US sues Walmart accusing retailer of helping fuel opioid crisis

US Justice Department says Walmart ignored warning signs from its pharmacists and filled thousands of invalid prescriptions

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If found liable, Walmart could face civil penalties of up to $67,627 for each unlawful prescription filled and $15,691 for each suspicious order not reported. (AP)

The US Justice Department has sued Walmart over its role in the opioid crisis, alleging the giant retailer wrongly filled prescriptions and worsened a public health disaster.

In a civil lawsuit filed in US District Court in Delaware on Tuesday, the department accused Walmart of failing to take its gatekeeping duties as a pharmacy seriously.

Walmart, the world's biggest retailer, created a system that turned its 5,000 in-store pharmacies into a supplier of highly addictive painkillers, dating as early as June 2013, the lawsuit said.

Walmart, whose shares were trading down 1.5 percent following the news, rejected the allegations, saying the "Justice Department’s investigation is tainted by historical ethics violations, and this lawsuit invents a legal theory that unlawfully forces pharmacists to come between patients and their doctors, and is riddled with factual inaccuracies."

Heavy penalties

The suit accuses Walmart of irresponsible handling of orders, filling thousands of "invalid" prescriptions.

Authorities could seek up to billions of dollars in penalties, in the litigation that followed a multi-year investigation, the Justice Department said in a press release.

"As one of the largest pharmacy chains and wholesale drug distributors in the country, Walmart had the responsibility and the means to help prevent the diversion of prescription opioids," said Jeffrey Bossert Clark, acting head of DOJ's civil division.

"Instead, for years, it did the opposite – filling thousands of invalid prescriptions at its pharmacies and failing to report suspicious orders of opioids and other drugs placed by those pharmacies."

Asked if the government was planning on bringing criminal charges, Clark said "you should not draw any inferences about any criminal matters" from the civil filing.

The opioid epidemic has claimed the lives of roughly 450,000 people across the United States since 1999 due to overdoses from prescription painkillers and illegal drugs.

If found liable, it could face civil penalties of up to $67,627 for each unlawful prescription filled and $15,691 for each suspicious order not reported.

Walmart's lawsuit

Walmart has filed its own lawsuit against the Justice Department in October that argued that the US crackdown put it in a no-win position.

Pharmacists "must make a difficult decision" of either accepting a doctor's "medical judgment and fill the opioid prescription or second-guess the doctor's judgment and refuse to fill it," Walmart said in its suit.

"Either decision puts the pharmacist and pharmacy at great risk," the company argued.

It said it faces potential federal action if prosecutors say an order was wrongly filled, or the chance of having a pharmacist license "stripped for the unauthorised practice of medicine, not to mention the potential harm to patients in need of their medicine."

Trump administration considers immunity

for MBS in assassination plot

Riyadh has requested that the Crown Prince Muhammed bin Salman be shielded from a US lawsuit accusing him of sending a death squad to kill Saad Aljabri, a former Saudi spymaster.

The US administration is weighing a request to grant legal immunity for Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman from a lawsuit, which accuses him of sending a hit squad to kill dissident Saad Al Jabri, the Washington Post reported on Monday.

The Saudi government has requested Washington that MBS should be protected from liability in a case filed by Saad al Jabri, a deputy to former Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Nayef, who was then Minister of the Interior.

Al Jabri was once a key point man between Saudi intelligence services and Western agencies, and he is credited with stopping terrorist attacks, including one on synagogues inside the US, earning him the respect of American intelligence officials.

Sarah and Saad al Jabri in Boston, US, in 2016. (Reuters Archive)

“A license to kill”

In a lawsuit filed earlier this year, Al Jabri claims that a 50-person Saudi kill team was sent to assassinate him in 2018, almost two weeks after Washington Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi was murdered and dismembered by a Saudi hit squad.

The Post said that the US State Department sent a questionnaire to Al Jabri’s lawyers last month, asking for their legal opinions on whether it should grant the Saudi request.

Al Jabri’s eldest son Khalid told the Post if given, the US would essentially be granting MBS immunity for conduct that succeeded in killing Jamal Khashoggi and failed to kill his father.

“Lack of accountability is one thing, but allowing impunity through immunity is like issuing a license to kill.”


One last favour

A State Department recommendation could also lead to dismissal of Muhammed Bin Salman as a defendant in other cases filed in the US, including one accusing him of orchestrating the brutal murder of Jamal Khashoggi and of targeting a hack operation to discredit Al Jazeera anchor Ghada Ouesis for her criticism of the kingdom.

