JEWISH KING JESUS IS COMING AT THE RAPTURE FOR US IN THE CLOUDS-DON'T MISS IT FOR THE WORLD.THE BIBLE TAKEN LITERALLY- WHEN THE PLAIN SENSE MAKES GOOD SENSE-SEEK NO OTHER SENSE-LEST YOU END UP IN NONSENSE.GET SAVED NOW- CALL ON JESUS TODAY.THE ONLY SAVIOR OF THE WHOLE EARTH - NO OTHER. 1 COR 15:23-JESUS THE FIRST FRUITS-CHRISTIANS RAPTURED TO JESUS-FIRST FRUITS OF THE SPIRIT-23 But every man in his own order: Christ the firstfruits; afterward they that are Christ’s at his coming.ROMANS 8:23 And not only they, but ourselves also, which have the firstfruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting for the adoption, to wit, the redemption of our body.(THE PRE-TRIB RAPTURE)
2020 AMERICAN ELECTION RESULTS BY STATE TRUMP VS LOSER LIBERAL SLEEPY (SLOPPY JOE) BIDEN.
ON D-70 OF THE TRUMP WIN OF THE PRESIDENCY. SUN JAN 10, 21.
Key dates for the Electoral College and what they mean-AEIdeas-DECEMBER 14,20
What are the key dates for the workings of the Electoral College?
November 3 — Election Day
Election Day is November 3. We may or may not know the winner of the presidential contest on election night, but we certainly will not have a final tally and certified results until weeks later. States vary widely in the time they allot for certifying their election results. Some may give a final certification the week after Election Day. Others may take over 30 days. And there is the possibility of recounts and judicial contests of elections which could extend the time to determine an official winner of a state.
Ballots are passed out to 16 Electors on the Michigan Senate floor for them to cast their formal votes for the president and vice president of the United States in Lansing, Michigan, U.S., December 19, 2016. REUTERS/Rebecca Cook
December 8 — Safe Harbor
December 14 — The meeting of the Electors
Two key dates loom in December. On December 14, presidential electors must have been selected by the states and will meet as a group in their states to cast electoral votes for president and vice president. But December 8 is also a significant date, the so-called “safe harbor” date. The Electoral Count Act sets this date as an important date for states to make their official selection of electors, as those electoral votes will be given greater protection from challenge when Congress counts the electoral votes in January. The Supreme Court in Bush v. Gore assigned great significance to this date in Bush v. Gore.
January 3 — The convening of the new Congress
January 6 — Congress counts the votes
January 20 — Inauguration Day. The new presidential term begins at noon.
On January 3rd, the new Congress will take office, and on January 6th it will meet to count the electoral votes and declare a president- and vice president-elect. On January 20th at noon, the current presidential term will end and the next one will begin.This is excerpted from the new fourth edition of After the People Vote, edited by John Fortier, senior fellow at the Bipartisan Policy Center and a member of AEI’s Election Watch team.John C. Fortier-AEI Adjunct Scholar-SENOIRFELLOWKarlyn Bowman-Senior Fellow
ITS 6.55AM-SUN JAN 10,21-WITH 10 DAYS + 4 YEARS LEFT IN TRUMPS TERM. TRUMP IS GOING AFTER BIG TECH FOR BANNING HIM FROM TWITTER. AND NOW GOOGLE AND AMAZON ARE BANNING AN FREE SPEECH APP CALLED PARLER. AND ALSO TOMORROW THE DEMOLIBNUTS WANNA START IMPEACHING TRUMP FOR INCITING OF INSERRECTION. SINCE TRUMP WILL NOT RESIGN. I CAN NOT BELIEVE PENCE MIGHT USE THE 25TH AMENDMENT AGAINST TRUMP. TO MAKE HIM PRESIDENT FOR THE REMAINDER OF THIS TRUMP TERM. UNTIL TRUMP SOME HOW WINS THE NEXT 4 YEARS. TRUMP HAS NOT TALKED TO PENCE SINCE LAST WEDNESDAYS PEACEFUL PROTEST. BY THE MILLION TRUMP SUPPORTERS WHO KNOW TRUMP WAS CHEATED OF MILLIONS OF VOTES IN DEMOLIBNUTS VOTER FRAUD. AND ALSO GIULIANI AND DERSHOWITZ TRUMP IS CONSIDERING FOR HIS IMPEACMENT LAWYERS. 17 REPUBLICANS HAVE TO TURN THEIR PAID OFF SELVES IN ORDER FOR PILOSI TO IMPEACH TRUMP. OR 2/3RDS OF THE HOUSE. WE WILL SEE TOMORROW. WHAT HAPPENS. CNN HITLERS PROPAGANDA MOUTHPIECE JAKE TAPPER SAID EVERYTHING UNDER THE SUN TO CALL THE PEACEFUL TRUMP PROTESTERS. INCLUDING TERRORISTS, MOBSTERS AND TONS MORE. HITLERS CNN PROPAGANDIST TAPPER ALSO WANTS REPUBLICANS IN THE SENATE AND THE HOUSE TO RESIGN. WELL WE KNOW WHY CNN IS DOING THIS. SO THE REPUBLICANS CAN GET LIBERAL GOPS TO REPLACE THEM. AND THEN THE DEMOLIBNUTCASE HITLERS COULD REALLY CONTROL BOTH HOUSES OF PARLIAMENT. AS THE NEW ONES WOULD VOTE WITH THE DEMONUTS ALL THE TIME. THAT WAS AN EASY ONE TO FIGURE OUT. BY HITLERS PROPAGANDA PUPPETEERS CNN. AND THE LEFT LAME BRAIN- LAMESTREAM MEDIA.
Parler squeezed as Trump seeks new online megaphone-Though stripped of his Twitter megaphone, President Donald Trump does have alternative options of much smaller reach-By FRANK BAJAK AP Technology Writer-10 January 2021, 13:51
BOSTON -- President Donald Trump has been kicked off of most mainstream social media platforms following his supporters’ siege on the U.S. Capitol. But it remains to be seen how fast or where — if anywhere — on the internet he will be able to reach his followers.The far right-friendly Parler had been the leading candidate, at least until Google and Apple removed it from their app stores and Amazon decided to boot it off its web hosting service by midnight Pacific time on Sunday.Parler’s CEO said that could knock it offline for a week, though that might prove optimistic. And even if it finds a friendlier web-hosting service, without a smartphone app, it's hard to imagine Parler gaining mainstream success.The 2-year-old magnet for the far right claims more than 12 million users, though mobile app analytics firm Sensor Tower puts the number at 10 million worldwide, with 8 million in the U.S. That's a fraction of the 89 million followers Trump had on Twitter.Still, Parler might be attractive to Trump since it's where his sons Eric and Don Jr. are already active. Parler hit headwinds, though, on Friday as Google yanked its smartphone app from its app store for allowing postings that seek “to incite ongoing violence in the U.S.” Apple followed suit on Saturday evening after giving Parler 24 hours to address complaints it was being used to “plan and facilitate yet further illegal and dangerous activities.” Public safety issues will need to be resolved before it is restored, Apple said.A message seeking comment from Parler was sent Sunday on whether the company plans to change its policies and enforcement around these issues.Amazon struck another blow Saturday, informing Parler it would need to look for a new web-hosting service effective midnight Sunday. It reminded Parler in a letter, first reported by Buzzfeed, that it had informed it in the past few weeks of 98 examples of posts “that clearly encourage and incite violence” and said the platform “poses a very real risk to public safety.”Parler CEO John Matze decried the punishments as “a coordinated attack by the tech giants to kill competition in the marketplace. We were too successful too fast,” he said in a Saturday night post, saying it was possible Parler would be unavailable for up to a week “as we rebuild from scratch.”Earlier, Matze complained of being scapegoated. “Standards not applied to Twitter, Facebook or even Apple themselves, apply to Parler.” He said he “won’t cave to politically motivated companies and those authoritarians who hate free speech.”Losing access to the app stores of Google and Apple — whose operating systems power hundreds of millions of smartphones — severely limits Parler’s reach, though it will continue to be accessible via web browser. Losing Amazon Web Services will mean Parler needs to scramble to find another web host, in addition to the re-engineering.Trump may also launch his own platform. But that won't happen overnight, and free speech experts anticipate growing pressure on all social media platforms to curb incendiary speech as Americans take stock of Wednesday’s violent takeover of the U.S. Capitol by a Trump-incited mob.Twitter ended Trump’s nearly 12-year run on Friday. In shuttering his account, it cited a tweet to his 89 million followers that he planned to skip President-elect Joe Biden’s Jan. 20 inauguration, saying it gave rioters license to converge on Washington once again.Facebook and Instagram have suspended Trump at least until Inauguration Day. Twitch and Snapchat also disabled Trump’s accounts, while Shopify took down online stores affiliated with the president and Reddit removed a Trump subgroup. Twitter also banned Trump loyalists including former national security advisor Michael Flynn in a sweeping purge of accounts promoting the QAnon conspiracy theory and the Capitol insurrection. Some had hundreds of thousands of followers.In a statement Friday, Trump said: "We have been negotiating with various other sites, and will have a big announcement soon, while we also look at the possibilities of building out our own platform in the near future.”Gab is another potential landing spot for Trump. But it, too, has had troubles with internet hosting. Google and Apple both booted it from their app stores in 2017 and it was left internet-homeless for a time the following year due to anti-Semitic posts attributed to the man accused of killing 11 people at a Pittsburgh synagogue. Microsoft also terminated a web-hosting contract.Online speech experts expect social media companies led by Facebook, Twitter and Google's YouTube to more vigorously police hate speech and incitement in the wake of the Capitol rebellion, as Western democracies led by Nazism-haunted Germany already do.David Kaye, a University of California-Irvine law professor and former U.N. special rapporteur on free speech believes the Parlers of the world will also face pressure from the public and law enforcement as will little-known sites where further pre-inauguration disruption is now apparently being organized. They include MeWe, Wimkin, TheDonald.win and Stormfront, according to a report released Saturday by The Alethea Group, which tracks disinformation.Kaye rejects arguments by U.S. conservatives including the president’s former U.N. ambassador, Nikki Haley, that the Trump ban savaged the First Amendment, which prohibits the government from restricting free expression. “Silencing people, not to mention the President of the US, is what happens in China not our country,” Haley tweeted.“It’s not like the platforms’ rules are draconian. People don’t get caught in violations unless they do something clearly against the rules,” said Kaye. And not just individual citizens have free speech rights. “The companies have their freedom of speech, too.”While initially arguing their need to be neutral on speech, Twitter and Facebook gradually yielded to public pressure drawing the line especially when the so-called Plandemic video emerged early in the coronavirus pandemic urging people not to wear masks, noted civic media professor Ethan Zuckerman of the University of Massachusetts-Amherst.Zuckerman expects the Trump de-platforming may spur important online shifts. First, there may be an accelerated splintering of the social media world along ideological lines."Trump will pull a lot of audience wherever he goes,” he said. That could mean more platforms with smaller, more ideologically isolated audiences.———Associated Press writers Barbara Ortutay in Oakland, California, and Amanda Seitz in Chicago contributed to this report.
