thehuffingtonpost--2020-11-16--Michelle Obama Calls Out Trump's Refusal To Transition To Biden: 'This Isn’t A Game'

Michelle Obama shared some candid reflections Monday on the current state of the White House , calling out President Donald Trump for his refusal to concede the election and take part in a peaceful transition of power to President-Elect Joe Biden .
The former first lady shared her poignant thoughts on Instagram along with a snapshot of herself and President Barack Obama on Trump ’ s Inauguration Day in 2017 .
“ This week , I ’ ve been reflecting a lot on where I was four years ago .
[ Hillary ] Clinton had just been dealt a tough @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the one we ’ ve seen this year .
I was hurt and disappointed — but the votes had been counted and Donald Trump had won .
The American people had spoken , ” she began .
Obama explained that “ one of the great responsibilities of the presidency ” is to listen when the American people speak and recalled that she and her husband had instructed their staffs to “ run a respectful , seamless transition of power — one of the hallmarks of American democracy.
” “ We invited the folks @ @ @ @ @ @ @ our offices and prepared detailed memos for them , offering what we ’ d learned over the past eight years , ” she wrote .
Obama admitted that none of that was “ easy ” for her , as Trump had “ spread racist lies about my husband that had put my family in danger.
” “ That wasn ’ t something I was ready to forgive .
But I knew that , for the sake of our country , I had to find the strength and maturity to put my anger aside @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the White House and talked with her about my experience , answering every question she had — from the heightened scrutiny that comes with being First Lady to what it ’ s like to raise kids in the White House , ” she wrote , adding that it was the “ right thing to do ” as “ democracy is so much bigger than anybody ’ s ego.
” The Chicago native went on to say that “ our love of country requires us to respect the results of an election even when @ @ @ @ @ @ @ wish it had gone differently — the presidency doesn ’ t belong to any one individual or any one party.
” “ To pretend that it does , to play along with these groundless conspiracy theories — whether for personal or political gain — is to put our country ’ s health and security in danger , ” she said , before concluding with : “ This isn ’ t a game .
So I want to urge all Americans , especially our nation ’ s leaders , regardless of party , to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ part to encourage a smooth transition of power , just as sitting presidents have done throughout our history.
” Obama ’ s remarks came on the heels of her husband telling NPR in an interview that aired on Monday that Trump is simply “ denying reality.
” Barack Obama also called the current president ’ s unwillingness to take part in the transition to Biden ’ s White House “ yet one more example of how Donald Trump ’ s breach of basic democratic norms is hurting the American people.
” Despite the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ this month , Trump has not yet conceded .
He has also spent the better part of the last two weeks going on Twitter tirades in which he has erroneously claimed that he won and that the Democrats have “ stolen ” the election .

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Michelle Obama shared some candid reflections Monday on the current state of the White House, calling out President Donald Trump for his refusal to concede the election and take part in a peaceful transition of power to President-Elect Joe Biden.
The former first lady shared her poignant thoughts on Instagram along with a snapshot of herself and President Barack Obama on Trump’s Inauguration Day in 2017.
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“This week, I’ve been reflecting a lot on where I was four years ago. [Hillary] Clinton had just been dealt a tough loss by a far closer margin than the one we’ve seen this year. I was hurt and disappointed — but the votes had been counted and Donald Trump had won. The American people had spoken,” she began.
Obama explained that “one of the great responsibilities of the presidency” is to listen when the American people speak and recalled that she and her husband had instructed their staffs to “run a respectful, seamless transition of power — one of the hallmarks of American democracy.”
“We invited the folks from the president-elect’s team into our offices and prepared detailed memos for them, offering what we’d learned over the past eight years,” she wrote.
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Obama admitted that none of that was “easy” for her, as Trump had “spread racist lies about my husband that had put my family in danger.”
“That wasn’t something I was ready to forgive. But I knew that, for the sake of our country, I had to find the strength and maturity to put my anger aside. So I welcomed Melania Trump into the White House and talked with her about my experience, answering every question she had — from the heightened scrutiny that comes with being First Lady to what it’s like to raise kids in the White House,” she wrote, adding that it was the “right thing to do” as “democracy is so much bigger than anybody’s ego.”
The Chicago native went on to say that “our love of country requires us to respect the results of an election even when we don’t like them or wish it had gone differently — the presidency doesn’t belong to any one individual or any one party.”
“To pretend that it does, to play along with these groundless conspiracy theories — whether for personal or political gain — is to put our country’s health and security in danger,” she said, before concluding with:
“This isn’t a game. So I want to urge all Americans, especially our nation’s leaders, regardless of party, to honor the electoral process and do your part to encourage a smooth transition of power, just as sitting presidents have done throughout our history.”
Obama’s remarks came on the heels of her husband telling NPR in an interview that aired on Monday that Trump is simply “denying reality.”
Barack Obama also called the current president’s unwillingness to take part in the transition to Biden’s White House “yet one more example of how Donald Trump’s breach of basic democratic norms is hurting the American people.”


thehuffingtonpost--2020-11-16--Donald Trump Jr. Tries (And Fails) To Own Polling Pundit Nate Silver

It happened Sunday on Twitter after the president ’ s firstborn son came across a Nov. 10 exchange on the social platform between Silver and MSNBC ’ s Chris Hayes .
The two were discussing how the polls underestimated the support for Donald Trump in the Nov. 3 election , leading some to wonder about their accuracy .
Silver said people may need to accept that polls are an indicator of political trends , albeit one with uncertainties built into their findings .
If polls are becoming less accurate—it 's not clear they are but leave that aside for a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ there 's more uncertainty .
But instead what will happen is that people will just be more confident in their dubious narratives and hot takes .
— Nate Silver ( @ NateSilver538 ) November 10 , 2020 I think a measurement tool that 's simultaneously becoming more common and accessible and also less accurate is a pretty bad combination .
— Chris Hayes ( @ chrislhayes ) November 10 , 2020 Silver then explained that , in truth , the polls were more accurate than conventional wisdom might suggest .
There 's not @ @ @ @ @ @ @ less accurate .
They had perhaps their best year ever in 2018 .
2016 and 2020 polling errors were slightly worse than average but within a fairly normal range .
— Nate Silver ( @ NateSilver538 ) November 10 , 2020 Five days late , Trump Jr. barreled into the conversation ready to defend his father against nuanced takes regarding algorithms and scientific models .
He accused Silver of just trying to save his career as a pundit .
We understand you ’ re trying to salvage a very lucrative career in polling @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
https : //t.co/V6hXNyUNRk — Donald Trump Jr. ( @ DonaldJTrumpJr ) November 15 , 2020 Silver swatted away Trump Jr. ’ s trolling by pointing out the obvious truth about his Dad ’ s political future ( or lack thereof ) .
Others piled on the president ’ s son because ... do you need a reason ?
Jokes on you Nate , Junior has never had a job .
Ca n't lose what you never had .
pic.twitter.com/zz6C7dyVHU — SportsPoliticsCoffee ( @ SPC_Harry ) November 15 , 2020

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It happened Sunday on Twitter after the president’s firstborn son came across a Nov. 10 exchange on the social platform between Silver and MSNBC’s Chris Hayes.
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The two were discussing how the polls underestimated the support for Donald Trump in the Nov. 3 election, leading some to wonder about their accuracy. Silver said people may need to accept that polls are an indicator of political trends, albeit one with uncertainties built into their findings.
If polls are becoming less accurate—it's not clear they are but leave that aside for a moment—people basically just need to accept that there's more uncertainty. But instead what will happen is that people will just be more confident in their dubious narratives and hot takes. — Nate Silver (@NateSilver538) November 10, 2020
That didn’t ease Hayes’ mind.
I think a measurement tool that's simultaneously becoming more common and accessible and also less accurate is a pretty bad combination. — Chris Hayes (@chrislhayes) November 10, 2020
Silver then explained that, in truth, the polls were more accurate than conventional wisdom might suggest.
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There's not actually much evidence that polls are becoming less accurate. They had perhaps their best year ever in 2018. 2016 and 2020 polling errors were slightly worse than average but within a fairly normal range. — Nate Silver (@NateSilver538) November 10, 2020
Five days late, Trump Jr. barreled into the conversation ready to defend his father against nuanced takes regarding algorithms and scientific models. He accused Silver of just trying to save his career as a pundit.
We understand you’re trying to salvage a very lucrative career in polling punditry but it’s getting ridiculous. https://t.co/V6hXNyUNRk — Donald Trump Jr. (@DonaldJTrumpJr) November 15, 2020
Silver swatted away Trump Jr.’s trolling by pointing out the obvious truth about his Dad’s political future (or lack thereof).
I'll still have a job on January 21st, though. — Nate Silver (@NateSilver538) November 15, 2020
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Others piled on the president’s son because ... do you need a reason?
A job your daddy didn't give you. — George Conway (@gtconway3d) November 15, 2020


thehuffingtonpost--2020-11-16--Prosecutor Drops Dubious Confederate Statue Cases As Portsmouth Fires Police Chief

The same day , Portsmouth city officials fired suspended Police Chief Angela Greene , who had authorized a police sergeant with a grudge to bring the unusual felony charges against the 19 defendants , including state Sen. Louise Lucas ( D ) , a prominent critic of Greene .
Since Greene ’ s suspension in September over the incident , she has aligned herself with conservatives seeking to oust Lucas from office .
Police alleged Lucas ’ words were part of a criminal conspiracy that caused more serious destruction hours later , after night fell and she had left the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ used sledgehammers to damage the monument ’ s Confederate statues , causing one to fall on a protester .
Greene ’ s police department didn ’ t intervene that evening until the demonstrator was hurt .
Civil rights leaders and Democratic leaders argued the charges were politically and racially motivated , especially given the police department ’ s history of racial bias and the expressed political views of the sergeant overseeing the case .
The Portsmouth Police Department brought the charges without the loca prosecutor ’ s approval , relying on Virginia ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ then tried to sideline Portsmouth Commonwealth ’ s Attorney Stephanie Morales from handling the charges against Lucas and the others .
The elected progressive prosecutor previously secured a conviction against a former Portsmouth police officer who killed a Black teenager .
On Monday , the court granted Morales ’ motion to dismiss the 19 cases with prejudice , meaning they can ’ t be brought again .
Judge Claire Cardwell , an outside judge named to preside over the cases , said in court that she was very concerned that the police department @ @ @ @ @ @ @ commonwealth ’ s attorney in the matter , Morales told HuffPost .
Portsmouth Police Sgt .
Kevin McGee and his department were able to bring the unusual charges unilaterally without consulting Morales ’ office under Virginia ’ s magistrate system , which allows even regular citizens to file some criminal charges .
While some conservative critics have suggested that political considerations weighed into Morales ’ handling of the cases , she said her decision was based on the facts of the cases .
“ This was not dismissed in a discretionary matter , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ not met , ” Morales said .
“ On each and every case that comes before our office , we have a duty to ensure that the elements are met before proceeding with prosecution .
This is not just something that sounds good , this is an ethical obligation that we all have.
” McGee was allowed to investigate and bring the charges even though he ’ d written a lengthy political screed that blasted many of the defendants he ’ d later charge .
Greene praised the officer for that letter , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ’ d talk to McGee about it and refer the matter to the department ’ s internal affairs office .
In moving to dismiss the cases , Morales ’ office revealed other letters sent by McGee , who continued to claim he was acting in good faith .
As HuffPost previously reported , McGee was one of a group of white officers who pushed to oust the city ’ s prior police chief , a Black woman who said she encountered a culture of racism within the predominately white police force .
McGee @ @ @ @ @ @ @ wrote , “ Contrary to what has been portrayed in the media by the defendants , their supporters , and others on social media , there is not a behind-the-scenes conspiracy trying to manipulate the legal system or sideline your office from involvement in the case for some political reason or any other purpose.
” Remarkably , it was Greene herself who created some evidence that would be devastating to any attempted prosecution of the felony cases she later authorized .
She wrote in an August memo that because she had conflicting information @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the monument being damaged , she “ could not take any legal action without a victim ” and she “ didn ’ t have a crime ” if officials were OK with the monument being destroyed .
If citizens were being told by officials that they could damage property , she wrote , “ citizens assumed they were acting without criminal intent.
” Greene said Monday she would be filing an unlawful termination lawsuit .
In an interview ahead of her firing , she said was “ taking a stand against these elected @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , were interfering with her duties .

The elected prosecutor of Portsmouth, Virginia, dropped controversial charges on Monday against a high-ranking state senator, local civil rights leaders and city public defenders in connection with what the local police department had claimed was a felony criminal conspiracy to cause “injury to” the city’s Confederate monument.
The same day, Portsmouth city officials fired suspended Police Chief Angela Greene, who had authorized a police sergeant with a grudge to bring the unusual felony charges against the 19 defendants, including state Sen. Louise Lucas (D), a prominent critic of Greene. Since Greene’s suspension in September over the incident, she has aligned herself with conservatives seeking to oust Lucas from office.
Virginia state Sen. Louise Lucas (D) faced a felony charge in connection with the destruction of a Confederate statue in Portsmouth -- even though she wasn't at the scene when it was toppled. Zach Gibson via Getty Images
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Lucas is the most powerful Black woman politician in a former slave state, and the felony charges against her raised significant First Amendment concerns.
Police attempted to charge Lucas for her rhetoric about how police should handle demonstrators at a daytime protest against Portsmouth’s Confederate monument in June, not long after the death of George Floyd, a Black man, at the hands of police in Minneapolis.
Police alleged Lucas’ words were part of a criminal conspiracy that caused more serious destruction hours later, after night fell and she had left the scene. It was then that demonstrators used sledgehammers to damage the monument’s Confederate statues, causing one to fall on a protester. Greene’s police department didn’t intervene that evening until the demonstrator was hurt.
Civil rights leaders and Democratic leaders argued the charges were politically and racially motivated, especially given the police department’s history of racial bias and the expressed political views of the sergeant overseeing the case. The Portsmouth Police Department brought the charges without the loca prosecutor’s approval, relying on Virginia’s unusual magistrate system. The department then tried to sideline Portsmouth Commonwealth’s Attorney Stephanie Morales from handling the charges against Lucas and the others. The elected progressive prosecutor previously secured a conviction against a former Portsmouth police officer who killed a Black teenager.
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Morales fought back against the “bad faith” attempt to keep her off the cases, and a judge ruled her office could play its normal role.
On Monday, the court granted Morales’ motion to dismiss the 19 cases with prejudice, meaning they can’t be brought again. Judge Claire Cardwell, an outside judge named to preside over the cases, said in court that she was very concerned that the police department tried to circumvent the office of the commonwealth’s attorney in the matter, Morales told HuffPost.
“In thoroughly reviewing the investigative file, it became abundantly clear there was a mountain of exculpatory evidence” favoring the defendants, Morales said. The elements needed to pursue the cases “are not properly met.”
Stephanie Morales, the commonwealth's attorney for Portsmouth, successfully fought the local police department's efforts to sideline her office from controversial charges the department pressed against Lucas and others. Genoa Everett / Commonwealth's Attorney
Portsmouth Police Sgt. Kevin McGee and his department were able to bring the unusual charges unilaterally without consulting Morales’ office under Virginia’s magistrate system, which allows even regular citizens to file some criminal charges. While some conservative critics have suggested that political considerations weighed into Morales’ handling of the cases, she said her decision was based on the facts of the cases.
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“This was not dismissed in a discretionary matter, this was dismissed because the elements were not met,” Morales said. “On each and every case that comes before our office, we have a duty to ensure that the elements are met before proceeding with prosecution. This is not just something that sounds good, this is an ethical obligation that we all have.”
Morales said prosecutors should “never take anything at face value when people’s lives and freedom are on the line” and make sure they “are the gatekeepers for justice at all times.”
McGee was allowed to investigate and bring the charges even though he’d written a lengthy political screed that blasted many of the defendants he’d later charge. Greene praised the officer for that letter, even though she told Morales that she’d talk to McGee about it and refer the matter to the department’s internal affairs office.
Portsmouth Police Chief Angela Greene, who officially lost her job on Monday, praised Sgt. Kevin McGee for a letter he wrote that blasted a state senator he would later charge with a felony. WAVY
In moving to dismiss the cases, Morales’ office revealed other letters sent by McGee, who continued to claim he was acting in good faith. As HuffPost previously reported, McGee was one of a group of white officers who pushed to oust the city’s prior police chief, a Black woman who said she encountered a culture of racism within the predominately white police force.
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McGee, in a letter to Morales, wrote, “Contrary to what has been portrayed in the media by the defendants, their supporters, and others on social media, there is not a behind-the-scenes conspiracy trying to manipulate the legal system or sideline your office from involvement in the case for some political reason or any other purpose.”
In another letter, he complained that Morales’ office had been “hostile to me and my integrity,” and “implied I am withholding information when nothing could be further from the truth.”
Defendants celebrated the decision to drop the charges, which they argued from the start were politically and racially motivated.
All are celebrating outside. “When you don’t know your job and you don’t follow the law there are consequences of your action.” - @SenLouiseLucas pic.twitter.com/orvJ362tLz — Kofo Lasaki WTKR (@KofoLasaki) November 16, 2020
Remarkably, it was Greene herself who created some evidence that would be devastating to any attempted prosecution of the felony cases she later authorized. She wrote in an August memo that because she had conflicting information about whether city officials were OK with the monument being damaged, she “could not take any legal action without a victim” and she “didn’t have a crime” if officials were OK with the monument being destroyed. If citizens were being told by officials that they could damage property, she wrote, “citizens assumed they were acting without criminal intent.”
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“Without confirmation from city leaders regarding destruction of property, I had to protect the citizens and officers from this event escalating to individuals getting injured; officers utilizing force and possibly charged with false arrest and/or excessive force ― as I did not have a victim,” Greene wrote.
Greene said Monday she would be filing an unlawful termination lawsuit. In an interview ahead of her firing, she said was “taking a stand against these elected officials” who, in her view, were interfering with her duties.
Under Portsmouth’s city government structure, Greene was subordinate to the city manager, who is chosen by the elected city council members.
At the moment, Portsmouth has a majority-white city council. But that will change, after several Black candidates were swept into office in the Nov. 3 election.
Portsmouth’s Confederate monument, which was located near the location of an old slave whipping post, is now fully removed.
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The Confederate Monument in Portsmouth, the source of the city's ongoing civic controversy. Universal History Archive via Getty Images
Morales, asked how she’d improve her relationship with Portsmouth police officers given the controversy over the case, said that her “number one priority” was building trust with the community.
“I seek a relationship of mutual respect with law enforcement, but I seek to serve my community,” she said. “Everyone who is a sworn law enforcement officer has a duty to protect and serve, and they should be advocates for acting in a good faith basis and ensuring that when they are bringing charges that the elements are properly met.”


thehuffingtonpost--2020-11-16--ACLU Challenges ‘Torturous Conditions’ Of Only Woman On Federal Death Row

Handout/Reuters Lisa Montgomery is scheduled to be executed on Dec. 8 .
If it occurs , she will be the first woman executed by the federal government in almost 70 years .
Lisa Montgomery , the only woman on federal death row , is being subjected to “ torturous conditions ” as she awaits her upcoming execution , according to the American Civil Liberties Union , which is suing the federal government on her behalf .
Montgomery , 52 , has a severe mental illness and was a victim of repeated sexual and physical abuse as a child , including @ @ @ @ @ @ @ killed a pregnant woman and abducted her baby , a crime that her attorneys say occurred during a psychotic episode .
Montgomery is currently incarcerated at a women ’ s medical prison in Texas .
These days , she takes a cocktail of psychotropic drugs to function , and cycles in and out of touch with reality .
Ever since her execution was set for Dec. 8 , Montgomery has been held under harsh conditions that are especially traumatizing in light of her history of sexual abuse , said Cassandra Stubbs , director @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Project .
According to the lawsuit , once she received her execution date , Montgomery was moved into a cell with lights that remain on day and night .
Her clothes were confiscated , and she was forced to wear a loose-fitting gown without underwear that exposed her private parts when she crouched or bent over .
Her lawyers , who visited her in Texas , recalled in a separate court filing that she was distraught over the loss of her underwear , and reported that they spent hours trying to calm her @ @ @ @ @ @ @ rape and incest , Montgomery felt exposed and vulnerable .
Montgomery is currently being monitored with 24-hour video surveillance , and can be observed by male guards even while using the bathroom .
These “ deplorable and draconian ” conditions are inflicting gratuitous pain and suffering on her and exacerbating her mental illness , Stubbs said .
“ Being confined in a constantly illuminated room in an ill-fitting smock without undergarments while being constantly surveilled by male guards parallels the conditions under which Mrs. Montgomery was kept in a special room and raped @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ” the lawsuit states .
“ The continual reminders of her past sexual torment are likely to trigger her learned fear arousal and threat detection systems , including psychotic levels of dissociation.
” The lawsuit was filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia .
On Monday , the ACLU filed a motion asking the court to take immediate action to remedy the conditions of Montgomery ’ s confinement .
The motion also asked the court to halt Montgomery ’ s impending transfer to U.S. Penitentiary Terre Haute , an @ @ @ @ @ @ @ executions take place .
No female prisoners have ever been housed there .
If her execution goes forward , Montgomery will be the first woman executed by the federal government in nearly 70 years .
“ This is a woman who breaks out in hives when she ’ s exposed to new men , as a result of her gang rapes and years of torture and sexual abuse at the hands of men , ” Stubbs said .
“ Her involuntary trauma responses of dissociation are so powerful that the mental health experts @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a transfer like that to a male prison.
” She noted that Montgomery is currently being held under far harsher conditions than any man on death row .
For example , men who are awaiting execution at Terre Haute are allowed to exercise and take hot showers , and are given privacy shields so they can use the bathroom without being fully exposed .
“ She ’ s just falling through the cracks here because she ’ s a woman , and they don ’ t have written protocols and plans in place @ @ @ @ @ @ @ “ It ’ s resulting in this worse treatment for her.
” Over a thousand advocates , activists , prosecutors and supporters have signed on to letters urging President Donald Trump to commute Montgomery ’ s sentence to life in prison without possibility of parole , due to her mental illness and history of abuse .
President-elect Joe Biden has pledged to end the federal death penalty .
The coronavirus pandemic has complicated legal efforts to save Montgomery ’ s life .
At the Federal Medical Center , Carswell , where she is @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of the virus .
Both of Montgomery ’ s lead attorneys are now sick with the coronavirus after visiting the prison on multiple occasions .

Lisa Montgomery is scheduled to be executed on Dec. 8. If it occurs, she will be the first woman executed by the federal government in almost 70 years. Handout/Reuters
Lisa Montgomery, the only woman on federal death row, is being subjected to “torturous conditions” as she awaits her upcoming execution, according to the American Civil Liberties Union, which is suing the federal government on her behalf.
Montgomery, 52, has a severe mental illness and was a victim of repeated sexual and physical abuse as a child, including sex trafficking. In 2004, she killed a pregnant woman and abducted her baby, a crime that her attorneys say occurred during a psychotic episode. Montgomery is currently incarcerated at a women’s medical prison in Texas. These days, she takes a cocktail of psychotropic drugs to function, and cycles in and out of touch with reality.
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Ever since her execution was set for Dec. 8, Montgomery has been held under harsh conditions that are especially traumatizing in light of her history of sexual abuse, said Cassandra Stubbs, director of the ACLU’s Capital Punishment Project.
According to the lawsuit, once she received her execution date, Montgomery was moved into a cell with lights that remain on day and night. Her clothes were confiscated, and she was forced to wear a loose-fitting gown without underwear that exposed her private parts when she crouched or bent over.
Her lawyers, who visited her in Texas, recalled in a separate court filing that she was distraught over the loss of her underwear, and reported that they spent hours trying to calm her down. As a victim of gang rape and incest, Montgomery felt exposed and vulnerable.
After repeated complaints, prison staff finally gave her a pair of mesh underwear two weeks later, with the instruction “Be a good girl, now,” according to the ACLU filing.
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Montgomery is currently being monitored with 24-hour video surveillance, and can be observed by male guards even while using the bathroom. These “deplorable and draconian” conditions are inflicting gratuitous pain and suffering on her and exacerbating her mental illness, Stubbs said.
“Being confined in a constantly illuminated room in an ill-fitting smock without undergarments while being constantly surveilled by male guards parallels the conditions under which Mrs. Montgomery was kept in a special room and raped by multiple men as a child,” the lawsuit states. “The continual reminders of her past sexual torment are likely to trigger her learned fear arousal and threat detection systems, including psychotic levels of dissociation.”
The lawsuit was filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia. On Monday, the ACLU filed a motion asking the court to take immediate action to remedy the conditions of Montgomery’s confinement.
The motion also asked the court to halt Montgomery’s impending transfer to U.S. Penitentiary Terre Haute, an all-male federal prison in Indiana where federal executions take place. No female prisoners have ever been housed there. If her execution goes forward, Montgomery will be the first woman executed by the federal government in nearly 70 years.
“This is a woman who breaks out in hives when she’s exposed to new men, as a result of her gang rapes and years of torture and sexual abuse at the hands of men,” Stubbs said. “Her involuntary trauma responses of dissociation are so powerful that the mental health experts do not believe that she could withstand a transfer like that to a male prison.”
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She noted that Montgomery is currently being held under far harsher conditions than any man on death row. For example, men who are awaiting execution at Terre Haute are allowed to exercise and take hot showers, and are given privacy shields so they can use the bathroom without being fully exposed.
“She’s just falling through the cracks here because she’s a woman, and they don’t have written protocols and plans in place for her,” Stubbs said. “It’s resulting in this worse treatment for her.”
Over a thousand advocates, activists, prosecutors and supporters have signed on to letters urging President Donald Trump to commute Montgomery’s sentence to life in prison without possibility of parole, due to her mental illness and history of abuse. President-elect Joe Biden has pledged to end the federal death penalty.
The coronavirus pandemic has complicated legal efforts to save Montgomery’s life. At the Federal Medical Center, Carswell, where she is being held, six inmates have died of the virus. Both of Montgomery’s lead attorneys are now sick with the coronavirus after visiting the prison on multiple occasions.
Another lawsuit, filed by Cornell Law School’s International Human Rights Clinic, seeks a stay in Montgomery’s execution until her lawyers are well enough to finish working on her clemency application.
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thehuffingtonpost--2020-11-16--Biden Transition Team Starts Reviewing Judicial Nominees

A Biden aide who requested anonymity to speak freely said the incoming administration is in the process of doing internal reviews of potential candidates , although there hasn ’ t yet been formal outreach to judicial groups for assistance .
More than ever , Democrats recognize the power and importance of having allies in the courts .
President Donald Trump ’ s presence will be felt on the federal bench for decades , with three of his justices now part of the Supreme Court ’ s solidly conservative majority and more than 200 federal judges confirmed by the GOP-controlled Senate @ @ @ @ @ @ @ groups were already making lists of potential judicial candidates and coming up with key criteria for the kinds of nominees they wanted to see Biden select .
They were united in wanting not only demographic diversity , but also different backgrounds than the kinds of people typically given lifetime court appointments .
That experience might look like someone who didn ’ t go to a Ivy-League law school or a lawyer who led a civil rights organization .
NAACP Legal Defense Fund President Sherrilyn Ifill and American Civil Liberties Union Voting Rights Project @ @ @ @ @ @ @ as potential candidates progressive groups would like to see considered .
But there ’ s also widespread recognition , including on the Biden team , that getting judicial nominees confirmed will be a true fight if Mitch McConnell ( R-Ky. ) controls the Senate in 2021 .
Right now , Republicans have 50 Senate seats and Democrats have 48 .
Georgia ’ s two Senate seats will be determined in a Jan. 5 runoff election , meaning that Democrats still have a shot ― albeit uphill ― to have the majority .
Making @ @ @ @ @ @ @ with conservatives has been one of McConnell ’ s top priorities , and it will no doubt be one of his most lasting legacies .
He refused to give Merrick Garland a hearing or a vote when President Barack Obama nominated him for the Supreme Court in March 2016 , after Antonin Scalia ’ s death , saying it was too close to the election .
Yet he had no problem pushing through Amy Coney Barrett after Ruth Bader Ginsburg ’ s death just a week before the 2020 election .
Trump and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ U.S. appeals courts ― there were dozens ― meaning Biden won ’ t have any to fill immediately .
There are two openings right now , but Trump has already nominated people for both , and McConnell will likely get them confirmed before January .
Some Democrats are urging Biden to simply skip the Senate to install officials in his Cabinet and other top administration jobs , but he can ’ t do that for judges .
He needs some GOP cooperation to fill the federal bench , if the Senate remains controlled @ @ @ @ @ @ @ they want Biden to start moving on judges as soon as he takes office .
Former President Barack Obama faced significant obstruction from McConnell , but he was slow to get going on judicial nominations when he became president and didn ’ t always focus on stirring the base to fight against the GOP blockade .
Trump has refused to concede the election , and the General Services Administration has likewise refused to declare Biden the official winner .
That typically noncontroversial process is known as ascertainment , which is the formal start @ @ @ @ @ @ @ it , Biden and his team don ’ t have access to millions of dollars for staff salaries and other purposes , and they aren ’ t able to fully access classified information and other executive information needed to make sure they hit the ground running on Jan. 20 .
The Biden team is still pushing ahead with what they can without those resources , and their efforts are being funded through a 501c4 set up for the transition .
Individuals can contribute up to $ 5,000 , and the group is not @ @ @ @ @ @ @ committees .
It plans to disclose its donors after Dec. 1 .