US government lawyers will be required in February to submit arguments in two separate lawsuits related to the Khashoggi case, brought under the Freedom of Information Act by the Open Society Justice Initiative.

The lawyers have been prevented disclosure of relevant documents on national security grounds so far.

US President Donald Trump has been a staunch supporter of MBS. However, his days at the Oval Office are counted. And US President-elect Joe Biden issued a statement on the anniversary of Khashoggi's murder in October, saying the journalist and his loved ones “deserve accountability”.

“We will reassess our relationship with the Kingdom, end US support for Saudi Arabia’s war in Yemen, and make sure America does not check its values at the door to sell arms or buy oil… Jamal’s death will not be in vain, and we owe it to his memory to fight for a more just and free world,” the statement said.

A MURDEROUS COUPLE OF GRIFTERS 

Saudi Arabia's Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman shakes hands with US President Donald Trump, at the G20 leaders summit in Osaka, Japan, June 29, 2019. (Reuters)

“Black box”

The US State Department’s recommendation of immunity is binding on US courts and it usually seeks advice from other agencies before issuing it, the newspaper reported.

A quick decision can be made for a head of state, or take months or years. As another option, the Trump administration can ignore it, and deny the request.

Jabri’s lawyers are supposed to reply to the questions until the beginning of January. They are expected to assert that MBS is a prince, not the head of the state, so he should not be granted any legal immunity.

Al Jabri, 61, has been described as the "black box" of Saudi Prince Muhammed bin Nayef.

He is believed to hold the secrets of the ruling royal family. He worked for four decades in the Saudi Interior Ministry. In the last 20 years, he served as a security adviser to Bin Nayef and together they attempted to reform the intelligence service.

After Nayef was removed from his royal position by MBS, Al Jabri left Saudi Arabia for Canada with a fear of ill-treatment by the Saudi authorities.

He openly opposed Saudi Arabia's involvement in the Yemen war that has been underway since 2015. The Saudi government had detained Saad al Jabri’s two adult children and brother in March to try to force his return to the kingdom.

The government also sought his extradition via Interpol, citing corruption charges, but the organization rejected the Saudi request as they saw it as a “politically motivated move”.

A US court in August issued an order to summon Mohammed bin Salman and 12 other Saudi officials, who were accused of masterminding the attempted assassination of Al Jabri.

In one WhatsApp message, the lawsuit showed, MBS told Al Jabri: “Don’t force me to escalate things and take legal measures, as well as other measures that would be harmful to you.”

Source: TRT World

Trump pardons 15, including GOP allies and Iraq massacre contractors

US President Trump pardons 15 people, including Republican allies, a 2016 campaign official ensnared in Russia probe, and former Blackwater contractors convicted in 2007 Baghdad massacre.

US President Trump has issued a number of pardons during his time in the White House and is expected to deliver more before he leaves on January 20, 2021. (Reuters)

US President Donald Trump has pardoned 15 people, including Republican allies, a 2016 campaign official ensnared in the Russia probe, and former government contractors convicted in a 2007 massacre in Baghdad.

Trump also commuted the sentences of five people on Tuesday.

While it is not unusual for presidents to grant clemency on their way out the door, Trump has made clear that he has no qualms about intervening in the cases of friends and allies whom he believes have been treated unfairly.

Despite speculation, though, not on the list were members of Trump's own family, his personal attorney Rudy Giuliani and the president himself.

The pardons included former Republican Reps. Duncan Hunter of California and Chris Collins of New York. Trump commuted the sentence of former Rep. Steve Stockman of Texas.

Collins, the first member of Congress to endorse Trump to be president, was sentenced to two years and two months in federal prison after admitting he helped his son and others dodge $800,000 in stock market losses when he learned that a drug trial by a small pharmaceutical company had failed.

Hunter was sentenced to 11 months in prison after pleading guilty to stealing campaign funds and spending the money on everything from outings with friends to his daughter’s birthday party.

READ MORE: US investigates White House for suspected bribery-for-pardon scheme


Russia meddling

Trump also announced pardons for allies ensnared in the Russia investigation.

One was for George Papadopoulos, his 2016 campaign adviser whose conversation unwittingly helped trigger the Russia investigation that shadowed Trump's presidency for nearly two years. 