Parler jumps to No. 1 on App Store after Facebook and Twitter ban Trump-Jonathan Shieber@jshieber / 1:45 PM EST•January 9, 2021
Users are surging on small, conservative, social media platforms after President Donald Trump’s ban from the world’s largest social networks, even as those platforms are seeing access throttled by the app marketplaces of tech’s biggest players.The social network, Parler, a network that mimics Twitter, is now the number one app in Apple’s app store and Gab, another conservative-backed service, claimed that it was seeing an explosion in the number of signups to its web-based platform as well.Parler saw approximately 210,000 installs globally on Friday 1/8, up 281% from approximately 55,000 on 1/7, according to data from the analytics service Sensor Tower. “In the U.S., the app saw approximately 182,000 first-time downloads on 1/8, up 355% from about 40,000 installs on 1/7. Since Wednesday, the app has seen approximately 268,000 installs from across U.S. app stores,” a press rep from Sensor Tower wrote in an email.Parler’s ballooning user base comes at a potentially perilous time for the company. It has already been removed from Google’s Play store and Apple is considering suspending the social media app as well if it does not add some content moderation features.Both Parler and Gab have billed themselves as havens for free speech, with what’s perhaps the most lax content moderation online. In the past the two companies have left up content posted by an alleged Russian disinformation campaign, and allow users to traffic in conspiracy theories that other social media platforms have shut down.The expectation with these services is that users on the platforms are in charge of muting and blocking trolls or offensive content, but, by their nature, those who join these platforms will generally find themselves among like-minded users.Their user counts might be surging, but would-be adopters may soon have a hard time finding the services.On Friday night, Google said that it would be removing Parler from their Play Store immediately — suspending the app until the developers committed to a moderation and enforcement policy that could handle objectionable content on the platform.In a statement to TechCrunch, a Google spokesperson said:“In order to protect user safety on Google Play, our longstanding policies require that apps displaying user-generated content have moderation policies and enforcement that removes egregious content like posts that incite violence. All developers agree to these terms and we have reminded Parler of this clear policy in recent months. We’re aware of continued posting in the Parler app that seeks to incite ongoing violence in the US. We recognize that there can be reasonable debate about content policies and that it can be difficult for apps to immediately remove all violative content, but for us to distribute an app through Google Play, we do require that apps implement robust moderation for egregious content. In light of this ongoing and urgent public safety threat, we are suspending the app’s listings from the Play Store until it addresses these issues.“On Friday, Buzzfeed News reported that Parler had received a letter from Apple informing them that the app would be removed from the App Store within 24 hours unless the company submitted an update with a moderation improvement plan. Parler CEO John Matze confirmed the action from Apple in a post on his Parler account where he posted a screenshot of the notification from Apple.“We want to be clear that Parler is in fact responsible for all the user generated content present on your service and for ensuring that this content meets App Store requirements for the safety and protection of our users,” text from the screenshot reads. “We won’t distribute apps that present dangerous and harmful content.Parler is backed by the conservative billionaire heiress Rebekah Mercer, according to a November report in The Wall Street Journal. Founded in 2018, the service has experienced spikes in user adoption with every clash between more social media companies and the outgoing President Trump. In November, Parler boasted some 10 million users, according to the Journal.Users like Fox Business anchor Maria Bartiromo and the conservative talk show host Dan Bongino, a wildly popular figure on Facebook who is also an investor in Parler, have joined the platform. In the Journal article Bongino called the company “a collective middle finger to the tech tyrants.”It’s worth noting that Parler and Gab aren’t the only companies to see users numbers soar after the Trump bans. MeWe Network, OANN, Newsmax and Rumble have also seen adoption soar, according to data from the analytics company Apptopia.The company noted that Parler was the #1 app on the iOS app store for two days surging from 18th on Thursday and 592 on Wednesday. Overall, the app was the 10th most downloaded social media app in 2020 with 8.1 million new installs.“It is an event driven app though,” a company analyst noted. “After events like the election, BLM protests, Twitter first applying labels to Trump’s Tweets, we see bursts of downloads and usage but it will then drop off.”Sarah Perez and Lucas Matney contributed additional reporting to this article.
NBC News-As some Republicans distance themselves from Trump, Pompeo stays in his corner-Lauren Egan and Abigail Williams-Sat, January 9, 2021, 5:39 PM EST
WASHINGTON — As some Republicans are distancing themselves from President Donald Trump after a violent mob of his supporters breached the U.S. Capitol, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo came to the president's defense Saturday, criticizing Twitter's decision to ban his account."Silencing speech is dangerous. It’s un-American. Sadly, this isn’t a new tactic of the Left. They’ve worked to silence opposing voices for years. We cannot let them silence 75M Americans. This isn’t the CCP," Pompeo tweeted to his personal account.Pompeo's comments come as some Republicans have called for Trump's removal from office and as a handful of White House staff and administration officials have resigned over Trump's role in inciting a mob to storm the Capitol and disrupt the peaceful transition of power.The top arms control expert in the State Department resigned Friday in protest of the riots. Assistant Secretary Christopher Ford had already submitted his resignation letter to Trump the previous week as is traditional for political appointees during a change in administration with the intention to stay on until the end of the administration."I cannot continue to serve in an Administration at a time in which some are willing to condone, or even to incite, violent insurrection against the country I hold dear and whose Constitution I have taken a sacred oath to support and defend," Ford wrote in his resignation letter, which was first reported by The Washington Post.Pompeo's comments also come as some extremist Trump supporters are threatening to return to Washington to disrupt President-elect Joe Biden's inauguration on Jan. 20.Pompeo, who is responsible for representing American democracy around the world, has struck a noticeably different tone of his official Twitter account, where he condemned the "lawlessness and rioting" as unacceptable."Being the greatest country on earth is not just about our incredible economy & our strong military; it's about the values we project out into the world. I believe in America, and American goodness," he tweeted Friday on his official account.World leaders, many of whom are used to U.S. lectures about orderly transitions of power, responded to the images of the Trump mob swarming the Capitol on Wednesday with shock. British Prime Minister Boris Johnson called the scenes in Washington "disgraceful."Pompeo is widely thought to have political ambitions beyond his position in the Trump administration. He considered running for the U.S. Senate in 2020 from Kansas and, breaking with tradition for secretaries of state, he played an active role in campaigning for Trump in his re-election.Some Republicans with presidential ambitions, including Sens. Josh Hawley of Missouri and Ted Cruz of Texas, have resisted condemning Trump's actions this week, as many in the party continue to believe that they cannot win without support from the president's loyal base.Twitter permanently suspended Trump’s account on Friday, citing "the risk of further incitement of violence."The president’s account, with 88 million followers, was initially banned for 12 hours on Wednesday due to "severe violations of our Civic Integrity policy," after he used the platform to condemn Vice President Mike Pence as his supporters stormed the Capitol."After close review of recent Tweets from the @realDonaldTrump account and the context around them we have permanently suspended the account due to the risk of further incitement of violence," the company said in a tweet.Donald Trump Jr. called Twitter's decision to ban the president's personal account a "full frontal assault" of free speech."It's a sad day, when you're literally talking about losing free speech," he continued in a 9-minute video posted to his Facebook on Saturday.More than 200 members of Congress are calling for President Donald Trump to be removed from office.On Thursday Rep. Adam Kinzinger, R-Ill., became the first Republican to say the 25th Amendment should be invoked while Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, told the Anchorage Daily News on Friday that she wanted Trump to resign.House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., said in a statement on Friday that the House is prepared to move forward with articles of impeachment against Trump if he does not resign. The vote could come as early as the middle of next week, just days before the president's term expires."I don’t know what they are going to send over," said Sen. Pat Toomey, R-Penn. speaking to Fox News. "And one of the things that I’m concerned about frankly is whether the House would completely politicize something."I do think the president committed impeachable offenses," said Toomey. "But I don’t know what is going to land on the Senate floor, if anything."
