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      The Democrat standing in the way of his party’s efforts to protect voting rights

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      Sign up for the Guardian’s Fight to Vote newsletterHappy Thursday,For months, Democrats in Congress have remained united behind passing the For the People Act, legislation that would amount to the most sweeping protections for voting rights in a generation.But those efforts – which would ensure automatic and same-day registration, limit severe partisan gerrymandering and mandate new transparency in political donations – appear to be hitting a wall. “Failure is very much an option – it is, in fact, the most likely one,” the Washington Post reported bluntly earlier this month.The senator getting in Democrats’ way is one of their own: Joe Manchin, a West Virginia Democrat, who has publicly signaled recently that he does not back the bill and wants bipartisan support for it. Manchin also does not favor getting rid of the filibuster, a procedural rule that requires 60 votes for legislation to advance in the Senate, making it nearly impossible for Democrats to pass this bill or any other without support from 10 Republicans. Even after six months of an unprecedented Republican effort to restrict voting rights across the country, Manchin still isn’t budging.My colleague Daniel Strauss and I wrote about this quagmire for Democrats this week. We asked senators and voting rights groups how exactly they might win over Manchin and how they plan to move forward. They told us they were still optimistic about the bill’s prospects and they thought Manchin would ultimately come around as public pressure grew.“There is a ticking timebomb,” said Wendy Weiser, the director of the democracy program at the Brennan Center for Justice, which supports the bill. If it doesn’t pass “it will be a significant failure for the country, for the American people … I don’t think Joe Manchin wants that on himself.”Senator Alex Padilla, a Democrat from California, told us he saw a “glimmer of hope” last week. He pointed to a letter Manchin released with Lisa Murkowski, an Alaska Republican, calling to reinstate a provision in the 1965 Voting Rights Act that would require states to get election changes approved by the federal government before they went into effect. Such provision was originally included in the Voting Rights Act and forestalled discriminatory changes to voting rules, but in 2013 it was gutted by the US supreme court. “Inaction is not an option,” Manchin and Murkowski wrote.Weiser and other voting rights advocates also pointed to that letter as evidence that Manchin understood the stakes of acting to protect voting rights. But they said it would not be acceptable to treat restoring pre-clearance as a substitute for the more sweeping voting rights bill. Pre-clearance will be a guardrail against future discrimination, they said, but the For the People Act would set a national floor for voting standards.“It has to be both,” said Stephen Spaulding, senior counsel for public policy and government affairs at Common Cause, a government watchdog group. “They’re both critically important pieces of legislation and it’s a false choice to say I’m for the other and not for this. Because only together will we fully rebalance the state of voting in America to favor access.”Also worth watching …
      The Republican effort to review 2.1m ballots cast in Arizona’s largest county is getting even stranger. One of the subcontractors that was involved in running the audit is no longer participating, the Arizona Republic reported on Tuesday. The same firm had previously been hired by the non-profit of Sidney Powell, a Trump ally who promulgated lies about the 2020 election, to do an audit in Pennsylvania.
      There is growing concern that conservative activists are seeking to emulate the Arizona review elsewhere, including in California, Michigan and New Hampshire. Experts say the efforts in Arizona are so shoddy as to be illegitimate, and are simply an effort to sow more uncertainty about the 2020 election results.
      Texas Republicans are in the final stages of negotiating new voting rights restrictions. The Texas Tribune has a really good analysis of how that law would limit the number of polling places in Democratic-leaning areas as well as areas where there is a high share of voters of color. More

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      ‘A ticking timebomb’: Democrats’ push for voting rights law faces tortuous path

