US Politics

Michael Flynn allies allegedly plotted to lean on Republicans to back vote auditsEx-whistleblower says group enlisted his help to seek potentially damaging information on two members of Congress to prod them to back audits in key states Trump lost FBI agents and the House panel investigating the January 6 attack on the Capitol have both learned of an alleged plan by allies of retired army Lt Gen Michael Flynn to gather “intelligence” on top Republicans to “move” them to back election audits in key states Trump lost, said ex-whistleblower Everett Stern who talked to the panel and the FBI.Stern, who runs the intelligence firm Tactical Rabbit and is a Republican vying for a Senate seat in Pennsylvania, in multiple interviews with the Guardian said two Flynn associates with the rightwing Patriot Caucus group enlisted his help in April in a scheme to seek potentially damaging information on two Republican members of Congress to prod them to back an audit of the 2020 vote that Joe Biden won.Stern told the Guardian he spent several hours in November telling House panel investigators about the alleged drive by Flynn associates who sought campaign finance and other dirt on Pennsylvania’s senator Pat Toomey and congressman Brian Fitzpatrick to win their support for an audit to bolster Trump’s debunked charges that Biden’s win was fraudulent.A long shot candidate to succeed the retiring Toomey, Stern said he alerted the FBI in June when he learned more details of the bizarre drive by Flynn allies to specifically target the two Republicans, both of whom backed impeaching Trump after the January 6 insurrection.The efforts by Flynn’s Patriot Caucus allies were launched after Trump failed to block Biden from taking office, and are part of a wider drive by Trump loyalists and Flynn to help boost Trump’s political fortunes via more state audits nationwide into false charges that Biden’s win was rigged, and elect like-minded candidates in key states to top electoral offices.Stern provided text messages, emails and other documents revealing he had multiple contacts with one of the Patriot Caucus members, Velma Anne Ruth, and two other influential Flynn allies, Houston real estate mogul Al Hartman and former army green beret Ivan Raiklin, who were pushing audits in several key states.Stern said Flynn’s Patriot Caucus associates first approached him in Pennsylvania for possible help after an April Republican party event, and soon after told Stern in phone calls they worked with Flynn and the Patriot Caucus, and planned to recruit “former domestic and foreign intelligence officials” to facilitate their scheme.The plan by Flynn’s allies alarmed Stern, but as a former whistleblower involved in exposing a large bank money laundering scandal by HSBC in 2012, he told the Guardian he decided to play along for a few months to glean information to expose the Trump allies’ scheme.Stern expressed dismay that Flynn’s Patriot Caucus associates “don’t understand that Biden is the president. They wanted to collect information through Tactical Rabbit and my campaign,” to turn up the heat on Toomey and Fitzpatrick to back an audit which Stern viewed as potentially “extortion”.Stern gave the Guardian a voice mail he received in which Hartman talked about leaning on moderate Republican “RINOs” in Pennsylvania to gain support for an audit of that state’s vote which Biden won by over 80,000, and Hartman said a similar drive in Michigan was needed.Stern said Hartman wanted to use Tactical Rabbit’s intelligence gathering tools and his campaign to dig up potentially embarrassing campaign finance information and other dirt about the Pennsylvania members, plus Republican political figures in Michigan who were also resisting audits.Hartman and Raiklin also talked with Stern about meeting Flynn, Trump’s disgraced ex-national security adviser, and proposed compensating him for his information via campaign donations, said Stern.In an April exchange of Hartman text messages seen by the Guardian, Hartman asked a Flynn scheduler to help “connect” Flynn with Stern whose Senate campaign and credentials he touted highly, calling Stern a “strong believer”, in their cause.Although Stern tipped off the FBI in June about what he deemed a threat to national security and he said he met with agents again in November, it’s not clear if his allegations are still being pursued.Stern’s allegations have echoes of Flynn’s scheming with Trump and other loyalists in late 2020 to thwart Biden’s win, efforts that included a White House meeting with Trump where Flynn proposed declaring martial law in several states Biden won and then rerunning the election there.In November, the House panel probing the January 6 Capitol attack subpoenaed Flynn who Trump had pardoned post election even though he had pled guilty twice to lying to the FBI during the Russia investigation. In response to the subpoena to testify and turn over documents, Flynn sued the panel but a judge quickly dismissed his lawsuit last month.John Sipher, who was in the CIA’s clandestine services for 28 years, shares Stern’s view of Flynn who he knew in the military and shortly thereafter. “I am appalled by what he has become,” Sipher said in an email.Asked if he thought the FBI was pursuing Stern’s charges, Sipher said: “I would hope and assume they are taking this seriously.”While Fitzpatrick and Toomey were the main “targets” Stern said other Pennsylvania officials including judges were also being targeted by the Flynn allies as they sought to ramp up pressure for an audit in the state.Neither Fitzpatrick or Toomey’s offices replied to multiple requests for comment.The Patriot Caucus, a coalition of Patriot and other rightwing groups in some two dozen states with which Raiklin and Hartman have ties, according to Stern and documents, has worked with Trump loyalists like Flynn to push audits in key states Biden won, and backed Trump allies for governor, and other top posts in states like Pennsylvania and Arizona Trump lost.Flynn himself on 7 January publicly endorsed another Trump ally and election audit promoter, Doug Mastriano for governor in Pennsylvania, at a campaign rally also attended by Raiklin.Flynn has also endorsed two Trump backed candidates in Arizona: Kari Lake, an ex-Fox News figure for governor, and Mark Finchem, a state representative who attended the January 6 Stop the Steal rally, for secretary of state.To coordinate national efforts, Raiklin and Hartman on 3 July spearheaded one of a series of “Election Integrity” calls with Trump loyalists, lawyers and donors to discuss the status of audits efforts in several states and other plans to cast doubt on Biden’s win, according to an Arizona senate document shared by the watchdog group American Oversight.“Join us every second Saturday for SITUATION UPDATES and COLLABORATION from active leaders in the election remediation process at state level – attorneys with Mike Lindell and Patrick Byrne, data analysts, state legislators, gubernatorial candidates, and grassroots activists whose goal is completing a cyber forensic audit in their state,” the Arizona document reads.A who’s who list of Trump loyalists and groups invited to join these calls included the America Project and America’s Future, both of which Flynn played key roles with as they poured some $2m into a discredited audit of Arizona’s largest county, plus the Patriot Caucus’ Velma Anne Ruth, Finchem and Byrne, the millionaire chief financier of the Arizona audit.Hartman in emails with Stern obtained by the Guardian invited him in June to attend a religious far right meeting known as Ziklag in Dallas where he could meet separately with Flynn. Stern said Hartman told him a “private meeting was going to be arranged with Flynn” who Stern was told wanted to meet him.After indicating to Hartman he would attend, Stern opted to cancel at the last minute after his lawyer indicated there could be legal repercussions from a meeting with Flynn. “I thought it was extremely dangerous to meet with a three star general who I believed had broken the law.”“They planned to give my campaign funds to help me” develop damaging information on Toomey and Fitzpatrick, Stern claimed. “It was like a wink, wink. Hartman is the man behind the curtain. He’s an operative and financier,” promoting audits.Hartman has long been a donor to the right. He’s on the advisory council for the pro Trump Turning Point USA and has been active in the conservative donor network led by oil billionaire Charles Koch.Raiklin, an army reserve officer who reportedly has known Flynn since 2014, is facing an internal army reserve probe into possible violations of rules barring partisan political activity, according to a military official who spoke to Reuters last month.Raiklin in December 2020 outlined a wild scheme in tweets and a podcast to thwart Biden’s win, charging a vast conspiracy that included Pence, intelligence, China and Big Tech, as Reuters reported. Raiklin told Trump to “activate the emergency broadcast system,” and deployed the hashtag #FightLikeAFlynn, stressing that “we the people are going to force this plan on them”.Neither Hartman or Raiklin replied to multiple calls seeking comment.A Flynn scheduler did not respond to questions for the story.Velma Anne Ruth with the Patriot Caucus, who was photographed with Stern at a June event in Pennsylvania where she wore a tank top that said General Flynn, called Stern’s charges “delusional, fabricated and defamatory”, in a text message. Stern said he shared the photo and other documents involving exchanges he had with Ruth with the FBI.Senior ex-prosecutors and intelligence officials say Stern’s allegations merit law enforcement attention.“Stern’s allegations suggest serious crimes,” said ex-prosecutor Paul Rosenzweig who worked on Ken Starr’s team during the impeachment of Bill Clinton. “If his allegations were corroborated by extrinsic evidence they clearly would warrant investigation.”Former CIA official Sipher, who has spoken with Stern before, said: “Everett is someone with a strong sense of right and wrong, and willing to suffer the consequences of doing the right thing. We would be better served to have more people like Everett in public life.”TopicsDonald TrumpUS elections 2020US politicsRepublicansnewsReuse this content More

