theguardian--2020-06-24--Sarah Sanders lied again and again for Trump. Now she’s got her teeth into John Bolton | Arwa Mahdaw

Sarah Sanders lied again and again for Trump. Now she’s got her teeth into John Bolton | Arwa Mahdawi

Donald Trump may not like reading , but he has inspired a lot of people to take up writing .
Anyone remotely connected to the president appears to have an exposé of the Trump administration forthcoming .
That includes Sarah Sanders , the former White House press secretary ; her book , Speaking for Myself , will be released later this year .
Sanders has remained loyal to the president ; instead , she directs barbs at the former national security adviser John Bolton , who most certainly has not .
In an extract of her book given to the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ as being “ drunk on power ” and forgetting that “ nobody elected him to anything ” .
It is a shame Sanders has written a memoir , because she has a talent for fiction .
During her two-year tenure as press secretary , Sanders proved herself a smooth and shameless liar .
She maintained a straight face while arguing that Trump , who has repeatedly glorified violence , had never encouraged violence against anyone .
She claimed that Trump ’ s firing of the FBI director , James Comey , had support @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ” , before admitting under oath that this statement “ was not founded on anything ” .
When Sanders was not spouting outrageous untruths , she did not seem to know what to do with herself .
Daily media addresses were the norm before her reign ; she killed them off and set a White House record when she went 94 days without holding a proper press briefing .
In short , she collected a taxpayer-funded salary while openly holding taxpayers in contempt .
Nonetheless , a publisher has rewarded Sanders with a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in this .
Sanders has started a new chapter of her life , but there does not appear to have been any character development .

Donald Trump may not like reading, but he has inspired a lot of people to take up writing. Anyone remotely connected to the president appears to have an exposé of the Trump administration forthcoming. That includes Sarah Sanders, the former White House press secretary; her book, Speaking for Myself, will be released later this year.
Sanders has remained loyal to the president; instead, she directs barbs at the former national security adviser John Bolton, who most certainly has not. In an extract of her book given to the politics site Axios, she describes Bolton as being “drunk on power” and forgetting that “nobody elected him to anything”.
It is a shame Sanders has written a memoir, because she has a talent for fiction. During her two-year tenure as press secretary, Sanders proved herself a smooth and shameless liar. She maintained a straight face while arguing that Trump, who has repeatedly glorified violence, had never encouraged violence against anyone. She claimed that Trump’s firing of the FBI director, James Comey, had support from “countless members of the FBI”, before admitting under oath that this statement “was not founded on anything”.
When Sanders was not spouting outrageous untruths, she did not seem to know what to do with herself. Daily media addresses were the norm before her reign; she killed them off and set a White House record when she went 94 days without holding a proper press briefing. In short, she collected a taxpayer-funded salary while openly holding taxpayers in contempt.
Nonetheless, a publisher has rewarded Sanders with a book deal. Shame on everyone involved in this. Sanders has started a new chapter of her life, but there does not appear to have been any character development.


theguardian--2020-06-25--How damaging is John Bolton's scathing account of Donald Trump's presidency? - podcast

The publication of John Bolton ’ s White House memoir has caused a sensation .
Jonathan Freedland assesses the lurid @ @ @ @ @ authoritarian leaders as well as descriptions of ‘ stunning ’ ignorance Despite a last-ditch attempt @ @ @ @ @ Bolton ’ s tell-all book about his time in Donald Trump ’ s White House @ @ @ @ @ .
He claimed that as well as witnessing ‘ stunning ’ ignorance from the president @ @ @ @ @ close how Trump tried to ingratiate himself with authoritarian leaders , at the expense of @ @ @ @ @ ’ s Jonathan Freedland has been reporting on US politics for years and tells Anushka @ @ @ @ @ we do about the Trump administration , this account still has the ability to shock @

Presented by Anushka Asthana with Jonathan Freedland produced by Courtney Yusuf and Axel Kacoutié; executive producers Phil Maynard and Nicole Jackson

The publication of John Bolton’s White House memoir has caused a sensation. Jonathan Freedland assesses the lurid claims of cosying up to authoritarian leaders as well as descriptions of ‘stunning’ ignorance
Despite a last-ditch attempt to prevent publication, John Bolton’s tell-all book about his time in Donald Trump’s White House has landed with a bang. He claimed that as well as witnessing ‘stunning’ ignorance from the president, he also saw up close how Trump tried to ingratiate himself with authoritarian leaders, at the expense of the US.
The Guardian’s Jonathan Freedland has been reporting on US politics for years and tells Anushka Asthana that even knowing what we do about the Trump administration, this account still has the ability to shock.


theguardian--2020-06-25--Joe Biden to accept nomination at mostly virtual Milwaukee convention

Democrats will hold an almost entirely virtual presidential nominating convention in Milwaukee using live broadcasts and online streaming , party officials said Wednesday .
Joe Biden plans to accept the presidential nomination in person during the 17-20 August convention , but it remains to be seen whether there will be a significant in-person audience there to see it .
The Democratic National Committee said in a statement that official business , including the votes to nominate Biden and his yet-to-be-named running mate , will take place virtually , with delegates being asked not to travel to Milwaukee .
It ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the Covid-19 pandemic has upended American life and the 2020 presidential election , leading Biden and the party to abandon the usual trappings of an event that draws tens of thousands of people to the host city to mark the start of the general election campaign .
Not even during the civil war or second world war did the two major parties abandon in-person conventions with crowded arenas .
Biden ’ s campaign manager , Jen O ’ Malley Dillon , said the drastically altered convention won ’ t be an impediment .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ his party ’ s nomination in Milwaukee and take the next step forward towards making Donald Trump a one-term president , ” she said , adding that Biden ’ s campaign will continue to highlight Wisconsin as a key battleground state .
Democrats had offered strong signals before Wednesday that they ’ d curtail convention activities , including when Tom Perez , the Democratic party chairman , pushed back the original convention dates in mid-July .
The new details were released the same day that Biden ’ s team announced its leadership team @ @ @ @ @ @ @ states that helped propel Trump to an electoral college victory four years ago .
He won Wisconsin by fewer than 23,000 votes – less than 1 percentage point .
Representative Bennie Thompson of Mississippi will serve as convention chair , party officials said .
Perez said scaling back Democrats ’ festivities is a matter of public health .
He sought to draw a contrast with Trump ’ s push for a traditional convention in North Carolina , clashing with the state ’ s Democratic governor , Roy Cooper , and public health officials @ @ @ @ @ @ @ The Republican National Committee has confirmed its official business will be conducted in Charlotte .
But Trump has said he plans to accept his nomination in Jacksonville , Florida , because Cooper wouldn ’ t guarantee Republicans the ability to host a large-scale event in Charlotte ’ s NBA arena .
“ Unlike this president , Joe Biden and Democrats are committed to protecting the health and safety of the American people , ” Perez said .
Besides events in Wisconsin , Democrats plan other events in satellite locations around the country to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Veteran producer Ricky Kirshner , who has worked on every Democratic National Convention since 1992 , will lead production of the convention , including the satellite broadcasts .
Kirshner has served as executive producer of the Tony awards since 2004 and the Super Bowl halftime show since 2007 ; he ’ s won nine Emmy awards .

Democrats will hold an almost entirely virtual presidential nominating convention in Milwaukee using live broadcasts and online streaming, party officials said Wednesday.
Joe Biden plans to accept the presidential nomination in person during the 17-20 August convention, but it remains to be seen whether there will be a significant in-person audience there to see it. The Democratic National Committee said in a statement that official business, including the votes to nominate Biden and his yet-to-be-named running mate, will take place virtually, with delegates being asked not to travel to Milwaukee.
It’s the latest sign of how much the Covid-19 pandemic has upended American life and the 2020 presidential election, leading Biden and the party to abandon the usual trappings of an event that draws tens of thousands of people to the host city to mark the start of the general election campaign. Not even during the civil war or second world war did the two major parties abandon in-person conventions with crowded arenas.
Biden’s campaign manager, Jen O’Malley Dillon, said the drastically altered convention won’t be an impediment. “Vice-president Biden intends to proudly accept his party’s nomination in Milwaukee and take the next step forward towards making Donald Trump a one-term president,” she said, adding that Biden’s campaign will continue to highlight Wisconsin as a key battleground state.
Democrats had offered strong signals before Wednesday that they’d curtail convention activities, including when Tom Perez, the Democratic party chairman, pushed back the original convention dates in mid-July.
The new details were released the same day that Biden’s team announced its leadership team in Wisconsin, one of three key states that helped propel Trump to an electoral college victory four years ago. He won Wisconsin by fewer than 23,000 votes – less than 1 percentage point.
Congressman Bennie Thompson of Mississippi will serve as convention chair, party officials said.
Perez said scaling back Democrats’ festivities is a matter of public health. He sought to draw a contrast with Trump’s push for a traditional convention in North Carolina, clashing with the state’s Democratic governor, Roy Cooper, and public health officials over the details amid the pandemic.
The Republican National Committee has confirmed its official business will be conducted in Charlotte. But Trump has said he plans to accept his nomination in Jacksonville, Florida, because Cooper wouldn’t guarantee Republicans the ability to host a large-scale event in Charlotte’s NBA arena.
“Unlike this president, Joe Biden and Democrats are committed to protecting the health and safety of the American people,” Perez said.
Besides events in Wisconsin, Democrats plan other events in satellite locations around the country to broadcast as part of the convention.
Veteran producer Ricky Kirshner, who has worked on every Democratic National Convention since 1992, will lead production of the convention, including the satellite broadcasts. Kirshner has served as executive producer of the Tony awards since 2004 and the Super Bowl half-time show since 2007; he’s won nine Emmy awards.


theguardian--2020-06-24--US records highest one-day total in coronavirus cases since April

