Yes, Sidney Powell & Rudy Giuliani are "Legal Geniuses" (trademark pending) as they hold a press conference to utter and publish accusations that "The Elected Ones" of the politically stratified districts under John Conyers, Jr. were rift with public corruption.
I say we investigate!
Or, have we already?
I say Sidney and Rudy should go ask Rashida if there is still political corruption of criminal activities still going on in her congressional district.
Oh, Sidney and Rudy should go ask Rashida to call for an investigation into these alleged treasonous activities of Detroit by filing, first, with the U.S. Committee on Ethics.
Drats!
I forgot, that was already done, quite a few times, if I correctly recall.
Anyway, just watch them do the legal dilatory distraction dance, because we are already in Detroit, just watching the world realize, that the heavens are falling because this is about gerrymandering, or rather, stealin' the children, land & vote.
Watch Sidney and Rudy not say his name as they speak upon Detroit and Voting Rights, while demanding due process, but not for my Sweetie.
A real world working example of blasphemy is when you have someone, bearing false witness in the public square, whilst keeping and bearing the arms of the United States, engaging in commerce, under the Parental Rights of a foreign corporation.
Blasphemy is the law of the heavens to reign in the checks and balances of the content of one's character, in duly filed in the repository under the great seal, in the administration of justice.
It is called ethics and it is another mechanism under the Second Amendment, the default of the First Amendment, an act of justice under hierarchy of ecclesiastic law.
You see, blasphemy is the act of talking smack about a duly elected office holder, be it public or private, but, in this instance, MSNBC not only besmirches its psuedo-privatized roll as an unregulated keeper of the public record for obviation of U.S. policy and law, they straight up deny Trump any due process, then promulgate their manufactured propaganda to interfere in another U.S. election, by and through foreign interests.
Now, who else do you know was forcefully removed from elected office, after publicly decrying the veracity of absolutely outrageous false claims, and was denied due process, then had his legacy bleachbitted from Google for the purposes of resegregation, more intuitively known as predictive modeling crap (a.k.a. gerrymandering)?
The very same Meanies who were mean to my Sweetie are being uber mean to Trump, even though he is not duly elected, but, that I do know.
I know Trump is eligible to run another two terms, if he wants.
I do know these are vile creatures of MSNBC have transposed another model to promulgate false claims in the public record to remove a public official, as they seditiously cloak stealin' the children, land & vote.
I also know blasphemy is an eternal sin, as it is preserved in the annals of history, without opportunity for amendment, if there is no due process, being tried in the public cybersphere as guilty until proven innocent, without being able to face one's accuser, claiming the Right To Lie into the public record, to seditiously rally the termination of the right to keep and bear the arms of the Office of the President of the United States, and for that, and that alone, the heavens shall fall, because this is exactly what how they run Child Protective Services cases.
I bet it would be a blast to run metrics on this video, but, then again, it is on the Google Family Platform, which means Federal Subpoena can easily secure that emolument financial mapping of this individual video, to, of course, preserve the execution of justice so this may never, ever happen again.
All Trump has to do to stop the madness is to stop obstructing justice and pull that IG Report from his backpocket...
The article, below, was found as I was trying to find out which rock Sean Hannity slid beneath.
The reporting claims House Ethics released a report.
I searched House Ethics for the report, but found nothing which led me to believe the matter was referred to the OIG, which in turn, may have referred to his Florida District U.S. Attorney Office, which may have been the source of this article, but, hey, what do I know?
I know messy leakiness when I see it because Matt was mean to my Sweetie.
Neither do I know if Matt is going to be stripped of his right to keep and bear the arms of the United States if he is defrocked of his law license.
Fox News’s Sean Hannity advised Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.) about a tweet that was perceived as threatening to President Trump’s former lawyer Michael Cohen in 2019, according to a House Ethics Committee's report released on Friday.
The report on Gaetz included screenshots from a text conversation between Hannity and the Florida representative with the handwritten label “conservation with Sean Hannity on Feb 27th.”
That 2019 text conversation and the ethics investigation were centered on a tweet by Gaetz that suggested Cohen had not been faithful to his wife. The tweet came one day before the president’s former lawyer was scheduled to testify before a House committee.
Democrats and legal experts accused Gaetz of participating in witness tampering with the tweet, prompting the lawmaker to apologize. The House Ethics Committee admonished Gaetz for his Cohen tweet, saying it "did not meet the standards by which Members of the House should govern themselves."
The text exchange included in the report began with one from Gaetz: “F---ers are coming for my law license. You were right. We all spend our time in the barrel.”
“Run this shit by me!!!” Hannity replied. “You won’t lose the license.”
The Fox News host said it was “smart to pull it down and say what u said. It will pass. Attention span of people is zero. Just learn from it.”
The Florida lawmaker followed up by asking how long he should “lay low.” Hannity answered, “Just a while” and encouraged Gaetz to reach out to Cohen or his lawyer Lanny Davis.
“Just say you were upset at what was transpiring and meant it as a question, not a statement,” Hannity wrote. “And u would never threaten anyone. In retrospect it was poorly written and you wish u didn’t send it. That’s a CYA,” using an acronym for “cover your ass.”
Hannity then provided Gaetz with contact information for Cohen and Davis but instructed the lawmaker to send the apology to “me first.”
Gaetz sent a draft of the apology to Hannity. Another screenshot shows the Florida representative saying, “Cohen asked me to post apology and pls ask ppl to leave his family alone. I did. It felt good.”
