vox--2020-08-27--What would Trump actually want to do on health care in a second term?

Donald Trump ’ s second-term health care agenda would hinge on the Supreme Court .
If the Court sides with a group of conservative states that claim the entirety of the Affordable Care Act is unconstitutional , millions of Americans could lose their health insurance in the middle of the Covid-19 pandemic .
The White House and Congress would have to try to do something to stop such a calamity .
“ If the court knocks down all or part of the law , I think that ’ s a game changer in terms of what the priorities are , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of Capital Alpha Partners , an investment research firm based out of Washington , DC , told me .
“ That forces some sort of action or a fight.
” If the Supreme Court upholds the ACA , however , Trump ’ s health care agenda could become modest — and possibly even bipartisan .
The administration has come close to striking deals on bipartisan health care bills with the current Congress , and Trump may be tempted to try to get those across the finish line to secure a more lasting legacy @ @ @ @ @ @ @ would hope one of the things they ’ ve learned is [ that ] what they did in the first term is very much at risk .
It ’ s all executive action , ” Doug Holtz-Eakin , president of the right-leaning American Action Forum , told me .
“ Getting things done in legislation will be a bigger priority .
Drug-price bills and surprise-billing bills could get over the finish line with real White House effort.
” Although that sounds potentially optimistic , that would require Trump to succeed where he has @ @ @ @ @ @ @ House has proven itself ill-equipped to work well with either congressional Democrats or Republicans .
Obamacare repeal was a disaster ; deals on prescription drug prices and surprise medical bills fizzled .
As Holtz-Eakin summarized it : “ They have failed to pass any significant legislation on things they care about.
” I spoke with a half-dozen Republican lobbyists and conservative wonks for this story .
One thing became clear to me : Any optimism about what a second Trump term would mean for US health care hinges on the president mustering a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to display during his first three and a half years in office .
How Trump could respond if the Supreme Court overturns Obamacare Trump ’ s second term would start at the Supreme Court , which has scheduled oral arguments in Texas v. Azar for November 10 , 2020 .
Republican-led states and the Justice Department have urged the Court to invalidate the ACA in its entirety , arguing that because the individual requirement has since been repealed , the rationale used to save the mandate and uphold the law in 2012 ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Sebelius ( for which Chief Justice John Roberts wrote the majority opinion ) no longer applies — and as a result , Obamacare must fall .
That means all of it : Medicaid expansion , which has covered more than 12 million people ; the insurance marketplaces , where 11.4 million people have purchased coverage , most of them with the help of federal subsidies that would also be nixed ; protections for preexisting conditions ; and free preventive care .
The US would be starting over , as if the last 10 @ @ @ @ @ @ @ never happened .
In that scenario , Trump and Congress ( having either flipped back to full Republican control or with a Democratic House ) would have to figure out what to do next — and there is no single consensus on the right about the best way to reform health care .
Some conservatives still support a framework similar to that of 2017 ’ s Graham-Cassidy bill , which would effectively take the money appropriated by Obamacare and turn it into block grants for states to spend as they see fit ( @ @ @ @ @ @ @ people losing coverage , according to estimates from the Congressional Budget Office ) .
Others prefer to rebuild something closer to the ACA — as GOP Rep. Bruce Westerman ’ s bill would do — but with important tweaks , such as allowing insurers to charge older people higher premiums ( to make insurance more affordable for younger people ) .
There would be big changes to the Medicaid program under Westerman ’ s plan , though , with states having the option to adopt spending caps and move the Medicaid expansion population @ @ @ @ @ @ @ It ’ s an alternative form of the individual market , with important technical differences , ” Avik Roy , president of the right-leaning Foundation for Research on Equal Opportunity and an adviser on the Westerman bill , told me .
“ We ’ d end up in a pretty similar place , but with a reformed individual market.
” However , most people — including Roy and most of other conservatives I spoke with — don ’ t expect the Supreme Court to nullify Obamacare entirely .
At most , they anticipate @ @ @ @ @ @ @ protections for preexisting conditions along with the mandate , but leaves much of the law ( including premium subsidies and Medicaid expansion ) in place .
That ’ s still a significant political event .
Those protections are very popular , in no small part because an estimated 54 million Americans have a preexisting condition , and many of them would struggle to buy insurance on their own without those rules .
Under that scenario , Republicans could opt for a narrower fix .
During the current Congress , when Democrats tried to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ on health care , some GOP lawmakers introduced a resolution that said if the Supreme Court overturned the rules on preexisting conditions , they would vote to restore them sans mandate .
Roy thinks that ’ s a likely starting point for Republicans should the Court issue a narrow ruling .
Although some people more committed to conservative health care ideology might want to push farther , he said , he also believes most elected Republicans “ are totally fine with guaranteed issue and would vote to reinstate it.
” The political incentives @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Americans would be overwhelming , and would surely motivate Trump and Congress to make a deal .
But the president is playing with fire : He came into office with health care as the top item on the GOP agenda and full Republican control of Congress , yet he still failed to reach a consensus .
The stakes would be much higher the second time around .
Even if the Supreme Court spares Trump a manufactured health care crisis , his second-term agenda likely depends on a congressional panache he hasn ’ t @ @ @ @ @ @ @ health care agenda could actually look like in a second Trump term There ’ s actually quite a long list of areas in which both Democrats and Republicans want to act on health care , based on my conversations .
Everybody wants to reduce prescription drug prices , and Trump has often sounded more like a Democrat than a Republican on that issue , favoring aggressive intervention by the federal government .
Surprise medical bills remain the source of cross-party outrage , and there was movement late last year toward a bipartisan fix @ @ @ @ @ @ @ be revived .
“ I think if Trump is reelected on drug pricing , there will be another push for legislative reform , ” Monk said .
“ There actually is a lot of common ground .
...
I don ’ t see Trump totally cruising on that issue.
” There are also new issues that have cropped up during the coronavirus pandemic and require longer-term solutions — and likely congressional action .
The Trump administration has made regulatory changes to better compensate telehealth visits for doctors , but those would lapse unless @ @ @ @ @ @ @ The supply chain issues that have contributed to shortages of personal protective equipment and testing supplies could also be addressed through Congress , and there could be bipartisan interest in preventing the problems of the last few months from repeating themselves in a similar crisis .
“ The places they might want to go and that would represent significant steps forward really are legislative , ” Holtz-Eakin said .
“ All those things would strike me as sensible things to try to get done , even if they don ’ t sound as @ @ @ @ @ @ @ course , any of those items would require a deal between the White House and congressional Republicans — and likely Democrats , too , either because they control the House or because their votes are needed to get the 60 required to advance bills in the Senate .
And Trump , despite his dealmaker reputation , has not had a landmark health care agreement in his first term .
Obamacare repeal fell through .
As Politico chronicled in December 2019 , Trump initially greeted House Speaker Nancy Pelosi ’ s drug-pricing plan with @ @ @ @ @ @ @ his own proposal , such as pegging US drug prices to those paid in other countries and establishing an out-of-pocket cap in Medicare for prescription drugs .
But as Democrats pressed forward with their impeachment inquiry , Trump pulled back .
He lended his support to a competing bill in the Senate , which did make its way out of committee over drug companies ’ objections — “ a remarkable piece of progress , ” as Roy put it , given that pharma usually gets its way on Capitol Hill .
But that @ @ @ @ @ @ @ up on the Senate floor — likely the result of reticence on the part of Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell — and Trump has not shown a sustained interest in pressuring the upper chamber to act .
