Black leaders rally in Tallahassee against Florida’s denial of race studies course

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. — Black leaders on Wednesday ramped up their ongoing criticism of Gov. Ron DeSantis over Florida’s opposition to a new College Board Advanced Placement course in African American studies, claiming that the Republican governor is spurring a cultural battle to aid his expected presidential bid.

Civil rights activist Al Sharpton led a rally with several hundred people, including Black lawmakers and clergy, from a local church to the Capitol to protest the DeSantis administration’s objections to the course and recent moves, such as expanding a state program to transport migrants from the southern border to other states. DeSantis, meanwhile, has shown no signs of backing away from the College Board controversy and now wants to explore ways for Florida to avoid doing business with the nonprofit altogether.

“For them to write Black history and decide Black history is a national standard that we cannot allow to happen,” Sharpton told reporters Tuesday after the rally.

Tuesday’s rally was the latest chapter in a continuing saga over whether Florida will ultimately allow students to enroll in the College Board’s upcoming class on African American history.

The Florida Department of Education first raised public concerns about the course in January by rejecting a pilot version on the grounds that it “significantly lacks educational value” and violates the state’s “anti-woke” law. State officials later elaborated that the course denial was prompted by lessons that delve too far into political agendas, broaching topics such as queer studies and abolishing prisons.

Those topics, however, are not mandatory in the official framework of the African American history course that was released Feb. 1, a turn of events that led Democrats to criticize the College Board for allegedly caving to conservatives. Officials with the College Board, however, maintain that Florida, nor any other state, influenced the course that has been under development for nearly a decade and will debut in the 2024-2025 school year.

In wake of the tense back-and-forth between the organization and Florida, DeSantis this week suggested that the state could turn away from the College Board and seek a different vendor for students to take college-level courses. He hinted that the Florida House could propose legislation to tackle just that, but nothing has been filed as of Wednesday.

The Florida Department of Education, for its part, said Wednesday the College Board has yet to submit the African American Studies course to the state for its review.

“Florida students are going to have that ability (to earn college credit) — that is not going to be diminished,” DeSantis said Tuesday at an event in Jacksonville. “In fact, we’re going to continue to expand it. But it’s not clear to me that this particular operator is the one that’s going to need to be used in the future.”

Democratic lawmakers contend that the DeSantis administration picked the fight with the College Board to help the governor’s case as a potential 2024 GOP nominee.

“That’s the rub with this guy: if you dare to speak out against him, he will come after you,” state Rep. Fentrice Driskell (D-Tampa), the House Minority Leader, said at the rally Wednesday. “That is his MO, he wants us to be intimidated and afraid.”

Alongside Democrats, Black clergy and Sharpton called for voter registration efforts as a way to stand up to the DeSantis administration for allegedly whitewashing history by opposing the African American Studies course. They also criticized DeSantis’ efforts to end diversity, equity and inclusion, or DEI, programs at colleges across the state.

Sharpton called DeSantis a “baby Trump” and claimed his messaging will bring together voters in opposition, citing the 2020 election when President Biden defeated former President Donald Trump.

“After Disney one day, after Blacks the next day,” Sharpton said Wednesday. “Just like a baby — give him a pacifier and let some grown folk run the state of Florida.”

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D.C. police lieutenant delivered pre-Jan. 6 tips from Tarrio to Capitol Police, Proud Boy's lawyer says

In the weeks before Jan. 6, 2021, Proud Boys leader Enrique Tarrio shared information about his group’s planned activities with a D.C. police lieutenant, who then passed it along to top intelligence officials at the U.S. Capitol Police, Tarrio’s attorneys indicated on Wednesday.

Sabino Jauregui, Tarrio’s lawyer, said he hoped to show jurors messages between Lt. Shane Lamond and the Capitol Police intelligence unit’s director, Jack Donohue, that passed along information Tarrio had provided.

His comments, amid the seditious conspiracy trial of Tarrio and four other Proud Boys leaders, were meant to blunt the suggestion by prosecutors that Lamond, a 22-year veteran of the Metropolitan Police Department, routinely passed along sensitive investigative information to Tarrio — and rarely got anything from Tarrio in return.

