washingtontimes--2020-06-15--Miles Yu, Mike Pompeo adviser, helps form China policy

Miles Yu began life in rural China amid the madness of Mao Zedong ’ s Cultural Revolution , when Red Guard zealots roamed the country trashing and killing all vestiges of tradition and capitalism in the country .
Today , he is the principal China policy and planning adviser to Secretary of State Mike Pompeo , a key part of the storied Policy Planning Staff on the seventh floor of the State Department , the apex of American foreign policy located just a few steps from Mr. Pompeo ’ s office .
It ’ s an unlikely journey that has @ @ @ @ @ @ @ up in communist China and now living my American dream , I think the world should be incalculably grateful to America because , as [ President ] Reagan said , America represents ‘ the last best hope of man on Earth , ’ ” Mr. Yu said in an exclusive interview with The Washington Times .
“ And I truly believe that.
” Mr. Pompeo praises Mr. Yu as “ a central part of my team advising me with respect on how to ensure that we protect Americans and secure our freedoms in @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Chinese Communist Party ] .
” The planning office was once headed by George Kennan , author of the “ Mr .
X ” article in 1947 that set the stage for U.S .
Cold War containment policies that ultimately dispatched the Soviet Union to the ash heap of history .
Mr. Yu , who for several years wrote the “ Inside China ” column for The Washington Times , made the journey from China to the United States in 1985 .
As a student , he became an active advocate of freedom @ @ @ @ @ @ @ and crackdown four years later .
After earning a doctorate at the University of California , Berkeley , he took a position as a professor of modern China and military history at the Naval Academy in Annapolis , Maryland .
In the past three years , Mr. Yu has been a powerful behind-the-scenes force within the Trump administration reshaping U.S. policies toward China , which has been redefined as America ’ s most significant strategic adversary .
Mr. Yu calls the new China approach “ principled realism.
” “ Miles Yu is a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Force Brig .
Gen. David Stilwell , assistant secretary of state for East Asia and Pacific affairs .
“ He understands the difference between democratic and authoritarian governance and can explain it better than anyone I know.
” At the White House , Deputy National Security Adviser Matt Pottinger , also a low-key but influential power player on China policy , calls Mr. Yu “ an invaluable resource ” for the Trump administration ’ s foreign policy team .
“ His experience growing up under totalitarianism made him one of its most potent @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Mr. Stilwell said he is most impressed by Mr. Yu ’ s encyclopedic knowledge of U.S. and Chinese doctrine , not only from an academic perspective but also as a policy practitioner .
“ He is a clear-eyed student of the Cold War and the U.S.-China-USSR dynamic .
He understands the importance of culture and ideology in strategy-making , ” Mr. Stilwell said .
Under Mr. Pompeo , Mr. Yu and Mr. Stilwell have formed a small band of China realists who have set about systematically resetting policies that they saw as appeasement @ @ @ @ @ @ @ include Science and Technology Adviser Mung Chiang , a Hong Kong-born engineering professor , and Ambassador Kelley E. Currie , until recently deputy of the U.S. mission to the United Nations .
Mr. Yu , 57 , as the key official for China on the policy planning staff , has been the driving intellectual force in helping Mr. Pompeo and Mr. Stilwell develop and implement President Trump ’ s “ America First ” policies toward China .
As a native Chinese language speaker and a trained analyst , Mr. Yu is one of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Chinese Communist Party-speak .
Better than most other China experts in the U.S. government and on the outside , Mr. Yu has been able to identify hidden vulnerabilities and weaknesses in the Chinese leadership .
For instance , Beijing uses terms such as “ win-win , ” “ mutual respect ” and other Chinese proverbs that Mr. Yu says are “ really hackneyed Chinese expressions with no substance if you really know the Chinese language and culture.
” By exploiting democracy ’ s open and often messy political exchanges , the Chinese Communist @ @ @ @ @ @ @ been able to capture a significant portion of our China policy elite class and let them do China ’ s bidding in the corridors of Western capitals and think tanks , where the U.S. is under constant criticism for our alleged ‘ China bashing ’ and other American sins by ‘ fringe lunatics ’ who have impure and incorrect thoughts about the CCP regime , ” Mr. Yu said .
He said the Trump administration is the first in decades to recognize that Beijing played the “ U.S .
card ” far better @ @ @ @ @ @ @ China card.
” He also argues that the Chinese system is in fact run by a communist party unwilling to be influenced by the outside world and is determined to create a world order of its own .
That system has become a worthy and serious strategic competitor bolstered by a Marxist-Leninist ideology and China-centered nationalism .
The combination , Mr. Yu said , has allowed China to try to place itself as the moral and political center of the world — at the expense of the Western liberal order and democracy .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ outlined in several recent speeches by Mr. Pompeo that notably identified the CCP and not the Chinese people as the problem for bilateral relations .
The secretary of state has bluntly criticized what he sees as Beijing ’ s misbehavior , including cyberattacks , intellectual property theft , territorial aggression in the South China Sea and the repression of more than 1 million ethnic Uighurs in western China .
Mr. Stilwell said Mr. Yu is a key player in regular strategy sessions that help paint a complete picture of situations and how those @ @ @ @ @ @ @ both appreciate China as a people and a culture contrasted with the government of China and the [ Communist Party ] , ” Mr. Stilwell said .
“ His experiences growing up in that system are priceless.
” Mr. Yu was born in eastern Anhui province and grew up in Chongqing , now one of China ’ s megacities .
Starting in 1966 , China under Mao suffered the latest decadelong calamity known as the Cultural Revolution .
History was expunged to conform to communist revolutionary dogma , while thousands of Red Guards @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of people as “ enemies of the state.
” “ Although I was too young to fully experience the political madness , ” Mr. Yu recalled in the interview , “ my childhood innocence was brutally upended by the radical revolution ’ s violence , absurdity , ideological shriek , destruction of life , social trust and public mores , and utter hatred for anything Western or ‘ bourgeois.
’ ” Millions of lives were destroyed during the Cultural Revolution , scholars say .
The Cultural Revolution ended with Mao ’ s demise @ @ @ @ @ @ @ instituted under Deng Xiaoping and other Mao successors .
Under Chinese President Xi Jinping , who is also secretary-general of the CCP , many of the Cultural Revolution ’ s hallmark excesses — including intensifying ideological indoctrination and personality cult around Mr. Xi — are returning to China , critics say .
After graduating from high school , Mr. Yu enrolled in Nankai University in Tianjian in 1979 .
Among his professors were several Americans teaching as part of the Fulbright Scholar exchange program .
“ I soon realized I was wasting my @ @ @ @ @ @ @ dogmatic historical narratives , ” he said .
It was Reagan who inspired him to seek out America .
Mr. Yu secretly listened to some of Reagan ’ s 1980 speeches via the Chinese service of Voice of America .
The presidential candidate seemed to the young Chinese scholar to be the most eloquent Western leader who understood the ideologically driven totalitarian system and why it had been such a massive failure wherever it was tried .
President Reagan , Mr. Yu recalled , “ inspired me to come to America.
” In @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Kennedy International Airport in New York to attend Swarthmore College in Pennsylvania .
During postgraduate study at the University of California , Berkeley , Mr. Yu supported the massive pro-democracy protests that broke out in China in 1989 and resulted in the massacre at Tiananmen Square .
At Berkeley , Mr. Yu became actively involved in organizing like-minded graduate students and helped settle Chinese refugees from Tiananmen in the San Francisco Bay Area .
He also hosted the China Forum , a lecture series that gave voice to key Chinese dissidents , including @ @ @ @ @ @ @ speakers included former Ambassador to China James Lilley , scholar Orville Schell and author Bette Bao Lord .
After earning his doctorate from Berkeley in 1994 , Mr. Yu became a professor at the Naval Academy , where he has taught hundreds of future naval officers on China and military history .
Some of his former students are in China-related positions of responsibility at the Departments of Defense and State and still call him “ Professor Yu.
” “ It ’ s been both an honor and a privilege to teach the defenders @ @ @ @ @ @ @ he said .
“ It completely fulfills my intellectual aspiration inspired by Ronald Reagan back in the early 1980s.
” Although the U.S. has made progress , Mr. Yu said , several key policy ideas about China were wrong until the Trump administration took office .
Ever since the U.S. government opened relations with Beijing in the 1970s , he said , Washington was overconfident about its ability to influence the direction of the relationship .
Cold War policymakers praised the gambit of playing “ the China card ” — moving closer to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Soviet Union .
In reality , Mr. Yu said , it was China playing the U.S. card for its benefits and against American interests .
Next was the U.S. government ’ s frequent failure to distinguish or sufficiently articulate the differences between the Chinese people and the ruling CCP elites , Mr. Yu said .
“ The enthusiastic pursuit of the capitalist , bourgeois lifestyle by the Chinese people in today ’ s China who are increasingly politically apathetic to communist ideology is routinely confused by our policy and cultural elites with the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , whose people exercise total monopoly of political power and who are among the most ideologically intoxicated communists in recent memory , ” Mr. Yu said .
Senior U.S. statements often refer to “ the Chinese , ” failing to make the distinction between the Chinese people and the party-dominated regime .
Another major shortfall , Mr. Yu said , has been the failure of political and policy elites to properly measure Beijing ’ s weaknesses and vulnerabilities and adopt sound policies accordingly .
“ We have unwillingly succumbed to the CCP ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Yu said .
“ For decades , our China policy was carried out based upon an ‘ anger management ’ mode — that is , we formulated our China policy by calculating how mad the CCP might be at us , not what suits the best to American national interest.
” That approach , he said , resulted from a fundamental misunderstanding of China ’ s tactics : First raise the anger and rage level to a maximum level to see how the U.S. reacts .
“ Unfortunately , too often we fell @ @ @ @ @ @ @ China policies to appease CCP sensitivities and fake outrage to avoid an often imagined and exaggerated direct confrontation with the seemingly enraged CCP .
By doing so , we also failed to realize the enormous reputational and realistic advantages and leverage the U.S. has over a dictatorship , ” Mr. Yu said .
In reality , the Chinese regime at its core is fragile and weak , fearful of its own people and utterly paranoid about confrontation from the West , especially the United States , he said .
Private analysts say Mr. @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of China is finally getting its due in U.S. foreign policy .
“ Miles Yu was a voice in the wilderness who for years warned about Chinese imperial agendas , Chinese systematic mercantile theft and cheating , and Chinese communist thuggery , ” said the Hoover Institution ’ s Victor Davis Hanson .
“ The nation is finally listening to him and a few others who share his prescience — and his rise in stature is one of the most important developments in U.S. policy toward China in the last 20 years , @ @ @ @