“ What ’ s held up in the Senate Finance bill , it hasn ’ t been Dems per se , ” Roy said .
“ It ’ s believed that McConnell has not wanted to bring it to the floor , but it likely would pass on a straight majority vote .
It probably could @ @ @ @ @ @ @ would be there .
But Trump would have to close a deal .
The same principle applies to surprise billing .
The White House threw support behind an emerging bipartisan consensus on how to prevent patients from being hit with thousands of dollars in bills for out-of-network care , but a bill never passed .
Congress bears much of the blame for that failure , with Democrats divided against themselves and McConnell again playing his cards close to his chest , but more aggressive lobbying from the White House could conceivably help in @ @ @ @ @ @ @ factoring in the political landscape likely to result from Trump winning a second term , the lobbyists I spoke to are skeptical there would be any appetite among Democrats to work with the White House , since the president is already considered toxic when it comes to congressional negotiations .
“ They don ’ t let him get anywhere close to House or Senate Democrats because that relationship is so incredibly radioactive , ” one lobbyist , who spoke to me on the condition of anonymity , said .
“ It kills all @ @ @ @ @ @ @ action , Trump ’ s health care agenda in a potential second term will likely focus on following through on the executive actions from his first term , many of which are still subject to litigation .
“ I struggle to find a world where the drug pricing regulations don ’ t spend the vast majority of the administration ’ s final four years in court , ” the lobbyist said .
“ That ’ s how long it would take to drag through.
” And as the Trump administration has worked overtime @ @ @ @ @ @ @ s executive initiatives or using their administrative authority on the ACA , they should be more familiar than most about how fleeting executive actions can be .
The Trump presidency has been nothing if not unpredictable .
The Supreme Court could ensure that applies to the next four years of health care policy as well .
In the spring , we launched a program asking readers for financial contributions to help keep Vox free for everyone , and last week , we set a goal of reaching 20,000 contributors .
Well , you @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , we are extending that goal to 25,000 .
Millions turn to Vox each month to understand an increasingly chaotic world — from what is happening with the USPS to the coronavirus crisis to what is , quite possibly , the most consequential presidential election of our lifetimes .
Even when the economy and the news advertising market recovers , your support will be a critical part of sustaining our resource-intensive work — and helping everyone make sense of an increasingly chaotic world .
Contribute today from as little as $ 3 .

Donald Trump’s second-term health care agenda would hinge on the Supreme Court.
If the Court sides with a group of conservative states that claim the entirety of the Affordable Care Act is unconstitutional, millions of Americans could lose their health insurance in the middle of the Covid-19 pandemic. The White House and Congress would have to try to do something to stop such a calamity.
“If the court knocks down all or part of the law, I think that’s a game changer in terms of what the priorities are,” Kim Monk, a founding partner of Capital Alpha Partners, an investment research firm based out of Washington, DC, told me. “That forces some sort of action or a fight.”
If the Supreme Court upholds the ACA, however, Trump’s health care agenda could become modest — and possibly even bipartisan. The administration has come close to striking deals on bipartisan health care bills with the current Congress, and Trump may be tempted to try to get those across the finish line to secure a more lasting legacy in this policy area.
“I would hope one of the things they’ve learned is [that] what they did in the first term is very much at risk. It’s all executive action,” Doug Holtz-Eakin, president of the right-leaning American Action Forum, told me. “Getting things done in legislation will be a bigger priority. Drug-price bills and surprise-billing bills could get over the finish line with real White House effort.”
Although that sounds potentially optimistic, that would require Trump to succeed where he has already failed. Trump’s White House has proven itself ill-equipped to work well with either congressional Democrats or Republicans. Obamacare repeal was a disaster; deals on prescription drug prices and surprise medical bills fizzled.
As Holtz-Eakin summarized it: “They have failed to pass any significant legislation on things they care about.”
I spoke with a half-dozen Republican lobbyists and conservative wonks for this story. One thing became clear to me: Any optimism about what a second Trump term would mean for US health care hinges on the president mustering a dealmaking savvy with Congress he has yet to display during his first three and a half years in office.
How Trump could respond if the Supreme Court overturns Obamacare
Trump’s second term would start at the Supreme Court, which has scheduled oral arguments in Texas v. Azar for November 10, 2020. Republican-led states and the Justice Department have urged the Court to invalidate the ACA in its entirety, arguing that because the individual requirement has since been repealed, the rationale used to save the mandate and uphold the law in 2012’s National Federation of Independent Business v. Sebelius (for which Chief Justice John Roberts wrote the majority opinion) no longer applies — and as a result, Obamacare must fall.
That means all of it: Medicaid expansion, which has covered more than 12 million people; the insurance marketplaces, where 11.4 million people have purchased coverage, most of them with the help of federal subsidies that would also be nixed; protections for preexisting conditions; and free preventive care. The US would be starting over, as if the last 10 years of health policy and coverage expansion never happened.
In that scenario, Trump and Congress (having either flipped back to full Republican control or with a Democratic House) would have to figure out what to do next — and there is no single consensus on the right about the best way to reform health care.
Some conservatives still support a framework similar to that of 2017’s Graham-Cassidy bill, which would effectively take the money appropriated by Obamacare and turn it into block grants for states to spend as they see fit (and which would lead to millions of people losing coverage, according to estimates from the Congressional Budget Office). Others prefer to rebuild something closer to the ACA — as GOP Rep. Bruce Westerman’s bill would do — but with important tweaks, such as allowing insurers to charge older people higher premiums (to make insurance more affordable for younger people). There would be big changes to the Medicaid program under Westerman’s plan, though, with states having the option to adopt spending caps and move the Medicaid expansion population onto the private insurance markets.
“It’s an alternative form of the individual market, with important technical differences,” Avik Roy, president of the free-market Foundation for Research on Equal Opportunity and an adviser on the Westerman bill, told me. “We’d end up in a pretty similar place, but with a reformed individual market.”
However, most people — including Roy and most of other conservatives I spoke with — don’t expect the Supreme Court to nullify Obamacare entirely. At most, they anticipate a narrow decision that strikes down core protections for preexisting conditions along with the mandate, but leaves much of the law (including premium subsidies and Medicaid expansion) in place.
That’s still a significant political event. Those protections are very popular, in no small part because an estimated 54 million Americans have a preexisting condition, and many of them would struggle to buy insurance on their own without those rules. Under that scenario, Republicans could opt for a narrower fix. During the current Congress, when Democrats tried to force the GOP to take tough votes on health care, some GOP lawmakers introduced a resolution that said if the Supreme Court overturned the rules on preexisting conditions, they would vote to restore them sans mandate.
Roy thinks that’s a likely starting point for Republicans should the Court issue a narrow ruling. Although some people more committed to conservative health care ideology might want to push farther, he said, he also believes most elected Republicans “are totally fine with guaranteed issue and would vote to reinstate it.”
The political incentives to maintain health care for 25 million Americans would be overwhelming, and would surely motivate Trump and Congress to make a deal. But the president is playing with fire: He came into office with health care as the top item on the GOP agenda and full Republican control of Congress, yet he still failed to reach a consensus. The stakes would be much higher the second time around.
Even if the Supreme Court spares Trump a manufactured health care crisis, his second-term agenda likely depends on a congressional panache he hasn’t shown thus far.
What a bipartisan health care agenda could actually look like in a second Trump term
There’s actually quite a long list of areas in which both Democrats and Republicans want to act on health care, based on my conversations.
