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It's Up to You, New York: 'BradCast' 3/21/24
Trump staring down barrel of both civil and criminal accountability in NY; Also: Biden forgives another $6B in student loans; U.S. seeks 'sustained ceasefire' in Gaza; Scientists baffled by spike in record global heat...
'Green News Report' 3/21/24
  w/ Brad & Desi
Biden EPA issues biggest climate regulation in U.S. history; Rio hits 144°F heat index!; Exxon CEO blames YOU for climate change; PLUS: U.N. issues climate change 'red alert'!...
Previous GNRs: 3/19/24 - 3/14/24 - Archives...
'It All Comes Down to Brett and Amy': 'BradCast' 3/20/24
Guest: Slate's Mark Joseph Stern on another stunning week of federal judiciary debacles; Also: Primary results from AZ, FL, IL, KS, OH, CA; Biden EPA's 'biggest climate move yet'...
American 'Bloodbath':
'BradCast' 3/19/24
Trump is promising political violence whether he wins or loses; Also: Navarro goes to prison; Scofflaw MI MAGA attorney arrested; SCOTUS allows TX to override federal law, Constitution; Biden's SOTU success...
'Green News Report' 3/19/24
  w/ Brad & Desi
EPA finally bans all uses of asbestos; Biden unveils billions for rebuilding communities broken by highway construction; Extreme heat in Africa; PLUS: MA coastal town follies...
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Corporations 'Taking a Bazooka' to NLRB, Hoping to Declare it 'Unconstitutional': 'BradCast' 3/18/24
Guest: Labor journo Steven Greenhouse; Also: Putin's 'election'; Trump can't find $450M...
Sunday 'Wouldn't Wanna Be Ya' Toons
FEATURING: Moses Mike...Trump II Terror...TikTok Truth...and more in our latest collection of the week's most secular toons!...
Schumer Steps Up; Trump Associates Paid Biden 'Bribe' Liar $600k: 'BradCast' 3/14/24
Also: TikTok foolishness; NY hush-money trial delay?; Navarro must go to jail; Trump owes $400k for failed 'Steele Dossier' suit in UK...
'Green News Report' 3/14/24
FL bans heat protections for workers; Methane leaks continue; GOP Project 2025 would ban Paris Agreement; PLUS: CA snowpack is back, but too late for salmon...
After Accountability for Fraud, What's Next for the Corrupt NRA and Gun Safety Reforms?: 'BradCast' 3/13/24
Guest: Brady Center's Kelly Sampson; Also: Biden, Trump clinch; GA judge nixes 6 counts...
How to Media Better and Other Smart Ideas:
'BradCast' 3/12/24
Press quietly resets weeks of misreporting on Biden; Suggestions for NYT; Stephanopoulos v. Mace; Also: Buck quits; RNC 'bloodbath'; WI's MAGA Speaker Recall...
'Green News Report' 3/12/24
Biden touts climate jobs boom at SOTU; Feb. obliterated global temp and ocean heat records; PLUS: Great Barrier Reef hit with yet another 'mass bleaching event'...
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GOP Voter Registration Fraud Scandal 2012...
VA GOP VOTER REG FRAUDSTER OFF HOOK
Felony charges dropped against VA Republican caught trashing voter registrations before last year's election. Did GOP AG, Prosecutor conflicts of interest play role?...

Criminal GOP Voter Registration Fraud Probe Expanding in VA
State investigators widening criminal probe of man arrested destroying registration forms, said now looking at violations of law by Nathan Sproul's RNC-hired firm...

DOJ PROBE SOUGHT AFTER VA ARREST
Arrest of RNC/Sproul man caught destroying registration forms brings official calls for wider criminal probe from compromised VA AG Cuccinelli and U.S. AG Holder...

Arrest in VA: GOP Voter Reg Scandal Widens
'RNC official' charged on 13 counts, for allegely trashing voter registration forms in a dumpster, worked for Romney consultant, 'fired' GOP operative Nathan Sproul...

ALL TOGETHER: ROVE, SPROUL, KOCHS, RNC
His Super-PAC, his voter registration (fraud) firm & their 'Americans for Prosperity' are all based out of same top RNC legal office in Virginia...

LATimes: RNC's 'Fired' Sproul Working for Repubs in 'as Many as 30 States'
So much for the RNC's 'zero tolerance' policy, as discredited Republican registration fraud operative still hiring for dozens of GOP 'Get Out The Vote' campaigns...

'Fired' Sproul Group 'Cloned', Still Working for Republicans in At Least 10 States
The other companies of Romney's GOP operative Nathan Sproul, at center of Voter Registration Fraud Scandal, still at it; Congressional Dems seek answers...

FINALLY: FOX ON GOP REG FRAUD SCANDAL
The belated and begrudging coverage by Fox' Eric Shawn includes two different video reports featuring an interview with The BRAD BLOG's Brad Friedman...

COLORADO FOLLOWS FLORIDA WITH GOP CRIMINAL INVESTIGATION
Repub Sec. of State Gessler ignores expanding GOP Voter Registration Fraud Scandal, rants about evidence-free 'Dem Voter Fraud' at Tea Party event...

CRIMINAL PROBE LAUNCHED INTO GOP VOTER REGISTRATION FRAUD SCANDAL IN FL
FL Dept. of Law Enforcement confirms 'enough evidence to warrant full-blown investigation'; Election officials told fraudulent forms 'may become evidence in court'...

Brad Breaks PA Photo ID & GOP Registration Fraud Scandal News on Hartmann TV
Another visit on Thom Hartmann's Big Picture with new news on several developing Election Integrity stories...

