Crooked Media - What A Day: Crash in Toomey

What a year! We'll be on hiatus until Monday, January 4. Safe and happy holidays, and see you around the inbox in 2021. 

Say what you will about Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, but it takes a special kind of work ethic to spend the weekend before Christmas holding up coronavirus relief for nefarious political reasons, while taking just one quick break to get a vaccine in short supply. Sorry, not work ethic—what’s the phrase?—moral bankruptcy.
 

• A final relief agreement remains elusive after Senate Republicans, led by Sen. Pat Toomey (R-PA), decided to hold billions of dollars hostage to a late-announced demand that would cut off Federal Reserve lending programs created by the CARES Act. That’s for no purpose other than to hamstring the Biden administration, and it’s a big ol’ non-starter. As incoming NEC Director Brian Deese said in a statement: “Congress’s good faith effort to deliver immediate relief should not be delayed by provisions that could put our future financial stability at risk.” 
   
• And yet, here we are! Lawmakers have until midnight on Friday to approve an extension of federal funding (and the attached stimulus package), which does not appear likely. Thanks to Toomey’s last-minute, godawful proposal, the House has passed another stopgap spending bill and the Senate is expected to do so shortly, in order to avoid a government shutdown while negotiations continue into the weekend. Republicans: Burning the Midnight Oil to Deny You Aid Unless It Screws Over Joe Biden Somehow™.
   
• It bears repeating that the deal Republicans are obstructing is one they’ve already hacked into an insulting sliver of what it could and should be. Where Democrats have demanded $1,200 direct payments, the restoration of $600 weekly unemployment insurance, retroactive benefits, and funding for state and local governments, Republicans have winnowed that down to $600 checks (“it’s nine months of rent, Michael, what could it cost? $10?”), $300 unemployment benefits that will end earlier as a “compromise” for those checks, and a wet raspberry to be blown in the direction of the millions of people who could lose their jobs when state and local governments have to find additional budget cuts. 

In their mad scramble back to Austerity Mode, Republicans have held off calls for larger direct payments from (checks notes) Sen. Josh Hawley (R-MO) and (squints at notes, dons bifocals) President Donald Trump. 
 

• Sen. Ron Johnson (R-WI) shot down Hawley’s bill to provide $1,200 direct payments, citing the national deficit, which he remembered this morning upon waking from a peaceful four-year slumber in a distant forest. Sending hungry families $1,200 checks would be “mortgaging our children's future,” said Johnson, who voted for a $741 billion defense budget last week. The Washington Post reported that White House aides stepped in on Thursday to stop Trump from calling for $2,000 checks, out of fear it would blow up negotiations. We’re sick of saying this all the time, but out of respect for the presidency, it seems like we should listen to what Mr. Trump has to say.
   
• While Republicans waste time on attempted sabotage, millions of people are in for the bleakest Christmas since Melania was at the top of her decorating game. The Labor Department reported on Thursday that new unemployment claims rose to 885,000, up 23,000 from the previous week and the highest weekly total since September. Nearly 13 million Americans are behind on their rent or mortgage, according to the latest Census survey, and just under 27.4 million adults reported suffering from food scarcity. If Ron Johnson’s so concerned about our children’s future, wait ‘til he hears about their present. 

The embarrassing stimulus package that Senate Republicans will eventually, begrudgingly agree to is only on the table because they worry they’ll lose both Georgia Senate runoffs next month if they don’t pass something. Imagine what relief efforts will look like if Mitch McConnell is still in power in the new year without his majority at stake, then grab a shift to help Georgia voters send him packing.

