More evidence....

Recordings, emails show how Trump team flew fake elector ballots to DC in final push to overturn 2020 election

By Marshall Cohen, Zachary Cohen, Jeremy Herb and Katelyn Polantz

Two days before the January 6 insurrection, the Trump campaign’s plan to use fake electors to block President-elect Joe Biden from taking office faced a potentially crippling hiccup: The fake elector certificates from two critical battleground states were stuck in the mail.

So, Trump campaign operatives scrambled to fly copies of the phony certificates from Michigan and Wisconsin to the nation’s capital, relying on a haphazard chain of couriers, as well as help from two Republicans in Congress, to try to get the documents to then-Vice President Mike Pence while he presided over the Electoral College certification.

The operatives even considered chartering a jet to ensure the files reached Washington, DC, in time for the January 6, 2021, proceeding, according to emails and recordings obtained by CNN.

The new details provide a behind-the-scenes glimpse of the chaotic last-minute effort to keep Donald Trump in office. The fake electors scheme features prominently in special counsel Jack Smith’s criminal indictment against the former president, and some of the officials who were involved have spoken to Smith’s investigators.

The emails and recordings also indicate that a top Trump campaign lawyer was part of 11th-hour discussions about delivering the fake elector certificates to Pence, potentially undercutting his testimony to the House select committee that investigated January 6 that he had passed off responsibility and didn’t want to put the former vice president in a difficult spot.

These details largely come from pro-Trump attorney Kenneth Chesebro, who was an architect of the fake electors plot and is now a key cooperator in several state probes into the scheme. Chesebro pleaded guilty in October to a felony conspiracy charge in Georgia in connection with the electors’ plan, and has met with prosecutors in Michigan, Nevada and Wisconsin, who are investigating the sham GOP electors in their own states.

Chesebro is an unindicted co-conspirator in the federal election interference indictment against Trump.

CNN has obtained audio of Chesebro’s recent interview with Michigan investigators, and exclusively reported earlier this month that he also told them about a December 2020 Oval Office meeting where he briefed Trump about the fake electors plan and how it ties into January 6.

An attorney for Chesebro declined to comment. A spokesman for the special counsel’s office did not reply to a request for comment for this story.

‘A high-level decision’

Emails obtained by CNN corroborate what Chesebro told Michigan prosecutors: He communicated with the top Trump campaign lawyer, Matt Morgan, and another campaign official, Mike Roman, to ferry the documents to Washington on January 5.

From there, Sen. Ron Johnson of Wisconsin and a Pennsylvania congressman assisted in the effort to get the documents into Pence’s hands.

“This is a high-level decision to get the Michigan and Wisconsin votes there,” Chesebro told Michigan prosecutors. “And they had to enlist, you know, a US senator to try to expedite it, to get it to Pence in time.”

Chesebro also discussed the episode with Wisconsin investigators last week when he sat for an interview with the attorney general’s office as part of a separate state probe into the fake electors plot, a source familiar with the matter told CNN.

Wisconsin prosecutors asked about the episode “extensively,” the source said, noting Chesebro discussed how a Wisconsin GOP staffer flew the certificate from Milwaukee to Washington and then handed it off to Chesebro.

The firsthand account from Chesebro’s perspective helps fill in the narrative behind the effort to hand-deliver elector slates to Pence, which is vaguely referenced in Smith’s federal indictment.

Trump pleaded not guilty to the charges, which include conspiring with Chesebro and others to obstruct the January 6 certification proceeding. Before Chesebro’s guilty plea in Georgia, his attorneys reached out to Smith’s team. As of this week, he has not heard back from federal prosecutors, a source familiar with the matter told CNN.

Federal investigators have spoken with several individuals involved in the scramble with the phony elector certificates, according to a source familiar with the matter. This includes interviews with Trump staffers who were tapped to fly the papers to DC, and some fake electors who knew of the planning.

A spokesperson for the Trump campaign did not reply to a request for comment.

Asked about the episode, a spokesperson for Johnson pointed to his previous comments, where he said, “my involvement in that attempt to deliver spanned the course of a couple seconds,” and that, “in the end, those electors were not delivered.”

‘Day-by-day’ coordination

According to the recordings of Chesebro’s sit-down with Michigan prosecutors, he explained how a legal memo he wrote for Wisconsin transformed into a nationwide operation, where Trump lawyers were “day-by-day coordinating the efforts of more than a dozen people with the GOP and with the Trump campaign.”

On January 4, 2021, Morgan sent an email to Chesebro and Roman asking for confirmation that all of the Trump elector slates had been received by Congress, according to the documents obtained by CNN.

Roman responded that the Michigan certificate had been mailed on December 15 but was still “in transit” at a US Postal Service facility in DC. Wisconsin’s certificate also had apparently not arrived.

Chesebro told prosecutors that Morgan was “freaked out” when the campaign realized the phony certificates from Michigan were still in the mail.

That same day, Morgan weighed in over email asking Chesebro and Roman to rethink how they would deliver the certificates to Pence.

“As I thought about this more, a courier will not be able to access the Capitol to deliver a sealed package,” Morgan wrote on January 4, according to emails obtained by CNN “You will probably need to enlist the help of a legislator who can deliver to the appropriate place(s). I strongly recommend you guys discuss a revised delivery plan with Rudy (Giuliani) to make sure this gets done the way he wants.”

‘Can we charter a flight?’

Roman was concerned the Wisconsin documents wouldn’t reach Washington in time.

“Can we charter a flight? The only available commercial from MKE (Milwaukee Mitchell International Airport) to DCA (Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport) arrives at 2130 tomorrow night,” Roman wrote to Chesebro on January 4 at 11:24 p.m.

The job of physically flying the elector documents to Washington fell to two people: A Trump campaign staffer and a Wisconsin GOP official, according to the emails and what Chesebro told prosecutors.

The Wisconsin GOP official who had that state’s elector documents landed after 10 a.m. on January 5 at Baltimore-Washington International Airport, according to the emails.

Trump campaign aide Michael Brown flew with the Michigan certificates to Washington National Airport with a scheduled arrival around 1 p.m., according to emails obtained by CNN.  A source familiar with the matter told CNN that Brown flew to DC from Atlanta, because the Trump staffers who had custody of the Michigan ballots were in Georgia for the Senate runoffs.

The campaign booked and paid for Brown’s flight on Southwest Airlines, the source said. Federal campaign finance records indicate that a pro-Trump super PAC paid the airline on the day of Brown’s flight for travel related to election “recount” efforts.

Trump Hotel meetup

The emails show that Brown and the Wisconsin GOP official were instructed to meet Chesebro at the Trump International Hotel in downtown Washington to hand off the fake elector certificates. Chesebro said in an email that he’d keep the ballots in his hotel room safe until it was time to pass them along.

Wisconsin Republican Party officials were annoyed at the request to courier the fake elector certificates to Washington. “Freaking trump idiots want someone to fly original elector papers to the senate President,” a Wisconsin GOP official wrote to then-state party chairman Andrew Hitt on January 4, according to the January 6 committee report.

Hitt – who has provided information to federal investigators about the efforts to get the fake elector certificates to Washington, according to a source familiar with the matter – told the January 6 committee that the couriering ended up being overkill, because the original documents that the state party had mailed to Washington actually made it in time.

Getting the certificates inside the Capitol

The documents still had to be hand-delivered to Pence’s Senate office in the Capitol.

The electors plot – as envisioned by Chesebro and other Trump allies – was that Pence could reject Biden’s legitimate electors and recognize Trump’s “alternate electors” on January 6, while lawmakers tallied the electoral votes from each state. Per federal law, the certificates need to be physically presented on the floor of Congress during the joint session, while lawmakers tally the electoral votes.

Chesebro told investigators that Roman connected him with an aide for a Pennsylvania GOP lawmaker that he believed was Rep. Scott Perry to turn over the documents. Chesebro wasn’t certain which congressman the staffer worked for – and the January 6 report says a staffer for a different Pennsylvania Republican, Rep. Mike Kelly, helped shuttle the documents that day.

“I had the Wisconsin stuff. [Trump campaign aide] Mike Brown had the Michigan stuff. We walked to the Longworth Office Building, and the guy with Perry, or whatever his name is, and some other fellow, that were like staff members of the House, took them and said, ‘We’re going to walk them over to the Senate and give it to a Senate staffer,’” Chesebro told Michigan prosecutors, according to the audio obtained by CNN.

“I don’t know why logistically we didn’t take it directly to Johnson. But that’s how we did it,” he added.

Kelly and Perry’s offices did not respond to CNN’s requests for comment.

Brown did not comment for this story. CNN previously reported that he testified in June to Smith’s grand jury in the Trump election subversion probe.

CNN previously reported that Roman sat for a proffer interview with Smith’s team before Trump was indicted.  He was also indicted in the sweeping Georgia election racketeering case, in connection with the fake electors scheme, and has pleaded not guilty.

Roman’s attorney did not respond to multiple requests for comment.

The details from Chesebro put a finer point on how members of Congress, including a sitting US senator, were involved in making sure the electoral certificates for Trump ended up in Pence’s hands.

The January 6 committee first revealed last year Johnson’s involvement in trying unsuccessfully to deliver the fake elector certificates to Pence, who announced on the morning of the joint session that it would be unconstitutional to do what Trump wanted and unilaterally overturn the election results.

