(NEW YORK) — In an exclusive interview with ABC News’ George Stephanopoulos, Stephanie Grisham, one of former President Donald Trump’s most senior and longest-serving advisers, said she regrets enabling a culture of dishonesty at the White House.
“You are talking about this cultural culture of casual dishonesty at the White House, so you were, as press secretary, even if you weren’t getting briefings, enabling that culture, weren’t you?” Stephanopoulos asked Grisham on Good Morning America Monday morning.
Grisham, whose new tell-all book “I’ll Take Your Questions Now” is out this week, responded, “Yes, I was. And I’ve reflected on that and I regret that. Especially now when watching him, and so many people, push the false election narrative. I now want to, in whatever way I can, educate the public about the behaviors within the White House because it does look like he’s going to try to run in 2024.”
Stephanopoulos challenged Grisham, who served nearly the entire four-year term in the Trump White House before resigning after the Jan. 6 insurrection at the Capitol, asking, “but you stayed until the final two weeks … what took you so long?”
“Yes, that’s a fair question and it’s a complicated question,” Grisham responded, adding that she was at first drawn to Trump’s ability to attract large crowds and his support among Republicans. But she said that when she joined the West Wing, she “started to see what it was really like and I regretted that decision immediately.”
The former president has forcefully responded to the latest tell-all book by a former close ally, with Melania Trump’s office saying in a statement, “The author is desperately trying to rehabilitate her tarnished reputation by manipulating and distorting the truth about Mrs. Trump. Ms. Grisham is a deceitful and troubled individual who doesn’t deserve anyone’s trust.”
Grisham, who also told Stephanopoulos it was the former president who told her not to hold briefings during her time in the role, said she is unsure if she could have done more to protect a young female staffer who she writes in her new book Trump had developed a “unusual interest” in and had “behaved inappropriately” toward.
“Should you have done more to protect her?” Stephanopoulos pressed.
Grisham responded, “I don’t know if I could have, there’s, there’s not an HR department at the White House,” before Stephanopoulos pushed back and suggested she could have brought the issue to White House chief of staff.
“I didn’t feel comfortable talking to Mark Meadows,” Grisham responded. “I don’t believe he would have done anything. So I did the best I could, in terms of never letting her be alone with him in the cabin. I tried to keep her off trips as often as I could. I did the best I could, I think, in that environment.”
Another major theme in the book is the former president’s infatuation with world dictators. Grisham recalls how the former president tried to cozy up to Russia’s Vladimir Putin during an overseas trip for the Group of 20 summit in Osaka in 2019.
“How do you explain why the president was so placating of President Putin?” Stephanopoulos asked. Grisham said that, in her opinion, “I got the feeling that he wanted to impress dictators, I think he almost admired how tough they were.”
While other top aides resigned or were forced out, with some even speaking out against Trump while he was still in office, Grisham stood by the president throughout nearly the entirety of the Trump administration’s four-year term, through numerous controversies — and when asked on Monday by Stephanopoulos if it was a mistake to work for President Trump, she quickly replied, “Yes.”
“Why do it?” Stephanopoulos asked.
“I do believe he gave voice to a lot of people who did feel forgotten,” Grisham said. “But I think that many of us, myself included, got into that White House, and got heavy with power and … we didn’t think about serving the country anymore, it was about surviving.”
(NEW YORK) — The United States has been facing a COVID-19 surge as the more contagious delta variant continues to spread.
More than 701,000 Americans have died from COVID-19 while over 4.8 million people have died from the disease worldwide, according to real-time data compiled by the Center for Systems Science and Engineering at Johns Hopkins University.
Just 65% of Americans ages 12 and up are fully vaccinated against COVID-19, according to data from the CDC.
Here’s how the news is developing. All times Eastern.
Oct 04, 9:19 am
NYC public school employees must now be vaccinated
All New York City public school employees must now be vaccinated or risk losing their jobs.
More than 97% of the city’s public school teachers are now vaccinated, according to the United Federation of Teachers.
The union estimated about 1,000 more teachers were vaccinated over the weekend following the 5 p.m. Friday deadline.
