CRIMINAL CAPITALI$M

ZAMBIA

Glencore’s Corruption guilty verdict vindicates Critics of the New Dawn’s blind trust in dodgy Mining Houses


June 2, 2022
By Mwansa Chalwe Snr

The New Dawn government has been accused of being too cosy to the mining houses despite their poor record. The UPND administration’s development strategy is mainly anchored on mining without making changes to decades old agreements and unfair incentives, through negotiations with mining houses, despite overwhelming evidence in the past 20 years which shows that they have been ripping Zambia off with all sorts of legal machinations as well as through financial and environmental criminal practices.

The corruption guilty verdict in the US, of Glencore, the former owners of Mopani Copper Mines (MCM), vindicates the New Dawn critics. Glencore bought MCM for $30m and sold it back to Zambia for $1.5billion, after 20 years of paying no income taxes, claiming losses throughout the period.

Glencore, is expected to pay to authorities in the US, UK and Brazil the sum US$1.5bn after pleading guilty to a 10-year international bribery scheme as well as a plot to manipulate commodity prices. Guess what, the penalty may even be paid from the loan repayments they receive from Zambia for MCM which they sold us at such an exorbitant amount having bought it for a song.

“The scope of this criminal bribery scheme is staggering,” Damian Williams, US attorney for the Southern District of New York told a press conference. “Glencore paid bribes to secure oil contracts. Glencore paid bribes to avoid government audits. Glencore bribed judges to make lawsuits disappear. At bottom, Glencore paid bribes to make money – hundreds of millions of dollars. And it did so with the approval, and even encouragement, of its top executives.”
According to the US Department of Justice, Glencore was involved in a “decade-long scheme by Glencore and its subsidiaries to make and conceal corrupt payments and bribes through intermediaries for the benefit of foreign officials across multiple countries”. And between 2007 and 2018, Glencore paid around US$80mn to third-party intermediaries to secure business with state-owned or state-controlled entities. The practices took place in several African and Latin American countries, including Nigeria, Cameroon, Brazil and Venezuela. Glencore is also said to use inflated invoices, sham consulting agreements and intermediary companies to conceal payments to foreign officials

In its recent opinion piece on the verdict, the UK Financial Times wrote: “Glencore is not alone in needing a cultural overhaul on bribery. Broadly, the contribution of global resources companies to the impoverishment and penury of African nations was considered a niche concern in the Square Mile.” (the Square mile is the City of London- Central London- which has been a doyen of dirty and bloody money which we never knew until the Ukraine-Russia was has exposed the City)

The Financial Times Opinion clearly show that Glencore is not the only Mining house involved in corruption but others are also guilty of this. But Glencore appears to have been in the premier league of Multinational corruption and has been caught red handed. Although Zambia is not mentioned by name in guilty the verdict, it is included in the phrase “multiple countries”, “African Countries”. It follows that Zambia should not be naïve and have blind trust of other Mining houses. In any case, Vendetta Resources is another mining house in Zambia whose record in Zambia for various crimes is well documented.

It is with the above back ground, that critics including the author of this article have been critical of the New Dawn’s fallacious belief that ramping up production to 3million tonne will benefit Zambia without negotiating better deals, including revision of the archaic development agreements. The reality is that increased production will only benefit foreign mining houses’ shareholders and very little will remain in Zambia for development. The argument by critics is that Zambia will not sufficiently benefits from increased mining production as Mining houses having been involved in widespread schemes financial crimes like corruption, tax evasion through transfer pricing and other machinations to deny Zambia sufficient benefits from their natural resources due to pure greed by foreign investors and their local accomplices.

The Author has written so many opinion pieces on this issue ad nauseam, including a full chapter in his book, “China-West Battleground in Africa: Debt Ridden Zambia”, .He has argued for a new cooperation model between resource rich countries like Zambia and Mining houses which he coined Rational Resource Nationalism (RRA) meant to result in win- win situation.

It is the light of our past experience with Mining houses, which has been brought to the fore by the Glencore guilty verdict, that I and many other enlightened Zambian critics, are sceptical of the recent pledge of $1.5billion investment by FQM – even after Professor Saasa “validation” report of the investment, his conflict of interests notwithstanding. We are simply not excited by these pie in the sky and mirage investments. The question Zambians should ask is how much foreign exchange, tax revenue, skills and technology transfer, infrastructure built, entrepreneurship promotion etc will flow to Zambia as a result of these investments. Your guess is as good as mine.

To put the issue in perceptive, Glencore claims to have invested $4.4 billion in Mopani since 2000. I challenge anyone, to show me tangible evidence of the benefits to Zambia of this $4.4 billion investment by Glencore, in Mufulira and Kitwe especially – where they were located- during their ownership of MCM for 20 years, before taking off on expiry of the Development Agreements incentives and selling the Mines to Zambia for billions.

The jury is now out for the New Dawn government to carefully handle the other bad boy of the Zambian mining industry – Vendetta Mining Resources. The World’s number one super power has just confirmed that Zambia’s two major foreign Mining investors for the past 20 years, are criminals. How can anyone challenge home grown critics unless there are grateful beneficiaries?

The writer is a Chartered Accountant and Author. He is a retired international MSMEs Consultant and an independent financial commentator. He is also an Op-Ed Contributor to the Hong Kong based, Alibaba owned, and South China Morning Post (SCMP). Contact: pmchalwe@gmail.com
Some of the contents of this article are abridged excerpts from my book whose link is below.
CHINA-WEST BATTLEGROUND IN AFRICA: DEBT RIDDEN ZAMBIA: Why U.S. May Lose Geo-Economic Competition to China https://www.amazon.com/dp/B097DVXBKH/ref=cm_sw_r_wa_api_glt_7PR5H7YBZZ14FCDNT54Y

US bank chief warns of economic “hurricane”

Nick Beams

WSWS.ORG

Jamie Dimon, the chief executive of America’s largest bank, JPMorgan Chase, has warned that an economic “hurricane” is about to hit the US because of the war in Ukraine and the tightening of monetary policy by the US Federal Reserve.

Two weeks ago, Dimon warned of “storm clouds” gathering over the US economy. He escalated that assessment at a financial services conference yesterday.

“I said they’re storm clouds, they’re big storm clouds here. It’s a hurricane. That hurricane is right out there down the road coming our way,” he said.

“We just don’t know if it’s a minor one or Superstorm Sandy [the devastating hurricane of 2012] … And you better brace yourself,” he told investors at the conference.

The Wall St. street sign is framed by the American flags flying outside the New York Stock exchange, Friday, Jan. 14, 2022, in the Financial District. (AP Photo/Mary Altaffer)

He warned the Ukraine war would continue to put upward pressure on oil prices, which could go to as high as $150 or $175 per barrel. At present oil is over $120 after a spike following the decision by the European Union to ban seaborne oil imports from Russia as part of its tightening sanctions regime.

Dimon warned that oil prices would continue to rise over the longer term.

“We’re not taking the proper actions to protect Europe from what’s going to happen to oil in the short run. And we’re not taking the proper actions to protect you all from what’s going to happen to oil in the next five years, which means it almost has to go up in price.”

