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Why 2024 may be Joe Biden’s time — again!

In March of 2019, I wrote a piece for The Hill on why 2020 might just be Joe Biden’s time. At that point — early in the primary season — many had written him off. Now, as we approach the 2022 elections and polls and pundits are once again writing off Joe Biden, my advice is ­— be careful, be very careful.

Here are 10 reasons why, once again, I urge the chattering class not to count Biden out, should he decide to run.

Reason #1: Low presidential poll numbers in the off year are notoriously unreliable predictors. Just look at 1982, 1994, 2010. Here is the headline from the New York Times from August 19, 1982: “Approval Rating for Reagan is Lowest Ever in Gallup Poll.” Reagan’s job approval rating was a dismal 41 percent — and yet two years later, Reagan carried 49 states against Walter Mondale.

Bill Clinton was in desperate shape in late August of 1994, when his popularity was at 39 percent. Democrats lost the House for the first time since the 1950s, shedding 54 seats, while losing eight Senate seats. In 1996, Clinton came back to defeat Bob Dole by nearly 10 points.

In August of 2010 this was the headline from Reuters: Obama Poll Slide Mirrors Reagan’s 1982 Midterm Woes. Obama’s job performance number stood at 43 percent, Democrats lost 64 House seats in 2010, and yet Obama dispatched Mitt Romney fairly easily, winning 332 electoral votes two years later.

Thus, projecting the outcome of the 2024 presidential election based on what we are seeing today is risky business indeed.

Reason #2: The likely Republican nominee is Donald Trump. Of course, we said he was the easiest to beat in 2016, but now we really mean it. Yet for Biden, who beat Trump once, he should be able to beat him twice. Trump’s negatives are still through the roof, legal troubles abound, his ego runs wild and now he will have Liz Cheney and others nipping at his heels. Plus, there is also the age factor; he is not much younger than Biden.

Reason #3: Critically important: the economy is improving, inflation is coming down, jobs are plentiful, and salaries are increasing, especially for low- and middle-income Americans. Consumer confidence is likely to rise, and — just as in the case of Reagan, Clinton and Obama — voters are likely to feel “they are better off” as we head into the presidential election year. As Democratic policies improve economic prospects for Hispanic and African American voters, their turnout and support will be crucial in key swing states.

Reason #4: Social issues begin to work for Democrats and Biden. Republicans will increasingly be on the defensive on abortion, gun control, LGBTQ rights, women’s rights. The fear of the far right will motivate and sway not only younger voters, but also many older Americans who can remember life before Roe, even life when interracial marriages were illegal (pre-1968) and when gay marriage was prohibited. Once again, the prospect of turning the clock back will not sit well with suburban and ex-urban voters either.

Reason #5: Biden’s advantage — Debates. Although it is possible that there will not be presidential debates, they do almost always happen. Trump is huffing and puffing, but it is hard to imagine that there will be an empty stage. First, Trump’s ego won’t allow it, and second, his advisors will convince him to agree. Biden will be increasingly confident and in control; Trump will be lucky to have read the morning papers. Watching FOX News won’t cut it. Trump has always been ignorant of policy issues, and this year will be no different. It will remind voters of what an empty suit Trump has always been.

Reason #6: Trump’s MAGA playlist is old and tired; Biden is getting things done. The comparison between Biden as solid, competent, delivering on his promises and Trump’s blowhard rhetoric will be clear and convincing. Who delivered on roads, bridges and broadband? Who brought us out of the pandemic? Who moved us forward on climate change? Who got the economy moving again? Not the carnival barker; rather, the experienced leader with an experienced team.

Reason #7: More and more and more legal troubles for Trump. After all, how many presidents plead the fifth over 400 times, with more to come? How many members of his clown-car legal team end up in courtrooms? How many investigations can they all endure? From personal taxes, to conflicts of interest, to shady pardons, to undermining national security and hoarding documents … the list goes on and on. And why would we think Trump is going to change in the next two years?

