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U.S. campaign finance system rocked as major firms pause or halt political contributions after election results challenged

InternationalJan 12. 2021

By The Washington Post · Todd C. Frankel, Jeff Stein, Tony Romm

The funding of U.S. political campaigns is being rocked as some of the nation’s largest firms such as Google and J.P. Morgan announced plans to halt all political contributions after last week’s insurrection at the Capitol, with some companies targeting the 147 GOP politicians who voted against certifying the presidential vote totals – a sign of corporate America’s growing uneasiness with the election doubts and violent attacks inspired by President Donald Trump.

Major companies that collectively pour millions of dollars each year into campaigns through employee-funded political action committees are registering their worry and anger about last week’s chaos with a reexamination of their role in powering America’s fractious politics.

Facebook, Google and Microsoft said they will halt all political donations while they reviewed their giving. Banking giants such as Goldman Sachs and JP Morgan said they were doing the same. BlackRock made a similar announcement in a memo to its employees, noting its decision was spurred by “the horrific events in the nation’s capital.”

But Marriott, the world’s largest hotel chain, and many other firms announced a much more targeted response: A halt to the campaign cash flowing to the Republicans who voted against certifying President-elect Joe Biden’s win. Marriott said its decision suspending donations to 147 Republican U.S. representatives and senators was motivated by “the destructive events at the Capitol to undermine a legitimate and fair election.”

The Blue Cross Blue Shield Association said it would do the same, with the provider of health insurance to more than 100 million people pledging to end contributions “to those lawmakers who voted to undermine our democracy.”

American Express struck a similar note in a memo sent to all employees Monday, halting contributions to the Congress members who voted “to subvert the presidential election results and disrupt the peaceful transition of power.”

Hallmark Cards went even further. The Kansas City-based greeting card maker said its political action committee was asking that Sen. Josh Hawley, R-Mo., and Sen. Roger Marshall, R-Kan., return its donations following the Capitol attack. The committee gave $7,000 to Hawley’s campaign and $5,000 to Marshall’s in the last two years.

“Hallmark believes the peaceful transition of power is part of the bedrock of our democratic system, and we abhor violence of any kind,” said JiaoJiao Shen, a Hallmark public relations official said in a statement Monday. “The recent actions of Senators Josh Hawley and Roger Marshall do not reflect our company’s values.”

Last week’s violence at the Capitol appears to have companies scrambling to react, as they increasingly realize that this is not an ordinary political dispute and the option of sitting on the sidelines grows increasingly unsatisfying.

“These corporations are doing something very new, and something that could potentially alienate an important base for them,” said Craig Holman, government affairs lobbyist for Public Citizen, a money-in-politics group. “I’ve never heard of this happening before.”

The decisions could have lasting impact. Dow, a chemical company with 36,000 workers worldwide, said its decision to cut off political donations to the 147 Republican U.S. representatives and senators would last for an entire election cycle – two years for House members and six years for senators.

Commerce Bank – a holding company with branches in five mostly Midwestern states – said in a statement that its PAC has “suspended all support for officials who have impeded the peaceful transfer of power.” Some of the corporate decisions were first reported by the newsletter Popular Information.

The pace of corporate announcements has picked up in the days since last Wednesday’s violence at the Capitol and the vote to certify the presidential election results. What started out as companies and trade groups rushing to register their outrage — with statements ranging from condemnations to direct calls for Trump’s removal from office — has morphed into going after one of the main fuels of political campaigns: Money.

Some political operatives doubted that companies would be able to refrain from PAC donations for too long.

“The vast majority of these guys will be back at the table,” said a former White House official who departed last year, requesting anonymity to speak candidly. “When they see policies that threaten their business, they’ll have to be.”

But others were encouraged by the corporate reactions.

“I’d caution reading too much into it right now, but it will continue to snowball as the companies doing this continue to be applauded for it,” said Rory Cooper, managing director at Purple Strategies, a corporate reputation consulting firm.

“It’s a fantastically, extraordinarily big deal,” said Danielle Brian, executive director of the Project on Government Oversight, good government group. She said some politicians supported a vote against election certification as part of a calculation to maintain party support and receive political contributions. “This is adding a counternarrative to that calculation.”

And companies are rushing in — with decisions that are certain to be noticed.

The PACs of tech giants Facebook, Google and Microsoft donated more than $4.2 million over the last two years, according to Center for Responsive Politics’ Open Secrets.

Charles Schwab, after spending nearly $550,000 on PAC contributions in the last two years, said it was halting contribution to all politicians for the rest of this year.

Airbnb said in a statement it was withholding PAC support — money — from the GOP politicians “who voted against the certification of the presidential election results.”

Marriott’s PAC – which is funded by employee donations – gave more than $410,000 in the last election cycle, according to Federal Election Commission data.

The hotel chain also has a direct business relationship with Trump. It books travel to Trump Turnberry through the Marriott Luxury Collection program.

Marriott’s decision – along with ones such as from Blue Cross Blue Shield – would hurt the fundraising efforts of those who voted last week against certifying the presidential election results.

More pressure on companies is coming. The Lincoln Project, an anti-Trump group, in the coming days will launch a multimillion-dollar ad campaign targeting companies that bankroll Republicans who voted against certifying the results of the election, pushing those firms to cease donations to these and other Republicans.

The project will launch broadcast and cable advertising aimed at these companies and their senior leaders. The Lincoln Project will also target advertising for these corporation’s workers, hoping to “destabilize the companies’ operations by fomenting employee rebellions,” said Steve Schmidt, co-founder of the Lincoln Project.

Schmidt declined to comment on the companies the Lincoln Project plans to campaign against.

“Eighty-$90 million was spent by corporate America on political committees . . . on extremist groups that have destabilized American democracy,” Schmidt said. “After this point, nothing goes back to normal.”

