sábado, 31 de julho de 2021
A que velocidade ia o carro?
OPINIÃO
A que velocidade ia o carro?
Em 43 dias soubemos isto tudo. Só não soubemos a que velocidade
se deslocava o carro do ministro da Administração Interna, Eduardo Cabrita.
João Miguel
Tavares
31 de Julho de
2021, 0:00
https://www.publico.pt/2021/07/31/opiniao/opiniao/velocidade-ia-carro-1972453
Foi no dia 18 de
Junho, por volta da uma da tarde. O carro onde seguia o ministro da
Administração Interna, Eduardo Cabrita, colheu mortalmente um trabalhador na
A6, perto da saída para Évora. Nuno Santos deixou duas filhas menores. Foi há
43 dias. E 43 dias depois ainda não sabemos a que velocidade se deslocava o
carro do ministro.
Neste intervalo
de tempo, já soubemos muita coisa. Soubemos que no dia do acidente o INEM
demorou uma hora a chegar porque foi enviado para o sentido errado da
auto-estrada. Soubemos pelo advogado da família que não havia marcas de
travagem no pavimento. Soubemos que o carro circulava pela faixa da esquerda.
Soubemos que o condutor não foi sujeito ao teste de álcool. Soubemos por um
esclarecimento oficial do Ministério da Administração Interna que a culpa era
toda do trabalhador. Soubemos que nenhum representante do governo esteve
presente no funeral de Nuno Santos. Soubemos que o Presidente da República
desejava ver apurados todos os factos sobre o acidente. Soubemos que a violação
dos limites de velocidade por parte de viaturas oficiais só pode ocorrer em
serviço urgente de interesse público e com sinalização adequada da marcha.
Soubemos que os acidentes com carros de governantes são um problema antigo.
Soubemos que a BMW tem meios expeditos para saber com precisão a velocidade do
embate, e que está tudo armazenado no computador central do automóvel. Soubemos
pela boca de Eduardo Cabrita, após duas semanas de um desconfortável silêncio,
que ele não se iria demitir, que os factos estão a ser apurados, que está a
passar por uma situação “dramática” no “plano pessoal”, que o acidente não deve
ser “matéria de confrontação política”, e que aos seus quatro anos como
ministro da Administração Interna correspondem os “melhores quatro anos de
indicações de segurança em Portugal”. Soubemos que o carro envolvido no
acidente pertencia a um traficante de droga. Soubemos que a sogra do traficante
de droga continua a pagar todos os meses 500 euros pela prestação do carro
usado pelo ministro, e que está à espera que ele lhe seja restituído. Soubemos
que o ministro do Ambiente, João Pedro Matos Fernandes, foi apanhado pela TVI,
no dia 5 de Julho, a 200 km/h na A2 e a 160 km/h numa estrada nacional, mas que
não tem “qualquer memória de os factos relatados terem sucedido”. Soubemos que
o Correio da Manhã andou entretido a caçar carros de Estado, incluindo o do
primeiro-ministro, a circular a alta velocidade um mês depois do acidente.
Soubemos que a federação dos sindicatos do sector considera que existe “um
silêncio ensurdecedor” sobre o caso, e que ele “indicia um procedimento moroso,
burocrático e rotineiro do apuramento de responsabilidades”. Soubemos que
existe, e sempre existiu, nas palavras de Manuel João Ramos, uma “cultura de
impunidade rodoviária que se vive a bordo das viaturas oficiais”.
Em 43 dias
soubemos isto tudo. Só não soubemos a que velocidade se deslocava o carro do
ministro.
Aquilo a que
estamos a assistir, pela enésima vez num governo de António Costa, é à
transferência das responsabilidades políticas para a esfera criminal. É sempre
necessário um relatório externo, uma acusação, um documento oficial do
Ministério Público, para que um membro do governo conclua acerca da legitimidade
da sua acção. Só que aqui não é preciso nada disso. Basta um número.
Continuarmos a desconhecer esse número 43 dias após o trágico acidente na A6
não tem justificação, nem perdão.
Louvar Otelo
OPINIÃO
Louvar Otelo
Se Abril nos deu a liberdade e a democracia, foi apesar
de Otelo, não graças a Otelo. Otelo foi o pior que Abril nos deu.
António Barreto
31 de Julho de
2021, 0:15
https://www.publico.pt/2021/07/31/opiniao/opiniao/louvar-otelo-1972541
A morte de Otelo
Saraiva de Carvalho desencadeou uma inesperada controvérsia na sociedade
portuguesa. É herói ou não é herói? Merece ou não o “luto nacional”? Deve ou
não ser recordado com um monumento?
Mais do que a
personagem de Otelo, que é simples e pouco interessante, o que realmente
surpreende é a reacção de tantos portugueses que ainda se revêem nesta figura e
no percurso. Tristes os que se identificam com tão fracos heróis!
Depois de ter
diligentemente participado, com honra e eficácia, em duas frentes da guerra
colonial, Otelo insurge-se contra a ditadura. Graças aos seus talentos de
organizador, assumiu as funções de “estratego” do golpe, isto é, das operações
de Abril. Não foi “estratego” político, para o que não tinha conhecimentos. Mas
tratou ao pormenor dos preparativos e da logística. Coordenou a criação do
dispositivo militar. Comandou o desenrolar das operações que foram por si
lideradas com indiscutível êxito. Sem violência física e sem ter derramado
sangue, o que ficará, para sempre, a seu favor e para nosso bem. Se o golpe e a
revolução tivessem gerado violência, ainda hoje teríamos um país muito
diferente e pior.
Otelo merece
consideração profissional. Com capacidade, serviu na guerra colonial em duas
frentes, pelo que foi louvado e promovido. Também merece respeito político. Com
inegável êxito, liderou as operações que derrubaram a ditadura. Também por isso
foi louvado e promovido.
O estratega
político-militar e "um símbolo" da Revolução dos Cravos. O militar
que ajudou a derrubar a ditadura e o homem julgado, condenado e amnistiado pelo
envolvimento na rede terrorista das FP25. Otelo Saraiva de Carvalho morreu este
domingo, em Lisboa, aos 84 anos.
