(BOSTON) — Celebrity chef Mario Batali has been found not guilty of indecent assault and battery for a 2017 incident in Boston.
“It’s an understatement to say that Mr. Batali did not cover himself in glory on the night in question. His conduct and his appearance and his demeanor are not befitting of a public person of his stature at that time,” Boston Municipal Court Justice Judge James Stanton said Tuesday.
But the judge added, “This case is about credibility. And it’s the court’s job to adapt to assess the credibility of the witnesses. … The complaining witness has significant credibility issues.”
Natalie Tene, 32, said Batali forcibly kissed her and grabbed her breasts, buttocks and groin after meeting him in a Boston bar while having a drink with a friend in March 2017.
Under cross-examination, Tene repeatedly said she did not remember text messages she sent to friends that described her meeting Batali as “exciting.” In one message, she suggested to a friend she could “hopefully” get $10,000 for photos of the encounter.
After two days of testimony and two hours of deliberation Stanton ruled that the defendant had a financial motive for making the accusations. Stanton rendered the verdict directly as the sole decider of the case since Batali waived his right to a jury trial.
On Monday, at the start of the trial, Tene said she was speaking out “to be able to take control of what happened,” while a defense attorney for Batali called her a liar who is twisting the truth “for money and for fun.”
Tene claimed Batali was “grabbing me in ways I had never been touched before, squeezing between my legs … pulling me closer to him.”
Batali maintained that he was not guilty of the allegations.
Mario Batali takes leave of absence, apologizes to those ‘I have mistreated and hurt’
The alleged assault took place after the accuser asked the chef for a selfie. He smelled of alcohol and appeared intoxicated, she alleged. Tene has also filed a civil complaint for unspecified damages based on the same allegations that will be tried separately from this case.
Though this case was the only one to go to criminal trial, four women accused Batali of inappropriate touching in December 2017, which prompted him to leave the ABC daytime cooking show “The Chew” and remove himself from his restaurant business. In a statement at the time, Batali said he was “so very sorry” for disappointing his friends, family, co-workers and fans.
ABC News’ Mark Guarino contributed to this report.
(SAN FRANCISCO) — Former world heavyweight boxing champ Mike Tyson will not face charges in an incident last month in which he was recorded getting into a physical altercation with a fellow passenger on a flight at San Francisco International Airport, a California prosecutor announced Tuesday.
San Mateo County District Attorney Steve Wagstaffe said he decided not to charge the 55-year-old Tyson after reviewing police reports and videos of the confrontation.
“Our decision is that we will not file any charges against Mr. Tyson based on the circumstances surrounding the confrontation,” Wagstaffe said in a statement. “These include the conduct of the victim leading up to the incident, the interaction between Mr. Tyson and the victim, as well as the requests of both the victim and Mr. Tyson that no charges be filed in this case. We now deem this case closed.”
The incident unfolded on April 20 while Tyson was seated in first-class on a JetBlue flight at San Francisco International Airport waiting to take off for Florida.
A video obtained by the website TMZ Sports appeared to show a passenger seated behind Tyson repeatedly attempting to speak to the boxer, who became annoyed and told the man to “chill.”
“Unfortunately, Mr. Tyson had an incident on a flight with an aggressive passenger who began harassing him and threw a water bottle at him while he was in his seat,” representatives for Tyson said in a statement to The Associated Press.
The video showed Tyson standing up, leaning over the back of his seat and repeatedly punching the passenger, who was later video recorded with blood on his forehead.
San Francisco police officers detained Tyson and the passenger, and opened an investigation.
Wagstaffe said he reviewed the case and determined that allegations Tyson committed misdemeanor battery were not founded.
Tyson’s attorneys David Z. Chesnoff, Richard A. Schonfeld and Martin A. Sabelli issued a joint statement thanking Wagstaffe for conducting a thorough investigation and praising all law enforcement agencies involved in the probe for their “careful, diligent and professional work.”
(NEW YORK) — The parents of a 6-year-old marathoner are speaking out after they say child protective services paid their family an unannounced visit and questioned their children at home.
Ben and Kami Crawford shared a photo on Instagram Sunday purportedly of one of their children being interviewed by a CPS staffer. In the accompanying caption, they wrote in part, “Yesterday Child Protective Services (CPS) arrived at our home unannounced and interviewed our children, parents & grandmother. This is a scary process because usually children are interrogated away from parents, against their will, and their answers determine the agency’s legal right to take away the kids.”
