Author: PolitCens

Nonprofit organizations and other outside groups that don’t disclose their donors are spending record amounts of money on the 2020 U.S. presidential and congressional races, signaling their growing influence in national politics.These so-called “dark money” groups so far have funneled at least $177 million to independent political action committees, known as super PACs, in the 2020 election cycle, according to data compiled by the Center for Responsive Politics, a Washington-based group that tracks money in politics.By comparison, those groups gave $178 million in the entire campaign cycle two years ago, according to the center. In addition, dark money groups this time have spent more than $19 million on direct political advertising, a figure that is likely to rise as campaigning picks up its pace in the coming months.Anna Massoglia, a researcher at the Center for Responsive Politics, said spending by super PACs and other outside groups that take money from unidentified sources is on track to set a new record in this two-year election cycle.“Dark money spending has continued to flow into the 2020 election cycle,” Massoglia said in an interview. “We’ve seen dark money influencing and impacting 2020 elections in a few different ways.”Super PACsProponents of political groups that are beneficiaries of contributions from unidentified donors, such as nonprofits and shell corporations, reject the “dark money” label used by their detractors.Regardless of what this practice is called, the prevalence of outside money exploded after a 2010 Supreme Court ruling that said the government could not restrict political spending by corporations and labor unions. That gave rise to the emergence of a new breed of political spending juggernauts – the super PACs.In the decade since the Supreme Court decision known as Citizens United, dark money groups, such as the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, have reported nearly $1 billion in direct spending on U.S. elections to the Federal Election Commission, according to the Center for Responsive Politics.While that’s a small fraction of the overall spending on U.S. elections, critics say it has enabled wealthy donors to influence the outcome of elections while keeping voters in the dark about their role.“This is a growing problem, and millions of dollars are going to be flowing into super PACs in the weeks ahead before Election Day,” said Michael Beckel, research director for Issue One, a Washington-based group that monitors the role of money in politics. “Some of that money could be coming from mysterious sources that the public has no idea who it is,” he told VOA.Conservative defenders of anonymous spending dismiss claims of nefarious intent and say that disclosing the names of individual donors could subject them to political intimidation and harassment.When organizations such as the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and Planned Parenthood give money to super PACs, they say, voters know that the funds come from their members and backers.“So the idea that this is something that the American people know nothing about and don’t know who’s trying to influence them, I think is often quite false,” said Bradley A. Smith, a former Republican chairman of the Federal Election Commission who now heads the Institute for Free Speech, a conservative group that opposes campaign finance restrictions.Veil of secrecyDark money groups don’t just give money to super PACs and other political organizations. Increasingly, they are funding so-called issue advocacy ads. While carefully avoiding terms such as “vote for” or “vote against” a candidate, these ads can nonetheless cast a candidate in a certain light, Massoglia said.“In doing so, they effectively operate as political ads without having to disclose to the FEC,” Massoglia said.The goal of transparency is at the heart of the U.S. campaign finance system, even if it often is not achieved. By law, all political organizations must disclose their donors to the Federal Election Commission to help voters make more informed decisions about which party or candidate to support. Super PACs are no exception.But examining a super PAC’s FEC disclosure filings won’t lift the veil of secrecy over the true source of their funds.Take, for example, Victory 2020, a new joint fundraising committee involving two super PACs working to elect Democrats this November. One is called American Bridge 21st Century and the other is the pro-Joe Biden group Unite the Country.Victory 2020’s FEC filing shows that $5.7 million out of the $5.9 million it has raised this election cycle came from a progressive outfit called the Sixteen Thirty Fund. But because the Sixteen Thirty Fund is registered as a social welfare organization whose primary purpose is not political, it is not required to disclose its donors. The group says it helps “nonprofit leaders and advocates confront a wide range of challenges,” from climate change to racial justice.This lack of transparency runs the political gamut. On the Republican side, the super PAC Congressional Leadership Fund received $9 million from the conservative American Action Network in June. Like the progressive Sixteen Thirty Fund, the American Action Network is registered as a social welfare organization not required to disclose its donors.On its website, the group says that its “goal is to put our center-right ideas into action by engaging the hearts and minds of the American people and spurring them into active participation in our democracy.”The role of shell companiesWhile nonprofit groups are the most common vehicle for funneling dark money into elections, wealthy donors also use shell companies to fund super PACs.In a recent report, Issue One identified a dozen such shell corporations. Among them: a New York-based company that gave $75,000 to a liberal super PAC in Texas. Issue One said it could not conclusively link the company to any one individual. Other shell companies were apparently formed for the sole purpose of making donations to super PACs.“We’re completely in the dark about where some of these shell companies got the funds,” Beckel of Issue One told VOA.This is a loophole that could be exploited by foreign actors seeking to meddle in U.S. elections, Beckel warned.“The threat is serious, and anyone across the political spectrum could be benefiting from secret money,” he added.In recent years, the Justice Department has charged several individuals accused of giving foreign money to pro-Obama and pro-Trump super PACs.“This is a problem that needs action now, and it is a glaring loophole in campaign finance law that is just waiting to be abused,” according to Beckel.Transparency advocates want Congress to beef up disclosure requirements. A bipartisan bill introduced on Capitol Hill called the Shell Company Abuse Act would make it a crime to set up a shell company with the intent of concealing foreign campaign donations.“Unless Congress puts more teeth in the law, we expect foreign actors to continue to try to abuse this loophole in the system,” Beckel said.
