WASHINGTON – Two days after political rivals excoriated him about the issue during the debate in Las Vegas, Democratic presidential candidate Michael Bloomberg has agreed to release three women from confidentiality agreements his company signed related to comments they accused him of making.
After refusing on the debate stage to make those “nondisclosure agreements” (NDAs) public, the former New York City mayor has directed his namesake media company to review the use of such contracts and approve their release.
“They’ve identified 3 NDAs that we signed over the past 30-plus years with women to address complaints about comments they said I had made,” the billionaire businessman said in a statement. “If any of them want to be released from their NDA so that they can talk about those allegations, they should contact the company and they’ll be given a release.”
Bloomberg said he had done “a lot of reflecting on this issue over the past few days” and pledged his company would no longer offer confidentiality agreements to resolve claims of sexual harassment or misconduct. Nondisclosure agreements are a legally binding contract often used by businesses to pay employees not to speak about a host off issues including sexual harassment and competitive businessmen practices.
“I recognize that NDAs, particularly when they are used in the context of sexual harassment and sexual assault, promote a culture of silence in the workplace and contribute to a culture of women not feeling safe or supported,” he said. “It is imperative that when problems occur, workplaces not only address the specific incidents, but the culture and practices that led to those incidents. And then leaders must act.”
The billionaire businessman is not competing in Nevada but many political analysts say his shaky performance on the debate stage Wednesday, where he was confronted about the agreements, could stunt his surge in the polls that have been fueled by his aggressive television ad campaign in key states.
In a testy exchange during the Las Vegas debate, Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., pressed Bloomberg about women who worked for him being subject to non-disclosure agreements that made them unable to talk about harassment and abuse in the workplace. Earlier in the debate, Bloomberg had been asked about some of his past comments about women and the way women were treated at his company.
Bloomberg said his company, Bloomberg LP, had “no tolerance for the kind of behavior the MeToo movement has exposed. And anybody that does anything wrong in our company, we investigate it, and if it’s appropriate, they’re gone that day.”
“I hope you heard what his defense was: ‘I’ve been nice to some women,’” Warren shot back. “The mayor needs to stand on his record.”
Reporting by ABC News, The Washington Post and other outlets revealed a history of allegations of sexism, pregnancy discrimination and a hostile work environment in Bloomberg’s company.
ABC reported that numerous former employees have filed lawsuits against Bloomberg or Bloomberg LP. The outlet also reported it had spoken to “several” women who feared telling their stories publicly.
One, who did not sign an NDA but requested anonymity from ABC, told the outlet she was “sidelined” for her pregnancy. “Going to work was uncomfortable, everything was awful at that time,” she said. “It was the worst thing that has ever happened to me.”
With much of China still on lockdown, businesses are struggling to get workers back and factories running.
In a release this week, Foxconn, the world’s largest contract manufacturer of electronics and a key player in Apple’s supply chain, indicated just how difficult that will be. Foxconn said its revenue would take a hit from the spread of the coronavirus, and that it would be “cautious” in resuming work at its factories in China. Plants outside of the country, in places like Vietnam and Mexico, were at full capacity, the company said.
The revenue warning comes as Chinese leaders try to balance restarting the economy with controlling the virus. Concerns about Foxconn’s production also underscore the potential broader impact the epidemic could have on global electronic supply chains. A huge portion of the world’s electronics come out of China’s factories, filled with parts also made in China’s factories, and a longer suspension of production could hit overall supply. Some have even warned that it could hasten a decoupling, which has been urged at times by both Chinese and American leaders out of security concerns. — Paul Mozur
Procter & Gamble says its finances will suffer.
Procter & Gamble, the consumer products behemoth, said in a federal filing this week that disruptions to supply and demand caused by the outbreak would “materially” affect the company’s quarterly results.
KAUAI, HI (3TV/CBS5) — The mother arrested in the case of her two missing children has made her first court appearance since the disappearance of her kids. Lori Vallow, a 46-year-old Idaho mother with ties to Arizona, was arrested in Hawaii on Thursday. She appeared before a judge late Friday afternoon.
The hearing focused on Vallow’s extradition and bail. Even though her bail had been set at $5 million, Vallow’s attorney Friday tried to have it lowered to $10,000. He argued that Vallow would not flee from Hawaii if she posted bond. But prosecutors asked the judge to keep the high bond, saying, “If there ever was a case where a person is denied bail, it’s this one.”
Vallow’s extradition hearing is now set for Monday, March 2.
Vallow and her new husband, Chad Daybell, have been living in Hawaii for the last two months and have not cooperating with police in locating her children. Joshua “JJ” Vallow, 7, and his sister Tylee, 17, have been missing since September.
