DEMOLIBNUTS WANT PENCE TO 25TH AMEND TRUMP AS THEY PUT IMPEACHMENT BILL THREW.

 2020 AMERICAN ELECTION RESULTS BY STATE TRUMP VS LOSER LIBERAL SLEEPY (SLOPPY JOE) BIDEN.

ON D-71 OF THE TRUMP WIN OF THE PRESIDENCY. MON JAN 11, 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 11AM-JAN 11,21-AND SHORTLY THE DEMOLIBNUTS WILL BE VOTING TO A ARTICLE OF IMPEACH ON TRUMP FOR INCITMENT.DO THEY THINK THIS STUNT WILL REALLY WORK WITH 9 DAYS LEFT IN THIS TERM AND HOPEFULLY 4 YEARS NEXT TERM.FOR TRUMPY. THE DEMOLIBNUTS PUT A HOUSE BILL DEMANDING PENCE INVOKE THE 25TH AMENDMENT ON TRUMP. REPUBLICANS OBJECT. THE HOUSE IS THROWN OUT TILL TOMORROW. THERE WILL BE A FULL HOUSE VOTE TOMORROW.ITS 11.18AM. I HEARD IT WAS A BLACK OFFICER THAT KILLED THE WHITE WOMAN GOING THREW THE CAPITAL WINDOW. NO CALL OF RACISM BY THE WHITES AGAINST THE BLACKS IN THIS SHOOTING.IF IT WAS REVERSED. THE LEFT WOULD BE CRYING FOWL AND ASKING FOR THE OFFICER TO BE FIRED.

THE MEDIA ARE JUST A BUNCH OF HITLER PROPAGANDA PUPPETERS AGAINST MY GUY DONALD JOHN TRUMP. PRESIDENT OF AMERICA.

Associated Press-Supreme Court rejects fast track for Trump election cases-Mon, January 11, 2021, 9:55 AM EST

WASHINGTON (AP) -- The Supreme Court on Monday formally refused to put on a fast track election challenges filed by President Donald Trump and his allies.The court rejected pleas for quick consideration of cases involving the outcome in five states won by President-elect Joe Biden: Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin.The orders, issued without comment, were unsurprising. The justices had previously taken no action in those cases in advance of last week's counting of the electoral votes in Congress, which confirmed Biden's victory.The court still could act on appeals related to the Nov. 3 election later this winter or in the spring. Several justices had expressed interest in a Pennsylvania case involving the state Supreme Court's decision to extend the deadline for receipt of mailed ballots by three days, over the opposition of the Republican-controlled legislature.But even if the court were to take up an election-related case, it probably wouldn't hear arguments until the fall.

As impeachment bill filed, Democrats urge Pence to oust Trump on his own-Speaker recalls lawmakers to Washington for votes, as more Republicans say it’s time for POTUS to resign; House resolution urging VP to invoke 25th Amendment blocked by Republicans-By LISA MASCARO, DARLENE SUPERVILLE and MARY CLARE JALONICK-JAN 11,21-Today, 8:42 pm