He also directed attention to the monetary tightening initiated by the Fed.

This consists of two components: Interest rate rises each of 0.5 percent over the next two meetings of its policymaking body, with more to follow; and a winding down of the $9 trillion of financial assets purchased by the Fed in response to the 2008 financial crisis and the market meltdown in March 2020 at the start of the pandemic.

The effects of interest increases are generally known, at least if historical experience is any guide. They must be lifted to “stunt” economic growth, in the words of one of the Fed governors, Christopher Waller, in a speech delivered on Monday calling for sustained interest rate increases.

But the effect on financial markets and the economy more broadly of a continuous reduction in the Fed’s balance sheet, known as “quantitative tightening [QT],” is not because it has never been undertaken in a sustained way before. Before the 2008 crisis the Fed held just under $1 trillion in financial assets in order to facilitate the operation of its monetary policy.

The expansion of its assets holding since then has had a different purpose—to prevent the implosion of the financial system which has loomed large twice in the past 14 years.

The only other occasion when the Fed, briefly, moved to cut its asset holdings took place in 2018. It contributed to a sharp fall on Wall Street at the end of that year and was rapidly withdrawn by Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell in January 2019.

Dimon warned that there was a risk of market volatility as the Fed began quantitative tightening.

“They do not have a choice because there’s so much liquidity in the system,” he said. “They have to remove some of the liquidity to stop the speculation, to reduce home prices and stuff like that. And you’ve never been through QT.”

With the Fed reducing its holding of Treasury bonds, the supply will increase, bringing about a “huge change in the flow of funds around the world. I don’t know what the effect of that is,” he said, warning of the potential for “huge volatility.”

His “hope” was that it would end up “OK,” but “who the hell knows?”

As Dimon was making his remarks, the rating agency S&P Global issued a warning that investors were underestimating the severity of the financial and social effects of what it called the “global food shock.”

In a report published yesterday, it said food price rises, combined with the escalation of energy prices, would impact the credit worthiness of a large number of emerging economies.

According to Frank Gill, a specialist on sovereign debt for Europe, the Middle East and Africa at the ratings agency: “Rising energy and food prices represent yet further balance-of-payments, fiscal and growth shocks to the majority of emerging markets. This intensifies strains on their public finances and ratings, which are already impacted negatively by the global pandemic.”

These markets are already experiencing an outflow of capital from their bond markets, which have already had their worst start to a year in almost three decades, as a result of the increase in interest rates in the US. Dollar-denominated debt is also coming under increasing stress because of the rise in the value of the US currency on global markets.

S&P Global said emerging markets exposed to the food price hikes already had low credit ratings, and they could fall even further.

The social and political consequences were underscored in remarks by Uday Patnaik, head of emerging market debt at Legal and General Investment, a major European asset management firm, to the Financial Times.

“For emerging markets, food is a much more significant part of your disposable income. If you’re a big importer or poorer country this is painful. This is an issue that can cause governments to fall,” he said.

He commented that Sri Lanka, where ongoing protests strikes have erupted calling for the end of the Rajapaksa presidency, was already “highly stressed” before the war in Ukraine, but the food price shock was “the final straw that pushed them over the edge.”

Other countries could follow, with the S&P Global report noting that price shock and the reduction in food supplies raised the risk of social unrest with the crisis to last for years not months.

The economic and social turmoil will not be confined to so-called emerging market economies because the crisis is striking at the major economies as well. Inflation in the UK is running at 10 percent and threatening to go even higher. In the Eurozone it hit 8.1 percent in May, up from 7.4 percent in March and April; and in the US it is running at more than 8 percent.

In all these regions, as well as others, the cost of basic items, such as food and energy that make up much of the spending of the working class, are rising much faster than the official inflation rate.

The policy of capitalist governments and central banks everywhere is to hike interest rates, inducing a recession if that is considered necessary, to try to crush a wages movement of the working class.

In the US, the Fed’s agenda received the backing of the Biden administration in a meeting between the president, the Treasury secretary Janet Yellen and Fed chair Powell earlier this week.

Following the meeting Biden said: “My plan … to address inflation starts with a simple proposition: Respect the Fed, respect the Fed’s independence which I have done and will continue to do.”

He said Powell and other members of the Fed were focused, “laser-focused on addressing inflation as I am.”

As Powell had made clear on numerous occasions, that “laser focus” means continuing to lift interest rates to a level where they drive down wages, and a preparedness to follow the path of Fed chair Paul Volcker in the 1980s. He raised rates to record highs, resulting in the deepest recession since the 1930s and inflicting social and economic devastation from which the working class has never fully recovered.

Dimon’s “hurricane” remarks were directed to an audience of financial market operators. But it is also clear that a social and economic hurricane is confronting the working class in the US and around the world.

Framework developed to advance modern treaty implementation in B.C.


The Alliance of BC Modern Treaty Nations has developed a framework with the province to advance treaty implementation in British Columbia, which was announced on May 24.

It is the first of its kind within the province and renews B.C.’s commitment to effectively implement modern treaties, according to the Ministry of Indigenous Relations and Reconciliation.

“Modern treaties create the blueprint for Indigenous self-governance and effective government-to-government relationships,” Toquaht First Nation Chief Anne Mack said in a release, on behalf of the alliance. “However, you can’t live in a blueprint. You still need to build the house, and then you need to maintain it and expand it as the family grows.”

Treaty implementation is a work in progress that “requires ongoing efforts and attention,” she said.

Three priorities were identified in the framework, including: developing fiscal arrangements to fulfil treaty rights and obligations, establishing meaningful participation in B.C.’s legislative and policy initiatives, as well as initiating policy changes in the BC Public Service to advance a whole-of-government approach.

“The Shared Priorities Framework is B.C.’s commitment to modern treaty nations to create and strengthen relationships that are dynamic, evolving and improving over time,” Premier John Horgan said in a release. “Treaties are important living documents that provide a foundation for renewed relationships and certainty for all First Nations in the treaty process.”

The Alliance of BC Modern Treaty Nations was formed as a collective of the eight nations operating with modern treaties in British Columbia. It was established in 2018 by Tla’amin Nation, Tsawwassen First Nation and the Maa-nulth Treaty nations. Nisg̱a’a Nation joined later in 2019.

According to the alliance, modern treaty nations needed a way to collectively engage with the provincial government to advocate for improved implementation of the final agreements.

“Having the alliance being heard by B.C. is the first of many steps in the right direction for modern treaty nations to achieve reconciliation,” said Huu-ay-aht First Nation Councillor Brad Johnson. “What is needed is to continue building our government-to-government relationships and have a good working relationship so they understand our need to achieve our strategic goals.”

Over a decade ago, the Maa-nulth treaty was signed as one of the first final agreements reached under B.C.’s treaty process.

The government-to-government agreement between Canada, British Columbia and five Nuu-chah-nulth nations was signed on April 1, 2011.

It established Huu-ay-aht, Uchucklesaht, Yuułuʔiłʔatḥ, Toquaht and Ka:’yu:’k’t’h’/Che:k’tl7et’h’ First Nations as self-governing under provincial and federal law.