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President-elect Joe Biden’s team has started reviewing candidates for judicial nominations as it begins to look for people to fill out its administration.
A Biden aide who requested anonymity to speak freely said the incoming administration is in the process of doing internal reviews of potential candidates, although there hasn’t yet been formal outreach to judicial groups for assistance.
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An activist doing judicial work also confirmed that the Biden team has already started the work of identifying nominees.
More than ever, Democrats recognize the power and importance of having allies in the courts. President Donald Trump’s presence will be felt on the federal bench for decades, with three of his justices now part of the Supreme Court’s solidly conservative majority and more than 200 federal judges confirmed by the GOP-controlled Senate.
President-elect Joe Biden's transition team is reviewing potential nominees for judgeships. Carolyn Kaster/Associated Press
Months before the election, progressive groups were already making lists of potential judicial candidates and coming up with key criteria for the kinds of nominees they wanted to see Biden select.
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They were united in wanting not only demographic diversity, but also different backgrounds than the kinds of people typically given lifetime court appointments. That experience might look like someone who didn’t go to a Ivy-League law school or a lawyer who led a civil rights organization. NAACP Legal Defense Fund President Sherrilyn Ifill and American Civil Liberties Union Voting Rights Project Director Dale Ho have both been mentioned as potential candidates progressive groups would like to see considered.
But there’s also widespread recognition, including on the Biden team, that getting judicial nominees confirmed will be a true fight if Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) controls the Senate in 2021. Right now, Republicans have 50 Senate seats and Democrats have 48. Georgia’s two Senate seats will be determined in a Jan. 5 runoff election, meaning that Democrats still have a shot ― albeit uphill ― to have the majority.
Making sure that the federal judiciary is filled with conservatives has been one of McConnell’s top priorities, and it will no doubt be one of his most lasting legacies. He refused to give Merrick Garland a hearing or a vote when President Barack Obama nominated him for the Supreme Court in March 2016, after Antonin Scalia’s death, saying it was too close to the election. Yet he had no problem pushing through Amy Coney Barrett after Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s death just a week before the 2020 election.
Trump and McConnell filled every vacancy on the powerful U.S. appeals courts ― there were dozens ― meaning Biden won’t have any to fill immediately. There are two openings right now, but Trump has already nominated people for both, and McConnell will likely get them confirmed before January.
Some Democrats are urging Biden to simply skip the Senate to install officials in his Cabinet and other top administration jobs, but he can’t do that for judges. He needs some GOP cooperation to fill the federal bench, if the Senate remains controlled by Republicans.
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Judicial groups have said they want Biden to start moving on judges as soon as he takes office. Former President Barack Obama faced significant obstruction from McConnell, but he was slow to get going on judicial nominations when he became president and didn’t always focus on stirring the base to fight against the GOP blockade.
That Biden’s team is already reviewing potential nominees is a sign that he is making the fight a priority.
Trump has refused to concede the election, and the General Services Administration has likewise refused to declare Biden the official winner. That typically noncontroversial process is known as ascertainment, which is the formal start of the transition of power. Without it, Biden and his team don’t have access to millions of dollars for staff salaries and other purposes, and they aren’t able to fully access classified information and other executive information needed to make sure they hit the ground running on Jan. 20.
The Biden team is still pushing ahead with what they can without those resources, and their efforts are being funded through a 501c4 set up for the transition. Individuals can contribute up to $5,000, and the group is not taking money from corporations or political action committees. It plans to disclose its donors after Dec. 1.
CORRECTION: This article previously misstated the transition budget as “hundreds of millions.”


thehuffingtonpost--2020-11-16--As Trump Continues To Lie About The Election, Twitter Is Pulling Its Punches

Trump extended his series of tweeted complaints on Monday to laws on ballot signatures in Georgia : “ The Fake recount going on in Georgia means nothing because they are not allowing signatures to be looked at and verified .
Break the unconstitutional Consent Decree !
” he wrote .
Such a specific claim is easy to check : It ’ s wrong .
Georgia is not only allowed to look at and verify ballot signatures but is required to , as the state ’ s Republican secretary of state has pointed out .
But the label Twitter attached to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ convey that it ’ s wrong .
Instead , it just says his “ claim about election fraud is disputed , ” as if there is some legitimate debate about the Georgia signature law when there is not .
The platform has done this on dozens of recent Trump tweets that are clearly false or groundless .
Over this past weekend alone , as his supporters flooded the streets of Washington , D.C. , to rally against supposed electoral fraud , Trump tweeted that “ millions of ballots ” were “ altered by @ @ @ @ @ @ @ part of an effort to “ steal votes ” and people voted after the election was over , among a litany of other allegations of vote-rigging .
As Trump ’ s preferred mass communications platform , where he has nearly 89 million followers , Twitter has long grappled with the deluge of misinformation he spews there .
In the run-up to the election , Twitter hid Trump ’ s false and baseless claims behind labels warning that they “ might be misleading ” and restricted them from being liked or retweeted — a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the integrity of the vote .
“ It starts with Trump , but that ’ s not where it stops , ” he said .
“ It ’ s the [ Steve Bannons ] and Alex Joneses and Fox Newses and QAnons of the world — they take [ Trump ’ s unfounded narratives ] and start to proliferate and amplify , and then you have the mess that is the misinformation apocalypse that we ’ re all dealing with right now .
Trump is the tip of the iceberg.
” And though @ @ @ @ @ @ @ and suppressing election-related misinformation was not perfect , it did temporarily stifle the circulation of false claims from Trump and other political figures .
But Twitter ended that policy too soon , Farid suggested .
“ People were very concerned in the lead-up to the election that [ online misinformation ] would actually interfere with our democracy , our ability to vote , ” he said .
“ But that same fear is there today — that [ online misinformation ] could still interfere with the democratic process in terms of the handover @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
That ’ s at least as serious of an issue.
” Facebook , YouTube and other tech giants have varied approaches to Trump ’ s barrage of fabrications throughout the election period .
Although Twitter seemed to take perhaps the most aggressive stance at first , its context labels are now conspicuously vague and confusing .
On Monday , for example , when Trump falsely claimed on both Facebook and Twitter that he had won the election , Facebook appended a label noting that “ Joe Biden is the projected winner of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ’ s label stated , simply : “ Official sources called this election differently.
” There are contrasting views as to whether such context labels are effective at alerting people to misinformation .
One study from MIT found that the application of context labels to certain social media posts led some people to incorrectly conclude that all unlabeled posts therefore contain accurate information .

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In the nine days since Donald Trump was projected to lose the presidential election, he has insisted — repeatedly and without evidence — that the vote was rigged against him.
“The Radical Left Democrats, working with their partner, the Fake News Media, are trying to STEAL this Election,” he tweeted Monday morning. “We won’t let them!”
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Trump extended his series of tweeted complaints on Monday to laws on ballot signatures in Georgia: “The Fake recount going on in Georgia means nothing because they are not allowing signatures to be looked at and verified. Break the unconstitutional Consent Decree!” he wrote.
Such a specific claim is easy to check: It’s wrong. Georgia is not only allowed to look at and verify ballot signatures but is required to, as the state’s Republican secretary of state has pointed out.
But the label Twitter attached to Trump’s tweet doesn’t convey that it’s wrong. Instead, it just says his “claim about election fraud is disputed,” as if there is some legitimate debate about the Georgia signature law when there is not.
Twitter
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By suggesting that Trump’s false and deceptive assertions are only disputed, Twitter is enabling — and even legitimizing — the president’s disinformation campaign as he refuses to concede or commit to a peaceful transfer of power.
The platform has done this on dozens of recent Trump tweets that are clearly false or groundless. Over this past weekend alone, as his supporters flooded the streets of Washington, D.C., to rally against supposed electoral fraud, Trump tweeted that “millions of ballots” were “altered by Democrats,” voting technology glitches were part of an effort to “steal votes” and people voted after the election was over, among a litany of other allegations of vote-rigging.
Journalists and fact-checkers have already debunked all of these evidence-free claims, which remain on Twitter with notices calling them “disputed.”
As Trump’s preferred mass communications platform, where he has nearly 89 million followers, Twitter has long grappled with the deluge of misinformation he spews there. In the run-up to the election, Twitter hid Trump’s false and baseless claims behind labels warning that they “might be misleading” and restricted them from being liked or retweeted — a tepid but unprecedented measure taken to protect the integrity of the vote.
Twitter
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That changed after President-elect Joe Biden was projected to be the winner.
Twitter directed HuffPost to a page for its recent policy changes, implemented Thursday. The platform now only labels tweets containing election-related misinformation instead of restricting their visibility or shareability.
“People are able to engage with labeled Tweets, however, as with all Tweets with labels, they are de-amplified on our service,” a Twitter spokesperson told HuffPost in an emailed statement.
“Twitter is trying to be apolitical here,” said Hany Farid, a professor in the School of Information at the University of California, Berkeley.
But by labeling Trump’s tweets about voter fraud in a way that suggests they might actually be accurate, Twitter is, in fact, granting Trump a political advantage.
As the president continues to spread political misinformation across Twitter and other platforms, Farid is concerned about what he calls the “downstream effect.”
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“It starts with Trump, but that’s not where it stops,” he said. “It’s the [Steve Bannons] and Alex Joneses and Fox Newses and QAnons of the world — they take [Trump’s unfounded narratives] and start to proliferate and amplify, and then you have the mess that is the misinformation apocalypse that we’re all dealing with right now. Trump is the tip of the iceberg.”
Across the country, Trump supporters are rallying against supposed voter fraud. What begins as a tweet gets amplified across right-wing sites. imageSPACE/MediaPunch/MediaPunch/IPx
And though Twitter’s pre-election policy of restricting and suppressing election-related misinformation was not perfect, it did temporarily stifle the circulation of false claims from Trump and other political figures. But Twitter ended that policy too soon, Farid suggested.
“People were very concerned in the lead-up to the election that [online misinformation] would actually interfere with our democracy, our ability to vote,” he said. “But that same fear is there today — that [online misinformation] could still interfere with the democratic process in terms of the handover of power from one president to another. That’s at least as serious of an issue.”
Facebook, YouTube and other tech giants have varied approaches to Trump’s barrage of fabrications throughout the election period. Although Twitter seemed to take perhaps the most aggressive stance at first, its context labels are now conspicuously vague and confusing.
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On Monday, for example, when Trump falsely claimed on both Facebook and Twitter that he had won the election, Facebook appended a label noting that “Joe Biden is the projected winner of the 2020 US Presidential Election.” Twitter’s label stated, simply: “Official sources called this election differently.”
There are contrasting views as to whether such context labels are effective at alerting people to misinformation. One study from MIT found that the application of context labels to certain social media posts led some people to incorrectly conclude that all unlabeled posts therefore contain accurate information.
Experts say that applying context labels in conjunction with other moderation measures, as Twitter did initially, is a far more effective way to limit the spread of false and misleading claims than using labels alone.