The Crawfords made headlines last week after they let their children, including their son Rainier, 6, run the Flying Pig Marathon in Cincinnati on May 1 and shared it online. Their May 3 Instagram post in particular sparked outcry from social media users, with some critics going so far as to accuse the Crawfords of child abuse.
Campbell County, Kentucky, District Attorney Steve Franzen confirmed to “Good Morning America” that child services had visited the Crawfords, but said no determination had been made yet in the investigation.
Ben and Kami Crawford addressed critics’ accusations in a lengthy Instagram video Saturday.
“The real stuff that we got accused of was dragging Rainier, like physically dragging him on the marathon course after mile 13 and across the finish line,” Ben Crawford said.
“If you guys have seen our finish line picture, we all held hands for like the last probably, like, .2, .3 miles,” he added. “We talked about it ahead of time, like that’s what we’re going to do.”
The Crawfords maintain their 6-year-old wanted to run all along and stand by their decision to let the young boy run 26.2 miles.
“I don’t know if I should be angry. I like to believe that people are doing the best that they can. They’re not trying to ruin our life or, you know, they probably are legit afraid for our kids. But also, it’s like, where’s the line?” Ben Crawford asked.
“I feel like we’re doing what we feel passionate about,” Kami Crawford said. “It would be kind of tragic to stop all that.”
Experts say a marathon is a serious physical feat for anyone and it can take a toll on a child.
“If a young child were to run a marathon, I’m worried about electrolyte abnormalities, nausea, vomiting, heatstroke, all these signs and symptoms that may not be that clear in a young child,” Dr. Alok Patel previously told “GMA.”
Children may have a harder time recognizing warning signs of dehydration, exhaustion or other red flags. Parents and caregivers should consult with a child’s pediatrician before a child is permitted to engage in any strenuous exercise.
(NEW YORK) — Even if you’re not from Manhattan, chances are you’ve heard of, dreamt of or perhaps planned a visit to taste a scoop of Magnolia Bakery’s luscious, creamy, sweet banana pudding.
The New York City confectioner, known for its classic American desserts, has created a cookie with all the taste of the cult-favorite banana pudding.
Magnolia Bakery dropped its banana pudding cookie, which is available on MagnoliaBakery.com and at its 10 bakeries nationwide.
“It took six months to whip up, resulting in a soft, chewy cookie that’s full of flavor great to enjoy on its own or paired with a banana pudding,” a representative for the bakery told “GMA.”
The cookie is made with crushed vanilla wafers and mashed bananas in the dough to bring the classic flavor of the pudding to the baked treat. The treat is also packed with white chocolate chips and their world-famous Banana Pudding mix.
An order of six cookies is available online for $25 plus shipping and in-store cookies cost $3.70 apiece.
(MONTGOMERY, Ala.) — Alabama’s gender-affirming care ban went into effect on May 8, and physicians in the state say they’re scrambling to figure out how provide care for their young transgender patients.
S.B. 184, the Vulnerable Child Protection Act, states that anyone who provides gender-affirming care to anyone under 19 could be convicted of a felony and face up to 10 years in prison and a $15,000 fine.
This type of care includes providing puberty blockers, hormone therapy or physical gender-affirming surgeries.
Pediatric endocrinologist Hussein Abdul-Latif, who provides gender-affirming care for trans youth, told ABC News that before the ban went into effect, he was rushing to see his patients and refill the necessary prescriptions to continue their treatment in the meantime.
He has already seen the fear this legislation has caused as patients prepare for an end to healthcare.
“It was a scramble, trying to gather as many names as possible of the kids that we see in our clinic and make sure that they do have refills called in before the law took effect,” Abdul-Latif said.
Abdul-Latif says patients have attempted suicide due to discrimination, bullying and anti-trans sentiment. With this new law in place, he fears the worst.
“Physicians and the patient and the family [typically] walk through the different options that they have and come to the best solution that works for that particular context,” Abdul-Latif said. “By having a law, it took all that dialogue and that discussion that’s deep and that’s heartfelt … now, there’s no discussion. You just abide by the law or I will put you guys in jail. That is not how medicine is effective, but this is also not how civil society reacts.”
He’s had to cancel in-person appointments with trans patients who live too far away and would waste their time and money just to leave empty-handed, without the gender-affirming treatments they were traveling to him for.
He also said that some patients fell through the cracks and did not receive their prescription refills in time.