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U.S. President Donald Trump on Saturday signed an executive order and three memoranda to provide economic relief for the millions of Americans who have lost their jobs following the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic.Trump said at a news conference at his golf course in Bedminster, New Jersey, that the four measures would:— Continue expanded unemployment relief, which had been $600 a week, at $400 a week, with states covering 25% of the cost and the federal government covering the remaining 75%.— Provide a payroll tax holiday for Americans earning less than $100,000.— Continue to delay student loan payments.— Extend the freeze on evictions.The president accused congressional Democrats of including items in the relief bill that are unrelated to the pandemic.House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, both Democrats, offered Friday to reduce their proposed $3.4 trillion coronavirus aid package by nearly one-third if Republicans would agree to raise their $1 trillion counteroffer.But the White House negotiators, Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin and Chief of Staff Mark Meadows, rejected the offer.Sizable gapRepublican senators are not interested in an economic relief package that costs more than $1 trillion. The bottom line for the Democrats is $2 trillion. There seems to be no room for negotiating away from those numbers for the politicians. Reports said the lawmakers had not scheduled any additional meetings, and House and Senate members have left Washington.What Trump’s executive measures don’t include, but the economic relief bill did, was more than $100 billion to help schools reopen this fall, more funding for coronavirus testing, money to prevent furloughs by state and local governments, money for the struggling U.S. Postal Service and money for another round of $1,200 stimulus checks.Four coronavirus rescue bills amounting to nearly $3 trillion all won bipartisan approval, but conservatives have recoiled at the prospect of another agreement with a whopping deficit-financed cost.Millions of Americans recently saw the $600 enhancement to their weekly unemployment benefits end. Social service agencies had warned that the lack of the additional funds for the unemployed could result in food insecurity and evictions for millions.
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U.S. President Donald Trump said Friday he is ready to take executive action after congressional lawmakers failed again to reach agreement on a relief package for the tens of millions of Americans who have lost their jobs following the COVID-19 pandemic.Trump told a news conference that executive orders are being prepared to enhance unemployment benefits until the end of the year, defer student loan payments and forgive interest on the loans, and extend a moratorium on evictions. He said an executive order is also being prepared to defer payroll taxes until the end of the year.It was not immediately clear if he has the legal authority to take the executive actions he has proposed. It was also not immediately clear how the actions, if implemented, would work. For example, if payroll taxes are deferred, it is not clear whether workers would then have to pay them retroactively at some point and whether that payment would be one large payment or stretched out over time.Republican lawmakers are not interested in an economic relief package that costs more than $1 trillion. The bottom line for the Democrats is $2 trillion. There seems to be no room for negotiating away from those numbers for the politicians. Reports say the lawmakers have not scheduled any additional meetings.Millions of Americans recently saw the $600 enhancement to their weekly unemployment benefits come to an end. Social service agencies have warned that the lack of the additional funds for the unemployed could result in food insecurity and evictions for millions.
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Joe Biden’s controversial remarks about race this week risk alienating young Black voters who despise President Donald Trump but are not inspired by his Democratic rival.When pressed by Errol Barnett of CBS News on whether he’d taken a cognitive test, Biden responded that the question was akin to asking the Black reporter if he would take a drug test to see if “you’re taking cocaine or not? … Are you a junkie?”In a later interview with National Public Radio’s Lulu Garcia-Navarro, Biden seemed to draw distinctions between Black and Hispanic populations in the U.S. “Unlike the African American community, with notable exceptions, the Latino community is an incredibly diverse community with incredibly different attitudes about different things,” he told the Latina reporter.He later walked back the comment.Black voters as a whole delivered the Democratic nomination to Biden, powering his commanding win in the South Carolina primary, which rescued his floundering campaign. But that success was heavily dependent on older Black voters. In a general election where Democrats say no vote can be taken for granted, young Black activists and elected officials say this week’s missteps could make it harder to get their vote.“Trump is terrible, and he’s a racist, and we have to get racists out of the White House. But then Biden keeps saying racist things,” said Mariah Parker, a 28-year-old county commissioner in Athens, Georgia. “It doesn’t make me feel much better that we actually will have an improvement for the Black community with one president over the other.”Most Black voters view Trump as someone who exacerbates racial tensions and are unlikely to support his campaign in large numbers. But those who sit out the presidential election could sway the outcome in closely contested states.AP VoteCast data illustrates the generational divide Biden is confronting.Across 17 states where AP VoteCast surveyed Democratic voters during the primary, Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders Sanders won 60 percent of voters under 30 overall, to Biden’s 19 percent. And while Biden was strongly supported by African American voters overall, Black voters under age 30 were slightly more likely to support Sanders than Biden, 44 percent to 38 percent.Sorry, but your browser cannot support embedded video of this type, you can
download this video to view it offline.Download File360p | 9 MB480p | 13 MB540p | 17 MB720p | 34 MB1080p | 68 MBOriginal | 80 MB Embed” />Copy Download AudioA Washington Post-Ipsos poll conducted in June suggested that while Biden had majority support among Black voters aged 18-39, there was skepticism about Biden himself. Among Black Americans under age 40 that were polled, 32 percent said they didn’t feel he was sympathetic to the problems of Black people. And 24 percent of respondents under 40 said they felt Biden is “biased” against Black people, in contrast to much lower percentages for middle-aged and senior respondents.Part of the challenge for Biden, said activist Kristin Fulwylie Thomas, is the perception among young Black voters that he’s too moderate to deliver on issues that are important to them. The 31-year-old managing director of Equal Ground, an Orlando-based group working to boost turnout among Black voters across Florida, said she hears this concern from people in her community and voters across the state.“What I’m seeing and what I’m hearing among young Black voters is that Biden was not their first choice, so folks are not excited to vote for him this November,” she said.Every gaffe makes it harder for Biden to generate that excitement.Michigan State Rep. Jewell Jones, who at 21 was the youngest elected official ever in Michigan, said that he’s seen a number of Biden’s comments on Black voters, along with his past support for the 1994 Crime Bill that contributed to mass incarceration of Black Americans, pop up on social media and raise questions among his peers.“Young people are really holding people accountable these days,” he said. “Anything that comes up that they think is questionable, they’ll challenge.”Jones, who is now 25, said the issue with young Black voters is “not necessarily skepticism about whether or not he’s able to do the job.”“Young people today want to know, are politicians’ hearts in the right place?” he said.The Biden campaign says they’re working hard to reach out to young Black voters, and point to events hosted by their young voter outreach coalition, League 46, as well as outreach geared specifically towards Historically Black Colleges and Universities and Black sororities, among an array of other events broadly geared toward the Black community nationwide.Birmingham, Alabama, Mayor Randall Woodfin, who supports Biden, swept aside Biden’s comments this week. He noted that Biden, unlike Trump, later clarified his comments.“I truly believe that he wants to do the right thing moving forward,” he said.Sorry, but your browser cannot support embedded video of this type, you can
