Court blocks 'discriminatory' North Carolina voter ID law

Court blocks 'discriminatory' North Carolina voter ID law

File-This June 21, 2016, file photo shows North Carolina NAACP president, Rev. William Barber, center at podium gesturing during a news conference in Richmond, Va. A federal appeals court on Friday, July 29, 2016, blocked a North Carolina law that required voters to produce photo identification and follow other rules disproportionately affecting minorities, finding that the law was intended to make it harder for blacks to vote in the presidential battleground state. Rev. Barber, said in an interview that the ruling was a powerful victory for civil rights and for democracy

  

RALEIGH, N.C. (AP) -- A federal appeals court on Friday blocked a North Carolina law that required voters to produce photo identification and follow other rules disproportionately affecting minorities, finding that the law was intended to make it harder for blacks to vote in the presidential battleground state.

The Virginia-based 4th Circuit Court of Appeals declared that the measures violated the Constitution and the federal Voting Rights Act by targeting black voters "with almost surgical precision." It marks the third ruling in less than two weeks against voter ID laws after court decisions regarding Texas and Wisconsin.

Friday's opinion from a three-judge panel states that "the legislature enacted one of the largest restrictions of the franchise in modern North Carolina history" when it rewrote voting laws in 2013.

The appeals court also dismissed arguments by Republican lawmakers that the law was aimed at preventing voter fraud.

"Although the new provisions target African Americans with almost surgical precision, they constitute inapt remedies for the problems assertedly justifying them and, in fact, impose cures for problems that did not exist," the opinion states.

Opponents of the law say the ruling should increase participation by black and Hispanic voters on Election Day in the state that also has closely contested races for U.S. Senate and governor. The U.S. Justice Department, state NAACP and League of Women Voters were among those who sued over the restrictions.

"This is a strong rebuke to what the North Carolina General Assembly did in 2013. It's a powerful precedent that ... federal courts will protect voting rights of voters of color," said Allison Riggs, who served as the League of Women Voters' lead lawyer.

The Rev. William Barber, president of the North Carolina NAACP, said the ruling was "a vindication of our constitutional and moral critique and challenge to the constitutional extremism of our government."

The decision was lauded by Democratic Party presidential nominee Hillary Clinton and Attorney General Loretta Lynch, but decried by Republicans including Gov. Pat McCrory as an effort to tilt the electoral balance in the November elections.

North Carolina legislative leaders Senate leader Phil Berger and House Speaker Tim Moore, both Republicans, issued a statement that they would appeal the ruling to the U.S. Supreme Court and blasted the judges as "three partisan Democrats."

"We can only wonder if the intent is to reopen the door for voter fraud, potentially allowing fellow Democrat politicians ... to steal the election," they said.

All three panel members were appointed by Democratic presidents.

However, it's unlikely that the evenly divided and short-handed Supreme Court would take the case or block Friday's ruling from governing elections this November, said election-law experts Ned Foley of Ohio State University and Richard Hasen of the University of California at Irvine.

Earlier this month, a federal appeals court ruled that Texas' strict voter ID law is discriminatory and must be weakened by November. That followed a ruling by a federal judge in Wisconsin that residents without a photo ID will still be allowed to vote.

Hasen said the Obama administration took on the North Carolina and Texas cases as a bulwark against voting restrictions.

"If North Carolina and Texas could get away with these voting restrictions, it would have been a green light for other states to do so," he said. "I think this is a hugely important decision."

North Carolina's voting laws were rewritten in 2013 by the General Assembly two years after Republicans took control of both legislative chambers for the first time in a century. It was also shortly after a U.S. Supreme Court ruling changed the requirement that many Southern states receive federal approval before changing voting laws.

The voter ID mandate, which took effect in March, required people casting ballots in person to show one of six qualifying IDs, although voters facing "reasonable impediments" could fill out a form and cast a provisional ballot.

North Carolina legislators imposed the photo ID requirement, curtailed early voting and eliminated same-day registration and voters' ability to cast out-of-precinct provisional ballots in their home counties.

The appeals court cited data that these methods were used disproportionately by black voters, who also were more likely to lack a qualifying ID, and it blocked the contested provisions of the law.

The judges wrote that in the years before the North Carolina law took effect, registration and participation by black voters had been dramatically increasing.

"We recognize that elections have consequences, but winning an election does not empower anyone in any party to engage in purposeful racial discrimination," the panel said.

The Rev. Moses Colbert, a 61-year-old pastor at a church in Gastonia, said the elimination of same-day registration ensured that he couldn't vote on Election Day 2014 shortly after moving within North Carolina. 

He'd sought to change his voter registration at the Department of Motor Vehicles, but the update didn't get to county officials by the election.

He was told his name wasn't on the rolls where he'd just moved. But when he drove 20 miles back to the county where he was registered before, election workers turned him away because of the new address on his license.

"I was stunned. I'm only two generations away from slavery," said Colbert, who is black. "This is a privilege every American needs to be allowed to exercise."

Donald Trump speech beats Hillary Clinton in TV viewership

Donald Trump speech beats Hillary Clinton in TV viewership

Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump speaks during a campaign rally, Thursday, July 28, 2016, in Cedar Rapids, Iowa.

  

NEW YORK (AP) -- Donald Trump pulled off the upset - at least in television popularity.

Hillary Clinton's acceptance speech at the Democratic National Convention was seen by 29.8 million people on the commercial networks, the Nielsen company said Friday. That fell short of the 32.2 million people who watched Trump speak to the Republicans a week before.

Trump, who used to carefully watch television ratings during his days as star of "The Apprentice," immediately boasted about the victory during a campaign appearance Friday in Colorado Springs, Colorado.

"We beat her by millions on television. Millions!" he said. "Honestly, the numbers were incredible."

Although Trump has been a proven ratings draw throughout his campaign, the Democratic convention had proven more popular with viewers than the Republicans for its first three nights. Stars like Alicia Keys, Katy Perry, Lenny Kravitz and Paul Simon performed for the Democrats, and President Barack Obama, first lady Michelle Obama and former President Bill Clinton showed off their oratorical skills.

Meanwhile, star power was much dimmer at the Republican meeting. One night, the convention even ended 15 minutes earlier than planned, leaving television networks scrambling to fill time.