Ex-Trump advisor Papadopoulos imprisoned in Russia probe

He also pardoned Alex van der Zwaan, a Dutch lawyer who was sentenced to 30 days in prison for lying to investigators during special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation.

Van der Zwaan and Papadopoulos are the third and fourth Russia investigation defendants granted clemency.

By pardoning them, Trump once again took aim at Mueller’s probe and pushed a broader effort to undo the results of the investigation that yielded criminal charges against a half-dozen associates.

Last month, Trump pardoned former national security adviser Michael Flynn, who had twice pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI, and months earlier commuted the sentence of another associate, Roger Stone, days before he was to report to prison.

READ MORE: Trump pardons ex-aide Flynn, who pleaded guilty of lying in Russia probe

Former Blackwater contractors pardoned

In the group announced on Tuesday night were four former government contractors convicted in a 2007 massacre in Baghdad that left more a dozen Iraqi civilians dead and caused an international uproar over the use of private security guards in a war zone.

Supporters of Nicholas Slatten, Paul Slough, Evan Liberty and Dustin Heard, the former contractors at Blackwater Worldwide, had lobbied for pardons, arguing that the men had been excessively punished in an investigation and prosecution they said was tainted by problems and withheld exculpatory evidence.

All four were serving lengthy prison sentences.

The pardons reflected Trump’s apparent willingness to give the benefit of doubt to American service members and contractors when it comes to acts of violence in warzones against civilians.

Last November, for instance, he pardoned a former US Army commando who was set to stand trial next year in the killing of a suspected Afghan bomb-maker and a former Army lieutenant convicted of murder for ordering his men to fire upon three Afghans.

'Paul Slough and his colleagues didn’t deserve to spend one minute in prison," said Brian Heberlig, a lawyer for one of the four pardoned Blackwater defendants. "I am overwhelmed with emotion at this fantastic news."

IT'S BAAAAACK H5N1 

Bird flu outbreaks reported in Egypt’s rural areas

The World Organization for Animal Health had earlier this year declared Egypt free of bird flu for the first time in 14 years.

A pelican waves its wings as it advertises a fish market in Ismailia, Egypt, in this April 17, 2009. (AP)

Local authorities in rural Egypt have declared a state of emergency after detecting two outbreaks of bird flu.

Nagy Awad, head of the veterinary agency in the southwestern province of al Wadi al Gedid, said on Sunday that avian influenza was detected in two poultry farms in the villages of Ezab el Qasr and Oweina in the Dakhla Oasis, located over 750 kilometers (470 miles) from the capital, Cairo.

He said the infected birds were culled and authorities have carried out medical examinations of people who were in contact with them. The virus, which is mainly spread through contact with infected animals, can cause severe illness or death in humans.

READ MORE: France confirms highly pathogenic H5N8 bird flu outbreak on duck farm

High-risk country

Egypt suffered a major outbreak of bird flu in 2006 that led to the suspension of all poultry exports.

Authorities have been pressing to renew them, and earlier this year, the World Organization for Animal Health, an intergovernmental body, had declared Egypt free of bird flu for the first time in 14 years.

The H5N1 strain of bird flu spread in early 2000s in Asia, Europe, Africa and the Middle East, leading to the slaughter of tens of millions of chickens and ducks. Hundreds of people were infected, many of whom died, according to the World Health Organization.

Egypt is at high risk because many of its poultry farms are in residential areas. Many Egyptians also raise pigeons and chickens at home to supplement their income. Even in dense urban areas, birds are kept on rooftops, balconies and courtyards.

READ MORE: Japan to cull 40,000 chickens after bird flu outbreak

Number of Journalists Murdered in Retaliation for Their Work More Than Doubled in 2020: Report

"The fact that murder is on the rise and the number of journalists imprisoned around the world hit a record is a clear demonstration that press freedom is under unprecedented assault."

by Brett Wilkins, staff writer
Published on Tuesday, December 22, 2020
by Common Dreams

The December 22, 2020 funeral procession for Afghan journalist Rahmatullah Nekzad, who was gunned down as he left his home in Ghazni city to attend mosque on December 21, 2020. (Photo: AFP/Getty Images)

In what one leading advocate called "a failure by the international community," the number of journalists murdered in retaliation for their work more than doubled in 2020, according to a report published Tuesday by the Committee to Protect Journalists.

