theguardian--2020-06-12--Louisville and San Francisco latest cities to take steps toward police reform – as it happened

On the calls to defund the police , Trump said : “ I heard they want to close up all police forces ... What happens late at night when you make that call to 911 and there ’ s nobody there ?
What do you do , whether you ’ re white , black , or anybody else , what do you do ?
” President Trump : `` I heard they want to close up all police forces ... What happens late at night when you make that call to 9-1-1 and there 's nobody there ?
What do @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , black , or anybody else , what do you do ? ''
pic.twitter.com/iiVzMPkpOd The calls to “ defund police ” come from community groups , who have long advocated for defunding law enforcement – taking money away from police and prisons – and reinvesting those funds in services .
The basic principle is that government budgets and “ public safety ” spending should prioritize housing , employment , community health , education and other vital programs , instead of police officers .
Groups now have a range of demands , with some @ @ @ @ @ @ @ defunding as a step toward abolishing contemporary police services .
Some lawmakers are responding and now proposing minor cuts that would allow police to continue to receive substantial funding .
Regarding questions about the impact of public safety if police budgets are defunded , abolition groups argue that policing and prison are at their core racist and harmful and make communities less safe .
They also point out that the vast majority of police work has nothing to do with responding to or preventing violence , and that police have a terrible track @ @ @ @ @ @ @ and domestic violence .

Sam Levin (now) and Joan E Greve and Martin Belam (earlier)

12 Jun 2020 02.07 BST Summary That’s all for today, thanks for following along. A recap of some key developments of the day: General Mark Milley, the nation’s top military officer, apologized for participating in Trump’s photo op after the forcible removal of peaceful protesters. “I should not have been there,” Milley, the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, told the National Defense University in a prerecorded video commencement address. “My presence in that moment and in that environment created a perception of the military involved in domestic politics.”
“I should not have been there,” Milley, the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, told the National Defense University in a prerecorded video commencement address. “My presence in that moment and in that environment created a perception of the military involved in domestic politics.” Trump’s convention speech is officially moving to Florida after it was originally supposed to be in North Carolina.
is officially moving to Florida after it was originally supposed to be in North Carolina. Kevin McCarthy, the top House Republican, said he would support a national ban on police chokeholds. The House minority leader said he was also open to renaming military bases named after Confederate generals, which Trump has said he will “not even consider.”
The House minority leader said he was also open to renaming military bases named after Confederate generals, which Trump has said he will “not even consider.” Nancy Pelosi called for the removal of Confederate statues from the Capitol. The House speaker said she also believed the military bases should be renamed, telling reporters, “The American people know these names have to go.” Pelosi added that Trump “seems to be the only person left who doesn’t get it.”
The House speaker said she also believed the military bases should be renamed, telling reporters, “The American people know these names have to go.” Pelosi added that “seems to be the only person left who doesn’t get it.” Trump condemned a bill amendment to establish a commission for changing the base names within three years. The president called on Republicans to block the amendment, but the Republican-led Senate armed services committee has already adopted the amendment to the annual defense authorization bill, although it can still be stripped out.
The president called on to block the amendment, but the Republican-led Senate armed services committee has already adopted the amendment to the annual defense authorization bill, although it can still be stripped out. Chicago police officers were caught on camera relaxing in a Democratic congressman’s office while looting took place nearby. House Democrat Bobby Rush shared some of the footage, which showed several officers lounging on couches and making themselves popcorn and coffee from the office’s supplies as the looting unfolded. “They were in a mode of relaxation, and they did not care about what was happening to businesspeople, to this city,” Rush said at a press conference with mayor Lori Lightfoot.
House Democrat shared some of the footage, which showed several officers lounging on couches and making themselves popcorn and coffee from the office’s supplies as the looting unfolded. “They were in a mode of relaxation, and they did not care about what was happening to businesspeople, to this city,” Rush said at a press conference with mayor The mayor of San Francisco said today police would no longer respond to calls for “non-criminal activity” , such as disputes between neighbors and complaints about homeless people, part of reforms she is pushing amid protests.
, such as disputes between neighbors and complaints about homeless people, part of reforms she is pushing amid protests. The metro council in Louisville has unanimously passed a policy banning police from using “no-knock warrants”, the practice that led to the killing of 26-year-old Breonna Taylor.
12 Jun 2020 01.52 BST Trump’s convention speech will take place in Florida, Republican officials have just announced. The GOP is officially moving the speech to Jacksonville after there were disputes over coronavirus safety measures in the original North Carolina location. The speech will happen 27 August in a venue with a capacity for 15,000 people. Florida recently reported a record number of Covid-19 diagnoses. The governor of North Carolina had required that there be a plan for social distancing and masks, which is why Trump and the GOP found a new location. We are thrilled to hold @realDonaldTrump's acceptance of the Republican nomination in the great city of Jacksonville!
Not only is Florida his home state, it is crucial to victory.
We look forward to bringing this great celebration and economic boon to the Sunshine State! — Ronna McDaniel (@GOPChairwoman) June 12, 2020
Updated at 02.04 BST
12 Jun 2020 01.43 BST San Francisco mayor says police won't respond to calls over 'non-criminal activity' The mayor of San Francisco said today police would no longer respond to calls for “non-criminal activity”, such as disputes between neighbors and complaints about homeless people, part of reforms she is pushing amid protests. Mayor London Breed said officers in these cases would be replaced by professionals who are trained and unarmed and is meant to limit contact between police and the public. NEW: SF Mayor London Breed unveils major police reform plan that would demilitarize police, divert calls for homelessness and mental-health issues. With @DominicFracassa https://t.co/8ntSMKsvJU — Megan Cassidy (@meganrcassidy) June 11, 2020 Her announcement comes amid increasing calls to defund the police stemming from the George Floyd protests. Breed did not provide specifics about budget or implementation of her plans, which also included a call to “demilitarize police”. Breed recently faced criticisms when records revealed that she had personally texted police officials to “clean up” homeless encampments that she saw.
Updated at 02.11 BST
11 Jun 2020 00.15 BST An essential worker in New York City has spent a week in jail after he was arrested for violating curfew, according to a report in Gothamist: A full week later, Williams is STILL locked up at MDC for his allegedly breaking @NYCMayor's curfew — and, as a result, violating his parole. Last night, he called me from jail and we spoke for 30 minutes... https://t.co/JFuphz4O5k https://t.co/DN6sEx7YzY — Jake Offenhartz (@jangelooff) June 11, 2020 The 27-year-old was leaving a job as a janitor and preparing to get a few hours of sleep before beginning a graveyard shift at another job when he briefly participated in the protest and was then arrested, Gothamist reported. The publication said the mayor’s office and police spokespeople did not respond to requests for comment.
11 Jun 2020 23.35 BST At Trump’s Dallas event on policing, which has just ended and featured a panel of people who heaped praise on the president, there were some notable absences. The local police chief, sheriff and district attorney, who are the county’s top three law enforcement officers and are all black, did not attend, the Dallas Morning News noted. The three were not invited, the paper noted. The event came as Trump is moving forward with his campaign rallies while the protests against police brutality continue across the country.
11 Jun 2020 23.03 BST A physician speaking at Trump’s roundtable is repeatedly praising the president’s support of hydroxychloroquine, sparking loud applause from the audience. The latest on hydroxychloroquine from the Guardian’s health editor, Sarah Boseley: Hydroxychloroquine does not work against Covid-19 and should not be given to any more hospital patients around the world, say the leaders of the biggest and best-designed trial of the drug, which experts will hope finally settle the question.
“If you are admitted to hospital, don’t take hydroxychloroquine,” said Martin Landray, deputy chief investigator of the Recovery trial and professor of medicine and epidemiology at Oxford University. “It doesn’t work.” Many countries have permitted emergency use of the drug for Covid-19 patients in hospitals, following claims from a few doctors, including Didier Raoult in France, that it was a cure, and the ensuing clamour from the public. Landray said the hype should now stop. “It is being touted as a game-changer, a wonderful drug, a breakthrough. This is an incredibly important result, because worldwide we can stop using a drug that is useless.” Hydroxychloroquine does not cure Covid-19, say drug trial chiefs Read more
11 Jun 2020 22.54 BST André Wheeler The National Football League announced it would donate $250m to the black community over the next ten years. The NFL has been under increased scrutiny as reckonings around race and discrimination touch practically every industry. Numerous celebrities, from rapper Ludacris to tennis star Naomi Osaka, have called for the organization to redraft Colin Kaepernick. The football star and civil rights activist was allegedly blackballed after he began kneeling at games during the national anthem, in protest of police brutality and racial inequality. In 2017, an unemployed Kaepernick filed a grievance against the NFL and the two parties reached a confidential settlement last year. In today’s announcement, the league acknowledged Kaepernick for pushing it to change. “We wouldn’t be where we are today without the work Colin and other players have led off,” an unnamed source told NFL.com. “That is a key point here. We listened to our players. We needed to listen more, we needed to move faster. We heard them and launched a social justice platform because of what Colin was protesting about.” The NFL announcement comes after Major League Baseball, Nike, and other major players in the sports industry announced similar pledges as protests against racial injustice rage across the globe.
11 Jun 2020 22.52 BST The Trump campaign’s invite for rallies now includes a coronavirus disclaimer, CNN notes: A warning is now included when you sign up for Trump rally tickets: "By attending the Rally, you & any guests voluntarily assume all risks related to exposure to COVID-19 & agree not to hold Donald J. Trump for President, Inc.; BOK Center; ASM Global; or any of affiliates..." pic.twitter.com/qvbS0UYDQC — Kaitlan Collins (@kaitlancollins) June 11, 2020 There have been growing concerns that the recent mass protests could lead to a spike in coronavirus cases, though public health experts have said the police response, including tear gas, pepper spray and aggressively arresting people could exacerbate problems. There are likely to be concerns about Covid exposure at the president’s upcoming rallies, which come as much of the US is reopening despite the ongoing pandemic.
11 Jun 2020 22.37 BST At Trump’s roundtable, attorney general Bill Barr says, “We’ve never had a president who’s more committed to reforming law enforcement.” Fact check: The Trump administration abandoned Obama-era police reform efforts, which had included civil rights investigations into local police agencies with documented records of abuse and problems. “Police departments are not investigated under this administration,” Christy Lopez, who led the justice department group investigating police departments under Obama, recently told the Washington Post. The roll-back of Obama’s efforts began under attorney general Jeff Sessions.
11 Jun 2020 22.28 BST Fact check: Trump on defunding police On the calls to defund the police, Trump said: “I heard they want to close up all police forces... What happens late at night when you make that call to 911 and there’s nobody there? What do you do, whether you’re white, black, or anybody else, what do you do?” President Trump: "I heard they want to close up all police forces... What happens late at night when you make that call to 9-1-1 and there's nobody there? What do you do, whether you're white, black, or anybody else, what do you do?" pic.twitter.com/iiVzMPkpOd — The Hill (@thehill) June 11, 2020 The calls to “defund police” come from community groups, who have long advocated for defunding law enforcement – taking money away from police and prisons – and reinvesting those funds in services. The basic principle is that government budgets and “public safety” spending should prioritize housing, employment, community health, education and other vital programs, instead of police officers. Groups now have a range of demands, with some seeking modest reductions and others viewing full defunding as a step toward abolishing contemporary police services. Some lawmakers are responding and now proposing minor cuts that would allow police to continue to receive substantial funding. Regarding questions about the impact of public safety if police budgets are defunded, abolition groups argue that policing and prison are at their core racist and harmful and make communities less safe. They also point out that the vast majority of police work has nothing to do with responding to or preventing violence, and that police have a terrible track record of solving murders or handling rape and domestic violence. More here: What does 'defund the police' mean? The rallying cry sweeping the US – explained Read more
11 Jun 2020 22.19 BST Hi all - Sam Levin in Los Angeles, taking over our live coverage. Trump is currently doing a roundtable on police. The president is focused on defending police and presenting problems with officers as isolated incidents. He said: And you always have a bad apple no matter where you go. You have bad apples. And there are not too many of them, and I can tell you, there are not too many in the police department.” In the massive protests of the last two weeks, there has been a growing interest in the movement to defund police, with activists arguing that brutality and killing are not isolated problems but systemic issues, and that the best way forward is to take funding away from law enforcement. While many defenders of police have cited the “bad apple” argument in recent days, there have been increasing accusations of widespread abuse. In Los Angeles, for example, police are now investigating 57 cases of alleged misconduct by officers during the protests.
11 Jun 2020 22.01 BST Today so far That’s it from me today. My west coast colleague, Sam Levin, will take over for the next few hours. Here’s where the day stands so far: General Mark Milley, the nation’s top military officer, apologized for participating in Trump’s photo op after the forcible removal of peaceful protesters. “I should not have been there,” Milley, the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, told the National Defense University in a prerecorded video commencement address. “My presence in that moment and in that environment created a perception of the military involved in domestic politics.”
“I should not have been there,” Milley, the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, told the National Defense University in a prerecorded video commencement address. “My presence in that moment and in that environment created a perception of the military involved in domestic politics.” Kevin McCarthy, the top House Republican, said he would support a national ban on police chokeholds. The House minority leader said he was also open to renaming military bases named after Confederate generals, which Trump has said he will “not even consider.”
The House minority leader said he was also open to renaming military bases named after Confederate generals, which Trump has said he will “not even consider.” Nancy Pelosi called for the removal of Confederate statues from the Capitol. The House speaker said she also believed the miliary bases should be renamed, telling reporters, “The American people know these names have to go.” Pelosi added that Trump “seems to be the only person left who doesn’t get it.”
The House speaker said she also believed the miliary bases should be renamed, telling reporters, “The American people know these names have to go.” Pelosi added that “seems to be the only person left who doesn’t get it.” Trump condemned a bill amendment to establish a commission for changing the base names within three years. The president called on Republicans to block the amendment, but the Republican-led Senate armed services committee has already adopted the amendment to the annual defense authorization bill, although it can still be stripped out.
The president called on to block the amendment, but the Republican-led Senate armed services committee has already adopted the amendment to the annual defense authorization bill, although it can still be stripped out. Chicago police officers were caught on camera relaxing in a Democratic congressman’s office while looting took place nearby. House Democrat Bobby Rush shared some of the footage, which showed several officers lounging on couches and making themselves popcorn and coffee from the office’s supplies as the looting unfolded. “They were in a mode of relaxation, and they did not care about what was happening to businesspeople, to this city,” Rush said at a press conference with mayor Lori Lightfoot. Sam will have more coming up, so stay tuned.


