“The threat of coronavirus variants is growing, and CDC Director Dr. Rochelle Walensky warns that, if we’re not careful, their spread could reverse falling case numbers and delay the recovery that’s just now coming over the horizon. In the UK, officials are racing to track down a single person infected with a variant first identified in Brazil to prevent further spread. The key to getting over this hurdle? Vaccinations, experts say, and a few more excruciating months of safety precautions. Meanwhile, China is aiming to have half a billion of its citizens vaccinated by June, a massive number that will account for 40% of its population. So far, about 50 million people there have gotten a vaccine.” Read more at CNN
“The Supreme Court hears a case today that could weaken a key provision of the Voting Rights Act that prohibits laws that result in racial discrimination. Brnovich v. DNC concerns a challenge brought by the Democratic National Committee against two provisions of an Arizona law that critics say unfairly affect communities of color. The laws have to do with strict requirements to vote in a specific precinct and who can handle ballots. Voting rights advocates fear the court’s conservative majority could set new and stricter voting precedents. After Donald Trump’s repeated baseless claims of voter fraud after the 2020 elections, state lawmakers have carried over or introduced at least 253 bills to restrict voting access in 43 states.” Read more at CNN
A “souls to the polls” march in Miami in November. Rebecca Blackwell/Associated Press
How hard should voting be?
“In dozens of states, the Republican Party has responded to Donald Trump’s defeat by trying to change election laws, often to make voting more difficult.
The Democratic Party is struggling to figure out how to respond.
And voting-right experts are worried that the result could be the biggest rollback of Americans’ voting rights since the demise of Reconstruction in the 19th century.
First, some background: Trump did not start this trend. For more than a decade, Republican politicians — often worried about their ability to win elections in a diversifying country — have tried to reduce voting access. But Trump’s defeat and his repeated claims about voter fraud (almost all of them false) have lent new energy to the effort.
Legislators in Georgia are pushing bills that would make it harder to register and harder to vote by mail. Arizona, Pennsylvania and several other states are also considering new restrictions on mail voting. The Brennan Center for Justice, a think tank in New York, has counted 253 bills across 43 states seeking to tighten voting rules, as The Times’s Michael Wines has noted.
It’s a reflection of a widespread belief among Republican officials that high voter turnout hurts their chances of winning elections. They may be wrong about that: As the Republican Party has become more working class, it has attracted many supporters who vote only occasionally.
Still, Republican candidates will probably benefit from any changes that disproportionately affect Black and Latino voters, like the elimination of automatic registration. ‘The restrictions we’re seeing are going to have a greater impact on the communities that have been most traditionally disadvantaged,’ says Myrna Pérez, a voting rights expert at the Brennan Center.
Democrats, along with any Republicans and independents who favor wider voting access, have three possible ways to respond. One of those three will be on display today at the Supreme Court.
‘The last place you want to be’
The court will hear a case from Arizona in which Democratic officials are challenging two state provisions. One requires the disposal of any ballots cast at the wrong precinct, and another forbids people — like church leaders or party organizers — to collect absentee ballots for submission. The Democrats argue that these provisions especially affect minority voters and thus violate the Voting Rights Act. (Adam Liptak, The Times’s Supreme Court reporter, explains in more depth here.)
The Arizona lawsuit is an example of a main way that advocates have tried to protect voting rights over the past few decades: through the courts. Along the way, they have won some victories, including in a recent case from North Carolina.
But they have usually lost. The Supreme Court under Chief Justice John Roberts has generally ruled against voting-rights advocates, and most court observers expect the justices to allow Arizona’s restrictions to stand.
If anything, the justices may use the case to issue a broader ruling that endorses other voting restrictions. ‘I think the real question here is not what happens to these particular restrictions,’ said my colleague Emily Bazelon, who’s covered fights over election laws. ‘It’s the test the Supreme Court imposes for future challenges to more onerous restrictions, more of which are coming down the pike.’
Richard Hasen, an election-law expert at the University of California, Irvine, told me that he thought Democrats had made a mistake in bringing this case. ‘If you’re a voting-rights lawyer, the last place you want to be right now is the Supreme Court,’ Hasen said.
The filibuster versus voting rights
Other than the courts, the other two main voting-rights battlegrounds are state governments and Congress.
But state governments are hard places to protect voting rights today, because Democrats control only 15 of them — and none in swing states like Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, North Carolina, Pennsylvania or Wisconsin. The Democrats’ biggest problem in many states is the failure to develop a message that resonates not only with college graduates and in major metropolitan areas but also in blue-collar and rural areas. Republicans have compounded that issue through aggressive gerrymandering, including in Michigan, North Carolina and Wisconsin.
The remaining option for voting-rights advocates is Congress — and Democrats now control both Congress and the White House.
