

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  • Team USA women’s basketball squad emphasizes endorsement of Kamala Harris for president

    Team USA women’s basketball squad emphasizes endorsement of Kamala Harris for president

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    (CNN) — The head coach and players of Team USA’s women’s basketball emphasized their endorsement of Vice President Kamala Harris’ presidential bid on Wednesday.

    It’s the first major political statement from a top American team at this year’s Olympics and comes as the presidential race is heating up back home.

    Harris took over the Democratic nomination earlier this month after President Joe Biden decided to end his reelection bid and endorse his No. 2. She’s now attempting to gain momentum in the race against former President Donald Trump, who is running to regain the office he lost to Biden in 2020.

    The players on Team USA – and the WNBA in general –have been far more willing to engage in political statements than some of their other professional sports peers.

    “We have been talking, especially with the social justice committee, finding a way to make sure that we can obviously back Kamala as much as we can. Because everything that we’ve been kind of working for this year … has been about voting rights, reproductive rights,” said Breanna Stewart, a power forward who plays her professional ball for the New York Liberty, on July 27.

    “The things she stands for, we also stand for. So making sure that we can definitely stay united and continue to push the message of registering to vote, knowing where to vote and all the resources behind it.”

    Women’s basketball players have had influential voices in key elections before.

    In 2020, the Atlanta Dream protested against their then co-owner – then Sen. Kelly Loeffler, who was running for reelection against Rev. Raphael Warnock – over her opposition to the Black Lives Matter movement. That race ended up going to a run-off and Warnock defeated Loeffler. He’s now serving as a senator from Georgia.

    “I think that’s a really important thing that our league has done through the years, using our voice as a vehicle for change, and I think no question that we would step to the plate in this scenario,” said Team USA head coach Cheryl Reeve, who also coaches the WNBA’s Minnesota Lynx, on Wednesday.

    “I think it’s really important that we don’t go backwards as we’ve seen, some of the threats to basic human rights, the things that we care about in our league, and so I’m proud to stand with the players in this in backing Kamala Harris.”

    WNBA legend Diana Taurasi added Wednesday that she was thrilled to see Harris taking over the Democratic presidential ticket. Ultimately, it comes down to policy, she said.

    “What are you going to do for the people of America that need you? And I think there’s a big portion of us that see a lot of us in her and what she wants to do with our country,” Taurasi said. “For me, that is one of the proudest and most amazing moments, so yeah, we’re going to back her and we’re going to do everything we can to make sure she wins and we go forward in this country in the right way.”

    The endorsement from the women’s Team USA comes a little less than a week after men’s star Stephen Curry said he was excited about Harris’ candidacy. Harris had visited the men’s basketball team during their training camp ahead of the Games.

    “If she’s on the ticket winning the election, like it’s, it’s a big, big deal to say the least and she represents the Bay Area,” Curry said last week. “She’s been a big supporter of us. And so I want to give that energy right back to her and just excited knowing, obviously, we’re representing our country here and this is a very monumental next couple of months for, for our country and the direction that we’re headed.”

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  • Biden administration announces $2 billion in direct payments for Black and minority farmers

    Biden administration announces $2 billion in direct payments for Black and minority farmers

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    COLUMBIA, Mo. (AP) — The Biden administration has doled out more than $2 billion in direct payments for Black and other minority farmers discriminated against by the U.S. Department of Agriculture, the president announced Wednesday.

    More than 23,000 farmers were approved for payments ranging from $10,000 to $500,000, according to the USDA. Another 20,000 who planned to start a farm but did not receive a USDA loan received between $3,500 and $6,000.

    Most payments went to farmers in Mississippi and Alabama.

    USDA Secretary Tom Vilsack told reporters that the aid “is not compensation for anyone’s loss or the pain endured, but it is an acknowledgment by the department.”

    The USDA has a long history of refusing to process loans from Black farmers, approving smaller loans compared to white farmers, and in some cases foreclosing quicker than usual when Black farmers who obtained loans ran into problems.

    National Black Farmers Association Founder and President John Boyd Jr. said the aid is helpful. But, he said, it’s not enough.

    “It’s like putting a bandage on somebody that needs open-heart surgery,” Boyd said. “We want our land, and I want to be very, very clear about that.”

    Boyd is still fighting a federal lawsuit for 120% debt relief for Black farmers that was approved by Congress in 2021. Five billion dollars for the program was included in the $1.9 trillion COVID-19 stimulus package.

    Handy Kennedy Jr of AgriUnity speaks during a tour of the Bugg Family Farm on Monday, May 15, 2023 at Pine Mountain, Georgia. (Photo: Itoro N. Umontuen/The Atlanta Voice) Credit: Itoro N. Umontuen / The Atlanta Voice

    But the money never came. White farmers in several states filed lawsuits arguing their exclusion was a violation of their constitutional rights, which prompted judges to halt the program shortly after its passage.

    Faced with the likelihood of a lengthy court battle that would delay payments to farmers, Congress amended the law and offered financial help to a broader group of farmers. A new law allocated $3.1 billion to help farmers struggling with USDA-backed loans and $2.2 billion to pay farmers who the agency discriminated against.

    Wardell Carter, who is Black, said no one in his farming family got so much as access to a loan application since Carter’s father bought 85 acres (34.4 hectares) of Mississippi land in 1939. He said USDA loan officers would slam the door in his face. If Black farmers persisted, Carter said officers would have police come to their homes.

    Without a loan, Carter’s family could not afford a tractor and instead used a horse and mule for years. And without proper equipment, the family could farm at most 40 acres (16.2 hectares) of their property — cutting profits.

    When they finally received a bank loan to buy a tractor, Carter said the interest rate was 100%.

    Boyd said he’s watched as his loan applications were torn up and thrown in the trash, been called racial epithets, and was told to leave in the middle of loan meetings so the officer could speak to white farmers.

    “We face blatant, in-your-face, real discrimination,” Boyd said. “And I did personally. The county person who was making farm loans spat tobacco juice on me during a loan session.”

    At age 65, Carter said he’s too old to farm his land. But he said if he receives money through the USDA program, he will use it to get his property in shape so his nephew can begin farming on it again. Carter said he and his family want to pitch in to buy his nephew a tractor, too.

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  • Your Voice: What was your initial reaction to Biden pulling out of the campaign, and what do you want to see happen next?

    Your Voice: What was your initial reaction to Biden pulling out of the campaign, and what do you want to see happen next?

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    Vice President Kamala Harris embraces President Joe Biden in Raleigh, N.C., March. 26, 2024. (AP Photo/Matt Kelley)

    Bernita Lawrence

    Conyers

    “I was upset that he dropped out of the race. [But] I woke up today with a different outlook because I don’t like a quitter, and I wouldn’t say I liked the fact that the Democrats were not being unified like the Republicans. But I wanted Kamala to be at the top of the ticket in the future, and now she is. I do feel encouraged today with Kamala at the top of the ticket. So, I’m looking forward to the first black female president. I do hope that she does unify the country.”

    Douglas Johnson

    College Park

    “I was happy he dropped out, but I’m stuck with who will replace him. I’m all for Black women. Let’s get together and uplift and empower our Black women. But I don’t think she’s authentic. I’ve been reading a lot of your articles where she kept black men [locked up] and incriminated a lot of black men that she could have helped them. I wish it were somebody like Joe that was more authentic. At one point, she was claiming she was Indian and not necessarily black. To me, it’s no different than what Trump is doing. I don’t want him. I know he doesn’t like us, but she pretends she is for us only for her cause. That’s what she’s done her whole life.”

    Lorene Hill

    Newnan

    “I believe it will be an interesting race because One, she’s Black. Two, she’s a woman. Third, there was still some controversy about how she was as a D.A. On the other hand, Trump has a lot of followers, but in my opinion, he’s a cult leader. [I hope] people get out and vote for who [they feel is] their best person that they think will take care of our country.”

    Marc Smith

    Atlanta

    “I was relieved because I was really for Biden and his family and relieved that maybe there’s a chance of beating Trump. I hope that Kamala gets the nomination, that she wins, and that people accept that you can have a female president. It’d be great to have the first black female president. I mean, we’re in peril. We’re in a moment of crisis. And she’s running against a guy that has 34 felonies. So, I don’t know how that’s a choice.”

    The post Your Voice: What was your initial reaction to Biden pulling out of the campaign, and what do you want to see happen next? appeared first on The Atlanta Voice.

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  • Your Voice: What was your initial reaction to the assassination attempt on Republican candidate Donald Trump?

    Your Voice: What was your initial reaction to the assassination attempt on Republican candidate Donald Trump?

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    Beverly Baker

    Atlanta

    “My initial reaction was it was an inside job. I believe that the shooter and also the victim were part of Donald Trump’s plan. This is just a derailment to get off the subject of what he’s facing, and I truly believe it is an inside job. I do. I believe it was an inside job until I see proof that this man was not part of a plan.”