After Democrats’ historic defeat on voting rights, what happens next?In an extremely bruising loss for Biden, Republicans used the filibuster to block the sweeping bill from passing Sign up for the Guardian’s Fight to Vote newsletterFor a little over a year, America has faced a democratic crisis unlike any it has seen in recent history.As Republicans have spread lies about the 2020 presidential election, confidence in it remains staggeringly low and about 1 in 3 Americans now believe Joe Biden was not legitimately elected. Republicans who claim the election was stolen are trying to grab key election administration roles, prompting unprecedented alarm that a future election could be overturned.And after an election with record participation, Republicans have pushed a wave of new laws making it harder to vote, placing new restrictions on longstanding policies that went unquestioned for years. “We’re facing the most significant test of our democracy since the civil war,” Biden said in July.On Wednesday night, Democrats’ biggest hope of blunting that threat failed in a historic defeat as Republicans used the filibuster – a technical senate rule that requires 60 votes to advance most legislation – to block a sweeping voting rights bill from passing.For months Democrats had offered the legislation as an antidote to the anti-democratic sickness that is plaguing America. The bill would have been the most dramatic expansion of the right to vote in a generation. It would have outlawed partisan gerrymandering, protected election officials from partisan interference, required early voting and same-day registration, and restore the pre-clearance provision at the heart of the Voting Rights Act.Politically, the loss was extremely bruising for Biden, who has spent an enormous amount of his political capital in recent weeks only to end up on the losing side. And – even worse – though the measure was blocked by 50 Republicans who refused to even negotiate around it, the moment was one of clear weakness for Democrats. The party has control of both chambers in Congress yet appeared helpless as two of its conservative senators joined with Republicans to preserve the filibuster and doom the legislation.But the deeper stakes of the failure go far beyond politics.It was a moment in which an American government system, crippled by deep partisanship and an arcane rule, turned its back on a rising threat of a dangerous anti-democratic tide. It’s a moment that future historians will be mystified by, a group of scholars warned in November.“To lose our democracy but preserve the filibuster in its current form – in which a minority can block popular legislation without even having to hold the floor – would be a short-sighted blunder that future historians will forever puzzle over,” they wrote.What happens next isn’t exactly clear.Biden suggested the 2022 elections could be illegitimate absent congressional action, a claim the White House quickly walked back on Thursday. “He was explaining that the results would be illegitimate if states do what the former president asked them to do after the 2020 election: toss out ballots and overturn results after the fact,” Jen Psaki, the White House press secretary, tweeted.Cliff Albright, a co-founder of the group Black Voters Matter, said the vote Wednesday was “disappointing”, but said that his group would continue to push for significant voting reforms. He noted how successful pressure from his group and others had been in getting Biden and other Democrats to support changing the filibuster and pointed out that historic past campaigns to pass the Civil Rights Act and Voting Rights Act required continued pushing after setbacks.“Those debates and those votes were important, to put them on record. So that’s a victory for movement,” he said. “I don’t think this moment will be forgotten.”Tiffany Muller, the president and executive director of Let America Vote/End Citizens United, similarly pledged her group would “regroup” and “keep going” to push voting reforms.“We’re going to take that fight to the states. And we’re going to continue to elect champions down the ballot who will prioritize our democracy, and we’re gonna make sure that we’ll hold Republicans accountable at the ballot box in 2022,” she said. “There is no doubt about it that last night’s vote makes the best option on the federal level not available to us anymore. But we’re still gonna look at ‘are there ways to get other pieces of legislation passed on the federal level?’”Politically, Democrats have pledged to fight on.Previewing what could be a midterm message to frustrated voters on Thursday, Jaime Harrison, the chair of the Democratic National Committee, said the failure in the Senate was evidence for why there needed to be more Democrats in the US Senate.“We can send more Democrats to the US Senate and give President Biden and Vice-president Harris the votes they need to pass voting rights legislation. We can show those who stand in the way of voting rights that their actions have consequences,” he said in a statement.Senator Jeff Merkley, an Oregon Democrat who laid out a plan for a talking filibuster, said in a statement he would continue to push to reform the rule.“We fell short. But this is not the end of the story,” he said. “When I came to the Senate, 48 senators voting to change the filibuster seemed like a distant dream, something that would never happen. We’re not there yet, but we’re closer than we’ve ever been.”With broad voting reform stalled, there appears to be some bipartisan appetite in congress for changing the Electoral Count Act, a confusing 19th century law that sets out the procedures for counting electoral votes. Trump’s legal team planned to use ambiguities in the law to try and overturn the election, and election scholars for years have said that it needs to be fixed. “There’s a good win there,” Manchin said after the vote on Wednesday. “I mean, my goodness, that’s what caused the insurrection.”But Democrats have rejected fixing the law alone as an acceptable solution, saying it’s unacceptable to fix the way votes are counted if the rules of voting are rigged. It would be a bit like deciding to fix an unreliable scoreboard in a game of basketball where the rules are rigged against one team. Muller also said she was skeptical of how sincere Mitch McConnell, the Republican leader, was in his wish to change the law.“We are supportive of reforming the act. But that’s not going to be nearly enough to protect voters in all of these states. It does nothing to fight back against these voter suppression laws,” she said.Meanwhile, congressional inaction is also likely to encourage those seeking to undermine democracy to be even more aggressive, Sherrilyn Ifill, the director-counsel of the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, told Congress on Thursday.“In 2021, we saw a repeat of history – a steady drip of old poison in new bottles. Whereas in a bygone era, discriminatory intent in voting restrictions was dressed up in ideals such as securing a more informed and invested electorate, the new justification is fighting imaginary voter fraud, a phantom conjured only to attack,” she said, according to prepared remarks.“With no pushback from Congress, those intent on subverting the next election by continuing to raise doubts about 2020 are becoming more brazen, not less,” she added.Eric Foner, a historian at Columbia who studies the Reconstruction era in US history, said it was difficult to predict how future historians would remember this moment. He said there were parallel moments in history when congressional efforts to protect voting rights were thwarted by the filibuster, such as in 1890 when federal voting protections backed by Henry Cabot Lodge were defeated after a filibuster in the senate.“​​Historically, the filibuster has been used for one reason: that is to prevent legislation supporting the rights of Black people,” he said. “Let’s not try to glorify the filibuster as having any reasonable reason for existence other than allowing a minority to rule over a majority.”TopicsUS politicsThe fight to voteDemocratsRepublicansBiden administrationanalysisReuse this content More

