Judge Orders Trump Administration To Give Tribes Their COVID-19 Relief Funds

The Treasury Department was planning to sit on $679 million in emergency aid that was due to go to tribal governments months ago.


By Jennifer Bendery, HuffPost US

WASHINGTON ― A federal judge on Monday ordered Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin to distribute $679 million in emergency COVID-19 relief funds to Native American tribes that should have gotten it months ago, and he chided the agency for causing “irreparable harm” with its delays.


“Continued delay in the face of an exceptional public health crisis is no longer acceptable,” said U.S. District Judge Amit Mehta, who gave Mnuchin until Wednesday to disburse the funds.

Here’s a copy of Mehta’s opinion:

https://home.treasury.gov/system/files/136/Tribal-Allocation-Methodology-for-Second-

The judge’s order comes after the Treasury Department has blown past deadlines, for months, for distributing coronavirus aid to tribal governments, who have been hit particularly hard by the pandemic. Congress set aside $8 billion for tribes when it passed the CARES Act stimulus package in late March, and directed the Treasury Department to get the money out the door by April 26. That didn’t happen. The agency distributed about $4.8 billion in late May, and most of the remaining $3.2 billion wasn’t distributed until last Friday.

The delays have stemmed largely from the Treasury Department’s incompetence in working with tribes, but a lawsuit over Alaska Native Corporations’ eligibility for funds also complicated matters. The latest problem is that Mnuchin has been withholding $679 million of tribes’ money while a separate court challenge plays out over the agency’s methodology for calculating how much money tribes get.

Mnuchin had argued that he needs to hold on to the $679 million in the event the Treasury Department loses the case and needs to pay out more money to the tribe claiming it was underpaid. But Mehta said Monday that $679 million is “grossly disproportionate” to the amount of money that Treasury could have to pay out ― the tribe in the case claims it was underpaid by $7.65 million ― and there is no court order preventing the agency from releasing that money to tribes.

So, Mehta concluded, Mnuchin needs to release the funds to tribes ― now.

“That amount is being withheld of the Secretary’s own accord,” Mehta said. “The Secretary’s withholding of $679 million ‘to resolve any potentially adverse decision in litigation’ … simply cannot be justified.”

A Treasury Department spokesperson did not respond to a request for comment.
ALEX EDELMAN VIA GETTY IMAGESSen. Tom Udall (D-N.M.) called it "a shameful scandal" that the Trump administration has delayed the distribution of COVID-19 relief funds to tribes.


Lawmakers on Capitol Hill praised the court’s decision and fumed that tribes have had to wait this long to get their emergency COVID-19 relief.

“The Court is absolutely correct: this administration has and continues to do ‘irreparable harm’ to Indian Country as it inexplicably holds back funds that Congress intended to get to Tribal governments urgently,” Sen. Tom Udall (D-N.M.), vice chairman of the Senate Indian Affairs Committee, told HuffPost in a statement. “It continues to be a shameful scandal that the Trump administration has dawdled with this funding while people in Native communities are getting sick and dying, and while businesses and essential services are shuttering.”

“It is unconscionable that it has taken court action to force this administration to distribute relief to Tribal governments as Congress intended and the law requires,” said Rep. Ruben Gallego (D-Ariz.), chairman of the Subcommittee for Indigenous Peoples of the United States on the House Natural Resources Committee.

Rep. Deb Haaland (D-N.M.), one of two Native American women in Congress, said it is outrageous that a court had to intervene in order for tribes to get their federal funds.

“Sovereign Nations shouldn’t have to fight for money that Congress approves, ever,” Haaland tweeted. “It’s shameful that a judge has to force the Treasury to do their job.”

Mehta did allow Mnuchin to withhold a bit of the tribal funding: $7.65 million, in the event the tribe claiming it was underpaid wins its case, and an undisclosed amount that is reserved for the case involving Alaska Native Corporations.

GRANDRIVER VIA GETTY IMAGESA Navajo family wears masks to protect against the spread of COVID-19 in Monument Valley, Arizona.

Guest Workers Describe Coronavirus Nightmare On Louisiana Crawfish Farm

Two women on H-2B visas say they and others fell ill with COVID-19 but were told not to leave company housing for the hospital.

By Dave Jamieson, HuffPost US 06/17/2020 

Two guest workers from Mexico say they were stricken with COVID-19 as they processed crawfish in a crowded Louisiana plant ― and that their bosses forbid them from going to the hospital and threatened to report them to immigration authorities when they finally did. Ultimately, they got fired.

The women, Reyna Isabel Alvarez Navarro and Maribel Hernandez Villadares, detailed their disturbing allegations this month in filings with the Occupational Safety and Health Administration and the National Labor Relations Board. The documents (here, here and here) offer a chilling depiction of the challenges confronting essential workers amid the pandemic, similar to the widely reported stories from meatpacking plants.

In this case, both women were foreign-born guest workers who came to the U.S. on temporary H-2B visas to work at Acadia Processors, a crawfish wholesaler in Crowley, Louisiana.

Seafood processors along the Gulf Coast use the H-2B workers, and claims about poor working conditions and substandard housing are not uncommon. The program ties a worker’s employment to a particular company for the duration of the visa, an arrangement that can prevent workers from seeking other jobs or speaking up about working and living conditions.

