An anonymous reader quotes a report from The New York Times: Millions of people gave their email addresses to Quibi, JetBlue, Wish and other companies (Warning: source may be paywalled; alternative source) -- and those email addresses got away. They ended up in the hands of advertising and analytics companies like Google, Facebook and Twitter, leaving the people with those email addresses more easily targeted by advertisers and able to be tracked by companies that study shopping behavior, according toa reportpublished on Wednesday. The customers unwittingly exposed their email addresses when signing up for apps or clicking on links in marketing emails, said the researcher Zach Edwards, who runs the digital strategy firm Victory Medium. In the report, he described the giveaway of personal data as part of a "sloppy and dangerous growth hack."
Mr. Edwards, a contributor to a recent studythat examined potential privacy violations by dating services like Grindr and OkCupid, wrote in the new report that one of the "most egregious" leaks involvedQuibi, a short-form video platform based in Los Angeles that is run by the veteran executives Jeffrey Katzenberg and Meg Whitman. Quibi went live on April 6, long after new data privacy regulations went into effect in Europe and California. People who downloaded the Quibi app were asked to submit their email addresses. Then they received a confirmation link. Clicking on the link made their email addresses available to Google, Facebook, Twitter and Snapchat, according to the report.
Quibi said in a statement on Wednesday that data security "is of the highest priority" and that "the moment the issue on our webpage was revealed to our security and engineering team, we fixed it immediately." "Mr. Edwards said customers were probably unaware of leaks at Wish, an e-commerce platform where hundreds of millions of email addresses were most likely exposed starting in 2018," the report adds. "When users clicked on links in marketing emails from the company, their email addresses were shared with Google, Facebook, Pinterest, PayPal and others, he wrote."
Other companies that suffered limited leaks included The Washington Post, JetBlue, and Mailchimp.
While Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell is saying he'll block aid to states and cities unless he gets the gift of no liability for companies that endanger their workers and customers, cities and states are laying off workers, potentially by the hundreds of thousands—perhaps millions.
That means public safety and health, sanitation, utilities, transportation, libraries, and education are all in jeopardy, a review by TheWashington Post has found. Police and firefighters are being furloughed and laid off. Revenue to localities and to states has cratered because of the crisis. "Some local governments have already started laying off or furloughing thousands of their workers, and the numbers are likely to grow markedly in the absence of federal aid," the Post's Tony Romm reports.
The National League of Cities estimates that between 300,000 and 1 million public sector workers are in immediate danger of losing their jobs or being furloughed without pay. Dayton, Ohio's Democratic Mayor Nan Whaley says the city it has furloughed 470 workers so far out of 1,900, including in the water department. She's looking at an additional 18% reduction in every department for the next fiscal year, barring federal assistance. That means EMT and 911 and cops and fire departments and "slow response times," she said. "It will fundamentally change how we do business long-term."
Where Donald Trump sees opportunity, like punishing sanctuary cities, and Mitch McConnell sees a hostage, hundreds of thousands of people see their jobs. Millions more will see the cut in the invisible services like garbage collection, water supply, and their kids' schools.
Here's the chance, Republicans think, to finally get rid of the moochers and leeches that make everything run. Here's the chance for the entire nation to be just like Kansas under the utter disaster former Gov. Sam Brownback engineered. There's a reason, however, that Kansas now has a Democratic governor. There's a reason teachers' strikes across the nation in some very red states have resulted in higher pay and new protections for them.
People like having their garbage collected, their roads plowed, and their 911 calls answered. They want their cities to function. They like their kids' teachers. They know all these people in their communities. That's the fire Mitch McConnell is playing with, and you can bet more than one vulnerable Republican senator recognizes that.
The concept of a living wage is apparently still unfathomable for South Carolina Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham, who on Wednesday promised he would do everything in his power to fight an extension of federal coronavirus relief that would give those who are unemployed an extra $600 a week, according toThe Post and Courier. “I promise you over our dead bodies will this get reauthorized,” Graham said of himself and Republican Sen. Tim Scott. “We’ve got to stop this.”
Graham was speaking to business leaders in the state when he made the promise regarding the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act. “My dad owned a bar, a liquor store and a pool room. I have walked in your shoes,” he reportedly said. “If you pay people $23 an hour not to work, they will take you up on it. It doesn’t mean they’re lazy. It means if you offer them $23 an hour not to work, they’ll probably take that over $17 to go to work.”
Despite legislators passing the CARES Act earlier this month, the unprecedented number of claims resulting from the coronavirus pandemic has triggered processing delays and the legislation is set to expire July 31, according toThe New York Times. It already doesn’t cover everyone in need. Despite states like Georgia and Tennessee prematurely ending stay-at-home orders and forcing employees back to work before doing so is safe, "voluntarily deciding to quit your job out of a general concern about exposure to COVID-19 does not make you eligible” for the unemployment relief, according to the U.S. Department of Labor.
While Democrats advocate for ways to make sure that at least Americans who qualify for the assistance get it, Republicans are fighting to make sure the protections vanish without extension. Oklahoma Democratic Rep. Kendra Horn tweeted Wednesday: "Oklahoma hasn't even successfully implemented unemployment assistance for all those who need it and who qualify under the CARES Act. But already, state officials are discussing how to cut relief for Oklahomans out of work and in crisis. This is shameful."
Florida Democratic Rep. Margaret Good asked the Department of Labor to expedite the process. "Independent &GIG workers shouldn’t have to be kept in limbo because the state cant fix UI system," she tweeted Friday.
Since the Florida unemployment system is still not working, I have asked the Secretary of Labor to step in & make sure the $600/wk from the CARES Act gets to Floridians immediately. Independent &GIG workers shouldn�t have to be kept in limbo because the state cant fix UI system. pic.twitter.com/12Hx3Je4tk
Graham’s response to employers who are worried that their employees won’t return to work when doors reopen doesn’t even attempt to provide context on behalf of workers. He instead gave the employers advice on ways to strategize and keep the masses at bay.
Responding to a local labor department suggestion that business owners report instances of workers turning down work to his agency, which can stop unemployment benefits for those in need, Graham said: “It’s probably smart to enforce that in a practical way but not go too far to create a war between the employer and employee.”
“You cannot turn on the economy until you get this aberration in the law fixed,” he added in The Post and Courier. “Your challenge is, what do you do between now and July 31? You don’t want a bunch of people coming back pissed off at you.”
Apparently, nothing says employers care like forcing workers back to risky jobs during a deadly pandemic.
No. McConnell doesn't get to interfere in Dem politics after standing by Mr. Pussy Grabber In Chief.
Mitch McConnell said Thursday that Joe Biden will likely have to "participate in releasing all of the information related to" the allegations of sexual assault from former Biden staffer Tara Reade.
Though the Senate majority leader has not made the same request for the dozen-plus sexual assault allegations leveled at President Donald Trump, McConnell (R-Ky.) said the Reade allegation is fair game. Reade claims Biden assaulted her in 1993; Biden's campaign has denied the allegation but the former vice president has yet to address it himself.
On Fox News, McConnell was asked whether Biden's papers at the University of Delaware should be released to offer more information about the alleged assault. McConnell and Biden worked closely together during Biden's time as vice president on fiscal matters.
"When you run for president of the United States your life is an open book and I can't imagine that Vice President Biden isn't going to have to participate in releasing all of the information related to the allegations," McConnell said. "It's a very challenging thing to run for president. And I think everyone that's done that has realized their entire life is opened up to scrutiny. And I think that's happening to Vice President Biden and they shouldn't be surprised."
Republicans have generally stuck by Trump amid sexual assault allegations leveled at him, including in 2019 when they were asked about columnist and author E. Jean Carroll's charge that Trump raped her. The president denied the allegation and claimed he never met Carroll.
Democrats are similarly sticking by Biden so far. Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) said on CNN Thursday that she has "great sympathy for any women who bring forth an allegation." But she also said she is "satisfied with how he has responded" to Reade's allegation.
"It's a matter that he has to deal with. But I am impressed with the people who work for him at the time saying that [they] absolutely never heard one iota of information about this. Nobody ever brought forth a claim or had anybody else tell them about such a claim," Pelosi said of Biden. "I was proud to endorse him. America needs a person like Joe Biden with his, again, his integrity and his vision for the future."
Right wing nutjob says insane things. Pick a side of the picture.
Brazil’s rabidly anti-gay president, Jair Bolsonaro, is falsely accusing the World Health Organization of encouraging children to masturbate and try “same-sex relations.”
Like President Donald Trump, Bolsonaro has been a vocal critic of WHO’s response to the coronavirus pandemic. Earlier this month, Trump announced the U.S. would halt funding for the U.N. agency.
In a Facebook post late Wednesday that he later deleted, Bolsonaro’s attacks on WHO took a strange new turn.
“This is the World Health Organization whose advice on coronavirus some people want me to follow,” he wrote. “Should we follow their education policy guidelines, too? For children zero to four years old: satisfaction and pleasure when touching their bodies, masturbation…. For children four to six years old: a positive gender identity… masturbation in early childhood, same-sex relations…. Nine to 12 years old: first sexual experience.”
More from Yahoo News: The origin of the information appeared to be a 2010 guide called “Standards for Sexuality Education in Europe,” published by Germany’s Federal Centre for Health Education and the WHO’s European office. Though not its main focus, the guide briefly explains that young children are typically discovering their bodies, and tells parents and educators that behavior such as touching oneself and curiosity about sexuality are normal in kids. But it does not call on them to encourage any of the behaviors mentioned by Bolsonaro. … Sometimes called the “Tropical Trump,” Bolsonaro, like his US counterpart, is an avid social media user, firing up his core supporters on Facebook and Twitter. He has regularly been at odds with the WHO since the coronavirus pandemic began. He says social distancing measures are needlessly wrecking the economy over a virus he compares to a “little flu,” and recently fired Health minister Luiz Henrique Mandetta, who was popular with his pro-confinement, pro-science handling of the crisis.
