Politics

(NEW YORK) — New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo has announced he will resign from office following accusations of sexual harassment and inappropriate conduct from a number of women, including former staffers and one current staffer.

His resignation will be effective in 14 days, Cuomo said.

After a four-month investigation, New York State Attorney General Letitia James announced in a 168-page report last week that “the governor engaged in conduct constituting sexual harassment under federal and New York State law.”

“Specifically, we find that the Governor sexually harassed a number of current and former New York State employees by, among other things, engaging in unwelcome and nonconsensual touching, as well as making numerous offensive comments of a suggestive and sexual nature that created a hostile work environment for women,” the report said.

In announcing his resignation, Cuomo said his instinct was to fight through the controversy, which he said is politically motivated.

“This is about politics, and our political system today is too often driven by extremes,” Cuomo said.

However, Cuomo said, the situation on its current trajectory would create months of controversy, consume government, and cost taxpayers millions of dollars.

As a result, he said, “the best way I can help now is if I step aside.”

Lt. Gov. Kathy Hochul will assume the governor’s seat, becoming the first woman to lead New York state.

Cuomo, the son of legendary former Gov. Mario Cuomo and the heir to his deep political legacy, gained renewed national attention during the pandemic with his daily COVID-19 briefings.

But his image took a hit with the drumbeat of allegations from women surfacing as well as questions about his administration failing to fully disclose the nursing home deaths caused by the virus.

The governor admitted that the state miscategorized the nursing home data but said it was because it had not been verified.

Cuomo, however, has vehemently denied the allegations of sexual harassment and inappropriate conduct, including a reported sexual assault. In a March 12 press conference he told reporters, “I did not do what has been alleged,” but defended the right of his accusers to come forward and tell their stories.

At Tuesday’s press conference, employment discrimination attorney Anne Clark, one of the investigators assigned to lead the probe, presented findings from the report, including specific examples of the governor making suggestive comments and engaging in unwanted touching that 11 women found “deeply humiliating and offensive.”

In at least one instance, the investigation determined that the governor sought to retaliate against a woman who leveled accusations against him, identified in a report released by the AG’s office as Lindsey Boylan.

In February, Boylan, a former special adviser to the governor, and Charlotte Bennett, a former health policy adviser, both detailed examples where Cuomo allegedly spoke inappropriately while they were both employed by the governor’s office. Boylan initially made the allegations in a series of tweets in December, and Cuomo denied the accusations.

In an instance involving one of Cuomo’s unnamed executive assistants, the governor was found to have “reached under her blouse and grabbed her breast,” according to the report.

The same woman also recounted a circumstance in which “the governor moved his hand to grab her butt cheek and began to rub it. The rubbing lasted at least five seconds,” the report said.

After allegations were first made against Cuomo, other women began accusing the governor of various forms of inappropriate conduct.

Anna Ruch claimed Cuomo touched her and asked if he could kiss her during a wedding reception in September 2019.

Karen Hinton, a former press aide to Cuomo when he was the secretary of the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, told The Washington Post that while later working as a consultant, Cuomo had summoned her to his hotel room.

Hinton said she pulled away from Cuomo, but he pulled her back toward his body, holding her before she backed away and left the room.

Another former staffer, Ana Liss, also came forward on March 6 with allegations of inappropriate comments and touching.

Another woman alleged the governor groped her during a visit to the executive mansion in 2020, the Albany Times Union reported March 10.

Sherry Vill, came forward with allegations that the governor inappropriately touched and kissed her in 2017.

Cuomo met with her during a tour of flood damage near her town in Greece, New York, she said. The governor took her by the hand, pulled her in and kissed her on both cheeks, Vill said.

“That’s what Italians do, kiss both cheeks,” the governor allegedly told Vill.

Vill said at the time she was not pressing charges or filing suit for this incident but was planning to meet with the state attorney general to discuss the matter.

