Not even a month after the show premiered, Peacock has given the green light to Rian Johnson’s stylish, star-packed mystery series Poker Face.
The show centers on Natasha Lyonne’s Charlie Cale, who is blessed — or possibly cursed — with the ability to tell if someone is lying. Her skills take her on the road, where she finds colorful characters and untangles strange crimes.
The show premiered on January 26 and this season features a who’s who of Hollywood in guest roles, from Oscar winner Adrien Brody, and Academy Award nominees Nick Nolte and Everything Everywhere‘s Stephanie Hsu to Tony winners Cherry Jones and Judith Light,and comedian and Free Guy actor Lil Rel Howery.
Thursday, February 16, will see the eighth episode drop on the streaming service; it was directed and co-written by Lyonne.
Poker Face‘s creator, Knives Out Oscar nominee Rian Johnson, explains the appeal of Lyonne’s character and the show: “It has that kind of world-wise sort of little edge … Charlie Cale’s a character that really likes people, that genuinely has kind of like an openness and a sunniness to her. And I think the combination of those two things, it’s a little chocolate and peanut butter. I think they go together and it creates this character that I want to just keep watching.”
Peacock has renewed a slate of original shows this year, including Pitch Perfect: Bumper in Berlin, Bel-Air, Killing It, Dr. Death, We Are Lady Parts and Wolf Like Me.
(WASHINGTON) — President Joe Biden’s pick to head the Internal Revenue Service appeared to quell some GOP criticism at his confirmation hearing Wednesday by promising to restore trust in the troubled agency.
Through three hours of questioning before the Senate Finance Committee for what chairman Ron Wyden, D-Ore., called “one of the more challenging and least popular jobs in town,” Daniel Werfel confirmed his backing of Biden’s desire to target high income taxpayers and reaffirmed Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen’s promise to not increase audit rates for small businesses and households making under $400,000.
“If I am fortunate enough to be confirmed, the audit and compliance priorities will be focused on enhancing IRS’ capabilities to ensure that America’s highest earners comply with applicable tax law,” Werfel said.
Werfel’s nomination comes amid intense GOP scrutiny of the IRS, which received a significant funding boost through the Inflation Reduction Act, passed by Congress in August. That funding, Treasury Department officials say will be used mostly for improving taxpayer services and modernizing antiquated, paper-based IRS operations.
“Also front and center will be efforts to modernize and dramatically improve taxpayer service. If confirmed, I will lead these efforts in close collaboration with this committee and will be unyielding in following my ‘true north’ — to increase the public trust, unheralded effective implementation of our taxes and do anything necessary to fund critical government services,” he said.
“My understanding is the focus is to hire people with understanding and capacity and talent to unpack very complicated, intricate returns, which is a capacity gap that exists today,” he said.
Werfel, a 51-year-old business consultant who has previously held a number of government jobs in both Republican and Democratic administrations, also committed during the hearing to releasing a plan for spending the IRS’s recent funding increase — about $80 billion over the next 10 years.
The IRS is required to submit a plan, which Werfel has not been involved in writing, to Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen by Friday on how it plans to spend the funds.
Werfel said the committee and members of the public would be able to connect the dollars from the IRA to the various activities and investments in the plan.
He also reaffirmed that as IRS commissioner, he’d commit to not increasing tax audit rates on small businesses and households making less than $400,000 per year, something Yellen confirmed in a letter to the former IRS commissioner shared with Congress last year.
GOP opponents of the IRA have claimed funding will be used to hire 87,000 new agents in order to target middle-class Americans and small business
In his first speech to the 118th Congress, newly-elected House Speaker Kevin McCarthy promised: “our very first bill will repeal the funding for 87,000 new IRS agents.” Days later, House Republicans voted to do just that, though Treasury Department officials and documents verify the claim is false.
Democratic Sen. Catherine Cortez-Masto of Nevada asked Werfel directly at Wednesday’s hearing if he planned on using 87,000 new agents to audit Americans.
“I am not. I think it’s patently incorrect,” he said, ading that the “notion of armed agents” — another GOP claim debunked by Treasury officials — also is incorrect.
“I certainly would have no intention of making that part of any plan going forward.”
