Trump, Low Information Voters and George Floyd: Distorting the Defunding the Police Argument

The rogue cop who responds to crime too aggressively, and defies attempts to reign in his behavior is an American movie icon.  Who can't quote such classic lines from Dirty Harry movies as "Go ahead, make my day," and "I guess you got to ask yourself, do you feel lucky.  Well, do you, punk?"  But there is a big difference between rooting for the good guy in a very contrived, but entertaining, movie plot, and seeing how such attitudes among the police play out in real life.  For far too long, we have seen images of police taking a far too aggressive stance when the person of interest happens to be African-American.  Over and over again, police response to stopping African-Americans suspected of breaking the law has been way out of proportion to the offense charged.

But Donald Trump's base of support is made up of uneducated white voters.  These are people who not only see the police as their allies, but call on the police when they spot a rogue person of color in their parks, swimming pools, neighborhoods.  To these voters, Dirty Harry is the way things ought to be. And why not?  With their white privilege, the police aren't a threat to them.  The greater militarization of the police, the proliferation of aggressive tactics, that's to be encouraged.  Give the police the tools they need!

And again, it's these low information white voters that Donald Trump is manipulating through his reaction to the proposals for police reform that have arisen out of the George Floyd protests.

As we watch how Donald Trump reacts to the protests over the killing of George Floyd, we can see how he inflames his low information voter base by deliberately distorting some of the proposals being floated about to address police brutality, and society's impotence in preventing it.  Here, I am talking about the growing movement to "defund" the police.

Trump, Tucker Carlson, Sean Hannity, they would all have you believe that this is a movement to eliminate all police everywhere.  They manipulate fears, claiming that if you don't have police, there would be no one around to respond to crime.  Tucker Carlson, most notably, accused celebrities calling for police defunding of being hypocritical, as they tend to live in gated communities with their own security forces.  Carlson infamously stated, "There aren't going to be any rapes on your street."

Um, Tucker, I have some news for you.  Rapes rarely happen in the streets.  Rapes happen in board rooms, rapes happen in executive offices, rapes happen in college dormatories, rapes happen in living rooms and bedrooms across the country.  And even with the enormous police presence we have in the United States, all too often, rapes go unpunished, indeed unreported, because victims see the process as futile.  Defunding the police is not likely to lead to a rise in rapes, because, to be frank, rapes already occur at an unacceptably high rate.

The concept of defunding the police is much more nuanced.  No one can deny that in the past two or three decades, we have asked the police to do a lot more than merely protect us from crime. We’ve asked them to become family counselors, we’ve asked them to become drug addiction interventionalists, we’ve asked them to address troubled teens, we’ve asked them to address the homeless. We’ve done this as a matter of expediency, and not by considering if giving the police these responsibilities truly fits within their training and primary role. 

At the same time, we’ve thrown more money at hiring police and arming them to the teeth.  Yet, we’ve had diminishing returns.  The level of crime has essentially been declining for a quarter of a century.  Plus, we’ve seen that disciplining those so-called “bad apples” has become harder and harder.  We have also seen that responding to some situations in the aggressive way many of the police are trained to do only exacerbates the situation.  It causes an almost counter intuitive result that when we spend even more on police, crime goes up.  In fact, when New York police department recently engaged in a slow down as a form of protest, it had the surprising result of lowering complaints of major criminal activity.  

Defunding the police means taking the money we’ve been overspending on police, and funneling it to more targeted, better equipped public uses, such as public schools, drug counselors, social workers, mental health programs. What is clear is that throwing money and armaments at the police has only led to the disgusting levels of brutality that has been on display ever since the protests over George Floyd have spread across the country.  Something has to change.

But Trump's voters don't want to recognize the complex interconnectedness of societal problems and crimes.  They want the simple answer of putting more Dirty Harrys on the streets.  And Trump wants to manipulate their ignorance by promising to do just that, without stopping to consider the broader consequences.

Which brings us to the last point.  That is how conservatives deceptively blame the problem of police brutality toward African-Americans on "a few bad apples."  They will acknowledge that police brutality happens, but claim it's not all police, it's just a few bad apples.

Let me start by saying that I have friends who are police officers.  I have no doubt in my mind regarding their compassion and sincerity.  I have worked as a criminal defense lawyer.  I have interacted with police officers and members of the sheriff's department all the time.  The vast majority of officers with whom I have interacted truly wanted to be helpful.  I say that in particular when I have represented women who were victims of domestic abuse.

Nonetheless, there is a systemic problem that permits the bad cops to continue to engage in brutality and violate human rights with impunity.  Think about the proverb from which comes the saying "a few bad apples."  The proverb is, "a few bad apples spoil the bunch."  It is meant to convey the need to be vigilant, lest you leave a bad apple in the barrel, and its blight spreads to its counterparts.  The same rings true for bad cops.  They need to be rooted out, lest they infect the police force.

But we have two issues preventing that from happening.  The first is qualified immunity.  This is the legal doctrine that if somebody is acting in their official role, and they act in good faith, they ought not be held personally liable for any harm that flows from their actions.  That's really an oversimplification.  To go into qualified immunity really deserves its own commentary.  The main point is that the courts have been expanding the concept of qualified immunity to protect bad cops from being held responsible for their actions in lawsuits.

The second is police unions.  Understandably, you can't take action against a police officer without some form of due process.  And as a lawyer, I can appreciate that.  You need to give the person notice of the problem, and a meaningful opportunity to defend himself.  It is the cornerstone of the American justice system.  But the police unions go beyond merely insisting on due process for officers accused of wrong doing.  They act to insulate the bad cops form facing any consequences for their actions.  And the unions often do so by encouraging colleagues to support and defend the bad cops, regardless of the quality of evidence against them.

Take what happened in Buffalo in response to the George Floyd protests.  Like many cities, Buffalo imposed a curfew in an effort curb violence.  After curfew, the police emergency response team was given the order to clear a city square where protestors had gathered.  The police response, which was endemic of the problems that have been brought to light because of how the police reacted to the protests, was to forcibly march through the area, shields in front of them, and push people away.  While the police were doing so, a seventy-five year old man, Martin Gugino, a peace activist motivated by his Catholic faith, approached some police officers.  Instead of talking with the man, or instructing him where to go, two officers pushed him rather forcefully.  He fell to the ground, hit the back of his head hard, and started bleeding from the head.  In fact, it has been reported that Mr. Gugino cracked his skull as a result of this incident, and hasn't been able to walk.

I will have a link to the video of this below.  Any different interpretation of that video is  disingenuous, willfully blind or deliberately deceptive.  Such as that of Donald Trump, again attempting to appeal to his low information white voter base by calling Mr. Gugino an "antifa provocateur."

The two police officers have been suspended, and are pending criminal charges.  The entire emergency response team has resigned, not from the police force mind you, just from the emergency response team.  Yet, these two officers were caught on video of being way too aggressive.  They are being given due process.  Still, their colleagues have blindly decided to show support for the "bad apples," instead of letting the system run its course to have these officers face the consequences of what they did.

This isn't an isolated incident.  Even in the face of nationwide protests of police aggressiveness, Atlanta Police Office Garrett Rolfe shot and killed African-American Rayshard Brooks, responding to a call that Brooks had fallen asleep in his car and was blocking a Wendy's drive-thru.Video shows that Brooks was running away from Rolfe, and had pointed a stun gun, that he had stolen from a police officer who was attempting to subdue him.  Rolfe had time to respond by putting away his own stun gun, pulling out his real gun, and shooting Brooks dead.  Rolfe faces criminal charges for the incident, including murder.  Many of his colleagues on the Atlanta police force responded to the news of the felony charges against Rolfe, by calling in sick last minute right before their shift.  Again, police are showing solidarity despite clear video evidence of a "bad apple" choosing unnecessary and disproportionate violence against an African-American who was being detained for minor charges.

