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Democratic presidential candidate tells Florida town hall that ‘tough guy’ president should be afraid for those around him after taking off mask
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WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court on Monday mostly reinstated a South Carolina law that requires absentee ballots to be accompanied by a witness’s signature. Lower courts had blocked the law, saying it interfered with the right to vote during a pandemic.The Supreme Court made an exception for ballots cast before it acted and received by election officials within two days of its order.The court’s most conservative members, Justices Clarence Thomas, Samuel A. Alito Jr. and Neil M. Gorsuch, said they would have reinstated the requirement for all ballots.Only one member of the court provided reasons. In a concurring opinion, Justice Brett M. Kavanaugh wrote that the majority’s approach was warranted because state election laws should not ordinarily be second-guessed by federal judges and because the Supreme Court frowns on changes to election procedures made close to Election Day.Several voters and Democratic groups sued to block the witness requirement. In granting a preliminary injunction, Judge J. Michelle Childs of the Federal District Court in Columbia, S.C., said the requirement served no useful purpose, rejecting an argument from state officials that the witnesses could aid in potential investigations of voter fraud.“The fact the witness requirement may provide a lead to investigate absentee fraud is undercut by an utter dearth of absentee fraud,” Judge Childs wrote.A three-judge panel of the United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit initially blocked Judge Childs’s injunction, but the full appeals court reinstated it.State officials and the South Carolina Republican Party asked the Supreme Court to step in, saying that the witness requirement imposed a minimal burden.“Watching someone sign something takes no more than 60 seconds,” their brief said, “and witnesses can be family, friends, co-workers, congregants, teachers, waiters, bartenders, gymgoers, neighbors, grocers and more.”The brief added that the witness requirement helped prevent fraud. “That South Carolina doesn’t have massive voting fraud is a good thing and shows the state’s election rules are working; it cannot be a reason to suspend those same requirements,” the brief said.The decision continued what has been a string of Supreme Court rulings largely siding with arguments pressed by Republicans to restrict voting rights. But the court had recently split its decisions in two similar cases over absentee ballots.In July, the Supreme Court reinstated a similar law in Alabama, by a 5-to-4 vote. But it refused a request from Rhode Island Republicans in August to revive that state’s requirement that voters using mailed ballots fill them out in the presence of two witnesses or a notary, over the dissents of Justices Thomas, Alito and Gorsuch.There were important differences between the Alabama and Rhode Island cases, the court explained at the time in an unsigned order. In Alabama, state officials had sought to reinstate the law. In Rhode Island, officials had agreed to a consent decree suspending the witness requirement.“Here the state election officials support the challenged decree,” the Rhode Island order said, “and no state official has expressed opposition.”The order added that Rhode Island’s last election was conducted without the witness requirement, meaning that instituting a change later could confuse voters.State officials in the South Carolina case said it was “virtually identical” to the one from Alabama. But the challengers responded that South Carolina’s primary, unlike the one in Alabama, was conducted without the witness requirement.More than 8,000 people have already voted by mail in South Carolina’s general election, presumably under the impression that the witness requirement had been suspended. “Many of these voters face certain disenfranchisement through no fault of their own,” the challengers’ brief said.State officials, in reply, said the number of such ballots is unknown and called the possibility “unfortunate.”“If South Carolina discovers that some ballots are missing a witness signature and were submitted while the district court’s injunction was in place, the state will simply have a decision to make about what to do with those ballots,” the officials wrote. “Whatever it decides, the possibility that some people might have voted without complying with the witness requirement cannot be a reason to let everyone vote without complying with the witness requirement.” More

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Donald Trump has returned to the White House following his hospital stay at the Walter Reed Medical Center. He removed his surgical mask on the White House balcony and recorded a video message telling people not to be afraid of Covid-19. ‘Don’t let it dominate you, don’t be afraid of it, you’re going to beat it,’ the US president said. ‘I know there’s a risk, there’s a danger but that’s OK’. He suggested he may now be immune to the disease though he added he did not know. 
