08 December 19
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07 December 19
Paul Sonne, Greg Miller and Josh Dawsey, The Washington Post
Excerpt: "Even as the House of Representatives began drafting charges against President Trump this week, his private attorney, who many believe is partly responsible for leading Trump on the path to his likely impeachment, made an audacious trip to the country at the center of the scandal."
Rudolph W. Giuliani departed Kyiv after meeting with a range of Ukrainians who have been feeding him unproven allegations against former vice president Joe Biden and helping construct a counternarrative that is taking hold in the Republican Party. The latter story line asserts that Ukraine interfered in the 2016 election, including with the baseless theory that Ukraine, rather than Russia, was behind the hacking of the Democratic National Committee.
The purported purpose of the trip was to conduct interviews for a documentary on a right-wing media network. But Giuliani’s travel also appeared designed to send a broader and more brazen signal of the disregard that he and Trump have for the unfolding impeachment process.
As if to underscore that, Giuliani used his Twitter account while on the trip to describe the impeachment hearings as a “witch hunt,” attack the former U.S. ambassador whom he helped oust earlier this year, and assert that Trump’s demands for politically beneficial investigations by Ukraine’s government were appropriate.
The flurry of messages seemed designed to taunt Democrats in Washington.
Current and former officials in Washington expressed astonishment at how Giuliani — apparently on behalf of the president — seemed to be mocking impeachment investigators, if not the very idea that either he or his client should answer any articles of impeachment.
“It’s unbelievable to me the open way in which the administration and Giuliani are still pursuing this,” said Jeffrey Edmonds, who served as Russia director at the White House National Security Council under both Barack Obama and Trump. “It is a way of . . . asserting that everything that we’re doing is perfectly normal, perfectly fine and we’re going to keep doing it.”
Giuliani couldn’t be reached for comment on his trip.
The aftermath of Giuliani’s trip came as the White House signaled that it would not mount a formal defense of Trump in the House impeachment proceedings. White House counsel Pat A. Cipollone sent a letter to the chairman of the House Judiciary Committee on Friday, saying adopting articles of impeachment “would be a reckless abuse of power by House Democrats.”
Giuliani’s trip also represented an affront to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, whose government was welcoming a high-level State Department diplomat at the same time and hoping to return relations with the United States to normal after more than two months at the center of an American political maelstrom.
Zelensky, who didn’t meet with Giuliani, is preparing for a high-stakes summit on Monday in Paris, where he is scheduled to meet Russian President Vladimir Putin alongside the leaders of Germany and France in a renewed attempt to bring an end to the war between Russia-backed proxies and Ukrainian forces in the nation’s east. More than 13,000 people have died in the conflict.
The disruption in U.S.-Ukraine relations caused by Giuliani’s activities and the resulting impeachment inquiry have led some Ukrainians to fear that Zelensky, who promised an end to the conflict during his campaign, will cut a bad deal with Putin, owing partly to a growing sentiment in Kyiv that Ukraine can no longer count on support from the United States.
Such concerns appeared to be far from Giuliani’s mind.
During his trip, he sat down with a mustachioed Ukrainian lawmaker who has promoted Russian interests in Ukraine and once studied at a KGB academy in Moscow.
He was accompanied by a former Ukrainian diplomat who has won renown in U.S. right-wing circles by alleging Ukraine colluded with the DNC to undermine Trump in 2016.
He received a bon voyage message from a former Ukrainian parliamentarian, who once sent a peace proposal to the White House that would have lifted sanctions on Russia and recognized the Kremlin’s annexation of Crimea.
The trip also served a practical purpose ahead of a likely Senate trial of his client. Giuliani brought a correspondent from the right-wing One America News to interview many of the Ukrainians he has interacted with in the past year — people who are willing to make allegations against Biden and the Democrats.
The footage will help inject the theories Giuliani has gathered over the past year even further into the American public discourse, as the Senate prepares to embark on a trial that some Republican lawmakers want to make as much about Biden as it is about the president.
Giuliani has alleged that Biden pushed for the 2016 firing of Ukraine’s top prosecutor to help his son, Hunter Biden, who at the time was a board member of a Ukrainian gas company whose owner was under investigation in Ukraine. Apart from a claim by the top prosecutor in question that Biden had him fired for that reason, no evidence has surfaced to show that is why Biden sought his removal. European Union leaders also wanted the prosecutor removed.
