Wednesday, August 05, 2020

VIDEO
In Lebanon's Beqaa Valley, locals divided over legalisation of medical marijuana


Issued on: 03/08/2020 -

FOCUS © FRANCE 24
By:Mayssa AWAD|Romeo LANGLOIS|Catherine NORRIS-TRENT

For thirty years, the Lebanese government tried to crack down on marijuana production. But in May of this year, in a bid to save the ailing economy, the Lebanese parliament legalised marijuana for medical use. However, local villagers have greeted the move with suspicion. Our team reports from the Beqaa Valley in north-eastern Lebanon, where the marijuana harvest season has begun.

'How can I help?': Lebanon's diaspora mobilizes in wake of blast
Issued on: 06/08/2020

Lebanese come together for a vigil held at Kensington gardens in central London to honour the victims of the Beirut blast on August 5, 2020. Tolga Akmen AFP

Los Angeles (AFP)

Lebanon's diaspora, estimated at nearly three times the size of the tiny country's populatio of five million, has stepped up to provide assistance following the massive explosion that laid waste to the capital Beirut.

Lebanese expats rushed to wire money to loved ones who lost their homes or were injured in the blast on Tuesday that killed at least 113 people, while others worked to create special funds to address the tragedy.

"I've been on the phone all morning with ... our partners in order to put together an alliance for an emergency fund in light of the explosion," said George Akiki, co-founder and CEO of LebNet, a non-profit based in California's Silicon Valley that helps Lebanese professionals in the United States and Canada. "Everyone, both Lebanese and non-Lebanese, wants to help."
Akiki said his group, along with other organizations such as SEAL and Life Lebanon, have set up Beirut Emergency Fund 2020, which will raise much-needed money and channel it to safe and reputable organizations in Lebanon.

Many Lebanese expats, who almost all have loved ones or friends impacted by the disaster, are also helping individually or have started online fundraisers.

"As a first step, my wife Hala and I will match at least $10,000 in donations and later on we will provide more help towards rebuilding and other projects," Habib Haddad, a tech entrepreneur and member of LebNet based in Boston, Massachusetts, told AFP.

He said many fellow compatriots are doing the same, channeling their grief and anger toward helping their stricken homeland, which before the blast was already reeling from a deep economic and political crisis that has left more than half the population living in poverty.

"They're asking Lebanese emigrants around the world to try and help," said Maroun Daccache, owner of a Lebanese restaurant in Sao Paulo, Brazil, a country that has an estimated seven million people of Lebanese descent.

"I'm trying to help with something but here the business is not very good because of the pandemic. Still, we are much better off than those over there," Daccache said.

- 'Terrible and heartbreaking' -

Even before the tragedy, Lebanon heavily relied on its diaspora for cash remittances but these inflows had slowed in the last year given the country's political crisis.

Expats also usually visit home every summer, injecting much-needed cash into the economy. But the diaspora this year has largely been absent because of the COVID-19 pandemic and many had become increasingly skeptical and reluctant to send aid to a country where corruption is widespread and permeates all levels of society.

"People are outraged by the mismanagement of the country and they want to help, but no one trusts the people in charge," said Najib Khoury-Haddad, a tech entrepreneur in the San Francisco area, echoing the feeling of many Lebanese leery of giving money to a dysfunctional government.

"I heard that the government has set up a relief fund but who would trust them?" he added.

Ghislaine Khairalla, 55, of Washington DC, said one idea being floated was to pair a needy family in Beirut with one outside the country that could provide a safe and direct source of assistance.

"We (the diaspora) are the financial bloodline especially since the economy is not going to recover anytime soon," Khairalla, whose brother's home was reduced to rubble by the blast, said. "And we are lucky to have a kind of stable life here. We are physically outside Lebanon but our hearts and emotions are there."

Nayla Habib, a Lebanese-Canadian who lives in Montreal, said she planned to help in whatever way she can and expressed outrage at reports that the blast was caused by more than 2,700 tons of ammonium nitrate stored at the Beirut port, which is located in the heart of the densely populated city.

