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Secretary of defense issues ‘stand-down’ order to address extremism in the military

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Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin is taking on right-wing extremism in the military, ordering all commanding officers and supervisors to issue a one-day stand-down order, to address extremism in the ranks.

In a Friday memo, Austin granted a 60-day window for military leaders to discuss “the importance of our oath of office; a description of impermissible behaviors; and procedures for reporting suspected, or actual, extremist behaviors,” following reports that some of the rioters who stormed the Capitol on Jan. 6 were active duty service members and military veterans.

HOUSE, SENATE APPROVE CIVILIAN WAIVER FOR BIDEN’S DEFENSE SECRETARY NOMINEE LLOYD AUSTIN

“We will not tolerate actions that go against the fundamental principles of the oath we share, including actions associated with extremist or dissident ideologies,” the memo signed by Austin read. “Service members, DoD civilian employees, and all those who support our mission, deserve an environment free of discrimination, hate, and harassment.”

The stand-down order was first announced by the Pentagon Wednesday, when Austin noted that though the number of individual service members involved in the attack was “small”, they were “not as small as anyone would like,” reported the Department of Defense.

The department has not released information on how many active military service members are believed to have been present at the Jan. 6 riot, but Pentagon Press Secretary John Kirby said during a Wednesday press conference, “No matter what it is, it is … not an insignificant problem and has to be addressed.”

The secretary of defense said this order is just the first in a greater strategy to better understand the scope of extremism in the military and to “develop sustainable ways to eliminate the corrosive effects that extremist ideology and conduct have on the workforce.”

Kirby said that fight against extremism is a “thorny problem” that the military has fought against in the past.

A 2019 Military Times poll found that 36 percent of its active-duty poll takers had personally witnessed “evidence of white supremacist and racist ideologies in the military” – a figure that jump from 22 percent of poll takers in 2018.

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Austin is the first Black Secretary of Defense and is expected to lead the charge in what the Pentagon has said must be a leadership down approach.

“We owe it to the oath we each took and the trust the American people have in our institution,” he wrote in the memo.

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Nazi death camp secretary charged with accessory to murder

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German prosecutors have filed charges against a 95-year-old woman who they say helped carry out “the systematic killing of Jewish prisoners,” along with Polish partisans and Russian prisoners of war.

The woman, who testified against the Nazi camp’s commandant in the 1950s and was the subject of an investigation since at least 2016, was charged with 10,000 counts of accessory to murder and an unspecified number of counts of accessory to attempted murder.

In a twist, the case is being handled by a juvenile court because the woman was under 21 when she worked as a secretary at the Stutthof concentration camp near Gdansk on Poland’s Baltic coast, NPR reported.

The woman was not named, but Senior Public Prosecutor Peter Müller-Rakow used the term “Heranwachsenden” to refer to her. German law uses the term to refer to someone between 18 and 21 years old.

The woman testified against the Nazi camp’s commandant in the 1950s and was the subject of an investigation since at least 2016.
AP

She would have been 18 or 19 when she started working at the Nazi camp in June 1943. She was a close aide to the SS commandant there until April 1945. The camp was one that used Zyklon B gas chambers to exterminate prisoners. More than 60,000 people were killed there.

In an interview with a German public broadcaster in late 2019, the woman, who was identified as “Irmgard F.,” said she has repeatedly given witness accounts to authorities about what she saw and did at the Stutthof camp. She claimed that she wasn’t aware of mass poisonings or other acts of genocide — in part because her office window faced outward from the camp, NPR reported. She said she never set foot in the camp itself, according to The Associated Press.

People visit the museum in the former Nazi Death Camp Stutthof, in Sztutowo, Poland, on July 21, 2020.
AFP via Getty Images

In 1957, Stutthof’s commandant Paul-Werner Hoppe was sentenced to nine years in prison. He died in 1974. In the interview, Irmgard F said she testified at his trial that all Hoppe’s correspondence with higher SS administration had gone past her desk and that the commandant had dictated her letters daily, the AP reported. She said she did not know of prisoners being gassed, but told authorities at the time she was aware Hoppe had ordered executions, which she presumed were as punishment for infractions.

Last year, Bruno Dey, a 93-year-old former guard at the Stutthof camp, was convicted of being an accessory in the murder of more than 5,200 prisoners — but got off with a two-year suspended prison sentence. Among the witnesses at his trial was then 91-year-old Asia Shindelman, who survived the camp and eventually settled in Wayne, NJ.