“During times of crisis, the governor has frequently sought to comfort New Yorkers with hugs and kisses,” Cuomo’s attorney, Rita Glavin, said. “As I have said before, the governor has greeted both men and women with hugs, a kiss on the cheek, forehead or hand for the past 40 years.”

After a back and forth on Feb. 28 between the governor’s office and the New York attorney general’s office over who would oversee an investigation into the allegations, Cuomo gave James the approval to look at the case.

James deputized two private lawyers to conduct the investigation.

As the number of allegations grew, elected officials on both sides of the aisle called for Cuomo to step down including New York Sens. Chuck Schumer and Kirsten Gillibrand, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio and state Senate Leader Andrea Stewart-Cousins.

State Assembly Leader Carl Heastie announced on March 11 that he authorized the Assembly Judiciary Committee to begin an impeachment investigation. On Tuesday, in the wake of the attorney general’s report, he said the Democratic majority had lost confidence in the governor.

“After our conference this afternoon to discuss the Attorney General’s report concerning sexual harassment allegations against Governor Cuomo, it is abundantly clear to me that the Governor has lost the confidence of the Assembly Democratic majority and that he can no longer remain in office,” Heastie said in a statement. “Once we receive all relevant documents and evidence from the Attorney General, we will move expeditiously and look to conclude our impeachment investigation as quickly as possible.”

Cuomo initially denied the allegations from the first two victims but acknowledged on March 3 that he “acted in a way that made people feel uncomfortable.”

“It was unintentional, and I truly and deeply apologize for it. I feel awful about it and, frankly, I am embarrassed. And that’s not easy to say,” he said.

After more women came forward, he made similar statements and insisted he was not going to resign during news conferences in March.

Cuomo was elected governor in 2010 after serving as New York’s attorney general for three years. He won re-election in 2014 and 2018 and served the state during many major moments, including Superstorm Sandy.

The governor began his political career working as a campaign manager for his father and also worked under New York City Mayor David Dinkins as the chair of the New York City Homeless Commission.

Cuomo served as the assistant secretary for Community Planning and Development under the Clinton administration and was later appointed as the secretary of the Department of Housing and Urban Development during former President Bill Clinton’s second term.

He first attempted to run for New York governor in 2002 but dropped out before the Democratic primary. Four years later, he won the election for the state’s attorney general.

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(NEW YORK) — Dominion Voting Systems on Tuesday morning filed three $1.6 billion defamation lawsuits against two pro-Trump media networks and an outspoken Trump ally, the latest in a string of suits from the company against those it says pushed false accusations that the company helped rig the 2020 election.

The complaints were filed against Newsmax and One America News Network, as well as against former Overstock CEO Patrick Byrne, who is an outspoken supporter of the former president.

Newsmax and OAN “helped create and cultivate an alternate reality where up is down, pigs have wings, and Dominion engaged in a colossal fraud to steal the presidency from Donald Trump by rigging the vote,” Dominion wrote in each of its complaints against the two networks.

Specifically, Dominion alleges that two networks “manufactured, endorsed, repeated, and broadcast a series of verifiably false yet devastating lies about Dominion.” OAN, they allege, was motivated by a “quest for profits and viewers” in competition with leading conservative network Fox News. They say both outlets helped spread these lies by promoting other figures such as Byrne, who they say “pushed lies” in collaboration with “other Trump-connected individuals.

“Byrne continues to stick to his manufactured, inherently improbable, profitable, and demonstrable lies,” the complaint against him says.

The complaints include dozens of statements by the networks and Byrne repeating conspiracy theories about the company, and claiming “evidence” to back them up.

A Newsmax spokesperson said in a statement, “While Newsmax has not reviewed the Dominion filing, in its coverage of the 2020 Presidential elections, Newsmax simply reported on allegations made by well-known public figures, including the President, his advisors and members of Congress — Dominion’s action today is a clear attempt to squelch such reporting and undermine a free press.”

