Orange Meltdown, Con't

I mean we've gotten to the point where Trump has gone so far into the ether now that he's demanding that the entire Constitution be scrapped and that he declared Maximum Leader.

 

DONALD TRUMP, the former president and the person that polls show is still the most likely GOP presidential nominee in 2024, today on Truth Social called for the suspension of the Constitution to overturn the 2020 election, citing false conspiracy theories about election fraud.

“A Massive Fraud of this type and magnitude allows for the termination of all rules, regulations, and articles, even those found in the Constitution,” Trump wrote, hours after new details of Twitter’s internal moderation deliberations in 2020 were released at the behest of new owner ELON MUSK. (More on that below.)

Every Republican will be asked about Trump’s statement. The former president dined with antisemites last week, and now he says the Constitution should be discarded. If you are a Republican who thinks being asked to take a position on this is just some liberal media trap, consider what you would say if BARACK OBAMA or JOE BIDEN tweeted this.

 

Yes folks, the Twitter nonsense from yesterday about Hunter Biden is now grounds for "the termination of all rules, regulations, and articles, even those found in the Constitution" and this is straight up, pure-tee, no holds barred fascism right here, folks.

This is who the GOP is and has been.

Always.

The Snowden Job, Con't

Dudebro Defector Ed Snowden is now all but a Russian comrade, subject to whatever Daddy Putin wants him to do.

 

Edward Snowden swore an oath of allegiance to Russia and has collected his Russian passport, his lawyer said Friday.

The 39-year-old former intelligence contractor who leaked highly classified information in 2013 was granted Russian citizenship by Vladimir Putin in September.

He faces espionage charges and 30 years in prison in the United States if he were to return.

"Edward received a Russian passport yesterday and took the oath in accordance with the law," his lawyer Anatoly Kucherena said, according to Russia's Interfax news agency.

"He is, of course, happy, thanking the Russian Federation for the fact that he received citizenship," he continued. "And most importantly, under the Constitution of Russia, he can no longer be extradited to a foreign state."

 

At least, we think he's still alive. Who actually knows?

 

More importantly, who actually cares after handing over the crown jewels of American intelligence over to Vlad?

 

I tell you what, if there's a prime example of the term "traitor" here in the last decade, it's this guy. None of the Trump stuff happens without the Russians having the keys to essentially every US network out there. They knew everything and they leveraged it to do more damage to America than any bomb or weapon possibly could. 

I know as a Black man I don't owe this country any allegiance, but Russia has never, ever been our friend in my lifetime, either.

Last Call For It's A Gas, Gas, Gas Con't

Gasoline prices have fallen sharply since Election Day, but the news behind that price drop at the pump isn't exactly great.

 

The cost of gasoline is falling so fast that it is beginning to put real money back in the pockets of drivers, defying earlier projections and offering an unexpected gift for the holidays.

Filling up is now as cheap as it was in February, just before Russia’s invasion of Ukraine touched off a global energy crisis. AAA reported the average nationwide price of a gallon of regular Wednesday was $3.50, and gas price tracking company GasBuddy projected it could drop below $3 by Christmas. And all of that relief probably helped drive robust shopping over Thanksgiving weekend.

“People are realizing that they might be back to spending $50 to fill their tank instead of $80,” said Emma Rasiel, a professor of economics at Duke University. “It is the main signal consumers notice on inflation. It is the one thing they are likely to track, how much it has gone up or down, because every week they need to fill up their car.”

But Rasiel cautioned that less-expensive gas can also give consumers the wrong idea. Prices of other goods and services are much less volatile, and there is no indication that this moment of more-affordable fuel is pushing the cost of other things down.

Even as the plunge in prices at the pump helps fuel a national holiday shopping spree, it is a reflection of the financial strain consumers and businesses are confronting worldwide. Prices are going down because demand for oil and gas is falling as countries brace for recession, coronavirus outbreaks in China threaten major financial disruption and drivers cut back on gas-guzzling as they try to save money to cover skyrocketing mortgage payments and stock market losses.

Earlier worries that sanctions on Russian oil would create a shortage in supply and send prices soaring toward the end of the year have, for now at least, given way to ailing economies and jittery financial markets.

“We’re heading into serious recession in Europe and further economic slowdown in the U.S. as people struggle with high interest rates and worry about their personal wealth and savings,” said Ben Cahill, an energy security analyst at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. “Add it all up and it creates a bleak picture for oil demand. Prices are reflecting that.”

Also helping keep prices low at the moment are some key U.S. oil refineries that returned to churning out gasoline after months of being out of commission for maintenance and repairs.

But just as big a factor is the turmoil in China. As its leaders signal that new coronavirus lockdowns are imminent, touching off protests throughout the country, the expected economic fallout has turned oil traders bearish.

China alone accounted for 16 percent of global oil demand last year, according to the research firm Capital Economics, which projects its purchase of oil will drop by 1 million barrels per day in December as coronavirus infections spread. The effect of such a drop on global oil markets is considerable, reducing the price of Brent crude by as much as $10 a barrel, or more than 10 percent.

 

So the Russian oil doomsday scenario hasn't come to pass quite yet, but the global economy is headed for some bad times in 2023. How hard the landing is going to be is still up in the air, but at least gas prices are headed back under $3 for a while. 