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China’s top diplomat takes hardline stance in first call with new US Secretary of State

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Yang Jiechi, the top foreign policy aide to Chinese leader Xi Jinping, told Blinken during their Friday call that the US should “correct recent mistakes, and work with China to promote the healthy and stable development of China-US relations by upholding the spirit of non-conflict, non-confrontation, mutual respect and win-win cooperation,” according to a statement released by the Chinese Foreign Ministry.

Yang emphasized that both sides should respect the other’s core interests, as well as political systems and developmental paths of their own choosing, the statement said.

“Each side should focus on taking care of its own domestic affairs. China will firmly continue down the path of socialism with Chinese characteristics and no one can stop the great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation,” Yang said.

Relations between Washington and Beijing under former US President Donald Trump were oftentimes fractious, with clashes on issues relating to trade, technology, regional security and human rights. Recent statements from the new administration of President Joe Biden suggest there will be little in the way of pullback. In a speech Thursday, Biden described China as the US’ “most serious competitor” and outlined plans to confront Beijing’s “attack on human rights, intellectual property, and global governance.”

During the phone call Friday, Yang highlighted several major sources of continued tension between the two countries, including Taiwan.

Beijing claims full sovereignty over Taiwan, a democratic island of almost 24 million people, despite the fact that the two sides have been governed separately for more than seven decades.

Beijing has stepped up military activity around Taiwan since Biden took office, sending combat aircraft, including H-6K bombers, into Taiwan’s air defense identification zone on several occasions in what was seen as a direct message to the new US administration that China will not relent on its claims of sovereignty over the island.

On Thursday, the US Navy sent a guided-missile destroyer through the Taiwan Strait, the first time a US warship has gone through the waterway that separates China and Taiwan during the Biden administration.

Yang also warned Blinken that issues relating to Hong Kong, Xinjiang and Tibet are China’s internal affairs, and that the country would not tolerate any external interference.

The Trump administration determined that China is committing genocide against Uyghur Muslims and ethnic and religious minority groups in Xinjiang, a designation Blinken has said he agrees with.

The US State Department has previously estimated that up to two million Uyghurs, as well as members of other Muslim minority groups, have been detained in a sprawling network of internment camps in the region.

According to a US state department readout of the call, Friday, Blinken stressed the US would continue to stand up for human rights and democratic values, including in Xinjiang, Tibet, and Hong Kong, and pressed China to join the international community in condemning the military coup in Myanmar.
Blinken also reaffirmed that the US would work together with its allies and partners to hold China accountable for its “efforts to threaten stability in the Indo-Pacific, including across the Taiwan Strait,” the US statement said.

CNN’s Jennifer Hansler contributed to this report.

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Biden Press Secretary Jen Psaki Prepares for End of Media Honeymoon, Says ‘I’m Not Gonna Be a Pushover’

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If not quite over, the honeymoon is starting to fade.

The touching romance between the Biden administration and the news media that cover it—which began with such ardor and emotional release on Jan. 20—has finally begun to cool down to the sort of businesslike, occasionally bickering liaison that is only to be expected of an arranged marriage between two hoary institutions of American democracy.

Four years after White House press secretary Sean Spicer devoted his first formal briefing to yelling at the assembled journalists about “deliberately false reporting” of the crowd size at Donald Trump’s inauguration—before storming off without taking questions—Joe Biden’s top spokesperson, Jen Psaki, stood at the podium for the first time and delivered a heartwarming tribute to “the role of a free and independent press in our democracy and for the role all of you play.”

“That has certainly been my perspective throughout my career, and my goal was to return to accuracy and transparency from the podium,” Psaki—a former Obama White House official and State Department spokesperson—told The Daily Beast on Friday, elaborating on her own inaugural address. “But also [to acknowledge that] there would be moments of disagreement, and that was part of democracy, right?”

The job of the White House press secretary—which encompasses being interrogated on live television on behalf of the president and the entire United States government on issues foreign and domestic, substantive and trivial—is by far the highest-profile role that the 42-year-old Psaki has played on the global stage.

Her every word, past and present, is now subject to intense scrutiny, as with her tweet last August mocking Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina as “Lady G,” a reference to the Washington-insider joke that the 65-year-old Graham is a closeted gay man (which he has steadfastly denied).

