Monkeypox is a rare viral disease that is usually transmitted through body fluids, respiratory droplets and other contaminated materials. The disease usually results in fever, rash and swollen lymph nodes…reports Asian Lite News
The United States may see more cases of monkeypox before the numbers go down, Director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) Rochelle Walensky said on Friday.
“With the scale-up of testing, with the scale-up of information, we anticipate that there will be more cases before there are less,” Walensky told The Washington Post. The CDC currently does not have specific projections on how serious the situation may be, Walensky added. “I do not think that we have a stable estimate now,” the director said.
But the director did note that the United States on Friday detected two monkeypox cases in children for the first time. The two cases are unrelated and are likely the result of household transmission, the CDC said in a statement.
The agency said the children are in good health and are being treated. Both of them are doing well, but they had contact with other people, and the CDC is following up on that, Walensky added. As of July 22, the United States has altogether over 2,800 confirmed monkeypox/orthopoxvirus cases, according to CDC data.
Dr Ashish Jha, White House COVID-19 response coordinator, said the government has delivered 300,000 doses of a monkeypox vaccine and is working to expedite the shipment from Denmark of 7,86,000 more doses.
He said there is already enough vaccine on hand to provide a first vaccine dose to more than half of the eligible population in New York City and over 70 per cent of the eligible population in Washington DC
Monkeypox is a rare viral disease that is usually transmitted through body fluids, respiratory droplets and other contaminated materials. The disease usually results in fever, rash and swollen lymph nodes.
The United States is still evaluating whether the monkeypox outbreak should be declared a public health emergency. “We’re looking at what are the ways in which the response could be enhanced, if any, by declaring a public health emergency,” said Jha. (ANI/Xinhua)
If Trump announces his decision to run for President in 2024 as he himself admitted he might before fall and in advance of the January 6 panel’s report, republicans feel that it might deflect much of the attention they have been building up against Joe Biden’s inability to take on challenges in the US …writes Ashok Nilakantan
With just four months away from the November 8 polling for all of the 435-member house of representatives, most of the US media from reputed TIME to New York Times, Washington Post, and multitudes of blogs in America have started gauging the American mood, given the severe dent that the eighth hearings of the ‘January 6’ panel on Capitol Hills alleged insurrection has had on Trump’s larger than life image with aide after aide and his fellowmen going against him.
Former President Donald Trump’s poll numbers are suffering in the wake of several prime-time hearings held by the January 6 committee that revealed new details about the Capitol riot and Trump’s role in its 8th hearing with explosive footages of Trump’s speeches, twitters and his fellow republican photo of Hawke showing his fist as encouraging the riotous mob and later ducking for cover for his own Lifes safety from the oath keepers and proud boys, both ultra-right wingers and the former an amorphous group of militia men from army and police, who think they alone can protect American way of life.
Prominent TV news network, CNN, lists what it calls takeaways from the 8th final hearing of the Jan 6 panel. In its final public hearing until the fall, damning new evidence on Thursday highlighted then-President Donald Trump’s three-hour refusal to publicly condemn the unfolding insurrection at the US Capitol or to call off the violent mob. This would not have apparently not gone down well with the near 18 million viewers on prime-time TV who saw explosive footage of Trumps inaction during those 187 minutes of terror when police officers feared for their lives and sent good bye messages to their loved ones.
The prime time session — the eighth hearing so far this summer — focused on the “187 minutes” between Trump telling his supporters to march to the Capitol, and when he finally told them to “go home”, CNN said in its analysis of the January 6 events. The hearing was co-led by Rep. Elaine Luria, a Virginia Democrat, and Rep. Adam Kinzinger, an Illinois Republican. Two former Trump White House aides who resigned in the immediate aftermath of the attack — Matthew Pottinger and Sarah Matthews — testified in-person on Thursday. The former was a press aide and the latter the deputy national security advisor to Trump.
Here are takeaways from Thursday’s epic prime-time hearing that could dent Trump’s image and leave donors for his campaign funds indecisive. Whether they are backing the right horse. If Trump announces his decision to run for President in 2024 as he himself admitted he might before fall and in advance of the January 6 panel’s report, republicans feel that it might deflect much of the attention they have been building up against Joe Biden’s inability to take on challenges in the US economy like an impending recession and historic highs in inflation since the last four decades and soaring gas prices which have now shown some signs of descendancy since the tax breaks.
Trump’s decision not to act during those 187 minutes might severely affect his chances with the American population though die hard ultra-right wingers and republicans and select lobbies like the NRA might still support him. CNN says the committee used Thursday’s hearing to show how Trump not only failed to act, but chose not to as he watched the violent assault on the US Capitol unfold.
Several witnesses with first-hand knowledge of what was happening inside the White House on January 6 told the committee that Trump did not place a single call to any of his law enforcement or national security officials as the Capitol attack was unfolding, according to previously unseen video testimony played during Thursday’s hearing. The panel said it “confirmed in numerous interviews with senior law enforcement and military leaders, Vice President Mike Pence’s staff, and DC government officials: None of them — not one — heard from President Trump that day,” Luria said.
