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Two Democrats running for statewide office received a significant infusion of taxpayer cash into their campaigns through the state’s public financing system, state officials said Monday.Quentin Palfrey, one of the three Democrats running for the state’s open attorney general’s seat, received $165,412, while state Representative Tami Gouveia, who is running in the three-way primary for lieutenant governor, got $143,994, according to the state Office of Campaign and Political Finance.The funds would more than double what either had in their campaign accounts at the end of June. They’d also have the ability to access more public funds ahead of the Sept. 6 primary, depending on how much money they raise.Massachusetts’ public financing system offers some public funds to statewide candidates in return for agreeing to limits on spending. The money comes from taxpayers who voluntarily divert $1 to the program from the state income taxes they owe.State campaign finance officials said that roughly $1 million is available overall, which would be evenly split for candidates between the Sept. 6 primary and the November election.Three other statewide candidates besides Palfrey and Gouveia had initially joined the program, though two — Republican gubernatorial candidate Geoff Diehl and his running mate, Leah Allen — later said they wouldn’t accept any public money. The other, Republican attorney general candidate Jay McMahon, doesn’t have a primary opponent, thus is ineligible to receive public funds for his primary race.But the spending limits that the candidates agreed to can be flexible. If a candidate’s opponents do not join the program, a participating candidate is then only limited to spending up to their opponents’ self-imposed maximum.None of Palfrey or Gouveia’s primary opponents ultimately opted in, and in Palfrey’s case, he’s now capped at spending $12 million — a huge sum for a down-ballot primary race — after one of his opponents, Shannon Liss-Riordan, submitted that as her self-imposed spending limit. Gouveia is capped at $5 million.The state’s complex public financing system is set up so that gubernatorial candidates get public funds first, with surplus money going to other statewide candidates until it runs out.Initially, Diehl, the former lawmaker now running for governor, decided to join the program, which would have made him eligible to tap into hundreds of thousands of dollars in public funds.But the next day, he said that neither he nor Allen, a lieutenant governor candidate, would take any public funds and that he opted in as “a strategic decision to try to limit the role of outside money” in the race, even though the program doesn’t place limits on super PAC or other forms of outside spending. Diehl and Allen ultimately did not submit the required paperwork showing whether they hit a certain threshold in his fund-raising to receive public funds, according to Jason Tait, an OCPF spokesman.That meant funding was available for Palfrey and Gouveia, both of whom have been outraised by their opponents this year.A spokesman for Palfrey, who ended June with $135,284 in his campaign account and had raised about $320,751 this year before receiving the taxpayer financing, said the public funds “coupled with our strong fund-raising well positions our campaign to communicate with primary voters.”“Our campaign is fueled by a grassroots effort that reaches every corner of the Commonwealth,” Joe Caiazzo, a Palfrey spokesman, said in a statement.Palfrey won the state party’s endorsement at its June convention, narrowly topping former Boston city councilor Andrea Campbell on a second ballot. Campbell, a former Boston city councilor, has raised more than $1.1 million so far this year, while Liss-Riordan has loaned her campaign $500,000 of her own money, making up the bulk of the $721,000 she’s raised this year, according to state campaign finance data.Gouveia ended June with less than $56,000 on hand and had raised about$192,000 this year before getting the public funds. State Senator Eric Lesser, meanwhile, had more than $1 million at his disposal to close last month, while Salem Mayor Kim Driscoll, the party’s endorsed candidate, had $276,341 on hand.Gouveia said the public funds will “allows candidates like me, a social worker and organizer, to spread our message further.”“Elections should not be about who has the most corporate donations or who knows the most max donors, but instead about who will fight for everyday people every single day,” Gouveia said in a statement. “Public financing is good for democracy and good for Massachusetts.”Matt Stout can be reached at matt.stout@globe.com. Follow him on Twitter @mattpstout.

US Campaigns & Elections

Facebook owner Meta is quietly curtailing some of the safeguards designed to thwart voting misinformation or foreign interference in U.S. elections as the November midterm vote approaches.It’s a sharp departure from the social media giant’s multibillion-dollar efforts to enhance the accuracy of posts about U.S. elections and regain trust from lawmakers and the public after their outrage over learning the company had exploited people’s data and allowed falsehoods to overrun its site during the 2016 campaign.The pivot is raising alarm about Meta’s priorities and about how some might exploit the world’s most popular social media platforms to spread misleading claims, launch fake accounts and rile up partisan extremists.“They’re not talking about it,” said former Facebook policy director Katie Harbath, now the CEO of the tech and policy firm Anchor Change. “Best case scenario: They’re still doing a lot behind the scenes. Worst case scenario: They pull back, and we don’t know how that’s going to manifest itself for the midterms on the platforms.”Since last year, Meta has shut down an examination into how falsehoods are amplified in political ads on Facebook by indefinitely banishing the researchers from the site.CrowdTangle, the online tool that the company offered to hundreds of newsrooms and researchers so they could identify trending posts and misinformation across Facebook or Instagram, is now inoperable on some days.Public communication about the company’s response to election misinformation has gone decidedly quiet. Between 2018 and 2020, the company released more than 30 statements that laid out specifics about how it would stifle U.S. election misinformation, prevent foreign adversaries from running ads or posts around the vote and subdue divisive hate speech.Top executives hosted question and answer sessions with reporters about new policies. CEO Mark Zuckerberg wrote Facebook posts promising to take down false voting information and authored opinion articles calling for more regulations to tackle foreign interference in U.S. elections via social media.But this year Meta has only released a one-page document outlining plans for the fall elections, even as potential threats to the vote remain clear. Several Republican candidates are pushing false claims about the U.S. election across social media. In addition, Russia and China continue to wage aggressive social media propaganda campaigns aimed at further political divides among American audiences.Meta says that elections remain a priority and that policies developed in recent years around election misinformation or foreign interference are now hard-wired into company operations.“With every election, we incorporate what we’ve learned into new processes and have established channels to share information with the government and our industry partners,” Meta spokesman Tom Reynolds said.He declined to say how many employees would be on the project to protect U.S. elections full time this year.During the 2018 election cycle, the company offered tours and photos and produced head counts for its election response war room. But The New York Times reported the number of Meta employees working on this year’s election had been cut from 300 to 60, a figure Meta disputes.Reynolds said Meta will pull hundreds of employees who work across 40 of the company’s other teams to monitor the upcoming vote alongside the election team, with its unspecified number of workers.The company is continuing many initiatives it developed to limit election misinformation, such as a fact-checking program started in 2016 that enlists the help of news outlets to investigate the veracity of popular falsehoods spreading on Facebook or Instagram. The Associated Press is part of Meta’s fact-checking program.This month, Meta also rolled out a new feature for political ads that allows the public to search for details about how advertisers target people based on their interests across Facebook and Instagram.Yet, Meta has stifled other efforts to identify election misinformation on its sites.It has stopped making improvements to CrowdTangle, a website it offered to newsrooms around the world that provides insights about trending social media posts. Journalists, fact-checkers and researchers used the website to analyze Facebook content, including tracing popular misinformation and who is responsible for it.That tool is now “dying,” former CrowdTangle CEO Brandon Silverman, who left Meta last year, told the Senate Judiciary Committee this spring.Silverman told the AP that CrowdTangle had been working on upgrades that would make it easier to search the text of internet memes, which can often be used to spread half-truths and escape the oversight of fact-checkers, for example.“There’s no real shortage of ways you can organize this data to make it useful for a lot of different parts of the fact-checking community, newsrooms and broader civil society,” Silverman said.Not everyone at Meta agreed with that transparent approach, Silverman said. The company has not rolled out any new updates or features to CrowdTangle in more than a year, and it has experienced hourslong outages in recent months.Meta also shut down efforts to investigate how misinformation travels through political ads.The company indefinitely revoked access to Facebook for a pair of New York University researchers who they said collected unauthorized data from the platform. The move came hours after NYU professor Laura Edelson said she shared plans with the company to investigate the spread of disinformation on the platform around the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol, which is now the subject of a House investigation.“What we found, when we looked closely, is that their systems were probably dangerous for a lot of their users,” Edelson said.Privately, former and current Meta employees say exposing those dangers around the American elections have created public and political backlash for the company.Republicans routinely accuse Facebook of unfairly censoring conservatives, some of whom have been kicked off for breaking the company’s rules. Democrats, meanwhile, regularly complain the tech company hasn’t gone far enough to curb disinformation.“It’s something that’s so politically fraught, they’re more trying to shy away from it than jump in head first.” said Harbath, the former Facebook policy director. “They just see it as a big old pile of headaches.”Meanwhile, the possibility of regulation in the U.S. no longer looms over the company, with lawmakers failing to reach any consensus over what oversight the multibillion-dollar company should be subjected to.Free from that threat, Meta’s leaders have devoted the company’s time, money and resources to a new project in recent months.Zuckerberg dived into this massive rebranding and reorganization of Facebook last October, when he changed the company’s name to Meta Platforms Inc. He plans to spend years and billions of dollars evolving his social media platforms into a nascent virtual reality construct called the “metaverse” — sort of like the internet brought to life, rendered in 3D.His public Facebook page posts now focus on product announcements, hailing artificial intelligence, and photos of him enjoying life. News about election preparedness is announced in company blog posts not written by him.In one of Zuckerberg’s posts last October, after an ex-Facebook employee leaked internal documents showing how the platform magnifies hate and misinformation, he defended the company. He also reminded his followers that he had pushed Congress to modernize regulations around elections for the digital age.“I know it’s frustrating to see the good work we do get mischaracterized, especially for those of you who are making important contributions across safety, integrity, research and product,” he wrote on Oct. 5. “But I believe that over the long term if we keep trying to do what’s right and delivering experiences that improve people’s lives, it will be better for our community and our business.”It was the last time he discussed the Menlo Park, California-based company’s election work in a public Facebook post.

US Campaigns & Elections

The head of fundraising group Climate 200 has endorsed a cap on electoral spending proposed by Labor, but warned it must not be set at a level that helps incumbents and disadvantages new political players.Byron Fay, the executive director of Climate 200, made the comments on Wednesday in response to the special minister of state, Don Farrell, revealing the government would aim to legislate a cap as part of reforms, including truth in political advertising and improving adherence to the one-vote one-value principle.In an address to the National Press Club in Canberra, Fay also outlined that the fundraising body would not go into “hibernation” after its success getting six independent MPs and one senator elected in May, and might target state seats in Victoria and New South Wales.Climate 200 helped raise $13m from 11,200 donors, supporting a slew of successful candidates in the former Liberal-held seats of Wentworth, North Sydney, Mackellar, Goldstein, Kooyong and Curtin; and David Pocock’s Senate campaign in the Australian Capital Territory.On Sunday, Farrell told Guardian Australia that Labor would seek to legislate spending caps after an inquiry into the 2022 election. Labor was concerned about the tens of millions in electoral spending racked up by the United Australia Party at the past two elections.Asked his view on the proposed reform, Fay said the spending cap needed to be considered “in the context of a root-and-branch review of all the incumbency benefits the major parties have given themselves”.Those included “pork-barrelling” aimed at winning votes and $750,000 every three years for MPs’ office expenses, including electoral communications, which Fay said were “often used for campaigning”.Fay said he was “very open-minded to the idea of caps” but it had to be legislated to “make sure we are not disadvantaging future community groups that want to put up community leaders”.“We should think very carefully about any reform in that space so it doesn’t entrench the advantages the major parties have given themselves.”Fay ruled out providing support to independents, after the Albanese government cut their staffing allocation from eight staff each to five.“Not a single independent MP we supported has asked us for support to help them deal with their staffing and is not our mandate.”Unlike after the 2019 election, Climate 200 would not go into hibernation but would be guided by donors and supporters about how it engage in future campaigns, he said.The model was “demand driven” and Climate 200 might be willing to help state candidates if “people get mobilised and start to speak to their friends and colleagues get and start to have a different type of community leadership”, he said.“There is some momentum building in Victoria but it is a long way away from being the type of campaign we will be supporting at this time.”Fay said the “stranglehold” of the two major parties had been “shattered” at the 2022 election, which had shown “well-organised communities with the right support can take on the party machines and win against former and would-be future prime ministers”.“The result was a launchpad for the community independence movement, not a landing zone. Now, the real work begins.”Fay warned that Australia was still “miles away” from a science-based response to global heating, as the Coalition’s targets were consistent with three degrees of heating and Labor’s two degrees.Asked how parliamentarians should respond to Labor’s take-it or leave-it approach to its proposed 43% emissions cut by 2030, Fay noted that target “enshrined in our nationally determined contribution is that it is a step in the right direction” and that voters “want to see parliamentary action”.“We would see that as a stepping stone to greater ambitions and in terms of what the now elected [MPs] and senators want to do, that is entirely up to them.”On Wednesday the Greens leader, Adam Bandt, said that while his minor party in the Senate balance of power was “willing to negotiate on climate … it seems Labor isn’t”.“This ‘my way or the highway’ approach from Labor is setting Australia up for a very long three years. The government should choose cooperation over confrontation.”Bandt warned that Labor’s weak climate targets would be “blown” if it proceeded with new gas projects such as the Northern Territory’s Beetaloo Basin, which he said would lift greenhouse pollution by up to 13%.

US Campaigns & Elections

| August 12, 2022 06:00 AM The White House is bolstering Democrats' appeal to working-class and lower-income voters before November's midterm elections by amplifying President Joe Biden as an opponent of special interests. But Republicans, who have been eroding the demographic's support of Democrats over successive cycles, are skeptical Biden and his congressional colleagues can counter their perception as being the party of the "elite" as the economy continues to recover after the pandemic. BIDEN UNABLE TO SHAKE TRUMP AS MIDTERM ELECTION PICTURE GETS MURKIER Working-class and lower-income voters used to provide a deep well of support for previous Democratic presidents, according to pollster David Paleologos. "But the wobbly economy is hitting this segment hard, resulting in a significant change of purchasing habits this year," Paleologos told the Washington Examiner. Paleologos, director of Suffolk University's Political Research Center, cited his organization's 100-days-before-the-midterm-elections poll, in which 70% of voters with household incomes less than $50,000 per annum reported eating out less frequently, while 60% were buying fewer groceries and driving less often. "When the quality of your life declines that fast through no fault of your own, someone is going to pay at the ballot box," he said, adding that a similar dynamic was evident among respondents without a college degree. The White House's focus on Biden's fights against special interests comes after a series of presidential legislative victories. They include the bipartisan $280 billion CHIPS and Science Act and veterans-centric PACT Act, as well as the Senate-approved $700 billion Inflation Reduction Act, which the House will consider Friday. And they are supplemented by the nationwide average gas price being less than $4 per gallon, strong job numbers, and the precision drone strike that killed al Qaeda leader Ayman al Zawahiri in Afghanistan. Simultaneously, a briefing with senior administration officials about the shift was scheduled roughly 90 days before the 2022 elections. Although Democrats acknowledge it will be difficult for the party to hold on to the House, odds regarding the Senate have become more favorable. And contestable seats, such as those in Pennsylvania and Wisconsin, are home to working-class and lower-income voters to whom the special interests talk speaks. Former President Donald Trump, who has helped Republicans with the group, clinched Pennsylvania by 44,000 votes, or less than a percentage point, and Wisconsin by 23,000 votes, again by less than a point, over 2016 Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton. Biden returned the states to the Democrats' ledger four years later, taking Pennsylvania by 81,000 votes, or a point, and Wisconsin by 21,000, or less than a point. "During this recess, the White House will drive one clear message to the American people," Communications Director Kate Bedingfield and senior adviser to the president Anita Dunn wrote in a memo, referring to gun reform, abortion access executive action, and the climate and healthcare spending bill. "Every step of the way, congressional Republicans sided with the special interests — pushing an extreme agenda that costs families." Despite the promotion, a White House aide downplayed the idea that the special interests framework is new or is related to concerns about Democrats' relationship with working-class and lower-income voters. "Democrats have been consistently pushing this kind of message and these kinds of policies, including in the way we fought Trump’s attempts to repeal the ACA and his tax plan," he said, abbreviating the Affordable Care Act. Instead, for another Democratic source, 2022 campaigns will be based on a combination of the party's positive record under Biden and drawing a negative contrast with Republicans. "President Biden and Democrats are making these historic wins," he said. "We are also, I think, across the board in the Democratic Party, highlighting Republican opposition and how Republicans don't have an agenda that is going to deliver for the American people." The GOP, including Republican National Committee spokesman Will O’Grady, dismissed the White House's emphasis, underscored the day after Biden departed for a long weekend in South Carolina and July's year-ending consumer price index increase of 8.5% and flat month-to-month rate. "Joe Biden is on vacation amid 8.5% inflation and a recession," he said. "He couldn't be more out of touch with Americans if he tried." A second Republican staffer contended Democrats' argument that the party is against special interests has been undermined by accusations Biden was involved with son Hunter's business dealings when he was vice president. CLICK HERE TO READ MORE FROM THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER "Biden is underwater with minorities who make up a lot of the working class, and for Hispanics and other minorities, their top issue is the economy," she said. "So when Biden says inflation is 0% or the economy is great while on another vacation, it is so out of touch with what Americans are feeling."

US Campaigns & Elections

More Democrats than Republicans questioned in a new survey say they are more likely to vote in the midterm elections after the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade on Friday. The NPR/PBS NewsHour/Marist poll, published on Monday, found that 78 percent of Democrats said they are more likely to vote in this year’s midterms in response to the ruling, which opened the door to state bans on abortion.  When asked the same question, 54 percent of Republican respondents said they are more likely to vote in November, while 53 percent of independents agreed.   Eighty-eight percent of Democrats, meanwhile, said they strongly oppose the Supreme Court’s ruling on abortion, as did 53 percent of independents.  By comparison, 77 percent of Republican respondents said they support the ruling, while 10 percent opposed it.  Additionally, 59 percent of female respondents said in the poll that they disapprove of the court’s decision to overturn Roe v. Wade, and 54 percent of male respondents agreed with the same sentiment.  The Supreme Court in a ruling on Friday overturned Roe v. Wade, the landmark decision that established the right to abortion, in a 5-4 vote. Dozens of states are expected to tighten abortion access as a result of the ruling. Fifty-one percent of those surveyed in the new poll also said they will vote for a candidate who would support a federal law to restore the right to an abortion, while 36 percent of respondents said they would vote against a candidate who supports abortion rights.  The new NPR/PBS NewsHour/Marist poll was conducted June 24-25 with a total of 941 respondents. The survey had a margin of error of 4.9 percentage points. Tags Abortion in the United States abortion rights nonprofit organization NPR NPR NPR Poll PBS-NPR-Marist poll Roe v. Wade Roe v. Wade supreme court abortion ruling Supreme Court of the United States

US Campaigns & Elections

Sen. Rick Scott (R-FL) declined to endorse Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell to be the Senate majority leader should Republicans regain the Senate after the midterm elections. Rumors have been swirling that former President Donald Trump has been courting Scott behind the scenes to mount a challenge against McConnell for the No. 1 Senate Republican slot, but Scott said he does not plan to run for the top spot when he spoke to reporters Wednesday morning. MCCONNELL SAYS HE SUPPORTS BIPARTISAN GUN LEGISLATION “There’ll be an election. ... Right now, I don’t know if anybody is going to run against Leader McConnell,” he told reporters. “I don’t have a plan to run.” Scott, who is the chairman of the National Republican Senatorial Committee, has been at odds with McConnell since he unveiled an agenda for the party that McConnell publicly rejected. At the time, Republicans faced criticism from Democrats for not releasing a clear slew of policy objectives should they win the midterm elections. Democrats saw an opening in Scott’s proposal, honing in on a provision that maintained, “All Americans should pay some income tax to have skin in the game, even if a small amount. Currently, over half of Americans pay no income tax.” Democrats panned the measure as a tax increase on the poor. This prompted McConnell to distance Senate Republicans from the proposal. “If we’re fortunate enough to have the majority next year, I’ll be the majority leader. I’ll decide in consultation with my members what to put on the floor,” McConnell told reporters, per the Washington Post. “Let me tell you what would not be a part of our agenda: We will not have as part of our agenda a bill that raises taxes on half the American people and sunsets Social Security and Medicare within five years.” CLICK HERE TO READ MORE FROM THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER Trump has chastised McConnell during rallies over recent months, frustrated with the Senate minority leader’s blunt criticism of his actions surrounding the Capitol riot, which he derided as a “disgraceful dereliction of duty.”

US Campaigns & Elections

Former Vice President Mike Pence on Friday sharply rebuked former President Trump for suggesting he had the ability to overturn the results of the 2020 election, calling the idea “un-American.” “There are those in our party who believe that as the presiding officer over the joint session of Congress, I possessed unilateral authority to reject Electoral College votes. And I heard this week that President Trump said I had the right to ‘overturn the election,'” Pence said at a Federalist Society event in Florida. “President Trump is wrong. I had no right to overturn the election,” Pence continued. “The presidency belongs to the American people, and the American people alone. Frankly, there is almost no idea more un-American than the notion that any one person could choose the American president.” “Under the Constitution, I had no right to change the outcome of our election. And Kamala Harris will have no right to overturn the election when we beat them in 2024,” Pence said to applause. Pence’s remarks were his clearest break yet with his former boss, who has for more than a year claimed without evidence that the 2020 election was fraudulent. Several judges threw out allegations of voter fraud alleged by Trump-aligned attorneys. Trump has periodically attacked Pence for certifying the Electoral College results on Jan. 6, 2021, after a mob of Trump supporters violently stormed the Capitol in a bid to stop the process. Earlier this week, Trump explicitly said Pence should have unilaterally overturned the results that declared Joe Biden president on that day. Trump later suggested a House committee investigating the Jan. 6 riot should probe why Pence did not reject the election results. The events of Jan. 6, 2021, have spurred talks among some lawmakers about strengthening the Electoral Count Act, which governs the way votes are counted and certified by Congress. Pence’s comments on Friday came as part of a broader speech about the need for conservatives to remain true to the Constitution and reject efforts to consolidate power at the federal level. “I understand the disappointment so many feel about the last election. I was on the ballot. But whatever the future holds, I know we did our duty that day,” Pence said. “The truth is, there’s more at stake than our party or our political fortunes. If we lose faith in the Constitution, we won’t just lose elections — we’ll lose our country,” Pence added. Pence repeated his criticism that the media and Democrats should not use the events of Jan. 6 to distract from the issues facing the country and the Biden administration. Pence’s commentary about Jan. 6 and conservative principles was particularly striking given it came hours after the Republican National Committee formally censured Reps. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) and Adam Kinzinger (R-Ill.) for their participation in the House committee investigating the riot and the broader attempts among some Republican leaders to downplay the events of that day. The former vice president urged conservatives to focus on the future, citing immigration, inflation, crime and foreign policy as areas where Republicans can offer an alternative agenda to the Biden administration. Pence is widely considered a potential 2024 GOP presidential candidate, and he has stoked speculation of a possible campaign with visits to early voting states like Iowa, South Carolina and New Hampshire. But his actions to certify the election, and Friday’s criticism of Trump, are likely to complicate his path to the nomination, should he run, given the fervent support of the former president among GOP voters. Trump late Friday responded to Pence’s comments in a lengthy statement that largely avoided direct criticism of the former vice president. Instead, Trump claimed his position was correct and Pence did have the power to reject the election outcome because of “irregularities” in the results. “That’s why the Democrats and RINOs are working feverishly together to change the very law that Mike Pence and his unwitting advisors used on January 6 to say he had no choice,” Trump said in a statement. “If there is fraud or large scale irregularities, it would have been appropriate to send those votes back to the legislatures to figure it out,” the former president added. “The Dems and RINOs want to take that right away. A great opportunity lost, but not forever, in the meantime our Country is going to hell!” Updated at 10:16 p.m.

US Campaigns & Elections

NEWYou can now listen to Fox News articles! The demographics of voters in both the Republican and Democratic parties are changing as the November midterm elections approach, according to recent polls.Republicans are starting to attract more voters in the working class, while Democrats are gaining more votes from wealthier Americans as midterm candidates make their priorities clear in the last four months before the election.The majority of voters consist of working-class citizens, a group that has historically leaned Democrat. Minority voters are likely to see inflation as the country's greatest concern, but the Democratic Party has made clear its main priorities approaching the midterms are abortion, gun laws and climate. This type of agenda is likely to appeal more to wealthier, suburban voters.ECONOMIST LAFFER SAYS RECESSION IMMINENT AS INFLATION HITS 40-YEAR-HIGH: ‘WORST OF ALL POSSIBLE WORLDS’ People shop in a supermarket as rising inflation affects prices in Los Angeles June 13, 2022. (REUTERS/Lucy Nicholson)The two parties are neck and neck with Hispanic voters on the generic congressional ballot after a New York Times-Siena College poll discovered 41% said they would vote Democrat and 38% Republican. During the 2018 midterm election cycle, Democrats had a 47-point advantage among Hispanic voters, a number that has significantly dropped since the election.NBC News conducted a poll this spring that found Democratic support among women with college degrees is up 28 points since 2010, rising from 10 points to 38 over the past decade. The party did not see a rise in any other demographic.With inflation on the rise and hitting a 40-year high of 9.1% in June, these middle-class voters are taking the hit and will be more likely to vote for a candidate this November who plans on making it a priority to tackle the issue.An Associated Press-NORC poll released in early July affirmed that most Americans' biggest concern is inflation, despite Democratic candidates centering campaigns around abortion and gun laws.INFLATION RANKS AS BIGGEST CONCERN TO AMERICANS OVER ABORTION, GUNS: NEW POLLThe poll also revealed the main priorities of most voters from each party. Republicans point to the economy and the rising cost of gas, while Democratic voters are most worried about gun laws. Protesters shout as they join thousands marching around the Arizona Capitol after the Supreme Court decision to overturn the landmark Roe v. Wade abortion decision June 24, 2022, in Phoenix.  (AP Photo/Ross D. Franklin)Hispanic and Latino voters will play a major role in this year's midterms. A Gallup poll released in April found that President Biden's approval rating has significantly dropped among Hispanic voters, from 73% to 52%, since his first few months as president in 2021.The Biden administration has been making recent efforts to attract more votes from the community, with first lady Jill Biden calling it as "unique" as "breakfast tacos" Monday, a comment that received a lot of media attention and backlash from the Hispanic community.REPUBLICANS EXPECTED TO CONTROL HOUSE AFTER 2022 MIDTERMSAccording to the National Republican Congressional Committee, a record number of 81 African Americans are running for GOP seats in 72 congressional districts this midterm. This could potentially lead to more African Americans voting Republican at the polls this November.A recent NYT-Siena College poll showed that African Americans believe crime and gun policies are the country's top issues, while White Americans believe abortion takes precedence.The poll said Democrats are ahead of Republicans in attracting White, college-educated voters. Two-thirds of Democrats also say they do not want President Joe Biden to run for re-election in 2024.CLICK HERE TO GET THE FOX NEWS APPNovember 8 is approaching fast, leaving the candidates with only a few more months to push their campaigns, attract more votes and hope for a win this fall. Aubrie Spady is a college associate for Fox News Digital.

US Campaigns & Elections

President Joe Biden's poll numbers augur poorly for November's midterm elections, particularly when compared to former Presidents Barack Obama and Bill Clinton. But pollsters speculate Biden's political fortunes could improve post-midterm cycle, at least according to trends set by his predecessors. HIGHLAND PARK SHOOTING HEIGHTENS PRESSURE ON BIDEN TO CONFRONT CRIME Past presidents have seen some rise in their approval ratings before their reelections, though not before their first midterm cycle, according to Marquette Law School's poll director, Charles Franklin. Obama, as well as former Presidents George W. Bush and Richard Nixon, are recent examples. By contrast, Clinton and former President Ronald Reagan experienced an approval bounce almost immediately after their first midterm cycle, Franklin said. Donald Trump, George H.W. Bush, Jimmy Carter, and Gerald Ford did not. "So if a recovery is possible, it is likely more than a year away," Franklin told the Washington Examiner. Suffolk University Political Research Center Director David Paleologos predicted the historic pendulum swing against in-power Democrats will be "more pronounced" before then "as the economy continues to falter over the next three months." Biden's current average approval is 39%, while his average disapproval is 56%, according to FiveThirtyEight. At the corresponding point in Obama's and Clinton's terms, Obama's approval was 47% and Clinton's was 46%. Democrats went on to lose 63 House seats in 2010 and 54 in 1994. Interestingly, Trump's approval was 42% this time in 2018, and Democrats gained 41 seats for that next Congress. A Cook Political Report House analysis considers there to be 25 Democratic and eight Republican toss-up campaigns, as well as 11 lean-Republican races, seven of which have Democratic incumbents. It finds another 12 likely Republican contests, three seats of which are occupied by Democrats. It also assesses there to be three Senate toss-up bids, including those of Sens. Mark Kelly (D-AZ), Raphael Warnock (D-GA), and Catherine Cortez Masto (D-NV). Paleologos described Rhode Island's 2nd Congressional District, a previously "safe" Democratic seat that is now deemed a toss-up, as "the canary in the coal mine." "The likely Republican nominee beat every possible Democrat by between 6 and 14 points," Paleologos said of a Suffolk University poll he conducted in June. "If 'safe seats' like this are in jeopardy for Democrats, 'toss-ups' will fare much worse." "In that poll, 6 in 10 Rhode islanders revealed that they are driving less, eating out less often, and cutting back spending on clothes," he added. "Among those making [less than] $50,000 per year, these findings were around 10 points higher." Suffolk University's Rhode Island poll is echoed nationally by a Monmouth University survey fielded last week. More than 4 in 10 people told pollsters they are struggling to maintain their financial standing, with a third citing inflation as their No. 1 concern, followed by 15% who listed gas prices. A majority additionally complained the federal government had hurt their families during the past six months regarding their policy priority and that Biden's agenda has not buoyed the middle class. For Paleologos, Obama and Clinton were boosted by "rebranding" and having other names on their reelection campaign ballots. "In the case of Clinton, he benefited from the presence of independent Ross Perot, who garnered substantial support such that Clinton could win states with 45%-47% of the vote," he said. "In Obama's reelection try, Hurricane Sandy in October helped Obama seal doubters with his genuine leadership. And Republican Mitt Romney was an awful candidate who got crushed by Hispanic voters, and some conservatives weren't motivated to vote for him." White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre has been needled about Democrats attempting to assert their dominance on abortion access and gun reform amid frustration with Biden's own responses. "The president has been also very loud and also very focused on those two issues," she told reporters Wednesday en route to Ohio. "Now, with all of that said, the president believes there is more work to be done. ... He welcomes other voices in the Democratic Party, and he welcomes other voices in the Republican Party as well, to join him." Jean-Pierre reiterated the day prior that Democrats, if dissatisfied, should vote in November so the party can maintain its majorities. CLICK HERE TO READ MORE FROM THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER "This is a president that has been working tirelessly, day in and day out, since he's walked into this administration, fighting for the American public," she said, referring to executive and legislative action. "That is what matters to him. That is what is important — is delivering every way that he can to make sure that we get things done."

US Campaigns & Elections

Brian Schwalb bested on Tuesday his two challengers in the Democratic primary for the second-ever elected attorney general in Washington, D.C., clearing the way for him to assume the role after the November general election. Schwalb's victory brings a close to a contentious primary season, ending a monthslong fight for the nomination after a bumpy start caused the front-runner to be removed from the ballot in April — throwing the race into uncertainty because the remaining three did not hold the same name recognition. Winning the Democratic nomination all but guarantees Schwalb will assume the role in November because there are no Republicans running for the office. MEET THE CANDIDATES RUNNING FOR DC ATTORNEY GENERAL AFTER FRONT-RUNNER DECLINES Incumbent Karl Racine announced in October 2021 that he would not run for reelection, leaving open a coveted seat that acts as the enforcer of district laws. The former front-runner, Kenyan McDuffie, was deemed ineligible by the Council of the District of Columbia due to years of inactivity as a lawyer, launching a three-way race between Schwalb, Bruce Spiva, and Ryan Jones. With McDuffie out of the way, Schwalb rose as the apparent heir, earning the endorsement of incumbent Racine and former Washington Attorney General Irvin Nathan, who was appointed to the post in 2011.  As a first-time candidate and Justice Department alumnus, Schwalb sought to distinguish himself with a grassroots campaign of small-dollar donations. He has prioritized addressing the rise in crime through empowering police and addressing disparities that cause violence. Schwalb vowed to reset the relationship between the mayor’s and the attorney general’s offices while maintaining independence from the city government. The relationship between the two offices has been rocky over the last few years with Racine at the helm, occasionally butting heads with Mayor Muriel Bowser when it comes to addressing crime.  CLICK HERE TO READ MORE FROM THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER Schwalb will likely take on the role of attorney general at a crucial time as the city faces increasing rates of violent crime and gun violence in the district. Reducing crime is consistently ranked as a top priority for Washington voters ahead of the midterm elections. The office will also be tasked with soothing its relationship with the mayor’s office as a growing hostility between the two elected officials has grown more apparent with Racine at the helm over the last few years, occasionally butting heads with Bowser when it comes to addressing crime.

US Campaigns & Elections

On Thursday the Trump campaign sent out a begging-bowl email to hundreds of thousands of supporters, previewing the former president’s rally in Arizona this weekend and teasing the recipients with a portent of momentous things to come.Donald Trump “wants to make sure it’s one of his best rallies yet”, his loyal followers were told. “He is preparing the speech that he will give in front of the American people.”“The speech he will give” was a nudge-nudge wink-wink suggestion that the one-term president is poised to announce another run on the White House in 2024. The tantalizing hint was the latest in an intensifying stream of similar baits – most recently in remarks to Olivia Nuzzi of New York magazine this week – that are driving Republican party leaders to distraction.With inflation running at 40-year highs, and with Joe Biden suffering record lows in his approval ratings, the Republican script for winning back the US House and Senate in November’s midterm elections writes itself. The last thing the party needs, many top Republicans believe, is Trump muddying the message by talking about himself and 2024.“Trump never misses an opportunity to miss an opportunity,” said Frank Luntz, the pollster who has a long track record of advising Republican campaigns. “He has the chance to participate in an amazing, historic Republican resurgence, and instead he’s making everything all about him. That could cost Republicans the majorities.”Luntz said that Republican leaders have told Trump “in no uncertain terms that anything that takes attention away from inflation and Biden’s failures could hand the election to the Democrats. But they know there is nothing they can do to influence him, and that he doesn’t really care.”The incentive to announce early is self-evident: Trump is a past master at deflecting public attention from inconvenient truths. It is no coincidence that his dalliance with a third presidential bid comes just when he is taking a battering at the hands of the congressional hearings into the January 6 insurrection at the US Capitol.Millions of Americans have watched live as the January 6 committee has exposed the lengths to which the then-sitting president was prepared to go to hold onto power having lost the 2020 election. He tried to grab the steering wheel of his armored vehicle to turn it towards the Capitol and join the insurrectionists; he splattered White House walls with ketchup in a fit of rage; and when his vice-president faced a mob of violent white supremacists chanting “Hang Mike Pence!” he told aides that “Mike deserves it”.“It’s the cumulative weight of the evidence that’s piling up,” said Charlie Sykes, a prominent conservative commentator who edits the Trump-critical news site the Bulwark. “The most damaging evidence is coming from people within Trump’s orbit. That’s potentially the greatest danger for Donald Trump: it’s the people closest to him, people who were inside the Oval Office, who are saying it was a big lie.”People like Trump’s then-attorney general Bill Barr who testified that he told the president to his face that his claims that the election was stolen were “crazy stuff” and “bullshit”. Or Pat Cipollone, the White House counsel, who declared in a heated Oval Office meeting a month after the election that seizing voting machines was a “terrible idea” and “not how we do things in the United States”.It is not yet clear whether the hearings have managed to launch a torpedo sufficiently explosive to sink USS Trump. But the vessel is clearly taking on water, as is demonstrated by the polls.Trump supporters storm the Capitol on January 6. Photograph: Jim Urquhart/ReutersA revealing survey from the New York Times / Siena College this week showed that more than half of Republican primary voters want to move on from Trump. Though the former president remains dominant in the field of possible candidates, there is one obvious and growing threat: Ron DeSantis, the governor of Florida, who is quietly but steadily gaining strength.“Trump is dropping,” Luntz said. “Six months ago he was at 60%, and no one else was in double digits. Now he’s in the upper 40s and DeSantis has climbed into the 20s. You see poll after poll suggesting a majority of Republicans not wanting him to run again.”That explains the baby steps that some Republican leaders have begun to take to detach themselves from Trump ahead of a possible 2024 head-to-head. Last month DeSantis, who initially adopted the mantle of Trumpism but is now forging his own iteration of it, pointedly let it be known that he was not interested in Trump’s endorsement in his gubernatorial re-election race.Pence, in May, campaigned with the governor of Georgia, Brian Kemp, in his primary re-election contest in which Trump had backed a rival candidate (Kemp went on to win).Such activity, tentative though it may yet be, is matched by moves among those who are arguably the real powerbrokers in the Republican party: the major donors. “Donors are increasingly flocking to and chatting about Ron DeSantis – he is increasingly sucking up all the oxygen,” said Dan Eberhart, a Denver, Colorado-based businessman who is himself a longtime Republican donor. “They are tired of rehashing the 2020 election. They like Trump’s policies, but not the drama. If he runs they will vote for him, but their preference would be to have someone else like Trump on the top of the ticket,” Eberhart said.One of those critical battleground states is Arizona which Biden won in 2020 by just 10,000 votes. A fascinating insight into the sea-change that is happening in the Grand Canyon state is given by Rusty Bowers, Republican speaker of the Arizona House.In the fourth day of the January 6 hearings last month, Bowers related in searing detail how he had refused to play along with Trump’s plot to overturn Biden’s victory in his state. Asked at the hearing what he thought of a Trump-backed scheme to send fake electors to Washington countering Biden’s win, he called it a “tragic parody”, citing the words he wrote in his journal at the time: “I do not want to be a winner by cheating”.This week Bowers elucidated his thinking on the future of Trump and the Republican party in Arizona to the Guardian. In response to Guardian questions about Trump’s possibly imminent announcement of another presidential run, he talked about the growing exhaustion that he and many other Republicans are feeling.“I know I am no-one in the great scheme of things, and Mr Trump still has a lot of sway here with the extreme part of the Republican party,” Bowers began. “I personally am more upset that we have inflation robbing us of our financial security and many of our seniors are very worried.”He went on to say that “many Republicans are tired of the friction between the poles of the parties and would like us to focus on getting water supplies increased for our arid state, getting common sense solutions to the border which has gone crazy and which causes much of the angst that the extremists take advantage of. I am in that camp and know there are many with me.”He ended with this reflection: “While the fringes focus on the past, we want to tackle the present and future progress we need.”If those are the expressed views of one of the most powerful Republicans in a key swing state, it is a fair assumption that similar ennui is setting in across the country. The question is, will any of the leaders of the party have the guts to act on it?“This is an ideal off-ramp for Republicans to take from Trump, but they’ve had so many other off-ramps they’ve refused to take,” Sykes said. “The one thing we’ve learned is that the Republican party is ultimately invertebrate – it just cannot stand up to someone like Donald Trump, even in these circumstances.”Luntz’s assessment was more bullish about the prospects of Trump being ousted. “No one attacks Republicans more viciously than Donald Trump, not even top Democrats like Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer,” he said.“Eventually that will come back to bite him.”

US Campaigns & Elections

Rep. Fred Upton (R-Mich.), who voted to impeach then-President Trump following the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol riot, said on Sunday he believes Trump will run again in 2024 and that voters “still like him a lot.” Upton predicted to CNN “State of the Union” co-anchor Dana Bash that the former president will be difficult to beat if he pursues a third bid for the White House amid high prices at the pump and other economic challenges. “He’s had a number of decisive wins where he’s endorsed candidates that they have won,” Upton said of Trump. “He’s had a few losses as well, but he certainly entertains a majority of the Republican base and will be hard to stop.”  Democrats are facing historical headwinds as this year’s midterm elections approach, a political problem exacerbated by voters’ concerns over President Biden’s handling of the economy. “As we look at the economy, we look at gas prices, all these different things, folks are not really happy with the Biden administration, which is why he is mired at a level even below where Donald Trump was at this point in his tenure,” Upton said on Sunday. Biden’s approval rating clocked in at 39 percent, according to a USA Today-Suffolk University poll released last Monday that mirrors other recent dismal surveys for the president. Meanwhile, Upton has faced increasing criticism from his own party after supporting legislation to establish an independent commission to investigate Jan. 6 alongside 34 other House Republicans as well as joining nine of his Republican colleagues in impeaching Trump. One of those 10 Republicans, Rep. Tom Rice (S.C.), was defeated in his GOP primary last Tuesday against former state Rep. Russell Fry, whom Trump endorsed. Despite recent victories from many Trump-backed candidates, Upton, who is not running for reelection, said on Sunday he expects some Republicans who voted to impeach Trump will remain in office. “We will see when these primaries are over, but, yes, I think there will be some of the 10 that are standing,” Upton said.

US Campaigns & Elections

Election officials across the country are under attack, egged on by former President Trump’s false claims that ballot fraud was responsible for his 2020 defeat. Vicki Gordon, a candidate for Contra Costa County clerk-recorder, drives away from a Pleasant Hill home on June 1, 2022, after she was caught taking a campaign sign of an opponent. (Photo courtesy of Anna Stahl) While Trump’s onslaught is based on lies, it is critical that those who oversee our elections are above reproach — that they provide no opportunity for criticism that can be used as a wedge to undermine confidence in our balloting process. That’s why Vicki Gordon, the second-place finisher in the June 7 race for Contra Costa County clerk-recorder, should drop out of the Nov. 8 runoff election. Gordon wants the job overseeing the county’s elections. But, as we reported in an editorial just days before the primary, Gordon was caught taking an opponent’s campaign sign. It was a cringeworthy moment, one for which Gordon attempted to apologize at the time. She now admits it “was a terrible mistake.” But the true show of contrition would be to exit the race. Gordon revealed in that moment that, depending on the account of events, at best she has horrible judgment and at worst she was willing to put personal gain above election integrity. Either way, she’s not the person who should be running Contra Costa’s elections. This is a county already reeling from the felony convictions of former District Attorney Mark Peterson and former Clerk-Recorder Joe Canciamilla, who were both caught illegally using campaign funds for personal expenses. The disrepute of these officials has unfairly tarnished the hard work of their staff members. The last thing the elections office needs is another questionable leader. We supported Gordon two years ago when she ran unsuccessfully for reelection to the Contra Costa Community College District board and was subjected to a sleezy political attack. But being a victim in one campaign doesn’t excuse her actions in another. What she did on June 1 was inexcusable. Gordon was taking a sign from a Pleasant Hill property when the homeowner confronted her. Gordon apologized repeatedly and left the sign. She later said it was on the shoulder of the road leaning against a retaining wall, which she thought was improperly in the public right of way. She said she wanted to return it to the opponent before it was confiscated. Homeowner Anna Stahl says that the campaign sign Vicki Gordon took on June 1 was firmly staked in the planter area above her retaining wall. Gordon says is was on the ground below leaning against the wall. (Photo courtesy of Anna Stahl)  Gordon’s explanation doesn’t make sense. The homeowner, Anna Stahl, who took a picture of Gordon’s car and license plate as she drove away, says the sign was firmly stuck in the ground in the planter area of her property above the retaining wall. But even if the sign were on the ground in front of the retaining wall, that was not justification for Gordon taking it. Despite the incident, or maybe because it happened so late in the campaign, Gordon still managed to garner 24% of the vote, enough to finish second in the four-way race and qualify for the runoff. Kristin Braun Connelly, who is by far the best candidate, finished first in the June 7 election with 34% of the vote. Since the election, Gordon has not returned messages from Pleasant Hill police, who have called and visited her home twice. It’s unlikely this case will result in a criminal prosecution. Gordon left the sign behind when she was caught, and the district attorney’s office has bigger cases to pursue. But the issue for voters is not whether a crime was committed. It’s whether a lack of good judgment was unveiled. And it clearly was. For the sake of public confidence in the county’s election system, Gordon should abandon her campaign.

US Campaigns & Elections

HUNTSVILLE, Alabama — Rep. Mo Brooks delivered an angry, bitter concession speech after media outlets projected Katie Britt the winner of the runoff election to determine Alabama’s Republican Senate nominee, saying his defeat was a major victory for the Democrats. “It’s always appropriate to congratulate the winners, and some of these winners might be a little bit unexpected, but I’d be remiss if I did not congratulate the Alabama Democratic Party for helping to ensure that the Democratic nominee in the Republican primary won,” Brooks said Tuesday evening during a prepared speech to supporters who gathered with the congressman for an election night party at a Huntsville gun range. “Congratulations to the Democrats. They now have two nominees in the general election,” Brooks continued. “Another group I’d be remiss if I did not congratulate are special interest groups generally and more specifically the special interest groups that support open borders and cheap foreign labor. They worked hard for their values.” REP. MO BROOKS AND THE DOWNFALL OF A GOP MAGA CONSERVATIVE IN PRO-TRUMP ALABAMA Britt was leading Brooks 65% to 35% with more than 60% of precincts reporting and winning all 67 counties in the state in what unfolded as a low-turnout runoff triggered when Britt won the May 24 GOP primary but fell just short of the required 50% of the vote. Brooks never congratulated Britt during his speech, but the congressman’s spokesman confirmed to the Washington Examiner that he did call Britt and concede the election. Brooks’s speech, which capped decades of public service in the Alabama legislature and in Congress, was typical for the congressman — feisty, unapologetic, and mocking of his political opponents. Britt was favored to cruise to victory in the runoff for weeks. But the congressman, signaling he had no intention of asking for GOP unity ahead of the midterm elections, called Britt a “RINO,” or a "Republican in name only," in comments to reporters ahead of his address. “Is Britt a RINO?” a reporter asked. “Absolutely,” Brooks said. “Either that or a Democrat.” During his election night screed, Brooks took parting shots at his party, his country, and Congress, where he has served since 2011, saying, "The Republican Party of Alabama lost in a variety of different ways,” before going on to say that “America quite clearly lost” and adding, finally, that Capitol Hill “is a really depressing place to work.” Who escaped Brooks's wrath? Former President Donald Trump, who endorsed Brooks last June and then yanked his support for the congressman this past March. For many of the approximately 150 supporters who joined Brooks on election night, his speech was a hit. “I loved it,” Vicki Bryant said. “He showed a lot of spirit.” CLICK HERE TO READ MORE FROM THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER Frank Zawada, a retired Air Force lieutenant colonel, said Brooks delivered “a good speech,” calling it “fitting” and lamenting that it was not more aggressive in calling out the congressman’s opponents than it actually was. Brooks, who attempted to close on a positive note, said losing the Senate race to Britt carried benefits, mainly his ability after he retires in December to spend more time with his wife, four children and their spouses, and his 13 grandchildren. The congressman’s family, flanking him as he spoke, smiled as he mentioned this development.

US Campaigns & Elections

National Democrats are continuing to warn about several extreme Republican candidates who, if elected, supposedly would lead to the end of democracy. At the state time, Democrats are doing all they can to help those candidates move one step closer to office. The latest example comes from the Arizona Democratic Party, which is messing around with the Republican nomination for the governorship. In terms of general election viability, businesswoman Karrin Taylor Robson is widely seen as the GOP's strongest choice against the Democrats. Cleverly, then, Arizona Democrats are assiduously undermining Robson on behalf of Republican rival Kari Lake, who has been endorsed by former President Donald Trump. Party officials issued a press release "thanking" Robson for her past contributions to Democratic candidates, which obviously would look bad to most Republican voters, thus trying to negate Robson’s accusations that Lake has done the same. The attack would be expected from Lake’s own campaign, but it is coming from the Arizona Democratic Party, which is obviously hoping to face a more beatable candidate than Robson. Pushing Trump's "Big Lie," Lake has said it is “disqualifying” and “sickening” that Robson would not say the 2020 election was stolen. Instead of staying out of the GOP’s fight or jumping in to help bury an election truther in Lake, Arizona Democrats are defending her and attacking her more sensible opponent on her behalf. This is playing out in states across the country. Pennsylvania Attorney General Josh Shapiro propped up an election truther during the GOP primary in the race for governor. Shapiro is only leading in the polls by 3 or 4 points, meaning there is a real shot that a “stolen election” Trump truther could be put in charge of Pennsylvania in time for the 2024 election. Democrats are even taking up this strategy in House races, potentially adding more election truthers to the GOP’s House caucus. The reason for the strategy is simple enough: Democrats view these extreme candidates as their best chance to win in a national environment that favors the GOP. Take Colorado, where Democrats spent millions to prop up election conspiracy theorist Ron Hanks in the GOP primary for the U.S. Senate. That effort failed, and now, Sen. Michael Bennet is sounding the alarm over a race with his more competitive challenger, businessman Joe O’Dea. Normally, this kind of election gamesmanship would be par for the course. But prominent Democratic politicians across the country can’t find enough television cameras to warn about the consequences of electing Republicans like Lake, while Democratic campaigns are pushing those candidates one step closer to power. If these candidates and their supporters are “threats to democracy,” as we are so often told, the same must be said of these Democratic campaigns.

US Campaigns & Elections

NEWYou can now listen to Fox News articles! Virginia voters are heading to the polls Tuesday for the state's primary elections, with education and inflation as two of the top issues.Virginia mothers Cheryl Onderchain, Amie Bowman, and Briana Howard joined "Fox & Friends First" to discuss these key issues and how they have impacted their families ahead of the midterm elections. "I think we're going to see a huge red wave, not just in Virginia in November, but across the country," Onderchain, a single mother of three, told co-host Carley Shimkus. "Education has been a huge one for me for… over two years now, ever since they closed schools and I became an accidental activist and part of the parents' movement here."VIETNAMESE REFUGEE RUNNING FOR CONGRESS, SAYS VIRGINIA SCHOOLS BEING ‘DESTROYED’ BY WOKE POLICIESDr. Amie Bowman, also a mother of three, said education, inflation, and "social instability" are the issues at top of mind as she heads to the polls. "This year, as parents, we found out that more than 60% of the kids in Virginia at the third and the eighth-grade level aren't proficient in reading or in math, and yet the schools seem more concerned about what pronouns the students are using and whether they can… understand the language of oppressed versus oppressor," Bowman said. "Well, where does reading and math come in? That was their job." Residents of Loudoun County, Virginia, have helped make critical race theory a national conversation in 2021.  (REUTERS/Evelyn Hockstein)Americans nationwide have been grappling with sky-high inflation in recent months. As prices continue to rise at the grocery store and gas pump, voters are looking to cast their ballot for candidates ready to tackle those issues. CLICK HERE TO GET THE FOX NEWS APPHoward stressed the importance of politicians being a part of the solution as families continue to suffer. "It's just a nightmare any time you go to the grocery store, even food shortages," Howard said. "I went to go get eggs yesterday and I had to go to two different grocery stores to get eggs for my family.""I think politicians need to recognize the struggles and the trauma that many families have faced over the course of the last two years and really create solutions," she continued. "I think many people are feeling what can go wrong next, and we need hope. We need solutions for many of the problems that are in our communities." Bailee Hill is an associate editor with Fox News Digital.

