Democracy Now!

The U.S. Supreme Court on Thursday struck down a century-old New York state law that limited who can carry concealed weapons in public, with Justice Clarence Thomas writing for the 6-3 majority that the statute violated the Second Amendment’s right to bear arms. The ruling vastly expands gun rights in the U.S. just weeks after mass shootings in Buffalo, New York, and Uvalde, Texas, and represents “a revolution in Second Amendment law,” says Slate senior writer Mark Joseph Stern. “It declares that any restriction on the right to self-defense is presumptively unconstitutional.” In light of the Supreme Court decision, a bipartisan gun violence bill passed by the Senate is “one step forward, two steps back.” Stern also discusses a separate ruling in which the court’s conservative majority said a person who is arrested and not told of their right to remain silent cannot subsequently sue police for violating their Fifth Amendment rights against self-incrimination — even if statements they give are ultimately used against them at trial. The decision could be setting the stage for the court to overturn the 1966 Miranda v. Arizona precedent altogether, Stern warns.

Senate Approves Bipartisan Gun Safety Bill by 65-33 Vote, Supreme Court Strikes Down New York Gun Control Law in Major Expansion of Second Amendment, Trump Pushed DOJ to Seize Voting Machines & Declare Election Results “Corrupt”, Six Republican Congressmembers Who Backed Trump’s Election Lies Sought Pardons, Ukraine Orders Troops to Withdraw from Severodonetsk, Russia Meets with Other BRICS Nations at Virtual Meeting, Afghan Earthquake Death Toll Rises to 1,150; U.S. Urged to Unfreeze Afghan Assets, United Nations Blames Israel for Fatally Shooting Journalist Shireen Abu Akleh, Indigenous Protesters Attempt to Storm National Assembly in Ecuador, Deposed Burmese Leader Aung San Suu Kyi Moved to Solitary Confinement, Supreme Court Protects Police from Lawsuits over Violating Miranda Rights, California Lawmakers Move to Make State a “Legal Sanctuary for Reproductive Choice”, Biden Proposes Expanding Title IX to Protect Trans Students, Report: New England Patriots Plane Used for ICE Deportation Flights

Hundreds of public health and civil society organizations have denounced the World Trade Organization for approving a text last week that they say leaves in place intellectual property barriers that will continue to limit global access to COVID-19 vaccines, tests and treatments. We host an in-depth discussion about the WTO’s move, and what should come next, with two global health justice advocates, Mihir Mankad and Fatima Hassan. Mankad, who attended the WTO meeting and is a senior adviser for global health advocacy and policy for Doctors Without Borders, says the agreement “may ultimately cause more damage than good.” Hassan, founder and director of Health Justice Initiative in South Africa, believes Global South countries were “bullied into silence” by richer countries during the WTO negotiations.

We speak with food systems experts Sofía Monsalve Suárez and Rachel Bezner Kerr about how to prevent a looming global food shortage. The global food crisis “is not a food shortage crisis” yet, says Suárez, secretary general of FIAN International, a human rights organization working for the right to food and nutrition. “The problem is access to food, that people don’t have money to pay for food, that people are jobless.” Both guests call for a fundamental “transformation” of the global food system, away from food trade systems and instead toward domestic production and food sovereignty.

Experts are warning of a pending global food shortage due to the climate crisis, blocked grain shipments amid the Ukraine war, and a lack of humanitarian aid. Joining us from Mogadishu, Somalia, Jan Egeland, secretary general of the Norwegian Refugee Council, says poorer countries in Africa aren’t able to financially compete with richer countries to afford basic staples like wheat. Egeland calls on G7 countries to take immediate action to prevent a global famine — which he believes is still stoppable.

A massive 5.9-magnitude earthquake that struck southeastern Afghanistan early Wednesday has killed more than 1,000 people, according to local officials, though the death toll is expected to rise. The earthquake comes as the United Nations reports nearly half of Afghanistan’s population already faces acute hunger. Thousands more have been injured and lost their homes along with everything they own. “Many more will be dead, and we are now rushing with aid,” says Jan Egeland, secretary general of the Norwegian Refugee Council. He says he agrees with the Taliban government that U.S. sanctions on Afghanistan are making it more difficult for aid organizations like his to supply critical resources to Afghans.

