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      Rapper Lil Wayne in line for last-day pardon from Donald Trump

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      The rapper Lil Wayne was among those reportedly expected to receive a pardon or clemency from Donald Trump on his last full day in office on Tuesday.Sources familiar with the matter who spoke to Reuters suggested that neither the president himself, nor Trump’s personal lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, or former aide Steve Bannon would be on the list, which may number up to 100. Neither would members of Trump’s family get pre-emptive pardons, reports suggested.While the legality of a presidential self-pardon remains untested, aides have cautioned Trump that pardoning himself and members of his family may imply guilt that becomes a liability in future state or civil lawsuits.It has also been suggested that a self-pardon could antagonise some Republican senators who will be voting during the second impeachment trial, expected later this month.Lil Wayne pleaded guilty last month to possessing a loaded, gold-plated handgun when his chartered jet landed in Miami in December 2019. He faces up to 10 years in prison at a 28 January hearing in Miami.The rapper appeared to support Trump during last year’s presidential campaign when he tweeted a photo of himself with the president and said he backed Trump’s criminal justice reform programme and economic plan for African Americans.On Tuesday morning, the New York Times reported that the list of new pardons or acts of clememcy “includes the names of people who have been serving life sentences for drug or fraud charges and who for years have been seeking clemency”.The paper said the White House was keen to blunt criticism for Trump’s handing of pardons to allies and cronies, reporting: “Tuesday’s group includes non-violent offenders whose names have been percolating for years among advocates who believe their punishments never fit their crimes and whose cases underscore the broken nature of the country’s criminal justice system.”The Times also reported that the list of pardons and commutations was expected to include the former New York assembly speaker Sheldon Silver, 76, who was convicted of corruption charges in 2015. After a lengthy legal process, Silver was sentenced in July 2020 to six-and-a-half years in prison and a $1m fine. He is held in the federal prison at Otisville, New York.Also said to be under consideration for a pardon was Sholam Weiss. Weiss was sentenced to 835 years in prison in 2000 for crimes including racketeering, wire fraud and money laundering. It is frequently described as the longest sentence imposed in the US for a “white collar” crime.Bannon, 66, who has pleaded not guilty to charges that he defrauded donors to “We Build the Wall”, an online fundraising campaign that raised $25m, was not expected to be on the list. Neither was Giuliani.It has been reported Giuliani has fallen out with the president over unpaid legal fees, and the former New York mayor has recused himself from defending Trump in his Senate impeachment trial, since Giuliani was also involved in the rally on 6 January that preceded a pro-Trump mob ransacking the US Capitol.He notoriously told the crowd “Let’s have trial by combat,” a remark he has since claimed was a reference to Game of Thrones.Julian Assange, the WikiLeaks founder, another name frequently mentioned in connection to a possible Trump pardon, was also not expected to be on the list.The list of pardons was prepared over the weekend in a series of meetings involving the White House counsel, Pat A Cipollone, Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner.It is traditional for US presidents to issue pardons and clemency at the end of their term in office. Barack Obama commuted the sentence of Chelsea Manning, George W Bush commuted the sentence of former staffer Lewis “Scooter” Libby, who had been found guilty of perjury, and Bill Clinton controversially pardoned the financier Marc Rich in a move widely criticised as being corrupt, after Rich’s ex-wife had made substantial donations to Clinton-related causes. More

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      How will Trump pass 'nuclear football' to Biden if he's not at swearing-in?