“Ten years feels like a long time in one’s life,” said Toquaht Nation Director of Operations Angela Polifroni, on behalf of the alliance’s technical team. “But it's a very, very short time for First Nations entering into a self-government under a modern treaty.”

Especially, she said, “since a lot of what we’re trying to achieve is new to us and new to our treaty partners.”

Part of that discovery is learning what's needed to succeed, she said.

“Modern treaty governments need sufficient resources to succeed,” Polifroni said. “Modern treaty governments are responsible for lawmaking and enforcement, land management, social programs and services, and so many other obligations – many of which were B.C.’s responsibility pre-treaty.”

To date, Polifroni said B.C. has contributed “very little to our fiscal arrangements.”

“The shared priorities framework affirms B.C.’s commitment to working collaboratively with modern treaty nations to rectify this major gap,” she said.

A whole-of-government approach requires education for staff to understand treaty rights and treaty implementation obligations, Polifroni said.

“It requires effective communication and fully resourced engagements,” she said. “It requires accountability and oversight at the highest levels in all of the B.C. public service.”

That’s why it was important to the alliance that the framework be signed by the premier – to affirm the whole-of-government commitment to treaty implementation, said Polifroni.

One of the major benefits of becoming a treaty nation was that Huu-ay-aht was no longer “restricted” on how to allocate their funding and budget, said Johnson.

“Treaties recognize the inherent rights of Indigenous peoples and enable them to rebuild their communities and governments on their own terms,” Murray Rankin, minister of Indigenous Relations and Reconciliation, said in a release. “To uphold our treaties with the intent they were written, we must be intentional about how we implement them and grow our government-to-government relationships through collaborative action. This framework gives us the vision to do just that.”

It's important to consider that modern treaties were negotiated at a specific point in history, Polifroni said.

“Canadian and B.C. laws and policies have changed,” she said. “And part of treaty implementation is ensuring that modern treaty nations are aware of the changes and can benefit from [them].”

Because the treaty is a “living relationship,” Polifroni said agreements and relationships are going to continue to grow and evolve.

“Treaty implementation is ongoing,” Polifroni said. “We will never be able to say that the treaties are fully implemented because the work will be ongoing as long as the modern treaty nations, the province of B.C., and Canada continue to exist.”

Melissa Renwick, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter, Ha-Shilth-Sa

Who is Cassidy Hutchinson and what has she told the Jan. 6 committee?

Caitlin Dickson
·Reporter
Wed, June 1, 2022

The House select committee investigating the Jan. 6 insurrection has kept a tight lid on its plans for televised hearings slated to take place this month, but that hasn’t stopped speculation about who might be called to testify.

Among the names that have been floated as a potential witness in the highly anticipated hearings is that of Cassidy Hutchinson, an aide to former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows, who has already been cited as the source of multiple revelations uncovered by the select committee’s probe.

Hutchinson, who served as a special assistant to the president for legislative affairs, was subpoenaed in November 2021, along with several other former Trump administration officials who, the panel believed, had relevant information regarding the former president’s activities on Jan. 6 and the role he and his aides played in efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 election.

ICONIC

Far-right supporters of Donald Trump gather near the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.

 (Shay Horse/NurPhoto via Getty Images)

According to her subpoena, Hutchinson was not only at the White House on Jan. 6 but she’d been with Trump during his speech at the “Stop the Steal” rally on the Ellipse, where he urged his supporters to “fight like hell” before promising to march with them to the Capitol.

She also emailed Georgia officials directly following Meadows’s trip to attend that state’s election audit, according to the subpoena, and was present for other key meetings and conversations at the White House leading up to Jan. 6.

Unlike her former boss, whose refusal to cooperate with House investigators has earned him a Justice Department referral for criminal contempt charges, Hutchinson has appeared before the committee on three separate occasions since the beginning of this year. In fact, following her most recent deposition last month, a source reportedly told CNN that Hutchinson believes she’s being forced to testify due to Meadows’s refusal to comply with his own subpoena. The same source said Hutchinson will likely make another appearance before the committee, possibly during the upcoming public hearings, according to CNN.

Trump aide Cassidy Hutchinson, left, with White House press secretary Kaleigh McEnany in 2020. (Jonathan Ernst/Reuters)

A spokesperson for the Jan. 6 committee declined to comment on whether Hutchinson will be called as a witness at the hearings, the first of which is set for June 9. Hutchinson’s attorney did not respond to a request for comment from Yahoo News.

While much remains unknown about what Hutchinson has told the select committee so far, a handful of key details have emerged from her closed-door depositions that seem likely to feature prominently in the case House investigators hope to present to the American public this summer.

Here’s a look at some of the key revelations that have already been attributed to Hutchinson, and how they might factor into the public hearings.

House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., surrounded by reporters after House investigators issued a subpoena to McCarthy and four other GOP lawmakers.

 (J. Scott Applewhite/AP)

Meadows and others pressed ahead with plans to overturn Trump’s election loss, court filing says, even after White House counsel had deemed them not “legally sound.”

The select committee’s legal battle against Meadows, who has sued to block the panel’s subpoenas, may offer clues on how Hutchinson’s testimony could be used in the hearings.

In an April court filing, the select committee cited sections of Hutchinson’s testimony as proof of the former chief’s involvement in the effort to overturn the results of the 2020 election and that he had pursued unlawful plans to make that happen.

According to the filing, Hutchinson told the committee that the White House Counsel’s Office repeatedly objected on legal grounds to a plan to push Republican officials in battleground states that had voted for Biden to send alternate, pro-Trump slates of electors to Congress when lawmakers met on Jan. 6 to certify the Electoral College vote count.

Hutchinson told the committee that the counsel’s office had concluded that the alternate electors plan was not legally sound potentially as early as November 2021, and that this conclusion was raised during multiple meetings at the White House involving Meadows, other Trump associates like Trump’s former personal attorney Rudy Giuliani, and members of Congress including Reps. Scott Perry, R-Pa., Matt Gaetz, R-Fla., and Louie Gohmert, R-Texas.

“Despite that advice, the plan moved forward,” the committee’s filing states.

The role played by Trump and advisers like Meadows has been a key focus of the committee’s investigation, and the Guardian reported last month that the upcoming hearings are expected to highlight how the Trump White House pursued potentially illegal methods, including the plot to send fake electors to Congress to subvert Joe Biden’s win and secure a second term for Trump.

Then-President Donald Trump arrives to speak at the "Stop the Steal" rally on Jan. 6, 2021. (Jacquelyn Martin/AP)

Meadows was warned about the possibility of violence on Jan. 6, filing says

Another focus of the panel’s investigation has been the role Trump advisers played in organizing the events that took place on Jan. 6 as Congress met to certify the Electoral College results. Those events include the rally at the Ellipse that preceded the Capitol riot, which left five people dead and more than 140 police officers injured.

In that same April court filing, the select committee also cited Hutchinson’s testimony as evidence that Meadows went ahead with plans for Trump’s Jan. 6 rally in Washington despite receiving direct warnings of violence that day.

The filing includes quotes from Hutchinson's March 7 deposition in which she told investigators, “I know that there were concerns brought forward to Mr. Meadows,” and “I know that people had brought information forward to him that had indicated that there could be violence on the 6th. But, again, I’m not sure if he — what he did with that information.”

