Former Sen. Rick Santorum says he has "concerns" about ExxonMobil CEO Rex Tillerson, President-elect Donald Trump's pick for secretary of state, over the issue of climate change. Mr. Santorum said Mr. Tillerson was an "unorthodox" pick and that he'd withhold judgment until he found out more about him. "But there are some concerns I have about…
Democratic group Progress North Carolina is broadcasting today's protests at the state capitol in Raleigh via Facebook Live.
Democrats are gathered to demand access to the state Senate's special session where Republican lawmakers are preparing a bill in secret to cripple the incoming administration of Democratic governor-elect Roy Cooper.
Watch the video, embedded below:
A North Carolina man pleaded not guilty on Friday to weapons and assault charges after he allegedly fired an assault rifle in a crowded Washington pizzeria that fake news stories on the internet claimed was a front for a child sex ring.
Edgar Maddison Welch, 28, of Salisbury, entered the plea during a brief preliminary hearing in U.S. District Court. He is suspected of firing an AR-15 assault rifle inside the Comet Ping Pong restaurant on Dec. 4. No one was injured.
Welch had planned his raid for days and tried to recruit an accomplice to come along on his ad-hoc investigation of the nonexistent pedophilia ring, according to the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
Bogus news stories had claimed 2016 Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton ran such an operation out of the restaurant.
Magistrate Judge G. Michael Harvey admonished Welch over reports that he was talking about the incident inside the jail. Welch, the father of two children, said he would heed Harvey's warning.
He is charged with interstate transportation of a firearm with intent to commit an offense, assault with a dangerous weapon and possession of a firearm during the commission of a crime of violence. Welch is being held without bond.
The fake news stories were an example of a proliferation of false reports during the U.S. election campaign, often disseminated through websites purporting to be news outlets and quoting bogus sources.
The firearm transportation and assault charges each carry a maximum prison sentence of 10 years. The maximum sentence for firearm possession is 15 years.
(Reporting by Ian Simpson and Tom Ramstack; Editing by Lisa Von Ahn and Andrea Ricci)
John Podesta, the former chairman of Hillary Clinton's campaign and the direct target of Russian hacking, is shocked by reports of the FBI's "lackadaisical response" to foreign interference in the presidential election.
The New York Times reported this week that federal investigators discovered a Russian cyber attack in September 2015 but failed to send a single agent to warn senior Democratic National Committee officials.
Instead, FBI agents left a voice mail message about the attacks with the DNC's information technology help desk, and the former head of the bureau's cyber division justified the response because the office was not "in the middle of the woods of Montana."
Podesta wrote an op-ed published late Thursday in the Washington Post, where he blasted the FBI's response in comparison to its dogged pursuit of alleged wrongdoing related to Clinton's email server.
"What takes this from baffling to downright infuriating is that at nearly the exact same time that no one at the FBI could be bothered to drive 10 minutes to raise the alarm at DNC headquarters, two agents accompanied by attorneys from the Justice Department were in Denver visiting a tech firm that had helped maintain Clinton’s email server," Podesta wrote.
FBI Director James Comey authorized thousands of hours of investigation of Clinton's emails, which resulted in no charges but plenty of innuendo, because of what he called "intense public interest."
But Comey disregarded the concerns of the rest of the intelligence community about Russian cyberattacks related to the election because he didn't want to appear "political," Podesta noted.
Podesta found that justification highly ironic, since Comey sent his "infamous" vaguely worded letter hinting at new evidence in the Clinton investigation just 11 days before the election.
He wondered why Comey, the FBI and Republican lawmakers were seemingly unconcerned about those cyberattacks and President-elect Donald Trump's extensive ties to Russia.
"House Republicans who had an insatiable appetite for investigating Clinton have been resistant to probing deeply into Russia’s efforts to swing the election to Trump," Podesta said. "The media, by gleefully publishing the gossipy fruits of Russian hacks, became what the Times itself calls 'a de facto instrument of Russian intelligence.'"
He called on Congress to investigate Trump's ties to Russia and the possible politicization of the FBI.
"If ever there were a case of 'intense public interest,' this is it," he wrote. "What’s broken in the FBI must be fixed and quickly."
Rep. Elijah Cummings (D-MD) lamented that revelations about Russian hacking of the U.S. election had devolved into yet another partisan feud.
The Maryland Democrat said intelligence officials found clear evidence the election interference was directed by "the highest levels of the Russian government," and he compared the hacks to the deadliest terror attack in American history.