Miles Yu began life in rural China amid the madness of Mao Zedong’s Cultural Revolution, when Red Guard zealots roamed the country trashing and killing all vestiges of tradition and capitalism in the country.
Today, he is the principal China policy and planning adviser to Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, a key part of the storied Policy Planning Staff on the seventh floor of the State Department, the apex of American foreign policy located just a few steps from Mr. Pompeo’s office.
It’s an unlikely journey that has affected him deeply.
“Having grown up in communist China and now living my American dream, I think the world should be incalculably grateful to America because, as [President] Reagan said, America represents ‘the last best hope of man on Earth,’” Mr. Yu said in an exclusive interview with The Washington Times. “And I truly believe that.”
Mr. Pompeo praises Mr. Yu as “a central part of my team advising me with respect on how to ensure that we protect Americans and secure our freedoms in the face of challenges from the [Chinese Communist Party].”
The planning office was once headed by George Kennan, author of the “Mr. X” article in 1947 that set the stage for U.S. Cold War containment policies that ultimately dispatched the Soviet Union to the ash heap of history.
SEE ALSO: Miles Yu, Mike Pompeo adviser, discusses Reagan inspiration, China Cultural Revolution
Mr. Yu, who for several years wrote the “Inside China” column for The Washington Times, made the journey from China to the United States in 1985. As a student, he became an active advocate of freedom and democracy after the Tiananmen Square protests and crackdown four years later.
After earning a doctorate at the University of California, Berkeley, he took a position as a professor of modern China and military history at the Naval Academy in Annapolis, Maryland.
Key policymaker
In the past three years, Mr. Yu has been a powerful behind-the-scenes force within the Trump administration reshaping U.S. policies toward China, which has been redefined as America’s most significant strategic adversary. Mr. Yu calls the new China approach “principled realism.”
“Miles Yu is a national treasure,” said retired Air Force Brig. Gen. David Stilwell, assistant secretary of state for East Asia and Pacific affairs. “He understands the difference between democratic and authoritarian governance and can explain it better than anyone I know.”
At the White House, Deputy National Security Adviser Matt Pottinger, also a low-key but influential power player on China policy, calls Mr. Yu “an invaluable resource” for the Trump administration’s foreign policy team.
“His experience growing up under totalitarianism made him one of its most potent foes,” Mr. Pottinger said.
Mr. Stilwell said he is most impressed by Mr. Yu’s encyclopedic knowledge of U.S. and Chinese doctrine, not only from an academic perspective but also as a policy practitioner.
“He is a clear-eyed student of the Cold War and the U.S.-China-USSR dynamic. He understands the importance of culture and ideology in strategy-making,” Mr. Stilwell said.
Under Mr. Pompeo, Mr. Yu and Mr. Stilwell have formed a small band of China realists who have set about systematically resetting policies that they saw as appeasement toward Beijing.
Others on the team include Science and Technology Adviser Mung Chiang, a Hong Kong-born engineering professor, and Ambassador Kelley E. Currie, until recently deputy of the U.S. mission to the United Nations.
Mr. Yu, 57, as the key official for China on the policy planning staff, has been the driving intellectual force in helping Mr. Pompeo and Mr. Stilwell develop and implement President Trump’s “America First” policies toward China.
As a native Chinese language speaker and a trained analyst, Mr. Yu is one of the few high-ranking officials capable of decoding Chinese Communist Party-speak. Better than most other China experts in the U.S. government and on the outside, Mr. Yu has been able to identify hidden vulnerabilities and weaknesses in the Chinese leadership.
For instance, Beijing uses terms such as “win-win,” “mutual respect” and other Chinese proverbs that Mr. Yu says are “really hackneyed Chinese expressions with no substance if you really know the Chinese language and culture.”
By exploiting democracy’s open and often messy political exchanges, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) leadership “has been able to capture a significant portion of our China policy elite class and let them do China’s bidding in the corridors of Western capitals and think tanks, where the U.S. is under constant criticism for our alleged ‘China bashing’ and other American sins by ‘fringe lunatics’ who have impure and incorrect thoughts about the CCP regime,” Mr. Yu said.
He said the Trump administration is the first in decades to recognize that Beijing played the “U.S. card” far better than the United States played the “China card.” He also argues that the Chinese system is in fact run by a communist party unwilling to be influenced by the outside world and is determined to create a world order of its own.
That system has become a worthy and serious strategic competitor bolstered by a Marxist-Leninist ideology and China-centered nationalism. The combination, Mr. Yu said, has allowed China to try to place itself as the moral and political center of the world — at the expense of the Western liberal order and democracy.
The new State Department approach has been outlined in several recent speeches by Mr. Pompeo that notably identified the CCP and not the Chinese people as the problem for bilateral relations.
The secretary of state has bluntly criticized what he sees as Beijing’s misbehavior, including cyberattacks, intellectual property theft, territorial aggression in the South China Sea and the repression of more than 1 million ethnic Uighurs in western China.
Mr. Stilwell said Mr. Yu is a key player in regular strategy sessions that help paint a complete picture of situations and how those situations have been created.
“We both appreciate China as a people and a culture contrasted with the government of China and the [Communist Party],” Mr. Stilwell said. “His experiences growing up in that system are priceless.”
A Chinese boyhood
Mr. Yu was born in eastern Anhui province and grew up in Chongqing, now one of China’s megacities. Starting in 1966, China under Mao suffered the latest decadelong calamity known as the Cultural Revolution.
History was expunged to conform to communist revolutionary dogma, while thousands of Red Guards took to the streets to identify millions of people as “enemies of the state.”
“Although I was too young to fully experience the political madness,” Mr. Yu recalled in the interview, “my childhood innocence was brutally upended by the radical revolution’s violence, absurdity, ideological shriek, destruction of life, social trust and public mores, and utter hatred for anything Western or ‘bourgeois.’”
Millions of lives were destroyed during the Cultural Revolution, scholars say.
The Cultural Revolution ended with Mao’s demise in 1976, and reform-style communism was instituted under Deng Xiaoping and other Mao successors. Under Chinese President Xi Jinping, who is also secretary-general of the CCP, many of the Cultural Revolution’s hallmark excesses — including intensifying ideological indoctrination and personality cult around Mr. Xi — are returning to China, critics say.
Inspired by Reagan
After graduating from high school, Mr. Yu enrolled in Nankai University in Tianjian in 1979. Among his professors were several Americans teaching as part of the Fulbright Scholar exchange program.
“I soon realized I was wasting my time studying the mandatory dialectical materialism and dogmatic historical narratives,” he said.
It was Reagan who inspired him to seek out America. Mr. Yu secretly listened to some of Reagan’s 1980 speeches via the Chinese service of Voice of America. The presidential candidate seemed to the young Chinese scholar to be the most eloquent Western leader who understood the ideologically driven totalitarian system and why it had been such a massive failure wherever it was tried.
President Reagan, Mr. Yu recalled, “inspired me to come to America.”
In 1985, he arrived at John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York to attend Swarthmore College in Pennsylvania. During postgraduate study at the University of California, Berkeley, Mr. Yu supported the massive pro-democracy protests that broke out in China in 1989 and resulted in the massacre at Tiananmen Square.
At Berkeley, Mr. Yu became actively involved in organizing like-minded graduate students and helped settle Chinese refugees from Tiananmen in the San Francisco Bay Area.
He also hosted the China Forum, a lecture series that gave voice to key Chinese dissidents, including Harry Wu and Fang Lizhi. Other speakers included former Ambassador to China James Lilley, scholar Orville Schell and author Bette Bao Lord.
After earning his doctorate from Berkeley in 1994, Mr. Yu became a professor at the Naval Academy, where he has taught hundreds of future naval officers on China and military history. Some of his former students are in China-related positions of responsibility at the Departments of Defense and State and still call him “Professor Yu.”
“It’s been both an honor and a privilege to teach the defenders of American liberty and democracy,” he said. “It completely fulfills my intellectual aspiration inspired by Ronald Reagan back in the early 1980s.”
Understanding China
Although the U.S. has made progress, Mr. Yu said, several key policy ideas about China were wrong until the Trump administration took office.
Ever since the U.S. government opened relations with Beijing in the 1970s, he said, Washington was overconfident about its ability to influence the direction of the relationship.
Cold War policymakers praised the gambit of playing “the China card” — moving closer to Beijing in a bid to undermine the Soviet Union. In reality, Mr. Yu said, it was China playing the U.S. card for its benefits and against American interests.
Next was the U.S. government’s frequent failure to distinguish or sufficiently articulate the differences between the Chinese people and the ruling CCP elites, Mr. Yu said.
“The enthusiastic pursuit of the capitalist, bourgeois lifestyle by the Chinese people in today’s China who are increasingly politically apathetic to communist ideology is routinely confused by our policy and cultural elites with the rigid and dogmatic Marxist-Leninist CCP inner core, whose people exercise total monopoly of political power and who are among the most ideologically intoxicated communists in recent memory,” Mr. Yu said.
Senior U.S. statements often refer to “the Chinese,” failing to make the distinction between the Chinese people and the party-dominated regime.
Another major shortfall, Mr. Yu said, has been the failure of political and policy elites to properly measure Beijing’s weaknesses and vulnerabilities and adopt sound policies accordingly.
“We have unwillingly succumbed to the CCP’s often blistering bluffs,” Mr. Yu said. “For decades, our China policy was carried out based upon an ‘anger management’ mode — that is, we formulated our China policy by calculating how mad the CCP might be at us, not what suits the best to American national interest.”
That approach, he said, resulted from a fundamental misunderstanding of China’s tactics: First raise the anger and rage level to a maximum level to see how the U.S. reacts.
“Unfortunately, too often we fell for this CCP sophistry and made our China policies to appease CCP sensitivities and fake outrage to avoid an often imagined and exaggerated direct confrontation with the seemingly enraged CCP. By doing so, we also failed to realize the enormous reputational and realistic advantages and leverage the U.S. has over a dictatorship,” Mr. Yu said.
In reality, the Chinese regime at its core is fragile and weak, fearful of its own people and utterly paranoid about confrontation from the West, especially the United States, he said.
Private analysts say Mr. Yu’s hardheaded, realistic appraisal of China is finally getting its due in U.S. foreign policy.
“Miles Yu was a voice in the wilderness who for years warned about Chinese imperial agendas, Chinese systematic mercantile theft and cheating, and Chinese communist thuggery,” said the Hoover Institution’s Victor Davis Hanson.
“The nation is finally listening to him and a few others who share his prescience — and his rise in stature is one of the most important developments in U.S. policy toward China in the last 20 years,” he said.
• Bill Gertz can be reached at bgertz@washingtontimes.com.


