theintercept--2020-01-30--The Majority of Voters Now Support Decriminalizing Sex Work. It’s About Time.

spring 2018 , every single Democratic presidential candidate who was then in Congress — from progressive Sen. Bernie Sanders to conservative Sen. Amy Klobuchar — voted for a bill that expanded the criminalization of sex work and imperiled sex workers nationwide .
The Stop Enabling Sex Traffickers Act , later combined with the Allow States and Victims to Fight Online Sex Trafficking Act to form the pernicious FOSTA-SESTA legislative package , sailed through both the Senate and the House with bipartisan support .
The voices of sex worker organizers , who correctly stressed that the law would deny sex workers @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to end trafficking , were roundly ignored .
Fast forward nearly two years and the Democratic consensus around the criminalization of sex work has , thankfully and finally , seen a most dramatic shift .
As a report published today by a coalition of organizations , including Data for Progress , the American Civil Liberties Union , Mijente , and the Human Rights Campaign noted , “ For the first time in presidential primary history , 2020 candidates have competed for a progressive position on the sex trade.
” While the issue has @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a clear policy proposal for the candidates , the positioning away from criminalization is marked .
The report , released on Thursday alongside two new national polls , does not just focus on sex work decriminalization as an electoral issue — it also surveys and commends a significant shift in public support , especially among young people , for seeing sex work decriminalized .
National polling carried out by Data for Progress and YouGov Blue found that two-thirds of voters aged 18 to 44 support the full decriminalization of sex work ; two-thirds @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , compared to 37 percent of Republicans and 55 percent of independents .
“ Fully 52 percent of voters somewhat or strongly support decriminalizing sex work , ” noted the report , authored by Data for Progress fellow Nina Luo , who is also an organizer with Decrim NY , a coalition pushing for decriminalization , the decarceration of sex workers , and the destigmatization of the censured industry .
In a similar poll taken just seven month earlier , 45 percent of overall voters supported decriminalization ; support among Democratic voters has @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Sex work decriminalization should not be considered a fringe issue .
It intersects many of the most urgent political struggles of our time : the fight to end mass incarceration , racial profiling , and transphobic police violence ; the demand for a social safety net ; and robust and protections for all workers .
To fight for the decriminalization of sex work is to fight for and with society ’ s most vulnerable and marginalized communities , in particular women of color and of immigrant backgrounds , especially trans women who often @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in other industries .
Black women account for 94 percent of people arrested for the absurd and capacious charge of “ loitering for the purposes of prostitution ” in the New York City boroughs of Brooklyn and Queens .
Thus , to ignore the struggle for sex workers ’ rights is de facto to allow their lives not to matter .
According to Luo , it is in part the growing recognition of the necessity of these connected struggles that accounts for the increased support for sex work decriminalization .
“ Living wages @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of Americans know someone who has died because they couldn ’ t afford health care , ” Luo told me , noting that “ people are in economically desperate situations and increasingly understand that people do things for survival , that survival work is work , that sex work is work.
” Full decriminalization would recognize that as work , sex work is not the business of the police and courts .
For many , sex work may not be good work , or always free of exploitation , and it may be @ @ @ @ @ @ @ options .
But the very same is true of many jobs in which workers are nonetheless deemed worthy of rights and legal protections as workers .
Luo also attributed the changing views on decriminalization to the sex worker movement ’ s alignment with a multiracial coalition and “ a rising left.
” There ’ s little doubt that the infusion of new , decidedly left-wing blood into parts of the Democratic political landscape has pushed the issue to the fore in state houses nationwide .
New York and D.C. have introduced bills to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ are gaining ground in California , Oregon , Illinois , Vermont , Connecticut , and Colorado , the report noted .
Progressive politicians like Rep. Ro Khanna , D-Calif. , deserve credit for new efforts to repeal FOSTA-SESTA , and left-to-liberal NGOs getting behind the issue are to be commended .
But the long overdue shift in political consensus was hard fought by sex worker organizers on the front lines .
The report includes testimonies from a number of sex workers and former sex workers attesting to the violences enacted through criminalization .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ with immigrant advocacy group Make the Road , who emigrated from Mexico as a teenager to escape LGBTQ persecution , was fired from her restaurant job in the U.S. when she transitioned on hormones .
Having previously been a victim of sex trafficking , Garcia then turned to consensual , independent , survival sex work .
“ I ’ ve been arrested four times for prostitution , ” she notes in the report , “ Only once was I actually doing sex work , the other three arrests were just profiling because I @ @ @ @ @ @ @ testimony , from Victoria Walker , who turned to sex work for survival , recalls that each time an aspect of the industry was further criminalized , the work became more dangerous .
For example , FOSTA-SESTA led to the shuttering of sites where workers could screen clients and connect to other members of the community .
“ If sex work were decriminalized , ” notes Walker , “ the sex worker community could find each other again and feel safe by having each others ’ backs.
” It is only full decriminalization @ @ @ @ @ @ @ workers to obtain the rights they well deserve .
The so-called Nordic model , in which only buyers of sex or third parties face criminalization , forces sex workers into the shadows and continues to entrap sex workers and their loved ones in the system of carceral injustice .
Examples abound of sex workers being arrested for soliciting under such laws .
The new report notes that under the Nordic model , pitched as legislation to protect sex workers , Norway “ evicted more than 400 sex workers , primarily migrant women , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ not offer economic justice and material safety for the vulnerable people who turn to sex work for survival , but it would remove at least some of the grounds used by the police and state to further oppress these communities .
And it is support for full decriminalization that the new polls reflect .
Respondents were asked whether they would support sex work following the example of New Zealand , which in 2003 did away with “ criminal penalties for adults to sell and pay for consensual sex while also maintaining laws that @ @ @ @ @ @ @ seen the sex work industry grow since it was decriminalized , according to the report , but 90 percent of people trading sex said decriminalization gave them employment , legal , and health rights , while 64 percent found it easier to refuse clients .
Luo told me that the shift in support for decriminalization , especially among young people , is a “ momentous ” indication of “ where the future is for the issue , ” but the organizer was clear that barriers to full decriminalization , decarceration , and destigmatization @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in carceral approaches to ending violence and exploitation , transphobia , fearmongering , and myths about trafficking persist with force , as do reactionary and powerful police unions lobbying for criminalization .
She added , though , that “ perhaps the greatest barrier of all ” is that people who are inoculated from deprivation and discrimination “ find it unbelievable that people living at the intersections of marginalization and oppression often trade sex to survive.
” As Luo put it , “ it gets at the very core of who we are as @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to reckon with the realities of survival sex work and the added brutality of its criminalization is to understand that this society needs changing at its core .

Photo: John Locher/AP
As recently as spring 2018, every single Democratic presidential candidate who was then in Congress — from progressive Sen. Bernie Sanders to conservative Sen. Amy Klobuchar — voted for a bill that expanded the criminalization of sex work and imperiled sex workers nationwide. The Stop Enabling Sex Traffickers Act, later combined with the Allow States and Victims to Fight Online Sex Trafficking Act to form the pernicious FOSTA-SESTA legislative package, sailed through both the Senate and the House with bipartisan support. The voices of sex worker organizers, who correctly stressed that the law would deny sex workers crucial online resources and networks while failing to end trafficking, were roundly ignored.
Fast forward nearly two years and the Democratic consensus around the criminalization of sex work has, thankfully and finally, seen a most dramatic shift. As a report published today by a coalition of organizations, including Data for Progress, the American Civil Liberties Union, Mijente, and the Human Rights Campaign noted, “For the first time in presidential primary history, 2020 candidates have competed for a progressive position on the sex trade.” While the issue has arisen as more a talking point than a clear policy proposal for the candidates, the positioning away from criminalization is marked.
The report, released on Thursday alongside two new national polls, does not just focus on sex work decriminalization as an electoral issue — it also surveys and commends a significant shift in public support, especially among young people, for seeing sex work decriminalized.
The Democratic consensus around the criminalization of sex work has, thankfully and finally, seen a most dramatic shift.
National polling carried out by Data for Progress and YouGov Blue found that two-thirds of voters aged 18 to 44 support the full decriminalization of sex work; two-thirds of Democratic voters of all ages agree, compared to 37 percent of Republicans and 55 percent of independents. “Fully 52 percent of voters somewhat or strongly support decriminalizing sex work,” noted the report, authored by Data for Progress fellow Nina Luo, who is also an organizer with Decrim NY, a coalition pushing for decriminalization, the decarceration of sex workers, and the destigmatization of the censured industry. In a similar poll taken just seven month earlier, 45 percent of overall voters supported decriminalization; support among Democratic voters has increased from 56 to 61 percent.
