Joining the panel for today's show are Mike Barnicle, Harold Ford Jr., Katty Kay, Howard Dean, Peter Alexander, Mike Allen, Mayor Ras Baraka, Wes Moore, Bianna Golodryga, Pastor Jamal Bryant, Ben Goldberger, Michael Waldman, Austan Goolsbee, Michelle Caruso-Cabrera, John Della Volpe and more
If we only had body cameras on the police officers. We would not be going through what we are going through today. The latest reports released by the Baltimore Police is that there are reports from another person in that an that was also being incarcerated that day is that Freddie Gray was bashing his head and neck on the wall of the van evidently on purpose. The autopsy report will be coming out today. Also, I don't think its a good idea for the police to investigate themselves. That should not be allowed and this needs to be changed by law. Howard Dean agrees with what i just said.
Maryland Democrat Elijah Cummings is in Baltimore tonight, and he started using a bullhorn at around 10 pm to tell people to clear out after the police-imposed curfew for protesters. Fox News reporter Leland Vittert was on the scene and asked some questions of Cummings about the protests and the new report tonight claiming Freddie Gray may have been trying to injure himself.
Sean Hannity, back in his studio, had some questions for Cummings too, but the second Cummings was informed Hannity wished to speak with him, he made his way off-camera.
Vittert kept following him, though, and Hannity used him to ask Cummings if President Obama jumped to conclusions too soon in Baltimore. And as Cummings spoke, Hannity chimed in with counter-commentary that he couldn’t hear, like claiming that Obama “lashed out against the police.”
Cummings kept shouting through his bullhorn for people to go home instead of answering more questions. Vittert kept following and at one point Cummings shouted at him through the bullhorn.
And towards the end of this segment, you can hear Cummings shouting to another Fox News personality: “Excuse me, Geraldo! Excuse me! We’re trying to make sure people go home!”
Freddie Gray could be heard banging his head against police vehicle and may have been 'intentionally trying to injure himself', report says. Freddie Gray could be heard banging his head against the wall of the police vehicle he was placed in and may have been “intentionally trying to injure himself,” according to another prisoner who also in the van
In explosive twist that will spark more anguish in an already anguished city – and which many have already dismissed - the Washington Post said that the prisoner, who has not been identified, was separated by a partition and could not see Mr Gray. However, he said could hear him as he appeared to bang his head against the wall.
The testimony is contained within within a sealed legal document related to a request for a search warrant and many will consider it too unlikely to be credible.
It has not been made public and many will perceive it to be a cover-up by police. There has been no independent confirmation of the claim and a lawyer for Mr Gray’s family rejected it.
The Post said it was given the document under the condition that the prisoner not be named because the person who provided it feared for the inmate’s safety
The newspaper said the document, written by a Baltimore police investigator, may offer the first glimpse of what might have happened inside the van. It is not clear whether any additional evidence backs up the prisoner’s version, which is just one piece of several investigations.
Mr Gray was found unconscious in the wagon when it arrived at a police station on April 12. The 25-year-old had suffered a spinal injury and died a week later, sparking waves of protests. Mr Gray’s funeral service was held earlier this week and was followed by rioting in parts of the city.
On Friday, Baltimore police are due to hand to prosecutors an initial probe into Mr Gray’s death. However, on Wednesday police said they would be making the report public, partly perhaps, as part of an effort to avoid further violence.
Jason Downs, one of the attorneys for the Mr Gray family, told the Washington Post that family had not been told of the prisoner’s comments to investigators.
“We disagree with any implication that Freddie Gray severed his own spinal cord,” said Mr Downs. “We question the accuracy of the police reports we’ve seen thus far, including the police report that says Mr Gray was arrested without force or incident.”
Freddie Gray death: New narratives question police brutality claim. Two new accounts of what happened to Freddie Gray question the narrative that has fueled protests in Baltimore -- the notion that Gray died as a result of police brutality.
The first comes from a woman close to one of the officers involved in the arrest. She told CNN the officer thinks Gray was injured while he was being arrested -- before he was put inside a police van.
The second is an account published in the Washington Post in which a prisoner who was in the van told investigators he thought Gray "was intentionally trying to injure himself."
The new twists to the story come just before Baltimore police are set to release their investigation to state prosecutors, who will decide whether charges should be filed against any officers.
Source: Officer doesn't know how Gray was hurt. The woman who spoke to CNN did so on the condition of anonymity. She is related to the officer, but said the officer didn't request the interview.
The woman told CNN that the officer doesn't know how Gray was hurt during his arrest.
She also gave an explanation of why Gray was not buckled into the police van: he appeared belligerent.
"They didn't want to reach over him. You were in a tight space in the paddy wagon. He's already irate," she said.
"He still has his teeth and he still has his saliva. So in order to seat belt somebody you have to get in their personal space. They're not going to get in his personal space if he's already irate."
Baltimore Police Commissioner Anthony Batts has said Gray should have been buckled in.
"We know he was not buckled in the transport wagon, as he should've been. No excuses for that, period," Batts said last week.
He said there was "potential" that Gray's fatal injury could have come either inside or outside the police van.
Report: Gray was trying to hurt himself, prisoner says
The Washington Post account cites an investigative document written by a Baltimore police investigator.
In it, a prisoner who was in the same police van as Gray said he could hear Gray "banging against the walls" of the van and thought Gray "was intentionally trying to injure himself."
The prisoner was separated from Gray by a metal barrier and could not see him, police have said.
The account is similar to what the police commissioner told CNN affiliate WJZ last week, when Batts said another suspect in the van heard Gray "thrashing about."
But Gray family attorney Jason Downs disputes the notion that Gray caused his own fatal injury.
"We disagree with any implication that Freddie Gray severed his own spinal cord," Downs told the Post. "We question the accuracy of the police reports we've seen thus far, including the police report that says Mr. Gray was arrested without force or incident."
Police to hand over investigation
Baltimore police said they plan to hand over findings from their investigation to state prosecutors Friday. But that's far from the end of the case.
"Let me further clear up: When we take our information or our files to the State's Attorney's Office on Friday, that is not the conclusion of this investigation," Batts said last week. "That is just us sitting down, providing all the data we have. We will continue to follow the evidence wherever it goes." Charges, if any, may not come anytime soon.
"I hate to say this, but I think if people are waiting for answers or charges to come on Friday. I don't think that's going to happen based on the way the process works," Gray family attorney Mary Koch said. "I think that the government officials need to advise people of how the process honestly works and to lower their expectations about what's going to happen this Friday." Wednesday night, protesters took to the streets Baltimore once again, demanding change and accountability for Gray's death. For the second night in a row, a 10 p.m. curfew went into effect. And for the second night in a row, the crowd dissipated peacefully, preventing a repeat of Monday night's riots. But a protest in New York City turned out differently. More than 60 people were arrested during demonstrations in Times Square.
And in Denver, police made nine arrests during a similar protest. The charges include assault of a police officer, robbery, resisting police, disobedience to lawful orders, obstructing roadways, and interference. CNN's Eliott C. McLaughlin, Rich Phillips, Dana Ford, Ed Payne and Anderson Cooper contributed to this report.
Remember when i got on the mom's case for doing what she did in public to her kid, even though i am not into parents hitting kids, I actually like this mom. I get her points. I love how honest she is and was when she said she lost it that day. She and her kid have a good dynamic. But again, it was after I heard her side of the story when I felt bad for writing that the other day. Also, that 16-year-old Baltimore teen who received the "slap heard round the world" from his mom for participating in Monday’s riots admits he’s “embarrassed.”
"I understand how much my mama really cares about me,” Michael Singleton said in an interview with ABC World News Tonight. "I just got to try to do better." Toya Graham, a single mother of six, was praised as “mom of the year” for he actions, which were caught on camera by ABC 2 News. "As long as I have a breath in my body, you will not be on the streets selling drugs,” Graham told ABC. “You’re just not going to live like that. Not with me.”
"She didn't want me to get in trouble [with the] law,” Michael acknowledged to CNN. "She didn't want me to be like another Freddie Gray."
On a total other note today, the former Christie Ally David Wildstein Set to Plead Guilty.
Bloomberg reports that David Wildstein, a former ally of New Jersey Governor Chris Christie, is set to plead guilty, according to a person with knowledge of the matter, suggesting he may be cooperating with prosecutors probing traffic jams he ordered near the George Washington Bridge.
Wildstein is scheduled to appear as early as Friday in federal court in Newark, where grand jurors heard testimony in secret for months about gridlock over four mornings in Fort Lee, New Jersey, according to the person, who requested anonymity because the matter isn’t public. The plea was originally scheduled for Thursday, the person said. The specific charges were unclear.
A plea by Wildstein, who was a top appointee at the Port Authority of New York & New Jersey, would be the first conviction for U.S. Attorney Paul Fishman in an investigation of the September 2013 lane closures. The scandal has hurt Christie’s popularity as the Republican weighs a run for the White House and tests his tough-talking image with voters in Iowa and New Hampshire. Christie denies knowledge of a plot to close two of the three local-access lanes to the world’s busiest bridge, which is run by the Port Authority. If Wildstein pleads guilty and cooperates with prosecutors, he could give them an inside view of how the plot unfolded.
‘Evidence Exists’
Fishman spokesman Matthew Reilly declined to comment. Wildstein’s lawyer, Alan Zegas, didn’t immediately return phone and e-mail messages seeking comment on the scheduled plea. Zegas has said “evidence exists” that Christie knew of the traffic jams at the time.
Once a national Republican star, Christie has tried to move past a lagging state economy and criminal and legislative probes of the scandal. An April 20 poll by Quinnipiac University found 56 percent of New Jersey voters disapprove of his performance while 38 percent gave him good marks, his lowest rating since taking office in January 2010.
Speaking to reporters Wednesday in New Brunswick, Christie reiterated what he said at a news conference Jan. 9, 2014, when he said he had no advance knowledge of the lane closures.
“I don’t expect that anything’s going to be different than what I said on Jan. 9,” Christie said. “But I can’t speculate as to what may happen or not happen. We’ll see. Whenever anything does occur, we’ll react to it. But I know what the truth is, so I’m not the least bit concerned about it.”
