AMERIKA ALL VIOLENCE IS RIGHT WING VIOLENCE
A man charged with killing a federal officer during George Floyd protests is tied to the far-right 'Boogaloo' movement, authorities say

Sonam Sheth

A member of the far-right militia, Boogaloo Bois, walks next to protesters demonstrating outside Charlotte Mecklenburg Police Department Metro Division 2 just outside of downtown Charlotte, North Carolina, on May 29, 2020. LOGAN CYRUS/AFP via Getty Images


A man who was charged with killing two officers in recent weeks — including one standing guard during an anti-police brutality protest following George Floyd's death — has ties to the far-right "Boogaloo" movement, authorities said in federal court documents.

Air Force Staff Sgt. Steve Carrillo was charged with killing the first officer, David Patrick Underwood, in a drive-by attack on May 29.

Carrillo was also arrested and charged with killing a second officer in a separate ambush after authorities arrived at his home following Underwood's murder.

When investigators searched Carrillo's car, they discovered a ballistic vest with insignia linked to the "Boogaloo" movement, which prosecutors defined as "a term used by extremists to reference a violent uprising or impending civil war in the United States."

The charges against Carrillo come amid multiple instances of individuals associated with the far-right being accused of stoking violence connected to the protests against police brutality.

Meanwhile, President Donald Trump and his Republican allies have accused the far-left group antifa of organizing the violence, despite a lack of evidence to back up the claim.

A man charged with killing two officers in recent, separate attacks in California has ties to the far-right "Boogaloo" movement, authorities said in a federal indictment.

Air Force Staff Sgt. Steven Carrillo was charged Tuesday with killing a federal service officer, 53-year-old David Patrick Underwood at an Oakland courthouse in a drive-by attack on May 29, the Justice Department announced Tuesday.

Carrillo also faces state charges in the killing of Santa Cruz County Sgt. Damon Gutzwiller on June 6.

A second man, Robert Justus Jr., was charged with aiding and abetting Carrillo in killing Underwood in the initial attack. Another officer was also critically wounded in the ambush. Both officers were guarding the courthouse while demonstrations against racism took place nearby, and both were part of the Department of Homeland Security's Federal Protective Service.


Law enforcement officials said Carrillo and Justus went to Oakland to kill police officers and believed that nationwide protests against police brutality following the death of 46-year-old George Floyd would facilitate their motives.

Floyd was a Black man who died after a white Minneapolis police officer knelt on his neck for nearly nine minutes while Floyd said he couldn't breathe and begged for air.

Authorities went on a manhunt following Underwood's slaying on May 29. Eight days later, they showed up at Carrillo's home after discovering a van belonging to him that contained firebombs, ammunition, and materials used to make bombs, authorities said.

When officials arrived at his home on June 6, Carrillo ambushed them, killing Gutzwiller and injuring another officer, prosecutors said.

When they searched Carrillo's van after the ambush, officials discovered a ballistic vest that had a patch on it with insignia linked to the far-right "Boogaloo" movement, the charging document said.

The "Boogaloo" movement, as defined by prosecutors in Carrillo's indictment, "is a term used by extremists to reference a violent uprising or impending civil war in the United States."

Carrillo allegedly used his own blood to write "various phrases" on the hood of a Toyota Camry that he carjacked as well, prosecutors said. One officer reviewed a photograph and recognized the word and phrases "BOOG," "I became unreasonable," and "stop the duopoly."
There have been multiple recent instances of far-right individuals accused of violence, but the Trump administration has largely blamed antifa for clashes

The charges in Carrillo's and Justus' cases come amid multiple instances of individuals associated with the far-right being accused of trying to stoke violence connected to the demonstrations against police brutality.

Earlier this month, three men who were self-proclaimed members of the "Boogaloo" movement were arrested on domestic terrorism charges and accused of carrying unregistered firearms and trying to spark riots during the demonstrations.

According to the charging document, which was reviewed by Business Insider, the three defendants previously served in the US Navy, US Army, and US Air Force.

Last Monday, CNN reported that a man accused of driving his car through a crowd of protesters in Virginia during the previous weekend was an "admitted leader" of the Ku Klux Klan and a "propagandist for Confederate ideology," according to the county attorney.

The man, Harry Rogers, was charged with attempted malicious wounding, felony vandalism and assault, and battery.

The arrests come as President Donald Trump and his allies urge law enforcement officials to crack down on the protests and accuse "antifa" — a loosely organized far-left group of anti-fascism activists — of sparking violence during the demonstrations.

But a closer examination of court records, media reports, and social media posts shows little evidence of a widespread or organized antifa-led effort to infiltrate the protests.

In early June, The Nation reported that the FBI had "no intelligence indicating Antifa involvement/presence" in violence that took place on May 31 as protests following Floyd's death reached a climax. The report cited an internal situation report from the FBI's Washington, DC, field office.

But the situation report did warn that people associated with a right-wing social media group had "called for far-right provocateurs to attack federal agents" and "use automatic weapons against protesters."


Politico also reported this month that a Department of Homeland Security intelligence note warned law-enforcement officials that a white supremacist channel on the encrypted messaging app Telegram encouraged its followers to incite violence to start a race war during the protests.

Citing the FBI, it said that two days after Floyd's death, the channel "incited followers to engage in violence and start the 'boogaloo.'"

One of the messages in the channel called for potential shooters to "frame the crowd around you" for the violence, the note said, according to Politico.

On May 29, the note said, "suspected anarchist extremists and militia extremists allegedly planned to storm and burn the Minnesota State Capitol."

And NBC News reported this month that Twitter had identified a group posing as an "antifa" organization calling for violence in the protests as actually being linked to the white supremacist group Identity Evropa.