This is what impunity looks like.  And this has to stop.

When you allow a group of people to flex their muscle, and violently violate civil rights, but protect those people from being disciplined over their wrongful acts, you have tyranny and oppression.  Brushing this off as the acts of "a few bad apples," without removing the apples from the barrel, is just a recipe for continued oppression, and the civil unrest that follows.  Playing ignorant and blindly supporting the police may play well for Trump's low information base.  But it's no way to run a democracy.


By: William J. Kovatch, Jr.

Check out my YouTube channel by clicking here! 

One thing I don't like to talk about is that cancer has left me disabled.  In fact, in my most recent hospitalization, which was over an infection, I suffered an TIA. Even with health insurance, I am amassing huge medical bills.  If you like what you are reading, and would like me to continue writing, and you feel generous enough to help, you can make a one-time non-tax deductible donation to my special needs trust, use this URL:

https://PayPal.me/KovatchSNT

You can also use this email address to make a PayPal donation:  KovatchSNT@gmail.com

Donations will go to a Special Needs Trust set up for my benefit and controlled by a separate trustee.

Photo is of Derek Chauvin kneeling on George Floyd’s neck, which was the cause of his death. Rights belong to Darnella Frazier, used with permission. Information on the license cane be found here:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:George_Floyd_neck_knelt_on_by_police_officer.png#mw-jump-to-license

References

Videos of Events

ABC 11, “Buffalo police officers suspended after video shows75-year-old man was pushed down, cracking head,” YouTube Video (June 5, 2020).

GPB, "Surveillance video of police shooting of Rayshard Brooks," YouTube Video (June 13, 2020).


News Articles and Analysis

Cotton, Tom, "Send in the Military," The New York Times (June 3, 2020).

Edmondson, Catie, "Trump's Response to Protests Draws Bipartisan Rebuke in Congress," The New York Times (June 2, 2020).

Eustachewich, Lia, “Entire Buffalo Emergency Response Team resigns in solidarity with cops who pushed old man,” New York Post (June 5,2020).

Feuer, Alan, “Trump Falsely Targets Buffalo Protester, 75,as ‘Antifa Provocateur,’” The New York Times (June 9, 2020).

Gelles Karl; Bravo, Veronica and Petras, George, “How police pushed aside protesters ahead of Trump's controversial church photo,” USA Today(June 5, 2020).

Nicholas, Peter, "Trump is Terrified of Protest," The Atlantic (May 31, 2020).

Nunberg, Geoff, “Bad Apple Proverbs: There's One In Every Bunch,” NPR (May 5, 2011).

Oliver, John, "Ferguson, MO and Police Militarization," YouTube Video (August 17, 2014).

Oliver, John, "Police," Last Week Tonight (June 8, 2020).

Oliver, John, "Police Accountability," Last Week Tonight (October 2, 2016).

Rosen, Christopher, “Why We Need to Defund the Police,According to John Oliver,” Vanity Fair (June 8, 2020).

"75-Year Old Protestor Fractured Skull in Cop Shove, Can't Walk: Lawyer," NBC 4 New York (June 17, 2020).

Shepherd, Katie, "Atlanta police call in sick to protest murder charge against officer who shot Rayshard Brooks," The Washington Post (June 18, 2020).

Tracey, Thomas, "NYPD work slowdown didn't result in crime increase after 2014 fatal shooting of two police officers, report shows,"  New York Daily News (September 26, 2017).

Zapotosky, Matt; Hawkins, Derek and Nirappil, Fenit, "Former Atlanta officer who shot Rayshard Brooks charged with murder, other offenses," The Washington Post (June 17, 2020).

Trump, Low Information Voters and George Floyd: Misdirecting Anger Over the Cause of the Violence

The images of the violence that has accompanied the protests over the police killing of George Floyd has been confusing.  At times, it has been hard to determine just who is responsible for the violence and the looting.  Donald Trump, his Republican allies and their willing accomplices in the conservative media, however, have given their voter base, uneducated white voters, a boogeyman to continue to manipulate their fears.

Having played up the violence that accompanied the peaceful protests over George Floyd's killing  to his intended audience, Trump went further by giving his supporters a tangible enemy.  Relying on a familiar scapegoat, Trump and his colleagues, such as Attorney General Bill Barr, almost immediately pinned the blame for the violence on antifa, threatening to label the group a terrorist organization.  Indeed, Trump sycophant, Florida Representative Matt Gaetz had a tweet of his flagged for promoting violence by Twitter, as he called for antifa to be hunted down as terrorists.  From Trump's perspective, blaming antifa was expedient, and easily inflamed the emotions of his followers.

Antifa is short of anti-fascist.  Calling antifa an organization is generous.  It is not really an organized group, so much as a collection of like-minded individuals who use modern technology, such as social media and the dark web, to coordinate activities.  People who claim to be part of antifa target conservative events and engage in efforts to disrupt them.  For example, people claiming to be part of antifa often show up at college events where controversial conservative speakers are scheduled to talk.  They have shown up at the protests when Trump was inaugurated.  Most notably, antifa showed up in Charlottesville when white supremacists marched to protest the removal of a statue of confederate general Robert E. Lee.

When antifa shows up at these events, they engage in violent disruptive behavior.  At Trump's inauguration, antifa broke store windows and threw rocks at police.  Antifa engaged in similar destruction when conservative speaker Milo Yiannopoulos was invited to speak at Berkley. In Charlottesville, antifa antagonized heavily armed white supremacists who, quite frankly, were already itching for a fight.

There was just one problem.  The police who were on the scene and the FBI have stated that there is no evidence that antifa was involved in the violence that erupted from the protests.

The cause of the violence in the early days of the George Floyd protests was multifaceted and complex.  On one hand, you had young people rightfully angry and frustrated by the failure of this country to properly discipline and prevent police brutality aimed at African-Americans.  Faced with such strong emotions, some people responded with violence.  In particular, when faced with heavily armed response teams from the police, who indiscriminately used hard-line tactics in an effort to control and disperse crowds, some people, filled with emotion, responded by pushing back and throwing rocks.  In a way, this was a reaction of powerlessness against a police force that was responding with the very same types of brutality to which the protestors were objecting.

Some of the violence, and in particular the looting, was perpetrated by opportunists who saw chaos on the streets.  With the police distracted, it was the perfect time to break into Target and take whatever they could carry with the hope of selling their bounty on the black market.  Interestingly, if you looked at the videos that were circulating that documented the looting, there was an awful lot of diversity among the looters.  The sad reality is that there are some truly immoral people in society just waiting for a chance to make a quick buck, especially if the chances of getting caught are low.  It is important to note, however, that the political leaders closest to these situations, such as the mayors, reported that there was a clear distinction between the people peacefully protesting police brutality, and the pockets of violence that broke out.  It is a distinction that unfortunately neither Donald Trump, nor many of the police recognized.

There has also been evidence of forces from outside of the communities where the protests sprung, traveling to the protests and instigating the violence.  Many saw the video out of Minneapolis, for example, of a young, white male, dressed in black, wearing a gas mask and carrying an umbrella to hide a hammer, breaking the windows of an Autozone store and walking away.  To date, no one has identified this person satisfactorily.  However, he was not the only one.  There has been evidence of yet another loosely affiliated set of individuals, known as the boogaloo bois, stoking violence.  Like antifa, it would be generous to describe the boogaloo bois as an organization.  Generally speaking, these are young people, who are convinced that a second civil war is coming, which will be based on racial lines.  They get their name from an '80s sequel of a movie on break dancing called, "Breakin' 2: Electric Boogaloo."  Some pervert the word "boogaloo," and call it "the big luau."  Bizarrely, some individuals sport Hawaiian shirts as their uniform.  And there have been reports of white men in Hawaiian shirts stoking violence.

