Tag: Senate

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Senate Finance Committee prepares to tackle billionaires, darkish cash

Senate Finance Committee prepares to take on billionaires, dark money

Senator Ron Wyden, an Oregon Democrat and senior member of the Senate Finance Committee, speaks during a hearing with Robert Lighthizer, a non-pictured U.S. commercial agent, in Washington, DC, United States on Tuesday, March 12, 2019.

Anna Moneymaker | Bloomberg | Getty Images

Democrats, who lead the Senate’s powerful finance committee, are preparing to take over the rich, dark money groups and specialized agencies after their party takes control of Congress.

Committee chairman Senator Ron Wyden, D-Ore., Announced its priorities to CNBC Thursday, one day after he officially took over the chairmanship of the panel.

He said tax reform was one of the priorities of the committee that includes Senator Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., A Wall Street critic and advocate of tax hikes for the rich. Of particular interest, Wyden said, is how billionaires made so much money during the pandemic when much of the economy, including millions of working families, was struggling.

Wyden also said the committee will get a grip on health care costs that will involve confronting drug companies.

With regard to big tech, Wyden continues to be an advocate for Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act of 1996, which he co-authored. The provision protects technology companies from being held liable for what users post on their platforms. Republican leaders, including former President Donald Trump, and several Democrats are against Section 230.

When asked if he would call executives from major pharmaceutical and technology companies, Wyden said, “We’re going to go where we need to get the facts.”

Dark money

The panel will delve into the tax-exempt nonprofits that organized the January 6 pro-Trump rally that led to the deadly Capitol Hill riot, Wyden said.

Shortly before becoming CFO, Wyden sent a letter to IRS Commissioner Charles Rettig asking him to investigate what role, if any, these groups played in the riot. Indeed, pro-Trump dark money organizations helped plan the rally, during which then-President Trump encouraged supporters to march on the Capitol.

These types of groups are known as dark money organizations because they do not publicly disclose their donors. Warren and Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse, DR.I., who is also a member of the Finance Committee, recently sent a letter to the new Treasury Secretary, Janet Yellen, addressing dark money groups across the political spectrum.

Wyden said the IRS told him it was considering his request.

“The reason I’m so interested in whether tax-exempt organizations were involved in planning or inciting the insurrection is that the law couldn’t be simpler and more understandable. Tax-exempt organizations cannot and cannot be involved in illegal activities. ” involved in inciting a riot, “Wyden told CNBC.” We will make sure the IRS moves on immediately. “

When asked whether he wants to ask Rettig to testify before the committee, Wyden did not rule this out. “We’re going to be looking at a number of issues where we want the IRS on file,” he said.

Tax reform targets over-riches

In 2019, Wyden proposed taxing income from capital gains at the same rates as wages and paying taxes on profits from stock operations. Upon joining the finance committee, Warren said she plans to introduce her proposed wealth tax on assets valued at over $ 50 million.

Warren’s plan includes “a two-cent tax on every dollar of individual assets over $ 50 million and an additional tax on every dollar of assets over $ 1 billion,” according to Wednesday’s press release.

For starters, the committee will focus on the news needed to ease tax reform – including an emphasis on how the rich got richer during the Covid-19 crisis.

“You have to be able to lay that foundation,” said Wyden.

“You have to be able to describe how people who are very, very wealthy billionaires … how come they can make these huge sums of money,” he added during the pandemic.

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Health

Senate confirms Pete Buttigieg as Transportation secretary

Senate confirms Pete Buttigieg as Transportation secretary

Pete Buttigieg speaks at the Senate Commerce, Science, and Transportation nomination hearings to review his awaited nomination for Secretary of Transportation in Washington.

Ken Cedeno | Reuters

The U.S. Senate confirmed Pete Buttigieg as Secretary of Transportation on Tuesday, presenting the former presidential candidate with a myriad of challenges – from President Joe Biden’s environmental priorities to the Covid-19 pandemic.

Buttigieg, the former mayor of South Bend, Indiana, easily received approval from the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation last week after a largely amicable hearing. He was asked about issues related to Covid-19, the much-needed improvement in infrastructure, and strengthening the powers of the Federal Aviation Administration if he were to lead the DOT, which has 55,000 employees.

The Senate approved Buttigieg’s 86-13 nomination with an overwhelming majority.

In the first two weeks, Biden’s government has already taken strict measures regarding transportation measures to contain the spread of Covid-19. Biden extended an entry ban for most non-US citizens who have recently been to Brazil, the UK and much of Europe. On Tuesday, the US government asked passengers to wear masks on planes, trains, buses, ferries and other means of transport.

Buttigieg’s DOT could become a driving or limiting force in the adoption of new technologies, especially autonomous and electric vehicles.

Biden has already directed federal agencies to consider revising the Trump administration’s lowered fuel emission standards for vehicles. He also said he plans to replace the government’s fleet of cars and trucks with U.S.-assembled electric vehicles

The 39-year-old will be the first openly gay person to hold a cabinet position and one of the youngest ever.

– CNBC’s Michael Wayland contributed to this article.

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Business

As Senate Weighs Biden’s Commerce Choose, Right here’s What to Watch

As Senate Weighs Biden’s Commerce Pick, Here’s What to Watch

WASHINGTON – The commercial division has taken on a new role in recent years and has extensive powers over issues such as technology exports and climate change. On Tuesday, President Biden’s candidate to run the sprawling agency, Gina M. Raimondo, will appear before the Senate Trade Committee for a confirmation hearing. Ms. Raimondo, the current governor of Rhode Island, is a moderate Democrat and former venture capitalist.

Here are five things to consider when the hearing starts at 10 a.m.

Senators from both parties are likely to ask Ms. Raimondo how she intends to use the powers of the Department of Commerce to counter China’s growing domination of cutting edge and sensitive technologies, such as advanced telecommunications and artificial intelligence.

The Trump administration extensively used the Department’s agencies to crack down on Chinese tech firms, often turning to the entity list, which allows the United States to prevent companies from selling American products and technologies to certain foreign firms to sell without first obtaining a license. Dozens of companies have been added to the Department of Commerce’s list, including telecommunications giants like Huawei and ZTE, which many American lawmakers see as a threat to national security.

“You can be pretty sure members are calling for a hard line,” said William Reinsch, a trade expert at the Center for Strategic and International Studies who was a senior trade official during the Clinton administration.

