NEW YORK (AP) — NBC News agreed to put President Donald Trump before voters in a town hall event on Thursday after the president submitted to an independent coronavirus test with the results reviewed by Dr. Anthony Fauci.

The announcement Wednesday sets up dueling town halls with Democratic opponent Joe Biden on a night the two candidates were supposed to meet for their second debate. Biden is appearing on a similar town hall event in Philadelphia, televised by ABC.

It also subjected NBC News to a sharp backlash on social media, where a call to boycott the network was a trending topic on Twitter.

NBC said Trump would be at least 12 feet (3.66 meters) from moderator Savannah Guthrie and the audience.

Trump, who tested positive for COVID-19 on Oct. 2 and spent three days at the Walter Reed military hospital, took a coronavirus test Tuesday administered by the National Institutes of Health, NBC said.

Both NIH clinical director Dr. Clifford Lane and Fauci reviewed Trump’s medical records and said they had a high degree of confidence that the president is “not shedding infectious virus.”

Trump’s ability to reach a national television audience on Thursday was in part dependent on Fauci, who had expressed anger at the Trump campaign in recent days for using one of his statements in a campaign ad. The coronavirus task force member said a quote used in the campaign ad was taken out of context.

A formal matchup between the Republican president and Biden that was scheduled for Thursday in Miami by the nonpartisan Commission on Presidential Debate was canceled. In light of the president’s infection, the commission shifted the format to a virtual meeting, and Trump declined to participate.

Both town halls will begin at 8 p.m. Eastern, but Biden will have the last word. The ABC event, moderated by George Stephanopoulos, will last 90 minutes with an additional half hour of analysis. Trump’s town hall on NBC is scheduled for an hour.

Critics of NBC questioned why the network scheduled Trump for the same time, making viewers have to choose if they were interested in seeing both candidates react live in a similar format.

Veteran journalist Jeff Greenfield called it “indefensible” in a Twitter post.

“They rewarded Trump by giving him this time,” Greenfield said in an interview.

He questioned whether NBC acceded to a demand by the president, but the network said in a statement that “the Trump campaign did not dictate or request the time slot nor express any preference.”

NBC considered it important that Trump be given the same format, day of the week and length of time that Biden had last week — although he will have a different moderator. Lester Holt hosted the Biden event.

In addition to preventing viewers from getting a side-by-side comparison of the two men, the dueling events will likely be seen by far fewer people.

The first debate between the two men last month was watched by an estimated 73.1 million people, the Nielsen company said.

An estimated 6.7 million people saw Biden at an NBC News-sponsored town hall last week. Like the Trump event on Thursday will be, it was simulcast on MSNBC, CNBC and streamed online.

Trump’s town hall with Stephanopoulos on Sept. 15 was seen by 3.8 million people, Nielsen said.

Thursday’s Trump town hall on NBC will be held outdoors at the Perez Art Museum in Miami. Audience members will be socially distanced, required to wear a mask and submit to a temperature check before entering the venue, NBC said.

Find your latest news here at the Hemet & San Jacinto Chronicle

The post After independent coronavirus test, NBC sets Trump town hall appeared first on The Hemet & San Jacinto Chronicle.

SANFORD, Florida (AP) — Just a week after his release from the hospital, President Donald Trump returned to the campaign trail Monday for the first time since contracting the coronavirus, resuming his effort to stage a late comeback in the election’s final stretch.

“It’s great to be back in my home state, Florida, to make my official return to the campaign trail,” Trump declared in front of a crowd of thousands of supporters, standing shoulder-to-shoulder, mostly without masks, despite the ongoing pandemic.

Trump said that, after being given experimental medication and other VIP treatment, he’s feeling great and glad he no longer needs to be concerned about infection because he’s now “immune.”

“I feel so powerful,” said Trump, displaying no obvious signs of lingering infection. “I’ll walk into that audience. I’ll walk in there, I’ll kiss everyone in that audience. I’ll kiss the guys and the beautiful women … everybody. I’ll just give ya a big fat kiss.”

Dr. Anthony Fauci, the nation’s top infectious-disease expert, said Monday on CNN that those who recover from COVID-19 are likely to be immune for a limited period of time, but there are cases emerging of people getting reinfected weeks or months later.

