Dispatches

NO WONDER REPUBLICANS BELIEVE IN CONSPIRACY THEORIES. Republican Congress members held another of their many, many rage-filled hearings July 20, Mark Sumner noted at Daily Kos (7/21). This one had the stated purpose of propping Republican-supported spoiler candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. in front of the cameras so that he could spew his racist, antisemitic, anti-scientific conspiracy theories while crying to a worldwide audience that he was being censored.

As Republicans rolled on through the day, tossing their own brand of woo woo onto the heaping pile of ugly and harmful nonsense that Kennedy carried into the chamber, one thing about all this began to make sense: Republicans should believe in an elaborate scheme involving thousands of individuals and hundreds of officials cooperating to overturn the results of the 2020 election. Because that’s exactly what happened.

NPR has been keeping a handy database of those involved in the Jan. 6 assault on the Capitol. As of July 14, a total of 1,064 people have faced charges in connection to the failed insurrection. Of those, 617 have pleaded guilty. Another 124 have faced trials. Only two have been acquitted.

Estimates of those who battered their way into the Capitol on Jan. 6 put the number at over 2,000. In addition, hundreds more pro-Donald Trump rioters battered police, damaged structures, and violated D.C. weapons laws. So it’s likely that all the numbers above will continue to grow as more of those involved are identified and arrested.

But these people are, for the most part, just foot soldiers. Sure, among them were members of the Oath Keepers who were convicted of seditious conspiracy and sentenced to years in federal prison, but even these guys were way down in the pecking order. They are the followers.

On July 18, Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel charged 16 false electors who signed certificates alleging that Trump had won the 2020 election with eight felonies each, including conspiracy to commit election law forgery. Each of these charges has a maximum sentence of 14 years. Since the 16 false electors range in age from 55 to 81, they may want to rethink their retirement plans.

But Michigan isn’t the only state where Republicans produced slates of false electors, or the only state where they may face charges. Wisconsin has been considering charges against the 10 false electors there, and a lawsuit is moving ahead that seeks $2.4 million in damages from the electors and from the Trump lawyers who advised them. False electors in other states have been connected to subpoenas from the FBI and meetings with the office of the special counsel, suggesting that federal charges may soon be filed by Jack Smith.

In all, there are 84 of these false electors scattered across Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, New Mexico, Nevada, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin.

These 84 people aren’t just mid-level officers in the insurrection: They’re people who absolutely knew better. They were insiders. Those who showed up at the Capitol to scream and break windows may have been ignorant enough to believe Trump and the angry rhetoric flying their way. These false electors were fully aware they were lying when they signed their names to fake certificates while claiming to be duly appointed representatives of their state’s voting results.

And dozens, if not hundreds, more Republican officials and politicians were involved. At the top of the pyramid were Donald Trump, Mark Meadows, John Eastman, Jeffrey Clark, Michael Flynn, Sidney Powell, Rudy Giuliani, and others who weren’t just involved in the false elector scheme: They were the authors. They weren’t taking orders. They were creating the strategy and tactics that resulted in the outreach to those false electors, the lies told to legislators, and the rallies that kept Trump voters riled up and ready to march.

IF ANYONE BENEFITS FROM TRUMP’S INDICTMENTS, IT’S BIDEN. One of Republicans’ favorite talking points about Donald Trump’s successive indictments is the notion that every new criminal count only serves to make him stronger, Kerry Eleveld note at Daily Kos (7/21).

But while Trump continues to dominate the Republican primary for president in 2024, he’s not getting any more popular with the general electorate and, even among Republican voters, his indictment bumps appear to be fading.

A recent spate of national general election head-to-heads shows Biden almost uniformly besting Trump.

Here’s a sampling of national Biden versus Trump polls conducted by reputable pollsters over the last several weeks:

• You Gov/Yahoo (July 13-17): Biden 47%-Trump 43%, Biden +4

• Quinnipiac (July 13-17): 49%-44%, Biden +5

• Monmouth (July 12-17): 47%-40%, Biden +7

• Ipsos/Reuters (July 11-17): 37%-35%, Biden +2

• Morning Consult (July 14-16): 43%-41%, Biden +2

• YouGov/Economist (July 8-11): 42%-42%, even

Needless to say none of this is predictive and, in any other world, it would be way too early to even consider.