theguardian--2020-06-12--Trump administration reverses health protections for transgender people

The Trump administration has finalized a regulation rolling back Obama-era protections for transgender Americans against sex discrimination in health care .
According to the new version of the policy , the Department of Health and Human Services will be “ returning to the government ’ s interpretation of sex discrimination according to the plain meaning of the word ‘ sex ’ as male or female and as determined by biology ” .
The Obama regulation defined gender as a person ’ s internal sense of being male , female , neither or a combination .
The policy shift , long @ @ @ @ @ @ @ and socially conservative supporters , would allow healthcare providers and insurance companies that receive federal funding to refuse to provide or cover transition-related care for trans Americans .
Several organizations have announced they will challenge the change .
The Human Rights Campaign announced it would file a lawsuit .
The ACLU has also said it would sue to overturn the Trump rule .
Under the Obama-era federal rule , a hospital could be required to perform gender-transition procedures such as hysterectomies if the facility provided that kind of treatment for other medical conditions @ @ @ @ @ @ @ out the anti-discrimination section of the Affordable Care Act , which bars sex discrimination in healthcare but does not use the term “ gender identity ” .
Roger Severino , head of the health department unit that enforces civil rights laws , has said trans people continue to be protected by other statutes that bar discrimination in healthcare on account of race , color , national origin , age , disability and other factors .
But LGBTQ+ groups have long argued protections are needed for people seeking gender confirmation treatment , and for @ @ @ @ @ @ @ common conditions such as diabetes or heart problems .
Women ’ s groups say the new regulations also undermine access to abortion , which is a legal medical procedure .
“ No one should fear being turned away by a medical provider because of who they are or the personal health decisions they have made , ” said Fatima Goss Graves , president of the National Women ’ s Law Center .
For the administration , it is the latest in a series of steps to revoke newly won protections for LGBTQ+ people @ @ @ @ @ @ @ housing and education .
The administration also has moved to restrict military service by trans men and women , proposed allowing certain homeless shelters to take gender identity into account in offering someone a bed for the night , and concluded in a 2017 justice department memo that federal civil rights law does not protect trans people from discrimination at work .
Friday ’ s announcement came on the fourth anniversary of the Pulse nightclub shooting , when a shooter killed 49 people at a gay nightclub in Orlando , Florida .

