 |  | | Washington, Fast. | | | | | | | Good Thursday morning. June is over and Congress has not passed voting legislation, the Equality Act, gun background checks, or police reform and this is the Power Up newsletter. Thanks for waking up with us. | | | The people ABOUT THAT PANDEMIC: The Delta variant, a highly infectious strain of the coronavirus, is rapidly spreading through unvaccinated areas. Caseloads and hospitalizations in rural parts of the country are on the rise, and experts are warning of a potential surge this fall — even if 75 percent of the eligible population in the U.S. is vaccinated. TLDR; The pandemic is not over. Top White House officials, including first lady Jill Biden and second gentleman Doug Emhoff, have been traveling the country to counter vaccine skepticism that has stalled vaccination rates. The White House has in recent weeks tamped down expectations that the administration will reach President Biden's goal of getting shots to at least 70 percent of adults by July 4. Last week, White House coronavirus coordinator Jeff Zients acknowledged that the U.S. has fallen behind Biden's goals and announced a new one: "ensuring that 70 percent of Americans age 27 and up receive at least one shot through the July 4 holiday weekend. Seventy percent of Americans age 30 and up have already received at least one shot, Zients said," per our Dan Diamond. