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      Democrats present united front in For the People Act vote – video

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      Democrats demonstrated unity in the US senate as the West Virginia senator Joe Manchin said he would vote in favor of advancing voting rights legislation known as the For the People act to the debate stage.
      The Republican Senate minority leader, Mitch McConnell, denied any voter suppression was happening despite around 400 bills introduced in more than 43 states which could restrict the right to vote. The legislation would remove hurdles to voting.
      In the evenly split Senate, Republican votes mean the bill will not garner the necessary 60 votes to advance.

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      Biden under pressure to act as landmark voting rights bill faces Senate defeat

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      Joe Biden was facing a huge setback on Tuesday as one of his top priorities, a set of reforms to protect voting rights and shore up American democracy, barrelled towards defeat in Congress.Progressives accused Biden of failing to use his bully pulpit to champion the sweeping legislation, which aims to safeguard elections against attacks by former president Donald Trump and his allies.“OK I have reached my WTF moment with Biden on this,” tweeted Ezra Levin, co-executive director of the grassroots movement Indivisible. “Is saving democracy a priority for this administration or not?”The Senate was due to hold a procedural vote on whether to start debate on the For the People Act, a significant near-900-page overhaul of voting and election law that the White House has described as a “cause” for Biden.But in chamber split 50-50, the bill was poised to fall at the first hurdle. Sixty votes are required to overcome a procedural rule known as the filibuster and there was no prospect of 10 Republicans crossing the floor to join Democrats in advancing the legislation.The For the People Act is seen as a crucial counterweight to hundreds of voting bills introduced by Republican-controlled states, many of which include measures that would make it harder for Black people, young people and poor people to vote. Fourteen states had enacted 22 of these laws by mid-May, according to the Brennan Center for Justice.Biden has spoken passionately about the need to defend democracy but despite his penchant for bipartisanship he has been unable to move the needle. Levin, a former congressional aide, drew a contrast with Barack Obama, who organised a debate with Republicans about his signature healthcare law, and Bill Clinton, who gave 18 speeches to promote a North American free trade agreement.Because of one man’s lie, Republicans are now doing the dastardly act of taking away voting from millions of AmericansHe added: “Democracy is under threat. Fascism is rising. Time is running out. It’s time for the president to get off the sidelines and into the game, or we’re all going to lose.”Obama has also sounded the alarm. Speaking on a call with grassroots supporters, he said: “We can’t wait until the next election because if we have the same kinds of shenanigans that brought about [the insurrection on] 6 January, if we have that for a couple more election cycles, we’re going to have real problems in terms of our democracy long-term.”Democrats’ goals include expanding early voting in elections for president and Congress, making it easier to vote by mail – a tool used by record numbers during the coronavirus pandemic – and improving the transparency of certain campaign contributions. They are also aiming to remove party bias from the once-a-decade drawing of congressional districts.Democrats also accuse Republicans of seeking to reduce polling hours and locations and drop boxes, and tightening voter ID laws, as a direct response to Trump’s lie that the 2020 election was stolen by voter fraud.In remarks on the Senate floor on Tuesday, Chuck Schumer, the Democratic majority leader, likened Trump to “a petulant child”.“Because of one man’s lie, Republicans are now doing the dastardly act of taking away voting from millions of Americans … making it much harder for them to vote, and many, many, many will not,” Schumer said.“From Georgia to Montana, from Florida to Iowa, Republican state legislatures are conducting the most coordinated voter suppression effort in 80 years.”These state houses are making it easier to own a gun than to vote, Schumer said.“Republican legislatures are making it harder to vote early, harder to vote by mail, harder to vote after work. They’re making it a crime to give food or water to voters waiting in long lines. They’re trying to make it harder for Black churchgoers to vote on Sunday.“And they’re actually making it easier for unelected judges and partisan election boards to overturn the results of an election, opening the door for some demagogue, a Trumpian-type demagogue, maybe he himself, to try and subvert our elections in the very same way that Trump tried to do in 2020.”Republicans argue the For the People Act would infringe on states’ rights and that state measures are needed to stop fraud, even though there is no evidence of widespread such problems. Mitch McConnell, the Republican minority leader, dismissed the bill as a “partisan power grab” in his own speech on the Senate floor.Although the outcome of Tuesday’s vote was a foregone conclusion, there is still suspense around two subplots with wider implications.The bill was co-sponsored by 49 Democratic and independent senators. The sole holdout was Joe Manchin, a conservative Democrat from West Virginia who has expressed opposition to the legislation and declined to say if he would support the procedural motion to debate it.If, as expected, Manchin did fall into line, it would intensify pressure for Democrats to abolish the filibuster so legislation can be debated and passed by a simple 51-vote majority – with Vice-President Kamala Harris holding the tie-breaking vote. But Manchin and some colleagues have deep reservations about doing so.Kyrsten Sinema, a Democratic senator from Arizona, wrote in the Washington Post: “The filibuster compels moderation and helps protect the country from wild swings.”She said she welcomed a full debate, “so senators and our constituents can hear and fully consider the concerns and consequences”.Biden held talks with Manchin and Sinema at the White House on Monday, aware the congressional stalemate threatens to stall his agenda. Manchin told reporters at the Capitol on Tuesday: “We had a very good conversation, very respectful … We’ve just got to keep working.”Both sides are looking for political advantage ahead of next year’s midterm elections, where Republicans hope to win back the House and Senate. More