Earthquake Death Toll in Afghanistan Tops 1,000; Heavy Rain & Sanctions Hamper Relief Efforts, House Jan. 6 Panel Moves Hearings to July Following Flood of New Evidence, Justice Department Subpoenas Chair of Georgia GOP over Fake Elector Plot, Uvalde School Police Head Placed on Leave as Local & State Officials Blame Each Other for Mistakes, Ukraine Warns Battles in Luhansk Cities Entering “Fearsome Climax”, Critics Says Biden Push to Suspend Gas Tax Will Aid Oil Companies, Not Consumers, Saudi Arabia and Turkey Move to Mend Ties Four Years After Khashoggi Assassination, Elizabeth Warren Blasts Fed Chair Jerome Powell on Hiking Interest Rates, Minnesota City to Pay $3.25 Million Settlement with Daunte Wright’s Family, Three Men Held at Rikers Island Jail Die in Less Than a Week, Federal Court Upholds Arkansas Anti-BDS Law, Head of Australian Journalism Prize Denounces U.K. Approval of Julian Assange’s Extradition

In some of the most dramatic testimony from the fourth hearing of the House Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the U.S. Capitol, Shaye Moss, a Black election worker in Georgia, and her mother Ruby Freeman described how their lives were forever changed in December of 2020 when Trump’s top campaign lawyer Rudy Giuliani claimed they manipulated ballots to rig the election outcome in the state, which was among those he had lost. They faced severe harassment, racism and death threats from Trump supporters and had to be relocated by the FBI for safety. “I don’t want anyone knowing my name. … I don’t want to go anywhere. I second-guess everything that I do,” said Moss, who, like her former colleagues, is no longer an election worker in Fulton County. “Do you know how it feels to have the president of the United States to target you?” said Freeman in taped testimony. “The president of the United States is supposed to represent every American — not to target one.”

Tuesday’s hearing of the House committee investigating the January 6 attack included evidence of how then-President Trump and his campaign “were directly involved” in a plot to replace Biden electors with fake electors for Trump in states where he had lost. Investigators displayed fake certifications manufactured by the Trump campaign and said that one group of fake electors even asked for a promise that the campaign would pay their legal fees if they got sued or charged with a crime. The committee also revealed that just minutes before the joint session on January 6, a staffer for Wisconsin Senator Ron Johnson told Mike Pence he wished to hand deliver to the vice president the fake electors’ votes from Michigan and Wisconsin — which Pence’s aide unambiguously refused. We feature a video presented to the January 6 committee as evidence that features Casey Lucier, an investigative counsel, describing the plan to organize fake electors for Trump in states where he had lost, with testimony of former Trump staffers, lawyers and other Republican officials.

The House select committee investigating the January 6 insurrection held its fourth public hearing Tuesday with testimony that included a series of Republican state officials detailing pressure they faced from President Donald Trump and his staff to overturn the results of the 2020 election. Republican Speaker of the Arizona House “Rusty” Bowers described how he was pushed by Trump, John Eastman and Rudy Giuliani to call the Arizona Legislature back into session to investigate what Trump’s team claimed were hundreds of thousands of illegal votes cast by dead people and undocumented immigrants in a greater effort to undo Joe Biden’s win in the state. Bowers refused after Trump’s team wasn’t able to provide evidence of a rigged election — and consequently Bowers and his family became the target of death threats by white supremacist groups and other Trump supporters. “I didn’t want to be used as a pawn,” said Bowers during his live testimony.

Earthquake in Afghanistan Kills at Least 1,000; Over 1,500 Injured, Jan. 6 Committee Accuses Trump of Pressuring State and Local Officials to Overturn Election, Russia Seizes More Areas in Eastern Ukraine, On Visit to Ukraine, Merrick Garland Vows to Probe War Crimes Allegations, I Have “Zero Trust” in U.S. Government: Wife of Brittney Griner, Basketball Star Detained in Russia, Senate Votes to Advance New Bipartisan Gun Legislation, Texas Official: Police Response to Uvalde School Shooting Was “Abject Failure”, Alabama: Katie Britt Defeats Mo Brooks in Republican Senate Primary, Recount Shows Henry Cuellar Beat Jessica Cisneros by Less Than 300 Votes, Supreme Court Says Religious Schools in Maine Can’t Be Excluded from Voucher Program, Coffin Holding Patrice Lumumba’s Tooth Returns to DRC Six Decades After Assassination, Indigenous-Led Protest in Ecuador Condemns Lasso’s Economic Policies, El Salvador Votes to Extend State of Emergency; 40,000 Arrested So Far, Third Suspect Arrested in Brazil in Murder of Dom Phillips and Bruno Pereira, Jury Orders Bill Cosby to Pay $500K for Sexually Assaulting 16-Year-Old in 1975

Colombian President-elect Gustavo Petro spoke to Democracy Now! in 2018 about his vision for the country after he placed second in the presidential election, losing to right-wing politician Iván Duque. Petro is a former M-19 guerrilla and the former mayor of Bogotá. “A new progressivism is emerging,” explained Petro. On Sunday, he succeeded in his new attempt at the presidency, becoming the first leftist president in Colombia, long a conservative stronghold in Latin America. He has vowed to fight worsening climate change, poverty and inequality in Colombia by raising taxes on the rich and expanding social programs, as well as access to education and healthcare.