The Department of Commerce was also tasked with setting out President Donald J. Trump’s US ban on Chinese-owned TikTok and WeChat social media apps – actions that were later stopped by a court order – and investigating bans on other Chinese apps . Mr Biden said he viewed TikTok’s access to American data as “seriously worrying,” but it is unclear how the new administration will address these issues.

However, the Commerce Department has other roles that some tech experts claim have been underutilized in the Trump administration, such as the role it plays in setting global technology standards that private companies must operate under. China has taken an increasingly active role in global standards-setting bodies in recent years and helped ensure adoption of technologies made in China, Reinsch said, and senators could urge Ms. Raimondo on the matter.

Mr. Biden has highlighted Ms. Raimondo’s role in promoting small businesses as Governor of Rhode Island – both before and during the pandemic.

As trade secretary, she would appoint certain agencies that could help get companies into trouble and advance the Biden administration’s goals of building domestic industry and revitalizing American research and development.

These include economic development programs and manufacturing partnerships that the Department of Commerce offers to small and medium-sized businesses, as well as its core mission of promoting American exports.

The department could also play a bigger role in expanding high-speed internet access to rural and low-income communities. This is a particularly critical issue as the pandemic has forced a lot of commerce and online schooling. The National Telecommunications and Information Administration, an agency of the Department of Commerce, leads the government’s broadband access efforts.

Updated

Jan. 25, 2021, 9:55 p.m. ET

Ms. Raimondo could ask questions about the department’s planned role in enforcing trade rules. It has a responsibility to impose tariffs on foreign countries that are found to be wrongly subsidizing and valued their goods, making them cheaper to sell in the United States.

The Trump administration also began to view countries’ manipulation of their currency – which can further reduce the cost of a product abroad – as some kind of foreign subsidy, and introduced the first tariffs to counter this. This move is popular with trade unions and many Congressional Democrats, but it has roused foreign allies and it is unclear how aggressively the Biden administration will pursue policy.

Another likely question for Ms. Raimondo concerns the tariffs Mr. Trump imposed on foreign steel and aluminum, ostensibly to protect U.S. national security. Mr Biden, Ms. Raimondo and others have to decide whether to maintain or remove these tariffs, which are supported by metalworking unions but are deeply unpopular with foreign governments and other industries whose prices have risen as a result.

President Trump and his deputies at the Commerce Department cited controversial efforts to exclude undocumented immigrants from the state census conducted by the Census Bureau, which is then used to determine Congressional representation and federal funding.

These efforts, which would have given the Republicans more political power, failed after numerous legal challenges and delays in calculating the data. Democrats sharply criticized the effort, calling it unconstitutional.

Senate committee members can ask Ms. Raimondo to confirm how the Census Bureau will calculate its future population data and when the census will provide the latest figures.

Like some of Mr. Biden’s other nominees, Ms. Raimondo has seen some backlash from progressive Democrats who have criticized her close ties with venture capital and big technology companies. Prior to running for political office, Ms. Raimondo was a founding associate at Bain Capital-backed investment firm Village Ventures and co-founder of her own venture capital firm Point Judith Capital.

Some progressives have also condemned certain actions she has taken as governor of Rhode Island, including clashes with unions during a revision of state pension plans and extending liability coverage to nursing homes and healthcare facilities during the pandemic. However, Democrats who support Ms. Raimondo’s swift endorsement are unlikely, if at all, to push too hard on these issues.

Some Republicans have referred to an ethical complaint by the Republican Party of Rhode Island against Ms. Raimondo complaining that the state awarded a $ 1 billion contract to a gaming company called International Global Solutions Corporation without a tender process. A lobbyist for the group was also an official for the Democratic Governors Association, which Ms. Raimondo ran. However, that complaint was dismissed in 2020 and the Raimondo press office has labeled the problem a partisan attack.

Overall, Ms. Raimondo’s potential controversies appear tame compared to her predecessor, financier Wilbur Ross, who was embroiled in a scandal over his role in the department’s census and weather forecasting, and over myriad investment relationships with overseas companies .

Ms. Raimondo’s financial disclosure forms released earlier this month also appear undisputed, showing an annual salary of $ 150,245 from the state of Rhode Island, plus cash, investment accounts and other assets of $ 2.9-7.5 million, mainly Investment funds.

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Politics

For the second time in simply over a yr, the Home delivered to the Senate an impeachment cost towards Trump.

For the second time in just over a year, the House delivered to the Senate an impeachment charge against Trump.

For the second time in just over a year, the House sent an impeachment notice to the Senate of Donald J. Trump on Monday, placing his political fate in the hands of 50 Republican senators who are currently reluctant to convict him.

On a day that was more ceremony than substance, nine property managers walked across the Capitol to inform the Senate that they were ready to prosecute Mr. Trump for “inciting insurrection,” a bipartisan charge Base was approved after the former president churned out a violent mob that stormed the Capitol earlier this month. But the senators planned to pause quickly, postpone the heart of the process until February 9, and buy Republicans time to prepare for a trial that will be as much a referendum on the future of their party as it is on Mr. Trump himself.

In contrast to Mr. Trump’s most recent impeachment, when the Republicans quickly and enthusiastically rallied behind him, several Republicans, including Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the minority leader, have signaled that they are ready to replace the former president after a mendacious campaign sentencing to overcome his election loss became fatal. That would allow the Senate to prevent him from ever assuming office again. But at least at the beginning of the trial, their number fell far short of the 17 Republicans it would take to reach a conviction with the Democrats.

Instead, Republicans’ initial anger over the January 6 attack, when the trial was interrupted, seemed to give way to cold political calculations about the price they might pay for leaving Mr Trump as he was the voters who made up the Party persists, base still held.

A New York Times poll on the eve of the trial found 27 Republican senators opposed indicting Mr Trump or otherwise impeaching him. Sixteen Republicans said they were undecided and seven had no answer. Most opponents increasingly resorted to litigation-based objections rather than defending Mr Trump.

President Biden said in an interview with CNN Monday that while he felt the trial was necessary, he did not believe that 17 Republican senators would vote in favor of Mr Trump’s condemnation.

“The Senate has changed since I was there, but it hasn’t changed that much,” said Mr Biden.

The caretakers, led by Jamie Raskin of Maryland, carried a slim blue envelope with the impeachment charge and passed through a Capitol where memories of the January 6 siege were still fresh. They started in the chamber of the house, where lawmakers ducked into cover and put on gas masks as rioters tried to make their way. past Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s office suite, which was searched by the crowd; through the rotunda, where officers fired tear gas when they lost control of the crowd; and in the well of the Senate Chamber, where invaders in Trump gear gathered and took turns to take photo ops on the podium that the Vice President and Senators had to evacuate shortly before.