Enthusiasm aside, Trump’s toxicity also exceeds Biden’s in recent polling. In Monmouth, for instance, fully 50% of respondents said they definitely would not vote for Trump, while 46% ruled out voting for Biden. It’s not a particularly heartwarming metric, but it renders Trump incapable of winning a majority of the electorate.

According to the YouGov/Yahoo survey, Trump is also moving in the wrong direction with Republican voters while Biden is moving in the right direction with Democratic voters.

While nearly half (49%) of potential GOP primary voters continue to prefer Trump to an unnamed, hypothetical alternative — the same as June — the share who select “someone else” has now jumped to 43%. That’s 4 points higher than it was in June, and the highest number so far this year. …

Biden, in contrast, has modestly improved his position among Democrats. Today, more than half (53%) of potential Democratic primary voters now prefer Biden to an unnamed alternative Democratic candidate, up from 48% in June.

None of this data is predictive, of course—there’s still eons between now and next November. Plus whatever the national polls say, the 2024 contest will be decided by the battleground states, where the contest will inevitably be tight. A July poll of Michigan conducted by Public Opinion Strategies put Biden over Trump by a single point, 45%-44%.

Another gut check came in late June from a poll of swing states commissioned by a group that recently formed to sound the alarms about a potential third-party spoiler. In Pennsylvania and Michigan, the survey found Biden and Trump were dead even (50%-50%) and in Nevada, Biden was edging out Trump by just 2 points, 51%-49%.

DEMS’ GROWING DOMINANCE OF KEY COLLEGE TOWNS UPENDS REPUBLICANS’ PATH TO VICTORY. Back in April, Wisconsin former Republican Gov. Scott Walker had an urgent message following his party’s devastating loss in an off-year state Supreme Court contest that flipped its control to Democrats: Republicans are screwed if they don’t find a way to quash college voters, Kerry Eleveld noted at Daily Kos (7/24).

“Dane County cast more ballots in the race for the Supreme Court than the largest county in the state—Milwaukee County,” Scott explained, noting that Dane County is home to some 50,000 University of Wisconsin students. “82% of votes went for the radical,” Walker added, referencing liberal leaning pro-choice judge Janet Protasiewicz.

Protasiewicz notched an eye-popping 11-point win over her conservative anti-abortion rival in a 50-50 state.

“Younger voters are the issue,” Walker tweeted, failing to entertain the idea that maybe—just maybe—Republicans are wildly out of step with Americans in their crusade to ban abortions entirely at the state and federal levels. “It comes from years of radical indoctrination ­– on campus, in school, with social media, & throughout culture.”

Walker warned that Republicans would “never” win a battleground state again if they didn’t turn back the trend. The problem wasn’t just that Dane County voters had so disproportionately opted for the liberal candidate — it was that they had turned out at such extraordinary levels they had upended the math for Republicans.

“This is a really big deal,” Mark Graul, a Republican strategist who ran George W. Bush’s 2004 reelection campaign in Wisconsin, told Politico in a deeply reported piece by Charlie Mahtesian and Madi Alexander. “What Democrats are doing in Dane County is truly making it impossible for Republicans to win a statewide race.” The article notes how Democrats are turning college campuses into electoral juggernauts that have already tipped the balance toward Democrats in key states and threatens to shut out Republicans in a handful more.

In Michigan, for instance, where Democrats are reshaping public policy from the left, University of Michigan-based Washtenaw County went for Joe Biden in 2020 by some 46 points, 72%-26%, or nearly 101,000 votes. Hillary Clinton also decisively won Washtenaw in 2016, but she only netted 82,400 votes. If Clinton had bested Trump by the same vote margin as Biden, she would have more than made up the 10,704 votes by which she lost the state.

Dane and Washtenaw counties aren’t outliers. Democrats are seeing the same trends in college-town counties across the country.

Of the 171 cities and counties identified as “college towns” by the American Communities Project, 2 in 3 have grown more Democratic and 38 have flipped from red to blue, according to a Politico analysis of the MIT Election Data and Science Lab.

Colorado is one of the states that have benefited from this shift. “Since 2008, when Larimer [County] first flipped from red to blue, [Colorado] has firmly been in the Democratic column,” reported Politico. “Between the 2000 and 2020 presidential elections, in Larimer [home of Colorado State University,] and Boulder County, home to the University of Colorado, the Democratic vote grew by 169,000 votes. The Republican vote, by comparison, grew by just 21,000 votes.”