Não são dele a
orientação política nem o programa, para o que não tinha sabedoria. Mas colocou
o seu talento ao serviço da insurreição política. Merece aplauso, que recebeu
em devido tempo. E que ainda hoje recebe, dado que os seus admiradores se
contam por milhares. Mesmo altas autoridades, que não optaram pelo “luto
nacional”, não deixaram de aparecer no velório.
Depois do 25 de
Abril, Otelo desempenhou altas funções políticas e militares, sempre a favor da
revolução, raramente a favor da democracia. Pertenceu a todos os órgãos
revolucionários militares, liderou o COPCON, um autêntico quartel-general da
revolução. Sob seu comando, com mandatos assinados por si e com o seu
patrocínio, pessoas foram detidas, capturadas e batidas, contas bancárias foram
congeladas, casas e empresas foram ocupadas. Otelo e o COPCON governaram,
durante uns meses, Lisboa e grande parte do país, com terror e intimidação.
Otelo opôs-se ao
voto nas eleições constituintes e aconselhou o voto em branco, contrariou a
Assembleia Constituinte e patrocinou o mais sinistro dos planos políticos, o
“Documento Guia da Aliança Povo MFA”, que a Assembleia do MFA aprovou e que se
destinava a destruir qualquer hipótese de Estado de direito e de sistema
democrático. Lutou contra os partidos democráticos e contra o “Grupo dos Nove”,
intimidou o PS, o CDS e o PSD, competiu com o PCP, com o qual teve querelas.
Dirigiu várias iniciativas revolucionárias, todas anti-democráticas, como as
organizações do Poder Popular, os GDUP, a FUP e as FP-25.
Nunca defendeu
eleições livres para a criação de poder legislativo, nunca lutou pelo Estado de
direito, sempre atacou o regime parlamentar e o sistema democrático. Foi
derrotado no 25 de Novembro pelas forças democráticas. Como foi derrotado por
duas vezes que concorreu às eleições presidenciais. Contrariou todas as
tentativas de criação de instituições representativas. Sem pensamento político
próprio, pastoreou os grupos revolucionários que lhe batiam à porta e que ele
alegremente apadrinhou.
Tendo sido
derrotado e depois de afastado de qualquer função política ou militar de
relevo, Otelo enveredou por uma carreira de conspiração e de organização de
acções revolucionárias e terroristas. Apesar de condenado sem hesitações, foi
amnistiado.
É infeliz notar que tantos políticos, intelectuais,
académicos e jornalistas consideram Otelo o símbolo da liberdade e cultivam o
mito de Otelo como construtor da democracia, quando ele nada fez por isso, bem
pelo contrário, foi uma das suas piores ameaças
Se o critério for
o da liberdade e da democracia, os portugueses devem-lhe pouco. Apenas lhe
devem a organização do 25 de Abril, ponto final. Depois, exagerou nos seus
desmandos, nas ameaças e nos atentados. Apesar disso, transformou-se num
símbolo de Abril e da liberdade. É pena, pois foi o pior que Abril nos deu. E
se Abril nos deu a liberdade e a democracia, foi apesar de Otelo, não graças a
Otelo.
É infeliz notar
que tantos políticos, intelectuais, académicos e jornalistas consideram Otelo o
símbolo da liberdade e cultivam o mito de Otelo como construtor da democracia,
quando ele nada fez por isso, bem pelo contrário, foi uma das suas piores
ameaças.
Boa parte das
esquerdas, sobretudo as esquerdas mais radicais, sempre teve um problema com a
violência e o terrorismo. Se forem praticados “contra o capital”, contra o
“imperialismo e o colonialismo”, contra “os ricos” e contra as “classes
dominantes”, os actos violentos têm desculpa, são erros de passagem ou mesmo
glórias inesquecíveis. Há esquerdas que nunca condenaram a violência, toda e
qualquer violência. Há esquerdas que só depois de verem o bilhete de identidade
é que condenam ou apoiam a violência. A simetria funciona também. As direitas
sempre entenderam que a violência era necessária e bem-vinda contra os
revolucionários e contra as esquerdas.
O luto nacional não é apenas isso, luto. Nem só
recordação. É também louvor. Louvar Otelo seria simplesmente aceitar a
violência. Os democratas podem perdoar os seus inimigos. Mas não louvar
A violência e o
terrorismo em África, no Próximo Oriente, na América Latina, mesmo nos EUA e em
certos países europeus, não só não foram condenados, como foram justificados.
As Torres Gémeas de Nova Iorque foram festejadas por muitas esquerdas
europeias. As Brigadas Vermelhas italianas, o Exercito Vermelho alemão, a ETA
espanhola e o IRA irlandês acabaram quase sempre por ser louvados pela esquerda
radical ou perdoados por esquerdas mais suaves. Apenas esquerdas mais moderadas
souberam condenar sempre a violência e o terrorismo.
Cada vez que as
esquerdas são colocadas perante o absurdo dos seus louvores à violência de
esquerda, respondem com brutalidade: mas as direitas também! E citam, para
justificar os seus desmandos, Marcelino da Mata, Wiriyamu, as tropas
portuguesas em Nabuangongo e na Baixa do Cassanje. Para já não falar dos
assassinatos e das torturas de que a PIDE foi responsável. A fraqueza deste
argumento é absoluta. Não há, como no tempo e nos escritos de Trotsky, uma
moral “deles” e uma “nossa”.
A democracia pode
desculpar os seus inimigos. Pode perdoar a violência e o terror. É discutível,
mas percebe-se. Não pode é louvar os terroristas. O luto nacional não é apenas
isso, luto. Nem só recordação. É também louvor. Louvar Otelo seria simplesmente
aceitar a violência. Os democratas podem perdoar os seus inimigos. Mas não
louvar.
Sweden goes to war over its forests
Sweden goes to war over its forests
The EU’s Forest Strategy has ignited a political
battle in the heavily forested country.
BY CHARLIE
DUXBURY
July 27,
2021 6:54 pm
https://www.politico.eu/article/sweden-forests-europe-strategy-climate-change/
STOCKHOLM —
More than two-thirds of Sweden is covered by trees, and that's turning the
country into a battleground between loggers and climate activists.
