“Andrew wouldn’t give up like Breitbart has. Trump won and everyone knows it. Wake up Breitbart before you go down like Fox”
– The current top comment on the Breitbart article “Wall Street Ally to Donald Trump: Time to Move On” posted Monday morning, headline referring to Steve Schwarzman of Blacktone group.
Setting a new pandemic record, more than three million Americans took flights within the United States from Friday through Sunday, CNN reports.
Despite warnings from public health officials suggesting people forgo large gatherings during the Thanksgiving holiday, approximately 1% of the American population opted to board flights.
Medical professionals noted that while the flights themselves may not lead to infections, the ensuing gathers of family and friends–particularly those who do not isolate beforehand–will lead to a widespread growth in infections.
With economic signals and coronavirus infection rates pointing to a “double dip” recession as more states implement public health restrictions due to virus outbreaks, President-elect Joe Biden is pushing Congressional leadership to strike a deal on a relief package, according to the New York Times (via Yahoo News to avoid paywall).
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and the GOP have blocked efforts to negotiate a relief bill, saying that they will not budge off an inadequate $500 billion proposal. The Democrats, led by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, have presented a $2.4 trillion package.
Republicans do not support the Democratic package because it provides funds for cities and states that are facing decreased tax revenues during the pandemic. Trump, McConnell and Republicans have claimed falsely that the money will only go to “bail out Democrat [sic]-led cities.”
Axios: “President-elect Joe Biden on Monday unveiled his nominations for top national security positions in his administration, tapping former Secretary of State John Kerry as his climate czar and former deputy national security adviser Avril Haines as director of national intelligence. Haines, if confirmed, would make history as the first woman to oversee the U.S. intelligence community. Biden also plans to nominate Alejandro Mayorkas to become the first Latino secretary of the Department of Homeland Security.”
Where's John Durham?
— Rep. Matt Gaetz (@RepMattGaetz) November 23, 2020
Rob Portman (R-OH): “I have supported the Trump campaign’s right to count every lawful vote, request state recounts and pursue lawsuits regarding election fraud or other irregularities. Based on polling, a substantial majority of the nearly 74 million Americans who supported President Trump question the legitimacy of the election. I believe going through a fair and transparent process to ensure the election was properly decided is important for our democracy and to help heal our polarized country. In supporting this post-election process, I have said that the states and the courts should act expeditiously and that any allegations of fraud must be based on evidence, which is what the law requires. This process has now been going on for about three weeks.”
“The Trump campaign has taken steps to insist that only lawful votes were counted in key states, including filing numerous lawsuits. At this point, the vast majority of these lawsuits have been resolved and most of the remaining ones are expected to be resolved in the next couple of weeks. There were instances of fraud and irregularities in this election, as there have been in every election. It is good that those have been exposed and any fraud or other wrongdoing should be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law, but there is no evidence as of now of any widespread fraud or irregularities that would change the result in any state.”
FLASHBACK: In 2018, President Trump attacked Carrots the turkey for refusing to concede he had lost the vote on the White House turkey pardon contest.
"This was a fair election… unfortunately, Carrots refused to concede and demanded a recount."
— Andy Kaczynski (@KFILE) November 23, 2020
Georgia’s state election board has extended two emergency measures designed to make vote processing easier used in the November election to apply to the January Senate runoff elections, the Atlanta Constitution Journal reports.
The measures allow for county boards of elections to use ballot drop boxes and also allow, but not mandate, local election officials to process mail-in ballots prior to the date of the election.
Georgia is holding two simultaneous runoff elections for its two Senate seats. In one, incumbent Republican Kelly Loeffler faces Democrat Raphael Warnock. In the other Republican David Perdue is running for reelection against Democrat Jon Ossoff.
“George Soros has been arrested and is currently being held in federal custody in Philadelphia. According to a recently unsealed indictment filed in the Western District of Pennsylvania, Soros has been charged with a number of serious crimes relating to the US election. The indictment lists only on the criminal activity Soros participated in prior to the November election, such as wire fraud, identity theft, aiding and abetting, and damage to computers.”
“The FBI stated that the indictment will likely be updated to reflect election interference charges in relation to Dominion Voting, once the full scale of Soros’ operations has been exposed. Soros is currently being interrogated by the FBI” says an article on YourNewsWire.com, a site which was identified as a Russian proxy by Salon in 2017.
Mr. Soros is comfortably celebrating Biden’s victory and planning his next moves as of this writing.
The US Supreme Court issued on Monday its order list for outstanding cases, including denied motions in submitted cases, and it excluded any decision on the Trump campaign’s case to exclude mail-in ballots in Pennsylvania.