During the trip, Giuliani said on Twitter that until the matter is resolved, the issue “will be a major obstacle to the U.S. assisting Ukraine with its anti-corruption efforts.”
In Kyiv, Giuliani met with two members of Ukraine’s parliament, Andriy Derkach and Oleksandr Dubinsky, who have called for a joint U.S.-Ukrainian parliamentary investigation into the gas company. The One America News correspondent traveling with Giuliani posted photos of them interviewing former Ukrainian Prosecutor General Yuri Lutsenko in Budapest, where they stopped before traveling on to Ukraine.
On Capitol Hill, Democrats were shocked by Giuliani’s nerve.
“It’s a brazen move,” said Rep. Raja Krishnamoorthi (D-Ill.), a member of the House Intelligence Committee, which led the impeachment inquiry. “This is emblematic of this White House: When they are in the wrong, they double down. And in this case, they are tripling down.”
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) called the trip an indication of “the arrogance of it all” in comments at a CNN Town Hall on Thursday night.
Some Republicans were left scratching their heads.
Asked about the trip, Rep. Mo Brooks (R-Ala.) replied, “Rudy does what Rudy does.”
Others were surprised. “The fact that Giuliani is back in Ukraine is like a murder suspect returning to the crime scene to live-stream themselves moon dancing,” said Dan Eberhart, a prominent Republican donor and Trump supporter. “It’s brazen on a galactic level.”
At the White House, deputy press secretary Hogan Gidley sidestepped the matter.
“That’s a question between Rudy and the president,” Gidley said.
Privately, however, two officials involved in the White House’s impeachment response said Trump aides were not told Giuliani was traveling to Ukraine and do not view it as helpful.
Some House Republicans have sought to create distance between Trump and Giuliani, but the president has not yet signaled a willingness to support such a move, the two officials said. On Friday, Gidley said that as a far as he was aware, Giuliani remained Trump’s personal attorney.
White House senior policy adviser Stephen Miller, left, walks to Marine One on the South Lawn of the White House, Nov. 14, 2019. (photo: Patrick Semansky/AP)
After Stephen Miller's White Nationalist Views Outed, Latinos Ask, 'Where's the GOP Outrage?'
Suzanne Gamboa, NBC News
Gamboa writes: "It wasn't the content of White House adviser Stephen Miller's leaked emails that shocked Rep. Veronica Escobar, a Democrat from El Paso, Texas, but the silence of her Republican colleagues that has followed."
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Suzanne Gamboa, NBC News
Gamboa writes: "It wasn't the content of White House adviser Stephen Miller's leaked emails that shocked Rep. Veronica Escobar, a Democrat from El Paso, Texas, but the silence of her Republican colleagues that has followed."
READ MORE
Workers build a wall in May along the U.S.-Mexico border in Texas. (photo: Herika Martinez/Getty)
Private Border Wall Construction Continues Despite Court Order
Nina Lakhani, Guardian UK
Lakhani writes: "The construction of a private border wall partially funded by rightwing allies of Donald Trump continued with vigor in south Texas this week, seemingly in blatant violation of a court injunction ordering work to be suspended."
Nina Lakhani, Guardian UK
Lakhani writes: "The construction of a private border wall partially funded by rightwing allies of Donald Trump continued with vigor in south Texas this week, seemingly in blatant violation of a court injunction ordering work to be suspended."
A judge has said the US-Mexico barrier, partially funded by an anti-migrant group, could damage a sanctuary and ecosystem
On Thursday and Friday, within three days of a temporary restraining order being issued, the Guardian found construction crews with at least 10 heavy machinery vehicles moving soil, digging trenches and positioning tall metal posts along the US bank of the Rio Grande in Hidalgo county, which forms the border with Mexico. A 3.5-mile, privately-funded concrete barrier is planned on the site, near Mission, Texas.
The state court order was served to We Build the Wall (WBTW), an anti-migrant group founded by military veteran Brian Kolfage, and the landowners, Neuhaus and Sons LLC, whose land is situated between Trump’s proposed wall and the Mexican border.
WBTW is a not-for-profit group that has crowd-funded millions of dollars by tapping into anti-migrant fervor and is led by former White House advisor Steve Bannon as chairman of its advisory board. Kolfage has described migrants as terrorists and drug traffickers, and accuses border wall critics as being cartel collaborators.
The injunction, issued on Tuesday by a state judge, was granted citing potential “imminent and irreparable damage” to the National Butterfly Center, a popular 100-acre riverfront nature reserve adjacent to the Neuhaus property. The wall could act as a dam and redirect floodwater and debris to the sanctuary, destroying an ecosystem which sustains hundreds of native butterfly species and birds, the center said.
