Tag: ABC News

Indictment #71543-23

Ex-President Trump pleaded not guilty Tuesday to 34 counts in the case related to hush money payments to adult film star Stormy Daniels (CNN). PICTURED: Trump with his defense team appears at his arraignment in Manhattan (AP Photo). The indictment is "all about election interference" according to CNN.

This Just In – Milwaukee County Circuit Judge Janet Protasiewicz trounced private attorney Dan Kelly for a Wisconsin Supreme Court seat in an ostensibly non-partisan race (AP). Kelly was appointed in 2016 by then-Gov. Scott Waker (R) to the state Supreme Court to fulfill an unexpired term, but lost election for a full term in 2020. 

Protasiewicz beat Kelly with 55.1% of the vote according to NBC News, and her tilting of the state Supreme Court to 4-3 liberal indicates a successful challenge to Republican-drawn redistricting maps that have made Wisconsin among the most gerrymandered states in the country, as well as the likely overturning of an 1849 abortion ban triggered by last year’s U.S. Supreme Court ruling in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health that overturned the 49-year-old Roe v. Wade decision. 

The race reportedly became the most expensive ever for a state Supreme Court election, with both sides spending an estimated $40 million-plus.

•••

Meanwhile, in Chicago – Cook County commissioner and former teacher Brandon Johnson has won a runoff election for Chicago mayor, with 51% of the vote to Chicago Public Schools CEO Paul Vallas’ 49%, the Chicago Sun-Times reports. Though both are Democrats, winner Johnson is a progressive contrast to law-and-order candidate Vallas, who is more of a Richard Daley Democrat.

--TL

_____________________________________________

It's Super Tuesday

TUESDAY 4/4/23

Donald J. Trump’s ‘defense fund’ raised $8 million in the three days since his indictment, senior campaign advisor, Jason Miller, tweeted Tuesday. Trump is on his way to a Manhattan court for his arraignment, expected about 2 p.m. local time Tuesday.

•••

Finland Joins NATO – Finland joins the North Atlantic Treaty Organization Tuesday, the alliance’s secretary general, Jens Stoltenberg says. The country’s 800 miles border with to Russia nearly doubles the NATO border with the country. Russia has said it will bolster defenses along that border in response to Finland joining NATO, according to The Guardian.

Meanwhile: Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan has blocked Sweden’s efforts to join NATO, at least until Turkey’s May 14 elections. Challenger Kemal Kilicdaroglu is leading Erdogan in NATO-member Turkey’s polls by 10 points, Reuters reports.

--TL

_______________________________________________

Super Tuesday Indications

MONDAY 4/3/23

Hush Money – Former President Donald J. Trump arrives in Manhattan Monday ahead of his Tuesday perp walk on a reported 34-count indictment connected to $130,000 in hush money paid to adult film star Stormy Daniels. Trump’s indictment came after District Attorney Alvin Bragg reviewed a second payment, this one for $150,000 to former Playboy model Karen McDougal, USA Today reports. 

It is not known whether the alleged McDougal hush money ended up in the indictment which remains under seal until Trump appears in court Tuesday.

That hasn’t stopped Republican leaders … from criticizing Bragg’s indictment following the grand jury’s recommendation. This includes Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin, “famous for being just Trumpy enough to woo MAGA Republicans without alienating more moderate voters,” according to The Washington Post.

“It is beyond belief that District Attorney Alvin Bragg has indicted a former president and current presidential candidate for pure political gain. Arresting a presidential candidate on a manufactured basis should not happen in America.”

Double-edged or circular argument?: Trump has warned that if he can be “indicated” (see tweet, above) any American can be, uh, indicted for the likes of hush-money payments. Right, say the Trump critics: No one is above the law, not even an ex-president.

Counterpoint: Undeclared 2024 presidential candidates Youngkin, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and ex-Veep Mike Pence have come to Trump’s defense over the Manhattan D.A.’s indictment. Anticipating a GOP implosion under the weight of the ex-prez’s considerable legal issues, former Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson says he will declare as an anti-Trump Republican.

