Wicked Blue
Wicked Blue's JournalU.S. files conspiracy charge against Oath Keeper leader in alleged plot against the Capitol
Source: Washington Post
By Spencer S. Hsu and Devlin Barrett
Jan. 19, 2021 at 8:52 a.m. EST
U.S. authorities have leveled the first conspiracy charge against an apparent leader of an extremist group in the Jan. 6 storming of the U.S. Capitol, arresting an alleged Oath Keeper who is accused of plotting to disrupt the electoral vote confirmation of President-elect Joe Biden’s victory and proposing further assaults on state capitols.
Thomas Edward Caldwell, 65, of Clarke County, Va., was taken into custody before 7 a.m. on four federal counts, including conspiracy to commit an offense against the United States in the attack on the Capitol. The conspiracy charge is reserved for offenses interfering with or obstructing the lawful operation of government.
A charging affidavit says he helped organize a group of eight to 10 individuals, including self-styled Ohio militia members apprehended Sunday, who wore helmets and military-style gear and were seen moving purposefully toward the top of the Capitol steps and leading the move against police lines.
The affidavit cited a Jan. 1 Facebook message in which Caldwell said he had scouted lodging for several others at a Comfort Inn in Ballston, Va., about eight miles from the Capitol that “would allow us to go hunting at night if we wanted to.”
Read more: https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/legal-issues/conspiracy-oath-keeper-arrest-capitol-riot/2021/01/19/fb84877a-5a4f-11eb-8bcf-3877871c819d_story.html
Anonymous $40 Million Gift Will Pay Law School for 50 Civil Rights Attorneys
NBC4Washington
By Michael Warren
The NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund launched a $40 million scholarship program on Monday to support a new generation of civil rights lawyers, dedicated to pursuing racial justice across the South.
With that whopping gift from a single anonymous donor, the fund plans to put 50 students through law schools around the country. In return, they must commit to eight years of racial justice work in the South, starting with a two-year post-graduate fellowship in a civil rights organization.
“The donor came to us,” said Sherrilyn Ifill, president of the Legal Defense and Educational Fund. “The donor very much wanted to support the development of civil rights lawyers in the South. And we have a little bit of experience with that.”
https://www.nbcwashington.com/news/national-international/anonymous-40-million-gift-will-pay-law-school-for-50-civil-rights-attorneys/2545105/
Trump lifts Covid-19-related travel restrictions for much of Europe, the UK, Ireland and Brazil
Source: CNN
By Kaitlan Collins, Caroline Kelly and Gregory Wallace
(CNN) President Donald Trump on Monday lifted coronavirus-related travel restrictions for much of Europe, the United Kingdom, Ireland and Brazil, effective on January 26 -- nearly a week after he leaves office.
In an executive order issued Monday evening, Trump said he had been advised to lift restrictions for European countries in the Schengen Zone, which consists of 26 countries, the UK, Ireland and Brazil but leave in place restrictions on travel from Iran and China.
"I agree with the Secretary that this action is the best way to continue protecting Americans from COVID-19 while enabling travel to resume safely," Trump wrote in the order, referring to Secretary of Health and Human Services Alex Azar.
President-elect Joe Biden is set to take over the presidency on Wednesday and his incoming press secretary, Jen Psaki, said that his administration would not lift the restrictions.
Read more: https://www.cnn.com/2021/01/18/politics/trump-covid-travel-restrictions/index.html
Because CNN updated its story, I UPDATED the last paragraph to add comment by Biden's press secretary saying the Biden administration will not list the restrictions
McConnell, Schumer close in on power-sharing agreement in evenly divided Senate
CNN
Manu Raju, Senior Congressional Correspondent
The top two Senate leaders are nearing a power-sharing agreement to hash out how the evenly divided chamber will operate, with Democrats in charge of setting the schedule but both parties likely to hold an equal number of seats on Senate committees, according to sources familiar with the talks.
The negotiations between Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer and Republican Leader Mitch McConnell have been built largely around how the Senate operated the last time the body was split 50-50: When George W. Bush initially became president in 2001. Final details are still being sorted out between the two leaders, sources said.
Biden Transition
Similar to those rules, set in January 2001, Schumer and McConnell aides are discussing allowing bills and nominations to advance to the Senate floor even if they are tied during committee votes, something that could become common given that each party is expected to have the same number of seats on committees.
Democrats will hold the chairmanships of the committees, giving them power to set the agenda, and Schumer will be granted the title of majority leader since Vice President-elect Kamala Harris will cast tiebreaking votes on the floor.
https://www.cnn.com/2021/01/18/politics/mitch-mcconnell-chuck-schumer-power-sharing-deal/index.html
Aditya Singh: Man found 'living in airport for three months' over Covid fears
BBC
A man too afraid to fly due to the pandemic lived undetected in a secure area of Chicago's international airport for three months, US prosecutors say.
Aditya Singh, 36, was arrested on Saturday after airline staff asked him to produce his identification.
He pointed to a badge, but it allegedly belonged to an operations manager who reported it missing in October.
Police say Mr Singh arrived on a flight from Los Angeles to O'Hare International Airport on 19 October.
