Twitter users on Saturday night were quick to declare the social media campaign’s victory. “Actually you just got ROCKED by teens on TikTok,” Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York tweeted in response to Mr. Parscale, who had tweeted that “radical protestors” had “interfered” with attendance.
“The teens of America have struck a savage blow against @realDonaldTrump,” added Steve Schmidt, a longtime Republican strategist.
Mary Jo Laupp, a 51-year-old from Fort Dodge, Iowa, said she had been watching black TikTok users express their frustration about Mr. Trump hosting his rally on Juneteenth. (The rally was later moved to June 20.) She “vented” her own anger in a late-night TikTok video on June 11 — and provided a call to action.
“I recommend all of those of us that want to see this 19,000-seat auditorium barely filled or completely empty go reserve tickets now, and leave him standing there alone on the stage,” Ms. Laupp said in the video.
When she checked her phone the next morning, Ms. Laupp said, the video was starting to go viral. It has more than 700,000 likes, she added, and more than two million views.
President Trump’s return to the campaign trail Saturday is finding a smaller-than-advertised crowd in Tulsa, Okla. — and his aides are pointing fingers.
“Sadly, protesters interfered with supporters, even blocking access to metal detectors, which prevented people from entering the rally,” campaign spokesman Tim Murtaugh said about an hour before Trump was set to take the stage at the 19,000-seat BOK Center.
Campaign manager Brad Parscale had touted more than a million ticket requests for the rally, but said he expected about 100,000 to actually show up.
An outdoor stage was set to accommodate entertainment for an expected overflow crowd — but Trump’s speech there was called off when the masses never materialized.
“Radical protesters coupled with relentless onslaught from the media, attempted to frighten off the President’s supporters,” Murtaugh said. “We are proud of the thousands who stuck it out.”
Local health officials in Tulsa have opposed Trump’s decision to hold the rally in their city while the coronavirus pandemic continues.
Some social media posts initially said the attack happened during the Black Lives Matter protest. But Lawrence Wort, a 20-year-old personal trainer who said he had witnessed the attack, disputed that. He said the protest had ended at least three hours before the stabbings.
“The park was pretty full, a lot of people sat around drinking with friends when one lone person walked through, suddenly shouted some unintelligible words and went round a large group (of about 10 people) trying to stab them,” Mr. Wort said in a message on Twitter.
He said the man’s eyes “looked like he was on some sort of drugs.” The assailant stabbed three people in the neck and under the arms before turning and running toward Mr. Wort, who said he ran to escape.
The attacker then turned his attention to another group of people who were sitting, stabbing one of them in the back of the neck, Mr. Wort said. When he realized that everyone had started to run, the assailant left the park, he continued.
“This evening we saw a senseless attack on people simply enjoying a Saturday evening with family and friends,” British Home Secretary Priti Patel said in a statement early Sunday. “My heart, prayers and thoughts are with all of those affected and to the people of Reading who will be deeply shocked and concerned by this terrible incident.”
A close adviser to the former vice-president Joe Biden has begun forming a team to oversee the transition, should the Democratic candidate beat Donald Trump in November’s presidential election.
Ted Kaufman has recruited six people to a team that will be expanded, a person familiar with the transition team told Reuters. Several former Obama administration officials are included in the Biden team.
Major party nominees set up transition teams before a general election to coordinate with the incumbent administration.
In 2016, Trump’s transition effort was led by the former New Jersey governor and presidential candidate Chris Christie. An enemy of Trump’s son-in-law and close adviser Jared Kushner, Christie was summarily fired in what he called a political “hit job”.
The ensuing chaos of the Trump transition has been widely chronicled, not least by the Moneyball author Michael Lewis in a bestselling book, The Fifth Risk.
According to Lewis, Trump’s campaign chair, Steve Bannon, “was fucking nervous” about Trump’s handling of the transition.
“I go, ‘Holy fuck, this guy doesn’t know anything. And he doesn’t give a shit.’”
In a statement, Kaufman said the Biden team would “ensure continuity of government” in the event that their candidate must prepare to take over amid the coronavirus pandemic and ensuing economic crisis.
“No one will have taken office facing such daunting obstacles since Franklin Delano Roosevelt,” said Kaufman, adding that Biden was ready to begin that work “the day he is sworn in as president”.
Roosevelt took office in 1933, with the world in the grip of the Great Depression. He won four terms and died in 1945, shortly before victory was secured in the second world war.
Kaufman, who filled the US Senate seat for Delaware when Biden became vice-president to Barack Obama in 2009, co-authored a 2015 law that requires initial transition work to begin six months before an election.
Yohannes Abraham, who served in Barack Obama’s White House, will manage the day-to-day operation of the transition team, which will be independent of Biden’s presidential campaign.
Recruits also include the former CIA deputy director Avril Haines, another Obama administration veteran.
UPDATED, with comment from Trump, Bolton’s attorney, and Simon & Schuster:A federal judge rejected a Justice Department effort to prevent the release of the memoir from Donald Trump’s former national security adviser John Bolton.