Sex work decriminalization should not be considered a fringe issue. It intersects many of the most urgent political struggles of our time: the fight to end mass incarceration, racial profiling, and transphobic police violence; the demand for a social safety net; and robust and protections for all workers. To fight for the decriminalization of sex work is to fight for and with society’s most vulnerable and marginalized communities, in particular women of color and of immigrant backgrounds, especially trans women who often rely on sex work when discriminated against in other industries. Black women account for 94 percent of people arrested for the absurd and capacious charge of “loitering for the purposes of prostitution” in the New York City boroughs of Brooklyn and Queens. Thus, to ignore the struggle for sex workers’ rights is de facto to allow their lives not to matter.
According to Luo, it is in part the growing recognition of the necessity of these connected struggles that accounts for the increased support for sex work decriminalization. “Living wages haven’t risen and 13 percent of Americans know someone who has died because they couldn’t afford health care,” Luo told me, noting that “people are in economically desperate situations and increasingly understand that people do things for survival, that survival work is work, that sex work is work.” Full decriminalization would recognize that as work, sex work is not the business of the police and courts. For many, sex work may not be good work, or always free of exploitation, and it may be resorted to when there are few other options. But the very same is true of many jobs in which workers are nonetheless deemed worthy of rights and legal protections as workers.
Luo also attributed the changing views on decriminalization to the sex worker movement’s alignment with a multiracial coalition and “a rising left.” There’s little doubt that the infusion of new, decidedly left-wing blood into parts of the Democratic political landscape has pushed the issue to the fore in state houses nationwide. New York and D.C. have introduced bills to decriminalize sex work, and similar efforts are gaining ground in California, Oregon, Illinois, Vermont, Connecticut, and Colorado, the report noted. Progressive politicians like Rep. Ro Khanna, D-Calif., deserve credit for new efforts to repeal FOSTA-SESTA, and left-to-liberal NGOs getting behind the issue are to be commended. But the long overdue shift in political consensus was hard fought by sex worker organizers on the front lines.
The report includes testimonies from a number of sex workers and former sex workers attesting to the violences enacted through criminalization. Bianey Garcia, a trans rights organizer with immigrant advocacy group Make the Road, who emigrated from Mexico as a teenager to escape LGBTQ persecution, was fired from her restaurant job in the U.S. when she transitioned on hormones. Having previously been a victim of sex trafficking, Garcia then turned to consensual, independent, survival sex work. “I’ve been arrested four times for prostitution,” she notes in the report, “Only once was I actually doing sex work, the other three arrests were just profiling because I’m a trans woman.” Another testimony, from Victoria Walker, who turned to sex work for survival, recalls that each time an aspect of the industry was further criminalized, the work became more dangerous. For example, FOSTA-SESTA led to the shuttering of sites where workers could screen clients and connect to other members of the community. “If sex work were decriminalized,” notes Walker, “the sex worker community could find each other again and feel safe by having each others’ backs.”
“If sex work were decriminalized, the sex worker community could find each other again and feel safe by having each others’ backs.”
It is only full decriminalization that can lay the ground for sex workers to obtain the rights they well deserve. The so-called Nordic model, in which only buyers of sex or third parties face criminalization, forces sex workers into the shadows and continues to entrap sex workers and their loved ones in the system of carceral injustice. Examples abound of sex workers being arrested for soliciting under such laws. The new report notes that under the Nordic model, pitched as legislation to protect sex workers, Norway “evicted more than 400 sex workers, primarily migrant women, from their home.” Full decriminalization will not offer economic justice and material safety for the vulnerable people who turn to sex work for survival, but it would remove at least some of the grounds used by the police and state to further oppress these communities.
And it is support for full decriminalization that the new polls reflect. Respondents were asked whether they would support sex work following the example of New Zealand, which in 2003 did away with “criminal penalties for adults to sell and pay for consensual sex while also maintaining laws that criminalize violence.” New Zealand has not seen the sex work industry grow since it was decriminalized, according to the report, but 90 percent of people trading sex said decriminalization gave them employment, legal, and health rights, while 64 percent found it easier to refuse clients.
Luo told me that the shift in support for decriminalization, especially among young people, is a “momentous” indication of “where the future is for the issue,” but the organizer was clear that barriers to full decriminalization, decarceration, and destigmatization remain steep. She highlighted that beliefs in carceral approaches to ending violence and exploitation, transphobia, fearmongering, and myths about trafficking persist with force, as do reactionary and powerful police unions lobbying for criminalization. She added, though, that “perhaps the greatest barrier of all” is that people who are inoculated from deprivation and discrimination “find it unbelievable that people living at the intersections of marginalization and oppression often trade sex to survive.” As Luo put it, “it gets at the very core of who we are as a society, pretty immediately.” And to reckon with the realities of survival sex work and the added brutality of its criminalization is to understand that this society needs changing at its core.


theintercept--2020-02-05--Nontraditional Voters at Iowa Satellite Caucuses Could Tip the Balance to Bernie Sanders

Whether high turnout translates into success depends heavily on who turns out ; a candidate has to increase turnout among the people most likely to vote for them .
( Donald Trump , for instance , helped drive higher turnout among Democrats in the 2018 midterms , but that hardly can be counted as a victory for him . )
Throughout the 2020 campaign , Sanders has targeted nontraditional voters , students , and working-class people who usually stay home during primaries and caucuses .
As the campaign pointed out on Wednesday , turnout among 17-to-29 year olds went up @ @ @ @ @ @ @ about turnout , Sanders told The Intercept that he would have preferred more .
Sanders , noted that the numbers were “ somewhat higher than in ’ 16 , ” when Sanders lost to Clinton by less than 1 percent of state delegates .
But , he said , they were “ not as high frankly as I would ’ ve like to have seen.
” Except , of course , it ’ s not that simple .
On Monday evening in Iowa , turnout did not match the 2008 record set as @ @ @ @ @ @ @ John Edwards battled it out .
Yet , Sanders still won the most votes so far , both on the first and final ballots , even as the delegate total remains unsettled .
Heading into Iowa , Sen. Bernie Sanders had a mantra he used in his stump speech : If you turn on the TV on caucus night and they say turnout is high , we win .
If they tell you that turnout is low , we lose .
Simple as that .
The members of the Democratic establishment who could @ @ @ @ @ @ @ low youth turnout in IA were not only extremely disrespectful to this future of this party , they were wrong .
Kudos to @ sunrisemvmt & all the other IA youth organizers !
https : //t.co/G7UProlQLs In particular , the campaign focused heavily on bringing people out to the satellite caucuses that were held across the state and in other parts of the world for Iowans who couldn ’ t make it to the 7 p.m. caucuses .
This was the first year the party hosted satellite caucuses , and no other campaign @ @ @ @ @ @ @ turning those voters out .
With 41 state delegates available to be swept up , and fewer than 25 delegates currently separating Pete Buttigieg and Sanders , they could end up making the difference when the delegate count is finalized .
The first caucus was held in Tbilisi , Georgia , of all places and reports are that Sanders led the delegates there .
Another was held in St. Petersburg , Florida , where former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg is heavily on the airwaves .
The first in Iowa was held @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , with Sanders winning all 14 of the final votes to net four precinct delegates , a relatively large pickup .
At Drake University in Des Moines , workers and students went overwhelmingly for Sanders , giving him five delegates and Sen. Elizabeth Warren two , meaning that he netted five relative to Buttigieg .
( On the Intercepted podcast , we interviewed voters at satellite caucuses and in Precinct 36 .
Online , some Sanders supporters had urged people not to caucus for Warren but to switch instead to Buttigieg for strategic @ @ @ @ @ @ @ there took that advice at Drake , and Buttigieg fell one person shy of viability .
His supporters then dispersed to both Sanders and Warren , increasing Sanders ’ s delegate share and once again showing the folly of believing that the system can be gamed strategically , a reality that dawned on the Clinton campaign only after the candidate they prayed would win the GOP nomination ended up beating them in the general . )
In all , there were 87 satellite caucuses .
According to Iowa Democratic Party rules , the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ be determined by satellite turnout and in proportion to the total number of people who came out to vote in the regular caucuses .
