Hong Kong (CNN)North Korea unveiled what analysts believe to be one of the world’s largest ballistic missiles at a military parade celebrating the 75th anniversary of the Workers’ Party broadcast on state-run television on Saturday.

    ‘);$vidEndSlate.removeClass(‘video__end-slate–inactive’).addClass(‘video__end-slate–active’);}};CNN.autoPlayVideoExist = (CNN.autoPlayVideoExist === true) ? true : false;var configObj = {thumb: ‘none’,video: ‘world/2020/08/31/north-korea-politics-power-change-ripley-pkg-intl-hnk-vpx.cnn’,width: ‘100%’,height: ‘100%’,section: ‘domestic’,profile: ‘expansion’,network: ‘cnn’,markupId: ‘body-text_32’,theoplayer: {allowNativeFullscreen: true},adsection: ‘const-article-inpage’,frameWidth: ‘100%’,frameHeight: ‘100%’,posterImageOverride: {“mini”:{“width”:220,”type”:”jpg”,”uri”:”//cdn.cnn.com/cnnnext/dam/assets/200831121558-kim-jong-un-small-169.jpg”,”height”:124},”xsmall”:{“width”:307,”type”:”jpg”,”uri”:”//cdn.cnn.com/cnnnext/dam/assets/200831121558-kim-jong-un-medium-plus-169.jpg”,”height”:173},”small”:{“width”:460,”type”:”jpg”,”uri”:”http://www.noticiasdodia.onlinenewsbusiness.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/200831121558-kim-jong-un-large-169.jpg”,”height”:259},”medium”:{“width”:780,”type”:”jpg”,”uri”:”//cdn.cnn.com/cnnnext/dam/assets/200831121558-kim-jong-un-exlarge-169.jpg”,”height”:438},”large”:{“width”:1100,”type”:”jpg”,”uri”:”//cdn.cnn.com/cnnnext/dam/assets/200831121558-kim-jong-un-super-169.jpg”,”height”:619},”full16x9″:{“width”:1600,”type”:”jpg”,”uri”:”//cdn.cnn.com/cnnnext/dam/assets/200831121558-kim-jong-un-full-169.jpg”,”height”:900},”mini1x1″:{“width”:120,”type”:”jpg”,”uri”:”//cdn.cnn.com/cnnnext/dam/assets/200831121558-kim-jong-un-small-11.jpg”,”height”:120}}},autoStartVideo = false,isVideoReplayClicked = false,callbackObj,containerEl,currentVideoCollection = [],currentVideoCollectionId = ”,isLivePlayer = false,mediaMetadataCallbacks,mobilePinnedView = null,moveToNextTimeout,mutePlayerEnabled = false,nextVideoId = ”,nextVideoUrl = ”,turnOnFlashMessaging = false,videoPinner,videoEndSlateImpl;if (CNN.autoPlayVideoExist === false) {autoStartVideo = false;if (autoStartVideo === true) {if (turnOnFlashMessaging === true) {autoStartVideo = false;containerEl = jQuery(document.getElementById(configObj.markupId));CNN.VideoPlayer.showFlashSlate(containerEl);} else {CNN.autoPlayVideoExist = true;}}}configObj.autostart = CNN.Features.enableAutoplayBlock ? false : autoStartVideo;CNN.VideoPlayer.setPlayerProperties(configObj.markupId, autoStartVideo, isLivePlayer, isVideoReplayClicked, mutePlayerEnabled);CNN.VideoPlayer.setFirstVideoInCollection(currentVideoCollection, configObj.markupId);videoEndSlateImpl = new CNN.VideoEndSlate(‘body-text_32’);function findNextVideo(currentVideoId) {var i,vidObj;if (currentVideoId && jQuery.isArray(currentVideoCollection) && currentVideoCollection.length > 0) {for (i = 0; i 0) {videoEndSlateImpl.showEndSlateForContainer();if (mobilePinnedView) {mobilePinnedView.disable();}}}}callbackObj = {onPlayerReady: function (containerId) {var playerInstance,containerClassId = ‘#’ + containerId;CNN.VideoPlayer.handleInitialExpandableVideoState(containerId);CNN.VideoPlayer.handleAdOnCVPVisibilityChange(containerId, CNN.pageVis.isDocumentVisible());if (CNN.Features.enableMobileWebFloatingPlayer &&Modernizr &&(Modernizr.phone || Modernizr.mobile || Modernizr.tablet) &&CNN.VideoPlayer.getLibraryName(containerId) === ‘fave’ &&jQuery(containerClassId).parents(‘.js-pg-rail-tall__head’).length > 0 &&CNN.contentModel.pageType === ‘article’) {playerInstance = FAVE.player.getInstance(containerId);mobilePinnedView = new CNN.MobilePinnedView({element: jQuery(containerClassId),enabled: false,transition: CNN.MobileWebFloatingPlayer.transition,onPin: function () {playerInstance.hideUI();},onUnpin: function () {playerInstance.showUI();},onPlayerClick: function () {if (mobilePinnedView) {playerInstance.enterFullscreen();playerInstance.showUI();}},onDismiss: function() {CNN.Videx.mobile.pinnedPlayer.disable();playerInstance.pause();}});/* Storing pinned view on CNN.Videx.mobile.pinnedPlayer So that all players can see the single pinned player */CNN.Videx = CNN.Videx || {};CNN.Videx.mobile = CNN.Videx.mobile || {};CNN.Videx.mobile.pinnedPlayer = mobilePinnedView;}if (Modernizr && !Modernizr.phone && !Modernizr.mobile && !Modernizr.tablet) {if (jQuery(containerClassId).parents(‘.js-pg-rail-tall__head’).length) {videoPinner = new CNN.VideoPinner(containerClassId);videoPinner.init();} else {CNN.VideoPlayer.hideThumbnail(containerId);}}},onContentEntryLoad: function(containerId, playerId, contentid, isQueue) {CNN.VideoPlayer.showSpinner(containerId);},onContentPause: function (containerId, playerId, videoId, paused) {if (mobilePinnedView) {CNN.VideoPlayer.handleMobilePinnedPlayerStates(containerId, paused);}},onContentMetadata: function (containerId, playerId, metadata, contentId, duration, width, height) {var endSlateLen = jQuery(document.getElementById(containerId)).parent().find(‘.js-video__end-slate’).eq(0).length;CNN.VideoSourceUtils.updateSource(containerId, metadata);if (endSlateLen > 0) {videoEndSlateImpl.fetchAndShowRecommendedVideos(metadata);}},onAdPlay: function (containerId, cvpId, token, mode, id, duration, blockId, adType) {/* Dismissing the pinnedPlayer if another video players plays an Ad */CNN.VideoPlayer.dismissMobilePinnedPlayer(containerId);clearTimeout(moveToNextTimeout);CNN.VideoPlayer.hideSpinner(containerId);if (Modernizr && !Modernizr.phone && !Modernizr.mobile && !Modernizr.tablet) {if (typeof videoPinner !== ‘undefined’ && videoPinner !== null) {videoPinner.setIsPlaying(true);videoPinner.animateDown();}}},onAdPause: function (containerId, playerId, token, mode, id, duration, blockId, adType, instance, isAdPause) {if (mobilePinnedView) {CNN.VideoPlayer.handleMobilePinnedPlayerStates(containerId, isAdPause);}},onTrackingFullscreen: function (containerId, PlayerId, dataObj) {CNN.VideoPlayer.handleFullscreenChange(containerId, dataObj);if (mobilePinnedView &&typeof dataObj === ‘object’ &&FAVE.Utils.os === ‘iOS’ && !dataObj.fullscreen) {jQuery(document).scrollTop(mobilePinnedView.getScrollPosition());playerInstance.hideUI();}},onContentPlay: function (containerId, cvpId, event) {var playerInstance,prevVideoId;if (CNN.companion && typeof CNN.companion.updateCompanionLayout === ‘function’) {CNN.companion.updateCompanionLayout(‘restoreEpicAds’);}clearTimeout(moveToNextTimeout);CNN.VideoPlayer.hideSpinner(containerId);if (Modernizr && !Modernizr.phone && !Modernizr.mobile && !Modernizr.tablet) {if (typeof videoPinner !== ‘undefined’ && videoPinner !== null) {videoPinner.setIsPlaying(true);videoPinner.animateDown();}}},onContentReplayRequest: function (containerId, cvpId, contentId) {if (Modernizr && !Modernizr.phone && !Modernizr.mobile && !Modernizr.tablet) {if (typeof videoPinner !== ‘undefined’ && videoPinner !== null) {videoPinner.setIsPlaying(true);var $endSlate = jQuery(document.getElementById(containerId)).parent().find(‘.js-video__end-slate’).eq(0);if ($endSlate.length > 0) {$endSlate.removeClass(‘video__end-slate–active’).addClass(‘video__end-slate–inactive’);}}}},onContentBegin: function (containerId, cvpId, contentId) {if (mobilePinnedView) {mobilePinnedView.enable();}/* Dismissing the pinnedPlayer if another video players plays a video. */CNN.VideoPlayer.dismissMobilePinnedPlayer(containerId);CNN.VideoPlayer.mutePlayer(containerId);if (CNN.companion && typeof CNN.companion.updateCompanionLayout === ‘function’) {CNN.companion.updateCompanionLayout(‘removeEpicAds’);}CNN.VideoPlayer.hideSpinner(containerId);clearTimeout(moveToNextTimeout);CNN.VideoSourceUtils.clearSource(containerId);jQuery(document).triggerVideoContentStarted();},onContentComplete: function (containerId, cvpId, contentId) {if (CNN.companion && typeof CNN.companion.updateCompanionLayout === ‘function’) {CNN.companion.updateCompanionLayout(‘restoreFreewheel’);}navigateToNextVideo(contentId, containerId);},onContentEnd: function (containerId, cvpId, contentId) {if (Modernizr && !Modernizr.phone && !Modernizr.mobile && !Modernizr.tablet) {if (typeof videoPinner !== ‘undefined’ && videoPinner !== null) {videoPinner.setIsPlaying(false);}}},onCVPVisibilityChange: function (containerId, cvpId, visible) {CNN.VideoPlayer.handleAdOnCVPVisibilityChange(containerId, visible);}};if (typeof configObj.context !== ‘string’ || configObj.context.length 0) {configObj.adsection = window.ssid;}CNN.autoPlayVideoExist = (CNN.autoPlayVideoExist === true) ? true : false;CNN.VideoPlayer.getLibrary(configObj, callbackObj, isLivePlayer);});CNN.INJECTOR.scriptComplete(‘videodemanddust’);

