Pressure on Cuba

Biden keeps pressure on Cuba, meets with Cuban American leaders

In recent days, the Biden administration has begun to roll out its Cuba strategy, which includes targeted sanctions and ongoing efforts to secure internet access and remittances for the Cuban people.

By SABRINA RODRIGUEZ

President Joe Biden on Friday will announce more targeted individual sanctions on Cuban regime officials and entities as he meets with a group of Cuban-American leaders to discuss his administration's response to recent historic anti-government protests on the communist-run island.

It comes after thousands of Cuban Americans on Monday protested in Washington to urge Biden to take swift action and do more to support the Cuban people following the island-wide protests. Demonstrations led by Cuban Americans have been ongoing in Washington, Miami and several cities around the country and world in the almost three weeks since protests in Cuba began on July 11.

The Biden administration has begun to roll out its Cuba strategy in recent days, including targeted sanctions on those in Cuba involved in human rights abuses and ongoing efforts to secure internet access and remittances for the Cuban people.

"We’re going to do everything we can to keep Cuba on the frontburner” to keep the focus on the Cuban people and their right to protest peacefully, a senior administration official said in a call with reporters.

The administration on Friday will announce plans to slap more individual sanctions on two Cuban regime officials and one entity, the senior administration official said. The official would not specify the names of those targeted, so as not to get ahead of a formal announcement from the Treasury Department. The sanctions will be imposed under the Magnitsky Act, which allows the U.S. to impose economic sanctions on individuals believed to be engaged in human rights abuses and corruption.

Biden announced last week similar sanctions on the head of the armed forces in Cuba, and the Cuban Ministry of the Interior’s Special National Brigade, known as the "black berets," for their involvement in the Cuban government’s crackdown. More than 700 protesters have been arrested or are missing following the protests, activists on the island say.

Cuban officials and entities are already largely sanctioned by the U.S., so it’s unclear that Biden’s sanctions will have a significant impact on those targeted. But the senior administration official explained that it’s also about sending a message to the international community and Cuban people.

“Part of it is to layer on sanctions,” the official said. “But the other one is to make sure we are keeping these individuals in the spotlight, not just on the international community but that the Cuban people know that the United States is supporting them and is trying to defend them.”

On Thursday, Biden also announced he would nominate Frank Mora, a prominent Cuban American Democrat, to serve as ambassador to the Organization of American States.

Earlier this week, the foreign ministers of the U.S. and 20 other countries, including Colombia, Greece and Israel, released a joint statement, condemning the mass arrests in Cuba. But U.S. allies like Canada and Spain — both of which have close ties with Cuba — did not sign on.

Prior to the protests, Biden’s team repeatedly made clear that Cuba policy was not a foreign policy priority for the administration. But the protests on the island — the largest in decades — have forced Biden officials to speed up in their efforts to develop a Cuba plan.

Procedural skirmish

Senate takes next step on infrastructure, after floor drama

Lead negotiating Sens. Rob Portman and Kyrsten Sinema said they are still working on finalized bill text.

By MARIANNE LEVINE and BURGESS EVERETT

The Senate took the next step Friday to move forward on the bipartisan infrastructure package, after a brief procedural skirmish.

In a 66-28 vote, the Senate advanced the $550 billion agreement on physical infrastructure, even as the final legislative text was still being worked out. While the Senate is plowing ahead, the legislation is far from across the finish line.

Negotiators are still ironing out issues, including on broadband. And once the text is finished, it will be subject to an arduous amendment process.

In his opening remarks Friday, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer predicted that the Senate would move quickly on the bill and suggested that the chamber could stay in during the weekend.

“With the cooperation of our Republican colleagues, I believe we can finish the bipartisan infrastructure bill in a matter of days,” Schumer said, adding that the legislation is a “massive down payment towards rebuilding our nation’s infrastructure” that “ will benefit our economy for years and decades.”

But in a sign that the process is nowhere near over, Friday’s vote was briefly interrupted after a draft of the legislation began to circulate that Republicans did not support. Republicans are asking for assurances from Schumer that the text will be based on the agreement by a bipartisan group of 10 negotiators.

Before the vote, Schumer and Portman spoke by phone and the New York Democrat assured him that he would use the bipartisan group’s language, according to sources familiar with the call. Schumer has previously promised a vote on the bipartisan bill text first.

In a statement ahead of the scheduled vote, Sens. Rob Portman (R-Ohio) and Kyrsten Sinema (D-Ariz.) said the text would be released when it was final. Democratic aides insist that the bipartisan bill will be the eventual legislation that will be voted on.

“When legislative text is finalized that reflects the product of our group, we will make it public together consistent with the bipartisan way we’ve worked for the last four months,” Portman and Sinema said.

Sen. Jeanne Shaheen (D-N.H.), one of the Democratic negotiators, said Friday that broadband remains a problem. "As we’re drafting the language, some issues have come up," she said.

Senate Minority Whip John Thune (R-S.D.) said Friday that "Dems are in disarray," adding: "I keep hearing it’s not done, it’s not baked."

The delayed vote prompted confusion among senators. Earlier this week, 17 Senate Republicans supported considering the bipartisan agreement. But some said Friday that if the legislative text is not what Portman and Sinema agreed to, they would not vote to move forward.

“If it’s not Sinema-Portman, I’m out,” said Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.), one of the 17 Republicans.

It’s too late

‘It’s too late’: Doctor forced to turn down COVID patients begging for vaccine

By Jackie SaloJuly

Young, unvaccinated patients are begging for the COVID-19 shot as they fight for their lives at an Alabama hospital.

But Dr. Brytney Cobia has to deliver a heartbreaking dose of reality, instead.

“One of the last things they do before they’re intubated is beg me for the vaccine. I hold their hand and tell them that I’m sorry, but it’s too late,” Cobia, who works at Grandview Medical Center in Birmingham, wrote in a Facebook post on Sunday.

Cobia said she has been forced to turn down the desperate pleas from coronavirus patients about to be placed on ventilators.

“I’m admitting young healthy people to the hospital with very serious COVID infections,” she wrote.

The doctor’s account has drawn scrutiny by skeptics, who have pointed out online that the number of deaths in the state is far below last spring. 

Author Jeffrey A. Tucker described Cobia’s post as “just too perfectly crafted in some way. It tells a story that fits a prevailing narrative in every respect, but leaves out any details about age and health of severe effects. And it ends predicting ‘impending doom’ for maskless kids in school.”

While Alabama has the lowest percentage of fully vaccinated people in the country – just 33.7 percent of the state’s population – the seven-day average of coronavirus deaths stood at eight as of Tuesday, far below the peak of 154 deaths that was reached in late January.

The majority of the infected patients currently in the hospital have not received the shot — and the one patient who has been vaccinated just needed a little oxygen and is expected to recover, Cobia told AL.com.

But some of the patients who were not vaccinated have not been as fortunate, she said.

“When I call time of death, I hug their family members and I tell them the best way to honor their loved one is to go get vaccinated and encourage everyone they know to do the same,” she wrote on Facebook.

“They cry. And they tell me they didn’t know. They thought it was a hoax. They thought it was political. They thought because they had a certain blood type or a certain skin color they wouldn’t get as sick. They thought it was ‘just the flu’. But they were wrong. And they wish they could go back. But they can’t.”

Cobia said she recommends that anyone who hasn’t been vaccinated reach out to their physician with questions.

“I try to be very non-judgmental when I’m getting a new COVID patient that’s unvaccinated, but I really just started asking them, ‘Why haven’t you gotten the vaccine?’ And I’ll just ask it point blank, in the least judgmental way possible,” she said. “And most of them, they’re very honest, they give me answers. ‘I talked to this person, I saw this thing on Facebook, I got this email, I saw this on the news,’ you know, these are all the reasons that I didn’t get vaccinated.”

“And the one question that I always ask them is, did you make an appointment with your primary care doctor and ask them for their opinion on whether or not you should receive the vaccine? And so far, nobody has answered yes to that question,” she continued.

Across the country, at least 99% of COVID-19 deaths and 97% of hospitalizations are among people who have not been vaccinated, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Spread To 15 Chinese Cities

An Outbreak Of The Coronavirus Delta Variant Has Spread To 15 Chinese Cities

SCOTT NEUMAN

More than a year and a half after the coronavirus was first detected in China — followed by the world's first big wave of COVID-19 — the country is again battling to stem the spread of new cases attributed to the more infectious delta variant of the virus.