Reason #8: The Jan. 6 investigation is a serious problem. When the House Select Committee hearings began, many were not sure where it was headed and how long and in-depth it would be. This is like peeling back the onion. Trump looks worse and worse, and the far-right Republicans can’t ignore it or explain it away. When you have America’s generals opening up to reporters, more close White House aides telling the truth, and revelations taking all this to Trump’s door, it makes Watergate look like child’s play.

Reason #9: Watch the independents and some moderate/conservative Republicans. There is no question that most Americans are pretty locked in to their political preferences; however, there are clearly persuadable voters, less interested voters and those that move, especially with high turnout elections like we had in 2020. Winning by 7 million votes isn’t exactly chump change, and 2024 may see critical states where Biden increases his narrow lead because he gains support from independents and some Republicans who can’t force themselves to back Trump. And, in the case of Republicans, it won’t take that many!

Reason #10: Finally, there’s the spoiled child syndrome. Let’s face it: Throwing his lunch and ketchup against the wall, really? The constant tantrums? More and more people close to Trump admit they were forced to deal with a man-boy, with a toddler mentality, who constantly needs diversions, cajoling and convincing. Trump defiled the presidency. Do we want to go through all this again?

The contrast between a Joe Biden Presidency and a Donald Trump Presidency could not be more clear. A re-match between these two would bring that to full flood-light. Just like four years ago, don’t count Joe Biden out.

Peter Fenn is a long-time Democratic political strategist who served on the Senate Intelligence Committee, was a top aide to Sen. Frank Church and was the first director of Democrats for the 80s, founded by Pamela Harriman. He also co-founded the Center for Responsive Politics/Open Secrets. He serves on the board of the Frank Church Institute. Follow him on Twitter @peterhfenn.

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Warren says she is 'very worried' Fed will 'tip this economy into a recession'

Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) on Sunday said she is “very worried” that the Federal Reserve will “tip this economy into a recession” after Chairman Jerome Powell announced the bank would keep raising interest rates in an effort to combat inflation.

Warren told CNN’s “State of the Union” co-anchor Dana Bash that raising interest rates does not help alleviate problems with the economy caused by supply chain disruptions and exacerbated by the war in Ukraine.

“I am very worried about this,” the senator said. “There is nothing in raising the interest rates. Nothing in Jerome Powell’s toolbag that deals directly with those, and he has admitted as much in congressional hearings when I’ve asked him about it.”

During a keynote speech in Jackson Hole, Wyo., Powell said the Federal Reserve is focused on bringing inflation down and will keep raising interest rates in an effort to tame the 40-year high inflation rate.

In July, the Federal Reserve raised interest rates by 75 basis points following the same hike in June.

Leading economists have expressed concern about the Fed’s ability to lower inflation while not triggering a recession, with a majority in one survey expecting a recession sometime next year.

Warren said that while inflation is high, the nation has seen strong job growth and low unemployment numbers. That could change amid more interest rate hikes, she said.

“Do you know what’s worse than high prices and a strong economy?” she asked Bash on CNN. “It’s high prices and millions of people out of work. I’m very worried that the Fed is going to tip this economy into recession.”

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GOP senator says Biden's student loan forgiveness plan 'monumentally unfair'

Sen. Roy Blunt (R-Mo.) said on Sunday that the Biden administration’s plan to forgive some student loans is “monumentally unfair” to people who didn’t attend college or have already paid back their debt and therefore wouldn’t benefit.

During an appearance on ABC’s “This Week,” Blunt told anchor George Stephanopoulos that while “education is important” the loan forgiveness plan is “just bad economics.”

“It should impact the way people live their lives. I just thought it was monumentally unfair, unfair to people who didn’t go to college because they didn’t think they could afford it, unfair to people who pay their loans back, unfair to people who got higher education in an area that the government didn’t make loans, and just bad economics,” Blunt told Stephanopoulos. 

“In addition to that, I think it’s going to have a long term devastating effect on a student loan program that worked pretty effectively until about 10 years ago when the federal government assumed responsibility for that program,” Blunt added. 

President Biden announced on Wednesday an initiative to forgive up to $10,000 in federal student loan debt for borrowers who make less than $125,000 annually as well as $20,000 in forgiveness for borrowers who are Pell Grants recipients. 

