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      Colorado man suspected in wife’s death allegedly voted for Trump in her name

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      A Colorado man suspected in the death of his wife, who disappeared on Mother’s Day last year, is also accused of submitting a fraudulent vote on her behalf for Donald Trump in November’s presidential election, court documents show.Barry Morphew told investigators he mailed the ballot on behalf of his wife, Suzanne Morphew, to help Trump win, saying “all these other guys are cheating” and that he thought his wife would have voted for Trump anyway, according to an arrest warrant affidavit signed by a judge in Chaffee county.Trump and his supporters in the Republican party claim Joe Biden won the White House through mass electoral fraud – a lie repeatedly thrown out of court.In December, the Washington Post reported that “only a handful of cases” of actual voter fraud had “resulted in criminal charges alleging wrongdoing”.Some of the charges, it said, were “against Republican voters aiming to help Trump … including a man charged with trying to cast a ballot in Pennsylvania for the president in the name of his deceased mother”.In Colorado, Morphew, 53, faces possible first-degree murder and other charges in connection with the disappearance of Suzanne Morphew on 10 May last year. He was arrested on 5 May and is being held in connection with that case.Morphew posted a widely viewed video on Facebook pleading for his wife’s safe return shortly after she disappeared.Authorities say the arrest was the result of an investigation that has failed to find Suzanne Morphew’s body. After conducting more than 135 searches across Colorado and interviewing 400 people in multiple states, investigators believe she is dead but have not found her body, the Chaffee county sheriff, John Spezze, has said.An arrest affidavit by an Chaffee county sheriff’s detective sergeant, Claudette Hysjulien, says the county clerk’s office received a suspicious mail ballot in Suzanne Chaffee’s name in October.Sheriff’s investigators saw the ballot, which had been mailed by the state to Suzanne Chaffee, lacked Suzanne’s signature, as required by law. Barry Morphew had signed it as a witness.Morphew was interviewed by two FBI agents about the ballot in April. Asked why he sent it, he told the agents, “Just because I wanted Trump to win,” according to the affidavit. “I just thought, give him another vote.”Asked if he knew it was illegal to send someone else’s ballot, Morphew replied: “I didn’t know you couldn’t do that for your spouse.”The affidavit says Morphew faces two new counts: felony forgery and misdemeanor ballot fraud. On Friday, Morphew was being advised of the new charges in Chaffee county district court. More

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      Tim Scott ‘hopeful’ deal can be reached with Democrats on US policing reform

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      Tim Scott, the Republican senator leading negotiations with Democrats over police reform, who insisted during his rebuttal to Joe Biden’s address to Congress the US was not a racist country, said on Sunday he was “hopeful” a deal can be reached. Scott, from South Carolina and the only Black Republican in the Senate, said he saw progress in talks which stalled last summer as protests raged following the killings of George Floyd and other Black Americans.“One of the reasons why I’m hopeful is because my friends on the left aren’t looking for the issue, they’re looking for a solution, and the things that I offered last year are more popular this year,” the senator told CBS’s Face the Nation.“The goal isn’t for Republicans or Democrats to win, but for communities to feel safer and our officers to feel respected. If we can accomplish those two major goals, the rest will be history.”The talks are intended to break an impasse over the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act, which passed the House in March but is frozen by the 50-50 split in the Senate.Negotiations have taken on increasing urgency following the high-profile killings of Daunte Wright in Minneapolis and Andrew Brown in North Carolina, Black men shot in their vehicles by officers, killings which sparked outrage.“The country supports this reform and Congress should act,” Biden said on Wednesday during his address on Capitol Hill.I personally understand the pain of being stopped 18 times driving while BlackA panel including Scott, the New Jersey Democrat Cory Booker and Karen Bass, the author of the House bill and a Democrat from California, met on Thursday to discuss key elements including individual liability for officers who abuse their power or otherwise overstep the line.Republicans strongly oppose many of the proposals but Booker said it had been “a promising week”.Scott, a rising star in Republican ranks, said he was well-placed to help steer the discussion.“One of the reasons why I asked to lead this police reform conversation on my side of the House is because I personally understand the pain of being stopped 18 times driving while Black,” he said.“And I have also seen the beauty of when officers go door to door with me on Christmas morning, delivering presents to kids in the most underserved communities. So I think I bring an equilibrium to the conversation.”Scott said he was confident major sticking points in the Senate version of the proposed legislation could be overcome and the bill aligned to that which passed the House.“Think about the [parts] of the two bills that are in common … data collection,” he said. “I think through negotiations and conversations we are closer on no-knock warrants and chokeholds, and then there’s something called Section 1033 that has to do with getting government equipment from the military for local police.“I think we’re making progress there too, so we have literally been able to bring these two bills very close together.”The House speaker, Nancy Pelosi, placed no timeline on when a revised version of the bill would get a vote.“We will bring it to the floor when we are ready, and we will be ready when we have a good, strong bipartisan bill,” she said on Thursday. “That is up to the Senate and then we will have it in the House, because it will be a different bill.”On the issue of whether lawsuits could be filed against police departments rather than individual officers, Chuck Schumer, the Democratic Senate majority leader, said: “We’re moving towards a reasonable solution.”Scott said the issue was “another reason why I’m more optimistic this time”.He said: “We want to make sure the bad apples are punished and we’ve seen that, through the convictions of Michael Slager when he shot Walter Scott in the back to the George Floyd convictions.“Those are promising signs, but the real question is how do we change the culture of policing? I think we do that by making the employer responsible for the actions of the employee.”Others senators in the negotiations include Dick Durbin of Illinois and Lindsay Graham of South Carolina, senior figures in their parties.Scott also broke with Republicans who support Donald Trump’s big lie that the presidential election was rigged, saying the party could only move on once it realised “the election is over, Joe Biden is the president of the United States”.On CNN’s State of the Union, Susan Collins, a moderate Republican senator from Maine, appeared to acknowledge Scott’s rising profile.“We are not a party that is led by just one person,” she said. “There are many prominent upcoming younger men and women in our party who hold great promise for leading us.” More