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      It is a responsibility that has passed to every president since John F Kennedy – the custody of the so called “nuclear football” – the hardened brief case that is handed over on the day of the inauguration of new presidents by their predecessor.The question being asked, given Trump’s almost unprecedented decision not to meet Joe Biden or attend his swearing in, is what will happen to the nuclear football?The reality is that while the briefcase, carried by a military aide, and containing nuclear attack plans, access to command and control systems and the mechanism for authorising the nuclear codes has become a shorthand for the president’s singular responsibility to order a nuclear attack, the mechanisms are a little more complex.The “football” itself – also known as the “emergency satchel” or simply “the button” is a metal Zero Halliburton briefcase covered in leather to look rather like an old fashioned doctor’s bag, weighing around 20kg.The bag is said to contain a copy – in some form – of the Black Book, the options for nuclear retaliation, the “biscuit”, an active electronic card identifying the president as the person able to authorise the “watch signal” triggering the use of nuclear weapons and the ability to communicate with command and control hubs.Finally, perhaps most important, the briefcase contains an emergency broadcast system to allow the president to communicate any orders.The football itself, however, is very much a backup, designed for use when the president is away from the fixed and protected command and control centres such as the White House situation room, where he would expect to be briefed by key officials in most circumstances ahead of authorising a nuclear retaliation as the US, while not having an all-encompassing no first strike nuclear policy, does have a “negative security assurance” on nuclear weapons use with 180 countries, although excluding the likes of Russia, China and North Korea.In 2013 Dick Cheney, Gerald Ford’s former chief of staff, described what usually happens on inauguration day when the responsibility for that attack moves to a new president.“The passing of the football occurs at high noon. No one says a word but I knew what to look for.“So you got the ceremony going down front, [but] behind one of the big pillars there, these two guys are standing in their uniforms. And at the right moment, [the outgoing military aide] reaches over and hands it to the newly designated military aide and he takes it from that moment on.”While the physical transfer has become part of the ritual of the transfer of power, albeit an unseen one among the pomp and circumstance, described by one of Bill Clinton’s aides as a “sacred duty”, the real transfer of responsibilities is actually somewhat more prosaic.During the briefing about the nuclear codes and the briefcase on the morning of the inauguration, the key thing that happens is that “the biscuit” or rather “a biscuit” is reprogrammed and given to the new president or his designated military aide activating at noon on the day of the swearing, meaning that the new president can identify himself.According to reports, the Pentagon has long had a plan for the transfer of responsibility in the event of Trump skipping the transfer of power.Given the importance of the football, with its antenna protruding from it, it seems unlikely that there would be no redundancy in so important a system, a fact underlined by reports that there are actually three physical briefcases, not a solitary presidential satchel, one that can be assigned to the vice president and one to the “designated survivor” – usually a member of the cabinet designated by the president to ensure continuity if both the president and vice president are incapacitated.“We war-game this stuff, and we practise it ad nauseam for years and years,” Buzz Patterson, who carried the football for Clinton, told Business Insider, adding that the transfer needed to be instantaneous.“There are systems in place to make sure that happens instantaneously. There won’t be any kind of question about who has it, who is in charge at that point in time.“We don’t take this stuff lightly. There won’t be any kind of hiccup. It’ll just go down without anybody even noticing, which is what is supposed to happen.”At midday, as Joe Biden is sworn in, Trump’s “nuclear biscuit” will become inactive. The most frightening of his powers will be gone. More

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      Biden to target Covid and the economy amid stack of orders in first 100 days