They are to be worth some percent of the total , meaning that the four delegates Sanders won in Ottumwa , for instance , could actually rise or shrink in the final analysis .
But what we know about those caucuses suggests that Sanders may have won those caucuses by enough to overcome his deficit with Buttigieg , which at the time of writing sits at 23.987 delegates with @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Jeff Weaver , a senior campaign adviser , said at a Sanders rally in New Hampshire on Tuesday night that he remained optimistic about winning not just the popular vote , but also the delegate count , citing success in the satellite caucuses .
“ If you look at satellite caucuses — we don ’ t have final numbers yet — if you look at new Latino voters coming out in Iowa , new Muslim voters coming out in Iowa , caucus sites in union halls , that ’ s part of this @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a while , but I ’ m very proud of the work we did helping underrepresented communities get represented in the caucus , ” Weaver said .
The negative ads run against Sanders at the end of the campaign , he argued , could have depressed turnout .
“ We were trying to drive as high a turnout as we possibly could in Iowa .
Who knows whether the fact that three people weren ’ t in state for a week , what effect that had on sort of like , the excitement @ @ @ @ @ @ @ s impossible to know all the mix .
Another thing that happened which was unfortunate was an outside Democratic group — I think really , on the Democratic side , maybe for the first time — came in with some really nasty advertising and frankly that tends to suppress turnout , ” Weaver said .
Indeed , a number of factors unrelated to Sanders likely influenced turnout numbers this year .
As Weaver mentioned , three of the top five ( or perhaps top four , when the final votes are counted ) @ @ @ @ @ @ @ an impeachment trial in the U.S. Senate , while one of the five did little campaigning .
Only Buttigieg was able to hit multiple events per day for an extended period .
Also , turnout in 2008 — the record year , with 236,000 caucus-goers in a state of over 3 million people — benefited from some structural advantages : The caucuses were held on the first Monday in January , which meant college students were home for winter break , and workers who travel were more likely to be home as well @ @ @ @ @ @ @ — the night after the Super Bowl — those students were back at their respective schools .
In 2016 , when Sanders and Clinton faced off , turnout dropped to 171,109 .
That ’ s a dip in roughly 55,000 potential Democratic voters .
This year , Sanders was unlikely to gain those 55,000 voters back — since they had the chance to caucus for him in 2016 and didn ’ t .
Instead , the makeup of those 172,000 may have changed .
At a largely black working-class precinct in central Des @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , Joe Biden had a level of support that was startling in comparison to his healthy polling numbers among African Americans .
Of the 133 caucus-goers at Precinct 36 , Sanders won 69 — more than half — while Biden was backed by just 25 percent .
After a long struggle , Warren ’ s supporters were able to persuade enough Buttigieg backers to join them to barely hit the 15 percent threshold .
Working to turn out voters is no guarantee of victory .
But in a close election , it can @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .

Heading into Iowa, Sen. Bernie Sanders had a mantra he used in his stump speech: If you turn on the TV on caucus night and they say turnout is high, we win. If they tell you that turnout is low, we lose. Simple as that.
Except, of course, it’s not that simple. On Monday evening in Iowa, turnout did not match the 2008 record set as Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, and John Edwards battled it out. Yet, Sanders still won the most votes so far, both on the first and final ballots, even as the delegate total remains unsettled.
Asked Tuesday about turnout, Sanders told The Intercept that he would have preferred more. Sanders, noted that the numbers were “somewhat higher than in ’16,” when Sanders lost to Clinton by less than 1 percent of state delegates. But, he said, they were “not as high frankly as I would’ve like to have seen.”
Whether high turnout translates into success depends heavily on who turns out; a candidate has to increase turnout among the people most likely to vote for them. (Donald Trump, for instance, helped drive higher turnout among Democrats in the 2018 midterms, but that hardly can be counted as a victory for him.) Throughout the 2020 campaign, Sanders has targeted nontraditional voters, students, and working-class people who usually stay home during primaries and caucuses. As the campaign pointed out on Wednesday, turnout among 17-to-29 year olds went up, even from 2008.
The members of the Democratic establishment who could barely contain their excitement as they reported low youth turnout in IA were not only extremely disrespectful to this future of this party, they were wrong. Kudos to @sunrisemvmt & all the other IA youth organizers! https://t.co/G7UProlQLs — Briahna Joy Gray (@briebriejoy) February 5, 2020
In particular, the campaign focused heavily on bringing people out to the satellite caucuses that were held across the state and in other parts of the world for Iowans who couldn’t make it to the 7 p.m. caucuses. This was the first year the party hosted satellite caucuses, and no other campaign seems to have invested serious resources in turning those voters out. With 41 state delegates available to be swept up, and fewer than 25 delegates currently separating Pete Buttigieg and Sanders, they could end up making the difference when the delegate count is finalized.
The first caucus was held in Tbilisi, Georgia, of all places and reports are that Sanders led the delegates there. Another was held in St. Petersburg, Florida, where former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg is heavily on the airwaves. The first in Iowa was held at a UFCW union hall in Ottumwa, with Sanders winning all 14 of the final votes to net four precinct delegates, a relatively large pickup. At Drake University in Des Moines, workers and students went overwhelmingly for Sanders, giving him five delegates and Sen. Elizabeth Warren two, meaning that he netted five relative to Buttigieg. (On the Intercepted podcast, we interviewed voters at satellite caucuses and in Precinct 36.)
In all, there were 87 satellite caucuses. According to Iowa Democratic Party rules, the total delegate value of those caucuses will be determined by satellite turnout and in proportion to the total number of people who came out to vote in the regular caucuses. They are to be worth some percent of the total, meaning that the four delegates Sanders won in Ottumwa, for instance, could actually rise or shrink in the final analysis. But what we know about those caucuses suggests that Sanders may have won those caucuses by enough to overcome his deficit with Buttigieg, which at the time of writing sits at 23.987 delegates with 86 percent of the precincts reporting.
Jeff Weaver, a senior campaign adviser, said at a Sanders rally in New Hampshire on Tuesday night that he remained optimistic about winning not just the popular vote, but also the delegate count, citing success in the satellite caucuses. “If you look at satellite caucuses — we don’t have final numbers yet — if you look at new Latino voters coming out in Iowa, new Muslim voters coming out in Iowa, caucus sites in union halls, that’s part of this expansion of the electorate. It takes a while, but I’m very proud of the work we did helping underrepresented communities get represented in the caucus,” Weaver said.
The negative ads run against Sanders at the end of the campaign, he argued, could have depressed turnout. “We were trying to drive as high a turnout as we possibly could in Iowa. Who knows whether the fact that three people weren’t in state for a week, what effect that had on sort of like, the excitement level in the state. It’s impossible to know all the mix. Another thing that happened which was unfortunate was an outside Democratic group — I think really, on the Democratic side, maybe for the first time — came in with some really nasty advertising and frankly that tends to suppress turnout,” Weaver said.
Indeed, a number of factors unrelated to Sanders likely influenced turnout numbers this year. As Weaver mentioned, three of the top five (or perhaps top four, when the final votes are counted) candidates spent most of January stuck in an impeachment trial in the U.S. Senate, while one of the five did little campaigning. Only Buttigieg was able to hit multiple events per day for an extended period.
Also, turnout in 2008 — the record year, with 236,000 caucus-goers in a state of over 3 million people — benefited from some structural advantages: The caucuses were held on the first Monday in January, which meant college students were home for winter break, and workers who travel were more likely to be home as well. By the first Monday in February — the night after the Super Bowl — those students were back at their respective schools. In 2016, when Sanders and Clinton faced off, turnout dropped to 171,109. That’s a dip in roughly 55,000 potential Democratic voters. This year, Sanders was unlikely to gain those 55,000 voters back — since they had the chance to caucus for him in 2016 and didn’t.
Instead, the makeup of those 172,000 may have changed. At a largely black working-class precinct in central Des Moines, held at King Elementary School, Joe Biden had a level of support that was startling in comparison to his healthy polling numbers among African Americans. Of the 133 caucus-goers at Precinct 36, Sanders won 69 — more than half — while Biden was backed by just 25 percent. After a long struggle, Warren’s supporters were able to persuade enough Buttigieg backers to join them to barely hit the 15 percent threshold.
Working to turn out voters is no guarantee of victory. But in a close election, it can make all the difference. Or not.