Protesting teachers will march across the Brooklyn Bridge to City Hall for a rally Monday afternoon.
(NEW YORK) — The United States has been facing a COVID-19 surge as the more contagious delta variant continues to spread.
More than 701,000 Americans have died from COVID-19 while over 4.8 million people have died from the disease worldwide, according to real-time data compiled by the Center for Systems Science and Engineering at Johns Hopkins University.
Just 65.4% of Americans ages 12 and up are fully vaccinated against COVID-19, according to data from the CDC.
Here’s how the news is developing. All times Eastern:
Oct 04, 10:24 am
NYC public school employees must now be vaccinated
All New York City public school employees must now be vaccinated or risk losing their jobs.
Mayor Bill de Blasio said Monday that 95% of full-time employees are now vaccinated, including 96% of teachers and 99% of principals.
“It clearly works,” the mayor said of the mandate, which went into effect at 5 p.m. Friday.
Schools Chancellor Misha Porter said 18,000 new shots were given out since Friday. She said unvaccinated employees can still get their shots and return to work.
Protesting teachers will march across the Brooklyn Bridge to City Hall for a rally Monday afternoon.
(PHILADELPHIA) — An employee at Philadelphia’s Jefferson University Hospital was gunned down, allegedly by a coworker wearing scrubs, before the suspect shot and injured two officers during his capture, authorities said.
The shooting was reported at 12:13 a.m. local time at the hospital’s Gibbon Building, according to an internal law enforcement briefing reviewed by ABC News. No one else at the hospital was hurt.
Philadelphia police said they believe the slain employee was targeted.
Police found the suspect outside a school about 4 miles from the hospital at 1:29 a.m. local time, the briefing said.
The gunman shot at police, striking two officers, before the suspect was injured and taken into custody, according to law enforcement.
One officer was hit in the elbow and the other suffered a graze wound to the face, the briefing said. Both officers are in stable condition, law enforcement said.
The suspect is in the hospital and is expected to survive, Philadelphia police said.
Police searched a box truck the suspect was driving and found a gun, scrub pants and body armor, law enforcement said.
(NEW YORK) — The skin care ingredient retinol has been receiving a lot of attention lately, especially on social media apps like TikTok.
But what does retinol actually do and should you be using it?
According to the Journal of America Academy of Dermatology: “retinoids, chemicals that have vitamin A activity, have become important therapeutic agents for a variety of cutaneous disorders, including acne.”
Below, dermatologist Dr. Whitney Bowe answers five questions about retinol.
1. What is retinol?
“Retinol is an over-the-counter form of topical vitamin A. It is one of the most researched and effective skin care ingredients that you can use without getting a prescription.
In fact, retinol is considered by many dermatologists and experts in skin health to be the gold standard in terms of ingredients that deliver clinically evident results and lead to healthier skin.
Retinol can increase skin cell turnover, boost collagen production over time, regulate oil production, even out skin texture, and help brighten dark spots on the skin resulting in a more even skin tone. It can even help fight acne and brighten those dark marks left over after acne pimples go away (post inflammatory hyperpigmentation).”
2. Should you be using retinol?
“Anyone looking to smooth out wrinkles, smooth skin texture, minimize the appearance of pores, or brighten skin can use retinol.
I do not recommend that pregnant women, or women who are breastfeeding, use retinol.
I also advise my patients with eczema or rosacea flares to hold off on retinol until their skin is under better control. Then, they can reintroduce this ingredient, but slowly and carefully.”
3. How do you use retinol?
“I recommend what I call ‘skin care cycling,’ which means cycling on and off powerful but potentially irritating ingredients like retinol.
I usually recommend that my patients start using a pea-sized amount once every fourth night.
If their skin is tolerating it well after a few weeks (no stinging, burning, redness, flaking) then they can graduate to every third night.”
4. Is retinol a new ingredient?
“It’s definitely not new! It’s finally getting the attention it deserves, though.
People are more skin savvy than ever these days, and I believe that dermatologists like myself, taking a more active role on social media, is playing a large role in that evolution.