With three weeks to go before Election Day, Trump — whose doctor said Monday for the first time that he had received a negative test for COVID-19 — is pushing to correct a stubborn deficit in national and battleground state polling as he continues to spread misinformation about a virus that he spent months downplaying.

That includes in Florida, which is seen as critical to his reelection chances. Trump narrowly beat his 2016 rival, Democrat Hillary Clinton, in the state by just over 112,000 votes. Some recent polls have suggested a close race in the state, while others have put Democrat Joe Biden ahead.

Trump’s Sanford rally was his first stop in a busy week that will include events in Pennsylvania, Iowa, North Carolina and Wisconsin. The robust schedule underscored the urgency he is facing to recover from a series of self-inflicted setbacks that have rattled his base of support and triggered alarm among Republicans who fear the White House is on the verge of being lost to Biden.

And it comes amid still-unanswered questions about the impact so much travel so soon could have on the 74-year-old president’s health. The progression of COVID-19 is often unpredictable, and there can be long-term complications.

After Air Force One lifted off from Joint Base Andrews, the president’s doctor released an update on his health that said Trump had tested negative for the virus — and had done so on consecutive days. His doctor, Navy Cmdr. Scott Conley, said that the tests, taking in conjunction with other data, including viral load, have led him to conclude that Trump was not contagious.

For days, the White House had sidestepped questions about whether Trump had tested negative. Conley over the weekend said that the president met Centers for Disease Control and Prevention criteria for safely discontinuing isolation and that by “currently recognized standards,” Trump was no longer considered a transmission risk.

Some medical experts, however, have voiced skepticism that Trump could be declared contagion-free so soon. And it was unclear what — if any — added precautions and safety measures the campaign planned to take to prevent the trip from further spreading a virus that has already infected so many of the president’s closest aides and allies, including his campaign manager and the head of the Republican Party.

Trump’s decision to so quickly return to the campaign trail drew criticism from Biden and other Democrats.

“President Trump comes to Sanford today bringing nothing but reckless behavior, divisive rhetoric, and fear mongering,” Biden said in a statement. “But, equally dangerous is what he fails to bring: no plan to get this virus that has taken the lives of over 15,000 Floridians under control.”

Florida state Rep. Shevrin Jones, a Democrat who is running for state Senate and who recently recovered from his own COVID-19 infection, said in a conference call with reporters that Trump should not be coming to Florida.

“It’s reckless and irresponsible,” Jones said.

Fauci also questioned the wisdom of holding such an event, noting the climbing test positivity rates in parts of the Sun Belt.

“We know that that is asking for trouble when you do that,” Fauci said.

Trump has been eager to show the world that he is no longer sidelined by a virus that he has consistently played down and that has killed 215,000 people across the nation, including more than 15,000 in Florida.

Indeed, Trump on Monday continued to mock Biden for his efforts to encourage social distancing at his campaign events, deriding as “crazy” the circles Biden’s campaign uses to delineate individual space.

“He’s got a lot of bad days coming,” Trump said at another point.

Since his release from a military hospital after three days of around-the-clock care that included access to experimental antibody treatments unavailable to the public, Trump has used his personal experience to try to convince the public that he was right all along.

He has repeatedly told Americans who contract the virus that they’re “going to get better really fast,” although hundreds of people in the U.S. die of the virus every day.

Trump held his first public event since his diagnosis on Saturday, addressing a crowd of hundreds of people on the South Lawn from a White House balcony. Appearing without a mask and with bandages still visible on his hands, likely from intravenous injections, Trump spoke for just 18 minutes — far less than his usual campaign rallies, which can last upwards of 90 minutes.

He told the crowd the virus is “disappearing,” even as cases have been on the rise.

Find your latest news here at the Hemet & San Jacinto Chronicle

The post Trump holds 1st rally since contracting coronavirus appeared first on The Hemet & San Jacinto Chronicle.

Following weeks of national protests since the death of George Floyd, President Donald Trump signed an executive order Tuesday that he said would encourage better police practices. But he made no mention of the roiling national debate over racism spawned by police killings of black men and women.

Trump met privately with the families of several black Americans killed in interactions with police before his Rose Garden signing ceremony and said he grieved for the lives lost and families devastated. But then he quickly shifted his tone and devoted most of his public remarks to a need to respect and support “the brave men and women in blue who police our streets and keep us safe.”

