motherjones--2020-09-14--The Teacher Who Realized She Was Expendable

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We asked people who have quit since January 2020 how and why they did it.. You can read more about the project and find every story here . Got your own quitting tale? Send us an email
Cristine Jasso, 35 Position: Fifth-grade teacher, Houston Gateway Academy
Started: August 2016
Quit: August 17, 2020
Salary: $57,000 per year As told to Edwin Rios
I did have my worries throughout the summer. I was kind of having anxiety upon coming back. Then my dad ended up catching COVID in June.
He was basically the head of custodians. If something broke in your school, he was the go-to guy. I had even talked prior to him getting sick and told him: “You can quit your job, you’re always in pain. We will take care of you.” We almost had him until they told him, “You can come to work, and we’ll give you overtime.” And once he heard overtime, he ended up going back to work. That was him.
He was just this really strong-headed guy. He was working all the time. I mean, he was always in pain. He had multiple shoulder surgeries, his meniscus replaced. But he still worked hard for my mom, for us, to get anything that we needed. He was the “give you the shirt off his back” kind of person.
And no sooner than he went back to work, it was just like, oh, he got sick. We’re not going to say he got sick at school. I don’t think he got it from there. He was the one who did everything—the one going grocery shopping, the one going out and making sure we had all the stuff we needed. So if anything he may have caught it at the grocery store. Unfortunately, you know, he got exposed. How? We’ll never know.
He told his boss he felt sick, and they told him to go home and get better, and he never did. He ended up going to the hospital. I happened to be there because I was having dehydration issues unrelated to COVID. But to see him, it was like night and day. I have never seen him that weak in my whole entire life. He looked like some old man hunched over in this wheelchair. And he told me, “I don’t know what’s wrong, and I feel like shit, I’m hurting.” I was helping him, and I was massaging him, and I’m just like, oh my god, like it’s a reality—he may not make it.
His case was so severe that he had to only be on his belly. He was saying: “I can’t breathe. I can’t. I’m tired. I can’t catch my breath. I don’t feel right.” They tried plasma. They tried the experimental drugs, and that didn’t work. I even asked the nurse. I’m like, “Is there anything we can do?” And she’s just like, “No, the most we can do is just make him comfortable.” Even when she said that, it doesn’t hit me. It hit me that he was going to die, and I had to be the one there to see if they let me in.
They kept resuscitating him because he wanted to be resuscitated. The doctors kept calling me and my mom screaming, “We can’t keep doing this.” Once I got there, I had to be the one to tell them to stop. And I struggle with that. I told them to kill him. We did the right thing, but it doesn’t make me feel better.
It feels like we’re all lost because he was always in charge. He knew what to do.
That’s why I’m so upset about my school. If you don’t know, you’ll never know. And for you to be willing to put anybody and everybody through it? You don’t know what it felt to be the one who has to call my whole entire family and be like, Dad passed. I’ve already lost four people in my family—my cousin and my aunt, they passed away from COVID—in not even two months. It’s just, boom, boom, boom.
So on August 17, I went to my classroom at Houston Gateway Academy to see how the next school year would go. The school’s philosophy was that people go to an office to work, so we had to be at school for the virtual meeting. My room was bare except for the Hello Kitty decorations I left up on the wall near the end of the school year. We welcomed students with pink bows for girls and blue bows for boys, with their names on the Hello Kitty faces.
I called them with concerns like, “Hey, this is close to home. I’m very concerned about my safety. Obviously this is nothing to mess around with. It has killed somebody in my family. This is very alarming. So what are you going to do about our safety?” And so, I had called my principal, and I asked her, “What are y’all doing as far as gear, like PPE?” I said, “Because nurses and doctors have gowns, booties, face shields, masks, like everything, and they’re still getting sick. So what are you doing for us?” “Oh, well, I don’t know. I don’t know the answer to that question right now.”
Doctors and nurses are doing everything they can to try to mitigate the spread. You’re just saying, “Oh, you’ll be fine.” Just wearing a mask is not going to be enough. I have diabetes. I’m a little overweight. You have a plan in place, but you’re saying only that you are mandating masks, and that’s it.
You already had COVID cases during the summer. You’re asking for us to not only come in as a hybrid, but you’re asking us to stay for like 10 hours a day. Our charter school goes from 7:45 in the morning till about 5:30 in the afternoon, with a mandatory after-school program, which is intended to help students succeed on state assessment exams. So not only are you mandating us to stay until 5:30, but you’re also mandating the kids in our classrooms to be here until 5:30. So you’re having this in an enclosed space for more than 10 hours with literally just a mask. With nurses, they are at least rotating through patients, but they’re still getting a cold and getting sick.
I’m just like, look, they’re offering children the option that once they get exposed they can switch to virtual. Okay, if you’re giving the option to a child, why don’t we teachers also have that option if we were to be exposed? We should have the choice on whether or not we want to do hybrid. To them that one is a non-negotiable, it doesn’t matter what my opinion is. It’s really like, you either work or you go. That’s what you’ve got to be telling us—that we’re expendable. But not children. And don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying children are expendable. Nobody should be. We all matter. We should all have the options to still function and make money. You’re asking teachers to not only take that risk but to potentially be in the hospital—accruing that much money in debt. It’s like, you want me to risk my life, for nothing, like you’re not even going to pay me nothing. But a child gets to have that option. To me, it’s not entirely fair. I love children. I wouldn’t be a teacher if I didn’t. But I should not be a pawn in a game, just for them to have money coming in based on the head of a child and not an employee. At the end of the day, it all boils down to funding. The more children they can have to come to the school, the more money they get. So an employee is expendable. You know, that’s basically what you’re telling me.
For me to be in that situation, with going to work and being exposed and bringing that to my mother—I can’t lose both my parents. I can’t do that.
All this together made me realize, this is not worth it. I understand we all have a job to do. I know that nurses are taking a huge risk to take care of patients. But as a teacher, I signed up to teach you. This is my job. It’s not to be someone who has to be exposed all the time. We can do it safely. There are ways to do it.
There was absolutely no way I could, in good conscience, go into school with just a mask. You know, give me the option to wear at least a facial shield or something. They told me, “We don’t want to scare children.” I understand you don’t want to scare children. But this is a very serious situation. They shouldn’t be scared, but I’m scared. The rest of my colleagues are scared. Last year, honest to God, I had an upper respiratory infection five times. How the hell are you going to tell me that by wearing a mask and having hand sanitizer that I’m not going to get anything at all? I wiped everything down. I had sprays and hand sanitizer in my room.
I’m hoping that their plan does work. Because at the end of the day, I don’t want kids to die. I don’t want adults to die. But to me, it just did not seem enough because if nurses and doctors are wearing all of this whole protection, and they’re still getting sick, you’re not even offering that. That was my question: Can I wear a gown, a hair net, gloves, booties, anything that would at least give me a layer of protection so that I’m not taking particles home with me and introducing them into a whole new atmosphere? And their response was, well, we don’t want to scare children.
After the meeting, I got my work computer and my work phone and stuck them in my backpack. I was furious. I got into my car, went home, and tried my best to clear everything before giving it back to them. My principal was blowing me up. I said, “I am clearing my computer, and I’m clearing my phone, and I’m bringing them to you.” She’s just like, “Okay,” and she hung up on me. I went to the front office and asked for the HR person because I was not going to leave there without my service records showing that I had spent four years there. I met with HR, and my literal last words were, “I quit because four people in my family passed away, and I’m not about to be the next one.” And I left and literally walked out the building. As soon as I walked out, I felt a huge load just drop. I literally felt freedom. Not once did they try to stop me. They didn’t say like, “Oh, we need you.” Nothing.
I went home and told my mom and sister I’d quit. My mom was asking me what happened, and I let them hear the recording of the meeting. And that’s when I asked, “Did I make the right decision?” And they both were just like, “Fuck yeah, you did. Listen to them. They’re laughing at you. Look at the responses you’re getting—the anonymous messages. Of course you did the right thing.”
I have no regrets.
My father Luis was a little pain in the ass, but he was a good pain in the ass. He was very direct. I got a lot of that from him. We would always butt heads. He and my mom were very open-minded. They raised me to be very independent. I would always work with my dad, and do a little bit of construction. He was the genius who could look at a room and know how much square footage It was. The dude could build and do great, amazing work. He was an artist in his own right. He could make beautiful things.
He had just turned 60 in February, you know. I thought it would be really cool to have like a ’60s theme party. I researched because I didn’t want to culturally appropriate. We had a lot of decorations, afro centerpieces, photo frames with marijuana leaves, a DJ, and a tie-dye cake with a smiley face on it. It was a surprise party for him. For me, it was something that I really, truly wanted to do for him because he never, never wanted parties.
I just remember looking at him. He was sitting with my grandparents, my mom, and my aunt. They were just talking, and he actually said that, for the first time in a long time, he’d had a beer. He was relaxed, and his face was full of joy. And it meant a lot. He didn’t really say too much, but I knew in my heart of hearts, he loved it. It was a really good memory to be left with.


motherjones--2020-09-12--Right-Wing Conspiracists Linked Antifa to the Wildfires. Then They Got a Big Boost From Russian Medi

Right-Wing Conspiracists Linked Antifa to the Wildfires. Then They Got a Big Boost From Russian Media.