Right-wing media outlets and various Republican operatives especially have characterized Psaki’s tweet—prompted by Graham’s antagonistic grilling of former acting attorney general Sally Yates over her role in the Trump/Russia investigation—as “homophobic,” although The Advocate, a prominent gay publication, defended it in light of Graham’s public record of anti-LGBTQ policies and rhetoric.

“I don’t believe anyone should be spreading conspiracy theories or attacking public servants, and that’s what that tweet was about,” Psaki said in her first public comments on the flap. “I sent it six months ago, long before I was involved in the Biden White House [when she was an on-air commentator for CNN]. And I think anyone who’s known me for more than three minutes—which is not any of the people who are attacking me on Twitter—knows that I am a longtime, lifelong advocate—long before most people were—for LGBTQ rights in the community. But yes, it’s painful, and you try not to let some of this stuff bother you, but sometimes it does.”

Two-and-a-half weeks in, Psaki and the White House press operation are getting largely positive reviews from reporters on the beat, who, during the Trump presidency—even before the COVID-19 pandemic—had become accustomed to not having any briefings at all or even getting their emails answered. During her rare appearances in the briefing room, Trump’s fourth White House press secretary, Kaleigh McEnany, used the occasion mainly to launch personal attacks on reporters, praise Trump and spin falsehoods.

“People should know that I’m not gonna be a pushover up there. And I’m not going to allow people to put words in my mouth or misconstrue what I said.”

— White House Press Sec. Jen Psaki

“It’s great to have a return to briefings and a useful exchange for reporters to get their questions answered,” said the Associated Press’s Zeke Miller, president of the White House Correspondents Association. “But it’s not just about the exchange of information; it’s about the potent symbol that that forum sends around the world, but also in Washington—that the government is not above taking questions from journalists. It’s an important principle that’s good to see.”

Ironically, given the bad blood between the 45th president and the press, it’s unlikely that Washington journalists will ever have the near-naked visibility into the machinations of Team Biden that they enjoyed with Trump and his often-warring minions.

“With Donald Trump, you always knew what was going on in the cortex of his brain, minute to minute, because he was tweeting it,” said Washington Post columnist Karen Tumulty. “It is true that Biden himself is rarely seen except in kind of scripted settings. It’s not perhaps as transparent as it was, but it’s a lot more orderly.”

A veteran White House correspondent, who asked not to be further identified, said: “Jen Psaki is having daily briefings and she is actually letting people ask follow-up questions, and she’s not doing a little political speech at the end with a video on how awful the press is! There’s probably a natural human tendency to be, like, ‘Wow!’”

Making an implicit invidious comparison to the previous regime, CNN White House correspondent John Harwood tweeted: “Jen Psaki is a very disciplined briefer.”

Yet CBS 60 Minutes correspondent John Dickerson, who covered Bill Clinton and the second Bush White House for Time magazine, argued that the Biden White House is hardly doing anything extraordinary.

“The Biden team is just doing the expected things that they’re supposed to do, but because it’s such a departure from the previous administration, it seems like—actually it is—quite a hairpin turn,” said Dickerson, whose book about the American presidency, The Hardest Job in the World, is out next month with a new edition.

“The contrast with the Trump administration is huge in all kinds of different ways, not just stylistic,” Dickerson told The Daily Beast. “The basic agreement between those in public office and members of the press was constantly up for grabs and a matter of dispute in the Trump administration. They didn’t feel the obligation to perform the explanatory, informational role of the presidency and the executive branch. They would have briefings, but the briefings weren’t for the purpose of explaining, they were for the purpose of spinning the story.”

Indeed, during the previous administration, White House reporters were frequently left in the dark—sometimes for days—about what exactly was in many of the executive orders that Trump signed with his trusty Sharpie and then displayed during Oval Office photo ops. By contrast, when Biden signed several executive orders on the first day of his presidency, the White House press office not only provided reporters with the actual wording, they also included explanatory fact sheets.

“Fact sheets are back,” Psaki said. “We love facts sheets here. Making policy hip again is our goal.”

Over at the state department, the freshly confirmed secretary, Antony Blinken, gave diplomatic beat reporters a rousing endorsement of their work—noting that he, too, “started my career as a journalist” (in his case, as a columnist for the Harvard Crimson and an intern at The New Republic). “You keep the American people and the world informed about what we do here,” Blinken said—earning several grateful thank-yous from the state department press corps. “And you hold us accountable, ask tough questions, and that really does make us better.”