Earlier this year, however, Newsmax retracted some its reporting surrounding the 2020 election as part of a settlement after it was sued by a Dominion employee last year. Referring to allegations that Dominion had schemed to rig the election in favor of President Joe Biden, the network reported that it “subsequently found no evidence that such allegations were true.”

OAN and Byrne did not immediately respond to ABC News’ request for comment.

Dominion’s latest complaints were filed in Delaware by the Denver-based voting company, which became the subject of false far-reaching conspiracy theories fueled largely by right-wing figures close to then-President Donald Trump as part of efforts to overturn the results of the election

Dominion has in recent months filed similar billion-dollar defamation suits against other Trump allies for what the company said was their role in pushing the false allegations, including Rudy Giuliani, Trump’s personal attorney; Sidney Powell, a member of the Trump’s legal team who was later removed; and Mike Lindell, the Trump-aligned pillow magnate.

All of those parties have denied the allegations against them and have asked a judge to dismiss the lawsuits. Those motions are still pending.

The litigation comes amid a wave of renewed scrutiny of the 2020 election results, as Democrats in Congress have ramped up their investigation into the storming of the Capitol on Jan. 6 by Trump supporters who believed the election was tainted by fraud, while Republicans in some states have renewed calls for additional audits of the 2020 returns.

After pushing baseless allegations of election fraud, Byrne was one of the key figures who helped fund a partisan audit of the 2020 election in Arizona’s Maricopa County, ABC News has previously reported.

Byrne, who previously said he’d been funding his own team of “hackers and cybersleuths and other people with odd skills” to search for voter fraud, has so far raised over $1.5 million to support the audit, according to the website created by his new nonprofit organization, The America Project. The former CEO also claims to have donated at least $500,000 of his own money to fund the audit.

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(WASHINGTON) — Fresh off one of the most expensive presidential elections in modern American history, wealthy donors from both sides of the aisle are already back pumping big checks into supporting Donald Trump and Joe Biden’s political efforts.

Campaign disclosure reports filed last week showed Team Trump’s aggressive post-White House fundraising efforts raising more than $50 million over the past six months, with more than $100 million on hand heading into the second half of the year. Trump’s post-election fundraising operation has mainly focused on small-dollar online contributions through his newly formed political action committee, Save America, and his presidential campaign committee-turned PAC, Make America Great Again PAC — both of which are limited by federal campaign regulations to contributions of $5,000 per person.

In comparison, Team Biden — which hasn’t been soliciting donations as aggressively or extensively as Trump’s multi-entity fundraising team and instead has mainly been raising money through his presidential campaign committee — reported bringing in $10 million in the first six months of the year, with $4.7 million on hand. Much of Biden’s campaign committee’s fundraising — limited by federal regulations to contributions of $2,800 per person — has also focused on small online donations.

As a result, contributions from wealthy donors who want to show bigger support are coming through outside entities like super PACs, which can solicit an unlimited amount of money from a single donor — unlike a presidential campaign or a regular PAC.

A newly formed pro-Trump super PAC, led by former Trump campaign manager Corey Lewandowski, took in more than $3 million in the two months since it started accepting donations, its first financial disclosure report shows.

The super PAC, called Make America Great Again Action (MAGA Action), received donations ranging from $5,000 to $1 million from three dozen donors between May 10 and June 30, after reportedly hosting a fundraising dinner at Trump’s golf club in Bedminster, New Jersey, with a price tag of $250,000 per person.

The $1 million donation came from Nevada-based businessman Don Ahern, who had fundraised for Trump during Trump’s 2020 presidential campaign. Waste management tycoon Anthony Lomangino, who had previously given big checks to Trump’s various fundraising committees during Trump’s presidency, also gave $500,000 to the super PAC.

Former Georgia Sen. Kelly Loeffler, who was unseated by Democratic challenger Raphael Warnock last November, also wrote a $250,000 check to the super PAC, while MyPillow CEO Mike Lindell, who has continued to push false claims of a rigged election, also gave $100,000 to the group.