    Source Article from https://www.cnn.com/2020/10/10/asia/north-korea-military-parade-new-missiles-intl-hnk/index.html

    Former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie left the hospital on Saturday after a week-long stay that began shortly after he tested positive for COVID-19 last week.

    “I am happy to let you know that this morning I was released from Morristown Medical Center,” Christie tweeted. “I want to thank the extraordinary doctors & nurses who cared for me for the last week. Thanks to my family & friends for their prayers. I will have more to say about all of this next week.”

    CHRIS CHRISTIE CHECKS INTO HOSPITAL AFTER POSITIVE COVID DIAGNOSIS

    Christie announced last Saturday that he had tested positive for COVID-19 , two days after President Trump tested positive for the virus. Hours later, the Trump ally checked into the center as a “precautionary measure” and citing his history of asthma as the reason why.

    “In consultation with my doctors, I checked myself into Morristown Medical Center this afternoon. While I am feeling good and only have mild symptoms, due to my history of asthma we decided this is an important precautionary measure,” he said.

    Christie was part of Trump’s debate prep team ahead of the Sept. 29 debate between Trump and Democratic nominee Joe Biden. Christie later said that when people gathered the night before in the White House’s map room to help Trump prepare for the debate, no-one was wearing a face mask.

    “We were – the group was – about five or six people in total,” Christie told ABC’s “Good Morning America.”

    CLICK HERE TO GET THE FOX NEWS APP

    Christie had also been in attendance at a Rose Garden event a few days earlier, where Trump announced  that he would nominate Amy Coney Barrett to fill the vacant Supreme Court seat.

    Along with Trump, a number of top White House officials, Trump campaign officials and Republican lawmakers later tested positive for the virus. Trump was also hospitalized but since returned to the White House.

    Fox News’ Sam Dorman contributed to this report.

    Source Article from https://www.foxnews.com/politics/chris-christie-new-jersey-hospital-covid-19-released

    The United States reported 57,420 new cases of the coronavirus on Friday, the highest daily totals since mid-August, according to data compiled by Johns Hopkins University.

    New cases are rising in 33 states across the South, East and Midwest. Cases continue to surge in the nation’s Great Plains region, with Montana, North Dakota, South Dakota and Wyoming reaching record highs for average new cases, among other states.

    Coronavirus outbreaks have been on the rise in the nation’s Great Plains after they were largely concentrated first on the East Coast and then in America’s Sun Belt states. Earlier this week, North Dakota and South Dakota reported more new Covid-19 cases per capita than any other state across the nation, while Wisconsin’s outbreak showed signs of taking a “dire” turn. On Friday, the state’s hospitalizations hit record highs, according to Hopkins data.

    Officials have grown increasingly concerned about rising coronavirus cases across the country as the nation enters its fall and winter seasons. Health experts have also warned that the coming flu season could further challenge the U.S. response to the coronavirus pandemic.

    On Thursday, White House coronavirus advisor Dr. Anthony Fauci said he’s “not comfortable” with the level of U.S. coronavirus cases, noting that it could become more difficult to deal with the virus as people increasingly move indoors during the colder months.

    More than 7.6 million people in the U.S. have contracted coronavirus during the pandemic, according to Hopkins data. The virus has now killed more than 213,000 people in the U.S.

    — CNBC’s Noah Higgins-Dunn contributed to this report.