Donald Trump leaves hospital as Covid-19 treatment continues – live

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BISHKEK, Kyrgyzstan — Protesters clashed with the police in Kyrgyzstan’s capital, Bishkek, on Monday during a demonstration against the results of a parliamentary election, with dozens of people reported injured.Early results in the election gave the majority of votes to two parties with ties to the country’s ruling elites amid allegations of vote buying.Local media estimated that about 4,000 people took part in the rally in Bishkek, with smaller protests taking place in two other Kyrgyz cities.One video of the protest in Bishkek showed a group of young men trying to break through the gates of a government complex that houses both the Parliament and the presidential office.The police moved to disperse the crowds in the evening, using water cannons, tear gas and flashbang grenades.In the early hours of Tuesday, protesters succeeded in breaking into government and state security headquarters, the local news websites Akipress and 24.kg reported, according to Reuters. The protesters then freed an ex-president, Almazbek Atambayev, and a few other former senior officials, according to the local reports.Preliminary results of the Sunday election, reported on Monday evening, showed that only five parties out of 16 featured on the ballot won seats in the Kyrgyz parliament.The Birimdik party, which is considered pro-government, received over 26 percent of the votes. The Mekenim Kyrgyzstan party, linked to a former top customs official, won over 24 percent. Three other parties have passed the 7 percent threshold to gain seats in Parliament.The election-monitoring body of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe said in a report on Monday that “fundamental rights and freedoms were overall respected” in this year’s election in Kyrgyzstan, but that “credible allegations of vote buying remain a serious concern.”Local media reported that 12 parties have signed a document demanding that the authorities cancel the results of the election and hold a new one.“We all have witnessed a true lawlessness during the election campaign and the Election Day yesterday,” said Klara Sooronkulova, leader of the Reforma opposition party. “Pressure on the voters, intimidation of the voters, bribing.”According to media reports, the unrest in Bishkek continued well into the night. Late Monday, the winning Birimdik party said it was ready to take part in a new election, should one be scheduled, and urged other parties who won seats to do the same.President Sooronbai Jeenbekov of Kyrgyzstan called a meeting for Tuesday morning with leaders of all 16 parties. More

WASHINGTON — President Trump returned to the White House on Monday night, staging a defiant, made-for-television moment in which he ripped off his face mask and then urged the nation to put aside the risks of the deadly coronavirus that has swept through his own staff and sent him to the hospital for three days.Just hours after his press secretary and two more aides tested positive, making the White House the leading coronavirus hot spot in the nation’s capital, Mr. Trump again dismissed the pandemic that has killed 210,000 people in the United States, telling Americans “don’t be afraid of it” and saying that he felt “better than 20 years ago.”The words and visuals were only the latest ways Mr. Trump has undermined public health experts trying to persuade Americans to take the pandemic seriously. Even afflicted by the disease himself, the president who has wrongly predicted that it would simply disappear appeared unchastened as he pressed America to reopen and made no effort to promote precautions.“We’re going back to work. We’re going to be out front,” Mr. Trump said in a video shot immediately after his return and then posted online. “As your leader, I had to do that. I knew there’s danger to it, but I had to do it. I stood out front. I led. Nobody that’s a leader would not do what I did. And I know there’s a risk, there’s a danger, but that’s OK. And now I’m better and maybe I’m immune, I don’t know. But don’t let it dominate your lives.”Mr. Trump’s statement was meant to cast his illness as an act of courage rather than the predictable outcome of recklessness. He took no responsibility for repeatedly ignoring public health guidelines by holding campaign rallies and White House events without masks or social distancing, like the Supreme Court announcement at the White House last month that may have infected a wide array of his aides and allies.The regret-nothing approach demonstrated that the president intended no pivot in his handling of the pandemic despite his own medical crisis. The message, in effect, was that Americans should live their lives and not worry about catching the virus because “we have the best medicines in the world,” never mind that he has had access to experimental treatment and high-quality health care not available to most people.The president’s dismissal of a virus that in recent weeks has been killing another 700 people each day in the United States set off alarm bells among health specialists who worried that it would send the wrong message to the public.Kristin