James.galbraith

Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg said he does not think social networks should be fact-checking what politicians post. From a report: Zuckerberg's comment came after CNBC asked him for thoughts on Twitter's decision to start fact-checking the tweets of President Donald Trump. Twitter's move came on Tuesday after Trump tweeted that mail-in ballots would be "substantially fraudulent." Earlier Tuesday, Twitter declined to censor or warn users after Trump tweeted baseless claims that MSNBC host Joe Scarborough should be investigated for the death of his former staffer. "I don't think that Facebook or internet platforms in general should be arbiters of truth," Zuckerberg said. "Political speech is one of the most sensitive parts in a democracy, and people should be able to see what politicians say."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

The White House won’t make its usual economic forecast when a review of federal spending is released this summer, two senior administration officials confirmed to POLITICO on Thursday.

Those economic projections — which administrations have typically published each summer since the 1970s — would surely reflect the steep downturn caused by the coronavirus pandemic, including cratering growth and unemployment levels unseen since the Great Depression. The grim outlook on the economy, which is not required by law, would come just a few months before voters decide whether to reelect President Donald Trump.

Administration officials said the data is too volatile to produce reliable projections and that federal agencies responsible for the numbers are overwhelmed with the implementation of federal legislation passed in response to the pandemic, including the $2 trillion CARES Act cleared by Congress in March.

The data is “extremely fluid and would produce a less instructive forecast,” one senior official told POLITICO.

“It is foolish to demand such a forecast simply because that is business as usual, particularly when that forecast may mislead the public,” the official said.

Another senior administration official said the White House is still on track to release updated economic projections in October, just weeks before Election Day.

The decision to skip the economic projections, which was first reported by The Washington Post, breaks precedent but not federal law, because there is no requirement that the projections be included in what's called a "mid-session review" published in the summer, following the release of the federal budget request earlier in the year.

The review typically provides an update on the request, economic forecasts, federal spending and more. The numbers are produced by the so-called “troika,” or the leaders of the Treasury Department, the Office of Management and Budget and the White House Council of Economic Advisers.

The economic volatility produced by the pandemic hasn’t stopped other agencies, like the Congressional Budget Office, from releasing updated forecasts.

CBO typically publishes 10-year budget and economic projections in late August. The independent budget office still expects to release that report before Labor Day, taking only a little extra time to fully assess the effects of the coronavirus.

Trump has predicted a swift economic rebound, but other assessments anticipate a much slower recovery. Last month, CBO said it expects to see a “sharp contraction“ of the economy through June before growth starts on the path to improvement, as well as double-digit jobless rates well into next year.

The independent budget office also expects the federal deficit to explode to nearly $4 trillion. Earlier this month, the Treasury Department announced it will borrow a record-breaking $3 trillion through June to offset the enormous costs of the coronavirus outbreak.

Russ Vought, Trump‘s nominee to helm OMB, is set to appear before the Senate Budget and Homeland Security committees next week.

As the U.S. death toll from COVID-19 surpassed 100,000, President Donald Trump was busy sharing inflammatory posts on Twitter, after threatening to “shut down” the social media platform for fact-checking his lies.

First, at midnight Wednesday, Trump shared a video from Cowboys for Trump in which Couy Griffin, who heads the group, said during a rally in New Mexico that “the only good Democrat is a dead Democrat.”

Thank you Cowboys. See you in New Mexico! https://t.co/aCRJeskUA8

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) May 28, 2020

Then, at 8 a.m. today, the president shared a tweet from pro-Trump author Lee Smith, who wrote that “masks aren’t about public health but social control. Image of Biden in black mask endorses culture of silence, slavery, and social death.”

So many different viewpoints! https://t.co/DCesPbJu5M

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) May 28, 2020

More than 90 minutes later — and nearly a full day after the death toll hit 100,000 — Trump finally acknowledged the “sad milestone.”

We have just reached a very sad milestone with the coronavirus pandemic deaths reaching 100,000. To all of the families & friends of those who have passed, I want to extend my heartfelt sympathy & love for everything that these great people stood for & represent. God be with you!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) May 28, 2020

Later today, Trump is expected to sign an executive order threatening punishment against Facebook, Google and Twitter over allegations of political bias.

This will be a Big Day for Social Media and FAIRNESS!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) May 28, 2020

The post Trump Tweets: ‘The Only Good Democrat is a Dead Democrat,’ Masks are Akin to Slavery, And — Oh Yeah — We Just Hit 100K Deaths appeared first on Towleroad Gay News.

Back in April, it became clear that Florida was intentionally hiding a list of daily deaths that had previously been compiled by county medical examiners. Since that time, those examiners, as well as hospitals and local officials, have complained that the number of COVID-19 deaths being reported in Governor Ron DeSantis regular updates, doesn’t match what they’re seeing in their areas. Last week, the scientist behind Florida’s COVID-19 dashboard was fired after she says she refused to alter numbers as she was told. 

With 52,600 confirmed cases of COVID-19, Florida is in the top ten states when it comes to infections. But the 2,300 recorded deaths is less than half of those from Michigan, a state with a similar number of cases. Considering the number of elderly residents and retirement communities, Florida’s relatively light death toll seemed somewhat miraculous, and DeSantis has been bragging both about the “success” of his policies and sneering at pundits that warned of potential disaster from his refusal to enforce social distancing guidelines.

But there’s still more evidence that “miracle” isn’t the right word. The correct word is “con.” Because it looks like DeSantis has been taking COVID-19 deaths out of one column and inserting them into another.

Even before the state took what had always been public information and began to hide it behind a newfound concern for privacy, there was evidence that DeSantis was covering up COVID-19 in the “Sunshine State.” On April 17, the Sun Sentinel warned that there was a spike in “pneumonia deaths” indicating that COVID-19 was already present and active in the state at a time when the official test results were showing a handful of cases. Even though flu cases were winding down in mid-March, pneumonia deaths had continued to head straight up. State Department of Health officials refused to comment on whether there was a connection between the soaring death count and the coronavirus, even as the official number of COVID-19 remained low.

On May 7, the Miami Herald called on DeSantis to stop hiding the true toll of deaths from the novel coronavirus. In particular, that paper pointed out that DeSantis “continues to keep Floridians in the dark about what is—and isn’t—happening in the state’s 3,800 nursing homes and assisted-living facilities.” And on Wednesday, the Tallahassee Democrat reported that in spite of DeSantis’ claims about his actions in Florida, the “whack-a-mole approach” to dealing with nursing homes was failing. Instead, the percentage of deaths in those facilities was continuing to grow along with a rising tide of new cases.

But DeSantis didn’t open up. He didn’t open the list of deaths, or any other information. As the firing of Dr. Rebekah Jones made clear, Florida has only continued to hide and alter more information over time.  

And it seems there really was something to hide. Multiple tweets have pointed out that Florida is one of several states where a particular category of deaths that have happened in 2020 represents a sharp increase over past years. That category is deaths due to “flu or pneumonia.” As compiled by the CDC, in the first six months of 2020, Florida has logged 5,248 deaths due to pneumonia. Of those deaths, 960 were identified as being connected to COVID-19. That leaves 4,288 pneumonia deaths which were reported, but not logged against the COVID-19 deaths. Looking at the period between 2014 and 2018, Florida has averaged 2,870 deaths from pneumonia … over an entire year. 

That leaves an excess of 1,418 deaths from pneumonia over past years. If those numbers were added to Florida’s current COVID-19 total, the number of deaths would be 3,738. That would still leave Florida with a lower death toll due to COVID-19 than many other states, but it should certainly represent a bit of a stumble in DeSantis’ self-congratulation tour … and a reason to think again about the speed with which already lax social distancing rules are being dropped.

It’s also worth noting that Florida isn’t the only state with a spike in pneumonia cases not attributed to either flu or COVID-19. Across the country, the total number of deaths logged to COVID-19, flu, or pneumonia was 139,925 on May 27.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi at a news conference at the US Capitol on May 27 in Washington, DC. | Drew Angerer/Getty Images

If the rule House Democrats followed doesn’t allow enough spending, what use is their rule?

At the end of No Country For Old Men, hitman Anton Chigurh arrives to murder Carla Jean, the wife of his dead nemesis. He offers her one chance to live: He’ll flip a coin, and if she guesses right, he’ll spare her life.

“Call it,” he says.

She refuses.

“Call it,” he says again.

“The coin don’t have no say,” she replies. “It’s just you.”

Which brings me to the House Democrats.

The House Democrats’ $3 trillion HEROES Act has much of what the economy needs. A trillion dollars in aid to state and local governments. Another round of stimulus checks. An expanded SNAP benefit. An extension of expanded unemployment benefits through January 31. But conspicuously absent is the policy that would do the most to guarantee — or at least support — ongoing recovery: automatic stabilizers.

The idea is simple, and backed by an array of economists. We’re in a depression. The support people need should be tied to the economic conditions they face, not arbitrary expiration dates.

Tom Williams/CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Images

There are various proposals for how to do it. Rep. Don Beyer’s (D-VA) Worker Relief and Security Act is a good place to start. It groups states into tiers based on their unemployment rates, and ties both extensions and expansions of unemployment insurance to those tiers. The support doesn’t end until the economic emergency ends.

“Peter Drucker wrote years ago that the best leaders make the fewest decisions,” Beyer told me, referencing the famed business author. “Let’s make the decision now and let things play out.”

In the run-up to the HEROES Act, House Democrats seemed united around automatic stabilizers. The progressives supported them. But the moderates did, too.

“We’ve been pushing it,” says Rep. Derek Kilmer (D-WA), chair of the New Democrat Coalition, which is both the House Democrats’ largest internal caucus and the one that represents most of its moderates. “We’ve been arguing we should look past the upfront cost. These investments will be made eventually. Let’s get it right the first time, give people certainty, and avoid brinksmanship.”

Surveys showed the idea was popular. Polling by Data for Progress from May found that 73 percent of all voters — including 69 percent of Republicans — would support “a policy that would increase government spending on unemployment benefits whenever the average unemployment rate increases above 5 percent.”

Data for Progress

So what happened?