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      After six months of aggressive Republican efforts to restrict voting access, Democrats are facing new questions about how they will actually pass voting rights reforms through Congress.The most recent hand-wringing comes as Joe Manchin, the West Virginia Democratic senator, made clear earlier this month he still is not on board with the For the People Act, which would require early voting, automatic and same-day registration, and prevent the severe manipulation of district boundaries for partisan gain.Senate Democrats, including Manchin, met privately on Wednesday to map out a path forward on the bill, which has already passed the US House. They were mostly mum about the discussions of that meeting but overall resolute that some kind of voting rights bill has to pass. Senator Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota said: “It was a really productive meeting.”Senator Raphael Warnock of Georgia said: “I think members of the caucus understand the urgency and we’re focused on getting something passed. We have an obligation to the American people to find a way to protect our democracy.”Sign up for the Guardian’s Fight to Vote newsletterManchin’s opposition comes at a critical moment when there is escalating concern about aggressive state Republican efforts to curtail access to the ballot. Arizona, Florida, Georgia, Iowa and Montana have all put new restrictions in place this year. Many see this as an existential moment for the Democratic party and fear that Republicans will permanently reap the benefits of a distorted electoral system if Democrats cannot pass federal legislation. There is heightened urgency to act quickly so that crucial protections can be in place when the once-per-decade redistricting process gets under way later this year.“There is a ticking timebomb,” said Wendy Weiser, the director of the democracy program at the Brennan Center for Justice, which supports the bill. “It will be a significant failure if [Congress] doesn’t pass these two pieces of major voting legislation. It will be a significant failure for the country, for the American people … I don’t think Joe Manchin wants that on himself.”Manchin is concerned the bill still does not have enough Republican buy-in, and favors an alternative piece of legislation that would reauthorize the Voting Rights Act and require election changes to be pre-approved by the federal government. Some observers say that solely passing that bill, named the John R Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act, would be inadequate to undo the suppressive laws that have gone into effect and that trying to get bipartisan support for the measure is a fool’s errand, given the Republican party’s embrace of Trump’s lies about the 2020 election. Senator Mitch McConnell has also taken a personal interest in trying to sink the bill, saying it would be devastating to Republicans, McClatchy reported earlier this month.The West Virginia senator’s concern highlights an even bigger question looming over the Democratic party – how to pass any priority legislation with only, at best, 51 votes in the Senate. Chuck Schumer, the Senate majority leader, has set August as a deadline for passing a voting rights bill – a deadline the White House has embraced.Schumer has repeatedly said “failure is not an option”. But absent a shift on eliminating the filibuster, a procedural rule in the Senate that requires 60 votes to advance legislation, failure seems to be the most likely option, the Washington Post reported. Senator Kyrsten Sinema of Arizona, another Democrat who does not support eliminating the filibuster, bluntly asked the caucus what the plan on the legislation was earlier this month.“The goal of the authors is to get it signed into law. I don’t see a path,” one Democratic senator vented to Politico.In the past few months it seemed like a showdown over the filibuster would come on a voting rights bill. Now, though, some Democrats think that showdown may come over a vote on a 6 January commission to investigate the mob attack on the Capitol. In both cases Democrats don’t seem to have the votes to overcome a filibuster which would spur a showdown.“Part of what I’ve heard is let’s not race to abolish or even reform the filibuster rule because frankly there hasn’t been a ‘casualty on the floor of the Senate’,” said Senator Alex Padilla of California, a former top elections official in his home state. “There’s no bill this session that has died because of the filibuster rule. So what might it be that breaks the filibuster’s back? Is it the infrastructure package? Is it the voting rights bill? Is it a climate change bill?”Manchin’s comments are being closely watched because Democrats cannot afford to lose his vote – or that of any other senator – since they control only 50 seats in the Senate. Manchin has said he does not favor getting rid of the filibuster.But outside groups supporting the For the People Act say they are unfazed by Manchin’s recalcitrance. They remain optimistic that he will eventually come around to support it.“Reports of the bill’s death are very premature. It is still the priority for Democrats in Congress,” Weiser said.“We remain optimistic about the path forward for this bill,” said Tiffany Muller, the president and executive director of End Citizens United/Let America Vote, which is backing a $30m effort to support the bill.Manchin has pointed to a reauthorization of preclearance requirements as a better way to protect voting rights than a sweeping voting bill. Last week, he released a letter with the Republican senator Lisa Murkowski calling on Congress to reauthorize the Voting Rights Act, including the preclearance provision gutted by the US supreme court in 2013. “Inaction is not an option,” they wrote.That letter was a “glimmer of hope”, said Padilla.“All the more reason to continue to make the case not just in Senate chambers but in the court of public opinion across the country,” he added, stressing that Democratic efforts to engage in genuine debate would address Manchin’s concern that a real attempt at bipartisanship should be made.Voting groups say it would be a mistake to only pass a voting rights reauthorization. While current proposals would only require certain places with documented evidence of voting discrimination to be subject to preclearance, Manchin told ABC he thinks every state should have to get its voting changes preapproved. Republicans are unlikely to support such an idea. “That’s just not actually in the cards,” Weiser said.“It’s a false choice. It has to be both,” said Stephen Spaulding, senior counsel for public policy and government affairs at Common Cause, a government watchdog group. “They’re both critically important pieces of legislation and it’s a false choice to say I’m for the other and not for this. Because only together will we fully rebalance the state of voting in America to favor access.”Four House Democrats sent a letter to colleagues last week making a similar argument. Advocates are heartened by polling that shows the measure is extremely popular and the fact that Democrats have held together so far and brought the bill to the verge of a Senate floor vote despite some grumbling from their own caucus.“What you’re seeing is a commitment to a floor vote and getting people on record,” Spaulding said.If Democrats went into the 2022 midterms without doing anything to protect voting rights, it would be disastrous, advocates said.“Voters showed up in record numbers to choose new leadership. There were commitments made across multiple Congresses on both bills and so saying ‘we tried’ isn’t going to work,” Spaulding said.“If these bills weren’t to go to President Biden’s desk, they’d have … to articulate why they did nothing when they had the power to do so.” More

