(WASHINGTON) — The state of Mississippi formally asked the U.S. Supreme Court Thursday to uphold its ban on abortions after 15 weeks of pregnancy and overturn Roe v. Wade, the landmark 1973 decision that gave women the unfettered right to end a pregnancy before a fetus is viable outside the womb.
“Under the Constitution, may a State prohibit elective abortions before viability? Yes. Why? Because nothing in constitutional text, structure, history, or tradition supports a right to abortion,” the state says bluntly in its opening brief in a blockbuster case that will dominate the court’s next term.
The cascade of arguments Mississippi lays out constitute the most direct and aggressive attack on abortion rights in years before the high court.
Republican Attorney General Lynn Fitch, leading the case, declares outright that the time has come for the justices to discard long-standing precedent because Roe and Casey, a 1992 decision that reaffirmed the right to abortion access for women, are “egregiously wrong.”
“Roe and Casey are unprincipled decisions that have damaged the democratic process, poisoned our national discourse, plagued the law — and, in doing so, harmed this Court,” the brief says.
Mississippi argues that states have compelling interests in protecting the lives of the unborn — interests that have been neglected, it claims, by decades of flawed legal analyses by the court’s majority.
“Scientific advances show that an unborn child has taken on the human form and features months before viability. States should be able to act on those developments. But Roe and Casey shackle States to a view of the facts that is decades out of date.”
Abortion rights advocates were quick to respond Thursday, calling Mississippi’s legal case “stunning” and “extreme.”
“Their goal is for the Supreme Court to take away our right to control our own bodies and our own futures — not just in Mississippi, but everywhere,” said Nancy Northup, president and CEO of the Center for Reproductive Rights, which is challenging the law, in a statement.
“Let’s be clear; any ruling in favor of Mississippi in this case overturns the core holding of Roe — the right to make a decision about whether to continue a pregnancy before viability,” she continued. “The Court has held that the Constitution guarantees this right. If Roe falls, half the states in the country are poised to ban abortion entirely. “
The Supreme Court has not yet scheduled the case for oral argument in the term set to begin in October. A decision is expected by June 2022.
(IOWA) — Democrat Abby Finkenauer, a one-term congresswoman who represented Iowa’s 1st Congressional District until she was unseated by a Republican in 2020, announced Thursday she’s running for Senate.
In her announcement video, Finkenauer, who is also a former state representative, shares the news with an intimate group of Iowans, calling out longtime fixtures of the Senate for how “obsessed” they are with maintaining power, citing their response to the Jan. 6 insurrection at the U.S. Capitol.
“The politicians who’ve been there for decades … [t]hey think they own democracy, and they were silent when it was attacked. You see it’s politicians like Senator Grassley and Mitch McConnell, who should know better, but are so obsessed with power that they oppose anything that moves us forward. Since the Capitol was attacked, they’ve turned their backs on democracy, and on us,” she says. “They made their choice, and I’m making mine. I’m running for the United States Senate.”
The seat Finkenauer is seeking has been held by Republican Chuck Grassley for 40 years. First elected in 1980 when Republican Ronald Reagan ascended to the White House and defeating incumbent Democrat Jimmy Carter, Grassley is the longest serving senator to ever represent the Hawkeye State.
The 87-year-old has been fundraising, earning nearly $2 million in contributions so far this cycle, according to the Federal Election Commission filing for his campaign committee submitted a week ago. But Grassley has not made his reelection bid official yet, despite the National Republican Senatorial Committee’s chairman persistently “bugging” the senator to make an announcement.
However, Sen. Rick Scott, the NRSC’s chairman, indicated in a podcast interview Tuesday he feels good about Grassley seeking another term, citing a fundraiser he recently held for him in Florida.
“If he flies all the way from Iowa down to Naples, Florida, I think he’s gonna run,” Scott said.
The Republican Party of Iowa was quick to blast Finkenauer after her announcement.