But viewers turned up to hear Trump: his audience was watched by 9 million more people than it was for any other night of the Republican convention, Nielsen said. Meanwhile, the Democrats actually had slightly more viewers for the first night of its convention than it did for the nominee's speech, typically the highest-rated night of convention coverage.

Four years ago, the audience for Obama's acceptance speech was 35.7 million, while 30.2 million saw Republican challenger Mitt Romney.

Nielsen's count did not include PBS' commercial-free coverage, which made the margin closer. PBS said its viewership for Clinton's speech was 3.91 million people, and 2.75 million the week earlier for Trump.

Fox News Channel went from first to worst during a tumultuous two weeks that included the resignation of its chief executive, Roger Ailes, on the day Trump spoke. An estimated 9.4 million people watched Trump on Fox, the most popular network for Republicans, and Fox took out newspaper ads touting its first-place finish among those covering the convention.

Just over 3 million people watched Clinton on Fox. Perhaps sensing its audience's level of interest, Fox showed fewer live events from the convention floor than its rivals, preferring discussions hosted by anchors Bill O'Reilly and Megyn Kelly. Sean Hannity was brought in for analysis immediately after the convention closed each night.

Meanwhile, it was a coup for CNN, whose 7.51 million viewers topped all of the networks Thursday by a comfortable margin. This convention marked the first time the cable network beat the broadcasters in head-to-head competition. The relatively newsy events appeared to benefit the networks that followed them throughout the prime time hours, as opposed to ABC, CBS and NBC, which came on at 10 p.m. ET each night.

MSNBC was seen by 5.27 million, NBC had 4.52 million, ABC had 3.85 million and CBS had 3.65 million, Nielsen said. It was measuring the time all of the networks competed head-to-head, from 10 p.m. until the convention's close.

For politicians, the true measure of the speech's effectiveness will come in about a week, when polls indicate whether or not the convention gave Clinton a bump in popularity.

AP EXPLAINS: Long history of women running for president

AP EXPLAINS: Long history of women running for president

California delegates hold up signs as they cheer for Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton during the final day of the Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia, Thursday, July 28, 2016.

 

It's been read, written and said countless times in the last few days: Hillary Clinton is the first woman to claim a major party's presidential nomination.

But why that "major" qualifier?

No woman has been this close to the Oval Office before, right?

The background:

---

HOW MANY WOMEN HAVE RUN FOR PRESIDENT BEFORE?

According to Smithsonian historians, the number exceeds 200, a list that comprises nominees of many minor parties, and includes candidates who ran for president before women won the right to vote in 1920.

The list includes recent names like Jill Stein, this year's Green Party candidate who ran under the same label in 2012; Shirley Chisholm, the first black congresswoman, who ran for the Democratic presidential nomination in 1972; then-Congresswoman Michele Bachmann, a Republican candidate in 2012; and former Sen. Carol Moseley Braun, a Democratic hopeful in 2004.

---

VICTORIA WOODHULL?

A women's rights crusader in the latter half of the 19th century, Victoria Woodhull is generally cited as the first woman to seek the presidency as the nominee of a political party.

But Woodhull's place in history comes with its own caveat.

Woodhull announced her candidacy publicly in an April 2, 1870, letter to the New York Herald. As recorded by Smithsonian Magazine, she wrote that she expected "more ridicule than enthusiasm" but "what may appear absurd today will assume a serious aspect tomorrow."

She went on to win the 1872 nomination of the Equal Rights Party (one of several organizations to claim that name in the era). But the Equal Rights Party didn't achieve ballot access in any state in 1872, so there are no recorded votes for Woohdull.

Further, she still would have been shy of 35 years old on Inauguration Day, making her ineligible to serve.

---

IF NOT WOODHULL, THEN WHO?

A decade after Woodhull, suffragist Belva Ann Lockwood twice ran with the nomination of the National Equal Rights Part in 1884 and 1888.

Her May 20, 1917, obituary in The New York Times described her as "the first woman admitted to practice before the Supreme Court, a pioneer in the woman suffrage movement, and the only woman who was ever a candidate for President of the United States."

Most tallies of the popular vote do not list Lockwood, though various historians record her as having garnered about 4,100 votes across six states that allowed her name on the ballot in 1884.

---

WHAT DOES THIS MEAN FOR CLINTON'S ACCOMPLISHMENT?

Woodhull's story has proliferated in recent weeks on social media, often circulated by conservatives - or perhaps aggrieved Bernie Sanders backers - seeking to cast doubt on Clinton's place in history.

It's certainly a reminder that vocal, even if small minor party movements have helped shape American politics and policy.

But let's be clear: The U.S. government has long revolved around a two-party system. The last time a third-party or independent presidential candidate garnered a single Electoral College vote was George Wallace in 1968, and he was the former governor of Alabama, elected as a Democrat. Not even Ross Perot managed an electoral vote in 1992 or 1996, despite millions of popular votes.

No, presidents come from the Democratic Party or the Republican Party. And for the first time, one of those two great, enduring organizations has chosen a woman as its standard-bearer.

Surely Victoria Woodhull and Belva Ann Lockwood would agree on the historic nature of such an occasion.

Mom of slain Florida teen warned son of nightclub shootings

Mom of slain Florida teen warned son of nightclub shootings
 

A police vehicle blocks off the area near Club Blu after a fatal shooting in Fort Myers, Fla., Monday, July 25, 2016.

  

FORT MYERS, Fla. (AP) -- With the Orlando massacre still fresh on everyone's mind, the mother of a young man who was slain at a nightclub early Monday had warned her son about what to do if there were a shooting: "hit the floor, find a table."

But when gunfire erupted at the Club Blu parking lot, 18-year-old Stef'an Strawder didn't have anywhere to hide. He was killed along with a 14-year-old boy, and 17 other people ranging in age from 12 to 27 were wounded during a swimsuit-themed party for teens.

"I told him to look for all the exits if any kind of shooting would go off, to hit the floor, find a table and get out of the way ... because I thought about the people in Orlando. That was a big thing," Strawder's mother, Stephanie White, told The Associated Press.

Since the shooting happened in the parking lot, "He didn't have that chance," she said.

Florida is again reeling from a mass shooting at a nightclub, but instead of being committed by a terrorist spouting Islamist ideology, this rampage may have started with an argument over a rap performance. Police have not yet released a motive.