The US has recorded a one-day total of 34,700 new Covid-19 cases , the highest level since late April , when the number peaked at 36,400 , according to the count kept by Johns Hopkins University .
A coronavirus resurgence is wiping out two months of progress in the US and sending infections to dire new levels in southern and western states .
Administrators and health experts warned on Wednesday that politicians and a public that , in many cases , is tired of being cooped up are letting a disaster unfold .
While newly-confirmed infections have been declining steadily @ @ @ @ @ @ @ York and New Jersey , several other states set single-day records this week , including Arizona , California , Mississippi , Nevada , Texas and Oklahoma .
North Carolina and South Carolina joined some other states in breaking hospitalization records .
“ People got complacent , ” said Marc Boom , CEO of the Houston Methodist hospital system .
“ And it ’ s coming back and biting us , quite frankly.
” With the US death toll creeping towards 122,000 on Wednesday , and confirmed cases at almost 2.4 million for the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ computer model of the outbreak projected nearly 180,000 deaths by 1 October .
Stocks slid on Wall Street as the news dampened hopes for a quick economic turnaround .
The Dow Jones Industrial Average lost more than 700 points for a drop of 2.7 % .
The broader S & P 500 fell 2.6 % .
Experts urged Americans to continue following guidelines to stop the spread of coronavirus as , in total , seven states reported record-high hospitalizations and 19 others saw new cases rising compared to last week .
The increase @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in the past month .
The federal government is also starting to roll back testing programs , including in states most affected by the resurgence in cases .
The record-high hospitalizations indicate the rise in cases is not simply because of increased testing , a point confirmed by the leading public health expert on the White House coronavirus task force , Anthony Fauci , and in sharp contrast to views put forward by Donald Trump .
Dr Scott Gottlieb , the former FDA commissioner , said on Wednesday he expected that hospitals in @ @ @ @ @ @ @ would need to again suspend elective surgeries in order to have capacity to deal with coronavirus patients .
“ They ’ re going to be on a trajectory to get overwhelmed again , ” Gottlieb said on CNBC .
Epidemiologist Caitlin Rivers warned the national case count is going in the “ wrong direction ” .
Rivers , an assistant professor at Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security , said in addition to her concerns about the increase in hospitalizations , she was worried about the higher percentage of positive tests .
“ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ April , because at least then there was energy around gaining control , ” Rivers tweeted .
“ I sense less of that now.
” Rivers is one of several public health experts to express concern that people are taking public health guidance less seriously though the threat of infection remains .
States across the US have eased lockdown restrictions , but with inconsistent policies on what can open , where crowds can gather and how much these rules are enforced .
Outside a Trump rally in Phoenix on Tuesday , few people @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ignored .
Despite eased restrictions across the country , it is still important to follow local health guidance .
This includes wearing masks , frequent hand washing and isolating if experiencing Covid-19 symptoms .
Texasgovernor Greg Abbott urged people to stay at home , as a children ’ s hospital in Houston was forced to admit adults because of increasing coronavirus cases .
Texas began lifting its shutdowns on 1 May and hospitalizations have doubled and new cases have tripled in two weeks .
Abbott told local station KFDA-TV that the state is @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Meanwhile on Wednesday , California reported over 7,100 new cases in 24 hours , an all-time high .
Florida ’ s single-day count surged to 5,500 , a 25 % jump from the record set last week and triple the level of two weeks ago .
Amid the increase in cases , the Trump administration is ending funding and support for 13 testing sites in states including Texas this month , local officials told Talking Points Memo .
Rocky Vaz , the director of emergency management for the city of Dallas , told @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the federal government to extend the testing program but it refused .
Testing is crucial for monitoring the spread of the illness and for helping people to know when to isolate and warn others of possible exposure .
Republican senator John Cornyn of Texas offered a rare rebuke of the president from the GOP over the president ’ s decision to wind down funding for testing sites – including some in Texas .
“ I know there ’ s concern , concern I share , over some of the statements being made about @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Texas at the end of June , ” Cornyn said .
“ It ’ s pretty clear to me , and I think it ’ s clear to all of us , that with the uptick of cases , now is not a time to retreat from our vigilance in testing.
” He called on the White House to extend federal support for Texas , “ at least until we get this most recent uptick in cases addressed ” .
And a spokesman for Ted Cruz , the other Republican senator of Texas @ @ @ @ @ @ @ has urged and will continue to urge [ health officials ] to extend the community testing sites in Texas ” .

Amanda Holpuch in New York, Maanvi Singh in Oakland and agencies

The US has recorded a one-day total of 34,700 new Covid-19 cases, the highest level since late April, when the number peaked at 36,400, according to the count kept by Johns Hopkins University.
A coronavirus resurgence is wiping out two months of progress in the US and sending infections to worrying new levels in southern and western states.
Administrators and health experts warned on Wednesday that politicians and a public that, in many cases, is tired of being cooped up are letting a disaster unfold.
While new infections have been declining steadily in early hotspots such as New York and New Jersey, several other states set single-day records this week, including Arizona, California, Mississippi, Nevada, Texas and Oklahoma.
North Carolina and South Carolina joined some other states in breaking hospitalization records.
“People got complacent,” said Marc Boom, the chief executive of the Houston Methodist hospital system. “And it’s coming back and biting us, quite frankly.”
With the US death toll creeping towards 122,000 on Wednesday, and confirmed cases at almost 2.4 million for the US, a widely-cited University of Washington computer model of the outbreak projected nearly 180,000 deaths by 1 October.
Stocks slid on Wall Street as the news dampened hopes for a quick economic turnaround. The Dow Jones Industrial Average lost more than 700 points for a drop of 2.7%. The broader S&P 500 fell 2.6%.
Experts urged Americans to continue following guidelines to stop the spread of coronavirus as, in total, seven states reported record-high hospitalizations and 19 others saw new cases rising compared to last week.
The increase is hitting states which eased lockdown restrictions in the past month. The federal government is also starting to roll back testing programs, including in states most affected by the resurgence in cases.
The record-high hospitalizations indicate the rise in cases is not simply because of increased testing, a point confirmed by the leading public health expert on the White House coronavirus task force, Anthony Fauci, and in sharp contrast to views put forward by Donald Trump.
Dr Scott Gottlieb, the former FDA commissioner, said on Wednesday he expected that hospitals in Texas, California, Florida and Arizona would need to again suspend elective surgeries in order to have capacity to deal with coronavirus patients.
“They’re going to be on a trajectory to get overwhelmed again,” Gottlieb said on CNBC.
Epidemiologist Caitlin Rivers warned the national case count is going in the “wrong direction”.
Rivers, an assistant professor at Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security, said in addition to her concerns about the increase in hospitalizations, she was worried about the higher percentage of positive tests.
“In some ways this feels worse than April, because at least then there was energy around gaining control,” Rivers tweeted. “I sense less of that now.”
Rivers is one of several public health experts to express concern that people are taking public health guidance less seriously though the threat of infection remains.
States across the US have eased lockdown restrictions, but with inconsistent policies on what can open, where crowds can gather and how much these rules are enforced. Outside a Trump rally in Phoenix on Tuesday, few people wore masks and social distancing guidelines were ignored.
Despite eased restrictions across the country, it is still important to follow local health guidance. This includes wearing masks, frequent hand washing and isolating if experiencing Covid-19 symptoms.
The safest place for you is at your home Greg Abbott
Texasgovernor Greg Abbott urged people to stay at home, as a children’s hospital in Houston was forced to admit adults because of increasing coronavirus cases.
Texas began lifting its shutdowns on 1 May and hospitalizations have doubled and new cases have tripled in two weeks. Abbott told local station KFDA-TV that the state is facing a “massive outbreak”.
Meanwhile on Wednesday, California reported over 7,100 new cases in 24 hours, an all-time high. Florida’s single-day count surged to 5,500, a 25% jump from the record set last week and triple the level of two weeks ago.
Amid the increase in cases, the Trump administration is ending funding and support for 13 testing sites in states including Texas this month, local officials told Talking Points Memo.
Rocky Vaz, the director of emergency management for the city of Dallas, told the website that the city had asked the federal government to extend the testing program but it refused.
Testing is crucial for monitoring the spread of the illness and for helping people to know when to isolate and warn others of possible exposure.
Republican senator John Cornyn of Texas offered a rare rebuke of the president from the GOP over the president’s decision to wind down funding for testing sites – including some in Texas.
“I know there’s concern, concern I share, over some of the statements being made about withdrawing federal support for coronavirus testing in Texas at the end of June,” Cornyn said. “It’s pretty clear to me, and I think it’s clear to all of us, that with the uptick of cases, now is not a time to retreat from our vigilance in testing.”
He called on the White House to extend federal support for Texas, “at least until we get this most recent uptick in cases addressed”.
And a spokesman for Ted Cruz, the other Republican senator of Texas, told NBC News that he “has urged and will continue to urge [health officials] to extend the community testing sites in Texas”.


theguardian--2020-06-24--Long lines and delayed results: key takeaways from the latest US primaries

A slew of elections on Tuesday in New York , Kentucky and North Carolina threw out numerous story lines , from successful mail-in ballots to victories for insurgent challengers to more mainstream politicians successfully fending off their rivals .
Here are five key takeaways : A long and painful drought of victories ended Tuesday night for the liberal wing of the Democratic party .
In New York , liberals appear to have replaced the incumbent congressman Eliot Engel with the progressive darling Jamaal Bowman .
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez won her district ’ s Democratic primary , effectively ensuring her re-election , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ congressional district , Mondaire Jones won a crowded primary .
Some races are still outstanding as of Wednesday afternoon .
In New York ’ s 12th congressional district , the Democratic congresswoman Carolyn Maloney is in real danger of losing her seat to challenger Suraj Patel .
The race has not been called yet .
Overall , though , New York was the center of progressive victories and it ’ s clear the liberal wing of the party shouldn ’ t be written off , even in the era of Joe Biden .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ In Kentucky , Democrat Amy McGrath , the longtime heavy favorite candidate to face the Senate majority leader , Mitch McConnell , found herself in a tougher than expected primary against Charles Booker , the youngest African American legislator in Kentucky ’ s house of representatives .
As of Wednesday afternoon Booker trailed McGrath by double digits .
That ’ s despite a surge of endorsements and support from the larger constellation of progressive groups and activists behind Booker .
Tuesday ’ s primaries saw upset wins on both the Republican and Democratic @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Cawthorn , a 24-year-old congressional candidate and political newcomer , beat Republican Lynda Bennett , who had been endorsed by Donald Trump .
Cawthorn ’ s unexpected victory once again calls into question how far the president ’ s reach now goes even in a Republican primary contest .
Delayed results , long lines and voting problems are the new normal Delayed election results and election-day problems are becoming the norm .
Many of the races on Tuesday weren ’ t called by Wednesday afternoon .
And in Kentucky , the McGrath and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ polls open to allow more voters a chance to cast their ballots .
The injunction was denied .
In New York , some of the races still aren ’ t called , even as candidates declared victory .
Political strategist are expecting similar delays and a wave of mail-in ballots could mean that the presidential election won ’ t be called until days after 3 November .
Despite a primary challenge from the attorney Todd McMurtry and receiving criticism from Trump himself , the Kentucky Republican Thomas Massie held on to his congressional @ @ @ @ @ @ @ 60 points .
Like the result in North Carolina , Massie ’ s victory calls into question whether Trump ’ s endorsement matters much at all in some Republican primaries .
He had criticized the congressman as a “ third rate Grandstander ” and warned that he would be thrown out of congress , yet Massie won decisively .