“Let me be as clear as possible – Abby Finkenauer will never represent the state of Iowa in the U.S. Senate,” Chairman Jeff Kaufmann said in a statement. “Iowans know Finkenauer and her disastrous record, it’s why they rejected her last November. No matter how she tries to reinvent herself, Iowans will see that her values and priorities are just the same as AOC’s and Chuck Schumer’s. Finkenauer will fall in line with Democrat leadership every chance she gets in hopes to gain media notoriety. … I look forward to seeing even more Iowans reject Finkenauer once again.”
When Finkenauer won in 2018, she became one of the youngest members of Congress along with New York’s Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. At only 32 years old, Grassley was already serving his second Senate term when she was born.
After flipping her district from red to blue in the 2018 blue wave, the Democrat narrowly lost reelection in 2020 to Republican Ashley Hinson. Hinson won about 10,700 more votes than Finkenauer, giving her a 2.6-point lead over Finkenauer. Across the country in 2020, Republicans picked up 14 seats, not including Republican-turned independent Justin Amash’s district, giving Democrats the slimmest House majority since the early 2000s.
Based on the 2020 election, Democrats are facing an uphill battle to win statewide in Iowa. The Republican in Iowa’s 2nd Congressional District, Mariannette Miller-Meeks, also won her election, flipping an open seat from blue to red as well. Republican Joni Ernst fended off a challenge from Democrat Theresa Greenfield, winning reelection by a 6.6-point margin. Former President Donald Trump’s margin against President Joe Biden was even bigger, 8.2 points.
But if Grassley chooses to forgo a bid, an open race could be much more competitive.
(WASHINGTON) — House Speaker Nancy Pelosi shot back at House GOP Leader Kevin McCarthy on Thursday and said the Jan. 6 select committee is “deadly serious” after McCarthy accused Pelosi of an “egregious abuse of power.”
“It’s my responsibility as speaker of the House, to make sure we get to the truth on this, and we will not let their antics stand in the way of that,” she said at her weekly press conference on Capitol Hill.
The boiling tensions between the two come after Pelosi rejected two of McCarthy’s nominees for the committee — Ohio Rep. Jim Jordan and Indiana Rep. Jim Banks — citing concerns with “statements made and actions taken by these members” that might compromise the integrity of the investigation. Jordan and Banks are vocal allies of former President Donald Trump and supported his efforts to overturn the election.
“It’s bipartisan, and we have a quorum. Staff is being hired to do the job,” Pelosi continued. “We’re there to get the truth, not to get Trump.”
While Pelosi accepted McCarthy’s other three picks — Illinois Rep. Rodney Davis, North Dakota Rep. Kelly Armstrong and Texas Rep. Troy Nehls — McCarthy threatened Wednesday to pull all of his members.
“Unless Speaker Pelosi reverses course and seats all five Republican nominees, Republicans will not be party to their sham process and will instead pursue our own investigation of the facts,” McCarthy said at a press conference on the Hill.
Pelosi acknowledged at her press conference that Nehls had also voted against certifying election results for President Joe Biden, but said the two members she rejected, Jordan and Banks, had taken the big lie to another level.
“The other two made statements and took actions that just made it ridiculous to put them on such a committee seeking the truth,” she said.
She said some counseled her to allow Jordan and Banks on the committee “and then when they act up you can take them off,” she disclosed. “I said, ‘why should we waste time on something so predictable?'”
“I’m not going to spend any more time talking about them,” she added later.
Back in May, Senate Republicans killed a proposal for an independent, bipartisan commission that would have given Republicans equal representation to investigate the Capitol attack. Under the House select committee proposal, which was approved by the House mostly along party lines with GOP Reps. Liz Cheney of Wyoming and Adam Kinzinger or Illinois joining Democrats, Pelosi gets seven appointments and McCarthy has five.
Pelosi also maintained the power to reject McCarthy’s appointments, which she exercised Wednesday.
The House Select Committee was expected to hold its first hearing on Tuesday. Capitol police officers are among the first witnesses.
(WASHINGTON) — Speaker Nancy Pelosi and House Democrats are considering inviting former House Republican Rep. Denver Riggleman to serve as an adviser to the Jan. 6 select committee investigating the Capitol assault, according to sources familiar with the deliberations.