"This is like a 9/11 for us," Cummings said. "We should be addressing it in a very serious and, it must be, an independent way."
The congressman said President Barack Obama had issued a warning Oct. 17 about Russia's interference in the U.S. election, but that was buried under coverage of a recording that revealed Donald Trump boasting about getting away with grabbing women by their genitals.
Cummings and Rep. Eric Swalwell (D-CA) have introduced legislation that would establish a bipartisan commission, similar to the one that investigated the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, to investigate the election-related hacks.
"This is a struggle for the soul of our democracy," Cummings said. "We're seeing all of our institutions being attacked -- our election system, the FBI, the CIA -- so there is a real crisis of legitimacy."
"This is a struggle for the soul of our democracy" -- @RepCummings wants 9/11-type commission to look into hackings https://t.co/tDUzmXcuop
— New Day (@NewDay) December 16, 2016
It would seem Donald Trump attributes his November win in part to the decrease in black voters at the polls.
The Associated Press reports that Trump's Hershey, Pennsylvania victory tour speech featured a largely white crowd cheering on Trump's declaration that African-Americans were "smart" to listen to his message and therefore "didn't come out to vote" for former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.
"That was the big thing, so thank you to the African-American community," Trump told the crowd.
Trump also told the rally attendees that he's the first Republican to have won the state in over 30 years.
"Everyone leaves Pennsylvania, Republicans, thinking they won Pennsylvania. And they never do. They just don't win Pennsylvania," said Trump.
Full rally video is below - he begins talking about it at the 27:30-minute mark:
After months of denying that the Russians had any involvement in the election, Fox News has finally revealed that the Russians hacked the election.
According to MediaMatters, Fox News’ chief intelligence correspondent Catherine Herridge explained that the conservative network independently verified that the hack was real. Herridge reported that Russian cyber militias went after US systems as part of “an effort to interfere in the US election.”
(READ MORE: )
"These operations were sanctioned by the highest levels of the Russian government," Herridge continued. "After the FBI director’s July statement about the Clinton email investigation, a government source says there was a reluctance to further insert government institutions and their assessments into an already deeply politicized election cycle. A leading cybersecurity expert says the intelligence community reviewed the techniques, tactics, and procedures leveraged in the attacks and made the link to Russia. In October, the agencies and Homeland Security, or DHS, went on the record, though Putin was not mentioned by name."
Not only has Fox News denied that the Russian hack was an effort to swing the election but as late as this evening political analyst Monica Langley of the Wall Street Journal told Anderson Cooper and Don Lemon that the Trump campaign wouldn't deny the hack if Democrats stopped making it about the election.
"His team and the president-elect believe they are trying to delegitimize his election, his win," Langley said. "They" in this case, refers to those talking about the Russian hack and demanding accountability and an investigation. "I talked to somebody high level within the Trump organization today with the transition. They said Donald Trump is spending zero time on worrying about the Russian hack. He's spending time on getting the best cabinet possible and bringing back good-paying American jobs. They are acting like this is not important to them right now. And they're focused on bringing in this new administration."
Lemon remarked that despite that claim, Trump himself is still tweeting about it, so he is actually thinking about it.
See the full video from Fox News below ala Media Matters:
See the interview with Langley below via CNN:
Russian President Vladimir Putin supervised his intelligence agencies' hacking of the U.S. presidential election and turned it from a general attempt to discredit American democracy to an effort to help Donald Trump, three U.S. officials said on Thursday.
U.S. intelligence agencies' conclusion that Russia tried to influence the election by hacking people and institutions, including Democratic Party bodies, has angered President-elect Trump, who says he won the Nov. 8 vote fairly. Russian officials have denied accusations of interference in the U.S. election.
Separately, a senior White House official said on Thursday that Putin was likely to have been aware of the cyber attacks but he fell short of accusing the Russian president.
"I don't think things happen in the Russian government of this consequence without Vladimir Putin knowing about it," Ben Rhodes, the White House's deputy national security adviser, told MSNBC. "When you're talking about a significant cyber intrusion like this, we're talking about the highest levels of government."
The U.S. officials - who have knowledge of intelligence information on the matter - said on the condition of anonymity that the hacking of U.S. political groups and figures had a more general focus at first.
"This began merely as an effort to show that American democracy is no more credible than Putin's version is," one of the officials said.
"It gradually evolved from that to publicizing (Hillary) Clinton's shortcomings and ignoring the products of hacking Republican institutions, which the Russians also did," the official said.