As Joe Biden marks his first year in the White House, Democrats will be reeling from their loss to Republicans in the Senate, after Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema chose to let an important voting rights bill fail over a technicality. The Freedom to Vote: John R Lewis Act would have helped bolster voting rights for many minorities who have felt disenfranchised by recent legislation.Jonathan Freedland speaks to Errin Haines of The 19th about how black voters – who were instrumental in getting Biden elected in 2020 – think the president has done in his first year.

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Mitch McConnell’s viral Black voter comments cause widespread furorRepublican Senate minority leader’s comments came after party members blocked voting rights bill and changes to filibuster rule00:33Senate minority leader Mitch McConnell has sparked widespread outrage by appearing to refer to African Americans and Americans as two separate groups in comments about Black voters that have since gone viral.Republican voter suppression is rampant. Manchin and Sinema are complicit now | Moira DoneganRead moreThe Kentucky Republican was speaking after Republican senators once again blocked Democrats’ voting rights legislation on Capitol Hill on Wednesday evening.Speaking to reporters after the bill failed and the Senate rejected a change to the filibuster rule that could facilitate its passage, McConnell was asked for his message to voters in minority communities who are concerned that voting restrictions being enacted in many states will keep them from the ballot box without new federal laws.“The concern is misplaced, because if you look at the statistics, African American voters are voting in just as high a percentage as Americans,” McConnell said.In fact, studies indicate that voting restrictions, like those passed by 19 states in the past year, disproportionately impact voters of color.Democratic Illinois congressman Bobby Rush swiftly called out McConnell’s comment, saying in a tweet: “African Americans ARE Americans. #MitchPlease”One of Rush’s Democratic colleagues, Diana DeGette of Colorado, echoed that assessment, describing McConnell’s comment as “disgusting”. “African-American voters ARE AMERICANS & to suggest otherwise is about as racist as it gets,” DeGette said in a tweet.African Americans ARE Americans. #MitchPlease https://t.co/N3dSsQ9Jqn pic.twitter.com/SRnTTVJdJ4— Bobby L. Rush (@RepBobbyRush) January 20, 2022
Former Kentucky state senator Charles Booker, who is campaigning for the US senate against Republican Rand Paul, tweeted: “I am no less American than Mitch McConnell” and also said: “I need you to understand that this is who Mitch McConnell is. Being Black doesn’t make you less of an American, no matter what this craven man thinks.”Pastor and activist Talbert Swan quipped that he “can’t qwhite put my finger on” what distinction McConnell might be drawing, tweeting: “I wonder what’s the difference he sees between ‘African-American voters’ and ‘Americans.’”And Malcolm Kenyatta, a Democratic Senate candidate in Pennsylvania, argued that McConnell’s words were not a slip of the tongue but were instead an accurate reflection of the Republican party’s mindset toward Black voters.“Mitch McConnell’s comments suggesting African Americans aren’t fully American wasn’t a Freudian slip – it was a dog whistle. The same one he has blown for years,” Kenyatta said.Mitch McConnell’s comments suggesting African Americans aren’t fully American wasn’t a Freudian slip — it was a dog whistle. The same one he has blown for years.— Rep. Malcolm Kenyatta (@malcolmkenyatta) January 20, 2022
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Key events

