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Jumat, 20 November 2020

Trump to meet Michigan lawmakers as he seeks to overturn defeat - CNA

WASHINGTON, DC: President Donald Trump will meet with Republican leaders from Michigan at the White House on Friday (Nov 20) as his campaign pursues an increasingly desperate bid to overturn the Nov 3 election result following a series of courtroom defeats.

The Trump campaign's latest strategy, as described by three people familiar with the plan, is to convince Republican-controlled legislatures in battleground states won by Biden, such as Michigan, to undermine the results.

"The entire election frankly in all the swing states should be overturned and the legislatures should make sure that the electors are selected for Trump," Sidney Powell, one of Trump's lawyers, told Fox Business television on Thursday.

President-elect Joe Biden, a Democrat, won the election and is preparing to take office on Jan 20, but Trump, a Republican, has refused to concede and is searching for a way to invalidate the results, claiming widespread voter fraud.

READ: Trump's election power play: Persuade Republican legislators to do what US voters did not

The Trump team is focusing on Michigan and Pennsylvania for now, but even if both those states flipped to the president he would need another state to overturn its vote to surpass Biden in the Electoral College.

Michigan's state legislative leaders, Senate Majority Leader Mike Shirkey and House Speaker Lee Chatfield, both Republicans, will visit the White House at Trump's request, according to a source in Michigan.

The two lawmakers will listen to what the president has to say, the source said. Shirkey told a Michigan news outlet earlier this week that the legislature would not appoint a second slate of electors.

"It's incredibly dangerous that they are even entertaining the conversation," Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer, a Democrat, told MSNBC.

"This is an embarrassment to the state."

SOUNDING THE ALARM

Biden, meanwhile, is due on Friday to meet Democratic leaders in Congress, House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer after spending most of the week with advisers planning his administration.

Nationally, Biden won nearly 6 million more votes than Trump, a difference of 3.8 percentage points. But the outcome of the election is determined in the Electoral College, where each state's electoral votes, based largely on population, are typically awarded to the winner of a state's popular vote.

READ: Georgia confirms Biden's victory in state as it completes hand audit of ballots

READ: Wisconsin to hold partial vote recount as fuming Trump denies defeat

Biden leads by 306 electoral votes to Trump's 232 as states work to certify their results at least six days before the Electoral College convenes on Dec 14.

Legal experts have sounded the alarm at the notion of a sitting president seeking to undermine the will of the voters, though they have expressed skepticism that a state legislature could lawfully substitute its own electors.

Trump's lawyers are seeking to take the power of appointing electors away from state governors and secretaries of state and give it to friendly state lawmakers from his party, saying the US Constitution gives legislatures the ultimate authority.

Reaching out to state officials represents a shift in Trump's attempts to overturn the result after his campaign failed to muster evidence to support the president's claims of widespread voter fraud.

Election officials have said they saw no evidence of any major irregularities.

'TOTALLY IRRESPONSIBLE'

Trump's attempts to reverse the outcome via lawsuits and recounts have met with little success.

A hand recount of Georgia's roughly 5 million votes wrapped up on Thursday, affirming Biden's victory there, while judges in three states rejected bids by the Trump campaign to challenge vote counts.

Despite the setbacks, the Trump campaign has not abandoned its legal efforts.

Rudy Giuliani, the president's personal lawyer, said on Thursday he planned to file more lawsuits, accusing Democrats of masterminding a "national conspiracy" to steal the election, though he offered no evidence to support the claim.

Biden called Trump's attempts "totally irresponsible" on Thursday, though he has expressed little concern they will succeed in preventing him from taking office on Jan 20.

Biden has spent the week putting together his team. His incoming chief of staff, Ron Klain, told CNN on Thursday that Biden would announce more White House officials on Friday, after naming several senior staff members earlier this week.

Biden said on Thursday he had selected a treasury secretary and could announce his pick as soon as next week.

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2020-11-20 11:53:33Z
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Joe Biden turns 78, will be oldest serving US president - CNA

WASHINGTON: United States President-elect Joe Biden turned 78 on Friday (Nov 20). In exactly two months, he'll take the reins of a politically fractured nation facing the worst public health crisis in a century, high unemployment and a reckoning on racial injustice.