Hannity responded, “Good,” and Gaetz followed up by saying, “You are amazing. Thank you.”
Fox News and Gaetz’s office did not immediately return a request for comment.
In February 2019, the Florida lawmaker posted the tweet in question to Cohen. It said, “Do your wife & father-in-law know about your girlfriends? Maybe tonight would be a good time for that chat. I wonder if she’ll remain faithful when you’re in prison. She’s about to learn a lot.”
Gaetz uses convention speech to criticize Biden for lack of activity
Michael Cohen burned book manuscript to prevent leak by pro-Trump...
Gaetz tweeted an apology hours after posting the tweet, saying it was not his “intent to threaten.”
"While it is important 2 create context around the testimony of liars like Michael Cohen, it was NOT my intent to threaten, as some believe I did," he tweeted. "I’m deleting the tweet & I should have chosen words that better showed my intent. I’m sorry."
Months later, the Florida Bar determined there was “no probable cause” that Gaetz broke its rules with his tweet on Cohen.
Montgomery, Alabama – On Monday, August 17, 2020, Walter James, III, a 49-year-old from Montgomery, Alabama, and former Montgomery Public Schools employee, pleaded guilty to wire fraud, announced United States Attorney Louis V. Franklin, Sr., FBI Special Agent in Charge James Jewell, and Alabama Attorney General Steve Marshall.
According to court documents, while he was employed by the Montgomery Public Schools (MPS) system, James held himself out to be the owner of a consulting company, "ED-ONE Professional Development Services." He then collaborated with others at his high school and the MPS central office to submit fraudulent invoices for consulting or professional development services. The invoices listed vague descriptions of the types of services that the vendor supposedly rendered. For example, the invoices would include descriptions such as “books & materials,” “consulting,” or “three-day workshop.” However, James did not provide any professional development services or products of any kind to MPS, nor did any of the purported consulting companies on the corresponding invoices that James submitted for payment. As a result of this scheme, the submission of false invoices from August 2016 to April 2019 gave rise to a loss of more than $250,000.00 to MPS.
James was charged with wire fraud on March 3, 2020. His sentencing hearing will be scheduled in the next few months and he is facing up to 20 years in prison and a significant fine. He will also be subject to an order of restitution for the stolen money.
The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), the Alabama Attorney General’s Office, the Alabama Ethics Commission, and the Alabama Department of Examiners of Public Accounts investigated this case. Assistant United States Attorneys Thomas Govan and Jonathan Ross are prosecuting the case.
You know I know you know there are two other Horowitz IG Reports that have yet to see the light of day.
Actually, there is an entire slew of Horowitz IG Reports that have yet to see the light of day, being referred to DOJ, who then, deferred to the Districts, where, some of them have Grand Juries, but, hey, what do I know?
What about Michael Flynn?
He plead guilty, twice.
You do know Boo Boo Barr knows more than he is doing, right?
Hey, Lindesy,
How come Barb knows more about the Mueller investigation than you?
FBI lawyer charged with altering an email for Page FISA application clearly violated law, but consider what this is and is not. This does not change fact that DOJ IG found Russia investigation was properly opened 11 months BEFORE this conduct occurred. https://t.co/xQwRiu24Ro
Weissmann weighed in following reports Friday that Clinesmith intends to plead guilty to falsifying a document that was part of the FBI's justification for wiretapping former Trump campaign adviser Carter Page as part of the 2016 investigation into Russian election interference.
"Question for [U.S. Attorney General William Barr]: how are [former national security adviser Michael Flynn's] confessed lies to the FBI (repeated to the VP) not a crime, but Clinesmith changing an email (the full version of which he also sent to DOJ) is?" Weissmann tweeted, referencing the Justice Department's controversial move to withdraw its case against Flynn, who had already pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI.
Weissmann later asserted that there were "two systems of justice at play."
"Questions judge should ask before accepting Clinesmith guilty plea: What precisely is the falsity of the statement that Clinesmith made? What investigation was it material to?" he tweeted.
Questions judge should ask before accepting Clinesmith guilty plea:
What precisely is the falsity of the statement that Clinesmith made?
What investigation was it material to?
He gave DOJ accurate information for the Page FISA?
How does the Barr materiality std for Flynn apply?
Question for Barr: how are Flynn’s confessed lies to the FBI (repeated to the VP) not a crime, but Clinesmith changing an email (the full version of which he also sent to DOJ) is?
— Andrew Weissmann (@AWeissmann_) August 14, 2020
The charge against Clinesmith marks the first criminal case arising from the probe led by U.S. Attorney John Durham. The Justice Department alleges that the former FBI attorney altered an email to say that Page was not a source for the CIA, even though Page had had a relationship with the agency.
Georgia state trooper charged with murder after fatally shooting man...
Clinesmith’s lawyers on Friday said this was unintentional.
“Kevin deeply regrets having altered the email. It was never his intent to mislead the court or his colleagues as he believed the information he relayed was accurate. But Kevin understands what he did was wrong and accepts responsibility,” his lawyers told The Washington Post.
The DOJ's probe into Clinesmith came at Barr's behest after a report from Justice Department Inspector General Michael Horowitz found “significant inaccuracies and omissions” in the FBI’s application to a court to obtain permission to monitor Page.
John Paul Manuel, Chief of Staff for Michael F.Q. San Nicolas, Guam, was the one who accepted the unreported cash, which he then, turned around and used to book the hotel for the Member and his lover, who more than likely is a consensual woman over the age of 21 years.
