Joe Biden condemns Georgia voting law: ‘This is Jim Crow in the 21st century’ – live | US news

Hi there, it’s Maanvi Singh – blogging from the west coast.

Joe Biden spoke with Boris Johnson today.

The two leaders spoke about global health security, and “discussed the importance of developing ambitious climate goals” the White House said. Here’s the official readout of the call:

They discussed the importance of developing ambitious climate goals, noting the opportunities provided by the Leaders Summit on Climate and the UK’s G7 presidency. They agreed to work closely together on shared foreign policy priorities, including China and Iran. The leaders also affirmed the importance of preserving political stability in Northern Ireland.

A further note on those “foreign policy priorities”:

After the US and Britain, along with the European Union and Canada, imposed sanctions on Chinese officials accused of involvement in widespread abuses against Uighur Muslims in Xinjiang, China responded with counter-sanctions against British and EU officials.

“The prime minister and president reflected on the significant action taken by the UK, US and other international partners earlier this week to impose sanctions on human rights violators in Xinjiang and expressed their concern about retaliatory action taken by China,” a spokesman for Johnson said.

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:

• Joe Biden condemned the Georgia law restricting voting access, describing the legislation as “Jim Crow in the 21^st century”. “Instead of celebrating the rights of all Georgians to vote or winning campaigns on the merits of their ideas, Republicans in the state instead rushed through an un-American law to deny people the right to vote,” the president said in a statement released this afternoon. “This is Jim Crow in the 21^st century. It must end. We have a moral and constitutional obligation to act.”
• Two voting rights groups have already filed a federal lawsuit against the Georgia bill. The New Georgia Project and Black Voters Matter argued that the law, which was signed by the Republican Governor Brian Kemp last night, violates the 1965 Voting Rights Act and the US constitution.
• Dominion Voting Systems has filed a $1.6bn defamation lawsuit against Fox News, accusing the network of having “sold a false story of election fraud in order to serve its own commercial purposes, severely injuring Dominion in the process”. Fox has criticized the lawsuit as “baseless” and defended the integrity of its election coverage.
• The director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said she remains “deeply concerned” about coronavirus case numbers, even as vaccinations ramp up across the country. Dr Rochelle Walensky noted coronavirus cases and hospitalizations have slightly increased in recent days. “Please take this moment very seriously,” the CDC director said.

Maanvi will have more coming up, so stay tuned.

After arriving in Delaware moments ago, Joe Biden spoke to reporters about the Georgia voting law for a few minutes.

Asked about what action he might be able to take on voting rights, the president said, “We’re working on that right now. We don’t know quite exactly what we can do at this point. The Justice Department’s taking a look as well.”

A reporter then asked Biden whether the need for voting rights legislation changed the calculus on eliminating the Senate filibuster.

“Well, look, we’ll see. … You have to have 50 votes, 51 votes,” Biden said. “Right now, that doesn’t exist. That doesn’t exist. So you know, look, the only thing I’ve been relatively good at in my long career in the Senate is figuring out when to move and when not to move. You got to have the votes.”

As of now, at least two Democratic senators — Joe Manchin of West Virginia and Kyrsten Sinema of Arizona — have indicated they do not support eliminating the filibuster.

Joe Biden has invited 40 world leaders to a virtual summit on climate change next month, the White House just announced.

“The Leaders Summit on Climate will underscore the urgency – and the economic benefits – of stronger climate action. It will be a key milestone on the road to the United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP26) this November in Glasgow,” the White House said in a statement.

“By the time of the Summit, the United States will announce an ambitious 2030 emissions target as its new Nationally Determined Contribution under the Paris Agreement. In his invitation, the President urged leaders to use the Summit as an opportunity to outline how their countries also will contribute to stronger climate ambition.”

The list of invited leaders includes Chinese President Xi Jinping and Russian President Vladimir Putin, although it’s unclear whether they will attend.

The Guardian’s Sam Levine reports:

Activists in Georgia vowed on Friday to keep up an aggressive campaign to pressure Republicans over their support for the law restricting voting access, saying they were undeterred by its final passage through the legislature.

Two voting rights groups, the New Georgia Project and Black Voters Matter, filed a federal lawsuit challenging the law hours after Governor Brian Kemp signed it Thursday evening. They say the law violates both the 1965 Voting Rights Act and the US constitution, noting that provisions in it “serve no legitimate purpose other than to make absentee, early, and election-day voting more difficult – especially for minority voters.”

Several more lawsuits are expected in the coming days.

“We are filing this lawsuit for one simple reason: SB 202 should be classified as a violation of voting rights. It is a violation of our dignity and our power,” Nse Ufot, chief executive of the New Georgia Project, said in a statement.

“Georgia’s Black, Brown, young, and new voters are here to stay. We will organize, knock on doors, and show up to the polls ten times over. And we will fight for solutions and progress for all Georgia voters.”

The Senate majority leader, Chuck Schumer, argued the Georgia law restricting voter access underscored the need to pass the For the People Act.

The Democratic-controlled House passed the election reform legislation earlier this month.

“We saw it in Georgia last night. We see it across the country,” Schumer said in a tweet. “A concerted, nationwide and racist effort by Republican state legislatures to limit the right of American citizens to vote. The #ForThePeople Act is a priority of this Congress to fight this and renew Democracy.”

With the filibuster in place, it will be very difficult for Senate Democrats to get the For the People Act passed because they will need to convince 10 of their Republican colleagues to join them in supporting the bill.

Many Republican senators have already signaled they do not support the election reforms proposed in the legislation.

Joe Biden continued to condemn the Georgia voting law moments ago, as he departed the White House to travel to his home state of Delaware for the weekend.

“It’s an atrocity,” the president said of the Georgia law, adding that the legislation was “designed to keep people from voting”.

Biden specifically cited the provision prohibiting people from giving water to voters waiting in line as inhumane.

“You don’t need anything else to know that this is nothing but punitive,” Biden said. “You can’t provide water for people about to vote. Give me a break.”

The president is traveling to Delaware with his son, Hunter, and Hunter’s wife and son.

The White House press secretary, Jen Psaki, said this afternoon that Joe Biden intended to release a statement about the Georgia law.

Psaki was also asked about the arrest of Park Cannon, the Democratic state legislator who was handcuffed while trying to watch Governor Brian Kemp sign the controversial bill yesterday.

“Anyone who saw that video would have been deeply concerned by the actions that were taken by law enforcement to arrest her,” Psaki said of Cannon.

“The largest concern here, obviously beyond her being treated in the manner she was, which is of course of great concern, is the law that was put into place,” the press secretary added. “It should not be harder, it should be easier to vote.”

Joe Biden concluded his statement on the Georgia law by arguing that the American people should get to decide the future of US voting laws.

“I will take my case to the American people – including Republicans who joined the broadest coalition of voters ever in this past election to put country before party,” the president said.

“If you have the best ideas, you have nothing to hide. Let the people vote.”

Polls have showed that a broad majority of Americans support some of the voting policies that Democrats have proposed, including same-day voter registration and automatic registration.