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Breonna Taylor
Why the officers who shot and killed Breonna Taylor may never be arrested
A tangled legal doctrine in Kentucky means a kind of self-defense stalemate that leaves a lot of questions over what charges a prosecutor could bring against the officers More
A fire lit inside a police union building by a small fraction of protesters in Portland overnight led the authorities to declare the situation a riot and then use flashbang munitions and smoke canisters to force hundreds away from the area.The flare-up in the Oregon city marred demonstrations that took place across Portland this weekend as part of protests that have continued daily, calling for police restructuring and systemic anti-racism reforms, since George Floyd was killed by police in Minneapolis in May.Portland protests had been in a calmer vein since federal law enforcement agents withdrew in late July, but early Sunday saw a clash at the scene of the arson attack.It was the second time such a fire has been set in recent days. Though both fires were quickly put out, the incidents brought criticism of individuals who have been provoking police by damaging property and other belligerent tactics, in contrast to much wider, calmer protests, according to a report by the Oregonian.Three officers were hurt during efforts to clear a crowd of several hundred people outside the Portland Police Association building, police said in a statement.Rallies had been held earlier in the afternoon and evening throughout the city.Seneca Cayson, a black business owner who helped lead peaceful gatherings in downtown Portland, worries that incidents of vandalism and taunting of law enforcement by a tiny minority of the many thousands of white protesters turning out distracts from the main aims of the Black Lives Matter movement.But he speculated that such clashes also draw more attention to racial injustice and said of white rebels: “We are fighting alongside them to … be equal.”Many cite competing voices and the harsh glare of a national spotlight, which has reduced the situation to a culture war when the reality is much more complex.“It happens so much that the things that we care about get hijacked and get put on the back burner. And that just gets put into a big barrel with everything else,” said Neil Anderson, another local Black business owner. “We all want the same thing. But so often we get drowned out.”For many, part of breaking down racial barriers means taking funds from and restructuring the police entirely.Portland’s population is less than 6% black but people of color have been disproportionately stopped by a city program that created a gun violence reduction team.An analysis of police use of force published last month found that in 2019 officers were much more likely to use force against black people and particularly young black men than other groups, despite overall trends towards less use of force.“It is the entire culture of the Portland police bureau that is fundamentally unmanageable and must change,” said Jo Ann Hardesty, the city’s first black councilwoman and an activist who has pressed for police reform for three decades.“Thirty years is a long time to be asking for the exact same reforms. The difference now is there are tens of thousands of Portlanders who want the exact same thing,” Hardesty said.Police said demonstrators broke into the union building late Saturday, set the fire and were adding to it when officers made the riot declaration.Democratic mayor Ted Wheeler said violent protesters are serving as political “props” for Donald Trump in a divisive election season where the president is hammering on a law-and-order message.Meanwhile, Oregon state politicians will discuss on Monday in a special session passing a broader ban on police use of chokeholds and further restricting other use of force, the Oregonian reported on Sunday. More
US reported record 1.87m new Covid-19 cases in July
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Federal agents accused of behaving like an ‘occupying army’ are said to be pulling out of Portland, Oregon, in an embarrassing climbdown by the White House, but many protesters are sceptical over whether the agents will actually withdraw from the city.
The force, which have been dubbed by some as ‘Donald Trump’s troops’, were sent in by the president a month ago to end what he called ‘anarchy’ during Black Lives Matter protests sparked after the police killing of George Floyd.
The Guardian’s Chris McGreal looks at what Trump was hoping to gain by sending paramilitaries into the city, if and how they will leave, and how their presence has fuelled anger among most residents
Federal agents show stronger force at Portland protests despite order to withdraw
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Portland
Protest
Donald Trump
Race
Black Lives Matter movement
US elections 2020
Trump administration More
Thursday night’s protest passed off without major incident or intervention by the police in the absence of federal officersJoin us for a live digital event with former attorney general Eric Holder to discuss voter suppression in 2020, Thursday at 5pm ET. Register nowThe withdrawal of federal agents from frontline policing of demonstrations in downtown Portland significantly reduced tensions in the city overnight.Protesters in support of Black Lives Matter once again rallied near the federal courthouse that became a flashpoint, and the scene of nightly battles amid the swirl of teargas, after Donald Trump dispatched agents to end what he called anarchy in the city after weeks of demonstrations. Continue reading… More
Trump calls election ‘inaccurate’ amid news of GDP plummet
Former presidential candidate Herman Cain dies from Covid-19
Economy suffers worst quarter since second world war as GDP shrinks by 32.9%
US passes 150,000 deaths
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Mourners arrive for John Lewis memorial service – watch live
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11.16am EDT11:16
Funeral for civil rights leader John Lewis begins in Atlanta
10.39am EDT10:39
Former presidential candidate Herman Cain dies from Covid-19
9.01am EDT09:01
Nasa successfully launches Perseverance mission to Mars
8.56am EDT08:56
Trump appears to call for delay to November election over his mail-in voting fears
8.41am EDT08:41
Mike Pompeo appears before the Senate foreign relations committee
8.34am EDT08:34
Grim GDP and jobless figures reveal extent of Covid-19 damage to economy
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Biden posts video with Obama criticising administration over approach to schools during Covid-19 crisis
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11.16am EDT11:16
Funeral for civil rights leader John Lewis begins in Atlanta
The funeral for civil rights leader John Lewis has just begun at Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta, Georgia.