Court paperwork states that JJ was last seen at his school in Idaho on Sept. 23, 2019. The next day, Vallow informed the school that her son would no longer be attending the school and that she planned to home-school him. It also states that a babysitter hired by Vallow to watch her son was told on Sept. 24 that her “services were no longer needed” because Vallow’s son had allegedly “gone to stay with his grandma for several weeks.”
Tylee’s Last-Known Whereabouts
Tylee was last seen on Sept. 8. According to court paperwork, police believe Tylee accompanied Vallow on a day trip to Yellowstone National Park on Sept. 8, 2019. Police say they’ve obtained a photograph on Tylee at the park entrance. No one has reported seeing her since.
STILL MISSING
The bottom line of the newly-released probable cause statement is that Vallow’s two kids still have not been located. “As of the date of this affidavit, [JJ and Tylee] are still missing,” states the paperwork. The detective states: “I believe probable cause exists that Lori Vallow has deserted [JJ and Tylee]” and that “I further believe probable cause exists that Lori Vallow intentionally and willfully abandoned [JJ and Tylee.]”
Multiple Charges
The paperwork states that Lori Vallow faces two felony charges of desertion and non-support of dependent children. She’s also accused of resisting and obstructing an officer, solicitation of a crime and contempt of court. If convicted, Vallow could face more than a decade in prison.
The paperwork also states that “Lori Vallow provided verifiably false information” to the police, and that “false information obstructed and delayed the investigation into the location of [JJ.]” An Idaho detective writes: “I believe probable cause exists that Lori Vallow did resist, delay, or obstruct a public officer in the discharge or attempt to discharge a duty of his office, specifically investigating a report of a missing child.” The probable cause statement suggests that Vallow has been uncooperative with police searching for her kids, and that she “has refused to provide law enforcement with any information regarding the location of her children.”
What Was (and Wasn’t) Found in Hawaii
The probably cause paperwork details what was and what wasn’t found during searches of Vallow’s car and condo in Hawaii.
In the Ford Explorer: Police say several items belonging to the missing kids were found in a black Ford Exporer that Vallow rented in Hawaii. The court documents state that during the search, detectives found the kids’ birth certificates, Tylee’s bank card, Joshua’s iPad, another iPad logged into Joshua’s account and Joshua’s registration receipts from his school in Idaho. Tylee’s bank card reportedly is still active, and police say it HAS has been used since she was last seen.
In the condo: During a search of the Kauai condo where Vallow was living, police found no signs of children. Searchers say they found things like beach chairs and yoga mats, but no children’s belongings. “There was nothing found in the condominium that would indicate that a seven-year-old boy had been there, such as children’s clothing, toys, children’s books, children’s medication, etc.,” according to police.
$5 Million Bail
When she was arrested, Vallow’s bond was set at $5 million because she’s believed to be a flight risk. Police had said that not only does she have the financial means to run, but that she “has already displayed a willingness to disobey and ignore a court order by not producing [JJ and Tylee]… even though she was specifically ordered by the court to do so and had adequate time to do so.”
Relatives React to Vallow’s Arrest
Relatives say they’re just praying the kids are found. “So just please tell us where the kids are; that’s what the most important thing is, period,” said Kay Woodcock, JJ’s grandmother. “I hope the next news we hear is her telling us where they are and they’re alive and well and that’s the next step we’re praying for,” said Woodcock. Kay and her husband Larry Woodcock have been traveling the country trying to get the word out about the missing children. They said they were jumping with excitement when they got the news of her arrest. “Now it’s like, okay Lori, talk to us; tell us where the kids are, let’s end this stupid stuff,” said Woodcock.
Background
In 2014, Lori, her children and her then-husband, Charles Vallow, moved to Hawaii and stayed for several years. The Vallow family moved to Arizona a few years later, and Charles filed for divorce about a year ago. According to court paperwork, Charles became worried for JJ’s safety— as Lori had suddenly become obsessed with preparing for the end of the world and even threatened to kill Charles if he got in her way.
By July, Charles was killed by Lori’s brother. Chandler police, initially, said that the shooting was in self-defense— but the case is still under investigation. Lori’s brother also, suddenly, died in December—around the same time that Lori and Chad moved to Kauai.
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They (the crew) were preparing food and delivering meals to cabins, leading some critics to charge they were inadvertently spreading the virus throughout the ship, which has seen more than 600 cases of the potentially deadly COVID-19 disease.
As they have been in close contact with possibly infected passengers, the crew is expected to undergo a 14-day quarantine starting when the last passenger leaves the ship.
Crew have generally been reticent to speak to media, apparently concerned for their jobs, but some have broken their silence to describe difficult conditions and fear on board.
Sonali Thakkar, a 24-year-old security officer on board, told AFP in an interview crews were sleeping two to a cabin, sharing washrooms and eating together, “so the disease can spread very easily.”
