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Cheney: Hutchinson’s testimony showed young women ‘what it really means to be a patriot’

Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) on Wednesday said the testimony from former Trump White House aide Cassidy Hutchinson before the Jan. 6 select committee showed young women “what it really means to be a patriot.”

The comment came during Cheney’s speech at the Reagan Presidential Library on Wednesday, one day after the Jan. 6 panel held a surprise hearing with Hutchinson, a former special assistant to Trump White House chief of staff Mark Meadows.

Among the most stunning revelations she made was that then-President Trump knew the crowd at his Ellipse speech had weapons, but did not care because they were “not here to hurt me.”

Cheney on Wednesday said she has been “incredibly moved” by the young women who have come before the committee, including Hutchinson.

“Some of these are young women who worked on the Trump campaign, some worked in the Trump White House, some who worked in offices on Capitol Hill, all who knew immediately that what happened that day must never happen again. America had the chance to meet one of these young women yesterday, Ms. Cassidy Hutchinson,” Cheney said.

“Her superiors – men many years older – a number of them are hiding behind executive privilege, anonymity and intimidation. But her bravery and patriotism yesterday were awesome to behold,” she continued. “Little girls all across this great nation are seeing what it really means to love this country and what it really means to be a patriot.”

Hutchinson, now 26, appeared before the Jan. 6 select committee on Tuesday and delivered gripping, first-hand testimony regarding what occurred in the Trump White House before, during and after the Capitol riot.

Hutchinson’s public appearance before the panel came after she spoke with committee investigators four times behind closed doors.

Her testimony, however, has since come under scrutiny — particularly one second-hand account she delivered about a ride Trump took in his presidential vehicle following his speech at the Ellipse.

Hutchinson told the committee that Trump, angry that he was not permitted to go to the Capitol with his supporters, lunged for the steering wheel of his presidential SUV.

The ex-aide said she first heard about the incident from White House deputy chief of staff Tony Ornato and Robert Engel, head of the president’s security detail who was in the vehicle at the time of the episode.

Hutchinson said Ornato told the story while Engel was in the room, and that the head of Trump’s security detail did not refute the account.

Some, however, are now pushing back on the story, claiming that the incident relayed by Hutchinson did not happen.

Trump said he did not lunge at the Secret Service, telling Newsmax in an interview, “Who would do that? I would grab a Secret Service person by the throat?”

According to NBC News, a source close to Ornato said the former deputy chief of staff first learned about the vehicle incident during Tuesday’s hearing. Additionally, CBS News reported that Engel and the driver of the SUV are willing to testify that the president did not physically attack or assault them, and are prepared to say that Trump did not lunge at the steering wheel.

Cheney, however, is standing by Hutchinson, telling ABC News in an interview that she is “absolutely confident” in the ex-aide’s credibility.

“I’m confident in her testimony,” Cheney said. “I think that what Cassidy Hutchinson did was an unbelievable example of bravery and of courage and patriotism in the face of real pressure.”

During her remarks at the Reagan Presidential Library on Wednesday, Cheney spoke directly to young women, saying “the power is yours and so is the responsibility.”

“In our great nation, one individual can make all the difference, and each individual must try. There are no bystanders in a Constitutional Republic,” she said.

“And let me also say this to the little girls and to the young women who are watching tonight: these days, for the most part, men are running the world, and it’s really not going all that well,” she added.

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Supreme Court agrees to hear high-stakes election law clash

The Supreme Court on Thursday agreed to review an effort by Republican lawmakers in North Carolina to advance a sweeping legal theory that, if successful, could hand state legislatures broad new powers over how voting maps are drawn and federal elections conducted.

Viewed narrowly, the case is an appeal from a state court’s ruling that a new Republican-drawn North Carolina voting map amounted to an illegal partisan gerrymander.

But the breadth of the legal argument put forth by the Republican challengers raises the stakes of the case considerably, legal experts say.

“An extreme version of the theory would shut down state courts’ ability to rein in partisan gerrymandering and protect voters’ rights in federal elections,” said Rick Hasen, a professor at UCLA Law.

The justices will hear the case next term, which begins in October, with a decision likely in 2023. Arguments have not yet been scheduled.

The Republican challengers in the case have urged the justices to rule in their favor by finding that the Constitution’s Elections Clause hands state legislatures near total control over how federal elections are carried out in their state, a theory known as the “independent state legislature doctrine.”

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Sen. Leahy, third in line to presidency, falls and breaks hip

Senate President Pro Tempore Pat Leahy (D-Vt.), the most senior member of the Senate Democratic caucus who stands third in the line of presidential succession, fell and broke his hip and will undergo surgery Thursday.  

