'This will be a stain on our country not so easily washed away,' the Senate minority leader, Chuck Schumer, said on the Senate floor after it reconvened to finish certifying Joe Biden's election victory after a six-hour delay.Schumer further called for the 'goons' and 'thugs' and 'domestic terrorists' who stormed the Capitol today to be 'prosecuted to the full extent of the law'.
Social media users lambaste president and compare police treatment of racial justice protesters with response to mobMany Americans and people around the world watched in horror as a mob of Donald Trump supporters rushed the US Capitol in Washington DC on Wednesday afternoon, wreaking fear and chaos with seemingly little resistance from police on Capitol Hill.The events inside the building quickly unfolded on social media as tweets poured out from concerned members of Congress and images of the insurgents inside the Capitol went viral. Continue reading...
Some congressmembers are calling for Trump, who directed supporters toward the Capitol, to be impeachedThe riots at the US Capitol shocked many in the US and around the world, but for some, the violent scenes in Washington are simply the natural culmination of Donald Trump’s baseless claims of voter fraud and repeated stoking of division in the US. Continue reading...
Building that was set on fire by British troops in 1814 has also seen bombings and a presidential assassination attemptThe US Capitol has been the scene of bombings, a presidential assassination attempt and countless demonstrations in its more than 200-year-old history.For the first time on Wednesday, it was the site of an armed insurrection incited by the sitting president. Continue reading...
A mob of Trump supporters invaded the Capitol after mass demonstrations in the nation’s capital. They breached security, took over the rotunda and House chamber, and disrupted the vote certification for Joe Biden
Protesters swarmed the Capitol on Wednesday, putting it on lockdown, as Mike Pence rebuffed Donald Trump's demand to overturn his loss to Democrat Joe Biden and the Senate's Republican leader denounced a bid in Congress to undo the election outcome.Trump supporters overturned barriers and clashed with police on the US Capitol grounds and streamed inside the building. The demonstrations flared as lawmakers met inside to formally certify Biden's victory over Trump in November's election. Law enforcement authorities struggled to maintain order.Biden won the election by 306-232 in the electoral college and by more than 7m ballots in the national popular vote, but Trump continues to falsely claim there was widespread fraud and that he was the victor
Garland, 68, was the supreme court nominee of Barack Obama who was memorably blocked by RepublicansJoe Biden will nominate the federal appeals judge Merrick Garland to be the next US attorney general, a transition official for the president-elect said on Wednesday, a choice most Americans know as the supreme court nominee of Barack Obama who was memorably blocked by Republicans.Garland, 68, serves as a judge on the US court of appeals for the District of Columbia circuit. Obama, a Democrat, nominated him to the supreme court in 2016 while Biden was vice-president, but the Republican-controlled US Senate refused to hold hearings on the nomination. Continue reading...
Competition and Markets Authority examining deal to buy UK-based chip firmBritain’s competition watchdog has launched an investigation into the $40bn (£29.5bn) takeover of the UK-based chip designer Arm by the US company Nvidia.The Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) has called for interested parties to submit views on the contentious deal before the launch of a formal investigation later this year. Continue reading...
China is criminalising political moderates, in defiance of their overwhelming victory in direct electionsThe arrest of 53 activists in Hong Kong on national security charges represents the purge of an entire generation of politicians. Police also demanded documents from three news organisations and for the first time arrested a foreign citizen – the US human rights lawyer John Clancey – on national security charges. These moves represent an assault on civil society the aim of which appears to be the destruction of the system that nurtured the type of political engagement that brought nearly 2 million people – almost a quarter of the population – out on to the streets in 2019.Related: China 'misled world' on Hong Kong security law, says Dominic Raab Continue reading...
Yolanda Coar was 40 when she died of Covid-19 in August this year in Augusta, Georgia. She was also a nurse manager, and one of nearly 3,000 frontline healthcare workers who have died in the US fighting this virus, according to an exclusive investigation by the Guardian and Kaiser Health News.The Guardian has profiled hundreds of healthcare workers in a year-long project. Read their stories here Continue reading...