I’m personally blown away by the sophisticated questions I get about skin care ingredients on my TikTok and Instagram channels. My social media followers are incredibly informed, and demand science-backed, scientifically proven recommendations from me, which I love!”
5. What should you look for when purchasing retinol products?
“Studies, studies, studies. Reputable brands will take the time to put their final formulations to the test in clinical studies.
Just because an ingredient performs well in a test tube doesn’t mean it will translate into meaningful results on someone’s skin.
Furthermore, especially with retinol, it’s not just about that single ingredient or what percentage that ingredient is being used in the product. You must also look at studies done on the final formula. Results from the formula should be greater than the sum of its parts.
Retinol can be unstable, or irritating. However, when formulated by someone who really understands the ingredient and how it will ‘play’ with other ingredients in the cream, gel, or lotion, that’s when you can see beautiful results and minimize side effects.”
(WASHINGTON) — Facing an onslaught of political pressure tactics and plunging public approval, the U.S. Supreme Court on Monday sails into a new term set to decide some of the most divisive cases in decades on abortion, gun rights, the death penalty and religious freedom.
By the end of June 2022, the court’s conservative majority has the potential to roll back 50 years of abortion rights precedent; declare a right to carry a handgun outside the home; bolster the death penalty; and, allow some American parents to use taxpayer funds for religious schools.
“This is not a court that has the opportunity to inch forward and tip toe around issues,” said University of Chicago law professor and legal historian Farah Peterson. “We should all be watching these cases very closely because suddenly the court has new members interested in taking up issues of grave public concern.”
The justices are also expected to address challenges to the Biden administration’s nationwide vaccine mandate; continuation of Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, or DACA, for young immigrants; partisan drawing of congressional districts with new census data; and, Harvard’s use of racial affirmative action.
The blockbuster docket will play out as public approval of the Supreme Court in Gallup polling hits its lowest point in more than two decades — 40% in September, down precipitously from a ten-year high of 58% just last year.
“Not since Bush v. Gore has the public perception of the court’s legitimacy seemed so seriously threatened,” said Irv Gornstein, executive director of Georgetown Law’s Supreme Court Institute.
On the heels of a term marked by moderation and unanimity, most court watchers are braced for a sharp pivot to more polarizing decisions, foreshadowed in part by the justices’ 5-4 vote this summer to allow Texas to ban nearly all abortions across the state on technical grounds.
Taken together with a presidential commission weighing an overhaul of the bench, and mounting pressure on the court’s oldest liberal member to retire, veteran legal analysts say it could be one of the most consequential years for the Supreme Court in a generation.
“We’re going to have a huge explosion whichever direction they rule,” said Carrie Severino, president of the Judicial Crisis Network, a conservative legal advocacy group, of the abortion cases. “Even if they try to rule down the middle and come up with a middle ground, you’re going to have outrage from the left or serious concerns from the right.”
Several justices have tacitly acknowledged in recent high-profile speeches and interviews that stubborn public perception of them as a politically-motivated group — combined with the hot-button decisions on the horizon — may significantly undermine the court’s credibility.
The court announced last month that it would continue live-streaming oral arguments to the public at least through the end of the year, continuing an act of transparency prompted by the pandemic but even as the justices return to in-person sessions on Oct. 4.
“We don’t trade votes, and members of the court have different judicial philosophies,” Justice Stephen Breyer said in an interview on “Good Morning America” this month. “The great divisions are probably much more along those lines than what we would think of as political lines.”
Justice Amy Coney Barrett used a joint appearance with Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell at the University of Kentucky to reject the notion that the justices are simply politicians in robes.
“To say the court’s reasoning is flawed is different from saying the court is acting in a partisan manner,” Barrett told students. “I think we need to evaluate what the court is doing on its own terms.”
Justice Clarence Thomas used a speech at the University of Notre Dame to warn critics against “destroying our institutions because they don’t give us what we want, when we want it.”
To many observers, however, the court’s opinions remain impossible to view without a political lens.
“If right-side judicial philosophies always produce results favored by Republicans and left-side judicial philosophies always produce results favored by Democrats, there is little chance of persuading the public that there is a difference between the two,” said Gornstein.