Considering the fact that we are dealing with campaign funds, I am just going to go out there on a limb and say that the Guam Delegate to Congress, more than likely had no idea that the hotel room was booked with undocumented cash as a campaign contribution, because he probably assumed it was his personal credit card or, in the purpose of business, his congressional office credit card, because he did end up hiring as a new staffer.
I will even go so far as to allege, just because I know how these people think, that the hotel room was set up with cameras, and there is probably a secret romantic tape, ready to be dropped, in hopes of distracting the masses with the thought of more congressional porn, so as not to be indicted for blackmail and other nefarious charges, when it comes to money laundering through the Member's congressional campaign, gifts of lucrative fake ass contracts, and, more than likely, the Congressional Credit Union.
The only problem in this absolutely ingenious, transposable model is that there exists a significant distinction between a congressional tryst and an epic romance, whereby that difference is that the latter involves a Quantum Renaissance.
Pursuant to Committee Rule 7, the Chairman and Ranking Member of the Committee on Ethics (Committee) determined to release the following statement:
In accordance with House Rule XI, clause 3, and Committee Rules 10(a)(2) and 18, the Committee unanimously voted on March 11, 2020, to establish an Investigative Subcommittee. Pursuant to the Committee’s action, the Investigative Subcommittee shall have jurisdiction to determine whether Delegate Michael F.Q. San Nicolas may have: engaged in a sexual relationship with an individual on his congressional staff; converted campaign funds to personal use; accepted improper and/or excessive campaign contributions; reported campaign disbursements that may not be legitimate and verifiable campaign expenditures attributable to bona fide campaign or political purposes; omitted required information from or disclosed false information in reports filed with the Federal Election Commission; made false statements to government investigators or agencies; and/or improperly interfered or attempted to interfere in a government investigation of related allegations in violation of House Rules, law, regulations, or other standards of conduct.
The Honorable Grace Meng will serve as Chairwoman of the Investigative Subcommittee, and the Honorable Jackie Walorski will serve as the Ranking Member. The other two members of the Investigative Subcommittee are the Honorable Darren Soto and the Honorable Vicky Hartzler.
The Committee has determined to take this action following receipt of a referral from the Office of Congressional Ethics regarding this matter. The Committee notes that the mere fact of establishing an Investigative Subcommittee does not itself indicate that any violation has occurred.
No other public comment will be made on this matter except in accordance with Committee rules. Pursuant to House Rule XI, clause 3(b)(8)(B)(iii), and Committee Rule 17A(f)(1), no documents will be released at this time.
WASHINGTON – The House Committee on Ethics announced Friday it was moving forward with an investigation into Guam's lone member of Congress over allegations he had sexual relations with a staff member and accepted improper political contributions.
The member, Del. Michael F.Q. San Nicolas, said he was ready to "disprove the allegations."
The bipartisan panel had been looking at the allegations against San Nicolas since last fall and decided in March to launch a full investigation. News of that unanimous vote to move forward was announced Friday by the committee in a news release.
The release said the panel would probe the freshman Democrat for engaging in a sexual relationship with a member of his congressional staff; converting campaign funds to personal use; accepting improper and/or excessive campaign contributions; and reporting campaign disbursements that may not be legitimate and verifiable campaign expenditures.
U.S. Capitol Building
The panel will also probe whether San Nicolas omitted required information from – or disclosed false information in – reports filed with the Federal Election Commission; made false statements to government investigators or agencies; and/or improperly interfered or attempted to interfere in a government investigation of related allegations, according to the release.
The issue was referred to the committee by the Office of Congressional Ethics, a separate, non-partisan body of the House.
The release does not list the specific circumstances of the allegations.
'Baseless' claim:Complaint filed on alleged illegal use of campaign funds, San Nicolas says it's baseless
But in September, San Nicolas' former manager of his 2018 congressional campaign, John Paul L. Manuel, filed a compliant with the Guam Election Commission alleging the delegate received a $10,000 contribution from a Guam businessman – an amount above the legal campaign limit, according to the Pacific Daily News in Guam.
Manuel also alleged San Nicolas reimbursed himself from federal campaign funds after using money to carry on an extra-marital affair with a woman he later hired as a member of his congressional staff. He also alleged San Nicolas forged his own father's signature on campaign checks, the newspaper reported.
"This is just a part of the process that we are required to go through in order to disprove the allegations made against us," San Nicolas said in a statement released Friday to USA TODAY through his office. "We will continue to cooperate and thank the people for their patience and support during this time."
The House banned members from having sexual relations with their staff members in 2018 as part of sweeping ethics rules adopted after several lawmakers resigned over accusation of sexual harassment.
The probe will be led by two Democrats – Grace Meng of New York and Darren Soto of Florida – and two Republicans - Jackie Walorski of Indiana and Vicky Hartzler of Missouri.
Well, considering the fact that it was public knowledge because they used to hem up in public, I would say the only ones who did not know about the relationship were the media.
I wonder what other revelations of romantic trysts in public office shall be revealed by the absolutely brilliant investigative journalists of the Main Stream & Social Media.
Go forth and google as I await with baited breath, clutching my pearls, sipping on a cocktail, eating popcorn, for the heavens to fall.
A married Nevada congressman has admitted having a longstanding affair with a former intern calling herself “Love Jones” — after she exposed him in an explosive series of podcasts.