But U.S. District Judge Royce Lamberth, in a ruling issued on Saturday, also was highly critical of the way that Bolton went ahead with publishing the book, concluding that he submitted it to the government’s national security review did not complete the process. Bolton may face having the government collect the proceeds from the book.
Bolton “has gambled with the national security of the United States,” Lamberth wrote. “He has exposed his country to harm and himself to civil (and potentially criminal) liability. But those facts do not control the motion before the court. The government has failed to establish that an injunction will prevent irreparable harm.”
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Bolton’s book, The Room Where It Happened, is due to be released on Tuesday by Simon & Schuster, and he has scheduled a publicity blitz that will start with an ABC News special on Sunday night. Many of its bombshell details — including Bolton’s claims that Trump pursued a foreign policy in his own self interest — already have been the source of news stories and an excerpt in The Wall Street Journal.
Lamberth rejected the Justice Department’s motion for a temporary restraining order and preliminary injunction to stop the book’s release.
In his ruling, Lamberth noted that 200,000 copies of the book already have been shipped domestically, and “reviews of and excerpts from the book are widely available online,” and it’s even circulated among reporters at the White House. A CBS News reporter already had an advance copy of the book when questioning the White House press secretary on Thursday.
“By the looks of it, the horse is not just out of the barn—it is out of the country,” Lamberth wrote.
The government argued that, despite the book’s pre-release availability, Bolton should be required to “instruct his publisher to take any and all available steps to retrieve and destroy any copies of the book that may be in the possession of any third party.”
Lamberth rejected that idea. “For reasons that hardly need to be stated, the Court will not order a nationwide seizure and destruction of a political memoir,” he wrote.
Yet the judge clearly found fault with the way that Bolton went about going through a mandated pre-publication review process before publishing the book. Having signed a non-disclosure agreement as part of his tenure as national security adviser, Bolton was required to submit his book to the government to ensure that it did not contain classified material. As that process dragged on, Lamberth wrote that he “pulled the plug” and sent the manuscript to the publisher for printing.
Lamberth wrote that the Justice Department is likely to succeed on the merits of its lawsuit, in which it seeks, among other things, an order that proceeds from the book be held by the federal government. In fact, Lamberth order raises the prospect that the DOJ will also pursue criminal charges against Bolton.
He wrote, “Bolton could have sued the government and sought relief in court. Instead, he opted out of the review process before its conclusion. Unilateral fast-tracking carried the benefit of publicity and sales, and the cost of substantial risk exposure. This was Bolton’s bet: If he is right and the book does not contain classified information, he keeps the upside mentioned above; but if he is wrong, he stands to lose his profits from the book deal, exposes himself to criminal liability, and imperils national security. Bolton was wrong.”
Bolton’s attorney, Charles Cooper, argued that the NSC official tasked with reviewing the book, Ellen Knight, concluded after a lengthy, four-month editing process that the book no longer contained classified information. But Cooper said that the administration then withheld issuing Bolton a written clearance letter, a delay that he said was a pretext for stifling its ultimate publication. Instead, the Justice Department said that another NSC official, Michael Ellis, senior director of intelligence, started an additional review at the request of Bolton’s successor, Robert O’Brien, who “was concerned that the manuscript still appeared to contain classified information.”
“While the Government seeks to dispute Ms. Knight’s considered judgment, its claim is, quite simply, a regrettable pretext designed to cover up what is in fact a determined political effort to suppress Ambassador Bolton’s speech,” Cooper wrote in a court filing earlier this week.
But Lamberth was not persuaded.
“Many Americans are unable to renew their passports within four months, but Bolton complains that reviewing hundreds of pages of a National Security Advisor’s tell-all deserves a swifter timetable,” he wrote.
He added, “Access to sensitive intelligence is rarely consolidated in individuals, and it comes as no surprise to the Court that the government requested several iterations of review headed by multiple officers. But what is reasonable to the Court was intolerable to Bolton, and he proceeded to publication without so much as an email notifying the government.”
Adam Rothberg, a spokesperson for Simon & Schuster, said in a statement, “We are grateful that the Court has vindicated the strong First Amendment protections against censorship and prior restraint of publication. We are very pleased that the public will have the opportunity to read Ambassador Bolton’s account of his time as national security advisor.”
In a statement, Cooper said, “We welcome today’s decision by the Court denying the Government’s attempt to suppress Ambassador Bolton’s book. We respectfully take issue, however, with the Court’s preliminary conclusion at this early stage of the case that Ambassador Bolton did not comply fully with his contractual prepublication obligation to the Government, and the case will now proceed to development of the full record on that issue. The full story of these events has yet to be told—but it will be.”
Trump tweeted about the decision, warning that Bolton “will have bombs dropped on him!”
“BIG COURT WIN against Bolton,” he wrote. “Obviously, with the book already given out and leaked to many people and the media, nothing the highly respected Judge could have done about stopping it…BUT, strong & powerful statements & rulings on MONEY & on BREAKING CLASSIFICATION were made. Bolton broke the law and has been called out and rebuked for so doing, with a really big price to pay. He likes dropping bombs on people, and killing them. Now he will have bombs dropped on him!”
