Dance With The One That Brought You-- BERNIE! But Brace, NPR Will Red-Bait Your Dance Card

Bernie 2020 by Nancy Ohanian

by Skip Kaltenheuser

Dance with the one that brought you-- BERNIE! As Bernie changed the national dialogue on critical issues and transformed large swaths of the Democratic Party, that’s my bid for his slogan.

It won’t be NPR’s. NPR political reporting isn’t evolving, it’s devolving, already tipping its hand that it’s out to sink Bernie, as it did its best to in 2016, taking every opportunity then to slip in the knives of Hillary talking points. When Bernie announced last week, I heard a public radio newscaster remind us that Bernie ran in 2016, winning several primaries. Several? Somebody must have jumped him, I didn’t hear that repeated. Now something more insidious than dopey has come along.

A friend, Elliott Negin, knows the treacherous territory of Washington. You can catch samples of his splendid insights, for the Union of Concerned Scientists here, and for the Huff Post here.

After hearing this politics segment on NPR’s Weekend Edition Saturday, Elliott wrote a social media post I’d like to share:

DID NPR REDBAIT BERNIE SANDERS THIS MORNING?

I just sent this email to host Scott Simon and reporter Ron Elving:

Ron and Scott: In a two-way between the two of you this morning, Ron confused socialism with communism.

Referencing Bernie Sanders announcing his presidential bid, Ron said: "The phrase democratic socialist that Sanders uses a lot-- that has quite a few fans, especially among younger voters, who seem to take this word socialist in stride. Older voters still remember the years when to be a socialist was to be on the wrong side of the Cold War in many people's minds. And voters of all ages will be taking part in those primaries and caucuses starting in less than a year."

Older voters still remember the years when a COMMUNIST was to be on the wrong side of the Cold War, not a socialist. Sanders' socialism has nothing to do with the Soviet Union or China and everything to do with the social democracies of Europe and Canada.

In the mid- to late-1980s, I was the editor of Nuclear Times, a peace and disarmament magazine that covered the Cold War face-off between the United States and the Soviet Union, and we would never call the USSR a "socialist" country. Sweden, da. Russia, nyet. After my stint at Nuclear Times, I joined the NPR foreign desk as an editor.

Either you guys don't know your history or you are deliberately redbaiting Sanders.

Unfortunately other reporters and columnists have done the same thing. In October 2015, for example, the Washington Post ran a front page story on Sanders that included this passage:

"Twenty-four years after the end of the Cold War, many Americans no longer associate socialism with fear or missiles-- or with failure, food lines or empty Soviet supermarkets. A word that their elders saw as a slur had become a blank, open for Sanders to define."

I wrote a letter to the editor to correct the record, pointing out that the "Soviet system of government was communism, not socialism." My letter went on to explain that the residents of social democracies in Europe and Canada on average fare better than Americans.

It is critical for news organizations to accurately define what Sanders is talking about when he says that he is a democratic socialist, especially since President Trump and other Republicans are now associating socialism with the debacle in Venezuela.

It's shocking that NPR could get this wrong. I expect more from you guys.

Analyze the points packed into the Sanders portion of the NPR segment below and the packaged propaganda shines through.

SIMON: Senator Bernie Sanders entered the 2020 race for president this week - I think $6 million he raised within 48 hours or something. But he touched off a recurrent question about if he's really a Democrat in all ways, maybe. This week, he refused to call Nicolas Maduro a dictator.

Everyone knows Bernie raised nearly 6 million, mostly small contributions, in 24 hours, with 600 grand of that in monthly pledges. Except Simon, who waters that impressive feat down, to “forty-eight hours or something.” Then he trots out the murky strawman of whether Bernie’s “really a democrat in all ways, maybe.” Simon elevates that to “a recurrent question”, nevermind Bernie’s pledge to run as a Democrat, his position in the Democratic leadership, his stumping like a circus trooper for Democratic Party candidates, and everything else in his history, not least his 2016 campaign. Simon then parrots the criticism of Floridians like Clintonite Donna Shalala that Bernie didn’t call Venezuela's Maduro a dictator, as if Bernie secretly supports Maduro. There’s no elaboration that while Bernie is not beating the drum for opening the Pandora’s Box of military intervention, he is calling for free and fair elections in Venezuela. That’s hardly a subversive position, particularly when the mouths of the slippery axis of Trump, Bolton and Abrams publicly water for Venezuela crude. But Simon won’t even attempt such basic and responsible nuance. He just lets the smear float freely.

Does Simon really believe his own bullshit, or is it flowing from an NPR edict from top down? Is Simon auditioning for Chuck Todd and his merry band of Sabbath Gasbags? Inquiring minds want to know.

And now Elving takes the cue, undermining Berne’s prospects by implying Bernie is disingenuous and only feigning to be a Democrat because he’d like to be President. And, he’s been an independent! Never mind that he always caucused with the Democrats, and be sure to ignore he’s in the Democratic leadership. Just keep up the Orwellian suggestions of uncertainty about who Bernie really is, that he’s just playing the Democrats. Does Elving think the largest group of voters, self-identified independents, will take offense at independent labels?

ELVING: You know, terminology and labels are not ultimately where people live, but they can have meaning and effect when it comes to campaigns. We certainly saw that in 2016. Sanders only calls himself a Democrat when he's seeking to be the party nominee for president. The rest of the time and in Congress, he calls himself an independent. And that may be more accurate.

Elliott already nicely addressed the red-baiting below, but also note the attempt to undercut Bernie’s prospects by driving an electorate age wedge on Bernie’s secret identity. I think much of that age wedge is a work in progress by pundits in search of a comment. If enough say it, it must be true.

The phrase "democratic socialist" that Sanders uses a lot-- that has quite a few fans, especially among younger voters, who seem to take this word socialist in stride. Older voters still remember the years when to be a socialist was to be on the wrong side of the Cold War in many people's minds. And voters of all ages will be taking part in those primaries and caucuses starting in less than a year.

Christ on a bicycle! Trump’s writers are moonlighting at NPR! They at least seem kissing cousins. Their common purpose ultimately juices the risks of getting the same result as the 2016 fiasco.

Part of Last Conversation Piece by Juan Munoz, by the Hirshhorn Museum. Its conspiratorial feel, with panicked outsiders, seems apt for Washington.

