TRUMP RETURNS TO STIMULUS TALKS, BUT REPUBS BALK. When Trump came back to the White House from Walter Reed Medical Center (10/5), one of the first things he did was tweet that there would be no more stimulus package for COVID-19 relief until after the election. By the end of the week Trump changed his mind as Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin offered a $1.8 trillion deal that included $300 billion for cities and states, up from $250 billion in the earlier proposal, a $400 weekly enhanced unemployment insurance benefit for a longer duration than the earlier proposal, and stimulus checks with $1,000 per child, instead of the $500 per child, the Washington Post reported (10/10), but House Speaker Nancy Pelosi was still holding out for a more ambitious package while Republican leaders said any bill larger than $1 trillion would be difficult for many Senate Republicans to accept. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, who was focusing on confirming Amy Coney Barrett as a new Supreme Court justice before the election, said passing a stimulus bill was “unlikely in the next three weeks.”

Pelosi has in particular demanded that the Trump administration adopt Democrats’ plan for robust testing and tracing to contain the novel coronavirus, which was part of the $3 trillion Heroes Act the House passed in May but never got a Senate hearing. The House passed a $2.2 trillion bill Oct. 1.

Rep. Ro Khanna (D-CA) called for Pelosi to accept the offer of a $1.8 trillion stimulus (10/11). “Make a deal & put the ball in McConnell’s court,” Khanna tweeted.

LET THE COURT DECIDE IF IT NEEDS ‘PACKING.’ Republicans keep talking about how the Democrats plan to “pack the court” if they take over, but packing the court is precisely what Republicans have done since Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) blocked hearings for Judge Merrick Garland, Obama’s choice for the Supreme Court after Antonin Scalia’s sudden death in February 2016, nine months before the election. Republicans left the seat open for through the election, supposedly because voters had a right to weigh in, but Republican senators also threatened to keep the seat open for at least four more years if Hillary Clinton was elected president.

After Trump was placed in the White House with a minority of the popular vote, the Republican Senate did away with the requirement that Supreme Court candidates get at least 60 votes for a lifetime appointment, and the Senate confirmed Trump’s nomination of Neil Gorsuch to the Supreme Court, 54-45, on April 7, 2017. 14 months after Scalia’s death. Now Republicans can’t wait six weeks to see what the voters decide about who will choose the successor to Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg.

McConnell apparently has the votes to push Amy Barrett onto the court over Democratic opposition, but Democrats on the Judiciary Committee made it clear they would hang the impending threat to the Affordable Care Act around the necks of Republican senators who are up for election this year — all of whom have voted to do away with the ACA and the guarantee of coverage for pre-existing conditions. McConnell’s political power play strips the court of much of its legitimacy as a neutral arbiter. Biden has not declared that he would support an effort to reform the Supreme Court if Democrats regain the majority in the Senate, but if Barrett is seated on the court, he might wait until the right-wing bloc starts showing its political leanings before he gives congressional leaders the go-ahead to add seats on the court that he could fill to put balance back on the court. Overturning the Affordable Care Act, for example, which the court is scheduled to hear the week after the election, would be asking for trouble. Or Democrats could leave the court intact and simply expand Medicare to cover everybody. Then see if the court wants to try overturning the Social Security Act. Don’t think it isn’t in their sights.

PRESIDENT ENGAGED IN PAY-FOR-PLAY SCAMS. A New York Times analysis of tax records (10/10) showed that more than 200 companies, special-interest groups and foreign governments have funneled millions of dollars to President Trump’s properties while reaping benefits from the president and his administration. Nearly a quarter of the entities have not been previously reported, The Hill noted (10/11).

Sixty patrons who promoted specific interests to the Trump administration spent almost $12 million on expenses associated with the Trump Organization during the first two years of Trump’s presidency. The Times reported nearly all of these customers saw their interests move forward. In interviews with almost 250 business executives, club members, lobbyists, Trump property employees and current administration officials, sources detailed to the Times how Trump conducted business and interacted with customers who were seeking help from the administration.

Charles Pierce noted at Esquire.com (10/12), “Every American with even a tangential interest in politics understands why this is sleazy and corrupt, because they’ve seen it up close in their county commissions, and city councils, and state legislatures. You pay the pol and you get the gig. Good god, Massachusetts had three consecutive speakers of its House go to jail for variations on this theme. Illinois had four out of seven governors go up the river for monetizing their job in similar ways, most notably eventual Trump pardon-ee Rod (Fcking Golden) Blagojevich. Pay for play is one of the easy ones.”

