(WASHINGTON) — As the report of a special counsel investigation into classified documents found at locations associated with President Joe Biden became public Thursday, here’s what he has said about the matter before now.
Jan. 10, 2023 — President Biden said he was “surprised” to learn that there were any government records at his Penn Biden Center office in Washington, D.C., which he used after leaving as vice president, adding, “I don’t know what’s in the documents.”
Jan. 12, 2023 — Biden spoke about the documents found in the garage at his Wilmington, Delaware, home and said he was complying with the Department of Justice.
A reporter asked Biden about the documents:
Q: Mr. President, classified — classified material next to your Corvette. What were you thinking?
BIDEN: Let me — they’re — I’m going to get a chance to speak on all this, God willing, soon, but as I said earlier this week, people — and, by the way, my Corvette is in a locked garage. OK? So, it’s not like they’re sitting out in the street. But at any rate —
Q: So, the material was in a locked garage?
BIDEN: Yes, as well as my Corvette.
But as I said earlier this week, people know I take classified documents and classified material seriously. I also said we’re cooperating fully and completely with the Justice Department’s review.
As part of that process, my lawyers reviewed other places where documents might of — from my time as vice president were stored. And they finished the review last night.
They discovered a small number of documents with classified markings in storage areas and in file cabinets in my home and my — and my — in my personal library. This was done in the case of the Biden Penn — this was done in the case of the Biden Penn Center.
The Department of Justice was immediately — as was done, the Department of Justice was immediately … notified, and the lawyers arranged for the Department of Justice to take possession of the document.
Jan. 19, 2023 — At the end of remarks on extreme weather, in Aptos, California, reporters shouted questions at Biden, who said he had “no regrets” and that “there is no there there.”
Q: Mr. President, may I ask you a question about the classified documents, sir? Do you have any regret — regret, sir?
BIDEN: You know, the only — I will answer the question, but here’s the deal: You know, what quite frankly bugs me is that we have a serious problem here we’re talking about. We’re talking about what’s going on. And the American people don’t quite understand why you don’t ask me questions about that.But having said that, what’s your question?
Q: Do you have any regret, sir, that you did not reveal the existence of the documents back in November, before the midterms?
BIDEN: Just hang on, OK? Look, as we found — we found a handful of documents that were failed — were filed in the wrong place. We immediately turned them over to the Archives and the Justice Department. We’re fully cooperating and looking forward to getting this resolved quickly.I think you’re going to find there’s nothing there. I have no regrets. I’m following what the lawyers have told me they want me to do. It’s exactly what we’re doing. There is no there there.
(NEW YORK) — Six family members remain unaccounted for a day after a massive house fire engulfed a Pennsylvania residence where officers responding to an emergency call were met with gunfire, officials said.
Authorities presume that three adults and three children who lived in the house were inside during the shooting and subsequent fire and are dead, Delaware County District Attorney Jack Stollsteimer told reporters during a press briefing on Thursday.
The remains of a human torso and a rifle have so far been recovered from the house, which has been largely burned out, Stollsteimer said.
“There’s a lot more work to be done,” he said, adding that a timeline on the recovery effort is unclear as the scene is “very unsafe.”
While responding to the home Wednesday afternoon, officers were “immediately met by gunfire,” Stollsteimer told reporters during a press briefing Wednesday. Two officers were shot, he said.
The two male officers, who were with the East Lansdowne and Lansdowne police departments, each sustained a single gunshot wound, Stollsteimer said. They were pulled from the scene to safety by responding officers from the Upper Darby Police Department, he said.
The injured officers are in stable condition with non-life-threatening injuries, according to Stollsteimer. One officer is expected to be released from the hospital Thursday afternoon, he said. The second suffered a “slightly more serious wound” and remains hospitalized, he said.
During the incident, the house became engulfed in flames while shots were still being fired from the home, Stollsteimer said. It is unclear how the fire started.
A 911 caller reported that an 11-year-old girl had been shot at the residence in East Lansdowne, according to Stollsteimer. It is unclear if an 11-year-old had been shot, he said.
Stollsteimer said he believes a family member who was not in the home may have called 911, but it is unclear if that was the 911 that “triggered the response.”
A neighbor, John White, told reporters at the scene he heard gunfire and sometime later, “13 or 15 more shots.” He said he “got low” during the incident, and SWAT members later evacuated him from his home.
(ELLSWORTH, Kan.) — For the first time in decades, prison inmates are eligible for the Pell Grant, a federal financial aid program that helps low-income students receive a college education.