CAUGHT ON TAPE: COORDINATED NATIONWIDE GOP VOTER REG SCAM
The GOP Voter Registration Fraud Scandal reveals insidious nationwide registration scheme to keep Obama supporters from even registering to vote...

CRIMINAL ELECTION FRAUD COMPLAINT FILED AGAINST GOP 'FRAUD' FIRM
Scandal spreads to 11 FL counties, other states; RNC, Romney try to contain damage, split from GOP operative...

RICK SCOTT GETS ROLLED IN GOP REGISTRATION FRAUD SCANDAL
Rep. Ted Deutch (D-FL) sends blistering letter to Gov. Rick Scott (R) demanding bi-partisan reg fraud probe in FL; Slams 'shocking and hypocritical' silence, lack of action...

VIDEO: Brad Breaks GOP Reg Fraud Scandal on Hartmann TV
Breaking coverage as the RNC fires their Romney-tied voter registration firm, Strategic Allied Consulting...

RNC FIRES NATIONAL VOTER REGISTRATION FIRM FOR FRAUD
After FL & NC GOP fire Romney-tied group, RNC does same; Dead people found reg'd as new voters; RNC paid firm over $3m over 2 months in 5 battleground states...

EXCLUSIVE: Intvw w/ FL Official Who First Discovered GOP Reg Fraud
After fraudulent registration forms from Romney-tied GOP firm found in Palm Beach, Election Supe says state's 'fraud'-obsessed top election official failed to return call...

GOP REGISTRATION FRAUD FOUND IN FL
State GOP fires Romney-tied registration firm after fraudulent forms found in Palm Beach; Firm hired 'at request of RNC' in FL, NC, VA, NV & CO...
The Secret Koch Brothers Tapes...

How states, counties and YOU must help defend our 'last firewall'...
By Ernest A. Canning on 8/10/2020 10:05am PT  

This will not be easy. It never is. But, this year, we are facing obstacles to voting that we have never seen before. Not only from the unprecedented COVID-19 crisis, which is already difficult enough, but from those who hope to exploit the pandemic along with their access to the levers of power to make voting --- by some --- as difficult as possible. It is now up to all of us to overcome those obstacles.

President Trump is, by no means, the first right-wing Republican to recognize that he can't win if voters turn out in large numbers.

"I don't want everybody to vote," Paul Weyrich, the GOP's notorious godfather of right-wing voter suppression infamously quipped during a 1980 address to a group of evangelical Christian ministers. "In fact, our leverage in the elections goes up as the voting populace goes down," he added, after denigrating those who seek "good government" through maximum, informed voter participation, as people who suffer from "goo goo syndrome".

(The soaring pandemic death toll and an unprecedented 32.9% annualized second quarterly plunge in the GDP, serve as testament to what happens when We the People allow those opposed to "good government" to be placed in charge of our political economy.)

Trump's repeated attempts to suppress voter turnout are by no means novel --- as amply demonstrated during our two-part coverage (here and here) of the 2011 U.S. Senate hearings concerning a spike in GOP-engineered, state voter suppression laws. During those hearings nearly a decade ago, civil rights litigator Judith Browne Dianis described that spike as "the largest legislative effort to roll back voting rights since the post-Reconstruction era."

What makes our current circumstance both novel and extraordinarily dangerous is that an authoritarian-wannabe Donald Trump is the first Republican President who has been positioned to weaponize a pandemic by forcing voters to choose between exercising their fundamental right to vote and the risk of contracting a deadly virus. Instead of simply relying upon state voter suppression laws, Trump has aspired to engage in wholesale suppression on a national scale. Operating through a major GOP/Trump donor-turned-Postmaster General Louis DeJoy, Trump seeks to actively sabotage the social distancing protection that Vote-by-Mail (VBM) affords by creating delays in U.S. Postal Service (USPS) deliveries.

Last Friday, during a must-listen-to segment of The BradCast, Mark Dimondstein, President of the American Postal Workers Union (APWU), confirmed that mail slow-downs were "happening across the country" at a time in which the USPS was already in "crisis mode" as a result of the dangers posed by COVID-19. In his view, the Post Office is now at the "epicenter" of the 2020 battle over "voting rights", noting that "without Vote-by-Mail people aren't going to be able to vote."

Thus, in addition to fending off "dubious" Republican legal challenges to mail-in voting expansion, democracy's defenders --- which, in this case, includes We the People --- must now double our own efforts to navigate Trump's sabotage of mail delivery. This, at a time when election officials in states that have not previously engaged in near-universal VBM must upgrade their electoral infrastructure in order to accommodate and tabulate an unprecedented volume of hand-marked paper VBM ballots.

But there are proactive steps that jurisdictions --- and, yes, you! --- can take to maximize the odds that your ballot is tallied this year...

--- Click here for REST OF STORY!... ---




Measuring the risks of such an escalation by local officials...
By Ernest A. Canning on 7/24/2020 1:00pm PT  

Philadelphia's progressive District Attorney Larry Krasner told Democracy Now's Amy Goodman on Thursday that any federal officers who break state law within the City of Brotherly Love will be arrested and prosecuted. His comments come in response to President Trump's threat to expand the "totalitarian" assaults by his secret police from Portland, Oregon to other cities run by "liberal Democrats."

While Krasner and other local law enforcement agencies likely possess the authority to arrest law breaking federal agents, should they?

Krasner acknowledged that federal officers have a right to enter the city, and often do so for agreed upon joint law enforcement activities, but argued that no one, including the President, has a right to violate state law:

If people are going to come to Philadelphia and, in uniform, they're going to fracture the skulls of protesters with rubber bullets, they're going to jump out of rental vans and drag people into those vans without probable cause, they are committing crimes under the Pennsylvania statutes. These are Pennsylvania offenses over which the district attorney in Philly has jurisdiction over that area, and we can bring those charges.