Blunt added that the forgiveness wouldn’t benefit an already complicated economy.

“You don’t slow the economy down by forgiving debt and giving people another $24 billion to spend that they would have been spending paying off the student debt that they borrowed,” Blunt said. 

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Warren: Cost of college should be tackled after student loan debt cancellation

Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) on Sunday said the next step is to tackle the cost of college after President Biden announced that he will forgive some student loan debt for millions of Americans.

While she praised Biden’s decision to cancel up to $20,000 in student loan debt for some borrowers, Warren told CNN’s “State of the Union” anchor Pamela Brown that universities and public education have widespread problems that must be addressed.

“We have a lot of problems in the whole system. The president has done what he can do with the tool in front of him. And that is he’s helped relieve the debt burden for millions of Americans,” Warren said, adding that “we need to deal directly with the cost of college. Absolutely.”

Biden announced last week he would cancel up to $10,000 in student loan debt for borrowers who make under $125,000 a year and up to $20,000 for borrowers who were Pell Grant recipients. The long-awaited move was hailed by Democrats and progressives.

Still, many have turned to the question of what comes next, considering the next generation of students will face the same high tuition costs.

Warren on Sunday noted that Democrats have several bills on the table that would address the rising cost to attend college, including one she has sponsored focusing on more transparency around pricing.

Warren, who has long pushed for student loan debt cancellation, told CNN that when she was in college, she paid her entire way through the university as a part-time waitress, before becoming a special education teacher and opening a “million doors” of opportunities.

“That opportunity is not out there today for any of our kids,” she said. “Our public education system is no longer creating opportunities for kids like me and other families who can’t afford to write a check.

“Instead, we’re saying to these young people you got to get an education, but we are going to wrap the chains of debt around you,” she continued. “For many, you’re going to be paying it for decades into the future.”

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With Artemis 1 mission, NASA is leading the world back to the moon

Fifty years after the last humans walked on the moon, humankind has started to go back to Earth’s nearest neighbor. After all the false starts, the political wrangling, the technological difficulties and the bureaucratic ineptitude that has accompanied the effort, NASA’s Artemis 1 mission will launch as soon as Monday, Aug. 29.

The Artemis program has taken the efforts of many engineers, managers and politicians over the past several years to make the dream a reality. The latest return to the moon effort has been as much a product of backroom dealing and political compromise as it has been engineers refining designs and managers trying to control costs.

The NASA Space Launch System, which will hurtle the uncrewed Orion capsule on a multiweek mission around the moon, resulted from a “Faustian bargain,” as former Deputy NASA Administrator Lori Garver put it. The deal took place in the wake of President Barack Obama’s cancelation of the previous return to the moon, Project Constellation. In return for Congress swallowing that cancelation and the start of the Commercial Crew effort, NASA agreed to build the giant, Space Launch System using engines and other parts left over from the space shuttle.

Theoretically, using proven hardware would keep costs low. The reality turned out to be different. The Space Launch System is years behind schedule and billions over budget. One launch will cost an eyepopping $4.1 billion, although NASA hopes to reduce that amount to some extent. Ironically, one of the senators involved in the deal, Bill Nelson, is now NASA administrator and thus has the task of making the heavy-lift rocket work.

Leaving aside that we are going back to the moon in the most expensive, hardest way possible — we are, in fact, returning to the moon, an event that will affect the course of history in ways that are beyond evaluation. Artemis will recapture the lost promise of Apollo. The program will help to make humanity a multi-planet species, with all that implies to the acquisition of knowledge, wealth and soft political power.

Artemis 1 will not carry astronauts to the moon, but the mission will test technologies that will be important for future crewed missions. One such technology is a version of Amazon Alexa, a virtual assistant technology,  that will report on the status of the Orion spacecraft’s systems and allow astronauts to control the spacecraft with voice commands.

The mission will also test an anti-radiation vest designed by Israeli and German engineers. A mannikin designed to simulate the female body called Zohar will wear the vest along with radiation sensors to test how the device shields against space radiation. Another mannikin, dubbed Helga, will not be equipped with the vest and will serve as a control.