You mean voting for the GOP has consequences? It's about fucking time. Now if only Dems could make the case: hey, maybe stop voting a party in government when they only run on hating government and being bad at it.
Republicans designed unemployment systems to be inefficient and frustrating. Now even "their" people are paying the price.
Democratic primary voters in Cincinnati, Ohio on Tuesday gave the boot to a Trump rally-attending sheriff who collaborated with Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) by wrongfully holding immigrants for deportation, The Appeal reports. Challenger Charmaine McGuffey, who will become Hamilton County’s first openly gay sheriff should she win the general election, ousted her former boss Jim Neil by a “resounding” 70% to 30%.
Immigration “loomed large over this sheriff’s primary,” The Appeal said. “Neil has long faced protests against his relationship with ICE. He honors ICE’s warrantless requests (detainers), which enable the agency to continue detaining certain people at the local jail beyond their scheduled release. McGuffey told the Political Report in March that she would no longer honor detainers if elected.”
McGuffey “is the latest in a recent string of sheriff’s candidates who have ousted incumbents on promises to restrict cooperation with the federal agency,” the outlet continued. That includes the issue of detainees, which immigrant rights advocates have long noted can ultimately lead to family separation for some.
“ICE detainers are issued when a police officer has jailed an immigrant—for reasons as minor as driving with a broken tail light—and ICE asks the police to hold the immigrant until they can pick that person up,” immigrant rights advocacy group America’s Voice says. “However, being undocumented is a civil violation, not a crime. So, if the person hasn’t done anything wrong, it’s unconstitutional for the police to hold that person for ICE.”
The Appeal reports Neil had already pissed off Democrats by attending a rally by then candidate Trump back in 2016, which he was later forced to apologize for. ”Neil repeatedly said ... he attended the Trump rally to show appreciation for Trump's support of law enforcement. Neil wore his sheriff's uniform to the event,” Cincinnati.com reported at the time. Trump later showed his appreciation for law enforcement officers by withholding funding from some over so-called sanctuary cities and insulting others as president.
McGuffey, who was fired from the department in 2017 after calling out the excessive use of force, also notably ran on opposing construction of a new jail, saying according to The Appeal that “the solution to the problem of mass incarceration is certainly not more mass incarceration.” She could now become “the county’s first female and first out LGBTQ person elected sheriff,” LGBTQ Nation said.
“[My election] would mean that our country is moving forward,” she said according to the outlet, “that we really have moved away from the 1950s model of law enforcement, where not just women are embraced in the law enforcement world, but also LGBTQ members of the community can wear a uniform and be quite successful.”
He really thinks he can just say shit and make it so
Despite more than twice as many recorded deaths as any other country in the world, President Donald Trump claimed Thursday that his administration’s response to the coronavirus pandemic has been nothing short of “spectacular.”
Less than 24 hours after the US coronavirus death toll passed 60,000, Trump says, “I think we did a spectacular job” responding to the outbreak. pic.twitter.com/cAU2o3EZTu
— The American Independent (@AmerIndependent) April 30, 2020
The Guardian reports: The president said he thought the White House had done a “spectacular” job responding to coronavirus, despite widespread criticism of the administration’s early response. During an Oval Office meeting with New Jersey governor Phil Murphy, Trumptold reporters, “I think our whole group has been spectacular.” But the administration has been criticized for fumbling its early response to the virus by failing to make testing more widely available. Trump noted the US has now conducted more tests than any other country, but the country has still conducted far less tests per capita than Italy.
A few reactions below.
As spectacular as the government's handling of the Vietnam War. Worse, actually. Since that war ended. We're still not even at halftime with this pandemic. https://t.co/EGylXh6ykP
— Laurence “lock it all down, test and trace” Lewis (@RealTurkana) April 30, 2020
He is right, it was spectacular in the sense of how it is possible that the leader of the free world ignored ALL of the warning signs in his daily briefings in January and on top of that started down playing the whole virus danger to the American public.
Trump somehow thinks that 60k dead Americans (and counting), 20 million unemployed, and a $4 trillion deficit are "spectacular". https://t.co/hIyxWFoeXX
Obama and his team left Trump a thorough handbook on pandemics and a top notch team to monitor and deal with such a crisis. Trump threw it all in the trash. Apparently they were supposed to leave him with the tests for a pandemic that came nearly 4 years after they left office. https://t.co/OKPnLK6S8q
“Spectacular”, like “awesome”, is one of those ambiguous words that doesn’t necessarily mean good or bad. Merrian-Webster describes as “of, relating to, or being a spectacle“, where spectacle is: https://t.co/gtfUfbXNq8. The spectacle is the point, it distracts from everything.
She certainly found her soulmate. "thou shalt not bear false witness" clearly doesn't apply to the Pences.
Vice President Mike Pence’s wife, Karen, is claiming that her husband didn’t know about the Mayo Clinic’s policy requiring visitors to wear masks when he toured the Minnesota facility without one on Tuesday.
“As our medical experts have told us, wearing a mask prevents you from spreading the disease, and knowing that he doesn’t have COVID-19, he didn’t wear one,” Karen Pence told Fox & Friends on Thursday morning. “It was actually after he left Mayo Clinic that he found out they have a policy of asking everyone to wear a mask. You know, someone who’s worked on this whole task force for over two months is not someone who would have done anything to offend anyone, or hurt anyone, or scare anyone, so I’m glad you gave me an opportunity to talk about that.”
The @MayoClinic told reporters it “shared the masking policy with the VP’s office" before his arrival. Karen Pence says Mike Pence didn't find out about it until after he left. So either someone is lying or Pence's staff didn't do its job. https://t.co/0GpxVsQMj0
Business Insider reports: This contradicts the Mayo Clinic’s claim — which it tweeted and then later deleted on Tuesday — that it “informed” Pence about its mask requirement prior to his visit. The vice president defended his decision not to wear a mask on Tuesday, arguing that he’s regularly tested negative for the virus. “As vice president of the United States I’m tested for the coronavirus on a regular basis, and everyone who is around me is tested for the coronavirus,” Pence said, according to NBC. “Since I don’t have the coronavirus, I thought it’d be a good opportunity for me to be here, to be able to speak to these researchers these incredible healthcare personnel and look them in the eye and say thank you.”
A short time after her interview aired on Thursday, “Karen Pence” began trending on Twitter:
BREAKING: Karen Pence says Mike didn’t know about the hospital regulation of wearing a mask during his tour. That is a lie. Pence and his staff were told by the hospital it was mandatory. Pence should be removed from the coronavirus task force. Pence failed us all.
All of us who traveled with him were notified by the office of @VP the day before the trip that wearing of masks was required by the @MayoClinic and to prepare accordingly. https://t.co/LFqh27LusD
— Chrissy in the Dumbest Dystopia (@C_Stroop) April 30, 2020
Karen Pence lying for her husband that he wasn't informed about Mayo Clinic's mask policy is just preposterous. Mayo tweeted that it informed Mike Pence prior to his visit but deleted it after being intimidated. Pence saw everyone around him wear one but was too arrogant to care.
In an all-too-familiar storyline, a Catholic high school in Ohio has dismissed a beloved gay teacher for exercising his freedom to marry.
In this case, the timing is somewhat peculiar given that the teacher, James Zimmerman (pictured), reportedly tied the knot with his husband in 2016.
Perhaps administrators at Archbishop Alter High School in Kettering, where Zimmerman has taught English for the last 23 years, viewed the COVID-19 crisis as a potential distraction from their dirty deed. Or, who knows, maybe Zimmerman was emboldened to come out to his students during distance learning.
That’s all speculation because — as seems to be the norm in these cases — school principal Lourdes Lambert isn’t really talking, other than to say that a “concern” about Zimmerman was sent directly to the Cincinnati archdiocese, and calling the situation “unfortunate.” In fact, much of what is known comes from a former student, David Beck, who summarized the situation on Facebook.
“It has been brought to my attention from several trusted sources that my 11th grade high school honors English teacher Jim Zimmerman has been fired from his job at Archbishop Alter High School in Kettering, Ohio for being married to a man,” Beck wrote. “He’s been married since 2016, one year after marriage equality passed…Supposedly some misguided soul found his marriage certificate and brought it to the attention of the Archdiocese. How convenient that he is fired now, during the pandemic, as to sweep it so easily under the rug. If these reports are true, this is blatant discrimination, and we need to band together to stop it.”
The Dayton Daily News reports: Teachers in Catholic Archdiocese of Cincinnati schools sign an annual “teacher-minister” contract that includes an agreement to refrain from any conduct that is “in contradiction to Catholic social doctrine or morals.” Examples listed in the contract include “cohabitation outside marriage, sexual activity out of wedlock and same-sex sexual activity,” among several others. The contract also says promoting such conduct as being acceptable also is a violation. Several Alter High School graduates and supporters of the teacher argued on social media against the removal this week, with one calling the moving hypocritical and another saying she would stop donating to the school. Others praised the educator’s ability as a teacher, while one said the teacher displayed “Jesus’ teachings of love and acceptance.” The school posted a statement on its Facebook page Monday, citing “a great deal of online and social media discussion” on the issue, and saying the school must “adhere to Archdiocesan policy.” The post later was taken down.
A Change.org petition calling for Zimmerman’s reinstatement has garnered more than 10,000 signatures in just two days.
“He is the favorite teacher for many of the students and well known by students who don’t even have him in class. He is a teacher who does not just teach the curriculum but also teaches important life lessons,” Michael Ferguson wrote in the petition. “The Church has always told me and my fellow students to love and accept others. … But what the Archdiocese is doing is not accepting nor loving Mr. Zimmerman but pushing him away just because who he loves.”
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) speaks during a news briefing at the Capitol in Washington, DC, on April 21. | Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images
Jane Mayer on how McConnell exemplifies the GOP’s “cult of winning.”
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell is a nihilist.