download this video to view it offline.Download File360p | 11 MB480p | 15 MB540p | 19 MB720p | 37 MB1080p | 73 MBOriginal | 93 MB Embed” />Copy Download AudioBiden has put out an array of proposals focused on Black economic mobility, which include pledges to steer federal money and tax credits to small business and economic development programs for minority-owned firms and disadvantaged neighborhoods. Biden also said he’d encourage home ownership to help close wealth gaps among minority communities, among other policies.On criminal justice reform, he’s called for a federal ban on police chokeholds, national standards for police use of force, mandatory data collection from local law enforcement, a new federal police oversight commission. He’s also embraced some progressive proposals that may appeal to younger voters, like forgiving some student loan debt and offering some free college.But on a number of key issues being pushed by some young Black activists — like defunding or dismantling police forces, Medicare for All, and legalizing marijuana — Biden has thus far declined to embrace the most progressive policies.As Jones put it: “The younger generation are not just asking for reform or just asking for change. They want a revolution.”But some of the enthusiasm gap has to do with a generational split on voting within the Black community that has little to do with Biden, said Leah Daughtry, a Black operative who has twice served as CEO of the Democratic National Convention.“For my generation and older, voting was this thing that was this great privilege because we didn’t always have it,” she said, noting that at 55, she was part of the first generation of Black women to get the right to vote. For younger Black Americans, “they don’t have the lived experience of not being able to.”Still, Daughtry said that she was willing to give Biden “a pass” on his comments after listening to the full interview, but young voters might not be so forgiving.“It’s absolutely a problem, and unfortunately the campaign appears to be having to spend time clarifying and cleaning them up,” she said. “For young people — when they see the one quote it would appear to confirm to them or solidify questions in their mind about the vice president’s intent and goals. And the best we can hope for is they will do further research. At worst you have some who will say it adds to their reasons for disillusionment.”  
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A last-ditch effort by Democrats to revive collapsing Capitol Hill talks on vital COVID-19 rescue money ended in disappointment on Friday, making it increasingly likely that Washington gridlock will mean more hardship for millions of people who are losing enhanced jobless benefits and further damage for an economy pummeled by the still-raging coronavirus.”It was a disappointing meeting,” declared top Senate Democrat Chuck Schumer, saying the White House had rejected an offer by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi to curb Democratic demands by about $1 trillion. He urged the White House to “negotiate with Democrats and meet us in the middle. Don’t say it’s your way or no way.”Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin, left, and White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows, right, walk out of a meeting with House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Minority Leader Sen. Chuck Schumer, Aug. 7, 2020.Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said, “Unfortunately we did not make any progress today.”With the collapse of the talks, he said President Donald Trump was now likely to issue executive orders on home evictions and on student loan debt.White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows said, “This is not a perfect answer — we’ll be the first ones to say that — but it is all that we can do, and all the president can do within the confines of his executive power.”Friday’s session followed a combative meeting on Thursday that, for the first time cast real doubt on the ability of the Trump administration and Democrats on Capitol Hill to come together on a fifth COVID-19 response bill. Pelosi summoned Mnuchin and Meadows in hopes of breathing life into the negotiations, which have been characterized by frustration and intransigence on both sides.A breakdown in the talks would put at risk more than $100 billion to help reopen schools, a fresh round of $1,200 direct payments to most people and hundreds of billions of dollars for state and local governments to help them avoid furloughing workers and cutting services as tax revenues shrivel.In a news conference on Friday Pelosi said she offered a major concession to Republicans.”We’ll go down $1 trillion, you go up $1 trillion,” Pelosi said. The figures are approximate, but a Pelosi spokesman said the speaker is in general terms seeking a “top line” of perhaps $2.4 trillion since the House-passed HEROES Act is scored at $3.45 trillion. Republicans say their starting offer was about $1 trillion but have offered some concessions on jobless benefits and aid to states, among others, that have brought the White House offer higher.Mnuchin said that renewal of a $600 per-week pandemic jobless boost and huge demands by Democrats for aid to state and local governments are the key areas where they are stuck.”There’s a lot of areas of compromise,” he said after Friday’s meeting. “I think if we can reach an agreement on state and local and unemployment, we will reach an overall deal. And if we can’t we can’t.”Pelosi declared the talks all but dead until Meadows and Mnuchin give ground.”I’ve told them ‘come back when you are ready to give us a higher number,'” she said.Democrats have offered to reduce her almost $1 trillion demand for state and local governments considerably, but some of Pelosi’s proposed cost savings would accrue chiefly because she would shorten the timeframe for benefits like food stamps.Pelosi and Schumer continue to insist on a huge aid package to address a surge in cases and deaths, double-digit joblessness and the threat of poverty for millions of the newly unemployed.On Friday, they pointed to the new July jobs report to try to bolster their proposals. The report showed that the U.S. added 1.8 million jobs last month, a much lower increase than in May and June.”It’s clear the economy is losing steam,” Schumer said. “That means we need big, bold investments in America to help average folks.”Senate Republicans have been split, with roughly half of Majority Leader Mitch McConnell’s rank and file opposed to another rescue bill at all. Four prior coronavirus response bills totaling almost $3 trillion have won approval on bipartisan votes despite intense wrangling, but conservatives have recoiled at the prospect of another Pelosi-brokered agreement with a whopping deficit-financed cost.McConnell has sent the Senate home rather than forcing impatient senators to bide their time while Democrats play hardball. That suggests a vote won’t come until late next week, if then.Pelosi and Schumer have staked out a firm position to extend a lapsed $600-per-week bonus jobless benefit, demanded generous child care assistance and reiterated their insistence for food stamps and assistance to renters and homeowners facing eviction or foreclosure.”This virus is like a freight train coming so fast and they are responding like a convoy going as slow as the slowest ship. It just doesn’t work,” Pelosi said Friday.