The committee revealed text messages during their hearings last year that Johnson aide Sean Riley sent to Pence aide Chris Hodgson, saying that Johnson “needs to hand something to VPOTUS please advise.”

“What is it?” Hodgson asked.

“Alternate slates of electors for MI and WI because archivist didn’t receive them,” Riley responded.

“Do not give that to him,” Hodgson said.

‘F**k these guys’

In his Michigan interview, Chesebro also dished on some of the internal disagreements among the Trump lawyers, campaign officials and other allies, who clashed over the purpose of the electors’ plan and how far to take things on January 6.

Chesebro has maintained – then, and now – that the plan was a lawful move to preserve Trump’s legal rights.

Even before the Trump electors met in their state capitals on December 14, 2020, to cast their fake ballots and sign the certificates, Chesebro heard about concerns from some of the electors about possible legal jeopardy, according to emails and text messages reported by the Detroit News and obtained by CNN.

Chesebro added hedging language for the faux certificates from Pennsylvania and New Mexico in response to those concerns. He proposed to Roman and Morgan that they add the contingency caveats to the paperwork for all seven states in the plan. But Roman rejected the idea, according to the emails.

“F**k these guys,” Roman texted Chesebro on December 12, 2020.

By this time, the Trump campaign had essentially cleaved in two. Top officials who had managed day-to-day activity for Trump up to the election, including in court, say they ceded responsibility to Rudy Giuliani and others, such as Chesebro, according to congressional testimony transcripts. Roman effectively switched teams to work under Giuliani’s structure, according to the testimony from Morgan and others.

A spokesperson for Giuliani did not reply to a request for comment.

‘It really went south on me’

Chesebro told Michigan investigators that his own emails show that Morgan remained deeply involved, including in the final hours before January 6, to ensure that the certificates reached DC.

“I don’t have a really warm feeling toward, at least, the top Trump lawyers that did this, hid from me what they were doing and then lied to Congress about me. So, it’s been really difficult,” Chesebro said.

Chesebro further describes the fallout from his involvement the attempts to overturn the 2020 election.

In his congressional testimony, Morgan said he knew of the elector plan but wanted to distance himself from the effort, delegating the work to others, including those under Giuliani.

Morgan told the January 6 committee last year that he initially believed the electors were only meant to be used as a contingency. The electors, he believed, should meet in their state capitals and cast their electoral votes but “not necessarily submit” the certificates to Congress unless “we prevailed” in court.

Morgan told the committee that the plan changed in December, saying it morphed from a “cast-and-hold” operation and had “shifted to cast-and-send.” And that’s when Morgan told the committee that he backed out, testifying that he directed an aide to “email Mr. Chesebro politely to say, ‘this is your task. You are responsible for the Electoral College issues moving forward.’”

“This was my way of taking that responsibility to zero,” Morgan told the committee, later adding that he “moved on” after that email was sent.

Morgan explained that he was concerned that the new plan to try to count the fake electors on January 6 “would make the Vice President’s life harder, and I didn’t want to be a part of that.”

“Mr. Morgan stands by his congressional testimony,” his defense attorneys told CNN in response to his emails and Chesebro’s statements to investigators.

Ultimately, on the eve of the joint session of Congress, Morgan helped get the ballots in place, according to the emails and according to Chesebro, who blamed his legal troubles squarely on the Trump campaign’s legal team.

“I could have avoided all this,” Chesebro vented to Michigan prosecutors. “It’s been a real lesson in not working with people that you don’t know and are not sure you can trust, because it really went south on me.”

Only in russia...........

Russian passenger plane lands on frozen river by mistake

By Paul Kirby

A passenger plane with 34 people on board has landed on a frozen river in Russia's Far East, apparently because of a mistake by the pilot.

No-one was hurt when the Polar Airlines Soviet-era Antonov An-24 plane came to a halt on Thursday morning not far from land, on the frozen River Kolyma.

The plane landed off the runway of Zyryanka airport.

Initial inquiries said pilot error was to blame, prosecutors said. Thirty passengers and four crew were on board.

Flight PI217 left Yakutsk, the capital of the Sakha republic in Russia's Far East, early on Thursday.

It was bound for Zyryanka, 1,100km (685 miles) to the north-east, and was due to fly on to another small town in Srednekolymsk before returning to Yakutsk.

Video from one of the passengers showed the plane almost in the centre of the frozen River Kolyma in eastern Siberia. Temperatures in Zyryanka dip to around -40C at this time of year.

Prosecutors said the plane had landed on a sandbank in the river. A trail in the snow revealed how long it had taken to come to a standstill.

Urgent to-do list

The urgent to-do list awaiting Congress in January

Everything Congress has procrastinated on and needs to do in the new year, explained.

By Cameron Peters

It has not been a very productive year for the House, even when it wasn’t outright humiliating for its dwindling Republican majority. The body passed historically little in the way of legislation in 2023, defenestrated one speaker and elected another after almost a month of chaos, and expelled its first member in more than two decades.

What Congress didn’t do, though, was strike a long-term funding solution to keep the government open, or pass a supplementary appropriations bill to keep money flowing to Ukraine and Israel. And with money and time running out, lawmakers will have to shake off holiday inertia and move quickly in the new year to get those priorities finished.

Here are four big questions about Congress’s January slate.

What exactly does Congress have to get done — and by when?

The first major priority Congress will be confronted with is keeping the government open. In September and again in November this year, Congress passed a pair of continuing resolutions, or CRs, to prevent imminent government shutdowns, but time is once again pressing.

The November shutdown, as Vox’s Li Zhou has previously reported, used an unusual two-part structure, funding part of the government through January 19 and the rest through February 2. That means lawmakers have just nine legislative days before five areas of government — transportation, housing, energy, agriculture, and veterans’ affairs — run out of money.

According to CNN, House Republican leadership has little interest in another short-term funding punt, but a full-year CR will face bipartisan opposition in the Senate, setting up an impasse — and there’s also no sign of agreement on funding levels in a new appropriations bill.

Resolving that impasse can be thought of as Congress’s only firm deadline — if it doesn’t happen by midnight on January 19, a partial government shutdown begins, and additional agencies will shut down two weeks later, in February.

It’s not the only thing that needs to get done quickly, though: While funding measures for Ukraine and Israel don’t have a specific date attached, there’s still strategic pressure to get them done soon. Both countries are actively at war, and the Biden administration has indicated it will run out of money for Ukraine this month.

While there’s a great deal of bipartisan support behind aid for Israel despite a mounting civilian death toll and catastrophic human suffering in Gaza, support for Ukraine has continued to fray, particularly among Republicans, as the two-year anniversary of Russia’s invasion approaches in February with no end in sight and little visible military progress.

How did Congress get into this jam in the first place?

The biggest reason that Congress finds itself once again in a time crunch is its House Republican majority. After negotiating the first of two CRs in September 2023, former Speaker Kevin McCarthy was ejected from the speakership by an internal revolt. The party then chewed through multiple replacement speaker candidates, and lots of clock, before landing on the current speaker, Rep. Mike Johnson of Louisiana.

As Vox’s Ellen Ioanes explained at the time, “For the rest of the country, a fight over the speakership takes away from the work of passing a long-term funding deal, as well as negotiating the future of aid to Ukraine.” That fight ended up taking 22 days, giving Johnson little time in his new chair to do more than kick the can down the road with November’s CR — and the time that bought him is running out.

Now, Johnson is left with the same majority that turned on McCarthy for striking a deal, minus the seat vacated by the expulsion of former Rep. George Santos (R-NY) and with more vacancies on the horizon — including that of McCarthy, whose resignation will take effect December 31. And many of his most hardline members want far deeper spending cuts than would likely be acceptable to the Democratic majority in the Senate, or to the White House, further complicating negotiations. Some of those members, in the far-right House Freedom Caucus, already condemned Johnson’s previous CR, which ultimately passed with far more Democratic support. Johnson may need to do the same this time around, but such a maneuver could put him at risk of a McCarthy-style ouster.

Why does Congress’s inability to pass a regular funding bill matter?

Continuing resolutions are often the lesser of two evils versus a partial government shutdown, and they can be a genuinely useful measure to win a few more days or weeks for the legislative process to work itself out. But they’re still not a good way to govern: As the name suggests, the bills only maintain previous funding levels, and over the long term, that poses a challenge for the functioning of the federal government.

Specifically, inflation means that a CR may be insufficient even to fully fund the programs of the previous year — and it certainly lacks money for new programs, or existing programs where the funding demands have increased. All of those impacts would be compounded by a full-year CR, which Johnson could propose in the new year (though its passage would be uncertain, to the say the least).

In 2022, the Pentagon warned in no uncertain terms about the potential impacts of a year-long CR, which Navy chief of operations Adm. Michael Gilday described at the time as “completely new territory that we have not dealt with before that will have significant impacts across our military.” Such a measure could have similar impacts across government.

This month, the Pentagon issued a similar caution. At a December event with the Atlantic Council, according to a Defense Department news story, Adm. Christopher Grady noted that “continuing [resolutions] are not where we want to be. We need stable and predictable funding.”

How does immigration factor in?

Adding to the tangled bundle of congressional priorities in January is immigration. Though frequently considered one of Capitol Hill’s most intractable issues, congressional Republicans have seized on the Biden administration’s request for more Ukraine funding as a leverage point, and hope to secure limitations on asylum and quicker deportations, among other policy changes.

