The Washington Post - 23.08.2019

smile as she delivered the script she had

rehearsed. “If you have some time, please, we

need your help.”

Throughout the country, domestic work-

ers frustrated with their working conditions

are mobilizing in historic numbers, inspired

by the #MeToo movement and energized by

what they describe as an increasingly hostile

political climate. Many are connected by the

National Domestic Workers Alliance, an ad-

vocacy group that has successfully led state

and local campaigns to expand rights for

domestic workers.

In 2010, New York City nannies and house

cleaners gathered at the Harriet Tubman

memorial in Harlem to celebrate the passage

of the state’s Domestic Workers’ Bill of Rights

SEE WORKERS ON B

them because of their gender or whom they

love.

On a recent Saturday afternoon, Ingrid

Vaca braved the 90-degree heat and an army

of mosquitoes to knock on the doors of

strangers on the eastern fringes of Capitol

Hill in an effort to change it.

“Sorry to disturb you. My name is Ingrid,

and I’m a domestic worker,” the 55-year-old

housekeeper said, always remembering to

BY REBECCA TAN

F

or 42 years, the District’s Human

Rights Act has protected workers in

the nation’s capital from discrimina-

tion and harassment based on race,

gender or sexual orientation — with one

notable exception.

The act, widely seen as one of the most

liberal anti-discrimination laws in the na-

tion, excludes “domestic servants, engaged in

work in and about the employer’s household.”

This clause has left 100,000 or so nannies,

house cleaners and au pairs defenseless,

advocates say, against employers who reject

their job applications due to their race or

national origin, fire them when they become

pregnant, or harass or discriminate against

the coarseness and growing

divisions we see across the rest

of the nation. But the big

departure, reported this week

by my colleagues Michael E.

Miller and Steven Rich, is that

they aren’t being held

accountable for the hate.

The Post found that 59 cases

led to arrests of adults in the

more than 200 bias-motivated

incidents investigated by police

last year. Only three of those

were prosecuted as hate crimes,

and one of those cases was

dropped. Not a single person

has been convicted.

The bigots and bullies, in

other words, are getting away

SEE DVORAK ON B

convict a single shooter, beater,

screamer or bully for hate in

2018’s record year of hatred.

How can that be acceptable?

And how can we hold U.S.

Attorney Jessie K. Liu —

appointed by hater in chief

Donald Trump — accountable

for her miserable record?

The District had its highest

number of reported hate crimes

last year: 204. That’s a year of

gay men being beaten, black

girls being threatened,

transgender women being hurt,

synagogues being harassed,

Muslims being taunted and a

Trump supporter smacked in a

restaurant.

The upward trend tracks with

You’ve seen those

yard signs —

“Hate has no

home here” — all

over liberal D.C.,

right?

But it looks

like hate is

actually a pretty

stubborn tenant in the nation’s

capital, where hate crimes are

up (like the rest of the nation)

but are not being punished

(unlike the rest of the nation.)

And this means that hate’s

anything-goes landlord is our

own U.S. Attorney’s Office for

the District of Columbia, which

handles most criminal cases in

the District and has yet to

KLMNO

METRO

FRIDAY, AUGUST 23 , 2019. WASHINGTONPOST.COM/REGIONAL EZ SU B

CAPITAL WEATHER GANG

Thanks in part to climate

change, average humidity

in the District has surged,

making it feel hotter. B

VIRGINIA

Police officers who shot a

man who allegedly

charged with a knife won’t

face criminal charges. B

OBITUARIES

Celso Piña, a self-taught

Mexican accordionist and

cumbia artist, became a

75 ° 74 ° 75 ° 73 ° Latin music superstar. B

8 a.m. Noon 4 p.m. 8 p.m.

High today at

approx. 12 a.m.

77

°

Precip: 55%

Wind: NNW

7-14 mph

BY ANN E. MARIMOW

Most lawyers are intent on win-

ning every argument.

But in his defense of President

Trump, friends and former col-

leagues say, William S. Consovoy is

prepared to lose the first round —

and even the second.

For the unconventional lawyer

with an unconventional client, the

focus is all about the endgame.

The conservative warrior from

New Jersey and former law clerk

for Justice Clarence Thomas is at

the forefront this summer of some

of the most attention-

getting battles over whether

Trump can be compelled to reveal

his personal finances as part of

congressional investigations of

possible conflicts of interest and

foreign influence.