Leahy, who is 82 years old, fell Wednesday evening at his home in McLean, Va., his office announced.  

Leahy’s emergency surgery means he may have to miss time in the Senate, which would limit what Senate Majority Leader Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) could schedule in the 50-50 Senate.  

Any nominee who doesn’t have Republican support will have to wait for Leahy’s return to work unless there’s also an absence on the GOP side of the aisle.  

“This morning, Sen. Leahy will undergo surgery to repair a broken hip that he suffered as a result from a fall at his house in McLean, Virginia, Wednesday night,” Leahy’s office announced in a statement.  

The statement said lack of depth perception was a factor and that the senior senator is expected to make a full recovery.  

“Having been born blind in one eye, the Senator has had a lifelong struggle with reduced depth perception. He has taken some remarkable dingers over the years but this one finally caught up with him,” his office said.  

The office explained that doctors determined that the best course of action would be to have surgery to repair his broken hip as soon as possible.  

Leahy, who is serving his 8^th Senate term, announced in November that he would retire at the end of this year.  

Only Vice President Kamala Harris and Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) are ahead of Leahy in the line of succession should President Biden not be able to perform his duties.  

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Supreme Court curbs EPA’s climate powers

The Supreme Court on Thursday curbed the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA’s) ability to regulate climate change, setting limits on how the agency can deal with power plants.

In a 6-3 ruling, the justices determined that the EPA cannot induce a shift toward cleaner energy sources using the approach that an Obama-era regulation sought to. 

 “Congress did not grant EPA…the authority to devise emissions caps based on the generation shifting approach the Agency took in the Clean Power Plan,” the majority wrote. 

The ruling was spurred by an appeal to a decision last year that struck down a Trump-era power plant rule. 

Developing

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Alyssa Farah says she put Hutchinson in touch with Cheney

Former White House Communications Director Alyssa Farah said she put Cassidy Hutchinson, a personal friend and top aide to former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows, in touch with the select House committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, riot at the U.S. Capitol and encouraged her to testify.

“A couple months ago, I put her in touch with Congresswoman Cheney,” Farah said while appearing on CNN’s morning show New Day on Thursday. “She got a new lawyer and that’s how this testimony came about.”

Farah said Hutchinson had previously been given legal representation by “someone who had been in the White House counsel’s office,” and was “still aligned with Trump World.”

Hutchinson spoke to the committee behind closed doors before her in-person testimony this week.

“She did her interview, she complied with the committee, but she shared with me ‘there is more I want to share that was not asked in those settings. How do we do this?’” Farah said.

“In that process, she got a new attorney of her own. Congresswoman Cheney had a sense of what questions needed to be asked that weren’t previously. So that’s how this shocking testimony that people didn’t realize before kind of came about, and it didn’t come up in her earlier interview, some of these facts.”

Hutchinson on Tuesday provided bombshell revelations about Trump and his inner circle near the time of the Capitol riot. Among the allegations was that Trump on Jan. 6 was irate that his security detail and advisors would not allow him to go to the Capitol to be with the mob that ended up rioting that day.

At one point, she said other top White House aides told Hutchinson that Trump lunged for the steering wheel of the presidential vehicle he was riding in after speaking at a rally on the National Mall and attacked a secret service officer who tried to stop him.

Trump has denied those allegations, dismissing Hutchinson as a low-level staffer who he says is not credible. Members of the Secret Service in the car that day are also reportedly ready to testify that Trump did not grab the steering wheel or attack them.

Hutchinson also said that both Meadows and Trump were aware that some attendees at a rally earlier on Jan. 6 were armed, and that they had received repeated warnings of potential violence leading up to that day.

Trumps allies on Capitol Hill and in conservative media have attacked Hutchinson over her testimony, arguing her statements rely on hearsay or are not plausible.

Farah, a former top staffer in Trump’s White House, praised Hutchinson before her testimony this week. She has spent her time since leaving the White House as a contributor to CNN and guest host on ABC’s The View.

Source: TEST FEED1

Two local newspapers close every week in the US

Local news has been on the decline for decades, thanks in part to the exodus of advertisers from the classified pages to then-startups like Craig’s List, and the advent of the internet and social media. 

New research from Northwestern University’s Medill School of Journalism, Media and Integrated Marketing Communications painted an updated picture of the situation in a report that found that two local newspapers fold each week in the United States. 

The findings spell concern for rural communities unable to sustain local coverage. Areas that currently lack robust coverage also tend to have older, poorer and less educated populations compared with areas that are covered well.

