“You would think if you’re in the FBI or Department of Justice, this is the biggest thing you could be looking at,” Trump said. “Where are they? I’ve not seen anything.”
Most recently, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court dismissed a case Saturday night brought by Rep. Mike Kelly, R-Pa., and a handful of other Republican voters who sought to overturn last year’s law creating no-excuse mail-in voting as well as halt further action in certifying Pennsylvania’s votes.
Judge Ken Starr said the president’s path to victory is fading despite “numerous” examples of anecdotal evidence.
Democratic President-elect Joe Biden and Vice President-elect Kamala Harris on Sunday announced the first-ever all-female White House senior communications team.
“I am proud to announce today the first senior White House communications team comprised entirely of women. These qualified, experienced communicators bring diverse perspectives to their work and a shared commitment to building this country back better,” Biden said in a statement.
“Communicating directly and truthfully to the American people is one of the most important duties of a President, and this team will be entrusted with the tremendous responsibility of connecting the American people to the White House,” he added.
Most members of the new team have previously worked for Biden and other Democrats. Jen Psaki, who was named as the White House press secretary, had served under the Obama administration as a White House communications director, deputy White House communications director, and deputy White House press secretary.
President-elect Joe Biden and Vice President-elect Kamala Harris hold a news conference at the Queen Theater on November 19, 2020 in Wilmington, Delaware. Joe Raedle/Getty
“Honored to work again for @JoeBiden, a man I worked on behalf of during the Obama-Biden Admin as he helped lead economic recovery, rebuilt our relationships with partners (turns out good practice) and injected empathy and humanity into nearly every meeting I sat in,” Psaki wrote in a tweet after the announcement.
Symone Sanders was named as senior adviser and chief spokeswoman for the vice president. She previously worked as a senior adviser on Biden’s 2020 campaign after serving as Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders‘ 2020 campaign press secretary.
“Also AN ALL LADY SQUAD?! I am excited to serve alongside @AshleyEtienne09, my battle buddy @KBeds, @jrpsaki, @pilitobar87 and @EAlexander332. We each take our service seriously and are elated to get to work for the people and build back better! Lets go ladies!” Symone Sanders tweeted.
Kate Bedingfield is slated to become Biden’s White House communications director. Prior to the announcement, Bedingfield was the Biden campaign’s communications director and deputy campaign manager. She also worked for the former vice president under the Obama administration.
“I’m unspeakably proud to have the opportunity to serve as White House Communications Director for @joebiden,” Bedingfield tweeted. “Working for him as VP and on this campaign gave me insight into what kind of capable, compassionate, clear-eyed president he will be and it will be a profound honor to be a small part of his work.”
The Biden administration’s principal deputy press secretary will be Karine Jean-Pierre, who worked as an adviser for Biden’s 2020 campaign. Jean-Pierre was previously an MSNBC and NBC analyst.
Pili Tober, a former deputy director at America’s Voice, a nonprofit focused on immigration reform, was named the deputy White House communications director.
Vice President-elect Harris’ communications director will be Ashley Etienne, who also worked on Biden’s campaign as an adviser. Etienne had served as House Speaker Nancy Pelosi‘s communications director and senior adviser.
“On behalf of our House Democratic Majority, I congratulate Ashley and thank her for her important and impactful service in my office and in the House,” Pelosi said in a statement. “Her experience working on both sides of Pennsylvania Avenue and the immense respect she commands among both Members and staff will make her a powerful force in the Biden-Harris Administration.”
Former Biden campaign senior adviser Elizabeth Alexander was named as first lady Jill Biden‘s communications director.
“Honored & humbled to join @DrBiden and her growing team as she charts her own historic path forward as the next FLOTUS. And so proud [to] be part of this group of hard-working pros and strategic communicators,” Alexander wrote on Twitter.
Newsweek reached out to the president-elect’s transition team for additional information.
In a tweet Sunday evening, Trump accused producers of the program of not contacting the White House for comment about remarks made by Christopher Krebs, formerly head of the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, regarding the integrity of the 2020 election.
Trump fired Krebs earlier this month after Krebs said the election was “the most secure in American history.”
“.@60Minutes never asked us for a comment about their ridiculous, one sided story on election security, which is an international joke. Our 2020 Election, from poorly rated Dominion to a Country FLOODED with unaccounted for Mail-In ballots, was probably our least secure EVER!” the president claimed Sunday evening.
.@60Minutes never asked us for a comment about their ridiculous, one sided story on election security, which is an international joke. Our 2020 Election, from poorly rated Dominion to a Country FLOODED with unaccounted for Mail-In ballots, was probably our least secure EVER!
Producers for “60 Minutes” did not immediately return a request for comment from The Hill.
The president has launched a number of legal challenges in battleground states such as Pennsylvania and Michigan in recent weeks, seeking to overturn the results of the 2020 election. The lawsuits have so far failed to gain any traction in courts across the country.
Krebs told CBS News in an interview which aired Sunday that he stands by his comments defending the integrity of the 2020 election, which the president pointed to when firing him as director of the cybersecurity agency earlier in November.
“We did a good job. We did it right. I’d do it a thousand times over,” he said in the interview.
Avid snowboarder Jenny Leveilledoesn’t plan to rely on ski resorts’ indoor facilities this season. This decision, she believes, will giveher a possible advantage when it comes to coronavirus and swirling concerns over indoor exposure.
Leveille, who’ll be heading to the mountains out West after Thanksgiving in Michigan, plans to return to her van — which includes a bathroom — when she needs a break for fuel or relief.