Rep. Steven Horsford (D-Nev.) — who had previously been Nevada’s first African American state Senate majority leader — came forward after Gabriela Linder detailed the affair in a podcast, “Mistress for Congress.”
It started in 2009 when she was a 21-year-old intern at then-US Sen. Harry Reid’s Nevada office — and they only broke ties in April, the same month she started her podcast, she told the Las Vegas Review-Journal.
“It is true that I had a previous relationship outside of my marriage, over the course of several years,” Horsford told the paper.
“I’m deeply sorry to all of those who have been impacted by this very poor decision, most importantly my wife and family.
“Out of concern for my family during this challenging time, I ask that our privacy is respected,” he said.
The 47-year-old congressman calls himself a “devoted family man” in his online bio, and has been married since 2000, long before the affair started.
“Rep. Horsford has raised a strong family with his wife, Sonya Horsford, and their three children,” his bio states.
Linder hid behind the name “Love Jones” for her podcast and related social media until coming forward formally to the Vegas paper last week.
Linder said their sexual relationship continued intermittently for a decade until 2019, and they remained in contact until April. Linder never worked for Horsford in any capacity.
She told the Review-Journal that Horsford offered her financial support and ties to political connections — and even used his congressional staff to help film a segment for her young son’s YouTube show.
Linder — who is also planning a book — told the paper she decided to speak out as “an empowering journey,” ending the affair because she “deserved more.”
She says she had only kept quiet until now because she was “loyal to a fault.”
“He knew how in love with him I was, and he knew what he could do and get away with,” she told the Review-Journal. “He never told me to keep quiet. He didn’t have to.”
Despite insisting she does not have political motives in coming forward, she still claims he should not run for re-election now that his affair has been exposed.
“He obtained this position under false pretenses that he was a family man and man of God,” she told the paper. “He should take a step back, atone, and if people are satisfied, then he can come back into politics.”
However, an aide for Horsford insisted, “This was a private relationship of the congressman’s and this was in no way related to his public office.”
Over his decades-long career in the Senate, former Vice President Joe Biden was known as a demanding but fair and family-oriented boss, devoted to his home life in Delaware and committed to gender equality in his office.
He was not on a list of “creepy” male senators that female staffers told each other to avoid in the elevators on Capitol Hill.
Yet Biden, now the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee, was also a toucher, seemingly oblivious to whether physical contact made some women uncomfortable. That behavior has persisted in recent years. Biden is now facing fresh scrutiny after a former aide in March charged that he sexually assaulted her when she worked in his Senate office in the early 1990s, an allegation Biden has categorically denied.
The PBS NewsHour spoke with 74 former Biden staffers, of whom 62 were women, in order to get a broader picture of his behavior toward women over the course of his career, how they see the new allegation, and whether there was evidence of a larger pattern.
None of the people interviewed said that they had experienced sexual harassment, assault or misconduct by Biden. All said they never heard any rumors or allegations of Biden engaging in sexual misconduct, until the recent assault allegation made by Tara Reade. Former staffers said they believed Reade should be heard, and acknowledged that their experiences do not disprove her accusation.
In all, the NewsHour tried to contact nearly 200 former staffers of Biden’s, based primarily on public records of his time in the Senate and White House and also from interviews with current campaign advisers. They include former interns and senior aides, from his 1972 Senate campaign through his time at the White House.
Some are still in politics, others left long ago to pursue other careers. They were asked about Reade’s allegation but also whether they, or anyone they know, were ever uncomfortable around Biden. Many said that her sexual assault allegation was at odds with their knowledge of Biden’s behavior toward women.
The interviews revealed previously unreported details about the Biden office when Reade worked there, such as an account that she lost her job because of her poor performance, not as retaliation for lodging complaints about sexual harassment, as Reade has said.
Other recollections from former staffers corroborated things she has described publicly, such as Biden’s use of the Senate gym and a supervisor admonishing her for dressing inappropriately.
Overall, the people who spoke to the NewsHour described largely positive and gratifying experiences working for Biden, painting a portrait of someone who was ahead of his time in empowering women in the workplace.
“The one thing about Joe Biden is, he is a man of the highest character and that’s why these accusations are so surreal and just can’t comport with the man I worked with,” said Marcia Lee Taylor, a senior policy advisor on the Judiciary Committee, where women held leading roles when Biden served as chairman.
But he had blindspots, which Biden himself has publicly acknowledged, when it came to how his interactions with women in public could make them uncomfortable.
Reade declined the NewsHour’s interview request but her attorney, Doug Wigdor, sent detailed answers to a number of questions by email. He wrote that Biden’s public touching is evidence that he could have mistreated his client in the way she claims.
“I don’t think anyone would describe these situations as normal,” Wigdor wrote. “They are troublesome, to say the least.”
Many former Biden staffers said they believe Reade’s allegation is false.
Addressing Tara Reade’s allegations
Since Reade went public with her assault accusation in March, former staffers of Biden’s world have been scanning their memories, considering the details of her story and their own experiences.
Reade, in interviews with multiple news outlets, has alleged that Biden attacked her in the Senate complex when she met him on an errand. But her accusations are also more sweeping. She has charged that the Biden office was a toxic place to work, that the senator touched her shoulders and neck multiple times, and that she was asked to serve drinks because he thought she was pretty. Reade has also claimed she was demoted and ultimately pushed to leave because she complained about workplace harassment.
The NewsHour spoke with more than 20 people who worked for Biden when Reade was also a staffer. Some remembered her, many did not.