"It's appalling that the murders of journalists have more than doubled in the last year, and this escalation represents a failure of the international community to confront the scourge of impunity."
—Joel Simon, CPJ

CPJ's annual report contains a database of 30 journalists who were killed in 15 countries during the course of the year. Of these, six died while working "dangerous assignments," three were caught in the crossfire during the ongoing Syrian civil war, and 21 were murdered.

Afghanistan and Mexico suffered the most journalist murders in 2020, with four each. Illegal firearms—many trafficked from the United States—have reportedly been used to kill reporters in Mexico, where drug war violence has fueled a nearly doubling of the nation's overall homicide rate over the past five years.

These two countries are followed by the Philippines with three murdered journalists; India and Honduras with two; and one each in Bangladesh, Iran, Paraguay, Somalia, Syria, and Yemen.

The death of a fifth Afghan journalist, Rahmatullah Nekzad—who was gunned down as he left his Ghazni home to attend mosque on Monday—did not make the list, as it is still under investigation.

CPJ said that all 21 murdered journalists were slain in targeted killings it called "direct reprisals" for their work, an increase from 10 such murders in 2019.

The number of journalists singled out for murder in reprisal for their work more than doubled in 2020.
At least 30 journalists were killed for their work as of December 15, 2020.
21 of those were murdered in retaliation for their work.https://t.co/6Sn5RjwN4O pic.twitter.com/adetcAs2d3
— Committee to Protect Journalists (@pressfreedom) December 22, 2020

"It's appalling that the murders of journalists have more than doubled in the last year, and this escalation represents a failure of the international community to confront the scourge of impunity," CPJ executive director Joel Simon said in a statement accompanying the report's publication.

The most recent murders listed on CPJ database are those of Hussein Khattab, a Syrian reporter for the Turkish state-owned broadcaster TRT Arabic who was assassinated by masked men on a motorcycle in Al-Bab, Syria on December 12; Roohollah Zam, who was executed in Iran on December 12 for covering anti-government protests; and Malala Maiwand, who along with her driver Mohammad Tahir was shot dead on her way to work at Enikass TV and Radio in Jalalabad, Afghanistan earlier this month.

Malala Maiwand's murder highlights plight of female reporters in#Afghanistan. She was the latest victim of a slew of attacks on #femalejournalists. pic.twitter.com/bIKgvUAwh0

— DW Hotspot Asia (@dw_hotspotasia) December 11, 2020

CPJ said it is currently investigating the killings of 15 other journalists this year to determine whether they were slain for reasons related to their work.

Last week, CPJ also reported that a record number of journalists are being jailed around the world, many for reporting on the Covid-19 pandemic or political uprisings.

"The fact that murder is on the rise and the number of journalists imprisoned around the world hit a record is a clear demonstration that press freedom is under unprecedented assault in the midst of a global pandemic, in which information is essential," Simon said. "We must come together to reverse this terrible trend."

If there is a silver lining to the latest CPJ report, it is that the number of journalists killed covering wars and other military conflicts fell to its lowest level of the century, although at least four reporters died in war-torn Afghanistan and Syria. 

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This is the world we live in. This is the world we cover.

 

The defeats of Golden Dawn

by Antonis A. Ellinas, 3 November 2020

cc. K. Gerontis

The twenty thousand protesters who cheered outside an Athenian court for the conviction of Greek neo-Nazis sent a clear message of democratic resilience at a time when it is badly needed.

A few years back, many of those convicted were freely marching through immigrant-rich neighbourhoods and colourful squares with swastika-like symbols, flaming torches and black uniforms.

Amid one of the biggest and most protracted economic contractions in postwar history, an unemployment rate of 27% and a collapsing party system, the parading neo-Nazis drew global attention and encouraged comparisons between crisis-ridden Greece and Weimar Germany.

What a turn around. In 2019 Golden Dawn was defeated in the court of public opinion, losing all its parliamentary seats, and this month it was defeated in a court of law.

Its leadership, former MPs and a few dozen militants were sentenced to between five and thirteen years in prison. The judges unanimously decided that they should be held accountable for a series of attacks against left-wing opponents and dark-skinned immigrants carried out during its electoral ascendance in the early 2010s.

Read also Jean-Yves Camus, “Not your father’s far right”, Le Monde diplomatique, March 2014.A deceptively simple story, then, could be made out of the Greek experience with neo-Nazism: two pillars of liberal democracy, elections and courts, helped deflate and defeat one of the most extreme political parties in Europe.