"My God, the state of our country is terrible and heartbreaking," Habib told AFP. "I donated before the blast to a lady that helps feed the poor and I will donate again.

"Whatever I give is like a drop in the ocean but it's necessary," she added. "I live in Canada but part of my heart is still there."

© 2020 AFP

Chemical linked to Beirut blast caused past explosions in Texas, Toulouse
Issued on: 05/08/2020 -

A worker lifts a sack of confiscated ammonium nitrate at the customs office of Ngurah Rai International Airport in Bali, September 22, 2016. © Sonny Tumbelaka, AFP

Text by:NEWS WIRES|

Video by:Shirli SITBON AT THE END

Ammonium nitrate, which Lebanese authorities have said caused the devastating Beirut blast, is an odorless crystalline substance commonly used as a fertilizer that has been the cause of numerous industrial explosions over the decades.


These include notably at a Texas fertilizer plant in 2013 that killed 15 and was ruled deliberate, and another at a chemical plant in Toulouse, France in 2001 that killed 31 people but was accidental.

When combined with fuel oils, ammonium nitrate creates a potent explosive widely used in the construction industry, but also by insurgent groups such as the Taliban for improvised explosives.

Two tonnes of it was used to create the bomb in the 1995 Oklahoma City attack that destroyed a federal building, leaving 168 people dead.


Lebanese Prime Minister Hassan Diab said 2,750 metric tons of ammonium nitrate that had been stored for years in a Beirut portside warehouse had blown up, killing dozens of people and causing widespread damage to the Lebanese capital.

In agriculture, ammonium nitrate fertilizer is applied in granule form and quickly dissolves under moisture, allowing nitrogen -- which is key to plant growth -- to be released into the soil.

Generally strict rules on storage

However, under normal storage conditions and without very high heat, it is difficult to ignite ammonium nitrate, Jimmie Oxley, a chemistry professor at the University of Rhode Island, told AFP.

"If you look at the video (of the Beirut explosion), you saw the black smoke, you saw the red smoke -- that was an incomplete reaction," she said.

"I am assuming that there was a small explosion that instigated the reaction of the ammonium nitrate -- whether that small explosion was an accident or something on purpose I haven't heard yet."

That's because ammonium nitrate is an oxidizer -- it intensifies combustion and allows other substances to ignite more readily, but is not itself very combustible.

For these reasons, there are generally very strict rules about where it can be stored: for example, it must be kept away from fuels and sources of heat.


In fact, many countries in the European Union require calcium carbonate to be added to ammonium nitrate to create calcium ammonium nitrate, which is safer.

In the United States, regulations were tightened significantly after the Oklahoma City attack.

Under the Chemical Facility Anti-Terrorism Standards, for example, facilities that store more than 2,000 pounds (900 kilograms) of ammonium nitrate are subject to inspections.

Despite its dangers, Oxley said legitimate uses of ammonium nitrate in agriculture and construction have made it indispensable.

"We wouldn't have this modern world without explosives, and we wouldn't feed the population we have today without ammonium nitrate fertilizer," she said.

"We need ammonium nitrate, we just need to pay good attention to what we're doing with it.”

(AFP)


I WORKED FOR LIQUID AIRE CANADA EDMONTON IN MY EARLY UNIVERSITY DAYS
IT WAS A GAS PLANT WE USED THIS IN OUR PLANT AS WELL PRODUCING OTHER DANGEROUS MATERIALS LIKE ACETYLENE, IN THE MIDDLE OF EDMONTON NOT FAR FROM WHERE I LIVE NOW. THE PLANT IS NOW A CLEANING PLANT, WAIT THATS JUST AS DANGEROUS
'State, what state?' Lebanese together in solidarity and rage

THIS IS WHAT REAL ANARCHY LOOKS LIKE!
MUTUAL AID, SOLIDARITY, DIRECT ACTION (DIY)
I
ssued on: 06/08/2020 
The day after a massive explosion at Beirut's port devastated the Lebanese capital's Mar Mikhail district, a spontaneous cleanup operation was underway
PATRICK BAZ AFP

Beirut (AFP)

In Beirut's beloved bar districts, hundreds of young Lebanese ditched beers for brooms on Wednesday to sweep debris in the absence of a state-sponsored cleanup operation following a deadly blast.

