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Hey people: It’s time to take a moment and cheer for our new and hard-working president, Joe Biden. He’s getting s**t done! And we should all take a breath and enjoy the successes.

Remember, when Biden took office he was facing monumental challenges. Between a worldwide pandemic and a staggering daily death toll, following a violent attempted coup d’état and an outgoing president refusing to acknowledge defeat while facing impeachment for a second time, the only thing the incoming president didn’t have on his plate was a war. 

Narrowly coming from behind, and thanks to a pair of January Georgia Senate runoffs that helped to put Democrats in positions of some authority on Capitol Hill, Biden has led the nation with on-the-mark stimulus policies, revived a slogging economy, and made huge improvements toward slashing poverty. 

“The number of poor Americans is expected to fall by nearly 20 million from 2018 levels, a decline of almost 45 percent,” according to The New York Times. 

Fast forward 10 months, and Monday, Biden signed the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (IIJA). 

With $550 billion in new investments, the bill will definitely create jobs. It includes $110 billion for highways, bridges, and roads; $65 billion for power grid upgrades; $39 billion for transit; $65 billion for high-speed internet expansion, with targeted funding for rural areas and low-income communities; and $55 billion to invest in clean water, focused on replacing lead drinking water pipes.

If you’ve noticed that gas prices seem exorbitantly high, it’s not your imagination, and it’s gotten the attention of Biden as well. Wednesday, the president reached out to the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) head to examine “mounting evidence of anti-consumer behavior by oil and gas companies” to drive up U.S. gas prices. 

As The New York Times reports, Biden’s letter may not force the FTC to level gas prices, but it could push for an investigation into how prices are set and impact future restrictions. 

In terms of U.S. spending, according to Market Watch, Target Corp. Chief Executive Brian Cornell says the retailer has reported stellar third-quarter earnings with revenue that “blew past Street expectations.”

Cornell said in a statement that “With a strong inventory position heading into the peak of the holiday season, our team and our business are ready to serve our guests and poised to deliver continued, strong growth, through the holiday season and beyond.” 

Then there is climate change, where Biden has moved from an archaic anti-science stance on the world stage to a global leader, apologizing for Trump’s abrupt departure from the Paris Climate Accord to a commitment to clean energy, forest conservation, and the creation of a “comprehensive strategy to improve public safety and justice for Native Americans” and address the “epidemic of missing and murdered indigenous people.”

Lastly, let’s not forget the appointment of literally thousands of diverse and talented folks the president has named to the judiciary, the ambassadorial corps, and to lead a plethora of regulatory agencies—many of which have taken up causes such as erasing student debt and undoing the Trump-era mandates banning transgender people from serving in the military.

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Amazingly enough, control of Virginia’s House of Delegates is still up in the air as a pair of extremely tight races are headed for recounts. Here’s everything you need to know:

• There are 100 seats in the House.

• Republicans won 50 of them in the Nov. 2 elections, Democrats won 48, and two races remain uncalled.

• Those uncalled races are for seats held by two Democratic delegates: Alex Askew (85th District in Virginia Beach) and Martha Mugler (91st District in Hampton Roads).

• Republican candidates currently lead in both the uncalled races, but their margins are so razor-thin—127 votes and 94 votes, respectively—that they’re now going to undergo automatic recounts.

• These last two races will determine whether Republicans win an outright majority, or whether the chamber will be split 50-50, forcing Republicans into a power-sharing arrangement with Democrats.

There’s no sugarcoating it: The odds that Democrats can overcome the GOP margins in both these races are long. But when there’s any chance at all of stopping Republicans from seizing power, we need to take it. That means we need fight to make sure every vote is correctly and fairly counted. In fact, one error in the initial vote tally halved the Republican’s lead in Mugler’s race, prompting her to withdraw her concession.

The traditional media has been eagerly writing the Democrats’ obituaries ever since the elections earlier this month, but a turnaround here would undercut that narrative and snatch a share of victory from the jaws of defeat. That’s why we have to help. The campaign arm of the Virginia House Democrats is handling these recounts, and Mugler and Askew have asked their supporters to contribute to those efforts.

Please donate $3 now to help Virginia Democrats make sure every vote is counted in the battle for the state House!

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Republicans are really pushing the outrage over the idea that federal law enforcement would pay attention to crimes being committed against local educators and education officials—at least if those crimes are being committed in the name of “concerned,” and conservative, parents. Reporting from The Wall Street Journal, and a responding tweet from Rep. Jim Jordan, really shows how the outrage machine works.

