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The majority of the country’s largest school districts have made plans to begin the academic year online, somehow unpersuaded by President Trump’s insistence that the virus “will go away like things go away.”
- Here’s how that’s going: Florida has become the second state to record over 500,000 confirmed coronavirus cases; the only state with more cases is California. Florida crossed that milestone even as its new cases dropped artificially, after the state shut down testing sites in anticipation of Tropical Storm Isaias. Test numbers have dropped in 22 states over the past two weeks, a worrying trend that health officials have largely attributed to public frustration with long delays. Seems crazy, who wouldn’t want to sit in their car for three hours to one day find out if they were coronavirus-free two weeks ago?
- As the country suffers through what Dr. Anthony Fauci acknowledged to be the world’s worst coronavirus outbreak (eat our dust, Brazil), more school districts have walked back plans to reopen IRL. Chicago public schools will start the school year fully online, after parents and teachers pushed back against a plan for a mix of online and in-person classes. That leaves New York City as the only major school system planning to offer some in-person classes in the fall. Only five of the country’s 25 largest school districts plan to reopen with any form of in-person learning.
- Those decisions amount to a rejection of President “It is what it is” Trump, who advocated for children and teachers to cram together in poorly ventilated buildings as recently as this morning on Fox & Friends: “My view is the schools should open. This thing is going away.” Trump also falsely asserted that children are “virtually immune” from COVID-19. Meanwhile, a second-grader in Georgia tested positive after attending the first day of school in a school district that doesn’t require masks, and a viral photo from a mask-optional Georgia high school (which reopened despite reports of positive coronavirus cases among students and staff) showed mostly maskless students crowded into hallways.
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If only some other country had made this mistake already and we could see how it went.
- Back in late May, the Israeli government felt confident about Israel’s subsiding coronavirus numbers and triumphantly welcomed the country’s student body back to school. Within days, an outbreak at a Jerusalem high school spiraled out of control, quickly spreading to students’ families, and then to other schools and neighborhoods. Hundreds of schools were forced to close, and tens of thousands of students and teachers were quarantined. The U.S. is in a much worse state now than Israel was in May. Could there be some kind of lesson here?
- Not only is the U.S. reopening schools too early and haphazardly, we’re going about it backwards. Education experts broadly agree that the national priority should be getting young children back into classrooms first: They have to learn to read, they can’t learn independently online, and their parents need to be able to work. But financial pressures have forced colleges to reopen their campuses first, while schools for younger students lack the necessary funding to reopen safely.
Of course, any form of “safe school reopening” is a fantasy until outbreaks in the communities around schools have been contained, a first step the Trump administration is profoundly uninterested in taking. Eighty-nine days left to elect someone who will.
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To celebrate the life of Congressman John Lewis and mark the 55th anniversary of the Voting Rights Act, Vote Save America is hosting a special virtual screening of the new documentary John Lewis: Good Trouble on Thursday at 4pm Pacific/7pm Eastern, join Jon Favreau, Crooked’s Political Director Shaniqua McClendon, and special guests for a panel discussion about the life and legacy of Congressman Lewis. $5 from each virtual ticket will go to our Every Last Vote fund supporting PowerPAC and groups building long-term political infrastructure for underrepresented communities. Visit crooked.com/goodtrouble to get your ticket.
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Defense Department officials have no idea why President Trump called the huge explosion in Beirut a “terrible attack” on Tuesday, and suggested it had been caused by “a bomb of some kind.” Defense Secretary Mark Esper said that “most believe” the explosion was “an accident, as reported.” Lebanese authorities said a fire triggered the explosion of 2,750 tons of ammonium nitrate that had been stored in an unsecured warehouse for more than six years, and have launched an investigation into how that came to pass. At least 135 people were killed, more than 5,000 were injured, and many people are still missing.
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- The acting State Department inspector general has resigned, less than three months after Trump fired the previous inspector general. Probably a good sign. Probably so few shady things going on at the State Department, he just got super bored.
- Progressive Cori Bush defeated long-time Rep. William Lacy Clay (D-MO) in a stunning Democratic congressional primary upset. In another progressive victory, Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-MI) won her primary against challenger Brenda Jones.
- Okay back to bad news: Rep. Roger Marshall (R-KS) defeated former Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach in the GOP Senate primary. That probably dims Democrats’ hopes of flipping a Kansas Senate seat for the first time in nearly a century.
- Joe Biden will no longer travel to Milwaukee to accept the Democratic presidential nomination, on account of the raging plague. Get hyped for an Extremely Virtual Convention.
- Also, a potentially illegal GOP one: President Trump said that he’ll “probably” accept the Republican nomination from the White House, setting fire to whatever tissue-paper-thin veil remained between the U.S. presidency and his re-election campaign.
- Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-CT) ominously tweeted that the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence has received “chilling” reports of ongoing foreign election interference, but that it’s all classified.
- Former Deputy Attorney General Sally Yates used her appearance before the Senate Judiciary Committee (part of Chairman Lindsey Graham’s effort to breathe life into “Obamagate”) to refute false GOP claims about the Obama administration’s involvement in the FBI’s Michael Flynn investigation.
- Wisconsin Republicans (including a lawyer who represented the Trump campaign) gave Kanye West a hand to get on the ballot. As did Ohio Republicans. A subtle pattern emerges.
- While effectively campaigning for Trump in Wisconsin, Interior Secretary David Bernhardt confirmed that federal authorities are monitoring protesters’ social media feeds.
- WNBA players have begun wearing shirts supporting Democrat Raphael Warnock, who's running against Sen. Kelly Loeffler (R-GA). Loeffler, who was appointed to her seat and co-owns the WNBA team Atlanta Dream, has whined about being canceled after disparaging the Black Lives Matter movement. Hard to think of anyone in America having a tougher time right now, keep your head up Kelly.
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For at least two months, an Instagram “bug” showed users negative hashtags related to Joe Biden, but not Donald Trump. Instagram searches for Joe Biden returned both negative related hashtags and pro-Trump hashtags, while searches for Trump-related topics returned nothing negative, or any hashtags that would have pushed users towards alternative content. Meanwhile, over on Facebook—Instagram's parent company—Trump’s re-election campaign has run ads with a false claim about Biden’s desire to “defund” police forces at least 22.5 million times. Fact-checkers unanimously found the ads “false” or “deceptive,” but Facebook didn’t share those assessments with its users, under its policy allowing politicians to lie with impunity. Another damning pile of evidence of social media companies’ flagrant liberal bias.
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Missouri voters approved a Medicaid expansion in defiance of GOP state leaders, extending coverage to over 200,000 currently uninsured residents.
Gov. Kim Reynolds (R-IA) signed an executive order restoring voting rights to tens of thousands of Iowans who served felony sentences, with no requirement that they pay off outstanding fees or fines.
A growing number of southern states have begun removing Confederate statues from Capitol buildings of their own accord.
Oregon could become the first state to decriminalize drug possession this fall.
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