The Washington Post - USA (2022-03-07)

MONDAY, MARCH 7 , 2022. THE WASHINGTON POST EZ RE A

ALABAMA

Harris commemorates

‘Bloody Sunday’

Vice President Harris visited
Selma, Ala., on Sunday to
commemorate a defining
moment in the fight for the right
to vote, making her trip as
congressional efforts to restore
the landmark 1965 Voting Rights
Act have faltered.
Harris took the stage at the
foot of the bridge where in 1965
White state troopers attacked
Black voting rights marchers
trying to cross. She called the site
hallowed ground on which
people fought for the “most
fundamental right of America
citizenship: the right to vote.”
“Today, we stand on this
bridge at a different time,” Harris
said before a cheering crowd of
thousands. “We again, however,
find ourselves caught in
between. Between injustice and

justice. Between disappointment and determination. Still in a fight to form a more perfect union. And nowhere is that more clear than when it comes to the ongoing fight to secure the freedom to vote.” The nation’s first female vice president — as well as the first African American and Indian American in the role — spoke of marchers whose “peaceful protest was met with crushing violence. They were kneeling when the state troopers charged. They were praying when the billy clubs struck.” On “Bloody Sunday,” March 7, 1965, state troopers beat and tear-gassed peaceful demonstrators, including activist John Lewis, who became a Georgia congressman. The images of violence at the Edmund Pettus Bridge — originally named for a Confederate general — shocked the nation and helped galvanize

support for passage of the Voting Rights Act. Fifty-seven years later, Democrats are trying to update the landmark law and pass additional measures to make it more convenient for people to vote. A key provision of the law was tossed out by a U.S. Supreme Court decision. The new legislation, named for Lewis, who died in 2020, is part of a broader elections package that collapsed in the U.S. Senate in February. — Associated Press

NEW YORK

Cuomo appears to hint at a political comeback

Just six months after he resigned from office in disgrace over sexual harassment allegations, former New York governor Andrew M. Cuomo appeared to be hinting at a

political comeback in remarks at a Brooklyn church on Sunday. In a campaign-like stop, the Democrat delivered a speech in which he condemned “cancel culture.” The public appearance, his first since leaving office, came after Cuomo’s campaign launched a digital and television advertising campaign pushing a similar message: He was driven from office unfairly. Cuomo quoted the Bible several times as he described his travails, then went on the offensive to attack the “political sharks” in Albany who, he said, “smelled blood” and exploited the situation for political gain. “The actions against me were prosecutorial misconduct,” Cuomo said, repeating a theme he has pushed from the outset. “They used cancel culture to effectively overturn an election.” He resigned in August, days after an independent probe found he sexually harassed

nearly a dozen women and that he and aides worked to retaliate against an accuser. On Sunday, Cuomo acknowledged his behavior wasn’t appropriate but quickly added that nothing he did violated the law. “I’ve learned a powerful lesson and paid a very high price for learning that lesson,” he said. “God isn’t finished with me yet.” Cuomo hasn’t said he’s running for office but is still sitting on a multimillion dollar campaign war chest he could use to finance another run. Several district attorneys in New York said that they found Cuomo’s accusers “credible” but that the available evidence wasn’t strong enough to press criminal charges against him. — Associated Press

Fla. wildfires force nursing home evacuation: Huge wildfires in the Florida Panhandle forced veterans in a

nursing home to evacuate Sunday alongside residents of more than 1,000 homes in an area still recovering from a Category 5 hurricane three years ago. Firefighters battled the 9,000-acre Bertha Swamp Road fire and the 841-acre Adkins Avenue fire, which have threatened homes and forced residents of at least 1,100 houses in Bay County, Fla., to flee over the weekend. The Adkins Avenue fire destroyed two structures and damaged 12 homes Friday. On Sunday, a third fire developed, forcing the evacuation of a 120- bed, state-operated nursing home in Panama City. Public transit was being used to move the residents at the Clifford Chester Sims State Veterans’ Nursing Home. Buses also were on standby in case the 1, inmates at the nearby Bay County Jail needed to be evacuated to other facilities. — From news services

