thehuffingtonpost--2020-08-06--Milwaukee Chief Who Ordered Tear Gassing Of George Floyd Protesters May Lose Job

MADISON , Wis. ( AP ) — An oversight board is considering firing Milwaukee Police Chief Alfonso Morales after he ordered officers to use tear gas to break up protests over George Floyd ’ s death , the last straw for members upset with how the chief has handled incidents since the arrest of Milwaukee Bucks player Sterling Brown in 2018 .
The city ’ s Fire and Police Commission was set to decide Morales ’ fate at a meeting Thursday evening .
The decision could leave Wisconsin ’ s largest police department without a leader as the city grapples @ @ @ @ @ @ @ plans security for the Democratic National Convention .
“ I ’ m unaware of him having any supporters ( on the commission ) , ” Gimbel , said .
“ There seems like a cumulative sense that they want to dump the guy.
” Morales is Latino and the majority of the commissioners are Black .
His relationship with the board has deteriorated since it named him to the post in February 2018 .
Gimbel said problems began when officers arrested Brown for parking illegally in January 2018 .
Officers swarmed the Bucks @ @ @ @ @ @ @ him when he didn ’ t remove his hands from his pockets .
The commission ’ s chairman , Steven DeVougas , who is Black , told Morales to fire one of the officers involved but Morales refused , the attorney said .
In February , the Milwaukee Police Association , which represents rank-and-file officers , filed an ethics complaint against DeVougas alleging he accompanied a real estate developer during an interview with police who suspected the developer of sexual assault .
DeVougas practices real estate law for the developer ’ s business @ @ @ @ @ @ @ presence during the interview was a misuse of his position as commission chairman .
A city ethics board is investigating .
Fast forward to May and June , when Milwaukee police used tear gas and pepper spray to disperse protesters demonstrating over Floyd ’ s death .
Floyd , who was Black , died on Memorial Day in Minneapolis after a white police officer pressed his knee into his neck for nearly eight minutes .
The decision to use tear gas and pepper spray drew criticism from Democratic Mayor Tom Barrett .
The @ @ @ @ @ @ @ from using tear gas , prompting a number of departments from across the state slated to help with convention security to rescind their support .
The commission on July 20 ordered Morales to produce reams of records related to multiple incidents , including the decision to tear gas and pepper spray protesters , Brown ’ s arrest and the June arrest of a local activist on suspicion of burglary .
The panel also demanded Morales draft community policing standards , develop a discipline matrix to clarify how officers are disciplined and draft a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ during the pandemic .
“ We are in the midst of an urgent overdue reckoning on race and policing in this country , ” the commission said in a statement Monday .
“ Only with transparency , accountability and truth will we move on as a society .
This discussion may make some uncomfortable , and may bluntly scare others.
” The commission gave Morales a week to respond to some of the requests and threatened to discipline or fire him if he didn ’ t comply .
Gimbel has said those expectations @ @ @ @ @ @ @ gave Morales ’ predecessor , Ed Flynn , 50 days to respond to a similar request for information on the department ’ s pursuit policy .
The police department Wednesday blasted the orders as vague , invalid and possibly illegal .
The department noted the orders weren ’ t approved during an open meeting and the requests seek information from still-open criminal and internal investigations .
The orders also could violate a 2018 settlement with the American Civil Liberties Union over stop-and-frisk policies because the department would have to release confidential information it @ @ @ @ @ @ @ monitoring compliance with the settlement , the department said .
“ The ( orders ) attempt to paint a picture that MPD has been non-compliant or outright insubordinate with the FPC , ” the department said in a statement .
“ The manner in which business is being conducted at the FPC causes alarm.
” Barrett , the mayor , dove into the fray on Wednesday , sending a letter to the commission calling for an “ orderly review ” of the orders and the commission to remove DeVougas as chairman since he @ @ @ @ @

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MADISON, Wis. (AP) — An oversight board is considering firing Milwaukee Police Chief Alfonso Morales after he ordered officers to use tear gas to break up protests over George Floyd’s death, the last straw for members upset with how the chief has handled incidents since the arrest of Milwaukee Bucks player Sterling Brown in 2018.
The city’s Fire and Police Commission was set to decide Morales’ fate at a meeting Thursday evening. The decision could leave Wisconsin’s largest police department without a leader as the city grapples with a surge in gun violence and plans security for the Democratic National Convention.
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Milwaukee’s mayor has urged the commission to slow down, but Morales’ attorney, Franklyn Gimbel, said the odds appear stacked against the chief.
“I’m unaware of him having any supporters (on the commission),” Gimbel, said. “There seems like a cumulative sense that they want to dump the guy.”
Morales is Latino and the majority of the commissioners are Black. His relationship with the board has deteriorated since it named him to the post in February 2018.
Gimbel said problems began when officers arrested Brown for parking illegally in January 2018. Officers swarmed the Bucks guard and used a stun gun on him when he didn’t remove his hands from his pockets. The commission’s chairman, Steven DeVougas, who is Black, told Morales to fire one of the officers involved but Morales refused, the attorney said.
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“From there it got stressful,” Gimbel said. “DeVougas viewed him as not being a team player.”
In February, the Milwaukee Police Association, which represents rank-and-file officers, filed an ethics complaint against DeVougas alleging he accompanied a real estate developer during an interview with police who suspected the developer of sexual assault. DeVougas practices real estate law for the developer’s business. The police association argued DeVougas’ presence during the interview was a misuse of his position as commission chairman. A city ethics board is investigating.
Fast forward to May and June, when Milwaukee police used tear gas and pepper spray to disperse protesters demonstrating over Floyd’s death. Floyd, who was Black, died on Memorial Day in Minneapolis after a white police officer pressed his knee into his neck for nearly eight minutes.
The decision to use tear gas and pepper spray drew criticism from Democratic Mayor Tom Barrett. The commission in July banned the police department from using tear gas, prompting a number of departments from across the state slated to help with convention security to rescind their support.
The commission on July 20 ordered Morales to produce reams of records related to multiple incidents, including the decision to tear gas and pepper spray protesters, Brown’s arrest and the June arrest of a local activist on suspicion of burglary. The panel also demanded Morales draft community policing standards, develop a discipline matrix to clarify how officers are disciplined and draft a policy requiring officers to wear face masks during the pandemic.
“We are in the midst of an urgent overdue reckoning on race and policing in this country,” the commission said in a statement Monday. “Only with transparency, accountability and truth will we move on as a society. This discussion may make some uncomfortable, and may bluntly scare others.”
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None of the commissioners, including DeVougas, returned messages Thursday.
The commission gave Morales a week to respond to some of the requests and threatened to discipline or fire him if he didn’t comply. Gimbel has said those expectations are ridiculous; he noted the commission gave Morales’ predecessor, Ed Flynn, 50 days to respond to a similar request for information on the department’s pursuit policy.
The police department Wednesday blasted the orders as vague, invalid and possibly illegal. The department noted the orders weren’t approved during an open meeting and the requests seek information from still-open criminal and internal investigations.
The orders also could violate a 2018 settlement with the American Civil Liberties Union over stop-and-frisk policies because the department would have to release confidential information it has been sharing with a consultant group monitoring compliance with the settlement, the department said.
“The (orders) attempt to paint a picture that MPD has been non-compliant or outright insubordinate with the FPC,” the department said in a statement. “The manner in which business is being conducted at the FPC causes alarm.”
Barrett, the mayor, dove into the fray on Wednesday, sending a letter to the commission calling for an “orderly review” of the orders and the commission to remove DeVougas as chairman since he’s under investigation.
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thehuffingtonpost--2020-08-06--Senate Starts Long Weekend With No Deal In Sight As Corona Crisis Festers

The Senate is technically still in session and members have been told to be ready to return to the Capitol next week , when they were supposed to begin their August recess , in case there ’ s a last-minute breakthrough .
But at this point , both sides are extremely pessimistic about a deal happening .
The most pressing disagreement concerns a $ 600 weekly boost to unemployment insurance , which expired last month amid Republican complaints that jobless workers shouldn ’ t have so much money .
The lapse cut benefits by 50 % to 85 % for @ @ @ @ @ @ @ major implications for the broader economy .
Democrats made clear they are holding firm in their demands to continue the benefits as part of a larger relief package , calling renewed Republican objections to more spending amid a historic pandemic cruel and heartless .
The two sides remain “ trillions ” of dollars apart in their proposals , according to the White House .
Republicans , for their part , accused Democrats of being the ones holding hostage aid to millions of struggling Americans in order to exact political victories in November ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the benefits for four months and made no effort to replace them before they lapsed .
“ As long as they calculate that they ’ re better off politically doing nothing , it ’ s going to be hard for us to move forward , ” Sen. Marco Rubio ( R-Fla. ) told reporters on Capitol Hill .
House Democrats passed a massive $ 3 trillion bill months ago ; Senate Republicans haven ’ t passed or coalesced around a single piece of legislation .
Their opening offer , a $ 1 trillion @ @ @ @ @ @ @ been mired in a sea of Republican division .
As a result , Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell ( R-Ky. ) has watched from afar while Democrats negotiate with Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin and White House chief of staff Mark Meadows .
Meanwhile , the fledgling economic recovery from springtime lockdowns could be devolving into a fresh crisis , as the lapse of extra unemployment benefits threatens to sap consumer spending and spur a surge of eviction notices .
As of late July the share of renters making timely payments had already declined @ @ @ @ @ @ @ according to the National Multifamily Housing Council .
“ Please let me know how you make out with United Way , ” the landlord replied .
“ Have you tried Salvation Army as well .
Your stimulus check from the gov could help.
” Dean , 48 , lost her job as a dental assistant in March .
In an email , her boss said ” it was one of the hardest things that I have ever done in my life ” but that his hands were tied by the governor ’ s @ @ @ @ @ @ @ hasn ’ t asked her to come back .
The stress has been exacerbating her health problems , she said , which include lupus and rheumatoid arthritis .
She had a breast cancer scare last year but recently put off diagnostic testing because she can ’ t afford the copays .
Going out and finding a new job , she said , is “ a big risk for us because I ’ m on so much medication.
” The virus has been running wild in Florida .
Asked what his message was to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ as senators left town on Thursday , Sen. Jon Tester ( D-Mont . )
said , “ This is what happens when you have a dysfunctional Senate .
We have an opportunity to fix that.
” Party leaders agree on another round of stimulus checks .
They even agree that the federal government should resume supplementing state unemployment benefits .
The problem is that while Democrats think $ 600 is the right number , Republicans want to pay people less , but can ’ t agree how much less .
The two sides @ @ @ @ @ @ @ state and local governments , which may be forced to lay off public sector employees due to massive budget shortfalls , as well as education funding , food assistance , rental assistance and liability protections for businesses .
Trump has threatened to take action unilaterally if Congress can ’ t reach a deal .
On Thursday , he said he was contemplating extending unemployment benefits , lengthening the moratorium on evictions , and suspending the payroll tax via executive order .
It ’ s not clear how he could extend benefits legally , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ matter of law .
Lawmakers suspect the move may be more about positioning himself ahead of the November election .