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      Rudy Giuliani’s apartment searched as part of Ukraine investigation

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      Federal investigators have executed a search warrant at a New York office and private apartment belonging to Rudy Giuliani, the former mayor of the city and personal lawyer to Donald Trump.Federal authorities have been examining whether Giuliani illegally lobbied the Trump administration in 2019 on behalf of Ukrainian officials and oligarchs, who at the same time were helping him search for dirt on Trump’s political rivals.Investigators had seized some of Giuliani’s electronic devices from the Upper East Side residence, and from his law office on Park Avenue, early on Wednesday, the New York Times reported.Giuliani’s own lawyer, Robert Costello, condemned the raids as “legal thuggery,” claiming his client had cooperated with prosecutors and offered to answer questions not involving his “privileged” communications with Trump.“What they did today was legal thuggery. Why would you do this to anyone, let alone someone who was the associate attorney general, United States attorney, the mayor of New York City and the personal lawyer to the 45th president of the United States,” he told the Wall Street Journal.Giuliani posted, then deleted, a tweet saying he would be giving a live statement about the raids during his afternoon radio show on WABC radio. When the show started at 3pm, Giuliani was missing and a guest host, Dominic Carter, was presenting.Giuliani was considered a heroic figure in New York politics for his role as a top mafia prosecutor and then as mayor during the 9/11 terror attacks. But his reputation nosedived during the Trump era as he became embroiled in numerous scandals involving the administration and his role as one of Trump’s most fervent cheerleaders and attack dogs.In the infamous “quid pro quo” episode, officials in Ukraine were alleged to be simultaneously attempting to “dig up dirt” on Trump’s political rivals, including Joe Biden, who was shortly to become the Democratic party’s presidential nominee.Biden’s son, Hunter, had business dealings in Ukraine when his father was Barack Obama’s vice-president earlier in the decade, including a seat on the board of Burisma, one of the country’s largest energy companies.The Foreign Agents Registration Act (Fara) makes it a federal crime to try to influence or lobby the US government at the request of a foreign official without informing the justice department.Giuliani was back at the heart of the news cycle after the 2020 presidential election last November. He was a leading proponent of “the big lie”, Trump’s false claim that the election was stolen from him by “widespread fraud” in the voting process.Giuliani became something of a laughing stock when he represented Trump in numerous failed legal challenges to the election result and made inept appearances in court and at press conferences.But the anti-democratic campaign ultimately led to the 6 January insurrection by Trump supporters at the US Capitol, during which five people lost their lives.According to the New York Times, the US attorney’s office in Manhattan and the FBI have been seeking a search warrant for Giuliani’s phones for months, which officials in Trump’s justice department continually sought to block.Following Trump’s departure from office in January, and confirmation in March by the US Senate of Biden’s pick Merrick Garland as attorney general, the justice department dropped its opposition.The Times noted that while the warrant is not an explicit accusation of wrongdoing against Giuliani, it showed the investigation was entering “an aggressive new phase”. The newspaper contacted the FBI and US attorney’s office, both of which, it said, declined to comment.In a tweet on Wednesday, Michael Cohen, Trump’s former personal attorney who was sentenced to three years in prison after pleading guilty to tax evasion, campaign finance fraud and lying to Congress, and who has since become a Trump critic, said simply: “Here we go folks!!!”The New York Times further reported that the FBI also served a search warrant Wednesday on the Washington DC home of attorney Victoria Toensing, an associate of Giuliani and reported contact of Ukraine officials who were looking into the Bidens. Toensing, the newspaper said, has previously represented Dimitry Fitash, a Ukrainian energy billionaire with alleged mob contacts who is under indictment in the US for bribery.The Wall Street Journal said Costello told its reporters that authorities arrived at Giuliani’s apartment at 6am and seized his devices.He said the search warrant described the investigation as a probe into a possible violation of foreign lobbying rules and “sought communications between Mr Giuliani and individuals including John Solomon, a columnist who was corresponding with Mr Giuliani about his effort to push for investigations of Joe Biden in Ukraine”.Solomon, a conservative political operative and Giuliani ally, has been accused of using his columns in the Hill to help spread disinformation about the Bidens’ dealings in Ukraine, his writing earning praise from Trump and his acolytes, who called them worthy of a Pulitzer.The Hill, meanwhile, decided in 2018 to classify Solomon’s future contributions as “opinion.”Costello added that in recent years he had offered to answer investigators’ questions as long as they agreed to say what area they were looking at ahead of time. He said they declined the offer. “It’s like I’m talking to a wall,” Costello said.Prosecutors began looking into Giuliani after building an unrelated case against Lev Parnas and Igor Fruman, two Soviet-born American citizens alleged to have aided his efforts in Ukraine and later charged with crimes including conspiracy and campaign finance violations.The Times said the investigators were looking into Giuliani’s push to remove the then US ambassador to Ukraine, Marie Yovanovitch, whom Trump considered disloyal and obstructive, and whom he removed in May 2019.The Ukraine scandal, and Trump’s dark prediction during his notorious July 2019 call with the country’s prime minister Volodymyr Zelensky that Yovanovitch was “going to go through some things,” was the subject of Trump’s first impeachment trial. More

