Governor Brian Kemp

Dear Commons Community,

The Associated Press has an article this morning explaining some of the key changes in the election law just signed by Governor Brian Kemp in Georgia.  Written by Ben Nalder and Jeff Amy, it clarifies several of the new provisions.  Here it is in its entirety.

Tony

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ATLANTA (AP) — The sweeping rewrite of Georgia’s election rules represents the first big set of changes since former President Donald Trump’s repeated, baseless claims of fraud following his presidential loss to Joe Biden.

Georgia has been at the center of that storm. Trump zeroed in on his loss in the state, even as two Democrats won election to the U.S. Senate in January, flipping control of the chamber to their party. The 98-page measure that was signed into law Thursday by Republican Gov. Brian Kemp makes numerous changes to how elections will be administered, including a new photo ID requirement for voting absentee by mail.

Republican supporters say the law is needed to restore confidence in Georgia’s elections. Democrats say it will restrict voting access, especially for voters of color. Here’s a look at some of the top issues:

CAN THE STATE TAKE OVER LOCAL ELECTION OFFICES?

Much of the work administering elections in Georgia is handled by the state’s 159 counties. The law gives the State Election Board new powers to intervene in county election offices and to remove and replace local election officials. That has led to concerns that the Republican-controlled state board could exert more influence over the administration of elections, including the certification of county results.

ARE PEOPLE BANNED FROM HANDING OUT SNACKS OR WATER TO VOTERS IN LINE?

The new law makes it a misdemeanor to hand out “any money or gifts, including, but not limited to, food and drink” to anyone standing in line to vote. The prohibition extends 150 feet from a polling place and 25 feet from any person standing in line.

Advocates of the law say they are attempting to crack down on political organizations or advocacy groups trying to influence voters just before they cast a ballot. Critics say it’s cruel and would penalize even nonpartisan groups or individuals for something as simple as giving water to someone waiting in a long line. Democratic state Senate Minority Leader Gloria Butler slammed the proposal Thursday before the bill was signed into law, saying: “They want to make it a crime to bring Grandma some water while she’s waiting in line.”

Polling places would be able to, but not required to, set up self-serve water dispensers for voters.

DOES THE BILL ELIMINATE SUNDAY VOTING?

Republicans had proposed at one time to limit early voting on weekends, a time when many Black churches conduct “souls to the polls” efforts to take congregants to vote. But Republicans reversed themselves, and the measure now expands weekend early voting. Previously, one day of weekend voting was required, with counties given the option of offering more. Now two Saturdays will be required, and counties can offer two Sunday voting days as well. Republicans point to this provision to argue they are actually expanding, rather than restricting, voting access.

“Contrary to the hyper-partisan rhetoric you may have heard inside and outside this gold dome, the facts are that this new law will expand voting access in the Peach State,” Kemp said Thursday.

HOW WILL RUNOFFS CHANGE?

Georgia is the only state in the nation that mandates runoff elections between the top two finishers following general elections in which no candidate achieves a majority. Like some other states, Georgia also mandates runoffs for candidates who do not win a majority in a party primary.

The system came under scrutiny from Republicans after Sens. Raphael Warnock and Jon Ossoff won twin runoffs in January.

The new law shortens the time for runoffs from nine weeks to four, with lawmakers saying the current span is “exhausting” and needs to be shortened to a “more manageable period.”

Military and overseas voters will use ranked-choice absentee ballots to rank all possible candidates before a primary or general election, allowing their preferences to be determined in any possible runoff. Georgia only had three weeks before runoffs until 2013, when a federal judge ordered a longer gap to give military and overseas voters more time to return ballots.

The shorter period means less time for early and mail voting. Early voting had lasted three weeks before runoffs. Now early voting would begin “as soon as possible” but no later than the second Monday before the election, possibly leaving as little as five weekdays and no weekend days of early voting. Voters would also have less time to apply for a mail ballot.

No new voters could be registered in the period before a runoff because the registration deadline would be the day before the earlier election.

WHAT’S NEXT?

Three groups filed a lawsuit late Thursday to try to block the law. The New Georgia Project, Black Voters Matter and Rise Inc. say the law violates the First and 14th Amendments of the U.S. Constitution, as well as parts of the federal Voting Rights Act that say states cannot restrict Black voter participation.

“These unjustified measures will individually and cumulatively operate to impose unconstitutional burdens on the right to vote, to deny or abridge the voting rights of Black Georgians, and to deny Black voters in Georgia an equal opportunity to participate in the electoral process and elect candidates of their choice,” says the lawsuit, which is filed against Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger and Georgia’s State Elections Board.

Opponents are also looking to Congress, which is considering nationwide voting standards. A Democratic-backed measure passed the House earlier this month, but faces opposition from Senate Republicans wary of a federal takeover of state elections.

The federal proposal would create automatic voter registration nationwide, allow former felons to vote, and limit the ways states can remove registered voters from their rolls. It would expand voting by mail, promote early voting and give states money to track absentee ballots.

Dear Commons Community,

President Biden during his first press conference yesterday (see video clip above) said that he plans to seek reelection in 2024.