“We do have a lot of fear, me and my colleagues, more than 1000 crew. We’ve been working since the quarantine started. As the days pass and the number of patients increase, the crew is feeling more afraid,” she said.
“They are scared that it can spread really fast and all we want is tests to be done and to be separated from those who are positive. We don’t want to stay on board.”
Her father Dinesh said: “Sonali is stuck in a small windowless room on the cruise and is very scared… We speak to her every day trying to calm her.”
“Why did the government wait for so long as more and more people got infected? She should have been rescued with other Indians from the cruise long ago. This is very wrong,” he told AFP.
The jury did not say what it had decided on the lesser counts. The predatory sexual assault count requires prosecutors to prove that Mr. Weinstein committed a serious sexual felony against at least two people.
The case against Mr. Weinstein, 67, was built primarily on the accusations brought by two women: Miriam Haley, 42, a former production assistant who testified that Mr. Weinstein forced oral sex on her in 2006; and Jessica Mann, 34, an actress who said Mr. Weinstein raped her in a Midtown Manhattan hotel room in 2013.
In weighing the predatory sexual assault charges, the jury was also asked to consider testimony given by the actress Annabella Sciorra, who said Mr. Weinstein raped her in the early 1990s. Prosecutors were barred by New York State’s statute of limitations from bringing charges in the incident involving Ms. Sciorra, 59, who was the prosecution’s strongest witness.
The jury’s note suggested that one or some jurors did not believe Ms. Sciorra. In previous notes, jurors have asked to review testimony given by both Ms. Sciorra and Ms. Haley, as well as to review communications and emails related to the two women.
Mr. Weinstein has pleaded not guilty and claims all his sexual encounters with his accusers were consensual.
LAS VEGAS – President Donald Trump is looking to fire up supporters in Las Vegas on Friday, just one day before Nevada Democrats decide who they want to challenge him in November.
Refresh here for updates.
Donald Trump … movie critic?
President Trump is still sore about the Oscars.
For the second night in a row, Trump complained that this year’s Academy Award for Best Picture went to “Parasite,” a film from South Korea.
“I don’t get it,” Trump said.
“I get along great with South Korea,” he said, “but you know I never saw that one before.”
Trump aired the same gripe Thursday night at a rally in Colorado Springs, Colo., suggesting that an American movie should have won.
“Was it good? I don’t know. Let’s get ‘Gone with the Wind’ back, please? ‘Sunset Boulevard.’ So many great movies,” he said.
–Michael Collins
‘Thank you, President Trump’
President Donald Trump used his Las Vegas rally to mark the 40th anniversary of one of the sports world’s biggest upsets: The U.S. Olympic ice hockey team’s 4-3 victory over the Soviet Union in 1980.
Trump brought members of the “Miracle On Ice” team to the stage; as college-age kids back in 1980, the U.S. team defeated the heavily favored Soviets – essentially professional-level players – en route to the gold medal in ice hockey.
Trump also inserted himself into the discussion, asking team leader Mike Eruzione if he regarded the president as a good athlete and golfer.
“You are, sir,” Eruzione told Trump. “Whatever you say.”
Some people may have wondered why Trump was celebrating the 1980 Winter Olympic ice hockey team – at least until the president noted that Los Angeles will host the 2028 Summer Olympics, and give himself credit for that.
“Thank you, President Trump,” Trump said.
– David Jackson
Trump rally underway
WASHINGTON – President Donald Trump has kicked off his rally at the Las Vegas Convention Center – the third of three rallies this week during his swing through western states.
Trump is speaking a day before Nevadans head to their caucus to choose a Democratic presidential candidate. If past is prologue, Trump is guaranteed to rag on the Democratic field, knock his impeachment as a “hoax” and tout the economy.
Nevada swing. How much Trump talks about Nevada as a state he’ll compete in later this year. The state has gone for Democrats in the past three elections, but by progressively narrower margins. Polls indicate that the state leans Democratic, but is still up for grabs this year.
Caucus trouble? The Democratic Party is bracing for its second try at a caucus following the messy problems in Iowa. Trump relished slamming Democrats for the problems that delayed the results in Iowa, and it’s possible he’ll revisit the issue again Friday on the eve of the voting in Nevada.
Thank the Academy. In his rally in Colorado on Thursday, Trump broke into a new line of attack against the Oscars, asserting that the Academy should not having given the Best Picture award to the South Korean film Parasite. Film executives fired back by suggesting that Trump didn’t appreciate the movie because he couldn’t read the English subtitles. Was Trump’s criticism a renewal of his broadside against Hollywood liberals, or a one off for the Colorado crowd? His supporters will know soon.