The MAGA Action committee is reportedly going to serve as the main pro-Trump super PAC in his post-White House era, a role that another super PAC, America First Action, had played during his time in office. America First donated an additional $1.8 million in monetary and in-kind contributions to MAGA Action during the first half of this year, according to its disclosure report.

MAGA Action has already begun supporting pro-Trump political efforts, spending more than $417,000 to support coal industry lobbyist Mike Carey in a GOP special election primary in Ohio’s House race. Carey, who was endorsed by Trump, won the primary last week.

Biden’s big-dollar supporters are already in action as well, writing five-figure and six-figure checks to super PACs that have been supporting his campaign and political efforts, according to disclosures.

Unite the Country, a super PAC formed last year with the main purpose of supporting Biden during the 2020 presidential election, brought in just over $1 million from a handful of big and small donors in the first half of this year.

Major labor unions were among Unite the Country’s biggest donors, with the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers PAC contributing $500,000, the Amalgamated Transit Union’s super PAC giving $250,000, and the ironworker union’s PAC contributing $100,000.

Wayfair CEO Niraj Shah also contributed $95,000, while several attorneys made five-figure donations.

The American Bridge 21st Century PAC, another major Democratic super PAC that backed Biden during the 2020 election and is also involved in numerous other pro-Democratic political efforts, reported taking in nearly $9 million already this year. Among the big checks the organization received was $2 million from Lone Pine Capital partner Stephen Mandel and $1 million from Sequoia Capital partner Michael Moritz, disclosure filings show.

Unite the Country and American Bridge have yet to report any 2021 expenditures supporting specific candidates, but they have reported other advertising, fundraising and consulting expenditures.

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(NEW YORK) — If impeachment proceedings against embattled New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo were to take place, the process would likely begin in early September, according to a tentative hearing schedule set by state lawmakers.

The New York State Assembly Judiciary Committee said it will hold hearings through the remainder of the month to review evidence against Cuomo, as well as hear expert testimony surrounding sexual harassment and the standards for impeachment.

“These sessions will conclude with the potential for a vote on articles of impeachment if necessary and appropriate,” the committee’s chairman, Charles Lavine, said Monday.

A report released by State Attorney General Letitia James last week found that Cuomo sexually harassed multiple women, including current and former state employees. In at least one instance, the investigation determined that the governor sought to retaliate against a woman who leveled accusations against him.

Cuomo has denied all allegations of sexual misconduct or harassment.

Lavine said Cuomo has until Friday to submit exculpatory evidence which he promised the committee would consider.

“The governor has clearly lost the confidence of the majority members,” Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie said Monday, reiterating what he said last week in the wake of the state attorney general’s report being released.

“Our goal is to bring the matter to a close with all haste,” Heastie added.

The impeachment investigation includes the sexual harassment allegations and allegations the governor inappropriately used state resources to write a book, as well as further concerns raised surrounding COVID-19 and nursing homes and accusations that Cuomo provided preferential access to COVID-19 testing to friends and relatives, according to Lavine.

“Just on the nursing home question alone there are a half million pages of documentation,” Lavine said in noting the volume of evidence.

On Aug. 16 and Aug. 23, outside counsel is set to update investigative findings and the Judiciary Committee members will review the evidence in a secure environment. After Aug. 23, public hearings for expert testimony on sexual assault and harassment and on the impeachment process itself are set to take place. The committee will then issue a recommendation on whether the Assembly should approve articles of impeachment.

If the governor resigns beforehand, Lavine conceded “impeachment would be moot” but said there is a procedure to establish a prohibition on Cuomo that prevents him from holding elective office in the state.

Earlier Monday, Lavine called the findings of the state attorney general’s report “deeply disturbing” as he ushered the committee into executive session to discuss next steps in the impeachment investigation.

“We commend the attorney general on her work and her agreement to provide relevant materials to this committee,” Lavine said. “The findings, the content, of the report are deeply disturbing.”

If impeachment proceedings are initiated, it would mark the first impeachment of a New York governor in more than a century.