As he wrestles with those issues, Biden will be attempting to accomplish another feat: Demonstrate to Americans that age is but a number and he's up to the job.

Biden will be sworn in as the oldest president in the nation’s history, displacing Ronald Reagan, who left the White House in 1989 when he was 77 years and 349 days old.

The age and health of both Biden and President Donald Trump - less than four years Biden’s junior - loomed throughout a race that was decided by a younger and more diverse electorate and at a moment when the nation is facing no shortage of issues of consequence.

Out of the gate, Biden will be keen to demonstrate he's got the vigour to serve.

“It’s crucial that he and his staff put himself in the position early in his presidency where he can express what he wants with a crispness that's not always been his strength," said Ross Baker, a political scientist at Rutgers University who has advised legislators from both parties.

“He has got to build up credibility with the American people that he’s physically and mentally up to the job.”

Biden Birthday — In this Dec 13, 1972, file photo, the newly elected Democratic senator from Delaware, Joe Biden, is shown on Capitol Hill in Washington. President-elect Biden turned 78 on Friday, Nov 20, 2020. (File photo: AP)

Throughout the campaign, Trump, 74, didn’t miss a chance to highlight Biden’s gaffes and argue that the Democrat lacked the mental acuity to lead the nation.

Both critics and some backers of Biden worried that he was sending the wrong message about his stamina by keeping a relatively light public schedule while Trump barnstormed battleground states. Biden attributed his light schedule to being cautious during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Some of Biden’s rivals in the Democratic primary also made a case on age - while skipping Trump’s vitriol - by raising the question of whether someone of Biden’s and Trump’s generation was the right person to lead a nation dealing with issues like climate change and racial inequality.

READ: Biden chides Trump for lack of cooperation on COVID-19 vaccine

Brian Ott, a Missouri State University communications professor who studies presidential rhetoric, said Biden was hardly impressive as a campaigner, but has proven far more effective with his public remarks since Election Day.

Ott said Biden's victory speech was poignant, and his empathy showed in a virtual discussion that he held earlier this week with frontline healthcare workers.

The president-elect’s experience - a combination of age and nearly 50 years in politics - conveys more clearly through the prism of governing than the chaos of campaigning, he said.

“The rhetoric of governing, unlike the rhetoric of campaigning, is collaborative rather than adversarial,” Ott said.

Biden’s relatively advanced age also puts a greater premium on the quality of his staff, Baker said. His choice of Senator Kamala Harris, nearly 20 years younger than him, as his running mate effectively acknowledged his age issue.

Biden has described himself as a transitional president but hasn’t ruled out running for a second term.

“He’s well served in making it known from day one that she’s ready to go,” Baker said of Harris. “She’s got to be in the images coming out of the White House. They also need to, in terms of their messaging, highlight her inclusion in whatever the important issue or debate is going on in the White House.”

Biden, in a September interview with CNN, promised to be “totally transparent” about all facets of his health if elected, but he hasn’t said how he'll do that.

READ: Commentary: It’s engagement not containment of China that Joe Biden will focus on

The campaign has made the case that Biden isn’t your average septuagenarian.

His physician, Dr Kevin O’Connor, in a medical report released by the campaign in December, described Biden as “healthy, vigorous ... fit to successfully execute the duties of the Presidency, to include those as Chief Executive, Head of State and Commander in Chief”.

O’Connor reported that Biden works out five days a week. The president-elect told supporters that during the pandemic he has relied on home workouts involving a Peloton bike, treadmill and weights.

In 1988, Biden suffered two life-threatening brain aneurysms, an experience that he wrote in his memoir shaped him into the “kind of man I want to be”.

O’Connor also noted in his report that Biden has an irregular heartbeat, but it has not required any medication or other treatment. He also had his gall bladder removed in 2003.

A September article by a group of researchers in the Journal on Active Aging concluded that both Biden and Trump are “super-agers” and are likely to outlive their American contemporaries and maintain their health beyond the end of the next presidential term.

Some of Biden's White House predecessors left behind breadcrumbs about the dos and don'ts of demonstrating presidential vigour, said Edward Frantz, a presidential historian at the University of Indianapolis.

Reagan made sure the public saw him chopping wood and riding horses.