Christie said he won’t let the investigation affect “his political future or ability to get things done in the state.”
Cooperation
Daniel Richman, a Columbia University law professor and former federal prosecutor, said if Wildstein pleads guilty, he is likely to help the government. “In complex investigations, an early guilty plea by someone who’s implicated is often entered as part of a cooperation agreement,” said Richman. “One of the things to look for is the extent to which his guilty plea implicates others, either explicitly or by implication.”
The scandal burst into view in January 2014 with the release of an e-mail that Bridget Kelly, a former Christie deputy chief of staff, sent to Wildstein on Aug. 13, 2013, almost a month before the unannounced lane closures. “Time for some traffic problems in Fort Lee,” Kelly wrote. “Got it,” replied Wildstein, a former interstate capital projects director at the Port Authority. He ordered the lane closures and monitored their progress at the bridge on the first day.
Paralyzed
The closures paralyzed traffic in Fort Lee, delayed emergency crews and caused widespread exasperation during the first week of the school year. Mayor Mark Sokolich repeatedly sought an explanation from Bill Baroni, a former deputy executive director at the Port Authority who ignored his pleas for help. Sokolich said he was being punished, and he didn’t know why.
Wildstein and Kelly monitored the mayor’s reaction until the shutdown ended early on the fifth day. Port Authority Executive Director Patrick Foye, an appointee of New York Governor Andrew Cuomo, a Democrat, ordered the lanes reopened in an e-mail that said state and federal laws may have been broken. Baroni and Wildstein, who both said the lane closures were part of a traffic study, resigned in December 2013 as that explanation seemed more implausible amid an investigation by state lawmakers. When the Kelly e-mail surfaced in January 2014, Christie fired her and removed Bill Stepien as a political adviser.
Blindsided
Christie said he was blindsided by his aides, and he had no knowledge of the plot -- a viewpoint affirmed by a law firm he commissioned to explore the traffic jams. Gibson Dunn & Crutcher LLP and its lead lawyer, Randy Mastro, blamed the plot on Kelly and Wildstein, saying in a March 2014 report that the pair acted for an undetermined “ulterior motive” in punishing Sokolich.
At a dinner in early December 2013, Wildstein told Christie’s former press secretary, Michael Drewniak, that he discussed the lane closings with the governor during a ceremony marking the 12th anniversary of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, according to the report. “Wildstein said this as he reiterated that the lane realignment was his idea and a legitimate traffic study, and he never admitted or even suggested to Drewniak that he or anyone else had any ulterior motive,” Gibson Dunn reported.
Exchange
The exchange with Wildstein is a “reference that the governor does not recall and, even if actually made, would not have registered with the governor in any event because he knew nothing about this decision in advance and would not have considered another traffic issue at one of the bridges or tunnels to be memorable,” the report states.
Mastro’s firm charged taxpayers $7.4 million for its work. Like lawmakers, Mastro’s firm wasn’t able to question Samson, Kelly, Wildstein, Baroni or Stepien. State lawmakers spent almost a year trying to figure out what the governor and members of his administration knew and when, issuing dozens of subpoenas and holding hearings that gripped the state capital of Trenton. Their report last December also pinned blame on Kelly and Wildstein, while saying some key questions remained outstanding, including why Kelly sent Wildstein her “traffic problems” e-mail. It asked whether they acted on their own or with the knowledge and approval of anyone else.
Punitive Measure
“The evidence clearly suggests that the lane closures were intended as a punitive measure directed against Mayor Sokolich,” stated the report by the law firm Jenner & Block LLP. “What the committee cannot say for certain is whether the closures were intended as retribution for the mayor’s failure to endorse Governor Christie or some other, unknown reason.”
They acted with “perceived impunity” in an environment at the governor’s office and the Port Authority, in which they felt empowered to act with “little regard for public safety risks or the steadily mounting public frustration,” according to the report. Christie’s office “responded very slowly and passively to mounting indications that serious harms had been inflicted on thousands of New Jersey motorists for political rather than legitimate policy reasons,” according to the report.
Samson
Fishman has also been investigating the role of former Port Authority Chairman David Samson in the lane closures. He’s also looking at weekly flights that United Continental Holdings Inc. offered between Newark Liberty International Airport and Columbia Metropolitan Airport in South Carolina, about 50 miles (80 kilometers) from a house in Aiken that Samson’s wife owns.
Known to Samson and others as the “chairman’s flight,” it left Thursday afternoons and returned Monday mornings, running from September 2012 to April 2014. It ended days after Samson left the authority. Prosecutors also examined several instances in which Samson may have used his post to benefit clients of his law firm.
Fishman’s office also interviewed Dawn Zimmer, the Democratic mayor of Hoboken, New Jersey, about her claims that Christie’s administration threatened to withhold Superstorm Sandy aid if she didn’t back a redevelopment project involving Samson’s law firm, Wolff & Samson PC. The firm represented a developer seeking to build an office tower in Hoboken.
The WAPO reports about the Hillary Clinton donors that 1,100 donors to a Canadian charity tied to Clinton Foundation remain secret.
A charity affiliated with the Clinton Foundation failed to reveal the identities of its 1,100 donors, creating a broad exception to the foundation’s promise to disclose funding sources as part of an ethics agreement with the Obama administration.
The number of undisclosed contributors to the charity, the Canada-based Clinton Giustra Enterprise Partnership, signals a larger zone of secrecy around foundation donors than was previously known. Details of the organization’s fundraising were disclosed this week by a spokeswoman for the Canadian group’s founder, mining magnate Frank Giustra.
The Canadian group has received attention in recent days as a potential avenue for anonymous Clinton Foundation donations from foreign business executives, including some who had interests before the U.S. government while Hillary Rodham Clinton was secretary of state.
The partnership, named in part for Bill Clinton, sends much of its money to the New York-based Clinton Foundation. Two of the partnership’s known donors — Giustra and another mining executive, Ian Telfer — are featured in the soon-to-be-released book “Clinton Cash” for their roles in a series of deals that resulted in Russia controlling many uranium deposits around the world and in the United States.
With the foundation’s finances emerging as an issue for Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign, a foundation official this week defended the arrangement with the Giustra group, noting in a blog post that Canadian law prevents charities in that country from disclosing their donors without the donors’ permission.
The Canadian partnership has in recent days begun to reach out to its 28 largest donors, each of whom gave donations equivalent to at least $250,000 in U.S. dollars, to seek permission to release their names, said a person familiar with the foundation, who was not authorized to speak publicly about the matter.
The large number of undisclosed supporters of a Clinton-affiliated charity raises new questions about the foundation’s adherence to the 2008 ethics agreement it struck with the Obama administration, which was designed to avoid conflicts of interest during Hillary Clinton’s tenure at the State Department.
Former senator Richard G. Lugar (Ind.), who as the senior Republican on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee quizzed Hillary Clinton during her 2009 confirmation hearings about potential conflicts stemming from foundation fundraising around the world, said Tuesday that he considered such undisclosed donations to violate the spirit of the ethics agreement.
“Clearly, there was an expectation and a commitment that large donations to the Clinton Foundation would be disclosed,” Lugar said via e-mail. A spokeswoman for the Canadian group said the majority of the 1,100 donors gave small, one-time gifts while attending a 2008 fundraising gala.
A spokesman for the Clinton Foundation said the agreement did not apply to the Canadian organization, which is a separate charity based in Vancouver. The spokesman compared the group to other major charities that provide funding to the Clinton Foundation but do not themselves disclose all their donors, such as Partners in Health and the Nature Conservancy.
Clintons' personal wealth intertwined with charity(1:50)
In an analysis of public records and Clinton Foundation data, The Washington Post found that there was an overlap of Bill and Hillary Clinton's charitable work and their growing personal wealth. The Post's Rosalind S. Helderman breaks it down. (Alice Li/The Washington Post)
In the Sunday blog post, the foundation’s acting chief executive, Maura Pally, said the arrangement was “hardly an effort on our part to avoid transparency.” However, the Giustra partnership has been more intertwined with the Clintons’ $2 billion foundation than other independent charities.
It uses both the Clinton name and the logo of the Clinton Foundation. Giustra himself has given more than $30 million directly to the Clinton Foundation and sits on the organization’s board. He has separately pledged $100 million to the Clinton Giustra Enterprise Partnership, making him one of the foundation’s largest donors. Bruce Lindsey, a longtime Clinton adviser who chairs the foundation board, also sits on the board of the Canadian organization.
According to Canadian tax filings, the Clinton Giustra Enterprise Partnership (CGEP) has spent nearly $30 million in current U.S. dollars since 2007; and nearly $25 million of that spending has gone directly to the Clinton Foundation, a spokeswoman said.
Bill Clinton has also personally raised funds for the group, including at the 2008 gala, where the Canadian mining industry pledged millions for the effort. “I love this guy, and you should too,” Clinton said of Giustra that night, according to Toronto’s the Globe and Mail newspaper.
A foundation official has said the partnership was Giustra’s brainchild, born of his desire to join forces with Bill Clinton to work to alleviate poverty around the world, particularly in places where the mining industry had been present.
The partnership’s projects have included funding thousands of cataract operations for local residents in Peru and thousands more meals for starving children in Colombia, where Giustra has many investments.
A spokeswoman said the organization is active in Haiti, India, Peru, Colombia and El Salvador and is exploring expanding in Mexico, South Asia and Africa. In an interview, Giustra said his group was not dependent on the Clintons.
“I’m not doing this because of Bill Clinton,” Giustra said. “He loves what we’re doing with CGEP. But if for some reason he walked away tomorrow, I would just rename it. Call it something else and keep doing it, because I think we’re on to something really great.”
Giustra said many of the organization’s other donors are people he has met through the mining industry, where he has made his fortune, a community he saw as an untapped resource for philanthropy.
“Every year, we come up with a budget for CGEP programs,” he said. “And I make sure, by hook or by crook, that that amount is there. It has to come from me or some other means.” One controversial Clinton Giustra partnership donor is a Canadian energy company that operates oil fields in Colombia.