Ben Savage, who said his desk was next to Reade’s in the Biden mailroom, disputed her charge that she was forced out of her job in retaliation for a sexual harassment complaint she claims to have filed.
Savage, who worked as the office’s systems administrator, overseeing computers and information processing, told the NewsHour that Reade was fired for her poor performance on the job, which he witnessed — not as retaliation for her complaints about sexual harassment.
But according to Savage, Reade had been mishandling a key part of her job and an essential office task — processing constituent mail, something they worked on together. Savage said he recalls reporting these issues to his boss, deputy chief of staff Dennis Toner. After that, Savage said he began diminishing Reade’s duties, taking over some of her tasks and rerouting parts of the process to exclude her.
“I don’t think anyone would describe these situations as normal. They are troublesome, to say the least.”
“Of all the people who held that position, she’s the only one during my time there who couldn’t necessarily keep up or who found it frustrating,” said Savage, who worked in the office for three years, from 1993 to 1996.
Toner, who was Savage’s direct supervisor, told the NewsHour that he did not remember Reade. He said he did remember Savage as a good worker who stood out in the office.
“I can’t take issue with Ben saying that her job performance was not up to par. We would have had a discussion with Tara or whomever the employee would have been to see how we could make it work,” Toner said. “I do not recall Tara being in the office. I can’t comment on why she would have left or anything like that,” he added.
Wigdor, Reade’s attorney, said that she does not remember Savage specifically, but said his story is wrong and her performance had nothing to do with her termination.
“Ms. Reade recalls that there was a lot of nitpicking regarding her performance in the office,” he wrote. “She was also very nervous at that point and distracted so it is possible that from time to time there was a mistake made … but her performance had nothing to do with her termination.”
More broadly, Wigdor said, it was “not surprising” that former staffers would say they did not believe the allegation against Biden. Wigdor argued that former aides have an incentive to stand with Biden because they could benefit personally if he becomes president, do not want to have “their lives turned upside down if they come out against him,” or are simply motivated by a desire to protect Biden to help bolster his chances of beating President Donald Trump in the general election.
Reade’s story has been corroborated publicly by three people who spoke with other news organizations, saying she told them in the past about the alleged assault. Despite numerous attempts to contact them via phone, email and through a lawyer, none of them responded or could be reached for comment on this story.
Biden’s presidential campaign responded with a statement from deputy campaign manager and communications director Kate Bedingfield.
“Whether it was in his campaigns, his Senate office, his family, or in the Obama Administration, Joe Biden has always championed and empowered women professionals. He has and will always insist on a workplace culture built on respect, equality and dignity, leading by his own example,” Bedingfield said.
Last year, after seven women — including Reade — publicly stated Biden made unwanted physical contact with them, like touching their shoulders and smelling their hair, he released a video and tweet addressing their concerns.
Senators Joe Biden and Daniel Patrick Moynihan arrive at the confirmation hearing of Ruth Bader Ginsburg in June 1993. (Photo by Jeffrey Markowitz/Sygma via Getty Images)
“Social norms are changing,” he wrote. “I’ve heard what these women are saying. Politics to me has always been about making connections, but I will be more mindful about respecting personal space in the future.”
Reade did not publicly accuse Biden of sexual assault until March of this year.
Reade has claimed a supervisor admonished her for the way she dressed and asked her to be more modest. She has claimed this was a baseless criticism and retaliation for her complaint about sexual harassment from Biden.
A woman who worked with Reade, but who spoke to the NewsHour on the condition she not be named, said she remembers Reade mentioning that she was scolded for her attire and that Reade asked her if it was a legitimate complaint. That coworker and two other staffers who worked with Reade said they believe she was not appropriately dressed for work.
Reade has said that she was bringing Biden his gym bag, somewhere “down toward the Capitol,” when the alleged assault took place.
Several staffers confirmed to the NewsHour that Biden regularly used the Senate gym, and that a person in Reade’s position might have been asked to bring him items, such as paperwork, or in one example given, Advil, that he needed. None of them recalled ever bringing him a gym bag.
Biden’s Senate offices were in a prime location, bookending the second floor of the Russell Senate Office building, the closest to the U.S. Capitol.
Reade’s attorney told the NewsHour that Reade recalls the assault happening “in a semiprivate area like an alcove” and that it was “somewhere between the Russell (building) and/or Capitol building.” He pointed out that survivors often have difficulty with specifics about trauma.
Reade’s description aligns with other staffers’ recollections of Biden’s short indoor route between his office and the Capitol. It is a roughly 10-minute walk that consists of one flight of stairs and one long hallway inside the Russell Building, followed by a wide tunnel through which he could walk or take an internal subway train to the Capitol.
The layout of that route and building has not changed. A recent walk through that area showed the subway tunnel contains no out-of-view areas, like an alcove. The remaining portion of the route includes multiple stairwells as well as corridors lined with offices. It is a main thoroughfare for senators and staffers.
Some former staffers told the NewsHour that if Biden did assault Reade in any of these places, it would have been a brazen attack in an area with a high risk of being seen.
“He didn’t want an image of a young woman staffer serving him.”
“When I worked in the Senate, it was always crowded [and] packed with lobbyists, staff and tourists,” said Sheila Nix, who was Biden’s chief of staff on the 2012 presidential campaign and previously worked as chief of staff to two other Democratic senators.
In interviews, staffers have also raised doubts about Reade’s claim that she was asked to serve drinks at a fundraiser, an incident she said she included in an official complaint of sexual harassment submitted while she worked in the office.