US Campaigns & Elections

get the free app Updated on: June 14, 2022 / 10:23 PM / CBS News Rep. Nancy Mace faces tough primary Rep. Nancy Mace faces tough GOP primary in South Carolina 11:10 Voters cast their ballots Tuesday in primary elections in four states, setting up some of the most closely-watched and expensive general election matchups in the fall. Polls are now closed in all four states: South Carolina, Nevada, North Dakota and Maine.In South Carolina, Republican incumbent U.S. Reps. Tom Rice and Nancy Mace are both facing Trump-backed challengers. Rice is one of the six House Republicans who voted to impeach former President Donald Trump and is up for reelection. Rice has vehemently defended his impeachment vote, telling Politico recently that "I think that was one of the worst things, if not the worst, that a president has ever done in terms of attacking the Constitution and separation of powers." Trump has backed Russell Fry in the race, and they face five other Republicans in the primary. The large number of candidates could keep both Rice and Fry under 50% of the vote, which would lead to a runoff on June 28. Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images, Sean Rayford/Getty Images Mace, a freshman Republican who flipped South Carolina's 1st District from blue to red, is facing off against former State Rep. Katie Arrington, who was the 2018 GOP nominee for this district who lost to Democrat Joe Cunningham.Mace voted to certify the 2020 election results and to hold Trump ally Steven Bannon in contempt of Congress for failing to comply with a subpoena from the Jan. 6 select committee. She was also outspoken against Trump's conduct in the immediate aftermath of the Jan. 6 attack.In a statement on Saturday, Trump continued his attacks on her. "Nancy fights Republicans all the time and is not at all nice about it.  Frankly, she is despised by almost everyone, and who needs that in Congress, or in the Republican Party?" he said.Republican incumbent Sen. Tim Scott isn't facing any serious primary challengers on Tuesday and he's expected to easily win deep-red South Carolina in November. But he's raised nearly $40 million so far, more than any other Republican.Democrats Catherine Fleming Bruce, Angela Geter and state Rep. Krystle Matthews are competing to take on Scott.In the governor's race, Trump-backed incumbent Republican Gov. Henry McMaster defeated his primary challenger, Harrison Musselwhite.On the Democratic side, Cunningham, who lost his House seat to Mace in 2018, won the primary, defeating state Sen. Mia McLeod and several others. Also in the spotlight will be Nevada, the state that officially gave President Joe Biden enough electoral votes to win the presidency in 2020. Mr. Biden won the state by less than three points in 2020, and the state's economy has been hit hard by inflation and the COVID-19 pandemic. Republicans are hoping to flip the Senate seat and the governor's mansion in the fall — and a number of Republicans are running to succeed the term-limited Secretary of State, who refused to throw out the election results in favor of Trump.Trump-backed Republican Adam Laxalt, who succeeded current Democratic Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto as the state's attorney general, long held a comfortable lead in the Senate race, but retired Army captain Sam Brown has narrowed the once 40-point gap.  Ben Smith (left) and Adam Laxalt are running for the Republican nomination for Senate in Nevada.  David Calvert/Getty Images, David Becker/Getty Images Laxalt, who lost the governor's race in 2018, also has endorsements from a number of high-profile Republicans, including Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas and Donald Trump Jr., who came to Nevada to campaign with Laxalt. Cortez Masto doesn't have a serious challenger on Tuesday, but she has already raised big sums ahead of November — nearly $20 million in the last year — and goes into primary day with more than $9 million cash on hand.Nevada Gov. Steve Sisolak, elected in 2018, was the first Democrat to win the governor's mansion in more than 20 years. He faces a primary challenger on Tuesday, Clark County Commissioner Tom Collins.Fifteen Republicans are on the Republican primary ballot for governor. Clark County Sheriff Joe Lombardo, former boxer Joey Gilbert, former U.S. Sen. Dean Heller, North Las Vegas Mayor John Lee and entrepreneur Guy Nohra are so far leading the field. Republican Secretary of State Barbara Cegavske has faced blowback from Trump's supporters since the 2020 election, including being censured by the state party. There is a crowded Republican primary field to be the party's nominee in November, including some candidates who have spread false claims or raised questions about the 2020 election. There has been no credible evidence of widespread fraud that could have changed Nevada's results. In Nevada's 1st Congressional District, Democratic incumbent Rep. Dina Titus is facing a challenger on the left, progressive Amy Vilela, who is backed by Sen. Bernie Sanders. In the 2nd District, national Republican groups have gotten involved to support Congressman Mark Amodei in his primary. Amodei is being challenged by Danny Tarkanian, a Douglas County commissioner who has had unsuccessful runs for Congress in the past decade.And in one bonus race, South Texas will be holding a special election to fill the House seat vacated by Democrat Filemon Vela, in the 34th District, for the remainder of the term. A win could give House Republicans a symbolic win ahead of this November. Two Republicans and two Democrats are running in the nonpartisan primary, which would go into a runoff if no candidate clears 50%.    6:05 PM / June 14, 2022 South Carolina 1st U.S. House District Republican primary Rep. Nancy Mace and Kate Arrington are on the ballot.    6:05 PM / June 14, 2022 South Carolina 7th U.S. House District Republican primary Rep. Tom Rice, Russell Fry, Barbara Arthur, Garrett Barton, Mark McBride, Spencer Morris and Ken Richardson are on the ballot.   6:05 PM / June 14, 2022 South Carolina U.S. Senate Republican primary Sen. Tim Scott and Larry Adams Jr. are on the ballot.   6:04 PM / June 14, 2022 South Carolina U.S. Senate Democratic primary Catherine Fleming Bruce, Angela Geter and Krystle Matthews are on the ballot.   Updated 7:52 PM / June 14, 2022 South Carolina Governor Republican primary results: Henry McMaster wins Republican nomination for South Carolina Governor Gov. Henry McMaster wins Republican nomination for South Carolina Governor   Updated 4m ago South Carolina Governor Democratic primary: Joe Cunningham wins Joe Cunningham wins the Democratic primary for South Carolina governor.    6:04 PM / June 14, 2022 Nevada U.S. Senate Republican primary Adam Laxalt, Sam Brown, William Conrad, William Hockstedler, Sharelle Mendenhall, Tyler Perkins, Carlo Poliak and Paul Rodriguez are on the ballot.   6:03 PM / June 14, 2022 Nevada U.S. Senate Democratic primary Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto, Stephanie Kasheta, Corey Reid and Allen Reinhart are on the ballot.   6:03 PM / June 14, 2022 Nevada Governor Republican primary Joe Lombardo, Dean Heller, Joey Gilbert, John J. Lee, Guy Nohra, Seven Achilles Evans, Gary Evertsen, Eddie Hamilton, Tom Heck, Stan Lusak, Edward O'Brien, Fred Simon, William Walls, Amber Whitley, Barak Zilberberg.   6:03 PM / June 14, 2022 Nevada Governor Democratic primary Gov. Steve Sisolak and Tom Collins   6:02 PM / June 14, 2022 Nevada Secretary of State Republican primary Kristopher Dahir, Jesse Haw, Jim Marchant, Richard F. Scotti, John Cardiff Gerhardt, Socorro Keenan and Gerard Ramalho are on the ballot.   6:02 PM / June 14, 2022 Texas 34th U.S. House District Republican special election Republicans Mayra Flores and Juana Cantu-Cabrera and Democrats Rene Coronado and Dan Sanchez are on the ballot.

US Campaigns & Elections

NEWYou can now listen to Fox News articles! Katie Britt, a former leader of the Business Council of Alabama, has defeated Rep. Mo Brooks, R-Ala., in the Alabama GOP Senate primary runoff election as she aims to become the Yellowhammer State's first elected female senator later this year.The runoff election between Britt and Brooks came after neither candidate garnered more than 50% of the vote in the May 24 primary election. Both candidates were running to replace retiring Sen. Richard Shelby, R-Ala., who has served more than 35 years in Congress and tossed his support behind Britt. Senate candidates Katie Britt (L) and Mo Brooks (R) (Andi Rice, Bloomberg via Getty Images / AP Photo, Vasha Hunt)KATIE BRITT, MO BROOKS TOUT AMERICA FIRST AGENDATrump, who has weighed in on multiple races taking place across the country ahead of the 2022 midterm elections and received immense support from Alabamians in both the 2016 and 2020 presidential elections, initially endorsed Brooks last year. He later rescinded his endorsement and accused Brooks, one of few members in Congress who offered overwhelming support for Trump following his loss in the 2020 presidential election, of going "woke" when he told voters in the state it was time to place focus on the 2022 and 2024 elections.Two weeks before the runoff election, Trump endorsed Britt as she gained in the polls and said in a statement that she is "a fearless America First Warrior." Speaking to Fox News Digital in an interview last week, Britt said she was "excited and grateful" to have Trump's support as "people are ready for new blood."CLICK HERE FOR THE LATEST PRIMARY RESULTS FROM FOX NEWS"Alabamians loved the president," she said at the time. "They miss the America First agenda and they are ready for our country to get back on track." Katie Britt, US Republican Senate candidate for Alabama, speaks during an election night watch event in Montgomery, Alabama (Andi Rice/Bloomberg via Getty Images)Ahead of the election, Brooks, who told Fox News Digital he had not spoken with Trump since he lost his endorsement and insisted during an interview last week with AL.com that the former president "has no loyalty to anyone or anything but himself," said he was the "MAGA candidate" in the race. Britt responded to Brooks' remarks and insisted that Trump had "told who the MAGA candidate" was in the race.CLICK HERE TO GET THE FOX NEWS APPBritt formerly served as an aide to Shelby and served as his chief of staff from 2016 to 2018. Britt will now face off against Will Boyd, the state's Democratic nominee for Senate, in the Nov. 8 general election where she is expected to succeed in the deep red state. Boyd is a pastor and a former Democratic Party county chair. Kyle Morris covers politics for Fox News. On Twitter: @RealKyleMorris.

US Campaigns & Elections

A series tracking the growing assault on voting rights, and efforts to undermine the democratic process in America.Here’s the lineup from the latest installment of our new Breaking the Vote newsletter, covering the ongoing threats to democracy in the U.S.Al Schmidt, the lone Republican on Philadelphia’s election board, announced this week he’s stepping down early from the job. Former President Trump targeted Schmidt after the 2020 election, and that led to months of intimidation and harassment that continues today. Trump called Schmidt’s exit “great news” and attacked Philadelphia’s election results. His campaign attempted multiple lawsuits over the vote count in Philly, all of which were rejected by courts. And while Schmidt had already said in 2019 he would not run again after his four-year term is up, he’s the latest high-profile election official to leave their post amid Trumpists’ campaign to undermine confidence in 2020 and increase control over elections into the future. I called him to get his take on his exit, the harassment, and what’s at stake for our democracy. (The conversation has been edited for length and flow.)Do you think the people who threatened you and threatened your family still see a victory here? Well, they could, but they'd be wrong, although getting it wrong is not going to stand in their way. It never has. They were wrong about the 2020 election. They were wrong about the integrity of elections in Philadelphia, they're wrong about just so very much. And I am certainly beyond thinking that anything I say or do could change their minds. And yet, intimidation is done to get a result. So it actually matters what people or their ideological leaders believe about someone like you exiting.Yeah, I believe that matters. The most important thing for me is to act independently of whatever these sorts of psychological terrorists want.At the same time, this part of your professional life ends with you getting attacked yet again by Donald Trump. There's really no way around that.There was a reporter yesterday who mentioned, “Well, the former president may have something to say about this.” And I said I hope he has better things to do with his time. But apparently he doesn't.I don't think Trump has anything better to do, because you leaving this swing-state post, for whatever reason, is mission-critical for him.Well, I have the advantage of leaving, knowing that our mayor appoints my replacement. And whoever he appoints to replace me will not be someone who the former president or his disciples like. That's what I know for sure. You're not alone. We've all read the reports of thousands of election workers across the country leaving their posts, in some cases after threats and intimidation. It seems to be a flashing danger sign.I think it is. My educational background includes a Ph.D. in political history, mainly focused in 20th century European history. And you can see how democracies have the ability, once a non-democratic majority takes power, to essentially dismantle themselves. We have to do everything we can to prevent it from self-destructing, because democracies have within themselves the mechanism for their own self-destruction. Meanwhile, Republicans in Pennsylvania are back at it. They've got an audit-like effort underway. So what’s happened on your end? Whenever that chatter increases, the threats return. They're less frequent, and they're less graphic and less specific than they were in 2020. There's a big difference between general threats coming in from some knucklehead who says you're a traitor, you're going to get what's coming to you, and ones in 2020 that named my children and [included] pictures of my house and all sorts of specifics.Are you still living with security?I really can't speak to that. I'm sorry.What’s going on with people that causes them to reach out and threaten you? There's no one who's threatening to kill my children who isn't already a creep to begin with. They're just being motivated. But there's a whole other universe of people who aren't making threats but are still believing these lies they're being told. It's ordinary people who are losing confidence in democracy because they're being lied to. And the thing that's really intrigued me is, while the former president may have exploited that, people were already receptive to it. He exploited something that was already there. And he may have made it worse.What is the reality that January 6 is broadcasting to everybody?I think the reality is that these lies have consequences. And people want to run away from the consequences of the lies that they're telling. But the consequences are election administrators across the country doing their job getting death threats, being hounded away from these important, although obscure jobs. And it’s culminating in people not just making threats but acting out on these threats, as we saw on Jan. 6 on Capitol Hill.The message from the very top of the Republican Party now is that that was a patriotic day, a justified day. Any Republican who takes any pleasure in the Confederate flag being walked around inside the Capitol of our republic, they're the ones who are off-message.Where are we headed when the leader of the party and the possible nominee for 2024 issues propaganda like that? The people being held accountable right now are the ones who told the truth. And the ones who are benefiting from all these lies are obviously the ones lying. And you can see it playing to their base, in terms of political contributions or all the rest. There's a real perverse incentive right now that is dangerous. That is that lying about the election benefits you, telling the truth about the election is to your political or personal detriment.What about accountability for people who've called you, emailed you, threatened you or your family? What I do know is the Philadelphia Police Department has taken all these threats very seriously and allocated resources to protect me and my family. Like, I could look outside and see them. So that's very real. I also know that federal and state law enforcement have taken it seriously in terms of conversations and requests for information passing along information so that they can conduct investigations. What I haven't seen yet is anyone being held accountable for that. I know our attorney general and his people have taken these threats very seriously. I know the FBI that I've been in contact with throughout this whole process has taken it seriously. But I also know, as yet, that no one has been held accountable for it.What do you say to people out there who feel helpless and resigned to what they see going on in their democracy?That, in so many ways, is the real tragedy of it—and the fact that what appears to be a majority of my party believing that the 2020 election was stolen based on no evidence whatsoever. When a majority of one of only two major parties in our country is embracing anti-democratic principles and seeking to undermine the democratic process and seeking to not have our voters' votes counted, maybe that's the biggest danger of all this.Watch this clip from our interview with Al Schmidt:WHAT’S HAPPENING‘I Can’t Imagine Ever Going Back’Former Fulton County, Georgia, election worker Ruby Freeman says she “can’t imagine ever going back to election work” after being harassed and seeing her family threatened after 2020. Now Freeman and her daughter, Shaye Moss, are suing the far-right website Gateway Pundit for spinning months of Trump-backed election conspiracies that they say led to the intimidation.Gateway Pundit repeatedly pushed a conspiracy accusing Freeman, by name, of counting votes from a suitcase hidden under a table. The theory came from surveillance video that Trump campaign lawyers presented to Georgia officials. In fact, workers had been ordered to stop counting for the night, and the video merely showed Freeman starting again the next day. But Trump latched on, tweeting right-wing news coverage of the conspiracy theory in late December 2020 and then mentioning Freeman by name when he called Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger in early January to push him to help steal the election (more on that below). Freeman and Moss—and Moss’s son—reportedly faced threats online, on the phone, and in person. Their lawsuit claims people twice tried to force their way into Moss’s home, and that she fled her home for two months on the advice of the FBI.Freeman and Moss are seeking compensation and a statement from Gateway Pundit saying that the illegal-vote story is false. Trump’s not named in the suit. Reps. Bennie Thompson, Liz Cheney, and Adam Kinzinger at a hearing for the January 6 committee investigating the Capitol riot. It was a high-traffic week at the January 6 House Select Committee investigating Trump’s attempted coup and the insurrection supporting it. The committee is staring down the barrel of a probable GOP takeover of the House in 2022 and the inevitable shutdown of its investigation. So, yeah, they’re in a hurry. Let’s check in!Will Jeffrey Clark Cooperate?The time crunch explains the urgency of slapping contempt charges on Steve Bannon last month and his ongoing prosecution. And it also explains this week’s criminal contempt citation for former Acting Assistant Attorney General Jeffrey Clark. Like Bannon, Clark played a key role in executing Trump’s attempt to overturn the election results, in Clark’s case by threatening DOJ officials and leaning on them to meddle with Georgia’s election results. And like Bannon, Clark shirked the January 6 committee and refused to honor its subpoena (Clark appeared with his lawyer in early November but stonewalled).The committee voted to hold Clark in criminal contempt, just after Clark made another offer to appear. As of this writing, House Dems are holding off Clark’s contempt resolution, waiting to see if he actually cooperates or stonewalls again. Fifth Amendment claims against self-incrimination could be in his future.   Rolling Meadows? All that contempt seems to have made some impact on former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows, who this week reversed course and agreed to cooperate with the committee. That’s important because Meadows is known to have been in touch with people at several levels of the coup attempt as well as the organizers of the Jan. 6 rally on the Ellipse. He’s also one of the few people who could testify to Trump’s actions and state of mind in the hours before and during the insurrection.But here’s the catch! The practical meaning of “cooperate” is very much an open question. Meadows reportedly turned over documents and agreed to be deposed, but his lawyer made clear that he’s keeping Meadows away from anything potentially privileged… i.e., anything touching directly on Trump. Former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows surrounded by press at the CapitolOne notable thing about Meadows’ reversal is what didn’t happen: The usual public abuse and derision Trump heaps on those he perceives as disloyal hasn’t materialized for Meadows. Maybe the boss isn’t so nervous about what his lieutenant will reveal after all.  Raffensperger Pays a VisitWhile Meadows was cutting deals (we’ll see) with the January 6 committee, one of the officials Trump tried to coerce into changing the election results popped up for testimony of his own. Brad Raffensperger, Georgia’s Republican secretary of state, met with the panel for five hours this week, giving them details on his post-election interactions with Trumpworld, including the now-famous call where Trump, on tape, tried to coerce him to “find” votes and overturn Georgia’s election. Raffensperger said he talked about that and a lot more but didn’t give details. Raffensperger has detailed the death threats he and his family have faced for refusing to do Trump’s bidding in 2020, and he remains one of Trump’s biggest targets for abuse and unemployment. Trump has backed a primary challenge from Rep. Jody Hice, a Georgia Republican who voted to overturn election results on Jan. 6. Working as IntendedRaffensperger may be a critic of Trump and his attempts to intimidate his way out of losing 2020, but he’s also a staunch defender of Georgia Republicans’ new voting restrictions. It took a day after Raffensperger’s quality time with the January 6 committee for him to turn around and sue the Justice Department, looking for evidence of political motives in DOJ’s own suit seeking to strike Georgia’s restrictions down. That’s a lot of legal back and forth, but don’t let it hide what’s most important: Georgia’s new voter suppression law is working. Last month’s off-year election was the first since Republicans passed SB 202 in Georgia, putting new restrictions on ballot drop boxes, requiring more voter ID, and making it harder to get an absentee ballot. Now we know how effective that last part was. You used to have until the Friday before Election Day to request an absentee ballot in Georgia. But the new law changed that to 11 days. The result? More rejections (and, you guessed it, fewer voters). Late application was the No. 1 reason for absentee ballot rejections in November, more than all the others combined. Overall, close to 4 percent of 32,312 applications were rejected, nearly four times the rejection rate of 2020. Four percent doesn’t seem like much, but scale that off-year result up to 2020, when Joe Biden’s margin of victory in Georgia was less than 12,000 votes out of nearly 5 million, and you can see how subtle voter suppression has to be to work its sordid magic. Getting It Right the Second TimeOne thing the rise of Trumpism has made clear is that the GOP it now controls is no longer a party devoted to American democracy. That realization has come quicker to some in the American political press than it has to others. Some journalists remain nestled in the cozy cognitive nook that lets them operate as arbiters between two opposed, but democratically equal, sides. Check out this thread from NYU media critic Jay Rosen, who’s been warning for years about Trumpism’s depredations on journalism but also noticed a small but critical shift this week. I SAID WHAT I SAID "If people believe there is an existential threat to democracy, then they should act like it. The Justice Department should act like it, the Congress should act like it, the administration should act like it, and to date I don't think that they have." - Conservative political commentator and Bulwark founder Charlie Sykes, on the urgency of attacks on fair elections and election administration. ON OUR RADAR Funding the ‘Cold Civil War’ — VICE News’ Cam Joseph has the story on the new super PAC hoping to convert some of Trumpism’s hardest-right cultural and political ideas into candidacies. The new American Firebrand super PAC is funded by Thomas Kingenstein, a conservative mega-donor who also funds the Claremont Institute. That group, as Cam has reported, employs John Eastman, the lawyer who drafted a memo instructing then-VP Mike Pence on how he could help Trump reject electors on Jan. 6 in an effort to overturn the election.In a video unveiling the PAC, Klingenstein describes his organization as locked “in a cold civil war… over the American way of life.” Klingenstein has shoveled millions into Claremont and other hard-right causes, though it’s still unclear how much the super PAC will spend. All the Young Moods — If you’re into promoting authoritarianism, you really want a country where the rising generation isn’t super concerned about staying a democracy. Young Americans are definitely not feeling optimistic about the future of the republic. More than half told the Harvard Youth Poll that American democracy is either “in trouble” or “failing,” including 70 percent of Republicans. That last figure is less than surprising given the alarming number of Republicans who say the 2020 election was stolen, but there are more troubling numbers. Fifty-eight percent of 18-29-year-olds say it’s important the United States remain a democracy, while 28 percent said it’s “somewhat” or “not very” important. The most alarming figures belong to young people without a college degree. Young people not currently in college or without a college degree are evenly split on whether it’s important for America to remain a democracy. Insurrection, Succession… Victory — We learned several weeks ago that at least 10 people who attended the Jan. 6 rally won public office in last month’s off-year elections. Now a Texas man accused of assaulting a police officer at the insurrection is running for the Texas state House on a secessionist platform. Mark Middleton, a 52-year-old salesman and Cub Scout leader from Forestburg, Texas, pleaded not guilty to nine federal charges, including interference with a law enforcement officer during civil disorder and obstruction of an official proceeding. Middleton and his wife were captured on video participating in the riot, according to the Dallas Morning News.Middleton is now a Republican primary candidate for Texas House district 68, where the state GOP accepted his application to run. His campaign website calls for Texas to “seriously consider” separation from the United States. *CLICK* —David Pepper on US statehouses as laboratories of autocracy —Trump allies work to place supporters in key election posts, spurring fears about future vote challengesLook for more coverage of who’s being held accountable for intimidating election workers soon on VICE News Tonight. And send your friends the Breaking the Vote newsletter!

US Campaigns & Elections

NEWYou can now listen to Fox News articles! EXCLUSIVE: Two Washington GOP House candidates, both of whom are seeking to represent two different Congressional districts in the state, will face off in their primary elections next week against incumbent Republicans who voted to impeach former President Donald Trump last year, insisting that those impeachment votes will move voters to the polls.The two vulnerable Republicans – Third Congressional District Rep. Jaime Herrera Beutler and Fourth Congressional District Rep. Dan Newhouse – are up against several challengers in each of their primary elections, with both seeking to fend off two different challengers who have received the backing of Trump.In recent interviews with Fox News Digital, Loren Culp, a former Washington police chief who is challenging Newhouse, and Joe Kent, a retired Army Special Forces chief warrant officer who is challenging Beutler, insisted that the votes to impeach Trump by the two GOP House members could have an impact on Tuesday's election.Both Beutler, who has served in Congress since 2011, and Newhouse, first elected to Congress in 2014, voted to impeach Trump after the Jan. 6 Capitol protests following the 2020 presidential election. In addition, the two Republicans who have faced backlash over the decision from voters in their districts also voted in favor of establishing an independent commission to investigate the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol. Reps. Dan Newhouse, R-Wash., and Jaime Herrera Beutler, R-Wash., arrive for a House vote, June 30, 2021, on creating a select committee to investigate the January 6th attack on the Capitol. (Tom Williams/CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Images)"Having the endorsement of President Trump is huge," said Culp, who ran for governor of Washington in 2020. "All of my competitors ran around the country to Trump events, and some of them even paid to get into fundraising events at Mar a Lago, trying to rub elbows with people in Trump's orbit and meet President Trump to get his endorsement.""I did exactly the opposite," he added. "I told my campaign, I said, ‘President Trump is not going to endorse someone without looking at everybody. He’s a smart man and he will make the right decision. He'll see what I've done, he'll see what we did in 2020 …"Describing the moment he found out he had received Trump's endorsement in the race, Culp said, "I did not know he was going to call me.""My wife and I were sitting having a cup of coffee, talking about our grandkids, and my phone rang," Culp recalled. "I was very surprised. … and he said exactly what I knew he would have done. He said, 'I looked at all the candidates, checked the background. I've seen what they've done, I see what you did, and I'm backing to you 100%.'"Culp said he has gathered a lot from voters in the state and throughout the district over how they feel about Newhouse's vote to impeach Trump. Washington Fourth District candidate Loren Culp is shown during a rally supporting President Donald Trump on Oct. 10, 2020, in Bellevue, Washington. (Karen Ducey/Getty Images)"They're not happy that Newhouse voted to impeach President Trump and then doubled down and voted for the January 6th commission, which is nothing but political theater for Nancy Pelosi to demonize Trump and conservatives," Culp said.Culp, who is also endorsed by former Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi and Colorado Republican Rep. Lauren Boebert, took aim at Newhouse on a variety of fronts, including his willingness to support Democrats' "out-of-control spending" measures."My opponent, Dan Newhouse, has voted for all of the big spending bills that have come along," Culp said, vowing to vote in accordance with the Constitution and for things that will economically benefit Americans.Echoing Culp, Kent said Trump's endorsement, which he considers to be the "most powerful endorsement in the country" and the "gold standard" of approval for America First candidates, has "been huge" for his campaign."He's definitely the leader of the America First Movement," Kent said of Trump. "But the other reason why the Trump endorsement was so critical in our race is because of the jungle primary here in Washington State. In order to be effective against a 12-year incumbent, we had to really rally around one candidate."Taking aim at Beutler, Kent, a Gold Star husband whose wife was killed in 2019 while conducting special operations against ISIS in Syria, said "people are still furious" that she voted to impeach Trump. Joe Kent, a retired Army Special Forces chief warrant officer, aims to defeat incumbent GOP Rep. Jaime Herrera Beutler in next week's primary election to represent Washington's Third Congressional District. (Joe Kent campaign)"Really what that vote did is it exposed her record, the totality of her record," Kent said. "I say this all the time … I challenge Republicans to show me the one issue where Jamie has stood up for Republican values or for the district. She's very much, I would just say, controlled opposition for the left. … The vote for impeachment really exposed all of her true colors.""Her impeachment vote finally put her in play," Kent said, claiming that Beutler has never been challenged in a similar fashion by another Republican.Regarding the overall response to their campaigns, both Culp and Kent said they have received overwhelming support from voters in the districts they hope to represent at the national level.Culp, who made headlines in 2018 during his tenure as police chief of Republic, Washington, when he vowed to defend voters' Second Amendment right against newly implemented gun regulations, said voters are "very pissed off.""They're mad at Newhouse, they're mad at Biden, they don't like the way our country's headed," he said. "They're sick and tired of the prices of everything going up. You see what Biden's done with our energy policy and we're definitely not on the right track. Most of the people that I talk to understand what's going on.""Biden is totally a puppet of our enemies, including China," Culp added. "If you just look at the evidence, he's trying to destroy America. That's what people are saying to me. That's what they're seeing, that's what I see." Washington GOP House candidates Joe Kent, left, and Loren Culp. (Joe Kent campaign; Karen Ducey/Getty Images)Kent, who has also received endorsements from former acting Secretary of Defense Christopher Miller and Florida Rep. Matt Gaetz, said he is "under a lot of fire" as election day approaches."We have $3.7 million in dark money getting dropped on the race right now," Kent said. "But I think that is almost better than polling because they wouldn't be spending the money on me if they didn't view me as a threat."CLICK HERE TO GET THE FOX NEWS APP"I'm feeling a lot of grassroots support here," he added. "Our town halls are bringing out quite a few people every single night. We knocked on over 120,000 doors. So, I mean, we feel a lot of really good momentum."The Washington primary elections will take place on Aug. 2. Unlike several other states, Washington has a top-two primary election and all candidates in the race appear on the same ballot. The two individuals who receive the most votes in each election, regardless of party affiliation, will move on to the general election.Fox News did not receive responses from the campaigns of Beutler or Newhouse. Kyle Morris covers politics for Fox News. On Twitter: @RealKyleMorris.

US Campaigns & Elections

Some North Carolina Democrats are growing increasingly piqued about what they say is insufficient support from the national party for Senate nominee Cheri Beasley, who appears to be getting caught in a midterm map crunch.Democratic operatives and donors told ABC News they are bullish on their chances in the Tarheel State race to succeed retiring Republican Sen. Richard Burr -- and, the Democrats say, Beasley, a Black woman who served as state Supreme Court chief justice, is as strong a candidate as the party can put forth against Rep. Ted Budd, the GOP nominee.But operatives believe getting her across the finish line in a persistently red-tinged swing state is going to take tens of millions of dollars in support from Washington, particularly after the state's 2020 race was one of the country's most expensive Senate contests and was decided by less than 2 points -- after the Democratic nominee admitted to an extramarital relationship.Instead, operatives are seeing spending go to other purple states but not to North Carolina."The investment is incongruous. It's not necessarily that there's none of it, it's just that it's not keeping pace with -- A, what is needed to win in North Carolina; and B, what is being given elsewhere across the country," one Democratic strategist who's worked closely with campaigns in the state told ABC News."The race in North Carolina, which is as competitive as many of the other front-line races that are getting a lot of coverage across the country, we're not seeing the same kind of enthusiasm and emphasis," added the source, who requested anonymity to discuss party dynamics.North Carolina has been a white whale for Democrats on the federal level in recent cycles: The party hasn't won a presidential or Senate race there since 2008, though they have had better success with state and local offices.The party’s investment decisions this cycle could be partially fueled by the favorable environment the GOP is anticipated to enjoy this November amid stubbornly high inflation and other issues eroding President Joe Biden's approval ratings -- even though, according to FiveThirtyEight, Republicans have only a narrow advantage on the generic ballot question of which party should control Congress.The national mood has forced Democrats onto a more defensive footing as they seek to at least retain -- rather than expand -- their fragile majorities in the House and Senate. Operatives in North Carolina told ABC News that the party may be prioritizing Pennsylvania and Wisconsin because of more recent success there.North Carolina is narrowly divided between the two major parties, with registered Democrats outnumbering Republicans by a hair and with more than 2.5 million unaffiliated voters. But with a mushrooming population in urban and suburban Raleigh and Durham combined with shrinking populations in the rural expanses, Democrats see a state still within their grasp.Early in the 2022 cycle, the Senate race was thought to be on par with other flip opportunities in Pennsylvania, where Republican Sen. Pat Toomey is also retiring, and Wisconsin where Republican Sen. Ron Johnson is running for a third term.More recently, however, Democrats in North Carolina say they're getting short-changed by the national party, though top operatives in Washington insist they support Beasley and that the money will be there for her as November nears.Operatives on the ground say Beasley –- one of two Black women nominated in any Democratic Senate primary this year and the first Black woman to win a major party's Senate nomination in North Carolina –- also offers a prime opportunity for the national party to put its money where its mouth is after promising to prioritize Black women, who are often its most reliable voters.North Carolina was included in the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee's (DSCC) "Defend the Majority" program, a $30 million investment in organizing programs in nine states. However, the DSCC would not disclose how much is going to each state specifically and it did not include North Carolina in its initial round of ad buys.Senate Majority PAC (SMP), Senate Democrats' main super PAC, has spent $2.1 million in ads in North Carolina, though its only reservation after August was a $700,000 ad reservation in the Charlotte market announced Tuesday.Senate candidate Cheri Beasley speaks during the North Carolina Democratic Party's election night party in Raleigh, N.C., May 17, 2022.The Washington Post via Getty Images, FILENational Democrats could still swoop in later to boost Beasley. But the funding so far pales in comparison to what's being funneled to Pennsylvania and Wisconsin as well as the $6.5 million and $27.6 million initially invested in North Carolina by the National Republican Senatorial Committee and Senate Leadership Fund, SMP's GOP counterpart, respectively."It's just not here at the level that it needs to be yet," said Morgan Jackson, a North Carolina Democratic strategist who worked on the campaign for 2020 Senate nominee Cal Cunningham."We know [Republicans] reserved their time," Jackson added. "Democrats are going to have to come in and help match some of that money for this race to stay competitive. And I think this is a race Cheri Beasley can win even in a challenging environment. But she can't win without a lot of support from the outside."The DSCC's initial ad reservations included $3 million for Pennsylvania and Wisconsin each, and SMP has announced at least $5 million in ad buys in each state. Arizona, Georgia, Nevada and New Hampshire, where Democrats are defending incumbents, have enjoyed millions more in air cover."I think it's been surprising the lack of out-of-state money that has not yet come in North Carolina," said Michael Bitzer, a politics professor at Catawba College. "From a North Carolina point of view, I think that there feels like a missed opportunity to get invested. But if you look at the broader range of races that Democrats have to deal with … they're limited in terms of where they've got money to direct to those other races as well."Still, Beasley is virtually tied with Budd in public polling so far, according to FiveThirtyEight's polling average, and has a gargantuan individual fundraising advantage over him, finishing June with $4.8 million on hand compared to $1.8 million for Budd. She's also demonstrated an ability to win statewide races and only lost her seat as chief justice in 2020 by about 400 votes in what was one North Carolina's closest races ever."The burden of proof is not on North Carolinians or Cheri Beasley or anyone down this side. The burden of proof is on the Democratic Party. And if they are deciding not to prioritize Cheri, fine, they should just have to answer as to why they have chosen not to back a woman of color who's a former chief justice, who is raising incredible money and can build a competitive coalition," said the strategist who's worked with North Carolina campaigns.Prior to Beasley's nomination, top Democrats in North Carolina were mostly drawn to candidates like Cunningham or state Sen. Jeff Jackson, who has been hyped for years as a rising star and is now running for a House seat, in a state where more than 20% of the population is Black.Two years ago, the DSCC and SMP combined to shower $60 million on Cunningham, albeit in a year with fewer vulnerable incumbents.Cal Cunningham addresses a gathering of the Democratic Women of Wake County during a forum with other candidates in Raleigh, N.C., March 24, 2010.he News & Observer via AP, FILE"Sometimes our actions don't match up with our words. And when we have really counted, especially, on African-American women to make a difference in a number of elections, too often we weren't nominating those same women to be the standard bearer for our party," North Carolina Democratic fundraiser Bruce Thompson told ABC News. "It's the right time for North Carolina to have a female African-American as our U.S. senator."Strategists also say Beasley's candidacy hands Democrats a chance to try and energize a core constituency in a cycle that will largely be dictated by base turnout."She has an historic candidacy, and we've seen historic candidates oftentimes give a shot in the arm to their party and their voters because they have the chance to make history," Jackson said.Groups in Washington insist they're still impressed with Beasley and are leaving the door open to reserving ad time for her later this year."North Carolina is a Senate battleground, and the contrast between Cheri Beasley’s strong campaign and focus on finding solutions for North Carolinians with Budd’s record of changing the rules to help himself and his special interest donors is making the race highly competitive," said DSCC spokesperson Amanda Sherman.But privately, national Democrats bristle at questions on whether they're making North Carolina a priority.When asked whether North Carolina is considered as competitive as Pennsylvania or Wisconsin, one Democrat involved in Senate races replied, "Kiss my a--."Senate candidate Cheri Beasley, center, laughs after posing for a photograph with voters near a polling place at Fearrington Village's The Gathering Place in Pittsboro, N.C., May 17, 2022.The Washington Post via Getty Images, FILEBeyond contesting North Carolina this cycle or boosting a new party star, investing in the Tarheel State could also be crucial to keeping it as a battleground for future cycles, a valuable prospect in the Sun Belt (along with Arizona, Georgia and others) as longtime Democratic strongholds in the Midwest get more competitive.Professor Bitzer and others who spoke to ABC News compared North Carolina to Georgia, where years of massive voter registration and other efforts laid the groundwork for Democrats' breakthrough successes in the 2020 cycle."There needs to be, from a grassroots infrastructure approach, a real long-term investment in making voters care to show up," Bitzer said."In the grand scheme of things, it's 51-49, 52-48, 49-48 [in Republicans' favor]," Bitzer added, "unless that commitment is made."

US Campaigns & Elections

NEWYou can now listen to Fox News articles! House Republicans representing districts that voted for President Joe Biden in the 2020 presidential election are largely quiet over whether they would welcome support from former President Donald Trump, and if they would offer him their support should he run for president again in 2024.Fox News Digital reached out to each of these ten Republicans, asking them if they wanted, or were seeking, Trump's endorsement, and if they would support him should he seek another presidential term in the 2024 election as he has hinted.Only one responded through a statement from his office with what appeared to be a clear intention to avoid Trump."Rep. Bacon is not seeking the endorsement of President Trump and is not looking towards 2024 at this time, but focusing on 2022 and taking back control of the House," the statement from the office of Rep. Don Bacon, R-Neb., read. Former President Donald Trump (Getty Images)TRUMP DEALT NEW SETBACKS IN GEORGIA, AS CANDIDATES HE BACKED TROUNCED IN GOP PRIMARY RUNOFF ELECTIONSThe nine Republicans who did not respond included Rep. David Schweikert, R-Ariz., Rep. David Valadao, R-Calif., Rep. Mike Garcia, R-Calif., Rep. Young Kim, R-Calif., Rep. Michelle Steel, R-Calif., Rep. Peter Meijer, R-Mich., Rep. Yvette Herrell, R-N.M., Rep. Steve Chabot, R-Ohio, and Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick, R-Pa.Meijer and Valadao were two of the ten Republicans who voted to impeach Trump following the Jan. 6 storming of the U.S. Capitol last year.Fox News Digital also reached out to the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC) for comment on the lack of responses from the group of Republicans. Spokesperson Chris Taylor responded by accusing them of trying to escape from the party's "MAGA agenda.""Republicans like Don Bacon will try to run away from their party’s extremist MAGA agenda like chickens. They know full-well their extremist agenda that puts our kids and elders in harm's way, weakens the power of our vote, and their decades long plot to take away a woman’s right to make decisions about her own body is a non-starter in suburban swing districts," Taylor said. U.S. President Joe Biden speaks during an event at the Royal Castle, amid Russia's invasion of Ukraine, in Warsaw, Poland March 26, 2022. Slawomir Kaminski /Agencja Wyborcza.pl via REUTERS ATTENTION EDITORS - THIS IMAGE WAS PROVIDED BY A THIRD PARTY. POLAND OUT. NO COMMERCIAL OR EDITORIAL SALES IN POLAND. (Reuters)With Republicans appearing all but certain to retake the House of Representatives in this year's midterm elections, considering historical trends and the sharp collapse of Biden's approval rating, those representing these swing districts seem overtly aware that the path to the majority could be spoiled should their races once again become a replay of 2020.2024 POLL: DESANTIS EDGES TRUMP IN NEW HAMPSHIRE, WHICH HOLDS THE FIRST PRESIDENTIAL PRIMARYRepublicans currently hold 210 seats of the 218 needed for a majority. Democrats currently hold 220.Trump has already made a swath of endorsements in primary races across the country, but with mixed results. Although his endorsed candidates have maintained a high winning percentage, many of them ran in uncontested or noncompetitive races. A number of the candidates he backed lost more high-profile races in South Carolina and Georgia, with the latter seeing a clean sweep of losses in the May primaries and Tuesday's runoff elections. Pennsylvania U.S. Senate candidate Dr. Mehmet Oz speaks during a Republican leadership forum at Newtown Athletic Club on May 11, 2022 in Newtown, Pennsylvania.  (Photo by Michael M. Santiago/Getty Images)Trump has seen success with other high-profile endorsements, including Dr. Mehmet Oz, the Republican nominee for Senate in Pennsylvania, and Katie Britt, the Republican nominee for Senate in Alabama.CLICK HERE TO GET THE FOX NEWS APP Other Republicans have also avoided seeking Trump's endorsement, including Republican Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, who is up for re-election this year. DeSantis is considered a possible Trump rival for the 2024 Republican presidential nomination, but has not yet said if he is going to run.Fox News' Paul Steinhauser contributed to this report. Brandon Gillespie is an associate editor at Fox News. Follow him on Twitter at @brandon_cg.

US Campaigns & Elections

As Tuesday's primaries get underway, the influence of big money, the "big lie" and some Democratic groups have meddled in some of the races.Primaries in several states, including Colorado, Illinois and New York, will also be held against the backdrop of the latest -- surprise -- Jan. 6 hearing in the House.Republican candidates remain divided on Donald Trump's evidence-free election denialism across Colorado's congressional and statewide GOP nominating contests, which are further complicated by Democratic efforts to boost the seemingly more right-wing candidates -- assuming those choices would then backfire in the general election.Two GOP politicians are on the ballot in the Republican Senate primary hoping to unseat Democratic incumbent Michael Bennet. Businessman Joe O'Dea, the moderate in the race, has focused his campaign on public safety and economic reform.In stark contrast, Ron Hanks has centered his campaign around the "big lie," baselessly disputing the last presidential race. Hanks attended Trump's infamous Jan. 6 rally in Washington ahead of the deadly insurrection at the Capitol.Joe O'Dea talks during a campaign appearance at a brew pub in south suburban Littleton, Colo., June 9, 2022.David Zalubowski/AP, FILEIn this GOP Senate primary, some Democrats have directed their money toward supporting Hanks, the election denier in the race. Democratic Colorado, a super PAC, has run ads highlighting Hanks' conservative values; and ProgressNow Colorado has simultaneously campaigned against O'Dea. Their thinking -- as yet unproven -- is that Hanks will ultimately be less appealing to much of the electorate even if the conservative base embraces him.Meanwhile four Republican candidates are vying for the nomination in Colorado's newly minted 8th Congressional District. Whoever wins will face off against Democratic Nominee Rep. Yadira Caraveo. This highly competitive election could help decide who controls Congress in 2022, where Democrats hope to preserve their fragile majority.The candidates in that race include state Sen. Barbara Kirkmeyer, Thornton Mayor Jan Kulmann, Weld County Commissioner Lori Saine and political newcomer Tyler Allcorn.While there is no front-runner in this four-way primary, Lori Saine, the most conservative candidate on the ballot, may likely prove the easiest for Democrats to beat, given past trends.The House Majority PAC has run ads featuring Saine. Though the ad does not deliberately promote her, it characterizes her as a "conservative warrior" with strong popular Republican stances. A political action committee backing Democratic candidates has also run ads against Saine's opponent Kirkmeyer.For the governor's race, two candidates are facing off in Colorado's Republican primary to unseat Democratic incumbent Jared Polis: Heidi Ganahl, the establishment favorite, and Greg Lopez, an outspoken election denier who has emphasized that, if elected, he would pardon Tina Peters, an accused election worker there. (She has said she is innocent.)Colorado Gov. Jared Polis speaks during a bill signing event in Pueblo, Colo., May 27, 2022.Pueblo Cheiftain via USA Today Network, FILEThe Democratic Governors Association sponsored ads raising Lopez's profile, emphasizing his staunch conservative stances on issues like abortion access and gay marriage.Against the backdrop of Trump's election lies, Democrats play a risky game -- potentially advancing election deniers further in the race for elected office.In New York, the Democratic primary for governor features a three-way race between a favored incumbent who has yet to serve a full term and two challengers on her left and right.Gov. Kathy Hochul is considered a front-runner after she stepped into the position (and became New York's first female governor) in 2021, following Andrew Cuomo's resignation.Her two primary opponents are Rep. Tom Suozzi and New York City Public Advocate Jumaane Williams.Four candidates are fighting for the nomination in the New York GOP gubernatorial primary: Rep Lee Zeldin, Rob Astorino, Andrew Giuliani (son of Rudy Giuliani) and Harry Wilson.Zeldin was first elected to the House in 2014 after serving in the state Senate; he is a member of the House Financial Services and House Foreign Affairs committees. Zeldin also voted in 2021 to sustain objections to certifying the 2020 election results even after the Jan. 6 attack.Andrew Giuliani, a Republican candidate for governor of New York, speaks during a news conference in New York, June 7, 2022.Mary Altaffer/AP,FILEThe younger Giuliani's dad is a former New York City mayor and adviser and attorney for former President Trump. Andrew Guiliani recently had to join a gubernatorial debate from a separate studio, instead of appearing alongside the other candidates, because he refused to provide proof of being vaccinated against COVID-19.Astorino is a consultant and former county executive of Westchester County while Wilson is a businessman who emphasizes his working-class roots. Notably, Wilson supports abortion rights, according to Politico, which could appeal to liberal-leaning voters in a general election in light of the reenergized national conversation around abortion after the Supreme Court struck down Roe v. Wade.In Illinois, the governor's race is becoming a heated battle between billionaires as candidates enter the last leg of the primary.Democratic Gov. J.B. Pritzker -- whose family controls the Hyatt Hotel enterprise -- is running for reelection. A billionaire in his own right, Pritzker is expected to succeed in his party's primary.Two Republicans are fighting for the chance to go head-to-head with Pritzker in the general election.Richard Irvin was the first Black mayor of one of Chicago's largest suburbs, Aurora. Irvin and his campaign have heavily focused on crime and taxes, while the former mayor has avoided mentioning other pressing issues such as abortion.Pritzker's nemesis -- Billionaire Ken Griffin of Citadel, a hedge fund and financial services company -- has helped fund Irvini's campaign: According to the Illinois State Board of Elections website, Griffin has donated $50 million. Griffin also poured millions in 2018 against Pritzker during his first run for governor of Illinois.Pritzker and the DGA have spent millions trying to ensure that Irvin is not the GOP nominee in the race.Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker speaks during an event in Springfield, Ill., April 27, 2022.John O'Connor/AP, FILEAnother candidate is Republican state Sen. Darren Bailey, who received an endorsement from Trump on Saturday during the former president's rally in Illinois.Bailey fought against COVID-19 restrictions, is against abortion access and is an avid supporter of the Second Amendment and Trump.Bailey has also garnered support from billionaire Richard Uihlein -- a mega GOP donor who has thrown millions behind Bailey's run for governor. According to the Illinois State Board of Elections website, Uihlein has donated $9 million to Bailey's campaign.The Illinois primary will also display some of the most heated battles involving incumbent candidates drawn into the same congressional district.GOP Reps. Mary Miller and Rodney Davis will face off against each other in Tuesday's primary.Davis voted to certify the 2020 election and supported a proposal for a bipartisan Jan. 6 commission. On the other hand, Miller voted against certifying the 2020 election results.Trump endorsed Miller in the race earlier this year and held a rally for her last weekend where Miller spoke on the Supreme Court's decision to overturn Roe, saying that it was a "historic victory for white life.""President Trump, on behalf of all the MAGA patriots in America, I want to thank you for the historic victory for white life in the Supreme Court yesterday," Miller said.A spokesperson for Miller told the Associated Press the line was a "mix up of words."Davis tweeted to criticize Miller, saying her initial comments were part of a "disturbing pattern of behavior she's displayed since coming to Congress."In January 2021, Miller had quoted Adolf Hitler during a rally in Washington. She said then: "Hitler was right on one thing. He said, 'Whoever has the youth has the future.'"Davis has also outraised Miller, $3.4 million to $1.4 million. In addition, the Club For Growth has supported Miller during her reelection.Over in Illinois' 6th Congressional District, incumbent Reps. Marie Newman and Sean Casten will face off against one another.As a member of the progressive caucus, Newman is facing an ethics probe into whether or not she bribed someone into not running for office. She has denied wrongdoing.

US Campaigns & Elections

NEWYou can now listen to Fox News articles! The Democratic Governors Association didn’t waste any time blasting Republican Dan Cox after the state delegate from Maryland convincingly won his party’s gubernatorial primary in the race to succeed term-limited Republican Gov. Larry Hogan."Dan Cox wants to turn Maryland into MAGAland," charged the narrator in a DGA video launched on Wednesday, hours after Cox – who was endorsed and actively supported by former President Donald Trump – topped Kelly Schulz, a former state lawmaker who had served as Maryland’s secretary of labor and later secretary of commerce in the Hogan administration, and who was backed by the governor."Not only does Cox want to roll back abortion and make it easier for criminals to get weapons of war, he promoted the January 6th insurrection, called Mike Pence a traitor as a mob attacked the Capitol, and worked to overturn the 2020 election. No wonder Donald Trump is his biggest fan," the narrator claimed.But the DGA, the top organization helping Democratic candidates in gubernatorial races, spent nearly $2 million to run ads boosting Cox ahead of the primary. Democrats viewed Cox, a conservative lawmaker who supports Trump’s repeated unproven claims that his 2020 election loss to President Biden was due to "massive voter fraud," and who takes a hard line in opposing abortion, as a weaker candidate than Schulz in the general election as they aim to flip the governor’s office from red to blue.TRUMP, DEMOCRATS, BOTH BIG WINNERS IN MARYLAND'S GOP GUBERNATORIAL PRIMARY Republican gubernatorial candidate Dan Cox declares victory over his opponents at his campaign party on primary election night at Vigilant Hose Company Event Hall in Emmitsburg, Md., on Tuesday, July 19, 2022.  (Baltimore Sun )Cox’s victory in the Maryland primary came three weeks after conservative state Sen. Darren Bailey’s convincing win in the Illinois GOP gubernatorial primary. Bailey, who similar to Cox is a strong supporter of Trump’s constant re-litigation of the 2020 election, was also endorsed and supported by the former president. And Bailey was also supported by the DGA and Democratic Gov. J.B. Pritzker, who, combined, spent tens of millions of dollars to boost Bailey over moderate Republican Mayor Richard Irvin of Aurora, Illinois, a city in metropolitan Chicago.HEAD TO THE FOX NEWS ELECTIONS CENTER FOR THE LATEST PRIMARY RESULTS There was a similar dynamic in Pennsylvania's May GOP gubernatorial primary, where the Trump-endorsed candidate -- conservative state Sen. Doug Mastriano – was also boosted to victory by the DGA.While Cox and Bailey will be considered underdogs in the general election in the blue states of Maryland and Illinois, the latest polling in battleground Pennsylvania indicates a competitive contest between Mastriano and state attorney general Josh Shapiro, the Democratic gubernatorial nominee. State Sen. Doug Mastriano, R-Franklin, a Republican candidate for Governor of Pennsylvania, speaks at a primary night election gathering in Chambersburg, Pa., Tuesday, May 17, 2022. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster) (AP)The possibility of a conservative, Trump loyalist, winning a crucial gubernatorial election has an increasing number of Democrats concerned – and questioning the strategy of meddling in the other party’s primaries."I think it’s always a bad idea to let people win a primary who could extremely dangerous if they won. And believe me, in the political word of today, anything can happen and usually does," longtime Democratic state Sen. Lou D'Allesandro of New Hampshire told Fox News.D’Allesandro, a top Biden supporter in the first-in-the-nation primary state during the 2020 election cycle, warned "be very cautious about what you do because the ultimate result could be a thing that you don’t want."DEMOCRATS MEDDLE IN MARYLAND'S GOP GUBERNATORIAL PRIMARYA veteran national Democratic strategist who’s worked on numerous presidential and statewide campaigns noted that "this is what we did in 2015 and 2016 and we got Trump. The strategy was let’s get Trump. Trump will be easy to beat. Trump’s a terrible candidate and has all these character flaws….and he got elected president.""I understand with tough headwinds you want to draw the worst candidate you can as your opponent," acknowledged the strategist, who asked for anonymity to speak more freely. "But result might be that you elect people in Trump’s image taking over key offices across the country. There’s a double-edged sword here."A handful of other Democratic operatives and strategists Fox News spoke with also raised concerns. But a couple of political veterans agreed with the strategy."It’s a smart strategy to support these extremist candidates in the primaries, because even in the age of Trump, extremism rarely prevails," longtime Iowa based Democratic consultant Jeff Link told Fox News.POLITICAL STRATEGISTS WARN ABOUT MEDDLING IN OTHER PARTY'S PRIMARIES Pointing to November’s general election contests, Link argued that "people are looking for someone who’s for solutions and not just for extreme positions."The DGA stands by its strategy."The best way to protect democracy is by electing Democratic governors. Primary after primary, Republicans are either committed to overturning democratic elections, or refuse to commit to protecting democracy," DGA communications director Dave Turner told Fox News. "Democrats have a duty to expose this extremism whether it is explicit or implicit."And Turner charged that if the GOP "had more leaders and fewer cowards, these extremists wouldn’t have a lane to run in. Instead, it’s abundantly clear Republican primary voters want these extremists because they keep nominating them. Educating voters early on the clear contrast between MAGA Republicans and Democrats creates a clear and undeniable distinction that voters will recognize, and defeat the radicalism in November." CLICK HERE TO GET THE FOX NEWS APPBut the veteran strategist wasn’t convinced."It’s just likely to work less well in an election cycle where you’re facing such stiff headwinds and people are single-issue voters on the issue of inflation and that’s being hung around the neck of Democrats because we have control of Congress and the White House," the strategist emphasized. Paul Steinhauser is a politics reporter based in New Hampshire.