    Omari Stennet

    Covington

    “I think it was absurd. I think it was uncalled for. I’m not a big fan of politics like that. I’m not even a big fan of Donald Trump. However, he’s for the people from listening to Donald Trump and what he represents and speaks about. And all he wanted to do was the right thing. So I don’t I don’t want him to get killed. I don’t want anybody to get killed. But, you know, I thought it was absurd. And I’m more than grateful that he survived. And I wish the best for him. I don’t want anything to happen to Donald Trump. And that’s my answer. It’s good.”

    Francesca Lowe

    Fayetteville

    “I didn’t believe it. I didn’t know what was going on. I didn’t hear about it. My coworker just told me. And the first thing that came to mind was that it was staged. It was not real to provoke sympathy or empathy. I’m not sure which one. That’s it.”

    Roger Williams

    Atlanta

    “My first reaction to what happened to Trump is that I believe the government set it up because a real sniper is not going to miss; if they wanted to shoot you, they would have shot you. A real sniper is not going to miss. I think it was politically set up for him to get more votes, get more attention, and for him to make history because he was almost assassinated. I mean, it’s all publicity.”

    The post Your Voice: What was your initial reaction to the assassination attempt on Republican candidate Donald Trump? appeared first on The Atlanta Voice.

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  • President Biden’s health and age under even further scrutiny amid questions over his political future

    President Biden’s health and age under even further scrutiny amid questions over his political future

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    Washington (CNN) — As President Joe Biden isolates at his Delaware beach home after testing positive for Covid-19, he is growing increasingly isolated from many corners of his Democratic Party as he faces deepening questions about whether he should continue his reelection campaign.

    The announcement of Biden’s positive test on Wednesday came as calls from his party for him to step aside in the 2024 race are growing louder. CNN reported that former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi privately told the president that polling shows Biden cannot defeat former President Donald Trump in November and that continuing his run for the presidency could destroy Democrats’ chance to take back the House.

    Following Biden’s campaign-changing performance in last month’s presidential debate, his age and health — which have long been his biggest political weakness, dating back to his third run for the presidency starting in 2019 — have been under the microscope. In the last week, multiple incidents have been held up as signs that Biden is not sharp enough to convince voters that he could defeat Trump, let alone serve another four years as commander-in-chief.

    An interview with BET that taped on Tuesday and aired in full late Wednesday night is the latest moment that’s being scrutinized by nervous Democrats. In that interview, Biden said that only a “medical condition” would convince him to leave the race — a statement made just one day before he tested positive for Covid.

    He stumbled while referring to Black members of his administration, describing Lloyd Austin as the secretary of defense rather than saying his name.

    “For example, look at the heat I’m getting because I named a, uh … the — secretary of defense, a Black man. I named Ketanji Brown, because of the people I’ve named,” Biden said, also referring to Supreme Court Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson, whom he appointed to the high court.

    The White House said Wednesday the president had “upper respiratory symptoms, to include rhinorhea (runny nose) and non-productive cough, with general malaise” as a result of his Covid infection. Video of the president leaving Las Vegas showed him slowly walking up the steps to enter Air Force One, including pausing on the second step to gather himself before continuing into the plane.

    Biden on Thursday is experiencing “mild upper respiratory symptoms” and is continuing to receive Paxlovid, according to a note from his physician Dr. Kevin O’Connor. O’Connor notes that Biden does not have a fever and his vitals remain “normal.”

    Additional video shot by pool reporters who met Biden in Delaware late Wednesday also shows the president appearing to have difficulty getting situated in his SUV for the drive to his Rehoboth Beach, Delaware, home, where he is planning to isolate. The video shows Biden taking half a minute to get into the SUV and requiring the assistance of Secret Service agents to get situated in the car. The president was not wearing a face mask while he was interacting with the agents, despite having Covid. He eventually did put on a mask.

    Earlier on Wednesday, while visiting a local restaurant, the president appeared to mistake Nevada Attorney General Aaron Ford for the state’s governor. While speaking to a guest, Biden pointed to Ford and asked, “You know the gov?” Individuals nearby laughed at the statement, but it was unclear whether Biden was joking.

    CNN has reached out to the Biden campaign and White House for comment on the moment in Nevada and the president’s arrival in Delaware. Biden’s deputy campaign manager Quentin Fulks on Thursday said the campaign is “not working through any scenarios” where Biden is not the presidential nominee.

    “The vice president is a part of the Biden-Harris ticket. Our campaign is not working through any scenarios where President Biden is not the top of the ticket. He is and will be the Democratic nominee,” he said during a DNC news conference in Milwaukee when asked if the campaign was working on any plans should Vice President Kamala Harris take the lead.

    Asked if Biden’s receptive to conversations about leaving the race, Fulks replied, “The president has said it several times, he’s staying in this race.”

    “The president is in this race. He’s going to and we look forward to him accepting the delegates in Chicago and continuing with this race to talk about what’s at stake,” he added.

    Polling shows a problem

    As calls for Biden to reconsider his candidacy are poised to grow even louder on Thursday, some of the reasons why are coming into sharper focus: Not only is Biden falling short to Trump, but Democratic candidates are afraid voters could see their own defenses of Biden as dishonest.

    “Defending Biden’s fitness for office is an untenable position for down-ballot Democrats,” according to a memo a leading Democratic research firm released Wednesday. It details that voters are “likely to see other Democrats’ defense of him as fit as dishonest” by a wide margin.

    CNN obtained a polling memo from Blue Rose Research, which is distributed daily to operatives and officials across the Democratic Party. Pelosi is among those who pore over the details and findings in documents like this that are rarely shared.

    The memo dated Wednesday shines a brighter light on the reasons behind the calls for Biden to step aside.

    “Concerns about President Biden’s fitness for office are pervasive,” the memo says, pointing to polling data that shows a remarkable low number of voters — even those who supported Biden in 2020 — who believe he is capable of serving a second term.

    While partisan polling does not meet CNN standards, the 16-page document has value because it offers a window into the panic and alarm across the Democratic Party.

    An AP-NORC poll released Wednesday found 14% of all Americans are extremely or very confident that Biden has the “mental capacity to be an effective president.” Among Democrats, that number is 27%.

    The internal polling data shows an expanding battleground in the presidential race, with New Hampshire, Minnesota, New Mexico, Virginia and Maine becoming highly competitive in the race between Biden and Trump, in addition to the seven current top battleground states.

    Worrying moments for Democrats

    The president has had several moments over the last week that have worried Democrats even more about whether he can effectively continue to campaign.

    On July 11, the president had back-to-back slip-ups on the last day of the NATO summit in Washington, referring to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky as “President Putin” before correcting himself at one event and then referring to Harris as “Vice President Trump” in a press conference, a mistake he did not correct or acknowledge.

    In that same press conference, Biden also appeared to back away from his previous assertion that only the “Lord Almighty” could convince him to leave the race, saying he would not leave the race “unless they came back and said there’s no way you can win.”

    Several calls with key groups of lawmakers on Friday and Saturday also did not seem to convince skeptical lawmakers that Biden was able to win. CNN reported Wednesday night that a Democratic lawmaker told CNN that Biden’s full court press in recent days following Saturday’s assassination attempt on Trump has only exacerbated the panic inside the party. “Getting worse” is how the member put it.

    Another House Democrat who watched Biden’s interview with NBC News’ Lester Holt on Monday described feeling “profound sadness watching an admirable man tread water instead of leading us through it.”

    While the assassination attempt on Trump eased the political pressure on Biden for a few days, that pressure has kicked up again over the last several days as CNN and others reported that some Biden allies were making a quiet push for the Democratic National Committee to speed up Biden’s virtual nomination process — with the hope of beginning the roll call vote as soon as next week.

    Concerned Democrats bought themselves a little more time by convincing the DNC to not move up the timeline — voting will not begin before August 1, CNN reported. The delay stopped a draft letter circulating among House Democrats that, if made formal, would have exposed further cracks in the party. House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer both pushed the DNC to delay the process, multiple sources told CNN.

    Behind the scenes, the president is not as defiant as he is in public, multiple Democratic sources told CNN.

    “The private conversations with the Hill are continuing,” a senior Democratic adviser told CNN, speaking on condition of anonymity to avoid alienating the campaign and the White House. “He’s being receptive. Not as defiant as he is publicly.”

    “He’s gone from saying, ‘Kamala can’t win,’ to ‘Do you think Kamala can win?’“ the adviser said. “It’s still unclear where he’s going to land but seems to be listening.”

    The Biden campaign, which is also facing a growing outcry from Democratic donors, dismissed the suggestion the president was rethinking his candidacy.

    “If the facts matter — and they should — here is one: President Biden is the Democratic nominee and he is going to win this November,” Kevin Munoz, a Biden spokesman, told CNN.

    Biden on defense

    Biden has been growing increasingly defensive over his political standing in recent days. CNN has reported that calls over the weekend with groups of Democratic lawmakers did not go well when the president was confronted with polling data that lawmakers said showed his standing in the race had fallen dramatically.

    On Wednesday night, CNN reported Pelosi had told Biden within the last week that the polling data showed he could not win reelection. The president responded by pushing back, telling Pelosi he has seen polls that indicate he can win, one source said. Another one of the sources described Biden as getting defensive about the polls. None of the sources indicated whether Pelosi told Biden in this conversation that she believes the president should drop out of the 2024 race.

