“Manhattan’s district attorney has convened the grand jury that is expected to decide whether to indict former president Donald Trump, other executives at his company or the business itself should prosecutors present the panel with criminal charges, according to two people familiar with the development. The panel was convened recently and will sit three days a week for six months.”

“It is likely to hear several matters – not just the Trump case ­- during the duration of its term, which is longer than a traditional New York state grand-jury assignment, these people said. Like others, they spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss an ongoing investigation. Generally, special grand juries such as this one are convened to participate in long-term matters rather than to hear evidence of crimes charged routinely. The move indicates that District Attorney Cyrus R. Vance Jr.’s investigation of the former president and his business has reached an advanced stage after more than two years. It suggests, too, that Vance believes he has found evidence of a crime – if not by Trump then by someone potentially close to him or by his company” – Washington Post.

Barring an unforeseen update to the lineup, it appears that low-talent comedian Joe Piscopo has not been asked back to headline the second Frank Speech rally following his ghastly performance at the first one earlier this month at the “legendary” Corn Palace in Mitchell, South Dakota. Altogether it appears as though Lindell is upping his spending on these events, as the production value of the flyer has been bumped up quite a bit, as well as the star quality the of, um, performers. It’s like a MAGA Coachella – with Diamond and Silk, Former Sheriff David Clarke, entitled little prick Charlie Kirk, Dinesh D’Souza, Dinesh D’Souza’s teenage girlfriend – or maybe she’s his daughter – who cares, some square-headed fuck named Brandon Howse, and the man himself, Mike Lindell.

However, despite the “star” power, the “family friendly” and “please no coolers” parts should be a big red flag for the rank and file “working class” of MAGA Nation. That means no “Fuck Biden” flags or open containers of alcohol. You’re not there to party and scream racial slurs like you would at a normal Trump MAGA rally, you’re there to pray and use barely coded Midwest-nice substitutes for racial slurs with your inside voice. As such, you’ll also need to make sure Diamond, Silk, and David Clarke aren’t within earshot when you when you talk about “those people”, because they could react by shattering your carefully constructed self-delusion that you are not a racist.

Senate Minority Leader (and “before” model for chin enhancement surgery) Mitch McConnell has finally come out of his shell to condemn Marjorie Taylor Greene’s comparison of facemask requirements during the coronavirus pandemic to Nazis forcing Jews to wear the Star of David on their clothing.

The Washington Post reports McConnell’s belated denunciation of Greene’s comment came with a caveat that he can do nothing to discipline her because she is a member of the House, not the Senate.

“Well, she doesn’t serve in the Senate. But this is one of the frequent outbursts that are absolutely outrageous and reprehensible,” McConnell told reporters at the Capitol on Tuesday afternoon. “But any punishment, I assume, would have to be administered by the House.”

So ⁦@BarackObama⁩ and I suffer from the same affliction: enlarged male BREASTS. I “deal with it” by covering up—he flaunts it and gets away with it because he’s Obama. Fortunately, our conditions aren’t as bad as BILL GATES, who seems to be snacking on ESTROGEN SANDWICHES pic.twitter.com/8U4QcqAcRr

— Greg Kelly (@gregkellyusa) May 25, 2021

An off-duty Copperas Cove police officer apparently shot a woman who made a U-turn in front of his car after an apparent road rage incident started an argument about the woman’s driving, KWTX CBS-10 News reports.

The incident happened after Lecresha Murray suddenly felt ill while she was driving her pickup and made a U-turn in the street to go to a nearby hospital.  The off-duty cop apparently took offense to Murray’s maneuver and sped up to try to cut her off, which prompted a cycle of the two drivers trying to speed past one another.

Murray finally stopped to confront the driver of the other vehicle, which was a civilian vehicle, not a police car.  Getting out of her pickup, Murray was holding the side of her body, which was in pain.  The other driver got out of his car and started arguing with Murray, and then brandished a gun. Murray tried to get back into her car, but the off-duty officer opened fire. 

Ottawa Citizen: “A soldier who called on his fellow military personnel to refuse helping with the distribution of COVID-19 vaccines has been charged with an offence related to mutiny. It’s believed to be the first time in decades that the Canadian military has laid such a charge. Officer Cadet Ladislas Kenderesi was charged with one count of ‘endeavoring to persuade another person to join in a mutiny,’ an offence under the National Defence Act. Kenderesi was also charged with one count of behaving in a scandalous manner unbecoming of an officer. The charges were laid May 12 by the Canadian Forces National Investigation Service, defence officials told this newspaper.”