Trump, after being diagnosed with the coronavirus, quickly returned to a busy campaign schedule - holding dozens of crowded rallies in battleground states in the final weeks of the campaign.

Those events flouted COVID-19 guidelines on social distancing, wearing masks and avoiding large gatherings.

In 1841, William Harrison, 68, attempted to show off his vigour by delivering a lengthy inaugural address without a coat or hat.

Weeks later, Harrison, then the oldest president elected in US history, developed a cold that turned into pneumonia that would kill him just a month into his presidency.

It’s disputed whether Harrison’s illness was related to his inaugural address.

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2020-11-20 10:27:22Z
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Hong Kong closes more schools as COVID-19 situation turns 'severe', health minister says - CNA

HONG KONG: Hong Kong has suspended in-person classes for lower primary school students after the city’s top health official said the COVID-19 situation in the city was rapidly deteriorating.

Classes for Primary 1 to 3 students will be suspended for two weeks from Monday (Nov 23). The suspension comes more than a week after kindergartens were ordered to close following an outbreak of upper respiratory tract infections.

Hong Kong confirmed 26 new coronavirus infections on Friday, 21 of which are local cases.

“I would appeal to people to stop all unnecessary gathering activities because the situation is severe now in Hong Kong,” Hong Kong's Secretary for Food and Health Professor Sophia Chan said.

Hong Kong is due to launch an air travel bubble with Singapore on Sunday.

Currently, the air travel bubble remains on track, although it could be suspended according to the agreement between Singapore and Hong Kong if the seven-day moving average for unlinked coronavirus infections exceeds five in either city.

Prof Chan said Hong Kong has "probably entered into a new wave of cases", citing experts and information from the Centre for Health Protection.

"But of course we are now doing our best, and before this severe situation started, in the past week, we have already tightened many of our measures, including border control measures, quarantine measures, hotel regulation measures, and also some of the social distancing measures," she said.

Prof Chan added that Hong Kong has ramped up its testing capacity and set up four community testing centres, adding that the government would continue to tighten measures.

She said that Hong Kong must "do more at different junctures, different points" when it comes to border control measures.

For those coming into Hong Kong, pre-departure COVID-19 tests are required and flights are also stopped if there are more confirmed cases. Testing measures have also been tightened at the airport and "everybody has to be tested at the airport", said Prof Chan.

People returning to Hong Kong, except those from mainland China, are required to be quarantined at hotels rather than at home.

"We will look into the science and the quarantine period to see how best we can actually be more 'water tight' in these measures," she added.

BOOKMARK THIS: Our comprehensive coverage of the coronavirus outbreak and its developments

Download our app or subscribe to our Telegram channel for the latest updates on the coronavirus outbreak: https://cna.asia/telegram

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2020-11-20 08:37:30Z
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Kamis, 19 November 2020

Xi touts China's huge economy as base of free trade in APEC speech - CNA

KUALA LUMPUR: President Xi Jinping hailed China as the pivot point for global free trade Thursday, vowing to keep its "super-sized" economy open for business and warning against protectionism as the world battles the COVID-19 pandemic.

Buoyed by the signing of the world's largest trade pact over the weekend, Xi said the Asia-Pacific is the "forerunner driving global growth" in a world hit by "multiple challenges."

He vowed "openness" to trade and rejected any possibility of the "decoupling" of China's economy, in his only nod to the hostile trade policy of US President Donald Trump's administration, which has battered China with tariffs and tech restrictions.

Xi was speaking at the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) forum, held online this year because of the pandemic, which brings together 21 Pacific Rim countries, accounting for about 60 percent of global GDP.

It was not immediately clear if Trump, wounded by his election loss to Joe Biden, would take part in the two-day gathering or send a high-level delegate in his place.

In a speech that veered into triumphalism over China's economic "resilience and vitality" in bouncing back from the virus, which first emerged in the central city of Wuhan, Xi warned countries who insist on trade barriers would suffer self-inflicted wounds.

"Openness enables a country to move forward while seclusion holds it back," he said.

"China will actively cooperate with all countries, regions and enterprises that want to do so. We will continue to hold high the banner of openness and co-operation."

