With affirmative-action ruling, SCOTUS seems set for a return to 1954, and the days before Brown v. Board of Education made segregated schools unlawful

If you are a minority, affirmative action in college admissions effectively is no longer available to you after the U.S. Supreme Court's (SCOTUS) decision yesterday in Students for Fair Admissions Inc. v. the University of North Carolina, et al. If you are not a minority, however, various types of affirmative action still are available. That sounds like a peculiar outcome, but longtime Alabama attorney and civil-rights advocate Donald Watkins says, in the current American environment, it was pretty much expected.

The essence of yesterday's affirmative-action ruling, Watkins says, is this: The nation's highest court seems determined to take us back to 1954 -- and the days before Brown v. Board of Education, outlawed racial segregation in public schools.

Under the headline "Affirmative Action for Black College Students is Dead; Affirmative Action For Whites is Thriving," Watkins shows how whites have benefited from a nation that historically has granted them favorable treatment, even in states (such as Alabama) with a heavy Black population.Writes Watkins:

When it comes to matters of race, some things never change. Consider these poignant observations.

First, affirmative action that INCLUDES racial minorities in the socioeconomic progress of this nation is now outlawed. The U.S. Supreme Court killed this type of affirmative action yesterday on a 6-3 vote in a college and university admissions case involving Harvard University and the University of North Carolina.

Second, affirmative action that EXCLUDES racial minorities is still fashionable. This is why the overwhelming majority of the 5,996 publicly traded companies in America have all-white boards of directors.

This is also why the 19-judge Alabama appellate- court system is all white today in a state that is 26 percent black. Since 2000, every vacancy on the state supreme court has been filled by the gubernatorial appointment of a white lawyer or white lower-court judge.

Race, of course, long has been a hot-button topic, but matters of race do not always play out in a straightforward fashion. In some cases, the impact of race can be present in plain sight, with many Americans not even noticing. Watkins provides examples:

Third, the relatively small number of black athletes in colleges and universities across America who can run, catch, and/or dribble a ball in an outstanding manner can get into any school, college, or university regardless of their academic qualifications.

Academic standards do not seem to matter very much in cases where black athletes are used to produce hundreds of millions of dollars each year for major university athletics programs.

Fourth, legacy admissions programs at prestigious white colleges and universities have always been available to underachieving white students, and they remain available today. The Supreme Court did not touch this category of affirmative action that has overwhelmingly white beneficiaries.

Simply put, predominantly white graduates of these colleges and universities can always get their children and close relatives admitted to these fine educational institutions under a legacy admission program, regardless of how low their academic qualifications are.

What really is going on with SCOTUS? Watkins spells it out in stark terms:

Fifth, this Supreme Court is now functioning much like an Old South, "Redemption Era" court. A majority of the justices is on a judicial "holy mission" to take America back to the pre-Brown v. Board of Education era -- with all deliberate speed. Brown was the 1954 landmark case that outlawed state law mandated racial segregation in public schools.

One justice stands out in this discussion because his hypocrisy on the subject is hard to ignore. That justice, of course, is Clarence Thomas. Writes Watkins:

Sixth, Clarence Thomas has always been the nation's best known and greatest beneficiary of affirmative action. Thomas has never made it in life on his own merit. Admissions standards for educational institutions always had to be lowered for him.

Thomas has never had the intellectual acumen to be a great lawyer, appellate-court judge, or Supreme Court Justice. In fact, Thomas is ranked as one of the five worst Justices in Supreme Court history.

Thomas' professional ascent within the federal judiciary has been based on his political philosophy and not his intelligence.

Clarence Thomas is viewed by many Americans as an unabashed political "whore." Today, Thomas has the highest unfavorability rating on the Court.

As far as I can determine, Thomas has never ruled in favor of any black civil-rights litigant's legal claims in his 31 years on the Supreme Court.

What is worse, Clarence Thomas has shown that he hates Black people. Thomas also hates the fact that he is Black. Experts say there is no known cure for Thomas' self-hatred psychological condition. 

What is more, Clarence Thomas' vote on the Court has always been "for sale" for the right price, in the right case, for the right billionaire. Harlan Crow owns him. 

Yesterday's Supreme Court decision in the college and university admissions case was one more milestone along the Court's journey to a place in time when blacks had no legal rights that white men were bound to respect. The final destination for this journey is the Court's affirmation of its infamous 1857 Dred Scott v. Sandford decision.

African-Americans refer to this dreaded journey as a "Trip to the Land of Misery."

Note: Rex Chapman, a former (White) University of Kentucky basketball star, who played 12 years in the NBA and now is a well-known social-media influencer, shared this on Twitter:

Rex Chapman

@RexChapman

 

Some folks keep saying America has made so much racial progress that affirmative action is unnecessary. This happened two-and-half years ago in the United States Capitol.

 

 

  

A nuclear disaster at Southern Company's Plant Vogtle in Georgia would lead to death, destruction, and disease on an unprecedented scale in the United States

What would be the fallout from a nuclear accident at Southern Company's Vogtle Electric Generating Plant in East Georgia? That is a grim scenario to contemplate, and longtime Alabama attorney Donald Watkins, who has become a leading voice in online journalism about the racketeering, accounting fraud, cost overruns, and shoddy workmanship that have plagued Southern Company for years, has a grim answer to our question. Under the headline "Preparing for Death, Injuries, and Destruction at Vogtle Unit 3," Watkins writes:

Today, there is a 99% probability that a Level 7 nuclear disaster will occur at Unit 3 within 90 days after it becomes fully operational. (It is scheduled to go online in July.)