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      Trump impeachment: police bodycam footage shows Capitol attack – video

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      Police bodycam footage showing officers under attack at the US Capitol attack has been released during the second impeachment trial for Donald Trump. Democrat congressman Eric Swalell played footage captured from the officer’s perspective showing the crowd attacking police with whatever items were at hand, including crutches and a Trump flag. Swalell also revealed vision showing the evacuation of representatives including Senate majority leader Chuck Schumer being ushered away by security
      Trump trial shown disturbing footage of lawmakers ‘hunted’ by Capitol mob More

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      Senate leaders announce Trump impeachment trial rules – video

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      On the eve of Donald Trump’s impeachment trial on a charge of inciting the deadly US Capitol attack, Chuck Schumer and Mitch McConnell, the Senate majority and minority leaders, have laid out the framework for the trial. ’All parties have agreed to a structure that will ensure a fair and honest Senate impeachment trial of the former president,’ Schumer said. Each side will have 16 hours to present their arguments and the trial will break on Friday afternoon and resume on Sunday afternoon
      Trump impeachment: Schumer says agreement reached on rules for trial – live More

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      Trump impeachment article to be sent to Senate on Monday, setting up trial

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      Democratic leaders announced on Friday that the article of impeachment against Donald Trump for incitement of insurrection would be transferred from the House to the Senate on Monday, setting up a trial of the former president.“The Senate will conduct a trial on the impeachment of Donald Trump,” the majority leader, Chuck Schumer, said. “It will be a fair trial. But make no mistake, there will be a trial.”The move was a stunning rebuke of a proposal a day earlier by the Republican Senate minority leader, Mitch McConnell, to delay transfer of the article and push the trial into February, to make “additional time for both sides to assemble their arguments”.Trump is the only president in history to be impeached twice. Conviction in the Senate, which would require a two-thirds majority vote, could prevent him from ever again holding public office.But in rejecting McConnell’s offer, Democrats did more than press the case against Trump. They also staked out a tough stance in an internal Senate power struggle, as the newly installed Joe Biden administration prepares to ask Republicans for support on initiatives including pandemic policy, economic relief and immigration reform.McConnell and Republicans lost control of the Senate with a double loss in runoff elections in Georgia earlier this month. But McConnell has been fighting for advantage, refusing to approve a basic power-sharing agreement in a body now split 50-50, unless Schumer promised to retain a Senate filibuster rule that enables the minority party to block legislation with only 41 votes.Schumer rejected that pitch by McConnell on Friday, too, demanding that Republicans approve the organizing agreement, which would for example grant the parties an equal number of members on each committee, with no strings attached.“Leader McConnell’s proposal is unacceptable – and it won’t be accepted,” Schumer said.The pair of forceful moves by the Democratic leadership signaled an intention to deliver on a mandate they feel they won last November and displayed an unaccustomed assertiveness after four years of Trump and McConnell.But the power plays also called more deeply into question whether Biden would benefit from any measure of Republican support as he attempts to answer multiple national crises.The most fierce Trump supporters in the Senate have threatened to hold hostage every ounce of Biden’s agenda, including cabinet appointments, unless Democrats called off the impeachment trial.