theguardian--2020-09-04--The danger is now clear: Trump is destroying democracy in broad daylight

This is not a normal election .
I don ’ t say that because it is now clear that , against some stiff competition , Donald Trump is the most repellent individual ever to have sought , let alone won , the presidency of the United States .
The latest proof comes in a quadruple-sourced account of Trump describing US troops who died for their country as “ losers ” and “ suckers ” , and demanding that a military parade exclude wounded veterans , lest spectators glimpse an amputee .
“ Nobody wants to see that , ” he @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the Atlantic ’ s jaw-dropping report , later corroborated “ in its entirety ” by the Associated Press , would have proved terminal for a politician in a country where respect for the military supposedly has the status of a religious obligation .
But that time is long past .
It ended in 2015 when Trump branded John McCain – who had spent more than five years in a Hanoi cell as a prisoner of war – a “ loser ” , though of course now Trump swears blind that he never said @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of video showing him saying exactly that .
In a normal election , you ’ d be running the numbers on the harm this would do to Trump among his avowedly patriotic base .
But wiser heads have learned to give up on such calculations .
Trump ’ s supporters will write this off as more fake news , and stick with their man even as he tramples on everything they claim to hold dear .
Like he always said , he could shoot people on Fifth Avenue and they ’ d still @ @ @ @ @ @ @ it will similarly make no difference that this week he spouted conspiracist garbage about Joe Biden being controlled by people “ in the dark shadows ” , or reheated a Facebook-spread fantasy about black-clad looters boarding planes to fly around the country causing trouble – think of it as RiotAir – offering no evidence .
Of course that won ’ t move the needle .
Remember , this is a country where close to 200,000 people are dead thanks to a pandemic that Trump refused to admit was happening , and for which @ @ @ @ @ @ @ The US economy lies in tatters , racked by mass unemployment .
And yet , despite that record of lethal failure , this inadequate , malignant man still has the support of 42 % of the American people .
That fact alone makes this an abnormal election .
But that ’ s not the exceptional circumstance I have in mind .
Rather , it is that the critical contest on 3 November is not so much between Democrat and Republican as between democrat and anti-democrat .
It is that nothing less than the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ is at stake .
Consider the evidence .
This week , the president urged his supporters to vote twice .
It wasn ’ t a joke .
It was a message delivered in earnest .
In a series of Twitter messages that the social media company hid from view for violating its rules on “ civic and election integrity ” , Trump told his followers to vote early by mail-in ballot and then turn up in person on election day to vote again .
Here was the self-styled law-and-order candidate urging Americans to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ only wanted people to test the robustness of the system – because if the system worked , then his supporters shouldn ’ t be allowed to cast that second ballot – but that ’ s the logic of the bank robber who insists he ’ s only emptying the safe to help the bank improve its security .
Besides , there ’ s a pattern here .
Little more than a month ago , Trump suggested that , since postal voting – set to increase massively because of the pandemic – was bound @ @ @ @ @ @ @ & FRAUDULENT election in history ” , it would be best to delay the election , even though the constitution bars him from making such a move .
At his convention last month , he urged the crowd , who had been chanting for “ four more years ” to call instead for “ 12 more years ” , even though that too would violate the constitution .
Most troubling , he has repeatedly refused to say whether he will accept defeat and leave office if that ’ s what the voters decide @ @ @ @ @ @ @ on mail-in voting are about : Trump is preparing the ground to challenge the electorate ’ s verdict , arguing that the result can not be trusted because postal votes shouldn ’ t count .
He has seen the data that shows mail-in voters are more likely to lean towards Biden , and so wants to be able to argue , come 4 November , that tens of millions of postal votes should be chucked out – leaving only the votes cast on election day , from which Trump reckons he could achieve @ @ @ @ @ @ @ why he installed a Republican donor as head of the US Postal Service , a man who has set about gutting the service ’ s ability to process mail-in ballots in time .
And that ’ s why he ’ s starving the post office of cash .
This is not guesswork , or the analysis of hostile commentators .
Trump has admitted as much .
Explaining why he was seeking to cut off two sources of postal service revenue , he said : “ If they don ’ t get those two @ @ @ @ @ @ @ t have universal mail-in voting because they ’ re not equipped to have it.
” With Trump , he always says the quiet part out loud .
Given that the polls suggest he can not win a straight fight , Trump ’ s next best scenario is a cloud of confusion and doubt hanging over the November result .
Sackfuls of uncounted ballots stuck in postal depots ; his base crying fraud , groundlessly suggesting that the mail-in votes are forgeries : this is the context in which he reckons he could argue @ @ @ @ @ @ @ there was no good reason for him to leave office .
And who would stop him ?
Note that the attorney general , William Barr , supposedly the most senior law enforcement officer in the land , this week refused to say whether voting twice was against the law .
Trump ’ s enablers have come this far .
Why would they change course now ?
The danger is clear , even before you reflect on the decades-old Republican effort to suppress the vote , especially the Black vote – an effort whose @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Fox News that if voting was easier and turnout went up , “ you ’ d never have a Republican elected in this country again ” .
Not for nothing did Barack Obama , a man not prone to hyperbole , warn last month that Trump is willing to “ tear our democracy down if that ’ s what it takes to win ” .
Consider all that Trump has been willing to do already .
Imagine what he would do if he received the mandate of re-election .
Except there ’ s @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ’ s contempt for democracy is in plain sight .

This is not a normal election. I don’t say that because it is now clear that, against some stiff competition, Donald Trump is the most repellent individual ever to have sought, let alone won, the presidency of the United States. The latest proof comes in a quadruple-sourced account of Trump describing US troops who died for their country as “losers” and “suckers”, and demanding that a military parade exclude wounded veterans, lest spectators glimpse an amputee. “Nobody wants to see that,” he said.
There was a time when the Atlantic’s jaw-dropping report, later corroborated “in its entirety” by the Associated Press, would have proved terminal for a politician in a country where respect for the military supposedly has the status of a religious obligation. But that time is long past. It ended in 2015 when Trump branded John McCain – who had spent more than five years in a Hanoi cell as a prisoner of war – a “loser”, though of course now Trump swears blind that he never said any such thing, despite the existence of video showing him saying exactly that.
In a normal election, you’d be running the numbers on the harm this would do to Trump among his avowedly patriotic base. But wiser heads have learned to give up on such calculations. Trump’s supporters will write this off as more fake news, and stick with their man even as he tramples on everything they claim to hold dear. Like he always said, he could shoot people on Fifth Avenue and they’d still vote for him.
Which is why it will similarly make no difference that this week he spouted conspiracist garbage about Joe Biden being controlled by people “in the dark shadows”, or reheated a Facebook-spread fantasy about black-clad looters boarding planes to fly around the country causing trouble – think of it as RiotAir – offering no evidence. Of course that won’t move the needle.
Remember, this is a country where close to 200,000 people are dead thanks to a pandemic that Trump refused to admit was happening, and for which his proposed remedy was self-injected bleach. The US economy lies in tatters, racked by mass unemployment. And yet, despite that record of lethal failure, this inadequate, malignant man still has the support of 42% of the American people.
That fact alone makes this an abnormal election. But that’s not the exceptional circumstance I have in mind. Rather, it is that the critical contest on 3 November is not so much between Democrat and Republican as between democrat and anti-democrat. It is that nothing less than the US’s standing as a democracy is at stake.
Consider the evidence. This week, the president urged his supporters to vote twice. It wasn’t a joke. It was a message delivered in earnest. In a series of Twitter messages that the social media company hid from view for violating its rules on “civic and election integrity”, Trump told his followers to vote early by mail-in ballot and then turn up in person on election day to vote again. Here was the self-styled law-and-order candidate urging Americans to break the law.
He claimed he only wanted people to test the robustness of the system – because if the system worked, then his supporters shouldn’t be allowed to cast that second ballot – but that’s the logic of the bank robber who insists he’s only emptying the safe to help the bank improve its security. Besides, there’s a pattern here.
Little more than a month ago, Trump suggested that, since postal voting – set to increase massively because of the pandemic – was bound to lead to “the most INACCURATE & FRAUDULENT election in history”, it would be best to delay the election, even though the constitution bars him from making such a move. At his convention last month, he urged the crowd, who had been chanting for “four more years” to call instead for “12 more years”, even though that too would violate the constitution. Most troubling, he has repeatedly refused to say whether he will accept defeat and leave office if that’s what the voters decide.
This is what his now-constant attacks on mail-in voting are about: Trump is preparing the ground to challenge the electorate’s verdict, arguing that the result cannot be trusted because postal votes shouldn’t count. He has seen the data that shows mail-in voters are more likely to lean towards Biden, and so wants to be able to argue, come 4 November, that tens of millions of postal votes should be chucked out – leaving only the votes cast on election day, from which Trump reckons he could achieve a narrow victory.
That’s why he installed a Republican donor as head of the US Postal Service, a man who has set about gutting the service’s ability to process mail-in ballots in time. And that’s why he’s starving the post office of cash. This is not guesswork, or the analysis of hostile commentators. Trump has admitted as much. Explaining why he was seeking to cut off two sources of postal service revenue, he said: “If they don’t get those two items, that means you can’t have universal mail-in voting because they’re not equipped to have it.” With Trump, he always says the quiet part out loud.
Given that the polls suggest he cannot win a straight fight, Trump’s next best scenario is a cloud of confusion and doubt hanging over the November result. Sackfuls of uncounted ballots stuck in postal depots; his base crying fraud, groundlessly suggesting that the mail-in votes are forgeries: this is the context in which he reckons he could argue that the election was disputed and therefore there was no good reason for him to leave office.
And who would stop him? Note that the attorney general, William Barr, supposedly the most senior law enforcement officer in the land, this week refused to say whether voting twice was against the law. Trump’s enablers have come this far. Why would they change course now?
The danger is clear, even before you reflect on the decades-old Republican effort to suppress the vote, especially the Black vote – an effort whose motive Trump brazenly disclosed when he told Fox News that if voting was easier and turnout went up, “you’d never have a Republican elected in this country again”. Not for nothing did Barack Obama, a man not prone to hyperbole, warn last month that Trump is willing to “tear our democracy down if that’s what it takes to win”.
Consider all that Trump has been willing to do already. Imagine what he would do if he received the mandate of re-election. Except there’s no need to imagine it. Trump’s contempt for democracy is in plain sight.


