This week, I’m adding a new news category, sadly out of necessity. Since we’re on mass shooting number 253 for the year (defined as four or more people shot or killed), I think it’s only appropriate to highlight them all in their own section. Jesus. When does his end, folks? When will we actually do something about it?

Here’s what happened in politics for the week ending August 4…

Missing From Previous Weeks:

1. The origins of the Seth Rich conspiracy story were published in early July. It turns out that three days’ after Rich’s murder, Russian Intelligence planted a story that he was the leak of the hacked DNC documents and that he was on his way to the FBI to spill the beans on Clinton’s corruption when Clinton’s hit squad killed him.

• • Jerome Corsi, Fox News (especially Sean Hannity), Steve Bannon, Jay Sekulow, and other right-wing figures ran with the story, even though the police concluded it was a botched robbery and even though Rich’s parents begged them to stop. They didn’t stop until a court forced them to.
  • Russia’s RT and Sputnik media outlets kept boosting this conspiracy theory for two years.

2. Here are a few other stories that Russian trolls pushed in recent years and that mostly less-than-reliable media outlets picked up:

• • A young German girl claimed she was raped by Middle Eastern immigrants. She recanted—in reality she spent the night with a friend and was scared to tell her parents. But the alt-right pushed an anti-immigrant, anti-police, and anti-media narrative that took hold across the globe.
  • Rumors flew around Twin Falls, ID, that two Syrian refugees aged seven and 10 raped a five-year-old girl at knifepoint and they were later seen high-fiving their dads over it. This also didn’t happen, but exactly what did happen is under seal due to the children’s ages.

Shootings This Week:

1. The gun used in the Gilroy Garlic Festival shooting last week was purchased legally in Nevada, a state with looser gun regulations than California.
2. A shooter at a Walmart in Southaven, MS, kills two men and injures an officer. The shooter is also injured.
3. A gunman opens fire in an El Paso Walmart and nearby shopping mall, killing 20 people and injuring 26.

• • The suspect is taken into custody without the police firing a shot. It turns out he drove 10 hours to stop the “invasion” by immigrants crossing the southern border.
  • He posted a short screed online attacking immigrants and expressing empathy for the Christchurch shooter. He says he wanted to shoot as many Mexicans as he could.

4. After to the shooting, Texas Lt. Gov Dan Patrick issues this warning to Antifa:

“Stay out of El Paso. Stay out of TX … scratch TX off your map and don’t come in … it is not the time and place for them to come at any time…”

• • He’s referring to a story posted by the Daily Caller about Antifa planning a “siege of El Paso”. Only it turns out Antifa isn’t involved, it’s a training not a siege, and the Daily Caller issued a correction.
  • So the Lt. Governor repeated a conspiracy theory started by a tweet and escalated by a media outlet founded by Tucker Carlson. Reminiscent of the Jade Helm conspiracy, no?

5. Seven Mexican nationals are among the dead and the Mexican government says they’ll take legal action.
6. The head of Cloudfare says the company will stop hosting 8chan following the discovery of the shooter’s screed on the site. 8chan is a home for white hate, white supremacy, and terrorist activity.
7. Less than 24 hours after the El Paso shooting, another shooter attacks an upscale entertainment area in Dayton, Ohio. He kills nine people and injures 29 even though police neutralize him less than a minute after he starts shooting.

• • The motive for the second shooting isn’t yet known, though rumors abound.

8. Beto O’Rourke is done with the bullshit. He gives an emotional response at a presidential forum, and then cuts his trip short to return to El Paso to be with his family and town. Here’s what he has to say about the El Paso mass shooting:

• • “We’ve got to acknowledge the hatred, the open racism that we’re seeing. There is an environment of it … We see it from our commander-in-chief. He is encouraging this. He doesn’t just tolerate it, he encourages it.”
  • When asked if he thinks Trump is a white nationalist, Beto says yes.
  • And then, as Beto is on his way to meet up with his family a journalist asks if there’s anything Trump can do now to make this better. Beto’s response:

“What do you think? You know the shit he’s been saying. He’s been calling Mexican immigrants rapists and criminals. I don’t know, like, members of the press, what the fuck?”