thehuffingtonpost--2020-11-16--GOP Sen. David Perdue Declines To Debate Democrat Jon Ossoff Ahead Of Georgia Runoff

Sen. David Perdue ( R-Ga. ) has declined an invitation to debate Democratic challenger Jon Ossoff ahead of January runoff elections for both of the state ’ s Senate seats .
The Atlanta Press Club said Perdue , who is seeking a second term , will be “ represented by an empty podium ” at the Dec. 6 debate .
Perdue ’ s decision to skip the debate was first reported by The New Yorker on Sunday .
“ The Atlanta Press Club ’ s Loudermilk-Young Debate Series is disappointed that Sen. David Perdue has decided to not participate in @ @ @ @ @ @ @ said in a statement .
The statement continued : “ Jon Ossoff has confirmed his participation , so according to our rules , we will proceed with the debate and Sen. Perdue will be represented by an empty podium .
That is not our preference.
” Runoff elections for Perdue and Ossoff , as well as for Sen. Kelly Loeffler ( R-Ga. ) and Democrat Raphael Warnock , were scheduled for Jan. 5 after none of the candidates received at least 50 % of the votes in their respective races this month .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ Republicans maintain control of the Senate .
If Democrats succeed in flipping both seats , the Senate would likely be split 50-50 .
Democratic Vice President-elect Kamala Harris would have the power to cast a tiebreaker vote .
Perdue declined an invitation to debate Ossoff just ahead of Election Day on Nov. 3 , after a clip of Ossoff accusing Perdue during a previous debate of leveraging inside information to profit off the coronavirus pandemic went viral .
( Perdue ’ s campaign has said a federal investigation into the matter cleared the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Looks like Sen. David Perdue is too much of a coward to debate me again , ” Ossoff tweeted Sunday .
“ Perdue can ’ t defend his lies about COVID-19 , self-dealing stock trades , his bigotry , or his votes to take away Georgians ’ health care .
Senator , come on out and try to defend your record .
I ’ m ready to go.
” Ossoff has challenged Perdue to at least three debates ahead of the runoff .

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Sen. David Perdue (R-Ga.) has declined an invitation to debate Democratic challenger Jon Ossoff ahead of January runoff elections for both of the state’s Senate seats.
The Atlanta Press Club said Perdue, who is seeking a second term, will be “represented by an empty podium” at the Dec. 6 debate. Perdue’s decision to skip the debate was first reported by The New Yorker on Sunday.
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“The Atlanta Press Club’s Loudermilk-Young Debate Series is disappointed that Sen. David Perdue has decided to not participate in his debate,” the press club said in a statement.
The statement continued: “Jon Ossoff has confirmed his participation, so according to our rules, we will proceed with the debate and Sen. Perdue will be represented by an empty podium. That is not our preference.”
Perdue’s campaign did not immediately respond to HuffPost’s request for comment.
Runoff elections for Perdue and Ossoff, as well as for Sen. Kelly Loeffler (R-Ga.) and Democrat Raphael Warnock, were scheduled for Jan. 5 after none of the candidates received at least 50% of the votes in their respective races this month.
The closely watched runoffs will determine whether Republicans maintain control of the Senate. If Democrats succeed in flipping both seats, the Senate would likely be split 50-50. Democratic Vice President-elect Kamala Harris would have the power to cast a tiebreaker vote.
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Perdue declined an invitation to debate Ossoff just ahead of Election Day on Nov. 3, after a clip of Ossoff accusing Perdue during a previous debate of leveraging inside information to profit off the coronavirus pandemic went viral. (Perdue’s campaign has said a federal investigation into the matter cleared the senator of any wrongdoing.)
“Looks like Sen. David Perdue is too much of a coward to debate me again,” Ossoff tweeted Sunday. “Perdue can’t defend his lies about COVID-19, self-dealing stock trades, his bigotry, or his votes to take away Georgians’ health care. Senator, come on out and try to defend your record. I’m ready to go.”


thehuffingtonpost--2020-11-16--2019 Was The Deadliest Year For Hate Crimes On Record, New FBI Data Shows

More people were killed in hate crimes last year in America than in any year since 1992 , when the FBI first started recording such killings , new data shows .
But 2019 would have been a record year for deadly hate crimes even without the massacre in El Paso , according to Brian Levin , executive director of the Center for the Study of Hate and Extremism at California State University .
In April 2019 , for example , a gunman opened fire inside a synagogue in Poway , California , killing one person .
The gunman reportedly called @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ’ d targeted the synagogue because Jews were trying to “ destroy all white people.
” There were 7,314 total hate crimes last year , according to the FBI ’ s annual Uniform Crime Report , a 2.7 % increase from the year before and the highest number of recorded hate crimes the FBI has recorded in a single year since 2008 .
As in previous years , the majority of hate crime victims — about 58 % — were targeted due to their race or ethnicity .
Nearly half of those targeted @ @ @ @ @ @ @ FBI ’ s annual hate crime statistics , however , offer a woefully incomplete picture of hate crimes in the U.S. That ’ s because law enforcement agencies aren ’ t required to send their hate crime statistics to the FBI , and thousands of agencies make no attempt to do so .
Moreover , of those agencies that do send their statistics to the FBI , many either underreport their hate crimes or incorrectly report having had zero .
“ As advocates working with communities and law enforcement agencies at the local @ @ @ @ @ @ @ are occurring and are deeply disturbed that these crimes do not get reflected in the data , ” Arusha Gordon , associate director of the Lawyers ’ Commitee ’ s James Byrd Jr. Center to Stop Hate , said in a statement .
“ When communities and individuals are targeted in a hate crime , and law enforcement fails to capture the bias-motivated nature of the crime in their reporting , ” Gordon said , “ that sends a message to the community that law enforcement fails to understand what hate looks like.
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ U.S. Bureau of Justice Statistics found that between 2003 and 2015 , there were likely 250,000 hate crimes per year across the U.S , the vast majority of which went unreported to police , and thus to the FBI .
The Khalid Jabara-Heather Heyer NO HATE Act — named for two people whose murders were at one time not included in hate crime statistics — would require the federal government to improve its collection of hate crime data .
“ Passing this bill represents a critical step in tackling the scourge of hate @ @ @ @ @ @ @ — one that requires accurate data collection , appropriate funding , and coordinated local and federal action to even begin to solve , ” Nikki Singh , policy and advocacy manager at the Sikh Coalition , said in a statement on Monday .
“ Especially given the dangerously divisive political climate of the past four years , we should be reckoning with the problem of hate in America — not continuing to sweep it under the rug , ” she added .
Despite its problems , experts still consider the FBI ’ s @ @ @ @ @ @ @ one of the best available indicators of hate in the U.S .