The church’s senior pastor, reverend Raphael Warnock, is leading the service, which has dozens of attendees who are keeping social distance and wearing masks.
“Here lies a true American patriot,” Warnock said.
This morning, the New York Times published a powerful essay Lewis submitted two days before he died from pancreatic cancer at age 80.
The Guardian’s Ed Pilkington writes:
The essay rehearses several of the key moments that for Lewis shaped his life in non-violent protest and what he called “good trouble”. He said he was inspired into the movement against America’s brutal history of race discrimination by the lynching in Mississippi of Emmett Till, aged 15, in 1955 – when Lewis was himself just 14.
“Emmett Till was my George Floyd. He was my Rayshard Brooks, Sandra Bland and Breonna Taylor,” he writes.
He recalls how in his childhood in Alabama, the white supremacist threat was a fact of everyday life. “Unchecked, unrestrained violence and government-sanctioned terror had the power to turn a simple stroll to the store for some Skittles or an innocent morning jog down a lonesome country road into a nightmare.
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11.00am EDT11:00
Julian Borger
The Guardian’s world affairs editor, Julian Borger, is watching secretary of state Mike Pompeo testify before the Republican-led Senate Foreign Relations committee.
Mike Pompeo has been questioned on the decision announced yesterday to pull nearly 12,000 US troops out of Germany, bringing 6,400 of them back to the US, and how that squared with Pompeo’s claims to be leading a tough policy towards Russia. He confirmed the state department was “very involved at the strategic level” but argued that bringing the troops home did not mean they were “off the field”
“These units will participate in rotational activity. They’ll be forward deployed. They won’t be stationed or garrisoned. But make no mistake about it they will be fully available to ensure that we can properly prosecute the challenges we have from the global powers.”Senator Jeanne Shaheen asked him whether the impact on relations with Germany had been taken into account, to which Pompeo replied: “This is personal for me I fought on the border of East Germany when I was a young soldier I was stationed there.”
Pompeo was stationed in West Germany as an army lieutenant in the late eighties. There was no fighting there.
Mitt Romney, who continues to be the only Republican senator to seriously challenge the administration, picked up the issue in his own remarks, saying: “I have heard from the highest levels of the German government that this is seen by them as an insult to Germany, and I can’t imagine, at a time when we need to be drawing in our friends and allies so that we can collectively confront China, we want to insult them.”
Pompeo was also questioned about Donald Trump’s suggestion that the election might be delayed.
Senator Tom Udall asked the secretary of state: “Will you respect the results of the certified election as the State Department typically does throughout the world?”
Pompeo replied: “Senator I’m not going to speculate. You had about 15 ‘ifs’ in there.. I’ve said repeatedly to this committee I will follow the rule of law, follow the Constitution. I’ve endeavored to do that in everything I’ve done and I’ll continue to do that every day.”
10.39am EDT10:39
Former presidential candidate Herman Cain dies from Covid-19
Former presidential candidate Herman Cain, 74, has died from Covid-19 after contracting the illness nearly one month ago.
His official Twitter account, which had been providing updates on Cain’s hospitalization due to Covid-19, posted an announcement of his death on Thursday morning.
Herman Cain
(@THEHermanCain)
You’re never ready for the kind of news we are grappling with this morning. But we have no choice but to seek and find God’s strength and comfort to deal… #HermanCain https://t.co/BtOgoLVqKz
July 30, 2020
Cain, the co-chair of Black Voices for Trump, had attended Donald Trump’s rally in Tulsa, Oklahoma in June, where he did not wear a mask.