The latest outbreak was first discovered in the eastern city of Nanjing, in the coastal province of Jiangsu south of the capital, Beijing. In the past week, it has quickly spread to 15 cities across the country, the South China Morning Post reports.

In the most recent outbreak, the first case was detected on July 20 in a passenger arriving from Russia at the international airport in Nanjing — a city of more than 9 million. Since then, at least 184 new infections have been found, Reuters reports.

"The number of cases reported has climbed recently," deputy director general of the Nanjing Centre for Disease Control and Prevention Ding Jie said on Tuesday, the South China Morning Post reported. "Early cases transmitted among aircraft cabin cleaners quickly and spread further through social activities and work environment contamination."

"We tracked down a large number of close contacts and have been testing them. New cases are constantly being discovered," Ding said.

All flights from Nanjing have been canceled until Aug. 11, the Communist Party-controlled Global Times said earlier this week. It said the number of flights in and out of the city had been reduced since Monday.

The latest outbreak "may prove to be of a larger scale than the previous outbreak in Guangzhou, South China's Guangdong Province" that first hit in May, the Global Times reported.

Losing their homes......

The eviction ban is ending, putting millions at risk of losing their homes

By Anna Bahney

Ronald Leonard expects the sheriff to arrive at the door of his Daytona Beach, Florida, home any day after the federal ban on evictions expires on Saturday.

"I'm kind of a wreck," said Leonard, a retiree who lives on a fixed income. "If I end up on the street, I'll never survive."

Like many of the 11.4 million people currently behind on their rent, Leonard was able to remain in his home after his landlord filed for an eviction because of the federal eviction moratorium. Put in place by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention last September to stop the spread of coronavirus, the order banned the eviction of renters for nonpayment of rent.

The CDC moratorium -- controversial and confusing from the start, and continually up against a moving expiration deadline -- was always a "Band-Aid on a wound that needed to be healed," said David Dworkin, president and CEO of the National Housing Conference.

The White House announced Thursday that it would not ask the CDC to again extend the protection, which expires on July 31, and called on Congress to take action. The Biden administration would have liked to extend it (it has been extended four times already) given the rise in the spread of Covid cases due to the Delta variant, but White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki cited the Supreme Court's ruling that, "clear and specific congressional authorization" -- new legislation -- would be needed for the CDC to extend the moratorium past its current deadline.

The House Rules Committee meets on Friday to consider a bill to extend the federal eviction moratorium through December. But there isn't wide bipartisan support and it faces an uncertain future in the Senate.

The CDC eviction moratorium and other protections have prevented an estimated 2.2 million eviction filings since March 2020, according to Peter Hepburn, a research fellow at the Eviction Lab and assistant professor of sociology at Rutgers University-Newark.

"These moratoria and protections, they haven't been perfect, but they've undeniably had a massive effect in preventing eviction filings," Hepburn said.

This comes as an unprecedented amount of federal rental relief -- $46 billion -- works its way through states, cities and local distribution points to the landlords and tenants who need it. The aid is the last lifeline that many renters can grab on to. But for many, it won't come in time.

Nowhere to go

Leonard, 68, rented his one-bedroom apartment from Tzadik Park, at the end of March 2020, just as the pandemic was spreading across the country. It was to be a fresh start for him after a living situation with family members deteriorated. He planned to stay there for a year while he found a more permanent income-based retirement home.

The former heavy equipment operator lives on $1,159 in monthly Social Security income. With a monthly rent of $819, including utilities, housing costs took up 75% of his income. But he could pay it, even as he struggled to furnish his empty apartment with basics. After July, when his doctor told him to stay in the house for protection from the virus, his expenses went up. He had to pay more for necessities and to have them delivered and he fell behind on rent.

When his rent was not paid in March 2021, along with $1,433 in back rent after several months of partial payments and hundreds more in late fees for not paying in full, his landlord filed for eviction.

Leonard is now $5,688 behind on rent, according to Christina Alletto, chief people officer at Tzadik Properties, which owns and manages Tzadik Park and apartment buildings in more than six states.

He found some security by invoking the CDC protection and applied for rental assistance. But his landlord would not accept the funds, he said.

In an email to CNN Business, Alletto said the company worked with him, providing the necessary documentation to apply for the rent relief, but the assistance he was applying for covered just one month's rent, not the full balance.

"Mr. Leonard stated in his letter to [apply for the] assistance that he bought new furniture with his stimulus check instead of paying rent, so they denied him further assistance," Alletto said, referring to the distributor of rental assistance.

Leonard says he had been sleeping on the floor for many months after he moved into the apartment because he hadn't been able to buy a mattress. He said he spent $69 on an air mattress.

Alletto said Tzadik continues to accept rent relief funds and is willing to work with struggling tenants. "Eviction is always a last resort after all other avenues have been explored with each individual resident," she said in the email.

But Leonard, who until now had been protected by the CDC's eviction ban, is running out of avenues to explore. His last-ditch effort to remain in his home is a letter to the judge in the eviction case explaining that he now has an application pending for 12 months of rent relief and expects to receive it, but does not think it will arrive before the eviction ban expires.

With medical problems and nowhere to go but "out on the street," he asked for more time in his handwritten letter. "All the rent will be paid but I don't know if it will be paid by the 31st of July....Please help me so I don't lose everything I own."

Millions at risk of eviction

There are millions of renters like Leonard at risk of eviction as the clock ticks down on the precarious protection. More than 3 million people said they were likely to be evicted "within the next two months," according to a Census survey from early July and nearly 5 million renters said they won't be able to pay August rent, according to the same survey.

Unable to extend the protection, the Biden administration has shifted its focus to accelerating rent relief distribution, streamlining applications and encouraging communities to create off-ramps so that millions of people don't fall off of an eviction cliff.

"We've known for nearly a year that the eviction moratorium would eventually come to an end," said Dworkin. "In December, Congress appropriated $25 billion to assist renters. We have had seven months to spend that money. There is no excuse that it is not in the hands of those who need it the most."

While some states and localities are doing better than others in getting the money out, only a fraction of the full $46 billion committed to rent relief -- including money from the December stimulus and the American Rescue Plan -- has made its way to renters and landlords.

"We are seeing the leading edge of the eviction crisis," said Dworkin. "It will be concentrated in states that have the heaviest impact and least tenant protections."

States where residents have the greatest risk of eviction include South Carolina, Mississippi, Georgia, Alabama and New Jersey, according to an Eviction Risk Insights report from UrbanFootprint, an urban planning data company. Its research also shows that Black renters are at more than double the risk of eviction compared to White renters, with about 25% of the at-risk population Black and 11% White.

Areas where people are most likely to be evicted are also areas more likely to have lower vaccination rates, according to research from the Eviction Lab.

"Given low vaccination rates in areas at highest risk of eviction and the rapid spread of the Delta variant of Covid-19, the public health case for an eviction moratorium is every bit as strong today as it was when the CDC originally instituted the policy," said Hepburn.

Finding new protections

Valeria Allieti, a single mother who lives in Las Vegas, found her income upended when the pandemic kept her from cleaning houses.

She fell behind on the $1,270 a month rent she pays for the four-bedroom house she shares with her three sons. But she found protection under the eviction moratorium.

Allieti said she was reluctant to apply for rent relief -- accustomed as she was to being a single mom who needs to fix the problem herself.

"I don't feel I'm powerful because of the moratorium," she said through a translator. "I feel like a bad person. I have always been able to do it by myself."

But she now owes about $6,000 in back rent and sees applying for assistance as her best protection against eviction after the CDC moratorium expires.

Nevada has extended its eviction protection to those who are in the process of applying for rental assistance. The state has also passed a law to seal eviction records from the pandemic.

"Despite the eviction moratorium and the tenant protections we've won, we're facing an uphill battle," said Lalo Montoya, political director and housing justice coordinator at Make the Road Nevada.

For Allieti, that means waiting as patiently as she can for the rent relief to arrive so she can pay what she owes and stay in her home.

"Right now I feel that I can't focus on my day-to-day," Allieti said. "I feel like I'm lost in the clouds. I'm worried about the prospect of losing our home, of the uncertainty about what could happen."

How CORRUPT? This corrupt!

Trump to DOJ last December: 'Just say that the election was corrupt + leave the rest to me'

By Jeremy Herb

Former President Donald Trump pressured his incoming acting Attorney General Jeffrey Rosen to declare that the election was corrupt in an attempt to help Republican members of Congress try to overturn the election result, according to notes of a December 2020 call Trump held with Rosen and acting deputy attorney general Richard Donoghue.

