Top HHS spokesman repeatedly directed sexually crude and sexist tweets at women

(CNN)The top spokesman for the Department of Health and Human Services repeatedly directed crude and sexist comments toward women in now-deleted tweets, a CNN KFile review finds.

Michael Caputo, who just started at the department in April, called several women on Twitter "dogface" and made crude insinuations and sexist comments aimed at former FBI attorney Lisa Page prior to joining HHS.

KFile reviewed several thousand deleted tweets from Caputo in 2019 and 2020, which were available on the Internet Archive's "The Wayback Machine." The review also turned up additional offensive tweets from Caputo aimed at prominent public figures.

KFile reviewed several thousand deleted tweets from Caputo in 2019 and 2020, which were available on the Internet Archive's "The Wayback Machine." The review also turned up additional offensive tweets from Caputo aimed at prominent public figures.

Caputo, a fierce loyalist to President Donald Trump, worked on the President's 2016 campaign as an adviser and surrogate. He regularly deletes his tweets and erased nearly his entire Twitter history prior to April 12. The New York Republican political operative was appointed as assistant secretary for public affairs at HHS on April 15.



https://www.cnn.com/2020/05/01/politics/michael-caputo-sexist-tweets/index.html

Klobuchar launches campaign to aid Senate, House Dems in 2020

Amy Klobuchar is kicking off her next act.

Two months after ending her presidential campaign and amid vice presidential speculation, the Minnesota Democrat is launching a new effort to help direct money and campaign help to down-ballot Democrats. The endeavor — called the Win Big Project, a play on one of Klobuchar’s 2020 campaign slogans — started on Friday by endorsing a slate of a dozen House and Senate candidates.

Klobuchar endorsed four Senate challengers: Cal Cunningham in North Carolina, Jamie Harrison in South Carolina, Mark Kelly in Arizona and Ben Ray Lujan in New Mexico. But she didn’t weigh in on any of the contested Democratic primaries coming up in June. She also backed three House challengers, including Dan Feehan, Jackie Gordon and Christy Smith.

“It’s not enough to just win back the White House and eke out a victory on Election Night,” said Justin Buoen, a senior adviser for Klobuchar and her former presidential campaign manager. “We need to win big so we can take back the U.S. Senate, keep the House and focus on an agenda and policies that will improve people’s lives. We can do that by electing Democrats in blue, purple, and red districts and states across the country.”

Klobuchar, who dropped out of the presidential primary and endorsed Joe Biden a day before Super Tuesday, is among the contenders being considered for Biden’s ticket. Her group — a joint effort of her PAC, Follow the North Star PAC, and her reelection committee, Klobuchar for Minnesota — joins a crowded collection of post-presidential campaign vehicles also aimed at growing the Democratic bench and its pipeline of candidates. Those include Pete Buttigieg’s Win The Era PAC and Kamala Harris’ Fearless For the People PAC.



https://www.politico.com/news/2020/05/01/amy-klobuchar-launches-campaign-to-aid-senate-house-dems-in-2020-228360

Black man shot dead while jogging in Georgia, and two months later, no arrests

Relatives of a black man gunned down while jogging in southeast Georgia by white men who chased him believing he was a burglar said Thursday they're discouraged by the lack of charges in the case.

Ahmaud Arbery's relatives say the 25-year-old was a victim of "racial violence."

Arbery was killed in Brunswick, a coastal city about midway between Savannah and Jacksonville, Fla., on Feb. 23 as he was running through the quiet neighborhood of Satilla Shores.

The two men who chased down Arbery, identified by police as Brunswick resident Gregory McMichael, 64, and his son Travis McMichael, 34, have not been charged and the investigation is ongoing.

"I'm feeling very discouraged at this point," the victim's mother Wanda Cooper told reporters. "The tragedy happened back in February ... and there still has not been an arrest."



https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/black-man-shot-dead-while-jogging-southeast-georgia-two-months-n1196621?cid=sm_npd_nn_tw_ma

Capitol physician says Senate lacks capacity to test all senators

The Capitol’s attending physician said Thursday that coronavirus tests will be available for staffers and senators who are ill, but not enough to proactively test all 100 senators as the chamber comes back in session, according to two people familiar with the matter.

In a conference call with top GOP officials, Dr. Brian Monahan said there is not sufficient capacity to quickly test senators for coronavirus — a contrast with the White House, where any people meeting with President Donald Trump and Vice President Mike Pence are tested for the disease. Monahan said test results in the Senate will take two or more days, while the White House has rapid testing.