Now, Abdul-Latif says he and his fellow physicians that provide such care are left hoping that a federal judge will block the ban following a lawsuit filed by GLBTQ Legal Advocates & Defenders (GLAD) and other civil rights organizations against Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey and other state officials seeking an injunction against the law. The judge is expected to issue a decision by the end of the week.
“We’re trying to prepare for the worst-case scenario while we’re hoping for the best-case scenario,” he said.
The governor’s office did not immediately respond to ABC News’ request for comment Tuesday.
The bill’s sponsor, Republican state Sen. Shay Shelnutt, has called gender-affirming health care, “child abuse.”
“We don’t want parents to be abusing their children. We don’t want to make that an option because that’s what it is, it’s child abuse. This is just to protect children,” Shelnutt said on the state Senate floor in February.
After signing the bill into law last month, Ivey said, “I believe very strongly that if the Good Lord made you a boy, you are a boy, and if he made you a girl, you are a girl.”
She continued, “We should especially protect our children from these radical, life-altering drugs and surgeries when they are at such a vulnerable stage in life. Instead, let us all focus on helping them to properly develop into the adults God intended them to be.”
The law was panned by physicians, including Abdullatif, who say it is riddled with misinformation about gender-affirming care.
The legislation makes the claim that puberty blockers can cause infertility or other health risks.
According to physicians, these potential side effects only present real risks after puberty and are not a risk to youth taking puberty blockers.
The bill also cites the higher rate of mental health conditions among transgender people as a reason to ban care — though many medical organizations say poor mental health conditions is due to anti-trans discrimination and lack of gender-affirming care.
“I know that I am a girl and I always have been,” said a 15-year-old transgender girl in a statement from LGBTQ legal advocacy group Lambda Legal. “The possibility of losing access to my medical care because of this law causes me deep anxiety. I would not feel like myself anymore if this lifesaving medication was criminalized.”
Several medical organizations, including American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry and American Academy of Pediatrics, have spoken out against the bill.
“The American Academy of Pediatrics recommends that youth who identify as transgender have access to comprehensive, gender-affirming, and developmentally appropriate health care that is provided in a safe and inclusive clinical space,” the American Academy of Pediatrics said in a statement.
It continued, “These bills not only ignore these recommendations, they undermine them.”
(NEW YORK) — ABC News correspondent Bob Woodruff and his cameraman Doug Vogt were covering the Iraq War in 2006 and embedded with U.S. and Iraqi forces when an explosion nearly killed them.
Woodruff and Vogt were severely injured and rushed to the hospital in Baghdad, the place where Woodruff met the medic who he says helped save their lives, Sgt. Dave Williamson, including by giving them pharmaceutical-grade fentanyl to manage their pain.
Once in the trauma bay, Williamson and his surgical team were able to treat Vogt and Woodruff.
“We knew that [Woodruff and Vogt] were in, in serious, serious, serious dire straits … we just needed to get a tube in your throat and have you breathing off machines,” Williamson said.
Due to the severity of Woodruff’s injuries, Williamson injected him with multiple drugs, including fentanyl. Williamson said he had complete control over the drug, and he knew that it was the kind of opioid that would manage Woodruff’s pain.
“Our go-to drug was fentanyl. So at the time the fentanyl that we had was given in micrograms and it was glass vials,” Williamson said. “We had a very solid understanding of what it is, what it’s capable of doing and also how dangerous it was.”
Fentanyl was developed in 1959 to be used for chronic pain, anesthesia as well as sedation, according to the Drug Enforcement Administration. The drug, according to the National Institute on Drug Abuse, is 50 to 100 times more potent than morphine.
Although fentanyl and other opioids are intended for patients suffering from extreme pain, they are also powerfully addictive and carry strong warnings about the potential for harm.
Today, medical experts say illicit versions of the drug are driving the opioid crisis and contributing to one of the leading causes of drug overdoses in America.
Originally made for sedation during surgery, fentanyl rapidly began infiltrating the illicit drug market. Considered to be one of the most powerful opioids ever created — Mexican cartels are pouring tons of fentanyl over the U.S. border every year, according to the DEA.
Woodruff and Vogt safely returned to the U.S. and, as the war began to wind down, Williamson left the military. The effects of the war, however, stayed with him for years after his return and he was soon diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder.
“You’re looking for anything to numb the pain. Even though it may not be physical pain, it’s something that just doesn’t go away,” Williamson said. “It just stays with you and it just gnaws and you’re trying to emotionally cope with everything that happened over the course of 18 months for 12 to 14 hours a day, seven days a week, and you don’t have time to deal with it then, and now you’re home or you’re out of the Army and now you’ve got time to process it.”