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3.59pm EST

15:59

Ivanka Trump asked to cooperate with Capitol attack committee

3.11pm EST

15:11

US accuses Russia of conspiring to take over Ukraine government

1.29pm EST

13:29

Congressman Jamaal Bowman arrested outside Capitol amid voting rights protests – report

12.49pm EST

12:49

Georgia DA requests grand jury to investigate Trump efforts

12.30pm EST

12:30

Today so far

11.52am EST

11:52

Biden clarifies Ukraine comments: ‘Russia will pay a heavy price’ for invasion

11.16am EST

11:16

‘There are no minor incursions,’ Ukrainian president says after Biden’s flub

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11.52am EST

11:52

Biden clarifies Ukraine comments: ‘Russia will pay a heavy price’ for invasion

Joe Biden sought to clarify his comments from yesterday about a potential Russian invasion of Ukraine, after the US president appeared to downplay the threat of a “minor incursion” into Ukraine.
Speaking at the start of a meeting on infrastructure, Biden told reporters moments ago, “I’ve been absolutely clear with President Putin. He has no misunderstanding. If any — any — assembled Russian units move across the Ukrainian border, that is an invasion.”
Biden said such an invasion would be met with a “severe and coordinated economic response,” which he has “discussed in detail with our allies as well as laid out very clearly for President Putin”.
He added, “But there is no doubt — let there be no doubt at all that, if Putin makes this choice, Russia will pay a heavy price.”

ABC News
(@ABC)
“I’ve been absolutely clear with President Putin…If any, any assembled Russian units move across the Ukrainian border, that is an invasion,” Pres. Biden says. “It will be met with severe and coordinated economic response.” https://t.co/aWy2ej1jCo pic.twitter.com/Z5d2pDVEnw

January 20, 2022

Biden’s comments come one day after he seemed to imply that Nato was at odds over how to respond to Russian aggression depending upon the type of attack that was launched against Ukraine.
“I think what you’re going to see is that Russia will be held accountable if it invades,” Biden said at his press conference yesterday.
“And it depends on what it does. It’s one thing if it’s a minor incursion and then we end up having a fight about what to do and not do, et cetera.”
That comment required a coordinated clean-up effort from Biden administration officials, with Kamala Harris and Jen Psaki, the White House press secretary, seeking to clarify that the US and its allies are united in responding to Russian aggression.

4.42pm EST

16:42

A spokesperson for Ivanka Trump seemed to suggest that she did not have any relevant information to share with the House select committee investigating the Capitol insurrection.
“As the Committee already knows, Ivanka did not speak at the January 6 rally,” the spokesperson said in a statement provided to CBS News.
“As she publicly stated that day at 3:15 pm, ‘any security breach or disrespect to our law enforcement is unacceptable. The violence must stop immediately. Please be peaceful.’”

Fin Gómez
(@finnygo)
New- Statement from @IvankaTrump Spokesperson to @CBSNews on January 6th committee request to cooperate w/its inquiry. pic.twitter.com/rSGG2EpgMn

January 20, 2022

However, in his letter to Ivanka Trump, committee chairman Bennie Thompson specifically said the panel is interested in any conversations she had with Donald Trump about efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 election.
So even though Ivanka Trump did not speak at the January 6 rally that preceded the insurrection, it is still quite likely that she has relevant information for the investigation.
The statement makes it seem even less likely that Ivanka Trump will voluntarily agree to cooperate with the select committee.

4.23pm EST

16:23

Democratic congressman Jamie Raskin, a member of the House select committee investigating the Capitol insurrection, said Ivanka Trump could be a “material fact witness” for the panel’s inquiry.
“If the former president has no executive privilege to hide evidence of an attempted coup or insurrection, neither do his family or friends,” the Maryland congressman said on Twitter.
“If Ivanka Trump was with Donald Trump as the attack unfolded, she is a material fact witness. I look forward to her testimony.”

Rep. Jamie Raskin
(@RepRaskin)
If the former president has no executive privilege to hide evidence of an attempted coup or insurrection, neither do his family or friends. If Ivanka Trump was with Donald Trump as the attack unfolded, she is a material fact witness. I look forward to her testimony.