….Bolton broke the law and has been called out and rebuked for so doing, with a really big price to pay. He likes dropping bombs on people, and killing them. Now he will have bombs dropped on him!
Press Secretary Kayleigh McEnany said that the government “intends to hold Bolton to the further requirements of his agreements and to ensure that he receives no profits from his shameful decision to place his desire for money and attention ahead of his obligations to protect national security.”
An arrest warrant has been issued for a suspect in the arson fire that burned down an Atlanta Wendy’s restaurant last week after the police killing of Rayshard Brooks, authorities announced Saturday.
“An arrest warrant has been issued by Atlanta Fire Investigators for Ms. Natalie White,” Atlanta Fire and Rescue said in a tweet. “She has been identified as a suspect in the arson fire that burned down the Wendy’s Restaurant (125 University Ave) on Saturday, June 13th.”
The warrant is for first-degree arson, Atlanta Fire Sgt. Cortez Stafford told CNN.
Stafford says more suspects could be involved.
“We take arson very seriously,” Stafford said. “Someone could have been injured or killed.”
In one sign that Mr. Barr’s move to oust Mr. Berman may have been hastily arranged, even Mr. Clayton, the man who had been poised to take Mr. Berman’s place, appeared to be caught off guard.
Mr. Clayton had sent an email to his staff on Thursday saying that he looked forward to seeing them in person, once work-at-home restrictions that had been put in place because of the coronavirus could be lifted. The email offered no indication that Mr. Clayton was planning to leave the S.E.C., according to a person briefed on it.
Just after midnight on Saturday, Mr. Clayton sent another email to his employees, telling them about his new position. “Pending confirmation,” he wrote, “I will remain fully committed to the work of the commission and the supportive community we have built,” according to a copy reviewed by The New York Times.
Mr. Clayton could not be reached for comment.
Later on Saturday, Representative Jerrold Nadler, a New York Democrat who heads the House Judiciary Committee, said the committee would investigate the firing of Mr. Berman as part of a larger inquiry into what he said was undue political interference at the Justice Department.
“The whole thing smacks of corruption and incompetence,” Mr. Nadler said of Mr. Berman’s dismissal.
Under Mr. Trump, the Justice Department has long believed that the Southern District was out of control. In no small part that was because the department believed that prosecutors in New York delayed in warning them that they were naming Mr. Trump — as “Individual-1” — in court documents in the Cohen prosecution.
When Mr. Barr became attorney general, officials in the deputy attorney general’s office, which oversees regional prosecutors, asked him to rein in Mr. Berman, who they believed was exacerbating the Southern District’s propensity for autonomy. The office has embraced its nickname the “Sovereign District” of New York because of its tradition of independence.
One particular point of contention was the question of how Mr. Berman and his staff should investigate Halkbank, a Turkish state-owned bank that the office indicted last year, according to three people familiar with the investigation.
About a dozen armed police officers carrying shields were seen entering a block of flats in Basingstoke Road in Reading at around 23:00 BST.
Prime Minister Boris Johnson said his “thoughts are with all of those affected by the appalling incident in Reading”.
“My thanks to the emergency services on the scene,” he added.
South Central Ambulance Service said it was “assessing and treating a number of casualties who had sustained injuries as a result of the incident”.
Image copyright PA Media
‘He started coming towards us’
Laurence Wort, 20, who was visiting Reading for the day, told the BBC he was about 10m away from the incident.
“A man walked along the path opposite where we were walking past a group of eight to 10 men, before darting to the left and going to stab three people in the first group.
“Changing direction, he runs towards us and then when we realises he’s not going to catch us, he turned back and went for another group that hadn’t realised what was happening yet, and he managed to stab someone in the second group,” Mr Wort said.
Claire Gould, a freelance journalist who lives in Reading, said she walked past Forbury Gardens at around 18:40 BST “and everything seemed calm”.
She then saw an air ambulance land in King’s Meadow – another park close to the scene – at around 19:00 BST, followed by a second around 10 minutes later.
“There were multiple sirens from 19:00 going on for the next couple of hours and police helicopters [were] circling,” she added.
Media captionReading’s town centre has been cordoned off by police following a stabbing at Forbury Gardens
Home Secretary Priti Patel tweeted to say she was “deeply concerned” at the incident.
She said: “My thoughts are with everyone involved, including police and emergency responders at the scene.”
Policing minister Kit Malthouse tweeted his “deepest sympathies to all affected” and described the incident as “horrific” and “dreadful”.
Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer said the stabbing was “very concerning”.
Image copyright PA Media
Image caption
Police at Forbury Gardens in Reading town centre
Thames Valley Police said there was no indication the incident was connected to an earlier Black Lives Matter (BLM) protest in the park.
Reading council’s leader urged people to stay away from the area.
A spokesman for Thames Valley Police said: “A number of people sustained injuries and were taken to hospital. A police cordon is in place in Forbury Gardens as officers investigate.
“We are asking the public to avoid the area at this time.”
Image copyright AFP
Image caption
A large cordon remains in place following the incident
‘Peaceful protest’
BLM organisers said the incident was unrelated to a protest march in the area earlier.