Ski season is underway, and changes are afoot. In Europe, Germany, hard hit by Covid-19, is aiming for a coordinated European Union approach to keeping ski resorts shut in Alpine countries for the holiday season in order to limit the spread of coronavirus. However, reaching an agreement with neighboring Austria is proving challenging, German Chancellor Angela Merkel indicated last Thursday.
Meanwhile, some slopes have opened in Switzerland, which is not an EU member. The “future for the upcoming winter season looks bright,” Mayor of Zermatt Romy Biner-Hauser told CNN on Thursday.
With its wide-open spaces, stashes of powder and even covering up to brave the elements, skiing might seem like the perfect pandemic sport — if the proper precautions are taken.
A face mask, a standard part of the skier’s uniform, is a requirement this year. Resorts are implementing mask mandates except while guests areactively eating and drinking. Ski destinations are also limiting indoor capacity, adding outdoor capacity, adding hand-sanitizing stations on chair lift lines and reconfiguring how chair lifts are filled.
The picture showed an Australian soldier smiling and sitting on an Australian flag that was eclipsed with Afghanistan’s flag.
Morrison described the tweet as a “repugnant post” and said it was “deeply offensive” to every Australian, including past and present members of the Australian Defence Force.
“It is utterly outrageous and it cannot be justified on any basis whatsoever. The Chinese government should be totally ashamed of this post. It diminishes them in the world’s eyes,” Morrison said.
Twitter has yet to take down the tweet. The social media platform did not immediately respond to CNBC’s request for comment asking if it plans to do so.
Zhao’s tweet was in reference to a report earlier this month of a four-year investigation by the inspector-general of the Australian Defence Force. The report found that Australia’s special forces allegedly killed 39 unarmed prisoners and civilians in Afghanistan. The inquiry timeframe covered incidents rumored to have occurred between 2005 to 2016.
The inquiry said it found credible information that junior soldiers were required by their patrol commanders to shoot a prisoner in order to achieve the soldier’s first kill — a practice that was known as “blooding.” All those unlawful killings were said to have been done outside the “heat of battle.”
Australia said 19 current and former soldiers will be referred for potential criminal prosecution, Reuters reported.
Morrison said while tensions undoubtedly exist between the two countries, it should be addressed in a mature and responsible way by seeking engagement at leadership and ministerial levels.
(CNN)The Iranian nuclear scientist assassinated Friday east of Tehran was shot by a remote-controlled machine gun operating out of another car, the semi-official Fars News Agency said Sunday.
“You would think if you’re in the FBI or Department of Justice, this is the biggest thing you could be looking at,” Trump said. “Where are they? I’ve not seen anything.”
Most recently, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court dismissed a case Saturday night brought by Rep. Mike Kelly, R-Pa., and a handful of other Republican voters who sought to overturn last year’s law creating no-excuse mail-in voting as well as halt further action in certifying Pennsylvania’s votes.
Judge Ken Starr said the president’s path to victory is fading despite “numerous” examples of anecdotal evidence.
Democratic President-elect Joe Biden and Vice President-elect Kamala Harris on Sunday announced the first-ever all-female White House senior communications team.
“I am proud to announce today the first senior White House communications team comprised entirely of women. These qualified, experienced communicators bring diverse perspectives to their work and a shared commitment to building this country back better,” Biden said in a statement.
“Communicating directly and truthfully to the American people is one of the most important duties of a President, and this team will be entrusted with the tremendous responsibility of connecting the American people to the White House,” he added.
Most members of the new team have previously worked for Biden and other Democrats. Jen Psaki, who was named as the White House press secretary, had served under the Obama administration as a White House communications director, deputy White House communications director, and deputy White House press secretary.
President-elect Joe Biden and Vice President-elect Kamala Harris hold a news conference at the Queen Theater on November 19, 2020 in Wilmington, Delaware. Joe Raedle/Getty
“Honored to work again for @JoeBiden, a man I worked on behalf of during the Obama-Biden Admin as he helped lead economic recovery, rebuilt our relationships with partners (turns out good practice) and injected empathy and humanity into nearly every meeting I sat in,” Psaki wrote in a tweet after the announcement.
Symone Sanders was named as senior adviser and chief spokeswoman for the vice president. She previously worked as a senior adviser on Biden’s 2020 campaign after serving as Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders‘ 2020 campaign press secretary.
“Also AN ALL LADY SQUAD?! I am excited to serve alongside @AshleyEtienne09, my battle buddy @KBeds, @jrpsaki, @pilitobar87 and @EAlexander332. We each take our service seriously and are elated to get to work for the people and build back better! Lets go ladies!” Symone Sanders tweeted.
Kate Bedingfield is slated to become Biden’s White House communications director. Prior to the announcement, Bedingfield was the Biden campaign’s communications director and deputy campaign manager. She also worked for the former vice president under the Obama administration.
“I’m unspeakably proud to have the opportunity to serve as White House Communications Director for @joebiden,” Bedingfield tweeted. “Working for him as VP and on this campaign gave me insight into what kind of capable, compassionate, clear-eyed president he will be and it will be a profound honor to be a small part of his work.”
The Biden administration’s principal deputy press secretary will be Karine Jean-Pierre, who worked as an adviser for Biden’s 2020 campaign. Jean-Pierre was previously an MSNBC and NBC analyst.
Pili Tober, a former deputy director at America’s Voice, a nonprofit focused on immigration reform, was named the deputy White House communications director.
Vice President-elect Harris’ communications director will be Ashley Etienne, who also worked on Biden’s campaign as an adviser. Etienne had served as House Speaker Nancy Pelosi‘s communications director and senior adviser.