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WASHINGTON ― Senators left town Thursday with nothing to show for days of negotiations between Democrats and Trump administration officials on another round of coronavirus pandemic relief.
“We might not get a deal,” Senate Appropriations Chairman Richard Shelby (R-Ala.) told reporters on Thursday. “We’re at an impasse right now.”
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The Senate is technically still in session and members have been told to be ready to return to the Capitol next week, when they were supposed to begin their August recess, in case there’s a last-minute breakthrough. But at this point, both sides are extremely pessimistic about a deal happening.
A three-hour meeting in House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s office on Thursday evening yielded no measurable progress, deepening a stalemate with no end in sight.
“We’re very far apart. It’s most unfortunate,” the California Democrat told reporters afterward.
The most pressing disagreement concerns a $600 weekly boost to unemployment insurance, which expired last month amid Republican complaints that jobless workers shouldn’t have so much money. The lapse cut benefits by 50% to 85% for more than 25 million people, with major implications for the broader economy.
Democrats made clear they are holding firm in their demands to continue the benefits as part of a larger relief package, calling renewed Republican objections to more spending amid a historic pandemic cruel and heartless. The two sides remain “trillions” of dollars apart in their proposals, according to the White House.
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Republicans, for their part, accused Democrats of being the ones holding hostage aid to millions of struggling Americans in order to exact political victories in November’s elections, even though Republicans criticized the benefits for four months and made no effort to replace them before they lapsed.
“As long as they calculate that they’re better off politically doing nothing, it’s going to be hard for us to move forward,” Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) told reporters on Capitol Hill.
House Democrats passed a massive $3 trillion bill months ago; Senate Republicans haven’t passed or coalesced around a single piece of legislation. Their opening offer, a $1 trillion package they unveiled in July, has been mired in a sea of Republican division. As a result, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) has watched from afar while Democrats negotiate with Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin and White House chief of staff Mark Meadows.
Meanwhile, the fledgling economic recovery from springtime lockdowns could be devolving into a fresh crisis, as the lapse of extra unemployment benefits threatens to sap consumer spending and spur a surge of eviction notices. As of late July the share of renters making timely payments had already declined 2 percentage points from last year, according to the National Multifamily Housing Council.
“The whole thing is hopeless. We are waiting and they can’t agree on anything and we’re left hanging.” - Wendy Dean
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The extra benefits have spared some people from eviction. Wendy Dean, a single mom in Naples, Florida, saw her weekly payment shrink from nearly a thousand dollars to $275, the maximum state benefit.
She emailed her landlord on Monday to say she couldn’t make this month’s rent, but that she’d applied for help from United Way.
“Please let me know how you make out with United Way,” the landlord replied. “Have you tried Salvation Army as well. Your stimulus check from the gov could help.”
Dean, 48, lost her job as a dental assistant in March. In an email, her boss said ”it was one of the hardest things that I have ever done in my life” but that his hands were tied by the governor’s business shutdown orders. She said he hasn’t asked her to come back.
The stress has been exacerbating her health problems, she said, which include lupus and rheumatoid arthritis. She had a breast cancer scare last year but recently put off diagnostic testing because she can’t afford the copays.
Advertisement
Going out and finding a new job, she said, is “a big risk for us because I’m on so much medication.” The virus has been running wild in Florida.
“The whole thing is hopeless,” Dean said. “We are waiting and they can’t agree on anything and we’re left hanging.”
Asked what his message was to Americans waiting on their added unemployment benefits as senators left town on Thursday, Sen. Jon Tester (D-Mont.) said, “This is what happens when you have a dysfunctional Senate. We have an opportunity to fix that.”
Party leaders agree on another round of stimulus checks. They even agree that the federal government should resume supplementing state unemployment benefits. The problem is that while Democrats think $600 is the right number, Republicans want to pay people less, but can’t agree how much less.
The two sides are also far apart on aid to state and local governments, which may be forced to lay off public sector employees due to massive budget shortfalls, as well as education funding, food assistance, rental assistance and liability protections for businesses.
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“We Democrats believe the patient needs a major operation while Republicans want to apply a Band-Aid,” Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) said Thursday.
Trump has threatened to take action unilaterally if Congress can’t reach a deal. On Thursday, he said he was contemplating extending unemployment benefits, lengthening the moratorium on evictions, and suspending the payroll tax via executive order. It’s not clear how he could extend benefits legally, however, since their expiration was a matter of law. Lawmakers suspect the move may be more about positioning himself ahead of the November election.


thehuffingtonpost--2020-08-06--GOP Plan To Beat Biden By Pushing Kanye West Could Backfire On Trump

WASHINGTON ( AP ) — Kanye West ’ s unlikely White House bid is getting help qualifying for presidential ballots in key states from Republicans around the country , fueling suspicions he ’ s being pushed to run by allies of President Donald Trump hoping to siphon support away from Joe Biden .
The rapper qualified for Colorado ’ s presidential ballot on Thursday , after the Secretary of State ’ s office verified that nine electors he submitted are all registered to vote in that state .
One of those was Matthew Zielinski , is a former Republican congressional @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a county Republican Party in suburban Denver .
A similar pattern has played out in in Wisconsin , Ohio , Vermont and Arkansas , where lawyers or activists with GOP ties have been involved in securing the star ’ s place on the ballot .
The successful effort in battleground states Wisconsin and Ohio in particular raised red flags for Democrats , who are braced for a close race and anxious about any third-party candidate drawing voters .
Trump ’ s reelection campaign has denied involvement , with spokesman Tim Murtaugh saying , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Kanye West is doing or who is doing it for him.
” Speaking to reporters at the White House , Trump said , “ I like Kanye very much ” but added : “ I have nothing to do with him being on the ballot .
I ’ m not involved.
” The Biden campaign did not respond to messages seeking comment Thursday .
Still , the former vice president enjoyed strong support among African American voters during the Democratic primary and is counting on topping Trump by wide margins with them , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ November .
Having West , who is Black and a hip-hop icon , on the ballot could be a ploy to hurt Biden with both sets of voters .
A third-party candidate with name recognition as high as West could undoubtedly influence a close election .
In Wisconsin in 2016 , there were 36,460 write-in votes for president — exceeding Trump ’ s statewide margin of victory of 22,748 , said David Jackson , a political science professor at Bowling Green State University whose research focuses on the links between young people ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ African Americans tend not to vote for candidates solely because they are Black , while West ’ s status with Americans age 18 to 29 is actually more unfavorable than favorable , Jackson said .
That means Republicans working to ensure he competes with Biden may not be able to peel many of their target voters away from the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee .
It ’ s also possible West could actually draw support away from Trump , since he ’ s been an outspoken supporter of the president in the past .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ a lawyer with longstanding ties to the Wisconsin Republican Party , who was captured on video dropping off signatures on West ’ s behalf to the election board there .
The Ohio attorney who filed a ballot access form on West ’ s behalf in that state , Matthew Aumann , is an associate at a Columbus law firm that has been paid thousands of dollars in legal consulting fees by the state House and Senate Republican campaign committees , campaign finance records show .
West ’ s ballot paperwork in Arkansas lists @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , the former executive director of the American Conservative Union .
In Vermont , Charles H. Wilton is a West elector despite previously being chosen as a delegate to the Republican National Convention .
West , meanwhile , missed qualifying for New Jersey ’ s ballot and also failed to file in South Carolina — despite holding a recent rally there where he railed against Harriet Tubman and sounded far from someone seriously preparing to seek the presidency .
West has yet to make enough ballots to have a mathematical chance of winning @ @ @ @ @ @ @ clinch the White House .
That makes him ineligible for the part of the race where he might have the most visible effect , participating in debates , according to rules set by the nonpartisan Commission on Presidential Debates .
West has nonetheless insisted that his bid is serious .
But his wife , Kim Kardashian , has noted that he has been diagnosed with bipolar disorder and asked the public show him compassion .
“ Those who are close with Kanye know his heart and understand his words some times do not @ @ @ @ @ @ @ posted on her Instagram Live feed .

