‘A farce of social equity’: California is failing its Black cannabis businesses Half a million dollars and nearly four years into his Los Angeles-based cannabis venture, Donnie Anderson had no shop, no prospects and a mountain of debt. With financial help from family and friends, Anderson rented a $6,000-a-month space in January 2018 for his new cannabis retail shop. He kept paying the rent as the city’s permitting process dragged on. He bought cabinets and other equipment as he waited. And waited. Sick of waiting, he’s selling all that equipment and giving up his lease. Inaction by the city is forcing him to give up his dream, he says. “It’s killing business owners,” Anderson says. “All the air has been let out of me.” In November 2016, Californians voted to legalize recreational cannabis. But nearly five years later, the state and many of its cities and counties are still figuring out how exactly to regulate the industry. The challenge has been particularly frustrating for Black entrepreneurs like Anderson, who were promised a leg-up getting started, but have seen little movement in that regard. Following regulation, several cities and counties in California created social equity programs to help entrepreneurs in communities most harmed by the war on drugs. Black people have borne the brunt of marijuana criminalization in the US over the past 20 years. They’re nearly four times as likely as white people to be arrested for pot violations, according to the American Civil Liberties Union, even though the two groups use marijuana at roughly the same rate. The equity programs were supposed to help people of color and those formerly incarcerated for cannabis crimes get licensed to run all types of cannabis businesses: cultivation, manufacturing, delivery, retail. The programs created big expectations, but implementation has been much trickier. “Many people got totally burnt,” said Christine De La Rosa, co-founder and CEO of cannabis company The People’s Ecosystem, who planned to apply for a social equity license in Los Angeles but didn’t win the city’s lottery for a chance. “I can’t think of one [program] that has been good for women or for people of color. It has been a failure.” Republicans continue to stymie Democrats on voting rights. Will anything change? Sam Levine No, it’s not deja vu: Senate Republicans once again used the filibuster on Wednesday to stymie Democratic efforts to pass a significant voting rights bill. It’s the fourth time it’s happened this year, the most recent coming just two weeks ago. But Democrats and other voting rights advocates hope that this time is different. They never really expected 10 Republicans to sign on to the bill and advance it. Instead, they hoped to use the vote as a final chance to show the West Virginia senator Joe Manchin and Arizona senator Kyrsten Sinema, two of the staunchest filibuster defenders, that there is no hope of passing a voting rights bill while the filibuster remains in place. It’s a development that significantly escalates pressure on Manchin, specifically. The voting rights bill blocked in late October was one he personally helped write and sought GOP input on. The measure Republicans blocked on Wednesday, which would have restored a critical provision of the Voting Rights Act, is one he supports. Manchin has said that “inaction is not an option” on voting rights. But now Republicans have made it clear that while the filibuster remains in place, inaction is the only option. So where do things go from here? To start, I think we’ll begin to see a lot more explicit language from Chuck Schumer, the majority leader, about changing the rules of the filibuster. While Schumer has repeatedly said “all options are on the table” when it comes to voting rights, he’s stopped short of outlining specific changes he’d like to see or calling out Manchin and Sinema in particular. Schumer has only recently begun talking about the need “to restore the Senate as the world’s greatest deliberative body”. I expect we’ll also see some increased pressure from the White House. Schumer continued that rhetoric on Wednesday after the filibuster. He described it as a “low, low point” in the history of the Senate, and questioned whether some of Congress’s greatest legislative accomplishments would have been able to overcome the filibuster if they had been proposed in today’s Senate. Here’s more background on the Texas voting restrictions, which the Justice Department is challenging in a lawsuit: A former senior official in the Trump administration’s justice department will testify before members of congress investigating the 6 January insurrection, Reuters reports. A congressional aide familiar with the probe shared the information with Reuters. Last week, the House of Representatives Select Committee delayed testimony by Jeffrey Clark because he had retained a new lawyer. Clark did not immediately respond to requests for comment. The congressional aide spoke on condition of anonymity. Clark, the former acting head of the Justice Department’s civil division, was a proponent of Trump’s unfounded claims that Democrat Joe Biden’s victory in the November 2020 election was the result of fraud. On Oct. 13, the committee announced it had issued a subpoena to Clark asking him to produce records and testify at a deposition by Oct. 29. In announcing it had subpoenaed Clark, the panel said it needed to understand all the details about efforts inside the previous administration to amplify misinformation about election results. In January, the Justice Department’s inspector general announced his office was launching an investigation into whether Clark plotted to oust then-Acting Attorney General Jeff Rosen so he could take over the department and help pursue Trump’s baseless claims by opening an investigation into voter fraud in Georgia. A U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee report found Clark also drafted a letter he wanted Rosen to approve which urged Georgia to convene a special legislative session to investigate voter fraud claims. Clark’s plan ultimately failed after senior department leaders threatened to resign in protest, the Senate investigation found. Sam Levine The lawsuit comes as Joe Biden faces mounting pressure to enact federal legislation to protect voting rights. Republicans have successfully used the filibuster four times this year to block voting rights bills in the US senate. The