Werfel also spent part of Wednesday’s hearing addressing additional GOP skepticism of the agency, which Sen. James Lankford, R-Okla., said has been leveled to “silence conservative voices” and engages in unnecessary intrusion of the public.
GOP committee members referenced a ProPublica project called the Secret IRS Files — a series of stories on the tax avoidance techniques of the ultra-wealthy based on tax information provided directly by the IRS.
Sen. John Thune, R-S.D., asked: “There still hasn’t been any, you know, accountability on the leak … would you take steps to ensure that that kind of confidential tax information, the one that the breaches, there’s accountability there and to that it doesn’t happen again?”
Werfel said that maintaining data security would be a “top priority,” especially in reaching his goal of garnering additional public trust in the agency.
“Data security is a top priority. I don’t know how to build trust with the public when there’s a sense that there’s there’s risk material risk of unauthorized disclosures,” he said.
“So, one of the things that I will absolutely do is work with the inspector general to understand what did they see as the risks any specific action or activity that’s taken place have been investigated–what are the root causes … if there are their corrective actions because if there are, we will make them.”
Nominated to replace Charles Rettig, an IRS commissioner selected by President Donald Trump, Werfel is expected to glide towards a bipartisan confirmation vote.
“I intend to support your confirmation, incidentally” said Sen. Thom Tillis, R-N.C., during his questioning of Werfel.
Wyden ended the hearing saying he expects to move Werfel’s nomination quickly after the Senate returns from its Presidents Day break.
(WASHINGTON) — With her announcement this week that she is running for president, Nikki Haley has made a bit of history again — becoming the first prominent woman of color to seek the Republican nomination.
With Vice President Kamala Harris presumed to be President Joe Biden’s running mate if he announces a second run, as he has said he will, it’s possible that both major political parties in America could simultaneously have a woman on their ticket for the first time. And both would be South Asian, specifically of Indian descent — which observers called a massive feat considering the community makes up only about 1% of the country’s population and produced two recent political stars.
“This is absolutely a moment,” Sara Sadhwani, an assistant professor of politics at Pomona College and co-author of the Indian American Election Survey, told ABC News. “We see South Asians who have largely been on the outskirts of American politics in many ways. This is a moment where we’re seeing South Asians step into the limelight.”
That representation began at the national level more than half a century ago, when Dalip Singh Saund led a push to change immigration laws so he and other Indians could become citizens. He then became the first Asian American, first South Asian and first Sikh in Congress, in 1956.
There are now five South Asians in Congress, often referred to as “the Samosa Caucus.”
“Since 2016, we’ve quintupled our representation in Congress and gone from 12 to 43 in state legislatures. Over that same period of time, our population has not multiplied the same way,” said Neil Makhija, the executive director of the Indian American Impact, an organization that helps South Asians run for elected office. “Once people start running, it shows that it’s possible.”
When it comes to world leaders, University of California, Riverside, public policy professor Karthick Ramakrishnan points to Rishi Sunak, whose parents are of Indian descent, as someone who represents how fast a community can advance — considering the British ruled India until 1947. “One generation,” Ramakrishnan said, “Someone who is the child of the empire is now the prime minister of Britain.”
Nearly one-fourth of the world’s population lives in South Asia and many of the countries within it — India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Nepal and Sri Lanka — have all already had women prime ministers or presidents.
“[Women leading countries] is not something that’s necessarily out of the norm of the cultures from which a lot of these people are coming from,” said Maneesh Arora, an assistant professor of political science at Wellesley College.
Harris’ maternal grandfather, P.V. Gopalan, worked to fight for the country’s independence from Britain and she’s spoken about her parents taking her in a stroller to political protests in the ’60s. Haley wrote in her autobiography that her mom, Raj Randhawa, studied law and was offered the first female judgeship in India, although Haley said her own family blocked it because she was a woman.
“They grew up in households where public service was not looked down upon. … Plenty of Indian Americans grew up in households where it was about becoming a doctor or engineer,” Ramakrishnan said.
Harris, who ran for president in 2020 before being selected as Biden’s vice president, and now Haley are testing what it means to pursue success at the highest levels of American politics.
Haley is not the first woman of color to seek the GOP nod: Angel Joy Chavis Rocker, a Black school counselor in Florida, ran in the 2000 campaign. But Haley is the most notable non-white conservative woman to ever enter the race.