After Mr. Raskin read the charges in full, the managers left. The Senate planned to meet again on Tuesday at 2:30 p.m. to call on Mr. Trump to answer for the indictment and to officially approve a negotiation plan for the coming weeks.

Senators will also take a special 18th-century oath of impeachment to practice “impartial justice”.

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Politics

Divisions Harden in Senate as It Prepares to Obtain Impeachment Article

Divisions Harden in Senate as It Prepares to Receive Impeachment Article

WASHINGTON – Legislators dug themselves into dueling positions on Sunday over the impeachment trial of former President Donald J. Trump and deepened divisions in an already divided Senate a day before its indictment was handed over to local lawmakers.

Utah Senator Mitt Romney, the only Republican to vote for the conviction of Mr Trump in his first impeachment trial, said Sunday that he believes the former president committed a criminal offense and efforts to keep him out after his departure To bring the office to court are largely constitutional.

“I believe that what is claimed and what we have seen that incites insurrection is a criminal offense,” Romney said of State of the Union on CNN. “If not, what is it?”

But even as Mr Romney signaled his openness to convicting Mr Trump, other Senate Republicans made it clear that they would even speak out against the idea of ​​a trial and attempt to dismiss the charge before it began. Taken together, the comments underscored the rift created by the January 6th Capitol uprising and its impact on the Republican conference as Senators weighed up whether or not to pay a steeper political price for breaking with the former president .

Although the House will broadcast the impeachment notice on Monday, Senate leaders agreed on Friday to postpone the process by two weeks to give President Biden time to set up his cabinet and Mr Trump’s team time to prepare a defense. But the plan also guarantees that the process will dominate the crucial first few days of his term in office, and it could spark tensions between the partisans even if the president pushes a message of unity.

Some Senate Republicans, including Kentucky minority leader Mitch McConnell, are increasingly concerned that their ties with the former president could hurt the party’s political fate for years if they don’t step in to distance themselves from Mr Trump. Others, bypassing the question of whether Mr Trump committed a criminal act, have argued that conducting a Senate trial for a president who has already resigned would be unconstitutional and would further divide the nation.

Florida Republican Senator Marco Rubio described holding a trial as “stupid” and “counterproductive”, comparing it to “taking a bundle of gasoline and pouring it on the fire.”

“The first chance I get to end this process,” he said, “I’ll do it because I think it’s really bad for America.”

In an interview with Chris Wallace on Fox News Sunday, Mr. Rubio compared the change in power to that of President Richard M. Nixon.

“In hindsight, I think we can all agree that President Ford’s pardon was important in order for the country to move forward,” said Rubio, “and history pretty much has Richard Nixon for what he did as a result blamed. “

When asked if he believed Mr. Trump had committed a criminal offense, Republican Senator Mike Rounds of South Dakota called it “a point of contention”, arguing that prosecuting an impeachment trial against a former president was both unconstitutional and unconstitutional Is a waste of time.

“When we start working on an impeachment, it looks like we will only have a couple of weeks here to actually work through and give this president the opportunity to form a cabinet.” Mr. Rounds said on “Meet the Press” on NBC. “Many of us would prefer to solve these problems instead.”

Representative Madeleine Dean, Democrat of Pennsylvania and one of the impeachment executives who will try the case against Mr Trump, said Sunday she expected the process to be “faster” than his 2020 trial, which took 21 days.

“Some people want us to turn the page, ‘Oh, let’s move on,'” Ms. Dean told State of the Union. “I think we have to remember that this impeachment, I hope the conviction, the final disqualification, are the first powerful steps towards unity.”

Ms. Dean declined to say whether impeachment managers would take up a New York Times report on Friday that Mr. Trump had considered firing the acting attorney general during his tenure in order to exercise the Department of Justice’s power to power Georgia lawmakers force his president to overthrow election results. However, the impeachment managers have previously signaled that they intend to bring a relatively simple case with the siege, which took place in public, at the center of their case.

Quoting both the Capitol uprising and an hour-long phone call Mr Trump pressured the Georgian Foreign Secretary to dismiss the election results, Mr Romney said the allegations, already contained in the impeachment article, were themselves of sufficient nature that the american people are outraged. “

The delay until the start of the attempt also means that lawmakers will continue to think about another coronavirus stimulus package. A bipartisan group of lawmakers, including Mr Romney, will meet later Sunday with Brian Deese, Mr Biden’s key economic advisor, to discuss the government’s proposed $ 1.9 trillion bill. The Republicans have largely turned down this offer and rejected it at the expense.

“I am open to this discussion. I want to hear what the White House has to say, ”Romney said. “But at the same time, I think people are realizing the important thing that we don’t borrow hundreds of billions – trillions of dollars in fact, from the Chinese – for things that may not be strictly necessary.”

Chris Cameron contributed to the coverage.

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Senate Democrats plan to focus on IRS in probe of pro-Trump teams

Senate Democrats plan to target IRS in probe of pro-Trump groups

Supporters of the fight of US President Donald Trump against the police at the west entrance of the Capitol during a “Stop the Steal” protest in front of the Capitol in Washington DC on January 6, 2021.

Stephanie Keith | Reuters

Senate Democrats plan to focus on the Internal Revenue Service as part of a larger investigation into tax-exempt groups that helped organize the pro-Trump rally before the deadly January 6 riot in the U.S. Capitol.

Democrats, partially led by lawmakers on the Senate Finance Committee, have begun asking the IRS to review the tax-exempt status of the dark money groups that helped plan the rally. At the event, then-President Donald Trump encouraged his supporters to march on the Capitol.

The eventual uprising left five dead, including a police officer.

Several nonprofit groups helped plan and organize the rally, including Women for America First, a 501 (c) (4) organization chaired by a senior tea party attorney. It had previously been funded by America First Policies, a 501 (c) (4) organization chaired by former wrestling executive and former Trump cabinet member Linda McMahon.

Such groups are known as dark money organizations because they do not publicly disclose their donors.

Senator Ron Wyden, D-Ore., The senior member and expected chairman of the committee, recently sent a letter to IRS Commissioner Charles Rettig asking him to investigate and investigate any group involved in planning the rally to see if she can revoke her tax exemption status.