Nieema Hassan said in a video message posted to Facebook: “They were very peaceful and we worked with the police liaison.
“In terms of the protest and the people who attended from Black Lives Matter, we’re all safe.
“None of us are affected. We had all left by the time this happened.”
Six members of President Donald Trump’s campaign staff who are in Tulsa, Oklahoma, to setup for the president’s first campaign rally in months tested positive for the coronavirus, the campaign announced on Saturday.
The president’s campaign said they performed hundreds of tests ahead of Trump’s rally, his first since March 2, but six members of his advance team tested positive.
“Six members of the advance team tested positive out of hundreds of tests performed, and quarantine procedures were immediately implemented,” Tim Murtaugh, the campaign communications director said in a statement. “No COVID-positive staffers or anyone in immediate contact will be at today’s rally or near attendees and elected officials.”
The news comes as Trump, the White House and the president’s re-election campaign organization have been criticized for hosting an event in an enclosed, 19,000-seat arena in Tulsa. The campaign has required all those in attendance to sign a digital waiver releasing the campaign and president of any liability if they get sick.
NBC News previously reported on Friday that Dr. Anthony Fauci, the nation’s top infectious disease expert, and coronavirus task force response coordinator Dr. Deborah Birx both expressed concern in the last week over the safety of holding Saturday’s rally in part because Oklahoma has also seen a significant rise in COVID-19 cases.
There has been a 100 percent spike in Tulsa County just this week, the highest in the state, and health officials announced Saturday that it had 136 new coronavirus cases, the highest number its yet to report in a single day as the trend of cases, hospitalizations and deaths in Oklahoma continues to rise.
The campaign, however, has maintained that they are taking enough precautions to avoid a sudden uptick in cases.
“As previously announced, all rally attendees are given temperature checks before going through security, at which point they are given wristbands, facemasks and hand sanitizer,” Murtaugh said.
WASHINGTON — A federal judge on Saturday denied a request by the Department of Justice to halt the sale and distribution of a forthcoming memoir by former Trump national security advisor John Bolton.
U.S. District Court Judge Royce Lamberth wrote that the government’s request to block distribution of “The Room Where it Happened,” a damning memoir of Bolton’s White House tenure, would be impossible to enforce because thousands of copies of the book have already been printed and shipped to distributors.
The ruling is a significant blow to the White House, which has taken extraordinary steps in the past week to quash the memoir, set for release on Tuesday and already a bestseller.
In addition to its motion requesting that Lamberth halt sales of the book, which the government filed on Wednesday, the Justice Department has also sued Bolton personally, alleging that he violated nondisclosure agreements he signed with the White House.
“The Room Where it Happened” paints Trump as a “stunningly uninformed,” craven and mendacious chief executive, one who repeatedly signaled his willingness to sell out the nation’s security interests if it meant advancing his own interests.
Saturday’s ruling was far from a total victory for Bolton, however. At several points in his order, Lamberth suggested that Bolton probably did violate his employment contract, and that the government would likely prevail in its lawsuit against Bolton.
“This was Bolton’s bet,” wrote Lamberth. “If he is right and the book does not contain classified information, he keeps the [profits and the publicity for the book]; but if he is wrong, he stands to lose his profits from the book deal, exposes himself to criminal liability, and imperils national security. Bolton was wrong.”
Bolton’s attorney, Charles Cooper, said in a statement, “We welcome today’s decision by the Court denying the Government’s attempt to suppress Ambassador Bolton’s book.”
“We respectfully take issue, however, with the Court’s preliminary conclusion at this early stage of the case that Ambassador Bolton did not comply fully with his contractual prepublication obligation to the Government,” Cooper continued. “The case will now proceed to development of the full record on that issue. The full story of these events has yet to be told—but it will be.”
Within minutes of Saturday’s ruling, Trump tweeted fresh attacks on Bolton.
“Wow, I finally agree with failed political consultant Steve Schmidt, who called Wacko John Bolton ‘a despicable man who failed in his duty to protect America.’ Also stated that he should never be allowed to serve in government again. So true!” Trump wrote.
“Plain and simple, John Bolton, who was all washed up until I brought him back and gave him a chance, broke the law by releasing Classified Information (in massive amounts). He must pay a very big price for this, as others have before him. This should never to happen again!!!”
The question of whether Bolton’s book contains classified information is at the heart of an ongoing legal battle between Bolton and the White House.
And while Lamberth did not directly rule on this question Saturday, he made little effort to hide the fact that he agrees with the government’s claim that it does, indeed, contain classified material.
Bolton and his attorneys have flatly denied that there is classified information in the book, and they point to a monthslong prepublication review process Bolton underwent with the National Security Council which resulted in several changes to the book at the NSC’s request. Following the edits, the book’s primary reviewer wrote in an email to Bolton in late April that the book did not appear to contain any more classified information.
Yet according to the Justice Department, after this first review process was over, a second, unannounced review of the book was initiated, and this second review turned up more classified information that the first review had missed.