The House of Representatives has passed a bill that would expand voting rights, and President Biden supports it. It would guarantee automatic voter registration and widely available early voting and mail voting, among other steps. For the bill to have any chance in the Senate, however, Democrats would need the unanimous support of their 50 senators, and they would need to scrap or alter the filibuster.
The debate over the filibuster can sometimes seem theoretical. But voting rights is one of the tangible ways in which it matters. If the filibuster remains in place, voting rights in the United States will probably be in retreat over the coming decade.
A different G.O.P. approach: In Kentucky, Republican state legislators are working with Democrats to expand ballot access while also strengthening election security, as Joshua Douglas of the University of Kentucky has explained for CNN.” Read more at New York Times
“Oil trade group is poised to embrace carbon pricing. The American Petroleum Institute, one of the most powerful trade associations in Washington, is preparing to endorse setting a price on carbon emissions in what would be the strongest signal yet that oil and gas producers are ready to accept government efforts to confront climate change.” Read more at Wall Street Journal
“CVS, Walgreens look for big data reward from vaccinations.Administering Covid-19 shots comes with a valuable perk for retail pharmacies: access to troves of consumer data. Chains are collecting information from millions of customers as they sign up for vaccinations, enrolling them in patient systems and having recipients register customer profiles.” Read more at Wall Street Journal
“FBI director to testify about Jan. 6 riot. Christopher Wray is expected to make his first extensive remarks about the violence at the U.S. Capitol before a Senate panel today, as the agency grapples with how to combat violent domestic extremism in the wake of the attack.” Read more at Wall Street Journal
“A third woman has accused Gov. Andrew Cuomo of misconduct, saying he placed his hands on her face and asked if he could kiss her the first time they met. Representative Kathleen Rice became the first Democrat in the New York congressional delegation to call for Cuomo’s resignation.” Read more at New York Times
“Hundreds of schoolgirls kidnapped at gunpoint last week have been rescued, authorities say. The 279 girls were abducted by armed men who raided their state-run school in Nigeria's northwest Zamfara State. The abduction is the latest in a string of similar kidnapping cases in the country. At least 42 people were kidnapped from a state-run school last month and later released, and more than 300 schoolboys were taken and later freed in December. Attackers who carry out these kidnappings often demand massive ransoms for the students’ safe return or use victims for blackmail. The recent rash of incidents has raised questions about school safety in Nigeria's northern region.” Read more at CNN
“The Boy Scouts of America released a bankruptcy reorganization plan late Monday calling for local councils to contribute at least $300 million to a trust to settle tens of thousands of sex-abuse claims.
The long-awaited reorganization plan, filed as part of the Boy Scouts’ ongoing Chapter 11 bankruptcy proceedings, begins to outline how the embattled organization aims to compensate the deluge of 85,000 potential victims who came forward last year with claims. But lawyers on behalf of both the victims and the group’s insurers say they are unsatisfied with the plan.
The Boy Scouts of America, which filed for bankruptcy in February 2020, had initially sought to shield its local councils from the bankruptcy process. But more recently, it became clear that any settlement was going to involve local council participation, and Monday’s filing anticipates a $300 million contribution from some of the Boy Scouts’ 253 councils across the country. The plan did not state which councils would contribute to the fund, or how.” Read more at Washington Post
“President Biden pledged to increase the number of refugees admitted to the US, but because he hasn’t signed an executive action on it yet, refugees abroad are in limbo. Hundreds of refugees bound for the US have had their trips postponed as the Trump administration cap remains in place. Meanwhile, Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas says families separated at the border under other Trump-era policies may be reunited in the US and given lawful pathways to stay in the country. And migrant numbers are on the rise, as are apprehensions at the southern US border. Despite the increase, US officials have publicly said now is not the time for migrants to come, citing the pandemic and hoping to avoid a surge at the border.” Read more at CNN
The U.S. Capitol attacked by thugs. An alleged plot to kidnap a state governor. Bogus claims of widespread election fraud. Violent protests in the streets. Death threats against public health officials. And a never-ending barrage of anger and misinformation on social media directed at, and by, politicians, leaders, pundits and an increasingly bitter and frustrated populace.
As the battles have raged, trust in institutions — government, media, the law — has plummeted.
So how did we get here? And how do we get out?
For many close observers, a direct line can be drawn from today’s civics crises to a long-standing failure to adequately teach American government, history and civic responsibility. Breadth has been emphasized over depth, they say, and the cost is a citizenry largely ignorant of the work needed to sustain a democracy.
Now, a diverse collection of academics, historians, teachers, school administrators and state education leaders is proposing an overhaul of the way civics and history are taught to American K-12 students. And they’re calling for a massive investment of funds, teacher training and curriculum development to help make that happen.