9. A drive-by shooter injures seven people in Chicago. Another shooter kills one person and injures seven in Chicago.
   
10. A shooter kills one person and injures three at a gas station in Memphis.
11. A domestic killing leaves two people dead and three injured in Suffolk, VA.
12. Five people are injured during a shooting at a party in Columbus, OH.
13. Trump spent the first hours after the shootings tweeting from his golf course in New Jersey.

Russia:

1. After Mitch McConnell blocks the election security bills passed by the House, #MoscowMitch and #MoscowMitchMcTreason trend on Twitter. Finally a moniker that actually gets through to him. Trump defends him, calling the Washington Post a Russian asset.
2. In the months before Dan Coates resigned, the White House had been watering down his warnings about the threats posed by Russia, including interference in our elections, past, present, and future.
3. A federal judge dismisses a case brought by the DNC against the Trump campaign related to the cyberattacks on their computers and subsequent release of the hacked information.
4. Trump imposes additional sanctions against Russia for using chemical weapons to poison Russian double agent Sergei Skripal and his daughter in England in 2018.
5. Trump and Putin hold a phone meeting to talk about Siberian wildfires and a new U.S. ambassador to Russia. They don’t talk about Russia’s meddling in our elections.
6. Trump formally pulls the U.S. out of the INF arms control treaty, saying Russia isn’t keeping up their end of the deal.

• • The U.S. plans to start testing a new non-nuclear missile, which would’ve been prohibited under the treaty.
  • Leaving the treaty allows the U.S. to counter new developments by both Russia and China.

7. After the proof presented in Robert Mueller’s report and in the Senate Intelligence Committee report about Russian interference in the 2016 elections, and after Mueller confirmed those findings in his congressional hearings, Trump has this exchange with a reporter:

REPORTER: Mr. President, Robert Mueller said last week that Russia is interfering in the U.S. elections right now. Is that —

TRUMP: “Oh you don’t really believe this. Do you believe this? Ok, fine. We didn’t talk about it. I spoke with President Putin of Russia yesterday.”

8. Protests continue in Moscow for free elections (the government isn’t letting opposition candidates on the ballot in Moscow city council races). 1,000 people are arrested, on top of the 1,300 arrested the previous week.Putin’s approval is at a low point.

Legal Fallout:

1. Trump sues to prevent New York from releasing his tax returns, as allowed by a recently passed bill. A federal judge temporarily prevents the state from sharing Trump’s returns while the case moves through the courts.
2. Support for beginning impeachment hearings is growing in the House, and now more than half of House Democrats support it. Speaker Nancy Pelosi is still hesitant.
3. State prosecutors in New York subpoena Trump Organization records relevant to the Stormy Daniels hush-money case.

Courts/Justice:

1. The DOJ declines to prosecute James Comey over the leak of his personal memos that were later determined to contain classified information. The DOJ says there’s no evidence that he intended to violate rules on handling classified information or that he knew he was doing so.
2. A new FBI bulletin calls fringe domestic terrorism driven by conspiracy theories a growing threat, and specifically mentions QAnon.

• • QAnon believes there’s a deep-state conspiracy against Trump and he’s leading a covert effort to dismantle both that and an international child sex trafficking ring run by global elites.
  • The group also believes that Clinton and Podesta were running a pedophile ring out of the basement of a pizzeria (that doesn’t have a basement).

• • The report says conspiracy-driven violence is likely to increase in the 2020 election cycle. Great.
  • The report lists several conspiracy theories that have already led to violent attacks.

3. Democrats demand an answer from Attorney General William Barr about why changes were made to funding for victims of trafficking. Trump ended the practice of using federal funds to help victims of sex trafficking clear their criminal records, which often stem from the activities they were forced into doing (like prostitution).