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      When Joe Biden is sworn in as president on Wednesday, he plans to trigger a range of executive orders aimed at solving two of the biggest crises facing the country: the economic downturn and the coronavirus pandemic.The president-elect’s team has been floating its ideal scenario for how Biden’s first hundred days in office will go. That includes almost a dozen executive orders and pushing for a massive $1.9tn coronavirus and economic stimulus plan. The Biden team is also planning another proposal aimed at reinforcing the economy.The executive orders concern fighting climate change, battling Covid, pausing payments on student loans, rejoining the Paris climate agreement and ending the travel ban from Muslim-majority countries. He also plans to quickly take steps to change the country’s criminal justice system and expanding healthcare to low-income Americans.“President-elect Biden is assuming the presidency in a moment of profound crisis for our nation. We face four overlapping and compounding crises: the Covid-19 crisis, the resulting economic crisis, the climate crisis and a racial equity crisis,” Biden’s incoming chief of staff, Ron Klain, circulated in a memo the campaign released to the public over the weekend.Klain added: “All of these crises demand urgent action. In his first 10 days in office, President-elect Biden will take decisive action to address these four crises, prevent other urgent and irreversible harms, and restore America’s place in the world.”On immigration, Biden is aiming to end some of the hardline immigration policies of the Trump administration. He plans to unveil proposals that will offer a path to citizenship for undocumented immigrants, and foreign aid to countries in Central America.At the same time, however, a Biden official cautioned to NBC that did not mean the next administration would grant entry to all asylum seekers coming to the country.In laying out his agenda, Biden has worked to frame it as more of a moment for the nation to rally and forget partisan divides.“It’s not hard to see that we’re in the middle of a once-in-several-generations economic crisis with a once-in-several-generations public health crisis,” Biden said during a press conference over the weekend.The stimulus proposal and the executive actions underscore Biden’s hypothesis that his decades-long career in the Senate and deep ties in Washington can help heal the partisan rancor and political divides that kept Congress in gridlock through multiple presidencies.“Unity is not some pie-in-the-sky dream, it’s a practical step to getting the things we have to get done as a country get done together,” Biden said at the press conference.The incoming president has shown more interest in trying to work with Republicans and Democrats rather than vowing than this presidency would fulfill progressives’ legislative wishlists.Unity is not some pie-in-the-sky dream, it’s a practical step to get things doneDemocratic control of the House of Representatives, and the slimmest of majorities in the Senate (a 50-50 split where Kamala Harris, as vice-president, will play the tie-breaker) also means that much of Biden’s first – and possibly only – term as president depends on whether enough senators support a bill to overcome a filibuster.This is unlike the beginning of the Trump administration, where the new president opted to fulfill the No 1 item on Republicans’ wishlist: gutting Obamacare. That decision resulted only in a partial victory. It also erased any tiny vestige of openness Democrats may have secretly kept that maybe some kind of bipartisanship was possible under Trump.Biden, though, is starting out advertising priorities that, at least in the abstract, aren’t obviously objectionable to Republicans or Democrats: curbing the virus, helping small businesses and improving the economy.Biden has also set a goal of 100m vaccine shots in the first 100 days of his presidency.“We’ll have to move heaven and earth to get more people vaccinated,” Biden said.One Biden transition adviser who is joining his administration said of the $1.9tn plan: “We believe that across this plan are proposals that are pragmatic, that have support not only in Washington but in capitals and cities and communities across the country and are urgently necessary. And so the president-elect will make the case that we need to come together and move on this as well.”Asked which part of Biden’s first 100 days in office would be the toughest, the House majority whip, Jim Clyburn, the most influential African American Democrat in Congress, said stimulus payments.“Because all that’s wrapped into one. Everybody’s out for that, so I don’t see them being able to turn around for that,” Clyburn told the Guardian. “I think the toughest thing is going to be his infrastructure package.”Clyburn said “you’ve got to have some ‘pay-fors’. I don’t think he ought to put all of that on the credit card. The Republicans are always going to try to keep Wall Street from paying for anything, but I think the time has come, and I’m going to be very vocal, and other people are going to be very vocal about it.“We can’t keep doing these infrastructure programs and having them paid for by rural farmers, rural communities. We’ve just got to stop doing that.”Despite Biden’s vocal optimism that the Trump fever will leave with his administration, there are already signs of top Republicans getting ready to stonewall Biden’s agenda and paint it as a thinly veiled push by progressives and the left.“I think we are going to have, in the first 100 days by the Biden administration, the most aggressive socialized policy effort in the history of the country,” Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina said during a recent appearance on Fox News.Still, that opposition may be weaker than the obstruction put up during Barack Obama’s administration.Biden and Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the top Senate Republican, have a longstanding relationship, and Republican and Democratic veterans of Washington say they are in closer contact than is publicly known. Publicly they have both been relatively quiet, refraining from lobbing potshots.That detente could turn into a quiet working relationship where bipartisan policy proposals become law, just as Biden has hoped. More