Twitter suspended the account, @ANTIFA_US, after it posted a tweet that incited violence. A company spokesperson also told NBC News that the account violated Twitter's rules against platform manipulation and spam.

RIGHT ON TIME
West Virginia sees coronavirus outbreaks in churches

Less than a month after President Trump urged churches to reopen

THE ANTI-CHRIST SACRIFICES HIS FOLLOWERS TO BRING FORTH ARMAGEDDON/APOCALYPSE/RAPTURE 

Alexander NazaryanNational Correspondent, Yahoo News•June 15, 2020

WASHINGTON — Less than a month after President Trump urged churches to reopen, West Virginia has reported a significant number of coronavirus outbreaks linked to houses of worship. According to the state’s public health office, a total of five churches have seen outbreaks.

Those churches are scattered across the rugged, mountainous state. The affected churches are in Jefferson County on the border with Maryland; Boone County, in the state’s southwestern coalfields, not far from the Kentucky border; Hampshire County, also near the Maryland border; and Marshall County, in a narrow swath of the state squeezed between Ohio and Pennsylvania known as the Northern Panhandle.

The state’s Department of Health and Human Resources announced the five-church outbreak in a Saturday press release about a house of worship in Greenbrier County, where it said “at least 17 cases have been identified.” It did not name the Greenbrier church, or the churches in the other four counties, to “protect the possibility of identifying individuals.”

On Monday, health officials said that there had been eight church-related cases in Hampshire County, seven in Boone County and five each in Jefferson and Marshall counties. Speaking at a press conference on Monday, West Virginia Gov. Jim Justice revealed that the outbreak in Greenbrier County was at Graystone Baptist Church in Lewisburg. And he said that the number of cases there had risen to 28.

State health officials told Yahoo News that the infected churchgoers had themselves infected an additional 26 people, so that the total number of people who had contracted the coronavirus either directly or indirectly because of the worship services was now 79. “DHHR is monitoring any increase in COVID-19 cases with coordination from the local health department,” said Allison Adler, director of communications for the Department of Health and Human Resources. She said that the West Virginia National Guard was assisting in the response, including by helping clean the five churches.
Graystone Baptist Church in Lewisburg, W.Va. (via Facebook)

Describing the coronavirus as a “cannonball killer,” Justice suggested that officials at the church did not take sufficient measures to protect parishioners.

“Maybe we didn’t use the level of caution there,” Justice said. “Maybe we didn’t social distance properly, or properly wear masks.” He later clarified that this was only “hearsay.”

Graystone Baptist posted a statement on Facebook on Saturday afternoon, around the same time that state health officials sent out the notice about the outbreaks in the state. “We greatly encouraged anyone who was feeling ill to remain home. Attending church was on a voluntary basis. We exemplified social distancing within the church walls,” the statement said.

“We made aware and made use of hand sanitizing stations and Antibacterial sprays,” the statement continued. “We do not understand the source of the outbreak. To the best of our ability we followed the guidelines that were given to us.”

Trump insisted in late May that churches reopen, threatening governors who continued to impose restrictions on houses of worship. The pronouncement, which appeared to lack legal grounds because such decisions reside with governors, covered synagogues, mosques and other congregations. But some believe the order was meant to specifically address weakening political support for Trump among evangelical Christians, whose votes Trump needs in the November election.

Writing in the Washington Post, two evangelical leaders called the president’s push to reopen churches “irresponsible and potentially destructive.”

In another move that appeared targeted at conservative Christian voters, Trump earlier this month had the U.S. Park Police disperse peaceful protesters gathered in Lafayette Square, across the street from the White House, so that he could walk to St. John’s Episcopal Church and pose holding a Bible there. That highly controversial incident backfired when some religious leaders condemned the use of force for the sake of a photo shoot.

West Virginia Gov. Jim Justice. (Al Drago/Reuters)

Gov. Justice is a billionaire, the only one in the entire state. He owns the Greenbrier, a historic luxury resort in Greenbrier County that is about 10 miles from Lewisburg. He described Graystone Baptist as “right in my backdoor.” Justice was elected as a Democrat in 2016 but announced that he was becoming a Republican some months later. He and President Trump have been close allies ever since.

“A lot of the attendance at our churches are those that are elderly and at higher risk, so we are cautioning everyone to strictly follow our guidelines,” Justice was quoted as saying in the health department’s press release, which went out on Saturday afternoon. “As I have said many times, we will have stormy seas before we get a vaccine, so it is imperative that we strictly follow the guidelines or the seas will only get rougher.”

Justice advised church attendees to “use every other pew, maintain social distancing, and please wear masks.” State health authorities announced that there would be additional coronavirus testing sites on Sunday and Monday in Lewisburg, the county seat.

The state’s coronavirus czar, Dr. Clay Marsh, said on Monday that “singing is a particular challenge when it comes to the spread” of the coronavirus. Singing is integral to religious gatherings in nearly all cultures and faiths. On March 3 and 10, a coronavirus superspreader infected 52 people at choir practices in Skagit County, Washington state. Two of those people died.Some places of worship in West Virginia chose not to reopen even once they were permitted to do so. Rabbi Joe Blair of Temple Israel in the state capital of Charleston said that while there was a “push” from some of the synagogue’s board members to reopen, he worried about elderly congregants and would resume in-person worship only “when it is safe and prudent to do so.” Blair told Yahoo News that prospects were “extremely low” for Temple Israel to reopen by the time the two holiest Jewish holidays, Yom Kippur and Rosh Hashanah, take place in late September.

Bruce Lane, a pastor at the Chestnut Creek megachurch in Morgantown, where the flagship state university is based, said that his congregation was taking a similar approach. “We’ve decided to be a little cautious right now,” Lane told Yahoo News. He expects in-person church services to resume in early August.