The Democratic candidate has given a speech thanking the people of Georgia for electing him to the US Senate before the final tally is formally announced.In his speech, Jon Ossoff asked the country to unite to beat the coronavirus pandemic and said he would fight both for people who voted for him and those who did not in the second of two runoff elections in Georgia
With protests planned in Washington DC over the ratification of Joe Biden’s victory in the presidential election, and some Republicans planning to object, we’d like to hear from those in the US about how they feel about today’s eventsThe confirmation of the presidential election result in Congress is traditionally a rubber stamp exercise, but Donald Trump has portrayed it as an opportunity to stop an election he baselessly claims is fraudulent.With Trump encouraging demonstrations on the streets of Washington, and pressing vice-president Mike Pence to use his ceremonial role to prevent the confirmation of Biden as president, this year’s Congressional confirmation is anything but perfunctory. Unusually, a handful of Republican politicians are set to object to the ratification of the presidential election result. Continue reading...
In the minds of many Georgia swing voters, the Trump-dominated Republican party is a threat to the nationIt appears, at the moment I’m writing this, that Democratic candidates have won both of the US Senate races in Georgia, with the Rev Raphael Warnock and Jon Ossoff defeating the Republican incumbents Kelly Loeffler and David Perdue. If these results are confirmed, the incoming US Senate will be split 50-50 between the two parties but Democrats will hold de facto control, with Vice President-elect Kamala Harris serving as the tie-breaking vote. This further will mean that the Republican party under Donald Trump lost control of the House of Representatives in 2018, the White House in 2020 and the Senate in 2021 – a trifecta of defeat that may finally convince the party of the need to liberate itself from Trump’s malign domination.Related: Congress is facing an election reckoning. Democracy hangs in the balance | Lloyd Green Continue reading...
Decision not to charge officer for shooting Blake seven times in the back sparked anger in Wisconsin although the march was peacefulProtesters marched in Kenosha, Wisconsin, on Tuesday night to express outrage over the decision not to charge a white police officer for shooting a Black man, Jacob Blake, in the back from close range last summer, in an incident that sparked a fierce uprising.The rally on Tuesday followed an announcement by prosecutors that the officer, Rusten Sheskey, would not face charges despite shooting Jacob Blake seven times in the back in August. Blake survived the shooting but has been left paralyzed from the waist down. Sheskey has said he acted in self-defense as he feared Blake would stab him with a knife he was carrying. Continue reading...
Whatever you think about the Philadelphia Eagles conceding a meaningless game for draft position, the pearl-clutching it has aroused is far more cringeworthyIf anyone spots my eyeballs, grab them for me. I do believe they rolled out of my skull on Monday when first-year New York Giants head coach Joe Judge accused the Philadelphia Eagles of “disrespect” for the game of football for effectively tanking in their regular-season finale against Washington on Sunday night.After banging on for several minutes about the additional sacrifices made by players and coaches during a pandemic-racked season, Judge brought it home with an oblique reference to his Philadelphia counterpart Doug Pederson, the Super Bowl-winning coach whose apparent willingness to concede a game that was meaningless to his team had the effect of eliminating the slightly-less-woeful Giants from playoff contention. Continue reading...
As a procedural certification has become a coup attempt, Trump and his allies have done lasting harmDemocracy in the US teeters on the edge of a figurative sword. On Wednesday, the US Congress will convene to formally receive the outcome of the 2020 presidential election. Unfortunately, Donald Trump and his allies have converted a legal formality into a blatant coup attempt.The ex-reality television host is like none who have come before him. Presidents Hoover, Carter and Bush Sr all suffered rejection at the ballot box after just one term. However painful, they accepted the electorate’s verdict. In the end, personal pride took a backseat to the orderly transition of power. The nation had spoken. Continue reading...
by Timothy Colman, Pascal Emmer, Andrea Ritchie and T on (#5CF9S)
People of color and immigrants who bear the brunt of Covid-19 are also subject to the most punitive enforcement of public health ordersCovid-19’s spread is neither colorblind nor colorless, sending Black, Latinx and Indigenous people to the hospital at a rate four times higher than white people. To make matters worse, the people of color and immigrant communities who already bear the brunt of the Covid-19 outbreak are also subject to the most punitive enforcement of emergency public health orders. The co-occurring pandemics of Covid-19 and state violence are deeply interconnected.The Covid-19 Policing Project launched in May 2020 to monitor how cities, states, territories and tribal jurisdictions police the pandemic. As we watched cops drag a Black man off a bus in Philadelphia, put a Black man in a chokehold, and throw a Black mother to the ground in New York City in front of her toddler, all in the name of promoting health and safety, we asked ourselves: if this is the floor for treatment during unprecedented health, economic and state violence crises, then what is the ceiling? Continue reading...
