| Welcome to The Daily 202 newsletter! Tell your friends to sign up here. On this day in 1971, the Supreme Court ruled 6-3 that The Washington Post and the New York Times had the right to publish articles based on the Pentagon Papers, a significant First Amendment victory. I have a lot of questions. South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem may seek the 2024 Republican presidential nomination. Immigration — specifically, across the U.S.-Mexico border — inflames the party's base. Now, a GOP megadonor has made "a private donation" to facilitate sending up to 50 South Dakota National Guard troops to our southern doorstep. Noem announced the deployment yesterday in a statement that blistered President Biden's handling of illegal border crossings, as U.S. and Customs and Border Protection reported intercepting 180,034 migrants in May — a new 20-year high. The unusual financing caught pretty much everyone's eye, generating a lot of "can they do that?" responses to the prospect of a Republican donor greasing the way for a Republican officeholder to use her official powers in a manner that lines up neatly with her potential future political interests.  President Donald Trump appears with South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem (R) in Sioux Falls, S.D, in 2018. (Susan Walsh/AP) | Noem spokesman Ian Fury told The Daily 202 yesterday the gift in question came from the foundation run by auto-salvage billionaire Willis Johnson, who has given hundreds of thousands of dollars to help GOP candidates, including Donald Trump. (In an interview with Talking Points Memo, Johnson explained his motivation: "I feel sorry for the Mexicans, but they need to come through the right channels," Johnson added. "I love 'em, I just think they oughta follow the rules.") Fury also said the money went to the Emergency and Disaster Fund at the South Dakota Department of Public Safety, not directly to the National Guard. "Governor Noem welcomes any such donations to help alleviate the cost to South Dakota taxpayers. The soldiers will be on a state active duty mission. For security reasons, we cannot answer any questions about operational specifics," Fury said. I should leave it up to The Lawyers, but the arrangement appears to be legal: Noem has authority over her state's National Guard, and American citizens can donate money to government. (Again, The Lawyers will be more definitive.) But Military Times, which had one of the finest write-ups of this whole strange episode of 2021 politics, reported: "The federal government usually pays for National Guard deployments to other states. When troops respond to an in-state emergency, they are paid from state government funds, according to Duke Doering, a historian with the South Dakota National Guard Museum. He said he had never heard of a private donor funding a deployment. 'This kind of floors me, when you're talking about a private donor sending the Guard, that doesn't even make sense to me,' Doering said. Each state has their own laws in terms of funding, National Guard Bureau spokesman Wayne Hall told Military Times on Tuesday, referring questions for specifics to Noem's office." My colleague Alex Horton reported: "Privately funding a military mission is an affront to civilian oversight of the armed forces, said military and oversight experts, describing the move — a Republican governor sending troops to a Republican-led state, paid for by a Republican donor — as likely unprecedented and unethical. 'You certainly don't want our national security priorities up to the highest bidder,' said Mandy Smithberger, a defense accountability expert at the Project on Government Oversight, a nonprofit government watchdog. About 3,600 service members are already on the border supporting Department of Homeland Security operations, the vast majority of whom are National Guard troops carrying out federal orders, defense officials said." Fury didn't answer some of my questions. Among other things, I asked whether the "initial deployment" of 30 to 60 days is renewable, what criteria Noem would use to decide whether to extend it, and whether her administration approached Johnson or vice