“On behalf of our House Democratic Majority, I congratulate Ashley and thank her for her important and impactful service in my office and in the House,” Pelosi said in a statement. “Her experience working on both sides of Pennsylvania Avenue and the immense respect she commands among both Members and staff will make her a powerful force in the Biden-Harris Administration.”
Former Biden campaign senior adviser Elizabeth Alexander was named as first lady Jill Biden‘s communications director.
“Honored & humbled to join @DrBiden and her growing team as she charts her own historic path forward as the next FLOTUS. And so proud [to] be part of this group of hard-working pros and strategic communicators,” Alexander wrote on Twitter.
Newsweek reached out to the president-elect’s transition team for additional information.
Though the transition has begun, President Trump remains largely holed up in the White House tweeting false accusations of a rigged election from behind a crumbling wall of lawsuits. No legal challenge, no recount, no audit has changed the outcome in any state. Mr. Trump’s claim that millions of votes were deleted or switched is denied by the official he chose to secure the nation’s election systems. Christopher Krebs called the 2020 vote “the most secure in American history” which promptly got him fired. Tonight, in his first interview since he was dismissed, Krebs tells us why he believes the vote was accurate and why saying otherwise puts the country in danger.
Chris Krebs: I have confidence in the security of this election because I know the work that we’ve done for four years in support of our state and local partners. I know the work that the intelligence community has done, the Department of Defense has done, that the FBI has done, that my team has done. I know that these systems are more secure. I know based on what we have seen that any attacks on the election were not successful.
Two years ago, President Trump put Christopher Krebs in charge of the new Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency. Krebs, a lifelong Republican, was confirmed unanimously by the Senate.
Chris Krebs
His agency, known by its acronym, “CISA” helps secure computer systems anywhere that a security breach could be catastrophic, nuclear power plants for example, and the election hardware in all 50 states.
Scott Pelley: Why are you speaking to us?
Chris Krebs: I’m not a public servant anymore, but I feel I still got some public service left in me. And, you know, it’s hard once you take that oath to uphold and defend the constitution from threats foreign and domestic, it’s hard to walk away from that. And if I can reinforce or confirm for one person that the vote was secure, the election was secure, then I feel like I’ve done my job.
Krebs, who’s 43, worked on cybersecurity in the Bush administration, became director of cybersecurity policy at Microsoft and joined the Trump Department of Homeland Security in 2017. His priority was to stop anyone from repeating Russia’s 2016 election hacking and disinformation.
Chris Krebs: So we spent something on the order of three and a half years of gaming out every possible scenario for how a foreign actor could interfere with an election. Countless, countless scenarios.
Scott Pelley: So back in 2017, as you’re looking ahead to the election in 2018 and then ultimately the election in 2020, you have a to-do list. And the to-do list includes what?
Chris Krebs: Paper ballots. Paper ballots give you the ability to audit, to go back and check the tape and make sure that you got the count right. And that’s really one of the keys to success for a secure 2020 election. 95% of the ballots cast in the 2020 election had a paper record associated with it. Compared to 2016, about 82%.
Scott Pelley: And with a paper record, you can go back and verify what the machine is saying by physically counting the paper?
Chris Krebs: That gives you the ability to prove that there was no malicious algorithm or hacked software that adjusted the tally of the vote, and just look at what happened in Georgia. Georgia has machines that tabulate the vote. They then held a hand recount and the outcome was consistent with the machine vote.
Scott Pelley: And that tells you what?
Chris Krebs: That tells you that there was no manipulation of the vote on the machine count side. And so that pretty thoroughly, in my opinion, debunks some of these sensational claims out there– that I’ve called nonsense and a hoax, that there is some hacking of these election vendors and their software and their systems across the country. It’s– it’s just– it’s nonsense.
Before the election, as the president called mail-in ballots a fraud, Krebs’ team released a report highlighting the safeguards built into mail-in voting. His agency knocked down rumors and exposed an Iranian plot to intimidate voters. On Election Day, Krebs assembled a team in his command center to defend the vote.
Krebs in the Oval Office with President Trump. Mr. Trump put Krebs in charge of the agency handling election security two years ago.
Chris Krebs: We had the Department of Defense Cyber Command. We had the National Security Agency. We had the FBI. We had the Secret Service. We also had representatives from the Election Assistance Commission, which is the federal independent agency that supports the actual administration of elections. We had representatives from some of the– vendors, the election equipment vendors. And they’re critical because they’re the ones out there that know what’s going on on the ground if there’s any sort of issue with some of their systems. And we had representatives from state and local governments.
Scott Pelley: How did the day go?
Chris Krebs: It was quiet. And there was no indication or evidence that there was any sort of hacking or compromise of election systems on, before or after November 3rd.
And yet, this was the president, November 5.
President Trump on November 5: And this is a case where they’re trying to steal an election, they’re trying to rig an election.
Nine days after Election Day, Mr. Trump tweeted falsely that machines from Dominion Voting Systems deleted millions of votes. Krebs couldn’t remain silent. His agency and its election security partners answered with a public statement.
Scott Pelley: To quote from the November 12th statement that CISA and its partners put out, “The November 3rd election was the most secure in American history. There is no evidence that any voting system deleted or lost votes or changed votes or was in any way compromised.”
Chris Krebs: Yeah, I stand by that.
Scott Pelley: The president tweeted after that statement, quote, “The recent statement by Chris Krebs on the security of the 2020 election was highly inaccurate, in that there were massive improprieties and fraud.” Do you remember what the president said at the end of that tweet?
Chris Krebs: Oh, I was terminated? Is that– yes. I recall that.
Scott Pelley: Were you surprised?