A slew of elections on Tuesday in New York, Kentucky and North Carolina threw out numerous story lines, from successful mail-in ballots to victories for insurgent challengers to more mainstream politicians successfully fending off their rivals.
Here are five key takeaways:
A good night for New York liberals
A long and painful drought of victories ended Tuesday night for the liberal wing of the Democratic party. In New York, liberals appear to have replaced the incumbent congressman Eliot Engel with the progressive darling Jamaal Bowman. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez won her district’s Democratic primary, effectively ensuring her re-election, and in New York’s 17th congressional district, Mondaire Jones won a crowded primary. Some races are still outstanding as of Wednesday afternoon. In New York’s 12th congressional district, the Democratic congresswoman Carolyn Maloney is in real danger of losing her seat to challenger Suraj Patel. The race has not been called yet.
Overall, though, New York was the center of progressive victories and it’s clear the liberal wing of the party shouldn’t be written off, even in the era of Joe Biden.
Not so great for liberals in Kentucky
In Kentucky, Democrat Amy McGrath, the longtime heavy favorite candidate to face the Senate majority leader, Mitch McConnell, found herself in a tougher than expected primary against Charles Booker, the youngest African American legislator in Kentucky’s house of representatives. As of Wednesday afternoo,n Booker trailed McGrath by double digits. That’s despite a surge of endorsements and support from the larger constellation of progressive groups and activists behind Booker.
Madison Cawthorn wins in North Carolina
Tuesday’s primaries saw upset wins on both the Republican and Democratic side. In North Carolina, Madison Cawthorn, a 24-year-old congressional candidate and political newcomer, beat Republican Lynda Bennett, who had been endorsed by Donald Trump. Cawthorn’s unexpected victory once again calls into question how far the president’s reach now goes even in a Republican primary contest.
Delayed results, long lines and voting problems are the new normal
Delayed election results and election-day problems are becoming the norm. Many of the races on Tuesday weren’t called by Wednesday afternoon. And in Kentucky, the McGrath and Booker campaigns filed an injunction to keep polls open to allow more voters a chance to cast their ballots. The injunction was denied.
In New York, some of the races still aren’t called, even as candidates declared victory. Political strategist are expecting similar delays and a wave of mail-in ballots could mean that the presidential election won’t be called until days after 3 November.
A blow to Trump in Kentucky
Despite a primary challenge from the attorney Todd McMurtry and receiving criticism from Trump himself, the Kentucky Republican Thomas Massie held on to his congressional seat, beating McMurtry by more than 60 points. Like the result in North Carolina, Massie’s victory calls into question whether Trump’s endorsement matters much at all in some Republican primaries. He had criticized the congressman as a “third rate grandstander” and warned that he would be thrown out of Congress, yet Massie won decisively.


theguardian--2020-06-24--Democrats block 'empty' Republican police reform bill

Congress was at a standstill on police reform on Wednesday after Senate Democrats successfully blocked a Republican bill they have criticized as a toothless response to police brutality .
The vote was 55-45 , failing to reach the 60-vote threshold needed to advance .
Two Democrats , the Alabama Senator Doug Jones and the West Virginia Senator Joe Manchin , along with Senator Angus King of Maine , an independent who caucuses with Democrats , voted with Republicans to open the debate .
A rival police reform bill put forward by Democrats is expected to pass in the House this @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , Mitch McConnell , a Republican , has already said it would be a non-starter in the Senate .
That leaves Congress at an apparent impasse over an issue that has prompted mass protests in dozens of cities across the US since the 25 May police killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis .
In a press conference after the vote on Wednesday , Senate Democrats urged their supporters to keep up the fight for change .
“ This does not mark the end of the road , ” the Senate minority leader , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Cory Booker , who helped craft the Democratic police reform bill , specifically addressed supporters , saying , “ Stay at it .
... Let ’ s keep pushing.
” But Republicans were much more pessimistic about the path forward , blaming Democrats .
“ I hope that the American people see how the Democrats blocked solutions from coming to their communities for the sake of partisan politics , ” said the Republican Senator Tim Scott , who led the group in charge of crafting the bill .
The Republican Senator Lindsey Graham @ @ @ @ @ @ @ is , I don ’ t see a way forward.
” While common ground is not completely out of reach , such a standoff is now a familiar scene .
Lawmakers have frequently failed to act during times of crisis on gun control or immigration changes despite broad support for change .
An Associated Press-NORC poll published on Monday showed Americans were largely united behind the idea that action is required , and found strong support for penalizing officers who engage in racially biased policing .
The Republicans ’ Justice Act is seen @ @ @ @ @ @ @ point in the broader debate over how best to change policing practices as demonstrations in cities large and small focus on law enforcement and racial injustice .
It would create a national database of police use-of-force incidents , restrict police chokeholds and set up new training procedures and commissions to study race and law enforcement .
But it is not as sweeping as a Democratic proposal , which mandates many of the changes and would hold police liable to damages in lawsuits .
There are similarities on some issues , lawmakers say , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ California Senator Kamala Harris said the House bill offered “ concrete solutions ” whereas the Republican bill was “ empty ” and was not “ about real consequence and real accountability ” .
With the Democratic bill headed for a House vote Thursday , support is growing from high-profile backers .
Hundreds of celebrities , actors , musicians and industry leaders including Rihanna , RZA , Elon Musk and mayors from cities nationwide signed on to a support letter obtained by the Associated Press and being released Wednesday .
Civil rights leaders and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ vote on the GOP bill .
Law enforcement and business groups including the US Chamber of Commerce have urged both parties to find common ground .
The two bills , the House and Senate versions , would ultimately need to be the same to become law .
On Wednesday , McConnell criticized Democrats as engaging in “ political nonsense ” .
Still , he vowed to try again , hoping to pass legislation before a 4 July holiday recess .
McConnell switched his vote to no , a procedural move so he could @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Political risks of inaction are high , as the public wants to see policing changes after nearly a month of constant demonstrations nationwide forcing a worldwide reckoning over law enforcement and racial injustice .
Associated Press contributed to this report

Congress was at a standstill on police reform on Wednesday after Senate Democrats successfully blocked a Republican bill criticized as a toothless response to police brutality.
The vote was 55-45, failing to reach the 60-vote threshold needed to advance. Two Democrats, the Alabama senator Doug Jones and the West Virginia senator Joe Manchin, along with Angus King of Maine, an independent who caucuses with Democrats, voted with Republicans to open the debate.
A rival police reform bill put forward by Democrats is expected to pass in the House this week, but the Senate majority leader, Mitch McConnell, a Republican, has already said it would be a non-starter in the Senate.
That leaves Congress at an apparent impasse over an issue that has prompted mass protests in dozens of cities across the US since the 25 May police killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis.
In a press conference after the vote on Wednesday, Senate Democrats urged their supporters to keep up the fight for change.
“This does not mark the end of the road,” the Senate minority leader, Chuck Schumer, told reporters.
Senator Cory Booker, who helped craft the Democratic police reform bill, specifically addressed supporters, saying, “Stay at it … Let’s keep pushing.”
But Republicans were much more pessimistic about the path forward, blaming Democrats.
“I hope that the American people see how the Democrats blocked solutions from coming to their communities for the sake of partisan politics,” said the Republican Tim Scott, who led the group in charge of crafting the bill.
The Republican Lindsey Graham added: “All I can say is, I don’t see a way forward.”
While common ground is not completely out of reach, such a standoff is now a familiar scene. Lawmakers have frequently failed to act during times of crisis on gun control or immigration changes despite broad support for change.
An Associated Press-NORC poll published on Monday showed Americans were largely united behind the idea that action is required, and found strong support for penalizing officers who engage in racially biased policing.
The Republicans’ Justice Act is seen by Republicans and Democrats as a starting point in the broader debate over how best to change policing practices as demonstrations in cities large and small focus on law enforcement and racial injustice. It would create a national database of police use-of-force incidents, restrict police chokeholds and set up new training procedures and commissions to study race and law enforcement.
But it is not as sweeping as a Democratic proposal, which mandates many of the changes and would hold police liable to damages in lawsuits. There are similarities on some issues, lawmakers say, but also vast differences.
The Democratic California Senator Kamala Harris said the House bill offered “concrete solutions” whereas the Republican bill was “empty” and was not “about real consequence and real accountability”.
With the Democratic bill headed for a House vote Thursday, support is growing from high-profile backers. Hundreds of celebrities, actors, musicians and industry leaders including Rihanna, RZA, Elon Musk and mayors from cities nationwide signed on to a support letter obtained by the Associated Press and being released Wednesday.
Civil rights leaders and the Congressional Black Caucus urged a no vote on the GOP bill. Law enforcement and business groups including the US Chamber of Commerce have urged both parties to find common ground.
The two bills, the House and Senate versions, would ultimately need to be the same to become law.
On Wednesday, McConnell criticized Democrats as engaging in “political nonsense”. Still, he vowed to try again, hoping to pass legislation before a 4 July holiday recess. McConnell switched his vote to no, a procedural move so he could swiftly bring it back for reconsideration.
Political risks of inaction are high, as the public wants to see policing changes after nearly a month of constant demonstrations nationwide forcing a worldwide reckoning over law enforcement and racial injustice.
Associated Press contributed to this report


theguardian--2020-06-24--'Too early to call': why it's unlikely we'll have a winner on US election night