The Trump administration has finalized a regulation rolling back Obama-era protections for transgender Americans against sex discrimination in health care.
According to the new version of the policy, the Department of Health and Human Services will be “returning to the government’s interpretation of sex discrimination according to the plain meaning of the word ‘sex’ as male or female and as determined by biology”.
The Obama regulation defined gender as a person’s internal sense of being male, female, neither or a combination.
The policy shift, long sought by Donald Trump’s religious and socially conservative supporters, would allow healthcare providers and insurance companies that receive federal funding to refuse to provide or cover transition-related care for trans Americans.
Several organizations have announced they will challenge the change. The Human Rights Campaign announced it would file a lawsuit. The ACLU has also said it would sue to overturn the Trump rule.
Under the Obama-era federal rule, a hospital could be required to perform gender-transition procedures such as hysterectomies if the facility provided that kind of treatment for other medical conditions. The rule was meant to carry out the anti-discrimination section of the Affordable Care Act, which bars sex discrimination in healthcare but does not use the term “gender identity”.
Roger Severino, head of the health department unit that enforces civil rights laws, has said trans people continue to be protected by other statutes that bar discrimination in healthcare on account of race, color, national origin, age, disability and other factors.
But LGBTQ+ groups have long argued protections are needed for people seeking gender confirmation treatment, and for trans people who need medical care for common conditions such as diabetes or heart problems.
Women’s groups say the new regulations also undermine access to abortion, which is a legal medical procedure.
“No one should fear being turned away by a medical provider because of who they are or the personal health decisions they have made,” said Fatima Goss Graves, president of the National Women’s Law Center.
For the administration, it is the latest in a series of steps to revoke newly won protections for LGBTQ+ people in areas ranging from the military to housing and education.
The administration also has moved to restrict military service by trans men and women, proposed allowing certain homeless shelters to take gender identity into account in offering someone a bed for the night, and concluded in a 2017 justice department memo that federal civil rights law does not protect trans people from discrimination at work.
Friday’s announcement came on the fourth anniversary of the Pulse nightclub shooting, when a shooter killed 49 people at a gay nightclub in Orlando, Florida.


theguardian--2020-06-12--'Trump thought I was a secretary': Fiona Hill on the president, Putin and populism