But by the time the White House informed Bolton, in June, that the second review had found more classified information, it was too late. Bolton had already instructed his publisher to print the book and distribute it around the world.
In his ruling Saturday, Lamberth repeatedly faulted Bolton for not waiting until he had final, written authorization from the government before telling his publisher to proceed with printing the book.
The judge also said that after personally reviewing the material in Bolton’s book that the government claims is classified, Lamberth agreed with the Justice Department: Bolton’s memoir discloses classified information.
For the purposes of Saturday’s order, however, Lamberth set aside this question of whether there is classified information in the book.
Instead he zeroed in on the issue of whether a last-minute court order blocking the book was an appropriate remedy to prevent this information from becoming public.
And one of the things the government had to prove in order to convince him to issue such an order, Lamberth wrote, was that it would actually work.
With the book already in thousands of bookstores, distributed to reviewers and journalists and purchased by thousands of people online, a court order blocking it would not succeed in keeping the classified material under wraps, wrote the judge.
Below is a photo of “The Room Where it Happened,” taken at the White House earlier this week. Many journalists there received advance copies of the memoir from the publisher.
A 19-year-old man was killed and another person was in critical condition after a pre-dawn shooting in Seattle’s protest zone, authorities said on Saturday.
The shooting happened at about 3am in the area near downtown known as the Chaz, short for “Capitol Hill Autonomous Zone”, police said in a statement on Twitter.
Seattle’s police department claimed in a press release on Saturday morning that when officers responded to reports of gunshots inside the protest zone, they “were met by a violent crowd that prevented officers safe access to the victims”.
Police were later informed that the protesters’ own medics transported the two gunshot wound victims to a hospital, the department said.
Two males with gunshot wounds arrived in a private vehicle at Harborview medical center at about 3am, said a hospital spokeswoman, Susan Gregg. The 19-year-old man died and the other person was in critical condition in intensive care.
Sgt Lauren Truscott of Seattle police told the Seattle Times she did not know if police had taken anyone into custody and had no immediate details about how the shooting unfolded.
Investigators were reviewing public-source video and body-camera video for clues and authorities planned to disclose more information about the shooting later, Truscott said.
Protesters have cordoned off several blocks near a police station in Seattle’s Capitol Hill neighborhood, in the wake of demonstrations against police violence since the police killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis several weeks ago.
Police have largely retreated from the zone after clashes with protesters ended with people throwing things at police and police teargassing people and using other crowd control munitions.
City officials have said they are still communicating with protest leaders, who had pledged to keep the peace in the zone.
The situation has drawn the continued ire of Donald Trump. His tweets about possibly sending in the military have been met with condemnation from the Seattle mayor, Jenny Durkan, and Washington governor, Jay Inslee, both Democrats.
People stand around the statue of Confederate Gen. Albert Pike after it was toppled by protesters at Judiciary Square in D.C. on Friday evening, June 19, 2020. (AFP via Getty/Eric Baradat)
The statue of Confederate Gen. Albert Pike, seen here on Friday evening, June 19, 2020, was the only statue of a Confederate general in D.C. (AFP via Getty/Eric Baradat)
The statue of Confederate Gen. Albert Pike was pulled down with rope before demonstrators chanted “black lives matter” on Friday evening, June 19, 2020. (AFP via Getty/Eric Baradat)
The statue of Confederate Gen. Albert Pike is seen here on the ground, on Friday evening, June 19, 2020. (AFP via Getty/Eric Baradat)
The statue of Confederate Gen. Albert Pike, seen here standing along Indiana Ave. near Judiciary Square on Thursday, Aug. 17, 2017. D.C. Councilmember David Grosso and seven other District elected officials had asked the National Park Serve to remove the statue. (WTOP)
(1/5)
Following a day of peaceful protests celebrating Juneteenth, protesters pulled down and burned the statue of Confederate Gen. Albert Pike in D.C.’s Judiciary Square on Friday evening.
WTOP’s Ken Duffy reported that protesters arrived to the monument’s location, near the corner of 3rd Street and D Street, and began tearing down the statue after 10 p.m.
Developing: Protesters tear down, set fire to lone Confederate statue in DC of General Albert Pike on Indiana Ave NW
Cheering demonstrators jumped up and down as the 11-foot statue of Albert Pike wobbled on its high granite pedestal before falling backward, landing in a pile of dust.
Protesters then set a bonfire and stood around it in a circle as the statue burned, chanting, “No justice, no peace!” and “No racist police!”
D.C. Police, whose headquarters are located on the same block of the statue, put the flames out but did not engage with protesters.
After the statue was toppled, President Donald Trump tweeted that D.C. Police should have stopped the protesters from removing the statue.
The D.C. Police are not doing their job as they watch a statue be ripped down & burn. These people should be immediately arrested. A disgrace to our Country! @MayorBowser
Jubilant protesters read out Trump’s tweet over a bullhorn and cheered. After the statue fell, most protesters returned peacefully to Lafayette Square near the White House.
The former Confederate general was also a longtime influential leader of the Freemasons, who revere Pike and who paid for the statue.
The Masons had successfully lobbied Congress to grant them land for the statue — as long as Pike would be depicted in civilian, not military, clothing.