Urquiza, who addressed the Democratic National Convention after her father died of the coronavirus, responded on Twitter to the president’s admonishment to Americans not to be afraid of Covid-19, the disease caused by the coronavirus. “At this point the only thing we should be afraid of is you,” she wrote.Mr. Trump pressured his doctors to release him from Walter Reed National Military Medical Center in suburban Maryland, but it did not indicate that he had escaped jeopardy, only that he could be treated at the White House, where he has 24-hour medical care. Dr. Sean P. Conley, the White House physician, acknowledged that the president “may not entirely be out of the woods yet,” adding that it would be another week until doctors could feel confident that he had passed the danger point.“We all remain cautiously optimistic and on guard because we’re in a bit of uncharted territory when it comes to a patient that received the therapies he has so early in the course,” Dr. Conley told reporters outside Walter Reed. “So we’re looking to this weekend. If we can get through to Monday with him remaining the same or improving, better yet, then we will all take that final deep sigh of relief.”Doctors said the president had gone 72 hours without a fever and had normal blood oxygen readings after two earlier bouts of falling levels that led to him being given supplemental oxygen. But they refused to discuss scans of the president’s lungs, which independent medical experts said could mean he has pneumonia, and would not disclose when he had his last negative test.Mr. Trump emerged from Walter Reed around 6:30 p.m. wearing a dark suit, a blue tie and a white face mask and boarded Marine One for the short flight back to the White House. After landing on the South Lawn, the president climbed the steps to the balcony over the Diplomatic Entrance, where four American flags had been placed, took off his mask, flashed two thumbs up and saluted twice for the benefit of television cameras on the ground below.He then entered the building without immediately putting his mask back on even though staff members were nearby and he could still be contagious, according to medical studies of the virus timeline. At that point, he filmed the video, which was quickly uploaded to Twitter. A separate video, set to triumphal music, showed Marine One’s return and his saluting pose, and was posted online within an hour of his landing.The president looked stronger than he did on Friday when he was first taken to the hospital, but he did appear to breathe heavily once reaching the top of the White House stairs. He has been taking steroids that are known to produce a feeling of energy, even exhilaration, while suppressing pain or discomfort.After largely laying off Twitter, his favorite form of communication, for three days, Mr. Trump woke up Monday morning and began blasting out a string of messages in all capital letters in machine gun fashion shortly after 6 a.m., amplifying campaign messages like “LAW & ORDER. VOTE!” and “SAVE OUR SECOND AMENDMENT. VOTE!” By afternoon, he added, “Don’t be afraid of Covid. Don’t let it dominate your life.”With the election 29 days away and polls showing him trailing former Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr., the Democratic nominee, Mr. Trump appeared eager to be back at the White House to dispel any questions about his capacity.“I was glad to see the president speaking and recording videos over the weekend,” Mr. Biden said in a speech in Miami, wearing a mask. “Now that he’s busy tweeting campaign messages, I would ask him to do this, listen to the scientists: Support masks. Support a mask mandate nationwide.”He added, “I hope the president’s recovery is swift and successful but our nation’s coronavirus crisis is far, far from over.”Mr. Trump has long preferred to project strength regardless of the circumstances — what his disaffected niece, Mary L. Trump, a clinical psychologist, has called “toxic positivity” — and may fear that any concession to the virus would validate widespread criticism of his handling of the pandemic, which could be the defining issue of the election on Nov. 3.Throughout the weekend, Mr. Trump told the small group of aides with him as well as other advisers and allies he spoke with by telephone that he wanted to leave Walter Reed. He felt trapped in the hospital, the type of setting he typically hates, and pushed to be released on Sunday, only to meet resistance from his doctors, according to people familiar with the discussions. Instead, the medical team cleared him to take a brief ride in his armored sport utility vehicle to wave at the crowd of supporters outside the building.At the White House, which was emptier than usual as staff members stayed away, some aides fretted that Mr. Trump was being allowed to leave too soon, and by late Monday afternoon they had not been given guidance about what to expect when he returned. A preliminary plan called for confining Mr. Trump to the White House residence until he is no longer contagious and keep him away from the West Wing.But advisers said Mr. Trump wanted to demonstrate from the Oval Office that he was back and healthy, and they were unsure if they could prevent