motherjones--2020-07-14--“Delay and Disruption”: Fired Prosecutor Has “Serious Concerns” About Bill Barr’s Motives

Geoffrey Berman , the recently ousted US attorney for the Southern District of New York , last Thursday told the House Judiciary Committee , around 25 times , that he feared Attorney General William Barr ’ s efforts to replace him with someone from outside that office would have caused the “ delay and disruption ” of active investigations .
Berman ’ s former office is reportedly investigating Trump ’ s lawyer , Rudy Giuliani , in relation to a scheme to help Trump by digging up dirt on Joe Biden in Ukraine .
The office has looked into the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ committee .
It is prosecuting Halkbank , a Turkish state-run bank , for violating US sanctions on Iran—a probe that former national security adviser John Bolton alleges Trump promised to curtail as a favor to Turkey ’ s president .
And Manhattan prosecutors have probed the Trump Organization and hush money payments related to Trump ’ s 2016 campaign .
“ I believe the attorney general was trying to entice me to resign so that an outsider could be put into the acting US attorney position at the Southern District of New York @ @ @ @ @ @ @ delay and disruption of ongoing investigations , ” Berman said , one of various iterations of this assertion .
Berman also threw in the word “ impede ” half a dozen times .
Berman , under the terms he negotiated with the Justice Department , declined to be more specific .
During the three-hour , 41 minute interview , he said , around 15 times , that he didn ’ t know what Barr ’ s “ motives ” were .
But he described Barr ’ s actions , eight times , as @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , the interview—the transcript of which was released to the public Monday evening—has received only modest attention .
In more normal times , like February , it would probably have been a bigger deal that the just-fired head of one of the most powerful prosecutor ’ s offices in the country seemed to suggest , over and over again , that the attorney general ’ s scheme might have derailed investigations of personal interest to the president .
Quick rehash : On June 19 , Barr pressed Berman to accept a nomination for @ @ @ @ @ @ @ and proposed replacing him with an official from outside the office .
Barr ’ s plan was to have Trump nominate Jay Clayton , the head of the Securities and Exchange Commission , for Berman ’ s job .
Barr also wanted Craig Carpenito , the United States attorney for New Jersey , to serve simultaneously as acting head of the Manhattan office while Clayton awaited Senate confirmation .
( “ The U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York is not a part-time position , ” Berman remarked in his congressional @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , but Barr nevertheless issued a press release that falsely said Berman had agreed to step down .
( This was one of a series of highly controversial moves the Trump administration has recently announced on Friday nights .
Last Friday , Trump commuted the three-year prison sentence that his longtime adviser Roger Stone received for lying to Congress and witness tampering ) .
Berman responded to Barr with his own defiant release , refuting Barr ’ s claim that he was resigning and arguing , based on the unusual circumstances of his @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to oust him .
The next day , Barr announced Trump had fired Berman , a claim Trump promptly undermined by denying any involvement .
Still , Berman then agreed to step down .
He says that is because Barr quietly agreed to make Berman ’ s deputy , Audrey Strauss—rather than Carpenito—the acting head of the office .
“ With that concession , and having full confidence that Audrey would continue the important work of the office , I decided to step down and not litigate my removal , ” Berman said @ @ @ @ @ @ @ congressional lawyer who drew attention for his stumbles during last fall ’ s impeachment hearings , returned to form Thursday when he asked Berman : “ There was no quid pro quo proposed , correct ?
” Berman : “ You know , he wanted me to resign to take a position .
I assume you could call that a quid pro quo .
You resign and you get this , that would mean quid pro quo.
” Absent from Thursday ’ s interviews was discussion of which specific investigations Berman was worried @ @ @ @ @ @ @ impeded—and what if any impact they might have on Trump ’ s chances in November .
Berman declined , 35 times , to answer questions related to investigations .
But Democratic aides pointed out Thursday that prosecutors in Manhattan are reportedly investigating Giuliani , Trump ’ s personal lawyer , for activity connected to the scheme that led to Trump ’ s impeachment .
Reuters reported last year that a New York grand jury subpoenaed records of payments to Giuliani .
And the New York Times said prosecutors were looking into whether Giuliani @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a Ukrainian official influence US policy toward Ukraine .
Giuliani disputes doing this and has questioned whether he is really under investigation .
Wherever that alleged investigation stands , a “ delay and disruption ” of it would presumably benefit Trump .
Berman ’ s former office in 2018 also essentially called Trump an unindicted conspirator ( “ Individual-1 ” ) in a campaign fraud scheme in which his former personal lawyer , Michael Cohen , paid women who said they ’ d had affairs with Trump to stay silent ahead of the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a policy that bars prosecuting a sitting president .
If Trump loses , prosecutors at least in theory could charge Trump in January .
“ Do you know one way or another whether Attorney General Barr removed you so that you would not be making the decision whether to investigate the president prior to the 2020 elections or whether to indict him after the 2020 elections ?
” a Democratic aide asked Berman .
“ I do not know what the attorney general ’ s motives were , ” replied Berman , “ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the attorney general raised serious concerns for me .
”

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Geoffrey Berman, the recently ousted US attorney for the Southern District of New York, last Thursday told the House Judiciary Committee, around 25 times, that he feared Attorney General William Barr’s efforts to replace him with someone from outside that office would have caused the “delay and disruption” of active investigations.
Berman’s former office is reportedly investigating Trump’s lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, in relation to a scheme to help Trump by digging up dirt on Joe Biden in Ukraine. The office has looked into the finances of Trump’s 2016 inaugural committee. It is prosecuting Halkbank, a Turkish state-run bank, for violating US sanctions on Iran—a probe that former national security adviser John Bolton alleges Trump promised to curtail as a favor to Turkey’s president. And Manhattan prosecutors have probed the Trump Organization and hush money payments related to Trump’s 2016 campaign.
“I believe the attorney general was trying to entice me to resign so that an outsider could be put into the acting US attorney position at the Southern District of New York, which would have resulted in the delay and disruption of ongoing investigations,” Berman said, one of various iterations of this assertion. Berman also threw in the word “impede” half a dozen times.
Berman, under the terms he negotiated with the Justice Department, declined to be more specific. During the three-hour, 41 minute interview, he said, around 15 times, that he didn’t know what Barr’s “motives” were. But he described Barr’s actions, eight times, as “irregular and unexplained.” Even so, the interview—the transcript of which was released to the public Monday evening—has received only modest attention.
In more normal times, like February, it would probably have been a bigger deal that the just-fired head of one of the most powerful prosecutor’s offices in the country seemed to suggest, over and over again, that the attorney general’s scheme might have derailed investigations of personal interest to the president.
Quick rehash: On June 19, Barr pressed Berman to accept a nomination for a different job in the Trump administration and proposed replacing him with an official from outside the office. Barr’s plan was to have Trump nominate Jay Clayton, the head of the Securities and Exchange Commission, for Berman’s job. Barr also wanted Craig Carpenito, the United States attorney for New Jersey, to serve simultaneously as acting head of the Manhattan office while Clayton awaited Senate confirmation. (“The U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York is not a part-time position,” Berman remarked in his congressional testimony.)
Berman refused to resign, but Barr nevertheless issued a press release that falsely said Berman had agreed to step down. (This was one of a series of highly controversial moves the Trump administration has recently announced on Friday nights. Last Friday, Trump commuted the three-year prison sentence that his longtime adviser Roger Stone received for lying to Congress and witness tampering). Berman responded to Barr with his own defiant release, refuting Barr’s claim that he was resigning and arguing, based on the unusual circumstances of his appointment, that Barr lacked the power to oust him. The next day, Barr announced Trump had fired Berman, a claim Trump promptly undermined by denying any involvement. Still, Berman then agreed to step down. He says that is because Barr quietly agreed to make Berman’s deputy, Audrey Strauss—rather than Carpenito—the acting head of the office. “With that concession, and having full confidence that Audrey would continue the important work of the office, I decided to step down and not litigate my removal,” Berman said Thursday.
Stephen Castor, the GOP congressional lawyer who drew attention for his stumbles during last fall’s impeachment hearings, returned to form Thursday when he asked Berman: “There was no quid pro quo proposed, correct?” Berman: “You know, he wanted me to resign to take a position. I assume you could call that a quid pro quo. You resign and you get this, that would mean quid pro quo.”
Absent from Thursday’s interview was discussion of which specific investigations Berman was worried about being delayed, disrupted, or impeded—and what if any impact they might have on Trump’s chances in November. Berman declined, 35 times, to answer questions related to investigations.
But Democratic aides pointed out Thursday that prosecutors in Manhattan are reportedly investigating Giuliani, Trump’s personal lawyer, for activity connected to the scheme that led to Trump’s impeachment. Reuters reported last year that a New York grand jury subpoenaed records of payments to Giuliani. And the New York Times said prosecutors were looking into whether Giuliani broke foreign lobbying laws by allegedly helping a Ukrainian official influence US policy toward Ukraine. Giuliani disputes doing this and has questioned whether he is really under investigation.
Wherever that alleged investigation stands, a “delay and disruption” of it would presumably benefit Trump.
Berman’s former office in 2018 also essentially called Trump an unindicted conspirator (“Individual-1”) in a campaign fraud scheme in which his former personal lawyer, Michael Cohen, paid women who said they’d had affairs with Trump to stay silent ahead of the 2016 election. The Justice Department has a policy that bars prosecuting a sitting president. If Trump loses, prosecutors at least in theory could charge Trump in January.
“Do you know one way or another whether Attorney General Barr removed you so that you would not be making the decision whether to investigate the president prior to the 2020 elections or whether to indict him after the 2020 elections?” a Democratic aide asked Berman.
“I do not know what the attorney general’s motives were,” replied Berman, “but the irregular and unexplained actions by the attorney general raised serious concerns for me.”


motherjones--2020-07-14--The White House Just Caved on Its Plan to Kick Out Thousands of International Students

The Trump administration is rescinding its controversial new policy that would have forced international students to leave the country if @ @ @ @ @ to in-person classes this fall .
On Tuesday afternoon , the Justice Department was supposed @ @ @ @ @ defend the rule against a lawsuit brought by Harvard and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology @ @ @ @ @ Burroughs announced at the hearing that the government had agreed to rescind the policy only @ @ @ @ @ unveiled by Immigration and Customs Enforcement .
The abrupt reversal means that students will be @ @ @ @ @ United States regardless of whether their schools decide to reopen in the fall .
More @ @ @ @ @ the lawsuit brought by Harvard and MIT .