“I urge the IRS, in coordination with other law enforcement agencies, to investigate the extent to which tax-exempt organizations were involved in any part of the uprising or actions of the Capitol in the lead up to this event and, to the greatest extent possible, to revoke the law of exemption from those organizations that do Role played in inciting or committing violence and other illegal acts, “said Wyden Rettig in the letter.

With control of the White House, House and Senate, Democrats may have the best opportunity yet to tighten regulations on these groups and the agencies that are supposed to oversee them.

Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse, DR.I., another member of the Senate Finance Committee, goes a step further and examines how the IRS certifies these groups. Whitehouse has passed laws for years that would force dark money groups to disclose their donors.

In an interview with CNBC late Thursday, Whitehouse said he was particularly focused on the groups that organized the rally, during which Trump and some of his allies made inaccurate claims that the election was stolen in favor of current President Joe Biden.

“The most immediate [objective] is to look into the dark money groups involved in the Capitol raid, “Whitehouse said.

Part of the focus, he said, will be on the IRS itself and how to deal with these groups.

“The question would be whether the IRS, beaten by the armed forces of the Right, interpreted and enforced the law and whether its enforcement is actually compliant with the law,” Whitehouse said.

The IRS has the power to revoke the tax exemption status of these groups if they exceed what the agency deems to be promoting “social welfare”. Although it is a broad mandate, 501 (c) (4) are typically allowed to exercise limited political activity. You can focus on promoting specific guidelines that can be oriented towards candidates for a federal office.

Democrats say these groups should lose the right to remain a 501 (c) (4) if they incite the insurrection.

Whitehouse told Treasury Secretary-designate Janet Yellen during her Senate confirmation hearing that he would ask her to “conduct a review of IRS 501 (c) guidelines” once it is confirmed. “I believe that the IRS guidelines have long been very inaccurate with the legal instruction that Congress has given the IRS through these agencies,” he added.

Yellen said she would initiate a review.

Beyond Whitehouse and Wyden, Democrats in general are making a legislative push against dark money organizations.

The summary of Senate Democrats’ first business mandates includes the DISCLOSE Act that Whitehouse introduced in 2019.

The bill, according to the Senate Democratic Legislature Summary, would require “super PACs, 501 (c) 4 groups, and other organizations spending money on elections and judicial nominations to reveal donors contributing more than $ 10,000.” “.

One of the Senate Democrats’ priorities is a focus on the IRS.

The separate bill would “lift an existing ban on the IRS from enacting rules to provide clarity on the rules governing political activity under 501 (c),” the executive reads.

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Politics

How Alvin the Beagle Helped Usher in a Democratic Senate

How Alvin the Beagle Helped Usher in a Democratic Senate

The dog was very busy.

He starred in a political ad that had to show the candidate’s good-natured warmth. But the ad also had to stave off an onslaught of racially motivated attacks without directly embroiling them, and to convey to white voters in Georgia that the black pastor who ran the Ebenezer Baptist Church could represent them.

Of course, Alvin the Beagle couldn’t have known about it when he was walking with Rev. Raphael Warnock last fall when a film crew was recording their time together in a neighborhood outside of Atlanta.

Pulling a Mr. Warnock in a puffer vest for an idealized suburban stroll – bright sunshine, picket fence, an American flag – Alvin appeared in several of Mr. Warnock’s commercials fighting his Republican opponent in the recent Georgia Senate runoff .

Perhaps at its most famous spot, Mr. Warnock, a Democrat, throws a plastic bag of Alvin’s feces in the trash and compares it to his rival’s increasingly caustic ads. The Beagle barks in agreement and when Mr. Warnock explains that “we” – he and Alvin – approve of the news, the dog licks its goatee healthy.

“The entire ad screams that I’m a black candidate who whites shouldn’t be afraid of,” said Hakeem Jefferson, a Stanford political science professor who studies race, stigma and politics in America.

On Wednesday, Mr Warnock became the first black Senator from Georgia after the Democrats swept both Senate seats in the runoff elections. The double victories gave President Biden and his chances of implementing his agenda, democratic control over the chamber and an enormous boost.

While there isn’t a single factor responsible for such narrow victories – Mr Warnock won by less than 100,000 out of around 4.5 million votes and the other new Democratic Senator, Jon Ossoff, won by even fewer – there is a bipartisan agreement That the Beagle played an outsize role in breaking the clutter in two competitions that broke every Senate spending record.

“The puppy ad got people talking,” said Brian C. Robinson, a Georgia-based Republican strategist. “It made it harder to caricature him because they humanized him.”

At the end of the campaign, the helpers from Warnock saw that their internal surveys showed dog warnings, supporters lifted their own puppies at solidarity rallies and put home-made beagle-themed signs in the front gardens. They even started selling Puppies 4 Warnock merchandise.

All of this would probably surprise Alvin. After all, he wasn’t even Mr. Warnock’s dog.

Before the November 3 election, two Republicans, Senator Kelly Loeffler and Rep. Doug Collins, bled each other in a race to the right as they pledged allegiance to President Trump.

Mr. Warnock found himself on a glide path to the drains, and had the rare opportunity to do months of uninterrupted introductory advertising about himself.

The 51-year-old pastor had taken for granted on camera, and his campaign would film him speaking directly to audiences in much of his ads. But the Warnock team also knew that the pastor’s two decades of sometimes fiery rhetoric in the pulpit would lead to potentially devastating attacks.

Racial politics was inevitable. In addition to being a black candidate, Mr. Warnock was the pastor of Ebenezer Baptist Church, the spiritual home of Martin Luther King Jr., and political scientists and strategists emphasized that he faced Mrs. Loeffler with a unique challenge: against a white woman in the South.

“He knew he would be perceived as a highly raced candidate,” said Andra Gillespie, professor of political science at Emory University in Georgia and author of several books on race and politics. A key question for his campaign was she said, “Can you be racially transcendent and the pastor of arguably the most prominent black church in America?”

The Beagle spots were the brainchild of Adam Magnus, the lead admaker of the Warnock campaign, who wanted to use humor to find a way to vaccinate Mr. Warnock against explicit and implicit attacks. First he had to call the pastor. “I want to make sure you like dogs,” he recalled.

Mr. Warnock said he did – he had previously owned dogs (Comet, Cupid, and Brenal – all mutt), though not currently – and was playing a game for a puppy-themed commercial. Next, Mr Magnus had to cast a star pooch that he eventually found from a Georgia supporter whose name the campaign refused to reveal.