The company, Pacific Rubiales, has been the subject of complaints to the State Department from organized labor groups reporting alleged mistreatment of workers. Labor officials said that repeated complaints to the State Department under Clinton and her successor have not produced significant action. The counsel for Pacific Rubiales, Peter Volk, denied the allegations, saying the complaints “stemmed from a rival union to the one representing our employees.”
The company does not appear in the Clinton Foundation’s published list of donors. But it has said in a news release that it has given$3.5 million to the Clinton Giustra partnership. Rosalind Helderman is a political enterprise and investigations reporter for the Washington Post.
Tom Hamburger covers the intersection of money and politics for The Washington Post.
There is quite a debate onthe Morning Joe show about this Hillary Clinton issue. Howard Dean was just referred to as the james carville of the NorthEast. Harold Ford Jr. is saying that it is not fair to lump what happened with Bob McDonald and Bob Menendez and now that Harold says it this way. I agree. John Allen is now on the show breaking a story for POLITICO that Ken Vogel says that many Donors are now rethinking its gifting to the Clinton Foundation. Clinton Is Playing Her Fans for FoolsI once had a boss who gave me some great advice, not just for managing people but for judging politicians: You forgive mistakes; you punish patterns. Everybody screws up. But if someone won’t learn from his mistakes and try to correct his behavior, then he either doesn’t think it was a mistake, he just doesn’t care, or he thinks you’re a fool. The one indisputable takeaway from Peter Schweizer’s new book, Clinton Cash, is that Bill and Hillary Clinton fit one or all of those descriptions.
Let us recall Marc Rich, a shady billionaire indicted for tax evasion and defying trade sanctions with Iran during the U.S. hostage crisis. Rich fled to Switzerland to escape prosecution. He hired Jack Quinn, a former Clinton White House counsel, to lobby the administration for a pardon. Quinn sought help from then–deputy attorney general Eric Holder, who advised Quinn to petition the White House directly — advice Holder later regretted. On the last day of his presidency, Bill Clinton pardoned Rich.
The ensuing scandal was enormous — and bipartisan. It was widely believed that Rich had bought his pardon. Denise Rich, his ex-wife, had made huge donations to the Democratic party, including $100,000 to Hillary Clinton’s Senate campaign and $450,000 to the foundation building Bill Clinton’s presidential library.
Liberals were infuriated. “You let me down,” wrote the Washington Post’s Richard Cohen. “It’s a pie in the face of anyone who ever defended you. You may look bad, Bill, but we look just plain stupid.”
“It was a real betrayal by Bill Clinton of all who had been strongly supportive of him to do something this unjustified,” exclaimed then-Rep. Barney Frank (D., Mass.). “It was contemptuous.” Senator Patrick Leahy (D., Vt.) chastised, “It was inexcusable.” New York Times columnist Maureen Dowd suggested Clinton had “traded a constitutional power for personal benefit.” Jimmy Carter all but called it bribery and said it was “disgraceful.”
You can understand the bitterness. Democrats had defended the Clintons through Whitewater, Travel-gate, and Hillary Clinton’s billing-records shenanigans. They even defended Bill Clinton when he raised millions in re-election donations from Chinese donors and rented out the Lincoln bedroom. But this was just too much. Fool us once, shame on you. Fool us half a dozen times . . .
The Clintons said it was all a misunderstanding, which is what they always say. Quinn offered a familiar defense: “The process I followed was one of transparency.” Bill Clinton: “As far as I knew, Marc Rich and his wife were Republicans.” Hillary Clinton kept quiet. Personally, I think Jimmy Carter was right, which is not something I say often.
But let’s assume it really was just a misunderstanding. Wouldn’t a normal person — never mind a family with historic ambitions — go to great lengths to avoid even the appearance of a repeat performance? When Senator John McCain was unfairly lumped in with the “Keating Five” influence-peddling scandal, he said the dishonor was more painful than his five years in a Vietnamese prison. He dedicated himself to demonstrating the sincerity of his shame, including his decades-long — though intellectually misguided — quest to reform campaign-finance laws.
There are no allegations of pardons for sale in Schweizer’s book. After all, Bill Clinton had none to sell anymore. But the Rich scandal was equally about the wealthy buying access and influence. And though there is no clear proof that Bill Clinton illegally sold access to shady gold-mining interests in Haiti or uranium moguls in Canada, no one this side of longtime Clinton defender Lanny Davis can dispute that the Clintons have acted as if they really just didn’t care how it all looked.
As New York Magazine’s Jonathan Chait notes, the “best-case scenario” is that the Clintons have been “disorganized and greedy.” The Clinton spin on the book is that there’s not a “shred of evidence” of criminal wrongdoing, or as ABC’s George Stephanopoulos helpfully repeated over the weekend, “There’s no smoking gun.” He’s right, but not being a criminal is a remarkably low bar for a politician, even a Clinton.
The standard is that public servants should avoid even the appearance of impropriety. Not only is there three decades of evidence that the Clintons don’t think that standard applies to them, but there’s growing evidence that his biggest supporters are happy to play the fool — again. © 2015 Tribune Content Agency, LLC contributed to the last few paragraphs via real Clear Politics.
Anyway, at least we are talking about other things besides the rioting that went down in Baltimore this week/last week/over the weekend. But at the same time, I am not sure what the Clinton Foundation did wrong legally. I assume that taking money to use for the greater good from suspect donors is iffy and i agree with that but at the same time and again, I don't think there is an illegal issue here. I mean I would not work with people I feel do not fit my moral standard but that is me.
One cool thing going on now in Newark, New Jersey is that Mayor Ras Baraka (who is on the show now) has created a civilian review board in his city. This civilian review board will have power to subpoena, not discipline Newark police. City officials today announced plans to form a new civilian complaint review board that will have the power to investigate and subpoena police officers, though it will lack the authority to impose discipline of its own.
Mayor Ras Baraka, flanked by Police Director Eugene Venable and Police Chief Anthony Campos, announced his intention to draft an executive order establishing the nine-member board, which is designed to provide additional civilian oversight over the department following a scathing federal report that found it routinely engaged in excessive force and violated citizen’s constitutional rights.
“This board is a major part of our efforts to create a new relationship between our residents and police. A relationship of trust, of warmth, mutual respect, of support, understanding and a commitment to a safer Newark. A Newark where the constitutional rights of all our residents will be respected,” Baraka said.
Once established, citizens would have the option of bringing a complaint to either the board or the police department’s internal affairs unit. Board members would then conduct an independent investigation on cases brought before them, and would be able to summon the officers facing the allegations to a formal hearing.
If the board determines that punishment is warranted, it can make a recommendation to the director and chief, who will issue a final decision. Baraka said final word will not be left solely to their discretion, but will be based on a so-called discipline “matrix” that the city is in the process of drafting.
“We are contemplating adding pieces that talk about a threshold of when the police department can contradict the CCRB,” Baraka said. The board will consist of an inspector general appointed by the mayor, three members of the Municipal Council or their designees, and one chosen each of five community organizations — the American Civil Liberties Union, NAACP, People’s Organization for Progress, Ironbound Community Corporation and La Casa de Don Pedro.
Only the inspector general will be permitted to be a current or former member of the police department, Baraka said. The first inspector general will serve a three-year term and initial council appointees will serve two years, respectively, though all subsequent members will be granted one-year terms on the board.
North Ward Councilman Anibal Ramos Jr., who chairs the city's Public Safety Committee, said he had concerns over whether the board would adequately reflect the city's diverse population, though he was encouraged by its potential to help better the police department's effectiveness and reputation.
"As long as it operates within legal boundaries, the board can help build the public's trust with the police while creating more transparency," he said in a statement. Baraka's executive order is set to take effect in 30 days, during which officials plan to consult with community stakeholders and entertain potential changes, though the board is unlikely to actually begin reviewing cases until late this year at the earliest, officials said. Udi Ofer, the executive director of the ACLU's New Jersey chapter, said he was encouraged by the outline for the board, despite the lack of discipline power the organization had been hoping for.
"I don’t think anyone can question Mayor Baraka's commitment to police accountability," he said. "Community members are now looking forward to working with the mayor over the next 30 days to work on his proposal, and work out some of the kinks that are remaining, to make sure that this is a CCRB where discipline actually sticks."
People's Organization for Progress Chairman Lawrence Hamm said he hoped the board would help identify what he called a very small but harmful segment of the police force that was to blame for a long-standing rift between law enforcement and Newark citizens. "What we are trying to do now is weed out police officers that consider themselves judge, jury and executioner. Hopefully the civilian review board will be a part of that process," he said.
Back to the Baltimore issue. Why did it take so long to release that Autopsy report? First, second and third is that Freddie gray is buried. I assume that autopsy was done weeks ago and i thought it takes two days to deal with. It is a medical situation. Something should have been released. i was surprised to hear yesterday that it was still coming out. The preliminary autopsy report states that there is no findings at all that he bashed his own head and neck against the van wall. And, in essence that he killed himself in that van. besides, how does the other guy being transported know that at all since they could not see each other in that van (there was walls in between to the people being transported). I am scratching my head about why the autopsy report is not been released out yet. Now we must ask as Katy Kay just concurred is that who is this other guy making that claim (in the van). Who is the police officer that is leaking information about the autopsy? And, I also want to know what police officer leaked out the other day that the gangs were bonding together to get at the police (the day that riots begun). I think I may be wrong about the timings as to when autopsy reports get completed. Wes More says it takes weeks long to complete which then begs me to as again, how can anyone give out information about it?
BTW, I must talk about that Baseball game yesterday. How surreal was that to see? The funny thing is that they played music in between innings. They had the 7th Inning stretch then and they did the national Anthem which I get but it was weird to see. Some player was giving our make pretend autographs.
As Kwame Opam says in his article at verge, how a baseball game played for no one symbolizes what's wrong with America. The Baltimore Orioles played against the Chicago White Sox in an empty stadium today. The Orioles won, but no one was there to cheer.
The head of Major League Baseball Robert D. Manfred decided this week that it would be safer for fans that the game proceed without spectators in the stands, and the game made history for being the first ever closed to the public.