Donoghue provided the House Oversight Committee with his contemporaneous notes from the December 27 call Trump held with Rosen and Donoghue, who took over the top spots at DOJ in the final weeks of Trump's presidency following the resignation of Attorney General William Barr.

During the call, Trump pressured Rosen and Donoghue to falsely declare the election "illegal" and "corrupt" even after the Justice Department had not uncovered evidence of widespread voter fraud.

"Just say that the election was corrupt + leave the rest to me and the R. Congressmen," Trump said on the call, according to Donoghue's notes.

The notes are the latest evidence of Trump's efforts to pressure the Justice Department to try to support his false claims of election fraud as he tried to overturn his November loss to Joe Biden. Those efforts are now the subject of a new House select committee that's investigating the January 6 attack on the Capitol carried out by pro-Trump supporters to try to stop the certification of Biden's election win, in addition to the investigation into Trump's election fraud claims by the House Oversight Committee.

"These handwritten notes show that President Trump directly instructed our nation's top law enforcement agency to take steps to overturn a free and fair election in the final days of his presidency," House Oversight Chairwoman Carolyn Maloney said in a statement.

Senseless, self-inflicted wound.........

ER Doctor: 'What a senseless, self-inflicted wound'

Opinion by Alex Busko

During my final months of residency training in Florida this past spring, I lost count of how many young, healthy Covid-19 patients I cared for in the emergency room who just never imagined that they -- of all people -- could become seriously ill.

In the early stages of the pandemic, my sickest patients were almost exclusively older people with chronic health problems. But after the vaccine rollout and the giddy days of "reopening" -- followed by the arrival of the more contagious Delta variant -- all that changed.

Now the patients I see, frightened and struggling to breathe, are mostly in their 30s, 40s and 50s. They come from different racial and socioeconomic backgrounds. Many of them have no identifiable risk factors. The one thing many of them have in common: They are all unvaccinated.

The more than 40% of Americans who remain unvaccinated now account for 97% of all Covid-19 hospitalizations and 99.2% of deaths. Hundreds of Americans are dying every day from a vaccine-preventable illness.

About seven months ago, at the beginning of the vaccine rollout, the United States was averaging more than 3,000 deaths each day -- for nearly a month. The surge in cases back then pushed hospitals across this country to their breaking point. People with cancer and chronic illnesses had their treatments interrupted. Without the tens of millions of Americans who lined up to get the vaccine last winter, there is no telling how long that would have gone on.

Half of America has rolled up its sleeve and done its part so we can all move on from this. My colleagues and I have been working tirelessly for over a year to end this pandemic. But here we are, staring down the barrel of yet another wave of death. What a senseless, self-inflicted wound.

One patient I cared for, an unvaccinated man in his late 30s, was only a few days into his illness and was already severely short of breath and requiring oxygen. Neither his clinical appearance nor his chest X-ray was particularly encouraging. I told him that there was a good chance he would get worse and that he would need to be admitted to the hospital. He asked me if I could give him the vaccine before he got worse, seemingly unaware that it does not treat the disease or cure you once you become infected.

Many of my patients exhibit stunning levels of ignorance when it comes to this disease and the vaccine, which, it's worth noting, has so far saved an estimated 275,000 lives and prevented over a million hospitalizations in the US alone, according to research from Yale University and the Commonwealth Fund.

The list of debunked myths and misinformation I hear -- presented to me as fact -- grows longer by the day. No wonder the US Surgeon General has called Covid-19 misinformation an "urgent threat" to public health.

I hear often from patients that the vaccine development was "rushed" or that it hasn't been "studied enough" despite the fact that the Covid-19 vaccine was assessed for safety in tens of thousands of patients -- far more than widely-used drugs like Viagra were. More than 3.8 billion doses have been administered worldwide, over 340 million of them right here in the US.

Many of these same patients, unwilling to be what they term as vaccine "guinea pigs," end up hospitalized, deeply regretting their decision. Ironically, pretty much every therapy that hospitals have used to treat Covid-19 -- like dexamethasone, remdesivir, hydroxychloroquine, and monoclonal antibodies like tocilizumab, sotrovimab, bamlanivimab -- has far less data behind it than the vaccine does.

Another young man in his 20s with no pre-existing medical conditions was admitted to a Florida hospital in the spring after catching Covid-19 at a concert. He quickly ended up on a ventilator. Though I was not involved in his care, the story has been widely reported by CNN and others. He spent several months in the intensive care unit and ended up on extracorporeal membrane oxygenation, or ECMO, a last-ditch therapy that uses a machine to oxygenate your blood outside of the body. He ultimately underwent a double lung transplant and is expected to recover.

Many young women tell me they are concerned about infertility or miscarriage, despite there being zero scientific evidence to support such fears. In fact, there is now a large body of evidence that vaccination is safe before and during pregnancy, and it's recommended by both the American College of Obstetricians & Gynecologists and the American Society for Reproductive Medicine.

The risk to mom and baby posed by Covid-19 is real and cannot be overstated. Pregnancy increases a woman's risk of severe illness, respiratory failure requiring intubation and death from Covid-19. Pregnant women are also more likely to go into premature labor, and their baby is more likely to require admission to the neonatal intensive care unit.

I will never forget some of the pregnant women I have seen with this disease. Early on in the rollout, one young woman I cared for, so young she did not yet qualify for the vaccine, presented severe respiratory failure, and she underwent an emergency Caesarean section to save her baby. In the ICU, she developed multi-organ failure and spent weeks in critical condition. Her child will never truly understand how close he came to growing up without a mom.

It sounds strange to say this, but the patients I've just described are some of the lucky ones. We still do not understand why this virus causes mild symptoms in some people but severe organ failure and death in others. I have seen bedbound nursing home patients get asymptomatic infections and teenagers end up on ventilators, and I have read numerous case reports of young athletes in peak physical condition who die from this. I cannot urge people strongly enough not to mistake their youth or good health for invincibility.

When it was first reported that an American contracted this disease in January 2020, we knew virtually nothing about the virus and even less about how best to treat it. By December, the Food and Drug Administration had given emergency use authorization to two vaccines with over 90% efficacy against Covid-19. A generation ago, there's no telling how many years that would have taken.

In the beginning, ending up on a ventilator was basically a death sentence. Now, if you become that sick, there's a decent chance we can save your life. The one thing we haven't figured out yet is how to convince someone to save their own.

Cry babies...

Japanese athletes face Chinese nationalists' wrath after beating China at Olympics

By Nectar Gan

Some of Japan's victorious Olympic athletes have been subjected to a storm of online abuse from Chinese nationalists following the defeat of their Team China opponents in Tokyo.

As of Friday afternoon in Japan, China and the hosts occupied the top two places in the medal table, with a number of events pitting Chinese athletes directly against their longtime rivals for places on the podium. And that's raised temperatures on social media.

On Wednesday, Japan's Daiki Hashimoto won gold in the men's all-around gymnastics final, edging out China's Xiao Ruoteng by 0.4 points. At just 19 years old, Hashimoto is the youngest gymnast to ever win the event.

As Japan celebrates his victory, some in China questioned the fairness of the result and accused the judges of favoritism toward the hosts by allegedly inflating Hashimoto's score on the vault.

The anger, first set off on Chinese social media, soon spilled over to platforms typically censored in China. Chinese nationalist trolls circumvented the Great Firewall and descended on Hashimoto's Instagram account, inundating his feed with angry comments and tagging him in insulting posts.

Many called Hashimoto Japan's "national humiliation," while others accused him of stealing China's gold medal. Some even tagged him in photos of the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

Some of the accounts attacking Hashimoto appeared to be created specially for this purpose, with their entire feeds filled with posts targeting the Japanese gymnast.

Hashimoto later changed the privacy settings on Instagram, so he could no longer be tagged on the platform -- but angry comments have kept pouring in under his posts.

The attacks and harassment are emblematic of the rising tide of ultranationalism sweeping through social media in China, which has silenced many of the country's more liberal and moderate voices online. The nationalist sentiment against Japan has often flared, due to deep-rooted rancor against Japan's invasion of China in World War II.

Other Chinese netizens criticized the online abuse and called for an end to it, but they were also attacked.

In recent years, Chinese nationalists have launched massive online trolling campaigns against those they regard as Beijing's political foes, including Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen and Hong Kong's pro-democracy protesters. They also lashed out at Australian Olympic swimmer Mack Horton at the 2016 Rio Games, after he called China's Sun Yang a "drug cheat."