More than any other politician in recent memory, McConnell’s life is a monument to self-dealing and partisan hackery.
His devotion to winning at all costs, to ensuring that there are no limits on private money in politics, to bending the rules and shunning public opinion, has done incalculable damage to constitutional norms in the US. As my colleague Andrew Prokop noted back in 2017, McConnell has almost singlehandedly broken the Senate — and with it, American politics.
New Yorker writer Jane Mayer is the latest to take a deep dive into the life and mind of McConnell. In a lengthy profile for the April 20, 2020 issue, Mayer documents McConnell’s capitulations to President Donald Trump and tries to explain what’s motivating them — or at least what people who know McConnell think is motivating him.
Her answer is familiar: power. It’s the only thing McConnell appears to want, and there’s no ideology behind it, no real worldview, no purpose. But Mayer manages to unearth some new revelations about McConnell’s corruption and some of the behind-the-scenes dealings.
I spoke to Mayer by phone about what she learned, what surprised her, and what she thinks of McConnell’s role in shaping the modern Republican Party. A lightly edited transcript of our conversation follows.
Sean Illing
What did you learn about McConnell over the course of this story that you didn’t know when you walked into it?
Jane Mayer
I guess I thought that he was an ideologue of a certain kind and what I discovered is that he actually has almost no fixed ideology. It’s pretty hard to find any important issue that he hasn’t switched positions on at some point or another when it was convenient for him. Whether it’s abortion or campaign spending or many other issues, he just switches like a chameleon when he needs to and I hadn’t really realized how many times he’s done this and how easily he did it.
Sean Illing
I interviewed one of McConnell’s biographers, Alec MacGillis, and he pointed to the same thing: There’s just no consistent commitment to anything in McConnell’s political life except for winning the next election.
Jane Mayer
What’s interesting, and MacGillis writes about this in his book on McConnell, is that this very much reflects the trajectory of the Republican Party since maybe the Reagan years. I covered Reagan for the Wall Street Journal and there was at least some content to the ideology at that point, which was sort of a rebellion against liberalism in favor of small government. But all we have now, and McConnell really exemplifies this, is a cult of winning.
Sean Illing
A lot of the conservatives you quote criticize McConnell for his obsequiousness toward Trump, but I’m curious if you talked to Republicans who defended McConnell or at least rationalized his nihilism in this moment.
Jane Mayer
Well, there’s Chris Christie, who sort of admires McConnell in the way that people who think gaining and retaining power is the only measure admire him. But I don’t know, McConnell has this reputation as a shrewd political operator, but some of the concessions he’s making to Trump may backfire on him in a big way.
Sean Illing
Do you think McConnell will live to regret his capitulation to Trump?
Jane Mayer
I think the only measure will be who wins. He’ll think he did the right thing if he’s re-elected and his Republican majority holds in the Senate. Nothing else matters. If Trump’s re-elected, he’ll think he played it smart. But to be honest, I don’t even think he’s a big supporter of Trump. Based on what people around him told me, I think he would have been just as happy, if not happier, if Trump had been defeated because then he, McConnell, would’ve been the most important Republican in the country and the most powerful.
Sean Illing
Someone you quoted said that the GOP changed beneath McConnell’s feet and that he just rode the wave wherever it took him regardless of the costs. But as I read your piece, I kept wondering if that almost lets McConnell off the hook in a way. You could say that McConnell is a reflection of his times, or you could say that he helped make the times what they are. I’d argue it’s the latter — what do you think?
Jane Mayer
Oh, I totally agree that it’s the latter. He’s not just a passive bystander in this. McConnell is an active participant in this devolution, he has helped push the country in a certain direction. I interviewed a historian who I didn’t end up quoting in the end but who’s an expert in the rise of Hitler before World War II, and he was likening McConnell to Paul von Hindenburg, a German statesman who was part of the political establishment and thought he could control an autocrat and realized too late that he had unleashed something he couldn’t contain.
Now, I want to be clear and say that there’s no analogy to that period in history, but the historian’s point, which I think is right, is that there’s at least a weak echo of this in McConnell’s orientation to someone like Trump. McConnell is just chasing power wherever it takes him, and in doing that, he has actively shaped the world we’re in right now.
Sean Illing
Pushing the country “in a certain direction” is an interesting choice of words and gets at what’s so maddening about McConnell. It would somehow be better if he at least believed in something, even if it was an insanely blinkered worldview. But it’s so obvious that he doesn’t care which direction we go, as long as he has a seat at the table when we get there.
Jane Mayer
It’s all tactical, no strategy, no vision. I talked to John Yarmuth, a Democratic Congressman from Louisville, who told me that McConnell’s very smart but he’s not intellectual. If you tried to have a conversation with him about some big issue that we’re facing as a society, like climate change or artificial intelligence, he wouldn’t be able to have that conversation and he wouldn’t be interested in it. He’s interested in winning and nothing else. He’s devoted to the tactical game of politics in a way I just haven’t seen before.
Sean Illing
A conservative you cite in the piece said that McConnell is the most corrupt politician in the country. Is that how you feel after reporting this out?
Jane Mayer
Well, what’s corrupt? McConnell would say he’s doing nothing illegal, nothing we’d call criminal. I think he’s the case study in how our democracy has been captured by private interests instead of public interests. It’s a deeply corrupt process that has hurt the country, even if it isn’t technically illegal. McConnell has played a huge role in legalizing all of these practices.
Sean Illing
We’re short on time but I want to highlight a couple examples of the sort of corruption you’re talking about. You described a $250,000 donation to an academic center at the University of Louisville named after McConnell.
What happened there?
Jane Mayer
There’s a judge named Gregory Van Tatenhove, who is on the federal court in Kentucky. His appointment was pushed by McConnell. He was championed by McConnell and I learned that this judge’s wife later contributed $250,000 to an academic center that’s named for McConnell. It’s called the McConnell Center at the University of Louisville and it has a permanent exhibit that honors McConnell’s career and place in history. Is that corruption? It looks a lot like a “Thank you for putting me on the bench,” and maybe a way to curry favor with McConnell for any future promotions to a higher bench.
All that said, I just have to say that we got commentary and pushback from the judge who said it was not his money, that it was his wife’s money and that it has nothing to do with his judgeship. It’s just because his wife went to the University of Louisville and was a supporter of that center, which had supported her when she was an undergraduate.
People can judge for themselves. $250,000 is a lot of money from the wife of a federal judge. That’s a very big gift and I filed a public records search to find out about what money was going into the McConnell Center. It’s a cause McConnell really cares about. If you want to please him, it’s a good way to do it.
Sean Illing
This “contribution” wasn’t public knowledge?
Jane Mayer
I guess that money was not disclosed in any kind of public way. I got the records through a records search, but it took a long time before they were made available and that contribution was hidden. It was just an unnamed bank account and I had to go back at them a second time to make them disclose to me whose bank account it was. It wasn’t as if this was something that was being publicly mentioned in any big way at the time when I was reporting on it.
Sean Illing
Tell me about Joe and Kelly Craft.
Jane Mayer
Joe Craft is one of the bigger coal barons in America and his company, Alliance Resource Partners, has been a big backer of McConnell. His wife, Kelly Craft, with the help of McConnell, was nominated and confirmed first as ambassador to Canada by Trump and now ambassador to the United Nations.
Now, this is a position that’s been held by people like Adlai Stevenson and Daniel Patrick Moynihan — serious people. Someone I interviewed told me it was just “unbelievable” to appoint her to that position. It is, for all intents and purposes, the first real job that Kelly Craft has had. She’s a fundraiser without much experience in the diplomatic world. It looks, again, like a nice fat, “Thank you,” for a donor’s wife.
Sean Illing
I know you have to go, so one last question: How would you sum up McConnell’s impact on American politics?
Jane Mayer
That’s a big question. I see McConnell as having legitimized the role of money in overwhelming our democracy — that’s his biggest legacy. I think his second biggest legacy is in having placed the pursuit of power over the public good during the Trump years. That’s how he’ll be remembered.
Support Vox’s explanatory journalism
Every day at Vox, we aim to answer your most important questions and provide you, and our audience around the world, with information that has the power to save lives. Our mission has never been more vital than it is in this moment: to empower you through understanding. Vox’s work is reaching more people than ever, but our distinctive brand of explanatory journalism takes resources — particularly during a pandemic and an economic downturn. Your financial contribution will not constitute a donation, but it will enable our staff to continue to offer free articles, videos, and podcasts at the quality and volume that this moment requires. Please consider making a contribution to Vox today.
After scrapping plans to consider remote voting last week, House Democrats announced Monday on a caucuswide call that they would move ahead on addressing the issue next week. Though they did not commit to an exact timeline, Democratic leaders said they expect to hold a vote as early as next week on a rules change that will allow members to vote on bills by proxy due to the coronavirus epidemic, according to The Hill. Members who are unable to be physically present in the Capitol will be able to authorize colleagues who are there to vote on their behalf.
Democrats had originally planned to hold a vote on the matter during a floor vote last week on a $484 billion pandemic relief bill for small businesses and hospitals. But they delayed consideration of the issue after Republicans objected to the rules change, saying that lawmakers should be doing their jobs in person just like many essential workers do.
Now the feeling in the caucus seems to be that they must take responsible action regardless of GOP objections. "As we urge the public to observe social distancing practices, comply with shelter-in-place orders, and telework as much as possible, Congress must adapt itself to the public health threat our nation faces," members of the New Democrat Coalition wrote in a letter urging their leadership to act.
House Rules Committee chair Jim McGovern, who first unveiled the remote voting proposal last week, also penned an op-ed this week in the Washington Post stressing the urgency of the matter. McGovern said having all members go home to their districts—some of which are hotspots—then return to Washington to congregate in the Capitol was a "recipe for disaster."
"The status quo has become unacceptable and dangerous—not just to members of Congress, but more importantly, to everyone we come in contact with," he wrote. “I have always believed that whenever possible, any changes to House rules should be bipartisan. I still believe that today. Inaction, however, is simply not an option. The need to adapt is urgent.”