US Campaigns & Elections

CHICAGO — Illinois Republicans have descended into infighting and finger-pointing on the eve of the state’s primaries as a MAGA-aligned candidate for governor appears poised to claim the nomination over the GOP establishment favorite who spent $50 million only to see his prospects collapse.Richard Irvin, the mayor of Aurora, not only is expected to lose Tuesday, but he could end up in third place or worse, according to recent polls. That’s despite the tens of millions in dollars that a hedge fund billionaire poured into his candidacy — all part of an effort to propel a candidate who party leaders believed could give Democratic Gov. J.B. Pritzker a tough race in a state where Republicans have typically had to position themselves as moderates to win statewide.Interviews with more than a dozen Illinois Republicans point to external and internal forces driving Irvin’s flagging levels of support, which have exposed sharp splits within the party between moderates and MAGA conservatives that mirror divides playing out in other states and nationally. Meanwhile, the GOP establishment, long frustrated by the state’s Democratic Party dominance, is experiencing its own rift. It’s angry over how the Irvin campaign was run, about how he was drafted in the first place and, most significantly, that the best chance Republicans had to defeat Pritzker may have already slipped through their fingers. “This is the biggest debacle I’ve ever seen. It’s the biggest screw-up I’ve ever seen and the biggest waste of money I’ve ever seen,” said former Illinois Republican Party Chair Pat Brady, who is doing communications work for candidate Gary Rabine. Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker at the Chicago Pride Parade on Sunday.Jon Durr / APDarren Bailey, a Trump-supporting conservative from a rural downstate town, took a comfortable lead in the primary weeks ago, according to a Chicago Sun-Times/WBEZ poll that showed him leading among Republicans downstate and in the Chicago suburbs. Trump’s endorsement at a weekend rally in west-central Illinois most likely gives Bailey an even healthier bump among MAGA primary voters who dominate the vote outside the Chicago metropolitan area and suburbs.“It’s the most epic political failure of all time,” state Rep. Blaine Wilhour, a conservative who supports Bailey, said of the party’s early move to coalesce around Irvin. “It’s a total repudiation of the political establishment from the voters.”A number of Republicans said in interviews that a Bailey victory could mean the party has little chance of winning in November, however. Irvin’s campaign was the target of Democratic meddling by both national Democrats and Pritzker himself, who put up aggressively negative ads against Irvin as he ran unopposed for his party’s nomination — a tacit acknowledgment that Irvin most likely presents the biggest general election threat. “If Darren Bailey does come through on Tuesday, J.B. Pritzker can actively start his campaign for president — he doesn’t even need to be in Illinois,” said a state Republican who supported Irvin, who asked not to be named for fear of retribution. Pritzker, who recently visited New Hampshire and is more visible on the national political scene, is among those speculated to be interested in running in 2024, although he has said he’s interested only in the governor’s job right now.The Irvin campaign declined to comment on the criticism and second-guessing by other Republicans. It highlighted the deluge of money Democrats pumped into the primary, calling it unprecedented and holding it up as evidence of his potential as a potent general election candidate.  “Richard Irvin’s strong record as a tough-on-crime prosecutor, combat veteran and mayor has the Democrats running scared as Pritzker and his Democrat allies are on track to spend the most money in a Republican primary in the history of our nation,” Irvin spokeswoman Eleni Demertzis said. “If what the armchair quarterbacks are saying is true, then J.B. Pritzker and national democrats wouldn’t have spent an unprecedented $35 million meddling in a Republican primary."In total, TV ad spending by all parties from January of last year through Monday — including the DGA, Pritzker and any GOP gubernatorial candidates on air — totaled at least $100 million, according to AdImpact, an ad analytics firm.Darren Bailey, a candidate for governor of Illinois, speaks Saturday in Mendon after former President Donald Trump endorsed him.Michael B. Thomas / Getty ImagesIrvin was drafted to run for governor last year with the promise of financial backing from the wealthiest man in the state, Kenneth Griffin, the founder of the hedge fund Citadel. Griffin tapped veteran operative Mike Zolnierowicz, with whom he had previously worked, with the job of drafting a candidate and then sketching out the campaign. Irvin had a compelling personal story as a descendant of a slave and as the first from his family to graduate from college. He leads the second-largest city in Illinois, and he had the potential to appeal to a cross-section of voters in a general election, said several Republicans familiar with the push. Republicans haven’t won the governorship in Illinois since 2014, but President Joe Biden’s tanking poll numbers, inflation and rising gas prices added up to what Republicans thought could be their best opportunity in a year already expected to favor their party.But first Irvin had to get through the primary, and Trump almost immediately complicated things. Irvin dodged question after question about whether he supported the former president. Last month, WTTW, a Chicago TV station, published text messages that left no question about his feelings for Trump.    “And I hate Trump too!” Irvin wrote in the texts, according to the report. “He’s an idiot!!!” Irvin added: “and a bigoted racist.” Some Republicans have blamed Irvin’s campaign for not anticipating the Democratic playbook of meddling that has been run in other states, including Pennsylvania. Several who had interactions with the campaign questioned whether Irvin was fully vetted. One devastating negative ad after another, all run by Democrats, exposed potential deal breakers for Republican primary voters — including the fact that Irvin voted in Democratic primaries in 2014, 2016 and 2020.  There are signs that the Democratic meddling knocked Irvin off his game. According to AdImpact, from Jan. 1 through the end of March, the most-aired Irvin ads were biography spots.By March 31, the Democratic Governors Association (DGA) had begun running attack ads against Irvin. From April 1 through mid-June, Irvin’s top two most aired ads were responding to attacks leveled in ads funded by Pritzker or Democrats, according to AdImpact. At the same time, Republican financier Richard Uihlein steered more than $16 million — to Bailey himself and to a supportive outside PAC — that helped pay for ads boosting Bailey and piling on Irvin. According to AdImpact, the Pritzker campaign spent a staggering $32 million on TV ads in a primary in which he was unopposed, with the bulk of the spending targeting Irvin, and the Democratic Governors Association spent $18.4 million more. Brady, the former state GOP chair, accused Zolnierowicz of using a closed, secretive process when he recruited Irvin as the party’s preferred candidate and of intimidating Republicans if they waffled with getting on board, by telling them it would be considered “bad behavior” and suggesting that future support for them could be cut off. The Irvin campaign did not comment on Brady’s allegations. “This was so bad and so arrogant and so deceitful to Republican voters what Mike Z did running this,” Brady said, referring to Zolnierowicz, who was chief of staff to the last Republican governor, Bruce Rauner. “If you’re a Republican, you should be furious with these guys.” Brady said the effort to recruit Irvin should have involved a broader segment of Republicans who were instead shut out. During Rauner’s 2014 campaign, Brady worked with and counted as personal friends many of the same people now working on Irvin’s team.Much of the team running the Irvin campaign, including Zolnierowicz, also worked on Mark Kirk’s GOP Senate victory in 2010. And in 2020, the same team was successful in defeating a Pritzker-backed referendum that would have changed Illinois’ income tax from a flat tax to a graduated income tax. Griffin, who had long fiercely opposed the tax change, stunned Chicago business leaders and political insiders last week when he announced he was moving his hedge fund, Citadel, out of Chicago to Florida.  Some Republicans privately criticized Brady, saying he was letting personal feelings get in the way because the Irvin team selected a slate of Republicans it would back that excluded Brady’s cousin, Dan Brady, who is seeking the nomination for secretary of state Tuesday. Several Republicans agreed with Brady that the Irvin campaign had operated in a heavy-handed manner, including aggressively pushing Republicans to get on board with its slate of candidates no matter their past allegiances. But they chalked it up to politics. “This is nothing new. Someone always feels left out and snubbed,” said an influential Republican who backs Irvin and wasn’t authorized to speak publicly. “This isn’t powder puff. This isn’t a gentleman’s duel. The state of campaigns are completely different than what they were 20 years ago.” Wilhour said the issues plaguing Irvin’s candidacy illustrated how out of touch the party is with its base.“That’s how tone-deaf the Republican Party in the state of Illinois has been,” Wilhour said. “They were so tone-deaf on this thing they thought the only chance they had of winning was to become more like Democrats.”

US Campaigns & Elections

As midterm election season rolls on, primaries in Arizona, Missouri, Michigan and Washington state represent the latest chapter in the ideological battle among Democrats and yet another test of former President Donald Trump’s grip on the Republican Party.Tuesday’s races include several that could have a major impact on the battle for Congress, including one in a swing House seat in Michigan and another to determine who will face Sen. Mark Kelly (D-Ariz.) in a crucial Senate contest.And two races in Arizona could eventually have a major impact on the 2024 presidential election, with devoted election deniers up for the GOP nominations for both governor and secretary of state.Here’s what HuffPost is watching:Missouri’s Trump ‘Endorsement’ And A Democratic DivideEven by the outré standards of GOP primaries this cycle, the battle for the Republican nomination in Missouri has been chaotic, wacky and often disturbing. Every candidate with a chance has worked overtime to ingratiate themselves to Trump, hiring his former advisers and singing his praises relentlessly.One candidate, Rep. Billy Long, laid out a plan to make Trump president again by convincing President Joe Biden to appoint him as vice president and has handed out fake $45 bills with Trump’s face on them. Another, gun-toting lawyer Mark McCloskey, falsely implied a Vanilla Ice performance at a county fair was in support of his campaign. Another, Rep. Vicky Hartzler, was apparently shunned by Trump for saying his behavior on Jan. 6, 2021, was “unpresidential,” even though she voted against certifying the election.Ultimately, Trump’s endorsement came down to two men: former Gov. Eric Greitens and state Attorney General Eric Schmitt. Greitens, in a normal political era, would be persona non grata: He has been credibly accused of sexual and domestic abuse. He angled aggressively for Trump’s endorsement, hiring Kimberly Guilfoyle, who is Donald Trump Jr.’s girlfriend, as a top aide. Schmitt, by contrast, is a run-of-mill Republican ― something that, at this point, does mean embracing Trump’s lies about the 2020 election.Republican donors in Missouri, fearing Greitens could cost them a seat, have funded a super PAC called Show Me Values PAC that has spent $6 million on ads attacking Greitens, including one in which a female narrator reads aloud from an affidavit filed by Greitens’ ex-wife.That’s led to a turnaround in the polls: While Greitens has led for most of the race, most recent surveys show Schmitt pulling into the lead. The only remaining variable was Trump’s endorsement. And on Monday night, he delivered it.“I trust the Great People of Missouri, on this one, to make up their own minds, much as they did when they gave me landslides victories in the 2016 and 2020 Elections, and I am therefore proud to announce that ERIC has my Complete and Total Endorsement!,” he wrote.Both Erics claimed the endorsement.While Missouri is solidly red at this point, Democrats do have a contested primary of their own. The race pits Lucas Kunce, a Marine veteran and antitrust expert who is running a class-focused progressive campaign, against Trudy Busch Valentine, an heiress to the beer fortune who has run as a more mainstream Democrat.Kunce, with his broadsides against corporate consolidation, willingness to deploy salty language and some big-name endorsements ― including from Missouri native and Mad Men star Jon Hamm and Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) ― has received far more media attention. But Busch Valentine has a familiar last name and loaned her campaign $3 million to deploy television ads. There’s been only sporadic polling in the race, but the campaigns expect a tight contest.Pro-Israel Groups Spend Big In MichiganU.S. Rep. Andy Levin (D-Mich.), left, and U.S. Rep. Haley Stevens (D-Mich.).Brittany Greeson for HuffPostDeep-pocketed pro-Israel groups are trying to shape the outcomes of Democratic primaries in three safely Democratic House seats in the Detroit area.The contest that has gotten the most attention is in Michigan’s 11th Congressional District in suburban Oakland County, where redistricting prompted a faceoff between Reps. Haley Stevens and Andy Levin. A super PAC aligned with the American Israel Public Affairs Committee has spent more than $4.2 million to defeat Levin, who is both Jewish and more progressive than Stevens, in the hopes of punishing him for supporting additional U.S. pressure on Israel to end its occupation of lands conquered in 1967.The race is also set to test the appeal of female Democratic candidates after the Supreme Court’s June decision overturning the federal right to an abortion, and the extent of progressive influence among the highly educated suburbanites who have become a core part of the Democratic electorate.In Michigan’s 12th Congressional District, which encompasses a swath of Detroit’s west side and adjacent communities, Rep. Rashida Tlaib faces a primary from Detroit City Clerk Janice Winfrey, a more moderate Democrat. Winfrey, who has faced criticism for her management of elections over four terms in office, is backed by two pro-Israel groups that have bundled donations for her, and a super PAC funded by a pro-Israel hedge fund manager that has also spent almost $700,000 on her behalf.Winfrey and her allies have attacked Tlaib for remarks calling for the abolition of police, her vote against the bipartisan infrastructure bill, and her refusal to explicitly endorse Joe Biden during the 2020 presidential race. But the pro-Israel groups supporting Winfrey are targeting Tlaib for a mostly unrelated reasons: her outspoken pro-Palestinian views, including her support for a binational state in Israel and Palestine.Michigan’s redrawn 12th District includes all of Dearborn, where a large Arab American community tends to be more sympathetic to Tlaib’s foreign policy stances. But it is also home to Southfield, a majority-Black, middle-class city that may be more receptive to Winfrey’s pitch.Finally, nine Democratic candidates are vying for the chance to fill Michigan’s open 13th Congressional District, which comprises portions of Detroit and its affluent eastern suburbs. The top three contenders are state Sen. Adam Hollier, state Rep. Shri Thanedar and Portia Roberson, chair of the Michigan Civil Rights Commission.Although the ideological stakes of the race are less clear than in other districts, Hollier is favored both by AIPAC’s super PAC, which has spent more than $4.1 million on his behalf, and the cryptocurrency billionaire-backed super PAC Protect Our Future, which has chipped in another $1 million to elect him. Roberson is backed by the influential pro-choice group EMILY’s List.Thanedar, who amassed a multimillion-dollar fortune as a chemical testing entrepreneur, has spent well over $5 million of his own money running. A win for Thanedar, who has spoken out against U.S. military aid to Israel, would disappoint both pro-Israel groups and some Black voters eager to ensure Detroit has at least one Black representative in Congress.Three House Republicans Who Voted To Impeach TrumpRep. Peter Meijer (R-Mich.), left, speaks with Tim Faasse, right, at Blues Gym in Grand Rapids, Michigan, on July 25.Brittany Greeson for HuffPostThree of the 10 House Republicans who voted to impeach Trump following the U.S. Capitol riot face Trump-backed primary challenges on Tuesday: Reps. Peter Meijer (Mich.), Jaime Herrera Beutler (Wash.) and Dan Newhouse (Wash.).Meijer, a first-term lawmaker representing Michigan’s 3rd Congressional District in the western part of the state, appears to be in the greatest danger of losing his primary. It is also the race where a victory for the Trump-aligned candidate would have the biggest implications for the general election. Redistricting has made Michigan’s 3rd more Democratic, making it a rare pickup opportunity for the party this election cycle. To that end, House Democrats’ campaign arm has spent almost $450,000 boosting Meijer’s challenger, John Gibbs, on TV.In Washington state, Herrera Beutler and Newhouse both have the benefit of running in a nonpartisan “jungle” primary, in which the top two vote-getters proceed to the general election regardless of party. Herrera Beutler, who is running in Washington’s 3rd Congressional District, is explicitly appealing to moderate Democrats and independents, who lack a competitive Democratic candidate to rally behind. She and Newhouse, who is running in Washington’s 4th Congressional District, are also both expected to profit from a divided field of Trump-aligned challengers.Election Denial On The Ballot In ArizonaRepublican gubernatorial candidate Kari Lake speaks to supporters during a campaign event at the Whiskey Roads Restaurant & Bar on July 31 in Tucson, Arizona.Brandon Bell via Getty ImagesMany politicos see the GOP gubernatorial primary in Arizona as a proxy war between Trump and the current GOP governor, Doug Ducey. Trump backed a candidate who is essentially a female version of himself, former Phoenix news anchor Kari Lake, while Ducey, who is term-limited from running for another term, endorsed real estate developer Karrin Taylor Robson, whose mild-mannered demeanor and business background harken to a now-vintage era of the GOP.The latest polling on the race shows Lake ahead of Robson, but strategists in the state aren’t waging any bets before Tuesday.Democrats see Lake as the easier candidate to beat in November. A former Obama supporter, Lake has called the 2020 election “corrupt” and “stolen” and has suggested she would dispute the results if she doesn’t win ― positions that might alienate swing voters. Robson has propped up her campaign with millions of dollars of her own to argue she has the better resume and temperament to lead the state. She recently caught flak for flying her family’s private jet to a campaign event in Tucson.This GOP primary will reveal whether the Republican base is sick of looking back to the last major election — or whether it truly craves another version of Trump at Arizona’s helm.But election denial is also key in two other races further down the ballot: State Rep. Mark Finchem, who helped organize “Stop the Steal” campaigns in Arizona and was present outside the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, is the apparent front-runner in the GOP primary for secretary of state. He won Trump’s endorsement, holds a sizable lead in pre-primary polls, and has few rivals in Arizona ― or anywhere else ― when it comes to his commitment to spreading lies about the country’s election system.Finchem, who in the past identified as a member of the far-right militia group the Oath Keepers, is a member of the so-called America First coalition of secretary of state candidates seeking to take over top elections offices ahead of the 2024 presidential contest. He has said he wouldn’t have certified the results of Arizona’s 2020 election, which Joe Biden narrowly won.He has also pledged to ban early voting, and wants to force Arizona officials to hand count all ballots instead of using electronic machines. He is among the sponsors of a bill that would give the Arizona state legislature the authority to overturn elections, as The New York Times reported this week.His chief primary rival may be Beau Lane, a political newcomer who won the endorsement of Gov. Doug Ducey and other prominent Arizona Republicans who have broken with Trump over election lies. Lane ― unlike Finchem and fellow state Rep. Shawnna Bolick, another secretary of state candidate ― has not called for the decertification of the 2020 results, and may be the GOP’s best hope of winning the race in November. He has supported other voting changes, though, including purges of Arizona’s early voting list and a referendum that would impose new voter-ID requirements.State Sen. Michelle Ugenti-Rita hasn’t been as aggressive on the 2020 election as Finchem or Bolick, but that’s not saying much. She has successfully pushed new laws to curb voting rights in Arizona, including a law that banned third-party ballot collection, a practice that made it easier to vote, especially for many of the state’s Native American tribes. Ugenti-Rita also initially supported the conspiratorial Cyber Ninjas “audit” of Maricopa County’s 2020 results before ultimately criticizing it.The winner will face either state Rep. Reginald Bolding or former Maricopa County Recorder Adrian Fontes, who will face off for the Democratic nomination in Tuesday’s primary.And while state legislative races usually don’t make national news, Rusty Bowers’ race for Arizona Senate is the exception to the rule.Bowers became a memorable figure in the House Jan. 6 probe after he testified emotionally about the pressures he faced, including from Trump himself, to overturn the election results in his capacity as speaker of the Arizona House of Representatives.Naturally, Bowers has a Trump-backed opponent in this conservative, east-of-Phoenix district, former state Sen. David Farnsworth, who says he believes all the things Bowers doesn’t about the 2020 election.Bowers’ political future could hinge on whether GOP voters are willing to reject Trump’s election lies.The headline race in the state, however, is likely the nasty GOP Senate primary to challenge Democratic Sen. Mark Kelly. Trump-endorsed Blake Masters, a protege of venture capitalist and democracy critic Peter Thiel, is a slight favorite against Jim Lamon, a businessman who has poured $14 million of his own money into the contest.Lamon has used ads to highlight Masters’ controversial past writings and statements, including once praising the Unabomber as an “underrated subversive thinker.”Those writings mean Democrats would likely prefer to face Masters, but the race will be a toss-up contest regardless of who triumphs in the primary.

US Campaigns & Elections

Midwestern states are battling to be bumped up to a coveted early slot in the Democratic presidential nominating calendar, jumpstarting what election watchers say could be a big shakeup ahead of the 2024 election.  Michigan, Minnesota and Illinois are among the states hoping to exert more influence and help diversify a lineup — led by the largely rural and predominantly white states of Iowa and New Hampshire — that many Democrats say doesn’t represent the party’s true strength.   The Democratic National Committee (DNC) has announced 17 finalists to be among the first four or five, including Michigan, Minnesota, Illinois and all four current early primary states. State party officials began drafting proposals earlier this year and are set to make their cases to the body’s regulatory committee later this month.  Proponents of Michigan and Minnesota point to them being critical swing states that helped elect President Biden. Geography matters too, they say. If Iowa gets the boot from its traditional role as the first-in-the-nation caucus state, either state would provide an alternative in the Midwest.  “There needs to be a midwest state,” Michigan Rep. Debbie Dingell (D) told The Hill in an interview. “We’re the heart of the country.”   After going for former President Trump by a slim margin in 2016, Michigan flipped back to blue four years later to give Biden enough electoral college votes to help win the presidency.   “I was one of the people that told people that Donald Trump would win Michigan in 2016, and, by the way, people in both parties thought that I was crazy and I think it stunned a lot of people,” Dingell said. “It is a purple state and we do decide who the president’s going to be.”   “I’m not interested in presidential candidates testing the waters in my state, I’m interested in seeing the candidates answers to the questions that voters care about,” she added.   Democrats see an advantage to having a general election battleground go earlier in the process, arguing that there’s value in showing voters the kind of candidates who can win in the fall, even a year or more ahead of the next presidential race.   “The economy is diverse, the population is diverse, the geographical population is diverse, the educational levels are diverse,” said John Anzalone, one of Biden’s top pollsters who works on Michigan elections.  “If you’re a presidential candidate looking to be tested with a bunch of different universes of voters, it’s really perfect,” he said.  Michigan Democrats are expected to pitch their case to the DNC’s Rules and Bylaws Committee, the governing force that decides the order of the calendar, on June 23.  As part of their case-building, they recently sent a letter to the national party listing reasons why they believe the Great Lakes State is best suited to appear on the early roster. The memo was signed by Dingell and the rest of Michigan’s congressional delegation.   Minnesota is also high on Democrats’ list of considerations. It currently leans blue, but also has a strong independent streak that state party officials believe can be beneficial to voters.   In 2016, it awarded Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) a momentum-boosting win over Hillary Clinton, which temporarily changed the narrative that progressives can’t catch on in geographically diverse areas. Clinton took Minnesota in the 2016 general election and in 2020 Biden won the state over Trump.  “Our state is a true microcosm of the country,” said Ken Martin, who chairs Minnesota’s Farmer-Labor Party and serves as the vice chair of the DNC.   Martin has been closely involved in navigating the complicated process each presidential cycle. As president of the Association of State Democratic Committees, he’s seen the importance of bringing new perspectives into the conversation that set the tone and direction for the election.  Martin believes Minnesota, which currently votes on Super Tuesday, brings together “diverse racial and ethnic communities, a strong agriculture industry and the presence of rural Democratic voters.” He also praised the strong union and business footprint.  “Presidential candidates who can bring all of these voters together and win in Minnesota would be well-positioned to win across the country,” he added.   Adding to the intrigue, a third state, Illinois, has also thrown its hat in the ring. Officials there recently submitted their pitch to the DNC, also citing the state’s “unmatched” diversity in the midwest.   “That diversity would strengthen candidates’ campaign messaging and tactics for both the primary and general elections, because winning in Illinois requires building the kinds of broad-based coalitions necessary to win the Electoral College in November,” the state party wrote.   Biden was the overwhelming favorite in the Prairie State in 2020, outcompeting Trump by double digits. That could ultimately work against its chances of moving up, as many Democrats are openly expressing a desire for a battleground to serve as a test run ahead of the eventual Democrat vs. Republican matchup.   Still, others see the upside overtaking any potential shortcomings. An official with the state Democratic Party listed recent Democratic gains there as reasons for the national party to consider its bid.    “We really have a blueprint here for national candidates and how to translate Democratic values and Democratic campaign tactics into persuading voters, turning them out and winning,” said Jake Lewis, deputy director of the Illinois Democratic Party.   “We are a bigger state. We understand that,” Lewis continued. “But Democrats have to win big states.”  “We vote to be able to win big states like Florida, Pennsylvania, Ohio, and so testing Democratic candidates early on their ability to organize in bigger states and their ability to organize in bigger cities in a city like Chicago, it’s really important.”   Even as newcomers try out for a spot, the original first-four are working to keep their place on the calendar. Election strategists say that may be hardest for Iowa.  Democrats have long lamented the state’s prominence in the process, pointing to its lack of racial diversity and its rightward tilt in recent years. The highly-public debacle in 2020, when a technology malfunction caused uncertainty among voters and problems for party officials, may have been the final push to retool the calendar.  But supporters of Iowa keeping the electoral status quo are fighting to maintain its first-in-the-nation status, saying the state has played a defining role in previous races that sent more liberal candidates to the White House.  “There wouldn’t have been a President Obama without Iowa,” said Ross Wilburn, chair of the Iowa Democratic Party.   But they are open to making a significant change. Another major criticism of the caucus process is that it excludes anyone who may not be able to spend multiple hours at the event on a cold, winter night. The Des Moines Register reported earlier this month that state party officials have put forward a plan where voters would send in “presidential preference cards” in advance. In an attempt at compromise, the results would be announced on the original caucus date, but the voting process itself would be closer to a traditional primary.  And for officials like Wilburn, the state’s small size is an asset. “I understand other states wanting to be part of the process, but our presidential nominee cannot be decided by large media markets and candidates who just have larger dollars,” he said.   “We have an affordable television market and a candidate who doesn’t have the funds necessarily or the notoriety nationally, initially, they can campaign here in Iowa. There’s great grassroots strength. Our friends and neighbors help inform the messaging of presidential candidates.”

US Campaigns & Elections

NEWYou can now listen to Fox News articles! A Virginia law enforcement officer, born to Salvadoran immigrants after they fled civil war for a better life in America, is seeking the Republican nomination to represent Virginia's 7th Congressional District in the House and will face off against five other GOP hopefuls in the state's primary election on Tuesday.In 2018, Yesli Vega, who began her law enforcement career as a street cop with the City of Alexandria’s Police Department, won the Republican nomination and later defeated her Democratic challenger in a general election to earn a spot on the Prince William County Board of Supervisors.Speaking to Fox News Digital, Vega outlined the experiences she has endured in her life, including the loss of her brother's life to MS-13 gang members, that moved her to seek a seat in the House and improve living conditions for residents in the 7th District. Virginia 7th Congressional District candidate Yesli Vega, a Republican, will face off against challengers in a primary election on Tuesday. (Yesli Vega campaign)HOUSE GOP ELECTION ARM ADDS MEMBER OF DEM LEADERSHIP, THREE OTHERS TO MIDTERM TARGETS LIST"It's no surprise that our nation is in trouble under Biden and the Democrats," Vega said. "Virginians have seen not only gas, but grocery prices skyrocket, a humanitarian crisis after another to include the southern border, a crumbling education system, and a defund the police agenda that has caused rapid crime in our communites."Describing the loss of her brother who was "gunned down," Vega said the issue of crime in her community is "personal.""When I talk about crime, when I talk about the violence, when I talk about the drugs that are coming into our southern border, it's personal, and I mean it," she said, adding that she wants to "set things in motion" for a better future for all Americans.Vega said her experience as a law enforcement officer and her position on the board of supervisors in Prince William County has led her to better understand and connect with the needs and desires of those in the community."I can share with you that we conducted a county-wide survey where we asked folks in Prince William County what is a priority for them and the number one issue for folks is safe and secure communities," she said. "People don't want to live in crime-infested communities. People want to make sure that they are safe, that their children are getting the best education possible and that they're learning in a safe environment."REPUBLICANS GEARING UP TO CONTEST MIDTERM ELECTIONS VIA POLL WORKERS, ATTORNEYS: REPORTShould Vega prove outshine her competition in Tuesday's election and advance to the general election in November, she would face incumbent Rep. Abigail Spanberger, D-Va., who has represented the district in Congress since 2019. Vega expressed optimism that she can defeat Spanberger and take back the seat from Democrats that has historically been held by a Republican. Rep. Abigail Spanberger D-Va., speaks at a press conference at the US Capitol in Washington, DC.  (Michael Brochstein/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images)Vega said because of her story and her line of work in "delivering results" in law enforcement and throughout Prince William County, she is in a position to defeat Spanberger."You have somebody in Abigail who I consider the worst kind of politician because she goes down to Washington and acts and engages in a completely different manor than the Abigail that comes to the 7th District," Vega said. "One thing you can never do is take voters for granted or feel entitled as if you are over their vote and that's why I'm hearing on the ground people are tired of her lies, people are tied of her lip service.""She has enabled Joe Biden every single step of the way, she led the charge to end qualified immunity," she added. "When we talk about safe and secure communities, that is going to be a big part of discussions, especially when we've seen a Democrat Party that has been the party of violence, the party of chaos, the party of intimidation, and when Abigail Spanberger had an opportunity to stand up and push back, gagged. But now all of a sudden, she's acting like she's a friend of the police, like she cares about members of the community and their safety because it's election time. People are tired of that and they're gonna reject her this fall."Vega also touted the significance of Republican Mayra Flores' win of a South Texas seat held almost exclusively by Democrats for more than 100 years last Tuesday. Yesli Vega and her family (Yesli Vega campaign)"It's very significant," Vega said of Flores' win that some GOP strategists say marks the shift of a new trend for Latino voters. "We're trying to build off that momentum as well. We've seen so many folks in the 7th District who are excited about that victory in Texas and that we can do it here.""When you look at this 7th Congressional District, when you look at the demographics, you know, I'm in a position to really turn out the vote and I'm excited," she added. "I'm excited because of my personal story, which starts with my parents who fled from war in El Salvador in the middle of the civil war… I can relate to folks who have fled their native countries, who have fled from socialism, from communism, from living in crime-riddled communities. People don't want that here. They reject that."CLICK HERE TO GET THE FOX NEWS APPSen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, has endorsed Vega's candidacy and will offer support for her campaign in Virginia Monday evening.The Republican primary election will take place in Virginia on Tuesday. Kyle Morris covers politics for Fox News. On Twitter: @RealKyleMorris.

US Campaigns & Elections

Rep. Tom Rice, R-S.C., one of 10 Republicans to vote for former President Donald Trump’s impeachment after the Capitol riot, was ousted by a Trump-backed challenger, state Rep. Russell Fry, in a GOP primary Tuesday, NBC News projects.Rice’s defeat in the state’s 7th Congressional District marks the first time this election cycle that a pro-impeachment Republican has lost at the ballot box while also delivering Trump his first victory against an incumbent this year. Trump-backed candidates had lost five straight races against incumbents entering Tuesday.In South Carolina’s 1st Congressional District, a different story appeared to be unfolding. Rep. Nancy Mace held a more than 7-point lead over a Trump-backed challenger, though that GOP primary remained too early to call. Should she hold off the challenge from former state Rep. Katie Arrington, it would mark another loss for Trump in his efforts to exact revenge on Republicans he’s deemed disloyal. Rice surprised many by joining nine other Republicans in voting to impeach Trump after the former president’s supporters stormed the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021. The congressman knew his impeachment vote could cost him re-election, but expressed no regrets in an interview with NBC News last week."Win, lose or draw, I did the right thing, and I know I did the right thing," he said, adding of Trump’s conduct amid the riot: "I can’t think of any president who has ever done anything worse in terms of government. Mace did not support impeachment but, like Rice, has questioned the role Trump should play in the future of the GOP. She also voted to hold Steve Bannon — the former Trump adviser and a major voice in perpetuating lies about the 2020 election — in contempt of Congress after he defied a subpoena from the House committee investigating the attack. But she has not been as consistent as Rice has been in her opposition to Trump.As he weighs another White House bid in 2024, Trump’s influence was also on the line Tuesday in Nevada. There, he and his allies spent the last week trying to buttress his endorsed Senate candidate, former state Attorney General Adam Laxalt, against late momentum from GOP primary rival Sam Brown. That race and others in the state were too early to call after polls closed at 10 p.m. ET.While Trump’s influence has been a major story in each race, the South Carolina campaigns' closing weeks have seen much attention paid to gas prices, with each candidate seeking to accuse their rival of being responsible for rising costs. Both Mace and Rice have pointed to Arrington and Fry having voted in 2017 to raise the state gas tax when they were members of the state Legislature. In his tele-town hall with South Carolina voters last week, Trump himself made mention of gas prices, suggesting it was Fry and Arrington who would be best positioned to address the issue."It’s nice to look at what other people do, but we’re very much our own state with our own mind," Barbara Nielsen, a Beaufort County GOP activist who supports Arrington, told NBC News last week. "I know, all the news media has tried to, you know, they always look at where is Trump, who has he endorsed, and they try to make it into that. … I think that will probably factor in. But in the long run, it comes down to who the candidate is, and if they can close the deal."The races have had national involvement from big-name Republicans outside of Trump. Mace is backed by former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley, who served under Trump and is widely admired in the state, as well as former acting chief of staff Mick Mulvaney. Former House Speaker Paul Ryan, meanwhile, made a campaign stop in support of Rice, who also won the backing of former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie.Trump's most explicit efforts to punish those who've crossed him have not paid off for him so far in 2022. In Georgia last month, for example, Gov. Brian Kemp, Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger and Attorney General Chris Carr — all of whom refused to rig the state's 2020 election results in Trump's favor — won their GOP primaries against challengers the former president had endorsed. And in Alabama's Senate primary last month, Rep. Mo Brooks advanced to a runoff election even after Trump rescinded his endorsement, citing Brooks' desire to move on from the 2020 election. Over the weekend, Trump endorsed Brooks' Republican rival in the runoff, Katie Britt. Trump has had better endorsement luck in wider open races that lack the revenge narrative, including the Ohio and Pennsylvania Senate primaries. He also has padded his endorsement record by backing many candidates who were well on their way to winning before he got involved.In Nevada, Trump's decision was more about loyalty. Laxalt, as a Trump campaign co-chair in 2020, was behind several unsuccessful legal challenges to the election results in a state Joe Biden narrowly won. Laxalt, like Trump, raised baseless doubts about election integrity, but official investigations found no widespread fraud.But Laxalt has faced a robust fight from Brown, a retired Army captain whose straw poll victories and knack for collecting small donations has indicated momentum with grassroots voters. Laxalt has led in polls and has much of the national GOP establishment behind him, but some surveys have showed the race tightening. Last week, Trump held a telephone rally for Laxalt and his son Donald Trump Jr. traveled to Nevada for an in-person campaign event. The winner of the Senate primary will likely face Democratic incumbent Catherine Cortez Masto in what's expected to be one of the most competitive races that could determine control of the chamber this fall. Trump Jr. also campaigned last week for Clark County Sheriff Joe Lombardo, his father's preferred candidate in Nevada's crowded GOP primary for governor. Polls have shown Lombardo as the front-runner in a field that includes former Sen. Dean Heller and retired professional boxer Joey Gilbert, who has the state party’s endorsement. The winner of that primary is expected to face Democratic Gov. Steve Sisolak in the general election.Nevada's GOP primary for secretary of state is also worth watching. Jim Marchant, a former state legislator who has promoted election conspiracy theories, is a leading candidate to become the state's next chief elections officer. Marchant has said he would not have certified Biden's win in the state if he were secretary of state in 2020. Trump has not endorsed in the race. A recent poll showed more than a third of likely primary voters undecided, with Marchant and businessman Jesse Haw the two leading candidates. Other primaries on the ballot Tuesday included the South Carolina race for governor. Republican incumbent Henry McMaster was renominated after facing a challenge from political newcomer Harrison Musselwhite, a truck driver campaigning as "Trucker Bob," NBC News projects. McMaster will face former Rep. Joe Cunningham, the winner of the Democratic primary, NBC News projects.Also in South Carolina, Spartanburg County Democratic Party chair Angela Geter, state Rep. Krystle Matthews and author Catherine Fleming Bruce are vying for the Democratic nomination to face U.S. Sen. Tim Scott this fall. Scott, who is unopposed in the Republican primary, is seen as a potential presidential candidate in 2024. Voters in Maine will also cast primary ballots Tuesday.In the state’s competitive 2nd Congressional District, which covers the mostly rural northern three-quarters of the state, moderate Democratic Rep. Jared Golden is seen as one of the nation’s most vulnerable incumbents in the fall. Depending on how the GOP primary turns out, he’ll face either a rematch against former Rep. Bruce Poliquin, whom he defeated in 2018, or political newcomer Liz Caruso, who has been boosted by some national conservatives like Fox News host Tucker Carlson and who has said she'd align herself with people like Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., if elected to Congress.Meanwhile, Maine's marquee race this fall is already set. Democratic Gov. Janet Mills and Republican Paul LePage — a former two-term governor who left office highly unpopular — are running unopposed for their parties’ nominations.

US Campaigns & Elections

Election deniers suffered a stinging series of defeats in Colorado on Tuesday night, losing handily in Republican primaries for governor, U.S. Senate and secretary of state ― the top three statewide races on the ballot.Greg Lopez, a former mayor who falsely claimed that former President Donald Trump won the 2020 election, lost his primary to Heidi Ganahl, a University of Colorado regent who finally said in mid-June that she believed President Joe Biden won legitimately. Businessman Joe O’Dea, who acknowledged Biden’s victory, defeated state Rep. Ron Hanks, a Jan. 6 insurrection attendee, in the GOP Senate nomination.And in the secretary of state race, Pam Anderson, a former county election clerk who also called Biden’s win legitimate, defeated two candidates who questioned the results of the election, including Tina Peters, a county clerk who is under felony indictment on charges that she tampered with voting machines as she tried to prove that the election was stolen from Trump. Trump’s conspiracy theories have dominated Republican Party politics since the 2020 contest, turning this year’s primaries into a series of referendums on baseless claims of widespread voter fraud, the lie that the election was stolen, and right-wing efforts to take over the country’s election system before the 2024 presidential contest, when Trump may be on the ballot again.Across the country, GOP candidates have staked their primary campaigns entirely on the “big lie.” Such candidates have won scores of races nationwide already this year, including Pennsylvania’s GOP gubernatorial primary and Nevada’s Republican secretary of state race. Michigan’s state Republican Party backed election deniers for secretary of state and attorney general at its nominating convention. And Republicans who have embraced those lies are leading contenders in major primaries in Arizona, Minnesota, Wisconsin and other states that have yet to hold their contests.But Colorado is the latest swing state where Republican voters have rejected those conspiracy theories and the candidates who pushed them. In May, Georgia voters similarly turned away a trio of Trump-backed candidates in GOP contests for governor, attorney general and secretary of state, rejecting the “big lie” in one of its original birthplaces.Tina Peters, a county clerk under criminal indictment on charges that she tampered with voting machines, was among the "big lie" candidates who lost Republican primaries in Colorado on Tuesday night.Marc Piscotty via Getty ImagesThe Georgia losses were fueled by a variety of factors: Winners that all benefited from the fact that they were incumbents, and the state’s open primary system allowed Democrats to cast ballots in GOP contests. That rule likely helped Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, the chief target of Trump’s election ire, to win a clear majority of votes in his race and avoid a costly and uncertain run-off contest against his election-denying opponent.Colorado’s victorious Republicans enjoyed no such incumbency advantage on Tuesday. And at least in the Senate race, Democrats sought to boost Hanks’ candidacy with a bevy of ads and a barrage of late spending, hoping that a more radical opponent would bolster Sen. Michael Bennet’s (D) reelection chances this fall.They did, however, enjoy one major potential advantage: an efficient election system that makes it easy to vote, has earned the broad trust of Coloradans, and has not spent the last two years as a focal point of Trump’s “big lie” battering ram.Over the last decade, Colorado has built one of the country’s best election systems, according to nonpartisan experts. In 2013, the Democratic-controlled state legislature passed a law requiring the state to automatically send mail-in ballots to every registered voter, codifying and expanding a practice that was hardly novel to Colorado voters, nearly two-thirds of whom already regularly cast absentee ballots. The law also improved the in-person voting system, getting rid of specific local precincts in favor of countywide voting centers. And it modernized the state election system, bolstering security systems that had been the focus of intense criticism from both parties and election experts.Colorado voters loved it. In 2014, after the first election held under the new system, 95% of absentee voters said they were satisfied or very satisfied with their experience, while 96% of in-person voters said the same, according to Pew. Subsequent laws further expanded voting rights and automatic voter registration programs, turning Colorado into one of the easiest places in the nation to vote.Trump lambasted mail-in voting programs as a chief source of purported fraud during the 2020 election, but unlike in states that had enacted sweeping changes to election laws amid the COVID-19 pandemic, vote-by-mail was already familiar to most Coloradans. (Georgia, too, notably had an expansive absentee voting program in place, although it has since come under more scrutiny from the state’s GOP-controlled legislature.)Colorado also never became a specific focus of Trump’s fraud claims, likely because in his 14-point loss there was a substantially larger margin of defeat than he suffered in Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Pennsylvania or Wisconsin ― all states where he lodged direct legal and relentless public challenges to elections. The former president who has endorsed a litany of election deniers nationwide even refrained from weighing in on Colorado’s primaries: He didn’t officially back Lopez, Hanks or Peters, despite the latter’s efforts to win his support. Trump’s fraud claims also especially prospered among conservative voters in states where 2020 vote counts were particularly slow, in part because of the pandemic-related changes and deliberate efforts from Republican legislatures to delay the counting of votes. In Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin, officials can’t begin processing absentee ballots until Election Day, a rule that contributed to days-long counts that fueled Trump’s fraud allegations ― and the belief among his supporters that something was amiss ― as his early leads turned into narrow deficits. Colorado doesn’t have that problem. Efforts to modernize and improve its elections have created one of the country’s most efficient and secure systems, and made Colorado one of the fastest states to tally and report its results. On Tuesday night, the winner of each major statewide primary was evident within an hour of polls closing.“Colorado is considered the nation’s gold standard for voting,” Secretary of State Jena Griswold, a Democrat, told HuffPost last year, as she touted the changes her state has made and pushed federal lawmakers to adopt similar changes. “And we’re considered the securest state in which to vote.”There are notable caveats to any celebration of Colorado’s primary results as a total refutation of Trump’s conspiracies. In the secretary of state race, a majority of voters backed the pair of election-denying candidates ― it was their sharing of those votes that seems to have paved Anderson’s path to victory. And an expansive and trusted election system isn’t necessarily enough to defeat Trump’s conspiracies. Americans overall broadly enjoyed the expanded voting options that were implemented during the pandemic, but that hasn’t stopped the GOP from targeting them. A majority of Arizona voters, meanwhile, regularly take advantage of the state’s broad vote-by-mail program, but after Trump’s 2020 loss it has nevertheless become one of the major targets of the GOP-controlled legislature and Republican election deniers running in upcoming primaries.Even after the trio of losses in Colorado, challenges may persist. Peters, the secretary of state candidate, suggested Tuesday night that she would attempt to dispute the results. “This is not over,” she told supporters, according to the Denver Post.Unsurprisingly, she focused her ire on the very system that produced a convincing rejection of candidates like her: “I’m sorry,” she said. “We had faith in the system again.”

US Campaigns & Elections

Former U.S. President Donald Trump speaks during the National Rifle Association (NRA) annual convention in Houston, Texas, U.S. May 27, 2022. REUTERS/Shannon StapletonRegister now for FREE unlimited access to Reuters.comWASHINGTON, June 14 (Reuters) - Former President Donald Trump's efforts to punish his perceived enemies will be tested in South Carolina on Tuesday as Republican U.S. Representatives Tom Rice and Nancy Mace try to fend off Trump-backed primary election challengers.In Nevada, Trump-endorsed Republican Adam Laxalt is seeking his party's nomination for a crucial U.S. Senate race in this year's midterm elections. Republican Jim Marchant, who falsely claims the 2020 election was stolen from Trump, is vying for a chance to become the state's top election official.Voters also go to the polls in Maine and North Dakota to choose party nominees to compete in the November general election.Register now for FREE unlimited access to Reuters.comWith Democratic President Joe Biden slumping in the polls and soaring inflation souring voters' moods, Republicans are expected to win control of the House of Representatives and possibly the Senate. That would bring Biden's legislative agenda to a halt and give Republicans the power to launch investigations that could be politically damaging.Rice, a five-term South Carolina incumbent who was one of 10 Republicans to vote for Trump's impeachment after the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol, is seeking reelection against a crowded field of contenders that includes Trump-backed challenger Russell Fry, a state legislator.Mace, a first-term incumbent, drew Trump's ire by refusing to back Republican efforts to challenge the 2020 presidential election results and then breaking party ranks to hold his former adviser, Steve Bannon, in contempt of Congress. She is defending her seat against Trump-endorsed Katie Arrington, a former state lawmaker.Arrington won the same district's 2018 Republican primary only to lose in the general election to Democrat Joe Cunningham, who in turn lost to Mace in 2020.Rice and Mace each need to more than 50% of Tuesday's vote to avoid a June 28 run-off. Whoever ultimately wins the two Republican contests will likely be elected to Congress in November.The results will be watched as a measure of Trump's continued influence over the Republican Party as he hints at another run for the White House in 2024. His endorsees so far have had mixed success in battleground states including Ohio, Pennsylvania, Georgia and North Carolina. read more KEY NEVADA CONTESTSRepublicans in Nevada are looking to pick up the Senate seat held by Democrat Catherine Cortez Masto, considered one of the most vulnerable Democrats in the 2022 midterm campaign. read more Adam Laxalt, a former state attorney general, leads a crowded field of Republican primary contenders. He holds a 15-point advantage over his nearest rival, political newcomer Sam Brown, according to a May poll by the Nevada Independent.Laxalt is the son of former New Mexico Senator Pete Domenici and the grandson of former Nevada governor and U.S. Senator Paul Laxalt.In Nevada's secretary of state contest, Marchant, a former state legislator, is vying for the party nomination to oversee the 2024 presidential election against six other Republican candidates. He has received endorsements from high-profile conservatives, including former Trump White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows and pro-Trump businessman Mike Lindell.Among 2020 election deniers running for election posts across the country, Marchant has distinguished himself by claiming that elections have been rigged for decades and by arguing that electronic voting machines should be replaced by paper ballots. He blamed his own 2020 U.S. House loss to Democratic Representative Steven Horsford on election fraud.Republicans also will select nominees to run against three vulnerable House Democrats from Nevada - Horsford, Dina Titus and Susie Lee.Titus, who entered Congress in 2009, faces a challenge for her party nomination from progressive Democrat Amy Vilela, who is endorsed by Senator Bernie Sanders.The Republican field in Titus' district includes former Nevada Trump campaign aide Carolina Serrano, retired Army Colonel Mark Robertson and pro-Israel activist David Brog. Brog is endorsed by Trump's former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo.In Maine, Paul LePage, whose turbulent eight years as the state's governor foreshadowed Trump's rise, is running unopposed for the Republican nomination to challenge Democratic Governor Janet Mills in November.LePage, who once described himself as "Donald Trump before Donald Trump became popular," was widely criticized as governor for his inflammatory remarks on a host of topics from immigration, the environment and LGBTQ issues to abortion and voting rights. He left office with an approval rating below 40%.Register now for FREE unlimited access to Reuters.comReporting by David Morgan Editing by Colleen Jenkins and Alistair BellOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

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Following the various setbacks and missteps by the Biden administration, talk among Democrats that President Joe Biden should step aside to let a younger, more nimble politician lead the party into the 2024 election cycle is increasingly out in the open.Pouring a bit of gasoline on this simmering debate within the party is Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker, who said Wednesday that it is “certainly possible” that Biden will face a Democratic primary challenge ahead of 2024. Then came some eyebrow-raising comments on the very same day by Vice President Kamala Harris. During a flight aboard Air Force Two, the vice president said that “the president intends to run and if he does, I will be his ticket-mate” — the “if” in her remark fueling fresh speculation that a second Biden bid might not be such a sure thing.The president has failed to meet the moment by not adequately addressing important kitchen table issues across the country. But it’s not just elected officials who are questioning whether Biden should or will throw his hat in the ring for a repeat — recent polling by YouGov suggests that as few as 4 in 10 Democrats are convinced he should run again in 2024. Biden, for his part, has apparently become increasingly irritated by fellow members of his party who regularly bring up the matter of him stepping aside while at the same time working overtime to sell his viability for a Round #2 to party leaders. So, will he or won’t he run again 2024? That depends on three crucial issues and one “X-Factor” — all of which will pretty much play themselves out in the coming months.First, there is Biden’s approval rating. Right now it sits below 40%. For a president in the modern era, that’s pretty much rock bottom, and reflects a widespread view that Biden has not been leading the country in the right direction.To be fair, he has accomplished several important things since taking office, such as building an international coalition to fight Vladimir Putin in Ukraine while keeping China on the sidelines. His aggressive push to get more people in the U.S. vaccinated has also been a huge success —  67% of the population are now fully vaccinated, and 78% have received at least one dose. Another major win was his signing into law the first major gun safety measure in more than 30 years. And finally, perhaps most importantly, Biden has returned a sense of normalcy to the presidency after the tumultuous Trump era. However, in other key areas, the president has failed to meet the moment by not adequately addressing important kitchen table issues across the country. His anemic response to concerns about rising gas prices has been a point of contention that cuts across party lines, as have his plans for combating inflation, of which now nearly 3 in 4 Americans disapprove, according to an ABC News poll. His milquetoast response to the overturning of Roe vs. Wade (Let’s elect more Democrats!) falls short of some of the more aggressive tactics championed by Democratic New York Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and other progressives, such as expanding the Supreme Court or moving abortion clinics to federal lands.On the other hand, his inability to reign in his party’s progressive wing is turning off critical swing voting blocs, including Latinos.  With all these negative factors at play, it’s easy to see why, according to a new Associated Press poll, most Americans say the country is on the wrong track — including 8 in 10 Democrats — and why Biden’s approval rating is lower than any of his recent predecessors at the same point in their presidencies.Want more articles like this? Follow THINK on Instagram to get updates on the week’s most important political analysis If Biden continues to sport an approval rating well below 50%, as the 2024 election season gets into gear we can expect calls for a new candidate for 2024 to persist. It would almost ensure that he will face a serious primary challenge if he doesn’t step aside on his own.A second way to evaluate the likelihood of a 2024 Biden bid is through the lens of this fall’s midterm elections. Until rather recently, with fears of a recession looming large, it was looking to be a bloodbath for Democrats, who many were expecting to lose control of both chambers of Congress. But a spate of unpopular rulings by the Supreme Court coupled with a constant flow of damning revelations for Republicans coming out of the House committee investigating Jan. 6 have finally given Democrats a leg to run on. Still, it won’t be easy. In many contested areas, ultra-progressive candidates are beating moderate Democrats in primaries, almost ensuring victories for Republicans. Paired with redistricting that has created an uphill climb for Democrats in many House races, it is clear that the GOP will likely take back the House and has a chance to regain the Senate. If Democrats can keep the bleeding in the House to a minimum and retain control of the Senate, it will be a boon to Biden’s leadership within the party. But if an Armageddon scenario plays out with deep cuts in the House and a loss of the Senate, expect more pressure to be exerted on Biden to step aside ahead of 2024. A Donald Trump redux is the third issue at hand. Right now, things are not looking good for the former president; the details emerging from the Jan. 6 hearings have some speculating that he may be too weak to run in 2024. Former top Trump White House aide Mick Mulvaney said that Cassidy Hutchinson’s testimony has hobbled Trump politically. And he’s not alone in his thinking.  But make no mistake about it — Trump has been down and out before. His 1997 memoir “Trump: The Art of the Comeback” tells his own account of how he came back from bankruptcy in the 1990s. Who Republicans put up in 2024 is an important factor in weighing the pros and cons of a Biden bid. The president firmly believes that he is the only Democrat who can beat Trump in a rematch. But what happens if Trump isn’t on the ballot in the next presidential election? Is Biden best suited to take on younger and less polarizing candidates like Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis or Nikki Haley? Probably not.Lastly, there is the X-factor. The elephant in the room, of course, is the one thing completely out of Biden’s control: his age. Too many Americans feel that Biden, who would be 82 by the time he is sworn in a second time, is simply too old to continue to perform at a high level in the most important — and taxing — job in the world. That’s why incidents like the spill Biden took during a recent bike ride (albeit something that happens to many people) continue to raise plenty of questions about his mental and physical fitness. Even if all the stars were to align with his approval rating, the ‘22 midterms and with Trump wanting a rematch, if Biden were to start showing more instances of cognitive or physical decline, he might have no choice but to pass the party baton to the next generation.Related:Why Biden’s gas tax holiday is a terrible ideaThe person who has the most to gain from the Trump Jan. 6 revelationsBiden’s gaffes might actually be his selling pointArick WiersonArick Wierson is a six-time Emmy Award-winning television producer and a former senior aide to former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg. He advises political and corporate clients on communications strategies across the U.S., Africa and Latin America.Bradley HonanBradley Honan is the CEO of Honan Strategy Group, a polling and analytics firm. He has advised the campaigns of Bill and Hillary Clinton, Michael Bloomberg, Tony Blair and leading global companies.

US Campaigns & Elections

| August 12, 2022 12:40 PM Lawyers for the Maricopa County Board of Supervisors are urging a court to slap penalties against Kari Lake, Mark Finchem, and their lawyers for a "frivolous lawsuit" against the county pertaining to election practices. Lake and Finchem filed a suit in April demanding a judge prohibit the county from using certain equipment in the 2022 election due to concerns about possible fraud and hacking, but Maricopa County is arguing that the suit was rife with "demonstrably false allegations made without any basis or reasonable factual inquiry." MARICOPA 2020 AUDITORS 'MADE UP' NUMBERS, ELECTION ANALYSTS SAY "Plaintiffs and their counsel violated Rule 11(b)(1) by pursuing this frivolous lawsuit that has no factual or legal basis for the improper purpose of undermining confidence in elections and to further their political campaigns," the motion for sanctions said. Their lawsuit in April alleged that Arizona does not use paper ballots, audit its election results, or test its voting machines, assertions that Maricopa County lawyers strongly refuted in their motion for sanctions. The motion for sanctions was filed in the U.S. District Court of Arizona on July 18. Lawyers for Finchem and Lake, which includes Alan Dershowitz, are named in the motion. The county is also seeking attorney fees from the defendants in addition to sanctions the court deems sufficient to "deter repetition of such conduct or comparable conduct by others similarly situated." Both Lake and Finchem are vying for statewide office in the midterm elections, with Lake clinching the Republican nod for governor and Finchem the nod for secretary of state earlier this month. The pair have regularly peddled claims about election malfeasance in the Grand Canyon State. "Both counsel and Plaintiffs have pursued this matter for an improper purpose — namely to sow doubts about the reliability and trustworthiness of elections for their own financial and political benefit," the motion continued. The Washington Examiner reached out to representatives of Finchem and Lake for comment. CLICK HERE TO READ MORE FROM THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER Maricopa County, Arizona's most populous county, was a hotbed for election fraud claims in the 2020 election cycle. Former President Donald Trump and some of his allies alleged widespread fraud transpired in the county during the presidential election cycle. In response to concerns about the election, state Republicans tapped Cyber Ninjas to conduct an audit of the county's tabulation. The controversial review eventually reaffirmed President Joe Biden's victory. The Cyber Ninjas found 99 additional votes for Biden and 261 fewer votes for former President Donald Trump, but Arizona's Senate referred the findings due to concerns raised by the auditors regarding election practices.