    Source Article from https://www.cnbc.com/2020/10/10/us-sees-highest-number-of-new-coronavirus-cases-in-nearly-two-months.html

    Hurricane Delta, now a tropical storm, made landfall near Creole, Louisiana, on Friday evening, with nearly 11 million people in the storm’s path. More than 700,000 power outages were reported across Texas, Louisiana and Mississippi Saturday morning as the storm moved further inland. 

    “Delta will continue to impact portions of the Gulf Coast with storm surge, heavy rainfall, flooding, and dangerous winds as it advances northward,” the National Weather Service said Saturday. 

    The hurricane slammed the same region that was devastated by Hurricane Laura just six weeks ago. 

    Delta is now expected to move across northeastern Louisiana before heading over northern Mississippi and into the Tennessee Valley later Saturday and Sunday, according to forecasters. It is expected to weaken further, to a tropical depression, later on Saturday.

    Latest updates:

    Source Article from https://www.cbsnews.com/live-updates/hurricane-delta-tropical-storm-latest-news-updates-2020-10-10/

    President Donald Trump‘s suggestion that the families of troops who died during active duty service were responsible for his COVID-19 infection has earned substantial scorn from veterans and family members, who labeled his comments as just the latest in a pattern of actions that make them question his support for the U.S. armed forces.

    In his first interview since being diagnosed with the novel coronavirus disease, Trump recalled to Fox News on Thursday how the family members of fallen service members—called Gold Star families—wanted to hug and kiss him during a September 27 event at the White House. Some came “within an inch” of his face, and he said he felt helpless to say no because of the emotional nature of the event.

    “I’m not telling them to back up. I’m not doing it,” Trump told Fox News. “But I did say it’s obviously dangerous, it’s a dangerous thing, I guess, if you go by the COVID thing.”

    The comments were ill-received by a number of those who have survived their service to the country, who felt the president had disrespected the men and women who had not.

    “As a wounded combat veteran, it’s absolutely disgusting President Trump would blame gold star families as the reason he contracted COVID,” Alan Pitts, a U.S. Army combat veteran who served in Iraq and is a Purple Heart recipient, told Newsweek.

    Pitts, who is a member of the Common Defense political action committee, said that these grieving families had enough to deal with without being berated by the commander in chief.

    “As if Gold Star families don’t have enough tragedy and guilt in their lives, the commander-in-chief is adding to their burden,” he said. “But it’s just the latest incident of Trump abdicating his responsibilities and shifting the blame to others. It’s extremely sad and embarrassing.”

    “Trump has no shame,” the Purple Heart recipient said.

    Prior to becoming sick himself, Trump has disparaged scientifically backed practices designed to halt the spread of the disease. These include the wearing of masks, which the president declined to do while posing for pictures at the White House event.

    As the nation’s top political and military leader, veterans like Shyamali Hauth, who served with the U.S. Air Force, felt it was the president who should own up to his choice.

    “President Trump, as the commander in chief, needs to take responsibility for his own actions and inactions, and not place blame for getting COVID-19 on our gold star families,” Hauth told Newsweek.

    “These families have lost their loved ones in service to our country,” she said. “For a president who claimed bone spurs as his reason for not serving in the military, its beyond the pale that he blames Gold Star families for his political decision to not wear a mask.”

    Those with family members still serving also took exception to what they felt was the president playing politics with members of the U.S. military and their families.

    “I find it personally offensive that the president continues to pull service members of all ranks, veterans and their families into his off-the-cuff remarks in disparaging and insensitive ways,” one active duty family member involved in advocacy told Newsweek.

    Others used their own military experience to drive the point home. Jason Kander, a veteran of the U.S. war in Afghanistan and former Missouri secretary of state, recalled an incident in which a senior officer fired a round into his clearing barrel, considered a negligent discharge in military circles, but swiftly admitted to his mistake, making an example out of himself.

    “That wasn’t remarkable. Nearly any military leader would’ve responded that way,” Kander told Newsweek. “By exposing Gold Star families to COVID and then blaming them for his own mistakes, it’s like if that officer had accidentally shot one of his soldiers and then told the entire unit the soldier had attacked him.”

    Kander also shared this anecdote Friday during a press call, where other veterans such as Moe Davis, a U.S. Air Force veteran and Democratic candidate for North Carolina’s 11th congressional district, took aim at Trump’s record.

    “It’s a shame,” Davis said.

    “Our troops deserve to know that their commander in chief has their best interests at heart,” he said, “and that begins with telling the truth. And it’s clear in this case, beginning in January when he knew that COVID-19 wasn’t just like the flu, it was much worse, to continually expose Americans, with 212,000-plus deaths so far.”

    Davis listed a series of policies and remarks that have rocked the president’s military record, including attempts to privatize the Veterans Affairs Department, his mockery of the late Senator John McCain—a former prisoner of war in Vietnam—and his alleged dismissal of U.S. troops who died in World War I as “suckers” and “losers,” as first reported last month by The Atlantic and later corroborated by some other major outlets.

    The result, Davis said, has been a “steady erosion” of support for the president among even conservatives serving in the military and their family members.

    Trump’s waning support among this community was also attested to on Friday’s call by Claire Russo, a Marine Corps veteran and former congressional candidate for Virginia’s fifth district. She argued there were even more serious consequences to Trump’s remarks.

    “Donald Trump disrespecting and denigrating families who have given their fathers, their mothers, their sisters, their brothers in defense of our democracy, in defense of our United states is abhorrent,” Russo said, ” but it is also a threat to every single American and the future of our democracy.”

    Fellow Marine Corps veteran Jake Auchincloss, who is the Democratic nominee for Congress in Massachusetts’ fourth congressional district, said he felt the commander in chief would never have been able to live up to the Marines motto of honor, courage and commitment.

    “He is without honor, he lacks courage and he has no commitment,” Auchincloss said, “and this latest episode is just the last example of that in relation to the U.S. military.”

    The source of Trump’s COVID-19 has not yet been identified, and the president has not provided evidence as to his indications that his hosting of the Gold Star families at the White House led to him getting sick. And while he, First Lady Melania Trump, Coast Guard Vice Commandant Charles and a number of White House officials present at the event later tested positive for the disease, reports indicate the families themselves have not gotten sick.

    A statement sent to Newsweek by Bonnie Carroll, president of the Tragedy Assistance Program for Survivors (TAPS) involved with the September 27 event, said the five families in attendance were COVID-19-free.

    “Each family has indicated to us that they were healthy and feeling well prior to attending the event,” Carroll said, adding “that they were tested at the event and found to be negative for the coronavirus, and all have felt well in the time since the event.”

    She said that in spite of the recent negative news cycle surrounding the event, the families remained grateful for the opportunity.

    “They were honored that their loved ones were remembered in this moving tribute,”Carroll said, “and found comfort in coming together with others who understood their loss.”

    But the fact that these families have shown no signs of having been infected with COVID-19 has only further fueled his critics.

    “Donald Trump blaming Gold Star families for his positive COVID-19 diagnosis—with zero evidence—is disgusting,” Will Goodwin, a U.S. Army veteran and director of government relations for progressive political action committee VoteVets, told Newsweek.

