DonViejo
DonViejo's JournalFired Trump Cybersecurity Official Debunks President's Election Lies, One By One
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/chris-krebs-donald-trump-election-fraud-debunks_n_5fca0e9ac5b6636e09246671
What you need to know about Joe Biden's presidential inauguration
By Emily Davies, Justin Jouvenal and Teddy Amenabar
Dec. 4, 2020 at 6:00 a.m. EST
Joe Biden is expected to begin his term as the 46th president on Jan. 20, when he is scheduled to be sworn into office amid an inauguration ceremony unlike any other in recent memory.
The coronavirus pandemic will transform the traditions long associated with inaugural celebrations. Galas and balls may be canceled entirely. Some events, such as the parade on Pennsylvania Avenue, are expected to occur in a smaller and potentially distant form. Other celebratory components may be virtual, drawing inspiration from the Democratic National Convention’s online event. And people interested in coming to D.C. for the 59th presidential inauguration will have to navigate coronavirus travel restrictions. Here’s a look at what is known so far.
Who is organizing the ceremony?
The Joint Congressional Committee on Inaugural Ceremonies (JCCIC) is responsible for planning the swearing-in ceremony at the Capitol on Jan. 20. The theme of the swearing-in ceremony will be “Our Determined Democracy: Forging a More Perfect Union."
The six-member committee is led by Sen. Roy Blunt (R-Mo.) and includes Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.), House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), House Majority Leader Steny H. Hoyer (D-Md.) and House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.).
Biden’s Presidential Inaugural Committee (PIC), formally launched Nov. 30, is responsible for coordinating and funding the inauguration’s opening ceremonies, parades, galas and balls (if they exist this year). The PIC is led by Tony Allen, the president of Delaware State University who served as a special assistant and speechwriter for Biden during four years of his career in the Senate.
more
https://www.washingtonpost.com/dc-md-va/2020/12/04/2021-inauguration-biden-harris/
Graham Could Be in Hot Water
Speaking of people who could use a pardon right now, Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) may have taken his enthusiasm for kowtowing to Donald Trump a bit too far. Michael J. Moore is currently in private practice, but he served as U.S. Attorney for the Middle District of Georgia for five years, and so he knows a thing or two about election law. And Moore has now filed a formal complaint with the Georgia State Board of Elections, asking them to look into Graham's mucking around in the Peach State's ballot counting.
Under the terms of Georgia law, it is a criminal offense when someone "solicits, requests, commands, importunes, or otherwise attempts to cause" another person to commit an election-related offense. It is also a criminal offense to interfere with the state secretary of state as they perform their election-related duties. And so, when Graham called Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger (R) and leaned on him to toss out multiple thousands of valid ballots, the Senator appears to have committed both offenses. He also unwisely chose to do so while several of Raffensperger's underlings were listening in. Those folks, who have already confirmed what happened, are what is known as "witnesses" (forgive the fancy legal terminology).
It short, Graham certainly appears to have been caught red-handed. His best hope is that Georgia authorities decline to pursue the matter. Failing that, he can shoot for a pardon, but he can't get one from Trump since it's a violation of state, and not federal, law. Gov. Brian Kemp (R-GA) might be persuaded to grant one, except that in Georgia, he doesn't have that power. Instead, it would be up to the five-member Georgia State Board of Pardons and Paroles, who are presumably less susceptible to political influence than a governor who will have to go before voters again in 2 years. Add it up, and the Senator might well need recommendations for a good lawyer. Which is, of course, something else Trump can't help him with. (Z)
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https://www.electoral-vote.com/evp2020/Pres/Maps/Dec04.html#item-3
Biden wrestles with politics in effort to depoliticize the Justice Department
By Dan Merica, Jeff Zeleny, Evan Perez and Manu Raju, CNN
Updated 6:03 AM ET, Fri December 4, 2020
Washington (CNN) - Political questions from Democrats and a new Republican litmus test have suddenly become complicating factors in one of President-elect Joe Biden's most critical choices: picking a new Attorney General to lead the Justice Department out of its highly politicized era.
This creates competing realities for Biden. He must get an attorney general confirmed by a Senate that could be controlled by Republicans, some of whom tell CNN they will only vote for a candidate who pledges to continue an investigation into the 2016 election.