Riggleman, a former intelligence officer who lost his primary last year, has been a forceful critic of other Republicans over election-related disinformation and QAnon conspiracy theories.
Rep. Liz Cheney, picked by Pelosi to serve on the committee, has been pushing the idea even before Pelosi rejected two of House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy’s choices on Wednesday.
Whether it is investing in a coal mining community, or in regional tourism, Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo says new “investing in America” grants being announced Thursday are designed so every community in America feels empowered and included to get back on their feet in the wake of the pandemic.
She said the Commerce Department is making $3 billion in grants available for a myriad of programs, using funds passed as part of the American Rescue Plan.
Interested communities will have to apply for the grants, which exclude businesses.
“It’ll be a nationwide competition to quite literally ‘build back better,'” Raimondo told ABC News’s Karen Travers, using the name President Joe Biden uses for his recovery program. “Building back certain communities from the ground up so that everybody can thrive in the new economy.”
With concerns growing about how long current price surges will last, Raimondo said the Biden administration is watching inflation “very closely.”
“And not, you know, not trying to deny that there’s a link between large fiscal stimulus and inflation,” she said, “but inflation is not the only thing we need to be worried about.”
Raimondo said the kind of funding the Commerce Department is investing in communities can be “quite beneficial” in countering inflation.
“These are investments in productivity. And that’s what we need to be making. Every economist will tell you, you want to invest, to enhance productivity, and that’s exactly what this is,” Raimondo said. “This is investments in infrastructure, investments in skills, education, job training, and those are not inflation creating expenditures of money.”
The grants will be distributed through the Commerce Department’s Economic Development Administration.
Programs include the “Build back better challenge,” in which regions can apply for up to $100 million to “accelerate recovery and inclusive economic growth by developing new industries or expanding existing ones through planning, infrastructure development, workforce training, innovation and commercialization, access to capital, and more,” the department said.
Those programs include $300 million to invest in communities affected by the shrinking coal mining industry.
“We also need to be there for communities that have been traditionally dependent on coal,” Raimondo explained. “And so that’s what this money is for putting folks to work in those communities, making investments in those communities so they benefit from the transition to renewables, whether that’s retraining, or innovation hubs or building infrastructure.”
Raimondo insisted there would be no political considerations when grants are made to coal mining communities, especially since influential Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin represents West Virginia, a state hit hard by the industry downturn.
“It isn’t just West Virginia. It’s Virginia, it’s West Virginia it’s Ohio with Kentucky it’s you know it’s not about one state it’s about being honest with people and creating jobs for people everywhere,” she explained.
Another program is aimed at getting Americans back to work through investments in worker training and in funding infrastructure projects.
“So, the way it works is pretty simple: a group of companies would come together in a community, they would say, ‘we have 1000 open jobs right now,’ for example, in order to hire people for those jobs. ‘These are the skills they need to have,'” she said. “Then the money that we’re providing would train those people in exactly those skills, and here’s the best part, the businesses have to hire the folks, so that this is not trained, and pray and get a job. This is enroll, train, graduate, get your job.”
The Commerce Department also will focus on providing funds for underserved communities, providing regional tourism grants, and helping communities plan for any potential economic hardship in the future.
Raimondo said the administration is not telling local communities how to invest their money, but rather providing a road map.
“This is bottom up,” she said. “This is not Washington telling any community, how to do economic development. Every community has certain strengths, maybe it’s, a certain talent pool, maybe it’s, I don’t know tourism, maybe it’s a certain kind of skill set, maybe it’s a certain technical know how. So each community wants to build on those strengths, and then use our funds to kind of supercharge those efforts.”
Money will be available almost immediately especially for communities impacted by a lack of tourism because of the pandemic, Raimondo explained.
“There’s so many communities that have lost jobs because of the lack of travel and lack of tourism,” she said. “You need help yesterday and we know that.”
Raimondo also touted the $1.2 billion infrastructure bill being debated in Congress.