But more than 50 former staffers said they didn’t remember ever attending a fundraiser for Biden in Washington, D.C., when they were on his Senate staff. And some recalled an office policy banning most of Biden’s Senate staff from doing campaign work.
“Never would have happened,” said Melissa Lefko, who was a staff assistant in Biden’s office during the time Reade was there. “We all knew there was a very hard line there.”
Dozens of staffers, from different eras, said Biden rarely attended any events in Washington, racing to catch his train home to Wilmington, Delaware, as soon as Senate voting ended each night.
Further, two men who worked as junior staffers for Biden said the senator specifically did not want women to serve beverages, like coffee, or perform other menial tasks in his Senate office or on the committees he chaired. Men were typically asked to perform such tasks.
“He didn’t want an image of a young woman staffer serving him,” said John Earnhardt, who took over Reade’s duties. Reade left the office in mid-1993, after working there approximately nine months.
Biden’s treatment of women
In separate and in-depth interviews, women who worked for Biden generally did not want to weigh in with certainty on whether they believed Reade’s allegation was true. But they all said it is at odds with their experience.
Numerous former Biden staffers said they felt he treated men and women equally, and that he was known for hiring women for top jobs that women seldom held in other Senate offices.
“Biden has a terrific record on hiring women at very high levels and doing it long before other people did,” said Diana Huffman, who served as the staff director for the Judiciary Committee in the late 1980s, when Biden was chair.
“He was fully embracing the idea that women should have the same opportunities and be taken with the same seriousness as male staff. That was distinctive,” said Liz Sherwood-Randall, a former senior foreign policy adviser to Biden.
The experiences of former Biden staffers underscore the complicated nature of sexual assault reporting and how to judge conflicting portraits of an individual. It is a current topic of research and heated debate among experts.
“It only takes one act to be worthy of consideration,” said Juliet Williams, a gender studies expert at the University of California, Los Angeles, pointing out that years of inoffensive behavior with many or even most women does not indicate whether someone is capable of ever committing an offense.
“When we try someone for murder it’s not like, ‘Well there’s serial murders and one-offers,’” Williams said. “There’s certain kinds of behavior that are never acceptable. Quantity is not the only metric.”
Sherry Hamby, the founding editor of the academic journal The Psychology of Violence, also said that any pattern is possible.
She described the idea of a 50-year-old man, the age Biden was at the time of the alleged attack, committing his first and only act of sexual assault as improbable. “In terms of likely statistical pattern, that would be an incredibly unlikely trajectory to see,” Hamby said.
But she and others also noted that false reports of sexual assault are rare, and that the way women’s accusations are evaluated is flawed because they face more pressure than men to have their stories corroborated or to prove that they’re part of a larger group of victims.
Still, Williams said, “I do think it is worth recording if the evidence shows that in the case of the former vice president there are scores of women who actually praise him for his collegiality and professionalism and respect.”
Biden’s office was known for having women-friendly work policies. For example, he promoted at least one Senate staffer while she was on maternity leave. As vice president, he helped secure paid family leave for White House employees.
Female staffers who spent countless hours with Biden, including in one-on-one settings, like his small private office in the U.S. Capitol, known as a “hideaway,” said he never made passes at them or behaved in other ways that suggested sexual impropriety.
“Never, ever, ever did I feel uncomfortable.”
Victoria Nourse, who served as Biden’s top lawyer on the Judiciary Committee in the early 1990s, recalled Biden’s reaction when another official made a comment about her looks in front of Biden during a flight in 1991. The man said, “‘Oh Joe, let me sit next to the pretty girl,’” recalled Nourse, who later served as Biden’s chief counsel in the White House.
Biden told the man off, Nourse said, “making it clear that we were here for work, and that was inappropriate — in a very no nonsense way.”
“I traveled with him all over the world, all over the country. I was alone with him all the time,” said Elizabeth Alexander, a former Senate and White House aide. “Never, ever, ever did I feel uncomfortable.”
Hill culture
The Reade accusation is part of a larger, decades-long discussion about misogyny on Capitol Hill. It highlights a pivot point in the Senate in the 1990s, when a then-record four women were newly elected to the chamber, and prominent claims of sexual harassment drew more attention to the behavior of male senators.
Biden was a central figure and front-row witness to this shift.
In October 1991, Biden chaired the Judiciary Committee when Anita Hill testified that Clarence Thomas, then a Supreme Court nominee, had sexually harassed her in the workplace. Biden has been roundly criticized by advocates for women and former Democratic senators for agreeing to keep other female witnesses from testifying about Thomas’ conduct toward them, and for appearing tone-deaf on sexual harassment.
Five months later, in March 1992, Sen. Brock Adams, D-Wash., announced his retirement after the Seattle Times reported that eight women had accused him of sexual crimes, including drugging and molesting them.
At the time, a climate of harassment and sexual entitlement existed in some offices in the Senate, driven by some male senators whose behavior was well known on Capitol Hill.
“We all worked in a culture where men put their hands on you, often,” said Mary Byrne, who worked in the Senate from 1988 to 1995. “I remember sitting at a desk outside the Agriculture Committee and one staffer would come in and give you a shoulder massage, say you are doing good,” Byrne said. “Men there felt they had access to your body as a young woman.”
Byrne also said she remembers walking in on a female deputy chief of staff sitting on a senator’s lap. Another person who worked in the Senate at the time told the NewsHour he recalled seeing a senator with his arm around the waist of a young female staffer on an elevator.