A current White House correspondent said a sense of relief among the press corps is only natural. “There’s this huge exhale when you have a secretary of state stand up and, first of all, do a press conference, which Mike Pompeo rarely did, and when he did do it he was just a total asshole,” this person said. “Now it’s kinda like, here’s Tony Blinken and he’s actually answering some questions and he’s not berating people for asking the questions!”

Not surprisingly—after Trump repeatedly branded working journalists “liars,” “scum,” “fake news” and worse—some of the post-Trump euphoria was bound to be excessive. Describing a display of lights at the Lincoln Memorial, CNN political director David Chalian claimed: “Those lights that are just shooting out from the Lincoln Memorial along the Reflecting Pool — it’s like almost extensions of Joe Biden’s arms embracing America.”

MSNBC political analyst John Heilemann was predictably derided by Breitbart News for this on-air description of the inauguration scene at the Capitol: “The sight of the Clintons and the Bushes and the Obamas, the Avengers, sort of the Marvel superheroes back up there together all in one place with their friend Joe Biden.”

John Dickerson, however, credibly denied reports in The Daily Mail and the New York Post that he had ever referred to Biden’s ascension as “America’s happy ending”—especially given the unfortunate double entendre.

“Exactly one of the reasons I never would have used that phrase!” he said. “I also don’t believe it substantively.”

“I call on every person every day… It doesn’t matter what the political persuasion of the media outlet is.”

— Jen Psaki

At the White House on Day 2, meanwhile, Washington Post reporter Annie Linskey posed gauzy queries about the meaning of “unity”—formerly known as the standard student-election platform of every high school politician—not only to Psaki but also to President Biden. In its appeal to sweetness and light, if not substance, Linskey’s question was reminiscent of then-New York Times reporter Jeff Zeleny’s ethereal challenge to Barack Obama at the beginning of that presidency: “What has… enchanted you the most about serving in this office?”

Unity and enchantment have notoriously brief half-lives in Washington. Less than a week after Linskey’s question in the James S. Brady Press Briefing Room, Psaki became visibly annoyed with Politico’s Anita Kumar when the longtime White House correspondent pushed her on why President Biden had not yet spoken to Chinese dictator Xi Jinping and whether it was the administration’s strategy to keep Xi at bay.

“I don’t appreciate the, like, putting words in my mouth,” Psaki snapped at Kumar—the equivalent of a hard hockey check that startled the reporter, who seemed only to be seeking clarification on what Psaki meant by “strategy.” (Kumar declined to comment.)

“People should know that I’m not gonna be a pushover up there,” Psaki told The Daily Beast. “And I’m not going to allow people to put words in my mouth or misconstrue what I said. And that exchange was, in part, because the reporter spat back, ‘well, this is what you’re saying,’ and I said, ‘that’s not what I’m saying.’ It’s important to be clear and concrete and very specific, because you’re still speaking on behalf of the government.”

The same day as that back and forth, The Daily Beast reported certain members of the White House press corps’ increasing discomfort and irritation with the Psaki team’s attempts to find out what individual correspondents planned to ask her at briefings. It’s an effort to provide the press with more complete answers at the televised briefing, according to defenders of the practice—or, in a more ominous interpretation, a way for Psaki to avoid questions she doesn’t like.

“I call on every person every day,” Psaki pointed out, noting that only 14 masked-up reporters attend each socially distanced briefing. “And that’s part of what I think the role is, too. It doesn’t matter what the political persuasion of the media outlet is.”

Indeed, since the presidential campaign, Fox News’ Peter Doocy has become a convenient foil for President Biden, who during a recent photo op answered Doocy’s perfectly legitimate question—what did he discuss on the phone with Vladimir Putin?—“You!” as he walked away. “He sends his best,” Biden added sarcastically.

But whenever Doocy has attended the briefing, Psaki has called on him.

“Our job is to provide information about a range of things and if somebody has a very unique and particular interest, I want to be able to say, ‘I went and talked to the person who’s an expert on Bangladesh, and here’s what they had to say.’ And I want to bring them to the briefing room,” Psaki said.

“But there’s a complete mischaracterization of what we do—which is be a resource to reporters before the briefing, after the briefing, at night, first thing in the morning, to try to explain, provide information, get a sense from them for what’s of interest, what aren’t we explaining well, what more information are you looking for, what expert are you looking to talk to?”

Psaki joked: “If I got a book of questions that were gonna be asked, that would sure make my job easier.”