US Campaigns & Elections

get the free app Updated on: June 15, 2022 / 12:57 AM / CBS News Rep. Nancy Mace faces tough primary Rep. Nancy Mace faces tough GOP primary in South Carolina 11:10 Four states held primary elections Tuesday, and in one of the most closely watched races in South Carolina, CBS News projects Russell Fry wins the 7th-District Republican primary, defeating incumbent Rep. Tom Rice, who voted to impeach former President Donald Trump. Tuesday's primaries are setting up some of the most expensive general election matchups in the fall.Rice vehemently defended his impeachment vote, telling Politico recently that "I think that was one of the worst things, if not the worst, that a president has ever done in terms of attacking the Constitution and separation of powers." Trump backed Fry in the race, and there were five other Republicans in the primary.  Tom Rice (left) and Russell Fry AP Photo/Alex Brandon, AP Photo/Meg Kinnard The former president issued a celebratory statement on Tuesday night, calling Fry's win the "biggest News of the evening so far is that Russell Fry beat Impeach Master Tom Rice with a Vote of more than 51%, therefore WINNING OUTRIGHT with no need for a run-off." Fry on Tuesday night called it a "huge night for Republicans" and thanked Trump for his endorsement. CBS News projects that Rep. Nancy Mace has won the Republican primary in South Carolina's 1st District. Mace, a freshman Republican who flipped South Carolina's 1st District from blue to red,defeated Trump-backed former state Rep. Katie Arrington, the 2018 GOP nominee for this district who lost to Democrat Joe Cunningham.Mace voted to certify the 2020 election results and to hold Trump ally Steven Bannon in contempt of Congress for failing to comply with a subpoena from the Jan. 6 select committee. She was also outspoken against Trump's conduct in the immediate aftermath of the Jan. 6 attack.Trump had issued a statement Saturday saying that Mace is "despised by almost everyone" and said she "fights Republicans all the time and is not at all nice about it." But on Tuesday night, Trump issued a statement on Truth Social saying "Katie Arrington was a long shot but ran a great race and way over performed. Congrats to Nancy Mace, who should easily be able to defeat her Democrat opponent!" Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images, Sean Rayford/Getty Images Republican incumbent Sen. Tim Scott didn't face any serious primary challengers on Tuesday and he's expected to easily win deep-red South Carolina in November. But he's raised nearly $40 million so far, more than any other Republican.Democrats Catherine Fleming Bruce, Angela Geter and state Rep. Krystle Matthews are competing to take on Scott.In the governor's race, Trump-backed incumbent Republican Gov. Henry McMaster defeated his primary challenger, Harrison Musselwhite.On the Democratic side, Cunningham, who lost his House seat to Mace in 2018, won the primary, defeating state Sen. Mia McLeod and several others. Also in the spotlight is Nevada, the state that officially gave President Joe Biden enough electoral votes to win the presidency in 2020. Mr. Biden won the state by less than three points in 2020, and the state's economy has been hit hard by inflation and the COVID-19 pandemic. Republicans are hoping to flip the Senate seat and the governor's mansion in the fall — and a number of Republicans are running to succeed the term-limited secretary of state, who refused to throw out the election results in favor of Trump.Trump-backed Republican Adam Laxalt, who succeeded current Democratic Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto as the state's attorney general, held a comfortable lead in the Senate race, but retired Army captain Sam Brown has narrowed the once 40-point gap.  Ben Smith (left) and Adam Laxalt are running for the Republican nomination for Senate in Nevada.  David Calvert/Getty Images, David Becker/Getty Images Laxalt, who lost the governor's race in 2018, also has endorsements from a number of high-profile Republicans, including Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas and Donald Trump Jr., who came to Nevada to campaign with Laxalt. Cortez Masto doesn't have a serious challenger on Tuesday, but she has already raised big sums ahead of November — nearly $20 million in the last year — and goes into primary day with more than $9 million cash on hand.Nevada Gov. Steve Sisolak, elected in 2018, was the first Democrat to win the governor's mansion in more than 20 years. He faces a primary challenger on Tuesday, Clark County Commissioner Tom Collins.Fifteen Republicans are on the Republican primary ballot for governor. Clark County Sheriff Joe Lombardo, former boxer Joey Gilbert, former U.S. Sen. Dean Heller, North Las Vegas Mayor John Lee and entrepreneur Guy Nohra are so far leading the field. Republican Secretary of State Barbara Cegavske has faced blowback from Trump's supporters since the 2020 election, including being censured by the state party. There is a crowded Republican primary field to be the party's nominee in November, including some candidates who have spread false claims or raised questions about the 2020 election. There has been no credible evidence of widespread fraud that could have changed Nevada's results. In Nevada's 1st Congressional District, Democratic incumbent Rep. Dina Titus is facing a challenger on the left, progressive Amy Vilela, who is backed by Sen. Bernie Sanders. In the 2nd District, national Republican groups have gotten involved to support Congressman Mark Amodei in his primary. Amodei is being challenged by Danny Tarkanian, a Douglas County commissioner who has had unsuccessful runs for Congress in the past decade.In the special election to fill the remainder of Democratic Rep. Filemon Vela's term in Texas' 34th District, Republicans got a short-term win with Republican Mayra Flores winning enough votes, 50% of the total turnout, to win the race outright to hold the seat until January. Vela resigned in March to work for a lobbying firm.Republicans are hoping the win Tuesday will give them an edge to flip the district in November, where Flores will face off against Democratic Rep. Vicente Gonzalez. Although the district lines will lean more Democratic in November than the version used in the special election, the win comes as Republicans continue to invest in their outreach with Hispanic voters in this region and across the country on issues such as the economy and immigration.Flores and Republican groups spent close to $1 million dollars on ads for the special election, while national Democratic groups only devoted a fraction of their resources to the race.   Updated 11:20 PM South Carolina 1st U.S. House District Republican primary: CBS News projects Nancy Mace wins CBS News projects Nancy Mace wins Republican primary   Updated 11:10 PM South Carolina 7th U.S. House District Republican primary: CBS News projects Russell Fry wins CBS News projects Russell Fry wins the Republican primary.    6:04 PM / June 14, 2022 South Carolina U.S. Senate Democratic primary Catherine Fleming Bruce, Angela Geter and Krystle Matthews are on the ballot.   Updated 7:52 PM / June 14, 2022 South Carolina Governor Republican primary results: Henry McMaster wins Republican nomination for South Carolina Governor Gov. Henry McMaster wins Republican nomination for South Carolina Governor   Updated 10:22 PM South Carolina Governor Democratic primary: Joe Cunningham wins Joe Cunningham wins the Democratic primary for South Carolina governor.    6:04 PM / June 14, 2022 Nevada U.S. Senate Republican primary Adam Laxalt, Sam Brown, William Conrad, William Hockstedler, Sharelle Mendenhall, Tyler Perkins, Carlo Poliak and Paul Rodriguez are on the ballot.   Updated 2m ago Nevada U.S. Senate Democratic primary: Catherine Cortez Masto wins Catherine Cortez Masto wins Democratic primary for U.S. Senate in Nevada.   6:03 PM / June 14, 2022 Nevada Governor Republican primary Joe Lombardo, Dean Heller, Joey Gilbert, John J. Lee, Guy Nohra, Seven Achilles Evans, Gary Evertsen, Eddie Hamilton, Tom Heck, Stan Lusak, Edward O'Brien, Fred Simon, William Walls, Amber Whitley, Barak Zilberberg.   Updated 2m ago Nevada Governor Democratic primary: Steve Sisolak wins Steve Sisolak wins Democratic primary for governor in Nevada.   6:02 PM / June 14, 2022 Nevada Secretary of State Republican primary Kristopher Dahir, Jesse Haw, Jim Marchant, Richard F. Scotti, John Cardiff Gerhardt, Socorro Keenan and Gerard Ramalho are on the ballot.   Updated 11:46 PM Texas 34th U.S. House District Republican special election: Republican Mayra Flores wins Republican Mayra Flores wins the special election in Texas' 34th District to fill the remainder of Rep. Filemon Vela's term.

US Campaigns & Elections

Former President Donald Trump is considering launching his 2024 presidential campaign this fall, a source close to the president confirmed to CBS News.The former president told New York magazine in a post published Thursday that he's "already made that decision." What he hasn't settled on is the timing. "I would say my big decision will be whether I go before or after," he said, in reference to the midterm elections in November.President Joe Biden is currently facing low approval ratings amid record-high inflation and disillusionment among Democrats after the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade. But a national poll released this week from The New York Times and Siena College found that Trump currently trails Mr. Biden in a head-to-head matchup.The same poll found that a majority of Republicans do not want Trump to run again, although 49% supported him over five potential 2024 candidates. Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, one of the biggest threats to a Trump candidacy, recently held a meeting in Fort Lauderdale connecting major donors with GOP governors and gubernatorial candidates, sources confirmed to CBS News.On Truth Social, Trump hit back at The New York Times after the poll was published, calling them the "failing New York Times" and "truly the enemy of the people."The possible fall launch was first reported by The Washington Post.Former President Donald Trump speaks during an event with Joe Lombardo, Clark County sheriff and Republican candidate for Nevada governor, and Republican Nevada Senate candidate Adam Laxalt, Friday, July 8, 2022, in Las Vegas. / Credit: John Locher / APTrump plans to return to Washington, D.C. on July 26 – his first trip back to the nation's capital since he left office on Jan. 21, 2021. The former president will headline a speech to the America First Policy Institute, the institute said in a release Thursday.Trump has been holding a number of rallies as the primary season heats up this summer, including one coming up this Saturday in Arizona.Talk of Trump's possible 2024 announcement comes as the House committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol has been holding public hearings to reveal what it has learned so far about the riot and the role of Trump and his inner circle. The committee has unveiled new details about the pressure campaigns by Trump and his allies to overturn the election results on former Vice President Mike Pence, the Justice Department, state lawmakers and even local elections officials. The panel's prime time hearing next Thursday will delve into what Trump was doing during the height of the assault on the Capitol, between 2 p.m. and just after 4 p.m. Committee vice chair Liz Cheney said the hearing would provide a "minute-by-minute" account of what transpired that day.The committee has also focused on a plot by Trump's allies to put forward alternate electors in seven battleground states Mr. Biden won. Committee chair Rep. Bennie Thompson said Wednesday that the committee is having conversations with the Justice Department related to the phony elector scheme.On the social media platform Truth Social, Trump has repeatedly tried to cast doubt on the Jan. 6 committee hearings. Last week, he referred to the committee members as "Political Hacks and Thugs."Therapy dog helps Highland Park heal after shootingFormer lawyer Alex Murdaugh charged with killing wife and sonBiden vows to stand with Israel against Iran nuclear program

US Campaigns & Elections

Trump attorney Rudy Giuliani made a striking pitch while trying to convince Arizona House Speaker Rusty Bowers to decertify the 2020 election, the state lawmaker alleged. The former New York City mayor conceded the Trump campaign did not have evidence to back its claims of widespread voter fraud, instead offering only "lots of theories" in support of its position, Bowers said in Tuesday's testimony before the House select committee investigating the Jan. 6 riot. "We’ve got lots of theories. We just don’t have the evidence," Giuliani said when the speaker pressed him for evidence to justify his decertification requests, according to Bowers. GEORGIA ELECTIONS OFFICIALS DETAIL TRUMP PRESSURE TACTICS TO REVERSE 2020 RESULTS "I don't know if that was a gaffe, or maybe he didn't think through what he said, but both myself and others in my group, the three in my group, and my counsel, both remember that specifically, and afterwards, we kind of laughed about," he told the committee while recounting the exchange. Bowers said he was stunned by the remark and felt that former President Donald Trump's allies wanted him to undertake unprecedented action to thwart the election without sufficient proof of malfeasance. Trump appealed to Bowers as a fellow Republican, asking him, "Aren't we all Republicans here?", Bowers said. But Bowers did not "want to be used as a pawn" and felt Trump and his allies failed to show the evidence needed. Trump had castigated Bowers as a "RINO," short for "Republican in name only," prior to the hearing and alleged that he had a conversation with Bowers in which he professed his belief that the election was "rigged," adding that Bowers "should hope there's not a tape of the conversation." Bowers denied making those remarks during the hearing. "[If] anywhere, anyone, anytime has said that I said the election was rigged, that would not be true," he added. In February, Bowers bucked members of his own party in Arizona by blocking legislation that would have given the state legislature the power to overrule election results. A self-described conservative and supporter of the former president, Bowers was adamant that he was not going to undertake an illegal action on his behalf. He felt carrying out the requests would amount to violating his oath of office and told the Trump team to battle out its electoral challenges in court instead. CLICK HERE TO READ MORE FROM THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER Bowers said he faced harassment from Trump supporters for resisting efforts to challenge the 2020 election at a time when his daughter was "gravely ill." He also said both his daughter and wife were deeply disturbed by the harassment, which included paneled trucks blaring claims that he was a pedophile and a corrupt politician. Trump and his allies, such as Giuliani, tried to squeeze key state and local officials across the country, according to committee members, who made claims of a pressure campaign the focus of their fourth day of public hearings this summer.

US Campaigns & Elections

The state Senate Redistricting and Elections Committee voted to approve a map altering all 14 of the state’s districts, creating 10 districts that favor Republicans, three that favor a Democrat, and one that would be considered a toss-up. If adopted, the map would give Republicans a major advantage in the state, currently split 50-50 by Democrats and Republicans. The full state Senate is set to vote on advancing the proposal on Tuesday, later heading to the House for passage as soon as Wednesday. If approved, the map would pose a serious threat to the incumbent Democrats, particularly Reps. Kathy Manning in the 6th Congressional District, Wiley Nickel in the 13th District, and Jeff Jackson in the 14th District, with all three races being moved from “toss-ups” to “likely Republican,” according to the nonpartisan Cook Political Report. Rep. Don Davis in the 1st District is also considered vulnerable as his district has been moved from “leaning Democratic” to “toss-up.” “I think the maps represent overt political corruption,” Jackson told the Washington Examiner last week. “I think if more people in the state were following it closely, they would be extremely disappointed.” Jackson said he’d “be surprised” if the maps are not met with some sort of litigation, maintaining that the current proposals are “not final yet.” It’s unclear whether Jackson intends to run for reelection, noting he would make a decision “once we know what the final map looks like.” Either map, if approved, would give Republicans a major advantage heading into the 2024 cycle, especially as they seek to hold on to their slim majority in the House. All 435 seats are up for grabs in 2024 as Republicans seek to hold their slim majority in the lower chamber. Of these, 42 are considered competitive, with most of those held by Democrats compared to Republicans, giving the GOP a slight advantage as it prepares for the next election cycle. However, of the 42 competitive seats, 18 are held by Republicans in districts that voted for President Joe Biden in 2020, compared to just five Democrats who must defend their seats in districts carried by former President Donald Trump. That means there are just enough vulnerable GOP-held seats to keep things competitive heading into the next election cycle.

US Campaigns & Elections

Just one-fifth of New Hampshire voters want President Joe Biden to seek another term in 2024, and his support within his own party has fallen sharply since last summer, according to a new poll. But likely Democratic primary voters in the key first-in-the-nation contest appear to show early signs of favoring an alternative to Biden: Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg. The new Granite State Poll, conducted by the University of New Hampshire Survey Center, found that only 31% of Democrats want Biden to run again, down from 54% in June and 74% in July 2021. REP. MALONEY TOUTS ABORTION RALLY ARREST AHEAD OF NEW YORK DEMOCRATIC PRIMARY “President Biden is increasingly seen as an electoral liability for Democrats, both in the 2022 midterms and 2024 presidential election,” UNH Survey Center Director Andrew Smith said in a statement. The poll found Biden’s net favorability is at an all-time low and that voters appear increasingly concerned about his age. Seventy-eight percent of respondents said they are very or somewhat concerned about Biden's age, including 88% of Republicans, 75% of Democrats, and 65% of independents. Biden, 79, holds the record for the country's oldest chief executive, a record previously set by his predecessor, former President Donald Trump, now 76. In a hypothetical 2024 Democratic primary field, the poll found Biden statistically tied with Buttigieg among New Hampshire Democrats at 16% and 17%, respectively. Vice President Kamala Harris was the first choice of just 6% of respondents, trailing both Sens. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) and Elizabeth Warren (D-MA). CLICK HERE TO READ MORE FROM THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER Although it is still nearly two years away, New Hampshire’s first-in-the-nation presidential primary is an important contest because an early victory in the Granite State can give campaigns momentum for further presidential primary contests. Biden has indicated he intends to run for reelection for a second term.

US Campaigns & Elections

Former President Donald Trump's decision to endorse Republican Katie Britt in Alabama's Senate primary runoff represents an about-face for the former president who previously belittled Britt when he was backing GOP Rep. Mo Brooks. Trump announced his endorsement of Britt on Friday, calling her "a fearless America First Warrior," while criticizing Brooks. It's the latest twist and turn in a state that's proven to be uncomfortable political terrain for Trump despite his own massive victories there in 2016 and 2020 (Trump backed appointed Republican Sen. Luther Strange in the 2017 GOP special primary, switched to nominee Roy Moore after Strange lost, and Moore lost the special general election). Britt's certainly never run against Trump — she touted how she helped "build President Trump's border wall" in her announcement video and called for a forensic audit of the 2020 election — but Trump has been critical of Britt at times. Here's a timeline demonstrating how the former president's public statements on the race tell the story of his shift. April 7, 2021: Trump backs BrooksTrump endorsed Brooks, a stalwart promoter of his attempts to discredit the 2020 election, in a statement that praised him and offered his signature "Complete and Total Endorsement." "Few Republicans have as much COURAGE and FIGHT as Alabama Congressman Mo Brooks. Mo is a great Conservative Republican leader, who will stand up for America First no matter what obstacles the Fake News Media, RINOs, or Socialist Democrats may place in his path," Trump said. July 10, 2021: Trump blasts Britt as an 'assistant' About a month after Britt jumped into the Senate race, Trump came out with a new statement attacking her as a tool of her former boss, retiring Alabama GOP Sen. Richard Shelby, and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell."I see that the RINO Senator from Alabama, close friend of Old Crow Mitch McConnell, Richard Shelby, is pushing hard to have his “assistant” fight the great Mo Brooks for his Senate seat. She is not in any way qualified and is certainly not what our Country needs or not what Alabama wants," he said. Britt served as Shelby's top aide in the Senate, his chief of staff, and his campaign manager. She also worked as the president and CEO of Alabama’s business council.August 21, 2021: Brooks rallies with Trump, makes comment that will haunt himTrump held a rally in the state where he echoed that praise of Brooks, albeit briefly. "With your help, we’re going to elect our friend, Mo Brooks, to the U.S. Senate," he said to the crowd. "Mo is a fearless warrior for your sacred right to vote, and so many other things," he added after calling Brooks up to the stage. But there was another moment at that rally that would turn out to be the most important development for this race. Brooks, who helped to spearhead the objections in Congress to the 2020 election and continues to claim Trump won, called on Republicans to keep fighting in future elections. "Godless, evil, amoral Socialist Democrats are on the march. And we have to fight back and we have to beat them in '22 and we have to beat them in 2024," he said. "There are some people who are despondent about the voter fraud election theft in 2020. Folks, put that behind you. Put that behind you. Yes, look forward," he said to a smattering of boos from the crowd. March 23, 2022: Trump withdraws endorsementPointing specifically to Brooks' comments at the 2021 rally, Trump announced he would "withdrawing my Endorsement." “Mo Brooks of Alabama made a horrible mistake recently when he went ‘woke’ and stated, referring to the 2020 Presidential Election Scam, ‘Put that behind you, put that behind you.'" Trump said. Sources familiar with the dynamic between Trump and Brooks told NBC at the time that there were other issues at play, including Brooks’ poor fundraising and lackluster poll results. That same day, Brooks told NBC News that Trump had asked him to "rescind the 2020 elections" sometime after Sept. 1, 2021, and brushed aside Trump's label of him as "woke." “There’s no one in Alabama with the brain size of a pea or larger who would believe that I’m a woke liberal,” he said. Trump ended his statement teasing another endorsement in the race in the future. June 11, 2022: Trump endorses BrittLast week, Trump endorsed Britt through a statement, weeks after she took the top billing in the first round of Alabama's GOP Senate primary (the race went to a runoff between Britt and Brooks, the top-two finishers, because no one won the majority of the vote). "Katie Britt, on the other hand, is a fearless America First Warrior. The opposition says Katie is close to Mitch McConnell, but actually, she is not—in fact, she believes that McConnell put Mike Durant in the race to stop her, which is very possibly true," Trump said, comparing Britt to Brooks. Ben KamisarBen Kamisar is a deputy political editor in NBC's Political Unit.

US Campaigns & Elections

Throughout primary season, FiveThirtyEight and ABC News have been covering the GOP candidates who believe former President Donald Trump’s “Big Lie” that the 2020 election was stolen. This week, politics and technology reporter Kaleigh Rogers talks about one of the matchups between two Big Lie supporters in Alabama: Tuesday’s runoff for U.S. Senate between Rep. Mo Brooks and Katie Britt. Transcript Last April, former President Donald Trump endorsed Rep. Mo Brooks in his campaign to become the Republican nominee for Senate in Alabama. But a year later, Trump rescinded that endorsement. And about two weeks ago, he endorsed Katie Britt, Brooks’s opponent in the runoff this week. Why did the former president turn his back on Brooks? According to Trump, it’s because Brooks wasn’t enthusiastic enough in his support of the “Big Lie.” Throughout the primary season, FiveThirtyEight and ABC News have been tracking candidates who have either questioned Trump’s loss, said the 2020 election was illegitimate or took legal action to overturn its results. Here are some of the Big Lie believers we’ve identified who are running in primaries this week. When Trump endorsed Britt, he took another opportunity to criticize Brooks, saying the congressman “backtracked and made a big mistake by going Woke.” He specifically referenced a rally in Alabama last summer, where Brooks said this about the 2020 election: “There are some people who are despondent about the voter-fraud election theft in 2020. Folks, put that behind you. [crowd boos] Put that behind you. Yes! Look forward! Look forward! Look forward!” But here’s the thing, Brooks hasn’t exactly gone soft on the Big Lie. If anything, Trump rescinding his endorsement has only made Brooks double down on the false claims of a stolen election. Brooks even signed a sworn affidavit saying that he believes the 2020 election was stolen from Trump. Britt has been equally vocal in supporting the Big Lie, calling for an audit and saying she would have objected to the 2020 results had she been a senator at the time. So, regardless of the outcome of the race, the GOP Senate candidate will be a Big Lie supporter, even if they’re not up to Trump’s standards. In fact, a Big Lie supporter will be the candidate regardless of the outcome in a few runoffs this week. Both candidates running in Alabama’s 5th Congressional District — Dale Strong and Casey Wardynski — have supported Trump’s false claims, with Strong posting on Facebook that Trump won and Wardynski claiming “leftists” stole the election. The same is true in the GOP runoff for Georgia’s 10th Congressional District, with both Vernon Jones and Mike Collins claiming Trump won in 2020. So far this cycle, a large number of candidates who believe the Big Lie have won their primaries. For elections that had been called through June 13, 52 percent of Republican nominees have either said the election was stolen or questioned the results. If you want to see which candidates in your state support the Big Lie, follow along with FiveThirtyEight. Kaleigh Rogers is FiveThirtyEight’s technology and politics reporter.

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A New York City police officer was caught on video hitting a woman in the face, sending her reeling onto the ground, as police officers were trying to arrest a man allegedly in connection with an attempted murder. The incident unfolded Tuesday as police were arresting Elvin James, 22, at West 136th Street just before 5 p.m.During the arrest, “multiple individuals” at the scene “interfered by physically assaulting numerous officers,” the New York Police Department said. One officer sustained a minor injury to the head, police said. Bystander video circulated online. Police Commissioner Keechant Sewell released a brief snippet of the scuffle captured in body camera video Thursday. The video shows multiple officers and bystanders at the scene in front of a home. A young woman runs up to an officer and appears to shove his shoulder. The officer immediately responds and appears to hit her in the face with an audible blow, causing her to fall on her back, smacking against the sidewalk. A police officer punches Tamani Crum during an arrest in Harlem on Tuesday.NYPDPeople in the background are heard clamoring after the hit. One person yells: “Why would you do that? That’s a little girl.”She is then lifted by two officers and placed in handcuffs, the video shows.The woman, identified by NBC New York as Tamani Crum, 19, of the Bronx, was charged with assault on a police officer, resisting arrest and obstructing governmental administration, police said. In a statement, Sewell said the incident and the officer who used force are under “ongoing review” by the Internal Affairs Bureau’s Force Group.Sewell said Crum was an acquaintance of James’. She said that after the woman "struck" one of the officers, “the officer fended off that interference and struck the woman with an open hand."Crum remained conscious and was transported to a hospital at her request, Sewell said. NBC News has asked a lawyer for Crum's family for comment. The attorney, Jamie Santana Jr., told NBC New York, “This has to stop, and we are seeking full accountability in this action."Her next court date is Oct. 11 in Manhattan Criminal Court. The detective was identified as Kendo Kinsey, who has had six complaints against him over the past 10 years, NBC New York reported, citing the Civilian Complaint Review Board, which investigates citizen police misconduct allegations. None of the claims was substantiated. Crum’s mother said her daughter was covered in bruises. “I get blown away to see this happen to my daughter. It’s so painful for a mother to see that,” the woman, who did not share her name, told the station. “They are just violating these kids’ rights. It’s not right.”Two other women were charged with interfering with police officer actions, Sewell said. James was arrested in connection with an investigation of an attempted murder that took place on Aug. 12. During the arrest, he was found to have a ghost gun and a large amount of a “controlled substance” police said. He was hit with the same charges as Crum, as well as several counts of criminal possession of a weapon and criminal possession of a controlled substance.Detectives’ Endowment Association President Paul DiGiacomo said in a statement, “When you assault a New York City Detective in order to interfere with an arrest of a man armed with a gun there are repercussions.”He said the group is exploring a possible civil suit against the woman on behalf of the officer.Marlene LenthangMarlene Lenthang is a breaking news reporter for NBC News Digital.

US Police Misconduct

Families of Black men killed by police or gun violence have come together to brainstorm how to turn their “grief into action” to prevent continued instances of police violence. The conversation comes as the country awaits a decision from a grand jury on the indictment of officers in the death of Jayland Walker, who was shot by police following a 2022 attempted traffic stop. The panel, held by civil rights organization National Action Network on Wednesday in Manhattan, included family members of Eric Garner, Ahmaud Arbery, George Floyd, Trayvon Martin, Tyre Nichols, Amir Locke and Botham Jean. Martin was fatally shot by George Zimmerman, a man who followed Martin for believing Martin was suspicious. He was acquitted on all charges connected to Martin's death. Arbery was followed by three men and fatally shot by one of them while out for a jog because the men believed he was responsible for trespassing. Together, the families talked about their collective efforts to keep the memory of their deceased loved ones alive – in some ways, through the implementation of police reform. On Tuesday, the evening before the panel, Memphis passed an ordinance called the “Driving Equality Act in Honor of Tyre Nichols” that would ban traffic stops for secondary violations like overdue registration or broken lights. Nichols died in January following a violent traffic stop captured in body camera footage, which shows officers striking Nichols repeatedly. Five officers have been charged so far in connection with his death. “He was on his way home from watching the sunsets. He liked to go to a park and watch the sunsets as much as possible,” said Row Vaughn, mother of Nichols, through tears. She continued, “He was stopped. He was beaten. Less than 800 feet from my home … I didn't watch the video, but I could hear him calling my name.” She applauded Memphis for the move, but says there is much more to be done. “We are going to continue to fight so that this doesn't happen to another Tyre,” said Vaughn. “There’s just too many of our Black men being killed for nothing. I'm not understanding why Black men can’t even go home.” Gwen Carr, mother of Eric Garner, said the pain over her son’s 2014 death by police in New York City lingers on. She reminds other families facing similar tragedies that they’re “all fighting for the same thing, going down the same road.” “I remember when this horrible incident happened to my son – I didn't know what I would do. I was in a dark place at that time. But I decided to turn my mourning into action,” Carr said. In 2020, several years after Garner's death, she helped to pass the Eric Garner Anti-Chokehold Act, which criminalizes the harmful use of a chokehold by a police officer. “You’re going to knock on doors that are not going to open, but sometimes you have to kick the door in,” said Carr. She also helped build the E.R.I.C. Initiative Foundation, which offers scholarships, free meals, toy giveaways and retreats in an effort to connect and uplift those affected by police brutality. Wanda Cooper Jones, the mother of Ahmaud Arbery, also has been fighting for legislative change since her son’s death. Arbery was killed in Brunswick, Georgia, when three men followed him while he was jogging in their neighborhood and one of the men fatally shot him. Arbery’s death and the nationwide outcry that followed led to the repealing of Georgia’s citizen’s arrest law and the enactment of hate crime laws that criminalize acts motivated by someone’s identity. “They repealed the citizens' arrest laws, so white people cannot get in their trucks and chase down a Black boy,” said Cooper Jones. She said her son’s death made her redefine who she was “as a woman.” “Wanda, are you just going to sit down or are you going to implement more changes?” she said she asked herself. “Ahmaud is gone, but it is very important that his legacy lives forever.” Though the evening applauded the wins so far from victims and their families, others said there’s a long way to go in addressing the policing issues that lead to the deaths of their children. Amir Locke’s father, Andre Locke, is working on federal legislation that would end the use of no-knock warrants, which allow officers to enter a home without announcing their arrival. Locke was fatally shot by police who were executing a no-knock warrant. The passage of the George Floyd Policing Act also has been an ongoing battle for police reform advocates. The legislation would improve accountability for police misconduct, restrict certain harmful policing practices, and enhance transparency and data collection. “I cannot explain the pain,” said one of George Floyd’s brothers. “We’ve been fighting since 2020 – it is 2023. Times are changing."

US Police Misconduct

The Tampa Police Department announced it had terminated an officer Tuesday following an internal investigation into a video where he was seen dragging a woman into jail. Gregory Damon violated multiple department policies last month during an incident where a woman refused to exit a patrol vehicle to be booked into jail, the department announced in a press release. A review of body-worn camera and surveillance footage showed that Damon grabbed her by her arm to the jail's front door after she yelled at him, "I want you to drag me," in addition to other obscenities.Damon also responded to the woman with "rude and derogatory comments," the department said.Interim Tampa Police Chief Lee Bercaw said Damon's actions were "unacceptable and are not tolerated at this department." "Professionalism is not only expected, it is demanded, in every encounter our officers have with the public, regardless of the arrestee being uncooperative or unpleasant in return," Bercaw said. "As law enforcement officers, we are held to a higher standard." Damon was unable to speak with NBC News when reached by phone Thursday. The Tampa Police Benevolent Association said in a statement it was aware of the allegations against Damon but was not representing him in the matter. "We do however support the men and women of the Tampa Police Department who serve our citizens daily with the highest levels of professionalism and integrity," the organization said.The incident occurred on Nov. 17, after officers were called to Tampa Family Health Center for a reported individual sleeping outside the property and refusing to leave, police said. The woman, who had a prior incident at the facility in October, was arrested for trespassing. Supervisors at the Hillsborough County Sheriff’s Office, the agency which manages the jail, referred Damon's actions to Tampa Police's standards bureau. It was determined that he had violated multiple protocols, including policies regarding searching, transporting, and booking of prisoners, reporting response to resistance, and treatment of person in custody.Tampa Police Department had revised its protocols in 2013 following a similar incident with uncooperative prisoners. "Detention deputies must assist an officer with lifting the individual from the transport vehicle and securing them in a restraining chair to be rolled into the intake area," the department said in its press release. Tampa Mayor Jane Castor was chief of the department when the policy went into place. The mayor's office declined to comment on the termination Thursday. Damon's termination comes after two other incidents of police misconduct at the Tampa Police Department in recent weeks. Former chief Mary O’Connor was asked to resign earlier this month after she and her husband were stopped in November while driving a golf cart without a license plate. During the stop, O'Connor flashed her badge at a Pinellas County sheriff’s deputy and asked if he would let them go.The incident was recorded on the deputy's body camera and O'Connor was placed on administrative leave. "It is unacceptable for any public employee, and especially the city's top law enforcement leader, to ask for special treatment because of their position," Castor said following the resignation. "Public trust in Tampa's police department is paramount to our success as a city and community." An officer was placed on leave on Dec. 16 following a crash where he was arrested by sheriff's deputies on suspicion of driving under the influence. The outcome of the investigation in that case is still pending. Doha Madani is a senior breaking news reporter for NBC News. Pronouns: she/her.

US Police Misconduct

ST. LOUIS (AP) — St. Louis police officers fatally shot a 16-year-old who was reaching for a gun, police said Monday.Darryl Ross was shot just after 11:30 p.m. Sunday at a gas station on the city's north side. Ross is Black. A police incident report said one of the officers involved in the shooting was Black, and one was white.The city's new Force Investigation Unit, established last month, was handling the investigation.Police said two drug enforcement detectives spotted several people with guns at the service station and drove to the parking lot. Their car was unmarked and they were in plain clothes but wearing black, bulletproof vests with the word “POLICE” written on the front and back.Ross, armed with a gun according to the police report, walked away quickly to an alley. The detectives followed him and announced they were police officers. Ross ran, then tripped and fell, dropping a pistol, police said.Related video: Police shoot and kill man in WestwoodAs the detectives approached, Ross reached for the pistol, the report said, prompting both officers to shoot him. Ross was taken to a hospital where he was pronounced dead. The officers were unhurt.It was the second fatal officer-involved shooting in St. Louis in less than a week. Officers killed a 61-year-old man last Wednesday at an apartment complex. Police said a man who had been evicted engaged police in a standoff. When officers entered the building, the man charged at officers with a butcher knife, prompting several to open fire, police said.In August, St. Louis Mayor Tishaura Jones signed legislation creating a Division of Civilian Oversight, an independent agency to investigate allegations of police misconduct and use of force incidents. Under the new law, a Force Investigation Unit under the direction of the circuit attorney investigates use-of-force incidents.The St. Louis region drew national scrutiny for officer-involved shootings of young Black men in the wake of Michael Brown's death in the St. Louis County town of Ferguson in August 2014. Brown, who was 18, was killed in a street confrontation with Officer Darren Wilson. Wilson was cleared of wrongdoing, but the shooting led to months of often-violent protests.

US Police Misconduct

CHICAGO (CBS) -- The Chicago Police Department is investigating claims that several officers engaged in sexual misonduct with migrants living at a West Side police station. Many in the community are expressing outrage as key questions remain unanswered. All the migrants who were being housed at the 10th District have now all been relocated. The group has been dispersed to a number of shelters across the city, and many were bused out early Friday. The allegations being made are very disturbing. Police officers are accused of having sex with migrants. Sources say as many as four officers are involved in the alleged misconduct. Sources tell CBS 2 that a teenage migrant is now pregnant as a result of one of these alleged encounteers. The only thing that the Chicago Police Department would confirm is that it has opened an investigation into the allegations. The Civilian Office of Police Accountability, the agency that investigates police misconduct cases, is also investigating. The Fraternal Order of Police, the union that represents Chicago Police officers is pushing back against the claims, calling them ridiculous in a statement on YouTube late Friday. "There is no validity to the complaints," said John Catanzara, president of the FOP. "There is no basis or origin of where it originated from. We don't have a victim's name or anything, or victims repeatedly, multiple at this point. Who knows if it's even true?" A spokesperson for Mayor Brandon Johnson released a statement Friday saying the city is taking these allegations very seriously. The names of the officers allegedly involved in this situation have not been released. for more features.

US Police Misconduct

Crime June 29, 2022 / 6:45 AM / CBS News Crime Without Punishment | Preview Crime Without Punishment | Preview 01:52 Police called Denita Williams in April and gave her the address of a gas station in their town of Jackson, Mississippi and asked how long it would take for her to get there. "When I pulled up, all I see is this crime tape," Williams told CBS News.  Her son, Kenland Thompson, Jr., was shot and killed while putting air in his tires. He was 20 years old.  "The coroner had already taken his body," she said. "He was already gone." Three months later, no one has been arrested for the murder of Kenland Thompson, Jr.  "I gave them names," Williams said, describing how she told police she would help them investigate the case herself. "I felt like I was going crazy, giving them so much. They're not doing their job."  Across a nation that is already in the grips of a rise in violent crime, murders are going unsolved at a historic pace, a CBS News investigation has found. A review of FBI statistics shows that the murder clearance rate — the share of cases each year that are solved, meaning police make an arrest or close the case due to other reasons — has fallen to its lowest point in more than half a century. "It's a 50-50 coin flip," says Thomas Hargrove, who runs the Murder Accountability Project, which tracks unsolved murders nationwide. "It's never been this bad. During the last seven months of 2020, most murders went unsolved. That's never happened before in America." Police are far less likely to solve a murder when the victim is Black or Hispanic, according to CBS News' analysis. In 2020, the murders of White victims were about 30% more likely to be solved than in cases with Hispanic victims, and about 50% more than when the victims were Black, the data show.   In dozens of interviews across the country, police and criminal justice experts have offered a range of explanations for these trends. Some factors are evident when visiting communities such as Jackson, Mississippi, which has suffered from one of the nation's highest murder rates.  In that city of about 160,000 people, the police department responded to 153 murders in the past year but has just eight homicide detectives to work that caseload. FBI guidelines suggest homicide detectives should be covering no more than five cases at a time.   Police Chief James Davis said his department needs more of everything to keep up with the violence. "The whole system is backlogged," Davis said. "I could use more police officers. I could use more homicide detectives, but if the state is backed up, the court is backed up, we will still have the same problem by developing these cases that we're already doing."  Jackson, Mississippi Police Chief James Davis CBS News Police are also contending with a breakdown in trust between their officers and the communities they serve, a result of decades of tensions that spilled over during high-profile cases of police misconduct in recent years.  That has made it harder for police to receive tips or obtain help from witnesses, said Danielle Outlaw, the commissioner of the Philadelphia Police Department. Outlaw told CBS News there is a history of "systemic inequities that contribute to the mistrust" in many communities most affected by crime. "We've gotten in our own way," Outlaw said, referring to past episodes of police misconduct. "It has to be a two-way street, as it is with any relationship."  The challenge of closing murder cases is reflected in national statistics, but is especially acute in some locations, the CBS News review found. METHODOLOGY: Learn how CBS News analyzed FBI homicide clearance rate data "I don't have any hope in the system" Some states have struggled with consistently low clearance rates, CBS News' analysis shows. From Maryland to Texas, from Michigan to California, families who buried loved ones too soon await justice, often going years without answers. Three-year-old Terrell Mayes, Jr. had celebrated Christmas with his family just one day before he was killed by a stray bullet, his life cut short as he fled up the stairs to safety inside his north Minneapolis home. More than 10 years later, his mother, Marsha Mayes, still grieves — and still longs for the day that her son's killer will be brought to justice.  "I want the killer to know you can't run," Mayes said. "God knows everything."  But she still knows little more than what she did more than a decade ago: that the person who killed her child hasn't been caught.   During the 10 years since Terrell's murder, the Minneapolis Police Department recorded 418 homicides committed and only 221 solved — a clearance rate of about 53%, according to CBS News' analysis of FBI data.   In Los Angeles, Barbara Pritchett-Hughes mourns her own loss. Her son Devon Hughes, 15, was caught in the crossfire outside of a church in 2007. His killer was caught just four days after the shooting and is in prison to this day. But nine years later, in 2016, another tragedy: her other son, DeAndre Hughes, was shot and killed just steps away from their front door.  "Not again, not again," Barbara said she remembers thinking after she heard the news. "And I prayed, and I asked God to don't allow this to happen again."  Barbara said she initially thought DeAndre's murder would be solved just as quickly as Devon's. But some six years later, she still doesn't know who's responsible.  In 2020, the Los Angeles Police Department reported a clearance rate of about 55% — slightly better than the national average. But that clearance rate masks a deeper problem: like in many cities, police are less likely to solve the murders of Black victims.  Between 2016 and 2020, the average clearance rate for Black homicide victims in Los Angeles was just 45%, according to CBS News' analysis of data submitted by the LAPD to the FBI. For White victims, it was 70%. The LAPD recorded 351 homicides in 2020 — 36% more than the previous year. Chief Michael Moore pointed to that spike, along with the pandemic, as explanations for the city's clearance rate. He also cited a lack of community trust in police that prevents potential witnesses from coming forward.   "The solving of a crime, a homicide particularly, is dependent on community trusting police," Moore said. The city of Los Angeles is now offering a $50,000 reward for information leading to the arrest of DeAndre's killer. Barbara implores anyone from the community to come forward. "Tell, because if this was your loved one you would want someone to tell," she said.  An incomplete picture? In Chicago, police don't report clearance data through the FBI's Uniform Crime Reporting program, so CBS News submitted a Freedom of Information Act request for Chicago Police Department (CPD) data. In 2020, that data showed, the department's murder clearance rate was about 44% — 16% less than the national average.  But that doesn't show the whole picture. The CPD data distinguished between cases that were cleared because a suspect was arrested and charged, and those cleared for other reasons. Those cases — so-called "exceptionally cleared" murders — are closed even though a suspect wasn't prosecuted. Exceptional clearances are supposed to be rare — reserved for unusual cases such as when police identify the suspect, but that suspect is dead, Hargrove said. That's not the case in Chicago, where, in 2020, half of the homicide cases police closed were exceptionally cleared. One of those exceptionally cleared cases was that of Diego Villada, who, in April 2017, was murdered in an alley in broad daylight on the city's Northwest Side after being jumped by two men. His sister, Anna Villada, watched it happen.   "One of the dudes told Diego, 'Start running, because this is the day that you die,'" Anna said. Diego tried to get away but was shot in the head. Anna tried desperately to save him, but it was too late. He died in the hospital two days later.  Anna said she made direct eye contact with Diego's killer immediately after the shooting and described him to police. The man she identified was arrested the same day, but wasn't charged due to lack of evidence, according to spokespeople from both CPD and the Cook County State's Attorney's Office.  Police exceptionally cleared his murder case due to that lack of evidence exactly four years after he was killed, on April 1, 2021. Without those exceptionally cleared cases like Diego's, CPD's 2021 murder clearance rate was just 24%, CBS News' analysis shows. In other words, three out of four killers in Chicago are still on the street. This lack of accountability perpetuates the cycle of violence, according to Arthur Lurigio, who teaches criminal justice at Loyola University Chicago.  "When 70% of homicide homicides don't lead to an arrest, that's a critical mass of survivors of homicide victims that are never going to experience the justice that they deserve," Lurigio said. "So, they bury their child and have to live with it for the rest of their lives, feeling that there's been no closure on the matter."   In Baltimore, a federal prosecutor hopes to tackle the problem through a partnership headquartered in a nondescript warehouse in a secure location. There, a collaboration of more than 20 local, state and federal agencies work together investigating Baltimore's most brazen drug syndicates, and a special intelligence unit identifies connections among the city's hundreds of uncleared murders.The intelligence unit hopes to follow the "Al Capone strategy" of convicting murder suspects for other crimes being pursued by the interagency partnership. Former acting U.S. Attorney Jonathan Lenzner used that model in 2021, when his office indicted 15 members of a Baltimore gang on charges related to racketeering and drug conspiracy. Prosecutors linked them to unclosed cases involving 18 murders and 27 attempted murders."There are homicides and non-fatal shootings occurring all across the city, [and] we have a map which shows where each of these shootings has occurred. And at times, unfortunately, and somewhat tragically, that map can look like the constellations on a clear, starry night," Lenzner said.  Thanks for reading CBS NEWS. Create your free account or log in for more features. Please enter email address to continue Please enter valid email address to continue

US Police Misconduct

WASHINGTON (AP) — House Democrats on Thursday pushed through a long-sought policing and public safety package after overcoming internal differences on legislation they plan to make central to their election-year pitch.The package of four bills passed in succession — all with bipartisan support — and headed to the Senate, where their fate is uncertain. The Democrats’ success came after party leaders spent hours wrangling with progressives who threatened to block the package over their concerns about increasing money for local police departments. A few lawmakers said the plan lacked the accountability measures that Democrats had once sought after the police killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis sparked protests against racial injustice. The House ended up approving the money, including for departments with fewer than 125 officers, and aid for de-escalation training and mental health services. A chief objective is reducing fatal encounters between police and people with mental illness.Other parts of the package would provide money for enhanced community violence intervention — a priority for progressives — and technology investments to help local investigators close unsolved cases, especially those involving gun crimes.“The bottom line is that you can’t cut it or defund your way to safer communities and better police departments,” said Rep. Josh Gottheimer, D-N.J., one of the lead negotiators. “It’s about investing to protect. We must always have the backs of those who risked their lives every day to protect us.”Despite the opposition from some liberals, there was support from top progressives Reps. Pramila Jayapal, D-Wash., and Ilhan Omar D-Minn., who had negotiated with Gottheimer, a moderate. Reps. Joyce Beatty of Ohio, who leads the Congressional Black Caucus, and Hakeem Jeffries of New York, the Democratic Caucus chairman, facilitated a number of the conversations after it was clear in recent days that progress could be made.After a deal was announced Wednesday, Democratic leaders quickly moved to bring the bills to a vote.“We are proud of the work that we have been able to do here collectively as Democrats with different ideologies,” Omar told reporters. “And I think that this is the beginning, hopefully, of a process that we can continue to engage in.” To get more liberals on board, language was included that would allow the Justice Department to have discretion over which police departments are permitted to receive the grants. It would also allocate departments to use any of the $60 million authorized for the data collection on police practices and community safety. A policing package that passed in the House in March 2021 went much further, including banning police chokeholds and altering so-called qualified immunity for law enforcement, which would make it easier to pursue claims of police misconduct. None of those provisions were included this time. Rep. Cori Bush, who rose to prominence as an activist leader in Ferguson, Missouri, after the fatal police shooting of 18-year-old Michael Brown, said the current funding bill does little to address “the crisis of police brutality.” “Even the most bare-bones accountability measures” passed last year failed to make it into the new package, Bush said in a statement.Despite those internal divisions, the bills did attract some Republican support. Rep. John Rutherford, R-Fla., a co-sponsor of Gottheimer’s funding bill, spent time on the floor Thursday urging other Republicans to join him in supporting it. “This is for our law enforcement men and women. This is for those small agencies,” Rutherford, a former sheriff in Jacksonville, said. “We need to be able to help them out. And I can tell you the last 2 1/2 years has left law enforcement demoralized like I’ve never before seen it.”More than 140 Republicans ended up voting for that bill. But other Republicans called the Democrats’ package a last-ditch effort to win over voters in the November elections.“Democrats are bringing out these bills today because we’re 46 days from a midterm election,” Rep. Pete Stauber R-Minn., said. “They want the American people to suddenly and miraculously believe that they care about the crime crisis plaguing our nation.”___Associated Press reporter Kevin Freking contributed to this report.

US Police Misconduct

Five former Connecticut police officers who were arrested for allegedly mistreating a prisoner after he was paralyzed in the back of a police van applied Wednesday for a probation program that could result in the charges being erased. The applications further frustrated Richard “Randy” Cox's supporters, who have criticized prosecutors for only charging the five former New Haven officers with misdemeanors — negligent cruelty to persons and reckless endangerment. A judge in New Haven scheduled a Nov. 1 hearing to determine whether the ex-officers are eligible for accelerated rehabilitation, a program generally for first-time offenders that can erase minor criminal charges if defendants successfully complete a period of probation. “I’m praying the judge does the right thing — hold them accountable to the full extent of the law and send a strong message to police officers ... that there is zero tolerance for this type of behavior,” said Scot X. Esdaile, president of the NAACP's Connecticut State Conference. Cox, now 37, was left paralyzed from the chest down June 19, 2022, when a police van he was riding in braked hard to avoid a collision with a car, sending him head-first into a metal partition. His hands were cuffed behind his back and the van had no seat belts. Cox had been arrested on charges of threatening a woman with a gun, which were later dismissed. “I can’t move. I’m going to die like this. Please, please, please help me,” Cox said minutes after the crash, according to police video. Once at the police station, officers mocked Cox and accused him of being drunk and faking his injuries, according to surveillance and body-worn camera footage. Officers dragged Cox by his feet out of the van and placed him in a holding cell prior to his eventual transfer to a hospital. In June, Cox and the city of New Haven agreed to settle his lawsuit against the city and the officers for $45 million, which Cox's lawyers called the largest-ever settlement of a police misconduct case. The case drew outrage from civil rights advocates such as the NAACP, along with comparisons to the Freddie Gray case in Baltimore. It also led to reforms at the New Haven police department as well as a statewide seat belt requirement for prisoners. Cox is Black, while all five officers who were arrested are Black or Hispanic. Gray, who also was Black, died in 2015 after he suffered a spinal injury while handcuffed and shackled in a city police van. The five New Haven officers — Oscar Diaz, Betsy Segui, Ronald Pressley, Jocelyn Lavandier and Luis Rivera — have pleaded not guilty to the charges. Diaz was the van driver, while Segui was a supervisor in the police lockup. All the officers were fired except for Pressley, who avoided discipline by retiring in January. Segui's lawyer, Gregory Cerritelli, said Wednesday that he expected her application for accelerated rehabilitation to be approved. “These are two misdemeanors, so I can't believe a judge under these circumstances wouldn't grant her the benefit of that program,” he said, adding “the crime is not of a serious nature.” State prosecutors declined to comment on the applications.

US Police Misconduct

A Florida man who was paralyzed when a police officer shot him after mistaking his handgun for his stun gun filed a lawsuit on Wednesday against the city of Hollywood, the officer and others, saying: “My life got destroyed.” Michael Ortiz is seeking unspecified millions of dollars from Hollywood, Florida, and Henry Andrews, 50, the officer who also faces a misdemeanor charge for the 2021 shooting, one of several over the last 20 years in which officers have said they mistook their gun for their Taser. The federal civil rights lawsuit also names officers Dionte Roots and Jhonny Jimenez, who were subduing Ortiz when Andrews shot him. Ortiz told reporters not only had his life been destroyed but so has his mother’s as she has to change his diapers and provide other care. He called 911 for help while suffering from a mental health crisis but was shot while handcuffed on the ground. “She is treating me like I am six months old,” said Ortiz, 43, who is paralyzed from the chest down and uses a wheelchair. He owes $3m in medical costs and will need lifetime care. The Florida-based civil rights attorney Ben Crump, who is representing Ortiz with attorney Hunter Shkolnik, said it was an “injustice” that Andrews has been charged with only a misdemeanor. “Michael Ortiz needed a helping hand and what he got was a bullet to the back,” Crump said. Crump represents victims of alleged police misconduct including the families of Michael Brown, Breonna Taylor and George Floyd, Black Americans killed by officers in high-profile cases. “There should have been greater accountability for the officer,” Crump said. Hollywood officials declined comment. The attorney Jeremy Kroll, who represents Andrews in the misdemeanor culpable negligence case, said another lawyer will be hired for the Ortiz lawsuit. “In responding to a difficult and chaotic situation, Officer Andrews intended to deploy his Taser and mistakenly discharged his firearm. There was absolutely no intent to harm in this case. He and his family continue to have Mr Ortiz in their thoughts and prayers,” Kroll said. It could not be determined if Roots and Jimenez had attorneys who could comment. They have not been charged criminally. Ortiz called 911 on 3 July 2021, telling operators he was experiencing a mental health crisis while house-sitting his mother’s apartment and his dog was missing. He told them he had used marijuana and was having chest pains. The operators noted that he sounded delusional and suicidal. Ortiz took a shower to calm down. When paramedics arrived, he refused to come outside so they called for police assistance. Paramedics say Ortiz came into a hallway nude and became combative, threatening suicide. They say they were stopping him from jumping from a sixth-floor balcony when Roots and Jimenez arrived. Security video has not been released but the city has shown it to Shkolnik. He said Roots used his Taser to subdue Ortiz, who was then handcuffed behind his back and placed naked on the floor. He was still struggling but was not posing any danger to himself or the officers if they had just moved back and let him calm down, Shkolnik said. The elevator opened and Andrews stepped out. Roots tried to use his Taser on Ortiz again but it didn’t discharge. In a court filing in his misdemeanor case, Andrews, an officer for more than 20 years, said he reached for his Taser but instead grabbed his gun, firing one shot into Ortiz’s back. That happened about 10 seconds after the elevator door opened, Shkolnik said. “I genuinely believed I had grabbed and was discharging my Taser,” Andrews wrote. Andrews’ Taser, like most, was shaped like a handgun and had a similar grip and trigger. But it was also bright yellow instead of black, a detail supposed to serve as a visual warning to an officer in the heat of the moment. Officers are trained to keep their firearm on their strong side and their stun gun on the opposite hip. Andrews did that. Kroll said in the filing that while Andrews’ conduct may have been civilly negligent, it was not criminal and asked that the charge be dismissed. The judge has not ruled. There have been other cases where officers say they mistook their gun for their stun gun and shot a suspect, sometimes fatally. Criminal charges are sometimes pursued but officers have broad immunity when dealing with potentially dangerous suspects. In 2021, a Minnesota officer was found guilty of manslaughter in such a case. That also happened after a 2015 shooting in Oklahoma. In 2009, a fatal shooting at an Oakland, California, transit station became the subject of a 2013 movie, Fruitvale Station. That officer was found guilty of involuntary manslaughter.

