Mayor of Portland to Trump: Get your troops out of the city
PORTLAND, Ore. — The mayor of Portland demanded Friday that President Donald Trump remove militarized federal agents he deployed to the city after some detained people on streets far from federal property they were sent to protect.
“Keep your troops in your own buildings, or have them leave our city,” Mayor Ted Wheeler said at a news conference.
Democratic Gov. Kate Brown said Trump is looking for a confrontation in the hopes of winning political points elsewhere. It also serves as a distraction from the coronavirus pandemic, which is causing spiking numbers of infections in Oregon and the nation.
Brown’s spokesman, Charles Boyle, said Friday that arresting people without probable cause is “extraordinarily concerning and a violation of their civil liberties and constitutional rights.”
The ACLU of Oregon said the federal agents appear to be violating citizens’ rights, which “should concern everyone in the United States.”
“Usually when we see people in unmarked cars forcibly grab someone off the street we call it kidnapping,” said Jann Carson, interim executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Oregon. “The actions of the militarized federal officers are flat-out unconstitutional and will not go unanswered.”
Federal officers have charged at least 13 people with crimes related to the protests so far, Oregon Public Broadcasting reported Thursday. Some have been detained by the federal courthouse, which has been the scene of protests. But others were grabbed blocks away.
Reality shows shortfalls of Trump’s claim to ‘best testing’
WASHINGTON — Here are some snapshots from what President Donald Trump describes as the nation with the “best testing in the world” for the coronavirus:
In Sun Belt states where the virus is surging, lines of cars with people seeking tests snake for hours in the beating sun, often yielding results so far after the fact that they’re useless.
In Pittsburgh, adults who are afraid they’ve been exposed to the coronavirus are being asked to skip testing if they can quarantine at home for 14 days to help reduce delays and backlogs.
In Hawaii, the governor will wait another month to lift a two-week quarantine on visitors because of test supply shortages and delays that potential visitors are facing in getting results.
“Testing has been a challenge everywhere,” says Utah Republican Gov. Gary Herbert.
Iowa meth kingpin is third executed by U.S. government
TERRE HAUTE, Ind. — The U.S. government on Friday put to death an Iowa chemistry student-turned-meth kingpin convicted of killing five people, capping a week in which the Trump administration restored federal executions after a 17-year hiatus.
Dustin Honken, 52, who prosecutors said killed key witnesses to stop them from testifying in his drugs case, received a lethal injection at the Federal Correctional Complex in Terre Haute, Indiana. Two others were also put to death during the week after a hiatus of nearly 20 years, including Wesley Purkey. His lawyers contended he had dementia and didn’t know why he was being executed.
The first in the spate federal executions happened Tuesday, when Daniel Lewis Lee was put to death for killing a family in the 1990s as part of a plot to build a whites-only nation. Lee’s execution, like Purkey’s, went ahead only after the U.S. Supreme Court gave it a green light in a 5-4 decision hours before.
Honken, who had been on death row since 2005, was pronounced dead at 4:36 p.m. The inmate — known for his verbosity at hearings and for a rambling statement declaring his innocence at sentencing — spoke only briefly, neither addressing victims’ family members nor saying he was sorry. His last words were, “Holy Mary, mother of God, pray for me.”
A Catholic priest, Honken’s spiritual adviser, stood near him inside the death chamber. Honken spoke on his back, strapped to a gurney under a pale-green sheet. He didn’t look toward witnesses behind a glass barrier, keeping his eyes firmly fixed on the ceiling.
Republicans eye sweeping shield from coronavirus liability
WASHINGTON — A new plan from Senate Republicans to award businesses, schools, and universities sweeping exemptions from lawsuits arising from inadequate coronavirus safeguards is putting Republicans and Democrats at loggerheads as Congress reconvenes next week to negotiate another relief package.
The liability proposal, drafted by Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., and senior Republican John Cornyn of Texas, promises to shield employers when customers and workers are exposed to coronavirus by moving lawsuits to federal court and limiting legal liability to acts of “gross negligence or intentional misconduct,” according to a draft of the plan obtained by The Associated Press.
Supporters say the plan protects businesses and other employers who adhere to public-health guidelines in good faith. Opponents argue it will permit wrongdoing to go unpunished. It’s up to Congress to resolve the debate, with the outcome likely to determine what legal recourse is available to Americans who contract the virus.
“Even if businesses and hospitals follow all the relevant guidelines and act in good faith, they could end up fighting a very long and a very expensive lawsuit,” Cornyn said. “They could end up winning that lawsuit, but they could also end up going bankrupt in the process.
In the courts, gross negligence amounts to “reckless disregard” for the safety of others, which is a high standard to meet. Ordinary negligence, by contrast, occurs when a business owner fails to take reasonable precautions to protect people from the COVID-19 threat. The GOP’s proposed standard would apply retroactively to when the coronavirus began to circulate in December and would extend through at least 2024.
Stress rises for unemployed as $600 benefit nears end
WASHINGTON — A major source of income for roughly 30 million unemployed people is set to end, threatening their ability to meet rent and pay bills and potentially undercutting the fragile economic recovery.
In March, Congress approved an extra $600 in weekly unemployment benefits as part of its $2 trillion relief package aimed at offsetting the impact of the coronavirus pandemic. That additional payment expires next week unless it gets renewed.
For Henry Montalvo, who was furloughed from his job as a banquet server and bartender in Phoenix in mid-March, the expiration of the $600 will cut his unemployment benefits by two-thirds. He uses the money to help support his three children and pregnant girlfriend.
“Now that it’s about to end, that grim and uneasy feeling is coming back and really fast,” Montalvo said.
The unemployment insurance program has emerged as a crucial source of support at a time when the jobless rate is at Depression-era levels. In May, unemployment benefits made up 6% of all U.S. income, ahead of even Social Security, and up dramatically from February, when it amounted to just 0.1% of national income.