Following the latest controversy, the International Gymnastics Federation (FIG) issued a statement Thursday expounding on Hashimoto's score, including a detailed list of the imperfections.

"The FIG can assess that the 14.7 score obtained by Hashimoto on this apparatus is correct in regards to the Code of Points, and so is the final ranking," the statement concluded.

In an Instagram post on Thursday evening, Hashimoto expressed gratitude for the support he received, while acknowledging he had received abusive comments on social media.

"You may think the score of the Vault might be unfair, but FIG has given its verdict on the official scoring result...We have to accept the result as it is even it is very difficult to take in," he wrote.

"The Tokyo Olympics is not over yet...I do hope there will be less smear comments and more praises for the athletes," he added, sharing a photo of himself, Xiao and the Russian Olympic Committee's Nikita Nagornyy posing together with medals.

A wider problem

The nationalist rage against Hashimoto followed attacks on Mima Ito and Jun Mizutani, the Japanese table tennis duo who narrowly defeated the Chinese team to win the first-ever gold medal in mixed doubles Monday.

On Wednesday, Mizutani said on Twitter that he had received a torrent of messages attacking him, without directly mentioning China.

"Got tons of DM from a country telling me to 'Go to hell! P*ss off!', but I'm totally OK as I'm used to such comments. I'm just happy that I got the whole word excited. All messages from Japanese are cheering me, thank you!" he wrote in the tweet, which was later deleted.

Ito, who has an account on Weibo, China's heavily censored version of Twitter, had to shut down her feed due to an onslaught of hate comments. She was also attacked on Instagram, where fans have organized themselves to support her against the abuse, leaving encouraging comments and tagging her in positive posts to drown out hate messages.

The attacks have since drawn wide attention in Japan, making headlines and sparking anger on social media.

Speaking at a news conference Thursday, Japan's Chief Cabinet Secretary Katsunobu Kato said he was aware of the incidents, although not the details.

"We, as the government, believe any discrimination should not be allowed," he said. "It is also against the Tokyo Olympics' spirits. We ask everyone to let the athletes to concentrate on their matches so they can do their best."

Elsewhere, other Olympic athletes have also faced social media trolling, including America's Simone Biles.

Biles, one of the greatest gymnasts of all time, withdrew from the individual all-around competition this week to focus on her mental health. While the 24-year-old has received an outpouring of support for her decision, she has also been viciously attacked by trolls.

On Twitter, some Indian swimmers were trolled for failing to qualify for the semifinals.

Addressing the problem at a news conference Friday, International Olympic Committee (IOC) spokesperson Mark Adams said he didn't think the IOC could give advice to athletes individually, but he stressed that online abuse has "no place in sport."

"Such trolling...or aggression is really, really not acceptable and we would completely go against that and support the athletes in every way," he said.

Hmmmm, not good...

NASA’s Boeing Orbital Flight Test-2 Mission

NASA and Boeing have decided to stand down from Friday’s launch attempt of the agency’s Orbital Flight Test-2 mission. Currently, launch teams are assessing the next available opportunity. The move allows the International Space Station team time to continue working checkouts of the newly arrived Roscosmos’ Nauka module and to ensure the station will be ready for Starliner’s arrival.

Flor-i-daaaaaaaaaaaa

Florida officials defy DeSantis as infections spike

By MATT DIXON 

Florida’s Covid wars are starting again.

Local officials across Florida are bucking Gov. Ron DeSantis and his anti-mandate coronavirus strategy as infections soar in the state and nation. They’re imposing vaccine and mask requirements for government workers and even declaring states of emergency. In a sign of how worrisome the new Covid-19 surge is, Disney World is ordering all guests over 2-years-old to wear masks indoors at its Florida theme park, regardless of vaccination status.

The new pandemic regulations were announced Wednesday, a day after Florida reported over 16,000 new cases — the highest one-day total since mid-January when the vaccine was not widely available. The local mandates also came as DeSantis reiterated that the state will resist any pandemic-related regulations, even as it remains one of the worst hotspots in America.

“It is very important that we say unequivocally ‘no’ to lockdowns, no to school closures, no to restrictions and no to mandates,” DeSantis said Wednesday night in Salt Lake City, where he was the keynote speaker at a conference hosted by the conservative American Legislative Exchange Council.

The current fight mirrors the clash between DeSantis and local officials that consumed Florida during the pandemic last year, but with a new deadly twist: People continue to resist vaccinations even as the highly infectious Delta Covid variant sweeps through America.

DeSantis raised his national profile last year by declaring Florida was open for business, resisting lockdowns and mask mandates. He used the last legislative session to push for measures that strengthened his hands-off coronavirus approach, convincing the GOP-led Legislature to approve a statewide ban on vaccine passports. He’s also warned lawmakers that he would call them back to Tallahassee for a special legislative session to block the Biden administration if it institutes a nationwide mask mandate for students.

But the current infection crisis threatens to derail DeSantis’ successes ahead of his 2022 reelection campaign and possible bid for president in 2024. Already, Rep. Charlie Crist (D-Fla.) and Agriculture Commissioner Nikki Fried, the two biggest-name Democrats running to challenge DeSantis in 2022, have used Florida’s recent surge to hammer the governor. Crist criticized DeSantis this week for sending a fundraising email focused on claims he would “hold Fauci accountable” while Fried said she will begin hosting regular briefings to update the public on Covid and vaccination rates in the state.

And with no state-level policy response to the recent infection spike, local government officials are rushing to fill the void.

Orange County Mayor Jerry Demings, husband to Democratic U.S. Senate candidate and Rep. Val Demings, has declared a state of emergency and is requiring the county’s 4,200 nonunion workers to get vaccinated by the end of September. Leon County announced it’s also imposing a vaccine requirement for county workers. Miami-Dade Mayor Daniella Levine Cava mandated masks at all county facilities. And in Broward County, school board officials are keeping in place mask mandates for students in the next school year despite DeSantis’ vocal opposition.

“I want to show our residents and visitors Orange County is being proactive,” Jerry Demings said during a press conference this week. “We remain focused on lowering our numbers of hospitalizations.”

The cascade of new local Covid-19 regulations comes months after lawmakers approved a DeSantis-championed law that now allows the governor or GOP-dominated legislature to invalidate local orders, including those tied to the pandemic, if they decide the order “unnecessarily restricts a constitutional right, fundamental liberty, or statutory right.”

Christina Pushaw, DeSantis’ spokesperson, downplayed the response from local governments, saying Orange County’s mayor “is making a recommendation and asking for voluntary compliance, which is not the same thing as a mandate.” She added that recommendations “don’t run afoul of state law.”

She said that private companies like Disney are allowed to institute their own mask policies but reiterated that there could be a special legislative session “to ensure that all Florida school districts are mask optional.”

The schools issue has the potential to be the most contentious. Last week, 6,999 children under the age of 12 contracted Covid-19 in Florida, which was nearly 10 percent of the 73,199 new cases across the state last week, according to the Florida Department of Health, which no longer does daily reporting.

Last week, the positive rate for those under 12 — a segment of the population that can’t get vaccinated yet — was at 15.4 percent, higher than the 15.1 percent average for all ages. A Jacksonville TV station on Wednesday reported that the city’s Baptist Health is treating 13 children who contracted Covid-19, five of whom are in intensive care.

“We are all elected to protect students and employees,” Broward board member Sarah Leonardi said. “It’s my feeling that just because the governor doesn’t want to act in the best interest of his constituents, that does not absolve us from our responsibility.”

But DeSantis has steadfastly maintained that schools should not require students to wear masks, saying at a press conference last week that “we’re not doing that in Florida. OK? We need our kids to breathe.”

In a sign of how nationalized the fight has become, the Republican Governors Association, which has given $3 million to DeSantis’ political committee ahead of his 2022 re-election, has been trying to give DeSantis political cover. On Wednesday, it hit Fried and Crist over what the group says is message inconsistency over Covid-19 regulations.

“It’s going to be a long year watching Nikki Fried and Charlie Crist twist themselves into pretzels as they balance winning over their far-left base with what’s best for the people of Florida,” said Joanna Rodriguez, the group’s communications director.

Not Funny....

 

Capitol security bill

House passes Capitol security bill, sending to Biden's desk

The $2.1 billion compromise bill addresses security shortfalls around the Capitol complex.