The argument may be legally supportable, but the issue entails not only the question of whether local DAs and police have the authority to effectuate the arrest of miscreant federal agents but also of weighing the risk of potentially adverse consequences...

--- Click here for REST OF STORY!... ---




Despite legal challenges, White House threatens to expand 'shock troop' operation 'across heartland of the country'...
UPDATE, 7/23/20: Federal 'thugs' attack 'wall of moms', Navy vet; Tump/AG Barr expand 'illegal' assault to Kansas City, Chicago and Albuquerque; Judge issues TRO against feds...
By Ernest A. Canning on 7/21/2020 1:21pm PT  

Under the guise of protecting federal property and public safety, a militarized secret federal police force, deployed by President Trump to Portland, Oregon, has unleashed a totalitarian assault on democracy and the rule of law. The brutal assault has trampled the civil liberties of peaceful protesters, journalists, legal observers and bystanders.

The astonishing offensive has extended well beyond the boundaries of federal enclaves. It also entailed a great deal more than the arbitrary application of police violence. Wearing military fatigues with patches bearing only the word "POLICE", previously unidentified, armed federal stormtroopers roamed city streets and sidewalks, arbitrarily snatching-up terrified citizens, who they whisked away in unmarked vehicles.

In a federal lawsuit filed late on Friday, Oregon Attorney General Ellen Rosenbaum challenged these wholesale violations of civil liberties and alleges that the arbitrary snatch and grab operation also creates a "risk" that law abiding, peaceful protesters could be kidnapped by armed and unaccountable, civilian right-wing "militias".

Separately, the ACLU, seeking to rein in what its staff attorney, Vera Eidelman, aptly described as an "unconstitutional nightmare", filed a 2nd amended complaint, which added the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and the U.S. Marshals Service (USMS) as party Defendants to the ACLU's already successful federal lawsuit. That lawsuit was initially filed previously against the City of Portland.

Earlier this month, U.S. District Court Judge Michael H. Simon issued a Temporary Restraining Order (TRO) and, later, a Preliminary Injunction [PDF], that blocked the Portland Police Bureau "from arresting, threatening to arrest, or using physical force...against any person they know or reasonably should know is a Journalist or Legal Observer...unless the Police have probable cause to believe such individual has committed a crime." The injunction also prevents police from seizing photographic, audio and video-recording equipment. (To its credit, the City of Portland agreed to the issuance of the preliminary injunction.)

By way of a newly filed Motion for a TRO [Temporary Restraining Order] and Preliminary Injunction, the ACLU now seeks a ruling from Judge Simon that would provide the same injunctive relief against the DHS and the USMS. In their motion, the ACLU described Trump's secret police as "shock troops" who "were successfully subjugating protesters and carrying out [the President's] longstanding vendetta against the press."

DHS and USMS were not the only federal agencies that have taken part in the trampling of civil liberties in Portland. In its federal complaint, Oregon also named the Federal Protection Service (FPS) and U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) as party Defendants.

Where both the ACLU and Oregon complaints lay out facts that support the assessment offered by Kelly Simon, ACLU Oregon's interim legal director, that Trump's stormtroopers have been "terrorizing the community, risking lives, and brutally attacking protesters," Oregon's complaint, unlike the ACLU's, seeks declaratory and injunctive relief designed to remedy the violations of the 1st, 4th and 5th Amendment rights of all affected citizens, including protesters and bystanders. Oregon also alleges that these agencies, especially the CBP, have violated Oregon's sovereign right to protect its own citizens.

Despite this disturbing, uninvited and unwelcome federal deployment --- as well as the now very serious legal challenges --- on Sunday, White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows told Fox "News" to expect a "roll out" of similar deployments to "Chicago or Portland or Milwaukee or someplace across the heartland of the country"...

--- Click here for REST OF STORY!... ---




Case may persuade state Dems to nix restrictions on Nov. mail-in voting...
By Ernest A. Canning on 7/17/2020 11:35am PT  

As recently observed in a Hartford Current editorial by Shari Cantor, the Mayor of West Hartford, Connecticut, her state's residents face some of the most restrictive Vote-by-Mail (VBM) requirements in the nation. She notes, in her op-ed calling for an expansion of absentee voting in the Constitution State, that voters "may not obtain an absentee ballot unless they are a poll worker, an active member of the military, sick, out of town during all hours of voting, physically disabled or prevented by their religion."

In response to the restrictions, attorneys from the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), on behalf of an individual voter and the Connecticut branches of the NAACP and League of Women Voters, have now filed a federal complaint [PDF] seeking to compel the state to allow every lawfully registered voter to cast a VBM ballot during the November 3rd general election.

CT's extraordinarily restrictive "Excuse Requirement" for voting via absentee, according to the complaint, combined with the fact that state election law does not provide for early in-person voting, forces the electorate to choose this year between exercising the franchise and the very real risk of contracting (and subsequently spreading) the deadly COVID-19 virus.

Because the restrictions on mail-in voting forces the electorate to choose between voting and a risk of death --- a choice CT's Democratic Secretary of State Denise Merrill, the only named Defendant in the case, conceded voters should "never" have to make --- the complaint alleges CT's Excuse Requirement, if applied during the Nov. 3rd general election, would impose an unreasonable burden on the right to vote in violation of the 1st and 14th Amendments to the U.S. Constitution.