DIGEST

Politics & the Nation

BY JOSH DAWSEY

new orleans — Former presi-
dent Donald Trump mused Satur-
day to the GOP’s top donors that
the United States should label its
F-22 planes with the Chinese flag
and “bomb the s--t out of Russia.”
He also praised North Korean
leader Kim Jong Un as “seriously
tough,” claimed he was harder on
Vladimir Putin than any other
president, reiterated his false
claims that he won the 2020 elec-
tion, urged his party to be “tough-
er” on supposed election fraud,
disparaged a range of prominent
party opponents and called global
warming “a great hoax” that could
actually bring a welcome develop-
ment: more waterfront property.
“And then we say, China did it,
we didn’t do it, China did it, and
then they start fighting with each
other and we sit back and watch,”
he said of labeling U.S. military
planes with Chinese flags and
bombing Russia, which was met
with laughter from the crowd of
donors, according to a recording
of the speech obtained by The
Washington Post.
His 84-minute address to about
250 of the Republican Party’s top
donors at the elite Four Seasons
focused heavily on foreign policy
and his claims that the 2020 elec-
tion was “rigged,” as he ticked
through a smorgasbord of topics
and perceived enemies, using vul-
garities and jokes that often drew
raucous laughter. Trump also
took pictures with some of the
party’s top donors and participat-
ed in a pricey roundtable for
about 10 of them.
After coming under fierce criti-
cism for praising Putin as “savvy”
and “brilliant” for the Russian
leader’s moves in Ukraine last
month, he struck a tougher tone
Saturday — claiming Putin never
would have invaded the country if
Trump was president of the Unit-
ed States.
But he spent far more time
blaming President Biden than Pu-

tin and often spoke in vague plati- tudes without specifying what he would have done differently. “I knew Putin very well. He would not have done it. He would have never done it,” Trump said, without mentioning that, as president, he held up military aid for Ukraine as he pushed the country to investigate Biden’s son Hunter. He espoused praise for North Korea’s brutal leader, marveling at how Kim’s generals and aides “cowered” when the dictator spoke to them. “Total control,” Trump said of how Kim ran the country, describing generals snapping to attention and stand- ing up on command. “His people were sitting at attention,” he added. “I looked at my people and said I want my people to act like that,” he said to laughter. Trump also spent a large por- tion of his speech falsely claiming that he won Georgia, Wisconsin and other states in the 2020 election, offering unsubstantiated theories about how he won. After not touching on the election until minute 45 — a win for some of his advisers — he finished the speech with a long jeremiad about it. For example, he said, he knew he had to have won Georgia because he won Alabama and South Carolina by such large numbers, and he accused Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg of tilting the election against him. Trump made an ominous call for the party to be more loyal in backing up his claims about fraud. “The vote counter is often more important than the candidate,” he told the crowd, saying he had learned that from radio show host Mark Levin. “ ... We have to get a lot tougher and smarter at the polls.” If not, he said, the Republican Party would no longer exist. “At a certain point, they won’t show up if we allow this to happen again,” he said of Republicans. Republican National Commit- tee Chairwoman Ronna McDan- iel, he added, had vowed she would “work on it.” He also viciously mocked Re- publicans who didn’t back him in his crusade to hold power after he lost the 2020 election. “Stupid,

corrupt Mitch McConnell,” he said of the Senate minority leader, before labeling former vice president Mike Pence a “conveyor belt — like corn” for opening and counting the electoral college votes as the Constitution requires. “Terrible,” he said of Republi- can Sen. Bill Cassidy (La.), who voted to impeach him. Trump all but said he planned to run for the presidency again — and that he wasn’t going any- where. “I wonder who that might be,” he jokingly said of the 2024 nominee, as the crowd broke out in “Trump!” chants. “We’ve already won two presi- dential elections,” Trump falsely stated. “And now I feel obligated that we have to really look strongly at doing it again. ... We are looking at it very, very strongly. We have to do it. We have to do it.” “We’re doing great as a party,” he said. “The Republican Party is now a fighting party. We are now a winning party. We are never going back to what it was before. It was heading in the wrong direction.” Trump’s speech was a culmina- tion of two days of events at the gilded riverfront resort here, where a dazzling chandelier dom- inates the lobby and sturgeon cav- iar goes for $200 an ounce and tiki cocktails go for $18. Donors who have written checks for tens of thousands of dollars walked out Saturday night holding copies of the former president’s photo book, titled “Our Journey Togeth- er,” purchased by the RNC. The mood has been largely ebullient at the hotel, as donors and operatives predicted Repub- licans would win back congressional majorities. Donors have also heard from Pence, senators and members of Congress, pollster Kellyanne Con- way and former U.N. ambassador Nikki Haley, according to people familiar with the events. Pence and Haley, both potential 2024 candidates, touched on some of the same themes as Trump — Ukraine and Russia, chiefly — but offered vastly shorter and different speeches. Discussing future elections, Pence said Republicans needed to move past the 2020 election loss. Trump has continued to falsely claim that Pence had the authori-