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motherjones--2020-07-14--Ivanka’s Tone-Deaf Advice to Millions of Unemployed Americans: Find Something New

The US unemployment rate , currently at 11.1 percent , is higher than at any point during the Great Recession—a grim stat that in the face of ballooning coronavirus cases and , in some states , a return to lockdown measures , is unlikely to see substantial improvement in the months ahead .
To make matters worse , the $ 600 federal unemployment insurance weekly subsidy is set to expire at the end of the month thanks to Republicans , even as experts credit the benefit as a crucial lifeline preventing countless families from descending into poverty .
In the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of Americans , enter Ivanka Trump with advice for the unemployed : Embrace the chaos , she urges , and “ Find Something New.
” The initiative comes as her most recent diamond-encrusted middle finger to American families since the pandemic hit .
The campaign ’ s website , which boasts ties with companies like Apple , reads like a choose-your-own-adventure where options like vague certificate and intensive programs are presented but with scant detail on how to pursue such paths , much less pay for some of them .
Click on Apple @ @ @ @ @ @ @ re simply rerouted to a page offering free beginner coding courses that surely won ’ t be enough to even land you an interview with the company .
It ’ s the equivalent of directing someone to Indeed.com , wishing them good luck , and congratulating yourself for helping them in a meaningful way .
That isn ’ t to say that “ Find Something New ” will fail to inspire .
For a growing number of Americans , it ’ s a reminder that they ’ ll have the chance to do @ @ @ @ @

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The US unemployment rate, currently at 11.1 percent, is higher than at any point during the Great Recession—a grim stat that in the face of ballooning coronavirus cases and, in some states, a return to lockdown measures, is unlikely to see substantial improvement in the months ahead. To make matters worse, the $600 federal unemployment insurance weekly subsidy is set to expire at the end of the month thanks to Republicans, even as experts credit the benefit as a crucial lifeline preventing countless families from descending into poverty.
In the midst of this economic crisis facing millions of Americans, enter Ivanka Trump with advice for the unemployed: Embrace the chaos, she urges, and “Find Something New.” The initiative comes as her most recent diamond-encrusted middle finger to American families since the pandemic hit.
More than ever our #PledgetoAmericasWorkers is focused on helping Americans 🇺🇸 bolster skills to find new jobs + navigate career transitions. Today we are launching the #FindSomethingNew ad campaign!https://t.co/gS1JL50lcU — Ivanka Trump (@IvankaTrump) July 14, 2020
The campaign’s website, which boasts ties with companies like Apple, reads like a choose-your-own-adventure where options like vague certificate and intensive programs are presented but with scant detail on how to pursue such paths, much less pay for some of them. Click on Apple, for example, and you’re simply rerouted to a page offering free beginner coding courses that surely won’t be enough to even land you an interview with the company. It’s the equivalent of directing someone to Indeed.com, wishing them good luck, and congratulating yourself for helping them in a meaningful way.
That isn’t to say that “Find Something New” will fail to inspire. For a growing number of Americans, it’s a reminder that they’ll have the chance to do exactly that come November.


motherjones--2020-07-15--John Leguizamo on Trump, Dirty Jokes, and the Whitewashing of Latinx History