Shortly after the ruling, Kolfage posted a video on Twitter of a man standing on the riverbank wearing a fluorescent vest, identified only as “Foreman Mike”, who said that thanks to “patriotic donors” a mile and a half of land had been cleared, and steel bollards and panels would be installed within 48 hours.
Foreman MIKE with a huge announcement just now! WE ARE GETTING IT BUILT! Border agents said “anyone trying to stop us is probably benefiting from the cartels”. @TrumpStudents @DeplorableChoir @fleccas @FogCityMidge @DailyMail @JackPosobiec @RyanAFournier @KatTimpf
929 people are talking about this
“We’re going to be putting this up,” said the foreman, Mike, asking for more donations, while promising to have the barrier built by mid-January 2020. “We have to supercharge it now. It’s time to get really moving.”
On Wednesday, Kolfage said that construction work continued as neither he, or the group, had been physically served with the order.
Work was still going on on Friday afternoon when the Guardian was given access to an adjacent private plot, and witnessed crews moving soil, excavating a trench on a vast stretch of cleared riverbank, and preparing it for concrete foundations and metal posts. A Border Patrol vehicle was parked close to the bulldozers, partially hidden by lofty sugar cane.
An employee of the construction company Fisher Industries, who identified himself as Sean, confirmed that work had continued uninterrupted – despite the injunction.
“They [the construction workers] have told us they are not going to stop,” Sam Pena from the local sheriff’s office said on Thursday. The sheriff’s deputies filed reports documenting the ongoing construction work that appeared to be in violation of the court order.
And, on December 5, the federal government launched separate legal action to stop the construction, on the grounds that it violated binational treaty obligations with Mexico. A temporary injunction was granted by the US District judge Randy Crane.
That federal lawsuit, filed on behalf of the International Boundary and Water Commission (IWBC), states that required hydraulic studies proving that the wall would not worsen flooding on the river had not been completed, and scant detail about the planned work had been submitted.
An injunction issued by a Texas state judge on Tuesday, cited “imminent and irreparable damage” to the National Butterfly Center if the border wall was built. Photograph: Delcia Lopez/The Guardian
“At last the federal government is doing what it should be doing,” said Sarah Burt, a lawyer from EarthJustice, a not-for-profit legal group, which is suing the government over the border wall. “There is still a rule of law in this country, and everyone should be subject to it.”
But, in a twist, judge Crane agreed to dismiss WBTW as a defendant after its lawyer and prominent conservative, Kris Kobach, the former Kansas secretary of state, claimed the group mostly handled “social media cheerleading” for the project and was nothing more than a passive investor, providing only 5% of the funding.
“We don’t have any control over the project or the machinery or what’s going on,” Kobach said in court in the Southern District of Texas.
The removal of WBTW from the lawsuit raised questions about the group’s finances, which has attracted scrutiny from the authorities – and supporters who have donated at least $25m to build a wall.
“Where is the money?” said Javier Peña, a lawyer acting for the National Butterfly Center. “They use fear and anger to divide people and convince them to give money for a wall which they now say they are not funding. We build the Wall is either misleading its donors, which is fraud, or lying to a federal judge.”
Kolfage has said he aims to raise $1bn for his cause to boost the Trump administration’s push for a new barrier between the US and Mexico, which Trump has repeatedly promised, in vain,would be “paid for by Mexico”.
On its website, the group claims that Project 1, a wall stretching just under a mile long in New Mexico, has stopped “100% of illegal crossings”. The Hidalgo county stretch is known as Project 2, and “multiple [other] projects are underway”, Kolfage told the Guardian.
“We Build the Wall are investors in wall projects, we are not contractors nor are we builders. We fund walls and unite people to build border walls. There is no discrepancy, these walls would not be built without our funds,” said Kolfage.
Thursday’s federal injunction prevents Neuhaus and Sons, the landowners, Fisher Industries and its parent company, Fisher Sand and Gravel, from excavating and clearing more land, or constructing any permanent structures until the IBWC determines whether it could cause flooding or redirect the water flow in violation of the 1970 binational treaty.
The North Dakota-based Fisher companies are owned by Tommy Fisher, who has made regular appearances on Trump’s favorite TV channel, Fox News, to boast about how he could build the wall, faster, better and cheaper than anyone else.