TRADE AGENDA

But Xi's rhetoric may raise eyebrows in capitals where China has either restricted trade or used its giant economy as a bargaining chip in wider geopolitical disputes.

Australian exports of beef, wine and barley to China - their biggest market - have been restricted, as a diplomatic rumble over the origins of the pandemic as well as accusations of espionage hammer relations.

The APEC summit comes a week after China and 14 other Asia-Pacific countries signed the world's largest free-trade deal.

Commentary: RCEP a huge victory in tough times

The Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP), which excludes the US, is viewed as a major coup for China and further evidence that Beijing is setting the agenda for global commerce as Washington retreats.

RCEP's rival was the Trans-Pacific Partnership - championed by former US president Barack Obama - but Trump withdrew from it and the pact has now been replaced by a watered-down alternative that the United States has not joined.

Xi had no direct words for President-elect Biden, whose ascension to office next year, while still clouded by Trump's refusal to concede defeat, is expected to see a more nuanced extension of Washington's current China policy.

Biden has been strident on China's human rights record, from its treatment of Uighur Muslims in the restive Xinjiang region to Hong Kong's democracy movement.

READ: Trump to represent US at this week's virtual APEC summit, official says

READ: US being left behind after Asia forms world's biggest trade bloc RCEP: US Chamber

But some at the APEC forum were optimistic the incoming US president would engage more with international groupings.

"I think that (a Biden administration) will be more supportive of the WTO (World Trade Organization), and of APEC," Singaporean Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong said.

"I hope that there will be a more constructive approach - one where countries work together, rather than against one another."

The US turned away from multilateral bodies during Trump's tenure as he pushed his "America First" agenda, while APEC gatherings were overshadowed by US-China trade tensions.

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2020-11-20 04:55:05Z
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Xi touts China's huge economy as base of free trade in APEC speech - CNA

Buoyed by the signing of the world's largest trade pact over the weekend, Xi said the Asia-Pacific is the "forerunner driving global growth" in a world hit by "multiple challenges."

It was not immediately clear if Trump, wounded by his election loss to Joe Biden, would take part in the two-day gathering or send a high-level delegate in his place.

"Openness enables a country to move forward while seclusion holds it back," he said.

"China will actively cooperate with all countries, regions and enterprises that want to do so. We will continue to hold high the banner of openness and co-operation."

TRADE AGENDA

But Xi's rhetoric may raise eyebrows in capitals where China has either restricted trade or used its giant economy as a bargaining chip in wider geopolitical disputes.

The APEC summit comes a week after China and 14 other Asia-Pacific countries signed the world's largest free-trade deal.

Commentary: RCEP a huge victory in tough times

Biden has been strident on China's human rights record, from its treatment of Uighur Muslims in the restive Xinjiang region to Hong Kong's democracy movement.

READ: Trump to represent US at this week's virtual APEC summit, official says

READ: US being left behind after Asia forms world's biggest trade bloc RCEP: US Chamber

But some at the APEC forum were optimistic the incoming US president would engage more with international groupings.

"I think that (a Biden administration) will be more supportive of the WTO (World Trade Organization), and of APEC," Singaporean Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong said.

"I hope that there will be a more constructive approach - one where countries work together, rather than against one another."

The US turned away from multilateral bodies during Trump's tenure as he pushed his "America First" agenda, while APEC gatherings were overshadowed by US-China trade tensions.

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Biden says Trump will go down in history as 'one of the most irresponsible presidents' - The Straits Times

WASHINGTON (BLOOMBERG) - United States President-elect Joe Biden on Thursday (Nov 19) assailed the Trump administration's lack of cooperation on the presidential transition, which he says hinders his team's ability to get up-to-date information on the coronavirus pandemic.

Mr Biden said he couldn't "fathom" President Donald Trump's refusal to concede the election, saying he would "go down in history as being one of the most irresponsible presidents".

"Far from me to question his motives, it's just outrageous what he's doing," Mr Biden said, referring to Mr Trump's legal manoeuvres to overturn the election result.

Mr Biden called on the administration to allow his team to get details on a coronavirus vaccine and plans for distribution.

"I would like to know exactly what this administration has in mind in terms of their Operation Warp Speed and how they plan it," he said.