Byrne, like many women working on the Hill in those years, talked with other female aides about a “list” of senators to avoid.
“You got to know which senators you didn’t want to be on an elevator alone with,” said Liz Tankersley, who was Biden’s legislative director from 1985 to 1993. “No one ever said Joe Biden was one of them.”
On that list in 1993, according to multiple staffers, was Sen. Bob Packwood, R-Ore. He later resigned, in 1995, after the public revelation that he had engaged in years of aggressive sexual behavior toward women, including staffers. The late Sen. Strom Thurmond, R-S.C., was also infamously on the avoid-elevator list, staffers claimed. So was another now-deceased lawmaker — Sen. Ted Kennedy, D-Mass.
“I know some of those people on the list,” said former Sen. Dennis DeConcini, a Democrat from Arizona who served from 1977 to 1995 and sat on the Judiciary Committee with Biden for many years. “There were several, it was almost common knowledge. And Biden was never mentioned in any of that. He went home every night to Delaware.”
Around the time Reade alleges Biden attacked her, he was building a reputation as a leading crusader on behalf of women. Biden had already introduced and was pushing for passage of the landmark Violence Against Women Act. In March 1993, he held a hearing on protecting women from stalkers.
“You got to know which senators you didn’t want to be on an elevator alone with. No one ever said Joe Biden was one of them.”
But Byrne, who was then press secretary to Democratic Florida Sen. Bob Graham, and others told the NewsHour that Biden was known for his habit of touching people when interacting with them.
“We knew that about Biden,” Byrne said. “He was always massaging somebody’s shoulders. But never anything more than that. There was no vibe about him.”
Many staffers stressed that people frequently gravitate to Biden, as a kind of “comforter-in-chief,” and look for an arm around a shoulder or a kiss on the cheek.
However, staffers agree it was not in Biden’s nature to gauge social signals about whether someone wanted to be hugged or touched. Many said they learned that he might do so without warning, though most saw it as an endearing quality that wasn’t sexual in nature.
A former staffer said that when Biden does things like stroking women’s hair, there’s a complicated dynamic at play.
His behavior toward women can be “somewhat infantilizing,” the staffer said. “That doesn’t look like equality, right? But that was an expression of empathy, as opposed to flirtation.”
For others, Biden’s touching evoked some regret. “There were times as I now look back that I think we messed up. We should have said something about that,” a different former staffer said. “We probably should have recognized that made people uncomfortable.”
Democratic Members of Congress want to change the laws on Voting Rights for Members of Congress by introducing a new rule for proxy voting by proxy voting.
The Roach I Wish To Stomp, Donna Shalala, is talking about saving lives.
Mostly Republican membership showed up to vote on the Democratic $3 trillion bill, where the Democrats refuse to show up for fear of arrest.
Yes, this is what they are discussing, a constitutional crisis because the Democrats want to vote by proxy.
So, the legislation gives members of congress the powers to vote by proxy, where they can represent 10 proxy votes of other members.
What about a livestream vote, because it does come with lots and lots of certifications and timestamps, you know?
The livestream can even have a network of all the registered constituents, who take oaths in the act of grievances, as verified sources, you know, like they do with the twat blue checkmark.
This is not that difficult, but, when you are dealing with the fact that Obamagate is about to come out to make your worst nightmares the only thing left you have to cling onto, you typically start to lose command of bodily functions, whereby, you rightfully give tribute to more cooties money, in a series of distractionary legislative tributes to your handlers, in hopes that you retain your freedom, just one more day.
The last time I checked you have to be an attorney to represent someone from congress, with consent and advise from congress.
These people are discussing about members need to pay back part of their salaries if they live in their offices but not about the members who are engaging in lucrative stock trades like Richard Burr.
It seems Ethics Committee may have its functions halted.
Yes, it is about time Congress, and the other two branches of government enter the 21st Century because it is woefully arcane when it comes to its functioning.
You should see some of the Windows 98 systems still up there.
So, as this hot mess of a constitutional crisis continues to escalate for our birthdays week, I just would like to put it out there that I have already developed and launched the new congressional office IT model, all run from your handheld device, or desktop for those hard core keyboard constituent warriors, with lots of pretty data stuff so we can all enjoy life, like we were born to do
#maytheheavensfall
(ii) ADOPTION TAXPAYER IDENTIFICATION NUMBER.—For purposes of clause
6 (i), in the case of a qualifying child who is adopted or placed for adoption (Foster Care), the term ″valid identification number″ shall include the adoption taxpayer identification number of such child.
Children in Foster Care or under the legal aegis of the State or a private, foreign corporation, by law, do not get a penny.
AMENDMENTS Summary
Status
1
Version 1 Murphy, Gregory (NC), Norman (SC)
Republican
Strikes provisions that would allow existing recovery rebate checks to be claimed with a Taxpayer Identification Number (TIN), and changes the rules for the second recovery rebate checks to remove the TIN requirement and match what is in existing law (SSNs, plus TINs allowed for adopted children of citizens with SSNs).
Submitted
2
Version 1 Budd (NC), Buck (CO)
Republican
Caps the amount individuals can receive from unemployment insurance at 100 percent of their previous wages.
Submitted
3
Version 1 Lesko (AZ)
Republican
Strikes the entirety of Title I, Subtitle G-Deduction of State and Local Taxes from the bill.
Submitted
4
Version 1 Lesko (AZ)
Republican
Ensures that no taxpayer funds authorized in this bill will be given to anyone in America illegally.