A third mannikin, dubbed “Commander Moonikin Campos,” will wear an orange Orion spacesuit. Campos will come equipped with a number of sensors designed to measure things like radiation and vibration that will be experienced by future astronauts.

Artemis 1 is also carrying 10 CubeSats as secondary payloads. Among the more interesting ones are:

• Lunar IceCube, designed to study water distribution and interaction on the moon.
• NEA Scout, which will use a solar sail to perform a flyby of a small, Earth-approaching asteroid.
• OMOTENASHI, which will attempt a semi-hard landing on the lunar surface to test the technology for cheap, small landers.

The CubeSats will be released shortly after the Orion performs a translunar injection maneuver.

The future of humanity’s return to the moon depends on the success or failure of the Artemis 1 mission. If Artemis 1 launches, completes its mission and then splashes down off the coast of California, much criticism of the expense and complexity of the Space Launch System will likely fade away.

However, if the mission ends in failure, and uncounted ways exist for it to fail, critics will raise questions. The date of the first footprints on the moon will be pushed back while engineers search for what went wrong and how to correct it. People who are opposed to going back to the moon at all will be emboldened.

Currently, NASA has scheduled Artemis 2, which will take four astronauts around the moon, for 2024. If Artemis 2 succeeds, one to two years after, human beings will walk on the moon. The event will be fraught with beauty and glory, two things this world needs more of.

Mark R. Whittington is the author of space exploration studies “Why is It So Hard to Go Back to the Moon?” as well as “The Moon, Mars and Beyond,” and “Why is America Going Back to the Moon?” He blogs at Curmudgeons Corner. 

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Don’t let Trump ‘graymail’ his way out from under the Espionage Act

For most of his life, Donald Trump appeared to evade justice by using a combination of bluster, economic intimidation, and legal feints. Another legal stratagem may rescue him from his latest exposure for grossly mishandling government secrets: “graymail.”

Graymail was coined to describe a tactic used by defendants in cases in which national security information is at issue: The defendant dares the government to proceed, threatening to insist that the raw information the government wants to protect must be disclosed in court, thus inflicting the very damage to national security that the government wants to avoid.

Sometimes this brazen tactic works. But it may not work for Trump if he is ever charged with a crime in connection with the search.

When U.S. magistrate judge Bruce E. Reinhart released the search warrant for Trump’s residence at Mar-a-Lago, many observers reacted instinctively, saying this at last could be a rap that Trump can’t beat. The warrant showed that the government was investigating a variety of potential federal crimes involving alleged mishandling of national security information, and the inventory of materials seized seemed to demonstrate that Trump actually had been concealing the kind of information that he was not permitted to have. Additional reporting revealed that both the National Archives and a federal grand jury issuing subpoenas had been trying for months to retrieve the material. That seemed to be about as clear-cut as any of the various abuses that have been attributed to Trump over his career.

But what may seem clear to an objective observer has rarely been sufficient to keep Trump from skating through various stages of legal jeopardy.

In some ways, Trump is a modern-day legal Houdini. From bankruptcies to allegedly fraudulent business deals and charities,to alleged racial discrimination in housing and allegations of sexual assault, Trump successfully sidesteps them all, engaging in massive counterattacks, legal delay and financial settlements. And that was before he was elected president.

After his election, Trump avoided responsibility for nearly a dozen apparent incidents of obstruction of justice in the Russian-influence investigation, thanks to the deferential passivity of special counsel Robert Mueller. Adding to his unique trophy case as the nation’s “Teflon Don,” Trump successfully relied on partisan enablers to shield him from two impeachments.

Which brings him to the seeming predicament that he now confronts in the aftermath of the Mar-a-Lago search and seizure. Trump already initiated the first phase of his customary strategy, going on the offense in order to throw off-balance the forces pursuing him. He and his proxies issued statements characterizing the search as a “siege,” an “assault” and a “break-in.” He filed a lawsuit in south Florida asking the federal court to appoint a “special master” to take control of the seized documents and return “his” property to him. All of which is to distract both the prosecutors and the public and enhance Trump’s strategic theme that he is the real victim.