Simon Garcia, 34, who graduated college last November from a state prison in Ellsworth, Kansas, is just one of the people whose life was changed due to a Pell Grant.
“I’ve been in prison and incarcerated all my life, since I was 12 years old,” Garcia told ABC News. “Initially, was just gang related and it was aggravated assault.”
While in prison, 10 more years were added to his sentence for hiding a homemade knife and shoving a corrections officer off a second-floor balcony.
“I thought that I was the king of my world, and I had it all going on,” Garcia said. “But I was so broken and messed up inside.”
The Pell Grant has given Garcia a new opportunity. With seven more years to go in prison, he has now earned his associate’s degree in general studies with honors, after being a full-time student taking five classes a semester. He is graduating along with a dozen other convicted men.
“I feel like education helped me gain the power to break free from the shackles of ignorance,” Garcia said. “Nobody’s too far past redemption.”
Former President Bill Clinton had removed Pell Grant eligibility for incarcerated individuals through the Federal Crime Bill of 1994, as an answer to the crack cocaine epidemic of the early 1990s. Then-Delaware senator and current President Joe Biden co-authored the bill.
“I think the reason that people in prison lost eligibility for Pell Grants in 1994 was really just part of our larger tough-on-crime attitude at the time, as a country,” said Margaret DiZerega, the managing director of initiatives at the nonprofit Vera Institute of Justice, a research organization. “And so, it was seen as another way to be punitive and to take this away from people who are in prison, even though less than 1% of all people accessing Pell at that time were people who were in prison.”
But in 2016, the Obama administration reintroduced the Pell Grants to incarcerated individuals. Through the Second Chance Pell experiment, selected pilot correction facilities offered fully funded Pell Grant college programs.
According to a 2018 study from the RAND Corporation funded by the Department of Justice, incarcerated individuals who participated in prison education were 48% less likely to return to prison within three years. RAND also estimated that for every dollar invested in prison education, up to $5 is saved on re-incarceration costs.
“That means there are fewer crime victims, there are more people living freely in the community,” said DiZerega.
At the end of 2020, the FAFSA Simplification Act was passed, restoring Pell Grants for students incarcerated in federal or state prisons, regardless of their conviction type or sentence length.
Roy Maney is a Pell Grant applicant at Ellsworth Correctional Facility. Maney, 42, was convicted of second-degree murder for killing 30-year-old Tiffany Mogenson when he sped away from a police officer and crashed into Mogenson’s car in 2013.
“The balance between punishment and rehabilitation is always tough for a victim’s family,” Mogenson’s father, Randy Long, wrote to ABC News. “I truly doubt that any continued education will assist [Roy Maney] in his life after prison. To me this is an additional slap in the face for all who supported Tiffany. They now get to pay for this government boondoggle.”
The state of Kansas says that Maney could be released in three years.
“Would you want someone that don’t have a degree to be your neighbor or a person with a degree?” Maney said. “These inmates that people just say, ‘oh, forget about them.’ These same people are going to the street. They can be in the grocery store with you. So why write them off? Everybody deserves a second chance.”
“Everyone’s made a mistake in their life,” said Don Langford, the prison warden at Ellsworth. “And by giving those GEDs and Second Chance Pell Grants, it gives men and women that opportunity to learn something that they may have never learned.”
Terrin Keith has directly experienced the benefits of the prison college program. Once a hard drug user, Keith, 35, has been in and out of state penitentiaries his whole adult life.
“In the past, when I would get released, and I would go apply for jobs,” said Keith. “But just having the felony checkmark on the application, it just seemed like I’d get no response. And so, then I’d fall back into my old habits.”
But this time, he was released from prison last summer with an associate’s degree in applied science with a 4.0 grade point average. He secured a job building windows while in prison.
“Being able to get that education and then landing that job while incarcerated was a big game changer,” said Keith. “It made the transition a lot easier.”
While most companies refuse to hire convicted felons, Keith’s new employer, Bob Holloway, needs skilled and educated labor to build architectural German windows. He has agreed to interview men at the prison for his company, Advantage Architectural Woodwork.
“I was skeptical that he would show up the first day,” Holloway said. “Ten years ago, two years ago, I would have never seen myself employing convicts. And yeah, so far so good.”
For others still in prison, a college degree brings hope for possibilities. Garcia feels that his newly earned degree has provided him the tools to become a better man. Before he leaves prison, Garcia plans to earn a master’s degree that he can use on the outside.