John King, executive pastor of the Bible Center Church in Charleston, told Yahoo News that he had not “seen a rise in COVID cases in our congregation.” King said, “One of our steps has been to delay resuming our in person weekend gatherings until the end of June. We presently do not have groups gathering in our building other than staff.”

The news about church-based outbreaks comes as many Americans continue to gather at large demonstrations to protest police brutality. Speaking to Yahoo News last week, Dr. Anthony Fauci, a leading member of the White House coronavirus task force, said he was “concerned” the protests could lead to a spike in coronavirus cases.

Meanwhile, in many states, restaurants, bars and other establishments have begun to reopen after months of lockdown. Public health officials worry that those activities, like religious services, could contribute to an increase in coronavirus infections.

COVID-19, the lower respiratory disease caused by the coronavirus, has infected 2.1 million Americans, killing nearly 116,000. Reports of “quarantine fatigue” have been widespread, and people have sometimes flouted lockdown restrictions in states where such measures remain in place. That worries public health officials, who have pointed to drastic rises in coronavirus infection rates in states like Texas and Florida, which were among the slowest to close and the quickest to reopen.

A reopened beach on Friday in Miami Beach, Fla. (MediaPunch/IPX via AP)
West Virginia has so far been relatively mildly affected by the coronavirus, which has killed 88 people there. It was the last state to record a coronavirus case, though it is unclear whether that was because the pathogen was slow to arrive there or because the state’s public health authorities were slow to have diagnostic testing resources. The state has an older population that could prove particularly vulnerable to the coronavirus.

No other state appears to have reported as many outbreaks related to religious gatherings as West Virginia, though that could be because diagnostic testing and reporting practices vary widely across the nation. Early in the pandemic, coronavirus clusters were reported in communities of religious Jews in and around New York City. And in March, a church in rural Arkansas saw 35 of 92 attendees at a religious service test positive for the coronavirus, making for a troublingly high 38 percent infection rate from a single event.

In his remarks on Monday, Justice said that “all of our churches should take heed.” He added that “losing lives” by neglecting to institute proper precautionary measures was “not worth it.”

San Francisco's District Attorney is suing DoorDash for classifying workers as contractors instead of employees despite AB5 gig-worker law

Katie Canales

A worker with a DoorDash delivery pouch in San Francisco in 2019. Katie Canales/Business Insider

San Francisco District Attorney Chesa Boudin is suing food delivery platform DoorDash for misclassifying its workers as contractors instead of employees.

The civil lawsuit is one of the latest examples of how California's AB5 law is upending tech companies' reliance on the gig economy.

The law went into effect in January and requires companies to treat their gig workers as employees, an action that the lawsuit is calling for DoorDash to take.

A DoorDash spokesperson told Business Insider in an email that "today's action seeks to disrupt the essential services Dashers provide."

San Francisco District Attorney Chesa Boudin is suing food delivery platform DoorDash for "unlawful and unfair business practices."

According to the complaint, pulled by Mission Local reporter Joe Eskenazi who first reported the news, the company has continued to classify its delivery workers as independent contractors instead of employees in direct defiance of a California law passed to prevent companies from doing just that.

The state's AB5 law went into effect in early January 2020 and strives not only to require companies to classify gig workers as employees but also to pay local, state, and federal taxes in accordance with that classification, as Eater SF notes. Boudin's civil lawsuit is asking for DoorDash to classify its delivery workers, known as "Dashers," as employees.

"Today's action seeks to disrupt the essential services Dashers provide, stripping hundreds of thousands of students, teachers, parents, retirees and other Californians of valuable work opportunities, depriving local restaurants of desperately needed revenue, and making it more difficult for consumers to receive prepared food, groceries, and other essentials safely and reliably," DoorDash Global Head of Public Policy Max Rettig said in an email to Business Insider. "We will fight to continue providing Dashers the flexible earning opportunities they say they want in these challenging times."


San Francisco tech companies — including Uber, Postmates, and Lyft — and their business models rely heavily on gig workers. By doing so they're able to avoid the higher costs that come with doling out wages and benefits typically reserved for full-time employees.

DoorDash — which filed to go public in late February — isn't the only firm that has aggressively pushed back on AB5. The company and others like Lyft, Uber, and Instacart have poured millions into a campaign supporting a California ballot measure designed to reverse the AB5 law.

Ride-hailing giant Uber and food delivery company Postmates had also filed a lawsuit in December 2019 arguing that the law was unconstitutional.

But the gig workers are also going to court.

As Business Insider's Tyler Sonnemaker reported, drivers with Uber and Lyft in California filed claims against the companies in mid-April. The workers claimed they were owed at least $630 million in back wages as their employers continued to classify them as independent contractors, despite the passage of AB5.

SEE ALSO: DoorDash is preparing an IPO.

Feds say company provided subpar steel for US Navy subs

GRIFTER NATION 

MILITARY INDUSTRIAL COMPLEX

GETS SLAP ON THE WRIST
Gene Johnson, The Associated Press,Defense News•June 16, 2020




SEATTLE — For decades, the Navy’s leading supplier of high-strength steel for submarines provided subpar metal because one of the company’s longtime employees falsified lab results — putting sailors at greater risk in the event of collisions or other impacts, federal prosecutors said in court filings Monday.

The supplier, Kansas City-based Bradken Inc., paid $10.9 million as part of a deferred prosecution agreement, the Justice Department said. The company provides steel castings that Navy contractors Electric Boat and Newport News Shipbuilding use to make submarine hulls.