Elving caught my attention a while back when an NPR correspondent described newly elected Arizona Senator Kyrsten Sinema as a moderate. Elving went that foolishness one better, calling Sinema a progressive. As Howie has pointed out, when Sinema was in the House she had the worst voting record of any Democrat. Sinema, a bought and paid for Wall Street minion, was chair of the Blue Dogs. Would someone please explain to Ron Elving that the Blue Dogs are not a posse of progressive pooches? And perhaps NPR analysts might want to study up on the analyses of Progressive Punch, which awards Sinema an F as she battles it out with Nevada’s Jacky Rosen for worst Democrat in the Senate. Spell-check keeps changing Sinema to Cinema. Perhaps it’s right. Her image embraced by NPR is quite a show.

NPR’s bias drifts about. In December I watched a seminar, Undermining the Courts and the Media: The Consequences for American Democracy at the National Press Club. Bob Garfield, a host of NPR’s On the Media was the moderator of a panel of journalists. About five hours and eight minutes into this video, here’s Garfield. "As an institution, we are almost as equally distrusted by the Left. I mean, there is nothing quite like the lip curl of a Bernie Bro using the words mainstream media. I mean, it’s really such a sight to behold. Because obviously we are just such whores to The Man…. especially the Times, James, I mean, what does your inbox look like? …Your job is to have a diversity of opinion and balance and yet you have to deal with these sometimes quite astonishing accusations that you are just a shill for big capital or you name it.”

With his affinity for lip curls, I’m surprised Garfield didn’t just reveal Bernie as Snidley Whiplash. I’ll resist the temptation to mention the Times drumbeat to invade Iraq, its continued backing of the mythology that Clinton’s repeal of Glass-Steagall had nothing to do with the economic debacle bequeathed by bankers behaving badly, and the gatling gun Times columnists trained on Bernie during the 2016 primaries. Well, my resistance is weak.

To his credit, James Bennet, now editor of the Times editorial page, said a lot of the criticism is deserved, and that the editorial page needs to have its feet held to the fire, that it aims to have a wide variety of opinions needed while arguing its way toward the truth at a time a lot of big questions are in play, and conventional answers aren’t adequate. A number of the journalists’ comments on challenges facing journalism are worth a listen.

Is On the Media looking for topic suggestions? Probably not this one. How about a serious soul-searching on the bias of mainstream media, including NPR, specifically against Bernie during the 2016 primaries? And maybe keep an eye on it during the 2020 primary season. Have Thomas Frank on as a guest, revisiting the points he made about he Washington Post and other media coverage of the 2016 primaries in his excellent Harper’s essay, Swat Team, by Thomas. It ought to be required reading for journalism students rolling the dice that a career might await. WaPo is already preparing its editorial gauntlet for Bernie. Here’s a silly early entrant, pushing the notion that Bernie was a flash in the pan Bernie, your moment has come-- and gone. After Amazon had to pony up 15 beans an hour, is the world’s richest man running scared from Bernie?

I imagine we’ll see NPR-- including focused shows like On the Media and 1A, Speak Freely-- honestly tackle that topic about the time we’ll see in-depth coverage of the proposals for anti-boycott laws that seek to throw America’s First Amendment under the bus on behalf of a foreign power. Or for that matter, on the systematic repression, often violent and sometimes fatal, of Palestinian journalists, as the American government averts its gaze and opens its treasury to unquestioned support of Israel’s far and farther right.

Appropriately, NPR never misses the chance to mention the Saudi assassination of journalist Jamal Khashoggi. It does miss the chance to discuss the Israeli spy technology the Saudi regime uses to monitor dissidents like Khashoggi. Selective critiques are the difference between earning sanctioned merit badges and attempting a journalistic profile in courage.

Bernie is more apt to call Middle East injustices as he sees them, which is a profile in courage by Washington standards. It earns him the ready-made enmity of groups that want no such clear-eyed views and that seek to marginalize him. Other groups that realize Bernie is as unbuyable as the late Wisconsin Senator Willam Proxmire was also want to define Bernie in ways that diminish him. They know people who can’t be bought pose a danger. Bernie’s deep in the pockets of hordes of small donors. Pretty damn dangerous, that.

Irritation by NPR’s political coverage of the 2016 primaries prompted this piece: Reflections on an Election Year When It Finally Hit the Fan.

"Frustrations on the coverage of the Democratic primaries have been slow-cooking quite awhile. Not just with the networks, I’m also looking at you, National Public Radio. Does NPR have a clue as to how badly it's damaged its brand from reporters and commentators chirping regurgitations of Hillary talking points from the outset? For that matter do the NY Times and the Washington Post? They’ve sounded so long like self-appointed gatekeepers, queen-makers, charges of media malpractice now abound. Now brace for articles, already appearing, on how Bernie blew it, too little too late. Never mind media putting him in a box and for so long paying scant attention beyond socialist snowball in hell status.

We can take solace that the public’s collective tin ear to media fixes is well on its way to repair, but that doesn’t cure the frustration. I listened to NPR’s Scott Simon Saturday, interviewing (lecturing) RoseAnn DeMoro, executive director of National Nurses United, over her group’s support of Bernie Sanders.

Ms. DeMoro acquitted herself well, plowing past Simon’s condescending entreaties to party unity, to getting the inevitability of math, to what’s really practical for health care in the political system, and to every other point he could squeeze in to call the game before the clock runs out. In his mindset there's only one game in town. Never mind pushing the party where it needs to go, never mind concern over game-changers that might wait in the wings. But I assure you in Washington there’s ample trepidation over what might next waltz out of the wings, and on its impact on voter turnout for down-ballot races.

Simon’s comments typify the drumbeat to make Bernie the fall guy for Hilary’s troubles. Apparently it’s now against the law to point out that occasionally the empress strolls buck-naked. And the commentariat now infuses Bernie with mystical powers to demand his supporters rise up for Hillary. If not, Bernie’s fault Hillary loses…

...Here’s a thought. If you want Bernie’s supporters to come around for Hillary, quit trying to stifle their voice at every opportunity, quit telling them from the outset their aspirations are hopeless, their efforts pointless, that they’re naive as to what’s possible, that if we end up in Trumpville it’s their fault for not folding early."

Fortunately, the unwavering support of media champions like Simon glided Hillary over the top and into the White House. What?

I’ve been wondering what fears and long term bets resonate at NPR during these days of shifting political fortunes, what it looks for when it looks over its shoulder.

Elliott told me, “In the mid-1990s, some NPR editors were worried about being perceived as ‘too liberal.’ Newt Gingrich was speaker of the house, and he was harassing NPR. If I remember correctly, Gingrich was threatening to cut off federal funds for NPR and asked the network to produce a list of all its employees who had previously worked for Pacifica radio stations. NPR refused to honor his request.”