The point is that there is no one single cause of the violence and looting.  Blaming a single group, when the actors were from various sources with various motivations, falls right into the hands of those people who don't pay very close attention to political news and current events.  These are the low information voters who make up Trump's base.

By: William J. Kovatch, Jr.

Check out my YouTube channel by clicking here! 

One thing I don't like to talk about is that cancer has left me disabled.  In fact, in my most recent hospitalization, which was over an infection, I suffered an TIA. Even with health insurance, I am amassing huge medical bills.  If you like what you are reading, and would like me to continue writing, and you feel generous enough to help, you can make a one-time non-tax deductible donation to my special needs trust, use this URL:

https://PayPal.me/KovatchSNT

You can also use this email address to make a PayPal donation:  KovatchSNT@gmail.com

Donations will go to a Special Needs Trust set up for my benefit and controlled by a separate trustee.

Photograph is of a Target store that was looted in Minneapolis, and was taken by Lorie Shaull on May 28, 2020.  You can find licensing information at this link:  https://commons.m.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:The_Target_on_Lake_Street_is_looted_and_graffitied_on_Thursday_morning_after_a_night_of_protests_and_rioting_in_Minneapolis,_Minnesota_(49945831221).jpg

References

Fineout, Gary, and Dixon, Matt, “Twitter takes action against Gaetz — After more than 2 days, DeSantis breaks silence on protests —Governor extends freeze on evictions,” Politico (June 2, 2020) 

King, Laura and Read, Richard, “Protests rage nationwide Sunday as Trump threatens to label ‘antifa’ a terrorist group,” Los Angeles Times (May 31, 2020).

Kreig, Gregory, "Police injured, more than 200 arrested at Trump inauguration protests in DC," CNN (January 21, 2017).

Kuznia, Robert; Griffin, Drew and Devine, Curt “Gun-toting members of the Boogaloo movement are showing up at protests,” CNN (June 4, 2020).

MacFarquhar, Neil, “Many Claim Extremists Are Sparking Protest Violence. But Which Extremists?”, The New York Times (May 31, 2020). 

MacFarquhar, Neil; Feuer, Alan Feue and Adam Goldman, “Federal Arrests Show No Sign that Antifa Plotted Protests,” The New York Times (June11, 2020).

Mallin, Alexander, "What is antifa? Behind the group Trump wants to designate as a terrorist organization," ABC News (June 3, 2020).

O'Connell, Oliver, “Questions raised over masked white man with umbrella seen calmly smashing windows before Minneapolis riots,”Independent (May 30, 2020).

Park, Madison, and Lah, Kyung, “Berkeley protests of Yiannopoulos caused $100,000 in damage,” CNN (February 2, 2017).

Pearce, Matt, "Who was responsible for the violence in Charlottesville?  Here's what witnesses say," Los Angeles Times (August 15, 2017). 

Schreckinger, Ben, “Fringe groups point finger back at Trump, Democrats,” Politico (June 2, 2020).

Timberg, Craig; Dwoskin, Elizabeth and Mehenment, Souad, "Men wearing Hawaiian shirts and carrying guns add a volatile new element to protests," The Washington Post (June 3, 2020).

"Who Are Antifa?", Anti-Defamation League (site accessed June 4, 2020).

Trump, Low Information Voters, and George Floyd: Conflating Protestors and Rioters

For the uneducated, white voter, who makes up President Donald Trump's base, the protests that broke out across the country in response to the killing of George Floyd by Minneapolis police may have been not only confusing, but downright scary.  People were legitimately angry.  And that anger was aimed at the police, the very people that white voters are trained to rely upon for their protection.  With such anger aimed at the very people charged with enforcing the law, some violence was to be expected.  Trump, armed with the images of these angry protests, has been trying to manipulate his voter base by intentionally conflating the peaceful, though angry, protests, with the incidental violence.

Images of African-Americans being brutalized by police have sparked outcry and protests for generations.  Yet, the officers responsible have rarely been held accountable for their actions.  As has happened far too often, Americans from all walks of life have been outraged over the treatment of George Floyd, an African-American stopped by the police.  In an unnecessarily brutal detention, police restraining techniques, in particular Officer Derek Chauvin kneeling on George Floyd's neck, resulted in Floyd's death.  Frustrated over the lack of change in police attitudes towards African-Americans, protests broke out nation-wide.  Disappointingly, although not surprisingly, the response of President Donald Trump and his Republican supporters has been, not to acknowledge the wide-spread problem of impunity among the police, but to placate the uneducated white voters who make up the Republicans' base of support.

Let's examine Trump's response to the protests over George Floyd's death, and how they were meant to manipulate the emotions of the base of his support.  Yes, violence has regrettably accompanied the peaceful protests.  But people are angry, and rightfully so.  Institutional racism among the police is a problem that grabs the public's attention over and over again.  Yet nothing seems to change.

Trump, his Republican allies and their willing accomplices in the conservative media have used the images of that anger, and intentionally conflated the peaceful protests with the incidental violence that has accompanied it.  People are yelling angry slogans: "I can't breathe!"  The slogans reflect the dying words of George Floyd.  In fact, we've heard this slogan far too many times in recent years, as over and over again, police restraining techniques have suffocated the African-American males suspected of committing crimes.  And in most cases, those have been minor, non-violent crimes.

Groups of angry people shouting at the police.  Fists in the air.  These are all frightening images, especially for uneducated white voters.

At the same time, news reporters of violence and looting in the streets of major American cities have flooded the internet and the television airwaves. Juxtapose those images of angry protestors with images of those who have taken the opportunity of the protests to engage in violence, and it can become difficult for the uneducated to distinguish between the two.  Trump and his conservative allies took full of advantage of this.

Trump's initial response to the protests was to emphasize the violence, and ignore the root cause.  Trump has called the protestors "THUGS" -- itself a racially charged word.  He tweeted his willingness to use overwhelming military force to control the cities, warning that "when the looting starts, the shooting starts."

That phrase is also tainted with racist overtones.  It was uttered by Miami Police Chief Walter Headley in 1967, in response to similar angry demonstrations over institutional racism that broke out over fifty years ago.  It was a phrase meant to appeal to fears of white voters, with the promise of cracking down on the disturbances, and protect their privileged existence.  The phrase has also been believed to contribute to the intensification of angry racial protests in Miamiin the late 1970s and early 1980s, as oppression continued, and African-American demonstrators became more defiant of this assertion of power.

Speaking of assertion of power, Trump has repeatedly tweeted "LAW & ORDER!"  He admonished governors to dominate the protestors, not only imploring them to call upon the National Guard, but threatening to step in and take over governmental responses to the protests that did not meet his requirement of hard-line suppression.

The very notion that there were peaceful, albeit very angry, protestors, lawfully exercising their First Amendment rights to free speech and free assembly was simply lost on him and his base of support.

Trump's reaction to the protests shows that he has no intention to listen to the grievances of the protestors. His goal has not been to engage in constructive dialogue to address the systemic problems.  He just wants to crack down on them.  And in doing so, to ignite the passions of uneducated white voters, who could only fear the loss of control being portrayed by the conservative echo chamber.

Tucker Carlson, Sean Hannity and Laura Ingraham of Fox News have all emphasized the violence and the looting and called for strong police and National Guard response.  Republican politicians, such as Matt Gaetz, Tom Cotton, Kevin McCarthy, joined with this appeal to scared white voters, also failing to recognize the grievances of the protestors, and calling for a harsh, military-like crack-down.

One of the worst of such appeals came from Republican Sid Miller, Commissioner of the Texas Department of Agriculture.  On May 31st, Miller posted the following on Facebook:

• Folks this is not a protest. It is a well orchestrated attack on America's major cities with plans to attack the police, riot, loot, and burn buildings. The so-called ‘protestors’ are, in fact, domestic terrorists who were organized and paid for by George Soros to further divide our country. These terrorists were bused into these large cities. We must repel this attack and hold those responsible for their actions. This must be brought to a stop now or we will lose control of our country!