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WASHINGTON (AP) — Kanye West’s unlikely White House bid is getting help qualifying for presidential ballots in key states from Republicans around the country, fueling suspicions he’s being pushed to run by allies of President Donald Trump hoping to siphon support away from Joe Biden.
The rapper qualified for Colorado’s presidential ballot on Thursday, after the Secretary of State’s office verified that nine electors he submitted are all registered to vote in that state. One of those was Matthew Zielinski, is a former Republican congressional candidate who served as an officer with a county Republican Party in suburban Denver.
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Zielinski tweeted that he believed in “fair ballot access” but declined further comment.
A similar pattern has played out in in Wisconsin, Ohio, Vermont and Arkansas, where lawyers or activists with GOP ties have been involved in securing the star’s place on the ballot. The successful effort in battleground states Wisconsin and Ohio in particular raised red flags for Democrats, who are braced for a close race and anxious about any third-party candidate drawing voters.
Trump’s reelection campaign has denied involvement, with spokesman Tim Murtaugh saying, “We have no knowledge of what Kanye West is doing or who is doing it for him.”
Speaking to reporters at the White House, Trump said, “I like Kanye very much” but added: “I have nothing to do with him being on the ballot. I’m not involved.”
The Biden campaign did not respond to messages seeking comment Thursday. Still, the former vice president enjoyed strong support among African American voters during the Democratic primary and is counting on topping Trump by wide margins with them, as well as young voters, in November. Having West, who is Black and a hip-hop icon, on the ballot could be a ploy to hurt Biden with both sets of voters.
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A third-party candidate with name recognition as high as West could undoubtedly influence a close election. In Wisconsin in 2016, there were 36,460 write-in votes for president — exceeding Trump’s statewide margin of victory of 22,748, said David Jackson, a political science professor at Bowling Green State University whose research focuses on the links between young people’s entertainment and political preferences.
But African Americans tend not to vote for candidates solely because they are Black, while West’s status with Americans age 18 to 29 is actually more unfavorable than favorable, Jackson said. That means Republicans working to ensure he competes with Biden may not be able to peel many of their target voters away from the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee.
“It proves that people from the opposite party really know nothing about the appeal of the other party,” Jackson said.
It’s also possible West could actually draw support away from Trump, since he’s been an outspoken supporter of the president in the past.
The Republicans involved include Lane Ruhland, a lawyer with longstanding ties to the Wisconsin Republican Party, who was captured on video dropping off signatures on West’s behalf to the election board there. The Ohio attorney who filed a ballot access form on West’s behalf in that state, Matthew Aumann, is an associate at a Columbus law firm that has been paid thousands of dollars in legal consulting fees by the state House and Senate Republican campaign committees, campaign finance records show.
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West’s ballot paperwork in Arkansas lists as a point of contact Gregg Keller, the former executive director of the American Conservative Union. In Vermont, Charles H. Wilton is a West elector despite previously being chosen as a delegate to the Republican National Convention.
West, meanwhile, missed qualifying for New Jersey’s ballot and also failed to file in South Carolina — despite holding a recent rally there where he railed against Harriet Tubman and sounded far from someone seriously preparing to seek the presidency.
West has yet to make enough ballots to have a mathematical chance of winning the 270 Electoral College votes needed to clinch the White House. That makes him ineligible for the part of the race where he might have the most visible effect, participating in debates, according to rules set by the nonpartisan Commission on Presidential Debates.
West has nonetheless insisted that his bid is serious. But his wife, Kim Kardashian, has noted that he has been diagnosed with bipolar disorder and asked the public show him compassion.
“Those who are close with Kanye know his heart and understand his words some times do not align with his intentions,” Kardashian posted on her Instagram Live feed.
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thehuffingtonpost--2020-08-06--Time Dumps Donald Trump Into A Sea Of Surging Coronavirus For New Magazine Cover

President Donald Trump stands in a sea of the coronavirus — outside the White House — on Time ’ s new cover .
“ The rising water as a metaphor for chaos in the Trump White House could only end two ways , ” artist Tim O ’ Brien explained of his picture that will grace the cover of the magazine ’ s Aug. 17 issue .
Trump “ survives only to be in the surging waves surrounded by coronavirus , each one a little bomb , ” O ’ Brien added .
The cover story — headlined “ The @ @ @ @ @ @ @ pandemic has changed the 2020 campaign .
It also imagines how Trump and presumptive Democratic nominee Joe Biden ’ s respective campaigns may have played out without the public health crisis .
O ’ Brien ’ s depictions of Trump ― whose administration ’ s response to the pandemic has been fiercely criticized ― have appeared on the publication ’ s cover on multiple previous occasions .
In 2017 , the “ chaos ” inside the White House was laid bare via this image : The text was tweaked for the April 2018 @ @ @ @ @ @ @ campaign cash to buy porn star Stormy Daniels ’ silence over their alleged affair. Trump was “ In Deep ” with this cover by O ’ Brien in September 2018 : And in April 2019 , O ’ Brien showed Trump in a more joyous mood following the conclusion of special counsel Robert Mueller ’ s Russia investigation : Sneak peek at this week 's cover of @ TIME .
I could see the president getting this one framed ... pic.twitter.com/i6cDRmEzMc — Brian Stelter ( @ brianstelter ) March 28 , 2019

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President Donald Trump stands in a sea of the coronavirus — outside the White House — on Time’s new cover.
“The rising water as a metaphor for chaos in the Trump White House could only end two ways,” artist Tim O’Brien explained of his picture that will grace the cover of the magazine’s Aug. 17 issue.
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Trump “survives only to be in the surging waves surrounded by coronavirus, each one a little bomb,” O’Brien added.
Check out the cover here:
TIME’s new cover: How COVID-19 changed everything about the 2020 election https://t.co/WcGbCk7j7t pic.twitter.com/Bwq5PyKBzR — TIME (@TIME) August 6, 2020
The cover story — headlined “The Plague Election” — tells how the pandemic has changed the 2020 campaign.
It also imagines how Trump and presumptive Democratic nominee Joe Biden’s respective campaigns may have played out without the public health crisis.
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O’Brien’s depictions of Trump ― whose administration’s response to the pandemic has been fiercely criticized ― have appeared on the publication’s cover on multiple previous occasions.
In 2017, the “chaos” inside the White House was laid bare via this image:
The text was tweaked for the April 2018 edition as Trump faced accusations of using campaign cash to buy porn star Stormy Daniels’ silence over their alleged affair.
Trump was “In Deep” with this cover by O’Brien in September 2018:
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And in April 2019, O’Brien showed Trump in a more joyous mood following the conclusion of special counsel Robert Mueller’s Russia investigation:


thehuffingtonpost--2020-08-06--Los Angeles Will Shut Off Water, Power To Those Caught Violating COVID-19 Orders

Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti this week pledged to crack down on residents who continued to flout the city ’ s social distancing measures by hosting parties and other large social gatherings .
At a Wednesday news conference , the mayor authorized the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power to cut off utility service to properties whose occupants are caught violating COVID-19 health orders .
He said the measure , set to take effect Friday , is targeted at those “ determined to break the rules ” and are known to have “ repeatedly engaged in such behavior ” @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the [ Los Angeles Police Department ] responds and verifies that a large gathering is occurring at a property , and we see these properties reoffending time and time again , they will provide notice and initiate the process to request that [ the Department of Water and Power ] shut off service within the next 48 hours , ” Garcetti said .
“ By turning off that power , shutting down that water , we feel we can close these places down , ” he added .
The mayor ’ s announcement @ @ @ @ @ @ @ cases across Los Angeles County .
The county ’ s public health director , Barbara Ferrer , said Thursday that residents under the age of 50 now make up more than 60 % of new COVID-19 diagnoses .
With bars and nightclubs shuttered , officials say many of the city ’ s young adult residents are nonetheless taking a cavalier approach to coronavirus health restrictions and flocking to private house parties , often without wearing masks .
His announcement followed a large house party in the Beverly Crest neighborhood of Los Angeles that @ @ @ @ @ @ @ on Tuesday .
It ended in a shooting that left one woman dead and four other people injured .
According to the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health , there had been more than 197,912 cases of COVID-19 across LA County as of Thursday afternoon .

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Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti this week pledged to crack down on residents who continued to flout the city’s social distancing measures by hosting parties and other large social gatherings.
At a Wednesday news conference, the mayor authorized the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power to cut off utility service to properties whose occupants are caught violating COVID-19 health orders.
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He said the measure, set to take effect Friday, is targeted at those “determined to break the rules” and are known to have “repeatedly engaged in such behavior” rather than first-time offenders.
“If the [Los Angeles Police Department] responds and verifies that a large gathering is occurring at a property, and we see these properties reoffending time and time again, they will provide notice and initiate the process to request that [the Department of Water and Power] shut off service within the next 48 hours,” Garcetti said.
“By turning off that power, shutting down that water, we feel we can close these places down,” he added.
The mayor’s announcement comes amid a recent spike in coronavirus cases across Los Angeles County. The county’s public health director, Barbara Ferrer, said Thursday that residents under the age of 50 now make up more than 60% of new COVID-19 diagnoses.
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With bars and nightclubs shuttered, officials say many of the city’s young adult residents are nonetheless taking a cavalier approach to coronavirus health restrictions and flocking to private house parties, often without wearing masks.
“These large parties are unsafe and can cost Angelenos their lives,” Garcetti said Wednesday.
His announcement followed a large house party in the Beverly Crest neighborhood of Los Angeles that drew noise complaints and continued past midnight on Tuesday. It ended in a shooting that left one woman dead and four other people injured.


thehuffingtonpost--2020-08-06--Trump Says He Wants Debates To Start Early Because Of Mail-In Voting