US Police Misconduct

The Justice Department on Friday issued a scathing assessment of Minneapolis police, alleging that racial discrimination and excessive force went unchecked before George Floyd's killing because of inadequate oversight and an unwieldy process for investigating complaints. The probe began in April 2021, a day after former officer Derek Chauvin, who is white, was convicted of murder and manslaughter in the May 25, 2020, killing of Floyd, a Black man. Floyd, who was in handcuffs, repeatedly said he couldn’t breathe before going limp as Chauvin knelt on his neck for 9 1/2 minutes. The killing was recorded by a bystander and sparked months of mass protests as part of a broader national reckoning over racial injustice. Here are six takeaways from the report: WHAT WAS THE PURPOSE OF THE INVESTIGATION? The focus of the probe was to examine whether there has been a pattern or practice of unconstitutional or unlawful policing in the Minneapolis Police Department. It examined the use of force by officers, including during protests, and whether the department engages in discriminatory practices. It also looked at the handling of misconduct allegations, treatment of people with behavioral health issues and systems of accountability. WHAT WERE THE KEY FINDINGS? Investigators found numerous examples of excessive force, unlawful discrimination and First Amendment violations. They reviewed 19 police shootings and determined that officers sometimes fired without first determining whether there was an immediate threat of harm to the officers or others. In 2017, for example, an officer fatally shot Justine Ruszczyk Damond, an unarmed white Australian-born woman who “spooked” him when she approached his squad car, according to the report. She had called 911 to report a possible rape behind her house. The city paid $20 million to settle with her family. In another case, officers shot a suspect after he started stabbing himself in the neck in a police station interview room. Officers also used neck restraints like the one Chauvin used on Floyd 198 times between Jan. 1, 2016, and Aug. 16, 2022, including 44 instances that didn’t require an arrest. Some officers continued to use neck restraints even after they were banned in the wake of Floyd’s killing, the report said. At protests, it found, people were sometimes shot with rubber bullets when they were committing no crime or were dispersing. According to the report, one journalist was hit by a rubber bullet and lost her eye, while another was shoved to the pavement while filming and pepper-sprayed in the face. One protester was shoved so hard that she fell backward, hit the pavement and lay unconscious for three minutes. WHAT DID INVESTIGATORS FIND ABOUT RACIAL BIAS IN POLICING? The report documented rampant racism and racial profiling in the department, with Black drivers more than six times more likely to be stopped than white ones. The racism also extended to arrests. When one Black teen was held at gunpoint for allegedly stealing a $5 burrito, the teen asked the plainclothes officer if he was indeed police. “Really?" the officer responded, according to a video recording. "How many white people in the city of Minneapolis have you run up against with a gun?” In another case, a woman reported that an officer said to her that the Black Lives Matter movement was a “terrorist” organization. “We are going to make sure you and all of the Black Lives supporters are wiped off the face of the Earth,” she recalled him saying. Her complaint against the officer was closed by the department with a finding of “no merit.” HOW DID THE DEPARTMENT TREAT THE MENTALLY ILL? Mental health crises often were made worse when police responded, investigators found. In 2017, for instance, officers encountered an unarmed man in the midst of what neighbors described as a mental health episode. He initially paced around his yard, yelling. After complying with orders to sit on his front steps, an officer fired his taser without warning. In another case, a mother called 911 to report that her adult daughter, a Black woman with bipolar disorder, was attempting to hurt herself by lying in the road. By the time officers got there, the woman was calmly walking through a park. The officers nevertheless grabbed her, and she began yelling and pulled away. The woman was then put in a neck restraint as her mother pleaded, “Don’t choke her like that!” HOW DID OFFICERS GET AWAY WITH MISCONDUCT? Investigations into police misconduct took months and sometimes years, according to the report. And those conducting the inquiries frequently failed to view video corroborating public complaints. Supervisors also were quick to back their subordinates. In one case, an officer tased a man eight times without pausing even as the man protested that he was doing “exactly” what he was told. The supervisor found no policy violations and told the man after the fact that if he hadn't been resisting, “they wouldn't have had to strike you.” The report also highlighted the case of John Pope, who was just 14 when Chauvin struck him in the head with a flashlight multiple times and pinned him to a wall by his throat. He then knelt on the Black teen, as his mother pleaded, “Please do not kill my son.” Chauvin, the report found, kept his knee on the teen’s neck or back for over 15 minutes. But due to poor supervision and a failed internal investigation, commanders did not learn what had happened to Pope until three years later, after Chauvin killed Floyd, the report said. The city ultimately agreed to settle a lawsuit in the case for $7.5 million. WHAT HAPPENS NOW? The report noted that the department has made some improvements, such as banning chokeholds and no-knock warrants, training officers on the duty to intervene and sending mental health workers to some incidents. But it said there is still work to be done. As a result of the investigation, the city and the police department agreed to a deal known as a federal consent decree, which will require reforms to be overseen by an independent monitor and approved by a federal judge. That arrangement is similar to previous interventions in cities such as Seattle, New Orleans, Baltimore and Ferguson, Missouri.

US Police Misconduct

JACKSON, Miss. -- Men who had sworn an oath to protect and serve were huddled on the back porch of a Mississippi home as Michael Corey Jenkins lay on the ground, blood gushing from his mutilated tongue where one of the police officers shoved a gun in his mouth and pulled the trigger. The roughly 90-minute period of terror preceding the shooting began late on Jan. 24 after a white neighbor called Rankin County Deputy Brett McAlpin and complained that two Black men were staying with a white woman inside a Braxton home. McAlpin tipped off Deputy Christian Dedmon, who texted a group of white deputies who called themselves “The Goon Squad,” a moniker they adopted because of their willingness to use excessive force. “Are y'all available for a mission?” Dedmon asked. They were. A little more than six months after the racist attack on Jenkins and his friend Eddie Terrell Parker, who are Black, six former officers pleaded guilty on Thursday. The officers included Christian Dedmon, Hunter Elward, Brett McAlpin, Jeffrey Middleton and Daniel Opdyke of the Rankin County Sheriff’s Department and Joshua Hartfield, a former Richland police officer. Their attorneys did not immediately respond to requests for comment. They pleaded guilty to charges including conspiracy against rights, obstructions of justice, deprivation of rights under color of law, discharge of a firearm under a crime of violence, conspiracy to obstruct justice. The Mississippi attorney general’s office announced Thursday it had filed state charges against the men including assault, conspiracy and obstruction of justice. Court records detail how they burst into a home without a warrant, handcuffed Jenkins and Parker, assaulted them with a sex toy and beat Parker with wood and a metal sword. They poured milk, alcohol and chocolate syrup over their faces and then forced them to strip naked and shower together to conceal the mess. Then one of them put a gun in Jenkins' mouth and fired. As Jenkins lay bleeding, they didn't render medical aid. They knew the mission had gone too far and devised a hasty cover-up scheme that included a fictitious narcotics bust, a planted gun and drugs, stolen surveillance footage and threats. The deputies were under the watch of Rankin County Sheriff Bryan Bailey, who called it the worst episode of police brutality he has seen in his career. Law enforcement misconduct in the U.S. has come under increased scrutiny, largely focused on how Black people are treated by the police. The 2020 killing of George Floyd by Minneapolis police ignited calls for sweeping criminal justice reforms and a reassessment of American race relations. The January beating death of Tyre Nichols by five Black members of a special police squad in Memphis, Tennessee, led to a probe of similar units nationwide. In Rankin County, the brutality visited upon Jenkins and Parker was not a botched police operation, but an assembly of rogue officers "who tortured them all under the authority of a badge, which they disgraced,” U.S. Attorney Darren LaMarca said. The county just east of the state capital, Jackson, is home to one of the highest percentages of Black residents of any major U.S. city. A towering granite-and-marble monument topped by a Confederate soldier stands across the street from the sheriff’s office. The officers warned Jenkins and Parker to "stay out of Rankin County and go back to Jackson or ‘their side’ of the Pearl River,” court documents say, referencing an area with higher concentrations of Black residents. Kristen Clarke, head of the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division, said the trauma “is magnified because the misconduct was fueled by racial bias and hatred.” She mentioned another dark chapter in Mississippi law enforcement: the 1964 kidnapping and killing of three civil rights workers. The violent police misconduct is a reminder “there is still much to be done," Clarke said. After Dedmon summoned “The Goon Squad,” the officers crept around the ranch-style home to avoid a surveillance camera. They kicked down the carport door and burst inside without a warrant. Opdyke found a sex toy, which he mounted on a BB gun he also found and forced into Parker's mouth. Dedmon tried to sexually assault Jenkins with the toy. The officers repeatedly electrocuted the victims with stun guns to compare whose weapons were more powerful. Elward forced Jenkins to his knees for a “mock execution” by firing without a bullet, but the gun discharged. The bullet lacerated Jenkins’ tongue and broke his jaw before exiting his neck. As Jenkins bled on the floor, the officers devised a cover story for investigators: Elward brought Jenkins into a side room to conduct a staged drug bust over the phone and Jenkins reached for a gun when he was released from handcuffs. Middleton offered to plant an unregistered firearm, but Elward said he would use the BB gun. Dedmon volunteered to plant methamphetamine he had received from an informant. Jenkins was charged with a felony as a result but the charges were later dropped. Opdyke put one of Elward's shell casings in a water bottle and threw it into tall grass nearby. Hartfield removed the hard drive from the home's surveillance system and later tossed it in a creek. Afterward, McAlpin and Middleton made a promise: they would kill any of the officers who told the truth about what happened. They kept quiet for months as pressure mounted from a Justice Department civil rights probe. An investigation by The Associated Press also linked some of the deputies to at least four violent encounters with Black men since 2019 that left two dead and another with lasting injuries. One of the officers came forward in June, Bailey said. Bailey on Thursday said he was lied to and first learned everything that happened to Jenkins and Parker when he read unsealed court documents. Some of the deputies, including McAlpin and Elward, had worked under Bailey for years and been sued several times for alleged misconduct. The sheriff promised to implement a new body camera policy and said he was open to more federal oversight. He also called the officers “criminals,” echoing federal prosecutors. “Now, they’ll be treated as the criminals they are,” U.S. Attorney LaMarca said. ___ Associated Press writer Emily Wagster Pettus contributed to this report. ___ Michael Goldberg is a corps member for the Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on undercovered issues. Follow him at @mikergoldberg.

US Police Misconduct

The Justice Department issued a scathing critique Wednesday on the Louisville Metro Police Department after a nearly two-year review it launched into the force following the botched raid that killed Breonna Taylor. The review, looking at whether the Louisville Metro Police Department used excessive force, found that officers use unreasonable tactics including unjustified neck restraints, police dogs and tasers. The report also found that the police department executes search warrants without knocking and announcing. “For years, LMPD has practiced an aggressive style of policing that it deploys selectively, especially against Black people, but also against vulnerable people throughout the city,” the report said. “LMPD cites people for minor offenses, like wide turns and broken taillights, while serious crimes like sexual assault and homicide go unsolved,” the report added. “Some officers demonstrate disrespect for the people they are sworn to protect. Some officers have videotaped themselves throwing drinks at pedestrians from their cars; insulted people with disabilities; and called Black people ‘monkeys,’ ‘animal,’ and ‘boy.’” Attorney General Merrick Garland announced the results of the investigation Wednesday. “This conduct is unacceptable. It is heartbreaking. It erodes the community trust necessary for effective policing and it is an affront to the vast majority of officers who put their lives on the line every day to serve Louisville with honor,” Garland said at a news conference. “And it is an affront to the people of Louisville who deserve better.” The DOJ found that “police officers’ forcible and violent entry into a person’s home strikes at the heart of the constitutional protection against unreasonable government intrusion.” “But Louisville Metro’s and LMPD’s unlawful conduct did not start in 2020. As an LMPD leader told us shortly after we opened this investigation, ‘Breonna Taylor was a symptom of problems that we have had for years,’” the report said. The department’s leaders failed to curb the “unacceptable” conduct, the report found. “Failures of leadership and accountability have allowed unlawful conduct to continue unchecked,” DOJ said. “Even when city and police leaders announced solutions, they failed to follow through. In LMPD, officer misconduct too often goes unnoticed and unaddressed. At times, LMPD leaders have endorsed and defended unlawful conduct.” As a result of the misconduct, the police department has paid more than $40 million to resolve claims of police misconduct over the past six years, according to the report. The Justice Department review was launched after the botched raid that killed Breonna Taylor. Four current and former Louisville police officers involved in the deadly raid – including detectives who worked on the search warrant and the ex-officer accused of firing blindly into her home – have been federally charged with civil rights violations. One of the former officers, Kelly Hannah Goodlett, pleaded guilty to conspiring to falsify an affidavit for a warrant to search Taylor’s home and to covering up the false document by lying to investigators. Under the Biden administration, the Justice Department significantly ramped up efforts to address abusive policing, and the systemic issues that contribute to police misconduct. The Justice Department has initiated several similar probes, including one on Wednesday into the Memphis, Tennessee, Police Department. This story has been updated with additional details.

US Police Misconduct

U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris and civil rights leader the Rev. Al Sharpton will be among the mourners Wednesday at the funeral of Tyre Nichols, whose death earlier this month after being beaten by police once again focused attention on police brutality. Nichols’ mother and stepfather, RowVaughn Wells and Rodney Wells, invited Harris to attend the service at Mississippi Boulevard Christian Church in Memphis, Tennessee. She expressed her condolences in a phone call with the family on Tuesday. “The persistent issue of police misconduct and use of excessive force in America must end now,” Harris said in a statement Friday, the same day police released video of the January 7 traffic stop and beating that led to his death. Sharpton is set to give the eulogy at Wednesday’s funeral. He gathered with family members late Tuesday at the Mason Temple Church of God in Christ in Memphis, where the Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. delivered his final speech the night before he was assassinated in 1968. “This is holy ground. And this family now is ours and they’re in the hands of history,” Sharpton said. Also expected to attend Wednesday were Tamika Palmer, the mother of Breonna Taylor, and Philonise Floyd, the brother of George Floyd. The deaths of Taylor and Floyd at the hands of police in 2020 sparked widespread protests in the United States about racial injustice. Five Black officers have been fired and charged in connection with the death of Nichols, who was also Black. Two other officers have been disciplined, while three emergency responders have been fired. The Memphis Police Department also disbanded a special unit that targeted violent criminals in high-crime areas that included six of the officers involved. Some information for this report came from The Associated Press, Agence France-Presse and Reuters.

US Police Misconduct

When President Joe Biden delivers his second State of the Union speech Tuesday night, two guests are expected to be in the audience: the mother and stepfather of Tyre Nichols. Nichols died after being beaten during a violent encounter with Memphis police last month. His death has sparked calls for police reform at the federal level. His parents, RowVaughn and Rodney Wells, will sit in the first lady's box on Tuesday. RowVaughn made a tearful plea for the passage of the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act at his funeral last week. "We need to get that bill passed, because if we don't, that blood, that next child that dies -- that blood is going to be on their hands," she said. It's a topic Biden is likely to address as he speaks to lawmakers and the nation in what could be his largest audience of the year. But how far he'll will go in calling for reform, and how far his comments will go in a divided Congress, remains to be seen. "Criminal justice reform and fears about racism have been top issue concerns for Black Americans and Black voters for several cycles," Karen Finney, a Democratic strategist and former Hillary Clinton adviser, told ABC News. "I think given that Tyre Nichols' parents will be in the audience, we should expect that the president will talk about that," Finney added. Biden said he was "outraged and deeply pained" when graphic footage of Nichols' fatal confrontation with police was released last month showing officers striking and kicking Nichols. He's called on Congress to send the George Floyd Justice in Policing reform bill to his desk, and met last week with members of the Congressional Black Caucus to discuss possible paths forward. Vice President Kamala Harris, in remarks delivered at Nichols' funeral, said the beating of the 29-year-old Nichols was "not in pursuit of public safety." "When we talk about public safety, let us understand what it means in its truest form," the vice president said. "Tyre Nichols should have been safe." The country's confidence in police practices have hit new lows, according to a recent ABC News/Washington Post poll. Just 39% of Americans expressed confidence that the police are trained to avoid excessive force, and 41% were confident the police treat Black and white people equally. "People are going to be listening very closely for what's the vision for what public safety and reforms look like," Finney said of Biden's speech, "because it's got to go hand in hand." What police reform advocates want Biden to address "I sincerely hope he doesn't double down on throwing more police at the problem because the calculus of that would be very wrong," Damon Hewitt, the president and executive director of the Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, told ABC News ahead of the State of the Union address. Last year, Biden, as part of his administration's crime prevention proposal, called for nearly $13 billion to hire 100,000 police officers around the country over the next five years. Hewitt said he hopes to hear Biden call for comprehensive legislation, noting the odds of passing a police reform package may be slim but "that doesn't mean that any member of Congress, regardless of party affiliation, should be let off the hook." The George Floyd policing bill passed the Democrat-controlled House in 2020 and 2021 but stalled in the Senate. It now faces bigger hurdles now that the House is controlled by a Republican majority. Rashad Robinson, the president of civil rights advocacy group Color of Change, told ABC News he wants to see Biden talk about the need to end qualified immunity, create a database of police misconduct, more power to the Department of Justice for policy and practices, and more policies. But he also said it's even more important for the president to use the national address to speak more directly to the American people to inspire them to get more organized around police reform. "People don't remember all of the list of demands, or the things that the president wants on his desk," Robinson said. "But it is an opportunity to tell a story … He needs to tell a story about why we haven't actually gotten change, and who is standing in the way." "It's something that I think is going to be necessary to actually build the momentum to win something real."

US Police Misconduct

Dozens of LASD deputies ordered to show suspected gang tattoos, reveal others who have them Nearly three dozen deputies have been ordered to come in for questioning, show their tattoos and give up the names of any other deputies similarly sporting ink connecting them to two of the Los Angeles County Sheriff Department’s most notorious deputy gangs. The demand came Friday in a letter sent by county Inspector General Max Huntsman to 35 deputies suspected of being members of either the Executioners, which operates out of the Compton station, or the Banditos, which operates out of the East L.A. station. The names of the deputies have not been released to the public, but Huntsman said they were a subset of the 41 deputies he identified as suspected gang members last year. “The Los Angeles Sheriff’s Department conducted incomplete internal affairs investigations into the Banditos and Executioners, failing to identify all members,” Huntsman told The Times this week. “California’s new gang law addresses discrimination based on race and gender and gives inspectors general enhanced authority to collect evidence. We’re using that authority to complete the investigations by directing deputies to show their tattoos and tell us who else has them.” Top watchdog for the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department has identified dozens of deputies who are allegedly members of gang-like groups that operate out of two stations. It’s unclear what the consequences would be if deputies do not show up, though the letters Huntsman sent last week warned that refusing to answer questions could “adversely affect your employment with Los Angeles County or your status as a peace officer.” In a mass text sent to members this week, one union representing deputies, the Los Angeles Sheriff’s Professional Assn., advised members to call the union immediately if they received a letter. In a Facebook post, another union, the Assn. for Los Angeles Deputy Sheriffs, advised members not to respond to the letters and to instead “call ALADS right NOW.” Richard Pippin, ALADS president, said the union believes that some aspects of the inspector general’s investigation “infringe upon the fundamental constitutional rights of individuals” and that there are major parts of the letter that need clarification. “Deputies will no doubt be looking to Sheriff [Robert] Luna, their employer, for that clarification,” he said. In a statement late Tuesday, department officials said they were aware of the letters, but did not clarify whether deputies would be directed to respond or whether there would be consequences for ignoring them. “The Department supports any investigation that seeks to uncover wrongdoing, since all members of the Sheriff’s Department are expected to hold themselves to the highest ethical and professional standards,” officials wrote in an unsigned statement sent by email. “Department members who engage in misconduct or criminal activity will not be tolerated and will be held accountable.” A new study finds that 16% of L.A. County Sheriff’s deputies and supervisors said in an anonymous survey they’ve been asked to join a secret clique. The five-page letter from the inspector general, the county’s watchdog, opens by explaining the recipient is “directed to appear in person to participate in an interview to be conducted by the Office of Inspector General concerning the presence of law enforcement gangs in the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department.” It lays out the legal basis for such a probe, citing a 2021 state law that gave inspectors general the authority to investigate law enforcement gangs by specifying that agencies “shall cooperate” with inspector general investigations. Though the law doesn’t specify what happens if an individual deputy doesn’t cooperate, Huntsman’s letter points to another section of the state’s penal code, which says that failing to cooperate with an investigation into police misconduct can be grounds for decertification of a peace officer. Then the letter explains the reason for the investigation: Though the Sheriff’s Department has had evidence that secretive and exclusive deputy gangs commonly known as the Banditos and Executioners both exist, the department has never been able to provide investigators with a full list of the members in either group. “The Office of Inspector General is conducting a series of witness interviews to establish the membership of the Banditos and the Executioners,” the letter continues. A new report by the Civilian Oversight Commission condemned the “cancer” of violent deputy gangs in the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department and urged a ban on the secretive groups. The letter lays out more than a dozen questions interviewers plan to ask, including: Do you have a tattoo related to the Banditos or the Executioners anywhere on your body? Who was present when you were tattooed? Who knows about your tattoo? Who else have you seen the tattoo on? The letter also included a request to see each deputy’s legs, which are a common spot for suspected gang tattoos. The letter ends by instructing recipients to contact the Office of the Inspector General within two weeks to schedule an interview. Though the letter says deputies “must” appear and answer questions, it does lay out one possible exception: the 5th Amendment. If deputies assert their 5th Amendment right to refuse answering questions that could incriminate them, Huntsman’s office will not legally force them to answer — or at least not yet. “Should the Office of Inspector General elect to compel a statement over a Fifth Amendment assertion, you will be recalled at a future date,” the letter states. “Absent an assertion by you of your Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination, failure to answer may adversely affect your employment with Los Angeles County or your status as a certified peace officer.” The deputies who received the letter — under a delivery process that Huntsman said was possible only because of cooperation from the Sheriff’s Department — were all among those referenced in a longer letter Huntsman sent to then-Sheriff Alex Villanueva in early 2022. A Los Angeles County sheriff’s deputy associated with a gang-like group of deputies with matching tattoos testified that he has attended about seven “inking parties.” The purpose of that earlier letter was to ask the department for an array of materials needed for the investigation. But it also laid out some of the information Huntsman already had about their existence. While the letter didn’t name any gang members, it did say that the office had identified 11 suspected Banditos and 30 suspected Executioners. The Sheriff’s Department has long faced allegations about secretive deputy groups running amok in certain stations and jails, controlling command staff and promoting a culture of violence. A Loyola Marymount University report released in 2021 identified 18 such groups that have existed over the last five decades, including the Executioners and the Banditos. Members of the former are alleged to sport tattoos of a skull with Nazi imagery and an AK-47, while members of the latter are allegedly known for their matching tattoos of a skeleton outfitted with a sombrero, bandoleer and pistol. The current round of letters comes on the heels of a series of efforts to curb gang activity within the Sheriff’s Department. Shortly after taking office, Luna announced the creation of an Office for Constitutional Policing with the aim of eradicating deputy gangs. Facing long-standing allegations of “appalling” conditions inside the county’s jails and violent deputy “gangs” operating on its streets, Sheriff Robert Luna announced a new office designed to combat those problems. And, in a lengthy report released a few weeks later, the Civilian Oversight Commission’s special counsel offered more than two dozen recommendations to get rid of gangs, including firing captains who won’t support anti-gang policies, requiring deputies to hide any gang-related tattoos at work, notifying prosecutors whenever a gang-involved deputy is set to testify as a witness in court and holding community meetings. Unlike his predecessor, Luna has acknowledged the existence of deputy gangs and publicly said he wants to end them. However, he has not yet formally accepted the report’s recommendations. The stories shaping California Get up to speed with our Essential California newsletter, sent six days a week. You may occasionally receive promotional content from the Los Angeles Times.

US Police Misconduct

SACRAMENTO, Calif. -- Police in California are not immune from civil lawsuits for misconduct that happens while they investigate crimes, the state Supreme Court ruled this week, overruling a precedent made by lower courts that had helped protect law enforcement from litigation for decades. The justices on Thursday unanimously rejected an argument by Riverside County that its sheriff's deputies couldn't be sued for leaving a man's naked body lying in plain sight for eight hours while officers investigated his killing. California law protects police from being sued for any harm that happens during a prosecution process — even if the officer acted “maliciously and without probable cause.” Now, the Supreme Court says police can be sued for misconduct during investigations. The ruling cites previous case law that defined investigatory actions as those before charges are filed. “The potential for factual overlap between investigations and prosecutions does not justify treating them as one and the same,” Justice Leondra Kruger wrote in the ruling. Kruger noted the court issued a similar ruling in 1974. But in 1994, a state appeals court adopted a broader interpretation to shield police from lawsuits stemming from conduct during investigations. Lower courts have been relying on that ruling to dismiss misconduct lawsuits against law enforcement that did not involve prosecutions. A lawyer representing Riverside County in the case did not immediately respond to a request for comment Friday. This particular case centered on Jose Leon, who was shot and killed by a neighbor in 2017 southeast of Los Angeles in Riverside County. Shortly after sheriff’s deputies arrived at the shooting, they heard several gunshots nearby and dragged Leon’s body behind a police vehicle, causing his pants to fall down and exposing his genitals, according to the lawsuit. His wife Dora Leon sued the county for negligence and emotional distress, saying police had left her husband's naked body in plain view for hours. The case was dismissed by lower courts that ruled state law provides immunity to law enforcement officers and agencies for police conduct during investigations. The Supreme Court reinstated Dora Leon's lawsuit. Kruger wrote that the lower courts' decision was wrong, saying police investigations cannot be interpreted as part of the prosecution process. Many local police departments have routinely argued that they are immune from damage claims “the moment a police officer arrives on the scene of a crime,” said Richard Antognini, a lawyer representing Leon. If the Supreme Court had ruled in favor of the county, “it would have essentially immunized them for almost anything,” he said. The recent ruling helps remove an obstacle for victims seeking damages from police misconduct, Antognini said. California laws still provide immunity to certain aspects of police investigations. The ruling was praised by John Burris, a California civil rights attorney who has represented more than 1,000 victims of police misconduct across the country. “This should have a positive impact on police reform, because now the law has spoken,” Burris said. “Police should be trained and be better informed as to what their obligations are.” ___ Associated Press writer Claudia Lauer in Philadelphia contributed to the report.

US Police Misconduct

For the first time in more than 25 years, Georgia men Darrell Lee Clark and Cain Joshua Storey will be home for Christmas, thanks to a true-crime podcast that uncovered their wrongful convictions for murder, and attorneys from the Georgia Innocence Project.  Clark and Storey walked out of the Floyd County jail as free men Thursday after the Rome Judicial Circuit District Attorney's Office agreed that their convictions in the 1996 shooting death of a friend should be overturned. They were embraced by tearful friends and family who gathered to meet them. "You never think something like that is going to happen to you," Lee Clark said in a statement. "Never would I have thought I would spend more than half my life in prison, especially for something I didn’t do. I’m just glad the truth finally came to light after 25 years. I’m so thankful for the Georgia Innocence Project and Proof Podcast for what they did. Without them, I would still be in prison."Attorneys with the Georgia Innocence Project said Clark's exoneration was obtained after they filed new evidence of police misconduct in the law enforcement investigation of 15-year-old Brian Bowling's death in 1996. IDAHO POLICE WARN OF ‘CRIMINAL CHARGES’ FOR WEB SLEUTHS ENGAGED IN ‘HARASSING’ AMID ‘MISINFORMATION’ Lee Clark, left, and Joseph Storey, right, were released from prison Thursday after serving 25 years for a murder they did not commit. Their release was secured after Proof podcast uncovered new evidence in their case. (Courtesy of Fox 5 Atlanta)On Oct. 18, 1996, Bowling was hanging out with his best friend, Cain Joshua Storey, in his parent's trailer home. He was on the phone with his girlfriend when he told her they were playing Russian Roulette with a gun brought over by Storey. The stupid and dangerous game ended tragically. Bowling pulled the trigger on the weapon, sending a bullet through his head and killing him. Investigators initially believed Storey's account of the accident. He was charged with manslaughter. But in the months following, police re-opened the investigation at the urging of Bowling's distraught family, the Georgia Innocence Project said. In the course of their investigation, they interviewed a woman who lived nearby the Bowling's home. She told investigators that Storey and Clark had come to a party she had hosted a few months after the shooting. She alleged that at her party, the pair of 17-year-olds had told her they had planned Bowling's murder because he had known too much about a prior theft Storey and Clark had committed. After further investigation, Storey's manslaughter charge was upgraded to murder, and Clark was arrested as a co-conspirator, despite the fact that Clark had a corroborated alibi. Police relied on the testimony of a hearing- and speech-impaired witness who'd been in a different room in the Bowlings' home when the shooting occurred. They claimed the witness had identified Clark from a photo lineup as someone he had seen running through the backyard that night. No one else at the Bowlings' home reported seeing anyone outside. GEORGIA MAN PLEADS GUILTY TO KILLING 2 DEPUTIES WHILE SERVING WARRANT Cain Joshua Storey gives an interview to FOX 5 Atlanta after his release from prison. Storey was present when 15-year-old Brian Bowling shot himself on Oct. 18, 1996.  (Courtesy of Fox 5 Atlanta)At trial, the state built its case on the party hostess's testimony that the boys had conspired to kill Bowling in an act of revenge, and on the witness's identification of Clark fleeing the home.  The speech- and hearing-impaired witness, Charlie Childers, had difficulty communicating to the court. He repeatedly said that Storey was present in the home on the night of the shooting, but also said a person he called "Darrell" was not present in the courtroom, even though Clark was sitting at the defense table. Childers told the court, through an interpreter, that "Darrell" was a "Black boy" with "black hair" who had a wife, according to FOX 5 Atlanta. The description didn't fit Clark, who goes by his middle name, Lee, is White and unmarried and has brown hair.The state also heard testimony from the county coroner, who had no formal medical training, because no autopsy was performed on Bowling's body. The coroner told the court that he had a "gut feeling" the gunshot wound was not self-inflicted, because it was not a close-contact wound. Despite the shaky evidence and Clark's alibi, the trial was wrapped up in a week, and both men were convicted of murder and sentenced to life in prison. GEORGIA MAN CHARGED WITH MURDERING EX-WIFE'S DIVORCE ATTORNEY, BURNING OFFICE Lee Clark was wrongfully imprisoned for more than 25 years after he had been convicted for a killing he did not commit.  (Courtesy of FOX 5 Atlanta)It wasn't until 2021, more than two decades later, that the facts of the case were re-examined by Susan Simpson and Jacinda Davis on their Proof podcast. Simpson and Davis re-interviewed the key witnesses from the trial. They found a better interpreter for Childers, who revealed that he had never told police that he had seen Clark on the night of the shooting. Most of his testimony concerned an unrelated crime he had witnessed a decade earlier. The Proof podcast hosts also spoke to the party hostess, who recanted her testimony and said she had been coerced by police, who allegedly had threatened to take her children away and requested sexual favors from her. A new witness interviewed on the podcast corroborated her fear of police retaliation. With this new evidence in hand, senior attorney Christina Cribbs and accountability counsel Meagan Hurley of the Georgia Innocence Project secured a new trial for Clark. At the hearing on Thursday, the district attorney and a superior court judge agreed that Clark should be exonerated of all charges, FOX 5 reported.ATLANTA TEENS ARRESTED IN SHOOTING THAT LEFT 2 YOUNG PEOPLE DEAD"We are elated to see Lee and his family finally obtain the justice that is so long overdue. This would not have been possible without the Bowling family’s support and a district attorney’s office that was willing to take an objective, new look at an old case," said Cribbs. "The Bowling family suffered a great loss when Brian died. Their strength, open minds, willingness to question information that has been presented as ‘fact,’ and quest for the truth is inspiring.""Official misconduct was certainly a contributing factor in Lee’s case, just as it has been in over 50 percent of wrongful conviction cases. What we should take away from this is that unfettered power, without proper checks and balances, leaves ripe the opportunity for mistakes and misconduct. Proper oversight, coupled with educational initiatives designed to prevent and correct wrongful convictions, is key," said Hurley. "Prosecutors have a duty to see that justice is done in their cases, and that must include a commitment to principles of integrity, equity and accountability. It is imperative that they are willing to take corrective action when they see injustice, including when the injustice is perpetrated by police."The judge reduced Storey's charge back to the original manslaughter charge, which carried a sentence of 10 years, and gave him credit for time served.  Both men went home to their families in time for the Christmas holiday.CLICK HERE TO GET THE FOX NEWS APP"It is a real shock. Been behind prison walls for 25 years and walk out and see how the world has changed," Clark told Fox 5. His father, Glen Clark, was thankful to God that justice had finally been served. "Let me tell you something. The Lord is shining, he's shining today," he said. Chris Pandolfo is a writer for Fox News Digital. Send tips to chris.pandolfo@fox.com and follow him on Twitter @ChrisCPandolfo.

US Police Misconduct

A year after a 22-year-old Black man was shot dead by police serving a no-knock warrant, Amir Locke’s parents on Friday sued the city of Minneapolis and the officer who fired the fatal shot in federal court. “We all saw that horrific video where Amir Locke didn’t even have a chance … He was practically in slumber when the police did what they do so often with Black people – they shoot first, and ask questions later,” civil rights attorney Ben Crump said Friday in announcing the suit. Court action over Locke’s death comes on the heels of the deadly police beating in Memphis of a 29-year-old Black man, Tyre Nichols – a case that swiftly yielded murder charges against five officers and renewed calls for policing reform nationwide. Prosecutors in Locke’s case declined in April to file charges against any officers. The Locke family lawsuit renews a spotlight on no-knock warrants, in which high-risk warrants are served at homes without giving occupants a chance to open the door. The practice – also at issue in the botched 2020 police raid that left Breonna Taylor dead in Kentucky – is inappropriate in almost all circumstances, leaders and advocates have said. “This has got to stop,” Locke’s mom, Karen Wells, said Friday. “Amir will be the face of banning no-knock warrants. He will not die in vain.” The lawsuit asks the court to appoint a monitor to make sure that the city carries out a ban on no-knock warrants, as well as money damages for the Locke family. Long before Locke’s killing – as the nation was reeling from another Minneapolis officer’s murder of George Floyd – the city in late 2020 announced it was changing its policy on no-knock warrants. But the option wasn’t banned outright: Like most police department policies, the policy gives wide leeway to field supervisors to make decisions based on conditions and allows for no-knock warrants in certain situations. That change was a focus Friday of Locke’s parents’ lawyers. “Why were they (the local government) misleading us to believe that no-knock warrants had been banned?” plaintiffs’ attorney Jeff Storms said at the news conference. “They told us there was a ban when there wasn’t.” The city did not immediately have a comment on the suit, noting it “will review the Complaint when it receives it.” A Minneapolis officer shot Locke just before 7 a.m. on a weekday last February as he emerged from a couch with a handgun and raised it toward an officer while a SWAT team yelling commands executed a warrant linked to a homicide probe, prosecutors have said. Locke was not named in any search warrants, police have said. He was in legal possession of his firearm, which he used as protection while working as a food delivery driver, his mother and attorneys for his family have said. Locke might still be alive “absent the no-knock warrant used in this case,” Attorney General Keith Ellison and then-Hennepin County Attorney Michael Freeman said in announcing no charges against officers, noting their role wasn’t to evaluate the use of the warrant. ‘This here will not be swept under the rug’ In passionate remarks Friday, those who spoke at the news conference – their voices often shaking – intoned the exhaustion and fury still simmering since Floyd’s 2020 death sparked a reckoning over US police use of force, especially against people of color. “We keep seeing this brutality all over America, this excessive use of force whether shooting or brutalization of Black people by police officers who are supposed to protect and serve them,” said Crump, who also represents Nichols’ family. “But you don’t see that in those videos with Amir Locke. You don’t see that in these videos with George Floyd. You don’t see that in these videos with Andre Hill in Ohio. You don’t see that in these videos that we see with Tyre Nichols, the latest America tragedy of police brutality against black people in America.” No family mourning a loved one slain by police – while also mounting a battle for justice – has asked for this, Locke’s dad said. “We should not be here. We don’t wanna be here. We didn’t ask to be here this is something that we were forced into,” Andre Locke said. “Listening to the reports and everything that’s taken place in this country, this here will not be swept under the rug. I’ve said this before: This is not the 1920s, not the 1930s, the 1950s or ’60s or ‘70s. We stand for something different. No disrespect to those that have walked the way for us and for us to be here, to have a voice. And we’re absolutely thankful. But we’re not going – at all. We’re not going.” Minneapolis police again under scrutiny The defendants in the federal lawsuit are the city of Minneapolis, as the responsible party for the Minneapolis Police Department, as well as Officer Mark Hanneman. It seeks compensatory, special and punitive damages and costs in an amount to be determined by a jury. Floyd’s death prompted the US Justice Department in 2021 to launch a federal civil investigation into policing practices in Minneapolis to determine whether its police department has “a pattern or practice of unconstitutional or unlawful policing,” Attorney General Merrick Garland said. It includes a “comprehensive review” of the department’s “policies, training, supervision and use of force investigations,” Garland said at the time. Meanwhile, Nichols’ death in Memphis has renewed calls to pass the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act passed. The legislation, introduced in 2020 and again in 2021, would set up a national registry of police misconduct to stop officers from evading consequences for their actions by moving to another jurisdiction. CNN’s Omar Jimenez, Brad Parks, Paul LeBlanc contributed to this report.

US Police Misconduct

Public figures and law enforcement officials across the country reacted online to the Friday night release of police bodycam footage that showed the violent encounter between Tyre Nichols and five police officers in Memphis, Tennessee.The Memphis Police Department released the footage of the Jan. 7 traffic stop that preceded the death of 29-year-old Nichols, who spent three days in the hospital before succumbing to his injuries, according to authorities. Five Memphis police officers – Demetrius Haley, Tadarrius Bean, Emmitt Martin III, Desmond Mills and Justin Smith – involved in the encounter have been fired and face a slew of charges, including second-degree murder. Officials across the country reacted after the release of the much-anticipated footage, which prompted law enforcement agencies across the country to prepare for potential protests or unrest. In a statement, President Biden said he spoke with Nichols' mother and stepfather Friday afternoon.TYRE NICHOLS' MOTHER URGES PEACEFUL PROTESTS: ‘I DON'T WANT US BURNING UP OUR CITIES'"Like so many, I was outraged and deeply pained to see the horrific video of the beating that resulted in Tyre Nichols' death," he said. "It is yet another painful reminder of the profound fear and trauma, the pain, and the exhaustion that Black and Brown Americans experience every single day."Vice President Kamala Harris similarly referenced the graphic nature of the video, saying its contents "will forever be seared in our memories.""Tyre Nichols should have made it home to his family. Yet, once again, America mourns the life of a son and father brutally cut short at the hands of those sworn to protect and serve," Harris said on Twitter Friday night. "The footage and images released tonight will forever be seared in our memories, and they open wounds that will never fully heal."The vice president added: "The persistent issue of police misconduct and use of excessive force in America must end now."House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D-New York, wrote on Twitter: "The brutal and violent killing of Tyre Nichols by officers sworn to protect the community is unconscionable."He added: "Justice for Tyre Nichols must be swift and complete."Former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi tweeted: "My heart goes out to Tyre Nichols’ mother and their entire family. Tyre should be alive today. Justice must be done."U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-New York, also responded."The effort to separate the officers who murdered Tyre Nichols from the system of policing that produced them is palpable," she tweeted. "Tyre Nichols should be alive. Charges alone aren’t justice. Change is.""Let’s call this footage what it is—murder," U.S. Rep. Ilhan Omar, D-Minnesota, tweeted. Rep. John Garamendi, D-Calif., demanded justice for the Nichols family and other potential victims of police brutality. "He called out for his mother and they kept beating him," the lawmaker tweeted. "How much longer do we have to watch this in America until we ensure our justice system lives up to its name?"He added: "We demand accountability and justice for Tyre Nichols and everyone who is a victim [of] tragedies like his."Freshman U.S. Rep. Maxwell Alejandro Frost, D-Florida, said it "Doesn’t matter what color those police officers are. The murder of Tyre Nichols is anti-Black and the result of white supremacy."TYRE NICHOLS' BROTHER AWAITS FATE OF 5 OFFICERS INVOLVED IN BEATING: 'I HOPE THEY DIE'Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-New York, said the incident left him "heartbroken, horrified and appalled.""I am heartbroken, horrified and appalled by the heinous murder of Tyre Nichols. The repetitiveness of unjust murders is a stain on America. The five police officers betrayed their oath to serve and protect their community and they should be held accountable to the fullest extent of the law," Schumer said in a statement.He added: "Tyre was a father, a son, a friend—a talented young man who should still be alive. We must honor his memory by both making sure these officers are prosecuted to fullest extent of the law and by bringing lasting, meaningful change to create a more just and fair America."Sen. Bernie Sanders wrote on Twitter: "Tyre Nichols should be alive.""Yes, the police officers who brutally murdered him must be held accountable. But even their conviction on the strongest possible charges cannot bring Tyre back. We must do everything in our power to end police violence against people of color," his post said.Sen. Joe Manchin, D-West Virginia, said the "brutal violence" inflicted on Nichols was "horrific and inhumane.""For too long, we have witnessed these senseless acts by those sworn to protect us, and it must end," he said in a statement. "This cannot be the America we strive for, and we must come together to meaningfully address it.""The footage released tonight is difficult to watch," added U.S. Sen. Marsha Blackburn, R-Tenn.U.S. senatorial candidate John Fetterman wrote: "Tyre Nichols should be here. It doesn’t have to be like this. It’s time for justice."Govs. Glenn Youngkin of Virginia and Gavin Newsom of California also shared their thoughts."The hearts of Virginians and our entire nation ache tonight as we struggle with the horrible events in Memphis and grieve for Tyre Nichols and his family," Youngkin said in a statement after the video's release. "The disturbing and shocking video released this evening displays incomprehensible violence towards another human being and we must condemn these heinous actions.""Tyre Nichols should be alive today," Newsom tweeted.  A view from a camera mounted above the intersection where Memphis police caught up with Tyre Nichols, who died three days later. Authorities released footage of the deadly encounter between Nichols and police Friday.   (Memphis Police Department)Portland, Oregon Mayor Ted Wheeler and other city and county leaders said they felt "the rippling effects of this tragedy in our own communities as we all await the results of the pending investigation."In a tweet, New York City Mayor Eric Adams, a former police officer, said he was "outraged. And as someone who spent decades fighting for police diversity and against police abuse, I feel betrayed."New York Attorney General Letitia James wrote on Twitter Friday night, "My heart is with his mother and everyone feeling pain and outrage from yet another life that should not have been taken."MEMPHIS BUSINESSES BOARD UP IN PREPARATION FOR RELEASE OF TYRE NICHOLS BODYCAM VIDEOMartin Luther King III, son of the slain civil rights leader, said he was "deeply disturbed by the video released by Memphis Police today. We all witnessed a horrific yet perversely familiar act committed by officers of the law. Everyone involved must be arrested & charged with the murder of Tyre Nichols. His family and our nation deserve justice."Memphis Police Chief Cerelyn Davis called the incident "heinous, reckless and inhumane" but also urged calm. In an interview with Fox News Friday, shortly before the video's release, she said she believed it goes beyond recordings of excessive force used against Rodney King in 1991 and George Floyd in 2020.Even among law enforcement, the actions of the five officers has been widely condemned. "The killing of Tyre Nichols at the hands of the five cowardly former Memphis police officers is repugnant and the complete antithesis of how honorable law enforcement professionals conduct themselves every day," the union that represents Los Angeles police officers said in a statement. RELEASING TYRE NICHOLS VIDEO ON FRIDAY EVENING COULD LEAD TO VIOLENT WEEKEND PROTESTS, EXPERTS SAY This photo provided by the Nichols family shows Tyre Nichols, who had a passion for photography and was described by friends as joyful and lovable. Nichols was just minutes from his home in Memphis, Tenn., on Jan. 7, 2023, when he was pulled over by police and fatally beaten. Five Memphis police officers have since been charged with second-degree murder and other offenses.  (Courtesy of the Nichols family via AP)New York Police Commissioner Keechant Sewell said the video footage showed the "disgraceful actions depicted in the released video are an unequivocal violation of our oath to protect those we serve, and a failure of basic human decency.Betsy Branter Smith, spokeswoman for the National Police Association, said the officers' actions were not indicative of American law enforcement.  "Just saw the video. NOBODY teaches baton strikes above the shoulders, NOBODY teaches kicks to the head, NOBODY teaches the denial of medical aid," she said."These men were street fighting, they were not acting as police officers. Instead of a conversation with (CNN host) Don Lemon, the chief really needs to review her hiring and training practices."Nichols was a FedEx worker with a 4-year-old son who enjoyed photography and skateboarding, according to his family's attorney, Ben Crump.Officials in Memphis and other big cities around the country are expecting demonstrations following the highly anticipated release of police bodycam video in connection with the case.CLICK HERE TO GET THE FOX NEWS APP Speaking at a vigil Thursday evening, Nichols' mother RowVaughn Wells urged supporters to protest peacefully."When that tape comes out tomorrow, it’s going to be horrific," she said. "I didn’t see it, but from what I hear it’s going to be horrific."

US Police Misconduct

GLENDALE, AZ — A former Glendale police officer criminally charged for kicking and tasering a handcuffed man in the groin has pleaded guilty to a single misdemeanor count of disorderly conduct. Matthew Schneider, who avoided jail time and probation, had been facing three felony aggravated assault charges. The former officer addressed the judge ahead of his sentencing on Friday. “Your honor, I’m standing before the court today as something in a million years I would never dreamed I’d be, a convicted criminal,” said Schneider, who was reading a prepared statement to the court. “As you know, I come from a law enforcement family… It’s hard to describe the shame I felt telling the people who raised me and were excellent role models, that I would be pleading guilty today. It was even harder when I had to tell my kids.” He added, “I accept full responsibility for my actions on July 26, 2017. I tried to do my absolute best as a police officer and human being that day and it wasn’t good enough.” In July 2017, Schneider and other officers repeatedly tasered Johnny Wheatcroft, who was the passenger in a vehicle stopped for an alleged blinker violation. In front of his two children, Wheatcroft was tasered nearly a dozen times. Schneider delivered the final tase to a handcuffed Wheatcroft by pulling down his shorts and stunning him in the testicles, according to body camera video and a federal lawsuit. In February 2019, ABC15 exposed body camera video of the disturbing incident, and it immediately drew national attention and outrage. Surveillance video also showed Schneider likely lied about witnessing the alleged blinker violation. Multiple independent law enforcement experts also said Schneider’s conduct was unlawful and one of the most cruel and most troubling cases of police misconduct they’ve ever seen. Without public exposure, it’s unlikely the case would have been investigated further. The AG’s Office was forwarded the case in June 2020 by the Maricopa County Attorney’s Office. Under former County Attorney Bill Montgomery, MCAO initially declined to file charges against Schneider in 2017. Before he was charged, Schneider forfeited his police officer certification; and Glendale approved an accident disability claim, which allows him to collect a pension and benefits. During his sentencing hearing, Maricopa County Superior Court Judge Patricia Starr said that she did not feel probation was necessary and expressed sympathy for Schneider. “You’ve suffered for the last five and half years the consequences of what’s happened Your family has suffered the consequences of what happened. You’ve lost a lot of things that were very important to you,” Starr said. “What you did with that is now what a lot people would do, you picked yourself up, found something else and are now excelling at that. So, I would see no purpose what’s so ever to put you on probation… I see the loss of your career as a very severe punishment that’s already happened to you.” Starr did order Schneider to pay fines and fees totaling $115. “And that’s going to be my sentence. I think it’s time for everybody to move on,” Starr said. Wheatcroft and his attorneys did not address the court about the plea deal. They are in the process of finalizing a confidential settlement for their federal civil rights lawsuit. In a final statement before the court, prosecutor John Hudson did talk about the Attorney General’s Office’s plea deal. “The behavior that happened that day was not only inappropriate, it was criminal. He has pled to a criminal action. That was the goal of this case,” Hudson said.