Miller succeeded in wrapping together all of the elements of popular conspiracy theories that motivate the low information voters that support Trump.  It was meant to blur the lines between the lawful and peaceful protests and the incidental violence that accompanied them.

But the most egregious example came from President Trump himself.  Fearful of the presence of angry protestors who had gathered in Lafayette Square, a park directly across the street from the White House where all sorts of protestors have historically gathered, on Saturday, May 30th, Trump retreated to an underground bunker in the White House.  There, Trump only inflamed passions further, tweeting about "vicious dogs" and "ominous weapons" that would await protestors who got out of hand.

Trump grew irritated over media reports, which portrayed him as a coward hiding in the safety of the White House bunker.  He wanted to project a show of strength, and manipulate the reports that someone had broken into St. John's Episcopal Church the night before and set fire to the basement of the parish house.  The location of the church next to Lafayette Square is historically significant, as almost every President since James Madison has worshiped there at least once.  His goal was clearly to conflate the violence with the peaceful demonstrations.

On Monday, June 1st, he arranged for U.S. Park Police to use chemical irritants, smoke canisters and flash-bang grenades on people who had been peacefully exercising their First Amendment rights, to clear Lafayette Square.  The images of Park Police using brutal, physical force to attack peaceful protestors merely exercising their First Amendment rights lawfully, was shocking.  These were unjustifiable war-like techniques, including the use of a police shield as a blunt-force weapon to strike a cameraman of an Australian news crew.  Indeed, the indiscriminate police actiondrove  away the very Rector of St. John's, Gini Gerbasi.

We learned that this authoritarian show of force was perpetrated specifically to allow Trump to appeal to his base by projecting an image of strength and religiosity.  Trump had just finishing an inflammatory speech in the Rose Garden again encouraging governors "dominate" the protestors, "establish an overwhelming law enforcement presence," and pushing for the violence to be "quelled."  He then made a spectacle of walking from his speech, through the park that he just had cleared, to use St. John's Episcopal Church as a backdrop for a photo opportunity, as he held a Bible aloft awkwardly. 

It bears emphasizing that Trump didn't care a lick about how St. John's and the the Episcopal Church themselves wanted to react to the damage to their building.  This stunt wasn't for the benefit of the church.  It was to benefit his own ego, and ignite the passions of his Evangelical Christian followers.

He didn't even consult the church before his stunt.  In fact, his Park Police not only chased the Rector away, but disrupted the church's chosen response to the protests.  Rev. Gerbasi and her colleagues were passing out water and snacks to protestors, and offering prayerful support.  Indeed, her op-ed piece in the Washington Post offers further eye witness evidence that the demonstrations on that evening were peaceful.  Mariann Budde, Washington Bishop of the Episcopal Church, the very denomination that owns and operates St. John's, immediately condemned Trump for using the church and the Bible as objects in a politically motivated message.

Nonetheless, this piece of showmanship served its purpose.  On cue, white Evangelical Christians expressed support for the move, and criticized anyone who saw Trump's use of the Bible as sacrilege.  (Such Evangelicals ought to consult the Gospel themselves, paying close attention to Matthew 6:1.)

Trump's tactic is not going to unite the country in an effort to solve the problem of police aggression.  His tactic is just going to further divide the country, in particular along racial lines, and ignore a festering issue that has become intolerable to many.  Just conflating the protests and their goals with the incidental violence, and keeping his voters scared, will only further divide America, and continue to empower those among the police who resist the imposition of accountability among those officers who continue to oppress and brutalize the African-American community.

By:  William J. Kovatch, Jr.

Check out my YouTube channel by clicking here! 

One thing I don't like to talk about is that cancer has left me disabled.  In fact, in my most recent hospitalization, which was over an infection, I suffered an TIA. Even with health insurance, I am amassing huge medical bills.  If you like what you are reading, and would like me to continue writing, and you feel generous enough to help, you can make a one-time non-tax deductible donation to my special needs trust, use this URL:

https://PayPal.me/KovatchSNT

You can also use this email address to make a PayPal donation:  KovatchSNT@gmail.com

Donations will go to a Special Needs Trust set up for my benefit and controlled by a separate trustee.

The photograph “George Floyd protests in Washington, D.C. at the White House perimeter” and was taken by Frypie. Licensing information can be found here:  https://commons.m.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:George_Floyd_protests_in_Washington,_D.C._1250_08.jpg

References

Videos of Events

C-SPAN, "President Trump walks across Lafayette Park to St. John's Church," YouTube Video (June 1, 2020).

The Telegraph, “Australian news cameraman struck by US police in Washington D.C while covering George Floyd protests,” YouTube Video (June 2, 2020).

News Articles and Analysis

Ballasy, Nicholas, "House GOP Leader: 'Rioters and anarchists are not protestors,'" Just the News (June 5, 2020).

Boorstein, Michelle and Pulliam Bailey, Sarah, “Episcopal bishop on President Trump: ‘Everything he has said and done is to inflame violence,’” The Washington Post (June 1, 2020).

Cotton, Tom, "Send in the Military," The New York Times (June 3, 2020).

Edmondson, Catie, "Trump's Response to Protests Draws Bipartisan Rebuke in Congress," The New York Times (June 2, 2020).

Gelles Karl; Bravo, Veronica and Petras, George, “How police pushed aside protesters ahead of Trump's controversial church photo,” USA Today(June 5, 2020).

"George Floyd death: More large protests in US but violence falls,” BBC News (June 2, 2020).


Gini Gerbasi “I’m a priest. The police forced me off church grounds for Trump’s photo op.,” The Washington Post (June 3, 2020).

Lamothe, Dan, "Pentagon's top general apologizes for appearing alongside Trump in Lafayette Square," The Washington Post (June 11, 2020).

Nicholas, Peter, "Trump is Terrified of Protest," The Atlantic (May 31, 2020).

Phillips, Amber, "The difference between Democratic and Republican reactions to the protests: Elevate George Floyd or 'antifa'?" The Washington Post (June 1, 2020). 

Pulliam Bailey, Sarah and Boorstein, “Michelle St. John’s Episcopal Church, historic church next to the White House, set on fire during protests,” The Washington Post (June 5, 2020).

Samuels, Albert, “In false Facebook posts, Texas Agriculture Commissioner Sid Miller accused George Soros of paying protesters to “destroy”the country,” The Texas Tribune (June 5, 2020).

Sprunt, Barbara, “The History Behind 'When The Looting Starts, The Shooting Starts,’” NPR (May 29, 2020).

Stone, Devin, "American Carnage at Lafayette Square," Legal Eagle (June 3, 2020) (YouTube Video).

Can You Guilt Your Way Out of a Recession?

The COVID-19 pandemic has wreaked havoc on the economy. To enforce social distancing measures, businesses were shut down, and people were laid off. Over 40 million people applied for unemployment compensation.  The Federal Government did respond. Congress passed a special $600 per week federal benefit for unemployment compensation that lasts through the end of July. Congress also provided an advance on a future tax rebate, that was the $1,200 per person stimulus check. Finally, Congress  provided low interest loans to small businesses, which could be forgiven if they kept their people employed.  As state governments give approval for businesses to re-open, the question is whether the government assistance is enough to kick-start the economy to get it moving again.  While many experts believe it will take a long time for the United States to get its economy rolling again, there are members of Congress, particularly some Republican senators, who think they can guilt the economy out of recession.  Let me explain.

We have a consumer-driven economy.  People need to buy things to keep stores open.  Stores need to arrange to have merchandise on their shelves.  The service industries, lawn service, pool service, cleaning services, all need people to pay for those services in order to employ people.  To put simply, you, the consumer need to have enough disposable income to go buy things and services.  Disposable income being, of course, money left over after you have paid for the necessities like housing, food, and health insurance.

