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Lloyd Austin at the Pentagon in 2014. He will be Joe Biden’s pick for defense secretary.
Photograph: Paul J Richards/AFP/Getty Images
California has enacted new stay-at-home guidelines as coronavirus cases in the state have surged, placing 33m pandemic-fatigued residents under some of the harshest restrictions in the US in a last-resort effort to rein in the pandemic.
The measures are the strictest since those enacted in March, when California’s early, aggressive lockdown helped keep the state’s death rate relatively low. Nine months on, however, a worn-out public seems less willing to comply with shelter-in-place and many workers – devastated by the economic toll of the pandemic – are unable to do so.
In Los Angeles, hospitals are expected to overflow by Christmas. In southern California, only 12.5% of ICU beds remain available. In the San Joaquin Valley, just 8.6% of ICU beds are open.
“We’re seeing the healthcare system become overwhelmed right now,” said Marta Induni, the director of research at the Oakland-based non-profit Public Health Institute.
California’s new shelter-in-place order, which will remain in place until 4 January, requires people in affected regions to stay home and minimize contact with those outside their household. Outdoor dining, playgrounds, campgrounds and other recreation areas are closed. “My message couldn’t be simpler: it’s time to hunker down,” Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti said last week.
But the rules aren’t so simple – they come with many exceptions and caveats. Non-essential retail, including malls and shopping centers, will remain open at reduced capacity. Outdoor religious services and protests are permitted, and entertainment production and professional sports can continue without a live audience.
Read more of Maanvi Singh’s report from San Francisco here: Fatigued Californians are back in lockdown. Will it work?
Federal judge finds Seattle Police in contempt of court over use of “blast balls” and pepper spray during BLM protests
A federal judge has found the Seattle Police Department in contempt of court for the indiscriminate use of pepper-filled “blast balls” and pepper spray during Black Lives Matter protests.
The Associated Press reports that US District Judge Richard Jones issued a 27-page order in response to a motion by Black Lives Matter Seattle-King County to find the police department in contempt of his earlier injunction barring police from using force against peaceful protesters.
Jones found four “clear violations” of his order: one involving the use of pepper spray and the other three involving blast balls, a grenade-like device that explodes and spews pepper gas.
“Of the less lethal weapons, the Court is most concerned about SPD’s use of blast balls, the most indiscriminate of the four” crowd-control weapons he examined. “SPD has often hurled blast balls into crowds of protestors” when no immediate threat to the officers’ safety or public property could be identified, the judge found.
Jones also highlighted four instances where officers’ use of force complied with his order. All the other instances cited in voluminous briefs filed by BLM and the city’s attorneys were too close to call one way or another, he said, which Jones said was not a good thing for the police department.
“Some might say that four clear violations out of four days of protests and countless uses of less-lethal weapons must surely be insufficient to ‘vitiate’ (spoil) the City’s otherwise substantial compliance,” Jones wrote. “But this is misguided.”
In a statement, Black Lives Matter Seattle-King County said police do not have license to attack people demanding accountability and change, adding that “the use of pepper spray and blast balls against our community is proof that our protests are necessary. We will continue to defend our rights until we achieve systemic change and accountability. We will not stop.”
Lisa Nowlin, staff attorney for the ACLU of Washington and among the attorneys representing the plaintiffs, said in a statement they are pleased the court is acknowledging the city’s “repeated violations of court orders and is holding them accountable.”
“Seattle Police’s continued use of less lethal weapons against protesters is disturbing and the City needs to focus on protecting freedom of speech and freedom of assembly, rather than using force to prevent protesters from exercising their constitutionally-protected rights,” she said.
Neil Young drops lawsuit against Donald Trump
Neil Young’s lawsuit against Donald Trump, filed in opposition to his music being used in campaign rallies, has been dismissed by a New York court.
The musician voluntarily dismissed the case himself, “with prejudice”, which means it cannot be brought again. It is possible that the case was settled out of court, though neither the president’s team nor Young has made any further statement.
Young filed the lawsuit in August, after his songs Rockin’ in the Free World and Devil’s Sidewalk were used at a Trump rally in Tulsa. He claimed copyright infringement, with the complaint stating that Young “cannot allow his music to be used as a ‘theme song’ for a divisive, un-American campaign of ignorance and hate”. He said Trump had repeatedly played the songs as far back as 2015, and claimed he did not have a licence to play them.
Trump himself said “Rockin’ in the Free World was just one of 10 songs used as background music. Didn’t love it anyway.” But he started to use the song again in his 2020 re-election campaign, by which time Young had become a frequently outspoken opponent of the president.
Read more of Ben Beaumont-Thomas’ report here: Neil Young drops lawsuit against Donald Trump
If president-elect Joe Biden’s reported pick for defense secretary Lloyd Austin, is confirmed by the Senate, he would be the first Black leader of the Pentagon.
Biden appears to have selected Austin over the longtime frontrunner for the position, Michele Flournoy, a former senior Pentagon official and Biden supporter who would have been the first woman to serve as defense secretary. Biden also had considered Jeh Johnson, a former Pentagon general counsel and former secretary of homeland security.
As a career military officer who served 41 years in uniform, the 67-year-old Austin is likely to face opposition from some in Congress and in the defense establishment who believe in drawing a clear line between civilian and military leadership of the Pentagon. Although many previous defense secretaries have served briefly in the military, only two – George C Marshall and James Mattis – have been career officers. Marshall also served as secretary of state.
Biden has known Austin at least since the general’s years leading US and coalition troops in Iraq while Biden was vice-president. Austin was commander in Baghdad of the multinational corps-Iraq in 2008 when Barack Obama was elected president, and he returned to lead US troops from 2010 through 2011.
Austin also served in 2012 as the first Black vice-chief of staff of the army, the service’s No 2-ranking position. A year later he assumed command of US central command, where he fashioned and began implementing a US military strategy against Islamic State militants in Iraq and Syria.
Austin retired from the army in 2016. Like Mattis, he would need to obtain a congressional waiver to serve as defense secretary, exempting him from the legal requirement that a former member of the military be out of uniform at least seven years before serving as secretary of defense. Such laws were meant to preserve the civilian nature of the Department of Defense.
Read more here: Lloyd Austin – Biden to nominate retired army general to be defense secretary