Actor , activist , author , and educator John Leguizamo loves that his comedy makes people feel angry .
In his 2018 one-man Broadway show , Latin History for Morons ( now available on Netflix ) , the 55-year-old star splices raunchy jokes with history about the genocide of Native American people , his experience being racially profiled , and a welter of statistics about the underrepresentation of Latinx people in American media .
Born in Colombia and raised in Queens , New York , Leguizamo grew up seeing negative portrayals of Latinx people in Hollywood and in the pages @ @ @ @ @ @ @ feeling of being an outsider , of not belonging , was a power that he eventually came to value—and harness as fuel for his comedy and acting career .
In January , Leguizamo sat down with Mother Jones ’ s DC Bureau Chief David Corn onstage at the Comedy Cellar , the historic New York City stand-up venue , to talk about his work , his ego , his process , and his favorite subject : Latinx history .
Corn ’ s interview with Leguizamo is one of several notable guests featured over @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Jones Podcast—a special summer series with a very “ 2020 ” origin story .
Earlier this year , the coronavirus pandemic stalled work on a new podcast , co-produced by Mother Jones and the Comedy Cellar , but not before three fascinating guests joined Corn for in-depth interviews about art , politics , comedy , and the philosophies that infuse their work .
These chats were too good to simply shelve ; in the coming week ’ s you ’ ll also hear from music icon Debbie Harry , and talkshow host Samantha @ @ @ @ @ @ @ with John Leguizamo on the Mother Jones Podcast : Listen to the latest episode of the Mother Jones Podcast : Subscribe using Apple Podcasts , Spotify , Stitcher , or your favorite podcast app .
A transcript of Corn ’ s interview with Leguizamo is below , edited for length and clarity .
David Corn : In October 2016 you were working to register Latinx voters .
You said Trump was good for Latinos because he was bringing together a group of people , people from Mexico , Cuba , Puerto Rico , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Republic , who hadn ’ t always seen themselves as part of a larger unified community .
Well , what happened ?
John Leguizamo : He ’ s a horrible human being who does a lot of horrible things , but he ’ s so horribly blatant about it that he galvanizes us .
We were asleep at the helm , bro .
All of us—white liberals , moderate Republicans , independents , Latin activists , black activists .
He got us woke .
We are in a moral correction right now in @ @ @ @ @ @ @ right because he does everything so wrong .
I was never as political as I am since he was elected .
I went to Florida , stumped for Hillary .
I went to Vegas , stumped for Hillary .
I ’ ve never done that for anybody .
I went to Florida and I flipped the seat that was red for 30 years in Hialeah , a Republican city .
We flipped that blue .
Beto and I tried to flip Texas because we believed we could flip it with Maria Teresa Kumar @ @ @ @ @ @ @ 12 percent black .
It should be a blue state , but for gerrymandering , voter suppression , and all the horrible things .
This is a democracy !
How do you make it so difficult for people to vote ?
Maria Teresa Kumar , she and her lawyers came up with a way around that is called VoterPal .
We have to be so clever now and so active .
It ’ s not a spectator sport anymore , being an American , you have to throw your hat into the ring @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Hos , Playa Hatas , and All the Rest of My Hollywood Friends : My Life , you noticed that you felt like a second class citizen in the United States .
And then 14 years later in Latin History for Morons you say the same thing .
And I was just wondering if there ’ s been any change , any progress , or do you look at it a different way ?
Look at these facts : We Latinx people are the second oldest ethnic group in America after Native Americans @ @ @ @ @ @ @ America after white people .
Where are we ?
What are our percentages of success ?
Less than one percent of government officials .
Less than three percent of the faces in front of the camera in Hollywood or behind the camera .
Less than one percent of the stories in the New York Times , New York Magazine , New Yorker or any other rag that has the city ’ s name on its banner , when we ’ re equal to whites in population in New York City .
We ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Texas and less than seven percent of the government officials .
That ’ s not okay .
That ’ s not alright .
That ’ s cultural apartheid .
I ’ m living in a cultural apartheid .
It ’ s demoralizing .
It ’ s demeaning .
It ’ s painful .
And you have to fight this with yourself .
You have to build yourself up every day before you leave your house .
To be able to confront all this , these micro aggressions , upon you daily .
With @ @ @ @ @ @ @ feel this ?
Yeah , of course .
It ’ s hard to get rid of .
I see it happening .
New York City has three of the best gold standard public schools in the country : Bronx science , Brooklyn Tech , and Stuyvesant .
It ’ s supposed to be the schools that help the poorest children in New York City make it .
Less than five percent of those children are Latin .
Why is that ?
How is that ?
that should not be happening .
That outrages @ @ @ @ @ @ @ with all my success and fame , and this is happening to kids that look just like me ?
That ’ s not okay .
You ’ ve been very critical about Hollywood , where you make your make a lot of money , for not casting Latinx people in a positive role , but even more importantly , not having them in the decision making positions .
Well that ’ s where I find that the problem is .
[ Los Angeles ] is 50 percent Latino , and less than three @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the camera or behind the camera are Latinx .
That ’ s cultural apartheid .
It ’ s like we don ’ t exist .
How is that possible ?
It ’ s not for lack of talent .
It ’ s not for lack of trying .
It ’ s that executives don ’ t see our stories .
They don ’ t see us .
They don ’ t understand us .
I ’ ve been trying to sell scripts for the last 30 years of my life .
It ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ just did , Critical Thinking , is a true story about five Latin and black kids in the ghetto-est ghetto Miami who became United States chess champions in 1989 .
It was impossible to get it done .
I had raised the money myself .
And it was a brilliant story .
But dude , it ’ s hard without Latin execs .
Now isn ’ t there a market imperative ?
The accelerated growth of the Latinx population in the United States , doesn ’ t that get them thinking , hey @ @ @ @ @ @ @ out there ?
We ’ re 25 percent of the US box office .
We added $ 2.3 trillion to the US economy .
If we Latin people had our own country , we ’ d be the eighth largest country in the world , the second largest state in America .
They know that , but until you have a Latin executive who understands us , who sees us , until you have editors at the New York Times who live in our culture and appreciate our culture , where are you @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Latin people ?
Who knows that Prince Royce sold out Yankee Stadium twice , two nights in a row .
No white or Black artists or any other artists in America has done that .
Why isn ’ t that in the New York Times ?
Why isn ’ t it in the New York Times that we Latinx people have the 10 top hits internationally in the world in music today ?
Where ’ s that a big feature in the New York Times or New York magazine ?
That ’ s @ @ @ @ @ @ @ I got more shit to say .
I ain ’ t done yet .
An hour may not be enough .
I did watch Latin History for Morons , and you talk a lot about the conquest of the Americas by the Spaniards and what you call the “ Great Extermination.
” You can give us statistics because they are absolutely overwhelming .
We all know how many people perished in the Holocaust .
We don ’ t really talk about the numbers of Native Americans , let alone indigenous people throughout North @ @ @ @ @ @ @ wonder why you think the terminology , calling this the Great Extermination , why it hasn ’ t been more widely used and accepted ?
Because once you start acknowledging the oppression , the exploitation of Latinx people and Native Americans , once you start accepting that this country was stolen , it ’ s hard for people to live with that .
It ’ s hard for people to accept that because then you feel like you have to do something about it—reparations and whatnot .
