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July 5, 2020

Protesters Attacked by Police Are Suing to Vindicate Their Constitutional Rights

Protesters demonstrating against white supremacy and police brutality in the wake of George Floyd’s public lynching have been met with illegal repression by law enforcement. Police have utilized toxic chemical and sonic weapons, dangerous projectiles, intrusive surveillance, physical violence and “kettling” to trap demonstrators after dispersal orders are given.

In a study conducted by the University of Chicago Law School’s International Human Rights Clinic, researchers found not one police department in the 20 largest U.S. cities in compliance with minimum human rights standards governing use of lethal force. They called the use of force by police “state-sanctioned violence.”

Victims of police abuse are filing litigation, and at least one judge has put a halt to some of the most egregious misconduct.

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June 30, 2020

The Fine Line Between the Criminals and the Cops: A Review of Mike Avery’s “The Cooperating Witness”

Susan Sorella is in her last year at Suffolk Law School in Boston. When she began clerking for criminal defense lawyer Bobby Coughlin, Susan had no idea she would become a central figure in a murder case that pitted the mob against corrupt FBI agents. Or that she would be compelled to take the lead and risk her life when her troubled boss was poised to plead his likely innocent client guilty. Mike Avery’s new hardboiled crime novel, The Cooperating Witness, combines the noir tradition – the fine line between right and wrong – with a biting critique of the criminal justice system. The former criminal defense attorney, civil rights lawyer and Suffolk law professor knows his way around the courtroom and has written non-fiction books. But Avery’s foray into fiction writing is a refreshing surprise.

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June 19, 2020

Massive Uprisings Confront White Supremacy

That’s not a chip on my shoulder.
That’s your foot on my neck.
-Malcolm X

On May 25, a Minneapolis police officer tortured George Floyd to death in what his brother, Philonise Floyd, called “a modern-day lynching in broad daylight.” Hundreds of thousands of people took to the streets in all 50 states and Washington D.C.; the anti-racist uprisings continue. 

Why do a majority of people in this country now support the Movement for Black Lives? Why have calls to defund and abolish the police entered the mainstream discourse? Why are people risking the deadly coronavirus to join the protests? And why are we seeing what may be the broadest popular movement in the history of the United States?  

More than 400 years after the first Africans were kidnapped, forcibly brought to this country and enslaved, White supremacy continues to infect our society. Police murder Black people with impunity. Black people are incarcerated at an unprecedented rate. And White fragility keeps us in denial about our White skin privilege.

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June 13, 2020

Trump’s Illegal Use of Military Against Anti-Racist Uprisings Portends Battles Ahead

The backlash against Donald Trump’s illegal show of military force against anti-racist protesters compelled him to withdraw the troops — for now. But we must continue raising the illegality of this use of the military and pushing for barriers to guard against future such deployments. The threat of a resurgence of this violation still looms because as the protests continue, Trump might change his mind. And if he loses the election, all bets are off.

Government officials, legislators, lawyers and civil society should strenuously oppose the recall of federal troops because it would be deadly as well as illegal. “Armed forces taking on protesters may cause them to go away, but make no mistake: People would die. And even one more death is too many,” Kelsey Baker, a former Marine who deployed to Kuwait and Iraq, wrote for Newsweek.

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June 1, 2020

The Supreme Court Is About to Make Seismic Rulings on Reproductive Rights

The rights of women to terminate their pregnancies and to receive free contraceptives under the Affordable Care Act (ACA) are on the chopping block. Those challenges to reproductive freedom are consistent with Trump’s agenda of pandering to the religious right while erasing Barack Obama’s achievements. The Supreme Court will rule on these cases during the month of June.

Burdening the Right to Abortion

Although the Court does not yet have a case that contests the constitutionality of Roe v. Wade, it has the opportunity to chip away at the right to abortion as opponents continue to erect obstacles to reproductive health care. Their strategy is to bring about death of abortion by a thousand cuts.

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May 14, 2020

Don’t Expect to See Trump’s Tax Returns Before the Election

Donald Trump claims that while he is president, his pre-presidency financial records can’t be subpoenaed and he can’t even be investigated for criminal conduct. The Supreme Court will decide by the end of June whether Trump is indeed beyond the reach of the law.

