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Zelensky knocks Russian plans to put captured Ukrainians on trial

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on Monday said negotiations would be “impossible” with Russia if it holds a trial for captured defenders from Mariupol.

Ukraine’s military intelligence arm warned on Friday in a Telegram post that Russia has been remodeling the Mariupol Chamber Philharmonic and installing iron cages in the building for a trial on Wednesday, which marks Ukraine’s independence day and six months since the war began.

“If this despicable show trial takes place, if our people are brought into this scenery in violation of all agreements, all international rules, if there is abuse…this will be the line beyond which any negotiations are impossible,” Zelensky said on Monday. 

“Russia will cut itself off from the negotiations,” he continued. “There will be no more conversations. Our state has said everything.”

Zelensky added that he spoke with French President Emmanuel Macron and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan about the trial, and he also expects United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres to react.

“Everyone understands everything,” Zelensky said. 

“They understand what the occupiers are doing and what it threatens,” Zelensky added. “And they understand that Ukraine will not tolerate this. It will not tolerate tormenting of people about whom only one thing can be said: they are heroes of their homeland, they defended the freedom of their people from invaders on their land.”

Mariupol, a major Ukrainian city located on the coast of the Sea of Azov, fell to Russia in May when hundreds of Ukrainian fighters abandoned the Azovstal steel plant, where they had held out for months as the final place of resistance in the city as it faced mass destruction. Many of the fighters were detained by Russian forces.

Fighting had been largely focused on Ukraine’s east in the Donbas region in recent months. 

But as the war approaches its seventh month, Ukrainian forces are trying to drive Russian forces out of regions they have controlled in the country’s south, areas located just north of Crimea, which Russia annexed and began controlling in 2014.

A Russian ammunition depot exploded last week in Crimea, the second recent suspected Ukrainian attack on the peninsula. Zelensky’s government has not publicly claimed responsibility.

Source: TEST FEED1

Record high in US categorized as suffering: Gallup

The percentage of Americans classified as suffering rose to a record high in July, according to a Gallup survey released Monday.

The new poll found that 5.6 percent of Americans rate their lives poorly enough to be categorized as suffering.

Gallup measures the life quality index of Americans as “thriving,” “struggling” or “suffering” based on respondents who evaluate their current lives and their anticipated, future lives on a scale of zero to 10. A rate of four or lower is classified as suffering, while seven or higher is categorized as thriving.

The percentage of Americans who are classified as thriving dropped to 51.2 percent in July, according to the Gallup survey, a drop from 59 percent in November.

Americans are currently struggling with a declining economy, a 40-year high inflation rate and soaring gas prices, while the pandemic continues to disrupt lives and abortion has been severely restricted in about half of all states.

Americans who identify as independent are more likely to now be classified as suffering, according to the Gallup poll, with 6.2 percent reporting a poor life rating in July, up from 5 percent in January, 2021.

About 5.4 percent of Republicans and Democrats are currently classified as suffering. For Republicans, that’s up from 3.3 percent in January 2021, while for Democrats, it’s up from 2.7 percent in that same month.

Gallup began asking the life quality question in 2008. That year, during the Great Recession, about 3.8 percent of Americans were categorized as suffering.

The lowest point on record was recorded in April, 2020, when 2.4 percent of Americans were classified as suffering. That percentage has slowly climbed ever since, through peak waves of the pandemic, political disruption, inflation and states banning or restricting abortion procedures across the nation.

The new Gallup poll was conducted from July 26 to Aug. 2 among 3,649 U.S. adults.

Source: TEST FEED1

The world is changing — why isn’t America’s approach to foreign policy?

Words and slogans matter. President Obama’s “pivot to Asia;” President Trump’s “do me a small favor”; and President Biden’s “pariah and war criminal” labels all created major problems. Two current slogans, unless stricken from the lexicon now, will prove as counterproductive or worse.

Since Russia’s 2014 attack on Georgia, many have regarded East-West relations as having entered a “new cold war” or “Cold War 2.0.” The arguments superficially may seem self-evident, as Russia turned from potential partner to adversary. They are not. The principal reason is that none of the assumptions foundational to the old Cold War paradigm apply today.

That Cold War construct rested on containing and deterring the Soviet Union. The thinking was that military alliances, principally NATO, and nuclear weapons would deter future Soviet expansion and aggression. The double-edged phrase MAD, for mutual assured destruction, expressed the understanding that thermonuclear war would eviscerate society on both sides of the Iron Curtain, making it unwinnable. And the West assumed or hoped that nuclear deterrence could be extended to deter lower levels of conflict with the USSR. 

Further, both sides maintained ongoing dialogues and communications that produced substantial arms control agreements and treaties. This ensured that what Nikita Khrushchev called “peaceful coexistence” would persist. Crises such as the Cuban Missile Crisis in 1962 were resolved short of war. And the West’s endurance combined with the irrationality of the Soviet political and economic systems resulted in its collapse, ending the Cold War.

None of these remains in place.  Then, the Soviet Union was singularly a military superpower.  China was a nascent, developing country, used as a lever to bring about detente between Washington and Moscow. Today, Russia is a military and energy superpower.  China is both an economic and rising military superpower. And the two are hostile towards America and NATO.