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      US Capitol on security lockdown ahead of Biden inauguration – video

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      The tightest security measures in recent memory are in place in Washington, two days ahead of the inauguration of Joe Biden as the 46th president of the US.
      25,000 National Guard soldiers from across the east coast are stationed in the city. The streets around the Capitol remain eerily empty as all but the most determined protesters have stayed away after the pro-Trump riot at the Capitol on 6 January. 
      The FBI has vetted all troops who are guarding the event because of fears of an insider attack at the inauguration.  More

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      FBI vets thousands of troops amid fears of insider attack on Biden inauguration

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      Thousands of military personnel guarding Joe Biden’s inauguration as US president on Wednesday are being vetted by the FBI amid fears of an insider attack.The biggest ever security operation for a presidential transition has turned swaths of Washington into a fortress, barricades, razor wire and 7ft fences erected to prevent a repeat of the deadly 6 January attack on the US Capitol by a mob incited by Donald Trump.National guard personnel train part-time while holding civilian jobs or attending college. Some 25,000 members – more than double the number at previous inaugurations – are pouring into Washington from across the country, at short notice.There are concerns that some of the very people assigned to protect the city could present a threat to the incoming president and other dignitaries, the Associated Press reported. Their names will be fed through an FBI database for any evidence of connections to investigations or terrorism or other red flags.Ryan McCarthy, the army secretary, told the AP guard members were receiving training on how to identify potential insider threats, although no hard evidence had come to light.“We’re continually going through the process, and taking second, third looks at every one of the individuals assigned to this operation,” he said, adding: “We need to be conscious of it and we need to put all of the mechanisms in place to thoroughly vet these men and women who would support any operations like this.”At least two active-duty service members or national guard members have been arrested in connection with the Capitol assault. Video footage from inside the building suggests some rioters had military training and that there was a significant level of planning and coordination.The Pentagon received 143 notifications of extremism-related investigation last year from the FBI, 68 of which were related to current and former service members, the Washington Post reported.The national guard played down fears of extremism in its ranks. Maj Gen William Walker, commanding general of the DC national guard, told MSNBC: “I don’t have any concerns because it’s a layered scrub. The FBI is scrubbing, the Secret Service gives out the credentials and then we have other agencies helping with the scrub as well. We really are pretty sure we know who is out here supporting us.”But Washington remains on edge amid fears of attacks by far-right militants, white supremacists and other radical groups encouraged by Trump’s claims that the election was rigged – claims repeatedly tossed out of court and rejected by the US Department of Justice and Republican election officials in battleground states.Five people including a Capitol police officer died in the mayhem on 6 January, which included chants for the death of Vice-President Mike Pence as he presided over the certification of Biden’s victory.Pence will attend the inauguration, with former presidents Bill Clinton, George W Bush and Barack Obama and their wives. Lady Gaga and Jennifer Lopez will be among the performers. Attendance will be scaled down because of the coronavirus pandemic.The Secret Service is in charge of security but a wide variety of military and law enforcement personnel are also involved, from the national guard and FBI to three police departments.The Capitol was temporarily closed on Monday after a fire broke out at a homeless encampment, Capitol police said. All participants in a rehearsal for the inauguration were evacuated into the building, Reuters reported, before the Secret Service said there was no threat to the public.State capitols across the US stayed on alert. Weekend protests were calm and thinly attended but some pro-Trump demonstrators carried weapons. On Monday Andrew Cuomo, the Democratic governor of New York, said he would skip the inauguration to guard against the possibility of violence in his state capital, Albany.On Monday – a public holiday celebrating the birthday of Martin Luther King – Trump remained behind closed doors at a mostly deserted White House. Biden, wearing black cap, dark glasses, black mask and blue and yellow gloves, stood at a conveyor belt packing beans and rice for a food bank in Philadelphia.Trump was reportedly planning to issue more than 100 pardons as his last major act in office. The president met his son-in-law Jared Kushner, daughter Ivanka Trump and senior advisers on Sunday to thrash out a lengthy list of requests, the Post reported.Trump will be the first outgoing president to skip his successor’s swearing-in since Andrew Johnson did not attend the inauguration of Ulysses S Grant in 1869. Johnson, like Clinton, was impeached. Trump is the only president to be impeached twice.Trump has requested a departure ceremony at Joint Base Andrews with a military band and red carpet, ABC News reported.He will then head to his luxury estate, Mar-a-Lago, in West Palm Beach, Florida, to begin an uncertain future. Impeached by the House of Representatives for inciting violence against the US government, he is awaiting a trial in the Senate and a potential ban from running for office.By the time Biden takes the stage on Wednesday, the death toll from coronavirus in the US will in all likelihood have passed 400,000. The pandemic is among “four crises” identified by the new president – along with the economy, climate change and racial injustice.Biden is set to hit the ground running by reversing many of Trump’s most contentious policies with a flurry of executive orders, returning the US to the Paris climate agreement and Iran nuclear deal, accelerating the delivery of Covid-19 vaccines and canceling an immigration ban on some Muslim-majority countries.Kamala Harris, the vice-president-elect, resigned her Senate seat on Monday. She will be replaced by the California secretary of state, Alex Padilla. More