“I’ve never felt this happy in my life and I’m in prison and I still have seven years to go,” said Garcia. “I don’t feel negative at all. I don’t feel like anything bad is going to happen, and if it does, I’m ready for it.”
(WEST PALM BEACH, Fla.) — Donald Trump emerged in front of his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida minutes after Supreme Court arguments concluded in a historic case challenging his ability to hold office again due to Section 3 of the 14th Amendment — the “insurrection clause” — over his actions related to Jan. 6 and the 2020 election.
Watching the hearing play out was a “a very beautiful process,” he said, speaking with reporters.
“I hope that the democracy of this country will continue,” he said, going on to repeat many of his familiar campaign trail criticisms of President Joe Biden and to talk about the alleged “weaponization of politics,” which prosecutors and his legal challengers deny.
Multiple justices throughout the hearing had expressed concerns over ballot access and the potentially far-reaching consequences of allowing states to exclude candidates under the 14th Amendment.
Trump, afterward, sounded confident about the work of his legal team, calling their case “very strong.”
“I thought the presentation today was a very good one. I think it was well received. I hope it was well received. You have millions of people that are out there wanting to vote, and they happen to want to vote for me or the Republican Party,” he said.
While the case has now been officially submitted for consideration, a ruling is not expected imminently.
Pressed about arguments from the challengers’ counsel regarding his well-documented initial inaction to quell the violence during the Jan. 6, 2021, riot, Trump attempted to stop the reporter mid-question and said the blame was with former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.
“I said peacefully and patriotically. The speech was called peacefully and patriotically. It’s peacefully and patriotically,” Trump said, referring to a speech he gave on the morning of Jan. 6 near the White House, in which he also said “if you don’t fight like hell, you’re not going to have a country anymore.”
“He said I said bad statements, it was the exact opposite,” Trump said on Thursday. “So I think you should take a look at the statements that I made before and after. And you’ll see a whole different dialogue.”
Trump’s Florida remarks came in lieu of him attending the Supreme Court hearing in person, though campaign officials had previously floated the idea that he would, just as he has with some of his other court proceedings. (He denies all wrongdoing.)
But Trump has generally been adamant about going to court, which has caused him to maintain a light campaign schedule compared to his other Republican challengers and even cancel trail appearances to appear at his trials.
However, with the Nevada caucuses taking place Thursday evening, Trump’s campaign and legal schedule are colliding once again.
After speaking at Mar-a-Lago, Trump plans to head to Las Vegas for a caucus night watch party.
Trump had used his recent campaign speeches to suggest that the Supreme Court — which includes three justices that he named — would side with him in the 14th Amendment case. Some of the liberal-leaning justices also sounded skeptical of the challenge on Thursday.
“All I want is fair,” Trump said last month at a campaign stop in Iowa. “I fought really hard to get three very, very good people and they’re great people, very smart people. And I just hope that they’re going to be fair.”
(WASHINGTON) — The U.S. Supreme Court on Thursday appeared highly critical of a Colorado Supreme Court decision that would ban former President Donald Trump from the state’s 2024 GOP primary ballot under Section 3 of the 14th Amendment.
During more than two hours of oral argument in the historic case Trump v. Anderson, each of the court’s nine justices expressed skepticism that an individual state has the authority to deny a candidate for federal office from the ballot as an “insurrectionist.”
“It just doesn’t seem like a state call,” Justice Amy Coney Barrett said.
“Why should a single state have the ability to make this determination not only for their own citizens, but for the rest of the nation?” said Justice Elena Kagan.
While the court’s ultimate decision is not always clear based on the questions raised during a hearing, it appeared likely that a majority of the court is ready to reverse the Colorado decision and put an end to efforts nationwide seeking to disqualify Trump under the rarely used, 150-year-old constitutional provision.
Section 3 of the 14th Amendment was drafted after the Civil War to prevent former Confederates from holding positions across government. It reads no person who took an oath as an “officer of the United States” who then “engaged in insurrection” can hold an office “under the United States” in the future.
Only Congress, it adds, can remove the disqualification by two-thirds vote of both the House and Senate. It does not spell out who gets to decide when someone has “engaged in insurrection” or how. The nation’s highest court has never before examined the issue.
“Well, when you look at Section 3, the term insurrection jumps out. And the questions are: What does that mean? How do you define it? Who decides? Who decides whether someone engaged in it? What processes– as justice, what processes are appropriate for figuring out whether someone did engage in that?”Justice Brett Kavanaugh said.
The justices spent nearly the entire argument before a packed courtroom grappling with who enforces Section 3 and whether states have any authority to do so on their own.