The spark
is the EU's new Forest Strategy, published earlier this month. It aims to boost
biodiversity, limit burning trees for energy, protect remaining old growth
forests from logging and plant 3 billion trees as part of the bloc's effort to
slash emissions on the path to its Green Deal goal of becoming climate neutral
by 2050.
Despite
assurances from the European Commission that it isn't trying to dictate forest
policy to member countries, the strategy has set off a furious row in Sweden.
On one side
are environmentalists and Swedish Green Party lawmakers who say the industry
must move away from intensive harvesting of forests and let trees stand to
maximize the positive impact they can have on CO2 levels, flood risk and soil
quality.
They see
merit in the EU’s new strategy.
“This
strategy looks like a good first step, and that isn’t something I often say
about environmental stuff coming out of the European Commission,” said Pär
Holmgren, a Green Party European parliamentarian.
That
concern is heightened by soaring temperatures and massive annual forest fires.
"June
2021 was the hottest June ever recorded in my hometown Stockholm by a large
margin. The second hottest June was in 2020. The third in 2019," tweeted
climate campaigner Greta Thunberg earlier this month.
But the
farmer-friendly Swedish Center Party and a swathe of Swedish forestry companies
say the industry has the balance right, and the EU should butt out.
The likes
of SCA Group, Europe’s largest private forest owner, want to continue logging
to supply vast quantities of building materials, fuels, and paper products.
They say
their trees sequester CO2 while they are growing, and when felled, they can be
used to replace more environmentally damaging products — for example switching
paper cups for plastic ones or timber beams to replace steel in construction.
“For me, it
is so obvious that the most important thing that we can do for the climate is
to continue to manage our forests in an active way,” said SCA Chief Executive
Ulf Larsson.
The forest
debate is shaking Sweden's already fragile politics, as both the Greens and the
Center Party back the current left-leaning government. Their spat could upend
the government if they refuse to back the fall budget.
Social
Democrat Prime Minister Stefan Löfven recently asked Business Minister Ibrahim
Baylan to try and resolve the policy differences between the Greens and the
Center Party to help the government make it to next year's scheduled election.
Asked what he planned to prioritize, Baylan said: "Forestry policy is the
obvious one."
Forests and
trees
This
summer, the catastrophic effects of global warming have become increasingly
visible in the form of flash floods in Germany and Belgium and record-smashing
heatwaves in the American northwest, as well as across Nordic countries.
For Sweden,
the debate over forests mixes the global with the intensely local. Small forest
owners operate alongside Europe’s biggest timber companies, and in some areas,
vast patches of monoculture rub up against ancient untouched tangled bosks.
On a recent
weekday, piles of tree trunks, stripped of their branches, lay alongside the
road in the small central Swedish town of Lidköping. A sticker on one stack
showed it was aspen belonging to a nearby landowner, Thomas Arvidsson, to be
picked up by a big local processor called Södra.
Since
before the Vikings began turning the trees that grew in the area into
longboats, wood and wood products have been central to Swedish life.
Sweden is
the world’s third-largest exporter of pulp, paper and sawn timber, according to
forestry lobby group Swedish Forest Industries. Timber employs 70,000 people
and a further 50,000 single-person businesses are active in the sector — making
it a political heavyweight. In counties like Värmland, on the other side of
Lake Vänern from Lidköping, you can drive for hours and barely see a gap in the
trees lining the main highway.
Generations
of lumberjacks have trooped into the woods to bring down the mighty pine trees
which are then floated, dragged and driven to Sweden’s network of sawmills and
pulp plants.
Critics of
the forestry industry say powerful companies like SCA Group, backed by the
Center Party, have for too long been able to dictate to Stockholm and Brussels
what constitutes sustainable operations.
Green Party
MEP Holmgren said that forestry companies’ tendency to plant “fields full of
the same type of tree” is bad for biodiversity, while harvesting the wood too
quickly to burn as fuel or for use in throwaway cups wastes the true ecological
support society could get from forests.
"At
the moment, too much of the material from forests is made into paper or
biofuels which then means that the carbon will be released into the atmosphere
as CO2 very fast," he said. "Then we don’t have the climate
benefit."
SCA's
Larsson said that, despite its intensive harvesting methods, the company still
plants more trees than it takes, and its clear-cutting of some areas of
woodland merely echoes the role of fires in unmanaged forests.
For
Holmgren, the EU strategy looks like the first real challenge in a long time to
the idea that forests should be used, not saved. Pointing to the recent
flooding in Germany and Belgium, he said that allowing forests, with their
associated wetlands, to endure could help stop similar disasters from happening
in other places.
He wants
European authorities to compile better data on the current state of the
Continent's forests to get a better idea of what is vulnerable and needs
protecting. What is key is that the climate and the wider environment must be
considered before business and not the other way around, he said.
"The
most important thing for me and the Swedish Green Party — and this should be
the most important thing for everyone — is to realize that without a
sustainable ecology, we won’t have a sustainable economy either.”
The Guardian view on investigating 6 January: the truth about the storming of the Capitol
The Guardian view on investigating 6 January: the
truth about the storming of the Capitol
Editorial
The attitude of Republican politicians to the
committee shows exactly why it is needed
Fri 30 Jul
2021 18.30 BST
The
investigation into the deadly insurrection of 6 January is not one but two
processes. The first is an attempt to discover the truth about those events:
not only what happened, but who, beyond the members of the mob, was responsible
and in what ways. The second is the task of getting people to accept that truth
– knowing that many will not.
Senior
Republicans initially acknowledged the horror of the events and the culpability
of Donald Trump, whose big lie of a stolen election triggered the assault upon
the Capitol to stop the peaceful transfer of power. Kevin McCarthy, the House
minority leader – who is said to have telephoned the president urging him to
call the rioters off as they tried to break through his office window – said that
Mr Trump bore responsibility. He and others called for a 9/11-style independent
commission.
Yet since
then they have sought to rewrite history and diminish the attack. They blocked
a bipartisan proposal for the commission and pulled all their picks from the
House select committee when Nancy Pelosi vetoed the nomination of Jim Jordan
and Jim Banks, who challenged the legitimacy of Joe Biden’s victory. They
vilify two Republicans, Liz Cheney and Adam Kinzinger, who joined nonetheless.
