November 19, 2024

Tuesday, November 19, 2024. Annette’s News Roundup.

Joe is always busy.

aka a reminder of how a real President acts.

Joe in the Amazon Rain Forest.

Joe protecting the Chips Act.

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I won’t watch a Trump interview. I won’t watch Morning Joe.

Will you?

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Those who know the truth will not be victims.

I’m 16. On Nov. 6 the Girls Cried, and the Boys Played Minecraft.

On the morning after the election, I walked up the staircase of my school. A preteen was crying into the shoulders of her braces-clad peer. Her friend was rubbing circles on her back.

I continued up the stairs to the lounge, where upperclassmen linger before classes. There I saw two tables: One was filled with my girlfriends, many of them with hollows under their eyes. There was a blanket of despair over the young women in the room. I looked over to the other table of teenage boys and saw Minecraft on their computers. While we were gasping for a breath, it seemed they were breathing freely.

We girls woke up to a country that would rather elect a man found liable for sexual abuse than a woman. Where the kind of man my mother instructs me to cross the street to avoid will be addressed as Mr. President. Where the body I haven’t fully grown into may no longer be under my control. The boys, it seemed to me, just woke up on a Wednesday.

What made my skin burn most wasn’t that over 75 million people voted for Donald Trump. It was that this election didn’t seem to measurably change anything for the boys around me, whether their parents supported Mr. Trump or not. Many of them didn’t seem to share our rage, our fear, our despair. ​​We don’t even share the same future.

I am scared that the Trump administration will take away or restrict birth control and Plan B — the same way they did abortion. I am scared that the boys I know will see in a triumphant, boastful Mr. Trump the epitome of a manly man and model themselves after him. I was 8 years old the first time he was elected. Now I am 16. I am still unable to vote, but I am so much more aware of what I have to lose.

I have seen the ways in which many of the boys in my generation can be different from their fathers. The #MeToo movement went mainstream when they were still wearing Superman pajamas. On Tuesdays in health class, they learn about the dangers of inebriated consent. They don’t pretend to gag when a girl mentions her period or a tampon falls out of her backpack. They don’t find sexist jokes all that funny and don’t often make them in public.

I’ve heard they even use new language in the locker room about getting rejected by a girl, one where no means no and don’t try again. I love and care for many of these boys and have always felt they were on my side. I’m grateful to my school for taking gender equality as seriously as it does trigonometry.

But most of the guys I saw that Wednesday appeared nonchalant. A smiling student shook his friend’s hand and said sarcastically, “Good election” in the same hallway where I saw a female teacher clutching a damp tissue.

Why did it seem these boys were so unperturbed? I worried that my guy friends might only care about women until it conflicts with other, more pressing, priorities.

That morning, I spoke with a male classmate. He asked if I was OK. I nearly melted with relief. See, I knew not all guys were ignorant! Then, before I responded, he continued. Why, he wondered, are so many girls crying? I stared. I swallowed that familiar lump. And I had one thought: I pray that my older brother never asks that question. How could my classmate not know why girls in his grade were biting their nails and doing breathing exercises in the bathroom? It seemed like our future was sliding down the sides of our faces, and he asked me why we were crying? I have never felt that disconnected from men. I have never felt more like a girl.

Eight years ago, I was too young to feel the full force of Hillary Clinton’s loss. Now at 16, I’ve had the wind knocked out of me. On Wednesday, I was flush with anger — but it was diluted by an even stronger feeling: defeat. I saw it in the eyes of women in my subway car that morning. I saw it in the barista at the coffee shop on the corner, the female security guard at my school and in the face of my history teacher.

In a terrible way, I’ve never felt more part of a sisterhood or more certain that pain is shared within that family. I wish the consequences of this moment for young women punctured the apparent indifference of so many men and boys I saw that day. I wish they could breathe in what the women and girls I know have been inhaling since Nov. 5.