Last year, the justices handed down unanimous or near-unanimous decisions in roughly 60% of cases, according to an ABC News analysis. On several hot-button social issues, Chief Justice John Roberts, Justice Brett Kavanaugh, and Barrett joined liberal Justices Breyer, Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan, to forge common ground.
“Barrett, for example, voted with Roberts and Kavanaugh over 90% of the time,” said FiveThirtyEight contributor Laura Bronner. “Based on what we know so far she seems like she’s going to be a core component of the conservative triad at the center of the court.”
That triad could be the key to just how quickly the court continues its shift to the right and whether it’s prepared to set into motion major societal changes on several controversial issues.
“The conditions for the right side running the table have never looked better,” said Gornstein. “But I don’t think sweeping right-side rulings in all politically salient cases is inevitable.”
The court’s coming term will be dominated by the issue of abortion rights, centered on a case out of Mississippi that asks the justices to directly reconsider the landmark precedent in Roe v. Wade and Planned Parenthood v Casey.
“Roe v. Wade is on thin ice,” said Florida State University law professor and abortion law historian Mary Ziegler. “At the moment it really feels more as if it’s a question of when, not if; and how, not whether.”
As Americans snatch up guns at record pace and shooting deaths soar, the justices will also decide a major case out of New York on whether the Second Amendment creates a right to carry a handgun outside the home.
“It would mean that you could expect more people to be carrying handguns in places like New York City, Boston and Los Angeles” if the court affirms such a right, said Southern Methodist University law professor Eric Ruben. “One of the things that the justices, especially the ‘institutionalist justices,’ are going to be considering is ripple effects that could undermine a decade’s worth of precedent and the lower courts.”
The court will decide whether to reinstate the death sentence for Boston Marathon bomber Dzhohkar Tsarnaev and whether a Texas man sentenced to death has a First Amendment right to his pastor praying aloud and laying hands on him in the execution chamber.
A pair of cases will also test the government’s power to keep national security secrets: A former alleged associate of Osama bin Laden detained for decades at Guantanamo Bay is demanding the CIA turn over information on alleged torture at black sites overseas; and, a group of Muslim men in California is seeking to sue the FBI for alleged unlawful surveillance.
Analysts say the conservative Supreme Court supermajority is at a crossroads, the cases ahead set to reveal how far and how fast they’ll move the court’s jurisprudence to the right.
(NEW YORK) — When Sarah Smith experienced three miscarriages in less than two years, she suffered through each of them while at work.
“I didn’t ever feel like there was a space to talk about it with anybody,” Smith, now a mom of three, told “Good Morning America.” “It’s not listed like in your benefits, like if you suffer pregnancy loss, you can take time off, so nobody’s even talking about it.”
During one miscarriage, Smith, of Washington, D.C., remembers sitting at her desk in an open office, trying to pretend like nothing was wrong.
“I went through the day having meetings and talking to people while in excruciating pain, just waiting for the day to be over,” she said. “And every time I got up to go to the bathroom, I was petrified that there would be blood.”
During another, Smith said she sat at work while awaiting a scheduled dilation and curettage (D&C), a medical procedure performed to clear the uterine lining after a miscarriage, because she did not know how to talk about it with her employer.
Smith said the experience of suffering three miscarriages at work led her to change careers. She now works for the March of Dimes, a nonprofit organization focused on the health of moms and babies.
“You’re just in this place where you’re like, ‘I don’t know what I’m supposed to do here,'” she said of her past experiences. “You just are kind of suffering in silence.”
When Hannah Crowder, of California, suffered her first miscarriage, she said she continued to work because she had no available time off.
“I remember going [to the doctor] at 9:30 in the morning, not hearing a heartbeat, knowing it was going to be a miscarriage and having to go back in to to teach my afternoon classes,” said Crowder, a teacher and now the mom of a 4-year-old daughter. “I ended up having to have a D&C, so that was a day of missed work and then had to go back to the work the next day.”
