Independent News
California police officials blast Disney songs in alleged attempt to keep videos off social media
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Instead of working to end racial injustice and discrimination within their department, some cops are just finding ways not to get caught. In order to stop videos of them abusing individuals from making it on social media, cops in California have been blasting Disney songs. According to The Washington Post officers in Santa Ana, California, blasted out classics from Toy Story, Mulan, and Encanto at night so that people would not be able to upload videos of them due to copyright reasons.
Alongside a city councilman, locals have expressed concern about the practice. The practice has been used in the past to prevent individuals from posting violent videos that would draw attention to the actions of the department. The latest incident took place on April 4.
In that incident, a police cruiser blasted Disney music at 11 PM on a residential street when a cameraman asked whether or not the department was paid to listen to music. According to local news reports, police officials had been investigating a stolen vehicle at the time.
Santa Ana City Councilman Johnathan Hernandez was also present, who then asked: “Why are you playing Disney music?” He also questioned if the officer lived in the area.
The officer referenced “copyright infringement” in his reply.
The video exchange was posted on the Santa Ana Audits YouTube channel and garnered more than 45,000 views. The channel monitors police exchanges with the public.
In response to the clip, Santa Ana Chief of Police David Valentin said: “My expectation is that all police department employees perform their duties with dignity and respect in the community we are hired to serve.”
But given the history of the practice, Hernandez said he believed the officers were trying to keep the clip off social media.
Hernandez told the Post he plans to introduce a ban on the practice.
“I’m embarrassed that this is how you’re treating my neighbors. There’s children here,” he told the Post. “If you work for the public and there are numerous people out recording you telling you to please turn it off, why wouldn’t anyone in their right mind stop that?”
In one incident last year, cops in Oakland, California, played Taylor Swift’s 2014 song “Blank Space” as they confronted activists. While they did this in an attempt to have videos of them not make it to social media, in this incident footage made it to and stayed on social media.
According to research by Harvard University’s Lumen project, which studies copyright content removal, several videos linked to Black Lives Matter protests have been removed because they contained copyrighted music. The researchers noted that “law enforcement,” or anyone who wanted to stop videos from being shared online, “need only make sure that copyrighted audio is present with sufficiently recognisable clarity and volume in the background of a protest or other event,” BBC reported.
Vote on naming a federal courthouse shows just how extremist House Republicans have become
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Even in the worst of times, Congress can usually get its act together to name federal buildings. It’s kind of a joke about Congress, actually. But House Republicans just got to the point of divisive extremism where they won’t even reliably do that.
Every member of Florida’s congressional delegation had co-sponsored a bill to name a federal courthouse after Justice Joseph W. Hatchett, the first Black man to serve on the Florida Supreme Court and the first Black judge on a federal appeals court in the Deep South. That means Republican Sens. Rick Scott and Marco Rubio and 16 House Republicans, along with 11 House Democrats. The bill had passed the Senate. But then, at the last minute, a majority of Republicans in the House, including co-sponsors, turned against the bill in a moment that resonated with the racist attacks some Senate Republicans leveled at Justice-designate Ketanji Brown Jackson in her Supreme Court confirmation hearings.
RELATED STORY: Far-right Freedom Caucus is poised to have serious sway if Republicans take the House
Rep. Andrew Clyde of Georgia appears to have singlehandedly turned the vote from a routine vote to name a federal building after a trailblazing judge into a Republican purity test. Clyde circulated a 1999 Associated Press article about one of Hatchett’s decisions relating to prayer in schools. Never mind that Hatchett was following Supreme Court precedent when he ruled against student-approved prayers at graduation ceremonies. This single decision made him toxic among House Republicans, with 89% voting against naming the courthouse after him. Since the bill’s passage was seen as certain, it had come for a vote under a fast-tracked process that required a two-thirds majority, which meant that with Republicans suddenly opposed, it failed.
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All this at the behest of Clyde, a lawmaker most famous for his insistence that the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol was a “normal tourist visit.” Clyde also voted against the Emmett Till Anti-Lynching Act and against making Juneteenth a federal holiday, which, combined with his active organizing against naming a federal courthouse after a Black judge, kind of starts looking like a pattern.
Clyde did not bring years of credibility within the House to his objection. He’s a first-term representative. Republicans are now so beholden to extremism, so ready to jump at the first hint they might not be pure enough, that a first-termer who should be seen as an embarrassment is able to wield the power to shift a majority of Republican votes. Multiple representatives who had sponsored the bill voted no at the last minute, with one, Rep. Vern Buchanan, saying “I don’t know” why he had changed his mind.