Or, more broadly, liberal democratic institutions survived the extreme crisis and the extremists.

To many worried observers of troubled democracies across the world, the message from Greece might be that, given time, democracy will prove resilient. As long as there are fair elections and independent courts, democratic polities can protect themselves from anti-democrats.

This narrative of democratic resilience, however, is problematic.

The automatic quality ascribed to the democratic process and the assumed tolerance of democrats towards anti-democrats is historically inaccurate. As Giovanni Capoccia at Oxford University points out, in the interwar years some European democracies (for example, Czechoslovakia, Finland and Belgium) took legislative and administrative measures to defend themselves from anti-democratic parties. And, running against the odds of their time, they survived. In modern times, too, countries like Belgium, the Czech Republic, the Netherlands and Slovakia, have taken measures to defend themselves from anti-democrats.

The first line of defence against neo-Nazism in Greece was not politicians, prosecutors and police but civil society. Long before Golden Dawn members’ criminal prosecution, civil society groups sprang up in most urban centres, complicating the organisational efforts of Golden Dawn to grow roots in local societies. At a time when Golden Dawn tried to dominate in the streets, dozens of small but well-organised groups — from teacher unions to human rights advocacy networks — put aside their differences and pooled resources to organise thousands of neighbourhood demonstrations, protests and meetings against it. Although a small segment of antifascist protesters turned violent, the vast majority were peaceful, broadening the antifascist coalition and forging alliances with institutional and political actors. Non-violent tactics allowed antifascist groups to go beyond street mobilisation and use institutional mechanisms. In 2013, Greek civil society groups convinced institutional and political actors to stop sitting idle in the face of extremism. In 2020, a group of antifascist lawyers convinced the judges against the acquittal originally proposed by the state prosecutor for the neo-Nazis.

The second line of defence was institutional. Societal mobilisation compelled the previously inactive Greek police to take decisive steps against the violent activity of Golden Dawn. In 2013, after large mobilisations triggered by the stubbing of an antifascist activist, Pavlos Fyssas, Greek police arrested the leadership of the party. Amid a large wave of antifascist mobilisation, the Greek parliament passed legislation that curbed the racist social activism of Golden Dawn (for example, the distribution of food to ‘Greeks only’). Moreover, many Greek municipalities decided to condemn Golden Dawn mobilisations in their areas. Societal reactions to Golden Dawn also compelled the Greek police to change its administrative structures to improve its handling of racist violence and to more effectively monitor extremism. Police officers with links to Golden Dawn were shown the door.

The third line of defence was political. The Greek political system is known for its high levels of polarisation and the economic crisis accentuated political conflict. Yet, when it came to addressing the neo-Nazis, Greek legislators showed rare unity, getting together and passing legislation that denied Golden Dawn state money during the trial. The broad consensus of Greek political parties sent a signal that its practices went well beyond what was democratically acceptable. Without public money flowing into party coffers, Golden Dawn had to shut down a number of its local branches and curb its controversial ‘social’ activism. By the 2019 elections, at least half of its local branches had closed and a number of the remaining ones had become empty shells.

Long before it was defeated in the elections and in court, Golden Dawn was defeated by societal pressure, institutional action and political isolation. Democracy proved resilient but only because so many people mobilised to peacefully defend it.

Antonis A. Ellinas

Antonis A. Ellinas is a political scientist at the University of Cyprus and author of Organizing against Democracy (Cambridge UP, 2020).

Le Monde diplomatique, originally published in French,

 An entire continent in need of cheap medicines

Africa’s drugs free-for-all

by Séverine Charon & Laurence Soustras 

Cogal · Getty

The price of medicines in many low- and middle-income countries, especially in Africa, can be 20-30 times the international reference price for generics; this is true even for basic products such as paracetamol (1). The problem is blamed on inconsistent and inefficient healthcare systems, but also on disorganised demand, logistical issues and supply chains focused on cities to the detriment of rural areas.

Organisations like Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) also blame manufacturers’ pricing policies. MSF wants multinational Johnson & Johnson (J&J) to make its tuberculosis drug Bedaquiline available for $1 per day ($180 for a six-month course of treatment). In low- and middle-income countries J&J currently charges $400 for a six-month course, putting it ‘out of reach for more than 80% of people who need it to stay alive’ (2). This July, J&J compromised, agreeing to $1.50 per day, but MSF believes the price should reflect the government subsidies that went into to its development, and the role that the scientific community and NGOs play in the fight against drug-resistant TB.