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(WASHINGTON) — Senate Democrats on Monday unveiled details of their $3.5 trillion budget resolution, setting up Congress to begin work on the second portion of President Joe Biden’s major economic objectives.

The legislative language comes just as the Senate is preparing to complete its work on a separate $1.1 trillion bipartisan infrastructure bill late Monday or early Tuesday morning. Taken together, the bills are designed to comprise the whole of Biden’s American Families Plan priorities.

Unlike the bipartisan infrastructure plan, which focuses on “core” infrastructure needs such as roads bridges and waterways, the budget resolution includes many of Biden’s social programs focusing on family, climate and health care.

Key campaign promises, including universal pre-K, free 2-year community college, and paid family leave are included in the package, as are many of Biden’s climate priorities. The bill, pushed by Senate Budget Committee Chairman Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., also secures investments in public housing, invests in job training, adds new Medicare benefits and extends expansions of the Affordable Care Act.

Democrats are expected to try to force the massive package through the Senate this week without a single GOP vote. Budget bills are not subject to the regular 60-vote threshold generally necessary to move legislation forward.

But any Senate action on the budget this week is just the first in a long series of steps before these objectives make it to Biden’s desk.

After the Senate votes on the budget bill, individual committees must craft legislation in line with the new budget, and that legislation will go before the full chamber for a second vote, likely in the fall.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has also been clear that she’ll need to see the Senate’s final budget product before she brings the House in to vote on the bipartisan infrastructure bill and the budget resolution. House progressives want assurances that the Senate can approve social programs in the budget bill before they lend their support to the slimmed-down bipartisan package.

Republicans have vowed to fight the budget resolution at every step, including through what is expected to be a marathon of votes this week on partisan amendments designed to score political points and make centrist Democrats squirm.

The Democrat-only bill is expected to be funded in part by raising taxes on big corporations and wealthy Americans, something Republicans see as a referendum on the 2017 tax cuts, which many of them view as on one of former President Donald Trump’s most significant legislative achievements.

As well as general opposition to the massive $3.5 trillion price tag, Republicans have also promised a bruising fight over language incorporated into the legislation aimed at implementing significant changes to immigration policy, including providing a pathway to citizenship for undocumented immigrants.

According to a top-line summary of the budget resolution released Monday, the package will “provide green cards to millions of immigrant workers and families” and “fund smart technology for safe and efficient borders for trade, travel and migration.”

Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Dick Durbin, D-Ill., has told reporters that his panel, which will write this portion of the final bill, plans to draft legislation that would provide green cards for so-called “Dreamers” — children brought to the U.S. illegally – and for farmworkers.

It is not yet clear whether these immigration policies will be permissible under the strict rules governing what may be in a Senate budget bill, but barring a ruling by the chamber’s parliamentarian that such policies are out of bounds, there isn’t much that Republicans can do to stop passage of the bill if all Democrats are on board.

It will require all 50 Senate Democrats plus the tie-breaking vote of Vice President Kamala Harris to move the budget resolution forward, but it is not yet clear that the caucus will remain united.

Earlier this month, Sen. Kyrsten Sinema, D-Ariz., announced that she would not support a $3.5 trillion top-line package. She said she’ll allow the process to move forward this week by lending her support to the budget bill for now, but as committees slog through their work, she said she wants to see overall spending reduced.

It is also not clear if all Democrats will agree with the leadership’s budget strategy for keeping the overall price tag of the bill down. Committees are expected to sunset costly programs – like the childcare tax credit – before the bill’s 10-year budget window, even though the programs could be extended in later years, thus growing the ultimate spending on the plan.

Foreshadowing another major partisan fight to come, Democrats also left a hike of the federal debt limit out of their budget blueprint, perhaps to appease moderates in their ranks, many of whom are up for re-election in 2022 and fearful of growing deficit spending in Washington. Republican challengers are all but certain to use a vote to raise the debt limit against them.