In news deserts, local officials are no longer held accountable for misdeeds by the press, and an uninformed populace tends to participate less in democracy. 

Between late 2019 and May 2022, over 360 newspapers closed, while since 2005, the nation has lost over a quarter of its local publications. That trend is expected to continue, and by 2025, researchers predict the US will lose one third of its local newspapers.

The majority of communities that have seen a local paper fold do not have an online or digital replacement, putting one fifth of the country’s population, or 70 million Americans, at risk of living in a void of local information, researchers found. Roughly 7 percent of counties throughout the United States currently have no newspaper. 

“This is a crisis for our democracy and our society,” said lead author Penelope Muse Abernathy in a statement. 

“Invariably, the economically struggling, traditionally underserved communities that need local journalism the most are the very places where it is most difficult to sustain print or digital news organizations.”

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The repercussions of closing local papers include increased spread of misinformation, heightened political polarization, and declined public trust in media. Surveys have consistently shown local media tends to garner higher trust from the public when compared with national outlets. 

Although corporate and philanthropic funding efforts in recent years have contributed to several new hyper-focused digital sites, these outlets tend to exist in “digitally connected urban areas with diverse sources of funding,” according to a Northwestern press release. 

Newspapers that survived the shift significantly cut staff and reduced circulation, while conglomerates like Gannett, Lee Enterprises and Alden Global Capital have bought up huge shares of local papers throughout the country, the release continued.

Adopting a non-profit model has resulted in some success for individual newsrooms. 

Citing additional signs of hope, Tim Franklin, senior associate dean, John M. Mutz Chair in Local News and director of the Medill Local News Initiative explained how new startups have also launched in places like Baltimore, Chicago and Cleveland. 

“Some legacy news outlets are deftly transforming from print to digital,” he continued. “There are unheralded local news leaders who are adapting and experimenting with new models. And local news is increasingly being delivered through newsletters and other digital platforms. But the need to innovate is urgent.”

Another potential solution proposed by experts is to partner college journalism students with local newsrooms to provide a staffing and coverage boost.

Report For America, a non-profit organization that places journalists in local newsrooms across the country, has also grown in popularity in recent years and is based off of similar public service projects like Teach For America. 

Additional solutions include offering tax credits for individuals or businesses who subscribe to local news, a hallmark of the Local Journalism Sustainability Act. 

Other countries that have seen a similar decline in news revenue already engage with social media companies or search engines like Facebook and Google to pay news organizations every time an article or link is published on the platform. 

Source: TEST FEED1

The woke crowd should wake up: Ours is a country to brag about

You’re always on shaky ground when you make generalizations, but that doesn’t mean the generalization isn’t true. In fact, very often it’s the opposite. That’s probably how it became a generalization in the first place.

Here’s a generalization that a lot of conservatives believe is true: that while liberal elites may love some hypothetical, perfect version of America — one where there’s absolutely no racism, no discrimination of any kind, no bad cops, no pollution —  they don’t love the America we currently inhabit. Or at least, they’re not proud of their country.  

This was true before Donald Trump came along and made them ill. It’s especially true now with all that’s coming out at the Jan. 6 House hearings. But it’s not just Trump himself who has soured them on America, a man they likened to all sorts of Nazis. It’s also the millions of Americans in “flyover country” who voted for him. To the elite left, this is not a country they want to brag about.    

Just this week, with the Fourth of July right around the corner, New York Times columnist Pamela Paul wrote about all sorts of things she finds wrong with America. “What, if anything, makes this country different from other countries … in terms of morals or ideals?” she wondered. Could it be our freedom? The rights outlined in our Constitution? That we’re a haven for legal immigrants? None of the above, as far as Paul is concerned. “I land on a distinct absence of mercy,” she concluded, and “I can’t help but see a particular American bent toward cruelty.”

The column, by the way, ran under the headline, “America the Merciless.”  

A while back, Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) tweeted that “American workers are some of the most overworked yet our standard of living has fallen. For many, the American dream has become a nightmare.”

The American dream … a nightmare? That’s pretty dark stuff, though not really surprising coming from a progressive. And while Sanders said it back in 2016 when he was running for president, I suspect it’s what a lot of progressives think today. No matter how much progress we make, for elites on the left, the glass always seems to be half empty.

Never mind that you could make a case that they’re the ones who should be chanting, “USA! USA! USA!” Democrats control the House, the Senate, the White House — and, for crying out loud, they control American culture. 

It’s not conservatives who run most American news organizations, or American universities, or Hollywood entertainment. “Woke” leftists even have taken over many American corporations.  They’re the ones who set the table for the national conversation.