Her campaign did not comment for this story.
What Haley has said about her heritage
Haley was born Nimrata Nikki Randhawa to Punjabi Sikh parents who emigrated from India in the 1960s. She has said that early on she adopted her middle name, which means “little one” in Punjabi, as her first name and later took on her husband’s last name as her own.
Haley was raised Sikh and has publicly talked about converting to Christianity, once saying the language barrier was what ultimately led to her decision to convert. “At some point, you have to understand the words …. Christianity spoke to me,” she previously said while adding, “It wasn’t political.” She explained to The New York Times in 2012: “We always said ‘no’ when my mom was trying to teach us Punjabi. Now I wish we had learned, but that is why I think I made the transition.”
She joined a Methodist church with her husband but has said she continues visiting the Sikh temple with family.
But for some South Asians, the conversation about Haley rarely gets past her name or religion.
“Her example would reflect the kind of assimilationism that most Indian Americans — most South Asians — actually don’t do. They don’t change their name and they don’t convert their religion,” Ramakrishnan said.
In 2001, Haley also listed her race as “white” on her voter registration card, according to The Post and Courier. At the time, a spokesman for her declined to comment and state Republicans suggested the issue was a stunt because it had been uncovered by Democrats, who criticized her as disingenuous.
Dr. Hajar Yazhida, a University of Southern California assistant professor in sociology and faculty affiliate at their equity research institution, told ABC News that being able to have racial ambiguity has had a massive impact for both the vice president and Haley — especially on Haley’s journey. (Harris’ father is Black, from Jamaica; her mother was born in Chennai, India.)
“We might look at Kamala Harris on one side and Nikki Haley on the other and wonder how it is that two South Asian women ended up as political front-runners? But we have to remember that neither of the candidates are socially read as South Asian women,” Yazhida argued.
But Ramakrishnan said even being able to “claim” an identity is something unique to living in the United States — and something that most politicians do in some way: “We all have different aspects of our identity that we activate. … Given the context, people code-switch all the time.”
Haley has seen prejudice — even from fellow politicians.
During a runoff election for a state legislative seat in South Carolina, an opponent published ads referring to her as “Nimrata N. Randhawa” and sent out mailers with her standing with her dad in his turban.
When she was running for governor in 2010, a South Carolina state senator called her and then-President Barack Obama a “raghead.”
Haley has touched on some of the struggles her family faced. “I am the proud daughter of Indian immigrants. They came to America and settled in a small southern town. My father wore a turban. My mother wore a sari. I was a brown girl in a black and white world,” she said at the 2020 Republican National Convention. “We faced discrimination and hardship, but my parents never gave into grievance and hate.”
The NAACP also pointed to then-Gov. Haley’s heritage in 2011 when criticizing South Carolina for flying the Confederate flag at the Statehouse for nearly half a century. In 2015, in the wake of the fatal shooting of nine Black people at Charleston’s Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church, Haley urged the flag to be removed and state Republicans quickly agreed.
Haley’s politics differ from most in the community
Pomona College professor Sadhwani said South Asians really want to support other South Asians, regardless of party. But the data she has collected on Haley appears to be an exception. “Haley’s unfavorable score is 55% in our sample,” Sadhwani said. This could be in part because many South Asian people identify as Democrats, data shows.
Former President Donald Trump wasn’t able to capture the South Asian vote either — but he tried. In 2019, he held a “Howdy Modi!” rally with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi that attracted thousands and filmed an ad where he attempted to speak in Hindi.
That got him ahead with the group — but not by enough. “Trump made inroads among Indian American voters between 2016 and 2020. He still lost the Indian American vote,” said professor Ramakrishnan.
Biden and Harris have focused on South Asians and the Indian community as well, with Biden releasing an agenda for the Indian American community prior to the 2020 election and both him and the vice president including cultural celebrations as part of administration events.
Numbers illustrate how Asian American voters, and Indian voters, can be influential. According to AAPI Data, an organization that publishes demographic data and research, in 2018 there were an estimated 161,000 eligible Indian voters in Texas, 87,000 in Florida, 61,000 in Pennsylvania, 57,000 in Georgia and 45,000 in Michigan.
Major contests in those states, including the 2020 and 2016 presidential elections, have all recently been decided by smaller margins.