The last-minute shift shows how undisciplined House Republicans now are by anything except the race to the right. But its echoes of Jackson’s confirmation hearing—in which senators like Josh Hawley and Tom Cotton used routine decisions of the sort made by judges all the time to paint her as a supporter of pedophiles and drug dealers—highlight how willing Republicans are to trash any Black person who is a candidate for an honor. Years of judicial decisions can always be cherrypicked to find something that sounds objectionable to someone, somewhere, but whose decisions are cherrypicked and to what end matters. So Republicans tried to turn Jackson into a pedophile-supporter using a sentencing record that was in line with the averages and in fact similar to that of other judges for whom those same Republicans had voted. And they voted against honoring Hatchett with a courthouse name over a single decision that followed Supreme Court precedent.
As Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz said after the vote, “If the standard that we use is one ruling out of thousands, then what else could we conclude but that they are not willing to name a courthouse after a Black person.”
RELATED STORIES:
Three Republicans stop anti-lynching bill from passing unanimously in House
Republican who deemed insurrection a ‘tourist visit’ didn’t exactly look unbothered in photos
That Supreme Court confirmation hearing was so racist. We can’t ignore it or normalize it
Florida teen who gave presentation on Stonewall shows concerning photo from new classroom …
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Will Larkins, a 17-year-old junior at Winter Park High School in Winter Park, Florida, recently went viral online for giving a presentation on the 1969 Stonewall uprising to their history class. Larkins gave the presentation on March 31 and requested that a classmate film the presentation, which they gave in a dress and pearls, to post to social media later. Larkin reportedly received permission from their teacher to give the presentation, though according to the Washington Post, the teacher wasn’t actually familiar with Stonewall to begin with.
The class was learning about history from the 60s and 70s in the United States, and Larkin reportedly asked the teacher if they’d be covering Stonewall, and the teacher replied by asking what Stonewall was. According to the post, the teacher reviewed the 10-minute PowerPoint presentation Larkins put together before they spoke in front of the class.
Larkins, who founded the Winter Park High’s Queer Student Union, has openly opposed Florida’s hateful Don’t Say Gay bill, and has organized a walkout for students in protest of the discriminatory legislation. They’ve also written about their perspective for The New York Times and even testified against the bill in the Senate in Tallahassee, Florida, at the end of February. Now, according to Metro Weekly, Larkins has been moved to a different class and placed under an “investigation.”
RELATED: Ever wondered why we file taxes the way we do? According to Elizabeth Warren, we can thank the GOP
“Essentially, people were fed up with the abuse,” Larkins (accurately) explains in the video clip, adding that Stone was a “tipping point” for many LGBTQ+ people after decades of being discriminated against and targeted by police.
Here is the initial tweet and video from Larkins about their presentation.
According to updates Larkins shared on Twitter, the student they asked to film the class received a “referral” from school officials, and several other students who filmed the presentation did not. Larkins also shared a photo from a location they describe as their new history class which features a yellow “Don’t Tread on Me” sign on the wall. While the meanings of this flag have changed throughout history, it’s now commonly understood to be a symbol of the far-right.
“All of this really plays into a larger issue of adults not really respecting the youth’s voices,” Larkins told LGBTQ+ outlet Xtra in an interview. Larkins went on to say they do have some “allyship” within the school’s administration, but they still don’t understand why they’re effectively being punished.
“When I look back to elementary school, I wonder how different my childhood would have been had my classmates and I known that I wasn’t some tragic anomaly, a strange fluke that needed to be fixed,” Larkins shared in their Times op-ed that ran on March 12.
“People in support of the bill always ask, ‘Why do these subjects need to be taught in schools?’ To them I would say that if we understand ourselves, and those around us understand us, so many lives will be saved,” they continued.
Larkins is right, of course. We already know LGBTQ+ youth report higher rates of depression, anxiety, bullying, and harassment. We already know they’re more likely to leave high school without a diploma. Trans youth, in particular, are being unfairly targeted over sports opportunities, in addition to basic dignities like using the bathroom and locker room. All students deserve to learn accurate, inclusive history, and that includes LGBTQ+ history.
In terms of the Don’t Say Gay bill, this situation is actually a great example of how far the decidedly vague legislation can go. Supporters of Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis have said the bill only refers to young students, up to the third grade, and suggests people are overreacting by how far it can go.