In the last days before Washington was locked down , Fiona Hill was standing on the street on her phone dealing with a domestic crisis .
Hill ’ s daughter had become ill , it was unclear whether it was coronavirus ( it later turned out to be regular flu ) and the family had relatives flying in that weekend for a visit .
As she paced up and down making contingency plans , passersby on Connecticut Avenue looked and looked again on recognising her .
The British-born White House adviser had temporarily become one of the most famous faces @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ’ s impeachment hearings in November .
As senior director for Europe and Russia in the national security council she had been an eyewitness to Trump ’ s encounters with Vladimir Putin , and to the White House machinations over Ukraine .
Her calm under pressure , her clarity of recall , and her evident expertise on all things Russian , confirmed what was already suspected : the president and his associates had conducted a parallel foreign policy towards Kyiv to further his political interests .
For many , Hill was a hero @ @ @ @ @ @ @ County Durham received offers of book contracts , requests for interviews and appearances .
For a few , however , she became a target because her testimony contradicted Trump .
In the present era , that is enough .
She sought police advice after receiving death threats , and this was one of her early sorties into public life after three months in seclusion .
She was planning a cautious return to a normal existence at a Washington thinktank – a plan which was blown up with everyone else ’ s , by @ @ @ @ @ @ @ we met in February , impeachment still felt the climactic drama of the Trump saga to date .
After all , he was only the third president in US history to be impeached , and the details of his attempt to shake down the Ukrainian government by withholding US aid until it produced damaging information about Trump ’ s political rival , were stunning .
But a couple of months on , all this was a dim memory , and the Ukraine scandal appears trivial compared with what followed .
More than 100,000 @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the administration was incapable of handling and unrest was spreading across the nation .
When we talked in May , Hill was back in seclusion but so was the rest of Washington .
She was speaking from home , where she had an array of books spread around her feet .
She had laid them out to try to piece together an explanation of why the three countries with which she was intimately familiar – the UK , where she was born ; Russia , the country she had spent her life studying @ @ @ @ @ @ @ has lived since 1989 and risen to the highest level of government – had all failed so spectacularly in handling the health crisis .
She is one of a handful of people to have stood at the nexus of these three disastrous governments , to have been in the room to witness Donald Trump , Vladimir Putin and Boris Johnson operate .
“ It ’ s a story really about how the US , UK and Russia have all ended up in the same spot weirdly , not just in terms of Covid-19 @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the same out-of-control inequalities , ” Hill said .
In her view populist governments are useless at handling complex problems of governance , almost by definition .
If leaders are fit to govern , they generally don ’ t need populism to get elected .
“ It ’ s all about style and swagger and atmospherics , with superficial solutions to things , with lots of sloganeering , and obviously dealing with a pandemic is pretty methodical and boring .
It requires an awful lot of planning and logistical organization and you can @ @ @ @ @ @ @ on the fly with an ad hoc coalition.
” What interests Hill is how the three such different countries end up in the same boat , run by populists and significantly less able to cope with a pandemic than their neighbours .
She believes the critical common factor is the heady rise , and then the catastrophic collapse , of heavy industry and the failure of their governments to manage the fall and cushion the impact on their people .
It is a story she feels destined to tell , as a child @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the Durham town of Bishop Auckland at the time its mines and steelworks were closing down , destroying jobs , communities and shared identities .
Her father , Alfred , the son and grandson of miners , started work in the local colliery at 14 , and lost his job when the mine closed down in the 1960s .
He spent almost all the rest of his working life as a hospital porter , but to the end , thought of himself as a miner .
He suffered from chronic ill health in @ @ @ @ @ @ @ condemned building .
Her mother , June , was a midwife , and still lives in Bishop Auckland .
Hill sees unexpected parallels between the UK and Russia when researching a book she co-wrote on post-Soviet industrial collapse in Russia : The Siberian Curse : How Communist Planners Left Russia Out in the Cold .
In both the UK and Russia , the planners had built new towns as part of the great industrialisation drive , which suddenly had their economic lifelines cut off and were left to wither .
Hill felt another @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , where her in-laws lived .
The great cities built on steel and automobiles had died , leaving hollowed-out communities .
“ For a lot of people there was no social mobility whatsoever , ” Hill said .
“ I ’ ve seen that same phenomenon here , and also in Russia – people have got stuck – stuck in place both metaphorically and physically.
” In all three countries , the government did little to mitigate the pain , leaving afflicted families to move to where the jobs were .
In practice @ @ @ @ @ @ @ distances and bureaucracy in Russia , house prices in the UK – kept them anchored .
Even in the US , the bursting of the housing bubble in 2008 made movement harder .
And in all three countries , the ties of family obligations and social networks kept people rooted in place without prospects , and educational opportunities to change your destiny have withered away .
“ Education becomes the purview of the elite .
You start to see all educational opportunities confined in a certain income bracket or region , ” Hill @ @ @ @ @ @ @ UK , in the north and other places where the economy collapsed and the tax base eroded , it ’ s the same in the United States .
Local education authorities can barely make ends meet , and the same goes for Russia .
So big swaths of the population in all three countries don ’ t have the skills that are transferable.
” In 1970s Britain , the village where Hill ’ s grandparents lived was deemed no longer viable and cut off from bus routes and other council services .
The @ @ @ @ @ @ @ their shopping .
When the mines closed , moving south was not an option for her father .
“ If you ’ re in the north of England it ’ s probably easier to move to Australia , Canada or America and start again , like some of my family did , rather than trying to find a job in the south , ” Hill said .
“ House prices in the north-east were so ridiculously low vis-a-vis in London or the south.
” Alfred Hill did look into emigrating to work in @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Valley .
There was a long history of immigration from Durham to America .
George Washington ’ s family came from there , as did Jeremiah Dixon , a surveyor who helped draw the Mason-Dixon line .
Stan Laurel ’ s father ran a music hall in Bishop Auckland where Hill ’ s great-grandfather performed a vaudeville act .
Alfred ultimately decided he could not leave his mother , but his daughter did manage to escape .
Her academic gifts took her to St Andrews University to study history and Russian but felt @ @ @ @ @ @ @ distinctions still held her back .
Introducing herself to the House intelligence committee conducting the impeachment hearings , she said : “ I grew up poor with a very distinctive working-class accent .
In England in the 1980s and 1990s , this would have impeded my professional advancement.
” The memories of some humiliations are still fresh decades later , like her interview for a place at Oxford University in 1984 , when another candidate mockingly offered to translate for the benefit of the southerners .
“ When it was my turn to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ girls stuck her leg out and I tripped over and busted my nose on the door frame , ” Hill said .
“ So – one humiliation after another .
I just couldn ’ t believe it .
It was like some bad movie … I felt like Billy Elliot.
” The idea of making a career in Britain appeared daunting .
“ If I lived in the south , or had gone to school down here , I might have stayed in Britain .
It might have seemed more feasible , ” @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ’ re coming from the north of England , you are completely network-poor – you have no idea of how to go about it .
It ’ s all about mentorship and connections.
” In place of a network , Hill had karma and a certain amount of luck .
A chance meeting with a US academic on a work trip to Russia led to her to try for a place at Harvard .
At the interview in London , only she and another northern girl , a farmer ’ s daughter from @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to the secretary .
It turned out that the secretary was part of the selection panel , and it was the two northerners who won the fellowships .
It is her first-hand experience of exclusion in Britain , Hill says , that has helped her to appreciate the powerful appeal of populism .
It fills a void .
“ Populism provides a narrative for people who have lost their identities that were tied to meaningful work , ” she said .
“ When people lose that then they ’ re looking for something @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ’ ve been robbed and deprived of a golden age , and they want that back and populist politics feeds upon that , and provides scapegoats for losing it.
” Bishop Auckland voted 61 % for Brexit .
And just as people voted against the seemingly self-evident advantages of the European Union , Hill said they can vote away pillars of the liberal democracy and elect authoritarian narcissists in its place .
“ Liberal democracy hasn ’ t been delivering , ” she argued .
“ If I go back to my home @ @ @ @ @ @ @ better than it was when I was growing up in terms of opportunity .
The shops are boarded up in the main street .
Nothing new is coming in .
There ’ s just no kind of sense of optimism .
And when I visit my relatives here in the US in Wisconsin and other places , there ’ s a lot of sense of : the rest of the world is kind of moving on and leaving us behind .
People see that as being closely associated with liberal democracy.
” Given @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the threats to democracy from populism and Putin ’ s Russia , some of her friends and colleagues were astonished when she went to work for Trump in the early months of the administration , with one accusing her of “ aiding and abetting a criminal enterprise ” .
“ That was the general thrust .
They were telling : You really shouldn ’ t do this , ” she said .
She says she felt obliged to do what she could to address the dangerous volatility of the relationship between two nuclear-armed @ @ @ @ @ @ @ worried about was the toxicity of the issue of Russia .
I mean I really felt that actually that was one of the reasons why I should try to do something , ” she said .
“ You have to be able to balance off deterrence with some forms of engagement to be able to move things in a different direction.
” She was recruited into the Trump administration by KT McFarland , a Fox News talkshow host who had been made deputy national security adviser .
McFarland had had Hill on her @ @ @ @ @ @ @ and Putin ( Hill is the co-author of a well-regarded portrait of the Russian president , Mr Putin : Operative in the Kremlin . )
Now she was inside the White House , McFarland wanted Hill at her side giving Trump briefings on Russia , as she had done for George W Bush and Barack Obama .
“ I think honestly , they got this idea initially that I could sit down with the president and do a bit of a spiel on Putin but it just never worked out like that , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ wanted to get on with it himself.
” Hill ’ s first Oval Office encounter with Trump was inauspicious .
It was on 3 April 2017 .
She was on her first day of orientation , but there had been a terror attack on the St Petersburg metro and she was called in to brief the president .
She remembers only having her running shoes on , having left home in a rush , leaving her work shoes behind , and trying to hide her feet under her chair .
She need not @ @ @ @ @ @ @ t look up when I came in and I don ’ t think he looked up the whole time I was giving my spiel about the terrorist attack , ” Hill said .
The president was busy writing something on a pad on his desk .
“ And then Ivanka came in and sat down next to me , the first thing she did was look at my shoes.
” The next meeting with Trump was even worse .
McFarland tried to introduce her to the president in a crowded room and tell @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Russia , but Trump just waved towards the secretary of state .
“ He said : Rex Tillerson is working on Russia , and I thought : this is not going to work , ” she recalled .
“ I never really imprinted.
” That much was clear on her next visit to the Oval Office .
Trump was making a call with Putin , and as is customary , relevant White House officials were sitting around the president ’ s desk .
Hill had listened to what the Russian president had said @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , when she suddenly became aware everyone was looking at her .
Trump had decided he wanted a press release and assumed Hill , one of the few women in the room , was there to type it up .
“ The president thought I was part of the executive secretariat taking notes , ” she said .
“ He was basically saying : ‘ Can she go do this ?
’ and I had no idea what they ’ re talking about .
I was like a deer in the headlights , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to me ?
“ It ’ s not like the first time I ’ ve been mistaken for a secretary .
I ’ ve been mistaken for many things , believe me , ” she said .
The incident was leaked by enemies of Trump ’ s second national security adviser , HR McMaster , who hoped to show him as out of step with the president .
“ There were these internal knife fights which I was pretty much unaware of , ” Hill said .
In particular , there was a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in Syria policy .
“ A lot of this stuff which is described as policy is really all about personal fighting … And it ’ s kind of a comedy of errors , with all this intriguing .
It ’ s very reminiscent of Kremlin intrigue and the kind of intrigue around No 10 in the UK – people always trying to do each other in.
” For the record , she is dismissive of the Manchurian Candidate theory that Trump was somehow controlled by Putin through the use of kompromat .
She @ @ @ @ @ @ @ officer , from an earlier job in the national intelligence council .
He was her counterpart , and she was taken by surprise when his dossier on Trump and Russia emerged .
She argues Trump ’ s desire to forge a personal relationship with Putin is no different from his approach to the North Korean leader , Kim Jong-un , or the Chinese president , Xi Jinping , or Israel ’ s prime minister , Benjamin Netanyahu .
“ He wants to be like he was as a CEO , he has all @ @ @ @ @ @ @ He has a very informal style with everyone .
Putin is similar .
He just tries to engage with people in the way that he thinks kind of fits them best , ” she said .
“ Boris is the same .
It ’ s like the guy in the pub .
It ’ s less getting into the weeds of the substance in some sort of formal way , and more two guys talking .
“ Trump just wants to sit down with the guy , whoever it is , and create @ @ @ @ @ @ @ out the details , ” she said .
“ He wanted to treat Putin the same way he treated Xi or Netanyahu .
He wanted to be able to pick up the phone and talk to them.
” But Putin could not be treated like the others .
The Trump campaign had dozens of contacts with Russian officials or Kremlin intermediaries , and the candidate had appealed to Moscow to interfere in the election by hacking Hillary Clinton ’ s emails .
Furthermore , as Hill made clear in her biography of him @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of his long KGB career with him to the Russian presidency .
And the Kremlin was constantly outmanoeuvring the White House , arranging events so that Trump would be alone with Putin with only the Russian president ’ s translator in the room .
The state department , which stuck to rigid protocol rules on whose translator should be where and when , was being played .
“ Putin doesn ’ t operate like that .
Putin takes translators with him for every occasion , ” she said .
“ The Russians are @ @ @ @ @ @ @ every opportunity , every vulnerability , every open door they can walk through.
” In her efforts to have US career officials included in Trump ’ s meetings with Putin , she found herself facing determined resistance from inside the president ’ s entourage , as they became more and more distrustful of career officials as disloyal potential whistleblowers .
“ I was saying to the people around him it ’ s the president ’ s own security here , because then they [ the Russians ] can say that he said things @ @ @ @ @ @ @ And they did that repeatedly , ” she said .
“ They could be recording things in big meetings like the G20 where we don ’ t control the site .
It gave Russians unnecessary leverage , and made it much more difficult for us to get ahead of things.
” In the end , events got ahead of Hill and many of the people she worked with at the national security council .
As 2020 has shown , Trump has few if any advisers ready to push against his impulses .
He @ @ @ @ @ @ @ after another with the result that in less than a year ’ s time , there could be no limits left on the world ’ s major nuclear arsenals .
And Trump ’ s politics of division have spilled out in the streets of US cities , where liberal democracy appears ever more in jeopardy .
Hill sees some hope for the future in citywide grassroots activism , to confront the climate crisis , the coronavirus , poverty and inequality .
But those are more aspirations for the future .
Right now , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ it is the populists who have the upper hand .