Diesel out here in the Midwest is still $4.50-$5 a gallon though, so that's still costing consumers more at checkout. Still, gas prices here in KY are below $3 in several counties.

Beshear also applauds gas prices dropping across the state. ^AH pic.twitter.com/OkQuwvG56l

— Bluegrass Politics (@BGPolitics) December 1, 2022

We'll see what the Fed decides to do with interest rates later this month.

Ron's Gone Wrong, Con't

Now that Florida GOP Gov. Ron DeSantis has easily prevailed in the 2022 midterms, and Disney CEO Bob Chapek has been shitcanned in favor of a return to former CEO Bob Iger, the stage is set for both sides to come to the table and reverse Florida's very expensive decision to eliminate Disney's special tax district status.

Florida lawmakers are working on plans to reverse a move that would strip Disney of its right to operate a private government around its theme parks, potentially resolving the fallout from the “Don’t Say Gay” controversy that dragged the entertainment giant into the culture wars.

In April, the Florida legislature voted to dissolve Disney’s 55-year-old special tax district following a public feud between Ron DeSantis, the state’s governor, and then-chief executive Bob Chapek over a new state law restricting discussion of LGBTQ issues in classrooms.

The set-up allows Disney to tax itself to cover the costs of providing water, power, roads and fire services in the area, known as the Reedy Creek Improvement District. The special district is seen as essential for the theme park operator to maintain high standards for visitors.

However, state lawmakers are working on a compromise that would allow Disney to keep the arrangement largely in place with a few modifications. Some believe the return of Bob Iger as CEO last month will help pave they way for a resolution, according to people briefed on the plan.

Randy Fine, the Republican lawmaker who drafted the law to end Disney’s control over the 25,000-acre Reedy Creek property, said that Chapek’s removal from executive office last week improved the chances that “something will get sorted out” over the district. “It’s easier to shift policy when you don’t have to defend the old policy,” Fine said. “Chapek screwed up, but Bob Iger doesn’t have to own that screw-up.”

Since returning to Disney, Iger has steered clear of criticising Florida for a bill that he had warned would “put vulnerable, young LGBTQ people in jeopardy” when it was introduced in February. Iger’s full-throated opposition to the legislation, dubbed “Don’t Say Gay” by critics, put pressure on Disney to reverse course this spring and come out against the bill after initially refusing to take a stand. The vacillation helped fuel a sense Chapek was struggling to make big calls as CEO.

At a town hall meeting with employees on Monday, Iger said he was “sorry to see us get dragged into [the] battle” over Reedy Creek and needed time to “get up to speed” on the issue.

“What I can say [is] the state of Florida has been important to us for a long time and we have been very important to the state of Florida,” Iger said. “That is something I’m extremely mindful of and will articulate if I get the chance.”

Iger struck the right tone for reaching a compromise, said an influential figure in Florida state politics. “That was a good olive branch message to Disney employees and the state of Florida,” he said. “It was a diplomatic kind of message.”

Meanwhile, tax officials and lawmakers have warned dissolving Disney’s private government threatens to shift an enormous financial burden to taxpayers and potentially transfer a $1bn debt load to the state.

 

Both Disney and DeSantis know quite a bit about putting on a show for the folks in Florida, and both sides will get what they want. Keep this is mind as Ron goes after Apple over Twitter next.

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) on Tuesday joined a growing chorus of Republicans criticizing Apple after Twitter owner Elon Musk claimed the tech giant threatened to remove Twitter from its App Store, strengthening the GOP’s ties to Musk and amplifying their shared criticism of major tech companies.

Removing Twitter from the App Store would be a “huge, huge mistake and a really raw exercise of monopolistic power,” DeSantis said Tuesday while speaking at an unrelated event in Duval County, adding that he believes the move would call for a congressional response.

Apple has not publicly responded to Musk, who tweeted about the alleged threat Monday afternoon, or confirmed that it threatened to remove Twitter’s app.

DeSantis speculated Apple’s alleged threat was based on Musk’s reinstatement of Twitter accounts that were “unfairly and illegally suspended for putting out accurate information about Covid,” he said, though Musk has said it’s unclear why Apple issued the warning.

 

At this level folks, it's all a show.

 

Long Train Runnin', Con't

As expected, the Senate easily passed the bill to force unions and the railroad corporations to accept the tentative deal from September, but Senate Republicans -- and Joe Manchin -- killed the sick leave proposal.

 

The Senate on Thursday voted to force a labor agreement to try and avert a looming strike of the nation's railway workers.

A bipartisan majority of senators approved a House bill that will codify a tentative agreement between the rail companies and rail unions, which was brokered in September and subsequently rejected by some of the workers.

The Senate separately voted down two additional provisions to address the labor dispute: whether to institute a 60-day extension of the cooling-off period between both sides and whether to grant workers seven days of paid sick leave.

The first vote, on the cooling off period, failed 69-26.

The second vote, to add seven paid sick days for workers, needed 60 votes to pass and fell short with a 52-43 total. Six Republicans -- Lindsey Graham, Josh Hawley, Marco Rubio, Ted Cruz, Michael Braun and John Kennedy -- voted to add sick leave while one Democrat, Joe Manchin, voted no.

The third vote, to uphold an agreement negotiated by the White House between freight employees and their bosses in September, passed 80-15. Five members of the Democratic caucus -- Bernie Sanders, an independent, as well as John Hickenlooper, Kirsten Gillibrand, Elizabeth Warren and Ed Merkley -- voted no.