But Trump has a sharper arrow in his defense quiver — the graymail defense: The same facts that appear to make his culpability so clear would make it difficult to succeed in prosecuting him.

The graymail problem arises because, in any criminal prosecution, the government must prove as a fact that the information that Trump refused to surrender constituted “national defense information” that any reasonable person would realize could injure the country if disclosed.

The government’s burden to prove this crucial element of the crime was used for years as an effective device for discouraging the government from pursuing even hard-core espionage cases, as well as the kinds of crimes that Trump apparently committed.

The government must demonstrate that disclosure of the information would be at least “potentially damaging” to the United States or advantageous to a foreign government. Espionage Act defendants often argued that, since the jury has to be persuaded about the seriousness of the danger posed by the information, the constitutional rules of evidence require that the information be displayed in open court.

When I was asked to join Watergate special prosecutor Archibald Cox as his counsel, I was serving as Deputy Solicitor General for Criminal and National Security Matters. I was familiar with this problem. This issue eventually arose during the Watergate investigations, because some of the so-called White House “plumbers” had broken into the office of the psychiatrist consulted by Daniel Ellsberg, the former Defense Department official who had leaked the Pentagon Papers to the Washington Post and New York Times. Lawyers for the men tried to forestall prosecution for invading the psychiatrist’s civil rights, arguing that the plumbers were looking to see whether Ellsberg had disclosed such highly sensitive information as the government’s SIOPs — nuclear targeting strategies — and that they would insist on having us produce the information in open court in order to allow them to explain their motives.

We were able to sidestep this graymail defense by developing an alternative evidentiary approach, which I subsequently urged Congress to codify. After two years of hearings, Congress enacted the Classified Information Procedures Act in 1980. The statute is carefully designed to balance the defendant’s interest in a fair trial in matters involving national defense information and the public’s compelling interest in protecting nuclear secrets and intelligence sources and methods. Among other techniques, it allows federal trial judges to craft accurate descriptions of the types of information at issue without actually disclosing the detailed information itself.

Over the past few decades, this statute has worked reasonably well, although not always. The Guantanamo prisoners case is an example of a situation in which the court determined that the CIPA mechanisms would not work, because information about the alleged terrorists’ activity had to be made available in raw form. Defendants with their backs to the wall, aided by clever and imaginative lawyers, are still able to develop arguments that nothing short of full disclosure of the secrets themselves will be sufficient to give the jury a fair picture of the accused’s conduct.

It remains to be seen whether the statutory reform will allow the Justice Department to override any attempt by Trump to graymail his way out of another alleged flouting of the rule of law.

Given Trump’s track record, he just might escape again.

Philip Allen Lacovara was Deputy Solicitor General of the United States for criminal and national security matters, counsel to the Watergate Special Prosecutor, and president of the District of Columbia Bar.

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Red wave hits breaker: GOP midterm worries rise

Republican worries of a midterm flop are growing heading into the critical post-Labor Day campaign season, with analysts who had previously predicted massive GOP gains shifting their forecasts toward Democrats.

Rick Tyler, a Republican strategist and analyst, said the environment looks “not even close” to a red wave election year.

“The enthusiasm is just not there,” Tyler said. “Last time Republicans had a good year, they were six points ahead in the generic poll. Now we’re barely two points ahead. So it’s definitely not going to happen.”

RealClearPolitics averages of polls measuring whether voters would prefer Republican or Democratic control of Congress show the GOP slipping from a 4.8-point advantage in late April to less than a point as of Friday. At around this point in 2010, when Republicans saw historic gains in Congress, generic polls showed a four- to-six-point advantage for the GOP.

Punctuating the narrowing polls was the result in a special election on Tuesday. New York’s 19th Congressional district — which includes suburban areas and went for former President Trump in 2016 but President Biden in 2020 — is representative of the kind of battleground districts that Republicans are hoping to flip across the country. 

But while Republican Marc Molinaro stuck to the party’s points about inflation and the economy, topics that Republicans have repeatedly said are top-of-mind for voters, Democrat Pat Ryan narrowly won the seat after focusing heavily on abortion rights after the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade earlier this summer.

