Commentary

COMMENTARY: Was Trump’s ‘Last Stand’ in El Paso Foreshadowing of 2020 Game Plan?

WASHINGTON INFORMER — President Donald Trump leaked word of a late-night tentative agreement on border security.

Published

6 years ago

February 20, 2019

By D. Kevin McNeir

Once again, with the showmanship of a veteran ringmaster, President Donald Trump leaked word of a late-night tentative agreement on border security being reached by a 17-member, bipartisan committee Monday — while keeping oddsmakers scrambling as to whether he’ll say, “Deal” or “No Deal.”

But with only days remaining before a Feb. 15 deadline, many Americans, still reeling from the impact of an historic 35-day shutdown, fear that the president will open the floodgates to more unchartered waters and a second partial federal government shutdown.

Nonplussed by deadlines and drama, Trump seemed to have other things on his mind, hinting that he “may” sign off on the latest offer despite being “displeased” — before quickly transforming the “support the wall hoedown” in El Paso Monday evening into a carefully-crafted campaign rally for 2020 bragging rights.

“Just so you know; we’re building the wall anyway,” Trump said, then further promoting his unique blend of hyperbole to which America and the world have grown so accustomed over the course of his two years in office.

“Only 6,500 people are allowed in this arena but thanks to the fire department, we’ve got around 8,000 in here — thousands more are watching outside on closed circuit TVs,” he said.

Terms and Conditions

The terms of the agreement, according to key lawmakers, include $1.37 billion which would pay for 55 miles of new border fencing in the form of steel slats but not a solid wall — far less than the $5.7 billion Trump has sought for more than 200 miles of walls. Democrats compromised by removing their demand for a new cap on immigrants detained in the U.S.

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) described the deal as “good news,” adding that it “provides new funds for miles of new border barriers.” He promised to review the finer points of the bill with hopes that the Senate will vote for its approval “in short order.”

Meanwhile, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) remained adamant when asked what he believes the president should do.

“These months of shutdown politics must come to an end,” he said.

According to Senator John Cornyn (R-TX), who flew back with the president to the White House following the rally in El Paso, Trump was “reviewing his options” with one possibility still being for the president to transfer money from other programs in order to fund the building for a more expansive wall along the southern border.

Closer to home here in the greater Washington Area, William C. Smith, Jr., a state senator from Montgomery County, also an officer in the U.S. Navy Reserve who received orders from the Pentagon to deploy to Afghanistan and must report for duty March 29 (10 days before the last day of the General Assembly on April 8), says he’s kept in touch with Reps. Anthony Brown and Jamie Raskin who represent Maryland in Congress and how Marylanders might suffer, again.

“Maryland is particularly impacted by a shutdown like this because we have a little over 200,000 federal workers. The folks that are non-essential don’t go to work and you have the essential employees who are working for free, essentially. It’s a tremendous impact. There’s also ancillary impact with the local economy. It would be a terrible thing if they can’t get this together and come up with a deal. We will see,” Smith said.

Both the House and Senate must now approve the pending legislation and secure Trump’s signature to avoid the shutdown.

Pitch for Wall Morphs into Old-Fashioned Hoedown

With the sudden turn-of-events, whether by coincidence, providence or the result of chicanery committed at the highest level, Trump aptly abandoned his original script, a plea for the funding of his “wall,” instead touting victories secured under his watch, proposing what he deems to be a “mainstream, nonpartisan agenda” and calling the role of his hard-and-fast “American values, traditions and beliefs which unite us all.”

The throng of staunch supporters who stood for well over two hours — a crowd mostly comprised of white Americans and American families — men, women and children — repeatedly applauded Trump’s boasts, beliefs and promises.

Trump referred to his comments made during the recent State of the Union address during which he says he asked both Democrats and Republicans to “choose greatness.”

“We now have the hottest economy on Earth. We’ve invested $700 billion into the military that was in real trouble, we’re more powerful than we’ve ever been and we’re caring for our warriors. America is winning again,” he said, before citing a list of the many demographics of Americans he’s “proud to be fighting for” — a list that either by error or design, did not include the country’s LGBTQ [sexual orientation] citizens.

“Ours is a mainstream, commonsense agenda that’s good for the American people and moves us in the direction that Americans want to go. We support the dignity of work, the sanctity of life and we encourage faith and family over government bureaucracy. Most of all, we continue to guarantee religious freedom, freedom of speech, the right to bear and keep arms and uncompromised respect for the American flag,” he said.

As the rally drew to a close, Trump shared comments about his mission, perhaps echoing the words White House Press Secretary recently made while on a Christian radio show during which she referred to the president’s election victory being due to the “will of God.”

“Like you [Texans] have done throughout this state’s history, today, we’ve made our stand,” he said. “We’ve come together, millions and millions of people, in numbers never witnessed in history. We’ve come for safety, sovereignty and the sacred rights given to us by the hand of Almighty God.”

“We will make America wealthy, strong, safe and great again.”