The exact parameters of such a bill are still unclear, but it’s looking more likely than it once might have. As Vox’s Andrew Prokop reported this month, the Biden administration is concerned that the border represents a political vulnerability, and as a result, a deal with Senate Republicans could emerge in the new year.

Such a deal would link Ukraine funding and legislation focused on immigration and the border. President Joe Biden has also argued for linking Ukraine and Israel aid, which means all three priorities could advance together — or not at all.

A bipartisan immigration bill would be complicated for Democrats, both politically and morally. As Prokop writes:

Cutting an immigration restriction deal would be a major shift for the “in this house, we believe no human is illegal” party. It would sink the hopes of many of the millions of people coming to the US to seek a better life for themselves and their families, often braving a treacherous journey. And it would cause immense controversy among progressives and activists on the left.

But the urgency of Ukraine aid, in the eyes of the White House, could smooth its path nonetheless. Though Biden lambasted congressional Republicans for “playing chicken with our national security, holding Ukraine’s funding hostage to their extreme partisan border policies” in a speech earlier this month, he also noted that “any disruption in our ability to supply Ukraine clearly strengthens Putin’s position. We’ve run out of money to be able to do that, in terms of authorization.”

A previous package linking all three priorities failed to advance in the Senate in early December, and any deal would face additional hurdles in the House, but bipartisan interest in Ukraine, Israel, and the border means a deal could still materialize.

If it does, it will join government funding in what is shaping up to be a busy January on Capitol Hill.

Failures.......

House Republicans’ humiliating year, explained

Even by House GOP standards, 2023 was absurd.

By Li Zhou

There’s nothing quite like starting the year with 14 consecutive rounds of failed speaker votes.

Just one week into 2023, House Republicans had already endured a humiliating leadership race full of infighting and chaos. And while that was a low point for them, things arguably went downhill from there.

Since then, the GOP followed up its first wave of speaker drama with another equally tumultuous contest, expulsion votes on one of its own members, failed attempts to get much of its policy agenda out the door, and floundering investigations of President Joe Biden.

Spending a year dealing with political and personnel problems left the party with little to show for itself policy-wise ahead of an election year in which Republicans hope to expand on their narrow House majority. And it has given Democrats plenty of ammunition to use in making the case the GOP shouldn’t be trusted to govern.

According to the New York Times, this is the most unproductive the House has been in years, even compared to other instances of divided government. In 2023, the House passed just 27 bills that became law, a far lower figure than the 72 it passed in 2013 when Congress was similarly split.

It was always going to be difficult for Republicans to leave a mark given Democratic control of the Senate and White House, but in the past, parties in the GOP’s position have stayed better united on their policy priorities and put pressure on the administration while sticking together on their demands. Although there’s still time to turn things around next year, at this point in the term, it seems as though this House will be remembered for being the one in which Republicans were seriously in disarray. Below is a rundown of some of the moments that defined that mayhem.

Speaker drama (round one)

For four days, members of the House’s right flank like Rep. Matt Gaetz refused to back Rep. Kevin McCarthy for the role of speaker because, they argued, he hadn’t sufficiently committed to their interests and wasn’t conservative enough.

That led to round after round after round of failed votes. On the 15th round of voting, McCarthy was finally able to secure the majority he needed to ascend to the role, but not without making some serious concessions that greatly diluted his power.

Those concessions included putting multiple members of the Freedom Caucus on the Rules Committee, an agreement to curb government spending, and changes to a policy known as the motion to vacate, which would allow any one member to introduce a resolution to remove McCarthy from the job.

That last concession would come back to haunt McCarthy later in the year, when House conservatives would use it to protest his handling of government funding legislation. The whole speakership debacle also foreshadowed the ideological divides that would come to plague Republicans for the duration of this year and make not just keeping a leader, but producing concrete legislation, difficult.

Debt ceiling

A segment of the House Republican conference has long threatened to refuse to raise the debt ceiling — something that could spark economic calamity — if they don’t get the spending cuts they demand.

The debt ceiling is the limit that the US is able to borrow, and if the country defaults on it, it’s unable to pay its bills. Congress has to either raise or suspend the debt ceiling every few years to ensure that the US doesn’t default. If it were to do so, there’d likely be cascading negative effects on the US and global economies: The US could have a lower credit limit, interest rates could go up, and unemployment could surge. Despite these concerns, fiscal conservatives have long suggested they’d be open to defaulting if it meant that they could secure the social spending changes they demand.

This year, those lawmakers, which include members of the Freedom Caucus, urged then-Speaker Kevin McCarthy to take a hard-line stance in negotiations with Democrats. Specifically, they called for major cuts to climate spending and new work requirements for Medicaid in exchange for any willingness to raise the debt limit.

McCarthy did take a strong position in negotiations, to the point that questions were raised about whether the US, which typically comes down to the wire on debt ceiling deals, might actually default this time. In the end, with days to spare, GOP leaders wound up settling for a debt ceiling deal that didn’t include many of these requests. While they were able to secure some Republican wins — like the repurposing of roughly $20 billion in IRS funding and a cap on non-defense spending — the cuts wound up being far less than what some members had urged. The deal was generally seen as a compromise for all involved; not a loss for the GOP, but not a win, either.

Conservatives were incensed, setting the stage for later confrontations between the party’s right-most members and the rest of the caucus. “The concessions made by the speaker in his negotiations with President Biden fall far short of my expectations,” Rep. Wesley Hunt (R-TX), a Republican who opposed the deal, wrote on Twitter.

Investigation flops

One of Republicans’ chief promises when they entered office was that they’d be launching a series of investigations, including many that centered on the Biden administration and alleged biases the federal government has against Republicans.

These investigations have focused on everything from Twitter’s handling of a story about Hunter Biden’s laptop to the White House’s withdrawal from Afghanistan to the purported “weaponization of the federal government.”

By and large, as Vox’s Christian Paz has reported, many of the investigations have been nothing short of flops. The laptop investigation failed to find anything incriminating President Biden in misconduct, and the Afghanistan investigation didn’t turn up any useful knowledge to use against Democrats the way the Benghazi investigation did years earlier. Overall, not only have inquiries into President Biden failed to turn up any concrete evidence linking him to wrongdoing, these endeavors haven’t generated a lot of discourse, and the impeachment effort in particular has been unpopular.

According to a December Marist poll, voters were split on Biden’s impeachment inquiry, with just 48 percent approving of it. That figure is lower than the percentage of voters who approved of Trump’s two past impeachment inquiries, according to the Washington Post.

Although some of these efforts, like Republicans’ recent launch of Biden’s impeachment inquiry, might help rally the GOP base, they also endanger battleground members given they aren’t especially backed by the broader public. That makes these actions more risky for House Republicans, whose ability to maintain a majority hinges on these battleground members, 17 of whom are in districts that Biden also won.

Speaker drama (round two)

As if the January drama wasn’t enough, Republicans had yet another speaker debacle in October when the far-right faction of the GOP conference joined with Democrats to oust McCarthy from the speaker’s job.

The trouble began when McCarthy opted to work with Democrats to pass a short-term spending bill that kept the government open. Each year, Congress has to pass 12 appropriations bills, often consolidated into a larger package, to allocate the funds needed to keep the government running. Conservatives had hoped that McCarthy would leverage a potential government shutdown to force Congress to pass individual long-term spending bills that contained the cuts to programs like SNAP and Medicaid they wanted.

McCarthy’s decision to avert a shutdown followed other actions that had upset these far-right members, including the concessions he had previously made on the debt ceiling deal.

As a result, Gaetz opted to use the motion to vacate to force a vote on removing McCarthy, which was ultimately successful.

After McCarthy was booted, Republicans faced even more problems as the far right opposed other speaker options that were proposed, and moderates opposed the conservative options the far right wanted. Multiple people were floated as potential options, including longtime leadership member Rep. Steve Scalise from Louisiana and former Freedom Caucus Chair Ohio Rep. Jim Jordan. None were able to get the support needed to become speaker.

All of this culminated in the election of conservative member, election denier, and relative unknown Rep. Mike Johnson (R-LA) to the position.

The same fault lines that sparked the McCarthy drama, however, haven’t disappeared. Instead, they’re expected to re-emerge in 2024 when the House will have to figure out how to handle the passage of long-term spending bills as another funding deadline approaches in January.

Johnson will have to navigate these tensions on those bills — as well as on the Biden impeachment inquiry — as different factions of the party push for competing paths forward.

Failed abortion bills and culture wars

Beyond investigations into Biden, House Republicans kicked off their term with a laundry list of goals they hoped to achieve.

Chief among these were policies that would restrict abortion rights. Like the investigations, however, this goal proved fraught and revealing of the divisions in the caucus. Though some far-right members agitated for a national abortion ban, there was rapid blowback to such harsh proposals —with poll after poll after poll showing that Americans are in favor of at least some abortion access. In lieu of considering a national abortion ban, the House voted on a slate of abortion bills that would put limitations on federal funding for abortions and require care for infants if an abortion failed.

These had no chance of making it through the Democrat-controlled Senate.

A similar dynamic played out on legislation like the annual defense bill, which lays out the military budget that the US has each year. House Republicans used their version of the bill to restrict funds that the federal government can provide for servicemembers to travel for an abortion, and to limit funding for gender-affirming surgeries for trans servicemembers. Those amendments did not make it into a final compromise bill with the Senate.

While both bills were wins for a chamber that has struggled to pass even basic legislation, they also marked another failure by House Republicans to get their policies into law.