washingtontimes--2020-06-15--Woman, dog found dead in lake

Woman, dog found dead in lake

WESTON , Fla. ( AP ) - Florida deputies are investigating after a Florida woman and her dog were found @ @ @ @ @ her home , authorities said .
Ilba Dickey , 62 , was found in a @ @ @ @ @ , according to a Broward Sheriff ’ s Office news release .
Deputies responded to @ @ @ @ @ a.m. after the woman ’ s husband called to report her missing .
The husband @ @ @ @ @ his dog floating in the lake , along with a pair of his wife ’ @ @ @ @ @ ’ s office dive team responded and removed the woman from the water .
Investigators @ @ @ @ @ of trauma .
The Broward County Medical Examiner ’ s Office will conduct an autopsy @ @ @ @ @ death .

WESTON, Fla. (AP) - Florida deputies are investigating after a Florida woman and her dog were found dead in a lake near her home, authorities said.
Ilba Dickey, 62, was found in a Weston lake early Monday morning, according to a Broward Sheriff’s Office news release.
Deputies responded to the neighborhood shortly before 3 a.m. after the woman’s husband called to report her missing. The husband told deputies that he saw his dog floating in the lake, along with a pair of his wife’s sandals. The sheriff’s office dive team responded and removed the woman from the water. Investigators did not see any signs of trauma.
The Broward County Medical Examiner’s Office will conduct an autopsy to determine the cause of death.


washingtontimes--2020-06-15--Police to anonymous tipster: please get back in touch

ALEXANDRIA , La .
( AP ) - Police in a central Louisiana city are asking an anonymous tipster to get back in touch with more information about the shooting death of a gay black man .
An Alexandria Police Department spokesman declined on Monday to say whether the tipster has done so since the request went out in a brief Facebook post Friday about the death of 29-year-old McKinsley Lincoln .
Releasing any specific information might compromise the investigation and any future prosecution , Sgt .
Josh Peppers , a department spokesman , said in an email .
Friday @ @ @ @ @ @ @ person who submitted a recent anonymous tip to “ please contact the detective division as more information is needed to assist in solving this case .
You may continue to remain anonymous.
” News agencies report that Lincoln ’ s body was found May 15 on a street where a caller had reported an injured man .
A department Facebook post that day did not identify him by name .
Lincoln ’ s family , which had filed a missing persons report earlier that day , became frustrated with police , the National @ @ @ @ @ @ @ news release four days later .
“ McKinsley is an openly gay man and was the target of harassment and discrimination , ” his mother , Pamela Lincoln , told the civil rights group for black LGBTQ and same gender loving people .
According to the group ’ s statement , neighbors told Lincoln ’ s family that the death being reported on the news might be their son ’ s .
Peppers said the department “ is actively and fervently working all aspects of Mr. Lincoln ’ s unfortunate death .
We @ @ @ @ @ @ @ process any information that is brought forth.
” Asked whether his death is being investigated as a hate crime , he wrote , “ All aspects of any criminality are being considered to include the possibility of hate crime involvement .
”

ALEXANDRIA, La. (AP) - Police in a central Louisiana city are asking an anonymous tipster to get back in touch with more information about the shooting death of a gay black man.
An Alexandria Police Department spokesman declined on Monday to say whether the tipster has done so since the request went out in a brief Facebook post Friday about the death of 29-year-old McKinsley Lincoln. Releasing any specific information might compromise the investigation and any future prosecution, Sgt. Josh Peppers, a department spokesman, said in an email.
Friday’s statement asked the person or person who submitted a recent anonymous tip to “please contact the detective division as more information is needed to assist in solving this case. You may continue to remain anonymous.”
News agencies report that Lincoln’s body was found May 15 on a street where a caller had reported an injured man. A department Facebook post that day did not identify him by name.
Lincoln’s family, which had filed a missing persons report earlier that day, became frustrated with police, the National Coalition for Black Justice said in a news release four days later.
“McKinsley is an openly gay man and was the target of harassment and discrimination,” his mother, Pamela Lincoln, told the civil rights group for black LGBTQ and same gender loving people.
According to the group’s statement, neighbors told Lincoln’s family that the death being reported on the news might be their son’s.
Peppers said the department “is actively and fervently working all aspects of Mr. Lincoln’s unfortunate death. We are working to exhaust every lead and process any information that is brought forth.”
Asked whether his death is being investigated as a hate crime, he wrote, “All aspects of any criminality are being considered to include the possibility of hate crime involvement.”


washingtontimes--2020-06-15--Oklahoma sees 186 new coronavirus cases, no new deaths

OKLAHOMA CITY ( AP ) - Oklahoma health officials reported 186 new coronavirus cases Monday with no new deaths due @ @ @ @ @ caused by the virus .
There are now 8,417 confirmed cases with the total death @ @ @ @ @ The health department says 6,578 people have recovered .
The actual number of people who @ @ @ @ @ likely higher because many people have not been tested , and studies suggest people can @ @ @ @ @ sick .
For most people , the coronavirus causes mild or moderate symptoms that clear @ @ @ @ @ for others , especially older adults and people with existing health problems , the highly @ @ @ @ @ symptoms and be fatal .

OKLAHOMA CITY (AP) - Oklahoma health officials reported 186 new coronavirus cases Monday with no new deaths due to COVID-19, the disease caused by the virus.
There are now 8,417 confirmed cases with the total death toll unchanged at 359. The health department says 6,578 people have recovered. The actual number of people who have contracted the virus is likely higher because many people have not been tested, and studies suggest people can be infected and not feel sick.
For most people, the coronavirus causes mild or moderate symptoms that clear up within weeks. But for others, especially older adults and people with existing health problems, the highly contagious virus can cause severe symptoms and be fatal.


washingtontimes--2020-06-15--Donald Trump black outreach threatened by coronavirus, George Floyd protests