WASHINGTON (AP) — Impeachment pressure mounting, the House worked swiftly Monday to try to oust US President Donald Trump from office, pushing the vice president and Cabinet to act first, in an extraordinary effort to remove Trump in the final days of his presidency.Trump faces a single charge — “incitement of insurrection” — in an impeachment resolution that could go to a vote by mid-week. First, Democrats called on Vice President Mike Pence to invoke constitutional authority under the 25th Amendment to remove Trump from office before January 20, when Democrat Joe Biden is to be inaugurated.In all, these are stunning final moments for Trump’s presidency as Democrats and a growing number of Republicans declare that he is unfit for office, and could do more damage after inciting a mob that ransacked the US Capitol in a deadly siege on Wednesday.President Trump gravely endangered the security of the United States and its institutions of government,” reads the four-page impeachment bill.“He will remain a threat to national security, democracy, and the Constitution if allowed to remain in office,” it reads.Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., holds a news conference on the day after violent protesters loyal to US President Donald Trump stormed the US Congress, at the Capitol, in Washington on January 7, 2021. (AP/J. Scott Applewhite)-House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is recalling lawmakers to Washington for votes, as more Republicans say that it is time for Trump to resign. Republican Sen. Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania joined GOP Sen. Lisa Murkowski of Alaska over the weekend in calling for Trump to “go away as soon as possible.”During an interview on “60 Minutes” aired Sunday, Pelosi invoked the Watergate era when Republicans in the Senate told President Richard Nixon, “It’s over.”“That’s what has to happen now,” she said.On Monday, a House resolution calling on Vice President Pence to invoke constitutional authority to remove Trump from office was blocked by Republicans. However, the full House is set to hold a roll call vote on that resolution on Tuesday, and it is expected to pass.After that, Pelosi said Pence will have 24 hours to respond. Next, the House would proceed to impeachment. A vote could come Wednesday.Pence has given no indication that he is ready to proceed on such a course, which would involve invoking the 25th Amendment to the Constitution with a vote by a majority of the Cabinet to oust Trump before he leaves office.The impeachment bill from Reps. David Cicilline of Rhode Island, Ted Lieu of California, Jamie Raskin of Maryland, and Jerrold Nadler of New York draws from Trump’s own false statements about his election defeat to Biden. Judges across the country, including some nominated by Trump, have repeatedly dismissed cases, and Attorney General William Barr, a Trump ally, has said there was no sign of widespread fraud.The bill of impeachment details Trump’s pressure on state officials in Georgia to “find” him more votes, and his White House rally ahead of the Capitol siege, in which he encouraged thousands of supporters to “fight like hell” and march to the building.The mob overpowered police, broke through security lines and windows, and rampaged through the Capitol, forcing lawmakers to scatter as they were finalizing Biden’s victory over Trump in the Electoral College.“We will act with urgency, because this president represents an imminent threat,” Pelosi said in a letter late Sunday to colleagues emphasizing the need for quick action.“The horror of the ongoing assault on our democracy perpetrated by this president is intensified and so is the immediate need for action.”Republican Sen. Toomey said he doubted impeachment could be done before Biden is inaugurated, even though a growing number of lawmakers say that step is necessary to ensure Trump can never hold elected office again.“I think the president has disqualified himself from ever, certainly, serving in office again,” Toomey said. “I don’t think he is electable in any way.”Murkowski, long exasperated with the president, told the Anchorage Daily News on Friday that Trump simply “needs to get out.” A third, Sen. Roy Blunt, R-Mo., did not go that far, but on Sunday he warned Trump to be “very careful” in his final days in office.On impeachment, House Democrats would likely delay for 100 days sending articles of impeachment to the Senate for trial, to allow Biden to focus on other priorities.Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., said that instead of coming together, Democrats want to “talk about ridiculous things like, ‘Let’s impeach a president,’” with just days left in office.Still, some Republicans might be supportive.Nebraska Sen. Ben Sasse said he would take a look at any articles that the House sent over. Illinois Rep. Adam Kinzinger, a frequent Trump critic, said he would “vote the right way” if the matter were put in front of him.The Democratic effort to stamp Trump’s presidential record — for the second time — with the indelible mark of impeachment advanced rapidly after the riot.Rep. David Cicilline, D-R.I, a leader of the House effort to draft impeachment articles accusing Trump of inciting insurrection, said Sunday that his group had 200-plus co-sponsors.Potentially complicating Pelosi’s decision about impeachment was what it meant for Biden and the beginning of his presidency. While reiterating that he had long viewed Trump as unfit for office, Biden on Friday sidestepped a question about impeachment, saying what Congress did “is for them to decide.”

Parler forced offline after losing access to host servers-Head of platform popular with the far-right accuses tech giants of trying to stifle free speech: ‘They will NOT win!’By AFP-JAN 11,21-Today, 1:54 pm

SAN FRANCISCO — The conservative social network Parler was forced offline Monday, tracking websites showed, after Amazon warned the company would lose access to its servers for its failure to properly police violent content.The site’s popularity soared in recent weeks, becoming the number one download from Apple’s App Store after the much larger Twitter banned US President Donald Trump from its platform for his role in inciting a riot at the US Capitol last week.Messages of support for Wednesday’s attack in Washington DC — along with calls for more demonstrations — had flourished on the platform, leading Google to remove it from its app store on Friday, followed by Apple on Saturday.Amazon then confirmed it would suspend the platform from its cloud hosting services for allowing “threats of violence.”In a letter to Parler’s owners, the web giant said it would suspend service by 11:59 p.m. local time on Sunday.Tracking website Down For Everyone Or Just Me showed Parler offline from just after midnight, suggesting its owners had not been able to find a new hosting partner.In a series of posts on Parler before the site went down, CEO John Matze accused the tech giants of a “war on free speech.”“They will NOT win! We are the worlds last hope for free speech and free information,” he said.Parler did not respond to a request for comment from AFP.The social network, launched in 2018, operates much like Twitter, with profiles to follow and “parleys” instead of tweets.In its early days, the platform attracted a crowd of ultra-conservative and even extreme-right users.But it now attracts many more traditional Republican voices.Fox News star host Sean Hannity has 7.6 million followers, while his colleague Tucker Carlson has 4.4 million.Elected officials present include Republicans Devin Nunes, a California congressman, and South Dakota Governor Kristi Noem.Trump is not known to have a Parler profile.Safe haven-Parler’s recent growth was supercharged after last week’s violence in DC as new users, furious over Twitter’s ban onTrump, flocked to the app.In one now-deleted post, an account purporting to belong to Lin Wood, a pro-Trump lawyer, called for US Vice President Mike Pence to be put in front of a firing squad — threats which US media have reported led to a Secret Service investigation.Supporters of Trump expressed outrage at the news of the website being taken down.Ahead of the shutdown, the president’s son, Donald Trump Jr., complained that “big tech has totally eliminated the notion of free speech in America.”Prominent pro-Trump commentator and conspiracy theorist Mark Dice took to Twitter to accuse “Marxists” of taking Parler offline, urging followers to register on secure messaging app Telegram and Gab, another site popular with the far-right.With tech giants making their opposition clear, conservative sites such as Parler are likely going to have to find ways to adjust.The DLive video streaming service, used by several protesters during the invasion of the Capitol, closed seven of its channels and pulled more than 100 videos from the site.Gab may now also become a model for other websites, with CEO Andrew Torba claiming it had attracted 600,000 new users Sunday.The platform drew fierce criticism in 2018 when investigators found that the shooter who killed 11 people in an attack on a Pittsburgh synagogue had earlier posted anti-Semitic messages on the site.It has installed its own servers so as not to be dependent on outside providers.