The messages were the latest twist in the trial on charges that Tarrio and four other Proud Boys leaders conspired to violently prevent the transfer of power from then-President Donald Trump to Joe Biden, who won the 2020 election. Tarrio, because of his arrest, was not in Washington during the riot, but he remained in contact with other leaders, who marched on the Capitol and were present at some of the most significant breaches as the mob approached the building.

Prosecutors say the Proud Boys played a leading role in pushing the crowd toward weak points in the Capitol’s defenses and that their own “hand-selected” allies were responsible for breaching police lines — and ultimately the building itself — at multiple points.

The details of Tarrio’s relationship with Lamond had largely remained shrouded in mystery until Wednesday, when prosecutors unveiled dozens of messages between the two.

Over several months, including the crucial weeks before the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol, Lamond appeared to provide Tarrio with inside tips about investigations pertaining to the far-right group.

Lamond, who defense attorneys have lamented is unable to testify in Tarrio’s defense because of the threat of potential prosecution he faces, repeatedly sent messages on encrypted platforms to Tarrio in the weeks before Jan. 6, even tipping off Tarrio to his impending arrest for burning a Black Lives Matter flag at a pro-Trump rally in Washington in December 2020.

Prosecutors emphasized that this wasn’t a typical relationship between an investigator and an informant or cooperating source. Typically, it was Lamond who appeared to volunteer sensitive information about investigations connected to Tarrio, even when Lamond had learned that information from other agencies, like the FBI or Secret Service.

And Tarrio, in turn, shared that information with Proud Boys allies, informing the group on Jan. 4, 2021, that the warrant for his arrest “was just signed.” He would be arrested the next day when he arrived in Washington ahead of Trump’s “Stop the Steal” rally, which would later morph into a riot that led to the storming of the U.S. Capitol.

“That info stays here,” Tarrio told allies in one private chat.

The relationship between Tarrio and Lamond has been an enigma. Defense attorneys have pointed to it as proof of Tarrio’s close relationship with law enforcement and his willingness to give police departments a heads-up about Proud Boys activities.

During his own testimony to the Jan. 6 select committee, Tarrio alluded to his contacts with the police, indicating that he coordinated his group’s movements in December 2020, during a large pro-Trump rally.

“I coordinated with Metropolitan Police Department to keep my guys away — on these marches, to keep them away from counter-protesters completely,” Tarrio said. “I would say, ‘Hey, I want to march to the monument,’ and they'd tell me, ‘Hey, there's counter-protesters between where you are and the monument is.’ And I'd be like, ‘Okay, I'm not going to march 4 over there. We'll march in the opposite direction.’”

But he didn’t specifically identify Lamond. In their own Jan. 6 committee interviews, Donohue and his deputy, Julie Farnam, described coordinating with Lamond — a top intelligence official with the D.C. police — about potential threats. Neither Donohue norFarnam, referenced getting Proud Boys-related tips or any information derived from Tarrio.

Robert Glover, commander of the Metropolitan Police Department on Jan. 6, told the House select committee that the Proud Boys had had interactions with the department throughout 2020 and “always want to make it look like they're law enforcement's friends.” Robert Contee III, chief of the D.C. police, told the committee that Tarrio had been on the department leaders’ radar ahead of Jan. 6, including in a security briefing with Mayor Muriel Bowser a week before the riot.

“I forget the date that the warrant was actually signed for his arrest,” Contee told the committee, describing a Dec. 30, 2020, briefing with the mayor. “But that was kind of lingering out there, MPD world, something that we were following up on.”

The Jan. 6 select committee also indicated that Lamond forwarded other intelligence to the Capitol Police, including a tip from a “civilian” who lives near Washington who warned of stumbling upon a pro-Trump website that featured “detailed plans to storm Federal buildings, dress incognito, and commit crimes against public officials.”

Prosecutors repeatedly suggested Lamond’s contacts with Tarrio appeared to be a one-way street, with Lamond repeatedly providing sensitive nonpublic information to Tarrio, which he’d characterize as a “heads up.” For example, Lamond appeared to give Tarrio advance notice that an arrest warrant for Tarrio was imminent.