The complaint separately alleges that CT's restrictive VBM Excuse Requirement denies or abridges the right to vote on account of race because the combination of greater obstacles to in-person voting and COVID-19's disparate impact on the African-American community "interacts with social and historical conditions to cause inequality in the opportunities enjoyed by Black and White voters to elect their preferred representatives. [Appellate court citation]." This, the complaint alleges, violates Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act.

The 42-page federal complaint is replete with references to scientific facts and law that make it a compelling legal pleading. There's a very good chance, however, that a federal judge will never have to render a decision on the merits of the case. CT's Democratic leaders, including its Governor, Ned Lamont, may find those arguments persuasive and act accordingly...

--- Click here for REST OF STORY!... ---




Unlikely either a grand jury, Congress or the public will gain access to any incriminating financial records prior to the Presidential Election
UPDATE 8/4/20: Subsequent court orders/legal filings suggest NY grand jury may get records by September. Will there be an October Surprise?...
By Ernest A. Canning on 7/9/2020 1:23pm PT  


"Two hundred years ago, a great jurist of our Court [Chief Justice John Marshall] established that no citizen, not even the President, is categorically above the common duty to produce evidence when called upon in a criminal proceeding. We reaffirm that principle and hold that the President is neither absolutely immune from state criminal subpoenas seeking his private papers nor entitled to a heightened standard of need." --- Chief Justice John Roberts, 7 - 2 majority opinion in Trump v. Vance, July 9, 2020

In Trump v. Vance, the President of the United States sued to block Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance's subpoena of Donald Trump's accounting firm Mazar's USA. The subpoena seeks financial records that may expose criminal violations of NY law. Those potential violations include, but are not limited to, the sworn allegations presented by Trump's former attorney, Michael Cohen, that the President falsified loan applications and other financial documents.

The fact that the Supreme Court, as observed by Justice Brett Kavanaugh in his concurring opinion in Vance, "unanimously" agreed that "a President does not possess absolute immunity from a state criminal subpoena" is great news for those who are concerned about the threat the Trump administration poses to the survival of the rule of law. However, the Court's decision to remand the case to the District Court where President Donald J. Trump "may," per the majority opinion, "raise further arguments as appropriate" makes it unlikely that a New York grand jury will acquire the potentially incriminating records that might otherwise justify the issuance of a criminal indictment prior to the November 3. 2020 election.

Given the majority's conclusion, in Vance --- that the President's right to object to compliance with a criminal subpoena is no greater than the rights enjoyed by all private citizens --- it's unlikely Trump will prevail at the District Court level. However, the remand will allow Trump's legal counsel to seek further delays via stay requests associated with future appeals.

In a companion case, Trump v. Mazars USA, LLP --- in which Trump sued to block several Congressional Committees from obtain Trump's tax and other financial documents as part of their legislative oversight --- the Court vacated a District Court order compelling Trump to turn over financial records to Congress. Although the Court, in this case, left open the possibility that the District Court could again order the same financial records to be turned over to Congress after careful consideration of Separation of Powers issues. In this case as well, it is now highly unlikely that the records would be forthcoming to Congress prior to the Election.

The net result is that the Supreme Court has probably deprived the U.S. electorate of access to potentially incriminating financial records prior to the pivotal Presidential Election. That doesn't bode well for small "d" democratic accountability, which can only be accomplished when the electorate is "well informed". That's especially ironic given that even President Richard M. Nixon conceded that We the People have a right "to know whether or not their President is a crook."

UPDATE 8/4/20: Subsequent court orders, an expedited briefing schedule and legal filings suggest that a Manhattan grand jury may actually receive the withheld financial records by early September.

In a July 16 order [PDF], U.S. District Court Judge Victor Moreno adopted the parties' agreed upon expedited schedule, to wit: Trump was to file a second amended complaint by July 27. Vance could answer or move to dismiss by Aug. 3. Vance timely filed a motion to dismiss [PDF]. Trump has until Aug. 10 to file a brief in opposition to the motion to dismiss; Vance until Aug. 14 to file a reply.

On July 17, the Supreme Court issued an order granting Vance's request that the Supreme Court's July 9 decision be effective immediately --- as opposed to the usual 25 days after it was issued.

In his July 16 order, Judge Morero recited the following with respect to Vance's legal posture:

Each of [the President's] potential arguments must be understood first and foremost in the context of the Supreme Court's rejection of a heightened standard for the issuance of a standard of a state criminal subpoena to a sitting President. While the District Attorney does not contest that the President should have an opportunity to advance additional "appropriate" claims supported by factual allegations, consistent with the Supreme Court's opinion, his challenges to the Mazars subpoena must be considered in light of the principle that a President making such challenges stands "in nearly the same situation with any other individual."[Citation]. The President's proposal attempts to elide that standard; indeed, [he] expressly invites this Court to conduct a heightened-scrutiny inquiry drawn from the concurring opinion that was utterly rejected by the majority decision. Equally important, it overlooks the fact that he has already substantially advanced similar allegations in the [First] Amended Complaint, which this Court rejected.

The President states that he may argue that the subpoena "is motivated by a desire to harass or is conducted in bad faith…or that the subpoena is meant to 'manipulate' his policy decisions or to retaliate against him for official acts.' But this Court has already found there was no demonstrated bad faith, harassment, or any other unusual circumstance that would call for equitable relief. And this Court has rejected the President's claim that there was any evidence of a 'secondary motive' that goes beyond good faith enforcement of criminal laws.

In his erudite motion to dismiss Trump's Second Amended Complaint, which was co-authored by Walter E. Dellinger, III, a Duke Law Professor who had previously served as an Assistant Attorney General and as the head of the Department of Justice Office of Legal Counsel, Vance lays out the reasons why the Second Amended Complaint must be dismissed and the records promptly produced.