The Trump Organization’s customers included foreign politicians, Florida barons, a Chinese billionaire, a Serbian prince, clean-energy advocates, petroleum industry leaders, small-government advocates and contractors. The Times noted that some of the president’s customers did not see their interests fully fulfilled, but noted “whether they won or lost, Mr. Trump benefited financially.” More than 70 advocacy groups, businesses and foreign governments held events at Trump Organization properties that previously were at different locations or developed new events to be hosted at the properties. Religious organizations also participated by throwing prayer meetings, banquets and tours on Trump properties.

“And this is the ethical and moral context in which Judge Amy Coney Barrett is willing and able to take a lifetime position on the Supreme Court from this President of the United States. No person of character would do that,” Pierce concluded.

DEMS HAVE PLENTY OF TARGETS IN SENATE FIELD. Democrats need to pick up four seats to regain the Senate majority without a vice presidential tie breaker. States they hope to pick up include Arizona, where Mark Kelly (D) has been leading appointed Sen. Martha McSally (R); Colorado, where former Gov. John Hickenlooper (D) leads Sen. Cory Gardner (R); Maine, where Sara Gideon (D) has been leading Sen. Susan Collins (R); and North Carolina, where Cal Cunningham (D) leads Sen. Thom Tillis (R).

Democrats have pickup opportunities in several other states, including Iowa, where Theresa Greenfield (D) is narrowly ahead of Sen. Joni Ernst (R); Georgia, where polls show Raphael Warnock (D) is leading in a 20-person special election field with appointed Sen. Kelly Loeffler (R) but the real race is between Loeffler and Doug Collins (R) to see who gets in the Jan. 5 runoff with Warnock; in the other Senate race, Jon Ossoff (D) is running strong against Sen. David Perdue (R); Kansas, where Barbara Bollier (D) is in a tight race with Roger Marshall (R) for the seat Sen. Pat Roberts (R) is giving up; Montana, where Gov. Steve Bullock (D) and Sen. Steve Daines (R) are tied; and South Carolina, where Jaime Harrison (D) is narrowly ahead of Sen. Lindsay Graham (R).

Longer shots are Alaska, where Sen. Dan Sullivan (R) faces Al Gross, an independent candidate running with Democratic support; Texas, where M.J. Hegar (D) has been within single digits of Sen. John Cornyn (R) ; Kentucky, where Amy McGrath (D) is challenging Sen. Mitch McConnell (R); and Mississippi, where Mike Espy (D) is challenging Cindy Hyde-Smith (R).

Republicans hope to flip seats in Alabama, where Doug Jones (D) faces Tommy Tuberville, and Michigan, where Gary Peters (D) has been narrowly ahead of John James (R).

TRUMP-APPOINTED JUDGE SMACKS DOWN TRUMP EFFORTS TO SUPPRESS VOTE IN PENNSYLVANIA. The Trump campaign and the Republican National Convention’s efforts to steal the election in Pennsylvania were handed a setback (10/10) by a Trump-appointed judge. The Trump campaign and RNC were trying to block Pennsylvania from having ballot drop boxes, force signature matches between voter registration records and ballots, and pave the way for bringing in an army of nonresident “poll watchers” to intimidate voters.

US District Judge Nicholas Ranjan wasn’t having it, Laura Clawson noted at DailyKos (10/12). “While Plaintiffs may not need to prove actual voter fraud, they must at least prove that such fraud is ‘certainly impending.’ They haven’t met that burden. At most, they have pieced together a sequence of uncertain assumptions,” he wrote in a 138-page opinion.

Ranjan cited Justice Brett Kavanaugh in his decision, so if the Trump campaign and RNC appeal this to the Supreme Court, Kavanaugh will have to contend with his past self. Not that that’s usually a problem for partisan Republicans, Clawson noted.

Pennsylvania isn’t the only state where Republicans have had a court loss on efforts to rig the elections.

“In many respects, this case requires the Court to separate fact from fiction,” US District Judge Dana Christensen wrote in dismissing a Republican challenge to mail voting in Montana. “Central to some of the Plaintiffs’ claims is the contention that the upcoming election, both nationally and in Montana, will fall prey to widespread voter fraud. The evidence suggests, however, that this allegation, specifically in Montana, is a fiction.”

That 9/30 decision followed another federal district judge dismissing a lawsuit against Nevada’s new law calling for every registered voter to be sent a mail ballot. 

State by state, it’s clear Republicans just want to make it harder to vote during a pandemic. Of course the Trump Supreme Court may yet hand Republicans the means to suppress votes. But district judges have had some very strong opinions. To overturn all of them, the court’s conservatives will have to drop any pretense of being above partisanship, in ways that will make it easier for Democrats to make the case for reforming or expanding the court in the future.