theguardian--2020-09-04--'My son wasn't a sucker': Joe Biden reacts to report that Trump denigrated soldiers – video

A furious Joe Biden castigated Donald Trump after it was reported that the US president had called dead soldiers 'losers @ @ @ @ @ 'If what is written is true , it 's disgusting , ' Biden said .
@ @ @ @ @ us believe to be true : Donald Trump is not fit to be commander in @ @ @ @ @ made the remarks when he cancelled a visit to pay respects at an American military @ @ @ @ @ .
He has denied the allegations , first reported in the Atlantic magazine

A furious Joe Biden castigated Donald Trump after it was reported that the US president had called dead soldiers 'losers' and 'suckers'. 'If what is written is true, it's disgusting,' Biden said. 'It affirms what most of us believe to be true: Donald Trump is not fit to be commander in chief.'
Trump reportedly made the remarks when he cancelled a visit to pay respects at an American military cemetery outside Paris in 2018. He has denied the allegations, first reported in the Atlantic magazine


theguardian--2020-09-05--Trump calls for Fox News journalist to be fired for report on war dead scandal

The row over Donald Trump ’ s alleged remarks denigrating American soldiers has now seen the US president target one of his core areas of support as he called for a Fox News journalist who reported details of the scandal to be fired .
The Atlantic magazine published a story which described how Trump said he cancelled a visit to pay respects at an American military cemetery outside Paris in 2018 because he thought the dead soldiers were “ losers ” and “ suckers ” .
Other outlets confirmed the news and detailed more incidents of Trump ’ s insulting @ @ @ @ @ @ @ was the Fox News national security correspondent , Jennifer Griffin , who confirmed in a Twitter thread that Trump called soldiers “ suckers ” , had questioned why anyone would want to become a soldier and had not wanted to honor war dead at the Aisne-Marne cemetery in France .
Amid furious denials of the story from the White House and Trump allies , Griffin ’ s reporting probably touched a nerve as it came from the usually reliably pro-Trump Fox News , whose conservative leanings and pro-Trump opinion show hosts are reliable @ @ @ @ @ @ @ tweet Trump said : “ Jennifer Griffin should be fired for this kind of reporting .
Never even called us for comment .
Fox News is gone !
” The White House has moved to deny the report unusually forcefully perhaps fearful of the scandal ’ s impact on military-supporting conservatives .
Trump himself dismissed it as a politically motivated “ hoax ” .
“ There is nobody feels more strongly about our soldiers , our wounded warriors , our soldiers that died in war than I do , ” he told reporters @ @ @ @ @ @ @ “ It ’ s a hoax , ” he said on Friday night .
The first lady , Melania Trump , also weighed in , in a rare political intervention tweeting that the Atlantic story “ was not true ” .
Trump ’ s Democratic challenger , former vice-president Joe Biden , pounced on the news amid broad-ranging condemnation of Trump ’ s reported remark .
Biden called the alleged comments “ disgusting ” and said Trump was “ not fit to be commander-in-chief ” .
“ When my son volunteered and joined @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to Iraq for a year , won the Bronze Star and other commendations , he was not a sucker , ” Biden said in emotional remarks in Wilmington , Delaware .
His son Beau , who died of brain cancer in 2015 , deployed to Iraq in 2008 .

The row over Donald Trump’s alleged remarks denigrating American soldiers has now seen the US president target one of his core areas of support as he called for a Fox News journalist who reported details of the scandal to be fired.
The Atlantic magazine published a story that described how Trump said he cancelled a visit to pay respects at an American military cemetery outside Paris in 2018 because he thought the dead soldiers were “losers” and “suckers”. Other outlets confirmed the news and detailed more incidents of Trump’s insulting attitude to American soldiers.
Among those was the Fox News national security correspondent, Jennifer Griffin, who confirmed in a Twitter thread that Trump called soldiers “suckers”, had questioned why anyone would want to become a soldier and had not wanted to honor war dead at the Aisne-Marne cemetery in France.
Amid furious denials of the story from the White House and Trump allies, Griffin’s reporting probably touched a nerve as it came from the usually reliably pro-Trump Fox News, whose conservative leanings and pro-Trump opinion show hosts are reliable cheerleaders for the president.
In a tweet Trump said: “Jennifer Griffin should be fired for this kind of reporting. Never even called us for comment. Fox News is gone!”
The White House has moved to deny the report unusually forcefully perhaps fearful of the scandal’s impact on military-supporting conservatives. Trump himself dismissed it as a politically motivated “hoax”.
“There is nobody feels more strongly about our soldiers, our wounded warriors, our soldiers that died in war than I do,” he told reporters at the White House on Friday. “It’s a hoax,” he said on Friday night.
The first lady, Melania Trump, also weighed in, in a rare political intervention tweeting that the Atlantic story “was not true”.
But Trump’s former chief of staff John Kelly, a retired marine corps general, has remained notably silent about the president’s comments.
The Atlantic reported that Trump accompanied Kelly, who was the homeland security secretary at the time, to Arlington National Cemetery on Memorial Day 2017. While standing at the grave of Kelly’s son, who was killed in Afghanistan in 2010, Trump reportedly turned to Kelly and said: “I don’t get it. What’s in it for them?”
Multiple reports say that close friends and associates of Kelly have encouraged him to speak out, but Kelly has refused on-the-record interviews about the comments.
Anthony C Zinni, a retired marine corps general and close friend of Kelly, told the New York Times that Kelly is likely trying to “avoid taking a position that might be perceived as political”.
“I also think he takes to heart the commitment to confidentiality in matters related to their interaction with the president,” he said.
Meanwhile, Trump, who has speculated that Kelly might have been a source for the Atlantic story, said on Friday that Kelly “was totally exhausted” and “wasn’t even able to function in the last number of months” during his time in the Oval Office.
Other senior military officials, including Jim Mattis, also a retired marine corps general and Trump’s former secretary of defense, have been silent about the comment.
Trump’s Democratic challenger, the former vice-president Joe Biden, pounced on the news amid broad-ranging condemnation of Trump’s reported remark. Biden called the alleged comments “disgusting” and said Trump was “not fit to be commander-in-chief”.
“When my son volunteered and joined the United States military – and went to Iraq for a year, won the Bronze Star and other commendations, he was not a sucker,” Biden said in emotional remarks in Wilmington, Delaware.
His son Beau, who died of brain cancer in 2015, deployed to Iraq in 2008.


theguardian--2020-09-05--The bleak Covid winter? America still not on course to beat back the virus