There has been some discussion that the Beagle – the type of breed that “we psychologically associate with whites,” as Dr. Jefferson put it – another subtle but deliberate effort was to explode racial stereotypes. Mr. Magnus said the reality was more mundane: “The dog had to be very cute, relatable, and he had to be able to hold the dog.”

A take of Alvin in Mr. Warnock’s arms would be the punchline.

“Get ready, Georgia, the negative attacks are coming,” the contestant said, predicting cutting back on everything from eating pizza with a knife and fork to hating puppies.

“And by the way, I love puppies,” he added, rocking Alvin.

It was Mr. Warnock’s opening ad of the drains, and it immediately went viral online.

Mr Warnock is not the first candidate to proclaim love for puppies in a preventive act of political self-defense. In 2006, another black candidate running for the Maryland Senate, Michael Steele, a Republican, showed an ad with his own saying essentially exactly the same thing.

Mr Steele, who said he was “honored by the tribute” in the Warnock spot, said his campaign had not consciously considered racial prejudice in creating his ad, but he saw clear efforts by Mr Warnock’s campaign to address racial prejudice disarm. “He’s making a statement in response to the president that black people are coming into your neighborhood,” said Steele. “We already live there.”

The Warnock team knew that getting to the Senate would require a complex and fragile multiracial coalition. The party needed to simultaneously mobilize black voters on a turnout close to that of a presidential election, while also targeting suburban white voters who split from the GOP last November to make Mr Biden the first Democratic presidential candidate since 1992 who won the state.

There is a rough rule of thumb for Georgia Democrats to win: you need 30 percent of the electorate to be black and about 30 percent of the white vote to win.

“If you are trying to make history in the South, and if you are trying to elect an African American pastor for an election that you know you need white voters, you must be doing all you can with your resources to get promotional strategy making white voters comfortable, ”said Chip Lake, a Georgia Republican strategist who is white and has worked for Mr. Collins.

Or as Jessica Byrd, a Black Democrat strategist in Georgia put it, “I don’t think I’ve spent a day in the past five years not thinking about how white people will see black candidates.”

Dr. Gillespie and other political scientists refer to efforts to make black candidates more acceptable to white voters “deracialization,” and Alvin the Beagle is a case study of its success.

“The point of deracialization is not to wake up black voters,” said Dr. Gillespie. “It’s supposed to reassure white voters.” In Mr. Warnock’s case, she did not avoid dealing directly with racial justice, as some previous candidates did. He simply and deftly added a suburban puppy.

Given the popularity of the first Beagle ad, Mr Magnus knew he would be returning to Alvin. But how? It had to be humorous, he decided, and it had to repeat the theme of rejecting Ms. Loeffler’s attacks, including the misleading quotation of Mr. Warnock as “Damn America” ​​(he quoted someone else) and her attacking as a Marxist the “anti-American” Celebrated hatred “.

The second Alvin shoot on the scene where Americana leaked lasted about four hours. And at one point, Mr. Magnus crouched behind a tree trying to persuade Alvin to turn on the cue. And Alvin wasn’t asked to do more than his performance on camera: the bag that was thrown in the trash was full of gravel. .

They ran the ad right before Thanksgiving, including reserving the annual National Dog Show.

Online, the Beagle spot rose to three million views within hours and to five million in one day.

Republicans and Democrats in the state were amazed at the effectiveness of the advertising campaign. “I know a lot of people who didn’t vote for Raphael Warnock but didn’t like or despise him,” said Mr. Lake.

Dr. Jefferson, the Stanford professor, said Mr Warnock’s continued sympathy was all the more impressive now that “his opponent casts all this vitriolic – dare I say racist – criticism aimed at revealing his blackness and otherness towards the electorate Highlight Georgia. ” Mr. Warnock countered with “that cute little dog” and a landscape that evoked a “white aesthetic”.

However improbable it may be, said Dr. Jefferson, objects – buffer vests, picket fences, beagles, suburbs – have racial associations: “It’s the same as a pumpkin spice latte.”

When the campaign commissioned its next poll following this ad, it included an open-ended question to see what voters thought of Mr. Warnock. Mike Bocian, the pollster, made a word cloud of the answers and couldn’t believe the results.

“I saw ‘Puppy’ and I saw ‘Dog’ and I saw ‘Poop’,” he said. “That’s crazy.”

Alvin had broken through in the middle of the two most expensive Senate races in American history.

The race remained tied to internal polls until the end. But Mr Bocian couldn’t help but notice that Mr Warnock had taken a two-point lead after being tied in his previous poll. “You can never be sure of causality,” his voice fell silent.

On January 5th, Mr Warnock won by exactly two percentage points.

Democrats credited a number of factors when they swore in Mr. Warnock on Wednesday. Few believe that they would have won without years of grassroots organization from black leaders. Or without the Republican feud fueled by Mr. Trump.

Alvin appeared once in the final days of the race to pull Mr. Warnock across the finish line in a beige zip-up sweater. As they strolled through another suburb, more dogs of all breeds joined in.

“It was a symbol of how he had carried out his entire campaign,” said Lake. The Republican strategist, himself a proud dog lover, was stunned to learn that Alvin was not Mr. Warnock’s dog.

“You could have fooled me!” he cried. “It looked like he and this beagle had a bond!”

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Politics

Senate confirms Avril Haines, first Biden Cupboard member

Senate confirms Avril Haines, first Biden Cabinet member

Avril Haines speaks during her confirmation hearing before the Senate Intelligence Committee that she will be President-elect Joe Biden’s National Intelligence Directorate on January 19, 2021 in Washington, DC.

Joe Raedle | Pool | Reuters

WASHINGTON – The Senate confirmed Avril Haines as director of national intelligence on Wednesday evening, making her the first official member of President Joe Biden’s cabinet.

Before the evening was adjourned, the Senate voted 84-10 on Haines’ confirmation.

Haines, Biden’s election to head the nation’s 18 intelligence agencies, is the first woman to hold the position.

“Our opponents will not stand by and wait for the new government to fill critical positions, and I am pleased that my Senate colleagues, together with me, have quickly confirmed Director Haines for this important post,” said Senator Marco Rubio, R-Fla., Vice chairman of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, wrote in a statement.