Democratic House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer has been trying to find a way forward with GOP Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy. Democrats are also anxious to conduct some committee business virtually, such as interviewing Trump administration officials.
On the phone call, Democratic leaders said the House would reconvene Monday.
An electrical engineer from Silicon Valley got a $69 million contract to produce ventilators after tweeting at President Donald Trump last month.
But the engineer, Yaron Oren-Pines (pictured), never delivered any of the 1,450 ventilators to the state of New York, which ordered them from him in response to a recommendation from the president’s Coronavirus Task Force.
BuzzFeed News reports: On March 27, as emergency rooms in New York and across the country began filling with coronavirus patients struggling to breathe, President Donald Trump posted on Twitter to urge Ford and General Motors to “START MAKING VENTILATORS, NOW!” One of the thousands of replies that the tweet attracted struck an equally urgent tone: “We can supply ICU Ventilators, invasive and noninvasive. Have someone call me URGENT.” Its author was Yaron Oren-Pines, an electrical engineer in Silicon Valley. A specialist in mobile phone technology, he currently has just 75 followers on Twitter and no apparent experience in government contracting or medical devices. … Not a single ventilator ever arrived.
The state is now trying to recoup the money it paid to Oren-Pines, who refused comment.
Announcing TWO Tom the Dancing Bug books coming in May from Clover Press, in celebration of the comic's upcoming 30th anniversary--> Tom the Dancing Bug: Into the Trumpverse, and The Super-Fun-Pak Comix Reader.Information about the books, including how to pre-order, and special offers HERE.
"Behold the wondrous, whimsical, witty world that is Tom the Dancing Bug! If you're someone who's not a fan of potent political humor with an incisive absurdist twist that's not only consistently funny, but downright therapeutic for an ailing world, I suggest you avoid this book like the plague. For everyone else, it's a MUST-READ!"
-Mark Hamill
JOIN Tom the Dancing Bug's INNER HIVE. Get exclusive access to comics before they are published, sneak peeks, insider scoops, and lots of other stuff. JOIN TODAY.
Clearly he can't be set free and he thinks that just because you do it in public means it isn't criminal. Gee, I wonder where he got that idea.
Tony Spell, the pastor of Life Tabernacle Church outside of Baton Rouge, Louisiana, has already been charged for violating Gov. John Bel Edwards’ stay-at-home orders by holding packed church services amid the ongoing novel coronavirus pandemic. He was recently arrested on improper backing and aggravated assault charges for allegedly reversing a church van in the direction of a protester; after turning himself in, he was quickly released to a crowd of parishioners in the parking lot of the local police station. Unsurprisingly, he held a service that very same evening.
Most recently he defied orders yet again by holding large services while placed under house arrest, as reported by local outletThe Advocate. At the church’s most recent Sunday service, Spell reportedly wore an ankle bracelet. The pastor declared: “I’m not hiding anymore.”
As reported by NBC News, Spell had to wear the ankle bracelet because he would not agree to actually practice social distancing, according to his attorney, Joseph Long. In a statement to the news outlet, Long stressed that Spell lived within 50 yards of the church.
Local outlet WAFB-TV reported that when a judge asked Spell if he’d comply with orders and limit the number of people who can gather at once, Spell quoted a Bible verse. When asked by the judge a second time, he reportedly went silent, which the judge took as a communication that Spell would not comply.
Spell has been charged with six misdemeanor counts of violating the governor’s coronavirus orders. And it’s no meager discrepancy in number, either; the order bans crowds of more than 10 people. At one service, as reported by Reuters, for example, 1,200 people attended. The church also has a history of having buses sent out for people to more easily attend services. While outreach outside of a pandemic is one thing, during a pandemic it’s something else entirely. In the past, Spell has argued that his church is cleaned on a daily basis and that attendees stay six feet apart. As The Daily Beast pointed out, however, most people did not wear masks to the recent service. You can see the same in the Facebook live stream from Sunday.
As reported by The Advocate, Spell was released with conditions. He must “refrain from any and all criminal conduct,” which includes but is not limited to “strictly abiding by all emergency orders issued by the Governor of the State of Louisiana,” according to the publication.
One parishioner has reportedly died from COVID-19, though it’s not confirmed where he contracted the virus. Spell has denied the death was related to COVID-19 and suggested it was the result of another medical condition.
What’s the easiest solution for people of faith amid a pandemic? In today’s world of technology, a live stream will generally do just fine. Even the Pope is doing it.
Again, if someone tried to do this to a cop, they'd be shot. But when a cop does it to a kid? defended by his department.
Viral video of a violent police encounter shows a California police officer forcing a 14-year-old boy's face into the dirt and punching him in the chest in an attempt to detain him Monday. Yralina Tufono, the teen’s sister, told NBC News her brother, Elijah Tufono, was targeted because he held a Swisher cigar. “All of this” was “over a swisher,” the 20-year-old also tweeted. Although she didn’t witness the incident, her account of what sparked the officer’s attention seems to match that of the sheriff’s office investigating the encounter.
Yralina Tufono said in another tweet that her brother was left with scratches and chest pains and charged with resisting arrest. She said Elijah has “a serious heart condition that could be triggered very easily by being hit” in his chest or back. “He’s a kid and has never been in any kind of trouble with the law,” Yralina Tufono tweeted. “He was very scared and in so much pain!!!”
My baby brother who is 14 years old. All of this over a swisherðÂ�Â�¤ thereâÂ�Â�s more footage but I wasnâÂ�Â�t able to upload it all. Please repost, we just want justice for my baby!ðÂ�Â�ÂðÂ�Â�¯ #JUSTICE4JAHpic.twitter.com/reftDDyHha
Video of the incident has been viewed more than 190,000 times. In it, the officer is shown straddling the teen while Elijah was down on the ground with his back on the dirt. At one point, the officer grabs Elijah’s wrist and attempts to twist it behind his back, flipping the teen on his stomach before smashing his face into the dirt, the video shows. Somehow, the teen is able to roll onto his back again, when the officer swings at him repeatedly. The video shows the cop landing at least two punches in Elijah’s chest area. Someone on the scene can be heard yelling “stop” repeatedly. “Stop hitting him, bro,” the person said. Still, the officer yanks and flips the teen onto his stomach again, the video showed. “Ah,” Elijah could be heard yelling.
Sacramento County Sheriff's Sgt. Tess Deterding said in a statement posted to the police department’s website that it’s important to put the video footage into context, “especially in relation to a use of force incident." The officer, who wasn’t named in the release, was patrolling the area of Mills Station Road and Mather Field Road, which is about 15 miles east of Sacramento, after he received "complaints from citizens about hand-to-hand sales of alcohol, tobacco and drugs to minors," Deterding said. When the officer arrived on the scene, he saw “what he believed to be a hand-to-hand exchange between an adult and juvenile,” the spokesperson said.
“As the deputy turned around, he lost sight of the adult, who left the area,” Deterding said. “When the deputy approached the juvenile, the juvenile was uncooperative and refused to give the deputy basic identifying information.
“He told the deputy he was 18 years old. Having reasonable suspicion that criminal activity was occurring, the deputy attempted to detain the juvenile so he could conduct further investigation,” Deterding added. “The juvenile became physically resistive at that time, causing the deputy to lose control of his handcuffs, which landed several feet away. The deputy attempted to maintain control of the juvenile without his handcuffs and while alone waiting for his partners to arrive and assist him.”
The officer eventually “recovered tobacco products” from the teen, “which is presumably the reason for his resistance,” Deterding said. The child was cited and released to his guardians.
“This type of situation is hard on everyone—the young man, who resisted arrest, and the officer, who would much rather have him cooperate,” Deterding said. “The community should know our deputies have a heart for the Rancho Cordova community, especially for the youth they serve through the schools, PAL sports, and our new Youth Center.” The Sheriff’s Office and Rancho Cordova Police Department are investigating the incident.
Daily Wire editor Ben Shapiro suggested that a 30-year-old life was worth more than an 80-year-old life in a discussion with Dave Rubin on Wednesday about when the coronavirus lockdowns should be rolled back.
Said Shapiro: “Nobody just wants to say the obvious truth, which is we’re all making actuarial deductions about what are the costs in terms of how many human lives, how many years of life, because that is an actual issue in actuarial tables. If somebody who is 81, dies of Covid-19 that is not the same thing as somebody who is 30 dying of Covid-19. … If grandma dies in a nursing home at age 81, and that’s tragic and that’s terrible, also the life expectancy in the United States is 80. So, that is not the same thing. In moral terms, you want to save every life you can. At the same time, to pretend that it is of the same, it is the same calculation, the age of the person, no public policy acts like that, not a single public policy in America acts like that.”
Ben Shapiro: "If somebody who is 81 dies of COVID-19, that is not the same thing as somebody who is 30 dying of COVID-19…If grandma dies in a nursing home at age 81, that's tragic and it's terrible, also the life expectancy in the United States is 80" pic.twitter.com/L2UJi95OUN
Writes Mediaite: “Shapiro’s notable sang froid about elderly people being struck down by the coronavirus stands in stark contrast to his tone several years ago, when wrote an anti-Obamacare piece for the far right website, Breitbart, that was not-so-subtly titled ‘The Death Panels Are Coming.’ In that piece, Shapiro railed against the prospect of the Affordable Care Act resulting in ‘rationing of care’ and listed several examples of federal healthcare guidelines that suggested curtailing preventative tests like mammographies, colonoscopies, and PSA screening for adults in their seventies and eighties as a cost-saving measure.”
The full interview:
Ben Shapiro, 2017: "A first-trimester fetus has moral value… more value than just a cluster of cells. If left to its natural processes, it will grow into a baby. The real question is, where do you draw the line?"
Ben Shapiro draws close to his sainted grandmother’s lovely face. “This isn’t particularly sad, given your advanced age,” he whispers, closing the coffin lid.