theintercept--2020-02-05--The Iowa Democratic Party Did the Opposite of What It Should Have Done to Secure Its Disastrous App

in Iowa , according to press reports , precinct chairs across the state struggled to use a hastily-built and inadequately tested mobile app , developed by a shadowy for-profit tech company , to report results to the Iowa Democratic Party .
This seems to have been the main cause of massive delays in the publishing of results from the caucuses .
When the media learned last month that the Iowa Democratic Party planned to use a mobile app to report caucus results , the party refused to reveal many details about the app .
It didn ’ t publish the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ security researchers to inspect nor give any information about how thoroughly the app had been tested ( apparently , not very thoroughly ) .
The party wouldn ’ t even name the vendor that it hired to develop the app ( Shadow , Inc. ) , claiming that doing so could inadvertently help potential cyber attackers .
Elected officials couldn ’ t get answers , either .
The office of Sen. Ron Wyden asked the Democratic National Committee for details about the app three times in lead-up to the Iowa caucuses , but @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the Wall Street Journal .
Wyden is himself a Democrat , representing Oregon .
This is the opposite of what the Iowa Democatic Party should have done .
Hiding the details of how a computer system works does nothing to make it more secure .
This is known as “ security through obscurity , ” and it provides a false sense of security , while making it harder for people to have confidence that the system actually works as expected .
Election systems should instead rely on the information security principle of “ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Standards , the federal agency responsible for recommending standards that industry and government agencies should follow , lists open design as an important principle for designing secure computer systems .
“ System security should not depend on secrecy of the implementation or its components , ” NIST ’ s Guide to General Server Security says .
This open design practice is commonplace in the software industry , particularly in systems that handle very sensitive data .
The Signal app , for example , is widely known as one of the best designed end-to-end @ @ @ @ @ @ @ caucus reporting app : • Signal ’ s source code is freely available on the internet for anyone to inspect .
You can find the Android source code in this repository on GitHub , the iPhone source code in this one , and the desktop app source code in this one .
• The inner workings of Signal ’ s encryption algorithm are publicly documented , and the implementation has been peer-reviewed .
While it ’ s possible that cyberattackers could use this wealth of information about how the app works to find @ @ @ @ @ @ @ by far outweigh the risks .
When flaws are inevitably found , they are more likely to get fixed rather than to be quietly exploited by attackers , and the software ecosystem as a whole improves because of it .
And , perhaps most importantly , open design gives users confidence in the security of the app without having to blindly trust the claims of the developers .
The Iowa caucus reporting app was not used to actually cast any votes but rather to more quickly deliver the results of these votes to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ systems are large and complex .
If we insist on using technology for any parts of them — which we do , and probably will continue to do — it ’ s important that every part is as transparent as possible .
All election-related software , whether it ’ s registering voters , casting votes , delivering election results to a central database , or anything else , should use open design principles .
Here ’ s what the Iowa Democratic Party should have done ( and what everyone else in the business @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ensure that election software is as secure and reliable as possible , and that voters could have confidence in its use : • Commit to total transparency about the entire process , which definitely includes which vendor they choose to develop election-related software , and how they came to that decision .
• Make sure well before the election that the software designs and implementation , including the full source code and documentation , is freely available to the public so that experts can investigate it for issues .
• Hire professionals to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ issues found , and publish the results of these audits .
( This is common practice for companies that take security seriously ; the whistleblower submission system SecureDrop recently published the results of a security audit , and so did the VPN provider TunnelBear ) .
• Welcome outside security research , work with university research teams , and run a bug bounty program where individuals can get paid for disclosing vulnerabilities they discover .
• Conduct a test run or low-stakes trial of the software using real end users .
• All @ @ @ @ @ @ @ more time than the two months reportedly given to the team behind the Shadow app to get it up and running in Iowa .
Even this won ’ t ensure election security .
“ No steps can guarantee security in this day and age , ” Douglas Jones , an associate professor of computer science at the University of Iowa , told The Intercept .
“ Therefore , we need to build our entire framework for the use of technology in such a way that we don ’ t depend on it to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , the Iowa Democratic Party did correctly .
When the reporting app failed , it was able to fall back to paper records , albeit with extensive delays .
Jones also believes that new technology should never be deployed for the first time in a high-stakes national election .
“ New voting technologies should be used first in small local elections where the stakes are low , ” he said , adding that “ the best time to deploy new voting machines in the U.S. is right after November of an even-numbered year @ @

Throughout Monday’s caucuses in Iowa, according to press reports, precinct chairs across the state struggled to use a hastily-built and inadequately tested mobile app, developed by a shadowy for-profit tech company, to report results to the Iowa Democratic Party. This seems to have been the main cause of massive delays in the publishing of results from the caucuses.
A system where the vote is taken literally by having people stand around in groups is apparently being disrupted by a software failure. — matt blaze (@mattblaze) February 4, 2020
When the media learned last month that the Iowa Democratic Party planned to use a mobile app to report caucus results, the party refused to reveal many details about the app. It didn’t publish the app’s source code for independent security researchers to inspect nor give any information about how thoroughly the app had been tested (apparently, not very thoroughly). The party wouldn’t even name the vendor that it hired to develop the app (Shadow, Inc.), claiming that doing so could inadvertently help potential cyber attackers.
Elected officials couldn’t get answers, either. The office of Sen. Ron Wyden asked the Democratic National Committee for details about the app three times in lead-up to the Iowa caucuses, but the requests were ignored, according to the Wall Street Journal. Wyden is himself a Democrat, representing Oregon.
My warnings about this technology were ignored, and the result is chaos and a loss of confidence in our elections. Unless states step back from using unproven technologies in our elections this will keep happening. https://t.co/gAjV2kJJjB — Ron Wyden (@RonWyden) February 4, 2020
This is the opposite of what the Iowa Democratic Party should have done.
Hiding the details of how a computer system works does nothing to make it more secure. This is known as “security through obscurity,” and it provides a false sense of security, while making it harder for people to have confidence that the system actually works as expected.
Election systems should instead rely on the information security principle of “open design.” The National Institute of Standards, the federal agency responsible for recommending standards that industry and government agencies should follow, lists open design as an important principle for designing secure computer systems. “System security should not depend on secrecy of the implementation or its components,” NIST’s Guide to General Server Security says.
This open design practice is commonplace in the software industry, particularly in systems that handle very sensitive data. The Signal app, for example, is widely known as one of the best designed end-to-end encrypted messaging apps. Unlike the Iowa caucus reporting app:
Signal’s source code is freely available on the internet for anyone to inspect. You can find the Android source code in this repository on GitHub, the iPhone source code in this one, and the desktop app source code in this one.
The inner workings of Signal’s encryption algorithm are publicly documented, and the implementation has been peer-reviewed.
While it’s possible that cyberattackers could use this wealth of information about how the app works to find vulnerabilities, the benefits of open design by far outweigh the risks. When flaws are inevitably found, they are more likely to get fixed rather than to be quietly exploited by attackers, and the software ecosystem as a whole improves because of it. And, perhaps most importantly, open design gives users confidence in the security of the app without having to blindly trust the claims of the developers.
The Iowa caucus debacle is about rapid reporting of results, not about voting itself. Please keep those two things separate. The votes are backed on paper. The problem was the delivery system for reporting results quickly. — Kim Zetter (@KimZetter) February 4, 2020
The Iowa caucus reporting app was not used to actually cast any votes but rather to more quickly deliver the results of these votes to the state party. Still, election systems are large and complex. If we insist on using technology for any parts of them — which we do, and probably will continue to do — it’s important that every part is as transparent as possible.
All election-related software, whether it’s registering voters, casting votes, delivering election results to a central database, or anything else, should use open design principles.
Here’s what the Iowa Democratic Party should have done (and what everyone else in the business of running elections should do) to ensure that election software is as secure and reliable as possible, and that voters could have confidence in its use:
Commit to total transparency about the entire process, which definitely includes which vendor they choose to develop election-related software, and how they came to that decision.
Make sure well before the election that the software designs and implementation, including the full source code and documentation, is freely available to the public so that experts can investigate it for issues.
Hire professionals to conduct third-party security audits, fix any issues found, and publish the results of these audits. (This is common practice for companies that take security seriously; the whistleblower submission system SecureDrop recently published the results of a security audit, and so did the VPN provider TunnelBear).