Well, good for NPR on that refusal. But another topic for On the Media might be the influence of NPR donors, including donor demographics and particularly corporate donors, on topics and coverage.

Personally, I’d like to see increasing government funding of public radio that strengthens confidence in the independence of its political reporting. But until my confidence returns, I’m just glancing online to see if there are offerings of interest, usually arts and culture and science. Otherwise I’m spending more time perusing the BBC and Pacifica. And with apologies to Garfield, what I might call alternative media.

I thought it quite telling that NPR didn’t bother to cover Bernie’s town hall on inequality last Spring, with guests including Elizabeth Warren and Michael Moore. Despite an overflow crowd and nearly two million watching online, it got the NPR cold shoulder. It was held in the US Capitol building, a short walk from NPR headquarters.

To be fair, it was a crowded news day at NPR. A gorilla in Philly walked upright to keep his hands clean. You can still catch Inequality in America: The Rise of Oligarchy and the Collapse of the Middle Class, here.

The Breadline by sculptor Georg Segal, part of the expansive FDR Memorial. One of FDR’s quotes there, “THEY WHO SEEK TO ESTABLISH SYSTEMS OF GOVERNMENT BASED ON THE REGIMENTATION OF ALL HUMAN BEINGS BY A HANDFUL OF INDIVIDUAL RULERS… CALL THIS A NEW ORDER. IT IS NOT NEW AND IT IS NOT ORDER.”

Voters in the 2020 primaries, from the early states like Iowa to the ones that ice the cake, are well-advised to be as judicious parsing for objective news sources, and as wary of media herd instinct, as they are selecting their preferred candidates.

Trumpanzee Regime Admits Global Warming Is Real-- Does That Mean Fox News Loses Its Broadcast License?

Hear that report on Global Warming on NPR yesterday? Maybe the report from the Trumpanzee Regime is the real reason Congress' chief climate change denier, Lamar Smith, announced his retirement this week. Surprised Trump hasn't attacked his own government's report yet? Just wait. The executive summary starts ominously-- at least for Climate Change deniers: "The climate of the United States is strongly connected to the changing global climate." That's a pretty definitive first line.

Global annually averaged surface air temperature has increased by about 1.8°F (1.0°C) over the last 115 years (1901–2016). This period is now the warmest in the history of modern civilization. The last few years have also seen record-breaking, climate-related weather extremes, and the last three years have been the warmest years on record for the globe. These trends are expected to continue over climate timescales.

This assessment concludes, based on extensive evidence, that it is extremely likely that human activities, especially emissions of greenhouse gases, are the dominant cause of the observed warming since the mid-20th century. For the warming over the last century, there is no convincing alternative explanation supported by the extent of the observational evidence.

In addition to warming, many other aspects of global climate are changing, primarily in response to human activities. Thousands of studies conducted by researchers around the world have documented changes in surface, atmospheric, and oceanic temperatures; melting glaciers; diminishing snow cover; shrinking sea ice; rising sea levels; ocean acidification; and increasing atmospheric water vapor.

For example, global average sea level has risen by about 7–8 inches since 1900, with almost half (about 3 inches) of that rise occurring since 1993. Human-caused climate change has made a substantial contribution to this rise since 1900, contributing to a rate of rise that is greater than during any preceding century in at least 2,800 years. Global sea level rise has already affected the United States; the incidence of daily tidal flooding is accelerating in more than 25 Atlantic and Gulf Coast cities.

Global average sea levels are expected to continue to rise-- by at least several inches in the next 15 years and by 1–4 feet by 2100. A rise of as much as 8 feet by 2100 cannot be ruled out. Sea level rise will be higher than the global average on the East and Gulf Coasts of the United States.

Changes in the characteristics of extreme events are particularly important for human safety, infrastructure, agriculture, water quality and quantity, and natural ecosystems. Heavy rainfall is increasing in intensity and frequency across the United States and globally and is expected to continue to increase. The largest observed changes in the United States have occurred in the Northeast.

Heatwaves have become more frequent in the United States since the 1960s, while extreme cold temperatures and cold waves are less frequent. Recent record-setting hot years are projected to become common in the near future for the United States, as annual average temperatures continue to rise. Annual average temperature over the contiguous United States has increased by 1.8°F (1.0°C) for the period 1901–2016; over the next few decades (2021–2050), annual average temperatures are expected to rise by about 2.5°F for the United States, relative to the recent past (average from 1976–2005), under all plausible future climate scenarios.

The incidence of large forest fires in the western United States and Alaska has increased since the early 1980s and is projected to further increase in those regions as the climate changes, with profound changes to regional ecosystems.

Annual trends toward earlier spring melt and reduced snowpack are already affecting water resources in the western United States and these trends are expected to continue. Under higher scenarios, and assuming no change to current water resources management, chronic, long-duration hydrological drought is increasingly possible before the end of this century.

The magnitude of climate change beyond the next few decades will depend primarily on the amount of greenhouse gases (especially carbon dioxide) emitted globally. Without major reductions in emissions, the increase in annual average global temperature relative to preindustrial times could reach 9°F (5°C) or more by the end of this century. With significant reductions in emissions, the increase in annual average global temperature could be limited to 3.6°F (2°C) or less.

The global atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2) concentration has now passed 400 parts per million (ppm), a level that last occurred about 3 million years ago, when both global average temperature and sea level were significantly higher than today. Continued growth in CO2 emissions over this century and beyond would lead to an atmospheric concentration not experienced in tens to hundreds of millions of years. There is broad consensus that the further and the faster the Earth system is pushed towards warming, the greater the risk of unanticipated changes and impacts, some of which are potentially large and irreversible.

The observed increase in carbon emissions over the past 15–20 years has been consistent with higher emissions pathways. In 2014 and 2015, emission growth rates slowed as economic growth became less carbon-intensive. Even if this slowing trend continues, however, it is not yet at a rate that would limit global average temperature change to well below 3.6°F (2°C) above preindustrial levels.

Washington Post Climate expert Chris Mooney reported flatly that the government was unable to find any convincing alternative explanation for climate change. That took long enough. He also noted that the report calling human activity the dominant driver of global warming is at odds with White House decisions to withdraw from the Paris Accords, champion fossil fuels and reverse Obama-era climate policies.