Today, neither China nor Russia has been contained or deterred. China’s Belt and Road initiative, militarization of tiny islets in contiguous seas and military buildup continue. Russia’s annexation of South Ossetia in 2008 and its 2014 seizure of Crimea were unopposed until this past Feb. 24, when Moscow invaded Ukraine.

Unfortunately, using the term “Cold War 2.0” reinforces the logic that today’s confrontations with Russia and China must be met and countered largely through military means. That may or not be the case. It is insufficient, and it neglects the stunning absence of bilateral communications. Unlike the Cold War, the U.S. and NATO are not engaged in regular dialogue or discussion with Russia today to alleviate any military confrontation, nor with China.

Beginning with the Obama administration, the U.S. embraced “great power competition” with China and Russia as its strategic framework. But “great power competition,” like “Cold War 2.0,” is a substantively diaphanous concept. Competition requires rules if it is to occur on a level playing field. There are none.

Over what are the U.S., China and Russia competing as opposed to contesting? Adequate definitions of competition are also missing. Regarding a military competition, what safeguards are in place to prevent the rivalries that erupted into World War I from reoccurring? None.

Distorting the dimensions of great power competition is the importance President Biden attaches to the conflict between “democracy and autocracy.” This is both an unhelpful and false dichotomy as Biden’s trip to Saudi Arabia made clear. Democracy must demonstrate that it works. Yet, the U.S., UK, French and Italian governments show signs of failing while Russia’s and China’s seem more stable. 

“Cold War 2.0” and “great power competition” should be replaced by the more accurate description of “dangerous coexistence.” Ensuring that some form of coexistence in these dangerous times can be preserved must be in the interests of all, given the many areas of conflict that could collide or explode into crises. And there are even greater, possibly existential, threats.

Elsewhere, the tectonic change in international politics has been characterized as the transition from the old to the “new MAD” of Massive Attacks of Disruption. Disruptive attacks are caused by man, from the invasion of Ukraine to Jan. 6 insurgencies and by nature through natural disasters and pandemics. These and other disruptors are potentially existential. And the world is dangerously unprepared for the new MAD. 

“Dangerous coexistence” must replace “Cold War 2.0” and “great power competition” in our thinking. And within this new paradigm, containing and preventing the new MAD should become foundational. The sooner these necessities are fully understood, the sooner we will become safer, more secure and more prosperous.

Harlan Ullman is senior adviser at the Atlantic Council and the prime author of “shock and awe.” His latest  book is “The Fifth Horseman and the New MAD: How Massive Attacks of Disruption Became the Looming Existential Danger to a Divided Nation and the World at Large.” Follow him on Twitter @harlankullman.

Source: TEST FEED1

America must learn more about Indian boarding school injustices

In late July, Pope Francis made headlines by visiting Canada where he apologized for the Catholic Church’s role in abusing Indigenous children in residential schools. The United States has its own residential schools tragedy that Americans need to know about. 

On May 11, the U.S. Department of the Interior released the initial volume of its investigative report on federal Indian boarding schools. It was an important first step in telling the story of how generations of Native American youths were forcibly removed from their homes and subjected to mistreatment and attempts to eradicate their heritage. 

The 106-page report showed that there were at least 408 schools in 37 states operated or financed by the federal government from 1819-1969. It described the abusive and severe conditions that Native American children endured at these institutions and noted that burial sites have been found at 53 of the former schools. 

The Interior Department deserves praise for rolling out this important publication and sharing it with the public. Follow-up in our educational system will be paramount. 

We applaud Interior Secretary Deb Haaland for taking the initiative and starting the “Road to Healing” nationwide tour to support survivors of the Indian boarding school system. Going forward, Congress must support Haaland’s efforts. We urge Congress to appropriate the necessary funding for completing the boarding school investigations and assisting tribal communities with needed care, similar to what was called for in the proposed 2021 bill, Truth and Healing Commission on Indian Boarding School Policies in the United States Act. 

States also should play their part. One of us this year worked with a broad bipartisan majority of California legislators urging support for the federal investigation, and is laying the groundwork for California’s cooperation with the inquiry into state boarding schools.

Some will naturally wonder, what happened at these boarding schools that has upset people and why are folks making such a big deal about students who were mistreated so long ago? Simply put, hundreds of thousands of Native American children were removed from their tribal communities and forced to attend government- and church-run boarding schools. The purpose behind the government-sponsored family separations was to force the cultural assimilation of Native children into U.S. society and eliminate connections to Indigenous languages and culture.  

For over 100 years, these institutions made every effort to replace Native American values, languages and ways of life with Christianity, Western traditions and English. At its peak, an estimated 83 percent of American Indian children were attending these boarding schools, where many endured physical and sexual abuse in addition to hard labor and disease. 

We must learn the full truth of what happened at these schools given the devastating impact their crimes had on destroying the families and traditions of America’s first peoples. It is imperative that we understand fully the damage that was done to Indian Country by removing Native American children and placing them in these institutions. Without a full accounting of what happened, many of America’s Indigenous people will not be able to complete the healing process from these crimes. 

There is reason for hope that our country can learn from its mistakes. It bears saying that many of the Indian boarding schools’ assimilation policies were put in place by the Interior Department; Haaland, its current leader, has ancestors who attended some of these institutions. Her life trajectory and personal story are an indication of America’s capacity to make improvements. 