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The U.S. Postal Service says it lost $2.2 billion in the three months that ended in June as the beleaguered agency, hit hard by the coronavirus pandemic, piles up financial losses that officials warn could top $20 billion over two years.”Our financial position is dire, stemming from substantial declines in mail volume, a broken business model and a management strategy that has not adequately addressed these issues,” Louis DeJoy, the new postmaster general, said Friday in his first public remarks since taking the job in June.”Without dramatic change, there is no end in sight,” DeJoy told the postal board of governors at a meeting Friday.While package deliveries to homebound Americans were up more than 50%, that was offset by continued declines in first-class and business mail, even as costs increased significantly to pay for personal protective equipment and replace workers who got sick or chose to stay home in fear of the virus, DeJoy said.Without an intervention from Congress, the agency faces an impending cash flow crisis, he said. The Postal Service is seeking an infusion of at least $10 billion to cover operating losses as well as regulatory changes that would undo a congressional requirement that the agency pre-fund billions of dollars in retiree health benefits.Louis DeJoy, the 75th postmaster general of the United States and chief executive officer of the USPS. (USPS photo)The agency is doing its part, said DeJoy, a Republican fundraiser and former supply chain executive who took command of the agency June 15. DeJoy, 63, of North Carolina, is a major donor to President Donald Trump and the Republican Party. He is the first postmaster general in nearly two decades who is not a career postal employee.Limits on overtimeIn his first month on the job, DeJoy said, he directed the agency to vigorously “focus on the ingrained inefficiencies in our operations,” including by applying strict limits on overtime.”By running our operations on time and on schedule, and by not incurring unnecessary overtime or other costs, we will enhance our ability to be sustainable and … continue to provide high-quality, affordable service,” DeJoy said.While not acknowledging widespread complaints by members of Congress about delivery delays nationwide, DeJoy said the agency would “aggressively monitor and quickly address service issues.”DeJoy’s remarks came as lawmakers from both parties called on the Postal Service to immediately reverse operational changes that are causing delays in deliveries across the country just as big volume increases are expected for mail-in election voting.Democratic House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer said Thursday that changes imposed by DeJoy “threaten the timely delivery of mail — including medicines for seniors, paychecks for workers and absentee ballots for voters — that is essential to millions of Americans.”In separate letters, two Montana Republicans, Senator Steve Daines and Representative Greg Gianforte, also urged the Postal Service to reverse the July directive, which eliminates overtime for hundreds of thousands of postal workers and mandates that mail be kept until the next day if distribution centers are running late.FILE – Republican Greg Gianforte greets supporters after winning Montana’s sole congressional seat, May 25, 2017, in Bozeman, Mont.’Unacceptable’And 84 House members — including four Republicans — signed yet another letter blasting the changes and urging an immediate reversal.”Delaying mail service is unacceptable,” Gianforte wrote Thursday to DeJoy. “Do not continue down this road.”In their letter, the 84 House members said it was “vital that the Postal Service does not reduce mail delivery hours, which could harm rural communities, seniors, small businesses and millions of Americans who rely on the mail for critical letters and packages.” The letter was led by Representative Carolyn Maloney, D-N.Y., chairwoman of the House Oversight Committee, who has called DeJoy to testify at a hearing next month.The flurry of letters came as the top Democrat on a Senate panel that oversees the Postal Service launched an investigation into the operational changes.Michigan Senator Gary Peters of the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee said DeJoy had failed to provide answers about the service delays, despite repeated requests.Peters is asking members of the public to provide their stories about delays or other problems with deliveries.The Postal Service is reeling from mail delays and financial problems at a time when record numbers of mail ballots are expected in the November presidential election because of the coronavirus pandemic.FILE- In this Dec. 14, 2017, photo, boxes for sorted mail are stacked at the main post office in Omaha, Neb.Criticism from TrumpTrump, a vocal critic of the Postal Service, contended Wednesday that “the Post Office doesn’t have enough time” to handle a significant increase in mail-in ballots. “I mean, you’re talking about millions of votes. … It’s a catastrophe waiting to happen.”DeJoy met with Schumer and Pelosi on Wednesday in a closed-door session that Schumer called “a heated discussion.” Democrats told DeJoy that “elections are sacred” and urged him not to impose cutbacks “at a time when all ballots count,” Schumer said.In his remarks to the postal board of governors, DeJoy disputed reports that the agency was slowing down election mail or any other mail. He called election mail handling “a robust and proven process.”While there will “likely be an unprecedented increase in election mail volume due to the pandemic, the Postal Service has ample capacity to deliver all election mail securely and on time in accordance with our delivery standards, and we will do so,” DeJoy said. “However … we cannot correct the errors of [state and local] election boards if they fail to deploy processes that take our normal processing and delivery standards into account.”Democrats have pushed for $10 billion for the Postal Service in talks with Republicans on a huge COVID-19 response bill. The figure is down from a $25 billion plan in a House-passed coronavirus measure. Key Republicans whose rural constituents are especially reliant on the post office support the idea.