that. Mr. Trump is eager to show that he is a viable candidate for re-election, and advisers said he still planned to go ahead with the second debate with Mr. Biden scheduled for Oct. 15.While not as equipped as Walter Reed, the White House has a medical unit fully staffed by military doctors and assistants around the clock and capable of providing care to the president. With private examination rooms, a supply of medicine and a crash cart for emergency resuscitation, it has been described by one former White House physician as “like a mini urgent-care center.”The outbreak in the West Wing continued to spread on Monday as Kayleigh McEnany, the White House press secretary, and two of her assistants tested positive for the virus, heightening fears that more cases were still to come.Ms. McEnany said she had tested negative several times, “including every day since Thursday,” but health experts said she might have been infectious for days — including when she spoke briefly to reporters without a mask outside the White House on Sunday. Two more members of the press team, Karoline Leavitt and Chad Gilmartin, who is Ms. McEnany’s relative, also tested positive, according to two people familiar with the diagnoses.The three joined a growing list of people around the president who have tested positive, including Melania Trump, the first lady; Hope Hicks, a senior adviser; Nicholas F. Luna, the director of Oval Office Operations; Bill Stepien, the president’s campaign manager; Ronna McDaniel, the chairwoman of the Republican National Committee; Kellyanne Conway, the president’s former counselor; former Gov. Chris Christie of New Jersey, the president’s debate coach; and at least three White House reporters and two members of the residence staff.The culture of the White House under Mr. Trump is not to talk about the coronavirus tests. When he received his own initial positive result on a rapid test last Thursday shortly after returning from Bedminster, N.J., he wanted it kept quiet, according to people close to him. Likewise, the two members of the residential staff who tested positive a few weeks ago were advised by colleagues to “use discretion” in discussing it, people familiar with the conversations said.Vice President Mike Pence, who tested negative on Sunday, was scheduled to travel to Utah ahead of Wednesday night’s vice-presidential debate. Mr. Pence also plans to attend campaign events in Arizona and Florida this week before stopping in his home state, Indiana, to vote early.His doctor said that Mr. Pence was not quarantining because he had not been close enough to any infected individuals for long enough to qualify as “a close contact.” Attorney General William P. Barr, who attended an event at the White House on Sept. 26 linked to the outbreak, was at home on Monday with no symptoms, but planned to return to work this week in defiance of Justice Department guidance that employees exposed to people with the virus should stay away for 14 days.Mr. Trump’s upbeat mood could be a product of his medication. Medical experts said patients on steroids like dexamethasone can experience a sense of well-being and euphoria, in which aches and pains disappear for a time. The steroids can also disrupt sleep and, in some cases, may cause psychiatric effects, leading to feelings of grandiosity and mania.The effect of combining several drugs is not well understood, especially because two of the treatments administered to Mr. Trump — remdesivir and a monoclonal antibody cocktail — are still experimental. Giving patients multiple treatments at once can increase the chance of harmful interactions or reduce their effectiveness, doctors said.Mr. Trump’s risk factors — he is 74, male and overweight — mean that he should be closely watched for at least the first week of his infection because some patients quickly deteriorate several days into their illness. Dr. Céline Gounder, of N.Y.U. Grossman School of Medicine, who has been caring for coronavirus patients, said Mr. Trump could rapidly deteriorate at the White House and require an emergency transfer back to Walter Reed. “To me, it’s not safe,” she said.Dr. Abraar Karan of Brigham and Women’s Hospital and Harvard Medical School, said even if he was feeling better, Mr. Trump needed “extremely close monitoring as these next few days are critical.” The second week is often the most worrisome, he said, “as we have seen that patients recover briefly and then either continue improving or have a more sudden and abrupt decline.”Peter Baker reported from Washington, and Maggie Haberman from New York. Reporting was contributed by Katie Thomas from Chicago, and Katie Benner, Michael Crowley and Eileen Sullivan from Washington. More

Donald Trump

The president’s carelessness about others’ safety shows he will do almost anything not to lose in November
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‘Don’t be afraid of it’: Trump removes mask as he returns to White House – video

The desperation that has driven Donald Trump to leave hospital prematurely and theatrically pull off his mask on the White House balcony while in the throes of coronavirus infection gives some measure of how dangerous the next four weeks will be.