Now at home and away from the conflict, the medic who administered opioids to numb his patients’ pain, developed an addiction to them.
“They prescribed me Percocet,” Williamson said about a surgery he had shortly after returning home. “And I rifled through those Percocet like it was nobody’s business and then I just wanted to do it more and more and more and more and more,” he said.
Williamson was then introduced to OxyContin by a close friend, making his addiction even worse. He would often buy the drug on the street and, before realizing it, the spiral descended from painkillers to meth and even heroin.
“So it’s just this sense of loneliness, of solitude and, before you know it, it’s spiraling out of control,” Williamson said.
His wife, Jessica Williamson, also suffered from opioid addiction. Jessica said she had her first contact with the drug after a car wreck when she was 17. She was prescribed painkillers to help her recovery.
“OxyContin came around and that was a huge problem for me, that was really when things got pretty bad for me,” Jessica said.
The couple began struggling to access OxyContin due to its high price, so they found themselves turning to the streets and using cheaper drugs, such as heroin.
One night, the couple says they believe the pills they got from a dealer were laced with fentanyl — the same extremely powerful opioid Williamson had used to treat Woodruff’s nearly fatal injury.
“We’re sitting in this parking lot and David did his and immediately was, you know, nodding out and was in and out. And I thought, ‘Wow, he did too much.’ Then I started throwing up, I thought, ‘Oh my gosh, I did too much.’ But I knew that I hadn’t done more than what I normally do. And I was sick. I mean, it was scary. It was very scary,” Jessica said.
The couple said they would not knowingly take fentanyl. They both believe that without their years of building a tolerance to opioids, those pills would have easily killed them.
The couple’s turning point, however, was when their 3-year-old son witnessed what they had been hiding for years.
“One of the things that was a turning point was when my 3-year-old walked into my room when I was shooting up and I screamed at him to shut the door,” Dave Williamson said.
“And I mean… “Is this what I’m going to do when he’s 30?”
Williamson then decided to join a program to seek treatment for his opioid dependency.
With the help of therapy and support groups, the Williamsons said they have stopped using opioids, and their hope is to keep drugs out of their lives forever.
“Once you’re an addict, you’re always an addict. It’s just that we don’t have the want or the need or the desire to chase it anymore,” Williamson said.
“We both see how our lives were then and we see where our lives are now and we like where we’re at now and we know how slippery of a slope it is.”
(NEW YORK) — The woman accused of fatally pushing an 87-year-old woman on a New York City street was indicted on a manslaughter charge and ordered held without bail on Tuesday.
Lauren Pazienza, 26, pleaded not guilty in New York State Supreme Court to charges stemming from the March 10 attack, including one count of first-degree manslaughter and two counts of second-degree assault. She was remanded into custody, with the judge citing a recent bail reform change that allows judges to consider the seriousness of harm caused, according to New York ABC station WABC.
Prosecutors allege that on the evening of March 10, Pazienza crossed the street in Manhattan’s Chelsea neighborhood and “shouted obscenities” at the victim, Barbara Maier Gustern, a well-known and beloved member of the city’s cabaret scene and a vocal coach. Pazienza then “intentionally shoved her to the ground,” prosecutors allege.
Gustern hit her head on the ground, causing a hemorrhage to the left side of her brain, and died five days later in the hospital after she was removed from life support, according to prosecutors.
“This was a senseless and unprovoked attack,” Manhattan District Attorney Alvin L. Bragg, Jr., said in a statement. “Barbara Gustern was a beloved vocal coach who lived a vibrant and active life at the age of 87, and her loss was felt deeply by many throughout the city.”
Prosecutors allege Pazienza “went to great lengths to avoid accountability for her actions,” including leaving the scene as Gustern lay bleeding on the ground. The suspect stayed in the area for about 20 minutes, during which time video footage showed her have a “physical altercation” with her fiance and watch the ambulance arrive, before they headed back to their apartment in Astoria, Queens, according to prosecutors.
Following the incident, Pazienza deleted her social media accounts, took down her wedding website and “eventually fled to Long Island to stay with family,” according to prosecutors.
Pazienza allegedly admitted to her fiance that she pushed Gustern, prosecutors said. She turned herself in to police on March 22, nearly two weeks after the incident, and was arrested on manslaughter and assault charges. She was initially released on $500,000 cash bail.