And and when you knew that @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in North , Central , and South America , and then 95 percent of them vanished through disease brought in by the Europeans , extermination , mutilation… .
I mean , all kinds of horrors .
Columbus was a horrible , horrible human being .
He raped nine year old Taíno girls and bragged about them in his journals .
Tell us who the Taínos were .
I have to say I learned a lot from Latin History for Morons .
There was some elemental facts about the history of our culture that @ @ @ @ @ @ @ these stunning gaps in our collective ignorance .
I love that .
That ’ s the name of my next show , “ Collective Ignorance.
” So can you talk about the Taínos ?
There were 3 million Caribbean Native Americans under the under the Arawaks , and Taínos was was a branch of them .
They were in Puerto Rico , Cuba , and Hispaniola ( Dominican Republic and Haiti ) .
And they were completely exterminated .
Except a lot of my friends who did their DNA from Puerto Rico , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ they have like 5/10/20 percent Native American , so it ’ s got to be Taíno .
So that ’ s the beauty of knowing that their DNA is that we know they still they ’ re still alive , somehow , you know .
Yeah but basically it was a whole people completely wiped out .
Now I have to say Latin History for Morons is pretty funny .
I know , it ’ s hard to believe that it ’ s a funny show !
We ’ re talking about genocide @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ’ t want to give anyone the wrong impression .
But dude , that ’ s what my comedy has always been about .
And that ’ s what my fight with American comedy was .
It was like it never really captured life the way I grew up .
I grew up laughing and in pain and oppressed and racially profiled but I still laughed , I still enjoy my life , and that ’ s what I tried to bring to American comedy through all my work .
What do you @ @ @ @ @ @ @ I mean , I ’ m sure every audience is different .
But you ’ ve been doing this for over a year now longer .
Can you tell from the stage what has truly connected ?
There are moments of like raw honesty , of expressing the angst of what it ’ s like being Latinx in America still .
I feel like I have to defend myself all the time .
Sometimes you feel like everything is against you .
And then the audience gets so quiet .
I can hear @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to cry .
I hear that in those incredible moments of silence .
We sit there as if we were in church , and we meditate on that , and then I start doing some other crazy things .
I wanted to show people that our history and knowledge of it can be weaponized , that it ’ s a call to action , that we need to spread this information .
We got to get it into American history textbooks .
We got to get it out there .
There has to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
There has to be that Spielberg inclusion of our contributions to World War One and World War Two , because they ’ re massive .
We fought in every single war America ’ s ever had .
I ’ m talking about the American Revolutionary War , where 10,000 unknown Latino patriots fought .
Cuban women in Virginia sold their jewelry to feed the Patriots .
[ Bernardo de ] Gálvez gave $ 70,000 worth of weapons to George Washington .
He was General in Louisiana .
He had a misfit army @ @ @ @ @ @ @ His blockade , with 3000 Puerto Ricans , Cubans , Mexican , Native Americans , and freed slaves , blockaded the British from the south .
So they couldn ’ t surround the Patriots from the south and ambush them .
Cuba gave over $ 200,000 worth of contribution donations to the American patriots .
Now we know about Lafayette , but where ’ s the Mel Gibson movie about this ?
Right .
I know it ’ ll be up to me and and Latinx executives that we get into power .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ History for Morons where you say something like , if we were placed back in the history books , can you imagine how America would see us ?
How we we would see ourselves ?
You keep coming back to the way your culture internalizes the way it ’ s portrayed in the mainstream culture , right ?
Or the lack of seeing yourself .
Equally the negative images that Hollywood puts out about us , or New York Times just reporting the negative without equally putting positive .
If you don ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ at all , the unspoken message is you ’ re not worth it .
You ’ re not worthy .
You ’ re not going to make it .
And that ’ s what gets imprinted on the kids .
You can ’ t be what you can ’ t see .
Yeah , how can you project yourself into the future without seeing yourself in someone else in the past ?
Who looked like you , spoke like you , and had success ?
How do you , as a young person @ @ @ @ @ @ @ do you build your self worth ?
I mean , your parents can try , but if society is saying the opposite , it ’ s a it ’ s a tough internal battle for Latinx kids and youth .
How did you do it ?
I had a lot of mentors .
I had a ton of therapy .
I ’ m still in therapy .
I ’ m still working on it .
You know , it was rough .
It was hard , man .
I was a very troubled @ @ @ @ @ @ @ school forced me to go to therapy , thank God .
And and that saved me .
I started looking at myself in my life in America and I always felt like an outsider .
And now I started to value my outsiderness , my sort of lack of placement in this society .
It gave me some kind of power .
I really enjoy comedy .
I always have .
And I wonder what it is that makes something funny .
And there are people like you who ’ ve made a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ laugh or think something is funny .
And I wonder to what degree do you think about how that process works : why do we find things funny ?
How can you as performer do something , say something that makes us laugh , and how often do you think something ’ s going to be funny that actually isn ’ t ?
I still think shit that I say is funny , even though people don ’ t laugh .
I still think it ’ s funny .
It ’ s funny @ @ @ @ @ @ @ enough for me .
Laughter is just life ’ s greatest mechanism to keep us going , it ’ s the best thing ever .
I ’ ve always had to be funny because to keep bullies from beating me up , from my dad beating me up .
Funny was a thing that helped me through life .
I still love it , it still keeps me going .
Comedy is a science in a lot of ways .
When did you know you were funny ?
I guess when I was @ @ @ @ @ @ @ make people laugh and that ’ s how we would hang .
All of us would be trying to crack each other up , all day , all night .
I always tried to hang out with the people who love to groove like that , to vibe like that .
We would just make each other laugh .
In the book , you basically call yourself an asshole a lot .
You say actors are not human beings .
Work is everything .
We ’ re not really fit to cohabitate with @ @ @ @ @ @ @ how true is that ?
Is that a shtick ?
Is there something about performers that make them more difficult ?
Yeah , I mean , have you ever hung out with actors ?
It ’ s hard .
They ’ re beautiful .
But , especially the successful ones , there ’ s a level of narcissism that sometimes it ’ s hard to get through .
You don ’ t make it to this level without a healthy dose of narcissism .
And sometimes that ’ s a lot to put @ @ @ @ @ @ @ my kids have to deal with it .
I do like to talk about myself a lot .
I do like to do voices and I like to , you know , sometimes steal all the attention .
It ’ s just a natural thing that you ’ ve been sort of groomed for , but sometimes it ’ s too much .
You said not too long ago that American movies are so shallow .
Do you think that ’ s still the case or do you think the rise of all @ @ @ @ @ @ @ much content now , movies and unlimited series which are basically long movies… Well it ’ s flip-flopped , right ?
Back in in the ’ 70s , which was the golden age of American cinema , and those were some great masterpieces of writing , of auteurship .
Easy Rider , Harold and Maude , M*A*S*H , Annie Hall , Godfathers , Mean Street , Taxi Driver , Raging Bull , Apocalypse Now , Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid , The Last Detail , Five Easy Pieces .
It was masterpieces @ @ @ @ @ @ @ great films .
And then , not so great .
Then American cinema became very much about the blockbuster , about getting butts in seats .
It was no longer about the artists ’ storytelling .
And it ’ s getting worse and worse .
I don ’ t really go to the movies anymore .
Independent film is suffering .
But , now TV is the place you go .
Streamers and television are where the greatest writing , the the greatest acting , the greatest storytelling is happening now .