US Police Misconduct

It was an astonishing coincidence: a Stateville inmate encountering the Cook County state’s attorney, just a day after prosecutors discussed whether his decades-old murder case should be thrown out.But last month, Jose Cruz briefly met top prosecutor Kim Foxx as she was preparing to speak at a commencement for recent graduates at the prison. Cruz alleges he was framed by now-infamous retired Chicago police Detective Reynaldo Guevara. Foxx’s office has been reviewing Guevara-related cases.“He had his lineup photo that he wanted to show me and introduce himself to me,” Foxx told the Tribune this week. “I had shared with Mr. Cruz that I recognized his name. … Literally, his case was part of a series of cases I had talked about less than 24 hours earlier.”From there, the recollections apparently diverge. Cruz soon afterward emailed his attorney to say Foxx assured him he would be home soon; Foxx maintains she told Cruz to “hold on tight” as their review of Guevara cases was proceeding but did not make any promises. Cruz on Tuesday told the Tribune simply that their discussion was brief since he didn’t have his attorney with him.But on Monday, Cruz got his final answer, when prosecutors formally withdrew their opposition to Cruz’s efforts. Cook County Judge Tyria Walton threw out his murder conviction, and prosecutors dropped the charges, clearing the way for Cruz’s release from Stateville on Tuesday.“I’m doing great, enjoying my freedom, you know,” Cruz told the Tribune from his aunt’s restaurant on the Northwest Side — a welcome respite from prison food.“It felt great” to walk out of Stateville, he said. “I had a lot of support from the guys on the inside, even staff, they came out to congratulate me since I’d been there so long and they all know me, they’ve been supportive of me, they knew my situation.”Jose Cruz celebrates with family and friends after his release from Stateville Correctional Center on July 12, 2022, after a judge threw out his conviction and prosecutors dropped charges against him after he'd served 26 years. (E. Jason Wambsgans / Chicago Tribune)“He’s thrilled, he’s emotional,” Cruz’s attorney Gregory Swygert told the Tribune. “... He’s one of the most grateful, positive clients I’ve ever had, having been wrongfully convicted for so long.”The encounter with Foxx was “was an exciting moment for my client, who has been fighting for so long — to meet the person who would have the ultimate decision in the case,” Swygert said. “Maybe it’s a little bit of ‘Rashomon,’ everybody has a different version of how it played out. But again, he couldn’t be more grateful for her about the decision that was made.”Cruz was convicted in 1996 for a 1993 murder. At trial, he was identified by a single eyewitness; his attorneys allege Guevara improperly steered that witness to identify Cruz. In addition, two other eyewitnesses had identified the shooter as Black — not Hispanic, like Cruz — but were never called at trial. One of those witnesses has said Guevara pressured him to finger Cruz and was “furious” when he stood by his claim that the shooter was Black, according to court filings.“If we had to try that case today, we could not meet our burden (of proof),” Foxx told the Tribune.After a cascade of allegations against Guevara, Foxx’s office launched a review of cases related to the former detective. Cruz and another Guevara accuser, Daniel Rodriguez, had their cases thrown out this year with prosecutors’ agreement. The Cook County state’s attorney’s office has chosen to fight back against the claims of some other Guevara accusers, however.One of the petitions that prosecutors challenged was David Colon’s. After a series of hearings in October and November about his allegations against Guevara, Judge Sophia Atcherson on Friday threw out his murder conviction. Guevara improperly steered two witnesses to identify Colon as the gunman in a 1991 murder, Atcherson found.Atcherson ordered a new trial for Colon, who was released from prison in 2017. Prosecutors have not yet announced whether they intend to put him on trial again.“It is now undisputed that former Detective Guevara, motivated by a desire to close cases regardless of whether he had found the actual perpetrator, engaged in multiple and repeated instances of police misconduct which took various forms,” Atcherson wrote in her order throwing out Colon’s case.When asked why prosecutors chose to challenge Colon’s claims in evidentiary hearings, Foxx said the office has “been trying to get our arms around a lot of these cases.”In their review of police misconduct claims, sometimes cases proceeded to hearings “without us sharing as much information as possible” internally, Foxx said.Afternoon BriefingDailyChicago Tribune editors' top story picks, delivered to your inbox each afternoon.Guevara’s patterns of behavior “are not necessarily as easily identifiable” as the patterns of some other allegedly corrupt cops, Foxx said, and information needs to flow freely between different parts of the office and between prosecutors and accusers’ attorneys to get a fuller picture.From a review of cases connected to now-convicted ex-Police Sgt. Ronald Watts, prosecutors concluded that some officers are so questionable that prosecutors could not stand by convictions related to them, even if they believe the person might in fact have committed the crime as alleged, Foxx said.“Saying ‘Can we stand by the conviction?’ and ‘actual innocence,’ those are two different standards,” Foxx said.Dozens of people have accused Guevara, now retired, of manipulating witnesses, fabricating evidence and framing suspects over the course of his career. He has repeatedly asserted his Fifth Amendment right to remain silent when questioned about the alleged wrongdoing.When Guevara did take the stand in Cook County Court under a grant of immunity in 2017, Judge James Obbish found his testimony so untrustworthy that he found Guevara “has now eliminated the possibility of being considered a credible witness in any proceeding.”Multiple wrongful convictions have been linked to Guevara, and the city has faced lawsuits over his alleged conduct.mcrepeau@chicagotribune.com

US Police Misconduct

Congressional Black Caucus members met with President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris Thursday afternoon to renew a stalled police reform effort, days after video showed Memphis police officers brutally beating Tyre Nichols, a 29-year-old Black man, who later died. The Black Caucus pushed Biden to speak on reviving police reform legislation during the State of the Union Feb. 7 and share information on results from past executive orders on police reform. “The death of Tyre Nichols is yet another example of why we need action," said Rep. Steven Horsford, D-Nev., chairman of the CBC, during the meeting, according to a pool report and a White House email about the meeting. A small group of CBC members joined Horsford at the White House, including: Rep. Joe Neguse, D-Colo., Rep. Jim Clyburn, D-S.C., Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee, D-Texas, Sen. Cory Booker, D-N.J., and Sen. Raphael Warnock, D-Ga. Police reform: Tyre Nichols case reignites conversations among lawmakers on federal police legislation Horsford would not say, however, if Biden committed to issuing another executive order or bringing up police reform during the State of the Union. He did say that all options are being explored. "We are working with the President, his team, the Senate, and the House," Horsford said after the meeting. "This is going to require all of us, including Republicans, to get across the finish line. We recognize that, but we are committed to meaningful, substantive reforms and a focus on public safety for all communities." Warnock said that more work will be done in the days ahead. "You will hear from the president, you will certainly hear from all of us in the days ahead about the work we have to do. We're looking for meaningful solutions that provide a foundation for lasting change," he said. What would police reform look like? "This issue is about rooting out bad policing and bad policing practices," Horsford said. "And that does require legislation, including executive actions and measures that Congress can take up in a bipartisan way." The group wants Biden to call for bipartisan police reforms next week. "We are actively engaged in making sure we pull all of the relevant stakeholders together," said Rep. Alma Adams, D-N.C. "The president will be key to this." Horsford also said he's already reached out to Sen. Tim Scott, R-S.C., the lead Republican negotiator on police reform in 2021, and will reach out to other Republicans. But he also wants Biden to push for bipartisan support. "We need him to use that moment during the State of the Union— like he will talk about housing and jobs and investments in protecting Medicare and Social Security—to talk about the importance of keeping our community safe and rooting out bad policing," said Horsford. Nichols' parents are attending the State of the Union at the invitation of the CBC. How could some of this reform happen? If need be, Black lawmakers said they would want to see Biden issue another executive order on police reform. "We also want him, in terms of the executive power that he has, to make sure that we are publicly collecting data on these kinds of incidents at police departments across the country," said Adams. In one example, Horsford said data on the rates of Black and brown residents interacting with law enforcement compared to white residents and the use of force against residents should be collected in a nationwide database. "That's about transparency. That's about accountability. And that's about knowing what is happening, particularly with bad policing practices," he said. What has Biden done in the past? In 2022 Biden issued an executive order that established a National Law Enforcement Accountability database, improved the investigation and prosecution of criminal civil rights violations and ordered federal law enforcement to adopt body-worn camera policies. The Black Caucus, however, wants an update on the effectiveness on the order. "One of the things we're asking for is a status of where we are in the progress of the implementation of that executive order from 2022," Horsford said. "And what more can we do that that executive order did not include?" What Biden is saying? Biden has said he is in support of reviving the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act. "I think we should do it right now. We should have done it before," Biden told reporters on Monday. But he also admitted he needs congressional assistance. "As you know, I did it by executive order for the federal side," he said. "But I can’t do it otherwise without the help of the rest of the Congress." What are other lawmakers saying about police reform? Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee, called for a "national conversation" on federal police accountability legislation, during ABC’s "This Week." But any legislation will need buy-in from Republicans, who control the House and are skittish on using federal legislation to solve police misconduct problems. "I don't know that there's any law that can stop that evil that we saw," said Rep. Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, chair of the House Judiciary Committee, on NBC's "Meet the Press." What happened to previous police reform efforts? In the wake of Nichols' death, lawmakers have called for a renewal of police reform talks after the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act failed to gain traction in Congress. Bipartisan negotiations on the bill collapsed in 2021 when Sen. Cory Booker, D-N.J., former Rep. Karen Bass, D-Calif., and Sen. Tim Scott, R-S.C., failed to reach a compromise on what policies would be included in the legislation. Contributing: Maureen Groppe This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: State of the Union: Black lawmakers to press Biden on police reform

US Police Misconduct

The funeral for Tyre Nichols was filled with tributes for the 29-year-old who died after a violent encounter with police, and a call to action for reform. Nichols’ mother RowVaughn Wells, who addressed the mourners gathered in Mississippi Boulevard Christian Church through tears, said she needed the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act bill to be passed. “We need to take some action because there should be no other child that should suffer the way my son [did] and all the other parents here who’ve lost their children,” Wells said. “We need to get that bill passed because if we don’t, that blood -- the next child that dies -- that blood is going to be on their hands.” Vice President Kamala Harris, Rev. Al Sharpton and attorney Ben Crump all pushed for lawmakers to revive talks on the legislation, which was crafted in the wake of George Floyd’s killing in 2020 at the hands of Minneapolis police. "We demand that Congress pass the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act," Harris said at the funeral. "Joe Biden will sign it. We should not delay, and we shall not be denied. It is nonnegotiable." The bill, which would’ve sought to address racial profiling and use of deadly force, was passed by the Democrat-controlled House in 2021 but stalled in the Senate over the issue of qualified immunity for officers. Here’s what was included in the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act: Accountability for police misconduct The bill would have lowered the legal standard for prosecuting officers from willfulness to recklessness, and would've limited qualified immunity as a defense to liability in a private civil action against an officer. It also mandated the creation of a National Police Misconduct Registry to collect data on complaints and records of police misconduct. The registry would've been designed to keep track of termination records, lawsuits against officers, discipline records and more at the federal, state and local level. The Department of Justice would've also been granted administrative subpoena power in pattern-or-practice investigations -- reviews the agency says are a central tool to accomplish police reform and restoring police-community trust. Framework for addressing racial profiling The bill would have banned racial and religious profiling by law enforcement at the federal, state and local levels. It would also have required officers to complete training on racial profiling and other discriminatory practices. It would also have required procedures for investigating and "responding meaningfully" to complaints alleging racial profiling. Limit use of force The bill would also have banned no-knock warrants in federal drug cases. The use of no-knock warrants in such cases was highly scrutinized after police killed Breonna Taylor when entering her Louisville home on a no-knock warrant in March 2020. It would also have incentivized local and state agencies to ban chokeholds by tying the prohibitions to federal funding. Federal officers would also have been required to wear and activate body cameras except in narrow circumstances when stopping to activate it would endanger their life. The bill would have prohibited federal officers from using deadly force unless all “reasonable alternatives to the use of the form of less lethal force have been exhausted” -- including verbal warnings, de-escalation tactics and nonlethal force. The attorney general would also be mandated to establish a clear duty for federal officers to intervene in cases where another law enforcement officer is using excessive force against a civilian.

US Police Misconduct

Five former Memphis police officers accused of murder in connection to the traffic stop beating of Tyre Nichols are due in court for a bond arraignment Friday morning. The five officers -- Tadarrius Bean, Demetrius Haley, Desmond Mills Jr., Emmitt Martin III and Justin Smith -- were fired and arrested on charges including second-degree murder following Nichols' beating during a Jan. 7 traffic stop. Nichols, 29, was hospitalized and died three days later. Graphic footage of the traffic stop was released to the public last month and sparked nationwide outrage. A sixth officer was fired and a seventh has been relieved of duty in the wake of Nichols' death. More officers could receive administrative discipline and the district attorney said additional charges could be filed. At Nichols' funeral, family attorney Ben Crump said that Nichols' legacy "will be one of equal justice." "It will be the blueprint going forward, because we have to remember that in less than 20 days ... they were terminated, they were arrested and they were charged," he said of the officers. Nichols' family is now urging Congress to pass the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act, which would mandate accountability for police misconduct, address racial profiling and limit use of force for police officers.

US Police Misconduct

Vice President Kamala Harris took the podium at Tyre Nichols’ funeral on Wednesday and condemned the actions of the Memphis police officers who beat him days before his death. “This is a family that lost their son and their brother through an act of violence at the hands and the feet of people who had been charged with keeping them safe,” Harris said after being introduced by the Rev. Al Sharpton, who delivered Nichols’ eulogy at Memphis’ Mississippi Boulevard Christian Church. “When I think about the courage and the strength of this family, I think it demands that we speak truth,” she continued. “And with this, I will say: This violent act was not in pursuit of public safety.” Five officers have been charged with murdering Nichols. Police pulled over the 29-year-old Black man on Jan. 7 and proceeded to beat him and douse him in pepper spray as he screamed for help, body camera footage showed. A bruised and bloodied Nichols died in the hospital three days later. “Was he not also entitled to the right to be safe?” Harris asked of Nichols, a father of one. “So when we talk about public safety, let us understand what it means in its truest form: Tyre Nichols should have been safe.” The Shelby County District Attorney’s office said earlier this week it’s still investigating the events that led up to Nichols’ death and may proceed with more charges. The office is looking into additional police and fire department personnel who interacted with Nichols the night of his traffic stop ― some of whom have already been fired from their jobs. “Our goal remains the same: to seek justice for Tyre Nichols and hold all who contributed to his death accountable,” the district attorney’s office said in a statement Monday. “We ask for the public’s patience as the investigation continues.” Harris also demanded Wednesday that Congress pass the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act ― named for another victim of police brutality ― that contains several dramatic policing reforms aimed at combatting police misconduct, eliminating excessive force and fighting racial bias. It passed in the House in 2021 but did not make it through the Senate.

US Police Misconduct

A Chicago law firm said it has secured a $33.5 million verdict on behalf of a man who died following a 2016 police chase in Dolton and a second man who was left severely injured.At a news conference Thursday, attorneys with the firm Loevy & Loevy said the chase stemmed from a traffic violation after the car John Kyles and Duane Dunlap were in skidded through a stop sign.John Christopher Kyles, 22, died following a car crash Oct. 9, 2016, stemming from a police chase in Dolton. (Law firm of Loevy & Loevy)Kyles died while Dunlap was left with “severe, catastrophic and permanent injuries,” according to the wrongful death lawsuit filed in November 2019.The law firm said the jury award was reached Wednesday evening, and attorneys said they believe it is one of the largest police misconduct jury awards in state history.According to the complaint, the chase occurred Oct. 9, 2016, and began at the intersection of Greenwood Road and Sibley Boulevard in Dolton and continued for about a mile, ending near Zion Covenant Church, in the 14200 block of Greenwood.Attorneys said the chase put others in danger and that the “necessity of immediate apprehension did not outweigh the level of inherent danger” the chase created.The chase was unjustified, attorney Jon Loevy said at the news conference.“Police are supposed to ask themselves ‘Is it worth it?’” he said.Aja Seats, administrator of her brother, John Kyles, estate, said the verdict helps her and her family.“I miss John so much,” she said. “No amount of money can bring him back.”Daily SouthtownTwice-weeklyNews updates from the south suburbs delivered every Monday and WednesdayLoevy said the breakdown of the award provides $10 million for Kyles’ family and $23 million for Dunlap.Locke Bowman, another attorney with the firm, said the car had failed to stop at a stop sign and that the chase exceeded speeds of 80 mph.He said the vehicle being pursued was forced into a dead-end alley, and the driver lost control.Bowman said the jury verdict “signaled loud and clear that what happened was wrong.” The original complaint against the village of Dolton and officers involved in the chase had sought unspecified damages.Loevy said Dunlap was thrown from the vehicle and suffered a traumatic brain injury and was in a coma for a time following the crash. He said the man, now 30, will require residential care for the rest of his life.There were five people in the car that was being pursued by two Dolton police vehicles, Bowman told the Daily Southtown following the news conference. He said the car crashed into a large garbage container, then struck a guardrail before hitting a parked vehicle, and that Kyles, 22, and Dunlap bore the brunt of the impact.mnolan@tribpub.com

US Police Misconduct

Biden marks anniversary of George Floyd murder with call for police reform legislation President Biden early Thursday marked the three-year anniversary of George Floyd’s murder with a push for Congress to pass police reform legislation. “George Floyd’s murder exposed for many what Black and Brown communities have long known and experienced — that we must make a whole of society commitment to ensure that our Nation lives up to its founding promise of fair and impartial justice for all under the law,” Biden said in a statement. A white police officer kneeled on the neck of Floyd, who was Black, for more than 9 minutes on May 25, 2020. In video footage, Floyd could be heard saying, “I can’t breathe,” a phrase reminiscent of Eric Garner’s last words in 2014. Video of Floyd’s encounter with the police sparked outrage across the country, prompting activists to take to the streets to protest police brutality and call for police reform. In the three years since the murder, lawmakers in Congress have tried to pass the George Floyd Justice in Police Act, which would ban chokeholds, carotid holds and no-knock warrants at the federal level, overhaul qualified immunity for police officers and ban racial profiling at every level of law enforcement. The effort passed the House in 2021, but failed to pass the Senate. In his statement Thursday, Biden once again called for Congress to act on police reform. He also noted that he signed an executive order last year that, among other measures, banned chokeholds, restricted no-knock warrants and created a database for police misconduct at the federal level. “But we know that implementing real and lasting change at the state and local levels requires Congress to act,” he said. “I urge Congress to enact meaningful police reform and send it to my desk. I will sign it. I will continue to do everything in my power to fight for police accountability in Congress, and I remain willing to work with Republicans and Democrats alike on genuine solutions. “Equal justice is a covenant we each have with one another,” he added. “Today, three years after George Floyd’s murder, let us build on the progress we have made thus far and recommit to the work we must continue to do every day to change hearts and minds as well as laws and policies.” Derek Chauvin — the officer who kneeled on Floyd’s neck — was convicted of murder. Three other police officers involved in the encounter are also in prison. One of the three other officers is currently awaiting sentencing, but the two others pleaded guilty to aiding and abetting manslaughter and are serving shorter sentences than Chauvin. –Updated at 7:57 a.m. Copyright 2023 Nexstar Media Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

US Police Misconduct

Congressional Black Caucus addresses changes since murder of George Floyd, calls for more action On the three-year anniversary of the murder of George Floyd and one year after President Biden issued reforms for federal officers, the Congressional Black Caucus (CBC) laid out its work in increasing police accountability while also calling for more to be done. “In the year since President Biden issued the executive order on policing, the Congressional Black Caucus has been leading the effort in Congress to improve public safety and promote police accountability,” Rep. Steven Horsford (D-Nev.), chair of the CBC, said in a statement. “The CBC has worked to ensure the Department of Justice would make progress on implementation of key provisions in the president’s executive order by requesting regular status updates and holding meetings with President Biden, Vice President Harris, and the DOJ to discuss our public safety agenda and convey the concerns of numerous families and survivors impacted by police encounters – including from the family of George Floyd.” Earlier this year, the CBC sent a letter to the Justice Department demanding data around the status of Biden’s order called the Advancing Effective, Accountable Policing and Criminal Justice Practices to Enhance Public Trust and Public Safety. The order established a national law enforcement accountability database to track officer misconduct, and created guidance and practices to address mental health crises and improving safety conditions in prisons and jails. In the days leading up to Thursday, members of the CBC including Horsford met with Attorney General Merrick Garland, Associate Attorney General Vanita Gupta and Assistant Attorney General Kristen Clarke to discuss the Justice Department’s progress on these measures. “The CBC applauds the DOJ’s commitment to implementation of the executive order – particularly on key provisions that the CBC has communicated to the Biden-Harris Administration will save lives in Black and brown communities,” said Horsford. “Those provisions include updating its use of force policies and requirements for body-worn cameras; prohibiting sale and purchase for military-style weapons; providing stronger guidance to states and localities on death in custody investigations; and banning chokeholds and minimizing the use of no-knock warrants.” Meanwhile, the CBC’s fundraising arm issued a statement honoring the memory of Floyd’s life. His death, the Congressional Black Caucus Foundation (CBCF) said, ignited a global movement and “shined a spotlight on the urgent need for comprehensive police reform, accountability, and meaningful change within our criminal justice system.” “We commend the activists, organizers, and communities who have tirelessly fought for justice and equality since George Floyd’s death,” the CBCF said. “We recognize the strength and resilience of the Black community and its allies, who continue to push for meaningful reforms and demand an end to the violence and discrimination faced by Black Americans daily.” The CBCF added that it will remain committed to supporting comprehensive police reform at the federal, state and local levels, particularly legislation that “addresses police misconduct, promotes accountability, and works toward rebuilding trust between law enforcement and the communities they serve.” “Together, let us work towards a future where every individual, regardless of their race or background, can live free from fear, discrimination, and violence,” the foundation said. “We must turn the collective pain and anger into meaningful change, ensuring the legacy of George Floyd inspires us to build a better and more inclusive America.” Copyright 2023 Nexstar Media Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

US Police Misconduct

JACKSON, Miss. -- Mississippi sheriff's deputies already under investigation for possible civil rights violations after allegedly placing a gun in a Black man's mouth and firing it are now also being accused of attempting to assault him and a second Black man with a sex toy during an interrogation, The Associated Press has learned. The allegations are contained in a letter to the Justice Department written by Michael Corey Jenkins' attorney, who provided a copy to the AP. In it, attorney Malik Shabazz urges federal prosecutors to file civil rights charges against the deputies and to open a broader investigation into what he called the “unconstitutional customs and practices” of the entire sheriff’s office. Jenkins has accused six deputies of bursting into a home where he was visiting a friend on Jan. 24, putting a gun in his mouth, and firing after nearly two hours of “torture.” “This extreme case of police brutality warrants enforcement of the civil rights criminal laws on the books,” Shabazz said in a statement. “Sheriff Bryan Bailey and Rankin County are covering up the truth of what happened on Jan. 24, and all parties must be held accountable.” In his Monday letter to Kristen Clarke, assistant attorney general for civil rights at the Justice Department, Shabazz called for an inquiry into a “pattern and practice of police misconduct and police brutality” in Rankin County. Neither the sheriff's office nor an attorney representing the office responded to calls or an emailed list of questions about the allegations. In a statement, the Justice Department said the civil rights probe into the Jenkins case is ongoing and declined to comment further. An AP investigation published in March revealed that several Rankin County deputies had been involved in at least four violent encounters with Black men since 2019 that left two dead and another with lasting injuries. Two of the men, Jenkins included, allege that deputies shoved guns into their mouths during separate encounters. Jenkins and his friend Eddie Terrell Parker said on the night of Jan. 24, six white Rankin County deputies suddenly came into the home where Parker was living and proceeded to handcuff and beat them. They said the deputies shocked them repeatedly with stun guns over roughly 90 minutes and, at one point, forced them to lie on their backs as the deputies poured milk over their faces. Both Jenkins and Parker also informed agents with the Mississippi Bureau of Investigation that deputies stripped the two naked, forced them to take a shower together, and attempted to use a sex toy on them during an hourslong interrogation, according to the letter, which was accompanied by a photo of the toy. Jenkins, who has trouble speaking and eating because of his injuries, said one of the deputies, who has not been named publicly, fired a gun into his mouth. Medical records he shared with the AP show he was treated for a lacerated tongue and broken jaw. Deputies have said Jenkins was shot after he pointed a gun at them. The Sheriff's Office has not answered multiple inquiries from the AP asking whether a weapon was found at the scene. Shabazz has said his client didn’t have a gun. Jenkins was charged with possessing between 2 and 10 grams of methamphetamine and aggravated assault on a police officer. Parker was charged with two misdemeanors: possession of paraphernalia and disorderly conduct. Agents with the Mississippi Bureau of Investigation told the men they didn't expect the criminal charges against them to proceed, Shabazz wrote in his letter. Meanwhile, “No deputy has been disciplined or terminated by Rankin County and all the deputies are still roaming the public at large,” Shabazz wrote. The Rankin County Sheriff’s Office has not said whether any of the deputies were temporarily placed on leave following the incident. A spokesperson for the Mississippi Bureau of Investigation declined to comment, citing an “open and ongoing investigation.” Police and court records obtained by the AP show that several deputies who were accepted to the sheriff’s office’s Special Response Team — a tactical unit whose members receive advanced training — were involved in each of the four violent encounters with the Black men. Such units have drawn scrutiny since the January killing of Tyre Nichols, a Black father who died days after being severely beaten by Black members of a special police team in Memphis, Tennessee. Nichols’ death led to a Justice Department probe of similar squads nationwide. Shabazz said a wider investigation into the Rankin County Sheriff's Office would fit into the Justice Department’s past examinations of other departments around the country, including police departments in Ferguson, Missouri and Louisville, Kentucky. ___ Michael Goldberg is a corps member for the Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on undercovered issues. Follow him on Twitter at https://twitter.com/mikergoldberg.

US Police Misconduct

A Black man who says he was beaten by Oakland, Tennessee, police following a traffic stop attempt told ABC News he is traumatized following the incident."Looking back on the videos and the pictures, I realized I was really knocked out," said Brandon Calloway in an interview. "It is kind of hard to watch. But it is fulfilling that, to know that it was on video."Calloway’s attorney, Andre Wharton, says officers with the Oakland Police Department used excessive force when they allegedly beat Calloway with a baton and used a stun gun on him after a July 16 traffic stop.The Tennessee Bureau of Investigation (TBI) is investigating the incident at the request of 25th Judicial District Attorney General Mark Davidson, the agency said. Several documents concerning the case, including body camera footage, remain confidential, TBI told ABC News.Brandon Calloway is held by police officers in a still image from video taken by Calloway's girfriend Tamia Caldwell, on July 16, 2022, showing the altercation with police that left him injured.Tamia Caldwell via André C. Wharton, Esq.According to an affidavit acquired by ABC affiliate WATN, officers followed Calloway to his home after he allegedly refused to stop for police. Officers say they tried to stop Calloway after he allegedly ran a stop sign and was going 12 mph over the speed limit. Calloway was going 32 miles per hour when the speed limit was 20, the affidavit says, according to WATN.Police say the officers tried to stop Calloway, but he refused to stop and instead drove to his home and ran inside.The affidavit said police announced themselves at the home, but Calloway ran upstairs. Officers then pulled out their batons and tasers and hit Calloway several times, WATN reports.Video taken from Calloway’s girlfriend and provided by Wharton to ABC News, captures the incident.According to the footage, officers follow Calloway inside and can be seen using their batons and stun guns against him as they chase him through the home. Photos following the incident show Calloway’s face covered in blood, as he lays on the ground.The footage also shows an officer appearing to step on Calloway's body."I’ve got these stitches in my head. I don't know how many stitches I have. I'm not paying attention. I'm just worried about – I have stitches in my head," said Calloway. "My head has really just been hurting constantly. I'll wake up, if it's really sunny out, my head hurts and I’ve got a sharp pain in my eye. I can't focus. I can't focus for like more than like 15 minutes now."Brandon Calloway speaks with ABC News on July 21, 2022.ABC NewsThe Oakland Police Department did not immediately respond to ABC News’ requests for comment. The department's chief of police, Chris Earl, told HuffPost that one of the officers involved in the incident has been relieved of duty.The Oakland mayor's office declined to comment to ABC News.Calloway is charged with evading arrest, resisting arrest, failing to stop at a stop sign and speeding, according to WATN.Wharton said this incident is one of many instances of police brutality being seen across the U.S right now, and he hopes the investigation leads to accountability for the officers."For Brandon, this dream – if not nightmare – did become a reality," Wharton said. "He experienced abuse and abuse of power and police misconduct. He's yet another example of the long way we have to go as a community into resolving some of these issues."

US Police Misconduct

Mother Jones illustration; Chris Tuite/ImageSPACE /MediaPunch /IPX/AP; Steijn Leijzer/Unsplash Fight disinformation: Sign up for the free Mother Jones Daily newsletter and follow the news that matters.In 2020, the allocation of money within city budgets—and specifically the distribution of Minneapolis’ budget—became a national concern. The slogan was Defund The Police. The idea was to take some of the $193 million dollars in that year’s police allotment and put it towards alternatives and social programs. Options included unarmed emergency responders and youth employment initiatives, among others. The hope was more general though: to imagine beyond police a way of creating institutions that could prevent crime without the potentially deadly encounters with officers that had become all too common, especially over minor infractions. After all, Derek Chauvin killed George Floyd when the cops were called because of a counterfeit $20 bill. As Defund was debated across the country, a vague idea of Minneapolis took centerstage. It was often said incorrectly that the police were significantly defunded. In 2021, $8 million was reallocated from the police budget. Then later that year, the city voted down a ballot initiative that would’ve remade the police department into a department of public safety. It was a defeat for the Defund movement. By the 2022 budget the MPD had more cash on hand than they did before Floyd’s murder. Now something even starker is occurring: A combination of costs that all emerge directly from the police department has sent the city into a fiscal crisis. This has all been tracked by local reporters and especially Minnesota Reformer’s Deena Winter, whose extensive reporting has charted a story few have paid attention to as the national focus shifted away from police reform.  Simply put, Minneapolis did not defund the police. It’s the opposite. The police are defunding Minneapolis. How? Well, first there are the costly settlements from the violence the police committed: $27 million for George Floyd’s family; $2.4 million for protester Soren Stevenson; $650,000 for journalist Linda Tirado. Tirado and Stevenson both have an eyeball missing as a result of the police firing so called “less lethal” rubber-coated steel bullets at them during protests. There is $1.5 million for Jaleel Stallings, a Black army veteran who was hit by a less-lethal round from MPD officers riding around in an unmarked van five days after Floyd’s murder. Under the impression it was a real bullet, Stallings fired a real gun in self defense. He was beaten by the cops and charged with attempted murder only to be acquitted on all charges. His friend Virgil Lee Jackson Jr., who was with him and beaten and tased for two minutes, also received a $645,000 settlement. The total is staggering. An actuarial study by the city in 2021 estimated that legal claims made in the fifteen days after Floyd’s murder would lead to Minneapolis paying out $111 million in lawsuit settlements.   Then, there is the cost of the police officers themselves. Nearly 300 officers have left the department since Floyd’s murder, over one third of the force. Over 200 have left with workers’ compensation settlement checks and lucrative disability pensions, based on claims that policing the protests gave them post-traumatic stress disorder. Are these civil servants reaping the benefits of hard-won public-sector labor protections after bravely fulfilling their duty? Or is this a permanent version of what labor organizers would call a “sick-out”?  Either way, some of these cops are getting generous retirement packages (costing the city money) after a career of complaints (costing the city money). One officer racked up more than $344,000 in misconduct settlements over the course of 12 years. He’s now receiving $56,000 a year in disability pension, on top of $195,000 in a workers comp settlement, according to records reviewed by Winter. Another officer—one of five involved in the 2013 SWAT Team killing of a Black man named Terrance Franklin (after new reporting by Time the case has undergone renewed scrutiny)—is making more than $128,000 a year on disability pension, on top of $195,000 in his workers’ comp settlement. Those officers who fired at Stallings from an unmarked van, and fractured his eye socket? Three of them are getting a combined $22,000 a month in disability pension for the trauma inflicted upon them. Since Floyd’s murder, Minneapolis has paid more than $23 million in workers’ compensation settlements to police officers, according to the Star Tribune. Ronald Meuser, an attorney representing 200 MPD officers (a large portion of which he says were inside the 3rd Precinct station, and were forced to flee the building before the station eventually was set on fire by protesters), estimates that the city will eventually pay out $35 million dollars. This is a great deal of money. The combination of these payouts and police misconduct settlements is approaching $150 million dollars. That’s more than three fourths of what the MPD’s budget was in 2020. The city’s self-insurance fund, which it uses to pay out settlements, is expected to be at negative 94 million dollars by the end of 2022. “[The settlements are] contrary to this idea that we’re reforming this police department,” said D.A Bullock, a north Minneapolis based documentary filmmaker and former spokesperson for Reclaim The Block, a local abolitionist group that has worked to shift money out of the Minneapolis police budget. “Because the message they’re sending is that this is the way you game the system.”  City leaders, including council members who support or once supported defunding the police, have been left in a bind. They can either settle the cases or decide to take them to court and potentially risk paying out even more.  In 2021, Mayor Frey announced he would raise property taxes by 5.45 percent and use money from the city’s general fund and federal dollars from the American Rescue Plan to cover the budget shortfall. (President Joe Biden bragged about such use of funds, telling local officials to use federal dollars to “refund the police.”)  Last week, Frey announced his city budget for 2023 and 2024, increasing police funding to around $200 million per year. He also instituted a 6.5 percent tax levy that was, at least in part, to cover these ballooning police costs from workers compensation settlements.  “Under Minnesota law, an employee’s discipline or misconduct history is not relevant to whether that employee is entitled to workers compensation and denying claims based on prior acts would expose the City to penalties,” Mayor Frey said in a statement. His office also said that only $1.2 million, or 5 percent, of the tax is set to help with worker compensation claims. “If the city isn’t going to fight these settlements, what’s the message to MPD officers or recruits or cadets? You weather the storm for a little bit, and then you’re back to business as usual? You can do anything with impunity within the city, and there’s always an out for you?” said Bullock.   Defunding the police is about both reconsidering priorities and evaluating outcomes. If another city department was bleeding this much money with such a poor track record of success—the MPD has a 15% homicide clearance rate—it would be rightly condemned as fiscally irresponsible governance requiring drastic reforms, and perhaps even, prompt serious conversations about reallocating that money to more productive ends. But in the modern American city, austerity is the rule for everyone but the cops.

US Police Misconduct

Nichols' family saw the video before it was released to the public.Body camera video was released Friday showing the confrontation between Memphis police officers and 29-year-old Tyre Nichols after he was pulled over at a traffic stop on Jan. 7.Nichols died three days later.The five officers involved in his arrest -- Tadarrius Bean, Demetrius Haley, Emmitt Martin III, Desmond Mills Jr. and Justin Smith -- have been fired and charged with second-degree murder.Lawyers for Mills and Martin said Thursday their clients plan to plead not guilty. Mills' lawyer, Blake Ballin, told ABC News Friday afternoon that his client has expressed remorse and said Mills likely did not deliver any fatal blows in the incident.Tyre Nichols who was pulled over while driving by Memphis Police Department officers on January 7, 2023, in a screen grab from a video released by Memphis Police Department, Jan. 27, 2023.Memphis Police Department/via ReutersMemphis Police Chief Cerelyn "CJ" Davis said on ABC News' "Good Morning America" on Friday, "In my 36 years ... I would have to say I don't think I've ever been more horrified and disgusted."Rodney Wells, Nichols' stepfather, pleaded for calm after the release of the video."We want peace. We do not want any type of uproar," he said Friday."Even though this is a very, very difficult video to watch, it was never a thought that we would not release this video," Davis added. "We wanted to make sure that it wasn't released too prematurely because we wanted to ensure that the DA's office, the TBI [Tennessee Bureau of Investigation] and also the FBI had an opportunity to cross some of the hurdles that they had to in their investigation. And we're sort of at a point now that the DA has made his statements in reference to charges of these officers, that this is a safe time for us to release the video."People take part in a protest following the release of a video showing police officers beating Tyre Nichols, the young Black man who was killed during a traffic stop by Memphis police officers, in Memphis, Tenn., Jan. 27, 2023.Alyssa Pointer/ReutersNichols' family and their attorneys, Ben Crump and Antonio Romanucci, saw the video before it was released to the public. The family has supported the release of the video to the public.Crump said Friday at a press conference that the decision to charge the officers with second-degree murder just weeks after the incident set a precedent for police misconduct cases."We have a precedent that has been set here in Memphis," he said.

US Police Misconduct

A Mississippi man who barely survived being shot in the mouth while six white Rankin County police officers held him and his friend during an alleged drug raid has filed a $400 million federal lawsuit. Michael Corey Jenkins, 32, and Eddie T. Parker, 35, both Black, say their civil rights were violated on Jan. 24 when deputies from Rankin County’s Sheriff’s Department burst through the front door of Parker’s residence, handcuffed the men and searched for drugs. When the officers didn’t find anything when they illegally entered Parker’s home, they used “excessive interrogation methods to coerce a confession,” their attorney Malik Z. Shabazz previously told Capital B. Capital B has reached out to Jason Dare, an attorney for the sheriff’s department, for comment. Three of the officers, including Hunter Elward, who were at the Braxton, Mississippi, home, and Sheriff Byran Bailey were named as codefendants in the lawsuit. Jenkins said Elward shot him in the mouth causing severe, almost fatal injuries to his jaw and tongue. After the ordeal, Elward filed false criminal charges against Jenkins, claiming that he pointed a gun at him first, according to the lawsuit. “This is one of the worst and most bizarre incidents of police misconduct in the United States history, with the egregious conduct described,” Shabazz said at a press conference on Monday. For nearly two hours, the men were repeatedly punched, kicked, slapped, shocked with stun guns and berated with racist comments. The officers also allegedly attempted to use a sex toy to rape Jenkins and Parker, according to the lawsuit. When the officers weren’t able to commit the sexual assault against Jenkins because he defecated on himself, “in a very juvenile and bizarre manner,” the officers laughed, threw eggs at the men, forced them to strip naked and shower together, according to the lawsuit. The deputies intentionally deactivated their body cameras during the incident, stole surveillance computer equipment from Parker’s home, and turned their cameras back on when they left the scene in an attempt “to do their dirt and commit their torts and crime,” according Shabazz. The Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division has launched a federal investigation against the Rankin County Sheriff’s Office in connection to this case, but has not confirmed if the attempted sexual assault accusation will be included. Shabazz sent a letter to the Civil Rights Division on May 8 to demand that the case be investigated as a hate crime. A spokesperson for the Civil Rights Division confirmed receiving Shabazz’s letter. Warning: Graphic image Shabazz classified this incident as a “free-for-all intimidation and torture session” that included death threats by the deputies, false accusations of selling drugs, and “dating white women.” They also poured liquids from Parker’s refrigerator — beer, milk, water — over the faces of Parker and Jenkins, in an illegal practice called “waterboarding,” Shabazz said. “This is in the custom, in the practice of Rankin County… and Sheriff Bryan Bailey refuses to do anything about it,” said Shabazz, as he named two other officers accused of excessive force. Elward, Christian Dedmon, Bailey and other members of the Rankin County Sheriff’s Department are a part of the county’s Special Response Team, and have been named in other excessive force federal lawsuits, including the 2019 shooting death of Pierre Woods. Woods died in a hail of bullets fired by more than a dozen officers after an hours-long standoff where he appeared “disoriented, mentally challenged and possibly intoxicated,” and refused to leave a relative’s home in Pelahatchie, according to a federal lawsuit Woods’ family filed against the department. Elward admitted to firing eight of those shots, according to statements provided to the Mississippi Bureau of Investigation and obtained by Capital B through a public information request. The MBI closed their investigation in 2020, and a grand jury declined to file charges. In the ongoing lawsuit, video evidence from the scene led the judge to deny qualified immunity for Bailey. “The Video presented, which depicts officers firing their weapons at a face-down Woods for at least 7 seconds after he exited the front door. This court also notes that Sheriff Bailey held the authority to order ‘cease fire’, which would have immediately stopped the officers’ shooting,” according to an order filed in March by Judge Henry T. Wingate. Bailey is appealing the ruling.

US Police Misconduct

The city of Minneapolis agreed Thursday to pay nearly $9 million to settle lawsuits filed by two people who said former police officer Derek Chauvin pressed his knee into their necks years before he used the same move to kill George Floyd. John Pope Jr. will receive $7.5 million and Zoya Code will receive $1.375 million, respectively. The settlements were announced during a meeting of the Minneapolis City Council. Both lawsuits stemmed from arrests in 2017 — three years before Chauvin killed Floyd during an arrest captured on video that sparked protests worldwide, prompted a national reckoning on racial injustice and compelled a Minneapolis Police Department overhaul. The lawsuits stated that if the city had acted sooner to discipline Chauvin, "history could have been stopped from repeating itself with George Floyd." Bob Bennett, the attorney for Pope and Code, noted in a statement that other officers failed to intervene or report Chauvin, and police leaders allowed Chauvin to keep working even though they had video evidence from body cameras of his wrongdoing. He said the video is expected to be released soon. "The easy thing is to blame Chauvin for everything," Bennett said. "The important thing that the video shows is that none of those nine to a dozen officers at the scene ever reported it, ever tried to stop it. They violated their own policy and really any sense of humanity." Bennett said police leaders could have fired Chauvin, but ignored the evidence "until George Floyd was murdered." Councilmember Elliott Payne said he hoped the settlements "bring some closure to this era and is a stark reminder of the work we have lying ahead." He agreed with Bennett's assessment that it was "an institution problem." Code was arrested in June 2017 after she allegedly tried to strangle her mother with an extension cord. Pope was 14 in September 2017 when, according to his lawsuit, Chauvin subjected him to excessive force while responding to a domestic assault report. Both lawsuits named Chauvin and several other officers. The lawsuits alleged police misconduct, excessive force, and racism — Pope and Code are Black; Chauvin is white. They also said the city knew that Chauvin had a record of misconduct but didn't stop him. Criminal charges in both cases were eventually dropped. The lawsuits said body camera recordings showed Chauvin used many of the same tactics on Pope and Code that he used on Floyd. Chauvin was sentenced to 22 1/2 years in prison on a state murder charge in 2021 for killing Floyd by pressing his knee to Floyd's neck for 9 1/2 minutes as he pleaded that he couldn't breathe. The city also paid $27 million to Floyd's family. Code's lawsuit said she was in handcuffs when Chauvin slammed her head to the ground and pinned his knee on the back of her neck for 4 minutes and 41 seconds. A second officer didn't intervene and a responding police sergeant approved the force, the lawsuit stated. Pope's lawsuit said his mother was drunk when she called the police because she was upset that he and his 16-year-old sister left their cellphone chargers plugged in, leading to a physical confrontation. It alleged Chauvin struck Pope in the head with a large metal flashlight at least four times. It says he then put Pope in a chokehold before pinning him to the floor and putting his knee on Pope's neck. "Chauvin would proceed to hold John in this prone position for more than fifteen minutes, all while John was completely subdued and not resisting," the complaint alleged. "Over those minutes, John repeatedly cried out that he could not breathe." The complaint alleged that at least eight other officers did nothing to intervene. It said Chauvin did not mention in his report that he had hit Pope with his flashlight, nor did he mention pinning Pope for so long. Chauvin's sergeant reviewed and approved his report and use of force "despite having firsthand knowledge that the report was false and misleading," the lawsuit alleged. Chauvin admitted to many of Pope's allegations when he pleaded guilty in December 2021 to federal charges of violating the civil rights of both Floyd and Pope. He was sentenced in July to 21 years on those charges. Chauvin is serving his sentence in a federal prison in Arizona. for more features.

US Police Misconduct

A bill signed into law in Arizona Wednesday will make it illegal to take videos of police within 8 feet of law enforcement activity.The law, which will go into effect in September, was sponsored by state Rep. John Kavanagh and signed by Gov. Doug Ducey, both Republicans. "It is unlawful for a person to knowingly make a video recording of law enforcement activity if the person making the video recording is within eight feet of where the person knows or reasonably should know that law enforcement activity is occurring," the law states. A person recording police within 8 feet can face a misdemeanor charge, after they are warned once to back up. The law applies to situations in which a police officer is questioning a suspicious person, conducting an arrest, issuing a summons or enforcing the law and handling an emotionally disturbed person who is exhibiting abnormal behavior, the law says. It makes exceptions for police activity on private property, in which the person who is recording is authorized to be on the property, but specified that an officer can order the person recording to leave the area if the "law enforcement officer determines that the person is interfering in the law enforcement activity."The law also says that a person who is the subject of police activity can record as long as they're not being handcuffed, searched or subjected to a field sobriety test.And people in a vehicle that has been stopped by police can record "if the occupants are not interfering with lawful police actions," the law says. The National Press Photographers Association, in February, wrote a letter denouncing the bill, saying it was unconstitutional. At the time, the bill proposed people couldn't take videos of police from 15 feet away or less. "We are extremely concerned that this language violates not only the free speech and press clauses of the First Amendment, but also runs counter to the “clearly established right” to photograph and record police officers performing their official duties in a public place," said the letter, signed by The Associated Press, The New York Times Company and other organizations. "We believe that requiring the "permission of a law enforcement officer" and setting a minimum distance of fifteen feet in between the law enforcement officer and the person recording, would not survive a constitutional challenge and is completely unworkable in situations (such a demonstrations and protests) where there are multiple officers and people recording," the letter said. In a March op-ed, Kavanagh wrote that he had made concessions on the bill, lowering the buffer zone and adding the exceptions. He said he introduced the bill for safety reasons. "Getting very close to police officers in tense situations is a dangerous practice that can end in tragedy," Kavanagh wrote. He also said he believes the law won't affect the integrity of recordings taken of police. "A video taken from 8 feet away probably takes in the entire scene, providing more information and greater context," he wrote. Videos of interactions with law enforcement have become an increasingly useful tool in exposing police misconduct. Elisha Fieldstadt is a breaking news reporter for NBC News.

US Police Misconduct

The Chicago police department is under investigation for allegations of sexual misconduct with recently arrived asylum seekers who are living in several police precincts across the city. One case features an officer who allegedly impregnated an 18-year-old. The investigation follows a report that a police officer had “sexual contact with an unidentified underage female migrant, and indicated [that] several other unidentified officers … may also have engaged in similar misconduct”, Andrea Kersten, chief administrator of civilian office of police accountability (Copa), the city agency that investigates police misconduct, said at a summer press conference. Chicago has received 14,000 asylum seekers since August 2022. More than 7,000 are currently being accommodated in citywide shelters but almost 2,000 are living on the floors of police precincts in almost every law enforcement district of the city. People are also sleeping rough at Chicago’s O’Hare and Midway airports, and more arrive daily, some bussed there by Texas authorities who refused to liaise with the Democratic-led cities where they dispatch people who have crossed the US-Mexico border and have applied for asylum. Investigations are ongoing and began in July after claims from a city employee working at one police precinct prompted city officials to quickly move asylum seekers to another location, but then things got murky when Copa announced that officials had not identified any asylum seekers claiming to be victims of sexual misconduct by police officers. The agency said the investigation would continue and, since then, there have been no public updates. The Guardian requested comment from the mayor’s office and Copa but received no response. The Illinois Democratic congressman Jesús “Chuy” Garcia, who has joined calls for the Biden administration to expand work permits and provide more federal resources, said in a statement: “Our migrant neighbors came to Chicago seeking safety and stability. Police officers are sworn to protect our communities, not engage in illegal sexual conduct with teenagers and others in their care. This alleged behavior is completely unacceptable. I expect the city’s investigation to be timely, thorough, transparent, and lead to accountability for all who are found guilty.” As Chicago has struggled to quickly find temporary housing for thousands, asylum seekers have been obliged to bed down in police precinct lobbies, where reports vary from station to station on the quality of living conditions and what reception families have had from the cops working there. One single mother, Nelli Reina, arrived in Chicago from Colombia in early September, after being bussed from the southern border with her 14-month-old-son. “More than anything, I’m worried about the cold, because we sleep on the cold floor,” she told the Guardian in Spanish last week at precinct 12 on the Near West Side, while she waits for a shelter place. At many precincts, bedding and belongings are stacked up by the windows during the day to clear walkways, and often piled outside. As winter beckons, the new mayor, Brandon Johnson, a progressive, had talked about about erecting heated tents and shortly after that signed a $29m contract with a private security firm to install them, particularly for asylum seekers staying at police precincts and the airports, Crain’s Chicago Business and the Chicago Tribune reported. The company, GardaWorld Federal Services, already has a state contract with Illinois but is a highly controversial choice because of its role in heavily criticized migrant detention and relocations programs in other states, the Tribune further reported. Reina said: “I don’t know how much longer I’ll be here. It’s the first time I’m in this country and I don’t know the matter of the cold and all that, of the snow. So we are praying and asking God to get us out of here soon.” As she spoke, she and others opened up a trash bag filled with children’s clothes that a community volunteer had just dropped off. Reina told the Guardian that just a few days ago, her son ended up at the hospital. “He hadn’t eaten and he started to asphyxiate and cough a lot,” she said. “When we arrived at the hospital, they put him on a machine for asphyxiation, and they put me outside for dehydration.” Reina is diabetic and her blood sugar levels frequently drop due to lack of proper nutrition. She has been asking city employees if she can be transferred to a shelter, where she thought at least her son would have a warm bed to sleep in and could eat better, she said. Chicago’s response to the increase in arriving migrants is shared by various city departments and partner organizations, the office of emergency management said. The office did not give details about how and why migrants end up at police precincts and what protocols and procedures are in place. Diana Alpizar, director of career pathways at the Instituto del Progreso Latino, a non-profit organization in Chicago that provides education opportunities to immigrants, has been coordinating volunteer efforts at one police station, with some city funding. She was sorting socks, towels, diapers and other basics at her office for newly arrived families, which she put in bags ready for distribution. For asylum seekers staying at the precinct, Alpizar said: “The rule is to stay outside after 10am while the inside is cleaned and disinfected and people can come back inside when it’s time for bed.” In her opinion, the staff is “indifferent” and not “sympathizing”, she said. Police officers declined to talk to the Guardian. Precinct 12 is currently housing 10 to 15 families. There is one bathroom with a single toilet, sink and mirror, which the migrants are not supposed to use. Some started going to a splash pad for kids in a nearby public park to clean themselves, but Maria Bolivar, another woman sleeping at the precinct, said that the water playground was then closed and she believes the water supply was “locked” to stop migrants using it. Bolivar came to the US with her children aged nine and 11 from Venezuela. She said she fills up cups with water to pour on herself and her children to clean them. Then she dries off with a towel and said she also dries the floor and cleans thoroughly so that the staff doesn’t notice any mess. Another Venezuelan, Yannis Soto, said: “We are in a place that we have to keep clean so that people don’t speak ill of us.” A volunteer at another precinct said the asylum seekers she helps are desperate to work and fend for themselves while their applications go through the legal system, and one told her she meticulously cleans the police bathroom to “make sure it’s neat so they don’t close the doors on us”. On Wednesday, the Biden administration, under pressure from some senior Democrats in Washington, state governors and city mayors, said it would grant temporary legal status to hundreds of thousands of Venezuelan asylum seekers already in the US, quickly making them eligible to work. A local church provides food most days. City shelters, meanwhile, provide three meals a day, and Alpizar said the situation is more stable as asylum seekers are connected to a case manager to assist them with their immigration applications, and also to social services and possible housing. But people have reported problems at shelters too, however, including two women who told local news outlet Block Club Chicago that they were not given enough food and some of it was moldy. They also reported cold showers and strict rules preventing volunteers bringing supplies to them. Alpizar said that once at a shelter, asylum seekers begin working with a case manager who takes on their immigration cases. But not everyone will qualify for asylum. Some get permission to stay and work, some will get deported or end up living a precarious, undocumented life. “They get lost in the shadows,” she said. Meanwhile, Reina received blankets for her son and clothes from the volunteers. She’s waiting for news about a shelter. “They took my name down and gave me and my baby a number: 214. I don’t really know what my luck will be,” she said.

US Police Misconduct

The respected former judge Walter Sofronoff KC will lead the inquiry into the handling of the Bruce Lehrmann case after explosive allegations of police misconduct. The ACT attorney-general, Shane Rattenbury, is preparing to announce Sofronoff, an eminent jurist who recently led the inquiry into the Queensland forensics scandal, as the head of the inquiry on Wednesday morning. Sofronoff’s appointment, first reported by News Corp and confirmed by the Guardian, will see him investigate the damning allegations made by the ACT director of public prosecutions, Shane Drumgold, about police’s handling of the investigation, trial and the then-looming retrial of Lehrmann. The inquiry is also expected to have remit to examine the conduct of other parties, including the DPP and the ACT’s victims of crime commissioner, Heidi Yates. The trial against Lehrmann for the alleged rape of fellow political staffer Brittany Higgins collapsed last year, after the discovery of juror misconduct. A retrial was abandoned by the DPP due to expert evidence about the risk the proceedings posed to Higgins’ mental health. That leaves Lehrmann, who vehemently denied the allegation, with the presumption of innocence. The Guardian revealed in December that Drumgold had penned a damning letter to the chief police officer, Neil Gaughan, after the first trial collapsed, alleging police had engaged in “a very clear campaign to pressure” him not to prosecute. Drumgold alleged he was subject to “inappropriate interference” and said police were “clearly aligned with the successful defence of this matter” during the trial. ACT police have refused to comment on “any aspects surrounding this matter including commentary about the letter from the ACT DPP”. However, the police union called for Drumgold’s conduct to be investigated. The chief minister, Andrew Barr, described the allegations as “serious” and said an independent review of the “roles played by the criminal justice agencies involved” was the most appropriate response. Rattenbury described Drumgold’s allegations as “concerning” and said it was important the inquiry examine “fracture points” in the relationship between the DPP and ACT policing. The cooperation of the two agencies is crucial to the proper functioning of the territory’s criminal justice system. Sofronoff’s inquiry will be granted considerable powers. It will be able to compel witnesses, subpoena evidence, and hold public and private hearings. Sofronoff most recently oversaw the inquiry into forensic DNA testing in Queensland. That inquiry probed serious problems with the way Queensland police collected DNA evidence from rape victims. He is also a former Queensland solicitor general, a past president of Queensland’s highest court, the court of appeal, and led the inquiry into the Grantham floods. He also conducted a review of Queensland’s parole system. Sofronoff is expected to be formally announced on Wednesday morning.

US Police Misconduct

The ACLU and several news organizations have filed a lawsuit over a controversial Arizona law signed last month that bars recording video of law enforcement within 8 feet.The law, sponsored by state Rep. John Kavanagh and signed by Gov. Doug Ducey, both Republicans, makes it a crime to record law enforcement activity within that distance and violators can face a misdemeanor charge after they are warned once to back up.The new lawsuit, filed Tuesday, seeks an injunction ahead of the law's September effect date.The suit claims the law violates the First Amendment right to record, will inhibit journalist ability to work on police stories, and will create a new risk of arrest and prosecution for Constitution-protected activity. The ACLU of Arizona said the law will create “irreparable community harm,” if allowed to go forth.The complaint was filed in the U.S. District Court of Arizona by the ACLU of Arizona and 10 news media groups. Those groups include the Arizona Broadcasters Association, Arizona Newspapers Association, local news stations, as well as media broadcast companies, including NBC Universal Media, NBC News' parent company, on behalf of its subsidiary Telemundo Arizona.It names Arizona Attorney General Mark Brnovich, Maricopa County Attorney Rachel Mitchell, and Maricopa County Sheriff Paul Penzone as defendants. NBC News has reached out to Brnovich, Mitchell and Penzone for comment. Filming officers has become a tool in police accountability and preventing misconduct. The high-profile death of George Floyd in May 2020 in Minneapolis, Minnesota, sparked national outrage and protests after bystanders took cellphone video of officers holding him down as he pleaded that he couldn't breathe and died. The Arizona law states: “It is unlawful for a person to knowingly make a video recording of law enforcement activity if the person making the video recording is within eight feet of where the person knows or reasonably should know that law enforcement activity is occurring."However, it has exceptions for police activity on private property and for passengers in a vehicle during traffic stops. Subjects of police activity can also record law enforcement interactions as long as they’re not being handcuffed, searched or subjected to a field sobriety test. The plaintiffs argue the law “infringes the clearly established First Amendment rights” to record the public activities of law enforcement officers. By allowing “police officers to arrest and punish people for simply recording video of their actions,” it “creates an unprecedented and facially unconstitutional content-based restriction on speech about an important governmental function,” the complaint said.News organizations are part of the lawsuit to prevent the law from “trampling on their rights to report news, document the activities of public servants and hold police accountable for their actions toward the people they are sworn to protect and serve," the complaint said.It noted that journalists frequently directly cover law enforcement activities as well as stories where officers happen to be present such as protests, festivals and sporting events. The ACLU argued it films officers on the job when they interact with or use force against protesters — and such recordings are vital to accurately record the encounters and deter police misconduct, the complaint said. The lawsuit claims compliance will also be difficult, especially in crowded public situations like protests and parades, when it'll be difficult to avoid filming officers. The legislation was controversial even in its bill form. Kavanagh said in a March op-ed that he introduced the bill for safety reasons and he didn’t believe it would affect the integrity of recordings taken of police. In March, 27 organizations, including the Press Freedom Defense Fund, sent a letter to the heads of the Arizona Senate Judiciary Committee in opposition to the bill, arguing it violated free speech and violated the “clearly established right” to photograph and record officers performing their official duties in public. Marlene LenthangMarlene Lenthang is a breaking news reporter for NBC News Digital.