And the community is fast growing. In the last two decades, for example, the Indian population in the U.S. has doubled to about 4.6 million in 2019, according to the Pew Research Center.
Roughly 70% of Indian voters in America leaned Democratic as of 2022, according to AAPI Data. That’s more than Latinos but less than African Americans. Some of the reasons include religion, extensive training in science and living in a post-9/11 world.
In one of his most notable — and controversial — promises as a presidential candidate, Trump said he would block Muslims from entering the U.S. At the time, Haley appeared to distance herself from such a policy. Delivering the Republicans’ official 2016 State of the Union response, she said that America should resist following the “angriest voices” and welcome “properly vetted legal immigrants, regardless of their race or religion.”
According to AAPI Data, more than three-fourths of Indians and the majority of Asian voters overall voted for Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton over Trump in 2016, a finding that echoes other exit polling. Haley went on to join Trump’s administration, leaving some in her own community wondering how strongly she felt about what she had said just 12 months before.
Sangay Mishra, an associate professor of political science at Drew University and the author of “Desi’s Divided: The Political Lives of South Asian Americans,” said the vast majority of the South Asian community feels strongly about issues like abortion rights, restricting guns and critical race theory.
“In politics it’s hard to predict how the community will react. But it’s clear it doesn’t align with how she thinks,” Mishra said.
‘An opportunity for Haley’
But can Haley align South Asian donors?
Indian Americans have the highest levels of income in the country, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor and Statistics, a feat that’s often connected to the 1960s when the U.S. specifically engineered a demographic of highly professional immigrants. (Harris and Haley have something else in common that researchers said is powerful — they are byproducts of this era, with both of their parents coming to America around this time.)
An analysis done by The Los Angeles Times a few months into the 2020 Democratic primary race found that despite Indian Americans being a small demographic, they had donated more than $3 million to presidential campaigns — more than people in Hollywood.
Mishra told ABC News he created a list of major bundlers during the Obama administration and the number of South Asian names was a fairly big list compared to the population. “They were overwhelmingly going for the Democratic Party,” he said.
“What has not been noticed is this growth of a segment of Indian Americans who are affluent, and that goes back to the character of the community,” Mishra said.
Data from FiveThirtyEight details just the donations that South Asians made to other South Asian candidates running for House or Senate seats from 2000-2020. The numbers, especially for Democratic candidates, have exploded.
Haley’s former spokesperson Rob Godfrey said he remembered her being embraced by such donors while running in South Carolina. “Members of the South Asian community, members of the Indian community, have always been traditionally Democratic,” he acknowledged. “But when Nikki ran for governor, there was no shortage of support for her from the South Asian and Indian communities because they had a lot of great pride in her candidacy … she very much enjoyed the support of them within the state and they were very generous contributors to her campaign, from New Jersey to Chicago to California to Texas.”
Sadwani said that when it comes to South Asians though, her research showed that the numbers won’t be enough to tip the scale.
Haley’s announcement video, on Tuesday, highlighted her heritage and her optimistic vision of a society unencumbered by racial division.
“I was the proud daughter of Indian immigrants,” Haley said in her video, adding: “My mom would always say, ‘Your job is not to focus on the differences but the similarities.'”
Sadwani said that message isn’t for the South Asian community — it’s for everyone else.
“We’re talking more conservative-leaning Latinos, other Asian Americans and even plenty of of non-immigrant voters who are completely opposed to the age old story of the United States being a place that welcomes immigrants and might be disenchanted by the overt racial commentary, the negative stereotypes of a Trump administration, even while supporting many of the Trump-based policies,” Sadwani said. “I think this becomes an opportunity for Haley.”
NLE Choppa is gearing up for the release of “Ain’t Gonna Answer,” his collaboration with Lil Wayne. He announced the song on Instagram Tuesday, noting the project will drop on February 24.
NLE Choppa’s announcement captioned a Valentine’s Day dump, which featured photos and clips from what appears to be the set of the “Ain’t Gonna Answer” music video. In one clip, Choppa gifts Wayne some flowers and a note in which he expressed his appreciation.
“I simply wanted to physically gift you these flowers to symbolize my appreciation for you as an artist, an icon, and more importantly, an inspiration,” he wrote in the message. “I pray that this is just the beginning to a big brother, little brother relationship. With that being said, I want to say THANK YOU wholeheartedly.”