As this tempest in a teapot blew up into a category-4 hurricane on Newsmax and Fox News, Politico media columnist Jack Shafer tweeted: “Happy to see that the Psaki honeymoon is over.”



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How Biden’s Labor Secretary could shake up the gig economy

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At the same time, these companies are pushing to defend a controversial business model, one in which they treat their workers as independent contractors rather than employees who would be entitled to traditional benefits and protections such as workers’ compensation, unemployment insurance, family leave, sick leave, or the right to unionize.

“Right now we are at a crossroads,” said Shannon Liss-Riordan, a Boston-based labor attorney who has been challenging Uber and Lyft over worker classification through various lawsuits for seven years. “If he rises to the challenge, Marty Walsh can have one of the biggest impacts on labor in this country since Frances Perkins,” she said, referring to Franklin D. Roosevelt’s Labor Secretary, who was the chief architect behind the New Deal.

New industry, familiar issues

While Walsh has yet to delve extensively into the issue of app-based gig worker classification, labor experts and friends who’ve known him professionally throughout his career say they are encouraged by his background advocating for workers in the construction field, which has long dealt with the topic of misclassification.

“In construction, when contractors started reclassifying their workers from employees to independent contractors, it was just a scam to save money,” said Mark Erlich, a fellow at the Harvard Labor and Worklife Program who formerly served as Executive Secretary-Treasurer of the New England Regional Council of Carpenters and who has known Walsh for roughly 20 years. “What’s different now is it’s no longer [viewed as] a ‘scam,’ it’s [positioned by the companies] as beautiful scheme — a new conception of work in which you are your own boss, have flexibility scheduling — it is actually seen as desirable.”

The companies have long defended their business model, which was popularized by Uber during the last recession, claiming that workers have more flexibility when treated as independent contractors than employees. But there’s nothing preventing companies from offering flexibility to employees. Rather, it is a business decision — and one that critics say exploits workers in an effort to keep costs low for the companies.

In statements, a Lyft spokesperson said the company looks forward to working with Walsh and the new administration “to strengthen opportunities for app-based workers.” An Uber spokesperson echoed the sentiment, while stating it “supports efforts to ensure worker independence, while providing drivers and delivery people with new benefits and protections.”

Instacart and DoorDash pointed CNN Business to a spokesperson for the App-Based Work Alliance which is a coalition backed by Uber, Lyft, Instacart, DoorDash and Uber-owned Postmates.

“Our country’s independent workforce has been essential in helping our communities overcome the many challenges we’ve faced throughout this pandemic. We are looking forward to working with the Biden-Harris Administration, including the Secretary of Labor, to address the rapidly evolving needs of the 21st century workforce,” said Whitney Mitchell Brennan, a spokesperson for the App-Based Work Alliance in a statement to CNN Business. “We encourage Mayor Walsh to commit to promoting federal policies that will support the growing on-demand economy.”

Erlich said Walsh has “very strong instincts” about working people and working families. Walsh, the son of Irish immigrants, joined a union when he was 21 and later went on to earn his Bachelor’s degree while working as a legislator. For several years while in that role, he served as head of the Boston Metropolitan District Building Trades Council, an umbrella group of local unions, before becoming Boston’s mayor in 2014, a position he held when tapped by the Biden administration.
As mayor of Boston, Walsh made clear he saw a role for government in regulating gig companies, recently pushing for new fees on Uber and Lyft rides to encourage shared rides and decrease congestion. He’s also been critical of how services like DoorDash and Instacart are at times inaccessible to certain neighborhoods.

Representatives for Walsh and the White House did not respond to requests for comment. Walsh’s nomination as Labor Secretary is pending Senate approval. At his confirmation hearing Thursday, Walsh spoke of pivotal moments in his life — from having cancer as a child, to following in the footsteps of his father’s union job and recovering from addiction — that have informed how he views the work of the Department of Labor.

“Workers’ protection, equal access to good jobs, the right to join a union, continuing education and job training, access to mental health and substance use treatment. These are not just policies to me, I lived them,” Walsh said. “Millions of American families right now need them. I’ve spent my entire career at different levels fighting for them.”

Walsh wasn’t questioned about his stance on gig worker classification, but he did indicate some support for the PRO Act, legislation that was reintroduced by Democrats Thursday and would significantly alter existing labor law and make it easier for workers to unionize. “That is one step towards helping people organize freely. I do believe in the right of organizing. I do believe in the right of people being able to join a union, if they want to join the union. So, I certainly support that,” said Walsh.

