New top story from Time: Republicans Sink Proposal for a January 6 Commission

https://ift.tt/3wHhZyS

This article is part of the The DC Brief, TIME’s politics newsletter. Sign up here to get stories like this sent to your inbox every weekday.

As the clock ticked past 2 a.m. this morning, Sen. Dan Sullivan stood before a mostly-empty Senate chamber. Ostensibly the Alaska Republican was talking about the pending tech bill, but those watching in their offices knew their colleague’s filibuster was about everything but a tech bill on the floor. “We must face this challenge with confidence and strategic resolve,” Sullivan droned on as he took his turn gumming up the legislative process in a 19-hour filibuster. Just so long as facing that challenge wasn’t investigating the failed insurrection at the Capitol on Jan. 6.
[time-brightcove not-tgx=”true”]

Senators today rejected a planned commission to study what led to a mob storming the Capitol while trying to overturn the results of the 2020 election. The Democratic-led House had already passed its version of a bipartisan commission. But Republicans in the Senate would not go along with this because it likely would have codified that the deadly protest on Jan. 6 was a direct result of then-President Donald Trump and his promotion of The Big Lie—the false claim that he’s the rightful President instead of Joe Biden. In the end, only six Republican Senators joined Democrats in asking for the inquiry, short of the 10 required to break a procedural roadblock.

The commission to track down an official accounting of what happened on Jan. 6 now seems beyond resuscitation. Its cause of death? Partisanship.

“The Republican Party minority just mounted a partisan filibuster against an independent commission to report on Jan. 6,” Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said today on the Senate floor, his contempt hardly hidden. “Out of fear or fealty to Donald Trump, the Republican minority just prevented the American people from getting the truth about Jan. 6.” Moments later, he sent a letter to Democratic colleagues vowing to find answers, perhaps through a special select committee.

It’s a partisan jab, for sure. But he’s also not wrong. For the last 24 hours, moderate Republicans have been begging their colleagues to step up and make a stand against The Big Lie. Over lunch yesterday, Sen. Susan Collins of Alaska challenged her colleagues to do their jobs and push ahead with an inquiry. Not one to leave that unanswered, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell rose immediately to offer his rejoinder: any panel looking at Jan. 6 would be bad politics for their party, which stands to make inroads next year when one-third of the chamber is on the ballot and the map seems to favor the GOP.

It’s a cold political calculus in light of the terror he and his colleagues experienced less than five months ago. During normal times, the certification of the Electoral College vote on Jan. 6 would have been a bland vote of process, one that merited a handful of words buried in a few newspapers, and unremarked-upon in most others.

But Trump insisted on convening a rally a mile away from the Capitol that day. He whipped his supporters into a frenzy and urged them to march upon the Capitol. Once there, they breached security barricades, bashed windows and ransacked offices. They were unsuccessful in overturning the election but they shook many assumptions about government and its durability.

The ensuing riot sparked Trump’s second impeachment. He survived, of course, because Republicans feared crossing him. In the months that followed, his grip on the Republican Party has not faded. He is still a galvanizing force inside GOP politics and he seems to remain a king-maker inside the party. Which means the default position of ambitious Republicans will be to fall in line with what Trump demands. And, at least at the moment, that means burying their heads in the sand and ignoring the mob that tried to overtake the Capitol just a few months ago. It seems insane that a Republican Party that campaigned so hard on law and order in 2020 now is trying to mute a probe into a mob, but it’s that same party that needs the mob’s mascot to survive primaries.

Make sense of what matters in Washington. Sign up for the daily D.C. Brief newsletter.

Comments

Vaccine nationalism will not shorten COVID pandemic, warns WHO chief https://ift.tt/3oqykEN

The World Health Organization (WHO) chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus has called for solidarity in the rollout of future coronavirus vaccines. In a video address at the opening of the three-day World Health Summit in Berlin, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus noted that it was natural for the countries to want to protect their own citizens first but, he urged, "we must also use it effectively".

Black doctor dies of COVID-19 after racist treatment complaints https://ift.tt/3nR3RiK

A Black doctor who died battling COVID-19 complained of racist medical care in widely shared social media posts days before her death, prompting an Indiana hospital system to promise a “full external review" into her treatment.

Taken with Transportation Podcast: Connecting Community to Transit

Taken with Transportation Podcast: Connecting Community to Transit By The Bayview Community Shuttle is intended to help residents connect more easily with transit lines that serve Bayview-Hunters Point, such as the 54 Felton and T-Third. Accessing public transit can be more difficult for people in one particular San Francisco neighborhood than it is in other parts of the city. So we are designing a supplemental transportation program for this area, the Bayview Community Shuttle. You can learn more in the latest episode of the SFMTA podcast, Taken with Transportation . Host Melissa Culross talks with SFMTA Transportation Planner Christopher Kidd, San Francisco Supervisor Shamann Walton, Bayview-Hunters Point Community Advocates Environmental Justice Director Dalila Adofo, SFMTA Planning Director Maia Small and neighborhood residents about the shuttle, which is expected to begin running in Bayview-Hunters Point in 2024. Christopher Kidd is the planner in charge of the shuttle p...

New top story from Time: Schools Across the U.S. Are Already Switching Back to Remote Learning Amid COVID-19 Surge

https://ift.tt/3B8bWpt (ATLANTA) — A few weeks into the new school year, growing numbers of U.S. districts have halted in-person learning or switched to hybrid models because of rapidly mounting coronavirus infections. More than 80 school districts or charter networks have closed or delayed in-person classes for at least one entire school in more than a dozen states. Others have sent home whole grade levels or asked half their students to stay home on hybrid schedules. The setbacks in mostly small, rural districts that were among the first to return dampen hopes for a sustained, widespread return to classrooms after two years of schooling disrupted by the pandemic. [time-brightcove not-tgx=”true”] In Georgia, where in-person classes are on hold in more than 20 districts that started the school year without mask requirements, some superintendents say the virus appeared to be spreading in schools before they sent students home. “We just couldn’t manage it with that much sta...