In the last days before Washington was locked down, Fiona Hill was standing on the street on her phone dealing with a domestic crisis.
Hill’s daughter had become ill, it was unclear whether it was coronavirus (it later turned out to be regular flu) and the family had relatives flying in that weekend for a visit. As she paced up and down making contingency plans, passersby on Connecticut Avenue looked and looked again on recognising her. The British-born White House adviser had temporarily become one of the most famous faces in America after testifying in Donald Trump’s impeachment hearings in November.
As senior director for Europe and Russia in the national security council she had been an eyewitness to Trump’s encounters with Vladimir Putin, and to the White House machinations over Ukraine.
Her calm under pressure, her clarity of recall, and her evident expertise on all things Russian, confirmed what was already suspected: the president and his associates had conducted a parallel foreign policy towards Kyiv to further his political interests.
For many, Hill was a hero. The coalminer’s daughter from County Durham received offers of book contracts, requests for interviews and appearances.
For a few, however, she became a target because her testimony contradicted Trump. In the present era, that is enough. She sought police advice after receiving death threats, and this was one of her early sorties into public life after three months in seclusion. She was planning a cautious return to a normal existence at a Washington thinktank – a plan which was blown up with everyone else’s, by the looming pandemic and lockdown.
When we met in February, impeachment still felt the climactic drama of the Trump saga to date. After all, he was only the third president in US history to be impeached, and the details of his attempt to shake down the Ukrainian government by withholding US aid until it produced damaging information about Trump’s political rival, were stunning.
But a couple of months on, all this was a dim memory, and the Ukraine scandal appears trivial compared with what followed. More than 100,000 Americans had since died in a pandemic the administration was incapable of handling and unrest was spreading across the nation.
It’s a story really about how the US, UK and Russia have all ended up in the same spot weirdly
When we talked in May, Hill was back in seclusion but so was the rest of Washington. She was speaking from home, where she had an array of books spread around her feet. She had laid them out to try to piece together an explanation of why the three countries with which she was intimately familiar – the UK, where she was born; Russia, the country she had spent her life studying; and the US, where she has lived since 1989 and risen to the highest level of government – had all failed so spectacularly in handling the health crisis.
She is one of a handful of people to have stood at the nexus of these three disastrous governments, to have been in the room to witness Donald Trump, Vladimir Putin and Boris Johnson operate.
“It’s a story really about how the US, UK and Russia have all ended up in the same spot weirdly, not just in terms of Covid-19 but also populist politics and many of the same out-of-control inequalities,” Hill said.
Fiona Hill testifies before the House intelligence committee on 21 November 2019. Photograph: Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images
In her view populist governments are useless at handling complex problems of governance, almost by definition. If leaders are fit to govern, they generally don’t need populism to get elected.
“It’s all about style and swagger and atmospherics, with superficial solutions to things, with lots of sloganeering, and obviously dealing with a pandemic is pretty methodical and boring. It requires an awful lot of planning and logistical organization and you can’t just sort of do it on the fly with an ad hoc coalition.”
What interests Hill is how the three such different countries end up in the same boat, run by populists and significantly less able to cope with a pandemic than their neighbours. She believes the critical common factor is the heady rise, and then the catastrophic collapse, of heavy industry and the failure of their governments to manage the fall and cushion the impact on their people.
It is a story she feels destined to tell, as a child of deindustrialisation, growing up poor in the Durham town of Bishop Auckland at the time its mines and steelworks were closing down, destroying jobs, communities and shared identities.
Her father, Alfred, the son and grandson of miners, started work in the local colliery at 14, and lost his job when the mine closed down in the 1960s. He spent almost all the rest of his working life as a hospital porter, but to the end, thought of himself as a miner. He suffered from chronic ill health in part because of growing up in a condemned building.
Her mother, June, was a midwife, and still lives in Bishop Auckland.
Hill sees unexpected parallels between the UK and Russia when researching a book she co-wrote on post-Soviet industrial collapse in Russia: The Siberian Curse: How Communist Planners Left Russia Out in the Cold.
For a lot of people there was no social mobility whatsoever
In both the UK and Russia, the planners had built new towns as part of the great industrialisation drive, which suddenly had their economic lifelines cut off and were left to wither.
Hill felt another echo when she visited the American midwest, where her in-laws lived. The great cities built on steel and automobiles had died, leaving hollowed-out communities.
“For a lot of people there was no social mobility whatsoever,” Hill said. “I’ve seen that same phenomenon here, and also in Russia – people have got stuck – stuck in place both metaphorically and physically.”
In all three countries, the government did little to mitigate the pain, leaving afflicted families to move to where the jobs were. In practice, the barriers to mobility – vast distances and bureaucracy in Russia, house prices in the UK – kept them anchored. Even in the US, the bursting of the housing bubble in 2008 made movement harder.
And in all three countries, the ties of family obligations and social networks kept people rooted in place without prospects, and educational opportunities to change your destiny have withered away.
“Education becomes the purview of the elite. You start to see all educational opportunities confined in a certain income bracket or region,” Hill said. “Just as in the UK, in the north and other places where the economy collapsed and the tax base eroded, it’s the same in the United States. Local education authorities can barely make ends meet, and the same goes for Russia. So big swaths of the population in all three countries don’t have the skills that are transferable.”
In 1970s Britain, the village where Hill’s grandparents lived was deemed no longer viable and cut off from bus routes and other council services. The family had to walk to bring home their shopping. When the mines closed, moving south was not an option for her father.
“If you’re in the north of England it’s probably easier to move to Australia, Canada or America and start again, like some of my family did, rather than trying to find a job in the south,” Hill said. “House prices in the north-east were so ridiculously low vis-a-vis in London or the south.”
Alfred Hill did look into emigrating to work in the coalmines of Pennsylvania’s Lehigh Valley. There was a long history of immigration from Durham to America. George Washington’s family came from there, as did Jeremiah Dixon, a surveyor who helped draw the Mason-Dixon line. Stan Laurel’s father ran a music hall in Bishop Auckland where Hill’s great-grandfather performed a vaudeville act.
Alfred ultimately decided he could not leave his mother, but his daughter did manage to escape. Her academic gifts took her to St Andrews University to study history and Russian but felt Britain’s fine mesh of class distinctions still held her back.
Introducing herself to the House intelligence committee conducting the impeachment hearings, she said: “I grew up poor with a very distinctive working-class accent. In England in the 1980s and 1990s, this would have impeded my professional advancement.”
It was like a bad movie … I felt like Billy Elliot
The memories of some humiliations are still fresh decades later, like her interview for a place at Oxford University in 1984, when another candidate mockingly offered to translate for the benefit of the southerners.
“When it was my turn to go to the interview one of the girls stuck her leg out and I tripped over and busted my nose on the door frame,” Hill said. “So – one humiliation after another. I just couldn’t believe it. It was like some bad movie … I felt like Billy Elliot.”
The idea of making a career in Britain appeared daunting.
“If I lived in the south, or had gone to school down here, I might have stayed in Britain. It might have seemed more feasible,” she said. “But when you’re coming from the north of England, you are completely network-poor – you have no idea of how to go about it. It’s all about mentorship and connections.”
In place of a network, Hill had karma and a certain amount of luck. A chance meeting with a US academic on a work trip to Russia led to her to try for a place at Harvard. At the interview in London, only she and another northern girl, a farmer’s daughter from Sunderland, took the time to chat to the secretary. It turned out that the secretary was part of the selection panel, and it was the two northerners who won the fellowships.
It is her first-hand experience of exclusion in Britain, Hill says, that has helped her to appreciate the powerful appeal of populism. It fills a void.
“Populism provides a narrative for people who have lost their identities that were tied to meaningful work,” she said. “When people lose that then they’re looking for something. There’s a feeling they’ve been robbed and deprived of a golden age, and they want that back and populist politics feeds upon that, and provides scapegoats for losing it.”
A closed-down department store in Bishop Auckland. The market town in County Durham suffered from deindustrialisation during the 1980s and 90s. Photograph: Richard Saker/The Observer
Bishop Auckland voted 61% for Brexit. And just as people voted against the seemingly self-evident advantages of the European Union, Hill said they can vote away pillars of the liberal democracy and elect authoritarian narcissists in its place.
“Liberal democracy hasn’t been delivering,” she argued. “If I go back to my home town, it’s still no better than it was when I was growing up in terms of opportunity. The shops are boarded up in the main street. Nothing new is coming in. There’s just no kind of sense of optimism. And when I visit my relatives here in the US in Wisconsin and other places, there’s a lot of sense of: the rest of the world is kind of moving on and leaving us behind. People see that as being closely associated with liberal democracy.”
Given everything that Hill knew and understood about the threats to democracy from populism and Putin’s Russia, some of her friends and colleagues were astonished when she went to work for Trump in the early months of the administration, with one accusing her of “aiding and abetting a criminal enterprise”.
“That was the general thrust. They were telling me: You really shouldn’t do this,” she said. She says she felt obliged to do what she could to address the dangerous volatility of the relationship between two nuclear-armed states.
“What I was most worried about was the toxicity of the issue of Russia. I mean I really felt that actually that was one of the reasons why I should try to do something,” she said.
“You have to be able to balance off deterrence with some forms of engagement to be able to move things in a different direction.”
They got this idea I could sit down with Trump and do a bit of a spiel on Putin but it just never worked out like that
She was recruited into the Trump administration by KT McFarland, a Fox News talkshow host who had been made deputy national security adviser. McFarland had had Hill on her show several times to talk about Russia and Putin (Hill is the co-author of a well-regarded portrait of the Russian president, Mr Putin: Operative in the Kremlin.)
Now she was inside the White House, McFarland wanted Hill at her side giving Trump briefings on Russia, as she had done for George W Bush and Barack Obama.
“I think honestly, they got this idea initially that I could sit down with the president and do a bit of a spiel on Putin but it just never worked out like that,” she said. “He just wanted to get on with it himself.”
Hill’s first Oval Office encounter with Trump was inauspicious. It was on 3 April 2017. She was on her first day of orientation, but there had been a terror attack on the St Petersburg metro and she was called in to brief the president.
She remembers only having her running shoes on, having left home in a rush, leaving her work shoes behind, and trying to hide her feet under her chair. She need not have worried.
“Trump didn’t look up when I came in and I don’t think he looked up the whole time I was giving my spiel about the terrorist attack,” Hill said. The president was busy writing something on a pad on his desk. “And then Ivanka came in and sat down next to me, the first thing she did was look at my shoes.”
The next meeting with Trump was even worse. McFarland tried to introduce her to the president in a crowded room and tell him she was his senior director for Russia, but Trump just waved towards the secretary of state.
“He said: Rex Tillerson is working on Russia, and I thought: this is not going to work,” she recalled. “I never really imprinted.”
Fiona Hill in Washington in November 2019. Photograph: Andrew Caballero-Reynolds/AFP via Getty Images
That much was clear on her next visit to the Oval Office. Trump was making a call with Putin, and as is customary, relevant White House officials were sitting around the president’s desk.
Hill had listened to what the Russian president had said and was preparing some notes of analysis, when she suddenly became aware everyone was looking at her. Trump had decided he wanted a press release and assumed Hill, one of the few women in the room, was there to type it up.
“The president thought I was part of the executive secretariat taking notes,” she said. “He was basically saying: ‘Can she go do this?’ and I had no idea what they’re talking about. I was like a deer in the headlights, and thinking: You’re talking to me?
“It’s not like the first time I’ve been mistaken for a secretary. I’ve been mistaken for many things, believe me,” she said.
A lot of this stuff which is described as policy is really all about personal fighting
The incident was leaked by enemies of Trump’s second national security adviser, HR McMaster, who hoped to show him as out of step with the president.
“There were these internal knife fights which I was pretty much unaware of,” Hill said. In particular, there was a struggle of who should have a role in Syria policy. “A lot of this stuff which is described as policy is really all about personal fighting … And it’s kind of a comedy of errors, with all this intriguing. It’s very reminiscent of Kremlin intrigue and the kind of intrigue around No 10 in the UK – people always trying to do each other in.”
For the record, she is dismissive of the Manchurian Candidate theory that Trump was somehow controlled by Putin through the use of kompromat. She knew Christopher Steele, the former MI6 officer, from an earlier job in the national intelligence council. He was her counterpart, and she was taken by surprise when his dossier on Trump and Russia emerged.
She argues Trump’s desire to forge a personal relationship with Putin is no different from his approach to the North Korean leader, Kim Jong-un, or the Chinese president, Xi Jinping, or Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu.
“He wants to be like he was as a CEO, he has all these discussions with people in private … He has a very informal style with everyone. Putin is similar. He just tries to engage with people in the way that he thinks kind of fits them best,” she said. “Boris is the same. It’s like the guy in the pub. It’s less getting into the weeds of the substance in some sort of formal way, and more two guys talking.
“Trump just wants to sit down with the guy, whoever it is, and create personal chemistry and then everyone else works out the details,” she said. “He wanted to treat Putin the same way he treated Xi or Netanyahu. He wanted to be able to pick up the phone and talk to them.”
But Putin could not be treated like the others. The Trump campaign had dozens of contacts with Russian officials or Kremlin intermediaries, and the candidate had appealed to Moscow to interfere in the election by hacking Hillary Clinton’s emails.
Furthermore, as Hill made clear in her biography of him, Putin has taken all the skills of his long KGB career with him to the Russian presidency. And the Kremlin was constantly outmanoeuvring the White House, arranging events so that Trump would be alone with Putin with only the Russian president’s translator in the room. The state department, which stuck to rigid protocol rules on whose translator should be where and when, was being played.
“Putin doesn’t operate like that. Putin takes translators with him for every occasion,” she said. “The Russians are incredibly organized. They take advantage of every opportunity, every vulnerability, every open door they can walk through.”
Fiona Hill leaves after testifying to the House impeachment inquiry on 14 October 2019. Photograph: Carlos Jasso/Reuters
In her efforts to have US career officials included in Trump’s meetings with Putin, she found herself facing determined resistance from inside the president’s entourage, as they became more and more distrustful of career officials as disloyal potential whistleblowers.
“I was saying to the people around him it’s the president’s own security here, because then they [the Russians] can say that he said things that he didn’t say. And they did that repeatedly,” she said. “They could be recording things in big meetings like the G20 where we don’t control the site. It gave Russians unnecessary leverage, and made it much more difficult for us to get ahead of things.”
In the end, events got ahead of Hill and many of the people she worked with at the national security council. As 2020 has shown, Trump has few if any advisers ready to push against his impulses. He has torn up one arms control agreement after another with the result that in less than a year’s time, there could be no limits left on the world’s major nuclear arsenals. And Trump’s politics of division have spilled out in the streets of US cities, where liberal democracy appears ever more in jeopardy.
Hill sees some hope for the future in citywide grassroots activism, to confront the climate crisis, the coronavirus, poverty and inequality. But those are more aspirations for the future. Right now, in Washington, London and Moscow, it is the populists who have the upper hand.