Yet, the lasting change needed by our country will not come about without the proper investment in education that is needed on an ongoing basis. Heartbreaking chapters of Native American history — broken treaties, land removal and confiscation, Tribal reorganization, assimilation, termination, forced removal of children from Tribal communities — must be taught in our schools. Important concepts of American Indian tradition need to be taught, including tribal sovereignty, the Seven Generations Principle and other important currents of Indigenous thought. 

Native Americans’ contributions to sustainability, human rights and military service also need to be included in curricula. Undergraduate programs should require a Native American history course as a GE requirement, and law schools should institute a class on federal Indian policy as a prerequisite for a degree. 

While these measures would not solve all of Indian Country’s challenges, they would equip American society with the knowledge to avoid repeating past mistakes. We have a moral obligation to provide America’s next generation with a solid foundation of all chapters of Native American history — including the Indian boarding schools tragedy. Doing so will cultivate more empathetic citizens and voters on issues facing tribal nations, their aspirations and our collective future. 

James C. Ramos, an assembly member from Southern California, is the first Native American lawmaker elected as a state representative in the state’s 171-year history.

Ted Gover, Ph.D. (@TedGover) is director of the Tribal Administration Program at Claremont Graduate University. 

Source: TEST FEED1

Number of Republicans who say they support Trump over GOP rise: poll

Republicans who support former President Trump more than they support the GOP climbed to 41 percent in August, up seven points from May when 34 percent said they supported Trump more than the party, according to an NBC News poll released Sunday.

A slim majority of Republicans, or 50 percent, say they support the party more than they do Trump, the poll finds. But that’s down from 58 percent in May.

The former president continues to wield immense influence over the Republican party. He has heavily influenced the defeat of eight out of 10 House Republicans who voted to impeach him over the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol, either by forcing them to resign or defeating them in primaries by backing opposition candidates.

The most high-profile loss came last week, when Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.), arguably his fiercest critic on the GOP, was defeated by more than 40 points from a Trump-endorsed challenger.

Trump saw Republicans rally behind him this month yet again after the FBI raided his home in connection to an investigation probing whether he violated the Espionage Act by taking classified documents home with him upon leaving the White House.

Republicans decried the unprecedented raid of a former president’s home, calling it a politically motivated witch hunt.

Trump is also fending off a congressional investigation into the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol, which the panel of lawmakers has pinned on the former president, insisting that after he failed to overturn the results of the 2020 election, he allegedly incited rioters to march on the federal building.

Most Americans, or 57 percent, say the investigations into Trump should continue, according to the NBC News poll.

Source: TEST FEED1

California’s ‘privilege’-based curricula are at odds with American ideals

California’s schools increasingly are embracing the notion that students should be judged based on the color of their skin, rather than the content of their character. And these schools are not alone. Equality before the law, a fundamental American value, is under siege today in schools across the country. From the singling out of a biracial high school student in Nevada as an “oppressor” to teaching white students that they are inherently evil in Manhattan, K-12 education is becoming fertile ground for an assault on the ideal of equality. 

Whether it be under the banner of “critical race theory,” “equity,” or “intersectionality,” many activists and intellectuals have embraced the idea that one’s character is rooted in immutable and irrelevant characteristics such as race and sex, rather than one’s words and deeds. These activists have pushed for K-12 curricula that force students to participate in exercises in which they are separated based on their race and forced to describe the “privilege” or “marginalized status” they experience because of their race. This seeks to indoctrinate students in an ideology that emphasizes racial stereotyping and undermines equality before the law while silencing critics. 

A radical model curriculum created by the Liberated Ethnic Studies Model Curriculum Consortium, an educational advisory group that promotes race-based curricula in K-12 education, is the latest example of woke teaching in California. The home page of the group’s website emphasizes “lesson plans that center students in their self-identity” — based on race — and links to a YouTube video describing the sentence “I can expect my children to get a good education” as an example of white privilege.

The curriculum serves as a cautionary tale for the pitfalls of education based on racial identity. It  requires students to reflect on their racial ancestors and distinguish between individuals based on the supposed “privilege” derived from their race. It also mandates ritualistic “land acknowledgments,” which require students to proclaim that they occupy land owned by indigenous peoples. A similar curriculum created by this group is so radical that California Gov. Gavin Newsom rejected it in 2020 because it was “insufficiently balanced and inclusive” after it was dogged by accusations of antisemitism. Yet many school districts have rushed to adopt the Liberated Ethnic Studies Model Curriculum and others like it. 

By treating students differently based on their race, the Liberated Ethnic Studies Model Curriculum violates the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment and Title VI of the Civil Rights Act. Racially divisive speech and harassment by teachers create a hostile environment for students. This emphasis on racial identity flies in the face of Martin Luther King, Jr.’s dream that children “will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.”

Meanwhile, compelling students to express or adopt certain viewpoints violates the First Amendment to our Constitution. In 1943, the Supreme Court held that public schools could not force students to salute the flag and recite the Pledge of Allegiance against their will. Curricula forcing students to espouse woke dogma and requiring them to acknowledge that they are inherently “privileged” or “oppressors” because of their race raise similar concerns. Schools cannot compel students to express views that violate their consciences. 

Fortunately, some parents are standing up against this rising tide of illiberalism in our public schools. Public interest organizations s Pacific Legal Foundation are helping parents, students, and teachers fight for equality under the law and freedom of thought. People willing to fight for those traditional civil rights principles are needed now more than ever. As the Supreme Court noted in its landmark ruling in Brown v. Board of Education, “In the field of public education the doctrine of ‘separate but equal’ has no place.” Too many progressive activists have not taken this lesson to heart.  