A suspension of the federal debt limit expired at the end of July, and Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen has warned that the US could exhaust its borrowing authority in the coming months without swift congressional action.

But Republican Leader Mitch McConnell has repeatedly insisted that Republicans will not vote to increase the debt limit, arguing that Democratic policies, like the massive COVID-19 relief bill and the upcoming budget bill, are driving up the debt, even though an increase in the nation’s debt ceiling is done to accommodate spending and tax cuts that have already occurred, including the effects of the 2017 GOP tax cut.

“They won’t get our help with the debt limit increase that recklessly, that these reckless plans will require. I could not be more clear,” McConnell said of his Democratic colleagues on the Senate floor last week. “They have the ability. They control the White House, they control the House, they control the Senate. They can raise the debt ceiling and if it’s raised, they will do it.”

But the administration challenged that notion in a statement Monday from Yellen, who urged Congress to use “regular order,” rather than the budget bill, to raise the debt ceiling.

“The vast majority of the debt subject to the debt limit was accrued prior to the Administration taking office. This is a shared responsibility, and I urge Congress to come together on a bipartisan basis as it has in the past to protect the full faith and credit of the United States,” Yellen wrote.

Failure to act could prove catastrophic. The last time the parties engaged in a partisan fight over the debt ceiling in 2011 resulted in a historic downgrading of the U.S. credit rating for the first time. World and U.S. markets plunged.

The Senate is expected to leave town for a shortened August recess upon completion of its work on the budget. When they return the second week in September, they’ll have just weeks to forge a path forward on the debt limit, as well as pass a final version of the Democrat-budget bill, this as the government runs out of funding on Oct. 1.

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(NEW YORK) — Melissa DeRosa resigned Sunday as the top aide to embattled New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, less than a week after state investigators said he allegedly sexually harassed 11 women and she was part of the “retaliation” against one of his accusers.

As secretary to the governor, DeRosa was the most powerful unelected bureaucrat in state government and, until now, stood loyally by Cuomo even through recent controversies, including scandals like the sexual harassment allegations to nursing home death data, to the use of state resources to write his book.

Cuomo has denied these allegations and scandals.

In a statement, DeRosa did not mention Cuomo by name but said it had been “the greatest honor of my life to serve the people of New York for the past ten years.”

She added, “the past two years have been emotionally and mentally trying,” but did not explain whether that meant the pandemic or the controversies that have engulfed the governor and have state lawmakers beating the drums of impeachment.

“I am forever grateful for the opportunity to have worked with such talented and committed colleagues on behalf of our state,” DeRosa’s statement said.

DeRosa’s name appears throughout the attorney general’s report, particularly in the section that details accusations made by Lindsey Boylan.

Boylan, who formerly worked as an aide to the governor, spoke out in December in a series of tweets claiming Cuomo “sexually harassed me for years.”

“Ms. Boylan said Ms. DeRosa would scream at her and yell at her for illogical things,” the report said. It also described DeRosa’s role in releasing Boylan’s confidential personnel file to reports after Boylan went public with her accusations against Cuomo.

“Ms. DeRosa made the decision to disclose the confidential files on December 13, the day Ms. Boylan tweeted that the governor had sexually harassed her,” the report said.

Cuomo has denied the allegations raised by Boylan and all other accusations of sexual harassment and misconduct.

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(NEW YORK) — The Albany County sheriff said during a press conference that New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo could face a possible misdemeanor charge following a criminal complaint filed against him this week.

Sheriff Craig Apple told reporters Saturday that the investigation is in its “infant stages” and the complaint made against Cuomo is “criminal in nature” and the alleged conduct was “sexual in nature.” No reports will be released to the public.

The claim was filed Thursday by a former New York State employee who claimed the governor groped her breast at the governor’s state residence in 2020. She is referred to as “Executive Assistant #1” in New York Attorney General Letitia James’ report released Tuesday.

Apple said that authorities sat with the complainant and her lawyer for an hour Thursday.

