The Daily Moth 1-21-2020
Hello, welcome to The Daily Moth! It is Tuesday, January 21. Ready for news?
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Key phase of impeachment trial begins today
The key phase of the impeachment trial against President Trump began today in the Senate. It is the third time in U.S. history that a president has faced removal from office.
USA Today explained that the Constitution has only four requirements for an impeachment trial: that only the Senate can hold a trial, that senators swear an oath, that a two-thirds majority is required to remove an official, and that the Supreme Court chief justice presides over the trial of a president.
The rest of the rules for the trial has to be proposed and voted by the Senate. The trial officially started on Thursday with most of the senators swearing in, and today the trial opened with a debate on a resolution on trial rules.
The trial will be on television and broadcast by government-operated cameras. If a senator wants to debate an aspect of the trial, the Senate must go into a secret, closed session. The cameras would turn off and the public and media would have to exit the room.
The Senate leader Mitch McConnell (R) proposed in a resolution for the trial to wrap up as quickly as possible. His idea is for each side to have 24 hours to present their opening arguments over three days. It was originally 24 hours in 2 days, but that was changed to 3 days.
Axios said senators are likely to work “marathon sessions” and many expect to be in the chamber until the early morning hours on several days.
There will be a debate on whether to call witnesses or not later in the trial -- the New York Times said this would be in the "middle of the trial." Democrats are opposed to this and want documents and witnesses to be presented earlier in the trial.
There is no deadline to finish the trial. It could take from two to four weeks. Bill Clinton’s trial was six weeks long.
Seven Democratic House managers (prosecutors) argued that Trump deserves to be removed from office because he allegedly abused his power when he asked Ukraine to investigate a political rival while at the same time withholding almost $400 million in U.S. military aid.
President Trump's legal team said Trump did nothing wrong and that the Senate should reject the case against him because this is a "dangerous perversion of the Constitution."
President Trump is in Switzerland at the World Economic Forum in Davos.
https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2020/01/21/senate-impeachment-trial-trump-what-to-expect/4493107002/
https://apnews.com/2c79655e468cc949917f57c085d6bba7
https://www.axios.com/trump-impeachment-trial-live-updates-175149a5-67a5-4911-ae35-23662025f235.html
https://www.cbsnews.com/live-updates/trump-impeachment-trial-senate-proceedings-set-to-begin-as-rules-come-into-focus-2019-01-21/
https://www.nytimes.com/live/2020/impeachment-trial-01-21?action=click&module=Top%20Stories&pgtype=Homepage
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Hillary says "nobody likes Bernie"
Hillary Clinton said in a documentary that will be released on Hulu that "nobody likes" Bernie Sanders and that "nobody wants to work with him." She pointed out that Bernie was in Congress for years but had just one senator support him.
Hillary also said that Bernie is a "career politician" who "got nothing done" and that it is "just all baloney and I feel so bad that people got sucked in it."
The two, Hillary and Bernie, had a bruising primary season in 2016 before Hillary won the Democratic nomination. Although Bernie did eventually endorse her, the two never seemed to come together to present a unified appearance to bring Democratic voters together.
When Hillary was asked if she would endorse Bernie if he won the Democratic nomination this year, Hillary said "I'm not going to go there yet."
Bernie told Fox News that his focus is on the impeachment trial.
The Hulu documentary series is named “Hillary” and will be released in March.
https://www.axios.com/hillary-clinton-bernie-sanders-nobody-likes-him-f570ec0d-9ded-4966-9037-68dbf9abe931.html
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Supreme Court lets Flint residents sue over water contamination
Reuters reported that the U.S. Supreme Court will allow people who live in Flint, Michigan to proceed with their civil rights lawsuit against city and government officials.
Residents have accused city officials of allowing the city water supply to become contaminated with lead when they switched water sources from Lake Huron to the Flint River in 2014 to save money during a financial crisis.
The water was corrosive and caused lead to leach from the pipes and get into the water supply. There was also an outbreak of Legionnaires’ disease, which is caused by bacteria, and it killed 12 people.
Flint has since switched back to Lake Huron water, but many people have filed lawsuits. There are more than 25,000 people, including children, who said they were negatively affected by lead and bacteria in the water supply.
City and government officials argued that they were immune from liability because they did the best they could in difficult circumstances with limited information and appealed two cases to the Supreme Court, but the justices turned down the appeals and did not comment.
This means the lawsuits can proceed in lower courts.
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-court-flint-idUSKBN1ZK1S5
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49ers’ Katie Sowers is first openly gay NFL coach
This year’s Super Bowl LIV (54) matchup is set with the Kansas City Chiefs and the San Francisco 49ers to play in Miami Gardens for the Lombardi Trophy.
The 49ers’ offensive assistant coach, Kate Sowers, will make history as the first female and openly gay person to be a coach during the Super Bowl. It is her third season with the team.
She is the second female hired as a full-time coach for an NFL team. The first was Kathryn Smith, who worked with the Buffalo Bills when Rex Ryan was their coach.
Sowers came out as lesbian before the 2017 NFL season in an interview with outsports.com, a LGBT-focused sports website.
She said “one of the most important things is to be true to who you are.” She also said that there are “so many people who identify as LGBT in the NFL, as in any business, that do not feel comfortable about being public about their sexual orientation.”
Sowers used to work with the Atlanta Falcons, which is how she met and worked with the 49ers head coach Kyle Shanahan. She used to play football in the Women’s Alliance.
You may see Sowers in an ad by Microsoft in which she reads from piece of paper that she wrote when she was a girl in which she says, “I hope some day I will be on a real football team.”
She said in the commercial “I’m not just here to be the token female, I’m here to help us win.”
https://www.outsports.com/2020/1/20/21073581/49ers-katie-sowers-coach-gay-woman-super-bowl
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/49ers-katie-sowers-to-make-history-first-female-openly-gay-coach-super-bowl-liv/
https://www.outsports.com/2017/8/22/16175286/katie-sowers-san-francisco-49ers-coach-gay-coming-out
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First case of Chinese coronavirus in Washington state
News reports say that a man in Washington state has been diagnosed with the same kind of coronavirus that started spreading last month in China, killing at least six. I did a news story about this yesterday.
The man is in his 30’s and is in stable condition at a medical center in Everett and is monitored. He arrived in the United States last week from Wuhan, which is where the disease is believed to have spread from animal markets.
The World Health Organization will meet tomorrow to decide whether to declare the disease a public health emergency.
The Centers for Disease Control is screening passengers flying from Wuhan to airports in New York City, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Atlanta, and Chicago.
washingtonpost.com/health/2020/01/21/coronavirus-us-case/
https://www.cnn.com/2020/01/21/health/wuhan-coronavirus-first-us-case-cdc-bn/index.html
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That is all for today. See you tomorrow and stay with the light!