In 2016, when she was governor of Rhode Island, she passed “Rhode Works,” a sweeping infrastructure measure targeted at fixing Rhode Island’s roads and bridges, which then were among the worst in the nation. The cornerstone of the program was imposing tolls on truckers to pass through the state in order to fund the project.
“It was none other than Vice President Joe Biden, who traveled to Rhode island with me to stand under a crumbling bridge to say, ‘get behind this governor and let’s make this infrastructure investment happen,'” she said.
She urged Congress to pass the bill, saying that while it might seem controversial now, once communities see money being put into action, it will be seen as favorable.
“It is the right thing to do. And even if it’s controversial at the moment, we got to push it over the finish line is the American people want and deserve better infrastructure,” Raimondo told Travers. “And I promise you, it will be popular once you see the road crews out there making communities better and safer.”
The talk after Wednesday’s flurry of activity around Jan. 6 investigations was about separate partisan inquiries covering the same subject — a subject leaders of the two parties don’t see, or don’t claim to see, the same way at all.
Then there’s Rep. Liz Cheney, R-Wyo. She could perhaps be the only person standing in the way of final Jan. 6 takeaways devolving into wearying and meaningless “both sides-ism.”
Cheney’s decision to stay on the House select committee, and even back Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s rejection of two Republican members who were tapped to serve on it, is about more than a single vote, even a vote that belongs to a former member of GOP leadership.
She is also calling out her own party leader — the man favored to become the next House speaker if Republicans recapture the majority — as offering “disingenuous” rhetoric that should disqualify him from taking over any such job.
“There must be an investigation that is nonpartisan, that is sober, that is serious, that gets to the facts wherever they may lead,” Cheney told reporters.
House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy outlined questions about security shortcomings at the Capitol that made clear Republicans were looking for an escape that has them aiming at Pelosi in whatever separate probe they launch.
McCarthy and his allies also say the House-approved committee is designed to embarrass former President Donald Trump and his supporters. Trump, who months ago committed to booting Cheney out of office next year, would readily agree.
But when the select committee holds its first hearing on Tuesday, Cheney will be there. As she explores ways to make sure her presence is felt, that fact alone will give an extra dose of credibility — even bipartisanship — to the endeavor.
The RUNDOWN with Averi Harper
The White House is changing its tune on COVID-19 procedures.
The White House will now announce any official who tests positive for COVID-19 if they have had close contact with the the president, vice president, first lady or the second gentleman.
“An email from our COVID-19 operations protocol team has been sent to White House staff informing them of the official policy — that if you are in close contact with a principal, and test positive for COVID 19, your case will be disclosed to press along with any other relevant details,” said White House press secretary Jen Psaki. “We will share the name of the staffer if that individual agrees to do so; of course, we respect their privacy.”
Previously, White House officials said they would only announce cases of “commissioned officers,” or senior staff with “assistant to the President” in their title.
The marked difference came after Psaki confirmed a breakthrough case of the coronavirus in the White House.
Officials have not announced any changes to COVID-19 measures like testing or reinstating masking, but new cases at the White House make the “independence” from COVID-19 that Biden hoped would arrive by July 4 feel even more elusive.
The TIP with Alisa Wiersema
The outlook on what will happen with the national push for federal voting rights legislation is still unclear, but the issue of voter ID requirements remains a fixture in debates across state legislatures.
In a memo circulated Wednesday, Pennsylvania state Rep. Seth Grove — who also serves as the chairman of the Pennsylvania House State Government Committee — said he plans to reintroduce his state’s voting bill, H.B. 1300, which Democrat Gov. Tom Wolf vetoed earlier this month. Grove pegs his move on a Philadelphia Inquirer report that quotes Wolf indicating support for voter ID rules, despite previously citing such measures as nonstarters for advancing H.B. 1300.
The Pennsylvania Governor is the latest of several high-profile Democrats to lean into more nuanced positions on voter ID laws. Sen. Joe Manchin included voter ID requirements in his voting legislation compromise last month and was promptly backed by voting rights advocate Stacey Abrams.