The Educating for American Democracy (EAD) initiative will release a 36-page report and an accompanying 39-page road map Tuesday, laying out extensive guidance for improving and reimagining the teaching of social studies, history and civics and then implementing that over the next decade.
The partnership’s diagnosis is urgent and unsparing.
‘Civics and history education has eroded in the U.S. over the past fifty years, and opportunities to learn these subjects are inequitably distributed,’ the report states. ‘Dangerously low proportions of the public understand and trust our democratic institutions. Majorities are functionally illiterate on our constitutional principles and forms. The relative neglect of civic education in the past half-century—a period of wrenching change—is one important cause of our civic and political dysfunction.’
After Capitol attack, social studies and civics teachers struggle with real-time history lessons
Work on the report began two years ago with $650,000 in grants from the Education Department and the National Endowment for the Humanities to come up with a plan to address what some have described as an existential issue for the country. The grant was later increased to $1.1 million. More than 300 individuals with experience at all levels of civics, political science and social studies education contributed to the project, including many with disparate views and ideas about how the work should be done.” Read more at Washington Post
“WASHINGTON — Senator Elizabeth Warren, Democrat from Massachusetts, introduced legislation Monday that would tax the net worth of the wealthiest people in America, a proposal aimed at persuading President Biden and other Democrats to fund sweeping new federal spending programs by taxing the richest Americans. Warren’s wealth tax would apply a 2 percent tax to individual net worth — including the value of stocks, houses, boats and anything else a person owns, after subtracting out any debts — above $50 million.
It would add an additional 1 percent surcharge for net worth above $1 billion. It is co-sponsored in the House by two Democratic representatives, Pramila Jayapal of Washington, who leads the Congressional Progressive Caucus, and Brendan Boyle of Pennsylvania, a moderate.” Read more at Boston Globe
“Alexei Navalny, the Russian opposition politician, is going to serve his prison sentence in a penal colony notorious for disciplinary measures considered harsh even by Russian standards, Russian news outlets reported Monday.
Russia’s decision to transfer Navalny to a prison known for abusive treatment of inmates came even as the Kremlin faced mounting foreign criticism for the sentencing as well as an assassination attempt on Navalny last summer.
Navalny returned to Russia in January despite the government’s threats of arrest, after spending months in a Berlin hospital recuperating from being poisoned. He was subsequently convicted in a show trial of violating the terms of his parole during his stay in Germany and sentenced to more than two years in prison.” Read more at Boston Globe
“ISLAMABAD — The United States wasted billions of dollars in war-torn Afghanistan on buildings and vehicles that were either abandoned or destroyed, according to a report released Monday by a US government watchdog.
The agency said it reviewed $7.8 billion spent since 2008 on buildings and vehicles. Only $343.2 million worth of buildings and vehicles ‘were maintained in good condition,’ said the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction, or SIGAR, which oversees American taxpayer money spent on the protracted conflict.
The report said that just $1.2 billion of the $7.8 billion went to pay for buildings and vehicles that were used as intended.” Read more at Boston Globe
“The work-from-home revolution spurred by Covid-19 lockdowns has reshaped the daily lives of millions of people. Now interest in a four-day week is gaining momentum.
As Stefan Nicola reports, a push is underway to re-engineer places of employment as the pandemic hammers growth and increases inequality. Technological innovations from automation to the shift to green industries are also driving fundamental changes to jobs.
The benefits to employees of a shorter workweek (with no reduced pay) are obvious, but not everyone is convinced. Skeptics argue it damages productivity for companies and countries facing intense competition from fast-growing rivals in Asia. Alibaba co-founder Jack Ma famously extols China’s ‘996’ culture of 9am-9pm workdays six days a week.
Advocates, including companies that switched, say improved work-life balance makes staff more engaged and creative in meeting customer needs without loss of productivity.
As offices and factories change, the shorter workweek has the potential to become a political dividing line too.
Deteriorating labor conditions from wages to social protections helped fuel the backlash against globalization that underpinned Brexit and Donald Trump’s ‘America First’ presidency. Many governments face the growing influence of a rising generation for whom climate change and economic unfairness are political imperatives.
Almost 100 years after Henry Ford gave employees two free days per week, arguing they’d buy more cars if they had more leisure time, Covid-19 is forcing a reassessment of working culture for the 21st century.
Those that find the right balance between working longer and working smarter may be best placed to capitalize once the pandemic has faded. — Anthony Halpin Read more at Bloomberg
“Two painters' buckets filled with dirty water sit near the front door of April Jackson's apartment. A dead mosquito floats in one. She plans to use the water to fill her toilets later.