To the surprise of some scientists, the White House did not seek to prevent the release of the government’s National Climate Assessment, which is mandated by law. The report affirms that climate change is driven almost entirely by human action, warns of potential sea-level rise as high as eight feet by the year 2100, and details climate-related damage across the United States that is already unfolding as a result of 1.8 degrees Fahrenheit of global warming since 1900.

...The report’s release underscores the extent to which the machinery of the federal scientific establishment, operating in multiple agencies across the government, continues to grind on even as top administration officials have minimized or disparaged its findings. Federal scientists have continued to author papers and issue reports on climate change, for example, even as political appointees have altered the wording of news releases or blocked civil servants from speaking about their conclusions in public forums. The climate assessment process is dictated by a 1990 law that Democratic and Republican administrations have followed.

The White House on Friday sought to downplay the significance of the study and its findings... Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Scott Pruitt, Energy Secretary Rick Perry and President Trump have all questioned the extent of humans’ contribution to climate change. One of the EPA’s Web pages posted scientific conclusions similar to those in the new report until earlier this year, when Pruitt’s deputies ordered it removed.

What Happened To Trump's Promises About Massive Infrastructure Spending?

We'll look at the mess the Trump Regime has made of infrastructure in a moment. First though, I want to highlight one crucial part of that in my part of the country. The Republican-led Congress and the Trump Regime are screwing with California, Oregon and Washington over the earthquake early warning system-- enough time for people to take cover or pull their cars over-- the federal government was committed to, something NPR highlighted this week. An early warning system along the West Coast from the Canadian border to the Mexican border has been in the works for over a decade and is in beta testing now. NPR reported that Thomas Heaton, an engineering seismologist at the California Institute of Technology, has worked on this idea since 1985. 

“It's running right here in my office, and it has been running in my office for about 10 years, and I run it in my home,” Heaton said.

The sample earthquake scenario he pulled up on his computer showed a map of California with seismic waves radiating from the epicenter of a quake. Alarms rang, and an electronic voice called out a verbal warning, “Earthquake. Earthquake. Moderate shaking expected in six seconds.”

How such alerts would be sent to the public still needs to be ironed out, with some hoping warnings could be sent to mobile phones located in soon-to-be affected areas.

Heaton said a full rollout along the West Coast would take about 1,200 sensors. So far, there are 800 installed, half of which are in Southern California. Limited public rollout of the warning alert system has been planned for next year, but that depends on continued federal funding. The roughly $10 million the U.S. Geological Survey gets for the program would be wiped out under Trump’s proposed budget.

“If it goes through, there will not be an early warning system,” Heaton said. “I'm pretty confident about that.”

Los Angeles has already spent millions of dollars on its own to install its warning system sensors.

“We’re going to raise our own money and try to get this done, even if the federal government doesn’t help,” said Jeff Gorell, the city’s deputy mayor for public safety.

But L.A. can’t fund the full estimated cost, $16 million a year, to cover California and the whole Pacific Northwest. Lucy Jones, scientist emerita at USGS, where she helped get the early warning system going, said earthquake warnings need to come from the federal government, because research centers don’t want to own the system.

“The universities have uniformly said 'We don't want the liability of releasing these messages,'” Jones said.

The proposed federal cuts are getting pushback from Congress. A House subcommittee voted last week to keep funding at current levels. The funding proposal has more votes ahead in the House and Senate. What actually shakes out of the budget approval process is anyone’s guess, but California Rep. Ken Calvert, a Republican from Corona who chairs the subcommittee, said it has wide support.

Calvert, a Trump rubber-stamp says he has "bipartisan agreement [and] "We’re moving ahead"-- at least on the Appropriations Committee's subcommittee on Interior and Environment. He's the only Californian on the subcommittee, although Oklahoma Republican Tom Cole is a member and fracking-related earthquakes are shaking up his constituents lately.

Ted Lieu, who represents the west side of L.A. is concerned about Trump's decision to end the funding. This afternoon he said, "To borrow the President's phrase, not funding earthquake early warning systems would be 'dumb as a rock.' Such systems will save countless lives. The President's lack of an infrastructure plan shows the continued chaos at the White House. Cutting infrastructure funding with no plan will harm the American people. That's why Congress needs to pass the 21st Century New Deal for Jobs Act that I wrote, which will provide 2 trillion dollars of much needed infrastructure funding and create millions of jobs."

The Trump Regime's entire attitude towards infrastructure in basically the same-- stop spending money on anything and everything. Tom Scheck reported the story for NPR's Marketplace last week-- and who gets hurt the most? Folks in the rural areas who backed Trump most strongly in the election: Trump's desire for private infrastructure money will narrow his choices to mostly urban projects. The ignoramus in the White House insists that "business-- not government-- can deliver better services to Americans," which has sent officials in states, cities and counties scurrying for private money for public infrastructure projects like roads and bridges. They looked at 46 transportation and water-related projects in 23 states where private money-- "investment opportunities"-- is what the Trump Regime is pushing for.

We asked two Orange County candidates whose districts are plagued with infrastructure problems. Kia Hamadanchy is running for the seat held by Trump rubber stamp Mimi Walters do doesn't live in the district and isn't really aware about what people in CA-45 face. He told us that "This country-- and Orange County in particular-- needs immediate and dramatic investment in our infrastructure. Our roads and bridges are in an incredible state of disrepair and every dollar we fail to spend today is going to lead to an even higher cost down the road. Donald Trump promised time and time during his campaign he would invest in and fix infrastructure and more then six months into his administration we have yet to see a plan to do so. What we need is the right kind of investment that actually addresses the problems we have in this country and the answer certainly isn't more privatization and the selling off of our public assets. The solution must be driven by the federal government, working in concert with state and local governments."

And Sam Jammal, the progressive running against Ed Royce in CA-39 told us that "Every voter-- no matter whether they lean right or left-- has the basic expectation that government will invest in infrastructure. Unfortunately, we are years behind in these investments thank to a Republican Congress that has ignored the basics. Trump made his promise knowing full well that voters expect roads without potholes, safe bridges and the deployment of new infrastructure to modernize our economy. But, like so much else, his rhetoric doesn't meet reality. We need a real investment in infrastructure that moves us towards 2030, not backwards. To me, this means making sure we have our bridges modernized, roads paved and investments in clean energy infrastructure that promotes electric vehicles and renewable energy. This will create jobs and ensure economic growth. We lead when we invest in our country and right now, we aren't doing that. Just take a ride on any of our freeways in Orange County and its clear we aren't investing in the basics. Voters rightfully expect more and infrastructure must be a priority."