House Democrats Introduce Article Of Impeachment Against Donald Trump-Ryan GrenobleNational Reporter, HuffPost-Mon., January 11, 2021, 11:32 a.m. EST

House Democrats introduced an article of impeachment against President Donald Trump on Monday for “incitement of insurrection,” in the wake of last week’s deadly riot at the U.S. Capitol.House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) told Punchbowl News that he expects a vote on the article could come as early as Wednesday, with the goal of beginning Senate discussions as soon as possible.The four-page resolution notes Trump’s direct responsibility for inciting a seditious mob that proceeded to violently overwhelm the Capitol and “interfere with the Joint Session’s solemn constitutional duty to certify the results of the 2020 Presidential election.”Trump’s Jan. 2 phone call to Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger ― where the president encouraged Raffensperger to “find” enough votes for him to overturn President-elect Joe Biden’s victory there ― also earns a mention, as do Trump’s repeated false claims that he rightfully won the 2020 presidential race.“In all this, President Trump gravely endangered the security of the United States and its institutions of Government,” the resolution reads. “He threatened the integrity of the democratic system, interfered with the peaceful transition of power, and imperiled a coequal branch of Government. He thereby betrayed his trust as President, to the manifest injury of the people of the United States.”“Donald John Trump, by such conduct, has demonstrated that he will remain a threat to national security, democracy, and the Constitution if allowed to remain in office,” it says.The document was authored by Democratic Reps. David Cicilline (R.I.), Ted Lieu (Calif.), Jamie Raskin (Md.) and Jerrold Nadler (N.Y.).Earlier on Monday, a resolution in the House had called on Vice President Mike Pence to remove Trump by invoking the 25th Amendment. Republicans blocked that effort, which would have required unanimous consent among House members.The Article of Impeachment: Incitement to Insurrection, drafted by Rep @davidcicilline, @RepRaskin, me & @HouseJudiciary staff, has now been formally introduced at the House pro forma session today. https://t.co/Y6ntbSXF9G pic.twitter.com/MfB4CpqC6C— Ted Lieu (@tedlieu) January 11, 2021-In a memo obtained by The Washington Post on Friday, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) suggested the Senate would be unlikely to match the House’s high-priority timeline.While the Senate is scheduled for two sessions on Jan. 12 and Jan. 15, they aren’t expected to be much more than a formality, and it would require the unanimous consent of all 100 senators to change that.As it stands, the first full session at which impeachment could be considered is Jan. 19, the day before Biden’s inauguration. House impeachment managers would then present the articles on either Jan. 19 or 20.By that schedule, the Senate trial of Trump would likely not officially begin until Jan. 20 or 21 at the earliest, per McConnell’s memo.A handful of Republican senators have voiced support for the effort, including Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania and Lisa Murkowski of Alaska.“I want him to resign. I want him out. He has caused enough damage,” Murkowski told the Anchorage Daily News last week.If Biden is sworn into office before the Senate hearings begin, House Democrats may consider delaying the trial to give the nascent administration time to get organized.Rep. Jim Clyburn (D-S.C.), a Biden ally, told the Associated Press on Monday that he supports giving the new president 100 days “to get his agenda off and running.”Should Trump be convicted by the Senate, he could be barred from holding elected office again.This article originally appeared on HuffPost and has been updated.

Politics-Thousands Of Lawyers, Law Students Call For Sens. Hawley, Cruz To Be Disbarred-Nick Visser-HuffPostMon., January 11, 2021, 4:41 a.m. EST

Thousands of lawyers and law school alumni on Sunday signed an open letter calling for Sens. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) and Ted Cruz (R-Texas) to be disbarred over their leading roles in the effort to undermine Congress’ certification of the Electoral College vote declaring President-elect Joe Biden the winner of the 2020 race.The two Republican lawmakers were key figures in the effort to halt the certification process last week and, by doing so, support widely debunked claims of rampant voter fraud in an election that saw Biden triumph over President Donald Trump by more than 7 million votes. A pro-Trump mob, inflamed by the president’s own statements, stormed the U.S. Capitol in an unprecedented assault on Congress, leading to at least six deaths — four riot participants and two Capitol Police officers.“In leading the efforts to undermine the peaceful transition of power after a free and fair election, Senators Hawley and Cruz attacked the foundations of our democracy,” reads the petition, which as of 10 p.m. Sunday had been signed by more than 5,000 lawyers and law students, as well as more than 1,000 members of the Missouri and Texas bars. “Senators Hawley and Cruz directly incited the January 6th insurrection, repeating dangerous and unsubstantiated statements regarding the election and abetting the lawless behavior of President Trump.”The petition was started by seven Yale law students, and has grown rapidly to include prominent names such as former Sen. Russ Feingold and Harvard professor Laurence Tribe, per The Washington Post.Hawley is a graduate of Yale Law School and Cruz of Harvard Law School, and both are members in good standing of their respective state bars, as well as the District of Columbia Bar. Both have rejected assertions they contributed to the insurrection. A photo shows Hawley giving rioters a salute with a closed fist.Our goal is to create a safe and engaging place for users to connect over interests and passions. In order to improve our community experience, we are temporarily suspending article commenting.