The distribution of medicines in the private sector (which provides 80% of healthcare in middle-income countries) differs according to country. In Africa’s French-speaking countries, sales prices are regulated, and wholesale distributors handle supply; they procure medicines from manufacturers, and are required to supply dispensaries with the full range of authorised drugs, and deliver on a regular basis. In Africa’s English-speaking countries, manufacturers appoint a sole agent to import medicines, which are then sold on to large numbers of businesses, which in turn sell them on to retailers. These are not necessarily pharmacies: ‘In French-speaking African countries, as in France, you will find the same drugs in the same package, at the same price, everywhere. In English-speaking countries, prices are unregulated,’ said Jean-Marc Leccia, CEO of French distributor Eurapharma (now owned by Japanese carmaker Toyota), which controls 40% of the West African supply network.

Price liberalisation has less impact where private donors cover half of all public-sector healthcare spending, as is the case in the 24 low-income countries in Sub-Saharan Africa. The Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria (which spends at least $1bn a year on health products) acts as a powerful central purchasing organisation, able to negotiate simultaneously with the eight suppliers who share the market between them. But negotiations are tricky even between the pharmaceutical industry and major humanitarian organisations: manufacturers want to protect their profit margins, and the volume they sell. The less widely used treatments, such as paediatric drugs for HIV (which is declining among mothers and consequently among children) and concurrent administration of the antimalarials artesunate and mefloquine (necessary only in the Mekong valley), interest them only if the prices are high.

Even where demand exists, it does not always determine the price charged. ‘The way manufacturers set prices has nothing to do with the number of people who need the drug,’ said Gaëlle Krikorian, head of policy for MSF’s drug access campaign. ‘They try to strike a balance between the number of people who have enough money to pay for the drug, and the kind of price it’s possible to charge them.’ US pharmaceutical giant Gilead, making judicious use of licensing, charges several thousand dollars for its hepatitis C treatments in middle-income countries such as Morocco, where they are only accessible to a small proportion of the hundreds of thousands of people who need them. Manufacturers, including even generics firms, have no interest in older treatments, which are easier to make and less profitable: besides penicillin, these include painkillers, which are neglected in most of the poorest African countries. Morphine, which is subject to international regulation but cheap to make in oral forms, is virtually unobtainable in most African countries, whereas the imported injectable forms, more costly to make, are available on the private market.

In May 2019 the World Health Assembly adopted a resolution calling for greater transparency on actual prices paid by governments and health product buyers, and on the results of clinical trials (3). Krikorian said, ‘A very interesting coalition of countries from the North and South came together to say, “We must have transparency; we want to know how much people are paying, who pays for what, and how much it costs”.’ With the backing of NGOs, South Africa and Uganda campaigned for the adoption of the resolution; Germany (which proposed 25 amendments) and the UK opposed it.

Séverine Charon & Laurence Soustras

Séverine Charon and Laurence Soustras are journalists.

Translated by Charles Goulden

Le Monde diplomatique, originally published in French,

Trump threatens to not sign $900B stimulus package – 

:

An airline worker in Christmas themed attire assists travelers at Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport in Arlington, Virginia, US, December 22, 2020. (Reuters)

Wednesday, December 23, 2020

Trump calls Covid relief bill 'a disgrace'

President Donald Trump has rejected a $900 billion bipartisan Covid stimulus package, calling it "a disgrace" and demanding that lawmakers more than triple relief payments to Americans.

While he did not explicitly say he would not sign the bill, which passed overwhelmingly on Monday in both houses of Congress, Trump made clear he would not accept the legislation.

"It really is a disgrace," he said in a video message posted to Twitter.

"I am asking Congress to amend this bill and increase the ridiculously low $600 to $2,000, or $4,000 for a couple. I'm also asking Congress to immediately get rid of the wasteful and unnecessary items from this legislation, and just send me a suitable bill."