The Senate is scheduled to reconvene on Monday after more than a month away, bringing as many as 100 senators from across the country. Roughly half the senators are 65 or older and at increased risk for the coronavirus, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) has repeatedly vowed that the Senate can operate safely amid the pandemic with proper social distancing and masks. Though House Democrats originally planned to come back next week, they decided against returning after consulting with Monahan. On Thursday, he did not address whether he thought it was safe for the Senate to return, one of the people familiar with the call said.



https://www.politico.com/news/2020/04/30/capitol-physician-senators-coronavirus-testing-226980

Veterans Affairs orders $300,000 worth of body bags

The Department of Veterans Affairs ordered nearly $300,000 worth of body bags this month, according to a contracting document reviewed by POLITICO. The department ordered the body bags from a major contractor called ISO Group because of the coronavirus pandemic, according to the site. The contract was reached on April 15.

The order came as the VA has seen a growing number of deaths due to the pandemic. More than 8,500 patients of the VA have been diagnosed with Covid-19 and nearly 500 have died, according to data on the department’s website Thursday morning. The number of confirmed cases has grown by 3,000 since the contract was inked on April 15.

The contract did not say how many body bags the department was buying, and it is unclear whether the VA bought them because it expects a spike in patient deaths or because it plans to redistribute them to others who might need them. VA spokespersons did not respond to multiple requests for comment.

The Federal Emergency Management Administration recently paid $5.1 million for 100,000 body bags, as first reported by The Wall Street Journal — for a price of about $51 per bag. If the VA paid the same rate, it would have purchased nearly 6,000 bags — a number 12 times larger than the number of VA patients who have died from the disease.

But some retailers sell body bags for lower prices; BodyBagStore.com sells them for as little as $16.80, but limits on how many bags a customer can buy. And on Amazon, one vendor sells body bags for less than $15 each.




https://www.politico.com/news/2020/04/30/va-orders-300-000-worth-of-body-bags-227445

Lawmakers Vote by Mail to Roll Back Vote by Mail

An emergency plan for Louisiana’s delayed spring elections was approved by the state Legislature after Republican lawmakers rolled back an expansion of mail-in ballots for people concerned about the coronavirus.

The state House and Senate both approved the revised plan, crafted by Republican Secretary of State Kyle Ardoin, even as a contingent of GOP lawmakers sought to block it because they believed it still featured too much access to mail-in ballots.

Lawmakers voted by mail on the emergency plan. The House approved it on a 62-to-39 vote and the Senate voted 31-to-8.

Following the vote, Ardoin called it a “pragmatic and temporary response” to the pandemic.

Ardoin originally worked with Democratic Gov. John Bel Edwards on the emergency plan, and settled on an expansion of mail-in ballots to those 60 or older, those subject to a stay-at-home order, those unable to appear in public due to concern of exposure or transmission of COVID-19, or those caring for a child or grandchild whose school or child care provider is closed because of the virus, among others.




https://www.theadvocate.com/baton_rouge/news/coronavirus/article_5d1b0542-895c-11ea-b75e-6bba365dcb80.html

Bonus Tweet of the Day

BREAKING: Kemp to lift statewide shelter-in-place for most Georgians on Friday

Gov. Brian Kemp will lift a statewide shelter-in-place order for most of Georgia’s 10.6 million residents starting Friday as he continues to roll back coronavirus restrictions, though he urges Georgians to stay at home when possible to contain the pandemic.

The governor’s new order also extended restrictions on many Georgia businesses that have remained open through the pandemic, as he issued guidelines Thursday calling for shops to adhere to “strict social distancing and sanitation rules” that run through May 13.

The state will require elderly and “medically fragile” residents to shelter in place through June 12, and Kemp renewed restrictions that require nursing homes and long-term care facilities to take aggressive steps to curb the virus until that date.

But Kemp told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution on Thursday that it was time to lift other measures to help revive Georgia’s tattered economy, stressing that a ramp-up in testing and increased hospital capacity that helped influence his decision.




https://www.ajc.com/blog/politics/breaking-kemp-lift-statewide-shelter-place-for-most-georgians-friday/JdXpKK1srCbzlPZc2y3XuJ/

Journalist: I was assured today by several readers that it's ok to drink bleach

Tweet of the Day