But somehow, it’s not enough. And in their worldview, just about everything wrong with America leads back to the Republican Party — which, in fairness, is pretty much how hard-right conservatives feel about the Democratic Party. And while we’re on the subject, you could make a case that Donald Trump doesn’t love America, either. If he did, would he play fast and loose with our democracy, our Constitution? Would someone who loved America try to steal the election he claims was stolen from him? Would he try to do an end run around the peaceful transfer of power after he lost the election in 2020?  

Still, it’s elites on the left, with their holier-than-thou sanctimony and their supposed intelligence and sophistication, that I find so annoying.  

Here’s what I mean: After the tragic school shooting in Uvalde, Texas, Charles Blow, one of the New York Times’ many progressive columnists, wrote, “I understand that Republicans are the opposition, that they have come to accept staggering levels of death as the price they must pay to advance their political agenda on everything from COVID to guns.”

Republicans aren’t simply wrong, as far as many on the left are concerned, they’re people who make cold-blooded political calculations so they can accept a “staggering” level of death “to advance their political agenda.”  

And the problems we have can’t be fixed by mere tweaks around the edges, as far as the elites are concerned. Everything is a threat to our very existence. 

Climate change is an “existential threat,” the left keeps telling us. It’s a crisis that will end life as we know it if we don’t do something in the next 10 minutes. It’s also our very system of government, one that has survived for almost 250 years, that is constantly on the verge of going over the cliff — at least according to a lot of liberal and progressive Democrats who sound like a broken record when they tell us that democracy is under siege, thanks again to Republicans in general and Donald Trump in particular.

Maybe, to their discredit, some on the right choose not to see racism where it actually exists.  Maybe they make a conscious decision to look the other way. But to the left, there aren’t simply pockets of racism in America. The way they see it, racism is “systemic” — it’s a poison that is running through the bloodstream of the entire nation.    

For the record, I’m not nostalgic for the “good ol’ days” when, if you didn’t have a blind allegiance to the country, you were tarred as unpatriotic, maybe even as a communist. And I’m not endorsing Republican profiles in cowardice, those politicians who are too afraid to stand up to Donald Trump or to the NRA’s lobbying. I’m not defending the knuckleheads who stormed the Capitol — or Republicans who reflexively support anything Democrats hate and hate anything Democrats embrace. I’m merely pointing out that despite all the progress we’ve made in this country — on race, the environment, gay rights and all sorts of other issues — nothing seems to be good enough for a lot of my friends on the left.

Do they really not understand why so many people in so many countries actually admire the United States? Is it really a mystery why so many people from all corners of the planet desperately want to come to America?

Yes, there’s enough to gripe about. We’re a long way from being perfect here in America. But if this really were a country beset by “white supremacy” and “white privilege” and “oppression” of minorities, would people from all over the world choose to live here?

Despite your worst fears, my progressive and liberal friends, we still live in a free country. We can come and go as we please. And in case you haven’t noticed, there are a lot of folks coming — and almost nobody going. So, take a deep breath and try to have a happy Fourth of July.

Bernard Goldberg is an Emmy and an Alfred I. duPont-Columbia University award-winning writer and journalist. He was a correspondent with HBO’s “Real Sports with Bryant Gumbel” for 22 years and previously worked as a reporter for CBS News and as an analyst for Fox News. He is the author of five books and publishes exclusive weekly columns, audio commentaries and Q&As on his Substack page. Follow him on Twitter @BernardGoldberg.

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Young Americans are in for a rude awakening with the coming recession

Societal legends are born out of challenging times. The Great Recession bore out not only the difficulties of American capitalism, but provided a myth among millennials of living through uniquely bad times. The current crop of young adults has known the comfort and ease their parents’ work afforded them. A serious recession is something for which most in that age cohort have done little planning. The unsustainability of work-from-home, low output, and overpaid jobs, massive student loan debts accumulated for prestige, and the effects of the pandemic will come to bear soon. For many young people who have known nothing but relative ease, the coming years will be a harsh reality check. 

Many under-40s seemed to enjoy a “Goldilocks” view of the American economy. Any major pressure — from 9/11, to the 2008 financial crash, to massive money printing, to the pandemic — appeared to be solvable, for the most part, through a combination of economic stimulus spending and smoke and mirrors at the Federal Reserve. While each of the above came with its own economic pain, a low-inflation, moderate-growth future appeared inevitable for millennials and Generation Z — especially for those with a college education. However, this type of economic growth cannot remain forever. The current runaway inflation shows just the tip of the iceberg of federal irresponsibility, which we are already paying for as a massive unlevied tax.