“In this situation, a ruling from this court that affirms the decision below would not only violate term limits but take away votes of potentially tens of millions of Americans,” said Trump’s attorney Jonathan F. Mitchell.
While the counsel for Colorado voters challenging Trump’s eligibility repeatedly raised details of the former president’s efforts to overturn results of the 2020 election, the justices largely refrained from engaging with those facts or the merits of the Colorado ruling.
Instead, they zeroed in on the practical consequences of allowing each state to decide a presidential candidate’s eligibility under Section 3 and the unique role that the Constitution explicitly gives Congress in that amendment — namely, the right to remove an insurrectionist’s disability with a vote.
Justice Neil Gorsuch asked whether Section 3 was the only type of disqualification that could be removed by Congress.
“It’s the only one like that, right?” He asked.
Several justices voiced concern that chaos would ensue if each state could develop its own standard for “engaging in insurrection.”
“The question of who can enforce Section 3, with respect to a presidential candidate — the consequences of what the Colorado Supreme Court did, as some people claim, would be quite severe,” Justice Samuel Alito said.
“It would seem to me … if the Colorado position is upheld, surely there will be disqualification proceedings on the other side. Some of those succeed. Some of them will have different standards of proof. Some of them will have different views about evidence,” Chief Justice Roberts said.
On several occasions, the justices questioned whether the framers of the 14th Amendment had truly intended to give states more power in the aftermath of the Civil War when the federal government was trying to rein in former Confederate states.
History factored prominently in the debate, with even some of the court’s most liberal members referencing founding-era records to cast doubt on the idea that presidents and potential presidents were covered under Section 3.
“I guess my question is why the framers would have designed a system that would could result in this uniformity in this way when we have elections pending, different states suddenly saying you were eligible…,” said Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson.
The argument played out inside a court chamber shrouded in layers of extra security given the magnitude of the case. Outside the court, the scene was relatively quiet with little sign of widespread demonstrations or disruption.
The former president was not present in the chamber. But given the historic nature of the day, the wives of many of the justices were in attendance, as per tradition, as well as the Solicitor General of the United States Elizabeth Prelogar.
(WASHINGTON) — Special counsel Robert Hur has released to members of Congress his report summarizing his yearlong probe into President Joe Biden’s handling of classified documents while out of office.
It’s one of the final steps before the report is made public.
Earlier Thursday, the White House reviewed a draft of the report and said it would not seek to censor any information gathered by Hur.
Ian Sams, a spokesperson for the White House counsel’s office, said in a statement that the president’s legal team had completed a review of the report and that “in keeping with his commitment to cooperation and transparency,” the president would not assert executive privilege over any portion of the report.
Attorney General Merrick Garland earlier this week informed key lawmakers that Hur had concluded his investigation, which examined how approximately two dozen classified documents wound up at Biden’s personal home and office.
The records in question date back to Biden’s time as vice president, and at least some include “top secret” markings, the highest level of classification.
Garland appointed Hur as special counsel in January of 2023, after aides to the president discovered a batch of ten documents at the Penn-Biden Center in Washington, D.C., where Biden kept an office after his vice presidency.
A second discovery of additional records in the garage of Biden’s Wilmington, Delaware, home precipitated Garland’s decision to assign Hur as special counsel, ABC News reported at the time.
Investigators interviewed as many as 100 current and former officials, including Secretary of State Antony Blinken, former White House Chief of Staff Ron Klain, and Hunter Biden, the president’s son. In October, Hur’s team spent two days interviewing Biden himself.
ABC News previously reported that sources who were present for some of the interviews, including witnesses, said that authorities had apparently uncovered instances of carelessness from Biden’s vice presidency, but that — based on what was said in the interviews — the improper removal of classified documents from Biden’s office when he left the White House in 2017 seemed to be more likely a mistake than a criminal act.
The White House had emphasized from the beginning that it would cooperate with investigators. Biden himself repeatedly denied any personal wrongdoing and said he was “surprised” to learn of the documents’ existence.
The Hur investigation has played out quietly against the backdrop of special counsel Jack Smith’s inquiry into former President Donald Trump’s handling of classified records, which culminated last year in a 40-count indictment, to which Trump has pleaded not guilty.
Trump has sought to link his circumstances to Biden’s by trying to draw an equivalence between their conduct and calling his prosecution the result of a justice system improperly targeting Republicans.
But records subsequently released by the National Archives indicate that Biden’s legal team cooperated with National Archives officials, whereas federal prosecutors have accused Trump of deliberately withholding records he knew to be classified from investigators with the National Archives and, later, the FBI.