POPE FRANCIS’ ENCYCLICAL COULD SHAKE UP ELECTION. Catholics make up one of the most important constituencies of American voters, so it’s no wonder they have been courted by both Joe Biden and Donald Trump during the US presidential campaign. Four years ago, according to the Pew Research Center, 52% of them voted for Trump, compared with 44% for Hillary Clinton. With Biden himself being Catholic, you might expect substantial numbers American Catholics to consider switching sides to one of their own, Catherine Pepinster wrote in The Guardian (10/6).

But the Catholic vote got more interesting when Pope Francis travelled to Assisi (10/4) to honor Saint Francis, the saint he most admires, for his dedication to the poor, and to sign his new encyclical, “Fratelli Tutti (All Brothers),” which describes the need for greater fraternity and solidarity in a post-pandemic world.

Pope Francis does not name names in his encyclical, although he’s not above overt criticism. Ahead of the 2016 election, he described Trump’s plan to thwart migrants by building a wall between the US and Mexico as “not Christian.” Trump replied that Francis’ remark was “disgraceful” and advised the Pope to stay out of politics.

In this document Francis makes it clear that populism and nationalism – of the kind Trump typifies – are damaging, warning that “a concept of popular and national unity influenced by various ideologies is creating new forms of selfishness and a loss of the social sense under the guise of defending national interests.”

He also criticized unregulated capitalism. “The marketplace, by itself, cannot resolve every problem, however much we are asked to believe this dogma of neoliberal faith. Whatever the challenge, this impoverished and repetitive school of thought always offers the same recipes … the magic theories of ‘spillover’ or ‘trickle’ — without using the name.”

Also, “Anyone who thinks that the only lesson to be learned was the need to improve what we were already doing, or to refine existing systems and regulations, is denying reality. God willing, after all this, we will think no longer in terms of ‘them’ and ‘those’, but only ‘us’. … If only we might keep in mind all those elderly persons who died for lack of respirators, partly as a result of the dismantling, year after year, of healthcare systems.”

Charles Pierce noted a particularly relevant passage at Esquire.com (10/5):

“Things that until a few years ago could not be said by anyone without risking the loss of universal respect can now be said with impunity, and in the crudest of terms, even by some political figures. Nor should we forget that ‘there are huge economic interests operating in the digital world, capable of exercising forms of control as subtle as they are invasive, creating mechanisms for the manipulation of consciences and of the democratic process. The way many platforms work often ends up favouring encounter between persons who think alike, shielding them from debate. These closed circuits facilitate the spread of fake news and false information, fomenting prejudice and hate.’”

Pierce noted, “The most interesting thing about this section of the encyclical is its number. It’s 45.”

Pepinster noted in The Guardian, “With Catholics making up such a large proportion of voters, about 20%, both Democratic and Republican campaigners are keen to appeal to them. Trump’s camp stresses abortion and matters of religious liberty, while Biden has often spoken of the way in which his own Catholic faith has helped him in dark times, and he’s not averse to making the personal political. ‘The next Republican that tells me I’m not religious, I’m going to shove my rosary beads down their throat,’ the Cincinnati Enquirer once reported him as saying. His team stresses Catholic teaching that focuses on the poor and the vulnerable.”

DEMOCRATS ARE SWELLING EARLY VOTE. Americans are voting early in the 2020 general election at an unprecedented pace, with election officials having already received more than 9 million ballots in the 30 states that have made data available, and that data indicates that registered Democrats have returned more than twice as many ballots than Republicans thus far, Tommy Bear reported at Forbes.com (10/10).

In 2016, 57.2 million Americans voted early in person, by mail or via absentee ballot, yet, still more than three weeks from Election Day, voters have already cast a total of 9,055,052 ballots as of 10/10 in the 30 states providing applicable data. 

The previous week, Michael McDonald of the University of Florida, who administers the US Election Project, projected a record-setting 150 million people (65% of the US population) would vote in this election, which would represent the highest such percentage in more than a century.

As of 10/10, among the nine states that provide party registration data, Democrats had returned more than 2 million ballots nationally, while Republicans had returned approximately 891,000, according to the US Election Project data.

In the battleground state of Wisconsin, 646,987 people had already voted absentee as of 10/9, an exceptionally high number considering a grand total of 146,294 Wisconsinites voted by mail in the 2016 election. 