Earlier this week, Fisher Sand and Gravel was awarded a $400m Pentagon contract to build 31 miles of wall in Arizona – despite a history of environmental and tax violations
The chair of the House Committee on Homeland Security, Bennie Thompson, has called for an investigation to determine whether Trump unduly influenced the military’s decision to award the contract to Fisher.
Multiple requests to Tommy Fisher for comment have not received a response.
The Trump administration has suspended 28 laws relating to clean water, public lands, endangered species and the rights of Native Americans in order to speed up construction of the border wall.
But such waivers only apply to the official government wall; rogue private projects must obey all laws and treaties.
The Texas lawsuit in which the butterfly center is a plaintiff also includes a defamation claim, because Kolfage has repeatedly accused Marianna Treviño-Wright, head of the butterfly center, of criminality.
Kolfage responded: “There’s no defamation. The open border policies of the butterfly people 100% enable the cartels and humanitarian crisis. No one crosses the border without paying the cartels.”
Mariam, when she was pregnant. (photo: Luthfan/Eyeem/Getty)
People Who Wear the Hijab Face Unique Discrimination During Pregnancy
Tasmiha Khan, VICE
Khan writes: "'It is intimidating [for patients] to ask a question to begin with. Even though I am a physician, people automatically assume that I don't speak English or I have to have a husband to be heard.'"
Tasmiha Khan, VICE
Khan writes: "'It is intimidating [for patients] to ask a question to begin with. Even though I am a physician, people automatically assume that I don't speak English or I have to have a husband to be heard.'"
EXCERPT:
In September, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention released a special report that looked at racial and ethnic disparities in pregnancy-related deaths in the U.S. from 2007 to 2016. Indeed, racial disparities are a big part of this problem—Black women are three to four times more likely to die while pregnant or in the months after birth than are white women, and the CDC has also noted that more than half of pregnancy-related deaths are preventable.
It is no surprise that, as another recent study shows, women of color can feel disempowered during pregnancy, birth, and postpartum care thanks to providers delivering health information in a leading way rather than allowing the patient's true informed consent in decision-making. While data from the new CDC report is critical to understanding why U.S. maternal mortality rates are at an all-time high and women of color are being affected most, there's a segment of the population that is not properly accounted for: Muslim women who live in the United States. In fact, CDC reports on maternal mortality are limited to five racial/ethnic groups with no indication of religion: white, Black, Hispanic, Native American, and Asian/Pacific Islander. In addition, there is no breakdown of Middle Eastern, North African, or South Asian women, racial groups where Muslim women are likely to be represented.
Walmart worker. (photo: AP
This Is the Hottest Job Market Since the 1990s. Why Aren't Wages Growing Faster?
Heather Long, The Washington Post
Long writes: "By just about any metric this is the best job market since the late 1990s. The economy has been adding jobs for 110 straight months - a record streak. Jobs are plentiful. Unemployment is at a half-century low."
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Heather Long, The Washington Post
Long writes: "By just about any metric this is the best job market since the late 1990s. The economy has been adding jobs for 110 straight months - a record streak. Jobs are plentiful. Unemployment is at a half-century low."
READ MORE
Amir Zubeideh at home this week. (photo: Lex Levac)
These Boys Would Have Made It Home After School, if It Weren't for Israeli Sniper Fire
Gideon Levy and Alex Levac, Haaretz
Excerpt: "Anyone who sees Amir Zubeideh would find it hard to believe that there are soldiers who are capable of aiming their rifles at such a small child - he looks younger than his 11 years - and shooting him with live ammunition. "
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Gideon Levy and Alex Levac, Haaretz
Excerpt: "Anyone who sees Amir Zubeideh would find it hard to believe that there are soldiers who are capable of aiming their rifles at such a small child - he looks younger than his 11 years - and shooting him with live ammunition. "
READ MORE
Logging company Interfor's operation on Gilford Island, located in the southern tip of the Great Bear Rainforest. (photo: April Bencze)
Left Behind: Staggering Level of Waste at British Columbia Rainforest Logging Operation
Ben Parfitt, The Narwhal
Parfitt writes: "A controversial timber-pricing system may be to blame as forestry companies log the best and leave the rest."
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Ben Parfitt, The Narwhal
Parfitt writes: "A controversial timber-pricing system may be to blame as forestry companies log the best and leave the rest."
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The North Coast and Central Coast regions of B.C. are unique because of the highly diverse plant, animal, and marine life and the equally diverse geography and climate.
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