But the economy has been shut down for over two months.  And Congress was really late in approving of the first stimulus package, the CARES Act.  Then it took quite some time for the IRS to get their systems functioning properly in order to pass out all those checks.  While some people got their payments in mid-April, others had to wait until mid-May.  Still others never received their payments, and may need to wait for next year's tax filing before they receive it.

At the same time, rent and mortgage payments are still due.  Families need to be fed.  And for some people, being laid off means they have to pay for their own health insurance.  In many cases, the $1,200 per person stimulus payments were simply not enough to cover the necessities for one month.  Sure, there were protections from evictions, so you did not have to worry about being tossed in the streets if you couldn't pay the rent.  But that rent still accumulated.  Families have had to dip into savings, if they had them.  Even when people start going back to work, those arrearages will need to be addressed, especially since moratoriums on evictions are expiring.  There's not going to be a lot of disposable income readily available right away.

To address this, some political leaders have pushed for a second stimulus package.  There had been arguments about providing every adult a basic income of $2,000 per month until the national emergency is lifted.  Unfortunately, when the Government provides these benefits, they have to be paid for.  Republicans in the Senate don't want to raise taxes on businesses, which to a degree makes sense because we want those businesses to hire the people back.  There have been proposals to just print a couple of trillion dollars up out of nowhere to finance the benefits.  But when you print that much extra money, you risk hyper-inflation.  That, by the way, is what led to the Nazis taking over Germany in the 1930s.  So just printing money is a bad idea.  The only other solution is to borrow the money.  But that involves our Government taking on more debt, and paying more interest on that debt, which could lead to higher taxes.

The Republican Party has been traditionally known as deficit hawks.  Meaning that they try to protect the Government from spending too much money that they have to borrow a lot of it.  Well, at least when they're not talking about using so-called tax reform to give tax breaks to the big corporations.  But those programs to help the poor, well you better bet they will fight to avoid "excessive" spending on them.

Among the proposals made by Democrats has been to extend the extra $600 per week in unemployment benefits beyond July 31st.  But many Republicans will not hear of it.  You see, with the extra $600 per week, some people on unemployment are actually making more money than when they were working.  Republicans claim that they have an incentive to just sit around and live off of the Government's dime. What we really need to get the economy up and rolling again, is for people to just go back to work.  Their incentive to go back to work is to cut off that safety net.  As long as that extra money is there, who is going to want to go back to work.

Essentially, the Senate Republicans want to guilt you out of the recession.

There are just several problems with this.  Let's start to unpack them.  First, the number of people applying for unemployment compensation has just been massive.  This is no exaggeration.  The last time we saw numbers like these, it was the Great Depression.  And that has caused stress on the unemployment system.  Especially in Florida, where the former Governor purposefully designed the system to apply for unemployment benefits to be hard, and frustrating.  Because if it's frustrating, maybe you'll fed up, and get your ass up and go back to work.  That is just how most Republicans think.  Nonetheless, the point in that the official unemployment rate may be lower than what is being reported.  Which means there are people who are out of a job due to no fault of their own, who currently have no income.

Second, the theory that people will intentionally wait around until the extra federal unemployment benefits expire to find a job is based on two assumptions.  The first is that there will be jobs available on August 1st.  But as I explained above, for jobs to be available, people need to have disposable income.  If they are still preoccupied with paying down the bills that have piled up since March, there won't be a lot of disposable income to buy new things.  Indeed, given that many families have dipped into savings, the greater priority after paying for the basics may be to rebuild those savings. 

Add to that the fact that some businesses will be downsizing out of necessity.  There is still a new virus out there that is highly contagious and could easily overcome our medical resources.  We still need to be engaging in safe practices, like social distancing, once those businesses open.  People need to sit or stand further apart.  So personal service businesses, like hair stylists, personal trainers, restaurants, will not initially be hiring all of their employees back.  Indeed, even if sports come back, they will be televised only.  That means no jobs for ticket takers, security guards, hot dog vendors.  You can't just waive a wand, and expect that as of August 1st everything will be back to normal.

(Set aside, for the moment that the Republicans know how dangerous opening the economy too fast can be, as evident by their push for businesses to be immune from liability for opening too quickly and causing their employees to come down with the virus.)

The second assumption is that people will be intentionally waiting around until the end of July to start finding a job.  If people are being rational, they will understand that the extra unemployment compensation is a limited thing.  They are going to realize that a job that might pay less than unemployment now, is going to be worth more in the long run, especially when those jobs are going to be scarce for quite some time.

But this is all part of the normal Republican playbook: to demonize the poor, and to try to shame them into working more.  But when you think of it, people are being told inconsistent things.  On the one hand, you will hear Republicans say that more people should have been scrimping and saving.  They shouldn't have been buying that $4 Starbucks coffee every day.  They shouldn't go to the movies when they have cable TV at home.  Why are they eating out instead of cooking at home?  And yes, Americans need to save more, that's a point we can agree on.

Except, we are also being told that we need to spend money to get the economy rolling.  This is a consumer-driven economy.  If that person stopped buying Starbucks, then the store won't need as many barristers.  If you don't go to the movies, the theater will need fewer ushers and concession salespeople.  Every time you forgo going to a restaurant, there's less need for wait staff and cooks.

So it's a vicious cycle.  And it requires tough choices.  Either, you let the economy come back on its own gradually, in the meantime possibly hurting good, hardworking people who won't be able to find a job right away.  Or, if you want the recovery to start earlier, the Government will have to borrow the money to provide people with some money while they are out of work to pay their basic bills.  Indeed, the Government may need to provide a little extra if it expects people to spend money on non-essential consumables and services.

What is clear, is that if there are no jobs to come back to, you can't just guilt somebody off of unemployment benefits.

By:  William J. Kovatch, Jr.

Check out my YouTube channel by clicking here! 

One thing I don't like to talk about is that cancer has left me disabled.  Even with health insurance, I am amassing huge medical bills.  If you like what you are reading, and would like me to continue writing, and you feel generous enough to help, you can make a one-time non-tax deductible donation to my special needs trust, use this URL:

https://PayPal.me/KovatchSNT

You can also use this email address to make a PayPal donation:  KovatchSNT@gmail.com

Donations will go to a Special Needs Trust set up for my benefit and controlled by a separate trustee.

References

Aratani, Lauren, “‘Designed for us to fail’: Floridiansupset as unemployment system melts down,” The Guardian (April 15, 2020).

Casselman, Ben, “Millions Relying on Pandemic Aid Can SeeIts End, and They’re Scared,” The New York Times (May 28, 2020).

Colvin, Geoff, “How the American economy can recover fromthe coronavirus pandemic,” Forbes (April 20, 2020).

Davidson, Kate and Kiernan, Paul, “Coronavirus StimulusFunds Are Largely Depleted After Nine Weeks,” The Wall Street Journal (June 3,2020).

Edwards, Neil, “While Pandemic Surges, Consumers RetreatGlobally According To Deloitte Study,” Forbes (April 29, 2020).

Fineout, Gary and Caputo, Marc, ‘It's a sh-- sandwich':Republicans rage as Florida becomes a nightmare for Trump,” Politico (April 3,2020).

Hackett, Robert, “How does America pay for a $2 trillion coronavirusrelief bill? With two shiny coins, this lawmaker argues,” Fortune (March 25,2020).

Konish, Lori, "More $1,200 checks?  Maybe $2,000 a month?  The stimulus proposals that could put more money in your wallet," CNBC (June 2, 2020).

"Stimulus check: how many Americans have not received thepayment," AS English (May 31, 2020).

Wasson, Erik; Dennis, Steven T. and Litvan, Laura, “Democrats’$3 Trillion Aid Bill Has Seeds for Eventual GOP Deal,” Bloomberg (May 13, 2020).