Jack Brown (@jebrown300) is a constitutional law fellow and Ethan Blevins (@ethanwb) is an attorney at Pacific Legal Foundation, a nonprofit legal organization that defends Americans’ individual liberty and constitutional rights.  

Source: TEST FEED1

The Hill's Morning Report — Midterm jitters grip GOP

There are 78 days until Election Day and Republicans are worried. 

The GOP strategy to flip both the House and Senate based on public discontent with President Biden’s policies and the economy is being tested in the runup to Labor Day, according to recent polls and the hand-wringing witnessed in the last week among Republicans (including Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky).  

The biggest headwind as well as asset is former President Trump, leader of the Republican Party, who dominates headlines about the 2020 election, the Jan. 6, 2021, probe and classified documents found at Mar-a-Lago when the FBI fetched them on Aug. 8. Trump’s penchant for ignoring the GOP’s hoped-for concentration on inflation, domestic energy, crime, illegal immigration and the dreaded IRS has exasperated many GOP leaders.

The 45th president, almost certain to seek the presidency in 2024 and closely branded with his candidate endorsements this year, is now concerned he could be blamed if Democrats do better than expected in November. He will wait until after the midterms to announce his candidacy, NBC News reports. 

Other complications for Republicans this fall: Americans are uncomfortable and confused about legal and state legislative approaches to restricting abortion (Time), and the Supreme Court’s withdrawal of a constitutional right has mobilized female voters. Separately this month, some GOP Senate candidates in key states have faltered, leading to a discussion about “candidate quality” in states Republicans still hope to flip. 

▪ The Associated Press: Kansas recount released on Sunday confirmed referendum results in favor of abortion rights.

▪ The Associated Press: Pro-Trump candidate victories in blue states threaten GOP hopes in November when moderate Republicans had been eyeing a different strategy. 

All this early tea-leaf reading cheers Democrats who see some breaks in their direction, albeit with zero margin for error, reports The Hill’s Max Greenwood. Democrats say voters who may be swayed this fall hear more about policies that improve their lives from their side of the aisle than from Republican candidates, who get pinned down with Trump-triggered questions about the last election rather than this one. Biden and members of his party point to declining gas prices and the new, sweeping climate, health and tax law that includes popular provisions such as lower-cost prescription drugs that were opposed in lockstep by the GOP.  

▪ Yahoo News: New polls show Democrats could “win” the 2022 midterms. Should you believe them?

▪ NBC News: Falling gas prices could rise anew, warn oil traders, industry executives and former administration officials.

New York Rep. Sean Patrick Maloney, who leads Democrats’ efforts to retain House control, said Sunday that he is heartened by “a summer of strength [while] the other side has had a summer of stumbles.” 

“Republicans don’t have a plan. They have a ploy,” said the chairman of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee on NBC’s “Meet the Press.” 

Here’s what else we’re watching this week:

Monday: In Italy, campaigning picks up speed this week after a summer of voters’ seaside preoccupations ahead of a general election on Sept. 25. The Economist and GZero Media report that the race to replace Mario Draghi’s fallen government boils down to one essential question for Italy, with potential repercussions for Europe: whether Giorgia Meloni, 45, ultra-nationalist leader of the Brothers of Italy party, becomes the next prime minister.

Tuesday: Two high-profile New York House primaries are in the spotlight (The Hill and The Associated Press). … Florida holds its primary. … Will he or won’t he be compelled to testify in Georgia? On Sunday, a three-judge panel with the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals temporarily paused a judge’s order that Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) appear before a special grand jury in Atlanta on Tuesday as part of a Georgia criminal investigation of alleged attempts by Trump and his allies to overturn his 2020 election loss. The panel’s instructions to the district court judge: Reconsider whether the subpoena to Graham should be partially quashed or modified because of protections granted to members of Congress by the U.S. Constitution (The Associated Press).

Thursday: Facing a deadline, the Department of Justice must propose to a Florida magistrate judge any redactions it would make to an affidavit supporting a search warrant of Trump residence, as the judge weighs publicly releasing portions of the affidavit. … The president and first lady Jill Biden headline a Democratic National Committee event in Maryland close to the nation’s capital.  

Friday: With all eyes on inflation and economic demand, the government releases its report on U.S. consumer spending in July. … Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell delivers a much-watched speech at the Jackson Hole, Wyo., economic forum convened by the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City.

Related Articles

▪ The Associated Press: Trump’s long shadow keeps 2024 hopefuls away from the Iowa State Fair.

▪ The Washington Post: 2024 meets 2022: Trump, Pence, others ramp up for allies in midterms.

▪ The Hill: Trump pushes for release of an unredacted DOJ affidavit despite risks.

▪ MSNBC opinion, Hayes Brown: Why Trump and the media both want the DOJ’s Mar-a-Lago search affidavit released.

▪ The Hill’s Sunday talk shows roundup: House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) said the Justice Department should share with Congress some information from the affidavit leading to the FBI search of Trump’s residence, even if it is kept under seal. 

▪ The Hill: Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) said she is focused on keeping election deniers out of office. “I think it matters that much,” she told ABC’s “This Week” in an interview broadcast on Sunday.

