Today’s edition of quick hits:
* Good advice from the CDC: “Americans should avoid travel for Thanksgiving, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommended Thursday. It was a last-minute attempt by the nation’s leading public health agency to curb what’s sure to be yet another dangerous spike in Covid-19 cases if families gather next week.”
* Hospitalizations: “The number of patients hospitalized with COVID-19 in the United States has jumped nearly 50% in the last two weeks, forcing states to impose new restrictions to curb the alarming viral spread as Americans face a potentially grim winter and holiday season.”
* American politics in 2020: “Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger (R) has resisted what he describes as pressure from prominent Trump allies to discard legitimate ballots in ways that could allow Trump to carry the state. He has said that his state’s vote was not tainted by fraud and that his refusal to pretend otherwise has led to a flurry of death threats. Even his wife has been getting messages on her private cellphone.”
* Secretary of State Mike Pompeo “announced that the United States would henceforth view the international boycott-Israel movement as anti-Semitic. He stopped on the occupied West Bank, becoming the most senior American official to visit one of Israel’s settlements, which much of the world considers a violation of international law.”
* Stunning: “A federal wrongful death lawsuit alleges that a manager at a Tyson Foods plant in Iowa organized a group bet on how many meatpacking employees would contract Covid-19 just as the coronavirus began to spread widely among plant workers in late March and early April.”
* Stephen Miller’s handiwork: “The Trump White House blocked the Justice Department from making a deal in October 2019 to pay for mental health services for migrant families who had been separated by the Trump administration, two current and two former senior administration officials told NBC News.”
* Speaking of immigration policy: “An official at the agency that oversees US immigration and naturalization services told employees not to communicate with President-elect Joe Biden’s transition team until a Trump appointee deems the results ‘clear’ and recognizes the winner, according to an internal email obtained by BuzzFeed News.”
* ACA enrollment: “As COVID-19 spreads uncontrolled in many places, a coalition of states, health care groups and activists is striving to drum up ‘Obamacare’ sign-ups among a growing number of Americans uninsured in perilous times. The campaign kicking off Thursday is called Get Covered 2021 and contrasts with a lack of outreach to the uninsured by the Trump administration, which is still trying to overturn the Affordable Care Act, even in the coronavirus pandemic.”
* Interesting Census Bureau story: “The Census Bureau has identified issues in the data from the 2020 decennial census that will take an additional 20 days or so for it to fix, and thus delay the release of survey’s apportionment data until after President Trump leaves office, TPM has learned.” * New details in the alleged plot to kidnap Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer (D): “The 14 men charged had far more violent plans than just a kidnapping, according to federal and state authorities. New filings claim there was a Plan B the militiamen had drawn up, that involved a takeover of the Michigan capitol building by 200 combatants who would stage a week-long series of televised executions of public officials.” * My book didn’t sell quite this well: “Former President Barack Obama’s ‘A Promised Land’ sold nearly 890,000 copies in the U.S. and Canada in its first 24 hours, putting it on track to be the best-selling presidential memoir in modern history.” * This would have a dramatic impact: “General Motors says a pending breakthrough in battery chemistry will cut the price of its electric vehicles so they equal those powered by gasoline within five years. The technology also will increase the range per charge to as much as 450 miles.” See you tomorrow.
Steve Benen is a producer for "The Rachel Maddow Show," the editor of MaddowBlog and an MS NOW political contributor. He's also the bestselling author of "Ministry of Truth: Democracy, Reality, and the Republicans' War on the Recent Past."
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