Andy Borowitz: Kayleigh McEnany Tells January 6th Panel She Never Worked at White House

Kayleigh McEnany has rebuffed the subpoena from the House select committee investigating the January 6th attack, on the ground that she never worked at the White House.

In a brusque statement, McEnany claimed that “there is only one word for anyone who suggests I was ever a White House employee: liar.”

McEnany asserted that, contrary to the allegation of the congressional committee, “For the past five years, I have been assistant manager of an Enterprise Rent-a-Car branch in Las Vegas.”

Having established that she was not in Washington on January 6th, she pointed the finger at several people who were. “The members of the January 6th committee have a lot of explaining to do,” she said. https://www.newyorker.com/humor/borowitz-report/

In lawsuit, Pa. voting official says Trump, Giuliani lies led to his heart attacks

A Pennsylvania election worker who was falsely accused of rigging the state's election for Joe Biden is suing former President Donald Trump and some of his top surrogates, charging their lies about him led to numerous death threats and two heart attacks.

In papers filed in the Philadelphia Court of Common Pleas, Delaware County voting machine warehouse supervisor James Savage says his "character has been assassinated on a national level" thanks to the false claims made by Trump, his lawyers Rudy Giuliani and Jenna Ellis and others that he'd uploaded 50,000 votes for Biden. "The plaintiff did nothing of the sort," the suit says.

"As a result of the Defendants’ knowingly false statements, Mr. Savage and his family have been the target of threats and intimidation, including at his place of work and/or his home. https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/donald-trump/lawsuit-pa-voting-official-says-trump-giuliani-lies-led-his-n1283255

AOC Slams Paul Gosar for Fantasy Clip of Him Killing Her

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) hit back at Rep. Paul Gosar (R-AZ) after he posted an altered anime clip that showed him killing her, the Washington Post reports.

Said Ocasio-Cortez: “While I was en route to Glasgow, a creepy member I work with who fundraises for Neo-Nazi groups shared a fantasy video of him killing me.”

She added: “This dude is a just a collection of wet toothpicks anyway. White supremacy is for extremely fragile people & sad men like him, whose self concept relies on the myth that he was born superior because deep down he knows he couldn’t open a pickle jar or read a whole book by himself.” https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/republicans-gosar-trump-ocasio-cortez/2021/11/08/ead37b36-40ca-11ec-9ea7-3eb2406a2e24_story.html

Americans Are Flush With Cash and Jobs. They Also Think the Economy Is Awful.

Americans are, by many measures, in a better financial position than they have been in many years. They also believe the economy is in terrible shape.

This is the great contradiction that underlies President Biden’s poor approval ratings, recent Republican victories in state elections and the touch-and-go negotiations over the Biden legislative agenda. It presents a fundamental challenge for economic policy, which has succeeded at lifting the wealth, incomes and job prospects of millions of people — but has not made Americans, in their own self-perception, any better off.

Workers have seized the upper hand in the labor market, attaining the largest raises in decades and quitting their jobs at record rates. The unemployment rate is 4.6 percent and has been falling rapidly. Cumulatively, Americans are sitting on piles of cash; they have accumulated $2.3 trillion more in savings in the last 19 months than would have been expected in the pre-pandemic path. The median household’s checking account balance was 50 percent higher in July of this year than in 2019, according to the JPMorgan Chase Institute. Yet workers’ assessment of the economy is scathing. https://www.nytimes.com/2021/11/06/upshot/inflation-psychology-economy.html

GOP billionaire Ken Langone says he will hold a fundraiser for Democrat Joe Manchin, who has worked to shrink Biden’s agenda

Republican billionaire Ken Langone says he plans to host a fundraiser for Sen. Joe Manchin after the conservative West Virginia Democrat blocked key elements of President Joe Biden’s agenda.

The comments came as Democrats in Congress continue to hash out major parts of Biden’s economic agenda, namely social safety net spending and plans to battle climate change.

Langone, in an interview Wednesday on CNBC’s “Squawk Box,” praised Manchin for his “guts and courage” and explained that he was set to raise money for him. Manchin is up for reelection in 2024.

“I don’t see leadership any place in this country. Thank God for Joe Manchin,” Langone said.