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      Senate Republicans scramble to derail creation of Capitol riot commission

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      Top Senate Republicans are making a concerted effort to quash the creation of a 9/11-style commission to investigate the Capitol attack, deeply endangering the bill’s passage amid fears about what a high-profile inquiry into the events of 6 January might uncover.The Republican Senate minority leader, Mitch McConnell, has said he opposes the commission bill in its current form and several Republicans who have previously expressed support said they could no longer back it.McConnell’s opposition brings into sharp relief the treacherous path ahead for the legislation , which Senate Democrats could introduce as soon as this week, according to a source briefed on the matter.The reasons publicly offered by Republicans for rejecting the creation of a commission are myriad: it might impede existing congressional and justice department investigations into 6 January. It might become politicized. It might make pro-Trump rioters “look bad”.But in the end, the stance reflects the fear from McConnell and top Senate Republicans that extending their support to an inquiry likely to find Donald Trump at fault for inciting the Capitol attack could be used as a cudgel against Republicans ahead of the 2022 midterm elections.Both McConnell and House minority leader Kevin McCarthy are determined to put Republicans in the majority in both chambers next year, and both leaders regard the commission as an obstacle in their paths.The political calculations looming large echo many of the same concerns that arose during the debate to establish the 9/11 commission, which was opposed by a Bush administration anxious that the disclosure of security lapses could jeopardise their 2004 election chances.But while lawmakers then were able to put aside months of disagreements to form an inquiry – the bill passed in the House with three votes against and by voice vote in the Senate – the Capitol attack has become just another partisan issue in a divided Congress. The positions of the two Republican leaders also underscores the fear of what a full accounting of 6 January might uncover about the roles that Republicans may have played ahead of the insurrection, potentially inviting unwelcome scrutiny of Trump’s lies about election fraud they helped promulgate.The House minority leader, Kevin McCarthy, in particular could be left exposed should a 9/11-style commission ultimately be impanelled.McCarthy called Trump as rioters breached the Capitol building and begged him to call them off, only for the former president to side with the rioters, saying they appeared to care more about overturning the election results than Republicans in Congress. Five people eventually died as the mob looted the Capitol and hunted for politicians, including Vice-President Mike Pence.McCarthy, in his desperation, also spoke with senior White House advisor and Trump’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner, to try and stop the attack after his pleas to Trump went unheeded, a former administration source said.Those conversations between Trump and McCarthy – addressing the crucial question of what Trump was doing and saying privately as the Capitol was overrun – would almost certainly be examined, raising the specter that McCarthy himself would have to testify, voluntarily or under subpoena.“My humble opinion is that there’s some information that [McCarthy] would deem troubling for the Republican party if it got out. And I think he will do everything possible to prevent that,” said the House Democrat Bennie Thompson.McCarthy is also vulnerable to having his own senior aides investigated by a 6 January commission, having hired Brian Jack, the former political director of the Trump White House, who was involved in organizing the “Stop the Steal” rally that preceded the Capitol attack.Zach Wamp, a member of the original 9/11 commission and the former top Republican on the committee overseeing the US Capitol police, made it clear that whatever misgivings McCarthy or Republicans may have about the commission, they should put the country first.“We need to know exactly what happened,” Wamp said. “So I would appeal to my fellow Republicans in the House and the Senate, do the right thing here. We need to actually clear this up, do it together as Americans. Put our country above any political interests.”The bill to create a 9/11-style commission passed the House on Wednesday with bipartisan support after 35 Republicans, in a stinging rebuke, defied McCarthy and an emergency recommendation from the office of the House minority whip, Steve Scalise, office to oppose the legislation.But McConnell’s new resistance – a reversal from his previous openness to having a commission, as well as his sharp denunciation of Trump for inciting the Capitol attack – betrays the fraught political situation the bill faces in the Senate.The bill, in its current form, would need the endorsement of at least 10 Senate Republicans before it can be brought to the floor for debate. It would also need 10 Senate Republicans to cross the aisle and join Democrats to defeat an expected filibuster.Senate Democrats could chart a narrow path to 10 votes based on the seven Republicans – Mitt Romney, Susan Collins, Lisa Murkowski, Richard Burr, Bill Cassidy, Ben Sasse and Patrick Toomey – who voted to convict Trump at his second impeachment trial. The Senate majority leader, Chuck Schumer, and his leadership team were still hopeful in recent days of securing enough bipartisan support to push the bill through, according to a source familiar deliberations, with other Republicans, such as Rob Portman, remaining undecided.The Senate minority whip, John Thune, who has been bullish about the prospects of having a commission to tightly focus on 6 January and not unrelated leftwing violence, as suggested by McCarthy, has previously said that Republicans had not yet whipped against the bill.Zach Wamp, a member of the original September 11 commission and the former top Republican on the committee overseeing the US Capitol Police, condemned efforts from Republicans to doom an inquiry into Jan. 6.“We need to know exactly what happened,” Wamp said. “So I would appeal to my fellow Republicans in the House and the Senate: Do the right thing here. We need to actually clear this up; do it together as Americans. Put our country above any political interests.”But the bill’s chances of becoming law hit a further snag last week after at least one senator who voted to convict Trump announced he would oppose the commission. “I don’t believe establishing a commission is necessary or wise,” Burr said in a statement. More

