Fox News forced to correct legal scholar over humiliating and debunked election error claim

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A legal scholar on Fox News attempted to spew a debunked claim about election errors on Friday, and even the network’s conservative anchors had to stop him in his tracks. 

On Friday, Jonathan Turley, who famously defended the president during impeachment, appeared on Fox & Friends where he discussed a false theory surrounding the Dominion voting machines. According to Turley, “thousands” of President Donald Trump’s votes in Michigan were switched to President-elect Joe Biden in Michigan — another claim the president is pushing to undermine his election defeat to his Democratic opponent.

Turley claimed the software had been used in multiple states including “half of the districts in Michigan” as he suggested that the “vulnerable” software may have impacted the outcome of the election. He made clear he believed mistakes may be the result of “human error.” 

However, a Fox News co-host pushed back as he noted that he also researched Trump’s claim. He explained that the glitch did not impact or compromise the vote count in any way. Like Trump’s arguments, Turley’s claims were also confirmed to be unfounded.  Continue reading.

In Trump’s final days, a 30-year-old aide purges officials seen as insufficiently loyal

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Over the past week, President Trump has axed his defense secretary and other top Pentagon aides, his second-in-command at the U.S. Agency for International Development, two top Homeland Security officials, a senior climate scientist and the leader of the agency that safeguards nuclear weapons.

Engineering much of the post-election purge is Johnny McEntee, a former college quarterback who was hustled out of the White House two years ago after a security clearance check turned up a prolific habit for online gambling.

A staunch Trump loyalist, McEntee, 30, was welcomed back into the fold in February and installed as head of personnel for the Trump White House.. Since the race was called for President-elect Joe Biden, McEntee has been distributing pink slips, warning federal workers not to cooperate with the Biden transition and threatening to oust people who show disloyalty by job hunting while Trump is still refusing to acknowledge defeat, according to six administration officials. Continue reading.

White House official admits the administration is still pretending Biden didn’t win

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White House trade adviser Peter Navarro claimed on Friday that White House officials are still operating as if President Donald Trump will remain in office for a second term despite him losing the presidential election to President-elect Joe Biden. 

During an appearance on Fox Business, Navarro revealed how post-election day-to-day operations are occurring at the White House. Navarro’s remarks appear to confirm numerous reports circulating about the Trump administration’s stance on Biden winning the election. According to them, he did not win at the election at all. In fact, Navarro and others are continuing to blatantly disregard the outcome of the election.

“We are moving forward here at the White House under the assumption there will be a second Trump term,” Navarro said on Friday morning. Continue reading.

Minnesota GOP sent virus alert only to its side of the aisle

Some Republicans tested positive, but no DFLers were told before session. 

A day after it was revealed that GOP state Sen. Dave Senjem tested positive for COVID-19 after attending a Nov. 5 party caucus, news broke that Republican senators and staffers were informed in a Tuesday memo that “a number of [GOP Senate] members and staff have been diagnosed with COVID-19.”

DFLers were not informed of the rash of cases on the other side of the aisle.

In the memo, Craig Sondag, the Senate Republican chief of staff, declined to reveal the names of the infected, citing a balance between the infected people’s right to privacy and the need of their contacts to know they had been exposed. He instructed all GOP Senate staffers to work from home, including during Thursday’s special session. Continue reading.

Trump faces around two dozen legal threats leaving office — and he’s getting desperate

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President Trump has only made one brief public appearance since the election was called for Joe Biden, and his Twitter feed is filled with conspiracy theories about widespread voter fraud, which state elections officials have repeatedly rejected. His refusal to concede has complicated President-elect Biden’s transition, and senior Republicans have mostly aligned behind Trump or stayed silent as he continues his desperate legal campaign to overturn the election results in several key states that won Biden the presidency. New Yorker staff writer Jane Mayer says Trump has a lot at stake due to the litany of lawsuits and criminal investigations he faces. “He has many reasons to be concerned,” she says. “If he leaves the White House, he’s going to lose the immunity that goes along with being president.”

