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“Former President Trump received what he said was unwelcome news from Big Tech on Wednesday as Facebook’s oversight board upheld his suspension from the social media platform, which the company imposed following his persistent falsehoods about the 2020 election and the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol.
The 20-member board said in a statement that Trump ‘created an environment where a serious risk of violence was possible,’ leading to the ban following the deadly insurrection. The board also said Facebook must reexamine its decision within six months, effectively postponing any final decision about the former president until then.” Read more at The Hill
“In reaction, Trump assailed Facebook, Twitter — which banned him in January — and Google as ‘corrupt’ and said Big Tech is destroying the U.S. election ‘process.’
The Facebook decision to continue its ban affects how Trump can converse with his supporters. The 45th president has largely used cable news interviews and press releases to reach out to his base since his social media accounts were blocked. On Tuesday, Trump’s team announced the launch of what appears to be an expanded blog, allowing supporters to share Trump’s posts and missives.
Republicans say they doubt Facebook’s decision will change much for Trump as he gears up for a potential third White House bid.
‘President Trump can galvanize supporters without the help of social media companies, but if Facebook decides to lift their suspension in six months it certainly doesn’t hurt his chances for 2024,’ said one GOP strategist who worked for Trump’s reelection, adding that Trump’s fundraising prowess should not be hampered too much despite his reliance on the platform for reaching donors in past campaigns.
‘He’s capable of raising unrivaled amounts from small-dollar contributors even without the platform,’ the strategist added.
A second strategist suggested Facebook’s decision will backfire by displaying what conservatives assert is partisan bias (The Hill).
‘It’s incredible stupidity on the part of Facebook, who's now shut him out twice. It fuels the fire for conservatives to go after Big Tech,’ the strategist said, predicting that Facebook will eventually relent. ‘In the short term it probably helps him. He can yell and scream about how Big Tech is trying to shut him out.’” Read more at The Hill
“On Capitol Hill, GOP leaders have turned on House Republican Conference Chairwoman Liz Cheney (Wyo.) as they prepare to oust her next week in favor of Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-N.Y.), who received public boosts from Trump and House Minority Whip Steve Scalise (R-La.) on Wednesday.
Trump on Monday panned Cheney as a ‘warmongering fool who has no business in Republican Party Leadership,’ all the while hailing Stefanik, 36, as a ‘far superior choice.’” Read more at The Hill
“Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis is expected Thursday to sign into law the controversial election reform legislation SB 90 — one in a series of nationwide measures opponents say are aimed at suppressing voting. Some of the legislation's more contentious features are limits on drop boxes for hand-delivered voting, restrictions on third-party voter registration efforts and requirements that voters sign up for vote-by-mail in more frequent intervals. One voter advocacy group has vowed to lodge a legal challenge. ‘We have multiple grounds to challenge this, especially attacks on vote-by-mail,’ said Jorge Vasquez, an attorney for the Advancement Project civil rights organization. However Jason Snead, executive director of the Honest Elections Project, a conservative group, said the bill is a sensible, preventive measure. The signing ceremony at a West Palm Beach area hotel is scheduled to be hosted by the pro-Donald Trump fan organization Club 45.” Read more at USA Today
“Texas legislature poised to vote on election bill. Lawmakers will vote todayon a bill that Republicans say will increase election security but Democrats contend will restrict voting access, particularly to minority communities.” Read more at Wall Street Journal
“President Joe Biden will visit Louisiana Thursday to tout the American Jobs Plan. Biden will deliver remarks in Lake Charles and then tour the Carrollton Water Plant in New Orleans later in the afternoon, according to president's official public schedule. Biden unveiled the massive $2 trillion plan March 31, which includes rebuilding the nation's aging infrastructure and boosting access to caregivers and their pay in a massive undertaking that would be the centerpiece of his economic agenda. On Wednesday, Biden touted another government program, the Restaurant Revitalization Fund, while ordering tacos and enchiladas during a Cinco de Mayo visit to Taqueria Las Gemelas, a Mexican restaurant in Washington. The new $28.6 billion program offers grants to eateries slammed by the coronavirus pandemic.” Read more at USA Today