– John Fritze
‘Between us and the rest of the world’
LAS VEGAS — Israel Morfin drove nine hours from Santa Fe to attend the Las Vegas Trump rally.
The 42-year-old nurse has a complicated relationship with the presidency.
“I couldn’t stand the man for the first two years,” he said.
Morfin is a gay, Hispanic man born and settled in New Mexico. Most of his friends are Democrats.
So how did he end up here wearing a Captain America shirt and “Make America Great Again” hat?
“I saw a documentary,” Morfin said. “‘Trump At War.’ That changed everything. Trump is standing between the rest of the world and us.”
In Morfin’s view, Democrats sold out the U.S. to China — and calling a gay man LGBTQ is far-left propaganda.
“That term doesn’t represent me as a gay American,” he said. “I think a lot of gays are starting to open their eyes.”
Morfin echoes many Trump supporter sentiments about Democrats fighting the president in congress or on the campaign trail: “They’re trash. Impeachment? For making a phone call?”
In the distance, chants of “Four more years, four more years!” rippled through a sea of red waiting for the president to step up to the podium.
–Ed Komenda
The King backs The Donald?
LAS VEGAS – Elvis is not endorsing anyone for president. But Elvis impersonator Jeff Stanulis is all in for Trump.
Stanulis has been performing along the Las Vegas Strip for years and counts among his repertoire a majority of the 439 songs Elvis ever recorded.
Striding into the Las Vegas Convention Center wearing his white jumpsuit, sunglasses and that iconic hairdo, Stanulis seemed to be a reminder that this is not just any campaign rally — and certainly not Iowa or New Hampshire — but Las Vegas.
Why does The King back the president?
Stanulis said that the president seems to work for the public rather than powerful people in Washington — that swamp, perhaps, the president derides so often.
“He’s going to win by a landslide,” Stanulis said.
– Andrew Oxford
Does Trump have a chance in Nevada?
WASHINGTON – Nevada has backed a Democrat in the last three presidential elections. So why is President Donald Trump rolling the dice with a rally in Las Vegas?
For starters, Trump has showed up in every state where Democrats are holding a primary or caucus for a rally. Trump rallied in Iowa four days before Democrats voted in that state and visited New Hampshire on the eve of that state’s first in the nation primary election.
The Trump campaign, which also brings out a bevy of surrogates, has said the rallies are a good way to flex their organizing muscle ahead of November.
But Nevada is also a state that could potentially be in play this fall, depending on the Democratic nominee. While the state has been colored blue at the end of the last three elections, the margins for the Democratic candidate have gotten considerably smaller. President Barack Obama won the state in 2008 by more than 120,000 votes. By 2016, Clinton’s margin had shrunk to 27,000.
The polling also shows the potential for a close contest.
Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders has a wide lead in polling among Nevada caucusgoers. Sanders was up 14 percentage points over of former Vice President Joe Biden in a poll released this week by KLAS-TV and Emerson College.
But for the general election, polling is more sporadic and uncertain.
A Fox News poll last month had Biden beating Trump by 4 percentage points and showed the president narrowly ahead of Sen. Elizabeth Warren as well as former South Bend, Indiana, Mayor Pete Buttigieg. Another poll, conducted by Emerson College last fall, put Trump narrowly ahead of Biden and tied with Sanders.
Much of that polling was conducted before former New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg became a major force in the Democratic field by spending hundreds of millions of dollars on television and internet advertising.
LAS VEGAS – As hundreds of Trump supporters filed into his “Keep America Great” rally in Las Vegas on Friday, there was a clashing of conventions.
Standing in another line at the Las Vegas Convention Center were players of the Dragon Ball Super card game in town for a regional tournament.
Wearing team jerseys, beanies and otherwise nondescript clothing, the card players – many of them wearing eyeglasses – encountered Trump supporters with red shirts, cowboy hats and American flags.
“We’re going to make liberals cry,” said one woman in a red Trump campaign shirt.
The conversations were brief and entertaining to Dragon Ball players like Pooyan Nikjou.
“It’s kind of surreal,” said the 26-year-old Tulsa native. “If you look at the people in this line, they are all younger and more moderate.”
At one point, a MAGA support walked up to the group of card players and asked: “Do you want to keep American great?”
When the group said nothing, the supporter walked off after calling them “damn libs.”
Josh Harris, a 32-year-old Dragon Ball Super player from San Diego found the interaction between card players and Trump supporters disconcerting.
“It makes me really sad and embarrassed,” Harris said. “We’re all Americans.”
– Ed Komenda
‘He’s draining the swamp’
LAS VEGAS — Tammy Joslin, a LGBTQ Trump supporter, stood in line outside the rally with this message written across her shirt: “Find your safe space snowflake.”