At a May 14 press conference, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi laid it out. “I’m a big supporter of having stabilizers in the bill,” she said. She blamed their absence on the Congressional Budget Office (CBO), which estimates the costs of legislation, because under CBO’s rules, the likely cost of the stabilizers “counts in the bill today.”

What Pelosi is saying happened is this: House Democrats sent CBO a version of the bill that included automatic stabilizers. CBO estimated how high unemployment would be over the next few years to project how much the automatic stabilizers would cost. I’m told that, for the unemployment insurance, CBO’s estimate was in the $1-2 trillion range. When Pelosi saw the price tag, she decided the sticker shock could kill the bill. So she cut the stabilizers.

“If we put every good idea people wanted in the bill, it would be an $8 trillion bill,” a senior House Democratic staffer told me. Three trillion was simply the biggest bill Pelosi thought could pass. “It’s called political reality,” the staffer said, with some exasperation.

I’m not in a position to argue with Pelosi over how big of a bill House Democrats will or will not support. She knows them better than I do. But this is a terrible indictment of House Democrats. They are choosing, in effect, to spend more, and permit far more economic suffering, so they don’t have to look at the entire price tag at once.

This is fiscal irresponsibility masquerading as fiscal responsibility.

The CBO didn’t write this bill. House Democrats did.

We’re used to policy debates over how much money the federal government should spend. But that’s not the issue here.

“We couldn’t do [stabilizers], but I do think that everybody should know that the actions taken by Congress are predicated on the needs of the American people,” Pelosi said in that same press conference. “And should there be reason later to do that, we will be there.”

Pelosi, in other words, is saying that House Democrats are committed to providing as much economic support as the country needs, for as long as it needs it. If that’s true, then stabilizers don’t increase the actual amount the federal government will spend. After all, if the economy recovers rapidly, and the money doesn’t need to be spent, the automatic stabilizers cut the spending automatically.

House Democrats are, to paraphrase the old spiritual teaching, mistaking the finger for the moon. The price tag of the bill isn’t what should scare them. The massive economic suffering that price tag reflects is what should scare them. And what it should scare them into doing is insisting on automatic stabilizers.

Ben Hasty/MediaNews Group/Reading Eagle via Getty Images

“CBO’s initial estimate shows just how deep an economic hole the country will be climbing out of,” says Oregon Sen. Ron Wyden, the ranking Democrat on the Senate Finance Committee. “The score wouldn’t be that high if there wasn’t an unprecedented need.”

Even the most committed budget hawks think it’s shortsighted for Democrats to worry about the price tag rather than the actual economic needs. “I don’t think people should be dissuaded by the cost if it is just capturing the costs that would otherwise be recognized over time,” says Maya MacGuineas, president of the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget.

Automatic stabilizers are, if anything, cheaper than the alternative. They ensure the money is spent as soon as it’s needed. “The faster you act, the more effective the relief will be at fighting the recession,” says Claudia Sahm, the director of macroeconomic policy at the Washington Center for Equitable Growth.

The political economy of obstruction

There is an alternative to automatic stabilizers. We saw it in 2009 and 2010. It’s brinksmanship and sabotage.

The political economy of this moment is distinct. Republicans control the White House and the Senate. Though they are ideologically and temperamentally opposed to the kinds of economic support Democrats are seeking, President Trump’s reelection, and McConnell’s Senate majority, depend upon its passage.

That means Democrats have leverage. But if they win in November, that leverage evaporates. Even if Democrats exceed expectations in the polls, they’ll still only control a narrow majority in the Senate — well short of the 60 votes they’d need to get anything big done.

“If we don’t get these triggers now, Republicans will fight us every single day when we try to get a fair shake for workers when we win in November,” says Wyden. “And then they will say it’s the Democrats’ fault.”

Drew Angerer/Getty Images

This is, as Wyden says, a movie we have seen before. In 2009, facing the Great Recession, Democrats passed a too-small stimulus, believing they could come back for more if they needed it. They were wrong. The recession was longer and nastier than necessary because Republicans, freed from the responsibilities of governance, fought tooth-and-nail against further stimulus. The result was economic pain that Republicans weaponized into midterm gains in 2010.

“A lot of newer members aren’t really familiar with a lot of the Republican economic sabotage we’ve seen,” sighs Wyden.

If Democrats win the White House and the Senate in November, but they don’t lock in automatic stabilizers now, this will be the reality of Joe Biden’s presidency: endless, brutal fights to reauthorize support the economy badly needs, against a Republican Party ideologically and strategically opposed to further stimulus. Biden’s agenda will be a dead letter, overwhelmed by the same dynamics that undermined Obama.

House Democratic leaders dismiss this as tomorrow’s problem. McConnell is Senate majority leader now, and he’s not going to accept a $5 trillion bill. He’s refusing to even take up House Democrats’ $3 trillion bill. “What we were trying to do was put a reasonable first step out there,” says the Democratic staffer.

And Democrats do have their demands. In a call with reporters, House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-MA) said the state and local aid and a new round of stimulus checks were the House Democrats’ “red lines.” They will refuse to pass any bill without those policies.

But those are policies that Republicans need as much or more than Democrats do. For Republicans to oppose state and local aid and further stimulus checks is for them to hold a gun to their own heads and threaten to shoot. Those are the programs that pump blood through the economy between now and November, the only programs that give Republicans a bare shot at retaining power.

By contrast, Republicans actually don’t want automatic stabilizers: Many of them believe Trump will lose in November, and the absence of automatic stabilizers will let them mire Biden’s presidency in economic misery. You can’t pass a Green New Deal if you have to spend all your time fighting over unemployment insurance.

What the country needs is stimulus that sustains no matter what happens in November. It would be nice if that wasn’t just the Democrats’ job, but it is. And right now, they’re failing at it.

“We’re all hoping we Democrats take back the Senate and have Joe Biden as president,” says Rep. Beyer. “But what if we don’t? Or what if Biden wins and we don’t take back the Senate? We’re trying to thread a fairly narrow passage.”

Democrats see themselves as the responsible governing party, even though they’re in the minority. But the responsible thing to do, in this case, is insist on the right policy, the popular policy. The right thing to do is refuse to pass a bill without automatic stabilizers, and let Republicans try to explain why unemployment insurance should be untethered from the unemployment rate amid a generational economic crisis.

The CBO has no say here. The House Democrats do.

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The Daily Kos Elections Morning Digest is compiled by David Nir, Jeff Singer, Stephen Wolf, Carolyn Fiddler, and Matt Booker, with additional contributions from David Jarman, Steve Singiser, Daniel Donner, James Lambert, David Beard, and Arjun Jaikumar.

Leading Off

● AZ-Sen: The Arizona GOP pollster HighGround Public Affairs is out with a new survey that shows Democrat Mark Kelly leading appointed GOP Sen. Martha McSally by a wide 51-41 margin, which is up from the 46-39 edge Kelly enjoyed in February. This poll, which HighGround says it paid for itself, also finds Joe Biden leading Donald Trump 47-45.

Ominously for McSally, this is the second local Republican pollster to find her down by double digits in as many weeks. OH Predictive Insights, which also did not have a client, recently found Kelly up 51-38 as Biden led 50-43.

Kelly's allies at Honest Arizona are also out with a new commercial as part of what the National Journal's Madelaine Pisani reports is a seven-figure buy. The Spanish-language ad goes after McSally on healthcare.

Election Changes

Daily Kos Elections has published a new spreadsheet tracking more than 40 separate federal and state lawsuits related to pandemic-related changes to elections and voting procedures or dates. We'll be keeping this resource up to date as we continue to follow the latest developments in our Morning Digest and Voting Rights Roundup newsletters, and we welcome any additions or corrections.

● Arizona: Some county election officials in Arizona, including those in its largest county, Maricopa, plan to send a mail ballot request form to every voter who has not already signed up to receive one. Arizona already votes largely by mail, but Republican lawmakers have blocked Democratic attempts to transition to a system where mail voting is the default option.

● Connecticut: Following a recent executive order by Democratic Gov. Ned Lamont that allowed concerns about the coronavirus to count as an excuse for requesting a mail ballot in the August primary, Democratic state House Majority Leader Matt Ritter recently said, "I don't know how the legislature doesn't do [the same] for November," adding that he wants a vote to take place by July 4. Democrats hold full control over state government.

● Kentucky: The ACLU and other civil rights advocates have filed a federal lawsuit challenging Kentucky's voter ID law, which Republicans passed in April, as well as a longstanding requirement that voters provide a specific excuse to be able to vote absentee. Republicans have made Kentucky the only state so far to pass a new voting restriction since the pandemic began. Opponents of the voter ID law noted that, at the time the bill was passed, government offices that provide driver's licenses were closed due to the pandemic, making it effectively impossible for many citizens without a suitable ID to obtain one.

● Pennsylvania: A lower state court has rejected a request by officials in populous Montgomery County in the Philadelphia suburbs to extend the absentee ballot return deadline in the county from Election Day to a week afterward, so long as ballots are postmarked by Election Day. A county official said the county would appeal the ruling. The Pennsylvania Supreme Court recently rejected a request in a separate lawsuit to extend the deadline statewide.

● South Carolina: A federal district court has blocked South Carolina from enforcing a requirement that absentee voters have a witness sign their ballot return envelope. The result is a victory for the voting rights groups and Democratic Party organizations that had sued in two separate lawsuits that were later consolidated.

However, the court's ruling rejected Democrats' demand that ballots count if postmarked by Election Day but received a few days afterward, as well as a request that the state prepay postage. The court also held that plaintiffs' challenge to a requirement that voters under age 65 have an excuse to vote absentee was mooted after state lawmakers passed a law temporarily waiving the excuse requirement for the June 9 primary and June 23 primary runoff. However, the requirement is still in effect for November. Republican officials have not yet said whether they will appeal.

● Tennessee: Earlier this month, the ACLU filed a lawsuit in state court seeking to waive Tennessee's excuse requirement to vote absentee by mail during the pandemic. A set of other civil rights groups is currently waging a separate federal lawsuit that was filed at the beginning of May and is pending before a lower court.