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Trump’s last days bring fresh turmoil to U.S.-China relations

InternationalJan 12. 2021

By Syndication Washington Post, Bloomberg

The Trump administration’s final days are proving as confounding as ever for companies and investors stuck in the middle of an increasingly contentious U.S.-China relationship.

After a week of widespread confusion over the scope of a U.S. ban on investments in businesses linked to China’s military, both Washington and Beijing took steps over the weekend that threaten to further ratchet up tensions and cloud the outlook for cross-border commerce.

Secretary of State Michael Pompeo upended decades of U.S. policy on Saturday by removing self-imposed restrictions on how government officials interact with Taiwan, eliciting swift calls for retaliation by China’s state-run media. Pompeo’s announcement came just a few hours before Beijing issued new rules that would allow Chinese courts to punish global companies for complying with foreign sanctions — a move that could theoretically force businesses to choose between the world’s two largest economies.

In both cases, it was far from clear how the edicts would be implemented. China, for example, has been expanding its toolkit to fight back against U.S. sanctions for years, though it has so far refrained from using measures including blacklists and export controls. Hanging over everything is the question of how the world’s most important geopolitical relationship will evolve after Joe Biden enters the White House later this month.

The upshot is continued uncertainty for companies caught in the crossfire, from Apple Inc. to Tencent Holdings Ltd. and HSBC Holdings Plc. That risks chilling investment decisions, deal-making and startup funding at a time when the coronavirus-pummeled global economy needs all the support it can get.

“There is an escalation of tit-for-tat,” said Alex Capri, a research fellow at the Hinrich Foundation, an Asia-based foundation set up by U.S. entrepreneur Merle Hinrich to promote sustainable global trade. “From a corporate governance perspective, multinational companies and individuals will find themselves increasingly whipsawed.”

Chinese stocks underperformed regional peers on Monday, with the CSI 300 Index falling 1% at the close. S&P 500 Index futures slid 0.5% as investors weighed the implications of higher Treasury yields and President-elect Biden’s push for more fiscal aid.Traders in Taiwan largely brushed off rising cross-strait tensions, sending the local stock index to a record high. Pompeo lifted U.S. guidelines on meetings with Taiwanese officials, put in place after Washington’s recognition of China in 1979. They had required written permission from the State Department for diplomats and military personnel above a certain rank to visit Taiwan, and restricted the venues where meetings with Taiwan representatives could take place.

The Chinese Communist Party-backed Global Times warned that Pompeo was pushing the world’s biggest economies toward military conflict. Hu Xijin, the newspaper’s editor-in-chief, added in a microblog post that China has a “precious window of opportunity for mainland China to teach a heavy lesson to the ‘Taiwan independence’ forces” and re-establish “strategic leverage” in the Taiwan Strait.

The Chinese Foreign Ministry, which opposes official U.S.-Taiwan interactions, said Monday that it “firmly opposes and strongly condemns” the U.S. move and repeated that Taiwan is an “inalienable” part of its territory.

Beijing’s new rules on foreign sanctions, unveiled by the Commerce Ministry on Saturday, are meant to protect local firms from “unjustified” overseas enforcement actions by allowing Chinese citizens or companies to sue for compensation in Chinese courts if their interests are damaged by the application of foreign laws.

ByteDance Ltd., for example, has been pressured by the Trump administration to cede control over its hit TikTok short-video app for alleged national security concerns, but the startup’s investors could seek to use China’s new rules to win financial compensation for any losses.

Other potential scenarios raised by the new rules: if Apple removes Tencent’s WeChat or TikTok from its app store, could they get sued in mainland China for damages? Or if TSMC complies with sanctions against Huawei Technologies Co. by refusing to supply its chips, could the Chinese company seek financial compensation?

Beijing’s announcement at the end of Trump’s presidency was likely timed to send a signal to U.S. policy makers without overly antagonizing a new Biden administration in its early days, said Sean Ding, a Washington-based partner and analyst at Plenum, a research firm specializing in Chinese politics and economics.

“The new rules are more than anything a signaling mechanism to both Chinese companies and U.S. companies in China: We now have a legal ability to counteract the long arm jurisdiction of U.S. domestic law,” Ding said. “In short, it’s more of a signal at this stage rather than actually trying to put legal efforts in motion.”

That approach would be in line with previous Chinese responses to U.S. restrictions, including Beijing’s creation of an “unreliable entity list.” While the government has vowed to punish firms, organizations or individuals on the list that damage national security, authorities have yet to say if anyone has actually met the criteria for inclusion.

The national security law imposed by the Communist Party on Hong Kong in June also underscores how the U.S. may have an upper hand when it comes to sanctions, particularly those that affect the financial industry.

Even though Hong Kong’s security law forbids sanctions against the financial hub and China, state-owned lenders including Bank of China Ltd. have quietly taken steps to comply with U.S. sanctions against officials such as Hong Kong Chief Executive Carrie Lam. With more than $1 trillion of liabilities denominated in U.S. dollars, China’s four largest state-owned banks have huge incentives to stay on the good side of American regulators so they can retain access to dollar funding.

A similar dynamic has played out with international companies navigating conflicting rules in the U.S. and European Union over Iran, said Angela Zhang, director of the Centre for Chinese Law at the University of Hong Kong and author of “Chinese Antitrust Exceptionalism: How the Rise of China Challenges Global Regulation.”

“If you look at the EU precedent, I don’t see the Chinese rules being very effective in actually countering the U.S. sanctions,” Zhang said. They will, however, increase compliance costs for businesses, she said.

The long reach of U.S. sanctions — and the potential for confusion over their implementation — was on display again Monday as banks and money managers raced to comply with Trump’s executive order banning investments in Chinese military-linked companies.