Attorney General Merrick Garland said on Oct. 4 that the Justice Department would take action to address “a disturbing spike in harassment, intimidation, and threats of violence against school administrators, board members, teachers, and staff.” Republicans have responded aggressively by trying to turn this into an attempt to silence parents, because apparently Republicans think it’s impossible for their base to express opinions without criminally harassing, intimidating, or threatening people.

Now, the WSJ has reported on an internal FBI email creating a specific tag (“EDUOFFICIALS”) to track potentially criminal actions against school board members and educators. 

The email, signed by Timothy Langan, the FBI’s assistant director for counterterrorism, and Calvin Shivers, the since-retired assistant director of the FBI’s criminal division, explains, “The purpose of the threat tag is to help scope this threat on a national level, and provide an opportunity for comprehensive analysis of the threat picture for effective engagement with law enforcement partners at all levels.”

From the way Republicans are responding, you would think the FBI had sent out a directive readying a special prison for parents merely expressing polite disagreement with school policies. 

“Merrick Garland testified that the FBI wasn’t targeting parents,” Jordan tweeted. “We now know the FBI is ‘tagging’ parents they consider threatening. The Attorney General has some explaining to do.” Multiple FBI and Justice Department officials have already explained in congressional testimony: Parents have free speech rights to express disagreement, including vigorous disagreement. They do not have the right to commit crimes just because they’re parents.

Yes: “You are teaching my kids that racism is bad and that makes them feel bad about being white and I’m really angry! How dare you! I’m going to vote you out/sue the schools/tell all my friends you suck.”

No: “You’re going to get knifed, you [expletive]. You’re going to get a [expletive], you’re dead.”

School board members have reported having false child abuse allegations called in to the Department of Children and Family, and having people go to their homes and brandish weapons at their neighbors. That’s the stuff the FBI is concerned with, and trying to learn the scope of.

The way Jordan puts it, it sounds like the FBI is subduing parents while fitting them with physical tags like wildlife to be tracked across the landscape. Kind of different from the reality, in which acts of intimidation, harassment, or threats will be tagged with, you know, a word on a computer screen. And it’s totally possible that the FBI will conclude that there’s not a big national problem. The tag is supposed to help assess that: “The creation of a threat tag in no way changes the long-standing requirements for opening an investigation, nor does it represent a shift in how the FBI prioritizes threats,” the bureau said in a statement.

This would be an incredibly stupid response to a routine “let’s see if there’s widespread crime here” action by law enforcement, if it wasn’t actually Republicans being cynical and dishonest. Gym Jordan knows what’s going on here. He’s counting on his supporters not to know. And The Wall Street Journal offered an invaluable assist.

Dan Froomkin lays out the way this is being turned from from ‘well, yeah, threats are illegal” to an outrage:

Republicans don’t consider themselves bound by truth or decency or integrity. But without a complicit media—in this case, a Rupert Murdoch-owned newspaper—and social media companies, they wouldn’t get nearly as far as they do at spreading their lies.

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After more than eight hours of deliberations on Tuesday, the jury in the Kyle Rittenhouse case appears no closer to a verdict. Little was revealed from yesterday’s proceedings, save for the fact that jurors requested additional copies of the 36 pages of instructions they received. The jury reconvened at around 10 AM ET on Wednesday—two days after the defense filed a motion for mistrial with prejudice that Judge Bruce Schroeder has failed to rule on.

Rittenhouse’s defense team asked for a mistrial with prejudice last week and formally filed their motion on Monday. In their motion, Attorneys Mark Richards and Corey Chirafisi claim that the defense did not receive a higher quality version of the drone video presented by the prosecution and instead were given a compressed version. They believe that video is crucial in their case, writing that “the video footage has been at the center of this case.”

“The failure to provide the same quality footage in this particular case is intentional and clearly prejudices the defendant,” the motion reads. The defense also takes issue with a video showing Rittenhouse weeks before he fatally shot two people and injured another in Kenosha, Wisconsin, discussing “what he would like to do to people he believed were looting.” That video was barred as evidence in a pretrial hearing, but had been alluded to by prosecutor Thomas Binger while questioning Rittenhouse, earning him a swift rebuke from Schroeder.