‘There was no violence,’ claims Israeli Trump supporter who raided US Capitol-Brushing off suggestion of wrongdoing, Pinchas Gerby says the FBI could find him in ‘seconds’ if it pleased-By TOI staff-jan 10,21-Today, 7:49 pm
An Israeli supporter of US President Donald Trump was among those who participated in the breach of the US Capitol last week.Pinchas Gerby told Channel 12 on Sunday that he was inside the Capitol building for some 30 minutes and insisted there was no violence. Gerby claimed he was shoved into the building by the huge crowds behind him who broke through the police barricade, and shrugged off suggestions that US authorities could be on his tail.In an interview with the same network on Thursday, however, he offered a slightly different account, saying that he was hit with rubber bullets in the ribs and teargassed outside the US Capitol, during clashes that broke out between rioters and police. At the rally outside, “some of the guys started going wild, the police responded with force, they tear-gassed us, they shot rubber bullets at us,” he said. In that interview, he also said he was shoved into the building, where he remained for 45 minutes to an hour.Wednesday’s violent incursion at the US Capitol saw a largely white mob of Trump supporters overpower police, break through security lines and rampage through the Capitol, forcing lawmakers to scatter as they were putting the final, formal touches on Joe Biden’s victory over Trump in the Electoral College.The crowd surged to the domed symbol of American democracy following a rally near the White House, where Trump repeated his bogus claims that the election was stolen from him and urged his supporters to march in force toward the Capitol.Five people, including a Capitol police officer, died as a result of the siege.According to Gerby, at the end of the pro-Trump rally outside the legislature, a row of police prevented demonstrators from entering the building. But then, “a mass of people pushed us forward and breached the line of police officers. There was no violence. I wasn’t dangerous. I didn’t go wild.”He said he and others calmly walked through the corridors and rooms of the Capitol. “When someone shattered the window, we saw that guns were being pointed at us,” he said.However, the situation remained so calm that at one point Gerby even asked for directions to the nearest bathroom.“I then saw that policemen were going room by room to empty them,” he said, adding that he was then escorted outside the compound.“You may call me naïve, but I was protesting the fact that the courts didn’t look at the evidence” for widescale voter fraud, he said. No such evidence has been reported by credible sources or accepted by any official overseeing the election, whether Republican or Democrat.Gerby said he did not do anything wrong, since he was not arrested. However, friends later warned him that the FBI sent out notices asking for the public’s help in identifying and locating members of the mob that breached the Capitol.“You really think that with today’s technology, the FBI needs help from the public to find me? They can find me in two and a half seconds, which is two seconds too many,” Gerby said.Agencies contributed to this report.
Second Republican senator now urges Trump to resign over Capitol riot-Pat Toomey joins Lisa Murkowski in calling for US president to step down, as Democratic House Speaker Pelosi notifies colleagues to prepare for impeachment move this week-By DARLENE SUPERVILLE, Alan Fram and MARY CLARE JALONICK-jan 10,2`1-Today, 6:44 pm 1
WASHINGTON (AP) — Two Republican senators now say US President Donald Trump should resign as support for the drive to impeach him a second time is gaining momentum in his final days in office after the deadly riot at the Capitol by a violent mob of Trump supporters.Sen. Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania on Sunday joined Alaska Sen. Lisa Murkowski in calling for Trump to “resign and go away as soon as possible.” Murkowski, who has long voiced her exasperation with Trump’s conduct in office, told the Anchorage Daily News on Friday that Trump simply “needs to get out.”Toomey said that even though he believes Trump committed impeachable offenses in encouraging loyalists in the Capitol siege on Wednesday, he did not think there was enough time for the impeachment process to play out. Toomey said that resignation was the “best path forward, the best way to get this person in the rearview mirror for us.” He was not optimistic that Trump would step down before his term ends on January 20.The White House had no immediate comment Sunday.The House appears determined to act despite the short timeline.Late Saturday, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, a Democrat of California, sent a letter to her colleagues reiterating that Trump must be held accountable. She told her caucus, now scattered across the country on a two-week recess, to “be prepared to return to Washington this week.”“It is absolutely essential that those who perpetrated the assault on our democracy be held accountable,” Pelosi wrote. “There must be a recognition that this desecration was instigated by the President.”Rep. Jim Clyburn, the third-ranking House Democrat, said “it may be Tuesday, Wednesday before the action is taken, but I think it will be taken this week.” Clyburn, Democrat-South Carolina, said he was concerned that a Senate trial could distract from the process of confirming President-elect Joe Biden’s nominees.Clyburn said one option could be giving Biden the “100 days he needs to get his agenda off and running and maybe we’ll send the articles sometime after that” to the Senate for a trial.He said lawmakers “will take the vote that we should take in the House” and that Pelosi “will make the determination as when is the best time” to send them to the Senate.Kentucky Sen. Mitch McConnell, the Republican leader, has said an impeachment trial could begin as early as Inauguration Day, January 20.The new Democratic effort to stamp Trump’s presidential record — for the second time and days before his term ends — with the indelible mark of impeachment is gaining supporters. Rep. David Cicilline, Democrat Rhode Island, a leader of the House effort to draft impeachment articles — or charges — accusing Trump of inciting insurrection, said Saturday that his group had grown to include 185 co-sponsors.Lawmakers planned to formally introduce the proposal on Monday in the House, where articles of impeachment must originate.The articles, if passed by the House, could then be transmitted to the Senate for a trial, with senators acting as jurors who would ultimately vote on whether to acquit or convict Trump. If convicted, Trump would be removed from office and succeeded by the vice president.Potentially complicating that decision about impeachment is what it means for Biden and the beginning of his presidency. While reiterating that he has long viewed Trump as unfit for office, Biden on Friday sidestepped a question about impeachment, saying what Congress does “is for them to decide.”A violent and largely white mob of Trump supporters overpowered police, broke through security lines and rampaged through the Capitol on Wednesday, forcing lawmakers to scatter as they were putting the final, formal touches on Biden’s victory over Trump in the Electoral College.The crowd surged to the domed symbol of American democracy following a rally near the White House, where Trump repeated his bogus claims that the election was stolen from him and urged his supporters to march in force toward the Capitol.Five people, including a Capitol police officer, died as a result of the siege.Outrage over the attack and Trump’s role in egging it on capped a divisive, chaotic presidency like few others in the nation’s history. There is less than two weeks until Trump is out of office but Democrats have made clear they don’t want to wait that long.Trump has few fellow Republicans speaking out in his defense. He’s become increasingly isolated, holed up in the White House as he has been abandoned in the aftermath of the riot by many aides, leading Republicans, and, so far, two Cabinet members — both women.Toomey appeared on CNN’s “State of the Union” and NBC’s “Meet the Press.” Clyburn was on “Fox News Sunday” and CNN.