A Level 7 nuclear event is on the scale of the worst nuclear disasters at Chernobyl in the old Soviet Union in 1986 and Fukushima in Japan in 2011.

The Southern Company’s influence peddling in Washington and Georgia, coupled with “dark money” campaign contributions to key politicians in state and federal government, have brought the unthinkable at Vogtle Units 3 and 4 to the precipice of a disastrous reality.

To date, no state or federal government official has guaranteed the public that a Level 7 nuclear event will NOT occur at Unit 3 after it becomes fully operational. The reason for the lack of a public-safety guarantee is simple: Politics have trumped public safety 

How bad will it get? Watkins uses stark language to answer that question:

When the Level 7 nuclear disaster occurs, death and serious bodily injury from radiation poisoning, along with massive property destruction, will rain down upon the unsuspecting and innocent men, women, and children who live within a 40-mile radius of Vogtle.

This article discusses the need for affected residents to prepare for initial and delayed deaths from this Level 7 nuclear event.

While I sincerely hope I am wrong about the nuclear disaster at Unit 3, the credible whistleblower complaints and supporting documentation we have received to date suggests that no other outcome seems likely or probable.

Against this devastating backdrop, residents within a 40-mile radius of Unit 3 must decide whether they will entrust their lives to public officials who coddle corporate liars, shady contractors, and compromised politicians, or they will take the steps reasonably necessary to protect their own lives, as well as the lives of adult family members and children living with them.

This article discusses what these residents must know to prepare for initial and delayed deaths from the Level 7 nuclear event at Unit 3.

An upcoming article will address what the estimated 500,000 surviving residents need to know about the process of permanent resettlement, including their new life in old, nasty, and dilapidated Federal Emergency Management Agency trailer homes that are normally used to house hurricane victims on a temporary basis.

Another future article in this series will address the relocation of the Masters Golf Tournament at Augusta, GA, and what that entails for the PGA Tour.

In essence, Watkins is providing these 500,000 residents with life-saving information they are not likely to receive anywhere else, as those in officialdom take mostly a "head in sand" approach to looming disaster: 

According to an April 4, 2018, report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on radiation emergencies, a nuclear-reactor accident can result in the environmental release of radioactive material that is present inside the reactor core. If the core is damaged severely, exposure to high doses of radiation will cause injuries and deaths. Unrelated trauma may also be involved. This will occur in potentially hazardous areas of the nuclear plant and would likely affect only workers or responders. Environmental contamination with radioactive material can lead to internal contamination of the public with radionuclides, such as iodine. This internal contamination may increase the risk of developing cancer years after the incident.

A radiation emergency from a nuclear power plant accident may result in initial deaths during the emergency and delayed deaths after the emergency.

Initial deaths would occur at or near ground zero, caused by the blast, heat, prompt radiation, or flying debris.

Blast injuries would include perforated ear drums, lung and gastrointestinal injuries, trauma due to flying debris, fractures and crush injuries, smoke inhalation, and exacerbation of chronic conditions.

Heat or thermal injuries (from direct absorption of thermal energy) would include flash burns and flame burns caused by ignition of clothes or indirect effects of fires.

Delayed deaths would occur from

• Injuries sustained in the initial blast

• Acute Radiation Syndrome (ARS)

• Combination of injuries and ARS

Clinical effects decrease with increasing distance from the reactor meltdown and/or explosion; therefore, it’s important to know the location of injury or death of the affected resident.

Exposure to radioactive materials also increases risk of malignancies years after exposure. The effects of radiation on the human body are depicted in the chart at the top of this post.

 Radiation syndrome is a major threat to survivors of an initial blast, Watkins reports:

Radiation emergencies may lead to Acute Radiation Syndrome. ARS occurs when a person is exposed to very high levels of radiation, usually over a short period of time. These 3 types of ARS may result in death:

• Hematopoietic syndrome (absorbed dose 0.70 – 6 Gy) Nausea and vomiting (within hours), reduced lymphocyte count (1-2 days), reduced neutrophil and platelet count (days to weeks), infection, possible death within 30 days. Survival is possible, but less likely with combined injuries (thermal burns or trauma).

• Gastrointestinal syndrome (absorbed dose 6 – 10 Gy) Nausea and vomiting (within about an hour), reduced lymphocyte count (one day), reduced neutrophil and platelet count (less than one week), severe infection, bloody diarrhea, dehydration, death from 3 to 10 days. Very few will survive at this absorption dose level even with treatment. Survival is not possible with combined injuries (thermal burns or trauma).

• Neurovascular syndrome (absorbed dose 20 – 50+ Gy) Nausea and vomiting (within minutes), mental status changes (disorientation), shock, cerebral edema, death within 48 hours. Survival is not possible.