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Washington talks on vital COVID-19 rescue money are teetering on the brink of collapse after a marathon meeting in the Capitol generated lots of recriminations but little progress on the top issues confronting negotiators.”There’s a handful of very big issues that we are still very far apart” on, said Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin. He talked of impasses on aid to states and local governments and renewing supplemental unemployment benefits in the Thursday night meetings.
Both sides said the future of the talks is uncertain. No meeting is scheduled so far for Friday, an informal deadline to reach the broad outlines of an agreement. President Donald Trump is considering executive orders to address evictions and unemployment insurance, but they appear unlikely to have much impact.
A breakdown in the talks would put at risk more than $100 billion to help reopen schools, a fresh round of $1,200 direct payments to most people and hundreds of billions of dollars for state and local governments to help them avoid furloughing workers and cutting services as tax revenues shrivel.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., emerged from Thursday’s meeting to give a pessimistic update about the chances for an agreement.
“We’re very far apart. It’s most unfortunate,” Pelosi said.
Both sides have adopted a hard line in the talks, though the Trump team is more open in disclosing a handful of its proposed compromises. Republicans were late to agree to the talks and have become frustrated by the inflexible tactics of Pelosi and Schumer, who have been exuding confidence in a political and legislative landscape that appeared tilted in their favor.
The Democratic pair say the federal coronavirus aid package needs to be huge to meet the moment: a surge in cases and deaths, double-digit joblessness and the threat of poverty for millions of the newly unemployed.
“We believe the patient needs a major operation while Republicans want to apply just a Band-Aid,” Schumer said. “We won’t let them just pass the Band-Aid, go home and leave America bleeding.”
On Friday, the two pointed to the July jobs report to try to bolster their proposals. The report showed that the U.S. added 1.8 million jobs last month, a much lower increase than in May and June.
“The latest jobs report shows that the economic recovery spurred by the investments Congress has passed is losing steam and more investments are still urgently needed to protect the lives and livelihoods of the American people,” Pelosi and Schumer said in a joint statement.
Senate Republicans have been split, with roughly half of McConnell’s rank and file opposed to another rescue bill at all. Four prior coronavirus response bills totaling almost $3 trillion have passed on bipartisan votes despite intense wrangling, but conservatives recoiled at the prospect of another Pelosi-brokered agreement with a whopping deficit-financed cost.
The White House is also promising that Trump will attempt to use executive orders to address elements of the congressional package involving evictions and jobless benefits. But there’s no evidence that the strategy would have much impact or be anything close to what’s necessary, and Pelosi appeared unimpressed at a morning news conference.
“I don’t think they know what they’re talking about,” Pelosi said dismissively Thursday.
Pelosi and Schumer staked out a firm position to extend a lapsed $600-per-week bonus jobless benefit, demanded generous child care assistance and reiterated their insistence for food stamps and assistance to renters and homeowners facing eviction or foreclosure.
“Don’t nickel and dime our children,” Pelosi said. “Don’t say, ‘We want to give a tax break to a business lunch and not give more money for children to have food stamps.'”
Pelosi was referring to a GOP proposal to increase the deduction for business meals from 50% to 100%. The idea seems likely to die, along with Trump’s efforts to cut the Social Security payroll tax. But Schumer and Pelosi continue to push to restore a tax break for state and local taxes paid mostly by wealthier people with high incomes and valuable homes.
McConnell, R-Ky., is likely to have to assume a higher profile if the talks are to come to a successful close, but he issued a grim assessment of the situation Thursday, again complaining that Pelosi and Schumer are not negotiating in good faith.
“Day after day, they’ve stonewalled the president’s team. Day by day, they’ve tried to invent new euphemisms to create the illusion of progress,” McConnell said.
Frustration was palpable among Republican senators shuttling in and out of a GOP lunch session, some of whom say Schumer is intent on using the situation as a hammer against Republicans. Schumer is desperate to win the Senate majority just as Republicans are in trying to hold on in a terrible political year.
“As long as they calculate that they’re better off politically doing nothing, it’s going to be hard for us to move forward,” said Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla. “And that’s the calculation they’ve made, it appears.”
McConnell is sending the Senate home rather than forcing impatient senators to bide their time while Democrats play hardball. That suggests a vote won’t come until late next week or even after.
White House negotiators made some concessions on jobless benefits and aid to state and local governments in a Tuesday session — and then promptly got scalded by Republicans after details leaked out.
