Episode 46: July 25-July 31, 2021

July 25 - July 31, 2021

Good afternoon, I’m Dennis Futoryan, and this is the 25th hour, helping you remember everything that happened beyond the 24/7 news cycle. Now, in this week’s news for the week of July 25-31, 2021, the Delta variant leads to renewed indoor mask requirements amongst vaccinated or not, and governments are feeling bolder than ever as they mandate their workers to get the vaccine or annoyingly test themselves; Biden spurred states to incentivize the unvaccinated with cash, while allowing an eviction moratorium to expire, saying he didn’t have the authority to extend it, punting the issue to Congress, which dropped the ball. The Senate, meanwhile, spent the weekend working to release the infrastructure bill text it has been promising for weeks now, and the House January 6th commission held its first hearing. Now, onto the show; things may have changed by the time you hear this.

De Blasio

• COVID
  • The Mayor announced a vaccine mandate for all municipal employees, including cops, firefighters, and teachers. Those that don’t want to get vaccinated have to get weekly COVID tests to prove they’re not sick with COVID, as the Delta variant increases hospitalizations. Unvaccinated workers are also going to have to wear masks indoors, suspending anyone who won’t comply. The silver lining, if any, is that the rate of hospitalizations during this wave is less than the peak of the winter wave in 2020 from the original strain. 
  • De Blasio also announced this week that anyone that gets vaccinated at city-run vaccination centers would get $100 as an incentive for people to get their shots, and said that he would clarify the City’s mask rules starting on Monday. When it came to dining out, New Yorkers might have to start showing their vaccination cards soon in order to be able to sit in a restaurant, with the Mayor praising the move of those such as chef Danny Meyer, that required vaccination cards in his restaurants. 
  • The number of COVID cases has quadrupled from 250 to more than a 1000 infections per day, and hospitalizations are up 90% since July 4th, with more than 300 people currently in hospital beds. Although a tiny sliver of those hospitalized are vaccinated, underlying concerns of breakthrough infections from the Delta variant, the vast majority of those hospitalized are unvaccinated, and tend to skew towards younger patients here in the City. 
  • De Blasio’s former health commissioner, Oxiris Barbot, penned a letter to the Mayor warning him against kicking out homeless people from hotels back into congregate shelters, saying it was dangerous to do so after the Delta variant caused an uptick in COVID numbers. 
  • The City Department for the Aging said this week that certain senior centers are hosting mobile vaccine vans through August in order to give more senior citizens their COVID shots. Vaccine vans have helped inoculate close to 600 people, according to city data.
  • The Broadway League announced that Broadway audiences will be required to be masked during the show performances through at least October. The mandate also will require everyone attending the show over 12 years of age to be vaccinated and show proof of their vaccination.
  • As if the Delta variant hadn’t been concerning enough, researchers from CUNY’s Queens and Queensborough Colleges, the New School, and the University of Missouri, have found that the city’s 14 wastewater treatment plants had four different combinations of COVID mutations that were never seen before, and that could be infecting stray dogs and rats. The study has not been peer-reviewed.
• Mayoral elections:
  • Democratic nominee for mayor, Eric Adams, started hinting at his plans for staffing City Hall, saying that he might keep some of de Blasio’s staff, including mentioning the amazing job he thinks NYC Homeless Services Commissioner Steven Banks is doing.
  • Adams, in comments about COVID policy in the City, said that he might consider shutting things down again if the numbers go in the wrong direction during his mayoralty. 
  • The presumptive mayor continues to make rounds on the news and late-nite circuits, appearing on an episode of Bill Maher, where he made clear that his criticism of the far-left that have rankled progressives goes to show that “this isn’t a socialist country.” Adams recently met with other members of the progressive left, including Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Jamal Bowman, a conversation Bowman said left him hopeful when it came to working together to help poor New Yorkers and things said during the mayoral campaign was water under the bridge. 
  • Former President Bill Clinton opined on what the next Mayor of NYC should do, saying in an interview with NY1 that housing and rent should be at the top of City Hall's agenda.
• Schools:
  • A City Hall source told the Post that the Department of Education is thinking about a remote schooling option for the City’s most vulnerable students, including immunocompromised and disabled pupils. 
  • A new state initiative could see the elimination of around $125m in undergraduate college debt for 50k CUNY students, with the introduction of the CUNY Comeback Program. Funded from federal stimulus money, Governor Cuomo said the program would give students debt forgiveness programs to get over their COVID financial hardships and could even get relief money if they didn’t accrue tuition. CUNY students enrolled from March of last year are eligible for the program. 
  • Comptroller Scott Stringer is at it again with another audit focused on the Department of Education, this time saying the DOE messed up the way it distributed student iPads during the pandemic, leaving students waiting for months to get an iPad because the agency couldn’t get its record-keeping in order. The DOE bought 500k devices at a cost of almost $900 each, with almost 19.5k iPad requests still under review since March and 16k requests still unresolved since last year. Almost 3050 students were even mistakenly given more than one device.
• Crime:
  • The NYPD has fired two police officers, Sanad Musallam and Yaser Shohatee, after an internal department trial found them guilty of raping a 15 year old girl between 2015 and 2016.
  • Brooklyn DA Eric Gonzalez petitioned a judge to vacate 3500 pot-related cases, further clearing the docket of nonviolent marijuana convictions.
• Homeless:
  • Two weeks after a judge stopped the City from moving homeless people out of hotels and back into shelters, the City resumed its actions despite confusion from disabled homeless individuals that haven’t received their accommodations yet, which was a key underpinning behind the judge’s injunction in the first place.
• Environment:
  • Supermarkets are struggling with avoiding fines for carbon emissions emitted due to their fridges, after the City’s Local Law 97 targeting huge emitters didn’t cut food stores any slack, reports the publication The Real Deal. 
• Transportation:
  • Scooter ride sharing company Revel, which has been battling with the Taxi and Limousine Commission for approval of a Tesla ride-sharing service, finally got their plans greenlighted by the agency. The TLC originally rejected the plan even before a scheduled vote, which let Revel call foul and the agency had to take more deliberations.
• Development:
  • The Mayor commented on a nightlife advisory board’s recommendations to overturn bans on outdoor dancing and drinking, saying that he wouldn’t agree with outdoor drinking.
  • The never-ending development of two new towers overlooking the Brooklyn Botanical Gardens and casting a shadow of them has seen a last-minute change by the developer of the plan, capping the towers at 17 stories, down from the earlier proposed 34 stories. The City Planning Commission is set to vote on the plan no later than September 22nd.
  • Stephen Ross, the billionaire that spearheaded the opening of Hudson Yards, said he’s thinking about closing the popular tourist site, the Vessel, after a 14-year old jumped to his death from atop the sculpture, the fourth death by jumping from the Vessel since it opened. 
  • So-called NIMBYism, or Not In My Backyard, ruled the day at a Manhattan community board meeting on the topic of the SoHo and NoHo rezoning proposals, where the board almost unanimously voted against the plans. The proposed rezoning would add more affordable housing to the area, but residents reject the plans, claiming gentrification.