● Vermont: A committee in Vermont's Democratic-run state Senate has passed a bill that would remove a requirement that both Republican Gov. Phil Scott and Democratic Secretary of State Jim Condos agree to emergency election changes, instead leaving only the secretary's approval as necessary. Condos has proposed moving forward with preparing to hold November's elections near-universally by mail, which Scott has expressed skepticism about as being impractical to try to implement. Nevertheless, Scott has said he is fine with Democrats removing him from the process.

Senate

● CA-Sen, GA-Sen-B, OK-Sen, NC-Sen: The Wall Street Journal reported on Tuesday that the Justice Department has closed the investigations into the stock transactions of Democratic Sen. Dianne Feinstein and Republican Sens. Kelly Loeffler and Jim Inhofe. Federal investigators are still reportedly probing another Republican senator, Richard Burr of North Carolina.

● SC-Sen: A new poll from Democratic pollster Civiqs on behalf of Daily Kos finds Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham tied at 42 with his likely Democratic opponent, former state party chair Jaime Harrison, even as Donald Trump leads Joe Biden by a 52-42 margin in the presidential race.

The key reason Graham trails Trump by 10 points is his weak performance both with Republicans and independents. Among members of his own party, Graham leads 78-5, which might seem high until you compare it with Trump's 93-6 share of GOP voters. As for independents, Trump holds a small 44-40 edge, but Harrison actually leads 46-28 with these voters.

However, those who say in the Senate matchup that they prefer "someone else" or are undecided—16% of the total electorate—lean heavily Republican: By a 74-7 margin, they favor Trump. That means that, while Graham's unpopularity is hurting him right now, the fence-sitters are overwhelmingly likely to come back to him by Election Day. Put another way, for Harrison to find a path to victory, he'll have to win over a large chunk of Trump voters, but it's not clear how he might accomplish that.

Gubernatorial

● DE-Gov: GOP state Sen. Bryant Richardson, who represents the most Trumpy district in the chamber, announced this week that he would challenge Democratic Gov. John Carney. Delaware hasn't elected a Republican governor since Mike Castle won his second term in 1988, and there's no indication that Carney is vulnerable.

● VA-Gov: Del. Jennifer Carroll Foy announced Wednesday that she would seek the Democratic nomination to succeed termed-out Gov. Ralph Northam next year. Carroll Foy would be Virginia's first woman governor as well as its second-ever African American chief executive, as well as the first Black woman elected to lead any state.

Carroll Foy earlier made history in 2003 when she was among the first Black women to graduate from the Virginia Military Institute. She sought elected office for the first time in 2017 in a GOP-held open seat in Northern Virginia, and Carroll Foy told the Associated Press that Donald Trump's win and the previous Republican-majority legislature's "anti-woman" laws had motivated her to run.

Foy won the primary by 12 votes against Joshua King, who had narrowly lost the 2015 general election, but she had no trouble in November. Foy was easily re-elected in 2019, and she was the main supporter of this year's successful effort to ratify the Equal Rights Amendment.

● WV-Gov: The GOP firm Triton Polling and Research, polling on behalf of the radio station WMOV, is out with the first poll we've seen all year of the June 9 Republican primary, and it finds Gov. Jim Justice far ahead of his two intra-party rivals. The survey shows Justice leading former Del. Mike Folk 53-15, while former Secretary of Commerce Woody Thrasher, who appeared to be Justice's main opponent, is in third with 14%.

P.S. Triton also polled the Democratic primary but only sampled 231 voters, which is below the 300 minimum we require to include in the Digest.

House

● CO-03: Businessman James Iacino is out with his first TV ad for the June 30 Democratic primary to face GOP Rep. Scott Tipton. Iacino appears in the warehouse of his family business and tells the audience, "I started here, on the midnight shift, and worked my way to CEO."

What turns out to be the green screen behind Iacino shifts throughout the commercial to show parts of the warehouse, a hill, and a town street, as he talks about how his business has become "a progressive model for success." Iacino, who is shown at the end to be filming the commercial in his living room with his family, concludes, "I'll use that experience to fight climate change, lower healthcare costs and beat Scott Tipton. But for now, from my family to yours, stay safe."  

● ME-02: Former Gov. Paul LePage stars in former state Rep. Dale Crafts' first TV ad for the July GOP primary to take on Democratic Rep. Jared Golden.

LePage, who led a protest against Democratic Gov. Janet Mills' emergency coronavirus measures right after he returned from a short post-gubernatorial residency in Florida, adopts the hard-right rhetoric we've come to expect from him. LePage tells the audience, "Maine is at a crossroads. Liberals want a total shutdown, but President Trump wants America open for business." The ex-governor then promotes Crafts as "a proven fighter" who will support Trump.

● MI-08: The state Board of Canvassers ruled this week that Michigan state Board of Education member Nikki Snyder did not have enough signatures to make the August GOP primary ballot. Snyder had raised very little money for her campaign against freshman Democratic Rep. Elissa Slotkin, so it's unlikely her departure will have much of an impact on the race.

● NM-02: Democratic groups have been running commercials boosting 2018 GOP nominee Yvette Herrell, whom Team Blue believes is a weak candidate, ahead of next week's primary, and a national Republican group is now taking action to undermine her. Politico reports that Defending Main Street, a PAC that was set up years ago to stop anti-establishment candidates from winning GOP primaries, is spending $100,000 on an ad against Herrell.

The narrator begins, "What happened that night in San Diego Yvette Herrell won't say, but what we know is bad enough. Herrell jetted off to California to attend invitation-only meetings with Never Trumpers." As people are shown clinking champagne glasses he continues, "Shrouded in secrecy, they plotted. Partied. Hung a Trump piñata from the ceiling." The spot goes on to accuse Herrell of charging taxpayers for this expedition, where she "plotted behind the scenes to defeat Donald Trump."

Businesswoman Claire Chase, who is Herrell's main intra-party rival in the race to face freshman Democratic Rep. Xochitl Torres Small, and her allies have also spent the last few weeks running commercials hitting Herrell over this piñata story. The event in question was the annual meeting of the right-wing American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) in San Diego, California in the summer of 2015, a gathering that Herrell attended as ALEC's state chair.

Conservatives normally would have absolutely no problem with a Republican doing this, but as the Times of San Diego noted at the time, this crowd, like almost the entire GOP leadership at the time, was decidedly anti-Trump. As the site reported, GOP pollster Frank Luntz addressed the event and got absolutely no response when he asked, "How many of you are supporting Donald Trump?" The story also included a photo of a grotesquely orange Trump piñata at the event labeled #HowMoneyWalks.

Herrell herself responded to the attacks from Chase and her allies by insisting she's "proudly supported President Trump from day one, including voting for him in both the primary and the general election." However, in a March 2016 email, Herrell asked her colleagues in the legislature, "If you support (Ted Cruz) and would like to add your name to the growing list of State Legislators that are endorsing him around the country, please fill out the attached card and return it as directed." While Herrell didn't explicitly endorse Cruz or attack Trump, that hasn't stopped Chase from portraying her as a Trump opponent.

Herrell, as well as the Democratic groups that want her to win on June 2, have in turn run commercials going after Chase for her 2016 anti-Trump social media posts. Herrell notably employed a narrator who used what Nathan Gonzalez described as a "ditzy tone" to impersonate Chase and read her past messages, including, "(Donald Trump)'s an a**hole unworthy of the office... of the President."

● NV-03: Ending Spending, the ironically named conservative super PAC funded by the Ricketts and Adelson billionaire families, has started spending against former state Treasurer Dan Schwartz ahead of the June 9 GOP primary for this competitive seat. The Nevada Independent's Riley Snyder writes that the group has "purchased at least 6 figures in TV ad buys."

The commercial argues, "Washington has enough Trump hating career politicians. They don't need swampy Dan Schwartz." The narrator then goes after Schwartz for "saying he wasn't 'super enthusiastic' about Trump" and for supporting tax increases. The commercial doesn't mention former wrestler Dan Rodimer, who is Schwartz's main intra-party rival, or Democratic Rep. Susie Lee.

Ending Spending tried to influence another GOP primary here back in 2016 when it spent $1.6 million to stop perennial candidate Danny Tarkanian from winning the nomination against state Senate Majority Leader Michael Roberson. Tarkanian won by a surprisingly wide 32-24 margin, though, and he went on to lose the general election in both 2016 and 2018.

● NY-17: Attorney Mondaire Jones is out with his opening TV ad ahead of the crowded June 23 Democratic primary. The narrator declares, "Mondaire Jones grew up poor, but East Ramapo public schools helped Mondaire work for Barack Obama and make it to Harvard Law."

The commercial goes on to tout Jones as "the only Democrat who supports Medicare for All,  the only Democrat endorsed by leading progressives." That line is accompanied by pictures Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren and other Jones supporters. The candidate then recounts, "I remember being scared of getting sick because we couldn't afford a doctor. I won't stop until we make healthcare more affordable, and help everyone afford to live here."

● PA-01: GOP Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick uses his first TV ad to attack China. The narrator opens, "For decades, China has been stealing our jobs. Now, they are trying to steal our future." The commercial continues, "But Brian Fitzpatrick is fighting to make China pay for the damage caused by coronavirus and working to bring production of critical medical equipment back home, controlling our own destiny, putting our own people back to work."

● PA-07: Former Lehigh County Commissioner Lisa Scheller is out with an ad ahead of next week's GOP primary that touts her recent endorsement from Donald Trump. The commercial also once again goes after intra-party opponent Dean Browning, who is also a former Lehigh County commissioner, for having "cast the deciding vote for a $16 million tax hike."

● PA-08: Former Trump administration official Jim Bognet is out with another TV spot ahead of next week's GOP primary to face Democratic Rep. Matt Cartwright.

The ad features Bognet, who played on Hazleton Area High's football team, telling the audience, "Around here, we used to win a lot. But things have changed." Bognet goes on to utilize the racism that permeated his previous commercial when he declares, "China cheated us on trade and sent us the Wuhan flu. Illegal immigrants took our jobs, spread crime, and sent taxpayers the bill." After pledging he'll be a teammate to Trump, Bognet concludes his ad by kicking his football, a move that elicits applause from off-camera.

