Roisin Ni Fiachra
Roisin Ni Fiachra's JournalPeru's Castillo builds election lead but Fujimori says won't concede yet
Source: Reuters
Peruvian socialist Pedro Castillo widened his lead against right-wing rival Keiko Fujimori in the country’s presidential vote on Monday, but she said she will not concede yet and alleged “irregularities,” although without showing much proof.
The official count from Sunday's election showed outsider candidate Castillo with 50.3% and Fujimori on 49.7%, with around 95% of the vote counted. The leftist candidate had trailed overnight, but started to take the lion's share of ballots as the count progressed, on the back of a late surge of rural votes.
"There's a clear intention to boycott the will of the people," Fujimori said at a press conference, in which she showed social media videos to back her claims, and accused supporters of Castillo of stealing votes. She also asked her base to bring forth new allegations, if they exist, on social media.
Castillo's party, Free Peru, responded on Twitter that it "rejected" the allegations.
Read more: https://www.reuters.com/world/americas/peru-awakes-uncertain-future-with-polarized-vote-knife-edge-2021-06-07/
Fujimori is already trying out the Orange Fascist's "Big Lie" strategy on the People of Peru.
Charges after US Capitol insurrection roil far-right groups
Source: Associated Press
Former President Donald Trump’s lies about a stolen 2020 election united right-wing supporters, conspiracy theorists and militants on Jan. 6, but the aftermath of the insurrection is roiling two of the most prominent far-right extremist groups at the U.S. Capitol that day.
More than three dozen members and associates across both the Proud Boys and the Oath Keepers have been charged with crimes. Some local chapters cut ties with national leadership in the weeks after the deadly siege. The Proud Boys’ chairman called for a pause in the rallies that often have led to clashes with anti-fascist activists. And one Oath Keeper has agreed to cooperate against others charged in the riot.
Some extremism experts see parallels between the fallout from the Capitol riot and the schisms that divided far-right figures and groups after their violent clashes with counter-protesters at the “Unite the Right” white nationalist rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, in August 2017. The white supremacist “alt-right” movement fractured and ultimately faded from public view after the violence erupted that weekend.
“I think something kind of like that is happening right now in the broader far-right movement, where the cohesive tissue that brought them all together — being the 2020 election — it’s kind of dissolved,” said Jared Holt, a resident fellow at the Atlantic Council’s Digital Forensic Research Lab.
Read more: https://apnews.com/article/capitol-insurrection-charges-roil-far-right-groups-1e0560dbd5572944e3435e225f8be616
They're going deeper underground out here in the red rural west. They know the FBI is making them a priority as a terrorist threat.
Lock 'em up!
McConnell returns as Senate 'grim reaper'
McConnell has maintained the loyalty of his fellow GOP senators despite repeated attacks by former President Trump, who has called on Senate Republicans to oust him as their leader.
And it was McConnell’s opposition to a House-passed bill establishing a bipartisan Jan. 6 commission that snuffed out the legislation in the Senate on Friday.
One GOP senator said the measure would have garnered enough votes to pass the chamber and eventually land on Biden’s desk had McConnell not gotten involved.
https://thehill.com/homenews/senate/555877-mcconnell-returns-as-senate-grim-reaper
June 28, 2019
It is a role that can bring a pursed smile to his face. This week, he had many reasons to.
snip----
Rarely has a political figure pinned his fortunes on accomplishing so little. McConnell has made a career out of stopping things — first Barack Obama’s agenda (underscored by his unsuccessful vow to make him a “one-term” president), now Pelosi’s — taking pride in what has come to be known as the Senate graveyard.
snip----
Said Bennet, “Gridlock will not magically disappear as long as Mitch McConnell is there.”
https://apnews.com/article/c842a0bcecc840628a991092da3e7ce3
Sen. Joe Manchin, the West Virginia Democrat who has positioned himself as a fulcrum of power in the evenly divided Senate, expressed disappointment on Friday after Senate Republicans predictably used the filibuster — which he supports — to block a bipartisan commission to investigate the Jan. 6 Capitol riot.
snip----
The defeat was almost inevitable after Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., came out against the commission, reportedly because Republicans are worried it will make them look bad ahead of next year's midterm elections. But the majority support for the resolution left all eyes on the two major defenders of the filibuster in the Senate Democratic caucus: Manchin and Sen. Kyrsten Sinema of Arizona, who did not even show up for Friday's vote.
snip---
But many of Manchin's critics on the left are pointing out that he continues to oppose Democratic calls to eliminate the filibuster so the Senate can pass legislation with a simple majority vote. Just one day before the vote, Manchin vowed that he was "not willing to destroy our government" by eliminating the filibuster.
snip----
"You have it completely backwards, [Sen. Manchin] — the *filibuster* is what's destroying our government," Princeton historian Kevin Kruse wrote on Twitter. "It distorts the founders' vision in which a simple majority would control the Senate and lets a spiteful minority hold the government hostage to its whims. End it now."
https://www.salon.com/2021/05/28/joe-manchin-very-disappointed-after-republicans-use-filibuster-to-kill-capitol-riot-commission/
End it Now.
2022: Republicans win House and Senate. Manchin and Sinema defend stances on filibuster.
In a joint statement, Manchin and Sinema said, "The system worked. The filibuster did exactly what it was designed to do."
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