US Police Misconduct

President Biden recognized the three-year anniversary of George Floyd’s death Thursday by reflecting on a conversation he had with Floyd’s daughter the day before his funeral. Floyd, an unarmed Black man, was killed in police custody in Minneapolis on May 25, 2020, leading to nationwide protests for social justice and a push to eradicate police brutality. “Gianna told me, ‘Daddy changed the world.’ Three years after her father’s murder, my answer to Gianna remains the same: he has,” Biden said in a statement. Floyd, 46, died after police officer Derek Chauvin knelt on his neck for about nine minutes. Chauvin, who is white, was sentenced to 22.5 years in prison after being convicted of second-degree murder in Minnesota. He was also sentenced to 21 years after pleading guilty in federal court to depriving Floyd of his civil rights. Biden’s George Floyd Justice in Policing Act, a bill designed to fight police misconduct, was passed by the House but not the Senate. On Thursday, Biden again called for police reform. “I urge Congress to enact meaningful police reform and send it to my desk,” Biden said. “I will sign it. I will continue to do everything in my power to fight for police accountability in Congress, and I remain willing to work with Republicans and Democrats alike on genuine solutions.” Events commemorating Floyd are planned in Minneapolis through Sunday, including a candlelight vigil Thursday night. “George Floyd’s murder exposed for many what Black and Brown communities have long known and experienced — that we must make a whole of society commitment to ensure that our nation lives up to its founding promise of fair and impartial justice for all under the law,” Biden said Thursday. Ben Crump, a civil rights attorney who has represented Floyd’s family, was also among those to pay tribute on Thursday’s anniversary. “George Floyd’s murder exposed for many what Black and Brown communities have long known and experienced — that we must make a whole of society commitment to ensure that our ation lives up to its founding promise of fair and impartial justice for all under the law,” Biden said Thursday.

US Police Misconduct

Subscribe to Here’s the Deal, our politics newsletter for analysis you won’t find anywhere else. Thank you. Please check your inbox to confirm. Heather Hollingsworth, Associated Press Heather Hollingsworth, Associated Press Leave your feedback The Justice Department on Friday issued a scathing assessment of Minneapolis police, alleging that racial discrimination and excessive force went unchecked before George Floyd’s killing because of inadequate oversight and an unwieldy process for investigating complaints. The probe began in April 2021, a day after former officer Derek Chauvin, who is white, was convicted of murder and manslaughter in the May 25, 2020, killing of Floyd, a Black man. Floyd, who was in handcuffs, repeatedly said he couldn’t breathe before going limp as Chauvin knelt on his neck for 9 1/2 minutes. The killing was recorded by a bystander and sparked months of mass protests as part of a broader national reckoning over racial injustice. Here are six takeaways from the report: The focus of the probe was to examine whether there has been a pattern or practice of unconstitutional or unlawful policing in the Minneapolis Police Department. It examined the use of force by officers, including during protests, and whether the department engages in discriminatory practices. It also looked at the handling of misconduct allegations, treatment of people with behavioral health issues and systems of accountability. Investigators found numerous examples of excessive force, unlawful discrimination and First Amendment violations. They reviewed 19 police shootings and determined that officers sometimes fired without first determining whether there was an immediate threat of harm to the officers or others. In 2017, for example, an officer fatally shot Justine Ruszczyk Damond, an unarmed white Australian-born woman who “spooked” him when she approached his squad car, according to the report. She had called 911 to report a possible rape behind her house. The city paid $20 million to settle with her family. In another case, officers shot a suspect after he started stabbing himself in the neck in a police station interview room. Officers also used neck restraints like the one Chauvin used on Floyd 198 times between Jan. 1, 2016, and Aug. 16, 2022, including 44 instances that didn’t require an arrest. Some officers continued to use neck restraints even after they were banned in the wake of Floyd’s killing, the report said. At protests, it found, people were sometimes shot with rubber bullets when they were committing no crime or were dispersing. According to the report, one journalist was hit by a rubber bullet and lost her eye, while another was shoved to the pavement while filming and pepper-sprayed in the face. One protester was shoved so hard that she fell backward, hit the pavement and lay unconscious for three minutes. The report documented rampant racism and racial profiling in the department, with Black drivers more than six times more likely to be stopped than white ones. The racism also extended to arrests. When one Black teen was held at gunpoint for allegedly stealing a $5 burrito, the teen asked the plainclothes officer if he was indeed police. “Really?” the officer responded, according to a video recording. “How many white people in the city of Minneapolis have you run up against with a gun?” In another case, a woman reported that an officer said to her that the Black Lives Matter movement was a “terrorist” organization. “We are going to make sure you and all of the Black Lives supporters are wiped off the face of the Earth,” she recalled him saying. Her complaint against the officer was closed by the department with a finding of “no merit.” Mental health crises often were made worse when police responded, investigators found. In 2017, for instance, officers encountered an unarmed man in the midst of what neighbors described as a mental health episode. He initially paced around his yard, yelling. After complying with orders to sit on his front steps, an officer fired his taser without warning. In another case, a mother called 911 to report that her adult daughter, a Black woman with bipolar disorder, was attempting to hurt herself by lying in the road. By the time officers got there, the woman was calmly walking through a park. The officers nevertheless grabbed her, and she began yelling and pulled away. The woman was then put in a neck restraint as her mother pleaded, “Don’t choke her like that!” Investigations into police misconduct took months and sometimes years, according to the report. And those conducting the inquiries frequently failed to view video corroborating public complaints. Supervisors also were quick to back their subordinates. In one case, an officer tased a man eight times without pausing even as the man protested that he was doing “exactly” what he was told. The supervisor found no policy violations and told the man after the fact that if he hadn’t been resisting, “they wouldn’t have had to strike you.” The report also highlighted the case of John Pope, who was just 14 when Chauvin struck him in the head with a flashlight multiple times and pinned him to a wall by his throat. He then knelt on the Black teen, as his mother pleaded, “Please do not kill my son.” Chauvin, the report found, kept his knee on the teen’s neck or back for over 15 minutes. But due to poor supervision and a failed internal investigation, commanders did not learn what had happened to Pope until three years later, after Chauvin killed Floyd, the report said. The city ultimately agreed to settle a lawsuit in the case for $7.5 million. The report noted that the department has made some improvements, such as banning chokeholds and no-knock warrants, training officers on the duty to intervene and sending mental health workers to some incidents. But it said there is still work to be done. WATCH: New Minneapolis police chief on changing the department after George Floyd’s murder As a result of the investigation, the city and the police department agreed to a deal known as a federal consent decree, which will require reforms to be overseen by an independent monitor and approved by a federal judge. That arrangement is similar to previous interventions in cities such as Seattle, New Orleans, Baltimore and Ferguson, Missouri. Support Provided By: Learn more

US Police Misconduct

A Victorian community legal centre that specialises in police misconduct matters has stopped taking calls from the public because of funding shortfalls amid calls for the Andrews government to establish a new police watchdog.The Police Accountability Project, which is based at Inner Melbourne Community Legal Centre, is only taking on new clients referred to it by other lawyers and the most egregious cases, as it can no longer operate a phone intake line that had previously serviced as many as 400 people a year.Previous callers to the centre would generally be given a telephone appointment of an hour to discuss their cases, and about one in 10 callers were taken on as clients, but the line was recently closed amid uncertainty regarding the project’s funding.The centre relies on federal, state and philanthropic funding.“We don’t have the capacity for people to take those calls,” Gregor Husper, the project’s principal solicitor, said.“If we had funding stability, we could reopen the line. But we don’t even take inquiries any more.” Sign up to receive an email with the top stories from Guardian Australia every morning An open letter urging the state government to establish an independent police ombudsman was sent to the premier, Daniel Andrews, on Friday.The letter, signed by 29 organisations including community legal centres, private legal providers, academics from the University of NSW and Aboriginal service providers, says that a police ombudsman would be able to properly investigate all complaints about police misconduct and systemic failings.The current model of police oversight is under review, but the state government appears highly unlikely to announce significant reforms to the sector before November’s state election.The letter said police should no longer investigate police and that the Independent Broad-based Anti-corruption Commission (Ibac) should be stripped of its current police oversight role in favour of the ombudsman model.Their letter said any oversight system must be truly independent, well-resourced, complainant-centred and culturally appropriate, fair, accountable and transparent, able to achieve timely and fair outcomes, and promote systemic change.“The systemic failings of Victoria police have seriously diminished the Victorian community’s confidence in the organisation,” it said.Nerita Waight, the chief executive of the Victorian Aboriginal Legal Service and the spokesperson for the coalition, said that Ibac had found that more than half the time Aboriginal people make police complaints the force ignored relevant evidence.“Aboriginal people are more likely to suffer police misconduct, but less likely to make a complaint – our community knows that the system doesn’t take their complaints seriously.”Kirsty Mac, a Melbourne woman whose own police complaint took five years to resolve, backed calls for a new approach.In 2014, she was at a suburban train station when protective services officers (PSOs) asked to see her ticket. Despite travelling with a valid ticket, she says she was verbally and physically abused by the PSOs, who arrested her after she questioned why she needed to provide them with identification.Police did not uphold her complaint and neither did Ibac, but the force settled a civil complaint she made in 2019, the details of which are confidential.The lengthy period between when she made her complaint and when her civil case was settled caused her severe mental anguish, she said.“It got worse as time went on. The more I had to deal with legal things, I got more and more unwell,” she said.“I’m lucky that I’m a middle-class white lady. I had all the resources at my disposal to continue on for five years. But most people don’t.”

US Police Misconduct

Rogue cops still licensed to carry a badge despite government reforms A Denver Police officer bragged to coworkers that he shot a carjacking suspect once in the head to kill him, then at least 16 times more to see his “face fall apart.” They told investigators that he spent months trumpeting how much he enjoyed his second on-duty killing, and how eager he was for a third. Shane Madrigal resigned in 2022 while under investigation for what his supervisors deemed racist, homophobic and “grossly inappropriate” comments about killing people while he was on duty. The man colleagues say has “zero regard for human life” still has a clean disciplinary record with the Colorado Peace Officer Standards and Training (POST) board, the state agency responsible for regulating police. In the eyes of the law, Madrigal – who has denied any wrongdoing – remains qualified to keep serving in law enforcement. He isn’t the only officer who is still certified despite a pattern of alarming misconduct. "We had some terrible police in our community who’ve lost their jobs, but …are still able to find jobs elsewhere,” says Rio Blanco County Sheriff Anthony Mazzola, a member of the POST board. “If we’re going to make law enforcement more professional, and if we’re going to make the state of Colorado more safe, we need to hold these people accountable. “We have to be able to police our police.” An investigation by the Colorado News Collaborative (COLab), The Sentinel in Aurora and Rocky Mountain Public Media revealed a host of loopholes, mistakes and regulatory blind spots that have kept officers with documented records of abusive conduct in good standing with POST. We found that cops involved in some of Colorado's most-high profile misconduct cases – including Elijah McClain’s 2019 killing in Aurora – show up, falsely, with clean disciplinary records. We identified several who continued breaking laws and policies as they’ve been able to bounce from police job to police job. And only after we started asking questions about certain officers whose departments had months earlier reported their misconduct did the state take away their right to carry a badge in Colorado. We also found: - POST's practice of publicly disclosing disciplinary actions taken against police only since 2022 has shielded the identities of most cops with proven records of misconduct. - POST relies on local departments to report on their officers' misbehavior, yet has not used its power to sanction those that don't. - The Attorney General's office says POST has no authority to investigate or discipline officers whose departments have ignored their misconduct, leaving no other state agency to do so. - And POST's legal criteria for decertification are so narrow that it cannot decertify officers even when their records strongly suggest they are unfit for police work. More than three years after state lawmakers vowed a new era of police accountability, our findings cast doubt on how much progress Colorado has made keeping the public safe from rogue cops. "What kind of system allows the certification of an officer who takes pleasure in riddling people with extra bullets?” asks Trish Vigil, mother of the carjacking suspect whose fatal shooting Madrigal’s fellow officers say he gloated over. "That's not police discipline. It's a free pass. And it’s disgusting.” Law enforcement officers need certification from POST, an arm of the Attorney General’s office, to make arrests in Colorado. For decades, officers could lose their certification only if they were convicted of a felony or certain types of serious misdemeanors. That changed in 2019 when lawmakers made “untruthfulness” the first non-criminal reason for decertification. Some 53 officers statewide since have had their POST certification revoked for falsifying criminal justice records, misrepresenting facts during internal affairs, administrative and disciplinary investigations, or lying under oath. Another law, passed amid state and national outcry in 2020 against police abuses such as George Floyd's killing, went a step further by making police misconduct more transparent. It created a public database – one of 14 nationwide – to flag officers who’ve not only lost their certifications, but also have been slapped with various kinds of disciplinary actions. A law passed the following year requires departments to use the database to check job applicants’ disciplinary records. The assumption was that the information in the database would be complete and accurate. It isn’t. Our review found the database beset by glitches, including two malfunctions that make it look as though some officers who have been decertified still have their certification. POST has known about those crucial defects for a year, but says it does not have the budget to fix them. We found ways POST’s records raise more questions than answers. Many officers are listed as having been "terminated for cause," for example, but POST does not specify what that cause was. And, although it notes when officers become “subject of a criminal investigation,” it usually fails to say when they are convicted – and of what crimes – once those cases are closed. “If it’s misconduct, it’s misconduct. It ought to be in there, no matter what the (severity) of crime,” says Samuel Walker, a professor at the University of Nebraska at Omaha who studies police accountability. We found POST’s records are often outdated. An officer's right to due process means an inevitable delay between a sustained finding of misconduct and eventual decertification. But delays can be stretched out for months or longer because of confusion about POST’s reporting process, miscommunication between local law enforcement agencies and POST, and paperwork errors. The effort to decertify Sgt. Aaron Laing, for example, sat in 10 months of bureaucratic limbo after Colorado State Patrol fired him in November 2022 for materially changing dozens of case reports written by members of a Smuggling, Trafficking, and Interdiction Section (STIS) team he led, and then lying about those changes. Among them, documents show, he altered a report about a 2021 traffic stop by removing references to the involvement of an undercover Homeland Security Investigations vehicle driven by a special agent. Laing refused to comment when we called. POST decertified him in September, after we asked about the delay. Alamosa Police Chief Ken Anderson said he has reported two now-former officers to POST for untruthfulness – misconduct he assumed would have gotten both decertified. Both officers remain certified, he says, because his reports were snarled in bureaucracy and ignored by POST. “I feel like we’re following the rules and it’s frustrating if we’re not being listened to seriously," Anderson said. Quinten Stump was a Kiowa County sheriff’s deputy with a record of excessive force when, in April 2020, he took part in killing an unarmed man, Zack Gifford, with three bullets to the back. That shooting led Kiowa County to pay a $9.5 million civil settlement to Gifford’s family and a jury to convict Stump of attempted manslaughter. He is serving a three-year prison sentence at the Arkansas Valley Correctional Facility, yet, as of this writing, was still POST certified. POST would not comment on why. “It feels as though he’s still sort of getting away with it,” says Carla Gifford who, more than three years after her son’s killing, wonders how much longer her family will have to wait to hear Stump will never again work as a cop. In an interview, Attorney General Phil Weiser acknowledged problems with the database. “I will not say the system is perfect,” he said. “I always believe there is room for improvement.” The biggest gap in POST’s transparency effort is that it generally doesn’t list information about misconduct that happened prior to January 1, 2022, the date the office launched its database. It has no information, for example, about the involvement of three Aurora Police officers in one of the most high-profile excessive force cases in state history: the 2019 killing of Elijah McClain. Responding to a complaint that the 23-year-old Black massage therapist and violinist looked “sketchy,” officers Randy Roedema, Jason Rosenblatt and Nathan Woodyard wrestled him to the ground before Woodyard put him into two dangerous carotid holds. The officers each were indicted in connection with McClain’s homicide. Following a jury trial, on October 12, Roedema was found guilty of criminally-negligent homicide and third-degree assault, while Rosenblatt was acquitted of all charges. Roedema, now a felon, has since been fired, though his POST profile does not reflect it. Woodyard’s trial began October 17. None of the officers, however, showed up as subjects of criminal investigations because their alleged misconduct took place before January 1, 2022, the date POST launched its database. It’s not that POST doesn’t have older information. The office keeps police discipline data dating as far back as 1979. Nor do the laws that created the database expressly prohibit POST from listing records dating before 2022. Limiting the time frame never came up during 26 hours of public testimony about the reform bills. Weiser’s office ordered pre-2022 misconduct cases erased from the database earlier this year on grounds that the laws calling for its creation didn’t specify whether the information on it should be retrospective. That means the vast majority of Colorado officers who have disciplinary actions taken against them or who quit or were fired during misconduct investigations have effectively had their disciplinary records shielded from public view. There were about 13,000 active officers in the state in 2022 and the database shows only 186 – or roughly 1% – with disciplinary actions against them. The percentage of currently active officers would be higher if pre-2022 data were included. State Rep. Leslie Herod (D-Denver) and State Sen. Rhonda Fields (D-Aurora), who both co-sponsored the reform laws, are considering legislation to force POST to make public misconduct data predating 2022 so that fewer bad cops are allowed, as Fields put it, “to exist under the radar.” Another blind spot in POST’s data is that the office relies on police and sheriffs departments to report the disciplinary actions they take against their officers. Our investigation identified several departments that haven’t – and with impunity. The Denver Safety Department, for example, says it forgot to inform POST that Denver Officer Shane Madrigal resigned while being investigated for his comments and actions around the 2021 shooting of carjacking suspect Cedrick Vick. The Marine infantryman whom records show made frequent derogatory remarks about people who are Black, of Mexican descent or gay is said to have had disdain for the public he served. “He reportedly expressed multiple times that he does not care for human beings…,” reads an internal affairs report based on interviews with several of his colleagues. In September 2020, Madrigal took part in fatally shooting Christopher Escobedo as the car chase suspect held a gun to his wife’s head near Denver’s Sloan’s Lake. Eight months later, Madrigal was among nine officers to respond to a carjacking of a mother and her child in Denver’s Westwood neighborhood by Vick, a 22-year-old father of two who used a handgun to fire randomly into a playground and then toward officers. They shot back with a total of 109 rounds, including 19 from Madrigal’s rifle. Denver District Attorney Beth McCann determined both killings to be legally justified. At issue wasn’t that Madrigal fired so many times at Vick, but rather that he allegedly bragged in the months afterward that he did so mostly for kicks. “He told [redaction] that he knew his first shot hit the suspect in the face, but he wanted to keep shooting to watch the suspect's face rip apart,” reads a synopsis of one of several internal affairs interviews with his colleagues. “Officer [redaction] stated that Officer Madrigal is typically smiling when he talks about his officer-involved shooting,” the report continues. “Officer [redaction] stated that [redaction] has never heard another officer talk about being involved in a shooting the way that Officer Madrigal does because most people are not happy about killing people.” When he was contacted by a reporter for comment, twice, Madrigal declined. He told investigators that he stopped firing when he felt Vick was no longer a threat. He denied saying anything to coworkers about Vick’s face or taking any pleasure in shooting it. He also denied accounts by coworkers that he sought certification to use a shotgun on patrol because he had already taken part in on-duty killings using a handgun and a rifle, and wanted to use a third type of weapon so, as one put it, “he can kill another person and be three for three." “Officer [redaction] stated that Officer Madrigal is not joking when he makes these comments, he is ‘dead serious.’” Vick’s family doesn’t understand how Denver police simply forgot to report Madrigal’s decision to resign while under investigation any more than they understand how he remains a certified officer. As state law stands, there is likely nothing about his behavior that could cause him to be decertified. While it was alarming to fellow officers and his supervisors, it didn’t cross into criminality, untruthfulness or the other, very narrow criteria POST needs an officer's misconduct to meet in order to revoke their certification. “If he has the opportunity to do it again, he absolutely will,” Vick’s sister Devyn Vick says. “It's a game to him, and his bodies are trophies is the way I see it.” POST has the power to withhold funding or impose fines on Denver and other departments for not reporting their officers’ misconduct, but has chosen not to. Weiser says his office is working to ensure local departments know their responsibilities when it comes to reporting rogue cops to the state and that he prefers to educate than to sanction local departments as they adjust to the new reforms. As his office interprets the law, he says POST doesn’t have authority to audit non-reporting police and sheriff’s departments nor to investigate bad cops whose misconduct they’ve ignored. That leaves no other state agency to do so. “I start from a position of trusting local and regional actors to act appropriately,” Weiser said. Asked why he would maintain that trust in the face of documented instances of non-reporting, he wouldn’t comment. “I try not to worry about things I can’t control,” he told us. National law enforcement researchers say it’s naive for state regulators to count on police departments to self-report their officers’ misconduct. They point to years of academic research into the so-called “blue wall of silence” – a well-documented unwillingness among law enforcers to report or punish officers for abuses of power. “I can confidently say that there’s much more misconduct than what gets [reported] to the POST board in Colorado or any state,” says Rachel Moran, a professor at Minneapolis’s University of St. Thomas School of Law who studies police discipline. “What does, that’s just the tip of the iceberg.” In the meantime, civil libertarians and police watchdogs are calling for more aggressive steps to meaningfully strengthen Colorado’s system of police discipline. “We need to make sure state agencies like POST and the AG's office are fully enforcing existing laws and creating a culture where Colorado's law enforcement agencies go above and beyond to ensure maximum integrity,” says Taylor Pendergrass, advocacy director for the ACLU of Colorado. “We also need to take a hard look at additional legislative solutions right now, especially small changes tightening up the law that might make a big impact on ensuring rogue officers are not sneaking into our police departments and out on the streets." “Bad officers show up over and over again in our cases,” adds Colorado State Public Defender Megan Ring. “Clearly, not enough is [being] done to root them out.” The Sentinel in Aurora provided fellowship assistance to help make Andrew Fraieli available to the reporting team. Former Rocky Mountain Public Media Producer Brittany Freeman and Rocky Mountain Public Media Reporter Alison Berg contributed to this story, as did Zack Newman at 9News and Allison Sherry at CPR. The Colorado Media Project’s Watchdog Fund provided grants to COLab and Rocky Mountain Public Media to help offset costs for public documents used in this reporting.

US Police Misconduct

A bill signed into law in Arizona Wednesday will make it illegal to take videos of police within 8 feet of law enforcement activity.The law, which will go into effect in September, was sponsored by state Rep. John Kavanagh and signed by Gov. Doug Ducey, both Republicans. "It is unlawful for a person to knowingly make a video recording of law enforcement activity if the person making the video recording is within eight feet of where the person knows or reasonably should know that law enforcement activity is occurring," the law states. A person recording police within 8 feet can face a misdemeanor charge, after they are warned once to back up. The law applies to situations in which a police officer is questioning a suspicious person, conducting an arrest, issuing a summons or enforcing the law and handling an emotionally disturbed person who is exhibiting abnormal behavior, the law says. A nearby resident shoots video of a deadly shooting scene involving Phoenix Police officers in Phoenix, Ariz., on March 29, 2020.Ross D. Franklin / AP fileIt makes exceptions for police activity on private property, in which the person who is recording is authorized to be on the property, but specified that an officer can order the person recording to leave the area if the "law enforcement officer determines that the person is interfering in the law enforcement activity."The law also says that a person who is the subject of police activity can record as long as they're not being handcuffed, searched or subjected to a field sobriety test.And people in a vehicle that has been stopped by police can record "if the occupants are not interfering with lawful police actions," the law says. The National Press Photographers Association, in February, wrote a letter denouncing the bill, saying it was unconstitutional. At the time, the bill proposed people couldn't take videos of police from 15 feet away or less. "We are extremely concerned that this language violates not only the free speech and press clauses of the First Amendment, but also runs counter to the “clearly established right” to photograph and record police officers performing their official duties in a public place," said the letter, signed by The Associated Press, The New York Times Company and other organizations. "We believe that requiring the "permission of a law enforcement officer" and setting a minimum distance of fifteen feet in between the law enforcement officer and the person recording, would not survive a constitutional challenge and is completely unworkable in situations (such a demonstrations and protests) where there are multiple officers and people recording," the letter said. In a March op-ed, Kavanagh wrote that he had made concessions on the bill, lowering the buffer zone and adding the exceptions. He said he introduced the bill for safety reasons. "Getting very close to police officers in tense situations is a dangerous practice that can end in tragedy," Kavanagh wrote. He also said he believes the law won't affect the integrity of recordings taken of police. "A video taken from 8 feet away probably takes in the entire scene, providing more information and greater context," he wrote. Videos of interactions with law enforcement have become an increasingly useful tool in exposing police misconduct. Elisha Fieldstadt is a breaking news reporter for NBC News.

US Police Misconduct

Published August 22, 2022 8:27AM Updated 1:42PM Crawford County, AR sheriff on officer suspensions, viral video: 'Not what we stand for' Crawford County Sheriff Jimmy Damante held a press conference on Aug. 22, 2022, to discuss the suspension of three Arkansas officers after a video posted on social media showed a suspect being held down on the ground and beaten by police. Three Arkansas law enforcement officers were suspended, and state police launched an investigation after a video posted on social media showed two of them beating a suspect while a third officer held him on the ground. The officers were responding to a report of a man making threats outside a convenience store Sunday in the small town of Mulberry, about 140 miles (220 kilometers) northwest of Little Rock, near the border with Oklahoma, authorities said. Police lights are pictured in an undated file image. The video shows one officer punching the suspect with a clenched fist, while another can be seen hitting the man with his knee. The third officer holds him against the pavement. In video recorded from a car nearby, someone yells at officers to stop hitting the man in the head. Two of the officers appear to look up and say something back to the person who yelled. The officers' comments could not be heard clearly on the video. Warning: Embedded video shows graphic content Two Crawford County sheriff’s deputies and one Mulberry police officer were suspended, city and county authorities said. Arkansas State Police said the agency would investigate the use of force. State police identified the suspect as Randal Worcester, 27, of Goose Creek, South Carolina. He was taken to a hospital for treatment then released and booked into the Van Buren County jail on multiple charges, including second-degree battery, resisting arrest and making terroristic threats, state police said. Worcester’s father declined to comment when contacted Monday by The Associated Press. He referred a reporter to a law firm representing the family. That firm said it was still trying to gather information and did not immediately have a comment on the video. Worcester is white, according to jail booking information, and the three officers involved also appear to be white. U.S. crime trends: 2010 - 2020 The following is a breakdown of crimes per 100,000 people in the U.S., provided by the FBI: Authorities have not released the names of the three officers. "I hold all my employees accountable for their actions and will take appropriate measures in this matter," Crawford County Sheriff Jimmy Damante said. In a statement released Sunday evening, Mulberry Police Chief Shannon Gregory said the community and the department take the matter "very seriously." Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson said Sunday night on Twitter that the "incident in Crawford County will be investigated pursuant to the video evidence and the request of the prosecuting attorney." Cellphone video of often-violent police interactions has put a spotlight on officer conduct in recent years, particularly since the 2020 killing of George Floyd while he was being arrested by police in Minneapolis. The resulting nationwide protests called attention to officer brutality that often targets Black Americans. The front door at building that serves as the Mulberry police headquarters and city hall was locked Monday. A sign on the door directed anyone with questions about "the police investigation" to contact Arkansas State Police. It was unclear whether the officers were wearing body cameras. Amid public pressure for transparency and the proliferation of videos exposing police misconduct, there has been some pushback against recording officers. In July, the governor of Arizona signed a bill that makes it illegal to knowingly record officers from 8 feet (2.5 meters) or closer without permission. Mulberry is a town of 1,600 people on the southern edge of the Ozarks in western Arkansas, right off Interstate 40, which runs from California to North Carolina. RELATED: Couple arrested after drugs found next to toddler's Happy Meal in SUV, deputies say

US Police Misconduct

Desmond Ricks was released from prison in 2017 after 25 years, thanks to gun experts, law students at the University of Michigan and his unwavering insistence that he was innocent.Desmond Ricks listens to Judge Richard Skutt during a hearing in Detroit on June 1, 2017.Clarence Tabb Jr. / The Detroit News via AP fileJuly 14, 2022, 5:24 PM UTC / Source: Associated PressDETROIT — Detroit agreed to pay $7.5 million to settle a lawsuit by a man who claimed police switched bullets to pin a murder on him in 1992.Desmond Ricks was released from prison in 2017 after 25 years, thanks to gun experts, law students at the University of Michigan and his unwavering insistence that he was innocent.“I’m not greedy. I’m thankful,” Ricks, 56, told The Associated Press after the City Council approved the settlement Tuesday.“It’s a blessing to be alive with my children and grandchildren. It was a blessing to not lose my life in there,” Ricks said of prison.He was convicted of fatally shooting a friend outside a restaurant in 1992. Police seized a gun that belonged to Ricks’ mother and said it was the murder weapon.In 2016, the Innocence Clinic at University of Michigan law school asked a judge to reopen the case. Photos of two bullets taken from the victim, Gerry Bennett, did not resemble the bullets that were examined by a defense expert before trial decades earlier.The actual bullets surprisingly were still in Detroit police storage. Examinations showed they did not match the .38-caliber gun identified as the weapon.A judge granted Ricks a new trial, but prosecutors in response dropped charges.“It was layer upon layer upon layer of police misconduct. It was a truly egregious case,” said David Moran, director of the Innocence Clinic.During depositions in the lawsuit, even the city’s expert acknowledged that the bullet analysis by the police lab decades ago was flat-out wrong.“It’s one of two things. It was a horrible mistake or it was deliberate — I don’t know,” said Jay Jarvis, who worked for 32 years at the Georgia State Crime Laboratory.Separately, Ricks received more than $1 million from the state for his wrongful conviction, $50,000 for each year in custody. He’ll likely have to repay it now that Detroit has settled the lawsuit.

US Police Misconduct

Nearly 150 New York City police officers violated department rules during 2020 protests over the death of George Floyd, according to a new report issued Monday by the Civilian Complaint Review Board. The Board substantiated misconduct against 146 officers. Most of the violations involved excessive force, including improper use of batons and pepper spray. Other violations involved discourtesy or offensive language. The report said there were hundreds more allegations the CCRB could not investigate because officers wore bands over their badge numbers or refused to be interviewed remotely. “The Black Lives Matter protests that occurred in the summer of 2020 were massive in scale, but not unprecedented in nature,” said interim CCRB chairwoman Arva Rice. “Given what is happening across the country regarding reproductive rights, immigration, affordable housing, and police brutality, people will continue to protest for their rights. It is key for New York to know how to best respond to protests, especially protests against police misconduct.” The NYPD said the substantiated allegations amount to less than 15% of complaints. The department also objected to the way the CCRB characterized its response to the protests, including a failure to acknowledge that officers were working under sustained, dangerous conditions. “At the peak of the protests, there were more than 22,000 NYPD officers deployed in a single day, attempting to facilitate people’s rights to peaceful expression all while addressing acts of lawlessness including wide-scale rioting, mass chaos, violence, and destruction,” the NYPD said. The department continued, adding, “Officers were faced with perpetrators who were looting, setting fires, and destroying property. During this period, more than 400 uniformed members of the NYPD were injured, with over 250 of them hospitalized, and nearly 300 NYPD vehicles were vandalized, including several that were destroyed by arson from the throwing of Molotov cocktails.” Nearly 150 New York City police officers violated department rules during 2020 George Floyd protests: Report originally appeared on abcnews.go.com

US Police Misconduct

The San Francisco Police Department (SFPD) is proposing to use robots to kill suspects in 'rare' circumstances - with the force's 12 bots set to assist officers with deadly force and 'ground support'.The new policy proposal is to be debated next week by the San Francisco Board of Supervisors Rules Committee and will define how the SFPD is allowed to use its military-style weapons.One way the machines can cause deadly harm is by attaching a PAN disruptor device - which uses shotgun shells - to the robot. This can then fire bullets at the suspect. Another method would be strapping explosives to a robot and then using it to blow up a suspect - which was a technique used in Dallas in 2016. The draft policy has been scrutinized over the past several weeks by supervisor's Aaron Peskin, Rafael Mandelman and Connie Chan, who make up the committee.Peskin, the chair of the committee, initially attempted to limit the SFPD's authority over the robot's.'Robots shall not be used as a Use of Force against any person,' Peskin wrote. The San Francisco Police Department (SFPD) is proposing to use robots to kill suspects in 'rare' circumstances. They currently have 12 robots in their artillery including bomb detecting robots like this one from Long Beach California The new policy proposal is to be debated next week by the San Francisco Board of Supervisors Rules Committee and will define how the SFPD is allowed to use its military-style weaponsThis was struck out by the police department who replaced it with language that codifies the department's authority to use lethal force using robots.'Robots will only be used as a deadly force option when risk of loss of life to members of the public or officers are imminent and outweigh any other force option available to SFPD.'Robot use-of-force has never been approved in San Francisco, nor has it been prohibited.A version of the draft policy was unanimously accepted by the rules committee last week and will come before the full board on November 29.'The original policy they submitted was actually silent on whether robots could deploy lethal force,' said Peskin to mission local.He added that he decided to approve the SFPD's caveated guidelines because the department had made the case that 'there could be scenarios where deployment of lethal force was the only option.'Advocates and lawyers who opposed the militarization of police said that they are less convinced that the policy should be green lit.'We are living in a dystopian future, where we debate whether the police may use robots to execute citizens without a trial, jury, or judge,' said Tifanei Moyer, senior staff attorney at the Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights of the San Francisco Bay Area.Moyer leads the organization's work on police misconduct and militarization.'This is not normal, no legal professional or ordinary resident should carry on as if it is normal,' she added. The draft policy has been scrutinized over the past several weeks by supervisor's Aaron Peskin, Rafael Mandelman and Connie Chan, who make up the committee A bomb squad robot can be seen investigating a suspicious bag. If the policy goes ahead it will mean they may be used when risk of loss of life to members of the public or officers is imminent and outweigh any other force optionThe SFPD has 17 robots, 12 of which are fully functional but have never been used to attack people.The robots are remote-controlled and are typically used to investigate and defuse potential bombs or to survey areas too difficult or dangerous for officers to access.The uses of the technology as described in the new draft policy include 'training and simulations, criminal apprehensions, critical incidents, exigent circumstances, executing a warrant or during suspicious device assessments.'In 2016, the Dallas police force strapped plastic explosives to a robot and used it to blow up a shooter who had killed five officers, in the first U.S. instance of a police robot killing a suspect.One of the SFPD's robots, the Remotec F5A, is the same model as the one used by Dallas police.At the time Dallas police chief David Brown told reporters that they had no other option.'We saw no other option but to use our bomb robot and place a device on its extension for it to detonate where the suspect was,' he told the Guardian.Police detonated the explosive, which destroyed a wall in the building and killed the suspect, leaving the $151,000 robot with only minor damage to its arm.More recently in Oakland, a policy on lethal robots came before the city's police department's civilian oversight council. In 2016, the Dallas police force strapped plastic explosives to a robot and used it to blow up a shooter who had killed five officers, in the first U.S. instance of a police robot killing a suspect One of the SFPD's robots, the Remotec F5A, is the same model as the one used by Dallas police at the time of the incident in 2016 One device they discussed was the PAN disruptor, a device that can be attached to a remote-controlled robot and uses a blank shotgun shell to disable a bomb by blasting it with pressurized water.Oakland police acknowledged that, in emergencies, they could arm it with live rounds. The SFPD also has multiple PAN disruptors that can be attached to robots and fire shotgun shells.Last month, Oakland police ultimately backed down and removed language that would have allowed them to kill using robots. They said they hope to pursue the option in the future.Rueca said that the San Francisco Police Department 'does not have any sort of specific plan in place' for how lethal force would be used.Cities across California are currently drafting new policies on the use of military weapons by local police forces, thanks to a state law called AB 481, which passed last year.Figuring out the force options of robots is one small part of the law's remit.The law mandates that every police force in California must annually report its stock of all military-style weapons, their cost, how they can be used, and how they were deployed in the prior year.The law gives local authorities, in San Francisco's case, the Board of Supervisors, the ability to annually reject or accept the rules governing how the weapons are used.The Board will also be required to sign off on any new military-style equipment before purchase, although the police will be able to replace any existing equipment up to a value of $10 million without approval. Once the rules are settled, the process will begin again with the Sheriff's Department, which will need to create its own policy to stay in compliance with the AB 481 state law  Drones have also been a point of contention when used by the Police Department but have been a useful technology for stations across the country over the yearsThe robots identified in the draft policy include various remotely piloted robots designed for manipulating heavy objects, breaching walls, ordnance disposal, scouting, and surveillance. They include: Remotec models F5A, 6A, and RONS; QinetiQ Talon and Dragon Runner; IRobot FirstLook; and ReconRobotics Recon Scout ThrowBot.None of these units are designed to carry firearms, but at least some of them are capable of being used to kill.Another point of contention with advocates is that the SFPD has not included personnel training or maintenance times in their valuation of the cost of their military-style weapons.This appears to be required by AB 481, which states that costs must include 'acquisition, personnel, training, transportation, maintenance, storage, upgrade, and other ongoing costs' of the weapons.Once the rules are settled, the process will begin again with the Sheriff's Department, which will need to create its own policy to stay in compliance with AB 481.'The great news about this thing is that it can be evolved,' said Peskin, adding that policy must be scrutinized and approved every year if the SFPD wants to keep using its weapons.'And I think we are starting off in a good place.'

US Police Misconduct

Three St. Louis police associations have filed a lawsuit in an attempt to keep the city from expanding civilian oversight of their police department.Last month, Mayor Tishaura Jones signed into law a bill that strengthens the city’s two existing agencies — the Civilian Oversight Board and the Detention Facility Oversight Board — and moves them into a Division of Civilian Oversight, a larger entity within the state’s Department of Public Safety. The new division allows oversight officials to access the use of force and misconduct complaints and independently investigate misconduct claims. It also has the power to discipline law enforcement officers.  “When we put the public back in public safety, we are creating an environment where all members of the community are working towards accountability and safer neighborhoods in the long run,” Jones said during a news conference for the bill signing earlier this month. “If you’re a good officer focused on serving the community … you have nothing to worry about.” Local police groups say it’s not that simple. In their lawsuit, the Ethical Society of Police, the St. Louis Police Officers’ Association and the St. Louis Police Leadership Organization requested an injunction to keep the law from going into effect. Their complaint? The new legislation gives the civilian-led board too much power to discipline police, which would ultimately push officers out of the force and drive up crime rates. “We have a horrible situation already recruiting and retaining police officers. Police officers are stressed that … they’ll be targeted by anti-cop groups,” Sherrie Hall, attorney for the Ethical Society of Police, told NBC News.The mayor’s office said it could not comment on pending litigation. Representatives for and against the measure met at a hearing Wednesday, but Circuit Court Judge Jason Sengheiser did not rule on the matter. Such resistance is common, but despite the opposition, civilian oversight is already at work across the land. There were about 200 oversight entities in the U.S. before 2020, according to the National Association for Civilian Oversight of Law Enforcement. And in November 2020, after a swath of police violence protests across the country, at least 10 cities and counties approved civilian oversight measures, according to a report from the Lawfare Institute and the Brookings Institution. One of those cities was Columbus, Ohio, which that year passed a measure to establish a civilian-led board that would launch police misconduct investigations and recommend discipline. Until then, Columbus was the largest city without a review board, City Council President Shannon Hardin said at the time, and 74% of voters overwhelmingly supported the measure. Similar measures passed elsewhere, as in San Diego, which replaced its community review board with a Commission on Police Practices to review misconduct complaints and discipline measures. In Philadelphia, an initiative passed to create the Citizens Police Oversight Commission, which has the power to issue subpoenas and review police policies. “The more power and authority the agency is given, the more likely it is that there will be opposition on the part of the police.” - Richard Rosenthal, Independent Police auditor of pasadenia, california's community police oversight commissionThe St. Louis measure grants its new oversight agency the authority many cities and counties have unsuccessfully fought for. City officials said in their response to the police groups’ lawsuit that the groups could not accurately assess any supposed harm the bill would do before it took effect. City officials also said that not implementing the law would do great harm to the city. To that, Hall countered, “We know we have harm already. People are leaving the force over it and we’re already understaffed.” A spokesperson for the St. Louis Police Department could not confirm the claim, and the St. Louis City Department of Personnel did not immediately respond to a request for comment. History has shown that when there are attempts to improve police accountability, there is often pushback from law enforcement agencies. The Newark Fraternal Order of Police Lodge 12 famously tried to block a 2016 ordinance that  gave the city’s Civilian Complaint Review Board subpoena power to obtain internal police documents and the authority to investigate officers. The state Supreme Court ultimately stripped the entity of subpoena power. “The more power and authority the agency is given, the more likely it is that there will be opposition on the part of the police,” said Richard Rosenthal, who served as the independent monitor for Denver’s oversight agency from 2005 to 2011. He is now the independent police auditor of Pasadena, California’s Community Police Oversight Commission. Police oversight is nothing newPolice oversight of some form has existed in the U.S. since the 1800s, but the first modern civilian review board was established in Washington, D.C., in 1948, in response to the use of force by police on Black people, according to reports from both the National Association for Civilian Oversight of Law Enforcement (NACOLE) and other police oversight experts. Historically, the country’s civilian review boards faced fierce police opposition, a lack of resources, limited power and, as a result, had difficulty in reducing police violence and increasing accountability, according to the reports. The number of such boards has slowly risen over the decades, but began to skyrocket after 2010, the reports said. Today, almost all large U.S. cities have some kind of oversight agency, mostly under one of three models: investigation-focused, monitor-focused, or review-focused, with the review-focused model being most prevalent in the country, according to a NACOLE report. It is difficult to determine the efficacy of the boards overall when their scope of authority varies so widely from place to place. But some agencies have been held up as models of success. Rosenthal called Denver’s agency the “gold standard” of civilian oversight. In 2004, the city replaced its civilian commission with an independent monitor, and the new entity boasted community collaboration and new leadership. This proved crucial for the agency, which could then uncover inadequate police discipline and create a new system for identifying officers accused of misconduct, Rosenthal said. The New Orleans Office of the Independent Police Monitor has also seen success, according to Stella Cziment, the acting independent police monitor. The office helped create the New Orleans Police Department’s Use of Force Review Board, which, among other things, requires officers to release their body camera footage of officer-involved shootings within 10 days. “We’ve definitely impacted and helped reduce officer-involved shootings and use of force. Officer-involved shootings are happening less and when they are happening, they’re adhering to policy and to law,” Cziment said. The number of officer-involved shootings has decreased drastically, from 20 in 2012 to nine in 2020, according to a 2020 report from the office. Incidents of “serious uses of force” also declined from 79 in 2019 to 44 in 2021, according to an annual report.“We’re definitely doing a lot, and our priorities are sound. But we would like to be doing so much more," said Cziment. "We’re a very small team and we’re currently requesting additional funding to be able to expand our team.”As for St. Louis, John Chasnoff, a local activist who both worked with city officials on the new law and the original law establishing the city’s civilian oversight board in 2015, said he was expecting police groups to push back against the new legislation. He said revamping the city’s oversight entity was necessary, as the existing board did not have the power to discipline officers or have access to actual police complaints. Activists championed the original civilian oversight board after Michael Brown’s death in 2014, but the board wasn’t as effective as they’d hoped. Police killed more than two dozen people from 2015 through 2020, but the board couldn’t investigate those deaths because the police department “withheld nearly all of the complaints” it received against the officers involved, according to an investigation from Reveal and The Missouri Independent. “Under the new system, we’re taking the functions of the internal affairs and putting it inside this new Division of Civilian Oversight. That’s a major change. The investigations will be led by civilians. This is a new change and police are suspicious of it. I think over time, as the new division gets up and running, a lot of the fears will die down,” Chasnoff said. He added that he didn't believe the police groups’ lawsuit would be successful because the groups don’t seem to “fully understand” the new law. “And it surprised me that they filed the lawsuit on Aug. 9, which is the anniversary of the death of Michael Brown,” he noted. While some city oversight boards boast success, others have struggled to have a positive impact on the community and policing. Sharon Fairley, who led a Chicago oversight agency from 2015 to 2017 and is now a professor at the University of Chicago Law School, described Chicago as the “poster child for failed civilian oversight.” The city’s Independent Police Review Authority, tasked with investigating officer-involved shootings, faced criticism in 2015 when footage surfaced of an officer fatally shooting Laquan McDonald a year after the incident. Fairley said she was hired to revamp the agency but “its reputation was so badly tarnished at that point that it could not survive and needed to be replaced.” Chicago recently passed a landmark ordinance to establish a new oversight commission, giving it the final say on policy for the Chicago Police Department. Fairley, who studies oversight efforts across the country, published research in 2020 that highlighted the fact that while oversight agencies have become common across the U.S., tensions between politicians, police and the public persist. Fairley said two things were necessary for an oversight entity to be effective: resources and independence. “Independence meaning subpoena power, access to documentation. There’s got to be direct access to the information and material that the agency needs to do its work. By resources I mean financial, human and technical. They need money to support the efforts,” Fairley said. “Civilian oversight is no panacea for police misconduct,” he argued. “If law enforcement does not embrace accountability as a core value, there’s not a whole lot that a civilian oversight agency can do. For accountability to succeed, it’s gotta be part of the culture of the law enforcement agency, too.”Follow NBCBLK on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.

US Police Misconduct

San Diego Police officers guard the San Diego Police Department headquarters in downtown as protesters gather on Sept. 23, 2020. / File photo by Adriana Heldiz City labor negotiators and the union representing San Diego police officers are at an impasse in negotiations over who can and can’t serve on the Commission on Police Practices, the independent board that investigates allegations of police misconduct. At Monday’s City Council meeting, the San Diego Police Officers Association argued family members of current or former local law enforcement officers should be able to serve on the board, while city labor negotiators say they shouldn’t. They also split on whether individuals with a felony record can be appointed to the commission – police union representatives say no, and city negotiators say anyone whose criminal record doesn’t bar them from serving on a jury should be eligible. SDPD Sgt. Jared Wilson, the POA president, said the CPP — which is yet to be fully implemented, in part because of the stalled negotiations — was one of the reasons officers were leaving San Diego for jobs in other cities. He said the commission had a “radical, abolish the police agenda” and that “our cops are better off somewhere else.” The city’s lead labor negotiator, Tim Davis, said the CPP ordinance was “very carefully crafted and balanced.” He asked the City Council to approve a resolution resolving the impasse, which would allow the ordinance to move forward for an implementation vote at a later date. Andrea St. Julian, an attorney and co-chair of San Diegans for Justice, who authored the ballot measure that created the CPP, said she has family members in law enforcement whom she consulted when working on the measure. “There is nothing about me or my background that makes me anti-police,” she said. Councilwoman Monica Montgomery Steppe, whose office oversaw the drafting of the CPP ordinance, said guidance on the makeup of the commission came from the National Association of Civilian Oversight of Law Enforcement—the leading authority on citizen oversight—“and not from anti-police sentiment.” Councilman Chris Cate was the lone vote against moving the ordinance forward. He said his father is a retired law enforcement officer. “Being told that I can’t serve on a commission because there might be a perceived conflict of interest… I take that a little personally,” he said. Councilmembers said they were sympathetic to the POA’s position but were also concerned that allowing a law enforcement presence on the board would erode the trust of communities who’ve pushed for stronger oversight. Kelly Davis is a freelance journalist focusing on criminal justice and social issues. Follow her on Twitter @kellylynndavis... More by Kelly Davis

US Police Misconduct

The city of Minneapolis agreed Thursday to pay nearly $9 million to settle lawsuits filed by two people who said former Police Officer Derek Chauvin pressed his knee into their necks years before he used the same move to kill George Floyd. John Pope Jr. will received $7.5 million and Zoya Code will receive $1.375 million. The settlements were announced during a meeting of the Minneapolis City "Council. Both lawsuits stemmed from arrests in 2017 — three years before Chauvin killed Floyd during an arrest captured on video that sparked protests worldwide, prompted a national reckoning on racial injustice and compelled a Minneapolis Police Department overhaul. The lawsuits stated that if the city had acted sooner to discipline Chauvin, “history could have been stopped from repeating itself with George Floyd.” Bob Bennett, the attorney for Pope and Code, noted in a statement that other officers failed to intervene or report Chauvin, and police leaders allowed Chauvin to "field train and indoctrinate dozens of young MPD officers to his ways without fear of discipline or negative sanction and to continue his predatory ways for years.” Council member Elliott Payne said what happened to Code and Pope were reminders of what happened to Floyd and rekindled those emotions. "And it's actually not a Derek Chauvin problem. It's an institution problem,” Payne said. He hoped the settlements “bring some closure to this era and is a stark reminder of the work we have lying ahead.” Code, who has a history of homelessness and mental health problems, was arrested in June 2017 after she allegedly tried to strangle her mother with an extension cord. Pope was 14 in September 2017 when, according to his lawsuit, Chauvin subjected him to excessive force while responding to a domestic assault report. Both lawsuits named Chauvin and several other officers. The lawsuits alleged police misconduct, excessive force, and racism — Pope and Code are Black; Chauvin is white. They also said the city knew that Chauvin had a record of misconduct but didn’t stop him. Criminal charges in both cases were eventually dropped. The lawsuits said body camera recordings showed Chauvin used many of the same tactics on Pope and Code that he used on Floyd. Chauvin was sentenced to 22 1/2 years in prison on a state murder charge in 2021 for killing Floyd by pressing his knee to Floyd’s neck for 9 1/2 minutes as he pleaded that he couldn’t breathe. The city also paid $27 million to Floyd's family. Code's lawsuit said she was in handcuffs when Chauvin slammed her head to the ground and pinned his knee on the back of her neck for 4 minutes and 41 seconds. A second officer didn’t intervene and a responding police sergeant approved the force, the lawsuit stated. Pope’s lawsuit said his mother was drunk when she called police because she was upset that he and his 16-year-old sister left their cellphone chargers plugged in, leading to a physical confrontation. It alleged Chauvin struck Pope in the head with a large metal flashlight at least four times. It says he then put Pope in a chokehold before pinning him to the floor and putting his knee on Pope's neck. “Chauvin would proceed to hold John in this prone position for more than fifteen minutes, all while John was completely subdued and not resisting,” the complaint alleged. “Over those minutes, John repeatedly cried out that he could not breathe.” The complaint alleged that at least eight other officers did nothing to intervene. It said Chauvin did not mention in his report that he had hit Pope with his flashlight, nor did he mention pinning Pope for so long. Chauvin’s sergeant reviewed and approved his report and use of force, “despite having firsthand knowledge that the report was false and misleading,” the lawsuit alleged. Chauvin admitted to many of Pope’s allegations when he pleaded guilty in December 2021 to federal charges for violating the civil rights of both Floyd and Pope. He was sentenced in July to 21 years on those charges. Chauvin is serving his sentences in a federal prison in Arizona. —- For more of AP's coverage on the killing of George Floyd and the aftermath: https://apnews.com/hub/death-of-george-floyd

US Police Misconduct

All five former Memphis police officers accused of murder in connection to the traffic stop beating of Tyre Nichols entered not guilty pleas on Friday morning. Nichols' parents and their attorney, Ben Crump, were in the courtroom. The former officers are set to return to court on May 1. None of the officers spoke in the brief court appearance Friday. The five officers -- Tadarrius Bean, Demetrius Haley, Desmond Mills Jr., Emmitt Martin III and Justin Smith -- were fired and arrested on charges including second-degree murder following Nichols' beating during a Jan. 7 traffic stop. Nichols, 29, was hospitalized and died three days later. Graphic footage of the traffic stop was released to the public last month and sparked nationwide outrage. A sixth officer was fired and a seventh has been relieved of duty in the wake of Nichols' death. More officers could receive administrative discipline and the district attorney said additional charges could be filed. At Nichols' funeral, family attorney Ben Crump said that Nichols' legacy "will be one of equal justice." "It will be the blueprint going forward, because we have to remember that in less than 20 days ... they were terminated, they were arrested and they were charged," he said of the officers. Nichols' family is now urging Congress to pass the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act, which would mandate accountability for police misconduct, address racial profiling and limit use of force for police officers.