“I want my Republican colleagues to give me one thing — one — that I can go campaign on and say we did. Anybody sitting in the complex, if you want to come down to the floor and come explain to me, one material, meaningful, significant thing the Republican majority has done,” Rep. Chip Roy (R-TX), a far-right member said in November during a floor speech criticizing Republicans’ failures on spending cuts.

George Santos and a winnowing majority

After the 2022 midterms, the House GOP’s majority was narrow: In those contests, Republicans only won a nine-seat majority, after winning 222 seats to Democrats’ 213.

A combination of circumstance, bad luck, and misconduct have further winnowed that majority thanks to the scandals of former New York Rep. George Santos and some lawmakers’ decision to leave the House of their own volition.

Santos’s expulsion was the latest embarrassment for the GOP, and marked the first time a House lawmaker had been expelled in roughly two decades. His removal followed a 23-count federal indictment, extensive coverage of the lies he told about his work and educational history, and a scathing review by the House Ethics Committee.

In addition to Santos’s departure, there have been many other resignations on the Republican side. Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) has said he’ll leave his post before the end of 2023, and Bill Johnson (R-OH) has said he’ll leave his post in 2024, meaning their seats will be vacant until they can hold special elections in their districts (though both are expected to eventually be replaced by Republicans).

That means Republicans could be operating with fewer votes to spare in the new year. With McCarthy gone, they’re only able to lose three votes to keep their majority. Those narrow margins could give any small group of GOP lawmakers outsize control over policy or force them to keep relying on Democratic votes for key bills. “Hopefully no one dies,” Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) lamented in a tweet on this issue. (That post also suggested that Republicans will have only a one-vote majority which isn’t the case.)

Copyright Infringement

The New York Times Is Suing OpenAI and Microsoft for Copyright Infringement

Did your chatbot steal the morning paper?

ARIANNA COGHILL

The New York Times is suing OpenAI and Microsoft for copyright infringement—a major development in the ongoing, nationwide legal struggle between content creators and artificial intelligence firms. 

While previous lawsuits claiming intellectual property violations by AI companies have come from artists and writers, the Times is the first American news organization to sue the companies, alleging that OpenAI and Microsoft used millions of their articles to train digital chatbots that now compete with the publication. While the case does not specify the revenue the Times has lost to new robot rivals, the suit argues that the tech companies’ unauthorized use of the newspaper’s images and written work deprives it of income from “subscriptions, licensing, advertising, and affiliates.”

The complaint asks that the AI companies be held accountable for “billions of dollars in statutory and actual” damages, citing several examples where the program lifted excerpts from the paper’s stories verbatim. The Times is also calling for OpenAI and Microsoft to terminate any chatbot models that use its copyrighted material. 

“Since our nation’s founding, strong copyright protection has empowered those who gather and report news to secure the fruits of their labor and investment,” the filing states. “Defendants have refused to recognize this protection.”

Sailing shit...

51 second shitbox

From Sailing Anarchy

Nobody in the sailing community would begrudge LawConnect owner Christian Beck his amazing come-from-behind line honors victory in the Sydney-Hobart race. He’s been runner-up in the three previous years.

What a profound feeling of satisfaction that must have been for him and his crew as they out-thought and out-sailed Comanche over the last few hundred yards to the line.

There have been close finishes in the past – just seven seconds separated Apollo and Condor of Bermuda in 1982 – but this one-hour slow-motion gybing duel in the faintest of catspaw puffs on the Derwent River will become a legendary moment in the history of the race – a 51-second delta!

There were multiple lead changes as the two fat-arsed 100-footers strained for the smallest advantage. We witnessed triumph and despair in a single, final moment of match-racing tactics. After 600 brutal miles offshore when the supermaxis often clocked speeds in excess of 25 knots they finished at a crawl, and within spitting distance of each other.

But even as LawConnect ghosted to their well-deserved glory it was difficult to push away the thought that Wild Oats XI would have been unbeatable in the same situation. Her narrow beam and low wetted surface made her much easier to drive in light wind. Scallywag, too, might have been quick in those conditions. (Remember that as Ragamuffin 100 she outran Rambler in a similar drifting finish a few years ago.)

On the morning of the start on Boxing Day owner Christian Beck described LawConnect as a “shitbox” compared with Comanche. Maybe now he’s not so sure, and it’s quite possible that his will be the only 100-footer in the fleet for the next Sydney-Hobart. The days of these Down Under mastodons would seem to be numbered.

– anarchist David

Out-of-towners

Tahoe authorities send message to 'out-of-towners' as snow approaches

By Andrew Chamings

As snow heads to the Tahoe Basin Wednesday night, the California Highway Patrol has a message for those planning on visiting the mountains for the New Year. 

"The California Highway Patrol would like to remind locals and out-of-towners alike to not park along highways to play in the snow while traveling through the Sierra," CHP South Lake Tahoe wrote in a Facebook post Tuesday. 

Alongside the warning, the agency posted a version of the "bubbles girl" meme with the text: "Watch out for out-of-towners, they think it's safe to sled near the highway."

CHP told SFGATE they routinely receive dozens of calls reporting bad behavior on the roads, including vehicles blocking roadways, illegally parked cars, pedestrians walking along snowy roads and even sledding onto busy highways. 

"We've seen it all," CHP South Lake Tahoe public information officer Ruth Loehr said over the phone. "It's gotten worse since COVID. All of sudden, we have people in spots they're not supposed to be."

"Last year we had someone sled off the mountain and smack their noggin onto Highway 50," Loehr said. "This was an adult, not a child. A grown woman who slid into traffic and hit her head on the roadway. Thank god no cars were coming in that lane."

Loehr says that CHP wrote over 100 tickets and towed several cars parked illegally at Echo Summit and around Emerald Bay over Christmas weekend. 

"They just stop when they see snow and play there, and it's a domino effect. One car stops to go sledding, everyone does it," she said. "People don't want to pay for parking so they stop by the side of the road, literally in front of a sign that says 'no parking, tow away zone.'"

As for using a meme to get the message across, Loehr confessed that was her handiwork. "I'm terrible at it," she laughed. "I can't compete with Truckee."

Whether because of bad decisions or inclement weather, emergencies on the roads leading to Tahoe are a serious issue. CHP Truckee said they received over 700 emergency calls in one day during last winter's storms. This year, they're understaffed as snow approaches. “We’re so short-staffed this year,” Truckee CHP Officer Carlos Perez told SFGATE in November. “We’re going to do everything we can, obviously. But it’s all hands on deck. We’re going to feel it.” 

Snowfall has been scant in the basin this year, with the snowpack sitting at only 28% of the average as of last week — a fraction of last year's record-setting winter. The coming days are forecasting a glimmer of hope for those planning on hitting the slopes, with one to two inches of snow predicted for Donner Pass and other mountain passes. But CHP urges visitors to make smart decisions. 

"It's all about safety, I can't stress that enough. We don't want you to park here as it's unsafe for you to do so, "Loehr said. "We don't want anything bad to happen to anybody, that's why we're out here every single day." 

Beavers released

Beavers released into California wild for the first time in 75 years

By Amanda Bartlett

The little buck-toothed critter warily peered out of his kennel perched at the edge of a pond in Northern California, his beady eyes following five of his family members that were already paddling out toward the pine trees dotting the horizon. 

The water glimmered in the October sun as the willows rustled in the breeze. A group of wildlife officials and conservationists watched from the shore as the colony of beavers began to explore their new home in Tásmam Koyóm, a 2,325-acre valley in Plumas County and the ancestral lands of the Mountain Maidu people. Unbeknownst to the 2-month-old kit, a historic moment was underway for his keystone species — the first time they had been returned to their native state habitat in nearly 75 years, as part of a major project spearheaded by the California Department of Fish and Wildlife and the Maidu Summit Consortium.

Nevertheless, he stayed put.

The beaver’s protective mother remained right by his side, but eventually even her curiosity got the best of her, and she took off, too. Valerie Cook, the beaver restoration program manager for the CDFW, slipped on a pair of gloves and carefully removed the young beaver from his enclosure and into the grass, hoping to coax him to join the rest of his family. When he wouldn’t even leave the top of her rubber boot, she grinned down at him.

“I knew what he was doing,” said Cook. “He was waiting for someone to give them a ride on their tail.” 

Sure enough, one of the beaver’s siblings returned, hoisted the baby onto its back, and off they went into the wild. Cook explained that this dogpile behavior isn’t atypical for the species, and sometimes she’ll see as many as three at a time stacked on top of one another, an activity that likely offers security to some of the younger animals in the colony.  

“You just saw this tiny brown furball, this little nugget, catch a ride on the back of his sibling’s tail, and it looked like he was surfing,” Cook said with a laugh. “I don’t think it set in for days afterward, but that moment will go down as one of the highlights of my entire career. I think we were very proud of what we had done, and really optimistic about the potential that this represents for us and the good we think we can do moving forward.”

Beavers are native to Northern California, but their population was practically decimated during the fur rush in the 1800s, when maritime traders converged in the Bay Area and California’s Central Coast to harvest the valuable, chestnut-colored fur from the species, as well as otters, seals, mink and other mammals. By 1912, fewer than a thousand beavers lived in California.