The PRO Act would have implications for the gig economy, as it would implement an “ABC” test — which the gig companies fought against in California — for determining if a worker is an employee or contract worker, if passed.

Walsh’s Department of Labor can make a significant impact on worker classification not only by interpreting existing laws and using the office as a bully pulpit, but also through directing and coordinating enforcement action against employers who may not be following laws, according to labor experts.

Joanne Goldstein, who has known Walsh for 15 years through various jobs of hers such as the head of the Massachusetts Attorney General’s Fair Labor Division and as the state’s Secretary of Labor and Workforce Development, said he cares most about workers having access to social and economic safety nets.

“We had a number of situations where he’d approach me in my capacity to see what we could do in the context of the law to help workers have the wages, benefits, safety and training that workers deserve,” Goldstein told CNN Business.

Rethinking the Trump administration’s stance on independent contractors

Given the current economic downturn, the issue of gig worker classification may not be the first priority on Walsh’s list. But as Becki Smith, a director of work structures at the National Employment Law Project, notes, “It is urgent that they be very clear about their interpretation of the law very quickly.”

“The first order of business is going to be to erase Trump policies that very radically reinterpreted who among us gets access to basic legal protections,” Smith said. Much of that can be done administratively without changes in the federal law, Smith added.

The stance under former President Donald Trump’s Department of Labor favored employers, as relayed in a 2019 advisory memo and a rule squeezed in during the final days of the Trump administration. The latter clarified the standard of employment under the Fair Labor Standards Act, which establishes baseline standards like minimum wage and overtime for employees, to make it easier for companies to classify their workers as independent contractors.
Both Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris have signaled some opposition to the gig companies on this issue. They called for “no” votes on Prop 22, and campaigned on a platform that included putting “a stop to employers intentionally misclassifying their employees as independent contractors” and ensuring workers in the gig economy “receive the legal benefits and protections they deserve.”

Still, the coalition backed by Uber, Lyft, DoorDash and Instacart wasted no time in issuing a statement on Inauguration Day to congratulate Biden and Harris while pushing its agenda for “modern policies” that will give workers “access to benefits, while protecting their flexibility to earn independent income on their schedule.”

To really make a mark on the issue, Walsh will have to take on “the entrenched folks out of Silicon Valley,” said Erlich. Among that group are former Obama administration officials who are now in key roles at gig companies such as Lyft’s chief policy officer, Anthony Foxx, and Lyft board member Valerie Jarrett. Uber’s chief legal officer, Tony West, served in the Justice Department for the Clinton and Obama administrations and is Harris’ brother-in-law.

As Liss-Riordan, the Boston-based attorney, put it: “This could be an extremely significant position and there are a lot of people putting very high hopes in Marty that he does what needs to be done.”

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Female Nazi concentration camp secretary charged with complicity in 10,000 murders in Germany

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Prosecutors in Itzehoe did not name the woman but said in a statement that they charged her with “aiding and abetting murder in more than 10,000 cases,” as well as complicity in attempted murder.

The woman, who was a minor at the time of the alleged crimes, “is accused of having assisted those responsible at the camp in the systematic killing of Jewish prisoners, Polish partisans and Soviet Russian prisoners of war in her function as a stenographer and secretary to the camp commander,” between June 1943 and April 1945, the prosecutors said in a statement.

She will face a juvenile court because she was under 18 when she served in Stutthof.

It is estimated that about 65,000 people were murdered during the Holocaust in the Stutthof concentration camp, near the Polish city now called Gdansk.

German prosecutors are investigating 13 other cases connected to the concentration camps of Buchenwald, Sachsenhausen, Mauthausen and Stutthof, according to the Central Office for the Investigation of Nazi Crimes.

Last summer, a 93-year-old former guard at Stutthof, identified as Bruno D., was convicted of thousands of counts of being an accessory to murder and given a two-year suspended prison sentence

He, too, was tried in a juvenile court because because he was 17 years old at the time he served in Stutthof.

First established by the Nazis in 1939, Stutthof went on to house a total of 115,000 prisoners, more than half of whom died there. Around 22,000 went on to be transferred from Stutthof to other Nazi camps.

An estimated 6 million Jewish people were killed in Nazi concentration camps during World War II. Also killed were hundreds of thousands of Roma people and people with mental or physical disabilities.