Trump may love it but "privately financed projects have proven unpopular in at least two states after citizens learned they had to pay higher fees and tolls to private investors. And a federal loan program Trump is pushing to broaden has lost money on three projects that featured private investment." On top of this, most of the projects private capital is willing too invest in "serve high population, urban centers. That means rural voters, who helped elect Trump, could be left out of the potential infrastructure boom unless he either directs a significant amount of taxpayer money to rural projects or convinces investors to steer money there."

Forty of the 46 projects on the list are transportation related. The remaining six are water projects. Eight of the projects are entirely private enterprises with limited or no government involvement.

The others rely on a financing mechanism known as a public-private partnership, which can include a variety of models. The most common is a government receiving upfront financing to build or fix a project in exchange for either payments to the investors or rights to the investors allowing them to earn money on the project from, say, charging tolls on a highway.

...13 of the 46 projects on the list collected by the White House since November are road and bridge projects. That's more than half the total number of highways-- 21-- that relied on private financing between 1989 and 2012, according to a 2012 report by the Congressional Budget Office.

Trump has not released specifics about what he calls his $1 trillion infrastructure plan or the timing, but he has emphatically embraced public-private partnerships as a solution to a problem that he's identified as critical to America and what most political observers say could deliver a badly needed political win.

The American Society of Civil Engineers gave the nation's infrastructure poor marks in a report card released earlier this year. The group said it will cost $4.6 trillion to address the nation's roads, bridges, ports and water systems.

The White House budget plan clearly indicates that private investment will be a strategy. "Providing more federal funding, on its own, is not the solution to our infrastructure challenges," the document said.

...It isn't certain, though, how many projects will get financed with private money.

Investors may balk at a proposal because there isn't a revenue guarantee. Government officials may also decide that it's more cost effective to use traditional borrowing rather than private financing.

What's clear is that investors are eagerly moving to put more money into infrastructure. It's considered a safer and steadier investment than the stock market, yet has higher returns than bonds.

Wall Street is already lining up. Global Infrastructure Partners closed on a $15.8 billion fund in the first quarter of 2017, according to the data analysis firm Preqin.

The fund was the largest infrastructure fund at the time but was soon surpassed in May when Saudi Arabia announced it would invest $20 billion in a $40 billion infrastructure fund run by Blackstone Group, a private equity firm.

Other fund managers, state and national pension funds and foreign governments are also looking to profit. Preqin found $71 billion ready for infrastructure spending in North America even before the Saudi pledge.

"There has been reasonable investment within infrastructure in the U.S., so it's more of whether we're going to see a real explosion going forward," said Tom Carr, a Preqin analyst.

But private financing comes with risks and drawbacks:

• Last month, Texas-- an early adopter of privatizing transportation projects-- rejected efforts to authorize additional private investment.
• Private investors in road projects in South Carolina, Texas, California and Indiana have declared bankruptcy. In some instances, the bankruptcies resulted in a financial loss for the federal government.
• A 2015 Congressional Budget Office study found that private financing will speed up the construction of a road but doesn't reduce overall costs or increase with other transportation spending.
• Rural communities may lose out since they don't have the population willing to finance projects that can cost billions.

And critics of privatization warn against selling rights to what has long been considered a public asset. They also say private backers are looking for investment returns that could make the projects more expensive to the taxpayer.

Donald Cohen, executive director of the anti-privatization group In the Public Interest, called Trump's vision an attempt to "sell off America" to Wall Street investors. He said private investors will collect their returns by creating toll roads, increasing fees or finding other sources of revenue to get a return on their investment. "There may be lots of folks who actually want to rebuild America but their top job is to generate returns, and they're going to do pretty well under Trump's plan," Cohen said.

Despite the risks, the Trump Administration continues to push for increased private investment. "The private sector can provide valuable benefits for the delivery of infrastructure, through better procurement methods, market discipline, and a long-term focus on maintaining assets," a White House budget document said.

It's unclear, though, when the president will roll out the specifics of his plan or how it will fit into a congressional agenda bogged down by a stalled health care bill, a desire to overhaul the tax code, a measure to lift the debt ceiling and a budget plan that includes infrastructure spending cuts.

Kathrin Heitmann, an infrastructure analyst with Moody's, said that's why she doesn't expect an impact from Trump's plan in the short-term. "We are very cautious that the $1 trillion infrastructure investment can be realized," she said.

Heitmann also pointed that it will take a long time for projects to get started even if Trump's plan becomes law later this year. The lag between funding approval and project completion could mean that nothing substantial happens until the end of Trump's term in 2020. "It looks like that some of this funding will only peak at the end of the current administration's term," she said.

Adding to the uncertainty, public records show Trump's top infrastructure adviser is pushing states to finance construction projects without any help from the federal government, a quiet shift in rhetoric that reflects the president's onerous budget realities. That could be a blow to local governments since many have historically relied on federal funding to complete infrastructure projects.

...Larger population centers are the primary focus for private investment. Of the 46 projects that could rely on private investment, just two are located in and would serve rural America. Both are in Alaska.

Eight projects are located in rural communities but primarily serve urban population centers, including two privately financed projects that would allow companies to ship water from rural parts of California and New Mexico to urban areas.

The lack of financing opportunities for rural America is a bipartisan concern in Congress. Lawmakers worry that private money will chase the highest return, typically found in higher population centers instead of financing the neediest projects.

"There are thousands of miles of highway and tens of thousands of bridges that need work that can't make money," said U.S. Rep. Peter DeFazio, D-Ore. "No private sector person is going to buy them and repair them, because there isn't enough volume."

...Meanwhile, the nation's largest metropolitan areas are receiving unsolicited bids from private funds.

In November, voters in Los Angeles County approved a new half-cent sales tax and extended an existing half-cent sales tax. The increase is projected to raise $120 billion over 40 years. Even before the measure passed, private investors submitted unsolicited proposals to the Los Angeles County Metropolitan Authority.

California Gov. Jerry Brown asked the Trump Administration to include three Los Angeles County transit projects in its infrastructure plan. They are a 9-mile extension of an existing transit line, a connector to the airport and a bus rapid-transit line.

Experts say financing projects like those in Los Angeles County are perfect for investors looking to capitalize on long-term projects. The city is the second largest in the country, and county voters just approved a long-term funding stream that's attractive to private investors.

...Private financing is becoming a more attractive option as cities, counties and states grapple with tight budgets, a transportation system that is costly to maintain and a desire to build new projects that serve a growing population. The financing mechanism also allows state officials to finance projects without raising gas taxes.