versa. How much is Johnson giving? Unclear. What exactly will the South Dakota National Guard be doing in Texas? Unclear. How are other states paying for the personnel they're sending to Texas? Is this going to set a political precedent? So many questions. From a purely political standpoint, one of the most interesting wrinkles is the way Noem criti — okay, trashed — fellow Republican governors from Florida, Idaho, Iowa, and Nebraska who have announced they're sending police to Texas. (Arkansas is also sending National Guard troops to Texas.) At least one of them, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, regularly appears on lists of contenders for the 2024 GOP nomination — usually a few slots above Noem's name. "The border is a national security crisis that requires the kind of sustained response only the National Guard can provide," Noem said in her statement. "We should not be making our own communities less safe by sending our police or Highway Patrol to fix a long-term problem." | | | What's happening now  Trump Organization chief financial officer Allen Weisselberg looks on as then-candidate Donald Trump speaks during a news conference at Trump Tower in Manhattan, (REUTERS/Carlo Allegri) | "The Manhattan district attorney's office is expected to charge the Trump Organization and its chief financial officer with tax-related crimes on Thursday, people familiar with the matter said," the Wall Street Journal's Corinne Ramey reports. This "would mark the first criminal charges against the former president's company since prosecutors began investigating it three years ago. The charges against the Trump Organization and Allen Weisselberg, the company's longtime chief financial officer, are a blow to former President Donald Trump ... Mr. Trump himself isn't expected to be charged, his lawyer said. Mr. Weisselberg has rejected prosecutors' attempts at gaining his cooperation, according to people familiar with the matter." To start your day with a full political briefing, sign up for our Power Up newsletter. | | | Lunchtime reads from The Post - "Florida condo tenants fled a collapsing building without their pets. Firefighters are trying to reunite them," by Andrea Salcedo: "A firefighter stood inside a cherry picker Tuesday, carrying a bowl of water and bags of cat food as the machine elevated him to the balcony of Champlain Towers South, Apartment 405. 'Coco! Coco!' he yelled over and over as he shook the bags of food. The black-and-white cat has not been seen since her owners were rescued Thursday. ... Efforts to rescue Coco, which were handled by a separate team from the one digging through mounds of debris as they continue searching for the 149 people still unaccounted for, come as family members await news on their loved ones. ... 'For there to be some hope that families can be reunited with these pets in this tragedy, it is important,' [said Miami City Commissioner Ken Russell]. 'Our priority is human life,' Russel [said]. 'These search efforts for animals are not taking away any search efforts, resources or time for humans.'"
| | | … and beyond - "NY prosecutors examining cash bonuses at Trump Organization, sources say," by CNN's Kara Scannell, Erica Orden and Sonia Moghe: "The interest in cash payments, which has not been previously reported, is part of investigators' look at whether executives and the company failed to pay appropriate taxes on benefits, including school tuition, cars and rent-free apartments, the people said. It's not clear who received the bonuses or how much they totaled."
- "Trump rally in Mobile's Battleship Park cancelled amid concerns of 'partisan political event,'" by Al.com's Howard Koplowitz: "Plans for Trump to return July 4th weekend to the city many credited with lending legitimacy to his 2016 campaign [were cancelled] after USS Alabama Battleship Memorial Park commissioners reportedly did not sign off on a plan for Trump to hold a rally at the Mobile site. The commissioners were concerned that Trump's appearance on Saturday 'was going to be a partisan political event, rather than just a patriotic event planned for that evening,' Bill Tunnell, chairman of the commission, [said]."