Wildfires have long been weaponized by climate deniers wanting to sow political division .
But this week , the blazes consuming the West Coast became part of an election cycle culture war when claims that antifa started wildfires in Portland went viral .
There ’ s no evidence that antifa started any wildfires , but conservatives on social media ran with the claim anyway , spreading it far and wide in Facebook groups and on YouTube .
It ’ s unclear how the conspiracy theory originated , but its first big boost appears to have come courtesy of RT ( @ @ @ @ @ @ @ media outlet known for mixing news with Russian propaganda . )
RT ’ s signal boost came in the form of an article that smashed together separate pieces of information about policing in Portland and the wildfires , insinuating a nefarious ( and non-existent ) link between the two .
“ ‘ Antifa are thrilled to hear this ’ : Portland police ask protesters not to start blazes amid statewide wildfire emergency , ” read a RT headline from September 9th .
The story focused on how the Portland Police Department was imploring @ @ @ @ @ @ @ demonstrations “ since fire danger is very high right now.
” While the facts of the story are technically true , RT goes out of its way to connect the current wildfire crisis with antifa , by eliding dates , and wrongly conflating incidents .
The Sheriff ’ s call for protesters not to use fire came on September 9 .
The last time protestors set large fires during a protest was on the evening of September 6 , lasting into the early hours of the next day .
Regardless , RT used @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ( without noting the date the footage ) as the primary art for the story .
The headline is also misleading .
Portland Police never said “ Antifa are thrilled to hear this ” .
That quote was in a tweet from Andy Ngo , a right-wing propagandist who has been associated with the violent far-right group , Patriot Prayer .
Taken together , RT insinuates that antifa , the disparate and splintered group of antifascists , was a catalyst for the wildfires .
No such evidence exists .
But while they signal-boosted @ @ @ @ @ @ @ t invent it from whole cloth .
By the time Russian state media ’ s post came out , rumors about antifa intentionally starting wildfires had already spread in online forums like Reddit and Facebook for at least a day .
The most viral post supporting the conspiracy theory that followed RT ’ s article was Law Enforcement Today ’ s now-altered article , initially titled “ Sources : Series of wildfires on the West Coast may be ‘ coordinated and planned ’ attack.
” Law Enforcement Today changed it to “ Arson @ @ @ @ @ @ @ fires rage on , ” and appended an editor ’ s note , but not before it went viral , further feeding the online right-wing ecosystem .
A day after RT ’ s post , American right-wing websites like The Post Millennial , the right ’ s attempt to create a millennial Breitbart , and the conspiracy-laundering Gateway Pundit , ran their own misleading stories about an alleged arsonist who set a strip of grass in a highway median ablaze in Washington state .
The Gateway Pundit initially published an article with the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in Washington State ” on Friday , even though there was no reason to believe that the arson suspect had any ties to antifa ( it later quietly removed “ antifa ” from the headline . )
The Post Millennial ’ s story was only slightly less misleading , blaming the arson on a BLM activist—on the grounds that his Facebook account showed him attending one Black Lives Matter protest .
The publication also claimed he “ led ” the gathering .
A video shows him at the front of a protest , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ he organized it .
Matt Binder , a journalist who writes a newsletter on misinformation and who noticed RT trying to link antifa to wildfires , noted that this is how Russian political interference often works .
“ A lot of the coverage of the Russia stuff always sort of pushes the idea that Russia is creating narratives and then spreading , ” he explained over the phone .
“ That ’ s not what happens .
They see the stuff already happening online , and then they just help push it.
” @ @ @ @ @ @ @ this case .
Antifa wildfire rumors started online , and then RT helped provide the framing to give the idea more credence , before more cavalier , domestic right-wing sites blew the conspiracy out of control .

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Wildfires have long been weaponized by climate deniers wanting to sow political division. But this week, the blazes consuming the West Coast became part of an election cycle culture war when claims that antifa started wildfires in Portland went viral. There’s no evidence that antifa started any wildfires, but conservatives on social media ran with the claim anyway, spreading it far and wide in Facebook groups and on YouTube.
It’s unclear how the conspiracy theory originated, but its first big boost appears to have come courtesy of RT (formerly Russia Today, a Russian state-controlled media outlet known for mixing news with Russian propaganda.) RT’s signal boost came in the form of an article that smashed together separate pieces of information about policing in Portland and the wildfires, insinuating a nefarious (and non-existent) link between the two.
“‘Antifa are thrilled to hear this’: Portland police ask protesters not to start blazes amid statewide wildfire emergency,” read a RT headline from September 9th. The story focused on how the Portland Police Department was imploring protestors not to use fire during their demonstrations “since fire danger is very high right now.” While the facts of the story are technically true, RT goes out of its way to connect the current wildfire crisis with antifa, by eliding dates, and wrongly conflating incidents. The Sheriff’s call for protesters not to use fire came on September 9. The last time protestors set large fires during a protest was on the evening of September 6, lasting into the early hours of the next day. Regardless, RT used video from that night of the 6th (without noting the date the footage) as the primary art for the story.
The headline is also misleading. Portland Police never said “Antifa are thrilled to hear this”. That quote was in a tweet from Andy Ngo, a right-wing propagandist who has been associated with the violent far-right group, Patriot Prayer.
Taken together, RT insinuates that antifa, the disparate and splintered group of antifascists, was a catalyst for the wildfires. No such evidence exists. But while they signal-boosted that false claim, RT didn’t invent it from whole cloth. By the time Russian state media’s post came out, rumors about antifa intentionally starting wildfires had already spread in online forums like Reddit and Facebook for at least a day.
The most viral post supporting the conspiracy theory that followed RT’s article was Law Enforcement Today’s now-altered article, initially titled “Sources: Series of wildfires on the West Coast may be ‘coordinated and planned’ attack.” Law Enforcement Today changed it to “Arson arrests made across the west coast as fires rage on,” and appended an editor’s note, but not before it went viral, further feeding the online right-wing ecosystem.
“They see the stuff already happening online, and then they just help push it.”
A day after RT’s post, American right-wing websites like The Post Millennial, the right’s attempt to create a millennial Breitbart, and the conspiracy-laundering Gateway Pundit, ran their own misleading stories about an alleged arsonist who set a strip of grass in a highway median ablaze in Washington state. The Gateway Pundit initially published an article with the headline “Antifa Radical Arrested for Arson in Washington State” on Friday, even though there was no reason to believe that the arson suspect had any ties to antifa (it later quietly removed “antifa” from the headline.) The Post Millennial’s story was only slightly less misleading, blaming the arson on a BLM activist—on the grounds that his Facebook account showed him attending one Black Lives Matter protest. The publication also claimed he “led” the gathering. A video shows him at the front of a protest, but there’s no evidence that he organized it.
Matt Binder, a journalist who writes a newsletter on misinformation and who noticed RT trying to link antifa to wildfires, noted that this is how Russian political interference often works. “A lot of the coverage of the Russia stuff always sort of pushes the idea that Russia is creating narratives and then spreading,” he explained over the phone. “That’s not what happens. They see the stuff already happening online, and then they just help push it.”
That’s potentially what happened in this case. Antifa wildfire rumors started online, and then RT helped provide the framing to give the idea more credence, before more cavalier, domestic right-wing sites blew the conspiracy out of control.


motherjones--2020-09-17--Eric Trump Is Trying to Stonewall a Fraud Investigation Into His Company Until After the Election

Eric Trump says he will now cooperate with an investigation by New York Attorney General Letitia James into whether the Trump Organization committed tax and banking fraud—but only after the election .
Last month , James filed a motion to compel Eric Trump and the Trump Organization to abide by subpoenas her office has issued for details of the company ’ s financial history .
Specifically , she is trying to determine whether the president and his company misrepresented the Trump Organization ’ s finances to get better loans and tax benefits .
The investigation also focuses on whether Donald @ @ @ @ @ @ @ 100 million in forgiven debt .
Trump borrowed $ 120 million from private-equity fund Fortress Investment Group in 2006 .
In 2012 , when the outstanding amount he owed had ballooned to roughly $ 150 million , he convinced Fortress to settle for $ 48 million .
The rest of the debt was forgiven .
Around that time , Trump said at least once publicly that he had purchased a loan from a lender .
( When a loan is forgiven , the borrower owes a hefty tax bill , but if he @ @ @ @ @ @ @ can defer that tax liability at least temporarily . )
Since he ran for president , Trump has listed a mysterious debt on his personal financial disclosure that he claims to owe to himself ; it is worth $ 50 million or more and linked to the Chicago project .
Trump has implied this debt was purchased from a lender .
Mother Jones reported last year that this loan may be evidence of tax fraud if Trump in fact settled the debt and did not purchase it .
As part of her investigation @ @ @ @ @ @ @ buy the Fortress loan , and she asked the Trumps to provide documentation showing they paid the taxes on the forgiven portion of the debt .
According to last month ’ s filing by her office , James also is scrutinizing whether Trump overstated the value of his properties to convince banks he was a better credit risk and whether Trump misreported a conservation easement on a large property he owns north of New York City .
James said in her filing that the Trump Organization readily supplied most of the information her @ @ @ @ @ @ @ largely been running the company while his father serves as president—was scheduled to sit for an interview under oath on July 22 .
However , according to James , Eric Trump abruptly cancelled the interview .
When James ’ office tried to reschedule , Trump ’ s attorneys told investigators “ we can not allow the interview to go forward…pursuant to those rights afforded to every individual under the Constitution.
” In a filing made on Thursday afternoon , however , the Trump Organization backtracked , saying Eric Trump would sit for an @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Trump Organization ’ s attorneys said they didn ’ t allow the interview to go forward previously because they wanted to make sure James ’ office didn ’ t provide the results of its investigation to other agencies that might be investigating Trump—possibly an allusion to New York City district attorney Cy Vance who is reportedly pursuing his own fraud investigation into Trump .
Although they didn ’ t get that assurance , the Trump attorneys wrote , they are now happy to make Eric Trump available , but not before November 19 @ @ @ @ @ @ @ s extreme travel schedule and related unavailability between now and the election , and to avoid the use of his deposition attendance for political purposes.
” They added , “ It is well known that most , if not all , law enforcement and regulatory agencies studiously avoid certain actions within the 60-day period prior to a major election.
” In a statement provided to Mother Jones , James said it wasn ’ t up to the Trump Organization to tell investigators when its executives are free to talk .
“ While we @ @ @ @ @ @ @ we ’ re taking on specific litigation , we won ’ t allow any entity or individual to dictate how our investigation will proceed or allow anyone to evade a lawful subpoena .
No one is above the law , period , ” she said .
In its filing , the Trump Organization claims it has provided investigators with everything they requested regarding the Chicago loan—which the company ’ s motion confirms was paid off at a substantial discount—but most of the section on the deal was filed under seal and is redacted @ @ @ @ @ @ @ is due in court on September 23 for an initial hearing .