Following the historic victory in Colombia’s presidential election of former guerrilla member, former senator and former mayor of Bogotá Gustavo Petro and his running mate, the Afro-Colombian environmentalist Francia Márquez Mina, we feature interviews with each of the candidates on Democracy Now! Francia Márquez Mina is set to become Colombia’s first Black vice president. We spoke to her in March, when she was running for president. She later lost in the primary to Petro, who went on to choose her as his running mate. “We are giving impetus to the idea that in Colombia a new form of government is possible, governance that is built up from the Black, Indigenous and peasant peoples from the very different sectors of the community, LGBTIQ+, from the youth, from the women, from the small farmers of Colombia, those who have been no one — that is to say, who have never had a voice in the government,” says Márquez Mina.

Colombia made history Sunday as voters elected former guerrilla member Gustavo Petro as the country’s first leftist president and environmental activist Francia Márquez Mina as the country’s first Black vice president. The pair, gaining over 50% of the vote, defeated right-wing real estate millionaire Rodolfo Hernández but will now face a major challenge to pass legislation in the conservative Congress, where they lack a majority. “The hurdle has been overcome by winning the election, but the main hurdle, the establishment, cannot be changed by the government; it has to be changed from the people, by the people,” says Manuel Rozental, Colombian physician, activist and grassroots organizer. We also speak with Colombia-based journalist Simone Bruno, who says Petro’s election could transform the politics and economy of Latin America.

Gustavo Petro & Francia Márquez Mina Win Colombian Election in Historic Vote, Macron’s Party Loses Majority in Parliament as Left & Far-Right Parties Gain Seats, Russia Moves Closer to Seizing Severodonetsk in Eastern Ukraine, Ukraine Attacks Oil & Gas Platforms Off Coast of Crimea, Russia Says Captured U.S. Veterans Are Not Protected by Geneva Conventions, Russian Journalist Dmitry Muratov Auctions Off Nobel Prize for Ukrainian Child Refugees, Israeli PM Bennett to Resign & Dissolve Parliament, NYT Probe: Al Jazeera’s Shireen Abu Akleh “Most Likely” Shot Dead by Elite Israeli Soldier, Millions Displaced, Over 116 Dead in Flooding in India and Bangladesh, Heat Records Broken Across Globe, from Iran to Spain to the Midwest, Witnesses Say at Least 200 Killed in Ethiopian Massacre, Honduras: Former U.S.-Trained Military Officer Sentenced for Murder of Berta Cáceres, New Surveillance Video Raises Questions About Police Response to Uvalde School Massacre, FDA & CDC Approve COVID-19 Vaccines for Children Under 5, Jan. 6 Committee to Look at How Trump Pressured State Officials to Overturn Election, Adam Kinzinger, Republican on Jan. 6 Committee, Receives Death Threat, In Campaign Ad, Missouri’s Ex-Governor Calls for Moderate Republicans to Be Hunted and Shot, Texas GOP Approves Platform Rejecting 2020 Election Results, Apple Workers in Maryland Vote to Unionize, Thousands Gather in D.C. for Mass Poor People’s and Low-Wage Workers’ Rally

In the final part of our Juneteenth special broadcast, we look at Harvard University’s recent report detailing the school’s extensive ties to slavery and pledged $100 million for a fund for scholars to continue to research the topic. The report documents dozens of prominent people associated with Harvard who enslaved people, including four Harvard presidents. Harvard commissioned the study in 2019 as part of a wave of schools reckoning with their pasts and the ongoing legacy of racial discrimination. “Harvard’s ties to slavery begin with the founding of the institution,” says MIT historian Craig Steven Wilder, author of “Ebony & Ivy: Race, Slavery, and the Troubled History of America’s Universities.” Wilder says that while this history is not new, Harvard worked for decades to erase its complicity in slavery. “We’re really only beginning to reconcile and to really struggle with the deep ties that this institution has to slavery,” he adds.

In March, the United Nations marked the International Day of Remembrance of the Victims of Slavery and the Transatlantic Slave Trade. Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Nikole Hannah-Jones, creator of The New York Times’s groundbreaking 1619 Project, addressed the U.N. General Assembly. As part of our Juneteenth special, we air her full address. “It is time for the nations that engaged in and profited from the transatlantic slave trade to do what is right and what is just. It is time for them to make reparations to the descendants of chattel slavery in the Americas,” Hannah-Jones said. “This is our global truth, a truth we as human beings understand with stark clarity: There can be no atonement if there is no repair.”