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      Police records show threats to kill lawmakers in wake of Capitol attack

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      Washington’s Metropolitan police department recorded threats to lawmakers and public facilities in the wake of the 6 January attack on the Capitol, according to documents made public in a ransomware hack on their systems this month.The documents also show how, in the month following the Capitol attack, police stepped up surveillance efforts, monitoring hotel bookings, protests in other jurisdictions, and social media for signs of another attack by far-right groups on targets in the capital, including events surrounding the inauguration of Joe Biden as president.The revelation of the seriousness of the threats comes amid Republican opposition to forming a 9/11-style commission to investigate the January attack, which saw the Capitol roamed by looting mobs hunting for politicians and involved the deaths of five people.The police documents were stolen and published by the ransomware attack group Babuk, and some were redistributed by the transparency organization Distributed Denial of Secrets, from whom they were obtained by the Guardian. Various outlets last week published stories based on the data showing intelligence indicating that far-right Boogaloo groups planned to attack various targets in the capital.But another collection of documents labeled “chiefs intelligence briefings” shows a broad, cross-agency effort in the days following the attack on the Capitol to identify suspects, monitor and apprehend far-right actors, and anticipate further attacks on Washington around events like the inauguration of Joe Biden and the second impeachment trial of Donald Trump.In the aftermath of the riot, the attention of police and other law enforcement agencies was focused on far-right activity on social media platforms, and especially on a group calling itself Patriot Action for America.One 13 January bulletin said that the group had been “calling for others to join them in ‘storming’ state, local, and federal government courthouses and administrative buildings in the event POTUS is removed as president prior to inauguration day”.The bulletin also noted that the agency was facing broader challenges in monitoring far-right actors on social media websites, saying that “with the shutdown of Parler it has been a challenge to track down how activities are being planned”, and that they continued to “see more users on Gab and Telegram following the de-platforming of many accounts on more conventional social media companies”.The bulletin mentions a “possible second suspect” in the placement of pipe bombs near the DNC and RNC, who was “observed on video scouting/taking photographs in advance of the placement”, who “took a metro to the East Falls church stop and took a Lyft from there”.On 12 January, a bulletin noted that a supreme court agent had noticed “two vehicles stopped beside each other” outside the court building, and that in one an older white male was “videotaping the Capitol fence line and the court”, and in the other a passenger was “hanging out the window in order to videotape the court”.A 22 January bulletin mentions that in Pennsylvania a man was arrested after “transmitting interstate threats to multiple US senators of the Democratic party”, having stated that he was “going to DC to kill people and wanted to be killed by the police”. When Pennsylvania state police apprehended him “he was in possession of a rifle, two handguns, and a large quantity of ammunition”.A later bulletin described an incident in which a man with an illegal firearm was arrested after asking for directions to the “Oval Office”, and another man’s van was searched after he was observed sitting in the vehicle while parked outside the supreme court justice Sonya Sotomayor’s house.The same day’s bulletin mentioned that Metropolitan police were cooperating with Capitol police in investigating “a number of threats aimed at members of Congress as the Senate impeachment trial of Donald Trump nears”.The threats continued for weeks after the attack.Almost a month later, a bulletin reported that “an identified militia group member” in Texas was claiming that if their “operation failed at the US Capitol”, there was a “back-up plan” involving the group “detonating bombs at the US Capitol during the State of the Union”.The group was not named but was described as “a large organization allegedly with members from every state, which included individuals who were former military and law enforcement”.The documents also reveal how law enforcement agencies secured the cooperation of private companies, from ride-share companies to hotels.A bulletin includes the claim that “FBI [is] working with Lyft and Uber to identify riders to and from the protest locations”.The same bulletin carries detailed figures on reservations in hotels across the capital leading up to the inauguration on 20 January, which was secured by an unprecedented mobilization of law enforcement and the national guard.Two days later, another bulletin said that “MPD’s intelligence division has conducted extensive outreach with security directors of area hotels”, who they asked to be “vigilant for evidence of suspicious activity and firearms possession by hotel guests”. 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      Investigate the Capitol attack? Republicans prefer to back the big lie