In his courtroom role, Conso-

voy is trying to shape the law on

novel constitutional issues in the

power struggle between the Re-

publican president and House

Democrats.

Two of Trump’s critics have

called Consovoy’s views “spectac-

ularly anti-constitutional.” Feder-

al judges in Washington and New

York have rejected his argument

that the president’s financial rec-

ords for his businesses are off-lim-

its to Congress.

But Consovoy, whose small firm

in Arlington, Va., is appealing the

rulings this summer, is looking to

the next round with an eye on a

Supreme Court win.

Jay Sekulow, an early member

of Trump’s team of private law-

yers, said Consovoy’s strategic

thinking and appellate expertise

from years in the trenches at a big

Washington law firm make him a

SEE CONSOVOY ON B

BY PAUL DUGGAN

quantico, va. — A fatal shooting

in January at the Marine Barracks

on Capitol Hill occurred because a

Marine lance corporal failed to

properly unload his pistol after a

guard shift, then pointed the

weapon at a fellow Marine and

pulled the trigger as a joke, un-

aware that a bullet was in the

firing chamber, a prosecutor said

Thursday.

Lance Cpl. Andrew W. Johnson,

charged with unpremeditated

murder and several offenses relat-

ed to his alleged careless handling

of firearms, appeared at a prelimi-

nary hearing in a courtroom on

the Marine base here. A military

judge has not yet ruled on whether

the evidence against him is suffi-

cient to warrant prosecution.

The victim of the New Year’s

Day shooting, Lance Cpl. Riley S.

Kuznia, 20, from Karlstad, Minn.,

was “my friend, my brother,” John-

son said in a brief statement to the

judge. “I live every day with what

happened, and I’ll live with it ev-

ery day for the rest of my life.”

Pending the outcome of the

case, Johnson, from Plymouth,

Mass., has been assigned to un-

armed administrative duty at the

Marine Barracks Washington, a

Marine spokesman said. Johnson,

who entered the military in July

2017, appears to be in his early 20s.

The spokesman said he was not

authorized to disclose Johnson’s

age.

Addressing the court, the pros-

ecutor, Marine Capt. Brendan J.

McKenna, described “an escala-

SEE SHOOTING ON B

BY DANA HEDGPETH

It comes as no surprise to

commuters: The nation’s traffic is

bad and getting worse. Drivers in

the Washington region are feeling

their share of road congestion,

spending more time sitting in

traffic, on average, than anyone

outside of California.

Washington drivers spend

102 hours each year in traffic

delays, the third-highest amount

in the nation, according to a

report released Thursday by the

Texas A&M Transportation Insti-

tute. The annual study ranks

large metro areas using data on

speed and traffic volumes.

Los Angeles-area roads are the

nation’s most congested, with

drivers spending 119 hours a year

in traffic, followed by the San

Francisco-Oakland region, with

103 hours. After Washington, the

New York and San Jose areas

round out the top five, with

92 and 81 hours of delays, respec-

tively.

A silver lining of traffic conges-

tion is it’s often the result of job

growth, as more people commute

to work. Researchers said the

nation added 1.9 million more

jobs in 2017 than in 2016, which

was “more than enough to exacer-

bate the nation’s traffic woes,”

according to the 2019 Urban Mo-

bility Report.

For the D.C. region, the delays

SEE TRAFFIC ON B

Trump lawyer plays the long game

William S. Consovoy is

on the front lines of legal

battles with the House

As reports of hate crimes skyrocket, where is D.C.’s chief prosecutor?

Petula

Dvorak

Blunder

cited in

death of

Marine

FELLOW GUARD

FIRED ACCIDENTALLY

Prosecutor points to

failure to unload pistol

Study: D.C.

tra∞c is

third worst

nationwide

DIEGO M. RADZINSCHI/ALM MEDIA PROPERTIES

Arlington-based William S. Consovoy is described as a creative

thinker who is not constrained by precedent in crafting arguments.

D.C. domestic workers push for rights

Nannies, housekeepers and

others are excluded from a

decades-old law that protects

employees from discrimination

REBECCA TAN/THE WASHINGTON POST

Domestic workers Adelaide Tembe, left, Marta Sanchez and Ingrid Vaca share a joke in the Kingman Park neighborhood as they canvass

for signatures to improve working conditions. Advocates say D.C. domestic workers are defenseless against employers in many situations.

SALWAN GEORGES/THE WASHINGTON POST

U.S. Attorney Jessie K. Liu represents the nation’s capital, where

hate crimes are up but are not being punished.