The shooting at a venue tucked in a strip mall also left 14-year-old Sean Archilles dead, and a state and its governor grappling with another tragedy. The massacre at Orlando's Pulse nightclub last month killed 49 and wounded dozens of others.

"The positive is we are at a 45-year low in our crime rate. The negatives - I can't imagine this happening to any person in our state. 

I don't want this to happen to anybody in my state. The 20 million people who live here, the probably 150 million people who visit here. We just want everybody to be safe," Gov. Rick Scott 

told reporters at a news conference in Fort Myers.

He said gun laws are not to blame. "The Second Amendment has never shot anybody. The evil did this."

Fort Myers interim Police Chief Dennis Eads said the shooting was not an act of terror. 

Police detained three people and were searching for others, he added. He declined to give a motive for the shooting or discuss details, saying the investigation is ongoing. 

Hours after the shooting, police had marked more than two dozen shell casings in the parking lot outside the club.

The shooting happened about 12:30 a.m. Monday, just as the club was closing and parents were picking up their children.

Security guard Brandy Mclaughlin, who was hired for the event, said she saw someone with a semi-automatic rifle open fire, with the attack sounding like "firecrackers." Her car was hit in the spray of bullets.

"The rapper was upset, someone not being able to perform," she said. "It wasn't targeted, terrorist or gays, or anything like that. It wasn't a black or white situation. It was an idiot. An idiot with a firearm."

Club owner Cheryl Filardi, who said she was in the back room when the shots rang out, said at least 10 security guards were hired for the party - two in the parking lot, one or two at the door and the rest floating inside.

She said the club has had four or five teen parties over the past half-dozen years, and this was the second one this summer. She said the parties are something positive for a rough and often-violent neighborhood.

"To be honest with you, every day someone's getting shot in this area. These days in Lee County, somebody's always shooting," Filardi said. "If we do teen parties, we always have a ton of security and we've never had a problem."

While beer posters still hung in its windows, Club Blu's alcohol license was revoked June 7 because of an incident that occurred a year ago, according to records from the Department of Business and Professional Regulation. 

The same records show that a complaint was filed in 2014 for "criminal activity" and that the club was given an official notice. Further details were not available.

There were bullet holes in concrete planters and wooden support beams outside the club. Sheriff's evidence markers were still affixed to the holes. The letter "A'' was attached near a post, while nearby "L," ''M," ''N" and "O'' were marked near a planter filled with scraggly foliage.

The youngest to die, Archilles, lived about a mile from the nightclub, and loved to play football and basketball, said his father, Jean Archilles.

"He liked to make people laugh. He's a funny kid. He's always joking," Jean Archilles said.

Strawder starred on the Lehigh High School basketball team, averaging more than 15 points a game as a junior.

His sister also was at the party and was shot in the leg. She's home from the hospital.

"She didn't know she was shot because she was looking for her brother."

All around the home in the Fort Myers suburb of Lehigh Acres were testaments to Strawder's athletic ability. 

From the baby photo of him with a football on his lap - a ball nearly as big as he was - to the photos of him over the years on the court, to the dozens of trophies lining the cabinets, it was clear that his family adored him and his abilities.

He was the kind of guy who, even if he didn't have much money, he'd pay for meals for teammates, his mother said.

White clutched photos of her son while sitting in a chair in her home. The television was on, loud, and turned to the local news. A story came on about the shootings.

"My son," said White, waving a hand at the television. "There's another picture of him."

Democratic emails: All about the hack, the leak, the discord

Democratic emails: All about the hack, the leak, the discord

Demonstrators make their way around downtown, Monday, July 25, 2016, in Philadelphia, during the first day of the Democratic National Convention. On Sunday, Debbie Wasserman Schultz, D-Fla., announced she would step down as DNC chairwoman at the end of the party's convention, after some of the 19,000 emails, presumably stolen from the DNC by hackers, were posted to the website Wikileaks.

  

PHILADELPHIA (AP) -- First came the hack, then the leak. Now, the Clinton and Trump campaigns are fighting over Russia's role in the release of thousands of internal Democratic National Committee emails.

At least one thing is clear: The email uproar is an unwelcome distraction at the launch of the Democratic National Convention, inflaming the rift between supporters of Hillary Clinton and primary rival Bernie Sanders just when the party was hoping to close it.

As the Philadelphia convention got underway Monday, developments in the email story rolled out in rapid sequence:

Clinton's campaign, citing a cybersecurity firm hired to investigate the leak, blamed Russia for hacking the party's computers and suggested the goal was to benefit Donald Trump's campaign.

Trump dismissed that idea as laughable, tweeting: "The new joke in town is that Russia leaked the disastrous DNC e-mails."

Sanders supporters certainly weren't amused. Irate, in fact, that the emails confirmed their long-held suspicions the party had favored Clinton all along.

The FBI announced Monday it was investigating how the hack occurred, saying "a compromise of this nature is something we take very seriously."

A look at the hack, the leak and the politics of the DNC email fracas:

THE HACK

Democrats have known about the hack since April, when party officials discovered malicious software on their computers.

They called in a cybersecurity firm, CrowdStrike, which found traces of at least two sophisticated hacking groups on the Democrats' network, both with ties to the Russian government.

Those hacks vacuumed up at least a year's worth of chats, emails and research on Trump, according to a person knowledgeable about the breach who wasn't authorized to discuss it publicly.

The party publicly acknowledged the hack in June.

---

THE LEAK

On Friday, the public got its first look at DNC emails when Wikileaks posted a cache of 19,000 internal communications, including some that suggested party officials had favored Clinton over rival Sanders during the primaries.

It wasn't immediately clear how WikiLeaks got the emails - and WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange proudly told Democracy Now! he'd never tell.

Was it from the Russians?

Clinton's campaign didn't hesitate to make the connection, with campaign manager Robby Mook saying cyber experts believed "Russian state actors were feeding the email to hackers for the purpose of helping Donald Trump."

Trump's team went out of its way to dismiss the alleged Russian connection as outlandish. Trump senior policy adviser Paul Manafort called the Clinton campaign statements "pretty desperate" and "pretty absurd."

---

THE FALLOUT

Whatever the source, the fallout from the leaked emails was swift and dramatic.

Democratic Party chairwoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz resigned over the weekend after Sanders' campaign pounced on a number of leaked emails that they said showed that party officials had favored Clinton during the primaries.

