November, 16 2020, 11:00pm EDT
Wayne County's Board of Canvassers Deadlock on Certification of County Election Results
Wayne County Michigan's board of canvassers deadlocked this evening 2-2 on certifying the Nov. 3 election. Wayne County is the largest county in the state of Michigan with more than 1.7 million people, nearly 70% of whom are Black. Detroit, the largest metropolitan area in the state, is 78% Black.
WASHINGTON
Wayne County Michigan's board of canvassers deadlocked this evening 2-2 on certifying the Nov. 3 election. Wayne County is the largest county in the state of Michigan with more than 1.7 million people, nearly 70% of whom are Black. Detroit, the largest metropolitan area in the state, is 78% Black.
The deadlock comes one day after Trump allies voluntarily dismissed a failed lawsuit attempting to throw out tens of thousands of votes, overwhelmingly cast by Black voters, in Wayne County, combined with continued rhetoric from the outgoing president that he did not lose the November 3 election. Kristen Clarke, president and executive director of the Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, issued the following statement:
"Our democracy is built on respecting the will of the people when they express it at the ballot box. President Trump and his allies' relentless and anti-democratic attempts to undermine the election combined with the Wayne County Board of Canvassers' failure to certify the vote are part of an attempt to promote chaos, confusion, and discord. The will of voters is clear. As the process moves to the state level, eligible Black voters and others across Wayne County, who overcame tremendous obstacles to vote this season, are being rendered, second-class citizens. Astonishingly, Chairwoman Monica Palmer indicated a willingness to certify results across Wayne County with the exception of Detroit. This is striking evidence that Palmer's decision was likely racially motivated and intended to lock out votes cast by eligible voters in majority-Black Detroit. We will continue to fight these post-election attempts to disenfranchise voters on a scale that is simply unprecedented in modern times. Deadlock or not, in America the people will always have the last say."
The Lawyers' Committee is a nonpartisan, nonprofit organization, formed in 1963 at the request of President John F. Kennedy to enlist the private bar's leadership and resources in combating racial discrimination and the resulting inequality of opportunity - work that continues to be vital today.
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United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres said Thursday that he is "deeply concerned" by Israel's "recent and extensive violations of Syria's sovereignty and territorial integrity," including a ground invasion and airstrikes carried out by the Israel Defense Forces in the war-torn Mideastern nation.
Guterres "is particularly concerned over the hundreds of Israeli airstrikes on several locations in Syria" and has stressed the "urgent need to de-escalate violence on all fronts throughout the country," said U.N. spokesperson Stephane Dujarric.
Israel claims its invasion and bombardment of Syria—which come as the United States and Turkey have also violated Syrian sovereignty with air and ground attacks—are meant to create a security buffer along the countries' shared border in the wake of last week's fall of former Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and amid the IDF's ongoing assault on Gaza, which has killed or wounded more than 162,000 Palestinians and is the subject of an International Court of Justice genocide case.
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Addressing the assassination of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson and conversations it has sparked about the country's for-profit system, longtime Medicare for All advocate Sen. Bernie Sanders on Wednesday condemned the murder and stressed that getting to universal coverage will require a movement challenging corporate money in politics.
"Look, when we talk about the healthcare crisis, in my view, and I think the view of a majority of Americans, the current system is broken, it is dysfunctional, it is cruel, and it is wildly inefficient—far too expensive," said Sanders (I-Vt.), whose position is backed up by various polls.
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"The way we're going to bring about the kind of fundamental changes we need in healthcare is, in fact, by a political movement which understands the government has got to represent all of us, not just the 1%," the senator told Jacobin.
The 83-year-old Vermonter, who was just reelected to what he says is likely his last six-year term, is an Independent but caucuses with Democrats and sought their presidential nomination in 2016 and 2020. He has urged the Democratic Party to recognize why some working-class voters have abandoned it since Republicans won the White House and both chambers of Congress last month. A refusal to take on insurance and drug companies and overhaul the healthcare system, he argues, is one reason.
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In addition to highlighting Sanders' interview on social media, Congressman Ro Khanna (D-Calif.) pointed out to Business Insider on Wednesday that "you've got thousands of people that are sharing their stories of frustration" in the wake of Thompson's death.
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Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.)—a co-sponsor of Sanders' Medicare for All Act—similarly toldHuffPost in a Tuesday interview, "The visceral response from people across this country who feel cheated, ripped off, and threatened by the vile practices of their insurance companies should be a warning to everyone in the healthcare system."
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Reporters Without Borders' (RSF) 2024 roundup, which was published Thursday, found that at least 54 journalists were killed on the job or in connection with their work this year, and 18 of them were killed by Israeli armed forces (16 in Palestine, and two in Lebanon).
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Multiple journalists were also killed in Pakistan, Bangladesh, Mexico, Sudan, Myanmar, Colombia, and Ukraine, according to the report, and hundreds more were detained and are now behind bars in countries including Israel, China, and Russia.
Meanwhile, in a statement released Thursday, the International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) announced that at least 139 Palestinian journalists and media workers have been killed since the war in Gaza began in 2023, and in a statement released Wednesday, IFJ announced that 104 journalists had perished worldwide this year (which includes deaths from January 1 through December 10). IFJ's number for all of 2024 appears to be higher than RSF because RSF is only counting deaths that occurred "on the job or in connection with their work."
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