No new grants from SCOTUS this AM, including no action on the PA absentee ballot case (which won't affect the outcome either way): https://t.co/ERchEr8H8a
— Matt Ford (@fordm) November 23, 2020
The SCOTUS order list is a summary of orders issued by the Court in outstanding cases brought before it. It can deny the cases or it can order specific actions for the cases to proceed. The order is typically compiled during conferences with the justices and indicate that the justices have found specific legal grounds to issue these orders. They do not come with opinions or votes.
Greg Sargent: “So is this really how it’s going to be? Will it now become a fact of our political life that Democrats will be required to win future presidential elections by steal-proof margins in order to prevail? With President Trump’s attempts to overturn the election continuing in Michigan and Wisconsin, more Republicans are distancing themselves. They are ‘subtly urging’ Trump to accept reality and are ‘losing patience’ with his antics, we are told. But in the very formulation that some of these Republicans have adopted – and in the sheer numbers who have refrained from going even this far – there is grounds for serious pessimism about what all this portends.”
“What happens if the last-ditch tactic Trump’s team has adopted – trying to get rogue GOP-controlled state legislatures to appoint pro-Trump electors to the electoral college in defiance of their state’s voters – becomes seen as a conventional tool of political warfare, akin to more typical voter suppression efforts? The responses from Republicans hint at ways this could become a ticking electoral time bomb. Many of them are merely suggesting that Trump should allow the transition to proceed. But they are also carefully stressing that he is absolutely within his rights to continue legal challenges. And, tellingly, far fewer Republicans are denouncing the endgame that those legal challenges are all converging toward.”
More than 100 Republican former members of the national security community, including former Department of Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge sent a letter to Congressional GOP members, urging them to push outgoing president Donald Trump to concede the election, the Washington Post reports.
“President Trump’s refusal to permit the presidential transition poses significant risks to our national security, at a time when the U.S. confronts a global pandemic and faces serious threats from global adversaries, terrorist groups, and other forces,” the statement reads.
The Trump Administration is obstructing President-elect Joe Biden’s team by refusing to recognize Biden’s popular vote and Electoral College victories, preventing the incoming administration from learning about the status of key government pandemic and national security situations.
The DC U.S. Attorney today confirmed to me that they will not pursue an investigation of who is funding the thugs who attacked my wife and me and sent a DC police officer to the hospital. https://t.co/abpESDJ4nx
— Rand Paul (@RandPaul) November 23, 2020
“Concerned that President Trump’s refusal to accept the election results is hurting the country, more than 100 chief executives plan to ask the administration on Monday to immediately acknowledge Joseph R. Biden Jr. as the winner and begin the transition to a new administration.”
“As a way of gaining leverage over the G.O.P., some of the executives have also discussed withholding campaign donations from the two Republican Senate candidates in Georgia unless party leaders agree to push for a presidential transition, according to four people who participated in a conference call Friday in which the notion was discussed. The two runoff elections in Georgia, which will take place in early January, will determine the balance of power in the United States Senate. In a letter they plan to send Monday, business leaders will demand that Emily W. Murphy, head of the General Services Administration, issue a letter of ascertainment affirming that Mr. Biden and Vice President-elect Kamala Harris have won the election. Ms. Murphy has so far resisted calls to begin the normal transition planning, which includes providing resources and money to an incoming administration as it prepares to take control” – New York Times.
“From late December 2019 through Nov. 2, 67 percent of U.S. adults who identify as Republican viewed Fox News favorably, according to Morning Consult’s Brand Intelligence, which tracks consumer attitudes of thousands of brands, while roughly 16 percent had an unfavorable view of the cable channel. Then came election night, when Fox News was the first news organization to project a Trump loss in the battleground state of Arizona” Morning Consult reports.
“The announcement reportedly enraged the president, and in the days since he has continued to wallop the network on Twitter, saying its ratings have ‘completely collapsed,’ criticizing its coverage of his supporters’ rally in Washington, D.C., on Nov. 14 and suggesting that his followers turn instead to One America News Network or Newsmax, two conservative cable news networks. It appears such rhetoric has impacted public opinion of the brand. In polling conducted Nov. 9-16, the network’s average favorability rating among GOP respondents has dropped 13 percentage points, to 54 percent, and the average share of those with an unfavorable view of the network nearly doubled, to 30 percent. “
“The first person offering public comment at the Luzerne County’s Board of Elections in PA is a Trump supporter who is asking for the vote to not be certified until an investigation is completed. Trump won the county” reports Politico’s Holly Otterbein.