But even more significant, Biden is also feeling pressure from top Democrats and allied groups who believe he must nominate a person of color to at least one of the top four Cabinet posts, likely as attorney general.
Democratic lawmakers and allied groups are pressuring Biden's transition team after Biden selected White nominees for both his top job at the State and Treasury departments. The calculation is complicated by the fact that Michele Flournoy, who is also White, is seen as Biden's leading contender to lead the Defense Department.
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https://www.cnn.com/2020/12/04/politics/biden-attorney-general-search/index.html?
Biden Doesn't Care If Trump Attends Inauguration
December 4, 2020 at 6:30 am EST By Taegan Goddard
Joe Biden told CNN it’s “of no personal consequence to me” if President Trump attends the inauguration, but he thinks it’s important to demonstrate the peaceful transfer of power and an “end of this chaos that he’s created.”
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https://politicalwire.com/2020/12/04/biden-personally-doesnt-care-if-trump-attends-inauguration/
Claims of 'voter fraud' have a long history in America. And they are false
David Litt
Trump is not the first politician to push the voter-fraud myth for his political advantage, but he must be the last
Fri 4 Dec 2020 06.39 EST
Texas Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick was supposed to be a whole lot poorer by now.
On 11 November, eight days after the presidential election and four days after the networks called the race for Joe Biden, the conservative talk radio host turned Republican politician launched a bounty hunt. Any tipsters who could provide evidence of voter fraud that led to a criminal conviction would receive at least $25,000, up to a grand total of $1m. The money was set to come from Patrick’s campaign, not his personal account. Still, the point remains: if voter fraud was rampant, as President Trump and leading Republicans have repeatedly claimed, Patrick’s million-dollar fund should have run dry long ago.
As it stands, Patrick’s campaign finances are in far better shape than his credibility. To date, he has paid out a grand total of zero dollars and zero cents.
Patrick stands out for his willingness to put his donors’ money where his mouth was. But his million-dollar effort was just a small part of the largest voter-fraud hunt in American history. Never in American history have self-proclaimed fraud-fighters been given more attention, resources, and time to prove their case – that a major election was stolen through what they’ve dubbed “illegal votes”.
Instead, they’ve done the opposite. The 2020 election, and Trump’s attempt to overturn it, will leave us with plenty of reasons to remain concerned about the health of our democracy. But the idea that our political process has been compromised by widespread fraud isn’t among them. It’s time to retire the voter-fraud myth for good.
Falsely claiming voter fraud is a tradition nearly as old as American democracy itself. Take, for example, early 19th-century New Jersey. Under the state’s original constitution, some women had the right to vote, and some politicians (namely those of the Federalist Party) felt they would be more likely to win elections if those rights were taken away. But stripping eligible voters of their rights for purely partisan reasons was unseemly, even by 1800s standards, so ambitious lawmakers came up with an excuse. Men, they charged, were casting their ballots, slipping into petticoats, and then voting a second time. The only way to prevent this gender-bending fraud was to eliminate women’s voting rights entirely.
more
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/dec/04/trump-voter-fraud-america-false
Biden adjusting agenda to reflect narrow divide in Congress
By ALEXANDRA JAFFE
WASHINGTON (AP) — President-elect Joe Biden is adjusting the scope of his agenda to meet the challenges of governing with a narrowly divided Congress and the complications of legislating during a raging pandemic.
Rather than immediately pursue ambitious legislation to combat climate change, the incoming administration may try to wrap provisions into a coronavirus aid bill. Biden’s team is also considering smaller-scale changes to the Affordable Care Act while tabling the more contentious fight over creating a public option to compete with private insurers. Biden is already working on an array of executive actions to achieve some of his bolder priorities on climate change and immigration without having to navigate congressional gridlock.
The maneuvering reflects a disappointing political reality for Biden, who campaigned on a pledge to address the nation’s problems with measures that would rival the scope of Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s New Deal legislation. But Democrats acknowledge that big legislative accomplishments are unlikely, even in the best-case scenario in which the party gains a slim majority in the Senate.