“Avril Haines was the right choice for the director of the National Intelligence Service,” wrote Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, DN.Y., in a statement Wednesday evening. “We appreciate the bipartisan collaboration to be confirmed tonight and we hope there will be much more of it as the nation is in crisis and we need to deploy President Biden’s team as soon as possible,” he added.

White House press secretary Jen Psaki said in her first briefing Wednesday night that the gathering was of paramount importance to Biden’s cabinet and his national security team.

On Tuesday, Haines told the Senate Intelligence Committee, which had voted on her nomination, that one of her main initiatives would be to build trust in the country’s intelligence services.

“The DNI must never shrink from telling the truth to power – even if it can be impractical or difficult,” said Haines. “The DNI must insist that when it comes to intelligence, there is simply no place for politics – never.”

Susan Rice (left), Avril Haines and Lisa Monaco with President Barack Obama in December 2015.

Pete Souza | The White House | Wikipedia

Prior to joining the Biden administration, Haines was deputy national security adviser to former President Barack Obama.

Previously, she was also the CIA deputy director. She is the first woman to hold both positions.

Categories
Politics

Trump Senate impeachment trial seemingly throughout Joe Biden presidency

Trump Senate impeachment trial likely during Joe Biden presidency

A second impeachment trial against President Donald Trump is likely to impact President-elect Joe Biden’s tenure, as Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell will bring the upper chamber back no earlier than Tuesday.

A Kentucky Republican spokesman confirmed that his office had informed Senate Minority Chairman Chuck Schumer, DN.Y., that McConnell would not convene the Senate until Tuesday, the day before Biden’s inauguration. Schumer had urged his GOP counterpart to deploy emergency forces to quickly hold a trial and vote on whether Trump should be convicted and removed from office.

The House will vote on Wednesday to indict Trump for inciting the Capitol uprising last week while Congress is counting Biden’s election victory. While the Democrats said they would have to prosecute Trump to hold him accountable for the violent uprising, they feared a Senate trial in the early days of Biden’s administration would hinder cabinet members’ approval and passage of a coronavirus aid package.

Biden has suggested that the Senate could “split up”, using part of its day to impeach and another part to validate candidates.

Schumer becomes majority leader after the two elected Democratic Senators from Georgia are sworn in, which is expected to happen before the end of the month. The House took extraordinary steps to get an impeachment article to speak on Wednesday, but it is unclear whether a McConnell-led Senate would take additional steps to expedite the process.

The trial against the Senate following the initial indictment against Trump lasted almost three weeks, from mid-January to early February last year.

The schedule makes it unlikely that Congress will remove Trump from office a week from Wednesday before Biden’s inauguration. However, a Senate vote to condemn Trump would prevent him from becoming president again in 2025.

The Washington Post first reported that McConnell would not bring the Senate back early.

If the Senate voted on whether or not to convict Trump before control changes hands, all 48 Democrats and 18 Republicans would have to support the move. If the Senate were to consider impeachment after the Democrats took control, all 50 party members plus 17 Republicans would have to support the conviction.

The New York Times reported Tuesday that McConnell believes Trump committed criminal acts. In a Wednesday message to colleagues responding to “speculation” in the press, McConnell said he had not made up his mind whether he would support the impeachment.

“I have not made a final decision on how I will vote and I intend to hear the legal arguments when they are presented to the Senate,” he wrote.

Senator Ben Sasse, R-Neb., Said he would consider a House-sent impeachment order. GOP Sens. Lisa Murkowski from Alaska and Pat Toomey from Pennsylvania urged Trump to resign.

“I want him out. He’s done enough damage,” Murkowski told the Anchorage Daily News.

Other Senate Republicans have already said they will not vote to condemn the president. Senator Lindsey Graham, an ally of Trump who distanced himself from the president following the attack, said Wednesday he was opposed to impeachment.

The South Carolina Republican criticized the hasty process in the House of Representatives, claiming that Trump was “committed to an orderly transfer of power to promote calm and oppose violence.” On Tuesday the president said the impeachment posed an “enormous threat” to the country.

Graham has also looked at Republicans who support impeachment.

“My Republican colleagues who legitimize this process are damaging not only the country, the future of the presidency, but also the party,” he said.

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Categories
Business

Senate Democrats Plan to Prioritize Extra Direct Funds

“We have an opportunity to work with our House colleagues and a new administration to defeat the virus, provide the relief the American people need, and reunite the country,” Senator Chuck Schumer, the incoming majority leader, wrote.

Here’s what you need to know:

Credit…Al Drago for The New York Times

Senate Democrats plan to prioritize a bill containing more Covid relief, including additional $1,400 payments to many Americans and money to accelerate vaccine deployment, as their “first order of legislative business” when they assume control of the chamber.

The priorities, which Senator Chuck Schumer of New York, the incoming majority leader, outlined in a letter to colleagues on Tuesday, echo many of the policies that President-elect Joseph R. Biden Jr. has signaled he will officially unveil on Thursday.

The president-elect has said repeatedly in recent days that he will push Congress to pass an additional pandemic relief bill meant to boost the flagging economic recovery and to accelerate efforts to deploy vaccine doses. In a call with Mr. Schumer and Speaker Nancy Pelosi on Friday, Mr. Biden stressed the need for “immediate economic relief for families and small businesses, funding for Covid-19 response, including vaccinations, testing, school reopening, and state and local frontline workers,” according to a readout from the Biden transition team.

Mr. Schumer picked up on those themes in his letter. “The work of the 117th Congress will begin in the wake of a devastating attack, on the heels of a devastating year,” he wrote.

“We have an opportunity to work with our House colleagues and a new administration to defeat the virus, provide the relief the American people need, and reunite the country,” he said.

Mr. Schumer said the immediate relief bill would contain the additional money, on top of $600 individual payments Congress approved last month, to fulfill the promise of $2,000 payments that Mr. Biden made to voters in Georgia’s runoff elections this month: “We will get that done.”

He also said it would contain money for vaccine distribution, schools, small businesses and assistance for state and local governments, which was left out of the last Covid package in a dispute with Republicans. Mr. Schumer said senators would also prepare broader legislation to address climate change, infrastructure, manufacturing, immigration, criminal justice, inequality and elections.

Democrats will control the Senate by the narrowest of margins — it will be split 50-50, with Vice President-elect Kamala Harris holding the ability to break any ties. Mr. Schumer said Democrats would look to work with Republicans on legislation “when and where we can” but offered a warning to the other party: “If our Republican colleagues decide not to partner with us in our efforts to address these issues, we will not let that stop progress.”