| | | At the table Today we're lunching with Peter Hotez, the co-director of the Center for Vaccine Development at Texas Children's Hospital and dean of the National School of Tropical Medicine at Baylor College of Medicine. Hotez is a professor of pediatrics and molecular virology and has been studying coronaviruses and vaccine development for decades. We spoke to Hotez about the delta variant, a covid-19 strain that is tearing through unvaccinated populations across the globe. Alfaro: At the level of vaccination the U.S. is in right now, how concerned should we be concerned about the delta variant? Hotez: For me, the big concern is this is a variant that's more transmissible than anything we've seen before. We were already wringing our hands about the U.K. variant, the B117, which was about 50 percent more transmissible than the original lineage. And now this one, the delta, may be 50 percent more transmissible than even the U.K.'s. What that means is, anyone who's not been vaccinated or infected and recovered, is at high risk now of getting covid, especially in areas with low vaccination rates, where people have allowed transmission to proceed. In other words, the risk is going to be lower in a state like Vermont or Massachusetts, where there's such a high level of vaccination compared to say, southern Missouri, or Arkansas or Alabama, Louisiana. Alfaro: Recently, you told the Houston Chronicle that we are living in a divided, vaccinated states of America. Hotez: I called it the two covid nations. And the two covid nations, unfortunately, look a lot like fly-over nation, meaning that the Northeast, New England, Mid-Atlantic, the West Coast, have high vaccination coverage. And I have some optimism that they'll be able to vaccinate their way out of this epidemic. But what I'm worried about is in the states that I just mentioned, sort of the south-central and southern states, this summer, as well as Idaho and Wyoming. Later in the fall, I'm quite worried that we may see either a spike or a resurgence of illness. We're already seeing this now in places like southwest Missouri and southern Missouri, which has the highest rate of delta and low vaccination coverage. Mother nature's already telling us what's in store for us. Alfaro: With that in mind, do you think we are reopening too quickly? Hotez: I don't think so. I think it's okay to do it in areas of high vaccination coverage. You have to do it at some point. I'm worried about in the low vaccination areas, this virus is really going to accelerate. So the answer is not so much opening or not opening, it's about filling the gaps and getting those last 50 million adults who so far seem unwilling to get vaccinated — or don't have access to vaccines — vaccinated. Alfaro: We still don't have the data to tell us how strong the Johnson & Johnson vaccine is against the delta variant. What should Americans who received this vaccine — which, unlike the Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna vaccines, is not an mRNA shot — be on the lookout for? Hotez: It's one of my most asked questions. and I have an opinion on what should happen, but I'm a bit reluctant to get out over my skis and have to put the CDC behind a bit and then ask them to explain themselves. What I really want is for the CDC and FDA to issue some guidance about what to do. People need that because they're very concerned. Having very high levels of neutralizing antibodies against the virus is very important in terms of resilience against the delta variance. The vaccine regimens that give you really high levels of virus-neutralizing antibodies seem to be the best ticket to not getting sick from covid-19 from the delta variant. That being the case, the J&J vaccine is a good vaccine, but two doses was even better, looking at the phase one, phase two trial. So, potentially, one option is to recommend a second dose of the J&J vaccine. The other is to recommend re-vaccination with the Pfizer-BioNTech or Moderna vaccine. These are all options, but I think it's really important that the CDC weigh in on this, because I can only talk about what I know in terms of publicly available data. Alfaro: What about those who got Moderna or Pfizer shots? Will they need a third shot anytime soon? Hotez: There's a lot of discussion now about what to do about a third dose of the vaccine. I've been on a number of Zoom calls about that, and it could be that a recommendation will come to get a third immunization later this summer in order to rev up virus-neutralizing antibodies even further. Counterbalancing that is some data to saying that the level of the length of protection seems pretty durable with the two doses. And then there's additional data showing that people who are on immunosuppressive therapy especially might benefit from a third dose. So, all of that needs to be issued as new guidance from the CDC in dealing with the delta variant. Alfaro: While we may feel like the U.S. is coming out of this, that can't be said about the rest of the globe. Can you talk a bit more about the efforts to provide enough vaccines for other nations, and how this is being complicated by the delta variant? Are we moving fast enough? Hotez: The answer is no, we're not moving fast because of the delta variant, which is now accelerating in Africa. Latin America and the low-income countries of Southeast Asia are now much better, but we