Even with three decades of experience in the travel industry , Jorge Pesquera has never seen a downturn in business like this one .
Summer officially ends on Monday in the US , and now is the time when many people in colder climes in North America and across the world start dreaming about a winter break on Florida ’ s golden shores .
The US is closed for many outside its borders , and many within are too scared to fly as Covid continues its deadly sweep across the country .
The rate of infection has eased in Florida @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the marketing group Discover the Palm Beaches , is hopeful business is improving .
But it comes in a year of catastrophic collapse for Florida ’ s tourism .
“ Nobody has seen anything like this in a couple of generations , ” said Pesquera .
As the US enters its first coronavirus winter , economists and epidemiologists see a pivotal moment – a hinge whose swing will determine the direction of the economy and the course of the disease into 2021 and for years – potentially generations – to come .
The @ @ @ @ @ @ @ coronavirus in February .
Donald Trump predicted it would be over by Easter – that hope was pushed back to summer as deaths and infections soared .
Seven months on , the US is still not on course to control the pandemic .
Soon Covid-19 will have accounted for 200,000 deaths , and reported cases have already reached 6m .
By 1 January , the US coronavirus death toll could reach over 410,000 according to a forecast by researchers at the University of Washington ’ s Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation ( @ @ @ @ @ @ @ is based on the “ rollercoaster ” of cases in the US , where governments and individuals take up protective measures when things get bad , then let them slide when the local situation improves , potentially restarting the cycle all over again .
The virus has hit Florida particularly hard .
At least 630,000 people have been infected and more than 11,000 have died .
Tourism has plummeted .
In the second quarter – April , May and June – 60 % fewer people traveled to Florida compared with the same period @ @ @ @ @ @ @ 20 million visitors .
Pesquera is confident Florida will bounce back , and hotel occupancies have been climbing as locals and tourists from neighboring states get in their cars and head for a beach break .
While he is hopeful that the worst is over , Pesquera said it will be a hard winter and beyond for many in the industry .
But there are now worrying signs that the Covid-19 recession is reaching beyond the travel , leisure and hospitality industries that were hit so hard in the early months of the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ be long-lasting and some may well be permanent .
Already the pandemic has widened income inequality in the US .
Economists including Peter Atwater , a lecturer in the economics department at William & Mary , have begun talking of a “ K-shaped ” recovery – where the well-off thrive on the uptick of the K as stock markets and house prices rise , while the working poor fall further behind on the downtick .
The divide has once again highlighted the racial and gender wealth divide in the US .
Women , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ jobs than their male , white peers and as the US goes into winter , there are signs that more of that is to come .
Retail , too , was crushed by quarantine measures .
With 14.7m jobs , retail is the largest private employer in the country .
Employment has declined sharply as online sales have picked up .
The industry is dominated by women and people of color .
Dozens of retailers have filed for bankruptcy since the pandemic struck , and others are hanging by a thread .
The @ @ @ @ @ @ @ months but is still down a million jobs from last year .
More may soon be lost , said Jason Reed , assistant chair of finance at the University of Notre Dame .
With summer gone , the shopping season is approaching .
This year Walmart will be closed on Thanksgiving for the first time in 30 years and so will Target , Best Buy and Kohl ’ s .
The closures are around safety issues – the chance of spreading the disease at a door-crushing super-sale is just too high – but @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of things to come .
“ E-commerce has exploded [ since the pandemic began ] , ” said Reed .
“ It ’ s like we have done 10 years of growth in a few months .
Consumers are getting used to shopping online .
I just don ’ t see jobs coming back in that sector , and that is a huge number of people.
” Other changes , like the collapse of travel , may be temporary , but they will contribute to a dark winter for many .
Reed points @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the US are still closed , a situation that is already shuttering businesses reliant on office workers in city centers .
“ So many of these businesses are going to go under , if they haven ’ t already , ” he said .
And these closures are feeding into the wider economy , eroding the tax base of cities and states and threatening swingeing job cuts .
Employment in the sector is at levels unseen since 2001 .
New York alone is considering 22,000 jobs cuts , and Florida has a $ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Economic Policy Institute has warned that without more federal aid , currently deadlocked in Congress , 5.3m local government jobs could go by the end of 2021 .
Again , women and people of color will be overrepresented in those jobs losses .
Unemployment has dipped back down over the last few months , reaching 8.4 % in August .
But the rate is still as high as the peak in the last recession and weekly claims for unemployment insurance have remained historically high at close to 1m a week .
“ The @ @ @ @ @ @ @ temporary is over , ” said Atwater .
“ Furloughs are becoming permanent layoffs , and the psychological damage that will do to consumer confidence is going to be a problem.
” Even companies that are doing well are not immune to this pivot , said Atwater .
Companies – particularly in the tech sector – that have seen their share prices soar to sky-high valuations are now looking for ways to keep those share prices high .
Atwater pointed to the recent announcement from Salesforce that it was shedding 1,000 jobs , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ sales .
For many of these companies their share prices are now “ so high that they are scared to disappoint investors , and they are looking at cost-cutting to keep those share prices levitated , ” he said .
Only a fundamental breakthrough in treating Covid-19 is likely to stop winter ’ s woes .
And as the temperature drops and the leaves turn , there is little sign that one is coming soon .
Public health experts say the steps for reining in this pandemic are well established , and it @ @ @ @ @ @ @ coronavirus in the US within months .
To do so , the US would need to be in a position where it could depend on the public health interventions of rapid testing , contact tracing , isolation and quarantine to manage coronavirus cases , instead of depending on drastic measures such as having people work from home and keep their children out of school .
But without the government taking such steps , and maintaining them , the US could again soon be in the position it was in in June and July @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , warned Caitlin Rivers , an epidemiologist at the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security .
“ What I fear is we will just see continuous hotspots coming and going around the country until we get a vaccine , ” Rivers said .
“ That ’ s what we don ’ t want.
” With her colleagues at Johns Hopkins , Rivers identified 10 recommendations for the US to reset its approach to coronavirus in a late July report .
The recommendations include to scale up contact tracing , bolster personal protective equipment @ @ @ @ @ @ @ higher-risk activities in places where the epidemic is worsening .
The number of cases recorded each day has drifted down from the peak , and testing is happening more frequently than in the spring , but coronavirus is still spreading an “ enormous ” amount in communities , Rivers said .
“ It is very widespread around the country , ” Rivers said .
“ And we still don ’ t have as much diagnostic testing as we would like in order to be confident we are catching those cases .
I think @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to go before we can feel like we are on track to be in a better place.
” Looking ahead , Rivers said two social factors were bringing “ new urgency ” to stop the spread : school closures and people ’ s hopes to see family during the winter holidays .
“ It ’ s been five or six [ months ] , and it just seems like we are not heading anywhere purposefully , ” Rivers said .
“ We are rather drifting along .
So if we want to get @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to set out the course for that .
In some ways , the critical moment now is that if we want to be in a better spot we need to orient ourselves to that goal.
” Saskia Popescu , an infectious disease epidemiologist and infection preventionist , said the US has been consistently struggling to respond to coronavirus since it emerged .
“ We really haven ’ t seen a time where we ’ ve been able to wrap our arms around this , ” Popescu said .
“ I think that the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to the local state governors – that this is not that bad , or [ that ] we have it under control when we really don ’ t – has been really dangerous and misleading.
” In addition to improved rapid testing and contact tracing , Popescu said she wanted to see better leadership from federal and state officials .
Scientists have a much better understanding of how coronavirus is transmitted now , compared with when it first emerged .
But they are fighting a tidal wave of mistrust from people who think @ @ @ @ @ @ @ skeptical of , instead of a sign of evolving knowledge , and others who are pushing misinformation .
“ We need leadership across the country to be on the same page , to be supporting and promoting science and ultimately working to reduce transmission consistently , through masking , through ensuring adequate testing , all of those things , ” Popescu said .
The slightly more positive figures reported in August put the country in a better position to control the virus compared with when cases were surging around the country , but @ @ @ @ @ @ @ “ I do think it is really hard when cases start to decrease to maintain people ’ s attention and vigilance on it , ” Popescu said .
Complacency will only lengthen the pain – economic and otherwise – of a pandemic that is already fundamentally reshaping the US for years to come and a virus that doesn ’ t care what we think about the latest research on masks or social distancing .
“ We just don ’ t know how long this is going to last , ” said Reed .