Alvarez Navarro and Hernandez Villadares say they slept at company-provided housing while working on the nearby crawfish farm, a common arrangement in H-2B relationships. According to their complaints, workers in the plant began to show symptoms of COVID-19 in late March, and their supervisors soon imposed a “strict quarantine” and told them not to leave their living quarters. 

I felt like I was in the hands of the bosses.

Reyna Isabel Alvarez Navarro

Alvarez Navarro and Hernandez Villadares said they became “extremely sick” in mid-May, but were told to transfer to quarantine housing instead of seeking medical treatment. “I told my coworkers that I did not trust the company to take care of us and I thought we would all be safer going to the hospital immediately,” Alvarez Navarro wrote in her charge with the NLRB.

The two said they went to Acadia General Hospital for treatment on May 15 and did not return to the company housing. They were fired, and supervisors told them that the company was going to report them to immigration because they no longer worked for the company that held their visa, the pair said in their filings.

Three days after the women say they went to the hospital, the Louisiana Department of Health publicly announced severe coronavirus outbreaks had occurred among the workforces at three crawfish plants in Acadia and Lafayette parishes.

Aly Neel, a spokesperson for the state health department, said the agency would not confirm whether Acadia Processors was one of the trio of plants with major outbreaks. She said a total of about 100 cases were reported at the three.

“We worked closely with the facilities to minimize infection, ensure access to testing and provide technical support, including assisting with temporary housing for those who were unable to isolate,” Neel said in an email. “Fortunately, in the past month there have been no new cases.”

Acadia did not respond to messages left seeking comment on the women’s allegations.

The New Orleans-based news site The Advocate reported on the outbreaks at unnamed plants last month, finding that the crowded living quarters for guest workers likely played a significant role. “If one person gets it, there’s a good chance everyone’s going to get sick,” one crawfish farmer told the outlet.

According to Labor Department records, Acadia Processors requested at least 100 guest workers for 2020, to be paid a base rate of $9.75 per hour, though workers can earn more depending on how fast they peel crawfish. The housing provided would be “voluntary” and “low cost,” the company said in its application, with the company deducting $50 per week from those who opted for it.

In an interview with HuffPost, Alvarez Navarro said she and others worked so close to one another in the plant that their shoulders touched, and they often slept six or seven to a room in the dorm-style company housing. “One kitchen for everyone, one dining area where we eat together,” she said in Spanish through an interpreter.

Alvarez Navarro said it seemed as if everyone was infected, with so much of the workforce showing flu-like symptoms. She said supervisors took her and other workers to a clinic to get tested for the coronavirus, but she never received the results. She said tests also were offered at the plant, but workers were being charged for them.

She said a friend who lived in town took her and Hernandez Villadares to the hospital, adding that she felt “like I was going to die.”

Company officials said “no one can leave the house nor could anyone come in,” she said. “I felt like I was in the hands of the bosses. When people were infected… I had no resources to get tested. I just wanted to know.”

She said she received positive test results from the hospital about four days later. 
CHRIS GRAYTHEN VIA GETTY IMAGES

Alvarez Navarro and Hernandez Villadares say they were processing crawfish at a Louisiana plant when they and other workers got sick with COVID-19.
Daniel Costa, an immigration law expert at the Washington-based Economic Policy Institute, said that in general, the living and working conditions for H-2B workers are “tailor-made” for spreading the coronavirus.

The workers “are always easily fire-able if they speak up about wages or working conditions ― which leads to them losing their visa status and becoming deportable ― and most are terrified of losing their jobs because they’ve paid hefty recruitment fees,” Costa said in an email. “Now on top of that they have to worry about getting sick and the virus spreading in the workplace and in living quarters, and their employers not caring and not taking adequate precautions or implementing safety measures.”

Alvarez Navarro and Hernandez Villadares have received legal assistance from Centro de los Derechos del Migrante, a worker center for migrant workers from Mexico, which arranged the interview with Alvarez Navarro. In a letter to OSHA, the group argued that the women’s refusal to stay in company-ordered quarantine housing is protected under safety whistleblower law: They feared for their lives and had no reasonable alternative.

If their firings were found to be illegal, the two women would be entitled to back pay and job reinstatement.

The Seafood Workers Alliance, a New Orleans-based worker center, has been organizing guest workers in an attempt to improve the jobs inside seafood processing plants in the area. Sabina Hinz-Foley Trejo, an organizer for the group, said coronavirus outbreaks were “inevitable” considering the working standards and H-2B arrangements.

“The majority of crawfish peeler and harvesters are guest workers. That whole system just allows for very little enforcement, very little worker protections, and a lot of retaliation,” she said. “There are a lot of really horrible labor practices.”

Hinz-Foley Trejo also criticized the state for not disclosing the names of the plants where workers had high infection rates, saying it was a matter of public health to know where major outbreaks occurred.

“To keep this secret and to protect employers through this, essentially the state is complicit,” she said.

A picture and its story: Black personal trainer carries suspected far-right protester to safety

Reuters,NBC News•June 15, 2020

"That's not what we do!"