In a Juneteenth special, we mark the federal holiday that commemorates the day in 1865 when enslaved people in Galveston, Texas, learned of their freedom more than two years after the Emancipation Proclamation. We speak to the writer and poet Clint Smith about Juneteenth and his new book, “How the Word Is Passed: A Reckoning with the History of Slavery Across America.” “When I think of Juneteenth, part of what I think about is the both-handedness of it,” Smith says, “that it is this moment in which we mourn the fact that freedom was kept from hundreds of thousands of enslaved people for years and for months after it had been attained by them, and then, at the same time, celebrating the end of one of the most egregious things that this country has ever done.” Smith says he recognizes the federal holiday marking Juneteenth as a symbol, “but it is clearly not enough.”

We speak with Bishop William Barber and Reverend Liz Theoharis, co-chairs of the Poor People’s Campaign, about plans for Saturday’s Moral March on Washington and to the Polls to demand the government address key issues facing poor and low-income communities. The march will bring together thousands of people from diverse backgrounds to speak out against the country’s rising poverty rates, voter suppression in low-income communities and more. “To have this level of poverty that’s untalked about too often … is actually morally indefensible, constitutionally inconsistent, politically insensitive and economically insane,” says Barber. Theoharis says the lack of universal healthcare in the U.S. is a major source of economic insecurity and has contributed to the COVID-19 death toll. She asks how a rich country “that spends more money on healthcare than any other nation with a comparable economy still has [these] kind of poor health outcomes.”

During Thursday’s third public hearing of the House committee investigating the January 6 insurrection at the Capitol, Trump White House lawyer Eric Herschmann described in recorded testimony his call with John Eastman, the lawyer advising former President Trump on the plan to overturn the 2020 election. The call took place on January 7, one day after the deadly insurrection. “He started to ask me about something dealing with Georgia and preserving something potentially for appeal. And I said to him, 'Are you out of your F—ing mind?' Right? I said, 'I only want to hear two words coming out of your mouth from now on: orderly transition. … I don't want to hear any other F—ing words coming out of your mouth no matter what, other than orderly transition. Repeat those words to me,'” said Herschmann. Eastman later emailed Rudy Giuliani and requested that he be included on a list of potential recipients of a presidential pardon. Eastman's email stated, “I’ve decided that I should be on the pardon list if that is still in the works.”

We air highlights from the third public hearing of the House committee investigating the January 6 insurrection at the Capitol, which revealed that President Trump pressured Vice President Pence to overturn the 2020 election results even though he knew it was illegal. The hearing included testimony from Pence’s attorney, Greg Jacob, who said the plan’s main architect, attorney John Eastman, actively admitted his strategy violated the law, and yet continued anyway. Right-wing legal expert Michael Luttig advised Pence against following Trump’s orders, calling Trump and his supporters a “clear and present danger to American democracy.”

In a blow to press freedom, the United Kingdom has approved the extradition of WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange to the United States to face espionage charges related to the publication of classified documents exposing U.S. war crimes. Home Secretary Priti Patel signed off on the transfer after the U.K. Supreme Court denied Assange’s appeals earlier this year, part of a years-long legal battle that rights groups have decried as an attack on journalism and free speech. Assange faces up to 175 years in prison if convicted for violations of the Espionage Act, and his case represents a “once-in-a-lifetime fight for press freedom,” says Gabriel Shipton, Assange’s half-brother.

U.K. Home Secretary Approves Extradition of Julian Assange to U.S., House Jan. 6 Committee: Trump Knew His Plan to Overturn Election Was Illegal, People Over the Pentagon: Reps. Lee & Pocan Push for $100B Military Budget Cut, Ukraine Moves Closer to Joining European Union, Human Rights & Public Health Groups Blast WTO Deal on COVID Patents, Over 2,000 Cows Die in Kansas in Record-Breaking Heat Wave, Biden Declares Montana a Disaster Area After Yellowstone River Flooding, Study: Parts of Arctic Warming Seven Times Faster Than Rest of the Earth, Groups Sue Biden over Drilling Permits in New Mexico and Wyoming, Flooding Forces Abbott to Close Michigan Baby Formula Plant Again, Israel Shoots Three Palestinians Dead in Jenin Raid, Israeli Politician Says He Wishes He Could Get Rid of All Palestinians, Sister of Imprisoned Egyptian Activist Alaa Abd El-Fattah Launches Her Own Hunger Strike

We speak with Jennicet Gutiérrez, an organizer and co-executive director of Familia: Trans Queer Liberation Movement, who declined an invitation to attend the annual White House Pride Month celebration to protest the detention and deportation of LGBTQ immigrants and asylum seekers. At the U.S.-Mexico border, trans people in detention centers are reportedly being misgendered, denied access to essential healthcare, held in inhumane conditions or blocked altogether from entering the country due to the Trump-era Title 42. Roxsana Hernández Rodriguez, a trans asylum seeker from Honduras, died while in ICE custody. Regarding Biden’s recent executive orders to establish some protections against anti-LGBTQ discrimination, Gutiérrez says, “We cannot just applaud and say, 'Yes, you've done enough,’ when, no, that’s the least you can do.”