    He, like others Newsweek spoke to, linked it to a larger trend in the president’s beliefs.

    “It’s also just the latest instance in a pattern of inexplicable hatred from the commander in chief toward those who serve, and the families who serve alongside them,” Goodwin said. “There is no amount of sacrifice from our heroes and their families that can blunt Donald Trump’s desire to discard them for his own political needs.”

    p:last-of-type::after, .node-type-slideshow .article-body > p:last-of-type::after {
    content: none
    }]]>

    Source Article from https://www.newsweek.com/trump-suggestion-gold-star-coronavirus-disgusting-1537977

    An election worker accepts a mail-in ballot from a voter at a Houston drop-off site on Wednesday. A federal judge blocked Gov. Abbott’s order limiting one drop-off site per county late Friday.

    Go Nakamura/Getty Images


    hide caption

    toggle caption

    Go Nakamura/Getty Images

    An election worker accepts a mail-in ballot from a voter at a Houston drop-off site on Wednesday. A federal judge blocked Gov. Abbott’s order limiting one drop-off site per county late Friday.

    Go Nakamura/Getty Images

    A federal judge has blocked a Texas plan to limit voters to one location per county for dropping off absentee ballots in the upcoming election. The decision says the restriction places an undue burden on older and disabled citizens.

    The limit was imposed last week as Texas experienced a surge in requests for absentee ballots, even though most Texans aren’t eligible to vote that way.

    Gov. Greg Abbott announced that he was helping to protect election security by allowing only one drop-off site per county. Democrats accused Abbott of trying to suppress the vote.

    Judge Robert Pitman’s ruling sides with The League of United Latin American Citizens which sued to get the drop-off limit reversed.

    The lawsuit said the governor was forcing absentee voters to travel farther and to more-crowded locations, increasing the risk to populations already especially vulnerable to the coronavirus. The suit also said the Postal Service has warned it might not be able to deliver ballots in time to be counted.

    The state may appeal the ruling.

    Source Article from https://www.npr.org/2020/10/10/922541198/judge-rules-against-texas-limit-of-one-drop-off-site-per-county-for-absentee-bal

    The Michigan Attorney General’s office said Paul Edward Bellar, 21, of Milford, Michigan was arrested in the state’s capital city Wednesday. The Michigan AG’s office said it’s working to extradite him back to the state for charges. 

    Source Article from https://www.wltx.com/article/news/crime/michigan-governor-kidnap-plot-suspect-south-carolina/101-736d6fd8-cdfb-483b-ac74-0473d21f1c28

    President Donald Trump‘s suggestion that the families of troops who died during active duty service were responsible for his COVID-19 infection has earned substantial scorn from veterans and family members, who labeled his comments as just the latest in a pattern of actions that make them question his support for the U.S. armed forces.

    In his first interview since being diagnosed with the novel coronavirus disease, Trump recalled to Fox News on Thursday how the family members of fallen service members—called Gold Star families—wanted to hug and kiss him during a September 27 event at the White House. Some came “within an inch” of his face, and he said he felt helpless to say no because of the emotional nature of the event.

    “I’m not telling them to back up. I’m not doing it,” Trump told Fox News. “But I did say it’s obviously dangerous, it’s a dangerous thing, I guess, if you go by the COVID thing.”

    The comments were ill-received by a number of those who have survived their service to the country, who felt the president had disrespected the men and women who had not.

    “As a wounded combat veteran, it’s absolutely disgusting President Trump would blame gold star families as the reason he contracted COVID,” Alan Pitts, a U.S. Army combat veteran who served in Iraq and is a Purple Heart recipient, told Newsweek.

    Pitts, who is a member of the Common Defense political action committee, said that these grieving families had enough to deal with without being berated by the commander in chief.

    “As if Gold Star families don’t have enough tragedy and guilt in their lives, the commander-in-chief is adding to their burden,” he said. “But it’s just the latest incident of Trump abdicating his responsibilities and shifting the blame to others. It’s extremely sad and embarrassing.”

    “Trump has no shame,” the Purple Heart recipient said.

    Prior to becoming sick himself, Trump has disparaged scientifically backed practices designed to halt the spread of the disease. These include the wearing of masks, which the president declined to do while posing for pictures at the White House event.

    As the nation’s top political and military leader, veterans like Shyamali Hauth, who served with the U.S. Air Force, felt it was the president who should own up to his choice.

    “President Trump, as the commander in chief, needs to take responsibility for his own actions and inactions, and not place blame for getting COVID-19 on our gold star families,” Hauth told Newsweek.

    “These families have lost their loved ones in service to our country,” she said. “For a president who claimed bone spurs as his reason for not serving in the military, its beyond the pale that he blames Gold Star families for his political decision to not wear a mask.”

    Those with family members still serving also took exception to what they felt was the president playing politics with members of the U.S. military and their families.

    “I find it personally offensive that the president continues to pull service members of all ranks, veterans and their families into his off-the-cuff remarks in disparaging and insensitive ways,” one active duty family member involved in advocacy told Newsweek.

    Others used their own military experience to drive the point home. Jason Kander, a veteran of the U.S. war in Afghanistan and former Missouri secretary of state, recalled an incident in which a senior officer fired a round into his clearing barrel, considered a negligent discharge in military circles, but swiftly admitted to his mistake, making an example out of himself.

    “That wasn’t remarkable. Nearly any military leader would’ve responded that way,” Kander told Newsweek. “By exposing Gold Star families to COVID and then blaming them for his own mistakes, it’s like if that officer had accidentally shot one of his soldiers and then told the entire unit the soldier had attacked him.”

    Kander also shared this anecdote Friday during a press call, where other veterans such as Moe Davis, a U.S. Air Force veteran and Democratic candidate for North Carolina’s 11th congressional district, took aim at Trump’s record.

    “It’s a shame,” Davis said.

    “Our troops deserve to know that their commander in chief has their best interests at heart,” he said, “and that begins with telling the truth. And it’s clear in this case, beginning in January when he knew that COVID-19 wasn’t just like the flu, it was much worse, to continually expose Americans, with 212,000-plus deaths so far.”

    Davis listed a series of policies and remarks that have rocked the president’s military record, including attempts to privatize the Veterans Affairs Department, his mockery of the late Senator John McCain—a former prisoner of war in Vietnam—and his alleged dismissal of U.S. troops who died in World War I as “suckers” and “losers,” as first reported last month by The Atlantic and later corroborated by some other major outlets.

    The result, Davis said, has been a “steady erosion” of support for the president among even conservatives serving in the military and their family members.

    Trump’s waning support among this community was also attested to on Friday’s call by Claire Russo, a Marine Corps veteran and former congressional candidate for Virginia’s fifth district. She argued there were even more serious consequences to Trump’s remarks.

    “Donald Trump disrespecting and denigrating families who have given their fathers, their mothers, their sisters, their brothers in defense of our democracy, in defense of our United states is abhorrent,” Russo said, ” but it is also a threat to every single American and the future of our democracy.”