Also during Binger’s questioning of Rittenhouse, he claimed that this was the first time the teen was telling his story of what transpired last August as protests unfolded in Kenosha in the wake of the police shooting of Jacob Blake. Binger had to amend his comments and the jury was reminded that Rittenhouse has a constitutional right not to talk following his arrest.

As experts interviewed by the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel note, it’s unusual for a judge to essentially sit on a mistrial motion like this during jury deliberations. Criminal law professor Michael O’Hear, who teaches at Marquette Law School, told the paper Schroeder likely doesn’t anticipate granting the mistrial given his decision to turn things over a jury.

University of Wisconsin Law School professor Keith Findley backed up O’Hear’s claims: “The only reason I can think of for waiting is perhaps he wants to give the jury a chance to acquit so he doesn’t have to, but that’s speculation on my part.”

Given Schroeder’s conduct and seeming sympathy for Rittenhouse, the judge will most likely decide on whatever benefits the defense regardless of if that invalidates a conviction from jurors. Rittenhouse faces five charges with penalties ranging from monetary fines to life imprisonment.

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President Joe Biden is not, as of yet, calling out the Republicans who are taking credit for the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (IIJA) a large majority of them voted against. Not yet, but he’s making it very clear in his road trip to celebrate the bill who got the job done. He signed the bill on Monday, and then hit the road, starting in New Hampshire.

At his event there, Biden made a point of repeatedly and at length thanking the all-Democratic congressional delegation: Sens. Maggie Hassan and Jeanne Shaheen and Reps. Annie Kuster and Chris Pappas. “Folks, it’s not hyperbole to say that your delegation is laser-focused on your needs—the people of New Hampshire—the concerns that are discussed around our kitchen tables. This isn’t esoteric,” Biden said. “This isn’t some gigantic bill—it is. But it’s about what happens to ordinary people.”

“My message to the people of New Hampshire is simple,” the president said. “It’s this: Because of this delegation, New Hampshire and America are moving again.” The size of the bill, with $550 billion in new investments, will definitely create jobs. It includes $110 billion for highways, bridges, and roads; $65 billion for power grid upgrades; $39 billion for transit; $65 billion for high-speed internet expansion, with targeted funding for rural areas and low-income communities; and $55 billion to invest in clean water, focused on replacing lead drinking water pipes.

Biden is taking that message to Michigan on Wednesday, the second stop in what a White House official describes as “an administration-wide effort where the president, vice president, and Cabinet members will travel across the country promoting” the IIJA and “communicating directly with the American people about how it will change their lives for the better.”

There will be Biden officials in “red states, blue states, big cities, small towns, rural areas, tribal communities, and more” the official said, saying they would “underscore what the law means in tangible terms.” Vice President Kamala Harris will be in Ohio on Friday, and other officials will be in states including Arizona, Georgia, and Texas in coming weeks.

In Michigan, Biden will tour the newly retooled General Motors assembly plant, Factory ZERO, where GM is going to build all-electric vehicles. GM has pledged that by 2035, all of its cars and light-duty vehicles will be electric. Michigan will receive as much as $10 billion from the IIJA. Biden will also have his chance to reprise his famous test drive of the new all-electric Ford F150, this time in one of the first production 2022 GMC Hummer EV pickups to roll off the Factory ZERO line, a GM spokesperson said.

The president is expected to stump for the Build Back Better plan, his jobs, education, and climate change bill working through the House of Representatives now, as he did in New Hampshire, where he talked about his “plan to build back better for our people—getting folks back to work and reducing costs of things like childcare, eldercare, housing, healthcare, prescription drugs.”

“I’m confident that the House is going to pass this bill,” Biden said. “And when it passes, it’ll go to the Senate. I think we’ll get it passed within a week.” Maybe? The House is indeed on track to pass it this week (the lure of a week off for Thanksgiving always works), with opposition from the Sabotage Squad finally squelched. And Sen. Joe Manchin has, at least for now, indicated he won’t object to the bill coming before the Senate before Christmas. That’s new; he’s been arguing for weeks that there’s no rush, inflation, they should put it off into next year, blah, blah, blah.

It’s possible, just possible, that it really does happen, and Biden and Democrats can spend the next year touting the very concrete benefits they’ve brought to the American people.