Trump supporters taking over the steps of the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.

 (Bill Clark/CQ-Roll Call via Getty Images)

Specifically, Hutchinson told the committee that in early January, Meadows had discussed the potential for violence on Jan. 6 with Anthony Ornato, a senior Secret Service agent who also served as Trump’s White House chief of operations.

“I just remember Mr. Ornato coming in and saying that we had intel reports saying that there could be violence on the 6th,” Hutchinson said. “And Mr. Meadows said, All right, let’s talk about it.”

Hutchinson said Ornato had raised the subject with Meadows on his way out of the office one evening and the two discussed it briefly.

“I believe they went to the office for maybe five minutes,” she said. “It was very quick.”

Based on the sections of Hutchinson’s testimony that have been released by the select committee, it’s not clear whether she offered any further details about the warnings Meadows received, or whether he was warned specifically about the possibility that Trump supporters protesting the former president’s loss in D.C. on Jan. 6 could turn violent. Shortly after the rally at the Ellipse, a pro-Trump mob stormed the Capitol.

Rep. Scott Perry, R-Pa., speaks to Trump supporters in Harrisburg, Pa., on Nov. 5, 2020, the day after Joe Biden's election. (Mark Kauzlarich/Reuters)

Meadows reportedly burned papers after Scott Perry meeting

Recent reports suggest Hutchinson has continued to provide the select committee with other relevant details about the former chief of staff’s behavior in the lead-up to Jan. 6.

According to Politico, Hutchinson told the panel during her latest deposition last month that she saw Meadows burn documents in his office following a meeting with Rep. Scott Perry, R-Pa., in the weeks after the 2020 election.

Perry has emerged as another key player in the select panel’s investigation into Trump’s efforts to overturn his election defeat and the events leading up to Jan. 6. Testimony and documents obtained by the committee have identified Perry as the first link between the former president and Jeffrey Clark, then a little-known senior official at the Justice Department.

During his final weeks in the White House, Trump reportedly conspired with Clark to try to use the DOJ to sow doubt about the election results — even after the FBI failed to find evidence of widespread voter fraud He also came close to installing Clark as acting attorney general before several top aides threatened to resign in protest.

It’s not clear whether Hutchinson told investigators which papers Meadows had reportedly incinerated or if they should have been preserved under federal records laws. The select committee has uncovered other efforts by Meadows and Perry to conceal their communications in the wake of the 2020 election, including in one text message exchange in which Perry told Meadows he’d “just sent you something on Signal,” an encrypted messaging app.

Rep. Jamie Raskin, D-Md., second from right, speaks during a meeting of the House select committee investigating the Jan. 6 insurrection, on March 28. (Eric Lee/Bloomberg via Getty Images)

Trump reportedly expressed support for hanging Mike Pence

Another key line of inquiry for the select committee has been what, exactly, the president was doing while an angry mob of his supporters violently ransacked the Capitol, and why it took 187 minutes before National Guard troops and additional police were sent to the Capitol to stop them.

Investigators may seek to answer those questions by sharing one witness’s account, which has been reportedly confirmed by Hutchinson, of a telling scene that took place at the White House on Jan. 6.

According to the account that was provided to the Jan. 6 committee, not long after rioters began chanting “Hang Mike Pence!” outside the Capitol, Meadows told colleagues in his office that Trump was complaining about his vice president being evacuated to safety. According to the New York Times, which was first to report the story, Meadows “then told the colleagues that Mr. Trump had said something to the effect of, maybe Mr. Pence should be hanged.”

The Times reported that the select committee first heard about Trump’s comment from at least one witness, and then confirmed it with Hutchinson, who was present in Meadows’s office when he relayed what Trump had said. Meadows’s lawyer denied the account in the Times.

The Times report notes that it’s unclear what the tone of Trump’s comment was, but that it underscores his frustration with Pence, who’d refused to succumb to the president’s pressure campaign to get him to block Congress’s certification of the Electoral College results that day.

The anecdote also seems to shed light on Trump’s initial reaction to the riot, and why he did not act immediately to call off the mob despite repeated pleas from members of his family and Republicans in Congress to do so.

In Alabama’s ‘19th Unnamed Cave,’ a Trove of Ancient Dark-Zone Art

Researchers using 3-D technology brought to light an array of art in an Alabama cave, including a serpent, flying creatures and humanoid figures in regalia.

Alvarez worked on the photogrammetry project inside the main art gallery of the 19th Unnamed Cave in Alabama.

Credit...Alan Cressler


By Christine Hauser
 May 9, 2022

The cave meanders for two miles under northern Alabama, with passages that veer into mysterious so-called dark zones, sediment deposits, a waterfall and deep pools. Ancient footprints are embedded in its remotest passage. The names of Union soldiers from the Civil War remain scrawled on a wall.

Stooped over because the ceiling was so low, Alan Cressler unclipped a light from his helmet on July 30, 1998, and raked the beam across the surface above him.

The artwork of a fellow human being who lived many centuries ago came into view: possibly a bird, with a rounded head.

“Once I saw that, I am like, ‘OK,’” Mr. Cressler, who now works for the United States Geological Survey, said in an interview this week. “It gives me chills today to talk about it. I just recognized the immediate importance of it.”

With an archaeologist, an expert in 3-D photography and others, Mr. Cressler further explored the cave, known as the 19th Unfinamed Cave, and its art over the years. This week, they published their findings in the journal Antiquity. The study highlighted the role of 3-D technology in uncovering art that was not initially visible to Mr. Cressler over 20 years ago, when he was pressed so close to the ceiling that he could not see the full array that radiated in all directions above him.

Jan Simek, an archaeologist with the University of Tennessee and a co-author of the paper, said the cave art was among the largest found in North America, deep in a convoluted dark zone where natural light could not reach.

Using radiocarbon dating and analysis of pottery shards, the researchers estimate that the art dates to the Middle and Late Woodland periods, or between 500 A.D. and 1000 A.D., when farming, hunting and gathering gave way to food production and sedentary life in the region.

There are figures with human features, a coiled snake with a tail rattle and forked tongue and a 10-foot-long serpent winding its way across the expanse. Some incorporate the features of the ceiling into their design, such as the serpent that appears to emerge from a natural fissure.

Ghostly humanoid figures are adorned in regalia. Charred fragments of river cane suggest the artwork, finely incised in a veneer of mud, could have been a team effort, with someone holding a torch while the artist, or artists, worked.

The early artists were very likely lying on sediment deposits when they made their mud carvings, either with fingers or delicate tools with tines.

“It is highly detailed,” Dr. Simek said. “It covers an acre of surface area on the ceiling. The glyphs are in a single chamber, but the cave goes on.”

Since cave art was first documented in North America in 1979, Dr. Simek and Mr. Cressler have been studying what is known as dark-zone cave art, which involves exploring passageways unreachable by natural light.

The cave documented in 1979 in Tennessee, contained mud drawings, 750 to 800 years old, depicting pre-Columbian Native American religious themes, the Antiquity study said. Since then, it said, 89 other pre-Columbian cave-art sites have been identified in southeastern North America. The earliest is nearly 7,000 years old, but most of them date from 800 A.D. to 1600 A.D.