How did we reach a point where such a devastating event is likely to occur in the American South? Watkins provides some history:

On June 21, 2023, I published a warning to all persons living within a 40-mile radius of the Vogtle Electric Generating Plant owned by Southern Company affiliate Georgia Power Company (along with three other utility partners) and operated by Southern Company affiliate Southern Nuclear Operating Company. The warning advised these residents that they are in grave danger of a Level 7 catastrophic nuclear disaster after Unit 3 begins commercial operations in July 2023.

On June 25, 2023, I published a U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) letter describing how the Southern Company falsified critical test data on Unit 3. A catastrophic nuclear event was avoided during the hot functional testing of Unit 3 solely because no fuel was loaded into the reactor core.

Unit 3 at Vogtle is located near the city of Waynesboro in Burke County, Georgia.

Once Unit 3 is brought online for commercial service, it will become the first nuclear power plant built in America in more than 30 years.

Watkins compares Unit 3 to an automobile that has been declared a "lemon":

Vogtle Unit 3 is considered a “lemon" by many nuclear-power experts. The construction of Unit 3 is 7 years behind schedule and more than double its original budgeted cost.

Based upon NRC records and industry reports, Units 3 and a companion unit designated as Unit 4 have the highest pre-operational testing failure rates among the nation’s 92 nuclear power plants. These failure rates are the product of:

• A culture of production over quality

• A culture of poor inspecting or non-inspecting of work

• High personnel turnover and absenteeism

• Significant work backlogs

• High first-time component testing failure rates

• Need for extensive rework and retesting, and

• The willful falsification of test results

Today, there is a 99% probability that a Level 7 nuclear disaster will occur at Unit 3 within 90 days after it becomes fully operational.

A Level 7 nuclear event is on the scale of the worst nuclear disasters at Chernobyl in the old Soviet Union in 1986 and Fukushima in Japan in 2011.

Southern Company officials have: (a) consistently lied to state and federal regulatory agencies about the quality of their work at Units 3 and 4; (b) openly gouged and cheated the company's utility customers for more than a decade, without adverse consequences from regulators or law-enforcement officials; (c) co-opted greedy and morally bankrupt politicians who accepted “dark money” campaign contributions to sell out their constituents; (d) intentionally concealed design problems, engineering flaws, and shoddy workmanship from external safety monitors and inspectors; and (e) willfully falsified critical pre-operation test results.

A nuclear disaster at Vogtle would be historic in the United States. The enormity of such an event is hard for the human mind to grasp. Writes Watkins:

A catastrophic nuclear power event has occurred only once before on American  soil, and it resulted in the Level 5 nuclear disaster at Three Mile Island.

Vogtle Unit 3 will become the second and most deadly nuclear disaster in U.S. history. Based upon the estimated number of deaths from the Chernobyl nuclear accident, between 4,000 to 60,000 people within a 40-mile radius of Unit 3 will die a slow, painful, and needless death.

Politicians from across the nation, led by President Joe Biden, will offer their empty “thoughts and prayers” to the families of those killed from the reactor meltdown and/or explosion. The U.S. flag atop the National Capitol in Washington will fly at half mast for a few days. Numerous investigations into the cause of the nuclear disaster will be launched. Criminal prosecutions will ensue against top Southern Company executives and key regulatory officials.

Finally, the Southern Company has decided that it is cheaper to pay claims for death, personal injury, and property damages from its $13.7 billion nuclear insurance policy than it is to fix the fatally flawed, highly defective, and extremely dangerous Units 3 and 4 nuclear power plants at Vogtle, which have cost the ownership group over $35 billion to date. Only time will tell whether the Southern Company will pay dearly for this cold, hard, calculated, deadly, corporate decision.

Evidence points to Southern Company operatives' ties to ugly incidents, including the nearly fatal vehicle crash involving Alabama attorney Burt Newsome

Site of the Burt Newsome vehicle crash.

Documents provided to law enforcement and regulatory agencies serve as evidence that operatives for Southern Company have engaged in a string of dubious conduct against targeted individuals -- and this includes a vehicle crash, which appears to have been staged -- that nearly killed Birmingham-area attorney Burt Newsome.

The evidence contradicts claims in Tuesday's Wall Street Journal article that Southern Company has no idea how a surveillance campaign developed against former CEO Tom Fanning and his one-time girlfriend, Kim Tanaka -- and that the company has "moved on." A post today at the Ban Balch blog, which operates under the CDLU public charity and advocacy group, suggests Southern Company is not about to "move on" from an intimidation campaign against those it perceives as enemies. K.B. Forbes, CEO of the CDLU, writes today under the headline "On Fire! Southern Company Criminal Misconduct Allegations Escalate and Solidify."

Focusing on the targeting of Burt Newsome, who had engaged Southern Company and associated entities in a number of court battles, Forbes reports:

Southern Company operatives and consultants appear to have engaged in criminal and unsavory acts against unwitting victims, innocent children, and perceived enemies of Southern Company.

Spreadsheets and work orders provided to law enforcement and regulators list some of the unsavory acts.

Three specific acts were criminal felonies:

1. In September of 2020, Burt Newsome was injured in a head-on vehicle crash. He was gravely injured and nearly killed. Some even claimed the act was an alleged act of attempted murder by Southern Company. Evidence from the crash allegedly links known vendors of Southern Company to the law-enforcement agents at the scene.
   