ty to overturn the 2020 election during Congress’s counting of electoral college votes, which he did not. Such false claims helped fuel the “Hang Mike Pence!” chant that erupted among the pro- Trump mob during the U.S. Capi- tol riot on Jan. 6, 2021. “My fellow Republicans, we can only win if we are united around an optimistic vision for the future based on our highest values,” he said. “We cannot win by fighting yesterday’s battles or by re-litigat- ing the past.” Pence advisers said he wanted to draw a contrast with Trump, who continues to look back on the 2020 election, as he did on Satur- day evening. Pence obliquely chastised Trump for his comments that Pu- tin was “savvy” and “brilliant,” according to a copy of his remarks reviewed by The Post. “There is no room in this party for apologists for Putin,” Pence said. Trump cit- ed the comments Saturday night: “Nobody has ever been tougher on Russia than me,” he retorted, add- ing that those who have accused him of being a “Putin apologist” disqualify themselves from being “serious leaders of our country.” Haley did not mention Trump once in her speech, according to audio reviewed by The Post. She largely attacked Biden and described a country in decline that is battling over boys playing on girls’ sports teams, gender issues in the military and curriculum fights in classrooms. “The reason Ukraine is in this situation, the reason we have world chaos like we are, is the United States has been complete- ly and totally distracted,” Haley said. “ ... We have to stop this national self-loathing that’s hap- pening in our country.” She implicitly criticized the Trump administration for not doing more to take on China when it came to the coronavirus pandem- ic and, in contrast with Trump’s comments in recent weeks, criticized Russia for its moves in Ukraine. “When China gave covid to the world and millions of people died, what did we do? We didn’t even call one pitiful meeting at the United Nations,” she said. “We didn’t ask China to step up. ...

We’ve done nothing about it.” Several people in the room said that Trump’s speech stretched far too long and that he sounded like he was rambling more in the last 30 minutes. In the middle of the speech, attendees said people in the crowd seemed to lose interest. Trump came to the dinner as the leading figure in the GOP, but his influence has waned in recent months, according to polls and interviews with activists and donors. Though he has raised more money than any other Republican since leaving office — his political action committee has more than $120 million — he has seen some erosion in support. That Trump came to New Or- leans at all — he rarely leaves his properties — and that the GOP did not hold the event in Palm Beach, Fla., at his club as they did last year were signs to some that his influence has faded. Last year, his speech was widely panned, and some donors left early, as he made it all about the election. Trump spent much of the evening talking about the fighting in Ukraine and sought to project strength on his foreign policy record, regaling the crowd with a long story about how his administration took on the Islamic State militant group. He bragged about pushing NATO — which he called a “paper tiger” — to force its countries to pay more for joint defense, but did not mention that he threatened to pull out altogether. He attacked Biden for rising inflation and gas prices, using exaggerated numbers in some cases, and said countries were “emptying their pris- ons” in the United States until he came along. He mocked Biden for continu- ally saying the United States would not militarily attack Russia but offered ambivalence on exact- ly what he could do. “We’re not spreading democracy at the point of a gun,” he said. Trump said Putin had talked more about nuclear power recently because he did not respect Biden, but he did not offer proof. And he said Biden should take a more belligerent tone. “At what point do we say we cannot take this massive crime