City Council

• Speaker race:
  • Three sources told the Post’s Nolan Hicks that former Manhattan Borough President and recent winner of the primary for a Manhattan Council seat, Gale Brewer, is keeping her eyes on the Speaker position being vacated by Corey Johnson. If Brewer wins the secret vote for Speaker, she might also increase her chances of winning the general election for her Council seat.
• Carr v. Kepi:
  • Aiming to end the saga of an ugly Council primary race in Staten Island, the City Board of Elections certified David Carr as the winner of the Republican primary over Marko Kepi. Carr, a former staffer for Councilman Steven Matteo, accused Kepi, a Marine reservist, of election fraud for ballot harvesting, while Kepi accused Carr of racism against Kepi’s Albanian heritage. Kepi vowed to fight the certification in court. 
• Food delivery apps:
  • The Council voted for a series of bills late this week that would clamp down on food delivery apps following complaints from restaurants that the apps are taking advantage of them, extending a cap on delivery fees util February 2022. Apps such as Grubhub and Uber Eats were charging upwards of 35% on commission for deliveries, while the law caps those fees at 15% for deliveries and 5% for other services.
• Deutsch:
  • Chaim Deutsch, the former South Brooklyn Councilman who was kicked out of his seat following pleading guilty for tax evasion, has been sentenced to three months in prison for his crimes. Deutsch got around paying $82k in taxes in relation to a property management company he heads. Federal judge James Cott also ordered Deutsch to pay $5500 in fines and restitution.
• Class sizes:
  • Council members and members of the teachers union introduced a local law this week that would reduce public school class sizes to between 14-21 students over three years, getting around state laws by changing occupancy rules for public school buildings.
• Gender-based violence:
  • A new bill introduced in the Council also proposes to give gender-based violence victims a chance to sue their abusers by extending the statutes of limitations for lawsuits by two years, part of an effort by Councilwomen Carlina Rivera and Selvena Brooks-Powers.
• COVID oversight:
  • The Gotham Gazette reported this week that the Council went five months without an oversight hearing on how the City is handling the vaccination effort, with Council Speaker Corey Johnson’s office releasing a statement that the Council has been working with de Blasio behind the scenes regardless. Mark Levine and Carlina Rivera, two key Council members in charge of the health and hospital committees, respectively, outlined their efforts to increase vaccination drives and public health funding outside of committee meetings. 