“My plan is to run for reelection,” Biden told reporters during his first formal press conference as president. “That is my expectation.”

Biden said that he “would fully expect” Vice President Kamala Harris to be his running mate.

Asked whether he expects to face Trump in another general election campaign, Biden demurred.

“I have no idea,” Biden said. “I have no idea if there will be a Republican Party.”

Earlier, Biden explained why he has not yet filed paperwork for a reelection campaign like his predecessor, former President Donald Trump, did on his first day in office.

“My predecessor needed to,” Biden said, laughing. “My predecessor — oh God, I miss him.”

Run, Joe, Run!

Tony

Dear Commons Community,

The University of Southern California has reached the largest-ever sex abuse settlement against an American college or university, after hundreds of women accused former university gynecologist George Tyndall of sexual abuse. The settlement, announced yesterday, awards an additional $850 million to hundreds of women, bringing the total payout to more than $1 billion when combined with a previous class-action lawsuit.  As reported by the Los Angeles Times and the New York Times.

“Hundreds of former patients have accused Tyndall of sexually abusing them during examinations. The lawsuit claims the university knew about the complaints against him, yet did nothing to protect students. 

Tyndall was arrested in June 2019 and has since pleaded not guilty to 35 criminal charges. He’s due back in court today. 

Some of his alleged victims have spoken out about the abuse and criticized the university for its handling of the allegations. 

“I knew there was something wrong with the way he talked to me and the filthy disgusting stories he told me, but when he was taking pictures under the guise of treatment… I didn’t know those things were wrong.” said Audry Nafzinger, now a sex crimes prosecutor. “They are very powerful institution, USC, and the fact that they just didn’t care and threw us to the wolves is so disgusting.” 

Anika Narayanan, who was interviewed by CBS News in 2018, said she had never been to the gynecologist before her appointment with Tyndall. 

“Using two fingers, he performed an examination in a deeply massaging, sort of penetrating motion,” she said. 

University of Southern California president Carol Folt said in a statement that she is “deeply sorry” for the pain experienced by the women. Folt said she hopes the settlement provides some relief — but the victims at a Thursday news conference said no amount of money can make up for what they experienced.”

Tony

After Kashia Campbell graduated from Florida Career College, the school refused to release her transcript, which she would need for taking a certification exam, until she repaid more of a loan it had made to her.  Credit: William DeShazer for The New York Times

Dear Commons Community,

The New York Times has an article this morning featuring the plight of students who took out private loans from for-profit colleges. Produced by The Hechinger Report, a nonprofit, independent news organization focused on inequality and innovation in education, it describes students who have been left with a mountain of debt and no jobs.   The article goes on to comment that direct-lending programs have proliferated in the last decade, and almost never come with the safeguards guaranteed by federal loans. The colleges can demand payments while students are still in school. They can withhold transcripts for nonpayment. They can impose onerous interest rates, reaching into the double digits.  Many students are unable to make their monthly payments, leaving their credit ruined and their financial and professional futures in grave doubt.  These aren’t protected by the same government safeguards carried by federal loans.

To be fair, most colleges (for-profit and non-profit)  have policies that freeze the release of student transcripts if there are outstanding balances in tuition or private loans.

The entire article is below.

Sad plight for these students who were only trying  to better themselves!

Tony

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New York Times

Left in the Lurch by Private Loans From For-Profit Colleges

By Sarah Butrymowicz and Meredith Kolodner

March 25, 2021

After Kashia Campbell graduated from Florida Career College, the school refused to release her transcript, which she would need for taking a certification exam, until she repaid more of a $6,500 loan it had made to her.Credit…William DeShazer for The New York Times

By Sarah Butrymowicz and Meredith Kolodner

March 25, 2021

Kashia Campbell earned top grades from her patient care technician program at Florida Career College. So she was shocked to find that, upon graduation, she was blocked from the exam to get certified in the field.

The problem was a $6,500 private loan she had taken out from the college to help her cover tuition. Florida Career College demanded that she pay more of her loan before it would release her transcript, something she said she had not been told previously. The transcript was a prerequisite for the certification exam, and she ended up in a lower-paying job earning $10 an hour. Four years later, she can pay only $50 a month on her school loan.

Ms. Campbell is one of hundreds of thousands of students who have borrowed directly from for-profit colleges. These direct-lending programs have proliferated in the last decade, and almost never come with the safeguards guaranteed by federal loans. The colleges can demand payments while students are still in school. They can withhold transcripts for nonpayment. They can impose onerous interest rates, reaching into the double digits.

Many students are unable to make their monthly payments, leaving their credit ruined and their financial and professional futures in grave doubt.

Schools often offer these loans because they’re required by law to have a small portion of their revenue come from sources other than federal financial aid. For-profit schools reap billions from financial aid — grants, loans and other programs that students use to help pay for college — and the legal provisions were put in place to ensure that in an industry mired by scandal and fraudulent behavior, the colleges don’t exist only to harvest federal dollars.

The schools generally defend these loans as enabling students to pay for a college education that would otherwise be unaffordable. Jody Kent, vice president for communications and public affairs at Universal Technical Institute, said in an emailed statement that its loan program gave “students access to high-quality education.”