President Biden celebrated Pride Month at the White House Wednesday as events encouraging celebration of LGBTQ identity and visibility are increasingly being targeted by white supremacist violence and as Republican-controlled states pass a slew of anti-LGBTQ measures. We speak with Ari Drennen, LGBTQ program director for Media Matters, who says far-right social media influencers and conservative media outlets are spreading lies that members of the LGBTQ community “aim to confuse, corrupt or sexualize kids.” We also talk to Southern Poverty Law Center investigative reporter Michael Edison Hayden, who has studied the key players in recent attacks and describes a “concerted effort to ramp up this rhetoric tying LGBTQ people baselessly to pedophilia.”

The U.S. has announced another $1 billion in military equipment to Ukraine, adding to billions in military aid to Ukraine since the start of the Russian invasion. Support for a “military-first approach” to Ukraine is fueled by the mainstream media and not only undermines ceasefire talks but also funnels profits directly into the pockets of weapons manufacturers, says William Hartung of the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft. “The United States is a major player here, and its only policy shouldn’t be sending weapons without some sort of diplomatic strategy to go with it.”

Ukraine War, Food Crisis & Climate Emergency Push World Refugee Total Over 100 Million, Leaders of Germany, France and Italy Visit Ukraine, Xi Jinping Expresses Support for Russia’s “Sovereignty and Security”, U.S. Announces New $1 Billion Arms Package for Ukraine, Ukraine Accused of Shelling a Maternity Ward in Donetsk, Suspect in Brazil Admits to Killing Dom Phillips and Bruno Araújo Pereira, Jan. 6 Rioter Who Threatened Democrats Got Tour of Capitol a Day Earlier from GOP Lawmaker, Jan. 6 Hearing to Examine How Trump Pressured Pence to Overturn Election, Proud Boys Had Plan Named “1776 Returns” to Occupy Capitol Buildings, New Mexico’s Supreme Court Orders GOP-Led County Commission to Certify Primary Results, FDA Advisory Panel Recommends COVID-19 Vaccines for Young Children, Dr. Anthony Fauci Tests Positive for COVID-19, Activists Stage Die-In at WTO Summit Calling for TRIPS Waiver, Fed Issues Highest Interest Rate Hike Since 1994, Federal Hate Crime Charges Filed Against Buffalo Gunman, Street Outside Saudi Embassy in D.C. Is Renamed Jamal Khashoggi Way

President Biden’s formally announced plan to visit Saudi Arabia next month is a dramatic reversal of earlier promises to treat the Arab nation as a “pariah” in light of its repeated human rights violations. Calls are growing for Biden to hold the Saudi government accountable for the brutal murder and dismemberment of American resident and Washington Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi. But as he faces domestic anger over rising fuel prices, Biden seems to have declining leverage with one of the most oil-rich countries in the world and the top weapons client for the U.S. “The Biden administration has succumbed to the pressures of defense industries and the foreign government lobbyists to continue what are very profitable arms sales,” says Sarah Leah Whitson, executive director of Democracy for the Arab World Now, founded by Khashoggi.

President Biden addressed the economy and labor rights in an address Tuesday to the AFL-CIO convention as delegates elected Liz Shuler to become the AFL-CIO’s first female president and Fred Redmond to be its first African American secretary-treasurer. Longtime labor journalist Steven Greenhouse was there, and says the exclusion of organizers from Amazon and Starbucks from the convention disappointed those calling for the AFL-CIO and Democratic lawmakers to support the youth-led labor movement.

The 50th anniversary of the Watergate burglary in 1972 this Friday comes as public hearings are underway by the House committee investigating the January 6 Capitol insurrection. We speak with Garrett Graff, author of “Watergate: A New History,” about critical lessons and historical parallels between the defining controversies of the Nixon and Trump presidencies. Rather than isolated crimes, Watergate and January 6 should be seen as culminating events of U.S. presidencies that share a “dark, criminal, conspiratorial mindset that drives and links together so many of their scandals,” says Graff.

