White House says ‘schools are essential places of business’ in push to reopen – live

Virginia has removed monuments honoring Confederate generals and officials from its state capitol.

The AP reports:

Virginia House Speaker Eileen Filler-Corn, a Democrat, quietly ordered the Lee statue and busts of generals J.E.B. Stuart, Stonewall Jackson, Confederate President Jefferson Davis, and others removed from the historic Old House Chamber. A moving crew worked through the night Thursday — carefully removing the monuments and their plaques and loading them into a truck and taking them to an undisclosed location.

The stealth approach avoids the possibility of protests or a lawsuit to keep the monuments in place, but may prompt criticism that the monuments were moved without public discussion.

‘Virginia has a story to tell that extends far beyond glorifying the Confederacy and its participants,’ Filler-Corn said in a statement. ‘Now is the time to provide context to our Capitol to truly tell the commonwealth’s whole history.’

A number of Confederate monuments have been taken down since the police killing of George Floyd, which kicked off nationwide protests against racism and police brutality.

Earlier this week, the House of Representatives similarly passed a bill calling on states to replace any Confederate statues they still have in the US Capitol.

White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany has now concluded today’s briefing.

During the briefing, McEnany claimed Trump has been consistent in his messaging on coronavirus. “He hasn’t changed his tone,” McEnany told reporters.

That comment came one day after the president announced he was canceling the Jacksonville portion of the Republican convention out of safety concerns, even though Trump originally moved the convention to the Florida city in order to have a large, indoor event.

Trump also strongly urged Americans to wear masks for the first time this week, more than three months after the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention initially recommended the use of face coverings to limit the spread of coronavirus.

White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany once again defended Trump’s push to reopen schools, despite concerns about the spread of coronavirus in the classroom.

“It is our firm belief that our schools are essential places of business, if you will, that our teachers are essential personnel,” McEnany said.

That comment might be jarring for parents wrestling with the difficult decision of whether to send their young children back to school in the middle of a global pandemic.

White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany repeated Trump’s claim that the Republican chairman of the Senate armed services committee will work to quash a proposal on renaming military bases named after Confederate generals.

“The president was assured by Senator Inhofe that would be changing and that Republicans stand with the president,” McEnany said.

However, it seems extremely difficult for Inhofe to kill the proposal in committee because it has already been included in two versions of the national defense authorization bill that have passed the House and the Senate.

“I’ll leave that to Senator Inhofe on how that works, legislatively speaking,” McEnany said.

White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany was asked whether Trump brought up reports of Russian bounties on American troops when he spoke to Vladimir Putin yesterday.

“I won’t get into a private discussion with a foreign leader,” McEnany said. “As you know, that intelligence is unverified still to this day.”

McEnany repeated her claim that there are “dissenting opinions” within the intelligence community about the reports, although that shouldn’t prevent Trump from discussing it with Putin.

Fox News pulled away from the White House briefing as press secretary Kayleigh McEnany played a video of scenes from the Portland protests.

“We were not expecting that video, and our management here at Fox News has decided we will pull away from that at this time,” anchor Harris Faulkner said.

The video included images of fires in Portland and clips of violent language, as McEnany condemned protesters’ behavior.

The network returned to the briefing shortly after the video concluded.

White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany is now holding a briefing, and she started it by criticizing protesters in Portland.

McEnany condemned the “lawlessness, anarchy and destruction” in Portland, amid widespread criticism of the administration’s decision to send federal agents to the city to crack down on protests against racism.

The press secretary claimed Democrats and the media “continue to ignore reality” when it comes to Portland, and she said Democratic leaders’ rhetoric “undermines our justice system.”

She then played a video of protests to argue that the demonstrations have turned violent.

Michael Cohen has officially left prison again, after a federal judge ruled yesterday that Trump’s former lawyer was unfairly retaliated against because he intended to write a book about the president.

The AP reports:

Cohen walked out of a federal prison in New York on Friday afternoon, a day after U.S. District Judge Alvin K. Hellerstein ruled that his First Amendment rights were violated when he was ordered back to prison on July 9. Probation authorities said Cohen was sent back to prison because he refused to sign a form banning him from publishing the book or communicating with the media or public, Hellerstein said during a telephone conference.

Cohen will return to home confinement. The former Trump associate was first released to home confinement in May out of concerns about the spread of coronavirus in prisons.

Here’s where the day stands so far:

• Joe Biden warned Trump would “try to indirectly steal” the election. During a virtual fundraiser last night, Biden said, “This president is going to try to indirectly steal the election by arguing that mail-in ballots don’t work.” The president has repeatedly made false claims that mail-in ballots are extremely vulnerable to voter fraud, even though voter fraud is actually very rare.
• Trump claimed a top Senate Republican would seek to quash a proposal on renaming military bases named after Confederate generals. The president said senator Jim Inhofe, the Republican chairman of the Senate armed services committee, would move to strip the provision out of the national defense authorization bill in committee. However, that will be extremely difficult because the House and the Senate have both already passed versions of the defense bill that include the proposal with veto-proof majorities.
• New York governor Andrew Cuomo suggested that senior DHS leaders should be charged for making false statements about blocking New Yorkers from the Global Entry program and related travel programs. Cuomo’s comments came one day after federal lawyers acknowledged in a court filing that DHS officials madde false statements about the policy.

The blog will have more coming up, so stay tuned.

New York governor Andrew Cuomo suggested that acting secretary of homeland security Chad Wolf and acting deputy secretary Ken Cuccinelli should be charged for making false statements about blocking New Yorkers from the Global Entry program and related travel programs.

Federal lawyers admitted in a filing yesterday that senior DHS officials made false statements to justify blocking New Yorkers from the travel programs shortly after the state passed a law allowing undocumented immigrants to obtain driver’s licenses.

The filing said the inaccuracies “undermine a central argument” for the policy and thus the department would be abandoning the effort.

Cuomo lambasted Wolf and Cuccinelli during a press conference today, saying, “You are the department of homeland security. Is it plausible that you didn’t know what the laws were in this nation? No. They got caught. It was all politics, all the time.”

The Democratic governor added, “I believe Mr. Wolf and Mr. Cuccinelli have possible criminal liability. I believe there is civil liability.”

In a separate interview with CNN, Cuomo also said Congress “should be all over this” to investigate the department’s mishandling of the issue.

At least 81 frontline workers on the Capitol complex have tested positive or are presumed positive for coronavirus, according to Roll Call.

Roll Call reports:

That number marks an increase of 15 cases since June 19.

At least 24 Capitol Police employees have tested positive.

At least 24 Architect of the Capitol employees have tested positive or are presumed. Five are presumed positive.

And 33 workers assigned to the Cannon House Office Building renovation project have tested positive or are presumed positive for the coronavirus. Three are presumed positive.

The pandemic is also hitting home for more lawmakers. Republican congressman Vern Buchanan announced today that one of his longtime staffers had died of the virus.

Florida governor Ron DeSantis will be at the White House today for Trump’s event on lowering drug prices.

According to DeSantis’ schedule, the Republican governor will also meet with White House chief of staff Mark Meadows.

DeSantis’ White House visit comes one day after the president announced he was canceling the portion of the Republican convention that was scheduled to take place in Jacksonville, Florida.

DeSantis’ approval rating has been plummeting in recent weeks, as Florida grapples with a surge in new cases of coronavirus.

State health officials reported 12,444 additional cases today, bringing Florida’s total number of cases since the start of the pandemic to 402,312.

Quinnipiac University released a poll yesterday showing DeSantis currently has a negative 41%-52% approval rating, representing a 31-point net drop since April.