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Secretary of State Blinken condemns Russia for Navalny sentencing

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Russian opposition politician Alexei Navalny takes part in a rally to mark the 5th anniversary of opposition politician Boris Nemtsov’s murder and to protest against proposed amendments to the country’s constitution, in Moscow, Russia February 29, 2020.

Shamil Zhumatov | Reuters

Secretary of State Antony Blinken condemned the Russian government on Tuesday after Kremlin critic Alexey Navalny was sentenced to more than two years in prison.

The opposition leader’s arrest last month has sparked mass protests across Russia, leading to hundreds of his supporters getting thrown in jail.

“The United States is deeply concerned by Russia’s actions toward Aleksey Navalny. We reiterate our call for the Russian government to immediately and unconditionally release Mr. Navalny, as well as hundreds of other Russian citizens wrongfully detained in recent weeks for exercising their rights,” Blinken said.

Navalny, a leading critic of Russian President Vladimir Putin, was arrested for parole violations on Jan. 17 upon his return to Russia from Germany, where he had been treated for a nerve agent poisoning that took place last August.

He was accused of failing to keep in contact with his parole officer during that time regarding a suspended sentence related to 2014 fraud charges. Navalny called the case politically motivated.

The opposition leader has accused Putin of ordering the poisoning with the nerve-agent Novichok, but the Kremlin has denied any involvement.

Last month, Blinken said that the Biden administration is reviewing other Russia-related issues including the hacking of SolarWinds, reports of bounties placed by Russia on American forces in Afghanistan, and potential election interference and will determine its response based on its findings.

–CNBC’s Holly Ellyatt contributed to this report.

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Pennsylvania secretary of state resigns over ballot initiative error

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Pennsylvania Secretary of the Commonwealth Kathy Boockvar (D) said she will step down at the end of the week after her office failed to properly advertise a proposed constitutional amendment to expand the civil lawsuit window for alleged child sexual abuse victims.

The amendment would have given plaintiffs two years to file civil lawsuits, according to The Wall Street Journal. State law requires proposed amendments to first pass the state legislature during consecutive sessions before they are put directly to voters as a ballot initiative.

The State Department is required by law to place newspaper ads outlining any such proposed amendments.

While lawmakers passed the measure the first time in 2019 and were poised to pass it again in 2020, the state department failed to place the ads, according to the newspaper. This means the amendment process must start from the beginning unless lawmakers pass a bill creating the same two-year opening.

“The delay caused by this human error will be heartbreaking for thousands of survivors of childhood sexual assault, advocates and legislators, and I join the Department of State in apologizing to you. I share your anger and frustration that this happened, and I stand with you in your fight for justice,” Gov. Tom WolfTom WolfPennsylvania Lt. Gov. to defy ban on weed, LGBTQ rights flags Republicans plan voting overhauls after Biden’s win Scars of Capitol attack permeate high-security inauguration MORE (D), who announced Boockvar’s resignation, said in a statement.

The department on Monday also apologized for the oversight, calling it the result of “simple human error” in a statement. Boockvar was appointed by Wolf in January 2019 after previously serving as a senior adviser to Wolf on modernizing election procedures.

Other states, including New York, have similar laws on the books, which have prompted a series of lawsuits against institutions including the Boy Scouts of America and the Catholic Church.

State Rep. Mark Rozzi (D), a backer of the measure who has himself alleged sexual abuse by a priest as a teenager, said there is still a chance the proposal could make the May primary election ballot. “I’m just shocked this has happened, but we persevered for all these years and we will continue to do just that. I will not give up the fight until this gets done, period,” he told the WSJ.



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GOP threatens filibuster for Mayorkas nomination to be DHS secretary

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In confirming the GOP’s plans to filibuster, Republican Sen. John Cornyn of Texas told reporters Wednesday on Capitol Hill that “there’s a number of problems” with Mayorkas’ nomination.

Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer has pushed to have Mayorkas confirmed quickly, but Cornyn and other Senate Republicans argue that Mayorkas hasn’t been properly vetted on immigration issues and are calling for an additional hearing into his nomination.

The use of the filibuster — to stall nominations or legislation — has long been a favored tool of the minority party, something Schumer did often when trying to derail and delay the Republican agenda under then-President Donald Trump. In recent days, continued use of the filibuster on legislation became a central sticking point over a resolution that would allow the 50-50 Senate to officially organize, but the stall tactic is unlikely to be gutted further in this Congress because of resistance from some moderate Democrats.