President Donald Trump said Thursday he wants this fall ’ s presidential debates to start earlier than the current schedule because of mail-in voting .
How can voters be sending in Ballots starting , in some cases , one month before the First Presidential Debate .
Move the First Debate up .
A debate , to me , is a Public Service .
Joe Biden and I owe it to the American People !
— Donald J. Trump ( @ realDonaldTrump ) August 6 , 2020 The president ’ s tweet follows reporting from Axios Wednesday that Trump ’ s @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to schedule an additional debate in the first week of September , before early voting begins in states that offer it .
Currently , the first debate between Trump and presumptive Democratic nominee Joe Biden is scheduled for Sept. 29 .
The Trump campaign ’ s letter also lists preferred debate moderators , many of which are hosts on the president ’ s favorite network , Fox News .
The moves suggest Trump ’ s campaign is trying to improve conditions and lower expectations for the debates with Biden , whom they ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ because of limited in-person campaign events amid the coronavirus pandemic .
Earlier this week , Biden announced he would not travel to the party ’ s convention in Milwaukee to accept the Democratic nomination in person , citing COVID-19 safety measures .
“ The mayor has put in place a 225-person limit on people assembling in any one place .
I think it ’ s the right thing to do , ” Biden said at a campaign event Wednesday .
“ I ’ ve wanted to set an example as to how we @ @ @ @ @ @ @ “ We have said all along , including in a letter to the commission in June , that Joe Biden will appear on the dates that the commission selected and in the locations they chose , ” Biden ’ s campaign spokesperson Andrew Bates said in a statement responding to Trump ’ s campaign .
“ Donald Trump has not , continually trying to insert his choice of friendly moderators , now including one who just published an op-ed offering ‘ the case ’ for Trump ’ s reelection .
Joe Biden will @ @ @ @ @ @ @ draws closer , Trump has increasingly sought to cast doubt on the integrity of the process and claimed mail-in voting will lead to fraud .
Many voters will cast ballots by mail because of the pandemic , and Trump and his supporters have been spreading baseless conspiracy theories about the process .
Last week , he suggested delaying the election , which he can ’ t do ― an idea swiftly condemned by leaders in both parties .
During a 2016 presidential debate , Trump infamously would not commit to accepting the results @ @ @ @ @ @ @ I will tell you at the time.
” Even after winning , he falsely claimed that millions of people voted illegally .
He later ordered a commission to investigate his claims .
That commission found no evidence supporting Trump ’ s allegations .

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President Donald Trump said Thursday he wants this fall’s presidential debates to start earlier than the current schedule because of mail-in voting.
How can voters be sending in Ballots starting, in some cases, one month before the First Presidential Debate. Move the First Debate up. A debate, to me, is a Public Service. Joe Biden and I owe it to the American People! — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 6, 2020
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The president’s tweet follows reporting from Axios Wednesday that Trump’s campaign asked the Commission on Presidential Debates to schedule an additional debate in the first week of September, before early voting begins in states that offer it. Currently, the first debate between Trump and presumptive Democratic nominee Joe Biden is scheduled for Sept. 29.
The Trump campaign’s letter also lists preferred debate moderators, many of which are hosts on the president’s favorite network, Fox News.
The moves suggest Trump’s campaign is trying to improve conditions and lower expectations for the debates with Biden, whom they’ve falsely claimed is “hiding” because of limited in-person campaign events amid the coronavirus pandemic.
Earlier this week, Biden announced he would not travel to the party’s convention in Milwaukee to accept the Democratic nomination in person, citing COVID-19 safety measures.
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“The mayor has put in place a 225-person limit on people assembling in any one place. I think it’s the right thing to do,” Biden said at a campaign event Wednesday. “I’ve wanted to set an example as to how we should respond individually to this crisis.”
Citing Biden’s announcement, Trump campaign spokesperson Tim Murtaugh told Axios that “we are convinced he’ll try to weasel out of debates.”
“We have said all along, including in a letter to the commission in June, that Joe Biden will appear on the dates that the commission selected and in the locations they chose,” Biden’s campaign spokesperson Andrew Bates said in a statement responding to Trump’s campaign. “Donald Trump has not, continually trying to insert his choice of friendly moderators, now including one who just published an op-ed offering ‘the case’ for Trump’s reelection. Joe Biden will be there.”
As the November election draws closer, Trump has increasingly sought to cast doubt on the integrity of the process and claimed mail-in voting will lead to fraud. Many voters will cast ballots by mail because of the pandemic, and Trump and his supporters have been spreading baseless conspiracy theories about the process. Last week, he suggested delaying the election, which he can’t do ― an idea swiftly condemned by leaders in both parties.
During a 2016 presidential debate, Trump infamously would not commit to accepting the results of the election, saying: “I will tell you at the time.”
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thehuffingtonpost--2020-08-06--Trump Says He 'Ordered' No Drilling Off Florida. There's No Evidence Of Any Such Order.

“ We ’ re not gon na be drilling , and I ’ ve already put out that order ― actually quite a while ago , ” he said when asked if he could commit to not drilling in the eastern Gulf of Mexico .
“ We can ’ t do that .
And the people of Florida just don ’ t want it .
You know , there are some states that don ’ t mind it , but Florida does .
And I live here too , and I vote here .
And I will tell you , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ happening.
” Aside from the hypocrisy of proposing to open nearly all U.S. waters to fossil fuel development while declaring “ not in my backyard ” for Florida , the “ order ” Trump claims to have put out appears to be a figment of his imagination .
The White House sent an off-the-record comment in response to questions about the purported offshore directive .
The official did not include anything HuffPost could actually use in this article .
A spokesman for the Interior Department , the agency that oversees offshore oil and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ that “ the President ’ s remarks speak for itself ” and declined to answer any questions or direct HuffPost to where it might find said order .
Trump appears to be taking credit for former Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke ’ s announcement in January 2018 that , on the recommendation of then-Florida Gov .
Rick Scott ( R ) — whom he called a “ straightforward leader that can be trusted ” — he was taking Florida “ off the table for offshore oil and gas.
” Many saw the decision as @ @ @ @ @ @ @ vocal Trump ally , ahead of his run for Senate .
The director of the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management later told Congress that “ the secretary ’ s statement stands on its own ” and was “ not a formal action , ” and Zinke himself acknowledged “ no one was exempted.
” Trump ’ s public proclamation on offshore drilling is reminiscent of his response to the devastating 2018 wildfires in California ― the deadliest and most destructive wildfire season in the state ’ s history .
In a January 2019 @ @ @ @ @ @ @ he had “ ordered ” the Federal Emergency Management Agency to cut off wildfire relief aid for fire-scorched California until state officials “ get their act together ” and do a better job of managing forests , despite the fact that many of the infernos primarily burned on federally managed lands .
The White House and FEMA did not respond to HuffPost ’ s numerous requests seeking clarification at the time .
The following month , a FEMA official told BuzzFeed News that the agency “ never got any such directive ” from @ @ @ @ @ @ @ state of Alabama in March 2019 , Trump took a much different tone .
“ FEMA has been told directly by me to give the A Plus treatment to the Great State of Alabama and the wonderful people who have been so devastated by the Tornadoes , ” he wrote .
“ When somebody ’ s the president of the United States , the authority is total .
And that is the way it ’ s gon na be , ” Trump told reporters in April when pressed about his plans to force @ @ @ @ @ @ @ It ’ s total.
” Rachel Laser , a lawyer at Americans United for Separation of Church and State , was among many who challenged Trump ’ s rhetoric .
“ The president doesn ’ t have that power , ” she told Politico .
“ The Tenth Amendment to the Constitution forbids the federal government from strong-arming the states.
” While Trump fancies himself an all-powerful ruler and has a history of referencing nonexistent orders , he has issued a slew of real ones with great fanfare ― on everything from advancing @ @ @ @ @ @ @ social media companies that have fact-checked his misleading claims .
In fact , he signed more executive orders in his first 100 days than any other president in history , although many resulted in little concrete change or were blocked by the courts .

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Florida’s coastal waters are safe from any future offshore oil and gas development, President Donald Trump boasted in an interview with Spectrum News last week.
“We’re not gonna be drilling, and I’ve already put out that order ― actually quite a while ago,” he said when asked if he could commit to not drilling in the eastern Gulf of Mexico. “We can’t do that. And the people of Florida just don’t want it. You know, there are some states that don’t mind it, but Florida does. And I live here too, and I vote here. And I will tell you, that’s not going to be happening.”
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Aside from the hypocrisy of proposing to open nearly all U.S. waters to fossil fuel development while declaring “not in my backyard” for Florida, the “order” Trump claims to have put out appears to be a figment of his imagination.
Trump has issued no such order, but it’s not the first time he’s touted a seemingly nonexistent decree.
The White House sent an off-the-record comment in response to questions about the purported offshore directive. The official did not include anything HuffPost could actually use in this article.
A spokesman for the Interior Department, the agency that oversees offshore oil and gas development, told HuffPost via email that “the President’s remarks speak for itself” and declined to answer any questions or direct HuffPost to where it might find said order.
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Trump appears to be taking credit for former Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke’s announcement in January 2018 that, on the recommendation of then-Florida Gov. Rick Scott (R) — whom he called a “straightforward leader that can be trusted” — he was taking Florida “off the table for offshore oil and gas.” Many saw the decision as a political favor for Scott, a vocal Trump ally, ahead of his run for Senate. The director of the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management later told Congress that “the secretary’s statement stands on its own” and was “not a formal action,” and Zinke himself acknowledged “no one was exempted.”
The administration’s plan to expand offshore drilling remains on hold.
Diane Hoskins, a campaign director at ocean advocacy group Oceana, said that Trump’s remarks are encouraging but “a far cry from any official protections” for the area.
“Will President Trump give other states that oppose offshore drilling the same assurances?” she asked. “And will he immediately and formally withdraw his radical plan to expand drilling to nearly all waters?”
An oil-stained beach in Pensacola, Florida, in the wake of the Deepwater Horizon oil spill in 2010. Staff Photographer / reuters
Trump’s public proclamation on offshore drilling is reminiscent of his response to the devastating 2018 wildfires in California ― the deadliest and most destructive wildfire season in the state’s history. In a January 2019 post to Twitter, Trump declared that he had “ordered” the Federal Emergency Management Agency to cut off wildfire relief aid for fire-scorched California until state officials “get their act together” and do a better job of managing forests, despite the fact that many of the infernos primarily burned on federally managed lands.
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That came after the administration used the disasters to push partisan policy, connecting the infernos to a yearslong fight between farmers and environmentalists over water resources.
The White House and FEMA did not respond to HuffPost’s numerous requests seeking clarification at the time. The following month, a FEMA official told BuzzFeed News that the agency “never got any such directive” from Trump.
When tornadoes ravaged the ruby-red state of Alabama in March 2019, Trump took a much different tone. “FEMA has been told directly by me to give the A Plus treatment to the Great State of Alabama and the wonderful people who have been so devastated by the Tornadoes,” he wrote.
Much like the other cases, there is no record of a directive beyond Trump’s Twitter post.
More recently, the president has made sweeping ― and false ― statements about his power to order states to reopen amid one of the worst pandemics in a century.
“When somebody’s the president of the United States, the authority is total. And that is the way it’s gonna be,” Trump told reporters in April when pressed about his plans to force governors to restart their economies. “It’s total.”
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He made a similar declaration the following month about his authority to force states to deem churches as essential services during the pandemic.
“Allow these very important, essential places of faith to open right now for this weekend,” he said. “If they don’t do it, I will override the governors.”
Rachel Laser, a lawyer at Americans United for Separation of Church and State, was among many who challenged Trump’s rhetoric. “The president doesn’t have that power,” she told Politico. “The Tenth Amendment to the Constitution forbids the federal government from strong-arming the states.”
Asked what provision of federal law allows the president to override a governor’s order, White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany dodged, instead accusing reporters of “desperately” wanting to see places of worship remain shuttered.
While Trump fancies himself an all-powerful ruler and has a history of referencing nonexistent orders, he has issued a slew of real ones with great fanfare ― on everything from advancing construction of fossil fuel pipelines to targeting social media companies that have fact-checked his misleading claims. In fact, he signed more executive orders in his first 100 days than any other president in history, although many resulted in little concrete change or were blocked by the courts.
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thehuffingtonpost--2020-08-06--Children Will Bear The Brunt Of A Looming Eviction Crisis