Everybody wants to reduce prescription drug prices, and Trump has often sounded more like a Democrat than a Republican on that issue, favoring aggressive intervention by the federal government. Surprise medical bills remain the source of cross-party outrage, and there was movement late last year toward a bipartisan fix, which came up short but could be revived.
“I think if Trump is reelected on drug pricing, there will be another push for legislative reform,” Monk said. “There actually is a lot of common ground. ... I don’t see Trump totally cruising on that issue.”
There are also new issues that have cropped up during the coronavirus pandemic and require longer-term solutions — and likely congressional action. The Trump administration has made regulatory changes to better compensate telehealth visits for doctors, but those would lapse unless they are written into federal statute. The supply chain issues that have contributed to shortages of personal protective equipment and testing supplies could also be addressed through Congress, and there could be bipartisan interest in preventing the problems of the last few months from repeating themselves in a similar crisis.
“The places they might want to go and that would represent significant steps forward really are legislative,” Holtz-Eakin said. “All those things would strike me as sensible things to try to get done, even if they don’t sound as grand as repeal and replace.”
Of course, any of those items would require a deal between the White House and congressional Republicans — and likely Democrats, too, either because they control the House or because their votes are needed to get the 60 required to advance bills in the Senate. And Trump, despite his dealmaker reputation, has not had a landmark health care agreement in his first term.
Obamacare repeal fell through. As Politico chronicled in December 2019, Trump initially greeted House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s drug-pricing plan with warmth. It shared many features of his own proposal, such as pegging US drug prices to those paid in other countries and establishing an out-of-pocket cap in Medicare for prescription drugs. But as Democrats pressed forward with their impeachment inquiry, Trump pulled back. He lended his support to a competing bill in the Senate, which did make its way out of committee over drug companies’ objections — “a remarkable piece of progress,” as Roy put it, given that pharma usually gets its way on Capitol Hill.
But that legislation still hasn’t been brought up on the Senate floor — likely the result of reticence on the part of Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell — and Trump has not shown a sustained interest in pressuring the upper chamber to act.
“What’s held up in the Senate Finance bill, it hasn’t been Dems per se,” Roy said. “It’s believed that McConnell has not wanted to bring it to the floor, but it likely would pass on a straight majority vote. It probably could get 60 votes.”
So the opportunities would be there. But Trump would have to close a deal. The same principle applies to surprise billing. The White House threw support behind an emerging bipartisan consensus on how to prevent patients from being hit with thousands of dollars in bills for out-of-network care, but a bill never passed. Congress bears much of the blame for that failure, with Democrats divided against themselves and McConnell again playing his cards close to his chest, but more aggressive lobbying from the White House could conceivably help in getting such an agreement done.
But factoring in the political landscape likely to result from Trump winning a second term, the lobbyists I spoke to are skeptical there would be any appetite among Democrats to work with the White House, since the president is already considered toxic when it comes to congressional negotiations.
“They don’t let him get anywhere close to House or Senate Democrats because that relationship is so incredibly radioactive,” one lobbyist, who spoke to me on the condition of anonymity, said. “It kills all that comes near it.”
Absent congressional action, Trump’s health care agenda in a potential second term will likely focus on following through on the executive actions from his first term, many of which are still subject to litigation.
“I struggle to find a world where the drug pricing regulations don’t spend the vast majority of the administration’s final four years in court,” the lobbyist said. “That’s how long it would take to drag through.”
And as the Trump administration has worked overtime to roll back many of Obama’s executive initiatives or using their administrative authority on the ACA, they should be more familiar than most about how fleeting executive actions can be.
The Trump presidency has been nothing if not unpredictable. The Supreme Court could ensure that applies to the next four years of health care policy as well.
New goal: 25,000
In the spring, we launched a program asking readers for financial contributions to help keep Vox free for everyone, and last week, we set a goal of reaching 20,000 contributors. Well, you helped us blow past that. Today, we are extending that goal to 25,000. Millions turn to Vox each month to understand an increasingly chaotic world — from what is happening with the USPS to the coronavirus crisis to what is, quite possibly, the most consequential presidential election of our lifetimes. Even when the economy and the news advertising market recovers, your support will be a critical part of sustaining our resource-intensive work — and helping everyone make sense of an increasingly chaotic world. Contribute today from as little as $3.


vox--2020-08-27--Why police encouraged a teenager with a gun to patrol Kenosha’s streets

Kyle Rittenhouse , the 17-year-old charged with murder in the shooting deaths of two people during the violent protests in Kenosha , Wisconsin , had a run-in with the police earlier in the night — an extremely friendly one .
In footage from about 15 minutes before the shootings pieced together by the New York Times ’ s Visual Investigations team , you can see Rittenhouse walk up to an armored police vehicle and chat with officers .
A police officer pops out of one vehicle ’ s hatch and tosses bottles to Rittenhouse ’ s associates , members of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ you guys , we really do , ” the officer says before driving off .
The young-looking Rittenhouse is under the legal age for firearm ownership and was carrying an assault rifle , which appears to be a misdemeanor under Wisconsin law .
Instead of stopping him and asking for proof of age , the police give him water and an attaboy .
And when he tried to surrender after the shootings , the police went right by him , even as bystanders were telling them that Rittenhouse had shot people .
How @ @ @ @ @ @ @ do the police in Kenosha seem perfectly fine with armed militia members patrolling the streets — behavior that , just minutes later , ended with two people dead ?
Shouldn ’ t police want to be the only ones with guns ?
A recent paper by University of Arizona sociologist Jennifer Carlson offers some insight into the police ’ s behavior .
She conducted dozens of hours of interviews about guns with 79 police chiefs in three states — Michigan , California , and Arizona — to try to better understand the way @ @ @ @ @ @ @ that police leaders tended to see armed civilians as allies , maybe even informal deputies — provided they fit a set of racially coded descriptors .
“ Police chiefs articulated a position of gun populism based on a presumption of racial respectability , ” Carlson writes .
“ ‘ Good guys with guns ’ were marked off as responsible in ways that reflected white , middle-class respectability.
” This helps us understand what happened in Wisconsin as not a bug in the code of American policing , but a feature .
There ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ been met with crackdowns , while armed anti-lockdown protesters could menace the Michigan Capitol without incident .
Police — who are heavily white , heavily male , and overwhelmingly conservative politically — see guns as a scourge when they ’ re in the wrong hands .
But the “ wrong hands ” tend to be Black and brown ones .
When respectable-seeming white people arm themselves , police welcome their intervention — even , or perhaps especially , in a tense situation where the potential for escalation to violence is really high .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ there ’ s a long history of deeply racialized gun politics in America .
In 1967 , a group of Black Panthers carried guns in a demonstration outside the California statehouse ; shortly thereafter , then-Gov .
Ronald Reagan signed a bill banning open carry of loaded firearms .
Carlson ’ s study illustrates how this racial gun politics operates at the level of the streets as well as the statehouse .
Officers have significant discretion in how they choose to react to different situations ; this discretion is often used in racist @ @ @ @ @ @ @ police seemingly encouraged Rittenhouse ’ s vigilantism is a microcosm of some of the most fundamental problems in American policing .
In her research , Carlson distinguishes between two kinds of attitudes police have toward civilian ownership of firearms .
The first , “ gun militarism , ” sees armed individuals as a threat to blue lives .
“ It favors a state monopoly on legitimate violence , whereby police both protected and expanded their own access to firearms while policed and delimited gun access among the racialized , urban populations targeted by @ @ @ @ @ @ @ writes .
At other times , the police chiefs she interviewed embraced “ gun populism ” : the idea that “ rather than a threat to stability ( as under gun militarism ) , armed civilians may be imagined as generative of social order.