theguardian--2020-06-12--Trump campaign asks supporters to sign coronavirus waiver ahead of rally

Donald Trump will hold a political rally in an indoor arena in Oklahoma next week – his first amid the coronavirus pandemic – prompting organizers to demand attendees sign a waiver that absolves the president ’ s campaign of any liability from virus-related illnesses .
Trump is so keen to return to his cherished campaign format of fronting adoring crowds that he will hold a rally in Tulsa next Friday in the 19,000-seat BOK Center despite the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic .
Oklahoma is in the process of reopening businesses , although Governor Kevin Stitt has said people still need to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ spent in crowded environments ” .
To overcome this impediment , one that has claimed more than 115,000 lives in the US , the Trump campaign is asking supporters to sign a waiver that makes clear the campaign is not responsible if anyone gets ill from crowding with thousands of others in an enclosed space .
By registering to attend , supporters “ are acknowledging that an inherent risk of exposure to Covid-19 exists in any public place where people are present ” , the waiver states , adding that attendees and guests @ @ @ @ @ @ @ exposure to Covid-19 ” and agree to not hold the Trump campaign , the venue or other organizers liable .
Despite the rally breaking the guidelines he has set down , Stitt has welcomed Trump to the state , saying that the event “ confirms Oklahoma is the national example in responsibly and safely reopening ” .
With the US suffering mass joblessness and roiled by anti-racism protests , Trump is attempting to generate momentum for a re-election campaign in which he trails the Democratic challenger Joe Biden in early opinion polls .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ the electoral college votes of Oklahoma , a solidly Republican-voting state .
The rally has already proved controversial , however , because of the site and the date .
Tulsa is where a 1921 massacre took place in which a white mob killed up to 300 black people and burned down their buildings .
The rally will be held on 19 June , also known as Juneteenth , a holiday that marks the end of slavery in the US .
Reacting to the Trump campaign ’ s choice of location and date for @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Harris , who is widely tipped to lead Biden ’ s potential list of vice-presidential candidates , tweeted : “ This isn ’ t just a wink to white supremacists – he ’ s throwing them a welcome home party.
” Hillary Clinton , who lost the 2016 election to Trump , tweeted that : “ If your rallies come with a liability waiver , you shouldn ’ t be holding them .
”