(WASHINGTON) — Both Nevada and the U.S. Virgin Islands are holding their 2024 Republican presidential caucuses on Thursday.
Here’s what to know:
Nevada caucuses
Former President Donald Trump is the only major candidate running in the caucuses and is expected to sweep all 26 party delegates.
Trump’s remaining notable rival for the Republican nomination, former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley, is not competing in the caucuses — claiming it was “rigged,” which Nevada Republicans deny.
Instead, Haley ran in the state’s new Republican primary but lost by a huge margin to the quirky option “none of these candidates.”
Because of a dispute over keeping the caucuses rather than switching to the new primary, no delegates were awarded in the latter contest.
Thursday’s Republican caucuses will be held between 5:30 p.m. and 7:30 p.m. local time across more than 1,500 precincts.
Voters can simply cast their vote and leave instead of listening or participating in speeches or other party matters. Only members of the Republican Party can participate.
Trump and pastor Ryan Binkley are the only ones competing, after Ron DeSantis, Vivek Ramaswamy, Chris Christie and Doug Burgum all ended their own campaigns.
U.S. Virgin Islands caucuses
The U.S. Virgin Islands, as a territory, doesn’t get to vote in the 2024 presidential election but its residents do get to help decide the presidential nominees.
The presidential caucuses will be held on Thursday for Republicans and then on June 8 for Democrats.
Virgin Island Republicans will use ranked-choice voting, and a candidate receiving more than 50% of the vote will receive all of the available delegates.
Both Haley and Trump are on the ballot on Thursday, and Haley has made a point of speaking virtually with Republicans there.
The Virgin Islands have 12 delegate votes to award to Democrats and four to award to Republicans.
The GOP’s caucus date was moved up and cut into the early nominating calendar set by the national party, triggering a penalty — reducing the number of delegates from nine to four.
However, according to Virgin Islands GOP Executive Director Dennis Lennox, the local party plans to allocate nine delegates on Thursday night and hopes they will be seated at the Republican National Convention this summer.
(BOSTON) — Two JetBlue planes clipped each other Thursday morning while on a deicing pad at Boston Logan International Airport.
The incident occurred when the two planes were on adjacent deicing pad lanes, JetBlue said in a statement. According to the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), the left winglet of JetBlue flight 777, an Airbus A321neo, struck the right horizontal stabilizer of JetBlue flight 551, which was an Airbus A321.
The impact damaged one aircraft’s winglet and the other plane’s tail section, according to JetBlue.
The FAA said the event happened on an area of the tarmac that is controlled by the airline. The agency will investigate the incident.
The incident occurred around 6:40 a.m. ET, according to the FAA and the flight tracking website FlightRadar24.
JetBlue said no injuries were reported by passengers or crew on either aircraft.
“We were hit by another aircraft,” the pilot of JetBlue flight 551 said on air traffic control audio, obtained through LiveATC.net.
A pilot of a nearby plane, who witnessed the event, told air traffic control: “We saw two aircrafts hit the tail and the wing.”
Dave Sauter was a passenger on JetBlue flight 777, headed to Las Vegas.
“You felt the brake when they stopped; you didn’t feel the collision,” he told ABC News. “It was too minor with that amount of weight moving.”
He said that the passengers weren’t scared, but frustrated.
JetBlue said both aircraft will be taken out of service for repairs and the two flights will operate on other planes. JetBlue 777 was scheduled to go to Las Vegas and JetBlue 551 to Orlando.
“Safety is JetBlue’s priority, and we will work to determine how and why this incident occurred,” JetBlue said in a statement following the incident.
Boston Logan has seen other wing clip incidents over the past 12 months. Last March, two United planes clipped wings while one was pushing back from the gate. And in June, a United plane’s wing clipped the tail of a Delta plane while the United flight was taxiing to a holding pad.
(NEW YORK) — Brooklyn-based boxing instructor Nancy Chen said her Apple Watch was able to hone in on the effectiveness of her workouts.
But it wasn’t until her watch broke that she said she realized it ended up exacerbating some unhealthy behaviors.
“I really struggled with disordered eating, pretty much like off and on throughout college,” Chen told ABC News. “I realized that after like three months of not wearing [the watch], it really helped confirm that I was like moving past my eating disorder.”
Chen’s experience is not uncommon among the users of those devices, according to medical experts who point to some of the potential downsides posed by relying on the devices and data.
“There is a drawback for some, and we see this is more common in individuals that really seek perfection in a lot of aspects of our lives,” Dr. Rebecca Robbins assistant professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School, told ABC News.