” Gun populism is an “ embrace of ‘ the people ’ and a deep suspicion of elites , especially elite lawmakers who aim to regulate gun access in the United States.
” In essence , it ’ s the National Rifle Association view of gun rights .
These @ @ @ @ @ @ @ can you believe both that widespread gun ownership poses a threat to your officers and oppose regulations that aim to limit it ?
Typically , officers got around this dilemma by reference to legal and illegal uses of firearms .
The chiefs supported throwing the book at armed criminals , believing that anyone who uses a gun in commission of a crime should face serious jail time .
But gun ownership itself should be permitted and maybe even encouraged .
But here ’ s the thing : When they talked about gun-wielding criminals @ @ @ @ @ @ @ was unmistakable .
The criminals they were worried about were described as “ urban terrorists , ” “ gangbangers , ” and “ illegal immigrants ” ; their descriptions of respectable gun owners had a very different racial valence .
“ I am not worried about the people who just want an assault weapon for the hell of it , or a military guy who had an M16 and wants one because it reminds him of his old gun , ” one California police chief said .
“ I ’ m worried about @ @ @ @ @ @ @ then it gets into the hands of people who have hatred for America ” This bifurcation , between minority-coded bad guys and presumptively white good guys , led chiefs to take a generally positive view of civilian gun owners who didn ’ t fit their criminal stereotypes .
In Michigan , which borders Wisconsin and has similar gun laws , police chiefs embraced a vision of gun populism that saw civilian gun owners as their allies .
“ Michigan chiefs insisted that even the best-resourced police can not protect all victims at all @ @ @ @ @ @ @ prerogatives onto private civilians as part of their overall crime-fighting mission , ” Carlson writes .
“ They understood the capacity among civilians for private legitimate violence as supplementing public legitimate violence.
” A comment from one Michigan police chief , who works in a majority-white neighborhood , crystallized the sentiment .
“ I believe that citizens need to be able to protect themselves .
We can not protect them — we just can ’ t .
It ’ s impossible , ” the chief said .
“ The government can not save @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ridiculous .
So people should be allowed to defend themselves.
” As with all forms of right-wing populism , however , the real action is in the definition of “ the people.
” Certain kinds of people tend to be seen as legitimate rights-bearers , as people who presumptively deserve the benefit of the doubt when carrying weapons .
Others don ’ t .
And that ’ s where things get dicey .
How “ gun populism ” helps us understand the police reaction in Wisconsin In November 2014 , Cleveland police officers @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Black , from point-blank range .
The police , who had described Rice as “ maybe 20 ” on the radio , claimed they feared for their life because he was holding a “ black revolver.
” It was actually a toy gun .
The contrast between the treatment of Rice and Rittenhouse couldn ’ t be clearer .
Rice scanned to police as a threat , despite being a child with a toy gun .
Rittenhouse , a teenager with an actual rifle , did not .
Now , Cleveland and Kenosha @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ; there are lots of reasons the ending to these two stories wasn ’ t the same .
But there ’ s ample reason to believe that the mental shortcuts and stereotypes officers have for what kinds of people with guns are threats really do affect the way they treat people — for whether they default to “ gun militarism ” or “ gun populism ” in how they treat an armed civilian .
The reasons are rooted in basic human psychology .
Police officers work a difficult job for long hours , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ mental health intervention to spousal dispute resolution .
While on shift , they are constantly anxious , searching for the next threat or potential arrest .
Stress gets to them even off the job ; PTSD and marital strife are common problems .
It ’ s a kind of negative feedback loop : The job makes them anxious and nervous , which damages their mental health and personal relationships , which raises their overall level of stress and makes the job even more taxing .
According to Phillip Atiba Goff , a psychologist @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of the Center for Policing Equity think tank , it ’ s hard to overstate how much more likely people are to be racist under these circumstances .
When you put people under stress , he said , they tend to make snap judgments rooted in their basic instincts .
For police officers , raised in a racist society and socialized in a violent work atmosphere , that makes racist behavior all but inevitable .
“ The mission and practice of policing is not aligned with what we know about how to keep @ @ @ @ @ @ @ implicit biases and mental shortcuts , ” he says .
“ You could design a job where that ’ s not how it works .
We have not chosen to do that for policing.
” American police have a distinctive culture and ideology : a set of attitudes and biases that shapes the way they treat civilians .
“ Gun populism ” is one part of that ideology .
And in Kenosha , it seems to have influenced their decision-making — apparently leading them to encourage an underage gun owner to go into @ @ @ @ @ @ @ tragic results .
In the spring , we launched a program asking readers for financial contributions to help keep Vox free for everyone , and last week , we set a goal of reaching 20,000 contributors .
Well , you helped us blow past that .
Today , we are extending that goal to 25,000 .
Millions turn to Vox each month to understand an increasingly chaotic world — from what is happening with the USPS to the coronavirus crisis to what is , quite possibly , the most consequential presidential election of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ and the news advertising market recovers , your support will be a critical part of sustaining our resource-intensive work — and helping everyone make sense of an increasingly chaotic world .
Contribute today from as little as $ 3 .

Kyle Rittenhouse, the 17-year-old charged with murder in the shooting deaths of two people during the violent protests in Kenosha, Wisconsin, had a run-in with the police earlier in the night — an extremely friendly one.
In footage from about 15 minutes before the shootings pieced together by the New York Times’s Visual Investigations team, you can see Rittenhouse walk up to an armored police vehicle and chat with officers. A police officer pops out of one vehicle’s hatch and tosses bottles to Rittenhouse’s associates, members of an armed militia. “We appreciate you guys, we really do,” the officer says before driving off.
The young-looking Rittenhouse is under the legal age for firearm ownership and was carrying an assault rifle, which appears to be a misdemeanor under Wisconsin law. Instead of stopping him and asking for proof of age, the police give him water and an attaboy. And when he tried to surrender after the shootings, the police went right by him, even as bystanders were telling them that Rittenhouse had shot people.
How can we understand this behavior? Why do the police in Kenosha seem perfectly fine with armed militia members patrolling the streets — behavior that, just minutes later, ended with two people dead? Shouldn’t police want to be the only ones with guns?
A recent paper by University of Arizona sociologist Jennifer Carlson offers some insight into the police’s behavior. She conducted dozens of hours of interviews about guns with 79 police chiefs in three states — Michigan, California, and Arizona — to try to better understand the way police see armed civilians.
Carlson found that police leaders tended to see armed civilians as allies, maybe even informal deputies — provided they fit a set of racially coded descriptors.
“Police chiefs articulated a position of gun populism based on a presumption of racial respectability,” Carlson writes. “‘Good guys with guns’ were marked off as responsible in ways that reflected white, middle-class respectability.”
This helps us understand what happened in Wisconsin as not a bug in the code of American policing, but a feature. There’s a reason anti-police violence protesters have been met with crackdowns, while armed anti-lockdown protesters could menace the Michigan Capitol without incident.
Police — who are heavily white, heavily male, and overwhelmingly conservative politically — see guns as a scourge when they’re in the wrong hands. But the “wrong hands” tend to be Black and brown ones. When respectable-seeming white people arm themselves, police welcome their intervention — even, or perhaps especially, in a tense situation where the potential for escalation to violence is really high.
This is not a new phenomenon; there’s a long history of deeply racialized gun politics in America. In 1967, a group of Black Panthers carried guns in a demonstration outside the California statehouse; shortly thereafter, then-Gov. Ronald Reagan signed a bill banning open carry of loaded firearms.