• • People who are trafficked have a very tough time getting their lives back together, and if they have a criminal record, they often can’t get a job, get housing, get loans… you see where this is going.

Healthcare:

1. A federal judge strikes down Medicaid work requirements in New Hampshire—the third state where the requirements have been blocked.

• • The state had already put the policy on hold after learning that 17,000 residents would lose coverage. (Then why the fuck did they pass it in the first place?)

2. A new study finds that raising the minimum wage and increasing tax credits decreases the suicide rate. There’s actually a name for what low-wage workers experience — deaths of despair — which include things like overdoses and suicides.

International:

1. The Senate fails to garner enough support to override Trump’s veto of their bills banning sales of weapons to Saudi Arabia.
2. New documents show that Trump’s friend Thomas Barrack Jr. and campaign manager Paul Manafort helped officials from Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates edit a campaign speech made by Trump in May 2016.

• • This was part of an attempt to have the U.S. share nuclear information with Saudi Arabia, and Barrack planned to finance nuclear power plant construction in the Middle East.

• • Just after journalist Jamal Khashoggi was killed, Trump authorized two U.S. companies to share nuclear information with Saudi Arabia.
  • Barrack also lobbied to be appointed as a special envoy to the Middle East.

3. Trump’s new nominee for Director of National Intelligence has no background in intelligence and is considered by many to be too partisan for the position.

• • Ratcliffe spread the theory of a secret society in the FBI that was out to get Trump.
  • He lied about being appointed special prosecutor in a case against funders of Hamas.

• • He downplayed the issue of Russian interference in our elections during Robert Mueller’s testimony a few weeks ago.

4. Well that was quick! Ratcliffe withdraws his name from consideration following intense scrutiny over his lack of experience in the area and padding his resume.

• • Trump says Ratcliffe was being slandered in the media. FFS. Since when is vetting an official and bringing up their past slander? If Trump’s team would take the time and effort to vet half of his nominees, we wouldn’t have to vet them in the press. Sheez.
  • And just after I wrote that, Trump says that he White House has a great vetting process. He throws out a name and then the press vets them for the White House. Argh!
  • Trump won’t allow the deputy director, Sue Gordon, to take over as acting director of national intelligence, as per federal statute. Trump refuses to allow her to give the most recent intelligence briefing after she arrived at the White House to deliver it.

5. The Trump administration opposes sanctions against Iran’s Foreign Minister, their top diplomat. This is retaliation for Iran taking down a drone, seizing a British tanker, and running a missile-test.
6. The Senate confirms Trump’s pick for ambassador to the UN. Kelly Craft is currently our ambassador to Canada, where she appears to hardly have spent any time. She and her husband have donated millions to Republican candidates, and she’ll be the first in her position to be a major political donor.
7. Trump sends a special envoy for hostage affairs to Sweden to monitor court proceedings in the case of American rapper A$AP Rocky. Is anyone else confused by Trump’s concern over this case?
8. The U.S. will withdraw thousands of troops from Afghanistan as part of the negotiated deal with the Taliban. The deal hasn’t been finalized.
9. After North Korea tests some short-range missiles, Trump praises Kim Jong Un and tells him to “do the right thing.”
10. Boris Johnson’s party majority in Parliament shrinks to just one seat when a special election moves a rural seat from the Conservative Party to the Liberal Democrat party. Now Johnson can’t lose even one pro-Brexit vote.
11. Even though the original impetus for the Hong Kong riots has been tabled, the riots continue and worsen, causing businesses to close early and residents to shelter in place. The protestors now want liberation from China.

Legislation/Congress:

1. The House reintroduces an amendment to overturn Citizens United and get corporate and dark money out of politics.
2. After three major mass shootings in the span of a week, Democrats ask Mitch McConnell to call the Senate back into a special session to vote on the gun safety bills that the House has already passed.

Border Wall/Shutdown/National Emergency:

1. Remember last week when SCOTUS said that Trump could use DoD funding to build his wall along the southern border? It turns out that the funds pegged for the job will come out of retirement programs for our military, among other programs.