Short on alternatives, Trump fans trash Twitter ban — on Twitter-Conservative platforms popular among Trump’s fiercest supporters, like Parler and Gab, known for its far-right and neo-Nazi user base, have drawn a growing number of users-By Juliette MICHEL-JAN 10,21-Today, 2:50 pm
NEW YORK (AFP) — Friends, family and advisers to Donald Trump have been bitterly complaining that Twitter’s ban of the president after his supporters stormed the US Capitol amounts to an assault on free speech by radical leftists.Ironically, given the enormous influence of the platform, they have aired their grievances first of all on… Twitter — a choice underscoring the platform’s huge readership and the relative paucity of alternatives.“Free speech is dead & controlled by leftist overlords,” tweeted Donald Trump Jr., the president’s older son.Asked Rudy Giuliani, the president’s personal lawyer, “Who will be silenced next?” And Mike Pompeo — posting not as secretary of state but on his personal account — tweeted: “Sadly, this isn’t a new tactic of the Left. They’ve worked to silence opposing voices for years.”For influential Republican senator Ted Cruz, the decisions by Twitter and some other social media were “absurd & profoundly dangerous.”“Why,” he went on, “should a handful of Silicon Valley billionaires have a monopoly on political speech?”Every one of the above messages was posted on Twitter, the social network that for years has been Trump’s preferred means of communicating with the public — and sometimes even with other world leaders.But on Friday, amid widespread fury after he encouraged the supporters who forced their way into the US Capitol in a bloody and chaotic melee, Twitter banned him permanently.It was taking the rare measure, it said, “due to the risk of further incitement of violence.”Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat and Twitch joined in suspending the president’s accounts.Reddit, a news and discussion website that is normally fairly permissive, on Friday closed a forum popular with Trump fans, saying it was inciting hate.The question now is where Trump and his supporters will turn next.Donald Trump Jr., himself fearing exclusion from Twitter, has asked his followers to send him their email contacts — hardly the most reactive form of communications — so he can keep them abreast of news.A new platform? In a quickly deleted tweet, the president himself on Friday spoke of creating his own platform “in the near future,” without providing any detail.Conservative platforms popular among Trump’s fiercest supporters, like Parler and Gab, have drawn growing numbers of users.Gab saw “record traffic” on Friday night and Saturday, according to its creator Andrew Torba, and had to add computer servers to handle it.He reported 12 million visits in 12 hours, adding, “Exploding growth right now.”Launched in 2016, Gab positions itself as a platform promoting “freedom of expression” but has become known above all for its far-right — even neo-Nazi — user base.In 2018, when an assault on a Pittsburgh synagogue claimed 11 lives, investigators discovered earlier anti-Semitic posts by the shooter on Gab.Several companies have banned Gab, including PayPal, Visa and the Apple and Google app stores.Parler faced more severe consequences: after it, too, was banned first by Google and Apple in their app stores, Amazon confirmed it was suspending the social network from its cloud computing services, effectively pushing it offline.All three tech giants said Parler, which briefly became the top free app in the Apple store Saturday before it was removed, had failed to tackle violent content on its platform.Given the riot at the Capitol this week, there was a “serious risk that this type of content will further incite violence,” Amazon said in a letter to Parler first reported by Buzzfeed.Once the preferred platform of the far-right fringe, Parler — launched in 2018 — now draws more traditional conservative voices, like those of Fox News star and close Trump ally Sean Hannity, as well as the Republican governor of South Dakota, Kristi Noem.Another Parler regular, influential political commentator Mark Levin, said Friday he had “suspended” his own Twitter account “in protest against Twitter’s fascism.”Levin also mentioned his account on Rumble, a site which, like YouTube, broadcasts videos but promises its users they will “never be censored for political or scientific content.”Yet, all these alternative platforms are so closely identified with the right — even the extreme right — that, especially as tech companies move against them, they seem unlikely ever to draw followings like Trump’s 88 million Twitter followers.
Trump said considering Dershowitz, Giuliani for defense in possible impeachment-Harvard law scholar says it would be his ‘honor and privilege’ to defend the US president against claims he incited the storming of the Capitol-By TOI staff and Agencies-JAN 10,21-Today, 11:47 am
US President Donald Trump is reportedly considering appointing Rudy Giuliani and Alan Dershowitz as his defense lawyers if he faces an impeachment trial over his role last week’s deadly riot at the US Capitol by a violent mob of Trump supporters.According to CNN, Trump’s personal attorney Giuliani, who called for the 2020 presidential election to be settled as a “trial by combat” while speaking at the rally before storming of the Capitol, is set to be on the team, while legal scholar Dershowitz, who has frequently backed Trump, is also being considered.“It would be my honor and privilege to defend the Constitution of the United States and the First Amendment against partisan efforts to weaponize the Constitution,” Dershowitz told CNN.Giuliani declined to comment on the report.Democrats’ momentum for a fresh drive to quickly impeach Trump gained support Saturday with a top Republican saying the president’s role in the deadly riot was worthy of rebuke.Pennsylvania Sen. Pat Toomey said he believed Trump had committed “impeachable offenses.” But he stopped short of saying whether he would vote to remove the president from office at the conclusion of a Senate trial if the House sent over articles of impeachment.“I don’t know what they are going to send over and one of the things that I’m concerned about, frankly, is whether the House would completely politicize something,” Toomey said Saturday on Fox News Channel, speaking of the Democratic-controlled House.“I do think the president committed impeachable offenses, but I don’t know what is going to land on the Senate floor, if anything,” Toomey said.With Toomey, Rep. David Cicilline, a leader of the House effort to draft impeachment articles — or charges — accusing Trump of inciting insurrection, said his group had grown to include 185 co-sponsors.Lawmakers plan to formally introduce the proposal on Monday in the House, where articles of impeachment must originate. A vote could be possible by Wednesday — exactly one week before Democrat Joe Biden becomes president at noon on Jan. 20.The articles, if passed by the House, would then be transmitted to the Senate for a trial, with senators acting as jurors who would ultimately vote on whether to acquit or convict Trump. If convicted, Trump would be removed from office and succeeded by the vice president.House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, however, shared no details about her party’s plans as she addressed her hometown San Francisco constituents during an online video conference on Saturday.“Justice will be done. Democracy will prevail. And America will be healed,” she said. “But it is a decision that we have to make.A violent mob of Trump supporters overpowered police, broke through security lines and rampaged through the Capitol on Wednesday, forcing lawmakers to scatter as they were putting the final, formal touches on Biden’s victory over Trump in the Electoral College.The crowd surged to the domed symbol of American democracy following a rally near the White House, where Trump repeated his bogus claims that the election was stolen from him and urged his supporters to march in force toward the Capitol.Five people, including a Capitol police officer, died as a result of the siege.Outrage over the attack and Trump’s role in egging it on capped a divisive, chaotic presidency like few others in the nation’s history. There is less than two weeks until Trump is out of office but Democrats have made clear they don’t want to wait that long.Trump, meanwhile, has few fellow Republicans speaking out in his defense. He’s become increasingly isolated, holed up in the White House as he has been abandoned in the aftermath of the riot by many aides, leading Republicans and, so far, two Cabinet members — both women.Biden, meanwhile, reiterated that he has long viewed Trump as unfit for office. But on Friday he sidestepped a question about impeachment, saying what Congress does “is for them to decide.”After spending many weeks refusing to concede defeat in the November election, Trump promised — after the Capitol riot — to oversee a smooth transfer of power to Biden. He called for reconciliation and healing, but then announced he will not attend the inauguration — the first such presidential snub since just after the Civil War.
Seemingly abandoning Trump, Pence said planning to attend Biden inauguration-Reports say US vice president has decided to attend January 20 ceremony; incoming president says he’d be ‘honored to have him there’By AFP-JAN 10,21-Today, 11:46 am
WASHINGTON — Mike Pence will attend the upcoming inauguration of Joe Biden, multiple media reports said Saturday, the vice president becoming the latest longtime loyalist to abandon an increasingly isolated US President Donald Trump.Relations between Trump and Pence — who was previously one of the mercurial president’s staunchest defenders — have nosedived since Wednesday, when the vice president formally announced Biden’s victory in November’s election.A mob of far-right demonstrators stormed the US Capitol the same day in a failed bid to stop Congress from certifying Biden’s win, in a riot blamed on Trump that left five dead.Multiple media reports on Saturday cited senior administration officials as saying that Pence — who was forced to take shelter from the intruders during the riot — had decided to attend Biden’s inauguration on January 20.Preparations take place for US President-elect Joe Biden’s inauguration on the West Front of the US Capitol in Washington, Jan. 8, 2021, after supporters of US President Donald Trump stormed the building. (AP Photo/Patrick Semansky)-The president-elect earlier in the week said Pence would be welcome at his formal swearing-in, due to take place in a scaled-down format due to the coronavirus.“I think it’s important that as much as we can stick to what have been the historical precedents of how an administration changes should be maintained,” Biden told reporters.“We’d be honored to have him there, and to move forward in the transition.”Trump said on Friday he would not attend the inauguration.The outgoing president has been accused of provoking Wednesday’s violence, and now faces an unprecedented second impeachment, expected to begin on Monday.House Speaker Nancy Pelosi warned that Democrats would launch the process unless Trump resigned or Pence invoked the 25th Amendment, in which the cabinet removes the president from office.While Pence has not spoken publicly on the subject, the New York Times reported Thursday he was against invoking the mechanism, never used before in US history.