When President Trump ascended the dais in the House of Representatives in February to address Congress , one might be forgiven for thinking he was delivering the Black State of the Union address .
From the guests sitting next to the first lady to the plaudits Mr. Trump rained on himself , his mission was clear : Black voters should take a chance on backing him in November .
He pointed to two African-Americans he freed from prison , announced a school choice scholarship he was giving to a black fourth-grader from Philadelphia , promoted a 100-year-old Tuskegee airman to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ took a victory lap on low black unemployment and higher funding for historically black colleges and universities .
It ’ s all part of his “ what the hell do you have to lose ” challenge to black voters , and at the time it had some Democrats concerned it might work , at least enough to eat into the massive black vote their party counts on in each election .
A shift of a few percentage points in Rust Belt states could be enough to solidify Mr. Trump ’ s 2016 margins @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ’ s hopes are on shakier ground .
Coronavirus has devastated the economy and hit particularly hard among black Americans , and the killing of George Floyd at the knee of a Minneapolis police officer ignited a new civil rights movement , leaving the president ’ s arguments looking anachronistic at best .
Yet Mr. Trump and his team believe the fundamentals haven ’ t changed .
“ When he says , ‘ What the hell do you have to lose , ’ you ’ ve got to look at where we were @ @ @ @ @ @ @ COVID .
That ’ s proof .
The numbers don ’ t lie , ” said Bruce LeVell , an early and staunch defender of Mr. Trump and executive director of his national diversity coalition .
“ Don ’ t get caught in the emotions , pay attention to the numbers.
” The president has written his own report card for judging his accomplishments for the black community : poverty level , schools , jobs , income , homeownership and crime .
For many of those yardsticks , it ’ s too soon @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Department ’ s current data on school choice runs only through the 2016-2017 school year , just as Mr. Trump was taking office .
On poverty and income , the Census Bureau ’ s data runs through 2018 — and both measures showed improvements in Mr. Trump ’ s first years .
For example , median black family income was $ 41,361 in 2018 , up 2.7 % in one year , making it the second best year on record .
The record was set in 2000 , just before the dot-com bubble @ @ @ @ @ @ @ years , but the Great Recession pummeled them once again , and they are just now nearing the previous peak .
The most recent federal crime victim data is for 2018 , and it shows an increase in black victims of violent crime over his first two years , from 377,950 in 2016 to 416,850 in 2018 .
But even the president ’ s most fervent detractors acknowledge his steps to free black prisoners .
During his State of the Union address , he highlighted Alice Johnson , a great-grandmother whom he freed @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Matthew Charles , the first person released after Mr. Trump signed the First Step Act , a major overhaul of criminal sentencing .
Over time , the law is projected to cut federal prison populations by tens of thousands of people — and in its first year had already accrued a sizable downpayment , reducing sentences for 2,377 inmates .
Of those , 2,172 — 91 % — were black .
That should have been a major coup for Mr. Trump when he signed the law in December 2018 .
Yet he stepped @ @ @ @ @ @ @ pushed the government into a partial shutdown in a feud with Congress over funding for his border wall .
The bipartisan bill signing became a footnote amid the shutdown chaos .
Mr. Trump , in his State of the Union , also took a victory lap on Opportunity Zones , part of the GOP ’ s 2017 tax overhaul , which is intended to siphon investors ’ cash into low-income neighborhoods .
Mr. Trump pointed to a black Army vet in the first lady ’ s box , saying Tony Rankin had kicked @ @ @ @ @ @ @ job thanks to Opportunity Zone investment .
Though just two years old , the Opportunity Zone program had spawned 502 qualified funds as of January , according to the Novogradac Opportunity Funds Listing .
That report said investments totaled at least $ 6.72 billion .
Mr. Trump has mistakenly claimed that black homeownership is at record levels .
In fact , it peaked in 2004 at just shy of 50 % , and has been mostly downhill since then , bottoming out at 40.6 % in the first half of last year .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ rebounding to 44 % at the beginning of this year , though it ’ s not clear what effect the coronavirus has had since then .
Mr. Trump ’ s favorite selling point to black voters is their unemployment rate , which had fallen all the way to 5.1 % last year — the lowest on record .
That meant 19.5 million black workers holding jobs , or 1.3 million more than when President Obama left at the end of 2016 .
The coronavirus recession wiped out those gains and more , cutting @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to just 16.5 million .
Whatever the objective strength of Mr. Trump ’ s economic argument was , few black voters appear to be buying it now .
A YouGov survey taken at the beginning of this month asked whether Mr. Trump cared about “ the needs and problems of African-Americans.
” Just 4 % of the black voters surveyed said Mr. Trump cares “ a lot ” about their needs and problems , and another 8 % said he cares “ some.
” A stunning 64 % said he cares “ not @ @ @ @ @ @ @ % said Democrats ’ likely nominee , Joseph R. Biden , cares “ a lot ” or “ some.
” It ’ s easy to pinpoint reasons : His crusade to falsely claim Mr. Obama wasn ’ t born in Hawaii , or his assurance that there were “ good people ” among the crowd defending a Robert E. Lee statue in Charlottesville , Virginia , in 2017 , or his labeling of some African nations as “ s—hole ” nations , or his bizarre feud last year with Rep. Elijah Cummings , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ his district “ disgusting , rat and rodent-infested.
” Mr. Trump and his team , though , had been convinced a strong economy would overcome those misgivings .
“ It ’ s like with anything — you look back at where you were and where you are now , ” Mr. LeVell said .
“ Most common-sense people are going to say , you know , if it ’ s not broke , why fix it .
People are going to look beyond all the noise and chatter and say I ’ ve @ @ @ @ @ @ @ got employment.
” Theodore R. Johnson , who studies race and politics as a senior fellow at the Brennan Center for Justice , said that is a miscalculation .
The economic gains for black Americans seemed more happenstance than because of any concerted effort , or as Mr. Johnson put it , “ a propitious outcome from policies intended to appeal to other voters.
” “ None of the gains were presented during the policy formulation phase as being crafted with black voters in mind or directly responding to their needs .
So @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , home ownership , etc .
– it comes across as residual benefits or accidental gains instead of deliberate ones , ” he said .
Plus , he said , Mr. Trump is a Republican , and whatever his own personality and rhetoric , the GOP ’ s brand “ is so damaged in eyes of black voters that there ’ s very little any Republican candidate — much less President Trump — could do to win over black voters without a much deeper and sustained commitment to engage the black electorate.
” @ @ @ @ @ @ @ at Bowdoin College , has studied that exact issue and wrote a book , “ Steadfast Democrats , ” that examines the social pressures that push even conservative black voters to identify and cast ballots as Democrats .
She said Mr. Trump ’ s opening to convert black voters was always going to be small .
“ He ’ s not Donald Trump the businessman .
He is Donald Trump the Republican candidate , ” she said .
Ms. Laird said Mr. Trump had opportunities to make more specific appeals to black voters @ @ @ @ @ @ @ have announced a specific minority focus for some of the Paycheck Protection Program money doled out to small businesses , she said .
That might have played well with the black entrepreneurs most receptive to his message .
Instead , those entrepreneurs read news reports about many black-owned businesses getting shut out of the program because they didn ’ t have the same long-standing relationships with banks as other businesses .
The president ’ s years of commentary , so much of it offensive to so many people , also hurt .
Ms. @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to moderate his rhetoric .
“ He could .
He ’ s not , ” she said .
“ People would want to hear that from him , I think.
” Even Mr. Trump ’ s “ What do you have to lose ” argument falls flat when voters look at the coronavirus economy and the aftermath of the Floyd killing , Ms. Laird said .
In 2016 , Mr. Trump won 8 % of the black vote , according to the Roper Center for Public Opinion Research .
That was better than @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in 2012 — both of whom were running against Mr. Obama , who became the nation ’ s first black president .
But the 8 % was lower than every other GOP candidate Roper tracked going back to 1976 , the high-water mark for Republicans , when Gerald Ford won 17 % of the black vote .
Ms. Laird said Mr. Trump ’ s real target with his appeal to black voters may be suburban white women , who have been alienated by the GOP ’ s increasingly strident rhetoric .
Mr. Trump @ @ @ @ @ @ @ believe he should be rewarded for an economic surge that has helped black voters .
President George W. Bush made a similar case during his tenure at the beginning of the century , bragging to audiences about the soaring rate of black homeownership during his tenure .
In his Texas twang , he would mimic the greeting he imagined millions of families were saying : “ I love the idea when somebody opens up the door of their house and says , ‘ Welcome to my home ; welcome to my piece of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ 9 % of the African-American vote in 2000 to 11 % in 2004 .
Black homeownership rates did peak that re-election year , at 49.7 % .
The rate then began a steady slide that Mr. Trump had finally halted , dipping to 40.6 % last year before rebounding sharply .