“I’m going to have one of the biggest fundraisers I’ve ever had for him. He’s special. He’s precious. He’s a great American,” he added. Langone has never contributed to one of Manchin’s campaigns, according to the nonpartisan Center for Responsive Politics. https://www.cnbc.com/2021/11/10/republican-billionaire-ken-langone-says-he-will-hold-fundraiser-for-joe-manchin.html

Gohmert Exploring Bid for Texas Attorney General

Rep. Louis Gohmert (R-TX) is soliciting donations  or an “exploratory” bid for Texas attorney general,.

From the site: “We need a Texas Attorney General whose top attorneys working for him have not found it necessary to send a letter to the FBI urging an investigation into corruption of their boss.” https://gohmert.net/

At least 13 Trump officials illegally campaigned while in office

At least 13 senior Trump administration officials illegally mixed governing with campaigning before the 2020 election, intentionally ignoring a law that prohibits merging the two and getting approval to break it, a federal investigation released Tuesday found.

A report from the office of Special Counsel Henry Kerner describes a “willful disregard for the law” known as the Hatch Act that was “especially pernicious,” given that many officials abused their government roles days before the November election. President Donald Trump — whose job it was to discipline his political appointees — allowed them to illegally promote his reelection on the job despite warnings to some from ethics officials, the report says.

“This failure to impose discipline created the conditions for what appeared to be a taxpayer-funded campaign apparatus within the upper echelons of the executive branch,” investigators wrote in the scathing 60-page report. https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/trump-violations-hatch-act/2021/11/09/b3d4c764-4108-11ec-a88e-2aa4632af69b_story.html

Reuters unmasks Trump supporters who terrified U.S. election officials

For this report, Reuters set out to identify the people behind these attacks on election workers and understand their motivations. Reporters submitted public-records requests and interviewed dozens of election officials in 12 states, obtaining phone numbers and email addresses for two dozen of the threateners.

Reuters was able to interview nine of them. All admitted they were behind the threats or other hostile messages. Eight did so on the record, identifying themselves by name.

The nine harassers interviewed by Reuters said they believed they did nothing wrong. Just two expressed regret when told their messages had frightened officials or caused security scares. The seven others were unrepentant, with some saying the election workers deserved the menacing messages.

The harassers expressed beliefs similar to those voiced by rioters who stormed the U.S. Capitol on January 6, trying to block Democrat Joe Biden’s certification as president. Nearly all of the threateners saw the country deteriorating into a war between good and evil – “patriots” against “communists.” They echoed extremist ideas popularized by QAnon, a collective of baseless conspiracy theories that often cast Trump as a savior figure and Democrats as villains. Some said they were preparing for civil war. Six were in their 50s or older; all but two were men. https://www.reuters.com/investigates/special-report/usa-election-threats/

GOP Operatives Deploy Network of Local Fake News Sites

Metric Media is a massive network of websites linked to "conservative businessman Brian Timpone." There are more than 1300 sites currently in the network, including at least 28 that operate in Virginia. A Popular Information investigation reveals that, in 2021, Metric Media published thousands of articles promoting the notion that Critical Race Theory is taught in Virginia schools. Many, but not all, of these articles are automated. 

Nationwide, tens of thousands of articles about Critical Race Theory have been published across the Metric Media network. That number is growing every day. The network is positioned to be a powerful tool in injecting Critical Race Theory into the 2022 campaign under the guise of "local news.” https://popular.info/p/right-wing-operatives-deploy-massive

 

Countries’ climate pledges built on flawed data, Post investigation finds

Across the world, many countries underreport their greenhouse gas emissions in their reports to the United Nations, a Washington Post investigation has found. An examination of 196 country reports reveals a giant gap between what nations declare their emissions to be versus the greenhouse gases they are sending into the atmosphere. The gap ranges from at least 8.5 billion to as high as 13.3 billion tons a year of underreported emissions — big enough to move the needle on how much the Earth will warm.

The plan to save the world from the worst of climate change is built on data. But the data the world is relying on is inaccurate.

“If we don’t know the state of emissions today, we don’t know whether we’re cutting emissions meaningfully and substantially,” said Rob Jackson, a professor at Stanford University and chair of the Global Carbon Project, a collaboration of hundreds of researchers. “The atmosphere ultimately is the truth. The atmosphere is what we care about. The concentration of methane and other greenhouse gases in the atmosphere is what’s affecting climate.”

At the low end, the gap is larger than the yearly emissions of the United States. At the high end, it approaches the emissions of China and comprises 23 percent of humanity’s total contribution to the planet’s warming, The Post found.

