December 21, 2023

Thursday, December 21, 2023. Annette’s News Roundup.

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Joe is always busy.

Young voters right now overwhelmingly prefer Biden: The Economist/YouGov poll | The Hill.

Young voters overwhelmingly say they would support President Biden over former President Trump in a hypothetical head-to-head match-up if the 2024 presidential election were held today, according to a poll released Wednesday.

In the Economist/YouGov poll — conducted via web-based interviews Dec. 16-18 — more than half (53 percent) of registered voters under 30 said they would support Biden, and less than a quarter (24 percent) said they would support Trump.

Another 10 percent said they would support another candidate, 4 percent said they were not sure, and 9 percent said they wouldn’t vote.

Among registered voters 30–44 years old, Biden still leads but by a slimmer margin; 49 percent support Biden, and 38 percent support Trump.

The trend reverses for older age brackets. Among registered voters ages 45–64, 39 percent support Biden, and 47 percent support Trump. Among registered voters 65 and over, 36 percent support Biden, and 53 percent support Trump.

This poll departs from other polls released this week that showed Biden more popular among older Americans. A New York Times/Siena College poll released Tuesday showed Trump ahead of Biden by 6 points among registered voters under 30.(The Hill).

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Kamala is always busy.

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Guilty and barred from office under Amendment 14, paragraph 3 of the Constitution? Here is a precedent.

Cowboys for Trump co-founder barred from public office over Jan. 6.

A New Mexico judge removed Cuoy Griffin as commissioner of Otero County, citing the 14th Amendment’s clause barring officials who've engaged “in insurrection or rebellion” from holding public office.

A New Mexico judge ordered the co-founder of Cowboys for Trump removed from public office Tuesday over his presence at the U.S. Capitol during the Jan. 6 riot.

State District Judge Francis Mathew removed Otero County Commissioner Cuoy Griffin from his elected position "effective immediately" and banned him from seeking further public office, citing the 14th Amendment's clause barring those who have taken oaths to uphold the Constitution from holding federal or state office if they have engaged “in insurrection or rebellion."

“Due to his disqualification under Section Three of the Fourteenth Amendment, defendant is constitutionally ineligible and barred for life from serving as a ‘Senator or Representative in Congress, or elector of President and Vice-President,' or from ‘hold[ing] any office, civil or military, under the United States, or under any State,’ including his current office as an Otero County Commissioner,” Mathew wrote.

NBC News has asked Griffin for comment.

Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington and several New Mexico-based law firms represented a group of state residents in the lawsuit to remove Griffin as county commissioner.

Griffin, who has espoused false claims of mass voter fraud in the 2020 presidential election, was convicted in federal court this year of a misdemeanor for entering the Capitol grounds on Jan. 6, 2021, without going inside. Griffin was sentenced to 14 days and given credit for time served.

Griffin was the second defendant to go to trial in connection with the Capitol attack after his arrest in January 2021, weeks after supporters of then-President Donald Trump stormed the Capitol to protest the results of the 2020 election amid Trump’s refusal to concede.

Griffin, who faced misdemeanor charges, represented himself in a two-day bench trial. He made headlines at the start of the trial this year for ditching his plans to ride a horse to the courthouse. Griffin claimed that he abandoned the plan because he wanted to respect the court and didn’t want to create a “spectacle.” He instead showed up in a truck with a “COWBOYS FOR TRUMP”-branded horse trailer attached.

Upon walking into the courthouse in March, Griffin insisted that a metal police barricade he climbed upon on the grounds of the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, was actually a step. 

“That was a step,” Griffin claimed. “It was a metal step. I used it as a step. ... You can call it a barricade. I call it a step.” (NBC News).

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Watch these children. This is very sad. It must end.

Warning - this is very painful to watch.👇

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Over the weekend, 200 Jewish Institutions received threats.

On Monday, Rachel Maddow spoke about this, but all was not as it seemed. Putin and others like him want to sow dissension.

Nationwide swatting spree targeting Jewish institutions appears coordinated, coming from outside US: FBI.

A nationwide swatting spree targeting nearly 200 Jewish institutions over the weekend appears to have been a coordinated effort by an entity based outside the United States, the Federal Bureau of Investigation's top spokesperson said in a confidential memo to partner law enforcement agencies.

The communication, written by Assistant FBI Director Cathy Milhoan, and obtained by ABC News, says, "At this time, based on similar language and specific email tradecraft used, it appears the perpetrators of these threats are connected. Additionally, these threats appear to be originating from outside of the United States." (ABC News).

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Yes, remove a Confederate statue from Arlington cemetery!

Judge says US Army can remove Confederate Memorial in Arlington Cemetery.

Dec 19 (Reuters) - A federal judge in Virginia on Tuesday ruled that Army crews can continue removing a confederate monument at Arlington National Cemetery, as Congress has mandated must be done by Jan. 1.

U.S. District Judge Rossie Alston on Monday had ordered a halt to the removal as he considered a lawsuit against the work.

In his Tuesday ruling, he rejected the arguments from the group Defend Arlington, who claimed in their suit that the Pentagon had skirted federal environmental law in its rush to take down the monument, and that the work would disturb nearby graves.

Alston wrote that "this case essentially attempts to place this Court at the center of a great debate" between those who extol "the virtues, romanticism and history of the Old South" and people who say the monuments glorify the slave-owning culture of the Confederacy.

Erected in 1914, the Confederate Memorial is the latest of scores of statues seen by many as monuments to racism. They have been singled out for demolition by state and local leaders around the U.S. since a nationwide public uproar stirred in 2020 by the killing of George Floyd.

Congress formally mandated elimination of all names, symbols and statues commemorating the Confederacy throughout the U.S. military in 2021, creating a commission to oversee the endeavor.

Kerry Meeker, head of public affairs for Arlington Cemetery, said in a written statement that the Army would resume removal of the monument "immediately" and that great care would be taken to preserve "the sanctity of all those laid to rest" nearby.

The cemetery's own online critique describes the monument's imagery and inscriptions as sanitizing pre-Civil War slavery, romanticizing secession of the Southern pro-slave states, and perpetuating the noble "Lost Cause" myth of the Confederacy.

The monument features a classically robed woman cast in bronze representing the American South standing atop a three-story pedestal adorned with life-sized figures of deities, Confederate soldiers and civilians.

Among those figures are an enslaved African-American "mammy" character holding the infant child of a white Confederate officer, and an enslaved African-American man following his owner off to war, according to the cemetery's description.

The monument overlooks Confederate graves in a special corner of the sprawling cemetery, which stands in Arlington, Virginia, just across the Potomac River from Washington, D.C., on the grounds of a former plantation seized from Civil War General Robert E. Lee, commander of Confederate forces. (Reuters).

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Big election in Virginia in 2024.

Yes, the Presidency but down ticket too.

Abigail Anne Spanberger (née Davis; born August 7, 1979) is an American politician serving as the U.S. representative from Virginia's 7th congressional district since 2019. Spanberger, a Virginia native, is a former CIA officer.

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