Joslin has lived in Las Vegas for 24 years. She’s been married to her partner for 28 years. A Northern California native who moved to Southern Nevada to buy a home in a cheaper housing market, she works as a slot machine attendant at the Aria on the Strip.
She identifies as a fiscal conservative independent voter who is socially moderate.
Trump is the candidate America needs, she said.
“He’s not afraid to say what he feel,” Joslin said. “He’s draining the swamp for the people.”
– Ed Komenda
Vegas rally is part of 4-day western swing
The event at the Las Vegas Convention Center – Trump’s third “Keep America Great” rally in as many days – is the final stop on his four-day swing through the West. It starts at 3 p.m. ET.
Trump’s supporters won’t have the opportunity to vote for him on Saturday. Nevada Republicans canceled their caucus, citing what the state party said was the inevitable conclusion that Trump would be the party’s nominee.
But Nevada Democrats will be making their choices for president. And Trump has made a habit of trying to upstage Democrats by scheduling rallies just days – or hours, in some cases – before their caucuses or primaries.
In Iowa, Trump rallied his supporters in Des Moines four days before the state’s Feb. 3 caucuses. In New Hampshire, he held a rally in Manchester on the eve of the state’s Feb. 11 primary. His next rally is scheduled for next Friday in South Carolina – the day before voters in that state head to the polls.
A 29-year-old Chinese doctor who postponed his wedding to treat coronavirus patients died of the bug this week — one of the youngest people to die from the disease.
Dr. Peng Yinhua — who worked in the outbreak’s epicenter — died Thursday after contracting the deadly infection as he treated patients at the People’s No. 1 Hospital in Wuhan’s Jiangxia district, official news agency Xinhua reported, citing the local health bureau.
Peng was hospitalized on Jan. 25 and transferred to Wuhan Jinyintan Hospital for treatment five days later. He died from the virus at 9:50 p.m. Thursday, despite doctors’ life-saving efforts, the report said.
The respiratory and critical illness doctor had planned to get married during the Chinese New Year holiday, but put off the ceremony so he could be on the front lines as the outbreak intensified.
Peng “never got to send out his wedding invitations, which are still in his office drawer,” Xinhua reported.
At least eight medical professionals have been killed by the virus — including 34-year-old whistleblowing doctor Li Wenliang, whose death earlier this month prompted a public outcry and anti-government postings on social media.
Two medical staff work in the negative-pressure isolation ward in a Wuhan hospital.Getty Images
Facebook is concerned about a lack of transparency in how Mike Bloomberg’s field organizers are using the platform to advocate for his presidential campaign, without identifying that they work for him, according to a source at the company. The source said Facebook is considering taking steps to make it clearer that the people posting messages of support are paid employees.
Facebook has taken a range of steps to improve transparency around political advertising since the Cambridge Analytica scandal in March 2018. A New York Times report revealed that the political consulting firm improperly obtained information about Facebook users, then used that information to target political ads supporting Donald Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign.
Among other changes, Facebook now tags all political and issue ads, keeps a library of them and has built an interactive database of all political and issue ad purchases.
Enter Mike Bloomberg, who has spent $48.5 million on campaign and issue ads on Facebook since last May, according to Facebook’s Ad Library. Bloomberg’s campaign is hiring more than 500 deputy field organizers, a job which includes mobilizing supporters for get-out-the-vote efforts and engaging friends to support Bloomberg for president — which can include sharing on social networks.
But Facebook is concerned about the lack of transparency around Bloomberg’s employees’ unidentified posts and doesn’t want to undercut all the work the company has done around transparency by allowing a campaign to circumvent Facebook’s rules, this source said.
This follows last week’s news from Facebook when a company spokesperson told CNBC that Facebook would not put political posts from influencers into its ad database, even if a candidate paid the influencer for the post. However, the spokesperson said the posts would go in the archive if the influencer paid to promote it.
Facebook says it communicates with all the campaigns, urging them to follow best practices, including having people posting on behalf of campaigns make it clear in their posts and profiles who they’re working for. But Facebook currently has no means to enforce that kind of disclosure. Now, Facebook is exploring different ways to add more transparency about posts to make it clear if a person posting has a paid relationship with a campaign, the source said.
“We think it’s important that political campaigns have the guidance and tools to be transparent,” a Facebook spokesperson told CNBC. “That’s why we recommend campaign employees make the relationship clear on their accounts. We welcome clearer guidance from regulators in this area.”
Facebook is referring to the Federal Election Commission. The FCC’s regulations around internet communication were last updated in 2006.
Bloomberg’s team confirmed his investment in staffers to spread the word on social media.
“We are meeting voters everywhere on any platform that they consume their news. One of the most effective ways of reaching voters is by activating their friends and network to encourage them to support Mike for president,” Sabrina Singh, the Bloomberg campaign’s senior national spokesperson, said in a statement.