    Fellow Marine Corps veteran Jake Auchincloss, who is the Democratic nominee for Congress in Massachusetts’ fourth congressional district, said he felt the commander in chief would never have been able to live up to the Marines motto of honor, courage and commitment.

    “He is without honor, he lacks courage and he has no commitment,” Auchincloss said, “and this latest episode is just the last example of that in relation to the U.S. military.”

    The source of Trump’s COVID-19 has not yet been identified, and the president has not provided evidence as to his indications that his hosting of the Gold Star families at the White House led to him getting sick. And while he, First Lady Melania Trump, Coast Guard Vice Commandant Charles and a number of White House officials present at the event later tested positive for the disease, reports indicate the families themselves have not gotten sick.

    A statement sent to Newsweek by Bonnie Carroll, president of the Tragedy Assistance Program for Survivors (TAPS) involved with the September 27 event, said the five families in attendance were COVID-19-free.

    “Each family has indicated to us that they were healthy and feeling well prior to attending the event,” Carroll said, adding “that they were tested at the event and found to be negative for the coronavirus, and all have felt well in the time since the event.”

    She said that in spite of the recent negative news cycle surrounding the event, the families remained grateful for the opportunity.

    “They were honored that their loved ones were remembered in this moving tribute,”Carroll said, “and found comfort in coming together with others who understood their loss.”

    But the fact that these families have shown no signs of having been infected with COVID-19 has only further fueled his critics.

    “Donald Trump blaming Gold Star families for his positive COVID-19 diagnosis—with zero evidence—is disgusting,” Will Goodwin, a U.S. Army veteran and director of government relations for progressive political action committee VoteVets, told Newsweek.

    He, like others Newsweek spoke to, linked it to a larger trend in the president’s beliefs.

    “It’s also just the latest instance in a pattern of inexplicable hatred from the commander in chief toward those who serve, and the families who serve alongside them,” Goodwin said. “There is no amount of sacrifice from our heroes and their families that can blunt Donald Trump’s desire to discard them for his own political needs.”

    p:last-of-type::after, .node-type-slideshow .article-body > p:last-of-type::after {
    content: none
    }]]>

    Source Article from https://www.newsweek.com/trump-suggestion-gold-star-coronavirus-disgusting-1537977

    Show More

    Source Article from https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/trump-barr-durham-russia/2020/10/09/05ed9842-0a40-11eb-a166-dc429b380d10_story.html


    President Donald Trump participates in the first presidential debate. | Scott Olson/Getty Images

    WASHINGTON — The Commission on Presidential Debates on Friday canceled the second pre-election showdown between President Donald Trump and Democratic challenger Joe Biden, according to a person familiar with the situation.

    The debate, initially scheduled for Oct. 15 in Miami, was changed to a virtual format following the president’s coronavirus diagnosis last week. Trump and his campaign protested against a virtual debate, calling the change a ploy to help Biden. Biden’s campaign said it would not partake in the town hall-style debate if Trump did not show. The commission said the format change was to ensure the health and safety of everyone involved.

    Advertisement

    In a statement Friday evening, the commission acquiesced to the campaign’s protests, writing: “It is now apparent there will be no debate on October 15, and the CPD will turn its attention to preparations for the final presidential debate scheduled for October 22.”

    The co-chair of the Commission on Presidential Debates had rejected earlier Friday efforts by Trump’s campaign to clear him for in-person participation in the town hall-style forum — noting that the White House still has not provided basic information about the president’s recent coronavirus tests.

    The remarks from Frank Fahrenkopf, the co-founder of the nonpartisan debate commission and its Republican co-chair, came amid confusion over the timeline for the two remaining presidential debates — prompted by the commission’s announcement Thursday that the town hall on Oct. 15 would be conducted virtually.

    Trump has insisted that he does not think he is “contagious at all”. Sean Conley, the president’s physician, reported Thursday that Trump had completed his coronavirus therapy and that he expected Trump would be able to resume public engagements on Saturday — 10 days since Trump announced his Covid-19 diagnosis.

    Shortly after Conley’s assessment, Trump campaign manager Bill Stepien — who also has tested positive for Covid-19 — released a statement arguing there was “no medical reason why the Commission on Presidential Debates should shift the debate to a virtual setting, postpone it, or otherwise alter it in any way.”

    But Fahrenkopf was adamant Friday that the Oct. 15 debate, if it took place at all, would feature Trump and Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden participating from separate, remote locations.

    “We’re talking about something that will happen in less than a week, if it had originally gone forward. Less than a week,” Fahrenkopf told Fox News host Brian Kilmeade on his radio show. “And right now, as I understand it … at this point in time, there is no evidence whatsoever whether or not when the president tested negative.”

    The White House has not made public the details regarding the president’s coronavirus tests in the days leading to his diagnosis. It is not known when Trump last tested negative before becoming infected, and officials have not definitely said when Trump first tested positive. Conley’s memo Thursday also did not say whether Trump had tested positive after finishing therapy.

    Kilmeade said Friday that he had communicated with White House chief of staff Mark Meadows prior to his interview with Fahrenkopf, and that Meadows told Kilmeade to say that Trump will have twice tested negative before the Oct. 15 debate.

    Fahrenkopf was skeptical about Meadows’ prediction, saying: “Suppose [Trump] passes one, and then the day before, he doesn’t pass the other? Then the whole debate’s gone.”

    Even White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany appeared doubtful Friday that the president would return to the campaign trail by Saturday, telling “Fox & Friends” in an interview that “logistically … it would be tough.”

    McEnany also did not reveal whether the president had yet tested positive, instead saying that Conley told her “there are medical tests underway” to determine Trump’s contagiousness. “Rest assured, that test will show that it’s not transmissible. He won’t be out there if he can transmit the virus,” she said.

    The commission’s announcement Thursday set off an hourslong round of public negotiations between the Trump and Biden campaigns, with both teams issuing dueling demands for the dates and formats of the remaining forums.

    Trump’s campaign had proposed postponing the Oct. 15 town hall until Oct. 22 — the original date of the third and final debate — while also shifting the third debate back by one week to Oct. 29, just five days before Election Day.

    Biden’s campaign, however, has advocated against adding any previously unscheduled debates to the calendar, saying that it is Trump’s decision not to participate virtually in the Oct. 15 forum. Instead, the campaign has recommended that the third debate on Oct. 22 — which was organized as a one-on-one debate between the candidates — should now be replaced by the town hall.

    In lieu of the Oct. 15 debate, Trump has said he is interested in holding a rally, while Biden has already announced plans to participate in his own town hall hosted by ABC News.

    Alex Isenstadt and Matthew Choi contributed to this report.

    Source Article from https://www.politico.com/states/florida/story/2020/10/09/debate-commission-cancels-oct-15-biden-trump-showdown-1323100

    The disclosure has raised anew questions about the ethical use of fetal tissue and stem cells in groundbreaking research, ahead of a presidential election in which Trump has cast himself as a fierce anti-abortion candidate.