Ashley Johnson (right) has struggled to find safe, affordable homes for Mikaela, 14, Zach, 3, and Zinnia, 9 months. Barbara Shelly
This story about the effect of evictions on children was produced as part of the series Critical Condition: The Students the Pandemic Hit Hardest, reported by HuffPost and The Hechinger Report, a nonprofit, independent news organization focused on inequality and innovation in education.
Mikaela Johnson has a vague notion of a home she’d like to live in with her mother and her younger brother and sister.
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“A four-bedroom house,” she said. “A backyard for sure. Maybe a house that has no mold, no pests, no cracks, no floor that sinks.”
She paused. “Maybe I’m asking for too much.”
Rarely, if ever, in her 14 years has Mikaela lived in a home that matches her ideal. She is one of hundreds of schoolchildren in the Kansas City region who live on the brink of homelessness, their families consigned to substandard housing, when they can find it at all.
Mikaela’s mother, Ashley Johnson, has lost track of all the places they’ve lived.
There were a couple of apartments she got evicted from and others barely fit to live in. A stay in a family shelter. Too many hotel rooms and other peoples’ sofas and floors to remember. At her most desperate moment, in a Kansas City winter, Johnson signed Mikaela and her younger brother into a children’s shelter operated by the Salvation Army. She slept in her car, knowing her children at least were warm.
Mikaela just completed eighth grade. She has lived the kind of transient life that school leaders worry about — especially now. Educators know that moving around disrupts learning. They fear the upheavals created by the coronavirus will cause more instability for low-income families already struggling to find and afford decent housing.
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“Even before the pandemic we had an affordability crisis,” said Mike Koprowski, national campaign director for the National Low Income Housing Coalition. “We think there’s going to be a wave of evictions if Congress doesn’t act on another relief package. It’s going to further disrupt kids whose lives and learning processes have already been upended by school closures.”
A model created by the COVID-19 Eviction Defense Project, a coalition of economic researchers and legal experts, estimates that 20% of the 110 million Americans who live in rented homes risk displacement by September 30 unless policymakers enact aggressive relief measures. That would amount to 19 million to 23 million people, many of them schoolchildren.
“Even if it’s remote learning, the eviction is going to have an effect,” said Lavar Edmonds, a research specialist at Princeton University’s Eviction Lab. “How are you going to do your homework or participate in classes at home if you don’t have the internet, if you’ve been kicked out of your home?”
Those concerns are acute in the Kansas City region, where, according to an annual survey by the National Low Income Housing Coalition, two of three very low-income families spend more than half of every dollar they earn on housing and utilities. Only 33 affordable units are available for every 100 extremely low-income families. Evictions are rampant and often mark the start of a slide into prolonged homelessness.
“Housing is everything,” said Melissa Douglas, the liaison for homeless students in the Kansas City Public Schools district. “Moving from place to place is an unwarranted stress on adults and students. We know that the more moves [kids’] families make, the more gaps in their education that they may have.”
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And student moves can be especially problematic in Kansas City. The metropolitan area, depending on how it’s defined, is a patchwork of 20 to 30 school districts. A move of just a few blocks can easily place a family in a different district. The region also includes districts in both Missouri and Kansas, with schools using different curriculums and standards across the state line. And 20 charter schools, some with multiple campuses, offer more choices but also more fluidity.
In 2015, a study revealed that one in five students on the Missouri side of the Kansas City region had moved at least once in a calendar year and that students who changed schools had poorer attendance and lower achievement rates than students who hadn’t moved. More recent research from the Kansas City Public Schools district, in which nearly 40% of households with school-age children live in poverty, emphasized the flip side: Fifth graders who stayed in their schools for three consecutive years were twice as likely to score at proficient or advanced levels on state tests than children who switched schools; 11th graders who had attended the same high school for three years had higher GPAs and ACT scores than their more transient classmates.
Mark Bedell, superintendent of Kansas City Public Schools, understands how housing crises impact students and schools. Growing up poor in Rochester, New York, Bedell lived in 12 different homes from kindergarten through 12th grade and attended multiple schools — sometimes two or three in an academic year.
“I personally understand the impact of what mobility can do socially and emotionally to children,” Bedell said. “When you have to constantly restart, it’s depressing. You have to constantly meet new students and teachers. You’re leaving behind friends that you’ve met. It also has a negative impact on academic performance.”
Kansas City Public Schools Superintendent Mark Bedell, at podium, supports KC Tenants' call for housing protections in March 2019. Kansas City Public Schools
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Ashley Johnson, 35, experienced all of those setbacks.
“I was a child of foster care,” she said. “I know what it’s like to be in this school for two months, then another school for three months.”
When she could stay put for a while, she enjoyed school and made honor rolls, said Johnson, who spent her childhood in Arkansas. But she struggled when she was forced to move. Eventually she dropped out of school and earned her GED at age 16.
After moving to Kansas City in her early 20s, Johnson spent some time in community college and at three separate for-profit career colleges, acquiring certifications as a personal trainer and a holistic wellness coach — but also a cumulative $30,000 in student debt. She currently works a clerical job for a government agency and drives cabs intermittently, while trying to launch a holistic wellness business.
Although her family has moved many times, Johnson has up until now managed to maintain some stability in school for Mikaela. The teenager has attended just two schools: a Montessori-themed magnet school from preschool through sixth grade, and a middle school with neighborhood boundaries.
“It’s been hard for us,” her mother said. “But I always managed to get on a bus line and get her to school.”
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She was able to do so even though the family resided in a different school district for a few months, because of a 1987 federal law, the McKinney-Vento Homeless Assistance Act, which guarantees an uninterrupted education to students who meet a broad definition of homelessness. Johnson learned about it through the Kansas City Public Schools’ Students in Transition Office, which Douglas runs.
During the 2019-20 school year, Douglas said she and her staff worked with about 1,230 students whose families lacked a permanent residence. They were doubled up with friends and relatives or living in motels or shelters. About 30 students were “unsheltered,” meaning they lived in cars, campsites or abandoned houses.
In total, school districts in and around Kansas City work with several thousand homeless students each year. Assistance can take many forms, such as laundry services, tutoring and the waiving of ACT costs and graduation fees. But it often involves transportation. On a typical school day, hundreds of taxis and minibuses crisscross the region, taking students to and from their “school of origin” — the one they enrolled in at the start of the academic year.
That’s what Douglas worked out for Mikaela. A taxi picked her up on school mornings and transported her to school, a ride of about 30 minutes. She returned home the same way.
School districts in the Kansas City region have relied more heavily on the McKinney-Vento mandate in recent years as more families have been priced out of housing. This has cut down on student transience, but transporting hundreds of students, some for rides of half an hour or longer, is costly. Kansas City Public Schools spends $700,000 to $1 million a year on rides for children in its Students in Transition program, Douglas said.
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Educators also worry about the safety and well-being of children being transported long distances. “We have conversations where we talk with families about best interests,” Douglas said. “We need them to understand that this isn’t cheap. And I feel some kind of weight putting a kindergartner in a cab by themselves for over an hour.”
Mikaela Johnson said she enjoyed her cab rides, although they sometimes got her to school late. “One lady driver was really, really cool,” she said.
Academically, Mikaela held her own in middle school. She was inducted into her school’s honor society and selected for a trip to visit civil rights landmarks in Memphis during Black History Month. But she often was bored in classes, Mikaela said, and other students sometimes bullied her. She had wanted to participate in student council and track, but her family’s unstable living situation got in the way.
“Just busy at home,” Mikaela said, with a shrug. “Always moving. No correct transportation. I can say I have grown distant from a lot of friends. But it’s fine.”
Ashley Johnson said she wishes she could offer Mikaela a calmer adolescence. “My daughter, she is so motivating, so forgiving,” she said. “We have been through so much, but she is a model student.”
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Housing insecurity can have profound impacts on students’ well-being and academic performance, Bedell said. “We can sometimes control that one variable, keeping children in the same school,” he said. “But if they’re moving from shelter to shelter and place to place, they’re still transient. They still don’t know where they’re going to be sleeping from night to night.”
Traci Pettis Johnson, who works as a family school liaison at an elementary school in the Hickman Mills School District in south Kansas City, where families mostly rent their homes, sometimes pleads her students’ families’ cases with landlords, trying to buy them time to pay rent and utility bills.
“Consistency in education is key,” she said. “If you have to sleep on the floor, if you have to live with relatives who may be working different schedules, keeping children up at night, if you’re leaving a child with a younger sibling, then getting to school becomes less of a priority and staying awake in school becomes harder.”