Wolf previously voiced support for a handful of other provisions originally outlined in H.B. 1300, but it remains to be seen whether he will be open to renegotiating the bill after already vetoing it.
(WASHINGTON) — When the pandemic hit Alexandria, Virginia, the economic outlook was bleak.
In April 2020, the city projected a budget shortfall of up to $100 million as businesses shut down and workers lost their jobs, eliminating key revenue from sales, tourism and income taxes.
“Early on it was catastrophic for us,” Alexandria Mayor Justin Wilson told ABC News. “Every week, unfortunately, I was getting a notification from hotels, large restaurants, telling us that they were shedding workers.”
But a year later, those dire budget projections still haven’t become a reality. In fact, the city just passed its spending plan for the first tranche of $30 million in aid it had received from the federal government’s American Rescue Plan Act of 2021. The proposal includes investments in infrastructure, food assistance and a guaranteed basic income pilot program giving out $500 to about 150 families.
“We’re working on a variety of different ways to try to help our residents: food insecurity, housing insecurity [and] other efforts to ensure that they get back on their feet in the aftermath of this,” Wilson said.
It’s a story playing out from coast to coast. Thanks to generous federal relief funds, a rebound in consumer spending and stock market gains, state and local governments that had predicted economic calamity are now finding themselves flush with cash.
“So far, we are seeing that a lot of states [that] talked about how they were going to have to raise all sorts of taxes and cut all sorts of spending, and it didn’t happen,” Richard Auxier, a senior policy associate at the Tax Policy Center, told ABC News.
Auxier said that while it’s too soon to say that states are out of the woods, federal support has helped keep them afloat during the pandemic.
The American Rescue Plan Act passed in March included $350 billion in direct aid to state, local and tribal governments. A Treasury Department spokesperson told ABC News about $200 billion of that funding has already been paid out.
Unlike the previous two COVID-19 relief laws, there are fewer restrictions on how states can use the money, which must be obligated by 2024 and spent by 2026.
“By the time the third major piece of legislation came around in 2021, there was a big desire to give them that freedom, to have some slack on how they want to spend it,” Auxier said.
President Joe Biden is now urging some cities to use some of the funds toward fighting crime — for example, by paying overtime to police officers.
The Cherokee Nation is receiving $1.8 billion from the American Rescue Plan Act as well. Principal Chief Chuck Hoskin Jr. told ABC News the funding is going toward $2,000 stimulus checks for every resident, as well as investments in mental health, broadband internet and a new hospital.
“The number one plan was to get relief directly to our citizens,” Hoskin told ABC News.
In the meantime, 13 Republican state attorneys general are suing the Biden administration because they want to use the federal aid to fund tax cuts, which is one of the few restrictions under the current law.
“It’s not a matter for the federal government to decide Arkansas’s own tax structure,” Arkansas Attorney General Leslie Rutledge told ABC News. “That’s where the federal government’s overreaching.”
In Maryland, Comptroller Peter Franchot established a working group to determine where the federal money has been going. He said the funding has been a “game-changer” that it helped the state avoid bankruptcy. But he added that it’s clear some of the money isn’t going to the hardest-hit communities that need it the most.
“Some of it will be well spent, [but] a lot of it probably won’t be,” Franchot told ABC News. “That’s the nature of having a fire hydrant of cash come into the state suddenly.”
(TARRANT, Al.) — An Alabama city council member is facing calls to resign after he used a racist slur while pointing toward a Black colleague during a meeting Monday night.
John “Tommy” Bryant stood up and pointed at Black council member Veronica Freeman and said, “Do we have a house N-word in here? Would she please stand up?” during the council meeting.
Video of the meeting was shared on the Tarrant, Alabama, Facebook page. The clip shows audience members at the council meeting audibly gasping in response to his use of the slur.
Freeman was later seen sobbing with her head in her hands before stepping out.
Bryant said that his use of the slur was to reflect something Tarrant Mayor Wayman Newton, who is Black, allegedly said during an earlier private meeting.
“He doesn’t need to use that term in front of everybody, and I thought the city ought to know the kind of terminology the mayor uses, and I didn’t want him to get away with it. So that’s the reason I made that comment,” Bryant said in a Tuesday interview with local news station WVTM-TV.