By NICHOLAS WU

Both the House and Senate on Thursday easily passed a bill addressing Capitol security concerns exacerbated by the Jan. 6 insurrection, following weeks of deadlock.

The $2.1 billion compromise bill plugs security shortfalls around the Capitol complex, fully reimburses the National Guard and Capitol Police for increased staffing needs, provides $1.125 billion in relief for Afghan nationals who assisted the U.S. war effort, and increases the number of visas set aside for the Afghans by 8,000.

No senators voted against it and the House passed it 416-11.

“We have to make a strong statement of support for those officers who defended the building and all that it stands for on that terrible day,” said Appropriations Chair Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.) on the Senate floor.

And Sen. Richard Shelby (R-Ala.), the top Senate Republican appropriator, applauded the bill as proof they could “work together in a bipartisan way.”

The compromise comes just days after U.S. Capitol Police and Metropolitan Police Department officers gave emotional testimony to a House panel about the violence they endured during the worst attack on the Capitol since the War of 1812. Facing increased costs after the insurrection, both the USCP and National Guard faced a potential cash crunch heading into August.

Republicans had originally panned Democrats’ offer as too expensive and questioned whether the provisions supporting Afghan nationals needed to be included in the legislation. Several Republican senators had placed holds on the bill as they voiced their concerns.

The House took up the bill soon after Senate passage under a fast-track process. It earned overwhelming support from the House despite opposition from an unlikely group that included progressives like Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) and conservatives like Rep. Chip Roy (R-Texas).

Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.) said she voted against the legislation because she wanted an investigation before it advanced. She said she believed "we have to stop giving more resources in response to any time there is some level of incompetence or underpreparedness.”

Others who opposed the legislation groused about the speed at which the bill came up for a vote.

"We need time to read and digest these these bills before" they're voted on, said Rep. Jamaal Bowman (D-N.Y.), who said he was also concerned about an increase in Capitol Police funding.

Roy, an antagonist to both parties, was similarly irked by the speed of the vote, calling the legislation a "procedural sham" and saying it was "unacceptable" for lawmakers to be forced to vote on legislation so soon after the Senate passed it.

Afghan interpreters arrive

As Afghan interpreters arrive in the U.S., State eyes more flights in August

The 200 Afghans are the first of roughly 700 in the final stages of relocating to the United States.

By LARA SELIGMAN

The State Department is looking to evacuate a second round of Afghan interpreters from Kabul in August, according to the head of the task force newly created to coordinate the effort.

The group, which will be flown to countries outside of the U.S., will include roughly 4,000 applicants for the State Department’s special immigrant visa program and their family members. The total number of people in this second group to be evacuated and eventually brought to the U.S. could reach up to 20,000, including both applicants and family members, Ambassador Tracey Jacobson told POLITICO in an interview from the task force’s State Department headquarters.

The news comes as the first applicants began arriving in the U.S. early Friday morning. Just over 200 Afghans, including applicants and their family members, began the long flight from Kabul on Thursday and were expected to be transported to Fort Lee, an Army base in Virginia, where they will spend several days completing the final medical and administrative checks required to complete their applications, Russ Travers, deputy homeland security adviser, told reporters Thursday.

The two tranches represent only a portion of the Afghans in the special immigrant visa pipeline, which totals roughly 20,000, not counting family members.

The State Department stood up the task force on July 19 to lead the administration’s effort to relocate thousands of Afghans who risked their lives to help the U.S. war effort over the past 20 years and are now seeking to resettle in the United States through the special immigrant visa program. In parallel, the Pentagon formed a crisis action group to support the State Department-led effort, Garry Reid, DoD’s lead for the effort, told POLITICO.

The Biden administration has taken heat for its slow response to the crisis. But Jacobson praised the work of the task force, saying it has been “a force multiplier” for the SIV application process.

”It’s speedier, it’s more focused and it’s more collaborative,” she said. “I’ve watched it happen several times here: an issue comes up and all the right people are standing there to resolve it rather than have it done over time.”

The 200 Afghans who arrived Friday are part of a first tranche of roughly 700 applicants in the final stages of the process to relocate to the United States over the next few weeks. They have already completed “the majority” of their application process, including “rigorous” security background checks, Travers said. The total number in the first tranche, including family members, is expected to be 2,500 people, he said.

In Kabul, the applicants were tested for Covid, completed fitness-to-fly exams, and were offered vaccines, Jacobson said. A number of applicants who tested positive for Covid were not able to board the flight, and must quarantine in accordance with CDC guidelines before they can get on another flight, Jacobson said.

After they are admitted into the United States on a temporary basis, at Fort Lee they will undergo the necessary medical tests, including bloodwork, and receive vaccines for measles and polio, which are prevalent in Afghanistan, said Kelli Ann Burriesci, acting DHS undersecretary for Strategy, Policy and Plans. Then they will be resettled in cities across the country through the refugee admission program.

Burriesci praised the work of the task force in recent weeks, as the Taliban rapidly gained ground in Afghanistan. DHS is responsible for helping the applicants complete the immigration process once they have arrived in the United States.

“There is an urgency I think that a lot of us feel to save these true teammates of the U.S. government,” she said. “These people left everything behind. They’re coming here with a suitcase. And they need our support.”

In the meantime, the task force is working to relocate a second batch of 4,000 applicants and their family members — who, like the first group, fear retaliation from the Taliban for aiding the American war effort but aren't as far along in their application process.

While Jacobson would not say to which countries these Afghans would be going, POLITICO reported that the administration is in final talks with Qatar and Kuwait to relocate the individuals to U.S. military bases in those nations.

Instead of going through Fort Lee, these Afghans will complete their final vetting in another country before coming to the United States as immigrants, she said. Consular officers will be on site in that country to issue their visas, in accordance with the usual process.

The State Department asked DoD to be prepared to start receiving individuals from the second group as early as Thursday, Reid said, but he is not currently aware of any specific flight plans.

At least two locations will likely be needed to accommodate all 20,000 people, Reid said. It’s likely the department will need to erect temporary structures to meet the demand, he said. DoD is planning for the applicants to remain in the locations for roughly 9 to 12 months to complete their processing.

“This is very important to the secretary, it’s very important to all of our defense department personnel, certainly our military personnel that have personal experiences with these folks that have partnered with us on the ground,” Reid said. “Let’s do everything we can to make this a success.”

Mask mandate enforcement

GOP lawmaker challenges McCarthy over 'bullshit' mask mandate enforcement

There's mounting fury on the right about efforts to enforce the new House requirement as Covid's Delta variant spreads.

By OLIVIA BEAVERS

Rep. Chip Roy confronted House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy on Thursday about a new Capitol Police bulletin that suggests congressional staffers and visitors could be arrested if they fail to heed the chamber's new mask mandate.

“This is bulls---. We need to lead,” Roy, a member of the conservative House Freedom Caucus, told McCarthy during a brief meeting of GOP lawmakers in a Capitol reception room, according to two sources familiar with the exchange.

McCarthy replied to a frustrated Roy that his plan is to win back the majority in 2022 and become speaker, the sources said. Their back-and-forth illustrates the mounting fury on the right about efforts by Capitol security officials to enforce mask-wearing rules amid the surge of Covid's Delta variant.

A Capitol Police guidance flier circulated Thursday morning by Rep. Kat Cammack (R-Fla.) states: "If a visitor or staff member fails to wear a mask after a request is made to do so, the visitor or staff shall be denied entry" to House office buildings or the House side of the Capitol.

"Any person who fails to either comply or leave the premises after being asked to do so would be subject to an arrest for Unlawful Entry,” the flier continues.

The guidance made clear that members who fail to comply with the mask mandate won’t be arrested, but would be “reported to the House Sergeant at Arms’ Office.”

Cammack tweeted the guidance and argued that it was an “abuse of power” by Speaker Nancy Pelosi and the Capitol Police to propose arresting staffers, even those who are vaccinated.

"The Speaker of the House does not control the U.S. Capitol Police," Pelosi deputy chief of staff Drew Hammill said. "We were unaware of the [mask-related] memo until it was reported in the press."

Freshman Rep. Madison Cawthorn (R-N.C.) took it a step further, and offered to pay the bond of any staffer who is ultimately arrested for violating the mask guidance. The Capitol Police later walked back the guidance, writing in a statement that there is "no reason it should ever come to someone being arrested” and that anyone who does not follow the rule will be asked to “to wear a mask or leave the premises.”

The bulletin comes as Republicans are already hitting the Capitol physician for reimposing a mask mandate in the House when face coverings are not required across the building in the Senate. The mask requirement was put back in place as Covid cases rise in the Capitol, particularly in the House.