Trump's newest filing, Vance asserts, merely "repeats a conspiratorial assertion [the President] has unsuccessfully pressed for nearly a year to all three levels of the federal courts." The only "new" allegation is the claim the subpoena is over-broad because it seeks financial records dating back to 2011. This "new" allegation is based upon the factually erroneous assumption that Vance's investigation is confined to the 2016 "hush money" payments that were the source of the allegations leveled by Michael Cohen, the President's former lawyer. (Cohen was convicted for his role in the "hush money" scheme.)

In actuality, Vance points out, the subpoena goes back to 2011 because the grand jury, on the basis of publicly revealed evidence, is investigating "potentially improper financial transactions by a variety of individuals and entities over a period of years."

In the motion, Vance based assertion on Cohen's Congressional testimony and cited Washington Post and Wall Street Journal articles. Turns out, the Manhattan DA has additional information in his possession, according to a The New York Times article that was published one day after Vance filed the motion to dismiss. Last year, Deutsche Bank turned over the Trump organization's financial records to Vance's office pursuant to a subpoena. Thus, it's likely Vance already has evidence in his possession to support the assertion, set forth in the motion, that the NY grand jury subpoenas of financial records held by Mazars relate to decades-long "alleged insurance and bank fraud by the Trump Organization and its officers".

Given Judge Marrero's rejections of the President's prior identical legal arguments, and the already significant delay incurred, it's likely that, following a hearing, a new order compelling compliance with the subpoena will soon issue. It's unlikely further stays will be granted. Thus, it's likely, a NY grand jury will receive the financial records by early September. If those records are incriminating, the intriguing question is to whether Vance, who is not hampered by DOJ rules against initiating an action, could promptly seek and deliver an October Surprise in the form of an unprecedented indictment of a sitting President.

* * *
Ernest A. Canning is a retired attorney, author, and Vietnam Veteran (4th Infantry, Central Highlands 1968). He previously served as a Senior Advisor to Veterans For Bernie. Canning has been a member of the California state bar since 1977. In addition to a juris doctor, he has received both undergraduate and graduate degrees in political science. Follow him on twitter: @cann4ing




The OTHER Department whistleblower's astonishing testimony of gross misconduct by Trump's corrupt U.S. Attorney General
UPDATE 7/2/20: Barr Impeachment Inquiry Resolution introduced...
By Ernest A. Canning on 6/29/2020 11:05am PT  

Last Wednesday, the mainstream media paid scant attention to the damning testimony provided to the House Judiciary Committee by John W. Elias, a career attorney at the Department of Justice (DOJ). Elias revealed astonishing details on the corrupt manner in which Attorney General William Barr and the "political leadership" of the DOJ's Antitrust Division abused our antitrust laws; corruptly ordering career staff to open unwarranted but burdensome, politically-motivated antitrust investigations.

It's not that Elias' testimony was unimportant. His words were simply drowned out by the testimony provided by other witnesses about other Barr/DOJ misconduct, and by a separate, but related event. The combined effect of the other testimony provided to the the Judiciary panel and the separate news event was nothing short of jaw-dropping.

Still, Elias' previously unthinkable allegations were, in fact, no less so...

--- Click here for REST OF STORY!... ---




State legislature codifies Governor's Executive Order, Voting Rights Groups' Motion to Intervene upends Republican 'voter fraud' allegations...
UPDATE 7/10/20: After voluntarily dismissing its lawsuit, GOP falsely declares victory...
By Ernest A. Canning on 6/24/2020 10:35am PT  

In a recent article, we described the GOP's legal challenge to the Executive Order issued by California's Democratic Governor Gavin Newsom --- directing CA election officials to timely submit vote-by-mail (VBM) ballots to every active registered CA voter for the November general election --- as "dubious", at best.

We noted that the GOP plaintiffs lacked standing to sue in federal court because Republicans cannot show they suffered a legally cognizable injury. We also noted that the GOP's core legal challenge --- that the Elections Clause to the U.S. Constitution only permits state legislatures, not Governors, to set the time and manner of conducting federal elections --- was at odds with settled Supreme Court case law and that legislative approval for the Governor's pandemic-related emergency Executive Order can be found within the provisions of the CA Emergency Services Act.

Last week AB-860 was passed by the state legislature (even with support from Republicans) to codify Newsom's Executive Order by specifically providing that VBM ballots be timely sent to every active registered voter in the state, even if the voter did not request one. It was signed into law this week by the Governor, rendering the GOP's core legal argument moot.

The new law will not only mandate a dismissal of the GOP legal filing but also eliminate the need for the court to grant the Motion to Intervene [PDF] that was recently filed by several voting rights organizations opposing the challenge by a number of Republican groups, including the California Republican Party.

CA Common Cause, League of Women Voters of CA and the Community Coalition seek to be added as Party Defendants in order to counter the GOP's effort to compel in-person voting --- a GOP effort that, if successful, would dangerously and unnecessarily expose the state's electorate to the risk of contracting a deadly virus, COVID-19. The portion of those organizations' motion, which demolishes the GOP's VBM "voter fraud" lies, however, warrants verbatim coverage...

[Republicans'] allegations echo long-debunked claims that associate mail-in ballots with voter fraud. In reality, mail vote fraud is virtually non-existent. Millions of Americans vote by mail --- one in four voters did so in the last two federal elections. Yet an exhaustive investigation found only 491 instances of mail vote fraud committed between 2000 and 2012, a period in which billions of votes were cast.