And they pretend they did not even listen to the graphic and harrowing
testimony of police officers who defended them all against invaders.
In vivid,
unforgettable accounts at the committee’s opening hearing on Tuesday, the
officers laid out the full brutality and viciousness they endured. They also
spelled out why a wide-ranging investigation is necessary. As important and
disturbing as the institutional failures of policing were that day, no serious
inquiry could limit itself to that scope.
“All of
them were telling us, ‘Trump sent us,’” said one officer, Aquilino Gonell.
Another, Harry Dunn, told the committee that when a hitman kills someone, “Not
only does the hitman go to jail, but the person who hired them does ... A
hitman sent them. I want you to get to the bottom of that.”
This was
not merely a defence against Republican accusations of a witch-hunt. It was a
mandate. It demonstrated that politicians have a duty to establish
responsibility for the invasion. But the committee’s work will only get harder from
here, as they decide where to focus, what evidence to pursue and which
witnesses to call. Bennie Thompson, the committee’s chair, has said he will
investigate Mr Trump and depose political allies and key aides: “Nothing is off
limits.”
Should the
committee subpoena them, it will fuel the belief of Republican voters that this
is nothing but a partisan attack; a majority think that the election was
stolen. Supporters suggest both that the storming of the Capitol was
understandable or justified and that it was not significant at all, but an
inconsequential incident; “a normal tourist visit”. A poll in spring found that
while more than half of Americans saw the events of 6 January as an attack on
democracy that should never be forgotten, almost three-quarters of Republicans
said that too much was being made of it.
Though Mr
Trump initiated these beliefs, other politicians continue to cynically stoke
them: “Nobody actually believes the election was stolen from Donald Trump. But
a lot of them are happy to go out and say it was,” Mr Kinzinger observed of his
colleagues.
Their
behaviour is extraordinary as well as reprehensible: for the sake of their
political careers, they seem as reckless about their own safety as they are
about democracy’s. They presumably count on staying on the right side of any
future mob. Far from deterring the committee from pursuing this investigation
fully, their actions and rhetoric should provide a spur. Those who have
connived in the attack on democracy need to be held accountable. Whatever the
verdict of Republican voters, the truth must be written in the historical
record.
Trump Pressed Justice Dept. to Declare Election Results Corrupt, Notes Show
Trump Pressed Justice Dept. to Declare Election
Results Corrupt, Notes Show
“Leave the rest to me” and to congressional allies,
the former president is said to have told top law enforcement officials.
The demands are the latest example of President Donald
J. Trump’s wide-ranging efforts to delegitimize the election results during his
final weeks in office.
Katie Benner
By Katie Benner
July 30, 2021
WASHINGTON
— President Donald J. Trump pressed top Justice Department officials late last
year to declare that the election was corrupt even though they had found no
instances of widespread fraud, so he and his allies in Congress could use the
assertion to try to overturn the results, according to new documents provided
to lawmakers.
The demands
were an extraordinary instance of a president interfering with an agency that
is typically more independent from the White House to advance his personal
agenda. They are also the latest example of Mr. Trump’s wide-ranging campaign
during his final weeks in office to delegitimize the election results.
The
exchange unfolded during a phone call on Dec. 27 in which Mr. Trump pressed the
acting attorney general at the time, Jeffrey A. Rosen, and his deputy, Richard
P. Donoghue, on voter fraud claims that the Justice Department had found no
evidence for. Mr. Donoghue warned that the department had no power to change
the outcome of the election. Mr. Trump replied that he did not expect that,
according to notes Mr. Donoghue took memorializing the conversation.
“Just say
that the election was corrupt + leave the rest to me” and to congressional
allies, Mr. Donoghue wrote in summarizing Mr. Trump’s response.
Mr. Trump
did not name the lawmakers, but at other points during the call, he mentioned
Representative Jim Jordan, Republican of Ohio, whom he described as a
“fighter”; Representative Scott Perry, Republican of Pennsylvania, who at the
time promoted the idea that the election was stolen from Mr. Trump; and Senator
Ron Johnson, Republican of Wisconsin, whom Mr. Trump praised for “getting to
bottom of things.”
Mr. Jordan
and Mr. Johnson denied any role in Mr. Trump’s efforts to pressure the Justice
Department.
“Congressman
Jordan did not, has not, and would not pressure anyone at the Justice
Department about the 2020 election,” said Russell Dye, a spokesman for Mr.
Jordan, who voted to overturn election results in key states but has downplayed
his role in the president’s pressure campaign. “He continues to agree with
President Trump that it is perfectly appropriate to raise concerns about
election integrity.”
Mr. Johnson
had “no conversations with President Trump about the D.O.J. questioning the
election results,” said his spokeswoman, Alexa Henning. She noted that he had
acknowledged Joseph R. Biden Jr. as the president-elect but that he had also
called for what he sees as election irregularities to be fully investigated and
addressed to restore confidence in future elections.
Mr. Perry
did not respond to requests for comment. He has continued to assert Mr. Trump
won, but has not been tied directly to the White House effort to keep him in
office.
The phone
call by Mr. Trump was perhaps the most audacious moment in a monthslong
pressure campaign aimed at enlisting the Justice Department in his crusade to
overturn the election results.
After the
departure of Mr. Rosen’s predecessor, William P. Barr, became public on Dec.
14, Mr. Trump and his allies harangued Mr. Rosen and his top deputies nearly every
day until Jan. 6, when Congress met to certify the Electoral College and was
disrupted by Mr. Trump’s supporters storming the Capitol, according to emails
and other documents obtained by Congress and interviews with former Trump
administration officials.
The
conversations often included complaints about unfounded voter fraud conspiracy
theories, frustration that the Justice Department would not ask the Supreme
Court to invalidate the election and admonishments that department leaders had
failed to fight hard enough for Mr. Trump, the officials said.
The Justice
Department provided Mr. Donoghue’s notes to the House Oversight and Reform
Committee, which is investigating the Trump administration’s efforts to
unlawfully reverse the election results.
Typically,
the department has fought to keep secret any accounts of private discussions
between a president and his cabinet to avoid setting a precedent that would
prevent officials in future administrations from candidly advising presidents
out of concern that their conversations would later be made public.