Cuomo

• COVID:
  • Counties in New York don’t know what they’re doing anymore, as the CDC recommended new indoor mask requirements due to the rise of the Delta variant, but New York hasn’t officially adopted those regulations. 12 counties would be affected by the CDC’s suggestion that areas experiencing high transmission should adopt the rules. 
  • Cuomo followed the lead of other local governments in mandating state workers either get vaccinated or subject themselves to frequent COVID testing. The Governor also pleaded with private businesses to institute mask mandates or vaccine proof. 
  • While the state decides what to do regarding masking up kids in the fall semester, State Education Commissioner Betty Rosa said school districts should use the CDCs recommendation as the baseline for their reopening plans, which includes masking up every kid above the age of 2 unless those kids starting at the age of 12 have been vaccinated. Rosa also said that schools should be ready to go back to remote learning in case of future outbreaks, and expressed frustration at Cuomo’s lack of guidelines.
  • After New York Senator Chuck Schumer criticized the Cuomo administration for not being more proactive with helping renters fill out assistance forms, the state came out with a new application process to help those that owe rent to their landlords. The CDC’s eviction moratorium expired on Saturday.
• Scandals:
  • Cuomo and his team have become increasingly jaded as to whether Attorney General Letitia James’ investigation into his sexual assault claims, believing that James will drag things out for as long as possible for use in her own gubernatorial campaign against Cuomo, according to Politico New York. Cuomo questioned the credibility of James’ lawyers leading the investigation, Joon Kim and Anne Clark. 
  • Commenting on the dropped FBI investigation into NY’s policy to throw COVID-infected nursing home residents back into their homes from the hospital, Cuomo said the original allegations were outrageous and politically motivated since Trump was President at the time. The FBI is still looking into whether Cuomo manipulated data to downplay the number of dead nursing home residents. 
  • Attorney Brian Premo, who represents the undisclosed accuser that said Cuomo groped her in the Executive Mansion last year, said his client is willing to take a polygraph test to establish the veracity of her claims. Cuomo’s lawyer, Rita Glavin, called the news a press ploy and declined to say whether the Governor would follow suit. 
  • The Times Union reported that Cuomo held onto $15m from the federal government meant to address vaccine hesitancy since April when the state budget passed, waiting nearly three months to dole out funds to educate New Yorkers about vaccine facts and confidence, just as the Delta variant started ravaging the state.
  • One of Cuomo’s special counsels, Judith Mogul, is stepping down from her position as she faces allegations of being a key part in one of Cuomo’s sexual harassment scandals, chiefly that she mishandled Cuomo’s former executive assistant Charotte Bennett’s accusation that Cuomo made sexual overtures at Bennett. Cuomo’s senior advisor Rich Azzopardi said Mogul had always planned to leave her post since last year but extended her position due to the pandemic. 
• Marijuana:
  • Westchester County FA Mimi Rocah announced the dismissal of 184 felony and misdemeanor cases for marijuana possession or dealing, following a trend in the state to get rid of the cases. Meanwhile, Cuomo is reportedly causing a disruption to the state’s marijuana legalization agenda because he wasn’t able to easily appoint new leaders to the MTA.
• Shopping bag ban:
  • Remember the ban on single-use plastic shopping bags? Neither does the state, but there have been more than 300 complaints filed against alleged violaters of the law, which state regulators can’t seem to catch up with.
• Transportation:
  • A new report from the MTA inspector general found that thousands of MTA employees aren’t using a new timekeeping system put in place two years ago to stop overtime fraud. Inspector General Carolyn Pokorny said that MTA management is still letting employees skip clocking in and out with the system.
  • The woman who was hoping to lead the MTA, Sarah Feinberg, stepped down from her role following the Legislature’s failure to formally appoint her, part of a power struggle between Cuomo and the legislature, wherein the Governor was hoping the legislature could approve Feinberg in a late session splitting the board chair and CEO positions. Instead, construction chief Janno Lieber will act as the MTAs acting CEO.
• Nassau:
  • Nassau County, Long Island, Executive Laura Curran, revised her plan to provide direct payments of $375 a person from those that received New York’s school property tax exemption, but now applies to anyone that makes up to a combined $168,900 in household income, hoping the money gets recirculated within the county. Those making up to $500k have to provide proof of a negative impact from COVID in order to get the money. 
  • A bill introduced in the Nassau County legislature would let police officers seek damages from protestors, placing cops as a protected class, which would legally allow them to sue demonstrators for discrimination under the county’s Human Rights Law. Minority leaders are calling for the bill’s rejection.
  • Meanwhile, in the Nassau DA race, Republicans and Democrats are battling over claims that bail laws exacerbated crime in the county, with Democrats calling out Republicans for allegedly misleading allegations, specifically that GOP candidate Anne Donnelly is lying about bail reform laws in interviews and social media. Donnelly faces Democratic state Senator Todd Kaminsky in November.
• Buffalo:
  • The Buffalo Common Council is seemingly really afraid of a socialist Mayor. After India Walton beat incumbent Mayor Byron Brown this past primary day, the Buffalo Common Council is reportedly looking into whether they can transform the office of the mayor into a City manager selected by the nine-member body.