    When asked for comment, White House spokesperson Andrew Bates did not respond to the details of CNN’s reporting on the recent Pelosi-Biden call. “President Biden is the nominee of the party. He plans to win and looks forward to working with congressional Democrats to pass his 100 days agenda to help working families,” Bates said.

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  • Fact-checking night 2 of the Republican National Convention

    Fact-checking night 2 of the Republican National Convention

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    (CNN) — Speakers at the second night of the Republican National Convention made many false and misleading claims throughout the night which focused heavily on immigration and crime.

    Here is a list of fact checks from CNN’s Facts First team.

    Speaker Mike Johnson makes false claim about crime under Biden

    After criticizing President Joe Biden as weak, House Speaker Mike Johnson claimed in his Tuesday speech at the Republican National Convention that Democrats’ policies have brought communities “dramatic increases” in “violence, crime and drugs.”

    Similarly, House Republican Conference Chair Rep. Elise Stefanik referred to “Biden’s violent crime crisis,” and a video played near the beginning of the Tuesday evening proceedings featured a narrator saying, “It’s not just big cities. Rising crime is a problem everywhere.”

    Facts First: Johnson’s claims about dramatic increases in violence and crime are false, as is the convention video’s claim that there is a problem “everywhere” with “rising crime.” Official data published by the FBI shows violent crime dropped significantly in the US in 2023 and in the first quarter of 2024, though there were increases in some communities; violent crime is now lower than it was in 2020, President Donald Trump’s last calendar year in office.

    Stefanik’s claim of a “violent crime crisis” under Biden is subjective, but she certainly did not acknowledge that the current numbers under Biden are superior to final Trump-era numbers.

    Preliminary FBI data for 2023 showed a roughly 13% national decline in murder and a roughly 6% national decline in overall violent crime compared to 2022, bringing both murder and violent crime levels below where they were in 2020. And preliminary FBI data for the first quarter of 2024 showed an even steeper drop from the same quarter in 2023 – a roughly 26% decline in murder and roughly 15% decline in overall violent crime.

    There are limitations to the FBI-published data, which comes from local law enforcement – the numbers are preliminary, not all communities submitted data, and the submitted data usually has some initial errors – so these statistics may not precisely capture the size of the recent declines in crime. But these statistics and other data sources make it clear crime has indeed declined to some extent nationally, though not everywhere.

    Crime data expert Jeff Asher, co-founder of the firm AH Datalytics, said that if the final 2023 figures show a decline in murder of at least 10% from 2022, this would be the fastest US decline “ever recorded.” And he noted that both the preliminary FBI-published data from the first quarter of 2024 and also “crime data collected from several independent sources point to an even larger decline in property and violent crime, including a substantially larger drop in murder, so far this year compared to 2023, though there is still time left in the year for those trends to change.”

    From CNN’s Daniel Dale

    Scalise claims Biden has ‘erode’ American ‘energy dominance’

    House Majority Leader Steve Scalise claimed Tuesday in his Republican National Convention speech that the Biden administration has “eroded the American energy dominance that President Trump delivered.” He also claimed that Democrats are waging an “assault on American energy.”

    Facts First: Scalise’s claims are misleading. The US under President Joe Biden is producing more crude oil than any country ever has. The world record was set by the US in 2023, according to the federal Energy Information Administration, averaging about 12.9 million barrels per day – exceeding the Trump-era record, an average of about 12.3 million barrels per day in 2019. US production of dry natural gas also hit a new high in 2023. So did US crude oil exports.

    CNN’s Matt Egan reported in December that the US was exporting the same amount of crude oil, refined products and natural gas liquids as Saudi Arabia or Russia were producing, according to S&P Global Commodity Insights.

    None of this is to say that Biden is the reason that domestic oil production has increased; market factors are the key driver of companies’ investment and production decisions, and the Energy Information Administration has credited technological improvements in fracking and horizontal drilling technology that have made oil wells more productive. Egan reported in August: “The American Petroleum Institute, an oil trade group that has been critical of the Biden administration’s regulatory efforts, noted that approved federal permits and new federal acres leased have both fallen sharply under Biden.”

    Still, despite Biden’s often-critical rhetoric about fossil fuel companies, some policy moves to get tougher on those companies and his major investments in initiatives to fight climate change, he certainly has not come close to stopping fossil fuel production as Trump has claimed.

    Biden has also approved some significant and controversial fossil fuel projects, including the Willow oil drilling project in Alaska and the Mountain Valley gas pipeline from West Virginia to Virginia.

    From CNN’s Daniel Dale and Piper Hudspeth Blackburn 

    Scalise on migrants coming to the US

    Scalise said Tuesday that migrants are arriving in the US after having been deliberately freed from prison.

    “On the border, Biden and Harris opened it up to the entire world. Prisons are being emptied,” said Scalise, a Louisiana Republican.

    Facts first: There is no evidence for Scalise’s claim that “prisons of being emptied” so that prisoners can travel to the US as migrants.

    “I do a daily news search to see what’s going on in prisons around the world and have seen absolutely no evidence that any country is emptying its prisons and sending them all to the US,” said Helen Fair, who is co-author of the World Prison Population List, which tracks the global prison population, and a research fellow at the Institute for Crime & Justice Policy Research at Birkbeck, University of London.

    Trump, now the Republican presidential nominee, has repeatedly made such claims in his own speeches and interviews. But Trump has never provided any proof for the claim.

    Trump’s campaign has provided CNN with only a vague 2022 article from right-wing website Breitbart about a supposed federal intelligence report warning Border Patrol agents about Venezuela freeing violent prisoners who had then joined migrant caravans.

    But this supposed claim about Venezuela’s actions has never been corroborated, and experts have told CNN, PolitiFact and FactCheck.org that they know of no proof of any such thing having happened.

    The recorded global prison population increased from October 2021 to April 2024, from about 10.77 million people to about 10.99 million people, according to the World Prison Population List.

    From CNN’s Daniel Dale 

    Lara Trump’s claims about unemployment records under Trump

    Lara Trump, the co-chair of the Republican National Committee and the former president’s daughter-in-law, hailed the state of the country during the Trump administration. Among other things, she said there were “record low unemployment rates for African Americans, Hispanic Americans, Asian Americans and women.”

    Facts First: These claims need context. Lara Trump didn’t mention that the Trump-era record lows for African American unemployment, Hispanic Americans unemployment and women’s unemployment were all beaten or matched during President Joe Biden’s presidency, though the Trump-era record for Asian American unemployment still stands.

    The current record low for the Black or African American unemployment rate, 4.8%, was set under Biden in April 2023.
    That beat the Trump-era low that was a record at the time, 5.3% in August 2019 and September 2019. (A cautionary note: This official data series goes back only to 1972.)

    The Hispanic or Latino unemployment rate hit 3.9% under Biden in September 2022, tying the record low first set in 2019 under Trump.

    The unemployment rate among women hit 3.4% under Trump in September 2019 and October 2019, the lowest since the 1950s, but it fell to 3.3% under Biden in January 2023.

    The record set under Trump for Asian American unemployment, 2% in June 2019, has not been matched under Biden. The lowest Biden-era rate was 2.3% in July 2023.

    From CNN’s Daniel Dale

    Rep. Stefanik claims that Biden presidency has led to the highest inflation of her lifetime

    Rep. Elise Stefanik of New York claimed in her Republican National Convention speech Tuesday that Biden’s presidency has led to the “highest rate of inflation” in her lifetime.

    Facts First: This claim is out of date.

    While the year-over-year inflation rate in June 2022, about 9.1%, was the highest since late 1981, inflation has declined sharply since that Biden-era peak, and the most recent available rate, for June 2024, was about 3%. That rate was exceeded as recently as 2011.
    Stefanik was born in 1984.

    From CNN’s Daniel Dale and Piper Hudspeth Blackburn 

    Wisconsin Senate candidate exaggerates the numbers of fentanyl deaths

    Eric Hovde, the Republican running for Senate in Wisconsin, claimed in his RNC speech Tuesday that the Biden administration “emboldened drug cartels to flood our streets with fentanyl killing over 100,000 Americans every year” by opening the country’s southern border and allowing “criminals and terrorists to enter the country.”

    Facts First: It’s a significant exaggeration that fentanyl kills more than 100,000 Americans every year due to the country’s “open” borders. The number of overdose deaths involving synthetic opioids in 2023, including fentanyl, was approximately 75,000, according to estimated and provisional data. 

    The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said in May that roughly 107,500 people in the US died from a drug overdose, but that is the total number of people who died from an overdose from any kind of drug.

    Synthetic opioids, including fentanyl, were involved in the majority of those fatalities, making up nearly 70% of overdose deaths in 2023, but they did not account for all of them.

    In fact, compared with 2022, there were around 1,500 fewer overdose deaths involving fentanyl and other synthetic opioids in 2023. The estimated number of deaths involving cocaine and psychostimulants such as methamphetamines increased in 2023.

    Specifically, in 2023, there were 74,702 deaths from synthetic opioids, and most of those deaths were from fentanyl. By comparison, in 2022 the estimated number was 76,226, according to the CDC.