President Joe Biden has vowed to quickly sign the labor agreement into law.

The Senate’s move to try and end the labor fight comes as the White House has emphasized that they believe the chamber needs to send legislation "by this weekend" to avert a work stoppage or the nation could see potentially “devastating effects," given how much of the economy relies on rail to move goods.

The workers' unions reacted with open dismay, they said, at the government's intervention and Biden has described himself as a "proud pro-labor" president who made a difficult decision for the good of the larger economy.

At Biden's urging, the House on Wednesday passed a law enforcing the September tentative agreement plus separate legislation to add sick days for workers, which had become a major sticking point in the unsuccessful negotiations.

Representatives voted 290-137 to adopt the deal between the rail companies and employees that was negotiated by the White House and 221-207 for the sick leave -- a key provision in addressing progressive Democrats' concerns to further protect workers.

Sanders had been urging his colleagues to consider boosting paid leave provisions for the rail workers and spoke on the floor between votes.

“Workers who do difficult and dangerous work have zero paid sick days. Zero. You get sick, you’ve got a mark against you. Couple of marks, you get fired. This cannot and must not happen in America in 2022,” he said.

 

The rail unions are vowing not to forget this in the future.  Kinda don't blame them. But I hope they remember that Senate Republicans made sure they ended up with zero sick days, too. 

Still, it was Democrats who passed this billand Biden who will sign it, when Republicans were perfectly happy to have an economy-destroying rail strike two weeks before Christmas.

 

The real villains remain the railroad companies, but America can't exist without rail freight. We've been having this fight for 150 years, folks.

It's not going to get better anytime soon.

Last Call For Orange Meltdown, Con't

Team Trump just got destroyed by judges he appointed as all three Republican picks on the 11th Circuit panel overseeing his case on the Mar-a-Lago document special master ordered Judge Aileen Cannon's previous decision vacated.

The three-judge panel of the 11th US Circuit Court of Appeals reversed US District Judge Aileen Cannon’s order appointing a so-called special master to sort through thousands of documents found at Trump’s home to determine what should be off limits to investigators.

“The law is clear,” the appeals court wrote. “We cannot write a rule that allows any subject of a search warrant to block government investigations after the execution of the warrant. Nor can we write a rule that allows only former presidents to do so.”

The 11th Circuit said that either approach would be a “radical reordering of our caselaw limiting the federal courts’ involvement in criminal investigations” and that “both would violate bedrock separation-of-powers limitations.”

The opinion – which was issued jointly by the three-judge panel made up of all GOP appointees – dismantled Trump’s arguments for why a special master was necessary. The court said that only in extraordinary circumstances should courts intervene in Justice Department investigations that are still in their early stages, and that standard had not been met here.

“This restraint guards against needless judicial intrusion into the course of criminal investigations—a sphere of power committed to the executive branch,” the court wrote.

The ruling is a stinging rebuke of how Cannon inserted herself into the dispute. In addition to reversing the order, the appeals court is instructing her to dismiss the entire case.

The appeals court said that its new ruling will go into effect in seven days, unless a party in the case successfully seeks an order – known as a stay – pausing the ruling from going into effect while it is appealed.

 

Ahh, but that last part means Trump and the Roberts Court have a week to reinstate the order and take the case. We'll see if the Shadow Docket™ acts and puts the case in limbo for the next 8 months. After all, this is the court that decided to overturn precedent in Dobbs and turn half the country into wards of the states they are in. You think it won't protect Trump from legal peril at the federal level for as long as it can?

Ron's Gone Wrong, Con't

And while nationally the "Red Wave" was a trickle, in Florida, GOP Gov. Ron DeSantis and company finished off most of the rest of the Democrats in the state, leaving them in a flaming trash heap. As a result, DeSantis-backed school board members are already claiming the heads of educators in the state's largest school districts.

Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis put his weight behind dozens of conservative school board candidates across Florida during the midterms. Now they’re in office — and are purging some educational leaders who enforced Covid-19 mandates.

New board members in two GOP-leaning counties essentially sacked their school superintendents over the span of one week. The ousters were spurred by how the superintendents carried out local policies like efforts to support the rights of parents, an issue inflamed by schools imposing student mask mandates last fall in defiance of DeSantis.

And while not tied to the 2022 election, the school board in Broward County earlier this month fired its superintendent through an effort led by five members appointed by DeSantis. All combined, school boards with ties to DeSantis pushed out three superintendents in November alone — and each of them served over districts that implemented student mask mandates.

“We had a wave in school districts that spit in parents’ faces,” said state Rep. Randy Fine (R-Palm Bay), who earlier this year sought to punish schools with mask mandates. “And now the people who did that are gone.”

In Brevard and Sarasota counties, embattled school leaders have faced immediate pressure from newly-installed board members and offered to leave voluntarily rather than risk a vote on their terminations.

The boards in both counties now have conservative majorities who sought a change in leadership immediately after the midterms. Although school boards are nonpartisan posts, lines between Democratic and Republican candidates were drawn in many counties through endorsements from each party as well as outside groups. The newly-elected board members in these cases support parental rights while opposing critical race theory and teaching gender orientation in schools.