• • SCOTUS didn’t give Trump a blank check to build a wall, nor did they say that the wall is legal. Their ruling is limited to specific projects.

Travel Ban/Immigration/Discrimination:

1. Trump continues his attacks on Rep. Elijah Cummings, accusing Cummings of stealing funds from the district.

• • Four years ago, Trump said Obama wasn’t doing enough to fix the problems in Baltimore. Trump said he’d fix it fast. He hasn’t, according to his own tweets.
  • Also, Trump’s own eateries in New York have been flagged for vermin infestations.

2. The House Oversight Committee requests documents related to the private Facebook page for current and former CBP officers, which contains violent, racist, and misogynistic posts. The committee is concerned some of these officers might still be working with migrant women and children.
3. As part of Trump’s new “third-country” asylum policy, DHS cuts a question for asylum seekers, which was intended to be sure Mexico wasn’t a dangerous place for them. The question asked whether they had a fear of being returned to another country and, if so, which ones.
4. The Trump administration is still taking children away from their migrant parents—at least 1,000 since a judge ordered them to stop family separations. They’re being separated for minor reasons. 20% of these are children under five years old.
5. White House advisor Stephen Miller proposes using border patrol agents to screen asylum seekers because they’d be tougher critics.
6. After someone tries to break into Rep. Elijah Cummings home in Baltimore, Trump tweets a seemingly sarcastic “Too Bad!” but later says he really meant it was too bad.
7. An NYPD departmental judge recommends that officer Daniel Pantaleo should be fired because of his involvement in Eric Garner’s death.
8. A federal judge throws out Trump’s policy that immigrants who enter the U.S. in places other than ports of entry cannot apply for asylum. The judge says the policy violates the Immigration and Nationality Act.
9. Representative Liz Cheney (R-WY) says Native American tribes are destroying our western way of life after tribes and environmentalists successfully get the grizzly bear back on the endangered species list. That’s irony, right?
10. Hours after the FBI releases the report calling out QAnon as one of the originators of conspiracy theories driving domestic terrorism, one of the speakers who warms up the crowd at Trump’s campaign rally casually drops QAnon’s rallying call: “Where we go one, we go all.”

• • QAnon believers have been common at Trump’s rallies, and more recently have been showing up in QAnon gear.

Climate:

1. California Governor Gavin Newsom signs a bill requiring more environmental impact reviews for the Cadiz water project (which would drain the aquifer under the Mojave National Reserve). The Trump administration has tried to fast-track this project.
2. The heat wave that hit Europe last week hits Greenland this week, accelerating the melt rate for the Greenland ice sheet, which in July alone poured 197 billion tons a water into the Atlantic. July 31 has the most ice melt of any day in the past seven years.
3. In general, July was the earth’s hottest month on record (previously that was July 2016).
4. Ethiopian citizens plant 353 million trees in a single day to help combat climate change. In 2017, volunteers in India planted 66 million trees. In China, users of the Alibaba pay app planted 100 million trees over two years. Conversely, Brazil’s President Jair Bolsonaro ended protections for the Amazon rainforest, opening it to clear-cutting and development.
5. Interior Secretary David Bernhardt appoints William Pendley as the acting director of the Bureau of Land Management. Pendley is now tasked with managing federal lands, but doesn’t believe there should be federal lands. He says the Founding Fathers intended for all federal land to be sold.

Budget/Economy:

1. Under Trump’s proposed cuts to the SNAP program, more than 500,000 kids would lose their eligibility for free school lunches. The USDA failed to include this in their assessment when they proposed the new rules, so this is on top of the 3.1 million people expected to be dropped off the program.
2. Over 50% of the money given to farmers so far to help ease the effects of tariffs went to just 10% of all recipients.
3. The Federal Reserve cuts interest rates by one quarter of a percentage point. This isn’t a typical move when the economy is booming, and could signal that they’re trying to soften an economic slowdown that could become a recession. Trumps wants it cut a full percentage point and says Fed Chairman Jerome Powell has let him down again.
4. Trump ends the trade truce with China saying he’ll impose a 10% tariff on the remaining $300 billion of imported Chinese goods. Negotiators for the two sides had just wrapped up a round of talks the day before.