Like many residents here, she has been without water nearly two weeks after an ice storm rendered the capital city’s main water plant nearly inoperable. The problem has been decades in the making. Without federal help to update the city’s almost 100-year-old infrastructure, officials say it will happen again.
On Feb. 15, residents across Mississippi woke up to a blanket of ice, uncommon in this part of the South. The ice trapped many residents in their homes and rendered roads impassable. Days later, another winter storm made its way through the state, leaving residents in central Mississippi without power and ultimately resulting in six deaths.” Read more at Washington Post
“All Apple stores in the U.S. are open for the first time since businesses began widespread closures last spring.” Read more at Axios
“Former President Trump and former first lady Melania Trump were both vaccinated at the White House in January.” Read more at Axios
“Seven Nobel Prize winners and dozens of other scientists are publicly questioning the federal government’s prosecution of Harvard professor Charles Lieber and criticizing the university for failing to defend him against charges that he hid his ties to a Chinese government recruitment program.
A letter signed by 40 academics from across the country, including several at Harvard, calls the government’s case against Lieber ‘unjust.’ It also suggests that US scientists are becoming increasingly vocal in opposing the government’s crackdown on academics with financial and research ties to China.
In January, dozens of scientists signed off on a letter criticizing the arrest of MIT professor Gang Chen, who was indicted on wire fraud and tax violations in failing to disclose his financial ties to China.
Lieber, a world-renowned Harvard nanoscientist, was arrested a year ago and is alleged to have lied to the federal authorities about his involvement in a Chinese talent recruitment program and cheating on his taxes.
‘Despite his standing in the scientific community — or perhaps because of it — he has become the target of a tragically misguided government campaign that is discouraging US scientists from collaborating with peers in other countries, particularly China,’ the letter in support of Lieber states. ‘In so doing, it is threatening not only the United States’ position as a world leader in academic research, but science itself.’
Lieber was the most high-profile scientist arrested by federal prosecutors in a campaign to curbacademic espionage. These cases were a priority for Massachusetts federal prosecutors under the leadership of Andrew E. Lelling, the former US attorney, who stepped down at the end of February.
Over the past few years, the US government has fined universities and arrested academics for failing to properly disclose their financial ties to China. Federal prosecutors have alleged that these collaborations are an attempt by China to siphon cutting-edge technology and intellectual property from the United States.
Lieber has pleaded not guilty to the charges. US scholars have said that the Justice Department’s aggressive pursuit of these cases fails to understand that research is shared across national boundaries and breakthroughs are only possible if they work together.
But during the Trump administration, scientists were reluctant to publicly speak out, fearing that their government research funding would be at risk and their own international partnerships could be questioned.” Read more at Boston Globe
“Lives Lived: After nine years as a defensive back in the N.F.L., Irv Cross made history as the first Black full-time television analyst for a network television sports show. He died at 81.” Read more at New York Times
“Penguin Random House, the biggest book publisher in the U.S., is in the process of buying Simon & Schuster, a deal that would create a megapublisher responsible for roughly one-third of published books. But the deal requires approval from the Biden administration — and some authors’ groups and other organizations are calling on the Justice Department to block it, as a violation of antitrust laws.
Critics say the merger would create multiple problems, as our colleague Elizabeth Harris writes. Many authors could receive less money, because fewer publishers would exist to bid on their proposals. Writers without a proven track record might struggle to be published at all, and the industry could become even more dependent on blockbuster titles.
‘There are projects that would have sold for $150,000 years ago that might not sell at all now to the big five, whereas the book that would have sold for $500,000 might go for a million,’ one literary agent told The Times.
Still, many people in publishing consider Amazon the biggest threat to the health of the book business. ‘If it’s correct to worry about a merged company that publishes perhaps 33 percent of new books,’ Franklin Foer wrote in The Atlantic, ‘then surely it’s correct to worry more about the fact that Amazon now sells 49 percent of them.’” Read more at New York Times
“A new report by the Geneva-based Insecurity Insight and the University of California, Berkeley’s Human Rights Center identified more than 1,100 threats or acts of violence against health care workers and facilities last year.
Researchers found that about 400 of those attacks were related to COVID-19, many motivated by fear or frustration, underscoring the dangers surrounding health care workers at a time when they are needed most. Insecurity Insight defines a health care attack as any physical violence against or intimidation of health care workers or settings, and uses online news agencies, humanitarian groups and social media posts to track incidents around the world.” Read more at AP
“The Paris-based media advocacy group Reporters Without Borders has filed a criminal complaint with a German prosecutor also alleging that Saudi officials are responsible for ‘widespread and systematic’ persecution of journalists in Saudi Arabia. The complaint comes days after the United States released a report concluding that Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman approved the 2018 operation that led to the death of Khashoggi, a contributing columnist for The Washington Post.” Read more at Washington Post
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