Reuters photographer Dylan Martinez heard the words ring out during chaotic scenes in London on Saturday, when mostly peaceful anti-racist demonstrations turned into violent scuffles with counter-protesters in the area.

Then he saw the man who had uttered them — a Black protester emerging from the melee carrying an injured white man in a "fireman's lift" over his shoulder.

The picture he took has gone viral on social media and featured in news bulletins, capturing a moment of high drama that jars with the broader narrative of anti-racist and far-right protesters fighting each other.

"I saw a skirmish and someone falling to the ground," Martinez recalled of the moment near Waterloo Bridge, in central London, as he covered anti-racism protests that have flared up in the city.

The two men then appeared through the crowd.

"The crowd parted right in front of me. I was in the right place at right time, and incredibly lucky from that point of view. He came towards me walking briskly."

Martinez said the man being carried had injuries to his face, and Reuters journalists at the scene said he had been beaten in a skirmish with anti-racism protesters.

Some people in the crowd shouted out that the assault victim was a member of the far-right.

Reuters was not able to identify the victim or his political leanings. Police said they were aware of the incident and the photograph, but made no further comment when Reuters asked for details of the men's identity and what happened.

Image: Patrick Hutchinson, a protester, carries a suspected far-right counter-protester who was injured, to safety, near Waterloo station during a Black Lives Matter protest (Dylan Martinez / Reuters)

Protests have erupted across British cities and around the world after a Black man, George Floyd, died in police custody in Minneapolis on May 25.

In some cases they have sparked counter-demonstrations by people who do not agree with all of their aims and methods, and these have included people from far-right groups.

British media identified the Black man as Patrick Hutchinson, a personal trainer. On his social media account, he wrote: "We saved a life today."

Reuters spoke to the partner of Hutchinson's best friend, who confirmed it was him. Hutchinson did not reply to calls to his mobile phone.

He told British Channel 4 News on Sunday it was a "scary" scene. "It was pretty hectic, it was almost like a stampede.

"...The guys went in there, they sort of put a little cordon around him to stop him receiving any more physical harm. His life was under threat.

"So I just went under, scooped him up and put him on my shoulders and sort of started marching towards the police with him whilst all the guys were surrounding me and protecting me and the guy I had on my shoulder."

In a statement on Sunday police said 113 people had been arrested over the weekend and 23 officers were injured in the violence, none of them seriously.

Racist house deeds were ‘the most powerful tools to segregate American cities and determine who could own properties’

The way these deeds were written, blacks and Asians were barred from ever purchasing, renting, or otherwise living in houses in many parts of the U.S.

THREE MONTHS AGO THIS ARTICLE AT THIS SITE WOULD HAVE BEEN ON HOW GIVING CUT RATE MORTGAGES TO BLACKS CAUSED THE 2008 MARKET CRASH

Published: June 16, 2020 By  Clare Trapasso

Daniel Shiplacoff and his partner didn’t know that their Spanish-style home at the foot of Hollywood Hills had a dark secret until after they had purchased the four-bedroom house in late 2000.

The mixed-race couple were shocked to receive a copy of the original deed to the Los Angeles property, which dated to the 1920s. The document clearly stated that no one of African or Asiatic descent could remain on the property after 6 p.m., unless that individual was a caregiver to someone living in the home. In other words: Blacks and Asians were barred from ever purchasing, renting, or otherwise living in the house.


“It just became very real in that moment, the ugliness of racism and classism,” says Shiplacoff, now 43, who is half-Jewish and half-Filipino. His now-husband is white. “Being the son of a woman from the Philippines and considering myself brown, it was a little painful. At the same time, it felt gratifying that a brown, gay man was buying this home and giving it a new chapter in its history.”

In recent weeks, following several widely publicized killings of black Americans by police officers, frustration with and rage over centuries of racial injustice have erupted into passionate protests across the country that in turn have set off a round of apologies and a national reckoning.


“Systemic racism” has become a catchphrase—and historically, one of its most powerful and harmful tools has been housing segregation. The discrimination helped to widen the gulf between blacks and whites in wealth, quality of life, and economic opportunity that persists today.

Although they are now illegal to enforce, racial covenants like the one Shiplacoff discovered can be found even now on deeds in just about every corner of the country.


First appearing in the early part of the 20th century, these so-called deed restrictions legally prevented people of certain races from buying, renting, or living in individual homes in white communities well before the practice of redlining officially marked those areas as off-limits to minority buyers.

Racial covenants were finally outlawed by the Fair Housing Act of 1968. But as the document that legally transfers title of a home from one owner to the next, a deed is typically not easily changed without getting lawyers involved. So in many cases the language remains as an unpleasant—and, to a new owner, often wholly unexpected—reminder of the legacy of segregation.

The covenants were “the most powerful tools to segregate American cities and determine who could own properties,” says Kirsten Delegard, director of the Mapping Prejudice project based at the University of Minnesota in Minneapolis. The project looks at historic housing inequality in the Minneapolis area, where George Floyd was killed. “Even though racial covenants have been officially illegal since 1968 ... the segregation they’ve established continues today.”