“Kenderesi had appeared at an anti-lockdown rally in December in Toronto dressed in his Canadian Forces uniform and speaking out about the COVID-19 vaccine, claiming it was a ‘killer.’ He called on military personnel not to be involved in government plans to distribute the vaccine. ‘I’m asking military, right now serving, truck drivers, medical, engineers, whatever you are, do not take this unlawful order (for) the distribution of this vaccine,’ Kenderesi said at the rally. A video of his speech was posted on YouTube. Kenderesi, who had a civilian hunting knife strapped to his Canadian Forces uniform and was carrying a non-Canadian helmet, questioned the safety of the vaccine. ‘I might get in a lot of shit for doing this, but I don’t care anymore,’ he said. The crowd cheered his speech. Department of National Defence spokesman Dan Le Bouthillier said the charges will proceed through the military justice system. ‘OCdt Kenderesi was removed from performance of military duties following the December, 2020, incident,’ Le Bouthillier said.”

An incident this weekend of a passenger assaulting a Southwest flight attendant, resulting in the crew member losing two teeth, further illustrates the escalation of violence and threats on airline flights by unruly passengers, prompting a call by airlines and unions for tighter security and more stringent penalties for offenders.

According to CBS News, there were 477 documented incidents of passenger misconduct and/or violence on flights in US airways from April 7th through May 15th.  They range from passengers who are drunk and disruptive to people refusing to following mask requirements to individuals who seemingly think safety rules do not apply to them.  In Sunday’s incident, the woman who struck the flight attendant took issue with the flight attendant instructing the passenger to keep her seat belt on and remain seated while the plane was taxiing on the ground.

“While the flight attendant was staggering back with a bloody face, we were all told to stay in our seats while they brought in police to remove the unruly passenger,” a witness to the incident described in a post on Facebook.

“Attorneys for Sidney Powell once again asked a court to dismiss Dominion Voting Systems’ $1.3 billion defamation lawsuit against her, arguing that she was unfairly singled out among people who falsely claimed the company rigged the 2020 presidential election against Donald Trump. The attorneys’ Monday-night filing, meant to bolster a motion to dismiss the case, argued that Dominion didn’t have the standing to sue Powell” Business Insider reports.

“Powell has falsely claimed that Dominion was secretly in cahoots with the government of Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez, who died in 2013, and used its technology to ‘flip’ votes from Trump to Joe Biden. Powell pushed her false claims through interviews, rallies, news conferences, and four failed lawsuits seeking to overturn the election results. Powell’s attorneys, Lawrence J. Joseph and Howard Kleinhendler, said in the filing that Dominion’s lawsuit was unfair because the company didn’t also sue everyone else who supported Powell’s lawsuits. ‘Plaintiffs concede that as a public figure they must establish that Ms. Powell – the only human among defendants capable of uttering defamatory statements – acted with malice. Thus, if this Court somehow finds jurisdiction, this case must be dismissed,’ they wrote. ‘Nowhere in U.S. jurisprudence has a court found someone liable for defamation for publishing the basis of claims in four federal lawsuits supported by a combination of over 170 separate affidavits, declarations, and expert reports.'”

Senate confirms Kristen Clarke to be Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights 51-48

A Pennsylvania tech company subcontracted to conduct the recount of votes in Maricopa County has ended its participation in the audit effort, claiming that its job was done even though the recount isn’t over, AZCentral reports.

Working under Cyber Ninjas, the main contractor, Wake TSI developed the processes and procedures for Cyber Ninjas to recount the 2.1 million votes in Maricopa County.  Wake TSI’s contracted ended May 14th, the day the recount was originally supposed to end, and it opted not to renew it.

A Scottsdale-based technology company, StratTech Solutions, took over Wake TSI’s role in the recount, overseeing the manual tabulation and examination of the ballots.  The recount will restart on Monday, May 31st, after Cyber Ninjas can regain access to the arena where the recount was physically occurring; the recount was suspended because the arena had previously been booked for high school graduations.