Top Republican says Trump committed ‘impeachable offenses’But Pat Toomey stops short of saying whether he would vote to remove the US president from office if a Senate impeachment trial goes ahead-By DARLENE SUPERVILLE and Alan Fram-JAN 10,21-Today, 3:32 am
WASHINGTON (AP) — Democrats’ momentum for a fresh drive to quickly impeach outgoing President Donald Trump gained support Saturday, and a top Republican said the president’s role in the deadly riot at the Capitol by a violent mob of Trump supporters was worthy of rebuke.Sen. Pat Toomey, R-Pa., said he believed Trump had committed “impeachable offenses.” But he stopped short of saying whether he would vote to remove the president from office at the conclusion of a Senate trial if the House sent over articles of impeachment.“I don’t know what they are going to send over and one of the things that I’m concerned about, frankly, is whether the House would completely politicize something,” Toomey said Saturday on Fox News Channel, speaking of the Democratic-controlled House.“I do think the president committed impeachable offenses, but I don’t know what is going to land on the Senate floor, if anything,” Toomey said.The new Democratic effort to stamp Trump’s presidential record — for the second time and days before his term ends — with the indelible mark of impeachment gained momentum Saturday.Rep. David Cicilline, D-R.I, a leader of the House effort to draft impeachment articles — or charges — accusing Trump of inciting insurrection, said his group had grown to include 185 co-sponsors.Lawmakers plan to formally introduce the proposal on Monday in the House, where articles of impeachment must originate. A vote could be possible by Wednesday — exactly one week before Democrat Joe Biden becomes president at noon on Jan. 20.The articles, if passed by the House, would then be transmitted to the Senate for a trial, with senators acting as jurors who would ultimately vote on whether to acquit or convict Trump. If convicted, Trump would be removed from office and succeeded by the vice president.House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, however, shared no details about her party’s plans as she addressed her hometown San Francisco constituents during an online video conference on Saturday.“Justice will be done. Democracy will prevail. And America will be healed,” she said. “But it is a decision that we have to make.”A violent and largely white mob of Trump supporters overpowered police, broke through security lines and rampaged through the Capitol on Wednesday, forcing lawmakers to scatter as they were putting the final, formal touches on Biden’s victory over Trump in the Electoral College.The crowd surged to the domed symbol of American democracy following a rally near the White House, where Trump repeated his bogus claims that the election was stolen from him and urged his supporters to march in force toward the Capitol.Five people, including a Capitol police officer, died as a result of the siege.“It has been an epiphany for the world to see that there are people in our country led by this president, for the moment, who have chosen their whiteness over democracy,” Pelosi said of the attack.She added: “This cannot be exaggerated. The complicity, not only the complicity, the instigation of the president of United States, must and will be addressed.”No. 4 House Democratic leader Hakeem Jeffries of New York reiterated support for moving against what he deemed “an act of sedition that was incited and encouraged by Donald Trump.”Speaking of Trump, Jeffries said Saturday: “He should be impeached, convicted and thrown out of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue and forever banished to the dustbin of history.”Outrage over the attack and Trump’s role in egging it on capped a divisive, chaotic presidency like few others in the nation’s history. There are less than two weeks until Trump is out of office but Democrats have made clear they don’t want to wait that long.Trump, meanwhile, has few fellow Republicans speaking out in his defense. He’s become increasingly isolated, holed up in the White House as he has been abandoned in the aftermath of the riot by many aides, leading Republicans and, so far, two Cabinet members — both women.Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, who has long voiced her exasperation with Trump’s conduct in office, told the Anchorage Daily News on Friday that he simply “needs to get out.”Sen. Ben Sasse, another Trump critic, said more important than what happens to Trump “is what happens to the United States people and this union 12 days and beyond.”But the Nebraska Republican also told “CBS This Morning” on Friday that he “will definitely consider” whatever articles the House sends over because he believes Trump “has disregarded his oath of office” to preserve, protect and defend the Constitution.Biden, meanwhile, reiterated that he has long viewed Trump as unfit for office. But on Friday he sidestepped a question about impeachment, saying what Congress does “is for them to decide.”After spending many weeks refusing to concede defeat in the November election, Trump promised — after the Capitol riot — to oversee a smooth transfer of power to Biden. He called for reconciliation and healing, but then announced he will not attend the inauguration — the first such presidential snub since just after the Civil War.
Banned from Twitter, Trump may find new megaphone on far-right magnet Parler-Google removes platform from its store, Apple threatens to follow, amid US curbs on online incitement-By Frank Bajak-JAN 10,21-Today, 3:03 am
BOSTON (AP) — One Twitter wag joked about lights flickering on and off at the White House being Donald Trump signaling to his followers in Morse code after Twitter and Facebook squelched the president for inciting rebellion.Though deprived of his big online megaphones, Trump does have alternative options of much smaller reach, led by the far right-friendly Parler — even if Google removed it from its app store Friday and Apple threatened the same.Trump may launch his own platform. But that won’t happen overnight, and free speech experts anticipate growing pressure on all social media platforms to curb incendiary speech as Americans take stock of Wednesday’s violent takeover of the US Capitol by a Trump-incited mob.Twitter ended Trump’s nearly 12-year run on Friday. In shuttering his account it cited a tweet to his 89 million followers that he planned to skip President-elect Joe Biden’s Jan. 20 inauguration that it said gave rioters license to converge on Washington once again.Facebook and Instagram have suspended Trump at least until Inauguration Day. Twitch and Snapchat also have disabled Trump’s accounts, while Shopify took down online stores affiliated with the president and Reddit removed a Trump subgroup. Twitter also banned Trump loyalists including former national security advisor Michael Flynn in a sweeping purge of accounts promoting the QAnon conspiracy theory and the Capitol insurrection. Some had hundreds of thousands of followers.In a statement Friday, Trump said: “We have been negotiating with various other sites, and will have a big announcement soon, while we also look at the possibilities of building out our own platform in the near future.”The “immense power that the social media platforms have as gatekeepers of public discourse” had been flexed as never before — a power that should be troubling even for supporters of the Trump ban, tweeted Jameel Jaffer, director of the Knight First Amendment Institute at Columbia University.Experts are betting Trump pops up on Parler, a 2-year-old magnet for the far right that claims more than 12 million users and where his sons Eric and Don Jr. are already active. Parler hit headwinds, though, on Friday as Google yanked its smartphone app from its app store for allowing postings that seek “to incite ongoing violence in the US” and Apple threatened to do the same, giving Parler a 24-hour ultimatum.Apple told Parler executives in an email Friday it got complaints the app was being used to “plan and facilitate yet further illegal and dangerous activities.”Parler CEO John Matze complained on his site of being scapegoated. “Standards not applied to Twitter, Facebook or even Apple themselves, apply to Parler.” He said he “won’t cave to politically motivated companies and those authoritarians who hate free speech.”Losing access to the app stores of Google and Apple — whose operating systems power hundreds of millions of smartphones — severely limits Parler’s reach, though it will continue to be accessible via web browser. Another potential landing spot for Trump is Gab — though both Google and Apple booted it from their app stores in 2017.Online speech experts expect social media companies led by Facebook, Twitter and Google’s YouTube to more vigorously police hate speech and incitement in the wake of the Capitol rebellion, as Western democracies led by Nazism-haunted Germany already do.David Kaye, a University of California-Irvine law professor and former UN special rapporteur on free speech believes the Parlers of the world will also face pressure from the public and law enforcement as will little-known sites where further pre-inauguration disruption is now apparently being organized. They include MeWe, Wimkin, TheDonald.win and Stormfront, according to a report released Saturday by The Althea Group, which tracks disinformation.Kaye rejects arguments by US conservatives including the president’s former UN ambassador, Nikki Haley, that the Trump ban savaged the First Amendment, which prohibits the government from restricting free expression. “Silencing people, not to mention the President of the US, is what happens in China not our country,” Haley tweeted.“It’s not like the platforms’ rules are draconian. People don’t get caught in violations unless they do something clearly against the rules,” said Kaye. And not just individual citizens have free speech rights. “The companies have their freedom of speech, too.”While initially arguing their need to be neutral on speech, Twitter and Facebook gradually yielded to public pressure drawing the line especially when the so-called Plandemic video emerged early in the COVID-19 pandemic urging people not to wear masks, noted civic media professor Ethan Zuckerman of the University of Massachusetts-Amherst.Zuckerman expects the Trump de-platforming may spur important online shifts. First, there may be an accelerated splintering of the social media world along ideological lines.“Trump will pull a lot of audience wherever he goes,” he said. That could mean more platforms with smaller, more ideologically isolated audiences.A splintering could push people towards extremes — or make extremism less infectious, he said: Maybe people looking for a video about welding on YouTube will no longer find themselves being offered an unrelated QAnon video. Alternative media systems that are less top-down managed and more self-governing could also emerge.Zuckerman also expects major debate about online speech regulation, including in Congress.“I suspect you will see efforts from the right arguing that there shouldn’t be regulations on acceptable speech,” he said. “I think you will see arguments from the democratic side that speech is a public health issue.”You’re serious. We appreciate that!