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      in Elections

      'We are able to breathe again': George Floyd’s family reacts to Derek Chauvin verdict – video

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      Members of George Floyd’s family choked back tears while speaking of their relief that the former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin was convicted of murder in their brother’s death. ‘Today, we are able to breathe again,’ George Floyd’s brother Philonise Floyd told reporters. The Floyd family’s attorney, Benjamin Crump, said they were leaving the court knowing ‘that America is a better country’

      Derek Chauvin guilty verdict: Biden says ‘systemic racism is a stain on our nation’s soul’ – live
      Derek Chauvin found guilty of George Floyd’s murder
      The life of George Floyd: ‘He knew how to make people feel better’ More

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      in US Politics

      Derek Chauvin verdict: ex-police officer found guilty of George Floyd’s murder – live

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      Key events

      Show

      5.08pm EDT
      17:08

      Chauvin guilty of manslaughter

      5.07pm EDT
      17:07

      Chauvin guilty of third-degree murder

      5.07pm EDT
      17:07

      Chauvin guilty of second-degree murder

      4.25pm EDT
      16:25

      Jurors reached verdict after nine hours of deliberations

      3.38pm EDT
      15:38

      Verdict reached in Derek Chauvin murder trial

      Live feed

      Show

      5.50pm EDT
      17:50

      At a press conference after Derek Chauvin’s guilty verdict was read, Keith Ellison, Minnesota Attorney General, has thanked the community for giving his prosecutors the opportunity to pursue the case. Ellison has emphasized, however, that more work must be done.
      “I want to thank the community for giving us that time, and allowing us to do that work,” he says. “That long, hard, painstaking work has culminated today.”
      “I would not call today’s verdict justice, however, because justice implies true restoration, but it is accountability—which is the first step towards justice.”
      “George Floyd mattered,” he says. “He was loved by his family and his friends. His death shocked the conscience of our community, our country, the whole world,” Ellison also says. “But that isn’t why he mattered. He mattered because he was a human being.”
      “This has to end, we need to justice,” Ellison later says.
      “This verdict reminds us that we must make enduring enduring, systemic, societal change.”