As Kentucky voters wait to see which Democrat will challenge Mitch McConnell this fall , Americans are quickly realizing there ’ s a new normal for elections during the pandemic : we ’ re not going to know the winner on election night .
Over the last few months , states across the US have seen record numbers of their voters cast their votes by mail as states expand and encourage its use during Covid-19 .
It ’ s a change that means election officials are going to need more time to count votes as ballots flood election offices on @ @ @ @ @ @ @ count ballots postmarked by election day if they arrive in the days after the election .
There are worries about how the US will react to delayed results during November ’ s hotly contested presidential election .
Americans are used to the spectacle of election night – anchors on major networks breathlessly analyze and call races and the evening culminates in a late night speech from victorious candidates .
That ’ s very unlikely to happen this year – Americans are going to be waiting a while to find out whether or not @ @ @ @ @ @ @ four years .
“ The delays during the primaries in getting election results can teach the media and voters a valuable lesson : processing and counting absentee ballots takes more time than tabulating in-person votes , ” said Richard Hasen , a law professor at the University of California , Irvine who specializes in elections .
“ The public , despite the inevitable angst over the results of November ’ s election , needs to be prepared for the media to say that the presidential race is ‘ too early to call ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ college.
” In Kentucky , the state ’ s top election official projected turnout in the primary would exceed 1.1m votes .
But that total includes just 271,000 who voted in person either early or on election day .
Around 868,090 people requested absentee ballots in the state and as of Wednesday , 604,984 had been returned .
Many local clerks in Kentucky are waiting until 30 June to release full results because the state is allowing ballots to be counted as long as they are postmarked by the day of the election @ @ @ @ @ @ @ York , which also held a primary Tuesday , valid absentee ballots will probably continue to arrive over the next several days and officials won ’ t start counting them until next week .
Trump , already making baseless claims about mail-in fraud , could use such a delay to call the election illegitimate if he loses in November , some worry .
A particularly concerning scenario is one where Trump appears to be ahead based on the in-person results released on election night and then falls behind as more absentee ballots come @ @ @ @ @ @ @ 2018 , when Republicans led in several congressional races in California on election night and then ultimately lost those races weeks later as more mail-in ballots were counted ( California is one of the states that allows ballots to count if they are postmarked by election day and arrive in the days after ) .
“ Everyone needs to be on guard against candidates that might prematurely declare victory before all the votes are counted , ” Hasen said .
“ I ’ m especially worried Trump might try to do so , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ on later-counted ballots as somehow fraudulent.
” Counting mail-in ballots is an arduous task that can differ across states .
Several key swing states – including Wisconsin , Michigan and Pennsylvania – have laws in place that prohibit election officials from counting mail-in ballots until election day .
Officials say those measures are unworkable given the flood of mail-in ballots expected in November and will put election workers under enormous pressure to count ballots quickly .
There is a push in Pennsylvania – which took more than a week to count ballots from @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to get state lawmakers to allow officials to start processing the ballots earlier .
Some states allow election officials to begin to begin counting ballots before election day , allowing them to report unofficial results on election night .
In Oregon , which conducts its elections entirely by mail , officials can begin counting ballots a week before the deadline to get them in .
That head start allows election offices to keep up with an influx of ballots as election day approaches , said Andrea Chiapella , a spokesperson for the Oregon @ @ @ @ @ @ @ In Florida , where many people vote by mail , election officials can begin counting ballots 22 days ahead of election day .
Florida ’ s governor , Ron DeSantis , a Republican , issued an executive order this month allowing officials to start counting ballots even earlier .
In April , Hasen and a consortium of election experts offered two key recommendations on how to preserve confidence in the election even as it takes a while to count absentee votes .
They wrote that states should bring transparency to the absentee ballot @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ballots are counted as quickly as possible .
Media organizations , they wrote , need to set an expectation for the public that there won ’ t be a winner on election night and should work on teaching people about the processes in place to count ballots .
“ These efforts are likely to provide the strongest defense against misinformation about the electoral process or false allegations of widespread voter fraud , which media outlets should of course also seek to avoid amplifying , ” they wrote in their report .

As Kentucky voters wait to see which Democrat will challenge Mitch McConnell this fall, Americans are quickly realizing there’s a new normal for elections during the pandemic: we’re not going to know the winner on election night.
Over the past few months, states across the US have seen record numbers of their voters cast their votes by mail as states expand and encourage its use during Covid-19. It’s a change that means election officials are going to need more time to count votes as ballots flood election offices on election day and afterwards – some states count ballots postmarked by election day if they arrive in the days after the election.
There are worries about how the US will react to delayed results during November’s hotly contested election. Americans are used to the spectacle of election night – anchors on major networks breathlessly analyze and call races and the evening culminates in a late night speech from victorious candidates. That’s very unlikely to happen this year – Americans are going to be waiting a while to find out whether or not Donald Trump will be president for another four years.
“The delays during the primaries in getting election results can teach the media and voters a valuable lesson: processing and counting absentee ballots takes more time than tabulating in-person votes,” said Richard Hasen, a law professor at the University of California, Irvine, who specializes in elections.
“The public, despite the inevitable angst over the results of November’s election, needs to be prepared for the media to say that the presidential race is ‘too early to call’ if it is close in the electoral college.”
In Kentucky, the state’s top election official projected turnout in the primary would exceed 1.1m votes. But that total includes just 271,000 who voted in person either early or on election day. Around 868,090 people requested absentee ballots in the state and as of Wednesday, 604,984 had been returned.
The public ... needs to be prepared for the media to say that the presidential race is ‘too early to call’ Richard Hasen
Many local clerks in Kentucky are waiting until 30 June to release full results because the state is allowing ballots to be counted as long as they are postmarked by the day of the election and arrive by Saturday. In New York, which also held a primary Tuesday, valid absentee ballots will probably continue to arrive over the next several days and officials won’t start counting them until next week.
Trump, already making baseless claims about mail-in fraud, could use such a delay to call the election illegitimate if he loses in November, some worry. A particularly concerning scenario is one where Trump appears to be ahead based on the in-person results released on election night and then falls behind as more absentee ballots come in. A foreshadowing played out in 2018, when Republicans led in several congressional races in California on election night and then ultimately lost those races weeks later as more mail-in ballots were counted (California is one of the states that allows ballots to count if they are postmarked by election day and arrive in the days after).
“Everyone needs to be on guard against candidates that might prematurely declare victory before all the votes are counted,” Hasen said. “I’m especially worried Trump might try to do so, and to cast doubt without any evidence on later-counted ballots as somehow fraudulent.”
Counting mail-in ballots is an arduous task that can differ across states. Several key swing states – including Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania – have laws in place that prohibit election officials from counting mail-in ballots until election day. Officials say those measures are unworkable given the flood of mail-in ballots expected in November and will put election workers under enormous pressure to count ballots quickly. There is a push in Pennsylvania – which took more than a week to count ballots from its 2 June primary – and Michigan to get state lawmakers to allow officials to start processing the ballots earlier.
Some states allow election officials to begin to begin counting ballots before election day, allowing them to report unofficial results on election night. In Oregon, which conducts its elections entirely by mail, officials can begin counting ballots a week before the deadline to get them in. That head start allows election offices to keep up with an influx of ballots as election day approaches, said Andrea Chiapella, a spokesperson for the Oregon secretary of state’s office. In Florida, where many people vote by mail, election officials can begin counting ballots 22 days ahead of election day. Florida’s governor, Ron DeSantis, a Republican, issued an executive order this month allowing officials to start counting ballots even earlier.
In April, Hasen and a consortium of election experts offered two key recommendations on how to preserve confidence in the election even as it takes a while to count absentee votes. They wrote that states should bring transparency to the absentee ballot process and take steps to make sure ballots are counted as quickly as possible. Media organizations, they wrote, need to set an expectation for the public that there won’t be a winner on election night and should work on teaching people about the processes in place to count ballots.
“These efforts are likely to provide the strongest defense against misinformation about the electoral process or false allegations of widespread voter fraud, which media outlets should of course also seek to avoid amplifying,” they wrote in their report.


theguardian--2020-06-25--Down the rabbit hole: how QAnon conspiracies thrive on Facebook