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Actor, activist, author, and educator John Leguizamo loves that his comedy makes people feel angry. In his 2018 one-man Broadway show, Latin History for Morons (now available on Netflix), the 55-year-old star splices raunchy jokes with history about the genocide of Native American people, his experience being racially profiled, and a welter of statistics about the underrepresentation of Latinx people in American media. Born in Colombia and raised in Queens, New York, Leguizamo grew up seeing negative portrayals of Latinx people in Hollywood and in the pages of the New York Times. This feeling of being an outsider, of not belonging, was a power that he eventually came to value—and harness as fuel for his comedy and acting career.
In January, Leguizamo sat down with Mother Jones’s DC Bureau Chief David Corn onstage at the Comedy Cellar, the historic New York City stand-up venue, to talk about his work, his ego, his process, and his favorite subject: Latinx history.
Corn’s interview with Leguizamo is one of several notable guests featured over the next three episodes on the Mother Jones Podcast—a special summer series with a very “2020” origin story. Earlier this year, the coronavirus pandemic stalled work on a new podcast, co-produced by Mother Jones and the Comedy Cellar, but not before three fascinating guests joined Corn for in-depth interviews about art, politics, comedy, and the philosophies that infuse their work. These chats were too good to simply shelve; in the coming week’s you’ll also hear from music icon Debbie Harry, and talkshow host Samantha Bee.
Listen to the full interview with John Leguizamo on the Mother Jones Podcast:
Listen to the latest episode of the Mother Jones Podcast: Subscribe using Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, or your favorite podcast app.
A transcript of Corn’s interview with Leguizamo is below, edited for length and clarity.
David Corn: In October 2016 you were working to register Latinx voters. You said Trump was good for Latinos because he was bringing together a group of people, people from Mexico, Cuba, Puerto Rico, Colombia, Venezuela, in the Dominican Republic, who hadn’t always seen themselves as part of a larger unified community. Well, what happened?
John Leguizamo: He’s a horrible human being who does a lot of horrible things, but he’s so horribly blatant about it that he galvanizes us. We were asleep at the helm, bro. All of us—white liberals, moderate Republicans, independents, Latin activists, black activists. He got us woke. We are in a moral correction right now in our society, trying to make everything right because he does everything so wrong.
“This is a democracy! How do you make it so difficult for people to vote?”
I was never as political as I am since he was elected. I went to Florida, stumped for Hillary. I went to Vegas, stumped for Hillary. I’ve never done that for anybody. I went to Florida and I flipped the seat that was red for 30 years in Hialeah, a Republican city. We flipped that blue. Beto and I tried to flip Texas because we believed we could flip it with Maria Teresa Kumar. Texas is 40 percent Latin, 12 percent black. It should be a blue state, but for gerrymandering, voter suppression, and all the horrible things. This is a democracy! How do you make it so difficult for people to vote? Maria Teresa Kumar, she and her lawyers came up with a way around that is called VoterPal. We have to be so clever now and so active. It’s not a spectator sport anymore, being an American, you have to throw your hat into the ring now.
In your book Pimps, Hos, Playa Hatas, and All the Rest of My Hollywood Friends: My Life, you noticed that you felt like a second class citizen in the United States. And then 14 years later in Latin History for Morons you say the same thing. And I was just wondering if there’s been any change, any progress, or do you look at it a different way?
Look at these facts: We Latinx people are the second oldest ethnic group in America after Native Americans, with the largest ethnic group in America after white people. Where are we? What are our percentages of success? Less than one percent of government officials. Less than three percent of the faces in front of the camera in Hollywood or behind the camera. Less than one percent of the stories in the New York Times, New York Magazine, New Yorker or any other rag that has the city’s name on its banner, when we’re equal to whites in population in New York City. We’re 40 percent of the population in Texas and less than seven percent of the government officials. That’s not okay. That’s not alright. That’s cultural apartheid. I’m living in a cultural apartheid. It’s demoralizing. It’s demeaning. It’s painful. And you have to fight this with yourself. You have to build yourself up every day before you leave your house. To be able to confront all this, these micro aggressions, upon you daily.
“I’m living in a cultural apartheid. It’s demoralizing. It’s demeaning. It’s painful. And you have to fight this with yourself. You have to build yourself up every day before you leave your house.”
With all your success, do you still feel this?
Yeah, of course. It’s hard to get rid of. I see it happening. New York City has three of the best gold standard public schools in the country: Bronx science, Brooklyn Tech, and Stuyvesant. It’s supposed to be the schools that help the poorest children in New York City make it. Less than five percent of those children are Latin. Why is that? How is that? that should not be happening. That outrages me. How can I feel okay with all my success and fame, and this is happening to kids that look just like me? That’s not okay.
You’ve been very critical about Hollywood, where you make your make a lot of money, for not casting Latinx people in a positive role, but even more importantly, not having them in the decision making positions.
Well that’s where I find that the problem is. [Los Angeles] is 50 percent Latino, and less than three percent of the faces in front of the camera or behind the camera are Latinx. That’s cultural apartheid. It’s like we don’t exist. How is that possible? It’s not for lack of talent. It’s not for lack of trying. It’s that executives don’t see our stories. They don’t see us. They don’t understand us. I’ve been trying to sell scripts for the last 30 years of my life. It’s been impossible. The movie I just did, Critical Thinking, is a true story about five Latin and black kids in the ghetto-est ghetto Miami who became United States chess champions in 1989. It was impossible to get it done. I had raised the money myself. And it was a brilliant story. But dude, it’s hard without Latin execs.
Now isn’t there a market imperative? The accelerated growth of the Latinx population in the United States, doesn’t that get them thinking, hey, we’ve got an audience out there?
We’re 25 percent of the US box office. We added $2.3 trillion to the US economy. If we Latin people had our own country, we’d be the eighth largest country in the world, the second largest state in America. They know that, but until you have a Latin executive who understands us, who sees us, until you have editors at the New York Times who live in our culture and appreciate our culture, where are you going to get the better stories about Latin people? Who knows that Prince Royce sold out Yankee Stadium twice, two nights in a row. No white or Black artists or any other artists in America has done that. Why isn’t that in the New York Times? Why isn’t it in the New York Times that we Latinx people have the 10 top hits internationally in the world in music today? Where’s that a big feature in the New York Times or New York magazine? That’s crazy. I got more facts. I got more shit to say. I ain’t done yet. An hour may not be enough.
“I got more facts. I got more shit to say. I ain’t done yet. An hour may not be enough.”
I did watch Latin History for Morons, and you talk a lot about the conquest of the Americas by the Spaniards and what you call the “Great Extermination.” You can give us statistics because they are absolutely overwhelming. We all know how many people perished in the Holocaust. We
don’t really talk about the numbers of Native Americans, let alone indigenous people throughout North America and South America. And I wonder why you think the terminology, calling this the Great Extermination, why it hasn’t been more widely used and accepted?
Because once you start acknowledging the oppression, the exploitation of Latinx people and Native Americans, once you start accepting that this country was stolen, it’s hard for people to live with that. It’s hard for people to accept that because then you feel like you have to do something about it—reparations and whatnot. And and when you knew that there were 100 million Native American people in North, Central, and South America, and then 95 percent of them vanished through disease brought in by the Europeans, extermination, mutilation…. I mean, all kinds of horrors. Columbus was a horrible, horrible human being. He raped nine year old Taíno girls and bragged about them in his journals.
Tell us who the Taínos were. I have to say I learned a lot from Latin History for Morons. There was some elemental facts about the history of our culture that I forgot. And to think about these stunning gaps in our collective ignorance.
I love that. That’s the name of my next show, “Collective Ignorance.”
So can you talk about the Taínos?
There were 3 million Caribbean Native Americans under the under the Arawaks, and Taínos was was a branch of them. They were in Puerto Rico, Cuba, and Hispaniola (Dominican Republic and Haiti). And they were completely exterminated. Except a lot of my friends who did their DNA from Puerto Rico, Cuba, and Dominican Republic found that they have like 5/10/20 percent Native American, so it’s got to be Taíno. So that’s the beauty of knowing that their DNA is that we know they still they’re still alive, somehow, you know.
Yeah but basically it was a whole people completely wiped out.
Yeah it’s called the Caribbean Holocaust.
Now I have to say Latin History for Morons is pretty funny.
I know, it’s hard to believe that it’s a funny show!
We’re talking about genocide, extermination here, but I don’t want to give anyone the wrong impression.
But dude, that’s what my comedy has always been about. And that’s what my fight with American comedy was. It was like it never really captured life the way I grew up. I grew up laughing and in pain and oppressed and racially profiled but I still laughed, I still enjoy my life, and that’s what I tried to bring to American comedy through all my work.
“I grew up laughing and in pain and oppressed and racially profiled but I still laughed, I still enjoy my life, and that’s what I tried to bring to American comedy.”
What do you think resonates most with the audience? I mean, I’m sure every audience is different. But you’ve been doing this for over a year now longer. Can you tell from the stage what has truly connected?
There are moments of like raw honesty, of expressing the angst of what it’s like being Latinx in America still. I feel like I have to defend myself all the time. Sometimes you feel like everything is against you. And then the audience gets so quiet. I can hear sometimes people sniffling and quietly trying not to cry. I hear that in those incredible moments of silence. We sit there as if we were in church, and we meditate on that, and then I start doing some other crazy things. I wanted to show people that our history and knowledge of it can be weaponized, that it’s a call to action, that we need to spread this information. We got to get it into American history textbooks. We got to get it out there. There has to be that Ken Burns documentary on it. There has to be that Spielberg inclusion of our contributions to World War One and World War Two, because they’re massive.
We fought in every single war America’s ever had. I’m talking about the American Revolutionary War, where 10,000 unknown Latino patriots fought. Cuban women in Virginia sold their jewelry to feed the Patriots. [Bernardo de] Gálvez gave $70,000 worth of weapons to George Washington. He was General in Louisiana. He had a misfit army, like the Mets of armies. His blockade, with 3000 Puerto Ricans, Cubans, Mexican, Native Americans, and freed slaves, blockaded the British from the south. So they couldn’t surround the Patriots from the south and ambush them. Cuba gave over $200,000 worth of contribution donations to the American patriots.
Now we know about Lafayette, but where’s the Mel Gibson movie about this?
Right. I know it’ll be up to me and and Latinx executives that we get into power.
There’s a moment in Latin History for Morons where you say something like, if we were placed back in the history books, can you imagine how America would see us? How we we would see ourselves? You keep coming back to the way your culture internalizes the way it’s portrayed in the mainstream culture, right?
“If you don’t see yourself positively or see yourself at all, the unspoken message is you’re not worth it. You’re not worthy. You’re not going to make it.”
Or the lack of seeing yourself. Equally the negative images that Hollywood puts out about us, or New York Times just reporting the negative without equally putting positive. If you don’t see yourself positively or see yourself at all, the unspoken message is you’re not worth it. You’re not worthy. You’re not going to make it. And that’s what gets imprinted on the kids.
You can’t be what you can’t see.
Yeah, how can you project yourself into the future without seeing yourself in someone else in the past? Who looked like you, spoke like you, and had success? How do you, as a young person, build your self esteem? How do you build your self worth? I mean, your parents can try, but if society is saying the opposite, it’s a it’s a tough internal battle for Latinx kids and youth.
How did you do it?
I had a lot of mentors. I had a ton of therapy. I’m still in therapy. I’m still working on it. You know, it was rough. It was hard, man. I was a very troubled youth for all those reasons. High school forced me to go to therapy, thank God. And and that saved me. I started looking at myself in my life in America and I always felt like an outsider. And now I started to value my outsiderness, my sort of lack of placement in this society. It gave me some kind of power.
I really enjoy comedy. I always have. And I wonder what it is that makes something funny. And there are people like you who’ve made a career on being able to make others laugh or think something is funny. And I wonder to what degree do you think about how that process works: why do we find things funny? How can you as performer do something, say something that makes us laugh, and how often do you think something’s going to be funny that actually isn’t?
I still think shit that I say is funny, even though people don’t laugh. I still think it’s funny. It’s funny to me, that’s good enough for me. Laughter is just life’s greatest mechanism to keep us going, it’s the best thing ever. I’ve always had to be funny because to keep bullies from beating me up, from my dad beating me up. Funny was a thing that helped me through life. I still love it, it still keeps me going. Comedy is a science in a lot of ways.
When did you know you were funny?
I guess when I was like 13 and 14 because I would make people laugh and that’s how we would hang. All of us would be trying to crack each other up, all day, all night. I always tried to hang out with the people who love to groove like that, to vibe like that. We would just make each other laugh.
In the book, you basically call yourself an asshole a lot. You say actors are not human beings. Work is everything. We’re not really fit to cohabitate with other people. And I was wondering how true is that? Is that a shtick? Is there something about performers that make them more difficult?
Yeah, I mean, have you ever hung out with actors? It’s hard. They’re beautiful. But, especially the successful ones, there’s a level of narcissism that sometimes it’s hard to get through. You don’t make it to this level without a healthy dose of narcissism. And sometimes that’s a lot to put up with. My poor wife and my kids have to deal with it. I do like to talk about myself a lot. I do like to do voices and I like to, you know, sometimes steal all the attention. It’s just a natural thing that you’ve been sort of groomed for, but sometimes it’s too much.
You said not too long ago that American movies are so shallow. Do you think that’s still the case or do you think the rise of all these streaming networks, which produce so much content now, movies and unlimited series which are basically long movies…
Well it’s flip-flopped, right? Back in in the ’70s, which was the golden age of American cinema, and those were some great masterpieces of writing, of auteurship. Easy Rider, Harold and Maude, M*A*S*H, Annie Hall, Godfathers, Mean Street, Taxi Driver, Raging Bull, Apocalypse Now, Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, The Last Detail, Five Easy Pieces. It was masterpieces after masterpieces. So many great, great films. And then, not so great. Then American cinema became very much about the blockbuster, about getting butts in seats. It was no longer about the artists’ storytelling. And it’s getting worse and worse. I don’t really go to the movies anymore. Independent film is suffering. But, now TV is the place you go. Streamers and television are where the greatest writing, the the greatest acting, the greatest storytelling is happening now.