    “President Trump has been an outspoken opponent of fetal tissue research — and he used it. I just think it’s incredibly hypocritical across the board,” said Lawrence Goldstein, member of the National Institutes of Health’s Human Fetal Tissue Research Ethics Advisory Board and senior faculty member at the University of California at San Diego.

    The Regeneron cocktail was developed using mouse and hamster cells. But the effectiveness of the antibody’s ability to neutralize the virus was tested using a cell line derived from an aborted fetus in the 1970s.

    Regeneron said it does not consider the treatment to have relied on fetal tissue, since the cells were acquired so long ago. The 293T line used continued to divide and grow within a culture for decades, and for use in scientific discovery, even though they originated from fetal tissue, according to experts.

    They “are considered ‘immortalized’ cells (not stem cells) and are a common and widespread tool in research labs,” a Regeneron spokesperson told ABC in a statement. The cell line “wasn’t used in any other way, and fetal tissue was not used in this research.”

    Other companies racing to find effective treatments, and at last, a vaccine against the novel coronavirus, have also made use of these cell lines, which are commonly used in medical research.

    A spokesperson from AstraZeneca, one of the companies currently developing a vaccine, confirmed to ABC News their use of the 293T cell line in their vaccine development, further emphasizing, it is “derived from one of the most common cell lines used in biological research.”

    The New York Times reported that Moderna is also relying on the same cell line. When reached for comment, a Moderna spokeswoman told ABC News that it has “used this in the past for laboratory research for the vaccine, but we do not use this for making the vaccine.”

    In 2019, the administration suspended federal funding for scientific research reliant on fetal tissue cells derived from an elective abortion. Fetal tissue from miscarriages are permitted under this statute, although many scientists say it’s difficult to use because there are often abnormalities and other issues.

    But the policy allowed older existing cell lines derived from aborted fetal tissue — such as the one used by Regeneron — to be used.

    “Promoting the dignity of human life from conception to natural death is one of the very top priorities of President Trump’s administration,” the Department of Health and Human Services said in a statement at the time. “Intramural research that requires new acquisition of fetal tissue from elective abortions will not be conducted.”

    When asked to comment, the White House and a senior Health and Human Services official would only note that Regeneron’s research complied with its 2019 policy, which allowed previously established cell lines.

    “The Administration’s policy on the use of human fetal tissue from elective abortions in research specifically excluded “already-established (as of June 5, 2019) human fetal cell lines,” the HHS official said in a statement. “Thus, a product made using extant cell lines that existed before June 5, 2019 would not implicate the Administration’s policy on the use of human fetal tissue from elective abortions.”

    The Charlotte Lozier Institute, which opposes abortion rights and fetal tissue research, called the debate on Trump’s treatment “uninformed” and expressed support for the development of the antibody cocktail.

    “The cells were not used to create the antibiotic cocktail itself,” David Prentice, vice president and research director, said on a Friday press call. Prentice also sits on the NIH fetal tissue ethics advisory board, and told reporters those studies were “separate from production” of the cocktail treating the president.

    “Yes, the drug is still tainted by the stem cell or aborted fetal tissue line, cell line,” he said. “But it’s just not tainted in any of the ways that people claim that it is, and certainly not in a way that makes Republicans inconsistent.”

    As of yet, there is no known “cure” for the novel coronavirus. Some treatments have been given emergency authorization. The antibody cocktail given to the president — made by biotech company Regeneron — is thought to be promising, though still in its experimental phase.

    “To me it wasn’t therapeutic, it just made me better,” Trump said from in front of the Oval Office Wednesday. “I call that a cure.”

    Scientists say countless important medical discoveries have relied on similar lab-grown cells that were originally derived from stem cells, special “blank-slate” cells usually taken from human embryos or fetal tissue.

    “Research using human fetal tissue has been essential for scientific and medical advances that have saved millions of lives, and it remains a crucial resource for biomedical research,” the International Society for Stem Cell Research wrote in a July letter to the new fetal tissue ethics board established by the Trump administration.

    “Fetal tissue has unique and valuable properties that often cannot be replaced by other cell types,” the group wrote.

    In August, the HHS ethics board advised rejecting funding for nearly every proposal involving fetal tissue: 13 out of 14. The one approved proposal relied on tissue already acquired, “with no need to acquire additional tissue,” according to the board’s report; it is also noted that “tissue from miscarriage was a viable alternative to HFT.”

    Deepak Srivastava, president of the Gladstone Institute and immediate past president of the International Society for Stem Cell Research, said it’s important to note that if the Trump administration’s ban was in place when the cell line Regeneron uses was made — the innovations that have come from it would not have been possible — including testing the treatment Trump received.

    “That would not be available to make the drugs that we’ve had — and Trump would not have received those antibodies,” Srivastava said. “And I am worried about any moves that would slow further discovery — because we’re still in the middle of this pandemic.”

    ABC News’ Eric Strauss and Sony Salzman contributed to this report.

    Source Article from https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/trumps-covid-19-treatment-developed-cells-originally-drawn/story?id=73508455

    Show More

    Source Article from https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/trump-pelosi-presidency-25th-amendment/2020/10/09/88c4c0ce-0a45-11eb-991c-be6ead8c4018_story.html

    NEW ORLEANS (AP) — Hurricane Delta rashed onshore Friday in southwestern Louisiana as a Category 2 storm, compounding misery along a path of destruction left by Hurricane Laura only six weeks earlier.

    The center of the hurricane made landfall about 6 p.m. near the town of Creole with top winds of 100 mph (155 kph), pushing a storm surge that could reach up to 11 feet (3.4 meters), the National Hurricane Center said.

    As the 10th named storm to strike the continental U.S. this year, Delta’s arrival snapped a century-old record.

    People in south Louisiana steeled themselves as Delta delivered driving rain, powerful winds and rising water to a part of the state still recovering from a deadly catastrophic hurricane six weeks ago. Power outages in Louisiana and neighboring Texas soared past 203,000 homes and businesses Friday shortly after the storm came ashore, according to the tracking website PowerOutage.us.

    The Hurricane Center said wind gusts in Lake Arthur, Louisiana, reached 96 mph (154 kph) as Delta made landfall. Storm surge reached 8 feet (2.4 meters) east of Cameron, a sparely populated coastal community devastated by 2005′s Hurricane Rita and Hurricane Ike in 2008.

    In the city of Lake Charles, about 30 miles (50 kilometers) inland from where Delta made landfall, rain pelted the tarp-covered roofs of buildings that Hurricane Laura battered when it barreled through in late August and killed at least 27 people in the state.

    “It’s devastating and it’s emotional for the citizenry,” Mayor Nic Hunter said as he prepared to ride out the storm in downtown Lake Charles.

    Winds picked up Friday evening in inland areas such as Lafayette, where occasionally strong gusts buffeted trees and sheets of rain were falling. Many parishes and towns implemented curfews Friday until Saturday morning to encourage people to stay off the roads during the worst of the storm.

    Dawn Trosclair checked into a hotel Friday, worried about trees falling on her home in Lafayette.