How did we get here? What does a baseball game say about the status quo in America?
On April 12th, 25-year-old Freddie Gray was arrested by Baltimore police, allegedly for possession of a switchblade. He was handcuffed and put in the back of a police van. Within the next 45-minutes, his spine was almost completely severed at the neck, leaving him in a coma. He died a week later. The police department still has not been able to explain what happened.
Baltimore's black residents, already beaten down by decades of police brutality, deserve answers. They had not received any by Monday -- the day of Gray's funeral -- when a violent riot erupted. Maryland governor Larry Hogan declared a state of emergency, bringing the national guard and police from neighboring counties and states onto the streets of Baltimore in a scene reminiscent of the events in Ferguson.
A day at the ballpark against the backdrop of a battered city is surreal, but it’s also telling. Though people are dying on our streets, our institutions would rather have us cling to a fantasy of Americana that leaves them out.Whatever good intent the MLB may have, the decision to hold the game at all was about money. Pennant races aside, the Orioles already stand to lose more than $300,000 in revenue on ticket sales alone, and would lose more if the game were canceled. But both the MLB commissioner and governor are only reacting to a flashpoint, not the actual problems afflicting communities in Baltimore. No one with a clear view of the issues can argue that financial losses at a ball game can compare to the loss of life and livelihood happening outside Camden Yards and across the country.
"We need to keep in mind people are suffering and dying around the US," Orioles COO John Angelos tweeted. "And while we are thankful no one was injured at Camden Yards, there is a far bigger picture for poor Americans in Baltimore and everywhere who don’t have jobs and are losing economic civil and legal rights. And this makes inconvenience at a ball game irrelevant in light of the needless suffering government is inflicting upon ordinary Americans."
Still, we had baseball. Men paid millions to hit a ball around a field still played, locked in a fortress, away from a calmed yet tense city still gripped by abiding desperation. There was even color commentary. But who was this game for? Certainly not for the fans — they were locked out. It wasn’t for the Baltimore just outside Camden Yards, which is currently occupied by soldiers. And it wasn’t for Freddie Gray or any one of the black and brown men and women brutalized by police, because they couldn’t watch.
So what does an empty baseball stadium mean? It means regular Americans can't sit idly by, eating hot dogs and drinking beer, while the city around them suffers. Lock-outs won't protect anyone in this crisis anymore than lock-ins.
In a speech at the White House on Tuesday, President Obama said that while we cannot excuse the criminal activities on the ground, to witness the unrest in Baltimore is to witness people rail against a system that disenfranchises them and their communities. Dismantling that system means not going back to business as usual.
"If we think that we're just going to send the police to do the dirty work of containing the problems that arise there without, as a nation and as a society, saying what can we do to change those communities, to help lift up those communities and give those kids opportunity, then we're not going to solve this problem," Obama said. "And we'll go through the same cycles of periodic conflicts between the police and communities, and the occasional riots in the streets, and everybody will feign concern until it goes away and we just go about our business as usual." Business as usual is a baseball game on any other day. It’s a game, like the one played today, that serves no one.
In Nepal, a 4 month year old kid was pulled from the rrbble after a few days and is alive today. Rescuers in Nepal have pulled a man from the wreckage of a building where he was stuck for a staggering 80 hours after the devastating earthquake that hit the country Saturday. His survival is unusual, as experts say it’s rare for injured people who are trapped to hold out for longer than 72 hours after a disaster.
The man, Rishi Khanal, was saved after a French search and rescue team found him under the rubble on the outskirts of Kathmandu, the capital, around noon Tuesday, said Pushparam K.C., a spokesman for the Armed Police Force of Nepal. The team used specialized gear that detects signs of life, he said. But it took about 10 more hours for the French team and police officers to dig him out, the spokesman said.
A police video of the rescue showed the teams drilling through concrete to reach Khanal’s location and then hauling him up through the hole. They then carried him out of the ruined building on a stretcher. “It seems he survived by sheer willpower,” said Akhilesh Shrestha, a doctor who treated Khanal, according to the Reuters news agency. Khanal, 28, was possibly suffering from a broken leg, Reuters reported.
His story of survival isn’t the only one to emerge from the terrible destruction wrought by the quake, which has killed more than 5,000 people.
An infant’s cry heard from the rubble.
A 4-month-old baby was rescued from a destroyed building in the town of Bhaktapur at least 22 hours after the quake struck, the newspaper Kathmandu Today reported. A Nepali military team had failed to notice the child during its search but returned after his cry was heard, the newspaper said.
The little boy, whose name is Sonit Awal, was reported to be in stable condition without any internal injuries, according to initial examinations. CNN hasn’t independently confirmed Sonit’s rescue, but the newspaper published photos showing the dust-caked infant being lifted by Nepali soldiers in the ruined structure. A mother trapped for 36 hours. Tanka Maya Sitoula, a 40-year-old mother of four, was at home in Kathmandu when the earthquake shook the city, bringing the five-story building down around her ground-floor apartment.
She endured 36 long hours trapped in a room before an Indian rescue team freed her. She escaped without injury, apparently protected by a beam. Sitoula says she remained confident she would survive amid the rubble. “I heard people making noise outside, so I thought I would be rescued,” she said, as she and her family sheltered on the grounds of a nearby school.
What did she do for 36 hours? “I was just lying down,” she said. “There was no room to move here and there.” Sitoula’s husband, Mahendra, a butcher, said he called out for help for hours after the quake, as he could hear her shouting in the rubble of the collapsed building. It took 18 hours before the necessary help arrived, he said. And it took another 18 hours to free her. Days beneath a collapsed seven-story building. Jon Keisi was buried for more than 60 hours under the wreckage of a seven-story building in Kathmandu that came tumbling down around him during the quake.
Rescue workers flown in from Turkey had to help carve a tunnel deep into the debris to reach him. Encased in an orange stretcher, he was lifted to safety Tuesday. But he cried out in pain after his rescuers set him down, shaking his head from side to side. One of the hard-hat-wearing search team members that crowded around him called for water.
Keisi was injured and dehydrated, but the rescuers said they were confident he would survive. CNN’s Elizabeth Joseph reported from Kathmandu, and CNN’s Jethro Mullen wrote from Hong Kong. CNN’s Ivan Watson, Tim Hume and Pamela Boykoff contributed to this report.
After Hillary's (Clinton) incredible speech this week about iour failed rug war programs and about our massive incarceration processes that have been an issue for years now, Bill Clinton is now stating that mass incarceration on my watch 'put too many people in prison'.
Ya think?
Former president Bill Clinton set the tone for tough-on-crime policies that led to the prison population rising from 847,000 people in 1992 to 1,334,000 in 2000.
Now that the damage is done, what now? We have to now pick up the pieces from that wake left behind via his wife? Is that where we are at today? Her speech though was amazing for whatever that is worth in life but again, talk to me twenty years ago to figure this one out.
Former president highlights US’s unparalleled rate of imprisonment and admits changes in policy during his two terms ‘overshot the mark’Former US president Bill Clinton has called for an end to mass incarceration, admitting that changes in penal policy that happened largely under his watch put “too many people in prison and for too long” and “overshot the mark”.
As tension remains high in Baltimore and other cities across the country over police brutality, Clinton on Tuesday highlighted the related blight that has struck many urban communities as a result of America’s unparalleled rate of imprisonment. More than 2 million people are still held in captivity in prisons and jails, giving the country 25% of the world’s prison numbers despite having only 5% of its overall population.
During Clinton’s eight years in the White House the incarceration figures saw some of their steepest rises in modern times. Though the numbers had already begun to shoot up under Ronald Reagan’s vaunted war on drugs in the 1980s, Clinton further inflated them.
When he won his first presidential election in 1992 there were 847,000 people in prison. By the time he ended his second term in 2000 that population had grown to 1,334,000.
In 1994 Clinton championed a crime bill that laid down several of the foundations of the country’s current mass incarceration malaise. Vowing to be “tough on crime” – a quality that had previously been more closely associated with the Republicans and which Clinton adopted under his “triangulation” ploy – he created incentives to individual states to build more prisons, to put more people behind bars and to keep them there for longer. His also presided over the introduction of a federal three-strikes law that brought in long sentences for habitual offenders.
Under “truth in sentencing”, states which sentenced people to long terms in prison with no chance of parole were rewarded with increased federal funds. The crime bill also enshrined a Clinton program known as COPS – Community Oriented Policing Services – in which federal money was provided to states to allow them vastly to increase the number of police officers on the streets – in turn generating more arrests and more convictions.
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In a foreword to a new book of essays compiled by the Brennan Center for Justice, Clinton stops short of giving a full mea culpa for the vast increase in prison numbers. He writes that by 1994 crime had become a major problem across the country and that “we acted to address a genuine national crisis”.
But he goes on to say that “it’s time to take a clear-eyed look at what worked, what didn’t, and what produced unintended, long-lasting consequences … Too many laws were overly broad instead of appropriately tailored. Some are in prison who shouldn’t be, others are in for too long, and without a plan to educate, train, and reintegrate them into our communities, we all suffer.”
The Brennan Center’s president, Michael Waldman, who was an adviser in the Clinton administration in the 1990s and who edited the new book, said that the crime and widespread violence that was sweeping US cities in that period inflicted untold damage to communities: “Clinton focused a lot of energy on community policing, and that has stood the test of time. But looking back with the benefit of more than two decades of experience there were consequences that have been problematic, including some of the sentencing and the building of new prisons.”
Jeremy Haile, the federal advocacy counsel for the Sentencing Project that seeks alternatives to mass incarceration, said Clinton’s comments on overstepping the mark were welcome. “President Clinton was one of the leaders calling for a tough approach to crime in the 1990s. He wasn’t alone in that, but we did see virtually every state legislature and governor adopt tough-on-crime positions around the same time.”
The Brennan Center book, Solutions: American Leaders Speak Out on Criminal Justice, captures a new mood of rare bipartisan agreement in the US where politicians are now seeking to unpick the legacy of 1980s and 1990s mass incarceration. The volume includes essays from several declared or potential presidential candidates in 2016, including Democrats Hillary Clinton, Vice-President Joe Biden and former governor of Maryland Martin O’Malley; and on the Republican side senators Ted Cruz, Rand Paul and Scott Walker.