But handing
over the notes to Congress is part of a pattern of allowing scrutiny of Mr.
Trump’s efforts to overturn the election. The Biden Justice Department also
told Mr. Rosen, Mr. Donoghue and other former officials this week that they
could provide unrestricted testimony to investigators with the House Oversight
and Reform and the Senate Judiciary Committees.
The
department reasoned that congressional investigators were examining potential
wrongdoing by a sitting president, an extraordinary circumstance, according to
letters sent to the former officials. Because executive privilege is meant to
benefit the country, rather than the president as an individual, invoking it
over Mr. Trump’s efforts to push his personal agenda would be inappropriate,
the department concluded.
“These
handwritten notes show that President Trump directly instructed our nation’s
top law enforcement agency to take steps to overturn a free and fair election
in the final days of his presidency,” Representative Carolyn B. Maloney,
Democrat of New York and chairwoman of the House Oversight and Reform
Committee, said in a statement.
Trump’s Bid to Subvert the Election
A
monthslong campaign. During his last days in office, President Donald J. Trump
and his allies undertook an increasingly urgent effort to undermine the
election results. That wide-ranging campaign included perpetuating false and
thoroughly debunked claims of election fraud as well as pressing government
officials for help.
Baseless
claims of voter fraud. Although Mr.Trump’s allegations of a stolen election
have died in the courts and election officials of both parties from every state
have said there is no evidence of fraud, Republicans across the country
continued to spread conspiracy theories. Those include 147 House Republicans
who voted against certifying the election.
Intervention
at the Justice Department. Rebuffed by ranking Republicans and cabinet officials
like Attorney General William P. Barr, who stepped down weeks before his tenure
was to end, Mr. Trump sought other avenues to peddle his unfounded claims. In a
bid to advance his personal agenda, Mr. Trump plotted to oust the acting
attorney general and pressed top officials to declare that the election was
corrupt. His chief of staff pushed the department to investigate an array of
outlandish and unfounded conspiracy theories that held that Mr. Trump had been
the victor.
Pressuring
state officials to 'find votes.' In a taped call, Mr. Trump urged Georgia’s
secretary of state to “find 11,780 votes” to overturn the presidential election
and vaguely warned of a “criminal offense.” And he twice tried to talk with a
leader of Arizona’s Republican party in a bid to reverse Joseph R. Biden’s
narrow victory there.
Contesting
Congress’s electoral tally on Jan. 6. As the president continued to refuse to
concede the election, his most loyal backers proclaimed Jan. 6, when Congress
convened to formalize Mr. Biden's electoral victory, as a day of reckoning. On
that day, Mr. Trump delivered an incendiary speech to thousands of his
supporters hours before a mob of loyalists violently stormed the Capitol.
Mr. Trump’s
conversation with Mr. Rosen and Mr. Donoghue reflected his single-minded focus
on overturning the election results. At one point, Mr. Trump claimed voter
fraud in Georgia, Michigan, Nevada and Arizona, which he called “corrupted
elections.” Mr. Donoghue pushed back.
“Much of
the info you’re getting is false,” Mr. Donoghue said, adding that the
department had conducted “dozens of investigations, hundreds of interviews” and
had not found evidence to support his claims. “We look at allegations but they
don’t pan out,” the officials told Mr. Trump, according to the notes.
The
department found that the error rate of ballot counting in Michigan was 0.0063
percent, not the 68 percent that the president asserted; it did not find
evidence of a conspiracy theory that an employee in Pennsylvania had tampered
with ballots; and after examining video and interviewing witnesses, it found no
evidence of ballot fraud in Fulton County, Ga., according to the notes.
Mr. Trump,
undeterred, brushed off the department’s findings. “OK fine — but what about
the others?” Mr. Donoghue wrote in his notes describing the president’s
remarks. Mr. Trump asked Mr. Donoghue to travel to Fulton County to verify
signatures on ballots.
The people
“saying that the election isn’t corrupt are corrupt,” Mr. Trump told the
officials, adding that they needed to act. “Not much time left.”
At another
point, Mr. Donoghue said that the department could quickly verify or disprove
the assertion that more ballots were cast in Pennsylvania than there were
voters.
“Should be
able to check on that quickly, but understand that the D.O.J. can’t and won’t
snap its fingers and change the outcome of the election, doesn’t work that
way,” Mr. Donoghue wrote in his notes.
The
officials also told Mr. Trump that the Justice Department had no evidence to
support a lawsuit regarding the election results. “We are not in a position
based on the evidence,” they said. “We can only act on the actual evidence
developed.”
Mr. Trump
castigated the officials, saying that “thousands of people called” their local
U.S. attorney’s offices to complain about the election and that “nobody trusts
the F.B.I.” He said that “people are angry — blaming D.O.J. for inaction.”
“You guys
may not be following the internet the way I do,” Mr. Trump said, according to
the document.
In a moment
of foreshadowing, Mr. Trump said, “people tell me Jeff Clark is great, I should
put him in,” referring to the acting chief of the Justice Department’s civil
division, who had also encouraged department officials to intervene in the
election. “People want me to replace D.O.J. leadership.”
“You should
have the leadership you want,” Mr. Donoghue replied. But it would not change
the department’s position on a lack of widespread election fraud, he noted.
Mr.
Donoghue and Mr. Rosen did not know that Mr. Perry had introduced Mr. Clark to
Mr. Trump. One week later, they would be forced to fight Mr. Clark for their
jobs in an Oval Office showdown.
During the
call, Mr. Trump also told the Justice Department officials to “figure out what
to do” with Hunter Biden, Mr. Biden’s son. “People will criticize the D.O.J. if
he’s not investigated for real,” he told them, violating longstanding
guidelines against White House intervention in criminal investigations or other
law enforcement actions.
Two days
after the phone call with Mr. Trump, Mr. Donoghue took notes of a meeting with
Justice Department officials that also included Mr. Trump’s chief of staff,
Mark Meadows; the White House counsel, Pat Cipollone; and the White House
deputy counsel Patrick Philbin. They met to discuss a conspiracy theory known
as Italygate, which asserts without evidence that people in Italy used military
technology to remotely tamper with voting machines in the United States.