As wages fail to keep pace with rising rents and housing costs, families across the nation are finding themselves in a bind, said Megan Gallagher, who studies the relationship between housing and educational opportunities for the Urban Institute’s Metropolitan Housing and Communities Policy Center. “Many households with children have trouble finding housing that is affordable, stable, well constructed, the right size for a family and in an affordable neighborhood,” Gallagher said.
Researchers refer to those characteristics as “the housing bundle,” and each one impacts education, Gallagher said. “Many, many families have to compromise or sacrifice at least one aspect of that bundle to get another,” she said. “The issues of affordability are also issues of stability and safety and health and success at school.”
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Roughly 8 million extremely low-income renters spent more than half of their incomes on housing costs before the pandemic, according to a new report from the National Low-Income Housing Coalition, and more families are likely facing a similar cost burden now. A forecasting model from the Center on Poverty and Social Policy at Columbia University anticipates that poverty levels in the United States this year will reach those seen during the Great Recession, and could climb close to 20%.
Affordable housing has always seemed out of reach for Ashley Johnson, who acknowledges her rental history is not the best. She’s been evicted twice, once after she fell for a work-at-home scheme, not realizing the money orders her “employer” paid her were fake. She also left a few places without paying owed rent — usually after disputes with landlords about conditions.
She had an informal rent-to-own arrangement with the owner of a small house for a while, Johnson said, but the house needed expensive repairs she couldn’t afford. They left there in 2015 and “that’s when we started the hotel-hopping thing.”
The best place they’ve lived was a townhouse affiliated with a program that helps homeless families.
“It was a very clean place,” Mikaela said. “It was kind of spacious and I liked the fact that I had my own room.”
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By that time, Johnson had given birth to Zach, who is now 3. She left the townhouse in 2018 to live with Zach’s father. They broke up a short time later, when Johnson was pregnant again with Zinnia, who now is nearly a year old.
“Long story short, it’s been all downhill,” Johnson said. “I thought I’d find another place instantly, but it hasn’t worked out for us.”
They now live in a privately owned “transitional home,” a house where rooms are rented out separately, and residents share bathrooms and a kitchen. Johnson pays $500 a month to live with her three children in one bedroom. She thought the place would be a godsend, but it’s turned into a nightmare, she said.
When they moved there in the fall, the house was infested with bugs and rodents. A rat chewed through the cord of her breastfeeding pump, Johnson said. The refrigerator often didn’t work. She reported the conditions to the Kansas City Health Department, which arranged a mediation with her and her landlady. Since then, the rodent infestation has gotten better, but the place is barely habitable.
“People keep saying, ‘you should be blessed, you have a home.’” Mikaela said. “Yeah, I have a roof over my head. But no one should have to take those conditions. There’s too many pests. The ceiling is literally coming down. The floor is sinking. It should be torn down.”
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Descriptions like that — and she hears many — outrage Douglas at Kansas City Public Schools. The McKinney-Vento act considers a student to be homeless if they lack a “fixed, regular and adequate nighttime residence,” she noted.
“‘Adequate’ is our big thing,” Douglas said. “We’ve had families say they can’t walk across a room because there’s a big hole in the floor. That’s not adequate. Being rodent and pest-infested is not adequate.”
Johnson’s vision of an ideal home is simple. “Just a house, something that’s in my budget,” she said. “Something where my kids will be able to play safely and get back and forth to their schooling safely. Just coming home from work and being able to relax. I haven’t had the ability to relax in years.”
Mikaela Johnson, with her mother, Ashley Johnson, faces uncertain high school plans because of the coronavirus pandemic and her family’s unstable housing situation. Barbara Shelly
Before the coronavirus pandemic, Kansas City residents were already pushing officials to address the frequency of evictions. Researchers for the Kansas City Eviction Project published a study finding that landlords in Jackson County, where most of Kansas City is located, filed petitions to evict an average of 42 families per business day from 1999 to 2017. The pattern was so consistent the researchers suggested that “there could be a core of landlords in the city for whom eviction is a business model.” Judges granted an average of 25 evictions per business day.
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An activist group, KC Tenants, began showing up at public meetings and campaign forums, loudly demanding that public officials commit to protecting renters and improving housing conditions. Ashley Johnson attends the group’s meetings and sometimes speaks up at public events about her housing struggles.
School leaders around Kansas City also started paying attention to the effect of evictions on families. Bedell in particular became a vocal supporter of measures to lift up low-income citizens and neighborhoods. “Being somebody who’s lived through evictions and homelessness, this is personal to me,” Bedell said. “I don’t want to be viewed as a superintendent or a person that made it and then dismissed all the struggles I went through in order to be here.”
In 2019, the superintendent spoke on the steps of City Hall the day KC Tenants introduced its demand for a “bill of rights” intended to give renters more power in their relationships with landlords. The Kansas City Council eventually met many of their demands in an ordinance.
Meanwhile, Bedell’s district and the Hickman Mills district teamed up with Legal Aid of Western Missouri to place lawyers and paralegals in school buildings to work with families in danger of being evicted. With schools closed due to the coronavirus pandemic, families currently reach out to lawyers by phone or online.
And several school districts around Kansas City partnered with nonprofit and faith groups that offer emergency rent and utility payments, counseling and job placement. Among them was the Center School District, which, according to its administration, had a mobility rate of 27% in the 2018-19 academic year — meaning over a quarter of its students transferred into or out of its classrooms while schools were in session.
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“I would say that the No. 1 challenge is being able to maintain affordable, dignified housing in our district,” said Stacy King, director of family and student services.
Through a program called Impact Center Schools, her district has formed an alliance with multiple community partners to keep families from becoming homeless. The alliance has been able to help some families clear up their credit and erase evictions from their rental records, said Chris Buford, president of Serve the World Charities, a nonprofit that coordinates the work. But that assistance often isn’t enough to keep working families in the district. There simply isn’t enough appropriate housing to meet their needs.
“Honestly, nobody should be living in those houses,” Buford said. “In our experience, that comes down to out-of-town landlords and management companies that really have no interest in bettering this community.”
To address that issue, Serve the World and its partners are creating their own homes. A team of real estate agents, community leaders and others have been recruiting investors to purchase houses, improve them and reserve them for families in the Impact Center program.
While Impact Center’s stated goal is to end homelessness in the district within four years, everyone knows that is ambitious. In the absence of big public policy initiatives, the work of saving even one family at a time is slow going.
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As school districts in the region contemplate hard choices on reopening this fall, educators and others anticipate more instability for families and more students on the move. Coronavirus cases are rising in the Kansas City region, forcing more businesses to lay off workers. Landlords, who had been temporarily barred by local government orders from evicting tenants during the pandemic, are resuming those efforts as cities and counties lift the holds.
“I expect our transience numbers, and numbers across the state, to go up dramatically,” Douglas said.
Kansas City is the largest city in Missouri. Tim Clayton/Corbis via Getty Images
Koprowski at the National Low Income Housing Coalition said he thinks a spike will take place nationwide. His coalition is seeking a second federal relief package that would include generous rental assistance.
“I think we’re in a really dire situation,” Koprowski said. “The problem with these moratoria on evictions is that the rent still piles up. It’s not a rent-forgiveness program. People who have lost incomes as a result of the Covid-19 outbreak are really going to struggle to pay the large sums that are coming due.”
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Meantime, Ashley Johnson’s family may soon be on the move again. Her landlady recently filed a legal motion to have her vacate the room she rents, even though she’s up to date on payments. Johnson is making plans to fight the motion while also looking for a better place for her family to live. Sometimes she eyes vacant houses in the neighborhood, wondering if they would work as a last resort.
Johnson used her one-time stimulus check to pay some overdue bills, but money is still tight. She makes $14.50 an hour at her clerical job, but a portion of that is being garnished by a creditor. Cab traffic is down and Johnson doesn’t feel safe transporting passengers during the pandemic. And she’s had few takers for her fledgling holistic wellness business. Mikaela’s high school plans are in limbo, with her school district uncertain about when students will be able to return to classrooms.
Mikaela tried to keep up with online classes in the spring, using a laptop and mobile hotspot loaned from the district, but it was tough in their small room, Johnson said. Child care for the younger children was shut down for a while, and Mikaela spent a lot of time caring for her siblings. “She didn’t log in as much as she should have,” Johnson said.
Mikaela still holds out hope for attending high school, and has identified the one where she’d like to enroll. But her wish list for a high school experience may depend on resources increasingly out of reach for a school district coping with virus fears, state budget cuts and likely more student transience and poverty.
“Maybe a school that recognizes that children of my age have problems at home and in the head also,” Mikaela said. “I see a lot of teachers and people that don’t understand the reason children act the way they do is because of a situation at home. Also, a school that teaches me something I need to know, something useful. And maybe more counselors, after-school programs, stuff like that.”