January 20, 2022

According to the letter that committee chairman Bennie Thompson sent to Ivanka Trump, the panel is seeking information she may have about Trump’s efforts to pressure Mike Pence to attempt to overturn the results of the 2020 election.
“As January 6th approached, President Trump attempted on multiple occasions to persuade Vice President Pence to participate in his plan,” Thompson said in the letter.
“One of the President’s discussions with the Vice President occurred by phone on the morning of January 6th. You were present in the Oval Office and observed at least one side of that telephone conversation.”
Thompson also requested information from Ivanka Trump on “any other conversations you may have witnessed or participated in regarding the President’s plan to obstruct or impede the counting of electoral votes”.

3.59pm EST

15:59

Ivanka Trump asked to cooperate with Capitol attack committee

Hugo Lowell

The House select committee investigating the Capitol attack is asking Ivanka Trump, the daughter of the former president, to appear for a voluntary deposition to answer questions about Donald Trump’s efforts to stop the certification of Joe Biden’s election victory.
The move by the panel marks an aggressive new phase in its inquiry into the 6 January insurrection, as House investigators seek for the first time testimony from a member of the Trump family about potential criminality on the part of the former president.

January 6th Committee
(@January6thCmte)
The Select Committee is requesting that Ivanka Trump provide information for the committee’s investigation.In a letter to Ms. Trump seeking a voluntary interview, Chair @BennieGThompson underscored evidence that Trump was in direct contact with the former President on Jan 6th.

January 20, 2022

Congressman Bennie Thompson, the chair of the select committee, said in an 11-page letter to Ivanka Trump that the panel wanted to ask about Trump’s plan to stop the certification, and his response to the Capitol attack, including delays to deploying the national guard.
The questions to Ivanka appear directed at a key issue: whether her father oversaw a criminal conspiracy on 6 January that also involved obstructing a congressional proceeding – a crime.
The letter said that the panel first wanted to question Ivanka Trump about what she recalled of a heated Oval Office meeting on the morning of the 6 January insurrection when the former president was trying to co-opt Mike Pence into rejecting Biden’s win.
Read the Guardian’s full report:

3.31pm EST

15:31

Jen Psaki, the White House press secretary, pointed to the Treasury Department’s newly announced sanctions against four Ukrainian officials as an example of how the US is proactively responding to Russian aggression.
“We are not waiting to take action to counter Russia. We see what they’re doing. We’re disrupting it,” Psaki said at her daily briefing this afternoon.
“And these actions are also of course separate and distinct from the broad range of high-impact, severe measures we and our allies are prepared to impose in order to inflict significant costs should they invade.”

Bloomberg Quicktake
(@Quicktake)
Psaki says the U.S. is not waiting to take action against Russia over troop buildup on the Ukraine border after the Treasury Department announced sanctions against supposed Russian spies https://t.co/676DFgKgHT pic.twitter.com/X0J53QwFM9

January 20, 2022

3.11pm EST

15:11

US accuses Russia of conspiring to take over Ukraine government

The Guardian’s Julian Borger, Luke Harding and Andrew Roth report:
The US has alleged that Russian intelligence is recruiting current and former Ukrainian government officials to take over the government in Kyiv and cooperate with a Russian occupying force.
The US Treasury on Thursday imposed sanctions on two Ukrainian members of parliament and two former officials it said were involved in the alleged conspiracy, which involved discrediting the current government of the president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy.
“Russia has directed its intelligence services to recruit current and former Ukrainian government officials to prepare to take over the government of Ukraine and to control Ukraine’s critical infrastructure with an occupying Russian force,” the Treasury statement accompanying the sanctions said.
The claims suggest US intelligence fears Russia is preparing a full-scale invasion and not the “minor incursion” that Joe Biden referred to as a possibility in remarks on Wednesday that triggered alarm in Kyiv.
Online researchers have identified Russian troops and military vehicles within just ten miles of Ukraine’s borders, increasing the risk that Vladimir Putin could launch a military offensive on short notice.

2.54pm EST

14:54

As she wrapped up her daily briefing, White House press secretary Jen Psaki was asked whether Joe Biden plans to do more press conferences in the future.
“Stay tuned,” Psaki replied. “Buckle up, bring snacks next time.”
Biden’s press conference yesterday lasted nearly two hours, after the president decided to extend the event by calling on reporters who were not on the original list provided to him by his staff.
After taking questions for about an hour and a half, Biden looked at his watch and decided to keep talking for another 20 minutes — likely to the chagrin of his press staff.

2.41pm EST

14:41

A reporter asked Jen Psaki for further clarification on Joe Biden’s comments about the possibility of Russia executing a “minor incursion” into Ukraine.
The president has since sought to clear up those comments, saying this morning, “I’ve been absolutely clear with President Putin. He has no misunderstanding. If any — any — assembled Russian units move across the Ukrainian border, that is an invasion.”
Psaki said Biden was making the point yesterday that the US and its allies have “a range of tools” to respond to Russian aggression, which may take the form of paramilitary tactics like cyberattacks.
The press secretary also addressed Biden’s comment that there are “differences in Nato as to what countries are willing to do, depending on what happens”.
“We have been focused on ensuring that we remain united with Nato,” Psaki said. “Now united doesn’t mean that everything will be identical, right? It means we’re united in taking actions should they decide to invade. And we are united.”

2.23pm EST

14:23

A reporter pressed Jen Psaki again on Joe Biden’s comments yesterday about the legitimacy of the upcoming 2022 elections in the face of new voting restrictions in many states.
The reporter, Peter Alexander of NBC News, noted that Biden said yesterday, “I’m not going to say it’s going to be legit. The increase and the prospect of being illegitimate is in direct proportion to us not being able to get these reforms passed.”