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      Trump to issue more than 100 pardons before Biden sworn in – reports

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      Donald Trump is expected to issue more than 100 presidential pardons on Tuesday, during his final hours in the White House, but may not pardon himself or his immediate family, it was reported on Monday.White House officials say Trump has privately debated with aides whether he should take the extraordinary step of pardoning himself. Some administration insiders have reportedly warned against it, arguing that it would make Trump look guilty.On Sunday, Trump met his son-in-law Jared Kushner, daughter Ivanka Trump and senior advisers to thrash out a lengthy list of pardon requests, the Washington Post reported. The meeting took up much of the day. The president was personally engaged with the details of every case, it said.Some scholars believe a self-pardon would go against the US constitution, since it violates the basic principle that nobody should be able to judge their own case. But the issue has never been tested.The White House discussions took place against the backdrop of a looming Senate impeachment trial, after the storming on 6 January by a pro-Trump mob of the US Capitol building. If convicted, Trump could be disqualified from running again for the presidency in 2024.Out of office, Trump will also be vulnerable to prosecution from federal and state authorities over his actions in office and regarding his business empire.It is not clear whether Trump will act to pardon members of his inner circle including Steve Bannon, who has been charged with defrauding individuals who donated to a wall project on the US-Mexico border. Another possible name is Rudy Giuliani, Trump’s longtime personal lawyer, who led attempts to overturn the result of November’s election. Trump and Giuliani are said to have fallen out over unpaid legal bills.CNN reported on Monday that the final batch of clemency actions was expected to feature criminal justice reform-minded pardons as well as more controversial ones for allies and friends. Lobbyists have been pushing for months to include their clients on Trump’s valedictory list.“Everything is a transaction. He likes pardons because it is unilateral. And he likes doing favours for people he thinks will owe him,” one source familiar with the matter told CNN, adding that Trump wanted to help people who could in turn help him in his post-White House career.Dr Salomon Melgen, a prominent eye doctor from Palm Beach who is in prison after being convicted on dozens of counts of healthcare fraud, is expected to be on the clemency list, CNN said.Presidential pardons do not imply innocence – a fact President Gerald Ford clung to in the face of lasting opprobrium for his pardon of Richard Nixon, his predecessor who resigned in disgrace in 1974, over the Watergate scandal.Last-ditch pardons and acts of clemency are common as presidencies come to a close. Infamously, in 2001, Bill Clinton pardoned the fugitive financier Marc Rich on his last day in the White House.In an analysis of Trump’s pardons, the blog Lawfare concluded: “The clemency system is dominated by insider access to the president and almost exclusively serves the president’s personal and political goals and whims.”On Sunday the New York Times reported on intensive lobbying for pardons as the Trump era draws to a close. Among startling details, an unnamed associate of Giuliani reportedly told an ex-CIA officer a pardon was “going to cost $2m”.Participants in the Capitol riot have appealed directly – via television or their lawyers – for pardons from Trump. On Sunday Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, a key Trump ally, appealed to the president directly, telling him not to pardon anyone associated with the attack.“There are a lot of people urging the president to pardon the folks who participated in defiling the Capitol, the rioters,” he told Fox Business.“I don’t care if you went there and spread flowers on the floor. You breached the security of the Capitol. You interrupted a joint session of Congress. You tried to intimidate us all. You should be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law, and to seek a pardon of these people would be wrong. I think it would destroy President Trump, and I hope we don’t go down that road.”Trump has already given pardons to 94 people, most to prominent figures caught up in the investigation by special prosecutor Robert Mueller into conspiracy with Russia. They include Trump’s former campaign chairman Paul Manafort, longtime crony Roger Stone and ex-national security adviser Michael Flynn, who admitted lying to the FBI.US news organisations said the clemencies were expected to be issued on Trump’s last full day in office on Tuesday. Skipping the inauguration of the president-elect, Joe Biden, Trump leaves on Wednesday morning to begin his post-presidency at his Mar-a-Lago club in Palm Beach, Florida. His presidency ends at noon on Wednesday. More