Goldman Sachs Group Inc., Morgan Stanley and JPMorgan Chase & Co. said in exchange filings over the weekend that they’ll delist 500 structured products in Hong Kong, a move that will impact investors in the U.S. and around the world.

Investors have in many cases been given little warning on how regulators, banks, index providers and exchanges plan to implement Trump’s order, which takes effect Monday. The New York Stock Exchange flip-flopped twice before finally confirming last week it will delist China Mobile Ltd. and two other Chinese telecom companies. MSCI Inc. removed the three stocks from its indexes on Friday, giving global funds just one day to adjust billions of dollars of passive investments.

Wendy Liu, head of China equity strategy at UBS Group AG, said some bargain-hunting investors in Europe are interested in taking advantage of the sanction-induced drop in Chinese share prices. But she added that many are still waiting to pull the trigger as they await more clarity on the outlook for U.S.-China tensions.

“Reversing Trump’s sanctions and China policies too quickly will give a ‘pro-China’ signal that will not be beneficial for Biden’s polls,” Liu said. “We still need to wait and see how U.S.-China relations will unfold in the new administration.”

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Biden’s go-big stimulus plans set up fresh fight in Senate

InternationalJan 12. 2021Joe Biden

By Syndication Washington Post, Bloomberg · Erik Wasson, Laura Davison, Nancy Cook

President-elect Joe Biden’s plan to pass a multitrillion-dollar economic stimulus package early in his administration faces challenges in a closely divided U.S. Senate, with a potential impeachment trial for outgoing President Donald Trump that could add to delays.

Biden is set to release his proposals — the price tag for which has yet to be unveiled — on Thursday. The package will feature a range of support for state and local authorities long blocked by Republicans, a bump in direct payments to $2,000 and expanded unemployment benefits, along with funding for vaccine distribution, school re-opening, tax credits, rental relief and aid to small businesses.

Parts of last month’s $900 billion aid bill start running out in mid-March, and may not prove enough to forestall an economic contraction this quarter as the coronavirus continues to surge and wreak record deaths. Failure to win congressional approval by then could wallop equities, which climbed to a record last week amid expectations the Democrats’ coming Senate majority would unleash major new stimulus. Investors turned more cautious Monday, with the S&P 500 Index retreating.

The stakes underscore the risk of proceeding with Trump’s impeachment. The Senate isn’t coming back until Jan. 19, and an impeachment trial by law pushes to the top of the calendar. House Democrats are considering passing an impeachment article this week, then withholding it from the Senate indefinitely to allow the stimulus bill to jump ahead of impeachment in the legislative timetable.

Many elements of Biden’s plan are expected to be drawn from House Democrats’ $3.4 trillion Heroes Act, which passed in May and was blocked by the GOP-controlled Senate.

Economic and political aides to Biden spent the last several days working on size and components. Aides are still weighing the desire to spend money to help as many Americans as possible, against the political feasibility of passing another bill through Congress — even a Democratic-controlled one.

Sen. Chuck Schumer is set to be majority leader with the barest possible control of the chamber — a 50-50 split. Deficit-hawk Democrats from conservative states, such as West Virginia’s Joe Manchin and Montana’s Jon Tester, will have equal influence with leftist progressive Bernie Sanders.

Biden on Friday highlighted that the current historically low level of interest rates allows for taking action to bolster both the short-term and long-term growth outlook. Ultimately, it would “reduce our national debt burden,” he said.

– – –

“If we don’t act now things are going to get much worse,” Biden said on Friday.

Republicans are unlikely to warm to the argument. Their congressional leaders have signaled they will likely resist another major package after the last two record-high $2 trillion and $900 billion relief bills.

Biden and Schumer will need to hold the Democratic caucus together. Manchin specified on Friday he wants direct payments “targeted to those who need it.” On Sunday, he said $2,000 checks aren’t a clear “no” for him, but indicated he’s skeptical. Among his concerns: many higher income families who have not lost their jobs get the benefit.

Parts of Biden’s plan, including stimulus checks, unemployment relief and rental assistance, can be passed with just 50 votes using a special procedure for budgetary legislation. But other measures, such as state and local aid, may not qualify for so-called reconciliation, and would then require 60 votes; at least 10 Republicans would be needed to proceed.

– – –

The Biden team views boosting gross domestic product as just one metric of success, according to an ally of the president-elect. The uneven nature of the economic recovery has meant parts of the labor market have been hit much harder than others. Friday’s employment report showed a 140,000 slump in payrolls in December — the worst monthly report since April — with restaurant jobs hit particularly hard.

Appetite for some parts of a giant new bill could yet be limited. With California reporting an unexpectedly large surplus in its state budget last week, the case for the half trillion dollars in aid that Democrats were seeking for state and local authorities before the election may be tough to make to moderate members of the party. Some GOP members had backed $160 billion, while others wanted none.

Key Democrats are already weighing in with their own proposals for the bill.

Incoming Senate Finance Committee Chairman Ron Wyden wants to link expanded unemployment benefits for gig workers and the long-term unemployed to automatic triggers that would extend the programs based on national and state unemployment rates. The idea is to remove the need to negotiate repeated extensions after the initial bill is passed.

Wyden is also interested in boosting supplemental unemployment insurance payments to the $600 level that expired in mid-2020. The December bill included $300.

– – –

“Tying these programs to conditions on the ground also ensures Mitch McConnell and Senate Republicans can’t hold them hostage,” said Wyden in an emailed comment, referring to the GOP leader.

Biden’s plan will likely include an expansion of the child tax credit and tax break for dependent care, according to a person familiar with the plan. It could also have an expansion of the earned income tax credit, the person said.