Dominic Rushe and Amanda Holpuch in New York

Even with three decades of experience in the travel industry, Jorge Pesquera has never seen a downturn in business like this one.
Summer officially ends on Monday in the US, and now is the time when many people in colder climes in North America and across the world start dreaming about a winter break on Florida’s golden shores.
Not this year.
The US is closed for many outside its borders, and many within are too scared to fly as Covid continues its deadly sweep across the country. The rate of infection has eased in Florida and elsewhere and Pesquera, president of the marketing group Discover the Palm Beaches, is hopeful business is improving. But it comes in a year of catastrophic collapse for Florida’s tourism.
“Nobody has seen anything like this in a couple of generations,” said Pesquera.
As the US enters its first coronavirus winter, economists and epidemiologists see a pivotal moment – a hinge whose swing will determine the direction of the economy and the course of the disease into 2021 and for years – potentially generations – to come.
Nobody has seen anything like this in a couple of generations Jorge Pesquera
The US announced its first death from the coronavirus in February. Donald Trump predicted it would be over by Easter – that hope was pushed back to summer as deaths and infections soared. Seven months on, the US is still not on course to control the pandemic.
Soon Covid-19 will have accounted for 200,000 deaths, and reported cases have already reached 6m. By 1 January, the US coronavirus death toll could reach over 410,000 according to a forecast by researchers at the University of Washington’s Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME). Researchers said the projection is based on the “rollercoaster” of cases in the US, where governments and individuals take up protective measures when things get bad, then let them slide when the local situation improves, potentially restarting the cycle all over again.
The virus has hit Florida particularly hard. At least 630,000 people have been infected and more than 11,000 have died. Tourism has plummeted. In the second quarter – April, May and June – 60% fewer people traveled to Florida compared with the same period in 2019 – a decline of almost 20 million visitors.
Pesquera is confident Florida will bounce back, and hotel occupancies have been climbing as locals and tourists from neighboring states get in their cars and head for a beach break. While he is hopeful that the worst is over, Pesquera said it will be a hard winter and beyond for many in the industry.
An ice-cream store in Key West in March. Photograph: Joe Raedle/Getty Images
But there are now worrying signs that the Covid-19 recession is reaching beyond the travel, leisure and hospitality industries that were hit so hard in the early months of the pandemic. Some of the changes will be long-lasting and some may well be permanent.
Already the pandemic has widened income inequality in the US. Economists including Peter Atwater, a lecturer in the economics department at William & Mary, have begun talking of a “K-shaped” recovery – where the well-off thrive on the uptick of the K as stock markets and house prices rise, while the working poor fall further behind on the downtick.
The divide has once again highlighted the racial and gender wealth divide in the US. Women, Black and Latinx Americans are losing more jobs than their male, white peers and as the US goes into winter, there are signs that more of that is to come.
Retail, too, was crushed by quarantine measures. With 14.7m jobs, retail is the largest private employer in the country. Employment has declined sharply as online sales have picked up. The industry is dominated by women and people of color. Dozens of retailers have filed for bankruptcy since the pandemic struck, and others are hanging by a thread. The sector has regained some ground in recent months but is still down a million jobs from last year. More may soon be lost, said Jason Reed, assistant chair of finance at the University of Notre Dame.
With summer gone, the shopping season is approaching. This year Walmart will be closed on Thanksgiving for the first time in 30 years and so will Target, Best Buy and Kohl’s. The closures are around safety issues – the chance of spreading the disease at a door-crushing super-sale is just too high – but for Reed the closures are a sign of things to come.
“E-commerce has exploded [since the pandemic began],” said Reed. “It’s like we have done 10 years of growth in a few months. Consumers are getting used to shopping online. I just don’t see jobs coming back in that sector, and that is a huge number of people.”
A woman walks by a closed business in Brooklyn in July. Photograph: Spencer Platt/Getty Images
Other changes, like the collapse of travel, may be temporary, but they will contribute to a dark winter for many. Reed points to the fact that many offices across the US are still closed, a situation that is already shuttering businesses reliant on office workers in city centers. “So many of these businesses are going to go under, if they haven’t already,” he said.
And these closures are feeding into the wider economy, eroding the tax base of cities and states and threatening swingeing job cuts. Employment in the sector is at levels unseen since 2001. New York alone is considering 22,000 jobs cuts, and Florida has a $1.9bn shortfall in its budget. The Economic Policy Institute has warned that without more federal aid, currently deadlocked in Congress, 5.3m local government jobs could go by the end of 2021. Again, women and people of color will be overrepresented in those jobs losses.
Unemployment has dipped back down over the last few months, reaching 8.4% in August. But the rate is still as high as the peak in the last recession and weekly claims for unemployment insurance have remained historically high at close to 1m a week.
“The sense that this situation is short-lived and temporary is over,” said Atwater. “Furloughs are becoming permanent layoffs ,and the psychological damage that will do to consumer confidence is going to be a problem.”
The sense that this situation is short-lived and temporary is over
Even companies that are doing well are not immune to this pivot, said Atwater. Companies – particularly in the tech sector – that have seen their share prices soar to sky-high valuations are now looking for ways to keep those share prices high. Atwater pointed to the recent announcement from Salesforce that it was shedding 1,000 jobs, even as the software company announced bumper sales.
For many of these companies their share prices are now “so high that they are scared to disappoint investors, and they are looking at cost-cutting to keep those share prices levitated,” he said.
Only a fundamental breakthrough in treating Covid-19 is likely to stop winter’s woes. And as the temperature drops and the leaves turn, there is little sign that one is coming soon.
Public health experts say the steps for reining in this pandemic are well established, and it is possible to control the spread of coronavirus in the US within months. To do so, the US would need to be in a position where it could depend on the public health interventions of rapid testing, contact tracing, isolation and quarantine to manage coronavirus cases, instead of depending on drastic measures such as having people work from home and keep their children out of school.
But without the government taking such steps, and maintaining them, the US could again soon be in the position it was in in June and July, when cases surged around the country, warned Caitlin Rivers, an epidemiologist at the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security.
Nurses protest against the lack of PPE in St Petersburg, Florida. Photograph: Octavio Jones/Reuters
“What I fear is we will just see continuous hotspots coming and going around the country until we get a vaccine,” Rivers said. “That’s what we don’t want.”
With her colleagues at Johns Hopkins, Rivers identified 10 recommendations for the US to reset its approach to coronavirus in a late July report. The recommendations include to scale up contact tracing, bolster personal protective equipment supplies and test supply chains and close higher-risk activities in places where the epidemic is worsening.
The number of cases recorded each day has drifted down from the peak, and testing is happening more frequently than in the spring, but coronavirus is still spreading an “enormous” amount in communities, Rivers said.
“It is very widespread around the country,” Rivers said. “And we still don’t have as much diagnostic testing as we would like in order to be confident we are catching those cases. I think we still do have a long ways to go before we can feel like we are on track to be in a better place.”
Looking ahead, Rivers said two social factors were bringing “new urgency” to stop the spread: school closures and people’s hopes to see family during the winter holidays.
“It’s been five or six [months], and it just seems like we are not heading anywhere purposefully,” Rivers said. “We are rather drifting along. So if we want to get to a better place, we have to set out the course for that. In some ways, the critical moment now is that if we want to be in a better spot we need to orient ourselves to that goal.”
Saskia Popescu, an infectious disease epidemiologist and infection preventionist, said the US has been consistently struggling to respond to coronavirus since it emerged.
“We really haven’t seen a time where we’ve been able to wrap our arms around this,” Popescu said. “I think that the continued messaging from the White House down to the local state governors – that this is not that bad, or [that] we have it under control when we really don’t – has been really dangerous and misleading.”
In addition to improved rapid testing and contact tracing, Popescu said she wanted to see better leadership from federal and state officials.
Friends and family mourn the death of Conrad Coleman, who died of Covid in New Rochelle, New York, two months after his father died. Photograph: John Moore/Getty Images
Scientists have a much better understanding of how coronavirus is transmitted now, compared with when it first emerged. But they are fighting a tidal wave of mistrust from people who think shifts in messaging are something to be skeptical of, instead of a sign of evolving knowledge, and others who are pushing misinformation.
“We need leadership across the country to be on the same page, to be supporting and promoting science and ultimately working to reduce transmission consistently, through masking, through ensuring adequate testing, all of those things,” Popescu said.
The slightly more positive figures reported in August put the country in a better position to control the virus compared with when cases were surging around the country, but improvements come with their own challenges. “I do think it is really hard when cases start to decrease to maintain people’s attention and vigilance on it,” Popescu said.
Complacency will only lengthen the pain – economic and otherwise – of a pandemic that is already fundamentally reshaping the US for years to come and a virus that doesn’t care what we think about the latest research on masks or social distancing. “We just don’t know how long this is going to last,” said Reed.


theguardian--2020-09-05--'The politics of racial division': Trump borrows Nixon's 'southern strategy'

Donald Trump has warned that if Joe Biden replaces him as president the suburbs will be flooded with low-income housing .
He has backed supporters who have sometimes violently clashed with Black Lives Matter protesters across the country .
The US president has even refrained from directly condemning the actions of a teenager charged with killing two protesters in Kenosha , Wisconsin .
And Trump has also called the BLM movement a “ symbol of hate ” .
With such rhetoric , the president is taking a page or two out of the 1960s “ southern strategy ” : the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ and Barry Goldwater used to rally political support among white voters across the south by leveraging racism and white fear of people of color .
But Trump ’ s own version of the southern strategy is an updated one for 2020 .
It ’ s not a carbon copy , and the president has mixed this angle with other pitches to voters .
Yet as tensions over police and protests have increased across America , Trump has increasingly made these arguments the centerpiece of his campaign in the closing months of the election @ @ @ @ @ @ @ on a fire .
He knows what he ’ s doing .
He ’ s making a political calculus that by stoking the worst parts of the American psyche that he can somehow gain political leverage from that , ” said Isaac Wright , a Democratic strategist who specializes in rural campaigns and southern voters .
Wright pointed to when neo-Nazis marched through Charlottesville and the president defensively said there were “ very fine people ” both among the marchers and the counter-marchers .
“ I think this is what he did in @ @ @ @ @ @ @ more blatant and open of who he is and what he ’ s doing , ” Wright said .
The southern strategy was the plan used effectively by Nixon to increase voting among white voters in the south .
Nixon ’ s campaign put a heavy emphasis on law and order and states ’ rights to attract white voters concerned about racial integration .
Critics argued the language used in this strategy was a thinly veiled appeal to racists and an ugly response to the successes of the civil rights movement .
Nixon @ @ @ @ @ @ @ 1968 , but nonetheless won the election .
He and the segregationist George Wallace , running as an independent , carried all the states in the south except Texas , while the Democrat vice-president Hubert Humphrey won just 13 states – most of them in the north-east .
“ There ’ s a long history of these kinds of campaigns in the country , ” the Biden campaign ’ s chief strategist , Mike Donilon , said during a press briefing with reporters on Friday .
Donilon added : “ They tried to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ That has been his focus now for several weeks .
And there was a lot of speculation that when he did that , that would work to his benefit and drive the election there .
That didn ’ t happen .
The public is still primarily focused on the central issue in their life which is the virus.
” However , in some races , Trump ’ s version of this strategy has already been effective .
The former Indiana Democratic senator Joe Donnelly , who lost re-election in 2018 , described his @ @ @ @ @ @ @ for this .
They tested this model .
“ I think the president ’ s strategy was fear and division and to scare people to the polls , and it worked in my case , and I think that ’ s what they ’ re doing now , ” Donnelly said .
Trump , Donnelly said , “ convinced people that if they didn ’ t come vote for him their way of life was going to disappear ” .
The attack line hasn ’ t been lost on the Biden campaign , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ addressing it head-on .
Talking points sent out to Biden campaign surrogates and obtained by the Guardian said : “ Trump may believe mouthing the words law and order makes him strong , but his failure to call on his own supporters to stop acting as an armed militia in this country shows you how weak he is .
“ Does anyone believe there will be less violence in America if Donald Trump is re-elected ?
” The talking points also said : “ President Trump failed to protect America so now he @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ’ s warnings about what will happen if Biden wins the presidential election are becoming apocalyptic – and contain a series of lies .
He has warned that the country would fall into a new Great Depression and “ your taxes will be doubled , tripled and quadrupled ” .
“ You could forget about the second amendment if we lose this election , ” Trump warned in August .
Democrats say the scaremongering is a naked appeal to his own overwhelmingly white base .
“ I think what ’ s really stark @ @ @ @ @ @ @ s being that he feels his obligation to the people he ’ s talking to , and not the people who needs low-income housing , ” the Democratic strategist Maya Rupert said .
“ It ’ s making it abundantly clear he sees himself as representing a certain segment of this country , and those are people that are living in the suburbs and don ’ t want low-income housing .
He is making it abundantly clear that he is talking to white people.
” Last Sunday , Trump retweeted a video of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ counter-protest Black Lives Matter supporters in downtown Portland with paintball guns and pepper spray .
Those clashes turned violent and resulted in a shooting .
Trump had a similar line of attack in 2018 when he consistently warned of a caravan of migrants making its way through Central America to the southern US border .
But it did not work .
In that year ’ s midterm elections Democrats ended up retaking control of the House of Representatives and winning seven governor ’ s races .
Part of Trump ’ s approach has @ @ @ @ @ @ @ as much as what he proclaims at speeches or over Twitter .
When he visited Kenosha , Wisconsin , the site of the most recent clashes between police and protesters , he refrained from discussing systemic racism and instead focused on law enforcement .
Rory Cooper , a Republican strategist and longtime aide to the former House majority leader Eric Cantor , suggested that this approach might backfire .
“ Part of Donald Trump ’ s problem since the beginning is that he has a very low view of his base voter .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ voters have the same view of racial justice that he does , ” Cooper said .
“ And that ’ s not true .
The numbers have not really borne that out and he ’ s been bleeding white suburban voters since he was elected .
He is losing white voters with a college degree .
So he ’ s not going to get the white college degree suburban college voter back with the politics of racial division .
That ’ s just not going to work.
” Trump ’ s critique is @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of the dire warnings he is offering – about civic unrest and economic collapse – have actually already happened on his watch .
“ The weirdest thing I find about it , to be honest , is this aspect of the incumbent president touring smoldering cities and be like , ‘ This is coming your way , ” said Matt McDonald , a former senior adviser on the late Arizona senator John McCain ’ s presidential campaign .
“ I mean , it ’ s literally on his watch .
”

