Josh Hawley Proudly Declares Himself Pro-Hate Crimes

Fleeing to Cancún in the middle of a state of emergency and then blaming it on a 10-year-old and 12-year-old. Blocking a Supreme Court nominee because of a fake rule about needing to wait until a new president is installed, and then going against said rule on an even shorter timeline. Voting to overturn the results of a free and fair election. Publicly declaring someone “practically and morally responsible for provoking” an attack on the U.S. Capitol but voting to acquit him anyway. Telling cancer patients to fuck off and die—literally. There are some things that most of the human race would never do, and then you have Republicans, who were born without the gene for shame.

That shamelessness was on full display on Thursday when Senator Josh Hawley, late of pushing the voter-fraud lies that led to the storming of the Capitol, decided for some reason to vote against the COVID-19 Hate Crimes Act, making him the only senator to do so. Passed with overwhelming, bipartisan support, the bill received 94 yeses to Hawley’s single no. What does the senator from Missouri have against the legislation? Is it the fact that it is in response to a wave of discrimination and attacks against Asian Americans over the past year, inspired in part by his buddy Donald Trump’s racist rhetoric? Does he have a problem with it expanding support for local law enforcement to respond to racially based crimes? Is he miffed about the part that, per The Washington Post, issues “guidance on mitigating the use of racially discriminatory language to describe the pandemic”? Does he have a soft spot for the guy who confessed to murdering six women of Asian descent at three Atlanta spas this spring, a crime that put the pressure on Congress to do something about the rise in attacks on the Asian American community? Does he simply love hate crimes? It’s possible the answer is all of the above! (Previously, Hawley claimed to reporters that the bill was simply too broad for his liking. “I’m just concerned the bill is hugely broad, hugely open-ended,” Hawley said. “It’s just, you know, the ability and power to define crimes, to define incidents going forward, and collect all that data, it just seemed hugely, hugely over broad.” (As the Daily Beast notes, the bill does not, in fact, “define” any new crimes.)

Earlier this month equally shameless lawmakers-cum-professional trolls Marjorie Taylor Greene and Lauren Boebert made headlines for similarly hateful votes when they were the only two representatives to vote against a bill reauthorizing the National Marrow Donor Program, which helps match bone marrow donors and cord blood units with people who have leukemia and other diseases. (Boebert claimed in a statement that saving people’s lives was not worth adding to the national debt, while a spokesperson for Greene explained that the bill went against her staunchly pro-life views, which apparently do not extend to people dying of cancer.)

In other words, these three should consider getting together to form a bicameral Horrible People Caucus (assuming it doesn’t cut into Greene’s time connecting the dots between wildfires and Jewish laser beams).

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Sean Hannity bought a $5 million house to be closer to Trump

The ex-president and his Fox News fluffer are now mere minutes away, according to the Daily Beast:

Fox News host and right-wing hanger-on Sean Hannity shelled out $5.3 million for a beachfront house on the south end of Palm Beach—less than three miles from Mar-a-Lago, property records show…. Hannity made the purchase, first reported by the Palm Beach Post, on April 15, according to the deed finalized by the county clerk’s office on Tuesday.

Earlier this year, Donald Trump Jr. and his girlfriend, Kimberly Guilfoyle, decamped to the Sunshine State, also to be closer to the senior Trump, who is seemingly meh about his namesake on a good day.

Report: the Trump administration’s treatment of Puerto Rico was even more monstrous than previously thought

And when you previously thought they merely blocked billions of dollars in aid to the devastated territory and suggested their death toll was a Democratic hoax, you know it’s gotta be really bad:

The Trump administration put up bureaucratic obstacles that stalled approximately $20 billion in hurricane relief for Puerto Rico and then obstructed an investigation into the holdup, according to an inspector general report obtained by The Washington Post. Congress requested the investigation into the delays to recovery aid for Puerto Rico after Hurricanes Irma and Maria in 2017 left residents of the U.S. territory without power and clean water for months. But, the report said, former Housing and Urban Development secretary Ben Carson and another former HUD official declined to be interviewed by investigators during the course of the examination that began in 2019.

The 46-page report presents an incomplete picture of the political influence of the Trump White House on delaying disaster relief for the struggling island. Still, Inspector General Rae Oliver Davis, appointed by Trump as top HUD watchdog, found unprecedented procedural hurdles set by the White House budget office—in addition to an extended partial federal government shutdown that also produced delays. Puerto Rico Governor Pedro R. Pierluisi said in a statement that the inspector general’s findings show “clearly there were onerous and discriminatory restrictions on the funding appropriated by Congress to help Puerto Rico recover from recent natural disasters.”

This week, the Biden administration removed what it dubbed “onerous restrictions unique to Puerto Rico that limited the island’s access” to disaster-recovery funds because, among other things, they‘re not racist assholes.

Republicans insist D.C. can’t be a state because, um…reasons

Not good reasons, mind you, or reasons that hold up under the most minor scrutiny, but reasons nevertheless:

Elsewhere!

Climate Change Could Cut World Economy by $23 Trillion in 2050, Insurance Giant Warns (NYT)

“Long Hauler” Study Shows COVID Can Kill Months After Infection (Bloomberg)

Thanks to Republican anti-vaxxers, the U.S. may never reach herd immunity (Hive)

Biden Eyeing Capital Gains Tax as High as 43.4% for Wealthy (Bloomberg)

Amy Coney Barrett’s Big Book Deal Is Called Bad Optics for the Supreme Court (Bloomberg)

Republicans are one bill away from making it legal to shoot protesters whose signs they don’t like (Hive)

New probe confirms Trump officials blocked Puerto Rico from receiving hurricane aid (NBC News)

Whole Foods will soon let customers pay for groceries with palm scan (NYP)

$10,000 Flute Left in Cab Nine Years Ago Is Finally Returned (NYT)

Italian hospital employee accused of skipping work for 15 years (BBC)

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