Direct lending by for-profit schools boomed during the Great Recession, in part because private lenders stopped or curtailed what they offered, and it has spread steadily since. Without government oversight, for-profit colleges have lent at least $4 billion, and potentially much more that has gone untracked. The colleges plan for many of these loans to go unpaid — a core feature of their business models.

It’s a practice that lending experts say ultimately places the risk on students while helping to enrich the companies running the schools.

“The high default rates and low repayment rates — they factor that in as the cost of doing business, and the students are the ones who lose out,” said Ashley Harrington, federal advocacy director for the Center for Responsible Lending. “We’re particularly worried that we’ll see more of this as the economy gets worse.”

There are now dozens of companies and colleges, which enroll tens of thousands of students, that offer direct loans, according to federal audits, Securities and Exchange Commission filings and a review of college marketing materials.

The for-profit college industry has a long history of being accused of defrauding students, including by misleading them about the job prospects a degree would bring. At least two schools, ITT Technical Institutes and Corinthian Colleges, have closed after investigations.

But others have thrived, as has their lending.

When Ms. Campbell, now 49, signed her enrollment paperwork, she assumed she would quickly get a job after graduation and have no problem paying back her loans. Instead, she said, she is now worse off. After she graduated from Florida Career College in 2016, she said, she pleaded with the campus director and bursar’s office to release her transcript but was told no. She called the International Education Corporation but got the same answer.

“I was crying like crazy,” she said. “I don’t understand it. You’re not letting me go out and get a good-paying job so I can pay you back.”

Joseph Cockrell, a spokesman for the International Education Corporation, said that while he could not comment on individual students’ financial accounts, “students must be current with their loan payments for transcript requests.” He did not respond to follow-up questions about how much a student needs to pay to be considered “current” on loan payments.

Whatever money companies are able to recoup from the loans they directly offer may matter less than the fact that the loans themselves help keep the colleges eligible to receive billions of dollars in federal financial aid.

Under a federal law known as the 90/10 rule, for-profit schools are allowed to derive a maximum of 90 percent of their total revenue from federal student aid. The remaining 10 percent must come from elsewhere, including students’ repayments on their direct loans from the college. Even if a student pays back only a fraction of the money owed to a school, it helps the institution keep the correct ratio and continue to receive federal aid.

“In the case of these loans, it’s a pretty sure bet,” said Yan Cao, a fellow at the Century Foundation, a progressive think tank, which obtained several company audits through a public records request and shared them with The New York Times and The Hechinger Report. That federal money “goes straight into the school’s hands,” Ms. Cao said.

The International Education Corporation, the company that operates Ms. Campbell’s school and 29 other campuses, was owed $33 million in repayments in 2018, according to an independent audit submitted to the federal Education Department. The company estimated that $13 million of that — or 40 percent — would never be repaid.

And in 2012, the company said that collecting all its money would be unlikely “due to the nature of the programs and credit quality of the students,” according to another independent audit.

Lincoln Educational Services Corporation, another company that runs for-profit colleges, has described how it increased its direct lending in order to help it meet the 90/10 requirement. In 2012, the company explained that it had increased the gap between tuition and what federal financial aid covers and, in turn, provided loans to students to help them fill that gap. Over the first nine months in 2012, its lending had grown more than $7 million, to $33.7 million from $26.4 million.

That year, when Jodi-Ann Clarke enrolled in the licensed practical nursing program at Lincoln Technical Institute’s campus, which has since closed, in Hamden, Conn., the full cost of attendance came to $32,189. That was far more than what federal financial aid would cover or what she could afford out of pocket.

Ms. Clarke recalls college employees giving her instructions on how to take out a loan directly from the school during the enrollment process. Colleges sometimes encourage students to sign up for loans without the students realizing what they are taking on.

“It’s really helpful to think about this as an important part of the marketing process as much as it is a student loan,” said Mike Pierce, policy director and managing counsel at the Student Borrower Protection Center, a nonprofit advocacy group focused on student debt.

Unlike Ms. Clarke’s federal loans, which started accruing interest only after she left school, her Lincoln Tech loan began requiring payments when her classes started, and the interest accumulated while she was still in school. Lincoln Tech’s administrators projected an attitude of “we’re going to get our money and we’re going to put them in debt and they’re going to have to pay us back,” Ms. Clarke said. “I just feel like they’re a money pit.”

Peter Tahinos, senior vice president of marketing for Lincoln Educational Services, said in an email that he could not comment on individual students but added that employees “provide guidance on the best options for them to finance their education.” Lincoln charges 7 percent interest on its loans. Students can choose to begin payments immediately, with interest accruing right away, or after leaving school.

Some colleges increase the burden by imposing high interest rates. Unlike federal loans, which currently have interest rates of 2.75 percent for undergraduate borrowers, loans directly from schools can far exceed that. A 2020 report by the Student Borrower Protection Center uncovered interest rates as high as 19 percent for loans offered by some schools.