The Justice
Department officials told the White House that they had assigned someone to
look into the matter, according to the notes and a person briefed on the
meeting. They did not mention that the department was looking into the theory
to debunk it, the person said.
While the
Justice Department officials kept the pressure campaign hidden from public
view, the emails obtained by Congress and interviews with former Trump
administration officials show they were alarmed by Mr. Trump’s behavior,
particularly when he complained about the U.S. attorney in Atlanta, Byung J.
Pak, whom he viewed as not doing enough to examine voter fraud accusations
there.
Mr. Pak
abruptly stepped down on Jan. 4, after Mr. Donoghue told him about the
president’s plot with Mr. Clark and of Mr. Trump’s concerns about Atlanta,
according to documents and interviews.
Nicholas
Fandos contributed reporting.
Katie
Benner covers the Justice Department. She was part of a team that won a
Pulitzer Prize in 2018 for public service for reporting on workplace sexual
harassment issues. @ktbenner
IRS must turn over Trump tax returns to Congress, DoJ says
IRS must turn over Trump tax returns to Congress,
DoJ says
Department says House panel has ‘sufficient reasons’
for requesting returns as Nancy Pelosi hails ‘victory for the rule of law’
Joan E
Greve in Washington, Martin Pengelly in New York and agencies
Fri 30 Jul
2021 22.40 BST
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/jul/30/donald-trump-tax-returns-irs-congress-doj
The US
Department of Justice on Friday ordered the Internal Revenue Service to hand
Donald Trump’s tax returns to a House committee, saying the panel had “invoked
sufficient reasons” for requesting them.
The news
was a second blow for Trump in a matter of hours, after released DoJ memos
revealed that as part of his campaign to overturn his election defeat by Joe
Biden, he pressured top officials to falsely label the 2020 election as
corrupt, then “leave the rest to me”.
House
speaker Nancy Pelosi applauded the DoJ’s order to the IRS to release Trump’s
tax returns to the ways and means committee.
“Today, the
Biden administration has delivered a victory for the rule of law, as it
respects the public interest by complying with Chairman [Richard] Neal’s
request for Donald Trump’s tax returns,” Pelosi said in a statement.
“Access to
former President Trump’s tax returns is a matter of national security. The
American people deserve to know the facts of his troubling conflicts of
interest and undermining of our security and democracy as president.”
Candidates
for president traditionally disclose their tax returns, although they are not
legally compelled to do so. Trump kept his out of the public eye when he ran
for the White House in 2016, saying they were under IRS audit, and did not
release them while in office.
Once
Democrats took control of the House in 2018, amid the investigation of Russian
election interference and links between Trump and Moscow by the special
counsel, Robert Mueller, they began to seek the records in court.
Trump fought
hard to keep his tax returns out of the public eye but the New York Times
obtained some of the records, which showed Trump paid almost nothing in federal
income taxes in the years before he entered the White House.
In a memo
on Friday, the DoJ Office of Legal Counsel said Neal, the Massachusetts
congressman who chairs the ways and means committee, had “invoked sufficient
reasons for requesting the former president’s tax information”.
Under
federal law, the OLC said, the Department of the Treasury “must furnish the
information to the committee”.
The 39-page
memo was signed by Dawn Johnsen, installed by the Biden administration as the
acting head of the OLC.
Trump’s
treasury secretary, Steven Mnuchin, said he would not turn over Trump’s tax
returns because they were being sought for partisan reasons.
The House
ways and means committee sued for the records under a federal law that says the
IRS “shall furnish” the returns of any taxpayer to a handful of top lawmakers.
The committee said it needed Trump’s taxes for an investigation into whether he
complied with tax law.
Trump’s
justice department defended Mnuchin’s refusal and Trump intervened to try to
prevent the materials from being turned over to Congress. Under a court order
from January, Trump would have 72 hours to object after the Biden
administration formally changes the government’s position in the lawsuit.
Bill
Pascrell, a New Jersey Democrat who chairs the House ways and means
subcommittee on oversight, said: “It is about damn time. Our committee first
sought Donald Trump’s tax returns on 3 April 2019 – 849 days ago. Our request
was made in full accordance with the law and pursuant to Congress’s
constitutional oversight powers.”
Daniel
Goldman, an attorney who counselled Democrats during Trump’s first impeachment
inquiry and trial, said: “The former OLC opinion supporting Mnuchin’s ability
to withhold Trump’s tax returns was perhaps the most egregious and baseless
opinion of many bad ones during the Trump era.”
Michael
Stern, a former senior counsel for the House Office of General Counsel, told
Politico Trump had options to stop the release of his returns.
“I think
Trump will be given an opportunity to either file a new case or file something
in this case in which he states his legal grounds for objecting to his tax
returns being produced,” he said, adding: “It’s definitely not over yet.”
Elsewhere,
the Manhattan district attorney, Cyrus Vance Jr, has obtained copies of Trump’s
personal and business tax records as part of a criminal investigation.
Trump tried
to prevent his accountants from handing over the documents, taking the issue to
the supreme court. The justices rejected Trump’s argument that he had broad
immunity as president.
Speaking to
Reuters about the DoJ order, Richard Painter, a University of Minnesota law
professor who was ethics counsel to George W Bush, said it seems the Biden
justice department “is no longer going to simply kowtow to Donald Trump”.
“Every other
president has disclosed their tax returns” he said, “and finding out what the
conflicts of interest are on the president or a former president who may have
made decisions that now have to be revisited – that’s critically important.”
Justice Department says Democrats are entitled to Trump's tax returns
TAX
Justice Department says Democrats are entitled to
Trump's tax returns
“It’s about damn time,” said Rep. Bill Pascrell, head
of the Ways and Means oversight subcommittee.
By BRIAN
FALER
07/30/2021
01:52 PM EDT
Updated:
07/30/2021 09:20 PM EDT
https://www.politico.com/news/2021/07/30/democrats-entitled-trumps-tax-returns-501800
The Justice
Department said Friday that former President Donald Trump’s tax returns should
be released to congressional Democrats, though the administration said it won’t
hand them over without first giving Trump a chance to respond in court.