But the bill drops some very broad language, referring to age-appropriate curriculum for any level, and this example from a high school classroom is a great demonstration of that. Who decides what’s appropriate, especially if the subject is inherently inappropriate at least some of the time?
There’s no level of LGBTQ+ inclusion conservatives are going to agree is appropriate—especially not if this becomes an easy issue they can latch onto just in time for midterm elections.
Texas GOP official calls Abbott's policy 'economy killing action' as protests over delays continue
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Texas Gov. Greg Abbott’s stunt forcing commercial trucks to undergo unnecessary secondary inspections at ports of entry is turning into an economic and political disaster: a 60% drop in commercial traffic, continued protests by outraged Mexican truckers, and now condemnation from a fellow right-wing state official.
The Texas Tribune reports Texas Agriculture Commissioner and similarly terrible Republican Sid Miller labeled Abbott’s policy—which was launched in retaliation for the Biden administration’s just decision to end use of Stephen Miller’s white supremacist policy stomping on U.S. asylum law—“political theater.”
The report said the official told Abbott in a letter that his stunt “is not stopping illegal immigration,” but instead “stopping food from getting to grocery store shelves and in many cases causing food to rot in trucks—many of which are owned by Texas and other American companies.” Miller called Abbott’s stunt an “economy killing action.”
RELATED STORY: Abbott’s increased truck inspections in response to Biden admin leading to huge delays, rotting food
Abbott’s stunt was similarly slammed in a lengthy statement from Customs and Border Protection (CBP), which called the Texas Department of Public Safety’s checks of commercial vehicles after they’ve already been checked by U.S. border officials “additional and unnecessary,” and have led “to traffic disruptions and critical impacts to an already-strained supply chain.”
“Local trade associations, officials, and businesses are requesting the Texas state government discontinue their additional border truck inspection process because it is not necessary to protect the safety and security of Texas communities and is resulting in significant impacts to local supply chains that will impact consumers and businesses nationally.”
Mexico’s government similarly slammed the policy, “estimating that two-thirds of normal trade was being held up and costing ‘significant revenue’ for both U.S. and Mexican businesses,” Reuters reported. As noted earlier this week, Mexican truckers frustrated over delays to their work and livelihood blocked bridge traffic in protest of Abbott’s shenanigans. These protests have continued, Reuters said.
“Traffic at a fourth bridge connecting Reynosa to Pharr, Texas, was also halted on Tuesday by drivers who parked their trucks and began barbecuing on the Mexican side of the port of entry, according to photos sent to Reuters.” Trucker Raymundo Galicia told Reuters that it took him 17 hours to cross the border and back because of Abbott. “I get paid the same whether it takes me an hour or ten hours to cross, so this is affecting us a lot,” he said.
The Texas Tribune said that at least $60 million in goods and services go across the Pharr Bridge every single day. In terms of Mexican produce going to the U.S., it’s “the busiest land crossing.” Abbott’s stunt is set to raise food prices and make getting certain produce impossible, hurting families in Texas.
But as when he was confronted about the human costs of his Operation Lone Star scheme, he’ll likely just complaint about the president. Oh wait—Caller Times reports an Abbott spokesperson was already doing that. Mark Miner “sought to pin the blame on Biden,” the report said.
“It’s going to be very bad for the Texas economy. It’s going to be very bad for the national economy,” Abbott’s Democratic challenger for governor, Beto O’Rourke, told Caller Times. “When you see those trucks lined up miles deep all the way into Mexico, what you’re seeing is inflation, what you’re seeing is higher prices at the grocery store, and what you’re seeing are more supply chain problems. We are calling on Greg Abbott to end this policy today.”
Pointing to the agriculture commissioner’s statements, Rep. Veronica Escobar tweeted that “even Republicans agree” that Abbott’s unnecessary secondary checks “will have catastrophic consequences for families at the grocery store and businesses working to keep their doors open. It’s time for the Governor to put an end to his harmful directives.”
RELATED STORIES: Texas Gov. Greg Abbott peddles horrific plan to kidnap immigrants, then backtracks
Escobar says Abbott’s plan to get asylum-seekers out of Texas is more ‘politics of hate and cruelty’
Texas refuses to be transparent about Operation Lone Star. Probably because it’s all a scheme
Ukraine update: Mariupol gave its all, but now it needs a miracle
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On Wednesday, Russian officials reported that over 1,000 Ukrainian marines belonging to the 36th Brigade had surrendered in the besieged city of Mariupol. Reuters reports that these Ukrainian forces had been in the Azovstal industrial district, one of three much-reduced pockets of resistance remaining inside the battered remains of what was once a city of almost half a million people. If this area is captured, there may be no large organized force remaining to oppose Russian control of the city.