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A federal appeals court in Washington on Friday revived House Democrats’ lawsuit to force former White House counsel Don McGahn to appear before a congressional committee, but left other legal issues unresolved with time growing short in the current Congress.  The full U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit voted 7-2 in ruling that the House Judiciary Committee can make its claims in court, reversing the judgment of a three-judge panel that would have ended the court fight.The matter now returns to the panel for consideration of other legal issues. The current House of Representatives session ends on Jan. 3. That time crunch means the chances that the Committee hears McGahn's testimony anytime soon are vanishingly slim, dissenting Judge Thomas Griffith wrote. Judge Karen LeCraft Henderson also dissented.The Judiciary Committee first subpoenaed McGahn in April 2019 as it examined potential obstruction of justice by President Donald Trump during special counsel Robert Mueller’s Russia investigation. Trump directed McGahn not to appear and the Democratic-led panel filed a federal lawsuit to force McGahn to testify.A trial judge ruled in November that the president’s close advisers do not have the absolute immunity from testifying to Congress that the administration claimed. Griffith and Henderson formed the majority when the appellate panel said in February that the Constitution forbids federal courts from refereeing this kind of dispute between the other two branches of government.  On Friday, the full court said the panel reached the wrong decision. Lawmakers can ask the courts for judicial enforcement of congressional subpoenas when necessary, Judge Judith Rogers wrote.Congress needs detailed information about the executive branch for both oversight and impeachment, she wrote.House lawmakers had sought McGahn’s testimony because he was a vital witness for Mueller, whose report detailed the president’s outrage over the investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election and Trump’s efforts to curtail it.In interviews with Mueller’s team, McGahn described being called at home by the president on the night of June 17, 2017, and being directed to call the Justice Department and say Mueller had conflicts of interest and should be removed. McGahn declined the command, deciding he would resign rather than carry it out, the report said.Once that episode became public in the news media, Mueller’s report said, the president demanded that McGahn dispute the news stories and asked him why he had told Mueller about it and why he had taken notes of their conversations. McGahn refused to back down.If McGahn is ever to testify, it’s unclear his testimony would include any new revelations beyond what Mueller has already released. Mueller concluded that he could not exonerate Trump on obstruction of justice but also that there was insufficient evidence to prove a criminal conspiracy between Trump’s campaign and Russia.
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President Donald Trump huddled at the White House Thursday with the Senate’s top Republican over a vital COVID-19 rescue package, but hopes on Capitol Hill for a deal were souring and there was increasing worry that GOP negotiations with Democrats might collapse.The impasse in the negotiations is putting at risk more than $100 billion to help reopen schools, a fresh round of $1,200 direct payments to most people, and hundreds of billions of dollars for state and local governments to help them avoid furloughing workers and cutting services as tax revenues shrivel.Majority Leader Mitch McConnell is a key player in the troubled talks and possesses far more experience than Trump’s administration negotiating team, which is publicly frustrated by the inflexible tactics of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., and Senate Minority leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y. The Democratic duo has not yielded much ground from an unprecedented $3.5 trillion House-passed rescue package.McConnell seemed to downplay the significance of the Trump meeting, telling a reporter merely that “we talked a little bit about everything.”House Speaker Nancy Pelosi of Calif., joined by Senate Minority Leader Sen. Chuck Schumer of N.Y., speaks during a news conference on Capitol Hill in Washington, Aug. 6, 2020.And Pelosi and Schumer were still exuding confidence in a political and legislative landscape that’s tilted in their favor. Trump and McConnell both badly want an agreement, but Democrats control the House and may actually provide the lion’s share of votes in the Senate. The votes, as Pelosi often says, are the currency of the realm.The Democratic duo has stayed in sync throughout the talks — which they demanded — even reminding reporters Thursday that their relationship dates to Schumer’s time as a hard-charging House member in the 1980s and early 1990s.They say the federal coronavirus aid package needs to be huge in order to meet the moment: a surge in cases and deaths, double-digit joblessness, and the threat of poverty for millions of the newly unemployed.”We believe the patient needs a major operation while Republicans want to apply just a Band-Aid,” Schumer said. “We won’t let them just pass the Band-Aid, go home and leave America bleeding.”Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin arrives at House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s office on Capitol Hill in Washington, Aug. 6, 2020.After a Wednesday session that produced no progress, White House chief of staff Mark Meadows and Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin were returning to Pelosi’s Capitol suite to confront the gulf in their negotiating stances. Both sides have set a goal of agreeing on a deal by week’s end — though that is appearing increasingly out of reach.The White House is also promising that Trump will attempt to use executive orders to address elements of the congressional package involving evictions and jobless benefits. But there’s no evidence that the strategy would have much impact or be anything close to what’s necessary, and Pelosi appeared unimpressed at a morning news conference.”I don’t think they know what they’re talking about,” Pelosi said dismissively.Addressing reporters, Pelosi and Schumer staked out a firm position to extend a lapsed $600-per-week bonus jobless benefit, demanded generous child care assistance and reiterated their demand for food stamps and assistance to renters and homeowners facing eviction or foreclosure.”Don’t nickel and dime our children,” Pelosi said. “Don’t say we want to give a tax break to a business lunch and not give more money for children to have food stamps.”Pelosi was referring to a GOP proposal to increase the deduction for business meals from 50% to 100%. The idea seems likely to die, along with President Donald Trump’s efforts to cut the Social Security payroll tax. But Schumer and Pelosi continue to push to restore a tax break for state and local taxes paid mostly by wealthier people with high incomes and valuable homes.McConnell, R-Ky., is likely to have to assume a higher profile if the talks are to come to a successful close, but he issued a grim assessment of the situation on Thursday, again complaining that Pelosi and Schumer are not negotiating in good faith.”Day after day, they’ve stonewalled the president’s team. Day by day, they’ve tried to invent new euphemisms to create the illusion of progress,” McConnell said Thursday.Frustration was palpable among Republican senators shuttling in and out of a GOP lunch session, some of whom say Schumer is intent on using the situation as a hammer against Republicans.”As long as they calculate that they’re better off politically doing nothing, it’s going to be hard for us to move forward,” said Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla. “And that’s the calculation they’ve made, it appears.”McConnell is sending the Senate home rather than forcing impatient senators to bide their time while Democrats play hardball. That suggests a vote won’t come until late next week or even after. Progress has been scant in the talks despite more than a week of negotiation.White House negotiators made some concessions on jobless benefits and aid to state and local governments in a Tuesday session — and then promptly got scalded by Republicans after details leaked out.But Pelosi, a sometimes imperious force whose experience in negotiations is far more extensive than Meadows, will likely have to make some concessions soon. Her dollar figure for aid to states and local governments far exceeds what independent experts such as Moody’s Analytics recommend, for example, and her position in favor of restoring the expensive state and local tax break is probably unsustainable.”She’s not going to allow the negotiations to collapse. She knows what the right moment is to pull the trigger and to try and close the deal,” said Democratic lobbyist Steve Elmendorf. “But she also knows when to wait and to let the other side come to you.” 