White families who bought homes during that time saw huge price appreciation, allowing them to build wealth and pass it down to future generations. Black Americans, however, were restricted to purchasing homes in less desirable neighborhoods, with fewer resources. Those homes were often sold at inflated prices to buyers given shadier, more expensive mortgages. Meanwhile, price appreciation in nongentrified minority communities has been significantly lower than in white communities.


These disparities may help to explain why nearly three-quarters of white Americans, 73.7%, owned their homes—compared with just 44% of blacks in the first quarter of 2020, according to U.S. Census Bureau data. Meanwhile, the median net worth of a white family is almost 10 times that of a black family—$171,000 compared with $17,600, according to the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System. The Fed’s Survey of Consumer Finances looked at 2016 data.

“It’s had a disastrous impact on African-Americans,” says Evan McKenzie, a political-science professor at the University of Illinois at Chicago. “The symbolic statements that these covenants make is a national disgrace.

“It’s a legacy of shame.”



How racial covenants segregated America

Racial covenants began appearing in deeds around 1910. Their usage picked up during the great migration, which began shortly after and extended for decades, as black Americans left the Southeast for better opportunities and a better quality of life in the rest of the country. Cities and suburbs in the Northeast, Midwest, and West responded with racial covenants. When the U.S. Supreme Court struck down discriminatory zoning laws in 1917, many communities turned to these covenants to ensure that segregation would continue.

“Black people were viewed as a threat to white people’s property values,” says McKenzie. “There was a widespread [belief] in the real-estate industry that white people do not want to live around African-Americans.”

The restrictions exploded in popularity in the 1930s and the 1940s, especially after World War II. New suburban communities were cropping up on the outskirts of cities and beyond. White families were abandoning urban areas for this new version of the American dream: a single-family house with backyard in the suburbs. But many developers couldn’t get loans to build new homes and communities during this time without including the exclusionary clauses.

The covenants, coupled with the federal policy of redlining implemented in the mid-1930s, worked. Racial segregation flourished—and even though the racist restrictions have been illegal for the past half-century, their impact remains. America’s suburbs remain predominantly white today—according to the Pew Research Center, 90% of suburban counties have a majority-white population.

“The racial covenants created the racial disparities you have today,” says Delegard. “Racial covenants, in some ways, reveal the origins of the structural racism that is so pronounced in Minneapolis.

“Racial covenants determined who had access to affordable, safe, stable housing over time,” she continues. “They determined who could become a property owner, which in the United States is central to who can accumulate wealth.”

Delegard’s group, Mapping Prejudice, has found about 30,000 deeds in Hennepin County. The county includes the city of Minneapolis, the epicenter of the most recent Black Lives Matter protests, which have since spread throughout the world.

Minneapolis has one of the largest homeownership gaps in the country, with whites about three times more likely to own their homes. Only about a quarter of black residents are homeowners, compared with roughly three-quarters of white residents.

“We are always dealing with the repercussions of the past,” says Delegard.

“In the life of a property, 50 years is not very long. Many houses stay in the same family for that amount of time,” says Delegard. “Once racial covenants lock in these patterns of where people live, that is very hard to change. Once a neighborhood becomes exclusively white, it’s very hard to be the first person of color to live there. There’s all kinds of signals people get about whether they’re welcome in a neighborhood.”

Racial covenants were declared illegal, but community racism persisted

Kim Wrench had a particularly ugly experience when he bought a Colonial-style home in the tree-lined neighborhood of Greenway Fields in Kansas City, MO, in 1989. The original owner of the 1920s home, who was white, hadn’t realized Wrench was black until he showed up at the property with an inspector.

“I overheard her say that ‘If I had known Mr. Wrench was black I would have never sold my house to him,’” says Wrench, now 64, who works in sales at Tiffany & Co. Her agent and his agent were “appalled,” and explained to her that it was too late to back out of the deal.

“I hope no one has to experience what I did,” Wrench says.



In line with the previous owner’s sentiments, the deed to the three-bedroom house stated blacks, Jews, and other minorities were prohibited from buying homes in the community. And while the language was no longer legally enforceable, Wrench felt that the racist sentiments it expressed were alive and well in his new community.

“It was very difficult living in that neighborhood because I always felt profiled,” says Wrench. Security patrol cars, paid for by the local homeowners, would slow down considerably and even follow him initially when he was walking down the street. Neighbors were concerned because a black homeowner had moved into their enclave.

“At first I was shocked, and then I was appalled,” he says. “Then I thought, ‘You know what? To hell with it. It’s their problem.’”

He earned the neighborhood’s respect by restoring the home to its former glory. In 2012, he sold it after he and his partner split up. He never told the new buyers about the deed.

The fight to remove racial covenants continues

About 1,000 miles away from Wrench, web developer Chris Fullman, 37, who is white, also found a racial covenant attached to the deed for his Henrico, VA, home. He was so disturbed that he started a grass-roots project, MakeBetterDeeds.org, to lobby the state to make it easier to have the discriminatory language struck from the documents. And he won.



On July 1, Virginia residents can file a certificate with their jurisdiction to have the restrictions removed without having to retain an attorney, go to court, and pay fees. In Minnesota, California, and Washington, homeowners can have a document attached to their deed saying the racist stipulations are illegal.