This report may be false. The number of Ukrainian forces surrendering is almost certainly exaggerated. However, there have been other surrenders in the area in the last week, along with messages indicating that surviving forces were low on food, supplies, and ammunition. Cut off from resupply, battered by weeks of constant shelling, and hectored by Russian forces now entering the rubble with armor, there’s legitimately not much more that Ukrainian forces in Mariupol can do, barring a miracle.
Almost since the beginning of the Russian invasion, we’ve been writing about the situation in Mariupol. Russia desperately wants to take the city as part of a land bridge between the Donbas region and Crimea, and thanks to its location, Russia is able to mount immense force against Mariupol. Nearly surrounded by the second day of the war, a combination of territorial defense, fighters from the far-right Azov battalion, and regular Ukrainian military have waged a fierce resistance even as Russia shelled, bombed, and directed missiles into the city. Every single hospital in Mariupol was bombed. So were major shelters, like the opera house that Russia bombed in spite of—or because of—a sign indicating that there were children inside. We’ve come back to Mariupol again, and again, and again, both because of the strategic importance of the city and because of the genuine horrors happening there.
As kos covered last week, Ukraine was apparently slipping supplies to Mariupol in an amazing way: using helicopters to swing around above the Sea of Azov, then landing at a remote location on the outskirts of the city. In that way ammo kept coming in and the wounded were carried safely away. However, the reason the report came out when it did was that Russia had discovered this secret supply route and brought down two Ukrainian helicopters.
Without that stream of supplies, it seems that some units have quickly come to the end of their rope. Several hundred Ukrainian marines surrendered last week in a report that Ukraine first disputed, but which turned out to be true. Now it seems even more may have laid down arms.
Still, there are a few reasons why this still isn’t over. Reports of locations of engagements between Ukrainian forces and Russian invaders over the last week show that the Ukrainian forces were still able to move relatively freely around large areas of the city and contest even more. And if the large group of marines did surrender, that doesn’t seem to include other members of the 36th Marine brigade, who first announced that they had no choice but surrender because they were on their last legs, but then managed to fight their way through a Russian cordon within the city to join the Azov fighters.
How can we be sure this isn’t the same group? If Russia had captured the Azov fighters, they would definitely be talking about it. On Tuesday, Ukraine War Maps (@War_Mapper) reported that Ukrainian control in Mariupol remained in three areas.
Based on the site of the reported surrender on Wednesday and the site of reported Azov attacks over the last week, it’s possible to deduce that the Azov fighters are primarily operating in that southwest area, while the 36th Brigade was mostly to their east. Looking at the situation from a satellite view, it gives a sense of where these forces are located.
Based on the reported site of the surrender (the red triangle on the right) and the GPS location of recent Azov activity (blue stars on left), it can be theorized that some elements of the 36th Brigade fought their way across that roughly 2-mile gap between the area of Ukrainian control in the southeast to that area where Azov forces have been fighting in the southwest. This area, as well as the area in the north of the city, may still be controlled by forces loyal to Ukraine. However, if the surrender reports are accurate, Russia may now hold the city east of the Kal’mius River (though scattered fighting should be expected everywhere in Mariupol).
These areas of Ukrainian control are still large areas. They’re measured in miles, not blocks. So despite Russian proclamations, it seems unlikely that Mariupol will be entirely within their hands real soon now. However, it can be expected that all the Ukrainian forces in the city are suffering the same problems: lack of supplies, lack of food, lack of ammo, and plain exhaustion. Without a change in that situation, whatever Ukrainian forces remain in Mariupol can’t be expected to be there forever.
Meanwhile, horrible rumors and claims continue to circulate about the fate of civilians in the city. Russia has admitted to taking thousands to “filtration” camps inside Russia, where some former Mariupol residents have been forced to record propaganda videos thanking the Russian forces for saving them from a city that was peaceful and growing two months ago.
The mayor of Mariupol indicates that there are still as many as 120,000 people inside the city, trapped among the ruins and the rubble. The mayor indicates that as many as 20,000 people may have already been killed. Meanwhile, the Ministry of Defense reports that Russia wants to get the capture of Mariupol over with so that Russians can hold a parade there on May 9.
And this claim keeps popping up.