● TX-04: The Texas Tribune's Patrick Svitek writes that state Sen. Pat Fallon attended the Hunt County GOP convention over the weekend and "left attendees with impression he's running" for the nomination at the Aug. 8 party meeting to replace John Ratcliffe on the ballot. Fallon has not yet said anything publicly about his plans.

Last year, Fallon announced that he'd set up an exploratory committee for a possible primary challenge against Sen. John Cornyn, whom Fallon argued wasn't conservative enough. Reality eventually set in, though, and Fallon soon ended his effort.

The Guardian reports that Twitter's anti-porn filters have blocked Dominic Cummings' name from trending on the platform, despite Boris Johnson's chief adviser dominating British political news for almost a week. From the report: As a result of the filtering, trending topics over the past five days have instead included a variety of misspellings of his name, including #cummnings, #dominiccummigs and #sackcummimgs, as well as his first name on its own, the hashtag #sackdom, and the place names Durham, County Durham and Barnard Castle. The filter also affects suggested hashtags, meaning users who tried to type #dominiccummings were instead presented with one of the misspelled variations to auto-complete, helping them trend instead. This sort of accidental filtering has gained a name in computer science: the Scunthorpe problem, so-called because of the Lincolnshire town's regular issues with such censorship. Bizarrely, the shortened hashtag #cumgate has also trended, since the first word of the sentence is not included in Twitter's filter list, apparently in an attempt to avoid the Scunthorpe problem applying too broadly -- for instance, by blocking words such as "scum," "cumbersome" or "cumulative." Although Twitter does not publish the contents of the word filter list, users can check whether a particular term is blocked from trending by searching for it. By default, the site blocks all photo and video results from search terms it believes may contain sensitive content, meaning a media search for "porn" or "Cummings" will, unless the search filters are turned off, return zero results. Dominic Cummings is in the spotlight because he broke lockdown rules by making a 260-mile trip from London to the north of England, at the height of the coronavirus crisis after lockdown restrictions had been imposed.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

AmiMoJo shares a report: When visiting the eBay.com site, a script will run that performs a local port scan of your computer to detect remote support and remote access applications. Many of these ports are related to remote access/remote support tools such as the Windows Remote Desktop, VNC, TeamViewer, Ammy Admin, and more. After learning about this, BleepingComputer conducted a test and can confirm that eBay.com is indeed performing a local port scan of 14 different ports when visiting the site.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Anker, a brand normally known for its well-made, affordable accessories for Apple devices, has debuted a new $100 24K gold-plated USB-C to Lightning cable.


According to Anker, the cable, which is in the PowerLine+ III family, features a "Special Edition Gold Design" that's "bold yet elegant" with the aforementioned gold-plated cable heads and matching braided gold and black cable.


The braided design has a 35,000 bend lifespan, and each cable is partially assembled by hand and passes through Anker's 51-step construction process, much like other PowerLine cables. The cable measures in at 6 feet long.


There's no explanation for why Anker, a company that specializes in affordable products, has created a $100 USB-C to Lightning cable, but it ships with a gift box, travel pouch, welcome guide, and lifetime warranty.


USB-C to Lightning cables can be used to fast charge iPhones that support the feature, such as the 2020 iPhone SE, iPhone 11, iPhone 11 Pro, and iPhones dating back to the iPhone 8.


Those interested in the cable can purchase it from Amazon for $100.
This article, "Anker Launches $100 24K Gold-Plated USB-C to Lightning Cable" first appeared on MacRumors.com

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It pays to be a white college student, apparently even when suspected of killing two people and kidnapping another. Peter Manfredonia, a 23-year-old University of Connecticut senior from Sandy Hook, has been on the run since Friday, according to the Connecticut Post. That’s when he allegedly attacked two men with a machete, killing one of them. On Saturday, Manfredonia fatally shot a former Newtown High School classmate in the head. Still, police used sympathetic and understanding words to describe the subject of a four-state manhunt, in a public plea for him to turn himself in Tuesday.

“My message is to Peter directly -- Peter, we've talked to your family, your friends and your roommates. All of them have said the same thing. That this behavior is out of the ordinary for you,” Connecticut State Police Lt. John Aiello said Tuesday at a press conference. “We know this is not who you are.”

Manfredonia, who at one point lived on the same street as the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooter, was en route to meet a former girlfriend when his motorcycle broke down Friday, NBC News reported. He ended up killing Theodore DeMers, a man who offered him a ride, police told the New Haven Register. An onlooker trying to help DeMers was also critically injured in the attack but was last reported in stable condition, according to the newspaper.

That was hardly the end of the violent spree. A Connecticut man also told police that Manfredonia held him hostage Sunday and stole his guns, truck, and other supplies during a home invasion, the New Haven Register reported. Police found the victim’s truck in Derby and launched a vast manhunt in the area, which is about eight miles northwest of New Haven. That hunt extended to Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and Maryland when reports of potential sightings came in. 

“PA law enforcement agencies are actively looking for the suspect. Do NOT approach, he is ARMED AND DANGEROUS, call 911 immediately,” Connecticut State Police tweeted Sunday.

Still, it wasn't until police got a 911 call asking for a well-being check at a home on Roosevelt Drive that they discovered Manfredonia had allegedly shot and killed former classmate Nicholas Eisele and kidnapped his girlfriend, according to NBC Connecticut. Video surveillance showed Manfredonia walking toward Eisele's house, the New Haven Register reported. 

Police found Eisele’s girlfriend unharmed Sunday, and the last report of Manfredonia’s possible whereabouts was in Hagerstown, Maryland. Authorities again put out the warning to the public that Manfredonia is considered armed and dangerous Tuesday.

Police treatment of the suspect, however, didn’t always paint him as such. Social media users compared authorities’ seemingly kind approach with Manfredonia to that of George Floyd, a Black man who was shown in a viral video pleading with Minnesota police that he couldn't breathe as an officer kneeled on his neck. He later died, according to his family’s attorney Ben Crump. Floyd was suspected of forgery, Crump said in a news release.

RELATED: ‘I can’t breathe’: Black man pleads with Minnesota cop kneeling on his neck in deadly stop

"White boy who kills TWO people, police ask nicely for him to come in. Black man accused of 'writing a bad check', gets strangled to death. See the fucking problem with this country," teacher Damian Dena tweeted in response to a BuzzFeed News article about the search for Manfredonia.

Twitter user Hope Olivia critiqued BuzzFeed’s coverage, which included that Manfredonia had raised $1,845 for anti-violence and anti-gun charities last year. “When are we going to stop defending young white criminals?” Olivia asked.

Lt. Aiello said during his press conference that he simply wants a "peaceful" ending to the scenario. "Please call us,” he said, addressing Manfredonia directly. “We're waiting here to listen to you."

sassin'

Jerry Falwell Jr. has been pushing anti-COVID-19 propaganda for a couple of months now. He tried to keep Liberty University in Lynchburg, Virginia, open during quarantine. He did this in opposition against everyone in Lynchburg and the greater area. He was forced to close the school as reality struck. His school has subsequently been sued for trying to keep students’ money, having mislead many into believing the school was going to be open during the pandemic.

Falwell has taken every opportunity to promote misinformation about COVID-19 and the public health decisions made to stem the spread of it. On Tuesday, Gov. Ralph Northam announced that citizens of the state would soon be required to wear masks when inside public spaces with others. The requirement is for individuals 10 and older. This comes as confirmed cases in the state approach 40,000 and daily cases continue to surge. Falwell Jr. was dead set against this ... until he figured out a way to make it super racist.

On Wednesday, the Evangelical huckster logged on to his social media platform. 

Falwell is attacking Gov. Northam for Northam’s well-publicized 1984 year book photos, which Northam has apologized for and acknowledged were “clearly racist and offensive.” Fair enough—Gov. Northam’s yearbook imagery was super racist. Of course, Falwell Jr. being a special old-school racist kind of scumbag, is actually promoting white Evangelicals and Trump-supporting white folks walking around with racist imagery on their faces. Sort of like wearing a KKK hood or a swastika.

The responses to Falwell Jr.’s declaration of how much of a punk he is came fast and furious.

There is no sign that Falwell Jr. is selling these masks, just that he has designed his own offensive blackface mask, which he plans on wearing.

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On Wednesday, the United States officially passed the grim milestone of 100,000 deaths from the COVID-19 virus. While Donald Trump marked the occasion by attacking members of the media and floating conspiracy theories on Twitter, Joe Biden released a somber, heartfelt message to the families of the 100,000 Americans who fell victim to this deadly virus, as well as a message to Americans as a whole. 

Although he never mentions his own family, it is clear he taps his own journey with grief after the deaths of his first wife, Neila, his daughter, Naomi, and his son, Beau. 

Please take a moment to watch (or read via the transcript below) Biden’s message. Let’s all take a moment to hold those 100,000 families in our hearts and minds today.

My fellow Americans, there are moments in our history that are so grim, so heart-rending that they’re forever fixed in each of our hearts as shared grief. Today is one of those moments. 100,000 lives have now been lost to this virus here in the United States alone. Each one leaving behind a family that will never again be whole. 

I think I know what you’re feeling. You feel like you’re being sucked in a black hole in the middle of your chest. It’s suffocating. Your heart is broken, there is nothing but a feeling of emptiness right now.

For most of you, you were unable to be there when you lost your beloved family member or best friend. For most of you, you were unable to be there when they died alone. 

With the pain, the anger and the frustration you’ll wonder whether or not you’ll be able to get anywhere from here. It’s made all the worse by knowing that this is a fateful milestone that should’ve never reached—that could have been avoided. 

According to a study done by Columbia University, if the administration had acted just one week earlier to implement social-distancing and do what it had to do just one week sooner, as many as 36,000 of these deaths might have been averted. 

To all of you who are hurting so badly, I’m so sorry for your loss. I know there is nothing I or anyone else can say or do to dull the sharpness of the pain you feel right now, but I can promise you from experience, the day will come when the memory of your loved one will bring a smile to your lips before it brings a tear to your eyes. 

My prayer for all of you is that that day will come sooner rather than later. But I promise you it will come and when it does you know you can make it.