The committee used that testimony to make the case that Trump’s refusal to intervene amounted to a dereliction of duty. A president who is the commander of the armed forces being accused of dereliction of duty is not a good omen. A retired admiral in the navy castigated Trump for his inaction as a commander in chief of the forces. Former officials who were with Trump as he watched the riot unfold on television, including then-White House counsel Pat Cipollone and Trump’s body man Nick Luna, told the committee they had no knowledge of the former President making a single call to the heads of various agencies who could have responded to the violence, including the secretary of defense or attorney general.
Keith Kellogg, Pence’s national security adviser who was also with Trump that day, testified that he never heard the former President ask for the National Guard or a law enforcement response. These were not Trump’s enemies but his own party men, aides and officials in the west wing that tried to stop him from his unconstitutional act such as getting vice president Mike Pence not to certify Joe Biden’s election as a victory for the democrats and as new president of the USA just to retain his position in the white house. “Absolutely infuriating”, said an unnamed official of his actions.
Some feedback conducted recently shows a dip in Trumps larger than life popularity and an outsider to White House who had occupied the front pages of New York tabloids for 30 years despite not being in politics. Kellogg also reaffirmed that he would have been aware if Trump had made such an ask.
Matthews, the former White House spokeswoman, said she spoke with White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany during the riot, and McEnany “looked directly at me, and in a hushed tone, shared with me that the President did not want to include any sort of mention of peace” in a tweet that they were crafting.”To me, his refusal to act and call off the mob that day and his refusal to condemn the violence was indefensible,” Matthews said at the hearing.
All these exposures in the 8th hearings have made a section of republicans do a rethink on Trump’s candidacy for 2024 presidential run besides donors for campaign funds being rattled by the testimonies in the final hearing. That testimony fit with other evidence presented on Thursday, like the outtakes of Trump’s videotaped speech on January 7, where he tried to water down some of the prepared language and told his aides, “I don’t want to say the election’s over, OK?” ‘I don’t want to say the election is over’: This has not gone down well with most people.
Chairman of the Joint Chiefs Gen. Mark Milley told the House select committee that he was astonished by the fact that he never heard from Trump as the Capitol attack was unfolding — suggesting his failure to act amounted to an abdication of his duties as Commander in Chief, according to previously unseen video from his close-door deposition. Nothing could be more harmful than Mileys statement.
“You know, you’re the Commander in Chief. You’ve got an assault going on the Capitol of the United States of America and there’s nothing? No call? Nothing? Zero?” he said in the clip. The tape reveals Trump’s top general’s dismay over the former president’s conduct. Thursday’s hearing also featured new and disturbing video and audio showing how endangered Pence’s security detail felt he was as they tried to evacuate the vice president from the Capitol.
The committee painted the fullest picture to date of the danger facing Pence and his team as rioters called for hanging Pence when he refused to go along with Trump’s efforts to try to overturn the 2020 election. A committee witness testified that Pence’s detail was so concerned with what was transpiring that they “were starting to fear for their own lives”, and that there were calls “to say goodbye to family members.”The witness was an unidentified national security professional who worked in the White House on January 6, whose audio testimony was masked to shield the official’s identity.
“Is the VP compromised? Like, I don’t know. We didn’t have visibility, but if they’re screaming and saying things, like, say goodbye to family…. this is going to a whole other level soon,” the national security official said.
The House select committee also revealed, for the first time, Secret Service radio traffic as agents assessed the Senate stairwell where Pence would be evacuated, while rioters were confronting police in a hallway downstairs at the same time. The video played Thursday spliced together the surveillance tapes with the security footage and sound of Pence’s detail, bringing into focus how near a miss Pence and his detail experienced.
The Committee contrasted Pence’s presidential actions with Trump’s inaction saying how Trump did not try to call law enforcement or military officials on January 6, while Pence — whose life was endangered by rioters — “worked the phones” speaking to Milley and then-acting Defense Secretary Chris Miller. The committee played video of Milley’s deposition where he said he had “two or three calls” with Pence. “He was very animated, and he issued very explicit, very direct, unambiguous orders. Get the military down here, get the Guard down here, put down this situation.” That was Pence.
The committee’s comparison between Trump and Pence underscores how Trump is still angry with his vice president over January 6. Politically, Pence has gone against Trump in several primaries ahead of a possible 2024 presidential contest. The former vice president has endorsed Republicans who rejected Trump’s false claims of fraud, including Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp — who defeated a Trump-backed primary challenge — and Arizona Republican Karrin Taylor Robson, who is running in the state’s gubernatorial primary against a Republican who has embraced Trump’s “lies” about the election.
The committee, which counts two anti-Trump Republicans as members — Kinzinger and the committee’s vice chairman, Rep. Liz Cheney of Wyoming — has painted Pence as one of the key officials who stood up to Trump after he lost the 2020 election. The committee also included in its hearing Thursday a clip of Joe Biden on January 6 condemning the violence — in what was a subtle nod to Biden acting presidential before in comparison to Trump before he was inaugurated as president.
The committee threw several sharp elbows at congressional Republicans during Thursday’s hearing, taking on House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy and other allies of Trump. The committee played audio clips, which have been disclosed previously, where McCarthy spoke of his conversations with Trump after January 6 and said that he was considering advising him to resign.