“While the formal announcement will be later in April, in Bentonville (Arkansas),” Hutchinson told ABC News This Week co-anchor Jonathan Karl Sunday, “I want to make clear to you, Jonathan, I am going to be running. And the reason is, I’ve traveled the country for six months. I hear people talk about the leadership of our country. I’m convinced that people want leaders that appeal to the best of America, and not simply appeal to our worst instincts.”

•••

On Wisconsin’s Supreme Court – It’s the state Supreme Court race that “could change the political trajectory” of the Badger State, notes NPR’s Weekend Edition Sunday. Though ostensibly non-partisan, the race between Milwaukee County Judge Janet Protasiewicz and former state Supreme Court Justice Dan Kelly is expected to affect abortion rights, Republican-drawn redistricting maps and former Gov. Scott Walker’s (R) law limiting union rights. 

Protasiewicz says she favors women’s choice, indicating she will overturn a Wisconsin pre-Civil War abortion ban that triggered after the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade last year, while Kelly says politics would not determine how he would rule on the court. Then-Gov. Walker appointed Kelly, a private attorney, to fulfill the unexpired term of state Supreme Court Justice David Prosser Jr. in 2016, but lost election to a full term in 2020.

The Wisconsin race far exceeds the previous campaign spending record for a state Supreme Court race, which was $15.2 million for a 2004 Illinois election. The race between Protasiewicz and Kelly has cost nearly $29 million, and counting, says Wisconsin Public Radio, quoting the Brennan Center for Justice.

•••

Chicago’s Mayoral Runoff – Last, but not least, Democratic candidates Paul Vallas and Brandon Johnson face off in Tuesday’s runoff election for mayor of Chicago, to replace single-term incumbent Lori Lightfoot, who came in a distant third in the February 28 general election amidst a spike in the Second City’s crime rate. Vallas is the former special emergency manager of the Chicago, Philadelphia and New Orleans public school systems who says he will lower crime and improve schools, according to The New York Times, thus conjuring the Richard Daley wing of the city’s Democratic Party. 

Johnson is a county commissioner, former teacher and paid organizer with the Chicago Teachers Union who has campaigned on “sweeping new investments in neighborhood schools and social programs,” representing the party’s progressive wing.

Congressional Calendar -- This was to be a quiet two weeks on Capitol Hill. The Senate and House of Representatives are off for Easter/Passover break, returning Monday, April 17.

--Compiled and edited by Todd Lassa

_____
COMMENTS: editors@thehusitngs.news

Trump to Constitution: Drop Dead

By Todd Lassa

Donald J. Trump last weekend claimed the United States as his very own banana republic by calling for suspension of the Constitution so he could be reinstated as president, because, you know … the Big Lie. 

In case you missed it, this is what he said (via Politico) on his Truth Social site (as Elon Musk awaits his return to Twitter): “A massive fraud of this type and magnitude allows for the termination of all rules, regulations, and articles, even those found in the Constitution.”

Wonder whether it was one of Trump’s star attorneys who suggested it was within his right to call for ditching the Constitution? Or perhaps the advice came from antisemite Ye, white supremacist Nick Fuentes and/or far-right provocateur Milo Yiannopolis (who has just departed Ye’s 2024 presidential bid according to the Daily Beast – the campaign for which the artist formerly known as Kanye West wants Trump to be his running mate).

“Republicans are going to have to work out their issues with the former president and decide whether they’re going to break from him and return to some semblance of reasonableness,” said incoming House Democratic leader Hakeem Jeffries (NY), “or continue to lean into the extremism, not just of Trump, but Trumpism.” (PBS News Hour.)

One might also wonder what constitutional originalists on the right think of Trump’s call for “termination” of rules, regulations and articles found in the Constitution. 

GOP lack of reaction to Trump’s latest comments so far rival the party leadership's lack of their reaction to his dinner with Ye, Fuentes and Yiannopolis. ABC News This Week host George Stephanopoulos on Sunday had to press Rep. Dave Joyce (R-OH) for his comments on the Truth Social post. 