LEADING THE DAY

➤ STATE WATCH

In a case of local politics with international overtones, Indiana Gov. Eric Holcomb, a Republican, announced on Sunday he became the latest elected official from the United States to visit Taiwan amid tensions with China. Holcomb and a delegation that included Indiana’s commerce secretary were in the Taiwanese capital of Taipei to kick off an “economic development trip” in Taiwan and South Korea, following Biden’s signing of the bipartisan CHIPS Act and the recent announcement that Taiwan-based semiconductor company MediaTek will open a design center in Indiana, the governor’s office said in a statement. “I appreciate the warm welcome to Taiwan from Douglas Hsu, Taiwan Director of North American Affairs,” Holcomb tweeted (CNN).

The Associated Press: Republican governors blame Biden’s federal policies for high gasoline and food prices and warn constituents the economy is headed for recession. At the same time, they take credit for job gains the same policies helped spur in their states.

The Hill’s Nathaniel Weixel reports that state ballot measures are the new battlefield for voter decisions about abortion access following the Supreme Court’s decision sending the question to all 50 states. Ballot decisions in Kentucky, Michigan, California, Vermont and Montana are ahead in November. Polls show most Americans support some form of abortion access, and reproductive rights advocates are eager to take the issue directly to voters. Bans and restrictions on abortion (in some states with no exceptions for rape, incest or the health of a pregnant child or adult) have motivated female voters across party lines (The Hill) and spurred big Democratic investments in campaign ads supporting reproductive rights (The Associated Press).

The Hill: Republicans in some states are actively opposing environmental, social and governance investing, supported by Democrats, arguing the focus is anti-free market.

Voters defunded most of the financing for the only library in a rural western Michigan townduring an uproar over books with LGBTQ themes (The Wall Street Journal). The library asked the community to restore the money to keep it operating and has raised $100,000 (NBC News).  

IN FOCUS/SHARP TAKES

➤ ADMINISTRATION

Biden on Sunday shared concerns about precarious conditions at Ukraine’s Russia-held nuclear power plant during a call with French President Emmanuel Macron, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz and British Prime Minister Boris Johnson. The foursome also spoke about ongoing negotiations with Iran over its nuclear weapons program. Europe is alarmed about a potential catastrophe at the Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant in Ukraine and the potential risks to citizens well beyond its borders. Johnson’s staff in London said the prime minister and Germany’s chancellor, like Biden, “stressed the importance of ensuring the safety and security of nuclear installations and welcomed recent discussions on enabling an IAEA [International Atomic Energy Agency] mission to the Zaporizhzhia facility.”

Financial Times: Russian President Vladimir Putin and Macron agreed on Friday that IAEA inspectors could visit the Zaporizhzhiaplant from Ukrainian-held territory. Clearing technical experts to assess the safety of the plant would require a reliable cease-fire.

■ Seeking to act where Congress did not this year, Biden and his administration are planning executive actions to battle climate change, including new regulations on emissions from vehicle tailpipes, power plants and oil and gas wells (The New York Times). White House climate adviser Gina McCarthy said Biden’s regulatory moves, combined with the climate provisions in the newly enacted Inflation Reduction Act, and action from states, could bolster the U.S. goal to cut greenhouse gas emissions by 50 percent, compared to 2005 levels, by the end of the decade. The Biden administration is coming under pressure from environmental groups to take unilateral actions, even as Biden’s use of his executive sway is certain to be challenged in court by conservative attorneys general who have argued the administration has overstepped its authority on climate change.

■ Biden is poised before Labor Day to hit the road to promote Democrats’ sweeping climate, tax and health care law with the midterm contests in mind. Salesmanship amid the public’s late-summer distractions by a president whose job approval ratings hover at around 40 percent is viewed as politically essential — and a challenge (The Hill). Reuters and The Washington Post report why some Democratic candidates want Biden to stay away from their contests.

Ahead of the president’s planned, pre-Labor Day trip to an Intel Corp. plant location near Columbus, Ohio, veteran Rep. Marcy Kaptur (D-Ohio) last week released a campaign ad telling constituents she “doesn’t work for Joe Biden. She works for you.” Her seat is rated as a “toss-up” by the nonpartisan Cook Political Report. Kaptur, first elected to the House in 1982, has during past election cycles shown an ability to create distance when necessary between herself and Democratic presidents. Trump won Ohio decisively in 2020. 

OPINION

■ Trump’s Senate candidates say better call Mitch (McConnell): Struggling nominees in swing states turn to the Republican leader to save their campaigns, by The Wall Street Journal editorial board. https://on.wsj.com/3QSQmxe

■ The greatest obstacle to returning to the Iran deal isn’t Iran, it’s Congress, by Jonathan Lord, opinion contributor, The Hill. https://bit.ly/3PzKGah

WHERE AND WHEN

The House will meet at 10 a.m. Tuesday for a pro forma session. It will reconvene on Sept. 13.

The Senate convenes at 10:30 a.m. Tuesday for a pro forma session during its summer recess, which ends Sept. 6.

The president is in Rehoboth Beach, Del., until Wednesday.

Vice President Harris has no public events scheduled. 

First lady Jill Biden also is in Delaware after testing negative for COVID-19 on Sunday in South Carolina, where she had been isolating.

🖥  Hill.TV’s “Rising” program features news and interviews at http://thehill.com/hilltv, on YouTube and on Facebook at 10:30 a.m. ET. Also, check out the “Rising” podcast here.