A similar coming together of natural adversaries has been playing out across the country in recent months. Earlier this year the hyper-conservative Koch brothers joined forces with the liberal thinktank the Center for American Progress to sponsor a new criminal justice reform campaign, the Coalition for Public Safety.
Regardless of it all today, please stay in touch!
If we only had body cameras on the police officers. We would not be going through what we are going through today. The latest reports released by the Baltimore Police is that there are reports from another person in that an that was also being incarcerated that day is that Freddie Gray was bashing his head and neck on the wall of the van evidently on purpose. The autopsy report will be coming out today. Also, I don't think its a good idea for the police to investigate themselves. That should not be allowed and this needs to be changed by law. Howard Dean agrees with what i just said.
Maryland Democrat Elijah Cummings is in Baltimore tonight, and he started using a bullhorn at around 10 pm to tell people to clear out after the police-imposed curfew for protesters. Fox News reporter Leland Vittert was on the scene and asked some questions of Cummings about the protests and the new report tonight claiming Freddie Gray may have been trying to injure himself.
Sean Hannity, back in his studio, had some questions for Cummings too, but the second Cummings was informed Hannity wished to speak with him, he made his way off-camera.
Vittert kept following him, though, and Hannity used him to ask Cummings if President Obama jumped to conclusions too soon in Baltimore. And as Cummings spoke, Hannity chimed in with counter-commentary that he couldn’t hear, like claiming that Obama “lashed out against the police.”
Cummings kept shouting through his bullhorn for people to go home instead of answering more questions. Vittert kept following and at one point Cummings shouted at him through the bullhorn.
And towards the end of this segment, you can hear Cummings shouting to another Fox News personality: “Excuse me, Geraldo! Excuse me! We’re trying to make sure people go home!”
Freddie Gray could be heard banging his head against police vehicle and may have been 'intentionally trying to injure himself', report says. Freddie Gray could be heard banging his head against the wall of the police vehicle he was placed in and may have been “intentionally trying to injure himself,” according to another prisoner who also in the van
In explosive twist that will spark more anguish in an already anguished city – and which many have already dismissed - the Washington Post said that the prisoner, who has not been identified, was separated by a partition and could not see Mr Gray. However, he said could hear him as he appeared to bang his head against the wall.
The testimony is contained within within a sealed legal document related to a request for a search warrant and many will consider it too unlikely to be credible.
It has not been made public and many will perceive it to be a cover-up by police. There has been no independent confirmation of the claim and a lawyer for Mr Gray’s family rejected it.
The Post said it was given the document under the condition that the prisoner not be named because the person who provided it feared for the inmate’s safety
The newspaper said the document, written by a Baltimore police investigator, may offer the first glimpse of what might have happened inside the van. It is not clear whether any additional evidence backs up the prisoner’s version, which is just one piece of several investigations.
Mr Gray was found unconscious in the wagon when it arrived at a police station on April 12. The 25-year-old had suffered a spinal injury and died a week later, sparking waves of protests. Mr Gray’s funeral service was held earlier this week and was followed by rioting in parts of the city.
On Friday, Baltimore police are due to hand to prosecutors an initial probe into Mr Gray’s death. However, on Wednesday police said they would be making the report public, partly perhaps, as part of an effort to avoid further violence.
Jason Downs, one of the attorneys for the Mr Gray family, told the Washington Post that family had not been told of the prisoner’s comments to investigators.
“We disagree with any implication that Freddie Gray severed his own spinal cord,” said Mr Downs. “We question the accuracy of the police reports we’ve seen thus far, including the police report that says Mr Gray was arrested without force or incident.”
Freddie Gray death: New narratives question police brutality claim. Two new accounts of what happened to Freddie Gray question the narrative that has fueled protests in Baltimore -- the notion that Gray died as a result of police brutality.
The first comes from a woman close to one of the officers involved in the arrest. She told CNN the officer thinks Gray was injured while he was being arrested -- before he was put inside a police van.
The second is an account published in the Washington Post in which a prisoner who was in the van told investigators he thought Gray "was intentionally trying to injure himself."
The new twists to the story come just before Baltimore police are set to release their investigation to state prosecutors, who will decide whether charges should be filed against any officers.
Source: Officer doesn't know how Gray was hurt. The woman who spoke to CNN did so on the condition of anonymity. She is related to the officer, but said the officer didn't request the interview.
The woman told CNN that the officer doesn't know how Gray was hurt during his arrest.
She also gave an explanation of why Gray was not buckled into the police van: he appeared belligerent.
"They didn't want to reach over him. You were in a tight space in the paddy wagon. He's already irate," she said.
"He still has his teeth and he still has his saliva. So in order to seat belt somebody you have to get in their personal space. They're not going to get in his personal space if he's already irate."
Baltimore Police Commissioner Anthony Batts has said Gray should have been buckled in.
"We know he was not buckled in the transport wagon, as he should've been. No excuses for that, period," Batts said last week.
He said there was "potential" that Gray's fatal injury could have come either inside or outside the police van.
Report: Gray was trying to hurt himself, prisoner says
The Washington Post account cites an investigative document written by a Baltimore police investigator.
In it, a prisoner who was in the same police van as Gray said he could hear Gray "banging against the walls" of the van and thought Gray "was intentionally trying to injure himself."
The prisoner was separated from Gray by a metal barrier and could not see him, police have said.
The account is similar to what the police commissioner told CNN affiliate WJZ last week, when Batts said another suspect in the van heard Gray "thrashing about."
But Gray family attorney Jason Downs disputes the notion that Gray caused his own fatal injury.
"We disagree with any implication that Freddie Gray severed his own spinal cord," Downs told the Post. "We question the accuracy of the police reports we've seen thus far, including the police report that says Mr. Gray was arrested without force or incident."
Police to hand over investigation
Baltimore police said they plan to hand over findings from their investigation to state prosecutors Friday. But that's far from the end of the case.
"Let me further clear up: When we take our information or our files to the State's Attorney's Office on Friday, that is not the conclusion of this investigation," Batts said last week. "That is just us sitting down, providing all the data we have. We will continue to follow the evidence wherever it goes." Charges, if any, may not come anytime soon.
"I hate to say this, but I think if people are waiting for answers or charges to come on Friday. I don't think that's going to happen based on the way the process works," Gray family attorney Mary Koch said. "I think that the government officials need to advise people of how the process honestly works and to lower their expectations about what's going to happen this Friday." Wednesday night, protesters took to the streets Baltimore once again, demanding change and accountability for Gray's death. For the second night in a row, a 10 p.m. curfew went into effect. And for the second night in a row, the crowd dissipated peacefully, preventing a repeat of Monday night's riots. But a protest in New York City turned out differently. More than 60 people were arrested during demonstrations in Times Square.
And in Denver, police made nine arrests during a similar protest. The charges include assault of a police officer, robbery, resisting police, disobedience to lawful orders, obstructing roadways, and interference. CNN's Eliott C. McLaughlin, Rich Phillips, Dana Ford, Ed Payne and Anderson Cooper contributed to this report.
Remember when i got on the mom's case for doing what she did in public to her kid, even though i am not into parents hitting kids, I actually like this mom. I get her points. I love how honest she is and was when she said she lost it that day. She and her kid have a good dynamic. But again, it was after I heard her side of the story when I felt bad for writing that the other day. Also, that 16-year-old Baltimore teen who received the "slap heard round the world" from his mom for participating in Monday’s riots admits he’s “embarrassed.”
"I understand how much my mama really cares about me,” Michael Singleton said in an interview with ABC World News Tonight. "I just got to try to do better." Toya Graham, a single mother of six, was praised as “mom of the year” for he actions, which were caught on camera by ABC 2 News. "As long as I have a breath in my body, you will not be on the streets selling drugs,” Graham told ABC. “You’re just not going to live like that. Not with me.”
"She didn't want me to get in trouble [with the] law,” Michael acknowledged to CNN. "She didn't want me to be like another Freddie Gray."
Wildstein is scheduled to appear as early as Friday in federal court in Newark, where grand jurors heard testimony in secret for months about gridlock over four mornings in Fort Lee, New Jersey, according to the person, who requested anonymity because the matter isn’t public. The plea was originally scheduled for Thursday, the person said. The specific charges were unclear.
A plea by Wildstein, who was a top appointee at the Port Authority of New York & New Jersey, would be the first conviction for U.S. Attorney Paul Fishman in an investigation of the September 2013 lane closures. The scandal has hurt Christie’s popularity as the Republican weighs a run for the White House and tests his tough-talking image with voters in Iowa and New Hampshire. Christie denies knowledge of a plot to close two of the three local-access lanes to the world’s busiest bridge, which is run by the Port Authority. If Wildstein pleads guilty and cooperates with prosecutors, he could give them an inside view of how the plot unfolded.
‘Evidence Exists’
Fishman spokesman Matthew Reilly declined to comment. Wildstein’s lawyer, Alan Zegas, didn’t immediately return phone and e-mail messages seeking comment on the scheduled plea. Zegas has said “evidence exists” that Christie knew of the traffic jams at the time.
Once a national Republican star, Christie has tried to move past a lagging state economy and criminal and legislative probes of the scandal. An April 20 poll by Quinnipiac University found 56 percent of New Jersey voters disapprove of his performance while 38 percent gave him good marks, his lowest rating since taking office in January 2010.
Speaking to reporters Wednesday in New Brunswick, Christie reiterated what he said at a news conference Jan. 9, 2014, when he said he had no advance knowledge of the lane closures.
“I don’t expect that anything’s going to be different than what I said on Jan. 9,” Christie said. “But I can’t speculate as to what may happen or not happen. We’ll see. Whenever anything does occur, we’ll react to it. But I know what the truth is, so I’m not the least bit concerned about it.”
Christie said he won’t let the investigation affect “his political future or ability to get things done in the state.”