most recent filibuster came on Wednesday, when Republicans blocked a bill that would have restored a key part of the Voting Rights Act that required states with repeated evidence of voting discrimination, including Texas, to pre-clear voting laws with the federal government before they go into effect. Nineteen states have passed 33 laws this year restricting voting access, according to the Brennan Center for Justice. This is the second major voting rights suit Biden’s Justice Department has filed this year. It sued Georgia over its sweeping new voting restrictions in June. “Prohibiting assistors from answering voters’ questions, responding to requests to clarify ballot translations, and confirming that voters with visual impairments have marked a ballot as intended will curtail fundamental voting rights without advancing any legitimate state interest,” DoJ lawyers wrote in their complaint. “Conditioning the right to cast a mail ballot on a voter’s ability to recall and recite the identification number provided on an application for voter registration months or years before will curtail fundamental voting rights without advancing any legitimate state interest,” the complaint says. Biden administration files lawsuit challenging Texas voting law Sam Levine The Biden administration filed a federal lawsuit challenging Texas’ new voting law on Thursday, saying some of the state’s new restrictions violate key civil rights laws. The suit takes aim at two specific provisions in the Texas law that deal with providing assistance to voters at the polls and mail-in voting, respectively. The first measure restricts the kind of assistance people can provide at the polls to voters, blocking them from explaining how voting works or breaking down complex language on the ballot. That violates a provision of the Voting Rights Act that guarantees that anyone who requires assistance because of “blindness, disability, or inability to read or write” can receive assistance, the justice department said. The complaint targets a second provision that requires voters to provide identification information on mail-in ballot applications as well as the ballot return envelopes. The new Texas law says that election workers have to reject the ballots if there are discrepancies in the identification provided. The Justice Department said that violates a provision of the 1964 Civil Rights Act that says someone can’t be blocked from voting because of an error on a paper or record that is unrelated to their qualifications under state law to vote. “Laws that impair eligible citizens’ access to the ballot box have no place in our democracy. Texas Senate Bill 1’s restrictions on voter assistance at the polls and on which absentee ballots cast by eligible voters can be accepted by election officials are unlawful and indefensible,” Kristen Clarke, the head of the Department’s Civil Rights Division, said in a statement announcing the suit. Russian source for Steele’s Trump dossier arrested by US authorities A Russian analyst who was the main source for Christopher Steele’s dossier on Donald Trump and Moscow has been arrested by US authorities, the justice department said on Thursday. Igor Danchenko now faces charges as part of the investigation by John Durham, the special counsel appointed by the Trump administration to examine the origins of the FBI’s investigation into links between the Trump campaign and Russia. Danchenko collected much of the intelligence behind Steele’s dossier during three trips to Russia in summer and autumn 2016. He was the chief source behind its most incendiary allegation: that Trump was compromised during a trip to Moscow in November 2013 for the Miss Universe beauty pageant. Trump has vehemently denied the claim. Last summer, however, a report by the Senate intelligence committee said that the FSB spy agency presided over a network of secret cameras inside the Ritz-Carlton hotel where Trump stayed, including in guest bedrooms. An FSB intelligence officer was permanently on site, it said. The five-page indictment released on Thursday accuses Danchenko of lying repeatedly to the FBI when interviewed in 2017 – a criminal offense. These include over his dealings with an unnamed US PR executive with close links to the Democrats. The executive’s information found its way into some of the dossier’s memos, a fact Danchenko allegedly concealed. Today so far That’s it from me today. My west coast colleague, Maanvi Singh, will take over the blog for the next few hours. Here’s where the day stands so far: The Manhattan district attorney has reportedly convened a new grand jury in the Trump Organization case to weigh potential charges. According to the Washington Post, the grand jury is expected to hear evidence regarding how former president Donald Trump’s company valued its assets. A separate grand jury handed down tax evasion charges against the Trump Organization’s longtime chief financial officer. House speaker Nancy Pelosi pushed back against Joe Manchin’s criticism of the proposed paid leave program in Democrats’ reconciliation package. Speaking to CNN this morning, Manchin argued the paid family and medical program did not belong in the $1.75tn bill because it should be enacted through regular order. “I disagree,” Pelosi said in response to Manchin’s criticism. “I think this is appropriate for this legislation.” Pelosi touted a new report from the nonpartisan Joint Committee on Taxation showing that the reconciliation package will raise $1.5tn in revenue over 10 years. In a letter to her House colleagues, the speaker noted that the analysis does not include two other pay-for proposals, which could bring the total revenue raised to more than $2tn. “It is essential that the legislation is fully paid for and reduces the debt,” Pelosi said. Senate majority leader Chuck Schumer said he wants the upper chamber to pass the reconciliation package “before Thanksgiving”. “So as the House prepares to move forward, the Senate continues to achieve progress in our goal of passing Build Back Better before Thanksgiving. That’s our goal,” Schumer said. But it remains unclear whether the House will be able to vote on the reconciliation bill today. The Biden administration unveiled two new policies requiring more than 100 million American workers to be fully vaccinated against coronavirus by 4 January. According to one of the rules, those who work for companies with 100 