Wayne received the gift, calling Choppa “a good guy.”
“He’s a good guy, man, for real,” he says. “I do this a lot. This doesn’t happen, he’s a great guy.”
(WARRINGTON, U.K) — Two teens have been charged in the death of Brianna Ghey, a transgender girl found dead in the English town of Warrington.
Emergency services were called to a local park Feb. 11 when Ghey’s body was found on a path, authorities said. She was pronounced dead at the scene.
A 15-year-old boy and a 15-year-old girl were initially arrested and questioned by the Cheshire Constabulary police force and were later charged with murder Wednesday.
Police say it is unclear if the circumstances surrounding her death are hate-related, but the investigation into a motive is ongoing.
“A number of enquiries in relation to this incident are underway and we are doing all that we can to establish the exact circumstances of what has happened,” said Detective Chief Superintendent Mike Evans in a statement.
Ghey was described by her family as “a larger than life character who would leave a lasting impression on all that met her.”
“Brianna was a much loved daughter, granddaughter, and baby sister,” her family said in a statement. “Brianna was beautiful, witty and hilarious. Brianna was strong, fearless and one of a kind.”
Ghey was a popular personality on social media, with thousands of followers on Instagram and TikTok.
Candlelight vigils continue to be held across the U.K. – from Glasgow, Scotland to Dublin, Ireland – as the transgender community honors and grieves Ghey’s memory and life.
“The loss of her young life has left a massive hole in our family, and we know that the teachers and her friends who were involved in her life will feel the same,” Ghey’s family said.
Survivor keyboardist Frankie Sullivan, who co-wrote the band’s hit single “Eye of the Tiger,” is not happy that former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley used the band’s hit track this week as she walked out to announce her run for the Republican Party’s presidential nomination.
Sullivan tells Billboard that his initial reaction when he discovered she used the tune was, “Stop using my f***ing song!”
“That song belongs with the Rocky franchise and they don’t ask because they’d get a no. Absolutely,” he said.
“Eye of the Tiger” was the theme song to Rocky III, starring Sylvester Stallone, and went to number one for the band in 1982. In 2016 Sullivan sued Republican Mike Huckabee’s presidential campaign for using the song at a rally without permission; Huckabee had to pay $25,000.
“I don’t care who it is, I don’t think it’s appropriate, especially with ‘Tiger,’ since it’s such a special song,” he said. “I have no idea why any politician would play that as a walk on. I would say you have to have balls … but in this situation that doesn’t apply.”
Finally, he notes, “I wish they would just stop this nonsense!”
In a career full of awards and accolades, Sting has received one that really stands out.
Sting has been made a Fellow of The Ivors Academy, the body that presents The Ivor Novello Awards. These awards, which have been handed out since 1956, are the most prestigious music honor in the United Kingdom. They celebrate excellence in British and Irish songwriting, and are peer awards, voted on by other British and Irish songwriters and composers.
Sting has won seven Ivor Novello Awards, including a 2002 Lifetime Achievement Trophy, but being made an Academy Fellow is a bigger deal than that. In its 79-year history, the academy has only inducted 22 Fellows, including Paul McCartney, Kate Bush, Elton John, Peter Gabriel, the members of the Bee Gees and Annie Lennox.
“Of all the awards in the world of music, The Ivors are for me, the most prestigious. Songwriting is a skilled craft and The Ivors Academy are its guild,” Sting says in a statement. “So, I am delighted and honored to be offered this Fellowship of the Academy, joining and acknowledging this extraordinary group of fellow songwriters, and all of those who went before us.”
In honor of the, well, honor, Amazon Music — the award ceremony’s new title sponsor — has released an exclusive demo version of “If It’s Love,” a song from Sting’s most recent album, The Bridge.
The winners of this year’s Ivor Novello Awards will be announced May 18 in London. Nominations come out in April.
As has been established in Hoobastank‘s hit single “The Reason,” frontman Doug Robb is not a perfect person. Apparently, one of his imperfections is not being able to predict Rihanna would become a giant music star.