“Democrats can’t have it both ways: an unconstitutional impeachment trial & Senate confirmation of the Biden administration’s national security team,” tweeted the Republican senator Ron Johnson, who until this week was chair of the homeland security committee. “They need to choose between being vindictive or staffing the administration to keep the nation safe. What will it be: revenge or security?”Johnson’s explicit threat to hold national security hostage to a political agenda was not echoed by most colleagues, and the Senate proceeded with key Biden confirmations on Friday. The body overwhelmingly confirmed Lloyd Austin as the first African American defense secretary in history by a bipartisan vote of 93-2, and the Senate finance committee unanimously advanced the nomination of Janet Yellen to be treasury secretary.While McConnell and others have expressed an openness to the charges facing Trump in his second impeachment trial, expectations are low that Democrats will find the 17 Republican votes they probably need to convict him.While the transmission of the article triggers the launching of trial proceedings, the schedule ahead remains uncertain, and is subject to negotiations. After the article of impeachment is transmitted, lawyers for Trump would be called on to submit a response from the president, and prosecutors from the House, known as impeachment managers, would submit pre-trial briefs.“I’ve been speaking to the Republican leader about the time and the duration of the trial,” Schumer said.Lawyers defending Trump will include Butch Bowers, a former justice department official recommended by Lindsey Graham, the South Carolina senator announced on Thursday. No lawyers from Trump’s impeachment trial last year were expected to return to his defense team.When Trump was first impeached in December 2019, the House speaker, Nancy Pelosi, delayed the transfer of the case to the Senate in an effort to prolong Trump’s political pain and to win concessions on how Trump’s trial would be conducted.But this time Pelosi moved quickly, her decision linked to an unusual number of moving parts with deep significance for the Biden administration and the future of the country.Democrats might have concluded that it would be a mistake to bargain for Republican support for Biden’s agenda, the top item of which is a $1.9tn Covid relief and economic recovery package.The Republican senator Susan Collins of Maine, a potential swing vote for Democrats, told reporters on Thursday that Biden’s plan was “premature”.The government watchdog group Fix Our Senate on Friday blasted McConnell for linking support for an organizing agreement in the Senate to the filibuster.“By threatening to filibuster a routine resolution that simply affirms that Democrats won the majority and can now lead committees,” said group spokesman Eli Zupnick, “Senator McConnell has made it crystal clear, to anyone with any remaining doubts, that his only goal is to undermine, delay and block the Biden agenda that the American people just voted for.” More

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      Police chief and two security officials resign over Capitol assault

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      The head of the US Capitol police and two other senior security officials are resigning amid mounting criticism of the bungled police response to the assault on Capitol Hill by a violent mob of Donald Trump supporters.
      Steven Sund’s resignation will be effective from 16 January, and follows calls by the House speaker, Nancy Pelosi, and other senior figures for heads to roll.
      “There was a failure of leadership at the top,” Pelosi said.
      Michael Stenger, the Senate sergeant-at-arms, has also resigned, along with Paul Irving, the official who holds the same position at the House of Representatives.
      The Senate minority leader, Chuck Schumer, had said he would fire Stenger when he became majority leader later this month if he did not stand down.
      Incited by Trump, a mob descended on the Capitol on Wednesday, swiftly breaking through police barriers before smashing windows and parading through the halls, sending lawmakers into hiding.
      Late on Thursday, the Capitol police service disclosed that one of its officers had died from injuries he sustained “while physically engaging with protesters” on Wednesday.
      Brian D Sicknick returned to his division office and collapsed, the police said, later dying in hospital. Two law enforcement officials told Associated Press on the condition of anonymity that Sicknick had been struck in the head with a fire extinguisher during the melee.
      The FBI and Washington’s police department will jointly investigate his death, which was the fifth associated with Wednesday’s violence. A female protester was shot and killed by police, and three other people died after “medical emergencies” in the grounds of the Capitol.