"What state?" scoffed 42-year-old Melissa Fadlallah, a volunteer cleaning up the hard-hit Mar Mikhail district of the Lebanese capital.

The explosion, which hit just a few hundred metres (yards) away at Beirut's port, blew all the windows and doors off Mar Mikhail's pubs, restaurants and apartment homes on Tuesday.

By Wednesday, a spontaneous cleanup operation was underway there, a glimmer of youthful solidarity and hope after a devastating night.

Wearing plastic gloves and a mask, Fadlallah tossed a shard of glass as long as her arm at the door of the state electricity company's administrative building that looms over the district.

"For me, this state is a dump -- and on behalf of yesterday's victims, the dump that killed them is going to stay a dump," she told AFP.

The blast killed more than 110 people, wounded thousands and compounded public anger that erupted in protests last year against a government seen as corrupt and inefficient.

"We're trying to fix this country. We've been trying to fix it for nine months but now we're going to do it our way," said Fadlallah.

"If we had a real state, it would have been in the street since last night cleaning and working. Where are they?"


- 'Even a smile' -

A few civil defence workers could be seen examining building structures but they were vastly outnumbered by young volunteers flooding the streets to help.

In small groups, they energetically swept up glass beneath blown-out buildings, dragging them into plastic bags.

Others clambered up debris-strewn stairwells to offer their homes to residents who had spent the previous night in the open air.

"We're sending people into the damaged homes of the elderly and handicapped to help them find a home for tonight," said Husam Abu Nasr, a 30-year-old volunteer.

"We don't have a state to take these steps, so we took matters into our own hands," he said.
Towns across the country have offered to host Beirut families with damaged homes and the Maronite Catholic patriarchate announced it would open its monasteries and religious schools to those needing shelter.

Food was quickly taken care of, too: plastic tables loaded with donated water bottles, sandwiches and snacks were set up within hours.

"I can't help by carrying things, so we brought food, water, chocolate and moral support," said Rita Ferzli, 26.

"I think everyone should be here helping, especially young people. No one should be sitting at home -- even a smile is helping right now."

- 'This is it' -

Business owners swiftly took to social media, posting offers to repair doors, paint damaged walls or replace shattered windows for free.

Abdo Amer, who owns window company Curtain Glass, said he was moved to make such an offer after narrowly surviving the blast.

"I had driven by the port just three minutes earlier," the 37-year-old said.

He offered to replace windows for half the price, but said he was fixing some for free given the devastating situation for many families following the Lebanese currency's staggering devaluation in recent months.

"I've gotten more than 7,000 phone calls today and I can't keep up," said the father of four.

"You think the state will take up this work? Actually, let them step down and leave."

Outrage at the government was palpable among volunteers, many of whom blamed government officials for failing to remove explosive materials left at the port for years.

"They're all sitting in their chairs in the AC while people are wearing themselves out in the street," said Mohammad Suyur, 30, as he helped sweep on Wednesday.

"The last thing in the world they care about is this country and the people who live in it."

He said activists were preparing to reignite the protest movement that launched in October.

"We can't bear more than this. This is it. The whole system has got to go," he said.

© 2020 AFP
Lebanon has less than a month's grain reserves after Beirut blast
Issued on: 05/08/2020 -
In this photograph taken on July 15, 2020, a woman spreads bulgur to dry in the sun after grinding it in the southern Lebanese town of Marjayoun. © Joseph Eid, AFP
Text by:NEWS WIRES

Lebanon's main grain silo at Beirut port was destroyed in a blast, leaving the nation with less than a month's reserves of the grain but still with enough flour to avoid a crisis, the economy minister said on Wednesday.
Raoul Nehme told Reuters a day after Tuesday's devastating explosion that Lebanon needed reserves for at least three months to ensure food security and was looking at other storage areas.

The explosion was the most powerful to rip through Beirut, a city torn apart by civil war three decades ago. The economy was already in meltdown before the blast, slowing grain imports as the nation struggled to find hard currency for purchases.