God bless each and every one of you and the blessed memory of the one you lost. This nation grieves with you. Take some solace from the fact we all grieve with you.

Somber leadership. Wasn’t that a refreshing change?

The same denial leading ridiculous numbers of people to ignore the reality that social distancing and mask-wearing protects everyone during a pandemic seems to be prevailing when it comes to a potential vaccine for the novel coronavirus. An Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research poll finds the only about half of Americans would get a COVID-19 vaccine if it became available. About 20% said they'd refuse it outright and 31% weren't sure.

Among those who say they would refuse it, the large majority say it's because of safety concerns. That's not necessarily the usual anti-vaxxer position, as one respondent said. Melanie Dries of Colorado Springs, Colorado is worried that it will be released too soon, "to get a COVID-19 vaccine within a year or two […] causes me to fear that it won't be widely tested as to side effects." But this isn't just a safety issue dividing Americans—it's a partisan issue. "While 62% of Democrats would get the vaccine, only 43% of Republicans say the same," AP reports. They're not the only ones finding that this is a big Republican problem.

Two recent Gallup/Knight Foundation surveys, conducted in March and April, show a widening gap between Democrats and Republicans on the lethality of the coronavirus and on the death rate from it. Half of Republicans believe that the death toll is exaggerated. As the rest of the country became aware of how much more lethal the coronavirus is compared to seasonal flu from March to April, Republicans actually became less likely to believe it.

By April, just 40% of Republicans recognized that the coronavirus is more deadly than regular seasonal flu, down a few points from March. In contrast, by April, 67% of the rest of us recognized that this is a lethal disease, up from 60% in March. As Gallup put it, "this trend toward greater knowledge did not hold among Republicans." What's more, "Republicans are 10 times as likely as Democrats to say the death count is overstated (50% vs. 5%, respectively). Thirty percent of independents say the same. Most Democrats, 72%, believe the death count is understated."

It's already an uphill battle to get people to get a regular flu shot. Last fall, a National Foundation for Infectious Disease survey found that while 60% of people knew the vaccine is "the best preventive measure against flu-related deaths and hospitalizations," just 52% said they planned to get one. The actual percentage of those who got one was likely lower, though that data isn't available yet. In the 2018-2019 flu season, only 45% of adults got it.

Now flu shots—and specifically a potential coronavirus vaccine—have become politicized, because Republicans. That's why. Republicans. Their undying belief in Donald Trump will protect them from coronavirus, and if it doesn't, well, freedom! They're sure as hell not going to think about whether their actions are going to potentially harm someone else.

A community-wide protest in Minneapolis, Minnesota, was held May 26 after the death of George Floyd. | Richard Tsong-Taatarii/Star Tribune via Getty Images

In Minneapolis, police responded to a protest about police violence with more violence.

In Minneapolis on Tuesday, thousands of people gathered to condemn the police violence against George Floyd, a 46-year-old black man who died Monday after an officer knelt on his neck for more than seven minutes. The protest, which included chants of “It could have been me,” was met at times with tear gas and rubber bullets. It’s a response that was incredibly harsh — and one that marks a stark contrast with how law enforcement has reacted to lockdown protests, several of which have included armed white men.

Tuesday’s protest was prompted by officers’ violence toward Floyd, actions that were captured on camera by bystanders who urged the police to stop hurting him. Floyd was arrested in connection with a forgery report on Monday; shortly after, officers pinned him to the ground, with one putting his knee on his neck to keep him down.

In a video that circulated widely on social media, Floyd can be heard repeatedly saying, “I can’t breathe! I can’t breathe!” a statement reminiscent of the last words of Eric Garner, who died in New York in 2014 after a police officer put him in a chokehold. Following his transport to a medical center, Floyd died later in the day.

Floyd’s death has spurred massive outcry over the police’s excessive use of force during his arrest and the long pattern of police violence that’s resulted in the killing of black men. In Minnesota alone, there have been multiple incidents in recent years that have raised national attention, including the shooting of Philando Castile, who was killed by a police officer during a traffic stop in 2016.

Unlike many officer-involved shootings, though, there have been some swift repercussions to Floyd’s death: The four police officers who were involved in the incident were fired, and the FBI has now opened an investigation. “Being black in America should not be a death sentence,” Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey said in a statement. Floyd’s family is now calling for the officers to be charged with murder, a sentiment that’s been echoed by advocates around the country.

Yet despite the steps taken toward justice, the treatment of protesters during a Tuesday march in Minneapolis underscored how police continue to use violence against people of color.

Although the march was predominantly peaceful, at one point a group of protesters began to throw rocks and vandalize police cars, according to CBS Minnesota. When protesters approached the location of the precinct where the officers who hurt Floyd supposedly worked, some broke a window of the police station, while others tagged the outside of a car with graffiti. Around that time, police began firing tear gas at the crowd and using flash grenades, CNN reports. Andy Maddix, a Star-Tribune journalist who was on the scene, also noted that he was shot by a rubber bullet.

“It’s real ugly. The police have to understand that this is the climate they have created, this is the climate they created,” a protester told CBS Minnesota.

The escalation from police is an example of how open law enforcement can be to using violence against a crowd composed heavily of people of color. “This is where police have to become better at deescalating,” Rashad Robinson, the president of advocacy group Color of Change, told Vox. “It illustrates very clearly the ways controlling, harming, and mistreating black people are an acceptable course for police in America.”

Images from these protests — including protesters dousing their faces with milk in order to temper the sting of the tear gas — underscore not only the intensity of the response, but a major contrast with the lack of force that’s been used in anti-lockdown protests at state capitols around the country, when the protesters were armed white men. As Vox’s Katelyn Burns reported, white men equipped with assault weapons were among those who protested Gov. Gretchen Whitmer’s lockdown restrictions in Michigan in late April, prompting some lawmakers to wear bulletproof vests to work. In St. Paul, too, an overwhelmingly white crowd pushed to “liberate Minnesota” earlier this month, with some showcasing firearms.

“Unarmed people, many of whom are people of color, protest police brutality and are met with police brutality — flash grenades, tear gas, and rubber bullets,” says Georgetown Law professor Paul Butler, the author of Chokehold: Policing Black Men. “But when armed, mainly white protesters storm the Michigan state capitol, the police just let them be.”

There’s a major difference in how unarmed black protesters were treated in Minneapolis, compared to armed white protesters

The protests that took place in Minneapolis over Floyd’s death and those that have occurred in state capitols have many differences — including, in some cases, their size. Still, the contrast in how police reacted to protesters at these respective gatherings was evident, and several journalists and activists have called out the disparity on social media.

“There are different sets of rules, there are different sets of consequences,” says Robinson, regarding the way law enforcement reacted in these different scenarios. He recalls police using tactics like tear gas and rubber bullets against protesters in Ferguson, Missouri, when they pushed back on the police killing of 18-year-old Michael Brown in 2014.

Meanwhile, armed protesters in Michigan were met simply with pointed stares from the officers on the scene during a lockdown protest that itself drew attention to the racial disparities exacerbated by the coronavirus pandemic. “Armed men with guns have been showing up in capitols across the country, in essence, demanding that things open back up,” Robinson notes. “What’s been opening back up are places where black and brown people work.”

As advocates note, this is not to say that there should have been more force used in the protests at the state capitols, or in any protests, but to highlight the uneven response — and note that police shouldn’t be disproportionately using violence when these protests involve people of color.

Ultimately, both Robinson and Brown say that Floyd’s death — and the treatment of the protesters who were trying to raise awareness about it — draws attention to the lack of accountability of police in many cities.

Robinson notes that more policies focused on transparency and taking responsibility, coupled with a fundamental rethinking of why the criminal justice system is so central to American life, need to be implemented in order to advance long-term change. “We put everything in our police departments instead of investing in communities to make them home. Literally, we put our knee on people’s necks instead of lifting them up,” he said.

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Anthony Fauci told CNN Wednesday that the scientific data "is really quite evident now about the lack of efficacy" of hydroxychloroquine as a coronavirus treatment. From a report: The comments came in response to news that France on Wednesday banned the use of hydroxychloroquine to treat the virus, after a large retrospective study in The Lancet found an increased risk of heart problems and death among coronavirus patients who took the anti-malarial drug. The World Health Organization also announced on Monday it had temporarily stopped running tests on the drug to review safety concerns. Fauci stopped short of saying the U.S. should follow France's lead, but told CNN it has become "more clear" that using hydroxychloroquine could lead to "adverse" cardiovascular effects.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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When Daily Kos founder Markos Moulitsas asked me last week whether I had any burning questions to ask at the White House press briefings, I had an immediate sense of revulsion at the idea of being in that press room. Even though I spent several Obama-era years as a White House correspondent, nothing about the idea of sitting in that COVID-infected room only to be lied to by Trump's latest media hack sounded even remotely enticing or worthwhile.

But after reflecting on my reticence, I realized there was a place I'd like to be wandering around asking questions: Congress. Specifically, for a journalist looking to make newsworthy inquiries, Senate Republicans are the people to be bird-dogging, buttonholing, and peppering with questions. That's where the juice is this election cycle.

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Practically anything at all Senate Republicans say about Trump right now is newsworthy, particularly those in tight reelection bids this year. Naturally, I'm thinking of Sens. Susan Collins of Maine, Cory Gardner of Colorado, Martha McSally of Arizona, Thom Tillis of North Carolina, Joni Ernst of Iowa, David Perdue of Georgia, and others too. Precisely because they are the caucus that voted to save Trump's presidency and keep him at the helm of the country's pandemic response, reporters should make Senate Republicans own up to that decision and either stand by it or flee. And Trump offers a never-ending stream of material with which to work.

For instance, do any of them regret voting to acquit Trump without even staging a real trial? Gardner pitched a fit last week because the GOP caucus was leaving town without acting on more coronavirus relief—inaction initially backed by both Trump and McConnell. "Senator Gardner, do you stand by your vote to keep Trump in charge of the national response to the coronavirus?" Gardner could either run down a hallway or say that wasn't what the impeachment vote was about. "But you voted to keep Trump in charge of the country without hearing from any witnesses, right? Has he proven worthy of the vote of confidence you gave him?" Don't Coloradans deserve to know how their junior senator grades Trump's performance over the pandemic response?