The department’s criminal division “had me ID you from a photo you posted on Parler,” Lamond indicated on Dec. 25, 2020. “They may be submitting an arrest warrant to U.S. attorney’s office.”

To emphasize that point, prosecutors elicited testimony from FBI Agent Peter Dubrowski, one of the agents handling the post-Jan. 6 investigation of Proud Boys leaders, describing how unusual it is for law enforcement officials to share investigative information with someone who may be the subject or target of a probe.

“I see no benefit [to law enforcement],” Dubrowski said on the witness stand in response to questions from Assistant U.S. Attorney Conor Mulroe.

With the jury out of the room, Tarrio’s attorney, Sabino Jauregui, indicated that many of Lamond’s private communications would also show that he made use of information Tarrio provided him to inform superiors — and even other police agencies like the Capitol Police — about the group’s plans and activities.

“We have example after example,” Jauregui said, noting that Lamond would often tell superiors that “my contact” — Tarrio — had informed him about the timing and locations of Proud Boys activities. He said Tarrio even told Lamond about when he would be arriving in D.C. to help facilitate his planned arrest. Some of Tarrio’s information was directed from Lamond to Donohue in the weeks before Jan. 6, Jauregui said.

The trial featured some of the first discussion, with jurors present, of confidential human sources that the FBI relied on to investigate the Proud Boys. Prosecutors suggested that defense counsel had confused the matter by equating those sources — members of the public who voluntarily share information with law enforcement — with undercover FBI agents.

Dubrowski said there were no undercover FBI agents monitoring the chats of the Proud Boys. However, prosecutors emphasized that there were sources within the group who grew alarmed and provided information to law enforcement.

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Harris on China balloon episode: I don’t think it impacts our relations

Vice President Kamala Harris said the recent U.S. downing of a Chinese surveillance balloon over American waters should not have an impact on diplomatic relations between the two global superpowers.

“I don’t think so, no,” she told POLITICO in an exclusive phone interview Tuesday.

Harris’ remarks come more than a week after the U.S. decided to shoot down the balloon off the South Carolina coast, and they resemble one of the clearest public efforts by the administration to prevent further geopolitical fallout from the incident. Asked to describe the Biden administration’s approach to Beijing, she said: “We seek competition, but not conflict or confrontation.”

Harris noted that she said as much to Chinese President Xi Jinping when they met briefly in November at the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation summit in Bangkok. “Everything that has happened in the last week and a half is, we believe, very consistent with our stated approach,” she said.

The intrusion into U.S. airspace caused immediate anger and outrage throughout Washington, D.C., with members of both parties criticizing the Biden administration for failing to shoot down the balloon earlier. The White House says they waited until the balloon was safely away from civilians, though it has since taken aggressive action to shoot down other objects floating above U.S. territory. At this point, the administration isn’t tying those additional objects to the Chinese government.

Harris conducted the interview roughly 24 hours before she was scheduled to depart Washington to lead the U.S. delegation at the Munich Security Conference. China’s top diplomat will be in attendance but Harris said there was nothing scheduled between her and Foreign Minister Wang Yi. Reuters reported Monday that Secretary of State Antony Blinken, who will also be attending the conference, is considering a meeting with his counterpart.

This will be Harris’ second time attending the confab of global leaders and allies on behalf of the administration and her fourth trip to Europe since Russia invaded Ukraine. Her first visit last year came just days before the war began. In her meeting with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, Harris promised full support from the United States and encouraged him to prepare for a full-scale invasion.

Nearly a year later, Harris returns aiming to push the western alliance to sustain its stance against Russia despite the impact the invasion has had on the world economy and energy security in Europe.

“There is an enduring commitment on behalf of the alliance, but it's not without sacrifice that each country is doing that,” Harris said. “And that's to be applauded, which is a nation standing in defense of certain foundational principles when the going gets tough.”

A White House official said Harris’ tentative schedule in Munich includes meetings with leaders of the United Kingdom, Germany, Finland and Sweden, and that “more engagements are possible.” Harris also is scheduled to address the conference in a speech Saturday.

The vice president said she will be reassuring both the alliance and Ukraine of the U.S. commitment as the war enters its second year. Her stop in Munich will be followed by a visit from President Joe Biden to nearby Poland.