Some are on private property, and those findings are kept secret to keep the area free of vandals. Others are on public lands, including in Virginia, Tennessee, Kentucky and Alabama. Some can be reached only by boat because rivers have risen to entrances that were once accessible by land.

The use of 3-D modeling in Alabama’s 19th Unnamed Cave “promises a new era of discovery of ancient cave art” because it reveals images that could not be perceived otherwise, the researchers said in their study.

The technique has been used elsewhere, such as to create a replica of the art in the Lascaux caves in France, but not as much in searching, as Dr. Simek said, “to see if there are things we can’t see.”

The researchers used a technique called photogrammetry, in which a camera inches along a track, taking overlapping images that are then stitched together using software. It creates a seamless representation that highlights even the finest engravings in the mud, said Stephen Alvarez, a founder of the Ancient Art Archive and a co-author of the study. He was responsible for the 3-D work in the 19th Unnamed Cave.

More than 16,000 overlapping photographs produced the map of the cave’s known art.

“It is like magic,” Mr. Alvarez said. “Here is this thing that has been invisible for 1,000-plus years that has suddenly come to life. Even though the people were removed, their stories are still here.”

The method is useful because the uneven features of a cave ceiling can throw shadows that obscure delicate lines in the art. Mr. Cressler said those features complicated his early attempts to document the work with a camera.

One of the many large abstract mud-glyph panels on the ceiling in the 19th Unnamed Cave.

Credit...Alan Cressler

Dr. Simek said the use of photogrammetry was even more intriguing because ancient artists had no such technology, or opportunity, to see the big picture. Unlike with rock art, which is out in the open, the artists inside the cave chamber could not step back and ponder their work-in-progress from a distance.

“The makers of these images couldn’t see them in their totality except in their mind,” he said. “That means they had an idea of what they had to draw and to move around while they did it.”

But what exactly the artists had in mind has so far escaped the researchers.

Dr. Simek said the project’s work with Native American collaborators helped interpret the cave’s possible relation to the supernatural.

Dustin Mater, a Chickasaw citizen and artist who works with Mr. Alvarez’s archive, said themes and images from the cave art were similar to those he had learned about in tales from tribal elders, such as cave portals to the underworld and a winged humanlike figure armed with a war mace.

“It is almost speculative, but there are nuances today that are carried forward into our traditions and in our stories,” said Mr. Mater, whose ancestors were among the Indigenous people forcibly removed from northwest Alabama in the 1800s. “Living cultures take symbols and then revivify them and give them meaning.”

Cave Art and Photogrammetry

Pig Painting May Be World’s Oldest Cave Art Yet, Archaeologists Say
Jan. 13, 2021

In Cave in Borneo Jungle, Scientists Find Oldest Figurative Painting in the World
Nov. 7, 2018

Creating Stories You Can Walk Through
Oct. 13, 2020

Back to the Cave of Altamira in Spain, Still Controversial
July 30, 2014



Christine Hauser is a reporter, covering national and foreign news. Her previous jobs in the newsroom include stints in Business covering financial markets and on the Metro desk in the police bureau. @ChristineNYT

A version of this article appears in print on May 10, 2022, Section A, Page 18 of the New York edition with the headline: Deep in Alabama Cave, 3-D Tech Reveals Trove Of Ancient Native Art. 

OH THE IRONY

German anti-terrorism org launches U.S. operations in Pittsburgh with goal of preventing homegrown extremism


JESSE BUNCH
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
JUN 1, 2022

Imagine this scenario: a mother begins to notice a change in her teenage son, who spends an increasing amount of time online in chat rooms and on fringe forums. Around the house, the teen begins to spout racially-charged, anti-immigrant sentiments.

With nowhere to turn, she looks at his Google search history and finds he has been researching where to purchase a firearm nearby.

In the anonymity of the online world, it’s for outsiders to tell when someone is becoming radicalized by extremist groups that target vulnerable users. In Pittsburgh, which FBI officials recently warned was becoming a hotbed for far-right nationalist groups, a German-based nonprofit is hoping it can intervene in these scenarios before they escalate to tragedy.

The Violence Prevention Network convened in Downtown on Wednesday to announce its flagship U.S. operation. Board members explained that the choice to launch in Pittsburgh was very deliberate given the city’s relationship to extremist groups.

Citing the tragedy of the Tree of Life synagogue shooting coupled with budding activity from far-right groups like Sovereign Citizens and Patriot Front, VPN sees an opportunity to partner with local law enforcement agencies to spot would-be extremists and deradicalize them through its unique intervention program.

“There’s many organizations that work in the field of violent extremism, and one thing that’s very important to us, is that we talk to extremists, not about them,” said Michele Leaman, a director at the Violence Prevention Network.

Alongside Judy Korn, a VPN co-founder and director, Ms. Leaman detailed VPN’s strategy in Germany that it plans to mirror here. Originating in Berlin in 2002, the nonprofit has since received support from the country’s government along with the the European Commission, a branch of the European Union.

In Pittsburgh, VPN plans to operate telephone and digital hotlines for friends and family of potential extremists, who can call to receive support and education on the early warning signs of extremism that can crop up both online and in-person.

According to Ms. Leaman, VPN’s staff educates family members on how to maintain their relationship with the at-risk person while seeking help, instead of cutting them off completely.

Should the at-risk person escalate their interest in extremist groups, Ms. Leaman said VPN works with law enforcement to monitor their behavior. In addition, the group provides police departments with training on how to detect risks.

Already, the nonprofit of 120 employees claims it’s intervened and prevented at least eight would-be terrorist attacks in Europe through its program, including extremist Islamic activity that would have targeted Christmas Villages.

Ms. Korn said details or locations of the thwarted attempts could not be shared due to security concerns.

But because VPN values working alongside extremists, the nonprofit has a robust program though prisons in Germany that it hopes to eventually remodel in Western Pennsylvania’s correctional facilities.

“Our training and our program won’t stop if they are in prison,” Ms. Korn explained. “We go on with the relationship, we go on with the dialogues.”

VPN claims that it’s worked with over 800 far-right extremists and over 1,000 Islamic extremists in German prisons, 50% who were sentenced on terrorism-related charges.

Ms. Korn shared data provided by VPN that showed only around 13% of violent-offenders who passed through their education program were eventually reincarcerated, as opposed to the national German average of 41.5%.

According to Ms. Korn, the group has a presence in a quarter of all German prisons and has worked on over 1,800 individual cases.

Already, Ms. Leaman and Ms. Korn have presented their strategy to law enforcement in Fox Chapel, where one member of the nonprofit’s U.S. team resides.

Anne Clarke Ronce, a U.S. team member, said on Wednesday that law enforcement have expressed interest in partnering with VPN as they receive increasing alerts of potential far-right extremists in the Pittsburgh region.

Ms. Ronce mentioned concern over past gatherings of a group called the Iron City Militia, who self-describe on their website as a “well-regulated, well-trained, well-equipped and knowledgeable militia unit comprised of ordinary citizens, based out of the greater Pittsburgh area” that are a “last line of defense against a tyrannical government.”