State Legislature

• Elections Committee hearing:
  • State Senator Zellnor Myrie’s continued hearings about the state’s boards of elections saw a recent rabble from two dozen state residents that outlined concerns of poll workers nowhere to be found, conflicting information from their local board of elections, and a general loss of confidence in the electoral system due to the boards’ incompetence. Election workers, in turn, say that they’re not getting enough support from their BOE, with examples ranging from poll workers not showing up and site supervisors left hanging  

State Judiciary

• Gigante sex abuse:
  • Former 80s Councilman Louis Gigante has been accused of sexual abuse of a minor at a church in Longwood in the 70s, according to a Bronx court filing. The 50-year old male plaintiff alleges that Gigante forced the man to give Gigante oral sex when the man was 9. The filing comes as a wave of other child sexual abuse tort cases have been filed past their traditional statutes of limitation due to the Child Victims Act.
• Stop and frisk:
  • Eight years after federal Judge Shira Scheindlin ruled NYC’s stop and frisk policy unconstitutional for disproportionately stopping black and brown New Yorkers on scant reasonable suspicion, two new lawsuits are alleging that stop and frisk abuses have continued despite the appointment of a monitor by Scheindlin to oversee corrections to the policy. The plaintiffs in the lawsuits are asking a judge to create a seven-person advisory panel to work with the monitor and the creation of audits on stop-and-frisk activity every 6 months.
• SBA:
  • Sergeant Benevolent Association union leader Ed Mullins lost his attempt to get Judge Vernon Broderick to dismiss internal NYPD charges for offensive language and abuse of authority related to calling Congressman Ritchie Torres, a Councilman at the time, a “first class whore” in September 2020 for comments Torres made related to alleged police slowdowns following George Floyd protests. Mullins tried arguing he had a First Amendment right to the comments he made on social media, but Judge Broderick took the city’s side that Mullins has to follow the patrol guide and that he wouldn’t face irreparable harm from the discipline. 
• Vaccine mandate:
  • The State Bar Association announced that it has formed a taskforce to consider whether there should be vaccine mandates for the state’s lawyers.
• Hoosick Falls:
  • The settlement we reported on last week about the residents of Hoosick Falls potentially receiving $65.25m in a settlement from Saint-Gobain Performance Plastics, Honeywell International, 3M and DuPont Co. for polluting the water supply in the village, as evidenced by residents holding toxic chemicals in their blood, has been preliminarily approved by Senior federal judge Lawrence Kahn. Khan said the settlement amount is fair and reasonable and scheduled a hearing on February 2nd for a final settlement hearing.
• Donziger:
  • The lawyer that represented Ecuadorian farmers against energy giant Chevron, winning them a judgement that was rendered void in New York courts, was convicted of criminal contempt of court this week. Judge Loretta Preska chided Steven Donziger, saying that a lawyer should know they can’t take the law into their own hands if they don’t get their way. Donziger refused to abide by prior orders not to criticize the judge or the case, but refused, saying he was silenced. Donziger will be sentenced in a separate hearing and faces 6 months in prison.