"There is no bread or flour crisis," the minister said. "We have enough inventory and boats on their way to cover the needs of Lebanon on the long term.”

He said grain reserves in Lebanon's remaining silos stood at "a bit less than a month" but said the destroyed silos had only held 15,000 tonnes of the grain at the time, much less than capacity which one official put at 120,000 tonnes.

Beirut's port district was a mangled wreck, disabling the main entry point for imports to feed a nation of more than 6 million people.

Ahmed Tamer, the director of Tripoli port, Lebanon's second biggest facility, said his port did not have grain storage but cargoes could be taken to warehouses 2 km (about one mile) away.

"I want to reassure all Lebanese that we can receive the vessels," he said.

Alongside Tripoli, the ports of Saida, Selaata and Jiyeh were also equipped to handle grain, the economy minister said.

But former Deputy Prime Minister Ghassan Hasbani said other ports did not have the same capabilities.

Hani Bohsali, head of the importers' syndicate said: "We fear there will be a huge supply chain problem, unless there is an international consensus to save us.”

Reserves of flour were sufficient to cover market needs for a month and a half and there were four ships carrying 28,000 tonnes of wheat heading to Lebanon, Ahmed Hattit, the head of the wheat importers union, told Al-Akhbar newspaper.

Lebanon is trying to transfer immediately four vessels carrying 25,000 tonnes of flour to the port in Tripoli, one official told LBCI news channel.

(REUTERS)
THEY ARE KNOWN AS SEX WORKERS NOW
Controversial ‘Hookers for Jesus’ group to get more federal money as Bill Barr and Ivanka Trump announce anti-sex trafficking effort

AND THEY ARE NOT HAPPY ABOUT THEIR WORKING CONDITIONS 
Published on August 5, 2020 By Sky Palma


The Las Vegas-based group Hookers for Jesus has won a grant from the Justice Department less than a year after whistleblowers raised red flags about federal funds being awarded to the organization, Reuters reports.


The complaint from union officials says the group, which is run by a born-again Christian survivor of sex trafficking and operates a safe house for adult trafficking victims, got its grant due to political favoritism.A previous Reuters report revealed that the group required residents of the safe house to go to church, complete Christian homework, and banned them from reading “secular magazines with articles, pictures, etc. that portray worldly views/advice on living, sex, clothing, makeup tips.” As Reuters points out, recipients of federal funds are not allowed to use the funds to promote religion.

The group will now receive $498,764 in new federal funding, which is part of a $35 million grant to trafficking victims unveiled at the White House on Tuesday by Attorney General William Barr and Ivanka Trump.
Read the full report over at Reuters.
Chief Aritana, influential indigenous leader in Brazil, dies of Covid-19

Issued on: 06/08/2020
FILE PHOTO: Yawalapiti chief Aritana is seen in the Xingu National Park, Mato Grosso State, May 9, 2012. © eslei Marcelino/File Photo, Reuters
Text by:NEWS WIRES

Chief Aritana Yawalapiti, one of Brazil's most influential indigenous leaders who led the people of Upper Xingu in central Brazil and helped create an indigenous park there, died on Wednesday from COVID-19, his family said in a statement

His death underscores the threat that Brazil's indigenous people are facing from the novel coronavirus pandemic that has spread to their vulnerable communities, infected thousands and killed hundreds.

Aritana, 71, was rushed to a Goiânia hospital two weeks ago in a risky 9-hour drive from the western state of Mato Grosso, breathing with the aid of oxygen tanks so that he could get to an intensive care unit. He died at the hospital from lung complications caused by the disease.

His doctor Celso Correia Batista, who serves the indigenous people in the Xingu region, first drove Aritana 10 hours to the small Mato Grosso town of Canarana, where his lung condition deteriorated.

With no ICU and unable to find a doctor willing to transport Aritana by air, Batista decided to drive on to Goiânia.


One of the most traditional indigenous leaders in Central Brazil, Aritana led the people of the Upper Xingu and was one of the last speakers of the language of his tribe, Yawalapiti.Daily newsletterReceive essential international news every morningSubscribe

Aritana worked with the Villas-Bôas brothers to create the Xingu National Park, the first vast protected indigenous area in the Amazon where 16 tribes live.

