Washington State Gov. Inslee says not wearing masks is a misdemeanor . . . Starting Friday, individuals in Washington state who don’t wear face masks in public could face a misdemeanor charge, Gov. Jay Inslee announced. Washington joined several states Tuesday in instituting a statewide mask mandate amid an uptick in positive coronavirus cases, saying facial coverings are crucial in slowing the spread of the virus. “I think of these face coverings, in some sense, as a statement,” Mr. Inslee said. “It’s a statement that when you wear it, it means you care about people, because it means you want to reduce the risk that you are going to infect another person.” Washington Times

 

 

Bill Gates attack coronavirus response, wife Melinda says blacks should get vaccine first . . . Microsoft founder Bill Gates harshly criticized the United States' response to the coronavirus pandemic saying its refusal to work with other countries has caused a 'vacuum' in solving the global problem. Gates said that the U.S. had been more concerned with 'trying to cast blame' for the spread of the virus instead of collaborating with other countries in eradicating it, blasting the 'inward' approach the country has taken. Melinda Gates seconded his support of WHO's work, later adding that when a vaccine is available, black Americans should be among the first to receive it. Daily Mail

 

Quarantine for all Trump campaign staffers who were at rally in  Tulsa . . . All campaign staffers who attended President Donald Trump's rally are being asked to quarantine at home as a precaution after eight staffers tested positive for COVID-19 before and after the event. The Trump campaign revealed the decision to impose a quarantine in order to contain possible further spread of the coronavirus among those who worked the event to their families and others in the community. The decision comes after the U.S. Secret Service ordered dozens of officers who worked the event to quarantine upon return to their homes. Daily Mail

 

Trump administration asks Supreme Court to kill Obamacare . . . The Trump administration urged the Supreme Court to invalidate the Affordable Care Act in a legal brief filed Thursday, putting health care at center stage in an election year already focused on the coronavirus pandemic’s impact. The Justice Department said the 2010 health law is invalid because Congress in 2017 ended the financial penalty for not having health insurance. “The entire ACA thus must fall with the individual mandate,” Solicitor General Noel Francisco wrote in the Justice Department’s brief, which was filed late Thursday. “The individual mandate is no longer a valid exercise of Congress’s legislative authority in light of Congress’s elimination of the penalty for noncompliance.” Supreme Court consideration of the ACA won’t happen until the fall at the earliest, with any decision likely coming after Election Day. Wall Street Journal

 

 

Democratic Green Bay mayor welcomes Trump with warning of "limits" to hospitality . . . Democratic Green Bay Mayor Eric Genrich penned an open letter to President Trump calling the president intolerant, ignorant, divisive, and bigoted “We are an increasingly diverse city with a vibrant immigrant heritage and culture and strong connections to the indigenous people who call our region home,” the wrote in the letter, which he placed on his Facebook page. “Our instinct toward hospitality, of course, extends to our president, but I want you to know that it has its limitations. We don’t tolerate intolerance or willful ignorance, and we won’t endorse or ignore divisive and bigoted rhetoric.” White House Dossier

 

Biden calls Trump whiny, self-pitying "child" . . . Joe Biden blasted President Trump for his handling of the coronavirus crisis and said the Trump administration's lawsuit to kill Obamacare could leave COVID-19 victims without healthcare. 'It's like a child who can't believe this has happened to him. All his whining and self-pity. This pandemic didn't happen to him, it happened to all of us,' Biden said during a healthcare-themed speech in Lancaster, Pennsylvania Thursday. 'His job isn't to whine about it, his job is to do something about it, to lead.' 

Daily Mail

 

Trump says Democrats don't love our country . . . President Donald Trump ripped Democrats during his Fox News town hall Thursday night, saying Democrats are harder to work with than China or Russia and that their leaders don’t love America. Trump made the statement twice Thursday during his visit to a naval shipyard in Wisconsin in response to Fox News host Sean Hannity’s questions about foreign policy. Trump said people always assumed China, Russia or North Korea were the hardest people he’d ever had to work with, but he argued Democrats are worse. “We have Schumer and Pelosi and people that are bad people that I honestly believe don’t love our country,” he said. Daily Caller

 

 

De Blasio orders "Black Lives Matter" painted outside Trump Tower . . . Mayor Bill de Blasio has ignited a new feud with President Trump by ordering the words “Black Lives Matter” to be painted in large yellow letters on the street outside of Trump Tower. The words are expected to be painted in the coming week on Fifth Avenue, between 56th and 57th Streets, according to the city. “The president is a disgrace to the values we cherish in New York City,” a spokeswoman for Mr. de Blasio said. In a tweet in response, Mr. Trump referenced Mr. de Blasio’s plan to paint “the fabled & beautiful Fifth Avenue, right in front of Trump Tower/Tiffany.” New York Times