“The Paycheck Protection Program, a core element of the US government’s economic relief agenda, is officially exhausted weeks before its planned closure at the end of this month. The program reopened in January with an additional $284 billion for first-time borrowers and some second loans for those who participated in last year's first round. The Small Business Administration said more than 8 million small businesses were helped by the program. The SBA will keep taking some new applications from underserved areas. Meanwhile, President Biden is promoting the new Restaurant Revitalization Fund. The $28.6 billion program was established as part of Biden’s massive Covid-19 relief package and will provide money to match restaurants’ pandemic-related revenue losses.” Read more at CNN
“A federal judge ruled that the pandemic relief measure enforced by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention exceeded the agency's powers. The moratorium, which protected millions from being evicted, originated from an order then-President Donald Trump signed in September on public-health grounds, and the CDC later extended through June. Judge Dabney Friedrich of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, a Trump appointee, said federal law didn’t give the agency broad authority to continue the policy. The ruling could make it easier for landlords, many of whom have struggled to collect rent payments, to evict tenants who owe them. The decision is a blow to the Biden administration's plans to time the moratorim’s expiration with the distribution of nearly $50 billion in rental assistance authorized by Congress. As of March, renters owed an estimated $52 billion collectively in back rent, and landlords say they've been squeezed financially while providing services to nonpaying tenants.” Read more at Wall Street Journal
“Congressional Democrats have tweaked their marquee voting-rights, campaign-finance and ethics bill ahead of a Senate committee vote next week, addressing concerns raised by elections administrators but forgoing a more radical rewrite of the legislation.
The changes to the For the People Act come after the bill passed the House on a largely party-line vote in March and ahead of a critical vote Tuesday in the Senate Rules and Administration Committee that could advance the legislation to the floor.
The legislation is meant to curtail state-level pushes to restrict voter access, such as the nationally controversial effort in Georgia, and President Biden, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and Senate Majority Leader Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.) have all called the bill one of the Democratic Party’s top legislative priorities.
The For the People Act, however, presently has no viable route to enactment in the 50-50 Senate. The tweaks made Tuesday aren’t likely to change that.
Republicans are uniformly opposed to the bill, meaning it will be unable to clear a Senate filibuster, which can be defeated only with a 60-vote supermajority. While many activists and some senators are eager to change the chamber’s rules to allow the bill to pass with a simple majority, multiple Democratic senators have expressed misgivings about doing so.
It’s also not clear that all Senate Democrats are willing to vote for the bill — also known as H.R. 1 or S. 1 — even with the new amendments. Most prominently, Sen. Joe Manchin III (D-W.Va.) said in a March statement that he was wary of making changes to the election system on a partisan basis.” Read more at Washington Post
“$2.4 billion — The value of stock that an investment firm controlled by Bill Gates transferred to Melinda Gates this week. Ms. Gates is now one of the largest shareholders in two Mexican companies—bottler Coca-Cola Femsa and Grupo Televisa, a cable company and broadcaster—after one of the world's wealthiest couples announced their plans to divorce.” Read more at Wall Street Journal
FILE - In this April 15, 2021, file photo, Rep. Nicole Malliotakis, R-N.Y., speaks during a House Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Crisis hearing on Capitol Hill in Washington. Every Republican in Congress voted against the $1.9 trillion ‘American Rescue Plan,’ which President Joe Biden signed into law three months ago. But ever since, Republicans from New York and Indiana to Texas and Washington state have promoted elements of legislation that would not exist if they had their way. (AP Photo/Susan Walsh, Pool, File)
NEW YORK (AP) — “Rep. Nicole Malliotakis, R-N.Y., said it pained her to vote against the $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan.
But in the weeks that followed, the first-term Republican issued a news release celebrating more than $3.7 million from the package that went to community health centers in her district as one of her ‘achievements.’ She said she prided herself on ‘bringing federal funding to the district and back into the pockets of taxpayers.’
Malliotakis is far from alone.