Democrats have won one of the two Senate races in Georgia that will determine which party controls Congress’s upper chamber, with the second too close to call. Plus, the officer who shot Jacob Blake will not be chargedGood morning.Democrat Raphael Warnock has beaten the incumbent Republican senator Kelly Loeffler in Georgia’s critical Senate races. In doing so, he has become the first Black senator for Georgia and taken the Democrats a step closer to controlling the Senate. Current results also put Jon Ossoff marginally ahead of the Republican candidate David Perdue in a race that is too close to call. If Democrats win both seats, the Senate will be split 50/50, giving Kamala Harris as vice-president the tie-breaking vote. Continue reading...
New documentary is a portrait of a man whose unwillingness to speak out on race may be a form of self-protectionThe black Mercedes sedan had two blown tires when police found it idling with its brake lights bright and blinker flashing on the side of an empty six-lane road at 2am. When police happened upon the scene, the man at the wheel was asleep. To hear him slur his words as officers asked where he was going and where he had been, he might well have been somewhere on the fifth planet from the sun and not in the bedroom community that is Jupiter, Florida. And when he added that, no, he had not been drinking, an officer couldn’t help but wonder, “Are you sure?”Things only got worse once the man – zonked out on prescription drugs, as it happened – staggered his 6ft frame out of the car and on to the cool blacktop, a rippling vision of Florida Man chic in long sleeves, shorts and bare feet. He couldn’t keep his hand down tracking a light beam, couldn’t heel-toe a straight line, couldn’t recite the alphabet because he thought he was being asked “to sing the national anthem backwards.” When the officer asked if he had anything prickly on his person, the man, after an initial denial, confessed to “a few screws in the body” – mementoes from surgeries on his left knee and back. The entire incident goes down in about 20 minutes, maybe less. And as police cam B-roll goes, bless, it’s fairly G-rated. It’s only after the mind races to connect it to the more grisly police videos that have filled our timelines over the past six or so years, and this summer in particular, does this clip from Jupiter leave you breathless. That’s when you realize that, really, could have been the last we ever saw of Tiger Woods. Continue reading...
Shortly after midnight, Rev Raphael Warnock delivered a message of hope to Georgians and declared his win in the Senate runoff election: 'Whether you voted for me or not – know this: I see you. I hear you. And I will fight for you.' He beat Republican incumbent Kelly Loeffler, a Trump loyalist. This is the first time for 24 years that a Democrat will represent Georgia in the Senate
Democrat Raphael Warnock secures historic victory as outstanding Senate race draws to a closeVoters in the state of Georgia returned to the polls on Tuesday to cast their ballots in two runoff elections that will determine control of the US Senate. The results will significantly affect the extent to which President-elect Joe Biden will be able implement his agenda. Continue reading...
Congress is set to certify the 2020 election results – but the process is expected to be interrupted by unfounded objectionsCongress is set to certify the results of the 2020 presidential election on Wednesday, but the process is expected to be interrupted by unfounded objections by Republicans trying to curry favor with Donald Trump and the base of voters that support him.Related: Trump makes false claim Pence has power to alter election result Continue reading...
Normally, Congress simply receives results from states and announces them to the US – but this year may include some twistsA joint session of Congress is scheduled to begin meeting on Wednesday at 1pm to finally certify Joe Biden as the winner of the 2020 presidential election.Never in the modern political history of the United States have these proceedings been notable. For 150 years, Congress has acted in accordance with the constitution and the 1887 Electoral Count Act to simply receive election results from the states and announce them to the nation. It usually takes a couple hours on a weekday, and does not make many headlines. Continue reading...
by Tom Phillips Latin America correspondent on (#5CEZF)
Human Rights Watch describes crimes including rape, kidnapping, extortion but Biden team warns change may not be immediateThe incoming US president, Joe Biden, has been urged to scrap a “devastating” migration program that activists say has exposed tens of thousands of asylum seekers – many of them children – to violence, abduction and rape in some of the world’s most dangerous cities.The Trump administration created the “Remain in Mexico” program in January 2019 in an effort to deter asylum seekers trying to enter the US through is southern border. Continue reading...