The narcissist-in-chief brings it all crashing down days before his presidential term ends-The New York Times-Mon., January 11, 2021, 3:25 a.m. EST

The president has never been a very stable man. But I'm trying to think of what threshold of loco he had to clear in order for one of his senior advisors to confide in my colleague Maggie Haberman that Donald J Trump "lost it" on the day of the insurrection.Or for an administration official to describe him as "a total monster" to The Washington Post the next day.Or for Representative Adam Kinzinger, a member of Trump's own party, to call for the Cabinet and the vice-president to invoke the 25th Amendment because America requires "a sane captain of the ship" to steer us through the administration's final days, and "all indications are that the president has become unmoored, not just from his duty, or even his oath, but from reality itself."The president has always been out there. But on 6 January, 2021, he clearly reached escape velocity and hurtled into space.We shouldn't be surprised. The president's flight into the ozone of crazy was as inevitable as the country's descent into anarchy €" and almost certainly intertwined. Trump, as I and many others have noted, impeccably meets the criteria of a malignant narcissist, and he has a defect in moral conscience that is emblematic of psychopaths. People like this do not react well to being fired, divorced or kicked out of any club. They're ego haemophiliacs. Their self-esteem cannot self-repair. And so the president is now doing exactly what all pathological narcissists of the malignant, conscience-free variety do when they've been given the boot. They behave dangerously.They claim they are victims. They reject facts and call foul play. They blame everything €" and everyone €" for their failures except themselves. They accuse even their most loyal supporters of treachery. (On Thursday, a White House official told The Washington Post that Trump was so angry at Mike Pence that "he couldn't see straight." Pence! But as I've often said, you can never love a narcissist enough.)-They take one reckless, desperate risk after another to keep their amour propre intact.And most important, they lash out with an Old Testament vindictiveness, often destroying the very institution €" or spouse, family, whatever it is €" they were once sworn to nurture.Which in this case is democracy itself. Trump is a man who found failure so intolerable, so humiliating, that he was willing to incite an acre-wide mob to violent insurrection, both in and around the Capitol, on Congress' election certification day. Either he would get what he wanted or no one would. Five are now dead."Now we gather due to a selfish man's injured pride," as Mitt Romney said the night of the siege.You know who could have predicted this? Researchers who specialise in bad CEO behaviour. They've seen this movie dozens of times before. It's textbook stuff."It should be absolutely no surprise that this is where we are," Jennifer Chatman, a professor of management at the Haas School of Business at Berkeley who has written extensively about narcissistic leaders, told me. "It's never a pretty transition when they have to go."They're too entitled. They're too in the habit of sowing distrust. They have disdain for rules €" which in fact made them terrible leaders in the first place, prone to cheating and stealing and grift."They leave their organisations in terrible shape, both from a structural and cultural point of view," she said.As Trump has left the Republican Party. And the country at large.Charles O'Reilly, a management professor at Stanford and a frequent collaborator with Chatman, reminded me that Adam Neumann, the disgraced, extravagantly grandiose former CEO of WeWork €" his ambitions included becoming the world's first trillionaire and living forever €" presented an IPO prospectus that was patently bonkers in a last-ditch effort to save his company. It sounded awfully reminiscent of Trump's deluded lawsuits.O'Reilly added that most boards fail to stop such leaders, swooping in only when the company is falling apart, because they have too many incentives (money, power) to see them succeed. It sounded an awful lot like Congress. And every former White House official who's finally speaking up.You know where else you can find letter-perfect predictions of the president's current behaviour? Self-help books dedicated to helping people break up with the rotten narcissists in their lives. Seriously. I started burrowing into them in the last few days, more on a daffy hunch than anything else, and it turned out I could basically open any page €" and I mean any page €" and find something relevant to the president's current behaviour: That narcissists lurch between the role of victim and tormentor; that they are minor Shivas, destroyers of worlds; that they howl on and on about betrayal.But it was this common thread that stood out: Pathological narcissists make a point of saying that their former partners would have been €" and will be once again €" nothing without them.It rhymed with something a White House official recently said Trump was spewing about Pence: "All day, it was a theme of, 'I made this guy, I saved him from a political death, and here he stabbed me in the back.'"I do not by any means wish to suggest that Trump's disordered personality is the key to understanding his presidency. It is, in some ways, almost tedious, exactly what makes him boring and uncomplicated, as shallow as a spoon.But I also think it's impossible to understand Trump's behaviour without looking at him through the prism of his pathologies, which at this moment are threatening lives. He may have made a robotic statement Thursday that condemned Wednesday's violence and implicitly conceded the election. It's too late. Trump remains a domestic security risk, and he's made Americans a target for enemies. They know that a fragile, unbalanced man is at the helm, his nerves as combustible as dry leaves. He's desperate, and he's angry, and he's baitable. It makes us unsafe. We need to get him out.You needn't be a particularly astute observer of the Trump presidency to understand that his incendiary, hateful policies and rhetoric and mirthful disregard for the law would one day end in violence. But you needn't be a particularly astute observer of character, either, to see that a man who feels no empathy, exploits ruthlessly, lies reflexively, seeks success at any cost and lives in terror of seeing it vanish would never go quietly.Jennifer Senior c.2021 The New York Times Company.