When President Trump ascended the dais in the House of Representatives in February to address Congress, one might be forgiven for thinking he was delivering the Black State of the Union address.
From the guests sitting next to the first lady to the plaudits Mr. Trump rained on himself, his mission was clear: Black voters should take a chance on backing him in November.
He pointed to two black people he freed from prison, announced a school choice scholarship he was giving to a black fourth-grader from Philadelphia, promoted a 100-year-old Tuskegee airman to the rank of brigadier general, and took a victory lap on low black unemployment and higher funding for historically black colleges and universities.
It’s all part of his “What the hell do you have to lose” challenge to black voters, and at the time it had some Democrats concerned it might work, at least enough to eat into the massive black vote their party counts on in each election. A shift of a few percentage points in Rust Belt states could be enough to solidify Mr. Trump’s 2016 margins.
Four months later, Mr. Trump’s hopes are on shakier ground.
The COVID-19 pandemic has devastated the economy and hit particularly hard among black Americans, and the death of George Floyd while in the custody of Minneapolis police ignited a new civil rights movement, leaving the president’s arguments looking anachronistic at best.
DOCUMENT: How black Americans are faring under Trump
Yet Mr. Trump and his team believe the fundamentals haven’t changed.
“When he says, ‘What the hell do you have to lose,’ you’ve got to look at where we were and where we landed before the COVID. That’s proof. The numbers don’t lie,” said Bruce LeVell, an early and staunch defender of Mr. Trump and executive director of his national diversity coalition. “Don’t get caught in the emotions; pay attention to the numbers.”
The president has written his own report card for his accomplishments for the black community: poverty level, schools, jobs, income, homeownership and crime.
For many of those yardsticks, it’s too soon to grade Mr. Trump.
The Education Department’s data on school choice runs only through the 2016-2017 school year, just as Mr. Trump was taking office.
On poverty and income, the Census Bureau’s data runs through 2018, and both measures showed improvements in Mr. Trump’s first years. Median black family income was $41,361 in 2018, up 2.7% in one year, making it the second-best year on record.
The record was set in 2000, just before the dot-com bubble burst. Incomes rebounded over the subsequent years, but the Great Recession pummeled them once again, and they are just now nearing the previous peak.
The most recent federal crime victim data is for 2018, and it shows an increase in black victims of violent crime over the president’s first two years, from 377,950 in 2016 to 416,850 in 2018.
But even Mr. Trump’s most fervent detractors acknowledge his steps to free black prisoners.
During his State of the Union address, he highlighted Alice Johnson, a great-grandmother whom he freed from prison with a commutation, and Matthew Charles, the first person released after Mr. Trump signed the First Step Act, a major overhaul of criminal sentencing.
Over time, the law is projected to cut federal prison populations by tens of thousands of people and in its first year accrued a sizable down payment by reducing sentences for 2,377 inmates. Of those, 2,172 — 91% — were black.
That should have been a major coup for Mr. Trump when he signed the bill into law in December 2018.
Yet he stepped on his own messaging, having just pushed the government into a partial shutdown in a feud with Congress over funding for his border wall. The bipartisan bill-signing became a footnote amid the shutdown chaos.
Mr. Trump, in his State of the Union address, also took a victory lap on Opportunity Zones, part of the Republicans’ 2017 tax overhaul, which is intended to siphon investors’ cash into low-income neighborhoods. Mr. Trump pointed to a black Army veteran in the first lady’s box and said Tony Rankin had kicked a drug habit and landed a construction job thanks to Opportunity Zone investment.
Though just 2 years old, the Opportunity Zone program had spawned 502 qualified funds as of January, according to the Novogradac Opportunity Funds Listing. That report said investments totaled at least $6.72 billion.
Mr. Trump has mistakenly claimed that black homeownership is at record levels. In fact, it peaked in 2004 at just shy of 50% and has been mostly downhill since then, bottoming out at 40.6% in the first half of last year.
But it then began to surge, rebounding to 44% at the beginning of this year, though it’s not clear what effect the coronavirus outbreak has had.
Mr. Trump’s favorite selling point to black voters is their unemployment rate, which had fallen to 5.1% last year — the lowest on record. That meant 19.5 million black workers holding jobs, 1.3 million more than when President Obama prepared to leave office at the end of 2016.
The coronavirus recession wiped out those gains and more, cutting the number of black workers holding jobs to just 16.5 million.
Whatever the objective strength of Mr. Trump’s economic argument was, few black voters appear to be buying it now.
A YouGov survey taken at the beginning of this month asked whether Mr. Trump cared about “the needs and problems of African-Americans.” Just 4% of the black voters surveyed said Mr. Trump cares “a lot” about their needs and problems, and another 8% said he cares “some.” A stunning 64% said he cares “not at all.”
By contrast, 72% said presumptive Democratic nominee Joseph R. Biden cares “a lot” or “some.”
It’s easy to pinpoint reasons: His crusade to falsely claim Mr. Obama wasn’t born in Hawaii, or his assurance that there were “good people” among the crowd defending a Robert E. Lee statue in Charlottesville, Virginia, in 2017, or his labeling of some African nations as “s—-hole” nations, or his bizarre feud last year with Rep. Elijah E. Cummings, a black Democrat from Baltimore, calling his district “disgusting, rat and rodent-infested.”
Mr. Trump and his team, though, were convinced a strong economy would overcome those misgivings.
“It’s like with anything — you look back at where you were and where you are now,” Mr. LeVell said. “Most common-sense people are going to say, ‘You know, if it’s not broke, why fix it?’ People are going to look beyond all the noise and chatter and say, ‘I’ve got a job, I’ve got employment.’”
Theodore R. Johnson, who studies race and politics as a senior fellow at the Brennan Center for Justice, said that is a miscalculation.
The economic gains for black Americans seemed more happenstance than the result of any concerted effort, or as Mr. Johnson put it, “a propitious outcome from policies intended to appeal to other voters.”
“None of the gains were presented during the policy formulation phase as being crafted with black voters in mind or directly responding to their needs. So when good things happened — lower unemployment, homeownership, etc. — it comes across as residual benefits or accidental gains instead of deliberate ones,” he said.
Plus, he said, Mr. Trump is a Republican, and whatever his own personality and rhetoric, the Republican Party’s brand “is so damaged in eyes of black voters that there’s very little any Republican candidate — much less President Trump — could do to win over black voters without a much deeper and sustained commitment to engage the black electorate.”
Chryl N. Laird, an assistant professor at Bowdoin College, has studied that exact issue and wrote a book, “Steadfast Democrats,” that examines the social pressures that push even conservative black voters to identify and cast ballots as Democrats.
She said Mr. Trump’s opening to convert black voters was always going to be small.
“He’s not Donald Trump the businessman. He is Donald Trump the Republican candidate,” she said.
Ms. Laird said Mr. Trump had opportunities to make more specific appeals to black voters. During the coronavirus crisis, he could have announced a specific minority focus for some of the Paycheck Protection Program money doled out to small businesses, she said. That might have played well with the black entrepreneurs most receptive to his message.
Instead, those entrepreneurs read news reports about many black-owned businesses getting shut out of the program because they didn’t have the same long-standing relationships with banks as other businesses.
The president’s years of commentary, so much of it offensive to so many people, also hurt. Ms. Laird said Mr. Trump had plenty of chances to moderate his rhetoric.
“He could. He’s not,” she said. “People would want to hear that from him, I think.”
Even Mr. Trump’s “What do you have to lose” argument falls flat when voters look at the coronavirus economy and the aftermath of Floyd’s death, Ms. Laird said.
In 2016, Mr. Trump won 8% of the black vote, according to the Roper Center for Public Opinion Research. That was better than John McCain in 2008 and Mitt Romney in 2012 — both of whom were running against Mr. Obama, who became the nation’s first black president.
But the 8% was lower than every other Republican candidate Roper tracked going back to 1976, the high-water mark for Republicans, when Gerald Ford won 17% of the black vote.
Ms. Laird said Mr. Trump’s real target with his appeal to black voters may be suburban white women, who have been alienated by the Republican Party’s increasingly strident rhetoric.
Mr. Trump isn’t the first Republican to believe he should be rewarded for an economic surge that has helped black voters.
President George W. Bush made a similar case during his tenure at the beginning of the century, bragging to audiences about the soaring rate of black homeownership during his tenure.
In his Texas twang, he would mimic the greeting he imagined millions of families were saying: “I love the idea when somebody opens up the door of their house and says, ‘Welcome to my home; welcome to my piece of property.’”
Mr. Bush climbed from 9% of the black vote in 2000 to 11% in 2004.
Black homeownership rates did peak that reelection year, at 49.7%. The rate then began a steady slide that Mr. Trump finally halted, dipping to 40.6% last year before rebounding sharply.
• Stephen Dinan can be reached at sdinan@washingtontimes.com.


washingtontimes--2020-06-15--Kevin Stitt, Oklahoma governor, seeks larger venue for Donald Trump Tulsa rally

OKLAHOMA CITY — So many people have expressed an interest in attending President Donald Trump ’ s rally Saturday in Tulsa , Oklahoma , that the governor said he ’ s asked the campaign to consider a larger , outdoor venue to accommodate them .
Gov .
Kevin Stitt said Monday after talking with Trump and Vice President Mike Pence that nearly one million people have requested tickets to the event .
Some Trump supporters have already started waiting in line outside the 19,000-seat BOK Center in downtown Tulsa .
“ We ’ re excited we ’ re being recognized @ @ @ @ @ @ @ safely and measurably reopen , ” Stitt told reporters Monday .
“ I ’ m looking for a potential other venue that maybe we could move it outside .
It ’ s still kind of in the works.
” Stitt , who plans to introduce Trump at Saturday ’ s rally , said he also asked Trump and Pence to join him on a tour of the city ’ s Greenwood District , once home to a prosperous African American community dubbed Black Wall Street that was burned to the ground during a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ as many as 300 people dead .
The Trump campaign initially planned to hold the rally on Friday , which is Juneteenth , a celebration of the end of slavery in the United States , but agreed to move the date to Saturday at the request of Stitt and others .
The Trump campaign didn ’ t immediately respond to a request for comment on whether they ’ re considering moving the event to a larger venue or accepting Stitt ’ s invitation to tour the Greenwood District .
Health officials , including @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , have voiced concerns about having so many people in a confined space , noting both the state and Tulsa have seen daily highs in the number of positive cases in recent days .
Oklahoma County Republican Party Chairman David McLain said Monday that the Trump campaign intends to fill every one of the venue ’ s seats .
He said the campaign also intends to provide masks to every person who attends , although he said there won ’ t be a requirement to wear one .
“ I haven ’ t @ @ @ @ @ @ @ wearing at this point , ” McLain said , “ but that ’ s fluid and could possibly change.
” Social distancing is still encouraged in Oklahoma but there ’ s no prohibition on large gatherings .
There have been more than 8,400 confirmed positive cases of COVID-19 and 359 total deaths in Oklahoma from the disease , more than half of which have been residents of nursing homes or long-term care facilities .
Oklahoma began allowing some businesses , like hair salons , pet groomers and spas , to reopen on April @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
The state has since moved into its third phase of reopening , with virtually no restrictions on businesses .
While acknowledging the state has seen a recent surge in the number of people testing positive for the coronavirus , Stitt said much of that is due to an increase in testing .
He also said only 150 people are currently hospitalized due to COVID-19 and that the state has plenty of hospital capacity .
“ We need to continue to be vigilant and continue to take precautions , ” Stitt said , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ how to deal with COVID , because it ’ s in the United States , it ’ s in Oklahoma , and we can ’ t let it dictate our lives .
”