The disclosure set off devoted Sanders supporters, who were already having a hard time moving past the bitter primary battles to embrace Clinton as the nominee.

Sanders told his delegates Monday that Wasserman Schultz's departure would "open the doors of the party to people who want real change." But even after Sanders urged his supporters to back Clinton, some were flashing thumbs-down signals and waving signs that said, "not Hillary, not Trump."

---

A BROMANCE?

The email controversy raised new questions about Trump's foreign policy views with regard to Russia.

Clinton campaign chairman John Podesta suggested there was "a kind of bromance going on" between Russian President Vladimir Putin and Trump. Or "maybe it's simply just a mutual admiration society," he told MSNBC.

The Clinton campaign says Russia favors Trump's views, especially on NATO. Trump himself has spoken favorably about Putin as someone he could negotiate with.

Trump supporters did succeed in preventing a reference to arming Ukraine from getting into this year's platform, but the document is far from pro-Russia. It accuses the Kremlin of eroding the "personal liberty and fundamental rights" of the Russian people.

---

WISHFUL THINKING

Clinton loyalists were eager to put a period on the latest email episode. Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe, a former chairman of the Democratic Party, said Monday "we're done" with the controversy. But Sanders' delegates didn't seem ready to move on. And there may be more shoes to drop: Director of National Intelligence James Clapper has said U.S. officials expect more cyber threats against the campaigns.

---

EMAIL JINX

Clinton just can't stay out of hot water when it comes to email. The latest controversy serves as an unwelcome reminder of Clinton's earlier problems with her handling of classified email as secretary of state. 

In case anyone failed to make the connection, Trump was happy to tweet a reminder: "Here we go again with another Clinton scandal, and e-mails yet (can you believe)."

Tensions with West rise as Turkey continues purge

Tensions with West rise as Turkey continues purge
 

People walk by a Turkish flag in central Istanbul, Monday, July 18, 2016. Turkey's Interior Ministry has fired nearly 9,000 police officers, bureaucrats and others and detained thousands of suspected plotters following a foiled coup against the government, Turkey's state-run news agency reported Monday.

ANKARA, Turkey (AP) -- The purging of thousands of alleged plotters of a failed coup raised tensions Monday between Turkey and the West, with U.S. and European officials urging restraint, while Ankara insisted Washington extradite an exile accused of orchestrating the plot.

Authorities have fired nearly 9,000 police officers, bureaucrats and others, while detaining thousands more alleged to have been involved in Friday night's attempted coup, the state-run Anadolu news agency reported.

Former air force commander Akin Ozturk, alleged to be the ringleader of the uprising, was put under arrest following questioning by a magistrate along with 25 other suspects, the news agency said. Ozturk, who has denied involvement and insisted he had tried to suppress the rebellion, appeared in video from Turkish TV looking bruised with a bandage over his ear.

President Recep Tayyip Erdogan refused to rule out bringing back the death penalty, telling broadcaster CNN in an interview via a government translator, "There is a clear crime of treason." He added that it would be up to parliament to decide.

Anadolu said 8,777 employees attached to the Interior Ministry were dismissed, including 30 governors, 52 civil service inspectors and 16 legal advisers. Other media reports said police, military police and members of the coast guard also were removed from duty.

During the uprising by a faction of the military, warplanes fired on government buildings and tanks rolled into the streets of major cities before the rebellion was put down by forces loyal to the government and civilians who took to the streets. The top brass did not support the coup.

Prime Minister Binali Yildirim said 232 people - 208 government supporters he called "martyrs," as well as 24 coup plotters - died in the unrest. His voice cracked and he wept as he spoke with reporters after a Cabinet meeting and repeated a question his grandson had put to him: "Why are they killing people?"

He said he had no answer, but that Turkey would make the coup plotters answer "in such a way that the whole world will see."

As Western officials expressed alarm at the rapid roundup of so many by their key NATO ally, Turkish government officials explained that the plotters in the military had been under investigation and launched their ill-planned operation out of panic.

The swift move against so many reflected the prior investigation, the government said. It alleged the coup conspirators were loyal to moderate cleric Fethullah Gulen, a former Erdogan ally who lives in exile in Saylorsburg, Pennsylvania, and espouses a philosophy that blends a mystical form of Islam with democracy.

Erdogan has often accused Gulen of trying to overthrow the government, and Turkey has demanded his extradition, labeling his movement a terrorist organization and putting him on trial in absentia. 

Gulen strongly denies the government's charges and has suggested that Friday's attempted coup could have been staged, as a pretext for the government to seize even more power.

U.S. officials have said that the U.S. will consider extraditing Gulen, if the Turkish government offers evidence that he was involved in the plot or committed crimes. White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest said the U.S. would follow procedures in a decades-old extradition treaty and called Turkish charges that the U.S. was harboring Gulen "factually incorrect."

But Yildirim said the normal U.S. legal processes would not be good enough.

"We would be disillusioned and would question our friendship if our friends were to say to us 'Show us the evidence.' despite all the efforts ... to eradicate the elected government and the national will of a country," he said, while adding that the Justice Ministry was preparing documents to send to the United States.

Over the weekend, Turkey responded to the coup attempt by rounding up some 6,000 people, including hundreds of judges and prosecutors.

Reacting to the large number of arrests in the military and the judiciary, as well as Erdogan's suggestion that Turkey could bring back the death penalty, Western officials were urging Turkey to maintain the rule of law.

Earnest said President Barack Obama would call Erdogan soon to reiterate U.S. support for Turkey's democratically elected civilian government and make the case for restraint and respect for the freedoms enshrined in the Turkish constitution.

EU foreign policy chief Federica Mogherini said at a news conference with U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry that the coup "is no excuse to take the country away from fundamental rights and the rule of law, and we will be extremely vigilant on that."

Kerry added that Turkey must "uphold the highest standards for the country's democratic institutions and the rule of law."

While he recognized the need to apprehend the coup plotters, Kerry said: "We caution against a reach that goes beyond that."

Mogherini said the talks on Turkey's bid to join the European Union would end if Ankara restores the death penalty. That message was echoed by Germany, the EU's biggest state.

"The institution of the death penalty can only mean that such a country could not be a member," Steffen Seibert, spokesman for Chancellor Angela Merkel, said in Berlin.

NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg, who said he spoke to Erdogan, praised the Turkish people for showing "great courage," but he also said it was essential for the alliance member to "ensure full respect for democracy and its institutions, the constitutional order, the rule of law and fundamental freedoms."

For the fourth night in a row, hundreds took to public squares in major cities, including Istanbul, Ankara and Izmir, in a fresh show of support for the government. They waved Turkish flags, shouted pro-government slogans and sang praise of Erdogan.

Mostafa Minawi, director of the Ottoman and Turkish Studies Initiative at Cornell University, called the failed coup "a gift for President Erdogan, given him all the justification he needs to implement further clamp down measures against any dissenters, in the process sinking Turkey deeper into authoritarianism."

Middle-class Venezuelans liquidate savings to stockpile food

Middle-class Venezuelans liquidate savings to stockpile food
 

Ramiro Ramirez pushes a shopping cart as he shops for food with his wife Tebie Gonzalez in Cucuta, Colombia, Sunday, July 17, 2016, during the temporary opening of the long-closed border with Colombia. "This is money we had been saving for an emergency, and this is an emergency," Ramirez said. "It's scary to spend it, but we're finding less food each day and we need to prepare for what's coming."

SAN CRISTOBAL, Venezuela (AP) -- Tebie Gonzalez and Ramiro Ramirez still have their sleek apartment, a fridge covered with souvenir magnets from vacations aboard, and closets full of name brand clothes. But they feel hunger drawing close.

So when the Venezuelan government opened the long-closed border with Colombia this weekend, the couple decided to drain what remained of the savings they put away before the country spun into economic crisis and stocked up on food. They left their two young sons with relatives and joined more than 100,000 other Venezuelans trudging across what Colombian officials are calling a "humanitarian corridor" to buy as many basic goods as possible.

"This is money we had been saving for an emergency, and this is an emergency," Ramirez said. "It's scary to spend it, but we're finding less food each day and we need to prepare for what's coming."

Gonzalez, 36, earns several times the minimum wage with her job as a sales manager for a chain of furniture stores in the western mountain town of San Cristobal. But lately, her salary is no match for Venezuela's 700-percent inflation. Ramirez's auto parts shop went bust after President Nicolas Maduro closed the border with Colombia a year ago, citing uncontrolled smuggling, and cut off the region's best avenue for imported goods.

The couple stopped eating out this year, abandoned plans to buy a house and put a "for sale" sign on their second car. There is no more sugar for coffee, no more butter for bread and no more infant formula for their 1-year-old son.

When Ramirez, 37, went to get a late night snack on Friday, he found nothing in the refrigerator.

So Sunday, the couple donned their nicest clothes and hid fat wads of bills in their bags. Before heading to the border, they surveyed the stocks in their renovated granite kitchen: An inch of vegetable oil at the bottom of a plastic jug. A single package of flour. Some leftover cooked rice. No coffee.

Then they set off in a 2011 Jeep SUV onto darkened highways, the lights of hillside shantytowns glinting in the blue darkness like stars.

At the crossing, scowling soldiers with automatic weapons patrolled a line that wrapped around more than a dozen blocks. The couple considered turning back. But within minutes, people started shouting that immigration officials were waving everyone through, and the line broke into a stampede.

Gonzalez and Ramirez ran with thousands of others toward a bridge barely wide enough for two cars to pass. Soon, it was packed as tightly as a rush-hour subway train. Some people cradled newborns, others toted dogs as they headed to a new life in Colombia. Most carried suitcases and backpacks to fill with groceries.

The couple held hands to stop the crowd from pushing them apart. Two hours passed. People sang the national anthem. Gonzalez's feet ached in Tommy Hilfiger wedge heels and they had barely reached the middle of the bridge. People who couldn't stand the claustrophobia and heat doubled back to try to swim across the river, but soldiers stopped them.

At last, the Colombian flags came into view. Soon, the bridge opened out onto a road lined with officials waving, cheering, even doling out cake.

No one checked ID cards. Beyond the reception line, music played and kiosks sold products that have become treasures in Venezuela: rice, toothpaste, detergent, and sacks of sugar.

Gonzalez cried behind her oversized aviator glasses.

"I thought the crossing would be easier. It made me feel so humiliated, like I was an animal; a refugee," she said.

"But look how different things are on this side. It's like Disneyland," responded Ramirez. Not only was the town filled with prized groceries, but everything was much cheaper than on Venezuelan black market, now the only alternative for people who don't have time to spend in the hours-long lines for scarce goods that have become the most salient feature of the oil country's economic crisis.

They changed their Venezuelan money into Colombian currency at a mall, where Gonzalez luxuriated in the clean, air-conditioned space as she window-shopped for watches and handbags.

As she browsed past the shoes, a TV report flashed on the store television: It was an aerial shot of the bridge she had crossed over, crammed with people. "Humanitarian crisis," the headline said.

"Oh no," Gonzalez whispered.

Other shoppers were indignant.

"That isn't Venezuela. That isn't us," said a woman who was looking at sneakers.

Gonzalez crossed herself and left. It was time to go food shopping and get home.

The variety at the mall supermarket felt unreal after so many months of scrounging in near-empty stores.

The couple debated over the best baby toothpaste. Gonzalez ran her hand over seven varieties of shampoo. 

She examined each option in an aisle of pasta.

But while things were cheaper than in shortage-hit Venezuela, they were pricier than they had expected.

They decided to skip the flour and sugar, instead choosing 10 packages of the cheapest pasta. They went for cloudy soy oil instead of the more expensive canola. Every price was checked and rechecked as the couple spent three hours deciding how to allocate their emergency fund.

"It's more expensive than we had hoped, but what matters is that it's available at all," Ramirez said.

Other Venezuelans in the store - teachers, small business owners and office workers - pored over prices and reluctantly put things back.

In the end, the couple bought enough food to fill two suitcases and a duffle bag, then slipped into the stream of exhausted shoppers filing back to Venezuela. It hasn't been announced if Maduro will lift the border closure again next weekend.

Colombian soldiers shook hands with the departing Venezuelans. But the kindness didn't lift their spirits the same way it did when they entered Colombia hours later.

At home, Ramirez and Gonzalez stacked their hard-won supplies into gleaming white pantry cabinets. They still looked pretty bare.