Double standard': Black lawmakers and activists decry police response to attack on US Capitol-Grace Hauck and Deborah Barfield Berry, USA TODAY-Thu, January 7, 2021, 2:18 PM EST

WASHINGTON – President-elect Joe Biden, civil rights leaders and activists blasted law enforcement agencies for their slow response to rioters at the U.S. Capitol Wednesday, noting the massive show of police force in place for Black Lives Matter demonstrations last year over police killings of unarmed Black men and women.Biden said his granddaughter pointed out the unfair difference in images that showed the violence wielded against Black Lives Matter protesters versus the seemingly muted response against those who attacked the U.S. government."No one can tell me that if that had been a group of Black Lives Matter protesting yesterday, they wouldn’t have been treated very, very differently than the mob of thugs that stormed the Capitol," Biden said in remarks to the nation Thursday.Rep. Marcia Fudge, a Democrat from Ohio and former chairwoman of the Congressional Black Caucus, also questioned law enforcement officials' security efforts."The Capitol police were unprepared, ineffective and some were complicit. All of them should be held to account," Fudge, who was still in lockdown by the evening and who has been tapped by President-elect Joe Biden to lead the Department of Housing and Urban Development, told USA TODAY Wednesday night.Fudge said there's "no question" the response was different than at last year's Black Lives Matter protests at the Capitol. She shared a picture of a row of police standing guard on the steps of the Capitol."There is a double standard,'' she said.As thousands of people of color and allies took to the streets last year to peacefully protest police brutality, law enforcement often clashed with demonstrators, deploying tear gas and rubber bullets, bruising faces and bodies, and, in one incident that went viral, pushing an elderly man to the ground.But as thousands of President Donald Trump supporters, mostly white, marched from a campaign-style rally to the Capitol Wednesday and broke into the building as lawmakers were convening to count presidential electoral votes, forcing lawmakers and staff to shelter in place, crowds of law enforcement were notably absent.Trump, who previously characterized Black Lives Matter protesters as "thugs," said on Twitter that the people involved in the riots Wednesday were "great patriots who have been badly & unfairly treated for so long."Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said Thursday that he applauded Capitol police officers who bravely stood in the line of duty against the "failed insurrection."“With that said, yesterday represented a massive failure of institutions, protocols, and planning that are supposed to protect the first branch of our federal government," he said in a statement. "A painstaking investigation and thorough review must now take place and significant changes must follow."D.C. police chief Robert J. Contee III said the mob of Trump voters came to Capitol Hill "following the president's remarks" and was "intent on causing harm to our officers by deploying chemical irritants on police to force entry into the United States Capitol."But only a small group of riot police stood outside the back of the Capitol building in the early afternoon, and as demonstrators called for breaching the building, hundreds started swarming into the area, reporters at the scene noted Wednesday.As protesters began climbing up the side of the building and on the back balcony, police appeared to retreat. After the break-in, police attempted to secure one section outside the building but were quickly overwhelmed, according to reporters at the scene.One video posted to social media showed several people in D.C. Capitol Police jackets removing barriers outside the Capitol building, allowing demonstrators to pass through to the building. Videos posted to Twitter also showed at least one person who appeared to be an officer taking selfies with people who had breached the Capitol. USA TODAY has not been able to independently verify the identities of the people in these images.By Wednesday afternoon, Army Gen. Mark Milley said the D.C. National Guard had been fully activated. "We have fully activated the D.C. National Guard to assist federal and local law enforcement as they work to peacefully address the situation," Miller said in a statement.Several videos shared to social media Wednesday afternoon showed officials slowly escorting people out of the building. One officer in riot gear could be seen helping a white woman in a Trump hat down the Capitol steps, holding her hand, according to a CNN livestream.By Wednesday evening, nearly a full day after the demonstrators first clashed with police Tuesday night, officers began using tear gas and percussion grenades to begin clearing crowds, ahead of a 6 p.m. curfew. In the moments before, there were violent clashes between the police and protesters, who tore railing for the inauguration scaffolding and threw it at the officers.At least one woman suffered a fatal gunshot wound inside the capitol, Contee said. At least 13 people were arrested, and five firearms were recovered.By comparison, in the wake of the police killing of George Floyd, which sparked last year's protest movement, more than 100 people were arrested over the course of three days in Minneapolis. In subsequent days, cities across the country arrested dozens of people in a single night, with Los Angeles arresting more than 500 in one day."When Black folks are protesting and progressives are protesting peacefully they were tear-gassed, they were arrested, they were shot with rubber bullets. They were shot with real bullets," Derrick Johnson, president of the national NAACP, said in a telephone interview. "We watched it take place all summer long when people were peacefully demonstrating."U.S. Capitol Police did not immediately respond to multiple requests for comment.'A fanciful reality': Trump claims Black Lives Matter protests are violent, but the majority are peaceful.Johnson questioned why the Capitol police and other local law enforcement agencies weren’t prepared for thousands of Trump protestors, including the Proud