Submitted
5
Version 1 Lesko (AZ)
Republican
Ensures that no taxpayer funds authorized in this bill will be used to aid or support institutions that provide abortions.
Submitted
6
Version 1 Davis, Rodney (IL)
Republican
Amends the Help America Vote Act to prohibit individuals from collecting and returning more than 10 mail ballots to an election official.
Submitted
7
Version 1 Davis, Rodney (IL)
Republican
Amends the Help America Vote Act to prohibit individuals from collecting and returning mail ballots to an election official unless the individual attests to their eligibility to vote in the state.
Submitted
8
Version 1 Davis, Rodney (IL)
Republican
Amends the Help America Vote Act to require states to provide transparency on individuals that wish to collect and return mail ballots to an election official.
Submitted
9
Version 1 Davis, Rodney (IL)
Republican
Amends the Help America Vote Act to prohibit HAVA grants to states that allow ballot harvesting.
Submitted
10
Version 1 Ocasio-Cortez (NY)
Democrat Withdrawn Provides more funding towards the State Fiscal Stabilization Fund, would increase the age requirements in the State Fiscal Stabilization Fund, and would require nonprofit colleges to provide half of their allocated emergency aid to students in need.
Withdrawn
11
Version 1 Ocasio-Cortez (NY)
Democrat Withdrawn Ensures that money goes to local governments, provides State and local officials with the flexibility to do longer term planning for running their elections while the pandemic is ongoing, and to make responsible decisions when going through their procurement and administrative processes.
Withdrawn
12
Version 1 Ocasio-Cortez (NY)
Democrat Withdrawn Would prohibit the Secretary of State, Governors, and institutions of higher education from excluding undocumented students from emergency aid.
Withdrawn
13
Version 1 Ocasio-Cortez (NY)
Democrat Withdrawn Removes barriers formerly incarcerated individuals face when applying to PPP loans.
Withdrawn
14
Version 1 Ocasio-Cortez (NY), Cicilline (RI)
Democrat Withdrawn Places an immediate moratorium on mergers or acquisitions involving the largest companies and equity funds except for those that are clearly in the interest of economic or national security.
Withdrawn
15
Version 1 Ocasio-Cortez (NY)
Democrat Withdrawn Sets requirements of corporations receiving federal aid to implement paid leave for workers, a minimum wage, and a limitation of CEO and executive pay.
Withdrawn
16
Version 1 Ocasio-Cortez (NY)
Democrat Withdrawn Requires corporations receiving federal aid to maintain current workforce levels and benefits, worker pay, and collective bargaining agreements.
Withdrawn
17
Version 1 Ocasio-Cortez (NY)
Democrat Withdrawn Removes waiver authority from the Secretary of the Treasury and Board of Governors when it comes to requirements of corporations receiving federal aid.
Withdrawn
18
Version 1 Ocasio-Cortez (NY)
Democrat Withdrawn Grants an equity stake, dividend and voting rights to workers of corporations receiving federal aid.
Withdrawn
19
Version 1 Price (NC)
Democrat
Authorizes $500 million to CNCS, includes waivers and flexibilities.
Submitted
20
Version 1 Lowey (NY)
Democrat MANAGER’S AMENDMENT Makes technical and conforming changes so that the bill title reads as “The Heroes Act”. Modifies appropriations provisions to provide additional rural assistance, provide greater flexibility for Labor and Health and Human services funding items, adds a risk mitigation program, ensures application of non-discrimination requirements, incorporates increased eligibility for authorized programs, prohibits PPP assistance for lobbyists salaries, prohibits covered loans to certain nonprofits engaged in election and campaign activities, expands the forgiveness safe harbor and the allowable use and forgiveness of expenditures for PPE, provides student loan debt relief, and requires every federal agency that funds or oversees scientific research to develop, adopt, and enforce a scientific integrity policy.
Submitted
21
Version 2 Grothman (WI)
Republican Revised CDC Study on Connection Between Vitamin D Deficiencies and COVID-19 Mortality Rates
"Mirror, mirror, on the wall, who is the fairest of them all."
Trey is an ethics expert.
Justice comes in all shapes and forms, but the Great Mystery, is how?
He is foreshadowing to what is coming - due process.
Many do not qualify for due process in a wake of false claims, the bearing of false witness, or rather, propaganda.
See how easy it is to understand the purpose of Fairy Tales?
The tales, or what I like to refer to as one's armorial, are to ensure what has happened against humanity, never happens, ever again, but this time, we possess the methods and means to address such transgressions of due process in the public square through technology, preserved in the annals of history.
She is a vile creature who has no soul worthy in this ethereal realm of existence.
Her Flatulent Boviness, Sheila Jackson Lee, in her regal leadership on reparations, is now memorialized as the one who publicly initiated Emergency Manager Emperor Pence's Procurement Consortia Task Force to launch her bipartisan working group for TARP 2.0, because they stole all the TARP and need more money so their fake ass schemes for stealin'the children, land and vote can get bailed out, from another bailout, because they ran all the money out the country through children's trust funds, then back into the country to fund political campaigns, like hers.
It is all about the timing.
It is almost that time for Trump to stop obstructing justice and pull those IG Reports from his backpocket.
I bet they timed this to blame her this all fell apart, which is shall, when the heavens fall.
This is about the trafficking of tiny humans, of which, Her Flatulent Boviness promulgates the residuals of the peculiar institution for her personal inurement.