OKLAHOMA CITY — So many people have expressed an interest in attending President Donald Trump’s rally Saturday in Tulsa, Oklahoma, that the governor said he’s asked the campaign to consider a larger, outdoor venue to accommodate them.
Gov. Kevin Stitt said Monday after talking with Trump and Vice President Mike Pence that nearly one million people have requested tickets to the event. Some Trump supporters have already started waiting in line outside the 19,000-seat BOK Center in downtown Tulsa.
“We’re excited we’re being recognized as one of the first states to safely and measurably reopen,” Stitt told reporters Monday. “I’m looking for a potential other venue that maybe we could move it outside. It’s still kind of in the works.”
Stitt, who plans to introduce Trump at Saturday’s rally, said he also asked Trump and Pence to join him on a tour of the city’s Greenwood District, once home to a prosperous African American community dubbed Black Wall Street that was burned to the ground during a racially motivated massacre in 1921 that left as many as 300 people dead.
The Trump campaign initially planned to hold the rally on Friday, which is Juneteenth, a celebration of the end of slavery in the United States, but agreed to move the date to Saturday at the request of Stitt and others.
The Trump campaign didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment on whether they’re considering moving the event to a larger venue or accepting Stitt’s invitation to tour the Greenwood District.
Health officials, including Tulsa County Health Department Director Bruce Dart, have voiced concerns about having so many people in a confined space, noting both the state and Tulsa have seen daily highs in the number of positive cases in recent days.
Oklahoma County Republican Party Chairman David McLain said Monday that the Trump campaign intends to fill every one of the venue’s seats. He said the campaign also intends to provide masks to every person who attends, although he said there won’t be a requirement to wear one.
“I haven’t heard of any policy of mandatory mask wearing at this point,” McLain said, “but that’s fluid and could possibly change.”
Social distancing is still encouraged in Oklahoma but there’s no prohibition on large gatherings.
There have been more than 8,400 confirmed positive cases of COVID-19 and 359 total deaths in Oklahoma from the disease, more than half of which have been residents of nursing homes or long-term care facilities.
Oklahoma began allowing some businesses, like hair salons, pet groomers and spas, to reopen on April 24 during its first phase of reopening. The state has since moved into its third phase of reopening, with virtually no restrictions on businesses.
While acknowledging the state has seen a recent surge in the number of people testing positive for the coronavirus, Stitt said much of that is due to an increase in testing. He also said only 150 people are currently hospitalized due to COVID-19 and that the state has plenty of hospital capacity.
“We need to continue to be vigilant and continue to take precautions,” Stitt said, “but we also have to learn how to deal with COVID, because it’s in the United States, it’s in Oklahoma, and we can’t let it dictate our lives.”


washingtontimes--2020-06-15--Colorado to relax social, business coronavirus restrictions

DENVER ( AP ) - Colorado will soon enter a new phase with loosened coronavirus-related social and business restrictions , Gov .
Jared Polis announced Monday .
Under the next phase , which the Democratic governor calls “ Protect our Neighbors , ” individual counties will be able to make their own decisions to reopen businesses or social gatherings at the end of June or early July - if they have the adequate public health capabilities to respond to possible outbreaks .
The new guidelines are subject to public feedback and will be formalized by the end of this week @ @ @ @ @ @ @ can empower our local public health agencies and partners to meet the needs of communities across Colorado , then we truly can rely on these tools to flatten the potential second wave , ” he said .
The new measures include allowing the resumption , with conditions to be determined , of indoor and outdoor events or venues like conferences , museums , fairs and concerts .
He also announced that residential summer camps can open with as many as 10 children in individual indoor settings and 25 outdoors .
Bars can also @ @ @ @ @ @ @ up to 50 people .
As part of the next phase , Polis said several counties can choose to band together to combine their public health resources as a more effective means of containing the coronavirus .
The governor called local health agencies the “ first line of defense ” to close sites of outbreaks , conduct testing and contact tracing .
If outbreaks worsen , the state can get involved , Polis said .
“ If they fail to address it or the trend continues to move in the wrong direction , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Neighbors ’ back to ‘ Safer at Home , ’ or in an extreme life-threatening situation , to ‘ Stay at Home , ’ ” Polis said .
He was referring to the original statewide measure he ordered severely restricting business and social gatherings , as well as the relaxed measures currently in effect .
In recent weeks , Colorado has seen a downward trend in new cases of the coronavirus and in hospitalizations .
As of Monday , the state had more than 29,000 cases and more than 1,300 deaths .
That @ @ @ @ @ @ @ neighboring Arizona and Utah , and Polis once again said he was “ concerned and deeply worried ” about developments in those two states .
“ Human behavior is the variable and Coloradans thus far have been extremely responsible , ” he said .
For most people , the virus causes mild or moderate symptoms that clear up in two to three weeks .
Older adults and people with existing health problems can face severe illness and death .
The vast majority of people recover .
Nieberg is a corps member for the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on undercovered issues .

DENVER (AP) - Colorado will soon enter a new phase with loosened coronavirus-related social and business restrictions, Gov. Jared Polis announced Monday.
Under the next phase, which the Democratic governor calls “Protect our Neighbors,” individual counties will be able to make their own decisions to reopen businesses or social gatherings at the end of June or early July - if they have the adequate public health capabilities to respond to possible outbreaks.
The new guidelines are subject to public feedback and will be formalized by the end of this week, Polis said.
“If we can empower our local public health agencies and partners to meet the needs of communities across Colorado, then we truly can rely on these tools to flatten the potential second wave,” he said.
The new measures include allowing the resumption, with conditions to be determined, of indoor and outdoor events or venues like conferences, museums, fairs and concerts.
He also announced that residential summer camps can open with as many as 10 children in individual indoor settings and 25 outdoors. Bars can also open at 25% capacity, or up to 50 people.
As part of the next phase, Polis said several counties can choose to band together to combine their public health resources as a more effective means of containing the coronavirus. The governor called local health agencies the “first line of defense” to close sites of outbreaks, conduct testing and contact tracing. If outbreaks worsen, the state can get involved, Polis said.
“If they fail to address it or the trend continues to move in the wrong direction, counties would backslide from ‘Protect our Neighbors’ back to ‘Safer at Home,’ or in an extreme life-threatening situation, to ‘Stay at Home,’” Polis said. He was referring to the original statewide measure he ordered severely restricting business and social gatherings, as well as the relaxed measures currently in effect.
In recent weeks, Colorado has seen a downward trend in new cases of the coronavirus and in hospitalizations. As of Monday, the state had more than 29,000 cases and more than 1,300 deaths.
That contrasts with new spikes of cases in neighboring Arizona and Utah, and Polis once again said he was “concerned and deeply worried” about developments in those two states.
“Human behavior is the variable and Coloradans thus far have been extremely responsible,” he said.
For most people, the virus causes mild or moderate symptoms that clear up in two to three weeks. Older adults and people with existing health problems can face severe illness and death. The vast majority of people recover.
___
Nieberg is a corps member for the Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on undercovered issues.


washingtontimes--2020-06-15--Some Mississippi counties could move Confederate monuments

JACKSON , Miss .
( AP ) - Some Mississippi counties are debating whether to move Confederate monuments that have stood for more than a century outside courthouses or in other prominent spots on public property .
The potential changes are happening as Confederate monuments are being removed in some other southern states amid protests against racism .
On Monday , supervisors in majority-black Washington County voted 4-1 to work with a local historical commission to find a new place for the monument that ’ s outside the courthouse in Greenville , the Delta Democrat-Times reported .
Supervisors in majority-white @ @ @ @ @ @ @ voters decide in November whether to move a Confederate monument that was donated to the county in 1910 .
News outlets reported the decision was made after several people spoke for and against moving the statue .
A new site has not been proposed for the monument in a county named for Nathan Bedford Forrest , a Confederate general who later became a leader in the Ku Klux Klan .
A Mississippi law enacted in 2004 says no war monument may be “ relocated , removed , disturbed , altered , renamed or @ @ @ @ @ @ @ : “ The governing body may move the memorial to a more suitable location if it is determined that the location is more appropriate to displaying the monument.
” In majority-white Lafayette County , a diverse group of people carried signs Monday outside the new courthouse , calling on supervisors to remove a Confederate monument that stands outside the old courthouse nearby .
The Oxford Eagle reported that supervisors set a June 22 public hearing .
The monument outside the Lafayette County Courthouse is about a mile ( 1.6 kilometers ) from a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of debate on the University of Mississippi campus .
More than a year ago , student and faculty leaders and university administrators said the Confederate soldier statue should be moved from a spot near the main administrative building into a Civil War cemetery in a secluded part of the campus .
The state College Board has delayed a decision on moving the monument , but could discuss the issue at Thursday ’ s meeting .
A former University of Mississippi student was arrested May 30 after he spray painted “ Spiritual Genocide ” @ @ @ @ @ @ @ on campus .
He was charged with defacing public property .
The monument has already been cleaned .