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U.S. President Donald Trump’s reelection campaign on Thursday lost its bid to add a fourth debate with Democratic challenger Joe Biden in early September.In rejecting the request, the Commission on Presidential Debates said it remains committed to the current schedule of three 90-minute debates beginning in late September.It would only add a fourth debate, or move an existing debate to earlier in the month, if both sides in the campaign for the November 3 election agreed to it, it said.Trump’s personal lawyer Rudy Giuliani had asked for either a fourth debate in the first week of September or for the first debate to be moved up from September 29 because voters in some states would already be able to cast votes before then.The commission said voters will have a choice whether to watch a debate before casting a ballot, adding voters “are under no compulsion to return their ballots before the debates.”Trump, a Republican, is trailing Biden in most national opinion polls.The battleground state of North Carolina is scheduled to begin sending out mail-in ballots to registered voters who requested them on September 4, with several other states to follow in September. A massive surge in mail-in voting is expected because of fears the coronavirus may spread at public polling places.In a response to the commission, Giuliani said the campaign was “disappointed” by the rejection and still believed Americans deserve to see the candidates “compare their records and visions for the United States before actual voting begins.”The Biden campaign said it was pleased Trump had accepted the commission invitation to debate.”As we have said for months, the commission will determine the dates and times of the debates, and Joe Biden will be there,” Biden campaign spokesman TJ Ducklo said.The commission has organized three debates and one vice presidential debate during each presidential campaign since 2000. The presidential debates are set for September 29 in Ohio, October 15 in Florida and October 22 in Tennessee.   
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U.S. President Donald Trump is predicting a COVID-19 vaccine might be ready by this year’s election, less than 90 days away.  “I’m optimistic that it’ll probably be around that date,” Trump told reporters on the White House South Lawn on Thursday.  “It wouldn’t hurt” his reelection chances to have the vaccine available by the November 3 election, he acknowledged. “I’m doing it not for the election. I want it fast because I want to save a lot of lives.”  Later, during remarks at a washing machine factory in Ohio, Trump reiterated there would be a vaccine soon: “I hope long before the end of the year.”  The scientific community, including prominent infectious disease experts such as Dr. Anthony Fauci, who is member of the White House coronavirus task force, however, expects that none of the numerous vaccine candidates now undergoing human trials will be ready until the end of the year or early 2021.FILE – Democratic presidential candidate and former Vice President Joe Biden speaks about his plans to combat racial inequality at a campaign event in Wilmington, Delaware, July 28, 2020.“We’re going to win bigger in Ohio than we did four years ago,” predicted Trump, speaking to a group of supporters on arrival in Cleveland on Thursday.  “He’s against God. He’s against guns,” Trump said of Biden. “I don’t think he’s going to do well in Ohio.”  No Republican candidate has ever won the presidential election, or reelection, without taking Ohio. Trump, in 2016, captured nearly 52% of the vote in the state against Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton.  Trump’s standing in Ohio and other key states this year has been hurt by unfavorable public perception of his handling of the coronavirus pandemic.  During the 2016 campaign, Trump promised a revival for American manufacturing, something he highlighted in his remarks Thursday at a Whirlpool factory.  The president told the company’s workers he had gone beyond fulfilling the economic commitments made during the campaign four years ago.  “We produce more than I promise,” he said.  President Donald Trump wears a mask as he talks with employees as he tours the Whirlpool Corporation facility in Clyde, Ohio, Aug. 6, 2020.During the next four years, Trump said, he will bring back American jobs and factories using every tool at his disposal, including tariffs, countervailing duties and new trade deals.  At the factory, the president announced that earlier in the day he had signed a proclamation reimposing 10% tariffs on some Canadian aluminum products.  Trump also on Thursday signed an executive order intended to ensure that essential medicines are manufactured in the United States.    Earlier, at Burke Lakefront Airport in downtown Cleveland, Ohio Governor Mike DeWine had been scheduled to greet the president on the tarmac. However, just before Trump’s departure from Washington, the governor’s office announced that DeWine had tested positive for the coronavirus following standard protocol testing ahead of meeting the president.  FILE – Ohio Governor Mike DeWine speaks during an interview at the Governor’s Residence in Columbus, Ohio, Dec. 13, 2019.“Governor DeWine is returning to Columbus [the state capital] where he and First Lady Fran DeWine, who also has no symptoms, will both be tested,” according to a news release from the governor’s office, which said the couple will then quarantine at home in Cedarville for the next 14 days.DeWine becomes one of the highest-profile American politicians and only the second governor (after Kevin Stitt of Oklahoma) to test positive for the coronavirus.  The governor’s infection sounds a sour note for the president’s visit, which was to underscore his administration’s gains against the coronavirus, and economic prosperity.  Ohio Lieutenant Governor Jon Husted, who also took a COVID-19 test Thursday but had a negative result, stood in for the governor to greet Trump.  DeWine, in late July, issued a statewide mask mandate after previously reversing course on the idea in April.  Breaking ranks with other Republican governors, DeWine was one of the first state leaders to take steps to slow the spread of the virus, including promoting wearing of masks and social distancing.  Ohio has reported nearly 100,000 COVID-19 cases and about 3,600 deaths, according to the state health department’s COVID website.    