ABC News Politics
(@ABCPolitics)
Asked if Pres. Biden is confident that the midterm elections will be legitimate even if federal voting rights legislation doesn’t pass Congress, White House press sec. Jen Psaki says “yes.” https://t.co/Y5SVieyPLg pic.twitter.com/zsZXFgD41T

January 20, 2022

Alexander asked Psaki, “Yes or no: does the president believe, if all remains as it is right now, that the elections this fall will be legitimate?”
Psaki replied, “Yes, but the point that he was making was that, as recently as 2020 as we know, the former president was trying to work with local officials to overturn the vote count and not have ballots counted. And we have to be very eyes wide open about that and clear-eyed that that is the intention potentially of him and certainly of members of his party.”
Alexander then asked for clarification that Biden is confident in the legitimacy of the upcoming elections if no changes are made in voting rights legislation moving forward.
“Yes,” Psaki responded.

2.08pm EST

14:08

The White House press secretary, Jen Psaki, is now holding her daily briefing, and she is continuing her efforts to clean up some of Joe Biden’s comments from his press conference yesterday.
A reporter asked Psaki whether Biden has confidence in the legitimacy of the 2022 elections, as Democrats struggle to pass their voting rights bill.
During his press conference, Biden was asked whether he had faith in the legitimacy of the upcoming midterm elections if Democrats are unable to pass their bill.
Biden responded, “It all depends on whether or not we’re able to make the case to the American people that some of this is being set up to try to alter the outcome of the election.”
Psaki reiterated that Biden was not intending to cast doubt upon the legitimacy of the 2022 election but was instead making a point about how the 2020 election would have been illegitimate if election officials had cooperated with Donald Trump’s demands to overturn the results in battleground states.
The press secretary made the same point over Twitter this morning:

Jen Psaki
(@PressSec)
Lets be clear: @potus was not casting doubt on the legitimacy of the 2022 election. He was making the opposite point: In 2020, a record number of voters turned out in the face of a pandemic, and election officials made sure they could vote and have those votes counted.

January 20, 2022

1.56pm EST

13:56

Senate minority leader Mitch McConnell is attracting intense criticism for his comments about Black voters, which he made last night after Republican senators blocked Democrats’ voting rights bill (again).
Speaking to reporters after the bill failed and the Senate rejected a change to the filibuster, McConnell was asked for his message to minority voters who are concerned that they will not be able to vote unless the Democratic bill is enacted.
“The concern is misplaced, because if you look at the statistics, African-American voters are voting in just as high a percentage as Americans,” McConnell said.

BG
(@TheBGates)
.@LeaderMcConnell: “The concern is misplaced, because if you look at the statistics, African-American voters are voting in just as high a percentage as American.”Yikes. pic.twitter.com/WXR1WCZh5T

January 20, 2022

That comment sparked a lot of confusion among those who pointed out that African American voters are, in fact, Americans.
Democratic congressman Bobby Rush called out McConnell’s comment, saying in a tweet, “African Americans ARE Americans. #MitchPlease”
It’s also worth noting that studies indicate the voting restrictions enacted by 19 states in the past year will disproportionately impact voters of color.

Bobby L. Rush
(@RepBobbyRush)
African Americans ARE Americans. #MitchPlease https://t.co/N3dSsQ9Jqn pic.twitter.com/SRnTTVJdJ4

January 20, 2022

Updated
at 1.57pm EST

1.29pm EST

13:29

Congressman Jamaal Bowman arrested outside Capitol amid voting rights protests – report

Joanna Walters

Demonstrators are right now outside the US Capitol demanding action to protect voting rights and election integrity in the US, following the Senate’s resounding refusal, once again, to pass legislation on this issue last night. More

Ivanka Trump asked to cooperate with Capitol attack committeeInvestigators seek testimony from former first daughter, with panel increasingly focused on Donald Trump’s inner circle The House select committee investigating the Capitol attack is asking Ivanka Trump, the daughter of the former president, to appear for a voluntary deposition to answer questions about Donald Trump’s efforts to stop the certification of Joe Biden’s election victory.Biden warns Russia will ‘pay a heavy price’ if Putin launches Ukraine invasion – liveRead moreThe move by the panel marks an aggressive new phase in its inquiry into the 6 January insurrection, as House investigators seek for the first time testimony from a member of the Trump family about potential criminality on the part of the former president.Congressman Bennie Thompson, the chair of the select committee, said in an 11-page letter to Ivanka Trump that the panel wanted to ask about Trump’s plan to stop the certification, and his response to the Capitol attack, including delays to deploying the national guard.Ivanka Trump was a senior adviser to her father during her presidency, as was her husband Jared Kushner. The two were seen as a power couple very close to the inner workings of the Trump White House.The questions to Ivanka appear directed at a key issue: whether her father oversaw a criminal conspiracy on 6 January that also involved obstructing a congressional proceeding – a crime.The letter said that the panel first wanted to question Ivanka Trump about what she recalled of a heated Oval Office meeting on the morning of the 6 January insurrection when the former president was trying to co-opt Mike Pence into rejecting Biden’s win.The former president was on the phone with the then vice-president in an Oval Office meeting with Ivanka and Keith Kellogg, a top Pence aide, the letter said. When Pence demurred on the former president’s repeated request, Ivanka turned to Kellogg and said Pence was “a good man”.Thompson said in the letter that the panel wanted to learn more about that exchange with Pence she heard, as well as other conversations about impeding the electoral count at the joint session of Congress on 6 January that she may have witnessed or participated in.“The committee has information suggesting that President Trump’s White House counsel may have concluded that the actions President Trump directed Vice-President Pence to take would … otherwise be illegal. Did you discuss these issues?” the letter said.Thompson added House investigators had additional questions about whether Trump could shed light on whether the former president had been told that such an action might be unlawful, and yet nonetheless persisted in pressuring Pence to reinstall him for a second term.The letter said the select committee was also interested in learning more from Trump about her father’s response to the Capitol attack on 6 January, and discussions inside the White House about the former president’s tweet castigating Pence for not adopting his plan.Thompson said the nagging question for Ivanka Trump – who White House aides thought had the best chance of having the former president condemn the rioters – was what she did about the situation and why her father did not call off the rioters in a White House address.The select committee said in the letter that they also wanted to ask her about what she knew with regard to the long delay in deploying the national guard to the Capitol, which allowed the insurrection to overwhelm law enforcement into the afternoon of 6 January.Thompson said that House investigators were curious why there appeared to have been no evidence that Trump issued any order to request the national guard, or called the justice department to request the deployment of personnel to the Capitol.Speaking to the Guardian and a small group of reporters on Thursday, the chairman of the select committee said that the immediate focus for the investigation was on the former president’s daughter and not subpoenas to Republican members of Congress.Thompson said the panel would be “inviting some people to come and talk to us. Not lawmakers right now. Ivanka Trump.”The letter comes after the US supreme court, in another blow to the former president, late on Wednesday rejected his request to block the release of more than 700 of the most sensitive of White House documents he had tried to hide from the select committee.The former president’s defeat means those documents – including presidential diaries, notes and memos from the files of top aides including the former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows – that could shed light on the Capitol attack can now be transferred to Congress.TopicsUS Capitol attackIvanka TrumpUS politicsDonald TrumpHouse of RepresentativesnewsReuse this content More