Welcome outside security research, work with university research teams, and run a bug bounty program where individuals can get paid for disclosing vulnerabilities they discover.
Conduct a test run or low-stakes trial of the software using real end users.
All of the above strongly implies providing much more time than the two months reportedly given to the team behind the Shadow app to get it up and running in Iowa.
Even this won’t ensure election security. “No steps can guarantee security in this day and age,” Douglas Jones, an associate professor of computer science at the University of Iowa, told The Intercept. “Therefore, we need to build our entire framework for the use of technology in such a way that we don’t depend on it to be secure.” This, at least, the Iowa Democratic Party did correctly. When the reporting app failed, it was able to fall back to paper records, albeit with extensive delays.
Jones also believes that new technology should never be deployed for the first time in a high-stakes national election. “New voting technologies should be used first in small local elections where the stakes are low,” he said, adding that “the best time to deploy new voting machines in the U.S. is right after November of an even-numbered year.”


theintercept--2020-02-05--House Democrats Rushed Donald Trump’s Impeachment, Handing Him an Election Year Gift

the Supreme Court issued a unanimous decision that spelled the end of Richard Nixon ’ s presidency .
In a landmark ruling , the court ordered Nixon to release secret Oval Office tape recordings that proved he had been part of the Watergate cover-up .
With irrefutable evidence of his guilt out in the open , Nixon ’ s support among Republicans in Congress collapsed , and he resigned on August 9 rather than face impeachment .
That court ruling came more than two years after the June 1972 Democratic National Committee Headquarters break-in that triggered the scandal .
Today @ @ @ @ @ @ @ that quickly sank Nixon , but in reality , it took a long time to unspool .
In fact , Watergate didn ’ t really take off as a scandal that seriously threatened Nixon ’ s presidency until March 1973 , nearly a year after the break-in .
That was when James McCord , one of the Watergate burglars , wrote a private letter to the judge handling the burglars ’ criminal case revealing that he and his co-defendants had been under political pressure to plead guilty and remain silent as part of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ hearings began two months later , and in June 1973 , former White House counsel John Dean captivated the nation when he testified that he had told Nixon the Watergate cover-up was a “ cancer on the presidency.
” The one-two punch of McCord ’ s letter and Dean ’ s testimony finally transformed Watergate into an all-consuming national crisis .
The fundamental lesson ?
Regicide takes time .
Unfortunately , this revelation was lost on the Democrats who have been leading the rushed impeachment of Donald Trump .
House Democrats went into @ @ @ @ @ @ @ strong hand .
Thanks to an anonymous whistleblower and other courageous government officials who were willing to tell the truth , there was rock solid evidence that Trump had abused his presidential power in the Ukraine case .
Immediately after special counsel Robert Mueller declined to prosecute him for colluding with Russia to win the 2016 presidential election , Trump sought to pressure Ukraine to interfere on his behalf in the 2020 presidential election .
Trump withheld badly needed aid from Ukraine in a bid to force newly elected Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Vice President Joe Biden and his son , Hunter Biden , who had been on the board of a Ukrainian gas company .
It didn ’ t matter to Trump that there was no evidence of corruption by Joe Biden or his son ; he wanted Zelensky to announce an investigation into false charges that would hurt Biden ’ s candidacy .
Trump ’ s efforts to embroil Ukraine in his corrupt election scheme outraged the career government officials who knew about it , and many of them were willing to testify before @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to stonewall the House investigation , and , following his lead , many of the political appointees around him also refused to testify .
The White House issued lie after lie about the Ukraine case , while smearing the career officials who had testified under oath .
Trump and his enablers tried to discredit the investigation by claiming it was the product of a vengeful “ deep state.
” By December , House Democrats had built a case based on the testimony of several career officials , but they had reached an impasse @ @ @ @ @ @ @ appointees still refused to cooperate .
So House Democrats had a choice : Take more time to investigate or move straight to an impeachment vote .
Forcing the testimony of the uncooperative Trump administration officials might have required House Democrats to take the bold step of holding Cabinet-level officials in contempt for ignoring congressional requests and subpoenas .
The House Democrats could then have gone to federal court to enforce their actions .
House Democrats could also have sent a delegation to Ukraine to try to gather facts and negotiate for the testimony @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Or they could have slowed down in order to hire dozens of additional congressional investigators , who could have scoured Washington looking for more of the Trump-Ukraine story .
To stoke public interest , House Democrats might have continued to hold public hearings on the Ukraine scandal while waiting for their investigative efforts and legal challenges to bear fruit , much as the Senate Watergate Committee hearings did in 1973 .
Those hearings attracted celebrities like John Lennon and Yoko Ono and became appointment television for millions of Americans .
Instead , House @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Trump impeachment proceedings .
They were too impatient to endure the delays that would result from a deeper investigation .
They went straight to an impeachment vote in December , less than five months after the July 25 , 2019 , phone call between Trump and Zelensky that triggered the scandal .
If the Senate votes to acquit Trump on Wednesday , as expected , he will have nine full months before the 2020 election to boast about having been cleared .
The Democrats argued , correctly , that the evidence of Trump @ @ @ @ @ @ @ already so clear and convincing that there was no reason to wait , and that Trump ’ s stonewalling could just be added to the articles of impeachment as obstruction .
But impeachment is a political process more than a legal one , and House Democrats needed to win over the country .
In today ’ s news environment , the only way to change distracted minds is to keep hitting the same notes over and over until they sink in .
A lengthy congressional investigation of Trump ’ s efforts to abuse @ @ @ @ @ @ @ foreign government to help him destroy a political rival could have dominated the headlines throughout 2020 .
Trump ’ s criminal conduct would have been front and center throughout the presidential campaign .
What ’ s more , legal battles with Trump aides over their refusal to testify could have kept the pressure on those officials .
Their resolve might eventually have weakened in the face of mounting legal bills and the threat of jail time for contempt of Congress or contempt of court .
Instead , the Democrats leading the impeachment process @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of begging for information from an unpublished and largely unseen book by John Bolton , Trump ’ s former national security adviser who has not testified in the impeachment despite saying that he would if he were subpoenaed .
has to be asked about the Democratic strategy that brought us to this point so quickly and so early in the 2020 election campaign : Why didn ’ t Democrats move more slowly and purposefully ?
The answer is that the Democrats lacked the courage of their convictions .
Because of the Republican control @ @ @ @ @ @ @ t believe they could win the impeachment battle .
And without the prospect of certain victory , they weren ’ t willing to take the aggressive measures necessary to conduct a thorough investigation .
Democrats didn ’ t want Trump ’ s impeachment to linger into the middle of the 2020 presidential campaign because they feared it would spark a backlash among voters and help Trump politically .
Meanwhile , the leading Democratic presidential candidates all acted as if they were annoyed by the impeachment battle , as if it were just a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ failed to see that investigating Trump throughout the election would hurt him .
They chose shortcuts and half measures over pushing hard for more testimony and answers .
President Gerald Ford called Watergate a “ long national nightmare.
” Today ’ s Democrats were unwilling to do the nightmarish things required when seeking to oust a president from office .

Photo: AP
On July 24, 1974, the Supreme Court issued a unanimous decision that spelled the end of Richard Nixon’s presidency. In a landmark ruling, the court ordered Nixon to release secret Oval Office tape recordings that proved he had been part of the Watergate cover-up. With irrefutable evidence of his guilt out in the open, Nixon’s support among Republicans in Congress collapsed, and he resigned on August 9 rather than face impeachment.
That court ruling came more than two years after the June 1972 Democratic National Committee Headquarters break-in that triggered the scandal. Today, people remember Watergate as a scandal that quickly sank Nixon, but in reality, it took a long time to unspool.
In fact, Watergate didn’t really take off as a scandal that seriously threatened Nixon’s presidency until March 1973, nearly a year after the break-in. That was when James McCord, one of the Watergate burglars, wrote a private letter to the judge handling the burglars’ criminal case revealing that he and his co-defendants had been under political pressure to plead guilty and remain silent as part of the cover-up. The Senate Watergate Committee hearings began two months later, and in June 1973, former White House counsel John Dean captivated the nation when he testified that he had told Nixon the Watergate cover-up was a “cancer on the presidency.”
The one-two punch of McCord’s letter and Dean’s testimony finally transformed Watergate into an all-consuming national crisis. The fundamental lesson? Regicide takes time. Unfortunately, this revelation was lost on the Democrats who have been leading the rushed impeachment of Donald Trump.