Research from historical ecologist Rick Lanman proved the species’ California roots when he discovered a skull from a beaver that had been living in Saratoga Creek circa 1855. California Department of Fish and Wildlife translocated beavers to Lexington Reservoir and upper Los Gatos Creek in 1980, and though experts initially thought the semi-aquatic rodents wouldn’t utilize the surrounding creeks, they proceeded to chart new territory down to the Guadalupe River, which flows through downtown San Jose and into the South Bay. The animals continued to venture northward from there, and the discovery of beavers in Matadero Creek last year marked a major comeback for the species in the Bay Area. 

Meanwhile, the CDFW received nearly $2 million in funding from the state budget to build upon its existing beaver restoration program, hiring a team of environmental scientists who are tasked with determining nonlethal strategies for people and beavers to coexist, and ultimately promoting a larger effort to help mitigate the impacts of wildfires, climate change and drought by allowing beavers to repopulate the habitats where their ancestors once resided. Releasing beavers into Tásmam Koyóm is the first phase of this project following a lot of contention surrounding the species. 

“Over the last hundred years, there’s been a roller coaster surrounding how they should be managed,” said Cook, who is also the nutria eradication program manager for the CDFW, “as a nuisance or as a resource.” 

Because beavers don’t reproduce prolifically like other rodents (they tend to have one to two litters of just a few young per year) and juveniles typically have a 45% survival rate, Cook said allowing them to disperse and reestablish their territory can be a lengthy and challenging process. Human-wildlife conflict arises, and when people don’t like the impacts to the landscape that beavers can cause, like minor flooding and tree damage, the animals have to be removed, Cook said. 

But at the same time, Cook said, many government agencies statewide are spending hundreds of thousands to millions of dollars a year just to mimic what beavers naturally do to restore the natural ecosystems they live in. The animals are capable of reconnecting streams to floodplains and can help recover near-extinct species like coho salmon by creating new wetland habitats and encouraging the growth of the plankton and insects they feed on. Beaver dams can also slow down water flow and improve water quality by preserving sediment and nutrients in streams.

“This program will allow us to play a more active role to return them to where they were historically, and it’s a twofold process,” said Cook. “We’re restoring them so they can do their job restoring the environment they live in.”  

Beyond the ecological benefits, Cook underlined the importance of collaborating with the Maidu Summit Consortium and restoring a species that’s so important to the Maidu’s cultural history. 

“They’re our little cousins, and we’re going to pray for them to be safe and have a good life here in this beautiful environment,” said Allen Lowry, vice chairman of the Maidu Summit Consortium. “We’re so happy to be able to release them here, and we pray that they make a good home forever here.”

This family of seven beavers was relocated from Sutter County and now joins a single beaver that had already been living in Tásmam Koyóm. Cook hopes these efforts will expand as the CDFW works with the Tule River Tribe to reintroduce another beaver family to the Tule River Reservation in the southern Sierra Nevada by next year.  

“The unfortunate reality down there is with all the high flows and flooding that happened in the spring of last year, the habitat they had ready just ended up really getting blown out, delaying the trajectory of the project,” Cook said. “But it presents a real opportunity for beavers to come in and foster those changes the tribe is looking for.” 

Future projects could be headed for the Bay Area soon. Cook said there’s a lot of interest in the North Bay, particularly Lagunitas Creek in Marin County, which is home to a precarious population of endangered coho salmon. The CDFW hopes to have a beaver translocation project proposal submission form available on its website by late January for landowners to submit requests, but how the department prioritizes each project that gets approved will be determined by issues such as drought resiliency, high risk for wildfires, low flows and dry conditions in each area. 

“Basically, we’re looking at what’s the most bang for our beaver buck we can get,” Cook said. “One hundred percent, it’s going to happen in the Bay Area, but when and where yet, we don’t know.” 

Since the Oct. 18 release, the beaver family group in Tásmam Koyóm has explored miles and miles of habitat, located the territory of the resident beaver, which could lead to mating opportunities in the future, and established shelter for the winter. The CDFW and Maidu Summit Consortium will continue to monitor the colony for several years to come, assessing whether the population grows, how the habitat is utilized, and what benefits, conflicts and changes may arise as a result of the beaver engineering on the landscape, a news release from the CDFW read.

“I got a little choked up and teary-eyed,” Chuck Bonham, director of the California Department of Fish and Wildlife, said of the animals’ release. “I saw the beavers come into the water, and some swim off. About 20 minutes later, they’re out there making a home. This could be forever, and it’s the right thing to do.” 

OSIRIS-APEX

NASA Asteroid Sampling Mission Renamed OSIRIS-APEX for New Journey

Rob Garner

The former OSIRIS-REx spacecraft sets off on a journey to study asteroid Apophis and take advantage of the asteroid’s 2029 flyby of Earth, the likes of which hasn’t happened since the dawn of recorded history.

At the end of a long-haul road trip, it might be time to kick up your feet and rest awhile – especially if it was a seven-year, 4 billion-mile journey to bring Earth a sample of asteroid Bennu. But OSIRIS-REx (Origins, Spectral Interpretation, Resource Identification and Security – Regolith Explorer), the NASA mission that accomplished this feat in September, is already well on its way (with a new name) to explore a new destination.

When OSIRIS-REx left Bennu in May 2021 with a sample aboard, its instruments were in great condition, and it still had a quarter of its fuel left. So instead of shutting down the spacecraft after it delivered the sample, the team proposed to dispatch it on a bonus mission to asteroid Apophis, with an expected arrival in April 2029. NASA agreed, and OSIRIS-APEX (Origins, Spectral Interpretation, Resource Identification, and Security – Apophis Explorer) was born.

A Rare Opportunity at Apophis

After considering several destinations (including Venus and various comets), NASA chose to send the spacecraft to Apophis, an “S-type” asteroid made of silicate materials and nickel-iron – a fair bit different than the carbon-rich, “C-type” Bennu.

The intrigue of Apophis is its exceptionally close approach of our planet on April 13, 2029. Although Apophis will not hit Earth during this encounter or in the foreseeable future, the pass in 2029 will bring the asteroid within 20,000 miles (32,000 kilometers) of the surface – closer than some satellites, and close enough that it could be visible to the naked eye in the Eastern Hemisphere.

Scientists estimate that asteroids of Apophis’ size, about 367 yards across (about 340 meters), come this close to Earth only once every 7,500 years.

“OSIRIS-APEX will study Apophis immediately after such a pass, allowing us to see how its surface changes by interacting with Earth’s gravity,” said Amy Simon, the mission’s project scientist based at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland.

Apophis’ close encounter with Earth will change the asteroid’s orbit and the length of its 30.6-hour day. The encounter also may cause quakes and landslides on the asteroid’s surface that could churn up material and uncover what lies beneath.

“The close approach is a great natural experiment,” said Dani Mendoza DellaGiustina, principal investigator for OSIRIS-APEX at the University of Arizona in Tucson. “We know that tidal forces and the accumulation of rubble pile material are foundational processes that could play a role in planet formation. They could inform how we got from debris in the early solar system to full-blown planets.”

Apophis represents more than just the opportunity to learn more about how solar systems and planets form: As it happens, most of the known potentially hazardous asteroids (those whose orbits come within 4.6 million miles of Earth) are also S-types. What the team learns about Apophis can inform planetary defense research, a top priority for NASA.

OSIRIS-APEX: Travel Itinerary

By April 2, 2029 – around two weeks before Apophis’ close encounter with Earth –  OSIRIS-APEX’s cameras will begin taking images of the asteroid as the spacecraft catches up to it. Apophis will also be closely observed by Earth-based telescopes during this time. But in the hours after the close encounter, Apophis will appear too near the Sun in the sky to be observed by ground-based optical telescopes. This means any changes triggered by the close encounter will be best detected by the spacecraft.

OSIRIS-APEX will arrive at the asteroid on April 13, 2029, and operate in its proximity for about the next 18 months. In addition to studying changes to Apophis caused by its Earth encounter, the spacecraft will conduct many of the same investigations OSIRIS-REx did at Bennu, including using its instrument suite of imagers, spectrometers, and a laser altimeter to closely map the surface and analyze its chemical makeup.

As an encore, OSIRIS-APEX will reprise one of OSIRIS-REx’s most impressive acts (minus sample collection), dipping within 16 feet of the asteroid’s surface and firing its thrusters downward. This maneuver will stir up surface rocks and dust to give scientists a peek at the material that lies below.

Although the rendezvous with Apophis is more than five years away, the next milestone on its journey is the first of six close Sun passes. Those near approaches, along with three gravity assists from Earth, will put OSIRIS-APEX on course to reach Apophis in April 2029.

What OSIRIS-APEX will discover about Apophis remains to be seen, but if the mission’s previous incarnation is any indication, surprising science lies ahead. “We learned a lot at Bennu, but now we’re armed with even more questions for our next target,” Simon said.

Volcanic Moon Io

NASA’s Juno to Get Close Look at Jupiter’s Volcanic Moon Io on Dec. 30

Jet Propulsion Laboratory

NASA’s Juno spacecraft will on Saturday, Dec. 30, make the closest flyby of Jupiter’s moon Io that any spacecraft has made in over 20 years. Coming within roughly 930 miles (1,500 kilometers) from the surface of the most volcanic world in our solar system, the pass is expected to allow Juno instruments to generate a firehose of data.

“By combining data from this flyby with our previous observations, the Juno science team is studying how Io’s volcanoes vary,” said Juno’s principal investigator, Scott Bolton of the Southwest Research Institute in San Antonio, Texas. “We are looking for how often they erupt, how bright and hot they are, how the shape of the lava flow changes, and how Io’s activity is connected to the flow of charged particles in Jupiter’s magnetosphere.”