Boys. There had been plenty of warnings on social media and talk shows about the potential for riots, he said."We should not be witnessing what we are witnessing today in this nation,'' he said. "It is a global embarrassment.”Johnson said tens of thousands of people joined protests at Black Lives Matter Plaza in Washington without this level of violence. "None of this took place,’" he said.The majority of Black Lives Matter-affiliated protests over the summer were peaceful, according to a report by the U.S. Crisis Monitor, a joint effort including Princeton University in New Jersey that collects and analyzes real-time data on demonstrations and political violence in the United States.Kofi Ademola, a local Chicago activist who helped organize civil rights protests throughout the summer, said he was not surprised Wednesday by the police response."It’s not any shock that we see this huge contradiction that we can storm a capitol ... break into elected officials’ offices, the chamber, and create other chaos trying to perform a fascist coup, and we see little to no consequences,'' he said. "But Black protesters here in D.C. and Chicago, we’re heavily policed, brutalized, for literally saying, 'Don’t kill us.' There was no planned insurrections. We were literally just advocating for our lives. It speaks volumes about the values of this country. It doesn’t care about our lives."CNN commentator Van Jones highlighted the discrepancy in a tweet Wednesday."Imagine if #BlackLivesMatter were the ones who were storming the Capitol building," he wrote. "Thousands of black people laying siege to the seat of government – in the middle of a joint session of Congress? Just imagine the reaction."At the Capitol Wednesday, some lawmakers were holed up in their offices and other places. Several would not say where they were for safety reasons. Staffers were cleared out of the press galleries and the Capitol by the afternoon."The after-action review will determine what failures occurred and why,'' said U.S. Rep. Bennie Thompson, a Democrat from Mississippi and chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee. "The plans should have anticipated the potential for what happened today."Dzemila Hamzabegovic hugs Courtney Artis on Sunday, May 31, 2020, during a Black Lives Matter healing rally in front of KFC Yum! Center in downtown Louisville. The two were complete strangers before the event and embraced as they were overcome with emotion. "For white people to think about us, it's powerful. It's emotional," Artis said. "Don't hurt us. We won't hurt you."The chaos that unfolded Wednesday stands in particularly harsh contrast to the law enforcement presence seen when U.S. and military police drove protesters out of Lafayette Square, located between the White House and the historic St. John's Episcopal Church, shortly before a presidential photo op with a Bible at the church on June 1. Officers used smoke canisters, shields, pepper balls and horses to force demonstrators from the park.Black Lives Matter Global Network called the law enforcement response to Wednesday's riots hypocritical."When Black people protest for our lives, we are all too often met by National Guard troops or police equipped with assault rifles, shields, tear gas and battle helmets,'' the group said in a statement. "When white people attempt a coup, they are met by an underwhelming number of law enforcement personnel who act powerless to intervene, going so far as to pose for selfies with terrorists, and prevent an escalation of anarchy and violence like we witnessed today.'"Make no mistake, if the protesters were Black, we would have been tear-gassed, battered, and perhaps shot,'' the group wrote.Bernice King, daughter of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., put out a series of statements on Twitter Wednesday calling on law enforcement to engage demonstrators “with the same humanity and discipline with which they should have engaged people who were outraged by a police officer kneeling on George Floyd’s neck.”“What many are saying is true: If this were Black Lives Matter storming the Capitol, tanks would have been in the city by now,” she wrote. “The response tells the story of our nation’s racist history and present. How can we stop it from being the future?”As violent Trump supporters climbed the steps of the Capitol Wednesday, Trey Williamson, of Burke, Virginia, stood nearby while straddling his bike, arguing with those who would listen. He wore a helmet with Black Lives Matter written on it.Williamson, a food safety director at a large restaurant, was in Washington, D.C., last year when Trump had the streets cleared so that he could take his photo in front of St. John's Episcopal Church.“I got tear-gassed and all I was doing was riding my bike trying to see what was going on,” Williamson said.He said the police response at the Capitol was lukewarm in comparison to what he experienced during Black Lives Matter protests over the summer.“If there were nothing but Black people up there, there would’ve been a lot of injuries,” he said. “It sucks, but I know that this is how it is. I know that because Trump people have felt more comfortable to be at ease with their racism.”U.S. Rep. Ron Kind, D-Wis., was holed up in his Capitol Hill office Wednesday as protestors continued their assault on the Capitol. During a Zoom call with reporters, said he and his staff were safe and weren’t leaving. Kind said he intended to return to the House chamber to continue the debate over the certification of electoral votes."Things are still not in control, unfortunately," he said.Kind blamed Trump, who has been reluctant to denounce white nationalists and fraudulently insisted he won the November election, for encouraging the violence Wednesday.When he was encouraging the demonstrations, tweeting out that this was going to be quote ‘wild.’ I mean, what would he expect the reaction would be, especially when you're talking about the Proud Boys, militia groups, white supremacists coming into our nation's capital today,” Kind said.Contributing: Will Carless, Marco R Della Cava, N'dea Yancey-BraggThis article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Trump supporters attack US Capitol after Black Lives Matter protests.