Counter-Protest Efforts Fizzle

Trump gave short-shrift to a demonstration numbering hundreds of counterprotesters organized by Women’s March El Paso — a one-mile march past the president’s rally that also took place on Monday night. Former Rep. Beto O’Rourke (D-Texas) walked in solidarity, joining scores of civic and human rights organizations determined to counter Trump’s “lies and false narrative about the U.S.-Mexico border.”

Trump said in his recent State of the Union address that El Paso’s border walls helped it become one of the nation’s safest cities. O’Rourke and local leaders dispute Trump’s “facts,” calling them both inaccurate and irrelevant.

Protestors walked through El Paso just before Trump took the stage, chanting “build bridges, not walls” while marching along the border fence that separates the city from Ciudad Juarez, Mexico. Others hoisted signs that challenged Trump on his notions of immigration including “Trump made America hate again.”

“El Paso is safe not because of walls but in spite of walls,” O’Rourke said during the counter-protest rally.

This article originally appeared in the Washington Informer.

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Activism

‘Jim Crow Was and Remains Real in Alameda County (and) It Is What We Are Challenging and Trying to Fix Every Day,’ Says D.A. Pamela Price

“The legacy of Jim Crow is not just a legacy in Alameda County. It’s real. It is what is happening and how (the system is) operating, and that is what we are challenging and trying to fix every day,” said D.A. Price, speaking to the Oakland Post by telephone for over an hour last Saturday. “Racial disparities in this county have never been effectively eliminated, and we are applying and training our lawyers on the (state’s) Racial Justice Act, and we’re implementing it in Alameda County every day,” she said.

Published

35 mins ago

November 2, 2024

Oakland Post

Exclusive interview with County D.A. Price days before recall election. Photo by Ken Epstein.

By Ken Epstein

Part One

Alameda County District Attorney Pamela Price gave an exclusive in-depth interview, speaking with the Oakland Post about the continuing legacy of Jim Crow injustice that she is working to overturn and her major achievements, including:

restoring and expanding services for victims of crime,
finding funding for an alternative to incarceration and/or prosecution for substance use and mental health-related misdemeanors and
aggressively prosecuting corporations for toxic pollution and consumer violations.

“Racial disparities in this county have never been effectively eliminated, and we are applying and training our lawyers on the (state’s) Racial Justice Act, and we’re implementing it in Alameda County every day,” she said.

Passed by the State Legislature, this law “is an extremely helpful tool for us to address the racial disparities that continue to exist in our system,” she said.

(The law addresses) “the racial disparities that we find in our juvenile justice system, where 86% of all felony juvenile arrests in the county are Black or Brown children.

“We trained the entire workforce on the Racial Justice Act. We are creating a data system that will allow us to look at the trends and to clearly identify where racism has infected the process. We know that where law enforcement is still engaging in racial profiling and unfair targeting and arresting, we’re trying to make sure we’re catching that.”

Many people do not know much about the magnitude of Alameda County District Attorney’s job. Her office is a sprawling organization with 10 offices serving 1.6 million people living in 14 cities and six unincorporated areas, with a budget this year of about $104 million.

Asked about her major achievements since she took office last year, she is especially proud of the expanded and renewed victims’ services division in the DA’s Office, she said.

“We have expanded and reorganized the entire claims division so that we are now expediting as much as possible the benefits that victims are entitled to. Under my predecessor, they were having to wait anywhere, sometimes as long as a year, to 400 days to get benefits.

“Claims had been denied that should not have been denied. So, we’re helping people file appeals on claims that were denied under her tenure,” D.A. Price said.

“Under my predecessor, (the victims’ service office) was staffed by people who were not trained to provide trauma-informed services to victims, and yet they were the only people that the victims were in contact with. We immediately stopped that practice,” she continued.

“We had to expand the advocate workforce to include people who speak Hmong, the indigenous language of so many people in this county who are victims of crime.”

More African Americans advocates were hired because they represent the largest percentage of crime victims and we hired a transgender advocate and advocates who speak Cantonese and Mandarin. “The predominantly Chinese American community in Oakland was not being served by advocates who speak the language,” said D Price

“We reduced the lag time from the delivery of benefits to victims from 300 to 400 days down to less than 60 days.”

She increased victim advocacy by 38%, providing critical support to over 22,500 victims, a key component of community safety.

Other major achievements:

She recently filed 12 felony charges against a man accused of multiple armed robberies, demonstrating her seriousness about prosecuting violent crimes
In October, a jury delivered a guilty verdict in the double murder trial of former Alameda County Sheriff’s Deputy Devin Williams, showing DA Price’s commitment to holding law enforcement accountable.
She recently charged a man and woman in unincorporated San Leandro with murder, felony unlawful firearm activity, and felony carrying a loaded firearm in public.
A. Price’s office was awarded a $6 million grant by the state for its CARES Navigation Center diversion program. In partnership with the UnCuffed Project at a Seventh Day Adventist Church in Oakland, the program provides resources and referrals for services to residents as an alternative to incarceration and/or prosecution for substance use and mental health-related misdemeanors.