Transcript

This is a rush transcript. Copy may not be in its final form.

AMY GOODMAN: This is Democracy Now!, democracynow.org, The Quarantine Report. I’m Amy Goodman.

The number of Americans hospitalized due to COVID-19 has more than a doubled in the past week as infections soar to record numbers across the nation. On Thursday, a staggering 163,000 new cases were reported — a new world-shattering record. The U.S. death toll has topped 242,000. Despite the surge, President Trump is largely ignoring the crisis, letting the virus rip through the country. Continue reading.

Charles Koch says he regrets fueling partisanship: ‘Boy, did we screw up!’

The billionaire Charles Koch, who has funneled millions into the GOP and conservative movements, reportedly expressed misgivings over how that money had fueled excessive partisanship.

In an interview with The Wall Street Journal’s Douglas Belkinpublished Friday, Koch spoke about his new mission of unification across partisan lines.

He also shared with The Journal parts of his new book, “Believe in People: Bottom-Up Solutions for a Top-Down World,” in which he said he regretted his partisanship and the divisions it fostered. Continue reading.

John Kelly criticizes Trump over delay of Biden transition

“It’s about the nation,” Trump’s former chief of staff says in an interview with POLITICO. The wait “hurts our national security.”

President-elect Joe Biden should start receiving intelligence briefings, and the delay in allowing the transition to officially get started is damaging U.S. national security, President Donald Trump’s former chief of staff John Kelly told POLITICO in an exclusive interview.

“You lose a lot if the transition is delayed because the new people are not allowed to get their head in the game,” Kelly said Friday. “The president, with all due respect, does not have to concede. But it’s about the nation. It hurts our national security because the people who should be getting [up to speed], it’s not a process where you go from zero to 1,000 miles per hour.”

“Mr. Trump doesn’t have to concede if he doesn’t want to, I guess, until the full election process is complete. But there’s nothing wrong with starting the transition, starting to get people like the national security people, obviously the president and the vice president-elect, if they are in fact elected, to start getting them [up to speed] on the intelligence,” he said. Continue reading.

Passengers on first cruise in Caribbean since March test positive for coronavirus

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The first cruise in the Caribbean since March has halted its journey after passengers tested for the coronavirus “returned assumptive positive results” on Wednesday, yachting company SeaDream said in a news release.

The cruising ship, the SeaDream I, returned to port in Barbados on Wednesday after administering rapid tests on all passengers as part of its routine testing protocol, which requires testing before and during the journey.

The reported outbreak is a major setback for the cruise industry, which has been touting testing as a path to the return to sea. Continue reading.

Emmer, House GOP see majority in reach for 2022

‘High expectations’ after party beat expectations this year

Rep. Tom Emmer, the Minnesota Republican who chaired his party’s House campaign arm this election cycle, sees a GOP majority coming into view in 2022. 

Emmer, who is expected to reprise his role as chairman of the National Republican Congressional Committee for the coming election cycle, already has his sights set on districts where Democrats just barely kept their seats on Election Day. Republicans have history on their side too: The party out of power in the executive branch typically picks up seats in midterm elections. 

And with Democrats’ majority in the 117th Congress likely to be razor-slim, Republicans will probably need a net gain in the single digits to retake the gavels in two years. Continue reading.

In the Know: November 16, 2020

Coronavirus
Moderna’s coronavirus vaccine is 94.5% effective, according to company data, CNN 
Whitmer: Atlas’ call for Michiganders to ‘rise up’ against Covid restrictions ‘took my breath away, Politico
States and Cities Tighten Restrictions as U.S. Caseload Soars, New York Times

Georgia Senate Runoff
Ossoff, Warnock start Georgia runoffs behind the eight ball, Politico
Georgia Republicans Worry Trump Feud Could Hurt Key Senate RunoffsWall Street Journal 

Governor Tim Walz 
Walz, frontline workers to address Minnesotans Monday afternoon as hospitalizations surgeBring Me the News 
Walz criticizes Senate GOP for not disclosing COVID casesStar Tribune

Continue reading “In the Know: November 16, 2020”