Chris Krebs: I don’t know if I was necessarily surprised. It’s not how I wanted to go out. I think I– the thing that upsets me the most about that is I didn’t get a s– chance– to say goodbye to my team. And I’d worked with them for three and a half years, in the trenches. Building an agency, putting CISA on the national stage. And I love that team. And I didn’t get a chance to say goodbye, so that’s what I’m most upset about.
Since he was fired, about a dozen Republican senators have vouched for Krebs’ work.
Scott Pelley: The president’s essentially saying in that tweet that you did a lousy job, that you and your team blew it, and allowed massive fraud, all across the country.
Chris Krebs: We did a good job. We did it right. I’d do it a thousand times over.
Still, the president’s lawyers have filed at least a dozen suits and spun conjecture without evidence.
Rudy Giuliani on November 19: And you should be more astounded by the fact that our votes are counted in Germany and in Spain…
Scott Pelley: As you watched Rudy Giuliani’s news conference at the Republican National Committee headquarters, what were you thinking?
Chris Krebs: It was upsetting because what I saw was a apparent attempt to undermine confidence in the election, to confuse people, to scare people. It’s not me, it’s not just CISA. It’s the tens of thousands of election workers out there that had been working nonstop, 18-hour days, for months. They’re getting death threats for trying to carry out one of our core democratic institutions, an election. And that was, again, to me, a press conference that I just– it didn’t make sense. What it was actively doing was undermining democracy. And that’s dangerous.
Scott Pelley: Let me ask for your reaction to some of the vote fraud that the president and his team have been alleging. Votes tabulated in foreign countries.
Chris Krebs: So all votes in the United States of America are counted in the United States of America. I don’t– I don’t understand this claim. All votes in the United States of America are counted in the United States of America. Period.
Scott Pelley: Voting machines corrupted by mysterious actors in Venezuela.
Chris Krebs: So again, there’s no evidence that any machine that I’m aware of has been manipulated by a foreign power. Period.
Scott Pelley: Communist money from China and Cuba used to influence the election.
Chris Krebs: Look, I think these– we can go on and on with all the farcical claims that– alleging– interference in the 2020 election, but the proof is in the ballots. The recounts are consistent with the initial count, and to me, that’s further evidence, that’s confirmation that the systems used in the 2020 election performed as expected, and the American people should have 100% confidence in their vote.
Scott Pelley: In a news conference a lawyer who was representing the president at the time, Sidney Powell, said specifically that the Dominion Company’s voting machines, quote…
Sidney Powell on November 19: It can set and run an algorithm that probably ran all over the country to take a certain percentage of votes from President Trump and flip them to President Biden.
Chris Krebs: Votes were cast in Georgia, for instance, again, on paper. They were counted by a machine. They were subsequently recounted by hand. The outcomes of that count were consistent. If there was an algorithm that was flipping votes or changing votes, it didn’t work. I think the more likely explanation, though, is that there is no algorithm, that the systems performed as intended. That the series of security controls before, during, and after an election protected those systems from any sort of misbehavior.
Most elections are run by each state’s secretary of state. But not one of them, Democrat or Republican has reported ballot rigging that would change the election. Some are paying a price for integrity.
Chris Krebs: And it’s, in my view, a travesty what’s happening right now with all these death threats to election officials, to secretaries of state. I want everybody to look at Secretary Boockvar in Pennsylvania, Secretary Benson in Michigan, Secretary Cegavske in Nevada, Secretary Hobbs in Arizona. All strong women that are standing up, that are under attack from all sides, and they’re defending democracy. They’re doin’ their jobs. Look at– look at Secretary Raffensperger in Georgia, lifelong Republican. He put country before party in his holding a free and fair election in that state. There are some real heroes out there. There are some real patriots.
At the Capitol, the stage is going up for Inauguration Day, January 20. Well before that, on December 14 the presidential electors will cast their ballots—which should settle the election. Christopher Krebs told us it’s ironic that the disruption and disinformation he feared from abroad came, instead, from Pennsylvania Avenue.
Scott Pelley: The president says you’re dead wrong about election security, and to him you say what?
Chris Krebs: There is no foreign power that is flipping votes. There’s no domestic actor flipping votes. I did it right. We did it right. This was a secure election.
Produced by Rachael Morehouse. Associate producers, Jacqueline Kalil and Cassidy McDonald. Broadcast associates, Ian Flickinger and Sheena Samu. Edited by Sean Kelly.
Some progressive groups have warned against hiring Deese, 42, to a White House post, given his current job in the financial sector.
“We are concerned, as our name suggests, with revolving door hires,” Jeff Hauser, who founded the Revolving Door Project to scrutinize executive branch appointees, told POLITICO last week. “And Brian Deese’s [relationship] to BlackRock makes it less likely that the federal government will rein in BlackRock as it should be.”
Deese is widely popular among Democratic policy hands, however. He worked on the auto bailout and environmental issues in President Barack Obama’s White House, where he served as deputy director of both the NEC and the Office of Management and Budget. And at BlackRock, his work has focused on driving funds into sustainable investments like clean energy.
“He has just proven himself to be an effective champion for transitioning the economy to be a cleaner economy,” John Podesta, a former chief of staff to President Bill Clinton and counselor to President Barack Obama before founding the progressive group Center for American Progress told POLITICO last week. “There is no question in my mind that he will campaign aggressively on behalf of the environment.”
Wisconsin finished a recount of its presidential results on Sunday, confirming Democrat Joe Biden‘s victory over President Donald Trump in the key battleground state. Trump vowed to challenge the outcome in court even before the recount concluded.
Dane County was the second and last county to finish its recount, reporting a 45-vote gain for Trump. Milwaukee County, the state’s other big and overwhelmingly liberal county targeted in a recount that Trump paid for, reported its results Friday, a 132-vote gain for Biden.