House Democrats went into the impeachment process last year with a strong hand. Thanks to an anonymous whistleblower and other courageous government officials who were willing to tell the truth, there was rock solid evidence that Trump had abused his presidential power in the Ukraine case.
Immediately after special counsel Robert Mueller declined to prosecute him for colluding with Russia to win the 2016 presidential election, Trump sought to pressure Ukraine to interfere on his behalf in the 2020 presidential election. Trump withheld badly needed aid from Ukraine in a bid to force newly elected Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky to announce a corruption investigation of former Vice President Joe Biden and his son, Hunter Biden, who had been on the board of a Ukrainian gas company. It didn’t matter to Trump that there was no evidence of corruption by Joe Biden or his son; he wanted Zelensky to announce an investigation into false charges that would hurt Biden’s candidacy.
Trump’s efforts to embroil Ukraine in his corrupt election scheme outraged the career government officials who knew about it, and many of them were willing to testify before the House.
But Trump quickly sought to stonewall the House investigation, and, following his lead, many of the political appointees around him also refused to testify. The White House issued lie after lie about the Ukraine case, while smearing the career officials who had testified under oath. Trump and his enablers tried to discredit the investigation by claiming it was the product of a vengeful “deep state.”
By December, House Democrats had built a case based on the testimony of several career officials, but they had reached an impasse with the White House as top political appointees still refused to cooperate.
So House Democrats had a choice: Take more time to investigate or move straight to an impeachment vote.
Forcing the testimony of the uncooperative Trump administration officials might have required House Democrats to take the bold step of holding Cabinet-level officials in contempt for ignoring congressional requests and subpoenas. The House Democrats could then have gone to federal court to enforce their actions.
House Democrats could also have sent a delegation to Ukraine to try to gather facts and negotiate for the testimony of Zelensky and other Ukrainian leaders. Or they could have slowed down in order to hire dozens of additional congressional investigators, who could have scoured Washington looking for more of the Trump-Ukraine story.
To stoke public interest, House Democrats might have continued to hold public hearings on the Ukraine scandal while waiting for their investigative efforts and legal challenges to bear fruit, much as the Senate Watergate Committee hearings did in 1973. Those hearings attracted celebrities like John Lennon and Yoko Ono and became appointment television for millions of Americans.
Photo: Ting Shen/Xinhua via Getty Images
Instead, House Democrats decided to move fast with the Trump impeachment proceedings. They were too impatient to endure the delays that would result from a deeper investigation.
They went straight to an impeachment vote in December, less than five months after the July 25, 2019, phone call between Trump and Zelensky that triggered the scandal. If the Senate votes to acquit Trump on Wednesday, as expected, he will have nine full months before the 2020 election to boast about having been cleared.
The Democrats argued, correctly, that the evidence of Trump’s corrupt abuse of power was already so clear and convincing that there was no reason to wait, and that Trump’s stonewalling could just be added to the articles of impeachment as obstruction. But impeachment is a political process more than a legal one, and House Democrats needed to win over the country. In today’s news environment, the only way to change distracted minds is to keep hitting the same notes over and over until they sink in.
A lengthy congressional investigation of Trump’s efforts to abuse his power by trying to get a foreign government to help him destroy a political rival could have dominated the headlines throughout 2020. Trump’s criminal conduct would have been front and center throughout the presidential campaign.
What’s more, legal battles with Trump aides over their refusal to testify could have kept the pressure on those officials. Their resolve might eventually have weakened in the face of mounting legal bills and the threat of jail time for contempt of Congress or contempt of court.
Instead, the Democrats leading the impeachment process now find themselves in the strange position of begging for information from an unpublished and largely unseen book by John Bolton, Trump’s former national security adviser who has not testified in the impeachment despite saying that he would if he were subpoenaed.
A fundamental question has to be asked about the Democratic strategy that brought us to this point so quickly and so early in the 2020 election campaign: Why didn’t Democrats move more slowly and purposefully?
The answer is that the Democrats lacked the courage of their convictions. Because of the Republican control of the Senate, they didn’t believe they could win the impeachment battle. And without the prospect of certain victory, they weren’t willing to take the aggressive measures necessary to conduct a thorough investigation.
Democrats didn’t want Trump’s impeachment to linger into the middle of the 2020 presidential campaign because they feared it would spark a backlash among voters and help Trump politically. Meanwhile, the leading Democratic presidential candidates all acted as if they were annoyed by the impeachment battle, as if it were just a distraction from the campaign.
Democratic leaders failed to see that investigating Trump throughout the election would hurt him. They chose shortcuts and half measures over pushing hard for more testimony and answers.
President Gerald Ford called Watergate a “long national nightmare.” Today’s Democrats were unwilling to do the nightmarish things required when seeking to oust a president from office.


theintercept--2020-02-06--Congress Quietly Adopts Exxon Mobil-Backed Law Promoting New Gas Pipeline, Arms to Cyprus

In response , the legislative text also repeals the prohibition of weapons transfers to Cyprus put in place in 1987 , promotes greater U.S military assistance to Greece and Cyprus , and instructs the U.S. to maintain its newly situated predator drone fleet in the region .
The omnibus includes provisions from the Eastern Mediterranean Security and Energy Partnership Act , legislation introduced in the House and Senate last year .
Cyprus , one of the smallest states in the European Union , has come under increasing pressure from Turkey , which opposes the development of new gas fields off @ @ @ @ @ @ @ has used its navy to threaten drilling vessels .
The legislative text , mirroring a bill that has circulated in Congress over the last year , promises a range of U.S. assistance for the development of natural gas resources off the coasts of Israel and Cyprus , including support for constructing pipelines and liquified natural gas terminals and the creation of a United States-Eastern Mediterranean Energy Center in the region run by the U.S. Department of Energy .
During the holiday season legislative blitz in December , legislators tucked an obscure provision into @ @ @ @ @ @ @ restrictions and boosted a controversial pipeline deal in the eastern Mediterranean Sea .
In a bitterly divided Congress , lawmakers still managed to come together to help Exxon Mobil pass major legislation that could remake the geopolitics of the Middle East and Europe .
In October 2018 , the company also served as the lead sponsor of a gala held in Greece at the largest business convention in southeast Europe .
In a photo published by the U.S. Embassy in Cyprus , then-U.S .
Ambassador to Cyprus Kathleen Doherty is seen alongside Exxon @ @ @ @ @ @ @ watchdog media outlet , obtained an email showing that Exxon Mobil hosted a lunch in April 2018 with Cypriot members of European Parliament , Cyprus ’ s highest EU diplomat , and EU Commissioner Christos Stylianides , to discuss the company ’ s gas exploration of the Cyprus coast .
The lunch took place at a restaurant located close to the U.S. Embassy in Brussels .
Speaking with investors later that year , the company boasted about the Cyprus gas fields as a key area of growth .
Asked by analysts about where @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , Neil Chapman , Exxon Mobil ’ s senior vice president , said he “ would highlight Cyprus.
” Last year , in another conference call with investors , Chapman emphasized that the Cyprus fields “ turned out to be a pretty nice discovery.
” Lobbying disclosures in the European Union show that Exxon Mobil officials quickly went to work , scheduling meetings in March 2018 with an unnamed EU cabinet member on gas exploration near Cyprus .
Just three days later , the U.S. military brought the 26th Marine Expeditionary Unit to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Iwo Jima as Exxon Mobil commenced exploratory drilling in the region .
“ Exxon Mobil and our partner , Qatar Petroleum , have a long and successful history of developing gas resources , ” said Andrew Swiger , principal foreign officer of Exxon Mobil , in a press release at the time of winning bid .
“ We decided to explore this in a very audacious way : to form a trilateral committee between Greece , Cyprus , and Israel to plan the possibility of a pipeline that would take our common resources @ @ @ @ @ @ @ via Greece — a pipeline from Israel , Cyprus , through Greece to Europe , ” Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said at a press conference in 2016 .
Also in 2016 , Exxon Mobil and Qatar Petroleum formed a new venture and won a bid to explore offshore blocks near Cyprus .
The contract was later inked in a 2017 ceremony in Cyprus , with officials from both companies present , alongside both the U.S. and Qatari ambassadors to Cyprus .
In 2013 , the Hudson Institute was the first major Beltway @ @ @ @ @ @ @ provide military assistance to Cyprus and promote the development of the new gas discoveries in the region .