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Eric Trump says he will now cooperate with an investigation by New York Attorney General Letitia James into whether the Trump Organization committed tax and banking fraud—but only after the election.
Last month, James filed a motion to compel Eric Trump and the Trump Organization to abide by subpoenas her office has issued for details of the company’s financial history. Specifically, she is trying to determine whether the president and his company misrepresented the Trump Organization’s finances to get better loans and tax benefits.
The investigation also focuses on whether Donald Trump paid taxes on more than $100 million in forgiven debt. Trump borrowed $120 million from private-equity fund Fortress Investment Group in 2006. In 2012, when the outstanding amount he owed had ballooned to roughly $150 million, he convinced Fortress to settle for $48 million. The rest of the debt was forgiven. Around that time, Trump said at least once publicly that he had purchased a loan from a lender. (When a loan is forgiven, the borrower owes a hefty tax bill, but if he or she buys it, the borrower can defer that tax liability at least temporarily.) Since he ran for president, Trump has listed a mysterious debt on his personal financial disclosure that he claims to owe to himself; it is worth $50 million or more and linked to the Chicago project. Trump has implied this debt was purchased from a lender. Mother Jones reported last year that this loan may be evidence of tax fraud if Trump in fact settled the debt and did not purchase it.
As part of her investigation, James confirmed that Trump did not buy the Fortress loan, and she asked the Trumps to provide documentation showing they paid the taxes on the forgiven portion of the debt. According to last month’s filing by her office, James also is scrutinizing whether Trump overstated the value of his properties to convince banks he was a better credit risk and whether Trump misreported a conservation easement on a large property he owns north of New York City.
James said in her filing that the Trump Organization readily supplied most of the information her office requested and that Eric Trump—who has largely been running the company while his father serves as president—was scheduled to sit for an interview under oath on July 22. However, according to James, Eric Trump abruptly cancelled the interview. When James’ office tried to reschedule, Trump’s attorneys told investigators “we cannot allow the interview to go forward…pursuant to those rights afforded to every individual under the Constitution.”
In a filing made on Thursday afternoon, however, the Trump Organization backtracked, saying Eric Trump would sit for an interview—just not any time soon. The Trump Organization’s attorneys said they didn’t allow the interview to go forward previously because they wanted to make sure James’ office didn’t provide the results of its investigation to other agencies that might be investigating Trump—possibly an allusion to New York City district attorney Cy Vance who is reportedly pursuing his own fraud investigation into Trump.
Although they didn’t get that assurance, the Trump attorneys wrote, they are now happy to make Eric Trump available, but not before November 19, “because of Mr. Trump’s extreme travel schedule and related unavailability between now and the election, and to avoid the use of his deposition attendance for political purposes.”
They added, “It is well known that most, if not all, law enforcement and regulatory agencies studiously avoid certain actions within the 60-day period prior to a major election.”
In a statement provided to Mother Jones, James said it wasn’t up to the Trump Organization to tell investigators when its executives are free to talk. “While we cannot comment on the particular steps we’re taking on specific litigation, we won’t allow any entity or individual to dictate how our investigation will proceed or allow anyone to evade a lawful subpoena. No one is above the law, period,” she said.
In its filing, the Trump Organization claims it has provided investigators with everything they requested regarding the Chicago loan—which the company’s motion confirms was paid off at a substantial discount—but most of the section on the deal was filed under seal and is redacted from the public version.
The case is due in court on September 23 for an initial hearing.


motherjones--2020-09-17--Biden Volunteers Are Encountering a Shocking Number of Voters Pushing an Unhinged Smear

Since she retired last year , my mom has spent a good deal of her free time knocking on doors and making phone calls for political candidates .
During the pandemic , she ’ s turned to text-banking as a way to stay involved politically at a time when social distancing and travel restrictions have made it difficult to canvass in person .
But when she started sending texts last month on behalf of Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden , the responses she got back from the occasional Trump voters on her list surprised her .
“ They immediately start @ @ @ @ @ @ @ told me .
“ I send out 500 texts in a pop and maybe it ’ ll come up five to seven times.
” When you consider that not every text is going to yield a reply and only a fraction of the recipients are Trump voters , that ’ s a pretty high response rate .
Sometimes , the Trump supporters go into “ really filthy detail about what kinds of things he ’ s doing or likes to do , ” she added , though she never takes the bait and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ hear that complete strangers are ( digitally ) shouting at your mom about pedophilia .
But it turns out this is happening to many Biden text-bankers .
“ I have been doing a lot of text banking and the number of people who think Biden is a pedophile is astounding , ” one volunteer tweeted last week .
Another volunteer in Pennsylvania ranked it as the second most common response from Trump voters in her text-banking conversations .
What on Earth is going on ?
This smear appears to be an outgrowth of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
During the 2016 election , proponents of the “ Pizzagate ” conspiracy , including Trump ’ s disgraced first National Security Adviser Michael Flynn , came to believe—or pretended to believe—that prominent Democrats were involved in a child sex-trafficking ring located in the basement of a pizza parlor in Northwest Washington , DC .
( They were not . )
In the Trump era , Pizzagate was superseded by QAnon , an almost-too-absurd-to-explain mind-warp of a conspiracy which , in the words of my colleague Ali Breland , “ postulates that President @ @ @ @ @ @ @ arresting a throng of liberal elites for facilitating and participating in a sprawling child sex ring.
” ( He is not . )
Biden , meanwhile , has been the subject of his own form of disinformation on the subject .
Even before Q became a fixture on t-shirts at Trump rallies and an article of faith among some Trump-backed candidates for Congress , the “ Creepy Joe ” meme , in which clips of Biden interacting with women and children are mashed together to suggest inappropriate or lascivious behavior , began circulating @ @ @ @ @ @ @ titled “ Creepy Joe Biden Hair Sniffing Compilation ” has nearly a million views .
Over time , the implication of these images has gone from not respecting personal space—a charge for which Biden apologized—to , in the words of a meme shared by Donald Trump Jr. in May , that the Democrat is a “ pedophile.
” ( Junior later said he was joking .
LOL ? )
The purveyors of Biden memes and conspiracy theories are not necessarily Q believers ( though there ’ s certainly some overlap ) .
But @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , often with the sanction of influential figures on the right .
These Trump diehards reflexively view the president ’ s political opponents as not just ideological opposites , but as enablers of something far more sinister .
Woe unto the poor Biden text-banker who encounters them .
Bradd Silver , a Biden volunteer from California , recalled a recent text exchange with a voter who told him that “ Biden never goes by a young girl without smelling her hair or touching her on the back.
” “ My wife has gotten @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , ” he added .
“ We have a response for that , which is sort of , ‘ this is just nonsense let ’ s talk about real issues.
’ But no one wants to talk about real issues.
” After we spoke , Silver checked the Slack channel he ’ s in for Biden text-bankers to see if this had happened to anyone else .
“ Looks like 72 or so texters reported getting replies about Joe being a pedophile , ” he wrote to me .
Another volunteer I spoke @ @ @ @ @ @ @ least one pedophile comment during every text-banking shift , sent along a smattering of screenshots of responses her fellow volunteers had received .
One voter said , “ I personally believe that pedophiles should be fed feet first in to a woodchipper.
” Another said that they could not support a candidate who would “ associate with know [ sic ] pedophiles while being accused by the public to be a pedophile.
” “ I ’ d rather catch COVID-19 then [ sic ] vote for that pedophile…Trump 2020 bitch , ” responded @ @ @ @ @ @ @ heated time and canvassers learn to deal with plenty of abuse ( and a whole lot of rejection ) .
But the pedophile attack is something different , at once something old and very new .
As Ali wrote last summer , pedophilia has been the grist for conservative conspiracies for decades—an “ outgrowth of the normal workings of reactionary politics , ” part of the language of resistance to social change .
What ’ s new is the extent to which it has been normalized in the context of the campaign , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ started on message boards is now hard to escape in real life .
It ’ s winning primaries and permeating the president ’ s own campaign .
Marjorie Taylor Greene , a near lock to win an open congressional seat in Georgia , has said that Trump is fighting a “ global cabal of Satan-worshiping pedophiles.
” Another Q acolyte , Lauren Boebert of Colorado , unseated a five-term incumbent Republican congressman in a primary in June .
She , too , is a favorite to win a congressional seat .
A recent @ @ @ @ @ @ @ that 33 percent of Republican voters agreed that “ the QAnon theory about a conspiracy among deep state elites is true ” —a broadly worded and perhaps leading question that nonetheless suggests that the theory has moved out of the shadows .
When Crooked Media and Change Research asked undecided and infrequent voters for a one-word description of Biden , 46 different people said “ pedophile.
” A New York Times story last week noted the surge in interest in the conspiracy among white women .
“ Nobody is appropriately gauging how quickly @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ) has taken over among suburban and rural white women , ” observed NBC News reporter Ben Collins recently .
“ It is everywhere.
” “ I heard these are people that love our country , ” the president said in August of QAnon supporters .
By Tuesday , with 49 days to go until Election Day , he himself was sharing the pedophile meme , promoting a tweet with the hastag “ # PedoBiden , ” next to a .gif of Biden whispering in a woman ’ s ear .
( That @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of former defense secretary Ash Carter , has in fact written an entire Medium post about the harassment she ’ s faced from Biden critics over an image that was “ misleadingly extracted from what was a longer moment between close friends.
” ) It ’ s not just Trump supporters who are now dishing out these gross and debunked tropes .
The disinformation is coming from the campaign itself .