Republican Who Voted to Impeach Trump Defeated in GOP Primary in South Carolina, Backers of Trump’s Election Lies Win GOP Primaries in Nevada, Republican Mayra Flores Wins Special House Election in Texas, Jan. 6 Committee Appears Divided on Its Role in Making Criminal Referrals to DOJ, “Are You Out of Your F—ing Mind”: White House Lawyer’s Message to John Eastman on Jan. 7, 2021, Pope Francis Says Russia’s Invasion May Have Been “Provoked”, U.S. Admits It Is Not Pushing Ukraine to Hold Talks to End War, Report: Biden Officials Are Privately Concerned Russian Sanctions Are Backfiring, Biden to Visit Saudi Arabia in July Despite Campaign Vow to Make Kingdom a “Pariah”, Biden Urges Oil Companies to Produce More Gas as Price Reach New High, Federal Reserve Prepared to Hike Interest Rates as S&P Slump Continues, At AFL-CIO Meeting, Biden Blames GOP for Blocking His Plan to Fight Inflation, European Court of Human Rights Blocks U.K. from Sending Asylum Seekers to Rwanda, Indigenous Leader Arrested in Ecuador Amid Nationwide Strike, Brazil: Second Suspect Arrested in Case of Missing Journalist & Indigenous Expert, Anti-Sweatshop Activist & Researcher Charlie Kernaghan, 74, Dies

Monday’s January 6 committee hearing ended with closing statements from January 6 committee vice chair, Republican Liz Cheney and Democrat Zoe Lofgren describing how the Trump administration raised over $250 million from his supporters, off of the lie that the 2020 election results were fraudulent, for an election defense fund that didn’t exist.

The House Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack heard live testimony Monday from Al Schmidt, the sole Republican on the Philadelphia County Board of Elections in Pennsylvania, a key battleground state in the 2020 election. He described how he found no evidence of voter fraud in 2020, and said he and his family received death threats after Trump lashed out at him on Twitter for not halting the vote count due to false claims of fraud.

One of the key witnesses who testified live at Monday’s hearing of the House Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the U.S. Capitol was former Fox News political editor Chris Stirewalt, who led the the Fox News decision to become the first network to call Arizona for Joe Biden on election night in November 2020. Fox fired Stirewalt months later. Answering questions from Congressmember Zoe Lofgren, Stirewalt said Trump’s chance of winning was virtually zero. His comments were supported by Trump’s former Attorney General William Barr. The committee also heard testimony from Trump’s former campaign manager Bill Stepien, who said he had contradicted false election victory claims by Trump’s lawyer Rudy Giuliani, and was part of what he called “Team Normal.” Former Attorney General Barr told the committee about how he became “demoralized” after the 2020 election when he tried to counter allegations of voting fraud with then-President Trump.

We spend the hour featuring highlights from the second public hearing of the House Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol. Main witnesses were ex-President Donald Trump’s former inner circle, including campaign manager Bill Stepien, Attorney General William Barr, campaign adviser Jason Miller and his own daughter Ivanka Trump, who all said Trump ignored them on election night in November 2020 when they argued against declaring victory. They described how Trump instead turned to his lawyer Rudy Giuliani, who they said was drunk when he urged Trump to claim he’d won and say the election was being stolen.

Barr Says Trump Was “Detached from Reality” in Pushing Election Fraud Claims, “The Big Lie Was the Big Ripoff”: Jan. 6 Panel Accuses Trump of Ripping Off Donors, Supporters of Trump Coup Are on Ballot in Nevada and Other States Today, Study: 338,000 Lives Would Have Been Saved During Pandemic If U.S. Had Universal Healthcare System, Study Finds Ivermectin Not Effective at Treating COVID-19, U.K. Faces Outcry over Plan to Deport Asylum Seekers to Rwanda, Ukraine Seeks More Heavy Arms as Russia Moves to Solidify Rule in Eastern Ukraine, India Demolishes Homes of Muslim Activists, Arrests Hundreds Following Protests, Israel Is Suspected in Poisoning Deaths of Two Iranian Scientists, Over 100 Million Put Under Heat Advisories Amid Record-Breaking Heat Wave in U.S., Record Flooding Forces Closure of Yellowstone National Park, Nobel Peace Laureate Malala Yousafzai Warns Girls Impacted Most from Climate Crisis, Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine Signs Bill to Make It Easier for Teachers to Carry Guns, Supreme Court Makes It Harder for Jailed Immigrants to Challenge Their Detention, Police in Idaho Face Death Threats After Arresting White Supremacists Near Pride Event, Doctors Call on U.K. to Block Extradition of Julian Assange to U.S., Conflicting Reports Emerge from Brazil on Search for Missing Men

As the Summit of the Americas wrapped up in Los Angeles with President Biden announcing a plan to address migration in the Western Hemisphere that includes a series of so-called bold actions, we spend the hour with Democracy Now! co-host, professor, longtime journalist and author Juan González, who has just released the newly revised edition of his landmark 2000 book, “Harvest of Empire: A History of Latinos in America.” González’s best-seller has been expanded to include more contemporary Lantix history, such as U.S. immigration policy under Presidents Trump and Biden, the overpolicing of non-U.S. citizens and how it connects to a history of Western colonialism in the region. While European colonization caused Latin America to be “the incubator of the American empire,” the millennial immigration apparatus has become fixated on “kicking out Latin Americans, and no one is doing anything about it,” says González. He also examines the culture and history of Latinos and discusses the history of U.S. involvement and imperialism in countries like the Dominican Republic, where many of the immigrants here in New York City hail from, and the conditions of Guatemala’s Indigenous peoples under the brutal U.S.-backed government that drove many of them to leave their country and head north in search of safety.