Unholier Than Thou just released a very special episode with Crooked Media alum Brittany Packnett Cunningham.  Phill and Brittany discuss the idea of Jesus Christ in the modern context as a social justice warrior. With Christmas fast approaching, the discussion around the identity (as a brown man, inmate, undocumented immigrant, etc.) of the holiday’s namesake is more relevant than ever. Take a listen, and make sure to subscribe to Unholier Than Thou wherever you get your podcasts →

Here, we got you a little Christmas grift: Jared Kusher helped create a shell company that funneled millions of dollars in campaign funding to Trump family members. American Made Media Consultants Corporation, whose creation Kushner approved, has spent approximately half of the Trump campaign’s $1.26 billion in total funds since 2019. The company allowed the Trump campaign to shield details of its spending, and while earlier reporting pinned the whole scheme on former Trump Campaign Manager Brad Parscale, we now know that the family was directly involved: Lara Trump was AMMC’s president, Vice President Mike Pence’s nephew was (fittingly) veep, and Trump campaign CFO Sean Dollman was treasurer and secretary. Nothing a last-minute blanket pardon won’t clear up!

• The Trump administration has abruptly halted defense briefings for Biden’s transition team. After Axios reported that Acting Defense Secretary Chris Miller had ordered Pentagon officials to stop cooperating with the transition, Miller explained that it was just for a wildly unusual holiday break. Here’s Biden transition director Yohannes Abraham: “Let me be clear: there was no mutually agreed upon holiday break."
   
• The Supreme Court delayed a ruling on whether Trump can exclude undocumented immigrants from the Census count. The three liberal justices disagreed that it was “premature” to rule that the policy is unconstitutional. 
   
• Rep. Cedric Richmond (D-LA), an incoming White House senior advisor, has tested positive for coronavirus after campaigning alongside Biden in Georgia on Tuesday. Biden tested negative on Thursday. 
   
• Former national security advisor Michael Flynn has continued calling for Trump to institute martial law to remain in power, arguing that military coups are actually no big deal in a Thursday appearance on Newsmax.
   
• Rupert Murdoch has received his first dose of the coronavirus vaccine, while Tucker Carlson goes on his network and scares the shit out of people with vaccine disinformation. 
   
• New York City’s Department of Investigation released a report outlining the many ways the NYPD screwed up during the George Floyd protests, resulting in excessive use of force.  
   
• The New York Times has retracted the reporting of its Caliphate podcast and will return the Peabody award it won, acknowledging that the central figure’s account of acting as an ISIS executioner in Syria couldn’t be substantiated. 
   
• The Space Force announced that its members will be called “Guardians,” and that this was the result of a year-long naming process, and that it is “a name chosen by space professionals, for space professionals,” and that Guardians will be hired based on resemblance to Chris Pratt, and only that last part is made up. 
   
• Atlantic City is auctioning off the opportunity to blow up Trump’s casino. If that’s out of your price range, keep in mind that tweeting “lol remember when you lost” at the president is both legal and free.
   
• We normally wouldn't amplify vaccine misinformation, but this is important. 

The extensive Russian hack of federal networks that the president has yet to acknowledge keeps getting more alarming. At least six government departments were breached in an operation that went undetected for eight months. DHS’s Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency warned that malware-infused software updates from SolarWinds may not have been hackers’ only access point to government networks, and restoring security to those networks may take months. It’s still unclear how many total agencies were affected or what data may have been stolen. Anyway, remember three decades ago, in 2018, when the Trump administration eliminated the cybersecurity coordinator role on the NSC, and then spent 2019 bullying a whole bunch of cybersecurity experts out of the government? Seems like that might be worth a second look.

Sick of UTIs? Meet Uqora. UTIs are the second most common infection in the United States. Uqora was created by a chronic UTI sufferer who had tried it all and was sick of the constant cycle of infections. So, if you're tired of the cycle of UTIs, meet Uqora. Uqora specializes in UTI relief products and proactive urinary tract health supplements. They've helped more than 100,000 people stay healthy and want to help you too. Plus, you get 15% off.

The FDA has authorized Moderna's coronavirus vaccine. 

Nearly 76,000 new voters, a majority of them under the age of 35, have registered in Georgia since the November election.

A federal judge has rejected a lawsuit from Sens. Kelly Loeffler (R-GA) and David Purdue (R-GA) aiming to get those new voters’ ballots thrown out.

More than 1.1 million people in four countries have received their first coronavirus vaccine shots, according to a Bloomberg vaccine tracker that’s deeply soothing to stare at.  

Look at you. Thank you. Keep it going.