If you thought we might get through a day this week when we do NOT start off bright and early with a political update, well, today is not that day.
Good Thursday morning, CivMixers. The country marked a dubious milestone yesterday as Donald Trump became the first president in U.S. history to be impeached not once, but twice.
Members of the House voted 232 to 197 to impeach Trump exactly one week after rioters forced them (and their Senate counterparts) to flee from the very chamber in which they acted on what was also the fourth presidential impeachment in U.S. history.
Ten Republicans – including the chamber’s No. 3 GOP member, Liz Cheney of Wyoming – joined every Democrat in impeaching Trump for “incitement of insurrection.”
The vote won’t force Trump from office a week earlier than he was already scheduled to depart, as outgoing U.S. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has said the president won’t face a trial in the upper chamber until after the January 20 inauguration of President-elected Joe Biden and Vice President-elect Kamala Harris. (The Senate isn’t scheduled to return to D.C. until January 19).
But the vote was symbolic and also very speedy – something with which a number of Republicans, including House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, took issue, even as they expressed dismay, opposition or even disgust with Trump’s actions.
One New York Republican, Rep. John Katko from the Syracuse area, joined the Democrats in voting “yes.” He was, in fact, the first GOP member to publicly announce his plan to do so.
Biden, who has been trying mightily (and without much success) to avoid having the uproar over Trump and impeachment derail his transition process, issued a statement saying the vote has been “bipartisan” and “cast by members who followed the Constitution and their conscience.”
He then turned his attention to the ongoing pandemic and the economic damage it has caused, saying he hopes “that the Senate leadership will find a way to deal with their Constitutional responsibilities on impeachment while also working on the other urgent business of this nation.”
Interesting historical juxtaposition here: Today is Ratification Day, the day the Continental Congress ratified the Treaty of Paris, which officially ended the American Revolutionary War and made the U.S. a sovereign nation.
It’s also the day that the first ever successful delivery of a baby via c-section occurred in the U.S., way back in 1794.
The procedure was performed on a table in a cabin in rural Virginia by a doctor named Jesse Bennett on his own wife, Elizabeth, without any antiseptics or medical equipment or even an anesthesia. (She did get laudanum, which helped make her sleepy). The baby – the couple’s only child because the doctor removed his wife’s ovaries during the surgery as well – was not only successfully delivered, but mother and baby both lived for many decades after the fact.
Dr. Bennett didn’t report the details of the surgery during his lifetime, reportedly because he didn’t think other doctors would believe him. Because of this, his accomplishment was not recognized until after his death, when a neighbor publicly recalled witnessing the procedure.
The c-section, which obviously was enormously risky back in the 1700s, is now common, without about one in every three U.S. births occurring in this way.
We’re in for a slippery commute this morning, if you’re actually one of the people taking part in that drive-to-work ritual again, with a mix of rain and snow in the forecast. The precipitation will end by the afternoon, leaving us with overcast skies and temperatures in the mid-to-high 30s.
In the headlines…
Following the historic House vote to impeach him a second time in his four-year tenure, President Donald Trump released a video (via the White House Twitter account, because his social media is no longer accessible to him) that didn’t mention the historic vote, but did call on his supporters to refrain from violence.
The president offered no note of humility, regret or self-reflection about his two months of false claims that the election was stolen from him. But it was also a broader condemnation of the violence than he has offered so far.
An “increasingly isolated, sullen, and vengeful” Trump is serving his final few days in office in an emptying White House, taking out his anger on his shrinking inner circle.
Sources also describe Trump as “anxious” about his life post-White House as he’s watched multiple partners sever ties with the Trump Organization and Republican loyalists outright condemn his conduct.
The president reportedly has told aides not to pay his personal attorney, Rudy Giuliani, at all for his legal work attempting to overturn Trump’s loss in the November presidential election.
Throngs of armed, camouflage fatigue-clad members of the National Guard ringed the Capitol and lined its halls as the House met to debate impeaching Trump.