Joyce, chairman of the Republican Governance Group said, “It’s early. I think there’s going to be a lot of people in the primary … I will support whoever the Republican nominee is.”

At first glance, the defeat of many Trump-backed candidates in the midterms, and then the notorious Mar-a-Lago dinner two weeks later have been hailed as a voter affirmation of American democracy. Even the New York Post was ready to write the obituary for Trump’s political career as Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis emerged as the new darling of the hard-right wing. But the inability of such GOP leaders as Rep. Kevin McCarthy and Sen. Mitch McConnell, topped by Joyce’s comments on This Weekhave kept Trump’s future alive and well. According to Politico, latest polls show the ex-president remains the most likely 2024 GOP nominee.

_____
COMMENTS: editors@thehustings.news

…meanwhile…

(WED 11/16/22)

It’s Official: GOP Wins House – Republican Mike Garcia defeated Democratic challenger Christy Smith to win California’s 27th District House seat Wednesday, the AP reports, to finally give the GOP the majority in the lower chamber it had expected to come much more easily a week earlier. Garcia’s victory puts the House count at 218 Republicans and 211 Democrats, per The New York Times, with six more seats to call. 

Reddish Trickle: The GOP House margin, which will be anywhere from one to 14 seats -- though more likely between five and seven -- is good enough for the party’s first declared 2024 presidential candidate, Donald J. Trump. The jury was still out 24 hours after Trump’s Mar-a-Lago announcement on whether his fall from party leadership finally is over. Rupert Murdoch’s news empire is sticking to its guns so far – Sean Hannity even broke away from the drone of Trump’s “low energy” speech, and ABC News’ Jonathan Karl reported that Mar-a-Lago security had to keep several in the gaga-for-MAGA crowd from leaving his speech early. 

Why would GOP leadership break up with Donald J. Trump this time, and not after three election losses – the House in 2018, the presidency and Senate in 2020 and essentially both chambers this year (and his only win was by electoral count, not popular vote) – as well as two impeachments, one insurrection, and an FBI seizure of top secret documents? 

Consider that when Mitt Romney lost, miserably, in his bid to unseat President Obama in 2012, the GOP conducted an “autopsy” on the party’s apparent lack of popularity.

The answer, my friend, is blowin’ in Florida’s winds, where Gov. Ron DeSantis offers the party sanctuary, and he won’t fly you on a chartered airplane to get there.

Meanwhile, McConnell Holds: SCOTUS- and federal court-crusher Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-KY) won over his party’s caucus to remain minority leader, with 37 votes to Sen. Rick Scott’s (R-FL) 10 votes. One Republican voted “present” in the secret ballot held in the Old Senate Chamber according to Politico, which adds that Scott sent out a memo during the vote accusing the outgoing National Republican Senatorial Committee, led by Indiana’s Todd Young, for distributing “hundreds of thousands of dollars of unauthorized and improper bonuses to staff.”

McConnell has been GOP leader for nearly 16 years, and when asked whether he might soon consider stepping down, he told reporters “I’m not going anywhere” (Politico again). 

•••

Senate Moves to Codify Same-Sex Marriage – The Senate Wednesday passed a procedural provision, 62-37, to advance a same-sex marriage bill that could reach its final vote this week, per Roll Call. The bill would repeal the 1996 Defense of Marriage Act, which was ruled largely unconstitutional by the Supreme Court in a 2013 decision. The bill “will not take away or alter any religious liberty,” said Sen. Tammy Baldwin (D-WI), chief negotiator and the first openly gay U.S. senator. 

Among the 12 Republican senators voting to advance the bill was its primary GOP sponsor, Susan Collins, of Maine. It is the first among several bills the lame duck Congress will take up in a rush to beat the end of its 117th session.

--Compiled and edited by Todd Lassa

_____________________________________

Trump Trumps, Again

(WED 11/16/22)

It’s 2015 again, with the fabulosity of Mar-a-Lago – where FBI agents seized top secret government documents just three months ago -- substituting for Trump Tower’s Golden Elevator. Some 20 minutes after beginning his speech – which came off sounding like a low-key MAGA-hat rally in which he described the magnificent success of his administration and the dismal failures of his successor -- Donald J. Trump announced his third bid for president of the United States. 

