Trump to sign executive order to punish people who destroy or deface monuments – live

House energy and commerce committee chairman Frank Pallone asked the senior health officials whether Trump has ever told them to slow down coronavirus testing, as the president claimed over the weekend.

Each of the four officials said they had not been asked to slow down testing and would oppose such a move.

“To my knowledge, none of us have ever been told to slow down on testing,” Fauci said. “That just is a fact. In fact, we will be doing more testing.”

CDC director Robert Redfield added, “All of us have been and continue to be committed to increasing readily, timely access to testing.”

Dr Anthony Fauci applauded some states, such as New York, for their cautious approach ro reopening, but he warned of “a disturbing surge of infections” in certain parts of the country.

“We’ve been hit badly,” Fauci said. But he added, “In some respects, we have done very well.”

The infectious disease expert then told congressman Frank Pallone, the chairman of the House energy and commerce committee, “Bottom line Mr. Chairman, it’s a mixed bag. Some [areas] are good. Some now have a problem.”

Dr Anthony Fauci, the government’s top infectious disease expert, said he is “cautiously optimistic” a coronavirus vaccine would be ready by late 2020 or early 2021.

Fauci said there have been “financial risks” taken to quickly develop a vaccine, but he emphasized there have not been any health or safety risks taken for vaccine development.

Some public health experts have expressed fear that Trump will try to fast-track development of a vaccine to make it available before the November election, which could increase safety risks.

Senior health officials, including Dr Anthony Fauci, are now testifying before the House energy and commerce committee on the coronavirus pandemic.

Fauci is testifying alongside CDC director Robert Redfield, FDA commissioner Stephen Hahn and Brett Giroir, a top official at the department of health and human services.

The hearing comes as nearly half of US states are seeing increases in coronavirus cases after starting to reopen their economies.

Despite that alarming trend, Trump said over the weekend that he has asked his administration to slow down coronavirus testing because it is revealing more positive results.

So here’s the current state of play: it looks like Senate Republicans will not even get their police reform bill considered, and House Democrats’ bill will likely pass but won’t be taken up in the Senate.

This partisan standoff means it is less and less likely that Congress will approve any police reform legislation before the November election, despite the widespread protests in response to the police killing of George Floyd.

Senate minority leader Chuck Schumer and senators Cory Booker and Kamala Harris said in their letter that the Republican police reform bill did not go far enough to address police brutality.

Democratic lawmakers have previously complained that Republican senator Tim Scott’s bill only incentivizes police departments to ban police chokeholds by threatening to hold up federal funds.

In contrast, House Democrats’ police reform bill explictly bans police chokeholds and no-knock warrants.

The House is expected to pass the Democratic police reform bill later this week, but Senate majority leader Mitch McConnell has already said he considers it dead on arrival.

Senate Democrats have sent a letter to majority leader Mitch McConnell signaling they will block Republican senator Tim Scott’s police reform bill, describing the legislation as “woefully inadequate.”

Senate minority leader Chuck Schumer and senators Cory Booker and Kamala Harris wrote, “This bill is not salvageable and we need bipartisan talks to get to a constructive starting point.”

Senate Republicans need seven of their Democratic colleagues to vote with them on the motion to proceed in order for the Scott bill to advance, so the Democrats have the ability to block the legislation if they are unified in opposition to it.

McConnell has called on Democrats to vote in favor of the motion to proceed and allow for disagreements on the bill to be worked out through debate and amendments, but the latest letter makes clear that Democratic senators believe there are too many issues with the legislation to move forward.

“This is a serious challenge requiring serious solutions,” the three senators’ letter says. “Bringing the JUSTICE Act to the floor of the Senate is a woefully inadequate response, and we urge you to bring meaningful legislation to the floor for a vote.”

The vote on whether to advance the police reform bill is expected to take place tomorrow.

Joe Biden released a statement criticizing Trump for his trip today to Arizona, which is experiencing a surge in coronavirus cases after starting its reopening process.

“Make no mistake: this visit is a distraction,” Biden said in the statement. “It’s a distraction from Donald Trump’s failed response to combat the spread of COVID-19. It’s a distraction from his failure to get Americans — including many in Arizona — the testing we need.”

Trump is scheduled to hold a roundtable discussion on border security in Yuma and then speak at a Students for Trump event in Phoenix, for which attendees were asked to sign coronavirus liability waivers.