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The day after Donald Trump’s election in November 2016, the American Civil Liberties Union posted a message to him on its website: “See you in court.”
As president, Trump hasn’t personally squared off against the ACLU from the witness stand, but the broader warning has been borne out. As of this week, the ACLU has filed nearly 400 lawsuits and other legal actions against the Trump administration, some meeting with setbacks but many resulting in important victories.
Among other successes for the ACLU, it prevailed in a U.S. Supreme Court case blocking the administration from placing a citizenship question on the 2020 census. It also spearheaded legal efforts that curtailed the policy of separating many migrant children from their parents.
“The assault on civil liberties and civil rights is greater under this administration than any other in modern history,” said the ACLU’s president, Anthony Romero. “It’s meant we’ve been living with a three-alarm fire in every part of our house.”
Since the day Trump took office, the ACLU — according to a breakdown it provided to The Associated Press — has filed 237 lawsuits against the administration and about 160 other legal actions, including Freedom of Information Act requests, ethics complaints and administrative complaints.
Of the lawsuits, 174 have dealt with immigrant rights, targeting the family separation policy, detention and deportation practices and the administration’s repeated attempts to make it harder to seek asylum at the U.S.-Mexico border.
The other lawsuits address an array of issues high on the ACLU’s agenda: voting rights, LGBT rights, racial justice and others. In one long-running case, the ACLU succeeded in blocking the administration’s policy of barring young immigrant women in government custody from getting abortions.
“Donald Trump has provided a full employment program for ACLU lawyers on all of our issues,” Romero said.
By comparison, the ACLU says it filed 13 lawsuits and other legal actions against President George W. Bush’s administration in his first term, mostly alleging encroachments on civil liberties related to counter-terrorism policies.
Many of the ACLU’s recent lawsuits remain unresolved. Of those that have been decided, Romero said, the ACLU has won far more often than it has lost, though a precise breakdown was unavailable.
Among the setbacks, ACLU national legal director David Cole said, one of the most disappointing involved Trump’s efforts to ban foreign nationals from several predominantly Muslim countries. Lawsuits by the ACLU and its allies successfully blocked implementation of the first two versions of the ban, but the Supreme Court allowed a third version to go into effect in 2018.
By a similar 5-4 vote, the Supreme Court also allowed the implementation of the Trump administration policy barring transgender people from enlisting in the military. Lower courts had supported efforts by the ACLU and other groups to scrap the ban.
Another LGBT rights case recently ended in a major victory for the ACLU and its allies when the Supreme Court ruled 6-3 in June that gays, lesbians and transgender people were protected from employment discrimination under the Civil Rights Act of 1964. One of the ACLU’s clients, Aimee Stephens, was fired from her job at a Michigan funeral home because she was transgender; she died just a few weeks before the high court ruled in her favor.
There’s no question the ACLU has caught the attention of Trump and his administration.
The Republican president, at an “Evangelicals for Trump” rally in January, derided the ACLU as a “group of beauties” who had filed a lawsuit accusing public schools in Smith County, Tennessee, of improperly promoting Christian religious beliefs.
“We will not allow faithful Americans to be bullied by the hard left,” Trump said.
In a May 2018 speech, then-Attorney General Jeff Sessions assailed the ACLU for a lawsuit that led to a drop in stop-and-frisk arrests by Chicago police.
“If you want crime to go up, let the ACLU run the police department,” Sessions said.
Recently, the ACLU has drawn criticism from a longtime supporter, George Washington University law professor Jonathan Turley. He worries that the organization is aligning too closely with the Democratic Party and is now less willing than in the past to support unpopular causes, such as the free-speech rights of far-right activists.
In an email, Turley questioned the wisdom of the “torrent of lawsuits” against the Trump administration.
“The result was less of a sniper strategy and more of a saturated bombing strategy,” he wrote.
Even as it spars with the administration, the ACLU notes that Trump’s presidency has been beneficial in some respects — fueling huge increases in donations and membership.
Romero says the ACLU national office and its state affiliates received about $175 million in donations in the three months after Trump’s election. It says it has increased its headquarters staff from 386 to 605 and now has 122 attorneys, up from 84 in November 2016.
Membership has soared from about 400,000 to more than 1.8 million. Romero says many of the newcomers have been asking how they can help as volunteers in bolstering voting rights, immigrants’ rights and other causes.
Demonstrating its increased interest in electoral politics, the ACLU had directed $28 million of its national funds to its affiliates in battleground states such as Florida, Arizona and Texas. Since 2016, Romero said, the ACLU of Texas has been able to double its budget to $8.5 million and its staff to 65 employees.
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