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The United States Postal Service is the nation’s most popular federal agency by a mile—91% of Americans have a favorable opinion of it. Or at least, 91% of Americans (as close as you can get to unanimous in public opinion) loved it before Trump turned it over to Postmaster General Louis DeJoy and his enabler, Board of Governors Chair Ron Bloom, and they started doing things like killing baby chicks and delaying prescription drug and utility bill deliveries, and flirted with sabotaging the elections.

The Bloom/DeJoy team decided to follow up the debacles of 2020 by adopting DeJoy’s 10-year plan to slow down the mail, reduce local post office hours, and make it cost a lot more to send mail, just in time for the holidays. Given how much the public loves the Postal Service, it sure seems like it would welcome President Joe Biden saving the institution as his gift to the nation.

Just in time for Christmas, Bloom’s extended term on the board is going to expire. As of Dec. 8, he’s out of there unless Biden does something to piss off a great many of his allies and renominates Bloom. The Trump appointee was named to serve out the remainder of a seven-year term, left vacant (as most of them were, during the Obama administration) for Trump to fill. That term officially ended one year ago, but he’s been in a one-year holdover term, courtesy of Trump, where he has pushed DeJoy’s plan of slowly killing the public mail system in favor of the private companies they are allegedly profiting from.

The current board, still heavily laden with Trump appointees and with Bloom’s thumb on the scale, met last week and voted to extend Bloom’s term for another year. Note, that decision is not up to them—it’s Biden’s to make, but they were sending a message—and shutting out the opposition. Literally. Two of the Biden appointees on the board were not allowed to voice their objections to Bloom, and were ruled out of order when they tried.

That didn’t go over well with Save the Post Office, the coalition of consumer advocacy, civil rights, and labor groups that has formed to, well, save the Postal Service. They attended the public meeting of the board, and participated in the following public comment period. It didn’t go well.

“Whenever we are given the opportunity to ask if USPS leadership has done any impact analysis for any of their changes,” said Porter McConnell, co-founder of the Coalition, “the answer is always no. This board needs to start engaging meaningfully beyond hard-to-access technical comment sessions designed for industry, and start listening to the American public when they make changes to a vital public service that affect all of us.”

McConnell continued, “The fact that they re-elected Ron Bloom as Chair of the Postal Board today is proof that they are not listening to postal customers at all.” Wade Henderson, president and CEO of the Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights, added “Re-electing Ron Bloom as chair of this board is an endorsement of the 10 year plan that will wreck the postal service and put this board on the wrong side of history. […] If the current USPS leadership cannot fulfill its basic mission of ensuring prompt, reliable, and affordable service—indeed, it appears bent on making things worse—it is long past time to provide new leadership and give the Service the resources it needs to rebuild public trust and make things right.”

Layla Soberanz, senior government relations representative for the National Farmers Union, said, “Reappointing Ron Bloom as Chair of the USPS Board of Governors goes against advocating for America’s family farmers and ranchers who depend on USPS for on-time mail delivery.” Nancy Altman, president of Social Security Works, echoed that concern.

“Every mail slowdown is an attack on seniors and people with disabilities. The Postal Service delivers over a billion prescriptions a year. Mail slowdowns mean that people aren’t getting their life-saving and life-sustaining medications on time,” Altman said. “Millions of seniors and people with disabilities, especially those living in rural areas, do not use the internet. They rely on the postal service to pay bills, and to communicate with friends and family. For these Americans, fast and reliable mail service isn’t simply a convenience—it’s a necessity.”

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During that meeting DeJoy said the USPS is “ready” for the busy holiday season. “So send us your packages and your mail—and we will deliver timely,” he exclaimed.

He sits on a throne of lies.

Last month, the first full month of the new, slower delivery standards, USPS didn’t even meet them. Instead of delivering 95% of mail on time, as the plan demands, just 91% of it was delivered when it was supposed to be. That, says Paul Steidler, senior fellow at the Lexington Institute and an expert on the postal service, “underscores they aren’t performing and doing what they said they were going to do.”

“It’s especially not great for October because it’s a slow month for mail, so it’s not a good barometer” for the rest of the year. “I would take whatever the standards are for what you are mailing—it’s now 5 business days coast-to-coast—and I’d add two days onto it,” said Steidler. “It’s important to know that, not only for the holidays but for end-of-year bills.”

