Trump Accused of ‘Criminal Extortion’ After Asking Georgia Officials to ‘Find’ 11,000 Votes for Him

Trump Accused of ‘Criminal Extortion’ After Asking Georgia Officials to ‘Find’ 11,000 Votes for Him

“Knowing what Trump has said in leaked phone calls, just imagine what he’s said in calls that weren’t.”

by Julia Conley

Days before the U.S. Congress is set to certify President-elect Joe Biden’s victory in the November 3 election, political observers on Sunday demanded to know how much effort President Donald Trump has put into pressuring state officials into naming him as the winner, after the Washington Post released audio of Trump pleading with Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger to “find” more than 11,000 votes for him.

As the Post reported, Trump spoke with Raffensperger and Ryan Germany, general counsel to the secretary of state, warning that by certifying Georgia’s election results—which showed Biden winning 49.5% of the vote to Trump’s 49.3%, and taking the state’s 16 electoral votes—the two are taking “a big risk” and potentially breaking the law.

Trump urged Raffensperger to simply tell the public that he “recalculated” the results and determined the president won the state, to which the secretary of state, also a Republican, told Trump, “The data you have is wrong.”

The president soon thereafter took a more direct approach.

“So look,” Trump said. “All I want to do is this. I just want to find 11,780 votes, which is one more than we have. Because we won the state.”

Listen:

At one point the president asked Germany to substantiate baseless rumors that ballots which cast votes for Trump in Fulton County were “shredded” by poll workers and that Dominion, which supplied voting machines for the election, removed the machinery from polling places to unfairly swing the results in Biden’s favor.

“No, Dominion has not moved any machinery out of Fulton County,” Germany told Trump, adding, “I’m sure. I’m sure, Mr. President.”

The president suggested at one point that as a Republican, Raffensperger should want to have an “accurate election”—or one that Trump won.

“We believe that we do have an accurate election,” the secretary of state replied.

In a separate audio clip, Raffensperger reiterated, “We have to stand by our numbers. We believe our numbers are right.”

Critics condemned the latest evidence that Trump, two months after the election, is actively attempting to undermine the will of American voters.

The phone call came several weeks after Raffensperger told the Post that Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) was among several Republicans both in and outside of Georgia who pressured the secretary of state to invalidate legally-cast ballots.

Should Trump’s and other Republicans’ attempts to swing Georgia’s numbers in the president’s favor succeed, Trump would gain only 16 electoral votes—far fewer than he would need to meet the 270 threshold to be declared the winner of the election.

That suggests, some said on social media, that the president and his allies have likely made or plan to make similar phone calls to other election officials in states where they’ve contested the results, including Pennsylvania and Michigan.

“Everyone who has a tape of Trump abusing his power should release it now,” tweeted former U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara.

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Source: Trump Accused of ‘Criminal Extortion’ After Asking Georgia Officials to ‘Find’ 11,000 Votes for Him | Common Dreams News

‘This Is No Bluff’: Sanders Vows to Filibuster Military Budget to Force Senate Vote on $2,000 Checks

‘This Is No Bluff’: Sanders Vows to Filibuster Military Budget to Force Senate Vote on $2,000 Checks

“It would be unconscionable, especially after the House did the right thing, for the Senate to simply leave Washington without voting on this.”

By Jake Johnson

Sen. Bernie Sanders is vowing to filibuster the Senate’s upcoming attempt to override President Donald Trump’s veto of the annual military spending bill in an effort to force a clean vote on House-passed legislation that would provide one-time $2,000 direct payments to struggling Americans.

“This week on the Senate floor [Republican Majority Leader] Mitch McConnell wants to vote to override Trump’s veto of the $740 billion defense funding bill and then head home for the New Year,” the Vermont senator said in a statement late Monday. “I’m going to object until we get a vote on legislation to provide a $2,000 direct payment to the working class.”

“We can force the Senate to stay in session until the New Year. This is no bluff.”
—Warren Gunnels, Sanders staff director

“Let me be clear: If Senator McConnell doesn’t agree to an up or down vote to provide the working people of our country a $2,000 direct payment, Congress will not be going home for New Year’s Eve,” Sanders added. “Let’s do our job.”

Sanders’ statement came shortly after the Democrat-controlled House overwhelmingly passed the CASH Act, which would increase the direct payments in the new coronavirus relief law from $600 to $2,000 and include some people who were originally deemed ineligible for the checks, such as adult dependents. The measure passed by a 275-134 vote, with 44 House Republicans joining 231 Democrats in approving the bill.

Following the House vote, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) reiterated his intention to try to pass the CASH Act on Tuesday, declaring that “every Senate Democrat is for this relief.”

But McConnell has not committed to allowing a vote on the bill, intransigence that prompted Sanders’ vow to hold up a Senate vote to override Trump’s veto of the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA). The House voted to override the president’s veto Monday night.

“At noon tomorrow, McConnell is expected to ask for Unanimous Consent to vote on the veto override of the $740 billion defense bill,” said Warren Gunnels, Sanders’ staff director. “Bernie will object until we get a vote on $2,000 direct payments. We can force the Senate to stay in session until the New Year. This is no bluff.”

In an interview with Politico, Sanders said that “it would be unconscionable, especially after the House did the right thing, for the Senate to simply leave Washington without voting on this.”

“The American people are desperate,” the Vermont senator added, “and the Senate has got to do its job before leaving town.”