Yes, We're a Long Way Out, But We Could be About to Experience an Electoral College Landslide

Take this with a grain of salt.  After all, we are about six months out from the U.S. presidential election.  And if anything the last three months (if not the last week alone) have taught us that just about anything is possible this year.  Nonetheless, I now believe that there is a fairly decent chance of an electoral college landslide in favor of Joe Biden.

I repeat, take this with a grain if salt.  In the next sixth months, we could have another major natural disaster.  A major political scandal could hit Joe Biden that would convince his voters that Donald Trump is the better  choice (it would have to be one hell of a whopper).  An incredible economic recovery could happen.  We could be at war with Iran.  Trump could try to declare martial law before November.

Still, the polls from the several states in the month of May are enlightening.  Keep in mind the result of the 2016 presidential election.  Trump won 304 electoral votes out of the needed 270.  But, he lost the popular vote by almost 3 million.  Trump won three big prizes by less than one percent of the vote in each contest: Pennsylvania (20 votes), Michigan (16 votes), and Wisconsin (10 votes).  His campaign already had an uphill fight because his approval rating had never breached 50% for any significant period of time.  Plus, he could barely afford to lose even one of any of those three states.  Prior to 2016, all three had been Democratic states in presidential elections since 1992.

As I watched the protests over George Floyd's death at the hands of Minneapolis Police on TV spread across the country, and saw Trump's ridiculous response via Twitter, I just had to check the latest polls to see where things stand.  I hadn't looked at the polls in months, but I was curious at how the Trump/Biden race stood.  I was a little surprised by what I saw.

You see, in addition to the three states expected to be battleground states, there had been a significant demographic shift in Florida, a state that Trump won by a small margin.  There are some traditionally significant states, such as Ohio, which have a history of being close or a bellweather state.  Then there were some states that Trump won by a significant margin that had also experienced a sizable demographic shift.  They included Arizona, Georgia, North Carolina and Texas.  Finally, there's Utah.  While this has traditionally been a strong Republican state, Mormons don't always see eye to eye with Evangelical Christians.  To be blunt, Mormons tend to be far more consistent in applying their moral values to choosing a candidate, whereas Evangelical Christians are willing to accept serial adultery, among other moral failings, so long as the candidate supports the right position on a few key issues, abortion being chief among them.  Many of these races have either tipped, are extremely close, or are within a reasonable striking distance.

I took the website, 270 to Win, and had the states sorted by the most recent poll, or the average of the two or three most recent polls.  I then went to the electoral college map, and awarded Joe Biden each state where he had a lead of three percentage points or more.  The result was 318 eighteen electoral votes for Biden.  In Pennsylvania, for example, Biden currently holds a seven point lead.  In Michigan and Wisconsin, the lead is six points.  For 2020, that's all Joe Biden needs.  Game over.  But, Biden also currently holds a four point lead in Arizona and a three point lead in Florida. **cue record scratch sound effect**  Those states being in play, and leaning Biden this significantly so close to the November elections is a game changer.  Under this scenario, Biden has forty-eight electoral votes more than is necessary to win the presidency.

But that's not all.  Let's say Biden wins the one state where he currently has a two point lead.  That's North Carolina.  Yeah, I know, margin of error, blah, blah, blah.  But just for kicks, humor me.  Well, that brings Biden's total up to 333.

Now let's say the economic recovery is slow to start.  Maybe the recession from COVID-19 sticks around.  Maybe everyone but Donlad Trump's most ardent supporters get tired of his divisive tweets.  Maybe the trend that undecided voters break against the incumbent, particularly in bad economic times, rings true this year.  Well, in Georgia (16 votes), the race is currently tied.  In Iowa (6 votes), Trump leads by a mere two percentage points.  Trump's lead in Utah (6 votes), Ohio (18 votes) and Texas (38 votes) is a mere three points, and in each state the undecideds account for more than ten percent of those polled.  In a perfect storm, if a wave of anti-Trumpism sweeps the states, Joe Biden could find himself with a whopping 417 electoral college votes.

Not convinced?  Just peruse the state results on the website RealClear Politics.  These races are extremely close.  Plus, in all the battleground states where Trump has a lead, the latest data is from May 10th or earlier.  That is well before his debacle in responding to the George Floyd killing and the subsequent nationwide protests.  In fact, if you visit the state polling data available through CNN, you get very similar results.

Do I truly believe Joe Biden will win 417 electoral college votes?  No.  I'm merely putting out there that there is a not too insignificant chance that this could happen.  As I said, we are still a long way off.

There is one thing that I do believe.  There are multiple avenues open to Biden to take away just enough states to squeak out an electoral college win.  I believe he should maximize his chances of doing that in each state where the race is close, including states that currently lean Trump.  Biden has indicated that he wants to choose a woman as his vice presidential running mate.  Before this week, the front runners in the Beltway rumor mill were Amy Klobuchar, Kamala Harris and Gretchen Whitmer.  I've always believed choosing another Senator would have been a bad idea.  Klobuchar and Kamala are more valuable either on the Judiciary Committee or as Attorney General.  My perusal of the current polling data shows that Biden already has a fairly healthy lead in Michigan.  Plus, recent events show Gretchen Whitmer's husband is a bit of a wild card.  Georgia is the closely competitive state that could be Biden's crown jewel.  For that reason, I believe that Georgia Democrat Stacey Abrams, who lost the 2018 gubernatorial election by a  mere 50,000 votes, in the face of alleged voter roll shenanigans by the victor Brian Kemp, perpetrated when he was the Secretary of State, is Biden's best choice at the moment.

By:  William J. Kovatch, Jr.

Check out my YouTube channel by clicking here! 

One thing I don't like to talk about is that cancer has left me disabled.  Even with health insurance, I am amassing huge medical bills.  If you like what you are reading, and would like me to continue writing, and you feel generous enough to help, you can make a one-time non-tax deductible donation to my special needs trust, use this URL:

https://PayPal.me/KovatchSNT

You can also use this email address to make a PayPal donation:  KovatchSNT@gmail.com

Donations will go to a Special Needs Trust set up for my benefit and controlled by a separate trustee.

References:

Polling Data

CNN, "2020 Presidential Election Polls," (site accessed May 30, 2020).

270 to Win, "2020 President: Consensus Electoral Map," (May 24, 2020).

270 to Win, "2020 Presidential Election Polls," (site accessed May 30, 2020).

RealClear Politics, "Election 2020 Presidential Polls," (site accessed May 30, 2020).

Demographic Trends

"North Carolina's New Demographic Face," The Charlotte Observer (site accessed May 30, 2020).

Schneider, Mike, "Census shows greatest Hispanic growth rate in north Florida," Associated Press (June 21, 2018).

12 News, "All eyes will be on Arizona for how to handle majority-minority shift" (November 29, 2018).

Ura, Alexa and Jin, Connie Hanzhang, "Texas gained almost nine Hispanic residents for every additional white resident last year," The Texas Tribune (June 20, 2019).

Wilcox, Amanda, "The Six Demographics Changing North Carolina and What It Means for Communicators (Part 1)," Eckel & Vaughan (July 6, 2018).

Political Issues

Alba, Davey; Conger, Kate and Zhong, Raymond,"Twitter Places on Trump Minneapolis Tweet, Saying It Glorified Violence," The New York Times (May 29, 2020).

Bradner, Eric, "Whitmer faces backlash over husband's 'failed attempt at humor' about their boat," CNN (May 27, 2020).

Newkirk II, Vanne R., "The Georgia's Governor's Race Has Brought Voter Suppression into Full View," The Atlantic (November 6, 2018).

Park, Benjamin, "How Mitt Romney's impeachment vote was influenced by his Mormom faith," NBC News (February 6, 2020).