I can’t predict how well I’m going to do on an English test tomorrow and I definitely can’t predict the future for me and my fellow young women. For now, all I can do is tell you how I feel. (By Naomi Beinart, a 16-year-old high school junior. New York Times).

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Enough

For the past decade, as Donald Trump has risen in political stature, I have waited for that precarious but inevitable moment when his well-documented liabilities would end his political ascendancy, when it would all finally be too much. I waited through scandalous allegations about affairs and payoffs, and misogynistic and violent talk about grabbing women. There were the sexual abuse allegations for which he was found liable in one instance, dozens of felony convictions and even more outstanding indictments, flagrantly racist statements and unrepentant xenophobia.

There have been so many occasions when I thought finally, we have reached the apex. Finally, he has revealed too much of what lies behind the mask. Finally, this country will stand up and draw an unbreachable line in the sand. Finally, Americans will say this is not who we are and actually mean it.

That time hasn’t come.

Mr. Trump’s election demonstrates how American tolerance for the unacceptable is nearly infinite. There are hundreds of absolutely mind-boggling things I could point to from the past decade — the suggestion of bleach injections to potentially treat the coronavirus and the wild QAnon conspiracy theories infecting millions of Americans, including politicians, and insulting veterans and making fun of the disabled. But three elections in a row, Mr. Trump has been a viable presidential candidate and our democracy has few guardrails to protect the country from the clear and present dangers he and his political appointees will continue to confer upon us.

Clearly, Mr. Trump is successful because of his faults, not despite them, because we do not live in a just world.

Toward the end of the 2024 election cycle, the candidates made their closing arguments. Kamala Harris articulated a hopeful vision, a way forward for a fractured country. She positioned herself as a moderate, a leader willing to work with her political opponents, one who embraces diversity and cares about the middle class and recognizes that many people are struggling in one way or another and want those struggles acknowledged. They want solutions for their problems, and Ms. Harris promised she and her administration would work with Congress to better all our lives. Clearly, those promises were unconvincing.

Mr. Trump painted the United States as a dark and foreboding place, festering with immigrants and criminality. A place where good, “normal” Americans have been forgotten as unchecked progress reshapes the world they want — a white, middle-class, heterosexual world — into something inhospitable and unrecognizable. Mr. Trump lacks vision because he lacks imagination and empathy. He cares about himself and leads accordingly, surrounding himself with people who will enthusiastically stroke his ego and make him feel like the king he clearly wishes to be.

In the final, critical moments of the election cycle — during a Madison Square Garden rally featuring all of the bigotry to which we have become accustomed — I needed to believe we had, at long last, reached a point beyond which we could escape from the black hole of Mr. Trump’s terrible politics. Because if he were to be elected again despite all of this, if enough Americans remained obdurate in their willingness to embrace Republican extremism, it would be catastrophic.

And now Republicans will control the executive branch, the Senate and the House of Representatives. There will be few checks and balances.

Mistakes were made in the Harris campaign because mistakes are always made in presidential campaigns. Democrats are now reflecting on those mistakes and figuring out how to manifest a different outcome next time, if there is a next time. The recriminations have been numerous — too many celebrities, echo chambers, ignoring the economy, no alternative to the conservative media ecosystem, too much embracing of conservative politicians, too much identity politics, too big a tent, the price of eggs.

But to suggest we should yield even a little to Mr. Trump’s odious politics, to suggest we should compromise on the rights of trans people, for instance, and all of the other critical issues we care most about, is unacceptable. It is shameful and cowardly. We cannot abandon the most vulnerable communities to assuage the most powerful. Even if we did, it would never be enough. The goal posts would keep moving until progressive politics became indistinguishable from conservative politics. We’re halfway there already.

Mr. Trump’s voters are granted a level of care and coddling that defies credulity and that is afforded to no other voting bloc. Many of them believe the most ludicrous things: babies being aborted after birth and children going to school as one gender and returning home surgically altered as another gender even though these things simply do not happen. Time and again, we hear the wild lies these voters believe and we act as if they are sharing the same reality as ours, as if they are making informed decisions about legitimate issues. We act as if they get to dictate the terms of political engagement on a foundation of fevered mendacity.