Robert Shapiro, a postal expert and founder and chairman of economic advisory firm Sonecon, added, “There is every reason to believe mail delivery will deteriorate badly in the holiday season, and we’ll see what happens with package delivery.” Not just this year, either. “Unless either Congress or new leadership at the USPS says, ‘We are recommitting to our public mission [of mail delivery],’ this will just continue and I think will likely get worse,” Shapiro said.

This is all being done on purpose, and possibly for private personal gain. The leadership of the United State Postal Service is choosing to violate the agency’s mission statement as established by Section 101(a) of Title 39 of the U.S. Code: “The Postal Service shall have as its basic function the obligation to provide postal services to bind the Nation together through the personal, educational, literary, and business correspondence of the people. It shall provide prompt, reliable, and efficient services to patrons in all areas and shall render postal services to all communities.”

Trump picked Ron Bloom and Louis DeJoy to destroy that, to diminish it to the point that private companies take over, stealing the oldest and most revered of our institutions away. To make a buck. There’s absolutely no good reason for Biden to let this continue. He probably can’t save this Christmas from Bloom and DeJoy, but he can save the post office.

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The trial of three white men accused of hunting down and murdering Ahmaud Arbery after seeing him running from a house under construction in their South Georgia community began on Wednesday with the defense presenting a motion of acquittal on the malice murder charge. The charge, which Travis McMichael; his father, Gregory McMichael; and their neighbor, William “Roddie” Bryan—who recorded moments leading up to Arbery’s death—were indicted on requires proof of intent to kill. As part of an effort seeking a directed verdict and acquittal, the defense argued outside of the jury’s presence that no expressed malice has been proven in the shooting of Arbery.

The argument follows the prosecution resting its case on Tuesday’s eighth day of testimony, making way for the defense to begin presenting its case. All three defendants have pleaded not guilty to malice murder and felony murder charges as well as counts of aggravated assault, attempt to commit a felony, and false imprisonment.

Updates will be added as the trial continues. Jump below the fold for more information on the trial to date.

Bryan has had a media spotlight on him at several moments in the case, namely because of his attorney Kevin Gough’s advocacy work to get Black pastors banned from observing the trial in court. In a recent motion, Gough urged the court to consider on Tuesday, he said he was seeking to “prohibit activity that may intimidate jurors.” Gough defended another motion to reconsider the defense’s request for a speedy trial. In doing so, Bryan said—and CNN reported—on Tuesday that he was being held in a protective jail unit with restricted access to showers and outdoor recreation and that he was living in fear because of the coronavirus pandemic. The jury wasn’t present for Bryan’s claims, and they apparently did little to sway Judge Timothy Walmsley, who denied the motion. 

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President Joe Biden has signed the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, which means it’s time for Republicans who opposed the law to start coming out and claiming credit for funding it provides. Nineteen Senate Republicans and 13 House Republicans voted for the law. They can brag about its effects. The rest of them? Can keep their mouths shut.

First up in the shut-your-mouth crew: Rep. Gary Palmer of Alabama.

On Nov. 6 in a statement “on passage of Democrat infrastructure bill,” Palmer said: “Our economy is struggling, and our national debt already presents a serious national security threat, but the Democrats have shown they are willing to recklessly push through a bill that costs over a trillion dollars with only about 10 percent going to roads and bridges. I fully support funding for infrastructure that is focused on national priorities rather than wasting hundreds of billions of dollars on a Green New Deal wish list and programs under the guise of human infrastructure that simply expand government control of our lives.”

As if roads and bridges are the only infrastructure.

He concluded: “At least the bill includes legislation which I introduced with Rep. David Trone (D-MD) that includes funding for the Birmingham Northern Beltline.”

Nine days later, on Nov. 15, Palmer followed up on that point, touting the benefits of funding the Northern Beltline, a six-lane highway to connect some of the interstate highways that go through Birmingham. That funding “has consistently been one of my top priorities,” said Palmer, who voted against the bill that included that funding. Nine days after railing against the passage of things he didn’t consider “national priorities,” he was all about one 52-mile stretch of road around one city.

“The Appalachian Regional Commission has noted the completion will have an annual economic impact exceeding $2 billion in 10 years and has the potential to create 14,000 jobs,” Palmer continued, talking about economic impact and jobs he voted against.

“This is the opportunity we have been working for as a region and a state,” he said, still having voted against the funding he was raving about.

