Biden raps GOP over threat to Ukraine aid
Appeals court says Sen. Graham must testify on Trump
Also in today’s edition of “Regular Order” for October 21, 2022:
Biden targets GOP lawmakers over infrastructure.
A big week in Georgia for early in-person voting.
Hurricane Ian isn’t stopping GOP voters.
UKRAINE AID. With growing talk among Congressional Republicans in opposition to more military aid for Ukraine, President Biden acknowledged on Thursday he is concerned about what would happen if the GOP takes control of Congress in November. "I am worried," Biden told reporters in Pittsburgh on Thursday. "These guys don't get it."
RUSSIA. In a fundraiser last night in Philadelphia, the President said Republicans were moving back to an isolationist stance that doesn't help the world. "It's a lot bigger than Ukraine. It's Eastern Europe. It's NATO," Biden said of the GOP. "They have no sense of American foreign policy."
DECEMBER. A GOP win in November could force the White House to try to stuff extra money for Ukraine in a year-end funding bill for the federal government. That was suggested a few weeks ago by Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) - and may turn out to be the best option for the White House.
INFRASTRUCTURE. President Biden this week started to get more personal in his attacks aimed at Republicans who voted against a new infrastructure law - but who are now writing letters to the feds, asking for money for their districts. "I was surprised to see there are so many Socialists in the Republican caucus," Biden cracked on Thursday.
OFFENSE. The White House put out a slick social media video yesterday, showing the President reading letters written by GOP critics like Rep. Paul Gosar (R-AZ). "He says it would enhance the quality of life, ease congestion, and boost the economy," Biden added with a wry smile.
LETTERS. This is not unusual. The beauty of the system is that lawmakers can write letters asking for money - and those letters are rarely made public. So, no one knows that Republicans who voted against the infrastructure law are at the same time pressing the feds for money from that law.
REQUEST. I asked the Transportation Department this week for examples of GOP letters. We'll see if I get any by the close of business today. One reform that I would make in the federal government is that any Congressional letter or email asking for money should be posted on the internet.
TRUMP PROBE. A federal appeals court panel has rejected the effort of Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) to avoid testifying in a Georgia probe of Donald Trump's effort to reverse his 2020 election loss. "Senator Graham has failed to demonstrate that he is likely to succeed on the merits of his appeal," the three-judge panel wrote.
PHONE CALLS. Graham argues he should not have to testify about phone calls he made to the Georgia Secretary of State, in which Graham allegedly urged Brad Raffensperger to throw out votes for Joe Biden - in order to help Trump win.
DECISION. But three judges - two of them appointed by Donald Trump - did not feel Graham has constitutional protection. "We thus find it unlikely that questions about (the calls) would violate the Speech and Debate Clause."
WHAT’S NEXT. This ruling doesn’t mean Graham will testify immediately. He could still take his case to the U.S. Supreme Court and further delay the proceedings before the special grand jury in Atlanta.
TEXT MESSAGES. Former Sen. Kelly Loeffler (R-GA) got to read her texts in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution from after the November elections in 2020. And she wasn’t happy. "The radical Left doesn't want this election to be about their broken agenda," Loeffler said. "They are desperate to destroy conservatives by any means necessary."
WOODSTEIN. But Loeffler's tweets about the texts - which mysteriously were sent to the AJC - reminded me of a classic non-denial denial. Loeffler didn't deny that the texts were real, she just excoriated Democrats and the media.
DETAILS. The texts gave us a window into what was going on in Republican circles in Georgia. Loeffler was being lobbied by Marjorie Taylor Greene and other GOP lawmakers to vote to overturn Joe Biden's election victory - a step Loeffler at first embraced, and then backed off in the wake of the Jan. 6 attack.
TEXTS. It's not clear where the texts came from. But the fact that they were in a 59-page document makes it possible they were the subject of a subpoena. There's nothing especially damning in the details, other than it confirms GOP efforts in Georgia to keep Trump in office.
REGULAR ORDER. We welcome back our weekly subscribers. You missed a heck of a lot this week in ‘Regular Order.’ Why not upgrade to a paid subscription - or give the gift of straight news to one of your friends - and help put my kids through college!
GEORGIA VOTE. Voters in Georgia continue to turn out in high numbers for in-person early voting in that state. Over 500,000 people have voted so far this week, much higher than the 2018 early in-person turnout. If this presages a big overall turnout - which party benefits? That depends on where the votes are coming from.
JIM CROW 2.0. I've had a lot of people complain in recent days about the big numbers of early in-person votes in Georgia, and allude to charges from Democrats that a new election law in that state would restrict voting. "When does the suppression kick in?" one person asked.
CHANGES. Originally, the Georgia GOP voting plan would have restricted both early in-person voting and vote-by-mail. For example, Sunday in-person voting was on the chopping block, which was seen as an effort to undermine voting by Blacks after church ('Souls to the Polls'). But that was dropped.
FINAL BILL. The real change in Georgia was to limit voting by mail. "Part of what is happening is Georgia's new laws made it more difficult to cast a mail ballot," said Michael McDonald, a voting expert from the University of Florida. “Evidence is mounting people are shifting from mail to in-person early voting.”