Failed Trump Coup Gives Way to 'Brazen Attempt' by GOP to Undermine Voting Rights

"This appears to be laying the groundwork for what may be a more massive and coordinated voter suppression effort in the new year." 

by Julia Conley, staff writer

Published on Tuesday, December 22, 2020
by Common Dreams


Voters stand in line to cast their ballots during the first day of early voting in the U.S. Senate runoffs on December 14, 2020, in Atlanta, Georgia. Voting rights advocates say President Donald Trump's attempts to cast doubt on the validity of the presidential election results could threaten voting rights for years to come. (Photo: Tami Chappell / AFP via Getty Images)

Civil rights advocates and political observers are warning that while President Donald Trump has failed to introduce any successful challenges to the presidential election, which he decisively lost to President-elect Joe Biden on November 3, he and other Republicans have likely succeeded in laying the groundwork for a significant rollback of voting rights, particularly targeting communities where disenfranchisement is already rampant.

Trump and the Republican Party have now had more than 50 lawsuits dismissed by federal and state courts, and the Electoral College last week officially affirmed Biden's victory while the federal government's top cybersecurity official—a Trump appointee—called the election "the most secure in American history."

According to a Northeastern University survey, nearly 40% of GOP voters in states that flipped from Trump in 2016 to Biden in 2020 believe the president actually did not lose. And Republican officials are capitalizing on those beliefs and Trump's false claims of fraud to undermine efforts designed to expand voter access.

The doubt and distrust sowed by the president and dozens of Republican lawmakers over the last six weeks has now allowed Wisconsin Republicans to argue that events in public parks where absentee ballots were collected were unlawful, and that Democratic and nonpartisan attempts in the state to make it easier for residents to vote during the coronavirus pandemic "overstepped state law," according to Reuters.

Republicans, who control the Wisconsin state legislature, are expected to consider legislation to curtail in-person early voting, which has been permitted in previous elections.

In Georgia, where voting rights advocates and progressive grassroots groups worked tirelessly to register young voters and people of color—two years after a gubernatorial election in which Republican Gov. Brian Kemp narrowly won after overseeing the closure of dozens of polling locations—state GOP lawmakers said earlier this month that they would seek to end "no excuse" voting-by-mail, which the GOP itself introduced in 2005.

Party officials said doing away with the system would "secure our election process," despite several clear statements from Republican Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger that there was no evidence of election fraud or irregularities in Georgia.

"This appears to be laying the groundwork for what may be a more massive and coordinated voter suppression effort in the new year," Kristen Clarke, president of the Lawyers Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, told Reuters on Monday. "It is a brazen attempt to undermine and obstruct the progress that has been made in 2020 to make it easier for people to vote amid the pandemic."

The Brennan Center for Justice found that 29 states and the District of Columbia changed voting procedures this year to expand voting access, easing rules for voting by mail or by absentee ballot and expanding early voting so people could vote safely. The new rules made it possible for a record 158 million people to cast ballots amid the coronavirus pandemic, despite significant efforts by Trump and other Republicans to cal into questionl the validity of voting by mail and the use of drop boxes.

As Common Dreams reported, Trump ally Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) admitted shortly after the election that Republican efforts to place strict controls on mail-in voting are aimed at hurting Democrats' electoral chances.

"If we don't do something about voting by mail, we’re going to lose the ability to elect a Republican in this country,” Graham told Fox News last month.

As lawsuits brought by Trump and the Republican Party repeatedly failed in the courts over the past month, Paul Blumenthal wrote at HuffPost that the claims being pushed by the president "could be used in years to come to justify unnecessary and damaging voting restrictions that would disproportionately affect Black voters."

"Just because this is all incredibly dumb and has no chance of successfully overturning Biden's win doesn't mean it's not incredibly dangerous," wrote Blumenthal. "The entire scheme involves the delegitimization and disenfranchisement of voters in predominantly Black municipalities. It undermines his supporters' faith in democracy."

There’s a nut graf in this ⁦@PaulBlu⁩ story that should be in every Trump election coup story:

What Trump is doing undermines faith in democracy and could be used to justify unnecessary voting restrictions making it harder for Black people to vote. https://t.co/g5DIhW3FP9

— Matt Fuller (@MEPFuller) November 19, 2020

While election law expert and former Justice Department attorney Justin Levitt told NBC News earlier this month that Trump's claims of fraud were unlikely to lead "to a different result in January... I am really afraid about what Donald Trump is currently doing to the country for February and beyond."