Scrutiny of this practice remains low at both the state and federal levels. A survey of 75 agencies across all 50 states — including higher-education oversight agencies, attorneys general and departments of finance or banking — by The Hechinger Report, a nonprofit education news organization, found that few places tracked any information about school-offered loans. In fact, in the vast majority of states, higher-education authorizers don’t require colleges to report plans for such programs.

Universal Technical Institute, a publicly held chain of 12 campuses across eight states, told its investors in its 2020 annual report that “changes in laws or public policy could negatively impact the viability of our proprietary loan program and cause us to delay or suspend the program.”

But for now, there remains scant monitoring and regulation of the direct lending. Several state officials said that colleges would be subject to state laws and could be investigated if abuses were reported, but that otherwise they had no oversight of these loans. A spokesman for the federal Education Department said loans offered directly from schools fell outside the department’s purview. And since its creation in 2011, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau has taken action against just three for-profit education companies accused of predatory or deceitful loan practices.

Ms. Campbell has been unemployed for the past year and doesn’t think she’ll ever be able to find a job that pays well in health care without a license. She worked in financial auditing before going to Florida Career College and is sending out résumés to companies to see if she can find a way back into the industry.

“I wish I could go back in time,” she said. “I never would have signed up.”

This article was produced by The Hechinger Report, a nonprofit, independent news organization focused on inequality and innovation in education.

Frances Degen Horowitz

Dear Commons Community,

Frances Degen Horowitz, the past president of the CUNY Graduate Center died on March 15 at age 88.  Dr.  Horowitz served as The Graduate Center’s president from 1991 to 2005 and remained a member of the faculty until her retirement in 2010.

Her son Benjamin H. Levi said the cause was heart failure. Here is her obituary as published in the New York Times this morning.

“A behaviorist who had distinguished herself in child psychology, Dr. Horowitz steered the City University’s doctoral degree-granting program toward becoming a major research institution, despite competition for resources within the sprawling university system.  

She was instrumental in persuading city, state and university officials to approve and finance the Graduate Center’s new $160 million headquarters, which opened in 1999 and allowed the school to consolidate 1,600 professors scattered in eight locations in one grand building, the former B. Altman department store, a century-old limestone landmark in the Italian Renaissance Revival style that occupies an entire city block, between Fifth and Madison Avenues and between 34th and 35th Streets.

When the graduate school decamped from its tight quarters in the Aeolian Building, at 33 West 42nd Street opposite Bryant Park, William Kornblum, a sociology professor at the Graduate Center, invoked another major relocation.

“The Exodus from Egypt was surely a far greater leadership exploit than any Frances had achieved,” Professor Kornblum said at the time, “but consider that Moses was not dealing with full professors.”

“In this great building we won’t be selling apparel and notions,” Dr. Horowitz told The New York Times on taking over that former emporium. “We’ll be selling notions of a different kind — ideas.”

Here is an excerpt from her New York Times obituary.

Frances Degen was born on May 5, 1932, in the Bronx to Isaac and Elaine (Moinester) Degen. Her father was a blouse manufacturer, her mother a homemaker.

As a teenager, Frances won flying lessons as the prize in a New York City essay contest and became a qualified pilot. She met Floyd Ross Horowitz, who would one day be an educator in his own right, when she was 11; they married in 1953.

After attending the now-closed private Cherry Lawn School in Darien, Conn., her choice of career evolved from journalism to philosophy to education to psychology.

She earned a bachelor’s degree in philosophy from Antioch College in Ohio and a master’s in elementary education from Goucher College in Baltimore in 1954 before being hired to teach in the public schools in Iowa City.

There she began using untested teaching techniques in the classroom, earning her a reputation as an upstart. And when she applied to a doctoral program in education at the University of Iowa, the public schools superintendent recommended to his friend, the dean of Iowa’s education school, that her application be rejected. It was. But the moment proved pivotal in her career.

Professor Boyd R. McCandless, with whom she had taken a course, soon offered her a place in the university’s Iowa Child Welfare Research Station, a national leader then in the new fields of child development and child psychology. She accepted.

“That is how I came into the field of developmental psychology,” Dr. Horowitz said in 1995 in an interview with the Society for Research in Child Development. She earned her doctorate in developmental psychology from Iowa in 1959.

Her work with infants led to an association with the well-known pediatrician T. Berry Brazelton, who developed a scale that assesses newborns on the basis of 38 behaviors, although Dr. Horowitz insisted that the measure of present behavior not be used to predict future outcomes.

Dr. Horowitz later joined the University of Kansas in Lawrence, where she headed its department of human development and family life from 1968 to 1978. She was vice chancellor for research, graduate studies and public service for the university from 1978 to 1991, when she returned to New York to take over the Graduate Center. In Lawrence, as a member of a small but thriving Jewish community, she lived in a home originally built for the Episcopal archbishop.

Dr. Horowitz was president of the Graduate Center until 2005 and a faculty member there until she retired in 2010.

Her husband, a professor of English, author and editor, died in 2014.

In addition to her son Benjamin, a professor at Penn State College of Medicine, she is survived by another son, Jason Degen Horowitz; three grandchildren; and a sister, Alyce Scimeca.”