Taken together, the two counties barely budged Biden’s winning margin of about 20,600 votes, giving the winner a net gain of 87 votes.
“As we have said, the recount only served to reaffirm Joe Biden’s victory in Wisconsin,” Danielle Melfi, who led Biden’s campaign in Wisconsin, said in a statement to The Associated Press.
With no precedent for overturning a result as large as Biden’s, Trump was widely expected to head to court once the recount was finished. His campaign challenged thousands of absentee ballots during the recount, and even before it was complete, Trump tweeted that he would sue.
“The Wisconsin recount is not about finding mistakes in the count, it is about finding people who have voted illegally, and that case will be brought after the recount is over, on Monday or Tuesday,” Trump tweeted on Saturday. “We have found many illegal votes. Stay tuned!”
Trump campaign officials didn’t immediately respond to AP requests for comment on Sunday.
The deadline to certify the vote is Tuesday. Certification is done by the Democratic chair of the Wisconsin Election Commission, which is bipartisan.
The Wisconsin Voters Alliance, a conservative group, has already filed a lawsuit against state election officials seeking to block certification of the results. It makes many of the claims Trump is expected to make. Gov. Tony Evers’ attorneys have asked the state Supreme Court to dismiss the suit. Evers, a Democrat, said the complaint is a “mishmash of legal distortions” that uses factual misrepresentations in an attempt to take voting rights away from millions of Wisconsin residents.
Another suit filed over the weekend by Wisconsin resident Dean Mueller argues that ballots placed in drop boxes are illegal and must not be counted.
Trump’s attorneys have complained about absentee ballots where voters identified themselves as “indefinitely confined,” allowing them to cast an absentee ballot without showing a photo ID; ballots that have a certification envelope with two different ink colors, indicating a poll worker may have helped complete it; and absentee ballots that don’t have a separate written record for its request, such as in-person absentee ballots.
Election officials in the two counties counted those ballots during the recount, but marked them as exhibits at the request of the Trump campaign.
Trump’s campaign has already failed elsewhere in court without proof of widespread fraud, which experts widely agree doesn’t exist. Trump legal challenges have failed in Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada and Pennsylvania.
New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio said Sunday that the city will no longer use its previous threshold for closing schools.
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New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio said Sunday that the city will no longer use its previous threshold for closing schools.
Andrew Burton/Getty Images
Just 10 days after closing New York City’s schools because of rising coronavirus cases, Mayor Bill de Blasio announced Sunday that the nation’s largest school district will begin a phased reopening next week.
On Dec. 7, buildings will reopen for elementary school students and on Dec. 10, District 75, which serves students with disabilities, will reopen.
Students can only return if they have already signed up for in-person learning. About 190,000 elementary students and their parents must sign a consent form. In total, about 335,000 students out of the 1.1 million in the city have chosen in-person classes. While de Blasio has not announced a timeline for reopening middle or high schools, any school with enough space will eventually move toward in-person classes five days a week, instead of hybrid online and in-person classes.
Previously, the city had a rule that schools had to close if the city reached a 3% testing positivity rate, which caused New York City public schools to close for in-person learning on Nov. 19. The mayor said the city will no longer use that rule.
“Getting our kids back in school buildings is one of the single most important things we can do for their wellbeing, and it’s so important that we do it right,” Schools Chancellor Richard Carranza said in a statement. “The unparalleled value of in-person learning for students has been evident in the first few months of school, and we will do everything we can to keep our schools safe and keep them open for the duration of this pandemic.”
De Blasio said in a press conference that he is focusing on lower grades “because we know studies consistently show younger kids are having less of a negative experience and there is less concern about the spread when it comes to younger kids.” He added that it is important to have young kids in schools “both educationally and socially.”
Every student and staff member must consent to weekly random COVID-19 testing for 20% of those who attend classes in-person.
“Upon reopening, weekly COVID-19 testing will be in effect and testing consent forms will be required for our students to return,” de Blasio tweeted. “Finally, as we reopen, wherever possible we will move to 5 day a week in-person learning. We want our kids in the classroom for as much time as possible. Our families do, too. We’ll work to make it happen.”
New York City’s teachers union said it supported the plan on the condition of stringent testing. “At our insistence, much stricter testing measures will be in place in all schools,” the United Federation of Teachers said on Twitter.
Gov. Andrew Cuomo, who frequently and publicly disagrees with de Blasio, told reporters Sunday that the mayor’s school reopening plan is “the right direction.” Cuomo has ultimate say over schools under the current state of emergency.
“We do have new facts and new information on schools and just about every professional says the schools, especially [grades] K through eight, should be kept open whenever it’s possible to keep them open,” the governor said.
On Sunday, 130 patients were admitted to hospitals and there were 1,636 new cases of the virus in the city, the mayor said. The weekly average infection rate is 3.9%.
Fauci, the director of the National Institute for Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), told NBC News’s “Meet the Press” that the increase in U.S. cases would be almost vertical if shown on a graph.
He acknowledged that while health experts warned Americans not to travel for or spend Thanksgiving with people outside of their household, “people are not always going to do that.”
“So what we expect, unfortunately, as we go for the next couple of weeks into December, that we might see a surge superimposed upon that surge that we’re already in,” he said.
“When I give that message, I don’t want to frighten people, except to say it is not too late at all for us to do something about this, because as we travel back, to be careful when we go back to where we are, to just continue to do the things that we’ve been talking about,” he added.
Fauci pointed to states that have instituted coronavirus restrictions involving mask wearing, social distancing and limits on gatherings, saying in those states, the COVID-19 cases curve starts to flatten.
“So we know we can do something about it particularly now as we get into the colder season and as we approach the Christmas holidays,” he said.