Pro-Trump rioter in horned fur hat, man who grabbed Pelosi’s lecturn, charged-Jake Angeli and Adam Johnson hit with violent entry and other charges; dozens more held in deadly storming of US Capitol; officials say many more cases being probed-By AP and TOI staff-9 January 2021, 11:58 pm
Dozens of people have already been arrested and prosecutors across the US have vowed to bring to justice those who stormed the US Capitol on Wednesday, sending lawmakers into hiding as they began their work to affirm President-elect Joe Biden’s victory.Two men in high-profile photos from the events — one wearing a horned, fur hat and the other carrying House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s lectern — were charged Saturday, the latest arrests in Wednesday’s mayhem that left five people dead.The arrests come as more images emerge showing just how violent the riots were: a bloodied officer crushed in a doorway screaming; another tumbling over a railing into the crowd below after being body-slammed from behind; members of the media being cursed, shoved and punched.Jacob Anthony Chansley, an Arizona man seen in photos and video of the mob with a painted face and wearing a costume that included the horned hat, was taken into custody Saturday and charged with counts that include violent entry and disorderly conduct on Capitol grounds.Chansley, more commonly known as Jake Angeli, will remain in custody in Arizona pending a detention hearing that will be scheduled during an initial court appearance early in the coming week, Assistant US Attorney Esther Winne told The Associated Press by email. Chansley did not immediately respond to messages left via email and telephone.Chansley, who had become a staple in his costume at pro-Trump protests across the country, is now among dozens of people arrested in the wake of the Capitol invasion by a large mob of Trump supporters enraged over his election loss.The rioters took over the House and Senate chambers, smashed windows and waved Trump, American and Confederate flags, forcing lawmakers to halt their voting to affirm President-elect Joe Biden’s victory and go into hiding for hours.A Florida man accused of making off with Pelosi’s lectern during the chaos was arrested Friday night on a federal warrant and was being held Saturday without bail in Pinellas County, Florida. Jail records do not show if Adam Johnson, 36, of Parrish, Florida, has an attorney.Johnnson was charged Saturday with theft, violent entry and disorderly conduct on Capitol grounds.The married father of five who was quickly identified on social media by local residents as the man in a photo smiling as he walked through the Capitol rotunda carrying Pelosi’s lectern, The Bradenton Herald reported.Before being deleted or taken down, Johnson posted on social media that he was in Washington, DC, during Wednesday’s riot and included disparaging comments about the Black Lives Matter movement, according to The Bradenton Herald.By Saturday, prosecutors had filed 17 cases in federal district court and 40 others in the District of Columbia Superior Court for a variety of offenses ranging from assaulting police officers to entering restricted areas of the US Capitol, stealing federal property and threatening lawmakers.Prosecutors said additional cases remained under seal, dozens of other people were being sought by federal agents and the US attorney in Washington vowed Friday that “all options were on the table” for charges, including possibly sedition.Other notable arrests in the Capitol invasion include:— Doug Jensen, an Iowa man, was jailed early Saturday on federal charges, including trespassing and disorderly conduct counts, for his alleged role in the Capitol riot. Jensen, 41, of Des Moines, was being held without bond at the Polk County Jail and county sheriff’s Sgt. Ryan Evans said he didn’t know if Jensen had an attorney. Video posted online during the storming of the Capitol showed a man who appears to be Jensen, who is white, pursuing a Black officer up an interior flight of stairs as a mob of people trails several steps behind. At several points, the officer says “get back,” to no avail.This is HORRIFIC to watch pic.twitter.com/AToUyANEY7— Janey Godley (@JaneyGodley) January 6, 2021— Richard Barnett, an Arkansas man who was shown in a widely seen photo sitting in House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s office with his boots on a desk after the storming of the Capitol, was arrested Friday by the FBI. Barnett, 60, turned himself in to FBI agents at the Benton County Sheriff’s Office in Bentonville, Arkansas.Richard Barnett, a supporter of US President Donald Trump, holds a piece of mail as he sits inside the office of US Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi after protestors breached the US Capitol in the US Capitol in Washington, DC, January 6, 2021. (SAUL LOEB / AFP)-He is jailed in the Washington County Detention Center in nearby Fayetteville, Arkansas, without bond pending an initial court appearance, FBI Little Rock spokesman Connor Hagan said. No attorney is listed in online jail records for the Gravette, Arkansas, man.From his feet on Nancy Pelosi's desk to an Arkansas jail. Here's a mug shot of Richard Barnett, who was arrested this morning and is now facing federal charges pic.twitter.com/rpSJ3BvyAm — Reena Roy (@reenaroy) January 8, 2021— Derrick Evans, a West Virginia state lawmaker who posted videos online showing himself pushing his way inside the Capitol, was arrested Friday by the FBI at his home and charged with entering restricted federal property. Evans, who faced bipartisan calls for him to step down, submitted a letter of resignation Saturday to West Virginia Gov. Jim Justice and apologized for his actions. Evans faces charges that he entered a restricted area of the US Capitol after he livestreamed himself rushing into the building with a horde of rampaging Trump supporters as Congress was in session to certify the Electoral College vote. In the videos, Evans is seen fist bumping a police officer and then milling around the rotunda as he shouted, “Our house!”WV Delegate Derrick Evans, who live streamed himself breaking into the Capitol and posted it on the internet, is among those being charged. This is him: pic.twitter.com/CUzjQd6ZrI — Sara B. (@sara_bee) January 8, 2021-US attorneys in several states, including Kentucky, Ohio and Oregon, said people could face charges in their home states if they traveled to Washington and took part in the riot. The FBI has released photos of people inside the Capitol, urging the public to help identify them.Capitol Police arrested just more than a dozen people the day of the breach while DC police arrested around 70. Many people freely left the Capitol, which means investigators now have to work to identify them and track them down. Authorities have to distinguish between those who traveled to Washington only to participate in the rally before the riot versus those who were part of the insurrection at the Capitol. It can take weeks for investigators to go through photos and video, identify suspects, interview witnesses and write a complaint to secure an arrest.Those who’ve been charged so far could also lead investigators to others who joined in the violent siege on Capitol Hill.Michael Sherwin, acting US attorney for the District of Columbia, said this week that prosecutors are not keeping anything out of their “ arsenal for potential charges.” As prosecutors gather more evidence, they can add more charges against those they’ve already arrested.A member of a pro-Trump mob bashes an entrance of the Capitol Building in an attempt to gain access on January 6, 2021 in Washington, DC. A pro-Trump mob stormed the Capitol, breaking windows and clashing with police officers. Trump supporters gathered in the nation’s capital today to protest the ratification of President-elect Joe Biden’s Electoral College victory over President Trump in the 2020 election. (Jon Cherry/Getty Images/AFP)Experts say federal prosecutors could bring rarely used seditious conspiracy charges against some of the rioters. In the wake of protests across the U.S. over police brutality this summer, then-Deputy Attorney General Jeffrey Rosen told prosecutors in September that they should consider using the sedition charge, which calls for up to 20 years in prison, against violent demonstrators.Rosen, who took over the top Department of Justice job when Attorney General William Barr stepped down last month, said the charge does not require proof of a plot to overthrow the US government and gave the hypothetical example of a group that “has conspired to take a federal courthouse or other federal property by force.”Trump urged the crowd to march on the Capitol, even promising to go with them, though he didn’t in the end. The president told his supporters to “fight” to stop the “steal” of the election, while his personal lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, called for “trial by combat.”But the legal bar for charging the president or any other speakers at the rally with inciting violence is high. Experts say it would be tough to prove that the president intended for violence to happen on Capitol Hill. Trump’s speech likely would not be considered illegally inciting violence because he didn’t specifically call for people to storm the Capitol, experts say.But Trump faces an impeachment effort that is gathering steam. Democrats plan to introduce articles of impeachment against Trump in the House of Representatives on Monday.Meanwhile outgoing Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has informed senators that a potential trial in the Senate following impeachment in the House is unlikely to begin before Joe Biden’s inauguration on January 20.Democrats will gain a razor-thin majority in the Senate on January 22, but impeaching a president in the Senate requires a two-thirds majority.