UPDATE 7/10/20: After U.S. District Court Judge Morrison England, Jr. dismissed the GOP's frivolous legal challenge following a Republican filing of a voluntary Notice of Dismissal, GOP Chairwoman Rona McDaniel falsely proclaimed that the Republican Party "scored a major victory against Gov. Gavin Newsom's illegal executive order." She attempted to bolster this falsehood with another lie --- that, before the GOP filed its legal challenge to VBM in CA, "Democrats planned to automatically send ballots to inactive voters, including people who have moved or died."

As we observed in a 6/5/20 update to an article that had covered the "dubious" GOP legal challenge, the Office of CA Secretary of State Alex Padilla stated that, pursuant to the Executive Order which Padilla and Gov. Newsom issued, VBM ballots would only be mailed to "active" registered voters.

"Only active registered voters will be mailed a vote-by-mail ballot. That is and has been the practice in California," Padilla's spokesman Sam Mahood said. Under California's Elections Code, Mahood added, "'voters with an inactive voter registration status do not receive elections materials.' That includes vote-by-mail ballots."

The only change to CA Election Law as it existed at the time the Executive Order was issued was the elimination of the requirement that voters first request a VBM ballot before one would be mailed to an
active" registered voter. Thus, at best Rona and the GOP had erected a straw man; erroneously claiming that the Executive Order required submission of VBM ballots to "inactive" voters.

* * *
Ernest A. Canning is a retired attorney, author, and Vietnam Veteran (4th Infantry, Central Highlands 1968). He previously served as a Senior Advisor to Veterans For Bernie. Canning has been a member of the California state bar since 1977. In addition to a juris doctor, he has received both undergraduate and graduate degrees in political science. Follow him on twitter: @cann4ing




Anticipated court rulings will determine whether Trump's corrupt political influence will expand from a compromised DOJ to the Judiciary...
UPDATE : Sharply divided Appellate Panel orders District Court to dismiss Flynn case. UPDATE 7/10/20: District Court petitions full DC Circuit for en banc rehearing. UPDATE 7/30/20: DC Circuit grants en banc review; vacates panel's order. UPDATE: 9/2/20 DC Circuit denies Flynn's writ petition...
By Ernest A. Canning on 6/17/2020 11:33am PT  

This is about far more than the fate of Michael Flynn.

Last week, in an amicus curiae (friend of the court) brief [PDF], former federal prosecutor John Gleeson, a retired federal judge, together with a number of renowned attorneys and constitutional scholars, offered a scathing condemnation of the William Barr-led Department of Justice. Gleeson denounced the DOJ's "corrupt" and "politically motivated" effort to dismiss the long-running case against Flynn, Donald Trump's former National Security Advisor, who, the brief describes as a "political ally of the President."

The issue at stake in this case is not only on a matter of accountability for Trump's disgraced former National Security Advisor. It also entails a question of whether the corrupt political influence the President has exerted over an ethically compromised Attorney General will now flow into and compromise a co-equal branch of government, the federal Judiciary...

--- Click here for REST OF STORY!... ---




Appeals court previously found state's new poll tax unconstitutional
UPDATE, 7/1/20: Appellate Court expedites DeSantis appeal; sets oral arguments for Aug. 10; grants en banc review and stays the injunction...
By Ernest A. Canning on 6/5/2020 10:35am PT  

Last week, Florida's Republican Governor, Ron DeSantis, announced that he would legally challenge a federal court decision that would, with the exception of those convicted for murder or sexual offenses, permit most former felons in the state to register to vote prior to the November 3rd Presidential Election. "It will go to the 11th Circuit," DeSantis said, adding in Trump-like language: "We will see what happens."

The good news is that, at least with respect to the U.S. 11th Circuit Court of Appeal, the chances that DeSantis will prevail can be rated at somewhere between slim and none. The bad news is that, even with the benefit of U.S. District Court Judge Robert L. Hinkle's erudite 125-page decision in Jones v. DeSantis, the voting rights organization plaintiffs (League of Women Voters and the NAACP) may find it extraordinarily difficult to register those otherwise eligible former felons in time to cast a vote in the upcoming General Election due to the adverse impact of COVID-19.

But, as to the good news for the moment, a statute that may appear constitutional on its face can then be rendered unconstitutional by the manner in which it has been applied by a state agency. The background and the history of this case, as well as Judge Hinkle's "as applied" reasoning, help to explain why his decision will likely be upheld by the 11th Circuit...

--- Click here for REST OF STORY!... ---




Experts' findings raise questions about veracity of Hennepin County Medical Examiner; may support charges against other officers...
UPDATE: MN AG elevates charges against Chauvin to include 2nd degree murder; others charged with 'aiding and abetting' murder and manslaughter with negligence...
By Ernest A. Canning on 6/3/2020 11:18am PT  

After performing an independent autopsy at the request of the Floyd family's attorney, Ben Crump, Dr. Michael Baden, the world-renowned former NY forensic pathologist and Dr. Allecia Wilson, the Univ. of Michigan Medical School's Director of Autopsy and Forensic Services, released an initial report, which found, in pertinent part, that George Floyd's death could be classified a "homicide caused by asphyxia due to neck and back compression that led to a lack of blood flow to the brain" [emphasis added].

That finding, and additional observations, so sharply contrast with the initial findings of the Hennepin County Medical Examiner as to call into question the credibility of that public institution. The County Medical Examiner initially asserted that there were "no physical findings that support a diagnosis of traumatic asphyxia or strangulation." In a final report, the County Medical Examiner classified Floyd's death as a "homicide" but listed the cause of death as "cardiopulmonary arrest complicating law enforcement subdual [sic.], restraint, and neck compression."