“I don’t think people who haven’t experienced loss understand how invasive it really is if you end up having to have a D&C,” she said. “I had to wake up the next day like, ‘OK, I have 12 fourth-graders I have to go teach about American history today,’ and just turn that switch back on in my brain.”
As many as 20% of known pregnancies end in miscarriage, according to the Mayo Clinic.
Stillbirth, the loss of a baby after 20 weeks of pregnancy, happens in around 24,000 births each year, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
Both forms of loss are emotionally devastating and physically painful for those who endure them, yet there is relatively little support around pregnancy loss in society today, and especially in the workplace.
U.S. Sen. Tammy Duckworth (D-Ill.) recalled going through 10 years of failed cycles of in-vitro fertilization (IVF) and a miscarriage while continuing nonstop at work.
“I would find out that morning that I wasn’t pregnant or in the case of a miscarriage that I had, and I had to go right back on the campaign trail,” she told “GMA.” “I was still working my job and in the Senate and I was campaigning at the same time, so it just became so overwhelming and so emotional.”
“I thought, ‘This is crazy that women have to go through this and try to deal with all of this,'” added Duckworth, who in 2018 became the first U.S. senator to give birth while in office, when she delivered her second daughter.
Duckworth is now the co-author of the Support Through Loss Act, a bill she introduced in the Senate in July that would require U.S. employers to provide at last three days of paid leave to workers to address their own health needs or the health needs of a partner following a pregnancy loss, as well as an unsuccessful assisted reproductive technology procedure, a failed adoption or surrogacy arrangement or a medical diagnosis or event that impacts pregnancy or fertility.
The bill, introduced in the U.S. House by Rep. Ayanna Pressley (D-Mass.), also proposes a $45 million annual investment in pregnancy-loss research at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and a federal public information campaign to share information on both how common pregnancy loss is, and how people can be supported.
“I remember being in my doctor’s office after he said my pregnancy had failed. I was devastated and at the same time my doctor was saying, ‘It’s fine. It’s perfectly normal,'” recalled Duckworth. “I didn’t know that so many pregnancies could fail. Having that information I think would really help all our families who are going through the process of trying to get pregnant.”
Duckworth and Pressley’s legislation calls for employers to provide “at least” three days of paid leave, and advocates say it’s a step in the right direction towards employers recognizing the long recovery for a pregnancy loss.
“As a federal mandate, it’s at least a good start because in too many situations some workers have no accommodations,” said Stacey D. Stewart, CEO of March of Dimes, which has endorsed Pressley and Duckworth’s legislation. “We have to understand that when we don’t provide these accommodations, there’s a real cost in productivity.”
“The idea that women go through a miscarriage or stillbirth and just bounce back immediately and go back to work is just simply unrealistic,” said Stewart.
The emotional, physical pain of pregnancy loss
Many of the causes of miscarriage and stillbirth are still not known or understood.
People who have gone through either form of pregnancy loss though know the toll it takes on the body, in addition to the emotional trauma.
In the case of a stillbirth, a person goes through childbirth, delivering the baby.
“I still delivered a four-pound baby,” said Elizabeth O’Donnell, a former teacher who said she was denied paid leave after her daughter, Aaliyah Denise, was born stillborn in December, after a 48-hour labor. “I wanted to be recognized as having a baby, which I still did, and have the time to heal my body back.”
“But these things are just not spoken about,” she said.
With miscarriage, people may experience bleeding, cramping, diarrhea and nausea while the pregnancy tissue is expelled. Some people may need a surgical treatment like a D&C, which is done in an operating room under anesthesia to remove pregnancy tissue, according to the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists (ACOG).
In many cases, it takes as long as four to six weeks for a person’s body to recover from a miscarriage.
“It can be an extremely painful experience for a family and it not only takes time for a pregnant person’s body to recover from a miscarriage or stillbirth, it can take even longer sometimes to recover emotionally,” said Stewart. “It’s often painful for families to even share with others what they’ve been going through.”
For people who are not comfortable sharing with their employer that they are trying to get pregnant, a fearful topic of conversation that can keep people silent in the workplace, Duckworth noted the Support Through Loss Act would provide them a layer of protection on the federal level.