Donald Trump has warned that if Joe Biden replaces him as president the suburbs will be flooded with low-income housing. He has backed supporters who have sometimes violently clashed with Black Lives Matter protesters across the country. The US president has even refrained from directly condemning the actions of a teenager charged with killing two protesters in Kenosha, Wisconsin.
And Trump has also called the BLM movement a “symbol of hate”.
With such rhetoric, the president is taking a page or two out of the 1960s “southern strategy”: the playbook Republican politicians such as Richard Nixon and Barry Goldwater used to rally political support among white voters across the south by leveraging racism and white fear of people of color.
But Trump’s own version of the southern strategy is an updated one for 2020. It’s not a carbon copy, and the president has mixed this angle with other pitches to voters. Yet as tensions over police and protests have increased across America, Trump has increasingly made these arguments the centerpiece of his campaign in the closing months of the election.
“He’s throwing gasoline on a fire. He knows what he’s doing. He’s making a political calculus that by stoking the worst parts of the American psyche that he can somehow gain political leverage from that,” said Isaac Wright, a Democratic strategist who specializes in rural campaigns and southern voters.
Wright pointed to when neo-Nazis marched through Charlottesville and the president defensively said there were “very fine people” both among the marchers and the counter-marchers.
“I think this is what he did in 2016 – he’s just becoming more blatant and open of who he is and what he’s doing,” Wright said.
The southern strategy was the plan used effectively by Nixon to increase voting among white voters in the south. Nixon’s campaign put a heavy emphasis on law and order and states’ rights to attract white voters concerned about racial integration. Critics argued the language used in this strategy was a thinly veiled appeal to racists and an ugly response to the successes of the civil rights movement.
Nixon was fiercely criticized for this approach in 1968, but nonetheless won the election. He and the segregationist George Wallace, running as an independent, carried all the states in the south except Texas, while the Democrat vice-president Hubert Humphrey won just 13 states – most of them in the north-east.
“There’s a long history of these kinds of campaigns in the country,” the Biden campaign’s chief strategist, Mike Donilon, said during a press briefing with reporters on Friday. Donilon added: “They tried to reformulate it as a law-and-order campaign. That has been his focus now for several weeks. And there was a lot of speculation that when he did that, that would work to his benefit and drive the election there. That didn’t happen. The public is still primarily focused on the central issue in their life which is the virus.”
However, in some races, Trump’s version of this strategy has already been effective. The former Indiana Democratic senator Joe Donnelly, who lost re-election in 2018, described his own defeat as a “dry run for this. They tested this model.
“I think the president’s strategy was fear and division and to scare people to the polls, and it worked in my case, and I think that’s what they’re doing now,” Donnelly said. Trump, Donnelly said, “convinced people that if they didn’t come vote for him their way of life was going to disappear”.
Nixon attends a parade in Philadelphia in 1968. Photograph: Dirck Halstead/Getty Images
The attack line hasn’t been lost on the Biden campaign, which is seeking to blunt it by addressing it head-on.
Talking points sent out to Biden campaign surrogates and obtained by the Guardian said: “Trump may believe mouthing the words law and order makes him strong, but his failure to call on his own supporters to stop acting as an armed militia in this country shows you how weak he is.
“Does anyone believe there will be less violence in America if Donald Trump is re-elected?”
The talking points also said: “President Trump failed to protect America so now he is trying to scare America.”
Trump’s warnings about what will happen if Biden wins the presidential election are becoming apocalyptic – and contain a series of lies. He has warned that the country would fall into a new Great Depression and “your taxes will be doubled, tripled and quadrupled”.
“You could forget about the second amendment if we lose this election,” Trump warned in August.
Democrats say the scaremongering is a naked appeal to his own overwhelmingly white base.
“I think what’s really stark about it is how clear he’s being that he feels his obligation to the people he’s talking to, and not the people who needs low-income housing,” the Democratic strategist Maya Rupert said. “It’s making it abundantly clear he sees himself as representing a certain segment of this country, and those are people that are living in the suburbs and don’t want low-income housing. He is making it abundantly clear that he is talking to white people.”
The “suburban housewife” will be voting for me. They want safety & are thrilled that I ended the long running program where low income housing would invade their neighborhood. Biden would reinstall it, in a bigger form, with Corey Booker in charge! @foxandfriends @MariaBartiromo — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 12, 2020
Last Sunday, Trump retweeted a video of a caravan of Trump supporters planning to counter-protest Black Lives Matter supporters in downtown Portland with paintball guns and pepper spray. Those clashes turned violent and resulted in a shooting.
Trump had a similar line of attack in 2018 when he consistently warned of a caravan of migrants making its way through Central America to the southern US border. But it did not work. In that year’s midterm elections Democrats ended up retaking control of the House of Representatives and winning seven governor’s races.
Part of Trump’s approach has been what he has not said, as much as what he proclaims at speeches or over Twitter. When he visited Kenosha, Wisconsin, the site of the most recent clashes between police and protesters, he refrained from discussing systemic racism and instead focused on law enforcement.
Rory Cooper, a Republican strategist and longtime aide to the former House majority leader Eric Cantor, suggested that this approach might backfire.
“Part of Donald Trump’s problem since the beginning is that he has a very low view of his base voter. He believes that all white suburban center-right voters have the same view of racial justice that he does,” Cooper said.
“And that’s not true. The numbers have not really borne that out and he’s been bleeding white suburban voters since he was elected. He is losing white voters with a college degree. So he’s not going to get the white college degree suburban college voter back with the politics of racial division. That’s just not going to work.”
Trump’s critique is puzzling to some political veterans. Most of the dire warnings he is offering – about civic unrest and economic collapse – have actually already happened on his watch.
“The weirdest thing I find about it, to be honest, is this aspect of the incumbent president touring smoldering cities and be like, ‘This is coming your way,” said Matt McDonald, a former senior adviser on the late Arizona senator John McCain’s presidential campaign. “I mean, it’s literally on his watch.”


theguardian--2020-09-05--'Trump has a different leadership style': David Rubenstein plays it by the book