2. A few days after Newsome’s near-death crash, a Southern Company stooge attempted stupidly to impersonate our executive director, K.B. Forbes, and his then-eight-year-old daughter in two attempts to illegally obtain banking information from his regional bank in Alabama. The criminal suspects had private, confidential information, including full bank-account numbers.
3. In November of 2020, Burt Newsome, still recovering from his car wreck, discovered that a law office checkbook was stolen from his office. The weekly cleaning crew disconnected the security camera and stole the checkbook, allegedly bribed by Southern Company operatives.

The nastiness does not end there. Forbes spells out more:

Other alleged acts by Southern Company operatives include:

• The smashing of the car window of Burt Newsome’s wife at a gym in which her purse was stolen. Law enforcement alleged she was targeted. Video surveillance of the incident shows the suspects driving around,  apparently specifically looking for Mrs. Newsome’s vehicle.
• In 2018, the sick operatives tied to Southern Company who sent the Newsome family a threatening package: Five pieces of luggage and numerous clothing outfits. There were ten outfits for mom and the four Newsome children. Was Newsome going to be injured, killed or murdered?  Or were the wife and children going to “disappear” on a permanent vacation?
• In the summer of 2020, Southern Company allegedly and foolishly decided to target, harass, intimidate, and terrorize the Hispanic family of CDLU’s CEO, spending big bucks to do so, and gathering intelligence and detailed personal information about the family. The terror and harassment included phone calls to the Hispanic mother demanding to know her location, asking if she was at home, and offering to “drop off a package.”

Given that history, should anyone believe Southern Company is set to "move on"? Forbes isn't buying it:

What a hot mess!

Claiming that a million-dollar internal probe did not find out who authorized a surveillance effort conducted against ex-Southern Company CEO Tom Fanning and his then-girlfriend in 2017, Southern Company looks like a sack of lying fools at best or a bunch of incompetent imbeciles at worst.

Yesterday’s Wall Street Journal report appears to solidify and escalate the criminal-misconduct allegations against Southern Company, and shows an epic hole in their compliance, regulatory, and oversight executive team.

It is unlikely Southern Company has “moved on.”

This is just the beginning.

A pattern of deception, deep lies, secret surveillance, intimidation, unscrupulous behavior, and harassment are all tied to Southern Company.

From the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission to the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, how can Southern Company be trusted?

Top executives at Southern Company appear to have lied repeatedly, consistently, and habitually.

Pointing again to the targeting of Burt Newsome, his wife and children, his business, a minority family, and others, Forbes raises this question:

Will Southern Company officials attempt to say once again they did not know who authorized these acts and why?

All the while, Southern Company continues to pay embattled law firm Balch & Bingham and Joe Perkins, the Oompa Loompa of Alabama politics, millions of dollars.

What a hot mess! A scurrilously hot mess!

Wall Street Journal and Bloomberg News flush their reputations down the toilet by dumping plans for investigative stories on embattled Southern Company

A newspaper in decline?

 

These are tough days for The Wall Street Journal (WSJ), which is (was?) one of the most respected brands in journalism. The newspaper especially struggles when it comes to coverage of Atlanta-based Southern Company, the nation's second largest utility.

The latest example came yesterday when WSJ reported that Southern Company officials consider it a mystery that someone conducted surveillance on former CEO Tom Fanning and his one-time girlfriend, Kim Tanaka. K.B. Forbes, publisher of the Ban Balch blog and CEO of the CDLU public charity and advocacy group, calls BS on that. Under the headline "Mumbo Jumbo! No Mystery who Paid for Southern Company Surveillance Operations," Forbes writes:

A report published by The Wall Street Journal today outlining the “mystery” corporate surveillance operations at Southern Company has spurred more scrutiny in that Southern Company claims “it has no idea who ordered the operation or why.”

“Southern Company is using mumbo jumbo words. Southern Company paid for the surveillance, and they do not deny the expenditures at all,” said Ernesto Pichardo, the Chairman of the Board of Directors of the CDLU.

“Last year, according to news reports, Southern Company paid a generous financial settlement to former Southern Company CEO Tom Fanning’s  ex-girlfriend, Kim Tanaka, and the spy who infiltrated her life. Southern Company has habitually lied and misused investor funds to target alleged enemies, including us, the CDLU. In November, we anonymously received financial and internal documents showing unequivocally that Southern Company spent hundreds of thousands of dollars in a two-month period in 2020 to conduct surveillance, threaten minority families, and terrorize innocent individuals, including young children, using a network of criminal goons and paid stooges. The documents have independently been verified,” Pichardo, a respected civil-rights champion, stated.

Here is an al.com report on the WSJ story. Yahoo! finance has a report on the CDLU's story, in which Forbes traces the "mystery" to Montgomery-based consulting firm Matrix LLC and its owner, Joe Perkins:

Southern Company appears to have relied heavily on the obscure consulting firm Matrix, LLC, founded by Joe Perkins. Secret contracts allegedly paying Perkins and his affiliated entities $2.2 million a year without the need to invoice led to the eventual ouster in November of Alabama Power CEO Mark A. Crosswhite. Alabama Power is a wholly owned subsidiary of Southern Company.