US Police Misconduct

ST. LOUIS (AP) — Eight years after Michael Brown’s death pushed the St. Louis region front and center into the national debate over police accountability, the city’s elected officials and its police associations are at odds over a new oversight plan.St. Louis Mayor Tishaura Jones, a progressive Democrat elected last year in part on her pledge to hold police more accountable, this month signed into law a bill creating a Division of Civilian Oversight, an independent agency to investigate allegations of police misconduct and use of force incidents.Jones, who is Black, said at a news conference before the Aug. 3 bill signing that Black St. Louisans are more than four times more likely to be subjected to force by police than whites.“Accountability is the first step in building trust, and that will strengthen our enforcement and police department in the long run,” Jones said.The new plan has drawn a stern response from the St. Louis Police Officers Association and a smaller officers’ group, the Ethical Society of Police, an association that largely represents Black officers. The St. Louis Police Leadership Organization, representing officers with the rank of sergeant and above, also opposed the change.All three police associations joined together in a lawsuit seeking an injunction preventing the law from going into effect in September.Sherrie Hall, attorney for the Ethical Society of Police, said officers welcome accountability, but that the new law is flawed because parts of it conflict with Missouri's Officers’ Bill of Rights law. For example, the St. Louis law allows officers to be questioned by oversight investigators immediately after an incident, without seeing the complaint or obtaining a lawyer.“Those things are important," Hall said. "They’re important if you’re going to have an effective police force and be able to recruit and retain officers. They’re important because an officer should have the ability to know what they’re being accused of before they’re giving a statement, and to think it through."Hall also worries that good officers could be targeted if a board member is simply anti-police.Brown’s death, and the deaths of others at the hands of police, “pushed civilian oversight and police accountability into the national spotlight,” according to a 2018 report by the U.S. Department of Justice.Brown, a Black 18-year-old, was shot to death during a street confrontation with Officer Darren Wilson on Aug. 9, 2014. Wilson was later cleared of wrongdoing but the shooting led to months of often-violent protests.The incident happened in nearby Ferguson, Missouri, not St. Louis. But the resulting scrutiny shone a light on the sometimes troubled and confrontational relationship between police and Black men throughout the St. Louis region.That spotlight grew brighter after George Floyd’s death at the hands of a Minneapolis officer in 2020. Today, more than 200 oversight boards exist across the nation, though they cover only a fraction of the approximate 18,000 police agencies.How well they’re doing is up for debate. Information compiled by Mapping Police Violence found that the number of people killed by police annually has remained constant at slightly above or below 1,100 every year since 2013.“One of the major challenges with oversight programs is the limited empirical evidence demonstrating their effectiveness,” the Justice Department report stated.St. Louis officials hope the new approach is a step in the right direction. It replaces a review process established in 2015, the year after Brown's death. Under that process, complaints about misconduct and use-of-force were first investigated internally within the police department, then potentially reviewed by a Civilian Oversight Board. But most cases ended with the internal police review.The new Division of Civilian Oversight will be led by a commissioner, retired FBI agent Matthew Brummund, and staffed with 10 investigators. The nine-member oversight board can make recommendations, but the personnel department decides when discipline is appropriate. Appeals go to the Civil Service Commission.The law also establishes a new unit under the direction of Circuit Attorney Kim Gardner for the investigation of use-of-force issues. Gardner and police have a long history of butting heads.In 2019, Gardner placed dozens of officers on an “exclusion list,” prohibiting them from bringing cases. The list was developed after a national group accused the officers of posting racist and anti-Muslim comments on social media.In 2020, Gardner filed a lawsuit accusing the city, the St. Louis Police Officers Association and others of a coordinated and racist conspiracy aimed at forcing her out of office. The lawsuit alleged violations of the Ku Klux Klan Act of 1871, which was adopted to thwart efforts to deny the civil rights of racial minorities. A judge eventually tossed out the lawsuit.Sgt. Mickey Owens, president of the St. Louis Police Leadership Organization, called giving Gardner a role in investigating police shootings "downright frightening.”A 2021 report by the St. Louis civil rights law firm Arch City Defenders found that St. Louis officers killed 69 people from 2009 through 2019. Fifty-eight of those killed were Black.Among them was Anthony Lamar Smith. White Officer Jason Stockley and his partner tried to corner Smith in December 2011 after observing what they thought was a drug transaction on a fast food parking lot. Smith drove away, nearly striking the officers.During the ensuing chase, Stockley said, “Going to kill this (expletive), don’t you know," according to dashcam audio used as evidence in his trial.Smith, 24, was fatally shot by Stockley at the end of the chase. At his 2017 trial, Stockley testified he thought Smith was reaching for a gun that was found inside Smith’s car. Prosecutors alleged that Stockley planted the weapon.Stockley was acquitted, leading to weeks of often violent protests.Activist John Chasnoff has been pushing for a new form of better police oversight in St. Louis for 23 years.“I think it’s a big step forward,” Chasnoff said of the new plan. “It’s very difficult for any organization to investigate itself, hold itself accountable. This, for the first time, takes those investigations out of the police department and I think that’s a big step toward fairness and unbiased investigations.”

US Police Misconduct

Almost two decades ago, a misleading image lineup led to one man's imprisonment for murder. Now, the Brooklyn district attorney will move to vacate what a recent investigation determined was a wrongful conviction — one that law enforcement intentionally hid for years. Sheldon Thomas, now 35, was convicted in 2004 of second-degree murder, attempted murder and other crimes after being arrested in connection with a fatal shooting in East Flatbush that killed 14-year-old Anderson Bercy and wounded another person in December 2004, said the office of Brooklyn District Attorney Eric Gonzalez in a Thursday news release announcing his decision to vacate Thomas' conviction. The district attorney will also request that the indictment against Thomas be dismissed and he be freed from prison after 18 years. Thomas' initial arrest was based on a witness identification error, an investigation by Brooklyn's Conviction Review Unit found. The witness, according to the unit's report, had identified a different Sheldon Thomas, whose address was in the same precinct as the Sheldon Thomas eventually convicted for the crime. Investigators "concluded that detectives were intent on arresting the defendant and used the faulty identification procedure as pretext," the district attorney's office said, noting that law enforcement agents are implicated in the report for intentionally concealing and later justifying the witness' mistake during court proceedings. Thomas was scheduled to appear in court on Thursday afternoon before Brooklyn Supreme Court Justice Matthew D'Emic, according to the district attorney. The case "was compromised from the very start by grave errors and lack of probable cause to arrest Mr. Thomas," Gonzalez said in a statement. "He was further deprived of his due process rights when the prosecution proceeded even after the erroneous identification came to light, making his conviction fundamentally unfair," he said. The new investigation showed that Thomas' involvement in the initial homicide case came after a convoluted series of missteps. Detectives attempted to get his photo from a police database — he had a prior arrest for pointing an inoperable gun at officers and resisting arrest, according to Gonzalez's office — to use in an image array they planned to show the witness. However, before they received that image, they obtained a photo of the other Sheldon Thomas and placed his photo in the image array. The witness had previously identified two men, whom she knew, as being inside the car where gunfire originated during the shooting, and Thomas was not one of them. When asked to choose a face from the police's image lineup, the witness identified the other Sheldon Thomas "as being in the car with 90 percent certainty," the district attorney's office said. But, based on that identification, detectives went to Thomas' address — not the address of the Sheldon Thomas whose photo was identified by the witness — and arrested him. Later, the same witness identified Thomas as the perpetrator in a lineup after having previously identified the other Sheldon Thomas in images. Thomas was indicted alongside two others for the 2004 shooting despite this discrepancy. The identification of the other Sheldon Thomas in the photo array came to light in 2006, when a detective admitted on cross-examination that his previous testimony — in which he identified Thomas as the person in the photo array and said he had never seen Thomas before arresting him — was false. Another detective testified for the first time that the defendant was flagged to police through an anonymous tip given around the time of their initial investigation. That second detective "also conceded that, when questioned a few days after the murder, the defendant had told them that it wasn't him in the photo array," Gonzalez's office said. "Despite these revelations, the judge found that there was probable cause to arrest Thomas based on 'verified information from unknown callers' and the fact that he resembled the other Thomas from the photo array," the office wrote in Thursday's announcement. Thomas was eventually convicted of second-degree murder, attempted murder and other related counts, and was sentenced to 25 years to life in prison. Investigators determined that the witness was prompted by police detectives to identify Thomas, and noted that, despite claims by police, prosecutors, the trial judge and an appellate panel, "the Thomas in the photo array and the defendant do not look alike," Gonzalez's office said. Both Thomas and the other Sheldon Thomas are Black men. In a study commissioned by the defense, 27 of 32 law students of color who were shown the photo array with the other Sheldon Thomas concluded that Thomas was not in it. The review of Thomas' case comes as the district attorneys in Brooklyn and Manhattan work to re-examine past convictions andthose that resulted from police misconduct and other errors either made or overlooked by the criminal justice system. The Manhattan District Attorney's office announced in November that it would vacate 188 misdemeanor convictions dating back more than 20 years because police involved in those convictions have since been convicted of crimes related to misconduct in their roles as law enforcement officers. In Brooklyn, the district attorney's Conviction Review Unit has so far resulted in 34 convictions being vacated since 2014, according to the office. The review unit currently has about 50 open investigations. for more features.

US Police Misconduct

U.S. Updated on: August 22, 2022 / 7:34 PM / CBS/AP 3 officers taken off duty after violent arrest 3 Arkansas officers taken off duty after violent arrest 02:07 The Department of Justice has opened a federal civil rights investigation into the violent arrest of a 27-year-old man in Arkansas on Sunday, a department spokesperson confirmed to CBS News on Monday. The investigation will be separate from the state probe into the arrest, which was captured on video. The video shows the three officers repeatedly hitting 27-year-old Randal Worcester of Goose Creek, South Carolina. One officer repeatedly strikes Worcester with a closed fist while another knees him several times in the lower body. The officers are also seen slamming Worcester's head into the pavement.Crawford County Sheriff Jim Damante said Monday that none of the three officers were wearing body cameras. The Mulberry police officer's vehicle was equipped with a dash cam. "The dash cam does bring to light other things that did happen there that initiated, that wasn't caught on the citizen's camera," Damante said.Also Monday, officials identified the three law enforcement officials who have been suspended over the arrest: Crawford County Sheriff's Office deputies Zack King and Levi White and Mulberry police officer Thell Riddle.  The officers were responding to a report of a man making threats outside a convenience store Sunday in the small town of Mulberry, about 140 miles northwest of Little Rock, near the border with Oklahoma, authorities said.   A car is parked outside the Kountry Xpress in Mulberry, Ark. Three law enforcement officers have been suspended after a video posted on social media showed a South Carolina man being held down on the ground and beaten by police. Arkansas State Police said Sunday night that it would investigate the use of force by the officers earlier in the day outside the convenience store in Mulberry, about 140 miles northwest of Little Rock. Andrew DeMillo / AP According to Damante, a man was allegedly making "terroristic threats" against a gas station employee. The man, identified as Worcester, allegedly threatened to cut the employee's face off at one point. He then left and biked about seven miles before officers caught up with him.Damante claims that Worcester, who is White, surrendered a knife to the officers and then "football tackled" one of the deputies and punched him in the back of the head. The violent arrest captured on video then followed, according to Damante.None of the officers were rookies, Damante said Monday, telling reporters that all three had been in law enforcement for some time. The sheriff's office is conducting an internal investigation in addition to the Arkansas State Police's criminal investigation, Damante said. Worcester was initially taken to a local hospital for treatment. After his release, he was taken to Van Buren County Jail.Worcester has been charged with second degree battery, resisting arrest, refusal to submit, possessing an instrument of crime, criminal trespass, criminal mischief, terroristic threatening, and second degree assault, police said. Worcester was released Monday on $15,000 bond. When asked how he was feeling, he said "all right."  Carrie Jernigan, an attorney representing Worcester, told CBS News that she had made a separate excessive force complaint for a different client against Deputy White. Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson, a Republican, on Monday described the beating as "reprehensible conduct" and said the officers' actions were "not consistent" with the teachings of the Arkansas Law Enforcement Training Academy.Arkansas State Police Col. Bill Bryant said his agency's investigation would "take some time.""Once we get the facts and evidence, we'll prepare a case file and a summary and turn it over to the prosecutor," Bryant said. Cellphone video of often-violent police interactions has put a spotlight on officer conduct in recent years, particularly since the 2020 killing of George Floyd while he was being arrested by police in Minneapolis.The resulting nationwide protests called attention to officer brutality that often targets Black Americans.The front door at a building that serves as the Mulberry police headquarters and city hall was locked Monday. A sign on the door directed anyone with questions about "the police investigation" to contact Arkansas State Police.Amid public pressure for transparency and the proliferation of videos exposing police misconduct, there has been some pushback against recording officers. In July, the governor of Arizona signed a bill that makes it illegal to knowingly record officers from 8 feet or closer without permission.Mulberry is a town of 1,600 people on the southern edge of the Ozarks in western Arkansas, right off Interstate 40, which runs from California to North Carolina. Thanks for reading CBS NEWS. Create your free account or log in for more features. Please enter email address to continue Please enter valid email address to continue

US Police Misconduct

A recent amendment to the Illinois Constitution may provide a loophole for law enforcement to escape some of the SAFE-T Act provisions affecting police officers, according to a local sheriff. "Unintended consequences normally go against law enforcement when legislation comes along," Jefferson County Sheriff Jeff Bullard, a former member of the Illinois Fraternal Order of Police Labor Council, told Fox News. "But now there's an unintended consequence with the new government union amendment to the state constitution.""It states that language in a collective bargaining agreement now will trump state law," Bullard said. POLICE UNIONS LOOKING TO EVADE SAFE-T ACT PROVISIONS, SHERIFF SAYS:WATCH MORE FOX NEWS DIGITAL ORIGINALS HEREIllinois' new criminal justice reform law, the SAFE-T Act, includes provisions like streamlining the process to revoke an officer's license, allowing the investigation into anonymous complaints against officers and banning the destruction of police misconduct records. But law enforcement is interpreting a recent amendment to the state's constitution to mean that police unions can rework their contracts to overrule the SAFE-T Act, the sheriff said."We are researching that language," Bullard told Fox News. "We are looking at working with all stakeholders involved to come up with proper language that will protect our corrections officers or deputies or criminal justice employees from things that we see in the SAFE-T Act that are still bad." DERAILING ‘AMERICA’S MOST DANGEROUS LAW’: SHERIFF HOPES ILLINOIS SUPREME COURT UPHOLDS SAFE-T ACT DECISIONSHERIFF WARNS OF REMAINING DANGERS OF SAFE-T ACT:"The SAFE-T Act requires unsustained and sustained complaints to remain in employees' personnel file for their entire career," Bullard said. "Hopefully through this research … the union contract can be strengthened to say that there's expungement periods for progressive discipline based on the seriousness of the misconduct and that there won't be public dissemination without a court order."The sheriff worries that opening police files to the public could result in officers having their reputations unfairly smeared. A cop, for example, could be scrutinized for having 25 complaints in their public file, even if only three of those were sustained, he said."Disciplining police officers based on anonymous complaints … that violates the constitutional rights of a police officer who has the right of due process to face their accuser," Bullard previously told Fox News. "A police officer is not a lower-class citizen." He hopes these types of provisions can be stopped through collective bargaining in accordance with the state’s Workers’ Rights Amendment. The amendment, voted into law on Nov. 8, prohibits state laws from interfering with union agreements made between employers and labor organizations. CLICK HERE TO GET THE FOX NEWS APPThe SAFE-T Act — which one mayor called "America's most dangerous law" — went into effect Jan. 1. The Illinois Supreme Court paused one of its major provisions — the elimination of cash bail — after a lower court ruled it unconstitutional.The Illinois Fraternal Order of Police Labor Council, the Illinois Council of Police, the Metropolitan Alliance of Police and the Illinois Police Benevolent and Protective Association did not respond to Fox News' request for comment. To watch the full interview with Bullard, click here.  Teny Sahakian is an Associate Producer/Writer for Fox News. Follow Teny on Twitter at @tenysahakian.

US Police Misconduct

Ivy Ceballo Officer Jerry Wyche points at the words “you can be anything” on the packaging of the Black Barbie dolls dressed as doctors he delivered to children in their Tampa neighborhood. TAMPA, Florida — Officer Jerry Wyche had a decision to make.On the night of Jan. 1, 2018, his colleagues had stopped three Black teenagers at a Tampa gas station for driving with their lights off. A search revealed an illegal gun and a gram of cannabis. A 17-year-old boy was arrested. Many people would call that a success.But Wyche, a 10-year veteran of the force, called it “bullshit.” He believed his colleagues had cut corners to conduct the search.In the official report, officers wrote they had probable cause to search the car because they smelled cannabis. But Wyche hadn’t noticed any odors when he looked in the car that night. He remembered hearing the lead officer say he planned to ask the driver for consent to search — a constitutional requirement when cops don’t have probable cause — but the report made no mention of asking for consent.Wyche, who is Black and carries himself with the posture of a former Marine, had joined the agency as an idealistic 28-year-old, confident in his ability to change policing from the inside. Now, he believed, he had a duty to speak up.Friends warned he might face backlash for reporting his suspicions and counseled him to let it go. Did he really have enough evidence? What would he achieve from drawing attention to such a seemingly minor and murky case? Besides, Wyche had worked hard to reach his position. He had recently been selected for the elite SWAT team and was featured on a TV show about first responders. In evaluations, he was consistently praised for his ability to get guns off the street, his speed chasing down criminals on foot, and his skill as a mentor. “Not only is Officer Wyche an extremely hard worker, but his character, integrity, and loyalty to the Tampa Police Department should be recognized as a top-notch police officer,” a supervisor had written in his review two years earlier. Why mess with that?But in Wyche’s mind, it was a matter of principle. He imagined the teenagers facing the police version of events in court, their distrust of cops and the judicial system cemented. “We’re no better than the criminals if we bend or break the law for one arrest,” he said.For months, he had trouble sleeping. His mind kept replaying the movie Detroit, which features a Black security guard who attempts to play peacemaker in a volatile situation but winds up helpless to stop the brutality of white police officers. He recalled the words a stranger on the street had recently yelled: “You see the white officers fucking with us, and you’re just as bad as they are if you don’t speak up.”On April 26, 2018, the day before Wyche’s 39th birthday, he sat down with the agency’s internal investigators and shared his concerns. It was the most difficult thing he had ever done, he later said. At one point in the interview, he cried.“It’s hard going out there and knowing I have this on my chest,” he told them, according to transcripts. “People hate us enough — we gotta be able to police ourselves.”Wyche faced a tension familiar to many Black officers who know the toll of racial profiling from experience and feel the burden of representing their communities while in uniform: He was a minority in a police department with a legacy of mistrust in Black neighborhoods, trying to be part of the solution.BuzzFeed News interviewed 20 Black current and former Tampa police officers, who described an internal culture at the Tampa Police Department that pushes Black officers out of the profession and perpetuates police tactics that have left the city’s Black residents overpoliced and underserved for decades. A review of court documents, department records, discrimination complaints, and employment data corroborated the officers’ accounts. Ivy Ceballo Darrell Johnson, a retired Tampa cop, at the funeral home he runs. “They've had a good ol’ boy system right inside the police department,” said Darrell Johnson, a Tampa officer from 1990 to 2011, echoing comments from Wyche and at least three current officers. “It's not going anywhere, it just changes with time.”Officers said that that “system” is made up of veteran white middle managers and trainers who influence promotions, discipline, and tactics, and seem to endure every change of leadership.“If you are ‘in’ with certain people, you can do whatever and it never sees the light of day,” Johnson said, a perception current officers also shared.Most officers expressed pride in the careers they had built, as well as gratitude for a job that supported their families and, on the best days, filled them with purpose. But 15 Black officers, some of whom requested anonymity for fear of losing their jobs, said they were often frustrated to witness white officers disrespect Black residents, misinterpret cultural cues, and express stereotypes that contributed to unequal policing.Wyche said it demoralized him to hear some white officers refer to community policing efforts as “hug-a-thug” or share negative comments about women dealing with domestic violence. One officer he worked with called Black people at a club “animals who should be caged,” he said. Another joked he would “shoot any Black man running” while they were patrolling for a serial killer, he said. It seemed to him that too many of his colleagues focused their energy on low-level arrests and viewed Black neighborhoods as dangerous places that primarily needed to be controlled, not assisted — and there was no simple way for him to stop that.Still employed by the department, Wyche agreed to extensive interviews with BuzzFeed News and a review of his own missteps and discipline history. Over the course of months, he shared internal investigation files, official documents, and correspondence related to his discipline cases and discrimination complaints, as well as emails, text messages, photos, and body camera videos. BuzzFeed News also obtained his personnel files and spoke with family members and former and current colleagues.Sharing a window into his experience publicly, Wyche said, feels like a chance to contribute to the national conversation around policing and influence the system for future generations.“The community has been screaming for change for years,” he said. “It has to be yelled not only from the outside but also from within.” In the wake of George Floyd’s murder in 2020, people across the country filled city streets, marching to chants of “defund the police.”But by 2022, with rising crime rates fueling anxiety, local officials and President Joe Biden have largely rejected that call. The future of American law enforcement, it appears, rests on the ability of police forces to reform themselves from within.The Tampa Police Department, a midsize agency in a diverse Southern city, is emblematic of that challenge.For decades, the department has engaged in “proactive policing” — the prevalent crime reduction strategy at law enforcement agencies across the country. The philosophy, which took hold during the war on drugs era of the 1980s, promotes aggressive enforcement, encouraging officers to use traffic stops and minor violations in high-crime areas as a means to search residents for drugs or weapons. Data analysis often finds the tactic does little to improve public safety. Instead, it leads to racial profiling, acts as a gateway to mass incarceration, and contributes to increased killings by law enforcement.Tampa’s low-income Black neighborhoods have felt the brunt of that strategy. More than half of those arrested by Tampa officers annually are Black, though Black people make up less than a quarter of the population — a disparity that has remained consistent for at least the past decade.Police initiatives have disproportionately targeted Black residents, Tampa Bay Times investigations revealed. From 2009 to 2016, 80% of those ticketed in a bike citation program — which the federal government later deemed ineffective in fighting crime — were Black. Ninety percent of those evicted through a recent program aimed at reducing crime in low-income apartment complexes — sometimes triggered by misdemeanors or charges that were later dropped — were Black.Recent research suggests that police departments with more Black and Hispanic officers lead to fewer use-of-force incidents, traffic stops, and arrests — particularly in neighborhoods of color. As far back as the 1980s, mayors have promised to advance diversity at the Tampa Police Department, touting mentorship programs and recruitment strategies.Over the course of a generation, those efforts have barely made a dent.In 1987, the force was 10% Black. In 2020, it was 12%, compared to 22% of the population. Overall, nearly 70% of Tampa officers are white, compared to only 43% of the city, according to agency data.“I am one of those people who believes I control my own destiny,” said Reginald James, a current Black sergeant in Tampa with more than 22 years’ experience. “But there’s a lot of discrimination in our department.”Former Tampa mayor Sandra Freedman, who in the 1990s attempted to overhaul the force and boost diversity after the police killings of three Black men set off riots, said the agency’s internal culture proved her biggest roadblock to reform.“Every department has good officers — people who want to make change in their communities,” Freedman told BuzzFeed News. “But they are stymied at every turn by people who want to cut corners.”The agency says it has made efforts to move away from policies that result in racial profiling. Both the bike citation program and the crime-free housing program were discontinued. Arrests overall have decreased significantly over the past decade, according to data compiled by the Florida Department of Law Enforcement.Mayor Jane Castor, a former Tampa police chief who oversaw the bike citation and housing crime programs, declined interview requests from BuzzFeed News and did not respond to a list of questions and statements included in this story. Dirk Shadd/Tampa Bay Times via AP Mary O’Connor addressing reporters after being appointed police chief In March, she appointed a new police chief: Mary O’Connor, her former assistant chief at the agency who retired in 2016 to work as a consultant and trainer.O’Connor rose up through Tampa’s ranks at a time when sexual harassment was considered common on the force and told BuzzFeed News she recognized some of the Black officers’ frustrations. She declined to comment on the actions of previous administrations but promised a fresh start under her leadership and said the George Floyd protests had “changed the ball game” when it comes to responding to the needs of the community and officers’ mental health.“I know what it’s like to be in the minority in a white, male-dominated profession,” she said. “For officers like Jerry Wyche who want to see positive change, in the future, there will be a lot of opportunities to have their voices heard.”So far, she has been attending listening sessions with Black clergy members and created a suggestion box to solicit feedback from officers. She said she is working on ramped-up recruiting initiatives as well as wellness support and diversity and language training for officers.Implementing change from the top, she acknowledged, comes with challenges. “You have to get proper buy-in,” she said. “A lot of things can get lost to translation.”Wyche and other Black officers said they support O’Connor’s goals but are watching to see if she will be effective.“I know she wants to do new things and try different approaches, but we’ve still got the same like-minded individuals in leadership,” Wyche said. “I just hope she does try to get that old boy’s mentality out of here because obviously, it’s not working.” Wyche knew what it felt like to be profiled.Decades ago, he was driving around Tampa with friends: three young Black men, out for a night on the town in a champagne-colored Mazda Millenia.A Black officer pulled him over, then searched him. At least two more police cars pulled up to the scene, he recalled.Humiliated, Wyche asked the officer why. He remembers her saying, “It looked like you didn’t belong in your car.”The experience, and others like it, didn’t stop Wyche from becoming a cop.Other people could sit on the sidelines and complain, he liked to say. Wyche wanted a seat at the table.Raised in the Tampa suburbs by a single mother who had fled an abusive boyfriend, Wyche grew up with dreams of joining a brotherhood of higher purpose. He looked up to the cops who mentored him at an after-school program and brought him home after he drove a borrowed car into a ditch at 16. He credited them with helping him avoid the path of relatives who struggled with addiction or got into drug dealing, and he hoped to do the same for others.He joined the Tampa Police Department full time in 2008, then went undercover for the narcotics squad, served on the Honor Guard, and worked with the plainclothes violent crimes unit. He often referred to the agency as his “family.”But his idea of good police work sometimes clashed with the agency’s priorities.Early in his career, he came to understand how easily bias could creep into police work, even his own.In his first year patrolling a low-income, majority-Black neighborhood, he was on high alert to identify those involved in recent shootings or robberies. At the time, the agency judged officers on metrics: Productivity reports cataloged each ticket, arrest, or interaction and spit out a ratio that was used to measure success at yearly reviews (the practice has since been discontinued at yearly reviews, the agency said).So he focused on “pretextual stops” — finding reasons to pull over cars driven by young Black men who might be connected to the crimes — and ignored older drivers or white people. Then he noticed the habit stuck when he worked in other neighborhoods.He vowed to be more rigorous and to never become like the cop who had profiled him.What he saw in Tampa’s lower-income communities were people who were overpoliced yet underprotected, living with the constant fear of shootings and robberies but reluctant to share information with officers they mistrusted. If he wanted to get to the root of the neighborhood’s issues, he knew he had to work harder to build relationships that would help solve major cases of wrongdoing, instead of chasing every small drug charge he could find.He remembered the first time one of his arrests — a man caught carrying a baggie of crack cocaine — led to a federal conviction. With supervisors congratulating him, Wyche had felt proud.Then he learned the man’s prison sentence: 21 years. The number stopped him cold. He pictured the man’s children. What good could come of so many years locked away?He couldn’t change the laws, but at that moment he decided to focus his energies whenever possible on educating people rather than arresting them. Scott Olson / Getty Images Demonstrators protest the killing of teenager Michael Brown on Aug. 19, 2014, in Ferguson, Missouri. Six years into Wyche’s career, protests against police brutality began to fill streets across the nation. Michael Brown, Eric Garner, Alton Sterling, Tamir Rice, Philando Castile, and others killed by officers became household names.Wyche knew what it was like to face a volatile situation with your finger on the trigger. In one bodycam video reviewed by BuzzFeed News, he points his gun as a fleeing man puts his hands behind his back — a movement that Wyche believed supervisors would interpret as reaching for a weapon. Wyche didn’t shoot. A second later, the man revealed his hands: empty.So he understood the outrage against police actions that seemed driven by unconscious bias. But he also wanted to show the public his perspective that not all cops are so quick to use violence. In 2017, with the agency’s support, he was featured in the A&E docuseries Nightwatch, which aims to “chronicle the sacrifice and heroic work of the first responder.” The show captured him searching for armed robbers in dark alleys and calming a Black driver’s nerves during a traffic stop.On Snapchat and Instagram, Wyche began sharing personal snippets from his life and work, like dancing in the car with his partner or making blueberry pancakes with his teenage son. It was an entryway to dialogue: Young Black men and women sometimes messaged him with questions about police conduct or to tell him they appreciated the way he talked to people on the show. Some asked for help deciding if policing could be a career path for them.Around that time, Taylor Randolph, a Tampa activist involved in Black Lives Matter protests, came across his Snapchat feed. Under a photo of Wyche with a little girl, he’d written: “My job is to keep people out of jail. Help motivate them to be great young so they won’t get arrested older.” Intrigued, she followed him.At first, Randolph found many of his posts irritating. When he talked about police misconduct cases across the nation, he defended the institution and blamed “bad apples.” She was repelled by his earnest #BacktheBlue hashtags, she said.She started messaging Wyche on Snapchat. In screenshots of those messages she shared with BuzzFeed News, she sometimes ranted about police cases in the news, calling him a “Pig Cop.”Their conversations got heated, but neither backed away. Randolph’s son had recently started driving, and she appreciated hearing Wyche explain his approach to traffic stops. She grew grudging respect for him.“He is the kind of cop that cops should be,” Randolph said. “If there were more of them, the United States would be a far better and safer place for people who look like me.”Still, Randolph believed American policing was rotten from the inside, tainted by its role in upholding slavery and its legacy of racism. She couldn't understand how Wyche was able to reconcile his identity and his work in a system that fueled the mass incarceration of Black people. In her view, policing could only be fixed by outside pressure.Wyche recognized the legal system was “fucked up,” he conceded in his messages. Every day he put on the uniform knowing it was a symbol of oppression, he said, but he used that energy to motivate him.“I had a choice, be angry and bitter or do something,” he told Randolph one day. “I became a cop to make a difference.” On the night of the traffic stop he later reported, Wyche recalled pulling up to a Shell gas station at around 10 p.m. and saw his SWAT squadmate Nathan Toole talking to the teenage driver of a gray Toyota Camry.A former high school football star in nearby Hudson, Florida — a city of about 12,500 people that is more than 91% white — Toole had signed up for the police academy after an injury ended his collegiate sports career, according to a Tampa Bay Times article.He joined the Tampa Police Department in 2011 and made the SWAT team on his first try in 2014, personnel files show. His supervisors soon encouraged him to “start to study for the next promotional exam.”He has no major discipline cases in his file and excelled at the agency’s metrics on proactive policing, evaluations show. In his first three years on the force, Toole investigated 1,235 “quality of life” complaints — minor infractions that can include noise, loitering, or public intoxication — and made arrests in 92% of them. He was assigned 2,547 calls for service but initiated 10,999 on his own.“Officer Toole is extremely active and seizes all opportunities during patrol,” a supervisor wrote. “Although he is a relatively young officer, he has shown that he is willing to put the department’s objectives ahead of his personal desires.”Reached by phone, Toole declined to speak to a reporter without agency approval. The police department did not make him available for interviews.“We’ve got a spike in gun and violent crime and this is a really good cop that is making the community safer,” said Adam Smith, the mayor’s spokesperson.After arriving at the Shell gas station, Wyche peeked his head into the car and saw three Black teenagers sitting quietly and looking scared. He later told investigators he heard Toole say, “they’re clean”— meaning there were no warrants in the teenagers’ names — “I’m trying to get consent to search.”For a consent search to be legal, a driver must feel free to leave at any time. To Wyche, that meant turning off emergency lights, returning the driver’s license, and making sure officers weren’t crowded around. He usually made it clear by saying, “You’re free to go,” before asking, “Do you mind if I search the vehicle?”And yet, after Wyche walked back to his car, six of his colleagues remained in position around the Camry. Wyche snapped a photo on his phone to send to another Black officer.“I guess this is the new consent search,” he remembered writing in a text message.After Wyche reported his concerns to Internal Affairs, investigators interviewed the 18-year-old driver, My’Tia Pegues, and the owner of the car, Ebony Anderson, who was not at the scene.According to transcripts of her interview, Pegues told investigators that when Toole asked to search, she said she was uncomfortable. She had just taken a high school course in crime studies and knew her right to refuse a search, but the officer kept insisting, she said.So she called Anderson, her boyfriend’s mother, and passed the phone to the officer. When he hung up and ordered everyone out of the car, she assumed Anderson had consented.But Anderson told investigators she never agreed to a search. She remembered the officer saying on the phone, “I’m just letting them go, it’s no big deal.” When she couldn’t reach her son or Pegues on the phone, Anderson went to the scene and found officers arresting her son for a gun they had found in a backpack.When she asked why the car was searched, Toole mentioned smelling cannabis. That didn’t make sense to her, she told investigators. She asked why he hadn’t mentioned it on the phone.Pegues told investigators she was also confused by the cannabis explanation, which came after the search was already conducted.Yet the investigators omitted Pegues’ and Anderson’s skepticism and summarized their interviews this way: “Both subjects recalled the Officer mentioning the smell of marijuana in the car as the reason for the search. During the interviews, neither subject accused the Officers of any wrongdoing.”Investigators were unable to retrieve video from that night. They didn’t interview any of the other six officers who were at the scene and instead relied on their depositions given to the arrested 17-year-old’s public defender.Those depositions do not lay out a full timeline of events. Toole and his partner described smelling cannabis while questioning the teenagers. Toole said he touched his ear or nose to send a nonverbal cue to his partner about the cannabis smell. His partner described smelling it herself, then searching the car. They both said Toole called Anderson after the 17-year-old was in handcuffs — a contradiction to both Pegues’ and Anderson’s memories.But the investigators decided the officers’ depositions were consistent with the report and closed the case. The agency declined to comment on the investigation. When BuzzFeed News requested a list of internal investigations for the past 10 years, it was not included. The agency said it was “reclassified.”Keith Taylor, a former New York Police Department detective sergeant who supervised SWAT and Internal Affairs units, reviewed the investigation for BuzzFeed News. He called the differing accounts of the interaction “a very clear red flag of an attempt to cover up behavior that is not compliant with the agency’s policies.”He was unable to draw any conclusions from the investigation, he said, because it was incomplete. If he were overseeing it, he’d reinterview the officers instead of relying on their depositions to explore any inconsistencies and would likely pass the review to an independent entity, like the state attorney’s office, he said. At the New York Police Department, he would also have recommended integrity tests designed to see how the officers respond in similar situations.“This is a very serious matter because it involves intimidation and the loss of the rights of the persons that were stopped,” he said. “The tolerance for official misconduct or corruption is laid bare for the officer who made the complaint, as well as the individuals in the car. That has to be addressed in a forceful way.”Chief O’Connor said she supported Wyche’s decision to report the incident but declined to review the investigation because it occurred prior to her leadership. “I have to trust that professional standards were the same then as now,” she said.Contacted by a reporter, Pegues said she had never seen the 17-year-old, her boyfriend, get in trouble. She remembered him desperately repeating “junior, junior!” to make sure officers didn’t confuse him with his father, who has the same name and a long criminal record. The boy’s charges for being a minor in possession of a concealed firearm were ultimately dropped. Efforts to reach Ebony Anderson for this story were unsuccessful.Pegues said she had not understood her interview was part of an internal investigation into the search. She was surprised to learn there had been no consequences. Asked how she felt about Wyche’s decision to report the incident, she said, “I’m glad he couldn’t sleep. He should have said something when he snapped that photo.” Ivy Ceballo As in many police departments, the demographics of Tampa's don't reflect those of the city. When Wyche received the letter the following August notifying him of the investigation’s conclusion, he felt like a target had been placed on his back.Police officers who speak up against colleagues often face retaliation. Last year, reporters for USA Today identified 300 examples of officers who had reported misconduct over the last decade and found all of them were eventually forced out of their departments. Some received death threats or dead rats in their lockers. Others had their requests for backup ignored or soon became entangled in discipline cases.Wyche already had a blemish on his record. In March, he had received a written warning — his first major one — after weapons were stolen from his police vehicle.He had been using a loaner van that lacked a lockbox key while his usual car was in for repairs. He left his weapons in the car parked outside his house because he didn’t want to have guns inside with his son around, he said — but that violated policy. Supervisors also verbally warned him about his social media usage, saying they worried that his posts had led to his car getting burglarized, though they produced no direct evidence.A week after the traffic stop investigation closed in August, Wyche got into trouble again. At an elementary school presentation, he put his gun’s magazine in a basket on the teacher’s desk, worried the excited children might try to grab it from his pocket as he moved around the classroom. Then he forgot about it. When an employee found it the next day, the school went into lockdown.In the wake of his second violation in one year, Wyche was kicked off the SWAT team.He took it hard. The squad had represented a high point of his career dreams, and he saw it as punishment for speaking out.He couldn’t stop obsessing over all the little details and feelings of betrayal that had led up to his expulsion. The way a teammate he didn’t know very well had complained to supervisors about his social media accounts instead of talking to him directly. The time a colleague told him other officers were “gunning” for him. How his bosses said there weren’t any replacement weapons to give him after his were stolen — but how then, months later, they had weapons to give new recruits to the team.He knew he had made mistakes, but he also worried the scrutiny and discipline were signs of a deeper exclusion — that supervisors were building a pattern of incompetence that could lead to termination.The way he began to see it, he had given everything to the department, yet his SWAT “family” had turned their backs and discarded him as soon as he spoke up about the rights of Black teenagers.He gathered all those indignations into a discrimination complaint he filed with the state, alleging that, as one of two Black men on the SWAT team, he was singled out for social media monitoring, retaliated against because he had reported a teammate to Internal Affairs, and never reissued service weapons after his were stolen, putting him in danger on the job.Discrimination cases are difficult to win without an unmistakable, documented case of inequity or a clear pattern over time. Wyche had a collection of perceived selective treatment. The city responded with its own interpretation of those incidents, including that eight years earlier a white SWAT member had been kicked off the team for inappropriate social media conduct. His infractions included posts that showed him drinking while driving a boat, among 10 other incidents that displayed “an egregious pattern of behavior.”Wyche’s discrimination case was dismissed.His troubles continued. The next year, Wyche’s gun accidentally discharged in its holster while he was exiting his car.Wyche was kicked off plainclothes and undercover work and sent back to work overnight shifts responding to nonstop calls in the agency’s bottom ranks. He filed another discrimination complaint, but that didn’t go anywhere either.Colleagues believed Wyche’s treatment stood out.“For the last couple of years, they have been on his back — every time he did something they thought was wrong, they would go after him severely,” said James Dausch, a retired white officer who worked with Wyche on the Violent Crimes Unit. “To me, he is an excellent officer and now he’s getting a reputation as basically screwing up and getting in trouble for stuff other people don’t get in trouble for.”Wyche’s current supervisor, Reginald James, said he believes leaders like former chief Brian Dugan were looking to push Wyche out.“As a police officer, he is very, very good and shouldn’t be having the type of problems he’s having,” James said.The agency declined to respond to questions about the case or Wyche and others’ characterization of his career. Dugan, who retired last September, said he had lost confidence in Wyche because he felt he didn’t take responsibility for his mistakes. He confirmed that in a meeting, he called Wyche “incompetent” and an “embarrassment to the department.” When asked if he thought Wyche should be on the force, he said: “It’s probably good for him that I’m gone.”Meanwhile, in 2019 Toole was promoted to corporal. The agency posted a video of one of the ceremonies with a caption celebrating “18 of the best and brightest.”Sometimes, Wyche confided his frustrations in Randolph, the Black Lives Matter activist. The relentless optimism that had initially annoyed her was wearing thin. “It probably hurt him quite a bit to find the thin blue line only runs so deep, and at the end of the day, he is Black,” she said.Last June, Wyche was driving down Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard, turning over his job issues in his head, when he lost control of his car and crashed into an iron rod. It slammed through the window, barely missing him. For the first time, he called the agency’s mental health hotline. He wondered how much longer he would stay on the force. Wyche’s social media accounts are private now. Last year, feeling fed up, he posted a rant on Instagram:The good old boy system is stronger than ever. Because it’s allowed to thrive. It can be killed, but they won’t. Because that means you have to treat everyone equally. That’s not ever going to happen unless the cowards resign or you make them feel uncomfortable. Stand together and call them out on their BS.Over Snapchat, Randolph, the activist, wondered why he didn’t quit.“How can you survive in such an institution, with the trauma that comes along with it?” she asked him.But after all he had seen, he still felt tied to his commitment. He thought of the young girl who approached him recently in the courtyard of a public housing complex to ask, “When someone goes to jail, are they a bad person?” He recognized her and knew her mother had recently been arrested.“No,” he explained. “They’re not a bad person. They just made a bad decision.” It was a well-worn phrase Wyche often found himself needing to repeat to children in the neighborhood. (BuzzFeed News spoke to a witness who independently verified his account.)To Randolph, he replied: “My

US Police Misconduct

MEMPHIS, Tenn. (AP) — Memphis authorities released more than an hour of footage Friday of the violent beating of Tyre Nichols in which officers held the Black motorist down and struck him repeatedly as he screamed for his mother.The video emerged one day after the officers, who are all Black, were charged with murder in Nichols' death.The footage shows police savagely beating the 29-year-old FedEx worker for three minutes while screaming profanities at him throughout the attack. The Nichols family legal team has likened the assault to the infamous 1991 police beating of Los Angeles motorist Rodney King.“I’m going to baton the (expletive) out you,” one officer can be heard saying. His body camera shows him raise his baton while at least one other officer holds Nichols.After the first officer roughly pulls Nichols out of his car, Nichols can be heard saying, “I didn't do anything,” as a group of officers begins to wrestle him to the ground.“Get on the ground!," one officer yells, as another is heard yelling “Tase him! Tase him!”Nichols calmly replied soon after being wrestled to the pavement, “OK, I’m on the ground.” Moments later, as the officers continue to yell, Nichols says, “Man, I am on the ground.”An officer yells, “Put your hands behind your back before I break your (expletive).” Moments later, an officer yells, “(Expletive), put your hands behind your back before I break them.”“You guys are really doing a lot right now,” Nichols says loudly to the officers. “I’m just trying to go home.”“Stop, I’m not doing anything” he yells moment later.The camera is briefly obscured and then Nichols can be seen running as an officer fires a Taser at him. The officers then start chasing Nichols.After the beating, officers milled about for several minutes while Nichols lay propped up against the car, then slumped onto the street.Cities across the country braced for large demonstrations. Nichols’ relatives urged supporters to protest peacefully.“This young man, by definition of the law in this state, was terrorized. Not by one, not by two, but by five officers who we now know ... acted in concert with each other," said attorney Antonio Romanucci, who represents Nichols’ family.The officers "acted together ... to inflict harm, terrorism, oppression of liberty, oppression of constitutional rights, which led to murder," Romanucci said.Memphis Police Director Cerelyn Davis described the officers' actions as “heinous, reckless and inhumane,” and said that her department has been unable to substantiate the reckless driving allegation that prompted the stop.She told The Associated Press in an interview that there is no video of the traffic stop that shows Nichols recklessly driving.During the initial stop, the video shows the officers were “already ramped up, at about a 10,” she said. The officers were “aggressive, loud, using profane language and probably scared Mr. Nichols from the very beginning.”“We know something happened prior to this officer or these officers getting out of their vehicles … Just knowing the nature of officers, it takes something to get them amped up, you know, like that. We don’t know what happened," she said.“All we know is the amount of force that was applied in this situation was over the top,” Davis said.Given the likelihood of protests, Davis told ABC that she and other local officials decided it would be best to release the video later in the day, after schools are dismissed and people are home from work.Nichols' mother, RowVaughn Wells, warned supporters of the “horrific” nature of the video but pleaded for peace.“I don’t want us burning up our city, tearing up the streets, because that’s not what my son stood for,” she said Thursday. “If you guys are here for me and Tyre, then you will protest peacefully.”Speaking at the White House, President Joe Biden said Friday that he was “very concerned” about the prospect of violence and called for protests to remain peaceful.Biden said he spoke with Nichols' mother earlier in the day and told her that he was going to be “making a case” to Congress to pass the George Floyd Act “to get this under control.” The legislation, which has been stalled, is meant to tackle police misconduct and excessive force and boost federal and state accountability efforts.FBI Director Christopher Wray said he was “appalled” by the video and that all FBI field officers have been alerted to work with state and local partners, including in Memphis, “in the event of something getting out of hand.”Court records showed that all five former officers — Tadarrius Bean, Demetrius Haley, Desmond Mills Jr., Emmitt Martin III and Justin Smith — were taken into custody.The officers each face charges of second-degree murder, aggravated assault, aggravated kidnapping, official misconduct and official oppression. Four of the five officers had posted bond and been released from custody by Friday morning, according to court and jail records.Martin’s lawyer, William Massey, and Mills’ lawyer, Blake Ballin, said their clients would plead not guilty. Lawyers for Smith, Bean and Haley could not be reached.“No one out there that night intended for Tyre Nichols to die,” Massey said.Second-degree murder is punishable by 15 to 60 years in prison under Tennessee law.Patrick Yoes, the national president of the Fraternal Order of Police, condemned the alleged actions of the Memphis officers.“The event as described to us does not constitute legitimate police work or a traffic stop gone wrong. This is a criminal assault under the pretext of law," Yoes said in a statement.Rallies and demonstrations were planned Friday night in Memphis, Boston, Chicago, Detroit, New York City, Portland, Oregon and Washington.New York Mayor Eric Adams, a former police officer, said he and other mayors across the country had been briefed by the White House in advance of the video’s release, which he said would “trigger pain and sadness in many of us. It will make us angry.”Romanucci and civil rights attorney Ben Crump, who also represents Nichols' family, called on the police chief to disband the department’s so-called scorpion unit focused on street crime.Nichols “at all times was an innocent victim,” Romanucci said Friday. "He did nothing wrong. He was caught up in a sting. This scorpion unit was designed to saturate under the guise of crime fighting, and what it wound up doing instead was creating a continual pattern and practice of bad behavior.”Davis said other officers are still being investigated for violating department policy. In addition, she said “a complete and independent review” will be conducted of the department’s specialized units, without providing further details.Two fire department workers were also removed from duty.As state and federal investigations continue, Davis promised the police department’s “full and complete cooperation."Crump said the video showed that Nichols was shocked, pepper-sprayed and restrained when he was pulled over near his home. He was returning home from a suburban park where he had taken photos of the sunset.Relatives have accused police of causing Nichols to have a heart attack and kidney failure. Authorities have said only that Nichols experienced a medical emergency.___Associated Press reporters Aaron Morrison in New York; Travis Loller in Nashville, Tennessee; and Rebecca Reynolds in Lexington, Kentucky, contributed to this report.

US Police Misconduct

Hopin CEO and founder Johnny Boufarhat has made new cuts at the virtual events startup after pushing for “sustainable” growth as the global economy stalls.Johnny Boufarhat In July 2021, the virtual events startup Hopin was considered the fastest-growing startup in the world. Now, it's laying off 29% of its staff, following a previous cut of 12% back in February. With hiring now frozen, and marketing budgets slashed, a startup that was once worth $7.8 billion at its peak has stumbled—like many other pandemic winners—as restrictions have been lifted around the world. Hopin, which was founded in 2019, hosts online conferences for companies like Slack, Dell and Unilever. The new cuts add up to 380 layoffs this year, as the startup tries to focus on “sustainable growth” after the pandemic supercharged its business. The company, which is run as a remote team, has raised over $1.1 billion total in a lightning succession of rounds from top investors Andreessen Horowitz, Accel, Tiger Global and IVP. In July 2021, Hopin raised $470 million at a $7.8 billion valuation in a round led by Arena Holdings and Altimeter Capital. With the influx of cash came soaring head count: After acquiring six smaller companies in the space of just six months, Hopin had over 1,000 employees. CEO and founder Johnny Boufarhat, who recently moved to Switzerland, sold around $150 million of Hopin stock in the last fundraising. Boufarhat talked last July about preparing the company to go public in 2022, but the Russian invasion of Ukraine, and rising interest rates, sparked a major stock market sell-off earlier this year. The plunge in the valuation of publicly-listed competitors — Zoom which caters to smaller virtual events, has seen its stock plummet 71% over the last year — has started to filter through to startups like Hopin. At least 21,000 staff have been laid from US-based startups since the start of the year, according to Crunchbase data. Hopin executives said they had warned staff earlier this month that further cuts might be needed because of the “macroeconomic conditions” and the company’s new focus on profitable growth. Other so-called “pandemic winners” like Zoom, Peloton and Netflix have seen growth stall as offices, gyms and cinemas have reopened over the last year. “We’ve made the very difficult decision to reduce our workforce given the current macroeconomic climate and need for our events product to move forward efficiently,” says a spokesperson for Hopin in a statement. “While we took preventative measures before looking at a more significant restructure, it became necessary to simplify our events business and supporting operations to build a profitable and sustainable company.” Hopin says that staff involved in the cuts would get three months of compensation and benefits, share vesting options would be relaxed, and they would be allowed to keep company laptops.

Unemployment

The NSW government has announced free hospitality courses for anyone looking to peruse a career in the hospitality sector amid labour shortages across the state. The New South Wales Government has launched a number of free hospitality courses in a bid to “supercharge” the economy. The ‘Kickstart Your Career in Hospitality’ program will offer nine different courses to anyone looking to secure a job or further their career in hospitality.Minister for Skills and Training Alister Henskens said the move aims to alleviate labour shortages across the state.“A strong hospitality sector is absolutely critical for NSW,” he said.“Whether you want to be a barista or a bartender, this initiative will enable you to train for free and get the skills you need."Stream more on politics with Flash. 25+ news channels in 1 place. New to Flash? Try 1 month free. Offer ends 31 October, 2022Earlier this month, the Australian Bureau of Statistics reported the unemployment rate for June which fell by 0.4 per cent to 3.5 per cent.Head of Labour Statistics at ABS, Bjorn Jarvis declared this was the lowest unemployment rate since 1974. “This is the lowest unemployment rate since August 1974, when it was 2.7 per cent and the survey was quarterly,” he said.“These flows reflect an increasingly tight labour market, with high demand for engaging and retaining workers, as well as ongoing labour shortages.”ClubsNSW CEO Josh Landis also backed the program, saying it poses “incredible opportunities” in clubs across the state.“Someone who gets their first job in a club can go on to do amazing things,” he said.“Clubs offer careers in cooking, hotel management, customer service, business operations and much more.“These aren't just fee-free short courses, they could be your first step on a hugely successful and satisfying career journey.”In 2021, the NSW government took a similar approach when they announced thousands of free training opportunities to fill "critical" staff shortages in the hospitality sector.Up to 3,000 people were able to study across 29 different courses at TAFE NSW and other registered providers.Premier Dominic Perrottet said free training would help attract more workers to hospitality venues as part of the state's recovery from the pandemic."People from all over the state are lining up to get into pubs and clubs and we want to support those businesses with enthusiastic and skilled staff," he said.The Australian Bureau of Statistics revealed Australia’s inflation rate on Wednesday which rose 6.1 per cent over the year to June off the back of new houses and petrol. The yearly rise in the Consumer Price Index was the largest Australia has seen in more than two decades and up from the 5.1 per cent figure in the year to March. Over the quarter, the Consumer Price Index was up 1.8 per cent as Australia battled floods, labour shortages and increased freight costs."Shortages of building supplies and labour, high freight costs and ongoing high levels of construction activity continued to contribute to price rises for newly built dwellings," said Head of Prices Statistics at the ABS, Michelle Marquardt

Unemployment

MoneyWatch August 5, 2022 / 8:40 AM / MoneyWatch GDP growth falls for second quarter White House says U.S. is not in a recession despite GDP growth fall 02:19 Hiring surged in July, with U.S. employers creating 528,000 jobs last month, the Labor Department said Friday. That far exceeded economist expectations for gains of 250,000 new jobs during the period. It was also a jump from the previous month, when businesses added 372,000 jobs despite the highest inflation in 40 years. The unemployment rate ticked down to 3.5% from 3.6% in June, marking the lowest since February 2020, just before the COVID-19 pandemic erupted. Before the latest payrolls report, the economy was adding roughly 450,000 jobs per month.The employment numbers underscore the resilience of the economy following two straight quarters of declining GDP, which is considered a hallmark of a recession. Despite this shrinking economic growth, hiring has remained robust as businesses continue to add new jobs and hold onto their current workers amid strong consumer demand.  Weekly jobless claims rise and mortgage rates drop as economic recovery remains in flux 03:19 "With all the concerns around a recession, one of the key data points that says the economy is still growing has been the jobs numbers," noted Brad McMillan, chief investment officer for Commonwealth Financial Network, in a research note before the report was released.  Some analysts also point out that job growth alone is an unreliable indicator of a downturn, noting that hiring often remains strong in the early stages of a recession. For example, in the three months immediately preceding the housing crash-induced recession that started in December 2007, the Labor Department's monthly payrolls survey showed the economy gaining nearly 300,000 jobs per month, according to Societe Generale Cross Asset Research. Thanks for reading CBS NEWS. Create your free account or log in for more features. Please enter email address to continue Please enter valid email address to continue

Unemployment