A motive for the attack remains unclear.
Following her arrest, her attorney called the victim’s death a “tragedy.”
“We’re just going to get to the bottom of what really happened that day after we have all the evidence that’s in possession of the prosecutors because we don’t have any evidence,” her attorney, Arthur Aidala, said in a statement at the time.
Pazienza is next due in court on July 26.
ABC News’ Aaron Katersky contributed to this report.
(ATLANTA) — Gun homicides increased 35% across the country during the pandemic to the highest level in 25 years, according to newly released data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
“Unfortunately I am not surprised,” Debra Houry, acting principal deputy director of CDC and director of the National Center for Injury Prevention and Control, told ABC News, “but it is heartbreaking.”
Firearm murders increased most markedly among youth and young adults — 40% for those 10 to 24, the CDC data shows. The increases were also highest for people of color: rates of gun homicide involving Black males aged 10 to 24 years — which were already 21-times has high as white males of the same age — increased further still in 2020.
The study suggests that the rise in violence could be attributed to the social and economic pressures stemming from the pandemic that reinforced “longstanding” inequities between communities.
The report also found that while the increase in firearm suicides was less than firearm homicides, the sheer number of suicides involving guns continued to outpace homicides. There were 24,245 suicides involving firearms in 2020, the report found, compared to 19,350 firearm homicides.
“These stats have devastating effects on families, schools, and entire communities, and have lasting consequences on us as individuals and as a society,” Thomas Simon, associate director for science at the CDC’s Division of Violence Prevention, said during a press briefing on Tuesday.
“Our reports contain statistics and numbers, but it’s also important to reflect on the individual lives lost,” he added, “and even one homicide or suicide is too many.”
The new CDC data confirms trends identified by ABC News as it studied data compiled by the Gun Violence Archive over the past year. It also builds upon other research demonstrating rising rates of gun purchasing and gun violence during the pandemic.
Guns remained available for purchase throughout the pandemic — even during intermittent stay-at-home orders — due to exemptions designating firearm retailers (and shooting ranges) as “essential businesses” in all but four states. A December study found that 7.5 million Americans became new gun owners during the pandemic — 5 million of whom lived in a household that previously hadn’t had guns.
The purchasing patterns aren’t showing any sign of letting up, either. The FBI has conducted over 10 million firearm background checks — which are frequently used as a proxy for purchases — in 2022 through April.
Gun violence has picked up alongside the increase in purchases, other studies found. According to an October study, gun violence increased in 28 states during the pandemic; another found that firearm incidents increased 15% — and non-fatal firearm injuries increased 34% — during the pandemic.
The youngest Americans have, increasingly, been collateral damage of this violence. Firearm deaths in children between 1 and 4 years old have increased 5% annually since 1999. And in the first six months of the pandemic, the risk of firearm injuries in children less than 12 years was 90% higher than in the pre-pandemic period.
Monika Goyal, a pediatric emergency medicine specialist at Children’s National Hospital in Washington, D.C., called the statistics “sobering” — adding that they reinforce what she’s been seeing clinically: that children are increasingly finding themselves in the crosshairs.
The pandemic uptick in firearm purchasing, violence and homicide has been attributed in part, to intensifying economic pressures like unemployment, housing insecurity and childcare.
“Longstanding systemic inequities and structural racism have resulted in limited economic, housing, and educational opportunities associated with inequities in risk for violence,” the authors of the new CDC study wrote, “the COVID-19 pandemic might have exacerbated existing social and economic stressors.”
Social factors like decreases in mutual aid, pausing in-person harm-reduction initiatives and political unrest may have also fueled these patterns, researchers say.
“Stay-at-home orders and physical distancing likely increased the guardianship people had over their homes and property,” the authors of a February report wrote, which could “help explain the observed relationship with violence” and the fact that “interpersonal interactions — despite happening with lesser frequency during the pandemic — may have been increasingly violence-prone.”
According to Houry, policy changes to halt the worrisome and worsening trends in gun violence are urgently necessary.
“[Gun] violence is not inevitable,” she told ABC News, “it’s preventable.”
The authors of the CDC offered various recommendations to that end, which included expanded welfare policies, empowering community-based harm reduction efforts, and promoting strategies for urban renewal among other initiatives.
“The findings of this study underscore the importance of comprehensive strategies that can stop violence,” they wrote. “Now and in the future.”
(PALO ALTO, Calif.) — A hate crimes investigation has been launched at Stanford University after a noose was found hanging in a tree outside a student residence hall, officials said.