Donald Trump will hold a political rally in an indoor arena in Oklahoma next week – his first amid the coronavirus pandemic – prompting organizers to demand attendees sign a waiver that absolves the president’s campaign of any liability from virus-related illnesses.
Trump is so keen to return to his cherished campaign format of fronting adoring crowds that he will hold a rally in Tulsa next Friday in the 19,000-seat BOK Center despite the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic.
Oklahoma is in the process of reopening businesses, although Governor Kevin Stitt has said people still need to employ social distancing and “minimize time spent in crowded environments”.
To overcome this impediment, one that has claimed more than 115,000 lives in the US, the Trump campaign is asking supporters to sign a waiver that makes clear the campaign is not responsible if anyone gets ill from crowding with thousands of others in an enclosed space.
By registering to attend, supporters “are acknowledging that an inherent risk of exposure to Covid-19 exists in any public place where people are present”, the waiver states, adding that attendees and guests “voluntarily assume all risks related to exposure to Covid-19” and agree to not hold the Trump campaign, the venue or other organizers liable.
Despite the rally breaking the guidelines he has set down, Stitt has welcomed Trump to the state, saying that the event “confirms Oklahoma is the national example in responsibly and safely reopening”.
With the US suffering mass joblessness and roiled by anti-racism protests, Trump is attempting to generate momentum for a re-election campaign in which he trails the Democratic challenger Joe Biden in early opinion polls. He should, regardless, still win the electoral college votes of Oklahoma, a solidly Republican-voting state.
The rally has already proved controversial, however, because of the site and the date. Tulsa is where a 1921 massacre took place in which a white mob killed up to 300 black people and burned down their buildings. The rally will be held on 19 June, also known as Juneteenth, a holiday that marks the end of slavery in the US.
Reacting to the Trump campaign’s choice of location and date for the rally, the California senator Kamala Harris, who is widely tipped to lead Biden’s potential list of vice-presidential candidates, tweeted: “This isn’t just a wink to white supremacists – he’s throwing them a welcome home party.”
Hillary Clinton, who lost the 2016 election to Trump, tweeted that: “If your rallies come with a liability waiver, you shouldn’t be holding them.”


theguardian--2020-06-12--Bolton book claims Trump committed other ‘Ukraine-like transgressions’

Donald Trump ’ s former national security adviser John Bolton is set to claim in a bombshell book that the president has committed “ Ukraine-like transgressions ” across his entire foreign policy , far beyond the alleged misconduct he was impeached for .
He will also describe his attempts and those by “ others in the administration to raise alarms about them ” , according to a press release on Friday about the forthcoming memoir .
Bolton , a staunch conservative who previously served as Republican president George W Bush ’ s hawkish ambassador to the United Nations , will @ @ @ @ @ @ @ solely on Trump ’ s alleged bid to pressure the leader of Ukraine into damaging the reputation of Trump ’ s election opponent Joe Biden , while leaving out much wider accusations of similar wrongdoing .
Trump was acquitted by the Republican-led Senate in his impeachment trial early in 2020 .
Bolton will argue in his book , The Room Where It Happened , that the Democrat-led House of Representatives committed “ impeachment malpractice ” by impeaching Trump over his Ukraine dealings when , it is suggested in the book , the president @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
The press release for the book teases that Bolton will describe the transgressions .
New York publishers Simon & Schuster boasted : “ This is the book Donald Trump doesn ’ t want you to read.
” The White House has fought to block the book , claiming in January that it contained classified information .
The book is now due out on 23 June .
Bolton was ousted last September after months of disagreement over America ’ s foreign policy approach , especially Trump ’ s freewheeling ways , amid revelations @ @ @ @ @ @ @ s inner circle .
Trump said he had “ disagreed strongly ” with Bolton , who claimed he was in the process of resigning when Trump moved to fire him .
According to the release on Friday , the new book “ argues that the House committed impeachment malpractice by keeping their prosecution focused narrowly on Ukraine when Trump ’ s Ukraine-like transgressions existed across the full range of his foreign policy – and Bolton documents exactly what those were , and attempts by him and others in the administration to raise alarms @ @ @ @ @ @ @ pounce on Bolton for not publicly raising concerns about these “ transgressions ” while they were occurring – and for later refusing to testify to the House about them .
Bolton refused to provide a deposition during the impeachment inquiry .
Bolton also criticizes Trump for focusing solely on his chances of re-election as he made major policy decisions .
“ I am hard-pressed to identify any significant Trump decision during my tenure that wasn ’ t driven by re-election calculations , ” he writes .

Joan E Greve in Washington and Joanna Walters in New York

Donald Trump’s former national security adviser John Bolton is set to claim in a bombshell book that the president has committed “Ukraine-like transgressions” across his entire foreign policy, far beyond the alleged misconduct he was impeached for.
He will also describe his attempts and those by “others in the administration to raise alarms about them”, according to a press release on Friday about the forthcoming memoir.
Bolton, a staunch conservative who previously served as Republican president George W Bush’s hawkish ambassador to the United Nations, will criticize the Democrat-led impeachment inquiry for focusing solely on Trump’s alleged bid to pressure the leader of Ukraine into damaging the reputation of Trump’s election opponent Joe Biden, while leaving out much wider accusations of similar wrongdoing.
Trump was acquitted by the Republican-led Senate in his impeachment trial early in 2020.
Bolton will argue in his book, The Room Where It Happened, that the Democrat-led House of Representatives committed “impeachment malpractice” by impeaching Trump over his Ukraine dealings when, it is suggested in the book, the president had committed other “Ukraine-like transgressions”.
The press release for the book teases that Bolton will describe the transgressions.
New York publishers Simon & Schuster boasted: “This is the book Donald Trump doesn’t want you to read.”
The White House has fought to block the book, claiming in January that it contained classified information. The book is now due out on 23 June.
Bolton was ousted last September after months of disagreement over America’s foreign policy approach, especially Trump’s freewheeling ways, amid revelations of searing internal divisions within Trump’s inner circle. Trump said he had “disagreed strongly” with Bolton, who claimed he was in the process of resigning when Trump moved to fire him.
According to the release on Friday, the new book “argues that the House committed impeachment malpractice by keeping their prosecution focused narrowly on Ukraine when Trump’s Ukraine-like transgressions existed across the full range of his foreign policy – and Bolton documents exactly what those were, and attempts by him and others in the administration to raise alarms about them”.
Critics will probably pounce on Bolton for not publicly raising concerns about these “transgressions” while they were occurring – and for later refusing to testify to the House about them. Bolton refused to provide a deposition during the impeachment inquiry.
Bolton also criticizes Trump for focusing solely on his chances of re-election as he made major policy decisions. “I am hard-pressed to identify any significant Trump decision during my tenure that wasn’t driven by re-election calculations,” he writes.


theguardian--2020-06-12--It's the economy, stupid – but will Trump or Biden win the argument?