DeSantis in particular used his clout to endorse more than two dozen school board candidates during the 2022 election cycle, a rare move for a Florida governor that came with $1,000 cash contributions from DeSantis and other GOP lawmakers. Most of the candidates DeSantis endorsed won their elections and are now transforming the make-up of school district leadership and will have huge influence over policies affecting hundreds of thousands of students in the state.

Both Sarasota and Brevard’s school boards put the superintendents on the chopping block the same day that new members endorsed by DeSantis and conservative organizations like Moms for Liberty were sworn into office.

 

Expect more of this in the weeks ahead. Where Republicans have won and all but removed any resistance? Florida.

It won't get better anytime soon, folks.

How The Republicans Blew The "Red Wave"

Despite a three-point national vote lead in the 2022 Midterms, Republicans only gained around 8-10 seats in the House. Granted, that's enough to give them the majority next year, but that number should have been 28-30 or even 48-50 House seats. The difference? Democrats finally got as good as the GOP when it came to gerrymandering and defending their turf in a structural change from ten years ago, as Decision Desk's Zach Donnini analyzes.

The US House structural bias was more favorable to Democrats than expected for three reasons. First, as a byproduct of their previous house majority, Democrats held an incumbency advantage in most competitive districts. Republicans had to bear the burden of flipping Democratic seats to win the chamber. This challenge certainly cost Republicans several seats, where strong Democratic incumbents resisted national trends and held their Trump-won districts even as the nation shifted six points to the right. To compound the issue, Republicans did not even take advantage of the incumbents they could have had. Supported by Donald Trump, loyalist Republicans Joe Kent and John Gibbs led ousters of popular and electorally successful incumbents Jamie Herrera-Beutler and Peter Meijer, handing two districts to Democrats. Second, Democratic gerrymanders were highly effective. While Democrats could only pass optimal partisan gerrymanders in four states (Oregon, Nevada, New Mexico, and Illinois), they took advantage of the opportunity with clinical efficiency. Democrats won 24 of 30 (80%) of seats in these four states, despite only winning 54% of the combined house popular vote (controlling for uncontested districts). The third and final reason is the most worrisome for Republicans: the new Republican coalition—built by Donald Trump—is not remotely designed for success in the US House.

Fast Fact: Although recent political realignment has allowed Republicans to acquire a massive structural advantage in the US Senate, it is helping Democrats counteract gerrymandering and gain a structural advantage in the US House.

Why are Republicans Developing A Geographic Disadvantage in the House?

While Republicans were successful in rural America well before Donald Trump arrived on the political scene, it was not until the 2016 Presidential Election that the party began to dominate the regions. In 2012, Democrats wasted far more votes than Republicans in blowout House races. While 30 Democrats won their race by 60 points or more, only 7 Republicans won by the same wide margin. The 2016 election was an election of regional polarization: very blue areas (generally cities) became bluer, and very red areas (generally more rural areas) become redder. In the 2012 presidential election, only ~33% of Americans lived in a “non-competitive” area, a county where either Democrats or Republicans won >65% of the vote. But in 2016, this number increased to 43%. Democrats did boost their numbers in heavy blue areas, but it was Republican success in rural areas that primarily drove this increase, closing the gap between the two parties in wasted votes.



Ancestral rural Democrats across the country, particularly in the Midwest, left their party in droves for Trump and the GOP. For the most part, Republican House candidates did not need this marked improvement in the reddest areas, these were the districts Republicans were already holding easily. Of course, some of these rural voters were districted with blue areas and did contribute to battleground seats, but most of these rural improvements were turning 50-point wins into 60-point wins for the GOP.

Although Republicans disproportionately improved in very red areas in 2016, serious problems did not start to develop until 2020. Partisan realignment since 2016 (educational polarization and racial depolarization) has proven to be disastrous for the GOP in the House. To oversimplify American politics, the safest blue districts tend to be in cities, and the safest red districts tend to encompass rural areas and small towns. The battleground districts are disproportionately located in high-education suburban areas, where Republicans are slipping. Conversely, Republicans enjoy higher and higher levels of minority support as Black and Hispanic voters trend toward the party. Dividing all counties into five categories, ordered by the highest to the lowest proportion of the vote won by Biden, Trump only gained between 2016 and 2020 in the bluest counties. To make matters worse, Democrats gained the most in the most competitive counties.



Republicans will have to grapple with the uncomfortable reality that trading a suburban vote (in a competitive House district) for an urban vote (in a deep blue House district) deeply harms their ability to hold a geographic advantage. If educational polarization continues at this rate, it could be Democrats that hold a significant advantage in the US House by the end of the decade—but not because of gerrymandering.

 

Republicans did better in states like New York, Florida and California. But Democrats did better in states like Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, Michigan, Nevada and Arizona, the big five battleground states. Dems won competitive districts that needed fewer increases in votes to win, while Republicans did things like turning 30 point losses into 20 point losses in deep blue House races. Dems also picked up House seats that they shouldn't have in GOP states like Ohio, and Republicans handed them wins by purging their party of "moderate" seats in states like Oregon and NC.

If Democrats had fixed New York's gerrymander, we would have kept the House, because going forward the competitive suburban House districts are where Democratic vote growth is the best.