To be clear, images of a supposed mobile crematorium in Mariupol that have circulated on social media appear to be taken from a video that’s at least eight years old. That doesn’t mean the story of these mobile crematoriums isn’t true, but it certainly means that the images are false and the whole story is suspect. Despite claims that have continued since the beginning of the invasion, there doesn’t seem to be visual evidence of these units being deployed in Mariupol, or anywhere else at this point. Let’s hope it stays that way, but considering what’s already been seen in Bucha and elsewhere, it’s all too easy to believe.
Right now, Mariupol needs a miracle. What shape that might take is hard to imagine. But hopefully someone has a plan that isn’t a Russian parade.
Mark ‘Big Lie’ Meadows removed from voter roll in North Carolina amid voter fraud investigation
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Welp, I guess it’s official: Former Trump lackey Mark Meadows has been removed from North Carolina’s voter rolls. That means he can’t pretend to live in a mobile home in Scaly Mountain in Macon County, North Carolina, in order to vote there while actually living in Virginia—where he also apparently registered to vote.
Melanie Thibault, Macon County Board of Elections director, told the Asheville Citizen Times Tuesday that she consulted with the North Carolina Board of Elections staff after discovering that Meadows was registered in North Carolina and Virginia. The board removed him from their voter rolls.
“What I found was that he was also registered in the state of Virginia. And he voted in a 2021 election. The last election he voted in Macon County was in 2020,” Thibault said.
RELATED STORY: Voter fraud finally uncovered by GOP: Mark Meadows investigated in North Carolina
Meadows was removed in accordance with General Statute 163-57, which states:
“If a person goes into another state, county, municipality, precinct, ward, or other election district, or into the District of Columbia, and while there G.S. 163-57 Page 2 exercises the right of a citizen by voting in an election, that person shall be considered to have lost residence in that State, county, municipality, precinct, ward, or other election district from which that person removed.”
As first reported by The New Yorker in September 2020, about three weeks before North Carolina’s voter registration deadline for the general election, Meadows—a devout Stop the Stealer—claimed to be living in a 14-foot-by-62-foot mobile home in North Carolina, where he never actually lived. But he voted absentee using that address in the 2020 general election. Meadows, a former Asheville resident and Western North Carolina congressman, was actually living in Virginia at that time.
In March, an investigation into Meadows’ possible voter fraud was launched by the State Bureau of Investigation.
“The allegations, in this case, involve potential crimes committed by a government official,” Macon County District Attorney Ashley Hornsby Welch wrote in a letter to the attorney general’s office on March 14.
Nazneen Ahmed, a spokesperson for North Carolina Attorney General Josh Stein’s office, told CNBC at the time that “we have agreed to [Welch’s] request” to take responsibility for the investigation.
“We have requested that the Department of Justice’s Special Prosecutions Sections investigate alongside the State Board of Elections,” Ahmed said. “At the conclusion of the investigation, we’ll review the findings.”
As we’ve reported in the past, it remains to be seen what if any penalty will come to Meadows. But when it comes to the same thing happening to people of color, the outcome is quite clear.
In February, Pamela Moses, a Black woman, was sentenced to six years in prison for trying to register to vote. And in 2019, Lanisha Diresha Bratcher, another Black woman, was charged with a felony for voter fraud after she tried to vote while on probation.
RELATED STORY: Either Mark Meadows is living in a mobile home in North Carolina or he’s committed voter fraud
Zelenskyy calls Biden 'a true leader'
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During a trip to Menlo, Iowa, on Tuesday, President Joe Biden suggested that Russian President Vladimir Putin was carrying out “genocide” against the Ukrainian people.
When reporters later asked Biden to elaborate, the president said, “Yes, I called it genocide, because it’s become clearer and clearer that Putin is just trying to wipe out the idea of even being able to be a Ukrainian.”
Biden said the “evidence is mounting” week by week of the “horrible things” Russia has done in Ukraine.
“We’ll let the lawyers decide internationally whether or not it qualifies,” Biden added, “but it sure seems that way to me.”
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy welcomed Biden’s assessment, calling him “a true leader.”
“True words of a true leader @POTUS,” Zelenskyy tweeted. “Calling things by their names is essential to stand up to evil. We are grateful for U.S. assistance provided so far and we urgently need more heavy weapons to prevent further Russian atrocities.”
President Biden’s strong leadership on Ukraine, empathy for its people, and clear-eyed reflections on Putin’s brutal war are becoming an important part of how many Americans view the war. It has also typically reflected the thinking and sentiment of a broad coalition of the American people.