against humanity? We can’t let it happen. We can’t let it continue to happen,” he said. He said the military, under his watch, had gotten in “skirmishes” with Russian troops and won, but he did not say more. And he ominously spoke of Pu- tin being more willing to engage in nuclear war — even referencing World War III — because Biden is president. He said that around the world, others would become more aggressive, too, without him. “Watch China. You watch what’s going to happen there. Ev- erything seems to be falling to pieces,” he said. “[Biden’s] complete and gross incompetence, they threaten a much wider world.” Biden has received some plau- dits for his handling of the Ukraine situation among foreign policy experts. Trump reiterated some of his frequently repeated falsehoods and petty grievances. “The global warming hoax, it just never ends,” he said. He mocked the concept of sea levels rising, disputing widely held science. “To which I say, great, we have more waterfront property,” he said. “There was a big thing about global cooling — what will be next?” he said. Trump said he was more concerned about “nuclear warming” than global warming. He bragged about his crowds, inflating numbers at recent rallies, and mocked Biden for ob- serving social distancing during the 2020 campaign. “He’d have eight circles and he’d have to get the media to fill them,” he said, describing the distanced seats Biden’s team would put out at rallies, with circles around them. Trump called George Conway, the husband of Kellyanne Conway and a fierce critic of the former president’s, a “stupid son of a b----” and questioned why she married him, even as he extensively praised her. He mocked several of his former aides, including John Bolton, who he said only loved going to war. And he labeled Rep. Adam B. Schiff (D-Calif.), who led the congressional impeachment probes against him, a “watermelon head ... because his head is shaped like a watermelon.”

Trump muses on war with Russia, praises Kim Jong Un

Seeks to project strength on foreign policy record in speech to GOP donors

Violent winds ripped through an area along Carver Road, roughly three miles outside Win- terset. Ayala estimated 20 to 30 homes on both sides of the road were destroyed, with the damage

localized outside the city. State and local first responders from around Iowa were pouring into the hardest-hit areas to help with search efforts, Ayala said. Early Sunday, no one was left unac-

counted for. Local volunteers and churches have stepped in to provide shel- ter to displaced Iowans. Ayala praised the community for its togetherness but urged people to

stay away from the damaged sites to give space to those who had lost loved ones or their homes. “We’re a small community, but we take care of each other,” Ayala said. “We’ve had many volunteers coming in to help us. They’re caring. And we’re going to rebuild, but we need time to get together and heal.” The tornado was spotted by the weather observer at Des Moines International Airport, where all air traffic was briefly halted and travelers were evacuated to underground shelters. The storms left thousands without power late Saturday. Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds (R) issued a disaster proclamation for the area Saturday evening to divert state resources to the cleanup and recovery efforts. “Our hearts go out to all those affected by the deadly storms that tore through our state today,” Reynolds said. “Kevin and I join with Iowans in prayer for those that lost their lives and those injured. Our hearts ache during this time, but I know Iowans will step up and come together to help in this time of need. They already are.”

Jason Samenow contributed to this report.

BY MATTHEW CAPPUCCI, KIM BELLWARE AND JACOB FEUERSTEIN

At least seven people are dead,
two of them children younger
than 5, after multiple tornadoes
swept across central and south-
west Iowa on Saturday, officials
said Sunday.
Six of the fatalities came from
Madison County, just southwest
of Des Moines, including the
storm’s youngest victims, said
Madison County Emergency
Management Director Diogenes
Ayala. Four people were also
injured, including one who was
taken to the hospital with life-
threatening injuries, he said. One
person living in a destroyed
camper was killed in rural Lucas
County, county officials con-
firmed Sunday.
The National Weather Service
received 42 reports of tornadoes
in the south central and south-
west portions of the Hawkeye
State (some of these are dupli-
cate reports from the same twist-
er), part of an early season out-
break that was worse than fore-

casters feared. The most destructive tornado was described as “large and ex- tremely dangerous” by the Weather Service, with a number of “particularly dangerous situation” tornado warnings issued. The parent rotating thunder- storm or supercell tracked up- ward of 150 miles, and it was probable that the main Madison County tornado could have been on the ground for more than an hour. Madison County is home to the city of Winterset, which was ravaged by the twister. About 25 miles southwest of Des Moines, Winterset is the county seat and best known as the birthplace of actor John Wayne. “This is the worst anyone has seen in quite a long time,” Ayala said at a predawn news confer- ence Sunday. “This will be im- pactful for many years to come.” The Weather Service tweeted that the damage near Winterset was consistent with a twister that would earn a rating of “at least EF3” on the 0-to-5 scale for tornado intensity.

Des Moines area ravaged

as tornadoes kill at least 7

BRYON HOULGRAVE/DES MOINES REGISTER/ASSOCIATED PRESS Betty Hope of Winterset, Iowa, searches for items in the rubble of her home on Sunday after tornadoes tore the state on Saturday. Six of the fatalities occurred in the city’s Madison County.

The Washington Post - USA (2022-03-07)

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