are not accelerating our vaccination program as much as we should. I think it's important that the U.S. government take a greater leadership role in this. What they've done so far in terms of a global program has been more for optics rather than substance. What I'm looking for the Biden administration to do is, first of all, make a statement on the magnitude of what's needed — vaccinating a billion people in sub-Saharan Africa, 650 million people in Latin America, half a billion people in the smaller, low-income countries of Asia. That is 3 billion people. We need to get 6 billion doses of vaccine. We need a coherent framework in U.N. foreign policy for vaccine diplomacy articulated by our secretary of state, or the president, that really says how we're going to get from here to there. It's been frustrating that we haven't seen that yet. Alfaro: The Los Angeles County's Public Health Department recommended that residents wear masks in public spaces regardless of whether they're vaccinated or not. Do you expect more announcements like this from other health authorities? Hotez: I think it's possible. Then it's going to be an issue around compliance because once masks come off, it's not going to be easy to convince people to put them back on. Alfaro: A few days ago, the Biden administration warned that a review into the pandemic's origins may not be definitive. If you had an ideal situation where we would get to the bottom of how this pandemic started, what would it look like? Hotez: We absolutely can get to the bottom of this, and we should, and we actually have to if we are going to prevent a fourth major coronavirus pandemic in the next few years. This is already our third one. We need to understand at a granular level how these viruses emerge from bats and other zoonotic animal reservoirs and what are the mechanisms by which they're transferred to over to people. There is a way to do it, and that is to have an international team of scientists together with Chinese scientists working for over a year in central China, collecting blood and virus samples from bats, from other animal reservoirs and people doing it as serious outbreak investigation. And until we do that, we are destined to have another major coronavirus pandemic in the next few years. We need to stop obsessing over conspiracy theories around lab leaks, there's no evidence for that. It's not impossible, but there's no evidence for it. We do know that we're seeing coronavirus pandemics emerge every few years, that's why we went and started working on a vaccine a decade ago, cause we said it's just a matter of time. And sure enough, right on cue, that's what happened. Finding the source is not going to happen through intelligence. We've been throwing intelligence at it all year. What we need is for the president to send a U.S. science envoy to China, talk with Chinese leadership and strongly encourage them to participate in a serious outbreak investigation. There are ways to do it. I've worked in China for 30 years and this is very doable. So we have to stop posturing around lab leaks and do some serious discussion with our Chinese counterparts. It is very doable. I'd do it myself, but I don't know if that is what they want, hahaha. | | | The Biden agenda Biden is hosting a virtual meeting of governors from Western states today to discuss combating what is shaping up as a brutal wildfire season. - Among the issues to be discussed is a measure to temporarily raise pay for federal firefighters to at least $15 an hour, John Wagner reports. Pay for new federal firefighters typically starts at $11 to $14 an hour, according to the Interior Department.
- The meeting is expected to include Oregon Gov. Kate Brown (D), California Gov. Gavin Newsom (D), Wyoming Gov. Mark Gordon (R), New Mexico Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham (D), Utah Gov. Spencer Cox (R), Nevada Gov. Steve Sisolak (D), Washington Gov. Jay Inslee (D) and Colorado Gov. Jared Polis (D).
Biden hit the road for his infrastructure plan, but potholes loom. - The president spent Tuesday in Wisconsin, touring a municipal transit center as White House officials back in D.C. were busy "blitzing members of Congress from across the political spectrum, hosting a flurry of calls and meetings aimed at building support for the plan and assuaging anxieties in both parties," Sean Sullivan and Seung Min Kim report.
- "Biden framed the plan as a unifying force. 'This bipartisan breakthrough is a great deal for the American people — not just for folks in cities, not just for red states or blue states, but for everybody,' Biden said in a speech at a local transit utility. 'This is a blue-collar blueprint to rebuild America.' "
- "Biden made explicit appeals to working-class Americans, many of whom have gravitated toward the GOP in recent years over anxieties about job losses and the effects of globalization, including here in the heavily White Upper Midwest. The president repeatedly argued the plan would help the United States compete with China."
- But "questions emerged in Washington about exactly how the bill will be financed and whether the ideas that negotiators have offered are sufficient. On top of that, uncertainty persists about whether the bill will be held up by a companion plan, pushed by liberal Democrats, that is focused on social programs and will probably attract no Republican support."