House Republicans met with the Attending Physician Brian Monahan behind closed doors on Wednesday, hoping to get answers about new guidance this week that said masks must be worn in inside spaces. They walked out with a handful of new criticisms and another health official at whom to direct their ire.

House Republicans pressed Monahan about basing his new mask mandate off information from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention that is in part unpublished or not fully vetted. In particular, they raised issue with the CDC citing a study in India “with vaccines not authorized for use in the United States” that noted “relatively high viral loads and larger cluster sizes associated with infections with Delta, regardless of vaccination status.” The CDC linked to it as a citation on its website when discussing Covid variants, but the study has yet to go through “peer review” according to the journal that published it.

The agency also acknowledged that the "interpretation of these data is challenging" because the variant of the virus and the local variation change with time.

Health experts and now Republicans are asking why the CDC didn't publish that unreleased data when health officials made new recommendations about wearing masks earlier this week. GOP members argue Monahan should've looked into that data when making health decisions for Congress.

Broadly, Republicans are arguing that the new mask mandate from Monahan and the Biden administration will increase vaccine hesitancy, just as Republicans are increasingly urging their constituents to get protected. Voters who identify as Republican are less likely to be vaccinated than Democrats.

Democrats and some health experts argue masks are necessary with new information that large amounts of the Covid Delta variant can harbor in both vaccinated and unvaccinated people.

The heated Republican meeting with the attending physician was just the tip of the iceberg.

McCarthy and dozens of House Republicans stood on the Capitol steps Thursday attacking Pelosi and the Biden administration’s policies, hammering both the new mask mandate and the USCP bulletin. Members of the House Freedom Caucus also marched Thursday across from the Senate to the House to protest the rules varying in the Senate.

Undo executive order

Garland urges Abbott to undo executive order aimed at curbing migration

The U.S. “intends to pursue all appropriate legal remedies" if the Texas order is not reversed.

By MAEVE SHEEHEY

Attorney General Merrick Garland urged Texas Gov. Greg Abbott to reverse his day-old executive order that aims to restrict migration at the border following a rise in Covid-19 cases.

The attorney general called Abbott’s order “both dangerous and unlawful” in a Thursday letter to the governor. “The Order violates federal law in numerous respects, and Texas cannot lawfully enforce the Executive Order against any federal official or private parties working with the United States,” Garland wrote.

The executive order, issued Wednesday, had the stated intention of “restricting ground transportation of migrants who pose a risk of carrying COVID-19 into Texas communities.” In it, Abbott ordered the Texas Department of Public Safety to stop and reroute vehicles suspected of violations.

Garland's letter also said Texas does not have authority to interfere with the federal government’s “broad, undoubted power over the subject of immigration.” The Texas governor, a potential 2024 Republican presidential candidate, has clashed with the U.S. government in the past on the topic of immigration, repeatedly berating the Biden administration’s border policies and recently saying the state will build a border wall on its own.

In the letter, Garland said if Abbott does not immediately rescind the order, the U.S. “intends to pursue all appropriate legal remedies to ensure that Texas does not interfere with the functions of the federal government.”

Among Garland’s stated concerns were that the order would jeopardize the health and safety of noncitizens in U.S. custody, that it would contribute to overcrowding in border facilities and that it would interfere with implementing federal immigration policy.

False election fraud claims

Trump’s false election fraud claims fuel Michigan GOP meltdown

The ex-president’s refusal to accept defeat is taking a toll on the party in a key battleground state.

By NOLAN D. MCCASKILL

Joe Biden defeated Donald Trump by more than 150,000 votes in Michigan last November.

Trump and the Michigan Republican Party still aren’t over it.

The outcome — and the former president’s obsessive efforts to dispute it — has left the state party in disarray, raising questions about the GOP’s focus as it looks to unseat Democratic Gov. Gretchen Whitmer in a top battleground state next year.

“From a staff and leadership perspective, I don’t know that top-notch professionals would want to go into this quagmire,” said Jeff Timmer, a former Michigan GOP executive director who opposed Trump. “Unless you’re going to talk crazy talk, they don’t want you there.”

Much of the trouble can be traced to the 2020 presidential election results, which Trump and his allies have alleged were marked by fraud without providing evidence.

An April report from the state Bureau of Elections on 250 post-election audits conducted across the state found “no examples of fraud or intentional misconduct by election officials and no evidence that equipment used to tabulate or report election results did not function properly when properly programmed and tested.” Likewise, a GOP-led state Senate Oversight Committee report released in June found “no evidence of widespread or systemic fraud.”

But some party officials and conservative activists continue to press for a “forensic audit” of the election results, encouraged by Trump, who has called on “American Republican Patriots” to run primary challenges against “RINO State Senators in Michigan who refuse to properly look into the election irregularities and fraud.”

One of the casualties of Trump’s efforts to spread the lie that Biden stole the election was Jason Roe, the party’s executive director, who resigned this month. Roe — whose father also served as executive director of the state GOP — first raised the ire of activists for telling POLITICO Magazine last year: “The election wasn’t stolen. [Trump] blew it.” Then, in May, Roe told the Michigan Information & Research Services podcast that Trump “was seemingly doing everything he could to lose a winnable race” and urged the party to move on from 2020.

The state party also lacks a communications director after Ted Goodman left to join former Detroit Police Chief James Craig’s campaign for governor. Goodman’s replacement, Kaitlyn Buss, resigned within a week.

“I chose to leave after two days because it was clear to me that the party, generally, was not willing to move past Trump, and I was not willing to go through that again,” she told POLITICO.

At the top of the party, Ron Weiser, chair of the Michigan GOP, has faced his own distractions. A Trump loyalist and prolific party donor, Weiser agreed this month to pay $200,000 out of his own pocket to settle a complaint filed by his predecessor, former Chair Laura Cox, over an alleged “payoff” to pressure a candidate into dropping out of the 2018 secretary of state’s race.

In April, Weiser, an elected University of Michigan regent, was censured by the Board of Regents for calling the state’s top three elected female Democrats “witches” and joking about the assassination of the two Michigan congressional Republicans who supported Trump’s second impeachment.

Weiser’s co-chair, Meshawn Maddock, has been a leading voice in spreading Trump’s baseless election fraud claims. She organized buses of Trump supporters to Washington, D.C., on the day of the Capitol riot, though Maddock has said she wasn’t involved in the rally and has condemned the breaching of the Capitol.

In a statement to POLITICO, Weiser dismissed the string of negative headlines, arguing that what really matters is “standing up for the great people of Michigan and the scoreboard next November.”

“The Michigan Republican Party is on track for victories in 2022. Period,” he said. “We are raising millions of dollars, we have a strong team in place, and our candidates are already out-polling Democrat incumbents without having spent a penny.”

Republican National Committee Chair Ronna McDaniel — a former Michigan GOP chair herself — shares Weiser’s confidence about the party’s ability to compete in the midterm elections.

“As a lifelong Michigander, I’m proud of the great work the MI GOP continues to accomplish on behalf of the Republican Party,” she said in a statement. “The phenomenal partnership between the MI GOP and the RNC will be instrumental in our efforts to hold Biden, Whitmer, and congressional Democrats accountable for their failures and ultimately take back the House and Governor’s mansion in 2022.”

Bill Ballenger, a political pundit and former GOP state legislator, suggested the big issue for the party isn’t how to stem the tide of negative stories but how it will ease the tension between the Trump wing and the more traditional establishment Republicans. Even more consequential, he argued, are the new political maps after an upcoming round of redistricting that will determine congressional and state legislative districts.

“A lot of this other stuff is unseemly and ugly appearing and embarrassing, obviously, to people involved, but when it gets right down to it, if they come up with a relatively strong gubernatorial nominee, I think they certainly are gonna be in a better position next year against Gretchen Whitmer,” Ballenger said. “That’s what you need to concentrate on when you’re trying to get a grip on the reality here in Michigan, not these ankle-biting, nitpicking stories on personal foibles and problems of obscure party officials that are not gonna be on the ballot.”

Still, some Republicans argue that their party is too focused on the last election to be competitive in the next one.

“They’ve gotta offer something other than their wish that we could somehow redo the 2020 elections,” said Bob LaBrant, a GOP strategist and former general counsel at the Michigan Chamber of Commerce. “I think there’s a strong segment of the party that are convinced that the only thing we need to do is do a forensic audit and somehow that will uncover all sorts of fraud.”