“This is the largest grant investment in the history of the Alameda County District Attorney’s Office,” said D.A. Price.

She explained that the program now has a mobile unit. “We have washers and dryers. We have a living room. We have a television. It’s a place where people can decompress, get themselves stabilized,” she said.

The project has “the ability to refer people to housing, to more long-term mental health services, to social services, and to assist them in other ways.”

Her office joined in a $49 million statewide settlement with Kaiser Health Plan and Hospitals, resolving allegations that the healthcare provider unlawfully disposed of hazardous waste, medical waste, and protected health information. The settlement, which involved the state and a half dozen counties, resulted in Alameda County receiving $7 million for its residents.
DA Price charged a former trucking company employee for embezzling over $4.3 million, showing her commitment to tackling white-collar crime.
For the first time, Alameda County won a criminal grand jury indictment of a major corporation with two corporate officers that have been sources of pollution. “They had a record of settlements and pollution in this community, and they had a fire that constituted a grave danger,” she said.

Attorney Walter Riley contributed to this article.

See Part Two

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Activism

‘Criminal Justice Reform Is the Signature Civil Rights Issue of Our Time,’ says D.A. Pamela Price

Speaking about the destructive impact of mass incarceration, Price asked people to consider “how many children have incarcerated parents, where the practice has always been to isolate and eliminate connections between people who are incarcerated and their children and their families and the community. So, when we bring people home, they have no more connection.”

Published

50 mins ago

November 2, 2024

Oakland Post

“People have no idea what the vision is for the next district attorney, or where the office will go if I am, in fact, recalled, she continued. “I'm just running against a billionaire,” who does not show his face in public, she said. Courtesy photo.

“As long as our criminal justice system is stuck in the mentality and practices of the 1950s, our country is not going to move forward,” she said.

By Ken Epstein

Part Two

District Attorney Pamela Price, facing a recall that began before she took office in January 2023, explained in an exclusive interview with the Oakland Post how she came to dedicate her life to transforming a deeply flawed criminal justice system into one that provides equal justice and public safety for all and ends mass incarceration for African Americans and other working-class people.

She summarized her life experiences as someone who was “traumatized and radicalized” by Dr. King’s murder, joining the Civil Rights Movement full force, getting arrested when she was 13 years old in a civil rights demonstration, being tracked into the juvenile justice and the foster care systems, and making it as a foster kid from the streets of Cincinnati to Yale College.”

“I understand a lot of things about struggle, about sacrifice, about trauma and fortunately survived all of that, and as a survivor learned some important lessons, and I brought all of that with me into the law and have been able to become a civil rights attorney in Alameda County,” she said.

“That’s been the joy of my life; I’ve lived every lawyer’s dream,” she said.

“Years ago, when I first decided to run for district attorney, I realized that mass incarceration was so destabilizing to our communities,” she said.

She saw that the “criminal justice system has so many impacts on our community, the safety of our community, the stability of our community, the growth of our community, the direction of our community.”

“As long as our criminal justice system is stuck in the mentality and the practices of the 1950s … our society is going to be mired in discord, and we will not have social justice, racial justice, economic justice, none of the things that actually make our communities worth living in.”

It is crucial to address the needs of “young people in the juvenile justice system when they are more likely and able to be rehabilitated and redirected,” she said. Young people are much more able to be rehabilitated before the age of 18, really before the age of 26, and before they end up in an adult prison.

D.A. Price’s predecessor, Nancy O’ Malley, joined the D.A.’s office in 1984, where she remained for 39 years. She was promoted to a leadership position after just six years in the office during the era of mass incarceration when there was an explosion of prison construction in California.

“Prosecutors like my predecessor were the ones who filled (those prisons) up. She became a leader in the office around 1990. And what is very important for the public to know is that prior to becoming the district attorney in 2009, she was the chief assistant district attorney for 10 years under Tom Orloff.

“O’Malley worked very closely, hand-in-hand with him for the period of time that included the illegal conduct or the unconstitutional exclusion of Jewish people and Black people from death penalty juries.”

Commenting on the recall campaign against her, she said that had not a handful of multimillionaires and billionaires “put millions of dollars into this, we would not be having this recall. It is not a grassroots movement. It’s a platinum movement.”

“People have no idea what the vision is for the next district attorney, or where the office will go if I am, in fact, recalled, she continued. “I’m just running against a billionaire,” who does not show his face in public, she said.

If they successfully paint Oakland as a failed city, then hedge fund billionaires and real estate developers can come in and buy up the property cheap, she said.

Though D.A. Price has been bombarded by a massive tsunami of lies, slanders, and misrepresentation, she remains strong and positive because she is a woman of faith, she said.

“I’ve been saved and guided by (a) higher power since I was 13 years old. So, I’m not a new person to faith, and I’m grounded in that,” she said.