After Israel-Morocco deal, US launches work on consulate in Western Sahara-US envoy attends event in ‘stunningly beautiful’ disputed region; Moroccan FM says country ‘feels stronger in its legitimate fight for its territorial integrity’-By AFP-JAN 10,21-Today, 8:04 pm
RABAT, Morocco — The United States on Sunday started the “process of establishing” a consulate in contested Western Sahara, after Washington recognized Morocco’s sovereignty there in exchange for Rabat normalizing ties with Israel.US Ambassador David Fischer visited the port of Dakhla, 1,440 kilometers (895 miles) southwest of Rabat in the far south of Moroccan-controlled Western Sahara, to mark the start of work on a diplomatic office.“It is such an honor for me to visit this stunningly beautiful and critically important region of Morocco, and to begin the process of establishing a US diplomatic presence here,” Fischer said, according to the US embassy.Western Sahara is a disputed and divided former Spanish colony, mostly under Morocco’s control, where tensions with the pro-independence Polisario Front have simmered since the 1970s.Last year, Morocco joined the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, and Sudan in agreeing to normalize ties with Israel under US-brokered deals.In return, US President Donald Trump fulfilled a decades-old Moroccan goal by backing its contested sovereignty over the barren but phosphate-rich region, which lies next to key Atlantic fishing zones.Foreign Minister Nasser Bourita said Sunday that “Morocco feels stronger in its legitimate fight for its territorial integrity… with the support of its friends.”The Algerian-backed Polisario Front fought a war for independence from 1975 to 1991, and controls about one-fifth of the desert territory.Some 20 countries, mostly African and Arab nations, have already opened diplomatic offices in the Moroccan-held area, but the Polisario considers such moves to be violations of international law.UN peacekeepers in Western Sahara are mandated to organize a referendum on self-determination for the region, and despite Washington’s move, the UN insists its position is “unchanged.”In November, the Polisario announced it regarded a 1991 ceasefire as null and void, after Morocco sent troops into a UN-patrolled buffer zone to reopen a key road.Bourita said Sunday that Morocco continues to “support the ceasefire, but will react to any provocation,” adding that Rabat “will support the UN process… to find a solution to this long-standing dispute.”Fischer, who called the visit Sunday “another historic milestone in more than 200 years of friendship” between Morocco and the US, was accompanied by Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs, David Schenker.The pair donned flowing white embroidered robes that are traditionally worn in the territory over their suits.In December, the US State Department opened a “virtual” diplomatic post in Western Sahara, ahead of finding “an appropriate site” to build a consulate.The building is expected to be ready in coming months, Fischer added.Last month, Fischer said that a consulate would allow Washington “to take further advantage of Morocco’s strategic positioning as a hub for trade in Africa, Europe, and the Middle East.”The Morocco-Israel deal to normalize ties is expected to involve significant investment from the US International Development Finance Corporation, and Morocco hopes Dakhla can become a major regional port.Last month, the DFC inked a memorandum of understanding to invest $3 billion over the next four years into Morocco or with Moroccan partners working in sub-Saharan Africa.It also promised an initiative to “catalyze $1 billion of investments in projects that advance women’s economic empowerment in the Middle East and North Africa.”US President-elect Joe Biden, who will replace Trump on January 20, has not publicly commented on Western Sahara.
Israeli jets said to fly low over Beirut, scaring residents-Breaches of Lebanese airspace by Israel reportedly becoming a daily occurrence-By Agencies and TOI staff-JAN 10,21-Today, 6:44 pm
Israeli military jets carried out several low-altitude flights over Beirut as reconnaissance drones buzzed overhead Sunday in what has become a daily occurrence, according to social media users in Lebanon.Israel has been accused of regularly breaching Lebanese airspace, often to carry out strikes in neighboring Syria or reconnaissance missions on Hezbollah’s presence in the south of the country. The Iran-backed terror group, sworn to Israel’s destruction, has thousands of missiles stored in southern Lebanon aimed at the Jewish state.On Christmas Eve, Israeli jets flew low late into the night, spooking Beirut residents. They were followed by reported Israeli strikes in Syria.The reported frequency of low-flying warplanes over the capital has intensified in the last two weeks, making residents jittery as tensions run high in the region on the final days of US President Donald Trump’s administration.“When the drone leaves, the warplanes come. When the warplanes leave, the drones return. They have seen us in our PJs, filmed us in our PJs and surveilled us in our PJs. Now what,” quipped Twitter user Areej_AAH“Of all types of panic I experienced in life in Beirut, the panic that accompanies the Israeli warplanes flying this low in Beirut is very special,” tweeted Rudeynah Baalbaky, who said it brought back memories of the 2006 Second Lebanon War between Hezbollah and Israel.Israel rarely comments on these reports.Many fear conflict may erupt in the area before Trump leaves office in retaliation for the US killing of Iranian commander Qassem Soleimani in Iraq last year, or to scuttle efforts by the incoming administration of Joe Biden to negotiate with Iran.On Friday, the Lebanese army said it recorded an Israeli flight that lasted nearly six hours in the country’s south.A Twitter account that tracks aircraft movement in the Middle East, Intel_Sky, has recorded dozens of Israeli jets flying over Lebanon, since the start of the year. Intel_Sky called Sunday’s flights “mock raids.”At one point this summer, the Lebanese army said Israel violated its airspace nearly 30 times in two days, flying reconnaissance drones and jets into Lebanese territory.The United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon says Israel enters Lebanese airspace on a daily basis in violation of UN resolutions and the country’s sovereignty.Between June and October 2020, UNIFIL recorded a daily average of 12.63 airspace violations, totaling 61 hours and 51 minutes in flight time, a significant increase from the previous four months. Drones accounted for approximately 95 percent of the violations, UNIFIL said.Israel and Lebanon are technically at war.Hezbollah’s leader, Hassan Nasrallah, in a year-end interview, said Israel’s efforts to curb his group’s ability to acquire precision-guided missiles have failed. He boasted that Hezbollah now has twice as many such missiles as it had last year.Israel has in recent months expressed concern that Hezbollah is trying to establish production facilities to make precision-guided missiles.
'I’m frankly somewhere between addicted and intoxicated'Elated outgoing US envoy says ‘there’s no going back’ on Trump’s Israel policies-After overseeing shift on Jerusalem, Golan, settlements, along with Israel-Gulf normalization, David Friedman suggests traditional peacemaking tactics are a thing of the past-By TOI staff-JAN 10,21-Today, 6:44 pm
Donald Trump’s outgoing US Ambassador to Israel David Friedman has expressed confidence that the major shifts in Washington’s policy vis-a-vis Israel and the Palestinians cannot be reversed by the Biden administration.“I’m frankly somewhere between addicted and intoxicated with what I’ve been able to do, and how much joy it gives me,” he told The New York Times in a parting interview reviewing his time in Israel. The Trump administration, said Friedman, has “changed the narrative dramatically.”“There’s no going back on what we’ve been able to do,” said Friedman.(The interview was published Sunday, but carried out last Monday, two days before pro-Trump supporters invaded the US Capitol; Friedman commented on those events on Friday.)-Under Trump’s leadership, the US administration recognized Jerusalem as Israel’s capital and moved its embassy there from Tel Aviv, and recognized Israel’s sovereignty over the Golan Heights. It withdrew millions in aid to the Palestinians and shuttered the PLO office in Washington. The Trump peace plan unveiled last January — forcefully opposed by the Palestinians — did not call for the evacuation of Israeli settlements and would have allowed Israel to annex large swaths of the West Bank under its framework.Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, left, and US Ambassador David Friedman at the Western Wall on December 10, 2020, the first night of Hanukkah. Netanyahu hailed the “light” of US President Donald Trump’s announcement that Morocco and Israel are to establish full relations, issued hours earlier. (Kobi Gideon/GPO)-But Israel’s plans to unilaterally annex parts of the area were put on ice when the US clinched a normalization deal between Jerusalem and the United Arab Emirates in August. That agreement was followed in succession by deals establishing diplomatic ties between Israel and Bahrain, Sudan, and Morocco, all of which were brokered by the Trump administration. The UAE, Sudan and Morocco received significant rewards from the US for opening ties with Israel.In addition, US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo became the first top American diplomat to visit a Jewish settlement in the West Bank last year. In November 2018, his State Department said the US would no longer see settlements as contrary to international law. During his last visit to Israel, Pompeo also announced that Washington would designate as “anti-Semitic” the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions campaign, which seeks to isolate Israel over its treatment of the Palestinians.US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, left, with US Ambassador to Israel David Friedman as he prepares to board a plane at Ben Gurion Airport on November 20, 2020. (AP Photo/Patrick Semansky, Pool)-Freidman said the Trump administration “injected a tremendously needed dose of realism into the Palestinian psyche about what’s achievable and what’s not.” He said the Trump peace plan was “a gift to the Palestinian people” that would make their “quality of life far more bearable.”For the US to press Israel on increased settlement building, “just to kind of virtue-signal that we think the Palestinians should have something more, made no sense to me,” he said.The ambassador also said Israel could yet take unilateral steps to determine its borders, though he conceded such a move would be less than ideal.He said Israel would “continue a process that, hopefully, we’ve been helpful in starting, of determining internally — forget about the rest of the world — what its eastern border should be.”“They can act unilaterally,” he said, referring to an Israeli annexation. “It’s suboptimal, but at some point, it’s just sort of necessary just to move on.”Friedman acknowledged that US President-elect Biden would return to a “more internationally accepted view” of settlements as illegal. But he insisted the Trump peace plan “has the advantage of being a realistic two-state solution that is endorsed generally by the Israeli public. Why would you throw that out?”He opined: “A flood of refugees into Israel? Never going to happen. Dividing Jerusalem? It’s just never going to happen. Israel giving up certain parts of its biblical heartland? Never going to happen.”Friedman, who was seen as unusually close to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, also said he didn’t interfere with Israeli elections. “It may not look that way, but I respect Israel’s democracy,” he said. He also signaled he would seek Israeli citizenship, but not immediately.“I’m going to stay American-only for at least four years,” he said. “I want to give myself every opportunity to return to government.”