It was the third time in four years that a noose has been discovered on the Palo Alto, California, campus, and the second since November, according to university officials.
Susie Brubaker-Cole, the school’s vice provost for student affairs, and Patrick Dunkley, vice provost for institutional equity, access and community, issued a joint statement condemning the act.
“We cannot state strongly enough that a noose is a reprehensible symbol of anti-Black racism and violence that will not be tolerated on our campus. As a community, we must stand united against such conduct and those who perpetrate it,” Brubaker-Cole and Dunkley wrote in their statement to The Stanford Daily student newspaper.
The noose was discovered at about 7:45 p.m. Sunday hanging on a tree outside Branner Hall, an undergraduate residence hall, and was reported to the university’s Department of Public Safety, school officials said.
Campus police immediately launched a hate crimes investigation that included interviewing maintenance staff, students and school staff in an effort to narrow down the time frame for the incident and identify a suspect or suspects, according to a statement on the Stanford’s Protected Identity Harm Reporting website.
It was not immediately clear if any campus security video captured the culprit hanging the noose.
Brubaker-Cole and Dunkley thanked the people who saw the noose and reported it to the campus police.
“We are sharing this message with the full university community so that everyone is informed and we can move forward as one committed to ending anti-Black racism,” Brubaker-Cole and Dunkley said in their statement.
It was the second noose found on the campus in six months. On Nov. 29, a student reported seeing two long cords that appeared to be fashioned into a noose hanging from a tree along a campus walking trail. Campus police investigated the incident but could not determine if the cords were deliberately fashioned into a noose or were part of an abandoned swing or rope ladder, according to school officials.
In July 2019, campus police investigated the discovery of a noose near a residence for summer students.
No arrests have been made in any of the incidents.
(WASHINGTON) — President Joe Biden on Tuesday continued his sharpened attack on what he’s now calling the GOP’s “ultra-MAGA” agenda as he pitched his plan to tackle inflation.
His remarks came as the national average price of a gallon of gas hit a record high of $4.37 a gallon, AAA said.
“I want every American to know that I am taking inflation very seriously,” Biden said as he delivered remarks in the South Court Auditorium. “It is my top domestic priority.”
Inflation is one of the Democratic Party’s biggest problems heading into the 2022 midterm elections. Republicans have seized on higher costs to criticize Biden’s domestic agenda while the White House is pinning the problem on supply chain issues, the ongoing coronavirus pandemic and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
Biden used his speech on Tuesday to tout what he said were recent accomplishments aimed at alleviating the increasing financial burdens on Americans, including a historic release form the Strategic Petroleum Reserve to offset soaring gas prices.
Biden also used the occasion to continue his ramped-up rhetoric against the GOP, accusing Republicans of having no real plan to address inflation.
“My plan is to lower everyday costs for hardworking Americans and lower the deficit by asking large corporations and the wealthiest Americans to not engage in price gouging and to pay their fair share in taxes,” Biden said. “The Republican plan is to increase taxes on middle class families, let billionaires and large companies off the hook as they raise prices and reap profits in record amounts. And it’s really that simple.”
Biden has used one proposal in particular as a target: GOP Sen. Rick Scott’s pitch to have all Americans pay some income tax to “have some skin in the game, even if a small amount.” That would mean a tax increase on Americans whose income is currently too low to owe federal income taxes.
On Tuesday, Biden said Scott’s plan will hurt frontline workers like firefighters and teachers.
Despite Biden’s focus on the plan, Scott’s proposal hasn’t been embraced by Republican leaders. Instead, Sen. Mitch McConnell made a point to distance himself from it shortly after it was announced.
“If we are fortunate enough to have the majority next year, I’ll be the majority leader, I’ll decide in consultation with my members, what to put on the floor,” McConnell said. “Let me tell you what will not be a part of our agenda. We will not have as part of our agenda, a bill that raises taxes on half the American people, sunsets social security and Medicare within 5 years. That will not be a part of the Republican Senate majority agenda.”
Before Biden spoke, Scott tweeted that Biden was “unfit for office” and should resign. Asked about that after he finished his remarks, Biden said, “I think the man has a problem.”
Biden’s remarks on inflation come ahead of the release of April’s consumer price index. The Bureau of Labor Statistics will announce those numbers on Wednesday morning. In March, the consumer price index spiked 8.5% from the year prior–the largest 12-month increase in 40 years.
ABC News’ Ben Gittleson contributed to this report.