According to Brazil's largest indigenous umbrella organization APIB, 631 indigenous people have died from COVID-19 and there have been 22,325 confirmed cases in the community so far.

The Ministry of Health reports a smaller number of 294 deaths among indigenous people and 16,509 confirmed cases, because it does not count indigenous people who have left their lands and moved to urban areas.

Half of Brazil's 300 indigenous tribes have confirmed infections.

(REUTERS)

Trump’s unhinged fans get even more detached from reality as his chances fade




Published 2 hours ago

on August 5, 2020


By Amanda Marcotte, Salon
- Commentary


A pandemic is spiraling out of control and Donald Trump’s reaction is to roll his eyes and say, “It is what it is.” Unsurprisingly, polling data shows that his Democratic opponent, former Vice President Joe Biden, is pulling ahead, not just in national polls, but in a number of battleground states like Pennsylvania, Michigan and Florida, none of which Trump can afford to lose. After all, the incumbent has nothing real to run on. The economy is the worst it’s been since the Great Depression of the 1930s, Americans are losing health insurance by the millions, and Republicans are responding by trying to shortchange unemployment benefits for the millions of people who’ve lost their jobs.

With nothing real to hang on to, it’s no surprise that conservatives — already prone to spreading misinformation — are increasingly addicted to conspiracy theories, wallowing in paranoid fantasies to justify the ludicrous notion that there’s any reason to keep on supporting Trump and the Republican Party.




Unfortunately, this turn towards even greater conspiratorial thinking on the right is also extremely dangerous. There’s already a strong link between right-wing paranoia and right-wing violence. Add the increasing likelihood of Trump’s defeat, the rising stress from the coronavirus, and a blitz of violent propaganda, and there’s a real chance that right-wing conspiracism will lead to even more domestic terrorism, hate crimes and neofascist goons in the streets.

Alex Jones of Infowars, who still has a sizable audience despite having been de-platformed by many major social media companies, shamelessly encouraged his audience last week to lash out with murderous violence against the left.

Jones claimed to have reports that “Maoists” (which is fringe-right code for anyone to the left of Republicans) are stockpiling “explosives and weapons and trucks loaded with ammonium nitrate and chlorine gas” in the cities in preparation to wage war against all true-believing Americans. So “the best thing to do in a defensive way,” Jones said, “is kill as many of them as quickly as possible.”

Jones of course insisted that he was only talking about “defensive” tactics and warned viewers about not “jumping first,” but that rhetoric is mostly a weak attempt at ass-covering to disguise an effort to incite terrorist violence from the right.

For one thing, Jones is just making up the threat that his audience is supposed to be “defending” themselves against. No leftists are not stockpiling weapons or bomb-making materials, and there is no progressive conspiracy to wage war on right-wingers. For another thing, Jones painted a clear picture of the kinds of people he imagines killing as quickly as possible, specifically naming “the establishment perverts and pedophiles” who he believes run society, as well as people who “show up in black uniforms and burn down your local courthouse.”
The former is a reference to Democratic politicians, whom far-right conspiracy theorists have been accusing, under the banner of “Pizzagate,” of running a secret pedophile ring for at least the last four years now. The latter is a reference to Black Lives Matter protesters and anti-fascist activists, the vast majority of whom are peaceful. The right has been demonizing them as violent because of some graffiti and sporadic episodes of vandalism. Neither group is involved in a plot to kill conservatives (or anyone else), but by claiming that they, Jones is setting up a narrative clearly meant to incite or justify violent attacks.


On the Christian right side of things, similar conspiracy theories about progressives are spreading. As Right Wing Watch has documented, popular Christian right activist Scott Lively has claimed that “Democrat-controlled population centers” will soon be burned to the ground, as part of an elaborate conspiracy by liberals to get out of paying pensions to police officers.