When I served as the Executive Director of the Graduate Center’s PhD Program in Urban Education, I had chats with Dr. Horowitz in the hallways or in the elevator.  Among other things, we shared stories of growing up in the Bronx!

Tony

The Trump International Hotel in Washington on Tuesday evening. The lobby can hold 625 people, but it had only about eight guests.  Credit..Eric Lipton (New York Times)

Dear Commons Community,

It appears that Donald Trump’s hotel business took another hit when Virtuoso Travel ended its partnership with his company and removed his hotels from its exclusive listings.

Zenger News reported last week that Virtuoso Travel, a luxury travel network that caters to the wealthy, quietly cut off all Trump Hotels earlier this month. 

“Virtuoso considers many variables when reviewing both existing and new network participation,” a spokesperson told the website. “Out of respect for all involved parties, and as a general policy, we do not share comments regarding our non-renewal and exit decisions.” 

The Washington Post said Virtuoso agencies can still book clients at Trump properties, but they will no longer get the perks and other benefits that come from booking a stay with one of the company’s preferred partner hotels. 

In addition, Trump hotels are no longer listed on the Virtuoso website. 

“It’s a big deal because Virtuoso is very well-respected in the industry,” travel industry analyst Henry Harteveldt of Atmosphere Research Group told the newspaper.

He said Virtuoso’s “elite base” of customers means others in the industry study its moves… and often make similar moves of their own. 

“Some travel agencies that may have been debating whether or not to do it could decide, well, if Virtuoso has done this, we too will end our professional relationship with the Trump hotels,” Harteveldt said.  

The hospitality industry overall has been devastated by a year of pandemic restrictions. 

But the former president’s properties were hit especially hard on two levels. 

When Trump lost reelection last year, those hoping to curry favor politically no longer had reason to frequent his hotels and clubs. And after Trump incited the mob that stormed the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, many other organizations cut ties completely ― including the PGA, which stripped his Bedminster golf club in New Jersey of its role as host of the 2022 championship tournament. 

The result has been palpable to visitors of his properties. 

In January, CNN reported that a number of members of Trump’s Mar-a-Lago club in Florida “silently walked out” after his presidency, leaving it “a sad place.” 

And earlier this month, The Guardian said the once-bustling Trump International Hotel in Washington ― just blocks from the White House and the “crown jewel” of his hotel empire ― was so empty that it resembled the hotel in “The Shining.”

However, the four years as president had its financial advantages for Trump as government agencies would be forced to book rooms and purchase other services at Trump properties in order to keep close to the then-president. 

The Secret Service, for example, spent nearly $1 million on golf cart rentals alone, much of it at Trump properties. And last year, The Washington Post said the agency paid as much as $650 per room a night to accommodate agents at Trump properties.

It appears that Trump may have to find another line of work!

Tony

Oakland Mayor Libby Schaaf

Dear Commons Community,

Mayor Libby Schaaf  announced yesterday that a privately funded program will give low-income Oakland families $500 per month with no rules on how they can spend it.

The program is the latest experiment with a “guaranteed income,” an idea that giving poor people a set amount of money each month helps ease the stresses of poverty that often lead to poor health while hindering their ability to find full-time work. 

The idea isn’t new, but it’s having a revival across the U.S. after some mayors launched small, temporary programs across the country in a coordinated campaign to convince Congress to adopt a national guaranteed income program.

The first program launched in 2019 in Stockton, California, led by former Mayor Michael Tubbs. Tubbs, who founded the group Mayors for a Guaranteed Income, has said about six similar programs in other cities should be up and running by the summer.  As reported by the Associated Press.

“We have designed this demonstration project to add to the body of evidence, and to begin this relentless campaign to adopt a guaranteed income federally,” Oakland Mayor Libby Schaaf said.

The Oakland Resilient Families program has so far raised $6.75 million from private donors including Blue Meridian Partners, a national philanthropy group. To be eligible, people must have at least one child under 18 and income at or below 50% of the area median income — about $59,000 per year for a family of three.

Half the spots are reserved for people who earn below 138% of the federal poverty level, or about $30,000 per year for a family of three. Participants will be randomly selected from a pool of applicants who meet the eligibility requirements.

Oakland’s project is significant because it is one of the largest efforts in the U.S. so far, targeting up to 600 families. And it is the first program to limit participation strictly to Black, Indigenous and people of color communities.

The reason: White households in Oakland on average make about three times as much annually than black households, according to the Oakland Equity Index. It’s also a nod to the legacy of the Black Panther Party, the political movement that was founded in Oakland in the 1960s.

“Guaranteed income has been a goal of the Black Panther platform since its founding,” said Jesús Gerena, CEO of Family Independence Initiative, which is partnering with the program in Oakland. “Direct investment in the community in response to systemic injustices isn’t new.”

The idea of a guaranteed income dates to the 18th century. The U.S. government experimented with it in the 1960s and 1970s when Republicans Donald Rumsfeld, later a defense secretary, and Dick Cheney, the future vice president, oversaw four programs across the country during the Nixon administration.

Those studies concluded the money did not stop people from working, causing Nixon to recommend expanding the program. But it never got through Congress.

