TV News LIES

Protesters decrying delays to funding in the battle against HIV/Aids charged into a congressional hearing where the Trump administration’s budget czar, Russell Vought, was testifying in Washington on Wednesday.

The demonstrators disrupted the proceedings on Capitol Hill and twice brought the hearing to a halt.

The Trump administration has slashed global aid, including the US President’s Emergency Plan for Aids Relief (Pepfar), which was created by George W Bush when he was president, and enjoys bipartisan support in Congress. Lawmakers funded Pepfar with $4.6bn this year. But activists say the majority of payments are still not going out to organizations in the field.

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John Eastman, a lawyer who spearheaded efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election in President Trump’s favor, has been formally disbarred in California.

The California Supreme Court on Wednesday declined to review his appeal of a lower court’s recommendation to strip him of his law license, instead ordering his disbarment.https://thehill.com/homenews/5833287-john-eastman-disbarred-california/

“The court orders that John Charles Eastman…is disbarred from the practice of law in California and that Respondent’s name is stricken from the roll of attorneys,” reads a terse order on the docket of Eastman’s case.

The state’s highest court also ordered Eastman to pay a $5,000 sanction to the State Bar of California Client Security Fund.

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A national majority vote for president is one step closer to reality after the Virginia governor, Abigail Spanberger, signed the national popular vote bill into law, joining an interstate compact with 17 other states and the District of Columbia.

Under the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact, states would assign their presidential electors to the winner of the popular vote, regardless of the results within the state. The compact takes effect when states representing a majority of electoral votes – 270 of 538 – pass the legislation and thus would determine the winner of the presidential contest. With Virginia, the compact now has 222 electors

Every state that has so far enacted the compact has Democratic electoral majorities, including California, New York and Illinois. But legislation has been introduced in enough states to reach the 270-elector threshold, including swing states like Arizona, Michigan, Nevada, New Hampshire, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin.

The legislation relies on two provisions of the US constitution, which would face intense legal scrutiny if and when the compact comes into force. Article II, section 1 of the constitution authorizes each state to appoint electors “in such manner as the legislature thereof may direct”. The constitution does not require states to even have a vote for president, never mind delegating those electors as a state’s voters choose.

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When the Democratic party’s governing body adjourned its meeting on Saturday in New Orleans, supporters of Palestine and an end of the genocide in Gaza had few reasons to celebrate. The Democratic tinmajority of the party’s voters with distinctly negative views of Israel.

Last summer, a Quinnipiac Poll found that 77% of Democrats agreed that “Israel is committing genocide”. Last month, an NBC poll found that 67% of Democrats felt more sympathetic to Palestinians than Israelis, compared with 17% who felt more sympathetic to Israelis.

But the DNC continues to operate as if fully sealed off from the party’s voters on such matters. When the national meeting got under way on Thursday, the party’s resolutions committee proceeded to quickly discard a pair of resolutions critical of Israel.

One urged “an immediate and permanent ceasefire in Gaza and the Occupied Palestinian Territory” as well as “pausing or conditioning US weapons transfers to any military units credibly implicated in violations of international humanitarian law”. Another included opposition to “military actions that endanger civilians or exacerbate repression” in Iran.

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The US Department of Justice has requested that a federal appeals judge overturn convictions for members of far-right groups Proud Boys and the Oath Keepers, who were previously found guilty of seditious conspiracy in connection with the violent siege of the US capitol in 2021.

Jeanine Pirro, the Donald Trump-appointed US attorney for the District of Columbia, signed separate motions on Tuesday to vacate convictions for a slew of individuals, including the Proud Boys’ leaders Ethan Nordean and Joseph Biggs as well as Stewart Rhodes, a former attorney who founded the Oath Keepers’ militia.

The filings represent the latest move the Trump administration has made to absolve the January 6 rioters, a group composed largely of the president’s supporters who stormed the US capitol in a desperate attempt to overturn Joe Biden’s 2020 election victory over Trump.

Several members of the two far-right groups were later sentenced to prison for their attempted roles to obstruct a peaceful transfer of power. The lengthiest prison term was given to Enrique Tarrio, the former chairman of the Proud Boys, who faced 22 years behind bars.

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The Department of Homeland Security has ordered thousands of furloughed employees to return to work despite most of the agency remaining unfunded by Congress amid the longest partial government shutdown in U.S. history.

In a statement to USA TODAY, the agency said it "will be utilizing available funding" to recall its entire workforce. It wasn't clear how many employees in total have been ordered to return to work. The agency, which is among the largest departments in the federal government, employs more than 260,000 people.

The return-to-work notices come after President Donald Trump on April 3 signed a memorandum ordering all DHS employees to receive pay and benefits lost during the partial government shutdown.

In the order, Trump directed Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin to use funds with “a reasonable and logical nexus to the functions of DHS to provide each and every employee of DHS with the compensation and benefits that would have accrued to them" if not for the shutdown.

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