Carlson’s study illustrates how this racial gun politics operates at the level of the streets as well as the statehouse. Officers have significant discretion in how they choose to react to different situations; this discretion is often used in racist and violent fashion. The way the police seemingly encouraged Rittenhouse’s vigilantism is a microcosm of some of the most fundamental problems in American policing.
The “gun populism” of American police
In her research, Carlson distinguishes between two kinds of attitudes police have toward civilian ownership of firearms.
The first, “gun militarism,” sees armed individuals as a threat to blue lives. “It favors a state monopoly on legitimate violence, whereby police both protected and expanded their own access to firearms while policed and delimited gun access among the racialized, urban populations targeted by the War on Crime,” she writes.
At other times, the police chiefs she interviewed embraced “gun populism”: the idea that “rather than a threat to stability (as under gun militarism), armed civilians may be imagined as generative of social order.” Gun populism is an “embrace of ‘the people’ and a deep suspicion of elites, especially elite lawmakers who aim to regulate gun access in the United States.” In essence, it’s the National Rifle Association view of gun rights.
These two frames might seem contradictory. How can you believe both that widespread gun ownership poses a threat to your officers and oppose regulations that aim to limit it?
Typically, officers got around this dilemma by reference to legal and illegal uses of firearms. The chiefs supported throwing the book at armed criminals, believing that anyone who uses a gun in commission of a crime should face serious jail time. But gun ownership itself should be permitted and maybe even encouraged.
But here’s the thing: When they talked about gun-wielding criminals, the racialized nature of the language was unmistakable. The criminals they were worried about were described as “urban terrorists,” “gangbangers,” and “illegal immigrants”; their descriptions of respectable gun owners had a very different racial valence.
“I am not worried about the people who just want an assault weapon for the hell of it, or a military guy who had an M16 and wants one because it reminds him of his old gun,” one California police chief said. “I’m worried about the gangster who brings in guns and then it gets into the hands of people who have hatred for America”
This bifurcation, between minority-coded bad guys and presumptively white good guys, led chiefs to take a generally positive view of civilian gun owners who didn’t fit their criminal stereotypes. In Michigan, which borders Wisconsin and has similar gun laws, police chiefs embraced a vision of gun populism that saw civilian gun owners as their allies.
“Michigan chiefs insisted that even the best-resourced police cannot protect all victims at all times and thus opted to devolve some prerogatives onto private civilians as part of their overall crime-fighting mission,” Carlson writes. “They understood the capacity among civilians for private legitimate violence as supplementing public legitimate violence.”
A comment from one Michigan police chief, who works in a majority-white neighborhood, crystallized the sentiment.
“I believe that citizens need to be able to protect themselves. We cannot protect them — we just can’t. It’s impossible,” the chief said. “The government cannot save people from danger. That is just ridiculous. So people should be allowed to defend themselves.”
As with all forms of right-wing populism, however, the real action is in the definition of “the people.” Certain kinds of people tend to be seen as legitimate rights-bearers, as people who presumptively deserve the benefit of the doubt when carrying weapons.
Others don’t. And that’s where things get dicey.
How “gun populism” helps us understand the police reaction in Wisconsin
In November 2014, Cleveland police officers shot 12-year-old Tamir Rice, who was Black, from point-blank range. The police, who had described Rice as “maybe 20” on the radio, claimed they feared for their life because he was holding a “black revolver.” It was actually a toy gun.
The contrast between the treatment of Rice and Rittenhouse couldn’t be clearer. Rice scanned to police as a threat, despite being a child with a toy gun. Rittenhouse, a teenager with an actual rifle, did not.
Now, Cleveland and Kenosha are different places with different police officers; there are lots of reasons the ending to these two stories wasn’t the same. But there’s ample reason to believe that the mental shortcuts and stereotypes officers have for what kinds of people with guns are threats really do affect the way they treat people — for whether they default to “gun militarism” or “gun populism” in how they treat an armed civilian.
The reasons are rooted in basic human psychology. Police officers work a difficult job for long hours, called upon to handle responsibilities ranging from mental health intervention to spousal dispute resolution. While on shift, they are constantly anxious, searching for the next threat or potential arrest.
Stress gets to them even off the job; PTSD and marital strife are common problems. It’s a kind of negative feedback loop: The job makes them anxious and nervous, which damages their mental health and personal relationships, which raises their overall level of stress and makes the job even more taxing.
According to Phillip Atiba Goff, a psychologist at Yale University and the CEO/co-founder of the Center for Policing Equity research organization, it’s hard to overstate how much more likely people are to be racist under these circumstances. When you put people under stress, he said, they tend to make snap judgments rooted in their basic instincts. For police officers, raised in a racist society and socialized in a violent work atmosphere, that makes racist behavior all but inevitable.
“The mission and practice of policing is not aligned with what we know about how to keep people from acting on the kinds of implicit biases and mental shortcuts,” he says. “You could design a job where that’s not how it works. We have not chosen to do that for policing.”
American police have a distinctive culture and ideology: a set of attitudes and biases that shapes the way they treat civilians. “Gun populism” is one part of that ideology. And in Kenosha, it seems to have influenced their decision-making — apparently leading them to encourage an underage gun owner to go into a dangerous situation, with predictable and tragic results.
New goal: 25,000
In the spring, we launched a program asking readers for financial contributions to help keep Vox free for everyone, and last week, we set a goal of reaching 20,000 contributors. Well, you helped us blow past that. Today, we are extending that goal to 25,000. Millions turn to Vox each month to understand an increasingly chaotic world — from what is happening with the USPS to the coronavirus crisis to what is, quite possibly, the most consequential presidential election of our lifetimes. Even when the economy and the news advertising market recovers, your support will be a critical part of sustaining our resource-intensive work — and helping everyone make sense of an increasingly chaotic world. Contribute today from as little as $3.


vox--2020-08-27--Tropical Storm Laura’s flooding and other impacts on the ground: What we know

Tropical Storm Laura , which has been downgraded from a hurricane , made landfall early Thursday morning in Cameron , Louisiana — just 35 miles east of the Texas-Louisiana border — as a Category 4 storm with 150 mph winds .
Already , pictures and videos of the storm from Lake Charles , Louisiana , a town about 50 miles north of Cameron , show torn-off roofs , downed power lines , blown-out windows , and dozens of trees ripped from the ground .
Louisiana Gov .
John Bel Edwards said he ’ d received a report Thursday morning of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a 14-year-old girl from Vernon Parish who died when a tree fell on her home .
Edwards later said a total of four people in his state have died — all as a result of fallen trees .
Laura was also responsible for at least 23 deaths in Haiti and the Dominican Republic earlier this week .
There has been no official word of other injuries or deaths in the US since the storm made landfall .
What we know is that about 20 million people reside in the path of the storm @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , a task complicated by the Covid-19 pandemic .
And so far , more than 740,000 homes and businesses are without power in Texas and Louisiana .
Louisiana and Texas residents were warned the storm surge could be “ unsurvivable ” As a Category 4 hurricane , Laura reportedly became the strongest storm on record to make landfall along the western Louisiana and northern Texas coast .
Although the storm has weakened since moving inland , prompting its downgrade from hurricane status , it is still sustaining winds of 52 mph .
Hurricane-force @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the coast to be flooded by rising waters .
The National Hurricane Center ( NHC ) predicted that this phenomenon , referred to as “ storm surge , ” could result in up to 20 feet of flooding in places within 40 miles of shoreline where Laura made landfall , rendering some areas “ unsurvivable ” and resulting in “ catastrophic damage.