He said that the county sheriff’s office has reached out to James’ office to request investigative material used in the report, which concluded Cuomo violated state and federal law in sexually harassing at least 11 women.

Apple said next steps include waiting for the attorney general’s investigation material to come in and an interview with the victim. From there, the sheriff’s office will sit with the Albany district attorney’s office to decide whether to move forward with a criminal charge.

When asked what possible charge Cuomo could face, Apple said: “From what I’ve read so far I can say we’re floating around a misdemeanor, but again, that’s just from the attorney general report.”

Cuomo has denied all allegations of sexual harassment.

He responded to the Tuesday report with a video address stating: “I want you to know directly from me that I never touched anyone inappropriately or made inappropriate sexual advances.”

Cuomo’s lawyer, Rita Glavin, has said the groping allegation by Executive Assistant #1 was fabricated.

“He is 63 years old. He has spent 40 years in public life and for him to all of the sudden be accused of a sexual assault of an executive assistant that he really doesn’t know, doesn’t pass muster,” Glavin said in a press conference Friday in response to the complaint.

So far at least five district attorney offices — Manhattan, Albany, Westchester County, Nassau County and Oswego County — have launched investigations into Cuomo for alleged incidents outlined in the report that took place in their jurisdictions.

Following the Saturday press conference, Fabien Levy, the press secretary at the New York State AG office released a statement saying, “We will cooperate fully with the Albany sheriff and turn over all evidence related to this complainant. Similarly, we will cooperate with all law enforcement agencies, as appropriate.”

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(WASHINGTON) — With multiple Republicans joining Democrats in the effort, the bipartisan infrastructure bill cleared another hurdle on its way to passing the Senate on Saturday afternoon.

By a vote of 67-27, the Senate voted to advance the bill toward final passage. It’s not yet clear when the bill will receive a final vote, but Saturday’s vote makes all but certain that it will pass the Senate.

At least 60 votes were necessary to move forward on Saturday, a hurdle easily cleared with 18 Republicans joining all Democrats.

The bill, worth $550 billion in new spending, will address core infrastructure needs. It includes $110 billion in new funds for roads and bridges, $66 billion for rail, $7.5 billion to build out electric vehicle charging stations, $17 billion for ports, $25 billion for airports, $55 billion for clean drinking water, a $65 billion investment in high-speed internet and more.

Passage of the bill will prove a huge success for President Joe Biden, who campaigned on a promise to work across the aisle, and for the lawmakers, both Democratic and Republican, who huddled for weeks in an effort to craft the bill.

The Senate has been working through the weekends to try to finish up this bipartisan bill and move on to work on a second, larger budget bill that Democrats hope will include the remainder of Biden’s American Families Plan priorities.

That bill, set to include funding for housing, health care, child care and more, will likely need to be forced through along party lines. Democratic leadership in both chambers has insisted that both the bipartisan bill and the budget bill must move together.

Once the Senate finishes work on the bipartisan bill, it will head to the House, where Speaker Nancy Pelosi has threatened to postpone a vote on it until the budget bill is sent her way.

Democrats hold a razor-thin margin in the House, and some progressive Democrats, underwhelmed by the scope of the bipartisan infrastructure bill, have threatened to withhold their support for the bill without a robust budget bill in tandem.

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(WASHINGTON) — The Department of Homeland Security said Friday they have observed “an increasing but modest level of activity online” by people who are calling for violence in response to baseless claims of 2020 election fraud and related to the conspiracy theory that former President Donald Trump will be reinstated.

“Some conspiracy theories associated with reinstating former President Trump have included calls for violence if desired outcomes are not realized,” according to a DHS Office of Intelligence and Analysis bulletin obtained by ABC News.

There is no evidence that shows there was widespread voter fraud in the 2020 election.

“Over the last few days what has occurred is there’s been much more public visibility, meaning the discussions and these theories have migrated away from being contained within the conspiracy and extremist online communities, to where they’re being the topic of discussion on web forums, or more public web forums, and even within the sort of media ecosystem,” a senior DHS official explained.