Three lessons for the voting rights struggle from the latest Senate setbackSteve PhillipsThis latest defeat is not a fatal blow. The struggle for democracy is ongoing – and our fate has not been decided yet At the conclusion of the 1984 Democratic national convention, Jesse Jackson gathered his supporters and offered important perspective to those of us who had labored long and hard on his presidential campaign, telling us, “We’ve never gotten freedom at a convention. The convention is a comma, where you pause and go on. We’re going to keep fighting for freedom – at the polls, in the courts, in the streets.” And then he concluded by invoking the phrase made famous by Malcolm X – “Freedom, by any means necessary.”Seven ways Republicans are already undermining the 2024 election | David DaleyRead moreThis week’s fight in the US Senate over the voting rights bill is a comma in a much, much longer story. It is a story that started in 1619 when Africans were brought in chains to America’s shores to do the work that created the wealth that made many white people rich. It is a story encapsulated in the country’s 1790 Naturalization Act, one of the nation’s very first pieces of legislation, which stated that citizenship is reserved to “free white person[s]” (a law that defined US immigration policy until 1965). It is a story that saw hundreds of thousands of Americans who wanted to be able to continue to buy and sell Black bodies go to war and kill hundreds of thousands of other Americans who sought to end slavery.At its core, it is the story of the centuries-long struggle over whether the United States of America should be a multiracial democracy, or whether it should be a white nationalist country.Reflecting on the defeat in the Senate, three dominant realities can help us make sense of what just happened and determine where we go from here.First, the cold, hard truth is that the majority of white politicians have always been reluctant to make America a multiracial democracy (between the House and Senate votes, 60% of the white members of Congress voted against the John Lewis Voting Rights Act).Passage of the 15th amendment itself, guaranteeing the right to vote, was a ferocious battle that raged over months and multiple votes in 1869. Nearly 100 years later, in 1965, it was only after Jimmie Lee Jackson, Viola Liuzzo and James Reeb lost their lives in the struggle for voting rights that Congress was finally moved to pass the current Voting Rights Act. None of this unwillingness to protect the right to vote is new, and we should be disappointed – but not surprised – at the conduct of the country’s elected officials during this week in which we supposedly honored Martin Luther King Jr.The second reality is that many top Democratic strategists and leaders are behind the times and bad at math. The fact that Democrats put their political capital behind an infrastructure bill before taking on the task of protecting democracy was a race-based political calculation. The infrastructure bill was an attempt by Democrats to woo the support of white swing voters by emphasizing bipartisanship and brick and mortar, race-neutral, projects. The scary policies associated with people of color – things like reimagining public safety, providing a pathway to citizenship for immigrants and combating aggressive voter suppression – were downplayed.The mathematical calculation in determining that sequence of priorities was off from the start. Beyond the morality of the matter, from a crass realpolitik point of view, voting rights protections and ending whites-first immigration practices bring more people of color into the electorate. And people of color vote Democratic.The third, and most hopeful, reality is that progressives can still win, and we need look no further than Georgia for inspiration and instruction about what is possible even in the face of opposition from the right and lack of conviction on the left. Stacey Abrams is very good at math, and she has been working for a decade to engage the 1.1 million people of color who were not voting in a state where elections were routinely decided by 230,000 votes. On the right, Republican Brian Kemp, who was secretary of state during his gubernatorial run against Abrams, improperly purged 340,000 people from the rolls in the 2018 election Abrams lost by 54,723 votes.Abrams did not treat her defeat as a fatal blow; she saw it as a comma, and she went on to continue organizing and building a statewide network of groups and activists who could turn out large numbers of voters of color. For a long time, the leaders in Georgia soldiered on without support from top Democrats who couldn’t calculate the advantage of focusing resources in a state where the strategy centered on expanding the number of people of color voting. By late summer 2020, for example, Senate Majority Pac had invested zero dollars in Georgia while spending $7m in 85% white Iowa. Biden himself expressed amazement at his victory there, saying on election night, “We’re still in the game in Georgia. That’s not one we expected.”The Georgia model elected Senators Raphael Warnock and Jon Ossoff and delivered the current Senate control to the Democrats. In 2022, it can expand that majority, dramatically decreasing the dependence on Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema. Massive investments in civic engagement organizations and voter mobilization efforts in Florida, North Carolina and Wisconsin can propel Val Demings, Cheri Beasley and Mandela Barnes to victories in their races against Republican incumbent senators.This week’s defeat of the Voting Rights Act is one chapter in a long story. While a sad chapter, it need not be the last chapter, and by applying the lessons from Georgia’s journey, we can actually write a happy ending over the next several years.
Steve Phillips is host of Democracy in Color with Steve Phillips. His forthcoming book, How We End the Civil War, is due out this year. He is a Guardian US columnist
TopicsUS politicsOpinionUS voting rightsDemocratscommentReuse this content More