A second ultra-close flyby of Io is scheduled for Feb. 3, 2024, in which Juno will again come within about 930 miles (1,500 kilometers) of the surface.

The spacecraft has been monitoring Io’s volcanic activity from distances ranging from about 6,830 miles (11,000 kilometers) to over 62,100 miles (100,000 kilometers), and has provided the first views of the moon’s north and south poles. The spacecraft has also performed close flybys of Jupiter’s icy moons Ganymede and Europa.

“With our pair of close flybys in December and February, Juno will investigate the source of Io’s massive volcanic activity, whether a magma ocean exists underneath its crust, and the importance of tidal forces from Jupiter, which are relentlessly squeezing this tortured moon,” said Bolton.

Now in the third year of its extended mission to investigate the origin of Jupiter, the solar-powered spacecraft will also explore the ring system where some of the gas giant’s inner moons reside.

Picture This

All three cameras aboard Juno will be active during the Io flyby. The Jovian Infrared Auroral Mapper (JIRAM), which takes images in infrared, will be collecting the heat signatures emitted by volcanoes and calderas covering the moon’s surface. The mission’s Stellar Reference Unit (a navigational star camera that has also provided valuable science) will obtain the highest-resolution image of the surface to date. And the JunoCam imager will take visible-light color images.

JunoCam was included on the spacecraft for the public’s engagement and was designed to operate for up to eight flybys of Jupiter. The upcoming flyby of Io will be Juno’s 57th orbit around Jupiter, where the spacecraft and cameras have endured one of the solar system’s most punishing radiation environments.

“The cumulative effects of all that radiation has begun to show on JunoCam over the last few orbits,” said Ed Hirst, project manager of Juno at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California. “Pictures from the last flyby show a reduction in the imager’s dynamic range and the appearance of ‘striping’ noise. Our engineering team has been working on solutions to alleviate the radiation damage and to keep the imager going.”

More Io, Please

After several months of study and assessment, the Juno team adjusted the spacecraft’s planned future trajectory to add seven new distant Io flybys (for a total of 18) to the extended mission plan. After the close Io pass on Feb. 3, the spacecraft will fly by Io every other orbit, with each orbit growing progressively more distant: The first will be at an altitude of about 10,250 miles (16,500 kilometers) above Io, and the last will be at about 71,450 miles (115,000 kilometers).

The gravitational pull of Io on Juno during the Dec. 30 flyby will reduce the spacecraft’s orbit around Jupiter from 38 days to 35 days. Juno’s orbit will drop to 33 days after the Feb. 3 flyby.

After that, Juno’s new trajectory will result in Jupiter blocking the Sun from the spacecraft for about five minutes at the time when the orbiter is at its closest to the planet, a period called perijove. Although this will be the first time the solar-powered spacecraft has encountered darkness since its flyby of Earth in October 2013, the duration will be too short to affect its overall operation. With the exception of the Feb. 3 perijove, the spacecraft will encounter solar eclipses like this during every close flyby of Jupiter from now on through the remainder of its extended mission, which ends in late 2025.

Starting in April 2024, the spacecraft will carry out a series of occultation experiments that use Juno’s Gravity Science experiment to probe Jupiter’s upper atmospheric makeup, which provides key information on the planet’s shape and interior structure.

Carpetbagging

How Boebert's district switch could help Republicans

She's been accused of carpetbagging, but Boebert's controversial past had threatened the GOP's hold on her red-leaning seat.

STEVEN SHEPARD

Rep. Lauren Boebert’s decision to switch districts ahead of next year's election might not secure the controversial Colorado Republican a third term in Congress, but it should boost the GOP’s chances to retain control of her seat.

Boebert won reelection last year by the narrowest of margins: 546 votes, or less than two-tenths of a percentage point. That’s despite holding a vast, mostly rural seat — Colorado’s 3rd District — that voted for then-President Donald Trump by 8 percentage points in 2020.

The 2024 tea leaves: There were signs that 2024 could have been even more difficult for her. The Democrat whom Boebert defeated last year, Adam Frisch, a former member of Aspen’s city council, was back for another run — and cashing in on Boebert’s outsized profile and ignominy to raise $8.6 million already as of the end of September.

That makes Frisch the top-raising challenger anywhere in the country. Only soon-to-retire Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.), the former House speaker ousted by a majority of the chamber, had raised more through September among all congressional candidates, incumbents or otherwise.

Boebert was also facing a Republican primary challenger, attorney Jeff Hurd, who had establishment support from figures like former Colorado Gov. Bill Owens.

Boebert’s new home?: Boebert, who has collected $3.2 million so far this year and ended September with $1.4 million in cash on hand, will instead seek reelection in the state’s 4th District.

While the two districts share a border, their population centers are far apart. The 3rd District is mostly based in Colorado’s Western Slope, the name generally given to areas west of the Continental Divide. The 4th District, which will be an open seat following the retirement announcement of GOP Rep. Ken Buck, encompasses the eastern third of the state.

The 4th District is also more Republican: Trump carried it by 19 points in 2020. But there was already a field of GOP candidates vying to succeed Buck who might not be scared off by Boebert, a newcomer to the district and its constituents.

Why it might work: Frisch said Wednesday night he’s plowing ahead with his campaign, but defeating a Republican without Boebert’s baggage — whether it’s feuds on the Hill or getting kicked out of a Denver production of “Beetlejuice” for inappropriate behavior with her date — might be more difficult, depending on the GOP nominee.

And every seat counts for both parties, with Republicans holding only a five-seat majority, which could drop to four if the party cedes the Long Island seat vacated by expelled former Rep. George Santos (R-N.Y.).

Meanwhile, Boebert has six months before the late June primary to introduce herself to her new district’s Republican voters. Those in the southern part of the district overlap with some of the media markets, like Colorado Springs and Pueblo, where she’s campaigned for her current seat.

But the rest of the new district, which borders Kansas, Nebraska and Wyoming, probably isn’t as familiar with her profile outside of the tabloid headlines.

Tripped her up???? How can you be tripped up???

Haley blames a ‘Democratic plant’ for Civil War question that tripped her up

The former South Carolina governor also said that the war was, indeed, about slavery.

By SAM STEIN and MIA MCCARTHY

Hours after declining to do so, Nikki Haley said on Thursday morning that she believed slavery was, indeed, the cause of the Civil War. She suggested that the person who had asked her the question the night before was a “Democratic plant.”

“Well, two things on this track. I mean, of course, the Civil War was about slavery. We know that, that’s the easy part of it,” the former South Carolina governor told The Pulse of NH — News Talk Radio Network. “What I was saying was, what does it mean to us today? What it means to us today is about freedom. That’s what that was all about. It was about individual freedom. It was about economic freedom. It was about individual rights. Our goal is to make sure, no, we never go back to the stain of slavery.”

She did not go further in addressing why she did not say as much on Wednesday evening when she appeared at a town hall event in Berlin, New Hampshire. Instead, she posited that she had been set up.

“It was definitely a Democrat plant,” said Haley. “That’s why I said, what does it mean to you? And if you notice, he didn’t answer anything. The same reason he didn’t tell the reporters what his name was.”

Haley’s comments came the morning after she was asked specifically what she thought was the cause of the Civil War, to which she responded that it was “how government was going to run” that sparked the deadliest war in U.S. history.

“I think it always comes down to the role of government and what the rights of the people are,” Haley added. “And I will always stand by the fact that I think government was intended to secure the rights and freedoms of the people.”

The attendee at the town hall event in Berlin, New Hampshire pressed her several times on the matter, growing more impatient that she wouldn’t name slavery as a cause. The attendee told Haley it was “astonishing” she did not mention slavery in her answer.

“What do you want me to say about slavery?” she responded. She then asked for the next question.

The answer quickly got national attention, with President Joe Biden posting “It was about slavery” with the clip of Haley on X, formerly known as Twitter. An account for Gov. Ron DeSantis posted “Yikes” in response to Haley’s comments.

Sues OpenAI

The New York Times sues OpenAI, Microsoft over use of its stories used to train chatbots

The Times said OpenAI and Microsoft are advancing their technology through the “unlawful use of The Times’s work to create artificial intelligence products that compete with it.”

By ASSOCIATED PRESS

The New York Times has filed a federal lawsuit against OpenAI and Microsoft, seeking to end the practice of using its stories to train chatbots.

In the suit filed Wednesday in the Southern District of New York in Manhattan, the Times said OpenAI and Microsoft are advancing their technology through the “unlawful use of The Times’s work to create artificial intelligence products that compete with it” and “threatens The Times’s ability to provide that service.”

OpenAI and Microsoft did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Media organizations have been pummeled by a migration of readers to online platforms and while many publications have carved out a digital space online as well, artificial intelligence technology has threatened to upend numerous industries, including media.

Artificial intelligence companies scrape information available online, including articles published by media organizations, to train generative AI chatbots. Those companies have attracted billions in investments very rapidly.

The Times did not list specific damages that it is seeking, but said the legal action “seeks to hold them responsible for the billions of dollars in statutory and actual damages that they owe for the unlawful copying and use of The Times’s uniquely valuable works.”

In the complaint, the Times said Microsoft and OpenAI “seek to free-ride on The Times’s massive investments in its journalism” by using it to build products without payment or permission.