IAEA chief: Iran moving rapidly to enrich uranium, mere ‘weeks’ to save deal-Nuclear watchdog head Grossi says if talks are held when Biden takes office, ‘there will have to be clear understanding on how initial terms of accord will be recomplied with’ By TOI staff-JAN 11,21-Today, 6:35 pm

The head of the UN’s nuclear watchdog said Monday that there were “weeks” left to salvage the nuclear deal with Iran.Rafael Grossi, director of the International Atomic Energy Agency, said at the Reuters Next conference that Tehran was advancing “quite rapidly” toward enriching uranium to 20 percent, as it has announced it would, in breach of the accord. He said the IAEA has assessed Iran will be able to produce some 10 kilograms a month.“It is clear that we don’t have many months ahead of us [to save the deal]. We have rather weeks,” he said.If talks between the signatories of the accord are launched, “there will have to be a clear understanding on how the initial terms and provisions of the [nuclear deal] are going to be recomplied with,” Grossi said.The comments came two days after Iranian lawmaker Ahmad Amirabadi Farahani declared that Tehran would expel IAEA inspectors in February unless the US lifts its sanctions on the country.“If the sanctions against the Islamic Republic of Iran are not lifted by February 21, especially in the fields of finance, banking, and oil, we will definitely expel the International Atomic Energy Agency inspectors from the country,” said Farahani in a television interview, according to an English translation of his remarks by the Mehr news agency.UN inspections of Iran’s nuclear sites are a key part of a 2015 pact with world powers that saw sanctions lifted from Iran in return for its dismantling the weapons aspects of its nuclear program.The United States unilaterally withdrew from the agreement in 2018, and the remaining countries that signed it with Iran — Germany, France, Britain, China and Russia — have been trying to keep the accord from collapsing. The Trump administration imposed crippling sanctions on Iran while demanding it renegotiate stricter terms to the deal. Iran has refused and responded by walking back its own commitments to the accord.US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo responded to Farahani in a statement on Saturday that Iran has an obligation to allow the inspections to continue.“Nuclear brinksmanship will not strengthen Iran’s position, but instead lead to further isolation and pressure,” Pompeo warned and urged that expulsion of the inspectors “be met by universal condemnation.”On Sunday, the speaker of Iran’s parliament said that the so-called Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action “is not a sacred agreement; it is merely a deal to remove sanctions under the conditions accepted by the Islamic Republic.”Last month, Iran began enriching uranium to levels unseen since the 2015 deal. The decision appeared aimed at increasing Tehran’s leverage during US President Donald Trump’s waning days in office.Iran informed the IAEA of its plans to increase enrichment to 20 percent. Increasing enrichment at its underground Fordo facility puts Tehran a technical step away from weapons-grade levels of 90%.The purpose of the deal was to prevent Iran from developing a nuclear bomb — something Tehran insists it does not want to do.US President-elect Joe Biden has said he hopes to return the US to the deal if Iran returns to compliance with it.

Jerusalem recognition ‘led to explosion of peace,’ departing US envoy tells MKs-Knesset bids farewell to David Friedman; thanks him for ‘tremendous contributions’ after he oversaw policy shifts on Jerusalem, Golan, settlements, Israel-Gulf relations-By TOI staff-JAN 11,21-Today, 4:20 pm

The Knesset Subcommittee for Policy and Strategy held a celebratory meeting Monday for the departing United States Ambassador to Israel, David Friedman, amid the upcoming administration change in the US.“Everyone feared that the recognition of Jerusalem would lead to an explosion, but it turned out to be an explosion of peace and not of violence,” Friedman said during the event.“This meeting is not routine; it is a unique and rare event, much like the ambassador,” head of the subcommittee MK Zvi Hauser said in his opening remarks.Hauser thanked the ambassador for his years of service in Israel, specifically for his “extraordinary contribution in the tightening and strengthening of ties between the United States and the State of Israel.”In this January 11, 2021 photo, US Ambassador to Israel David Friedman (L), MK Zvi Hauser (C) and Knesset Speaker Yariv Levin (R), attend a farewell meeting for the outgoing envoy in the Knesset. (Dani Shem Tov/Knesset Spokesperson)-Knesset Speaker Yariv Levin said that “it is right and proper that the Knesset formally appreciate and recognize Ambassador Friedman’s tremendous contributions,” including the increased security coordination, recognition of Jerusalem as the capital of Israel, relocation of the embassy to Jerusalem, and recognition of Israeli sovereignty in the Golan Heights.Friedman thanked Hauser and Levin for their words, adding that “the past three and a half years flew by like a flash, a testament to how exciting, riveting and enjoyable the job was,” adding that the relationship between the leaders, military and intelligence officials of both countries was “extraordinary.”In this January 11, 2021 photo, US Ambassador to Israel David Friedman attends his farewell meeting in the Knesset. (Dani Shem Tov/Knesset Spokesperson)-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.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.