The committee also played a video clip from the deposition of Trump son-in-law Jared Kushner in which Kushner said that McCarthy “was scared” amid the unfolding violence at the Capitol when the two spoke by phone on January 6. ‘Chilling’: GOP lawmaker describes Trump’s call with McCarthy. In addition, the panel spotlighted Sen. Josh Hawley, the Missouri Republican who led the Senate’s objection to the election results on January 6. The panel showed a well-known photo of Hawley raising his fist toward the rioters outside the Capitol the morning of January 6 and later ducking for cover from the same mob.
Immediately afterward, the panel played a video showing Hawley running out of the Senate chamber — and played it a second time in slow motion for emphasis. Later that night, Hawley forced debate on the Pennsylvania election results and voted against certifying them.
The panel’s two Republicans, Kinzinger and Cheney, have been vocal critics of McCarthy as they’ve been ostracized from the House GOP conference. Both could be out of Congress next year: Kinzinger is retiring and Cheney is facing a Trump-backed primary challenger in Wyoming. She could lose as she is facing party ire.
The January 6 committee on Thursday provided new evidence to back up the explosive testimony of former White House aide Cassidy Hutchinson, who publicly described Trump’s angry interactions with his Secret Service detail after Trump was told he could not go to the Capitol. Luria said the committee had information from two additional sources to partially corroborate Hutchinson’s testimony that Trump lunged at his Secret Service detail. One of the witnesses, Luria said, “is a former White House employee with national security responsibilities.”
While the individual was not named, Luria said that the official testified that Tony Ornato, then-Trump White House deputy chief of staff and a current member of the Secret Service, told him the same story that Hutchinson testified Ornato had told her — that Trump was “irate” when Robert Engel, the Secret Service agent in charge on January 6, 2021, would not take him to the Capitol. The second witness was retired Washington, DC, police Sgt. Mark Robinson, who was in Trump’s motorcade that day.
Robinson testified that the Secret Service agent responsible for the motorcade had said that Trump had a “heated” discussion with his detail about going to the Capitol. Robinson added that he had been in “over 100” motorcades with Trump and had never heard of that type of exchange before January 6.
California Democratic Rep. Zoe Lofgren, a member of the committee, told CNN that Ornato and Engel have both retained private counsel to engage with the panel.
Taken together, all the video clips and audio tapes created a compelling multimedia experience, which the committee hopes will capture the public’s attention and drive home their message. After all, the panel hired a prominent former TV executive to produce the hearings, and has worked aggressively with subpoenas and court battles to obtain mountains of new material. It’s all now coming together.
Lawmakers have said their investigation is ongoing. Earlier in the hearing, Rep. Bennie Thompson, the committee chairman, said, “We continue to receive new information every day.” The panel has conducted eight public hearings so far, and has seen impressive TV ratings while presenting substantial amounts of damaging new information about Trump and January 6. The next wave of hearings in September will come during the final stretch of the midterm campaign.
Committee members have said they intend to issue an interim report around that time as well.”We’ve proven different components of a criminal case against Donald Trump or people around him in every hearing,” Kinzinger had told CNN’s Jim Sciutto on “Newsroom” in response to a question about whether the committee had brought sufficient evidence for the Justice Department to indict Trump.
“I think, taken in totality, this represents the greatest effort to overturn the will of the people, to conspire against the will of the people, and to conspire against American democracy that we’ve ever had, frankly, since the Civil War,” Kinzinger continued. “So yeah, I think we’ve proven that. It’s up to Justice now to make a decision.”
So what’s the November 08 midterm 2022 polls look like for President Biden and ex Donald Trump. If Trump announces his candidacy before fall to influence the midterms, then Biden enjoys the advantage of not facing a referendum on his alleged inept administration to tackle the American economy’s challenges and if Trump does listen for once to the advice from his republicans to delay his announcement, then the democrats and the republicans are in a tight race for the 435-member house of reps and senate were democrats have a wafer thin majority now.
If republicans fail to retake the congress house of reps, then Rino De Santis, Florida governor could be the republican candidate for presidency, but no candidate opposing Trump has ever beaten him in the GOP primaries head-to-head. As for Joe Biden, his prospects will become better if the US economy does not sink into recession, sanctions are lifted against Russia , Russia stops the war against Ukraine, and inflation reels down. Russian Gas supply to Europe has resumed ahead of the winter season, an encouraging sign.
This move would expand US involvement in war and risk significant escalation with Russia.
As the Ukraine-Russia war is set to enter its fifth month, the US is mulling increasing its military aid to the Eastern European country and in the latest announcement by the White House, Pentagon is now considering providing Ukrainian forces with fighter jets, media reports said.
On Friday, John Kirby, the National Security Council coordinator for strategic communications, said that the Pentagon “is making some preliminary explorations into the feasibility of potentially providing fighter aircraft to the Ukrainians,” adding, “But it’s not something that they’re going to be able to execute immediately or even in the short term.”
This move would expand US involvement in war and risk significant escalation with Russia, reported Wall Street Journal.
The comments from a senior White House national security spokesman are the latest sign of the Biden administration’s growing assertiveness on arms supply for Kyiv.