In early May , QAnon braced for a purge .
Facebook had removed a small subset – five pages , six groups and 20 profiles – of the community on the social network , and as word of the bans spread , followers of Q began preparing for a broader sweep .
Some groups changed their names , substituting “ 17 ” for “ Q ” ( the 17th letter of the alphabet ) ; others shared links to back-up accounts on alternative social media platforms with looser rules .
More than just another internet conspiracy theory , QAnon is @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a kind of gospel the online messages of an anonymous figure – “ Q ” – who claims knowledge of a secret cabal of powerful pedophiles and sex traffickers .
Within the constructed reality of QAnon , Donald Trump is secretly waging a patriotic crusade against these “ deep state ” child abusers , and a “ Great Awakening ” that will reveal the truth is on the horizon .
QAnon evolved out of the baseless Pizzagate conspiracy theory , which posited that Hillary Clinton was running a child sex ring out of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ has come to incorporate numerous strands of rightwing conspiracy mongering .
Dedicated followers interpret Q ’ s cryptic messages in a kind of digital scavenger hunt .
Despite the fact that Q ’ s prognostications have reliably failed to come true , followers rationalize the inaccuracies as part of a larger plan .
Q ’ s initial commentary on the Facebook bans was concise : “ Information Warfare , ” Q posted on the website 8kun .
Two days later , in a post that included a collage of dozens of news headlines @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , speculating that there had been a “ coordinated media roll-out designed to instill ‘ fear ’ ” in believers and dissuade them from discussing QAnon on social media .
“ When do you expend ammunition ?
” Q wrote .
“ For what purpose ?
” The anticipated purge never came .
Instead , QAnon groups on Facebook have continued to grow at a considerable pace in the weeks following the takedown , with several adding more than 10,000 members over 30 days .
• None More than 100 Facebook pages , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ with at least 1,000 followers or members each dedicated to QAnon .
• None The largest of these have more than 150,000 followers or members .
• None In total , the documented pages , groups and accounts count more than 3m aggregate followers and members , though there is likely significant overlap among these groups and accounts .
These groups and pages play a critical role in disseminating Q ’ s messages to a broader audience and in recruiting more believers to the cult-like belief system , researchers say .
“ Facebook @ @ @ @ @ @ @ amplification , ” said Brian Friedberg , a senior researcher at the Harvard Shorenstein Center ’ s Technology and Social Change Project who has been studying QAnon for years .
“ I really do not think that QAnon as we know it today would have been able to happen without the affordances of Facebook.
” Moreover , Facebook is not merely providing a platform to QAnon groups .
Its powerful algorithms are actively recommending them to users who may not otherwise have been exposed to them .
The Guardian did not initially go @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Instead , Facebook ’ s algorithms recommended a QAnon group to a Guardian reporter ’ s account after it had joined pro-Trump , anti-vaccine and anti-lockdown Facebook groups .
The list of more than 100 QAnon groups and accounts was then generated by following Facebook ’ s recommendation algorithms and using simple keyword searches .
The Instagram accounts were discovered by searching for “ QAnon ” in the app ’ s discovery page and then following Instagram ’ s algorithmic recommendations .
Receiving QAnon recommendations from Facebook does not appear to be that @ @ @ @ @ @ @ those pages and joining those groups , Facebook just started recommending more and more and more and more , to the point where I was afraid to like them all in case Facebook would flag me as a bot , ” said Friedberg .
Erin Gallagher , a researcher who studies social media extremism , said she was also encouraged to join a QAnon group by Facebook , soon after joining an anti-lockdown group .
Facebook ’ s own internal research in 2016 found that “ 64 % of all extremist group joins @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , the Wall Street Journal reported , primarily through the same “ Groups you should join ” and “ Discover ” algorithms that promoted QAnon content to the Guardian .
“ Our recommendation systems grow the problem , ” the internal research said .
Facebook did not directly respond to questions from the Guardian about its policy considerations around QAnon content .
“ Last month , we took down accounts , Groups , and Pages tied to this conspiracy theorist movement for violating our policies , ” a company spokesperson said in a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ and Pages that violate other policies from recommendations and demote in search results .
We ’ re closely monitoring this activity and how our policies apply.
” The company also claimed that “ all of the Pages ” and “ the vast majority of Groups ” documented by the Guardian had been removed from recommendation algorithms prior to the Guardian ’ s query .
The company did not provide evidence for this claim , which is contradicted by screenshots of pages and groups appearing in recommendations that were taken in May .
The @ @ @ @ @ @ @ join additional QAnon groups after its initial query to Facebook .
Asked about this discrepancy , Facebook said that the pages and groups in question had been marked as “ non-recommendable ” as of 8 April 2020 for violations of policies against clickbait , viral misinformation and hate speech , but that a page or group can be restored to eligibility for recommendations if its behavior improves for several months .
Over the course of reporting this article – about one month – the aggregate membership of the documented groups and pages grew @ @ @ @ @ @ @ or approximately 8.5 % .
Groups and pages that the Guardian had documented to have been promoted through Facebook ’ s recommendation algorithms grew 19.9 % .
One page that appeared in recommendations – “ We are ‘ Q ’ ” – saw its following grow nearly 60 % , from about 24,000 to about 38,000 over the month – despite the page not having posted any new content since February .
To Friedberg , the window for Facebook to act on QAnon may have already passed .
“ I ’ m starting @ @ @ @ @ @ @ waiting for the next shoe to drop – another act of violence , ” he said .
“ That seems to be what the platforms wait for , and that in and of itself is terrifying.
” While QAnon thrives on Facebook , another social media site took timely and decisive action against it .
Nearly two years ago , Reddit , the link-sharing network of interest-based message boards , carried out a site-wide purge of QAnon – and made it stick .
Reddit had been central to the development of the QAnon @ @ @ @ @ @ @ with the emergence of “ Q ” on 4chan , the anarchic image board that has served as a launching pad for memes and internet culture but also racist extremism and harassment campaigns .
Q , whose cryptic messages and predictions claimed to be based on a high-level government security clearance , quickly decamped from 4chan to the even more extreme 8chan , where believers could read Q ’ s latest “ crumbs ” directly from the source .
Q went briefly silent in 2019 when 8chan was forced offline in the wake @ @ @ @ @ @ @ re-emerged on the new site founded by 8chan ’ s owners , 8kun .
Anonymous internet posters claiming to be high-level government officials are not entirely uncommon ; in recent years , other so-called “ anons ” have emerged with claims that they were revealing secrets from inside the FBI or CIA .
But Q is the first such figure to have achieved such a broad audience and real-world political influence .
This is largely due to the activism of three dedicated conspiracy theorists who latched on to Q ’ s posts in @ @ @ @ @ @ @ investigation by NBC News .
These activists worked to develop a mythology and culture around QAnon and cultivated an audience for it on mainstream social media platforms .
Reddit was significantly easier to use for the kind of crowd-sourced research and interpretation that forms the core of participation in QAnon , and the site was host to a large pool of potential recruits , such as the 1.2m members of the subreddit r/conspiracy .
It had also long enjoyed and at times even earned a reputation as one of the danker cesspools of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ communities known as “ subreddits ” dedicated to sharing non-consensual sexualized images of women or advocating rape .
But the violent anger of adherents to QAnon crossed the line for Reddit in less than a year .
On 12 September 2018 , citing its ban on content that “ incites violence , disseminates personal information , or harasses ” , the company banned 18 QAnon subreddits , the largest of which had more than 70,000 members .
Social media bans are often difficult to maintain , but Reddit ’ s move was uncommonly @ @ @ @ @ @ @ on Reddit , with the few subreddits that address it dedicated to either debunking the theory or providing support to people who have lost friends and family members to QAnon .
QAnon did not disappear after Reddit pulled the plug , however .
Instead , its believers moved on to other platforms , including YouTube , Twitter , Discord and – crucially – Facebook .
At the time of the Reddit ban , one of the largest closed Facebook groups dedicated to QAnon , “ Qanon Follow the White Rabbit ” had 51,000 @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Today that group has grown to more than 90,000 members .
And while YouTube and Twitter have played an important role in providing a broadcast platform for QAnon content , the specific structures provided by Facebook are uniquely suited to the participatory “ work ” of engaging with QAnon .
Facebook also provides QAnon with an even larger pool of potential recruits than Reddit could , especially for the somewhat older , Evangelical crowd that has proven susceptible to QAnon ’ s messaging .
Will Partin , a research analyst with Data & @ @ @ @ @ @ @ professor of communication at the University of North Carolina , describe QAnon as a “ dark participatory culture ” , which is to say that it is a community that takes advantage of the infrastructure of social networking sites to bring disparate people together and foster discussion , collaboration , research and community , but directs those energies toward anti-democratic , regressive and even violent ends .
“ Everything about our research suggests that these people are not irrational ; they ’ re hyper-literate , even if they ’ ve come to beliefs @ @ @ @ @ @ @ said .
“ That ’ s partly because they have a fundamentally different epistemology to judge what is true and false.
” The digital architecture of Facebook groups is also particularly well-suited to QAnon ’ s collaborative construction of an alternative body of knowledge , Friedberg said .
The platform has created a ready-made digital pathway from public pages to public groups to private groups and finally secret groups that mirrors the process of “ falling down the rabbit hole or taking the red pill ” .
“ You can mechanically take those @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Very few of the contemporary Q-following base actually need to engage with 8chan at all.
” To ban or not to ban While Facebook has policies banning hate speech , incitement to violence and other types of content that it considers undesirable on a family- and advertiser-friendly platform , QAnon does not fit neatly into any single category .
Much of what is shared in QAnon groups on Facebook is a mix of pro-Trump political speech and pro-Trump political misinformation .
Memes , videos and posts are often bigoted and disconnected from reality @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the content that is shared in non-QAnon , pro-Trump Facebook groups .
The pages and groups that were removed in early May violated the company ’ s ban on “ coordinated inauthentic behavior ” – ie the kind of digital astroturf tactics that Russian operatives used to support Trump ’ s presidential campaign in 2016 .
Those rules are aimed at operations in which actors make false representations about their identities in order to mislead people – a description that could encompass Q – but Facebook only applies its policy to deceptive behavior @ @ @ @ @ @ @ on 8kun .
To enact a blanket ban akin to Reddit ’ s under its current rubric of rules , Facebook would likely have to designate QAnon as a “ dangerous organization ” – the category it uses to ban both terrorist and hate groups and any content published in support or praise of them .
QAnon is hardly an organization , though as a movement it has certainly caused harm and could be considered dangerous .
There are innate societal and individual harms to convincing people of a version of reality that @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , said Data & Society research analyst Will Partin .
“ When a common sense of what is real and what is correct breaks apart , it becomes nearly impossible to reach a democratic consensus.
” And QAnon followers ’ enthusiasm for misinformation is not confined to politics ; as the coronavirus pandemic took hold , the groups became a hotbed for medical misinformation – something Facebook has claimed to be working hard to combat .
Analyses by Gallagher , the social media researcher , and the New York Times demonstrated how QAnon @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Plandemic ” , a 26-minute video chock full of dangerously false information about Covid-19 and vaccines .
Facebook ’ s algorithms appear to have detected this synergy between the QAnon and anti-vaccine communities .
Several QAnon groups are flagged with an automated warning label from Facebook that reads , “ This group discusses vaccines ” and encourages users to go to the website of the Centers for Disease Control for reliable information on health .
It appears that anti-vaccine propagandists are also taking notice , and attempting to capitalize .
Larry Cook , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ one of the largest anti-vaxx Facebook groups , has begun incorporating QAnon rhetoric into the medical misinformation he peddles , as well as making explicit invitations to QAnon believers to join his group .
Cook has begun referencing the “ deep state ” and stoking fear of forced vaccination and “ FEMA camps ” .
“ I have discussed the concept many , many , many times that vaccines destroy our connection to God and that we are in a spiritual war with Principalities of Darkness that have a death wish for our @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ” he wrote in one QAnon-inflected post .
( Cook also uses the site to aggressively promote his various products and a subscription-only platform for “ medical freedom patriots ” . )
But the potential for damage from QAnon goes well beyond .
For those individuals who truly believe in the QAnon narrative , the crimes of the “ cabal ” are so grievous as to make fighting them a moral imperative .
“ They ’ re talking about a group of people who are operating our government against our wishes and they @ @ @ @ @ @ @ destroying our society , ” said Joseph Uscinski , a professor of political science who studies conspiracy theories .
“ It ’ s an incitement to violence.
” Indeed , there have been numerous incidents of real-world violence linked to QAnon , and in May 2019 , the FBI identified QAnon as a potential domestic terrorism threat in an intelligence bulletin .
While anti-government conspiracy theories were not new , the bulletin stated , social media was allowing them to reach a larger audience , and the online narratives were determining the targets @ @ @ @ @ @ @ subset of individuals who crossed over into real-world action .
Despite this , Uscinski is skeptical of the idea that kicking QAnon off Facebook would help anyone .
He regularly polls conspiracy theories and consistently finds that QAnon is “ one of the least believed things ” out there , well below belief in theories about Jeffrey Epstein ’ s death , anti-vaccine hoaxes , and Holocaust denialism .
Uscinski also cautions against overly exoticizing the QAnon narrative , noting that “ most of the component parts of QAnon have been around forever @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Panic of the 1980s or the plot of Oliver Stone ’ s JFK .
And he ’ s concerned about the free speech implications of censorship by tech platforms .
“ It ’ s a potentially dangerous belief ; it ’ s very disconnected from reality ; I don ’ t really think we want more people getting into it , ” he said of QAnon .
“ Do the internet companies bear some responsibility ?
Yes .
Would it be better if they took it down ?
Probably .
Does that take @ @ @ @ @ @ @ said that he generally favored Facebook taking a “ more aggressive approach to moderation ” , including addressing the recommendation algorithms and trying to reduce the spread of misinformation out of dedicated conspiracy communities and into the mainstream .
“ If Facebook flipped a switch and every Q post disappeared tomorrow , that probably would be harmful for QAnon , ” he said .
“ But there is resiliency built in .
Getting deplatformed is harmful , but the idea that it would somehow make this disappear is fanciful.
” Friedberg worried that @ @ @ @ @ @ @ “ Facebook should have taken action on this a long , long time ago , and the longer that they wait , the more deeply entrenched in mainstream politics this becomes , ” he said .
Facebook has been reluctant to appear in any way biased against Republicans , and if ( or when ) QAnon reaches Congress , it will be even more politically difficult for Facebook to take a stand .
In May , Republican voters in Oregon nominated a QAnon believer to run for the US Senate in November .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ , is likely to be elected to the House of Representatives after she came first in a Republican primary in a conservative Georgia district on 11 June .
“ In some ways , the second that Trump officially acknowledges QAnon is the second it becomes a partisan political issue that Facebook may not be able to take action against , ” said Friedberg .
“ We ’ re watching a normalization process of these conspiracies , and I think the beast that is Facebook was really the answer to this all along.
” @ @ @ @ @ @ @ QAnon accounts on Twitter , which believers take as confirmation of their alternate reality .
And on 20 June , just before Trump ’ s campaign rally in Tulsa , Oklahoma , Trump ’ s adult son Eric posted a QAnon meme on his Instagram account .
Eric Trump deleted the image relatively quickly , but not before screenshots spread across the Facebook Q-sphere .
“ So Eric Trump posted a pic with a ‘ Q ’ in the imagery , ” an administrator of one of the larger QAnon groups wrote .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ but the message was received !
”