The following year , the Hudson Institute published a long follow-up report on the issue , after which Exxon Mobil disclosed a donation of $ 15,000 to the think tank .
Seth Cropsey , a senior Pentagon official for the Reagan and George H.W .
Bush administrations , served as the lead author of both reports .
The rapid political moves on Capitol Hill came just months after Exxon Mobil announced one of the largest @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the coast of Cyprus last February — the latest in a series of new discoveries in the region over the past decade .
But disclosure documents reviewed by The Real News and The Intercept suggest that Exxon Mobil was at the center of the lobbying effort .
The energy giant curried favor to win support for the gas project within the European Union , as well as in Washington , D.C. That coalition included foreign agents tied to both Greece and Cyprus , the American Jewish Committee , and Christians United for Israel @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to Israel .
Greek American diaspora groups also mobilized to lobby for the legislation .
Hellenic American Leadership Council , one Greek American group , touted the passage of the text as the “ most pro-Hellenic bill in a generation .
” The authorization of the military assistance and pipeline support never received a single hearing , an up-or-down vote , or any open debate .
Its inclusion in the must-pass spending package reflects the powerful lobbying coalition that came together in support of the deal .
On January 2 , leaders of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ together to sign a trilateral deal to build a new $ 6.7 billion pipeline to bring gas from offshore fields in Israel and Cyprus to Greece , Italy , and Bulgaria .
The new EastMed pipeline could transport as much as 20 billion cubic meters of gas to those countries annually , pitched as a way to lessen Russian and Turkish energy influence in the region .
Days later , Russia and Turkey announced plans for their own joint venture , the TurkStream pipeline .
While the provision received scant coverage in American @ @ @ @ @ @ @ activity after its passage .
Exxon is also active within AmCham Cyprus , a global offshoot of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce that receives financial backing from the U.S. Embassy in Cyprus .
The company ’ s office in Cyprus is located next door to the embassy .
Varnavas Theodossiou , lead country manager for the company in Cyprus , sits on the board of directors for AmCham Cyprus .
Addressing Exxon Mobil by name for its efforts in the region , current U.S .
Ambassador to Cyprus Judith Garber gave a speech @ @ @ @ @ @ @ “ We are proud that two American companies — Exxon Mobil and Noble Energy — are participating in this game-changing development , ” said Garber , according to a transcript of her remarks .
— dubbed a “ private empire ” by investigative journalist Steve Coll — moved to shore up EU support for the deal , the U.S. also brokered a political agreement .
Secretary of State Mike Pompeo , last March , convened a meeting in Jerusalem with officials from Israel , Greece , and Cyprus to “ affirm their shared @ @ @ @ @ @ @ security , and prosperity in the Eastern Mediterranean region.
” The State Department ’ s release from the event noted that the leaders at the meeting “ welcomed the recent natural gas finds in the Eastern Mediterranean and its potential to contribute to energy security and diversification.
” The next month after the Jerusalem meeting , Sen. Bob Menendez , D-N.J. , and Sen. Marco Rubio , R-Fla. , introduced the bill .
Menendez , according to Senate expense filings , traveled to Athens shortly after introducing the legislation to discuss the idea @ @ @ @ @ @ @ public disclosures only show part of the story .
But over the following months throughout the year , Exxon Mobil , Christians United for Israel , the American Hellenic Educational Progressive Association , and American Jewish Committee mounted a sustained lobbying campaign with officials over the bill ( which later became the provision ) .
For 2019 , the American Hellenic Educational Progressive Association spent $ 15,000 during the second half of the year lobbying for the legislation and another bill that would prevent the U.S. Department of Defense from sending arms to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ lobbying for it and two other issues during the third quarter of 2019 alone .
And CUFI , for its part , spent $ 90,000 lobbying for the legislation and other bills during the second half of the year .
The group said in its fourth quarter filing that it pushed to get the legislation inserted into the budget bill .
That campaign called for the U.S. to lift the arms embargo on exports to Cyprus , which began in 1987 after a sustained lobbying campaign by the Turkish foreign agents in the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ most robust foreign lobbying presences in Washington .
Cyprus was divided following the Turkish occupation of the island in 1974 in response to a military coup engineered by the Greek government .
The Turkish government calls its occupied territory the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus , which is not internationally recognized .
The Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus lobbied against the legislation , according to foreign agency lobbying documents , hiring the firm Prime Policy Group to act on its behalf .
Prime Policy Group is the successor to Black , Manafort , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ that was the namesake of two allies of President Donald Trump : Paul Manafort and Roger Stone .
Despite that opposition , the mix of foreign , pro-Israel , and energy lobbying prevailed .
Without debate over either the wisdom of lifting the arms embargo or the exclusionary development of Cyprus gas fields in the hands of a few regional governments , Sen. Chuck Schumer , D-N.Y. — citing the bill ’ s bipartisan support — signaled approval for the vast majority of it to be included in the spending bill .
( @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ’ s arming Turkey with an S-400 fighter missile defense system last July . )
Concerns about the climate crisis and methane emissions associated with offshore gas drilling , too , went undiscussed .
Methane is a greenhouse gas more potent than carbon dioxide when emitted .
Pompeo was scheduled to appear in Cyprus to celebrate the signing of the legislative text , which boosted the new pipeline deal and the lifted of the arms embargo .
The trip , however , was canceled because of assassination of Iran Maj. Gen. Qassim Suleimani @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis on January 8 , the day after Mitsotakis met with Trump , with Menendez presenting him a copy of the legislation for a photo opportunity .
The senator received $ 36,500 in defense industry political action committee campaign contributions during his successful 2018 reelection bid cycle , garnering more than $ 10,000 in campaign contributions from General Atomics , producer of the MQ-9 drones that will continue to be stationed at the military base in Greece under the legislation ’ s dictates .
For his part , Rubio received $ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ during his 2016 reelection bid and another $ 27,900 from General Atomics during that same cycle .
Neither Menendez nor Rubio responded to repeated requests for comment for this story .
Belén Balanyá , a researcher and campaigner for the group Corporate Europe Observatory , said the passage of this bill symbolizes the clout that Exxon Mobil has within the EU political process .
“ ExxonMobil ’ s lobbying , direct and in association with other dirty fossil fuel companies and their huge web of lobby groups , has helped lock the EU @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , ” Balanyá said via email .
“ That ’ s why we have launched together with other groups the Fossil Free Politics campaign , where , similar to existing restrictions on tobacco industry lobbyists , we demand a firewall between decision makers and the fossil fuel lobby .
Only then can we take the real action we need to leave fossil fuels in the ground.
” This piece was co-published with The Real News .

In a bitterly divided Congress, lawmakers still managed to come together to help Exxon Mobil pass major legislation that could remake the geopolitics of the Middle East and Europe.
During the holiday season legislative blitz in December, legislators tucked an obscure provision into the omnibus spending package that lifted arms restrictions and boosted a controversial pipeline deal in the eastern Mediterranean Sea.
The legislative text, mirroring a bill that has circulated in Congress over the last year, promises a range of U.S. assistance for the development of natural gas resources off the coasts of Israel and Cyprus, including support for constructing pipelines and liquified natural gas terminals and the creation of a United States-Eastern Mediterranean Energy Center in the region run by the U.S. Department of Energy.
Cyprus, one of the smallest states in the European Union, has come under increasing pressure from Turkey, which opposes the development of new gas fields off the disputed coasts of the island-state and has used its navy to threaten drilling vessels.
In response, the legislative text also repeals the prohibition of weapons transfers to Cyprus put in place in 1987, promotes greater U.S military assistance to Greece and Cyprus, and instructs the U.S. to maintain its newly situated predator drone fleet in the region. The omnibus includes provisions from the Eastern Mediterranean Security and Energy Partnership Act, legislation introduced in the House and Senate last year.
While the provision received scant coverage in American media, it prompted a flurry of activity after its passage.
On January 2, leaders of Israel, Greece, and Cyprus appeared together to sign a trilateral deal to build a new $6.7 billion pipeline to bring gas from offshore fields in Israel and Cyprus to Greece, Italy, and Bulgaria. The new EastMed pipeline could transport as much as 20 billion cubic meters of gas to those countries annually, pitched as a way to lessen Russian and Turkish energy influence in the region. Days later, Russia and Turkey announced plans for their own joint venture, the TurkStream pipeline.