Last Call For The Old Guard And The New Blood

House Democrats elected new leadership for 2023, with Speaker Nancy Pelosi turning the caucus leadership over to Rep. Hakeem Jeffries, the first Black man to lead a House or Senate party conference.

 

House Democrats elected their new leadership team Wednesday, ushering in a younger generation of leaders after Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Majority Leader Steny Hoyer decided to step aside after Democrats narrowly lost the majority this month.

Pelosi, 82, of California, the first female speaker of the House, will pass the torch to Rep. Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., 52, who ran unopposed for minority leader and will make history as the first Black lawmaker to lead a political party’s caucus in either chamber.

"Today, with immense pride, I stood in front of the House Democratic Caucus as a candidate for Democratic Leader, and I am eternally grateful for the trust my colleagues placed in me with their votes," Jeffries said in a statement.

Jeffries’ top deputy will be Rep. Katherine Clark, D-Mass., 59, a progressive who served under Jeffries as vice chair of the Democratic Caucus and rose to assistant speaker this Congress. She was elected minority whip, the party’s top vote counter.

Rounding out the trio of new leaders is Rep. Pete Aguilar, D-Calif., 43, a Congressional Hispanic Caucus member and former mayor who was elected Democratic Caucus chairman — the role Jeffries has held for the past four years.

The election of Jeffries, Clark and Aguilar represents a changing of the guard for House Democrats who have seen the powerful triumvirate of Pelosi, Hoyer, D-Md., 83, and Jim Clyburn, D-S.C., 82, occupy top leadership posts for the past two decades.

“This is a moment of transition,” Jeffries told a small group of reporters in the Capitol on Tuesday night. “We stand on the shoulders of giants, but are also looking forward to being able to do what’s necessary at this moment to advance the issues.”

Of the current “Big Three” Democrats, only Clyburn, the current majority whip, has opted to stay in leadership in the new Congress. He will run for the job of “assistant leader,” which has been considered the No. 3 post in the minority in the past but will shift down to the No. 4 job this Congress.

 

Clyburn will run for the opportunity to assist, but at this point the House Democratic Caucus now belongs to Gen Xers like myself, and it's about time. Hell, Aguilar counts as an Elder Millennial, and not a white dude in sight, either.

 

I have a damn good feeling about this, especially given that the Republicans will be throwing paint on the walls for the next two months. The Dems are ready to go now.

 

Go get 'em, team.

 

 

Orange Meltdown, Trump's Triple Trouble Edition

Trump's former Secretary of Racism, Stephen Miller, spent hours on Tuesday testifying before the federal grand jury investigating Trump's role in the January 6th terrorist insurrection.

 

Former Trump adviser Stephen Miller testified on Tuesday to a federal grand jury in Washington, DC, as part of the January 6, 2021, investigation, CNN has learned, making him the first known witness to testify since the Justice Department appointed a special counsel to oversee the criminal investigations around the former president.

Miller was at the federal courthouse in downtown Washington for several hours throughout Tuesday, according to a person familiar with the investigation. January 6 lead prosecutor Thomas Windom was spotted at the same federal courthouse on Tuesday.

Windom is expected to join the newly created Special Counsel’s Office led by longtime public corruption prosecutor Jack Smith and will continue leading the investigation into former President Donald Trump’s role in efforts to impede the transfer of power following the 2020 election.

Federal investigators have for months sought information from Trump’s inner circle in the White House, attempting to gather insight into Trump’s state of mind before his supporters rioted on January 6.

Miller, a former White House speechwriter and senior adviser to Trump, could provide a firsthand account of the former president’s preparations for his speech at the Ellipse in Washington on January 6, including how he wanted to inspire his supporters, many of whom went on to attack the Capitol and disrupt Congress.

Miller was first subpoenaed in the federal criminal investigation months ago.

 

That's two major Trump players this week who have turned evidence against Trump, Miller yesterday to the grand jury investigating Trump, and former Trump Mouth of Sauron Kellyanne Conway on Monday to the House January 6th Committee.

Former Trump adviser Kellyanne Conway met for nearly five hours Monday with investigators on the House committee probing the Jan. 6, 2021, riot at the U.S. Capitol.

The committee did not publicly issue Conway a subpoena, and aides refused to comment on whether she was issued one privately. The panel declined to comment on her appearance Monday.


The closed-door meeting took place at the O’Neill House Office Building, where Conway was seen entering a conference room with attorney Emmet Flood, a lawyer in former President Donald Trump’s White House.

Conway spoke to the committee on the record, two sources familiar with her appearance said.

Speaking to reporters around 3 p.m. after the meeting ended, Conway said she did not invoke the Fifth Amendment at any point Monday.

Earlier, when Conway left the meeting room for a break, she told reporters, “I’m here voluntarily.” Asked by a reporter when she last spoke with Trump, Conway said he called her last week.

Conway worked as a senior counselor to Trump from the beginning of his term through August 2020. She decided to leave the administration because, she said, she needed to focus on her family. She also was a campaign manager for Trump's 2016 presidential bid.

Conway told reporters Monday that she is not working on Trump's 2024 campaign, and she refused to detail previous discussions with Trump about the 2020 election.

 

Oh but it gets even better, kids.

In South Carolina, former Trump WH Chief of Staff Mark Meadows lost his bid to block his Georgia subpoena compelling his testimony before Fulton County DA Fani Willis's grand jury on Trump's election interference case in that state.