In early May, QAnon braced for a purge. Facebook had removed a small subset – five pages, six groups and 20 profiles – of the community on the social network, and as word of the bans spread, followers of Q began preparing for a broader sweep.
Some groups changed their names, substituting “17” for “Q” (the 17th letter of the alphabet); others shared links to back-up accounts on alternative social media platforms with looser rules.
More than just another internet conspiracy theory, QAnon is a movement of people who interpret as a kind of gospel the online messages of an anonymous figure – “Q” – who claims knowledge of a secret cabal of powerful pedophiles and sex traffickers. Within the constructed reality of QAnon, Donald Trump is secretly waging a patriotic crusade against these “deep state” child abusers, and a “Great Awakening” that will reveal the truth is on the horizon.
QAnon evolved out of the baseless Pizzagate conspiracy theory, which posited that Hillary Clinton was running a child sex ring out of a Washington DC pizza restaurant, and has come to incorporate numerous strands of rightwing conspiracy mongering. Dedicated followers interpret Q’s cryptic messages in a kind of digital scavenger hunt. Despite the fact that Q’s prognostications have reliably failed to come true, followers rationalize the inaccuracies as part of a larger plan.
Q’s initial commentary on the Facebook bans was concise: “Information Warfare,” Q posted on the website 8kun. Two days later, in a post that included a collage of dozens of news headlines about the takedowns, Q went further, speculating that there had been a “coordinated media roll-out designed to instill ‘fear’” in believers and dissuade them from discussing QAnon on social media. “When do you expend ammunition?” Q wrote. “For what purpose?”
The anticipated purge never came. Instead, QAnon groups on Facebook have continued to grow at a considerable pace in the weeks following the takedown, with several adding more than 10,000 members over 30 days.
A Guardian investigation has documented:
More than 100 Facebook pages, profiles, groups, and Instagram accounts with at least 1,000 followers or members each dedicated to QAnon.
The largest of these have more than 150,000 followers or members.
In total, the documented pages, groups and accounts count more than 3m aggregate followers and members, though there is likely significant overlap among these groups and accounts.
These groups and pages play a critical role in disseminating Q’s messages to a broader audience and in recruiting more believers to the cult-like belief system, researchers say.
“Facebook is a unique platform for recruitment and amplification,” said Brian Friedberg, a senior researcher at the Harvard Shorenstein Center’s Technology and Social Change Project who has been studying QAnon for years. “I really do not think that QAnon as we know it today would have been able to happen without the affordances of Facebook.”
Suggested QAnon groups on Facebook. Composite: Eric Pratt/The Guardian
Moreover, Facebook is not merely providing a platform to QAnon groups. Its powerful algorithms are actively recommending them to users who may not otherwise have been exposed to them.
The Guardian did not initially go looking for QAnon content on Facebook. Instead, Facebook’s algorithms recommended a QAnon group to a Guardian reporter’s account after it had joined pro-Trump, anti-vaccine and anti-lockdown Facebook groups. The list of more than 100 QAnon groups and accounts was then generated by following Facebook’s recommendation algorithms and using simple keyword searches. The Instagram accounts were discovered by searching for “QAnon” in the app’s discovery page and then following Instagram’s algorithmic recommendations.
Receiving QAnon recommendations from Facebook does not appear to be that uncommon. “Once I started liking those pages and joining those groups, Facebook just started recommending more and more and more and more, to the point where I was afraid to like them all in case Facebook would flag me as a bot,” said Friedberg. Erin Gallagher, a researcher who studies social media extremism, said she was also encouraged to join a QAnon group by Facebook, soon after joining an anti-lockdown group.
Facebook’s own internal research in 2016 found that “64% of all extremist group joins are due to our recommendation tools”, the Wall Street Journal reported, primarily through the same “Groups you should join” and “Discover” algorithms that promoted QAnon content to the Guardian. “Our recommendation systems grow the problem,” the internal research said.
I really do not think QAnon as we know it today would have been able to happen without the affordances of Facebook Brian Friedberg
Facebook did not directly respond to questions from the Guardian about its policy considerations around QAnon content. “Last month, we took down accounts, Groups, and Pages tied to this conspiracy theorist movement for violating our policies,” a company spokesperson said in a statement. “We also remove Groups and Pages that violate other policies from recommendations and demote in search results. We’re closely monitoring this activity and how our policies apply.”
The company also claimed that “all of the Pages” and “the vast majority of Groups” documented by the Guardian had been removed from recommendation algorithms prior to the Guardian’s query. The company did not provide evidence for this claim, which is contradicted by screenshots of pages and groups appearing in recommendations that were taken in May. The Guardian also continued to receive recommendations to join additional QAnon groups after its initial query to Facebook.
Asked about this discrepancy, Facebook said that the pages and groups in question had been marked as “non-recommendable” as of 8 April 2020 for violations of policies against clickbait, viral misinformation and hate speech, but that a page or group can be restored to eligibility for recommendations if its behavior improves for several months.
Over the course of reporting this article – about one month – the aggregate membership of the documented groups and pages grew from 2.75m to more than 3m, or approximately 8.5%. Groups and pages that the Guardian had documented to have been promoted through Facebook’s recommendation algorithms grew 19.9%. One page that appeared in recommendations – “We are ‘Q’” – saw its following grow nearly 60%, from about 24,000 to about 38,000 over the month – despite the page not having posted any new content since February.
To Friedberg, the window for Facebook to act on QAnon may have already passed. “I’m starting to wonder if we’re just waiting for the next shoe to drop – another act of violence,” he said. “That seems to be what the platforms wait for, and that in and of itself is terrifying.”
A ban that stuck
While QAnon thrives on Facebook, another social media site took timely and decisive action against it. Nearly two years ago, Reddit, the link-sharing network of interest-based message boards, carried out a site-wide purge of QAnon – and made it stick.
Reddit had been central to the development of the QAnon movement, which began in October 2017 with the emergence of “Q” on 4chan, the anarchic image board that has served as a launching pad for memes and internet culture but also racist extremism and harassment campaigns. Q, whose cryptic messages and predictions claimed to be based on a high-level government security clearance, quickly decamped from 4chan to the even more extreme 8chan, where believers could read Q’s latest “crumbs” directly from the source.
Q went briefly silent in 2019 when 8chan was forced offline in the wake of the El Paso massacre, but re-emerged on the new site founded by 8chan’s owners, 8kun.
Anonymous internet posters claiming to be high-level government officials are not entirely uncommon; in recent years, other so-called “anons” have emerged with claims that they were revealing secrets from inside the FBI or CIA. But Q is the first such figure to have achieved such a broad audience and real-world political influence. This is largely due to the activism of three dedicated conspiracy theorists who latched on to Q’s posts in the early days, according to an investigation by NBC News. These activists worked to develop a mythology and culture around QAnon and cultivated an audience for it on mainstream social media platforms.
David Reinert holds up a ‘Q’ while waiting to see Donald Trump at a rally on 2 August 2018 in Wilkes Barre, Pennsylvania. Photograph: Rick Loomis/Getty Images
Reddit was significantly easier to use for the kind of crowd-sourced research and interpretation that forms the core of participation in QAnon, and the site was host to a large pool of potential recruits, such as the 1.2m members of the subreddit r/conspiracy. It had also long enjoyed and at times even earned a reputation as one of the danker cesspools of the social web, for years tolerating communities known as “subreddits” dedicated to sharing non-consensual sexualized images of women or advocating rape.
But the violent anger of adherents to QAnon crossed the line for Reddit in less than a year. On 12 September 2018, citing its ban on content that “incites violence, disseminates personal information, or harasses”, the company banned 18 QAnon subreddits, the largest of which had more than 70,000 members.
Social media bans are often difficult to maintain, but Reddit’s move was uncommonly effective. Today, QAnon remains unwelcome on Reddit, with the few subreddits that address it dedicated to either debunking the theory or providing support to people who have lost friends and family members to QAnon.
‘Taking the red pill’