Unfortunately, there’s good reason to fear these wild and violent theories are gaining even more traction than usual on the already paranoid far right. On Tuesday, Axios reported a massive surge in online interest in QAnon, which is basically an umbrella movement that organizes all these various right-wing conspiracy theories into one narrative that has become so elaborate and consuming for its followers that it’s almost a religion at this point.



Online searches for QAnon have reportedly exploded tenfold. Similarly, “QAnon pages and groups on Facebook had nearly 10 times more likes at the end of last month than they did last July” and there has been “a 190% increase in the daily average number of tweets with popular QAnon hashtags since March as compared to the seven months prior.”

QAnon followers believe that a shadowy “elite” — which they conflate with Democrats — runs both the country from the shadows and, oh yeah, that they also have a massive pedophilia ring, and that Trump is secretly masterminding a plot to destroy this elite cabal. (In real life, Trump’s reaction to people who run pedophile rings is to say they like “beautiful women” on “the younger side” and also to say “I wish her well.”) It’s a testament to the kinds of pretzels people will tie themselves into in order to believe that there’s anything noble or moral about Donald Trump, or some valid reason to support him.

The rise in interest in QAnon isn’t surprising, as the White House is actively encouraging their voters to get involved with this unified-field conspiracy universe. As Media Matters has reported, Trump has retweeted QAnon Twitter accounts at least 185 times, and “members of Trump’s family, his personal attorney, current and former campaign staffers, and even some current and former Trump administration officials have also repeatedly amplified QAnon supporters and their content.”



Honestly, the supposedly mainstream conservative network Fox News is just as dangerous at this point. Most Fox News hosts are careful to avoid overtly endorsing QAnon, but network content in recent weeks has been perfectly situated to validate and amplify the paranoia about Democrats and progressives who are supposedly gearing up to wage war on conservatives.

Day in and day out, Fox News has broadcast scary images of protesters fighting with police, clouds of tear gas and people running through city streets in the middle of the night, all to make rural and suburban viewers, who are even more shut-in than usual, believe that American cities are war zones right now. Fox News is also blatantly lying to its viewers, blaming “radicals” and “antifa” for the scary images, and not telling viewers that in most cases what they’re seeing is cops provoking conflict, often by chasing down, beating and tear-gassing peaceful protesters.


As those of us who actually live in American cities can attest, they don’t look like war zones, but pretty much like the same places they were before the pandemic and the protests (with a lot less traffic). Even when it comes to the protests themselves, despite some looting and vandalism back in early June, the vast majority of protests have been entirely nonviolent, at least as long as law enforcement isn’t attacking protesters without cause.

In spreading this bald-faced propaganda, Fox News — which tries to position itself as the voice of the Trump-era mainstream right — is working in tandem with cuckoo-for-Cocoa Puffs conspiracy theorists like QAnon and Alex Jones. Fox News viewers see all these misleading images and hear all this talk about “antifa” and the “radical left,” and it feels like concrete evidence that the conspiracy theorists are right and that “progressives” or “radicals” are starting a civil war. This not only reinforces conspiratorial thinking, but encourages more conservatives to seek out these outrageous theories.




Taken together, the Trump White House, the online conspiracy fringe and Fox News are enveloping Republican voters in this paranoid fantasy that they’re under violent assault from the leftists — and that they need to “defend” themselves through pre-emptive action. There’s already been a rash of violence against protesters, who have been run over with cars or shot down in the streets. Rather than toning it down, Trump and his allies in both “mainstream” and fringe right-wing media have ramped up their rhetoric, painting a lurid and entirely false picture of the supposed threat. Either implicitly, as on Fox News, or explicitly, as with Alex Jones, conservatives are being encouraged to respond to this imaginary threat with violence.

There’s no reason to expect this situation to improve as the November election nears — or after that either, quite likely. Right-wingers are sore losers on a good day, but now they’ve whipped themselves into a paranoid frenzy that is utterly detached from reality and could lead to tragic violence.
Ron DeSantis admits GOP sabotaged unemployment with ‘pointless roadblocks’ so fewer people would sign up

Published on August 4, 2020 By Matthew Chapman


In an interview with CBS4 Miami’s Jim DeFede, Gov. Ron DeSantis (R-FL) admitted that Florida Republicans, led by his predecessor, deliberately crippled the state’s unemployment system so that fewer out-of-work people would apply for benefits.