Doug McMillon, the chief executive of Walmart, at a White House event in April. Walmart said it would pause political contributions to the Republicans who voted against certifying the results of the presidential election.Credit…Anna Moneymaker/The New York Times

Walmart on Tuesday said it would “indefinitely” suspend contributions to members of Congress who voted against certifying the results of the presidential election, as businesses come under pressure to respond after a mob stormed the Capitol last week.

On Sunday, when asked about the Walmart’s corporate donations, including those to the Republican Attorneys General Association, a spokesman told the Times that Walmart examines and adjusts its political giving strategy at the end of every election cycle.

“As we conduct our review over the coming months, we will certainly factor last week’s events into our process,” the spokesman, Randy Hargove, said at the time.

Mr. Hargove on Tuesday said Walmart “is indefinitely suspending contributions to those members of Congress who voted against the lawful certification of state Electoral College votes,” even as the company continues to review its donation strategy.

Many companies, including Google, Goldman Sachs and Coca-Cola, opted to pause donations to both parties following the violence at the Capitol.

Fewer companies specified they will halt funding to only the 147 Republican members of Congress who objected to certifying the election results, as Walmart did on Tuesday. That group includes Marriott International, Dow, Airbnb and Morgan Stanley.

Walmart’s political action committee spent $1.65 million on political donations last year, according to Open Secrets, a program from the Center for Responsive politics that tracks the influence of money in politics.

Walmart’s chief executive, Doug McMillon, chairs the influential business lobbying group Business Roundtable, which after the election released a strongly worded statement acknowledging Mr. Biden’s victory and saying there was no indication that investigations or lawsuits would change the result.

President Trump is rushing to put into effect new economic regulations and executive orders before his term comes to a close.Credit…Erin Schaff/The New York Times

President Trump is rushing to put into effect a raft of new regulations and executive orders that are intended to put his stamp on business, trade and the economy before President-elect Joseph R. Biden’s inauguration on Jan. 20. Here are some of the changes the administration is rushing to make.

Defining gig workers as contractors. The Labor Department on Wednesday released the final version of a rule that could classify millions of workers in industries like construction, cleaning and the gig economy as contractors rather than employees, another step toward endorsing the business practices of companies like Uber and Lyft. — Noam Scheiber

Limiting banks on social and environmental issues. The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency is rushing a proposed rule that would ban banks from not lending to certain kinds of businesses, like those in the fossil fuel industry, on environmental or social grounds. The regulator unveiled the proposal on Nov. 20 and limited the time it would accept comments to six weeks despite the interruptions of the holidays. — Emily Flitter

Rolling back a light bulb rule. The Department of Energy has moved to block a rule that would phase out incandescent light bulbs, which people and businesses have increasingly been replacing with much more efficient LED and compact fluorescent bulbs. The energy secretary, Dan Brouillette, a former auto industry lobbyist, said in December that the Trump administration did not want to limit consumer choice. The rule had been slated to go into effect on Jan. 1 and was required by a law passed in 2007. — Ivan Penn

“The President’s conduct last week was absolutely unacceptable and completely inexcusable,” said Thomas J. Donohue, chief executive of the Chamber of Commerce.Credit…Riccardo Savi/Getty Images for Concordia Summit

The U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the nation’s largest business lobbying group, condemned President Trump’s conduct that led to the siege of the Capitol last week and said on Tuesday that lawmakers who backed his efforts to discredit the election would no longer receive the organization’s financial backing.

The criticism was the latest backlash against Mr. Trump and Republicans from the business community, which has been united in its opposition to an assault on the democratic process, and represented a major rift in the traditional alliance between industry and the Republican Party.

“The president’s conduct last week was absolutely unacceptable and completely inexcusable,” Thomas J. Donohue, the chief executive of the Chamber of Commerce, said. “By his words and actions, he has undermined our democratic institutions and ideals.”

The group said that it is trusting Congress, the vice president and the cabinet to act “judiciously” as it considers whether to invoke the 25th Amendment or impeachment to remove Mr. Trump from office before his term ends next week. The statement did not go as far as one released by the National Association of Manufacturers last week that explicitly called for the removal of the president from office.

The Chamber operates a powerful political action committee that supports candidates across the country. Neil Bradley, the group’s chief policy officer, said that it is evaluating how lawmakers voted last week during the electoral vote certification process and how they vote in the coming days when the House moves to impeach Mr. Trump when making decisions about donations. He said that lawmakers who did not demonstrate respect for democracy would no longer receive financial support.

The relationship between the Chamber and Mr. Trump has at times been fraught. The group opposed his protectionist trade policies and efforts to restrict immigration but supported his moves to cut taxes and roll back regulations.

In a speech on the state of American business on Tuesday, Mr. Donohue called on Mr. Biden to roll back most of those tariffs and work with Congress on immigration reform legislation.

Visa and the financial technology start-up Plaid abandoned their $5.3 billion merger deal on Tuesday, citing a Justice Department antitrust lawsuit.

The agreement between Visa and Plaid, a service that allows companies and apps to securely share customer data, was challenged in November by Justice Department officials who said the credit card giant was trying to eliminate a “nascent threat” to its online payments business.

“Visa is a monopolist in online debit, charging consumers and merchants billions of dollars in fees each year to process online payments,” the Justice Department said in a statement on Tuesday. The department said that Plaid was developing its own payments platform, and that the merger “would have enabled Visa to eliminate this competitive threat to its online debit business before Plaid had a chance to succeed.”

The leaders of Visa and Plaid said they disagreed with the Justice Department’s stance but decided not to fight the lawsuit, which will be dismissed as a result of the merger’s cancellation.

Al Kelly, Visa’s chief executive, said Plaid’s capabilities were complementary, not competitive, to Visa and added that he believed the companies would have prevailed in court.

“However,” he said, “it has been a full year since we first announced our intent to acquire Plaid, and protracted and complex litigation will likely take substantial time to fully resolve.”

Plaid’s chief executive, Zach Perret, added: “While Plaid and Visa would have been a great combination, we have decided to instead work with Visa as an investor and partner.”

The past year was a busy one for financial data companies: Intuit, which owns TurboTax and the personal finance app Mint, announced a $7 billion takeover of the credit reporting company Credit Karma in February, another deal the Justice Department said it would review. In June, Mastercard said it would buy the financial data firm Finicity.