IN-PERSON. I will say it again - early in-person voting is your best option. Voting by mail is easy to do, but it also is the easiest way to have your vote not counted (and who knows if there will be a bomb in the drop box).
FLORIDA. I promised to keep an eye on the four big GOP coastal counties in southwest Florida which were hit by Hurricane Ian. This is not a pure apples to apples comparison - but these numbers give us an idea of how early voting by mail is going in Florida. So far, Republicans are more than holding their own.
SOUTHWEST. In Lee County (Fort Myers), Charlotte County (Punta Gorda), and Collier County (Naples), GOP voters are voting by mail right now at a higher percentage rate than they did for the 2020 election. Democrats are only doing better in Sarasota County.
VOTING. Turnout is at +/- 9 percent in those four GOP counties. As for the big Democratic counties from 2020 - Palm Beach County is higher at 10.3% turnout. But that's it. Hillsborough (Tampa) is at 7.4%, Leon 6.7%, Dade 6.5%, Broward 5.7%, Alachua 5.1%, Orange 4.3%, and Duval 4%.
SUMMARY. That shows me that GOP voters are willing to crawl across broken glass (and hurricane damage) in order to vote in southwest Florida - while Democrats in most of their big areas outside the hurricane zone aren't exactly rushing to the polls. It's early. But it's something to watch.
HURRICANE IAN. Lawmakers from Florida continue to press the Biden Administration for additional federal aid to help those hit by Hurricane Ian. The latest is a call for a federal fishery resource disaster declaration.
AID. "We must help rebuild our seafood and fishing businesses that were disrupted by Hurricane Ian," said Rep. Greg Steube (R-FL). "Florida’s iconic fisheries are foundational to the economy and way of life in many of the communities," lawmakers wrote in a letter to the Commerce Department.
AG. It's the same message on the farm front, as Florida lawmakers are asking the Agriculture Department to 'expedite all available resources' to farmers and ranchers in the state. "The timing of Hurricane Ian’s devastating impacts will have serious consequences for Florida’s specialty crop industry.”
COST. The federal tab for recovery in Florida is going to be big. The state's Congressional delegation has already asked the feds for at least $33 billion in direct relief - it won't surprise me if the ultimate number is over $60 billion.
CRIME. There is a lot of talk about crime in this election year from Republicans, as they blame rising crime numbers on Democrats - and darkly hint that Blue States are crime-filled. So, let's look at the latest data on murders per 100,000 population. (The darker the color, the higher the murder rate.)
MURDERS. The murder rate is the highest in a group of SEC football states - Mississippi is #1, followed by Louisiana, Alabama, Missouri, Arkansas, South Carolina, and Tennessee. Georgia is 11th. Florida is 20th.
BOOMER SOONER. Also look at Oklahoma, which has a higher murder rate than New York. That came up in a debate for Governor the other day. The Democrat cited that statistic - Gov. Kevin Stitt (R) denied it - but it's true.
MAGNOLIA WATER. Earlier this week, I detailed questions from Congress to leaders in Mississippi, about how they planned to spend federal money to help the city of Jackson upgrade its water infrastructure. That city's water system literally crapped out this summer - leaving residents without water for several weeks.
PROBE. Now the feds are also getting involved, after an official complaint was filed by the NAACP. The Environmental Protection Agency is probing whether Mississippi's state government discriminated against the state capital of Jackson - a majority-Black city - in providing money for the city's failing water system.
EPA. "The initiation of an investigation of the issues above is not a decision on the merits," the EPA letter stated - but it certainly puts the state on the spot about aid to the city of Jackson. The city's Democratic mayor, and the state's Republican Governor have sparred over who is at fault for the water problems.
TRUMP-PANDEMIC. A new report shows how the Trump White House repeatedly interfered with the CDC during the Coronavirus outbreak - blocking press briefings, delaying scientific reports, and more - worried about the impact on Donald Trump and his reelection. That’s my column this week for the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
HOLIDAYS. The Christmas displays are already up in stores - and the official Capitol ornament for 2022 is now finished. Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI) gave us a preview on Thursday.
MUSE OF HISTORY. October 21, 1967. On this date, a massive anti-war rally saw up to 100,000 people gather at the Lincoln Memorial to protest the war in Vietnam. Thousands then marched to the Pentagon, where a riot ensued, as some demonstrators burned draft cards, while others tried to force their way into the building. Almost 700 people were arrested. In Congress, the protest spurred calls for retribution. Rep. Wayne Hays of Ohio said he would file a bill mandating that if someone destroyed their draft card - that person would be automatically inducted into the military.
LEGISLATIVE PROGRAM:
The House next has votes on November 14.
The Senate will have votes on November 14.
President Biden’s daily schedule link.
Follow me on Twitter @jamiedupree. Email me at jamiedupree@substack.com
Vote by mail in Georgia allows a voter to track their vote. It lets you know when it was received, etc
"That city's water system literally crapped out this summer" your blog is a critical daily read for me but, hey, if this political reporting thing doesn't work out perhaps there's a gig as a sit-com writer.