Decades later, proponents are trying again, only this time it’s led by progressive mayors. The program in Stockton, California, ended in February. An independent review found that after one year of getting the money, 40% of recipients had full-time jobs compared with 28% before the program started.

“The fact that mayors are piloting (guaranteed income programs), using political capital to raise capital to allow their constituents to have basic necessities, is a policy failure,” Tubbs said. “It’s an admission that we need to do more.”

It’s unclear what a national guaranteed income program would look like. A proposal by former Democratic presidential candidate Andrew Yang could have cost $2.8 trillion per year.

A form of guaranteed income could take effect for many parents this year as part of the latest federal stimulus package. Congress expanded the child tax credit, with the goal of giving many parents monthly payments of up to $300 per month. Those payments are temporary.

In California, a proposal by Assemblyman Evan Low to give $1,000 a month to adults with certain incomes could cost up to $129 billion annually — more than half the state’s total budget — paid for by a new 1% tax on incomes above $2 million. Low said that bill is unlikely to pass this year, but he said his goal is to get people comfortable with the idea.

“The initial shock seems to wear off the more people are educated and realize the benefits of having more control over their lives,” Low said.

Critics, including labor unions, worry such expensive programs could force the elimination of other safety net programs, like Social Security and food stamps. But Schaaf said she is unapologetic that “the social safety net programs must remain.”

“We believe that those safety net programs should not go away, but should be supplemented with unconditional cash that gives families the dignity and flexibility to meet their needs,” she said.

Guaranteed income is an idea whose time is coming!

Tony

Colorado Shooting Suspect Ahmad Al Aliwi Alissa

Dear Commons Community,

The suspect accused of opening fire inside a crowded Colorado supermarket on Monday was a 21-year-old man who purchased an assault weapon less than a week earlier, authorities said yesterday, a day after the attack that killed 10 people, including a police officer.

Ahmad Al Aliwi Alissa bought the weapon on March 16, just six days before the attack at a King Soopers store in Boulder, according to an arrest affidavit. It was not immediately known where the gun was purchased.  As reported by the Associated Press.

“Alissa, who is from the Denver suburb of Arvada, was booked into the county jail yesterday day on murder charges after being treated at a hospital. He was due to make a first court appearance tomorrow.

Investigators have not established a motive, but they believe Alissa was the only shooter, Boulder County District Attorney Michael Dougherty said.

A law enforcement official briefed on the shooting said the suspect’s family told investigators they believed Alissa was suffering some type of mental illness, including delusions. Relatives described times when Alissa told them people were following or chasing him, which they said may have contributed to the violence, the official said. The official was not authorized to speak publicly and spoke to the AP on condition of anonymity.

The attack was the nation’s deadliest mass shooting since a 2019 assault on a Walmart store in El Paso, Texas, where a gunman killed 22 people in a rampage that police said targeted Mexicans.

In Washington, President Joe Biden called on Congress to tighten the nation’s gun laws.

“Ten lives have been lost, and more families have been shattered by gun violence in the state of Colorado,” Biden said at the White House.

Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer vowed to bring forward two House-passed bills to require expanded background checks for gun buyers. Biden supports the measures, but they face a tougher route to passage in a closely divided Senate with a slim Democratic majority.

The shooting came 10 days after a judge blocked a ban on assault rifles passed by the city of Boulder in 2018. That ordinance and another banning large-capacity magazines came after the 2018 mass shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, that left 17 people dead.

A lawsuit challenging the bans was filed quickly, backed by the National Rifle Association. The judge struck down the ordinance under a Colorado law that blocks cities from making their own rules about guns.

Supermarket employees told investigators that Alissa shot a man multiple times outside the Boulder grocery store before going inside, according to the affidavit. Another person was found shot in a vehicle next to a car registered to the suspect’s brother.

The gunfire sent terrorized shoppers and employees scrambling for cover. SWAT officers carrying ballistic shields slowly approached the store while others escorted frightened people away from the building, which had some of its windows shattered. Customers and employees fled through a back loading dock to safety. Others took refuge in nearby shops.

Multiple 911 calls paint a picture of a chaotic, terrifying scene, according to the affidavit.

One caller said the suspect opened fire out the window of his vehicle. Others called to say they were hiding inside the store as the gunman fired on customers. Witnesses described the shooter as having a black AR-15-style gun and wearing blue jeans and maybe body armor.

By the time he was in custody, Alissa had been struck by a bullet that passed through his leg, the affidavit said. He had removed most of his clothing and was dressed only in shorts. Inside the store, he had left the gun, a tactical vest, a semiautomatic handgun and his bloodied clothing, the affidavit said.

After the shooting, detectives went to Alissa’s home and found his sister-in-law, who told them that he had been playing around with a weapon she thought looked like a “machine gun,” about two days earlier, the document said.

No one answered the door at the Arvada home believed to be owned by the suspect’s father. The two-story house with a three-car garage sits in a relatively new middle- and upper-class neighborhood.

When he was a high school senior in 2018, Alissa was found guilty of assaulting a fellow student in class after knocking him to the floor, then climbing on top of him and punching him in the head several times, according to a police affidavit.