motherjones--2020-07-15--Another Monument to White Supremacy That Should Come Down? The Electoral College

We are in a moment of reckoning over racism , not only taking down Confederate statues to eradicate these lingering odes to white supremacy but also examining how deeply our society has been shaped by slavery and its aftermath .
Last year , the New York Times ’ 1619 Project traced the influence of slavery on everything from American capitalism to the American diet .
Today , individuals , brands , and lawmakers are taking stock .
In this reappraisal , the Electoral College is likewise due for a second look .
In the last five elections , the Electoral @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Republicans who lost the popular vote : George W. Bush in 2000 and Donald Trump in 2016 .
Looking ahead to the election this November , Democrats harbor a very realistic fear that Trump will again prevail without winning the popular vote .
The political divisions and demographics of the 21st century have highlighted the undemocratic Electoral College system .
But the fact that we have an election system that privileges a minority white party over a diverse majority is not a quirk of the system .
That has been its purpose all @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Harvard historian Alexander Keyssar sets out to answer the question that is also the title of his book : Why Do We Still Have the Electoral College ?
Keyssar , who is an expert in surveying a topic throughout American history , including his seminal work on the history of voting rights in the United States , begins at the Constitutional Convention in 1787 and works his way up to the present , examining how the framers created the Electoral College , then each successive attempt to reform or abolish it .
The @ @ @ @ @ @ @ based on its number of representatives in Congress—which is based on a highly imperfect approximation of population that gives short shrift to populous states , plus two for each senator .
The result is that not everyone ’ s vote carries the same weight ; in 2016 , Wyoming had one electoral vote for every 190,000 residents while in California each vote represented 680,000 people .
It is conventional wisdom that the Electoral College system was a compromise to induce small states to join the union .
Almost 250 years after the Constitution @ @ @ @ @ @ @ that the Electoral College is here to stay because small states would refuse to give up their disproportionate power .
But it turns out that is a narrative prime for debunking .
Keyssar found that attempts to elect the president through a national popular vote have been thwarted not by small states but instead by the white leaders of southern ones , who viewed the system as key to maintaining white supremacy .
Before the Civil War , southern states enjoyed an advantage in the Electoral College the same way they did in @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Southern whites due to the Three-Fifths Compromise , by which slaves were counted as three-fifths of a person , and electoral votes were based on the same calculation as political representation .
As early as 1800 , “ electoral votes attributable to slaves provided Thomas Jefferson ’ s margin of victory , ” Keyssar writes .
After Reconstruction , Southern Whites used Jim Crow and vigilante violence to deprive Black people of the franchise .
Black Americans were now fully counted as part of a state ’ s population , but they still @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ’ outsized influence .
“ In 1904 , for example , Delaware had cast roughly the same number of votes for Congress as Georgia had , but Georgia had eleven representatives while Delaware had only one , ” Keyssar writes .
That same year , which was not an anomaly , Ohio had the same number of voters as nine southern states combined , “ but those nine states possessed ninety-nine electoral votes in comparison to Ohio ’ s twenty-three.
” Southern whites understood that the system was key not only to their @ @ @ @ @ @ @ subjugation of Black voters in state elections .
If the nation adopted a national popular vote , there would be attempts to court the votes of Southern Black people and pressure to lift voting restrictions .
Even after the civil rights movement and the end of Jim Crow , the Southern senators blocked the adoption of a national popular vote amendment .
“ The Electoral College is one of the South ’ s few remaining political safeguards , ” Alabama Democratic Sen. James Allen wrote in 1969 , according to Keyssar .
“ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ decision has continued to suppress the electoral views of Black voters in the South .
In 2016 , for example , every state of the former Confederacy except Virginia voted for Donald Trump , though the region ’ s Black voters overwhelmingly supported Hillary Clinton .
“ In a region whose population was 21 percent African American , only 13 of 160 electoral votes ( 8 percent ) were cast for the candidate favored by Blacks , ” Keyssar writes .
There have been various efforts to abolish the Electoral College over the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ focused on attempts to replace the winner-take-all system with proportional or district allotment .
But the closest Congress came to a national popular vote amendment to the Constitution was in 1970 .
The most notable current attempt to end the Electoral College is the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact , a clever end-run around Congress and the difficulty of amending the Constitution .
States that join promise to give their electoral votes to the winner of the popular vote ; the compact will be triggered once enough states join so that the winner @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Electoral College .
But Republican-controlled states are unlikely to join .
Because the GOP is an increasingly white party , which under Trump has embraced a politics of racial grievance that shrinks the party ’ s base of support , Republicans increasingly see the Electoral College as a lifeline .
As a result , Republican support for the institution has surged since 2016 .
But when I talked to Keyssar last week , he wasn ’ t sure that the Electoral College would endure .
Despite meticulously documenting each unsuccessful attempt to change @ @ @ @ @ @ @ hopeful the Electoral College , like Confederate statues , would be toppled in the not too distant future .
What follows is a transcript of our conversation , edited for length and clarity .
Despite the conventional wisdom that small states are the reason for the Electoral College , you found that there was much more consistent support for it from southern states .
Did that surprise you ?
As is true for everyone , I also thought that the small states [ were responsible ] .
It was the standard explanation .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ reason why it would be untrue .
Then there were several different stages in my thinking about this .
When I began reading about the events of the 1960s and 1970s , where we came closest to getting rid of the Electoral College and in favor of a national popular vote , I began noticing that a number of the leaders of the movement for a national popular vote came from small states : William Langer from North Dakota , John Pastore from Rhode Island , Mike Mansfield from Montana .
Then I @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the roll call votes , and they confirmed that the issue was not small states versus large states .
There is not a coalition of small states that functions politically .
And they don ’ t necessarily have a lot in common .
Whereas the states of the South were a block and they did have a lot in common politically .
And that was true in the 19th century and the 20th .
Another piece of conventional wisdom that I had absorbed was that the Electoral College was a compromise to get @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the Constitution .
You did find some evidence for that , but you found that it was much more a compromise for southern states .
The way in which I finally would understand this is that the fights between both small and large states and between slave and non-slave states had been fought out earlier in the summer [ of 1787 at the Constitutional Convention ] , over representation in Congress .
It produced the compromises of two branches of the legislature , one based on population and the other , every state @ @ @ @ @ @ @ and then the compromises over slavery which produce the three-fifths clause .
What the electoral college does , when the framers finally come up with the idea at the end of the convention when they ’ re struggling with this , is they import those compromises which were already agreed to , into the presidential election system .
They ’ re not making a new set of deals there .
Instead of wrestling with how to newly apportion things , they import the same compromises into what we call the Electoral College .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ showed how white supremacy was baked in from day one .
That ’ s right .
From day one , basically , the slave states and the small states were advantaged by the Electoral College , but slave states were advantaged more .
After Reconstruction , you point out that Southern whites actually had even more say in electing the president than before the Civil War , because of the five-fifths clause .
And they were not shy about that .
White Southerners , by and large , don ’ t seem to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ African Americans .
They still believe their states were entitled to the same amount of power in Congress and in presidential elections .
I think that that conviction , that notion that our state should carry weight relative to its population , no matter how many people are allowed to vote , becomes deeply embedded in southern political thinking .
[ North Carolina Democratic Senator ] Sam Ervin , who is one of the prime defenders of the Electoral College in the 1960s and into the 1970s , has a locution that at @ @ @ @ @ @ @ I finally understood it .
He said the problem with the national popular vote is that it just measures the preferences of “ those who happen to vote on the particular election day.
” That ’ s in contrast , in his mind , to representing the full weight of the state .
They feel entitled to this representation , entitled to the power that the “ five-fifths clause ” gives them .
Going back to the early 20th century , I was struck by the anecdote of Oscar Underwood of Alabama , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of a national popular vote .
You quote a campaign pamphlet which says it would “ allow the honest vote of a white man in Alabama to be neutralized by the fraudulent and debauched vote ” of women and Black people .
What I thought was remarkable about the documents that I ’ d found is it was a primary contest against the one southerner who had advocated a national popular vote .
The pamphlet that I was quoting from was really intended for an Alabama audience .
And there it becomes very @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a national popular vote is grounded in the desire to maintain white supremacy .
In the period of Underwood all the way up to the 1960s , Southern whites benefited from the five-fifths clause .
But even after the 1965 Voting Rights Act , they still didn ’ t want to give up the Electoral College .
Why do you think the South still came together as a bloc to prevent a national popular vote in 1970 , even though Black people were now voting in the South ?
What seems to be @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of the senior leaders in Congress , at least , such as Ervin , or Strom Thurmond [ of South Carolina ] or James Eastland [ of Mississippi ] , yes , the Voting Rights Act had been passed , but they were still hoping that they could roll pieces of it back .
The southern states are pressing very , very hard to eliminate the preclearance provision of the Voting Rights Act since the spring of 1970 .
And they still believe that something like that can happen .
And Thurmond is @ @ @ @ @ @ @ cause is not lost , we still may be able to contain the impact of this .
And if that were the case they were still much better off with the Electoral College than with the national popular vote .
It makes sense because they stuck out Reconstruction for like 15 years and then that went away .
Exactly .
They weren ’ t happy with the Voting Rights Act , but maybe they could figure out some way around it , some way to reduce its impact , and weren ’ t @ @ @ @ @ @ @ passed this law .
I feel like , at least where we stand in July 2020 , that bet paid off .
In 2013 preclearance did go away , due to the Supreme Court .
And it is easier to be disenfranchised in some of these states , which have erected more barriers to voting .
It seems like they made the right bet in terms of preserving their interests .
Alas , I agree with you .
The white dominant South has remained the white dominant South in many southern states in @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a large Black Democratic minority , but which is almost certainly not going to win the whole state .
In a situation like that having winner-take-all and having the Electoral College serve the advantage of the dominant party .
This is getting into speculation , but I think in the next 10 years we could see North Carolina , Georgia , and Texas all becoming purple or blue states , and the advantage that Southern whites have enjoyed for 250 years start to go away .
Do you see that as a possible @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Electoral College ?
We ’ re speculating , but I do think that when one looks at the demographics and the politics of a number of southern states , it seems unlikely that they will be able to present this consistent phalanx of support for Republican presidential candidates .
And I think it ’ s quite possible that if that “ solid South ” really does crumble or weaken in a significant way , what has become in recent decades the Republican Party ’ s reflexive opposition to Electoral College reform may really @ @ @ @ @ @ @ is a not implausible path towards reform within the next decade .
We are definitely in a moment where we are thinking about civil rights again , after sort of tabling that for a few decades .
We ’ ll just put that on the back burner for 40 years .
Right .
Your book points out that the closest we got to ending the Electoral College was in 1970 , following the civil rights movement with its focus on making the country more small “ d ” democratic .
That ’ s @ @ @ @ @ @ @ resurgence of pro small “ d ” democratic activism is very important now , and it ’ s hard to see that Electoral College reform would not be part of that .