or more employees must be vaccinated by 4 January or receive weekly coronavirus tests. Another rule specifies that workers at healthcare facilities must be vaccinated by 4 January, and they do not have the option to test out of the requirement. Maanvi will have more coming up, so stay tuned. According to public polling heading into Tuesday’s election, New Jersey governor Phil Murphy was cruising to re-election over his Republican opponent, Jack Ciattarelli. But in the end, the race wasn’t called until Wednesday, with Murphy narrowly eking out a victory. For this, a prominent New Jersey-based pollster is apologizing. “I blew it,” Patrick Murray, director of the independent Monmouth University Polling Institute, which is based in New Jersey, writes in a new op-ed, published by NJ.com. “The final Monmouth University Poll margin did not provide an accurate picture of the state of the governor’s race. So, if you are a Republican who believes the polls cost Ciattarelli an upset victory or a Democrat who feels we lulled your base into complacency, feel free to vent. I hear you. “I owe an apology to Jack Ciattarelli’s campaign — and to Phil Murphy’s campaign for that matter — because inaccurate public polling can have an impact on fundraising and voter mobilization efforts. But most of all I owe an apology to the voters of New Jersey for information that was at the very least misleading.” The final Monmouth poll had Murphy with a sizable lead over Ciattarelli. The final spread showed New Jersey voters favoring Murphy by an 11-point margin, 50% to 39%. Ballots are still being tabulated, by the final margin appears to be less than two percentage points. Since 2016, when polling largely failed to forecast the election of Donald Trump, pollsters and reporters have been grappling with questions about the accuracy of polling and the amount of faith the public, campaigns and the media should place in them. That uncertainty, Murray says, has led some organizations like Pew and Gallup to stop conducting election polling altogether. He wonders the same. “If we cannot be certain that these polling misses are anomalies then we have a responsibility to consider whether releasing horse race numbers in close proximity to an election is making a positive or negative contribution to the political discourse,” he writes. “Most public pollsters are committed to making sure our profession counters rather than deepening the pervasive cynicism in our society. We try to hold up a mirror that accurately shows us who we are,” he concludes. “If election polling only serves to feed that cynicism, then it may be time to rethink the value of issuing horse race poll numbers as the electorate prepares to vote.” Karine Jean-Pierre would not provide any clarity on when the House might vote on the bipartisan infrastructure bill or the reconciliation package, saying that was a decision for Nancy Pelosi. But the House speaker has not yet given any clear indication as to whether the chamber will vote on one of the bills tonight. Pelosi told reporters earlier today, “I’ll let you know as soon as I wish to.” And now some of the centrist members of the House Democratic caucus are suggesting they would not support a vote on the reconciliation package tonight, per CNN: The deputy White House press secretary, Karine Jean-Pierre, criticized Republicans for trying to win votes by stirring up fears about Critical Race Theory. During his campaign, Virginia gubernatorial candidate Glenn Youngkin warned of the dangers of CRT -- a theory that recognizes how racism has shaped American laws and institutions -- even though it was not taught in the state’s schools. “Republicans are lying. They’re not being honest,” Jean-Pierre said at the daily White House briefing. “They’re not being truthful about where we stand, and they’re cynically trying to use our kids as a political football. They’re talking about our kids when it’s election season, but they won’t vote for them when it matters.” Prosecutors gather new grand jury to weigh criminal charges relating to Trump Organization – report The Manhattan district attorney has convened a new grand jury in the Trump Organization case, in order to weigh potential charges. This is the second long-term grand jury in the case, gathered to hear evidence about the financial practices of former president Donald Trump’s business empire, the Trump Organization, and potentially to vote on criminal charges, unnamed sources with knowledge of the matter have told the Washington Post, the paper reported this afternoon. The Post notes that DA Cyrus Vance declined to comment today and the newly-elected (as of this week) Manhattan DA, fellow Democrat Alvin Bragg, had remained mum on the matter while he was campaigning. Vance is due to depart the office at the end of the year. The report continues: An earlier grand jury — convened this spring in Manhattan — previously handed down felony indictments against two Trump companies and Trump’s longtime chief financial officer Allen Weisselberg, charging them with tax evasion. It is unclear if that grand jury is still hearing evidence about the Trump Organization. The new grand jury was seated last week, and is expected to meet three days a week over six months, people familiar with the matter said. It was expected to hear evidence on Thursday, meeting in Manhattan’s Surrogate’s Court — usually a forum for disputes over the estates of the deceased — because the criminal court buildings are jammed with a rush of post-pandemic trials. One person familiar with the matter said the second grand jury was expected to examine how former president Donald Trump’s company valued its assets. That appears to be a separate issue than the one described in indictments from the first grand jury, which has dealt with allegations that Weisselberg and other Trump executives evaded taxes on their pay by systematically hiding some of their compensation from the IRS. Both Weisselberg and the two companies have pleaded not guilty. The seating of the new grand jury does not signal that any other Trump entities or executives will be charged. The second grand jury could end its term without indicting anyone. The former president has not been charged with any crime. On Thursday, neither Trump’s company or his post-presidential office responded to requests for comment. Ron Fischetti and Phyllis Malgieri, two of Trump’s personal lawyers, declined comment.