” However , it appears as if a slight change in wind direction may have spared the worst-hit areas from the feared 20-foot surge .
The NHC said Thursday the worst @ @ @ @ @ @ @ directly east of Cameron , which are experiencing surge of around 9 feet .
Some meteorologists , however , warn against jumping to premature conclusions about the extent of storm surge from Hurricane Laura , considering the limited number of data points currently available .
Heavy rain is also predicted to be widespread across the west-central Gulf Coast , with 5 to 10 inches falling over a broad area , and up to 18 inches locally .
And this rain is expected to result in flash flooding throughout the region .
After making @ @ @ @ @ @ @ across Louisiana throughout the day , and its center is expected to move into Arkansas overnight .
The storm will then move through the Tennessee Valley and the mid-Atlantic from Friday into Saturday .
As of now , the NHC predicts the storm will continue to give off heavy rain and sustain winds between 30 and 40 mph .
One of the most powerful storms in US history Meteorologists categorize hurricanes based on the intensity of storms ’ maximum sustained winds : • Category 1 : 74-95 mph ( a storm with winds @ @ @ @ @ @ @ “ tropical storm , ” and below 38 mph is a “ tropical depression ” ) Laura ’ s 150 mph winds at landfall made it a Category 4 hurricane and one of the most powerful in US history — as powerful as Hurricane Charley in 2004 and slightly less powerful than Hurricane Michael in 2018 , but far more powerful than Hurricane Katrina ( which clocked in at 125 mph at landfall ) in 2005 .
These categorizations are important in terms of assessing potential damage to life and property .
From @ @ @ @ @ @ @ clocked in at category 3 , 4 , and 5 at landfall have been responsible for 85 percent of total hurricane damage , despite making up around a quarter of total hurricanes .
That ’ s because relatively small changes in wind speeds can lead to exponentially more damage .
For instance , hurricanes like Laura that make landfall at around 150 mph cause , on average , 256 times more damage than hurricanes less than half their speed , at 75 mph , would .
But wind speed alone doesn ’ t @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
As my colleagues Brian Resnick and Eliza Barclay explain , storm surge , the coastal flooding that occurs when a storm ’ s winds push water onshore several feet above the normal tide , is particularly dangerous .
Severe storm surge — like that expected with Laura — can trap people in their homes , wash away houses , and make rescue missions harrowing and slow .
So far , we don ’ t know what the damage from Tropical Storm Laura will be , but we do have reference points .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ area as Laura in 2005 , produced up to 15 feet of storm surge , had Category 3 winds of 115 mph , and resulted in 97 to 125 deaths and $ 18.5 billion in damage .
By comparison , Laura made landfall with Category 4 winds of 150 mph and is predicted to produce up to 20 feet of storm surge .
Laura is the 12th of as many as 25 named storms that the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration ( NOAA ) has predicted would form this hurricane season ( which @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ) ; seven to 11 of those storms , including Laura , were expected to become hurricanes .
If NOAA ’ s predictions are correct , this will be a record-breaking season for hurricanes .
“ This is one of the most active seasonal forecasts that NOAA has produced in its 22-year history of hurricane outlooks .
NOAA will continue to provide the best possible science and service to communities across the Nation for the remainder of hurricane season to ensure public readiness and safety , ” said Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ encourage all Americans to do their part by getting prepared , remaining vigilant , and being ready to take action when necessary.
” There are a few explanations for this record-breaking season , but chief among them are the above-average sea surface temperatures in the tropical Atlantic Ocean and Caribbean Sea , particularly in the region between West Africa and the Leeward Islands , which tends to be a prime development region for hurricanes .
These warmer-than-average waters are , in part , the result of climate change .
A new study published @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the National Academy of Sciences by a group of NOAA and University of Wisconsin Madison researchers found that from 1979 to 2017 , the odds that a given tropical cyclone would become a Category 3 , 4 or 5 hurricane increased about 8 percent per decade as the planet has warmed .
This finding builds on lots of previous research — like multiple academic studies demonstrating that Hurricane Harvey ’ s record-blasting rains were likely amplified by climate change .
“ We ’ ve just increased our confidence of our understanding of the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , ” James Kossin , the lead author of the new study , told the Washington Post .
“ We have high confidence that there is a human fingerprint on these changes.
” In other words , Laura might be the most recent of the major hurricanes to reach US shores , but it certainly won ’ t be the last .
• The National Hurricane Center provides updates every few hours , with projections and important warnings .
Take a look here .
• The National Hurricane Center ’ s Twitter account @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the latest on forecast changes and public safety concerns .
• Meteorologist and journalist Eric Holthaus has compiled a Twitter list of weather experts that ’ s a valuable repository of forecasts , data , and useful information on hurricanes in general .
Correction , August 26 : An earlier version of this story misstated the relative strength of Hurricanes Michael and Charley .
In the spring , we launched a program asking readers for financial contributions to help keep Vox free for everyone , and last week , we set a goal @ @ @ @ @ @ @ you helped us blow past that .
Today , we are extending that goal to 25,000 .
Millions turn to Vox each month to understand an increasingly chaotic world — from what is happening with the USPS to the coronavirus crisis to what is , quite possibly , the most consequential presidential election of our lifetimes .
Even when the economy and the news advertising market recovers , your support will be a critical part of sustaining our resource-intensive work — and helping everyone make sense of an increasingly chaotic world .
Contribute @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .

Tropical Storm Laura, which has been downgraded from a hurricane, made landfall early Thursday morning in Cameron, Louisiana — just 35 miles east of the Texas-Louisiana border — as a Category 4 storm with 150 mph winds.
Already, pictures and videos of the storm from Lake Charles, Louisiana, a town about 50 miles north of Cameron, show torn-off roofs, downed power lines, blown-out windows, and dozens of trees ripped from the ground.
Widespread flash flooding along small streams, urban areas, and roadways will continue across portions of Louisiana, Mississippi, and Arkansas. #Laura pic.twitter.com/Z66sPA9A44 — National Hurricane Center (@NHC_Atlantic) August 27, 2020
Louisiana Gov. John Bel Edwards said he’d received a report Thursday morning of the first American fatality from Laura, a 14-year-old girl from Vernon Parish who died when a tree fell on her home. Edwards later said a total of four people in his state have died — all as a result of fallen trees. Laura was also responsible for at least 23 deaths in Haiti and the Dominican Republic earlier this week.
There has been no official word of other injuries or deaths in the US since the storm made landfall. What we know is that about 20 million people reside in the path of the storm and 500,000 have been ordered to evacuate, a task complicated by the Covid-19 pandemic.
And so far, more than 740,000 homes and businesses are without power in Texas and Louisiana.
Louisiana and Texas residents were warned the storm surge could be “unsurvivable”
As a Category 4 hurricane, Laura reportedly became the strongest storm on record to make landfall along the western Louisiana and northern Texas coast. Although the storm has weakened since moving inland, prompting its downgrade from hurricane status, it is still sustaining winds of 52 mph.
Hurricane-force winds can cause normally dry areas near the coast to be flooded by rising waters. The National Hurricane Center (NHC) predicted that this phenomenon, referred to as “storm surge,” could result in up to 20 feet of flooding in places within 40 miles of shoreline where Laura made landfall, rendering some areas “unsurvivable” and resulting in “catastrophic damage.” However, it appears as if a slight change in wind direction may have spared the worst-hit areas from the feared 20-foot surge.
The NHC said Thursday the worst of the initial storm surge hit communities directly east of Cameron, which are experiencing surge of around 9 feet.