He characterized the officers who have used excessive force as a “tiny” number of outliers among “trustworthy” police ranks.

“Reducing crime and raising standards are not opposite goals,” he said before signing the order, flanked by police officials.

Trump and Republicans in Congress have been rushing to respond to the mass demonstrations against police brutality and racial prejudice that have raged for weeks across the country in response to the deaths of Floyd and other black Americans. It’s a sudden shift that underscores how quickly the protests have changed the political conversation and pressured Washington to act.

But Trump, who has faced criticism for failing to acknowledge systemic racial bias and has advocated for rougher police treatment of suspects in the past, has continued to hold his ’law and order.” line. At the signing event, he railed against those who committed violence during the largely peaceful protests while hailing the vast majority of officers as selfless public servants.

Trump’s executive order would establish a database that tracks police officers with excessive use-of-force complaints in their records. Many officers who wind up involved in fatal incidents have long complaint histories, including Derek Chauvin, the white Minneapolis police officer who has been charged with murder in the death of Floyd. Those records are often not made public, making it difficult to know if an officer has such a history.

The order would also give police departments a financial incentive to adopt best practices and encourage co-responder programs, in which social workers join police when they respond to nonviolent calls involving mental health, addiction and homeless issues.

Trump said that, as part of the order, the use of chokeholds, which have become a symbol of police brutality, would be banned “except if an officer’s life is at risk.” Actually, the order instructs the Justice Department to push local police departments to be certified by a “reputable independent credentialing body” with use-of-force policies that prohibit the use of chokeholds, except when the use of deadly force is allowed by law. Chokeholds are already largely banned in police departments nationwide.

While Trump hailed his efforts as “historic,” Democrats and other critics said he didn’t go nearly far enough.

Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer said, “One modest inadequate executive order will not make up for his decades of inflammatory rhetoric and his recent policies designed to roll back the progress that we’ve made in previous years.”

Democratic House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said the order “falls sadly and seriously short of what is required to combat the epidemic of racial injustice and police brutality that is murdering hundreds of Black Americans.”

Kristina Roth at Amnesty International USA said the order “amounts to a Band-Aid for a bullet wound.”

But Trump said others want to go to far. He, framed his plan as an alternative to the “defund the police” movement to fully revamp departments that has emerged from the protests and which he slammed as “radical and dangerous.”

“Americans know the truth: Without police there is chaos. Without law there is anarchy and without safety there is catastrophe,” he said.

Trump’s audience included police officials and members of Congress, and came after he met privately at the White House with the families of men and women who have been killed in interactions with police.

White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany told reporters that many tears were shed at the meeting and “the president was devastated.” Trump listed the families’ relatives who died and said: “To all the hurting families, I want you to know that all Americans mourn by your side. Your loved ones will not have died in vain.”

White House adviser Ja’Ron Smith said it was “a mutual decision” for the families not to attend the public signing. “It really wasn’t about doing a photo opportunity,” he said. “We wanted the opportunity to really hear from the families and protect them. I mean I think it’s really unfortunate that some civil rights groups have even attacked them for coming.”

The White House action came as Democrats and Republicans in Congress have been rolling out their own packages of policing changes. Sen. Tim Scott of South Carolina, the sole African American Republican in the Senate, has been crafting the GOP legislative package, which will include new restrictions on police chokeholds and greater use of police body cameras, among other provisions.

While the emerging GOP package isn’t as extensive as sweeping Democratic proposals, which are headed for a House vote next week, it includes perhaps the most far-reaching proposed changes ever from a party that often echoes Trump’s “law and order” rhetoric.

It remains unclear whether the parties will be able to find common ground. Though their proposals share many similar provisions — both would create a national database so officers cannot transfer from one department to another without public oversight of their records, for instance — differences remain.

The Republican bill does not go as far as the Democrats’ on the issue of eliminating qualified immunity, which would allow those injured by law enforcement personnel to sue for damages. The White House has said that is a step too far. As an alternative, Scott has suggested a “decertification” process for officers involved in misconduct.

During the Obama administration, Attorney General Eric Holder opened a series of civil rights investigations into local law enforcement practices that often ended with court-approved consent decrees that mandated reforms. Those included Ferguson, Missouri, after the killing of Michael Brown and Baltimore following the police custody death of Freddie Gray.