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We are in a moment of reckoning over racism, not only taking down Confederate statues to eradicate these lingering odes to white supremacy but also examining how deeply our society has been shaped by slavery and its aftermath. Last year, the New York Times’ 1619 Project traced the influence of slavery on everything from American capitalism to the American diet. Today, individuals, brands, and lawmakers are taking stock. In this reappraisal, the Electoral College is likewise due for a second look.
In the last five elections, the Electoral College has handed the presidency to two Republicans who lost the popular vote: George W. Bush in 2000 and Donald Trump in 2016. Looking ahead to the election this November, Democrats harbor a very realistic fear that Trump will again prevail without winning the popular vote. The political divisions and demographics of the 21st century have highlighted the undemocratic Electoral College system. But the fact that we have an election system that privileges a minority white party over a diverse majority is not a quirk of the system. That has been its purpose all along.
In his new book, Harvard historian Alexander Keyssar sets out to answer the question that is also the title of his book: Why Do We Still Have the Electoral College? Keyssar, who is an expert in surveying a topic throughout American history, including his seminal work on the history of voting rights in the United States, begins at the Constitutional Convention in 1787 and works his way up to the present, examining how the framers created the Electoral College, then each successive attempt to reform or abolish it.
The Electoral College allots votes to each state based on its number of representatives in Congress—which is based on a highly imperfect approximation of population that gives short shrift to populous states, plus two for each senator. The result is that not everyone’s vote carries the same weight; in 2016, Wyoming had one electoral vote for every 190,000 residents while in California each vote represented 680,000 people.
It is conventional wisdom that the Electoral College system was a compromise to induce small states to join the union. Almost 250 years after the Constitution was written, it is widely assumed that the Electoral College is here to stay because small states would refuse to give up their disproportionate power. But it turns out that is a narrative prime for debunking. Keyssar found that attempts to elect the president through a national popular vote have been thwarted not by small states but instead by the white leaders of southern ones, who viewed the system as key to maintaining white supremacy.
Before the Civil War, southern states enjoyed an advantage in the Electoral College the same way they did in Congress; congressional representation was biased toward Southern whites due to the Three-Fifths Compromise, by which slaves were counted as three-fifths of a person, and electoral votes were based on the same calculation as political representation. As early as 1800, “electoral votes attributable to slaves provided Thomas Jefferson’s margin of victory,” Keyssar writes. After Reconstruction, Southern Whites used Jim Crow and vigilante violence to deprive Black people of the franchise. Black Americans were now fully counted as part of a state’s population, but they still could not vote, growing white southerners’ outsized influence. “In 1904, for example, Delaware had cast roughly the same number of votes for Congress as Georgia had, but Georgia had eleven representatives while Delaware had only one,” Keyssar writes. That same year, which was not an anomaly, Ohio had the same number of voters as nine southern states combined, “but those nine states possessed ninety-nine electoral votes in comparison to Ohio’s twenty-three.”
Southern whites understood that the system was key not only to their outsized influence but also to the continued subjugation of Black voters in state elections. If the nation adopted a national popular vote, there would be attempts to court the votes of Southern Black people and pressure to lift voting restrictions.
Even after the civil rights movement and the end of Jim Crow, the Southern senators blocked the adoption of a national popular vote amendment. “The Electoral College is one of the South’s few remaining political safeguards,” Alabama Democratic Sen. James Allen wrote in 1969, according to Keyssar. “Let’s keep it.” That decision has continued to suppress the electoral views of Black voters in the South. In 2016, for example, every state of the former Confederacy except Virginia voted for Donald Trump, though the region’s Black voters overwhelmingly supported Hillary Clinton. “In a region whose population was 21 percent African American, only 13 of 160 electoral votes (8 percent) were cast for the candidate favored by Blacks,” Keyssar writes.
There have been various efforts to abolish the Electoral College over the years. Until the 1950s, they focused on attempts to replace the winner-take-all system with proportional or district allotment. But the closest Congress came to a national popular vote amendment to the Constitution was in 1970. The most notable current attempt to end the Electoral College is the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact, a clever end-run around Congress and the difficulty of amending the Constitution. States that join promise to give their electoral votes to the winner of the popular vote; the compact will be triggered once enough states join so that the winner of the popular vote will win the Electoral College. But Republican-controlled states are unlikely to join. Because the GOP is an increasingly white party, which under Trump has embraced a politics of racial grievance that shrinks the party’s base of support, Republicans increasingly see the Electoral College as a lifeline. As a result, Republican support for the institution has surged since 2016.
But when I talked to Keyssar last week, he wasn’t sure that the Electoral College would endure. Despite meticulously documenting each unsuccessful attempt to change how we elect presidents, Keyssar was hopeful the Electoral College, like Confederate statues, would be toppled in the not too distant future. What follows is a transcript of our conversation, edited for length and clarity.
Despite the conventional wisdom that small states are the reason for the Electoral College, you found that there was much more consistent support for it from southern states. Did that surprise you?
As is true for everyone, I also thought that the small states [were responsible]. It was the standard explanation. I didn’t see an obvious reason why it would be untrue. Then there were several different stages in my thinking about this.
When I began reading about the events of the 1960s and 1970s, where we came closest to getting rid of the Electoral College and in favor of a national popular vote, I began noticing that a number of the leaders of the movement for a national popular vote came from small states: William Langer from North Dakota, John Pastore from Rhode Island, Mike Mansfield from Montana. Then I also went in and did analyses of the roll call votes, and they confirmed that the issue was not small states versus large states.
There is not a coalition of small states that functions politically. And they don’t necessarily have a lot in common. Whereas the states of the South were a block and they did have a lot in common politically. And that was true in the 19th century and the 20th.
Another piece of conventional wisdom that I had absorbed was that the Electoral College was a compromise to get the small states to sign on to the Constitution. You did find some evidence for that, but you found that it was much more a compromise for southern states.
The way in which I finally would understand this is that the fights between both small and large states and between slave and non-slave states had been fought out earlier in the summer [of 1787 at the Constitutional Convention], over representation in Congress. It produced the compromises of two branches of the legislature, one based on population and the other, every state getting the same amount of power, and then the compromises over slavery which produce the three-fifths clause.
What the electoral college does, when the framers finally come up with the idea at the end of the convention when they’re struggling with this, is they import those compromises which were already agreed to, into the presidential election system. They’re not making a new set of deals there. Instead of wrestling with how to newly apportion things, they import the same compromises into what we call the Electoral College.
I thought that was interesting because it showed how white supremacy was baked in from day one.
That’s right. From day one, basically, the slave states and the small states were advantaged by the Electoral College, but slave states were advantaged more.
After Reconstruction, you point out that Southern whites actually had even more say in electing the president than before the Civil War, because of the five-fifths clause. And they were not shy about that.
White Southerners, by and large, don’t seem to have been particularly embarrassed about having disenfranchised African Americans. They still believe their states were entitled to the same amount of power in Congress and in presidential elections.
I think that that conviction, that notion that our state should carry weight relative to its population, no matter how many people are allowed to vote, becomes deeply embedded in southern political thinking. [North Carolina Democratic Senator] Sam Ervin, who is one of the prime defenders of the Electoral College in the 1960s and into the 1970s, has a locution that at first I found startling and I think I finally understood it. He said the problem with the national popular vote is that it just measures the preferences of “those who happen to vote on the particular election day.” That’s in contrast, in his mind, to representing the full weight of the state. They feel entitled to this representation, entitled to the power that the “five-fifths clause” gives them.
Going back to the early 20th century, I was struck by the anecdote of Oscar Underwood of Alabama, who ran for Senate attacking the idea of a national popular vote. You quote a campaign pamphlet which says it would “allow the honest vote of a white man in Alabama to be neutralized by the fraudulent and debauched vote” of women and Black people.
What I thought was remarkable about the documents that I’d found is it was a primary contest against the one southerner who had advocated a national popular vote. The pamphlet that I was quoting from was really intended for an Alabama audience. And there it becomes very, very clear that the opposition to a national popular vote is grounded in the desire to maintain white supremacy.
In the period of Underwood all the way up to the 1960s, Southern whites benefited from the five-fifths clause. But even after the 1965 Voting Rights Act, they still didn’t want to give up the Electoral College. Why do you think the South still came together as a bloc to prevent a national popular vote in 1970, even though Black people were now voting in the South?
What seems to be the case is that among a number of the senior leaders in Congress, at least, such as Ervin, or Strom Thurmond [of South Carolina] or James Eastland [of Mississippi], yes, the Voting Rights Act had been passed, but they were still hoping that they could roll pieces of it back. The southern states are pressing very, very hard to eliminate the preclearance provision of the Voting Rights Act since the spring of 1970. And they still believe that something like that can happen. And Thurmond is giving speeches and writing essays that the cause is not lost, we still may be able to contain the impact of this. And if that were the case they were still much better off with the Electoral College than with the national popular vote.
It makes sense because they stuck out Reconstruction for like 15 years and then that went away.
Exactly. They weren’t happy with the Voting Rights Act, but maybe they could figure out some way around it, some way to reduce its impact, and weren’t about to completely capitulate just because Congress passed this law.
I feel like, at least where we stand in July 2020, that bet paid off. In 2013 preclearance did go away, due to the Supreme Court. And it is easier to be disenfranchised in some of these states, which have erected more barriers to voting. It seems like they made the right bet in terms of preserving their interests.
Alas, I agree with you. The white dominant South has remained the white dominant South in many southern states in terms of presidential elections. You have a large Black Democratic minority, but which is almost certainly not going to win the whole state. In a situation like that having winner-take-all and having the Electoral College serve the advantage of the dominant party.
This is getting into speculation, but I think in the next 10 years we could see North Carolina, Georgia, and Texas all becoming purple or blue states, and the advantage that Southern whites have enjoyed for 250 years start to go away. Do you see that as a possible turning point in Southern support for the Electoral College?
We’re speculating, but I do think that when one looks at the demographics and the politics of a number of southern states, it seems unlikely that they will be able to present this consistent phalanx of support for Republican presidential candidates. And I think it’s quite possible that if that “solid South” really does crumble or weaken in a significant way, what has become in recent decades the Republican Party’s reflexive opposition to Electoral College reform may really dissipate. I do think that that is a not implausible path towards reform within the next decade.
We are definitely in a moment where we are thinking about civil rights again, after sort of tabling that for a few decades.
We’ll just put that on the back burner for 40 years.
Right. Your book points out that the closest we got to ending the Electoral College was in 1970, following the civil rights movement with its focus on making the country more small “d” democratic.
That’s exactly right. I think that the resurgence of pro small “d” democratic activism is very important now, and it’s hard to see that Electoral College reform would not be part of that.


motherjones--2020-07-15--Jeff Sessions Ends His Political Career in a Blaze of Racism