It suggests an increasing willingness to provide advanced weaponry in an effort to help turn the tide of the war however the outcome is hard to predict as the war prolongs.
Poland, in March, proposed transferring MiG-29 aircraft to Ukraine however the Pentagon rejected the offer, calling it “high risk.”
Ukraine war (Photo@zelenskiy.official) (IANS)
The US intelligence community assessed that transferring the Russian-made aircraft would risk a response from Moscow that could result in a direct military conflict with NATO.
Kirby while addressing reporters during a briefing said that the issues that must be addressed before the US is to give Ukrainians training on the jet’s maintenance, and providing spare parts.
However, he did not say anything about the kind of aircraft the US was considering or when the administration would make a decision.
A former Pentagon official said F-15 and F-16 fighter jets have been discussed as options for Ukraine, though both aircraft require significant training and maintenance.
The Pentagon declined to provide details about what it is assessing. “We are certainly engaged in a large discussion with the Ukrainians about their future force needs,” a senior defense official told reporters during a briefing, as per the media portal. (ANI)
Among the most alarming things the FBI uncovered pertains to Chinese-made Huawei equipment atop cell towers near US military bases in the rural Midwest.
A frenzy of counter-intelligence activity by the FBI and US other federal agencies has focused on what career security officials say has been a dramatic escalation of Chinese espionage on American soil over the past decade.
Since at least 2017, federal officials have investigated Chinese land purchases near critical infrastructure, shut down a high-profile regional consulate believed by the US government to be a hotbed of Chinese spies and stone-walled what they saw as clear efforts to plant listening devices near sensitive military and government facilities, CNN reported.
Among the most alarming things the FBI uncovered pertains to Chinese-made Huawei equipment atop cell towers near US military bases in the rural Midwest.
According to multiple sources familiar with the matter, the FBI determined the equipment was capable of capturing and disrupting highly restricted Defence Department communications, including those used by US Strategic Command, which oversees the country’s nuclear weapons, CNN reported.
While broad concerns about Huawei equipment near US military installations have been well known, the existence of this investigation and its findings have never been reported.?Its origins stretch back to at least the former Barack Obama administration.
It’s unclear if the intelligence community determined whether any data was actually intercepted and sent back to Beijing from these towers. Sources familiar with the issue say that from a technical standpoint, it’s incredibly difficult to prove a given package of data was stolen and sent overseas.
Photo taken in 2019 shows then U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen, Acting Attorney General Matthew Whitaker, Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross, FBI Director Christopher Wray announcing 23 Criminal Charges Against China’s Huawei & Wanzhou Meng.
But multiple sources familiar with the investigation tell CNN that there’s no question the Huawei equipment has the ability to intercept not only commercial cell traffic but also the highly restricted airwaves used by the military and disrupt critical US Strategic Command communications, giving the Chinese government a potential window into America’s nuclear arsenal, CNN reported.
“This gets into some of the most sensitive things we do,” said one former FBI official with knowledge of the investigation.
“It would impact our ability for essentially command and control with the nuclear triad. That goes into the ‘BFD’ category. If it is possible for that to be disrupted, then that is a very bad day.”
However, the Chinese government strongly denies any efforts to spy on the US. Huawei in a statement to CNN also denied that its equipment is capable of operating in any communications spectrum allocated to the Defence Department.
Jail terms and fines will be determined during sentencing, which is scheduled for October 21. reports Yashwant Raj
A federal jury on Friday found Steve Bannon, an advisor to former US President Donald Trump, guilty of two counts of criminal contempt of Congress.
Jail terms and fines will be determined during sentencing, which is scheduled for October 21. Bannon faces between 30 days to one year behind bars and a fine of $100 to $100,000 for each count.
The trial lasted less than a week; it started on Monday, the US attorney and defence up their arguments on Thursday and the jurors returned the guilty verdict on Friday.
“This case is not complicated, but it is important,” Assistant US Attorney Molly Gaston told jurors during closing arguments on Friday. She argued, that “he did not want to recognise Congress’ authority” or play by the government’s rules.
Bannon was on trial for defying a subpoena from a congressional select committee investigating the January 6 riots at the US Capitol by hordes of Trump supporters who wanted to prevent Congress from certifying the election of Joe Biden as President in the November 2020 elections.
The select committee, which held its eighth public hearing on Thursday, had ordered Bannon to, one, depose before it and, two, submit documents it had sought.
Bannon did neither.
Despite having left the Trump administration in 2017 as senior advisor to President Trump, he had claimed the cover of Trump’s executive privilege to defy the subpoena. The committee rejected his plea and referred the case to the department of justice to determine if he needed to be prosecuted. He was indicted in February on two counts of criminal contempt of Congress.
Just ahead of the start of the trial, though, Bannon dropped his defiance and offered to testify. Trump also gave him a letter granting him exemption from executive privilege. But the select committee rejected his offer and the court refused to stop or delay the trial.
The select committee’s interest in Bannon stemmed from a perception that he may have played a role in the planning and executing of the January 6 insurrection.
Bannon had infamously predicted the January 6 riots. “All hell is going to break loose tomorrow,” Bannon had said on a right-wing radio talk show on January 5, the day before. A clip from that show was played by the select committee of the House of Representatives at a hearing in July. “It’s all converging, and now we’re on, as they say, the point of attack,” he had added.