“Do you believe that the system was in part put together the way it was to discourage people from being able to collect unemployment?” asked DeFede.

“I think that was the animating philosophy,” said DeSantis. “I mean having studied how it was internally constructed, I think the goal was for whoever designed, it was, ‘Let’s put as many kind of pointless roadblocks along the way, so people just say, oh, the hell with it, I’m not going to do that.’ And, you know, for me, let’s decide on what the benefit is and let’s get it out as efficiently as possible. You know, we shouldn’t necessarily do these roadblocks to do it. So we have cleared a lot of those.”

When DeFede pointed out to him the current system was designed by former Gov. Rick Scott, now a senator and ally of DeSantis, he replied, “I’m not sure if it was his, but I think definitely in terms of how it was internally constructed, you know. It was definitely done in a way to lead to the least number of claims being paid out.”

For months, Florida Republicans have faced allegations that the unemployment system was broken by design. It has been a massive obstacle as the coronavirus pandemic has shuttered businesses and left millions out of work and reliant on unemployment insurance.
New report accuses Trump of ‘intentional disregard’ and attack on democracy throughout failed COVID-19 response


 August 5, 2020 By Agence France-Presse

“What is becoming clearer each day is President Trump’s intent to use this chaos to create a crisis for our democracy.”

A new report published Wednesday details months of willful failures to confront the coronavirus pandemic by the White House and paints President Donald Trump’s authoritarian tactics during that national crisis as an overt assault on the nation’s democratic institutions ahead of elections in November.

The report by Common Cause—titled “Intentional Disregard: Trump’s Authoritarianism During the Covid-19 Pandemic,” (pdf)—highlights Trump’s coronavirus response as part of a larger effort by the president to attack U.S. democracy
As evidence to support its thesis, Common Cause points to the president’s repeated claim that mail-in voting—favored by 58% of Americans according to a Politico/Morning Consult poll released Wednesday—will result in a “rigged” election. The report also shows how the administration is actively undermining the U.S. Postal Service by naming a top GOP donor with no USPS experience as postmaster general.

“None of President Trump’s efforts to thwart oversight of his administration’s response to the Covid-19 pandemic come as a surprise. Throughout his presidency, Trump has abused his power to avoid accountability and install loyalists in key oversight positions.”
—Common Cause

“The Trump administration’s failed response to the Covid-19 pandemic has created an unprecedented public health crisis leading to a worsening economic crisis. What is becoming clearer each day is President Trump’s intent to use this chaos to create a crisis for our democracy,” said Common Cause president Karen Hobert Flynn.

“Intentional Disregard” catalogues the administration’s steadfast refusal to treat the pandemic as a serious threat, starting on January 3 when a Chinese official first informed the CDC of the Covid-19 outbreak in Wuhan.

Though the president received several classified, urgent briefings about the threat in early 2020, one of the administration’s earliest responses to the public health crisis was to ignore federal vaccine expert Rick Bright when he “he raised concerns in January about the need to prepare for the coronavirus” and insist that he invest in procuring hydroxychloroquine “without proper scientific vetting.” Bright was dismissed from his role at the Health and Human Services Department (HHS) when he refused.


Common Cause writes in its report that Trump’s response to Bright was indicative of a larger attack on inspectors general at federal agencies, including Christi Grimm. Grimm was ousted from her role as principal deputy inspector general at HHS on May 1, weeks after she published a report about Covid-19 testing supply shortages and widespread shortages of personal protective equipment at U.S. hospitals.

“None of President Trump’s efforts to thwart oversight of his administration’s response to the Covid-19 pandemic come as a surprise,” Common Cause reports. “Throughout his presidency, Trump has abused his power to avoid accountability and install loyalists in key oversight positions.”

The administration’s aversion to oversight during the pandemic has extended to the appropriation of funds under the $2 trillion CARES Act in March.