“We’re heartbroken, and the world is poorer,” said a post on Cain’s website, which provided insight into his Covid-19 infection.
“There were hopeful indicators, including a mere five days ago when doctors told us they thought he would eventually recover, although it wouldn’t be quick,” the post said. “We were relieved to be told that, and passed on the news via Herman’s social media. And yet we also felt real concern about the fact that he never quite seemed to get to the point where the doctors could advance him to the recovery phase.”
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10.10am EDT10:10
Dominic Rushe
More on the staggering drop in GDP figures from the Guardian US’s business editor, Dominic Rushe:
The fall came as large parts of the US economy shutdown in March in an attempt to halt the spread of the coronavirus across the US. The closures led to a historic number of layoffs and sent unemployment soaring to levels unseen since the 1930s Great Depression.
Lexie Testa, 26, from Lansing, Michigan lost her hotel job at the end of May and waited two months to receive her first unemployment payment. While her husband has retained his job, she said it had been a struggle since her layoff and that she was wary about finding new work as the virus continues to spread.
Testa said it was too early to cut benefits given how hard it remains to find work and the fact that the virus is still spreading. “I know a lot of people who aren’t really comfortable returning to work with children in their home and actually I have a few friends that cannot because they have no child care,” she said.
“I am lucky enough that I have a grandmother who usually babysits for me but I just am not really comfortable yet as I have always worked in the food service industry and I see places in my city of Lansing shut down and reopen due to Covid cases often.”
9.47am EDT09:47
The Guardian’s voting rights report, Sam Levine, notes that the president can’t unilaterally change the election date.
Sam Levine
(@srl)
The president cannot unilaterally move the election. The date of the election is set by Congress. The constitution says the President and Vice President’s term ends on January 20 https://t.co/LMVTeCOgRs https://t.co/LOz4qLjDBH
July 30, 2020
This is why people are speculating one of the reasons Trump asked whether the election should be delayed this morning is to distract from the very bad economic news this morning.
Government figures revealed Thursday morning that the US economy shrank by an annualized rate of 32.9% between April and June, its sharpest contraction since the second world war.
9.35am EDT09:35
Julian Borger
Secretary of state Mike Pompeo is appearing before the Senate foreign relations committee for the first time in more than a year, in what is already a particularly contentious hearing.
The ranking Democrat, Bob Menendez said the Trump administration had “at worst simply abetted Putin’s efforts” to undermine the US, and said the state department was “at risk of catastrophic failure.”
Menendez started his questioning on Trump’s admission on Wednesday that he had not confronted Vladimir Putin with intelligence reports that Russia was paying bounties to Taliban fighters for killing US soldiers in Afghanistan and asked Pompeo whether he had raised the issue with his counterpart, Sergei Lavrov.
Pompeo’s reply avoided confirming the reports, which Trump called “fake news”, but claimed that if it was true, he raised it.
“Anytime there was a tactical threat on the lives for the health of the safety and security or our assets in place, we have raised this with our Russian counterparts not only at my level but Ambassador Sullivan [US ambassador to Moscow], and every one of our team that interacts with the Russians we’ve made very clear our expectations.”
9.18am EDT09:18
One thing undermining Donald Trump’s ongoing quest against mail-in voting is that he and his officials have used it in the past.
Mother Jones reporter Ari Berman notes that at least 16 Trump officials have either voted by mail or requested absentee ballots, including the president himself. Others include attorney general William Barr, adviser and president’s daughter Ivanka Trump and White House press secretary, Kayleigh McEnany.
McEnany has voted by mail in every Florida election she has participated in since 2010, according to the Tampa Bay Times.
When asked about this in late May, McEnany said: “Absentee voting has the word absent in it for a reason. It means you’re absent from the jurisdiction or unable to vote in person. President Trump is against the Democrat plan to politicize the coronavirus and expand mass mail-in voting without a reason, which has a high propensity for voter fraud. This is a simple distinction that the media fails to grasp.”
Ari Berman
(@AriBerman)
16 top Trump officials have voted by mail or requested absentee ballots:TrumpPence Barr McEnanyConway IvankaMelaniaAzarRossDeVosMcDanielKushner GlassnerStepienAyersParscaleGOP only opposes mail voting when Dems use itpic.twitter.com/rBOKnJUoNe
July 30, 2020
9.01am EDT09:01
Nasa successfully launches Perseverance mission to Mars
On a brighter note, and sticking to their timetable, Nasa appears to have successfully launched the Perseverance mission, the third and final Mars launch from Earth this summer. China and the United Arab Emirates got a head start last week, but all three missions should reach their destination in February.