Mr Biden said he has not ruled out legal action to force the hand of the General Services Administration, which has so far declined to sign an ascertainment that Mr Biden likely won the election and free up money and access to government officials.

Until the paperwork is signed, Mr Biden cannot get national security briefings or real-time data on the coronavirus.

Mr Biden also spoke with governors who briefed him on the status of the pandemic in their states as the virus surges around the country.

"Governors made clear that beating Covid-19 will require all of us working together," he said.

Noting that state and local budgets have been devastated by pandemic-related slowdowns, he said: "We've got to come together. The federal government has to deliver this relief."

"My transition team hasn't been able to get access to information we need" on testing, vaccine development and distribution, he told the executive committee of the National Governors Association, in a video conference, made up of five Republican and five Democratic governors.

The meeting came as his team finds workarounds to get information and guidance while Mr Trump continues to block Mr Biden's efforts to build an administration. Transition officials have begun to contact staff of the congressional appropriations committees for information about federal agencies, people familiar with the meetings said.

Mr Trump, meanwhile, is standing by his unfounded claims that widespread fraud invalidate the election and insisting he will prevail.

A House Democratic aide said that Mr Biden's transition aides will meet staff from the House Appropriations Committee, which deals with all federal agencies and their budgets. And a Senate Democratic aide said that phone calls have already taken place between the Senate Appropriations Committee staff and Biden aides.

Business groups are joining the list of those clamouring for the presidential transition to begin.

US Chamber of Commerce chief executive officer Tom Donohue, the National Association of Manufacturers and Mr Joshua Bolten, president of Business Roundtable trade group for CEOs have all said it is time for the process to move forward.

The Trump White House is continuing to push forward with a fiscal 2022 budget proposal on the assumption that Mr Trump will have a second term, and as the appropriations committees are attempting to finish fiscal 2021 funding Bills by a Dec 11 deadline.

Mr Biden's transition team assembled agency review teams, made up of more than 500 people, who are charged with contacting federal agencies to better understand their policies and operations, but those efforts cannot begin until the GSA officially designates that the transfer of power from the Trump administration to a Biden one can begin.

Mr Biden advisers have warned of serious consequences if the Trump administration continues to deny access to the federal government, especially real-time data about the coronavirus pandemic and plans for distributing a vaccine.

Georgia confirms Biden's victory in state as it completes hand audit of ballots - CNA

WASHINGTON: Georgia confirmed Democratic President-elect Joe Biden as the winner of the Nov 3 election in the state as it completed a hand audit of ballots on Thursday (Nov 19), Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger said.

The audit, launched after unofficial results showed Biden leading Republican President Donald Trump by about 14,000 out of more than 5 million votes cast, ended with Biden winning by 12,284, according to data from Raffensperger's office.

"The audit confirmed that the original machine count accurately portrayed the winner of the election," the secretary of state's office said in a statement on Thursday evening.

The changes to the vote totals were "well within the expected margin of human error that occurs when hand-counting ballots", it said.

READ: Trump's election power play: Persuade Republican legislators to do what US voters did not

READ: Biden chides Trump for lack of cooperation on COVID-19 vaccine

The confirmation makes Biden the first Democratic presidential candidate to win the southern US state in almost three decades, since Bill Clinton in 1992.

Biden has captured 306 electoral votes to Trump's 232 in the state-by-state Electoral College that determines the winner of the election, well above the 270 needed for victory.

Raffensperger, a Republican, is expected to formally certify Biden's victory on Friday, despite pressure from Trump, who has claimed without evidence that there were widespread irregularities and fraud in states that he lost to Biden, including Georgia.

The state's Republican US senators, David Perdue and Kelly Loeffler, who both face runoff elections in January, have joined with Trump in accusing Raffensperger, without evidence, of overseeing a flawed election, an allegation Raffensperger has disputed.

Raffensperger told a local TV station that the Trump campaign had not produced evidence to back up its claims of fraud in the state.

“We have not seen any evidence they have given us, anything that supports - it just doesn’t show up,” Raffensperger told WSB-TV.

Trump's campaign can still request a recount in Georgia after the results are certified because the margin of victory was less than 0.5 per cent.

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2020-11-20 02:15:00Z
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Jumat, 20 November 2020

Kamis, 19 November 2020

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