We must refuse to participate in a mass delusion. We must refuse to accept that the ignorance on display is a congenital condition rather than a choice. All of us should refuse to pretend that any of this is normal and that these voters are just woefully misunderstood and that if only the Democrats addressed their economic anxiety, they might vote differently. While they are numerous, that does not make them right.

These are adults, so let us treat them like adults. Let us acknowledge that they want to believe nonsense and conjecture. They want to believe anything that affirms their worldview. They want to celebrate a leader who allows them to nurture their basest beliefs about others. The biggest challenge of our lifetime will be figuring out how to combat the American willingness to embrace flagrant misinformation and bigotry.

As Mr. Trump assembles his cabinet of loyalists and outlines the alarming policies he means to enact, it’s hard not to imagine the worst, not out of paranoia but as a means of preparation. The incoming president has clearly articulated that he may dismantle the Department of Education and appears to be giving the wealthiest man in the world unfettered access to the Oval Office. He plans to begin mass deportations immediately and has announced his pick of a Fox News host as the defense secretary — the list goes on, each promise more appalling than the last.

We would like to believe that many of the ideas on Mr. Trump’s demented wish list won’t actually come to fruition and that our democracy can once more withstand the new president and the people with whom he surrounds himself. But that is just desperate, wishful thinking. As of yet, there is nothing that will break the iron grip Mr. Trump has on his base, and Vice President-elect JD Vance is young enough to carry the mantle going forward for political cycles to come.

Absolutely anything is possible, and we must acknowledge this, not out of surrender, but as a means of readying ourselves for the impossible fights ahead. (Roxane Gay, New York Times).

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As Trump’s plans become clearer, reject these four dangerous ideas.

In this post, I offer thoughts about what not to believe as we adjust to the horrifying reality of a second term for Donald Trump. I’ll be interested to hear your thoughts, and I very much appreciate the support many of you have shown here, by subscribing, commenting and sending encouraging words. The comments here will remain open to all, no longer requiring a paid subscription to participate. I hope that’s meaningful, in some small way.

After a week of reading and talking to people, I want to push back against these notions:

First, that idea that Trump has a “mandate” from America because of some sort of landslide vote. With the vote still being counted Saturday, according to the highly credible Cook Political Report, he has fallen below 50 percent of the popular vote: 49.99 percent for him; 48.22 percent for Harris. Don’t buy the landslide talk.

Second, don’t believe that these unfit nominees for Trump’s cabinet represent some lofty idea of making America great again. Despite all his effusive language about the supposed statesmanship of Matt Gaetz and Pete Hegseth and Robert F. Kennedy Jr., and Tulsi Gabbard, these picks are meant to do two things: show his iron-grip control over the Senate; and sow chaos and despair in the non-MAGA members of the American public.

The 20th Century German-American political philosopher Hannah Arendt observed in “The Origins of Totalitarianism” that “totalitarianism in power invariably replaces all first-rate talents, regardless of their sympathies, with those crackpots and fools whose lack of intelligence and creativity is still the best guarantee of their loyalty.”

Sheldon Whitehouse, Democratic senator from Rhode Island, described what’s happening as “the crawl test.” He explained: “Autocrats like to make minions crawl. Gaetz and Gabbard nominations will test Republican senators’ willingness to crawl for Trump.”

Third, reject the notion that there’s nothing you can do and that it’s a good idea to tune out. It’s tempting, of course, but it’s absolutely not the way to go. I liked the way Princeton professor Eddie S. Glaude Jr. wrote about his restored resolve: “I have gotten myself together. Now I am ready to fight for a more just world. Choose your space and get to work.’