Subsequent to the Hennepin County Medical Examiner's initial findings, set forth in the criminal complaint filed by the Hennepin County DA against former Minneapolis Police Officer Derek Chauvin --- the officer seen forcefully pressing his knee to Floyd's neck for nearly 9 minutes --- Governor Tim Walz, a member of the Democratic Farmer Labor Party, appointed the state's Attorney General, Keith Ellison, a former progressive Democratic Congressman, to take the lead role in Chauvin's prosecution.

Tuesday, while appearing on NBC's Today Show, Crump said he'd heard from prosecutors that they "expect to charge" the other officers who were present at the time of Floyd's death.

There are aspects of Baden and Wilson's findings that could support the filing of criminal charges against the two officers seen in a second video kneeling atop Floyd's back and lower torso while Chauvin had his knee pressed against Floyd's neck. However, a comment from Baden raises a doubt as to whether Ellison, as urged by Crump, could successfully prosecute Chauvin for first degree murder...

--- Click here for REST OF STORY!... ---




Rightwing organization and GOP candidate Darrell Issa charge mailing ballots to every registered voter violates the U.S. Constitution...
UPDATE: Case likely to be dismissed as moot...
By Ernest A. Canning on 5/26/2020 9:35am PT  

In a desperate attempt to prevent a high turnout of California voters for the critical 2020 General Election, attorneys from the extreme right-wing organization, Judicial Watch, filed a federal complaint [PDF] late last week on behalf of former Republican Congressman turned candidate again Darrell Issa with several named Republican voters in the U.S. District Court (Eastern District CA)

The complaint alleges that CA Governor Gavin Newsom and Secretary of State Alex Padilla, both Democrats, unlawfully usurped the power of the CA state legislature when, on May 8, they issued an emergency Executive Order in response to the COVID-19 crisis. The order directed the election officials of every CA county to "transmit Vote-by-Mail [VBM] ballots for the November 3, 2020 General Election to all [registered] voters" no later than "the last day on which [VBM] ballots may be transmitted."

The complaint alleges that the Executive Order violates the Elections Clause of the U.S. Constitution, Art. I, §4. That clause provides, in pertinent part: "The Times, Places and Manner of holding Elections for Senators and Representatives, shall be prescribed in each State by the Legislature thereof."

The CA legislature, via the state's Voter's Choice Act, set forth explicit criteria that each county must meet in order to become an all VBM county. The Republican plaintiffs argue the Executive Order permits counties that have not met that criteria to act as VBM counties; that permitting all voters to cast VBM ballots "dilutes" the votes of the Republican voter plaintiffs who live in counties which have not met the statutory criteria. They seek to invalidate the Executive Order and compel those CA voters who have not timely requested absentee ballots under CA law, as it existed prior to May 8, to either vote in-person or not at all.

The Republicans' legal filing drew a sharp retort from Padilla: "Exploiting the COVID-19 pandemic to justify voter suppression is despicable, even for Judicial Watch's pathetically low standards."

From a legal standpoint, the Republicans' legal arguments are frivolous...

--- Click here for REST OF STORY!... ---




Judge rules 'all qualified candidates' must remain on the ballot in case filed by former hopeful Andrew Yang with the support of Bernie Sanders
UPDATE: 2d Circuit summarily rejects NY appeal...
By Ernest A. Canning on 5/6/2020 10:05am PT  

Bernie Sanders, thanks to Andrew Yang, is now back on the Presidential Primary ballot in New York state. So is Yang. At least for the moment.

By way of a 30-page decision [PDF] on Tuesday night, U.S. District Court Judge Analisa Torres ordered the New York State Board of Elections to reinstate the Empire State's June 23 Democratic Presidential Primary and to include, on the ballot, those candidates who previously suspended their campaigns but did not elect to remove their names from the ballot.

Last week, the Board's two Democratic Party Commissioners unilaterally removed from the ballot Presidential candidates who had suspended their campaigns. Because that left only one candidate, Joe Biden, they effectively cancelled the NY Democratic Presidential Primary.

Biden, Sanders, NY Gov. Andrew Cuomo, the state Democratic Party and the DNC all say they did not request the cancellation carried out by the two Commissioners on the Board. The Commissioners say they did so as a safety precaution in order to decrease polling place turnout during the coronavirus epidemic, even as Cuomo had previously ordered that all registered voters be mailed an absentee ballot application. Sanders and his supporters expressed outrage at the Board's decision.

The next day, however, former Democratic Presidential candidate Andrew Yang, along with seven of his pledged delegates, filed a legal challenge to the New York Board's decision...

--- Click here for REST OF STORY!... ---




...And ensure the former Veep keeps his promise for 'one of the most progressive administrations since Roosevelt'...
By Ernest A. Canning on 4/24/2020 11:05am PT  

While it might appear counterintuitive, if a significant number of people vote for Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) in the remaining primaries, that could enhance former Vice President Joe Biden's chances to defeat President Trump this November.

Let there be no mistake as to the tactical reasoning behind this assertion.

As observed recently by one of the Left's foremost intellectuals, Prof. Noam Chomsky, the U.S. 2020 Presidential Election will be "the most crucial election in human history." The re-election of Donald J. Trump, whom Chomsky describes as a "sociopath" and a "gangster", would produce an "indescribable disaster." It would threaten the survival of constitutional democracy and rule of law in these United States. Citing the climate crisis and an enhanced threat of nuclear war, Chomsky also argued that Trump's re-election would threaten the very survival of humanity.