Biden

Domestic

• COVID
  • The Department of Veterans Affairs followed the lead of some municipalities around the country in requiring medical staff working within the department to get vaccinated, or otherwise get weekly COVID testing. Biden quickly followed suit and mandated that all federal workers be vaccinated, or in the alternative, for those who still don’t want to get their shots, to get twice-weekly COVID tests to show they’re not sick with COVID. The mandate is designed to give workers a hard time without their shots, and federal worker unions quickly started crying out against the mandate. The Defense Department, meanwhile, made it clear that soldiers were a part of the mandate as well. The President also recommended that states follow NYCs lead and offer cash incentives like $100 in order to get people inoculated. 
  • What fed into much of the CDCs new rules for indoor masks is data showing the Delta variant is spread equally by both the vaccinated and unvaccinated, making the variant as contagious as chickenpox, pointing to a July 4th event in Provincetown, Massachusetts, that showed 74% of those who got COVID infections from that one event were inoculated. Furthermore, no matter if they got a vaccination, people showed the same amount of viral loads from the Delta variant. Still, those who are vaccinated have a far less chance of severe illness, hospitalization, or death, compared to their unvaccinated peers.
  • The CDC also decided to follow the lead of the American Academy of Pediatrics in recommending that all schools should mask up for their K-12 students, even for those who have been vaccinated, when they go back to school this fall.
  • NIAID Director Dr. Fauci said the US is going the wrong direction as the Delta variant sticks mostly unvaccinated Americans into the hospital. 
  • Pfizer said their data suggests a third dose of their vaccine strongly boosts protections against the Delta variant, in their continued campaign to get the FDA and CDC to go along with a booster shot. 
  • The White House at the start of the week recognized long-COVID as a disability, referring to the long-term symptoms someone faces after having COVID, such as fatigue, chronic pain, and more. The recognition allows patients to use resources guaranteed under the Americans for Disabilities Act, which had its 31st anniversary this week.
• Economy:
  • The administration has shifted its strategy on explaining rising inflation, as consumers’ demands increase faster than supply, with the President seeking to reassure Americans that rising prices are temporary, moving away from complicated economics terms.
  • In the meantime, the country’s gross domestic product, the monetary value of all finished goods and services, grew by 1.6% in the second quarter of 2021, a 6.5% annual rate, putting the US economy into pre-pandemic levels of growth, although the economy still faces severe supply-chain disruptions. 
  • Jobless claims have come down by 24k to a total of 400k claimed unemployment filings last week, still remaining historically high. 
  • President Biden proposed new rules meant to increase federal agencies’ consumption of American-made goods, announcing the measure ahead of a visit to a manufacturing plant in Pennsylvania this week. The rules also expand what qualifies as American-made, making it easier for agencies to increase purchases of American goods.
• Immigration:
  • Despite announcing earlier that the administration is going to phase out the practice of sending migrants back over the Mexican border for public health concerns as Trump had done, Biden is reversing course and continuing the order due to concerns over the Delta variant. Axios reported that 50k migrants were released from custody without a court date and ICE reported just 13% showed up to their assigned ICE offices for a check-in.
  • At the same time, the Biden administration released a plan on Tuesday that would speed up asylum approvals, as well as deportations by giving asylum officers the ability to rule on claims themselves, bypassing the 1.2m case-heavy immigration courts.
• Trump:
  • The Justice Department ordered the release of former President Trump’s tax returns to the House Ways and Means Committee that has been seeking those returns for almost the entirety of Trump’s tenure as President. Trump originally said he would release his tax returns if he had won his election in 2016, but ever since then said that an IRS audit prevented that release, which was a lie, as the audit never prohibited the release of his returns. Subsequent leaks of some years of Trump’s returns show that the businessman lied to bank and tax officials about the true worth of his assets in order to secure loans and get tax breaks. 
  • Reporting also came out this week that Trump pressured Justice Department officials to blatantly pronounce the 2020 presidential elections as corrupt and invalid in order to overturn the results, as evidenced in a December 27, 2020, phone call with acting Attorney General at the time, Joffrey Rosen, and his deputy Richard Donoghue, whose notes show Trump saying “Just say that the election was corrupt + leave the rest to me and the R. Congressmen.” Rosen reportedly said that he can’t snap his fingers and make the outcome of the election change. Trump has propagated a false narrative that various state elections were rigged against him and that he actually won the 2020 race, which precipitated the January 6th insurrection against Biden’s Electoral College certification and Trump’s second impeachment. 
  • Yet despite all of the outrage over Trump’s incitement of the January 6th insurrection, committees dedicated to reelecting Trump raked in more than $82m in the first half of 2021, according to disclosures, giving them $102m on hand. 
• Environment:
  • The EPA laid out plans to expand protections for America’s wetlands, replacing Trump’s Clean Water Act regulations that pulled back protections for marshes and swamps. 