Former GOP Sen. Rick Santorum (Pa.) said on Newsmax Thursday that after the special election, “Republicans have to start paying attention.” 

“The problem is, where Republicans have to pick up in order to win the Congress is in districts like that,” Santorum said. “If you look at the national polls, if you look at a lot of these races like in my home state of Pennsylvania — if this is a red wave year, the polls are not showing it right now.”

Democrats celebrating the win in New York also point to recent special House elections in Minnesota and Nebraska as evidence of enthusiasm. Candidates there overperformed historical trends in GOP-leaning districts, even though they ultimately lost those races.

And in wake of the Supreme Court’s Dobbs decision and the controversy surrounding Trump over Jan. 6 and the FBI seizing classified documents at his Mar-a-Lago estate, Democrats are aiming to emphasize negatives on Republicans rather than make the election a referendum on Biden or Democratic leadership.

“MAGA Republicans hope voters ignore their dangerous extremism, but NY-19 shows us that voters will reject their extreme agenda,” Democratic National Campaign Committee spokesperson Tommy Garcia said in a statement.

Top Republicans have already started tempering expectations of taking back the evenly divided Senate as GOP nominees who were boosted by Trump show signs struggling. 

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) said last week that the House is more likely to flip control than the Senate, citing “candidate quality.” 

Tyler blamed Trump for the shifting dynamic. 

“Donald Trump has turned this campaign from a referendum on Joe Biden, inflation, high food prices, high gas prices and affordable housing into a referendum on him,” he said.

Weaknesses for GOP candidates along with results from recent elections have led election analysts at Sabato’s Crystal Ball at the University of Virginia Center for Politics and the Cook Political Report to shift several forecasts for key congressional midterm races toward Democrats. Cook revised its expected GOP gain in the House from 15-30 seats to 10-20 seats, and its Senate outlook from Republicans having an edge to a toss-up. 

That marks a stark contrast from nine months ago, when House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) predicted that 2022 could be even more of a Republican wave than in 2010, when Republicans won a staggering 63 seats.

Republicans have since warned House members not to measure the drapes early and that the election will be tough, but GOP lawmakers are still largely operating on the assumption that they will win control of the chamber.

A Senate loss and only a small GOP majority in the House would “lead the media to say, ‘You know, this was a split decision,’” Tyler said. “No mandate, no red wave, no rejection of Biden’s policies. That’s a disaster for the Republican Party.”

Other GOP operatives downplay those fears, saying that the New York special election was an outlier case complicated by high Democratic turnout in primaries happening the same day, and noting that there are still months to go before the midterms.

“Anyone who thought retaking the majority was going to be easy needs to buck up,” National Republican Congressional Committee Communications Director Michael McAdams said in a statement. “Majorities are won in November not August and we look forward to prosecuting the case against Democrats’ failed one-party rule.”

Sarah Chamberlain, president and CEO of Republican Main Street Partnership, cautioned against looking at the New York special election as an indication for what may happen in November. Many voters did not even know the election was happening, she said, or were on vacation.

“I would not red flag it yet. We’re going to wait to see and do some more polling, but I think things are fine,” Chamberlain said.

Republicans have beat expectations before. Despite Democrats having more than a six-point edge on the generic ballot in 2020, Republicans gained House seats and squeezed Democrats into the slimmest majority in the lower chamber in a century.

Democrats are also spending millions on defending seats rather than being offensive in their House map, a GOP strategist noted, with the record number of Democratic House members retiring rather than running for reelection this year helping the GOP expand its pickup opportunities.

Kyle Kondik, managing editor at Sabato’s Crystal Ball, said that weaknesses in GOP Senate and gubernatorial candidates, as well as many Republicans’ position against abortion, has given Democrats the opportunity ”to make the election more of a choice than a referendum.” But he cautioned against fully reevaluating the midterm environment before Labor Day, and that Republicans could still flip both chambers even if they fall below expectations of a “red wave.”