The not-surprising, very bad defeat of Biden’s attempt to protect votingThe reason it failed is simple: 50 Republicans didn’t support the proposals and two Democrats opposed changing the filibuster Hello, and happy Thursday,It’s difficult to figure out what to say about the kind-of-surprising-yet- not-really-surprising-at-all collapse of Democrats’ effort to pass sweeping voting rights legislation.Get the latest updates on voting rights in the Guardian’s Fight to vote newsletterYes, the defeat is a major blow to Joe Biden, who spent significant political capital over the last few weeks, pushing the bill. Yes, the defeat makes Democrats, who pledged to protect voting rights when they took control of the US Senate last year, look incapable of governing. Yes, it’s disturbing to see just one Republican – Lisa Murkowski of Alaska – voice any kind of support for sweeping protections to support the right to vote. Yes, it’s astonishing to see two moderate Democrats block the bill because of their unflinching support for an arcane Senate rule.Yes, the defeat comes at a uniquely dangerous moment for democracy.There are plenty of takes to go around about why this push didn’t succeed – and I expect there will be more in the coming days. Biden should have pushed harder on voting rights sooner. Democrats were too ambitious in their proposal. Democrats should have focused on a narrower fix to the Electoral Count Act.Some of this thinking falls into what Brendan Nyhan, a political scientist at Dartmouth, calls the “green lantern theory” of the presidency – a belief that the president can do anything, persuade anyone, if they try hard enough. In the end, the reason the voting rights bills failed was simple – 50 Republicans didn’t support the proposals and two Democrats didn’t support changing the filibuster. After watching the fight in Washington play out over the last few weeks, I’m not sure there’s anything Chuck Schumer or Biden could have done to change that. Maybe I’m wrong.That doesn’t mean that the 50 Republicans who blocked the bill should evade scrutiny. As others have noted, 16 current GOP senators voted to reauthorize the Voting Rights Act in 2006, but oppose the current bill, which would update the most powerful part of the law. Republicans have said Congress has no constitutional role in elections, ignoring a provision in Article I that explicitly authorizes Congress to set federal election rules.But the thing that’s stuck with me the most over the last week is an idea that undergirded the entire voting rights debate, sometimes spoken out loud and sometimes unsaid – the idea that voter suppression just isn’t that bad right now.I saw it a few months ago when an unnamed White House adviser told the Atlantic Democrats would figure out how to out-organize new voter restrictions (“show us what the rules are and we will figure out a way to educate our voters and make sure they understand how they can vote and we will get them out to vote”). Biden made a similar comment on Wednesday afternoon, saying “no matter how hard they make it for minorities to vote, I think you’re going to see them willing to stand in line and defy the attempt to keep them from being able to vote.”I saw it when Republican senators consistently touted that 94% of Americans said it was easy to vote in 2020 and that turnout was higher than ever.And I saw it on Tuesday, when Joe Manchin, one of two key Democratic holdouts on the filibuster said no one was going to be blocked from voting. “The laws are there, and the rules are there, and basically the government, the government will stand behind them and give them the right to vote,” Manchin said. “We act like we are going to obstruct people from voting; that is not going to happen.”Of course, there’s a mountain of evidence that cuts against all this. Election officials in Texas are rejecting an astronomically high number of absentee ballot requests after the state imposed new restrictions. After Georgia enacted new limits on the availability of drop boxes, the number of voters who used them dropped significantly.Republican lawmakers across the country are also redrawing electoral districts in a way that weakens the influence of Black, Hispanic, and Asian voters, especially in rapidly diversifying places. It’s an invisible form of voter suppression, but perhaps the most powerful, because the votes of those affected will matter less.I had this in mind when Senator Kyrsten Sinema, another Democratic holdout, argued on the Senate floor that passing voting rights legislation would not get at the underlying ills of political division in the US. It was a good line in her speech that just didn’t match up with reality. A provision in the Democratic voting rights bill prohibits severe partisan gerrymandering – something that would go a long way towards fostering more bipartisan compromise.At almost the same time the voting rights bill was taking place on Wednesday, the election board in Lincoln county, a rural and heavily GOP Georgia county near Augusta, was meeting to vote on a plan to close six of seven polling locations. Residents there have been organizing for weeks to block the move, saying that many in the county lack transportation and would have to drive far to get to the single polling location. The county says closing the polling places will save money and make it easier to administer elections. The plan stalled Wednesday evening, but it’s the type of thing that the federal government would have more oversight over if Democrats were able to pass their bill.“If it happens here and they’re successful, maybe we’re the pilot,” said the Rev Denise Freeman, a longtime resident who has been fighting the closures. “Maybe we’re the showcase for the rest of the world to disenfranchise voters so select people can stay in power.”Also worth watching …
I interviewed Martin Luther King III and his daughter Yolanda about what comes next in the fight for voting rights.
Governor Ron DeSantis is proposing a massive new state agency to investigate election crimes, even though there’s little evidence of fraud in Florida.
Preparations for the upcoming Texas primary are a bit of a mess as officials struggle to implement the state’s new voting restrictions. Officials have reported rejecting high percentages of mail-in ballot applications.
The Ohio supreme court struck down GOP-drawn maps for both the state legislature and Congress, saying they were so partisan they violated the state constitution.
Republicans in Virginia and Arizona have introduced a slew of new voter restrictions.
TopicsUS voting rightsThe fight to voteUS politicsfeaturesReuse this content More