Reversing a
legal opinion by the Trump administration, the department said lawmakers are
entitled to the information under an arcane law allowing the heads of
Congress’s tax committees to examine anyone’s private tax information.
“The
Chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee has invoked sufficient reasons
for requesting the former President’s tax information,” the agency’s office of
legal counsel said in a 39-page opinion. “Treasury must furnish the information
to the Committee.”
Rep.
Richard Neal (D-Mass.) has said the committee needs the documents to examine
how thoroughly the IRS audits presidential tax returns, which the agency
routinely does. Republicans argue that Democrats want to comb the returns for
things that would embarrass Trump.
Democrats
have been suing for the long-hidden documents for more than two years, after
the Trump administration said they did not have a legitimate reason for seeking
the information.
In a court
filing late Friday, the administration told District Court Judge Trevor
McFadden that it would hold off handing over the documents in order to give
Trump an opportunity to consider his next move.
“The
parties wish to confer on an orderly schedule that would afford the
Defendant-Intervenors a reasonable opportunity to raise and to litigate such
grounds as they may have against disclosure of the requested tax-return
information, but that also respects the Committee’s interest in timely
production of the return information it seeks.”
Both sides
said they agreed to outline for McFadden by Aug. 4 how they would like to
proceed.
McFadden, a
Trump appointee, has issued a standing order requiring Treasury to give the
former president 72 hours-notice if it intends to release the documents – a
mandate Democrats said should be lifted in light of their willingness to
postpone producing the documents pending court action.
McFadden
has been urging the two sides to work out a compromise.
Manhattan
District Attorney Cyrus Vance already has Trump’s tax records as part of a
separate investigation into the former president.
In a
statement, Neal said: “As I have maintained for years, the committee’s case is
very strong and the law is on our side.”
“I am glad
that the Department of Justice agrees and that we can move forward.”
The agency
went “astray” in a 2019 legal opinion opposing the disclosure of the returns,
Biden’s Justice Department said.
Lawmakers
have a sweeping right to such information, the department said, and though
“some members of Congress might hope that former President Trump’s tax returns
are published solely in order to embarrass him” that is not enough to
“invalidate” the tax committee’s request.
The
century-old statute cited by Democrats gives the congressional tax panels
"unique and especially broad access to tax information."
Though the
Justice Department opinion is a blow to Trump, he still has options to try to
forestall the release of the returns, said Michael Stern, a former senior
counsel in the House of Representatives’ Office of General Counsel.
“There is
less of a probability that this is going to drag on for a long time, but it
certainly could, and it’s definitely not over yet," he said.
sexta-feira, 30 de julho de 2021
Justice department tells IRS to hand Trump tax
returns to Congress –
• IRS must give Trump tax returns to ways and means
committee
• Notes show Trump pressed DoJ officials to call
election corrupt
18:51
House
speaker Nancy Pelosi applauded the justice department for ordering the IRS to
turn over Donald Trump’s tax returns to the House ways and mean committee.
“Today, the
Biden Administration has delivered a victory for the rule of law, as it
respects the public interest by complying with Chairman Neal’s request for
Donald Trump’s tax returns,” the Democratic speaker said in a new statement.
“Access to
former President Trump’s tax returns is a matter of national security. The
American people deserve to know the facts of his troubling conflicts of
interest and undermining of our security and democracy as president.”
Trump has
fought for years to keep his tax returns from public view, although the New
York Times previously obtained some of the records, which showed the former
president paid almost nothing in federal income taxes in the years before he
entered the White House.
2h ago
18:31
DoJ says
IRS must give Trump tax returns to House committee
Martin
Pengelly Martin Pengelly
Double
trouble for Donald Trump. The US Department of Justice has ordered the Internal
Revenue Service to hand over his tax returns to a House committee, saying the
panel has invoked “sufficient reasons” for requesting it.
There are
also further developments in the saga of Trump’s attempt to overturn his
election defeat by Joe Biden, in the shape of the news that Trump pressured top
justice department officials to falsely claim the 2020 election was corrupt so
he and his allies in Congress could subvert the results and return him to
office, according to newly released memos.
As Hugo
Lowell puts it for us from Washington:
“Just say
that the election was corrupt [and] leave the rest to me,” the former president
told former acting attorney general Jeffrey Rosen and his deputy, Richard
Donoghue, memos obtained by the House oversight committee showed.
The notes
were taken by Donoghue, who documented a 27 December call with Trump and Rosen.
The
documentation of Trump’s demand to the justice department represented an extraordinary
instance of a president seeking to weaponise an agency that is supposed to
operate independently of the White House, to advance his own personal interests
and political agenda.
It is also
the latest example of the far-reaching campaign mounted by Trump over the final
weeks of his presidency to falsely cast doubt on the results of the 2020
election, which he lost to Joe Biden in a contest devoid of any widespread
voter fraud.
Lockdown raves: How Berlin's illegal techno raves thrive during the pand...
The
coronavirus pandemic forced all of Berlin's nightclubs to shut their doors,
bringing the city's famous techno music scene to a grinding halt. At least
that's the official version. Unofficially, a few rave venues have still been
operating, hidden from Berlin's authorities.
DW's
Anne-Sophie Brändlin has this report from inside Berlin's secret techno rave
scene.
Trump’s false election fraud claims fuel Michigan GOP meltdown
ELECTIONS
Trump’s false election fraud claims fuel Michigan
GOP meltdown
The ex-president’s refusal to accept defeat is taking
a toll on the party in a key battleground state.
By NOLAN D.
MCCASKILL
07/30/2021
04:30 AM EDT
Updated:
07/30/2021 08:31 AM EDT
https://www.politico.com/news/2021/07/30/michigan-gop-trump-election-fraud-501701
Joe Biden
defeated Donald Trump by more than 150,000 votes in Michigan last November.
Trump and
the Michigan Republican Party still aren’t over it.
The outcome
— and the former president’s obsessive efforts to dispute it — has left the
state party in disarray, raising questions about the GOP’s focus as it looks to
unseat Democratic Gov. Gretchen Whitmer in a top battleground state next year.
“From a
staff and leadership perspective, I don’t know that top-notch professionals
would want to go into this quagmire,” said Jeff Timmer, a former Michigan GOP
executive director who opposed Trump. “Unless you’re going to talk crazy talk,
they don’t want you there.”