Obama pays tribute to Dallas officers shot in racial attack

Obama pays tribute to Dallas officers shot in racial attack

President Barack Obama and first lady Michelle Obama attend an interfaith memorial service for the fallen police officers and members of the Dallas community at the Morton H. Meyerson Symphony Center in Dallas, Tuesday, July 12, 2016.

  

DALLAS (AP) -- President Barack Obama urged Americans rattled by a week of violence and protests to find "open hearts" and new empathy Tuesday in a speech that seesawed between honoring police officers for their bravery and decrying racial prejudice that can affect their work.

Obama stood next to five empty chairs for the white police officers killed last week by a black man seeking vengeance for police killings. Behind him, underscoring his message of unity: Dallas police officers, a racially diverse church choir and local officials who ranged from black Police Chief David Brown to former President George W. Bush, a Dallas resident.

Obama sought to reassure the nation that he understands the impact of the unsettling events of the past week - including the killing of two black men by white police officers as well as the Dallas attacks.

Disturbing videos of the events have "left us wounded and angry and hurt," he said."

It is as if the deepest fault lines of our democracy have suddenly been exposed, perhaps even widened."

Undaunted, the president urged Americans to cast aside such doubt and replace it with faith in the nation's institutions and progress.

"Dallas, I'm here to say we must reject such despair. I'm here to insist that we are not as divided as we seem. 

And I know that because I know America. I know how far we've come against impossible odds," he said.

The president spoke steps away from the chairs left empty for the five men killed last Thursday while protecting hundreds of people protesting the killings of black men in Louisiana and Minnesota. The Army veteran killed by police after the Dallas attack said he was motivated by revenge.

"The soul of our city was pierced," Mayor Mike Rawlings said, as he welcomed the president and a line of public officials, including Bush, who attended with his wife, Laura, Vice President Joe Biden and his wife, Jill, and Brown. The group on stage capped the ceremony by holding hands and swaying to the "Battle Hymn of the Republic" - a symbol in sight and song of the service's unity theme.

"Too often we judge other groups by their worst examples, while judging ourselves by our best intentions," Bush said. "And this has strained our bonds of understanding and common purpose."

Bush and other speakers paid tribute to the fallen officers - Brent Thompson, a 43-year-old newlywed; Patrick Zamarripa, 32, a Navy veteran who served in Iraq; Michael Krol, 40, an athlete and basketball lover; Michael Smith, 55, a former Army Ranger and father of two, and Lorne Ahrens, whose wife is a police detective.

No one expressed his appreciation for the men more memorably than Brown, who has emerged as the steady and charismatic face of the Dallas police. The chief spent part of his time reciting Stevie Wonder's "I'll 

Be Loving You Always" to express his affection for his officers.

For Obama, the moment was a chance to try to defuse what some have described as a national powder keg of emotions over race, justice, gun violence and policing. The president positioned himself as both an ally of law enforcement and a sympathizer of the Black Lives Matter movement.

It's a posture neither side has completely accepted.

Law enforcement officials have sharply criticized Obama and some of his policies, including a decision to stem the flow of military-grade equipment to local departments. One prominent voice, William Johnson, executive director the National Association of Police Organizations, accused Obama of waging a "war on cops."

Some protesters, meanwhile, questioned why Obama rushed home from Europe this week to attend the service in Dallas before meeting with the communities grieving their dead in Minnesota and Louisiana.

In a gesture aimed at the answering that, Obama telephoned members of the families of Alton Sterling and Philando Castile, the men killed in confrontations in Baton Rouge and suburban St. Paul, as he flew to Dallas.

The White House said Obama worked late into the night on his speech, consulting Scripture for inspiration..

After years of delivering emotional pleas for peace at similar memorials, Obama acknowledged his fatigue and the limits of his words on Tuesday.

"I'm not naive," he said. "I've seen how inadequate words can be in bringing about lasting change. I've seen how inadequate my own words have been."

When he has doubts, he said, he remembers a passage from Ezekiel, in which the Lord promised to take "your heart of stone, and give you a heart of flesh."

"With an open heart we can learn to stand in each other's shoes and look at the world through each other's eyes," Obama said. "So that maybe the police officer sees his own son in that teenager with a hoodie, who's kind of goofing off but not dangerous. And the teenager, maybe the teenager will see in the police officer the same words, and values and authority of his parents."

Black Lives Matter activist released from jail after protest

Black Lives Matter activist released from jail after protest
 

Police arrest activist DeRay McKesson during a protest along Airline Highway, a major road that passes in front of the Baton Rouge Police Department headquarters Saturday, July 9, 2016, in Baton Rouge, La. Protesters angry over the fatal shooting of Alton Sterling by two white Baton Rouge police officers rallied Saturday at the convenience store where he was shot, in front of the city's police department and at the state Capitol for another day of demonstrations.

  

BATON ROUGE, La. (AP) -- A prominent Black Lives Matter activist, three journalists and more than 120 other people were taken into custody in Louisiana over the weekend, authorities said Sunday, in connection with protests over the fatal shooting of an African-American man by two white police officers in Baton Rouge.

Spokeswoman Casey Rayborn Hicks of the East Baton Rouge Sheriff's Office told The Associated Press that nearly 100 people were taken to the parish jail over protests that began late Saturday. Most of those arrested were from Louisiana and faced a single charge of obstructing a highway.

A first wave of arrests took place on Friday and early Saturday, with 30 people taken into custody.

Police began releasing those who were arrested on Sunday afternoon. Kira Marrero, 21, of New Orleans, who faces a charge of obstructing a highway, was the first to leave the jail. She says she was not standing on the road.

"I did the right thing," said Marrero, a 2015 graduate of Williams College in Massachusetts. "I have no doubt in my mind that I did nothing wrong."

Tensions between black citizens and police have risen palpably over the past week or so amid police shootings of African-American men in Minnesota and Louisiana and the gunning down of five white police officers by a black suspect in Dallas in apparent retaliation.

Among those arrested was DeRay Mckesson, a leading figure in the Black Lives Matter movement that blossomed in recent years in the wake of numerous deaths of unarmed black men at the hands of police. Mckesson smiled and embraced supporters upon his release from jail Sunday afternoon.

"I remain disappointed in the Baton Rouge police, who continue to provoke protesters for peacefully protesting. There's a lot of work to be done, with this police department specifically," he said.