Ernesto Pichardo helps tie things together:

“Contracts allegedly giving carte blanche power and resources to Joe Perkins appears to be a betrayal of the fiduciary obligations to investors. Surveillance operations allegedly misusing company funds for personal and illegal purposes need to be thoroughly investigated by regulators and law enforcement. In today’s Wall Street Journal article, Southern Company prematurely states, ‘We have moved on.’ We, the CDLU, have not and we will continue working with federal and state investigators to protect our civil rights, our children, and our well-being from out-of-control utility companies who spend millions on surveillance programs, yet have no idea who authorized them,” Pichardo added.

As Forbes points out, much of this has been reported in the online press:

Last August, news reports revealed that Fanning and his then-girlfriend Kim Tanaka were spied on in 2017 in a surveillance operation allegedly authorized by Alabama Power and conducted by operatives working for Matrix. The apparent objective was to obtain photographic evidence that Fanning was bisexual and possibly blackmail him.

In 1993, Pichardo won a unanimous U.S. Supreme Court decision for religious freedom and Civil Rights after his Afro-Caribbean faith came under attack due to blatant intolerance and discrimination by racists and religious bigots. Pichardo has been a member of the Board of Directors of the CDLU since 2003.

An earlier example of WSJ's willingness to trash its own reputation came when -- someone, somehow -- convinced it to scuttle investigative stories on the accounting fraud, racketeering, and shoddy construction work that have plagued Southern Company for years. (Note: Rupert Murdoch's News Corp. has owned WSJ since 2007, so that might explain a lot. WSJ and Fox News now essentially are conjoined twins.) Bloomberg News (BN), which also used to enjoy a stellar reputation, was willing to take similar steps, canceling a planned investigative story on Southern Company.

Longtime Alabama attorney and civil-rights advocate Donald Watkins, has reported on these apparent examples of gross journalism malpractice. Writes Watkins:

The Southern Company’s Washington, D.C. office has successfully coordinated public-relations initiatives that completely co-opt and shut down negative investigative news stories that were developed for publication by Bloomberg News and the Wall Street Journal. These Southern Company “catch and kill” initiatives occurred in 2022 and 2023, respectively.

The Southern Company’s “catch and kill” of a Wall Street Journal investigative story was proudly celebrated by the board of directors during a dinner at the company’s annual shareholders meeting last month.

This effective approach to managing media content from New York-based news organizations is an extension of the Southern Company's “capture and control” program that began at its Alabama Power affiliate in 2017. National Public Radio (NPR) “outed” this creative program in a December 19, 2022, article titled, “In the Southeast, power company money flows to news sites that attack their critics.”

This raises all kinds of disturbing questions? Did WSJ and BN succumb to pressure from someone representing Southern Company's interests? Were they "incentivized" in some other ways -- perhaps with trips or junkets, gifts, favors (sexual or of other varieties), or maybe the old standby, cold, hard cash?

We appear to be talking about coverups, by news-gathering organizations that are supposed to be uncovering malfeasance. In short, WSJ and BN appear to have engaged in malfeasance of their own. Other media outlets should expose them for the journalistic frauds they apparently have become.

That is particularly disturbing because a nuclear disaster is looming in East Georgia because of corruption and incompetence at Southern Company. Writes Watkins:

As explained in my June 17, 2023, article, Units 3 and 4 will likely experience a Level 5 to 7 catastrophic nuclear disaster shortly after Unit 3 goes into commercial service. In light of the engineering flaws, shoddy workmanship, and lack of thorough, proper, and independent quality control inspections at Units 3 and 4, this nuclear disaster is inevitable.

Since 2017, politics has trumped public safety in the construction of the Units 3 and 4. Today, these units are nuclear deathtraps.

More than 500,000 residents within an 11-county area surrounding Waynesboro, Georgia will have to be permanently resettled after the likely nuclear disaster at Unit 3.

Thousands will become seriously ill from radiation poisoning. Many will die.

At this juncture, nobody inside of state and federal government appears to care about these residents or their likely plight.

The Wall Street Journal and Bloomberg News don't seem to care, either.

Horrified critics say Trump recording about handling of classified documents reflects his unfitness for office, but the MAGA voting base doesn't seem to give a hoot

Trump on the campaign trail

 

A tape recording uncovered this week of Donald Trump discussing classified documents suggests to some critics that the former president is not fit to hold the office he hopes to regain in 2024, but that might not affect Trump's support from his adoring political base, according to an analysis at CNN. Stephen Collinson, the network's White House reporter, writes under the headline "The tape that perfectly encapsulates why Trump may be unfit for the Oval Office – and why it may not matter":

Critics on Tuesday seized on the latest Trump tape as a perfect example of why the twice-impeached, twice-indicted former president is unfit to return to the Oval Office.

But the recording also explains the former commander in chief’s undimmed appeal to GOP base voters for whom rule breaking that horrifies Washington elites is a major justification for granting him a second term.

On the audio – exclusively obtained by CNN – Trump discusses holding a secret document. The conversation from a July 2021 meeting at his Bedminster, New Jersey, golf club is one of two episodes referenced in the indictment where prosecutors allege Trump showed classified information to others who did not have security clearances.

Given the extraordinary circumstances in which an indicted ex-president is also the GOP front-runner for 2024, the tape – the existence of which CNN first reported late last month – will play a political role separate from its use in Trump’s trial.