Foreign

• Afghanistan:
  • The head of Central Command, the division of the military overseeing the Middle East, General Kenneth McKenzie, said that the US is prepared to continue airstrikes on captured equipment by the Taliban. McKenzie said that airstrikes are going to stop on August 31st, the same last day of the US withdrawal. 
  • The first 200 Afghan interpreters landed in the US this week, being housed in Fort Lee, Virginia, as their visa applications go through the bureaucratic process.
  • A Defense Department Inspector General report found that at least 81 Afghan troops were killed from so-called insider attacks during the US withdrawal. Insider attacks refer to when embedded terrorists within the military attack soldiers. The report also emphasizes the challenge Afghanistan faces of a skyrocketing resurgent Taliban and how the country hopes to retain itself as US troops leave. 
  • The report follows another conclusion from Congress’ Afghanistan watchdog that concluded after twenty years and nearly $840b spent on Afghanistan, the country remains poor, dependent, and rife with conflict. 
• Ethiopia:
  • Samantha Power, head of the federal US Agency for International Development, is visiting Eithiopia’s Tigray region next week, the site of a recent series of serious clashes between the Tigrayan people of the region and combined Ethiopian and Eritrean forces. The conflict began when the breakaway Tigrayan political party refused to join with a unifying party initiated by Ethiopian prime minister Abiy Ahmed, coupled with the delay of elections due to COVID.
• Syria:
  • The Biden administration ordered its first sanctions against Syrian government officials, prisons, militants, and militia leaders for human rights abuses, moving past Trump’s sanctions scheme to punish just the Syrian business community and associates of Bashar al-Assad’s family.
• Iran:
  • The President is also reportedly thinking about sanctioning Iran’s drone and guided missile program, considering it a more immediate threat than the Islamic Republic's nuclear program, which negotiations for another deal related to stemming enrichment being frozen as talks remain at a standstill. 
• Iraq:
  • Biden announced the formal end to the war in Iraq by the end of the year after discussions with Iraqi officials nearing a deal to put troops strictly in an advisory capacity. American officials said the 2500 troops in Iraq already serve to assist their Iraqi counterparts.
• Russia:
  • The DOJ came out with a statement saying that Russian hackers breached federal prosecutors’ email accounts, with 80% of the Microsoft email accounts in the four US attorneys offices in New York compromised. 27 Attorney offices had at least one workers’ account breached during the SolarWinds hacking episode, wherein Russian hackers breached federal agency computer systems through a software backdoor.
• India:
  • Secretary of State Antony Blinken visited India this week, hoping to improve the relationship between the two countries in a strategic effort to oppose China’s rise in the Asian region. 

Congress

House

• Jan 6 Commission:
  • The select committee established to investigate Trump’s and other officials’ roles during the January 6th insurrection against Biden’s Electoral College certification. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi ended up following through on her plan to add a second Republican, Adam Kinzinger, who along with the other GOP member of the committee, Liz Cheney, voted to support articles of impeachment against former President Trump for his role in inciting the insurrection. Minority Leader McCarthy had earlier offered 5 Republican members to join the committee, but Pelosi rejected Jim Jordan and Jim Banks, who both supported Trump following the insurrection and even voted against certifying Biden’s Electoral College certification, which led to McCarthy pulling back all of his GOP. 
  • The committee held its first hearing on July 27th, hearing from two Capitol Police officers and two DC Metro police officers, Sergeant Aquilino Gonell, and Officers Michael Danone, Daniel Dodges, and Harry Dunn, who were at the Capitol on January 6th. Their testimony recounted the moments Trump’s supporters turned violent and even hurled racist tirades against Officer Dunn. While Republicans Kinzinger and Cheney, who serve on the committee, thanked the officers for their service, Minority Leader McCarthy and other House Republican leaders denounced the committee, including the hardline House Freedom Caucus, which called for the expulsion of Cheney and Kinzinger from the GOP caucus. The next steps for the committee involve defining the scope of the investigation, including interviewing former Trump officials, which the DOJ has clarified will be allowed.
• Eviction moratorium:
  • The moratorium that prevents landlords from kicking people out of their homes and apartments in the midst of COVID expired on Saturday, with the House failing to pass a last-minute extension before leaving town on Friday for a seven-week recess. President Biden had called on lawmakers to pass an extension, refusing to extend it himself through executive order because Biden said he lacked the authority to do so. Even if the House had passed a last-minute extension, it almost certainly would have been blocked in the Senate. Speaker Pelosi ended up calling on the CDC to extend the moratorium unilaterally.
• COVID:
  • Following the CDCs change in indoor mask rules, the House physician recommended the return of a mask mandate for the floor of the House chamber, leading to a Republican revolt on the floor against wearing masks, a rerun of what the situation looked like when the mandate first appeared. Minority Leader McCarthy hinted that at least 80 House Republicans aren’t vaccinated, while Pelosi called McCarthy a moron for opposing the mask rules. The Capitol Police announced that they were going to arrest anyone that didn’t follow the new indoor mask rules, following a letter from Capitol Police Chief Thomas Manger ordering his officers to enforce them.
• Debt ceiling:
  • Ahead of an October deadline to pass an extension to the debt ceiling, the term used for the government’s ability to borrow money to pay for itself, the House passed an initial series of spending bills totaling $67b for federal agencies, hoping to avoid a government shutdown, which occurs when the government doesn’t pass a budget and programs are shut down and employees get furloughed. 