    It is also worth noting that fentanyl is largely smuggled by US citizens through legal ports of entry, rather than by migrants sneaking into the country. Contrary to frequent claims by Republicans, the border is not “open”; border officers have seized an increasing amount of illicit fentanyl, numbering in the hundreds of millions of pills, under Biden.

    From CNN’s Jen Christensen

    Trump makes false claims about election fraud in RNC video 

    For the second consecutive night, the Republican National Convention played a video in which Trump urged Republicans to use “every appropriate tool available to beat the Democrats,” including voting by mail. Trump relentlessly disparaged mail-in voting during the 2020 election, falsely claiming it was rife with fraud, and he has continued to sharply criticize it during the current campaign

    But Trump’s comments in the convention video also included some of his regular false claims about elections. After claiming he would “once and for all secure our elections” as president, Trump again insinuated the 2020 election was not secure, saying, “We never want what happened in 2020 to happen again.” And he said, “Keep your eyes open, because these people want to cheat and they do cheat, and frankly, it’s the only thing they do well.”

    Facts First: Trump’s claims are nonsense – slightly vaguer versions of his usual lies that the 2020 election was rigged and stolen and that Democrats are serial election cheaters. The 2020 election was highly secure; Trump lost fair and square to Joe Biden by an Electoral College margin of 306 to 232; there is no evidence of voter fraud even close to widespread enough to have changed the outcome in any state; and there is no basis for claiming that election cheating is the only thing at which Trump’s opponents excel.

    The Trump administration’s Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, part of the Department of Homeland Security, said in a post-election November 2020 statement: “The November 3rd election was the most secure in American history.”

    From CNN’s Daniel Dale 

    Kari Lake on her opponent’s record about voting laws

    Kari Lake said Tuesday that Democratic Arizona Rep. Ruben Gallego, her likely opponent in the state’s US Senate race this fall, voted last week to let undocumented immigrants “illegally cast a ballot in this upcoming election.”

    “These guys are full, they’re full of bad ideas,” Lake said in her speech. “Just last week Ruben Gallego voted to let the millions of people who poured into our country illegally cast a ballot in this upcoming election.”

    Fact First: This claim is false.

    The House did not vote on whether to allow noncitizens to vote. The chamber passed a bill on July 10 that would require documentary proof of US citizenship to register to vote in federal elections. Gallego voted against the legislation, which is not expected to be taken up by the Democratic-controlled Senate.

    It is already illegal for noncitizens to vote in federal elections, and experts say it rarely occurs. When people register to vote, they must provide a driver’s license or Social Security number, and their identity is checked against existing databases. Voters are required to swear under penalty of perjury that they are a US citizen. Noncitizens who vote illegally can face imprisonment or deportation.

    Gallego said in a statement that he opposed the bill because its “only purpose is to disenfranchise tens of thousands of Arizonans, and I will not vote to take away the rights of Arizonans to stop something that is already illegal.”

    “Of course, only U.S. citizens should vote,” said Gallego. “But this bill isn’t about that, it’s about making it harder for Arizonans to vote, including married women, servicemembers, Native Arizonans, seniors, and people with disabilities.”

    From CNN’s Piper Hudspeth Blackburn

    Perry Johnson, a Michigan business owner who previously ran for governor and president, said Tuesday that income rose consistently under Trump.

    “Under Trump, family income went up every year. That is a fact,” Johnson told the crowd.

    Facts first: Johnson is incorrect. Median family income fell in 2020 during the Covid-19 pandemic in both inflation-adjusted and non-adjusted terms.

    Typical family income grew by several thousand dollars during each of Trump’s first three years in office, before adjusting for inflation. But it fell by $1,660 in 2020, when the pandemic wreaked havoc on the US economy.

    After factoring in inflation, typical family income fell by nearly $2,900 in 2020, after rising in each of the first three years of Trump’s administration.

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  • Biden says he’s grateful Trump is safe after rally shooting, denounces political violence

    Biden says he’s grateful Trump is safe after rally shooting, denounces political violence

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    Washington (CNN) — President Joe Biden said he is grateful former President Donald Trump is safe after a shooting at his rally in Pennsylvania.

    Speaking from Rehoboth Beach, Delaware, about two hours after the shooting, Biden said, “There’s no place in America for this kind of violence.”

    “It’s sick,” the president added.

    With the apparent shooting threatening to further inflame political rhetoric in the months ahead of November, Biden took the opportunity to call for the country to unite.

    “We cannot allow for this to be happening. We cannot be like this,” he said.

    Biden and Trump spoke late Saturday night, a White House official said.

    The shooting – which is being investigated as an attempted assassination, according to law enforcement officials – left Trump bleeding from the ear. A spokesperson said the former president was doing “fine” and being treated at a medical facility. The suspected shooter and at least one rally attendee were killed, Butler County, Pennsylvania, District Attorney Richard Goldinger told CNN.

    Biden was attending mass at St. Edmond’s Catholic Church in Rehoboth Beach when the shooting occurred. The president is due to return to the White House late Saturday night, cutting short his planned weekend in Delaware. He’ll receive an updated briefing from homeland security and law enforcement officials on Sunday, the White House official said.

    The shooting marks a massive turning point not only for the country, but for Biden’s role as president: he entered the church as a president fighting for his political future and exited in a familiar role – the nation’s counsellor in chief now tasked with bringing the United States together during a serious crisis.

    The shooting at Trump’s rally is a shocking turn in what has been a highly charged political season for both of the major-party candidates. Biden has pitched the race as the decision between the continuation and possible destruction of democracy in the United States. That rhetoric will now be closely examined in the aftermath of the apparent attack, including comments that the president made in a call with donors on July 8, during which he said, “It’s time to put Trump in the bullseye,” according to a summary of the call provided by his campaign.

    Biden said in a statement earlier Saturday that he was praying for Trump: “Jill and I are grateful to the Secret Service for getting him to safety. There’s no place for this kind of violence in America. We must unite as one nation to condemn it.”

    Inside Biden campaign’s response

    Moments after the incident, Biden campaign officials huddled and decided to pull down all TV ads and limit their public campaign messaging.

    Bidens campaign manager Julie Chávez Rodríguez and chair Jen O’Malley Dillon sent a note to campaign staff Saturday evening in the immediate aftermath of the shooting, urging staff to “refrain from issuing any comments on social media or in public.”

    “We’re also asking everyone to pause any proactive campaign communication across all platforms and in all circumstances until we know more,” they wrote in a note, which was obtained by CNN.

    Chávez Rodríguez and O’Malley Dillon began the note by saying that as more information comes in, they are “grateful to the members of law enforcement who immediately jumped into action and wishing Trump a quick and full recovery.”

    Mood inside the White House is ‘shock’

    The mood inside the White House is “shock” as officials responded to the shooting, according to a senior administration official, and who added that officials wanted “to be responsive and serious.”

    Biden’s chief of staff, Jeff Zients, sent a brief note to White House staff Saturday evening, saying that the president was “closely” tracking the situation and would continue to provide updates, according to the note obtained by CNN.

    Biden told his staff that he wanted to address the nation as soon as he was briefed, according to a source familiar with the matter.

    “It is just really horrible,” the senior administration official said, responding to how the reaction has been within the White House following the incident.

    “It should never happen. It’s unconscionable,” a senior White House official told CNN.

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  • President Biden seeks to reassure lawmakers after meeting with Minority House Leader Jeffries

    President Biden seeks to reassure lawmakers after meeting with Minority House Leader Jeffries

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    Washington (CNN) — President Joe Biden is launching a delayed outreach campaign to key groups of lawmakers – the kind of effort Democrats have long called for – after he met Thursday with House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries following the president’s closely watched solo news conference.

    In the meeting, Jeffries “directly expressed the full breadth of insight, heartfelt perspectives and conclusions about the path forward that the Caucus has shared in our recent time together,” the New York Democrat wrote in a letter to his colleagues on Friday.

    But Jeffries did not offer Biden one key thing: His endorsement.

    A person familiar with the meeting said Jeffries “bluntly” shared the views of the caucus – as he stated in his letter – but intentionally did not offer an endorsement or say publicly that the decision is Biden’s to make.

    While it is uncertain if Biden directly asked Jeffries for his tacit endorsement, a person familiar with the matter said, Jeffries did not extend it at the meeting or in the public letter released Friday morning.

    Following the conversation, the president has embarked on a series of calls to key groups of Democratic lawmakers – the kind of enterprise that many in Congress asked him to make weeks ago following his disastrous debate performance. CNN reported Friday that Biden had calls with the political wings of the Congressional Asian Pacific American Caucus and the Congressional Hispanic Caucus on Friday and a Saturday virtual meeting with both the New Democrat Coalition and the Congressional Progressive Caucus, according to sources familiar with those meetings.

    Ahead of those meetings, defections in Biden’s Democratic coalition in Congress continued.

    Biden’s performance during his news conference, which lasted just under an hour and during which he fielded 19 questions from reporters on topics ranging from his mental capabilities to foreign policy, was much stronger than his appearance during the CNN presidential debate, but it did not stem the steady stream of House Democrats coming out against Biden’s efforts to seek a second term.