A spokeswoman defended Palmer against completely accurate charges of hypocrisy by saying he would have voted for it as a stand-alone bill, but wasteful spending blah blah blah. Yeah. Palmer would have voted for his priority if he could have voted for just that—but how many other people would have voted for Palmer’s priority if he wasn’t going to vote for theirs? Just think, instead of getting a majority of members of Congress to vote to pass an infrastructure bill that funds a bunch of different things, Congress could have held votes on a couple hundred stand-alone bills, each of which would have gotten support from the handful of lawmakers whose districts would benefit. Nothing would have passed, but it would have been so pure! Truly the Republican way: Get nothing done, but be able to say that at least you didn’t do anything about climate change.

If you want a look into the future on Republicans claiming credit for programs in the infrastructure bill as its funding goes out, just consider a statement from Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey on the same day that Palmer was celebrating the Northern Beltline funding he voted against. Ducey announced $100 million in high-speed broadband investments—with that funding coming from the American Rescue Plan. While Ducey is a governor rather than a member of Congress, and therefore didn’t have a vote on that law, every single Republican in Congress opposed it. It’s pretty safe to say that Doug Ducey would have opposed it, too. But that isn’t stopping him from touting its major investment in rural broadband. 

Ducey joins a long list of Republicans who’ve touted the benefits of the American Rescue Plan, which got zero Republican votes. Palmer is at the head of what will no doubt become a long list of Republicans who voted against the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act and went on to cheer for money it brought to their districts. Republicans gonna Republican.

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On Wednesday, the U.S. House of Representatives will convene and later vote on a resolution to censure Arizona Republican Paul Gosar and strip him of his assignments on two congressional committees.

The vote to censure Gosar comes in the wake of the congressman posting to Twitter and Instagram a manipulated anime video that depicted him killing Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, a New York Democrat, and leaping at President Joe Biden with two swords drawn. The photoshopped rendering was derived from the anime program Attack on the Titan. When Gosar posted the now-deleted tweet, he asked: “Any anime fans out there?”

Though Gosar removed the video after a firestorm of outrage and criticism, he has not yet issued a public apology. Instead, the lawmaker followed up with another message, claiming he was merely joking.

The last lawmaker censured by the House was Charlie Rangel. The New York Democrat was in the hot seat for myriad abuses including misuse of congressional letterhead for fundraising, impermissible use of a rent-controlled facility for campaign headquarters, and inaccurate financial reports and federal tax returns.

According to the Congressional Research Service, just 23 members have been slapped with a censure.

The censure process works as follows: The House will convene and then vote on the resolution to condemn a lawmaker’s actions. Under congressional procedure, the lawmaker at the center of the resolution must stand in the well of the House floor as the resolution is read aloud.

Gosar’s resolution will highlight how the congressman “used the resources of the House of Representatives to further violence against elected officials” and to “spread hateful and false rhetoric.”

The censure resolution also lays bare critique of House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, noting that this vote has followed “whereas the leadership of the Republican Party has failed to condemn Representative Gosar’s threats of violence against the President of the United States and a fellow member of Congress.”

Such videos, the resolution continues, can “foment actual violence and jeopardize the safety of elected officials, as witnessed in this chamber on Jan. 6, 2021.”

In a message on Twitter Monday night, Rep. Adam Kinzinger of Illinois, one of two Republicans who sits on the January 6th Committee, announced that he would vote to censure Gosar. 

“We have to hold Members accountable who incite or glorify violence, who spread and perpetuate dangerous conspiracies. The failure to do so will take us one step closer to this fantasized violence becoming real,” Kinzinger wrote. “To be clear, I’ll be voting yes on the Gosar censure resolution.”

The GOP leader on Monday—a full week after Gosar posted the video—has yet to offer any direct condemnation of the lawmaker’s actions, only telling CNN that Gosar took the video down and made a statement that he doesn’t support violence against anybody.

“I called him when I heard about the video and he made a statement that he doesn’t support violence and he took the video down,” McCarthy said.

Gosar, for his part last weekend, issued statements affirming he did not “espouse violence or harm towards any member” or the president, but he maintained that the repugnant video was “truly a symbolic portrayal of a fight over immigration policy.”

“I am entitled to speak to the people and do so in a manner that is engaging,” Gosar said. “Further, I have a right to speak to the younger generation in this country.”

At a closed-door conference among Republican leadership and members on Tuesday, Gosar reportedly issued a private apology to fellow members. McCarthy told reporters after the meeting that Gosar “didn’t see it before it posted.”

