Nearly 400,000 California Ballots Sent To People Who Moved Out Of State Or Died

Millions of California ballots have been delivered to residents across the state as early voting begins for the 2020 general election, but some have gone to people who should no longer be registered to vote in the state.

A new study from the Election Integrity Project California has found that close to 400,000 ballots have been sent to people who moved or died.

“The fear is that people who are dishonest could vote those ballots and attempt to get them counted,” said Evelyn Swenson, who works with the organization. “What kind of confidence to the people of California have in the system when they’re getting ballots from their deceased loved one 10 years ago or someone who never lived there or someone who moved 10 years ago? That hurts the confidence in the election.”

CBS2 investigative reporter David Goldstein connected with several people who said that they received ballots for people who haven’t lived at their addresses for decades.

One ballot sent to Margaret Richards in Sherman Oaks, but moved to Tennessee 16 years ago. Richards said the fact that these ballots are being sent out worries her and makes her question the integrity of the election.

“It just is very unfortunate,” she said. “Think about how many people who have moved, and the same thing is happening over and over. How do you trust the system?”

Richards isn’t the only one. Monrovia resident Pam Harnden said she received ballots for the people who sold her her home 15 years ago. They now live in Texas.

“Whenever there’s an election of some sort, I get all the paperwork,” she said. “It’s really a shame because it’s, what, going on 15 years and they haven’t taken these people off the voter rolls?”

The L.A. County Registrar said that “a voter record is made inactive only when mail sent to the voter is returned undeliverable from the post office or through notification of a change of address. If you get a ballot in the mail not addressed to you, mark it return to sender. Voter no longer lives there.”

Harnden said she has done that every year, and she still receives them.

“Like a bad penny,” she said.

To protect the integrity of ballots, the registrar’s office said they are subject to signature verification and are checked statewide to see if someone may have voted twice. However, if someone voted in another state, it is more difficult to find out.

https://losangeles.cbslocal.com/2020/10/15/nearly-400000-california-ballots-sent-to-people-who-moved-out-of-state-or-died/

Ice Cube says CNN canceled his interview because they 'can't handle the truth'

Ice Cube blasted CNN for canceling his scheduled appearance on the network, saying, "They can't handle the truth."

The rapper, whose real name is O'Shea Jackson, was set to appear with host Chris Cuomo, but the network backed out after he acknowledged that he’s advising President Trump’s administration on a plan for black Americans.

“So the POWERS that be cancelled my interview on @CuomoPrimeTime tonight,” Jackson wrote Thursday night on Twitter. “I’ve actually been (banned) from @CNN for a few months so I was surprised they even asked. But it seems like they can’t handle the truth.”

Jackson has been helping Trump on his multifaceted Platinum Plan to improve economic prosperity for black Americans. The plan includes a pledge for 3 million new jobs for the black community, creating 500,000 new, black-owned businesses and increasing access to capital in black communities by nearly $500 billion. The plan also calls for better policing and access to education and job opportunities in the community.

The hip hop star said he offered to meet with both presidential campaigns, but Joe Biden’s campaign said they would address the plan “after the election.”

Meanwhile, the Trump campaign on Tuesday praised Jackson's help.

"Shoutout to @icecube for his willingness to step up and work with @realDonaldTrump Administration to help develop the #PlatinumPlan," senior campaign adviser Katrina Pierson tweeted Tuesday. "Leaders gonna lead, haters gonna hate. Thank you for leading!"

But that doesn't mean the 51-year-old is backing the president. In fact, he once said he would “never endorse a motherf* like Donald Trump." But he also said he would help “anybody on the planet who has the power to help black Americans close the enormous wealth gap.”

Jackson also pushed back on the notion that he is being used by Trump.

"Every side is the Darkside for us here in America. They’re all the same until something changes for us. They all lie and they all cheat but we can’t afford not to negotiate with whoever is in power or our condition in this country will never change. Our justice is bipartisan," he tweeted.

"Black progress is a bipartisan issue. When we created the Contract With Black America we excepted to talk to both sides of the isle. Talking truth to power is part of the process," he also wrote.

Republicans often get little support from black voters when running for the White House.

George W. Bush got 9% of the vote in 2000, then made a heavy outreach and soared in 2004 – to 11%. In 2012, Mitt Romney pledged to help the black community more than had President Barack Obama (who got 95% of the 2008 vote). Romney ended up with 8% of the that vote, the same percentage Trump got in 2016.

more

https://justthenews.com/government/white-house/ice-cube-says-cnn-cancelled-his-interview-chris-cuomo-because-they-cant

Coronavirus again hits Roosevelt carrier as sailors test positive two days after new deployment

Just two days after leaving San Diego to embark on its first deployment since a massive coronavirus outbreak swept through the ship, the Theodore Roosevelt aircraft carrier identified a “small number of sailors” testing positive for the virus, a Navy official told The Chronicle on Friday.

The sailors tested positive Thursday, about 48 hours after the nuclear warship left Naval Air Station North Island to conduct routine training at sea.