 

Police reform appears dead in Congress . . . Congress has been under intense pressure to act since George Floyd’s death by Minneapolis police sparked widespread protests and calls to end systemic racism and police brutality. The House passed a sweeping reform bill Thursday night, but that measure is going nowhere in the Senate, which is mired in its own partisan standoff. Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) said passing police reform “seems to be” dead in the Senate after most Democrats blocked a bill spearheaded by Sen. Tim Scott (S.C.), the only Black Republican senator, from moving forward. “I don’t know how you do something,” Graham told reporters. “It’s a shame, but we are where we are.” The Hill

 

Trump: Living in Democratic cities like "living in hell" . . . Trump, in a Fox News town hall with Sean Hannity on Thursday, tore into the soaring violent-crime rates in cities including Chicago and Baltimore – comparing them to Afghanistan and Honduras, and saying, “it’s like living in hell.” The president specifically called out Chicago, Baltimore, Detroit and Oakland as problematic. Trump blamed the mayors of those cities – all of them Democrats – along with former President Barack Obama and the party’s presumptive presidential nominee Joe Biden – for the high rates of homicide and other violent crimes. Fox News

 

Democrats to vote to make DC a state and rename it . . . House Democrats are poised to approve Washington, D.C., becoming the nation's 51st state in a historic vote scheduled for Friday. Washington the 'District of Columbia' would be no longer, the bill's language says, as the new state would be referred to as 'Washington, Douglass Commonwealth' - swapping out Italian explorer Christopher Columbus for Maryland-born abolitionist  Frederick Douglass. Daily Mail

 

Fiorina to support Biden . . . Former Republican presidential candidate Carly Fiorina revealed in a new interview that she will likely vote for former Vice President Joe Biden in the 2020 election, opting to cast her ballot for the presumptive Democratic nominee over her 2016 GOP primary opponent and the incumbent president. “I’ve been very clear that I can’t support Donald Trump. And, you know, elections are binary choices,” Fiorina told The Atlantic. Politico

 

Trump calls protestors "terrorists"  and vows "retribution" for tearing down statues . . . Trump on Thursday promised “retribution” against protesters nationwide who tore down statues and referred to Wisconsin demonstrators as “terrorists.” “Every night, we’re going to get tougher and tougher,” Trump said. “And at some point, there’s going to be retribution because there has to be. These people are vandals, but they’re agitators, but they're really — they’re terrorists, in a sense.” It’s unclear what the president meant by “retribution," but Trump earlier in the town hall called for prison time for protesters who tear down monuments. Politico

 

Officials expect surge of migrants to the Mexican border . . . A new immigration crisis, just in time for the election. This can only help President Trump as people are reminding of the kind of unlimited illegal immigration that was occurring before he assumed office. “What we are seeing right now is that while our economy is struggling, it is by far worse in Mexico, Northern Triangle countries, really in the Western Hemisphere really,” said Mark Morgan, who is performing the duties of acting commissioner of Customs and Border Protection. White House Dossier

 

Navy sailors getting high on LSD . . . The Navy disclosed on Thursday that it has seen an increase in its personnel purchasing, using, and distributing the hallucinogenic drug LSD. The Naval Criminal Investigative Service (NCIS) said it has "noticed an increase of drug investigations involving Department of Navy personnel" buying and using LSD during the past year."Many of these investigations involve purchasing the drug on the dark web," the NCIS said. The drug appears to be making a comeback after being used rarely within the Navy from at least 2003 to 2006 when there were only four detected instances of staff taking the drug. Washington Free Beacon

 

 

Support in Hong Kong for protests declines . . . 