LAS VEGAS — Nervous about another fiasco like Iowa’s, Democrats here and nationally are going to extra lengths to try to avoid a breakdown in the caucus process that could delay results on Saturday.
Nevada Democrats have hired a professional call center with 200 paid operators and dedicated reporting lines to help take in results from caucus sites around the state, diverging from Iowa where lightly trained volunteers manned the phones and reported chaos and jammed phoned lines after an app that was supposed to process most of the results malfunctioned.
“We have been working around the clock to ensure that what happened in Iowa will not happen here, which is why we’re taking no chances when it comes to reporting,” Molly Forgey, spokesperson for the Nevada Democratic Party, told NBC News. She added that the steps taken should “ensure that our precinct chairs and site leads will be able to successfully report results on caucus day.”
The Democratic National Committee, which faced blowback from the Iowa mess, has gotten far more involved in Nevada, dispatching some three dozen staffers to the state to help with everything from volunteer recruitment to technical assistance, while another team in Washington will assist with data processing.
And DNC Chairman Tom Perez, who stayed away from Iowa on caucus day, will be on the ground here Saturday.
Plans to use a similar app as the one used in Iowa were scrapped after the fiasco. Instead, officials distributed iPads loaded with off-the-shelf tools to help calculate results.
There are only 252 caucus sites, which will make it possible for officials to dispatch tech-savvy volunteers to most of them. (There are 2,099 precincts statewide, but many of them are sharing space, with some sites hosting as many two dozen precincts.)
Caucuses are complicated and messy processes that pose unique challenges. And unlike primaries, which are typically run by selection professionals from the state government, caucuses are administered by the political parties, whose core competency is winning elections, not running them.
Nevada caucuses feature a new challenge because the party, for the first time, is attempting to integrate early voting with caucus day results on Saturday. Outside experts have warned that delayed results or unforeseen complications are possible — or even likely.
Already, the party has had to invalidate a little more than 1,000 ballots from the first three days of early voting out of four days total. Most were voided because they lacked signatures, a Nevada Democratic Party official told NBC News.
The officials said the party is “actively chasing” people whose ballots were invalidated to urge them to come caucus on Saturday, and said they’ve given those voters’ names to the campaigns to do the same.
But some campaigns have been quietly raising concerns about the invalidated ballots, and those cries could grow louder if campaigns feel the process isn’t working.
This is the first time Nevada has offered early voting in its caucuses and turnout was high, with some 77,000 Democrats participating — nearly as many as the 84,000 that participated in the entire process in 2016. But it’s unclear if that means turnout will be high again on Saturday, or if people just shifted when they vote.
Former Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, who remains the most powerful Democrat in Nevada, has also been involved in trying to make the caucuses function as well as possible. He helped secure the state’s place as the third contest in the presidential primary, a legacy issue for the ailing power broker.
After Iowa, Reid and other Nevada Democrats see a chance to potentially leapfrog up in the voting calendar – but only if things don’t melt down here as well.
“I think Iowa and New Hampshire have been the first to vote, but they damn sure shouldn’t be. They have done so much damage,” Reid told NBC News. “There’s no diversity. It’s not right that 48 states should have to follow those two states, which are not representative of the country.”
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Sean Hannity declared Democratic presidential candidate Mike Bloomberg‘s campaign to be “on life support” after Wednesday night’s debate and lambasted the rest of the party’s presidential field as a “sick, twisted joke.”
“‘Mini’ Mike Bloomberg’s campaign, we can officially report, is on life support with a respirator and feeding tube with little to no hope of recovery. He was literally ripped to shreds in last night’s debate,” Hannity said on his television program. “I can’t really overstate how poorly he performed — the single worst debate performance I have ever witnessed in my lifetime.”
“Frankly, he embarrassed himself and anyone who supports him,” Hannity added, “but mostly himself.”
The host compared Sen. Elizabeth Warren’s attacks on Bloomberg to a mixed martial arts (MMA) beating before verbally dismantling Bloomberg some more.
“Now, you could buy a lot of things with $500 million. You really can. But you can’t buy a personality. You can’t buy charisma, and apparently you can’t even buy good debate preparation in two short hours,” Hannity said. “This never-ending, slick $500 million marketing campaign collapsed before the entire country’s eyes.”
Hannity claimed that Bloomberg was the Democratic Party’s “Plan B” and said the organization was having a “meltdown.”
“So the Democrats’ Plan B is an unmitigated disaster. It imploded last night. And with Biden and Bloomberg’s epic implosion, there’s no plan C,” Hannity said. “Last night’s debate did prove one thing: The Democratic Party is in a state of complete and utter chaos … and it’s only going to get worse.”
Hannity then turned his wrath on the rest of the Democratic field.