      5.38pm EDT
      17:38

      The Council on American-Islamic Relations’s Minnesota chapter has commented on Derek Chauvin’s guilty verdict.
      Jaylani Hussein, CAIR Minnesota’s executive director, says in a statement: “We are encouraged by the jury’s decision to convict Derek Chauvin. It is by no means the end of our efforts to build a more just and equitable Minnesota and nation, but it is an important milestone on our journey and a step to healing deep, generational traumas.”
      “While today’s verdict is encouraging, it does not diminish the urgency with which we must continue our efforts to combat the epidemic of police violence in our communities,” Hussein’s statement says. “George Floyd received justice today in that courtroom, now we must continue advocating for justice for all, everywhere: in the legislature, where we’re fighting to pass bills to increase police oversight and end qualified immunity, in our own communities, where we come together to heal and build trust and mutual understanding, and in the streets, where every day we are organizing, marching, and strengthening our movement.”
      By the way, here’s a recap on what the charges meant:

      The Recount
      (@therecount)
      Here’s a rundown of what the prosecution has to prove to convict Chauvin of three charges: pic.twitter.com/RbQnh4mXol

      April 20, 2021

      Updated
      at 5.45pm EDT

      5.35pm EDT
      17:35

      We now have a pool report detailing the scene inside Judge Peter Cahill’s courtroom for the verdict in Derek Chauvin’s case.
      Philonise Floyd, George Floyd’s brother, was sitting “with his head bowed and his hands folded in front of his face, perhaps in prayer,” prior to the reading of the verdict.
      Cahill enters the courtroom around 4:04 pm local time. The jurors walk in, “all looking serious, none appearing teary,” per the pool report. As Cahill reads the verdict, which found Chauvin guilty on all counts, the former Minneapolis police officer “stares at the empty witness podium.”
      Cahill ultimately thanks jurors for “heavy duty jury service” and they leave. Chauvin stands, hands “hands clasped behind his back.” When a deputy handcuffs Chauvin, he doesn’t resist.
      Philonise Floyd hugs prosecutor Jerry Blackwell, Minnesota attorney general Keith Ellison, and the other prosecutors, the pool report says.
      Here is a tweet from Keith Boykin, which speaks for itself.

      Keith Boykin
      (@keithboykin)
      Derek Chauvin handcuffed. pic.twitter.com/D0KoTJllE6

      April 20, 2021

      Updated
      at 5.38pm EDT

      5.23pm EDT
      17:23

      The Guardian’s Lois Beckett is outside the Minneapolis courthouse where Judge Peter Cahill just announced a guilty verdict in Derek Chauvin’s murder case.
      Beckett reports that the crowd has shouted “Guilty!” once news emerged. There have been huge cheers, with people shouting “Yes!”
      The crowd has chanted “George Floyd!” and “all three counts!” People have been screaming and crying.
      “Whose victory? Our victory” the crowd has chanted. Cars driving by have honked their horns in celebration.
      “Don’t let anyone tell you protest doesn’t work,” a man has told the crowd through a bullhorn.

      5.17pm EDT
      17:17

      The attorneys for George Floyd’s family have released statements following the conviction of former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin.
      Attorney Ben Crump commented: “Painfully earned justice has arrived for George Floyd’s family and the community here in Minneapolis, but today’s verdict goes far beyond this city and has significant implications for the country and even the world. Justice for Black America is justice for all of America. This case is a turning point in American history for accountability of law enforcement and sends a clear message we hope is heard clearly in every city and every state.”
      “Today’s verdict is so critical in that it not only holds Derek Chauvin accountable for his horrific actions, but it reinforces significant police reforms underway in Minneapolis including use-of-force reporting, a requirement to keep body-worn cameras on, and a policy for officers to de-escalate non-threatening encounters by disengaging or walking away. Now we call on Minnesota state lawmakers to pass ” said attorney Antonio M. Romanucci.
      Attorney L. Chris Stewart said: “Today the world had its hope and faith restored in the American justice system. All that people crave is accountability when an officer kills a Black American. For far too long that had never happened. Now George Floyd’s soul can finally rest in peace. Justice has been served.”
      Lawyer Jeff Storms similarly stated: “The impact of George Floyd’s death on Minneapolis is impossible to explain, but today’s verdict is an important step toward healing. The community here has struggled to create accountability for officers who have used excessive force over many years and too many lives and caused so much pain and suffering. This jury has sent a clear and direct message that this can never happen again.”