The House is preparing to fine lawmakers who flout the chamber’s new security measures after several took issue with a newly installed metal detector.
The NYPD provided the U.S. Capitol Police and the FBI with raw intelligence indicating likely violence on January 6 – the day lawmakers would meet to certify the results of the 2020 election – but no subsequent report of threat assessment was ever produced or released.
The FBI yesterday urged police chiefs across the country to be on high alert for extremist activity and to share intelligence on any threats they encounter, as the U.S. government issued a dire intelligence bulletin warning of potential violence ahead of the inauguration.
The insurrection at the U.S. Capitol last week will likely spur domestic extremists to carry out more violent attacks, according to a government intelligence bulletin.
The acting leader of US Immigration and Customs Enforcement abruptly resigned yesterday, just two weeks into the job after the agency’s previous director also stepped down unexpectedly in December.
Democratic lawmakers are voicing safety concerns in the week after the storming of the Capitol and criticizing the actions of some of their Republican colleagues regarding security in the days around the attack.
Lawmakers called for new investigations into the riot and federal authorities fanned out across the country, taking into custody several more suspects, including two police officers from Virginia and a firefighter from Florida.
More than 30 Democrats are calling for a probe into what they believe were suspicious tours of the U.S. Capitol, alleging that the visitors appeared to be “associated” with the Wednesday rally ahead of the breach of the Capitol building.
A number of those who law enforcement say participated in the riot came from Trump’s home state of New York.
Sen. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.), an influential conservative and possible contender for the White House in 2024, says the Senate lacks constitutional authority to hold an impeachment trial for Trump once he leaves office.
Ken Langone — the billionaire Home Depot co-founder and Republican megadonor — said he feels “betrayed” by Trump after last week’s siege on the Capitol.
Newly-elected Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) said she plans on filing articles of impeachment against Biden on his first full day in office next week.
The Trump administration has offered Biden the use of Blair House, the official residence for guests of the president, on the eve of his inauguration. Biden has accepted the offer.
Major League Baseball is suspending all political contributions in the wake of last week’s invasion of the U.S. Capitol by a mob loyal to Trump, joining a wave of major corporations rethinking their efforts to lobby Washington.
The president of a private university in southern California is under fire for his refusal to terminate a tenured law professor who spoke at the pro-Trump rally that led to the Capitol insurrection last week.
Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey called banning Trump from the social media platform the “right decision,” but lamented that the move was divisive and sets a precedent that he sees as dangerous to a “free and open global internet.”
Major labor unions have urged Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and incoming Senate Majority Leader Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) to provide $1 trillion in emergency funding for states, cities, towns and schools.
Biden will likely unveil his stimulus plan today, which is expected to include an increase to the $600 stimulus checks most Americans have received.
Biden announced that he has picked Samantha Power, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations under President Barack Obama, to run the agency overseeing American foreign humanitarian and development aid.
Former Republican Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder was officially charged with two counts of willful neglect of duty in connection with the ongoing investigation into the Flint water crisis.
Trump’s effort to exclude people in the U.S. illegally from being counted in the process for divvying up congressional seats was dealt another blow when the Census Bureau’s director indefinitely halted the gathering of data on the citizenship status of every resident.
More than a year after a new coronavirus first emerged in China, a team of experts from the World Health Organization finally arrived today in the central city of Wuhan to begin hunting for its source.
More than 38,000 Americans have died of Covid-19 in the first two weeks of the new year.Another 92,000 are projected to die from the virus over roughly the next three weeks, according to a forecast from the CDC.
Blood plasma transfusions with high concentrations of COVID-19 antibodies reduced deaths among some virus patients, according to a new study conducted by Mayo Clinic researchers, lending credibility to one of the few known treatments for the illness.
Early stage trials of Johnson & Johnson’s experimental coronavirus vaccine show it generated an immune response in nearly all volunteers, with minimal side-effects, after a single dose.