Biden’s off-the-cuff remark last month that Putin “cannot remain in power” was initially viewed by the media as a gaffe. But several polls have since shown that Biden’s comment was very much in line with the sentiment of roughly two-thirds of Americans—or even more.
Demonizing Putin—not that he needs any help—also continues to highlight the existential threat posed by the Trump-Putin axis.
It's tax week, and lobbying is still rotting the system
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It’s tax season (federal taxes are due April 18), and as millions of people crank up their computers and download Intuit’s TurboTax or H&R Block’s software, they are the unwitting victims of a multiyear, multimillion-dollar lobbying campaign by those companies to make you pay them to do your taxes. The dirty little secret is that the IRS already has the tax information they need about your income and how much tax you’ve paid. That’s reported to them with every paystub from your employer.
In fact, for most people the IRS could just send out pre-filled forms that taxpayers would only need to sign off on. The vast majority of people, about 70%, use the standard deduction and don’t bother to itemize, and could thus let the IRS do all the work—since the IRS has already done all the work! But Intuit and H&R Block exist precisely to make money off of you by keeping taxes far more complicated. They’ve even circumvented the one big effort on the part of the federal government to change that.
For about 20 years, the Free File Alliance, a group of private-sector tax preparation companies, have been working in partnership with the IRS to provide free online tax preparation and filing services. An investigation by public interest news organization Propublica in 2019 documented how the companies behind both TurboTax and H&R Block hid the free option for filing on their websites. Intuit actually added code on its webpages to block Google from locating the free file site in searches. Following Propublica’s exposé, Intuit changed the code so that the free version showed up in searches.
TurboTax has not been part of the Free File program since 2020, and has been under investigation by the Federal Trade Commission since Propublica’s investigation in 2019. Last month the investigation has started to show fruit. Intuit was sued by federal regulators last month for continuing deceptive practices in advertising with its “bogus advertisements pitching ‘free’ tax filing that millions of consumers could not use.” It also filed a complaint “asking a court to order Intuit to halt its deceptive advertising immediately” to prevent “ongoing harm to consumers rushing to file their taxes.”
“TurboTax is bombarding consumers with ads for ‘free’ tax filing services, and then hitting them with charges when it’s time to file,” said Samuel Levine, director of the Bureau of Consumer Protection. “We are asking a court to immediately halt this bait-and-switch, and to protect taxpayers at the peak of filing season.” Anyone who received a 1099 form for work in the gig economy, or anyone who earned farm income, can’t use TurboTax’s free product. The income limit for using free file this year, by the way, is an adjusted gross income of $73,000.
So if you haven’t already done your taxes, don’t use TurboTax on principle if for no other reason. But also because they’ve been lying to you about their “free” service.
In the meantime, here’s Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) talking about one of her long-term projects, the Tax Filing Simplification Act, and how these companies have been ripping us off for many years, not to mention making this whole process a lot more difficult than it needs to be.
Road rage is sky-high across the U.S.
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Road rage has been on a steady creep in the United States since 2016, but new analysis published this month offers a clearer glimpse into the staggering and needlessly tragic episodes of gun violence plaguing the nation’s roads and highways.
Everytown Research and Policy reported on April 4 that more than 500 people in America were shot and wounded or killed in more than 700 road rage conflicts last year. That translates to a shooting, injury, or killing on the road roughly every 17 hours.
RELATED STORY: Georgia just became the 25th state to let people carry concealed guns with no permit and no training
There’s not a definitive answer on why road rage incidents are exploding, but researchers suggest that the COVID-19 pandemic might be the culprit, as it has played a significant role in upping people’s stress levels across the board.
Road Rage Deaths and Injuries, 2016 to 2021 by Daily Kos on Scribd
Many of the factors that upped stress during the pandemic also coincide with the typical triggers for gun violence generally, like unemployment and a lack of affordable housing.
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Domestic violence shootings have also increased since the pandemic began. Just this week in Kentucky—home to Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell’s constituents—the state’s attorney’s office noted that domestic gun violence rocketed up an additional 30% in 2021 compared to just before the pandemic began in 2019.
The uptick in road rage is not surprising either when one considers the huge number of guns that Americans purchased in the last few years alone. In 2020, the nation broke its own record for gun sales with 22.8 million guns sold. In 2021, according to one estimate by the National Firearm Industry and Trade Association, sales dipped just slightly with 18.5 million guns sold.