“In the end, everything becomes a bit of a fantasy,” said Philippe Ciais, a scientist with France’s Laboratory of Climate and Environmental Sciences who tracks emissions based on satellite data. “Because between the world of reporting and the real world of emissions, you start to have large discrepancies.” https://www.washingtonpost.com/climate-environment/interactive/2021/greenhouse-gas-emissions-pledges-data/

NRSC chair Rick Scott declines to say if Trump-backed Senate hopeful accused of strangling wife is right candidate for the job

Sen. Rick Scott, who heads the group that works to elect Senate Republicans, declined Monday to say whether Sean Parnell, a GOP hopeful in Pennsylvania who has been accused of strangling his wife and abusing his children, is the right candidate for the job.

We’ll see who comes out of the primary,” Scott said. “Facts will come out. We’ll find out exactly what people think. I think what ultimately happens is people are going to look at somebody’s background and say is that the type of person they want and also are they talking about the issues I care about.”
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/rick-scott-sean-parnell/2021/11/08/d21bb370-4097-11ec-a3aa-0255edc02eb7_story.html

COVID-19 Misinformation is Ubiquitous: 78% of the Public Believes or is Unsure About At Least One False Statement, and Nearly a Third Believe At Least Four of Eight False Statements Tested

People’s trusted news sources are correlated with their belief in COVID-19 misinformation. At least a third of those who trust information from CNN, MSNBC, network news, NPR, and local television news do not believe any of the eight false statements, while small shares (between 11% and 16%) believe or are unsure about at least four of the eight false statements.

Larger shares of those who trust COVID-19 information from leading conservative news sources believe misinformation, with nearly 4 in 10 of those who trust Fox News (36%) and One America News (37%), and nearly half (46%) of those who trust Newsmax, saying they believe or are unsure about at least half of the eight false statements.

Whether this is because people are exposed to misinformation from those news sources, or whether the types of people who choose those news sources are the same ones who are pre-disposed to believe certain types of misinformation for other reasons, is beyond the scope of the analysis. https://www.kff.org/coronavirus-covid-19/press-release/covid-19-misinformation-is-ubiquitous-78-of-the-public-believes-or-is-unsure-about-at-least-one-false-statement-and-nearly-at-third-believe-at-least-four-of-eight-false-statements-tested/

Ted Cruz wants Texas to secede if 'things become hopeless' in the US

Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) said that Texas should secede if Democrats "fundamentally" destroy the U.S. but added that "he is not ready to give up on America yet."

"If the Democrats end the filibuster, if they fundamentally destroy the country, if they pack the Supreme Court, if they make D.C. a state, if they federalize elections, if they massively expand voter fraud, there may come a point where it's hopeless," Cruz said while speaking at an event at Texas A&M last month.

However, he emphasized that the country isn't at that point where Texas would secede and while he doesn't support the movement, he "understands the sentiment behind it."

"We're not there yet, and if there comes a point where it's hopeless, then I think we take NASA, we take the military, we take the oil," Cruz said. https://thehill.com/homenews/state-watch/580613-ted-cruz-wants-texas-to-secede-if-things-become-hopeless-in-the-us

GOP digs in on blocking Biden diplomatic picks

Republicans are putting up an intense series of roadblocks to confirmation for President Biden’s diplomatic nominees, issuing maximalist demands and raising objections to both policies and personalities.

More than 10 months into Biden's administration, the Senate has confirmed only seven of his ambassadorial picks, while more than 50 nominees for the State Department and U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) are awaiting votes, many of them held up by GOP objections. https://thehill.com/policy/international/580339-gop-digs-in-on-blocking-biden-diplomatic-picks

Deposition video shows Trump allies under oath discussing debunked election fraud claims

Allies of former President Donald Trump testified under oath that they had done little to verify debunked claims of fraud in the 2020 election before spreading them on the national stage, according to tapes of their depositions obtained exclusively by CNN.

The new footage of sworn testimony from Trump attorneys Rudy Giuliani and Sidney Powell animates the behind-the-scenes movements of the two in their effort to sow doubt about the integrity of the presidential election results. The video details responses from the Trump allies as a lawyer representing former Dominion Voting Systems executive Eric Coomer in his defamation case against them peppers them with questions about their allegations. Video https://www.cnn.com/2021/11/04/politics/rudy-giuliani-sidney-powell-deposition-tapes/index.html

Democrats ramp up filibuster talks after voting rights setback

Democrats are ramping up their discussions about changing the Senate's rules amid growing frustration about the inability to move voting rights legislation.  