The U.S. surpassed 13 million coronavirus cases on Friday, after reaching 12 million cases only six days prior. The number of COVID-19-related hospitalizations have reached an all-time high of more than 91,000, with more than 18,000 Americans in the intensive care unit, according to the Covid Tracking Project.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention cautioned people not to travel or gather with groups outside of their immediate household for Thanksgiving, but in the days before the holiday, millions of people got on flights.
California has more people hospitalized with COVID-19 than at any time since the pandemic began, an ominous sign that comes as officials warn of further virus spread after the long holiday weekend.
The rising numbers raise new concerns about hospitals filling up in the coming weeks, which has been predicted as coronavirus cases surge to unprecedented levels across the state and, particularly, in Los Angeles County.
A wave of new restrictions on personal gatherings and capacity levels at stores takes effect Monday. But there are concerns that the surge will get worse before it gets better due to Thanksgiving celebrations and Black Friday shopping — which, while less robust than in normal years, is likely to have caused new infections.
“We were prepared for an increase,” Barbara Ferrer, the L.A. County health director, said. “None of us really thought the increase would be so big across such a short period of time.”
There were 7,415 COVID-19 patients in California hospitals on Saturday, according to the latest numbers released by the state, surpassing the previous high of 7,170, set in July. Only a month earlier, on Oct. 28, there were about 2,400 COVID-19 patients in state hospitals.
L.A. County had the most COVID-19 patients in hospitals, reporting 2,185; the county is rapidly nearing its all-time high of 2,232, set in July.
The death rate is also rising — in Los Angeles, an average of 30 people are dying each day from COVID-19, triple the rate from the period around election day. Statewide, an average of 75 deaths were reported daily over the seven-day period before Thanksgiving, compared with 40 in mid-November.
The L.A. County Department of Health on Sunday reported 5,014 new cases of the coronavirus and 19 related deaths. The high tally came despite the fact that case numbers usually drop on the weekends, when some labs don’t report results, and despite officials saying they expected the number of new cases to be lower than usual for several days because no community testing was performed on Thanksgiving, and only limited testing was offered the day after.
As county health officials try to slow a worrisome coronavirus surge, holiday shopping and family gatherings could pose a danger as people tire of restrictions during a season many hoped would be a reprieve.
“More restrictive measures? I can’t imagine what that would look like at this point,” said Maria Salinas, president and chief executive of the Los Angeles Area Chamber of Commerce. She said the business community is concerned with the spike in cases, but many feel the move to shut down outdoor dining was not based on data that proved the virus was spreading among people eating at restaurants.
Health officials have said there’s an elevated risk of spread anywhere people gather with others and eat, drink and linger without wearing masks.
“Here we go again. I am not convinced that shutting down, reopening and shutting down again is effective,” said L.A. County Supervisor Janice Hahn, who, together with Supervisor Kathryn Barger, put forth a proposal that called for the board to allow restaurants to continue to offer outdoor dining. The motion was voted down last week.
“Nothing we have done so far has worked,” Hahn said in a statement. “Our businesses are hurting. Kids aren’t back at school. Our healthcare system is about to be overwhelmed.”
Other supervisors have said they back the tougher measures recommended by health officials.
“When the case rate reaches a certain point, it takes drastic measures to slow down the spread of this tremendously deadly virus,” Supervisor Hilda Solis said in a statement.
Physicians, epidemiologists and infectious disease experts have been clear: Outdoor restaurant dining is risky, and practices that seemed safe just a few weeks ago are more dangerous now because of the greater levels of virus spreading throughout L.A. County. Outdoor dining has likely become even more risky as restaurants have set up plastic sheeting to shield diners from wind — the very breezes that help blow away virus particles exhaled by those infected. Without those drafts, the virus hangs in the air longer, facilitating infection.
“I have yet to see someone eat dinner with their mask on,” said Dr. George Rutherford, epidemiologist and infectious disease expert at UC San Francisco. “Mixing across households — that creates transmission. It’s just the way it is.”
Dr. Robert Kim-Farley, medical epidemiologist and infectious disease expert at the UCLA Fielding School of Public Health, said Sunday that there’s renewed tension between those who wish to save every life possible and those concerned about a devastated economy. But those two goals aren’t mutually exclusive, he said — a recovering economy requires a virus under control.
“The current increasing of restrictions is trying to find a way to break the back of this current surge, to bring us to a level where we are not endangering our hospital system,” said Kim-Farley, a former senior official with the L.A. County Department of Public Health and U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
The surge in coronavirus cases began late last month, and new cases are rising more rapidly than they did during the peak of the crisis in mid-July, officials say. Across California, an average of 13,000 people are testing positive for the virus daily, more than quadruple the rate in late October, when the average was 3,000.
In L.A. County, an average of 4,300 people are testing positive daily; the figure was about 1,000 in mid-October, according to county records.
California state prisons continue to contend with new, growing outbreaks at multiple facilities amid lapses in tracing, testing, and mask-wearing by guards.
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Southern California as a whole has a particularly high infection rate. Over the seven-day period before Thanksgiving, Southern California counties reported a daily average of 40 new coronavirus cases per 100,000 residents, the most on record so far and more than twice as many as in the Bay Area, which reported an average of 17 per 100,000 residents.
The case numbers have been climbing so quickly that officials across the state are warning that hospital beds could run short in a matter of weeks unless something is done to drastically reduce the spread of disease. Should staffing at intensive care units be stretched beyond capacity, the mortality rate will worsen dramatically. The shortage would affect not only COVID-19 patients but those who need emergency treatment after accidents or for appendicitis, heart attacks or strokes.