“Mr. President, this disease is rearing its head in Arizona again and families are hurting,” Biden said. “Arizonans deserve a President who will rise to the moment amid the challenges we face today.”

Trump referred to the protesters who tried to tear down the Andrew Jackson statue near the White House as “vandals” and “hoodlums” who don’t love America.

“We are looking at long term jail sentences for these vandals and these hoodlums and these anarchists and agitators,” the president told reporters shortly before leaving for Arizona.

“Call them whatever you want. Some people don’t like that language, but that’s what they are. They’re bad people. They don’t love our country. And they’re not taking down our monuments. I just want to make that clear.”

The president was previously criticized for referring to those participating in George Floyd protests as “thugs.”

A Reuters reporter noted Trump’s expected executive order on monuments would likely be meaningless because it is already a federal crime to deface federal property:

Trump said he would sign an executive order “very soon” on punishing those who attempt to deface or destroy monuments.

As he left the White House to travel to Arizona, the president told reporters that his administration is “looking at long-term jail sentences” for “anarchists.”

Trump also thanked law enforcement for helping to save a “great monument” last night, referring to the Andrew Jackson statue in Lafayette Square near the White House.

Protesters defaced the statue of the seventh president and attempted to topple it, but it is still on its pedestal as of this morning.

Trump similarly tweeted this morning that he has “authorized the Federal Government to arrest anyone who vandalizes or destroys any monument, statue or other such Federal property in the U.S. with up to 10 years in prison, per the Veteran’s Memorial Preservation Act.”

A number of states have taken down statues of controversial figures, particularly Confederate leaders, since the start of the George Floyd protests. Some of the statues, such as that of Confederate general Albert Pike in Washington, have also been torn down by protesters.

Trump said he was serious on Saturday when he claimed he had asked his administration to slow down coronavirus testing.

As he was leaving the White House to travel to Arizona, the president was asked by a CBS News reporter whether he was kidding when he made the claim at his Tulsa rally.

“I don’t kid,” Trump replied.

Several senior administration officials, including press secretary Kayleigh McEnany, have tried to dismiss the comment as a joke.

However, Trump has continued to complain about how increased testing reveals more cases of coronavirus, and he deflected another reporter’s question about testing yesterday, saying, “We’ve done too good a job.”

Of course, public health experts have said states reopening and Americans relaxing their social distancing practices are much more to blame for the country’s high number of cases.

This is Joan Greve in Washington, taking over for Martin Belam.

The Commission on Presidential Debates confirmed the University of Michigan has dropped out of hosting the second presidential debate.

Instead, the October 15 debate between Trump and Joe Biden will take place at the Adrienne Arsht Center in Miami, Florida.

In its statement announcing the change, the commission simply said, “the University has concluded that it is not feasible to host the presidential debate as planned.”

However, news reports yesterday indicated the university was worried about hosting a major event in the middle of a pandemic, making the debate the latest event to be affected by coronavirus.

Biden’s campaign said in a letter yesterday that the Democratic candidate would participate in the three already-planned debates, but it did not commit to the expanded debate schedule that the Trump campaign has been pushing for.

The polls have opened in Kentucky, and some of the first pictures of early morning voters have begun to come through.

The Louisville Courier Journal is reporting that it is “so far, so good” in terms of the mechanics of the vote.

The paper says that the lines at the Kentucky Exposition Center in Louisville, which is acting as Jefferson County’s only polling location, are spaced with 6 feet between people in an effort to practice social distancing, and that most voters appear to have brought face masks with them. The voting booths are being sanitized by a cleaning crew after each use.

There were some lines before voting opened – but the paper’s live coverage quotes one voter as saying that at around 8am in Louisville, the whole process had been “a breeze”.

While Trump/Biden is a done deal for November, there’s a competitive race between Amy McGrath, Charles Booker and Mike Broihier for the Democratic nomination for the Senate, and the November chance to unseat Mitch McConnell.

USA Today have published a thought-provoking set of interviews ahead of what would have been Tamir Rice’s 18th birthday on 25 June. Rice was just 12 when he was killed. They’ve pulled together 31 interviews with 18-year-old black men from across the US, to hear their thoughts on growing up in “Tamir Rice’s America”

You can read it here: USA Today – These black teens are turning 18 in Tamir Rice’s America