Every Republican in Congress voted against the sweeping pandemic relief bill that President Joe Biden signed into law three months ago. But since the early spring votes, Republicans from New York and Indiana to Texas and Washington state have promoted elements of the legislation they fought to defeat.
The Republicans’ favorite provisions represent a tiny sliver of the massive law, which sent $1,400 checks to millions of Americans, extended unemployment benefits until September, increased the child tax credit, offered housing assistance for millions of low-income Americans and expanded health care coverage. Republicans tried to negotiate a smaller package, arguing that Biden’s plan was too expensive and not focused enough on the nation’s health and economic crises.” Read more at AP
“Two Asian women, ages 63 and 84, were stabbed without warning in downtown San Francisco on Tuesday. A man was arrested after the crime, and the District Attorney said charges could be announced Thursday. While police didn’t immediately say whether the victims — who remained hospitalized Wednesday — were targeted for their race, the incidents add to the growing number of recent attacks against people of Asian descent.” Read more at USA Today
“The lights will go back on Broadway, as tickets will go on sale starting Thursday. New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo said Wednesday that shows will resume Sept. 14 . Broadway was forced to shutter more than a year ago because of the coronavirus pandemic. The move comes after New York lifted capacity restrictions on arts venues and restaurants, but there still may be some limit on attendance to ensure social distancing. Nonetheless, tickets for the shows this fall will be sold at 100% capacity, according to Cuomo, and any seating limits will be addressed in the coming months. The Broadway League said preparations are underway, and that specific plays and their reopenings will be announced in the coming weeks.” Read more at USA Today
“The Biden administration on Thursday announced its support for waiving intellectual property protections on COVID-19 vaccines to boost production in a move celebrated by health advocates and scorned by the pharmaceutical industry.
U.S. Trade Representative Katherine Tai laid out the new U.S. position in a statement. ‘This is a global health crisis, and the extraordinary circumstances of the COVID-19 pandemic call for extraordinary measures,’ the statement read.
The Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America (PhRMA), the industry’s lobbying arm (and the third-highest lobbying spender in Washington in 2020), issued a scathing rebuke of the decision. The group’s CEO Stephen J. Ubl decried the move as an ‘empty promise’ saying it ‘does nothing to address the real challenges to getting more shots in arms, including last-mile distribution and limited availability of raw materials.’
The news comes a day after vaccine producer Pfizer, one of the few major companies selling its COVID-19 vaccines on a for-profit basis, announced $3.5 billion in revenue generated by vaccine sales in the first three months of this year, netting an estimated $900 million in profit. Stocks in vaccine producers briefly dropped following Tai’s announcement, before mostly recovering by the end of trading.
For supporters, the decision has been greeted with a mix of celebration and trepidation. World Health Organization Chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus hailed the decision as ‘monumental,’ while other groups pointed to the statement’s limited scope. The original proposal, put forward by India and South Africa last October, called for patent waivers on other medical tools, including personal protective equipment, therapeutic treatments, and testing kits. ‘It is crucial that this waiver not just apply to preventative vaccines,’ Avril Benoît, executive director of Doctors Without Borders USA said in an emailed statement.
Not so fast. More diplomatic hurdles must be surmounted before a vaccine waiver can go into effect internationally. The WTO operates on a consensus basis and Australia, Brazil, Canada, the European Union, Japan, Norway, Switzerland, and the United Kingdom have not yet supported the lifting of intellectual property protections. One holdout, New Zealand, announced it was backing the waiver following the U.S. decision.
There’s also the question of timing. Even if the opposing countries come on board, the text of the waiver is expected to be subjected to heavy scrutiny, and negotiations could take weeks, if not longer. Clete Williams, a former U.S. representative at the WTO in Geneva, told Reuters that a completed agreement was more likely to be in place by the end of November.
The herd race. The waiver could end up being merely a symbolic move if projected doses are produced on time and rich countries willingly share their stockpiles. Vaccine makers project 12 billion doses will become available by the end of 2021, and roughly 11 billion doses would vaccinate 70 percent of the world’s population—enough to pass estimated thresholds of herd immunity.