Wall Street banks’ expectations for the next round of stimulus fall well short of Biden’s multi-trillion dollar framework. JPMorgan Chase & Co. is at the higher end, penciling in $900 billion, while Goldman Sachs Group stands at $750 billion.

Others are even more restrained. UBS Group economists estimate any new covid-19 relief package in the wake of Biden taking office at $500 billion.

“We are firmly in the camp looking for half a loaf rather than a whole loaf” on the next fiscal package, said Seth Carpenter, UBS’s chief U.S. economist, who worked at the Treasury Department in the Obama-Biden administration. Carpenter highlighted the ability of Manchin and other centrist Democrats to scale block more ambitious proposals.

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Goldman, JPMorgan to delist some products in Hong Kong

InternationalJan 12. 2021A person past signage for Hong Kong Exchanges & Clearing at the Exchange Square complex in Hong Kong on Aug. 19, 2020. MUST CREDIT: Bloomberg photo by Roy Liu.

By Syndication Washington Post, Bloomberg · Yueqi Yang, Colin Keatinge

The fallout from U.S. sanctions on Chinese military-linked companies widened as banks and money managers raced to comply with a vaguely worded executive order from Donald Trump that bans new investments starting Monday.

Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley and JPMorgan Chase will delist 500 structured products in Hong Kong, filings show. The city is the world’s largest market for such contracts with more than 12,000 of them, according to Hong Kong Exchanges and Clearing.

Products being pulled include warrants and callable bull/bear contracts on the benchmark Hang Seng Index, the Hang Seng China Enterprises Index and China Mobile. The $14 billion Tracker Fund of Hong Kong managed by State Street Global Advisors Asia, the island’s most actively traded ETF, won’t make new investments in companies covered by the ban after saying it’s no longer “appropriate” for U.S. investors.

Investors have struggled to get more clarity on how regulators, exchanges and intermediaries will implement the order Trump issued in the waning days of his presidency. The New York Stock Exchange said last week it will delist China Mobile and two other Chinese telecom companies. MSCI deleted the stocks from its global benchmark indexes on Friday, triggering a rush to sell that led to record trading volume in the stocks and drove China Mobile’s share price to a 14-year low.

Trump’s order said designated stocks cannot be purchased by Americans starting on Jan. 11, and that holdings by Americans must be fully divested by November when transactions will be frozen.

For banks, index compilers and money managers, that has added to the challenges of navigating tensions between Washington and Beijing that have increasingly entered the financial sphere. China issued new rules on Saturday to protect its firms from “unjustified” foreign laws that will allow Chinese courts to punish global companies for complying with foreign restrictions.

“This will raise a big dilemma for companies,” Jingzhou Tao, an arbitrator with Arbitration Chambers, said in a Bloomberg Television interview. “On one hand you have these U.S. sanctions which you must observe, otherwise you get sanctioned by the U.S. government, on the other hand you have the Chinese government, if they say that you should not observe these sanction-related laws, then you’re in a big dilemma.”

The delisting of Hang Seng Index products, and State Street’s warning that U.S. investors should avoid the tracker fund, show how Trump’s order is impacting investment flows beyond just the handful of Chinese companies on the U.S. sanctions list.

The about 500 structured products being delisted account for less than 1% of Hong Kong’s turnover, according to Bloomberg Intelligence.

Even if banned companies comprise a small fraction of a widely followed index, the sanctions could force money managers to shift billions of dollars out of products linked to that index. It’s one reason why MSCI, FTSE Russell and S&P Dow Jones Indices have all adjusted their equity gauges to remove banned companies like China Mobile. Hang Seng Indexes said Friday that it has no plan to change its benchmarks for now, though it will monitor “market developments” closely.

Hong Kong’s exchange said it’s working closely with banks to ensure orderly delistings. “We do not believe this will have a material adverse impact on Hong Kong’s structured products market,” the exchange said in a statement Sunday. The city’s securities regulator said it has also been in close dialogue with the affected issuers and has reminded them to carefully assess the impact of the U.S. sanctions on their products.

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House Democrats introduce article of impeachment charging Trump with ‘incitement of insurrection’

InternationalJan 12. 2021

By The Washington Post · Annie Linskey

WASHINGTON – President-elect Joe Biden said Monday he is consulting with Senate leaders and the chamber’s parliamentarian about whether the Senate can “bifurcate” its schedule, so it can move forward simultaneously with impeaching President Donald Trump and enacting Biden’s agenda, including a multitrillion-dollar coronavirus relief plan.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/video/c/embed/ff55dd6e-eb04-43c5-9840-6645a9137309?ptvads=block&playthrough=false

Biden’s comments, made Monday just after he received his second dose of the coronavirus vaccine at a Delaware hospital, revealed his most detailed thinking to date about the threat that congressional Democrats’ impeachment efforts could overshadow the early days of his presidency.

The remarks also affirmed that the president-elect wants Congress to focus on improving the response to the virus and bolstering the struggling economy ahead of rebuking Trump for his role in inciting a deadly mob that briefly took control of the U.S. Capitol building last week.

“My priority, first and foremost, is the stimulus bill,” Biden said Monday, “and secondly to begin to rebuild the economy.”

Those sentiments could collide with the determination of many House members to penalize Trump for his role in the assault on the Capitol and to ensure he cannot seek office again. Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., has said the House will push ahead on impeachment if Vice President Mike Pence does not move to oust Trump by Wednesday, a step that seems highly unlikely.

Democratic leaders worry that if the Senate is consumed by an impeachment trial for the first few weeks of Biden’s term that it will have little capacity to do anything else, and Biden signaled Monday he is looking for a way around that.

“I had a discussion today with some of the folks in the House and Senate,” he said. “And the question is whether or not, for example, if the House moves forward, which they obviously are, with the impeachment and sends it over to the Senate, whether or not we can bifurcate this.”