Biden announced a fifth wave of judicial nominees as Democrats aim to maintain the quick pace of confirmations to the federal bench. - The administration introduced eight new federal judicial nominations this morning, CNN's Phil Mattingly reports. The announcement includes Biden's intent to nominate two circuit court selections.
- So far, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) has already shepherded seven judicial nominees through confirmation. That number is remarkable because it puts Biden on the fastest pace for judicial confirmations in a first presidential term in more than 50 years.
| | | More on the pandemic North Korean ruler Kim Jong Un warned of a "grave incident" in the fight against the virus. - Kim "chastised ruling party officials for failures in their anti-virus work that created what he called a 'grave incident' that caused a 'huge crisis' in the country's battle against covid-19, state media reported Wednesday," Simon Denyer reports. "But health experts said information was too sketchy to draw any immediate conclusions about whether the coronavirus had entered the country."
- "North Korea has gone to extraordinary lengths to keep covid-19 at bay, closing its border with China to people and most goods shortly after the pandemic broke out last year. ... It has not announced any confirmed cases of covid-19, a claim backed by the World Health Organization (WHO) but questioned by U.S. and South Korean officials."
- "By neglecting important decisions of the party in its national emergency antivirus fight in preparations for a global health crisis, officials in charge have caused a grave incident that poses a huge crisis to the safety of the nation and its people," the Korea Central News Agency quoted Kim as saying. But the state media didn't specify what had happened.
On a narrow vote, the Supreme Court left in place the CDC's ban on evictions. - "The ban has just been extended another month, until the end of July, and the Biden administration said it will end then," Robert Barnes reports. "A group of landlords, real estate companies and real estate trade associations in Alabama and Georgia convinced U.S. District Judge Dabney Friedrich in the spring that the CDC lacked authority to impose the moratorium. But Friedrich stayed her order to allow appeals to continue."
- "At the Supreme Court, Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. joined fellow conservative Brett M. Kavanaugh and liberal Justices Stephen G. Breyer, Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan to keep the stay in place."
| | | Hot on the left Ballot counting in New York City's mayoral race took a turn for the chaotic. The city's Board of Elections announced late last night that it had mistakenly included 135,000 test vote records in an initial tally, Wagner and Felicia Sonmez report. "Earlier Tuesday, the board released updated numbers showing that Brooklyn Borough President Eric Adams's lead in the Democratic primary had narrowed, with former city sanitation commissioner Kathryn Garcia pulling into a close second place. But hours later, the city's Board of Elections cast those results into question, saying there was a 'discrepancy' in the vote tally. Without providing details, it asked candidates and the public to 'have patience.' By Tuesday night, the board had removed all the unofficial results from its website and replaced them with a message stating, 'Unofficial Rank Choice Results Starting on June 30.' Then, around 10:30 p.m., came the announcement of the mistaken counting of test ballots."
The board's apology, published on its Twitter account, quickly drew criticism and mockery online by both sides of the political spectrum: | | | Hot on the right Trump is heading to McAllen, Tex., today, where he is expected to attack Biden's immigration policies. "Trump is slated to be joined by some Republican House members and by Texas Gov. Greg Abbott (R), who has vowed to use state and private donations to continue building barriers on the border," Wagner reports. | | | Miami condo internal structure, visualized The weight of the building is distributed across concrete floor slabs into columns and load-bearing walls, as the weight transfers to the foundation into limestone. Experts suspect that columns toward the bottom of the building failed. Post reporters' examination of the deadly collapse of the high-rise apartment building outside Miami contain video, images, interviews and a reconstructions of the collapse. | | | Quote of the day "You are missing until you are found. We don't stop the search," Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis said about the rescue efforts at the collapsed condo. | | | Today in Washington Biden and Vice President Harris are meeting with governors of Western states. | | | In closing | Stephen Colbert, poking fun at Biden's comments in Wisconsin yesterday, wondered if there is a blue-collar job the president hasn't done:  | | | | | | |
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