The select committee has said that Bannon made the “all hell is going to break loose” after a phone conversation with Trump on January 5. The former advisor had also attended a “war-room” meeting with other Trump aides such as personal attorney Rudy Giuliani the same day about the rally the next day.
Another Trump aide, former trade advisor Peter Navarro, is also facing contempt of congress proceedings; he was indicted in June. The department of justice has declined, however, to prosecute two other Trump aides – former Chief of Staff Mark Meadows and former Social Media Director Dan Scavino – referred to it by the committee for contempt.
Meadows first cooperated with the committee and turned over thousands of documents containing text messages, emails, and other communications, but pulled out of personal testimony.
The select committee is expected to hold its last public hearing on Thursday. It has no power to prosecute anyone, but the department of justice has been following the proceedings closely and had already raided two Trump-era aides who participated in his efforts to overturn his defeat in the 2020 presidential election.
Artemis 1, was earlier scheduled to launch in late May 2022. However, due to multiple delays in its wet dress rehearsal the mega moon rocket has been pushed further…reports Asian Lite News
NASA’s much awaited Artemis 1 moon rocket will likely be launched in late August, the agency has said.
NASA said it has tentatively selected 3 dates for the launch: August 29; September 2; and September 5.
However, “it’s not an agency commitment,” Jim Free, NASA’s associate administrator for exploration systems development, said during a media briefing.
“But these are the dates that the team is working to and have a plan to.
“We’re trying to make sure that everybody understands this is the first time that we’re going to try and launch this vehicle.
“We’re going to be careful. We’re going to work hard to meet the attempts on those dates that I gave you and do our best to position ourselves to have the confidence in those dates,” Free said.
Artemis 1, was earlier scheduled to launch in late May 2022. However, due to multiple delays in its wet dress rehearsal the mega moon rocket has been pushed further.
After multiple attempts, the wet dress rehearsal was finally concluded on June 20, amid a hydrogen leak.
The final test marked the culmination of months of assembly and testing for SLS and Orion, as well as preparations by launch control and engineering teams, setting the stage for the first Artemis launch.
A confirmed launch date is expected closer to the actual lift-off.
“We’ll make the agency commitment at the flight readiness review just a little over a week before launch,” Free said.
The uncrewed Artemis I mission is the first flight of the SLS rocket and Orion spacecraft together. Future missions will send people to work in lunar orbit and on the Moon’s surface.
With the Artemis missions, NASA will land the first woman and the first person of colour on the Moon and establish long-term exploration in preparation for missions to Mars.
Temperatures in large parts of the southwest United States have soared to over 100 degrees Fahrenheit (38 degrees Celsius), topping 110 degrees in some areas…reports Asian Lite News
A relentless heat wave that has triggered health alerts for more than 100 million people is set to intensify this weekend, with temperatures and humidity forecast to surge to suffocating highs in many parts of the country.
The devastating heat — which has also hit Europe, causing hundreds of deaths there — highlights the direct threat climate change poses to even the wealthiest countries on the planet.
“So far this week, 60 daily high temperature records have been tied/broken as dangerous heat enveloped much of the Nation,” the National Weather Service (NWS) said in a tweet Thursday morning
“More records are likely to be set over the next week,” it added.
Temperatures in large parts of the southwest United States have soared to over 100 degrees Fahrenheit (38 degrees Celsius), topping 110 degrees in some areas. Similar levels were recorded across the US south, where humidity compounded the discomfort.
The NWS tweeted Tuesday that 100 million people were under heat-related warnings and advisories, and said on Thursday that a “significant portion of the population” would remain under such warnings over the weekend.
Already high temperatures were set to rise further this weekend across the east coast of the United States, where high humidity could push “feels-like” temperatures well above 100 degrees.
Washington and Philadelphia have both declared heat emergencies, and warned their residents to remain vigilant.
“Stay hydrated, limit sun exposure, and check on seniors, neighbors & pets,” Washington Mayor Muriel Bowser said on Twitter.
Philadelphia’s Department of Public Health warned in a statement that “during hot weather, NEVER leave children and pets unattended in vehicles under any circumstances.”
More heat to come
While the oppressive heat is expected to subside in the US south and east next week, a high pressure system over the Pacific northwest is expected to push temperatures 10-15 degrees above normal levels.
Temperatures have also soared in Europe, setting a new all-time record in Britain, where the national weather service clocked 104.5 degrees in eastern England, surpassing the previous high set in 2019.
Unlike much of western Europe, most homes in the United States have air conditioning, helping to mitigate the heat wave’s health risks, but adding strain on the power grid in times of high usage.
In Texas, residents were asked last week to reduce their power consumption by not running major appliances from 2:00 pm to 8:00 pm, as the southern state’s electric utility warned that low windspeeds threatened the grid reliability.
The City of New York on Thursday asked residents to use less energy by raising their air conditioning to 78 degrees and unplugging appliances.
Scientists have warned that heat waves like the ones being felt in the United States and Europe will become more frequent and rise in intensity due to global warming.