“You have a devout Soviet-style socialist leading the way. A Wall Street billionaire that thinks anybody can be a farmer, a Harvard law professor who has been faking her race for three decades, [and] a couple of other sociopaths who are hell-bent on fame and glory,” Hannity said. “It’s like a sick, twisted joke. The weakest presidential field, frankly, in the history of American politics. And last night, it was essentially a circular firing squad, all showing their true colors. I couldn’t write it any better.”
Local residents protest the plans to quarantine evacuees from coronavirus-hit China at a local hospital, in the settlement of Novi Sanzhary, Ukraine, on Thursday.
Maksym Mykhailyk/AFP via Getty Images
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Maksym Mykhailyk/AFP via Getty Images
Local residents protest the plans to quarantine evacuees from coronavirus-hit China at a local hospital, in the settlement of Novi Sanzhary, Ukraine, on Thursday.
Maksym Mykhailyk/AFP via Getty Images
China reported 889 new cases of novel coronavirus infection on Friday, including more than 200 from a prison, and an additional 118 deaths – all but three in the province of Hubei, bringing the total deaths in the country to more than 2,200.
The latest count came as South Korea, with the highest number of cases outside China, reported another jump in infections to 204.
And residents clashed with police in a central Ukrainian town where evacuees from Wuhan, the Chinese province where the epidemic began, arrived for a two-week quarantine.
The numbers from China, which come 24 hours after the daily new case count there reached its lowest point in weeks, reflect a more general downward trend.
Cumulative new cases in China are now at 75,567. That figure includes people who have recovered, as well as those who have died from COVID-19, the disease caused by the novel coronavirus.
According to the latest World Health Organization situation report, there have been another 1,073 confirmed cases in 26 other countries, and an additional eight deaths.
On Thursday, the government in China’s eastern province of Shandong said that a prison guard at Rencheng jail in Jining, a city of 8 million, had shown COVID-19 symptoms in early February and that subsequently more than 2,000 inmates and staff were tested, with 200 prisoners and seven officers coming back positive.
Infections were also reported at three prisons in Hubei province, according to the South China Morning Post.
Outside China, rising infection numbers and civil unrest
In South Korea, officials on Thursday said the number of cases had doubled in a 24-hour period. On Friday they confirmed another 100 cases, bringing the total there to 204.
Among those infected were scores of members of the religious sect Shincheonji Church of Jesus. The infection was traced to a 61-year-old woman who apparently spread the virus as she attended church services before being diagnosed.
Evacuated Ukrainians and foreign nationals travel to the Novi Sanzhary Medical Center of the National Guard in Poltava Region for medical observation on Thursday.
Vyacheslav Madiyevskyy/Ukrinform/Barcroft Media via Getty Images
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Vyacheslav Madiyevskyy/Ukrinform/Barcroft Media via Getty Images
Evacuated Ukrainians and foreign nationals travel to the Novi Sanzhary Medical Center of the National Guard in Poltava Region for medical observation on Thursday.
Vyacheslav Madiyevskyy/Ukrinform/Barcroft Media via Getty Images
Meanwhile, in the central Ukrainian town of Novi Sanzhary, where coronavirus evacuees arrived from China, angry residents chanted “Shame on you,” scuffled with police and hurled stones at six buses carrying masked passengers on their way to a two-week quarantine. The residents blocked a road to a medical facility where the evacuees were to be housed.
Authorities said the group, which included 45 Ukrainians and 27 foreign nationals, had been screened for the virus before being allowed to fly from Wuhan, China, the disease epicenter. None had tested positive or shown signs of COVID-19, officials insisted.
Ukrainian Prime Minister Oleksiy Honcharuk, Health Minister Zoriana Skaletska and Interior Minister Arsen Avakov traveled to Novi Sanzhary to talk to the residents.
When Avakov pointed out that none of the evacuees was infected, one person replied “so far,” according to BBC.
“Isn’t there any other place in Ukraine … that is located in more or less remote villages or in far-off areas where there is no threat to population?” another resident, Yuriy Dzyubenko, was quoted by Reuters as saying.
President Volodymyr Zelenskiy called for calm and warned against the danger of “forgetting that we are all human.”
NPR’s Jason Beaubien in Hong Kong, Emily Feng in Beijing and Anthony Kuhn in Seoul contributed to this report.
The US and the Taliban have reached an “understanding” that could lead to “a significant and nationwide reduction in violence across Afghanistan” — and ultimately, end America’s oldest war, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo announced Friday.
A seven-day reduction of violence period will begin Friday night — and if it is successful, US and Taliban officials will sign the long-sought-after peace agreement Feb. 29 in Doha, Qatar, a senior State Department official told the Associated Press.
