WEDNESDAY, MAY 5, 2021
The birth rate in the United States fell to its lowest level since 1979, at slightly more than 3.6 million in 2020, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says in its Vital Statistics Surveillance Report released Wednesday. Last year marks the sixth straight year that the birth rate declined. Read Nic Woods’ news analysis on how that birth rate affects the U.S. Census on this page by scrolling down with the trackbar on the far right.
Facebook Board Upholds Ban on Trump – The quasi-independent Oversight Board has voted to uphold Facebook’s ban on former President Donald J. Trump, the AP reports. Facebook was the first social media platform to ban Trump for inciting “violent insurrection” in the January 6 attack on the Capitol. The board of 20 “international experts” ruled whether Trump may post to Facebook, normally a pretty libertarian platform for speech. The Oversight Board also faulted Facebook for the way it handled its initial decision, AP says. …
Meanwhile, Back at the Republican House Conference – Reps. Kevin McCarthy, R-CA, and Steve Scalise, R-LA, have fully turned on House of Representatives Republican Conference Chairman Liz Cheney, of Wyoming, and are working to remove her from the post and replace her with Rep. Elise Stefanik of New York, Punchbowl News reports. Two other GOP House members, Reps. Jackie Walorski and Jim Banks, both from Indiana, have dropped out. We mentioned Banks as a lead candidate for chairman in this space yesterday.
Note: Never-Trumper Republicans are wringing their hands over how the MAGA wing of the party has retained and even strengthened control since the January 6 Capitol Hill riots, and how members of the party on Capitol Hill are enabling the ex-president to pull strings from Mar-a-Lago. The answer that keeps coming up is that, for GOP House and Senate leadership, bolstering its mostly white base with a candidate like Trump is the easy way out. After Mitt Romney’s defeat in his 2012 bid to unseat President Barack Obama, the GOP’s “autopsy” found that the party must expand its tent to attract ethnic and racial minority voters to survive. …
The GOP clearly is ready to take the easy way again for 2022 and 2024, as state legislatures pass bills to constrict voting.
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Yellen Shakes Wall Street -- Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen’s remarks in an Atlantic magazine interview, released yesterday, “caused a brief panic on Wall Street,” The Washington Post reports. Yellen is quoted as saying, “It may be that interest rates will have to rise somewhat to make sure our economy does not overheat, even though the additional spending is relatively small relative to the size of the economy. It could cause some very modest increases in interest rates to get that reallocation.” The current rate ranges from 0% to 0.25%.
Note: The concern is inflation – rising prices of goods and services. There are various causes of inflation, including increases in production costs and surges in demand. Both of which seem to be the case right now, with supply chains being stretched by the pandemic and people relieving their pent-up demand by buying more goods. While Wall Street may be concerned that the cost of money is going to rise (an increase in interest rates would make it more expensive to borrow and, consequently, there might be a decrease in demand), it is clear that the economy is still in the midst of COVID recovery, so it may need a shot in the arm, which could mean that measures like increasing the interest rates to, say, a whole number might need to be taken.
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Will Democrats Go It Alone with Reconciliation? – As of today, the prospects for Senate passage of President Biden’s $2.3 trillion American Jobs Plan will likely depend on Democrats using the reconciliation process it employed for the $1.9 trillion American Rescue (from COVID-19) Plan Act – or kill the legislative filibuster. Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-KY, has said that “zero” of his Republican colleagues support the infrastructure (American Jobs) plan and has set a top bid of just $600 billion for roads and bridges, according to the National Review.
So former Democratic U.S. representative and House Speaker Harry Reid, of Nevada, recommends ignoring Republicans, in a Tuesday opinion piece in the Las Vegas Sun :
The lesson Democrats should take away from 2020 is that ignoring the naysayers, plowing ahead with popular proposals and delivering the results voters want is not only good policy, but also good politics.
The White House plan is to give negotiations with the Republican Senate Caucus a chance up to Memorial Day weekend, and then – apparently – damn the filibusters, full $2.3 trillion ahead! But can Biden prevent the McConnell from getting Sen. Joe Manchin III, D-WV, to defect?
Note: The calculation seems to be this – Democratic Senate leadership must sacrifice the legislative filibuster (which will be an issue for them when Republicans gain the majority) to push through the infrastructure plan, which according to most national polls has solid public support, even among Republican voters. As the clock continues to tick, the Biden White House now has less than 18 months before the mid-term elections to get this done, and to show some positive economic results in the interim. The “unity” alternative is to continue to negotiate with Republicans and work to prevent a mid-term flip in the Senate, as well as the House. The ongoing drama with House Republican leadership (see above) only adds to the urgency. The GOP isn’t getting weaker from the Cheney vs. Trumpers struggle; It’s coalescing behind a vanquished president who may very well run in 2024 on a platform of dismantling everything Biden gets passed in the next three-and-a-half years.
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Chauvin Seeks Retrial – Former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin has called for retrial weeks after his conviction on two counts of murder, and second-degree manslaughter in the death of George Floyd a year ago this month. Chauvin’s attorneys have cited jury and prosecutorial “misconduct,” without detailing any examples. However, a photo has surfaced of one juror attending a march in Washington last August, wearing a t-shirt that reads, “Get Your Knees Off Our Necks.” The photo has quickly become Fox News fodder.
–Edited by Todd Lassa, Gary S. Vasilash and Nic Woods