VPN members cited additional concern over the organization of Sovereign Citizen members in the Pittsburgh region.

The Southern Poverty Law Center, which monitors hate groups, classifies the Sovereign Citizen movement as racist and antisemitic, citing its founder’s belief that “non-white people were not human, and that Jews possessed a satanic plot to take over the world.”

As of May, VPN claims to have $100,000 in funding secured for its U.S. launch, partially thanks to a German donor whose identity was not disclosed.

After launching its Pittsburgh-based hotline, VPN hopes to extend its program into Western Pennsylvania jails and prisons, though Ms. Leaman said that could take a year or more.

A step in VPN’s U.S. launch includes hiring and training 15 “everyday heroes,” or staff specialists who work to deradicalize both rising and incarcerated extremists.

The launch comes as the national conversation around extremism and gun-control reaches a high-water mark. This month alone, a racially-motivated shooting in Buffalo left 10 Black people dead, while a gunman in Uvalde, Texas terrorized Reed Elementary last week, claiming 21 lives — most of them young children.

Bruce Bowden, a U.S. VPN board member, made that connection as he introduced Ms. Korn, who was visiting Pittsburgh from the nonprofit’s German office.

“This trip was planned before the recent incidents in Texas and other places,” Ms. Bowden said. “That’s just a very horrible coincidence that those things happened just before they came. But it makes this, I think, all the more timely.”

First Published June 1, 2022, 3:42pm

California releases groundbreaking reparations report urging 'comprehensive’ compensation for Black Americans


Marquise Franci
·National Reporter & Producer
Wed, June 1, 2022, 

An activist carries a Pan-African flag during a protest to mark the National Reparations Day on Capitol Hill in Washington in 2019. (Alex Wong/Getty Images)

California’s first-in-the-nation task force on reparations released an extensive report on Wednesday detailing the state’s role in 170 years of discrimination toward Black Americans, outlining how the lasting effects of slavery have produced “innumerable harms” that no level of government has addressed to date.

The exhaustive 500-page report documents how descendants of slavery in California, and more broadly in the U.S., have suffered compounding inequities through more than a dozen facets of life, including education, employment and housing, and offers recommendations to right those wrongs through systemic policy shifts and “comprehensive” financial compensation.

“In 1883, the Supreme Court interpreted the 13th Amendment as empowering Congress ‘to pass all laws necessary and proper for abolishing all badges and incidents of slavery in the United States,’” the report reads.

Sen. Cory Booker, D-N.J., testifies about reparations for the descendants of slaves during a House hearing in 2019. (Caroline Brehman/CQ Roll Call)

“However, throughout the rest of American history, instead of abolishing the ‘badges and incidents of slavery,’ the United States federal, state and local governments, including California, perpetuated and created new iterations of these ‘badges and incidents.’ The resulting harms have been innumerable and have snowballed over generations.”

The report, which is the first of its kind to be produced on the state level, urges the creation of a new statewide office that would provide a pathway for financial reparations for Black Americans, and pushes for expanded voter registration and the improvement of Black neighborhoods, among other recommendations. The document, however, stopped short of attaching a specific number to the reparations, mainly because it’s the first of two reports coming from the nine-member task force, with the second to be released some time next year.

“I’m hoping that this report is used as an education tool and an organizing tool, educating the state of California and the United States at large about the harms against the African American community and the contributions of the African American community in the United States,” said Kamilah Moore, chair of the task force. “This report is documenting the full corpus of evidence around the harms against the African American community, which will substantiate the claims for reparations in the final report.”

A resident of Tulsa, Okla., tells people about the history of the area in 2021. 

(Andrew Caballero-Reynolds/AFP via Getty Images)

Members of the task force claim this is the first government-commissioned study on harm against Black Americans since the 1968 Kerner Commission report, which was ordered by then-President Lyndon Johnson.

The findings come at a time of increased fervor around the topic of reparations — just last month more than 25 social justice organizations penned a letter to President Biden urging him “to study and develop reparations proposals for African Americans” by Juneteenth, or June 19, the anniversary of the day in 1865 that African-Americans returned in Galveston, Texas, to news that they were freed. Last March, Evanston, Ill., became the first city in the country to approve reparations for Black residents.

A sign welcomes visitors to the city on March 23, 2021 in Evanston, Illinois. The City Council of Evanston voted yesterday to approve a plan, which may be the first of its kind in the nation, to make reparations available to Black residents due to past discrimination. (Photo by Scott Olson/Getty Images)

Advocates for reparations believe the only way Black Americans will see any kind of financial compensation will be through policy and politics.

“This has to be a political campaign on top of a matter of policy and any sort of moral argument,” James Lance Taylor, a political science professor at the University of San Francisco and a member of the city of San Francisco’s reparations task force, told the Washington Post. “Anything in favor of expanding rights to Black people has always been negatively received. The odds are always against us, but we are further along than we’ve ever been.”

"The depth, breadth and scope of the report is astounding," task force member Lisa Holder told USA Today. "We are evaluating racism beginning in 1619 and going all the way to the present … and connecting (past) injustices to injustice that we are seeing today."

California Gov. Gavin Newsom on September 07, 2021 in San Francisco, California. (Photo by Justin Sullivan/Getty Images)

California Gov. Gavin Newsom, a Democrat, signed legislation to create the task force in 2020, becoming the only state to move forward with a reparations study at this scale. Following Wednesday’s report, the task force will now pivot to creating a detailed proposal for reparations for the Legislature to consider. In March, the group voted 5-4 to limit cash reparations only to people who can prove that they are descended from enslaved and free Black Americans who were in the country before the end of the 19th century.

“The harm against the African American community has been so extensive that reparations are pretty much overdue,” Moore said.

_____

Cover thumbnail photo: Alex Wong/Getty Images

Relief through student debt cancellation will help workers today

BY REP. ANDY LEVIN (D-MICH.), OPINION CONTRIBUTOR - 06/01/22 


Mr. President: do you want to be the most pro-worker and pro-union president?

My advice is simple: cancel student debt.

Americans collectively owe $1.6 trillion in federal student loan debt, affecting nearly 43.4 million American workers. The student debt crisis is fueled by a cycle of suppressed wages, demand for higher credentials and rising costs in the pursuit of an education.

As a union organizer and former chief workforce officer for the state of Michigan who spearheaded Michigan’s No Worker Left Behind program, I’ve seen firsthand what access to affordable education and job training can do to uplift workers and our economy. However, that opportunity ceases to exist in a system where growing student debt prevents workers from fully participating in our economy—buying homes, changing careers, even starting families.

Studies indicate that 60 percent of all jobs in the U.S. economy require postsecondary education and training beyond high school. Research from the Bureau of Labor Statistics suggests that a bachelor’s degree is typically required for entry in 169 occupations.

Thinking they were investing in their future, millions of U.S. workers have gone back to school or pursued a college degree. In 1960, roughly 7.7 percent of the U.S. population had graduated from college. Now more than 37.5 percent of U.S. workers aged 25 and above have at least a college degree.