The Republican Party and Low Information Voters: Russia, Michael Flynn, and Trump's Longing for Legitimacy

A few weeks ago, Donald Trump tweeted a single word, in all caps.  "OBAMAGATE!"  And, of course, his willing accomplices in conservative media repeated the word.  What exactly does it mean?  Well, it means Trump is once again trying to manipulate the low information voter, and deflect from his own malfeasance.

Trump's use of certain key words or phrases to inflame his voting base is nothing new.  He typically uses the phrases "Russia, Russia, Russia" or "the Russia hoax" when referring to the investigation by Robert Mueller into Russia's interference in the 2016 presidential election.  The findings of the Mueller Report were actually pretty damning.  But Trump doesn't want his base to realize that, or have his legitimacy as President questioned.  So he dismisses the Mueller Report out of hand, and his low information supporters dutifully follow suit.

This new phrase, "Obamagate," flows from his faulty logic regarding the Mueller investigation.  It is intimately tied to the continuing saga of Michael Flynn and Trump's efforts to use the Justice Department to bury the Mueller Report's findings.  In actuality, all Americans should be concerned with Russia's attempts to influence our political system, and to influence the Trump Administration's foreign policy.

Michael Flynn stands as a concrete example of how Russia may have been able to unduly affect Trump's foreign policy.  So let's start with examining him.

Michael Fynn is a retired lieutenant general from the U.S. Army.  In 2012, President Barrack Obama nominated Flynn, who was still serving in the Army, to become the Director of the Defense Intelligence Agency.  So far, so good.

But, Flynn's tenure as DIA Director was marked by controversy.  First, numerous people grew concerned with Flynn's behavior.  In 2013, he was invited to tour the Russian military intelligence headquarters in Moscow, becoming the first American military officer to visit the facility. Flynn believed that Russia could be a key ally in the fight against Islamic terrorism.  However, relations between the United States and Russia began to cool off during his tenure.

In 2014, Russia invaded Ukraine and seized the Crimea, territory on the Black Sea that legally belonged to Ukraine.  This was the continuation of a feature of Russian foreign policy that often brought the country into conflict with the United States and Western Europe.  Ever since the fall of the Soviet Union in 1991, Russia has seen itself as the U.S.S.R.'s successor.  This has been most evident in the way in approaches relations with the other fourteen former Soviet republics.  Russia considers that it has the right to bear strong influence over these sovereign countries, and calls them "the near abroad."

That has been particularly troublesome with respect to Ukraine.  In its short history, Ukraine has wavered between wanting to remain close to its Russian neighbor, and wanting to ally itself with the West.  And Russia has not been passive in Ukraine's road to self-discovery.  Russia has routinely tried to interfere in Ukrainian domestic politics in order to maintain its influence over the nation.

Take 2004 for example.  In that year, Ukraine was holding its presidential elections.  One of the top candidates, Viktor Yushchenko, favored creating greater ties to the West.  Russia had Yushchenko poisoned with dioxin.  His body immediately swelled.  To this day, Yushchenko still bears the pock-marks on his face that are remnants of his poisoning at the hands of Russia.  Nonetheless, due to the strength of the so-called Orange Revolution, Yushchenko won the presidency.

However, that didn't settle the issue, as Ukraine's government teetered between leaning toward greater cooperation with Russia and greater ties with the West.  And in February of 2014, the Ukrainian people once again rose up against a corrupt government with ties to Russia.  The Ukrainian president at the time,Viktor Yanukovich, who was charged with corruption, fled Ukraine to live in exile in Russia.  In fact, many corrupt Ukrainian officials fled the country during this time, and most wound up in Russia.

Russia's response was to invade Ukraine, and annex the Crimea.

President Obama set the official U.S. Government policy, and imposed sanctions against Russia, as did the European Union.

But Flynn, still Director of the DIA, continued to favor cooperation with Russia against Islamic terrorism.  It didn't help that rumors were flying concerning his relationship with a Russian-born graduate student living in the United Kingdom, Sventlana Lokhova.  Some people grew concerned with this relationship, and criticized Flynn for failing to report some emails he and Lokhova exchanged in 2014.

It didn't help that Flynn's leadership style at the DIA was questioned. He had been accused of being abusive with staff, stubborn and a poor manager.  Moreover, his support of cooperation with Russia flew in the face of official Administration policy.  President Obama chose not to extend his term, and Flynn was forced to retire early.

Flynn responded by becoming bitterly resentful.  Despite being a lifelong Democrat, Flynn became a Republican foreign policy advisor.  Privately, former Secretary of State and four-star general Colin Powell, a Republican, has called Flynn a "jerk," and a "right wing nutty."

Professionally, Flynn cashed in on his foreign policy experience by starting a consulting firm with his son called the Flynn Intel Group.  But his client list raised concerns about his continued ties to Russia. They included a Russian research firm suspected of having ties to Russian intelligence services, a Russian airline that had been examined by the United Nations for fraud, and a Russian news network, Russia Today, which has been accused of being a propaganda outlet by U.S. intelligence agencies.

In December of 2015, Flynn appeared in Moscow for a paid speaking engagement on behalf of Russia Today.  He was photographed sitting next to Russian President Vladimir Putin.  This was at a time when U.S.-Russian relations had cooled off due to the invasion of Ukraine.  The appearance of such a high-profile former U.S. military officer and former Director of the DIA at an event in Russia, sitting next to Putin raised eyebrows among U.S. officials.

Meanwhile, Flynn continued to publicly criticize President Obama and his failure to aggressively oppose the rise of ISIS in the Middle East.  While ISIS was certainly a dangerous force in the Middle East, Flynn's criticism often played into the irrational fears uneducated white voters have regarding Islam in general.  Flynn has called Islam a “cancer” and a “political ideology” that “definitely hides behind being a religion."

In July of 2016, Flynn published a book, called "Field of Fight," advocating decisive action against Islamic militarists. Coincidentally, that same month Flynn, still a registered Democrat, spoke at the Republican National Convention in Cleveland.  In that speech, Flynn railed against both Obama and former Secretary of State and Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton.  Indeed, Flynn joined with the crowd in chanting "Lock her up," in reference to Clinton's illegal use of a private email server for classified State Department business.  Rumor had it that before the convention Flynn had been vetted as a potential Vice Presidential candidate for Trump.  After the convention, Flynn became an advisor to the Trump presidential campaign.

On August 16, 2016, the FBI began an investigation into whether Flynn's work for Russian clients constituted a crime or a threat to U.S. national security.

Meanwhile, Turkish businesman Ekim Alpetkin hired Flynn's company to engage in a publicity campaign in support of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, and against Turkish dissident Muhammed Fatullah Gulen.  Gulen is the leader of a relatively new branch within Islam, called Hizmet.  Hizmet is a Turkish word meaning service.  The movement is marked by an emphasis on service to others and education.  And while Gulen and Erdoğan were once political allies, the two have had a falling out.  Gulen has lived in a self-imposed exile in Pennsylvania since 1999.  Hizmet followers in Turkey have faced persecution.  They have been labeled "terrorists" by the repressive Erdoğan government, and have come to the United States seeking asylum.

Erdoğan blamed Gulen for a failed coup attempt in June of 2016.  Flynn helped engage in a publicity campaign against Gulen, and even called for his extradition to Turkey.  It should be  noted that even the Trump Administration opposes Gulen's extradition to Turkey.  At any rate, Flynn's paid work included an op-ed piece, which appeared in the November 8, 2016 edition of the politically themed newspaper, The Hill.  This just so happened to coincide with Election Day.  In his op-ed, Flynn argued that Gulen should not be permitted to have a safe haven in the United States.

The op-ed piece prompted the FBI to open an investigation of Flynn, and whether he was serving as a paid lobbyist for the Government of Turkey.  Indeed, according to former FBI Director James Woolsey, in September of 2016, while working as an advisor to the Trump campaign, Flynn met with Turkish officials, including the foreign minister and the energy minister, to discuss the possibility of kidnapping Gulen and bringing him to Turkey without the need to resort to the U.S. legal process.  Eventually, after being fired from the Trump Administration, Flynn filed disclosures pursuant to the Foreign Agents Registration Act, admitting that the firm's work for Alpetkin "could be construed to have principally benefited the Republic of Turkey."