Because hospitalizations reflect cases that were identified two to three weeks earlier, officials are certain they’ll continue to increase for the next two to three weeks, given the recent case numbers.
If so, Ferrer said, “we’re in for a very rough time, because we will have a surge on top of a surge.”
A projection cited by Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti has 4,000 more L.A. County residents dying of COVID-19 by the year’s end. But experts say that dire outcome is avoidable.
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An influential model run by the University of Washington Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation says that, without major changes in current policies or behavior, California is on track to double its cumulative death toll by the end of winter, from more than 19,000 to more than 37,000 by March 1.
It’s still possible to change that trajectory, said Anne Rimoin, professor of epidemiology at the UCLA Fielding School of Public Health.
“Every illness, hospitalization and death at this point is avoidable, if we all do our part,” she said.
Washington, DC (CNN)President-elect Joe Biden has hairline fractures in his “mid-foot” and will “likely require a walking boot for several weeks,” his doctor said in a statement Sunday, after Biden slipped while playing with his dog, Major, Saturday.
MADISON — Wisconsin’s partial recount boosted Democrat Joe Biden’s victory by 87 votes Sunday as President Donald Trump said he was preparing a lawsuit to overturn the results.
The completion of the recount prompted the Democratic leader of the state Elections Commission to say she would certify Biden’s victory on Monday, clearing the way for Trump to file a lawsuit. But a Republican on the commission said it was premature for the state to sign off on the results and he hoped Chairwoman Ann Jacobs would not act until the commission meets Tuesday.
Biden netted 132 votes in Milwaukee County and Trump netted 45 votes in Dane County. When taken together, that increased Biden’s statewide margin to 20,695 votes out of about 3 million cast.
Trump’s campaign paid $3 million to cover the cost of the recounts in Wisconsin’s two most Democratic counties so he could pursue a long-shot lawsuit to claim the state’s 10 electoral votes.
“The Wisconsin recount is not about finding mistakes in the count, it is about finding people who have voted illegally, and that case will be brought after the recount is over, on Monday or Tuesday,” Trump wrote.
The recount has not turned up evidence of fraud, prompting Twitter to label his tweet as disputed. Trump’s campaign has alleged long-standing voting practices in Wisconsin are illegal and sought to throw out about 238,000 ballots in Dane and Milwaukee counties.
The campaign claims all early in-person votes in those counties are illegitimate, including ones cast by GOP state Sen. Alberta Darling of River Hills, GOP state Rep. Jessie Rodriguez of Oak Creek and Trump campaign attorney Jim Troupis. Democrats, election officials and election attorneys have called the claim preposterous, noting the state has been conducting early in-person voting the same way for a decade without any challenges.
Trump has faced setback after setback in court in other states and he faces an uphill battle in Wisconsin. Even if he managed to change the outcome in Wisconsin, Biden would still be able to claim the presidency because of his victories in other states.
Jacobs said Sunday she planned to certify Biden’s victory on Monday to help resolve any legal challenges as quickly as possible. She said it was better to move the process along on Monday instead of waiting until the commission meets Tuesday.
“The reason for that is the Trump campaign cannot appeal until it’s certified,” she said.
State law gives the commission chairperson the power to certify results, and that’s what has been done in past elections. But Republicans have argued the rest of the commission should play a role this year because of disputes over how voting was conducted.
Certifying the results is a simple, administrative matter, Jacobs said.
“The role of the Elections Commission is essentially to verify the numbers, and that’s the whole purpose of the canvass,” she said.
Commissioner Bob Spindell, a Republican, called Jacob’s move “completely inappropriate.” He said the commission should discuss the matter at Tuesday’s meeting, adding he didn’t think the state should certify anyone so the courts can consider what to do.
“Obviously, she’s trying to pull a fast one for some reason,” he said of Jacobs.
Biden improves margin after recount
In Milwaukee County, Biden netted 132 more votes over the initial results. Much of the increase occurred because tabulators discovered 386 votes had not been counted on Election Day.
In Dane County, Biden had 91 votes taken away and Trump had 46 votes taken away, netting Trump an uptick of 45 votes in that county. Most of the votes were taken away because absentee ballot envelopes were found to have lacked voter signatures, witness signatures or witness addresses, said Dane County Clerk Scott McDonell.
The county’s Board of Canvassers unanimously signed off on the recounted results. The board consists of one Republican and two Democrats, including McDonell.
“For me what this recount showed was that there was absolutely no evidence of voter fraud in this election even after looking at over 300,000 ballots, over 254,000 envelopes,” McDonell said. “Really this incredible level of transparency should provide reassurance to the public that the election was run properly and accurately and there was no fraud.”
McDonell said he was bothered that Trump tried to throw out votes in the state’s Democratic strongholds while letting stand ones that were cast the same way in Republican areas.
“I think we need to think about whether that is equal protection under the Constitution,” he said. “Those voters aren’t being equally protected if that were true — that the same action in one county as another, one vote gets tossed, the other doesn’t. I think that’s disturbing.”
Like the president, Trump attorney Jenna Ellis suggested a lawsuit is coming after the recounts were finished.
“As we have said from the very beginning, we want every legal vote, and only legal votes to be counted, and we will continue to uphold our promise to the American people to fight for a free and fair election,” she said in a statement.
Highlighting the difficulties for the Trump team, Assembly Majority Leader Jim Steineke signaled on Twitter he would not be on board with changing Wisconsin’s outcome.
In response to a headline about whether the Legislature could change Wisconsin’s slate of electors, the Republican from Kaukauna tweeted a clip of actor Dana Carvey playing President George H.W. Bush saying, “Not gonna do it.”