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Since she retired last year, my mom has spent a good deal of her free time knocking on doors and making phone calls for political candidates. During the pandemic, she’s turned to text-banking as a way to stay involved politically at a time when social distancing and travel restrictions have made it difficult to canvass in person. But when she started sending texts last month on behalf of Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden, the responses she got back from the occasional Trump voters on her list surprised her.
“They immediately start calling Biden a pedophile,” she told me. “I send out 500 texts in a pop and maybe it’ll come up five to seven times.”
When you consider that not every text is going to yield a reply and only a fraction of the recipients are Trump voters, that’s a pretty high response rate. Sometimes, the Trump supporters go into “really filthy detail about what kinds of things he’s doing or likes to do,” she added, though she never takes the bait and engages.
It is always disconcerting to hear that complete strangers are (digitally) shouting at your mom about pedophilia. But it turns out this is happening to many Biden text-bankers.
“I have been doing a lot of text banking and the number of people who think Biden is a pedophile is astounding,” one volunteer tweeted last week.
Another volunteer in Pennsylvania ranked it as the second most common response from Trump voters in her text-banking conversations.
What on Earth is going on? This smear appears to be an outgrowth of several years of right-wing disinformation and conspiracy-mongering. During the 2016 election, proponents of the “Pizzagate” conspiracy, including Trump’s disgraced first National Security Adviser Michael Flynn, came to believe—or pretended to believe—that prominent Democrats were involved in a child sex-trafficking ring located in the basement of a pizza parlor in Northwest Washington, DC. (They were not.)
In the Trump era, Pizzagate was superseded by QAnon, an almost-too-absurd-to-explain mind-warp of a conspiracy which, in the words of my colleague Ali Breland, “postulates that President Donald Trump is on the verge of arresting a throng of liberal elites for facilitating and participating in a sprawling child sex ring.” (He is not.)
Biden, meanwhile, has been the subject of his own form of disinformation on the subject. Even before Q became a fixture on t-shirts at Trump rallies and an article of faith among some Trump-backed candidates for Congress, the “Creepy Joe” meme, in which clips of Biden interacting with women and children are mashed together to suggest inappropriate or lascivious behavior, began circulating in right-wing circles. A YouTube video titled “Creepy Joe Biden Hair Sniffing Compilation” has nearly a million views. Over time, the implication of these images has gone from not respecting personal space—a charge for which Biden apologized—to, in the words of a meme shared by Donald Trump Jr. in May, that the Democrat is a “pedophile.” (Junior later said he was joking. LOL?)
The purveyors of Biden memes and conspiracy theories are not necessarily Q believers (though there’s certainly some overlap). But they end up in a similar place, often with the sanction of influential figures on the right. These Trump diehards reflexively view the president’s political opponents as not just ideological opposites, but as enablers of something far more sinister. Woe unto the poor Biden text-banker who encounters them.
Bradd Silver, a Biden volunteer from California, recalled a recent text exchange with a voter who told him that “Biden never goes by a young girl without smelling her hair or touching her on the back.”
“My wife has gotten this about pedophiles a bunch, too,” he added. “We have a response for that, which is sort of, ‘this is just nonsense let’s talk about real issues.’ But no one wants to talk about real issues.”
After we spoke, Silver checked the Slack channel he’s in for Biden text-bankers to see if this had happened to anyone else. “Looks like 72 or so texters reported getting replies about Joe being a pedophile,” he wrote to me.
Another volunteer I spoke with, who said she gets at least one pedophile comment during every text-banking shift, sent along a smattering of screenshots of responses her fellow volunteers had received. One voter said, “I personally believe that pedophiles should be fed feet first in to a woodchipper.” Another said that they could not support a candidate who would “associate with know [sic] pedophiles while being accused by the public to be a pedophile.”
“I’d rather catch COVID-19 then [sic] vote for that pedophile…Trump 2020 bitch,” responded yet another.
Election season is a heated time and canvassers learn to deal with plenty of abuse (and a whole lot of rejection). But the pedophile attack is something different, at once something old and very new. As Ali wrote last summer, pedophilia has been the grist for conservative conspiracies for decades—an “outgrowth of the normal workings of reactionary politics,” part of the language of resistance to social change. What’s new is the extent to which it has been normalized in the context of the campaign, including at the highest levels.
What started on message boards is now hard to escape in real life. It’s winning primaries and permeating the president’s own campaign. Marjorie Taylor Greene, a near lock to win an open congressional seat in Georgia, has said that Trump is fighting a “global cabal of Satan-worshiping pedophiles.” Another Q acolyte, Lauren Boebert of Colorado, unseated a five-term incumbent Republican congressman in a primary in June. She, too, is a favorite to win a congressional seat.
A recent survey by Daily Kos and Civiqs found that 33 percent of Republican voters agreed that “the QAnon theory about a conspiracy among deep state elites is true”—a broadly worded and perhaps leading question that nonetheless suggests that the theory has moved out of the shadows. When Crooked Media and Change Research asked undecided and infrequent voters for a one-word description of Biden, 46 different people said “pedophile.” A New York Times story last week noted the surge in interest in the conspiracy among white women. “Nobody is appropriately gauging how quickly QAnon (and Q by other names) has taken over among suburban and rural white women,” observed NBC News reporter Ben Collins recently. “It is everywhere.”
“I heard these are people that love our country,” the president said in August of QAnon supporters. By Tuesday, with 49 days to go until Election Day, he himself was sharing the pedophile meme, promoting a tweet with the hastag “#PedoBiden,” next to a .gif of Biden whispering in a woman’s ear. (That woman, Stephanie Carter, the wife of former defense secretary Ash Carter, has in fact written an entire Medium post about the harassment she’s faced from Biden critics over an image that was “misleadingly extracted from what was a longer moment between close friends.”)
It’s not just Trump supporters who are now dishing out these gross and debunked tropes. The disinformation is coming from the campaign itself.


motherjones--2020-09-17--A Former Model Accuses Trump of Sexual Assault at the 1997 US Open

A former model has accused President Trump of forcibly kissing and groping her while attending the 1997 US Open in Queens , New York .
The alleged incident is the latest in at least 24 credible sexual assault allegations against Trump , ranging from similar accusations of unwanted touching and kissing to rape .
Amy Dorris , who was 24 at the time , came forward to the Guardian with her account .
She alleges that Trump assaulted her “ all over her body ” outside the bathroom to the tournament ’ s VIP box .
Several people have corroborated @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the Guardian , including a friend she immediately confided to after the alleged incident took place and her therapist .
Trump , through his lawyers , denied the allegation , in the “ strongest possible terms.
” “ He just shoved his tongue down my throat and I was pushing him off .
And then that ’ s when his grip became tighter and his hands were very gropey and all over my butt , my breasts , my back , everything .
“ I was in his grip , and I couldn @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ” she said , adding : “ I don ’ t know what you call that when you ’ re sticking your tongue just down someone ’ s throat .
But I pushed it out with my teeth .
I was pushing it .
And I think I might have hurt his tongue.
” Doris said that she had kept silent out about the alleged assault out of concern for her family but chose to speak out now that her two twin daughters are older .
The allegation comes as the Justice Department @ @ @ @ @ @ @ earlier this month , moved to represent the president in his defense against the writer E. Jean Carroll ’ s defamation suit against him .
Last November , Carroll filed the suit after Trump denied her claims that he had raped her inside the dressing rooms of Bergdorf Goodman more than twenty years ago , and claimed that he had never met Carroll .

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A former model has accused President Trump of forcibly kissing and groping her while attending the 1997 US Open in Queens, New York. The alleged incident is the latest in at least 24 credible sexual assault allegations against Trump, ranging from similar accusations of unwanted touching and kissing to rape.
Amy Dorris, who was 24 at the time, came forward to the Guardian with her account. She alleges that Trump assaulted her “all over her body” outside the bathroom to the tournament’s VIP box. Several people have corroborated Dorris’s account, according to the Guardian, including a friend she immediately confided to after the alleged incident took place and her therapist. Trump, through his lawyers, denied the allegation, in the “strongest possible terms.”
Dorris recalled to the Guardian:
“He just shoved his tongue down my throat and I was pushing him off. And then that’s when his grip became tighter and his hands were very gropey and all over my butt, my breasts, my back, everything. “I was in his grip, and I couldn’t get out of it,” she said, adding: “I don’t know what you call that when you’re sticking your tongue just down someone’s throat. But I pushed it out with my teeth. I was pushing it. And I think I might have hurt his tongue.”
Doris said that she had kept silent out about the alleged assault out of concern for her family but chose to speak out now that her two twin daughters are older.
The allegation comes as the Justice Department, in a stunning and rare intervention earlier this month, moved to represent the president in his defense against the writer E. Jean Carroll’s defamation suit against him. Last November, Carroll filed the suit after Trump denied her claims that he had raped her inside the dressing rooms of Bergdorf Goodman more than twenty years ago, and claimed that he had never met Carroll.


motherjones--2020-09-17--As the Census Deadline Looms, South Texas Organizers Are in a Race Against Time