"States are becoming more enamored of this because they're able to deliver projects sooner," said Shailen Bhatt, executive director of the Colorado Department of Transportation. "It allows you to advance a project without necessarily, say, raising your gas tax."

But Bhatt says there are only so many projects that can be financed with private money. And he said federal and state officials should not ignore a gas tax increase as an option. Since Colorado is an early adopter in public-private partnerships, Bhatt would prefer Trump focus his plan on directly funding projects.

"If the president's plan was just more financing opportunities, well, we're already moving on that path on our own," he said.

The trade group for the national construction industry is also directing most of its efforts on states when it comes to public-private partnerships and infrastructure investment.

Ben Brubeck, an executive with Associated Builders and Contractors, said his organization has been pushing for an infrastructure package on the federal level but said the states are where he sees the most action. "If you look at the deal flow here in the United States, it's happening at the state level and not really happening at the federal level," he said.

Since President Trump was elected, anticipation has grown that the real estate billionaire would deliver on his promise to spend $1 trillion on infrastructure. He's met with union leaders, state and local officials and private business leaders trying to build support.

He's also assembled an infrastructure team led by New York real estate investors Richard LeFrak and Steven Roth. LeFrak has personal ties to the president, and Roth and Trump have a business relationship.

In May, the White House released Trump's budget proposal, which included spending $200 billion in "federal outlays to the infrastructure initiative," but didn't specify how the money will be spent.

And from some departments, Trump cut infrastructure funding.

He proposed a 13 percent reduction to the U.S. Department of Transportation general fund budget, eliminating funds for new transit projects and gutting a $499 million grant program that has paid for road, bridge and transit projects. The plan also eliminates a $500 million water and wastewater loan and grant program at the U.S. Department of Agriculture, but boosts funding for water and wastewater infrastructure at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

Since then, there have been few other details. In June, during a week devoted to promoting his ideas about infrastructure, Trump pledged $25 billion to rural projects and $15 billion to spur what he called "transformative" projects. An accompanying document didn't elaborate on the spending or say whether the funds are included in his $200 billion request.

And despite pleas by White House officials that journalists cover the president's policy agenda instead of allegations of Russian interference in last year's election, they didn't return repeated requests for comment about Trump's infrastructure plan.

The lack of specifics regarding infrastructure-- and a budget that weakens infrastructure-related programs-- have left state and local government officials wondering when a plan will be released and whether it will benefit them.

Documents show White House officials were still working to craft a policy in March despite a campaign rollout in October, a two-month presidential transition that focused on assembling wish lists from states and multiple meetings since the inauguration to discuss policy.

During a conference call with state leaders on March 23, D.J. Gribbin, the president's infrastructure policy adviser, was reluctant to embrace any plan and emphasized that he was only speaking for himself, not for Trump or other White House officials, according to a readout of the call.

And adding to the uncertainty, notes from the call-- captured in an email from Adam Zarrin, a policy adviser to Colorado Gov. John Hickenlooper-- show that Gribbin wants states to build projects without federal help. "They really are most excited ‘about projects [states] are paying for' and not the federal government. Want states to help themselves," read Zarrin's email.

Gribbin did not respond to an interview request.

The White House has aggressively courted states on infrastructure. In December, Trump's transition team requested a list of "shovel-ready" projects from governors. The White House also met in June with a group of county officials, mayors and Native American leaders to discuss infrastructure needs. The vast majority of those in attendance were Republicans.

Through the National Governor's Association, governors submitted a list of projects to the White House. Union officials, infrastructure consultants and campaign aides also submitted requests. It isn't certain whether White House officials are relying on those lists as it crafts its policy.

Others say they weren't approached to submit a list of projects. Oklahoma City Mayor Mick Cornett, who served as president of the U.S. Conference of Mayors through June, said his organization wasn't solicited. He's skeptical that any plan relying solely on private investment will work.

"I wouldn't get overly optimistic that the private sector is going to come to the rescue for America's infrastructure projects," Cornett said. "I don't think that's likely. And if that's the hope and dream, then we're probably going to be waiting a long, long time."

Cornett said that it's often cheaper for government officials to finance projects through government borrowing. He says cities, counties and states with a solid credit rating will likely get a cheaper rate than the private sector.

...Texas State Highway 130 offers a vivid example of how Trump's vision for infrastructure could spark projects. It also shows how some Texans have revolted against toll roads that have been privately financed.

In 2012, Gov. Rick Perry appeared at the grand opening of the highway. His speech focused on how the 41-mile stretch of road between San Antonio and Austin would reduce congestion on another busy freeway, Interstate 35. Perry, who now serves as Energy Secretary in the Trump Administration, also targeted critics of privatization.

"When we debated this concept back in 2003, there was no shortage of individuals both inside and outside the Capitol that said it wouldn't work," Perry said at the time. "Today's proof that the concept is complete, and it can be seen in concrete and asphalt."

His vision focused on the financing of public and private toll roads to spur road construction. The record shows Perry was successful.

A state report last year showed 53 toll roads spanning 671 miles in Texas. Many were built in the past two decades. Some, like State Highway 130, are privately operated. Others are managed by local governments or the state.

State officials claim that 10 public-private partnerships established since 2003 have generated $17 billion in construction. And Marc Williams, deputy executive director of the state's transportation department, said public-private financing was critical to speedy completion.

But swift, private construction and tolling doesn't guarantee a healthy return on investment. In 2016, the SH 130 Concession Company, which built the highway, declared bankruptcy. The firm-- owned by Cintra, a Spanish company, and a consortium of Australian entities-- cited less traffic than projected, according to bankruptcy records.

The combination hasn't proven politically popular, either.

Critics say the financial failure should be a warning to the Trump Administration about the unpopularity of toll roads in Texas. "If you want to lose a voter, the fastest way you do it is to take $300 or $400 out of their pocket every month," said Terri Hall, who runs Texans for Toll-Free Highways.

Hall, a Republican who says she voted for Trump, intends to lobby against increased private investment in transportation. She said Trump and others who back privatization will have a political problem on their hands. "They're going to have a rude awakening if they think that this is going to be something acceptable to the average Joe," she said.

Hall's lobbying appears to have been successful in Texas. Gov. Gregg Abbott opposes more toll roads, and the Texas House of Representatives defeated a bill in May that would have allowed communities to negotiate private financing for 10 projects.