Pike’s statue was D.C.’s lone confederate monument.
Pike’s body is interred at the D.C. headquarters of the Scottish Rite of Freemasonry, which also contains a small museum in his honor.
In 2017, D.C. Councilman David Grosso and seven other District elected officials asked the National Park Serve to remove the statue.
Ever since 1992, members of the DC Council have been calling on the federal gov’t to remove the statue of Confederate Albert Pike (a federal memorial on federal land). We unanimously renewed our call to Congress to remove it in 2017https://t.co/ggk8w2EypYhttps://t.co/f53tAH2potpic.twitter.com/4u28HvH4cu
GILBERT, Ariz. — Newly released police body camera footage and 911 calls outline how Charles Vallow, Lori Vallow Daybell’s former husband, pleaded with officers to get his wife help.
Footage from the morning of Jan. 31, 2019, shows Vallow talking with Gilbert Police officers outside a hotel about how his wife lost touch with reality. She was expressing strange beliefs and telling people she knew when the Second Coming of Jesus Christ would be happening.
“I tried to support her as much as I could, but it’s gotten really bad lately,” Vallow told officers. “She’s had a break. Says I’m Nick Schneider, I’ve taken over Charles’ body and Charles had been killed.”
It’s unknown who Schneider is, but Vallow says Daybell wants him dead, a story he told officers hours earlier after arriving home from a business trip.
“I never thought she would do anything like this, but she’s just lost touch with reality,” Vallow said. “She’s unhinged. It scares the crap out of me.”
Vallow told police in the earlier exchange that Daybell considered herself a translated being and a God who spoke with an ancient prophet and Jesus Christ daily. He said her strange religious views were several years in the making but became increasingly worse.
Vallow said Daybell told him, “I can murder you now with my powers.”
Newly unsealed court documents reveal new details about how Idaho police were able to locate the bodies Lori Vallow Daybell’s children on her husband’s property.
Since meeting with police that night, Vallow said he found Daybell’s car at the parking lot of a school where she dropped of their son Joshua “JJ” Vallow. While there, Vallow said he took Daybell’s keys, phone and wallet.
Vallow said a hotel key in her wallet helped him find her and he wanted to get Daybell picked up on a court order for her to receive a mental health examination.
An officer told Vallow they could not go into the hotel and check on Daybell if employees did not want them to. She said a sergeant with proper paperwork would need to come to the hotel and have Daybell admitted for a psychological evaluation.
“I don’t want her hurt. I don’t want her to hurt anyone else,” Vallow said. “Her religious stuff has gone way off the deep end.”
Police tell Vallow his main focus should be on the safety of JJ.
“If you don’t feel comfortable with her state of mind, then maybe figure out a way to keep him safe even if that means not being at school,” an officer tells Vallow.
The officer advises Vallow to not take JJ out of state too long and reminds him there are two sides to every story.
Later in the day, Daybell, Tylee and their friend, Melanie Gibb, visit the Gilbert Police Department to file a report against Vallow. Daybell corroborates that Vallow took her phone, keys and wallet and she says she just wants her property back.
“During my contact with Lori, I found her to be in a normal state of mind but only slightly upset she did not have her property,” a Gilbert officer wrote in a police report. “Lori showed no signs of mental distress as she described what was occurring and appeared to be in a good mood. Talking with Lori`s daughter and friend, they did not seem concerned for anything other than Lori getting her property back.”
Daybell agreed to go to the Community Bridges mental health facility on her own. Due to her apparent normal state of mind, the officer felt it best to not take her involuntarily as the order allowed, according to the report.
Community Bridges medically cleared Vallow later that day.
In the months following, Lori’s brother, Alex Cox, shot and killed Vallow at a home in Chandler, Arizona, on July 11. In August, Lori took her family to live in Rexburg. By the end of September, Joshua and Tylee had vanished.
Bolton, a veteran diplomat and security expert, denied the book contained any classified information. He asserted that after a painstaking, months-long review, a career White House official, Ellen Knight, effectively cleared his manuscript in April before Trump political appointees undertook to stall it through November’s election.
President Donald Trump’s Saturday rally in Tulsa, Oklahoma, has become the latest flash point in the country’s ongoing reckoning with systemic racism after widespread criticism of the timing and location of the event.
Trump had initially planned a campaign rally in Tulsa on Friday but later rescheduled to Saturday after learning about the significance of Juneteenth. The city is also where a white mob destroyed the “Black Wall Street” in 1921.
“The president said he was coming on June 19,” the Rev. Al Sharpton said at a Tulsa event Friday to boos from the audience, saying Trump’s admission showed he was “not qualified” to represent the country as a head of state. Sharpton also called Trump “insensitive and isolated,” especially when “he was born and raised in New York, where two-thirds of New York is Black and Latino.”
Friday night also brought controversy over a curfew surrounding the event. Tulsa officials rescinded a curfew after Trump spoke with the city’s mayor. Instead a “secure zone” established by the U.S. Secret Service will be used.
A closer look at some recent developments:
Late Friday, protesters in Washington, D.C., and in Raleigh, North Carolina, topple Confederate statues.