DHS says in the bulletin they do not have specific evidence there is a plot imminent.

“As public visibility of the narratives increases, we are concerned about more calls to violence. Reporting indicates that the timing for these activities may occur during August 2021, although we lack information on specific plots or planned actions,” the bulletin sent to state and local partners reads.

The department “does not have the luxury of waiting till we uncover information with the level of specificity, regarding a potential location and the time of an attack” to act on potential threats due to the threat environment, the senior DHS official explained.

“Past circumstances have illustrated that calls for violence could expand rapidly in the public domain and may be occurring outside of publicly available channels. As such, lone offenders and small groups of individuals could mobilize to violence with little-to-no warning,” the bulletin says.

The senior official said that one of the lessons learned from the Jan. 6 storming of the Capitol is “that information that may reflect a growing threat may be communicated on public forums.”

“The current threat environment is one which is fueled in large part by conspiracy theories and other false narratives that are spread online by foreign governments, not by foreign terrorist groups [but] by domestic extremist thought leaders, and are consumed by individuals who are predisposed to engage in violence,” the official said.

The official pointed to the events of Jan. 6 and the attacks on the synagogues in Pittsburgh and Poway, California, as examples.

The senior DHS official also pointed to the balance DHS has to walk when putting out products.

“We don’t want to overreact, but we want to make sure that we are at the earliest stage possible providing awareness to law enforcement and other personnel who are responsible for security and are critical to mitigating risk,” the senior official said, adding the bulletin was done with civil rights and civil liberties in mind.

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(WASHINGTON) — The House select committee investigating the Jan. 6 Capitol attack will hire former Rep. Denver Riggleman, R-Va., as an adviser to the panel, according to a source with direct knowledge of the forthcoming announcement.

The former congressman, who lost his primary last summer, has become one of the few voices inside the Republican Party criticizing the spread of disinformation and conspiracy theories, including the idea that the 2020 presidential election was stolen, which led to the Capitol riot.

Riggleman, who also served as an Air Force intelligence officer, is expected to help the committee catalog and track the mistruths that circulated online and on social media before thousands of former President Donald Trump’s supporters gathered in Washington and descended on the Capitol hoping to overturn the election results.

A spokesman for the Jan. 6 committee did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

ABC News reported earlier this month that according to sources briefed on the discussions, Riggleman could join the committee staff in an advisory capacity.

The committee held its first hearing last week with several police officers who had faced off against pro-Trump rioters at the Capitol in January. With the House now on recess through August, the panel is focused on mapping out the contours of its investigation and building up its staff.

Rep. Bennie Thompson, D-Miss., said the panel would issue “quite a few” subpoenas and could potentially seek to question and obtain documents from former Trump administration officials and Republican lawmakers who communicated with Trump before and on Jan. 6.

Asked if the committee would want to interview former acting Attorney General Jeffrey Rosen, following the release of handwritten notes from former acting Deputy Attorney General Richard Donoghue that appear to show Trump trying to pressure the Department of Justice to declare there was significant fraud tainting the 2020 presidential election, Thompson said the committee hasn’t determined who it wants to hear from yet.

“The president wanted to mobilize the apparatus of the entire U.S. government to reinstall him as president, essentially,” Rep. Jamie Raskin, D-Md., another panel member, told reporters. “As one member, I am very interested in retracing the steps of what the president did to guarantee what he called his ‘continuation in power.'”

Riggleman would be the third Republican linked to the panel, along with Reps. Liz Cheney of Wyoming and Adam Kinzinger of Illinois, who both called to impeach Trump and accepted House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s invitation to join the investigation over GOP leaders’ efforts to boycott it after Pelosi refused to seat two leading conservative lawmakers who voted to overturn the 2020 election.

In recent days, other conservative lawmakers have sought to push Cheney and Kinzinger out of the House GOP Conference and strip them of other committee assignments over their work on the committee.

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