Some of the former president’s most prominent critics already say it should be a campaign killer.

“We’ve seen now with the audio tape that is out today, as well you know, that there is simply no question that he’s unfit to be the president of the United States,” former Wyoming Rep. Liz Cheney, who effectively sacrificed her career in Republican politics to oppose Trump, told NBC’s Lester Holt at the Aspen Ideas Festival.

CNN senior legal analyst Elie Honig said the tape appears to play directly into the charges that Trump is facing – alleged willful and illegal retention of national-security documents.

Why does the tape matter in some circles? Collinson writes:

“What has this tape established? Donald Trump had sensitive information, confidential information relating to military plans,” Honig said on “CNN This Morning” on Tuesday. “He knows that that’s what this is. And he’s sharing the information somehow or other with outsiders with no security clearance.”

Former GOP Rep. Adam Kinzinger of Illinois – like Cheney, a former member of the House select committee that probed the January 6, 2021, insurrection in the last Congress – added: “Most people with an ego try to put national security … above your ego. It’s the opposite in this case.”

Trump has put his legal problems at the center of his campaign – portraying himself as an innocent victim of political persecution. While this may be a good strategy in the GOP primary, it may not play so well next November if he’s the nominee.

In a surprising twist on Tuesday that could fuel such concerns among Republicans, House Speaker Kevin McCarthy – one of Trump’s most loyal lieutenants – said in a CNBC interview that he thinks Trump can win in 2024, but added of his patron, “Is he strongest to win the election – I don’t know that answer.” The California Republican faced an immediate backlash in Trump world. “People are not happy. What was he thinking?” one source told CNN’s Kristen Holmes. (The speaker later told Breitbart News that he thinks Trump is “stronger today than he was in 2016.”)

It remains unclear what corroborating information prosecutors have around the recording and with key Trump interlocutors. But the audio does appear to undercut Trump’s previous claims he didn’t have any such classified material. It will be up to a jury of his peers in Florida to decide whether such evidence is sufficient to convict Trump, who has pleaded not guilty to 37 charges related to alleged mishandling of classified documents.

In the tape, Trump seems to indicate he was holding up information that may be among the government’s most closely guarded secrets. “These are the papers,” he says on the recording, suggesting he just picked up a pile off his desk.

His apparent disregard for classified information is breathtaking as he laughs and jokes. As he often did in office, Trump appears to have been using US national security as a tool for his own personal or political gain. Trump also appears to be making the case of federal prosecutors for them. He admits he can’t declassify the material as an ex-president, apparently blowing up one of his most likely avenues of self defense at trial. (Trump has recently said he did not have any documents with him, telling Fox that the papers were newspaper clippings and magazines.)

For national-security professionals, lawmakers, and former officials, many of whom fear infringing strict rules on the handling of classified material, his disdain for the law – and the national security of a nation he once pledged to preserve, protect and defend – is staggering.

As the blowback directed at McCarthy suggests, Trump's MAGA base does not much care what their beloved leader might have done wrong. Writes Collinson:

Yet as extraordinary as the latest example of Trump’s mockery of presidential conventions is, it is also likely to provide the umpteenth example of how Trump’s antics – while horrifying to millions of Americans – are unlikely to besmirch him with core GOP voters.

In response to the tape, Trump – as he often does – sought to redefine an apparent example of aberrant behavior as perfectly acceptable.

“I had a whole desk full of lots of papers, mostly newspaper articles, copies of magazines, copies of different plans, copies of stories, having to do with many, many subjects, and what was said was absolutely fine. … We did nothing wrong. This is a whole hoax,” he told Fox News Digital on Tuesday.

This is a tactic the ex-president has used before. He did so over a tape that appears to depict him trying to convince GOP officials in Georgia to help him steal the 2020 election in the swing state. And earlier over his “perfect” call to Volodymyr Zelensky in 2019, in which he leveraged military aid to try to coerce the Ukrainian president to investigate his 2020 rival, Joe Biden. That call led to Trump’s first impeachment.

On the campaign trail in New Hampshire on Tuesday, Trump was in vintage form, delighting an audience with his norm-busting behavior and untruths and conspiracy theories. He showed how he has successfully portrayed the criminal investigations he’s facing – including an earlier indictment in Manhattan – into a conceit bought by many GOP voters that he’s being targeted by a weaponized Justice Department.

“Every time the radical left Democrats, Marxists, communists and fascists indict me, I consider it a badge – a great, great, beautiful badge of honor and courage,” Trump said at the New Hampshire Federation of Republican Women’s annual Lilac luncheon.

“Because I’m being indicted for you.”

His argument reflected the many ways that Trump has changed the GOP. The so-called adult-in-the-room party on national security is now effectively led by a former commander in chief who mocks classified-document protocols and allegedly ferreted away critical war plans. Once the party of law and order, many Republicans now regard the FBI as little more than a hotbed of liberal extremists.

This might sound absurd to many Americans, but that's not how the MAGA crowd hears it. The more Trump spits in the face of convention and the rule of law, the more they love it:

There is plenty of evidence to suggest that the ex-president’s strategy is working politically – at least in a GOP primary.