Hours before he resigned as Trump’s first attorney general in November 2018, Jeff Sessions signed a memo that sharply curtailed the use of consent decrees.

Find your latest news here at the Hemet & San Jacinto Chronicle

Search: order on police reform

The post Trump signs order on police reform, doesn’t mention racism appeared first on The Hemet & San Jacinto Chronicle.

Breaking news — as they say to open every newscast — Breaking news: America is breaking. Its public health establishment certainly is. We have the most confirmed COVID cases per capita of any country, because at the very top of government, leadership has been replaced by hucksterism.

But let’s not just focus on President Donald Trump, which we do far too much. Let’s also talk about how his screw-up top appointees’ astounding ineptitude has taken a public health crisis that might have been managed and turned it into a full-blown national tragedy.

Breaking news! The federal government has started a program to examine the blood of those who have survived the coronavirus for antibodies. Smart, until we learn that one of the testing programs will be run by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, better known as the bonehead CDC. If this was television, we’d accompany that information onscreen with Edvard Munch’s “The Scream,” backed up by appropriate shrieking sound effects. That’s because the CDC’s actions thus far, designing and distributing the test for coronavirus, have made the once vaunted agency a worldwide laughingstock, except that it’s no laughing matter.

The actions — or, should I say, the inactions — of those in charge of the logistics necessary to supply medical centers with the basic tools they require have left hospitals in desperate need of basics like enough beds and ventilators, and their brave physicians, nurses, all their practitioners and support staff in mortal danger because of a lack of PPEs. We’ve sadly all learned that PPE stands for “personal protection equipment.” Unfortunately, the manufacture and distribution of PPEs is a chaotic mess. More breaking news: The president has given that portfolio to his always unqualified son-in-law Jared Kushner.

It’s just a matter of time before he’ll take over the distribution of the trillions of dollars in federal aid that was supposed to provide a floor to soften the country’s economic collapse. It’s even too mundane for the breaking news hoo-ha to learn that the distribution of those funds to Americans facing hard times with their livelihoods pulled out from under them is stuck in an incompetence logjam. Between the patchwork of states who run their overwhelmed unemployment programs to the loans designed to encourage small businesses to hire back workers and stay afloat, it’s becoming another rat flock.

Speaking of the state hodgepodge, it’s up to each governor to order remedial defensive action. And most of them have acted decisively to shut down society and try to keep the organism from spreading. But some gubernatorial nincompoops are doing too little too late, like Florida’s Republican Ron DeSantis, or they’re even doing even less. Some are pandering to politically powerful churches and have excluded them from the social distancing rules that are the only hope against the microscopic invader.

When this is over, IF it is over, our dishonor roll will have to include the private profiteers, the sleazes who have raised prices out of sight on vital supplies, scam artists selling bogus products and those corporations that have dragged their feet on retrofitting to manufacture lifesaving medical supplies.

America’s federal government is supposed to govern, and in far too many cases has failed miserably.

Breaking news then: Our country is not only shuttered but shattered. Whether it can fix itself is an open question.

Bob Franken is an Emmy Award-winning reporter who covered Washington for more than 20 years with CNN.

Find your latest news here at the Hemet & San Jacinto Chronicle

Search: American Disaster

The post American Disaster appeared first on The Hemet & San Jacinto Chronicle.

President Donald Trump slammed the World Health Organization at a recent news briefing and was immediately accused of scapegoating.

There’s no doubt that Trump is inclined to shift blame when possible (and even when it isn’t). He’ll never take ownership of the testing debacle at the outset of our coronavirus response or admit it was wrong initially to minimize the virus.

Yet none of this detracts from the force of his critiques of China (although he blows hot and cold on that) and the WHO, which are at the center of this international catastrophe and must be held to account.

Without China’s deceit and WHO’s solicitude for Beijing, the outbreak might have been more limited, and the world at the very least would have had more time to react. China committed unforgivable sins of commission, affirmatively lying about the outbreak and punishing doctors and disappearing journalists who told the truth, whereas the WHO committed sins of omission — it lacked independence and courage at a moment of great consequence.

In effect, China and the WHO worked together to expose the rest of the world to the virus, at the same time they downplayed its dangers.

China acted as you’d expect. Countries that run gulags aren’t typically noted for their good governance and transparency. The WHO is supposed to be different. According to its constitution, “The health of all peoples is fundamental to the attainment of peace and security and is dependent on the fullest co-operation of individuals and States.”