Biden has been particularly concerned about Senate confirmation for his Cabinet nominees and getting his national security team in place. “Can we go half-day on dealing with the impeachment and half-day getting my people nominated and confirmed in the Senate?” he said.

Biden campaigned on bringing the country together, and some lawmakers believe that could be more difficult if he launches his presidency amid a fiery effort to punish his polarizing predecessor. But many in Biden’s party argue that it will not be possible for the country to unify if Trump is not held accountable for his role in the riot.

Biden has said little about his views on whether impeachment should go forward, suggesting Friday that it is a matter for Congress to decide. But he has made it clear he wants lawmakers to “hit the ground running” on his agenda once he takes office on Jan. 20.

Although the House is expected to vote this week on an article of impeachment, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., issued a memo last week saying the Senate would not consider the matter until Jan. 19, which would mean a trial would bleed into Biden’s term and potentially derail chunks of his legislative program.

Biden was more forceful Monday in discussing the rioters who took control of the Capitol, saying they should be prosecuted. Dozens have been arrested.

“I think it’s critically important that there be a real serious focus on holding those folks who engaged in sedition and threatened people’s lives and defaced public property and caused great damage, that they be held accountable,” Biden said. “And I think that’s a view that is held by the vast majority of Democrats and Republicans in the Congress.”

Biden added that it is his “hope and expectation” that his agenda can move forward amid impeachment. But he said he has not heard from the parliamentarian about whether it is feasible for the Senate to handle other business during an impeachment trial.

Biden was also asked whether he is “afraid” at all of taking the oath of office outside in the aftermath of the violence at the Capitol. “No,” Biden said.

He has previously expressed confidence in the Secret Service, which he said would be handling the event. “I am not afraid of taking the oath outside. I’m getting briefed,” Biden said Monday, presumably a reference to intelligence and security briefings.

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Up to 15,000 National Guard members could be deployed in D.C. during inauguration

InternationalJan 12. 2021

Members of the National Guard outside the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 11. (Sarah Silbiger/Bloomberg News)

By The Washington Post · Dan Lamothe

WASHINGTON – Up to 15,000 National Guard members could be deployed in Washington during the presidential inauguration, senior defense officials said Monday, part of a rapidly expanding response following a deadly insurrection at the Capitol last week.

Army Gen. Daniel Hokanson, the chief of the National Guard Bureau, said in a call with reporters that about 6,000 guardsmen from six states already are in the nation’s capital, and that the military response will expand to about 10,000 by the weekend.

Hokanson said the numbers will be determined by the requirements that federal agencies have for support. The National Guard will bring their weapons to Washington and carry them based on discussions with the FBI, police and other agencies.

“Obviously, we’re very concerned that we want our individuals to have the right to self-defense,” the general said. “And so, that will be an ongoing conversation, and if the senior leadership determines that that’s the right posture to be in, then that is something that we will do.”

The shift comes after the Defense Department carved out a narrow role ahead of a protest of President Donald Trump’s election loss on Wednesday. Trump directed thousands of people to the Capitol afterward, some of whom began storming the building and attacking Capitol Police officers, including one who later died.

Just 340 D.C. National Guard members had been activated ahead of the riot, and none were posted outside the Capitol. Instead, they were assigned to traffic duty in other parts of the city, because the Capitol Police and the Pentagon had not worked out a plan in the event of a crisis at the home of Congress.

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Biden, once a warrior, may slowly retreat from the ‘war on drugs’

InternationalJan 12. 2021

By The Washington Post · Tim Craig

President-elect Joe Biden built part of his political career on being known as a fighter in the “war on drugs,” supporting legislation as a senator that set harsh penalties for some drug offenses.

But as president, Biden could potentially oversee broad changes in federal drug policy, including how the government and law enforcement agencies view drug addiction and treatment and classify the use of marijuana.

Biden will take office at a time when the nation’s attitudes about drugs, particularly the legalization or decriminalization of marijuana, appear to be one area where there is relative, and growing, bipartisan unity.

In an election that was otherwise defined by stark political differences, voters in both red states and blue states – Arizona, Montana, New Jersey and South Dakota – supported ballot initiatives to legalize the personal use of marijuana, while Mississippi voters legalized it for medicinal use. Along with earlier action by state legislatures or voters, 15 states have legalized marijuana, while 36 others have approved some form of medicinal marijuana use, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures.

But marijuana remains illegal under federal law, leaving users and suppliers vulnerable to prosecution even in places where the drug is otherwise legally sold and used. The nation’s growing cannabis industry also faces hurdles in transporting its products across state lines and accessing the country’s federally regulated banking system.

During his primary campaign, Biden was one of the few Democratic candidates who did not support federal legalization of marijuana for recreational use, citing concerns that it could be a “gateway drug.” But during the general-election campaign, he softened his stance, saying that the drug should be decriminalized and that individual states should decide whether to legalize it for recreational use.

As the general-election campaign progressed, Kamala Harris, Biden’s running mate and a former prosecutor, also advocated for the decriminalization of marijuana despite past opposition to legalizing it. During the October vice-presidential debate, Harris said a Biden-Harris administration “will decriminalize marijuana, and we will expunge the records of those who have been convicted of marijuana” crimes.

LED lights cast a strong glow in the grow room at District Growers in Washington on May 1, 2019. MUST CREDIT: Washington Post photo by Bonnie Jo Mount.

Marijuana advocates are gearing up to make sure Biden sticks to his campaign pledge, which they note that strong majorities of Democratic voters support, according to recent polls.

Last month, for the first time, the Democratic-controlled House voted – 228-164 – to decriminalize marijuana and remove it from the federal schedule of controlled substances. The Republican-controlled Senate did not take up the measure, and many advocates are skeptical of its chances there, even though Democrats narrowly won control of the chamber after two runoff elections in Georgia last week.