“Let’s assume my dream comes true,” Senate Democratic Whip Dick Durbin said, referring to a tight majority for his party. “I think we have to carefully construct any change in the Affordable Care Act, or any other issue, like climate change, based on the reality of the 50-50 Senate.”
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https://apnews.com/article/joe-biden-climate-climate-change-legislation-immigration-d82f2d93520edbf9ced20d599585a8e0
Wisconsin high court declines to hear Trump election lawsuit
Source: ABC12 News
By SCOTT BAUER
Published: Dec. 3, 2020 at 1:17 PM EST|Updated: moments ago
MADISON, Wis. (AP) — The Wisconsin Supreme Court on Thursday refused to hear President Donald Trump’s lawsuit attempting to overturn his loss to Democrat Joe Biden in the battleground state, saying the case must first wind its way through lower courts.
The legal defeat was the latest in a string of losses for Trump’s post-election lawsuits. Judges in multiple battleground states have rejected his claims of fraud or irregularities.
Trump had asked the Wisconsin Supreme Court to disqualify more than 221,000 ballots in the state’s two biggest Democratic counties, alleging irregularities in the way absentee ballots were administered. His lawsuit echoed claims that were earlier rejected by election officials in those counties during a recount that barely affected Biden’s winning margin of about 20,700 votes.
Trump had wanted the conservative-controlled Wisconsin Supreme Court to take the case directly, saying there wasn’t enough time to wage the legal battle by starting first with a lower court given the looming Dec. 14 date when presidential electors cast their votes. But attorneys for Gov. Tony Evers and the state Department of Justice argued the law required the lawsuit to start with lower courts.
Read more: https://www.abc12.com/2020/12/03/wisconsin-high-court-declines-to-hear-trump-election-lawsuit/
Democrats File Bar Complaint Against Joe diGenova for 'Blatant Threat'
MATT NAHAM Dec 3rd, 2020, 10:56 am
Joe diGenova said he was joking, but Democrats weren’t laughing and they filed a bar complaint against him with the D.C. Bar’s Office of Disciplinary Counsel.
Earlier this week, the Trump campaign lawyer and former U.S. Attorney went on Newsmax’s The Howie Carr Show and said that Chris Krebs should be “drawn and quartered,” a medieval capital punishment for traitors. DiGenova also said that Krebs should be “taken out at dawn and shot.” Krebs was the director of the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, and President Donald Trump fired him for saying that 2020 election wasn’t rigged.
These remarks by diGenova reportedly stoked division within the Trump campaign ranks and definitely sparked widespread condemnation.
Legal ethics experts were in disagreement as to whether diGenova clearly violated a rule that could result in some form of bar discipline for his words, but Democratic Reps. Kathleen Rice (D-N.Y.) and Ted Lieu (D-Calif.), both of them attorneys, filed a complaint alleging direct violations of the Rules of Professional Conduct:
more
https://lawandcrime.com/2020-election/democrats-file-bar-complaint-against-trump-campaign-lawyer-for-blatant-threat/
Trump administration pushes pay freeze for federal workers, after initially calling for a 1% raise
By Eric Yoder
Dec. 2, 2020 at 4:09 p.m. EST
The Trump administration has dropped its call for a 1 percent federal employee pay raise in January, advocating instead for a freeze on pay rates for the 2.1 million executive branch workers.
In a letter dated Monday to Capitol Hill, the Office of Management and Budget endorsed language in one of a set of agency funding bills crafted by the Senate that would provide for no raise.
“In the context of budgetary constraints and the recent, pandemic-related impacts on non-Federal labor markets, the Administration supports the policy in the bill to maintain for 2021 the current level of Federal civilian employee pay,” the letter said.
Since the start of its fiscal year Oct. 1, the government has been operating under a stopgap “continuing resolution” that expires Dec. 11. Congress is working to craft a replacement measure, using as its starting point the Senate bills — which have not reached voting even at the committee level — and bills the House passed over the summer.
more
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/trump-fed-pay-freeze/2020/12/02/8daaa8e4-34c3-11eb-b59c-adb7153d10c2_story.html
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Name: DonGender: Male
Hometown: Massachusetts
Home country: United States
Member since: Sat Sep 1, 2012, 03:28 PM
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