“It is possible that the Democrats’ addition of more college-educated voters, at the expense of losing more non-college voters, has skewed some of these special elections, as the college cohort is a more reliable voting bloc,” Kondik said. “That said, if the GOP had some big enthusiasm edge over the Democrats — and if it was bringing a lot of lapsed GOP voters back into the fold — one would think they’d be doing better than they are.”

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Watergate prosecutor: DOJ will be closely watching national security damage assessment of Mar-a-Lago documents

Former assistant special Watergate prosecutor Nick Ackerman said late Saturday that he thinks the Department of Justice (DOJ) will be closely watching the national security damage assessment reportedly underway regarding documents the FBI obtained from former President Trump’s Mar-a-Lago residence. 

“That’s a big issue here. In fact, I think the prosecutors will be investigating some of the same things. I mean, for example, they’re looking at the videos that were on the storage area,” Ackerman told anchor Jim Acosta on “CNN Newsroom.”

“They’re going to want to see who moved things in and out, when they did it in relation to requests that they made,” he added. “I’m sure they’re going to be fingerprinting every one of those documents to try and determine whether anybody else had access to them and who had access to them.”

Ackerman’s remarks come after the redacted FBI affidavit used to convince a judge to approve this month’s search of Trump’s Florida residence was unsealed to the public on Friday. 

The 28-page affidavit indicated that authorities found up to 184 classified documents they obtained from the Mar-a-Lago residence, with 25 of those documents containing top secret information. 

Ackerman also told Acosta that “the obstruction piece of this” stands out to him from the affidavit.

“The concealment that’s listed in that affidavit, I mean, that is what really triggered this search warrant in the first place because they had evidence that they were being lied to, that they were being played, and that Donald Trump and some others were basically concealing these documents, which leads to the big question why would they even want these documents in the first place, which of course, brings up this issue of what happened to these documents, who had access to them, and were any of our real major secrets blown because of the way this material was handled,” Ackerman said.

“I think from a prosecutor’s standpoint, it’s that obstruction piece that really is important here,” he added.

Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines reportedly sent a letter to two Democratic representatives on Friday noting that officials would assess the risk resulting from potential disclosure of the classified information in the documents.

Trump has denied any wrongdoing regarding the documents.

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What colleges are up against if the Supreme Court bans affirmative action

In the coming year, the Supreme Court appears poised to ban or sharply limit affirmative action in college admissions, reversing 40 years of precedent and overturning admission practices at hundreds of colleges and universities.        

Affirmative action has been the subject of heated controversy for decades. In a series of decisions dating back to 1978, the Supreme Court concluded that the educational benefits of diversity constitute a compelling governmental interest justifying some consideration of race in college admissions. Decades of social science research and “the overwhelming consensus of American universities” support that conclusion. Affirmative action is also justified, we would add, because, as Matt Zwolinski and John Tomasi have observed, discrimination against groups, like radioactive waste, “has a long, diffuse, and toxic half-life.”

Nonetheless, in 2014, Students for Fair Admissions (SFFA), a non-profit formed by conservative activist Edward Blum, sued Harvard University and the University of North Carolina (UNC) for allegedly discriminating against Asian-American and, in UNC’s case, white applicants. After losing in the lower courts, SFFA appealed to the Supreme Court, which will hear oral arguments on Oct. 31.

Given the changing landscape, admissions professionals in colleges and universities have been working hard to address the obstacles they face — by identifying, adopting, and/or expanding race-neutral strategies to attract a talented and diverse student body.

The fundamental issue, of course, is whether institutions of higher education can meet their diversity goals through race-neutral alternatives. The short answer is no, but race-neutral alternatives can contribute to student-body diversity.

Ten states, including California, Florida, and Michigan, already prohibit consideration of race in public university admissions. Since most colleges and universities admit most of the students who apply, bans on affirmative action have relatively little impact on them. But at highly selective institutions, the elimination of affirmative action has led to sharp declines in the percentages of students from underrepresented groups.