    More than a dozen Democratic House members and at least one Democratic senator have publicly called on Biden to withdraw from his reelection campaign. That list includes multiple House members in the nation’s most competitive congressional districts, but also senior Democrats on influential committees and members in safely Democratic seats.

    One of those Democrats, Rep. Mike Levin of California, told Biden directly on the Congressional Hispanic Caucus call that he should step aside, according to someone briefed on the call. It’s the first time CNN has reported on a member of Congress directly telling Biden to drop out of the race.

    Dozens of other Democrats have stopped short of calling for Biden to end his campaign, but have either expressed concerns about Biden’s chances, said he’ll lose out right or remain publicly undecided. Still, more than 70 members of the House and Senate have publicly reaffirmed their support for Biden as the party’s presidential nominee following his disastrous debate performance late last month.

    The top Democrats in Congress – Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer and Jeffries – have made a series of public statement supporting Biden’s bid this week. Former Speaker Nancy Pelosi – who remains in Congress and is among the most influential members of the party – has privately expressed her concerns, CNN reported Thursday night.

    Biden last night was able to provide incisive remarks on everything from Israel to Russia to China to gun control in the United States. But he also had two notable flubs: During a NATO event before the presser, Biden introduced Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky as “President Putin,” and repeated a similar mistake during the presser, using Donald Trump’s name to refer to Vice President Kamala Harris.

    The evening served as a sort of Rorschach test for Democrats’ feelings on Biden. Those who remain firmly in his corner seized on his extended answers on wonky foreign policy issues to prove he still has what it takes to lead the country effectively, while his Democratic doubters used his verbal miscues to reinforce their calls for someone to replace the president on the top of the ticket.

    Biden, for his part, came off as chastened during the news conference and was less defiant than in previous appearances. While he told ABC’s George Stephanopoulos last week that only the “Lord Almighty” could convince him to remove himself from the race, Biden on Thursday night opened the door for other scenarios in which he would drop out of the contest. Pressed on whether he might reconsider his stance if he was shown data that had Harris performing better against Trump, he offered some openness to that possibility.

    “No, unless they came back and said there’s no way you can win,” Biden said.

    Biden’s campaign, meanwhile, has bluntly acknowledged the challenges it has faced since his debate performance two weeks ago.

    Biden campaign chair Jen O’Malley Dillon acknowledged to staff in a call Thursday that the period after Biden’s disastrous debate performance have been “hard,” “very bad” and “bad f***ing weeks,” a source who was on the call said. Some of the details of what O’Malley Dillon said were first reported by Axios.

    O’Malley Dillon acknowledged when she fumbled words that she had not slept much recently. She tried to rally the troops on this call after first bluntly accepting that the most recent stretch has been deeply challenging, the source said.

    Her case, as this source described it, was: “It’s not just that we feel like we can win. We have a plan to get there.”

    She laid out both external and internal polling numbers, and made the case that the data still backs up that Biden can defeat Trump.

    O’Malley Dillon argued to her team that the Biden reelection campaign is going through a moment that they are “built for,” and that it is because of the team that the president would ultimately win.

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  • ‘He’s All In’: First Lady is in Georgia to support BIden-Harris campaign

    ‘He’s All In’: First Lady is in Georgia to support BIden-Harris campaign

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    A large crowd of supports filled a room inside the Bibb Mill Event Center in Columbus, Georgia to hear U.S. First Dr, Jill Biden (foreground in white and black) speak on Monday night. Photo by Julia Beverly/The Atlanta Voice

    COLUMBUS, GA. – United States First Lady Dr. Jill Biden came to Georgia’s third largest city on Monday night to speak in front of a crowd of Biden-Harris administration supporters at a Veterans & Families for Biden-Harris event at the Bibb Mill Event Center.

    When it came to what her husband, United States President Joseph R. Biden, was planning to do Dr. Biden’s message to the dozens of supporters in the warehouse-style space was clear: “He’s all in.”

    A number of veterans took the stage before Biden arrived in order to share their thoughts on former United States President Donald J. Trump’s past comments on veterans, such as the oft-used “losers and suckers” comment.

    Retired veteran Bill Martin (above) shared a story of getting a draft notice at his parent’s home in 1969. “We got to show up on November 5,” Martin said. “This election is about a lot more than veteran’s benefits. This election is about the survival of democracy.” Photo by Julia Beverly/The Atlanta Voice

    First to take the stage on Monday night, retired veteran Bill Martin shared a story of getting a draft notice at his parent’s home in 1969. Along with Martin, there were several veterans, lick Columbus resident Gloria Tyson, that mentioned Trump avoiding being drafted because of perceived or actual medical issues.

    “He’s all in,” said Dr. Jill Biden about her husband, U.S. President Joe Biden’s plans to continuing campaigning for a second term. Photo by JUlia Beverly/The Atlanta Voice

    “We got to show up on November 5,” Martin said. “This election is about a lot more than veteran’s benefits. This election is about the survival of democracy.”

    Tyson, a retired veteran of 21 years of service, said she was there or support the Biden-Harris administration. She took the stage and yelled into the microphone, “Good evening, democrats.” Tyson took the stage alongside Dr. Biden.

    “You don’t define a president in 90 minutes,” Tyson said. “We are a democracy and we are going to continue to be part of a democracy.” Tyson and her husband Kennedy, who was also in attendance, are both veterans and have been married for over 40 years.

    Dr. Biden opened by thanking the crowd and the community, which was made up of many veterans and seniors. “I’m glad to be back to visit with this community that so many veterans and veteran families call home,” she said. Biden’s father was a military veteran. “Does Donald trump know anything about being in the military?,” she asked.

    She took a few moments to list some of the pro-military accomplishments of the Biden-Harris administration, including health care and Pact Act .

    “You are what this election is all about,” Biden said. “We cannot trust Donald Trump…..the military community deserves better.”

    Phyllis Leggett (left) and Denise Ellis, a pair of Biden-Harris supporters in Columbus on Monday, both say that Biden is the best choice to run this country. Photo by Donnell Suggs/The Atlanta Voice

    Denise Ellis, a democrat and Minneapolis native, said she moved to Georgia in the wake of the George Floyd incident and because she wanted to get directly involved in local politics in a battleground state. She now works with the Muskogee County Democrats.

    “It’s a dangerous time and we’re not getting off the horse in the middle of the stream,” Ellis said. “We can’t take Trump, so we have to have get Biden back into office.”

    Phylis Leggett, a Biden-Harris supporter, added that she supports Biden and Harris because, “They stand for the values of what America should be. That’s what I want for my four grandchildren.”

    Throughout her 15-minute speech Biden was crystal clear about what the campaign needed from veterans and their families this election season. “Together Georgia, together, we are going to win this,” she said before leaving the stage.

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  • Vice President Kamala Harris highlights impact of abortion bans and HBCU investments at ESSENCE Festival

    Vice President Kamala Harris highlights impact of abortion bans and HBCU investments at ESSENCE Festival

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    NEW ORLEANS – Vice President Kamala Harris is keeping up a busy schedule these days. Before traveling to her sorority’s annual conference, Alpha Kappa Alpha’s Boule, in Dallas, she made a stop in the Crescent City to speak at the 30th Annual ESSENCE Festival of Culture. 

    Harris’s visit to the Global Black Economic Forum comes at a time after President Joe Biden faces questions regarding his age and mental acuity. While Harris was not asked from the age debate during her conversation with Caroline Wanga, CEO of ESSENCE Ventures. The Vice President did point out the ramifications of another President Trump administration and its threats on Democracy. 

    “Who has talked about being proud of taking from the women of America a most fundamental right to make decisions about your own body,” Harris asked the audience.  “And then last week, understand, sadly, the press has not been covering it as much as they should, in proportion to the seriousness of what just happened when the United States Supreme Court. Essentially telling this individual who has been convicted of 34 felonies that he will be immune. Essentially the Activity he has told us he is prepared to engage in if he gets back into the White House. Understand we all know: 122 days, we each have the power to decide what kind of country we want to live in.”

    The Vice President of the United States, Kamala D. Harris, speaks with Caroline Wanga, CEO of ESSENCE Ventures, during a roundtable discussion inside the Global Black Economic Forum at the 2024 ESSENCE Festival of Culture on Saturday, July 6, 2024 in New Orleans, Louisiana. (Photo: Itoro N. Umontuen/The Atlanta Voice)

    However, during the lead-in fireside chat, U.S. Representative Maxine Waters, D-Ca., laid out why she’s not having any of the ageist debate. 

    “But we’re now at a point in time where people are talking about how Biden is too old. Hell, I’m older than Biden,” exclaims Waters. 

    Harris also pointed out the hypocrisy among those on the right. She said there is a direct connection between strict abortion bans in southern States  and the high Black maternal mortality rates. 

    “And what I find is the hypocrisy by some of these extremists who are saying they’re passing these abortion bans because they care about women and children,” Harris explained. “So don’t come to us gaslighting us about where you’ve been and where you haven’t been on important issues that relate to what we know every day affects our sisters, our mothers, our aunties, our grandmothers, and could affect our daughters.”