“In order to make America great and glorious again tonight I am announcing my candidacy for president of the United States.” Though Trump did not conjure up his Big Lie that the 2020 election was stolen from him, he did suggest China had somehow meddled in the 2022 midterms. And the GOP did win the midterms thanks to Trump’s involvement, he suggested, but Republican leaders had overblown expectations they would win 40 House seats. 

Trump threw in this statement, devoid of any irony or self-awareness: “This will not be my campaign. This will be our campaign.”

Biden on Strike on Poland: Before Trump in his very big announcement could blame on the current president a missile that struck Poland – he perversely suggested that Russia would not have invaded Ukraine had he still been in office – Biden spoke at the G20 summit in Bali, Indonesia, telling reporters “there is preliminary information that contests that … it’s unlikely given the trajectory that it was launched from Russia.“ It has been identified as a Russian missile, however, and it killed two people in rural Poland. In discussions with Polish President Andrej Duda and NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg, Biden says the U.S. has offered support to Poland’s investigation “and we need to determine exactly what happened.”

--Todd Lassa

_____
COMMENTS: editors@thehustings.news

We’re Watching the Returns

By Todd Lassa

What will you watch, and what will you watch for Election Day Tuesday night?

Flipping between CNN, Fox News, and MSNBC is pretty easy, with the three news networks typically grouped together on most cable TV systems. However, if you try to switch at the commercials, you'll learn that the Big Three run them about the same time. Make such an effort to get a balance of viewpoints, and you'll quickly exceed your doctor's daily suggested intake of Progressive insurance, MyPillow, and Biktarvy commercials. You might be better off going for the free broadcast option and enjoy a cocktail of CBS, NBC, and ABC News with a dose of PBS and NPR thrown in. 

No matter what you choose, the likelihood of going to bed at a reasonable hour Wednesday morning will very probably leave you unsatisfied and almost certainly without any idea of whether President Trump or former Vice President Joe Biden will take the oath of office on the west front of the U.S. Capitol next Jan. 20.

Nevertheless, Trump reportedly told confidants he “plans to declare premature victory” Tuesday night, Axios reported over the weekend, citing three anonymous sources. Trump denied the report Sunday night, adding, "I think it's a terrible thing when ballots can be counted after an election. I think it's a terrible thing when states are allowed to tabulate ballots for a long time after the election is over." 

On Monday, Biden asked the country and the media to ignore any victory declaration before all ballots are counted. "Under no scenario" can Trump legitimately declare victory on election night, he said.

The last polls to close are 1 a.m. Eastern time Wednesday in parts of Alaska, considered solid Trump country. But several swing states are expected to take until the end of the week before all their mail-in and early voting ballots are counted. 

Of the potential swing states, Pennsylvania's polls close at 8 p.m. EST, but the state can count postmarked ballots as late as Friday. Florida's polls also close at 8 p.m., with many in the state closing at 7 Eastern; still, postmarked ballots cannot be counted beyond Tuesday. Georgia polls close at 7 p.m. and allow no late ballots, while North Carolina's close at 7:30 p.m., with late ballots counted by Nov. 12. Michigan's polls close at 9 p.m., with no postmarked ballots counted after election day. Ohio, the other remaining key state in the Eastern time zone, closes polls at 7:30 p.m. but allows postmarked ballots to come in as late as Friday, Nov. 13, with all such late ballots reported by Nov. 28.

Thanks to a Supreme Court ruling, no Wisconsin ballots may be counted after Election Day, where polls close at 9 p.m. Eastern. Iowa, which closes its polls by 10 EST, counts postmarked ballots as late as Nov. 9. Texas polls close at 9 p.m. Eastern, with most closing an hour earlier, and postmarked ballots are to be counted by Wednesday. Arizona closes its polls at 9 p.m. Eastern and does not count postmarked ballots after Election Day.

Please address comments to editors@thehustings.news

—–