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More people were killed in hate crimes last year in America than in any year since 1992, when the FBI first started recording such killings, new data shows.
Fifty-one people lost their lives to hate crimes in 2019, according to annual statistics the FBI released on Monday. That’s a 112% increase over the year before.
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The bulk of last year’s hate crime killings occurred on Aug. 3, 2019, when a gunman shot and killed 23 people inside a Walmart in El Paso, Texas, in an attack apparently targeting Latinos.
But 2019 would have been a record year for deadly hate crimes even without the massacre in El Paso, according to Brian Levin, executive director of the Center for the Study of Hate and Extremism at California State University.
“We’ve seen a terrible increase in homicides,” Levin told HuffPost, adding that there “seems to be a shift where extremism has become much more of a do-it-yourself operation.”
“Lone assailants,” Levin explained, are being radicalized in a “subculture where this kind of directed violence is becoming legitimized.”
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Abel Valenzuela visits the makeshift memorial for victims of the mass shooting at the Cielo Vista Mall Walmart in El Paso, Texas, on Aug. 8, 2019. PAUL RATJE via Getty Images
In April 2019, for example, a gunman opened fire inside a synagogue in Poway, California, killing one person. The gunman reportedly called 911 after the shooting, explaining he’d targeted the synagogue because Jews were trying to “destroy all white people.”
There were 7,314 total hate crimes last year, according to the FBI’s annual Uniform Crime Report, a 2.7% increase from the year before and the highest number of recorded hate crimes the FBI has recorded in a single year since 2008.
Hate crimes, according to the FBI’s definition, are crimes motivated by bias against a person based on their race, religion or sexual orientation, among other factors.
As in previous years, the majority of hate crime victims — about 58% — were targeted due to their race or ethnicity. Nearly half of those targeted for their race were Black.
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There was a 14% increase in anti-Jewish hate crimes, from 835 in 2018 to 953 in 2019.
Anti-Hispanic hate crimes rose for the fourth consecutive year, increasing by 9%.
There was also a 19% increase in hate crimes targeting people based on their gender identity in 2019, after a startling 40% increase in 2018.
The FBI’s annual hate crime statistics, however, offer a woefully incomplete picture of hate crimes in the U.S. That’s because law enforcement agencies aren’t required to send their hate crime statistics to the FBI, and thousands of agencies make no attempt to do so.
Moreover, of those agencies that do send their statistics to the FBI, many either underreport their hate crimes or incorrectly report having had zero.
Lori Gilbert Kaye's daughter mourns at her mother's grave on April 29, 2019, in San Diego, California. Kaye was killed in the Poway synagogue shooting. Mario Tama via Getty Images
About 86% of law enforcement agencies that sent their hate crime statistics to the FBI in 2019 reported they’d seen no hate crimes in their jurisdictions.
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This, according to a statement Monday from the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, is “statistically, a near impossibility.”
“As advocates working with communities and law enforcement agencies at the local level, we know that hate crimes are occurring and are deeply disturbed that these crimes do not get reflected in the data,” Arusha Gordon, associate director of the Lawyers’ Commitee’s James Byrd Jr. Center to Stop Hate, said in a statement.
“When communities and individuals are targeted in a hate crime, and law enforcement fails to capture the bias-motivated nature of the crime in their reporting,” Gordon said, “that sends a message to the community that law enforcement fails to understand what hate looks like.”
This problem is compounded by the fact that victims often don’t trust police and therefore don’t report hate crimes to law enforcement.
A national survey conducted by the U.S. Bureau of Justice Statistics found that between 2003 and 2015, there were likely 250,000 hate crimes per year across the U.S, the vast majority of which went unreported to police, and thus to the FBI.
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A piece of legislation introduced in 2018 seeks to improve law enforcement’s handling of hate crimes.
The Khalid Jabara-Heather Heyer NO HATE Act — named for two people whose murders were at one time not included in hate crime statistics — would require the federal government to improve its collection of hate crime data.
“Passing this bill represents a critical step in tackling the scourge of hate in our country as a policy problem — one that requires accurate data collection, appropriate funding, and coordinated local and federal action to even begin to solve,” Nikki Singh, policy and advocacy manager at the Sikh Coalition, said in a statement on Monday.
“Especially given the dangerously divisive political climate of the past four years, we should be reckoning with the problem of hate in America — not continuing to sweep it under the rug,” she added.
People attend a prayer vigil for the victims of the El Paso massacre. Just 13 hours after that shooting, there was another deadly shooting at a nightlife district in Dayton, Ohio. MARK RALSTON via Getty Images
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Despite its problems, experts still consider the FBI’s annual hate crime statistics report to be one of the best available indicators of hate in the U.S.
The data released by the FBI this week showed some disturbing trends, Levin, the executive director of the Center for the Study of Hate and Extremism at CSU, told HuffPost.
“The violence is getting worse,” Levin said, pointing to a rise in the number of 2019 hate crimes that included homicides, aggravated assaults and simple assaults.
Levin has been at the forefront of documenting a rise in hate crimes during the presidency of Donald Trump, who lost his reelection bid earlier this month. Hate crimes have risen during Trump’s time in the White House, with surges occurring after particularly bigoted or incendiary statements from the president.
Levin says he’s worried about how an emboldened “hard militant right, which includes neo-fascists and white supremacists,” will react once Trump is no longer president and they “perceive their connection to the mainstream has been cut.”
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thehuffingtonpost--2020-11-16--Betsy DeVos' Legacy: Transforming How The Education Department Treats Civil Rights

Illustration : Damon Dahlen/HuffPost ; Photos : Getty The Department of Education , under Secretary Betsy DeVos , has been @ @ @ @ @ , say some employees and advocates .
The Beginning Of A New OCR The End @ @ @