ELSEWHERE

➤ INTERNATIONAL

In Russia late on Saturday, a suspected car bomb attack outside Moscow killed the 29-year-old daughter of a prominent Putin ally (Reuters) and Russia opened a murder investigation (The New York Times). The intended target may have been her father, Alexander Dugin, known as “Putin’s brain,” according to the BBC. Father and daughter were at a festival and made a late decision to travel separately as they departed. A Ukrainian official dismissed accusations of Ukrainian involvement. “Ukraine, of course, has nothing to do with this, because we are not a criminal state, which is the Russian Federation, and even less a terrorist state,” said Mykhailo Podolyak, an adviser to President Volodymyr Zelensky.

Meanwhile, Russia on Sunday claimed its missiles struck Ukraine’s Odesa region, destroying an ammunition depot that supplies U.S.-made HIMARS rockets. Kyiv said a granary had been hit (Reuters).

The Hill’s Laura Kelly reports from Ukraine: From high fashion to flak jackets: Local Odesa designer now outfits Ukrainian military.

A dozen Chinese aircraft and five Chinese ships were detected operating around Taiwan on Sunday, including five aircraft that crossed the Taiwan Strait median line, according to Taiwanese defense officials (Reuters).

Japan is considering deploying 1,000 long-range cruise missiles to counter China, according to a Japanese news account on Sunday (Reuters).  

🦠Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida announcedon Sunday that he tested positive for COVID-19 with a cough and fever after a week’s vacation and planned to participate on Monday remotely with an African development conference in Tunisia (Reuters).

🏔 At Mount Kilimanjaro, Africa’s highest peak, adventurers (and there are 30,000 tourists with aspirations per year) can now chronicle their ascents in real time on Instagram, Twitter and TikTok following the installation of a new high-speed fiber-optic broadband internet network provided by Tanzania on the mountain’s slopes. Not everyone is thrilled (NBC News).

Colombia, the largest producer of cocaine in the world, wants to lead a global experiment by decriminalizing it (The Washington Post).

➤ PANDEMIC, POX & HEALTH

The Food and Drug Administration, mindful of the start of the new school year, on Friday authorized for adolescents the Novavax vaccine against COVID-19, offering an alternative for Americans skeptical of Pfizer and Moderna’s mRNA technology (The Hill). 

The New York State Department of Health over the weekend reported the first known case in the state of monkeypox in a child (the confirmed infection was not in New York City). There were a total of 2,798 confirmed monkeypox cases in the state as of Friday and 2,596 of those were in New York City (ABC News). … At least 10 pediatric cases of monkeypox have been reported in the United States. … There were at least 14,115 confirmed U.S. cases of monkeypox as of Thursday, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The first U.S. case was documented in Boston on May 19 — a reminder of the rapid spread of the virus.  

Total U.S. coronavirus deaths reported as of this morning, according to Johns Hopkins University (trackers all vary slightly): 1,041,419. Current average U.S. COVID-19 daily deaths are 392, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

As of today, 78.2 percent of the U.S. population has received at least one dose of a COVID-19 vaccine and 66.7 percent is “fully vaccinated,” according to the Bloomberg News global vaccine tracker and the government’s definition. The percentage of Americans who have received third or booster doses is 32.2.

➤ TECH & SOCIAL MEDIA

Since the 2020 election, mainstream platforms including Twitter and Facebook have applied measures to block, label and remove politicians and personalities with political impact in response to violations of company rules about dissemination of misinformation. As more candidates, elected officials and prominent influencers test the boundaries of those rules through incendiary and false posts, critics warn that tech companies need to follow through on commitments to block falsehoods and hate speech (The Hill).

▪ The Guardian: “Dangerous misogynist” Andrew Tate, a former kickboxer and reality TV personality who describes himself as a sexist with an online following, was removed from Instagram and Facebook. He previously was banned from Twitter and TikTok.

▪ The New York Times: Facebook and Instagram removed Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s anti-vax nonprofit on Thursday for medical misinformation.

▪ The Associated Press: Anti-vax group in Europe thrives online, thwarts Facebook.

THE CLOSER

And finally … It’s Monday. Time to stretch. We liked this weekend photo from the European Aquatics in Rome, a competition that ended on Sunday. If these medal winners can fold themselves in midair off diving boards, the Morning Report can surely find time for some terra firma exercise this week. Inspiration!

BBC: British divers Andrea Spendolini-Sirieix and Lois Toulson won their second gold medals of the European championships.

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GOP extends Hispanic outreach to down-ballot state races

Republican enthusiasm about Hispanic voters and candidates tilting their way is extending into targeted activities in down-ballot state races and the battle for control of state legislatures.  

The Republican State Legislative Committee (RSLC), which supports down-ballot state legislative and state-level offices, has invested in its first Spanish-language ad and has more than 16 Hispanic candidates in its “Right Leaders Network” recruitment and training program, including in New Mexico, Texas, California, Florida, Oregon and Illinois. 

Most recently, it announced working with Texas House Speaker Dade Phelan (R) to fund a $360,000 ad buy to support two of those Republican candidates in Texas: Janie Lopez in the Rio Grande Valley and state Rep. John Lujan in San Antonio. 

Lopez, a school board member running for a competitive new state House district, argued that the Democratic party does not align with her community’s values. 