The two parties have been engaged in “extensive talks” intended to “facilitate a political settlement to end the war in Afghanistan, reduce United States and Allied Forces presence, and ensure that no terrorist group ever uses Afghan soil to threaten the United States or our allies,” Pompeo said in a statement.
“Intra-Afghan negotiations” will begin soon after the Feb. 29 signing, “and will build on this fundamental step to deliver a comprehensive and permanent ceasefire and the future political roadmap for Afghanistan,” Pompeo’s statement says.
“The only way to achieve a sustainable peace in Afghanistan is for Afghans to come together and agree on the way forward,” the Secretary of State said.
The Taliban issued its own statement on the deal Friday.
“Both parties will now create a suitable security situation in advance of agreement signing date, extend invitations to senior representatives of numerous countries and organizations to participate in the signing ceremony, make arrangements for the release of prisoners, structure a path for intra-Afghan negotiations with various political parties of the country and finally lay the groundwork for peace across the country with the withdrawal of all foreign forces,” the Taliban said.
The war began October 2001, and if the peace deal is signed, it would mark an important step for President Trump toward meeting his 2016 campaign pledge to withdraw American troops from Afghanistan.
But if it fails, the president could run the risk of being labeled by his Democratic rivals as naive and willing to sacrifice the security of U.S. soldiers and interests to advance himself politically.
After Mike Bloomberg acknowledged using nondisclosure agreements to settle issues as a business executive during Wednesday’s debate, Sen. Elizabeth Warren wrote him up a contract of her own.
“So I used to teach contract law,” the former law professor said during a CNN town hall on Thursday night, “And I thought I would make this easy. I wrote up a release and covenant not to sue. And all that mayor Bloomberg has to do is download it. I’ll text it. Sign it, and then the women and men will be free to speak and tell their own stories.”
Warren, who was on the attack with just about everyone during Wednesday’s debate, went after Bloomberg for the use of nondisclosure agreements and his treatment of women that had been reported in the press, repeatedly asking how many of them were there.
“None of them accuse me of doing anything, other than maybe they didn’t like a joke I told,” Bloomberg, the former mayor of New York City, countered. “They signed those agreements, and we’ll live with it.”
But Warren doesn’t seem to be keen on living with it — she said on CNN that Bloomberg’s comments on women were “disqualifying” — and she tweeted her proposed contract.
The Bloomberg campaign did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Warren’s line of attack comes as her campaign seeks a much-needed comeback: after ending 2019 with $13.7 million in the bank, she spent $22.4 million in January. Her campaign told NBC News they took out a $3 million line of credit in January and spent $400,000 of it.
But her debate performance appears to be giving her a boost; she tweeted that she’d raised $5 million during and in the hours immediately after the debate and February has already been her best fundraising month yet, her campaign said, with more $17 million raised.
Later, on “The Last Word” with Lawrence O’Donnell, the Massachusetts senator described conversing with the former mayor during a debate commercial
She also offered another case for her candidacy: efficiency.
“I get real stuff done. I have rock solid values, and I get stuff done. I get hard stuff done. I fought for the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, got that thing enacted and set it up over the space of a year. I can work across the aisle when I need to,” she said, naming her hearing aid bill with Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, which Trump signed into law.
Warren has struggled to rise in the polls, while rival Sen. Bernie Sanders — who shares the progressive lane with her — surges.
“I don’t want to be president just to yell at people,” she said. “I want to be president to change things.”
After learning of that analysis, which was provided to House lawmakers in a classified hearing, Trump grew angry at his acting director of national intelligence, Joseph Maguire, in the Oval Office, seeing Maguire and his staff as disloyal for speaking to Congress about Russia’s perceived preference. The intelligence official’s analysis and Trump’s furious response ruined Maguire’s chances of becoming the permanent intelligence chief, according to people familiar with the matter who, like others, spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss a sensitive matter.
Fox Nation host Lawrence Jones speaks with voters attending Trump rally in Colorado.
“Hannity” correspondent Lawrence Jones traveled to Colorado Springs on Thursday to interview rallygoers ahead of President Trump’s event.
Jones told host Sean Hannity that the consensus among those waiting outside the Broadmoor World Arena was that while Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., may be running ahead of his rivals in the Democratic primary, his socialist platform has no chance against the incumbent president.
They also predicted former New York Mayor Mike Bloomberg’s campaign will crater after what they considered a lackluster performance at the Democratic debate in Las Vegas the previous evening.
“This was the largest crowd I’ve ever seen,” Jones said. “It wasn’t just elderly people, it wasn’t just farmers. It was young people that were against socialism.”
One man told Jones that none of the Democratic contenders could beat Trump in a general election debate.
“Last night’s debate showed a lot of those candidates are so flawed,” another man agreed.
Jones asked one woman about Bloomberg pumping millions of dollars into his campaign.
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