But it’s hard to see how the WHO would have acted any differently if its constitution contained a proviso stipulating that it should validate Chinese propaganda as much as possible, especially in the midst of a world-threatening outbreak of a novel virus.

On Jan. 14, WHO tweeted that “preliminary investigations” by Chinese authorities had found no evidence of human-to-human transmission. Several days later, it reported “limited” human-to-human transmission, although it downplayed the finding as typical of respiratory illnesses.
Then, the WHO declined to call the outbreak in China a public health emergency of international concern on Jan. 22, at the same time there were confirmed cases in Taiwan, Australia, Japan, Thailand and South Korea.

After the WHO finally declared the emergency, it proceeded to drag its feet on declaring a pandemic, waiting until March 12.

One of the worst things China did was seal off Hubei province from the rest of the country while flights continued around the world. Was the WHO concerned about that? No, it was fully on board. As a headline in Reuters put it in early February, “WHO chief says widespread travel bans not needed to beat China virus.”

Incredibly enough, in late January, WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus was praising Chinese officials for “the transparency they have demonstrated.” Despite the emerging consensus that China has lied about its number of cases and deaths, WHO hasn’t yet said a discouraging word about China’s actions. It’s been resolute, though, in excluding Taiwan from its workings, just as Beijing dictates.

Trump takes more than his share of potshots, but that doesn’t mean he’s always off the mark. China and the WHO are genuine malefactors who deserve all the obloquy the president, and anyone else, can heap on them.

Rich Lowry is editor of the National Review.

Find your latest news here at the Hemet & San Jacinto Chronicle

Search: Blaming China

The post Blaming China, WHO Isn’t Scapegoating appeared first on The Hemet & San Jacinto Chronicle.

RIVERSIDE (CNS) – President Donald Trump’s proposed rollback of anti- coronavirus measures to jumpstart the hobbled economy will not immediately change ongoing restrictions in Riverside County because COVID-19 cases have not “peaked,” according to the county Executive Office.

“The spread of the disease is slowing, due to the public health measures currently in place,” the agency said in a statement released to City News Service Thursday. “This is a continually evolving situation. As more data and information comes in, we will respond as needed.”
The president joined with other members of the administration to unveil a multi-phase “Opening Up America Again” plan, which stemmed from findings that fully one-third of the country has recorded no new COVID-19 cases in the last 30 days.

“The peak of new cases is behind us,” Trump said in a White House address. “We must have a working economy, and we will get it back very quickly.”

The president unveiled so-called “gating criteria” that states and localities may adopt for phasing out some of the restrictions that have forced businesses to close and thrown roughly 22 million people out of work, according to U.S. Department of Labor data.

“This country has suffered,” Trump said. “Restrictions can continue to be eased.”
He acknowledged that some states, particularly New York and New Jersey, were in worse shape than others in contending with the virus, but said even the hardest-hit places were experiencing a drop in cases. A chart presented by Vice President Mike Pence indicated that California is not amongstates with the severest outbreaks.

“If there are outbreaks (in the future), we can put them outrapidly,” the president said, citing strides in developing anti viral therapies, tests and immunizations, as well as increasing health care resources that he said will aid in containment. He said there’s a lingering outside chance of a “surge” in infections, but the threat is not significant.

“We need to allow Americans to get back to work,” he said.

The gating criteria is predicated on a verified 14-day decline inCOVID-19 cases, which would permit states and localities to move toward easing mitigation measures, such as restrictions on crowding, routine travel and similar activity. The process would have to be gradual and necessitate careful handling, according to White House officials.

The county’s so-called “doubling rate,” the key metric thatindicates steady growth or moderation in infections — in which the number of new cases increases by 100% every five days — has not been reached in the last week.

“A longer doubling period is a positive indicator. However, it’s also very important to note that we are still growing and don’t see that Riverside County has peaked or plateaued in cases,” according to the Executive Office. “In addition to the county’s public health orders, we are still under the governor’s executive order, as well.”

That March 19 order urges residents to remain at home as much as possible and prohibits non-essential travel.

To date, the county has documented 2,264 virus cases, 59 deaths and 472 recoveries.