But as students have graduated, they have entered a job market where wages are outpaced by tens-of-thousands in student loan debt. Over the past 40 years, wage growth for a typical worker was 23.1 percent, compared to a 169 percent increase in the cost of a college education in the U.S. In this world, investment in a higher education far too often is not paying off. Add to that that roughly 40 percent of workers with student debt were unable to finish their degree.

Wage growth for Black and Hispanic workers over the past 40 years also lagged behind wages for white workers, growing only 18.9 percent and 16.7 percent respectively.

Black workers are also more heavily impacted by the student debt crisis, owing an average of $25,000 more in student loan debt than white college graduates. Black women stand to benefit the most from debt cancellation, holding the highest average debt amount among all demographics.

This crisis extends beyond age or generation, with the fastest growing population of student debt carriers being Americans aged 65 years old and older.

Student debt cancellation isn’t just a “young person’s” issue as we so often hear. It’s an economic, workers’ rights, racial justice and gender equity issue spanning generations.

While we must have a full recalibration of our nation’s higher education policy to ensure college is once again affordable in the long term—and I’m proud to lead the America’s College Promise Act that will do just that and provide two years of free community college to every single American—immediate relief through student debt cancellation will help workers today.

This is relief people will feel immediately. It will lift millions of workers out of debt and give people across the country a pathway to financial stability to buy a house, change their career, get married and have kids. In the medium term, it will help grow the economy and empower workers by allowing them the freedom to compete for better jobs.

It is no longer a question of whether student debt should or can be cancelled. Poll after poll has indicated that Americans want student debt relief. And President Biden and the Department of Education have already exercised their authority to cancel student debt, cancelling roughly $17 billion for students defrauded by universities and beginning to fix a broken Public Loan Forgiveness Program.

It is now a question of when student debt will be cancelled.

For workers across the country, we must cancel student debt boldly. Cancelling $50,000 will make 76% of current borrows debt-free, transforming lives and delivering the biggest racial justice impact.

Means-testing student debt cancellation is also unnecessary and costly. The majority of federal loans are held by workers with no household wealth at all, with 97 percent of all student debt being held by people earning below $150,000. There is nothing to means test.It’s time to close a gaping import loophole to improve US competitiveness against ChinaBiden’s plan to ‘cancel’ student debt passes the buck to all taxpayers

For families being crushed by higher costs as inflation soars, we must do it now.

Mr. President, the ball is in your court and this crisis can be solved with a stroke of a pen. The American people are counting on you.

Andy Levin represents Michigan’s 9th District. He is a member of the Education and Labor Committee.

Washington gridlock could delay new COVID relief funds until fall — or longer


Senate Majority Leader Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.) says a new COVID relief package is “very, very much needed.”

(J. Scott Applewhite / Associated Press)

BY ALAN FRAM
ASSOCIATED PRESSJUNE 1, 2022
WASHINGTON —

The U.S. is headed for “a lot of unnecessary loss of life,” the Biden administration says, if Congress fails to provide billions more dollars to brace for the COVID-19 pandemic’s next wave. Yet the quest for that money is in limbo, the latest victim of election-year gridlock that’s stalled or killed a host of Democratic priorities.

President Biden’s appeal for funds for vaccines, testing and treatments has hit opposition from Republicans, who’ve fused the fight with the precarious politics of immigration. Congress is in recess, and the next steps are uncertain, despite admonitions from White House COVID coordinator Dr. Ashish Jha of damaging consequences from “every day we wait.”

Administration officials say they’re running low on money to stock up on, or even begin to order, the latest vaccines, tests and treatments. Also lacking are funds to reimburse doctors treating uninsured patients and to help poor countries control the pandemic.

House and Senate Democrats have been wrangling over how to resolve the stalemate and even over which chamber should vote first. It’s an open question whether they’ll ever get the GOP votes they’ll need to pull the legislation through the 50-50 Senate, and prospects in the narrowly divided House are unclear as well.

“There is still an urgency to pass a COVID relief package,” Senate Majority Leader Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.), said last week. “It’s very, very much needed.”

Optimists hope the measure could start rolling once Congress returns to session next week. Pessimists say that without quick resolution, Democrats may not have enough leverage to push the money to passage until early fall. That’s when they could stuff it into legislation that will probably be needed to finance government and avert a federal shutdown — a pre-election distraction Republicans will be desperate to avoid.

The heap of sidelined Democratic initiatives has grown this year, a victim of GOP opposition and rebellions by centrists like Sen. Joe Manchin III (D-W.Va.). Casualties include bills on voting rights, healthcare, environment, taxes, gun curbs, abortion rights, policing tactics and an investigation of the 2021 Capitol storming by then-President Trump’s supporters.

While lawmakers have approved massive packages financing federal agencies through September and helping Ukraine counter Russia’s invasion, other priorities are dead or drifting, even as Democrats’ days running Congress are likely dwindling. Republicans are favored to win House control in November’s elections and could grab the Senate as well, and Democrats’ frustration is clear.

“So far it hasn’t moved,” Sen. Mazie Hirono (D-Hawaii) said of Biden’s latest $22.5-billion request for COVID-19 relief, which he initially sent Congress three months ago. “But then, neither has sensible gun legislation, neither has voting rights.”

“The 50-50 Senate sucks,” she said.

The COVID money is needed quickly, officials say. Their warnings have come with over 1 million U.S. deaths from the disease and a fresh variant that daily is hospitalizing over 100,000 Americans and killing more than 300. Both numbers are rising.

Officials say that, lacking fresh funds, the U.S. is falling behind other countries that are already lining up supplies needed for fall and winter. That’s prompted Jha to plan for the chance that Congress provides no new money at all, threatening painful choices about what to do if there aren’t enough vaccines or therapeutics for all who need them.

“It would be terrible,” Jha told reporters recently. “I think we would see a lot of unnecessary loss of life if that were to happen.”

Congress has provided $370 billion for purchasing supplies, research and other public health initiatives to combat the pandemic, according to administration tallies obtained by the Associated Press. Around $14 billion of it was unspent or not committed to contracts as of April 5, the documents show, an amount the administration says falls below the ultimate need.

Most Republicans are skeptical about added pandemic funding. “I have a hard time believing that there’s not enough money and not enough flexibility already” to use it, said Sen. Kevin Cramer (R-N.D.).

Counterintuitively but unsurprisingly for the always perplexing Senate, one intractable puzzle stymying Democrats is immigration.

Senate Republicans are demanding a vote an amending the pandemic legislation with language retaining Trump-era border controls that, citing COVID-19, have made it easier to bar migrants from entering the U.S.

A federal judge has blocked Biden from ending those restrictions. Liberals want Congress to eliminate the clampdown, but some moderate Democrats in both chambers facing tough reelections want to vote to retain it.

The result: testy divisions between the Democrats’ two ideological factions, and knotty questions for party leaders about how to resolve them and push a pandemic package to passage.

Their task is compounded by disputes between House and Senate Democrats over why the COVID-19 battle remains unresolved.

Senate Democrats note a bipartisan $15.6-billion pandemic compromise was on the cusp of House passage in March until that chamber’s progressive Democrats rebelled against spending cuts to pay for it, derailing the money. “We’re waiting for the House to send us something,” Schumer said last week.