High court weighs lawsuits
Already there are two lawsuits over the election results pending before the Wisconsin Supreme Court. Both are asking the high court to throw out results and allow the Republican-controlled Legislature to decide how to cast the state’s votes in the Electoral College.
The justices have not said whether they would accept the cases. Conservatives hold a 4-3 majority on the court.
In one lawsuit, the Wisconsin Voters Alliance contended many of the state’s votes were illegal because clerks filled in the addresses for witnesses on some absentee ballot envelopes and some absentee voters may have claimed to be indefinitely confined even though they weren’t. Indefinitely confined voters, such as the elderly and disabled, can get absentee ballots without having to provide a photo ID to election officials.
The group also maintains it was illegal for Milwaukee, Madison and other Wisconsin cities to accept $6.3 million from the Center for Tech and Civic Life to help run their elections. The nonprofit center is funded by $350 million from Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg and his wife, Priscilla Chan. The group earlier made that claim in a federal lawsuit, but U.S. District Judge William Griesbach ruled against them.
“The Wisconsin Voters Alliance, we’re concerned by the money that goes from private individuals who have an impact on elections,” said Ron Heuer, the group’s president. “We’re not going to give up on that fight, come hell or high water. That is our ultimate goal to have that business stopped.”
Heuer formed the Wisconsin Voters Alliance in September and about 50 people belong to it, he said. Heuer is a retired travel industry executive and U.S. Army veteran who is chairman of the Republican Party of Kewaunee County.
On Friday, Dean Mueller of Chippewa Falls filed a lawsuit asking the Wisconsin Supreme Court to reject the state’s votes because many communities set up absentee ballot drop boxes that he contends were not allowed under state law.
Bill Glauber of the Journal Sentinel staff contributed to this report.
Contact Patrick Marley at patrick.marley@jrn.com. Follow him on Twitter at @patrickdmarley.
West Brooklyn Community High School students | Kathy Willens/AP Photo
NEW YORK — Nearly 200,000 pre-kindergarten, elementary school and special-needs students will begin returning to in-person learning next week, Mayor Bill de Blasio announced Sunday. The move follows outrage from parents and people in his own administration over his decision to shut public schools earlier this month.
Middle and high school students will continue remote education, since they are more likely to spread Covid-19 and can better acclimate to virtual classes, de Blasio said.
The younger students will be in school five days a week, and they and school staff will be tested for the virus weekly.
“It’s a new approach because we have so much proof now of how safe schools can be, and this has come from real life experience of the biggest school system in America,” de Blasio said when asked about his decision to change the threshold for school closures once again. “We feel confident that we can keep schools safe.”
The mayor laid out the reopening plan during a press conference Sunday, less than two weeks after he shut schools as part of a deal he had struck with the teacher’s union to close the buildings when the citywide transmission rate hit a weekly average of 3 percent. Sunday’s seven-day, citywide positivity rate was 3.9 percent.
The city will no longer use the 3 percent cutoff to determine school closures instead relying on specific Covid-19 cases at each school.
“I feel for all our parents who are experiencing so many challenges right now — how important it is to have their younger kids in school,” de Blasio said. “We now believe we know what we didn’t know back in the summer — we know what works through actual experience.”
Families will have to give consent for students to be tested once a week. Those who don’t will not be allowed to attend in-person classes, de Blasio said. Only students who opted for in-person learning earlier this year will be able to attend, but they will now have classroom instruction for fivedays a week, rather than the blended model the city used before.
United Federation of Teachers president Michael Mulgrew, who has held significant sway over City Hall’s actions during the course of the pandemic, said he supported the policy as long as “stringent testing is in place.”
“This strategy — properly implemented — will allow us to offer safe in-person instruction to the maximum number of students until we beat the pandemic,” Mulgrew said in a statement.
De Blasio’s decision to shut schools two weeks ago sparked anger within City Hall, with most public health and high-ranking administration officials advising against it, according to four people involved in the talks. They felt he was gratuitously kowtowing to Mulgrew, who ended up admonishing the system that affords city mayors control over the public school system days after he signed off on the closure plan.
“Closing schools was deeply frustrating after all the work that went into opening them and how much a success it had been,” said one administration official, who would only speak on the condition of anonymity to discuss internal deliberations.
The official, who is involved in the city’s pandemic response, said the decision to close schools was “based on a conservative approach that was out-dated after all the data [was] collected. The fact that we couldn’t pivot sooner was disappointing, but now we’re in the right place.”
The news will likely be a relief to parents of younger students who have criticized the mayor’s decision to close schools while restaurants, bars and gyms have remained open in a limited capacity. Gov. Andrew Cuomo has ultimate authority over those businesses and has said they will have to face renewed restrictions.
Cuomo told reporters Sunday he believes the plan is “the right decision,” given the facts and information public health officials now have about Covid-19 infection rates among younger school children.
“Keeping schools open, where safe, is best,” he said during an afternoon conference call. “And I think New York City opening schools is the right direction and the right decision.”
How to manage the city’s network of public schools has arguably been the biggest challenge de Blasio has faced during the pandemic. He agonized over whether to shut them during the virus’s surge in March, initially holding off — despite advice from the city’s health department — out of concern for delayed academic progress and working parents who cannot afford private child care. Days later he closed schools for the remainder of the academic year and, after several more delays, announced a blend of in-person and remote learning.
About half of the city’s 1.1 million students had opted to attend some in-person classes, though just about 283,000 showed up through October, according to city data.
Asked about his original call to shutter schools, the mayor replied, “I felt bad about it for sure and I didn’t want to do it, but I felt we had to keep the commitment we made.”
The latest blueprint, he added, “is what’s going to take us through until we have a vaccine.”
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