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'DeJoy Is the Real Life Grinch': Postmaster General's Pre-Election Sabotage Fuels Christmas Delivery Delays

"No parcels are moving at all. As bad as you think it is, it's worse."

by
Jake Johnson, staff writer
Published on Tuesday, December 22, 2020
by Common Dreams

"Mail performance has plummeted: Only 75.3 percent of first-class mail, such as letters and bills, arrived within the standard one- to three-day delivery window the week of December 5, according to the most recent agency data available," the Washington Post reported. 

(Photo: Adam Berry/Getty Images)

Postmaster General Louis DeJoy's sweeping and destructive effort to slash operating costs at the U.S. Postal Service has made an already difficult time of the year even more chaotic for the beloved agency, threatening the prompt delivery of millions of Christmas-time packages as strained postal employees tirelessly work their way through mounting backlogs.

The Washington Post reported late Monday that a "perfect storm of crises"—the coronavirus pandemic, an unprecedented level of online orders, and DeJoy's operational changes—is wreaking havoc on the agency, which has seen drastic performance fall-offs since the postmaster general began implementing his agenda over the summer.

"This is a long, hard struggle. We're asking for your patience, and no delayed gift should take away from the valuable family time and the reason people come together and celebrate."
—Mark Dimondstein, American Postal Workers Union

"Mail performance has plummeted: Only 75.3 percent of first-class mail, such as letters and bills, arrived within the standard one- to three-day delivery window the week of December 5, according to the most recent agency data available," the Post reported. "This time last year, the mail service's on-time score was closer to 95 percent."

"Adding to the slowdowns," the Post noted, "is on-the-ground confusion over the cost-cutting initiatives that Postmaster General Louis DeJoy implemented during the summer and then paused at the direction of five federal courts. The Postal Service has appealed several of those rulings."

A Michigan postal worker told the Post that "as bad as you think it is, it's worse."

"No parcels are moving at all," said the unnamed worker.

Mark Dimondstein, national president of the 200,000-member American Postal Workers Union (APWU) stressed that postal employees are doing their absolute best to ensure that Christmas gifts and other packages—including prescription medications and benefit checks—are delivered as quickly as possible. As the Post reported, mail carriers in busy areas are "working upward of 80 hours a week, including some who have worked every day since Thanksgiving without a weekend."

"This is a long, hard struggle," said Dimondstein. "We're asking for your patience, and no delayed gift should take away from the valuable family time and the reason people come together and celebrate. Hopefully everything will make it there on time. But if it doesn't, it'll still get there."

Twas the week before Christmas, when all through the House
Not a committee was stirring, not even oversight
The stockings were hung by the chimney with care
In hopes that St. Nicholas soon would be there

Hey Pelosi: Trump's DeJoy IS THE REAL LIFE GRINCH!https://t.co/XpQLkXoGes
— Jeff Hauser (@jeffhauser) December 22, 2020

In the wake of the presidential election, DeJoy—a Republican megadonor to President Donald Trump—swiftly resumed his push for a major operational overhaul at the Postal Service, brushing aside evidence that his original effort caused massive mail delays across the nation before it was temporarily suspended by DeJoy himself and federal judges.

DeJoy, who took charge of the Postal Service in the middle of June, "left his initiative seeking to eliminate late and extra mail transportation trips in place, but courts subsequently ordered USPS to walk it back," Government Executive reported last month. "USPS will now likely seek to resume those efforts, with DeJoy saying... USPS can 'operate with much greater precision.'"

Postmaster General Louis DeJoy testifies during a hearing before the House Oversight and Reform Committee on August 24, 2020 on Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C. 

(Photo: Tom Williams-Pool/Getty Images)

Given that the postmaster general serves at the pleasure of the USPS Board of Governors—which is currently dominated by 4-2 by Trump appointees—it is unclear how much the incoming Biden administration will be able to do to stop DeJoy from taking a sledgehammer to postal operations.

As the Wall Street Journal reported earlier this month, Biden vowed during the presidential campaign to fill the three vacancies on the nine-member Board of Governors with the hopes of forestalling DeJoy's agenda and potentially removing him from office. Last week, Trump moved to fill one of the board's three vacancies by nominating Roy Bernardi, who must be confirmed by the Senate.

"Like much else in Washington, DeJoy's fate may be linked to the outcome of the Georgia runoffs for U.S. Senate," the Journal noted. "Democrats on the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, which oversees the USPS, are eager to fill the vacant seats on the board and move away from the 'cost cutting mentality' among Postal Service leadership that has contributed to declines in service."

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