      The announcement of Sund’s departure came as he detailed the violence for the first time, saying police were “actively attacked” with metal pipes and other weapons.
      “They [the mob] were determined to enter into the Capitol building by causing great damage,” Sund said. Capitol police fired on the woman who died as “protesters were forcing their way toward the House chamber where members of Congress were sheltering in place”.
      There has been mounting criticism of the serious failures of leadership by those detailed to protect Congress in the days and hours leading up to the riot.
      According to reports, Capitol police declined offers from the Pentagon of additional National Guard manpower and from the Justice Department of additional FBI personnel.
      Amid allegations that he had missed the well-signposted potential for violence, Sund has said he had only anticipated a display of “first amendment activities”, and not a “violent attack”.
      The army secretary, Ryan McCarthy, said that as the rioting was under way, it became clear the Capitol police were being overrun.
      But he said there was no contingency planning done in advance for what forces could do in case of a problem at the Capitol because US defense department help was turned down. “They’ve got to ask us, the request has to come to us,” said McCarthy.
      Gus Papathanasiou, the head of the Capitol police union, said planning failures left officers exposed without backup or equipment against surging crowds of rioters.
      “We were lucky that more of those who breached the Capitol did not have firearms or explosives and did not have a more malign intent,” Papathanasiou said in a statement. “Tragic as the deaths are that resulted from the attack, we are fortunate the casualty toll was not higher.” More

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      Democratic leaders call for Trump's removal from office