House Democrats say that even if they do, the biggest hurdle will still be the Senate, where 10 GOP votes will be required to reach that chamber’s usual 60-vote threshold for passage. They note that an April deal between Schumer and Sen. Mitt Romney (R-Utah) for $10 billion in COVID-19 money collapsed after Republicans demanded the immigration vote.

“We want to get COVID-19 done, but the only impediment right now is the United States Senate,” House Majority Leader Steny H. Hoyer (D-Md.) told reporters recently.

That’s left Republicans waiting for Democrats’ next move.

“I would imagine at this point way over half of our members will vote against this, no matter what. So the question is what do you do to get it acceptable to 10 or 12 [Republican senators],” said Sen. Roy Blunt of Missouri, a member of GOP leadership. “And I don’t know.”

P3

NASA outsources development of Moon spacesuit to two private companies

Axiom Space and Collins Aerospace are tasked with creating NASA’s next-generation suits

By Loren Grush@lorengrush Jun 1, 2022, 

An artistic rendering of astronauts wearing next-generation spacesuits on the Moon. Image: NASA

Today, NASA announced that two private companies — Axiom Space and Collins Aerospace — will develop the next-generation spacesuits that future astronauts will wear to conduct spacewalks and eventually traverse the surface of the Moon. It’s a bold new direction for spacesuit development at NASA, with the agency handing the job over to the private sector after years of struggling to develop a new suit of its own.

These new spacesuits will play a critical role in NASA’s Artemis program, the agency’s flagship initiative to send humans back to the lunar surface. Currently, NASA is aiming to land the first Artemis astronauts on the Moon by 2025 — a one-year delay from the 2024 deadline originally set by the Trump administration. When the astronauts do land, NASA wants them to be equipped with proper spacesuits they can use to explore the Moon’s terrain.

There’s plenty of doubt that NASA can meet the 2025 deadline, though, as there’s still a significant amount of work left to do on the hardware and vehicles needed to achieve the first landing. But one of the primary holdups has turned out to be spacesuit development. Multiple audits have revealed that NASA’s quest to create next-generation suits has been inefficient, faced numerous technical challenges, and is many years behind schedule. Now, after 15 years of struggle to make these new suits, the agency is handing the reins over to the commercial industry. Collins Aerospace has history with spacesuit building, as it helped to create the current suits used by NASA, while Axiom Space is a relatively new company aimed at creating private space stations.

ONE OF THE PRIMARY HOLDUPS HAS TURNED OUT TO BE SPACESUIT DEVELOPMENT

NASA announced that the total value of the contracts is $3.5 billion, though the space agency would not say the individual values of each company’s contract, claiming that information will be revealed in a source selection statement that will be published at the end of the month. The $3.5 billion is a ceiling that covers the life of the contracts, encompassing both partial development costs and future purchases of the suits for use by NASA. Once the suits are complete, though, the companies will own them and have the option to use them for other purposes unrelated to NASA

The suits are meant to fit a wide range of body types, from the 5th percentile female to the 95th percentile male. The goal is for the spacesuits to be ready to be worn by astronauts on Artemis III, the third launch of NASA’s new rocket, the Space Launch System, and the current target for the first landing. Artemis also strives to land the first woman and the first person of color on the Moon. “So that she has got a suit that’s appropriately sized and tailored for her — that doesn’t feel like a spacecraft that feels like a ruggedized set of extreme sports outerwear — that should be the goal,” Dan Burbank, a former astronaut and senior tech fellow at Collins Aerospace, said during a press conference.

The new suits that these companies develop aren’t meant just for lunar exploration, though. NASA wants a new line of suits that are much more versatile than their predecessors to be used by both Artemis astronauts when exploring the Moon and to replace the aging suits on the International Space Station.

For the last four decades, NASA astronauts have relied on the same basic spacesuit design to conduct spacewalks on the ISS. Called the EMU, for Extravehicular Mobility Unit, the suit made its debut during the Space Shuttle era, and an “enhanced” version is used by astronauts on the ISS to leave the lab and conduct improvements and repairs on the outside of the station. The EMUs haven’t been upgraded in decades, though, and they aren’t intended to be used for lunar spacewalks. Plus, they are limited in sizing.

A prototype of NASA’s xEMU suit, featured in white, red, and blue in the middle, was unveiled in 2019.

 Photo by Joel Kowsky/NASA via Getty Images

But transitioning to a new spacesuit has proven difficult for NASA. The agency started work on new spacesuits back in 2007 and has spent a total of $420 million on spacesuit development since then. Those efforts eventually culminated in a new suit called the xEMU, a prototype of which was unveiled back in 2019. At the time of the unveiling, NASA hoped to have two suits ready to test on the space station before sending them to the lunar surface for the 2024 landing.

But, in August, an audit by NASA’s Office of Inspector General found that development of NASA’s new suits was significantly delayed due to a lack of money, technical problems, and issues associated with the COVID-19 pandemic. Ultimately, the report claimed the xEMU would not be ready by the Trump administration’s 2024 deadline. (A few months later, NASA moved the deadline to 2025.) The audit also noted that NASA would likely spend $1 billion total on spacesuit development by the time the first flight suits would be ready, which would be “April 2025 at the earliest.”

“WE WERE AT A GREAT PLACE TO TRANSITION”

Meanwhile, in April 2021, NASA put out a request for information from private companies for designs of new spacesuits that could be used for Artemis missions. At the time, NASA said it would still continue to develop the xEMU in-house, but the move signaled that the agency might rely on commercial suits instead. “NASA has a responsibility to taxpayers and future explorers to re-examine its infrastructure as needed to reduce costs and enhance performance,” the agency wrote when announcing the news.

Now, NASA is putting all its expectations on Collins Aerospace and Axiom Space. The space agency said that its engineers would continue testing on the xEMU through the end of the year, but eventually, it will shift focus and provide insight to the commercial companies as they move forward. Additionally, the data and research that NASA gathered throughout xEMU development will be made available to the two companies.

As for the companies’ abilities to meet the 2025 deadline, that will play out over the next few years. Collins Aerospace unveiled a prototype lunar suit back in 2019 and, today, Burbank said the company has already spent years of development on a suit. As for Axiom Space, the company’s CEO Mike Suffredini also said suit development began a few years back, as the company has long considered making suits for its future space stations. “We have a number of customers that already would like to do a spacewalk,” Suffredini said. “And we had planned to build a suit as part of our program.”

Still, 2025 is just a few years away. NASA says it’s confident about transitioning spacesuit duties at this juncture, claiming the existing xEMU research will help “reduce risk” and speed things up. “We were at a great place to transition, just because of how mature the xEMU was at the time,” Lara Kearney, the manager of the Extravehicular Activity and Human Surface Mobility Program at NASA, said during the conference. “And I think getting it to these guys sooner allows them to run.”

Plus, there are a whole host of milestones that NASA and its commercial partners need to meet in order to make 2025 work, including launching the agency’s new deep-space rocket for the first time and finishing up human lunar landers to take people to the Moon’s surface. Spacesuits are just one piece of the highly complex puzzle NASA must solve to get back to the Moon.