On May 12, the Supreme Court heard oral arguments about whether Trump can block subpoenas for his tax and other financial records that predate his presidency. Although prior presidents made their tax returns public, Trump has steadfastly refused to reveal his. In 2016, he promised to release them when the purported “audit” is complete. But they remain under wraps.

In April 2019, three committees of the House of Representatives and the New York district attorney issued subpoenas to banks and financial institutions to obtain Trump’s records. Trump sued to prevent the disclosures. Even though all four lower courts that considered the issue ruled that the records must be produced, Trump continues to stonewall, claiming in essence he is above the law.

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May 4, 2020

Israel’s New Government Is Exploiting Pandemic to Annex 30 Percent of West Bank

After three indecisive elections, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his opponent Benny Gantz agreed to form a unity government in light of the COVID-19 pandemic.

One of the central pillars of this new regime is the unlawful annexation of the Jordan Valley and illegal Jewish settlements in the occupied West Bank. The annexation has the full backing of U.S. President Donald Trump.

“Using the time when the world has been busy confronting the COVID-19 pandemic to commit more war crimes is immoral and poses new challenges for the rule of law and human rights,” Raji Sourani, director of the Palestinian Centre for Human Rights (PCHR), told Truthout.

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April 16, 2020

Intensifying Sanctions on Iran and Venezuela, Trump Is Weaponizing Coronavirus

As the entire world grapples with the most devastating pandemic of the modern era, the United States is pouring kerosene on the fire in Iran and Venezuela. The U.S. government has maintained punishing sanctions against the people of Iran and Venezuela to engineer regime change. But instead of ending the sanctions to help Iranians and Venezuelans fight the coronavirus, the Trump administration has expanded them and exacerbated the danger they pose.

“The world is facing the risk of an unprecedented humanitarian disaster,” the International Association of Democratic Lawyers wrote in a statement calling on the U.S. government to immediately lift all sanctions against Iran and Venezuela.

Sanctions (unilateral coercive measures), collective punishment and forcible regime change are illegal under U.S. and international law. Donald Trump’s intensification of sanctions against Venezuela and Iran during the pandemic constitutes a crime against humanity.

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March 28, 2020

DOJ Seeks to Exploit Coronavirus Emergency to Detain People Indefinitely

Throughout U.S. history, presidents have exploited national emergencies to exceed their constitutional powers. Abraham Lincoln illegally suspended habeas corpus during the Civil War. Franklin D. Roosevelt confined people of Japanese descent in internment camps during World War II. And George W. Bush used his post-9/11 “war on terror” to launch two illegal wars, mount a program of torture, conduct extensive unlawful surveillance and illegally detain people.

In light of the national emergency Donald Trump declared on Friday, March 13, his Department of Justice (DOJ) is asking Congress to allow the attorney general to indefinitely detain people without trial in violation of the constitutional right of habeas corpus. The DOJ also seeks to hold hearings without the defendant’s consent and exclude anyone with COVID-19 from eligibility for asylum.

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March 17, 2020

Is the DNC Once Again Orchestrating the Defeat of a Socialist Candidate?

In 1944, the Democratic National Committee (DNC) ensured that socialist Henry Wallace would not succeed Franklin D. Roosevelt (FDR) as president. Is history repeating itself in 2020?

Democratic socialist Bernie Sanders received the most votes in the first three primary elections. After centrist Joe Biden scored his first primary win, the DNC consolidated the Democratic Party establishment around him. Candidates Pete Buttigieg and Amy Klobuchar immediately dropped out of the race and endorsed Biden, as did former candidate Beto O’Rourke. Kamala Harris and Cory Booker, who had already quit the primary race, followed suit and Michael Bloomberg did as well. The party bosses likely wanted to ensure that Sanders would not upend the corporate order.

Wallace, who held many of the same political positions as Sanders, was one of the architects of the New Deal. He served as FDR’s agriculture secretary, vice president and commerce secretary. But the ailing FDR’s 1944 bid to select Wallace as his vice president for what would be his final presidential term was derailed by the corporate party bosses who made sure that Harry Truman would follow FDR as president instead of Wallace.

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