David Rubenstein ’ s first book of interviews featured leading historians and was called The American Story .
Its sequel , focusing on business , politics , the military , the arts and sports , could easily have been called These American Stories .
In fact it ’ s called How to Lead , but the billionaire investor and philanthropist has produced a collection of only-in-America tales .
His aim , he says , “ is to kind of give the story about how certain people became leaders , and hopefully inspire younger people to maybe improve their own leadership @ @ @ @ @ @ @ George W Bush are in there ; the House speaker , Nancy Pelosi , is in there ; so is Ruth Bader Ginsburg , supreme court justice and talisman to liberals everywhere .
Jeff Bezos speaks , as do Bill Gates , Warren Buffett and Phil Knight , the man who founded Nike .
Yo-Yo Ma shares his story , as do Jack Nicklaus and Mike “ Coach K ” Kryzyzewski , a giant of college basketball at Duke , Rubenstein ’ s alma mater .
One common thread is that like Rubenstein @ @ @ @ @ @ @ is worth around $ 3bn , most of the interviewees did not come from money .
“ As a general rule of thumb , ” Rubenstein says , “ certainly in western democracies over the last 100 years or maybe 200 years or so , [ leaders ] tend to rise up , to not come from extremely privileged backgrounds .
There are some exceptions , obviously – President Kennedy , FDR – but generally you get more Harry Truman figures and the same is particularly true in the sciences , particularly true @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in the military and so forth .
“ Growing up in a family with wealth has its benefits [ but ] you may not have to have all the qualities of a young person scrambling to kind of make a name for yourself.
” Rubenstein has signed the Giving Pledge , which means most of his wealth will not stay in his family .
In his introduction to How to Lead , he sketches out how he won it : a career which began in the law , took in the Carter White @ @ @ @ @ @ @ equity .
But he ’ s evidently proud his father worked for the US Postal Service in Baltimore – as did he , in the summer while a student .
“ My father didn ’ t graduate from high school , he went to world war two and never took advantage of the GI Bill or anything like that , so he had a blue-collar job … I didn ’ t feel terrible about it at the time .
I recognised that I wasn ’ t from a wealthy family but in the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ were from wealthy families , I can ’ t say they were necessarily happier than I was able to be.
” As it happens , Rubenstein shares a connection to the postal service with Robert F Smith , an investor who memorably paid the debts of a whole class at Howard University .
In their interview , Smith tells Rubenstein his grandfather was postmaster for three post offices around Washington DC .
The USPS is in the news in Washington now .
The postmaster general , Louis DeJoy , a Republican donor , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ an election set to feature unprecedented voting by mail .
How does Rubenstein feel about that ?
“ Well , I ’ m going to interview the postmaster general at the Economic Club of Washington in the next two or three weeks.
” Such are the circles he moves in – with care .
DeJoy has justified the changes , among them ending overtime and removing sorting machines , as ways to improve cost efficiency .
Rubenstein observes that the mail “ is really a service not a business , so it ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ effects ” .
Otherwise , we ’ ll have to wait for the interview , most likely broadcast on Bloomberg or PBS .
How to Lead is not without its awkward questions .
Colin Powell and Condoleezza Rice discuss the flawed case for war in Iraq .
But George W Bush doesn ’ t and in other cases , such as that of David Petraeus , the general who resigned as CIA director over an affair with his biographer , the more painful parts of being a leader can remain untouched .
“ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ” Rubenstein says .
“ My job is not to ask questions that might embarrass somebody … people can judge whether that ’ s a good or bad thing .
“ The people that I interview are people that I have known , generally , for a reasonably long time .
So the appeal of it is they feel comfortable with me , and they might be willing to say some things they might not to a professional journalist .
And here ’ s the cost of that : I won ’ t @ @ @ @ @ @ @ won ’ t expect it from me .
“ It ’ s not as if what you just cited [ about Petraeus ] is something that people don ’ t know about .
But what I ’ m trying to focus on is , you know , David Petraeus who came from a relatively modest background .
His father was in the Dutch merchant marine , he worked his way up and obviously had some good fortune but he came close to dying twice .
“ Colin Powell .
Think about what he @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the south .
You know , he can ’ t go get a hamburger in certain places and [ he becomes ] an American hero.
” It ’ s true that Rubenstein puts his subjects at ease – so much so that often , as in the case of the secretary of state , Mike Pompeo , and a remark that came to seem very telling after Donald Trump was impeached , they offer real insight .
Rubenstein asks Powell , a general and secretary of state , about his flirtation with running @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Winfrey if she has thought about the White House , a question also pitched at Tim Cook of Apple , Bezos of Amazon and more .
Of course , non-politicians running for office is no longer an outlandish idea .
Trump , a non-politician fighting for re-election , looms over Rubenstein ’ s book .
Billionaire interviewed billionaire before Trump set his sights on the Oval Office .
Rubenstein was one of a stream of visitors to the president-elect during the transition four years ago .
He says he ’ d like to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ him if he would let me interview him at the Economic Club of Washington DC , which is the format I used before .
He said he would do it but then events overtook us and we never got it done .
Between now and the election , probably not going to happen .
But one way or the other , I wouldn ’ t rule it out .
I ’ d like to do it.
” After four years of Trump , amid partisan divide , pandemic and a national reckoning on @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Lead – a majority , if the polls are right – will think America needs a change of leader .
When we talked for The American Story , Rubenstein said it was too early to pass judgment on Trump , because “ despite some of the flaws that have become evident ” , the unpredictability of events meant “ you can ’ t tell that he won ’ t be popular or that he won ’ t be successful ” .
Since then , Trump has survived impeachment and presided over a chaotic @ @ @ @ @ @ @ more than 6 million have been infected and nearly 200,000 have died .
His popularity remains stubbornly low .
“ I think history will judge Trump better or worse depending on whether he gets re-elected , ” Rubenstein says , informed by his experience working for Jimmy Carter , “ who could not believe that he could possibly lose to Ronald Reagan ” in 1980 , then did .
“ If [ Trump ] does get re-elected , despite all the challenges that he had , people will say , ‘ Well , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to be a leader of enough people to get elected.
’ But if he loses the election … “ I suspect he may have a different view on it .
He has a different leadership style than many people in the book , but he obviously has a leadership style that appeals to a number of people.
” Surely Trump ’ s response to Covid-19 could be called a failure to lead ?
“ It ’ s hard for me to know .
Who has been a great leader in dealing with this @ @ @ @ @ @ @ think there are any easy answers .
I wish we didn ’ t have as many people dying .
No people dying .
But it ’ s hard to know whether anybody [ could have ] prevented completely the loss of life .
And probably it ’ s not possible.
” How to Lead does contain passages that resonate strongly as the election draws near .
Speaking to Ginsburg , Rubenstein asks what she thinks “ is the biggest threat to our democracy ” .
“ A public that doesn ’ t care @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ” the justice says , in an interview from last September .
“ In a great speech on liberty , renowned judge Learned Hand said , ‘ If the fire dies in the hearts of the people , no constitution and no judge can restore it.
’ My faith is in the spirit of liberty.
” Rubenstein has used his billions to restore memorials to Washington , Jefferson and Lincoln , to preserve copies of the Declaration of Independence , the Magna Carta and more .
Proceeds from How to Lead will go @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Center .
You sense he shares Ginsburg ’ s faith .