It is vital that Trump be defeated. Basic math tells us that the only way sensible Americans --- Democrats, Independents and sane Republicans --- can avert Chomsky's "indescribable disaster" is to unite in support of the Democratic Party Nominee. There is virtually no chance that a third party candidate can win the 2020 election. Disaster cannot be averted by refusing to vote as a form of ill-considered protest.

Basic delegate math also reveals that, as Sanders clearly asserted, Biden will be the nominee. He offered that assessment, first, when he announced his decision to suspend his campaign and, again, during a joint, must-watch livestream endorsement. (See video posted below).

In Chomsky's view, there are "many enormous differences" between the presumptive empathetic Democratic Party Presidential Nominee and the "sociopath" who now occupies the White House.

As demonstrated by the President's asinine and unlawful decision to cut Congressionally authorized funding of the World Health Organization in the midst of a deadly global pandemic, Trump is impervious to either legality or political pressure. That stands in stark contrast to Biden, who, over his decades-long tenure on the Senate Judiciary Committee, demonstrated a basic commitment to the rule of law, and who, per Chomsky, can be "pushed" to accept a progressive agenda.

So why does a vote for Sanders now help Biden win this fall?...

--- Click here for REST OF STORY!... ---




Countering the deadly media-supported, health insurance industry spin...
By Ernest A. Canning on 1/29/2020 9:35am PT  

As Americans are being hoodwinked by a slick health insurance industry PR campaign, the time has come to carefully examine Medicare For All by separating myth from reality.

While morally repugnant, the privately-owned health insurance industry's deceptions are economically understandable. By the time Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) introduced the Medicare for All Act of 2019 in the U.S. Senate --- two months after Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-WA), co-chair of the Progressive Caucus, introduced H.R. 1384 - Medicare for All Act of 2019 in the House --- the industry realized that it faced an existential threat.

Medicare for All would create an entirely new single-payer healthcare system that, with limited exceptions (cosmetic surgery, home care nursing), would eliminate the need for anyone to purchase health insurance.

While the parasitic health insurance industry has faced-off against them in the past, single-payer advocates are better positioned to prevail in 2020 than at any time in the past 75 years. Sanders' single-payer healthcare legislation, S. 1129, was co-sponsored by 14 Senate Democrats. Those co-sponsors included several Presidential candidates --- Elizabeth Warren (D-MA), Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY), Cory Booker (D-NJ) and Kamela Harris (D-CA). More than one-half of all Democrats in the House (112), co-sponsored Jayapal's version of the bill. Medicare for All is also supported by 63 national organizations. More importantly, a poll taken in 2018 --- prior to a barrage of pro-insurance industry propaganda --- found that Medicare for All was immensely popular. It was supported by a whopping 70% of all Americans, including 84% of Democrats and a mind-boggling 52% of Republicans.

With their very survival at stake, the health insurance profiteers, along with large hospitals and the pharmaceutical industry, created a new PR front-group, Partnership for America's Healthcare Future (PAHF), to wage their defensive. According to Wendell Potter, a former CIGNA executive and author of Deadly Spin: How PR is Killing Healthcare and Deceiving Americans (2011), PAHF is the industry's newest propaganda arm.

In addition to carefully-timed commercial advertising, PAHF acts in concert with industry-funded politicians and mainstream media pundits. Their goal is to erect an industry-friendly frame that serves to mask the blatant deficiencies of our inordinately expensive, yet woefully inefficient, subsidized "free market" healthcare system. This, as Julie Hollar of the media watchdog FAIR observed, has succeeded in turning some of the recent Democratic Presidential Debates into "over the top, industry-friendly spectacle[s]."

Potter, the recovering healthcare industry veteran, told Los Angeles Times columnist Michael Hiltzek: "Health insurers have been successful at two things: making money and getting the American public to believe they're essential." But, "the truth", argues Hiltzik, "is that private health insurers have contributed nothing to the American healthcare system."

Most Americans, he charges, "blindly tolerate" our inordinately expensive, yet dysfunctional private insurance system "because the vast majority...don't have a complex interaction with the healthcare system within a given year...[One percent] of patients account for more than one-fifth of all medical spending, and 10% account for two-thirds." Far too many Americans fail to appreciate the "inadequacies of our private insurance system" until those inadequacies are thrust upon them by an unexpected serious illness or injury, according to the Pulitzer Prize winning business columnist.

Hence, the need to separate healthcare insurance myth from fact-based reality...

--- Click here for REST OF STORY!... ---




Setting politics aside, why the evidence-free Trump/GOP claims about Ukraine and the 2016 election actually make no sense whatsoever...
By Ernest A. Canning on 11/29/2019 10:05am PT  

Sometimes, when faced with an insidious canard, it isn't enough to either expose the true source of a conspiracy theory or the absence of any facts to support it. In order to thoroughly demolish it, one can identify a reductio ad absurdum --- "a form of argument in which a proposition is disproven by following its implications to absurd conclusions".

It is indeed important that, throughout the recent public impeachment hearings, House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff (D-CA) referred to allegations that CrowdStrike and the Ukrainians hacked the Democratic National Committee (DNC) server in 2016 as a "debunked" conspiracy theory and that none of the State Department and National Security Counsel (NSC) officials who testified during the impeachment hearings could identify any evidence that would support that "debunked" theory. It is also important that, in her opening statement, Dr. Fiona Hill, Trump's own former NSC Senior Director of Russian and European Affairs, proclaimed that Russian intelligence agencies were the source of that "fictional" canard.

While there is ample evidence to support the conclusions offered by Dr. Hill and Chairman Schiff, one can deliver the coup de grâce to the baseless but insidious theory that Ukraine and CrowdStrike hacked the DNC by asking "why" they would do that?...

--- Click here for REST OF STORY!... ---




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