Many users may experience benefits from knowing their fitness levels, sleep quality, and other general health metrics.
In August 2021, Christopher Oakley, a professor at University of North Carolina at Asheville, said readings from his Apple Watch were able to convince skeptical doctors that he was having a heart attack even though it appeared his heart had calmed down between the time he left his home and got to the hospital, according to ABC affiliate WLOS.
Apple did not provide a comment to ABC News when asked about its devices.
The company’s website said the Apple ECG app can not detect cannot detect a heart attack, blood clots, strokes or other heart conditions and users should consult emergency services or a medical professional if they are not feeling well.
While some of the tech companies behind the devices said their goal is to help their users have the best information about their workout they said they have been working to create a better balance.
“Being able to have visibility into what your body is doing and how your health is going. I think that’s only good,” Shelton Yuen, the director of research at Fitbit, told ABC News.
Sarah Madaus of Brooklyn told ABC News she first started tracking her workouts and health with a Fitbit.
“For a while, it made me feel successful because I was like looking at my weekly stats and it was like, ‘Look that you crushed it,'” she said.
She later asked her parents for an Apple Watch which she now admits became a “chokehold” for her.
“It’d be like, ‘Oh, you didn’t close your rings today.’ And I’m like, ‘You better hustle. Sorry, guys can’t come to the party, can’t go to dinner,'” Madaus said.
A 2017 study of college students published in the medical journal “Eating Behaviors” found that using a fitness tracker is linked with a higher rate of eating disorder symptoms in some, but didn’t necessarily cause the behaviors.
Anxiety around wearables isn’t limited to food, according to studies.
In one case study, one woman who was diagnosed with atrial fibrillation developed health anxiety after she ran nearly 1,000 ECG recordings through her smartwatch.
“When you’re bombarded with all of this constant information about your heart, your sleep, your weight, your fitness level, all of this stuff… I think a lot of times of trouble comes from we’re putting a lot of that understanding or expectation for understanding on the individual,” Dr. Tom Hildebrant, an associate professor of psychiatry Ichan School of Medicine, told ABC News.
Some tech companies are taking different approaches to the trackers.
The Oura Ring sits on a user’s finger and doesn’t have a screen that displays their workout and health information. Users can check the data on their phone or computer.
Shyamal Patel, the head of science for Oura Ring, told ABC News that his company’s devices and apps are made with user control in mind.
“You want to calibrate your activity goals or you can actually turn off calorie tracking,” he said.
Yuen also told ABC News that Fitbit devices also allow users to stop tracking certain metrics.
“We try to meet our users where they are so that we can help them establish and meet the goals that they care about,” he said.
Hildebrant said that if anyone is feeling too overwhelmed by the trackers and apps they should stop using them for one or two weeks and see how they feel mentally and physically.
Chen and Madaus told ABC News that they were able to have better workouts once they stopped using their Apple Watches.
“I think I was able to really focus on the workout and be very private,” Chen said,
“It’s really like you can focus so much more on the mind-muscle connection to and like how you’re actively feeling,” Madaus said.
(WASHINGTON) — The U.S. Supreme Court is taking up a historic case challenging Donald Trump’s ability to hold office again over his role in the Capitol attack on Jan. 6, 2021.
Trump is asking the justices to overturn an unprecedented Colorado Supreme Court decision deeming him ineligible to appear on the state’s GOP primary ballot because, it said, he “engaged in insurrection.” Trump has long denied any wrongdoing.
The legal battle centers on a previously obscure provision of the Constitution’s 14th Amendment — Section 3 — ratified shortly after the Civil War.
The case is casting a political shadow over the nation’s highest court not has not been seen since the 2000 election with Bush v. Gore.
Here’s how the news is developing. All times Eastern:
Feb 08, 12:37 PM
Trump speaks after arguments conclude
Donald Trump spoke from Mar-a-Lago in Florida moments after the arguments concluded at the U.S. Supreme Court in Washington.
The former president largely focused his criticism on President Joe Biden, but briefly addressed what transpired at the nation’s high court.
“In watching the Supreme Court today, I thought it was a very beautiful process,” he said. “I hope that democracy in this country will continue because right now we have a very, very tough situation with all of these radical left ideas.”
Feb 08, 12:29 PM
Justice Alito expresses concern about states retaliating
Justice Samuel Alito, questioning the Colorado solicitor general, brought up the possibility of other states retaliating and excluding another candidate from their ballot.
