News
March 1, 2022 – 6:15 pm to 7:45 pm (ET)
Associated Press, – March 1, 2022
The Arizona Senate voted Tuesday to censure Republican Wendy Rogers, whose embrace of white nationalism and calls for violence drew bipartisan condemnation.
Rogers is in her first term in elected office but has built a national profile among the far right with inflammatory rhetoric and vociferous support for former President Donald Trump’s false claims that the 2020 election was stolen from him.
Rogers has long faced fierce opposition from Democrats and a handful of Republicans for offensive comments on social media.
Pressure mounted within the GOP this week after she said over the weekend that her political opponents should face a “newly built set of gallows.” She spoke in a video played at the America First Political Action Conference, a white nationalist gathering.
Associated Press, – March 1, 2022
President Joe Biden will vow to make Vladimir Putin “pay a price” for Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in his first State of the Union address, rallying allies abroad while also outlining his plans at home to fight inflation and the fading but still dangerous coronavirus.
Biden planned in his Tuesday night remarks to highlight the bravery of Ukrainian defenders and the resolve of a newly reinvigorated Western alliance that has worked to rearm the Ukrainian military and cripple Russia’s economy through sanctions. He was set to deliver an ominous warning that without consequences, Russian President Putin’s aggression wouldn’t be contained to Ukraine.
“Throughout our history we’ve learned this lesson – when dictators do not pay a price for their aggression, they cause more chaos,” Biden was to say, according to advance excerpts released by the White House. “They keep moving. And, the costs and threats to America and the world keep rising.”
NPR, – March 1, 2022
The United States and other members of the International Energy Agency are releasing 60 million barrels of oil from their strategic petroleum reserves after crude prices surged following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
That represents just 12 days’ worth of Russian oil exports, and by itself, the move is seen as unlikely to significantly bring down oil prices. In fact, crude prices continued to rise despite the news — the global benchmark, Brent, soared past $107 a barrel to set a seven-year high.
The global release is also smaller than a similar release coordinated by the U.S. with individual allies in November, which also did not move prices down.
U.S. Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell said on Tuesday that Republicans largely support President Joe Biden’s actions toward Russia over its invasion of Ukraine, but that lawmakers have hit a snag in efforts to agree on aid to Kyiv.
“I think there’s broad support for the president in what he’s doing now. Our biggest complaint is, what took him so long?” McConnell told a press conference after the Biden administration ratcheted up sanctions against Russia and its central bank.
“Much of this might have deterred the aggression in advance. But, yes, we’re all together behind the Ukrainian people. We’re thrilled at the changes that have occurred within NATO, and I think I’ve seen our country pretty unified. As a matter of fact, the whole world seems to be unified,” McConnell said.
Associated Press, – March 1, 2022
NPR, – March 1, 2022
Russian President Vladimir Putin invoked World War II to justify Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, saying in televised remarks last week that his offensive aimed to “denazify” the country — whose democratically elected president is Jewish, and lost relatives in the Holocaust.
“The purpose of this operation is to protect people who for eight years now have been facing humiliation and genocide perpetrated by the Kyiv regime,” he said, according to an English translation from the Russian Mission in Geneva. “To this end, we will seek to demilitarize and denazify Ukraine, as well as bring to trial those who perpetrated numerous bloody crimes against civilians, including against citizens of the Russian Federation.”
Russian officials have continued to employ that rhetoric in recent days.
Russia’s Foreign Ministry last week accused Western countries of ignoring what it called war crimes in Ukraine, saying their silence “encouraged the onset of neo-Nazism and Russophobia.” Russia’s envoy to the United Nations reiterated over the weekend that it is carrying out “a special military operation against nationalists to protect the people of Donbass, ensure denazification and demilitarisation.”