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      Trump to hold early morning sendoff ceremony on Biden inauguration day

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      Donald Trump is planning an early morning sendoff event for himself at a military airfield in Maryland on Wednesday several hours before his successor, Joe Biden, is inaugurated as the 46th US president at the Capitol in Washington DC.For his last presidential ceremony, Trump reportedly wants an ostentatious military parade and an official armed forces farewell as the commander-in-chief, as well as a large crowd of supporters, selected backers and current and former officials in his administration and their guests at a huge red-carpet affair.But latest reports indicate that Trump, who is facing an impeachment trial in the Senate and a number of criminal and civil investigations, will not be afforded a big military sendoff just two weeks after a deadly insurrection at the US Capitol that followed his exhorting supporters to fight to overturn the election.Invitations have been issued from the White House for an event taking place at Joint Base Andrews, the military base in Maryland used by Air Force One, at 8am on Wednesday – four hours before Biden will take his oath.Many details of the ceremony are not yet clear, although attendees will have to make a pre-dawn start and have been told to arrive by 7.15am, when temperatures are forecast to be below freezing.Attendees may not bring items including firearms, ammunition, explosives, laser pointers or toy guns.President Trump is leaving office on Wednesday. Plans are underway for a departure ceremony at Joint Base Andrews. This is the invite sent to supporters. It includes a list of prohibited items such as ammunition, explosives, firearms, laser pointers and toy guns. pic.twitter.com/AZNoPUxCWB— Brie Jackson (@PositivelyBrie) January 18, 2021
      In his last few hours as president, Trump will fly to his private Mar-a-Lago resort and residence in Palm Beach, Florida, aboard the Air Force One jumbo jet for the last time in a presidential capacity, ensuring he and his wife Melania are almost 1,000 miles away from the White House and Capitol when Biden takes over.Air Force One will then be at the disposal of Biden. Trump would have had to have permission from the Democrat who defeated him to use it if he had waited to leave Washington until Biden was sworn in.According to some reports, a 21-gun salute has been under consideration for the event at Andrews, and officials are considering an elaborate ceremony that would have the feel of a state visit.Senior Pentagon officials reportedly told the security and intelligence news website Defense One that no military farewell was being planned for the commander-in-chief, unlike ceremonies for Ronald Reagan, George HW and George W Bush, Bill Clinton and Barack Obama.With the sun barely up at the start of an expected-to-be-chilly Wednesday, a minimal group of staff still left in a rapidly emptying White House will see off Trump as he takes one last walk across the lawn to enter Marine One, the presidential helicopter, for the short flight to Andrews just a few miles away.Strict security arrangements in place for the inauguration, following the 6 January violence , have also limited the number of people who can attend the White House departure.Four years ago, Barack and Michelle Obama hosted