Following a 1996 ban on affirmative action at the University of California (UC) system, for example, enrollment of Black and Native American students at Berkeley and UCLA, the system’s most selective campuses, was “cut in half.” Ever since, the UC system has “experiment[ed] with a wide variety of alternative approaches” for fostering student-body diversity, with only limited success. In 2019, although over 52 percent of California public high school graduates identified as Latinx, just 25 percent of UC freshmen did. At Berkeley, only 15 percent of freshmen identified as Latinx, and similar disparities exist for African American and Native American students. Other public university systems dealing with bans on affirmative action, such as those in Michigan and Oklahoma, have experienced similar outcomes.

But even though race-neutral measures cannot overcome the impact of a ban, they can help. The impact of any given race-neutral measure will depend on an institution’s characteristics, demographic patterns, and the ability to afford often expensive programs. Percentage plans, for example, which admit all students whose grades place them near the top of their high school class, might prove beneficial in states with a large number of majority-minority high schools. In Texas, a “top 10 percent” plan helped increase enrollment of Latinx students (though it had little impact on Black student enrollment). By contrast, in Michigan, where the “number of majority-minority schools is dwarfed by the number of schools that are heavily white,” a percentage plan “would have minimal or negative effects on racial diversity.”

SFFA and other critics of affirmative action often claim that targeting economically and educationally disadvantaged students is the best way to achieve diversity. In those categories, however, white students with competitive academic qualifications often greatly outnumber students of color; as a result, efforts to target those groups increase socioeconomic diversity, an important benefit in its own right, but are “less effective at enrolling students from underrepresented minority groups.”

The best approach, which many colleges now follow in various ways, involves “widening the funnel,” that is, to combine generous financial aid programs with targeted recruitment strategies. In addition to increasing admission officer presentations to students (and, when possible, their parents or guardians) at high schools with diverse populations, strategies include virtual high school visits, enhanced campus visit programs that focus on underrepresented prospective applicants, workshops for high school counsellors, and scholarships for high school sophomores and juniors to attend on campus summer academic programs. Building partnerships with community-based organizations, including affinity groups, and working with community colleges on transfer programs may also help.

Harvard, UNC, and many other institutions have already deployed many of these measures, and the admission office professionals continue to find new and data-driven ways to innovate. But much work is still needed to determine best practices generally and for each institution.

The Supreme Court is likely to reach a decision in the Harvard and UNC cases by June 2023.  As they hope for the best and prepare for the worst, it’s time for colleges and universities to redouble their already considerable efforts to prepare for the challenges ahead.

Glenn C. Altschuler is the Thomas and Dorothy Litwin Professor of American Studies at Cornell University. He is the co-author (with Isaac Kramnick) of “Cornell: A History, 1940-2015.”

David Wippman is the President of Hamilton College.

Source: TEST FEED1

Zelensky warns of 'very risky and dangerous' situation near nuclear plant

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said that a nuclear plant that produces power for the country is “constantly being provoked by Russian forces,” sparking fears of possible damage to the facility causing a radiation leak.

During a video address to the country late Friday evening, Zelensky said that Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant had been put in a “very risky and dangerous” situation, with nuclear scientists and specialists in the energy industry working to protect it from “the worst-case scenario.”

“I want to emphasize that the situation remains very risky and dangerous,” he said in a translated speech. “Any repeat of yesterday’s events, that is, any disconnection of the plant from the grid, any actions by Russia that could trigger the shutdown of the reactors, will again put the plant one step away from disaster.”

He said the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) should come to the plant as soon as possible, urging Russian troops to withdraw from the plant and neighboring areas to eliminate the threat entirely.

Zelensky also thanked “all those who are mobilizing the world’s response to Russian radiation blackmail.”

Russian rocket and artillery strikes hit areas near the plant, Ukrainian officials said Sunday. In the city of Zaporizhzhia, two people were wounded after heavy fire throughout the night. Heavy firing also left parts of Nikopol without electricity, and rocket strikes damaged about a dozen residences in Marhanets.

Russian forces occupied the Zaporizhzhia plant early in the invasion of Ukraine. Ukrainian workers still run the facility, which is the largest in Europe, and both sides have repeatedly accused each other of shelling the site.

Source: TEST FEED1