Ocasio-Cortez has been subjected to open disdain by Republican members before. Last July, Rep. Ted Yoho of Florida verbally attacked her, calling her a “fucking bitch,” and Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia hounded Ocasio-Cortez in the halls, generating security concerns.

“Remember when she stalked my office the first time with insurrectionists and people locked inside. All at my job and nothing ever happens,” Ocasio-Cortez wrote. 

Tuesday’s resolution also calls for Gosar to be removed from two committees: The House Committee on Oversight and Reform, which he sits on with Ocasio-Cortez, and the House Committee on Natural Resources. 

Significantly, the censure resolution also highlights the ubiquitous nature of harassment against women in office. 

The resolution notes that “violence against women in politics is a global phenomenon meant to silence women and discourage them from seeking positions of authority and participating in public life, with women of color disproportionately impacted.” 

A 2016 survey by the Inter-Parliamentary Union found 82% of women have experienced psychological violence and 44% of women have received threats of death, sexual violence, beatings, or abductions during their term.  

This story is developing.

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As the “Unite the Right” trial entered its third week, it became abundantly clear that all the Nazis who are being sued have left to protect themselves is whichever fellow defendant they think is more reprehensible than themselves. That became abundantly clear after Monday’s proceedings wrapped up and Tuesday kicked into high gear, culminating in Chris “Crying Nazi” Cantwell taking the stand while also answering to himself.

In a trial filled with self-serving moments from Cantwell, Tuesday’s display certainly took the cake. He read from his own blog posts, played clips of unaired interviews that added little to his own case, and pulled up audio from his own podcast in what mostly felt like an attempt to promote his brand. Cantwell seemed to miss the many moments that pointed to his role in planning the “Unite the Right” rally and orchestrating some of its violence.

Cantwell’s bruised ego incriminated him as he complained that the tiki torch march was supposed to have been a secret, as does his insistence of submitting evidence that shows his involvement in planning the rally while calling for violence. It’s worth noting that Cantwell pleaded guilty to two counts of assault and battery over his use of pepper spray during the tiki torch march specifically. True to his word, Cantwell previously said he was willing to “risk violence and incarceration” if “Unite the Right” faced any roadblocks. He tried to clarify that he meant he’d react with civil disobedience if their permits were revoked, but what Cantwell actually did was much, much worse.

At times, Cantwell appeared to try passing the buck by bringing up the actions of other defendants, but those instances were frequently culled from Cantwell in hateful conversation with his fellow Nazis. The likes of former Identity Evropa head Elliot Kline, aka Eli Mosley, and Richard Spencer reaffirmed with Cantwell their desire to fight counterprotesters, so entering evidence like this doesn’t make anyone look good.

Acting as if someone saying something worse than you somehow absolves you from your own shitty talking points isn’t the savviest strategy, but it’s one that’s been frequently employed by the many defendants in the Sines vs. Kessler case. Nazi organizer and named defendant Jason Kessler did his best to condemn Robert “Azzmador” Ray and the Daily Stormer crowd that attended “Unite the Right,” on the stand, but evidence showed that he relentlessly tried to court the group during the planning leading up to the event. Kessler also had no issue with Ray calling for the lynching of Dr. Cornel West over the course of that August weekend.

Though it’s easy to watch the defendants bury themselves over and over again, Integrity First for America has done a stellar job further driving home the point that the 25 defendants knew exactly what they were doing when the “Unite the Right” rally concluded. One person was dead, while countless others were injured. A particular highlight came from attorney Michael Bloch, who is part of the team representing the plaintiffs.

Yesterday, Bloch pulled up content Cantwell tried promoting today to illustrate just how explicitly Cantwell called for violence ahead of “Unite the Right.” Cantwell wrote in a blog post that “thousands of people listen to what I say” and bragged that some of those fans would carry out a mass shooting if he asked them to do so. He called for his audience to “prepare to hurt people” during one show and explicitly said, “We’re going to have to f***ing kill these people” when referring to proponents of non-violence during another.

The trial, which has been calendared for four weeks, is finally reaching its conclusion. An agreement appears to have been reached in which plaintiffs will have two and a half hours for closing, while defendants will have a total of three and a half hours between them. The jury is set to receive deliberation instructions on Wednesday, and closing arguments will begin on Thursday. It’s hard to imagine any other outcome than the Nazis getting what they deserve once this trial does conclude.