Find your latest news here at the Hemet & San Jacinto Chronicle

Search: Pro-Economy Measures

The post County: Too Early to Implement President’s Pro-Economy Measures appeared first on The Hemet & San Jacinto Chronicle.

When President Donald Trump announced a restriction on travel from Europe in a mid-March Oval Office address, European Union officials erupted in outrage.

The president of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, issued a joint statement with the president of the European Council, thundering, “The coronavirus is a global crisis, not limited to any continent, and it requires cooperation rather than unilateral action.”
Just a few days later, von der Leyen advanced her own proposal to ban nonessential travel into the EU.

We are all restrictionists now. In the coronavirus crisis, everyone realizes the importance of borders, even the people who not long ago were ideologically hostile toward them.

Borders mark off the sovereign territory of one people from another. They are a means — if they can be enforced and defended — for a sovereign state to protect its people from invaders, and unwelcome immigrants and goods. They are a tool almost every nation has used to try to keep the coronavirus from gaining a foothold in its population, and to try to keep it from spreading further.

The lyrics of the treacly John Lennon classic “Imagine” — recently performed by celebrities organized by actress Gal Gadot as a balm in this time of distress — have never been so absurdly inapt. If there were really no countries and the world were as one, we’d be even more vulnerable to whatever threat arises in a city in central China, or anywhere else on the globe.
Of course, travel restrictions haven’t prevented the spread of the disease — there’s no such thing as an airtight seal. But restrictions at least bought governments some additional time, and openness to foreign travel from China has been an accelerant on its spread.

Such restrictions are the least of it. Italy has had trouble importing masks because European counties have been working to hold on to medical supplies, indeed to hold on to food. According to the Wall Street Journal, “German officials said their restrictions were partly designed to safeguard supplies at German supermarkets from French shoppers.”
So much for a new era of European solidarity dissolving historic, centuries-old political and cultural divisions.

In a crisis, everyone realizes their foremost obligation is to their own.
Of course, Trump is naturally inclined to this view. He imposed travel restrictions even before he was truly seized with the seriousness of this crisis. The pandemic gives new credibility to his dim view of our commercial entanglement with China and, before this is all over, there will probably be bipartisan legislation to minimize our dependence on Chinese-manufactured pharmaceuticals and medical equipment.

None of this means that we shouldn’t wish other counties well, help them if we can, and share research and technologies. But borders exist for a reason. All peoples have their own governments that, if they are doing their jobs, put the health, safety and welfare of their own people first.

The coronavirus has acted as a solvent on a decade or more of cliches about the arrival of a globalized world where old lines drawn on a map no longer matter. In a crisis, everyone turns to borders as a first line of defense.

Rich Lowry is editor of the National Review.

Find your latest news here at the Hemet & San Jacinto Chronicle

Search: why borders exist

The post Pandemic shows why borders exist appeared first on The Hemet & San Jacinto Chronicle.

President Donald Trump said Tuesday he is hoping the United States will be reopened by Easter as he weighs how to relax nationwide social-distancing guidelines to put some workers back on the job during the coronavirus outbreak.

Trump’s optimism contradicted the warnings of some public health officials who called for stricter — not looser — restrictions on public interactions. But federal officials suggested that advisories could be loosened in areas not experiencing widespread infection.

With lives and the economy hanging in the balance, Trump said he was already looking toward easing the advisories that have sidelined workers, shuttered schools and led to a widespread economic slowdown.

“I would love to have the country opened up and just raring to go by Easter,” he said during a Fox News virtual town hall. Easter is just over two weeks away — Apr. 12.

“Wouldn’t it be great to have all of the churches full?” Trump said in a subsequent interview. “You’ll have packed churches all over our country.”

And as scientists warned the worst is yet to come — with hospital systems tested beyond their capacity and health workers sidelined by exposure — Trump addressed the nation, saying he was beginning “to see the light at the end of the tunnel.”

Trump’s comments came even as White House officials urged people who have left New York City amid the outbreak to self-quarantine for 14 days after their departure, owing to the widespread rate of infection in the metro area. It also follows on the president encouraging lawmakers on Capitol Hill to pass a roughly $2 trillion stimulus package — estimated at roughly $6 trillion once the Federal Reserve’s actions are included — to ease the financial pain for Americans and hard-hit industries.