David Rubenstein’s first book of interviews featured leading historians and was called The American Story. Its sequel, focusing on business, politics, the military, the arts and sports, could easily have been called These American Stories. In fact it’s called How to Lead, but the billionaire investor and philanthropist has produced a collection of only-in-America tales.
His aim, he says, “is to kind of give the story about how certain people became leaders, and hopefully inspire younger people to maybe improve their own leadership skills”.
Presidents Bill Clinton and George W Bush are in there; the House speaker, Nancy Pelosi, is in there; so is Ruth Bader Ginsburg, supreme court justice and talisman to liberals everywhere. Jeff Bezos speaks, as do Bill Gates, Warren Buffett and Phil Knight, the man who founded Nike. Yo-Yo Ma shares his story, as do Jack Nicklaus and Mike “Coach K” Kryzyzewski, a giant of college basketball at Duke, Rubenstein’s alma mater.
One common thread is that like Rubenstein, who co-founded the Carlyle Group and is worth around $3bn, most of the interviewees did not come from money.
“As a general rule of thumb,” Rubenstein says, “certainly in western democracies over the last 100 years or maybe 200 years or so, [leaders] tend to rise up, to not come from extremely privileged backgrounds. There are some exceptions, obviously – President Kennedy, FDR – but generally you get more Harry Truman figures and the same is particularly true in the sciences, particularly true in the arts, and certainly true in the military and so forth.
“Growing up in a family with wealth has its benefits [but] you may not have to have all the qualities of a young person scrambling to kind of make a name for yourself.”
Rubenstein has signed the Giving Pledge, which means most of his wealth will not stay in his family. In his introduction to How to Lead, he sketches out how he won it: a career which began in the law, took in the Carter White House, then took off in private equity. But he’s evidently proud his father worked for the US Postal Service in Baltimore – as did he, in the summer while a student.
“My father didn’t graduate from high school, he went to world war two and never took advantage of the GI Bill or anything like that, so he had a blue-collar job … I didn’t feel terrible about it at the time. I recognised that I wasn’t from a wealthy family but in the end, the kids that I knew were from wealthy families, I can’t say they were necessarily happier than I was able to be.”
As it happens, Rubenstein shares a connection to the postal service with Robert F Smith, an investor who memorably paid the debts of a whole class at Morehouse University. In their interview, Smith tells Rubenstein his grandfather was postmaster for three post offices around Washington DC.
The USPS is in the news in Washington now. The postmaster general, Louis DeJoy, a Republican donor, seemingly mandated to damage the system before an election set to feature unprecedented voting by mail. How does Rubenstein feel about that?
“Well, I’m going to interview the postmaster general at the Economic Club of Washington in the next two or three weeks.”
Such are the circles he moves in – with care. DeJoy has justified the changes, among them ending overtime and removing sorting machines, as ways to improve cost efficiency. Rubenstein observes that the mail “is really a service not a business, so it’s hard to kind of compare the effects”. Otherwise, we’ll have to wait for the interview, most likely broadcast on Bloomberg or PBS.
How to Lead is not without its awkward questions. Colin Powell and Condoleezza Rice discuss the flawed case for war in Iraq. But George W Bush doesn’t and in other cases, such as that of David Petraeus, the general who resigned as CIA director over an affair with his biographer, the more painful parts of being a leader can remain untouched.
Barack Obama congratulates Rubenstein, a Duke University trustee, during an event celebrating the NCAA champion men’s basketball team in 2015. Photograph: Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images
“I’m not a journalist,” Rubenstein says. “My job is not to ask questions that might embarrass somebody … people can judge whether that’s a good or bad thing.
“The people that I interview are people that I have known, generally, for a reasonably long time. So the appeal of it is they feel comfortable with me, and they might be willing to say some things they might not to a professional journalist. And here’s the cost of that: I won’t ask the embarrassing questions, because they won’t expect it from me.
“It’s not as if what you just cited [about Petraeus] is something that people don’t know about. But what I’m trying to focus on is, you know, David Petraeus who came from a relatively modest background. His father was in the Dutch merchant marine, he worked his way up and obviously had some good fortune but he came close to dying twice.
“Colin Powell. Think about what he saw growing up, the segregation in the south. You know, he can’t go get a hamburger in certain places and [he becomes] an American hero.”
It’s true that Rubenstein puts his subjects at ease – so much so that often, as in the case of the secretary of state, Mike Pompeo, and a remark that came to seem very telling after Donald Trump was impeached, they offer real insight.
‘History will judge’
Rubenstein asks Powell, a general and secretary of state, about his flirtation with running for president. He also asks Oprah Winfrey if she has thought about the White House, a question also pitched at Tim Cook of Apple, Bezos of Amazon and more.
Of course, non-politicians running for office is no longer an outlandish idea. Trump, a non-politician fighting for re-election, looms over Rubenstein’s book.
Billionaire interviewed billionaire before Trump set his sights on the Oval Office. Rubenstein was one of a stream of visitors to the president-elect during the transition four years ago. He says he’d like to talk again.
“I did ask him if he would let me interview him at the Economic Club of Washington DC, which is the format I used before. He said he would do it but then events overtook us and we never got it done. Between now and the election, probably not going to happen. But one way or the other, I wouldn’t rule it out. I’d like to do it.”
After four years of Trump, amid partisan divide, pandemic and a national reckoning on race, many who read How to Lead – a majority, if the polls are right – will think America needs a change of leader.
When we talked for The American Story, Rubenstein said it was too early to pass judgment on Trump, because “despite some of the flaws that have become evident”, the unpredictability of events meant “you can’t tell that he won’t be popular or that he won’t be successful”.
Since then, Trump has survived impeachment and presided over a chaotic response to the coronavirus pandemic in which more than 6 million have been infected and nearly 200,000 have died. His popularity remains stubbornly low.
“I think history will judge Trump better or worse depending on whether he gets re-elected,” Rubenstein says, informed by his experience working for Jimmy Carter, “who could not believe that he could possibly lose to Ronald Reagan” in 1980, then did.
Donald Trump looks after Rubenstein, after their meeting at Mar-a-Lago. Photograph: Don Emmert/AFP/Getty Images
“If [Trump] does get re-elected, despite all the challenges that he had, people will say, ‘Well, he actually managed to figure out how to be a leader of enough people to get elected.’ But if he loses the election …
“I suspect he may have a different view on it. He has a different leadership style than many people in the book, but he obviously has a leadership style that appeals to a number of people.”
Surely Trump’s response to Covid-19 could be called a failure to lead?
“It’s hard for me to know. Who has been a great leader in dealing with this situation? And I don’t think there are any easy answers. I wish we didn’t have as many people dying. No people dying. But it’s hard to know whether anybody [could have] prevented completely the loss of life. And probably it’s not possible.”
How to Lead does contain passages that resonate strongly as the election draws near. Speaking to Ginsburg, Rubenstein asks what she thinks “is the biggest threat to our democracy”.
“A public that doesn’t care about preserving the rights we have,” the justice says, in an interview from last September. “In a great speech on liberty, renowned judge Learned Hand said, ‘If the fire dies in the hearts of the people, no constitution and no judge can restore it.’ My faith is in the spirit of liberty.”
Rubenstein has used his billions to restore memorials to Washington, Jefferson and Lincoln, to preserve copies of the Declaration of Independence, the Magna Carta and more. Proceeds from How to Lead will go to the Johns Hopkins Children’s Center. You sense he shares Ginsburg’s faith.


theguardian--2020-09-05--'He is a coward': Trump condemned for reportedly calling US war dead ‘suckers’

Current and former members of the military , elected officials and Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden reacted with outrage and sadness on Friday , as ex-Trump administration officials confirmed key details of a bombshell report in which the US president referred to fallen soldiers as “ suckers ” and “ losers ” .
The Atlantic magazine published a story on Thursday in which four sources close to Donald Trump said he cancelled a visit to pay respects at an American military cemetery outside Paris in 2018 because he thought the dead soldiers were “ losers ” and “ suckers ” @ @ @ @ @ @ @ mess up his hair .
Elizabeth Neumann , a former assistant secretary of counter-terrorism in the Department of Homeland Security , and Miles Taylor , a former chief of staff in that department , said the account was true , asserting that Trump ’ s low opinion of soldiers killed and wounded in combat was well known inside the administration .
The White House moved to deny the report unusually quickly and forcefully .
Trump himself dismissed it as a politically motivated “ hoax ” and claimed 11 current and former officials supported @ @ @ @ @ @ @ feels more strongly about our soldiers , our wounded warriors , our soldiers that died in war than I do , ” he told reporters at the White House on Friday .
“ It ’ s a hoax .
Just like the fake dossier was a hoax , just like the Russia , Russia , Russia was a hoax .
It was a total hoax : no collusion .
Just like so many other things , it ’ s a hoax .
And you ’ ll hear more of these things , totally @ @ @ @ @ @ @ closer to election.
” Asked why John Kelly , a retired marine corps general and Trump ’ s former chief of staff , was not among those defending him , the president added : “ He was with me , didn ’ t do a good job , had no temperament and ultimately he was petered out , he was exhausted .
This man was totally exhausted .
He wasn ’ t even able to function in the last number of months .
He was not able to function.
” The Atlantic ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ could have been a guy like a John Kelly ” .
Trump tweeted that he would not defund the Stars and Stripes newspaper , which serves US servicemen and women worldwide , after a Pentagon memo ordering its closure was reported by USA Today , causing huge controversy .
The US secretary of state , Mike Pompeo , also defended Trump , but the denials were met with widespread skepticism because of his past remarks about military veterans .
And in an unusual intervention , the first lady , Melania Trump , also @ @ @ @ @ @ @ story “ was not true ” .
“ It has become a very dangerous time when anonymous sources are believed above all else , & no one knows their motivation , ” she wrote .
A visibly angry Biden called the alleged comments “ disgusting ” and said Trump was “ not fit to be commander-in-chief ” .
“ When my son volunteered and joined the United States military – and went to Iraq for a year , won the Bronze Star and other commendations , he was not a sucker , ” @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in remarks in Wilmington , Delaware .
His son Beau , who died of brain cancer in 2015 , deployed to Iraq in 2008 .
“ If these statements are true , the president should humbly apologize to every Gold Star mother and father and every Blue Star family , ” Biden said .
“ Who the heck does he think he is ?
“ I ’ m always cautioned not to lose my temper , ” Biden said .
“ This may be as close as I come in this campaign .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ how deeply the president and I disagree on the role of the president of the United States of America.
” Veteran Chesley “ Sully ” Sullenberger , the pilot who saved the lives of 155 people in 2009 when he guided his stricken plane onto the Hudson river , said : “ For the first time in American history , a president has repeatedly shown utter and vulgar contempt and disrespect for those who have served and died serving our country.
” “ While I am not surprised , I am disgusted by @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
He has repeatedly and consistently shown himself to be completely unfit for and to have no respect for the office he holds.
” On a press call hosted by Biden ’ s campaign , the Democratic Illinois senator Tammy Duckworth , who lost both her legs in combat in Iraq , accused Trump of attempting to “ politicize and pervert our military to stroke his own ego ” .
“ This is a man who spends every day redefining the concept of narcissism ; a man who ’ s led a life @ @ @ @ @ @ @ him on a silver platter , ” she said .
“ Of course , he thinks about war selfishly .
He thinks of it as a transactional cost , instead of in human lives and American blood spilled , because that ’ s how he ’ s viewed his whole life .
He doesn ’ t understand other people ’ s bravery and courage , because he ’ s never had any of his own .
“ I take my wheelchair , and my titanium legs over Donald Trump ’ s supposed bone @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , referring to one reason Trump received draft deferments during the Vietnam war .
The call also included the congressman Conor Lamb , a marine veteran , and Khizr Khan , a Gold Star father whose son was killed by a suicide bomber in Iraq in 2004 and who was himself famously attacked by Trump during the 2016 campaign .
Khan said Trump was “ incapable – let me repeat it again – he is incapable of understanding service , valor and courage ” .
“ His soul can not conceive of integrity @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of a coward.
” In an interview with the conservative radio host Hugh Hewitt , Mike Pompeo defended the president ’ s support of the military .
“ I ’ ve never heard that , ” the secretary of state said of Trump allegedly calling the war dead “ suckers ” .
“ Indeed , just the opposite .
I ’ ve been around him in lots of settings where there were both active-duty military , guardsmen , reservists , veterans .
This is a man who had the deepest respect for their @ @ @ @ @ @ @ always interacted with them in that way .
He enjoys those times .
He values those people.
” The Biden campaign released a video quoting the president , based on the Atlantic story and later corroborating reports by the Washington Post and the Associated Press .
Other media outlets , Fox News among them , also corroborated the Atlantic story .
With the tagline “ If you don ’ t respect our troops , you can not lead them , ” the Biden campaign video displayed the alleged Trump quotes over images of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ briefing , Trump was asked about his past mockery of the late senator John McCain , who served in the military and was a prisoner of war in Vietnam .
“ I say what I say , ” he told reporters .
“ I disagreed with John McCain on a lot of things .
That doesn ’ t mean I don ’ t respect him .
I respected him but I really disagreed with him on a lot of things and I think I was right .
I think time has proven me @ @ @ @ @ @ @