After months of trying to give space for bipartisan discussions on election legislation, Democrats are planning internal talks about what, if any, rules changes they’ll be able to get through on their own. Those ideas include smaller shifts on nominations or amendments. But altering the filibuster — particularly when it comes to elections bills — is getting the most attention.  https://thehill.com/homenews/senate/580189-democrats-ramp-up-filibuster-talks-after-voting-rights-setback

Trump-endorsed gubernatorial candidate appears with Nazi sympathizer and QAnon-linked activists at campaign events

Kari Lake (R), the Arizona gubernatorial candidate recently endorsed by former President Donald Trump, has embraced fringe far-right figures in her campaign events, including publicly thanking a Nazi sympathizer for his support and appearing with figures linked to the QAnon conspiracy. https://www.cnn.com/2021/11/04/politics/kfile-kari-lake-nazi-symapthizer-qanon-figure/index.html

In January the Hamtramck, Mich. City Council will be all Muslim, likely first in US

The six-member City Council of Hamtramck will consist of all Muslims starting in January, another historic first for the metro Detroit city known for its sizable immigrant population.

The newly elected mayor, Amer Ghalib, 42, is also Muslim, which means all of the city's elected officials will be Muslim.  https://www.freep.com/story/news/politics/elections/2021/11/05/hamtramck-first-muslim-city-council/6288652001/

Georgia Grand Jury Looms in Trump Inquiry

An Atlanta district attorney “is moving toward convening a special grand jury in her criminal investigation of election interference by the former president and his allies,” the New York Times reports.

The inquiry “is seen by legal experts as potentially perilous for the former president, given the myriad interactions he and his allies had with Georgia officials, most notably Mr. Trump’s January call to Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, urging him to ‘find 11,780 votes’ — enough to reverse the state’s election result.” https://www.nytimes.com/2021/11/06/us/politics/trump-election-interference-investigation.html

GOP erupts over its House members bailing out Biden

On Friday, 13 House Republicans delivered the decisive votes to rescue a key part of President Biden’s agenda — an agenda endangered by those in his own party.

And some Republicans are predictably furious — with undersold questions about House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy’s (R-Calif.) future leadership of the party potentially in the offing.

“I can’t believe Republicans just gave the Democrats their socialism bill,” Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.) said.

“That 13 House Republicans provided the votes needed to pass this is absurd,” Rep. Chip Roy (R-Tex.) said.

Others threatened before the vote to target or launch primaries against the defectors in their midst.

“Vote for this infrastructure bill and I will primary the hell out of you,” Rep. Madison Cawthorn (R-N.C.) said shortly before the vote.

Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.), in her typically understated fashion, warned last week that any Republican who voted for the bill would be “a traitor to our party, a traitor to their voters and a traitor to our donors.” After the vote, she accused the 13 of having voted to “pass Joe Biden’s Communist takeover of America” and tweeted the phone numbers to their congressional offices (while for some reason only listing 12 of the 13). https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2021/11/06/fix-gop-infrastructure-defections/

Under fire from the right, DeSantis calls for tougher election laws

Six months after signing what he called the strongest election security bill in the nation, Gov. Ron DeSantis on Wednesday said he wanted to beef up the state’s voting laws and create a new office to investigate and prosecute election-related fraud. https://www.tampabay.com/news/florida-politics/2021/11/03/under-fire-from-the-right-desantis-calls-for-tougher-election-laws/

Republicans Seize on Schools as a Wedge Issue to Unite the Party

After an unexpectedly strong showing on Tuesday night, Republicans are heading into the 2022 midterm elections with what they believe will be a highly effective political strategy capitalizing on the frustrations of suburban parents still reeling from the devastating fallout of pandemic-era schooling.

Seizing on education as a newly potent wedge issue, Republicans have moved to galvanize crucial groups of voters around what the party calls “parental rights” issues in public schools, a hodgepodge of conservative causes ranging from eradicating mask mandates to demanding changes to the way children are taught about racism.

Yet it is the free-floating sense of rage from parents, many of whom felt abandoned by the government during the worst months of the pandemic, that arose from the off-year elections as one of the most powerful drivers for Republican candidates. https://www.nytimes.com/2021/11/03/us/politics/school-republican-campaign-issue.html

Corporations calling for voting rights bill donated to Republicans who blocked it, watchdog says

A new analysis finds that 8 major corporations gave thousands of dollars to GOP senators who prevented the legislation from advancing.