“It’s important that it’s federal [in] that it does offer that protection much earlier in the process,” she said. “This is just sort of bringing the humanity back into our leave policies and more protections for families that are trying to get pregnant.”
Introduced four months ago, the legislation is still far from becoming law. If it were to be enacted, it would leap frog the U.S. from among the worst countries in the world on paid family leave to a pioneering role.
Earlier this year, New Zealand passed legislation that is believed to be among the first of its kind globally and would also require three days of paid leave after pregnancy loss for both the mother and her partner or spouse.
While a federal paid family leave policy is currently being debated in Congress, under current U.S. policy, the Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA), employees who qualify can take time off to care for a newborn or loved one or recover from illness without fear of losing their job, but in most cases the leave is unpaid.
Only about one-fifth of employees in the private sector have access to paid family and medical leave, according to the National Partnership for Women and Families.
And data shows that access to paid leave is lower for Black workers than their white counterparts, while the risk of miscarriage is 43% higher for Black women, according to a study published this year in The Lancet, a medical journal.
According to Pressley, the Support Through Loss Act would apply to both federal and private employers and would supplement current paid leave policy.
“These three days would be a separate layer of leave protections than those set in paid family and medical leave,” she said. “We have to ensure within those paid leave policies … that we’re not leaving behind families who have experienced pregnancy loss.”
Pressley, one of the founding members of the Black Maternal Health Caucus, said her goal with the Support Through Loss Act is to not only ensure people have time to recover, but also have support and information.
“I was unaware of the fact that there are doulas who can support you through pregnancy loss, and I’d be willing to bet that there are many healthcare professionals that might not be aware of that resource,” she said. “So we have to close that gap, make sure the information is more easily accessible, again, to better support those when they’re already in the midst of what is a traumatic and very isolating experience, and make sure that those supports are culturally responsive and holistic.”
The potential for not only paid time off but also recognition from the government and employers that pregnancy loss is both common and serious cannot come soon enough for people like Abby Mercado, who suffered a miscarriage three years ago while working in a nearly all-male office.
“I went to work because why wouldn’t I? Experiencing a pregnancy loss is just not something we talk about,” said Mercado, who went on to co-found Rescripted, an online infertility support community. “But my miscarriage was one of the hardest things I’ve ever had to go through in my life. From a grief perspective, I still grieve it, and from a physical perspective, it hurt.”
“With an effort like [the Support Through Loss Act], it elevates the conversation and one by one the dominoes start to fall and women are finally able to really advocate for themselves and have the government backing them up as they’re advocating for themselves,” she said.
(WASHINGTON) — In order for the bipartisan infrastructure bill and larger social spending package to pass, Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., said Sunday the $3.5 trillion budget resolution price tag will likely be lowered.
“Three and a half trillion should be a minimum, but I accept that there’s gonna have to be a give and take,” Sanders told ABC “This Week co-anchor Jonathan Karl.
House progressives have warned leadership they will not vote on President Joe Biden’s bipartisan infrastructure bill until the larger human infrastructure bill is also ready for a vote. The budget resolution calls for investments in climate change policy, child care and other social programs, and is wider in scope than the bipartisan infrastructure bill, which includes measures to improve the nation’s physical infrastructure.
“Both these bills are going forward in tandem,” Sanders said, reiterating the progressive call to hold out on passing infrastructure until the social spending bill is also passed.
Moderate Sens. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., and Kyrsten Sinema, D-Ariz., have said they will not support the bill’s $3.5 trillion price tag. Due to the slim Democratic majority in the Senate, neither bill will pass unless they have all the votes of the Democrats.
Sinema released a statement Saturday accusing progressives of “an ineffective stunt” and slammed House Democratic leadership for failing to pass the bipartisan infrastructure deal.
“Denying Americans millions of good-paying jobs, safer roads, cleaner water, more reliable electricity and better broadband only hurts everyday families,” Sinema wrote.
Asked by Karl to respond to her statement, Sanders said he thinks Sinema is “wrong” and said both bills must go forward together, adding that he voted for the infrastructure bill.