When the coronavirus pandemic struck earlier this year , Martha Sanchez and her team at La Union del Pueblo Entero realized that going door-to-door was no longer an option .
So they came up with a new , safer , way to spread the word about the census in the colonias of Hidalgo County , Texas , “ We get in the car and we use a megaphone , ” Sanchez says .
“ Sometimes it ’ s a recorded message .
Other times we just scream into the megaphone and invite people to come and get counted.
” The @ @ @ @ @ @ @ loaned out by local shops and markets , where they ’ ve set up tables with laptops so people can complete their census forms online .
“ We tell them , ‘ Come to the table , we ’ re offering you a chance to get counted and you can maybe even win something , ” says Sanchez , adding that they often conduct giveaways to entice people to participate .
The colonias—unincorporated rural neighborhoods comprised mostly of Spanish-speaking families of Mexican descent—are “ where the poorest and most disenfranchised people live , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ’ re committed to service this community.
” LUPE ’ s campaign typically attracts about 100 participants in a day .
That ’ s an impressive figure , but Sanchez worries that the Trump administration ’ s efforts to impose a last-minute deadline change will reduce the number of residents who get counted—depriving the already impoverished region of vital federal funds and reducing its representation in Congress .
The US Census Bureau had originally extended the deadline for households to fill out the all-important questionnaire through the end of October , to accommodate @ @ @ @ @ @ @ But , after a series of Trump administration appointees joined the agency , it announced that the deadline would be pushed up to September 30 .
A federal court temporarily halted the change and will decide as early as this week whether to allow the bureau to cease its outreach efforts at the end of the month .
Either way , with Hidalgo County ’ s self-response rates running 13.3 percentage points below the national average , according to the City University of New York ’ s Hard to Count map , community @ @ @ @ @ @ @ get as many residents counted as possible .
“ We still have a lot of people that need to be counted .
They ’ re in rural isolated areas , so it ’ s not easy , ” Sanchez says .
“ We wish we had had until October 31 because now that the time has shortened , it ’ s much more difficult and much more challenging.
” The pandemic isn ’ t the only hurdle .
Many in the area are deeply suspicious of the federal government , thanks in part @ @ @ @ @ @ @ and anti-Latino rhetoric .
Trump ’ s effort last year to add a citizenship question to the census spread even more fear , deterring people from participating .
The Supreme Court ultimately blocked the citizenship question , but “ the damage is done , ” Sanchez says .
“ This is an immigrant community with mixed status families who have people born on either side of the river , so we feel very offended and scared.
” The battle over the citizenship question is “ still in the public imagination , ” adds @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the network weaver for the Rio Grande Valley Equal Voice Network , works with partner organizations like the ACLU and LUPE to expand voting rights and increase census participation in the area .
Trump ’ s more recent attempt to exclude the undocumented population from congressional reapportionment based on the census results—a move blocked by a federal appeals court last week—has only amplified the confusion .
“ People living in the valley , even those who are documented , have fear of the government , ” Patiño Houle says .
“ People are @ @ @ @ @ @ @ they ’ re extracted from our community on a daily basis .
That is real trauma.
” The population in South Texas along the Rio Grande is growing rapidly .
Some of the area ’ s residents live in small cities , like Laredo and McAllen .
Others live in the colonias , where they often lack paved roads , electricity , and drainage infrastructure .
With tropical storms flooding the area , and with COVID-19 spreading at nearly double the rate of the rest of the state , residents feel that the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Sanchez , who works for the National Association of Latino Elected Officials .
For many , Sanchez says , participating in the census is not top of mind .
But these problems are also what makes the census so essential .
Funding allocated according to the census numbers could be used to improve drainage so the poorest residents aren ’ t displaced by floods , Patiño Houle explains .
It could help establish a public hospital , expand access to secondary health care , and provide lunches for schoolchildren .
“ You ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ kids are going to get fed , whether people will have a roof over their head during a natural disaster , ” she says , “ and whether or not they will die.
” Counting the population of the Rio Grande Valley was never going to be easy .
Responding to the questionnaire online isn ’ t an option for the many community members who lack wifi .
Since the Census Bureau doesn ’ t mail forms to PO boxes , which many residents of the valley rely on , the agency instead @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ’ s called the Update/Leave operation .
But even then , people might not mail back the forms , or their homes might be missed completely .
Local officials believe that the Census Bureau botched its 2010 operations in the region , overlooking thousands of people who each could have netted $ 3,000 in federal funding over 10 years , the Texas Tribune reports .
About two years ago , as part of the Census Bureau ’ s Local Update of Census Addresses ( LUCA ) operation , which helps the federal government @ @ @ @ @ @ @ unaware of in the past , the bureau worked with municipalities to compare addresses on file to satellite images , says Nestor Lopez , an economic development analyst who has been leading census outreach efforts in Hidalgo County .
“ What we found was terrible , ” says Lopez .
“ They had missed close to 20,000 homes in our area .
And the devastating part is that they had missed entire communities , where we ’ re talking about 150 , 200 homes—completely missed—that have been there for 20 , 25 years @ @ @ @ @ @ @ were not counted a decade ago , and they weren ’ t counted two decades ago.
” On top of missing large swaths of homes in 2010 , the Census Bureau further alienated respondents by sending enumerators—door-to-door census takers—who couldn ’ t communicate properly with the community , Lopez says .
“ They brought in a lot of people that might have been from different areas of Central America , and their Spanish is very different to ours , and it didn ’ t translate well , ” he says .
“ Ultimately @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to us , and it dissuaded people from really wanting to interact with people that you can clearly tell aren ’ t from our community.
” This year , the Census Bureau has committed to hiring local enumerators and to visiting the residences identified in the LUCA program .
But the obstacles to an accurate census count are greater than ever , and the uncertainty over when the count will end only makes things harder .
Given the confusion over the citizenship question controversy and many residents ’ fear of deportation , Patiño @ @ @ @ @ @ @ conveying that census responses are confidential—and essential .
For at least the next few weeks , Martha Sanchez and the LUPE team will continue driving around with megaphones and doing “ everything we can ” to get people counted .
“ But sadly , Washington has a bigger megaphone than us , ” she says .
“ They penetrate a lot of places that we can ’ t reach .
So it ’ s not an even playing field .
”

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When the coronavirus pandemic struck earlier this year, Martha Sanchez and her team at La Union del Pueblo Entero realized that going door-to-door was no longer an option. So they came up with a new, safer, way to spread the word about the census in the colonias of Hidalgo County, Texas,
“We get in the car and we use a megaphone,” Sanchez says. “Sometimes it’s a recorded message. Other times we just scream into the megaphone and invite people to come and get counted.”
“Washington has a bigger megaphone than us.”
The LUPE team directs residents to parking lots loaned out by local shops and markets, where they’ve set up tables with laptops so people can complete their census forms online. “We tell them, ‘Come to the table, we’re offering you a chance to get counted and you can maybe even win something,” says Sanchez, adding that they often conduct giveaways to entice people to participate.
The colonias—unincorporated rural neighborhoods comprised mostly of Spanish-speaking families of Mexican descent—are “where the poorest and most disenfranchised people live,” Sanchez says. “So we’re committed to service this community.”
LUPE’s campaign typically attracts about 100 participants in a day. That’s an impressive figure, but Sanchez worries that the Trump administration’s efforts to impose a last-minute deadline change will reduce the number of residents who get counted—depriving the already impoverished region of vital federal funds and reducing its representation in Congress.
The US Census Bureau had originally extended the deadline for households to fill out the all-important questionnaire through the end of October, to accommodate operational changes due to the pandemic. But, after a series of Trump administration appointees joined the agency, it announced that the deadline would be pushed up to September 30. A federal court temporarily halted the change and will decide as early as this week whether to allow the bureau to cease its outreach efforts at the end of the month. Either way, with Hidalgo County’s self-response rates running 13.3 percentage points below the national average, according to the City University of New York’s Hard to Count map, community activists are racing against the clock to get as many residents counted as possible.
“We still have a lot of people that need to be counted. They’re in rural isolated areas, so it’s not easy,” Sanchez says. “We wish we had had until October 31 because now that the time has shortened, it’s much more difficult and much more challenging.”
The pandemic isn’t the only hurdle. Many in the area are deeply suspicious of the federal government, thanks in part to President Trump’s aggressive anti-immigrant and anti-Latino rhetoric. Trump’s effort last year to add a citizenship question to the census spread even more fear, deterring people from participating. The Supreme Court ultimately blocked the citizenship question, but “the damage is done,” Sanchez says. “This is an immigrant community with mixed status families who have people born on either side of the river, so we feel very offended and scared.”
The battle over the citizenship question is “still in the public imagination,” adds Christina Patiño Houle, who, as the network weaver for the Rio Grande Valley Equal Voice Network, works with partner organizations like the ACLU and LUPE to expand voting rights and increase census participation in the area. Trump’s more recent attempt to exclude the undocumented population from congressional reapportionment based on the census results—a move blocked by a federal appeals court last week—has only amplified the confusion.
“People living in the valley, even those who are documented, have fear of the government,” Patiño Houle says. “People are deported, they’re disappeared, they’re extracted from our community on a daily basis. That is real trauma.”
The population in South Texas along the Rio Grande is growing rapidly. Some of the area’s residents live in small cities, like Laredo and McAllen. Others live in the colonias, where they often lack paved roads, electricity, and drainage infrastructure. With tropical storms flooding the area, and with COVID-19 spreading at nearly double the rate of the rest of the state, residents feel that the government has failed them, says Genesis Sanchez, who works for the National Association of Latino Elected Officials. For many, Sanchez says, participating in the census is not top of mind.
But these problems are also what makes the census so essential. Funding allocated according to the census numbers could be used to improve drainage so the poorest residents aren’t displaced by floods, Patiño Houle explains. It could help establish a public hospital, expand access to secondary health care, and provide lunches for schoolchildren. “You’re literally talking about whether or not kids are going to get fed, whether people will have a roof over their head during a natural disaster,” she says, “and whether or not they will die.”
“They had missed close to 20,000 homes in our area.”
Counting the population of the Rio Grande Valley was never going to be easy. Responding to the questionnaire online isn’t an option for the many community members who lack wifi. Since the Census Bureau doesn’t mail forms to PO boxes, which many residents of the valley rely on, the agency instead delivers census forms to homes in what’s called the Update/Leave operation. But even then, people might not mail back the forms, or their homes might be missed completely.
Local officials believe that the Census Bureau botched its 2010 operations in the region, overlooking thousands of people who each could have netted $3,000 in federal funding over 10 years, the Texas Tribune reports. About two years ago, as part of the Census Bureau’s Local Update of Census Addresses (LUCA) operation, which helps the federal government learn of residences it may have been unaware of in the past, the bureau worked with municipalities to compare addresses on file to satellite images, says Nestor Lopez, an economic development analyst who has been leading census outreach efforts in Hidalgo County.
“What we found was terrible,” says Lopez. “They had missed close to 20,000 homes in our area. And the devastating part is that they had missed entire communities, where we’re talking about 150, 200 homes—completely missed—that have been there for 20, 25 years. So in theory, these homes were not counted a decade ago, and they weren’t counted two decades ago.”
On top of missing large swaths of homes in 2010, the Census Bureau further alienated respondents by sending enumerators—door-to-door census takers—who couldn’t communicate properly with the community, Lopez says.
“They brought in a lot of people that might have been from different areas of Central America, and their Spanish is very different to ours, and it didn’t translate well,” he says. “Ultimately, that was very, very detrimental to us, and it dissuaded people from really wanting to interact with people that you can clearly tell aren’t from our community.”
This year, the Census Bureau has committed to hiring local enumerators and to visiting the residences identified in the LUCA program. But the obstacles to an accurate census count are greater than ever, and the uncertainty over when the count will end only makes things harder. Given the confusion over the citizenship question controversy and many residents’ fear of deportation, Patiño Houle says, activists are focusing on conveying that census responses are confidential—and essential.
For at least the next few weeks, Martha Sanchez and the LUPE team will continue driving around with megaphones and doing “everything we can” to get people counted. “But sadly, Washington has a bigger megaphone than us,” she says. “They penetrate a lot of places that we can’t reach. So it’s not an even playing field.”


motherjones--2020-09-16--The CDC Head Said Masks Are Better Than Vaccines. Here’s What He Meant.