By the fall, the official said, it became an effort to help Trump's campaign because "Putin believed he would be much friendlier to Russia, especially on the matter of economic sanctions" than Democratic rival Clinton.
Democratic President Barack Obama said in an interview with National Public Radio that the United States will take action against Russia.
"I think there is no doubt that when any foreign government tries to impact the integrity of our elections ... we need to take action and we will," he said according to excerpts of the Thursday interview released by NPR.
"At a time and a place of our own choosing. Some of it may be ... explicit and publicized; some of it may not be. ... Mr. Putin is well aware of my feelings about this, because I spoke to him directly about it," Obama said.
NBC reported earlier that U.S. intelligence officials have "a high level of confidence" Putin was personally involved in the Russian cyber campaign against the United States.
Hacked emails of Democratic operatives and Clinton aides were leaked during the presidential campaign, and at times dominated the news agenda. The U.S. officials said Russia also hacked Republicans but did little to nothing with the information they found.
PUTIN ROLE?
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov told state TV channel Rossiya-24 that he was "dumbstruck" by the NBC report of Putin's alleged involvement.
"I think this is just silly, and the futility of the attempt to convince somebody of this is absolutely obvious," he said.
Trump, who takes office on Jan. 20, has brushed off reports of Russian hacking of U.S. political institutions.
"If Russia, or some other entity, was hacking, why did the White House wait so long to act? Why did they only complain after Hillary lost?" Trump wrote in a post on Twitter on Thursday.
In fact, the U.S. government did formally accuse Russia of a campaign of cyber attacks against U.S. political organizations in October - one month ahead of the election.
Obama last week ordered a review by the U.S. intelligence agencies about foreign interference in the 2016 election.
Asked on Thursday about the hacks, Secretary of State John Kerry described how Obama had been considering the evidence ahead of the October announcement.
"The president made the decision based on the input that was carefully, carefully vetted by the intelligence community ... that he did have an obligation to go out to the country and give a warning. And he did so," Kerry said at a news briefing.
The three U.S. officials who spoke to Reuters said the fact that Putin oversaw a hacking operation was not surprising and is standard operating procedure in Russia.
"If anything, given his background as a KGB officer, Putin has a much tighter grip on all Russian intelligence operations, civilian and military, foreign and domestic, than any democratic leader does," one official said.
The reports of Russian hacking have raised concerns among both political parties in Congress, with top Republicans breaking with Trump to call for closer scrutiny.
Some Republican lawmakers have also questioned Trump's pick for Secretary of State, Exxon Mobil Corp Chief Executive Rex Tillerson, who has close business ties to the Russian government.
(Reporting by Washington newsroom and Vladimir Soldatkin in Moscow; Writing by Yara Bayoumy; Editing by Alistair Bell)
Since President-elect Donald Trump’s nomination of fast food CEO Andrew Puzder as labor secretary, there’s been lots of speculation that the administration could undo worker protections. The single best window into Puzder’s thinking may be an obscure book he wrote six years ago. It’s a blistering attack on business regulations, unions, and the Obama administration’s stimulus…
Protesters sang, chanted and marched in Raleigh, North Carolina on Thursday to protest the state Republican Party's attempts to undermine newly elected Democratic Gov. Roy Cooper by sharply limiting his powers.
Raleigh News and Observer reporter Colin Campbell posted video of the protesters as they sang "We Shall Not Be Moved" and attempted to disrupt the current session of the Republican-led state Senate. The state GOP is penning a law that it hopes will cripple the Cooper administration before the new governor is even sworn in.
Politico said that state Republicans want to "reduce the number of state government employees Cooper can hire and fire at will from 1,500 to 300, strip the governor of the power to appoint trustees to the University of North Carolina and give it to the General Assembly, and require Senate confirmation for Cabinet appointments. Another proposal would shift control of one state office from the governor to the lieutenant governor — who will still be a Republican next year."
Cooper has threatened to sue the state Republican Party for what some Democrats are calling a "coup" against the incoming governor.
The public wants access to the GOP-dominated legislature's session, but have now been locked out. On Wednesday, Cooper said:
"We don’t want another disaster like House Bill 2. This is exactly why we had problems with House Bill 2, because they wanted to do it in secret. They’re major changes in North Carolina law. They deserve debate. They deserve deliberation."