QAnon did not disappear after Reddit pulled the plug, however. Instead, its believers moved on to other platforms, including YouTube, Twitter, Discord and – crucially – Facebook. At the time of the Reddit ban, one of the largest closed Facebook groups dedicated to QAnon, “Qanon Follow the White Rabbit” had 51,000 members, according to NBC News. Today that group has grown to more than 90,000 members.
And while YouTube and Twitter have played an important role in providing a broadcast platform for QAnon content, the specific structures provided by Facebook are uniquely suited to the participatory “work” of engaging with QAnon. Facebook also provides QAnon with an even larger pool of potential recruits than Reddit could, especially for the somewhat older, Evangelical crowd that has proven susceptible to QAnon’s messaging.
Will Partin, a research analyst with Data & Society, and Alice Marwick, a professor of communication at the University of North Carolina, describe QAnon as a “dark participatory culture”, which is to say that it is a community that takes advantage of the infrastructure of social networking sites to bring disparate people together and foster discussion, collaboration, research and community, but directs those energies toward anti-democratic, regressive and even violent ends.
“Everything about our research suggests that these people are not irrational; they’re hyper-literate, even if they’ve come to beliefs that are empirically inaccurate ,” Partin said. “That’s partly because they have a fundamentally different epistemology to judge what is true and false.”
A man in the crowd holds a QAnon sign as crowds gather to attend Donald Trump’s campaign rally in Las Vegas, Nevada, 21 February 2020. Photograph: Patrick T Fallon/Reuters
The digital architecture of Facebook groups is also particularly well-suited to QAnon’s collaborative construction of an alternative body of knowledge, Friedberg said. The platform has created a ready-made digital pathway from public pages to public groups to private groups and finally secret groups that mirrors the process of “falling down the rabbit hole or taking the red pill”.
“You can mechanically take those steps,” he said. “Very few of the contemporary Q-following base actually need to engage with 8chan at all.”
To ban or not to ban
While Facebook has policies banning hate speech, incitement to violence and other types of content that it considers undesirable on a family- and advertiser-friendly platform, QAnon does not fit neatly into any single category.
Much of what is shared in QAnon groups on Facebook is a mix of pro-Trump political speech and pro-Trump political misinformation. Memes, videos and posts are often bigoted and disconnected from reality, but not all that different from the content that is shared in non-QAnon, pro-Trump Facebook groups.
The pages and groups that were removed in early May violated the company’s ban on “coordinated inauthentic behavior” – ie the kind of digital astroturf tactics that Russian operatives used to support Trump’s presidential campaign in 2016. Those rules are aimed at operations in which actors make false representations about their identities in order to mislead people – a description that could encompass Q – but Facebook only applies its policy to deceptive behavior that occurs on its platform, not on 8kun.
When a common sense of what is real and what is correct breaks apart, it becomes nearly impossible to reach a democratic consensus Will Partin
To enact a blanket ban akin to Reddit’s under its current rubric of rules, Facebook would likely have to designate QAnon as a “dangerous organization” – the category it uses to ban both terrorist and hate groups and any content published in support or praise of them. QAnon is hardly an organization, though as a movement it has certainly caused harm and could be considered dangerous.
There are innate societal and individual harms to convincing people of a version of reality that is simply false, as QAnon does, said Data & Society research analyst Will Partin. “When a common sense of what is real and what is correct breaks apart, it becomes nearly impossible to reach a democratic consensus.”
And QAnon followers’ enthusiasm for misinformation is not confined to politics; as the coronavirus pandemic took hold, the groups became a hotbed for medical misinformation – something Facebook has claimed to be working hard to combat. Analyses by Gallagher, the social media researcher, and the New York Times demonstrated how QAnon groups fueled the viral spread of “Plandemic”, a 26-minute video chock full of dangerously false information about Covid-19 and vaccines.
Facebook’s algorithms appear to have detected this synergy between the QAnon and anti-vaccine communities. Several QAnon groups are flagged with an automated warning label from Facebook that reads, “This group discusses vaccines” and encourages users to go to the website of the Centers for Disease Control for reliable information on health.
It appears that anti-vaccine propagandists are also taking notice, and attempting to capitalize. Larry Cook, the administrator of Stop Mandatory Vaccination, one of the largest anti-vaxx Facebook groups, has begun incorporating QAnon rhetoric into the medical misinformation he peddles, as well as making explicit invitations to QAnon believers to join his group.
Cook has begun referencing the “deep state” and stoking fear of forced vaccination and “FEMA camps”.
“I have discussed the concept many, many, many times that vaccines destroy our connection to God and that we are in a spiritual war with Principalities of Darkness that have a death wish for our children, and humanity at large,” he wrote in one QAnon-inflected post. (Cook also uses the site to aggressively promote his various products and a subscription-only platform for “medical freedom patriots”.)
A prominent anti-vaccine propagandist appeals to QAnon followers. WWG1WGA is a QAnon catchphrase. Photograph: Facebook
But the potential for damage from QAnon goes well beyond. For those individuals who truly believe in the QAnon narrative, the crimes of the “cabal” are so grievous as to make fighting them a moral imperative. “They’re talking about a group of people who are operating our government against our wishes and they’re molesting and torturing children and destroying our society,” said Joseph Uscinski, a professor of political science who studies conspiracy theories. “It’s an incitement to violence.”
Indeed, there have been numerous incidents of real-world violence linked to QAnon, and in May 2019, the FBI identified QAnon as a potential domestic terrorism threat in an intelligence bulletin. While anti-government conspiracy theories were not new, the bulletin stated, social media was allowing them to reach a larger audience, and the online narratives were determining the targets of harassment and violence for the small subset of individuals who crossed over into real-world action.
Despite this, Uscinski is skeptical of the idea that kicking QAnon off Facebook would help anyone. He regularly polls conspiracy theories and consistently finds that QAnon is “one of the least believed things” out there, well below belief in theories about Jeffrey Epstein’s death, anti-vaccine hoaxes, and Holocaust denialism. Uscinski also cautions against overly exoticizing the QAnon narrative, noting that “most of the component parts of QAnon have been around forever”, with parallels in the Satanic Panic of the 1980s or the plot of Oliver Stone’s JFK. And he’s concerned about the free speech implications of censorship by tech platforms.
“It’s a potentially dangerous belief; it’s very disconnected from reality; I don’t really think we want more people getting into it,” he said of QAnon. “Do the internet companies bear some responsibility? Yes. Would it be better if they took it down? Probably. Does that take care of it? No.”
Partin said that he generally favored Facebook taking a “more aggressive approach to moderation”, including addressing the recommendation algorithms and trying to reduce the spread of misinformation out of dedicated conspiracy communities and into the mainstream.
“If Facebook flipped a switch and every Q post disappeared tomorrow, that probably would be harmful for QAnon,” he said. “But there is resiliency built in. Getting deplatformed is harmful, but the idea that it would somehow make this disappear is fanciful.”
Friedberg worried that it may already be too late. “Facebook should have taken action on this a long, long time ago, and the longer that they wait, the more deeply entrenched in mainstream politics this becomes,” he said. Facebook has been reluctant to appear in any way biased against Republicans, and if (or when) QAnon reaches Congress, it will be even more politically difficult for Facebook to take a stand.
In May, Republican voters in Oregon nominated a QAnon believer to run for the US Senate in November. Another QAnon supporter, Marjorie Taylor Greene, is likely to be elected to the House of Representatives after she came first in a Republican primary in a conservative Georgia district on 11 June.
“In some ways, the second that Trump officially acknowledges QAnon is the second it becomes a partisan political issue that Facebook may not be able to take action against,” said Friedberg. “We’re watching a normalization process of these conspiracies, and I think the beast that is Facebook was really the answer to this all along.”
Indeed, Trump himself has repeatedly retweeted QAnon accounts on Twitter, which believers take as confirmation of their alternate reality. And on 20 June, just before Trump’s campaign rally in Tulsa, Oklahoma, Trump’s adult son Eric posted a QAnon meme on his Instagram account. Eric Trump deleted the image relatively quickly, but not before screenshots spread across the Facebook Q-sphere.
“So Eric Trump posted a pic with a ‘Q’ in the imagery,” an administrator of one of the larger QAnon groups wrote. “The pic has been taken down but the message was received!”