No matter; Texas communities seem undaunted and state transportation officials are still lobbying the Trump Administration to include an expansion of I-635 in its infrastructure plans.

Douglas Athas, mayor of Garland, Texas, said private investors are interested in expanding the highway from 10 lanes to 15 lanes. He said the $1.6 billion proposal would ensure the project is finished more quickly. The program relied on allowing the investors to collect tolls on a few of the managed lanes that run near existing lanes.

Like the federal government, Texas has not raised the gas tax since the early 1990s, which has slowed new road construction that's led to congestion as the state's population soars.

"Politicians are scrambling to solve a problem," said David Ellis, a research scientist at the Texas A&M Transportation Institute, and manager of the Infrastructure Investment Analysis Program. He said some toll roads, specifically in the Dallas-Ft. Worth area, have been effective. After all, said Ellis, while no one likes paying a toll, the alternative is waiting in traffic.

Drivers along SH130 say they've been forced to weigh those options.

D.J. Shaw, a daily commuter on that Texas highway, said he hates paying $15 a day in tolls to drive from Seguin to Del Valle. But he said it's better than spending an extra 30 minutes on I-35. "It costs so much money and there's no other way to go," he said. "Nobody likes sitting on I-35 so they kind of got you cornered."

Williams, the state transportation official, said the legislative action means it's unlikely that any new toll roads will be financed over the next two years. But he's confident his department will secure federal funding when Trump's infrastructure plan is introduced. Williams also said Texas will spend as much as $3 billion a year more on transportation projects after voters approved a ballot measure dedicating general fund money to projects.

...[C]ritics and even some supporters of public-private partnerships warn that the public loses control over infrastructure assets when a deal is done. A citizen upset with a road project or a new toll, for example, can't complain to an elected official and get relief.

"When you enter into the P3, you now have a third party that is now in the process," said Aubrey Layne, Jr., Virginia's Secretary of Transportation.

Unwinding a deal, he says, no longer means taking a vote in the Legislature or at a city council meeting. Instead, private investors want something in return if a government reopens a contract.

Layne said governments going into P3 agreements need contractual precision and an amount of prescience because deals could last decades.

Moreover, attorneys and financial consultants are critical to protect the public's interest, he said, because private investors are typically armed with savvy financial analysts, lawyers and contractors who have negotiated these complex deals in the past.

Cities and counties, particularly those with smaller population centers, may not have the same experience or budget to retain a high level of expertise to protect their interests. "These are some of the most sophisticated investors in the world you're going to be negotiating with," Layne said, cautioning that naivete will result in a bad deal for the public.

Cohen from In the Public Interest analyzes the choice more cynically, saying that too many policy leaders look for private investment instead of making the difficult choice of raising taxes. He said there's little worry because the policy leaders often leave office before there's blowback from an increase in fees or tolls. "They don't have to answer the question in eight years about what happened to the tolls when they're tripled," Cohen said.

In fact, a key selling point of public-private partnerships has been the financial protection of taxpayers. The private sector typically assumes most of the risk in the deal. When the private backers of the Indiana toll road filed for bankruptcy in 2014, for example, taxpayers there didn't see a loss.

However, that's not always the case.

At least three times in the past seven years taxpayers have been on the hook for business failures, each stemming from a federal loan program-- called the Transportation Infrastructure Finance and Innovation Act (TIFIA)-- which President Trump wants to grow.

The program helps finance transportation projects through direct loans, loan guarantees and lines of credit. In budget documents, the Trump Administration claims TIFIA is a success.

"One dollar of TIFIA subsidy leverages roughly $40 in project value. If the amount of TIFIA subsidy was increased to $1 billion annually for 10 years, that could leverage up to $140 billion in credit assistance, and approximately $424 billion in total investment," the document states.

But TIFIA loans have put taxpayers at risk:

• In 2010, the private investors of the South Bay Expressway in California declared bankruptcy. When the investors emerged from bankruptcy in 2011, the U.S. Department of Transportation took a $47 million loss on a $140 million loan that helped finance the road.

• In 2014, the U.S. Department of Transportation sold a federal loan it held on the Pocahontas Parkway in Virginia to private investors at a 59 percent loss. Anthony Foxx, who was the Transportation secretary, said he chose to sell the loan after private investors signaled they were losing money on the nearly 9-mile toll road near Richmond.

• And the bankrupt Texas highway-- State Highway 130-- was initially financed with a $430 million federal loan. It emerged from bankruptcy in June with new ownership and $260 million in new financing. The federal government received $16 million for the loan.

The Texas agreement also brings an ironic twist: The investors who insisted the private sector could manage transportation projects better than the public sector will now answer to a new owner: the federal government, which now has a 34 percent stake in the toll road.

"I think you only need to look at Texas to get an idea of what Trump’s infrastructure plan will look like down the road," said Tom Wakely, an economic populist who is running for Texas governor on a progressive platform. "Texas infrastructure, roads, bridges and damns, is to be kind in shambles but if we are telling the truth it is nothing short of FUBAR. Decades of failed Republican policies that emphasized private infrastructure money back by government guarantees over sound fiscal public infrastructure investment have left Texans sitting in traffic for hours.

Tom Wakely 

"A perfect example of this is Texas Toll Road 130. It was by built 130 Concession Co., a joint venture between Cintra, a Spanish developer and Zachry Construction Co., a San Antonio based company. It was build with a half-billion dollars in federal loans and another billion or so in private loans but it is nothing more than a 41 mile highway of broken concrete and promises. It was built by Republican Governor Rick Perry, now Trump’s Energy Secretary. The highway connects San Antonio and Austin but only if you drive a hell out of your way to get there. It causes flooding in nearby towns. It is nothing more than a public albatross and private get rich quick scheme.

"Another example of an infrastructure project here in Texas that is surely headed for bankruptcy is the flawed Vista Ridge pipeline. It is a $3.4 billion water project requiring the construction of a 142 mile pipeline from San Antonio north to rural Burleson County. This transfer of water will be the biggest in Texas history and has been described by financial advisers as one of the U.S.’ largest public-private partnerships in the water sector. To put it bluntly, it is morally wrong to grow a city like San Antonio by taking water from a distant ecosystem which will eventually need that water."

Jeff Sessions And Steve Bannon Share A Vision For America-- And For Texas

Americans have gotten a look at Trump's new Attorney General, Jefferson Beauregard Sessions, and they don't like what they see. A new Quinnipiac poll included a question about him for the first time. By a 52-40% margin, voters say Sessions lied under oath during his confirmation hearings and by a 51-42% say he should resign from office. Most American voters-- 66%-- support the establishment of an "independent commission investigating potential links between some of Donald Trump's campaign advisors and the Russian government." Only 30% disagree.