But there are questions about whether the White House’s hands will be tied back home. Congressional Republicans have demanded that any future aid to Ukraine be accompanied by stringent new layers of oversight, if passed at all.

Harris said she believed the GOP posture was overstated if not bluster.

“One thing is rhetoric at the press conference,” she said. “But the other thing is how they've been voting and they've been voting to support the assistance that we have been as a nation giving the Ukrainian people.”

A myriad of other international issues will be occurring in the backdrop of the Munich conference. Among the thorniest for the White House is Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s planned overhaul of his country’s judicial system to shift power away from its supreme court.

The move has been criticized by members of the Israeli government, including President Isaac Herzog, who in recent televised remarks said a “powder keg is about to explode” as thousands of Netanyahu’s opponents have taken to the streets in protest.

Harris offered a measured critique of the judicial reform as well, placing it in the context of democratic backsliding.

“As the president has said, an independent judiciary is foundational for a democracy,” she said. “And I think that there is no question that we need to make sure that that is supported in terms of what we talk about [and] in terms of our values.”

In the brief phone interview, Harris also addressed domestic matters, including concerns from members of her own party over the prospect of another Biden-Harris ticket. Biden is expected to announce his decision on a reelection bid in the coming weeks, amid polls that show most Democrats have doubts about the two taking on whomever the Republican nominee will be.

“We were in Philadelphia recently and hundreds of people were shouting their support of the work that our administration has had and the success that our administration has accomplished and their desire to see it keep going,” Harris said. “So I have seen just in terms of, in real life, real people being very supportive of the work that is happening. When I look at the midterms and how people voted, that gives me further objective and empirical evidence of this point.”

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DOJ won’t charge Gaetz in sex trafficking probe, lawyer says

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. — The Justice Department is closing its long-running sex trafficking investigation into GOP Rep. Matt Gaetz and will not charge the firebrand congressman, according to a lawyer representing a witness in the case and the lawmaker’s office.

Tim Jansen, a Tallahassee-based lawyer representing a witness, said that DOJ officials called him shortly after noon and confirmed that prosecutors will not charge Gaetz. Jansen represented an ex-girlfriend of the congressman.

“They had promised to let me know,” said Jansen, a well-known defense attorney. “They are not going to going to go against Matt Gaetz. The case is closed.”

Gaetz’ congressional office on Wednesday also confirmed that the DOJ confirmed to his attorneys that authorities have completed their probe and won’t charge Gaetz with any crime.

The news was first reported by CNN. POLITICO reported in September that the DOJ's investigation was winding down and that prosecutors weren't likely to file charges against Gaetz.

Officials at the DOJ declined to comment.

Federal prosecutors and the FBI began investigating Gaetz in late 2020 during the Trump administration over potential sex trafficking crimes related to allegations he’d paid women for sex and traveled overseas on at least one occasion to parties attended by teenagers who were not yet 18.

Federal authorities also looked into whether Gaetz had obstructed justice due to a call Gaetz and the lawmaker’s girlfriend had with a witness. Exact details of that phone call are unknown.

Gaetz repeatedly denied having sex with anyone who was underage. He did not respond to a request for comment on Wednesday.

Gaetz has been a staunch ally of former President Donald Trump and frequented appeared on conservative media to defend the president. His national profile grew even more this year when he was part of a group of conservative Republicans who refused to back GOP Rep. Kevin McCarthy as speaker. In one notable moment, another Republican confronted Gaetz on the House floor and had to be held back by fellow members.

The investigation into Gaetz came in the aftermath of federal authorities charging Joel Greenberg, a Florida county tax collector who once was close friends with Gaetz. Greenberg was sentenced in December to 11 years in prison.

He had been charged initially with more than two dozen criminal counts, but in May 2021 he pled guilty to six — including sex trafficking and fraud — in exchange for his cooperation in multiple cases, including the probe in into Gaetz.

Greenberg’s sentencing was delayed multiple times as he cooperated with authorities.

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FAA chief: Air travel is safe, despite spate of near-misses

Acting Federal Aviation Administration leader Billy Nolen defended his agency's handling of a recent spate of near-collisions and insisted on Wednesday that the aviation system is safe.