Bradken in 2008 acquired a foundry in Tacoma, Washington, that produced steel castings for the Navy. According to federal prosecutors, Bradken learned in 2017 that the foundry's director of metallurgy had been falsifying the results of strength tests, indicating that the steel was strong enough to meet the Navy's requirements when in fact it was not.

US Navy commissions its last Block III Virginia submarine

Prosecutors say the company initially disclosed its findings to the Navy but then wrongfully suggested that the discrepancies were not the result of fraud. That hindered the Navy's investigation into the scope of the problem as well as its efforts to remediate the risks to its sailors, prosecutors said.

“Bradken placed the Navy’s sailors and its operations at risk,” Seattle U.S. Attorney Brian Moran said in a news release. “Government contractors must not tolerate fraud within their organizations, and they must be fully forthcoming with the government when they discover it.”

There is no allegation in the court documents that any submarine parts failed, but Moran said the Navy had incurred increased costs and maintenance to ensure the subs remain seaworthy. The government did not disclose which subs were affected.

The foundry's director of metallurgy, Elaine Thomas, 66, of Auburn, Washington, was charged criminally with one count of major fraud against the United States. Thomas, who worked in various capacities at the lab for 40 years, was due to make an initial appearance in federal court June 30. Her attorney, John Carpenter, declined to comment.

The criminal complaint said investigators were able to compare internal company records with test results that Thomas certified. The analysis showed that she fabricated the results of 240 productions of steel, representing nearly half of the high-yield steel Bradken produced for Navy submarines — often toughness tests conducted at negative-100 degrees Fahrenheit, the complaint said.

When a special agent with the Department of Defense's Criminal Investigative Service confronted her with falsified results dating back to 1990, she eventually conceded that the results were altered — “Yeah, that looks bad,” the complaint quoted her as saying. She said she may have done it because she believed it was “a stupid requirement” that the test be conducted at such a cold temperature, the complaint said.

Investigators said the fraud came to light when a metallurgist being groomed to replace Thomas upon her planned 2017 retirement noticed some suspicious results. The company said it immediately fired Thomas.

“While the company acknowledges that it failed to discover and disclose the full scope of the issue during the initial stages of the investigation, the government has recognized Bradken’s cooperation over the last eighteen months to be exceptional,” the company said in an emailed statement. “Bradken has a long history of proudly serving its clients, and this incident is not representative of our organization. We deeply regret that a trusted employee engaged in this conduct.”

Bradken agreed to take steps that include increased oversight over the lab, fraud protections and changes to the foundry’s management team. If Bradken complies with the requirements outlined in the deferred prosecution agreement, the government will dismiss the criminal fraud charge against it after three years.

BEING QUEER SHOULD NOT BE A DEATH SENTENCE

LGBTQ activist Sarah Hegazi, exiled in Canada after torture in Egypt, dies at 30

Hegazi struggled with depression, trauma after enduring 3 months of torture by Egyptian authorities

Nick Boisvert · CBC News · Posted: Jun 16, 2020

friend captured a photo of Sarah Hegazi hoisting a rainbow flag at a concert in Cairo in 2017. She was arrested and tortured by the Egyptian authorities not long after. (Amr Magdi/Twitter)

A prominent LGBTQ activist who sought asylum in Canada after being arrested and tortured in her native Egypt has died, leaving behind unfulfilled dreams of liberating other people targeted for their sexual orientation and political beliefs.

Sarah Hegazi, 30, is being remembered as an inspiring symbol of resistance and bravery by mourners around the world.

She was found dead in her Toronto apartment on Saturday, June 13, of an apparent suicide.

Hegazi was imprisoned in the fall of 2017 after waving a rainbow flag at a concert in Cairo by the Lebanese band Mashrou'Leila, whose lead singer Hamed Sinno is openly gay.

The sight of the flag associated with LGBTQ liberation being so prominently displayed at the concert outraged many in the Egyptian establishment. It ignited a three-week anti-gay crackdown by the authorities, in which Hegazi was the only woman arrested.

"It was a shock for the conservative community and it was a shock to the Egyptian government," said her friend Ahmed Alaa, who was also jailed after raising a rainbow flag at the show.

In interviews, she was tortured by the Egyptian government for three months before her release on bail. Fearing her eventual prosecution as an openly gay woman in a country that routinely targets and charges its gay citizens with crimes of debauchery and blasphemy, Hegazi fled to Canada shortly after.

In Syria, he lived in secret. Now he's helping other LGBTQ refugees

Rainbow Railroad station praises expansion of program to help LGBTQ refugees get to Canada

In an interview with CBC News in 2018, Hegazi spoke of the unrelenting trauma caused by her imprisonment, which she said included torture by electric shock.

"I want to get over it and I want to forget," she said at the time. "But no, I'm still stuck in prison."

Hegazi described a life in Canada marked not by relief or a sense of sanctuary, but of nightmares, depression and panic attacks.

She was also debilitated by severe loneliness after being separated from her beloved mother and younger siblings, who remained in Egypt. Hegazi's mother died of cancer a month after she landed in Canada.

"Home is not land and borders. It's about people you love," Hegazi said. "Here in Canada, I haven't people, I haven't family, I haven't friends. So I'm not happy here."


Sarah Hegazi, a prominent Egyptian LGBTQ activist, has died in Toronto after fleeing imprisonment and torture in her homeland. 

While grateful for the protection from prosecution provided in Canada, Hegazi said she dreamed of returning to her homeland to continue her fight against discrimination, Western imperialism and capitalism.

But doing so would require shaking off the trauma of her imprisonment, which she described as a near-insurmountable task.