JACKSON, Miss. (AP) - Some Mississippi counties are debating whether to move Confederate monuments that have stood for more than a century outside courthouses or in other prominent spots on public property.
The potential changes are happening as Confederate monuments are being removed in some other southern states amid protests against racism.
On Monday, supervisors in majority-black Washington County voted 4-1 to work with a local historical commission to find a new place for the monument that’s outside the courthouse in Greenville, the Delta Democrat-Times reported.
Supervisors in majority-white Forrest County voted 3-2 Monday to let voters decide in November whether to move a Confederate monument that was donated to the county in 1910. News outlets reported the decision was made after several people spoke for and against moving the statue. A new site has not been proposed for the monument in a county named for Nathan Bedford Forrest, a Confederate general who later became a leader in the Ku Klux Klan.
A Mississippi law enacted in 2004 says no war monument may be “relocated, removed, disturbed, altered, renamed or rededicated.” But the law also says: “The governing body may move the memorial to a more suitable location if it is determined that the location is more appropriate to displaying the monument.”
In majority-white Lafayette County, a diverse group of people carried signs Monday outside the new courthouse, calling on supervisors to remove a Confederate monument that stands outside the old courthouse nearby. The Oxford Eagle reported that supervisors set a June 22 public hearing.
The monument outside the Lafayette County Courthouse is about a mile (1.6 kilometers) from a similar one that has been the subject of debate on the University of Mississippi campus. More than a year ago, student and faculty leaders and university administrators said the Confederate soldier statue should be moved from a spot near the main administrative building into a Civil War cemetery in a secluded part of the campus. The state College Board has delayed a decision on moving the monument, but could discuss the issue at Thursday’s meeting.
A former University of Mississippi student was arrested May 30 after he spray painted “Spiritual Genocide” and left bloody handprints on the monument on campus. He was charged with defacing public property. The monument has already been cleaned.
____
Follow Emily Wagster Pettus on Twitter: http://twitter.com/EWagsterPettus.


washingtontimes--2020-06-15--California governor defends reopening, urges public caution

SACRAMENTO , Calif. ( AP ) - Following a weekend that saw California ’ s broadest reopening yet since the coronavirus pandemic shuttered businesses , Gov .
Gavin Newsom on Monday defended the state ’ s pace and said the economic harm from isolation can have negative health outcomes , too .
“ We have to recognize you can ’ t be in a permanent state where people are locked away for months and months and months and months on end , ” he said .
Newsom ’ s remarks came in his first news conference in 10 days , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ reopening bars , wineries , hotels and other services .
Roughly three months after Newsom ordered residents statewide to stay home , most counties have now been cleared to open restaurants , shops , movie theaters , zoos , hotels , day camps and gyms .
Nail salons , massage studios and other personal care services can reopen Friday in counties where they ’ re approved .
Counties are pushing ahead as cases are climbing across the state , which comes as California ramps up testing .
More than 5,000 people have died @ @ @ @ @ @ @ than 150,000 people have been infected .
But Newsom and state health officials say the key metrics to watch are the state ’ s hospitalization rate and the percentage of people testing positive for the virus .
Both have remained relatively stable in recent weeks , according to state data .
Among people who get tested for coronavirus , between 4 % and 5 % are shown to have the virus .
That ’ s been consistent since mid-May .
Previously , when California was only testing people with symptoms , the percentage @ @ @ @ @ @ @ person who gets the virus spreads it to roughly one other person , according to state data .
That transmission rate has never gone above 1.4 , according to the data .
Since California began reopening on May 8 , between 4,000 and 5,000 people have been in the hospital each day .
Dr. Dean Winslow , an infectious disease physician at Stanford Health Care , said even a slight increase in hospitalizations is concerning , particularly because it can take weeks after someone is infected for them to end up in a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ shows up .
But all that data is statewide , and certain counties are seeing more concerning numbers .
Newsom warned that as the reopening moves ahead , Californians shouldn ’ t let their guard down and must continue to wear face coverings , wash their hands and stay physically distant if they are gathering with people they don ’ t live with .
“ We can manifest the future we want as long as we ’ re smart , ” Newsom said .
“ Total number of positive ( cases ) are @ @ @ @ @ @ @ say , ‘ Well , that ’ s not going to impact me , but you don ’ t know that.
’ ” Newsom said state officials are monitoring 13 counties because of spikes in hospitalizations or transmission rates .
In Fresno County , for example , 53 of every 100,000 people have the virus and 8.5 % of people who get tested are positive for the coronavirus - both higher than the state allows for reopening .
That ’ s been attributed to outbreaks in nursing homes and a state prison .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ County , the state ’ s most populous with 10 million people , for “ the possibility of elevated disease transmission , ” possibly attributed to higher testing capacity , including testing at 235 nursing homes .
Health officials have not revoked approval for any of the counties that have been cleared to reopen .
Dr. Eyal Oren , a professor of epidemiology and biostatistics at San Diego State University , said he worries people will think life is returning to normal as states reopen even though nothing about the virus and its @ @ @ @ @ @ @ m not convinced that we ’ ve seen a fundamental change , other than the need to open up for obvious political and economic reasons , ” he said .
He said positive case rates and hospitalizations are two of many important data points that states should consider .
California ’ s positive test rate falls within an internationally accepted range to show a government is doing enough testing to pick up most cases .
But he cautioned that rate is a statewide number and can mask areas where testing is not as @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .

SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) - Following a weekend that saw California’s broadest reopening yet since the coronavirus pandemic shuttered businesses, Gov. Gavin Newsom on Monday defended the state’s pace and said the economic harm from isolation can have negative health outcomes, too.
“We have to recognize you can’t be in a permanent state where people are locked away for months and months and months and months on end,” he said.
Newsom’s remarks came in his first news conference in 10 days, just days after most California counties began reopening bars, wineries, hotels and other services. Roughly three months after Newsom ordered residents statewide to stay home, most counties have now been cleared to open restaurants, shops, movie theaters, zoos, hotels, day camps and gyms. Nail salons, massage studios and other personal care services can reopen Friday in counties where they’re approved.
Counties are pushing ahead as cases are climbing across the state, which comes as California ramps up testing. More than 5,000 people have died from the virus in California and more than 150,000 people have been infected. But Newsom and state health officials say the key metrics to watch are the state’s hospitalization rate and the percentage of people testing positive for the virus. Both have remained relatively stable in recent weeks, according to state data.
Among people who get tested for coronavirus, between 4% and 5% are shown to have the virus. That’s been consistent since mid-May. Previously, when California was only testing people with symptoms, the percentage was much higher.
Meanwhile, every person who gets the virus spreads it to roughly one other person, according to state data. That transmission rate has never gone above 1.4, according to the data.
Since California began reopening on May 8, between 4,000 and 5,000 people have been in the hospital each day. Dr. Dean Winslow, an infectious disease physician at Stanford Health Care, said even a slight increase in hospitalizations is concerning, particularly because it can take weeks after someone is infected for them to end up in a hospital, delaying when new infection data shows up.
But all that data is statewide, and certain counties are seeing more concerning numbers. Newsom warned that as the reopening moves ahead, Californians shouldn’t let their guard down and must continue to wear face coverings, wash their hands and stay physically distant if they are gathering with people they don’t live with.
“We can manifest the future we want as long as we’re smart,” Newsom said. “Total number of positive (cases) are up, not down. You may say, ‘Well, that’s not going to impact me, but you don’t know that.’”
Newsom said state officials are monitoring 13 counties because of spikes in hospitalizations or transmission rates.
In Fresno County, for example, 53 of every 100,000 people have the virus and 8.5% of people who get tested are positive for the coronavirus - both higher than the state allows for reopening. That’s been attributed to outbreaks in nursing homes and a state prison.
State officials are also monitoring Los Angeles County, the state’s most populous with 10 million people, for “the possibility of elevated disease transmission,” possibly attributed to higher testing capacity, including testing at 235 nursing homes.
Health officials have not revoked approval for any of the counties that have been cleared to reopen.
Dr. Eyal Oren, a professor of epidemiology and biostatistics at San Diego State University, said he worries people will think life is returning to normal as states reopen even though nothing about the virus and its spread has changed.
“I’m not convinced that we’ve seen a fundamental change, other than the need to open up for obvious political and economic reasons,” he said.
He said positive case rates and hospitalizations are two of many important data points that states should consider. California’s positive test rate falls within an internationally accepted range to show a government is doing enough testing to pick up most cases. But he cautioned that rate is a statewide number and can mask areas where testing is not as robust or the positivity rate is higher.


washingtontimes--2020-06-15--L.A. superintendent wants to ban neck holds by school police

LOS ANGELES ( AP ) - Police in the Los Angeles Unified School District should be prohibited from using pepper spray and blood-stopping neck holds , Superintendent Austin Beutner said Monday .
Beutner said he will recommend that the board of the nation ’ s second-largest school district adopt the policy changes before the school year resumes in August .
The superintendent wants to bar carotid holds , an arm hold that cuts off blood flow in the carotid arteries of the neck .
It can quickly cause unconsciousness and can kill if held too long .
Many law enforcement @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Department , have suspended or ended use of the holds in the wake of the death of George Floyd after a Minneapolis police used his knee to pin Floyd to the ground for nearly nine minutes as Floyd said he couldn ’ t breathe .
Beutner also said that a committee of community members will make recommendations about school police operations to the board “ as soon as possible.
” The district has about 400 police officers .
Beutner said they are “ trained differently ” from metropolitan police .
School police investigated @ @ @ @ @ @ @ last year and handled more than 100,000 reports of incidents and have never fired a weapon on campus , the superintendent said .
“ But we can not ignore legitimate concerns and criticism that students and other members in the school community have about all forms of law enforcement , ” Beutner said .
“ The culture and climate of schools must be founded on inclusion and respect .
No person should feel the presence of a safety officer on a campus as an indictment of them or their character.
” He noted @ @ @ @ @ @ @ policies .
Beginning next month , the district will end random checks of students for weapons using metal-detecting wands .
Beutner ’ s remarks at his weekly briefing came days after the board of United Teachers Los Angeles , the powerful teachers union , voted to call for defunding the school police department and using the $ 63 million budget for counseling and other student services , the Daily News of Los Angeles reported .
Gil Gamez , president of the L.A. School Police Association , which is the police officers ’ union @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to reduce conflicts and keep the peace .
“ I ’ m not trained in homicide , I ’ m trained in school and school cultures , ” he told the Daily News .
“ UTLA is putting their students at risk , their own members at risk - everyone , from the principal to the custodian .
They say police officers ( are ) detrimental to mental and emotional well being , but it ’ s to the contrary.
” A police spokesperson said that in the last three years , school @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of 188 use-of-force incidents , the Daily News said .