As a reporter, when you know approximately the type of response you're going to get, the newsworthiness is usually about the phrasing of the question. Not every interaction goes as anticipated and by no means do they all end up being newsworthy. Plus, sometimes as a reporter, you're really just trying to gauge the progress of certain legislation, etc. But just five months out from November, my full attention would be trained on the electoral fate of the Senate.

"Senator Ernst, has Trump come through on the promises he made to Iowa farmers? Now that he's blaming China for spread of the coronavirus, do you think he'll really be able to seal the trade deal?" No, he won't. But don't Iowans deserve to know whether Ernst thinks Trump will deliver for them? "Senator, why isn't Trump prioritizing the trade deal over scapegoating China? Is finger pointing more important than saving Iowa farms from going under?"

I'm a little rusty, but you get the idea. "Senator Collins, if you really wanted action on coronavirus relief last week, why are you still voting to rubber stamp Trump's nominees?" Collins could be leveraging her votes in order to get action on more relief, or she could easily be registering protest votes and she’s not. One could also ask at-risk senators about the comments of other senators and GOP leadership, in particular. "Senator Collins, do you agree with Leader McConnell that there's zero urgency about bringing more relief to Mainers and other Americans?" (Mitch McConnell is currently changing his tune on that relief, but time is still of the essence.) Of course, McConnell is up for reelection too in Kentucky and while unseating him will be tough, he has more than just the GOP caucus to think about—he still has to get himself reelected. 

The Senate GOP is actually a total mess if reporters would just take the time to explore the fissures. Does Sen. Perdue think his governor made the right call to reopen Georgia? And if he does, does he support the notion that Trump should butt out of the state's business since Trump himself left it up to the governors? (Trump initially objected to Gov. Brian Kemp’s rush to reopen.)

Again, there's a million places to go. Do GOP senators support Trump promoting conspiracy theories and piddling away precious hours on the links right as America was reaching the deeply unsettling milestone of 100,000 deaths due to coronavirus? Do they worry that Trump still hasn’t developed a legit testing, tracking, and containment plan in case of a second wave? Every day, there's something more to ask about, and there's almost always something state specific—because Trump is a terrible politician and he is constantly hanging out GOP lawmakers to dry.

Every one of those GOP senators should have to answer for their failures to rein Trump in. They should all be held accountable for the fact that their repeated failures to act in the country's best interests helped turn Trump into the incomprehensible monster he is today. If you're a reporter in D.C. covering electoral politics and asking these kinds of questions isn't your mission in your life, you're entirely missing the biggest story of the election. Constituents should hear what Republican senators have to say for themselves. After all, Americans will be determining the fate of the GOP majority this coming November and they deserve answers. 

The Lincoln Project, the anti-Trump group led by Kellyanne Conway’s husband George, and other disillusioned Republicans which crafted the ‘Mourning in America’ ad that blew the president’s gasket, is out with another hit as the COVID-19 death toll approaches 100,000.

The ad features Trump declaring on February 26 that “You have 15 people, and the 15 within a couple of days is going to be down to close to zero.” As Trump’s words echo, a shot of seven body bags expands to thousands.

The post Devastating GOP-Crafted Ad Featuring American Flag Made of Body Bags Hits Trump on Grim Coronavirus Failure: WATCH appeared first on Towleroad Gay News.

On Tuesday night in Minneapolis, Minnesota, protesters gathered at the intersection where George Floyd, a 46-year-old Black man, was handcuffed and pinned to the ground for an estimated eight minutes by a white police officer. In a video that has since gone viral, Floyd can be heard saying: “I can’t breathe! Please, the knee on my neck.” Bystanders for the incident also called on the officer to let up; however, the officer doesn’t appear to stop until paramedics arrive with a stretcher, at which point Floyd is seemingly unresponsive. Floyd died hours later. Since then, the four officers involved have been fired, but protesters want further action: namely, charges and a conviction. 

Peaceful protesters originally chanted phrases like, “I can’t breathe!” and “It could’ve been me!” It’s estimated that hundreds of people gathered. In speaking to The Washington Post, Anita Murray, who was one of the protestors, noted: "It's scary to come down here in the middle of the pandemic, but how could I stay away?"

Then organizers marched to the precinct where it’s believed the officers involved worked. The Wall Street Journal reports that some of the protesters damaged windows and sprayed graffiti. Police in riot gear responded by firing tear gas and projectiles, as reported by the Associated Press.

“I got on my knees and I put up a peace sign and they tear gassed me,” one protester said as reported by local outlet WCCO.

In a statement, Mayor Jacob Frey said firing the officers involved was the “right call,” and stressed that “being black in America should not be a death sentence.” As of Tuesday, the FBI is reportedly launching an investigation, as is the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension. Minnesota Senator and former presidential hopeful Amy Klobuchar has also called for an investigation.

Floyd was a father and a security guard at a local restaurant. In an interview with the Post, Jovanni Thunstrom, owner of the restaurant where Floyd reportedly worked, described him as a great person who helped those in need. He told the Post that officers “are supposed to serve and protect, but Floyd didn’t get either. He didn’t get served or protected. He got choked.”

Given the recent coverage of anti-lockdown protests, like at the Michigan state capitol, many people are drawing comparisons between the way protesters are treated by both the police and the media. 

Many progressives are calling for justice and large-scale reform.

As reported by CBS News, Floyd was originally arrested “under suspicion of forgery.”

CNBC Squawk Box host Andrew Ross Sorkin laid into co-host Joe Kernen for ignoring the coronavirus pandemic to help his friend Donald Trump.

Sorkin exploded after Kernen began criticizing him for his pessimism about the markets and asserted that a lot of “smart people” are saying markets are too high.

Spat Kernen: “Why is that the smart people?! They’ve been wrong for 35 percent! Why are they smart?! Just because they can see what’s right in front of their nose?! That doesn’t make them smart! It makes them not savvy about the market!”

The conversation got more and more heated until Sorkin went on blast: “Joseph! Joseph! You didn’t panic about anything! Joseph, 100,000 people died! 100,000 people died, Joe! And all you did was try to help your friend the president! That’s what you did! Every single morning on this show! Every single morning on this show! You used and abused your position, Joe! You used and abused your position! … I wasn’t arguing to go sell your stocks, Joseph! … I was arguing about people’s lives! … Do the news, Joseph! I’m begging you! Do the news!”

The post CNBC Exchange Goes Off Rails as COVID-19 Accusations Fly: ‘100,000 People Died and All You Did Was Try to Help Your Friend the President!’ — WATCH appeared first on Towleroad Gay News.

On Tuesday, Donald Trump did something that Donald Trump does everyday—lie on Twitter. But something unusual did happen in response. After 52,000 tweets, Twitter decided to actually call out one of Trump’s persistent lies. Specifically, Twitter added “get the facts” tags to a pair of Trump tweets about vote by mail. Those facts show that Trump’s claims about vote by mail leading to fraud, are themselves fraudulent. Clicking the Twitter-added link takes readers to a fact-checking page detailing ways in which Trump’s statements about voting by mail are absolutely wrong. False. Lies. 

And, as might be imagined, Trump has responded on Wednesday morning with a sputtering fury in which he’s accused Twitter, and all of social media, with “silencing conservative voices.” And with “interfering in the 2020 election.” And with “stiffing free speech” (with quite a few more capital letters involved). Trump is not only blasting Twitter, all social media, and the fact checkers, he’s threatening to either regulate Twitter or to shut them down completely.

The tags that Twitter added to the pair of tweets are the first sign that Twitter is trying to hold Trump to anything approximating the rules that face ordinary users of the service. Trump’s eruptive response doesn’t just include a threat to “strongly regulate” social media sites or “close them down,” but claims that Twitter’s actions are “stifling free speech” and that Trump “will not allow it.”

Twitter is, of course, a private company. It’s not subject to claims of First Amendment violation, because it’s not a government actor. The government can’t either limit speech on a private platform, or require that the platform carry particular speech. Twitter is also not a regulated pubic forum, because numerous court rulings dating back decades have made a firm definition of those forums that makes them closely aligned to town halls. 

On the other hand, as a public official, Trump does have regulated responsibilities concerning speech. He has already lost one fight over Twitter, when multiple court rulings made it illegal for him to block Twitter users who posted replies to his tweets that Trump didn’t like. Both a district court and appeals court ruled that Trump could no longer block Twitter users—thanks to a lawsuit brought by former Daily Kos judicial affairs editor Rebecca Pilar Buckwalter-Poza.

There’s no doubt that Trump can issue regulations to demand that Twitter never add a comment to his post, or block any “conservative” throwing around lies and hate speech. Among others, FCC commissioner Ajit Pai would likely hop at the chance to craft such a regulation. But it’s almost equally certain that the regulation could never be enacted. Trump wouldn’t be writing a regulation; he’d just be drafting a headline for his latest fundraising appeal.

And at the bottom of this particular tirade is the power that fuels so many of Trump’s biggest lies—projection. In his Tuesday evening fuming over Twitter’s tags, Trump claims that social media platforms attempted to intervene against him in the 2016 campaign. In fact, it was thousands of Russian bots, hundreds of genuinely fake media sites, detailed analysis courtesy of Cambridge Analytica, direct cooperation from Facebook’s targeted ad services that turned social media into Trump’s biggest tool in 2016.

Since then, Republicans haven’t backed away. They’re still at it. Dozens of fake “local news” sites have popped up across critical swing states, and the whole “reopen” protest movement is a carbon copy of the Russian playbook from 2016. Trump can’t count on uncritical New York Times headlines to carry all his lies to the public—he needs Twitter. That platform, and the rest of social media, are at the heart of the right-wing propaganda engine that fuels anger, divisiveness, and racial hate. If the social media sites didn’t exist, Trump’s team would have to build them … and they absolutely will. As soon as they’ve gotten all they can from the existing platforms.

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Ya huh

Welcome to FiveThirtyEight’s weekly politics chat. The transcript below has been lightly edited.

sarah (Sarah Frostenson, politics editor): Former Vice President Joe Biden’s team is talking a big game about an expanded electoral map with Arizona, Georgia and Texas in play, even though those states haven’t voted for a Democratic presidential nominee in two decades.