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      “Tuesday, September 11, 2001, dawned temperate and nearly cloudless in the eastern United States.” So begins the report of the 9/11 commission, which investigated the terrorist attacks 20 years ago with bipartisan support.Will there be a similarly limpid introduction to a similarly weighty (567 pages) study of the deadly insurrection at the US Capitol in Washington on 6 January 2021? Not if Republicans can help it.The formation of a January 6 commission passed the House of Representatives on Wednesday evening thanks to the Democratic majority and 35 Republicans. But 175 Republicans voted against it. It will be a similar story in the Senate, where the minority leader, Mitch McConnell, announced his opposition earlier on Wednesday.There are sound reasons for a commission. Rarely has the old question “What did the president know and when he did know it?” been more applicable than to Trump on the day that a mob of his supporters stormed the Capitol as his election defeat was being certified.It was one of the greatest security failures in American history. US Capitol police were overrun. More than three hours passed before the national guard was deployed. A full investigation is surely critical for the public record.But Republicans’ logic is ruthlessly simple. Now that they have surrendered to Donald Trump, manifest in the ousting of Liz Cheney from House leadership, they would rather recycle false claims of election fraud than talk about 6 January.It was the spectacular culmination of Trump’s presidency, the moment when all the forces of anger and hatred he stoked for years were unleashed at the cost of five lives. Whereas 9/11 bequeathed memorials carved in granite – never forget – there is a concerted effort under way to airbrush 1/6 from history.Kurt Bardella, a political commentator who quit the Republican party, tweeted: “Asking Republicans to investigate 1.6 is like asking Al-Qaeda to investigate 9.11. The people who helped plan/promote the attack aren’t going to be partners in the investigation.”As always, there are outliers pushing the boundaries, trying to shift the centre of gravity and normalise the abnormal. Andrew Clyde, a Republican congressman, told a hearing that, based on TV footage inside the Capitol on 6 January, “you would actually think it was a normal tourist visit” – even though a photo shows him desperately barricading the House chamber.His colleague Louie Gohmert said on the House floor: “I just want the president to understand. There have been things worse than people without any firearms coming into a building.”Such pro-Trump loyalty from the rank and file is unsurprising. They don’t have to convince the public of what did or did not happen, just muddy the waters enough to cause confusion so that rightwing media partisans can play “bothsidesism”.But the House minority leader, Kevin McCarthy, knows better. He reportedly argued bitterly with Trump as the riot was unfolding and later said the president “bears responsibility”. Yet as the removal of Cheney demonstrated, McCarthy believes Trump is key to his ambition of becoming speaker after next year’s midterm elections.McConnell was even more sharply critical of Trump after the riot and, in theory, is an upholder of institutions who should welcome a commission. But he argued on the Senate floor on Wednesday that, with law enforcement and Senate investigations under way, “the facts have come out and they’ll continue to come out”.It was proof positive of Trump’s reach beyond the presidential grave. Republicans dare not alienate him or his base by rejecting “the big lie”. If election expediency takes precedence over the need to understand an attack on American democracy, is there any line they will not cross?Or as the Democratic congressman Tim Ryan put it to Republican members: “Holy cow! Incoherence! No idea what you’re talking about … We have people scaling the Capitol, hitting the Capitol police with lead pipes across the head, and we can’t get bipartisanship. What else has to happen in this country?” More