Atlanta Journal-Constitution: “Gov. Brian Kemp signed an executive order Tuesday that bans the state government from requiring proof of vaccination against the coronavirus, joining other Republican-led states in restricting the use of so-called ‘vaccine passports.’ ‘While I continue to urge all Georgians to get vaccinated so we continue our momentum of putting the Covid-19 pandemic in the rearview, vaccination is a personal decision between each citizen and a medical professional – not the state government,’ Kemp said in a statement.”

“The governor’s order applies to state agencies, state service providers and state properties. It also forbids officials from requiring proof of vaccination to travel to Georgia, and states that official immunization records cannot be shared to create a vaccine program. The order doesn’t extend to private businesses or organizations, which could rely on digital passes to make it easier for people to show they’ve been inoculated in order to travel, attend events and take part in other activities.”

“The failure of the Senate to convict Donald Trump for inciting the Jan. 6 Capitol insurrection means he can’t be held accountable for it in any way, the former president argued in a Monday court filing. Rep. Eric Swalwell (D-CA) sued Trump, Don Jr., Rudy Giuliani, and Rep. Mo Brooks (R-AL) over the insurrection attempt, saying that they violated laws against placing public officials in danger. Trump replied for the first time in the case on Monday, saying that ‘a trial already occurred on Representative Swalwell’s allegations.’ ‘The Senate acquitted former President Trump,’ the filing reads. ‘Undoubtedly, Plaintiff was disappointed with that result, but it does not give him a second bite at the apple to relitigate the issues here'” Talking Points Memo reports.

“Swalwell alleged in the lawsuit that Trump incited the insurrection during his months-long campaign to overturn the results of the 2020 election, and did so specifically during the Jan. 6 rally at the ellipse. That, Swalwell said, placed the lives of numerous public officials in danger, and also constituted violations of D.C. law that include aiding and abetting a riot. Trump hearkened back in the filing to the kind of standard response that he would use for any attempt at accountability during his presidency, describing those efforts as either harassment or witch hunts. In this case, Swalwell’s suit is ‘abuse of the legal system and an improper attempt to harass and malign a political opponent and his son.’ The court, located in D.C., is being asked, Trump said, ‘to wade into turbulent political waters to decide what controversial speech should be favored.’ The filing marks one of the first times that Trump has addressed the consequences of Jan. 6 – a ‘turbulent’ political event, no doubt – in court.”

“The events of January 6th were horrific. We could never have imagined an attack on Congress and our Capitol at the hands of our own citizens. In the hours and days following the attack, Republican and Democratic members of Congress condemned the violence and vowed to hold those responsible accountable so our Democracy will never experience an attack like this again. A bipartisan commission to investigate the events of that day has passed the House of Representatives with a bipartisan vote and is a critical step to ensuring our nation never has to endure an attack at the hands of our countrymen again. We implore our Senate Republican colleagues to work with us to find a path forward on a commission to examine the events of January 6th” – Joint statement from Dem Senators Joe Manchin and Krysten Sinema.

Separately, Huffington Post Congressional correspondent Igor Bobic reports “Murkowski tells me she’s going to support the bipartisan January 6 commission bill”.

“New York federal prosecutors investigating Rudy Giuliani have seized material from a wider array of individuals than previously disclosed, including messages from email and iCloud accounts they believe belong to two former Ukranian government officials, as well as the cell phone and iPad of a pro-Trump Ukrainian businessman, according to a court document unsealed Tuesday. The court filing, which contained redacted portions that CNN was able to read by copying and pasting them into another document, also disclosed that federal prosecutors have ‘historical and prospective cell site information’ related to Giuliani and another lawyer, Victoria Toensing, both of whom were the subjects of search warrants executed late last month.”

“Parnas’s lawyer, Joseph Bondy, filed the letter on behalf of attorneys for all of the defendants in the case, asking a federal judge for a status conference on materials seized by authorities in the searches executed Giuliani and Toensing in late April, saying the searches produced documents relevant to their case. A spokesman for the Manhattan US Attorney’s office declined to comment. Bondy wrote that the evidence seized ‘likely includes e-mail, text, and encrypted communications’ between Giuliani, Toensing, former President Donald Trump, former Attorney General Bill Barr, ‘high-level members of the Justice Department, Presidential impeachment attorneys Jay Sekulow, Jane Raskin and others, Senator Lindsey Graham, Congressman Devin Nunes and others, relating to the timing of the arrest and indictment of the defendants as a means to prevent potential disclosures to Congress in the first impeachment inquiry of then-President Donald. J. Trump'” – CNN.