So where might this trend help Democrats in the upcoming election cycles? The article identifies Gallatin County, Montana, home to Bozeman and Montana State University, and Buncombe County, North Carolina, where UNC-Asheville is located.

In Montana, Democrats are hoping Sen. Jon Tester can hang on to his seat to help retain their majority in a very challenging state. Gallatin County is critical for Tester to pull it off.

And while North Carolina isn’t fielding a US Senate race, Biden lost the state by just a single point in 2020. Flipping any single state from red to blue in the presidential contest would give Democrats breathing room in a contest that might just be a rematch between Biden and Trump. And Democrats need all the breathing room they can find.

GOP SPENDING CUTS WOULD KILL 500,000 JOBS, SLAM BRAKES ON ECONOMY. An analysis released July 19 by the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office estimates that House Republicans’ proposed cuts to federal spending for the coming fiscal year would kill 500,000 jobs and hinder economic growth, findings that Democrats seized on as further evidence of the GOP’s “willful disregard for the wellbeing of Americans,” Jake Johnson reported at CommonDreams (7/20)

The CBO examined the potential economic impacts of Republicans’ Limit, Save, Grow Act (LSGA), legislation that the GOP-controlled House passed in late April amid a debt ceiling crisis that the party manufactured.

The White House and GOP leaders later struck a deal that included caps on discretionary spending for the next two fiscal years, but Republican appropriators have spent the past several weeks proposing cuts that are more in line with the LSGA, which took aim at Medicaid, federal food assistance, and other critical programs.

According to the CBO, the Republican bill’s far-reaching spending cuts would result in 0.5% lower GDP growth next year, which “would correspond to reductions in employment.” The CBO’s analysis indicates that roughly half a million workers would lose their jobs in 2024 if the LSGA became law.

“Employment would remain below the level in CBO’s forecast through 2027,” the analysis notes.

Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.), chair of the Senate Budget Committee and the lawmaker who requested the CBO assessment, said in a statement that “these new cuts, in addition to being wildly unpopular, are shown to inflict widespread economic pain and drag down American economic growth.”

“Republicans shower the wealthy with budget-busting tax giveaways, then claim to care about deficits,” said Whitehouse. “In their anti-government, pro-polluter crusade, MAGA Republicans have no problem harming workers and families as collateral damage. On what planet is that fiscally responsible?”

The analysis comes as Republicans are pushing ahead with government funding bills that would slash spending on infrastructure, education, climate action, the Social Security Administration, and more, proposals that Democrats oppose. The federal government could shut down at the end of September if Congress doesn’t pass funding legislation.

“Even by the low standards of Congress in 2023, it’s shocking how quickly House Republicans ripped up their end of the bargain that steered the country clear of default last month,” Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), chair of the Senate Finance Committee, said. “We ought to take this as a clear indication that Republicans cannot be trusted to stand by any of their commitments, especially when it comes to protecting Medicare and Social Security.”

“Right now wages are up, unemployment is down, and inflation has cooled off, but the plans House Republicans are committed to passing would destroy half a million jobs and slam the brakes on our economy,” Wyden added. “It’s a recipe for slower growth and financial hardship for families all across the country.”

A union representing more than 750,000 federal employees warned that House Republicans’ proposed cuts to the Social Security Administration would deeply harm the already strained and understaffed agency, potentially forcing it to close offices and slash service hours.

Such impacts would “devastate the agency’s ability to serve the American public,” Julie Tippens, legislative director of the American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE), wrote in a letter to the top members of the House Appropriations Committee, Johnson reported (7/20).

A Republican-controlled appropriations subcommittee approved legislation that would cut the Social Security Administration’s (SSA) budget for fiscal year 2024 by $183 million below the currently enacted level. President Biden’s 2024 budget proposal, by contrast, called for a $1.4 billion increase for the agency.

The full House Appropriations Committee still must approve the measure, one of a dozen government funding bills that Congress is looking to pass by Sept. 30 to avert a government shutdown.

DESANTIS ATTACKS ON FLORIDA’S NEW COLLEGE HIT HOME AS FACULTY FLEE. As Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis attempted to burnish his hard-right credentials for a run for president, one of his big moves was a hostile takeover of the New College of Florida, known as the state’s most liberal public college and a place particularly loathed by White supremacists, Laura Clawson noted at Daily Kos (7/20). Now, as DeSantis’ presidential campaign founders, the damage he’s done to New College in a matter of months is becoming clear as more than 1 in 3 of the college’s full-time faculty won’t be back for the coming school year.