      5.11pm EDT
      17:11

      Derek Chauvin was directed out of the courtroom in handcuffs moments after the guilty verdict was read in his murder case.

      5.10pm EDT
      17:10

      Derek Chauvin has been remanded in the custody of the Hennepin County Sheriff.

      5.08pm EDT
      17:08

      Chauvin guilty of manslaughter

      Derek Chauvin was found guilty of second-degree manslaughter.

      Updated
      at 5.10pm EDT

      5.07pm EDT
      17:07

      Chauvin guilty of third-degree murder

      Derek Chauvin was found guilty of third-degree murder.

      Updated
      at 5.10pm EDT

      5.07pm EDT
      17:07

      Chauvin guilty of second-degree murder

      Derek Chauvin was found guilty of second-degree unintentional murder.

      Updated
      at 5.10pm EDT

      5.05pm EDT
      17:05

      The judge in Derek Chauvin’s murder trial has taken the bench. We expect the verdict will be read momentarily. More

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      Maxine Waters criticised by Republicans for Minneapolis remarks – video

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      The Democratic representative Maxine Waters has come under criticism from the Republican house minority leader, after she expressed support for protesters against police brutality at a rally on Saturday in Brooklyn Center, the Minneapolis suburb where Daunte Wright, a 20-year-old Black man, was shot and killed by police last week.
      Waters said she would ‘continue to fight in every way that I can for justice’, prompting the Republican minority leader, Kevin McCarthy, to accuse Waters of ‘inciting violence in Minneapolis’

      Republicans demand action against Maxine Waters after Minneapolis remarks More

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      Far-right Oath Keepers member is first suspect to plead guilty in US Capitol riot

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      A member of the far-right Oath Keepers militia group and heavy metal guitarist has become the first defendant to plead guilty to federal charges in connection with the insurrection at the US Capitol.Jon Ryan Schaffer, the frontman of the band Iced Earth, has agreed on Friday to cooperate with investigators in hopes of getting a lighter sentence, and the Justice Department will consider putting Schaffer in the federal witness security program, a US district judge said. This signals that federal prosecutors see him as a valuable cooperator as they continue to investigate militia groups and other extremists involved in the insurrection on 6 January as Congress was meeting to certify Joe Biden’s electoral win.Schaffer, a supporter of Donald Trump, was accused of storming the Capitol and spraying police officers with bear spray. He pleaded guilty in a deal with prosecutors in federal court in Washington to two counts: obstruction of an official proceeding, and entering and remaining in a restricted building with a dangerous or deadly weapon.An email seeking comment was sent to an attorney for Schaffer.Schaffer, of Columbus, Indiana, was wearing a tactical vest and baseball hat that read Oath Keepers Lifetime Member on 6 January and acknowledged in his plea agreement that he is a “founding lifetime member” of the extremist group, prosecutors said.The 53-year-old was not charged in the case involving Oath Keepers members and associates, who are accused of conspiring with one another to block the certification of the vote. The case is the largest and most serious brought by prosecutors so far in the attack.Authorities say those defendants came to Washington ready for violence and intent on stopping the certification. Many came dressed for battle in tactical vests and helmets and some discussed stationing a “quick reaction force” outside the city in the event they needed weapons, prosecutors have said.In his deal with prosecutors, Schaffer admitted to being one of the first people to force their way into the Capitol after the mob broke open a set of doors guarded by Capitol police. Schaffer was sprayed in the face with a chemical irritant that overwhelmed officers deployed and left the Capitol while holding bear spray, authorities said.Schaffer has voiced various conspiracy theories, once telling a German news station that a shadowy criminal enterprise is trying to run the world under a communist agenda and that he and others are prepared to fight, with violence.In court documents, the FBI said Schaffer “has long held far-right extremist views” and that he had previously “referred to the federal government as a ‘criminal enterprise’”.He turned himself in to the FBI a few weeks after the riot, after his photograph was featured on an FBI poster seeking the public’s help in identifying rioters.More than 370 people are facing federal charges in the deadly insurrection. More