“The sailors self-reported after experiencing symptoms, received immediate medical treatment and were transported off the ship for isolation,” Cmdr. Zach Harrell, spokesman for the Naval Air Forces commander, said in a statement. “Contact tracing aboard the ship is complete. Theodore Roosevelt is aggressively applying all mitigation measures in accordance with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and Navy guidance in order to protect the health of our sailors and stop the spread of the virus as we continue to identify and eliminate any of the virus’ potential vectors.”

It’s been a difficult week for the aircraft carrier trying to shake its COVID-19 stigma. On Tuesday, the day the ship left port, a 20-year-old Roosevelt sailor from Walnut Creek killed himself while standing security watch on a pier at the air station, Harrell said.

The Naval Criminal Investigative Service has launched an investigation into his death and has deployed support and counseling resources to “assist sailors of all ranks as they mourn their shipmate’s death,” Harrell said.

The warship returned to San Diego on July 9 after an ill-fated six-month deployment that led to a massive coronavirus outbreak infecting more than 1,250 of its crew. One sailor died from COVID-19 complications. The crew had spent about three months in the homeport.

During its challenging earlier deployment, the Roosevelt spent about a month in Guam trying to stem the outbreak, isolate sailors and sanitize the ship.

Last month, the ship had returned to open water to qualify pilots, standard procedure to hone skills to take off and land aircraft on an aircraft carrier. The ship’s top officers at the time said the previous outbreak had made the ship stronger.

“The ship just completed a maintenance period and the crew is ready to return to sea,” said Cmdr. Zachary Harry, Roosevelt’s chief engineering officer. “The improved material condition of the ship and the proficiency our sailors developed during last deployment is a recipe for continued success.”

“It is very gratifying to be able to return TR to sea,” said Capt. Eric Anduze, Roosevelt’s commanding officer. “Getting underway, seeing the professionalism of the crew firsthand and supporting the (air) squadrons during carrier qualifications is a great way to demonstrate once again what the TR team can do.”

https://www.sfchronicle.com/bayarea/article/Coronavirus-again-hits-Roosevelt-carrier-as-15653575.php

San Diego Unified School District Changes Grading System to ‘Combat Racism'

Students will no longer be graded based on a yearly average, or on how late they turn in assignments. Those are just some of the major grading changes approved this week by California's second-largest school district.

The San Diego Unified School District (SDUSD) is overhauling the way it grades students. Board members say the changes are part of a larger effort to combat racism.

“This is part of our honest reckoning as a school district,” says SDUSD Vice President Richard Barrera. “If we’re actually going to be an anti-racist school district, we have to confront practices like this that have gone on for years and years.”

According to data presented by the district, under the old grading system, teachers fail minority students more than White students – a lot more.

During the first semester of last year, 30% of all D or F grades were given to English learners. One in four, 25%, of failing marks went to students with disabilities.

By ethnicity, 23% went to Native Americans. Another 23% of failing grades went to Hispanics. And 20% of D or F grades went to Black students.

By comparison, just 7% of failing marks went to White students.

In an effort to change that racial imbalance, the school board voted unanimously this week to make several big changes to its grading system.

Academic grades will now focus on mastery of the material, not a yearly average, which board members say penalizes students who get a slow start, or who struggle at points throughout the year.

Another big change, teachers can no longer consider non-material factors when grading. Things like turning work in on time and classroom behavior will now instead count towards a student's citizenship grade, not their academic grade.

“I think this reflects a reality that students have described to us and it’s a change that’s a long time coming,” says Barrera.

Student School Board Member Zachary Patterson, who is also a junior at University City High School, says while some classmates expressed concerns about grade inflation, overall the feedback from his peers is positive.

“I know students all across the school district are really happy with the idea that these other accountability measures are no longer going to be defining their understanding of knowledge,” says Patterson.

After Patterson expressed concerns at this week’s meeting, the board will also review potential student disparities stemming from its zero-tolerance disciplinary policy on cheating in the coming weeks.

Nearly 106,000 students attend a San Diego Unified School District school.

https://www.nbcsandiego.com/news/local/san-diego-unified-school-district-changes-grading-system-to-combat-racism/2425346/

Authorities: Top Mexico Official Helped Smuggle Drugs to US

Mexico’s former defense secretary helped smuggle thousands of kilograms of cocaine, heroin, methamphetamine and marijuana into the United States in exchange for bribes, according to court documents unsealed Friday.

Gen. Salvador Cienfuegos Zepeda, 72, acted on behalf of the H-2 cartel while defense secretary from 2012 to 2018 under former President Enrique Pena Nieto, authorities said.

Thousands of intercepted Blackberry messages show the general ensured military operations were not conducted against the cartel, and that operations were initiated against rivals, according to prosecutors. Cienfuegos allegedly introduced cartel leaders to other corrupt Mexican officials.

Cienfuegos is also accused of alerting cartel leaders to a U.S. law enforcement investigation into its operations and the use of cooperating witnesses and informants, which resulted in the murder of a member of the cartel that leaders incorrectly believed was assisting U.S. law enforcement authorities.

Intercepted communications between Cienfuegos and a senior cartel leader discussed the general’s historical assistance to another drug trafficking organization, as well as communications in which the defendant is identified by name, title and photograph as the Mexican government official assisting the H-2 cartel, authorities said.