DeSantis installed six new members on the board of trustees, choosing hard-right anti-LGBTQ+ bigots and opponents of public education: Christopher Rufo, the architect of the Republican “critical race theory” panic and a huge proponent of labeling teachers “groomers”; the superintendent of a religious charter school; the dean of the private Christian Hillsdale College; and last but not least, the author of a book so anti-LGBTQ+ that Amazon stopped selling it. The goal, DeSantis’ chief of staff said, was to turn New College — a public institution — into “a Hillsdale of the South.”

The new DeSantis trustees then fired the college’s president, Patricia Okker, and put in a DeSantis loyalist as interim president at more than double Okker’s salary. Next, DeSantis pushed legislation giving boards of trustees and presidents sole decision-making power over hiring at Florida public colleges and universities, weakening faculty tenure, and banning gender studies majors or minors as well as all diversity, equity, and inclusion programming.

That affects every public higher education institution in Florida, but it was clear which college was most in the crosshairs of efforts to impose DeSantis-approved ideological conformity.

Go figure that faculty at New College who had the opportunity to leave are doing just that. Some of the 36 faculty who are leaving—out of fewer than 100 full-time faculty—had already planned retirements or other ways out. But most hadn’t. It’s a “ridiculously high” number of departures, according to the provost.

Richard Corcoran, the highly paid interim president, whined to the trustees, “The majority of faculty who have left have not given us any kind of consideration, or notice, or thought or anything.” The world’s tiniest violin may be playing for Corcoran, but this is a real problem for students at New College. There will be just one neuroscience professor this academic year, down from three, the Tampa Bay Times reports, which means there will be no upper-level neuroscience classes. That’s a big problem for juniors and seniors who have started a major in neuroscience that they now can’t finish.

This is what happens with the current wave of hateful Republican policies more generally. The people who can leave do. It’s not just faculty leaving New College if they can get jobs elsewhere, it’s families with trans kids moving out of hostile states to find the care and support they need, or businesses and the military paying for abortion-related travel. But while some people are able to escape these repressive Republican policies, the most vulnerable people are left to struggle.

DEMS KEEP AHEAD OF TRUMP’S PACE WITH JUDICIAL NOMINEES. President Joe Biden and Senate Democrats have passed a major milestone in confirming the 100th district court nominee, Erin Tulley reported at Daily Kos (7/20).

The pace put Biden 20 district judges ahead of the number appointed by Donald J. Trump at the same point in his term, Carl Hulse reported at the New York Times (6/28).

“While district court judges were often previously confirmed on voice votes, the fight over the ideological leanings of nominees means nearly all of them are forced to navigate two votes,” Hulse wrote. “And there is little margin for error given the Democratic caucus’s slim 51-to-49 edge in the Senate and occasional defections from the Democratic side by Senator Joe Manchin III of West Virginia. Both parties have put a major emphasis on filling vacancies, given the increasing role the federal courts play in setting policy and deciding politically charged cultural issues.”

Biden promised to ensure that the nation’s courts reflect our diversity, both in terms of personal and professional backgrounds. Diversity on the bench means representation on the bench.

At least 11 of Biden’s 39 circuit appointees are Black women, compared to eight for all his predecessors. Biden and Senate Democrats appointed the first Black woman to serve as a justice of the US Supreme Court. Biden and Senate Democrats have helped approve the most women, the most people of color, the most LGBTQ+ judges, and the most judges who have professional backgrounds representing people rather than corporations.

PBS News Hour reported: “The nominations send a powerful message to the legal community that this kind of public service is open to a lot of people it wasn’t open to before,” Ron Klain, the White House chief of staff, told The Associated Press. “What it says to the public at large is that if you wind up in federal court for whatever reason, you’re much more likely to have a judge who understands where you came from, who you are, and what you’ve been through.”

Republicans used ​Sen. Dianne Feinstein’s absence earlier this year to delay judicial confirmations. They continue to block nominees by refusing to return blue slips, particuarly in key states where right-wing extremists use federal courts to litigate civil and human rights in authoritarian power grabs.

From The Progressive Populist, August 15, 2023

Populist.com