“He said it in a derogatory manner, I said it so people would know what the mayor said,” Bryant added. “The mayor was being derogatory toward Veronica Freeman when he said that.”
When asked if he was racist, Bryant said, “It’s according to what your definition of the word racist is. What a lot of the public’s definition is, I might be a racist. But according to what the true definition of a racist is, absolutely not.”
Bryant and Freeman did not immediately respond to ABC News’ request for comment.
Newton, who was sworn in as mayor in November, did not respond to ABC News’ request but told Alabama Local News on Tuesday, “The video speaks for itself.”
Newton denied ever using the racial slur in reference to Freeman on Wednesday, telling ALN, “They are trying to expose me for saying something I did not say. All of that was a political stunt that they did not do very well.”
Alabama Democrats demanded Bryant resign after the outburst, saying in a statement, “He is racist and unfit to serve.”
“Alabama still has a long way to go when it comes to race, but cozying up to the KKK and using the N-word should make you unfit to serve. These racists belong in the history books with Bull Connor and George Wallace, not on the taxpayer’s payroll,” the statement added.
Alabama Republican Party Chairman John Wahl said Bryant’s behavior “is completely unacceptable in any setting,” but didn’t mention if he believed he should resign.
“The Alabama Republican Party is deeply troubled by the racially charged outburst and disrespect shown by Councilman Tommy Bryant. Such language is completely unacceptable in any setting, and even more concerning coming from an elected official,” Wahl said to ALN.
(WASHINGTON) — Senate Democrats on Wednesday lost a key test vote to allow a bipartisan infrastructure deal to advance — after Republicans involved in the talks say they needed more time to finalize details before helping Democrats meet the Senate’s 60-vote threshold to start debate on the bill.
While Majority Leader Chuck Schumer’s effort failed — handing him and President Joe Biden at least a temporary political loss on a top priority — the White House earlier Wednesday the president was “extremely supportive” of Schumer’s strategy aimed at jump starting negotiations on the measure that would spend $1.2 trillion on “traditional infrastructure.”
The partisan defeat, by a vote of 49 to 51, belied the comity behind the scenes as a bipartisan group of 11 senators works feverishly behind the scenes to finalize the terms of their package to fund major public works projects, from bridges and highways to public transit and broadband.
“This vote is not a deadline to have every final detail worked out. It is not an attempt to jam anyone,” Schumer said on the Senate floor Wednesday morning.
“According to the negotiators, spurred on by this vote this afternoon –- they are close to finalizing their product,” he argued. “Even Republicans have agreed that the deadline has moved them forward more quickly. We all want the same thing here – to pass a bipartisan infrastructure bill. But in order to finish the bill, we first need to start.”
Key Republican negotiators in the bipartisan group of senators who have been trying to work out the deal say they believe they can finalize it by Monday.
“We are making tremendous progress, and I hope that the majority leader will reconsider and just delay the vote until Monday. That’s not a big ask of him,” GOP Sen. Susan Collins of Maine told reporters Monday morning.
The group huddled over Mexican food and wine behind closed doors for over two hours late Tuesday night, but left without squaring all of their differences on how to pay for package.
Schumer, the Republicans say, is well-aware of their position that waiting until next week to hold a vote would heighten the chances of success.
Sen. Mitt Romney, R-Utah, told reporters Wednesday afternoon that 10 Republicans have signed a letter to Schumer indicating that they are prepared to support taking up the bill on Monday.
He said it was his understanding that “Leader Schumer wanted to understand if there were ten Republicans in favor of getting on the bill, and we’ve indicated, Yeah, there are ten. Probably more.”
Negotiators said Tuesday that there are about six remaining issues with the bipartisan bill, the thorniest of which is how to structure spending on public transit systems.
At the same time, the senior lawmaker expects the legislation to be finalized by Monday, and that includes the nonpartisan analyses by various agencies breaking down all of the financing options, how much revenue would be produced, and a final price tag.