So let’s talk about just how feasible this strategy is. How competitive are those three states at this point? And what’s more, how does this strategy complement — or counteract — Democratic efforts to pick up Midwestern battleground states like Michigan, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania, or perennial swing states like Florida?

First up, Arizona. What do we think? Does Biden have a shot there?

geoffrey.skelley (Geoffrey Skelley, elections analyst): Of the three states we’re looking at, I think it’s pretty clear that Arizona is the most in play — and that Biden may even have the lead there, based on the limited polling we have.

President Trump won Arizona by 3.5 points in 2016 while losing the national popular vote by 2 points. So it stands to reason that if Biden is up 6 points or so nationally, Arizona is a toss-up, and that’s before we consider other things that may have shifted between 2016 and now.

nrakich (Nathaniel Rakich, elections analyst): I agree, although I have been surprised at the degree to which Arizona seems to have moved to the left since 2016.

sarah: What other evidence do we have that Arizona has moved to the left since 2016?

geoffrey.skelley: Well, unlike in Georgia and Texas, Democrats actually won major statewide contests in Arizona in 2018 — including the state’s marquee Senate race — and election turnout was nearly as high as the 2016 presidential contest, meaning that performance may reflect a broader shift toward the Democrats rather than just a side effect of the midterms’ blue wave.

nrakich: G. Elliott Morris of The Economist had an interesting newsletter item recently that showed how much various states have moved left or right since 2016, based on the 2020 polls so far. Arizona had the starkest movement.

And Geoffrey’s right that, if Arizona were still 6 points redder than the nation and Biden led by 6 points nationally, we’d expect polls of Arizona to show a tied race. But Biden has consistently led in Arizona polls so far.

Biden has the edge in Arizona polling so far

Presidential general election polls of Arizona conducted since March 1

Dates	Pollster	Biden	Trump	Margin
May 18-22	HighGround	47%	45%	D+2
May 10-14	Redfield & Wilton	45	41	D+4
May 9-11	OH Predictive Insights	50	43	D+8
April 7-8	OH Predictive Insights	52	43	D+9
March 10-15	Marist	47	46	D+1
March 11-14	Monmouth	46	43	D+3
March 6-11	Latino Decisions	50	42	D+8
March 3-4	OH Predictive Insights	49	43	D+6
March 2-3	Public Policy Polling	48	47	D+1

Source: Polls

On the other hand, I’m still somewhat skeptical of the idea Arizona has moved that much to the left. Some of the higher-quality polls, like from Marist and Monmouth, do have the race closer to a tie, whereas the polls suggesting Arizona has gotten significantly more Democratic (e.g., by showing Biden up by 8 points) are not coming from gold-standard pollsters.

sarah: One other thing about Arizona that makes me think it might be fertile ground for Democrats in 2020 is that Democratic Senate challenger Mark Kelly seems to have the upper hand against Sen. Martha McSally, and if that race ends up close — or flips blue — that bodes well for Democrats in the long run, as it’s more evidence that Arizona might be becoming more of a blue state.

nrakich: Yeah, Kelly has been a monster fundraiser. He’s taken in more than $31 million since the beginning of last year.

Although I don’t think a down-ballot race is likely to drive turnout for the presidential. If anything, Kelly might run ahead of Biden because of his money and great bio.

geoffrey.skelley: That’s fair, but it’s worth remembering that every Senate seat that was up in 2016 went for the party that carried the state at the presidential level, so the fact a Democrat is polling that well in the Senate contest is probably a decent sign for the party’s chances as a whole.

sarah: For sure. It’s less that a down-ballot race would affect the top of the ticket, but more that Arizona really might go blue in 2020.

It sounds like we agree with the Biden campaign’s assessment that Arizona is in play, so does it make sense for them to campaign there?

Or is there an argument to be made that they should keep an eye on it, but maybe not commit fully?

nrakich: I mean … both?

It’s a spectrum.

I definitely think Biden should spend more time and money in Arizona than in Georgia and Texas. But I still think Arizona is unlikely to be the tipping-point state, and Biden should spend even more time and money in must-win states like Wisconsin, Pennsylvania and Michigan.

geoffrey.skelley: Oh, they should definitely fully commit. Arizona gives them another possible path to 270 in the Electoral College. Arizona’s worth 11 electoral votes, so it could sub in for, say, Wisconsin (10 electoral votes) if Trump were to narrowly carry the Badger State.

nrakich: Now you have me questioning myself, Geoffrey! *whips out calculator*

Hmmm, Florida and Wisconsin were 3 points to the right of the nation in 2016. Arizona, as discussed, was 6. That’s not a big gap at all; maybe they do converge this year?

geoffrey.skelley: Another thing to keep in mind is that Democrats have been making inroads in the suburbs and dominating urban areas. Maricopa County (Phoenix and its environs) was the most populous county in the country to vote for Trump in 2016, but Trump only won it narrowly by about 3 points, and in 2018, Democratic Sen. Kyrsten Sinema carried it by 4 points. So Democrats may be hoping for a repeat in 2020. Win Maricopa, win Arizona.

sarah: OK, it sounds like focusing on Arizona is smart for the Biden campaign, but maybe we’re a bit more skeptical of Georgia and Texas, the other two states the campaign has included in its “expanded” electoral map?

nrakich: Yeah. Georgia was 7 points to the right of the nation in 2016, and Texas was 11 points to the right. Given long-term trends, they have both probably moved a little to the left, but they have further to go than Arizona.

That said, Biden may well win those states — take a look at the polling there:

Georgia polls are extremely close

Presidential general election polls of Georgia conducted since March 1

Dates	Pollster	Biden	Trump	Margin
May 16-18	Civiqs	48%	47%	D+1
May 11-13	BK Strategies	46	48	R+2
May 4-7	Public Opinion Strategies	47	46	D+1
April 25-27	Cygnal	44	45	R+1
March 31-April 1	Battleground Connect	46	48	R+2

Source: Polls

Can Biden shock Trump in Texas?

Presidential general election polls of Texas conducted since March 1

Dates	Pollster	Biden	Trump	Margin
May 8-10	Emerson College	48%	52%	R+3
April 27-28	Public Policy Polling	47	46	D+1
April 18-27	University of Texas at Tyler	43	43	EVEN
April 10-19	YouGov	44	49	R+5

Source: Polls

But if he does, he will probably already have clinched the Electoral College in the Midwest, Arizona or Florida.

geoffrey.skelley: Georgia is interesting. On the one hand, Biden could target the increasingly Democratic suburbs of Atlanta. On the other hand, it’s one of the most inelastic states in the country — meaning voters there are among the most likely to stick with their usual party regardless of which way the rest of the country swings — in part because its white voters remain predominantly Republican and its large black population is heavily Democratic, and there just isn’t a ton of movement there.

Additionally, if Democrats couldn’t carry Georgia in 2018 when the electoral environment was very pro-Democratic, that makes me skeptical they can win it in a presidential year, when partisan conditions could be more balanced. That said, if Biden is winning by 6 or 7 points nationally, that might be enough to put Georgia in his column, as Trump only carried it by 5 points in 2016. But as Nathaniel was saying earlier, that’s not a situation where Georgia is an integral part of Biden winning 270 electoral votes. It’s gravy at that point, though maybe it helps Democrats in the two Senate contests there.

nrakich: Yeah, Georgia is definitely inelastic. But on the other hand, Georgia has inched leftward (relative to the nation as a whole) in the last three presidential elections. And I think there is room for more suburban whites to move toward Democrats, not only in Georgia but also in Texas and Arizona.

sarah: That’s a good point, and I think a real question determining whether Georgia and Texas will be competitive is just how much the trends of 2018 — namely, suburban white voters moving to the Democratic Party — hold true.

This is an extreme hypothetical, but earlier this year, Nathaniel looked at what would happen if a state’s presidential vote was based strictly on how rural or urban the state is, and he found that Georgia would remain in the R column, but both Arizona and Texas would swing blue:

What if the urban-rural divide dictated the 2020 election?

The results of a hypothetical presidential election if a state’s urbanization were the only factor, based on the relationship between FiveThirtyEight’s urbanization index and 2016 presidential election results

State	Result		State	Result
Alabama	R+16.0		Montana	R+30.8
Alaska	R+27.3		Nebraska	R+8.2
Arizona	D+6.1		Nevada	D+12.3
Arkansas	R+20.5		New Hampshire	R+11.9
California	D+17.7		New Jersey	D+18.3
Colorado	D+4.2		New Mexico	R+12.2
Connecticut	D+7.6		New York	D+22.5
Delaware	D+2.3		North Carolina	R+6.6
Florida	D+8.3		North Dakota	R+23.2
Georgia	R+3.6		Ohio	D+0.6
Hawaii	D+3.3		Oklahoma	R+11.6
Idaho	R+16.1		Oregon	R+1.5
Illinois	D+10.3		Pennsylvania	D+4.1
Indiana	R+5.5		Rhode Island	D+11.6
Iowa	R+16.1		South Carolina	R+9.4
Kansas	R+9.3		South Dakota	R+27.4
Kentucky	R+13.6		Tennessee	R+8.3
Louisiana	R+8.6		Texas	D+4.5
Maine	R+23.4		Utah	D+1.7
Maryland	D+11.5		Vermont	R+25.9
Massachusetts	D+13.2		Virginia	D+1.0
Michigan	R+0.3		Washington	D+3.8
Minnesota	R+4.9		West Virginia	R+22.4
Mississippi	R+25.1		Wisconsin	R+8.3
Missouri	R+8.2		Wyoming	R+33.6

Source: American Community Survey

What do we make of this? Might Texas actually turn blue before Georgia?

nrakich: We have a tendency to think about elections through the lens of the decisive voters in the previous election, which for 2018 was suburbanites. But as I showed in that urbanization article, Georgia does have a lot of rural voters too, and there is still room for them to move even more toward Trump. So, actually, maybe those two trends will cancel each other out.

geoffrey.skelley: OK, but Georgia was still notably closer to going for Clinton than Texas — Trump won Georgia by 5 points and Texas by 9 points, which is a fairly sizable difference. And while Georgia may be more inelastic than Texas, Texas is not that elastic. Our 2018 elasticity score for Texas was 1.03 — not that far above the baseline of 1 — while Georgia’s was 0.90.