"If I get the help and I can feel like I'm finally free from it, I'll be able to not only help my brother and sister, but hundreds of people who I know need it," Hegazi said.
A close friend promises to continue her life's work

Hegazi also hoped to draw attention away from her own experience and toward the many other people languishing in prisons at the hands of menacing regimes.

"I don't want to focus only on my case, I want to focus on the hundreds of thousands of people that are in jail because they either have a different political standing or sexual orientation," Hegazi said.

While Alaa said he is still struggling to accept her death, he pledged to remember her as a champion for human rights.

"For everyone who needs help and support, Sarah was the most kind, the most supportive person you might ever see," said Alaa, who also fled Egypt and now lives in Toronto.

Ahmed Alaa joined Hegazi in Canada after being jailed and tortured. 'All she wanted was to go back to Egypt, to live in peace, to love her siblings,' he said. (Grant Linton/CBC)

The two met in Egypt while working with a domestic violence organization. They later bonded over their shared interest in advancing human rights for Egyptians in the LGBTQ community.

"She was fighting a lot, but she just lost her energy," Alaa said, adding that continuing her work is "the only thing we can do."

Lead singer, LGBTQ community honours Hegazi online

News of her death has sparked an outpouring of support on social media, with many people using the hashtag #RaiseTheFlagForSarah in her honour.

But in a Facebook post, Hamed Sinno confronted an altogether different wave of online comments that welcomed news of her death, which was framed as the result of a life lived in contravention of God. 

https://www.facebook.com/1328501785/videos/10223708227916890/

"I don't know what to make of the amount of hate I've seen over the last two days," he wrote. "None of this is God's will. None of this is religion."

Sinno concluded the post by quoting a line of Hegazi's poetry, originally written in Arabic:

"The sky is sweeter than the earth, and I need the sky not the earth."

With files from Joyita Sengupta, Anand Ram, Adrienne Arsenault, Yasmine Hassan and Chris Glover

CANADA

CERB payments to be extended for 2 more months

Beginning July 5, recipients must sign attestation acknowledging government wants them to work

MAKE IT PERMANENT CALL IT
 UNIVERSAL BASIS INCOME UBI

Kathleen Harris · CBC News · Posted: Jun 16, 2020

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau announced a two-month extension to the Canada emergency response benefit today. (Adrian Wyld/The Canadian Press)

The Canada emergency response benefit (CERB) is being extended by two more months, even as the government encourages people to look for jobs and to go back to work when it's possible to do so.

CERB has provided taxable payments of $2,000 for up to four months to Canadians who lost income because of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau announced today that the financial supports will be extended for eight weeks for those who still can't work as provinces and territories gradually reopen their economies.

"The reality is that there are three million people out of work who are looking for work, and even as our economy is reopening, there are many, many more people out of work, willing to work, than there are jobs available," he said.

Governments shouldn't 'scare' Canadians, Liberal MP says as Ottawa threatens penalties for CERB fraud

A draft bill placed conditions on CERB payments requiring recipients to actively look for work and to not turn down reasonable work opportunities. That legislation did not pass, but Trudeau said today the government will find ways to encourage people to work when they are able.


CERB payments being extended 8 weeks: Trudea

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau says the Canada emergency response benefit (CERB) will be extended by two more months for those who still cannot work as provinces and territories gradually reopen their economies. 1:53

Employment Minister Carla Qualtrough said CERB recipients for the new phase will be required to sign an attestation acknowledging the government is encouraging them to look for work and to consult with the government's job bank.

"We know that Canadians are eager and ready to do their part. We expect that workers will be seeking work opportunities or returning to work when their employer reaches out to them, provided they are able and it is reasonable for them to do so," she said.

That attestation will be in place on July 5, according to her office.

Canadians have made 190,000 repayments on CERB claims, says CRA

The government has been encouraging employers to apply for the wage subsidy program, which covers 75 per cent of an employee's pay, up to $847 a week. More than 223,000 employers have applied for the Canada emergency wage subsidy to cover 2.6 million employees across the country, Qualtrough said.

"While the CERB has been helping millions of Canadian workers get through this difficult time, we know that this benefit is not a long-term solution," she said. "We are moving from a phase in the pandemic where we were asking everyone to stay home, to a phase where workers are going back to work when it is safe and possible for them to do so."

The student emergency benefit, which gives eligible students $1,250 a month — or $2,000 if they have a dependent — requires recipients to attest they are "actively looking for a job."

"The Canada Revenue Agency (CRA) may ask you to provide information later to verify that you have been looking for work during the eligibility period(s) that you have applied for, so it is important to keep track of your ongoing job search activities," the website reads.
Long-term solutions needed: Singh

NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh had called on the government to extend CERB for at least four months

"Millions of Canadians have been worried about how they will pay their bills this summer. The government can't put people in this situation again come August. Over the weeks ahead, we need a long-term plan to repair EI so that it is finally designed to continue to support workers that can't go back to work and still need help," he said in a statement.

"The prime minister says he has heard us and is extending support through CERB through the summer. This is what we were calling for in the short term. We'll keep working to make sure help is there for Canadians who need it in the long term."

Conservative employment critic MP Dan Albas called on the government to make "simple changes" that would help those ineligible for CERB.

He said there should also be built-in incentives for people to work whenever possible.

Federal deficit likely now at $260 billion due to COVID-19, PBO says

"As businesses start having shifts to fill, Canadians should not be penalized for returning to work. But that's exactly how the Liberals' programs are structured. Earning more than $1,000 a month results in a worker losing their entire benefit," he said.

"That is why Conservatives have called on the government to make the CERB more flexible so that no one is worse off going back to work or picking up a shift."

Employees who make more than $1,000 a month are no longer eligible for CERB. The Conservatives have called for a scaled approach that would allow people to collect a percentage of CERB while working more hours.