Cooperation
Daniel Richman, a Columbia University law professor and former federal prosecutor, said if Wildstein pleads guilty, he is likely to help the government. “In complex investigations, an early guilty plea by someone who’s implicated is often entered as part of a cooperation agreement,” said Richman. “One of the things to look for is the extent to which his guilty plea implicates others, either explicitly or by implication.”
The scandal burst into view in January 2014 with the release of an e-mail that Bridget Kelly, a former Christie deputy chief of staff, sent to Wildstein on Aug. 13, 2013, almost a month before the unannounced lane closures. “Time for some traffic problems in Fort Lee,” Kelly wrote. “Got it,” replied Wildstein, a former interstate capital projects director at the Port Authority. He ordered the lane closures and monitored their progress at the bridge on the first day.
Paralyzed
The closures paralyzed traffic in Fort Lee, delayed emergency crews and caused widespread exasperation during the first week of the school year. Mayor Mark Sokolich repeatedly sought an explanation from Bill Baroni, a former deputy executive director at the Port Authority who ignored his pleas for help. Sokolich said he was being punished, and he didn’t know why.
Wildstein and Kelly monitored the mayor’s reaction until the shutdown ended early on the fifth day. Port Authority Executive Director Patrick Foye, an appointee of New York Governor Andrew Cuomo, a Democrat, ordered the lanes reopened in an e-mail that said state and federal laws may have been broken. Baroni and Wildstein, who both said the lane closures were part of a traffic study, resigned in December 2013 as that explanation seemed more implausible amid an investigation by state lawmakers. When the Kelly e-mail surfaced in January 2014, Christie fired her and removed Bill Stepien as a political adviser.
Blindsided
Christie said he was blindsided by his aides, and he had no knowledge of the plot -- a viewpoint affirmed by a law firm he commissioned to explore the traffic jams. Gibson Dunn & Crutcher LLP and its lead lawyer, Randy Mastro, blamed the plot on Kelly and Wildstein, saying in a March 2014 report that the pair acted for an undetermined “ulterior motive” in punishing Sokolich.
At a dinner in early December 2013, Wildstein told Christie’s former press secretary, Michael Drewniak, that he discussed the lane closings with the governor during a ceremony marking the 12th anniversary of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, according to the report. “Wildstein said this as he reiterated that the lane realignment was his idea and a legitimate traffic study, and he never admitted or even suggested to Drewniak that he or anyone else had any ulterior motive,” Gibson Dunn reported.
Exchange
The exchange with Wildstein is a “reference that the governor does not recall and, even if actually made, would not have registered with the governor in any event because he knew nothing about this decision in advance and would not have considered another traffic issue at one of the bridges or tunnels to be memorable,” the report states.
Mastro’s firm charged taxpayers $7.4 million for its work. Like lawmakers, Mastro’s firm wasn’t able to question Samson, Kelly, Wildstein, Baroni or Stepien. State lawmakers spent almost a year trying to figure out what the governor and members of his administration knew and when, issuing dozens of subpoenas and holding hearings that gripped the state capital of Trenton. Their report last December also pinned blame on Kelly and Wildstein, while saying some key questions remained outstanding, including why Kelly sent Wildstein her “traffic problems” e-mail. It asked whether they acted on their own or with the knowledge and approval of anyone else.
Punitive Measure
“The evidence clearly suggests that the lane closures were intended as a punitive measure directed against Mayor Sokolich,” stated the report by the law firm Jenner & Block LLP. “What the committee cannot say for certain is whether the closures were intended as retribution for the mayor’s failure to endorse Governor Christie or some other, unknown reason.”
They acted with “perceived impunity” in an environment at the governor’s office and the Port Authority, in which they felt empowered to act with “little regard for public safety risks or the steadily mounting public frustration,” according to the report. Christie’s office “responded very slowly and passively to mounting indications that serious harms had been inflicted on thousands of New Jersey motorists for political rather than legitimate policy reasons,” according to the report.
Samson
Fishman has also been investigating the role of former Port Authority Chairman David Samson in the lane closures. He’s also looking at weekly flights that United Continental Holdings Inc. offered between Newark Liberty International Airport and Columbia Metropolitan Airport in South Carolina, about 50 miles (80 kilometers) from a house in Aiken that Samson’s wife owns.
Known to Samson and others as the “chairman’s flight,” it left Thursday afternoons and returned Monday mornings, running from September 2012 to April 2014. It ended days after Samson left the authority. Prosecutors also examined several instances in which Samson may have used his post to benefit clients of his law firm.
Fishman’s office also interviewed Dawn Zimmer, the Democratic mayor of Hoboken, New Jersey, about her claims that Christie’s administration threatened to withhold Superstorm Sandy aid if she didn’t back a redevelopment project involving Samson’s law firm, Wolff & Samson PC. The firm represented a developer seeking to build an office tower in Hoboken.
The WAPO reports about the Hillary Clinton donors that 1,100 donors to a Canadian charity tied to Clinton Foundation remain secret.
A charity affiliated with the Clinton Foundation failed to reveal the identities of its 1,100 donors, creating a broad exception to the foundation’s promise to disclose funding sources as part of an ethics agreement with the Obama administration.
The number of undisclosed contributors to the charity, the Canada-based Clinton Giustra Enterprise Partnership, signals a larger zone of secrecy around foundation donors than was previously known. Details of the organization’s fundraising were disclosed this week by a spokeswoman for the Canadian group’s founder, mining magnate Frank Giustra.
The Canadian group has received attention in recent days as a potential avenue for anonymous Clinton Foundation donations from foreign business executives, including some who had interests before the U.S. government while Hillary Rodham Clinton was secretary of state.
The partnership, named in part for Bill Clinton, sends much of its money to the New York-based Clinton Foundation. Two of the partnership’s known donors — Giustra and another mining executive, Ian Telfer — are featured in the soon-to-be-released book “Clinton Cash” for their roles in a series of deals that resulted in Russia controlling many uranium deposits around the world and in the United States.
With the foundation’s finances emerging as an issue for Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign, a foundation official this week defended the arrangement with the Giustra group, noting in a blog post that Canadian law prevents charities in that country from disclosing their donors without the donors’ permission.
The Canadian partnership has in recent days begun to reach out to its 28 largest donors, each of whom gave donations equivalent to at least $250,000 in U.S. dollars, to seek permission to release their names, said a person familiar with the foundation, who was not authorized to speak publicly about the matter.
The large number of undisclosed supporters of a Clinton-affiliated charity raises new questions about the foundation’s adherence to the 2008 ethics agreement it struck with the Obama administration, which was designed to avoid conflicts of interest during Hillary Clinton’s tenure at the State Department.
Former senator Richard G. Lugar (Ind.), who as the senior Republican on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee quizzed Hillary Clinton during her 2009 confirmation hearings about potential conflicts stemming from foundation fundraising around the world, said Tuesday that he considered such undisclosed donations to violate the spirit of the ethics agreement.
“Clearly, there was an expectation and a commitment that large donations to the Clinton Foundation would be disclosed,” Lugar said via e-mail. A spokeswoman for the Canadian group said the majority of the 1,100 donors gave small, one-time gifts while attending a 2008 fundraising gala.
A spokesman for the Clinton Foundation said the agreement did not apply to the Canadian organization, which is a separate charity based in Vancouver. The spokesman compared the group to other major charities that provide funding to the Clinton Foundation but do not themselves disclose all their donors, such as Partners in Health and the Nature Conservancy.
Clintons' personal wealth intertwined with charity(1:50)
In an analysis of public records and Clinton Foundation data, The Washington Post found that there was an overlap of Bill and Hillary Clinton's charitable work and their growing personal wealth. The Post's Rosalind S. Helderman breaks it down. (Alice Li/The Washington Post)
In the Sunday blog post, the foundation’s acting chief executive, Maura Pally, said the arrangement was “hardly an effort on our part to avoid transparency.” However, the Giustra partnership has been more intertwined with the Clintons’ $2 billion foundation than other independent charities.
It uses both the Clinton name and the logo of the Clinton Foundation. Giustra himself has given more than $30 million directly to the Clinton Foundation and sits on the organization’s board. He has separately pledged $100 million to the Clinton Giustra Enterprise Partnership, making him one of the foundation’s largest donors. Bruce Lindsey, a longtime Clinton adviser who chairs the foundation board, also sits on the board of the Canadian organization.
According to Canadian tax filings, the Clinton Giustra Enterprise Partnership (CGEP) has spent nearly $30 million in current U.S. dollars since 2007; and nearly $25 million of that spending has gone directly to the Clinton Foundation, a spokeswoman said.
Bill Clinton has also personally raised funds for the group, including at the 2008 gala, where the Canadian mining industry pledged millions for the effort. “I love this guy, and you should too,” Clinton said of Giustra that night, according to Toronto’s the Globe and Mail newspaper.
A foundation official has said the partnership was Giustra’s brainchild, born of his desire to join forces with Bill Clinton to work to alleviate poverty around the world, particularly in places where the mining industry had been present.
The partnership’s projects have included funding thousands of cataract operations for local residents in Peru and thousands more meals for starving children in Colombia, where Giustra has many investments.
A spokeswoman said the organization is active in Haiti, India, Peru, Colombia and El Salvador and is exploring expanding in Mexico, South Asia and Africa. In an interview, Giustra said his group was not dependent on the Clintons.
“I’m not doing this because of Bill Clinton,” Giustra said. “He loves what we’re doing with CGEP. But if for some reason he walked away tomorrow, I would just rename it. Call it something else and keep doing it, because I think we’re on to something really great.”
Giustra said many of the organization’s other donors are people he has met through the mining industry, where he has made his fortune, a community he saw as an untapped resource for philanthropy.
“Every year, we come up with a budget for CGEP programs,” he said. “And I make sure, by hook or by crook, that that amount is there. It has to come from me or some other means.” One controversial Clinton Giustra partnership donor is a Canadian energy company that operates oil fields in Colombia.
The company, Pacific Rubiales, has been the subject of complaints to the State Department from organized labor groups reporting alleged mistreatment of workers. Labor officials said that repeated complaints to the State Department under Clinton and her successor have not produced significant action. The counsel for Pacific Rubiales, Peter Volk, denied the allegations, saying the complaints “stemmed from a rival union to the one representing our employees.”