Texas is changing, but Barack Obama lost it by 12 points in 2008, which was a really good environment overall for Democrats.

nrakich: Yeah, there’s just too far for it to go.

geoffrey.skelley: As is often the case with questions about when Texas could go blue, it depends on how fast the political environment changes, but it still probably won’t happen until sometime after 2020, given what we know currently.

sarah: People seem to agree that the Biden campaign shouldn’t invest too much in Georgia and Texas if it comes at the expense of other battleground states in the Midwest or Florida. Is that fair?

nrakich: I think there’s a case for keeping your options open in Georgia. But the Biden campaign would be foolish to invest significantly in Texas. If Texas votes Democratic, Biden will already have won virtually every other swing state and, therefore, the election. It’s simply not a part of his path to 270 electoral votes — more like a part of his path to 400.

Also, Texas is an extremely expensive state in which to campaign, so it just wouldn’t be an efficient use of his money.

geoffrey.skelley: If Trump really is doing a lot worse among older voters than in 2016, it would be foolish for Biden to abandon Florida, which has one of the oldest populations in the country.

I could see reasons for Democrats to worry about Florida being a mirage after they failed to win the gubernatorial and Senate races there in 2018, but it’s just been too close in recent presidential elections to actually give up on it. Trump only won it by 1 point in 2016!

nrakich: Oh, I have strong feelings about Florida.

sarah:

nrakich: Florida is definitely still a swing state; it’s not as inelastic as the 2018 results implied. The Democratic nominees for governor and senator, Andrew Gillum and Bill Nelson, still outperformed Hillary Clinton in most counties; they just underperformed Clinton in a few key areas, especially Miami-Dade County. (This article by Florida Democratic consultant Matthew Isbell does a great job showing that.)

The reason for this is probably that their Republican opponents, Ron DeSantis and Rick Scott, did a lot better among Hispanic voters than Trump did. According to exit polls, Trump got 35 percent of the Latino vote in Florida in 2016, while DeSantis got 44 percent and Scott got 45 percent. In 2020, I don’t think Trump will be able to match DeSantis’s and Scott’s numbers.

So if Biden can pair Clinton’s performance among Hispanic Floridians with Nelson’s and Gillum’s among other voters, he can absolutely win Florida.

geoffrey.skelley: We’ve talked a lot about how Biden might be able to expand his electoral map, but he can’t afford to give up on Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin. In 2016, they were collectively decided by 78,000 votes, and who wins them in 2020 will likely be consequential as well.

The bigger questions in the Midwest and Rust Belt are probably whether to invest in Iowa and Ohio, which Trump carried by about 9 and 8 points, respectively. Those two states might be harder for Democrats to win back considering how they swung hard toward the GOP in 2016 after backing Obama in 2012.

That said, Iowa does have some history of being pretty swingy. It’s also cheaper to advertise in Iowa than Ohio, and if we’re talking down-ballot races, there is more at stake there, too. Potentially four competitive House races and a Senate seat in Iowa, whereas Ohio has no Senate race and is likely to have only one or two close House races.

nrakich: Yeah, if Biden wants to be an effective president, he’ll need a Democratic Senate. IMO, that means he should give extra credit to Georgia and Iowa when deciding where to allocate his resources.

sarah: The balancing act that the Biden campaign will inevitably have to engage in isn’t entirely clear to me yet. How much will they actually invest in states like Arizona, Georgia and Texas versus doubling down on states like Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin?

Much of this will inevitably boil down to what the tipping-point state is in 2020, but one thing that’s hard to figure out is how much of the map already realigned in 2016. Put another way, does Biden have his eyes on states like Arizona because winning states like Wisconsin back will be difficult?

nrakich: But I think that’s the needle we need to thread: Arizona might be moving in one direction and Wisconsin in the other, but even in the “realigned” (really more “recalibrated”) 2016 map, Arizona was redder than Wisconsin.

geoffrey.skelley: It’s curious because some of this comes down to the national environment. Maybe Wisconsin is a point or two redder than it was in 2016, but if Biden wins by 4 or 5 points nationally, maybe that’s enough to carry it even if Wisconsin is continuing to move toward the GOP.

But how exactly that plays out in each state is hard to say.

The C&C Coffee and Kitchen, a Castle Rock, Colorado diner, went viral over Mother’s Day weekend when it reopened for dine-in service in spite of a Colorado public health order with a video of the busy restaurant—and few mask-wearers—that was spread all over social media. Gov. Jared Polis responded by suspending the restaurant’s license indefinitely with a 30-day minimum and called the restaurant an “immediate health hazard.” Now, owners of the restaurant are suing Gov. Polis, the state, and the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment (CDPHE), arguing that their constitutional rights have been violated, as reported by The Denver Channel.

Some background on what’s been up in Colorado: Restaurants and bars in the state had been to-go and delivery only since March 19. The Mother’s Day video appeared on May 10. There was a public health order through May 26, which included social distancing of six feet between people, wearing masks, and no gatherings of more than 10 people. As of Wednesday, May 27, restaurants will be allowed to offer dine-in service, but with some safety measures still in place—mainly that restaurants may only operate at 50% of capacity or fewer than 50 people depending on the specific restaurant, six feet between tables, and all employees wearing masks. 

The Castle Rock eatery, however, opened for Mother’s Day, and based on what caught attention on social media, there was a long line of customers, tons of people dining at tables, and few people actually wearing masks. Now the owners of the diner, Jesse and April Arellano, are suing. Their attorney, Randy Corporon, filed the suit on Friday, May 22, alleging that the governor’s move to suspend the cafe’s license indefinitely is “unlawful, unprecedented and highly suspect.” 

The suit claims that the owners have “suffered devastating and possibly insurmountable financial hardship” and claims that they are now in debt. The suit also claims that the governor’s executive and public health orders don’t give him the authority to “designate and discriminate” among people for “selective imposition of emergency orders.” The suit alleges the governor moved with “particular hostility and desire for revenge.”

In reference to that Sunday, owner April Arellano told Colorado Community Media: "I expected it to be busy. I never expected this. I'm so happy so many people came out to support the Constitution and stand up for what is right. We did our time. We did our two weeks. We did more than two weeks […] and we were failing. We had to do something."

"Customers will return en masse when they feel safe. When people see videos of people packed into a restaurant with no social distancing and no masks, people feel less safe and the widespread economic pain will only be prolonged,” Polis said at a press conference after the video first went viral. He added: "I love my mom far too much to put her at risk by visiting a busy restaurant operating illegally just to take a selfie with omelets and a mimosa.”

Restaurants across the nation have defied orders, or threatened to do so, in order to stay open for dine-in service during the pandemic. One Carmel-by-the-Sea restaurant owner stayed open for dine-in service despite citations for violating the state’s shelter-in-place order, for example, while an elected official in North Carolina also kept his restaurant’s dining room open. One restaurant group in Washington, D.C. went viral for claiming it was going to defy coronavirus restrictions only to get a very public Twitter response from Mayor Muriel Bowser, and told The Washington Post it would comply. 

U.S. Ambassador to Germany Ric Grenell is set to join President Donald Trump’s 2020 campaign amid a broader shakeup that saw the promotion of two other campaign officials on Tuesday, according to two people familiar with the matter.

The addition of Grenell, a trusted Trump ally who recently stepped down as acting director of national intelligence, would come as the president faces sliding poll numbers nationally and in a handful of key battleground states. A Fox News survey conducted before the holiday weekend found presumptive Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden defeating Trump 48 percent to 40 percent five months out from Election Day.

A person familiar with the move said Grenell will take a senior role inside the Trump campaign, where he will be involved in fundraising and strategy. It was not immediately clear what his title will be or whether he will work from the campaign’s Northern Virginia headquarters. Grenell was seen entering the White House on Tuesday afternoon, shortly after the Trump campaign announced its promotion of senior political adviser Bill Stepien to serve as deputy campaign manager.

After this story was published, Grenell on Twitter called the report “fake news” and said “the entire story isn’t true.” Prior to publication, he hadn't responded to a request for comment. The Trump campaign didn’t respond to multiple requests for comment, but campaign manager Brad Parscale also denied the report on Twitter after publication.

Grenell would be the latest longtime Trump ally to be installed in a senior role that ensures deep involvement with the president’s reelection operation and communications strategy. Trump recently brought former White House communications director Hope Hicks back into the West Wing, and promoted his former body man, John McEntee, to head the Office of Presidential Personnel after he rejoined the administration last December.

“He wants to bring the band back together,” said a senior administration official familiar with Trump’s thinking.

Grenell, who is expected to step down as ambassador to Germany in a few weeks, has long been a forceful personality on Twitter — one of the president’s preferred platforms for taking on political opponents and communicating with supporters. His social media activity sometimes rankled diplomatic colleagues and career State Department officials, who worried about straining U.S. relations with Germany.

Grenell was a strong advocate of Trump’s nationalist policies, which at times didn’t play well with his German hosts. And during his short tenure as the nation’s top intelligence official, Grenell presided over a number of changes at the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, including slightly reducing the size of the National Counterterrorism Center and having the National Counterintelligence and Security Center, which is part of ODNI, take over election security briefings.

Grenell, who’s openly gay, also said the Trump administration could potentially cut back on the sharing of intelligence with countries that have criminalized homosexuality and urged U.S. intelligence agencies to do a better job of preventing discrimination against gay, lesbian and transgender employees.

In 2012, Grenell briefly served as a spokesman for Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney’s campaign. He resigned under pressure from social conservative groups who were critical of the campaign’s employment of an openly gay man. Throughout his tenure in the Trump administration, he repeatedly denounced countries that continue to outlaw homosexuality and once met with European LGBTQ activists to discuss his push to decriminalize homosexuality abroad.

Grenell also served as a spokesman at the U.S. mission at the United Nations during the George W. Bush administration. Prior to joining the Trump administration, he worked in media and public affairs consulting.