Several corporations that publicly declared their support for legislation strengthening the Voting Rights Act have donated thousands of dollars this year to Republicans who recently blocked the bill in the Senate, a new analysis found.

Accountable.US, a watchdog group, found that eight major corporations that signed a letter in July calling for passage of the John R. Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act of 2021 have collectively donated $164,500 to GOP senators who voted this week against allowing debate on the measure. The companies include household names like Amazon, Dell and Facebook. https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/elections/corporations-calling-voting-rights-bill-donated-republicans-who-blocked-it-n1283295

Arizona defies demand to stop using COVID-19 relief money for anti-mask schools

Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey (R) is pressing forward with using federal coronavirus relief funding for grant programs that exclusively go to schools that do not have mask mandates.

The AP reports Ducey is also providing private school vouchers to parents who object to schools' mask or quarantine requirements, ignoring Treasury Department demands on how the money can be spent. https://thehill.com/homenews/state-watch/580274-arizona-defies-demand-it-stop-using-covid-19-relief-money-for-anti-mask

New Grand Jury Convened In Trump Organization Case

The Manhattan District Attorney has convened a second long-term grand jury to hear evidence about the Trump Organization’s financial practices, and potentially to vote on criminal charges.

An earlier grand jury — convened this spring in Manhattan — previously handed down felony indictments against two Trump companies and Trump’s longtime chief financial officer Allen Weisselberg, charging them with tax evasion. It is unclear if that grand jury is still hearing evidence about the Trump Organization.

One person familiar with the matter said the second grand jury was expected to examine how former president Donald Trump’s company valued its assets. The people familiar spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe private legal proceedings. https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/manhattan-da-convenes-new-grand-jury-in-trump-case-to-weigh-potential-charges/2021/11/04/79549fe0-3d8b-11ec-a493-51b0252dea0c_story.html

Republicans found a new phony ‘issue’ to demagogue. They should be so proud.

Like Popeye chugging down a can of spinach or Steve Rogers being injected with super-soldier serum, the Republican Party has found the magical elixir that will give it the power to vanquish its foes: the “issue” of education.

House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) announced that in response to the election, he’ll be creating a “Parent’s Bill of Rights.” This issue, said the head of the conservative Heritage Action for America, will “be at the forefront of every narrative, of every grassroots campaign, of every political expenditure going forward.”

To hear this from a member of Congress is the equivalent of candidates for your local city council arguing over who has the better approach to containing North Korea’s nuclear ambitions. It’s just not something they have authority over. But it will be inescapable.

For Republicans, it’s the new Willie Horton, or Hillary Clinton’s emails, or Benghazi. https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2021/11/04/republicans-education-issue-demagogue/

The DAILY GRILL

I got the COVID-19 vaccine today! My wing is feeling a little sore, but it'll give my body an extra protective boost that keeps me and others healthy. — Big Bird @BigBird

VERSUS

Government propaganda…for your 5 year old! — Ted Cruz @tedcruz

 

Midway through Trump’s term, Mitch McConnell released a new version of his autobiography, which described his rise in the Senate in heroic terms. The book opened with a new glowing foreword penned by Trump, who lavished praise on McConnell as his “ace in the hole” and wrote that he “couldn’t have asked for a better partner.” https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2021/11/08/mitch-mcconnell-trump-impeachment-insurrection-senate/

VERSUS

Except Trump never actually wrote those words — at least according to the ex-president, who now mocks McConnell’s role in pursuing his agenda. In an interview with The Post, Trump said McConnell actually wrote that foreword and simply used the president’s name on the passage. Trump said he told McConnell, “Why don’t you write it for me and I’ll put it in, Mitch? Because that’s the way life works.” https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2021/11/08/mitch-mcconnell-trump-impeachment-insurrection-senate/

 

Donald Trump put out with a statement ripping Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) for supporting the bipartisan infrastructure bill while claiming he could have gotten a $2 trillion dollar infrastructure bill if not for McConnell’s opposition. https://twitter.com/realLizUSA/status/1458205303888130054

VERSUS

It was actually Trump who killed an infrastructure bill in 2019 in order to spite Democrats. https://www.cnbc.com/2019/05/22/trump-hosts-democratic-leaders-at-white-house-infrastructure-talks.html