Shannon Stevenson sought to downplay those concerns.
“I think we have to have faith in our system that people will follow their election processes appropriately,” she said. “That they will take realistic views of what insurrection is under the 14th Amendment. Courts will review those decisions. This court may review some of them. But I don’t think that this court should take those threats too seriously in its resolution of this case.”
Feb 08, 12:12 PM
Attorney for Colorado secretary of state begins argument
Shannon Stevenson, the Colorado solicitor general, is now representing Secretary of State Jena Griswold. She is making the case that Colorado has the power, under state election code, to disqualify candidates who are ineligible to assume the office they’re seeking.
“Nothing in the Constitution strips the states of their power to direct presidential elections in this way,” she said in her opening. “This case was handled capably and efficiently by the Colorado courts under a process that we’ve used to decide ballot changes for more than century. And as everyone agrees, the court now has the record that needs to to resolve these important issues.”
Feb 08, 12:07 PM
Challengers’ counsel argues this case is about ‘protecting democracy’
Justice Brett Kavanaugh asked whether the high court should think about democracy when interpreting Section 3, specifically the right of the people to elect candidates of their choice.
Murray, in a lengthy answer, gave an impassioned argument that this case is at the heart of protecting democracy.
“Constitutional safeguards are for the purpose of safeguarding our democracy, not just for the next election cycle but for generations to come,” he said. “And second, Section 3 is designed to protect our democracy in that very way. The framers of Section 3 knew from painful experience that those who had violently broken their oaths to the Constitution couldn’t be trusted to hold power again again because they could dismantle our Constitution democracy from within.”
“President Trump can go ask Congress to give him amnesty by a two-thirds vote but, unless he does that, our Constitution protects us from insurrectionists,” he continued. “This case illustrates the danger of refusing to apply section as written because the reason we’re here is that President Trump tried to disenfranchise 80 million Americans who voted against him and the constitution doesn’t require that he be given another chance.”
Feb 08, 11:49 AM
Justice Alito: ‘Would we have to have our own trial?’
Justice Samuel Alito pressed Murray on what the U.S. Supreme Court should do if different states adjudicate Trump’s conduct differently based on different sets of evidence or standards of proof.
“Would we have to decide what is appropriate standard of proof?” Alito asked. “Would we give any deference to these findings by state court judges, some of whom may be elected? Would we have to have our own trial?”
“No, your honor, this court takes the evidentiary record as it’s given,” Murray said. “And here we have an evidentiary record that all the parties agree is sufficient for a decision in this case.”
Feb 08, 11:37 AM
Chief Justice Roberts says Colorado case could mean disqualification efforts against Dems
“It would seem to me to be plain if Colorado position is upheld, surely there will be disqualification proceedings on the other side and some of those succeed,” Chief Justice John Roberts said.
“The fact that there are potential frivolous applications of a constitutional provision isn’t a reason to …,” Murray began to respond before Roberts cut him off.
“You might think they’re frivolous, I think people who are bringing them may not think they’re frivolous,” Roberts said. “Insurrection is a broad, broad term and there’s some debate about it.”
“There’s a reason Section 3 has been dormant for 150 and it’s because we haven’t seen anything like Jan. 6 since Reconstruction,” Murray countered.
Feb 08, 11:27 AM
Attorney for Trump challengers says US Supreme Court must ‘settle this issue for the nation’
Justice Elena Kagan asked Murray, the attorney for the Colorado voters, why a single state should be able to decide who gets to be president of the United States.
“That seems quite extraordinary doesn’t it?” she asked.
“No, because ultimately it’s this court that’s going to decide that question of federal constitutional eligibility and settle issue for the nation,” Murray replied.
Feb 08, 11:14 AM
Attorney for Colorado voters begins argument: ‘Trump disqualified himself’
Jason Murray, arguing the case for the Colorado voters seeking to bar Trump from the state’s GOP primary ballot, opened by noting the unprecedented nature of the case.
“We are here because for the first time since the War of 1812 our nation came under violent assault,” he said. “For the first time in history, a sitting president of the United States tried to disrupt the peaceful transfer of presidential power by engaging in insurrection against the Constitution.”
Feb 08, 11:11 AM
Justice Jackson asks Trump lawyer what constitutes an insurrection
Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson pressed Mitchell on the Colorado Supreme Court’s finding that the violent attempts by Trump supporters to halt the electoral count on Jan. 6 qualified as an “insurrection” under Section 3.
“Why would this not be an insurrection?” Jackson asked. “What’s your argument that it’s not?”