The company does not appear in the Clinton Foundation’s published list of donors. But it has said in a news release that it has given$3.5 million to the Clinton Giustra partnership. Rosalind Helderman is a political enterprise and investigations reporter for the Washington Post.
Tom Hamburger covers the intersection of money and politics for The Washington Post.
There is quite a debate onthe Morning Joe show about this Hillary Clinton issue. Howard Dean was just referred to as the james carville of the NorthEast. Harold Ford Jr. is saying that it is not fair to lump what happened with Bob McDonald and Bob Menendez and now that Harold says it this way. I agree. John Allen is now on the show breaking a story for POLITICO that Ken Vogel says that many Donors are now rethinking its gifting to the Clinton Foundation. Clinton Is Playing Her Fans for FoolsI once had a boss who gave me some great advice, not just for managing people but for judging politicians: You forgive mistakes; you punish patterns. Everybody screws up. But if someone won’t learn from his mistakes and try to correct his behavior, then he either doesn’t think it was a mistake, he just doesn’t care, or he thinks you’re a fool. The one indisputable takeaway from Peter Schweizer’s new book, Clinton Cash, is that Bill and Hillary Clinton fit one or all of those descriptions.
Let us recall Marc Rich, a shady billionaire indicted for tax evasion and defying trade sanctions with Iran during the U.S. hostage crisis. Rich fled to Switzerland to escape prosecution. He hired Jack Quinn, a former Clinton White House counsel, to lobby the administration for a pardon. Quinn sought help from then–deputy attorney general Eric Holder, who advised Quinn to petition the White House directly — advice Holder later regretted. On the last day of his presidency, Bill Clinton pardoned Rich.
The ensuing scandal was enormous — and bipartisan. It was widely believed that Rich had bought his pardon. Denise Rich, his ex-wife, had made huge donations to the Democratic party, including $100,000 to Hillary Clinton’s Senate campaign and $450,000 to the foundation building Bill Clinton’s presidential library.
Liberals were infuriated. “You let me down,” wrote the Washington Post’s Richard Cohen. “It’s a pie in the face of anyone who ever defended you. You may look bad, Bill, but we look just plain stupid.”
“It was a real betrayal by Bill Clinton of all who had been strongly supportive of him to do something this unjustified,” exclaimed then-Rep. Barney Frank (D., Mass.). “It was contemptuous.” Senator Patrick Leahy (D., Vt.) chastised, “It was inexcusable.” New York Times columnist Maureen Dowd suggested Clinton had “traded a constitutional power for personal benefit.” Jimmy Carter all but called it bribery and said it was “disgraceful.”
You can understand the bitterness. Democrats had defended the Clintons through Whitewater, Travel-gate, and Hillary Clinton’s billing-records shenanigans. They even defended Bill Clinton when he raised millions in re-election donations from Chinese donors and rented out the Lincoln bedroom. But this was just too much. Fool us once, shame on you. Fool us half a dozen times . . .
The Clintons said it was all a misunderstanding, which is what they always say. Quinn offered a familiar defense: “The process I followed was one of transparency.” Bill Clinton: “As far as I knew, Marc Rich and his wife were Republicans.” Hillary Clinton kept quiet. Personally, I think Jimmy Carter was right, which is not something I say often.
But let’s assume it really was just a misunderstanding. Wouldn’t a normal person — never mind a family with historic ambitions — go to great lengths to avoid even the appearance of a repeat performance? When Senator John McCain was unfairly lumped in with the “Keating Five” influence-peddling scandal, he said the dishonor was more painful than his five years in a Vietnamese prison. He dedicated himself to demonstrating the sincerity of his shame, including his decades-long — though intellectually misguided — quest to reform campaign-finance laws.
There are no allegations of pardons for sale in Schweizer’s book. After all, Bill Clinton had none to sell anymore. But the Rich scandal was equally about the wealthy buying access and influence. And though there is no clear proof that Bill Clinton illegally sold access to shady gold-mining interests in Haiti or uranium moguls in Canada, no one this side of longtime Clinton defender Lanny Davis can dispute that the Clintons have acted as if they really just didn’t care how it all looked.
As New York Magazine’s Jonathan Chait notes, the “best-case scenario” is that the Clintons have been “disorganized and greedy.” The Clinton spin on the book is that there’s not a “shred of evidence” of criminal wrongdoing, or as ABC’s George Stephanopoulos helpfully repeated over the weekend, “There’s no smoking gun.” He’s right, but not being a criminal is a remarkably low bar for a politician, even a Clinton.
The standard is that public servants should avoid even the appearance of impropriety. Not only is there three decades of evidence that the Clintons don’t think that standard applies to them, but there’s growing evidence that his biggest supporters are happy to play the fool — again. © 2015 Tribune Content Agency, LLC contributed to the last few paragraphs via real Clear Politics.
Anyway, at least we are talking about other things besides the rioting that went down in Baltimore this week/last week/over the weekend. But at the same time, I am not sure what the Clinton Foundation did wrong legally. I assume that taking money to use for the greater good from suspect donors is iffy and i agree with that but at the same time and again, I don't think there is an illegal issue here. I mean I would not work with people I feel do not fit my moral standard but that is me.
One cool thing going on now in Newark, New Jersey is that Mayor Ras Baraka (who is on the show now) has created a civilian review board in his city. This civilian review board will have power to subpoena, not discipline Newark police. City officials today announced plans to form a new civilian complaint review board that will have the power to investigate and subpoena police officers, though it will lack the authority to impose discipline of its own.
Mayor Ras Baraka, flanked by Police Director Eugene Venable and Police Chief Anthony Campos, announced his intention to draft an executive order establishing the nine-member board, which is designed to provide additional civilian oversight over the department following a scathing federal report that found it routinely engaged in excessive force and violated citizen’s constitutional rights.
“This board is a major part of our efforts to create a new relationship between our residents and police. A relationship of trust, of warmth, mutual respect, of support, understanding and a commitment to a safer Newark. A Newark where the constitutional rights of all our residents will be respected,” Baraka said.
Once established, citizens would have the option of bringing a complaint to either the board or the police department’s internal affairs unit. Board members would then conduct an independent investigation on cases brought before them, and would be able to summon the officers facing the allegations to a formal hearing.
If the board determines that punishment is warranted, it can make a recommendation to the director and chief, who will issue a final decision. Baraka said final word will not be left solely to their discretion, but will be based on a so-called discipline “matrix” that the city is in the process of drafting.
“We are contemplating adding pieces that talk about a threshold of when the police department can contradict the CCRB,” Baraka said. The board will consist of an inspector general appointed by the mayor, three members of the Municipal Council or their designees, and one chosen each of five community organizations — the American Civil Liberties Union, NAACP, People’s Organization for Progress, Ironbound Community Corporation and La Casa de Don Pedro.
Only the inspector general will be permitted to be a current or former member of the police department, Baraka said. The first inspector general will serve a three-year term and initial council appointees will serve two years, respectively, though all subsequent members will be granted one-year terms on the board.
North Ward Councilman Anibal Ramos Jr., who chairs the city's Public Safety Committee, said he had concerns over whether the board would adequately reflect the city's diverse population, though he was encouraged by its potential to help better the police department's effectiveness and reputation.
"As long as it operates within legal boundaries, the board can help build the public's trust with the police while creating more transparency," he said in a statement. Baraka's executive order is set to take effect in 30 days, during which officials plan to consult with community stakeholders and entertain potential changes, though the board is unlikely to actually begin reviewing cases until late this year at the earliest, officials said. Udi Ofer, the executive director of the ACLU's New Jersey chapter, said he was encouraged by the outline for the board, despite the lack of discipline power the organization had been hoping for.
"I don’t think anyone can question Mayor Baraka's commitment to police accountability," he said. "Community members are now looking forward to working with the mayor over the next 30 days to work on his proposal, and work out some of the kinks that are remaining, to make sure that this is a CCRB where discipline actually sticks."
People's Organization for Progress Chairman Lawrence Hamm said he hoped the board would help identify what he called a very small but harmful segment of the police force that was to blame for a long-standing rift between law enforcement and Newark citizens. "What we are trying to do now is weed out police officers that consider themselves judge, jury and executioner. Hopefully the civilian review board will be a part of that process," he said.
Back to the Baltimore issue. Why did it take so long to release that Autopsy report? First, second and third is that Freddie gray is buried. I assume that autopsy was done weeks ago and i thought it takes two days to deal with. It is a medical situation. Something should have been released. i was surprised to hear yesterday that it was still coming out. The preliminary autopsy report states that there is no findings at all that he bashed his own head and neck against the van wall. And, in essence that he killed himself in that van. besides, how does the other guy being transported know that at all since they could not see each other in that van (there was walls in between to the people being transported). I am scratching my head about why the autopsy report is not been released out yet. Now we must ask as Katy Kay just concurred is that who is this other guy making that claim (in the van). Who is the police officer that is leaking information about the autopsy? And, I also want to know what police officer leaked out the other day that the gangs were bonding together to get at the police (the day that riots begun). I think I may be wrong about the timings as to when autopsy reports get completed. Wes More says it takes weeks long to complete which then begs me to as again, how can anyone give out information about it?
BTW, I must talk about that Baseball game yesterday. How surreal was that to see? The funny thing is that they played music in between innings. They had the 7th Inning stretch then and they did the national Anthem which I get but it was weird to see. Some player was giving our make pretend autographs.
As Kwame Opam says in his article at verge, how a baseball game played for no one symbolizes what's wrong with America. The Baltimore Orioles played against the Chicago White Sox in an empty stadium today. The Orioles won, but no one was there to cheer.
The head of Major League Baseball Robert D. Manfred decided this week that it would be safer for fans that the game proceed without spectators in the stands, and the game made history for being the first ever closed to the public.
How did we get here? What does a baseball game say about the status quo in America?
On April 12th, 25-year-old Freddie Gray was arrested by Baltimore police, allegedly for possession of a switchblade. He was handcuffed and put in the back of a police van. Within the next 45-minutes, his spine was almost completely severed at the neck, leaving him in a coma. He died a week later. The police department still has not been able to explain what happened.