The Supreme Court of South Carolina has ordered former Trump White House chief of staff Mark Meadows to testify before a special grand jury investigating efforts to overturn the 2020 election in Georgia.

“We have reviewed the arguments raised by Appellant and find them to be manifestly without merit,” the South Carolina Supreme Court justices wrote in their opinion.

The decision upholds a ruling by a lower court in South Carolina, where Meadows resides, which determined he was “material and necessary to the investigation.”

Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis is spearheading the special purpose grand jury investigation into attempts to manipulate Georgia’s 2020 election results. The probe was prompted by the infamous call between then-President Donald Trump and Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, in which Trump requested that he “find” the nearly 12,000 votes that would secure his victory in the state. But the investigation has grown to include the fake electors plot, the presentations made by Trump allies to Georgia lawmakers that promoted bogus voter fraud claims and other Trump-world machinations from that period.

The Atlanta-area investigators, in demanding Meadows’ testimony, pointed to his involvement in the Trump-Raffensperger call and to a December 2020 White House meeting about election fraud claims that was touted by Meadows. Their filings also reference his visit to a site where an audit of Georgia’s election was underway and emails Meadows sent to Justice Department officials about unsubstantiated fraud allegations.

A spokesperson for Willis declined to comment.

An attorney and a spokesman for Meadows did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

 

You see, Meadows is scheduled to testify...today.

 

It's been a bad, bad 72 hours for Team Trump on three different fronts.

 

It's only going to get worse for him.

A Day Of Equality And Love

As promised, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer and the Senate have passed legislation codifying same-sex and interracial marriages into law, forcing states who might otherwise reject them should the Obergefell decision fall to the conservatives on the Roberts Court to accept marriage licenses from any other state.

 

The Senate passed landmark legislation on Tuesday to mandate federal recognition for same-sex marriages, as a lame-duck Congress mustered a notable moment of bipartisanship before Democrats were to lose their unified control of Capitol Hill.

The 61-to-36 vote put the bill on track to become law in the final weeks before Republicans assume the majority in the House of Representatives at the start of the new Congress in January. It marked one of the final major legislative achievements for Democrats before Republicans shift the focus in the House to conducting investigations of President Biden’s administration and family members.

The bill must now win final approval by the House in a vote expected as soon as next week, which would clear it for Mr. Biden, who said he looked forward to signing it alongside the bipartisan coalition that helped shepherd it through the Senate.

In a statement, the president said the vote reaffirmed “a fundamental truth: Love is love, and Americans should have the right to marry the person they love.”

There was little question that the bill’s embrace in the Senate, where proponents had a breakthrough this month in drawing a dozen Republican supporters and overcoming a filibuster, gave it the momentum required to become law.

The bill would repeal the Defense of Marriage Act, which denied federal benefits to same-sex couples. It prohibits states from denying the validity of an out-of-state marriage based on sex, race or ethnicity. But in a condition that Republican backers insisted upon, it would guarantee that religious organizations would not be required to provide any goods or services for the celebration of any marriage, and could not lose tax-exempt status or other benefits for refusing to recognize same-sex unions.

“Because of our work together, the rights of tens of millions of Americans will be strengthened under federal law. That’s an accomplishment we should all be proud of,” said Senator Chuck Schumer, Democrat of New York and the majority leader.

Mr. Schumer audibly choked back tears on the Senate floor as he described how his daughter, who is married to a woman and expecting a baby with her wife, had lived in fear that their union could be reversed.

“I want them to raise their child with all the love and security that every child deserves,” Mr. Schumer said, noting that he was wearing the same purple tie he had worn to their wedding. “The bill we are passing today will ensure their rights won’t be trampled upon simply because they are in a same-sex marriage.”

Passage of the legislation in the Senate marked a watershed moment for a bill that began as a messaging exercise by Democrats determined to show their commitment to protecting same-sex marriage rights amid fresh threats from a conservative-leaning Supreme Court but has morphed into a broadly supported effort on the brink of becoming law.

 

Probably the biggest win here is the death of DOMA, the Clinton-era bill that stood for a quarter-century and gave states the right to reject same-sex marriages performed in other states, while denying federal benefits to same-sex couples. The provisions of DOMA were killed by SCOTUS in 2013's Windsor and 2015's Obergefell decisions, but the danger is that if the conservatives on the Roberts Court reversed those decisions, and Justice Clarence Thomas in particular has stated publicly that those two decisions are not settled precedent and are "errors" that need to be revisited, DOMA would have gone into effect again.

Not anymore.

We'll see where the SCOTUS Sinister Six go from here, but they have a lot more damage that they can do elsewhere, as we'll see this summer.

For now, expect quick passage in the House, and a bill on President Biden's desk within weeks.

Last Call For Insurrection Connection

Today a federal jury returned guilty verdicts for January 6th Oath Keepers terrorist Stewart Rhodes and his fellow co-conspirators in the first seditious conspiracy convictions in decades.

A federal jury on Tuesday convicted Oath Keepers founder Stewart Rhodes of seditious conspiracy for leading a months-long plot to unleash political violence to prevent the inauguration of President Biden, culminating in the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol.

The panel of seven men and five women deliberated for three days before finding Rhodes and a co-defendant guilty of conspiring to oppose by force the lawful transition of presidential power. Rhodes and all four co-defendants on trial were also convicted of obstructing Congress as it met to confirm the results of the 2020 election. Both offenses are punishable by up to 20 years in prison.