    The ESSENCE Festival’s importance in Black Culture

    The ESSENCE Festival has been a place for African-Americans to have frank and honest conversations regarding issues in the community. The crowd was filled with mostly Black women, a group that has been the moral backbone of the Democratic Party.  Saturday, Harris discussed to a standing room audience that her background has prepared her for this moment. 

    “When I talk about the family that raised me: yes, they took me in a stroller as they were marching and shouting for justice,” Harris said. “Knowing that justice will not be achieved unless we are prepared to march and shout and fight for it. And one of the ways we do that is through our vote.”

    Actress Jenifer Lewis took the microphone during the lead-in conversation and instructed the crowd to do one thing: vote.

    “So repeat this: I will vote because I love my children,” Lewis instructed. “Now, get your ass out and vote.”

    The Vice President of the United States, Kamala D. Harris, speaks during a roundtable discussion inside the Global Black Economic Forum at the 2024 ESSENCE Festival of Culture on Saturday, July 6, 2024 in New Orleans, Louisiana. (Photo: Itoro N. Umontuen/The Atlanta Voice)

    The Biden Campaign goes after undecided and Trump-leaning Black voters

    The Biden-Harris administration successfully capped the cost of insulin for $35 for seniors. They expanded the child tax credit to $300 per child, per month, and $1,400 in-person checks to Black families. Moreover, According to PolitiFact and The Poynter Institute, the Biden administration invested more than $7 billion in HBCUs. 

    “Our Vice President has shown up talking about the issues that matter to us,” said U.S. Congresswoman Nikema Williams, D-Ga. “She reminds us who has been at the forefront of defending our freedoms every day and that is the Biden-Harris administration. I could not be more grateful to call her my Vice President, my Soror and my friend.”

    Included is $1.7 billion for grants to support low-income students and make HBCUs more affordable. By comparison, former President Trump did reauthorize the $250 million funding stream that lapsed under his watch. 

    The Biden-Harris campaign will continue to speak directly African-Americans who are on the fence during election season. The campaign is highlighting the clear differences between theirs and the Trump campaign. Representative Waters, the former leader of the House Financial Services Committee, supported more African-Americans to enter financial services. Also, she pushed for equal representation in lending and funding, which will allow more African-Americans to own homes and businesses. 

    What’s next?

    According to a 2021 study by the National Association of Realtors, the Black American homeownership rate is 44%. It lags far behind Hispanic Americans (50.6%), Asian Americans (62.8%) and White Americans (72.7%). Waters believes there is a solution. 

    “Ladies and gentlemen, we can do all of this,” exclaimed Waters. “If you don’t vote, you don’t understand your power. If you don’t vote, you don’t understand your influence. And don’t tell me when you see me in the street, ‘you got my back,’ if you ain’t voting!” 

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  • The stakes are high: Biden-Harris in-state campaign offices reach 16 

    The stakes are high: Biden-Harris in-state campaign offices reach 16 

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    DECATUR, Ga. — The office, though big in size, was quickly filling with democratic supporters on Saturday afternoon. The Biden-Harris administration opened a new campaign office in Decatur, next door to Calle Latina on East College Avenue in what is a heavily democratic area of metro Atlanta. The location is the 16th campaign office that has been opened this year, the first since the first presidential debate took place in Atlanta two weeks ago. The Biden-Harris train continues to make Georgia a crucial target for their campaign and the DeKalb Democrats, a local supporter group, were on hand to greet the dozens of supporters that came out to hear surrogates talk about continuing support of the current democratic ticket. 

    “This is our time on this planet to make a difference in the world,” said DeKalb Democrats Vice Chair Karen Davenport, who wore a white “Women for Biden-Harris” t-shirt and matching white pants. “Now is the time for us to work together to get people out to vote again. If you want this world to be better you have to get up and act.” 

    86-year-old Beatrice Williams (above) plans to vote for Joseph R. Biden for president. She came to the campaign office opening to show her support for the Biden-Harris administration. “I’m like Joe Biden and I’m going to stick with Joe Biden,” she said. Photo by Donnell Suggs/The Atlanta Voice

    Moments earlier DeKalb Democrats Chair Clare Schexnyder, a breast cancer survivor, who was standing beside Davenport, shared her story of how the Affordable Care Act saved her life, added, “This is the energy that all of us need. The world seems a little crazy right now, but we aren’t crazy. We need to spend a lot of time together. We are going to be all over this county.” 

    “The stakes are high,” Davenport said, leaning into the microphone for emphasis. “If we get everybody in DeKalb to vote then so goes Georgia.” 

    Biden won Georgia by a small margin during the 2020 presidential campaign, so Davenport’s claims of Dekalb County’s importance aren’t simply bluseter. The crowd inside the new campaign office was filled with seniors, people like 86-year-old Beatrice Williams, who said she felt close to Biden because of their ages. 

    Schexnyder and Davenport believe Dekalb County, the fourth largest county in the state in terms of population, will make up the difference the Biden-Harris administration needs to win Georgia, a crucial battleground state. 

    “I’m like Joe Biden and I’m going to stick with Joe Biden,” Williams said. “The reason why it’s important for older people to vote is because we still are in our right minds and plus Trump wants to cut my social security and all the benefits.” 

    Alongside Davenport and Schexnyder as speakers was Young Democrats of Georgia President Parker Short, who could have doubled as either woman’s youngest son. Short, 22, said of the new campaign office, “President Biden is expanding his presence across the state because we’re going to win Georgia again.” Short was enthusiastic about the opportunity to stump for Biden. “The path to the White House runs through DeKalb County,” he yelled. 

    Other older, more experienced voters that were in attendance agree with Short’s enthusiasm. 

    Carl Weaver, a local educator and Morris Brown College alum, says he is voting for Biden and harris in November because, “They are leading the fight against corruption and injustice.”
    Photo by Donnell Suggs/The Atlanta Voice

    “The reason I’m here today is because the Biden-Harris administration has provided the resources that people really need,” Carl Weaver, an educator and supporter said. “They are leading the fight against corruption and injustice.”

    Verdaillia Turner, the president of Georgia Federation of Teachers, also a Biden-Harris supporter, added about the recent talk of Biden stepping away, “There’s nothing perfect about a human being. There’s nothing perfect about democracy.”

    Verdaillia Turner, the president of Georgia Federation of Teachers (above), is a educator and also a Biden-Harris supporter. She believes the agism has got to stop. This campaign is reflecting what citizens think about people that have worked their whole lives in this country,” she said. Photo by Donnell Suggs/The Atlanta Voice

    On the fact that Biden is 81 years old and how that has become the crux of the political discussion lately, Turner said, “Number one, we need to stop the agism. That’s a message to America. This campaign is reflecting what citizens think about people that have worked their whole lives in this country.”

    Congressman Hank Johnson took the microphone to much applause and was equally saluted throughout his 10-minute speech. Johnson started with a story about how the first presidential campaign for former United States President Barack Obama had a common phrase associated with it: Yes We Can.

    “Y’all remember that,” he asked the crowd. “Today is no different from when we were chanting ‘Yes we can.’ Johnson added, “We were with Joe Biden before the debate and the people are with him after. Now it’s yes he can. Yes he can. Yes he can.” 

    Johnson said his conversation with his fellow members of Congress and his constituents has not been about Biden stepping away from the campaign. He blamed this conversation on the media. “It doesn’t make sense to change horses in the middle of the stream,” Johnson said. “We need to stick with Joe Biden. I talk to him often and he’s not in cognitive decline.” 

    Congressman Hank Johnson (above) was in full support of United States President Joseph R. Biden remaining the presidential candidate heading into November. “It doesn’t make sense to change horses in the middle of the stream,” Johnson said. “We need to stick with Joe Biden. I talk to him often and he’s not in cognitive decline.” 

    Asked if Black-owned media can play an even bigger part of getting the news out to voters, Johnson agreed. “This is a wakeup call for the administration and campaign to get the word out in minority-owned media,” he said. 

    There are plans to open another campaign office in Douglasville, according to the Biden-Harris campaign communications staff. Republican National Committee spokesperson Henry Scavon told The Atlanta Voice that the Trump campaign now has “over a dozen fully staffed field offices in the state right now.” There have been offices opened in remote Georgia cities like Martinez and north Atlanta Republican strongholds like Alpharetta, according to Scavon. There were also offices opened in Fayette, Gwinnett, Cherokee, and Cobb counties, he says.

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  • Trump seeks to distance himself from pro-Trump Project 2025

    Trump seeks to distance himself from pro-Trump Project 2025

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    (CNN) — Former President Donald Trump on Friday sought to distance himself from a closely aligned conservative group’s plans to radically reshape the federal government and American life should the former president win a second term.

    In a post to his social media site, Trump claimed, “I know nothing about Project 2025,” the name given to a playbook crafted by the Heritage Foundation to fill the executive branch with thousands of Trump loyalists and reorient its many agencies’ missions around conservative ideals.