Senators Reach Bipartisan Deal on Guns Without Ban on Assault Weapons, March for Our Lives: Protests Held in Hundreds of Cities Against Gun Violence, Amnesty Accuses Russia of Killing Hundreds of Civilians in Kharkiv, Russia Has Earned Nearly $100B in Fossil Fuel Exports Since War Began, SIPRI Warns Risk of Nuclear War Is Highest Since the Cold War, New Details Emerge of Ginni Thomas’s Support of Trump Coup, Bolivia: Jeanine Áñez Sentenced to 10 Years in Prison for 2019 Coup, Biden Unveils New Plan to Address Migration at Summit, Macron Fights to Keep Parliamentary Majority, Israel Bombs Damascus International Airport in Syria, Brazil: Two Bodies Found During Search for Dom Phillips & Bruno Pereira, China Begins Testing 5 Million in Beijing Following COVID Outbreak at Bar, FDA Announces Pfizer-BioNTech’s Vaccine Safe and Effective for Children Under 5, 31 Members of Neo-Nazi “Patriot Front” Arrested on Riot Charges in Idaho Near Pride Event, FDA Admits That Contaminated Formula May Have Killed Up to Nine Children, Larry Nassar Abuse Survivors Sue FBI for Delayed Action in Sexual Assault Allegations, Google to Pay $118 Million to Employees in Gender Discrimination Suit, Gen. John Allen, Subject of FBI Probe, Resigns as Brookings Institute President

The second witness who testified live in the first primetime hearing of the House select January 6 committee was Capitol Police officer Caroline Edwards, who suffered a traumatic brain injury as she tried to hold the line outside the Capitol with fellow officers. She was with officer Brian Sicknick, who she said appeared to have been sprayed in the face and was extremely pale. Sicknick died the next day. Sicknick’s fiancee sat behind Edwards as she testified. Edwards said the pro-Trump mob included Proud Boys leader Joseph Biggs, who is now facing federal seditious conspiracy charges. “What I saw was just a war scene. It was something like I’d seen out of the movies. I couldn’t believe my eyes. There were officers on the ground. You know, they were bleeding,” recalled Edwards. “I was slipping in people’s blood. … It was carnage. It was chaos.”

The white supremacist Proud Boys group and the far-right, anti-government Oath Keepers militia played an instrumental role in planning for a violent insurrection on the Capitol, according to the January 6 House committee, which aired new testimony from witnesses and the groups’ leaders in its first public hearing Thursday night. British filmmaker Nick Quested was embedded with the Proud Boys and shared his footage with the committee. As the first of two live witnesses, he said he was “confused” when “a couple of hundred of Proud Boys were marching toward the Capitol.”

The January 6 committee released new footage Thursday night showing a detailed timeline of the day of the insurrection. We feature the video they played that shows how Proud Boys and Oath Keepers marched from the National Mall — where Donald Trump delivered a speech pressuring Mike Pence to recertify the election results to deliver him a victory — to the Capitol Building to chants of “Hang Mike Pence,” before they violently pushed through police barriers and broke into the government building chanting “Nancy.”

Donald Trump “engaged in a massive effort to spread false and fraudulent information to convince huge portions of the U.S. population that fraud had stolen the election from him,” Congressmember Liz Cheney, vice chair of the House select committee investigating the January 6 attack, said during Thursday’s primetime hearing. “This was not true.” We air excerpts from her presentation, which included a new video of Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner dismissing concerns about the campaign to overturn the 2020 election as mere “whining.”

The House committee investigating the January 6 insurrection held its first public hearing Thursday night, televised in primetime by all major networks except Fox News. We spend the hour featuring excerpts from the hearing, starting with Committee Chair Bennie Thompson’s opening statement, in which he argued January 6 was the “culmination of an attempted coup” by Donald Trump, comparing the insurrection to the ransacking of Washington, D.C., by British forces more than two centuries ago.