Establishment veterans like LaBrant, however, no longer dominate in a state party where loyalty to Trump is expected.

“As much as these washed up, has-beens want to create a story, there is no there, there,” said Dennis Lennox, a Republican consultant in Michigan. “Jeff Timmer’s only paycheck is from Democrats and the pedophile-enabling Lincoln Project to actively work against the Republican Party, while Bob LaBrant is merely trying to appease the Democrat governor to keep his sinecure on a gubernatorial appointed commission. They are effectively buying indulgences from ruling-class Democrats.”

Jason Watts, a former Allegan County GOP official who was ousted from his post as Sixth District treasurer this year after telling The New York Times that he didn’t vote for Trump in 2020, said the party is dwelling on the 2020 election when it should be prioritizing winning back the once-reliable suburban voters it has lost in recent years.

“We’re not focused on 2022, and I don’t see that changing,” Watts said. “Until we get beyond that, we’re going to suffer the consequences and lose in the next couple of cycles because we just can’t get off this circular firing squad of remorse, and somehow feeling that the other side cheated, when the evidence doesn’t show that at all.”

“It’s a near-toxic environment,” Watts said, “and I don’t think you see any signs of that dissipating.”

French fume

Taking liberties: French fume at Macron’s vaccination push

In Marseille, president’s coronavirus health pass isn’t going down well with everyone.

BY CLEA CAULCUTT

As France rushes to vaccinate its population amid a surge in infections, President Emmanuel Macron is getting tough — essentially telling people to get the jab or forfeit a return to normal life. 

It’s a strategy that has prompted waves of indignation in the country of Liberté, with protests bringing 160,000 people onto the streets across France last weekend. But nowhere is Macron's tough-love recipe being put to a greater test than in Marseille, the Mediterranean port city that has emerged as a flagbearer for COVID skepticism.

High levels of poverty, a tradition of defiance against the state and the influence of controversial virologist Didier Raoult, who touted an antimalarial drug to treat the coronavirus, make the southern city fertile ground for discontent.

Near the old port, Robert Farina runs Le Vacon bar, a drinking hole that has maybe seen better days. Shirt unbuttoned, fists pressed against the counter, he quips that he is a "100 percent dissenter."

“It’s a dictatorship,” he thundered. “Hasn’t Macron read what's written on our coins? It says Liberté, Égalité, Fraternité — what happened to liberty?”

As of August 9, Farina will have to scan all his customers' coronavirus immunity passes as access to bars, restaurants and hospitals — as well as trains, planes and coaches — will be conditional on customers showing digital or paper certificates proving immunity or vaccination. Businesses that break the rules risk temporary closure and a fine of up to €9,000.

“I have to do it, or I’ll get fined,” said Farina, who reluctantly got vaccinated. “They will unleash their guard dogs — the police — to check on us. But how am I going to manage, serving drinks, checking people inside and out there on the terrasse?”

Some of Farina’s drinkers already have their passes, but others don’t. One mischievously raised a tumbler of his own “medication” — a glass of pastis.

But for the government, this is no laughing matter. A fourth coronavirus wave, driven by the highly transmissible Delta variant, is hitting France hard, according to a government spokesperson, with the number of new cases hitting 19,000 a day, virtually double last week's levels.

The vaccination rate in the Provence-Alpes-Côte d’Azur region, where Marseille is the main city, is the lowest in mainland France. According to figures from France’s COVID Tracker, only 57 percent of the population have received the first dose.

Some partly blame the influence of Raoult, who controversially promoted hydroxychloroquine as a cheap treatment for the virus. He has since come out in favor of the COVID-19 vaccine but is seen as contributing to an atmosphere of distrust in the region.

Fighting on several fronts

A silent majority, however, approves of Macron’s coercive measures. According to a recent Ipsos poll, 62 percent of the French are in favor of the immunity pass, and close to 70 percent approve of the president's decision to introduce mandatory vaccines for health workers in hospitals, clinics and care homes.

But France’s battle to vaccinate the masses has several fronts.

Last week, the head of the country's COVID-19 advisory board, Jean-François Delfraissy, warned that a fourth wave of the virus risked hitting the poor hardest, due to low vaccination rates among the rural poor and residents of France's hard-up banlieues.

In a homeless shelter in one of Marseille’s inner-city neighborhoods, Anne Dutrey Kaiser and her team are vaccinating volunteers, many of them migrants who rarely see a doctor.

She runs a coronavirus outreach scheme, and battles every day to get people vaccinated. “It was like attacking a problem with a pair of tweezers,” said Dutrey Kaiser, who visits institutions and gets referrals from local medics. “Many people weren’t dead set against the vaccine, but were waiting for others to do it first.”

Macron’s announcement triggered a sea change in attitudes, she said, with more and more people taking the jab.

But there were still small setbacks. In one room, a woman told Dutrey Kaiser she only wanted one jab, not two. In another, a patient fainted, triggering a wave of panic among some of the volunteers.  

Sometimes, even the social workers don’t want to be vaccinated.

“People should be allowed to choose whether they want to take it or not,” said Kala Ali, an admin staffer who works at the homeless shelter. “I wear a mask and social distance, I’m not a threat to anyone.”

Bitterly, Ali said she overcame her fears due to past illnesses and decided to get vaccinated so she would be able to accompany her children on outings.

A political gamble

At the Palais des Sports mass vaccination center in Marseille, there’s a steady stream of arrivals coming for a first jab.

In the wake of Macron’s announcements, vaccination appointments here jumped from under 1,500 a day to 2,500.

It seems Macron is winning the arm wrestle with the recalcitrant French. But at what cost? In the queue here, many complain they are coming under duress.

Geoffroy, a hotel waiter who didn't want to give his surname, said the move has dented his trust in the president. “Macron promised he would not make the jab mandatory, and now, in effect, he has. I really don’t understand,” he said.  

Macron’s political gamble is that the masses will be jolted into getting vaccinated and the anger and mistrust will fade.

And, with 93 percent of Macron supporters backing the immunity passport, according to a recent poll, it may prove to be not such a gamble after all.

€746M

Amazon fined €746M for violating privacy rules

Tech giant plans to appeal, says spokesperson.

BY LAURA KAYALI AND VINCENT MANANCOURT

Luxembourg's data protection authority (CNPD) fined Amazon €746 million for not complying with EU's privacy rules, according to the company's latest filings. 

According to the filing, the decision was taken on July 16, and the regulator ruled that "Amazon’s processing of personal data did not comply with the EU General Data Protection Regulation."

"We believe the CNPD’s decision to be without merit and intend to defend ourselves vigorously in this matter," the company said in the filing. 

Asked about the ruling, an Amazon spokesperson said: "We strongly disagree with the CNPD’s ruling, and we intend to appeal. The decision relating to how we show customers relevant advertising relies on subjective and untested interpretations of European privacy law, and the proposed fine is entirely out of proportion with even that interpretation.”

The data protection authority is also asking for "practice revisions," which are not detailed in the document.  

The fine is higher than previously reported.

Stupid...

Some people in Missouri are getting vaccinated in secret to avoid backlash from loved ones, doctor says

By Aya Elamroussi

The Covid-19 vaccine has become so polarizing that some people in Missouri are getting inoculated in secret for fear of backlash from their friends and family who oppose vaccination, a doctor told CNN on Wednesday.

"They've had some experience that's sort of changed their mind from the viewpoint of those in their family, those in their friendship circles or their work circles. And they came to their own decision that they wanted to get a vaccine," said Dr. Priscilla Frase, a hospitalist and chief medical information officer at Ozarks Healthcare in West Plains, Missouri.

"They did their own research on it, and they talked to people and made the decisions themselves," Frase told CNN's Anderson Cooper. "But even though they were able to make that decision themselves, they didn't want to have to deal with the peer pressure or the outbursts from other people about them ... 'giving in to everything.'"

In a hospital produced video, Frase said one pharmacist at her hospital told her "they've had several people come in to get vaccinated who have tried to sort of disguise their appearance and even went so far as to say, 'please, please, please don't let anybody know that I got this vaccine.'"

Frase told CNN if a patient asks for privacy to get vaccinated, the hospital tries to accommodate the request -- whether at the drive-thru window or at their cars.

"Anything we can do to get people in a place that they're comfortable receiving the vaccine," Frase said. "It's not a large number, but every single person that we can reach who wants to get vaccinated and we can provide that for them, that's a win. And we take every win that we can get."