In July, OpenAI and The Associated Press announced a deal for the artificial intelligence company to license AP’s archive of news stories.

However, the Times said it’s never given permission to anyone to use its content for generative AI purposes.

The lawsuit also follows what appears to be breakdowns in talks between the newspaper and the two companies.

The Times said it reached out to Microsoft and OpenAI in April to raise concerns about the use of its intellectual property and reach a resolution on the issue. During the talks, the newspaper said it sought to “ensure it received fair value” for the use of its content, “facilitate the continuation of a healthy news ecosystem, and help develop GenAI technology in a responsible way that benefits society and supports a well-informed public.”

“These negotiations have not led to a resolution,” the lawsuit said.

Migrant busing

Mayor Adams announces executive order aimed at restricting Texas Gov. Greg Abbott’s migrant busing

The executive order mandates migrant charter buses must announce their arrival 32 hours in advance and can only drop off migrants between 8:30 a.m. and 12 p.m.

By JASON BEEFERMAN

Mayor Eric Adams issued an executive order Wednesday to restrict the flow of migrant charter buses sent by Texas Gov. Greg Abbott to New York City.

Adams said the order mandates any buses carrying migrants arrive in the city only between 8:30 a.m. and noon on weekdays. The buses’ arrival must also be announced 32 hours in advance, he said. The order specifically applies to buses contracted by the state of Texas — whose governor Adams routinely blames for sending asylum seekers into the five boroughs.

The announcement came during a joint briefing with the mayors of Chicago and Denver. The three cities have formed a coalition to press the White House and federal government for more migrant aid as each metropolis grapples with the economic and governmental burden of housing, feeding and educating tens of thousands of migrants.

Adams administration officials said Tuesday that the city is receiving nearly 4,000 migrants each week. In total, more than 161,000 migrants have entered New York City since the crisis began in 2022, and 68,000 remain in the city’s care.

“I’m proud to be here with my fellow mayors to call on the federal government to do their part with one voice and to tell Texas Governor Abbott to stop the games and use of migrants as potential as political pawns,” Adams said during the Wednesday announcement. “We cannot allow buses with people needing our help to arrive without warning at any hour of day and night.”

“This not only prevents us from providing assistance in an orderly way, it puts those who have already suffered so much in danger,” he added.

The executive order came the same day five buses arrived in New York City at around 1 a.m., forcing officials to scramble as they received the migrants who had begun their journey with a chartered flight from El Paso. Last week, a record 14 buses arrived from Texas in a single night, Adams said.

Adams said violating his order would result in a misdemeanor punishable by fines or the impounding of charter buses. He also raised the possibility his administration would file lawsuits against violators.

Adams is not the first mayor of the coalition to attempt to restrict the arrival of migrants via chartered buses. Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson devised a similar order in November, and has already issued at least 96 citations to bus companies and impounded at least one bus. But bus companies were able to circumvent the Chicago order by dropping off migrants in far-flung suburbs.

It was unclear if Mayor Adams will try to proactively prevent the same from happening in New York.

While both Adams and Johnson have referred to Abbott’s transporting of migrants as “cruel,” New York City has also paid to transport asylum seekers to destinations outside the city. Between March and November, the city said it spent about $4.6 million to purchase more than 19,300 plane tickets for migrants seeking travel to other cities.

In both Texas and New York, local governments say the migrants are traveling willingly.

In response to a question about how Abbott’s actions differ from those of Adams, who is offering some migrants tickets out of the city, a spokesperson responded: “We are not chartering planes or busses and shipping migrants to other cities with little access to food, water and bathrooms on the journey. Our reticketing process is dedicated to getting migrants where they want to go.”

Senator from Wisconsin

Herb Kohl, formerly senator from Wisconsin and owner of NBA’s Milwaukee Bucks, has died. He was 88.

Kohl got into Wisconsin politics in the 1970s, serving as chair of the state Democratic Party from 1975 to 1977.

By ASSOCIATED PRESS

Herb Kohl, a former Democratic U.S. senator from Wisconsin and former owner of the Milwaukee Bucks basketball team, has died. He was 88.

His death Wednesday was announced by Herb Kohl Philanthropies, which did not give a cause but said he died after a brief illness.

Kohl was a popular figure in Wisconsin, purchasing the Bucks to keep them from leaving town, and spending generously from his fortune on civic and educational causes throughout the state. He also used his money to fund his Senate races, allowing to him to portray himself as “nobody’s senator but yours.”

In the Senate, a body renowned for egos, Kohl was an unusual figure. He was quiet and not one to seek credit, yet effective on issues important to the state, especially dairy policy. He was one of the richest members of the Senate, and the Senate’s only professional sports team owner.

Kohl was born in Milwaukee, where he was a childhood friend of Bud Selig, who went on to become commissioner of the MLB. The two roomed together at the University of Wisconsin and remained friends in adulthood.

After receiving his bachelor’s degree from the University of Wisconsin in 1956, Kohl went on to earn a master’s degree in business administration from Harvard University in 1958, and he served in the Army Reserve from 1958-64. He helped grow the family-owned business, Kohl’s grocery and department stores, and served as company president in the 1970s. The corporation was sold in 1979.

Kohl also got into Wisconsin politics in the 1970s, serving as chair of the state Democratic Party from 1975 to 1977.

In 1985, Kohl bought the Bucks for $18 million.

“I am pleased, happy and delighted,” he said at a news conference. “The Milwaukee Bucks are in Milwaukee and they are going to stay in Milwaukee.”

He later remarked: “The opportunity I was given to purchase and to keep the team here in Milwaukee is one of the most unique and fortunate experiences I’ve ever enjoyed.”

The team was in the middle of its sixth straight winning season when Kohl bought it, and it went on to post winning records in the first six full seasons with Kohl as owner, before stumbling through most of the 1990s. The team improved in the late ’90s and early 2000s. In 2006, Kohl, owner of the small-market Bucks, was one of eight league owners to ask NBA commissioner David Stern to implement revenue sharing.

Kohl’s civic commitments extended well beyond keeping professional basketball in Wisconsin. He donated $25 million to the University of Wisconsin to help fund construction of the Kohl Center, home to the school’s basketball and hockey teams. It was the single largest private donation in university history.

“I was very happy to be in a position to help build a first-rate, state-of-the-art sports arena,” Kohl once said. “I think it cements the university’s reputation as one of the premier athletic programs in the Big Ten and the country.”

He also used his own money to fund the Herb Kohl Educational Foundation, which donates money for scholarships and fellowships to students, teachers and schools in Wisconsin.

In 1988, Kohl decided to run for the Senate, following the announcement that Sen. William Proxmire was retiring, and defeated then-state Sen. Susan Engeleiter, the Republican candidate. He won reelection in 1994, 2000 and 2006. His considerable fortune helped scare away the Republican Party from mounting a serious challenge in 2006.

Kohl never accepted a pay raise in the Senate; he drew a salary of $89,500 every year, the same pay he got when he entered the Senate in 1989, returning the rest to the Treasury Department.

In the Senate, Kohl tended to home state interests. He opposed the Northeast Dairy Compact, a program opposed by Midwestern dairy farmers, and helped prevent it from being renewed in Congress. Kohl was instrumental in coming up with a replacement program, the Milk Income Loss Contract, which paid dairy farmers cash when prices fell below a certain level; the program especially helped Wisconsin dairy farmers.

As the top Democrat on the Senate Appropriations agriculture subcommittee, which controls the budget of the Department of Agriculture, Kohl had a strong say on farm policy. He was also the top Democrat on the Senate Aging Committee and the Judiciary antitrust subcommittee. Kohl served as chair of all three panels when Democrats were in the majority.

Kohl didn’t mind doing things in the Senate without much credit. As Congress became more and more partisan, the diminutive Kohl almost seemed to be a throwback to another era.

“I am a person who does not believe in invective,” he once said. “I never go out and look to grab the mike or go in front of the TV camera. When I go to work everyday, I check my ego at the door.”

Kohl’s moderate temperament was matched by his voting record.

In 2001, he was one of just a dozen Democratic senators to vote for President George W. Bush’s tax cuts, but he voted against the president’s tax cuts in 2003. He also voted to authorize military force against Iraq in 2002.

Kohl, who never married, said that being single gave him time to balance the demands of life as a senator and owner. A sign on his Senate office desk said: “The Bucks Stop Here.”

What a stupid shit...

Boebert switches congressional districts, avoiding a Democratic opponent who has far outraised her

Boebert announced she will enter a crowded Republican primary in the eastern side of the state, leaving the more competitive 3rd District seat she barely won last year.

By ASSOCIATED PRESS

Republican Rep. Lauren Boebert announced Wednesday she is switching congressional districts, avoiding a likely rematch against a Democrat who has far outraised her and following an embarrassing moment of groping and vaping that shook even loyal supporters.

In a Facebook video Wednesday evening, Boebert announced she would enter the crowded Republican primary in retiring Rep. Ken Buck’s seat in the eastern side of the state, leaving the more competitive 3rd District seat she barely won last year — and which she was in peril of losing next year as some in her party have soured on her controversial style.

Boebert implied in the video that her departure from the district would help Republicans retain the seat, saying, “I will not allow dark money that is directed at destroying me personally to steal this seat. It’s not fair to the 3rd District and the conservatives there who have fought so hard for our victories.”

“The Aspen donors, George Soros and Hollywood actors that are trying to buy this seat, well they can go pound sand,” she said.