House Jan. 6 Committee Says Trump Was at Center of Attempted Coup, Michigan GOP Gubernatorial Candidate Ryan Kelley Arrested over Jan. 6 Riot, Maryland Gunman Who Killed 3 Arrested After Shootout with Police, Ukraine Asks Allies for Rapid Delivery of Heavy Weapons as Fight Rages in East, Blood Found in Boat Tied to Disappearance of Dom Phillips and Bruno Pereira in Brazil, U.S. Secretary of State Dismisses Evidence Israel Killed Shireen Abu Akleh, U.S. Pentagon Chief Lloyd Austin Meets Chinese Counterpart , Iran Has Begun Removing Nuclear Site Surveillance Cameras, Warns U.N., Michigan Police Officer Charged with Murdering Patrick Lyoya, Justice Dept. to Probe Civil Rights Abuses by Louisiana State Police, Abbott Was Alerted to Formula Plant Problems in February 2021, Massachusetts to Allow Undocumented People to Apply for Driver’s Licenses , Uvalde Police Chief Defends Officers’ Actions Amid Delayed Response to School Massacre

The House committee investigating Donald Trump’s attempt to overturn the 2020 election and the deadly January 6 insurrection at the Capitol holds its first public hearing Thursday night in primetime, as five members of the far-right Proud Boys are indicted for seditious conspiracy. “These hearings will provide voters with a choice between those who will want to continue to defend free and fair elections and those who want to take away the will of the people,” says Kristen Doerer, managing editor of Right Wing Watch, who previews what to expect.

The House of Representatives on Wednesday approved new gun control measures, including raising the minimum age for the purchase of most semiautomatic rifles to 21 and banning high-capacity magazines. The new rules passed the House in a 223-204 vote, but are doomed in the Senate, where a bipartisan group is working on passing a much more limited set of reforms. The vote took place after a House committee heard harrowing testimony from people affected by recent gun violence, including an 11-year-old survivor of the Uvalde school massacre who watched her classmates get killed. “I grabbed a little blood, and I put it all over me’,” Miah Cerrillo told lawmakers in her testimony. “And then I grabbed my teacher’s phone and called 911.” We feature excerpts of Cerrillo’s testimony, along with the parents of 10-year-old victim Lexi Rubio and Dr. Roy Guerrero, Uvalde’s only pediatrician.

The United Nations is demanding an independent investigation into charges of rape and sexual assault committed by Russian soldiers in Ukraine since the start of the invasion. We speak with Pramila Patten, the U.N.’s special representative on sexual violence in conflict, who is just back from Ukraine and told the Security Council Monday about multiple shocking reports of rape and assault — all of which Russia has since denied. “We are dealing with a crime which is chronically underreported,” says Patten, who emphasized the need to establish safe spaces for victims to come forward and ensure no perpetrators be granted amnesty through a potential ceasefire or peace agreement. We also speak with Oksana Pokalchuk, executive director of Amnesty International Ukraine, whose organization is investigating the alleged war crimes.

House Approves Limited Gun Law Reforms, Mass Shooting Survivors Testify to Congress, Police Arrest Man for Allegedly Plotting to Kidnap or Kill Justice Brett Kavanaugh, House Jan. 6 Committee to Hold Primetime Public Hearing, Ukrainian Troops Hold Out in Severodonetsk Industrial Zone, Ukraine Brings Chernobyl Radiation Monitors Back Online, As Global Food Crisis Worsens, Russia and Turkey Discuss Grain Export Corridor, Sanctions Could Shrink Russian Economy by 15% This Year, Biden Admin Secures 10 Million Doses of Pediatric COVID-19 Vaccine, FDA Panel Recommends Emergency Use of Novavax COVID-19 Vaccine, Donald Trump, Ivanka and Don Jr. to Be Questioned Under Oath in New York Fraud Probe, Man Being Given Lethal Injection Has to Direct Execution Team on How to Find a Vein, Workers Attempt to Organize First-Ever Union at Trader Joe’s, Belgian King Voices “Deepest Regrets” for Atrocities in DRC, Does Not Apologize

British journalist Dom Phillips and Indigenous expert Bruno Pereira have still not been found, after being reported missing Sunday in one of Brazil’s most remote areas of the Amazon. The pair were traveling across the region to interview Indigenous leaders patrolling the area for illegal miners and fishers for Phillips’s upcoming book. “We know that they had been receiving threats. We know that there are other people who are being threatened in this territory,” says Ana Alfinito, Brazil legal adviser for Amazon Watch. Alfinito also explains how Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro has systematically destroyed protections for Indigenous groups across the Amazon.

The Biden administration has denied members of an Indigenous delegation from the Amazon rainforest entry at this week’s U.S.-hosted Summit of the Americas. Meanwhile, President Biden agreed to meet with Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro, who told Biden he would only attend the conference if he was guaranteed immunity from criticism on his systematic destruction of the Amazon rainforest, among other policies. We speak with one of the delegation’s members, Domingo Peas, an Achuar leader from Ecuador and territories coordinator for the Amazon Sacred Headwaters Initiative for the Confederation of Indigenous Nationalities of the Ecuadorian Amazon. “We cannot continue to destroy the forest and expect to survive. So we call on President Bolsonaro, we call on President Lasso, to act on behalf of future generations with courage, with their heart, and to stop expansion of disruptive economies, and to really embrace fully a new path forward that’s for the benefit of all life,” says Peas.