Senate

• Infrastructure:
  • It’s been rough going for the infrastructure plans in the Senate, as Republicans and Democrats disagreed with how much progress was even being made. Bill text was supposed to be released on Monday for the bipartisan infrastructure proposal struck between Senate Republicans and Democrats for a physical infrastructure plan for roads, bridges, etc., while there was no indication about more information on a “human” infrastructure plan that focuses on childcare, elder care, parental leave, etc. House Speaker Pelosi said that she wasn’t going to put just one plan on the floor without the other in the House, while the chief Senate Republican negotiator Rob Portman said Biden promised the two plans had nothing to do with the other.
  • But for all of the difficulties, Senators had finally reached a breakthrough compromise on the legislation at the end of the week, voting for cloture and moving forward to debating the bill. The bill’s text still hasn’t been released, but Rob Portman and moderate Democrat Kirsten Sinema said they were reviewing the text. The movement shows progress on Biden’s eventual big legislative achievement, if it passes. Majority Leader Schumer said that all 50 Democrats are on the same page when it comes to the $3.5t human infrastructure bill, and that the Senate is on track to pass the $1.2t hard infrastructure proposal. The Senate came into work in a rare Sunday session as of the time of this recording in order to unveil the bill text as soon as possible.
  • There is some doubt as to whether Democrats can include a measure to legislatively create the DACA program that was struck down by a trial judge last week, even though Biden supports the effort, because the measure may not pass budget reconciliation rules requiring a bill to have something to do with the federal budget in order to escape the filibuster. 
• Capitol Police + Afghan interpreters bill:
  • Senators already reached an agreement to pass a $2.1b spending bill to fund the Capitol Police and National Guard, which was also quickly passed in the House. The funding also included money to relocate thousands of the Afghan interpreters and their families in the US to hold up the US’ part of the bargain when interpreters agreed to help the military in Afghanistan. 

Federal Judiciary

• DOJ sues Texas:
  • The Justice Department filed suit against Texas and its governor, Greg Abbott, for a state executive order that bans private transportation from carrying migrants around the state who had been suspected of illegally crossing the border or could be expelled back to their home country for potentially carrying COVID under a federal immigration law called Title 42. Abbott said it was to prevent the spread of COVID, but the Republican Governor has been making many immigration-related moves that can prop him up for a 2024 presidential run, including crowdfunding the completion of a Southern border wall along Mexico. Abbott said that Texas is overrun by an influx of migrants, while Attorney General Merrick Garland said the order would make it harder for immigrants to make it to their immigration hearings. 