Boebert called it “a fresh start,” acknowledging the rough year following a divorce with her husband and video of her misbehaving with a date at a performance of the musical “Beetlejuice” in Denver. The scandal in September rocked some of her faithful supporters, who saw it as a transgression of conservative, Christian values and for which Boebert apologized at events throughout her district.

She already faced a primary challenge in her district, as well as a general election face-off with Democrat Adam Frisch, a former Aspen city council member who came within a few hundred votes of beating her in 2022. A rematch was expected, with Frisch raising at least $7.7 million to Boebert’s $2.4 million.

Instead, if Boebert wins the primary to succeed Buck she will run in the state’s most conservative district, which former President Donald Trump won by about 20 percentage points in 2020, in contrast to his margin of about 8 percentage points in her district. While it’s not required that a representative live in the congressional district they represent, only the state the district is in, Boebert said she would be moving — a shift from Colorado’s western Rocky Mountain peaks and high desert mesas to its eastern expanse of prairie grass and ranching enclaves.

In 2022, Frisch’s campaign found support in the conservative district from unaffiliated voters and Republicans who’d defected over Boebert’s brash, Trumpian style. In this election, Frisch’s campaign had revived the slogan “stop the circus” and framed Frisch as the “pro-normal” alternative to Boebert’s more partisan politics.

In a statement after Boebert’s announcement, Frisch said he’s prepared for whoever will be the Republican candidate.

“From Day 1 of this race, I have been squarely focused on defending rural Colorado’s way of life, and offering common sense solutions to the problems facing the families of Colorado’s 3rd Congressional District.” he said. “My focus will remain the same.”

The Republican primary candidate who has raised the second most behind Boebert in the 3rd District, Jeff Hurd, is a more traditional Republican candidate. Hurd has already garnered support from prominent Republicans in the district, first reported by VailDaily.

Boebert rocked the political world by notching a surprise primary win against the incumbent Republican congressman in the 3rd District in 2020 when she ran a gun-themed restaurant in the town of Rifle, Colorado. She then tried to enter the U.S. Capitol carrying a pistol and began to feud with prominent liberal Democrats like Rep. Ilhan Omar and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.

Self-driving cars

The sensors in those self-driving cars have become an international dispute

The domestic lidar industry is mounting a lobbying offensive against a leading Chinese rival that’s stepping up its own PR game.

By TANYA SNYDER

A key technology in futuristic cars is quickly becoming a new flashpoint in already fraught relations between the U.S. and China.

The development of “lidar” sensor technology has helped fuel the rise of driverless robotaxis roaming cities like San Francisco and Phoenix. But as automakers prepare to deploy lidar-enabled features such as adaptive cruise control and blind spot detection in more consumer vehicles, the homegrown industry is mounting a wide-ranging lobbying offensive against a leading Chinese rival that’s stepping up its own PR game.

The San Francisco-based lidar firm Ouster is appealing to Congress to stop the hemorrhaging by stoking fears that Chinese versions of the technology could be used to spy on Americans and deliver intelligence about sensitive U.S. infrastructure to Beijing. It’s a clash that comes as President Joe Biden navigates complicated relationships with China and segments of the U.S. auto industry while many Republicans are embracing a more aggressive tone toward the country.

“China’s ongoing efforts to dominate the market for LIDAR reduces our economic competitiveness, increases our reliance on them for critical technologies, and perpetuates their nefarious trade practices all while bolstering their military and security ambitions,” Ouster CEO Angus Pacala said in an email. “This is counter to U.S. interests and needs to stop.”

The U.S. industry’s leading trade group, the Lidar Coalition, declined to comment. But Ouster and its lobbyists have secured meetings with key lawmakers on the House Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party and Biden administration officials, trying to raise alarm about potential threats. They’ve been urging blacklists or outright bans, as well as imposing tariffs on Chinese-made lidar sensors.

Ouster’s campaign is a page ripped out of the playbook that ultimately led Congress and regulators to ban another Chinese company — drone-maker DJI — from Defense Department procurements and other business. And some in Washington appear to be listening.

Asked about Ouster’s concerns, Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg said in an interview that the U.S. needs “to watch very closely to make sure it doesn’t entail an undue economic security or cybersecurity threat.” He also noted the need to “de-risk and necessarily decouple from China,” especially when it comes to technology.

When Republican and Democratic leaders of the House Select committee on China spearheaded a letter last month urging the Biden administration to consider restrictions on Chinese lidar companies, Ouster’s lobbyists had helped drum up support and signatures.

Lawmakers charged that China’s National Security Law, which compels Chinese companies to provide data on demand to the government, could mean that “troves of data on not only U.S. mapping and infrastructure, but also on U.S. military systems” could fall into the hands of the Chinese government and military.

Two independent German technical testing companies assessed Hesai’s major lidar product sold in the U.S. market and determined that it does not have the capability to store or transmit data outside the vehicle.

The letter also suggests that the CCP could introduce malware “that could degrade the performance” of Chinese lidar installed in U.S. systems — claims the Chinese government denies.

“China has always opposed the use of information technology to damage other countries’ critical infrastructure or steal strategic data,” Chinese Embassy spokesperson Liu Pengyu said in a statement accusing U.S. lawmakers of “taking words out of context and making one-sided interpretations.”

He also said the larger narrative at play was suspect.

“The US has repeatedly generalized the concept of national security and hyped up the ‘China threat’ theory, which China firmly opposes,” Liu said.

The 20 members who signed the letter pressed for a review that might lead to limits on how U.S. companies invest in foreign auto tech firms and other restrictions.

But Chinese manufacturer Hesai, which makes lidar offerings that are more sophisticated, and sometimes cheaper, than many U.S. companies, is fighting back, egged on by some U.S. auto interests whose vehicles already use its technology. New scrutiny on the Defense Department’s use of Chinese-made lidar and a Congressional Research Service report outlining its potential dangers also spooked the company into action in Washington.

Ouster is turning a commercial dispute into “a political/national security issue — which is definitely not something the customers want to see, especially the bigger ones,” Hesai CEO David Li said in an interview this fall. The lobbying campaign from U.S. interests — and complaints from their own U.S. customers — encouraged Hesai to hire its own high-priced team of lobbyists and PR reps, Li said.

Sitting in the Washington offices of Hesai’s newly retained public relations firm, the BGR Group, Li said his visit was a direct result of the “false rumors” being spread by Ouster.

Li said he’d had “multiple discussions with different customers,” who told him: “‘Hesai, please help people understand this.’”

Hesai customers include robotaxi companies Cruise — which is backed by General Motors — and Zoox, along with automated trucking company Kodiak Robotics. Those companies would not confirm that they pushed Hesai to lobby in Washington, but a Democratic aide on Capitol Hill, briefed on a meeting with Hesai, said staffers “got the clear impression that Hesai’s customers specifically asked Hesai to talk to Congress.”

One U.S. Hesai customer said any restrictions the government placed on Chinese-manufactured lidar would seriously hamper the company’s ability to do business.

“The Hesai scanning lidar is the only sensor on the market that has the performance and reliability we need to operate,” said a representative from an autonomous vehicle company using Hesai lidar, granted anonymity to discuss sensitive matters. “There just simply isn’t another option available at any price.”

At the end of September, Hesai hired the two biggest lobbying firms in Washington, Akin Gump and Brownstein Hyatt, in addition to hiring BGR. Ouster, meanwhile, has increased its quarterly spending on lobbyists by about 50 percent compared with last year.

In addition, a new group called the Coalition for Safe and Secure Technology has formed to help Ouster make a case about the threat from China.

The director, Mark Paustenbach, a Democratic political consultant, said the group also wants to “create a level playing field for American and American-allied businesses in the lidar space, while safeguarding against potential threats to our national security.”

Though the group plans to lobby, Paustenbach is not a registered lobbyist, and he would not disclose the coalition’s membership.

Ouster and Hesai are hardly strangers. They have repeatedly scrapped over alleged patent infringement. In 2019, Velodyne, which has since been acquired by Ouster, sued Hesai and the Chinese lidar company RoboSense for patent infringement. (Velodyne settled and agreed to a global cross-licensing agreement, allowing Hesai to use Velodyne’s technology before its acquisition by Ouster.)

Ouster has also sued Hesai for allegedly infringing on five Ouster patents; the court sent the case to arbitration in October.

Former National Security Council China Director Liza Tobin — now working as senior director for economy at the Special Competitive Studies Project, a group founded by former Google CEO Eric Schmidt — compares lidar to drones, solar panels and other devices that U.S. consumers now primarily buy from China.

“It starts to be like rinse and repeat,” Tobin said. “Sometimes once we start noticing the problem in a particular subsector, like lidar, it’s almost too late.”

Rep. Raja Krishnamoorthi, ranking member of the House Select Committee on the CCP, put it this way: “We’ve seen the movie before. The question is whether we can author a different ending.”

Restrictions may not come from the U.S. side in the end. China is considering an export ban on lidar. China restricts exports on other raw materials and technologies both as retaliation for U.S. trade controls and out of national security concerns.

However it happens, barring lidar sensors from China could end up helping China more than it helps the U.S. autonomous vehicle industry, the U.S. Hesai customer warned.

“Virtually the whole industry uses these sensors,” the customer said. “If they were barred from the U.S. market and there was no replacement, it would have a serious impact on the industry’s ability to develop and grow. ... presumably to the benefit of China and Europe and other leading technology developers.”