The Guardian: “French and German YouTubers, bloggers and influencers have been offered money by a supposedly UK-based PR agency with apparent Russian connections to falsely tell their followers the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine is responsible for hundreds of deaths. Fazze, which said it was an ‘influencer marketing platform… connecting bloggers and advertisers’, claimed to be based at 5 Percy Street in London but is not registered there. On Tuesday, it closed its website and made its Instagram account private. The agency contacted several French health and science YouTubers last week and asked them, in poor English, to ‘explain… the death rate among the vaccinated with Pfizer is almost 3x higher than the vaccinated by AstraZeneca’. The influencers were told to publish links on YouTube, Instagram or TikTok to reports in Le Monde, on Reddit and on the Ethical Hacker website about a leaked report containing data that supposedly substantiates the claim.”

“The article in Le Monde is about data reportedly stolen by Russian hackers from the European Medicines Agency and later published on the Dark Web. It contains no information on mortality rates. The pages on the other two sites have been deleted. The influencers were asked to tell their subscribers that ‘the mainstream media ignores this theme’, and to ask: ‘Why some governments actively purchasing Pfizer vaccine, which is dangerous to the health of the people?’ The brief also included requests to ‘act like you have the passion and interest in this topic’, and to avoid using the words ‘advertising’ or ‘sponsored’ in posts or videos because ‘the material should be presented as your own independent view’. Screen shots of the emails were posted on Twitter by Léo Grasset, a popular French science YouTuber with nearly 1.2m subscribers. Grasset said the campaign had a ‘colossal budget’ but that the agency refused to identify its client. The French investigative news site Numerama also published extracts from the exchanges, including Fazze’s exhortation to ‘encourage viewers to draw their own conclusions, take care of themselves and their loved ones.'”

Quick rough footage of the moment we heard shots fired at George Floyd Square. We counted 30 upon looking back at the footage. pic.twitter.com/oxGkLQru9Q

— Philip Crowther (@PhCrowther) May 25, 2021

https://youtu.be/4AnwEnGdVxY

A video of Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene (Q-Georgia) speaking to the Dalton (Georgia) City Council in the summer of 2020 has re-emerged, in which Greene says that she would object to the removal of statues of Hitler or “Satan himself” because it would be an effort to “take down history.”

Marjorie is wrong, and her intentional decision to compare the horrors of the Holocaust with wearing masks is appalling.

Let me be clear: the House Republican Conference condemns this language.

My full statement: https://t.co/KnliN3YbJ2

— Kevin McCarthy (@SpeakerMcCarthy) May 25, 2021

“A White House official says the United States will have 50% of American adults fully vaccinated today” reports WSJ’s Sabrina Siddiqui.

Jonathan Bernstein, Bloomberg: “President Joe Biden has famously made being boring an electoral and communications strategy. It’s both a contrast to his unpopular predecessor and a way of squaring an aggressive liberal policy agenda with a promise to revive normal politics and normal behavior. But is being boring more than that for Biden? Is it also a governing strategy? That’s one way to interpret the events of the last week. Dan Drezner, the international politics scholar, has a very nice column in the Washington Post about Biden and the conflict between Israel and Hamas, in which he argues that Biden downplayed the situation to preserve his goal of preventing the Middle East from moving up his priority list. Drezner also praises Biden’s sense of how to ratchet up pressure by waiting for events to make it work. I think that all seems correct. It’s also the case that Biden avoided doing anything dramatic, in public and apparently in private as well. I’m not saying that he achieved a cease-fire by putting everyone to sleep. But he seemed careful to keep his own role, well, on the subdued side.”

“Biden appears to be avoiding the spotlight as a way to get things done. It’s not that Biden is keeping himself invisible. For example, he’s actively negotiating with Senate Republicans on his infrastructure package. But mostly in a fairly low-key way. To some extent, this may just be a case of returning to normal. Normal presidents, after all, don’t tweet out impulsive reactions to world events. They respond by going through a policy process, making sure the administration presents a unified message and crafting decisions with input from experts and relevant policy networks. It’s possible, however, that it’s something more: A deliberate style that uses ‘boring’ to give Biden extra room to maneuver, and perhaps even increased leverage. This seems at least somewhat related to the old saw that anyone can get things done in Washington by being willing to give others the credit, but it also may be something new.”