Earlier today , Robert Redfield , head of the Centers for Disease Control , provoked the ire of some parts of the internet when he suggested that masks might be more effective than vaccines .
“ I might even go so far as to say that this face mask is more guaranteed to protect me against COVID than when I take a COVID vaccine , ” Redford said while testifying before the Senate Subcommittee on Labor , Health and Human Services on expectations around the release of COVID-19 vaccines .
The statement is confusing , to put it mildly .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ a largely ineffective vaccine ?
Even worse : Is he intimating that we shouldn ’ t trust the vaccine because it ’ s being rushed for political reasons ?
Cue anti-vax groups : Any minute now , they ’ ll be seizing on Redford ’ s statement to validate their skepticism .
The delivery could have been clearer , but actually , Redfield is right .
He ’ s referring to the fact that universal masking—when everyone in a group wears a mask—reliably and dramatically reduces transmission of coronavirus .
By reducing the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , masks may also lessen the severity of the disease should they catch COVID-19 .
We don ’ t yet know how effective a vaccine will be , but it only needs to be 50 percent effective to gain approval from the FDA .
Most experts expect that the vaccine will work slightly better than that , but not by much .
Which brings me to the most important point : It is overwhelmingly likely that the first COVID-19 vaccine will not be a silver bullet .
Rather , it will be one @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to our arsenal .
If you don ’ t like the battle analogy , you might prefer the public health concept of layering .
It ’ s like getting dressed for a blizzard , where each intervention—in this case , masks , social distancing , and eventually a vaccine—will work in tandem to protect you .
This is an essential concept for everyone in the world to understand—because if we continue to think of the vaccine as a silver bullet , the results could be disastrous .
Let ’ s say it ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of family and friends all gets the vaccine just in time for an Easter gathering .
Thinking they ’ re no longer at risk of spreading the virus , they go to church , where they sing and socialize , then enjoy a meal together at someone ’ s house—all without masks .
If the vaccine is only 60 percent effective , this group unwittingly could be spreading the virus far and wide .
It ’ s a little like sunscreen .
For decades , dermatologists have noted that applying sunscreen makes people @ @ @ @ @ @ @ sun—which actually makes them more likely to engage in risky activities like sunbathing and less likely to use other methods of protecting themselves .
Does that mean you shouldn ’ t wear sunscreen ?
No .
It just means you should wear a hat and sit in the shade as well .
( Check out this 1998 deep cut from Mother Jones on the sunscreen paradox ! )
And as long as we ’ re talking about analogies , here ’ s another one : Writing in the New England Journal of Medicine @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Francisco infectious disease specialists described the compelling concept of a mask as a “ crude vaccine.
” Intuitively , this makes sense .
Just like a vaccine , the effectiveness of masks increases the more people who use them .
Even more interestingly , the analogy goes further .
Masks may expose people to just enough virus to create an immune response—an immunological concept , known as “ variolation.
” It ’ s the same one behind vaccines .
There ’ s another takeaway from Redfield ’ s comment .
Unfortunately , it @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ’ s disastrously inconsistent communication around coronavirus .
During the same testimony , he also said that he expects we ’ ll have enough vaccine to return to “ regular life ” by the third quarter of next year .
Many public health experts have noted the damage that ’ s been done by poor messaging from the government around coronavirus : more transmission , more deaths , and ultimately , an erosion of trust in public health .
That ’ s a big shame , because here ’ s what else works @ @ @ @ @ @ @ communication about how we can all work together , layer by layer , to protect ourselves .

Earlier today, Robert Redfield, head of the Centers for Disease Control, provoked the ire of some parts of the internet when he suggested that masks might be more effective than vaccines. “I might even go so far as to say that this face mask is more guaranteed to protect me against COVID than when I take a COVID vaccine,” Redford said while testifying before the Senate Subcommittee on Labor, Health and Human Services on expectations around the release of COVID-19 vaccines.
Redfield: masks are better than vaccines. pic.twitter.com/vyOB9UqDPj — Alexander Nazaryan (@alexnazaryan) September 16, 2020
The statement is confusing, to put it mildly. Is Redfield trying to prepare us for a largely ineffective vaccine? Even worse: Is he intimating that we shouldn’t trust the vaccine because it’s being rushed for political reasons? Cue anti-vax groups: Any minute now, they’ll be seizing on Redford’s statement to validate their skepticism.
The delivery could have been clearer, but actually, Redfield is right. He’s referring to the fact that universal masking—when everyone in a group wears a mask—reliably and dramatically reduces transmission of coronavirus. By reducing the amount of virus individuals are exposed to, masks may also lessen the severity of the disease should they catch COVID-19. We don’t yet know how effective a vaccine will be, but it only needs to be 50 percent effective to gain approval from the FDA. Most experts expect that the vaccine will work slightly better than that, but not by much.
Which brings me to the most important point: It is overwhelmingly likely that the first COVID-19 vaccine will not be a silver bullet. Rather, it will be one more weapon against the disease to add to our arsenal. If you don’t like the battle analogy, you might prefer the public health concept of layering. It’s like getting dressed for a blizzard, where each intervention—in this case, masks, social distancing, and eventually a vaccine—will work in tandem to protect you.
It’s like getting dressed for a blizzard, where each intervention—in this case, masks, social distancing, and eventually a vaccine—will work in tandem to protect you.
This is an essential concept for everyone in the world to understand—because if we continue to think of the vaccine as a silver bullet, the results could be disastrous. Let’s say it’s next spring, and a group of family and friends all gets the vaccine just in time for an Easter gathering. Thinking they’re no longer at risk of spreading the virus, they go to church, where they sing and socialize, then enjoy a meal together at someone’s house—all without masks. If the vaccine is only 60 percent effective, this group unwittingly could be spreading the virus far and wide. It’s a little like sunscreen. For decades, dermatologists have noted that applying sunscreen makes people feel invincible to skin damage from the sun—which actually makes them more likely to engage in risky activities like sunbathing and less likely to use other methods of protecting themselves. Does that mean you shouldn’t wear sunscreen? No. It just means you should wear a hat and sit in the shade as well. (Check out this 1998 deep cut from Mother Jones on the sunscreen paradox!)
And as long as we’re talking about analogies, here’s another one: Writing in the New England Journal of Medicine last week, two University of California-San Francisco infectious disease specialists described the compelling concept of a mask as a “crude vaccine.” Intuitively, this makes sense. Just like a vaccine, the effectiveness of masks increases the more people who use them. Even more interestingly, the analogy goes further. Masks may expose people to just enough virus to create an immune response—an immunological concept, known as “variolation.” It’s the same one behind vaccines.
There’s another takeaway from Redfield’s comment. Unfortunately, it’s characteristic of the Trump administration’s disastrously inconsistent communication around coronavirus. During the same testimony, he also said that he expects we’ll have enough vaccine to return to “regular life” by the third quarter of next year. Many public health experts have noted the damage that’s been done by poor messaging from the government around coronavirus: more transmission, more deaths, and ultimately, an erosion of trust in public health. That’s a big shame, because here’s what else works a little like a vaccine: Consistent communication about how we can all work together, layer by layer, to protect ourselves.


motherjones--2020-09-16--A Simple Plan to Deal with COVID-19: Free Flu Shots for All