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      Democratic leaders have called for Donald Trump to be forced from office before his term ends on 20 January for his role in inciting what his successor, Joe Biden, described as “one of the darkest days” in US history.As a new 7ft fence was belatedly erected around the US Capitol on Thursday, an inquiry was launched into why the seat of US democracy was left so poorly defended against a predictable assault.But the principal political focus was on the dangers of allowing a president widely seen as being the ultimate instigator of Wednesday’s mob attack to retain power in the remaining two weeks before Biden’s inauguration.The president-elect said Wednesday’s insurrection marked “one of the darkest days in the history of our nation”, saying the attack was carried out by “domestic terrorists”. Biden accused his predecessor of unleashing an “all-out attack” on the country’s democratic institutionsChuck Schumer, who is the incoming Senate majority leader following the Democratic sweep of Georgia, and the House speaker, Nancy Pelosi, called for Trump to be removed through the 25th amendment to the constitution, which allows for a president to be replaced by their vice-president, if they become incapable of doing their job.Failing that, they argued he should be impeached for a second time.Pelosi described Trump as “a very dangerous person who should not continue in office”.“This is urgent. This is an emergency of the highest magnitude,” Pelosi said.Several Democratic members of Congress drafted new articles of impeachment for inciting Wednesday’s violence and deliberating subverting US democracy.“What happened at the US Capitol yesterday was an insurrection against the United States, incited by President Trump. This president must not hold office one day longer. The quickest and most effective way – it can be done today – to remove this president from office would be for the Vice President to immediately invoke the 25th amendment,” Schumer said in a tweet.“If the Vice President and the Cabinet refuse to stand up, Congress must reconvene to impeach President Trump.”Charges for Trump’s second impeachment were drawn up by several Democratic congress members – Ilhan Omar, Ted Lieu, Jamie Raskin and David Cicilline – accusing him of “wilfully inciting violence against the government of the United States” and warning he remained “a threat to national security, democracy and the constitution, if allowed to remain in office”.Use of the 25th amendment, on the grounds unfitness for office is a form of incapacity, would rely on the cooperation of Republicans including the vice-president, Mike Pence, who would take over the administration in its final two weeks. That seemed unlikely on Thursday.Adam Kinzinger of Illinois, a frequent Republican critic of Trump, joined the calls for the 25th amendment to be invoked, saying in a video message: “The president must now relinquish control of the executive branch voluntarily or involuntarily.”But the GOP leadership did not appear sufficiently shocked to jettison their leader, who was reportedly warmly received on a conference call with the Republican National Committee on Thursday morning.There was a handful of resignations by second-tier officials, including the transport secretary, Elaine Chao (married to the current Senate majority leader, Mitch McConnell); the deputy national security adviser, Matthew Pottinger; the Northern Ireland envoy (and former White House chief of staff), Mick Mulvaney; and the first lady’s spokeswoman, Stephanie Grisham. But there was no sign yet of a sweeping exodus or mutiny that would be required to force the president from office.Trump loyalists in Congress and on Fox News quickly began circulating groundless conspiracy theories that disguised members of the leftist antifa movement had provoked the insurrection.The president himself made no public statements on Thursday, and after a call with the Republican National Committee spent part of the day awarding the presidential medal of freedom to two golf players and one Olympic athlete, one of them posthumously.Facebook imposed an indefinite ban on Trump, whose campaign has long used the platform to spread disinformation and conspiracy theories. The decision may also have been influenced by the Democratic success in taking control of the Senate.Former administration officials were scathing about the president’s role, most notably the recently departed attorney general, William Barr, who said Trump was guilty of “betrayal of his office and supporters” by “orchestrating a mob to pressure Congress.”.The former defence secretary James Mattis said Trump “fomented” the attack, intended “to subjugate American democracy by mob rule”.But current Republican leaders were much more guarded. McConnell said the blame for the attack lay with the “unhinged criminals” who carried it out “and with those who incited them” but did not name the president.Lindsey Graham, one of Trump’s top congressional allies, called on the president to accept his own role in the violence, saying that Trump “needs to understand that his actions were the problem, not the solution”.But asked about calls for Trump to be removed from office, the South Carolina senator said: “I do not believe that is appropriate at this point. I’m looking for a peaceful transfer of power.”A YouGov poll of Republicans found 45% of them supported the storming of the Capitol, 2% more than those who opposed it.At least some of Trump’s leading supporters abroad sought to distance themselves, including Boris Johnson, who said it was “completely wrong” for Trump to “encourage people to storm the Capitol” and cast doubt on the election result.In Washington, law enforcement agencies tried to respond to widespread outrage over the apparent impunity of the insurrectionists (only 14 of whom had been arrested by Thursday afternoon) and the lack of adequate defences for a vital organ of government.McConnell said it was a “massive failure” and called for a full investigation. The congressional sergeant at arms, responsible for overall security in the building, resigned on Thursday but Pelosi called for the chief of the Capitol police, Steven Sund, to step down as well.Sund issued a statement saying the storming of the legislature was “unlike any I have ever experienced in my 30 years in law enforcement here” and argued that his officers had been spread thin by having to respond to two pipe bombs found near the Capitol at the same time as the assault.Pelosi also said she had not received a satisfactory reply from the defence secretary, Christopher Miller, on why the national guard was so slow to respond, arriving in significant numbers only after the Capitol was occupied.The army secretary, Ryan McCarthy, told reporters that he had expected Wednesday’s events to be like other recent protests, adding that Pentagon officials had not imagined a breach of the Capitol in their “wildest imagination”.The head of the Washington metropolitan police department also claimed: “There was no intelligence that suggests that there would be a breach of the US Capitol.” Critics responded that those responsible had telegraphed their intentions in advance.“It was all in the open on public social media sites, not to mention in the President’s speech,” John Sipher, a former senior CIA officer, commented on Twitter. 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