Alissa “got up in classroom, walked over to the victim & ‘cold cocked’ him in the head,” the affidavit read. Alissa complained that the student had made fun of him and called him “racial names” weeks earlier, according to the affidavit. He was sentenced to probation and community service.

One of his former wrestling teammates, Angel Hernandez, said Alissa got enraged after losing a match in practice once, letting out a stream of invectives and yelling he would kill everyone. Hernandez said the coach kicked Alissa off the team for the outburst.

“He was one of those guys with a short fuse,” Hernandez said. “Once he gets mad, it’s like something takes over and it’s not him. There is no stopping him at that point.”

Hernandez said Alissa would also act strangely sometimes, turning around suddenly or glancing over his shoulder. “He would say, ‘Did you see that? Did you see that?’” Hernandez recalled. “We wouldn’t see anything. We always thought he was messing with us.”

Arvada police Detective David Snelling said officers investigated but dropped a separate criminal mischief complaint involving the suspect in 2018 and cited him for speeding in February. “Our community is obviously concerned and upset that the suspect lived here,” he said.

“We’d absolutely prefer not to have publicity we’re getting here,” said Matt Benz, who lives several houses away from the home that was searched overnight. He said dozens of FBI agents wearing night-vision goggles swarmed the area using a bullhorn to order everyone out of the home and was interviewing the home’s occupants.

The slain officer was identified as Eric Talley, 51, who had been with the force since 2010. He was the first to arrive after responding to a call about shots fired and someone carrying a gun, she said.

Homer Talley, 74, described his son as a devoted father who “knew the Lord.” He had seven children, ages 7 to 20.

“We know where he is,” his father told The Associated Press from his ranch in central Texas. “He loved his family more than anything. He wasn’t afraid of dying. He was afraid of putting them through it.”

The other dead ranged in age from 20 to 65. They were identified as Denny Stong, 20; Neven Stanisic, 23; Rikki Olds, 25; Tralona Bartkowiak, 49; Suzanne Fountain, 59; Teri Leiker, 51; Kevin Mahoney, 61; Lynn Murray, 62; and Jodi Waters, 65.

Well after dark Tuesday night, about 100 people milled about at a makeshift memorial near the supermarket that was adorned with wreaths, candles, banners reading “#Boulderstrong” and 10 crosses with blue hearts and the victims’ names. Four young girls huddled in the cold, one of them crying as she reminisced about how they had protested the 2018 shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida.

Leiker, Olds and Stong worked at the supermarket, former co-worker Jordan Sailas said.

Olds’ grandmother choked up on the phone as she described the young woman she played a large role in raising. “She was just a very kind and loving, bubbly person who lit up the room when she walked in,” said Jeanette Olds, 71, of Lafayette, Colorado.

The attack in Boulder, about 25 miles (40 kilometers) northwest of Denver and home to the University of Colorado, stunned a state that has seen several mass shootings, including the 1999 Columbine High School massacre and the 2012 Aurora movie theater shooting.

Monday’s attack was the seventh mass killing this year in the U.S., following the March 16 shooting that left eight people dead at three Atlanta-area massage businesses, according to a database compiled by the AP, USA Today and Northeastern University.

It follows a lull in mass killings during the coronavirus pandemic in 2020, which had the smallest number of such attacks in eight years, according to the database, which tracks mass killings defined as four or more dead, not including the shooter.

Biden announced that flags nationwide would be lowered in memory of the victims — an order that comes just as a previous flag-lowering proclamation expired for those killed in the Atlanta-area shootings. Together the two orders mean near-continuous national mourning for almost two weeks.”

It is just craziness that our country cannot come to grips with its gun and violence problems.

The thoughts and prayers of our political leaders are good but not enough!!

Tony

Sidney Powell

Dear Commons Community,

Donald Trump’s former campaign lawyer Sidney Powell is backtracking on her claims that voting machines were rigged in favor of now-President Joe Biden in the 2020 election.

Powell is claiming in a new court filing that reasonable people wouldn’t have believed as fact her assertions of fraud after the 2020 presidential election.

The election infrastructure company Dominion Voting Systems sued Powell for defamation after she pushed lawsuits and made appearances in conservative media on behalf of then-President Donald Trump to sow doubt about the 2020 election results. Dominion claims that Powell knew her election fraud accusations were false and hurtful to the company.  As reported by CNN.

“In the filing, Powell’s attorneys write that she was sharing her “opinion” and that the public could reach “their own conclusions” about whether votes were changed by election machines.

“Given the highly charged and political context of the statements, it is clear that Powell was describing the facts on which she based the lawsuits she filed in support of President Trump,”

Powell’s defense lawyers wrote in a court filing yesterday.

“Indeed, Plaintiffs themselves characterize the statements at issue as ‘wild accusations’ and ‘outlandish claims.’ They are repeatedly labelled ‘inherently improbable’ and even ‘impossible.’

Such characterizations of the allegedly defamatory statements further support Defendants’ position that reasonable people would not accept such statements as fact but view them only as claims that await testing by the courts through the adversary process.”