What could that mean in real life when everything seems so hopeless? That’s different for each person. I have a three-fold plan: to contribute to organizations that can fight back against what’s ahead — for example, the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press which provides expert legal help to journalists under siege; to keep pointing out the times when the mainstream press fails to meet the moment; and to try to live up to my own ideals by telling the truth and being a kind and decent person.

For you, it could be volunteering in a community organization such as Literacy Volunteers; helping vulnerable employees in your own workplace — immigrants, in particular — to protect themselves against what’s to come; running for office or supporting a local campaign; pressuring your own public officials to fight back by making phone calls or writing to them.

Finally, I urge us to reject the notion that the mainstream media should be absolved of wrongdoing during the campaign coverage because of the way things turned out. That somehow legacy media doesn’t matter because of the growing influence of right-wing podcasts and YouTube videos. I agree that the landscape has changed but surely many potential Harris voters stayed home because they didn’t fully understand the dangers of a second Trump term.

That mainstream journalists are still up to their normalizing and sanewashing tricks is obvious. Could we retire the all-purpose wimpy word “controversial” to describe the latest outrage? Or consider just this one example (from the New York Times): “Trump Taps Matt Gaetz for Attorney General, a Provocative Move.”

Provocative? Sounds exciting but acceptable enough. Perhaps closer to the truth, though, were these no-holds-barred accusations from The Editorial Board, written by journalist and scholar John Stoehr: “A rapist for AG….A spy for DNI … a zealot for Defense … an anti-vaxxer for Health … A criminal for president. This is what Orwellian means.”

However, if you do want something actually provocative, read this opinion piece on how Democrats should radically change their approach in order to start winning again — starting with the 2026 midterm elections. Do you agree? (American Crisis, by Margaret Sullivan, Substack).

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A new barrier against Trump.

Senate confirms Biden’s ethics czar, who will remain under Trump.

The Senate on Thursday confirmed President Biden’s nominee to serve as head of the Office of Government Ethics in a 50-46 vote, giving him a term that will last through President-elect Trump’s tenure.

David Huitema, currently a State Department ethics official, will now serve in the governmentwide ethics czar role in a five-year term. Senate Democrats sought to prioritize his confirmation in the waning days of the Biden administration and their control of the chamber before Trump’s inauguration, as the former and future president once again brings with him to the Oval Office a bevy of potential conflicts of interest.

Bringing Huitema’s role more into the foreground is Trump’s decision to so far refuse to sign agreements with the Biden administration, and the ethics agreements that go with them, that enable a formal presidential transition to take place. Absent those agreements, Trump’s teams have been unable to deploy into agencies and receive briefings from career staff.

OGE has been without a confirmed director for more than a year, when Trump-appointee Emory Rounds’ term expired. Shelley Finlayson, chief of staff and program counsel at the ethics agency, has filled in on an acting basis. During his first term, Trump bypassed Finlayson in a period without a confirmed director to instead install another career official as acting director.

Rounds had some high profile engagements with Trump during his tenure. OGE is heavily involved with political appointments and is typically communicating with the White House on a daily basis to help arrange disclosures and agreements from nominees.

In 2019, Rounds issued a warning to the Trump administration that agencies could not unilaterally change their ethics rules without Office of Government Ethics approval and threatened to hold up any ethics agreement with officials who refused to comply with the office's requests.

He was involved in an extended back-and-forth with then-Commerce Department Secretary Wilbur Ross after Rounds refused to certify Ross’ financial disclosure, stating it contained inaccuracies and failed to comply with the secretary's agreement to avoid conflicts of interest through divestiture. Rounds' office similarly refused to approve a disclosure from then-Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Scott Pruitt.

David Apol, who served as acting OGE director in 2017 when Trump bypassed Finlayson, responded to Health and Human Services Department Secretary Tom Price's resignation following reports he spent hundreds of thousands of dollars on private, chartered flights, and several other Trump officials facing allegations of abusing their posts, by sending a letter telling the administration’s political appointees to act more ethically.

