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BY BRIAN BEUTLER, PRIYANKA ARIBINDI & CROOKED MEDIA Tuesday, June 25, 2019 |
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| —USWNT star/national treasure Megan Rapinoe |
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| BORDERING ON TORTURE |
| President Trump is using the suffering of children at the southern border, and the threat of mass deportations, to extort Democrats in Congress to pass cruel immigration policy.
The good news? Democrats should be able to alleviate suffering at the border without caving to Trump’s demands.
What Trump is up to: The administration is breaking the law by holding thousands of Central American children who are seeking asylum in Customs and Border Patrol facilities for weeks at a time in the most inhumane, deplorable conditions.
Trump has separately threatened to order dragnet-style ICE raids in cities across the country if Congress doesn’t pass legislation allowing him to detain migrant families at the border indefinitely.
How has Congress responded? The House and Senate have each put forward emergency legislation to send billions of dollars to the border. House Democrats believe that the Senate’s bill, which is the only one Trump says he’s willing to sign, does not adequately spell out how the administration must spend the money, and worry that Trump will use it to conduct more raids or buy more detention beds, increasing his capacity for illegal detention.
What happens next? The House and Senate have to agree on a single bill before any aid will go toward helping children at the border. In the meantime, Trump’s threat to mass-deport immigrants hangs over everything. Congress has shown no signs of caving to this demand. As Julissa Arce wrote, Democrats “should hold the line at the principle that they will not trade the suffering of one group of people for the suffering of another.”
What can you do: Call your members of Congress, and give to RAICES Texas, an organization that provides free and low-cost legal services to immigrant children, families, and refugees in Texas → http://go.crooked.com/raices |
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| We did a poll! Crooked Media teamed up with Change Research to talk to Democratic voters in Iowa, New Hampshire, and South Carolina. Here’s one finding that didn’t get as much attention as Brian wanted:
Eighty-three percent of early state voters support beginning an impeachment inquiry, and 52 percent of them support it strongly. The follow-up questions tell an interesting story: Though 57 percent of those who support impeachment would be willing to vote for a candidate who voted not to impeach Trump, a whopping 91 percent of those who oppose impeachment would vote for a candidate who did vote to impeach him.
The takeaway: Democratic primary voters won’t penalize candidates for doing the right thing, but they might penalize them for doing the wrong thing! It’s almost as if conventional political wisdom is based on nothing at all!
While we’re talking about 2020, the Democratic primary debates start tomorrow. Sign up on Vote Save America to get our What a Debate newsletter specials recapping each night → |
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| The Iranian foreign ministry has declared the diplomatic channel between the U.S. and Iran “permanently closed,” and President Trump said that he would respond to an “attack by Iran on anything American” with “obliteration.” It’s really disconcerting to be stuck between the whims of a government full of fanatics threatening to terrorize their enemies, and Iran.
Customs and Border Protection agency’s acting commissioner, John Sanders has announced he will resign. Can’t imagine why!
Melania Trump’s spokeswoman Stephanie Grisham will become the new White House Press Secretary and Director of Communications, filling vacancies created by Sarah Huckabee Sanders and former Fox executive Bill Shine, respectively. We hope she enjoys her few months at the job that will discredit her in the public eye for the rest of her life!
Indicted Rep. Duncan Hunter (R-CA) used campaign funds to finance at least five romantic affairs with three different lobbyists, one of his own staff members, and an aide to a member of congressional leadership—crimes he tried to blame on his wife! He also engaged in conduct so scandalous that prosecutors have chosen not to disclose it because it might taint the jury pool. After pleading guilty to conspiring with him last week, Mrs. Duncan Hunter has agreed to cooperate with the government against her shitty husband.
Trump denied prominent advice columnist E. Jean Carroll’s allegation that he raped her in the mid-1990s by saying that she is “not my type.” Republican politicians who’ve been asked about this, including House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy and Senator Lindsey Graham, have said they believe Trump. Vote all of them out.
The Environmental Protection Agency wants to implement a new rule that would make it easier to reject Freedom of Information Act requests from journalists and the public, and allow political appointees to deny the existence of records even if the records exist. Looks like someone thought Chernobyl was an inspiring story about how to poison people and cover it up.
Employees of furniture company Wayfair will walk out tomorrow after the company’s CEO ignored their petition to stop selling beds to migrant detention facilities and end business with all border detention facilities. As AOC noted, “This is what solidarity looks like—a reminder that everyday people have real power, as long as we’re brave enough to use it.”
Ten candidates have joined 2020 hopeful Julián Castro in calling for the repeal of a decades-old law that makes unauthorized border crossing a criminal offense, rather than a civil violation. The Trump administration has used the law as justification to separate families.
The White House will block Kellyanne Conway from testifying before the House oversight committee about her serial violations of the Hatch Act, which prohibits federal employees from campaigning for or against candidates while on the job, but honestly we doubt she needed to be “blocked” from giving Congress the finger. Chairman Elijah Cummings has promised to subpoena her if she doesn’t appear Wednesday. |
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| A group of 19 billionaires wrote an open letter on Medium urging all presidential candidates to impose a wealth tax on the richest 0.1 percent of Americans. The group, including financier George Soros, Facebook co-founder Chris Hughes, and Disney heiress Abigail Disney, advocated for the “moral, ethical, and economic responsibility” to impose a wealth tax, and offered six reasons it should exist: to fight climate change, support economic growth, bolster public health investments, reduce the wealth gap, strengthen American democracy, and let billionaires fulfill their “patriotic” duties.
Surveys suggest that a majority of voters, including a majority of millionaires, support higher taxes on the ultra-wealthy. As these writers noted, research indicates that the wealthiest 0.1 percent of Americans will pay 3.2 percent of their wealth in taxes this year, while the bottom 99 percent will pay 7.2 percent of theirs. “We ask that you recognize its strong merit and popular support, and advance the idea to tax us a little more.” Billionaires, welcome to the resistance! |
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| The Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals has given a lower court judge the greenlight to reopen the Census citizenship-question case, based on new evidence that the Trump administration sought to add a citizenship question to the Census with the intent to discriminate against minorities.
The Supreme Court will rule this week on whether a citizenship question is constitutional in the abstract, and whether the administration followed proper procedures in trying to add it to the 2020 Census. This new ruling creates the possibility that the courts can stop the citizenship question on the grounds that it is unconstitutionally discriminatory, even if the Supreme Court rules for the Trump administration. |
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