Though he campaigned on an agenda of robust action against climate change, US President Joe Biden’s biggest plans have been stymied by the Supreme Court and lawmakers, including from his own Democratic party.
Biden announced in a speech Wednesday that his administration would redouble efforts to address global warming, but stopped short of declaring a formal climate emergency, which would grant him additional policy powers.
At the Capitol, the mob was chanting “Hang Mike Pence,” testified Matt Pottinger, a deputy national security adviser for Trump, as Trump tweeted his condemnation of his vice president…reports Asian Lite News
With the Capitol siege raging, President Donald Trump poured “gasoline on the fire” by tweeting condemnation of Mike Pence’s refusal to go along with his plan to stop the certification of Joe Biden’s victory, former aides told the Jan. 6 investigating committee in a prime-time hearing Thursday night.
Earlier, an irate Trump demanded to be taken to the Capitol after his supporters had stormed the building, well aware of the deadly attack, but then returned to the White House and did nothing to call off the violence, despite appeals from family and close adviser, witnesses testified.
At the Capitol, the mob was chanting “Hang Mike Pence,” testified Matt Pottinger, a deputy national security adviser for Trump, as Trump tweeted his condemnation of his vice president.
Meanwhile, recordings of Secret Service radio transmissions revealed agents asking for messages to be relayed telling their families goodbye.
Pottinger said that when he saw Trump’s tweet he immediately decided to resign, as did former White House aide Sarah Matthews, who described herself as a lifelong Republican but could not go along with what was going on. She was the witness who called the tweet “pouring gasoline on the fire.”
The hearing aimed to show a “minute by minute” accounting of Trump’s actions that day and how rather than stop the violence, he watched it all unfold on television at the White House.
An irate Trump demanded to be taken to the Capitol after the supporters he sent laid siege, well aware of the deadly attack and that some in the mob were armed but refusing to call it off as they fought to reverse his election defeat, witnesses told the Jan. 6 investigating committee Thursday night.
Trump had dispatched the crowd to Capitol Hill in heated rally remarks at the Ellipse behind the White House, and “within 15 minutes of leaving the stage, President Trump knew that the Capitol was besieged and under attack,” said committee member Elaine Luria, D-Virginia.
She said the panel had received testimony the confirming the powerful previous account of former White House aide Cassidy Hutchinson of an altercation involving Trump as he insisted the Secret Service drive him to the Capitol.
Among the witnesses testifying Thursday in a recorded video was retired District of Columbia Metropolitan Police Department Sgt. Mark Robinson who told the committee that Trump was well aware of the number of weapons in the crowd of his supporters but wanted to go regardless.
“The only description that I received was that the president was upset, and that he was adamant about going to the Capitol and that there was a heated discussion about that,” Robinson said. The panel heard Trump was “irate.”
Rep. Luria said Trump “did not call to issue orders. He did not call to offer assistance.”
Chairman Bennie Thompson opened Thursday’s prime-time hearing of the Jan. 6 committee saying Trump as president did “everything in his power to overturn the election” he lost to Joe Biden, including before and during the deadly Capitol attack.
“He lied, he bullied, he betrayed his oath,” charged Thompson, D-Mississippi
After months of work and weeks of hearings, committee co-chair Liz Cheney of Wyoming said “the dam has begun to break” on revealing what happened that day, at the White House as well as in the violence at the Capitol.
This was probably the last hearing of the summer, but the panel said they will resume in September as more witnesses and information emerges.
“Our investigation goes forward,” said Thompson testifying remotely as he isolates after testing positive for COVID-19. “There needs to be accountability.”
Plunging into its second prime-time hearing on the Capitol attack, the committee vowed close scrutiny of Trump’s actions during the deadly riot, which the panel says he did nothing to stop but instead “gleefully” watched on television at the White House.
The hearing room was packed, including with several police officers who fought off the mob that day. The panel is diving into the 187 minutes that Trump failed to act on Jan. 6, 2021, despite pleas from aides, allies and even his family. The panel is arguing that the defeated president’s lies about a stolen election and attempts to overturn Joe Biden’s election victory fueled the attack and have left the United States facing enduring questions about the resiliency of its democracy.
“A profound moment of reckoning for America,” said Rep. Jamie Raskin, D-Md., a member of the committee.
Live testimony
With live testimony from two former White House aides, and excerpts from the committee’s more than 1,000 interviews, the Thursday night session will add a closing chapter to the past six weeks of hearings that at times have captivated the nation and provided a record for history.
Ahead of the hearing, the committee released a video of four former White House aides — press secretary Kayleigh McEnany, security aide Gen. Keith Kellogg, White House Counsel Pat Cipollone and executive assistant to the president Molly Michael — testifying that Trump was in the private dining room with the TV on as the violence unfolded.
“Everyone was watching television,” Kellogg said.
Returning to prime time for the first time since the series of hearings began, the panel intends to explain just how close the United States came to what one retired federal judge testifying this summer called a constitutional crisis.
The events of Jan. 6 will be outlined “minute by minute,” said the panel’s vice chair, Rep. Liz Cheney, R-Wyoming.
“You will hear that Donald Trump never picked up the phone that day to order his administration to help,” Cheney said.