Sessions has no intention of resigning. He has an ugly, reactionary agenda he's been waiting his whole miserable life to implement. His "recusal" on Putin-Gate investigations is hollow and ineffectual. And his recusal on that case doesn't mean he won't be putting his energy into other ways to prove he truly is-- in Trump's own words (as well as Stalin's)-- "an enemy of the people." Take voting rights, for example. Sessions moved quickly to withdraw the government from the Texas case alleging racial discrimination in a Texas voter ID suit.



A bigger worry, was highlighted last week on NPR's Fresh Air when Terry Gross interviewed journalist Emily Bazelon about the longstanding relationship between Sessions and Trump's in-house neo-Nazi, Steve Bannon and how they plan to use the Justice Department to further their goals. Bazelon makes the point that Sessions nd Bannon have been working together even before either of them became part of Team Trump and she contends that "they took a long-shot bet on Trump that just happened to pay off." Now they can deal with a shared "deeper cultural discomfort with the growing population of people who are not white in this country, coming from a kind of traditional white sense of propriety of what America is about. That is what's motivating Sessions and Bannon, and that it's part of what's driving the more extreme elements of this presidency."

[B]efore Trump's candidacy, these were marginal fringe figures, Sessions and Bannon. They did not have anything like a central role in Washington. They didn't have a whole lot of power. But they had really strong ideas. And they had, I think, a very well developed sense about messaging. So then Donald Trump comes along. And he begins his campaign by, you know, in this broad brush way accusing Mexicans of being rapists. He gets a lot of attention. Nobody really takes him that seriously.

But Sessions and Bannon could see a willingness to kind of sign on to this anti-immigrant, divisive, nationalist agenda that they had been pushing for a few years. And so that's what I mean by vessel. In a sense, like, Donald Trump from their point of view was this happy coincidence that came along. What we do know is that, as you said, Sessions endorsed Trump pretty early on. And then Bannon wrote with some excitement to a friend of his to say that while he liked some of the other Republican candidates like Ted Cruz and Carly Fiorina, he was ready to sign up for Trump because Trump had endorsed the nationalist anti-immigration plan that Sessions was working on.

So you can see the way in which they really found a kind of common ground here. By signing on to Trump, Sessions gave Bannon a reason to get on board. And then a few months after that, you see Sessions actually crafting or helping to craft an immigration policy for Trump.

...Sessions made it clear early on that [Justice] was the Cabinet position that he was interested in. And it's not a coincidence. First of all the, Justice Department is just one of the most powerful agencies in our country. And also, Sessions had a background as a U.S. attorney in the 1980s. So he had actually worked for the Justice Department in that capacity before. And so I think you see a kind of perfect synergy here. Sessions is exactly the right person for Donald Trump in this attorney general position given his larger agenda, the one that he shares with Sessions and Bannon. And for Sessions, it's a very powerful post that he is well qualified for.

...[B]roadly speaking, there are a couple of different approaches to voting law. You can talk about how to make voting easier for people or you can talk about making it harder. President Obama wanted to make voting easier. And so his Justice Department looked at the Voting Rights Act of 1965, which protects the rights of minority voters, and tried to use that to prevent states from unnecessarily restricting people's voting rights.

So for example, Texas and North Carolina passed laws with strict voter ID and then other kinds of limitations, like taking away same-day voting registration. And the Justice Department sued those states and tried to make sure that the people who were going to be prevented from voting or for whom voting would be more difficult were being protected. And we know that in both states people who tend to lack the required forms of ID are more likely to be black and Latino. So we're talking about hundreds of thousands of minority voters for whom access to the polls becomes more difficult.

The Republican Party has had a different set of priorities. They have really pushed the idea that what's really important is to use the law to prevent voting fraud. Now, they've been doing this without evidence that in-person voter fraud is anything like widespread. But Donald Trump we know has really picked up on this theme. I mean, he made this unproven - wholly unproven allegation that millions of people had voted illegally in the election. And Sessions also has a history from when he was a prosecutor in the '80s of prosecuting African-American civil rights activists for voter fraud.

So there's again a kind of commonality here. And when you push the idea that what the Justice Department should be doing is preventing voter fraud, you've really made a case for using the law in a way that, as I said earlier, makes it harder to vote. And so I think what we're going to see and already seeing is the Justice Department shift from opening up access to the ballot to trying to restrict it. And in the Texas case, the Justice Department under Jeff Sessions has essentially switched sides. So instead of suing Texas, they're now saying they don't think that Texas intentionally discriminated against minority voters.

And there's more happening in Texas where Sessions has an agenda in direct opposition to democracy. First a little background. There has been no gerrymander in history as lethal and toxic to the Tom DeLay mid-decade takeover of the state's districts in 2003, which resulted in the GOP taking over a majority of Texas congressional seats just one year later-- for the first time since Reconstruction. Texas is a pretty red state but there are still millions of Democrats there. In 2012 Romney won the state 4,569,843 (57%) to 3,308,124 (41%). Last year Rump won the state 4,681,590 (52.6%) to 3,867,816 (43.4%). Let's split the difference and say 42% of Texas voters are Democrats. Texas has 36 congressional districts-- the most of any state other than California. All things being equal if there was no gerrymandering, Texas would be sending 21 Republicans and 15 Democrats to Congress. Instead, because of the way DeLay and his successors have drawn the districts, Texas sends 25 Republicans and just 11 Democrats to Congress.

Friday, a panel of 3 federal judges handed down a ruling that the Republicans in the legislature used racial gerrymandering to weaken the growing electoral power of minorities, particularly Hispanics. Texas is likely to appeal the case to the Supreme Court-- with the backing of... you guessed it, Beauregard Jefferson Sessions III.

In their opinion, 2 of the 3 judges wrote that "The record indicates not just a hostility toward Democrat districts, but a hostility to minority districts, and a willingness to use race for partisan advantage. The two Republicans directly impacted are Blake Farenthold (TX-27) and Will Hurd (TX-23), although redrawing their districts-- as well as Democrat Lloyd Doggett's 35th district-- would instantly spill over into bordering districts, threatening gerrymander-protected Republicans Lamar Smith, Pete Olson and Mike McCaul. Even if Sessions is impeached or forced to resign, it's unlikely that whomever Trump picks to replace him would be less... an enemy of the people.