‼#Laura Surge Thraad‼ Highest #StormSurge recorded seemed to be around 9 ft. Yes, that’s devastating, but it appears the “reasonable worst case scenario surge” was x2 higher than what occurred in most communities. 1/ pic.twitter.com/0BdvWTXd93 — Chris Gloninger NBC10 Boston (@ChrisGNBCBoston) August 27, 2020
Some meteorologists, however, warn against jumping to premature conclusions about the extent of storm surge from Hurricane Laura, considering the limited number of data points currently available.
Heavy rain is also predicted to be widespread across the west-central Gulf Coast, with 5 to 10 inches falling over a broad area, and up to 18 inches locally. And this rain is expected to result in flash flooding throughout the region.
After making landfall Thursday morning, Laura tracked north across Louisiana throughout the day, and its center is expected to move into Arkansas overnight. The storm will then move through the Tennessee Valley and the mid-Atlantic from Friday into Saturday. As of now, the NHC predicts the storm will continue to give off heavy rain and sustain winds between 30 and 40 mph.
One of the most powerful storms in US history
Meteorologists categorize hurricanes based on the intensity of storms’ maximum sustained winds:
Category 1: 74-95 mph (a storm with winds below 74 mph is classified as a “tropical storm,” and below 38 mph is a “tropical depression”)
Category 2: 96-110 mph
Category 3: 111-129 mph
Category 4: 130-156 mph
Category 5: 157 mph or higher
Laura’s 150 mph winds at landfall made it a Category 4 hurricane and one of the most powerful in US history — as powerful as Hurricane Charley in 2004 and slightly less powerful than Hurricane Michael in 2018, but far more powerful than Hurricane Katrina (which clocked in at 125 mph at landfall) in 2005.
#Laura is now forecast to continue to intensify and have 145 mph max winds later today. Here's a table of all landfalling continental US #hurricanes (on record) with max winds >=145 mph. Strongest winds were in Labor Day Hurricane (1935): 185 mph. pic.twitter.com/4BE0r7ARb5 — Philip Klotzbach (@philklotzbach) August 26, 2020
These categorizations are important in terms of assessing potential damage to life and property. From 1900 to 2005, US hurricanes that clocked in at category 3, 4, and 5 at landfall have been responsible for 85 percent of total hurricane damage, despite making up around a quarter of total hurricanes. That’s because relatively small changes in wind speeds can lead to exponentially more damage. For instance, hurricanes like Laura that make landfall at around 150 mph cause, on average, 256 times more damage than hurricanes less than half their speed, at 75 mph, would.
But wind speed alone doesn’t determine how deadly a hurricane will be. As my colleagues Brian Resnick and Eliza Barclay explain, storm surge, the coastal flooding that occurs when a storm’s winds push water onshore several feet above the normal tide, is particularly dangerous. Severe storm surge — like that expected with Laura — can trap people in their homes, wash away houses, and make rescue missions harrowing and slow.
So far, we don’t know what the damage from Tropical Storm Laura will be, but we do have reference points. Hurricane Rita, which hit the same area as Laura in 2005, produced up to 15 feet of storm surge, had Category 3 winds of 115 mph, and resulted in 97 to 125 deaths and $18.5 billion in damage. By comparison, Laura made landfall with Category 4 winds of 150 mph and is predicted to produce up to 20 feet of storm surge.
A record season for hurricanes
Laura is the 12th of as many as 25 named storms that the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) has predicted would form this hurricane season (which lasts from June 1 to November 30); seven to 11 of those storms, including Laura, were expected to become hurricanes. If NOAA’s predictions are correct, this will be a record-breaking season for hurricanes.
“This is one of the most active seasonal forecasts that NOAA has produced in its 22-year history of hurricane outlooks. NOAA will continue to provide the best possible science and service to communities across the Nation for the remainder of hurricane season to ensure public readiness and safety,” said Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross, who oversees the agency. “We encourage all Americans to do their part by getting prepared, remaining vigilant, and being ready to take action when necessary.”
There are a few explanations for this record-breaking season, but chief among them are the above-average sea surface temperatures in the tropical Atlantic Ocean and Caribbean Sea, particularly in the region between West Africa and the Leeward Islands, which tends to be a prime development region for hurricanes.
These warmer-than-average waters are, in part, the result of climate change. A new study published earlier this year in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences by a group of NOAA and University of Wisconsin Madison researchers found that from 1979 to 2017, the odds that a given tropical cyclone would become a Category 3, 4 or 5 hurricane increased about 8 percent per decade as the planet has warmed.
This finding builds on lots of previous research — like multiple academic studies demonstrating that Hurricane Harvey’s record-blasting rains were likely amplified by climate change.
“We’ve just increased our confidence of our understanding of the link between hurricane intensity and climate change,” James Kossin, the lead author of the new study, told the Washington Post. “We have high confidence that there is a human fingerprint on these changes.”
In other words, Laura might be the most recent of the major hurricanes to reach US shores, but it certainly won’t be the last.
How to follow Tropical Storm Laura:
The National Hurricane Center provides updates every few hours, with projections and important warnings. Take a look here.
The National Hurricane Center’s Twitter account has similar updates, as well as the latest on forecast changes and public safety concerns.
Meteorologist and journalist Eric Holthaus has compiled a Twitter list of weather experts that’s a valuable repository of forecasts, data, and useful information on hurricanes in general.
Correction, August 26: An earlier version of this story misstated the relative strength of Hurricanes Michael and Charley.
New goal: 25,000
In the spring, we launched a program asking readers for financial contributions to help keep Vox free for everyone, and last week, we set a goal of reaching 20,000 contributors. Well, you helped us blow past that. Today, we are extending that goal to 25,000. Millions turn to Vox each month to understand an increasingly chaotic world — from what is happening with the USPS to the coronavirus crisis to what is, quite possibly, the most consequential presidential election of our lifetimes. Even when the economy and the news advertising market recovers, your support will be a critical part of sustaining our resource-intensive work — and helping everyone make sense of an increasingly chaotic world. Contribute today from as little as $3.


vox--2020-08-27--Trump’s argument about “Joe Biden’s America” is undercut by the fact that he’s in charge

Vice President Mike Pence repeated an increasingly common Republican talking point in his speech at the Republican National Convention on Thursday : “ The hard truth is ... you won ’ t be safe in Joe Biden ’ s America , ” he argued , after referencing progressive Democrats ’ critiques of law enforcement — stances Biden himself has refused to take .
A preview of Biden ’ s America , Pence suggested , can be seen in cities where protests calling for an end to police brutality and racism have grown .
“ Rioting and looting is not peaceful @ @ @ @ @ @ @ falsely saying , “ Joe Biden would double down on the very policies that are leading to violence in American cities.
” That the US is in the midst of out-of-control violence is a misleading theme the Trump campaign has revisited throughout the convention in an attempt to paint a dark picture of what the United States could look like if Biden is elected in November .
But it ’ s also one that obscures Trump ’ s culpability .
He , not Biden , is president .
And as a leader , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ on Wednesday — including the shooting of a law enforcement official by the follower of a right-wing extremist movement and ongoing police violence .
While Republicans want people to think a Biden administration will threaten public safety , they fail to acknowledge how Trump is already doing so .
It is police violence — not protester violence — that is threatening people ’ s safety now A police officer earlier this week shot 29-year-old Jacob Blake , who is Black , at least seven times after Blake attempted to break up a dispute @ @ @ @ @ @ @ protests against racism and police brutality that built on the demonstrations already taking place in the wake of George Floyd ’ s killing in May .