LOS ANGELES (AP) - Police in the Los Angeles Unified School District should be prohibited from using pepper spray and blood-stopping neck holds, Superintendent Austin Beutner said Monday.
Beutner said he will recommend that the board of the nation’s second-largest school district adopt the policy changes before the school year resumes in August.
The superintendent wants to bar carotid holds, an arm hold that cuts off blood flow in the carotid arteries of the neck. It can quickly cause unconsciousness and can kill if held too long.
Many law enforcement agencies, including the Los Angeles Police Department, have suspended or ended use of the holds in the wake of the death of George Floyd after a Minneapolis police used his knee to pin Floyd to the ground for nearly nine minutes as Floyd said he couldn’t breathe.
Beutner also said that a committee of community members will make recommendations about school police operations to the board “as soon as possible.”
The district has about 400 police officers. Beutner said they are “trained differently” from metropolitan police. School police investigated 150 threats of mass shootings on campus last year and handled more than 100,000 reports of incidents and have never fired a weapon on campus, the superintendent said.
“But we cannot ignore legitimate concerns and criticism that students and other members in the school community have about all forms of law enforcement,” Beutner said. “The culture and climate of schools must be founded on inclusion and respect. No person should feel the presence of a safety officer on a campus as an indictment of them or their character.”
He noted that the district previously changed other policing policies. Beginning next month, the district will end random checks of students for weapons using metal-detecting wands.
Beutner’s remarks at his weekly briefing came days after the board of United Teachers Los Angeles, the powerful teachers union, voted to call for defunding the school police department and using the $63 million budget for counseling and other student services, the Daily News of Los Angeles reported.
Gil Gamez, president of the L.A. School Police Association, which is the police officers’ union, said officers are needed on campus to reduce conflicts and keep the peace.
“I’m not trained in homicide, I’m trained in school and school cultures,” he told the Daily News. “UTLA is putting their students at risk, their own members at risk - everyone, from the principal to the custodian. They say police officers (are) detrimental to mental and emotional well being, but it’s to the contrary.”
A police spokesperson said that in the last three years, school police used pepper spray 34 times out of 188 use-of-force incidents, the Daily News said.


washingtontimes--2020-06-16--NATO chief plays down concern over US troop plans in Germany

BRUSSELS ( AP ) - NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg on Tuesday played down concern that the United States will rush to pull thousands of its troops out of Germany , saying that Washington has made no final decision on when such a withdrawal might take place or even how it would happen .
President Donald Trump has said that he is ordering a major reduction in U.S. troop strength in Germany , from around 34,500 personnel down to 25,000 .
Members of his own party have criticized the move as a gift to Russia and a threat to U.S. national @ @ @ @ @ @ @ it clear that no final decision has been made on how and when , ” Stoltenberg told reporters on the eve of a video meeting between NATO defense ministers , where the issue is to be discussed .
Stoltenberg has spoken to Trump about the move and says he ’ s also in contact with Germany .
“ What matters for me is that we maintain credible deterrence and defense and that we maintain the strong link between North America and Europe , ” he said .
He underlined that Washington has increased @ @ @ @ @ @ @ years , and that European allies are spending more on defense .
Trump on Monday lashed out at Germany for failing to pay enough for its own defense , branding the NATO ally “ delinquent ” for not meeting a goal set in 2014 for members to halt budget cuts and move toward spending at least 2 % of gross national product on defense by 2024 .
Stoltenberg declined to speculate on whether the timing of Trump ’ s announcement has anything to do with the approach of the U.S. elections in November @

Details of President Trump’s announcement to withdraw U.S. forces from Germany have not yet been decided on among allies of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said Tuesday.
Mr. Trump earlier this month ordered the Pentagon to cut thousands of troops by September, a move that experts have warned could deeply impact the historic U.S.-German relationship.
The president doubled down on the move Monday, when he told reporters that he’s prepared to recall about half of the U.S. soldiers stationed in Germany if that nation doesn’t pay more to NATO and treat Washington more fairly on trade issues.
“The U.S. has made it clear that no final decision has been made on how and when,” Mr. Stoltenberg told reporters during a virtual news conference. “It’s not yet decided how and when this decision will be implemented.”
“It’s a bilateral arrangement between the U.S. and Germany, but of course it matters for the whole alliance,” the secretary-general said. “What matters for me is that we maintain credible deterrence and defense and that we maintain the strong link between North America and Europe.”
The move would reduce by about 28% the number of U.S. military personnel in the country, pulling back 9,500 from the 34,500 who are now there. There has also been speculation some of the forces in Germany could be redeployed in Poland and elsewhere in Europe closer to Russia.
The U.S. ambassador to NATO, Kay Bailey Hutchison, said she wasn’t aware of preparations for any possible troop withdrawal.
“Any kind of actual planning, I think, has not happened yet,” Hutchison told reporters at a video news conference Tuesday. “I don’t think that we have any kind of timeline that we have heard of.”
She described Germany as “a good partner” of the United States at NATO and said that “it should not be thought that there is any walking away from Europe, and Germany.”
The NATO allies are expected to convene in a virtual conference on Wednesday, when the issue is set to be discussed.
• This article was based in part on wire service reports.
• Lauren Toms can be reached at lmeier@washingtontimes.com.


washingtontimes--2020-06-16--Reward increased in case of missing Fort Hood soldier

KILLEEN , Texas ( AP ) - U.S. Army investigators have increased the reward for information about a missing Fort @ @ @ @ @ seen in April .
The U.S. Army Criminal Investigation Command said Monday that the reward @ @ @ @ @ information that leads to the whereabouts of Pfc .
Vanessa Guillen .
Guillen , 20 @ @ @ @ @ 22 in a parking lot at Fort Hood wearing a black T-shirt and purple workout @ @ @ @ @ car keys , barracks room key , ID card and wallet were later found in @ @ @ @ @ ’ d been working earlier in the day .
Investigators said more than 150 people @ @ @ @ @ regarding her disappearance .

KILLEEN, Texas (AP) - U.S. Army investigators have increased the reward for information about a missing Fort Hood soldier who was last seen in April.
The U.S. Army Criminal Investigation Command said Monday that the reward is now $25,000 for information that leads to the whereabouts of Pfc. Vanessa Guillen.
Guillen, 20, was last seen April 22 in a parking lot at Fort Hood wearing a black T-shirt and purple workout pants. Investigators said her car keys, barracks room key, ID card and wallet were later found in the armory room where she’d been working earlier in the day.
Investigators said more than 150 people have been interviewed so far regarding her disappearance.


washingtontimes--2020-06-16--One of 7 people shot outside Minneapolis bar has died

MINNEAPOLIS ( AP ) - One of seven people shot outside a north Minneapolis bar this past weekend has died @ @ @ @ @ said the man was in his 20s .
He has not been identified .
Six @ @ @ @ @ confrontation that began inside 200 Bar and spilled outside early Sunday .
The Star Tribune @ @ @ @ @ two women in their 20s , one man in his 30s and three men in @ @ @ @ @ knew only about six victims .
The victims were taken by personal vehicles to Hennepin @ @ @ @ @ Memorial Health Hospital .
The man who died Monday was transported by ambulance .
Police @ @ @ @ @ the victims may have been involved in the shooting .

MINNEAPOLIS (AP) - One of seven people shot outside a north Minneapolis bar this past weekend has died of his injuries.
Police said the man was in his 20s. He has not been identified.
Six others were shot during a confrontation that began inside 200 Bar and spilled outside early Sunday.
The Star Tribune reports the other victims include two women in their 20s, one man in his 30s and three men in their 40s. Police initially knew only about six victims.
The victims were taken by personal vehicles to Hennepin County Medical Center and North Memorial Health Hospital. The man who died Monday was transported by ambulance.
Police are investigating whether some of the victims may have been involved in the shooting.


washingtontimes--2020-06-16--2 sisters killed when bricks fall on hammock at their home

CLEVELAND HEIGHTS , Ohio ( AP ) - Two sisters were killed when they were trapped on a hammock by @ @ @ @ @ family ’ s home , authorities said .
Emergency responders found Scout Scaravilli , 14 @ @ @ @ @ Chasey , 12 , trapped under a pile of bricks when they responded to their @ @ @ @ @ p.m. Sunday .
The girls were soon freed from the hammock and were taken to @ @ @ @ @ were pronounced dead there a short time later .
The hammock was tied to a @ @ @ @ @ authorities said , but it ’ s still not clear what caused the pillar to @ @ @ @ @ were reported in the incident .

CLEVELAND HEIGHTS, Ohio (AP) - Two sisters were killed when they were trapped on a hammock by some falling bricks at their family’s home, authorities said.
Emergency responders found Scout Scaravilli, 14, and her sister, Chasey, 12, trapped under a pile of bricks when they responded to their Cleveland Heights home around 7:45 p.m. Sunday. The girls were soon freed from the hammock and were taken to a hospital, but they were pronounced dead there a short time later.
The hammock was tied to a tree and the pillar, authorities said, but it’s still not clear what caused the pillar to collapse.
No other injuries were reported in the incident.