Perhaps inspired by the “Umbrella” artist’s headline-making halftime performance at Super Bowl LVII, Robb revealed in a tweet, “There is a version of a @Hoobastank song featuring @rihanna when she was a ‘newer’ artist.”
“Displaying a total lack of foresight, we didn’t use that version of the song for the album,” Robb added.
Robb has since revealed to Consequence that the song in question was “Inside of You,” a single off Hoobastank’s 2006 album, Every Man for Himself.
“We gave [Rihanna’s] camp a song called ‘Inside of You,'” Robb shares. “I think they rearranged some of the music to create a pre-chorus section, that wasn’t originally part of the arrangement, for her to sing a small part on.”
“We heard it and didn’t really love it so we passed on using it,” he continues. “It’s really just that simple. I think we had already gotten used to hearing the song as it was written so it just felt weird to us.”
Further cementing the idea that trying to predict anything in the music industry is a losing battle, Robb wrote in his initial tweet, “We also didn’t think ‘The Reason’ was a single though either so…Oops.”
The 2023 NBA All-Star Game halftime show will be an Afrobeats jam session featuring Burna Boy, Tems and Rema. The Nigerian stars were tapped to entertain fans at Sunday’s game in Salt Lake, Utah.
Also taking the stage is Post Malone, who will be kicking off the show with a medley of his hits. Jewel will sing the national anthem as Vin Diesel introduces the NBA All-Stars.
The All-Star Game, which will honor all-time leading scorer LeBron James, airs at 8 p.m. ET on TNT. In the days leading up to the game, the league will host a myriad of activities, including the star-studded celebrity basketball game featuring Janelle Monáe, 21 Savage, Cordae and more.
(WASHINGTON) — Under political pressure from Democrats as well as Republicans, President Joe Biden is considering giving a speech in the coming days to address the Chinese spy balloon and the three other shot-down objects, two senior administration officials confirmed ABC News on Wednesday.
The White House is eying the days before Biden departs for his trip to Poland for the potential balloon remarks. He is scheduled to depart for that trip, during which he’ll mark the one-year anniversary of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, on Monday, Feb. 20.
The deliberations over the speech were first reported by Reuters.
The president has yet to extensively address the Chinese spy balloon shot down on Feb. 4 or the three unidentified objects taken down over North American airspace this past weekend.
Lawmakers on both sides of the aisle have urged Biden to address the matter more thoroughly.
“The American people need and deserve to know more,” Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., told reporters Tuesday upon exiting a classified briefing for all senators.
“There is a lot of information presented to us this morning that could be told to the American people without any harm to sources or methods or our national security and the American people need to know more so they’ll have more confidence in our national security,” Blumenthal added.
Sen. Roger Marshall, R-Ky., also called on Biden to “get in front of America and tell them firsthand that we’re safe.”
“The administration needs to be more transparent and, by the way, that was a bipartisan view down there,” Sen. Dan Sullivan, R-Alaska, added.
Biden’s first public comment on the Chinese spy balloon came on the day it was shot down, when he told reporters hours before the mission, “We’re going to take care of it.”
After it was taken down over the Atlantic Ocean off South Carolina, Biden told reporters he ordered the Pentagon shoot the balloon as soon as possible and he complimented the aviators that carried out the operation.
He’s since only addressed it briefly a handful of times, including a passing reference at the State of the Union when he said, “Make no mistake about it, as we made clear last week, if China threatens our sovereignty, we will act to protect our country and we did.”
During an interview with Noticias Telemundo anchor Julio Vaqueiro last week, Biden said the balloon “wasn’t a major breach” but was a violation of international law and U.S. airspace.
Biden has tapped national security adviser Jake Sullivan to oversee an interagency review “to study the broader policy implications for detection, analysis, and disposition of unidentified aerial objects that pose either safety or security risks,” White House spokesperson John Kirby said Monday.
That review is expected to be done by the end of this week, White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre told reporters Tuesday.
When asked whether the shooting down of the three unidentified objects warranted a national address, Jean-Pierre said Biden “takes this very seriously” and noted he’s been briefed multiple times on the incidents.
Kirby also defended the administration Monday amid the silence from Biden on the three successive shootdowns.
“We have been, I think, as transparent as we can be,” Kirby said. “I won’t speak for the president’s personal speaking schedule, but, I mean, he has been deeply engaged in every one of these decisions.”