The number of first-time gun buyers also went up by about a third last year, according to the National Shooting Sports Foundation. This January, the organization reported that 5.4 million people purchased a gun for the very first time in 2021.
Though gun violence and road rage have become more ubiquitous, the push by law enforcement across the U.S. to track and study the data has been slow to come online and no federal database on road rage yet exists. The New York Times reported on Tuesday that the Dallas Police Department, for example, only began tracking road rage shootings for the first time last year.
According to the Times, the department found that in Dallas alone, 45 people were wounded and 11 were killed by guns in a heated moment of road rage. Even in cities like Austin, Texas, incidents were up. The city’s population is largely liberal and though liberals often do not own guns at the same rate as their conservative counterparts, that did not stop Austin police from reporting more than 160 episodes of people “pointing or firing a gun at drivers” and 15 road rage shootings.
Georgia just became the 25th state to let people carry concealed guns with no permit and no training
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On a day that we’re lucky if there is only one mass shooting and on which congressional Democrats introduced a modest package of gun violence-related legislation, Georgia Republican Gov. Brian Kemp signed Senate Bill 319 Tuesday. This makes Georgia the 25th state to adopt a law allowing anyone who can legally own a firearm to carry it concealed without a permit or training. The signing was done, naturally, at a gun store in Douglas County and takes effect July 1. In the past two months, Republican governors in Alabama, Ohio, and Indiana have also signed such so-called constitutional carry laws. In the past 16 months, 10 states have enacted such laws.
It’s another victory for the National Rifle Association gun lobby and the even more extreme Gun Owners of America (GOA). The basic concept: if everybody is armed all the time just about everywhere, we’re all safer. I took note of the ridiculousness of this in Wannabe Wild Bill Hickoks fantasize heroic gunplay.
Nearly 40 years ago, the NRA began its crusade to get every state to issue concealed-carry permits to anyone who could legally own a firearm. When they began, nearly no state did so. Now, all but eight states do so. To get a permit, many states have required applicants to have a specific need for carrying—such as dangerous employment—and to undergo background checks and training, including live-fire proficiency tests.
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But beginning in 2009, the GOA and subsequently the NRA began a new crusade to eliminate permits altogether. At the time, just Vermont and Alaska were in that category. Now, as the green states in the map below show (with Georgia not yet included), 25 states have such laws on the books, the product of heavy lobbying. It doesn’t always work. Most recently, such a move failed by two votes in Nebraska. Here’s a state roster with some details.
Kemp had vowed to sign such a law during his 2018 campaign, which also featured him in a much-ridiculed TV ad that showed him pointing a shotgun at an actor depicting someone who wanted to date Kemp’s daughter.
Maya T. Prahbu reports:
In the three years after his election, Kemp did little to push permit-less carry at the Legislature, until former U.S. Sen. David Perdue declared he would challenge the governor for the state’s highest office. Perdue accused Kemp of being a “career politician who hasn’t delivered” for gun rights advocates or backed other cultural issues popular with the party’s conservative core.
While pursuing permit-less carry is considered a play for GOP voters, a poll by The Atlanta Journal-Constitution earlier this year found that about 70% of Georgia voters polled do not believe Georgians should be allowed to carry a concealed weapon without first obtaining a license. Of those, 54% of respondents who identified as Republican and 60% of those who said they were conservative opposed allowing handguns to be carried without a permit.
In an ad last week, state Democrats blasted Kemp for planning to sign the law.
It should be noted that while Georgia and other “constitutional carry” states don’t require background checks, anyone who purchases a firearm from an authorized dealer must still undergo a federal background check. But that doesn’t cover the 20% or so of Americans whom analysts say acquire firearms in private sales or as gifts.
The most powerful opposition to permitless carry laws comes from law enforcement. For instance, when the Ohio legislature was considering its own law, Hamilton County Sheriff Charmaine McGuffey challenged it:
“To allow people to carry concealed with no background check, no documentation of who they are and no training is dangerous,” McGuffey told ABC News. “I am not against the Second Amendment—the right to bear arms. What I’m asking people to do is consider that there must be some failsafe placed into the system.” […]
“I have 900 officers,” she said. “Our deputies are well-vetted for their backgrounds, their personalities, their integrity, their ability to follow rules and follow the law, and I would not hand one of them a gun with no training.”
Numerous organizations advocating tougher gun restrictions also opposed the Georgia bill and those in other states. Among them:
“There’s a reason law enforcement officers overwhelmingly oppose permitless carry: it makes their jobs harder and puts their lives – and the lives of the people they’re sworn to protect – on the line,” said Shannon Watts, founder of Moms Demand Action.