“If you go down here in the valley, they are very conservative-oriented in their values. We have our faith in God. We believe in doing what’s right, morally and spiritually. And at the same time, we are tired of the corruption down here. And people are seeing that it’s time for change,” Lopez said.  

The efforts add to GOP hopes of boosting the party by making inroads in Hispanic communities, which has been a major focus of national Republicans.  

The Republican National Committee has set up 12 Hispanic community centers where staff work to build relationships and outreach in Hispanic communities, and launched a program to help immigrants prepare for their naturalization test. The National Republican Congressional Committee recruited a total of 102 Hispanic candidates in this cycle. 

The party is generally bullish about its prospects with Hispanic voters, a group that’s become an increasingly important part of the Democratic coalition. 

Republican optimism stems from decades of success pursuing Florida Hispanic voters but also from recent key electoral wins elsewhere, particularly in Texas. 

Republicans have been quick to build a steady bench of Hispanic candidates, while Hispanic Democrats had to struggle within their party for years to grow their numbers. 

Still, Democrats have historically invested more in pursuing the Latino vote, and they have an overwhelming numerical advantage over Republicans nationally. 

“I think it’s a fair criticism — and it’s an absolute fact criticism — in Florida, [Democrats] have taken their foot off the accelerator in terms of investment. The Republicans have outhustled in pure campaign electoral politics the Democrats when it comes to cultivating the Hispanic vote,” said Fernand Amandi, a Democratic pollster who specializes in surveying multiethnic and multilingual groups. 

“But what the Democrats have is the better story, their narrative and, in this case, the ideological headwinds caused by a series of issues abortion extreme Republican candidates and the specter of return to Trump,” added Amandi. 

The RSLC’s candidates are largely staying focused on kitchen table issues, and Republicans hope their outreach efforts will help them make inroads with Hispanic voters. 

“For too long Democrats have taken Hispanic communities for granted and now these voters are looking for an alternative to the Democrats’ disastrous agenda that has given them rampant crime, skyrocketing inflation, a lack of control over their children’s education, and a disastrous border crisis,” RSLC spokeswoman Stephanie Rivera said in a statement, pumping up the organization’s “multi-pronged approach” of messaging campaigns, targeted spending and support for Hispanic candidates. 

Republicans have control of more state legislative seats and bodies than Democrats and have some pickup opportunities in states such as Nevada and Maine, a University of Virginia Center for Politics analysis found. Where Republicans already have control, they are hoping to expand their influence in states such as Texas. And elsewhere, they are aiming to thin Democrats’ majority. 

California state Assemblywoman Suzette Valladares, a Republican running in a Santa Clarita-area district where there are more registered Democrats than Republicans, said that voters in her district are willing to vote for the GOP if candidates talk about issues that matter to them.  

“For a long time, you know, the policies aimed at engaging Latinos were all policies that only focused on the issues for underserved, poor Latinos. And, mind you, there’s still a lot that needs to be done in that area. But the issues that are now impacting Latinos in the middle class are the same issues that are impacting the rest of California,” Valladares said. “Affordability, homelessness, crime — these issues are so vital.” 

Cost of living and well-paying jobs are major concerns in Lopez’s district, she said, adding that she is advocating to make technical training programs more accessible in her community. 

The RSLC Spanish-language ad released last month highlighted the cost of living. It was backed by a five-figure air and digital buy and played in RSLC-targeted states such as Arizona, Colorado, Florida, Nevada and Texas. 

For Nicole Chavez, a New Mexico House candidate seeking to flip an Albuquerque district red, said that high crime is a major motivator and the reason she switched from being a lifelong Democrat to a Republican. 

Chavez’s son was killed seven years ago in a drive-by shooting eight minutes after he arrived at a house party. In the aftermath, she started a nonprofit for homicide victims and started advocating for stronger penalties for criminals, but Democrats did not support her bills. 

“It was an eye-opening event. Let’s just say that,” Chavez said. “I hate to say that, but I call it generational ignorance, being a lifelong Democrat, with the families because people don’t educate themselves on what their legislators actually believe in, what bills that they fail, what do they stand for? They just identify with ‘If I’m a Hispanic, then I should be a Democrat.’” 

Chavez, Lopez and Valladares said that through the RSLC’s Right Leaders program, they have gotten not only financial assistance but also training it provides and access to a network of state Republicans across the country. 

They also said that it is also important for voters to see Hispanic and Latino Republican candidates. 

“When I’m meeting people out in the community or door to door, they’re saying, ‘Oh, wow. You’re Hispanic, and you’re a Republican too. I’m so glad to see that there’s more people like you,’” Chavez said. 

“If you can see it, you can do it a little easier,” Valladares said.  

Source: TEST FEED1

The IRS could be on the verge of changing the way Americans file their taxes

The IRS could be on the cusp of revolutionizing the way that Americans file their taxes.  

The Inflation Reduction Act signed into law by President Biden on Tuesday provided $80 billion in funding for the agency, including $15 million to deliver a report on a free, government-run tax e-filing system that tax simplification advocates have long argued for.  

But the agency is on a tight deadline to deliver.  

While most of the $80 billion for the IRS in the new legislative package goes out over the next decade, the agency has only about a year to turn in its e-filing report.  

Specifically, the agency has to figure out how much an online filing system would cost, the design of the system and how taxpayers would feel about using one. 