The U.S. will tumble into a full-blown recession in 2023 as inflation soars, 70 percent of economists predict. The past two years are a reminder that economic policy has consequences. The pandemic ushered in full-force Keynesian economics. The Fed grew the money supply by a whopping 42 percent in 2020 and 2021, while keeping interest rates low. Trillions of dollars in emergency pandemic funding, capped by President Biden’s 2021 American Rescue Plan, saturated the economy with cheap dollars. 

At first, it appeared that the rapid growth of government spending, money printing and federal power that ballooned during the pandemic would aid white-collar Americans. Being able to work from home or receive enhanced unemployment was an extension of the Goldilocks fallacy. Even the inflationary proposed partial forgiveness of student loan debt tracks along the same general benefit that college-educated young people derived from the pandemic. But just as 2008 burst their parents’ dream of real estate empires, so will 2022 or 2023 tear apart the uniquely advantageous position that young, upper-middle class Americans currently enjoy.

When the reckoning comes, it will be especially harsh on millennials and Gen Zers, who will be left without the safety net to which they have grown accustomed. The white-collar lifestyle of $14 margaritas, DoorDash, and their parents subsidizing a tiny yet expensive apartment in New York City, Washington, or San Francisco is not sustainable for most families during a recession. This is not to say that a young person can’t enjoy a night out with friends or an expensive avocado toast every once in a while. However, the lack of foresight shown by many in the youngest two generations is unique in recent history. 

All hope is not lost for young people; after all, some have recession-resistant jobs or have been responsible with their money. However, that won’t be the case for most. A pre-pandemic survey found most Gen Zers have less than $1,000 in their bank accounts, and almost half have nothing at all. The 22.5 million young people under 35 who attended college carry an average of $28,000 in student loan debt. Millennials also carry over $27,000 in average non-mortgage debt. 

Spending habits among the young are heavier on convenience, something that will come crashing down when the next recession hits. Almost three-quarters of millennials and 65 percent of Generation Z live paycheck to paycheck. Rapidly increasing rental and mortgage costs and the overall pressure of inflation will be the coup de grace of a 1970s-esque stagflation spiral. The last two decades have allowed for a false understanding of cost-of-living expenses that is unsustainable.

At the same time, the hope of working from home indefinitely will begin to dry up. When the recession hits, employers will prioritize essential and practical jobs over self-important ones. Layoffs will ensue and other positions will die through attrition. Working from home and demanding large salaries for relatively easy work will be increasingly difficult.      

Just as the lean Carter presidency years created a generation of conservative leaders, President Biden is looking at a similar fate. Biden declared that he wants to stand out in history. Young people may experience a moment similar to one that their parents did in the 1980s; they can double down on failure under Biden, or entertain voting for a young, energetic and competent Republican. 

And for those who are currently privileged, there will be a chance to understand a crucial lesson: The laws of economics are real. Efforts by Democrats to ignore them may cause voters to abandon the party for the next generation, and with good cause.

Kristin Tate is a visiting fellow at the Independent Women’s Voice and a libertarian writer. Her latest book is “How Do I Tax Thee? A Field Guide to the Great American Rip-Off.” Follow her on Twitter @KristinBTate.

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Consumer spending fell in May as food, fuel prices stoked inflation

Consumer spending dropped in May as food and fuel prices rose sharply, according to data released Thursday by the Commerce Department.

Personal consumption expenditures (PCE), a measure of consumer spending, rose 0.2 percent in May but fell 0.4 percent when adjusted for inflation. While personal incomes rose 0.5 percent in May, they fell 0.1 percent after adjusting for inflation.

The decline in consumer spending came as prices rose 0.6 percent overall in May, according to the Commerce Department’s PCE price index, a gauge of inflation. Without food and fuel prices, the PCE index rose 0.3 percent for the third consecutive month in May.

The PCE index rose 6.3 percent in the 12 months ending in May, in line with April’s annual inflation rate, and 4.7 percent without energy prices. The annual increase in the PCE without food and energy fell to 4.7 percent in May, declining for the third consecutive month.

While prices for other goods and services appeared to plateau in May, the steep increase in food and energy prices are driven largely by the war in Ukraine took a serious toll on consumer spending. Higher interest rates set by the Federal Reserve, which are meant to fight inflation, may have also weighed on consumer spending in May.

Inflation has remained close to 40-year highs for several months and has risen steadily for more than a year, far outdating the February outbreak of the war in Ukraine. But severe shortages of food, fertilizer, and other crucial commodities from Russia and Ukraine, along with the sharp increase in demand for oil, have added more pressure to inflation.

This story is developing

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