Ex-Atlanta police officer Garrett Rolfe, who faces 11 charges in the death of Rayshard Brooks, was reprimanded for firearm misuse among 12 incidents in his disciplinary records.
And there’s this: When people talk about systemic racism, they mean systemic: impacting institutions, policies and outcomes across all aspects of Black Americans’ lives. Here are 12 charts that show how racial disparities persist across wealth, health, education and beyond.
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Coronavirus surges aren’t linked to protests, USA TODAY analysis finds
The United States has seen new coronavirus cases climb from about 21,000 a day the last week of May to nearly 23,000 a day this week. Positive tests and, in some places, hospitalizations have spiked, too, leading many to wonder if a change in behavior caused outbreaks in states such as California, Arizona and Florida.
But neither protests or more people leaving home explain the surge of new COVID-19 cases, a USA TODAY analysis of counties with at least 100 cases has found. Residents of counties with growth of 25% or more over the previous two weeks left their homes at the same rate as people in counties without a surge of new infections, according to cell phone location data compiled by the company SafeGraph.
And large protests were as common in counties without outbreaks as in others – although those events could have seeded the virus broadly, and could still lead to outbreaks. Read more here.
– Matt Wynn and Jayme Fraser
Trump says feds ‘ready, willing, and able’ to take back Seattle from protesters
President Donald Trump says the federal government is “Ready, Willing & Able” to help Seattle if asked in “taking back” the city from protesters.
In a Friday night tweet, the president was apparently referring to protesters setting up the self-patrolled “Capitol Hill Organized Protests,” or CHOP, zone, in a Seattle neighborhood after police abandoned their east precinct during demonstrations.
“Waiting to hear from Dem run Washington State as to whether they want help in taking back Seattle,” he tweeted. “Ready to move quickly!” he said, adding that “damage” to the city, including the demolition of a statue, should not be allowed. “Ready to solve problem quickly! Federal Government is Ready, Willing & Able,” Trump added.
Washington state Gov. Jay Inslee said earlier that that Trump does not have the power to activate the Guard in Washington and called such threats “more like rants of a very insecure man.” Seattle Mayor Jenny Durkan has called Trump’s bid to bring in U.S. troops in local jurisdictions “unconstitutional and illegal.”
Authorities rule death of Malcolm Harsch, Black man found hanging in California, a suicide
The family of Malcolm Harsch, a Black man who was found hanging from a tree in Victorville, California, last month, says his death has been ruled a suicide after authorities released video showing what happened.
The video evidence, captured May 31 from two surveillance cameras on buildings on Victor Street, was also shown to a group of reporters at San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Department headquarters Friday afternoon.
Sgt. Steve Allen, with the Victorville’s Sheriff’s Station, said he hoped “to dispel some of the myths” surrounding Harsch’s death as protests against police violence and systemic bias continue worldwide after the death of George Floyd in police custody.
In response, Najee Ali, a spokesperson for the family, released a statement that read: “On behalf of the family of Malcolm Harsch unfortunately it seems he did take his own life.The Victorville Police Department officials released new video evidence to family members. The family wants to sincerely thank everyone for their support and prayers.”
— Martin Estacio, Victorville Daily Press
Second Minneapolis officer charged in Floyd killing freed on bail
J. Alexander Kueng, the second of four former Minneapolis police officers awaiting trial in the death of George Floyd, has been released on bail, according to media reports.
Kueng, along with former fellow officers Tou Thao, and Thomas Lane, are charged with aiding and abetting in Floyd’s death. Lane was released last week.
Derek Chauvin has been charged with murder in the case, which has sparked world protests against police misconduct.
All four officers have been fired by the Minneapolis Police Department. Kueng was ordered by the court not to perform any police or security work while awaiting trial,, KMSP reports, citing jail records.
Protesters topple Confederate statue in DC
Protesters on Friday night toppled the only statue of a Confederate general in the nation’s capital and set it on fire.
Cheering demonstrators jumped up and down as the 11-foot statue of Albert Pike — wrapped with chains — wobbled on its high granite pedestal before falling backward, landing in a pile of dust. Protesters then set a bonfire and stood around it in a circle as the statue burned, chanting, “No justice, no peace!” and “No racist police!”
Eyewitness accounts and videos posted on social media indicated that police were on the scene, but didn’t intervene.
President Donald Trump quickly tweeted about the toppling, calling out D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser and writing: “The DC police are not doing their job as they watched a statue be ripped down and burn.” After the statue fell, most protesters returned peacefully to Lafayette Park near the White House.
– Associated Press
Records show discipline history of ex-Atlanta officer who fatally shot Rayshard Brooks
Atlanta Police Department records list 12 incidents in former officer Garrett Rolfe’s discipline history, including a written reprimand for use of firearms in 2017.
Rolfe has been charged with multiple counts, including felony murder and aggravated assault with a deadly weapon, in connection with the death of Rayshard Brooks. Rolfe was previously cleared of wrongdoing in a 2015 shooting that punctured a man’s lung, The Atlanta Journal Constitution reports.