Election authorities and Dominion have resoundingly called Trump’s loss in the election accurate and untainted by any possible major security risks. Trump’s lawyers and his allies quickly lost or dropped all but one minor case out of nearly 60 following the election, as the then-President sought to overturn Joe Biden’s win in multiple key states.

Though the Trump campaign had sought to distance itself from Powell after she held a conspiracy-filled news conference with his other attorneys, Trump had told people he liked Powell’s arguments and wanted to see more of her on television.

In one chaotic Oval Office meeting in December, Trump said he had considered naming her as a special counsel to investigate voter fraud allegations

Besides Powell, the meeting included her client, former Trump national security adviser Michael Flynn, two people familiar with the matter previously told CNN, describing a session that began as an impromptu gathering but devolved and eventually broke out into screaming matches at certain points, as some of Trump’s aides pushed back on Powell and Flynn’s more outrageous suggestions to overturn the election.

The following day, Trump’s campaign legal team sent a memo to dozens of staffers instructing them to preserve all documents related to Dominion Voting Systems and Powell, in anticipation of litigation by the company.

The lawsuit — filed in January — outlined Powell’s TV appearances and online posts in extraordinary detail, including when she repeated her unfounded beliefs that Dominion was linked to communist Venezuela and Georgia officials were in on election fraud.

“Emboldened by Trump’s endorsement of her false accusations, which launched her into political superstardom, Powell’s defamatory media campaign continued and intensified” with her media appearances, Dominion alleged in its lawsuit.

A former federal prosecutor based in Texas, Powell rose to prominence through her criticism of the Robert Mueller investigation and her promotion of right-wing conspiracy theories about a range of topics on social media.

Powell also claims in court that her statements about the 2020 election were a “matter of public concern” about a publicly known company, Dominion, and thus protected speech.

Her attorneys also claim she had a right to make accusations because she was acting as an attorney for the Trump campaign, even during her right-wing TV appearances. As a result, Powell is asking a judge in Washington, DC, to dismiss the case, or to allow it to be moved to the federal court in Texas.”

I am not an attorney but Powell’s defense seems outlandish.  Maybe she should ask Rudy Giuliani to be a witness in her case.

Tony

Dear Commons Community,

Yesterday, Boston’s new mayor, Kim Janey, became the city’s first female and first person of color to take the office.

Marty Walsh resigned Monday evening to become President Joe Biden’s labor secretary. The Boston City Council President Janey, who is Black, stepped into the role of acting mayor and is scheduled to have a swearing in tomorrow.

Walsh, the latest in a long line of largely Irish-American Boston mayors stretching back the better part of a century said he welcomed the change. As reported by the Associated Press.

“History will be made tonight,” Walsh said earlier in the evening. “We’re an extremely diverse city from different backgrounds and different nationalities and different skin colors. I think it’s a good thing for our city. I think it’s a great thing for our city.”

Janey took to Twitter to wish Walsh well following his confirmation by the U.S. Senate.

“Congratulations on your confirmation, Secretary Walsh. You are a proud son of Dorchester who will bring our city with you,” she tweeted. “The working people of America will benefit greatly from your passion.”

“Now, we look ahead to a new day — a new chapter — in Boston’s history,” Janey, a fellow Democrat, added.

Walsh said for the past two months he’s had regular meetings and conversations with Janey. The two have also held extensive planning sessions, he said.

“Together the council president and myself and our teams have worked diligently to ensure a smooth transition,” he said.

By any typical political stopwatch, Janey’s rise has been lightning quick. She was first sworn in as a city councilor just three years ago.

Although Janey, 56, is holding the office only on an interim basis, she’s widely seen as hailing a new chapter in Boston’s political history.

Those actively seeking the office include three women of color — current city councilors Michelle Wu, Andrea Campbell and Annissa Essaibi George. John Barros, who is of Cape Verdean descent and state Rep. Jon Santiago are also running. Barros served as chief of economic development under Walsh.

Janey has a long history of activism in Boston, with deep roots in Roxbury, the heart of the city’s Black community.

Her grandfather, Daniel Benjamin Janey, was a member of Twelfth Baptist Church where Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. worshipped while attending Boston University. Her father was one of only eight Black students to graduate from the city’s prestigious Boston Latin School in 1964.

While spending time in her great grandmother’s home in the city’s South End neighborhood, Janey was also exposed to the city’s political culture as she watched a neighbor — Black community activist and former state Rep. Mel King — launch a bid for mayor in 1983, losing to Ray Flynn, an Irish-American city councilor.

During the second phase of Boston’s tumultuous school desegregation era, Janey would recall the rocks and racial slurs she said were hurled at her as an 11-year-old girl riding the bus to the largely white neighborhood of Charlestown. She would later take part in a program that allowed her to attend school outside the city.

Janey began her career in advocacy with Massachusetts Advocates for Children, pushing for policy changes she said were aimed at ensuring equity and excellence for public school students in Boston.

In 2017, she won a 13-candidate race and became the first woman to represent her district, which includes most of Roxbury, parts of the South End, Dorchester, and Fenway areas of the city.

She hasn’t said yet if she’ll run for mayor in the fall.

Congratulations Mayor Janey!

Tony