Rhodes, in a dark suit and black eye-patch from an old gun accident, watched impassively as verdicts were read for the defendants facing a 13-count indictment.

The indictment brought against Rhodes, 56, and other Oath Keepers associates in January was the first time the U.S. government leveled the historically rare charge of seditious conspiracy in the massive Jan. 6 investigation. He is the highest-profile figure to face trial in connection with rioting by angry Trump supporters who injured scores of officers and ransacked offices, forcing the evacuation of lawmakers.

Rhodes and followers, dressed in combat-style gear, converged on the Capitol after staging an “arsenal” of weapons at nearby hotels, ready to take up arms at Rhodes’s direction, the government charged. Rhodes’s defense said he and co-defendants came to Washington as bodyguards and peacekeepers, bringing firearms only in case Trump met their demand to mobilize private militia to stop Biden from becoming president.

Analysts called the outcome a vindication for the Justice Department.

“The jury’s verdict on seditious conspiracy confirms that January 6, 2021, was not just ‘legitimate political discourse’ or a peaceful protest that got out of hand. This was a planned, organized, violent assault on the lawful authority of the U.S. government and the peaceful transfer of power,” said Randall D. Eliason, a former federal prosecutor who teaches law at George Washington University.

“Now the only remaining question is how much higher did those plans go, and who else might be held criminally responsible,” Eliason said.

The verdict in Rhodes’s case likely will be taken as a bellwether for two remaining Jan. 6 seditious conspiracy trials set for December against five other Oath Keepers and leaders of the Proud Boys, including the longtime chairman Henry ‘Enrique’ Tarrio. Both Rhodes and Tarrio are highly visible leaders of the alt-right or far-right anti-government movements, and were highlighted at hearings probing the attack earlier this year by the House Jan. 6 committee.

 

There's at least some justice in all this. January 6th was a seditious terrorist attack, and some of the leaders have now been convicted as such on federal charges.

 

There's no pretending anymore that those involved aren't terrorists.

 

That includes dozens of sitting Republican members of Congress.

Chucking The Hawkeye Caucus Circus

Democrats may finally, finally, be getting rid of Iowa as the primary bellwether.

 

The list of states with the biggest say in Democratic presidential contests could get a big shake-up this week.

A flurry of public and private lobbying to reformat the longtime early-state lineup of Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada and South Carolina kicked off again after the midterms, with the Democratic National Committee’s group reviewing the order set to meet later this week. Key Democratic leaders have been bombarded with phone calls and memos in recent days, while some elected officials, like Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto (D-Nev.), took their state’s case to the cable news airwaves.

The behind-the-scenes jockeying has intensified, but the most important player in the drama — the White House — has remained tight-lipped about how the schedule should shake out, according to several Democratic operatives involved in the process.

States like Michigan and Minnesota are trying to push in, while Nevada is making a play for first-in-the-nation status over New Hampshire. The committee has still left open the possibility of adding a fifth calendar to the slate, while it’s also been suggested that two states could hold their contests on the same day. It’s unclear just how much will change. But there is at least one clear preference from many Democratic leaders, both outside and inside these party deliberations: that Iowa be scrapped from its coveted first slot.

“I don’t think there’s any way Iowa stays and there’s no reason for Iowa to stay,” said one Democrat familiar with the process of the DNC’s Rules and Bylaws Committee, the group charged with reordering the calendar. “From an electoral standpoint, we’ve lost Iowa completely.”

Later this week, the rules committee will meet again in Washington, D.C., to discuss the issue. They’re expected to move forward with a proposal for the 2024 presidential nominating calendar at the meeting, according to sources familiar with the agenda, which will then go before the full DNC for a vote in late January or early February.

But there is frustration among some DNC members about the silence from the White House.

“If the president says he wants this state or that state in the early window, then I’m going to support it because he’s the leader of the party and I would imagine every other [rules committee] member feels the same way,” said one DNC member, who was granted anonymity to speak candidly. “So, it’s frustrating when we’ve invested all this time, energy and money into this whole process and the White House has given us nothing, even though we’re only days away from making a decision.”

“It’s almost like Kabuki theater,” the person continued.

Some of the outstanding questions facing the DNC were reshaped by November’s midterm results.

One is which state would replace Iowa, representing the Midwestern region in the early-state lineup. Both Michigan and Minnesota are seen as leading contenders for the slot, positions that were further strengthened by the November results. Democrats flipped both of Michigan’s state legislative chambers and reelected Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, while Democrats in Minnesota also gained trifecta control there by flipping the state Senate and reelecting Gov. Tim Walz.

 

Biden's staying silent for good reason. Let' the rules committee hash it out, that's what they are there for. It can't look like he's putting his thumb on the scale.

 

As for who replaces 90% white Iowa as the Midwest bellweather when the party's makeup is majority-minority, Michigan looks more like America than Minnesota does, as much as I love the Land of 10,000 Lakes and lived there for two years, it was my first real exposure to the fact that the Midwest isn't the South, and I went from the only Black face in the room to the only Black face in the entire building at times.

My vote's for Michigan to replace Iowa. for whatever that's worth.