Authorities had just arrested a couple on a motorcycle driving by on the street when attention turned toward Mckesson, who had traveled from Baltimore for the protest and happened to be wearing bright red shoes. An officer could be seen pointing to a man and heard saying that he'd arrest the man with "loud shoes" if he could reach him.

Booking documents provided by the East Baton Rouge Sheriff's Office said Mckesson was arrested on a charge of obstructing a highway.

An affidavit of probable cause filed by police says Mckesson "intentionally" placed himself in the road after protesters were repeatedly warned via police loud speaker to remain on private property or the curb.

"During the protest, the defendant entered the roadway and was provided another verbal order to exit the lanes of travel. Moments later, the defendant entered the roadway again and was taken into custody by officers on scene without incident," the affidavit said.

Activist Brittany Packett, who was with Mckesson, said in an email that he was on the highway shoulder when "multiple police crossed onto the shoulder, tackling Deray and arresting him."

Photo images taken by The Associated Press show police apprehending Mckesson, who at one point was on his knees before being pulled to his feet by police and led away with his hands secured behind his back.

Baton Rouge police blamed violence and out-of-town agitators for the large number of arrests, noting that an earlier march the same evening was peaceful and nobody was arrested.

One police officer lost teeth to a projectile thrown from the protest Saturday night outside police headquarters, and police also confiscated three rifles, three shotguns and two pistols during that protest, Sgt. Don Coppola, a police spokesman, said in an emailed statement.

"It appears the protest at Baton Rouge Police Headquarters have become more violent as out of town protesters are arriving," he wrote.

The list released by the sheriff's office included two homeless people and 18 from out of state, including Mckesson. The vast majority of the Louisiana residents were from the Baton Rouge and New Orleans areas.

It was not clear just what police blamed on "out of town protesters." Only one person from outside the Baton Rouge area faced a charge other than obstructing a highway.

Three people - two from Baton Rouge and one from Humble, Texas - face a charge of inciting to riot, and four - all from the Baton Rouge area - face a charge of resisting arrest.

Darren Bowers, 26, of Baton Rouge, arrived at the jail around 9 a.m. Sunday to see if he could get his girlfriend, 26-year-old Ariel Bates, released. Bowers wasn't present when Bates was arrested near police headquarters. Bowers said she called him from the jail early Sunday.

"She told me that they jumped all on her and her cousin on the grass. They weren't on the street or anything," Bowers said.

He said he believes police are "antagonizing" protesters.

"People are peacefully protesting. Why are (police) in riot gear?" he said.

The tumult over police killings reached well beyond Louisiana. In Minnesota, police arrested about 100 people in the capital of St. Paul during protests. Authorities said 21 St. Paul officers and six state troopers were hurt late Saturday and early Sunday during clashes stemming from the police shooting and killing of Philando Castile, a 32-year-old black man, during a traffic stop in suburban St. Paul on Wednesday.

The starting point of Saturday's demonstration was the convenience store where 37-year-old Alton Sterling was shot and killed last week. Protesters then fanned out to the Baton Rouge police department and the state Capitol.

The Department of Justice has opened an investigation into Sterling's death.

Shouting "No justice! No peace!" roughly 1,000 protesters gathered outside the police department, waving homemade signs as passing cars honked their support.

Police in riot gear came out numerous times as the demonstration wore on into the evening, facing off against the crowd that yelled slogans and waved signs.

Authorities said they pulled in officers from nearby parishes to buttress their numbers.

WAFB-TV reporter Chris Slaughter was among those arrested, Hicks confirmed. Eve Troeoh, news director for New Orleans public radio station WWNO, said staff reporter Ryan Kailath was arrested.

Breitbart News reported that Lee Stranahan, one of its reporters, was arrested.

Members of the New Black Panther Party for Self Defense called for the arrest and indictment of the officers involved in Sterling's shooting, shouting "Black Power" and raising their fists.

"These are human rights violations," Krystal Muhammad shouted to the crowd at the convenience store before heading over to the police department. "They are not operating as human beings. They are being predators on our communities across America."

Texas woman shot while protecting son says she'd march again

Texas woman shot while protecting son says she'd march again
 

CORRECTS SPELLING TO SHERIE - Sherie Williams, left, and Theresa Williams, center, speak to the media as they leave the Baylor University Medical Center, Friday, July 8, 2016, in Dallas. Theresa Williams said her sister Shetamia Taylor, who was attending a rally with her four teenage sons in downtown Dallas, was shot in one of her legs.

 DALLAS (AP) -- A Texas woman who was wounded when she threw herself over her son during the attack on a Dallas protest march said Sunday she would go to another demonstration to show her boys that she's not a quitter.

Shetamia Taylor, who attended the march with her four sons, also thanked Dallas police for protecting her in the chaos that erupted Thursday night. She says officers shielded her as bullets whizzed through the air around them.

"They had no regard for their own life. They stayed there with us. They surrounded my son and I," she said.

Taylor, in a wheelchair with her right leg immobilized, told a news conference at Baylor University Medical Center that she always held police officers "in a very high place" and notes that her youngest son wants to be a cop.

"I never had an issue with police officers," she said. "If anything it made my admiration for them greater."

Taylor, who is black, said she went to the march to protest the killings of black men by police in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, and outside St. Paul, Minnesota, and previous encounters between blacks and police.

She said the attack on the march in Dallas, which killed five officers and injured seven others, wouldn't deter her from demonstrating again. She wants her sons - ages 12, 13, 15 and 17 - to know it was an isolated incident.

"I don't want them to think that I am a quitter, because I am not," she said.

Taylor said she and her sons were getting ready to leave the march when they heard two shots and saw an officer fall.

"As he was going down, he said, 'He has a gun. Run,'" she recalled.

As they fled, she felt a bullet hit her in the back of the leg.

She said she tackled her 15-year-old son, Andrew, and "laid on top of him."

An officer then jumped on top of them. "And there was another one at our feet. And there was another one over our heads. And there were several of them lined against the wall," she said. "And they stayed there with us. And I saw another officer get shot right in front of me."

Two of her other sons escaped through a parking garage, while the fourth fled the gunfire with another woman he didn't know.

Taylor suffered a bad fracture of her tibia just below her right knee, one of her doctors said. It was repaired with a plate and screws, but it will be two to three months before she can put weight on her leg.