“I am deeply concerned that the actions of some in government leadership have harmed perceptions about the importance of ethics and what conduct is, and is not, permissible,” Apol said at the time. “I encourage you to consider taking action to re-double your commitment to ethics in government.”

Senate Democrats tried in September to move Huitema’s nomination through a unanimous consent request, though Sen. Mike Lee, R-Utah, objected. Lee said Huitema would engage in “partisan lawfare” and only the next president should make the appointment.

Walt Shaub, who served as OGE director under President Obama and briefly under Trump, praised the Senate for ensuring Huitema’s confirmation even as he suggested Biden’s nominee may not be able to see his five-year term through.

“It might be a hollow victory for government ethics if Trump fires Huitema after the inauguration,” Shaub said. “Even if Trump doesn't fire Huitema, OGE won't be able to prevent Trump's top appointees from retaining conflicting financial interests if the Senate grants Trump's request that lawmakers conspire in skirting or short-shrifting the constitutional confirmation process.”

Trump has called for the Senate to relinquish its advise and consent role to instead allow for recess appointments. Shaub suggested Huitema take care not to “become mere window dressing” for Trump’s attempts at circumventing ethics law.

During his confirmation hearing, Huitema said would be entering the role at a critical time.

“We must support each other in courageously providing sound ethics guidance, even when it is unwelcome, and in pursuing enforcement of the ethics laws where necessary,” he said. (Government Executive).

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Introducing Trump 2.0

Touch to watch this. 👇

Diversity in the Trump Admin.

Deportation Plans.

President-elect Trump confirmed Monday that he is planning to declare a national emergency and use the U.S. military to carry out mass deportations.

Why it matters: Trump made his promise to deport millions of undocumented immigrants one of the cornerstones of his 2024 campaign, and his team has already begun strategizing how to carry its plan out.

A Truth Social post early Monday is the first time the president-elect has confirmed how his administration will execute the controversial plan.

Driving the news: Tom Fitton, the president of the conservative group Judicial Watch, posted on Truth Social earlier this month that Trump was "prepared to declare a national emergency and will use military assets to reverse the Biden invasion through a mass deportation program."

Trump reposted Fitton's comment Monday with the caption, "TRUE!!"

The big picture: There are an estimated 11 million undocumented immigrants living in the U.S. Trump's mass deportations are expected to impact roughly 20 million families across the country.

Immigration advocates and lawyers are preparing to counter the plan in court.

The president-elect's team is aiming to craft executive orders that can withstand legal challenges to avoid a similar defeat that befell Trump's Muslim ban in his first term, Politico reported.

Their plans also include ending the parole program for undocumented immigrants from Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua and Venezuela, per Politico.

Zoom out: Trump has also already begun filling out his Cabinet positions with immigration hardliners.

This includes tapping Tom Homan, the former acting head of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), to serve as his "border czar."

In addition, Trump nominated South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem as his secretary of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). (Axios)

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Update on the actual 2024 Presidential Election count.

Yes, counting continues.

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Only the “Finest People.”

Lawyer tells ABC News his 2 clients told House Ethics Committee that Gaetz paid them for sex

An attorney representing two women who testified before the House Ethics Committee told ABC News in an interview that former Rep. Matt Gaetz paid both his adult clients for sex.

Florida attorney Joel Leppard told ABC News' Juju Chang that one of his clients also witnessed Gaetz having sex with a third woman -- who was then 17 years old -- at a house party in Florida.

"She testified [that] in July of 2017, at this house party, she was walking out to the pool area, and she looked to her right, and she saw Rep. Gaetz having sex with her friend, who was 17," Leppard said.

The Justice Department spent years probing the allegations against Gaetz, including allegations of obstruction of justice, before informing Gaetz last year that it would not bring charges. Gaetz has long denied any wrongdoing related to the allegations investigated during Justice Department probe.