Politico noted that “the Vermont independent can’t ultimately stop the veto override vote, but he can delay it until New Year’s Day and make things more difficult for the GOP… Though veto overrides can be filibustered, as Sanders plans to do, it is a rare procedural move because the veto override already requires 67 votes and the filibuster is simply a delay tactic, according to the Congressional Research Service.”

While Sanders may not have the power to single-handedly kill the NDAA veto override, The American Prospect‘s David Dayen wrote Monday that the Vermont senator “has the procedural means at his disposal to keep the Senate in session all the way to New Year’s Day, inconveniencing senators of both parties, particularly the incumbent Republicans from Georgia, who are in their final full week of campaigning for runoff elections on January 5.”

Dayen reported that Sanders will be operating “with the backing of the Senate Democratic caucus.”

As Dayen explained:

In order to get through the week without a clean vote on the $2,000 payments, Senate Majority Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) will have to object numerous times to Sanders’ pleas to bring up the bill…

The Senate operates on the principle of unanimous consent. It’s not impossible to get things done if one senator objects, but it’s quite a bit slower. The majority needs to hold votes and waste time to muscle past an objecting senator. For this reason, Sanders can prevent quick passage of the defense bill override, the only thing McConnell really wants to accomplish in the last week of the Senate session.

This ramps up pressure on McConnell to just hold a vote on the $2,000 checks. Senators don’t want to be stuck in Washington on New Year’s Eve or New Year’s Day if they can prevent it…

McConnell has options to eventually get to the defense bill vote. He can move to end debate, known as a cloture vote, and push past Sanders’ objection. However, he cannot do that on Tuesday, because he won’t have enough senators in the building to win a floor vote.

In a tweet late Monday, Sanders pointed to new Data for Progress polling showing that 78% of likely U.S. voters—84% of Democrats, 73% of Republicans, and 74% of Independents—support a $2,000 direct relief check.

“The House approved a $2,000 direct payment,” Sanders wrote. “Let the Senate vote, Mitch!”

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Source: ‘This Is No Bluff’: Sanders Vows to Filibuster Military Budget to Force Senate Vote on $2,000 Checks | Common Dreams News

‘Yes, Exactly,’ Say Progressives After Pence Warns Democrats Will ‘Make Rich Poorer and Poor More Comfortable’

Yes, Exactly,’ Say Progressives After Pence Warns Democrats Will ‘Make Rich Poorer and Poor More Comfortable’

“You have to be all sorts of twisted to think ‘making poor people more comfortable’ is a bad thing.”

By Julia Conley

The grassroots organization People for Bernie on Tuesday advised the Democratic Party to take a page from an unlikely source—right-wing Vice President Mike Pence—after Pence told a rally crowd in Florida that progressives and Democrats “want to make rich people poorer, and poor people more comfortable.”

“Good message,” tweeted the group, alerting the Democratic National Committee to adopt the vice president’s simple, straightforward description of how the party can prioritize working people over corporations and the rich.

Suggesting that a progressive approach to the economy will harm the country—despite the fact that other wealthy nations already invest heavily in making low- and middle-income “more comfortable” by taxing corporations and very high earners—Pence touted the Republicans’ aim to “cut taxes” and “roll back regulations.”

The vice president didn’t mention how the Trump administration’s 2017 tax cuts overwhelmingly benefited wealthy households and powerful corporations, with corporate income tax rates slashed from 35% to 21%, corporate tax revenues plummeting, and a surge in stock buybacks while workers saw “no discernible wage increase” according to a report released last year by the Economic Policy Institute and the Center for Popular Democracy.

Similarly, the Republican Party’s recent attempts to roll back regulations include measures that have actively harmed working families, including the administration’s termination of overtime protections for workers—resulting in an estimated $1.2 billion in lost earnings—and of requirements that federal contractors meet labor and wage standards.

While the GOP during the coronavirus pandemic has allowed enhanced unemployment benefits to expire and cited concerns over the federal deficit while blocking legislation to offer Americans a second round of $1,200 stimulus checks—despite the fact that the deficit has grown by trillions of dollars under President Donald Trump—progressives including Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) have consistently called for robust economic relief for workers.

Along with Sen. Ed Markey (D-Mass.) and Vice President-elect Kamala Harris, Sanders introduced legislation to provide Americans with monthly payments of $2,000 in May, saying the $1,200 direct payment included in the CARES Act last March was “not nearly enough.”

In August, Sanders also introduced a bill to tax the “obscene wealth gains” of U.S. billionaires during the pandemic, which would raise at least $420 billion—a sum that would allow the popular Medicare program to pay all out-of-pocket healthcare expenses for everyone in the U.S. for a year.

Pence’s description of progressive goals was “exactly” correct, author and commentator Anand Giridharadas tweeted.

“Yes, and what’s wrong with making poor people more comfortable?” asked Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.).

The consumer advocacy group Public Citizen denounced Pence for suggesting the government should not prioritize the wellbeing of Americans who are struggling financially during a pandemic, including an estimated 50 million people expected to face food insecurity this year.

“You have to be all sorts of twisted to think ‘making poor people more comfortable’ is a bad thing,” tweeted the group.

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Source: ‘Yes, Exactly,’ Say Progressives After Pence Warns Democrats Will ‘Make Rich Poorer and Poor More Comfortable’ | Common Dreams News