Amid a continuing pandemic and a painful national introspection on race , a volatile American economy is also forcing Donald Trump and Joe Biden to recalibrate how they campaign in 2020 ’ s presidential election .
For Trump , any positive news about the economy needs to be trumpeted .
That ’ s what the president did when the most recent unemployment figures came in surprisingly lower than expected , at 13.3 % .
For Biden , Trump ’ s Democratic opponent in the 2020 presidential election , the approach is to remind voters that the soaring unemployment numbers are @ @ @ @ @ @ @ can , Biden looks to link the virus-cratered economy to Trump .
But as with many other things in 2020 , there is nothing normal or easy to predict about the US economy as the election unfolds .
Unlike normal recessions , the devastation unleashed on the American jobs market has come about because of deliberate shutdown policies aimed at curbing the pandemic ’ s spread .
That makes blaming Trump for the 40 million plus new jobless Americans a little more difficult .
By the same token , coaxing the economy back @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of trying to stimulate demand or tinkering with interest rates .
It is instead deeply entwined with public health policy , where reopening the artificially shut-down economy could cost tens of thousands of US lives .
That situation poses problems for both contenders as they seek to make the economy central to their campaigns .
Douglas Holtz-Eakin , who served as the 2008 John McCain campaign ’ s director of domestic and economic policy , said the challenge for Biden and Trump is different as they seek to persuade voters they have the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ an economic freefall driven by a virus .
“ For the Biden campaign , the challenge is to ask themselves every day : ‘ OK , what looks presidential in this moment ?
’ ” Holtz-Eakin said .
“ Both have to appear presidential , but Trump in particular has to be a source of trustworthy information .
“ People derive great comfort from someone who can tell them what ’ s happening.
” For Trump , he either needs to communicate a convincing argument to be optimistic that he can lead the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ is a worse alternative .
A swath of recent polling has shown Biden beating Trump in a general election matchup .
But on the economy , Trump is still competitive .
A recent Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll found that a plurality of voters still think Trump is preferable on dealing with the economy and cutting the unemployment rate .
Trump has habitually pointed to certain metrics – such as the stock market – to argue that he ’ s the stronger candidate on the economy .
He also likes to say Democrats @ @ @ @ @ @ @ taxes .
Holtz-Eakin expects Trump to focus more on bashing Biden as the election nears , regardless of how the economy is doing on any particular day .
“ I think he ’ s going to concentrate on the messenger , ” Holtz-Eakin said .
In recent days , Biden has tried to multitask in attacking Trump .
He and his campaign , publicly and privately , have put a heavy focus on race relations , and the unrest around the police killing of George Floyd .
Talking points sent to some Biden @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Guardian did not mention the economy , and instead focused on Floyd .
But Biden ’ s fundraising schedule this week includes multiple economy-related events , according to invitations obtained by the Guardian .
One fundraiser on Wednesday was labeled a “ Virtual Conversation on Rebuilding a Most Resilient Health Economy after Covid-19 ” .
Another fundraiser featured Peter Orszag , the former director for the Office of Management and Budget during the Obama administration .
In public remarks , Biden has also eagerly pivoted to addressing the economy and laying out his @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to crow about the great economy he built .
But when the crisis hit , it became clear who that economy has been built to serve .
Not workers .
Not the middle class .
Not families , ” Biden said in recent public remarks .
In addressing the economy , Biden often ties it to race relations or the coronavirus .
On Thursday , Biden ’ s campaign released a new factsheet titled “ The Biden Plan for an Effective Re-Opening that Jumpstarts the Economy ” .
The campaign has also set @ @ @ @ @ @ @ have Biden ’ s ear on economic policy .
The state of the economy isn ’ t everything in presidential politics ad campaigns .
Obama won re-election in the wake of the outbreak of the Great Recession against a candidate with a strong business background .
But amid the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression of the 1930s , it casts a long shadow in 2020 and both Democratic and Republican strategists have to deal with it .
Scott Kozar , a veteran Democratic strategist , said that the unemployment rate is @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the coming months , and is likely to be a problem for Trump because of the sheer scale of the collapse .
“ You ’ re really arguing that 16 % unemployment ’ s good ?
It ’ s a bit like arguing only 100,000 people died , ” Kozar said .
“ There is a clear vacuum of leadership.
” Other strategists , though , argue that the state of the economy will be too complicated for just one side to take advantage of .
“ I think the campaign that does @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , and the campaign that does a better job convincing people that the economy is either roaring back or is stalling out … whichever campaign wins that messaging battle is likely to be in the driver ’ s seat , ” said Republican strategist Todd Harris , who served as a top adviser for the Florida senator Marco Rubio ’ s 2016 presidential campaign .
“ I don ’ t think there ’ s going to be enough conclusive economic data one way or the other to have it be a slam dunk @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ” “ We ’ re not going to know when the light at the end of the tunnel ’ s going to come about between now and the election , ” the Democratic strategist Aaron Pickrell said .
“ It ’ s still going to be some ebbs and flows , and potentially a good jobs report and things aren ’ t as bad as they ’ re going to be one month .
But at the end of the day , I have a hard time imagining that voters think the economy @ @ @ @ @ @ @ by the time we ’ re voting in November .
”

Amid a continuing pandemic and a painful national introspection on race, a volatile American economy is also forcing Donald Trump and Joe Biden to recalibrate how they campaign in 2020’s presidential election.
For Trump, any positive news about the economy needs to be trumpeted. That’s what the president did when the most recent unemployment figures came in surprisingly lower than expected, at 13.3%.
For Biden, Trump’s Democratic opponent in the 2020 presidential election, the approach is to remind voters that the soaring unemployment numbers are unacceptably high. Virtually every time he can, Biden looks to link the virus-cratered economy to Trump.
But as with many other things in 2020, there is nothing normal or easy to predict about the US economy as the election unfolds.
Unlike normal recessions, the devastation unleashed on the American jobs market has come about because of deliberate shutdown policies aimed at curbing the pandemic’s spread. That makes blaming Trump for the 40 million plus new jobless Americans a little more difficult.
By the same token, coaxing the economy back into life is not just a matter of trying to stimulate demand or tinkering with interest rates. It is instead deeply entwined with public health policy, where reopening the artificially shut-down economy could cost tens of thousands of US lives.
That situation poses problems for both contenders as they seek to make the economy central to their campaigns.
Douglas Holtz-Eakin, who served as the 2008 John McCain campaign’s director of domestic and economic policy, said the challenge for Biden and Trump is different as they seek to persuade voters they have the answers to solve the problems posed by an economic freefall driven by a virus.
“For the Biden campaign, the challenge is to ask themselves every day: ‘OK, what looks presidential in this moment?’” Holtz-Eakin said. “Both have to appear presidential, but Trump in particular has to be a source of trustworthy information.
“People derive great comfort from someone who can tell them what’s happening.”
For Trump, he either needs to communicate a convincing argument to be optimistic that he can lead the economic recovery, or show that Biden is a worse alternative.
A swath of recent polling has shown Biden beating Trump in a general election matchup. But on the economy, Trump is still competitive. A recent Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll found that a plurality of voters still think Trump is preferable on dealing with the economy and cutting the unemployment rate.
Trump has habitually pointed to certain metrics – such as the stock market – to argue that he’s the stronger candidate on the economy. He also likes to say Democrats are the party that wants to raise taxes.
Holtz-Eakin expects Trump to focus more on bashing Biden as the election nears, regardless of how the economy is doing on any particular day.
Biden at an economic roundtable discussion in. Philadelphia on Wednesday. Photograph: Jim Watson/AFP/Getty Images
“I think he’s going to concentrate on the messenger,” Holtz-Eakin said.
In recent days, Biden has tried to multitask in attacking Trump. He and his campaign, publicly and privately, have put a heavy focus on race relations, and the unrest around the police killing of George Floyd. Talking points sent to some Biden surrogates on Monday and obtained by the Guardian did not mention the economy, and instead focused on Floyd.
But Biden’s fundraising schedule this week includes multiple economy-related events, according to invitations obtained by the Guardian.
One fundraiser on Wednesday was labeled a “Virtual Conversation on Rebuilding a Most Resilient Health Economy after Covid-19”. Another fundraiser featured Peter Orszag, the former director for the Office of Management and Budget during the Obama administration.
In public remarks, Biden has also eagerly pivoted to addressing the economy and laying out his policy platform.
“Trump has loved to crow about the great economy he built. But when the crisis hit, it became clear who that economy has been built to serve. Not workers. Not the middle class. Not families,” Biden said in recent public remarks.
In addressing the economy, Biden often ties it to race relations or the coronavirus. On Thursday, Biden’s campaign released a new factsheet titled “The Biden Plan for an Effective Re-Opening that Jumpstarts the Economy”. The campaign has also set up a secretive group of advisers who have Biden’s ear on economic policy.
The state of the economy isn’t everything in presidential politics ad campaigns. Obama won re-election in the wake of the outbreak of the Great Recession against a candidate with a strong business background.
But amid the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression of the 1930s, it casts a long shadow in 2020 and both Democratic and Republican strategists have to deal with it.
Scott Kozar, a veteran Democratic strategist, said that the unemployment rate is something that will continue to matter in the coming months, and is likely to be a problem for Trump because of the sheer scale of the collapse.
“You’re really arguing that 16% unemployment’s good? It’s a bit like arguing only 100,000 people died,” Kozar said. “There is a clear vacuum of leadership.”
Other strategists, though, argue that the state of the economy will be too complicated for just one side to take advantage of.
“I think the campaign that does a better job spinning the economic data, and the campaign that does a better job convincing people that the economy is either roaring back or is stalling out … whichever campaign wins that messaging battle is likely to be in the driver’s seat,” said Republican strategist Todd Harris, who served as a top adviser for the Florida senator Marco Rubio’s 2016 presidential campaign.
“I don’t think there’s going to be enough conclusive economic data one way or the other to have it be a slam dunk win for one side or the other.”
Still, Democrats are optimistic.
“We’re not going to know when the light at the end of the tunnel’s going to come about between now and the election,” the Democratic strategist Aaron Pickrell said.
“It’s still going to be some ebbs and flows, and potentially a good jobs report and things aren’t as bad as they’re going to be one month. But at the end of the day, I have a hard time imagining that voters think the economy is going great and everything is safe by the time we’re voting in November.”