Republicans, in particular, will be looking to show that the $579 billion in new spending is fully paid for.
If the vote seems certain to fail, Schumer could switch his vote to the losing side at the last minute, enabling him as majority leader, under Senate rules, to call up the vote again for reconsideration.
The Wednesday vote is to start debate on a shell bill because there is no final bill from the negotiators. It would serve as a placeholder should negotiators strike a final deal.
The measure is separate from a much larger bill Biden and Democrats are pushing that would spend $3.5 trillion on so-called “human infrastructure” such as child care.
Democrats plan to push that through the Senate with no Republican votes, using a budget tool called “reconciliation.”
(WASHINGTON) — America’s top general on Wednesday spoke publicly for the first time about whether he feared then-President Donald Trump would try to involve the military in the aftermath of the 2020 election, as reported in a newly-released book.
While Joint Chiefs Chairman Mark Milley, at a rare Pentagon news conference, declined to comment on specific claims made in the book, he and Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin Wednesday were emphatic that the military is and ought to remain a strictly “apolitical” institution.
“I, the other members of the Joint Chiefs, and all of us in uniform, we take an oath, an oath to a document, an oath to the Constitution of the United States, and not one time do we violate that,” Milley told reporters asking about the book excerpts. “The entire time, from time of commissioning to today, I can say with certainty that every one of us maintained our oath of allegiance to that document, the Constitution, everything that’s contained within it,” he said, referring to the Joint Chiefs.
“I want you to know, and I want everyone to know, I want America to know, that the United States military is an apolitical institution — we were then, we are now — and our oath is to the Constitution, not to any individual at all,” he said. “And the military did not and will not and should not ever get involved in domestic politics. We don’t arbitrate elections. That’s the job of the judiciary and the legislature and the American people. It is not the job of the U.S. military. We stayed out of politics, we’re an apolitical institution.”
Austin went out of his way to defend Milley.
“We fought together, we served a couple of times in the same units,” Austin said. “I’m not guessing at his character — he doesn’t have political bone in his body.”
Before the Jan. 6 riot at the Capitol, Milley saw ominous parallels between the political turmoil in the United States and the rise of the Nazi party in Germany, according to “I Alone Can Fix It: Donald J. Trump’s Final Catastrophic Year,” by Washington Post reporters Philip Rucker and Carol Leonnig.
“He had earlier described to aides that he kept having a stomach-churning feeling that some of the worrisome early stages of 20th-century fascism in Germany were replaying in 21st-century America. He saw parallels between Trump’s rhetoric about election fraud and Adolf Hitler’s insistence to his followers at the Nuremberg rallies that he was both a victim and their savior. ‘This is a Reichstag moment,’ Milley told aides. ‘The gospel of the Führer,'” Rucker and Leonnig wrote.
The authors say that Milley believed Trump was stoking unrest after the election, and decried what he called “brownshirts in the streets,” although an official told ABC News the comment was in reference to the radical members of the Oath Keepers and so-called “boogaloo boys,” not Trump supporters in general.
An early sign of unease between Trump and Milley came last July amid Black Lives Matter protests in Washington, D.C., when Milley apologized for taking part in Trump’s controversial walk from the White House to St. John’s Church, though he peeled off before the president’s notorious photo opportunity.
“I should not have been there,” Milley said in a prerecorded video commencement address to National Defense University. “My presence in that moment and in that environment created a perception of the military involved in domestic politics.”
In August 2020, Milley told Congress there is no role for the U.S. military in elections.
Then in January 2021, after the Capitol riot, Milley and the seven other members of the Joint Chiefs of Staff signed an internal memo to service members saying “the violent riot in Washington D.C. on January 6, 2021 was a direct assault on the U.S. Capitol building, and our Constitutional process,” warning them that any act to disrupt the constitutional process is against the law.
Milley said Wednesday that he and the other members of the Joint Chiefs always gave the “best military professional advice” to Trump and any other president they’ve served under.
“We always adhered to providing best professional military advice, bar none. It was candid, honest, in every single occasion. We do that all the time every time,” he said.