COVID is immune to the usual disinformation tactics. Bodies piling up and ambulances lining up will get noticed.
Russian President Vladimir Putin wearing protective gear visits a hospital where patients infected with Covid-19 novel are being treated in the settlement of Kommunarka in Moscow on March 24, 2020. | Alexey Druzhinin/SPUTNIK/AFP via Getty Images
The crisis continues to be a massive challenge for the Russian dictator.
Russia was always going to struggle if a large outbreak occurred in the country, and experts predicted one almost certainly would due to the country’s proximity to China and tightly packed cities, including the capital, Moscow. Hospitals in urban areas lack reliable medical equipment and staff to operate them, to say nothing of the state of medical facilities in rural areas.
Russian President Vladimir Putin on Tuesday admitted that the country had a shortage of critical personal protective equipment for health care workers, and warned that the worst the pandemic is yet to come.
“Ahead of us is a new stage, perhaps the most intense stage of the fight against the epidemic,” he said in a national address, in which he also announced an extension of his nation’s lockdown until May 11. “The risks of getting infected are at the highest level, and the threat, the mortal danger of the virus persists.”
“Russia has managed to slow down the spread of the epidemic, but we haven’t passed the peak yet,” Putin continued.
Millions of Russians could lose their jobs this year due to the lockdown and oil revenues, which make up a significant portion of Russia’s economy, have dropped sharply as people around the world have stopped traveling and business have shuttered due to the coronavirus.
As if that weren’t bad enough, a top Russian nuclear official said Tuesday that the virus is threatening the safety of three “nuclear towns” — places where nuclear research is conducted in Russia, including the birthplace of the Soviet atomic bomb — by getting top scientists sick.
This is perhaps the biggest test has Putin faced during his 20 years in power. He markets himself as Russia’s hero, the only man who can restore the former Soviet Union’s greatness and bring stability to his country. Anything that messes with that image — such as a nationwide health crisis — ruins the myth he and his allies have cultivated for decades.
The problem for him, and the millions of Russians counting on his leadership, is that when it comes to fighting the coronavirus, macho posturing and disinformation just don’t cut it.
Russia’s health care system is quickly reaching capacity, if it hasn’t already
Earlier this month, Michael Favorov, who led the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s Eastern European and Central Asian programs, told me that Russia is “probably in the early stage of the same epidemic which is going on in the United States now.”
“They are facing significant increases of cases within the next month” in the capital and beyond, “and a significant increase in the number of deaths.”
Favorov’s prediction seems to have come true. Just look at the chart below, with coronavirus statistics from Our World in Data. After a late start, Russia’s daily confirmed cases (in purple) have steadily risen over the past month, more so than in previous European epicenters like Spain and Italy.
And those growing numbers are starting to overwhelm Russia’s health care system.
A viral video circulating throughout Russia, filmed by an ambulance driver who says he waited nine hours to drop off a patient, shows a long line of ambulances waiting silently to get into a hospital just outside Moscow.
В Химках образовалась пробка из машин скорой помощи с пациентами, у многих из которых подозревают коронавирус и пневмонию.
Yelena Alikhashkina, a patient who feared she had the coronavirus, told Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty two weeks ago about her experience.
“I waited 3.5 hours for the ambulance,” she said, and it didn’t get much better after that. After she got in the ambulance, she said, it took 40 minutes before anybody answered the hotline to tell the ambulance where to take her. And when she finally arrived at the designated hospital, “there were 30 ambulances already in the line.”
Judy Twigg, an expert on Russia’s health care system at Virginia Commonwealth University, told me the long lines could be a function of Russia’s policy to have some hospitals treat only coronavirus patients while others handle only non-infected clients. While that may make treatment inside the coronavirus facility more efficient, it limits the amount of space available to those with the disease.
Dr. Vasiliy Vlassov, an epidemiologist at the Higher School of Economics in Moscow, told me that the “government continues to open more and more hospitals for Covid-19 patients, and they are filled quickly.” Thus, it seems the amount of patients continues to reach the country’s health care capacity.
But the situation inside Russia’s coronavirus hospitals isn’t great, either.
Experts say a lot of the equipment Russian hospitals have, including ventilators, break down with alarming frequency. Russia is having more produced, but it’s unclear if those who need them will have them in time, especially as the rich hoard them.
Further, Russia generally is short of the equipment that goes with ventilators, like oxygen and anesthetic sedatives. And the country appears to be short of well-trained 24/7 intensive care nurses needed to care for patients on ventilators. Putin himself acknowledged on Tuesday that there is a shortage of protective equipment for health care workers.
Even if medical facilities had all the necessary equipment, it doesn’t appear they would have the requisite space for patients.
If Russia continues to have around 6,000 confirmed coronavirus cases per day, as it has for about the last 10 days, Twigg said hospitals in Moscow and St. Petersburg “will get overwhelmed soon, as it looks like they’re already at capacity.”
Physicians like Irina Sheikina, from the capital’s Hospital No. 15, agree. “There are already nearly 1,500 patients, all with pneumonia,” she told the same outlet. “There are not enough beds. They put patients wherever there is free space.”
A video from the Moscow Times shows one of the nurses explaining why she left the hospital. “I worked for two days straight, sometimes three,” the unnamed medical professional said. “They stopped feeding us. They started handing out unsanitary [used] equipment to us.”
“No one paid us for extra shifts,” she continued. “I want people to listen to us finally, and I want us to be paid the money Vladimir Putin has promised us, especially for those working in these conditions.”
From almost every angle, then, Russia’s coronavirus crisis has hit — and hit hard.
“We in Russia are still in doubt about what is going on in the country”
No one can accuse Putin of standing by as the coronavirus swept across the globe.
That same month, passengers flying into Moscow from China, Iran, and South Korea — the coronavirus epicenters at the time — had to undergo tests once they stepped off the plane. Meanwhile, citizens returning from Europe would have their temperatures checked and be ordered to quarantine for 14 days at home.
Experts told me those measures, while tough, at best limited the number of infected people in the country and perhaps prevented an even larger outbreak than the one Russia is currently experiencing.
But it’s clear that Putin and his team have gotten more serious as the coronavirus crisis got more serious, too.
In an April 1 videoconference, Putin told government members to tell him truthful information when he needs it. “The results of our work should correspond to what is happening at present,” he said. That, for VCU’s Twigg, was surprising. “It was an implicit admission that what’s been going on until now was everybody lying to each other,” she told me.
Now Putin is extending lockdowns, telling citizens that the worst is yet to come, and having new hospitals built. There’s no question that he’s taking the crisis seriously, but the state of Russia’s health care system looks like it isn’t ready for the moment.
Some experts still suspect that the country’s official coronavirus statistics aren’t fully transparent, perhaps in an effort to make the situation look better than it is. Pro-Kremlin accounts on social media usually still focus on the low number of deaths, for example, as a way to say Putin has everything under control.
“We in Russia are still in doubt about what is going on in the country,” Vlassov, the epidemiologist, told me. “It’s not only doubt in the state’s statistics, but also in the picture in the social media.”
“The number of lethal cases ascribed to Covid-19 are still low,” he continued. “I think that it is a result of the misclassification of deaths from [the disease] to the other conditions or complications.”
That’s happened before: In 2015, Putin said he wanted to lower the death rate caused by cardiovascular disease in Russia. Almost immediately, hospitals began to report that fewer people were dying from heart conditions. What made that more suspicious is that there was a rise — at about the same rate — of deaths from other causes.
No one in the world, except for maybe Putin, has the full picture of what the crisis really looks like in Russia. But based on what’s already known, Putin has a lot more work to do.
Support Vox’s explanatory journalism
Every day at Vox, we aim to answer your most important questions and provide you, and our audience around the world, with information that has the power to save lives. Our mission has never been more vital than it is in this moment: to empower you through understanding. Vox’s work is reaching more people than ever, but our distinctive brand of explanatory journalism takes resources — particularly during a pandemic and an economic downturn. Your financial contribution will not constitute a donation, but it will enable our staff to continue to offer free articles, videos, and podcasts at the quality and volume that this moment requires. Please consider making a contribution to Vox today.
This is what happens when a religious hack becomes AG. Looks familiar, a la AZ.
From Judge David J. Hale's order in Maryville Baptist Church, Inc. v. Beshear (Apr. 18), rejecting a challenge to the Gov. Beshear's shutdown order that included religious worship:
Plaintiffs first argue that the Governor's orders amount to unconstitutional restrictions on their rights to free speech and assembly…. [T]o support their argument that the orders "are content-based restrictions on constitutionally protected liberties," Plaintiffs appear to mischaracterize the Commonwealth's prohibition on gatherings.
The order in question states in no uncertain terms that "[a]ll mass gatherings are hereby prohibited." This prohibition applies not only to faith-based gatherings, but to "any event or convening that brings together groups of individuals, including, but not limited to, community, civic, public, leisure, … or sporting events; parades; concerts; festivals; conventions; fundraisers; and similar activities." The "19 categories of businesses" allowed by subsequent order to continue operating are not, as Plaintiffs repeatedly suggest, exceptions to the prohibition on mass gatherings. Rather, by the plain terms of the March 19 Order, "[a]ll mass gatherings are … prohibited."
Plaintiffs seek to compare in-person attendance at church services with presence at a liquor store or "supercenter store[]." The latter, however, is a singular and transitory experience: individuals enter the store at various times to purchase various items; they move around the store individually—subject to strict social-distancing guidelines set out by state and federal health authorities—and they leave when they have achieved their purpose. Plaintiffs' desired church service, in contrast, is by design a communal experience, one for which a large group of individuals come together at the same time in the same place for the same purpose.
A more apt comparison, then, is a restaurant or entertainment venue—where patrons are gathered simultaneously for a longer period of time to eat and socialize—or a movie, concert, or sporting event, where individuals come together in a group in the same place at the same time for a common experience. And all such activities are temporarily prohibited.