Mexico authorities don’t identify any drug cartel as H-2, which, according to U.S. officials, was led by Juan Francisco Patrón Sánchez. Instead, Mexican officials alleged Patrón Sánchez was a regional leader of the Beltrán Leyva drug cartel. He was killed in 2017 in a shootout with Mexican marines.

U.S. authorities said in court documents that the cartel had numerous distribution cells in the U.S. when Cienfuegos led the Mexican military, including Los Angeles, Las Vegas, Ohio, Minnesota, North Carolina and New York.

In Mexico, the cartel is accused of trafficking hundreds of firearms and committing “countless acts of horrific violence, including torture and murder, in order to protect against challenges from rival drug trafficking organizations, fight for territory and silence those who would cooperate with law enforcement.”

Cienfuegos was indicted by a grand jury in the Eastern District of New York on Aug. 14, 2019, on charges of conspiracy to participate in international distribution of heroin, cocaine, methamphetamine and marijuana. He could face a mandatory sentence of at least 10 years in prison if convicted.

Federal prosecutors will ask that Cienfuegos be denied bail, saying he is a major flight risk. They say he last visited the United States in March 2019, and if he were captured in Mexico, extradition to the U.S. could take years.

Cienfuegos was scheduled to make an initial appearance later Friday in federal court in Los Angeles. He was expected to be transferred to New York, where his case is being handled.

The former defense secretary was to be represented at the hearing by public defender Ashley Mahmoudian, who did not immediately respond to a request for comment. His personal attorney Rafael Heredia was traveling from Mexico to be there.

Cienfuegos was arrested Thursday upon arrival at Los Angeles International Airport. A senior Mexican official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because he wasn’t authorized to give details of the case, said Cienfuegos was arrested with family members who were released and he was taken to the Metropolitan Detention Center. He was expected to appear in court via video from the detention facility.

Cienfuegos is the highest-ranking former Cabinet official arrested since top Mexican security official Genaro Garcia Luna was taken into custody in Texas in 2019. Garcia Luna, who served under former President Felipe Calderón, has pleaded not guilty to drug trafficking charges.

The arrest of Cienfuegos is a tough blow for Mexico, where the army and navy are some of the few remaining respected public institutions.

Current President Andrés Manuel López Obrador has vowed to go after corruption and lawbreaking under past administrations, but he has relied more heavily on the army — and given it more tasks, ranging from building infrastructure projects to distributing medical supplies — than any other president in recent history.

https://www.nbcsandiego.com/news/national-international/authorities-top-mexico-official-helped-smuggle-drugs-to-us/2425837/

CA Attorney General Backs Down, CAGOP Private Ballot Drop Boxes Will Remain

California Secretary of State Alex Padilla and Attorney General Xavier Becerra held a meandering and confusing press conference Friday morning to update reporters on the status of their showdown with the California Republican Party over the party’s private ballot drop boxes.

As we reported earlier in the week, the two sent the CAGOP and three county affiliates a cease and desist letter, demanding that the drop boxes be taken down and that they provide a list of all voters whose ballots had been collected so the Secretary of State’s office could contact the voters and make sure that they had turned the ballot in, and that the ballot hadn’t been returned fraudulently. Late Wednesday the CAGOP, through its attorney, Thomas W. Hiltachk, replied, essentially telling Padilla and Becerra to pound sand. (The letter is a masterpiece and worth a read.)

The thumbnail result is that since the two laws at issue, both authored by Asm. Lorena Gonzalez-Fletcher (D-NotTooBright) are so vague and seemingly self-contradictory, and because at least one Democrat congressman in a battleground district has deployed 11 ballot drop boxes of his own, Padilla and Becerra really didn’t have a way to shut down the CAGOP’s plan.

Padilla and Becerra weren’t too clear in their press conference, as this live-tweet thread from LA Times Sacramento Bureau Chief John Myers illustrates.

Politico’s Jeremy B. White understood Padilla to say that the CAGOP had agreed to not utilize the boxes when Padilla said “they have agreed to ‘no longer deploy these unstaffed, unsecured, and unofficial ballot drop boxes.'” (Note that they did not use the word illegal there.) That was not the case. as Sen. Melissa Melendez (R-Lake Elsinore) tweeted:

We’re still deploying the boxes.

They will of course be secure. https://t.co/uV5s5qu2gp

— Senator Melissa Melendez (@senatormelendez) October 16, 2020

To be fair, Padilla and Becerra were probably trying to save face just a bit, since their because their arguments and inflammatory rhetoric were utterly eviscerated by Hiltachk’s letter. He pointed out that despite the state’s insistence that the ballot harvester was required to sign each ballot harvested and state their voter, a clean-up bill passed in 2018 merely stated that there must be a place on the ballot return envelope for the harvester to sign, but that the ballot wouldn’t be invalidated if it wasn’t. So, that’s not a requirement.

more

https://www.redstate.com/jenvanlaar/2020/10/16/ca-attorney-general-backs-down-cagop-private-ballot-drop-boxes-will-remain/

https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/7231537-201014-Letter-to-SOS.html