Egypt, Germany, France, Jordan meet on reviving Israeli-Palestinian peace talks-European foreign ministers sit down in Cairo ahead of Biden taking office, seeking to build on ‘positive regional context’ of Israel’s normalization deals with Arab states-By AP and TOI staff-jan 11,21-Today, 4:20 pm

Egypt on Monday hosted the foreign ministers of Germany, France and Jordan to discuss ways to revive peace talks between Israel and the Palestinians, a week before US President-elect Joe Biden takes office.In Cairo, the country’s Foreign Ministry said the aim of the meeting was to urge the Palestinians and Israelis to negotiate a “just and comprehensive political settlement” on the basis of achieving a Palestinian state with East Jerusalem as its capital on territory Israel captured in the 1967 Six Day War.The Palestinians suffered numerous setbacks under the outgoing administration of US President Donald Trump and complained about what they say were pro-Israeli steps from Washington.The Palestinian Authority has boycotted the Trump administration since he recognized Jerusalem as Israel’s capital and moved the US Embassy there from Tel Aviv. Trump has since slashed financial assistance for the Palestinians and reversed course on the alleged illegitimacy of Israeli settlements on land claimed by the Palestinians.Egypt’s President Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi said last month that Cairo has been working toward a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, “taking into account the regional and international changes.” He was apparently referring to Biden’s election and the establishment of ties with Israel by four Arab countries — the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Sudan and Morocco.France’s Foreign Ministry said the meeting would discuss ways to have Israelis and Palestinians embark on talks, building on “the positive regional context” related to the recent normalization deals.“It is a question of contributing, at the same time, to a resumption of dialogue between Israelis and Palestinians, with a view to resolving the conflict in the framework of international law,” the statement said.Germany’s Foreign Minister Heiko Maas tweeted before leaving for Cairo on Sunday that the ministers would discuss “which concrete steps” could help “build trust” between Israel and the Palestinians.In September, Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas called for an international conference early in 2021 to launch a “genuine peace process,” based on the UN resolutions and past agreements with Israel. The Palestinians no longer see the US as an honest broker.PA Foreign Minister Riyad al-Malki said last month that the Palestinian Authority was ready to cooperate with the incoming Biden administration and urged Israel to return to talks based on a two-state solution for the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.Also last month, Channel 12 news reported that Sissi told Abbas when they met in Cairo that he intends to broker peace talks between Israel and the Palestinians.The unsourced report said the talks would be held under the auspices of Egypt, Jordan, France and Germany.Abbas reportedly said that while he supports the Egyptian initiative, he still intends to push for an international conference that will include the so-called Middle East Quartet (the US, UN, EU and Russia) and has reached out to UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on the matter.

Germany’s Merkel calls Trump’s Twitter eviction ‘problematic’ Spokesman for German chancellor says decisions on restricting speech should be based in law, ‘not according to a decision by the management of social media platforms’ By AP-JAN 11,21-Today, 4:15 pm

BERLIN — German Chancellor Angela Merkel considers US President Donald Trump’s eviction from Twitter by the company “problematic,” her spokesman said Monday.Twitter permanently suspended Trump from the microblogging platform on Friday, citing a “risk of further incitement of violence” in the wake of the storming of the US Capitol by supporters of the outgoing president.Asked about Twitter’s decision, Merkel’s spokesman, Steffen Seibert, said the operators of social media platforms “bear great responsibility for political communication not being poisoned by hatred, by lies and by incitement to violence.”He said it’s right not to “stand back” when such content is posted, for example by flagging it.But Seibert also said that the freedom of opinion is a fundamental right of “elementary significance.”“This fundamental right can be intervened in, but according to the law and within the framework defined by legislators — not according to a decision by the management of social media platforms,” he told reporters in Berlin. “Seen from this angle, the chancellor considers it problematic that the accounts of the US president have now been permanently blocked.”Facebook on Thursday suspended Trump’s account through January 20, the day of US President-elect Joe Biden’s inauguration, and possibly indefinitely.Merkel herself does not have a Twitter account, although Seibert does and many German government ministers do.

Iran lashes out at US, France for denouncing seizure of South Korean tanker-Tehran claims ship being held due to ‘technical problem,’ as it presses Seoul to release billions of dollars in frozen Iranian assets-By AFP-JAN 11,21-Today, 4:03 pm
   
TEHRAN, Iran — Iran warned Monday its seizure of a South Korean tanker in the Gulf must not be politicized, after the US and France urged the Islamic Republic to release the ship.“We have repeatedly told… the intervening parties, whether they are the United States or France, that the case does not concern them at all and that they will not help to solve a technical problem if they politicize it,” said foreign ministry spokesman Saeed Khatibzadeh.The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps seized the Hankuk Chemi and arrested its multinational crew of 20 near the strategic Strait of Hormuz one week ago.The move came as Tehran urged Seoul to release billions of dollars of Iranian assets frozen in South Korea as part of US sanctions.The United States and France have called for Iran to release the ship.A US State Department spokesperson called the seizure “part of a clear attempt to extort the international community into relieving the pressure of sanctions.”The French foreign ministry said the seizure was “fueling tensions in the region.”South Korean Deputy Foreign Minister Choi Jong-kun arrived in Tehran on Sunday for a long-planned visit.The South Korean news agency Yonhap has said Choi’s aim during his visit was to “negotiate an early release” of the tanker and its crew, which includes South Korean, Indonesian, Vietnamese and Burmese sailors.But according to Iran’s foreign ministry the “main goal” of his visit was “to discuss ways of accessing Iranian funds in (South) Korea.”Khatibzadeh said on Monday that the South Koreans “had questions about technical problems related to the ship which we answered,” without elaborating.