“He did not call the military. His Secretary of Defense received no order. He did not call his Attorney General. He did not talk to the Department of Homeland Security,” Cheney said. “Mike Pence did all of those things; Donald Trump did not.”
The hearing will show never-before-seen outtakes of a Jan. 7 video that White House aides pleaded for Trump to make as a message of national healing for the country. The footage will show how Trump struggled to condemn the mob of his supporters who violently breached the Capitol, according to a person familiar with the matter and granted anonymity to discuss it ahead of its public release.
Former White House aide Cassidy Hutchinson has testified that Trump wanted to include language about pardoning the rioters in the speech, but White House lawyers advised against it. Trump reluctantly condemned the riot in a three-minute speech that night.
Testifying Thursday are former White House aides. Matt Pottinger, who was deputy national security adviser, and Sarah Matthews, then press aide, both submitted their resignations on Jan. 6, 2021, after what they saw that day. Trump has dismissed the hearings on social media and regarded much of the testimony as fake.
Rep. Bennie Thompson, D-Mississippi, the chairman of the committee, is isolating after testing positive for COVID-19 and will attend by video. Rep. Elaine Luria, D-Virginia, a former Naval officer who will lead the session with Rep. Adam Kinzinger, R-Illinois, who flew combat missions in Iraq and Afghanistan, said she expects the testimony from the White House aides will “just be really compelling.”
“These are people who believed in the work they were doing, but didn’t believe in the stolen election,” Luria said.
840 rioters charged
The White House aides were not alone in calling it quits that day. The panel is expected to provide a tally of the Trump administration aides and even Cabinet members who resigned after Trump failed to call off the attack. Some Cabinet members were so alarmed they discussed invoking the 25th Amendment to remove Trump from office.
As the panel continues to collect evidence and prepares to issue a preliminary report of findings, it has amassed the most substantial public record to date of what led up to Americans attacking the seat of democracy.
While the committee cannot make criminal charges, the Justice Department is monitoring its work.
So far, more than 840 people have been charged with federal crimes related to the Capitol riot. Over 330 of them have pleaded guilty, mostly to misdemeanors. Of the more than 200 defendants to be sentenced, approximately 100 received terms of imprisonment.
What remains uncertain is whether Trump or the former president’s top allies will face serious charges. No former president has ever been federally prosecuted by the Justice Department.
Prosecutors opened the trial with the simple argument: The Trump ally decided he was “above the law”. They said his defiance of the January 6 panel was a “choice.”…writes Ashok Nilakantan
Close Donald Trump aide, media executive, and banker Steve Bannon was accused by prosecutors of thinking that he was “above the law” in not abiding by requests to appear before the Congressional committee investigating Jan 6 “Capitol Hill Insurrection” after several requests and even after being subpoenaed last year in October.
Bannon, who was in close touch with Trump before and after during the Jan 6 riots, had allegedly said in a message that “tomorrow (January 6, 2021) all hell is going to break loose”. It’s nothing like you ever imagined before, he had said indicating he had advance knowledge of what was going to unfold on January 6 because of being in touch with Trump in those crucial moments and days. He is standing trial for criminal charges for contempt for not obeying the subpoenas served on him.
Prosecutors opened the trial with the simple argument: The Trump ally decided he was “above the law”. They said his defiance of the January 6 panel was a “choice.”
Bannon’s lawyer argued that “no one believed” the Trump ally would testify in October 2021. Before opening arguments, Bannon’s lawyers tried again to delay the criminal trial but failed, according to various media reports.
Kicking off Bannon’s trial, federal prosecutors on Tuesday stressed their view of the case’s sheer simplicity: the longtime Trump ally received a deadline to answer a subpoena from the Committee investigating the January 6, 2021, Capitol attack. And Bannon just refused to comply.
“This case is about the defendant thumbing his nose at the orderly processes of our government,” said Assistant US Attorney Amanda Vaughn, in an opening argument to jurors. “It is that simple,” she added.
In a nearly 20-minute argument, Vaughn recounted how the House committee sought to question Bannon about his knowledge of the events leading up to the insurrection at the Capitol and gave him due dates last October to sit for questioning and turn over documents. Bannon then deliberately snubbed the House panel, she said, in spite of warnings that his defiance could result in the very criminal charges he now faces. “It wasn’t optional. It wasn’t a request, and it wasn’t an invitation. It was mandatory,” Vaughn said. “The defendant decided he was above the law… and that’s why we’re here today.”
“He didn’t get stuck on a broken-down Metro car. He just refused to follow the rules,” Vaughn was quoted by the media as saying. Vaughn’s opening argument seemed to head off Bannon’s expected defense: that he considered the House committee’s deadlines negotiable and not fixed.
Also, Bannon tried to seek refuge under the President’s executive privilege saying he could not testify unless Trump waived it, and surprisingly, Trump waived it. But the Congressional select committee said he was not entitled to the privilege as he was not physically present on the fateful day in the White House.
In his own opening argument, Bannon’s defense lawyer Evan Corcoran underscored the Trump ally’s time as an advisor to the former President and noted his past involvement with a “media company,” in an apparent reference to Breitbart News. “The evidence is going to be crystal clear: No one, no one believed that Steve Bannon was going to appear on October 14, 2021,” Corcoran said.