    “I have no idea who is behind it,” Trump continued on Truth Social. “I disagree with some of the things they’re saying and some of the things they’re saying are absolutely ridiculous and abysmal. Anything they do, I wish them luck, but I have nothing to do with them.”

    The post comes days after the president of the Heritage Foundation, Kevin Roberts, drew widespread backlash from Democrats for saying in an interview that the country was “in the process of the second American Revolution, which will remain bloodless if the left allows it to be.”

    Project 2025 — widely viewed by conservatives as a blueprint for Trump’s second term transition — is run by several former Trump administration officials and includes many policy priorities that are aligned with those of the former president, especially as they relate to cracking down on immigration and purging the federal bureaucracy by making it easier to dismiss civil servants and career officials.

    But it also includes controversial proposals Trump has not discussed, including banning pornography, reversing federal approval of the abortion pill mifepristone, excluding the morning-after pill and men’s contraceptives from coverage mandated under the Affordable Care Act, and making it harder for transgender adults to transition.

    Among the chief objectives of Project 2025, its authors wrote, is: “Restore the family as the centerpiece of American life and protect our children.”

    Trump’s campaign has sought for months to make clear that Project 2025 is not its official policy platform amid an intensifying effort by President Joe Biden and Democrats to tie Trump to its more controversial policies.

    Yet those efforts are complicated by Trump’s extremely close relationship with many of the people who launched Project 2025 or helped contribute to it. Paul Dans, the head of Project 2025, was chief of staff at the Office of Personnel Management during the Trump administration, and the group’s roadmap for the next administration includes contributions from others who have worked for the former president, including his former Housing and Urban Development Secretary Ben Carson, former acting Deputy Homeland Security Secretary Ken Cuccinelli and former deputy chief of staff Rick Dearborn. John McEntee, Trump’s former director of the White House Presidential Personnel Office and one of his closest aides while in office, is also a senior adviser for the project.

    Trump himself told a gathering of religious broadcasters in February that Roberts was “doing an unbelievable job” and “bringing (Heritage) back to levels never seen.”

    The remarks came at a Nashville conference shortly after Roberts and Dans both addressed the same crowd. Dans shared with the audience it was his intention to serve in a second Trump administration should the former president win in November. Speaking before Trump about Project 2025 that night, Roberts said, “We want no credit” for the groundwork it is laying, and instead wanted “President Trump and his administration to take credit for that.”

    The group has long stated its transition project is a template they hope will be adopted by the next Republican president, something a Project 2025 spokeswoman reiterated in a statement to CNN.

    “As we’ve been saying for more than two years now, Project 2025 does not speak for any candidate or campaign. We are a coalition of more than 110 conservative groups advocating policy and personnel recommendations for the next conservative president. But it is ultimately up to that president, who we believe will be President Trump, to decide which recommendations to implement,” the statement reads.

    A senior Trump campaign adviser told CNN that Trump’s post disavowing the group stemmed from a series of factors, most notably the Biden campaign’s recent messaging campaign tying Trump to the project.

    Project 2025 has long frustrated Trump and his top advisers, who have been annoyed with the amount of coverage its policy platforms have received and the perception that the group is working in tandem with the campaign — despite Project 2025 partnering with a series of top Trump allies.

    The group’s partners include several leading conservative groups with close ties to Trump’s campaign, including those who have been tapped by Trump’s advisers to serve as part of their 2024 ground game strategy in key battleground states, such as Turning Points USA.

    Other high-profile organizations partnered with Project 2025 include the Center for Renewing America, run by Trump’s former director of the Office of Management and Budget, Russ Vought, who is viewed by many in Trump’s orbit as a likely contender for another Cabinet position in a second administration and is helping to lead the GOP platform committee ahead of the Republican National Convention later this month. The Conservative Partnership Institute, run in part by Trump’s former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows and former Sen. Jim Demint, and America Legal First, founded by his immigration adviser Stephen Miller, are also partners.

    The Biden campaign on Friday quickly dismissed Trump’s attempts to keep Project 2025 at arm’s length.

    ​​“Project 2025 is the extreme policy and personnel playbook for Trump’s second term that should scare the hell out of the American people,” Biden campaign spokesman Ammar Moussa said in a statement. “Project 2025 staff and leadership routinely tout their connections to Trump’s team, and are the same people leading the RNC policy platform and Trump’s debate prep, campaign, and inner circle.”

    The Trump campaign has previously pushed back on reports about plans Trump’s allies are looking to implement if Trump wins reelection. Trump’s campaign managers Susie Wiles and Chris LaCivita issued a statement in November arguing that “reports about personnel and policies that are specific to a second Trump Administration are purely speculative and theoretical” and that no outside groups have the authority to speak on behalf of Trump or the campaign.

    LaCivita doubled down further on Friday, tweeting: “Poke the Bear you are going to be bit” while sharing an article titled: “Trump torches Heritage Foundation’s Project 2025.”

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  • Analysis: Supreme Court grants Trump ‘absolute’ immunity, raising concerns about potential dictatorship

    Analysis: Supreme Court grants Trump ‘absolute’ immunity, raising concerns about potential dictatorship

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    Happy Independence Day! Where’s the potato salad and the ribs?

    July 2, 1776 was the day that the Continental Congress actually voted for independence. John Adams noted that July 2 would be remembered in the annals of American history. 248 years later, the United States Supreme Court extended sweeping powers to the executive branch in a way that would make King George III blush.

    The Supreme Court in TRUMP vs. United States, the high court granted the executive branch “absolute” presidential immunity for “his core constitutional powers.” Additionally, the president “enjoys no immunity for his unofficial acts, and not everything the President does if official.” The six conservatives voted for and the three liberal-minded justices dissented.

    In layman’s terms, the executive branch has a greater level of immunity than police officers. Police officers can be charged with murder. However, the President is cloaked by the separation of powers as outlined in Article II of the United States Constitution, according to the Supreme Court decision. 

    So, what does that mean for the Republican nominee, Donald J. Trump? It means he can fulfill his promise of being a dictator on ‘day one.’

    One historical figure compares to Trump in this moment

    Secretary of Defense Caspar W. Weinberger meets with President Mobutu of Zaire in his Pentagon office in 1983.

    In 1960, Mobutu Sese Seko was the second in command in the Congolese Army. In November 1965, Mobutu led two successful coups, with the backing of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). And in 1971, Mobutu Sese Seko consolidated power unto himself. He launched a ‘national authenticity’ program in Congo, previously known as the Democratic Republic of Zaire. He rid his country of all colonial influence and re-established a national identity. 

    In a speech in Dakar, Mobutu described his plan as, “an experience drawn from the anarchy caused by the plurality of political parties and by the ascendancy of imported ideologies, spread through empty slogans. We have had to wipe the slate clean of all previously existing parties.”

    Essentially, Mobutu Sese Seko established a unitarian government. He had the backing of Chairman Mao and the support from Apartheid South Africa. He was a major cult of personality, an overseer of a bereft kleptocracy, while his government was full of corruption. His friends, family members, and benefactors ran government agencies. Mobutu embodied big man rule. What he said was law. 

    During his thirty-two year rule, Mobutu plundered nearly $5 billion of his country’s wealth and resources. He would take himself shopping in Paris, fly the famed Concorde supersonic jet, and entertain the world’s best and brightest. Meanwhile, his country was crumbling. The paved roads his country had in the sixties, devolved into bush in less than twenty years. In the mid-1990s, the AIDS epidemic and famine ravaged his nation. In a country that did not have clean drinking water, affordable medical infrastructure, and lacked security, the disease brought the country and Mobutu to its collective knees.  According to UNAIDS, an estimated 410,000 Congolese children have been orphaned by HIV/AIDS. 

    Mobutu’s government fell in 1997 when he was forced into exile. He was suffering from prostate cancer and he died from his illness on September 7, 1997. 

    Mobutu and Donald Trump love what the government could do for them. Both men had an insatiable desire for power and established autocracies. And both men were willing to destroy the economic prospects of their countries in the name of putting their pursuits first. 

    Project 2025 is happening right now

    Kevin Roberts, the President of the Heritage Foundation and architect of Project 2025, said this on national television: 

    “The reason that so many anchors on MSNBC, for example, are losing their minds daily is because our side is winning. And so I come full circle on this response and just want to encourage you with some substance that we are in the process of the second American Revolution, which will remain bloodless if the Left allows it to be.”

    Project 2025 will destroy women’s rights, civil rights, voting rights, plus LGBTQ+ rights and protections. It will slice and dice environmental protections and regulations. And it does not stop there. The Family Research Council is leading a new initiative called the “Platform Integrity Project.” It calls on the public to pressure the Republican Party to adopting a hardline anti-abortion, anti-LGBT stance ahead of the election.

    Donald Trump, after the Supreme Court handed immunity over to him, amplified calls for mass violence directed at his enemies. He also “ReTruthed” a post using the QAnon slogan, “Where we go one, we go all.” Trump’s MAGA movement believes African-Americans, women, and ethnic minorities, will “replace” White people in society. 

    This goes on while the corporate and mainstream media continue to shake their hands and whine about how President Biden is too old to be president. And yes, the corporate and mainstream media is still whining over the President’s poor debate performance. Why? They need a two-horse race in order to drive ratings and ad sales while ignoring what will be the most nakedly obvious power grab in the history of western civilization.