In much of the rest of the country, this stain of legalized discrimination is difficult—and costly—to remove. Homeowners in many cities and states must hire a lawyer and appear in court to have the covenants removed.

Fullman bought his three-bedroom, ranch house, built in 1952, in a quiet, blue-collar neighborhood near Richmond, VA, in 2016. After he’d completed all of the paperwork at the closing, his attorney told him there was just one last thing. Fullman was handed a document that stipulated only Caucasians could reside in the neighborhood, except for live-in servants.

Although his attorney explained it was unenforceable, Fullman was so appalled, he took action.

In April, Gov. Ralph Northam signed into law the bill simplifying the removal of such covenants.

“It’s just part of the healing and moving forward,” says Fullman, whose organization will offer information on how other states can move against legacy racial covenants. “It’s an important gesture. We’re officially saying this neighborhood is welcome to anyone, this house is welcome to anyone.”

This story originally ran on Realtor.com.

Clare Trapasso is the senior news editor of realtor.com and an adjunct journalism professor at the College of Mount Saint Vincent. She previously wrote for a Financial Times publication, the New York Daily News, and the Associated Press. She is also a licensed real-estate agent. Contact her at clare.trapasso@realtor.com.

SURPRISE
Administration officials back away from promise of vaccine by the New Year


Sean D. Naylor National Security Correspondent,Yahoo News•June 16, 2020

Trump declares, ‘Vaccine or no vaccine, we’re back’ at ceremony announcing coronavirus vaccine effort

A month after President Trump announced Operation Warp Speed, administration officials are offering no guarantees that the project will meet its goal of producing 300 million doses of a COVID-19 vaccine by January.

“There are no sure things in science,” said a senior Trump administration official, who asked not to be named, in a conference call with reporters Tuesday. “We cannot promise a 100 percent chance of success. What we can tell Americans is that we’ve taken every possible step to maximize the probability of success.”

Under the joint control of the Departments of Defense and Health and Human Services, Operation Warp Speed is the administration’s effort to drastically accelerate the development, production and distribution of an effective vaccine for the coronavirus.

President Trump, flanked by Dr. Anthony Fauci, outside the White House on May 15. (Alex Brandon/AP)

Previously, Trump administration officials have sounded sure that they would have 300 million doses ready by January. “I’m confident that we will be able to deliver a vaccine at scale in time,” Defense Secretary Mark Esper said May 28.

That claim met with skepticism from medical experts. “A lot of stuff needs to line up in the right way for it to happen,” a source familiar with the Defense Department’s vaccine efforts told Yahoo News at the time.

But the two officials who spoke with reporters Tuesday, both of whom spoke on condition of anonymity, were slightly more cautious than Esper in their predictions. “Given the vagaries of science … we cannot guarantee with a 100 percent probability that we’ll have a vaccine by the end of the year,” said the first official.

Rather than fixate on the Jan. 1 deadline, the Warp Speed “aspiration” is now that “by the height of flu season next year we have enough vaccines and we have vaccinated those who are vulnerable — and desire a vaccine — to protect as much life as possible,” the first official said. “We’re confident that we will hit that objective.”

The steps that Operation Warp Speed is taking largely involve the outlay of substantial amounts of money in a process that equates to the placing of bets on several horses in the same race. According to a fact sheet released in conjunction with the press call, the U.S. government has already invested a total of more than $2 billion in vaccine candidates being developed by AstraZeneca, Johnson & Johnson and Moderna. Those are among 14 of the most promising vaccine efforts chosen from more than 100 in development, the second official said, adding that they will soon narrow that field down to “approximately seven” candidates.

But what makes Operation Warp Speed unique is that rather than pursue the development, manufacture and distribution stages of a vaccine effort sequentially, “these elements are occurring simultaneously,” said the first senior administration official. “That will make the major difference and allow us to deliver safe and effective vaccines to Americans in record time.”

As an example, the first official said, “we expect to be producing large quantities of vaccines while the clinical trials are still underway, so that when safety and efficacy have been demonstrated, there isn’t a day’s delay due to manufacturing ramp-up timelines.” The reason drug companies typically don’t do this is that “it involves significant financial risk,” the official said. Under Operation Warp Speed, the U.S. government is assuming that risk, he added.

“When one looks at the potential health, social and economic benefits of getting a safe and effective vaccine faster, placing big financial bets on checking all these boxes at once is an immensely positive deal,” the official said.

A man receives a shot in the first-stage safety study clinical trial of a potential vaccine for the coronavirus, March 16, at the Kaiser Permanente Washington Health Research Institute in Seattle. (Ted S. Warren/AP)

Asked how much patients will have to pay to get the vaccine once it becomes available, the officials sought to allay fears that it would be too expensive for some Americans. “For any American who is vulnerable, who cannot afford the vaccine and desires the vaccine, we will provide it for free,” said the first official.

Meanwhile, in discussions with Operation Warp Speed officials, insurers have expressed “an eagerness to cover this vaccine as most if not all of them have covered other COVID-related services — without copay,” he added.

The government will work with the insurers to distribute the vaccine to retail pharmacies and doctors’ offices, while making sure it is also available to those who cannot afford it, as well as essential workers and “those associated with national defense,” the first official said.