New top story from Time: I Interviewed Hundreds of New Yorkers. Here’s What They Taught Me

https://ift.tt/3cgW6zl In 2014 I was given a unique assignment: move to New York and talk to people, hundreds of them, and then somehow create a book using their words to describe the experience of living in New York right now. I spoke to New Yorkers in all five boroughs, in coffee shops, in pizzerias, in elevator shafts, on job sites. At one point, when the book was nearly finished, I began to recognize a by-product of the interviewing process. Something happens when you ingest so many stories from so many New Yorkers. I learned a few things. I learned about express trains and egg creams, the route of the New York marathon and the strange naming protocols of the streets of Queens. I was taught how to steal a car in Manhattan, how to move properly on a sidewalk. Next came a list of specifics: best bagels, best pupusas, best baked clams (Donovan’s in Woodside). But I had no idea that speaking to New Yorkers would mean more important, subtle lessons would be shared from some of...

New top story from Time: U.S. Appeals Court Lets Texas Resume Ban on Most Abortions

https://ift.tt/30cFSna AUSTIN, Texas — A federal appeals court has allowed Texas to resume banning most abortions, just one day after clinics began racing to serve patients again for the first time since early September. A one-page order by the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals issued late Friday reinstated the nation’s strictest abortion law, which bans abortions once cardiac activity is detected , usually around six weeks. It makes no exceptions in cases of rape or incest . “Patients are being thrown back into a state of chaos and fear,” said Nancy Northup, president of the Center for Reproductive Rights, which represents several Texas clinics that had briefly resumed normal abortion services. [time-brightcove not-tgx=”true”] She called on the U.S. Supreme Court to “step in and stop this madness.” Clinics had braced for the New Orleans-based appeals court to act fast after U.S. District Judge Robert Pitman, an appointee of President Barack Obama, on Wednesday suspended...

New top story from Time: New York Police Seek Suspect After Elderly Asian American Woman Assaulted

https://ift.tt/2PLnYCU (NEW YORK) — An elderly Asian American woman was attacked by a man Monday afternoon who repeatedly kicked her in front of witnesses who seemingly stood by, according to surveillance footage released by the New York City Police Department. The 65-year-old woman was walking along 43rd street when a man came up to her and kicked her in the stomach, knocking her to the ground, the NYPD said. The man then stomps on the woman’s face several times while hurling anti-Asian statements at her, police said. He later casually walks away, the footage shows. The woman was hospitalized with serious injuries. According to video footage, a man inside a building lobby seemingly stopped what he’s doing to watch the assault and later two more men wearing blazers walked into the frame and one of them closed the door as the woman was on the ground. According to real estate website Street Easy , Brodsky Organization is the property developer and manager of the building...

New top story from Time: WikiLeaks Founder Julian Assange Accused of Conspiring With LulzSec and Anonymous Hackers

https://ift.tt/3hZ0cN4 WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange conspired with hackers affiliated with the “Anonymous” and “LulzSec” groups, which have been linked to numerous cyber attacks around the world, according to new indictment by the U.S. Justice Department. Assange, who’s detained in the U.K. on a U.S. extradition request, gave the leader of LulzSec a list of targets to hack in 2012 and told this person that the most influential release of hacked materials would be from the Central Intelligence Agency, National Security Agency or the New York Times, according to a statement Wednesday from the Justice Department. The LulzSec leader was cooperating with the Federal Bureau of Investigation at the time, according to the statement. An Anonymous and LulzSec-affiliated hacker stole emails through a data breach of an American intelligence consulting company that were published in WikiLeaks, according to the statement. Assange indirectly asked that hacker to spam that company a...

New top story from Time: At least 15 People Are Dead and Hundreds Injured and Missing After a Fire at a Rohingya Refugee Camp

https://ift.tt/2NQfc5U COX’S BAZAR, Bangladesh — Searchers recovered at least 15 charred bodies after a devastating fire destroyed thousands of shelters at a Rohingya refugee camp in southern Bangladesh, officials said Tuesday. At least 400 people were still missing and around 560 were injured by the fire, according to Louise Donovan, a spokesperson for the United Nations’ refugee agency. The UNHCR said around 45,000 people were displaced by the fire, which broke out Monday afternoon and burned well into the night. In the aftermath, refugees picked through the burned debris looking for their belongings. Others wept. “Yesterday before the fire started, my kids went to study at the Islamic school. I did not see them after they came back. I found two of my older kids but I still can’t find my youngest son,” said Shappuni, a Rohingya refugee who uses only one name. At least three of the dead were children and the search for victims was still ongoing, said Nizam Uddin Ahmed,...

New top story from Time: More Than 100 Injured in Stampede at Israeli Religious Festival

https://ift.tt/3e9j7VT (JERUSALEM) — More than 100 people were injured, dozens critically, in a stampede at a Jewish religious gathering in northern Israel attended by tens of thousands of people, Israel’s main rescue service said early Friday. Magen David Adom tweeted that it was treating 103 people, including 38 in critical condition. Israeli media had earlier reported that a grandstand collapsed, but the rescue service said all the injuries happened in a stampede. Israeli media reported that up to 38 people were killed, but the rescue service did not immediately respond to a request for confirmation. The Ynet news website was among those reporting the figure, and published a photo appearing to show several bodies. Tragedy in Meron: MDA is fighting for the lives of dozens wounded, and will not give up until the last victim is evacuated. 38 are in critical condition and still in the field 6 in critical condition who were evacuated 18 injured severely 2 ...

My precise view

Search This Blog