National

• COVID
  • The Delta variant rages through the US, bringing case counts, hospitalizations, and deaths way up from just weeks prior. In Florida alone, the state reported a new record in single-day infections, at almost 21,700 cases. Despite the rise, Florida Gov Ron DeSantis said that he would absolutely not institute COVID restrictions, signing an executive order blocking local government from requiring students to wear masks in the fall.
• Wildfires:
  • Wildfires in the Western US continue. The California Dixie Fire continued to spread, threatening almost 11k homes and having burned 190k acres. 
• Bob Moses:
  • 60s Civil Rights leader Bob Moses passed away this week at the age of 86. Moses was known for helping organize the Freedom Summer march in 1964 that sought to register voters in the South, where he was beaten, shot, and arrested by KKK-friendly cops. Moses then helped organize a math curriculum in the 80s, which he dubbed his second chapter in civil rights work, believing teaching math was a strong way to bring about equality. 
• Atlanta shootings:
  • Robert Aaron Long, the man that killed eight people during his rampage shooting up Asian spas in Atlanta, Georgia in March, pled guilty in court this week, helping him avoid the death penalty in Cherokee County, but still faces that possibility in Fulton County, where 4 of the murders were committed. 
• Police shootings:
  • New data released shows that police shootings are still continuing daily, despite the pandemic and police brutality protests. 2020 saw a record 1021 police-involved fatal shootings, as most departments still don’t use body cameras to record their encounters. The silver lining, if there is one, is that shootings are down at this point in the year as compared to this time last year. 
• California recall:
  • A recent poll for the California recall election shows that Governor Gavin Newsom may have something to worry about, after all. First Newsom’s lawyer messes up placing Newsom as a Democrat on the ballot, and now 47% of likely California voters support recalling the Governor, and 50% oppose removing him from office. 
• Olympics:
  • We have some Olympics updates, with some of our Olympians winning gold, losing, and in some cases, pulling out of the competition altogether. The latter refers to legendary young gymnast Simone Biles, who was described as brave when she pulled out of numerous competitions in gymnastics to focus on her mental health, culminating in her not taking part in the floor finals event. Advocates said that Biles instantly elevated the topic of mental health when she pulled out of her competitions, following a trend recently restarted by tennis player Naomi Osaka when she refused to talk to the press after a tennis match. Sunisa Lee, who took over from Biles, won the gold medal in the gymnastics all-around competition.
  • Olympic swimmer Katie Ledecky got a gold medal in the 8-meter freestyle race, adding to her other gold and silver medal from this year. Male Olympic swimmer Caeleb Dressel took the gold at the 100-meter butterfly competition, setting a world record for his time and nabbing a third gold medal. Dressel later upset the British when he won the gold in the 4x100 swimming medley, setting a world record.
  • The US women’s soccer team beat the Netherlands in penalty kicks, advancing to the semifinals against Canada on Monday. 
  • Tennis legend Novak Djokovic’s hopes for a Golden Slam, or receiving a gold medal in conjunction with the four Grand Slam titles he won, have been dashed as he lost in the singles tournament semifinals.
  • US pole vaulter Sam Kendricks tested positive for COVID, forcing him out of the competition. 
  • The US women’s 3x3 basketball team won the new sport’s gold medal, beating Russia 18-15.
  • Xander Schauffele took home the gold in the men’s golf competition, becoming the second American after Justin Rose to win the gold there since 2016.
• Carl Levin:
  • Former Michigan Democratic Senator Carl Levin passed away this week at the age of 87 from lung cancer, known for his 36 years of service in the Senate where he went after CEOs secret offshore profits and tax avoidance. During his time as chairman of the Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, he shed light on Apple’s $10b tax avoidance, Microsoft’s $8b tax avoidance, and Goldman Sachs’ practice of selling clients securities that the company bet would fail. 
• Mike Enzi:
  • And from Wisconsin, former Republican Senator Mike Enzi died when he was hit by a car on his bicycle in Colorado. Enzi had just recently retired from Congress after serving four terms, where he chaired the Senate Budget Committee.
• Theodore McCarrick:
  • Defrocked Catholic cardinal Theodore McCarrick has been formally charged with sex abuse of a 16-year old boy at a wedding in 1974. When abuse allegations became public in 2018, McCarrick quickly fell to Earth from becoming one of the most powerful members of the Catholic church to being expelled from the Vatican after it found McCarrick guilty in 2019.
• Black Widow lawsuit:
  • Spurring new lawsuits from actors against their movie studios, actress Scarlett Johansson is suing the Walt Disney corporation for alleged breach of contract for streaming the movie Black Widow at the same time as it was released in theaters, with Johansson saying it deprived her of properly profiting off of the motion picture. The lawsuit was later followed by other actions taken by actors like Gerard Butler for his movie Olympus Has Fallen.

And that’s it for this week’s show of THE 25TH HOUR, helping you stay on top of the 24/7 news cycle. Don’t forget to rate us on Apple Podcasts, share us with your friends, and subscribe to us wherever you get your podcasts. You can email your tips and suggestions at the25thhournews@gmail.com and become a Patron today for as low as $2 a month to support the show at patreon.com/the25thhournews! Thanks for listening, and we’ll see you next week.