There is an amazingly simple and clever step that the US federal government could take to counter a possible COVID-19 surge this fall and winter : a national crash program for flu shots .
So far , the Trump administration has not embarked on such a program .
Since the start of the pandemic , public health experts have voiced the fear that the coming weeks and months could yield a “ twindemic , ” as the coronavirus crisis overlaps with the spread of seasonal influenza .
A June editorial in Science raised the prospect of a “ convergence ” @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ” Scientific American reports that epidemiologists worry the United States could “ soon face two epidemics at the same time…and this combination could precipitate a crisis unlike any other.
” The problems are obvious .
COVID-19 and the flu share symptoms ( fever , muscle aches , respiratory problems ) and can be hard to tell apart .
People who contract the flu might believe they have the more deadly COVID-19 .
Those who become sick with COVID-19 might assume they have the flu .
Without clear and quick test results , doctors @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to provide .
“ Family doctors and even fancy infectious diseases experts will have trouble differentiating between patients who you treat for the flu and those who you hospitalize for COVID , ” says Dr. William Schaffner , a professor of medicine in the Division of Infectious Diseases at Vanderbilt University School of Medicine .
Most important , a rise in the number of flu patients will place additional pressure on hospitals and medical facilities dealing with COVID-19 .
“ People get sick and end up in the hospital and compete for the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Bhadelia , associate professor of medicine at Boston University School of Medicine and an infectious diseases physician at Boston Medical Center .
“ Extra tests and extra PPE will be needed.
” Health care professionals dread the possible return of the COVID-caused crush on the medical system that occurred this spring .
( During the 2019-2020 flu season , there were between 410,000 and 740,000 hospitalizations for flu and between 24,000 and 62,000 flu deaths , according to the Centers for Disease Control . )
Bhadelia also points out that there ’ s @ @ @ @ @ @ @ COVID might interact for patients who are exposed to both : “ We don ’ t have a good sense of what co-infection looks like .
Does it make either of the illnesses more severe ?
And some people who survive COVID have a long recovery .
If they get the flu , is their flu worse because architecturally their lungs are different ?
” Doing everything possible to reduce the flu this winter would certainly assist the fight against COVID-19 .
But that has yet to become a priority for President Donald @ @ @ @ @ @ @ events with super-spreading potential and who mocks mask-wearing social distancing .
There is yet no vaccine for COVID-19 , but one does exist for the flu—and it ’ s a powerful tool : One CDC study found that increasing flu vaccination coverage by five percentage points could prevent between 4000 and 11,000 hospitalizations .
And the CDC has long taken the flu season seriously .
Each year , it purchases flu shots and disseminates them to state and local immunization programs , many of which also buy doses on their own .
This @ @ @ @ @ @ @ “ supplemental ” adult flu vaccines for distribution—far more than the 500,000 the agency typically obtains and hands out—and it has requested that state and local health entities focus on delivering these shots to underserved communities , including Black and Latino populations , according to a CDC spokesperson .
The CDC also is sending $ 140 million in funding to state and local health departments to plan and implement vaccinations and to target minority communities , adults with underlying conditions , and essential workers .
This money supports mass vaccination events , vaccine @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
( The effectiveness of the flu shot varies form year to year , depending on that year ’ s influenza strain , but the more people who are vaccinated , the greater the collective protection . )
The CDC effort is only a slice of the overall flu immunization effort .
Flu shots are manufactured by private companies .
( According to the CDC , these firms expect to produce about 194 to 198 million doses of influenza vaccine this season ; as of early September , 47.6 million shots were distributed @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to Americans by a hodgepodge of medical facilities , drug store chains , doctors ’ offices , local health agencies , employers ( for their workforces ) , and federal agencies , with different sources , including private insurers , Medicare , Medicaid , and customers , covering the tab .
“ It ’ s a bit of a quilt work , ” says Schaffner .
“ There may well be a lot of people who need it and who don ’ t get it.
” There is no national immunization system to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ initiative is needed .
Though the supply of flu shots is usually not a problem—and the costs are not too high—many Americans still do not obtain the vaccination .
“ Kroger grocery stores give free flu vaccines , and there are various means to get it , ” says Schaffner .
“ But you have to be motivated to get it.
” A CDC study of the flu season of 2018 to 2019 noted that 62.6 percent of children in the United States ( 6-months to 17-years old ) had received a shot @ @ @ @ @ @ @ half : 45.3 percent .
And the numbers varied widely between states ( between 46 and 81 percent among children ; from 34 to 56 percent among adults ) .
Which means there is plenty of room for widely promoting and distributing flu shots .
Schaffner points out that there is a need to push out the vaccine into various communities , but state and local health departments “ tend not to have the budgets for something like this .
We need to expand current programs and communications methods to reach out to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ United States recently spotted encouraging news in the Southern Hemisphere , where the flu season this summer ( when it was winter down below ) was mild .
That could be because anti-COVID measures—wearing masks , socially distancing—also work to slow the spread of influenza .
But in Australia , for example , these steps were more widely embraced than they have been in parts of the United States .
“ Offering a free flu shot to everyone is a no-brainer , ” Bhadelia says .
Yet she notes that “ a lot @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , ” so there are plenty of cracks in the system .
Low-income people without insurance , she adds , are often not aware of immunization programs that will provide a flu vaccination with no charge .
And there are people in all income brackets who don ’ t see the need to get a shot .
As the nation heads into flu season with the deadly coronavirus pandemic still untamed , a comprehensive flu shot campaign that makes the vaccination available to all and that mounts wide-ranging and creative efforts to promote @ @ @ @ @ @ @ shot teams ? )
would be a straightforward way to address this double-threat and bolster a health care system still coping with COVID-19 .
It also could be something of a test run for what happens should a coronavirus vaccination be developed .
“ We are all anticipating a stressful winter coming up , ” Shaffner says .
An extensive flu shot blitz could mitigate that : “ It couldn ’ t be simpler .
Just roll up your sleeves.
” Funding for such a program would certainly be crucial .
But this @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , Schaffner contends .
Imagine if Trump said everyone should get a flu shot .
“ That would be very important , ” Schaffner remarks .
“ That could have a huge effect .
It ’ s the best thing that we can do.
” But as Trump has refused to embraced the basic steps necessary to contain the pandemic , he has also not yet demonstrated an interest in such an elementary and effective public health project .
Could that be because of his antivax past ?
Whatever the cause , he @ @ @ @ @ @ @ As the COVID-19 death count approaches 200,000 , Trump—and the nation—is running out of time to implement a damn easy way to assist an embattled health care system and to reduce suffering and death .

There is an amazingly simple and clever step that the US federal government could take to counter a possible COVID-19 surge this fall and winter: a national crash program for flu shots. So far, the Trump administration has not embarked on such a program.
Since the start of the pandemic, public health experts have voiced the fear that the coming weeks and months could yield a “twindemic,” as the coronavirus crisis overlaps with the spread of seasonal influenza. A June editorial in Science raised the prospect of a “convergence” that could become a “perfect storm.” Scientific American reports that epidemiologists worry the United States could “soon face two epidemics at the same time…and this combination could precipitate a crisis unlike any other.”
The problems are obvious. COVID-19 and the flu share symptoms (fever, muscle aches, respiratory problems) and can be hard to tell apart. People who contract the flu might believe they have the more deadly COVID-19. Those who become sick with COVID-19 might assume they have the flu. Without clear and quick test results, doctors might not know what advice and treatment to provide. “Family doctors and even fancy infectious diseases experts will have trouble differentiating between patients who you treat for the flu and those who you hospitalize for COVID,” says Dr. William Schaffner, a professor of medicine in the Division of Infectious Diseases at Vanderbilt University School of Medicine.
“Even fancy infectious diseases experts will have trouble differentiating between patients who you treat for the flu and those who you hospitalize for COVID.”
Most important, a rise in the number of flu patients will place additional pressure on hospitals and medical facilities dealing with COVID-19. “People get sick and end up in the hospital and compete for the same beds,” notes Dr. Nahid Bhadelia, associate professor of medicine at Boston University School of Medicine and an infectious diseases physician at Boston Medical Center. “Extra tests and extra PPE will be needed.” Health care professionals dread the possible return of the COVID-caused crush on the medical system that occurred this spring. (During the 2019-2020 flu season, there were between 410,000 and 740,000 hospitalizations for flu and between 24,000 and 62,000 flu deaths, according to the Centers for Disease Control.)
Bhadelia also points out that there’s no telling yet how the flu and COVID might interact for patients who are exposed to both: “We don’t have a good sense of what co-infection looks like. Does it make either of the illnesses more severe? And some people who survive COVID have a long recovery. If they get the flu, is their flu worse because architecturally their lungs are different?”
Doing everything possible to reduce the flu this winter would certainly assist the fight against COVID-19. But that has yet to become a priority for President Donald Trump, who continues to host campaign events with super-spreading potential and who mocks mask-wearing social distancing.
There is yet no vaccine for COVID-19, but one does exist for the flu—and it’s a powerful tool: One CDC study found that increasing flu vaccination coverage by five percentage points could prevent between 4000 and 11,000 hospitalizations. And the CDC has long taken the flu season seriously. Each year, it purchases flu shots and disseminates them to state and local immunization programs, many of which also buy doses on their own.
This year the CDC has procured 9.3 million “supplemental” adult flu vaccines for distribution—far more than the 500,000 the agency typically obtains and hands out—and it has requested that state and local health entities focus on delivering these shots to underserved communities, including Black and Latino populations, according to a CDC spokesperson. The CDC also is sending $140 million in funding to state and local health departments to plan and implement vaccinations and to target minority communities, adults with underlying conditions, and essential workers. This money supports mass vaccination events, vaccine strike teams, and curbside vaccination clinics. (The effectiveness of the flu shot varies form year to year, depending on that year’s influenza strain, but the more people who are vaccinated, the greater the collective protection.)
The CDC effort is only a slice of the overall flu immunization effort. Flu shots are manufactured by private companies. (According to the CDC, these firms expect to produce about 194 to 198 million doses of influenza vaccine this season; as of early September, 47.6 million shots were distributed.) And the shots are provided to Americans by a hodgepodge of medical facilities, drug store chains, doctors’ offices, local health agencies, employers (for their workforces), and federal agencies, with different sources, including private insurers, Medicare, Medicaid, and customers, covering the tab. “It’s a bit of a quilt work,” says Schaffner. “There may well be a lot of people who need it and who don’t get it.”
There is no national immunization system to swing into action. Yet a national initiative is needed. Though the supply of flu shots is usually not a problem—and the costs are not too high—many Americans still do not obtain the vaccination. “Kroger grocery stores give free flu vaccines, and there are various means to get it,” says Schaffner. “But you have to be motivated to get it.”
“Offering a free flu shot to everyone is a no-brainer.”
A CDC study of the flu season of 2018 to 2019 noted that 62.6 percent of children in the United States (6-months to 17-years old) had received a shot. Coverage among adults was less than half: 45.3 percent. And the numbers varied widely between states (between 46 and 81 percent among children; from 34 to 56 percent among adults). Which means there is plenty of room for widely promoting and distributing flu shots. Schaffner points out that there is a need to push out the vaccine into various communities, but state and local health departments “tend not to have the budgets for something like this. We need to expand current programs and communications methods to reach out to people.”
Infectious disease experts in the United States recently spotted encouraging news in the Southern Hemisphere, where the flu season this summer (when it was winter down below) was mild. That could be because anti-COVID measures—wearing masks, socially distancing—also work to slow the spread of influenza. But in Australia, for example, these steps were more widely embraced than they have been in parts of the United States.
“Offering a free flu shot to everyone is a no-brainer,” Bhadelia says. Yet she notes that “a lot of national health care is not national,” so there are plenty of cracks in the system. Low-income people without insurance, she adds, are often not aware of immunization programs that will provide a flu vaccination with no charge. And there are people in all income brackets who don’t see the need to get a shot.
As the nation heads into flu season with the deadly coronavirus pandemic still untamed, a comprehensive flu shot campaign that makes the vaccination available to all and that mounts wide-ranging and creative efforts to promote and distribute flu shots (door-to-door flu shot teams?) would be a straightforward way to address this double-threat and bolster a health care system still coping with COVID-19. It also could be something of a test run for what happens should a coronavirus vaccination be developed.
“We are all anticipating a stressful winter coming up,” Shaffner says. An extensive flu shot blitz could mitigate that: “It couldn’t be simpler. Just roll up your sleeves.” Funding for such a program would certainly be crucial. But this is largely a question of national leadership, Schaffner contends. Imagine if Trump said everyone should get a flu shot. “That would be very important,” Schaffner remarks. “That could have a huge effect. It’s the best thing that we can do.”
But as Trump has refused to embraced the basic steps necessary to contain the pandemic, he has also not yet demonstrated an interest in such an elementary and effective public health project. Could that be because of his anti-vax past? Whatever the cause, he is letting an opportunity slip by. As the COVID-19 death count approaches 200,000, Trump—and the nation—is running out of time to implement a damn easy way to assist an embattled health care system and to reduce suffering and death.