The U.S. Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights has spent months failing to make meaningful progress on urgent complaints of education discrimination relating to COVID-19, even as the pandemic continues to turn schools upside down and put vulnerable students at an even further disadvantage, according to multiple sources.
In September, employees in at least some of the department’s regional offices were informed that civil rights complaints specific to COVID-19 ― such as for children who have not been receiving accommodations for their disability during remote learning ― would require scrutiny from the highest levels of management, a development that would substantially slow the pace by which any of these complaints could get resolved.
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A parent and an advocate have also been given the message that coronavirus-related complaints are unlikely to be addressed in the near future. After disability rights advocate Marcie Lipsitt filed several complaints on behalf of families whose children with disabilities were not receiving appropriate services from their school during shutdowns, she received a call from a department attorney informing her that complaints referencing COVID-19 were receiving greater scrutiny than non-coronavirus complaints and rewriting them without references to the pandemic could help them get processed faster.
HuffPost has also reviewed an email from regional management to a group of employees telling them that COVID-19 complaints are requiring additional review from headquarters. Still, the Education Department has denied that such levels of scrutiny are taking place.
“This information is categorically false and represents the viewpoint of a low-level employee who has not been fully informed or brought up to speed on the clear directive given by [headquarters] to move forward on all COVID cases without delay,” Education Department spokeswoman Angela Morabito wrote to HuffPost. “Regional Directors have been instructed to take all necessary steps to move forward with COVID cases expeditiously. Unless they present novel COVID-related issues, those cases are not being reviewed by Headquarters.”
Multiple employees and advocates say that during a national education civil rights emergency, the Department of Education is effectively not addressing problems that are currently harming students as a result of the pandemic. The decision, they say, is not only baffling, but emblematic of some of the disorderly decision-making processes that have come to characterize the agency, especially during the past four years, under President Donald Trump and Education Secretary Betsy DeVos. Another employee says they believe department leaders are still figuring out how to respond to these complaints during an unprecedented time.
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The Office for Civil Rights (OCR) is one of the most impactful agencies within the Department of Education, overseeing and enforcing federal education civil rights laws. In addition to putting forth guidance on how schools and universities should handle civil rights laws and enacting regulations around these issues, it receives thousands of discrimination complaints a year from families and students, to be resolved by the department’s attorneys. Over the past four years under DeVos, its priorities have been transformed, according to interviews with eight current and recently departed OCR attorneys and several other civil rights advocates who regularly interact with the agency.
Beyond the agency’s most famous moves ― like striking down guidance designed to protect transgender students and rewriting rules governing campus sexual assault ― these employees describe a lack of leadership competence, with frequent process changes creating a sense of chaos and disorganization, a perception of those at the top cutting procedural corners to advance a political agenda and an overall push to take a more hands-off approach to enforcing civil rights in schools.
Morabito, the Education Department spokesperson, vigorously refutes this characterization of OCR, writing that such a statement “furthers the false narrative of those within the agency who oppose the Trump Administration at all costs, and choose to ignore the accomplishments of the last four years,” pointing to efforts to hold institutions like Michigan State University accountable for failing to protect students from predators like Larry Nassar. Ken Marcus, who led the agency between 2018 and summer 2020, also told HuffPost he believes the agency has not only become more efficient, but more effective, highlighting the number of cases resolved with change under his tenure and proactive investigations launched into problems of sexual violence in K-12 schools.
“I would love to see the next administration try to challenge our record on case resolutions,” said Marcus.
When it comes to COVID-19 complaints, OCR regional management told a group of employees this fall over email that top leadership needed time to formulate a plan on how to handle these new issues, though it has already been months.
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In the meantime, students facing potential discrimination are left in a lurch. One mother, Stephanie Onyx of Michigan, filed complaints for each of her children with special needs, after they stopped receiving disability-related services they’re legally entitled to ― like occupational, physical and speech therapy ― amid remote learning. Lipsitt filed a third complaint on behalf of Onyx, specifically referencing COVID-19, but nearly otherwise identical.
Onyx says she was told by an OCR attorney in early November that while they could start addressing her first two complaints, the third that specifically referenced COVID-19 would be put on the back burner.
“He told me on the phone anything COVID-related is being sent to headquarters,” Onyx said.
OCR attorneys say they have been left powerless to help these families.
“That’s kind of consistent with what we’ve come to expect. We have a staff of skilled passionate attorneys who want to do their jobs and I think many of us feel like we just can’t,” a current OCR attorney told HuffPost. HuffPost is providing anonymity for current and former employees who requested it out of concern over facing professional repercussions.
DeVos’ pet issue has always been touting private school choice, which gives children further access to private schools via taxpayer-funded scholarships. However, her work overseeing how the department handles civil rights issues may prove to be one of her most enduring legacies. While the agency’s most public moves have had an obvious impact on vulnerable students, employees say they also worry about the consequences of the more subtle changes in how the agency handles run-of-the-mill civil rights complaints.
With the recent election of Joe Biden, civil rights advocates and attorneys are looking ahead, but they worry the damage they believe DeVos inflicted on the agency might be difficult to reverse. Undoing the agency’s overhaul of Title IX regulations would likely be a lengthy process. Legions of top employees have long left. And vulnerable students and families might still believe the office is not on their side, making them less likely to file complaints when issues arise.
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“So much damage is already done. People’s confidence is low,” said a former OCR attorney who left the department in early 2019. “The advice I give people now [on filing complaints] is why bother. I don’t think that attitude will change. I think that’s how a lot of lawyers and advocates see it.”
The Beginning Of A New OCR
Almost immediately after taking control of the Education Department, DeVos’ OCR rescinded a piece of guidance that directed schools to allow transgender students to use the bathroom that corresponded with their gender identity. A few months later, she and her newly appointed OCR leader, Candace Jackson, began taking a fresh look at Obama-era Title IX guidance for how schools handle allegations of sexual assault.
Jackson made headlines at the time for suggesting that 90% of sexual assault allegations “fall into the category of ‘we were both drunk,’ ‘we broke up, and six months later I found myself under a Title IX investigation because she just decided that our last sleeping together was not quite right,’” per The New York Times.
Behind the scenes, a small group of career attorneys were working closely with Jackson on a project they thought could help bolster the previous pieces of Obama-era Title IX guidance. The attorneys were tasked with assisting Jackson in devising a subsequent document to clarify the earlier guidance and address concerns of unfairness during school proceedings, a former OCR attorney who left in 2018 told HuffPost.
Months into the task, though, they had the rug pulled out from underneath them, the attorney says. DeVos revealed during a speech at George Mason University in 2017 that her department would “replace the current approach” toward addressing sexual misconduct, citing anecdotes of students who she said failed to receive due process. The attorneys, who were watching the speech in a conference room with Jackson and other department staff, were stunned. They were soon made aware that Jackson had been working with political appointees to rescind the 2011 and 2014 guidance and develop a replacement guidance, undermining the very task she had assigned to them.
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In an email, an Education Department spokesperson said this description of events isn’t true.
The former OCR attorney said, “It was clear to us that [DeVos] didn’t understand the 2011 and 2014 guidance because much of what she cited in her speech [as problems caused by them] would have actually violated the guidance.”
“That was really upsetting, especially because of all the work we were doing with Candace beforehand, educating her about issues that some of us had been working on for years and thinking we were just building on the earlier guidance, without knowing that all along she was working on rescinding them. … We had a hard time trusting her then. I don’t know if it was to distract us or what the point of that was,” said the attorney.
The rescission of the guidance threw the process for handling current Title IX cases into disarray, though, under the Obama administration sexual violence cases were already moving impossibly slow and were accompanied by their own host of frustrations, multiple employees said.
Another attorney says that after the rescission they felt confused and lacked clear instruction about how to handle sensitive legal matters surrounding sexual harassment and assault.
“I felt like I could do disability civil rights work. I was unsure about Title IX ― what an investigation would look like, what an outcome would look like, what the standard is,” said the attorney, who left the job out of frustration with the working environment.
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President Donald Trump and DeVos make "U" symbols with their hands while posing with the Utah Skiing team as they greet members of championship NCAA teams at the White House in 2017. While DeVos was in charge, the Education Department changed its approach to addressing sexual misconduct cases. Joshua Roberts/Reuters
After Trump was elected, there were also almost immediate changes to the department’s internal processes, processes that would impact whether a civil rights complaint was thrown out or saw the light of day.
Under the Obama administration, certain types of discrimination complaints could trigger attorneys to look for evidence of systemic bias within institutions. While potentially impactful, these investigations could be labor intensive and cumbersome, lasting for years on end.
Under DeVos’ reign, employees were asked to focus on the individual instead, in part to promote expediency. Some employees were happy for the relief, but the new system also sometimes meant that institutions that might be perpetuating systemic discrimination could be let off the hook.
“There were a lot of staff who were disgruntled [under the Obama administration], because even if you’re investigating something, if it’s not resolved you don’t get that satisfaction,” noted one former attorney who left their job in 2018. “I think somewhere in between what was happening before this administration and a drastic shift to limit scope is probably the right place to be. But it was troubling to see the extent to which they moved to find reasons to close out complaints.”
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The department’s commitment to quickly working through grievances came to a head in spring 2018, when the department issued an update of OCR’s Case Processing Manual ― the legal document that helps dictates the process by which department attorneys handle complaints.
The update immediately resulted in litigation, after its changes allowed attorneys to automatically dismiss complaints from people or groups who frequently file grievances, if employees determined such complaints placed “an unreasonable burden on OCR’s resources.” Lipsitt, the disability rights advocate, for example, files hundreds of complaints a year dealing with website accessibility for students with disabilities. The update also eliminated the right of students and families to appeal decisions.
The National Federation of the Blind, the Council of Parent Attorneys and Advocates Inc., and the NAACP sued, claiming the agency has a duty to investigate discrimination complaints to the best of its ability. Advocates questioned why the agency would want to automatically throw out complaints when real instances of discrimination might be taking place, just because they were filed by the same person. The update seemed designed to silence students and their families and prevent them from obtaining justice, they said.
At the time, Education Department spokesperson Liz Hill told The New York Times that the changes were representative of their “commitment to robustly investigating and correcting civil rights issues” and “improving OCR’s management of its docket, investigations and case resolutions.”
Months later, the agency put forth an updated manual once more, riddled with typos in the table of contents and rolling back some of its original updates. “CASE pLANNING” reads one section in the manual’s table of contents, a sloppiness advocates feared was a reflection of the department’s commitment to the issue. The table of contents’ subheads skip from “ARTICLE III” to “ARTICLE V.”
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A case processing manual update was released in November of 2018. U.S. Department of Education
The revisions, Morabito says, were driven by changes in OCR leadership, noting that Jackson had recently been replaced as head of the agency by her successor, Ken Marcus. Marcus also told HuffPost that after his appointment “one of the first things I wanted to do was review the CPM, including but not limited to, the changes made earlier in the administration.”
In February of this year, the civil rights groups and the Department of Education resolved the issue in court, with the department agreeing to reopen the complaints it had previously dismissed and pay the plaintiff’s legal fees.
Attorneys say while these changes often fly under the radar and garner less public outrage as a guidance rescission, they can prove equally, if not more, dangerous.
“The CPM changes were really disheartening … all these little pin pricks unite into a gaping wound,” said a former OCR attorney.
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Another attorney, who still works at the department, says they believe this is part of the agency’s current modus operandi: to throw out as many complaints as possible and reduce the agency’s footprint as much as possible.
“It’s just shrink, shrink, shrink, get out of the locals’ ways,” they said.
A New Leader Takes The Helm
To Jackson’s credit, employees say she was thoughtful and warm, and took pains to solicit input, even if such suggestions rarely changed her mind. On a personal level, multiple attorneys say she was well-liked, despite political differences with some of the career staff. Employees say her successor, Ken Marcus, confirmed in 2018, interacted less with the rank and file and seemed less interested in their perspectives. In response, Marcus wrote over email that he “depended on [talented career staff] heavily. Of course, we relied more on some than others: some had more seasoning, broader experience, and sounder judgment.”
Marcus, who previously served in the same capacity under President George W. Bush, had a specific interest in protecting students against what he saw as a rising tide of anti-Semitism on college campuses, especially as it relates to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
He reopened an investigation into a complaint alleging anti-Semitism on campus at Rutgers University, which had previously been closed under the Obama administration. Such a move, to reopen a case that had already been investigated, was unprecedented, said a former attorney, and in the attorney’s view reflected a willingness to bend the rules in service of a political agenda.
Marcus says such an assertion reflects a misunderstanding of the facts surrounding the case. An appeal to the case was filed several years ago, as allowed for the Case Processing Manual at the time. While the CPM went on to eliminate appeals, once the process was reinstated, he decided to move forward with the process. “It wasn’t particularly unusual,” he says. The attorney’s confusion shows that there was already distrust surrounding the incident.
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At the same time, a March 2020 complaint from a number of groups including Palestine Legal, urges the inspector general for the Department of Education to investigate the incident, writing that reopening appeals is distinctively rare: Of over 180 appeals resolved between 2014 and 2018, only two were reopened, it says. The letter alleges that Marcus gave this case special treatment, though OCR is supposed to act as a legally neutral body.
Under his watch, Marcus helped the White House adopt a broader definition of anti-Semitism that allowed Judaism to be defined as a race or national origin in civil rights cases, making it easier to crack down on potential discrimination. In December 2019, Trump signed an executive order threatening to withhold federal money from universities seen as fostering anti-Semitism, an order critics feared would stifle free speech as it pertains to pro-Palestine activism.
Marcus also oversaw the rescission of Obama-era guidance designed to protect students of color from discriminatory disciplinary processes and guidance around how colleges could consider race in admissions. Most significantly, he led the department in crafting a new detailed and complicated rule governing Title IX and sexual harassment and assault on college campuses ― a rule that contains a more severe definition of sexual harassment, helps bolster the rights of the accused, and contains a higher standard for holding schools liable as they will no longer be held responsible for sexual violence occurring off-campus.
The rule, more than 2,000 pages long, has been decried by civil and women’s rights groups and some university administrators, while receiving praise from conservatives, men’s rights groups and some scholars. It has been subject to a litany of litigation from advocacy groups and attorneys general from 17 states.
Marcus’ actions promoting the rights of Jewish students were expected, but his views on other civil rights issues were lesser known. In the end, he worked to curtail the legal protections offered to transgender students, say advocates, pointing to a complaint filed by the Alliance Defending Freedom, an organization dedicated to fighting LGBTQ rights.
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The complaint sought to prevent an athletic conference in Connecticut from allowing transgender students to play on the teams that correspond with their gender identity, claiming it gave them an unfair advantage.
One former OCR attorney, Dwayne Bensing, was concerned about the way the agency quickly pushed the complex complaint forward, and in August 2019, he leaked internal emails pertaining to the case to the news outlet The Washington Blade. The emails showed attorneys expressing confusion over what legal framework to apply to the complaint, even after they had already decided to open it. The emails also showed that Marcus was involved in handling the complaint from its inception, which Bensing found worrying.
By December, he was forced out of his job, as first reported by HuffPost, even though he had a history of excellent performance reviews, and has since filed whistleblower and retaliation complaints. His whistleblower complaint was closed after the Office of Special Counsel said it was “unable to conclude that there is a substantial likelihood” the Department of Education had violated the law on its handling of the complaint. His retaliation complaint is ongoing.
“Other than their passion project of hurting trans kids, what else is the department or has the office done? Who are they helping?” said Bensing.
The Department of Education has said Bensing’s analysis of the situation is “based on incomplete information.” Marcus wrote over email that while he was “aware of the allegations ... I do not know of any deviations from the CPM in that case.”
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Later, after Marcus left the department, it threatened to withhold federal grant money from Connecticut schools that did not withdraw from the athletic conference that allows transgender students to play on the team that corresponds with their gender identity, The New York Times reported. The grant money is designed to help schools spur desegregation.
Members of the audience wait for the start of DeVos' confirmation hearing to be secretary of education in 2017. The #DearBetsy hashtag was part of a campaign urging DeVos to protect campus sexual assault guidelines laid out by Title IX. Yuri Gripas/Reuters
In one of his final moves, Marcus oversaw another update to the CPM, this time making changes that some current and former OCR employees say created new power for institutions accused of misconduct. These most recent changes allow the department to share its draft investigatory findings with schools, giving institutions an opportunity to “inform OCR of any factual errors contained therein,” but give complainants no such opportunity.
“The new changes result in a lopsided system. Schools get more chances to show OCR they’re not discriminating, but complainants get no additional opportunities to show OCR evidence of discrimination,” said Seth Galanter, senior director for legal advocacy at the National Center for Youth Law and a former high-ranking official at OCR during the Obama administration.
For staff, the update seemed like it came out of nowhere. When Jackson released the first CPM update of the administration in 2018, she sent proposed revisions to staff first, and then held an all-staff meeting to discuss them, a current attorney told HuffPost. Before the second update came out, management held a training session before publicly releasing it.
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“What they chose to fiddle with and not mess with is always a little head scratching, especially when they’re not getting input on the ground,” said an attorney.
Marcus concedes that because the most recent CPM update was not as comprehensive as previous ones, outreach to staff might not have been as far reaching, although “we did reach out to all employees requesting suggestions,” he said.
The decision to give schools an opportunity to review draft investigatory findings was one “that had been requested by recipients, and some in the department simply felt was a basic matter of fairness or due process,” said Marcus. Allowing parents or students ― or the people who had filed the complaints ― the same opportunity “was not something that had been raised during the process. It certainly is, I think, something that could be raised with OCR in the future and probably could be considered.”
“Other than their passion project of hurting trans kids, what else is the department or has the office done? Who are they helping?” - Dwayne Bensing, former OCR attorney
In one of his final acts in February, Marcus moved to consolidate the agency’s employee-led Diversity and Inclusion and Employee Engagement Advisory councils, which worked with management to relay concerns and suggestions. The two committees were combined ― at the time Marcus told employees the consolidation would make them more strategic and comprehensive ― and membership was limited to representatives generally approved by regional management. After Marcus stepped down from his post in July, a new hire with a long history of vocal anti-transgender activism was one of the two employees appointed to head the committee over the summer, HuffPost reported in October.
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“Diversity and inclusion remains a top priority for OCR’s leadership which is why the diversity and inclusion council is led by two senior leaders,” Morabito previously told HuffPost of the issue.
The move, said former employees, seemed consistent with the agency’s lack of commitment to diversity under the Trump administration.
In September, the agency further withdrew from inclusion efforts when the White House issued an executive order banning federal agencies from participating in “divisive” racial and gender diversity training. In the Education Department, this meant rooting out diversity training that might discuss the concept of white privilege or suggest that “virtually all White people contribute to racism or benefit from racism,” Politico first reported.
At the same time, OCR attorneys previously told HuffPost they were under the impression they could still require school districts to root out bias at their own organizations through trainings, creating a specifically awkward conundrum. One attorney wondered how OCR attorneys could be expected to work with schools to root out discrimination, without being able to discuss such issues at their own agency.
Morabito, however, has indicated that staff are no longer allowed to explicitly ask schools to conduct such trainings ― though multiple employees say this was never communicated to them.
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“OCR is unaware of any recent resolutions agreements that require or encourage school districts to use anti-bias training ― for the same reasons outlined in Executive Order 13950,” Morabito wrote to HuffPost.
The End Of An Era
The 2019 Office for Civil Rights annual report to Congress highlights some of the agency’s perceived accomplishments. Over the past two years, the office has resolved nearly 7,000 more complaints than had been resolved in the last two years of the Obama administration, the report says. This increase in efficiency is a major point of pride for the agency. Morabito also sent over numbers indicating it works through complaints more expeditiously than the previous administration, while being only slightly more likely to dismiss them.
“As each of OCR’s past two Annual Reports highlights, OCR has resolved complaints more effectively and more efficiently under the Trump Administration as compared to the Obama Administration,” wrote Morabito. “This is a stark contrast to OCR under the Obama administration, which often left students without resolution for years.”
A 2019 report from the United States Commission on Civil Rights, though, raises concerns about a “marked increase in case dismissal and closure rates in Fiscal Years 2017 and 2018” and questions whether the agency is meeting its duty “[to] investigate ‘whenever’ information indicates a possible failure to comply with the civil rights laws ED OCR enforces.” A 2018 ProPublica analysis found that the agency has become less likely to find school districts guilty of wrongdoing.
“I think the whole thing is insane, I think it is an OCR that under Betsy DeVos make up their own rules. The fact that they added all these additional ways for complaints to be dismissed … it’s so clear what an attack this is on the ability of Americans to file civil rights complaints,” said Lipsitt.
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Looking to the future, current and former OCR attorneys say the Trump administration accomplished something that the Obama administration didn’t: It took more pains to codify its changes, making them more difficult for the Biden administration to roll back.
Attorneys also believe the reputation of the agency was harmed enough that they will have to do major outreach to get stakeholders to trust them to handle civil rights complaints again.