Watch videos from the Senate gallery, embedded below:
Protesters singing "We shall not be moved" outside Senate chamber. Senate has now recessed following disruptions, public kicked out. #ncpol pic.twitter.com/ngOod2BEjG
— Colin Campbell (@RaleighReporter) December 15, 2016
As the era of Trump approaches, some of you are succumbing to the follow four syndromes:
1. Normalizer Syndrome. You want to believe Trump will be just another president – more conservative and pompous than most, but one who will make rational decisions once in office.
You are under a grave delusion. Trump has a serious personality disorder and will pose a clear and present danger to America and the world.
2. Outrage Numbness Syndrome. You are no longer outraged by what Trump says or what he does – his incessant lies, his cabinet picks, his bullying, his hatefulness – because you’ve gone numb. You can’t conceive that someone like this is becoming President of the United States, so you’ve shut down emotionally. Maybe you’ve even stopped reading the news.
You need to get back in touch with your emotions and reengage with what’s happening.
3. Cynical Syndrome. You’ve become so cynical about the whole system – the Democrats who gave up on the working class and thereby opened the way for Trump, the Republicans who suppressed votes around the country, the media that gave Trump all the free time he wanted, the establishment that rigged the system – that you say the hell with it. Let Trump do his worst. How much worse can it get?
You need to wake up. It can get a lot worse.
4. Helpless Syndrome. You aren’t in denial. You know that nothing about this is normal; you haven’t become numb or stopped reading the news; you haven’t succumbed to cynicism. You desperately want to do something to prevent what’s about to occur.
But you don’t know what to do. You feel utterly powerless and immobilized.
Millions of others feel equally powerless. But taking action – demonstrating, resisting, objecting, demanding, speaking truth, joining with others, making a ruckus, and never ceasing to fight Trump’s pending tyranny – will empower you. And with that power you will not only to minimize the damage that is about to occur, but also get this nation and the world back on the course it must be on.
If you find yourself falling into one or more of these syndromes, that’s understandable. Normalizing, numbing, becoming cynical, and feeling powerless are natural human responses to the gross absurdity and genuine peril posed by Trump.
But I urge you to pull yourself out. We need you in the peaceful resistance army, starting January 20.
Walmart's online store was selling "Got Hitler?" mugs in the style of the "Got Milk?" phrase on Monday until people started writing to the company to have them removed, Vocativ reported earlier this week.
According to the outlet, the Walmart and Amazon online stores both have third party vendors that are able to sell products of their own through the websites.
Walmart also had mugs on its website with the words "Got R*tard?" Customers were not happy and reached out to the company on social media to have the products removed.
The third party vendor, JM Holdings, was also responsible for a "Got Pepe?" mug, which was in reference to the once sad frog that has since been , a name that has been embraced by white supremacist movements.
JM Holdings told Vocativ that the slogans on these mugs are not necessarily intentional, but are generated based on words in the dictionary. According to Fast Forward, that these slogans in particular are now being generated signifies a push toward an anti-politically correct culture and use of language.
Rather, that these are the types of slogans found on mugs connotes a growing market of far right consumers. On the other hand, a number of brands have pulled their advertising from websites that have been associated with this growing alt-right movement.
Namely, Kellogg's pulled its advertising from the alt-right media site, Breitbart in November. The company noted that because of its process of finding website on which to advertise — similarly to Amazon and Walmart's issues with third party vendors — it sometimes misses where it is advertising.
Kellogg's pulling its advertising, however, resulted in Breitbart calling for an all-out boycott of all of the company's products. If anything, this appears to signify, in some ways, a wedge that the alt-right is creating, even in consumption.
Vandals drew swastikas, the N-word and "Trump 2016" in the snow piled up on vehicles near Philadelphia's Temple University on Wednesday night.
According to TheTab.com, Temple junior Daisy Calderon was walking home in the early hours of Thursday morning when she noticed the snow graffiti.
“(E)very car along Montgomery had snow drawings on them, but they were mostly just stupid stuff,” Calderon said, but then a particular vehicle caught her eye.
It said "Ni**er" across the trunk and "Trump 2016" on the back windshield. Calderon snapped a photo and a second photo of a swastika drawn on the same car.
She posted the images to social media with a note that said, "Already exhausted and frustrated from finals, I saw something that genuinely bothered me to the core. I saw this car on the way home from the tech last night. I'm disgusted that anyone, for whatever reason, would do something like this."
Temple police are investigating the incident. A similar incident took place in February of 2016, when someone wrote swastikas and the N-word on another vehicle on campus.
Calderon's photos are embedded below:
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