Baltimore's black residents, already beaten down by decades of police brutality, deserve answers. They had not received any by Monday -- the day of Gray's funeral -- when a violent riot erupted. Maryland governor Larry Hogan declared a state of emergency, bringing the national guard and police from neighboring counties and states onto the streets of Baltimore in a scene reminiscent of the events in Ferguson.
A day at the ballpark against the backdrop of a battered city is surreal, but it’s also telling. Though people are dying on our streets, our institutions would rather have us cling to a fantasy of Americana that leaves them out.Whatever good intent the MLB may have, the decision to hold the game at all was about money. Pennant races aside, the Orioles already stand to lose more than $300,000 in revenue on ticket sales alone, and would lose more if the game were canceled. But both the MLB commissioner and governor are only reacting to a flashpoint, not the actual problems afflicting communities in Baltimore. No one with a clear view of the issues can argue that financial losses at a ball game can compare to the loss of life and livelihood happening outside Camden Yards and across the country.
"We need to keep in mind people are suffering and dying around the US," Orioles COO John Angelos tweeted. "And while we are thankful no one was injured at Camden Yards, there is a far bigger picture for poor Americans in Baltimore and everywhere who don’t have jobs and are losing economic civil and legal rights. And this makes inconvenience at a ball game irrelevant in light of the needless suffering government is inflicting upon ordinary Americans."
Still, we had baseball. Men paid millions to hit a ball around a field still played, locked in a fortress, away from a calmed yet tense city still gripped by abiding desperation. There was even color commentary. But who was this game for? Certainly not for the fans — they were locked out. It wasn’t for the Baltimore just outside Camden Yards, which is currently occupied by soldiers. And it wasn’t for Freddie Gray or any one of the black and brown men and women brutalized by police, because they couldn’t watch.
So what does an empty baseball stadium mean? It means regular Americans can't sit idly by, eating hot dogs and drinking beer, while the city around them suffers. Lock-outs won't protect anyone in this crisis anymore than lock-ins.
In a speech at the White House on Tuesday, President Obama said that while we cannot excuse the criminal activities on the ground, to witness the unrest in Baltimore is to witness people rail against a system that disenfranchises them and their communities. Dismantling that system means not going back to business as usual.
"If we think that we're just going to send the police to do the dirty work of containing the problems that arise there without, as a nation and as a society, saying what can we do to change those communities, to help lift up those communities and give those kids opportunity, then we're not going to solve this problem," Obama said. "And we'll go through the same cycles of periodic conflicts between the police and communities, and the occasional riots in the streets, and everybody will feign concern until it goes away and we just go about our business as usual." Business as usual is a baseball game on any other day. It’s a game, like the one played today, that serves no one.
In Nepal, a 4 month year old kid was pulled from the rrbble after a few days and is alive today. Rescuers in Nepal have pulled a man from the wreckage of a building where he was stuck for a staggering 80 hours after the devastating earthquake that hit the country Saturday. His survival is unusual, as experts say it’s rare for injured people who are trapped to hold out for longer than 72 hours after a disaster.
The man, Rishi Khanal, was saved after a French search and rescue team found him under the rubble on the outskirts of Kathmandu, the capital, around noon Tuesday, said Pushparam K.C., a spokesman for the Armed Police Force of Nepal. The team used specialized gear that detects signs of life, he said. But it took about 10 more hours for the French team and police officers to dig him out, the spokesman said.
A police video of the rescue showed the teams drilling through concrete to reach Khanal’s location and then hauling him up through the hole. They then carried him out of the ruined building on a stretcher. “It seems he survived by sheer willpower,” said Akhilesh Shrestha, a doctor who treated Khanal, according to the Reuters news agency. Khanal, 28, was possibly suffering from a broken leg, Reuters reported.
His story of survival isn’t the only one to emerge from the terrible destruction wrought by the quake, which has killed more than 5,000 people.
An infant’s cry heard from the rubble.
The little boy, whose name is Sonit Awal, was reported to be in stable condition without any internal injuries, according to initial examinations. CNN hasn’t independently confirmed Sonit’s rescue, but the newspaper published photos showing the dust-caked infant being lifted by Nepali soldiers in the ruined structure. A mother trapped for 36 hours. Tanka Maya Sitoula, a 40-year-old mother of four, was at home in Kathmandu when the earthquake shook the city, bringing the five-story building down around her ground-floor apartment.
She endured 36 long hours trapped in a room before an Indian rescue team freed her. She escaped without injury, apparently protected by a beam. Sitoula says she remained confident she would survive amid the rubble. “I heard people making noise outside, so I thought I would be rescued,” she said, as she and her family sheltered on the grounds of a nearby school.
What did she do for 36 hours? “I was just lying down,” she said. “There was no room to move here and there.” Sitoula’s husband, Mahendra, a butcher, said he called out for help for hours after the quake, as he could hear her shouting in the rubble of the collapsed building. It took 18 hours before the necessary help arrived, he said. And it took another 18 hours to free her. Days beneath a collapsed seven-story building. Jon Keisi was buried for more than 60 hours under the wreckage of a seven-story building in Kathmandu that came tumbling down around him during the quake.
Rescue workers flown in from Turkey had to help carve a tunnel deep into the debris to reach him. Encased in an orange stretcher, he was lifted to safety Tuesday. But he cried out in pain after his rescuers set him down, shaking his head from side to side. One of the hard-hat-wearing search team members that crowded around him called for water.
Keisi was injured and dehydrated, but the rescuers said they were confident he would survive. CNN’s Elizabeth Joseph reported from Kathmandu, and CNN’s Jethro Mullen wrote from Hong Kong. CNN’s Ivan Watson, Tim Hume and Pamela Boykoff contributed to this report.
After Hillary's (Clinton) incredible speech this week about iour failed rug war programs and about our massive incarceration processes that have been an issue for years now, Bill Clinton is now stating that mass incarceration on my watch 'put too many people in prison'.
Ya think?
Former president Bill Clinton set the tone for tough-on-crime policies that led to the prison population rising from 847,000 people in 1992 to 1,334,000 in 2000.
Now that the damage is done, what now? We have to now pick up the pieces from that wake left behind via his wife? Is that where we are at today? Her speech though was amazing for whatever that is worth in life but again, talk to me twenty years ago to figure this one out.
Former president highlights US’s unparalleled rate of imprisonment and admits changes in policy during his two terms ‘overshot the mark’Former US president Bill Clinton has called for an end to mass incarceration, admitting that changes in penal policy that happened largely under his watch put “too many people in prison and for too long” and “overshot the mark”.
As tension remains high in Baltimore and other cities across the country over police brutality, Clinton on Tuesday highlighted the related blight that has struck many urban communities as a result of America’s unparalleled rate of imprisonment. More than 2 million people are still held in captivity in prisons and jails, giving the country 25% of the world’s prison numbers despite having only 5% of its overall population.
During Clinton’s eight years in the White House the incarceration figures saw some of their steepest rises in modern times. Though the numbers had already begun to shoot up under Ronald Reagan’s vaunted war on drugs in the 1980s, Clinton further inflated them.
When he won his first presidential election in 1992 there were 847,000 people in prison. By the time he ended his second term in 2000 that population had grown to 1,334,000.
In 1994 Clinton championed a crime bill that laid down several of the foundations of the country’s current mass incarceration malaise. Vowing to be “tough on crime” – a quality that had previously been more closely associated with the Republicans and which Clinton adopted under his “triangulation” ploy – he created incentives to individual states to build more prisons, to put more people behind bars and to keep them there for longer. His also presided over the introduction of a federal three-strikes law that brought in long sentences for habitual offenders.
Under “truth in sentencing”, states which sentenced people to long terms in prison with no chance of parole were rewarded with increased federal funds. The crime bill also enshrined a Clinton program known as COPS – Community Oriented Policing Services – in which federal money was provided to states to allow them vastly to increase the number of police officers on the streets – in turn generating more arrests and more convictions.
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In a foreword to a new book of essays compiled by the Brennan Center for Justice, Clinton stops short of giving a full mea culpa for the vast increase in prison numbers. He writes that by 1994 crime had become a major problem across the country and that “we acted to address a genuine national crisis”.
But he goes on to say that “it’s time to take a clear-eyed look at what worked, what didn’t, and what produced unintended, long-lasting consequences … Too many laws were overly broad instead of appropriately tailored. Some are in prison who shouldn’t be, others are in for too long, and without a plan to educate, train, and reintegrate them into our communities, we all suffer.”
The Brennan Center’s president, Michael Waldman, who was an adviser in the Clinton administration in the 1990s and who edited the new book, said that the crime and widespread violence that was sweeping US cities in that period inflicted untold damage to communities: “Clinton focused a lot of energy on community policing, and that has stood the test of time. But looking back with the benefit of more than two decades of experience there were consequences that have been problematic, including some of the sentencing and the building of new prisons.”
Jeremy Haile, the federal advocacy counsel for the Sentencing Project that seeks alternatives to mass incarceration, said Clinton’s comments on overstepping the mark were welcome. “President Clinton was one of the leaders calling for a tough approach to crime in the 1990s. He wasn’t alone in that, but we did see virtually every state legislature and governor adopt tough-on-crime positions around the same time.”
The Brennan Center book, Solutions: American Leaders Speak Out on Criminal Justice, captures a new mood of rare bipartisan agreement in the US where politicians are now seeking to unpick the legacy of 1980s and 1990s mass incarceration. The volume includes essays from several declared or potential presidential candidates in 2016, including Democrats Hillary Clinton, Vice-President Joe Biden and former governor of Maryland Martin O’Malley; and on the Republican side senators Ted Cruz, Rand Paul and Scott Walker.
A similar coming together of natural adversaries has been playing out across the country in recent months. Earlier this year the hyper-conservative Koch brothers joined forces with the liberal thinktank the Center for American Progress to sponsor a new criminal justice reform campaign, the Coalition for Public Safety.
Regardless of it all today, please stay in touch!