Similarly unpersuasive is Plaintiffs' contention that the orders violate their right to freely exercise their religion by discriminating against religious conduct. Again, the order temporarily prohibits "[a]ll mass gatherings," not merely religious gatherings. Religious expression is not singled out. And further, contrary to Plaintiffs' assertions, there are no identified exceptions to the prohibition on mass gatherings [such as for liquor, warehouse, and supercenter stores]. {In service of their argument, Plaintiffs make liberal use of the term "gather." Merriam-Webster defines "gather" as "to come together in a body"; a "gathering" is an "assembly" or "meeting." These terms do not, as generally understood, encompass separate, uncoordinated shopping trips by unrelated individuals. Presumably, no coordinated gathering in a grocery or liquor store would be permitted under the temporary restrictions.}
Finally, to the extent Plaintiffs argue that the orders violate the Kentucky Religious Freedom Restoration Act by substantially burdening the exercise of their sincerely held religious beliefs, the Court finds, based on the materials submitted by Plaintiffs, that the Governor will likely be able to meet the Act's requirement of "clear and convincing evidence that [the government] has a compelling governmental interest in" the restrictions "and has used the least restrictive means to further that interest." Plaintiffs do not contend that the Commonwealth lacks a compelling governmental interest in restricting mass gatherings to prevent the spread of COVID-19.
As to whether the Commonwealth has employed "the least restrictive means to further that interest," Plaintiffs merely point to orders issued in other states that declared religious gatherings exempt from mass-gathering prohibitions. They offer no evidence that such exemptions are equally effective in preventing the spread of the disease. Given that COVID-19 is widely understood to be transmitted through person-to-person contact, including persons with and without symptoms of illness, Beshear will likely be able to demonstrate that restricting large in-person gatherings is the least restrictive means of accomplishing the Commonwealth's objective.
Now, from the Kentucky AG's friend-of-the-court brief for the Commonwealth in Maryville Baptist Church, Inc. v. Beshear, filed today, supporting plaintiffs' motion for an injunction pending appeal:
On March 19, Governor Beshear banned Kentuckians from participating in all faith-based gatherings of any kind. Six days later, he ordered the closure of any business or organization that he does not consider "life-sustaining"—a vaguely defined term that includes newspapers, law firms, liquor stores, and hardware stores, but not churches, synagogues, or mosques. These restrictions apply no matter how large the gathering might be, no matter where the people might get together, and regardless of whether they practice safe social-distancing and good hygiene. This is unconstitutional….
The Court made two overarching errors in declining to grant a restraining order. First, the Court mistakenly found that Governor Beshear's restrictions are neutral toward religion and generally applicable, overlooking well-established precedent to the contrary that requires the Court to "survey meticulously the circumstances"ofthecase.
Second, the Court mistakenly declared, without significant analysis, that the Governor's orders are likely the "least restrictive means" of addressing the Covid-19 pandemic. And it did so despite the availability of clear, reasonable alternatives to such a sweeping prohibition, which other states currently use. Both errors merit this Court's reconsideration and entry of an injunction pending appeal.
[I.] Governor Beshear's executive orders target religious activity for disfavored treatment.
This case is primarily about two executive orders that Governor Beshear issued in response to the current Covid-19 pandemic. Together, these two orders amount to an outright ban on traditional, in-person religious services of any kind.
The first order, issued on March 19, prohibits "[a]ll mass gatherings." Unlike other states adopting similar measures, "mass gathering" is not defined. Rather, Governor Beshear vaguely describes the scope of his order as "includ[ing] any event or convening that brings together groups of individuals, including, but not limited to, community, civic, public, leisure, faith-based, or sporting events; parades; concerts; festivals; conventions; fundraisers; and similar activities." The broad sweep of this prohibition is undeniable: It applies to gatherings of any number of people. It applies to gatherings in confined spaces as well as the outdoors. It applies to gatherings in which people remain 6 feet apart, and it applies to gatherings in which people drive up and never leave their cars. This order is written as broadly as possible, and it leaves no doubt that all "faith-based" gatherings are illegal.
That's not to say, however, that the order is without exception. It in fact contains two. First, the order states that "a mass gathering does not include normal operations at airports, bus and train stations, medical facilities, libraries, shopping malls and centers, or other spaces where persons may be in transit." Second, the order provides that a mass gathering "does not include typical office environments, factories, or retail or grocery stores where large numbers of people are present, but maintain appropriate social distancing." Religious activities are not included in either exemption.
Six days after prohibiting the vaguely-defined-but-broadly-applicable "mass gatherings," Governor Beshear issued an executive order closing all organizations that are not "life-sustaining." "Life-sustaining" is defined in the order as any organization "that allow[s] Kentuckians to remain Healthy at Home." It includes approximately 19 different categories of businesses and organizations. Religious organizations are not among them.
What does Governor Beshear consider life-sustaining? "Media," is one example, which he defines as, "Newspapers, television, radio, and other media services." Also included on the list are law firms, accounting services, real estate companies, liquor stores, and hardware stores.
The lone reference to religious organizations in the March 25 order allows for religious charities to continue operating to the extent that they "provid[e] food, shelter, and social services, and other necessities of life for economically disadvantaged or special populations, individuals who need assistance as a result of this emergency, and people with disabilities." So while the order does not permit religious organizations to provide religious services to their parishioners and members, it does allow them to provide the kinds of services that the Governor has pre-approved.
Together, the March 19 and March 25 orders impose a sweeping prohibition against religious activity throughout every corner of the Commonwealth. Even though these same orders broadly permit individuals to crowd into hardware stores and law offices, or newsrooms, liquor stores and grocery stores, they do not permit people to attend religious services at a church, mosque, synagogue, or other house of worship, even if they follow social-distancing guidelines. This is, without question, an unconstitutional targeting of religious activity.
The Court mistakenly found that the executive orders do not target religious conduct because "[r]eligious expression is not singled out." It went on to state that "there are no identified exceptions to the prohibition on mass gatherings." This is, respectfully, not accurate. As explained above, the mass-gathering ban permits gatherings in airports, grocery stories, office spaces, and other places "where large numbers of people are present."
Only wordplay allows one to reach a different conclusion. The Court explained that to "gather" ordinarily means "to come together in a body," and that a "gathering" is an "assembly" or "meeting." So, the Court reasoned, "uncoordinated shopping trips by unrelated individuals" at a grocery store or liquor mart do not qualify.
That conclusion, however, overlooks a significant carve-out from the March 19 order. The order permits people to continue their daily routine in "typical office environments," which surely includes "meetings" as the Court explains it. In a "typical office," employees show up together, working for a common purpose during similar hours and often in close proximity. It is exactly the kind of coordinated activity that the Court says is a prohibited mass gathering. Yet the March 19 expressly exempts "typical office environments" from its coverage, while simultaneously singling out "faith-based" activities for no such exemption.
"If the law appears to be neutral and generally applicable on its face, but in practice is riddled with exemptions … the law satisfies the First Amendment only if it advances interests of the highest order and is narrowly tailored in pursuit of those interests." Said another way, even orders that appear facially neutral are not treated as such when they are filled with exemptions for secular activities. Governor Beshear's orders single out faith-based activities for prohibition, while simultaneously allowing similarly risky secular activities to continue. This is quintessential discrimination against religion requiring the state to meet the high burden of strict scrutiny.
Just as troubling is Governor Beshear's refusal to define religious activity as "life-sustaining" for those Kentuckians with sincerely held beliefs about communal worship. Not every state has taken the same discriminatory path. Ohio, a state that has also implemented aggressive social-distancing protocols and shelter-in-place orders, recognized the danger in categorizing some activities as essential but excluding religion from that list …. Governor Beshear issued a similar order three days later, when he set out the 19 differentcategoriesof"life-sustaining"businessesthatcanremainopen.Whilemuch of the wording is the same, Governor Beshear excluded religious organizations from the list of permissibleactivity ….
The exclusion of religious organizations from the list of "life-sustaining" activities is no small matter. Governor Beshear has publicly declared that attending worship service is not life-sustaining, while allowing liquor stores and retailers to continue operating. It is mind-boggling discrimination. Or as the court noted in a similar case, "if beer is 'essential,' so is Easter." On Fire Christian Ctr., 2020 WL 1820249, at *7. The fact that Governor Beshear has identified 19 categories of activities that are, in his judgment, more essential than in-person church services is proof positive of impermissible targeting of religious exercise.
{Nor does it lessen the discriminatory sting that Governor Beshear has recommended Kentuckians attend virtual services as an alternative. With respect, the point of the First Amendment is that Governor Beshear does not get to decide whether a virtual gathering is sufficient for every person of every faith. On this issue, Governor Beshear has gone remarkably far in dictating how Kentuckians should exercise their religion. At his Good Friday daily press conference, the Governor chastised people about what a true "test of faith" is. He proclaimed: "It is not a test of faith in whether you're going to an in-person service, it's a test of faith that you're willing to sacrifice to protect your fellow man, your fellow woman, your fellow Kentuckian, and your fellow American." Yet the First Amendment exists precisely to protect the beliefs of those who disagree.}
The thrust of the March 19 and March 25 orders are clear: Despite the First Amendment and Kentucky's own uniquely strong protections for religious liberty, Governor Beshear has failed to adopt neutral or generally applicable laws to address the current crisis, instead choosing to target religious organizations for disfavored treatment. It is, "'beyond all reason,' unconstitutional." On Fire Christian Ctr., 2020 WL 1820249, at *2 (quoting Jacobson v. Massachusetts, 197 U.S. 11, 31 (1905)).
[II.] The ban on religious worship is not narrowly tailored….