Boeing said that it had received orders for 90 new planes in December, after its 737 Max was allowed to fly again.Credit…Jason Redmond/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images

Boeing’s outstanding plane orders shrank by 500 in 2020, though its fortunes began to shift at the end of the year after the Federal Aviation Administration allowed the aircraft maker’s troubled 737 Max to fly again after a 20-month grounding.

The company said Tuesday that it had received orders for 90 new planes in December, most of which were part of a previously announced deal with the European airline Ryanair. The company also sold eight 777 freighters to DHL, the shipping company. Those orders were offset by 107 cancellations in the month.

“The resumption of 737 MAX deliveries in December was a key milestone as we strengthen safety and quality across our enterprise,” Greg Smith, Boeing’s chief financial officer, said in a statement.

In addition to the Max crisis, which has cost billions of dollars, Boeing was also hamstrung by the pandemic, which has sharply slowed air travel, and by concerns about manufacturing problems and defects involving the 787 Dreamliner, a popular plane airlines use for longer flights.

Boeing received just 184 new orders last year, compared with more than 650 cancellations, virtually all of them for the Max. After taking account of the planes it delivered, cancellations and orders that the company thinks might not be fulfilled, Boeing’s overall backlog shrank by nearly 1,000 planes.

The 2020 figure does not take into account a late-December announcement from Alaska Airlines that it would expand an existing purchase and lease order for the Max by 36 planes.

The Max crisis appears to be receding as aviation authorities around the world prepare to follow the F.A.A. in allowing airlines to resume commercial flights on the plane. Last week, the company also agreed to a $2.5 billion settlement with the Justice Department, resolving a criminal charge that it had sought to defraud the F.A.A.

The pandemic continues to take a toll on Boeing’s airline customers, but with vaccines being distributed, there is hope that travel demand might soon start recovering.

  • Stocks on Wall Street were mostly unchanged on Tuesday, after struggling to resume the advances that carried the major U.S. benchmarks to records last week.

  • After drifting between gains and losses, the S&P 500 ended the day with a gain of less than a tenth of a percent. Most major benchmarks in Europe were also flat or declined.

  • Energy prices rose, West Texas Intermediate crude touching its highest prices since February.

  • The S&P 500, Dow Jones industrial average and Nasdaq composite all closed at records last week but retreated on Monday.

  • Investors have mostly looked past the political turmoil in Washington and the state of the pandemic, focusing instead on a future ripe for gains in the U.S. equity market, in part because of the rollout of the coronavirus vaccine and supportive fiscal and monetary policies. They expect gains even though the American stocks haven’t been this expensive since the 2000 dot-com bubble, according to some measures of valuation.

  • Lombard Odier, a Swiss private bank, said it was also staying invested in U.S. stocks. “The shift in balance of power and stimulus support for the real economy is combining to create a sound environment for risky assets, in particular equities,” Stéphane Monier, the bank’s chief investment officer, wrote in a note. He added that the bank was betting on an economic recovery and was also buying more European and emerging market shares.

Adrian Wycisk, a manager at Henkel, left, during a meeting using SafeZone digital social distancing technology to prevent the spread of the coronavirus.Credit…Anna Liminowicz for The New York Times

A small piece of technology that played a big role in helping the National Basketball Association evade the virus in its 2019-20 season is garnering broader attention.

The device, a wristband that players, coaches and trainers could wear off the court, has a digital chip that enforces social distancing by issuing a warning — by light and sound — when wearers get too close to one another for too long.

The bands have been picked up by the National Football League, the Pacific-12 college football conference and other sports leagues around the world, Christopher F. Schuetze reports for The New York Times.

The Munich start-up behind the N.B.A.’s wristbands, Kinexon, is happy with the publicity of helping prevent top athletes from catching the virus, even as such devices raise privacy concerns. Now, it is looking toward broader arenas: factory production lines, warehouses and logistics centers where millions of people continue to work despite the pandemic.

One of the companies working with Kinexon is Henkel, a global industrial and household chemical manufacturer based in Germany. Henkel was already testing an earlier version of Kinexon’s wearable tech designed to avert collisions between forklifts and workers on high-traffic factory floors. Kinexon offered Henkel a chance to test a variation of that technology, called SafeZone.

The company said it was supplying the technology to more than 200 companies worldwide. It estimates its badges have prevented 1.5 million contacts a day, a difficult number to confirm. The sensors are priced at $100 to $200 each.

“What’s important in this is not only to have the technology working in a lab — what’s important now is to be able to bring the technology to where people need it,” said Oliver Trinchera, a co-founder of Kinexon and one of its directors, “be it on the factory floor or on the sports pitch.”

Mark Levin, a Trump-supporting radio host, has tweeted about a “massive fraud perpetrated against the president.” <a href=
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  • Twitter on Monday said that it had removed more than 70,000 accounts that promoted the QAnon conspiracy theory in recent days. Twitter, which carried out the suspensions over the weekend, said it acted to clamp down on posts that have “the potential to lead to offline harm.” It added that many of the users who were removed had operated multiple QAnon accounts, driving up the total number of accounts that were taken down.

  • Cumulus Media, a talk radio company with a roster of popular right-wing personalities including Dan Bongino, Mark Levin and Ben Shapiro, has ordered its employees at 416 stations nationwide to steer clear of endorsing misinformation about election fraud. “The election has resolved, there are no alternate acceptable ‘paths,’” read a memo sent to staff on Wednesday. “Please inform your staffs that we have ZERO TOLERANCE for any suggestion otherwise. If you transgress this policy, you can expect to separate from the company immediately. There will be no dog-whistle talk about ‘stolen elections,’ ‘civil wars’ or any other language that infers violent public disobedience is warranted, ever.”

  • Amazon said on Monday that it was removing products promoting QAnon, a baseless conspiracy, from its website, after QAnon supporters were prominent in the riot at the Capitol last week. The move followed Amazon’s decision to boot Parler, a right-wing social network, from its web servers and cloud services.

  • Marriott International, Dow, Airbnb and Morgan Stanley were among those that said they would halt donations from their political action committees to the 147 Republican members of Congress who objected to certifying the election results on Jan. 6. AT&T, whose PAC donated the most of any single public company in the 2019-20 election cycle, also said it would suspend contributions to those lawmakers. At the same time, Citigroup, Coca-Cola, Facebook, Goldman Sachs, JPMorgan Chase and Microsoft said they were pausing PAC donations to both Republican and Democratic candidates for various lengths of time — a tactic that will also penalize those who voted to uphold the election.