The authorization of the military assistance and pipeline support never received a single hearing, an up-or-down vote, or any open debate. Its inclusion in the must-pass spending package reflects the powerful lobbying coalition that came together in support of the deal.
That coalition included foreign agents tied to both Greece and Cyprus, the American Jewish Committee, and Christians United for Israel, an evangelical group with close ties to Israel. Greek American diaspora groups also mobilized to lobby for the legislation. Hellenic American Leadership Council, one Greek American group, touted the passage of the text as the “most pro-Hellenic bill in a generation.”
But disclosure documents reviewed by The Real News and The Intercept suggest that Exxon Mobil was at the center of the lobbying effort. The energy giant curried favor to win support for the gas project within the European Union, as well as in Washington, D.C.
The rapid political moves on Capitol Hill came just months after Exxon Mobil announced one of the largest gas field discoveries in recent years off the coast of Cyprus last February — the latest in a series of new discoveries in the region over the past decade.
In 2013, the Hudson Institute was the first major Beltway institution to call for the U.S. to provide military assistance to Cyprus and promote the development of the new gas discoveries in the region. The following year, the Hudson Institute published a long follow-up report on the issue, after which Exxon Mobil disclosed a donation of $15,000 to the think tank. Seth Cropsey, a senior Pentagon official for the Reagan and George H.W. Bush administrations, served as the lead author of both reports.
The new gas discoveries prompted growing coordination between Israel, Greece, and Cyprus.
“We decided to explore this in a very audacious way: to form a trilateral committee between Greece, Cyprus, and Israel to plan the possibility of a pipeline that would take our common resources of gas and export them to Europe via Greece — a pipeline from Israel, Cyprus, through Greece to Europe,” Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said at a press conference in 2016. Also in 2016, Exxon Mobil and Qatar Petroleum formed a new venture and won a bid to explore offshore blocks near Cyprus. The contract was later inked in a 2017 ceremony in Cyprus, with officials from both companies present, alongside both the U.S. and Qatari ambassadors to Cyprus.
“Exxon Mobil and our partner, Qatar Petroleum, have a long and successful history of developing gas resources,” said Andrew Swiger, principal foreign officer of Exxon Mobil, in a press release at the time of winning bid.
Lobbying disclosures in the European Union show that Exxon Mobil officials quickly went to work, scheduling meetings in March 2018 with an unnamed EU cabinet member on gas exploration near Cyprus. Just three days later, the U.S. military brought the 26th Marine Expeditionary Unit to Limassol, Cyprus, on the USS Iwo Jima as Exxon Mobil commenced exploratory drilling in the region.
Speaking with investors later that year, the company boasted about the Cyprus gas fields as a key area of growth. Asked by analysts about where Exxon Mobil sees its greatest future prospects, Neil Chapman, Exxon Mobil’s senior vice president, said he “would highlight Cyprus.” Last year, in another conference call with investors, Chapman emphasized that the Cyprus fields “turned out to be a pretty nice discovery.”
The EUobserver, a watchdog media outlet, obtained an email showing that Exxon Mobil hosted a lunch in April 2018 with Cypriot members of European Parliament, Cyprus’s highest EU diplomat, and EU Commissioner Christos Stylianides, to discuss the company’s gas exploration of the Cyprus coast. The lunch took place at a restaurant located close to the U.S. Embassy in Brussels.
In October 2018, the company also served as the lead sponsor of a gala held in Greece at the largest business convention in southeast Europe. In a photo published by the U.S. Embassy in Cyprus, then-U.S. Ambassador to Cyprus Kathleen Doherty is seen alongside Exxon Mobil executives.
Exxon is also active within AmCham Cyprus, a global offshoot of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce that receives financial backing from the U.S. Embassy in Cyprus. The company’s office in Cyprus is located next door to the embassy.
Varnavas Theodossiou, lead country manager for the company in Cyprus, sits on the board of directors for AmCham Cyprus. Addressing Exxon Mobil by name for its efforts in the region, current U.S. Ambassador to Cyprus Judith Garber gave a speech to AmCham Cyprus this past September.
“We are proud that two American companies — Exxon Mobil and Noble Energy — are participating in this game-changing development,” said Garber, according to a transcript of her remarks.
As the corporation — dubbed a “private empire” by investigative journalist Steve Coll — moved to shore up EU support for the deal, the U.S. also brokered a political agreement.
Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, last March, convened a meeting in Jerusalem with officials from Israel, Greece, and Cyprus to “affirm their shared commitment to promoting peace, stability, security, and prosperity in the Eastern Mediterranean region.” The State Department’s release from the event noted that the leaders at the meeting “welcomed the recent natural gas finds in the Eastern Mediterranean and its potential to contribute to energy security and diversification.”
The next month after the Jerusalem meeting, Sen. Bob Menendez, D-N.J., and Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., introduced the bill. Menendez, according to Senate expense filings, traveled to Athens shortly after introducing the legislation to discuss the idea with Greek and Cypriot officials.
The public disclosures only show part of the story. But over the following months throughout the year, Exxon Mobil, Christians United for Israel, the American Hellenic Educational Progressive Association, and American Jewish Committee mounted a sustained lobbying campaign with officials over the bill (which later became the provision).
For 2019, the American Hellenic Educational Progressive Association spent $15,000 during the second half of the year lobbying for the legislation and another bill that would prevent the U.S. Department of Defense from sending arms to Turkey. The AJC spent $30,000 lobbying for it and two other issues during the third quarter of 2019 alone. And CUFI, for its part, spent $90,000 lobbying for the legislation and other bills during the second half of the year. The group said in its fourth quarter filing that it pushed to get the legislation inserted into the budget bill.
That campaign called for the U.S. to lift the arms embargo on exports to Cyprus, which began in 1987 after a sustained lobbying campaign by the Turkish foreign agents in the U.S., known as one of the most robust foreign lobbying presences in Washington. Cyprus was divided following the Turkish occupation of the island in 1974 in response to a military coup engineered by the Greek government. The Turkish government calls its occupied territory the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus, which is not internationally recognized.
The Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus lobbied against the legislation, according to foreign agency lobbying documents, hiring the firm Prime Policy Group to act on its behalf. Prime Policy Group is the successor to Black, Manafort, Stone, and Kelly, a firm that was the namesake of two allies of President Donald Trump: Paul Manafort and Roger Stone.
Despite that opposition, the mix of foreign, pro-Israel, and energy lobbying prevailed. Without debate over either the wisdom of lifting the arms embargo or the exclusionary development of Cyprus gas fields in the hands of a few regional governments, Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y. — citing the bill’s bipartisan support — signaled approval for the vast majority of it to be included in the spending bill. (The spending bill removed language denouncing Russia’s arming Turkey with an S-400 fighter missile defense system last July.)
Concerns about the climate crisis and methane emissions associated with offshore gas drilling, too, went undiscussed. Methane is a greenhouse gas more potent than carbon dioxide when emitted.
Pompeo was scheduled to appear in Cyprus to celebrate the signing of the legislative text, which boosted the new pipeline deal and the lifted of the arms embargo. The trip, however, was canceled because of assassination of Iran Maj. Gen. Qassim Suleimani.
Menendez then met with Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis on January 8, the day after Mitsotakis met with Trump, with Menendez presenting him a copy of the legislation for a photo opportunity. The senator received $36,500 in defense industry political action committee campaign contributions during his successful 2018 reelection bid cycle, garnering more than $10,000 in campaign contributions from General Atomics, producer of the MQ-9 drones that will continue to be stationed at the military base in Greece under the legislation’s dictates.
For his part, Rubio received $17,951 in campaign contributions from Exxon Mobil during his 2016 reelection bid and another $27,900 from General Atomics during that same cycle. Neither Menendez nor Rubio responded to repeated requests for comment for this story.
Belén Balanyá, a researcher and campaigner for the group Corporate Europe Observatory, said the passage of this bill symbolizes the clout that Exxon Mobil has within the EU political process.
“ExxonMobil’s lobbying, direct and in association with other dirty fossil fuel companies and their huge web of lobby groups, has helped lock the EU into fossil-fuel dependency for another 30 years,” Balanyá said via email. “That’s why we have launched together with other groups the Fossil Free Politics campaign, where, similar to existing restrictions on tobacco industry lobbyists, we demand a firewall between decision makers and the fossil fuel lobby. Only then can we take the real action we need to leave fossil fuels in the ground.”
This piece was co-published with The Real News.