thehuffingtonpost--2020-11-16--Military Spouse Slams Trump's False 'Criminal Voter Fraud' Allegation

The wife of a U.S. Air Force major lashed out after she and her husband were falsely accused of “ criminal voting fraud ” in Nevada by Donald Trump ’ s campaign .
“ We knew our votes were legal and we had done nothing wrong , but our integrity was being challenged , ” attorney Amy Rose told The Military Times .
She called it “ upsetting ” to be used to “ undermine legitimate election results.
” “ We take our duties as citizens very seriously , and it ’ s just a shock to see that this @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in fact , ” Rose told NBC affiliate KSNV-TV in Las Vegas .
Rose , the former legal director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Nevada , said she and her husband voted by absentee ballot from Davis , California , where her husband is working on his doctorate .
Military personnel often vote by absentee ballot because they may be assigned to different locations — including overseas .
The Trump campaign ’ s Nevada list of alleged voter fraud includes votes mailed from hundreds of overseas military post office boxes , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ personnel are stationed , according to Military.com ’ s analysis .
Trump campaign attorneys from the Weir Group nevertheless listed the voter information in a Nov. 5 letter to Attorney General William Barr , stating : “ We write to bring to your attention criminal voter fraud in the state of Nevada in the 2020 general election.
” “ Voter fraud is a serious federal felony , one that cuts to the heart of our representative democracy , ” the Trump lawyers wrote .
“ We understand that these are serious allegations and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ The list available to the public doesn ’ t include names , but does include communities and zip codes .
Rose said she was “ shocked ” to find her information on the list .
“ Our names were ... sent to the Department of Justice for investigation for criminal voting fraud , ” a stunned Rose told The Military Times .
“ It ’ s incredibly frustrating and upsetting that our votes are being used in this way , to try to undermine legitimate election results in Nevada.
“ To “ see @ @ @ @ @ @ @ members of the military , to be challenged in this way , it is a shock , ” she added .
“ To be potentially disenfranchised because of these actions , that ’ s not okay .
”

LOADING ERROR LOADING
The wife of a U.S. Air Force major lashed out after she and her husband were falsely accused of “criminal voting fraud” in Nevada by Donald Trump’s campaign.
“We knew our votes were legal and we had done nothing wrong, but our integrity was being challenged,” attorney Amy Rose told The Military Times. She called it “upsetting” to be used to “undermine legitimate election results.”
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“We take our duties as citizens very seriously, and it’s just a shock to see that this accusation had been made without any basis in fact,” Rose told NBC affiliate KSNV-TV in Las Vegas.
Nevada is turning out to be a cesspool of Fake Votes. @mschlapp & @AdamLaxalt are finding things that, when released, will be absolutely shocking! — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) November 9, 2020
Rose, the former legal director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Nevada, said she and her husband voted by absentee ballot from Davis, California, where her husband is working on his doctorate.
Military personnel often vote by absentee ballot because they may be assigned to different locations — including overseas.
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The Trump campaign’s Nevada list of alleged voter fraud includes votes mailed from hundreds of overseas military post office boxes, and more than 1,000 locations where military personnel are stationed, according to Military.com’s analysis.
“The list has addresses that are literally on Air Force bases,” Rose said.
Trump campaign attorneys from the Weir Group nevertheless listed the voter information in a Nov. 5 letter to Attorney General William Barr, stating: “We write to bring to your attention criminal voter fraud in the state of Nevada in the 2020 general election.”
“Voter fraud is a serious federal felony, one that cuts to the heart of our representative democracy,” the Trump lawyers wrote. “We understand that these are serious allegations and we do not make them lightly.”
The list available to the public doesn’t include names, but does include communities and zip codes. Rose said she was “shocked” to find her information on the list.
“Our names were ... sent to the Department of Justice for investigation for criminal voting fraud,” a stunned Rose told The Military Times. “It’s incredibly frustrating and upsetting that our votes are being used in this way, to try to undermine legitimate election results in Nevada.“
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To “see my integrity challenged, along with other members of the military, to be challenged in this way, it is a shock,” she added. “To be potentially disenfranchised because of these actions, that’s not okay.”
Rose told the newspaper that other military spouses in similar circumstances have reached out to her.