“The ink of President Trump’s signature on the CARES Act was not even dry yet when he issued a statement indicating that he would not comply with the oversight provisions” in the bill, according to the report.


The president named White House lawyer Brian Miller as the inspector general for pandemic recovery, while Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin only agreed to release the names of companies which received aid under the CARES Act after public outcry over his initial refusal to disclose the names.

In a number of ways, the report explains, Trump and his top officials have used the pandemic to divide rather than unite people across the U.S. and to use the crisis to his own political advantage, even as the death toll rose to 1,000 people per day in July.

“We know the government can do better,” said Paul Seamus Ryan, Common Cause vice president for policy and litigation. “Other governments around the world are doing a much better job than our own handling this pandemic. Trump’s decision to politicize everything, including public health guidance, sets us apart from the world.”

The report detailed the president’s politicization tactics including:

his refusal to wear a protective face mask as advised by the CDC, pitting Trump supporters and detractors against one another by speculating in June “that people were wearing masks not as a preventivemeasure but as a way to signal disapproval of him”;

his claim that Democrats are pushing to keep public schools closed unless the federal government devises and fully funds a plan to mitigate the spread of Covid-19 in classrooms; 

and

his stoking of outrage over state and local lockdown measures, with groups affiliated with the Trump campaign bankrolling sometimes-violent anti-quarantine protests attended by a small, vocal minority of Americans.
“These groups have had the advantage of being amplified through the social media platform of President Trump,” the report states. “This includes the president tweeting things such as ‘LIBERATE MICHIGAN!’ and ‘LIBERATE MINNESOTA!’ When asked about whether he would urge protesters to follow the rules of local authorities, Trump all but confirmed that the protesters are following his rhetoric closely by saying, ‘I think they listen to me. They seem to be protesters that like me and respect this opinion.'”

A section of the report draws attention to the president’s attempts at “information manipulation,” including his undermining of the USPS.

As Common Dreams reported last week, following Trump’s appointment of former Republican National Committee chair Louis DeJoy as postmaster general, members of the postal workers union have raised alarm about new mail sorting procedures and overtime cuts that have already led to mail delivery delays in battleground states.

“Congress must step up to stop Trump from undermining the postal service by turning it into a partisan weapon as we head toward national elections, which will depend on the postal service more than ever,” Common Cause writes, as voters across the country will rely on a vote-by-mail system during the 2020 elections to cast ballots without risking Covid-19 infection.

Although Trump himself voted by mail in the 2018 election and several states including solidly-red Utah have held elections via mail for years, the president has repeatedly claimed voting by mail will be used to rig the presidential election in Democrats’ favor.

“Trump’s claims against vote-by-mail are simply NOT true,” tweeted Bette Marchant, chief financial officer at Common Cause.

Trump’s claims against #VoteByMail are simply NOT true. He continues to spread lies and threatened to withhold #FederalFunds to states that protect their citizens’ #RightToVote. https://t.co/bezHZ3ivdn
— Bette Marchant (@BetteMarchant) August 5, 2020

The report alleges that Trump “continues to spread lies” and rebukes the president for threatening to withhold federal assistance to states that implement robust vote-by-mail strategies. “It seems that he believes he is the only person who should be allowed to exercise his right to vote while protecting his health during the Covid-19 pandemic,” it states.

Ryan, speaking for Common Cause, said the November elections will be the “opportunity for Americans to hold government accountable” and that his group’s focus nationwide will be that “every eligible voter is able to cast a ballot safely and securely.”

In its report, Common Cause recommends a number of steps lawmakers must take to ensure U.S. democracy survives the coronavirus pandemic and that Americans are afforded the opportunity to remove Trump from office in November, including:
passing the HEROES Act and the For the People Act, both of which have been approved by the Democratic-led House and would expand vote-by-mail and fund this year’s elections;
ensuring federal oversight of Covid-19 relief through the passage of the Coronavirus Oversight and Recovery Ethics Act of 2020 (CORE Act); and
protecting inspectors general from firing without cause by passing the Inspector General Independence Act.

“Enactment of these reforms would make the government more responsive and accountable to the American people and less susceptible to authoritarians like President Trump,” the group said.