The First Amendment prohibits the government from burdening one's "free exercise" of religion…. In practice, that means the government cannot implement laws "targeting religious beliefs as such." But it also means that "[o]fficial action that targets religious conduct for distinctive treatment cannot be shielded by mere compliance with the requirement of facial neutrality." Public officials, in other words, cannot target religion through selective enforcement of otherwise neutral laws. Rather, laws must be neutral and generally applicable in both text and reality to survive constitutional scrutiny. And "[a] law that targets religious conduct for distinctive treatment or advances legitimate governmental interests only against conduct with a religious motivation will survive strict scrutiny only in rare cases."
No one doubts that the government has a compelling interest in preventing the spread of Covid-19 during the current pandemic. But so far, Governor Beshear has offered no explanation as to why it is necessary to prohibit religious activities that pose exactly the same risk as similar, non-religious activities. And in denying the Plaintiffs a temporary restraining order, this Court never even addressed the issue. Instead, the Court reasoned in a conclusory fashion that the Governor was likely to prevail in his assessment that the broad, ill-defined prohibitions against all religious gatherings are the least-restrictive means of prohibiting the spread of Covid-19. That is, at best, highly implausible.
The error here is most pronounced in the Court's assessment of what it means to "gather." As the Court explains it, a "gathering" is distinct from an "uncoordinated shopping trip[] by unrelated individuals." But presumably, the coronavirus does not care about whether people are "coordinating" or not. And it does not care whether they are in a store as friends, neighbors, or individuals. Rather, as the Court explained, Covid-19 "is widely understood to be transmitted through person-to-person contact," regardless of whether those people came into contact in a "meeting" or in a grocery aisle. So the obvious, least-restrictive means of preventing the spread of Covid-19 is not to target the purpose for which people come into close contact, as Governor Beshear's March 19 order does, but to target the close contact itself. By simply implementing the same social-distancing measures for religious gatherings as for liquor stores, retail chains, and offices, the Governor could achieve the same state interest in a less-restrictive manner.
In fact, the Court's decision implicitly reveals just how imprecise and overbroad the March 19 order is. The Court held that "Beshear will likely be able to demonstrate that restricting large in-person gatherings is the least restrictive means of accomplishing the Commonwealth's objective." But the word "large" is nowhere to be found in the March 19 order's definition of "mass gathering." The term is used in defining one of the exemptions—"office environments … where large numbers of people are present."
So in finding that Governor Beshear's order is the least-restrictive means, the Court actually showed that there are additional ways in which Governor Beshear could restrict his order further. Presumably, for example, the order could permit small gatherings, or gatherings based upon the size of the space in which people meet. Could a congregation of ten individuals, for example, meet for worship in a large auditorium? Surely this would pose no more serious risk of transmitting the virus than an office where "large numbers of people are present." But under the March 19 order, it is impermissible.
Moreover, there is ample evidence to suggest that broadly banning church services is not the least restrictive way of preventing further danger from Covid-19. Tennessee, for example, has not closed its places of worship. Yet Kentucky's hospitalization rate for Covid-19 is more than twice that of Tennessee's, and Tennessee has had 40 percent fewer deaths per capita. And to this date, Governor Beshear has failed to offer any evidence of any kind that closing religious services is more effective than mandatory strict social distancing.
And on the point of geography, Governor Beshear's orders face other problems as well. Governor Beshear has insisted on maintaining a statewide lockdown that does not take into account varying infection rates in different places. Currently, there are 8 counties in Kentucky that have zero reported cases and another 56 counties that have between one and ten. While residents of Jefferson County are free to continue shopping at big box retailers and grocery stores, where they might run into countless strangers as they turn the corner of an aisle, residents in Harlan where there are no reported cases are forbidden from attending church on Sunday. It defies logic to label this as the least-restrictive means of stopping the spread of Covid-19.
Nor can Governor Beshear find support in Jacobson v. Massachusetts. Even under Jacobson, a law is invalid if "purporting to have been enacted to protect the public health, the public morals, or the public safety, [the law] has no real or substantial relation to those objects, or is, beyond all question, a plain, palpable invasion of rights secured by the fundamental law." That is precisely the problem with Governor Beshear's executive orders here. Singling out religious activity for disfavored treatment is the kind of "palpable invasion of rights" that even a pandemic cannot justify. On Fire Christian Ctr., 2020 WL 1820249, at *8 n.73.
[III.] Constitutional requirements aside, the Kentucky Religious Freedom Restoration Act requires enjoining the Governor's orders.
Kentucky law could not be more clear: "Government shall not substantially burden a person's freedom of religion." "Burden" is defined to include "indirect burdens such as withholding benefits, assessing penalties, or an exclusion from programs or access to facilities." There is no question that the worshippers of Maryville Baptist Church have been assessed a penalty due to their exercise of sincerely held religious beliefs—they were, after all, ordered to quarantine. There is also no question that the Governor's orders burden "access" to the facilities of Maryville Baptist Church—the Governor has, after all, ordered that no one attend service at the church.
The question, then, is whether the Governor is likely to prove "by clear and convincing evidence that it has a compelling governmental interest in infringing the specific act or refusal to act and has used the least restrictive means to further that interest." Rev. Stat. 446.350. He has not, and he cannot meet his evidentiary burden in light of his orders—particularly his decision to permit the continued operation of "typical office environments, factories, or retail or grocery stores where large numbers of people are present, but maintain social distancing."
Simply put, permitting worshippers to attend a service where everyone typically remains in the same spot throughout (all the while social distancing) will logically place fewer Kentuckians within six feet of one another than shopping at a grocery store, hardware store, or other retail business where they will continuously pass one another, stand in line together, or bump into one another as they turn a corner. And that is not to mention that in such retail establishments shoppers will pick up and put back goods, push the same shopping carts, and touch the same credit card machines….
Well, killing off a few senators with COVID would be some delicious irony. Is it worth the judges, I wonder?
The House of Representatives, on the advice of the Office of the Attending Physician, has delayed returning to D.C. and to resume in-person work, even while the next phase of coronavirus stimulus becomes more urgent. "The House physician's view," Majority Leader Steny Hoyer said, "was that there was a risk to members that was one he would not recommend taking." It's a risk Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has no problem asking his members to take, and it's not to pass critical aid to the nation.
No, McConnell is bringing back his senators, and all of the staff and all of the maintenance and cafeteria and security workers they require, to confirm more extremist judges. He reiterated that last week when he talked to wing-nut radio host Hugh Hewitt, saying he will "leave no vacancies behind" and that the coronavirus "will not prevent us from achieving that goal." His first priority is promoting an unqualified judge, Justin Walker, to the second highest court in the land. He put Walker ahead of the nation last month when he delayed passing emergency stimulus legislation for days so that he could celebrate Walker back home in Kentucky, and he's doing it again.
Walker's confirmation hearing to the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals in the Judiciary Committee is already scheduled for Tuesday. Never mind that he just got his district court seat in Kentucky in October, despite the fact that the American Bar Association had rated him unqualified because at age 37 and as a law professor, he had never even gone to court. He is, of course, a Federal Society favorite and a McConnell protégé who also clerked for Brett Kavanaugh when he was on a lower court. Of Kavanaugh, Walker said, his "courageous and influential opinions on countless different issues—presidential power, regulatory overreach, religious liberty, the Second Amendment, and the list goes on—leave no doubt that he would be a forceful conservative justice for decades to come." So you know what kind of judge he's going to be, on the court that provides the springboard not just for the big cases the Supreme Court considers, but for future Supreme Court justices.
That's why they're coming back, for Walker and the other appeals court vacancies McConnell wants to pack with extremists. That's why he's endangering all the staff that works in the Senate and all the high-risk senators by forcing them back on Monday to do the nation's work. Not to respond to this coronavirus crisis, but to exploit it.
Huh, it's like killing off 60k americans in 6 weeks may cause you to lose support among the hardest hit demographics. Go figure.
Older white Americans over the age of 65 proved to be some of the most decisive voters in 2016. As demographer William Frey wrote in a post-election analysis: "Whites, especially older whites, were responsible for reversing past Democratic expansion in the Sun Belt states of Florida and North Carolina, as well as for capturing previously Democratic leaning northern states: Iowa, Michigan Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin.”
But according to recent Civiqs data, which tends to be less reactive to current events than many polls, support for Donald Trump among that bloc of 65-plus white voters is eroding in real time, due to Trump’s abysmal handling of the coronavirus response. It probably doesn’t hurt that Trump and other Republicans have been pushing the notion that getting the economy back on track is far more important than saving the lives of older Americans.
Let’s go step by step, beginning with Trump’s overall approval rating. Civiqs shows Trump’s approval rating amid the coronavirus crisis reverting back to 2018 government shutdown levels at 42%.
When looking specifically at voters over 65, the drop-off in support since about mid-March is notable, with Trump’s 53% approval, just before he declared a national emergency, dropping to 50% approval in late April.
But the data for older white independents is darn near eye-popping, with Trump hitting 61% approval around mid-March, before falling to 50% in late April.
That 10-point slide among older white independents is consistent among both men and women, though men’s support for Trump started off higher at the outset. So Trump’s approval among the demographic’s women has dropped from 55% in mid-March to 44% now; while among men, it has dropped from 69% to 58% in the same timeframe.
Even among older white Republicans, Trump has seen a 2-point slide in the last month and a half.
It’s a very interesting trend precisely because older white voters were the demographic group that pierced a hole in the Obama coalition of voters. As Frey noted in 2016, the bloc of white voters over 45 and over 65 constituted “the strongest support for Donald Trump in almost every swing state that he won.” Losing the support among a significant portion of white voters over 65 could very well prove unrecoverable for Trump.
Hackers have been using Google Play for years to distribute an unusually advanced backdoor capable of stealing a wide range of sensitive data, researchers said on Tuesday.
Researchers from security firm Kaspersky Lab have recovered at least eight Google Play apps that date back to 2018, a Kaspersky Lab representative said, but based on archive searches and other methods, the researchers believe malicious apps from the same advanced group seeded Google’s official market since at least 2016.