Watch | Power & Politics: Employment Minister Carla Qualtrough on the CERB extension
Feds extend CERB by eight weeks | Carla Qualtrough12 hours ago News
Employment Minister Carla Qualtrough on the decision to extend the Canada Emergency Response Benefit by two months. 9:58

USA WAGE SLAVERY
Just 3 in 10 people working outside the home get hazard pay, despite ‘pervasive fear’ of bringing coronavirus home

This fear exists ‘especially among vulnerable workers with the least bargaining power, such as Black and Hispanic workers and low- and middle-income workers’

LIKE THE UI $600 BONUS THE REPUBLICANS AND TRUMP WANT ENDED HERE AGAIN LOW PAID WORKERS WHO WOULD BENEFIT MOST, AS WOULD THE LOCAL ECONOMY, GET SCREWED BY CHEAP ASSED EMPLOYERS, TOO CHEAP TO PAY A LIVING WAGE AND HAZARD PAY

June 16, 2020 By Meera Jagannathan

Workers of color are overrepresented in essential jobs that 

require them to commute to work outside the home. GETTY IMAGES

For many people heading in to work during the COVID-19 pandemic, the rewards haven’t kept pace with the perceived risks, a new analysis suggests.

More than half of workers leaving their homes to go to work say they’re concerned about exposing their households to the coronavirus, but just 30% are compensated with hazard pay, according to a new report by the Economic Policy Institute, a left-leaning think tank. About 27% of white people, 41% of black people and 34% of Hispanic people working outside the home receive hazard pay.

See also:Cuomo: Federal government should pay frontline workers ‘hazard pay’ for risking their lives during coronavirus pandemic

Black, Hispanic and non-college educated workers leaving home for work are more likely to get hazard pay, the study found, “though not in proportion to the perceived greater risks”: About 71% of black people working outside the home are afraid of bringing the virus into their households, for example, while around 41% get hazard pay.

The study commissioned questions on a recent YouGov poll and also wrapped in survey findings from the National Employment Law Project (NELP), the progressive Roosevelt Institute and other sources. It defined hazard pay as when workers “received extra pay or benefits because of the higher risks you face” as either a one-time bonus or payment, a change in wage rate or another type of financial benefit.

‘Workers are thus being forced to make unacceptable choices between economic sustenance and their health and their family’s health, a squeeze targeted at those with the least power in the labor market.’— report by the Economic Policy Institute

“There is pervasive fear among workers of bringing the coronavirus home from work, especially among vulnerable workers with the least bargaining power, such as Black and Hispanic workers and low- and middle-income workers,” wrote the authors. “These workers are not being protected by OSHA-established standards and they are also not receiving additional compensation in proportion to the risks they face.”

Workers of color are overrepresented in essential jobs that require them to commute to work outside the home, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention note.

One Washington Post-Ipsos survey included in the EPI analysis found that 72% of Hispanic workers and 68% of black workers employed outside of their homes worried about exposure to COVID-19 on the job and subsequent infection of household members, compared to 50% of white workers.

Racial disparities also emerged in responses to a separate NELP survey, which asked, “Have you gone to work outside your home during this pandemic, even though you thought it might be seriously risking your health or a family member’s health?” Some 73% of black respondents and 64% of Hispanic respondents replied “yes” to the question, versus 49% of white respondents.

The HEROES Act passed by the Democrat-controlled House last month would provide up to $10,000 in “pandemic premium pay” for essential workers.
Many employees are “being forced to work in order to sustain their families, and many are being denied unemployment benefits for not being willing to go to jobs they consider unsafe,” the EPI report’s authors wrote.

“Workers are thus being forced to make unacceptable choices between economic sustenance and their health and their family’s health, a squeeze targeted at those with the least power in the labor market,” they said. “Policies to protect workers’ health on the job as well as to provide decent pay and income maintenance are essential.”

The extra $600 Americans receive in weekly unemployment benefits ends in July — how that could cost the U.S. more jobs

For every dollar spent on unemployment insurance, there’s a multiplier effect leading to a 1.64 increase in GDP, research shows

IN CANADA THE GOVERNMENT HAS EXTENDED ITS EMERGENCY FUNDING TILL THE END OF SEPTEMBER

CERB payments to be extended for 2 more months | CBC News

https://www.cbc.ca › news › politics › cerb-extended-trudeau-1.5613782

11 hours ago - Prime Minister Justin Trudeau announced today that the financial supports will be extended for eight weeks for those who still can't work as ...

Published: June 16, 2020 By Elisabeth Buchwald

In New York, the state that’s been hardest hit by coronavirus, construction workers are being put back to work in some areas during the state’s Phase 1 reopening. GETTY IMAGES

Two-thirds of Americans are receiving more money from unemployment benefits than they did from their jobs, largely because of a supplemental $600 weekly benefit that’s part of the $2.2 trillion CARES Act.
But decreasing those benefits could cost the country even more jobs on top of the historic 20 million jobs that have already been wiped away by the coronavirus pandemic, Heidi Shierholz, an economist at the Economic Policy Institute, a left-leaning think-tank based in Washington, D.C., said.

If the extra $600 unemployment benefit expires, millions of Americans will have less money to spend in stores, and that could ultimately lead to more unemployment.— Heidi Shierholz, an economist at the Economic Policy Institute

The weekly supplemental $600 benefit is set to expire at the end of July if the U.S. Senate and President Donald Trump don’t pass the $3 trillion HEROES Act stimulus package, which would extend the $600 weekly add-on unemployment benefit into January 2021.