    What’s Next?

    Here is the good news: The choice will be yours on November 5, 2024. It may be the last chance for Americans to exercise that right at the ballot box. 

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    Itoro N. Umontuen

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  • Opinion: Why Trump shouldn’t celebrate the immunity ruling just yet

    Opinion: Why Trump shouldn’t celebrate the immunity ruling just yet

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    (CNN) — Now that the Supreme Court has issued its historic decision on presidential immunity — one that will be “for the ages,” as Justice Neil Gorsuch put it — the most pressing question yet to be answered is far more immediate: What does this mean for special counsel Jack Smith’s prosecution of former President Donald Trump’s attempt to overturn the results of the 2020 election?

    We vehemently disagree with the majority decision to extend any immunity to aspects of Trump’s 2020 election interference. But the court’s opinion also makes clear that this ruling is not a death knell for Smith’s case.

    True, as the case now returns to the trial court, there is no longer time for a full jury trial in 2024. But the opinion calls on District Court Judge Tanya Chutkan to initiate the next best thing: an evidentiary hearing — a kind of mini-trial — that will thoroughly ventilate the facts in this case. She should do so quickly.

    Smith charged Trump with engaging in a “criminal scheme” to subvert the 2020 election; Trump has pleaded not guilty to four counts. The trial, which was originally scheduled to begin on March 4, has instead been stayed since December 2023. That is when Trump appealed an order refusing to dismiss the case on immunity grounds — and the Supreme Court first declined to review the case, beginning its unconscionable slow-roll that finally ended almost seven months later with this new decision.

    On Monday, the Supreme Court essentially found a middle ground between the government’s position and Trump’s. Rejecting Trump’s absurd claim of blanket criminal immunity for official acts, the court still carved out a broader scope of conduct for which a president cannot be prosecuted, even after they leave office.

    In doing so, the court adopted and modified the approach it had previously outlined, in the 1982 case Nixon v. Fitzgerald, establishing a president’s civil liability. All the parties, including Trump’s team, had already conceded that a president does not enjoy immunity from prosecution for private acts — just as a president can be held civilly liable for private conduct. In Nixon v. Fitzgerald, the Supreme Court held that a president enjoyed civil immunity for all “official acts.” Now, in Trump v. United States, the court grappled with which “official” acts should also receive criminal immunity.

    Writing for a 6-3 majority that split on party lines, Chief Justice John Roberts established a three-level immunity test: (1) absolute immunity when the president is exercising “his core constitutional powers,” (2) “presumptive immunity from prosecution for his official acts” that are not core to presidential duties (such as exercising powers given to him by Congress) and (3) “no immunity for his unofficial acts.”

    Given that ruling, the next logical question is: Which of the alleged actions taken by Trump, charged in the indictment, are protected official acts and which aren’t?

    First, the court has ruled that all of the allegations concerning Trump’s interactions with the Justice Department — and his attempt to get them to interfere in the election — were official. Therefore, all of that conduct is protected by immunity and cannot be presented at trial.

    But the court also held that there are two allegations for which Trump has presumptive immunity, yet this presumption can be overcome: the allegations surrounding his interactions with former Vice President Mike Pence, and his public communications. However, the court did not specify what it would take for that presumption to be overcome. Again, that is for resolution by Chutkan in the mini-trial.

    Finally, the court stated that there is one category of alleged conduct that requires a “fact-specific analysis of the indictment’s extensive and interrelated allegations”: all of Trump’s interactions with “persons outside the Executive Branch,” including state officials and private parties. More grist for Chutkan’s courtroom.

    The upshot is that this ruling ends any hope that this case will conclude before the election. But it also puts crucial judgments about Trump’s accountability back in Chutkan’s capable hands.

    In order to settle the extent of Trump’s immunity, Chutkan should expeditiously schedule the mini-trial to hear witness testimony and receive other relevant evidence from both parties. This would not be unprecedented. In fact, Chutkan can be guided by the process the federal court in Georgia utilized to handle a similar issue in the Fulton County election overthrow criminal case.

    After a grand jury indicted 19 individuals, including Trump, on state conspiracy charges, two of the defendants — former White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows and former Trump administration Justice Department official Jeffrey Clark — attempted last year to remove the case to federal court, claiming the charges involve actions that occurred in their capacities as federal officers. (Four of the 19 charged in the case have pleaded guilty, while Meadows and Clark are among those who have pleaded not guilty.) District Court Judge Steve Jones promptly held evidentiary hearings to determine whether Meadows and Clark were indeed functioning within the scope of their official duties as federal officers.

    Meadows and Clark were given ample opportunity to make their arguments and develop a thorough factual record for the court. In fact, at his hearing, Meadows himself testified before the judge, describing his role as chief of staff and how that impacted the charged conduct. Meanwhile, state prosecutors presented some of their key evidence to show that the defendants were acting outside the scope of official duties — including the infamous recorded phone call between Trump and Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, which Meadows facilitated and joined. Ultimately, Jones ruled against Meadows and sent the case back to state court, and the 11th Circuit upheld his decision. Clark’s removal attempt also failed.

    The 11th Circuit also endorsed the mini-trials themselves, holding that “determining whether Meadows’s proof was competent, the district court was entitled to evaluate the demeanor and presentation of witnesses, assess the credibility of testimony including Meadows’s, and weigh the competing evidence.”

    With that blessing, Chutkan should look to those federal hearings in Georgia as a model.

    The issues at play in the Georgia removal proceedings are strikingly similar to the ones Chutkan will be forced to consider with respect to Trump. The Supreme Court has explicitly directed Chutkan to determine whether Trump’s interactions with state officials and private parties were official — and left open the door for her to hold hearings over allegations that involved Pence, too. Chutkan can give both parties the opportunity to develop facts supporting their competing positions and then make her ruling on immunity, ensuring that Trump continues to receive due process throughout.

    The prosecution could call witnesses — such as Pence or former Attorney General Bill Barr — to testify about Trump’s actions in the wake of the 2020 election and whether they fell within his official duties as president, along with other supporting documentary evidence. The defense would also have the opportunity to introduce testimonial and documentary evidence supporting Trump’s motion to dismiss on immunity grounds — and could even put Trump himself on the stand to explain his conduct, just as Meadows did. This approach would assist Chutkan in swiftly ascertaining the nature and scope of Trump’s newfound presidential immunity.

    It is also far superior to the competing approach outlined in a separate but related civil case in DC, Blassingame v. Trump, in which members of Congress and Capitol Police officers are suing Trump for harms allegedly caused by the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol — in part, the complaint alleges, as a result of Trump’s inflammatory remarks that day on the Ellipse. In response to Trump’s assertion of civil immunity there, the DC Circuit put in place a lengthy discovery schedule for the lower court to determine the extent of Trump’s civil immunity.

    But applying that civil process in the criminal case would be inappropriate: While this type of extended discovery is commonplace in civil cases, including those without the unique immunity issues involved here, it would be quite unusual in the criminal context. Moreover, the criminal allegations against Meadows and Clark are far more analogous to the federal case against Trump than the civil lawsuit seeking monetary damages — among many other distinctions.

    Beyond the procedural considerations, the mini-trial would also serve a vital function for the public — allowing voters to learn more details about Trump’s alleged election interference. It would utilize the adversarial process at the heart of our criminal justice system to elucidate crucial information about the most grievous attack on our democracy since the Civil War.

    One other thing that this opinion makes clear is that Smith should seriously consider slimming down his indictment — not only excising the portions that the court has tossed for him (such as the allegations concerning the DOJ) but also considering where else he can “slim to win,” as prosecutors often refer to this process. Smith should do that immediately, to make Chutkan’s task as easy as possible before the inevitable appellate review of her decision.

    There will be ample time for further consideration of the far-reaching implications of the Supreme Court’s momentous decision, and what it means for the future of the presidency and the principle that no one is above the law. Justice Sonia Sotomayor, in a dissent joined by justices Elena Kagan and Ketanji Brown Jackson, warned, “The relationship between the President and the people he serves has shifted irrevocably. In every use of official power, the President is now a king above the law.”

    But the fact-finding at the heart of this case remains essential for the future of the republic.

    As Americans face a stark choice this fall, one made even more complicated by last Thursday’s presidential debate, they are entitled to know how close Trump came to decimating our democracy four years ago. That can now begin to happen again — so it’s time for the case to get back on track.

    Norman Eisen is a CNN legal analyst and editor of “Trying Trump: A Guide to His First Election Interference Criminal Trial.” He served as counsel to the House Judiciary Committee for the first impeachment and trial of then-President Donald Trump. E. Danya Perry is the founding partner at Perry Law, former deputy chief of the Criminal Division for the Southern District of New York, former deputy attorney general for the State of New York and chief of investigations for the Moreland Commission. Joshua Kolb is an attorney at Perry Law and served as law clerk for the Senate Judiciary Committee. The views expressed in this commentary are their own. 

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    Norman Eisen, E. Danya Perry and Joshua Kolb

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