The government will use a “tiered approach” to deciding who gets the vaccine first, according to the second official. “The elderly, those with preexisting conditions [and] people performing essential services would be given higher tiers,” he said. However, final decisions on which populations would benefit most from a vaccine will depend on the outcomes of clinical trials and any new information about the virus, he added.

Not everyone will be getting the vaccine, according to the first senior administration official. “For many reasons, we don’t expect to have all Americans vaccinated,” he said.

Those reasons include the fact that because the “safety and efficacy” of a future vaccine is currently unknown, “it may be much more applicable to certain demographic categories than others,” he said.

In addition, he noted that many Americans will already have been exposed to the virus by the time a vaccine is available.

“We fully expect there will be … 20, 30, 40 million Americans that probably have strong antibodies to coronavirus by the end of the year, so they would be a significantly lower priority.”

There is as yet no proof that previous exposure prevents reinfection, however.

Who are the Hindu Goddesses of Contagion?

The goddesses act as “celestial epidemiologists” curing illness.

by Tulasi Srinivas

June 16, 2020 Topic: Religion Region: India Blog Brand: The Reboot Tags: Religion India Coronavirus Hinduism Contagion

Hindus in India have had a helping hand – several in fact – when it comes to fighting deadly contagions like COVID-19: multi-armed goddesses co-opted to help contain and kill pestilence.

Collectively known as “Amman,” or the Divine Mother, the goddesses of contagion – and it always goddesses, not gods – have been called on for their services before. They have been deployed in many of the deadly pandemics India has experienced from ancient times until the the modern age.

In conducting my fieldwork as a cultural anthropologist who studies religion, I have seen small shrines all over India dedicated to these goddesses of contagion, often in rural, forested areas outside village and town limits.

The goddesses act as “celestial epidemiologists” curing illness. But if angered they can also inflict disease such as poxes, plagues, sores, fevers, tuberculosis and malaria. They are both poison and cure.

Blowing hot and cold

One of the first images of a contagion goddess recorded is of the demon-turned-goddess Hariti, carved and worshipped during the deadly Justinian plague of Rome that came to India via trade routes, killing between 25 to 100 million people globally. In the late 19th century, my hometown of Bangalore suffered an epidemic of bubonic plague, which required the services of a contagion goddess. British colonial documents record the repeated waves of illness that stalked the city, and the desperate pleas to a goddess named “Plague Amma.”

In south India, the premier contagion goddess is Mariamman – from the word “Mari” meaning both pox and transformation. In the north of India, she is known as the goddess Sheetala, meaning “the cold one” – a nod to her ability to cool fevers.

The goddesses’ iconography emphasizes their therapeutic healing powers. Sheetala carries a pot of healing water, a broom to sweep away dirt, a branch of the indigenous Neem tree – said to cure skin and breathing disorders – and a jar of ambrosia for eternal life. Mariamman, on the other hand, carries a scimitar with which to smite and decapitate the demons of virulence and illness.

Contagion goddesses are not angelic and gentle, as one might expect caregivers to be. They are hot-tempered, demanding and fiery. They are deemed wilderness goddesses – highly local and traditionally worshiped primarily by lower caste, Dalit, tribal and rural folk. Some are associated with tantric practices and dark magic.

Ritual readiness

Placating the goddesses through blood sacrifice, decorative offerings and self mortification, was – and in some places, still is – a way of preparing for a pandemic in parts of India.

Sometimes, painful piercings, hook swinging and self-flagellation were offered when patients recovered from illnesses, both mental and physical. Or in a sanitized version of blood sacrifice, small silver images of the patient were offered as a prophylactic against illness.

Rituals have often involved variolation. A devotee would be inoculated with infected pus and the goddess invoked through possession to save them. The aim was to trigger a milder form of the illness and gain immunity.

High caste Hindus and those who mirror high-caste practices often ignored and shunned the contagion goddesses, fearful of the blood rites, possession and the tantric rituals, which they associated with low caste worship.

But these local contagion goddesses merged over time with the Divine Mother Shakti, the feminine personification of the energy behind creation. This domesticated the goddesses, making them more acceptable to bourgeois Hindus.

The goddesses’ post-pox lives

With the widespread use of modern antibiotics, retrovirals and vaccines in the mid 20th century, traditional Hindu healing rituals became less relevant. Contagion goddesses were beginning to be forgotten and ignored. But a handful of them developed rich post-pox lives, reinventing themselves for modern afflictions. Some goddesses moved on from focusing on disease alone.

In Bangalore, a city plagued by traffic fatalities, the goddess Mariamman transformed from a cholera goddess into the protector of drivers. Now known as “Traffic Circle Amman,” the goddess’s temple sees cars and trucks line up everyday for blessings, before drivers face the deadly maelstrom of city traffic.

Other goddesses came into being to fight new illnesses. On Dec. 1, 1997, World AIDS day, a new goddess named AIDSAmma was created by a science schoolteacher, H.N. Girish, not to cure AIDS but to teach worshipers the prophylactic measures necessary to prevent the disease.

COVID-19 conscripts

During the COVID-19 crisis all the contagion goddesses have been re-conscripted.