“We’re not just taking on or dealing with Sen. Manchin and Sen. Sinema, we’re taking on the entire ruling class of the country,” Sanders responded. “Right now the drug companies, the health insurance companies, the fossil fuel industry are spending hundreds and hundreds of billions of dollars to prevent us from doing what the American people want.”
“This really is a test on whether democracy can work,” Sanders said. “I hope very much and I expect that the Democratic caucus and the president — I know he will — stand firm.”
Biden spent last week negotiating with members and visited Capitol Hill on Friday to meet with House Democrats. According to sources in the room for the meeting, the president suggested lowering the price tag for his social policy bill to a number ranging from $1.9 to $2.2 trillion to reach a compromise.
Sanders said he’s not sure it is “accurate” to say Biden would settle on a reconciliation package around $2 trillion.
“The president also said that a smaller investment could create historic achievements, but [for] you, $2 trillion is not enough?” Karl pressed.
“What the president is saying is that what we are trying to do is for the working families of this country, for the children, for the elderly, we’re trying to pass the most consequential piece of legislation since the Great Depression, and he’s right,” Sanders responded.
Sanders also said “no” when asked by Karl if a $2 trillion price tag for the larger bill would be enough.
Manchin has said he will not vote to go over $2 trillion on the reconciliation bill. Asked how they can proceed without his vote, Sanders said the bill is paid for by increasing taxes on “the wealthiest people not paying federal taxes.”
“If Manchin wants to pay for it, I’m there, let’s do it, and by the way, you could pay for it at $3.5 trillion, you can pay for it at $6 trillion,” Sanders said. “We have massive income and wealth inequality in this country.”
Democratic Virginia gubernatorial candidate Terry McAuliffe has called the $3.5 trillion price tag too high. Pressed on whether the Democratic infighting will not only hurt Democrats in the midterms, but also hurt McAuliffe in his November race, Sanders said he “wishes Terry McAuliffe the best of luck” and emphasized the popularity of the reconciliation bill.
“What we are fighting for is precisely what the American people want,” Sanders said.
Sanders emphasized his confidence in passing both bills.
“At the end of the day, I am absolutely convinced we’re going to have a strong infrastructure bill, and we’re going to have a great consequential reconciliation bill which addresses the needs of the American people,” Sanders said.
(HUNTINGTON BEACH, Calif.) — A major oil spill off the coast of Southern California has forced Huntington Beach and activities scheduled to take place in the region to shut down.
A leak from an offshore oil production facility leaked 3,000 barrels of oil, which is about 126,000 gallons, on Saturday, Huntington Beach Mayor Kim Carr said. The leak is expected to have occurred about 4.5 miles offshore, officials said.
The U.S. Coast Guard was notified of the spill around 9 a.m. Saturday, Carr said. By early Sunday morning, the oil had reached the shore. It had entered the Talbert Marshlands and the Santa Ana River Trail, fanning out over an area of about 5.8 nautical miles, the city of Huntington Beach announced in a press release Sunday morning.
The size of the spill “demanded prompt and aggressive action,” officials said, but the pipeline has been capped and is no longer leaking into the ocean.
Skimming equipment and booms have been deployed to prevent the oil from flowing into the Bolsa Chica Ecological Reserve and Huntington Beach Wetlands, according to the city.
On Sunday night, Laguna Beach closed all its beaches, asking that “all individuals remain clear of the beach and pay close attention to any beach closure or warning signs,” according to a statement released by the city.
“Some bad news for my Laguna Beach constituents (and everyone else). I just learned projections have the #HuntingtonBeachOilSpill reaching Crystal Cove around 10pm tonight. We need more resources deployed ASAP. And then we need to end all offshore oil drilling off the CA coast,” California Sen. Dave Min tweeted.
The Coast Guard has recovered 3,150 gallons of oil from the water as of Sunday night, and 5,360 feet of boom have been deployed, they said in a statement.
The shoreside response was conducted by 105 government agency personnel. Fourteen boats conducted oil recovery operations while three Coast Guard boats enforced a safety zone off 1,000 yards around the oil spill boats. Also, four aircrafts were dispatched for overflight assessments.