"Matt Gaetz will be the next Attorney General. He’s the right man for the job and will end the weaponization of our justice system," Trump transition spokesperson Alex Pfeiffer told ABC News regarding all the allegations involving Gaetz. "These are baseless allegations intended to derail the second Trump administration. The Biden Justice Department investigated Gaetz for years and cleared him of wrongdoing."

Leppard, who has called for the House Ethics Committee to release its report amid Gaetz's nomination to serve as President-elect Donald Trump's attorney general, told ABC News that the former congressman paid both of his clients for sex using Venmo.

"Just to be clear, both of your clients testified that they were paid by Rep. Gaetz to have sex?" Chang asked Leppard.

"That's correct. The House was very clear about that and went through each. They essentially put the Venmo payments on the screen and asked about them. And my clients repeatedly testified, 'What was this payment for?' 'That was for sex,'" Leppard said.

Leppard also told ABC News that his client testified to House Ethics Committee that, based on her knowledge, Gaetz stopped having sex with the minor after he learned she was underage.

"Her understanding was that Matt Gaetz did not know that she was a minor, and that when he learned that she was a minor, that he broke off things and did not continue a sexual relationship until she turned 18," Leppard said.

Leppard's interview with ABC News comes days after he publicly called for the House Ethics Committee to be released.

"As the Senate considers former Rep. Gaetz's nomination for attorney general, several questions demand answers," Leppard said. "What if multiple credible witnesses provided evidence of behavior that would constitute serious criminal violations?"

The House Ethics Committee is expected to meet on Wednesday and discuss its report on Gaetz and potentially vote on its release, despite the fact that the investigation ended when Gaetz resigned from the House, multiple sources told ABC News.

MORE: Woman testified to House Ethics Committee that Gaetz had sex with her when she was 17: Sources
The development comes after Leppard on Friday first told ABC News that one of his clients had witnessed Gaetz having sex with a minor -- amid mounting pressure on the House Ethics Committee to release its report on its probe into the former Florida congressman.

The two witnesses, who ABC News is not naming, both allegedly attended parties with the then-congressman and testified in both the DOJ and House Ethics investigations.

Gaetz's one-time friend Joel Greenberg is currently serving an 11-year prison sentence after reaching a deal with prosecutors in May 2021 in which he pleaded guilty to multiple federal crimes including sex trafficking of a woman when she was a minor and introducing her to other "adult men" who also had sex with her when she was underage.

Attorney John Clune, who represents the former minor at the center of the probe, called for the release of the Ethics Committee's report on Thursday.

"Mr. Gaetz's likely nomination as Attorney General is a perverse development in a truly dark series of events. We would support the House Ethics Committee immediately releasing their report. She was a high school student and there were witnesses," Clune said in a statement.

Sources said the woman, who is now in her 20s, testified to the House Ethics Committee that the now-former Florida congressman had sex with her when she was 17 years old and he was in Congress, ABC News previously reported.

Gaetz faces an increasingly uphill nomination process in the Senate, with at least five Republican senators signaling skepticism that he could get enough support to be confirmed.

President-elect Trump has repeatedly urged GOP leadership to bypass the traditional confirmation process through recess appointments, whereby Trump could appoint his cabinet while Congress is out of session. (ABC News).

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Your Daily Reminder

Trump is a convicted felon.

On May 30th, he was found guilty on 34 felony counts by the unanimous vote of 12 ordinary citizens.

The Convicted Felon Donald J. Trump was scheduled to be sentenced on July 11th and September 18th. He will now be sentenced on November 26.

In a decision issued November 12th, Judge Merchan granted the stay until Nov. 19. He gave the prosecution until then to file an outline of appropriate next steps.

Note - today is the day!

@simonwdc.bsky.social on Bluesky

Trump, a rapist, fraudster, traitor and 34 times felon, nominates people with - credible assault/rape allegations - extemist ties - history of “traiterous” advocacy for Russia - designs to unravel US public health system, kill Americans Hello media? https://www.politico.com/news/2024/11/15/pete-hegseth-flagged-insider-threat-00189991

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Good news.

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