thehuffingtonpost--2020-08-06--Cori Bush Is Set To Be The First Black Lives Matter Leader In Congress

Michael B. Thomas/Getty Images Cori Bush leads a demonstration against police brutality on June 12 in University City , Missouri .
She is the first leader of the Black Lives Matter movement who is likely to win a seat in Congress .
“ There ’ s always going to be a violent response to those who are trying to change systems , ” Reed said .
“ We ’ ve seen people be followed .
We ’ ve seen people be stalked and harassed online and receive death threats .
We ’ ve seen Black elected officials in St. Louis @ @ @ @ @ @ @ that often turns into white terror threats when they ’ re angry enough .
And so I think people need to understand that white supremacy is violence , and in a lot of ways , those who are the most visible take the brunt of that violence and the threat of that violence .
It shouldn ’ t be dismissed lightly as a conspiracy theory.
” “ They now finally have a representative that they know is not just going to be in Congress all the time but if things get bad will @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , ” Aldridge said .
“ To have someone who ’ s also going to be unapologetic , not buying into the status quo , and is just going to be speaking straight truth to power , it ’ s gon na be different .
It ’ s gon na be different and good for the state of Missouri but also for the whole country .
”

When Cori Bush arrived at a demonstration against police brutality in the St. Louis suburb of Florissant, Missouri, on July 5, she brought with her years of experience as a community organizer.
But as police began pummeling activists with their batons, it was Bush’s training as a registered nurse that sprang to the forefront. Seeing one of her comrades taking a beating from an officer, she jumped into the scrum to pull him out and provide emergency medical treatment.
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Before she could reach him, an officer sprayed tear gas directly in her face and at her upper body. Cleansing fluids that normally relieve the burning effect from pepper spray were useless, forcing her to endure stinging pain for 24 hours afterward.
(The Florissant Police Department referred HuffPost to public statements in which the law enforcement body maintained that it ordered the crowd, which had approaching the police headquarters, to disperse. It only began forcibly dispersing the crowd once protesters refused to leave and began damaging police property.)
Cori Bush uses water to rinse her face after being tear-gassed by police in Florissant, Missouri, on July 5. She went back to campaigning for Congress the following morning. Lawrence Bryant/Reuters
For most people, the experience would have been harrowing. For Bush, it was just another day on the congressional campaign trail. A month later, she would shock the country with an upset primary election win, unseating Rep. William Lacy Clay, the Democrat who has represented Missouri’s 1st Congressional District since 2001.
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Bush won her race for an overwhelmingly Democratic St. Louis-area seat and is all but assured of victory in the general election. She is set to become the first Black Lives Matter activist forged in the fires of Ferguson to grace the marble halls of the U.S. Capitol in Washington. Bush’s ascent comes as the country, in the wake of the police killing of George Floyd, undergoes a long-overdue reckoning on policing and racial justice. The work of Ferguson movement veterans such as Bush laid the foundation of the broader racial justice movement.
Missouri state Rep. Rasheen Aldridge (D), a young Ferguson activist who became one of the first protesters to carve a path from activism to government service, said Bush’s experience on the front lines will help the Black Lives Matter movement gain a voice in federal politics. He was there last month when Bush jumped into nurse mode to aid demonstrators after police used tear gas and batons on a protest group in Florissant, and he remembers being pepper-sprayed with Bush during a 2017 protest in downtown St. Louis.
“This isn’t anything new for her,” Aldridge said, recalling that Bush would hop out of a protest to do a campaign Zoom call and then get right back out on the streets.
“We have somebody who is like a John Lewis, who has been through the streets and moved now into a position of power,” Aldridge said. “That’s what we’re getting again: a female version of John Lewis. Somebody who understands the need of protests, the need of civil disobedience, and will not ever talk down to a movement or say they need to strategize different.”
“One of the first memories I have of Cori is of her in her scrubs at a protest, and it was early. It was in August of 2014,” said Kayla Reed, a Ferguson protester and racial justice activist who now serves as executive director of Action St. Louis. “If someone was, like, ‘Who is a Ferguson protester?’ Cori Bush’s name is on that list.”
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Now Bush has a chance to translate the passion that inspired her activism into results for the district that is likely to elect her. She told HuffPost on Wednesday that she plans to take a pragmatic approach to advance progressive goals ― stand apart from colleagues when necessary, but work with them whenever possible.
“My door’s not going to be closed to working with anyone, but I’m not going to be someone who goes along to get along either.” - Cori Bush
“This is about me building St. Louis in a way we haven’t seen ― especially in quite a while,” Bush said. “My door’s not going to be closed to working with anyone, but I’m not going to be someone who goes along to get along either.”
Aldridge, who was just 20 when he hit the streets of Ferguson in 2014, said the people in positions of power in law enforcement in St. Louis “should be nervous” about Bush’s new role because she’s not going to let them get away with what they’ve gotten away with in the past.
St. Louis leaders “should be on their tippy-toes” because Bush won’t be afraid to call out wrongdoing, even as she works with the departments she faced down at protests, he said.
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“That’s just Cori. She’s going to be willing to still work with those same police departments and officers that, you know, harassed her or arrested her or maced her or laughed at her for protesting the right way,” Aldridge said. “She’s going to work with them, but she’s also going to hold them accountable.”
As a member of Congress, Bush won’t have a direct oversight role over local police, whose actions are largely (often very loosely) regulated at the state and local levels. But being a member of Congress comes with a lot of power of the pulpit, and St. Louis police departments would be unwise to blow off the requests of a sitting congresswoman.
Hours after her surprising primary win, Bush was still working out her vision for what kind of member of Congress she wants to be. She said she wants to serve on the House Committee on Oversight and Reform, which is charged with supervising the executive branch.
Bush could support legislation such as the Breathe Act, a proposal backed by the Movement for Black Lives coalition and introduced by two members of the so-called squad, Democratic Reps. Rashida Tlaib (Mich.) and Ayanna Pressley (Mass.), said Reed, whose group knocked doors in support of Bush’s election.
Bush could also bring attention to structural issues — such as housing, health care and over-incarceration and how they manifest on the local level — and facilitate a national conversation on how to bring about change, Reed added.
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The violent response of law enforcement agencies to the protests that broke out in Ferguson, Missouri, in August 2014 further persuaded Bush of the need for major political change. Michael B. Thomas/Getty Images
What is clear is that Bush represents a new stage in the political development of a contemporary civil rights movement born in Ferguson. Veterans of the Ferguson protests ― and of demonstrations that broke out after police killings in major cities in subsequent years ― now occupy city councils, state legislatures and even prosecutors’ offices. Soon, one of their own will be on Capitol Hill.
Bush did not always regard the police with a mixture of fear and suspicion. Her father, Errol Bush, is an alderman in the St. Louis suburb of Northwoods, and police officers would come in and out of her home on official business.
As Bush got older, she started seeing her father pulled over frequently when he ventured out of the family’s neighborhood and saw the same thing happen to her friends. That’s when she began to view law enforcement as an agent of a racist social order.
Then, in August 2014, a white police officer shot and killed unarmed Black teenager Michael Brown. His death radicalized Bush, who was tired of what she saw as unaccountable police violence, as were so many other Black St. Louis-area residents.
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“I just couldn’t believe what was happening in my community,” she recalled. “So I went to the streets just thinking I could be a medic because I’m a nurse, help out, pray with people because I’m clergy. And I just saw something that I would have never expected and ended up staying ― just coming back day after day.”
During the day, Bush attended the protests in a professional capacity. The community mental health clinic where she worked sent her to help protesters coping with grief and trauma. At night, she would return as a demonstrator.
Cori Bush, right, joins Amy Vilela, left, and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) at the premiere of the documentary "Knock Down the House." The film raised Bush's profile. Roger Kisby/Getty Images
The violent suppression of police protests only hardened her belief that the country’s politics were in need of radical transformation. In an incident that closely resembled the tear-gassing she endured in early July, Bush found herself hurled to the ground and stomped on by police officers when she ran to help a woman experiencing what looked like a heart attack.
Bush brought a complaint about the officers’ conduct to the Ferguson police chief, but he pointed a finger instead at members of the National Guard and officers from other departments who had come to help quell the unrest. His officers were protecting the town’s firehouse and were not in the street that night, the chief argued.
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Bush did not pursue the complaint further. “I left it alone from there because I felt like I wasn’t going to get anywhere,” she said. (She was almost certainly right: St. Louis law enforcement agencies stymied internal affairs complaints, and a federal investigation found that departments that responded to the Ferguson unrest “made it difficult or impossible to lodge complaints.”)
Instead, Bush channeled her passion into a career in electoral politics. She ran first for U.S. Senate in 2016, nabbing 13% of the vote against the winner and party favorite, Jason Kander.
“People saw that I’ve been consistent.” - Cori Bush
Two years later, Bush set her sights on the more modest goal of winning a House seat. She was the first candidate recruited by Justice Democrats, a left-wing group founded by alumni of independent Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders’ 2016 presidential bid. In a four-candidate field, Bush earned a respectable 37%, losing to Clay by just under 20 percentage points.
The initial run raised Bush’s name recognition in the district and won her a starring role in the popular Netflix documentary “Knock Down the House,” laying the foundation of her successful rematch in 2020. The renewed energy behind the Black Lives Matter movement following the police killings of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor gave her critical momentum in the final weeks of the primary race.
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Bush recalls seeing people wearing her campaign T-shirts and other swag to protests against police racism in St. Louis.
“People saw that I’ve been consistent, and I’ve been leading and fighting for Black lives and so many other issues that concern us for a long time,” she said.
As her profile rises, Bush’s rhetoric around Ferguson and the death of Michael Brown is bound to draw scrutiny and make a lot of people uncomfortable.
In her acceptance speech, she said that Brown was “murdered by the police in the streets of Ferguson.” A federal investigation released by the Justice Department in 2015 found the evidence did not support the initial claims that Wilson had his hands up when he was fatally shot, and a progressive prosecutor elected in St. Louis County in the wake of the Ferguson unrest recently announced that he couldn’t make the case against former officer Darren Wilson. (A finding Wilson couldn’t face charges under current law, of course, does not mean that Brown’s death was unavoidable.)
Bush gives a victory speech on Tuesday. Bush described her win as a milestone for the movement that emerged out of Michael Brown's death in Ferguson in 2014. Michael B. Thomas/Getty Images
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Bush has also been vocal about her worries about her life and the threats she’s received as a prominent voice in the Ferguson movement. She described being followed and shot at, wondering at times if she was targeted by white supremacists or other right-wing extremists. Bush posted worries online that she’ll be killed and her death covered up as an accident or a suicide.
The Associated Press quoted Bush last year in its controversial story about the Ferguson activist community’s concerns that the deaths of several people tied to the movement were part of a broader plot against demonstrators. “Something is happening,” Bush told the news agency at the time.
Bush stood by her suspicions in an interview Wednesday with HuffPost. “I do have questions about the circumstances of those deaths,” she said.
Bush’s characterization of Brown’s death and her skepticism about the official cause of protester deaths may understandably raise eyebrows. But it is critical to view her suspicions in a broader context. Law enforcement officers in many departments in the St. Louis region lie so routinely that community members struggle to believe anything they say.
Agencies that responded to the Ferguson unrest regularly released information to the media that was plainly untrue. An investigation of the St. Louis County Police Department identified a “pattern of light discipline in investigations involving ethical failings and untruthfulness,” while an investigation of the Ferguson Police Department found that untruthfulness didn’t even always result in a formal investigation (let alone serious consequences), which sent a message that officers could “behave as they like, regardless of law or policy, and even if caught, that punishment will be light.”
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It is also undeniable that Ferguson activists such as Bush have been subjected to terrifying campaigns of racist harassment and that law enforcement officers in the St. Louis region have engaged in criminal conspiracies to brutalize protesters. Aldridge said he, too, received death threats and racist messages. One caller threatened to kill Aldridge if he walked down the caller’s street. Someone else mailed him a razor blade.
Several St. Louis officers pleaded guilty in a conspiracy to brutalize an undercover officer they thought was a protester, an investigation that revealed that officers exchanged texts about how it would be “fun” to start “beating the hell out of these shitheads once the sun goes down.”
HuffPost reached out to the Ferguson Police Department and the St. Louis County Police Department for comment on this story.
“There’s always going to be a violent response to those who are trying to change systems.” - Kayla Reed, Action St. Louis
“There’s always going to be a violent response to those who are trying to change systems,” Reed said. “We’ve seen people be followed. We’ve seen people be stalked and harassed online and receive death threats. We’ve seen Black elected officials in St. Louis deal with the kind of good-old-boy politics that often turns into white terror threats when they’re angry enough. And so I think people need to understand that white supremacy is violence, and in a lot of ways, those who are the most visible take the brunt of that violence and the threat of that violence. It shouldn’t be dismissed lightly as a conspiracy theory.”
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Beyond issues of policing, Bush’s life experience will shape the role she plays in Congress. Bush experienced unstable housing. She worked in low-wage jobs, and she’s been unemployed. When Clay’s campaign sent out mailers pointing out that Bush had been evicted, supporters saw Clay as out of touch with the needs of a place in which a quarter of the city of St. Louis lives under the poverty line.
“Right now, during the pandemic, thousands of people are going to be evicted, and to use that as some sort of leverage against her, that came out as classist. It came out as out of touch. It came off completely detached from the lived experiences of constituents that make up Congressional District 1,” Reed said.
Bush’s election was “a really loud rejection” of establishment politics in St. Louis, Reed said. Supporters such as Reed saw Bush’s rhetoric as authentic, reflecting a shared struggle for justice and equality. They’re eager to watch Bush bring the power of her voice to Washington.