    “No other storm really threatened us,” Trosclair said as she watched the gusting winds. “Laura was far enough away and the winds were going to be mild enough here where we didn’t leave.”

    Laura damaged about 95% of the homes and buildings in Lake Charles, while up to 8,000 residents — 10% of the population — remain displaced, the mayor said. Piles of moldy mattresses, sawed-up trees and other leftover debris lined the city’s largely vacant streets Friday, arousing concern they could cause more damage and deaths when the new storm strikes.

    “We just got lights back on like two weeks ago and then evacuating again? It’s extremely hard,” said Roslyn Kennedy. She was among a handful of evacuees at the Burton Coliseum in Lake Charles, waiting to be transported, again, to safer destinations.

    Delta was the 25th named storm of an unprecedented Atlantic hurricane season and became the first Greek-alphabet-named hurricane to hit the continental U.S. As the 10th named storm to hit the continental U.S. this year, it surpassed a record set in 1916, according to Colorado State University researcher Phil Klotzbach.

    As the fourth hurricane or tropical storm to hit Louisiana in a year, Delta also tied a 2002 record, Klotzbach said.

    The storm triggered hurricane warnings stretching from High Island, Texas, to Morgan City, Louisiana.

    Earlier Friday, it had sustained winds of 115 mph (185 kph), putting it at Category 3 strength. Though the storm weakened as it approached land, officials cautioned that it remained dangerous.

    “The fact that it’s weakening should not cause anyone to lose focus or lose vigilance, because this is still a very strong storm,” Gov. John Bel Edwards said during a news conference.

    Some residents were staying put, despite the danger. Ernest Jack remained in his Lake Charles house, one of those with a blue-tarped roof. He had gathered food, plenty of water and had covered his windows to protect against flying debris during Delta.

    “I just didn’t want to leave. I stayed during Hurricane Laura, too. I just put it in the Lord’s hands,” Jack said, pointing skyward.

    Delta, the latest in a recent flurry of rapidly intensifying Atlantic hurricanes that scientists largely blame on global warming, appeared destined to set records at landfall.

    Concern wasn’t limited to the Lake Charles and Cameron Parish areas, where Laura came ashore in late August. Further east, in Acadiana region towns like New Iberia and Abbeville, people took the storm seriously.

    “You can always get another house, another car, but not another life,” said Hilton Stroder as he and his wife, Terry, boarded up their Abbeville home Thursday night with plans to head to their son’s house further east.

    This week marked the sixth time of the current season that Louisiana has been threatened by tropical storms or hurricanes. One, Tropical Storm Marco, fizzled as it hit the southeast Louisiana tip, and others veered elsewhere, but Tropical Storm Cristobal caused damage in southeast Louisiana in June.

    New Orleans, to the east, was expected to escape Delta’s worst. But tropical storm-force winds were still likely in the city Friday, and local officials said they were preparing for the possibility of tornadoes.

    In Mississippi, Gov. Tate Reeves declared a state of emergency, as did his counterpart Edwards in Louisiana. Forecasters said southern Mississippi could see heavy rain and flash flooding.

    The hurricane was expected to weaken rapidly over land. Forecasters predicted Delta would be downgraded to a tropical storm late Friday. The storm’s projected path showed it moving into northern Mississippi on Saturday and then into the Tennessee Valley as a tropical depression.

    GET THE LATEST HEADLINES FROM FOX8.COM:

    Source Article from https://fox8.com/weather/hurricane-delta-makes-landfall-in-louisiana/

    President Donald Trump plans to hold an in-person event at the White House on Saturday, less than a week after he was in the hospital with the coronavirus, a White House official told CNBC on Friday.

    Later Friday, the Trump campaign announced that the president would travel to Sanford, Florida, on Monday to deliver a speech at a Make America Great Again event.

    The White House gathering marks Trump’s first public event since he revealed last week that he and first lady Melania Trump had tested positive for Covid-19. Since that announcement, numerous other people who work at and are connected to the White House have also tested positive. 

    The event is set to feature “remarks to peaceful protesters for law and order,” according to an invitation obtained by ABC News, which first reported the gathering. The White House official confirmed ABC’s reporting to CNBC.

    A crowd is expected to gather on the White House South Lawn beginning at 11:30 a.m., according to the invitation posted by ABC.

    Trump will address the attendees from the balcony of the White House at 2 p.m., multiple outlets reported.

    The in-person event comes as Trump faces criticism for downplaying the threat of the pandemic, and for participating in meetings that disregard social distancing recommendations from health experts in his own administration.

    The president contracted the virus less than a week after a large, in-person gathering at the White House celebrating the nomination of Judge Amy Coney Barrett to the Supreme Court. More than a dozen officials who attended that event, including multiple Republican lawmakers, have since tested positive, according to NBC News.

    The White House appears to be taking additional precautions for the upcoming event Saturday. All attendees are required to bring masks with them, and they will be instructed to wear them while on the White House grounds, a source with knowledge of the plans told CNBC. The participants must also submit to a coronavirus “screening,” the source said, which will include a temperature check and a brief questionnaire.

    “The health and safety of all attendees is our priority and following CDC guidelines is strongly encouraged,” the source said.

    The event was revealed just 25 days away from the presidential election between Trump and former Vice President Joe Biden. Trump, who is down in the polls, has been off the campaign trail since announcing his diagnosis. 

    But Trump has insisted throughout the week that he no longer feels any Covid-19 symptoms, and White House physician Dr. Sean Conley said in a memo Thursday evening that he anticipates the president can make a “safe return to public engagements” by the weekend.

    Trump was flown to Walter Reed National Military Medical Center last Friday evening, the same day he announced his diagnosis in a tweet. He was discharged on Monday evening and has continued to be treated at the White House by doctors.

    Despite a slew of Covid-19 cases being reported in and around the White House and the Trump administration — NBC counted 27 as of Friday morning — the president has not stayed isolated in the White House residence. On Wednesday, Trump returned to the Oval Office, where he was reportedly briefed on coronavirus stimulus talks and the progress of Hurricane Delta.

    The list of positive cases includes White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany, immigration policy advisor Stephen Miller and multiple members of the White House press corps. 

    Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, told CBS News on Friday: “I think the data speaks for themselves. We had a super spreader event in the White House.”

    More than 7.6 million coronavirus cases have been reported in the U.S., and at least 212,789 have died, data from Johns Hopkins University shows.

    Source Article from https://www.cnbc.com/2020/10/09/trump-to-appear-in-person-saturday-at-white-house-event-despite-coronavirus-outbreak.html

    We’ve detected unusual activity from your computer network

    To continue, please click the box below to let us know you’re not a robot.

    Source Article from https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-10-09/fauci-calls-white-house-ceremony-a-super-spreader-event

    During the Sept. 29 presidential debate with Democratic nominee Joe Biden in Cleveland, President Trump declined to denounce white supremacists. Days later he told Fox News that he condemned right-wing hate groups such as the Ku Klux Klan and the Proud Boys.