Body parts, debris found after Indonesia plane crash-Boeing 737-500 with 62 people onboard crashed shortly after takeoff from Jakarta, officials say-By Niniek Karmini and Edna Tarigan-JAN 10,21-Today, 5:09 am
JAKARTA, Indonesia (AP) — Indonesian rescuers pulled out body parts, pieces of clothing and scraps of metal from the Java Sea early Sunday morning, a day after a Boeing 737-500 with 62 people onboard crashed shortly after takeoff from Jakarta, officials said.Officials were hopeful they were honing in on the wreckage of Sriwijaya Air Flight 182 after sonar equipment detected a signal from the aircraft.Transportation Minister Budi Karya Sumadi told reporters that authorities have launched massive search efforts after identifying “the possible location of the crash site.”These pieces were found by the SAR team between Lancang Island and Laki Island,” National Search and Rescue Agency Bagus Puruhito in a statement.Indonesian military chief Air Chief Marshal Hadi Tjahjanto said teams on the Rigel navy ship equipped with a remote-operated vehicle had detected a signal from the aircraft, which fit the coordinates from the last contact made by the pilots before the plane went missing.“We have immediately deployed our divers from navy’s elite unit to determine the finding to evacuate the victims,” Tjahjanto said.An Indonesian Navy diver holds debris from Sriwijaya Air flight SJY182 during a search and rescue operation at sea near Lancang island on January 10, 2021, after the Boeing 737-500 crashed shortly after taking off from Jakarta airport on January 9. (ADEK BERRY / AFP)-More than 12 hours since the Boeing plane operated by the Indonesian airline lost contact, little is known about what caused the crash.Fishermen in the area around Thousand Islands, a chain of islands north of Jakarta’s coast, reported hearing an explosion around 2:30 p.m. Saturday.“We heard something explode, we thought it was a bomb or a tsunami since after that we saw the big splash from the water,” fisherman Solihin, who goes by one name, told The Associated Press by phone.“It was raining heavily and the weather was so bad. So it is difficult to see around clearly. But we can see the splash and a big wave after the sounds. We were very shocked and directly saw the plane debris and the fuel around our boat.”Sumadi said Flight SJ182 was delayed for an hour before it took off at 2:36 p.m. It disappeared from radar four minutes later, after the pilot contacted air traffic control to ascend to an altitude of 29,000 feet (8,839 meters), he said.There were 62 people on board, including seven children and three babies.“We are aware of media reports from Jakarta regarding Sriwijaya Air flight SJ-182,” Boeing said in a statement. “Our thoughts are with the crew, passengers, and their families. We are in contact with our airline customer and stand ready to support them during this difficult time.”Authorities established two crisis centers, one at airport and one at port. Families gathered to wait for news of loved ones.On social media, people began circulating the flight manifesto with photos and videos of those who were listed as passengers. One video shows a woman with her children waving goodbye while walking through the airport.Sriwijaya Air President Director Jefferson Irwin Jauwena said the plane, which is 26 years old and previously used by airlines in the United States, was airworthy. He told reporters Saturday that the plane had previously flown to Pontianak and Pangkal Pinang city on the same day.“Maintenance report said everything went well and airworthy,” Jauwena told a news conference. He said the plane was delayed due to bad weather, not because of any damage.Indonesia, the world’s largest archipelago nation, with more than 260 million people, has been plagued by transportation accidents on land, sea and air because of overcrowding on ferries, aging infrastructure and poorly enforced safety standards.In October 2018, a Boeing 737 MAX 8 jet operated by Lion Air plunged into the Java Sea just minutes after taking off from Jakarta, killing all 189 people on board. The plane involved in Saturday’s incident did not have the automated flight-control system that played a role in the Lion Air crash and another crash of a 737 MAX 8 jet in Ethiopia five months later, leading to the grounding of the MAX 8 for 20 months.The Lion Air crash was Indonesia’s worst airline disaster since 1997, when 234 people were killed on a Garuda airlines flight near Medan on Sumatra island. In December 2014, an AirAsia flight from the Indonesian city of Surabaya to Singapore plunged into the sea, killing 162 people.Sriwijaya Air has only has several minor incidents in the past, though a farmer was killed in 2008 when landing plane went off runway due to a hydraulic issue.The United States banned Indonesian carriers from operating in the country in 2007, but reversed the decision in 2016, citing improvements in compliance with international aviation standards. The European Union has previously had similar bans, lifting them in June 2018.
North Korea threatens to expand its nuclear arsenal, citing US ‘hostility’Kim Jong Un says he won’t use his nuclear weapons first, suggests he’s open to dialogue, but also calls Washington his ‘main enemy’By Hyung-Jin Kim-JAN 10,21-Today, 2:17 am
SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — North Korean leader Kim Jong Un threatened to expand his nuclear arsenal as he disclosed a list of high-tech weapons systems under development, saying the fate of relations with the United States depends on whether it abandons its hostile policy, state media reported Saturday.Kim’s comments during a key meeting of the ruling party this week were seen as applying pressure on the incoming administration of President-elect Joe Biden, who has called Kim a “thug” and has criticized his summits with President Donald Trump.The Korean Central News Agency quoted Kim as saying the “key to establishing new relations between (North Korea) and the United States is whether the United States withdraws its hostile policy.”Kim said he won’t use his nuclear weapons first unless threatened. He also suggested he is open to dialogue if Washington is too, but stressed North Korea must further strengthen its military and nuclear capability to cope with intensifying US hostility.He again called the US his country’s “main enemy.” “Whoever takes office in the US, its basic nature and hostile policy will never change,” he said.Biden, who will take office on Jan. 20, is unlikely to hold direct meetings with Kim unless the North Korean leader takes significant denuclearization steps.Cheong Seong-Chang, a fellow at the Wilson Center’s Asia Program, said Kim’s speech showed he has no interests in denuclearization talks with Biden if he insists that working-level negotiations must sort out contentious issues first.Kim didn’t cite any specific provocative US actions. North Korea has previously called regular US military drills with South Korea an invasion rehearsal, though the allies have repeatedly denied that.The North Korean leader listed sophisticated weapons systems that he said were under development. They include a multi-warhead missile, underwater-launched nuclear missiles, solid-fueled long-range missiles and spy satellites. He said North Korea must also advance the precision attack capability on targets in the 15,000 kilometer (9,320 mile)-striking range, an apparent reference to the US mainland, and develop technology to manufacture smaller nuclear warheads to be mounted on long-range missiles more easily.“The reality is that we can achieve peace and prosperity on the Korean Peninsula when we constantly build up our national defense and suppress US military threats,” Kim said.In this photo provided by the North Korean government, North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, center, attends a ruling party congress in Pyongyang, North Korea Thursday, Jan. 7, 2021. (Korean Central News Agency/Korea News Service via AP)-It’s unclear if North Korea is capable of developing such systems. It’s one of the world’s most cloistered countries, and estimates on the exact status of its nuclear and missile programs vary widely. In 2018, the South Korean government said North Korea was estimated to have up to 60 nuclear weapons.“What they want to tell the US is we’re developing the new strategic weapons that you can see as the most intimidating. Do you want to come to the negotiating table?” Choi Kang, vice president of Seoul’s Asan Institute for Policy Studies, said.KCNA said Kim’s comments were made during the ruling Workers’ Party congress, the first in five years, from Tuesday to Thursday. He spoke for nine hours, the agency said.The congress, the party’s top decision-making body, is being held as Kim faces what appears to be the toughest moment of his nine-year rule due to blows to his already-fragile economy — pandemic-related border closings that have sharply reduced the North’s external trade, a spate of natural disasters last summer and US-led sanctions.This image made from video broadcasted by North Korea’s KRT, shows a military parade with what appears to be possible new intercontinental ballistic missile at the Kim Il Sung Square in Pyongyang, Saturday, Oct. 10, 2020. (KRT via AP)-During his opening-day speech, Kim called the difficulties the “worst-ever” and admitted his previous economic plans had failed. In his other comments reported Saturday, he called for building a stronger self-supporting economy and reducing reliance on imports under a new five-year development plan.Since taking power in late 2011, Kim, who turned 37 on Friday, has pushed the so-called “byungjin” policy of simultaneously seeking economic growth and the expansion of his nuclear deterrent. After claiming to have achieved the ability to strike the US mainland with nuclear weapons, Kim launched high-stakes summits Trump in 2018, but their diplomacy later fell apart due to wrangling over the sanctions the following year.During this week’s speeches, Kim said North Korea will further boost ties with China, its biggest ally and economic lifeline but slammed South Korea for continuing the drills with the US and introducing modern weapons.South Korea’s Unification Ministry responded that it hopes for the early resumption of North Korea-US talks, saying the inauguration of a new president in Washington can serve as a good chance to improve their ties.“Kim’s speech foreshows the North Korean-US relations won’t be smooth in the next four years with Biden in office,” said Nam Sung-wook, an expert on North Korea at Korea University in South Korea. “We won’t likely see big events and spectacles (like the Kim-Trump summits) for the time being.”