Support for year-long pro-democracy protests in Hong Kong has slipped, now getting the backing of a slim majority, as the city braces for the imposition of Beijing-drafted national security legislation, a survey conducted for Reuters showed. Protests escalated last June over a since-withdrawn bill that would have allowed extraditions of defendants to mainland China. They later morphed into a push for greater democracy, often involving violent clashes with the police. The protests have resumed, but with far fewer participants, since China announced plans for the security law, which has alarmed foreign governments and democracy activists in Hong Kong. Reuters

 

China and Russia are worst human trafficking offenders . . .  China and Russia continue to rank among the world's worst human trafficking offenders, with both countries routinely exploiting vulnerable populations and doing little to stem the problem, according to a landmark report published Thursday by the Trump administration. Russia and China again topped the list of offenders, along with multiple countries in Africa and the Middle East. The problem is also rampant in the United States, where sex workers, drug addicts, and immigrant laborers, among many others, are exploited by networks of human traffickers. Washington Free Beacon

 

Facebook shares tumble as more companies boycott . . . Verizon has joined the growing list of US companies boycotting Facebook over its failure to crack down on hate speech, after one of its ads was reportedly posted next to a video 'drawing on hateful and antisemitic rhetoric' on the platform. The telecomms firm announced Thursday it will pull ads from Facebook until the social media giant 'can create an acceptable solution that makes us comfortable'. This marks the latest blow for Facebook after several firms have pulled the plug on advertizing in the last week in support of a campaign calling the company out for failing to stop hate speech and misinformation being posted on its platform. Shares in the social media giant tumbled 2 percent Thursday following Verizon's announcement. Daily Mail

 

Entrepreneurs starting new businesses despite pandemic . . . Amid the worst job market in decades and projections that the economy will contract by as much as 35% this quarter, entrepreneurs apparently missed the message of doom. New business formation has rebounded quickly in parts of the country, raising hopes for a stronger-than-expected recovery. The number of Employer Identification Number (EIN) applications, which new businesses file with the IRS, tanked in mid-March as the pandemic forced most of the nation into lockdown. Filings remained low for several weeks, but they’re growing again across much of the country, led by Southern states that have been less severely affected by the coronavirus outbreak. Bloomberg

 

Now the Left is coming after the Star Spangled Banner . . . There is growing outrage over calls by activists, historians and journalists to replace The Star Spangled Banner as the national anthem because it was written by slave owner Francis Scott Key, and potentially replace it with John Lennon's Imagine. They say that because the song was written by Francis Scott Key, a white slave owner who made overtly racist remarks, it is no longer appropriate that lyrics he wrote should still be the national anthem given the ongoing cultural reckoning and recognizing of systemic racism in America. Daily Mail

 

 

Mob will try to tear down Lincoln statue in DC . . . Activists have appeared to move their plans to tear down the Emancipation Memorial in D.C.’s Lincoln Park to Friday, announcing the event on social media and emphasizing their intentions by noting that “no revolution has ever been just peaceful. We are no different.” A leftist agitator made waves on Tuesday after publicly announcing plans to destruct the Emancipation Memorial, while speaking to a crowd gathered in Lincoln Park. “Thursday at 7 p.m., we tearing this motherfucker down!” he said while standing at the memorial’s base, prompting cheers from the crowd. Breitbart

British soccer club apologizes for letting Osama Bin Laden watch match . . . Leeds United, an English soccer club that plays in the second tier of the sport, apologized Wednesday after receiving backlash over an Osama bin Laden cutout which appeared in the stands during a match. Leeds United put up 15,000 cutouts for its match against Cardiff City because the team is barred from having fans in the stands because of the coronavirus pandemic. Fans could buy seats and fill them with their own face. However, the promotion turned ugly when the dead Al Qaeda leader's image appeared in the crowd, alongside those of other fans who had to pay to have their face on the seat. Fox News

 

Losing candidate claims black voter suppression even though winner was black . . . A New York state lawmaker who sought to replace a retiring member of Congress refused to concede defeat Thursday following Tuesday’s Democratic primary, claiming the election was plagued by “intentional black voter suppression.”

State Assemblyman Michael Blake, an African-American candidate, finished in second place in the 15th Congressional District contest’s in-person ballot count, the New York Daily News reported.

The top finisher was New York City Councilman Ritchie Torres, who is also African-American. Fox News

 

GOP candidate "proud" of daughter who opposed him . . . A Michigan state House candidate blames the influence of his daughter’s liberal college for her viral social media plea for voters to cast their ballots for someone else. “When they go off to college, quite frankly they get involved with these Marxist, socialist universities and they start getting indoctrinated with things that are completely polar opposite from where you raised them,” Republican Robert Regan, 52 said. Regan’s daughter, Stephanie Regan, sent out a tweet Tuesday that read, “if you’re in michigan and 18+ pls for the love of god do not vote for my dad for state rep. tell everyone.” The tweet quickly went viral with more than 177,000 likes by Thursday night. The candidate said that while he was hurt by the tweet he was also proud of his daughter. Fox News

 

What's the age limit on spankings? I guess at some point it becomes assault.