Jeff Sessions ’ political career came to an end on Tuesday .
Sessions had sought to recapture the Senate seat he held for 20 years before becoming President Donald Trump ’ s attorney general .
In his stead , Alabama Republicans nominated Tommy Tuberville , a former college football coach .
The former prosecutor , senator , and attorney general went out the same way he entered the national stage more than three decades ago : in a blaze of racism .
Racism defined Sessions ’ entire career , but racism is not what ended it .
In fact , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ put Sessions and the white grievance he long embodied at the center of American politics .
Sessions ’ political career is over now because he realized too late that Trumpism isn ’ t just about the worldview ; it ’ s also about Trump himself , a cult of loyalty that Sessions ran afoul of before it was clear how easily Trump cast people aside .
Sessions was the first senator to endorse Trump in 2016 , and he served as a trusted campaign adviser .
The attorney general position was his reward—the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ finally make his reactionary fever dreams a reality .
Sessions got to work rolling back federal oversight of police departments , orchestrating Trump ’ s family separation policy at the border , targeting sanctuary cities , deporting asylum seekers , and supporting voter suppression schemes .
Though Sessions faithfully and effectively enacted Trumpism as attorney general , he recused himself from the investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election .
Trump was furious at the decision , which ultimately led to the appointment of special counsel Robert Mueller .
Sessions was loyal @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Trump wanted someone loyal to him above all .
Sessions had caved , for once , to the calls of the mainstream to abide by recusal rules before he realized just how brazenly Trump would defy norms , rules , and laws .
The day after the 2018 midterms , Trump fired him .
How hard it must ’ ve been for Sessions to see his own project of white restoration taken away from him just as he was accomplishing so much .
When Sessions decided to try for his old job in @ @ @ @ @ @ @ whose campaign message can be summed up as God sent us Donald Trump .
Sessions ’ worldview and his politics were uncouth even as he crusaded for them as a young prosecutor .
He began his career in Mobile , on the southern coast of Alabama , where old-money aristocracy met white grievance populism .
The business-minded Republicans in the state found both the white grievance and the conservative populism unbecoming , even if they were Republicans for the same reason he was : The Democratic Party had embraced civil rights .
“ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ economy is centered , that ’ s the Republican establishment , ” Alabama historian Wayne Flynt told me shortly after Sessions became attorney general in 2017 .
“ They never liked Jeff Sessions very much .
Too many connections to race , to right-wing conservatism , to the white evangelical rabble-rousers.
” But he wasn ’ t too extreme to climb the political latter .
Reagan appointed him US attorney there in 1981 , and Sessions took up the racist drug war with zeal , meting out the harshest sentences possible .
He @ @ @ @ @ @ @ take on voting rights activists .
One of his earlier cases , his prosecution of the Marion Three , became a seminal moment in his career .
Despite the Voting Rights Act , Black people in Alabama ’ s rural counties lacked political power .
As Mother Jones previously reported : Soon after , in 1986 , Reagan nominated Sessions for a federal judgeship .
His prosecution of the activists was part of why the Senate rejected his nomination .
It didn ’ t help that witnesses also testified that he had called @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a white civil rights lawyer a disgrace to his race , and the ACLU and NAACP “ un-American.
” This was how the nation first met Sessions .
Sessions bristled at being labeled a racist , but he never changed .
When the Senate confirmed him as attorney general in 2017 , his Republican colleagues tried to scrub the stench of racism off him by relitigating the racism charges from 1986 , which Sessions denied .
In 2020 , Sessions ’ own campaign couldn ’ t be bothered to keep up the charade @ @ @ @ @ @ @ York Times Magazine recently , he seemed to refer to the renowned Black scholar Henry Louis Gates Jr. as “ some criminal ” in a factually muddled recollection of the Obama “ beer summit.
” The Times asked the campaign if Sessions had indeed been referring to Gates .
A spokesperson didn ’ t even try to correct the statement .
In 1994 , Sessions was elected attorney general of Alabama , a perch from which he supported lifetime prison sentences for children under 14 and the use of chain gangs for prison @ @ @ @ @ @ @ career .
In the Senate , he was known as a back-bencher , too extreme to be a leader but skilled enough to repeatedly help kill immigration reform efforts .
He also played a role in keeping Black judges off of the federal bench in Alabama , denying them the seat he had been denied in 1986 .
His office struck up a productive relationship with Steve Bannon ’ s Breitbart News and nurtured aides who would go on to be anti-immigrant footsoldiers , including Trump acolyte and white supremacist Stephen Miller .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ Mexicans rapists , Sessions had found his man .
Even now , however fractious the dissolution of their working relationship , there is little actual daylight between the two .
Sessions rarely defends himself against Trump ’ s public floggings , but he ’ s quick to defend Trump .
It ’ s ironic that Sessions ’ loss on Tuesday comes as Trump himself has launched a broadside against voting by mail , alleging incorrectly—in a move right out of the Marion Three playbook—that they are a source of fraud .
Over the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ were neoconfederate twins , including anti-immigrant policies and nostalgia for white supremacy .
When a Senate committee voted to rename military bases named for confederate generals , Sessions called it an attack on confederate soldiers .
Here lies the political career of Jefferson Beauregard Sessions III , named for two confederate heroes like his father and grandfather before him—the only monument to the Confederacy that Trump was eager to remove .

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Jeff Sessions’ political career came to an end on Tuesday. Sessions had sought to recapture the Senate seat he held for 20 years before becoming President Donald Trump’s attorney general. In his stead, Alabama Republicans nominated Tommy Tuberville, a former college football coach. The former prosecutor, senator, and attorney general went out the same way he entered the national stage more than three decades ago: in a blaze of racism.
Racism defined Sessions’ entire career, but racism is not what ended it. In fact, it was Trump’s patronage that put Sessions and the white grievance he long embodied at the center of American politics. Sessions’ political career is over now because he realized too late that Trumpism isn’t just about the worldview; it’s also about Trump himself, a cult of loyalty that Sessions ran afoul of before it was clear how easily Trump cast people aside.
Sessions was the first senator to endorse Trump in 2016, and he served as a trusted campaign adviser. The attorney general position was his reward—the zenith of his career where he could finally make his reactionary fever dreams a reality. Sessions got to work rolling back federal oversight of police departments, orchestrating Trump’s family separation policy at the border, targeting sanctuary cities, deporting asylum seekers, and supporting voter suppression schemes. Though Sessions faithfully and effectively enacted Trumpism as attorney general, he recused himself from the investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election. Trump was furious at the decision, which ultimately led to the appointment of special counsel Robert Mueller.
Sessions was loyal to Trumpism as an idea, but Trump wanted someone loyal to him above all. Sessions had caved, for once, to the calls of the mainstream to abide by recusal rules before he realized just how brazenly Trump would defy norms, rules, and laws. The day after the 2018 midterms, Trump fired him. How hard it must’ve been for Sessions to see his own project of white restoration taken away from him just as he was accomplishing so much. When Sessions decided to try for his old job in the Senate, Trump endorsed Tuberville, whose campaign message can be summed up as God sent us Donald Trump.
Sessions’ worldview and his politics were uncouth even as he crusaded for them as a young prosecutor. He began his career in Mobile, on the southern coast of Alabama, where old-money aristocracy met white grievance populism. The business-minded Republicans in the state found both the white grievance and the conservative populism unbecoming, even if they were Republicans for the same reason he was: The Democratic Party had embraced civil rights. “In North Alabama, where the knowledge economy is centered, that’s the Republican establishment,” Alabama historian Wayne Flynt told me shortly after Sessions became attorney general in 2017. “They never liked Jeff Sessions very much. Too many connections to race, to right-wing conservatism, to the white evangelical rabble-rousers.” But he wasn’t too extreme to climb the political ladder.
Reagan appointed him US attorney there in 1981, and Sessions took up the racist drug war with zeal, meting out the harshest sentences possible. He also went out of his way to take on voting rights activists. One of his earlier cases, his prosecution of the Marion Three, became a seminal moment in his career. Despite the Voting Rights Act, Black people in Alabama’s rural counties lacked political power. As Mother Jones previously reported:
So community organizers, led by Albert Turner, a former aide to Martin Luther King Jr., started teaching African Americans to vote absentee in order to boost turnout, particularly among elderly voters struggling to make it to the polls, which in some places were open for only four hours. In 1982, local candidates backed by Turner and his allies finally won. Two years later, Sessions began investigating absentee ballot use by African Americans in five rural counties where black voters’ influence was ascendant. He charged Turner, Turner’s wife, and another organizer—known as the Marion Three—with mail and voter fraud for allegedly tampering with ballots. During the trial, his case fell apart, and the jury found the three activists not guilty.
Soon after, in 1986, Reagan nominated Sessions for a federal judgeship. His prosecution of the activists was part of why the Senate rejected his nomination. It didn’t help that witnesses also testified that he had called a Black colleague “boy,” a white civil rights lawyer a disgrace to his race, and the ACLU and NAACP “un-American.” This was how the nation first met Sessions.
Sessions bristled at being labeled a racist, but he never changed. When the Senate confirmed him as attorney general in 2017, his Republican colleagues tried to scrub the stench of racism off him by relitigating the racism charges from 1986, which Sessions denied. In 2020, Sessions’ own campaign couldn’t be bothered to keep up the charade. In an interview with the New York Times Magazine recently, he seemed to refer to the renowned Black scholar Henry Louis Gates Jr. as “some criminal” in a factually muddled recollection of the Obama “beer summit.” The Times asked the campaign if Sessions had indeed been referring to Gates. A spokesperson didn’t even try to correct the statement.
In 1994, Sessions was elected attorney general of Alabama, a perch from which he supported lifetime prison sentences for children under 14 and the use of chain gangs for prison labor before embarking on his 20-year Senate career. In the Senate, he was known as a back-bencher, too extreme to be a leader but skilled enough to repeatedly help kill immigration reform efforts. He also played a role in keeping Black judges off of the federal bench in Alabama, denying them the seat he had been denied in 1986. His office struck up a productive relationship with Steve Bannon’s Breitbart News and nurtured aides who would go on to be anti-immigrant footsoldiers, including Trump acolyte and white supremacist Stephen Miller.
When Trump descended his golden escalator calling Mexicans rapists, Sessions had found his man. Even now, however fractious the dissolution of their working relationship, there is little actual daylight between the two. Sessions rarely defends himself against Trump’s public floggings, but he’s quick to defend Trump. It’s ironic that Sessions’ loss on Tuesday comes as Trump himself has launched a broadside against voting by mail, alleging incorrectly—in a move right out of the Marion Three playbook—that they are a source of fraud. Over the last few months, their 2020 campaigns were neoconfederate twins, including anti-immigrant policies and nostalgia for white supremacy. When a Senate committee voted to rename military bases named for confederate generals, Sessions called it an attack on confederate soldiers.
.@DougJones vote to remove from all military facilities and installations the names of every soldier who fought for the Confederacy betrays the character and decency of every soldier who fought for the South in that bloody and monumental war… — Jeff Sessions (@jeffsessions) June 12, 2020
Here lies the political career of Jefferson Beauregard Sessions III, named for two confederate heroes like his father and grandfather before him—the only monument to the Confederacy that Trump was eager to remove.