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      Republicans flout mask requirement in US House chamber

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      Republicans in Congress are rebelling against the mask requirement on the House chamber, which remains in place due to Covid-19 safety concerns from Democrats, who hold the majority.During votes on Tuesday, several Republican lawmakers refused to wear masks as they stood in the chamber and encouraged other members to join them.Lawmakers who refuse to wear a face covering are subject to a fine of $500 for the first offense and subsequent offenses can result in a $2,500 fine. In practice, however, the House sergeant-at-arms gives a warning for the first offense.The seven lawmakers who received warnings include Representatives Lauren Boebert of Colorado, Thomas Massie of Kentucky, Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia, Chip Roy of Texas, Bob Good of Virginia, Louie Gohmert of Texas and Mary Miller of Illinois, according to the Associated Press.Greene, a Republican extremist, posted a photo of herself with three other Republicans on the House floor without masks. The Georgia lawmaker tweeted: “End the oppression!” along with: “#FreeYourFace.”Massie also tweeted a card casting a “No” vote, along with a caption estimating that 10 Republicans were going maskless on the floor on Tuesday.The Republican stunt comes after the House speaker, Nancy Pelosi, said on Thursday that she would continue requiring masks to be worn on the floor of the chamber. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said earlier that day that fully vaccinated people can stop wearing masks in almost all settings, including indoors.When asked why she kept the mask rule for the chamber, Pelosi told Bloomberg that it’s not known how many lawmakers and their staff are vaccinated.Democratic lawmakers in both chambers of Congress have a 100% vaccination rate against Covid-19, according to answers from a CNN survey of Capitol Hill published on Friday. However, for Republicans, the numbers are less clear.In total, it is estimated that at least 44% of House members are vaccinated and at least 92% of senators are. More

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      Joe Biden poised to sign anti-Asian American hate crimes bill