A grand jury indicted Bannon in November, weeks after that deadline, on a pair of contempt of Congress charges – each carrying a maximum sentence of a year in prison and a fine of up to $100,000. In his opening argument, Corcoran said the charges amounted to a politically motivated attack. “Politics is the lifeblood of the US House of Representatives,” Corcoran said. “Politics invades every decision that they make.”
Following Tuesday’s opening arguments, prosecutors called the House January 6 Committee’s deputy staff director and chief counsel, Kristin Amerling, who stressed the “urgency” of the congressional panel’s inquiry. If Republicans retake the House majority in the upcoming midterm elections (November 8), they are expected to dissolve the January committee. “The select committee is looking at a violent assault on the United States Capitol, on law enforcement officials, on our democratic institutions. And we have a limited amount of time,” she said.
The opening arguments and Amerling’s testimony unfolded after a bumpy start to the trial, as Bannon’s defense lawyers, federal prosecutors, and the judge all reportedly quarrelled over what evidence could be presented to the jury. After multiple failed attempts to push back the trial, Corcoran asked again for a delay, saying the defense team needed a month to adjust its strategy in light of what he called a “seismic shift” in the case. “There are a lot of moving pieces,” Corcoran said. “We simply have not done the type of defense preparation we would have.”
US District Court Judge Carl Nichols however rejected the request. But the judge, a Trump appointee confirmed in 2019, did briefly entertain a one-day delay, while defense lawyers and prosecutors wrangled over to what extent Bannon’s correspondence with the House January 6 committee should be redacted – or blacked out – in the evidence shown to jurors.
Ahead of the trial, Nichols handed down a string of rulings that limited Bannon’s defenses, preventing him from arguing, for instance, that executive privilege excused his defiance of the House January 6 committee. But Nichols indicated that Bannon could raise a defense that he believed that the deadlines to respond to the House January 6 committee’s subpoena were negotiable and not fixed.
However, Judge Nichols said: “I don’t think it could have been clearer.”
Much of the drama of the Bannon trial has been about its timing. Will this trial be short and straightforward (like prosecutors foresee) or long and more complicated (like Bannon hopes)? Would it be delayed for a month or longer, or could it even head to deliberations before the select committee prime-time hearing Thursday night?
Only a handful of witnesses have been identified in both sides’ plans for the trial, meaning that the proceedings are still on track to take just a few days. The question now is whether Bannon’s charges will be deliberated by the jury before Thursday’s January 6 committee hearing where press aide Sarah Mathews and Deputy National Security Advisor (NSC) to the then President Donald Trump, Mathew Pottinger are scheduled to depose before the select committee prime time.
The group says Trump is flouting campaign finance laws by dropping frequent hints that he is planning to seek the White House again…reports Asian Lite News
A Democratic Party fundraising group has recently filed a complaint against the Federal Election Commission, accusing it of allowing former President Donald Trump to break campaign finance law by spending political donations on a 2024 presidential bid, media reported.
The group, American Bridge, complained in March to the FEC about Trump’s Save America fund, according to a Reuters report.
Under US law, the fund can pay for political activities such as Trump’s travel, hotel stays and contributions to political allies, but it cannot be used to fund the former Republican president’s own election campaign, it was reported.
The group says Trump is flouting campaign finance laws by dropping frequent hints that he is planning to seek the White House again while having Save America pay for rallies nationwide and digital advertising promoting him, it was reported.
Meanwhile, the Congressional committee investigating the January 6 Capitol Hill’s insurrection will hold its meeting as scheduled on Thursday (July 21) even as chairman Bennie Thompson has tested positive for Covid.
July 21 is yet another crucial day in the senate select committee’s hearings as two key witnesses are scheduled to depose before it – Sarah Mathews, Press Aide and Mathhew Pottinger, deputy national security advisor, both of whom resigned immediately from Trump’s administration after the January 6 Capitol Hills attack by the Oath Keepers and Proud Boys.
Bennie Thompson, a Democrat from Mississippi, in a statement said he tested positive for Covid even though he had taken the prescribed two shots plus the boosters.
“I am experiencing mild symptoms only,” but he said he would skip the hearings and isolate himself for some days, and the hearings would be held as scheduled on Thursday July 21 and continue,” according to the news portal CNET.
It’s not clear if vice chair Liz Cheney, Republican Wyoming, will chair the sessions or Benni Thompson will do so via TV or virtually.
The committee is heading for a conclusion as it continues to make its case about how the January 6 Capitol riot happened, who was involved and where the responsibility lies.
Constituted an year ago, the select committee has been investigating the circumstances behind the January 6 attack and those who influenced more than 800 people who’ve been criminally charged in connection with an attempt to stop Congress from certifying President Joe Biden’s win in the 2020.
The committee’s next hearing is Thursday, July 21, at 8 p.m. ET/5 p.m PT.
Hearings are available on C-SPAN and the January 6 committee’s YouTube channel. News networks such as CNN, CNBC and MSNBC will likely carry it live.
The last prime-time hearing was carried by Fox Business instead of Fox News. It’s unknown if the major networks will preempt their Thursday night lineup to show the session.