Although his support among Republicans appeared to soften in a CNN poll conducted after his second indictment, he still had a firm lead in the primary field. Furthermore, 54% of Republicans and Republican-leaning voters said Trump’s conduct doesn’t matter much to them as they consider his candidacy, because a president’s effectiveness matters more. Only 26% of Republican and Republican-leaning voters said that Trump should end his campaign in light of the federal charges.

In another sign his narrative has taken hold, a new national NBC News poll found that 6 out of 10 Republicans believe the indictments and investigations Trump faces are politically motivated. Anecdotally, multiple New Hampshire Republican voters interviewed at a May CNN town hall with Trump – before the federal indictment – indicated that they had no concern over Trump’s handling of classified documents and viewed him as a victim of political persecution who was getting an unfair measure of scrutiny simply because of who he was.

Trump denies all wrongdoing in both the classified-documents case and the Manhattan matter, which is due to go to trial in March – right in the middle of primary season. He could face other indictments, including in a Justice Department probe into efforts to overturn the 2020 election. CNN reported exclusively Tuesday that former Trump attorney Rudy Giuliani has been interviewed by federal investigators. Trump is facing a separate probe in Georgia into efforts to overturn Biden’s win in the state.

None of these cases appears likely to interfere with his bid for the GOP nomination – even if first voting is still months away. But it is unclear how multiple trials could impact his campaign schedule and whether the weight of multiple indictments could change his prospects.

And the same polls that show Trump maintaining a lead in the primary also contain warning signs for the former president regarding a general election. The CNN poll shows that most Americans approve of Trump’s indictment in the classified-documents case, even as 71% say politics played a role in that charging decision.

The electability question is why some of Trump’s Republican primary foes have been gently experimenting with rhetoric on the classified documents, possibly to test whether they can fan doubts about Trump’s suitability as a nominee among GOP voters fed up with losing national races.

Former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley, for instance, has said Trump was “incredibly reckless” over his handling of classified information if the 37-count indictment handed down by special counsel Jack Smith is true. But reflecting Trump’s Teflon status among primary voters, Haley didn’t weigh in on the audio tape, telling CNN on Tuesday, “We’re gonna let the courts play that out and do whatever.”

It is far too early to judge whether Trump’s deepening legal woes will convince some Republicans that another candidate might be a better standard bearer in 2024. And if he is the nominee, there are multiple factors – including the state of the economy, potential national-security crises, and Biden’s age – that could shape the election. 

But one key factor has been consistent since 2016: Whatever Trump does is unlikely to shake his bond with his most loyal supporters.

Alabama man files federal lawsuit after officers and police dog attack him on his own porch, in a case reminiscent of my violent "arrest for blogging" in 2013

 

Cops and a police dog attack Marvin Long

An Alabama man has filed a federal lawsuit over a 2021 incident where cops tackled him on the porch of his home, sicced a police dog on him (inflicting a number of injuries), and then arrested him -- all without apparent probable cause to even be on his property, much less initiating violence against him. (See video at this link.) From an article at al.com (dated 6/26/23) by reporter Paul Gattis:

A north Alabama man filed a federal lawsuit this week against 10 police officers, as well as the city of Sheffield, after a police dog attacked him on his front porch two years ago.

The federal complaint asserts that police had no reason to be on Marvin Long’s property nor to suspect him of a crime. The dog bit Long’s leg after police took him to the ground, according to the lawsuit. Body camera footage released by his attorneys shows Long on the ground as an officer shouts, “Bite him! Bite him!”

This is reminiscent of my "arrest for blogging," which made national and international news in 2013-14. Heck, it even was the subject of coverage and commentary in Russia. Much of the news coverage, including a letter from the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press, focused on the unlawfulness of jailing a journalist for engaging in constitutionally protected speech. The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) found that Shelby County Judge Claud Neilson engaged in a "censorship violation" by ordering my arrest.The CPJ's Sara Rafsky conducted an interview with plaintiff Rob Riley, catching him in at least one whopper of a falsehood, plus statements of apparent obfuscation. Rafsky created one of the most insightful articles about the case, and I highly recommend it as must reading for anyone who wants to understand the issues involved. Also, a University of Virginia center that promotes free-speech rights gave Neilson a "Jefferson Muzzles Award" for engaging in one of the year's "more egregious or ridiculous affronts to free expression." A CPJ survey in 2019 found Neilson's actions put Alabama in a class with Iran, Iraq, Uganda, Russia, Egypt, and other rogue states.

Receiving less attention were the numerous unlawful acts of the officers who engaged in my arrest, including the cop, Chris Blevins, who actually entered our home after being told to stay out and beat me up in my own garage. Blevins did this without stating he had a warrant, showing me a warrant, stating his purpose for being on the premises, and engaging in multiple acts of excessive force -- including dousing me with pepper spray -- all of which were unlawful.

Most reporting on police misconduct focuses on improper (and often deadly) use of firearms, beatings (often of individuals who have not been found guilty of any crime), and other forms of excessive force. My experience and the Marvin Long incident go to a different issue: Many law-enforcement officers are ignorant of the laws they are sworn to uphold. That certainly was the case with Chris Blevins, and it appears to be the case with officers who led the attack on Marvin Long -- even though they have access to the Alabama Sheriffs' Handbook, which apparently is designed to explain the law and describe a deputy sheriff's duties on the job.