Long Train Runnin', Con't

As I mentioned last week, the Biden administration's deal with rail unions to avert a rail strike has all but fallen apart, to the point where President Biden is calling on Congress to force them to accept the deal, and that was always going to be the endgame.

As a proud pro-labor President, I'm reluctant to override the ratification procedures and views of those who voted against the agreement.

But in this case – where the economic impact of a shutdown would hurt millions – I believe Congress must use its powers to adopt this deal.

— President Biden (@POTUS) November 29, 2022

 

The railroad companies are still terrible, and the deal is an improvement, but the unions are going to be broken here and they're choosing to go down swinging.

Yes, I know the $2 billion per day figure is probably going to be a lot more damage due to secondary and tertiary effects, and it's going to crater the holiday shopping season. The unions could technically strike as soon as Monday and frankly they have a ton of leverage here.

The leverage the rail unions have in extracting concessions from the rail industry is why unions were created in the first place. They have kids, medical bills, and debts to pay too. They have a reason for this fight.

Granted, the September agreement is more than the unions had, but yes, Pelosi and the House are expected to vote on the package very soon.

If a deal is not reached -- or forced by Congress -- then a strike could begin after the Dec. 9 deadline. Outgoing Speaker Nancy Pelosi said in a statement Monday night that the House will soon take up such legislation and won't modify the agreed-upon terms from September.

Like Biden, she said, "We are reluctant to bypass the standard ratification process for the Tentative Agreement -- but we must act to prevent a catastrophic nationwide rail strike, which would grind our economy to a halt."

The tentative contract included a 24% compounded wage increase and $5,000 total in lump-sum payments.

Pelosi praised certain elements of that deal but said, "Democrats are continuing to fight for more of railroad workers' priorities, including paid sick leave." Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., a member of the Democratic caucus, has said his colleagues should do more for workers.

The two largest unions had initially highlighted how the tentative agreement included "wage increases, bonuses, with no increases to insurance copays and deductibles" and improved time-off policies, which had become a sticking point.

While eight of the 12 rail unions then went on to formally ratify the agreement, four rejected it -- including the largest in the nation, with 50.8% of its workers voting against the deal.

Some of the workers' groups who rejected the agreement cited frustration with compensation and working conditions, particularly a lack of paid sick days.

They have the right to do that, but ultimately they can be broken by Congress and the President, and again, that was always going to be the outcome. They get to say they fought for it tooth and nail and they did.

On the other hand, Bernie Sanders, or any Senator, could delay a vote until after the strike deadline and that could get very messy very quickly.

We'll see if this train derails the entire economy.

Last Call For Vote Like Your Country Depends On It, Con't

Arizona Republicans are doing their dead-level best to destroy voting in the state, vowing that if they can't win, then nobody will.

 

Officials in a rural, Republican-controlled county in Arizona have voted to delay certifying the results of this month's midterm elections and miss the state's legal deadline of Monday, despite finding no legitimate problems with the local counts.

The move by the board of supervisors for Cochise County in southeastern Arizona, near Tucson, puts more than 47,000 Arizonans' votes at risk and is expected to set off court action. The state's secretary of state's office plans to file a lawsuit on Monday, spokesperson Sophia Solis said by email.

"There is no reason for us to delay," said the board's chair, Ann English, a Democrat, whose vote was outnumbered by the county's two Republican supervisors, Tom Crosby and Peggy Judd.

Before Monday's vote, Arizona's state election director, Kori Lorick, said in a statement that the state's secretary of state "will use all available legal remedies to compel compliance with Arizona law and protect Cochise County voters' right to have their votes counted" if the board failed to complete its "non-discretionary duty."

 

The problem with that of course is that the Arizona GOP may actually end up losing more races as a result of Cochise County's Republicans disenfranchising themselves like the childish idiots they are.

Board members who voted against certification would face the very real prospect of civil and criminal penalties. And in all likelihood, they would achieve nothing, as Arizona courts would almost certainly step in and order the board to abide by its legal obligations and certify the results.

But in the unlikely event that the courts didn’t intervene, the board’s gambit would only hurt the voters of Cochise County and the candidates that they support.

If the board has still refused to certify by the Dec. 5 deadline for state certification (which can be extended to Dec. 8, but no later), the law requires that the secretary of state still move ahead with the statewide canvass of results. In that case, the statewide canvass would not include the results from Cochise County, which is heavily Republican.

This mass disenfranchisement of Cochise County voters − at the hands of their own board of supervisors − could result in flipping the final results in a number of tight races, with Republican candidates and voters paying the price. For example, Republican Juan Ciscomani would likely lose his congressional race to Democrat Kirsten Engel.

That decision could prove decisive in the race for state superintendent, handing Democrats a win over their Republican opponents. This outcome would be even more likely if another heavily Republican county, such as Mohave County, followed the lead of Cochise County and likewise refused to certify. 

 

Again, the law makes it clear that these Republican scoundrels don't have any recourse. The courts will almost certainly rule against the county and possibly they could end up in jail. 

But if they are willing to disenfranchise their own voters, let the Democratic candidates take the wins.

And if you don't think 10 or 20 thousand votes matter in the grand scheme of things...

 

A swing of 3,340 votes from GOP to Dem in the 5 closest House races would have allowed Dems to hold the House.

— Tom Bonier (@tbonier) November 27, 2022

 

We lost the House by less than 4k.

 

Always remember that.