Much of the
trouble can be traced to the 2020 presidential election results, which Trump
and his allies have alleged were marked by fraud without providing evidence.
An April
report from the state Bureau of Elections on 250 post-election audits conducted
across the state found “no examples of fraud or intentional misconduct by
election officials and no evidence that equipment used to tabulate or report
election results did not function properly when properly programmed and
tested.” Likewise, a GOP-led state Senate Oversight Committee report released
in June found “no evidence of widespread or systemic fraud.”
But some
party officials and conservative activists continue to press for a “forensic
audit” of the election results, encouraged by Trump, who has called on
“American Republican Patriots” to run primary challenges against “RINO State
Senators in Michigan who refuse to properly look into the election
irregularities and fraud.”
One of the
casualties of Trump’s efforts to spread the lie that Biden stole the election
was Jason Roe, the party’s executive director, who resigned this month. Roe —
whose father also served as executive director of the state GOP — first raised
the ire of activists for telling POLITICO Magazine last year: “The election
wasn’t stolen. [Trump] blew it.” Then, in May, Roe told the Michigan
Information & Research Services podcast that Trump “was seemingly doing
everything he could to lose a winnable race” and urged the party to move on
from 2020.
The state
party also lacks a communications director after Ted Goodman left to join
former Detroit Police Chief James Craig’s campaign for governor. Goodman’s
replacement, Kaitlyn Buss, resigned within a week.
“I chose to
leave after two days because it was clear to me that the party, generally, was
not willing to move past Trump, and I was not willing to go through that
again,” she told POLITICO.
At the top
of the party, Ron Weiser, chair of the Michigan GOP, has faced his own
distractions. A Trump loyalist and prolific party donor, Weiser agreed this
month to pay $200,000 out of his own pocket to settle a complaint filed by his
predecessor, former Chair Laura Cox, over an alleged “payoff” to pressure a
candidate into dropping out of the 2018 secretary of state’s race.
In April,
Weiser, an elected University of Michigan regent, was censured by the Board of
Regents for calling the state’s top three elected female Democrats “witches”
and joking about the assassination of the two Michigan congressional
Republicans who supported Trump’s second impeachment.
Weiser’s
co-chair, Meshawn Maddock, has been a leading voice in spreading Trump’s
baseless election fraud claims. She organized buses of Trump supporters to
Washington, D.C., on the day of the Capitol riot, though Maddock has said she
wasn’t involved in the rally and has condemned the breaching of the Capitol.
In a statement
to POLITICO, Weiser dismissed the string of negative headlines, arguing that
what really matters is “standing up for the great people of Michigan and the
scoreboard next November.”
“The
Michigan Republican Party is on track for victories in 2022. Period,” he said.
“We are raising millions of dollars, we have a strong team in place, and our
candidates are already out-polling Democrat incumbents without having spent a
penny.”
Republican
National Committee Chair Ronna McDaniel — a former Michigan GOP chair herself —
shares Weiser’s confidence about the party’s ability to compete in the midterm
elections.
“As a
lifelong Michigander, I’m proud of the great work the MI GOP continues to accomplish
on behalf of the Republican Party,” she said in a statement. “The phenomenal
partnership between the MI GOP and the RNC will be instrumental in our efforts
to hold Biden, Whitmer, and congressional Democrats accountable for their
failures and ultimately take back the House and Governor’s mansion in 2022.”
Gretchen
Whitmer, Michigan Democratic gubernatorial nominee, speaks with a reporter
after a Democrat Unity Rally at the Westin Book Cadillac Hotel August 8, 2018
in Detroit, Michigan. | Bill Pugliano/Getty Images
Bill
Ballenger, a political pundit and former GOP state legislator, suggested the
big issue for the party isn’t how to stem the tide of negative stories but how
it will ease the tension between the Trump wing and the more traditional
establishment Republicans. Even more consequential, he argued, are the new
political maps after an upcoming round of redistricting that will determine
congressional and state legislative districts.
“A lot of
this other stuff is unseemly and ugly appearing and embarrassing, obviously, to
people involved, but when it gets right down to it, if they come up with a
relatively strong gubernatorial nominee, I think they certainly are gonna be in
a better position next year against Gretchen Whitmer,” Ballenger said. “That’s
what you need to concentrate on when you’re trying to get a grip on the reality
here in Michigan, not these ankle-biting, nitpicking stories on personal
foibles and problems of obscure party officials that are not gonna be on the
ballot.”
Still, some
Republicans argue that their party is too focused on the last election to be
competitive in the next one.
“They’ve
gotta offer something other than their wish that we could somehow redo the 2020
elections,” said Bob LaBrant, a GOP strategist and former general counsel at
the Michigan Chamber of Commerce. “I think there’s a strong segment of the
party that are convinced that the only thing we need to do is do a forensic
audit and somehow that will uncover all sorts of fraud.”
Establishment
veterans like LaBrant, however, no longer dominate in a state party where
loyalty to Trump is expected.
“As much as
these washed up, has-beens want to create a story, there is no there, there,”
said Dennis Lennox, a Republican consultant in Michigan. “Jeff Timmer’s only
paycheck is from Democrats and the pedophile-enabling Lincoln Project to
actively work against the Republican Party, while Bob LaBrant is merely trying
to appease the Democrat governor to keep his sinecure on a gubernatorial
appointed commission. They are effectively buying indulgences from ruling-class
Democrats.”
Jason
Watts, a former Allegan County GOP official who was ousted from his post as
Sixth District treasurer this year after telling The New York Times that he
didn’t vote for Trump in 2020, said the party is dwelling on the 2020 election
when it should be prioritizing winning back the once-reliable suburban voters
it has lost in recent years.
“We’re not
focused on 2022, and I don’t see that changing,” Watts said. “Until we get
beyond that, we’re going to suffer the consequences and lose in the next couple
of cycles because we just can’t get off this circular firing squad of remorse,
and somehow feeling that the other side cheated, when the evidence doesn’t show
that at all.”
“It’s a
near-toxic environment,” Watts said, “and I don’t think you see any signs of
that dissipating.”