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-55702003
Attorney Roberta Kaplan is about to make Trump's life extremely difficult
Washington Post
By Karen Heller
Jan. 18, 2021
On the other side of Donald Trump’s turbulent presidency, the lawyers are waiting.
Leaving aside his Senate impeachment trial, mounting government investigations include a civil probe by New York Attorney General Letitia James, a criminal probe by Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance Jr., and a federal probe by acting U.S. Attorney for D.C. Michael Sherwin that may include Trump’s role in the catastrophic storming of the U.S. Capitol this month.
But already pending for the soon-to-be South Florida retiree is a trio of lawsuits that allege defamation, fraud and more fraud — all of which are helmed by one attorney.
Roberta Kaplan’s clients include writer E. Jean Carroll, who filed a defamation case after Trump claimed she was “totally lying” about her allegation that he raped her a quarter-century ago in a Bergdorf Goodman dressing room, and niece Mary L. Trump, who claims that Trump and two of his siblings deprived her of an inheritance worth millions.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/style/roberta-kaplan-lawyer-attorney-trump/2021/01/17/ae8890f2-50f8-11eb-bda4-615aaefd0555_story.html
Raw Story has their version of the article at
https://www.rawstory.com/trump-legal-problems-2650010970/
Inside the roots of modern America's home-grown right-wing extremism
Raw Story
Heather Cox Richardson, Moyers & Company
January 18, 2021
Since right-wing insurrectionists stormed the Capitol on January 6 with the vague but violent idea of taking over the government, observers are paying renewed attention to the threat of right-wing violence in our midst.
For all our focus on fighting socialism and communism, right-wing authoritarianism is actually quite an old threat in our country. The nation's focus on fighting "socialism" began in 1871, but what its opponents stood against was not government control of the means of production — an idea that never took hold in America — but the popular public policies which cost tax dollars and thus made wealthier people pay for programs that would benefit everyone. Public benefits like highways and hospitals, opponents argued, amounted to a redistribution of wealth, and thus were a leftist assault on American freedom.
In the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries that fight against "socialism" took the form of opposition to unionization and Black rights. In the 1920s, after the Bolshevik Revolution in Russia had given shape to the American fear of socialism, making sure that system never came to America meant destroying the government regulation put in place during the Progressive Era and putting businessmen in charge of the government.
When Democrat Franklin Delano Roosevelt established business regulation, a basic social safety net, and government-funded infrastructure in the 1930s to combat the Great Depression that had laid ordinary Americans low, one right-wing senator wrote to a colleague: "This is despotism, this is tyranny, this is the annihilation of liberty…. The ordinary American is thus reduced to the status of a robot. The president has not merely signed the death warrant of capitalism, but has ordained the mutilation of the Constitution, unless the friends of liberty, regardless of party, band themselves together to regain their lost freedom."
Much more:
https://www.rawstory.com/right-wing/
Mick Mulvaney's niece listed on the permit for Trump rally that became Capitol insurrection
Raw Story
Sarah K. Burris
January 17, 2021
The Associated Press did an extensive expose on the public records available for those who participated in the "Stop the Steal" rally that ended with a riot and insurrection against the U.S. Capitol.
One piece of the report outed Maggie Mulvaney, niece to top Trump's old aide Mick Mulvaney, as the VIP Lead on the permit that Women for America First requested for the Trump rally.
According to the AP, the younger Mulvaney "worked as director of finance operations for the Trump campaign, according to her LinkedIn profile. FEC records show Maggie Mulvaney was earning $5,000 every two weeks from Trump's reelection campaign, with the most recent payment reported on November 13."
The insurrection on the capitol led to the resignation by Mick Mulvaney, who had moved from being Trump's chief of staff to United States Special Envoy for Northern Ireland after March 2020. He confessed to CNBC that he wanted to resign because his reputation would likely take a hit for the rest of history, prompting people to say "'Oh yeah, you work for the guy who tried to overtake the government.'"
https://www.rawstory.com/mick-mulvaneys-niece-listed-insurrection/
NJ Army Reservist With Security Clearance Busted for Capitol Riots
Daily Beast.
Justin Rohrlich
Updated Jan. 17, 2021 12:48PM ET / Published Jan. 17, 2021 12:12PM ET
A U.S. Army reservist with a secret-level security clearance and “access to a variety of munitions”—described in court papers as a white supremacist and Nazi sympathizer—has been charged with taking part in the violent Jan. 6 Capitol insurrection.
Timothy Louis Hale-Cusanelli of Colts Neck, New Jersey, works as a contractor at Naval Weapons Station Earle, which is also in Colts Neck, according to an FBI affidavit filed last week.
He now faces five federal counts: knowingly entering or remaining in a restricted building without lawful authority; disorderly conduct on Capitol grounds; disrupting the orderly conduct of government business; parading, demonstrating or picketing in a Capitol building; and obstructing a law enforcement officer.
Naval Weapons Station Earle is the operational support base for four Military Sealift Command combat logistics ships: USNS Arctic, USNS Robert E. Peary, USNS William McLean, and USNS Medgar Evers.
More:
https://www.thedailybeast.com/nj-army-reservist-with-security-clearance-busted-for-capitol-riots?ref=home
Biden has Cuppa Joe. What should be the official ice cream flavor for T-rump?
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