theguardian--2020-06-25--‘A matter for democracy’: why DC’s bid for statehood is returning to the House

Paul Strauss was a 29-year-old activist when Washington , District of Columbia ( DC ) last had a shot at becoming the 51st state in the United States of America .
He sat in the chamber as the Democratic-controlled House of Representatives defeated the statehood bill by an almost 2-1 margin in 1993 .
“ I was very disappointed and very frustrated , ” recalls Strauss , now 56 and the “ shadow ” senator for DC .
“ I really felt that we could do a lot more and I ’ ve been pushing the boulder uphill ever since.
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ s bid for statehood returns to the House on Friday with far brighter prospects .
Democrats , again in the majority , are expected to actually pass the bill this time , arguing that statehood has gained importance in the aftermath of protests for racial justice in Washington and across the US .
It will not be mission accomplished since the legislation then faces insurmountable opposition in the Republican-controlled Senate .
But should Democrats regain the Senate in November , DC will move closer to becoming the first state to join the union @ @ @ @ @ @ @ has been trying to make its case for decades .
Although at just 68 sq miles ( 176 sq km ) DC is hard to find on maps , its population of just over 700,000 is bigger than than Wyoming ’ s and Vermont ’ s .
Yet while famed as the most powerful capital city in the world , paradoxically its residents have long found themselves in a constitutional black hole .
Uniquely disenfranchised , they could not even vote for US president until 1964 and , alone among national capitals in @ @ @ @ @ @ @ denied a vote in their national congress or parliament .
DC residents pay more per capita in federal income taxes than any state but Congress controls the city ’ s budget and can override its laws and withhold funds .
Statehood would finally give DC one voting member of the House and two in the Senate , which may explain Republicans ’ staunch opposition .
Senator Edward Kennedy once described the arguments against statehood as the “ four too ’ s ” : a fear that DC would be too black , too @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
The African American population of DC is now just under half and the city remains overwhelmingly Democratic : Hillary Clinton won 91 % of the vote in the 2016 presidential election against Donald Trump ’ s 4 % .
The president vowed last month that “ DC will never be a state ” , telling the New York Post : “ They want to do that so they pick up two automatic Democrats – you know it ’ s 100 % Democrat , basically – so why would the Republicans ever do @ @ @ @ @ @ @ already gathering momentum this year , with backing from numerous Democratic candidates for president , but the police killing of George Floyd , an African American man in Minneapolis , gave added impetus .
As protests swelled in the capital , Trump ordered armed federal forces into DC against the will of the mayor , Muriel Bowser .
Susan Rice , a former national security adviser who grew up in DC and supports statehood , wrote in the New York Times : “ For one long week , Mr Trump transformed my hometown @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ‘ law and order ’ credentials .
Without statehood , Washington was virtually powerless to prevent Mr Trump from using the capital as a petri dish to intimidate protesters , divide Americans and goad activists into ugly street battles to galvanize elements of his base.
” It was Trump ’ s controversial use of federal security forces to clear Lafayette Square near the White House of peaceful protesters , allowing him to stage a photo op outside a historic church , that proved the catalyst for Democratic leaders to schedule the vote .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ presented by Bowser with a US flag bearing 51 stars , said “ this was an appropriate time to bring a bill forward to show respect for the citizens of the District of Columbia ” .
The DC statehood campaign has long been seen as an extension of the civil rights movement and could spur activists in Puerto Rico and other US territories .
Strauss , who as shadow senator was forced to watch Trump ’ s impeachment trial from the public gallery , said : “ Washington DC ’ s disenfranchisement has @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
The fact that all of the nonvoting parts of the United States have majority non-white populations is more than just a coincidence.
” DC would also get a new name : Washington , Douglass Commonwealth , which honors the abolitionist Frederick Douglass , a denizen of the city , and could still be written as Washington DC for short .
“ Frederick Douglass was a Washington DC resident , an elected official – he served as recorder of deeds here – and so if we ’ re going to keep the name @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ] , let ’ s at least balance it out with an emancipated slave , ” said Strauss .
The DC statehood campaign now resonates nationally , campaigners say , in part because Trump and the Senate have become guardians of minority rule .
Meagan Hatcher-Mays , director of democracy policy for the grassroots group Indivisible , said : “ People on the left are waking up to this issue , not as a fringe weird thing – like why does a small town want statehood ?
– but really as a matter @ @ @ @ @ @ @ being aided and abetted by an anti-democratic Senate .
It ’ s an institution that disproportionately represents small rural states that are an ideological minority in this country .
Meanwhile , 700,000 people who live in the District of Columbia , most of whom are not white , do not have any representation in the Senate at all , let alone a vote.
” Hatcher-Mays , formerly an aide to Eleanor Holmes Norton , the sole DC non-voting delegate in the House , added that the Black Lives Matter protests , where Trump @ @ @ @ @ @ @ law in DC ” , also played a part .
“ It becomes not just a matter of democracy , but it becomes a racial justice issue , too .
I think that really sealed it for a lot of people in a way that it hadn ’ t been a priority for people before .
”

Paul Strauss was a 29-year-old activist when Washington, District of Columbia (DC) last had a shot at becoming the 51st state in the United States of America. He sat in the chamber as the Democratic-controlled House of Representatives defeated the statehood bill by an almost 2-1 margin in 1993.
“I was very disappointed and very frustrated,” recalls Strauss, now 56 and the “shadow” senator for DC. “I really felt that we could do a lot more and I’ve been pushing the boulder uphill ever since.”
Twenty-seven years later, DC’s bid for statehood returns to the House on Friday with far brighter prospects. Democrats, again in the majority, are expected to actually pass the bill this time, arguing that statehood has gained importance in the aftermath of protests for racial justice in Washington and across the US.
It will not be mission accomplished since the legislation then faces insurmountable opposition in the Republican-controlled Senate. But should Democrats regain the Senate in November, DC will move closer to becoming the first state to join the union since Hawaii in August 1959.
Row houses line streets in Capitol Hill. Photograph: Al Drago/Bloomberg via Getty Images
It has been trying to make its case for decades. Although at just 68 sq miles (176 sq km) DC is hard to find on maps, its population of just over 700,000 is bigger than than Wyoming’s and Vermont’s. Yet while famed as the most powerful capital city in the world, paradoxically its residents have long found themselves in a constitutional black hole.
Uniquely disenfranchised, they could not even vote for US president until 1964 and, alone among national capitals in the democratic world, they are still denied a vote in their national congress or parliament. DC residents pay more per capita in federal income taxes than any state but Congress controls the city’s budget and can override its laws and withhold funds.
Statehood would finally give DC one voting member of the House and two in the Senate, which may explain Republicans’ staunch opposition. Senator Edward Kennedy once described the arguments against statehood as the “four too’s”: a fear that DC would be too black, too urban, too Democratic and too liberal.
The African American population of DC is now just under half and the city remains overwhelmingly Democratic: Hillary Clinton won 91% of the vote in the 2016 presidential election against Donald Trump’s 4%. The president vowed last month that “DC will never be a state”, telling the New York Post: “They want to do that so they pick up two automatic Democrats – you know it’s 100% Democrat, basically – so why would the Republicans ever do that?”
Washington DC’s disenfranchisement has always had its roots in systemic racism Paul Strauss
The statehood campaign was already gathering momentum this year, with backing from numerous Democratic candidates for president, but the police killing of George Floyd, an African American man in Minneapolis, gave added impetus. As protests swelled in the capital, Trump ordered armed federal forces into DC against the will of the mayor, Muriel Bowser.
Susan Rice, a former national security adviser who grew up in DC and supports statehood, wrote in the New York Times: “For one long week, Mr Trump transformed my hometown into a war zone to burnish his ‘law and order’ credentials. Without statehood, Washington was virtually powerless to prevent Mr Trump from using the capital as a petri dish to intimidate protesters, divide Americans and goad activists into ugly street battles to galvanize elements of his base.”
It was Trump’s controversial use of federal security forces to clear Lafayette Square near the White House of peaceful protesters, allowing him to stage a photo op outside a historic church, that proved the catalyst for Democratic leaders to schedule the vote. The majority leader, Steny Hoyer, presented by Bowser with a US flag bearing 51 stars, said “this was an appropriate time to bring a bill forward to show respect for the citizens of the District of Columbia”.
The DC statehood campaign has long been seen as an extension of the civil rights movement and could spur activists in Puerto Rico and other US territories. Strauss, who as shadow senator was forced to watch Trump’s impeachment trial from the public gallery, said: “Washington DC’s disenfranchisement has always had its roots in systemic racism. The fact that all of the nonvoting parts of the United States have majority non-white populations is more than just a coincidence.”
DC would also get a new name: Washington, Douglass Commonwealth, which honors the abolitionist Frederick Douglass, a denizen of the city, and could still be written as Washington DC for short.
If we’re going to keep the name of a slave owner [George Washington], let’s at least balance it out with an emancipated slave Paul Strauss
“Frederick Douglass was a Washington DC resident, an elected official – he served as recorder of deeds here – and so if we’re going to keep the name of a slave owner [George Washington], let’s at least balance it out with an emancipated slave,” said Strauss.
The DC statehood campaign now resonates nationally, campaigners say, in part because Trump and the Senate have become guardians of minority rule. Meagan Hatcher-Mays, director of democracy policy for the grassroots group Indivisible, said: “People on the left are waking up to this issue, not as a fringe weird thing – like why does a small town want statehood? – but really as a matter of democracy.”
“Trump is really being aided and abetted by an anti-democratic Senate. It’s an institution that disproportionately represents small rural states that are an ideological minority in this country. Meanwhile, 700,000 people who live in the District of Columbia, most of whom are not white, do not have any representation in the Senate at all, let alone a vote.”
Hatcher-Mays, formerly an aide to Eleanor Holmes Norton, the sole DC non-voting delegate in the House, added that the Black Lives Matter protests, where Trump was “able to effectively declare martial law in DC”, also played a part. “It becomes not just a matter of democracy, but it becomes a racial justice issue, too. I think that really sealed it for a lot of people in a way that it hadn’t been a priority for people before.”