Nolen's comments came under questioning from members of the Senate Commerce Committee, including after Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) shared a disturbing flight simulator recreation of a recent near miss at Austin-Bergstrom International Airport, where a FedEx cargo plane came within 100 feet of landing on top of a Southwest Airlines flight that was taking off on Feb. 4th.

“The system works as designed,” Nolen said after listening to the audio of air traffic controllers simultaneously clearing the FedEx plane for landing and the Southwest plane for takeoff — a potential disaster that the pilots averted at the last minute. Nolen added that the incident is under investigation and said that the near-miss should not have happened.

Nolen, who added that air traffic control's visibility of the runway and incoming flight in Austin was minimal, pledged to investigate the incident and other near-catastrophes that have drawn national attention, including a close call at John F. Kennedy International Airport in January and a United Airlines flight in Hawaii that took a steep dive to within 800 feet of the Pacific Ocean shortly after takeoff. That's in addition to a massive failure by an FAA computer system on Jan. 11 that led to the first nationwide airspace shutdown since Sept. 11, 2001.

“Can I say to the American public that we are safe? The answer is that we are," Nolen said. "If the question is can we be better? The answer is absolutely. And that’s the piece we’re working on.”

But Nolen was short on specifics about what could be done to prevent another near-miss in the near-term, or how to head off another nationwide computer failure before fiscal year 2025, when a yearslong modernization of the computer system that failed is scheduled to be completed.

After the hearing, Senate Commerce Chair Maria Cantwell (D-Wash.) did not seem satisfied with Nolen's testimony on the agency's computer system failure and said the FAA needs "to give us a few more answers."

"We think that we need more redundancy given that this is such a vital part of our air transportation system," Cantwell said. "If they can't give us more redundancy, tell us a faster timeline for updating the system."

On the eve of the hearing, Nolen issued a safety call to action and pledged to hold a nationwide safety summit in March to address the issue, with government and industry representatives sitting down to review systems and processes for improvement.

“The initial focus will be to hold a safety summit to examine what additional actions the aviation community needs to take to maintain our safety record,” Nolen said.

Nolen added after the hearing that the summit was called based on the recent close calls.

"Based on a couple events, I think it's a good time to stop and say 'Is there anything we're missing and is there anything we can do differently to maintain this high level of safety that we enjoy.'"

Republicans at the hearing also took aim at the fact that the FAA's top job remains unfilled — and that President Joe Biden's preferred pick to do the job has been in limbo for months over concerns about his background.

Republicans have for months criticized nominee Phil Washington, who has served as CEO of Denver International Airport since 2021; before that he had a long background in transit. He is also an Army veteran.

“The current nominee that is pending lacks that aviation experience,” Cruz said.

Cantwell pressed Nolen on the Jan. 11 notification system failure that led to flights across the country being grounded for 90 minutes. Cantwell asked Nolen if there is a backup system in place to prevent flight disruptions.

Nolen answered that a new system is in place for 80 percent of users, but the old notification system remains in place primarily to accommodate the Defense Department, users in Alaska and international users. When Cantwell asked if there’s a “true redundancy,” Nolen replied, “We will continue on this journey of modernization.”

Cantwell said it’s clear that the system isn’t truly redundant if the FAA’s explanation of the issue — an unintentional deletion of files while trying to synchronize the old and new systems — led to a shutdown.

“The architecture of the system isn’t a true redundancy, if the deletion impacted both systems you don’t have redundancy,” Cantwell said. “The backup didn’t work either because it was affected by the same deletion.”

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National Archives offers personal tours to anti-abortion activists who sued

The National Archives has struck a deal with a pair of anti-abortion activists who are suing the federal agency after security guards allegedly forced them to cover up T-shirts and pins with abortion-related messages on them during a visit to the Archives last month.

Under the agreement filed in federal court on Tuesday afternoon, the National Archives and Records Administration has promised to abide by a preexisting policy allowing visitors to wear T-shirts, hats and buttons “that display protest language” and to reiterate the policy to all Archives personnel who interact with the public.

The Archives has also agreed to give a “personal apology” and “personal tour” to Virginia resident Wendilee Lassiter and a 17-year-old Michigan high school student whose name has been withheld from public court papers related to the suit they and others filed last week in U.S. District Court in Washington, D.C.