Nasa’s science mission chief, Thomas Zurbuchen, pronounced the launch the start of “humanity’s first round trip to another planet.”
“Oh, I loved it, punching a hole in the sky, right? Getting off the cosmic shore of our Earth, wading out there in the cosmic ocean,” he said. “Every time, it gets me.” More
More than 1,300 lives lost from coronavirus in the US yesterday
Virus takes heavy toll in south Texas
Portland protesters unleash fury over BLM, Covid-19 and economy
Hateful incidents against Americans of color surge
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US attorney general William Barr will defend the aggressive federal law enforcement response to civil unrest in America in a highly anticipated hearing on Tuesday, arguing that “violent rioters and anarchists have hijacked legitimate protests” sparked by George Floyd’s death at the hands of Minneapolis police.Barr will tell members of the House Judiciary Committee that the violence taking place in Portland, Oregon, and other cities is disconnected from the death of Floyd, which he described as a “horrible“ event that prompted a necessary national reckoning on the relationship between Black men and law enforcement.“Largely absent from these scenes of destruction are even superficial attempts by the rioters to connect their actions to George Floyd’s death or any legitimate call for reform,” Barr will say of the Portland protests, according to a copy of his prepared remarks released by the Justice Department on Monday.Barr will also touch on other controversies that have shadowed his tenure, including his handling of the investigation into Trump campaign ties to Russia, which he derisively refers to as “the bogus ‘Russiagate’ scandal”.According to his prepared remarks, Barr will try to differentiate recent protests in cities like Portland and Seattle and the demonstrations that erupted following the death of George Floyd in May.The attorney general will acknowledge to lawmakers that Floyd’s death struck a chord in the Black community because it reinforced concerns that Blacks are treated differently by police. But he will also condemn Americans who he says have responded inappropriately to Floyd’s death through what he said was rioting and anarchy.Civil unrest escalated in Portland after federal agents were accused of whisking people away in unmarked cars without probable cause. The US agents, drawn mainly from border patrol, were dispatched to the city by Donald Trump ostensibly to protect the courthouse. But they have succeeded in inflaming the situation.Washington DC was stunned in June when peaceful protesters were violently cleared from the streets by federal officers using tear gas ahead of a photo op by Trump in front of a church, where Barr had accompanied him.The attorney general has defended as necessary the broad use of law enforcement power to deal with the situation, but the department’s internal watchdog has opened investigations into use of force and other tactics by agents in both cities.The hearing on Tuesday marks Barr’s first appearance before the House Judiciary Committee, bringing him face-to-face with a panel that voted last year to hold him in contempt and is holding hearings on what Democrats allege is politicization of the Justice Department under his watch. It comes during a tumultuous stretch in which Barr has taken a series of actions cheered by Trump but condemned by Democrats and other critics.Barr makes reference in his prepared statement to that antagonistic relationship, saying that “many of the Democrats on this committee have attempted to discredit me by conjuring up a narrative that I am simply the president’s factotum who disposes of criminal cases according to his instructions. Judging from the letter inviting me to this hearing, that appears to be your agenda today.”Beyond the federal response to the demonstrations, Barr is also expected to be pressed in detail about his intervention in criminal cases arising from special counsel Robert Mueller’s Russia investigation.The hearing will provide Barr with a forum to offer his most detailed account to date for his actions in the criminal cases, which he has said were taken in the interests of justice and without political pressure.Those include the Justice Department’s decision to drop the prosecution of former Trump administration national security adviser Michael Flynn (a request now tied up in court) and his firing last month of the top federal prosecutor in Manhattan, whose office oversaw investigations into allies of the president.Barr also pushed for a more lenient sentence for Trump ally Roger Stone, prompting the entire trial team’s departure. That decision was at the center of a separate hearing before the same committee last month, when one of the prosecutors alleged that politics from Justice Department leadership had influenced the handling of the sentence.In the past, Barr has said that Flynn, who pleaded guilty as part of Mueller’s probe to lying to the FBI, should never have been charged and that the original sentencing recommendation for Stone – also charged in the Mueller investigation – was excessive. Barr’s opening statement does not delve into the details of the case, though he will insist Tuesday that Trump has not attempted to interfere in those decisions and has “played a role properly and traditionally played by presidents”. More