Police records generated June 14 date to 2014 and list multiple vehicle accidents and citizen complaints. In many cases, Rolfe was listed as exonerated in his conduct.
In a 2017 incident, Rolfe was reprimanded for pointing a gun out of a passenger side window toward a fleeing vehicle. The reprimand says officers were not to point their weapon at a person “unless the discharge of that firearm would be justifiable.”
The latest entry in the log is for a firearm discharge, dated soon after Brooks’ death.
Protesters topple part of Confederate monument in Raleigh, North Carolina
Protesters in North Carolina’s capital pulled down parts of a Confederate monument Friday night. Demonstrators used a strap to pull down two statues of Confederate soldiers that were part of a larger obelisk near the state capitol in downtown Raleigh, WNCN-TV reported.
Protesters then dragged at least one of the statues down a street and used the strap to hang the figure from a street light pole.
Earlier in the day, hundreds of demonstrators had marched through downtown Raleigh and Durham to protest police brutality and to celebrate Juneteenth.
Numerous Confederate statues have been vandalized or torn down across the South in recent weeks following the death of George Floyd, a Black man who was killed after a white Minneapolis police officer pressed a knee into his neck for nearly nine minutes.
John Legend, Gabrielle Union among artists supporting new Black Artists for Freedom
John Legend, Gabrielle Union and Ava DuVernay are some of the many Black cultural leaders who have signed a letter to fight against racism, promote equal pay and ask industries to disassociate from police.
The letter was released Friday by a new organization called the Black Artists for Freedom, which describes itself as a collective of Black workers in the culture industries. The letter was published to celebrate Juneteenth.
The organization said the letter was inspired by recent protests against police brutality and systemic racism and included signatures from Black workers in film, television, music, publishing, theater, journalism and education.
“They are working in the spirit of the Black Radical Tradition to reclaim our freedoms,” the letter said. “Their courage and imagination have inspired us to build on their necessary demands including chiefly, the abolition of police and the complete dismantling of the racist prison-industrial system.”
Memorial to former owner of Washington Redskins who had named the team removed outside DC stadium
The memorial honoring former Washington Redskins owner George Preston Marshall was removed from its place outside of RFK Stadium in Washington, D.C., on Friday.
Although the team hasn’t played there since 1996, the memorial for Marshall — the man who re-named his team the Redskins and moved the franchise from Boston to Washington in 1937— remained until Events DC, the city’s sports and entertainment authority that oversees the site, announced its permanent removal.
“This symbol of a person who didn’t believe all men and women were created equal and who actually worked against integration is counter to all that we as people, a city, and nation represent,” Events DC chairman Max Brown and CEO Greg O’Dell said in a joint statement. “We believe that injustice and inequality of all forms is reprehensible and we are firmly committed to confronting unequal treatment and working together toward healing our city and country.”
Louisville police to fire officer involved in Breonna Taylor shooting
Louisville Mayor Greg Fischer announced Friday that Louisville Metro Police is terminating officer Brett Hankison, one of three officers who fired weapons at Breonna Taylor’s apartment, killing her.
Taylor was shot March 13 as the officers entered to serve a no-knock warrant. Her boyfriend, Kenneth Walker, fired a shot as officers entered, thinking they were intruders, and Taylor was hit eight times in the ensuing gunfire from officers.
Hankison is accused by the department’s interim chief, Robert Schroeder, of “blindly” firing 10 rounds into the apartment, creating a substantial danger of death and serious injury.
“I find your conduct a shock to the conscience,” Schroeder wrote in a Friday letter to Hankison laying out the charges against him. “I am alarmed and stunned you used deadly force in this fashion.”
Sam Aguiar, a Louisville-based attorney for Taylor’s family, said of the impending firing: “It’s about damn time.”
The other two officers have been placed on administrative reassignment.
Trump warns ‘protesters, anarchists, agitators’ to stay away from Tulsa; mayor lifts emergency curfew
While President Donald Trump warned “protesters, anarchists, agitators, looters or lowlifes” Friday not to come to Oklahoma during his weekend campaign rally in Tulsa, the mayor of the city lifted a “civil emergency” curfew saying the Secret Service said it was no longer necessary.
The president, who has charged that some cities and states led by Democrats have not cracked down on protest violence, tweeted that demonstrators headed for Oklahoma will find “a much different scene!.” He did not elaborate.
“Any protesters, anarchists, agitators, looters or lowlifes who are going to Oklahoma please understand, you will not be treated like you have been in New York, Seattle, or Minneapolis,” he tweeted.
Tulsa Mayor G. T. Bynum had declared a “civil emergency” and imposed the curfew, citing expected crowds of more than 100,000, planned protests and civil unrest, including a warning of organized, violent gangs heading for the city.
Meanwhile, another potential rally stumbling block fell Friday after the Oklahoma Supreme Court denied a request for a temporary injunction to block the event over health concerns.
On Thursday, Oklahoma Gov. Kevin Stitt, a Republican, told the president that the state is ready to host the rally, dismissing warnings from health officials about hosting a large gathering during the coronavirus pandemic.
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