Republicans’ planned objections to Biden’s nominee to lead the Homeland Security Department means Schumer would have to take procedural steps to overcome a filibuster on Mayorkas. The Senate Democratic leader would need 51 votes in the Senate to overcome the filibuster, a process sure to consume several days of floor time unless an agreement is reached for a quicker vote.

The Senate Homeland Security Committee held an extensive hearing into Mayorkas’ qualifications to lead the department last week and voted Tuesday to move Mayorkas’ nomination forward.

Republican Sen. Josh Hawley of Missouri attempted to block Mayorkas’ quick consideration after the hearing, arguing in a statement that Mayorkas had inadequately explained how he will secure the US southern border.

In a letter Tuesday, Cornyn led seven other GOP senators on the Senate Judiciary Committee, including Hawley, in demanding a hearing for Mayorkas before their panel.

They argued that Mayorkas spoke about “immigration priorities at length” during his January 19 hearing proving that immigration issues will be a “top focus” of his, and that the Senate Judiciary Committee has jurisdiction over immigration matters.

“All Members of the Committee should have the opportunity to hear from Mr. Mayorkas directly, and to publicly discuss with him his plans with respect to the Department’s immigration components and functions,” the Republican lawmakers wrote.

Democratic Sen. Dick Durbin, who is set to chair the Judiciary Committee, told CNN, “I don’t see why that’s necessary” and called the request for a hearing “totally political.”

While several of Biden’s nominees have been confirmed and have moved at a slower pace than some of his predecessors’ Cabinet picks, Republicans had not yet threatened to filibuster a nominee until Wednesday. Mayorkas is now the first.

The department has been without a Senate-confirmed leader since Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen was ousted in early 2019.

This story and headline have been updated with additional developments Wednesday.

CNN’s Geneva Sands and Priscilla Alvarez contributed to this report.

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Senate confirms Blinken as secretary of state and convenes as court of impeachment

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The Senate Homeland Security Committee voted to advance the nomination of Alejandro Mayorkas as secretary of homeland security, teeing up a full Senate vote on his confirmation.

The committee voted 7 to 4 to send his nomination to the Senate floor on Tuesday, with one additional vote against the nomination cast by proxy. GOP Senators Ron Johnson, James Lankford, Rick Scott, Josh Hawley and Rand Paul voted against advancing Mayorkas to a full Senate vote.

Mayorkas testified before the committee last week.

Johnson led the charge among those registering their opposition, voicing concerns over a 2015 Department of Homeland Security (DHS) inspector general’s report that found Mayorkas pushed for the approval of applications for a program for wealthy immigrant investors on the behalf of well-connected Democrats when he served as director of the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS). 

“My preference would have been not to air this dirty laundry publicly. I would have hoped that President Biden would have had better sense to nominate and carry forth with the nomination,” the outgoing chairman stated. He later added, “I’ve had a good working relationship with Mr. Mayorkas as deputy secretary of DHS and hope to work with him in good faith if he is confirmed as secretary. I simply cannot support his nomination and I would urge members not to as well.” 

GOP Senators Rob Portman and Mitt Romney expressed their concern with regard to the 2015 report, but ultimately voted in favor of pushing his nomination through to the upper chamber.  

“We’ve just endured a president over four years, who I will say generously, had a relaxed relationship with the truth. And I think we want the highest level of integrity in positions of government,” Romney remarked, noting that Mayorkas’ acknowledged his errors in a private conversation and vowed to learn from them.  

“This is a tough one,” Portman conceded. Ultimately, the Senator from Ohio reasoned that Mayorkas’ fate was already sealed. “He’s going to be confirmed. The question is how quickly is he going to be in place,” he told his colleagues, noting the importance of putting a secretary at the helm of DHS in the aftermath of the Solar Winds cyberattack.

Soon-to-be Democratic Chairman Gary Peters urged colleagues to “expedite” Mayorkas’ confirmation “as much as possible.”

“In fact, every day that this confirmation process is delayed, places the American people and our national security risk from threats posed by domestic terrorism, from cyber-attacks and the ongoing pandemic and so much more,” Peters said.

Senators wished Portman well following his announcement that he will retire from the Senate in 2022. Then Romney interjected with a laugh, “Don’t be too concerned about him leaving, because he’s just organizing his campaign for president.” 

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