A national Gallup poll released 10/7 showed that, unlike previous election cycles, a massive partisan gap has emerged between those who plan to vote early and those who plan to wait until Election Day. The survey found that 62% of Democratic registered voters plan to vote early or indicated they have already voted, compared with just 28% of Republican voters. This 34-percentage-point gap is striking, considering that over the past four presidential elections, it hasn't been greater than 2%. The messaging from the candidates atop each party's ticket has undoubtedly impacted these disparate approaches to voting in the age of the coronavirus pandemic. President Donald Trump has continuously denounced mail-in voting, declaring that “With Universal Mail-In Voting, 2020 will be the most INACCURATE & FRAUDULENT Election in history.” Joe Biden, on the other hand, has encouraged his supporters to vote as soon as possible. 

IN FLORIDA, DESPITE CONSTITUTIONAL AMENDMENT, FEW FELONS LIKELY TO VOTE. Two years after Florida voters approved a landmark constitutional amendment allowing felons to vote, which was expected to restore voting rights to as many as 1.4 million Floridians, Republicans have adopted countermeasures to keep all but a few from voting in the Nov. 3 election. First, the Republican-dominated legislature passed a law to keep felons who still owed fines or court fees or restitution from voting. Now the state refuses to let felons know if they still owe fees to the state, making them risk additional felony charges if they vote.

Georgetown University Law professor Neel Sukhatme used data on 850,000 felons in Florida to find that just 45,300 have registered over the same period. He estimated 78% might owe fees fines or restitution. He established a website, FreeOurVote.com, to let felons see if they are free of fines and fees,

ProPublica, the Tampa Bay Times and the Miami Herald, in a joint investigation, found that out of 418,00 inmates who have been released since 1997, 31,400 with felony convictions have registered to vote. About half of the convicted felons on the voting rolls identified by the Times/Herald/ProPublica analysis are Black, and 52% overall registered as Democrats. Another 25% registered with no party affiliation. It’s unclear how many of them have outstanding fines and fees, ProPublica reported (10/7).

Florida officials have not removed any felons from the rolls for owing fines or fees, and they’re unlikely to do so before Election Day, Secretary of State Laurel Lee said in an interview. It’s unclear whether those whom the state fails to prune are entitled to vote after all — or may face prosecution if they do.

Mike Bloomberg is leading a Democratic effort to pay fines and fees to make felons eligible to vote. They have raised $16 million to cover debts for felons who owe less than $1,500 and claim they have identified 32,000 Black and Hispanic voters who are on the rolls but are ineligible to vote because they owe court fees or fines.

Bloomberg’s team believes that if the 32,000 felons could vote, they could swing the election, even in a state with nearly 15 million registered voters. So far, however, efforts to pay fees and fines have not dramatically increased the rolls. Out of 325 people in Hillsborough County who have had their fines and fees paid off by the Florida Rights Restoration Coalition, and whose records were made available, only 56 registered to vote, the Times/Herald/ProPublica analysis shows.

Florida’s Division of Elections, which is responsible for removing ineligible voters from the rolls, can’t say how many registered voters are convicted felons. Florida has no central database of court fees or fines. Data on felony convictions is scattered across the state’s 67 county clerk’s offices, and much of that information is incomplete or outdated. Nobody tracks restitution paid to victims.

Secretary of State Lee’s office is capable of processing only 57 voter registrations per day, meaning it would take until 2026 to screen the tens of thousands of people flagged as potential felons and remove those who owe fines and fees. She requested more than $1 million from the Legislature this year to hire more people to screen Amendment 4-related voters but did not receive it.

Six political observers, advocates, lawmakers and lawyers told the Times/Herald/ProPublica either party might exploit voting by ineligible felons to challenge the state’s election results.

REPUBS SET UP ILLEGAL DROP BOXES IN CALIFORNIA. The California Republican Party is operating unofficial ballot drop boxes that Secretary of State Alex Padilla said were in “violation of state law.”

Jordan Tygh, a regional field director for the California Republican Party, promoted an “official ballot drop off box” on Twitter and urged followers to message him for “convenient locations” to drop their ballots (10/11), The Orange County Register first reported. One voter reported an “Official Ballot Drop Box” that was “approved and bought by the GOP” outside of a Los Angeles area church before it was removed after county officials warned on social media that it was “not an official vote by mail drop box and does not comply with [state] regulations for drop boxes,” according to KCAL-TV.

The boxes were set up across Southern California in front of churches, gyms, and gun stores by the California GOP, according to the Washington Post. One chapter of the state Republican Party in California rolled out its own drop-off sites while echoing President Donald Trump’s baseless allegations over the “security” of mail voting even though it has been repeatedly shown to be safe and secure.

From The Progressive Populist, November 1, 2020

Populist.com