motherjones--2020-09-15--Bipartisan House Group Tries to Revive Pandemic Aid Negotiations With Long-shot Bill

A bipartisan coalition of 50 House representatives unveiled a new coronavirus relief proposal on Tuesday , in hopes of restarting pandemic relief negotiations and passing an aid package in the weeks ahead of the November election .
The plan splits the difference between the meager Senate GOP bill and the more expansive House Democratic one , but it ’ s unlikely to please either side or stand a real chance of passage .
“ What brings us together—25 Democrats and 25 Republicans—is our shared goal of finding a pragmatic solution—a bipartisan path forward—to help get negotiators to return to the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ( D-N.J. ) on Tuesday .
The proposal , spearheaded by Gottheimer and Rep. Tom Reed ( R-N.Y. ) , follows weeks of deadlock between Republicans and Democrats in the Senate about how much relief to give to the American people , and in what form .
Last Thursday , Senate Republicans forged ahead with a vote on a slimmed-down aid bill but came up short of the 60 Senate votes needed for passage .
The legislation , which had a price tag of about $ 650 billion , included a $ 300-per-week @ @ @ @ @ @ @ include a second round of $ 1,200 stimulus checks , nutrition assistance , financial help for renters , or aid to state and local governments whose budgets have been battered by economic shutdowns .
Democrats had previously pushed for a $ 2.2 trillion aid package , after scaling back a $ 3 trillion bill the House passed in May , which included these elements and a continuation of the $ 600 weekly unemployment boost that expired at the end of July .
Every Democrat—and one Republican—voted against the “ skinny ” relief bill @ @ @ @ @ @ @ two parties would not come to an agreement ahead of November .
Tuesday ’ s proposal from the Problem Solvers Caucus attempts a compromise between these two visions .
Among other things , it proposes $ 500 billion in aid to state and local governments and a $ 450-per-week unemployment boost for eight weeks , followed by up to $ 600 per week through January 2021 .
The plan also proposes another round of $ 1,200 stimulus checks , as well as $ 25 billion in rental assistance and an additional $ 10 @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
As it stands , the Problem Solvers ’ package would cost about $ 1.5 trillion .
But the proposal would only stay within the bounds of that Goldilocks price tag if the pandemic doesn ’ t intensify , because it includes a number of automatic triggers for additional aid if the pandemic worsens this winter and spring that could bring the total cost closer to $ 2 trillion—far more than most Republicans are willing to spend .
The proposal ’ s prospects could also be hurt by both parties ’ political incentives @ @ @ @ @ @ @ blamed the ongoing lack of aid on Democrats ’ unwillingness to compromise .
Democrats , on the other hand , have sought to put responsibility on the GOP , arguing that the scale of current need is enormous enough that settling for a far reduced aid package is untenable .
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi called last week ’ s GOP proposal “ a missed opportunity to do what is right for the American people.
” For the Problem Solvers Caucus—many of whose members are up for reelection this November in tight races—their new @ @ @ @ @ @ @ show voters in their home districts that they , too , tried to find a solution , even if it goes nowhere .

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A bipartisan coalition of 50 House representatives unveiled a new coronavirus relief proposal on Tuesday, in hopes of restarting pandemic relief negotiations and passing an aid package in the weeks ahead of the November election. The plan splits the difference between the meager Senate GOP bill and the more expansive House Democratic one, but it’s unlikely to please either side or stand a real chance of passage.
“What brings us together—25 Democrats and 25 Republicans—is our shared goal of finding a pragmatic solution—a bipartisan path forward—to help get negotiators to return to the table,” tweeted Rep. Josh Gottheimer (D-N.J.) on Tuesday.
The proposal, spearheaded by Gottheimer and Rep. Tom Reed (R-N.Y.), follows weeks of deadlock between Republicans and Democrats in the Senate about how much relief to give to the American people, and in what form. Last Thursday, Senate Republicans forged ahead with a vote on a slimmed-down aid bill but came up short of the 60 Senate votes needed for passage. The legislation, which had a price tag of about $650 billion, included a $300-per-week boost to unemployment insurance but did not include a second round of $1,200 stimulus checks, nutrition assistance, financial help for renters, or aid to state and local governments whose budgets have been battered by economic shutdowns. Democrats had previously pushed for a $2.2 trillion aid package, after scaling back a $3 trillion bill the House passed in May, which included these elements and a continuation of the $600 weekly unemployment boost that expired at the end of July. Every Democrat—and one Republican—voted against the “skinny” relief bill last week, raising concerns that the two parties would not come to an agreement ahead of November.
Tuesday’s proposal from the Problem Solvers Caucus attempts a compromise between these two visions. Among other things, it proposes $500 billion in aid to state and local governments and a $450-per-week unemployment boost for eight weeks, followed by up to $600 per week through January 2021. The plan also proposes another round of $1,200 stimulus checks, as well as $25 billion in rental assistance and an additional $10 billion for food stamps through next July.
As it stands, the Problem Solvers’ package would cost about $1.5 trillion. But the proposal would only stay within the bounds of that Goldilocks price tag if the pandemic doesn’t intensify, because it includes a number of automatic triggers for additional aid if the pandemic worsens this winter and spring that could bring the total cost closer to $2 trillion—far more than most Republicans are willing to spend.
The proposal’s prospects could also be hurt by both parties’ political incentives to maintain the stalemate. Republicans have blamed the ongoing lack of aid on Democrats’ unwillingness to compromise. Democrats, on the other hand, have sought to put responsibility on the GOP, arguing that the scale of current need is enormous enough that settling for a far reduced aid package is untenable. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi called last week’s GOP proposal “a missed opportunity to do what is right for the American people.” For the Problem Solvers Caucus—many of whose members are up for reelection this November in tight races—their new compromise proposal also presents an opportunity to show voters in their home districts that they, too, tried to find a solution, even if it goes nowhere.


motherjones--2020-09-15--The Number of People Without Health Insurance Has Gone Up Under Trump

The number of uninsured Americans rose by 1 million in 2019 , according to a Census Bureau report released Tuesday , reversing a trend of lowering uninsured rates ushered in by the Affordable Care Act .
The number of people without insurance in the United States rose from 28.6 million , or 8.9 percent of the population , in 2018 to 29.6 million , or 9.2 percent of people , in 2019 , according to the report .
The uninsured rate among the non-elderly population started falling in 2010 after the Affordable Care Act was enacted , according to the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to tick back up in 2016 .
The increased uninsurance rates correlate with President Trump ’ s promotion of short-term “ junk insurance ” plans and the repeal of the individual mandate , which required people to pay a penalty if they weren ’ t insured .
The report also contains some disappointing numbers about coverage of children : The data in the report was gathered before the pandemic caused record joblessness , so the number of people without insurance in 2020 is likely much higher .
Meanwhile , the fate of the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ lawsuit that could repeal the entirety of the legislation awaits deliberation by the Supreme Court .

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The number of uninsured Americans rose by 1 million in 2019, according to a Census Bureau report released Tuesday, reversing a trend of lowering uninsured rates ushered in by the Affordable Care Act.
The number of people without insurance in the United States rose from 28.6 million, or 8.9 percent of the population, in 2018 to 29.6 million, or 9.2 percent of people, in 2019, according to the report.
The uninsured rate among the non-elderly population started falling in 2010 after the Affordable Care Act was enacted, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation, but it started to tick back up in 2016. The increased uninsurance rates correlate with President Trump’s promotion of short-term “junk insurance” plans and the repeal of the individual mandate, which required people to pay a penalty if they weren’t insured.
The nicks and cuts inflicted on the ACA have likely to led to an increase in the number of people uninsured. These include massive cutbacks in outreach, leeway given to states to restrict their Medicaid programs, and repeal of the individual mandate penalty. — Larry Levitt (@larry_levitt) September 15, 2020
The report also contains some disappointing numbers about coverage of children:
The ACS uptick in uninsured is concentrated among the nonelderly, both in the 19-64 group and for children. Sad news about kids’ coverage: “In 2019, there were about 320,000 more uninsured children than there were in 2018.” pic.twitter.com/wcPoMIJalN — Emily Gee (@EmilyG_DC) September 15, 2020
The data in the report was gathered before the pandemic caused record joblessness, so the number of people without insurance in 2020 is likely much higher. Meanwhile, the fate of the ACA hangs in the balance as a lawsuit that could repeal the entirety of the legislation awaits deliberation by the Supreme Court.