Donald and Melania Trump for tea at the White House before traveling to the ceremony to watch Trump inaugurated as the 45th US president.But Trump has made it clear he would become the only president in a century and a half not to attend his successor’s inauguration and only the fourth in history not to do so, with the plans for his premature departure unprecedented.Vice-President Mike Pence is attending Biden’s inauguration, but it is not yet known if he will attend Trump’s farewell at either the White House or Joint Base Andrews beforehand.Pence traveled to thank troops in California and New York over the weekend as part of a farewell from the Trump-Pence administration, engagements that would have been expected to be carried out by the president.Trump has not been seen in public since he traveled to the US-Mexico border last Tuesday. In recent weeks he has not visited the US military. And has not visited or spoken of healthcare workers overwhelmed at hospitals and vaccination sites as the US coronavirus death toll approaches 400,000.The Bidens may be able to see and hear Trump departing aboard Marine One as they are staying close to the White House the night before the inauguration.There is no word on whether Trump will call Biden or leave the traditional letter to his successor upon the Resolute desk in the Oval Office.Reports on Monday afternoon said that the Bidens would be greeted by the White House chief usher on Wednesday, whereas traditionally it would be the departing president and first lady.Joe and Jill Biden won’t be greeted by Donald and Melania Trump Wednesday, breaking White House tradition.Instead, they’ll be greeted by the White House chief usher, @KateBennett_DC reports.— Alexis Benveniste (@apbenven) January 18, 2021
      They also said Melania Trump would become the first modern first lady not to invite her successor for a tour of the private living quarters.Melania Trump will become the first modern first lady not to invite the woman who will replace her to the White House for a walk-through of the private living quarters on the second and third floors. https://t.co/a1e9RVzq6l— Kyle Griffin (@kylegriffin1) January 18, 2021
      Workers have already hung bunting that reads “2021 Biden-Harris Inauguration” from temporary stands across from the White House’s north portico, visible from the third-storey residence, CNN reported.The cable network also reported that on the day the White House Military Office will ensure there are several “nuclear footballs” available, the heavy briefcase that is always carried near the president with codes to launch weapons in case of nuclear attack.One such football will reportedly travel with Trump to Florida and his codes will be deactivated by the time Biden is sworn in at noon on Wednesday, when an aide carrying another nuclear football and working codes will then begin to shadow the new president.The invitation for Trump’s sendoff specifies that masks must be worn .Late last year, Trump was criticised for hosting a series of indoor and outdoor events at the White House where social distancing and mask-wearing guidelines were not enforced, leading to several high-profile Covid cases, with the gatherings described as “super-spreader” events. More

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      Biden inauguration: 25,000 National Guard vetted over insider attack fears as state protests fizzle