Google removed recent versions of the malware shortly after the researchers from Kaspersky, and earlier fellow security firm Dr. Web, reported them. Apps from earlier were already removed, and it’s not clear what prompted the move. Third-party markets have also hosted the backdoored apps, and many of them remain available.
No good options, two egregious hacks overseeing DNI
The Senate Intelligence Committee is preparing to hold a confirmation hearing as early as next week for President Donald Trump’s pick to lead the nation’s 17 intelligence agencies, two sources familiar with the matter told POLITICO.
Rep. John Ratcliffe (R-Texas), the president’s director of national intelligence nominee, will face senators as Congress deals with the fallout from the coronavirus pandemic, which has kept the Senate largely out of session for more than a month. The Senate is expected to return to Washington on Monday, while the House canceled plans to reconvene next week.
Confirming Ratcliffe as the nation’s top intelligence official would send Richard Grenell, the acting director of national intelligence, back to Berlin for his primary job of U.S. ambassador to Germany. Grenell is a Trump loyalist who took over when Trump forced out Joseph Maguire after the president learned Maguire had authorized congressional briefings on Russia’s attempts to interfere in the 2020 election.
Republican senators were cool to Ratcliffe the first time Trump signaled his intention last July to nominate the firebrand conservative congressman, who initially withdrew from consideration over questions about whether he embellished his résumé.
GOP leaders and rank-and-file senators alike have largely avoided commenting on Ratcliffe’s qualifications to lead the U.S. intelligence apparatus. Several said they simply did not know much about Ratcliffe, but they appeared eager to consider his nomination quickly so that Grenell, who had no experience within the intelligence community, could return to Germany.
Ratcliffe rose to national prominence during the House hearings with former special counsel Robert Mueller and, later, the chamber’s impeachment inquiry, during which he emerged as a vocal defender of the president. Some GOP senators, including members of the intelligence committee, have indicated that they will support Ratcliffe’s nomination.
CNN first reported the committee’s plans. A spokeswoman for Sen. Richard Burr (R-N.C.), the panel’s chairman, did not immediately respond to a request for comment. The details for a possible hearing next week have not been confirmed, as aides consider a format that takes into account the federal coronavirus guidelines on social distancing.
Ratcliffe previously served as U.S. attorney in Texas, and he was first elected to the House in 2014. He serves on the House intelligence and judiciary committees, giving him a prominent stage as House Democrats led myriad investigations targeting the president last year. Democrats have argued that Ratcliffe is too much of a partisan to occupy the chief intelligence post, and they are expected to largely oppose his nomination.
Trump’s first director of national intelligence, Dan Coats, was widely respected on both sides of the political aisle and often broke with the president in public statements, in particular with regard to Russia’s interference in the 2016 election.
The Senate Intelligence Committee has distinguished itself as one of the few functional bipartisan entities on Capitol Hill. Just last week, the panel released a report backing up the intelligence community’s initial assessment of Russia’s attempts to meddle in the 2016 campaign — specifically, that the efforts were aimed at helping put Trump in the White House. That report was voted out of the committee unanimously by the panel’s members, which range from Trump loyalists to progressive insurgents.
On March 31, Donald Trump appeared in front of a graph that projected the potential number of deaths in the United States from COVID-19. For Trump, who has been to this point universally dismissive of the virus, that particular meeting represented yet another of those points where the media declared that “he got it.” Rather than repeating, as he had done multiple times before, that the coronavirus was no worse than the flu, or explaining how it would vanish with the spring, Trump plodded through a terrifyingly downbeat presentation that included a prediction of at least 100,000 deaths. And then, as would become the case going forward, began the case for how 100,000 dead Americans was a good thing. 100,000 mean they had done “a tremendous job.”
The chart behind Trump was based on predictions from University of Washington’s Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation. So, after a weekend when Vice President Mike Pence, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, and White House counselor Kellyanne Conway all made appearances to explain how even the upper bounds of 240,000 dead wasn’t all that bad, the whole Trump team was ecstatic a week later when the IHME model was adjusted, bringing its predicted number of deaths down to 60,415 by August 4. It was an occasion for a victory lap as Trump and his surrogates treated the revised number as if he had taken some decisive action to move the needle. It’s also a number that was passed on Wednesday morning.
The IHME projection has been updated several times since that drop to 60,000. The numbers have dipped as low as 47,000 and been as high as 80,000. On Wednesday, the projections for August stand at 72,860 after an update on Tuesday morning.
However, this is the way those projections looked when Trump stepped out to brag about the great job he was doing and the many, many lives he was saving.
UW IHME Model projection on April 1
But on Wednesday afternoon, as the first states began reporting in for the day, the United States reached 1,048,834 confirmed cases and 60,495 deaths. This doesn’t just exceed the projections made at the first of the month—it exceeds the numbers projected as recently as 10 days ago. In fact, less than two days since the last update, the projections from IHME are once again 2,000 short.
That’s because, as we’ve covered before, the numbers being kicked out by the IHME aren’t a serious epidemiological model. They’re an attempt to take the curve generated by the rise and decline of cases in the Hubei region of China and drape that form over other data sets. In practice, that has proved not only problematic but pointless. When it comes to looking even a few days out, much less all the way to August, the IHME model has proven to be exceedingly inaccurate, and although the team behind this projection have regularly fed it new data and tweaked its parameters, it still hasn’t demonstrated an ability to look even a few days ahead, much less months.
So where is the best place to turn for accurate predictions of how the epidemic is going to turn out in America? Nowhere, really. With governors determined to make deadly choices and Trump firing off policies that have a lifespan shorter than a press conference, it’s impossible to generate an accurate model.
But people are trying. For example, there’s a new model from Johns Hopkins ID Dynamics COVID-19 working group that uses county-level data and a combination of two well-reputed epidemiological models overlaid with adjustments made with each shift in policy. Sounds good, right? Let’s hope not, because that model calls for 100,000 deaths in the next three weeks. Not for deaths to reach 100,000, but 100,000 additional deaths.
At the other end of the world, the IHME model is calling for just 7,000 more in the next three weeks. This sounds extremely unlikely, but it’s just another example of how the IHME model keeps trying to push everything into the shape of a wave that’s as steep in decline as it was going up.
In between these two extremes are a whole range of other models. At this point there are literally dozens. Reich Labs also keeps a kind of model of models, the COVID forecast hub ensemble projection, on its presentation page. That projection calls for about 90,000 cases at the end of three weeks, which is certainly horrible, though not as bad as some.
In any case, there are three takeaways from this:
The University of Washington IHME model is really not worth following. Weeks in, its reliability and accuracy has not improved, and its simplistic curve-fitting approach has proven to be wholly inadequate to describe the situation.
The Reich Labs page offers a set of some of the more widely viewed models, including those from Columbia, Northeastern, and UT-Austin. The page isn’t always easy to follow, but it does offer a middle of the road value in the ensemble projection.
We would not be talking about any of these numbers had Donald Trump not handled the U.S. response to COVID-19 worse than any leader in any other nation.
An earlier study looking at sites around the world came to a clear conclusion—deaths due to COVID-19 are being underreported. Deaths in those nations where the novel coronavirus has become widespread are up as much as 60% over past years, which is far more than the number of deaths that are tabulated as official COVID-19 deaths. Studies from both Financial Timesand The New York Times show that this is also true in the United States. Looking at just seven states found an additional 9,000 deaths that appear to be related to COVID-19.
In some cases this may be simply because systems are overwhelmed, or because reporting rules are confusing the outcomes. But in at least one case, there seems to be something decidedly fishy going on. And that case is Florida.
As of Wednesday morning, Florida officially had 33,000 confirmed cases of COVID-19 and 1,200 deaths. Those aren’t great numbers, but Florida’s 3.6% fatality rate is (horribly enough) below the national average and the state has tested at a rate of 18 people out of 1,000—almost exactly the national average.
Considering the reluctance of Republican Governor Ron DeSantis to impose serious social distancing guidelines, the way Florida filled the beaches for Spring Break in the early days of the outbreak, and the large number of elderly residents, it’s both amazing, and extremely relieving, that Florida hasn’t suffered more loss from its still increasing case load.
Unless, of course, it has. Florida wasn’t one of the states studied by the NYT team that looked for excess deaths in some of the states with the highest levels of known cases, but it might deserve a special look all on its own. That’s because, as the Tampa Bay Times reports, Florida has simply stopped releasing death statistics.
Until recently, a regular compilation of deaths was released by Florida’s medical examiners. Oddly enough, the number of coronavirus deaths on this list has regularly exceeded the number of COVID-19 from the official state count. Then, nine days ago, that list stopped appearing.
The Florida Health Department apparently called the Department of Law Enforcement, which supervises the medical examiners, and expressed concerns over privacy. However, though the medical examiner reports do include demographic information along with probable cause of death, they don’t contain names or addresses. Until this point, such records were apparently made public without concern. One medical examiner was told that the list would be allowed to be released … without causes of death mentioned and without the usual case descriptions.
In March, the Health Department has previously leaned on the medical examiner’s office in Miami-Dade County to restrict access to death records there. Similar events have followed in other counties.
In the first week of April, Democratic representatives in the Florida state legislators sent a letter to DeSantis expressing “concern” over inconsistencies between the official COVID-19 numbers and the values reported by the medical examiners. After all, if the state isn’t getting the information on cause of death from county medical examiners, then where is it getting that information?
Kathy B
(@Kathyduck7) April 30, 2020
#democratsavage
(@arunningriot) April 30, 2020
(@aussie_laurie) April 30, 2020
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) speaks during a news briefing at the Capitol in Washington, DC, on April 21. | Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images
(@cmclymer) April 29, 2020
Russian President Vladimir Putin wearing protective gear visits a hospital where patients infected with Covid-19 novel are being treated in the settlement of Kommunarka in Moscow on March 24, 2020. | Alexey Druzhinin/SPUTNIK/AFP via Getty Images
/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/19933599/daily_cases_covid_19.png)
Our World in Data