thehuffingtonpost--2020-08-06--Updated Forecast Warns Of 'Extremely Active' Atlantic Hurricane Season

Federal forecasters on Thursday updated their outlook for the ongoing Atlantic hurricane season , predicting an “ extremely active ” period as the nation continues to struggle with the coronavirus pandemic .
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration is now forecasting between 19 and 25 named storms , seven to 11 hurricanes , and three to six major hurricanes of Category 3 or stronger .
The adjusted outlook is worse than NOAA ’ s May prediction of an “ above-normal ” season with 13 to 19 named storms , six to 10 hurricanes , and three to six major hurricanes @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to 25 named storms .
“ This is one of the most active seasonal forecasts that NOAA has produced in its 22-year history of hurricane outlooks , ” U.S. Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross said in a statement .
The 2020 season got off to a rapid start , with a record-setting nine named storms in the first two months .
Typically , a ninth named storm does not form until early October .
The most recent storm , Isaias , battered the Bahamas before moving up the U.S. East Coast , where it @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , delivered torrential rain and left millions without power .
At least nine people were killed .
Factors contributing to this year ’ s potentially severe season include above-average sea surface temperatures in the Atlantic and Caribbean , and an enhanced west African monsoon , NOAA said .
The 2020 season officially runs from June 1 to Nov. 30 , with activity typically peaking during the later months .
In a call with reporters in May , NOAA researchers downplayed the significance of human-caused climate change on the potential severity of the 2020 @ @ @ @ @ @ @ cyclical impacts of El Niño and La Niña .
It is “ not a factor in this year ’ s forecast , ” Gerry Bell , a hurricane climate specialist and research meteorologist at NOAA , said when asked the agency saw a climate signal in the modeling .
A May study by researchers at NOAA and the University of Wisconsin at Madison found that planetary warming over the last 40 years increased the likelihood of tropical storms becoming major hurricanes ― anything over a Category 3 ― by 8 % per decade @

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Federal forecasters on Thursday updated their outlook for the ongoing Atlantic hurricane season, predicting an “extremely active” period as the nation continues to struggle with the coronavirus pandemic.
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration is now forecasting between 19 and 25 named storms, seven to 11 hurricanes, and three to six major hurricanes of Category 3 or stronger.
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The adjusted outlook is worse than NOAA’s May prediction of an “above-normal” season with 13 to 19 named storms, six to 10 hurricanes, and three to six major hurricanes. Never before has NOAA forecast up to 25 named storms.
“This is one of the most active seasonal forecasts that NOAA has produced in its 22-year history of hurricane outlooks,” U.S. Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross said in a statement.
The 2020 season got off to a rapid start, with a record-setting nine named storms in the first two months. Typically, a ninth named storm does not form until early October.
The most recent storm, Isaias, battered the Bahamas before moving up the U.S. East Coast, where it made landfall as a Category 1 hurricane, delivered torrential rain and left millions without power. At least nine people were killed.
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Factors contributing to this year’s potentially severe season include above-average sea surface temperatures in the Atlantic and Caribbean, and an enhanced west African monsoon, NOAA said.
The 2020 season officially runs from June 1 to Nov. 30, with activity typically peaking during the later months.
In a call with reporters in May, NOAA researchers downplayed the significance of human-caused climate change on the potential severity of the 2020 season. They pointed instead to the cyclical impacts of El Niño and La Niña.
It is “not a factor in this year’s forecast,” Gerry Bell, a hurricane climate specialist and research meteorologist at NOAA, said when asked the agency saw a climate signal in the modeling.
A May study by researchers at NOAA and the University of Wisconsin at Madison found that planetary warming over the last 40 years increased the likelihood of tropical storms becoming major hurricanes ― anything over a Category 3 ― by 8% per decade.


thehuffingtonpost--2020-08-06--Hasbro Pulls Trolls Doll Pulled Amid Complaints It Promotes Child Abuse

PAWTUCKET , R.I. ( AP ) — A Trolls doll is being pulled off store shelves amid complaints it promotes child abuse .
Toymaker Hasbro said Wednesday that it ’ s in the process of removing the “ Trolls World Tour Giggle and Sing Poppy ” from the market and will be offering customers a replacement doll of the popular female character .
The doll had been designed to giggle when placed in a sitting position , but some parents complain the sound activation button is inappropriately placed under the doll ’ s skirt and between her legs .
An @ @ @ @ @ @ @ conditioning our children to think pedophilia is OK. ” “ This is not okay for a child ’ s toy !
This toy needs to be removed from our stores , ” the petition by Jessica McManis reads in part .
“ What will this toy make our innocent , impressionable children think ?
That it ’ s fun when someone touches your private area ?
” The petition is addressed to major retailers including Target , Walmart and Amazon .
Hasbro spokeswoman Julie Duffy told The Providence Journal that the Rhode Island-based @ @ @ @ @ @ @ “ may be perceived as inappropriate.
” “ This was not intentional and we are happy to provide consumers with a replacement Poppy doll of similar value through our consumer care team , ” she told the newspaper .
“ We are in the process of removing the item for purchase.
” Hasbro is the maker of Transformers , G.I .
Joe , Monopoly and other beloved children ’ s toys and games .

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PAWTUCKET, R.I. (AP) — A Trolls doll is being pulled off store shelves amid complaints it promotes child abuse.
Toymaker Hasbro said Wednesday that it’s in the process of removing the “Trolls World Tour Giggle and Sing Poppy” from the market and will be offering customers a replacement doll of the popular female character.
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The doll had been designed to giggle when placed in a sitting position, but some parents complain the sound activation button is inappropriately placed under the doll’s skirt and between her legs.
An online petition suggests the doll is “conditioning our children to think pedophilia is OK.”
“This is not okay for a child’s toy! This toy needs to be removed from our stores,” the petition by Jessica McManis reads in part. “What will this toy make our innocent, impressionable children think? That it’s fun when someone touches your private area?”
The petition is addressed to major retailers including Target, Walmart and Amazon.
Hasbro spokeswoman Julie Duffy told The Providence Journal that the Rhode Island-based company recognizes the sensor’s placement “may be perceived as inappropriate.”
“This was not intentional and we are happy to provide consumers with a replacement Poppy doll of similar value through our consumer care team,” she told the newspaper. “We are in the process of removing the item for purchase.”
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