    Win McNamee/Getty Images


    hide caption

    toggle caption

    Win McNamee/Getty Images

    During the Sept. 29 presidential debate with Democratic nominee Joe Biden in Cleveland, President Trump declined to denounce white supremacists. Days later he told Fox News that he condemned right-wing hate groups such as the Ku Klux Klan and the Proud Boys.

    Win McNamee/Getty Images

    Soon after being discharged from the hospital for treatment for COVID-19, President Trump tweeted the slur “Chinese virus” to refer to the coronavirus, something he’s often repeated during the pandemic.

    It’s the latest example of Trump’s alarming language that critics charge is xenophobic, discriminatory and even white supremacist. While Trump denies those labels, he has increasingly returned to the issue of race in the runup to the November election.

    Last month he barred racial sensitivity training for federal workers and then expanded it to contractors in an executive order. At the first debate last month, to an international audience, he called the trainings — aimed at creating an inclusive work environment — “racist.”

    He’s also attacked The New York Times’ 1619 Project — which some schools are adopting into their curriculum to center the consequences of slavery in U.S. history — as anti-American propaganda. Then he formed the “1776 Commission” for what he called a “patriotic” education.

    And Trump paints the largely peaceful protests for racial justice across the country as violent riots and tries to portray himself as the “law and order” candidate.

    Courtney Parella, a spokeswoman for the campaign, said in a statement that labeling the president racist is a “pathetic attempt to negate his incredible accomplishments for Black America.”

    “Democrats, with the help of the mainstream media, try to label this President as something he’s not,” she said.

    She points to Trump’s record on criminal justice reform, support for funding of HBCUs and unemployment numbers and accused Joe Biden of failing “minority communities.” Trump has attacked Biden for his role in the 1994 crime bill and accused him of hurting the economy for Black Americans with his trade policies.

    The White House has repeatedly pointed to the record low Black unemployment rate before the coronavirus pandemic. But it shot up during the pandemic to 13 percent, above the national unemployment rate of about 8 percent.

    And the president’s language and policy changes over the last month are less blips and more features of his reelection campaign, said Ange-Marie Hancock Alfaro, a professor of political science and gender studies at the University of Southern California.

    “Part of the strategy is to create enough chaos and confusion and to create enough anger, frankly, in his base that they will make sure that they continue to kind of agitate during the electoral process,” Alfaro said.

    “Based on what happened in 2016, he and his campaign see this as a successful strategy. I think what’s different in 2020, though, is that you can’t just do the same thing that you did four years ago. You actually have to amp it up.”

    Alfaro said Trump is stoking racial tensions and playing on fears among some white voters to portray himself as the one who can save them from chaos.

    She pointed to a rally last month in Bemidji, Minn., where Trump falsely said former Vice President Joe Biden would flood the majority-white state with refugees from “Somalia and all over the planet.”

    Then to the almost exclusively white crowd, he invoked the “racehorse theory.”

    “You have good genes, you know that right? You have good genes. A lot of it’s about the genes, isn’t it? Don’t you believe?” he told the crowd. “The racehorse theory you think was so different? You have good genes, Minnesota.”

    Trump tells an almost exclusively white crowd in Minnesota they have “good genes.”


    Bahram Ansari
    YouTube

    That theory is a discredited, discriminatory belief from the eugenics movement that some genes are superior to others. These are the theories that shaped Nazi Germany’s policies. Eugenics was also behind the forced sterilization of women in the 1950s in North Carolina through the early 1970s in Puerto Rico. The pseudo-science led to the coerced sterilizations of Native American, Latina, African American and poor women.

    “Then now, most recently, we started to hear reports of women in detention, in [Immigration and Customs Enforcement] detention, who were being sterilized without informed consent and certainly against their will,” she said.

    Even if Trump loses to Biden in November, Alfaro said, his actions have normalized racist fringe ideologies and encouraged extremists.

    “There’s been this emboldening of violence, this emboldening of a certain kind of rhetoric that I think really could become a problem,” she said. “So even if there is a peaceful transfer of power in January, we do have to be very concerned about the legacy of what we’ve seen over the past four years.”

    There already appears to be a chilling effect as a result of Trump’s executive order to “combat offensive and anti-American race and sex stereotyping and scapegoating.”

    This week actor William Jackson Harper tweeted about his experience with a nonprofit he works with, Arts in the Armed Forces. He said the organization asked him to choose a film for cadets of all academies to screen virtually and discuss. They settled on the movie Malcolm X, but the executive order led some cadets to back out of the screening.

    In addition to barring racial sensitivity training, the order instructed federal and military institutions not to use material that promotes a “pernicious and false belief that America is an irredeemably racist and sexist country; that some people, simply on account of their race or sex, are oppressors.”

    “This executive order denies the very real experiences of so many minorities in this country. This executive order is rooted in the fictitious idea that the scourges of racism and sexism are essentially over, and that the poisonous fallout from centuries [of] discrimination isn’t real,” Harper wrote on Twitter. “But all of these things are real, and they remain to this day some of the most salient malignancies in our society.”

    Harper called it “selective censorship.”

    “It’s no accident that all of these kinds of flagrant comments, which feel really spontaneous, they all cohere around a narrative of elevating white Americans as the real Americans and around excluding those who don’t fit into that as unworthy or unequal,” said Natalia Mehlman Petrzela, a New York-based historian of contemporary politics and culture.

    She points to what she calls the whitewashing of America’s history through attacking efforts to teach about systemic racism.

    “It’s about dismissing the idea that racism is real,” Petrzela said, calling it a strategic attack “on the idea that we must take seriously the experiences of people of color and the exclusion and racism that they have faced as a defining aspect of American society.”

    Trump’s not the first president to be accused of using dog whistles and race in his campaign. One example is Jimmy Carter, a Democrat. During his campaign in 1976, he warned about low-income housing in the suburbs and used terms such as “ethnic purity,” and “Black intrusion,” when discussing all-white neighborhoods.

    M.E. Hart is an attorney who’s conducted hundreds of racial-sensitivity trainings for the federal government and American businesses. He said maligning efforts to create inclusive environments feels dangerous.

    “The trainings are designed to help people understand and work better across cultures, to help people to create a culture of psychological safety and belonging so people can bring their best to work,” he said. “They’re not anti-American; they’re pro-American, pro-business.”

    Hart was diplomatic before the presidential debate last week. But after watching Trump choose not to condemn white supremacy and then again attack mail-in voting as fraudulent with zero evidence, he no longer uses that diplomatic tone.

    “The president laid down the gauntlet, and I’m concerned for the safety of American citizens, regardless of race, of gender, ethnicity,” Hart said. “Every American should be concerned when our president is using race to divide us.”

    Days after the debate, Trump said on Fox News that he did, in fact, condemn white supremacy. “Let me be clear again: I condemn the KKK. I condemn all white supremacists,” he said.

    Source Article from https://www.npr.org/2020/10/09/921284261/critics-accuse-trump-of-using-race-to-divide-americans

    Source Article from https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2020/10/09/donald-trump-frustrated-william-barr-over-inquiry-into-russia-probe/5939328002/