Don’t miss: The extra $600 Americans get in weekly unemployment benefits ends next month — here’s what lawmakers are proposing to replace it


Republican lawmakers hold that the $600 weekly boost in unemployment insurance during the pandemic is a disincentive to return back to work, given that people could earn more from not working.

Ohio Republican Senator Rob Portman has instead proposed using federal funds to distribute a $450 return to work bonus. White House economic advisor Larry Kudlow said Tuesday that “it’s something we’re looking at very carefully.”


However, job openings hit a three-year low in March but made a slight bounce back in April with 10 million job losses compared to 14.6 million in March, according to Bureau of Labor Statistics monthly Job Openings and Labor Turnover report. The number of people hired in April fell to the lowest level on record at 3.5 million. Before the pandemic, job openings were running well above 7 million and had hit a record high.

Job openings are expected to continue to dwindle, suggesting that more Americans are unlikely to leave their state’s unemployment insurance program.

If the extra $600 unemployment benefit expires, millions of Americans will have less money to spend in stores, and that could ultimately lead to more unemployment, Shierholz said. “It’s not true that there’s a pool of jobs out there that people would fill if they weren’t receiving unemployment benefits,” she said.


For every dollar spent on unemployment insurance, there’s a multiplier effect leading to a 1.64 increase in GDP.

For every dollar spent on unemployment insurance, there’s a multiplier effect leading to a 1.64 increase in GDP, according to a 2008 study published by Mark Zandi, chief economist at Moody’s Analytics MCO, +1.60%. Meanwhile, for every dollar spent on infrastructure projects, U.S. GDP could be expected to increase by a multiple of 1.59.


That’s evident in last month’s retail sales report which documented a record 17.7% jump in retail sales. The brightest spots in terms of purchases Americans made were cars, clothing, furniture, books, music and sporting goods.

If people didn’t have checks to make these purchases, the job losses would have been much greater, Shierholz said. That could also help explain May’s surprise jobs report where nearly 2.7 million Americans who were temporarily laid off amid the coronavirus pandemic were rehired.

That’s why she considers it “incredibly efficient money to fight the recession.”

Right now, “it is appropriate to have the additional $600,” Zandi told MarketWatch, given the country’s 13.3% unemployment rate. Speaking anecdotally, he added that it is “hard to imagine people wouldn’t take their jobs back for a couple of hundred bucks.”

Meanwhile, for people who have no savings, “If they don’t get a check they’re going to be panicked and that makes for a very dark situation,” said Zandi, who advised the presidential campaign of the late U.S. Senator John McCain.

But that doesn’t mean that the extra $600 in unemployment should stay forever.

“At some point, lawmakers need to think about reducing it and winding down,” Zandi said. Once unemployment returns to “single digits,” he said, lawmakers should consider halving unemployment benefits.

Like Sen. Portman, Stan Veuger, an economist at the American Enterprise Institute, a right-leaning policy think-tank, believes the amount of money being distributed to Americans who are out of work is problematic.

“It’s reasonable to have an addition to what people would otherwise receive from their state unemployment program, but I don’t think it should be as large,” he said. “We want businesses to rehire, but replacement rates right now are just too high.”

PG&E pleads guilty to 84 deaths in 2018 California wildfire

CORPORATIONS ARE PERSONS UNDER US LAW, SO WHICH PERSON IS GOING TO JAIL? 

MICAEL LIEDTKE,Associated Press•June 15, 2020



1 / 10

California Wildfires Utility
FILE - In this Feb. 7, 2019, file photo, Christina Taft, the daughter of Camp Fire victim Victoria Taft, displays a collage of photos of her mother, at the burned out ruins of the Paradise, Calif., home where she died in 2018. Pacific Gas & Electric officials are to be expected to appear in court Tuesday, June 16, 2020, to plead guilty for the deadly wildfire that nearly wiped out the Northern California town of Paradise in 2018. (AP Photo/Rich Pedroncelli, File)
More


SAN RAMON, Calif. (AP) — Pacific Gas & Electric confessed Tuesday to killing 84 people in a devastating 2018 wildfire that wiped out the Northern California town of Paradise in November 2018.

PG&E CEO Bill Johnson entered guilty pleas on behalf of the company for 84 felony counts of involuntary manslaughter stemming from the fire, which was blamed on the company’s crumbling electrical grid.

“Our equipment started that fire," said Johnson, who apologized directly to the victims' families. ”PG&E will never forget the Camp Fire and all that it took away from the region.”

Although the admission was part of a plea deal, it came during a dramatic court hearing designed to publicly shame the nation’s largest utility for neglecting its infrastructure.

Butte County Superior Court Judge Michael Deems read the name of each victim aloud in the courtroom while the images of the dead were shown on large screen as Johnson entered a plea for each of the counts. The fire killed 85 people, but prosecutors weren’t certain they could prove PG&E was responsible for one of the deaths.

Johnson also pleaded guilty on behalf of the company to one felony county of unlawfully starting a fire.

Later Tuesday, Butte County District Attorney Mike Ramsey is expected to release a long-awaited grand jury indictment detailing the corporate misconduct that ignited the November 2018 wildfire that destroyed Paradise, California, located about 170 miles (275 kilometers) northeast of San Francisco.

PG&E has agreed to pay a maximum fine of $3.5 million for its crimes in addition to $500,000 for the cost of the investigation. The San Francisco company won’t be placed on criminal probation, unlike what happened after its natural gas lines blew up a neighborhood in San Bruno, California, killing eight people in 2010. That tragedy resulted in a criminal conviction that put San Francisco on a five-year probation that ends in January 2022.

With no prospect of jail time for a corporation, Ramsey tried to use Tuesday’s hearing to force PG&E to confront the death and destruction stemming from its its corporate culture of placing a greater priority on profits for its shareholders than protecting the safety of the 16 million Northern Californians who rely on the utility for power.