Nonetheless, after the election, Trump met with President Obama in the White House to discuss the transition.  Obama warned Trump against hiring Flynn as part of his administration.  Trump, however, chose to ignore this warning because, well, Obama.  Instead, Trump offered Flynn the job of National Security Advisor.

Around this time, U.S. intelligence agencies concluded that Russia interfered in the U.S. presidential election by spreading misinformation online, and hacking into the Democratic National Committee's server.  Obama responded by imposing sanctions against Russia.  He expected that Russia would retaliate with its own sanctions against the United States.  Obama, and other administration officials, were surprised when Vladimir Putin announced that Russia would not escalate the situation by imposing their own sanctions.  It was a move praised by President-elect Trump.

What wasn't generally known at the time was that Flynn, the incoming National Security Advisor, had been communicating with Russian Ambassador Sergei Kislyak.  Flynn discussed the sanctions with Kislyak.  This was potentially a violation of the Logan Act, which prohibits a private citizen from negotiating with a foreign power concerning any dispute that power may have with the United States.

By this time, counterintelligence officials were already aware of communications between members of the Trump campaign and Russia.  The FBI launched the counterintelligence investigation in July of 2016.  It was based, in part, on a Trump campaign aid, George Papadopoulos bragging to an Australian diplomat in London that he had had contact with a Russian official who claimed to have damaging emails from Hillary Clinton.  That Australian diplomat reported the conversation to the FBI, and the counterintelligence investigation began.  Papadopoulos, of course, served fourteen days im prison for lying to federal investigators.

At any rate, Flynn assumed his role as the new National Security Advisor.  He was asked by then Chief of Staff Reince Preibus and Vice President Mike Pence about whether he discussed sanctions with Ambassador Kislyak.  Flynn denied that he had.  When it became clear that Flynn lied to both Priebus and Pence, Trump asked for his resignation.  Flynn had the shortest tenure of any National Security Advisor, 24 days.

But this brings us to the Mueller investigation.  On February 14, 2017, after firing Flynn, Trump met with FBI Director James Comey.  Trump asked Comey to ease off of the investigation of Flynn, calling Flynn, "a good guy."  Now, while Trump likes to claim that the Mueller Report fully exonerated him, that's not entirely true.  Specifically, Mueller did not exonerate Trump on allegations that he committed obstruction of justice.  And this conversation with Comey is cited as one example of how Trump's behavior could be the basis of a charge of obstruction of justice.  Mueller, however, wanted to leave that to Congress to determine, because under Department of Justice protocol, only Congress had the power to charge the President with official malfeasance and that is through the impeachment process.

Still, Trump's pressure on Comey is what prompted the appointment of Mueller as Special Counsel to investigate Russia's interference in the 2016 presidential election.  It was during that investigation that Flynn was interviewed, and lied about his conversations with the Russian Ambassador.

While Trump likes to mislead his supporters by calling the Mueller investigation the "Russia hoax," the Mueller Report concluded that Russia had indeed illegally interfered in the 2016 presidential election.  It did conclude that there was not sufficient evidence to find that there was a conspiracy between Russia and the Trump campaign.  But, the Mueller Report did detail numerous disturbing contacts between Russian officials and members of the Trump campaign.

In fact, the Mueller investigation resulted in thirty-four indictments for violations of U.S. criminal law.  That included a number of Russian nationals and Russian agencies for hacking the DNC server.

With respect to Flynn, the Mueller team offered him a plea bargain.  If he would admit to lying to the FBI, the Justice Department would not pursue more serious charges, and would forgo charging Flynn's son with any crimes.  Flynn accepted that plea bargain, and admitted to lying to the FBI in open court.

But Trump wants to erase all memory of the Mueller investigation, and the stain it has caused for his presidency.  He wants to portray it as illegitimate from the start, and has used his Attorney General to further his cause.

Bill Barr replaced Jeff Sessions as Attorney General.  Sessions found himself much aligned by Trump, because Sessions had to audacity to recognize that he had a conflict of interest and should recuse himself from any investigation regarding Russian interference in the presidential election.  That meant that Session could not comply with Trump's demands that the Mueller investigation be shut down.

Trump found Barr to be a more willing lap dog.  You may recall that Barr started the campaign to downplay the significance of the Mueller Report, by writing a letter claiming that Trump had been exonerated.  But, as I explained above, that was a flat-out lie.

Barr has also agreed to placate Trump by investigating whether it was actually Ukraine, and not Russia, who hacked into the DNC server.  Trump's obsession with this conspiracy theory is what led to his impeachment for soliciting Ukrainian interference in the 2020 presidential election.

But Barr hasn't stopped there.  Barr has pressured Justice Department lawyers to drop charges against the Russian defendants connected with the hacking the scandal.  It was a move that prompted long-time Justice Department lawyers to withdraw from the case in protest.

After Trump expressed his desire to exonerate Flynn, Barr has pressured Justice officials to file a motion to dismiss the charges against Flynn.  This is despite the fact that Flynn has openly admitted under oath to the crime of lying to the FBI.  Justice Department lead prosecutor Brandon L. Van Grack withdrew from the case out of protest.

Only this time, the U.S. District Court judge assigned to the Flynn case has chosen not to rubber stamp Barr's action.  Instead, Judge Emmet G. Sullivan received a filing from sixteen former Watergate prosecutors, arguing that Judge Sullivan was not bound to comply with the Justice Department's motion.  Judge Sullivan then appointed former judge John Gleeson to argue against Government's motion.  This is a move for which Judge Sullivan has received sharp criticism from Trump supporters.

In a fit of rage, Trump responded with his now infamous tweet, "Obamagate."   The charge, which is not new, is that the counterintelligence investigation was really an effort to spy on the Trump campaign by the Obama Administration.  And specifically, that the unmasking of Michael Flynn in connection with the FBI report on his conversations with Ambassador Kislyak was illegal.

Let me step back for a minute, and try to briefly explain the concept of "unmasking."  Normally, when an intelligence agency present a report to the President concerning counterintelligence issues, the name of any U.S. citizen involved is redacted.  However, the President and other administration officials may ask for the name to be revealed, or "unmasked."  This can occur, for example, when the information may raise the suspicion that the U.S. citizen has violated U.S. law.

There are just two major problems with Trump's allegation.

The first is that there ample reason for the FBI to open a counterintelligence investigation involving the Trump campaign.  They include the conversation Papadopoulus had with the Australian diplomat back in 2016, bragging about the possibility of obtaining damaging emails concerning Hillary Clinton from Russian sources.

Second, Flynn's name was never masked in connection with his conversations with Ambassador Kislyak to begin with.  When the FBI circulated the report of the telephone conversations with Flynn, they hadn't redacted his name.  Simply put, there was no need to ask for any unmasking.

So, Trump's blustering of "Obamagate" has no basis in either fact or law.

Instead, there is a clear story here of a former Army General, who overstepped his authority, was forced to retire, worked against official U.S. foreign policy, played on some members of the public's ignorant fears of Islam in general, may have violated U.S. law by participating in a plan to kidnap a Muslim cleric residing in the United States, may have violated U.S. law with regard to his work on behalf of Russian clients, may have violated U.S. law concerning contacts with Russian officials before he became National Security Advisor, and certainly violated U.S. law by lying to the FBI in the course of an official investigation.  But acknowledging that means questioning the legitimacy of the Trump presidency.  Therefore, Trump is attempting to manipulate his low information voter supporters with baseless accusations concerning the commencement of the counterintelligence investigation involving his campaign.

By:  William J. Kovatch, Jr.

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