by David Smith in Dalton, Georgia, and Peter Beaumont on (#5CDFR)
President urges vice-president to subvert democracy while Washington DC prepares for protests planned by Trump supportersDonald Trump is intensifying pressure on Mike Pence to subvert democracy and overturn the election result when Congress meets on Wednesday to affirm Joe Biden’s victory, even as sources close to the vice-president indicate he will not interfere in the certification.The president has been hyping the congressional tally of electoral college votes as a dramatic last stand and urged supporters to stage “wild” street demonstrations in Washington. In reality, Biden’s win is a foregone conclusion and the vice-president’s ceremonial role as presiding officer has been likened to an awards host opening envelopes. Continue reading...
US prosecutors have cleared white police officer Rusten Sheskey in the shooting of 29-year-old Black man Jacob Blake in Kenosha, Wisconsin. ’It is my decision now … that no Kenosha law enforcement officer in this case will be charged with any criminal offence,’ said Michael Graveley, the Kenosha county district attorney. Sheskey shot Blake seven times in the back, leaving him paralysed. B’Ivory Lamarr, a lawyer for the Blake family, said the decision shows there are ‘three justice systems’ in America: ‘One for black and brown people, one for police officers and one for the rest of America.’ Lamarr said the fight for justice will continue: ‘We won’t stop until there is actually truly one nation under God with justice and liberty for us all.’
Prosecutor says white officer who shot Blake several times in the back would not be charged due to Wisconsin self-defense lawA Wisconsin prosecutor announced Tuesday that he will not bring criminal charges against the white police officer who shot Jacob Blake in the back from close range last August, which left the Black Kenosha father paralyzed from the waist down.Michael Gravely, Kenosha county district attorney, said during a press conference that his office determined that the officer, Rusten Sheskey, would not be charged based on the state’s law relating to self-defense. Continue reading...
Newly unsealed court documents show FBI use GPS and data use to narrow her whereabouts to an area measuring about 1 sq mileGhislaine Maxwell, the Jeffrey Epstein associate facing child trafficking charges, was tracked down to her remote hideaway by the FBI using data from her mobile phone, according to court documents.Maxwell was arrested at the 156-acre property in Bradford, New Hampshire, on 2 July last year, a day after a request was made for a search warrant to “employ an electronic investigative technique … to determine the location of the cellular device”. Continue reading...
Trump, in push to overturn election result, urged supporters to contact ex-Michigan speaker – but posted wrong phone numberA California resident confirmed they had been bombarded with calls and texts after the campaign team for Donald Trump erroneously shared the Michigan native’s phone number instead of that for a Michigan state senator.Related: Georgia voters cast their ballots in pivotal Senate runoff elections – live Continue reading...
Emanuel Cleaver says those such as Donald Trump Jr who objected to message are ‘soiled by selfishness and perverted by prejudice’A Democratic congressman said he was surprised by the negative response after he ended an opening prayer on the first day of the new Congress by saying “amen and a-woman” – and said conservative critics including Donald Trump Jr had only proved themselves “soiled by selfishness, perverted by prejudice and inveigled by ideology”.Related: Josh Hawley dodges question during Fox News grilling on election challenge Continue reading...
Amid suggestions that the US president is planning to travel to Scotland to play golf before Joe Biden’s inauguration on 20 January, Scotland's first minister said that in line with the latest coronavirus restrictions, Trump's trip would not be considered essential travel so he would not be permitted to enter Scotland.Sturgeon said she wasn't clear on the president's travel plans but hoped his immediate travel plan would be to 'exit the White House'
Lauren Boebert releases video pledging to carry loaded Glock, prompting police reminder about need for permit on city streetsStarting at a new workplace for most people may involve pondering car parking spaces or nearby lunch spots, but Lauren Boebert, a member of the US Congress, has made clear her key requirement is that she carries a loaded Glock handgun to and from the Capitol each day.Related: Georgia voters head to the polls in crucial Senate runoffs – US politics live Continue reading...
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