But advocates say Biden can still push toward decriminalization, even without a vote from Congress.

Under its current classification, which dates to a decision made under President Richard Nixon in 1970, marijuana is classified as a Schedule I narcotic for having “no currently accepted medical use and a high potential for abuse.” The remaining schedules of narcotics, II through V, are ranked by their potential for abuse and perceived level of danger, and the classifications help guide federal enforcement and regulations for controlled substances, including prescription medication.

Maritza Perez, director of national affairs for the pro-reform Drug Policy Alliance, said legal analysts for the movement think the Biden administration can unilaterally reschedule marijuana to a higher classification or even remove it from the list. Although she prefers congressional action, Perez said the administration could declassify marijuana through a process that would involve sign-off from the incoming attorney general as well as the secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services.

Biden has nominated California Attorney General Xavier Becerra, who has defended his state’s legalization of marijuana, as his secretary of Health and Human Services.

“The attorney general would have to work hand-in-hand with the HHS secretary, but we think this is certainly something within the administration’s power, which is why the marijuana advocates have been pushing for him to appoint a pro-marijuana AG,” Perez said.

But Sam Kamin, a law professor at the Sturm College of Law at the University of Denver and a leading expert on marijuana laws, is skeptical that Biden will aggressively pursue the unilateral rescheduling or de-scheduling of marijuana. De-scheduling the drug could upend international drug control treaties, while rescheduling it could undercut state medical marijuana laws, he said.

“They can begin the rescheduling process, but whether they can de-schedule without stepping on other rules and regulations is more complicated,” Kamin said. “Treating marijuana like a Schedule II or III drug would create serious tensions with a lot of states. . . . If it was scheduled the same way Vicodin is scheduled, you could not get it over-the-counter as you can in many states. You would need a prescription from a medical doctor.”

A chair used by people while they do drugs sits under a bridge near train tracks in Philadelphia on July 27. MUST CREDIT: Washington Post photo by Salwan Georges.

Even if Biden decides to largely steer clear of the marijuana debate, advocates for reforming the nation’s drug laws still think his administration will usher in a new period of compassion when it comes to addiction.

To combat the opioid crisis, Biden has promised to spend an additional $125 billion over 10 years on drug treatment and prevention programs, while also supporting some controversial local initiatives such as needle exchanges.

Perez is optimistic that the Biden administration, unlike President Donald Trump’s, will take a hands-off approach when it comes to proposals by some cities to open safe-injection sites, where people can use illegal drugs in safe, monitored environments.

Last year, the Trump administration sued to try to stop Philadelphia from opening a so-called safe injection site. But Perez noted in July that Becerra, as California attorney general, joined a multistate amicus brief in support of Philadelphia.

“Safe injection sites . . . are an innovative tool to combat the opioid epidemic and drug dependency while reducing overdose death and transmission of diseases,” Becerra said at the time.

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Biden’s ambitious LGBT agenda poises him to be nation’s most pro-equality president in history

InternationalJan 12. 2021Kelly Miller, left, and her wife, Lindsey Miller, center, embrace on June 26, 2015, outside the White House, lighted in multicolored lights in recognition of the Supreme Court’s decision to legalize same-sex marriage in all 50 states. The Millers were married two years ago in Washington State, where same-sex marriage was legalized. MUST CREDIT: Washington Post photo by Michael S. Williamson

By The Washington Post · Emily Wax-Thibodeaux

WASHINGTON – Joe Biden became a fast friend of the LGBTQ community as vice president in 2012 by stating his support for same-sex marriage in a television interview even before his boss, President Barack Obama, did.

That same year, outside an Obama-Biden campaign office in Florida, it was Biden’s unexpected support for the transgender community that elevated his status from an LGBTQ ally to a champion. When the mother of a Miss Trans New England pageant winner asked Biden if he would help transgender people, she later told reporters, Biden whispered that it was the “civil rights issue of our time.”

Since then, Biden’s views on the LGBTQ community have become clearer and louder.

When he left the vice presidency, Biden partnered with other advocates to start the As You Are campaign to advocate for families’ acceptance of their transgender children, which “dramatically improves their child’s self-esteem and decreases the likelihood they will experience depression or suicidal ideation,” the Biden Foundation was cited as saying in a 2019 announcement.

Now advocates say the 78-year-old will be the nation’s most pro-LGBTQ president ever. He and Vice President-elect Kamala D. Harris have promised an ambitious slate of actions that would go beyond reversing what LGBTQ advocates have called President Donald Trump’s “discrimination administration.”

The Trump Accountability Project, by the advocacy group GLAAD, has recorded more than 180 anti-LGBTQ statements and actions by the Trump administration and those in the president’s circle since January 2017, including a proposal that would allow homeless shelters to house transgender people according to their sex assigned at birth rather than their gender identity.

Transgender rights have become a lightning rod in the relentless culture war that has come to dominate American politics, pitting conservative Christians who want their religious views to be accommodated against liberal and secular Americans who think some of those views trample on minority groups’ rights.

Just weeks before it leaves office, the Trump administration handed out a 400-page document detailing how federal contractors and recipients of government grants can cite their religious views to refuse to provide health coverage for birth control and other reproductive care and adoption services to single people or LGBTQ couples.

Biden has called religious freedom “a fundamental American value,” but also promised to reverse Trump administration policies that are “misusing these broad exemptions.”

He has committed to overturning every Trump administration rule that limits transgender rights, including tossing out its near-total ban on transgender troops serving in the military on “Day One.” Biden also has promised to reinstate Obama-era guidance for protecting transgender students that the Trump administration withdrew.