Taylor says she wonders where the country is going to go from here.

"I'm just a mother and a wife," she said. "I'm not an activist. I'm not a politician. I just want to protect my family."

She stressed that most police officers deserve praise and not all of them are "out to get us."

"These are the people you call when you're in a situation. You gotta remember that," she said. "What are we gonna do if they stop policing? What are we gonna do? ... Who are you gonna call?"

Feds open civil rights investigation in Louisiana shooting

Feds open civil rights investigation in Louisiana shooting

Tawandra Carr, who said she was best friends with Alton Sterling, is comforted as people gather outside the Triple S convenience store in Baton Rouge, La., Wednesday, July 6, 2016. Sterling, 37, was shot and killed outside the store by Baton Rouge police, where he was selling CDs.

 

BATON ROUGE, La. (AP) -- In a swift move by authorities to keep tensions from boiling over, the U.S. Justice Department launched a civil rights investigation Wednesday into the video-recorded killing of a black man who was shot as he scuffled with two white police officers on the pavement outside a convenience store.

A law enforcement official said a gun was taken from 37-year-old Alton Sterling after he was killed early Tuesday in the parking lot where he regularly sold homemade music CDs from a folding table. The official was not authorized to discuss the investigation and spoke on condition of anonymity.

It was not clear from the murky cellphone footage whether Sterling had the gun in his hand or was reaching for it when he was shot. A witness said he saw police pull a gun from Sterling's pocket after the shooting.

The shooting in the Louisiana capital - and shocking videos that found their way all over the internet - set off angry protests in the city's black community and brought calls for an outside investigation. It came at a time when law enforcement officers across the country are under close scrutiny over what some see as indiscriminate use of deadly force against blacks.

Moving quickly just one day after the shooting, Democratic Gov. John Bel Edwards asked the Justice Department to take the lead in the investigation.

"I have very serious concerns. The video is disturbing, to say the least," the governor said at a news conference.

Edwards also met with black community leaders to reassure them about the investigation and to ask their help in keeping protests peaceful. He expressed hope that once the community sees that the shooting is "going to be investigated impartially, professionally and thoroughly" by the Justice Department, "the tensions will ease."

In a statement, Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton called the shooting a tragedy and said trust between police and the communities they serve needs to be rebuilt.

"Something is profoundly wrong when so many Americans have reason to believe that our country doesn't consider them as precious as others because of the color of their skin," Clinton said.

Baton Rouge Police Chief Carl Dabadie Jr. said that Sterling was armed - Dabadie didn't specify the type of weapon - but that there are still questions about what happened.

"Like you, there is a lot that we do not understand. And at this point, like you, I am demanding answers," Dabadie said, calling the shooting a "horrible tragedy."

Sterling was confronted by police after an anonymous caller reported being threatened by someone with gun outside the store, authorities said.

In the cellphone video taken by a community activist and posted online, one of the officers tackled Sterling, and the two officers pinned him to the pavement.

Someone yelled, "He's got a gun! Gun!" and one officer pulled his weapon from his holster. After some shouting, what sounded like a gunshot could be heard. The camera pulled away before more shots were heard.

The officers, identified by the chief as Blane Salamoni, a four-year member of the department, and Howie 

Lake II, who has been on the force for three years, were placed on administrative leave, standard department procedure.

Lake was involved in another police shooting in December 2014. He told detectives investigating that shooting that he fired six or seven times when a suspect refused to drop his gun, threatened to kill himself and pointed his revolver at officers. The man was wounded by police.

In the shooting Tuesday, authorities would not say whether one or both officers fired their weapons or how many times.

The store owner, Abdullah Muflahi, released a video that he said he shot from a slightly different angle. He said Sterling was not holding a gun during the shooting but that he saw officers remove one from his pocket afterward. His video shows an officer reaching into Sterling's pocket to grab an object.

Muflahi said an officer fired four to six shots into Sterling's chest.

Hundreds protested Tuesday night, and demonstrators gathered again Wednesday. A vigil Wednesday 

evening drew hundreds of mourners singing, praying and calling for justice.

uinyetta McMillon, the mother of Sterling's teenage son, trembled as she read a statement outside City Hall, where a few dozen protesters and community leaders had assembled. Her son, Cameron, 15, broke down in tears and was led away sobbing as his mother spoke.

She described Sterling as "a man who simply tried to earn a living to take care of his children.

"The individuals involved in his murder took away a man with children who depended upon their daddy on a daily basis," she said.

A cousin of Sterling's, Sharida Sterling, said he had been selling music there for about six years, often lugging his box of CDs, table and folding chair on two buses to get to the store.

Sharida Sterling said that the store management never had any problems with him but that he was often harassed by police - she suspected because he was black and a "big guy."

"I don't want them to get away with a slap on the wrist because it could happen to somebody else's brother," 

she said.

In announcing the Justice Department investigation, the governor was accompanied by black Democrats from Baton Rouge who praised him and others for quickly asking the federal government to get involved.

"We know there's going to be an external investigation. I think it makes all the difference in the world," said state Sen. Regina Barrow.

Baton Rouge, a city of about 229,000, is 54 percent black, according to census data, and more than 25 percent of its people live in poverty.

Police said they have dash-cam video, bodycam video and store surveillance footage of the shooting that will be turned over to the Justice Department.

But Lt. Jonny Dunnam said the bodycam footage may not be as good as investigators hoped for because the cameras became dislodged during the scuffle.

That raises serious questions, said Marjorie Esman, executive director of the Louisiana ACLU. "Right when they're needed most is when two of them malfunction in the same way," she said.

The Justice Department will look into whether the officers willfully violated Sterling's civil rights through the use of unreasonable or excessive force.

Similar investigations, which often take many months, were opened after Michael Brown's shooting in Ferguson, Missouri, and following Eric Garner's chokehold death in New York City.

Federal investigators must meet a high legal burden to bring a civil rights prosecution, establishing that an officer knowingly used unreasonable force under the circumstances and did not simply make a mistake or use poor judgment.

The man who claimed to have shot the first cellphone footage to circulate, Arthur Reed, said his company, Stop the Killing Inc., makes documentary-style videos about killings in Baton Rouge.

"We look at ourselves as being a service to the community," Reed said.