The Archives issued a statement last week apologizing for the incident.

“Early indications are that our security officers quickly corrected their actions,” the statement said, acknowledging the irony of the activists being told to cover up their protest garb while touring documents proclaiming free speech and freedom of religion.

Another group of young attendees at the annual March for Life filed a similar lawsuit last week against the Smithsonian Institution, alleging that during a visit to the National Air and Space Museum on the same day, they were harassed and told to take off matching ski hats reading “Rosary PRO-LIFE.”

The interim deal filed with the court on Tuesday in the Archives case will not resolve that lawsuit, but offers the plaintiffs a preliminary injunction similar to the one they planned to seek from the court, court papers say. The agreement needs approval from the judge assigned to the case, Timothy Kelly, an appointee of former President Donald Trump. According to a footnote, the deal is not intended to affect the Archives’ ability to regulate “clothing containing profanity.”

No similar agreement has been filed in the suit stemming from the events at the National Air and Space Museum, but the Smithsonian has apologized for its guards’ actions and promised retraining.

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U.S. detains 4 suspects in slain Haitian president probe

Miami — U.S. authorities have arrested four more people in the slaying of Haitian President Jovenel Moïse, including the owner of a Miami-area security company that hired ex-Colombian soldiers for the mission, prosecutors announced Tuesday.

Antonio “Tony” Intriago, owner of CTU Security, is charged with conspiracy to kill or kidnap a person outside the U.S. among other charges, along with company representative Arcangel Pretel Ortiz.

Florida-based U.S. financier Walter Veintemilla is accused of funding the operation. A fourth suspect, Frederick Joseph Bergmann Jr., is accused of smuggling goods.

“It is extremely important to bring [them] to justice,” said Markenzy Lapointe, U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of Florida. “We will deliver justice in the courtroom.”

A squad of former Colombian soldiers hired by CTU are among suspects who carried out the July 2021 attack, which authorities say originally was envisioned to be a coup rather than an assassination. The motives and ultimate masterminds of the attack remain unclear.

Tama Kudman, Veintemilla’s attorney, told The Associated Press that he would plead not guilty to both charges.

Claude Joseph, who was serving as prime minister when Moïse was killed, cheered the announcement. “Justice must prevail,” he tweeted, along with a picture of a U.S. government news release on Tuesday’s announcement.

Earlier this month, the president’s widow, Martine Moïse, who was shot during the attack but survived, called for the creation of a special U.N. tribunal to investigate the assassination, saying the case has faced obstacles for 19 months.

“The killers are out there,” she said.

A total of 11 suspects are now in U.S. custody, including key players like James Solages and Joseph Vincent, two Haitian-Americans who were among the first arrested after Moïse was shot 12 times at his private home in July 2021. Other suspects include Christian Emmanuel Sanon, a pastor and failed businessman whose associates have suggested he was duped by the real masterminds who have yet to be arrested.

Authorities have said that the original plan was to detain Moïse, force him onto a plane and whisk him to an unidentified location, but that plot crumbled when suspects couldn’t find a plane or sufficient weapons, according to court documents.

Sanon, who envisioned himself as Haiti’s new leader, was supposed to seize power, but the other suspects soon favored a former Haitian Supreme Court judge to take over instead. Police say the judge remains a fugitive.

A day before the killing, Solages falsely told other suspects that it was a CIA operation and that the real mission was to kill the president. Shortly before Moïse was killed, Solages yelled that it was supposedly a DEA operation so that the president’s security detail would comply.

Also detained are former Haitian Sen. John Joël Joseph, who had fled to Jamaica, and former U.S. government informant and Haitian businessman Rodolphe Jaar, who was extradited from the Dominican Republic.

As the U.S. investigation into the July 2021 assassination of Moïse pushes forward, the probe in Haiti is nearly idle. Three judges have stepped down from the case amid fears they will be killed and a fourth one was dismissed. Meanwhile, no court hearings have been held yet for the more than 40 suspects arrested in Haiti, with many of them including 18 Colombian soldiers languishing in a severely overcrowded jail in Port-au-Prince that often lacks food and water.

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