“Biden has made it clear that he intends to weaponize the law to crush dissent, in order to implement a far-left agenda,” said Kristen Waggoner, general counsel for Alliance Defending Freedom, a conservative legal organization that says it protects religious and moral convictions and freedom of speech. “That impacts not just people of faith, but all Americans who want to live life according to their convictions. The government can’t engage in religious bigotry.”

Alliance Defending Freedom is representing Christian adoption agency New Hope Family Services in an ongoing legal battle with New York state over its policy to place children only in homes with married opposite-sex couples.

“We live in a pluralistic society,” Waggoner said. “The government should not single out and punish those who believe that the best home for a child includes a married father and a mother.”

A judge recently sent the case back to a lower court, ruling that it should be allowed to continue its faith-based approach to adoption as the case proceeds, a move Waggoner cited as a win for religious liberty.

Biden has said he will protect the rights of anyone who qualifies to adopt, regardless of religion or family composition. Biden, who is Catholic, has split from his church’s stance on some issues, saying he values “the dignity of every person.”

During a town hall meeting with voters, Biden surprised even longtime LGBTQ advocates when he addressed the killing of transgender women – largely of color. At least 43 transgender or gender-nonconforming people were killed in the United States in 2020, according to the Human Rights Campaign. Advocates praised Biden for bringing the issue to the national stage and vowing to direct federal resources to prevent and prosecute such homicides.

“There’s an opportunity here for a national discussion on transgender people of color who are often just left out of the national conversation,” said David J. Johns, executive director of the National Black Justice Coalition, a civil rights organization dedicated to the Black LGBTQ community. “Even though the transgender community may have more visibility in TV shows like ‘Pose,’ the vitriol at the policy level that exists within the system leaves no promise of justice.”

Johns said he hopes to see more LGBTQ leaders of color appointed in Biden’s administration.

“That way they can show up and craft policy which will ensure that people of color can raise the alarm about issues of mental health, safety, housing or dealing with police in their communities,” he said.

Biden has promised that his administration will “look like America,” and has said he will provide anti-bias training for federal employees and offer incentives for states that adopt programs that help prepare transgender people for the workplace.

But he could face his most laborious hurdle in passing the Equality Act, a package of measures that protect against discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation that was passed by the House in 2019 but blocked by the Republican-led Senate.

That act – which Biden has pledged to make a policy priority during his first 100 days in office – has been a cornerstone of the community’s fight for equal rights in housing and employment since it was first discussed after the Stonewall riots in 1969.

If Republicans retain control of the Senate, the legislation’s passage will remain unpredictable. Some Republicans have instead backed the Fairness for All Act, which provides some LGBTQ protections while also granting certain exceptions for religious institutions and organizations.

Much of the battle over LGBTQ rights has been happening in statehouses, where those issues have been lightning rods in the nation’s culture war. This has kept policy debates about restroom access and puberty blockers largely beyond the reach of the federal government, but the rhetoric coming out of the White House does have influence, said Drew Anderson, a longtime LGBTQ advocate who used to work with GLAAD.

“It always helps to have an LGBTQ ally in the White House who will call it for what it is: hatred for an everyday American,” Anderson said.

Biden has credited his passion for LGBTQ issues to his late son Beau Biden’s close friendship with Sarah McBride, who is transgender.

McBride worked on Beau Biden’s reelection campaign for attorney general in Delaware, where they later collaborated to pass protections for transgender people in housing, health insurance and employment.

The Biden family developed a close relationship with McBride after Beau Biden died of brain cancer in 2015. McBride’s husband, Andy Cray, had died of cancer the year before.

“The president-elect has always been far out ahead on transgender issues. And I think all of us benefit from knowing people who are trans and organic agents of change in daily life,” said McBride, who was elected in Delaware in November as the first openly transgender state senator in the country. “But I know Joe Biden also wants to honor and carry forward his son’s work and legacy on this issue.”

Joe Biden wrote the foreword for McBride’s book “Tomorrow Will Be Different: Love, Loss and the Fight for Trans Equality.”

In it, he calls transgender equality “the civil rights issue of our time.”

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Britain faces harder lockdown restrictions as covid infections soar

InternationalJan 12. 2021

By Syndication Washington Post, Bloomberg · Tim Ross, Emily Ashton

British Prime Minister Boris Johnson warned he may tighten the coronavirus lockdown if people don’t follow the rules as his government backed tougher enforcement.

Any “complacency” about the disease is misplaced, Johnson said, even though an immunization program is well underway and 2.2 million people have received shots so far.

But he risked undermining his own appeal to the public to stay home and act responsibly when it emerged he had taken a bike ride 7 miles across London on Sunday.

“Of course, if we feel that things are not being properly observed, then we may have to do more,” Johnson said during a visit to a vaccination center in a sports stadium in Bristol, southwest England, Monday. The vaccine rollout is a “race against time,” with the country at a “very perilous moment” as infection rates soar, he said.

Britain is facing its toughest period of the pandemic, with hospital admissions up 22% in a week to more than 32,000, and the death toll now more than 80,000. Last week Johnson announced a third national lockdown, a move that threatens to push the U.K. into another recession and compound the damage of the first lockdown, which caused the deepest contraction for 300 years.

The vaccination program is the key to the economic recovery, Chancellor of the Exchequer Rishi Sunak told lawmakers Monday.

The government aims to start relaxing restrictions after Feb. 15, the target date by when Johnson wants all 15 million of the most vulnerable people and their carers to have been given at least one immunization dose.

Even though Britain is far ahead of other European countries in the rollout of vaccines, a new more contagious variant of the disease is pushing the health service to breaking point. Medical advisers and officials are growing increasingly concerned the public is not keeping to the rules, and that hospitals will soon be overwhelmed.