“When states dismantle permitting systems and gut gun safety laws, gun violence goes up. Gun lobby-backed politicians are shamefully putting primary politics over public safety, and the consequences will be even more devastation for their constituents and the law enforcement officers they pretend they support.”
Depending on how broadly the U.S. Supreme Court rules in the case of New York State Rifle & Pistol Association (NYSRPA) v. Bruen, states requiring concealed-carry permits and training may have to relax or eliminate such provisions. That ruling is expected in June.
Meanwhile, President Joe Biden on Monday announced his second nominee to lead the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, Steve Dittelbach. The agency hasn’t had a permanent director since 2015, and Biden had to pull his original nominee—Dave Chipman—after foes raised a stink that made his confirmation unlikely. Chipman previously was an adviser to the Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence and was viewed as anti-gun by advocates of looser firearm laws.
Biden announced the ATF will now require licensed gun dealers to keep their sales records until they close the business or give up their federal firearm license and then turn these records over the agency where they will be permanently kept. Previously, gun dealers could destroy their sales records after 20 years. The president also said Monday that it is cracking down on “ghost guns.” A White House Fact Sheet notes:
Today, the President […] will also announce that the U.S. Department of Justice has issued a final rule to rein in the proliferation of “ghost guns” — unserialized, privately-made firearms that law enforcement are increasingly recovering at crime scenes in cities across the country. Last year alone, there were approximately 20,000 suspected ghost guns reported to ATF as having been recovered by law enforcement in criminal investigations—a ten-fold increase from 2016. Because ghost guns lack the serial numbers marked on other firearms, law enforcement has an exceedingly difficult time tracing a ghost gun found at a crime scene back to an individual purchaser.
This final rule bans the business of manufacturing the most accessible ghost guns, such as unserialized “buy build shoot” kits that individuals can buy online or at a store without a background check and can readily assemble into a working firearm in as little as 30 minutes with equipment they have at home.
In addition to the administration’s efforts, six Democratic members of the House of Representatives have introduced a package of modest bills designed they say to reduce gun violence. At his website, Rep. Joe Neguse of Colorado summarized the legislation:
- Help for Healing Communities Act—this bill creates a new grant program in the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) to provide funding for mental health services to those who have survived an active shooter event or incident of targeted violence. The aim of this program is to promote resilience and equity in communities that have recently faced an active shooter or event of targeted violence through implementation of evidence-based, violence prevention, and community engagement programs, as well as linkages to trauma-informed behavioral health services.
- STOP Violence Act—this bill would provide federal funding for preventative security measures at active shooter sites and public assembly facilities. The Department of Justice’s anti-terrorism and emergency funding program currently allows for public agencies, US Attorney’s offices, public institutions of higher education and nongovernmental and victim services organizations to receive funding after a crime of terrorism or mass violence has occurred. The STOP Violence Act would expand this program to include the location of active shooter events, such as the Table Mesa King Soopers and public assembly facilities.
- Safe Workplaces Act, this bill would direct the National Institute of Occupational Safety and Health to conduct a study on threats of violence, including gun violence, in the workplace. Once the study has been completed, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) is tasked with developing best practices for employers to keep employees safe from these threats of violence which will be publicly disseminated.
- Prioritizing Resources for Victims of Firearm Violence Act to designate as a fifth priority category programs that provide assistance and mental health services to victims of firearm violence and families of victims of homicide through the Victims of Crime Act (VOCA). Ensuring states allocate at least 10% of VOCA funding to these programs, to guarantee funding for victims and communities in need.
The other five Democrats introducing these bills are Veronica Escobar (Texas), Ted Deutch (Florida), Lucy McBath and Nikema Williams (Georgia.), and André Carson (Indiana).
In March 2021, less than two weeks before a shooter killed 10 people at a shopping center in Boulder, part of Neguse’s 2nd District, the Congressman introduced a universal background check bill. Biden again pushed for its passage on Monday. Across the political spectrum, universal background checks have been the gun-law reform with the widest approval. Yet Neguse’s bill remains stalled in Congress. And previous efforts to pass universal background checks—like the one introduced in 2013 in the wake of the Sandy Hook massacre of 1st grade school children and educators in Newton, Connecticut—have failed under a barrage of NRA lobbying. Despite the organization’s financial and internal troubles over the past couple of years, its agenda is still being carried out.