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      The FBI is vetting all 25,000 National Guard troops arriving in Washington DC for president-elect Joe Biden’s inauguration amid fears of an insider attack, as heavily fortified state capitals across the US saw only small-scale protests by far-right groups on Sunday.
      Commanders have been warned to be on the lookout for problems within their ranks, and Guard members are being trained to identify potential insider threats, army secretary Ryan McCarthy told the Associated Press.
      “We’re continually going through the process, and taking second, third looks at every one of the individuals assigned to this operation,” McCarthy said in an interview on Sunday after he and other military leaders went through a three-hour security drill. So far, however, he and other leaders said they had not seen evidence of any such threats, and officials said the vetting hadn’t flagged any issues.
      The warning came after muted protests across the country saw only a handful of armed men showing up to planned rightwing demonstrations.
      Following the pro-Trump insurrection at the US Capitol on 6 January, governors in many states had mobilized the national guard, erected fences around government buildings, and in some cases even cancelled official business, amid warnings from law enforcement agencies of armed protests in all 50 states ahead of Biden’s inauguration.
      On Sunday, the only far-right groups that were visible at the protests were the ones who had first promoted the event: members of the “Boogaloo Bois”, an extremist pro-gun and anti-government movement fixated on a coming civil war. Their desire to make the protest happen across all 50 states was not realized, and even in the states where protests took place, they were unable to muster significant numbers.
      In Salem, Oregon, where the state capitol was breached in December, and where dozens of far-right protesters clashed with Oregon state police on 1 January, the entire protest consisted of eight heavily armed Boogaloo Bois, compared with more than 20 reporters.
      In Lansing, Michigan, where the state’s capitol was also breached by armed men in April, and where men with alleged Boogaloo ties were charged in a plot to kidnap the Democratic governor, Gretchen Whitmer, this fall, about a dozen Boogaloo Bois showed up to protest, according to local news reports. One journalist estimated the Boogaloo Bois stayed for about 30 minutes.

      Dave Boucher
      (@Dave_Boucher1)
      About a dozen people who appear to be boogaloo boys accompanied by a fair number of media members walk to the front of the Capitol pic.twitter.com/rUjWvP6F3C

      January 17, 2021

      In Ohio, there were about two dozen protesters at the capitol in all, some armed with assault-style rifles and wearing military gear. Several identified themselves as part of the Boogaloo movement. In Colorado, there were a handful of Boogaloo Bois at the state capitol, and in New Hampshire, there were five, the New York Times reported. In Arizona, there were about 10 protesters at the state capitol, the Arizona Republic reported, with two men captured in photographs wearing the Hawaiian shirts paired with a military-style rifle that the Boogaloo Bois chose as their uniform.
      The National Guard vetting process began as the first troops began deploying to DC more than a week ago, according to multiple officials.
      “The question is, is that all of them? Are there others?” said McCarthy. “We need to be conscious of it and we need to put all of the mechanisms in place to thoroughly vet these men and women who would support any operations like this.”
      “This is a national priority. We have to be successful as an institution,” said McCarthy. “We want to send the message to everyone in the United States and for the rest of the world that we can do this safely and peacefully.”
      Since June, prosecutors have charged multiple Boogaloo Bois in a series of violent incidents, including the alleged murders of a federal security officer and a sheriff’s deputy in California, an alleged plot to set off molotov cocktails at a Black Lives Matter protest in Las Vegas, and the alleged plot to kidnap a Democratic governor of Michigan.

      Anna Liz Nichols
      (@annaliznichols)
      View from Lansing, MI https://t.co/syDrL5Kv4n

      January 17, 2021

      Asked in a text message about the limited success of the protests on Sunday, Southern Poverty Law Center spokesman Michael Edison Hayden said: “Boogaloo adherents voiced quixotic plans for Sunday. They ran up against obstacles in achieving them in the aftermath of the violence on 6 January and lost access to websites they typically use to bring crowds together.”
      An influential Boogaloo movement website that analysts said had first advertised the national protests on Sunday was taken offline last week.
      And amid fallout from the Capitol riot, Sunday’s protests themselves had become a point of contention in the remaining online platforms that far-right activists could access.
      In a group dedicated to refugees from Parler, the far-right-friendly social media platform whose hosting was yanked by Amazon a week ago, users clashed over the planned protests, with some arguing the events were a “false flag”, and a trap laid by antifascists or law enforcement. More