Tom McCarthy in New York and Lauren Gambino and David Smith in Washington

Current and former members of the military, elected officials and Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden reacted with outrage and sadness on Friday, as ex-Trump administration officials confirmed key details of a bombshell report in which the US president referred to fallen soldiers as “suckers” and “losers”.
The Atlantic magazine published a story on Thursday in which four sources close to Donald Trump said he cancelled a visit to pay respects at an American military cemetery outside Paris in 2018 because he thought the dead soldiers were “losers” and “suckers” and did not want the rain to mess up his hair.
Elizabeth Neumann, a former assistant secretary of counter-terrorism in the Department of Homeland Security, and Miles Taylor, a former chief of staff in that department, said the account was true, asserting that Trump’s low opinion of soldiers killed and wounded in combat was well known inside the administration.
The White House moved to deny the report unusually quickly and forcefully. Trump himself dismissed it as a politically motivated “hoax” and claimed 11 current and former officials supported his account.
“There is nobody feels more strongly about our soldiers, our wounded warriors, our soldiers that died in war than I do,” he told reporters at the White House on Friday. “It’s a hoax. Just like the fake dossier was a hoax, just like the Russia, Russia, Russia was a hoax. It was a total hoax: no collusion. Just like so many other things, it’s a hoax. And you’ll hear more of these things, totally unrelated, as we get closer and closer to election.”
Asked why John Kelly, a retired marine corps general and Trump’s former chief of staff, was not among those defending him, the president added: “He was with me, didn’t do a good job, had no temperament and ultimately he was petered out, he was exhausted. This man was totally exhausted. He wasn’t even able to function in the last number of months. He was not able to function.”
The Atlantic’s source, he speculated, “could have been a guy like a John Kelly”.
Trump tweeted that he would not defund the Stars and Stripes newspaper, which serves US servicemen and women worldwide, after a Pentagon memo ordering its closure was reported by USA Today, causing huge controversy.
When my son volunteered and joined the United States military and went to Iraq for a year … he was not a sucker Joe Biden
The US secretary of state, Mike Pompeo, also defended Trump, but the denials were met with widespread skepticism because of his past remarks about military veterans.
And in an unusual intervention, the first lady, Melania Trump, also weighed in, tweeting that the Atlantic story “was not true”.
“It has become a very dangerous time when anonymous sources are believed above all else, & no one knows their motivation,” she wrote.
A visibly angry Biden called the alleged comments “disgusting” and said Trump was “not fit to be commander-in-chief”.
“When my son volunteered and joined the United States military – and went to Iraq for a year, won the Bronze Star and other commendations, he was not a sucker,” Biden said, his voice rising, in remarks in Wilmington, Delaware.
His son Beau, who died of brain cancer in 2015, deployed to Iraq in 2008.
“If these statements are true, the president should humbly apologize to every Gold Star mother and father and every Blue Star family,” Biden said. “Who the heck does he think he is?
“I’m always cautioned not to lose my temper,” Biden said. “This may be as close as I come in this campaign. It’s just a marker of how deeply the president and I disagree on the role of the president of the United States of America.”
03:06 'My son wasn't a sucker': Joe Biden reacts to report that Trump denigrated soldiers – video
Veteran Chesley “Sully” Sullenberger, the pilot who saved the lives of 155 people in 2009 when he guided his stricken plane onto the Hudson river, said: “For the first time in American history, a president has repeatedly shown utter and vulgar contempt and disrespect for those who have served and died serving our country.”
“While I am not surprised, I am disgusted by the current occupant of the Oval Office. He has repeatedly and consistently shown himself to be completely unfit for and to have no respect for the office he holds.”
On a press call hosted by Biden’s campaign, the Democratic Illinois senator Tammy Duckworth, who lost both her legs in combat in Iraq, accused Trump of attempting to “politicize and pervert our military to stroke his own ego”.
“This is a man who spends every day redefining the concept of narcissism; a man who’s led a life of privilege, with everything handed to him on a silver platter,” she said.
“Of course, he thinks about war selfishly. He thinks of it as a transactional cost, instead of in human lives and American blood spilled, because that’s how he’s viewed his whole life. He doesn’t understand other people’s bravery and courage, because he’s never had any of his own.
“I take my wheelchair, and my titanium legs over Donald Trump’s supposed bone spurs any day,” she added, referring to one reason Trump received draft deferments during the Vietnam war.
The call also included the congressman Conor Lamb, a marine veteran, and Khizr Khan, a Gold Star father whose son was killed by a suicide bomber in Iraq in 2004 and who was himself famously attacked by Trump during the 2016 campaign.
Khan said Trump was “incapable – let me repeat it again – he is incapable of understanding service, valor and courage”.
“His soul cannot conceive of integrity and honor. His soul is that of a coward.”
In an interview with the conservative radio host Hugh Hewitt, Mike Pompeo defended the president’s support of the military.
“I’ve never heard that,” the secretary of state said of Trump allegedly calling the war dead “suckers”.
“Indeed, just the opposite. I’ve been around him in lots of settings where there were both active-duty military, guardsmen, reservists, veterans. This is a man who had the deepest respect for their service, and he always, he always interacted with them in that way. He enjoys those times. He values those people.”
Mr. President, if you don’t respect our troops, you can’t lead them. pic.twitter.com/hcX9hGgdm5 — Joe Biden (@JoeBiden) September 4, 2020
The Biden campaign released a video quoting the president, based on the Atlantic story and later corroborating reports by the Washington Post and the Associated Press. Other media outlets, Fox News among them, also corroborated the Atlantic story.
With the tagline “If you don’t respect our troops, you cannot lead them,” the Biden campaign video displayed the alleged Trump quotes over images of military cemeteries.
At Friday’s briefing, Trump was asked about his past mockery of the late senator John McCain, who served in the military and was a prisoner of war in Vietnam. “I say what I say,” he told reporters. “I disagreed with John McCain on a lot of things. That doesn’t mean I don’t respect him. I respected him but I really disagreed with him on a lot of things and I think I was right. I think time has proven me right to a large extent.”


theguardian--2020-09-05--Trump orders crackdown on federal antiracism training, calling it 'anti-American'

Donald Trump has directed the Office of Management and Budget to crack down on federal agencies ’ antiracism training sessions , calling them “ divisive , anti-American propaganda ” .
The OMB director , Russell Vought , in a letter Friday to executive branch agencies , directed them to identify spending related to any training on “ critical race theory ” , “ white privilege ” or any other material that teaches or suggests that the United States or any race or ethnicity is “ inherently racist or evil ” .
The memo comes as the nation has faced a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ policing and other spheres of American life .
Trump has spent much of the summer defending the display of the Confederate battle flag and monuments of civil war rebels from protesters seeking their removal , in what he has called a “ culture war ” ahead of the 3 November election .
Meanwhile , he has rejected comments from the Democratic nominee , Joe Biden , and others that there is “ systemic racism ” in policing and American culture that must be addressed .
Vought ’ s memo cites “ press reports @ @ @ @ @ @ @ decision , apparently referring to segments on Fox News and other outlets that have stoked conservative outrage about the federal training .
Vought ’ s memo says additional federal guidance on training sessions is forthcoming , maintaining that “ the President , and his Administration , are fully committed to the fair and equal treatment of all individuals in the United States ” .
“ The President has a proven track record of standing for those whose voice has long been ignored and who have failed to benefit from all our country has @ @ @ @ @ @ @ continue to support all Americans , regardless of race , religion , or creed , ” he added .
“ The divisive , false , and demeaning propaganda of the critical race theory movement is contrary to all we stand for as Americans and should have no place in the Federal government .
”

Donald Trump has directed the Office of Management and Budget to crack down on federal agencies’ antiracism training sessions, calling them “divisive, anti-American propaganda”.
The OMB director, Russell Vought, in a letter Friday to executive branch agencies, directed them to identify spending related to any training on “critical race theory”, “white privilege” or any other material that teaches or suggests that the United States or any race or ethnicity is “inherently racist or evil”.
The memo comes as the nation has faced a reckoning this summer over racial injustice in policing and other spheres of American life. Trump has spent much of the summer defending the display of the Confederate battle flag and monuments of civil war rebels from protesters seeking their removal, in what he has called a “culture war” ahead of the 3 November election.
Meanwhile, he has rejected comments from the Democratic nominee, Joe Biden, and others that there is “systemic racism” in policing and American culture that must be addressed.
Vought’s memo cites “press reports” as contributing to Trump’s decision, apparently referring to segments on Fox News and other outlets that have stoked conservative outrage about the federal training.
Vought’s memo says additional federal guidance on training sessions is forthcoming, maintaining that “the President, and his Administration, are fully committed to the fair and equal treatment of all individuals in the United States”.
“The President has a proven track record of standing for those whose voice has long been ignored and who have failed to benefit from all our country has to offer, and he intends to continue to support all Americans, regardless of race, religion, or creed,” he added. “The divisive, false, and demeaning propaganda of the critical race theory movement is contrary to all we stand for as Americans and should have no place in the Federal government.”