It is not yet clear what caused the spill.
The final day of the Pacific Airshow was canceled in order to facilitate cleanup operations, city officials announced Sunday morning. In addition, residents were advised not to swim, surf or exercise near the beach due to the potential health hazards, such as toxic fumes.
The oil spill is already affecting wildlife, with dead birds and fish already washing up on the beaches, Orange County Supervisor Katrina Foley tweeted.
Newport Beach Mayor Brad Avery reported to Foley that he saw dolphins swimming through the slick oil plumes as he headed back to shore from Catalina, Foley tweeted.
Foley told ABC News she believes the spill is “irreversible.”
“You can’t get wildlife back that are killed in this process, and some of the habitat the plant species, they’re going to be impacted for years to come,” she said.
She added that the damage to the environment isn’t the only thing she fears as she has received reports of surfers getting sick.
“It feels like you have a thick coating in your mouth, if you’re out there too long. It’s definitely the vapors in the air, and they’re impacting the environment,” she said.
Marine animals will be taken to the Pacific Marine Mammal Center, where they will be triaged and later sent to Sea World San Diego for rehabilitation, animal rescuers told ABC News.
The Pacific Marine Mammal Center is currently in a “holding pattern” as it awaits the arrival of oiled animals in the next hours, days and weeks, Krysta Higuchi, communications representative for the organization, told ABC News.
The center is “preparing for the worst, hoping for the best,” Higuchi said.
Ocean conservation nonprofit Oceana urged policymakers to begin a widespread shift to clean energy and to end offshore drilling to prevent future spills.
“This is just the latest tragedy of the oil industry,” Jacqueline Savitz, chief policy officer for, told ABC News. “The reality of our reliance on oil and gas is on full display here.”
Saturday’s spill is just the latest in American waters this past month. After Hurricane Ida tore through the Gulf Coast in early September, it left a trail of oil in its wake, with nearly 350 oil spills reported to the Coast Guard in the days after the storm made landfall.
An analysis by the organization also found that ending new leasing for offshore oil and gas in the U.S. could prevent over 19 billion tons of greenhouse gas emissions as well as more than $720 billion in damages to people, property and the environment in the country.
The risk of oil spills may rise a climate change creates stronger offshore disturbances, experts told ABC News.
The California Department of Wildlife has set up a hotline to report wildlife impacted by the oil. Individuals are advised not to handle the wildlife but to report incidents to 877-823-6926.
(ORLANDO) — A body believed to be 19-year-old college student Miya Marcano, who has been missing for just over a week, was discovered Saturday morning, the Orange County Sheriff’s Office announced.
Authorities searched around the Tymber Skan apartments in Orange County, Florida, on Saturday and discovered a body in a wooded area nearby “that we believe to be that of Miya Marcano,” Sheriff John Mina said.
Marcano, a student at Valencia College, was last seen at the Arden Villas apartments complex in Orlando where she lived on Sept. 24.
“Although we are very certain of the identity, the positive identification will have to come from the medical examiner’s office. At this time we cannot confirm a cause of death,” Mina said.
Mina said Marcano’s family has been notified about the discovery of the body, which was found around 10:45 a.m. Saturday. He said a purse with Marcano’s identification was found near the body as well.
Police were led to the area based on cellphone records of “prime suspect” Armando Caballero, 27, a maintenance worker at Arden Villas who was found dead Monday from an apparent suicide, authorities said.
The records showed Caballero was near Tymber Skan apartments the day Marcano went missing around 8 or 9 p.m. Mina said that Caballero had lived at the Tymber Skan apartments at one time.
Authorities said Caballero had expressed a romantic interest in Marcano but she rebuffed his advances. Caballero possessed a key fob to access apartments and his was used at Marcano’s unit just before her disappearance, authorities said.
“We believe Armando Caballero is solely responsible for this crime,” Sheriff Mina said Saturday.
“This is not the update I wanted to give everyone,” Mina added. “Our hearts our broken. Everyone wanted this outcome to be different.”