The Indian government’s quick action in instituting a stay-at-home lockdown that lasted two months prevented widespread contagion, but it also meant that people weren’t allowed to go to temples to worship the goddesses and ask for intervention. So priests offered special decorations, including garlands of acidic lemons believed to placate the goddesses.

The goddesses have also been recalled in posters by Indian artists that circulate through Facebook. Artist Sandhya Kumari’s rendering of “Coronavirus Mardini” – a hygienically masked Mother India attacking the coronavirus with a trident – recalled Shakti’s killing of evil, a familiar image to all Hindus.

A nationalistic caption was added during reposting – “Mother India will end the Coronavirus, but it is every Indians duty to stay at home and take care of loved ones. Jai India!”

In Kumari’s rendering, the goddess’s iconography is updated for the pandemic. The goddesses’ many gloved hands grasp sanitizer, masks, vaccination needles and other medical equipment. The coronavirus is held in chains, immovable and shorn of its virulence.

While controversies over temples reopening dominates the news, a new deity, crafted from polystyrene and called “Corona Devi” has been installed in a temple dedicated to the pox goddess. Mr. Anilan, the priest and single devotee, says he will offer worship for “Corona Warriors” – health care workers, firefighters, and other front line personnel. Here science and faith are not seen as inimical to one another, but as working together, hand-in-glove.

COVID-19 has undoubtedly increased the goddesses’ workload. And with no known cure and no viable vaccine, the contagion goddesses may well have their hands full for some time.

Tulasi Srinivas, Professor of Anthropology, Religion and Transnational Studies, Institute for Liberal Arts and Interdisciplinary Studies, Emerson College

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Image: Reuters

#WW3.0  
India-China clash: 20 Indian troops killed in Ladakh fightingBBC•June 16, 2020

India and China have been locked in a border dispute for decades

At least 20 Indian soldiers were killed in a clash with Chinese forces in Ladakh in the disputed Kashmir region, Indian officials say.

The incident follows rising tensions, and is the first deadly clash in the border area in at least 45 years.

The Indian army initially said three of its soldiers had been killed, adding that both sides suffered casualties.

But later on Tuesday, officials said a number of critically injured soldiers had died of their wounds.

India's external affairs ministry accused China of breaking an agreement struck the previous week to respect the Line of Actual Control (LAC) in the Galwan Valley.

BBC diplomatic correspondent James Robbins says violence between two armies high up in the Himalayas is very serious, and pressure will grow on the two nuclear powers not to allow a slide into full-scale conflict.

Soutik Biswas: An 'extraordinary escalation' with rocks and clubs
What have both sides said about the incident?

Early on Tuesday the Indian army said three of its soldiers, including an officer, had died in a clash in the area.

Later in the day, it released a statement saying the two sides had disengaged.

It added that "17 Indian troops who were critically injured in the line of duty" and died from their injuries, taking the "total that were killed in action to 20".

China did not confirm any casualties, but accused India in turn of crossing the border onto the Chinese side.

Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian said India had crossed the border twice on Monday, "provoking and attacking Chinese personnel, resulting in serious physical confrontation between border forces on the two sides", AFP news agency reported.

Kashmir map #KASHMIR IS #INDIA'S #GAZA

Both sides insist no bullet has been fired in four decades, and the Indian army said on Tuesday that "no shots were fired" in this latest skirmish.

How a clash that did not involve an exchange of fire could prove so lethal is unclear. There are reports that it was fought with rocks and clubs

Local media outlets reported that the Indian soldiers had been "beaten to death".
How tense is the area?

The LAC is poorly demarcated. The presence of rivers, lakes and snowcaps means the line can shift. The soldiers either side - representing two of the world's largest armies - come face to face at many points.


India-China border row explained in 400 words


Why tensions are rising between the neighbours


How a new map stirred old rivalries

But there have been tense confrontations along the border in recent weeks.

India has accused China of sending thousands of troops into Ladakh's Galwan valley and says China occupies 38,000sq km (14,700sq miles) of its territory. Several rounds of talks in the last three decades have failed to resolve the boundary disputes.

The two countries have fought only one war so far, in 1962, when India suffered a humiliating defeat.

In May, dozens of Indian and Chinese soldiers exchanged physical blows on the border in the north-eastern state of Sikkim. And in 2017, the two countries clashed in the region after China tried to extend a border road through a disputed plateau.

There are several reasons why tensions are rising now - but competing strategic goals lie at the root, and both sides blame each other.

India has built a new road in what experts say is the most remote and vulnerable area along the LAC in Ladakh. And India's decision to ramp up infrastructure seems to have infuriated Beijing.

The road could boost Delhi's capability to move men and materiel rapidly in case of a conflict.

India also disputes part of Kashmir - an ethnically diverse Himalayan region covering about 140,000sq km - with Pakistan.


Kashmir: Why India and Pakistan fight over it

Analysis box by Soutik Biswas, India online correspondent

The two nuclear armed neighbours have a chequered history of face-offs and overlapping territorial claims along the more than 3,440km (2,100 mile), poorly drawn Line of Actual Control separating the two sides.

Border patrols have often bumped into each other, resulting in occasional scuffles. But no bullets have been fired in four decades.