But rich countries could continue to hoard doses, new variants could appear that require new vaccines, booster shots could be necessary later this year, and a desire to vaccinate children could prompt governments already overstocked with doses to think twice about sharing with other countries—a scenario that would make the waiver even more essential, according to its supporters.” Read more at Foreign Policy
“Scotland goes to the polls Thursday in a vote that could eventually lead to a truly historic event: the crackup of the United Kingdom.
The independence movement has gained momentum in the wake of Prime Minister Boris Johnson's Brexit. And the pandemic has further encouraged the idea that Scotland might be better off going its own way, with policies determined in Edinburgh viewed more favorably by Scots than those pronounced at Westminster.
As a result, the Scottish National Party, led by the popular First Minister of Scotland, Nicola Sturgeon, 50, is expected to perform well in Thursday’s vote for seats in the regional Parliament, with pro-independence parties winning a solid majority of the 129 seats in Holyrood.” Read more at Boston Globe
“Gunboat diplomacy | The U.K. has sent two naval patrol ships to the British isle of Jersey ahead of a potential blockade by French fishermen, as a dispute with France over post-Brexit fishing rights deepened. Paris has dispatched its own naval vessel, after threatening to cut off electricity supplies to Jersey in protest at a lack of licenses for its fishermen to operate.
Millions of Britons are voting in local and regional elections today that may shape the future of the U.K.” Read more at Bloomberg
Freshly caught bream on ice ahead of auction in Sete, France, in December.
“Blinken in Kyiv. U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken visits Ukraine today, where he is expected to meet with President Volodymyr Zelensky, in a sign of U.S. support following a recent heightening of tensions with Russia. Blinken is fresh off a two-day trip to London, where he and other G-7 foreign ministers expressed deep concern for the continuing ‘negative pattern of Russia’s irresponsible and destabilizing behavior.’ On April 22, Russia announced its withdrawal of tens of thousands of troops stationed near the Ukrainian border and described the build-up as a military exercise.” Read more at Foreign Policy
“India’s COVID-19 crisis. India has again broken the record for the highest daily number of new cases, as 412,262 new infections were reported in the past 24 hours. The Indian government’s previous forecast suggested cases would peak by Wednesday. The ever-increasing caseload comes as hospitals continue to face oxygen shortages. Health Minister Harsh Vardhan has said that oxygen supply in the country is not lacking, but transporting it to where it’s needed remains a problem.” Read more at Foreign Policy
“G7 leaders are warning China not to escalate tensions with Taiwan after a spike in military maneuvers around the self-governed island. Representatives from Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the UK and the US said in a joint statement that they support peace between China and Taiwan and wish to see Taiwan participate in World Health Organization forums and the World Health Assembly. Beijing has blocked Taiwan's participation in the WHO. G7 ministers also had tough words about China’s alleged human rights violations in Xinjiang and growing challenges to democracy in Hong Kong. While the statement didn’t recommend any action against China, it’s likely to fray already-fraught relations between China and these other world powers.” Read more at CNN
“Colombia has seen more than a week of bloody protests over economic inequality and police brutality, and experts think the unrest could have deeper regional effects. The protests began when President Ivan Duque unveiled a controversial fiscal reform proposal that critics say would have disproportionately impacted middle and working-class people. Although he withdrew it this weekend, demonstrations continued over broader grievances. More than 24 people have been killed and dozens have disappeared during the violence, prompting fear and outrage over the police response. How Duque responds to all this could impact how other countries in the region handle police brutality and economic issues.” Read more at CNN
“Lives Lived: Tamara Press was a dominant Soviet shot-putter and discus thrower in the 1960s. But amid questions about her physique, she pulled out of a major event that required sex testing. She died at 83.” Read more at New York Times
“Patrick O’Connell, who as the founding director of Visual AIDS, an advocacy group that supports artists living with the disease, helped shatter the stigma surrounding AIDS in the 1990s with awareness campaigns, including one symbolized by the ubiquitous red ribbon, died on March 23 at a hospital in Manhattan. He was 67.
His brother, Barry, confirmed the death, from AIDS-related causes. Mr. O’Connell lived with AIDS for almost 40 years.” Read more at New York Times