As for Chris Blevins, he will not be beating up any more innocent citizens because he died on July 25, 2022.  The cause of Blevins' death has not been reported in the press, but I have received reports from a number of sources that Blevins had troubles on several fronts, both personally and professionally, in the weeks and months leading to his demise. That raises this question: Did state or county authorities intentionally sic Blevins on me, knowing he was a troubled and dangerous individual who likely would do most anything that might help save his job? We intend to address that question, and other issues related to Chris Blevins in upcoming posts.

For now let's return to the story of Marvin Long because there are many similarities between what happened to him and what happened to me. This is from the al.com story about Marvin Long's lawsuit:

The lawsuit said the encounter with police began when Long, who is Black, stepped outside his home in Sheffield – a small northwest Alabama town that is part of the Shoals region – because of a large police presence on his street on June 21, 2021.

Police arrested Long on charges of resisting arrest and obstruction. A judge in Sheffield City Court found him not guilty of the obstruction charge, court records show. He faces trial on the misdemeanor charge of resisting arrest.

After he was released from jail, Long went to the hospital for treatment of the dog bite wound on his left leg, a knot on his head and back pain, according to the lawsuit. The suit says Long suffered the head and back injuries when police took him to the ground.

“It’s sickening,” Long attorney Harry Daniels said in a press release Monday announcing the lawsuit. “We expect to see this kind of brutality on old news reels or hear stories about it from our parents or grandparents. But here it is, in 2023. Apparently not much has changed in Alabama in 60 years.”

According to the lawsuit, Long walked into the street “out of concern” after noticing the police presence in his neighborhood. Long walked near a law-enforcement vehicle but never touched it, the lawsuit said. An officer told Long to get away from the car or he would be charged with obstruction. Long walked away from the vehicle before questioning the deputy’s order, according to the lawsuit and body-camera footage his lawyers obtained and released to the press earlier this month.

Officers then unleashed foul and disrespectful language at Long:

Another deputy, then cursed at Long, telling him to “kick rocks motherf-----” and referred to him by another profane term, according to the lawsuit.

Long continued walking away, the lawsuit said, and eventually reached his front porch. After arresting two of Long’s neighbors in connection with a drug raid, the deputies and police officers approached Long as he stood on the porch. Long repeatedly told law-enforcement officers to leave his property, the lawsuit said, and they refused. Long then turned to go inside his house, the lawsuit said, and “without legal cause or just provocation,” the law-enforcement officers “brutally grabbed” Long to prevent him from entering the house.

“As a result, (Long) instantly collapsed to the ground in pain while being violently slammed and aggressively wrestled  to the ground as he was grabbing onto the porch railing and screaming for “Help! Help!”

Law-enforcement officials then began to frisk Long “without probable cause or Long’s consent,” the lawsuit said.

“Further, without legal justification while (Long) was lying on the ground helpless and in severe pain, an officer released a police K-9 that viciously attacked and mauled (Long),” the lawsuit said. “The officer Nick Risner yelled over and over to the police K-9, ‘bite him! bite him! get him! good!’

Long's attorneys were appalled by what they saw on the video:

Atlanta-based attorney Harry Daniels and Birmingham lawyer Roderick Van Daniel filed the lawsuit on Long’s behalf. “These officers weren’t satisfied with violating Mr. Long’s civil rights and siccing their police dog on him while he was unarmed, defenseless and crying for help. They made up circumstances so they could charge him with a crime,” Van Daniel said in the press release. “If we let criminal cops assault an innocent man and then charge him for the crime, none of us are safe.”

The issue of probable cause, or lack thereof, was addressed in an earlier al.com article (dated 5/6/23):

“This gang of officers didn’t have the right to even walk onto Mr. Long’s property, much less attack him with a police dog,” attorney Harry Daniels said in a press release. “The video is clear. These men aren’t protecting the public or enforcing the law. They’re attacking an unarmed Black man for no reason and they’re enjoying it.”

Long is scheduled to go on trial this summer for resisting arrest. A judge in Sheffield City Court found him not guilty on an obstruction charge, court records show.

The attorneys, Daniels and Roderick Van Daniel, say the body-cam footage backs up Long’s claims that the Sheffield officers assaulted him and arrested him without probable cause. Van Daniel argued that the resisting arrest charge is invalid because Long had not committed any crime.

“How can you charge a man with resisting arrest when there wasn’t a lawful arrest in the first place?” said Van Daniel. “For two years, they’ve done everything they can to keep this video from coming out. Now it’s out and the people can see the truth with their own eyes.”

We are left with a number of questions: (1) How and why did cops in north Alabama attack and abuse Marvin Long, when video shows he committed no crime; (2) How and why did deputies in Shelby County attack and abuse me, when there wasn't even an allegation that I had committed a crime; it was a totally civil matter where a compromised or incompetent judge found I had violated a temporary restraining order/preliminary injunction, which have long been found to be unlawful prior restraints that violate the First Amendment. (See Near v. Minnesota, 283 U.S. 697 (1931); (3) What was going on with Chris Blevins at the time of my arrest, and did county and state officials designate him to arrest me because they knew he was troubled and dangerous and could cause serious harm to another human being?

We will examine those questions and more in upcoming posts. We invite you to stay tuned.