Tax experts say the system could take two basic forms: one more conservative in scope and one more far-reaching. 

The more conservative option would be a standardized government version of popular commercial software from companies like Intuit, H&R Block and TaxACT that prompts users to fill out a digital tax return. 

There has already been an IRS program in place that allows low-income Americans to use these and other commercial products for free, but the program has performed poorly. 

An April report from the U.S. Government Accountability Office found that while 70 percent of taxpayers are eligible for the Free File Alliance program, only 3 percent use it. 

In its agreement with commercial providers, the IRS signed a noncompete clause promising not to make its own free software tool.   

Former Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration (TIGTA) J. Russell George testified to the Ways and Means Committee back in 2006 that, “According to representatives of Alliance member companies that TIGTA interviewed, their primary goal is to keep the Federal Government from entering the tax preparation business.”  

It’s not clear how a new free e-filing system would line up with the IRS’s agreement with private tax preparers, but it may simply be allowed to expire if the agency decides to move ahead with its own large-scale public filing system. 

The Free File Alliance came to be because Congress originally mandated the IRS to do away with tax returns altogether in a law called the Internal Revenue Service Restructuring and Reform Act of 1998.

After a major lobbying push by the tax preparation industry, the Free File Alliance was introduced as a way to let low-income Americans file their taxes for free without getting rid of tax returns.

The Alliance drew institutional momentum away from the change to return-free filing, which likely would have rendered large segments of the tax prep industry totally useless.

In 1998, Congress told the Treasury to “develop procedures for the implementation of a return-free tax system under which appropriate individuals would be permitted to comply with the Internal Revenue Code of 1986 without making the return required.”

Return-free filing is the second, more dramatic option for a free, IRS-run e-filing system that experts say could once again be under consideration as part of the Inflation Reduction Act.

Return-free filing is used by many countries with advanced economies in the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. It essentially means that the government would do your taxes for you, withholding what’s owed and then doing its own accounting without requiring forms to be sent in by taxpayers. 

The main type of return-free filing — used by the United Kingdom, Japan and Germany, among dozens other countries — is referred to as an exact withholding system. With this system, the IRS would try to withhold fewer taxes from people’s paychecks and skip the refunding process made necessary by a self-reported tax return. 

“In most of these countries, taxpayers meet their tax obligations entirely through tax withholding payments made throughout the year,” the Treasury Department found in a 2003 report on return-free tax systems. 

But experts say that all the tax credits in the U.S. tax code make self-reporting helpful — if not necessary — from an administrative point of view. 

“With withholding, the IRS already has that information. So it’s kind of annoying that you have to go through and enter it in yourself. But in the U.S. we have, for instance, joint filing. So if your employer knows what your income is, they don’t necessarily know what your spouse’s is. Employer withholding isn’t reflective of various credits and tax programs,” Alex Muresianu, tax analyst at the Tax Foundation, a Washington think tank, said in an interview. 

The other kind of return-free filing is called agency reconciliation. This is where “tax authorities prepare tax returns for individuals based on information returns from employers and others, and send taxpayers a completed tax form for their review,” according to the Treasury report. 

Some studies have shown that the government would lose revenue with this kind of system since the IRS is doing all the clerical work without relying on reporting from taxpayers. 

“If you as a taxpayer know things the IRS doesn’t know that are to your advantage, then you might not want to share that with them,” Robert Weinberger, a nonresident fellow at the Urban-Brookings Tax Policy Center, said in an interview. “But there are arguments that that would be worth it, since the whole system would be simplified and people will be happier. So maybe that’s a trade-off we’d be willing to make.” 

The government found in 2003 that a simplification of U.S. tax law, which is full of credits and exceptions to credits, should be a prerequisite for implementing any return-free filing system.

“Moving to a return-free tax system without first simplifying the income tax would require substantive changes in tax administration,” the Treasury report found. “These changes could shift burdens from taxpayers to other parties, including employers, financial institutions, state governments, and the IRS.”

But that prerequisite may no longer make sense in an age when everything from doctor visits to school records can be accessed instantaneously online.

Tax simplification advocates say a slimmed down tax code, which now stands at nearly 10 million words between statutes and regulations, would be well worth the effort. 

“It’s critical to make filing taxes as easy as possible,” Frank Clemente, director of the left-leaning advocacy organization Americans for Tax Fairness, said in an interview. “We’ve got to move away from this adversarial feeling. A simpler tax system will reduce cost, increase compliance and make people just feel better about the IRS.” 

Clemente added that the $15 million in the Inflation Reduction Act for the report on e-filing “indicates a seriousness to move beyond where we currently are on this problem.” 

“Whatever the proposals look like, it means there’s got to be a plan behind that,” he added. 

Advocates are keeping an eye on a provision in the act’s requirement for the e-filing task force that says it needs to look at “options for differential coverage based on taxpayer adjusted gross income and return complexity.” 

They say this focus on “differential coverage” could suggest that Americans with more complicated tax returns, who are typically wealthier, could interact differently with a new e-filing system than the average wage earner. These differences could raise questions about the fairness of such a system. 

In a Wednesday memo to IRS Commissioner Charles Rettig, Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen expressed concern about unfairness built into the tax system, which she described as “two-tiered.” 

“Most Americans pay what they owe, but those at the top of the distribution often do not,” Yellen wrote.

Source: TEST FEED1