Health experts have made clear that unless Americans continue to dramatically limit social interaction — staying home from work and isolating themselves — the number of infections will overwhelm the health care system, as it has in parts of Italy, leading to many more deaths. While the worst outbreaks are concentrated in certain parts of the country, such as New York, experts warn that the highly infectious disease is certain to spread.

The U.S. is now more than a week into an unprecedented 15-day effort to encourage all Americans to drastically scale back their public activities. The guidelines, issued by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, are voluntary, but many state and local leaders have issued mandatory restrictions in line with, or even tighter than, those issued by the CDC.

On Monday, the U.S. saw its biggest jump yet in the death toll from the virus, with more than 650 American deaths now attributed to COVID-19. Trump’s comments come after dire warnings by officials in hard-hit areas. New York. Gov. Andrew Cuomo said his state’s hospital system will soon hit a breaking point — resulting in avoidable deaths — even with the restrictions already in place.

“I gave it two weeks,” Trump said during the town hall from the Rose Garden. He argued that tens of thousands of Americans die each year from the seasonal flu and in automobile accidents and “we don’t turn the country off.”

When the 15-day period ends next Monday, he said, “We’ll assess at that time and we’ll give it some more time if we need a little more time, but we need to open this country up.” He added, “We have to go back to work, much sooner than people thought.”

Trump’s Easter target was not immediately embraced by Dr. Deborah Birx, the coordinator for the White House task force, who indicated any move would have to be guided by data still being collected. She suggested that public health professionals could recommend a general easing, while pushing for local restrictions to remain in the hardest-hit areas.

Trump acknowledged that some want the guidance to continue, but claimed without providing evidence that keeping the guidance in place would lead to deaths from suicide and depression.

“This cure is worse than the problem,” Trump said.

During a press briefing Tuesday evening, Trump said public health officials and economists were “working to develop a sophisticated plan to open the economy as soon as the time is right — based on the best science, the best modeling and the best medical research there is anywhere on earth.”

Trump’s enthusiasm for getting people back to work comes as he takes stock of the political toll the outbreak is taking. It sets up a potential conflict with medical professionals, including many within his government, who have called for more social restrictions to slow the spread of the virus, not fewer.

Dr. Anthony Fauci, the nation’s leading expert on infectious diseases and a member of the White House’s coronavirus task force, did not appear at the virtual town hall, but Trump denied there were any tensions between the two men.

“I will be guided very much by Dr. Fauci and Deborah,” Trump said.

At the press briefing later, Fauci said, “No one is going to want to tone down anything when you see what is going on in a place like New York City.” But he suggested he would be willing to examine the potential for easing the CDC advisories in areas that have been less affected by the outbreak.

Larry Kudlow, Trump’s top economic adviser, told reporters Tuesday that “public health includes economic health.”

“That’s the key point. And it’s not either-or. It’s not either-or, and that’s why we’re taking a fresh look at it,” he said.

During a private conference call with roughly 30 conservative leaders on Tuesday, Vice President Mike Pence reinforced Trump’s eagerness to lift coronavirus-related work and travel restrictions “in a matter of weeks, not months.”

When pressed on a specific timeline for lifting restrictions, Pence said there would be no formal decisions made until the current 15-day period of social distancing was complete, according to a conference call participant who spoke on the condition of anonymity to share details of the private discussion.

Pence told the group that accommodations would need to be made for the highest-risk populations if and when restrictions begin to be lifted.

Despite Trump’s rosy talk, other elements of the government were digging in for the long haul. Top defense and military leaders on Tuesday warned department personnel that the virus problems could extend for eight to 10 weeks, or even into the summer.

Army Gen. Mark Milley, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said during a Defense Department town hall meeting that restrictions could go into late May or June, possibly even July. He said there are a variety of models from other countries, so the exact length of the virus and necessary restrictions are not yet clear.

Find your latest news here at the Hemet & San Jacinto Chronicle

Search: US economy reopened

The post Trump hoping to see US economy reopened by Easter amid virus appeared first on The Hemet & San Jacinto Chronicle.

I pray to my God daily that the American people will see the light and deny the re-election of Donald Trump.

I’m fully aware that many readers will react to the above statement with an automatic “oh no, here we go again” rejection, of a crucial issue that I am firmly convinced, will be the ruination of America with four more years of Trump in the White House.