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      Joe Biden is poised to sign legislation aimed at curtailing a striking rise in hate crimes against Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders, after Congress approved the bill in a bipartisan denunciation of brutal attacks that have proliferated during the pandemic.The bill, which the House passed on Tuesday in a 364-62 vote, will expedite the review of hate crimes at the justice department and make grants available to help local law enforcement agencies improve their investigation, identification and reporting of incidents driven by bias, which often go underreported. It previously passed the Senate, and Biden has said he will give it his signature..“Asian Americans have been screaming out for help, and the House and Senate and President Biden have clearly heard our pleas,” said Grace Meng, a Democratic congresswoman who helped lead efforts to pass the bill in the House.To many Asian Americans, the pandemic has invigorated deep-seated biases. Donald Trump repeatedly referred to the virus, which emerged in Wuhan, China, as the “China virus” or the “Kung flu.” And as cases of the illness began to rise in the US, so too did the attacks, with thousands of violent incidents reported in the past year.Representative Judy Chu, a Democrat of California, said it’s painful for many to “open up the newspaper every day and see that yet another Asian American has been assaulted, attacked and even killed”.In February, an 84-year-old man died after he was pushed to the ground near his home in San Francisco. A young family was injured in a Texas grocery store attack last year. And in Georgia, six Asian women were killed in March during a series of shootings targeting workers at massage parlors. Prosecutors are seeking hate crimes charges. The women who were killed are mentioned in the text of the bill.“You start to think, ‘Well, will I be next?”’ Chu said.Yet to some activists, including organizations representing gay and transgender Asian Americans, the legislation is misguided. More than 100 groups have signed on to a statement opposing the bill for relying too heavily on law enforcement while providing too little funding to address the underlying issues driving a rise in hate crimes.“We have had hate crimes laws since 1968, it’s been expanded over and over again, and this new legislation is more of the same,” said Jason Wu, who is co-chair of GAPIMNY-Empowering Queer & Trans Asian Pacific Islanders. “These issues are about bias, but also rooted in inequality, and lack of investment and resources for our communities. Not a shortage of police and jails.”The group Stop AAPI Hate said the bill was step but lamented that it centers a law enforcement approach over community-led reform.“Because the act centers criminal law enforcement agencies in its solutions, it will not address the overwhelming majority of incidents reported to our site which are not hate crimes, but serious hate incidents,” the group said in a statement.The bill also represented a rare moment of bipartisanship in a Congress that has struggled to overcome partisan gridlock, while underscoring an evolution in Republican thought on hate crimes legislation. Many conservatives have historically dismissed hate crimes laws, arguing they create special protected classes so that victims of similar crimes are treated differently.“I’m glad Congress is coming together in a bipartisan way,” said congresswoman Young Kim, a California Republican who is Korean American. “Let’s also recognize that we cannot legislate hate out of our people’s hearts and minds.” More

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      Val Demings likely to run for Senate against Marco Rubio – report

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      Marco Rubio avoided a Senate challenge from Ivanka Trump but he seems certain to face one from Val Demings, a Democratic Florida congresswoman who was the first Black female police chief of Orlando and who was considered as a potential vice-president to Joe Biden.An unnamed senior adviser told Politico Demings, 64, was “98.6%” certain to run against Rubio in the midterm elections next year.“If I had to point to one” reason why Demings had decided to run, the adviser was quoted as saying, “I think it’s the Covid bill and the way Republicans voted against it for no good reason.“That really helped push her over the edge. She also had this huge fight with [Ohio Republican representative] Jim Jordan and it brought that into focus. This fight is in Washington and it’s the right fight for her to continue.”Biden’s $1.9tn coronavirus rescue bill passed Congress in March without a single Republican vote. In April she made headlines by raising her voice when Jordan, a provocateur and hard-right Trump supporter, interrupted her during a House judiciary committee hearing on an anti-hate crimes bill.“I have the floor, Mr Jordan,” Demings shouted. “What? Did I strike a nerve?“Law enforcement officers deserve better than to be utilised as pawns, and you and your colleagues should be ashamed of yourselves.”Demings was a member of Orlando police for 27 years and chief from 2007 to 2011. She was elected to Congress in 2016. Her husband, Jerry Demings, is a former sheriff and current mayor of Orlando county.Police brutality and institutional racism have become a national flashpoint in light of the killings of numerous African American men.Demings is a political moderate but Quentin James of the the Collective Pac, a Florida group working on Black voter registration, told Politico her police background and political views would not necessarily handicap her.Young and progressive Floridians “aren’t really anti-police”, he said. “They’re against police brutality.”Rubio is a two-term senator who ran for the Republican presidential nomination in 2016. He was brutally beaten in that race by Donald Trump, then swiftly aligned himself with his persecutor when he won the White House.The prospect of a primary challenge from Ivanka Trump, the former president’s oldest daughter, was briefly the talk of Washington but she has said she will not run.The Senate is split 50-50 and controlled by Democrats through Kamala Harris’s casting vote as vice-president. Demings’s all-but-confirmed decision to run sets up an intriguing contest in a state where the large Latino population has increasingly broken for Republicans. Rubio is the son of Cuban migrants.Demings’s move also leaves the field open for challengers to Ron DeSantis, the Trump-supporting governor seen by some as a possible presidential candidate in 2024. In 2018 Democrats ran a progressive, Andrew Gillum, a former mayor of Tallahassee.Discussing Demings’s likely Senate campaign, James told Politico: “We came very close with Gillum. But now we’re back with a really great candidate.” More