That is why Sunday's night's clash following months of roiling tension has taken many by surprise.

Whatever the result, the latest incident is likely to trigger a fresh wave of anti-China sentiments in India.

It will also present daunting foreign policy and security challenges to Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his government, which is struggling to contain a surge of Covid-19 infections and revive an economy which looks headed for recession.

India-China clash: An extraordinary escalation 'with rocks and clubs'

Soutik Biswas - India correspondent, BBC•June 16, 2020

The two nuclear armed neighbours have a chequered history of face-offs

"It is looking bad, very bad," says security analyst Vipin Narang, of the deadly clash between Indian and Chinese soldiers in Ladakh on Monday night.

The most serious face-off on the world's longest unsettled land border in nearly half a century left 20 Indian soldiers dead. India says both sides suffered casualties.

"Once fatalities are sustained, keeping everything quiet becomes hard on both sides. Now public pressure becomes a variable," Dr Narang, a security studies professor at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, told me.

"The scale, scope and swathe of the pressure across the border is seemingly unprecedented."

The two nuclear armed neighbours have a chequered history of face-offs and overlapping territorial claims along the more than 3,440km (2,100 mile), poorly drawn Line of Actual Control (LAC) separating the two sides. Border patrols have often bumped into each other, resulting in occasional scuffles. But no bullets have been fired in four decades.

That is why the latest clash, following months of roiling tension, has taken many by surprise.

"It is an extraordinary escalation," Shashank Joshi, Defence Editor at The Economist magazine, told me. "No shots fired for 45 years, and then at least 20 soldiers dead in one evening in rock-throwing and bludgeoning." The clash comes amid fresh tensions between the two powers, which have brawled along the border in recent weeks but not exchanged any gunfire.

Reports say in early May, Chinese forces put up tents, dug trenches and moved heavy equipment several kilometres inside what had been regarded by India as its territory in Galwan valley in Ladakh. Ajai Shukla, a leading Indian defence analyst, has claimed that China had captured 60 sq km of Indian-patrolled territory in the area in the past one month. India claims China already occupies 38,000sq km (about 14,700sq miles) of its territory.

The move came after India built a road several hundred kilometres long connecting to a high-altitude forward air base which it reactivated in 2008.
'One of the most serious crises in years'

The details of how Monday's skirmish unfolded remain fuzzy.

India and China are accusing each other of violating the consensus to respect the Line of Actual Control that separates the both sides in the Galwan Valley.

India says the two sides have been exploring military and diplomatic channels to de-escalate the situation and that senior commanders had a "productive meeting" on 6 June. They agreed "on a process of de-escalation" and subsequently, the ground commanders had a series of meetings to implement the consensus, India's foreign ministry said.

India said both sides suffered casualties after the Chinese "unilaterally tried to change the status quo." And China accuses India troops of "violating" the consensus, crossing the border twice and carrying out provocative attacks on Chinese personnel".

Ankit Panda, a senior editor at The Diplomat magazine, says the ongoing crisis was "already among the most serious between the two countries - certainly since the 2017 Doklam standoff and possibly much longer". Road construction by the Chinese triggered a 73-day standoff in 2017 at a junction of India, China and Bhutan.

An Indian soldier at the border in Ladakh

But Chinese behaviour this time has "been very different from what we have seen in the past," Shivshankar Menon, a China expert and a former national security advisor, says.

"What we have seen is multiple incidents, multiple moves forward and China occupying spaces which it never occupied before along the LAC. This is a worrying sign because it's different from Chinese behaviour in the past," Mr Menon told interviewer Karan Thapar in The Wire, an independent online news portal.

Theories abound on the reasons behind China's actions in the area.

In a tactical sense, Delhi's beefing up of the border infrastructure may have triggered the Chinese army into action in Ladakh. The pandemic may have provided the cover for China to act, particularly as the Indian army had delayed exercises in Ladakh in March. "But I doubt it was the only cause," says Mr Joshi.

"Is it about the road? Is it about Article 370 [India's action of unilaterally changing the status quo of Kashmir in August last year] Is it broader aggressiveness? We don't know," says Dr Narang. "But it is tense and it is not over."

Mr Menon, who served as India's ambassador to China, believes that China is resorting to strident nationalism, due to "domestic and economic stresses" at home. "You can see it in their behaviour in Yellow Sea, towards Taiwan, passing laws without consulting Hong Kong, more assertive on India's border, a tariff war with Australia."

A map showing the disputed area

On Tuesday evening, India said the troops had disengaged from the clash site. Early reports suggest that established military channels were being used and both sides were not escalating. "That's good news for India, which has few credible retaliatory options in the current environment," says Mr Panda.

Mr Joshi believes the most important consequences of Monday's clashes will be the "wider and long-term diplomatic one".

"For 10 years, Sino-Indian rivalry has steadily intensified, but remained largely stable," he said. India and China have also been more engaged. Bilateral trade increased 67 times between 1998 and 2012, and China is India's largest trading partner in goods. Indian students have flocked to Chinese universities. Both sides have held joint military exercises.

"Now we may be entering a new period of heightened mistrust and antagonism washing away much of the bonhomie on display at the Wuhan summit in 2018," says Mr Joshi.

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.”