NBC News: “What’s gotten lost in all of the focus on President Trump’s lawsuits, his baseless accusations of voter fraud and his administration’s unwillingness so far to begin the transition is a simple fact. The 2020 presidential election wasn’t really that close. Right now, Joe Biden’s popular-vote lead over Trump stands at 4 percentage points, 51 percent to 47 percent — and it’s only going to grow once more of New York’s votes (finally) get counted.”
“That would give Biden the second-largest popular vote margin out of the 21st century’s six presidential elections, with only Barack Obama’s 7-point win in 2008 being greater. When it comes to the Electoral College, the tally stands at Biden 306, Trump 232 – which happens to be the exact same split as Trump’s 2016 win versus Hillary Clinton (but in reverse). And Trump referred to that as a ‘massive landslide victory.’ Biden’s ahead by 154,000 votes in Michigan (greater than Trump’s 10,000-vote winning margin there in 2016). He’s ahead by 81,000 votes in Pennsylvania (nearly twice Trump’s 44,000-vote win there four years ago). And he’s ahead by more than 20,000 votes in Wisconsin (almost the same as Trump’s 23,000-vote victory there in 2016). On top of those leads, Biden also narrowly flipped the traditionally GOP-leanings states of Arizona and Georgia. The 2020 presidential race looked close the 12 hours after the first polling places closed on Election Night. But nearly three weeks later — with almost all the votes counted — it’s now safe to say the Biden-vs.-Trump contest wasn’t that close.”
“Republicans represent a dwindling base of mostly white, working class voters. With every passing election, this base gets smaller. Therefore, in order to win they need to get higher and higher turnout from that base. Trump has proven that the best way to jack up turnout with these voters is through an apocalyptic, conspiracy theory laden narrative of victimization at the hands of others. The ‘others’ in this narrative are almost always people of color. This is the core of Trump’s white nationalist immigration appeal – immigrants/gang members/Muslims are coming to your community to take your job and threaten your life. It’s bullshit, but it’s clearly powerful with a relatively sizable portion of the population” writes Dan Pfieffer.
“An election ‘stolen’ in majority minority cities like Atlanta, Philadelphia, Detroit and Milwaukee is exactly the sort of racially divisive conspiracy theory that Republicans believe help them fire up their base. The Republicans continue to promulgate this absurd lie even though Trump actually improved on his 2016 performance in most of these cities. The Republican approach to the post-election period is a very specific political calculation about what they believe is best for the party – regardless of the impact on the country. To disabuse the base of the absurd notion that the election was stolen would risk lower turnout in the two Georgia special elections that will determine control of the Senate. Once these Senate elections are behind us, the prospect of taking the House in 2022 will once again push Republicans to adopt a proto-Trumpian strategy. And then with the 2024 GOP primary looming, things will get worse.”
Financial Times: “Facebook is plotting a charm offensive to repair ties with the incoming Biden administration, as it looks to stave off the threat of being more heavily regulated or even broken up during the president-elect’s term in office. Company executives are planning a major push to encourage users to take a coronavirus vaccine, as well as incentivising people to share content related to the Paris climate agreement, which Joe Biden has promised to rejoin, in the hopes of winning favour in Washington.”
“The social media company has long been a source of anger among senior Democrats, many of whom blame it for not doing enough to combat misinformation. In the days after this month’s election, Bill Russo, Mr Biden’s deputy communications director, posted a series of tweets attacking the company, saying: ‘If you thought disinformation on Facebook was a problem during our election, just wait until you see how it is shredding the fabric of our democracy in the days after.’ Facebook hopes that Nick Clegg, the company’s vice-president of global affairs, will help mend relations. The former British deputy prime minister struck up a rapport with Mr Biden when both were in office nearly a decade ago. The next few years are likely to prove one of the most important periods in Facebook’s history, and could even determine whether it will survive in its current form. The company is under investigation by the Federal Trade Commission and state attorneys-general for violating competition laws, and could face being broken up.”
“It’s over. That’s what Blackstone chairman, CEO and co-founder Steve Schwarzman — one of President Trump’s most loyal allies — and other top Republicans are signaling to the defeated president, 16 days after Joe Biden clinched the win” Axios reports.
“‘I’m a fan of good process,’ Schwarzman said. ‘In my comments three days after the election, I was trying to be a voice of reason and express why it’s in the national interest to have all Americans believe the election is being resolved correctly. But the outcome is very certain today, and the country should move on… I supported President Trump and the strong economic path he built. Like many in the business community, I am ready to help President-elect Biden and his team as they confront the significant challenges of rebuilding our post-COVID economy.’ Schwarzman’s signal is more meaningful in Trumpworld than any of the messages so far from corporate America. Trump’s top aides have undisguised contempt for some establishment business groups. But not Schwarzman. He has been a close confidant of Trump’s throughout his presidency.”
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