The pharmaceutical giant also revealed it had hit a production snag and would not be able to deliver said vaccine as quickly as it had promised.
The CEO of Covid-19 vaccine maker Moderna warned that the coronavirus that has brought world economies to a standstill and overwhelmed hospitals will be around “forever.”
Scientists at Ohio State University’s Wexner Medical Center and College of Medicine have discovered a new variant of the virus that is similar to the mutation found in the United Kingdom but probably originated in the U.S.
Texas became the second state to record 2 million coronavirus infections since the start of the pandemic. California reached that figure in December.
Two cases of a more virulent coronavirus mutation were identified in two New York City residents — one in Manhattan and the other in Queens, city officials said.
Three additional cases of the UK variant have been identified in Warren County, bringing the total number of cases in New York to 15.
After a rollout that some officials admit was slow, the push is on to get more people vaccinated against COVID-19 in New York – and quickly.
State officials opened mass-vaccination sites at the Javits Center in Manhattan, the state fairgrounds near Syracuse and a site in Westchester County. A site on Long Island at Jones Beach and another in the Albany area are expected to open tomorrow.
Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s 2021 State of the State Address continued yesterday as day three focused on shifting to green and renewable energy.
Cuomo announced a $26 billion private-public partnership initiative, involving wind and solar projects throughout the state, which he said will be the largest green energy program by any state in U.S. history.
The governor specifically mentioned the development of two massive wind farms off Long Island — located more than 20 miles off Jones Beach and 60 miles off Montauk, which he said won’t be visible from the shore.
“We will see a global competition among government to develop economics that quickly adjust to the new COVID economy and New York state must win that competition,” Cuomo said.
Cuomo said the Port of Albany would become the country’s first wind tower assembly site.
After a summertime slowdown, the coronavirus cut a deadly trail through New York nursing homes in December, killing more than 200 residents statewide in each of the last three weeks of the month, according to federal data.
Cuomo’s administration is again refusing to release the total number of nursing home residents who’ve died from the coronavirus for at least another two months — until March 22 at the earliest, the Empire Center said.
A week after a violent clash between Trump supporters and counterprotesters at a park next to the Capitol in Albany, activists gathered near the site to call attention to how they say police handled the incident.
Andrew Yang is entering the NYC mayor’s race, betting that the same concept of universal basic income that helped make him a stronger than expected candidate in the 2020 Democratic presidential contest will win over voters.
Yang made his campaign announcement via video.
Former Citigroup exec Ray McGuire has raked in a hefty $5 million in campaign contributions since launching his mayoral run just weeks ago, solidifying him as a force to be reckoned with in the race.
Cash poured into the coffers of the major candidates running to replace term-limited Mayor Bill de Blasio in the upcoming June Democratic primary, their campaigns said in statements released yesterday.
A Queens man who told federal agents he wanted to join the far-right Proud Boys group was charged with a weapons offense after messages he posted on social media around the time of the Capitol riot raised alarms, according to prosecutors and court documents.
Manhattan’s median rent ended 2020 down by 17.3 percent, but the sales market showed signs of life in the other boroughs.
Workers at the Big Apple’s largest supplier of fruit and vegetables, the Hunts Point Terminal Produce Market in the Bronx, said they’re ready to strike for the first time in nearly 35 years over a pay dispute despite keeping the city fed through the pandemic.
Public schools in the Capital Region reported 547 new cases of COVID-19 among students and staff in the past seven days, a 30 percent increase.
About 130 Troy Middle School seventh graders will move to remote learning today in response to a staffing shortage caused by mandatory COVID-19 quarantine, the Troy City School District said.
Albany International Airport says the federal government has “taken added protective measures” there after the Jan. 6 mob attack on the U.S. Capitol while warning passengers they could face jail time or heavy fines for creating a “safety risk” on flights.
The Delaware Humane Association, from which Biden adopted one of his two dogs, plans to “indogurate” the pup, Major on Sunday in a virtual ceremony.