“For an insurrection there needs to an organized, concerted effort to overthrow the government of the United States through violence. And this riot that occurred …” Mitchell began.
Jackson interrupted, “So, the point that a chaotic effort to overthrow the government is not an insurrection?”
“We didn’t concede that it’s an effort to overthrow the government either Justice Jackson, right?” Mitchell continued. “None of these criteria were met. This was a riot. It was not an insurrection. The events were shameful, violent, all those things. It was not an insurrection as that term is used in Section 3.”
Feb 08, 11:01 AM
Arguments largely centered on text of Section 3: Here’s what it says
The justices, so far, are avoiding thornier questions around Trump’s conduct on Jan. 6 and instead focusing on Section 3 of the 14th Amendment.
The provision reads: “No person shall be a Senator or Representative in Congress, or elector of President and Vice-President, or hold any office, civil or military, under the United States, or under any State, who, having previously taken an oath, as a member of Congress, or as an officer of the United States, or as a member of any State …”
Key in the debate is whether Trump is an “officer of the United States” as described by Section 3 and whether or not it is self-executing.
Feb 08, 10:56 AM
Trump attorney: State officials can’t disqualify even if candidate is ‘admitted insurrectionist’
Mitchell, continuing to argue Congress must enforce Section 3, argued state officials can’t take action even if a candidate were to openly acknowledge they participated in an insurrection against the United States.
“Because even if candidate is an admitted insurrectionist, Section 3 still allows the candidate to run for office and even win election to office and then see whether Congress lifts that disability after the election,” Mitchell said.
“This happened frequently in the wake of the 14th Amendment, where confederate insurrectionists were elected to Congress, and sometimes they obtained a waiver, sometimes they did not,” he continued.
Feb 08, 10:36 AM
Justice Alito questions impact of Colorado decision on other states
Justice Samuel Alito pressed Mitchell on the impact the Colorado decision may have on other states.
Mitchell warned about the possibility of national disuniformity.
“Your question gives rise to an even greater concern because if the decision does not have conclusive effect on other lawsuits, it opens the possibility that a different factual record could be developed in some of the litigation that occurs in different states and different factual findings could be entered by state trial judges,” he said. “They might conclude, in fact, that President Trump did not have any intent to engage in incitement or make a finding that differs from what this trial court found.”
Feb 08, 10:20 AM
First question comes from Justice Thomas, who faced calls for recusal
The first question to Mitchell came from Justice Clarence Thomas, who has been in the spotlight due to his wife Ginni’s role in Jan. 6.
Some called on Thomas to recuse himself from this case.
Thomas asked Mitchell if Section 3 is self-executing — a key issue in this case. Mitchell said the provision needs congressional enforcement.
Feb 08, 10:18 AM
Trump attorney kicks off oral arguments
Jonathan Mitchell, Trump’s attorney, in his opening statement, asserted that the Colorado Supreme Court decision is “wrong and should be reversed for numerous independent reasons.”
Mitchell argued that Trump is not covered under Section 3 as an elected official and claiming he is not an “officer” of the United States. He also said that Section 3 cannot apply to a candidate, only those who hold office.
He said that if the U.S. Supreme Court affirms the Colorado Supreme Court’s decision, it would “take away votes of potentially tens of millions of Americans.”
Feb 08, 10:02 AM
Scenes from outside the U.S. Supreme Court
Ahead of the historic arguments, some anti-Trump demonstrators gathered outside the front of the building with banners and signs disparaging the former president.
Police also took steps to ramp up security by placing fencing around the court.
Feb 08, 9:38 AM
What Americans think SCOTUS should do with Trump ballot challenges
An ABC News/Ipsos poll found a majority of Americans (56%) were willing to see Trump disqualified in all or some states: 30% said the U.S. Supreme Court should bar him completely and 26% said it should let each state decide.
Thirty-nine percent said the U.S. Supreme Court should keep Trump on the ballot in all states.
Americans were split on the decisions out of Maine and Colorado to bar Trump from the ballot: 49% supported them while 46% were opposed.
Feb 08, 9:52 AM
What to know about the arguments
There are 80 minutes total allotted for arguments but the court is expected to go over that timeframe.
A number of questions are likely to be debated: Is Trump an “officer” of the United States to whom Section 3 applies; who can enforce Section 3; and did Trump engage in an insurrection?
Trump is being represented by Jonathan Mitchell, a former clerk to Justice Antonin Scalia. The Colorado voters are being represented by Jason Murray, a former clerk to Justice Elena Kagan and Justice Neil Gorsuch.