Many students of Trump’s life and career have warned that he would be prepared to sacrifice anyone – even those closest to him – to spare himself the humiliation of a one-term presidency, but even they surely could not have anticipated how literal that sacrifice would be.
It involved creating a culture in the White House in which the wearing of masks was scoffed at, and seen as a sign of disloyalty, the worst sin in the Trump court. Trump drove home the message on Monday night, staging a spectacle of his return to the White House maskless, with photographers forced to be in attendance. He has produced a toxic workplace to the point of potential lethality.
A super-spreader event was held there to make the most out of Trump’s nominating Amy Coney Barrett to the supreme court – exploiting the opportunity of Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s death, and then the president and his considerable entourage fanned out around the country in pursuit of campaign funds.
It included Trump’s insistence on leaving hospital on Sunday night and driving around the block to drink in the adoration of the small crowd of faithful that had gathered at the gate. In so doing he obliged secret service agents to get into a hermetically sealed armoured car with a patient showing full-on symptomatic coronavirus.
The bodyguards are there to take a bullet for the president, not to take one from him, but that was in effect what Trump was demanding they do for a photo-op.
Amid the ensuing outrage over his insouciance, Trump appeared not to appreciate the point: that he had shown no heed of the safety of others, even loyal public servants. His reaction only served to prove that same point. He did not grasp that these people had significance.
“It is reported that the Media is upset because I got into a secure vehicle to say thank you to the many fans and supporters who were standing outside of the hospital for many hours, and even days, to pay their respect to their President. If I didn’t do it, Media would say RUDE!!!”, Trump tweeted.
What stands out is the president’s sense that he was the victim once again – and the only other people who mattered were those who had shown their personal allegiance to him.
No one really thought that Trump would emerge chastened from his brush with the virus (if the encounter is truly over – his doctor has stressed he is not “out of the woods”). But not only was he unrepentant about the White House’s cavalier approach to masks and social distancing, he has reinforced it.
“Don’t be afraid of Covid,” he tweeted. “Don’t let it dominate your life. We have developed, under the Trump Administration, some really great drugs & knowledge.”
Entirely absent was any acknowledgement of the more than 200,000 dead, the many more suffering serious and long lasting symptoms – and the reality that some of the “really great drugs” he was given at Walter Reed hospital were experimental and way beyond the reach of ordinary patients.
These facts are evident to most Americans. In a new survey commissioned by CNN from the polling organisation SSRS, two-thirds of them said Trump acted irresponsibly in handling the risk of infection to himself and those around him. Joe Biden’s nationwide lead has widened further.
There is now a very real danger of a vicious cycle. Desperation fuels Trump’s unpopularity, which triggers more desperation. Americans are already exhausted by October surprises, and the nation is only five days into the month. The calendar is unfurling towards the 3 November vote with a president who has little to lose from gambling.
The principal victims of his lack of empathy so far have been the concentric circles of supporters around him. In the coming weeks the collateral damage from his panic is likely to spread further afield. The president is already openly calling his supporters to gather at the polls as “watchers” on election day, and primed them to expect a vote rigged against their leader.
No one doubts now that he would take chaos and bloodshed over defeat, and the implications may not stop at the nation’s shore, with the greatest fear being a combination of a foreign adversary seeking to exploit a weakened administration, and a commander in chief ready to do anything to avoid looking weak.

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Donald Trump has left Walter Reed National Military Medical Center after spending several days receiving treatment for Covid-19. Trump’s doctors said the US president was ‘not yet out of the woods’ but had met all standard hospital criteria to be discharged. Trump’s physician, Dr Sean Conley, said: ‘We remain cautiously optimistic and on guard because we’re in a bit of uncharted territory when it comes to a patient that received the therapies he has so early in the course.’ When asked by reporters Conley said he was ‘not at liberty to discuss’ Trump’s latest lung scans due to health privacy regulations.
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