The doctor's assertion reflects the dramatic polarization of the Covid-19 vaccines and the extent to which vaccine skepticism has hardened into vaccine refusal.

Studies of the three authorized vaccines have shown that they are not 100% effective but nevertheless provide strong protection against infection and severe illness. The vast majority of people hospitalized and dying of Covid-19 are unvaccinated, the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has said.

Still, a Kaiser Family Foundation poll released earlier this month found that most people who'd made firm decisions one way or the other about their vaccination plans back in January hadn't budged since. Of those who were unvaccinated at the start of the year, only about 8% had changed their minds, the poll found.

Missouri has 41% of its population fully vaccinated against Covid-19, which ranks 13th-lowest among all US states, according to the CDC. The state has had some of the highest rates of new cases per capita in recent weeks as the coronavirus has preyed upon the unvaccinated.

Unvaccinated patients are getting sicker quicker

Frase said her hospital had 33 patients admitted with Covid-19 as of Wednesday and she's expecting that number to rise.

"The patients that are coming in are generally younger than what we saw before. It's more people requiring a lot more oxygen, a lot quicker," Frase said.

"The majority of people we've admitted have not been vaccinated," she added.

"The biggest thing that I think has been shocking for us is, back in the fall, in the winter, it took us four months to get to our peak admitted patients, which is around 22. It's taken us 30 days to exceed that and be up to 33 today." Frase said.

And it's not just Frase's hospital that is dealing with an influx of patients in Missouri.

The CoxHealth health system said it's expanding morgue capacity in due to an increase in Covid-19 related deaths.

"We've actually brought in a portable piece of technology that allows bodies to be cooled and placed outside the morgue. We have had to expand that because the mortality has gone up so much lately," CoxHealth President and CEO Steve Edwards said during a news briefing in Springfield-Greene County Tuesday.

Get the shot now, or beg for it in the hospital before you die...

Doctor: The heartbreaking Covid cases I'm seeing

Opinion by Janice Blanchard

The summer got off to a fun start. As vaccines became increasingly accessible, many of us had a sense of relief. But somehow America has hit a wall: Only around 50% of the country is fully vaccinated, well below the target set by President Biden earlier in the summer. On Tuesday, however, the Biden Administration made a big announcement. They are once again recommending that masks be worn inside in areas where rates of transmission are considered "high" or "substantial," and on Thursday, they are expected to announce that federal workers and contractors will be required to be vaccinated or get tested regularly, according to CNN reporting. This follows closely New York City and California's plans to do the same for government workers.

These new requirements make a lot of sense to me as an emergency medicine physician. The threat of increased infections is real due the spread of the highly contagious Delta variant -- I have seen it firsthand. As the first day of summer came around, weeks had passed, and I had not seen a single Covid case. Now, I am treating patients with the disease daily.

This time, things seem different. Last year, it was the elderly and patients with co-morbid conditions who came into my care, gravely ill from the virus. Now, the cases I see are mainly among young healthy people, some who are presenting with life threatening complications due to the virus.

Treating a young person who is critically ill from a preventable illness is particularly heartbreaking. Most are unvaccinated. While those who are vaccinated are still at risk, they generally have less severe disease.

I worry about how we can get over this wall. Sadly, I fear that only experiencing the disease in themselves or others close to them will be what changes the mind of the unvaccinated. This is a terrible public health strategy.

The Biden Administration's plan seems to be the only logical step for addressing the persistent challenge of vaccinating a population thus far reluctant to get immunized. Vaccinations have to be incorporated as part of normal social behavior to overcome the pervasive problem of hesitancy.

Adding a vaccine requirement helps do this. Just look at the history of the measles vaccine. During the Carter administration, when vaccine mandates were required for school children, vaccination rates in this population soared to 90% and public health officials saw a clear path towards eradication.

Many skeptics are already gearing up to oppose the presumed restrictions that mask requirements and vaccine mandates impose. But perhaps they forgot what things were like last summer. It was bad. Hospitals had shortages of ICU beds. Caregivers faced inadequate personal protective equipment. People died alone in their hospital rooms.

Lately, I have been feeling a sense of dread as I recall these past experiences. As the world starts creeping back to "normal," there is something deep, dark, and destructive lingering on the horizon. I hear the song from Jaws that played just as the shark attacks the unwitting swimmer or diver enjoying their vacation in that big blue ocean.

Maybe I have a flair for the dramatic. But remember, when the pandemic initially hit the United States, it was reported in just one man in his 30s in January 2020. In March 2020, the former president was concerned that 21 disembarking cruise ship passengers would cause the number of cases in our country to double. Covid now seems an ubiquitous part of our everyday life with over 34 million cases and 600,000 deaths. The number of new cases has the potential to rapidly increase, particularly as the Delta variant has become the predominant strain of Covid now being transmitted in the United States. As one public health expert announced, Delta is Covid on steroids.

We had it bad last spring. I am simply not ready to go back to how things were. Vaccine mandates and mask requirements make sense to me. Masks help protect us all. Let's all pitch in to end this pandemic.

Who gives a fuck about these dick-wads... They are not the whole country!

228 GOP lawmakers call on Supreme Court to overturn Roe v. Wade

By Ariane de Vogue

Nearly 230 Republican members of Congress told the Supreme Court on Thursday that it should overturn Roe v. Wade and release its "vise grip on abortion politics."

The new brief is the latest filing in a dispute that will be heard next term and represents the most significant abortion-related case the justices have taken up in nearly a half a century. The 6-3 conservative court, bolstered by three of former President Donald Trump's appointees, could gut, or invalidate court precedent, and that's what the GOP lawmakers are calling for.

"Congress and the States have shown that they are ready and able to address the issue in ways that reflect Americans' varying viewpoints and are grounded in the science of fetal development and maternal health," lawyers for 228 Republican lawmakers, including leadership in both chambers, told the justices.

At issue before the court is a Mississippi law that bars most abortions after 15 weeks of pregnancy. There is no exception for rape or incest. The court will render its decision by next June, in the lead up to the mid-term elections.

The lawmakers, including Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, are supporting Mississippi's request to allow the law to go into effect. They are represented by the group Americans United for Life.

In Thursday's brief, they asked the court to "affirm the constitutional authority of the federal and state governments to safeguard the lives and health of their citizens, born and not yet born."

Roe v. Wade legalized abortion nationwide prior to viability which experts believe occurs around 24 weeks of pregnancy.

The lawmakers say the court should revisit the viability line established in court precedent, because it "binds the States in a one-sided constitutional tug-of-war in which they are subject to intense factual scrutiny on the abortion advocates' issues but unable to establish the factual basis for their own vital interests."

Lower courts blocked the law after the Jackson's Women Health Center, the only remaining clinic in the state, brought the challenge arguing the law was a direct violation of Supreme Court precedent.

"In an unbroken line dating to Roe v. Wade, the Supreme Court's abortion cases have established (and affirmed and re-affirmed) a woman's right to choose an abortion before viability," a panel of judges on the 5th US Circuit Court of Appeals said in December 2019. "States may regulate abortion procedures prior to viability so long as they do not ban abortions," the court held and concluded that "the law at issue is a ban."

Earlier in the week, three other Republican senators -- Ted Cruz of Texas, Josh Hawley of Missouri and Mike Lee of Utah, who clerked for the late Chief Justice William Rehnquist, Chief Justice John Roberts and Justice Samuel Alito -- respectively, also weighed in in favor of Mississippi using their brief to make the argument that Roe should be invalidated even though it has been on the books since 1973.

Under normal circumstances, the Supreme Court is reluctant to overturn past cases, relying upon a doctrine called "Stare Decisis" which is roughly translated to mean "stand by the thing decided." The doctrine reflects a respect for the accumulated opinions that have been handed down in history as well as the consistent development of legal principles.

But the trio argued that while Stare Decisis considerations may be important to the judicial process, "they are not absolute" and that abortion precedent needs to be revisited.

"A history of confusion in the lower courts, an unstable pattern of Supreme Court decisions, and a persistent lack of judicially manageable standards all suggest that a precedent is or has become unworkable," they said in their friend of the court brief.

The Center for Reproductive Rights is representing the clinic and its medical director, Sacheen Carr-Ellis. Lawyers for the center will respond to Mississippi's appeal later this year.

Last year, the group urged the justices to allow the lower court opinion to stand, arguing that Supreme Court precedent makes clear that before viability "it is up to the pregnant person, and not the State, to make the ultimate decision whether to continue a pregnancy."