Johnson said the lockdown rules need to be enforced properly in food stores and urged people to think carefully before leaving home for any reason. Hospitals are under intense pressure from a surge in covid-19 cases, with oxygen supplies running short in some areas, he said.

Health Secretary Matt Hancock said everyone shares responsibility for ensuring the rules are obeyed and praised store chain Wm Morrison Supermarkets Plc for saying it will refuse entry to anyone not wearing a mask without a specific exemption.

“I am delighted that the police are stepping up their enforcement, but it isn’t just about the government and the rules we set, or the police and the work that they do, it’s about how everybody behaves,” he told a press conference. “I applaud the action Morrisons has taken today,” he said. “That’s the right approach.”

The premier’s office faced questions over his own action after London’s Evening Standard newspaper reported Johnson was seen cycling around the Olympic Park, 7 miles east of his official residence, at about 2 p.m. Sunday. Official government guidance allows people to leave their homes for the purpose of taking exercise but advises that people should stay within their “local area.”

Hancock said long bike rides and walks of 7 miles are allowed under the rules.

But the episode threatens to reignite a row over the behavior of Johnson’s former aide Dominic Cummings, who was accused of breaking lockdown rules last spring by driving more than 250 miles out of London when the country was being told to stay at home. Johnson’s office did not immediately respond to requests to comment on his trip.

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On civil rights, policing, prosecutions, Biden’s Justice Department will be distinct from Trump’s

InternationalJan 12. 2021Joseph Biden walks with civil rights leaders and lawmakers over the historic Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, Ala., on March 3, 2013. MUST CREDIT: Washington Post photo by Melina Mara

By The Washington Post · Matt Zapotosky

WASHINGTON – The Justice Department in the Biden administration is likely to increase resources for the civil rights division and resume wide-ranging scrutiny of troubled police departments nationwide, analysts say, as President-elect Joe Biden seeks to fulfill his campaign promises of combating systemic racism and fighting for equal rights.

Biden had been under pressure from civil rights leaders to appoint a Black attorney general with a background in civil rights and criminal justice reform. His selection, federal appellate judge Merrick Garland, is considered one of the more moderate candidates he could have chosen, and some criminal justice reform advocates have said previously that Garland’s record on the bench shows that he is too deferential to law enforcement. But others say that Garland has merely applied the law as his job requires, and that as attorney general he would surely seek to implement Biden’s agenda.

Biden also selected two prominent civil rights leaders for other top Justice Department jobs, allaying some concerns.

At a news conference announcing his nomination, Garland noted that the Justice Department was founded after the Civil War – in part to enforce constitutional amendments abolishing slavery and ensuring people of color the right to vote – and that the principles at that time remain relevant. He vowed that under his leadership, the department would be devoted to “ensuring racial equity in our justice system.”

For associate attorney general, the third-highest-ranking official, Biden chose Vanita Gupta, the president of the Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights and a former head of the Justice Department’s civil rights division. And he nominated Kristen Clarke, president of the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, as head of the Civil Rights Division.

Clarke said at the news conference, “We will turn the page on hate and close the door on discrimination by enforcing our federal civil rights laws.” Gupta vowed that the department would go far beyond merely repairing the reputational damage it suffered under President Trump, and would harness all the tools at its disposal to protect civil rights and force police reform.

“It will not be enough to restore what has been undermined or lost,” Gupta said. “This moment demands bold leadership.”

On his campaign website, Biden has made detailed commitments to how he will remake the Justice Department, especially when it comes to civil rights and policing. The Trump administration almost completely abandoned using broad pattern-or-practice investigations and court-monitored consent decrees to address systemic misconduct at local police departments, because Jeff Sessions, Trump’s first attorney general, did not favor them and issued a memo curtailing their use.

Judge Merrick Garland studies a toy that has been customized with his likeness, during a February, 2020 ceremony to pass the title of chief judge of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit to Sri Srinivasan, back right. MUST CREDIT: Washington Post photo by Bill O’Leary.

The Justice Department’s civil rights division under President Barack Obama opened 25 investigations of local law enforcement agencies across the country and enforced 14 court-approved consent decrees mandating changes. The Justice Department under President Trump initiated just one case involving a local police department, examining the former narcotics unit in Springfield, Mass. It opened other inquiries involving prisons.

Biden’s website, by contrast, promised to increase funding to the Justice Department’s civil rights division, which conducts such investigations and implements such decrees, and also vowed to push for legislation to clarify that pattern-or-practice inquiries could also target misconduct in prosecutors’ offices. Civil rights leaders welcome Biden’s promises.

“We need the Justice Department back in the business of holding the most egregious offenders accountable,” Clarke said in an interview weeks before her selection as the nominee to lead the Civil Rights Division was made public.

Biden’s campaign website said his administration would also reinvigorate the Community Oriented Policing Services office, which doled out grants in the Trump administration but stopped working with police departments on broad reform agreements.

Trump’s Justice Department took an aggressive posture toward cracking down on crime. Sessions issued a broad policy calling for prosecutors to pursue the most severe penalties possible, including mandatory minimum sentences, reversing an earlier directive by Obama attorney general Eric Holder to avoid charging offenses that might trigger such severe penalties.

Many federal prosecutors were not fond of Holder’s memo, and it was not immediately clear whether Biden’s attorney general will reinstate it. Doing so would probably win plaudits from advocates for criminal justice reform and from civil rights leaders, but it could spark complaints from prosecutors.

Biden’s campaign website said that he would “reduce federal spending on incarceration” and that the criminal justice system “must be focused on redemption and rehabilitation.” The site said Biden would again end the government’s use of private prisons – something that then-Deputy Attorney General Sally Yates had done when Biden served as vice president.

Biden also promised to aggressively press voting rights enforcement – which Clarke said was sorely lacking in the Trump Justice Department.