PG&E is hoping to emerge from its nearly year-and-half-long bankruptcy. The company has agreed to pay $25.5 billion for losses from the 2018 fire and other blazes in 2017 blamed on its crumbling equipment. The company says it has already made changes that will create a more reliable and safer electrical grid, although it still expects to rely on deliberate power outages during the next few years to minimize the risks of causing more fires. More than 20 family members of people killed in the 2018 wildfire are expected to appear before Deems in a proceeding Wednesday.

The proceeding unfolded as PG&E approaches the end of a complicated bankruptcy case that the company used to work out $25.5 billion in settlements to pay for the damages from the fire and others that torched wide swaths of Northern California and killed dozens of others in 2017. The bankruptcy deals include $13.5 billion earmarked for wildfire victims. A federal judge plans to approve or reject PG&E’s plan for getting out of bankruptcy by June 30.

“We want this to be impactful because this can't go on any longer," Butte County District Attorney Mike Ramsey told The Associated Press. “There is going to have to be a sea change in PG&E's method of operation."

The judge will formally sentence PG&E on Thursday or Friday, according to Ramsey. The plea agreement also spares PG&E from being placed on criminal probation for a second time. The company is in the midst of a five-year probation under the withering supervision of U.S. District Judge William Alsup for a 2010 explosion in its natural gas lines that blew up a neighborhood in San Bruno and killed eight people. The probation lasts until January 2022.

Since filing for bankruptcy early last year, PG&E says it has been dramatically altering a corporate culture that prioritized profits for its shareholders over the safety of the 16 million people who rely on the utility.

The company says it is being more vigilant about trimming trees around its power lines and replacing outdated equipment before it crumbles, although Alsup has repeatedly scolded PG&E for not doing even more to ensure its grid doesn’t cause more tragedy. As part of a deal with California power regulators, PG&E will replace 11 of its 14 board members. CEO Bill Johnson will step down June 30.

Despite PG&E’s pledge, critics fear more danger looms during an upcoming wildfire season after an unusually dry winter in Northern California.

The court hearing was streamed online.




PG&E pleads guilty to manslaughter charges from Camp Fire

PG&E raises fresh debt as it works toward bankruptcy exit

Bond financing comes as Fed eases criteria for corporate bond purchases through index program

Published: June 16, 2020 By Joy Wiltermuth

PG&E crews work to restore power in fire-damaged Santa Rosa, Calif., in October 2017. GETTY IMAGES

Email icon
Facebook icon
Twitter icon
Linkedin icon
Flipboard icon
Print icon
Resize icon

Referenced Symbols
PCG
-0.27% TMUBMUSD10Y
0.749% DJIA
+2.04%


Pacific Gas and Electric Co. completed an $8.925 billion debt deal on Tuesday to help finance the company as it emerges from bankruptcy.

The six-part bond deal, rated Baa3 by Moody’s and BBB- by S&P, is part of a larger $59 billion turnaround plan for the California power utility, which is gearing up to leave Chapter 11 with more debt than it entered bankruptcy with, in part to help pay billions of dollars’ worth of fire-related claims.


The new debt deal comes on the same day that a bankruptcy judge in San Francisco said he planned to greenlight the company’s reorganization plan and as PG&E’s chief executive pleaded guilty on behalf of the company to killing 84 people in the 2018 wildfire that wiped out the Northern California town of Paradise.
“I am here today on behalf of the 23,000 men and women of PG&E, to accept responsibility for the fire here that took so many lives and changed these communities forever,” said Bill Johnson, PG&E’s PCG, -0.27% CEO. “Our equipment started the fire that destroyed the towns of Paradise and Concow and severely burned Magalia and other parts of Butte County.”


S&P Global, a credit-ratings firm, this week said that PG&E is expected to emerge from bankruptcy with about $38 billion of debt, most of which will be backed by a first mortgage, but that it also owes $25.5 billion in wildfire settlements.

The new debt financing benefited from a further rally in corporate credit this week, after the Federal Reserve on Monday tweaked terms of its $750 billion emergency corporate lending facilities to further ease the flow of credit to big U.S. businesses.

Credit conditions briefly weakened last week on fears of rising COVID 19 infections and hospitalizations in some U.S. states.

But borrowing conditions improved Monday, after the Fed said it would start purchasing individual corporate bonds in the secondary market that mature in five years or less, through an index format. The Fed also clarified that bonds purchased through its index program will not require certification, a formal process that shows a company isn’t insolvent, but also lacks adequate access to credit at prices that reflect a “normal, well-functioning” market]

It is unclear if PG&E’s shorter-dated bonds would fit the Fed’s expanded purchase criteria. PG&E did not respond to requests for comment. The corporate lending facility is set to expire in late September, unless the it is extended.

For PG&E’s part, the utility on Tuesday sold its shortest $2.5 billion parcel of two-year bonds at a spread of 155 basis points over Treasurys, a yield of 1.753%.

That’s roughly a savings of 45 basis points from where initial pricing levels were circulated on Tuesday morning, according to a person with direct knowledge of the dealings.

Its longest $1.925 billion slug of 30-year bonds, due in 2050, cleared the market at 200 basis points over Treasurys to yield 3.534%. The initial spread level was in the 262.50 basis points area over Treasurys.

Spreads are the level of compensation investors are paid over a risk-free benchmark, like Treasury TMUBMUSD10Y, 0.749% notes.

Lower spreads can indicate high demand for a bond deal and can also point to a more bullish market tone. U.S. stocks extended their gains for a third day in a row on Tuesday, including the Dow Jones Industrial Average DJIA, +2.04%, which ended more than 500 points higher.