• • China threatens retaliatory tariffs, and companies consider moving up production and shipment of goods to get it done before the tariffs take effect.
  • Experts say this trade war could last years or even decades. So much for “trade wars are easy to win!”
  • The Dow Jones drops 600 points on the news and the S&P drops 45 points.
  • The National Retail Federation refers to the new tariffs as a “tax increase.”

5. The Senate and House both pass a $2.7 trillion spending bill that also lifts the debt ceiling for two years, or as Trump put it, until after the 2020 election.
6. Because of the tariffs against imported Chinese goods, manufacturers are moving some production outside of China. But they aren’t bringing it back to the U.S. They’re moving it to factories in Southeast Asia.
7. The Trump administration considers cutting capital gains taxes, giving the wealthy a $100 billion tax cut (because that first trillion just wasn’t enough). They’d have to bypass Congress to do it.
8. The economy added 164,000 jobs in July, and the unemployment rate remained at 3.7%.

Elections:

1. More House Republicans announce they’ll step down from Congress next year, including Rep. Will Hurd (TX). This brings the total to 12, and makes it much harder for Republicans to take back the House next year.

• • Hurd’s district has the longest stretch of the southern border of any U.S. district.
  • He has been a vocal opponent of Trump’s plans to build a wall.
  • He is the only black Republican in the House.

2. Lawyers file a court brief accusing Georgia election officials of destroying evidence related to a court case that alleges Georgia’s voting systems are outdated and vulnerable to hackers.
3. If you want to get on the presidential ballot in California, you now have to provide five years of your income tax filings. Lawsuits to follow, I’m sure.
4. In North Carolina, Leslie Dowless is charged with two felonies related to his ballot fraud activity in the 2018 midterms. The ballot fraud led to the election results being overturned, and the special election is finally being held next month.

Miscellaneous:

1. Trump orders the Navy to strip the commendations from the Navy prosecutors involved in the war crimes trial of a Navy SEAL who was acquitted.
2. The DOJ is investigating accusations that Ryan Zinke used a personal email account while he was head of the Interior Department. Ooh.
3. Despite allegations of sexual assault against Air Force General John Hyten, the Senate Armed Services Committee approves his nomination to be the vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. The vote now goes to the Senate.
4. The Intelligence Community’s inspector general won’t investigate how Jared Kushner, Ivanka, and other White House officials were granted security clearances. He says he’ll only conduct the investigation if Trump asks him too.
5. Oracle’s been complaining about Amazon getting the military’s cloud computing contract, so Trump tells the Secretary of Defense to re-examine the contract. Sounds like a little political favoritism there.

• • Also, the project has a cool name: Joint Enterprise Defense Infrastructure, or JEDI.

6. Trump holds his 64th campaign rally on his 923rd day in office (that’s roughly one every two weeks for those of you counting).

• • I won’t bother listing the lies; we’ve heard most of them before. But here’s a summary if you’re interested.

7. Mitch McConnell falls at his Kentucky home and fractures his shoulder.
8. Trump considers declaring a state of emergency in Baltimore because he says living conditions there are unacceptable. He also floats doing the same in other Democratic-led cities like San Francisco and Detroit.
9. And just in case you’ve forgotten, Trump got the idea to go after Cummings and Baltimore from an episode Fox & Friends.

Polls:

Here are the results of a new Quinnipiac poll on whether respondents think that Trump is racist:

• African Americans: 80% yes, 11% no
• Latinos: 55% yes, 44% no
• Whites: 46% yes, 50% no
• Democrats: 86% yes, 9% no
• Independents: 56% yes, 38% no
• Republicans: 8% yes, 91% no