“Now is the time for all good men and women to come to the aid of their nation,” read a slogan during WWI inducing all able-bodied American citizens to sign up for military service to fight against the tyrants of that era. No rallying cry is more appropriate today.

In all my many years, since becoming politically aware, understanding the workings of government, and observing the conduct of Presidents from Roosevelt on forward, with all their failings and incompetents, for which they later repented and apologized, I have never before seen a President who will systematically persist in exhibiting the same failings time and again and refuse to correct them, but rather “double-down” making his errors even greater.

President Trump is a pathological liar, an admitted misogynist, a bully with his subordinates who will tolerate being treated badly to keep their jobs, a man who has admitted sexually harassing women and many other grievous character flaws.

(The Enemy from Within)

In my view, his most deplorable behavior is disuniting the citizens of this great nation, pitting one faction against the other, thereby weakening the intimate fabric of the country, crucially needed to defend against external enemies of which there are many.

All races, Black, White, Asian, Hispanic, need to close ranks to defeat the threat posed by four more years of a Trump Presidency.

Donald Trump lost the popular vote in 2016 but won the electoral college vote due to the political savvy of his handlers, also accompanying him this time around.

According to a recent study, over one million Americans of all extractions did not vote in the last presidential election. If this article motivates citizens in my area of influence to go to the polls this time around and vote for anyone other than Trump, I will feel that the country is once again safe from internal enemies, of which there are also many.

The stakes are high; our freedom is at risk, the long-lasting effects of a Supreme Court crafted by an immoral and unethical President will affect all Americans, even those not yet born.

“Now is the time for all good men and women to come to the aid of their nation.”

Find your latest news here at the Hemet & San Jacinto Chronicle

Search: The Enemy from Within

The post Now is the Time for all Good Men and Women . . . The Enemy from Within appeared first on The Hemet & San Jacinto Chronicle.

NEW YORK (AP) — Lawyers for former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort filed court papers seeking the dismissal of his New York mortgage fraud case, arguing that the charges brought in the wake of his federal convictions amount to double jeopardy.

The state case involves some of the same allegations as federal cases that have landed Manafort behind bars, violating a state law that bars repeat prosecutions for the same general conduct, lawyer Todd Blanche wrote in the filing late Wednesday.

The factual overlap between the federal and state cases “is extensive — if not total,” Blanche wrote.

Manhattan District Attorney Cy Vance Jr. announced the state charges in March, minutes after Manafort was sentenced in the second of his two federal cases, which stemmed from the special counsel probe of Russian election meddling.

The state-level indictment was widely seen as a way to keep Manafort, who is serving a 7½-year prison sentence, locked up even if President Donald Trump were to pardon him for his federal crimes. The president can pardon federal crimes, but not state offenses.

“Mr. Manafort is entitled to the equal protection of New York’s double jeopardy statute, which permits no exceptions for defendants who have garnered national interest, nor for favored political causes of the elected district attorney,” Blanche wrote.

The Manhattan district attorney’s office declined to comment, saying it would respond in a court filing by an Oct. 9 deadline.

The New York Post first reported on the defense’s push to get the case dismissed.

Manafort was convicted in federal court of misleading the U.S. government about his foreign lobbying work, hiding millions of dollars from tax authorities and encouraging witnesses to lie for him.

The New York indictment alleges Manafort gave false and misleading information in applying for residential mortgage loans, starting in 2015 and continuing until three days before Trump’s inauguration in 2017.

Paperwork filed by New York prosecutors cited admissions Manafort made last year during his federal trial in Washington regarding misrepresentations in mortgage applications for properties in Manhattan and Brooklyn and on Long Island.

Manhattan prosecutors contend their case is safe from a double jeopardy challenge because mortgage fraud and falsifying business records are state crimes, not federal crimes.

Manafort’s federal cases were byproducts of special counsel Robert Mueller’s probe of Russian influence on the 2016 election, but a judge who presided over one of them made clear they had nothing to do with Russian election interference, but rather with Manafort’s years of “gaming the system.”

In May, New York lawmakers passed a bill to ease the state’s double jeopardy protections and ensure state prosecutors could pursue charges against anyone granted a presidential pardon for similar federal crimes.

Find your latest news here at the Hemet & San Jacinto Chronicle

Search: Manafort’s lawyers

The post Manafort’s lawyers: State charges are double jeopardy appeared first on The Hemet & San Jacinto Chronicle.