Police have shot and killed 1,019 people this year , according to a Washington Post database .
Based on data reporters have been collecting since 2015 , the paper also found that police have killed Black Americans at over twice the rate of white Americans .
As of earlier this year , the number of police killings was comparable to that of previous years , including those @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ’ s administration .
This summer ’ s demonstrations , which have helped drive a seismic shift in public opinion about the presence of racism in policing , have also been the scene of police violence against protesters .
In cities across the country , police have escalated attacks on protesters and used tools including pepper spray , tear gas , and rubber bullets to do so .
All of these incidents have happened while Trump has been president — and in some cases , his orders have contributed to them .
Trump @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , DC , earlier this year , some of whom tear-gassed peaceful protesters in Lafayette Square , clearing the area prior to the president ’ s photo opportunity at a nearby church .
In Portland , Oregon , the president also sent in federal forces who have tear-gassed protesters .
As Vox ’ s Cameron Peters has written , Trump has signed an executive order that would provide some narrow police reforms including the establishment of a national database on police misconduct .
But even as he ’ s backed this measure , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to encourage violence from law enforcement .
When Portland Mayor Ted Wheeler was tear-gassed by police , Trump seemed proud of the outcome .
“ They knocked the hell out of him , ” Trump said during a Fox News appearance .
“ That was the end of him.
” This summer , he posted a tweet that appeared to support violence in which he said , “ When the looting starts , the shooting starts , ” a phrase used by segregationists against civil rights protesters .
( He later said he @ @ @ @ @ @ @ . )
And he has endorsed harsh policing tactics throughout his tenure , from praising the way Secret Service agents “ would quickly come down on [ protesters ] , hard — didn ’ t know what hit them ” during May ’ s demonstrations to telling law enforcement officials in 2017 to “ please , don ’ t be too nice , ” when making arrests .
The president has also repeatedly empowered anti-government actors , from remarks that resonate with white supremacists to his calls for people to “ LIBERATE ” @ @ @ @ @ @ @ s Ian Millhiser has explained , the shooter who killed DHS officer Dave Patrick Underwood — the officer Pence mentioned in his speech — was a follower of the anti-government , right-wing “ boogaloo ” movement that ’ s sought to capitalize on protests to perpetrate violence .
Overall , Pence said Wednesday , “ In the midst of this global pandemic , just as our nation has begun to recover , we ’ ve seen violence and chaos in the streets of our major cities.
” His statement conveniently leaves out the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ s happening — and has even , at times , advocated for it .
In the spring , we launched a program asking readers for financial contributions to help keep Vox free for everyone , and last week , we set a goal of reaching 20,000 contributors .
Well , you helped us blow past that .
Today , we are extending that goal to 25,000 .
Millions turn to Vox each month to understand an increasingly chaotic world — from what is happening with the USPS to the coronavirus crisis to what @ @ @ @ @ @ @ consequential presidential election of our lifetimes .
Even when the economy and the news advertising market recovers , your support will be a critical part of sustaining our resource-intensive work — and helping everyone make sense of an increasingly chaotic world .
Contribute today from as little as $ 3 .

Vice President Mike Pence repeated an increasingly common Republican talking point in his speech at the Republican National Convention on Thursday: “The hard truth is ... you won’t be safe in Joe Biden’s America,” he argued, after referencing progressive Democrats’ critiques of law enforcement — stances Biden himself has refused to take.
A preview of Biden’s America, Pence suggested, can be seen in cities where protests calling for an end to police brutality and racism have grown.
“Rioting and looting is not peaceful protest,” Pence said, before falsely saying, “Joe Biden would double down on the very policies that are leading to violence in American cities.”
That the US is in the midst of out-of-control violence is a misleading theme the Trump campaign has revisited throughout the convention in an attempt to paint a dark picture of what the United States could look like if Biden is elected in November.
But it’s also one that obscures Trump’s culpability. He, not Biden, is president. And as a leader, he’s overseen incidents Pence lamented on Wednesday — including the shooting of a law enforcement official by the follower of a right-wing extremist movement and ongoing police violence.
While Republicans want people to think a Biden administration will threaten public safety, they fail to acknowledge how Trump is already doing so.
It is police violence — not protester violence — that is threatening people’s safety now
A police officer earlier this week shot 29-year-old Jacob Blake, who is Black, at least seven times after Blake attempted to break up a dispute in Kenosha, Wisconsin, sparking new protests against racism and police brutality that built on the demonstrations already taking place in the wake of George Floyd’s killing in May.
Police have shot and killed 1,019 people this year, according to a Washington Post database. Based on data reporters have been collecting since 2015, the paper also found that police have killed Black Americans at over twice the rate of white Americans. As of earlier this year, the number of police killings was comparable to that of previous years, including those that were tracked during President Barack Obama’s administration.
This summer’s demonstrations, which have helped drive a seismic shift in public opinion about the presence of racism in policing, have also been the scene of police violence against protesters. In cities across the country, police have escalated attacks on protesters and used tools including pepper spray, tear gas, and rubber bullets to do so.
All of these incidents have happened while Trump has been president — and in some cases, his orders have contributed to them.
Trump called in National Guard troops to Washington, DC, earlier this year, some of whom tear-gassed peaceful protesters in Lafayette Square, clearing the area prior to the president’s photo opportunity at a nearby church. In Portland, Oregon, the president also sent in federal forces who have tear-gassed protesters.
As Vox’s Cameron Peters has written, Trump has signed an executive order that would provide some narrow police reforms including the establishment of a national database on police misconduct. But even as he’s backed this measure, his other rhetoric and policies have appeared to encourage violence from law enforcement.
When Portland Mayor Ted Wheeler was tear-gassed by police, Trump seemed proud of the outcome. “They knocked the hell out of him,” Trump said during a Fox News appearance. “That was the end of him.” This summer, he posted a tweet that appeared to support violence in which he said, “When the looting starts, the shooting starts,” a phrase used by segregationists against civil rights protesters. (He later said he did not mean it as a threat.)
And he has endorsed harsh policing tactics throughout his tenure, from praising the way Secret Service agents “would quickly come down on [protesters], hard — didn’t know what hit them” during May’s demonstrations to telling law enforcement officials in 2017 to “please, don’t be too nice,” when making arrests.
The president has also repeatedly empowered anti-government actors, from remarks that resonate with white supremacists to his calls for people to “LIBERATE” their Democratic-run states.
As Vox’s Ian Millhiser has explained, the shooter who killed DHS officer Dave Patrick Underwood — the officer Pence mentioned in his speech — was a follower of the anti-government, right-wing “boogaloo” movement that’s sought to capitalize on protests to perpetrate violence.
Overall, Pence said Wednesday, “In the midst of this global pandemic, just as our nation has begun to recover, we’ve seen violence and chaos in the streets of our major cities.”
His statement conveniently leaves out the fact that Trump is overseeing what’s happening — and has even, at times, advocated for it.
New goal: 25,000
In the spring, we launched a program asking readers for financial contributions to help keep Vox free for everyone, and last week, we set a goal of reaching 20,000 contributors. Well, you helped us blow past that. Today, we are extending that goal to 25,000. Millions turn to Vox each month to understand an increasingly chaotic world — from what is happening with the USPS to the coronavirus crisis to what is, quite possibly, the most consequential presidential election of our lifetimes. Even when the economy and the news advertising market recovers, your support will be a critical part of sustaining our resource-intensive work — and helping everyone make sense of an increasingly chaotic world. Contribute today from as little as $3.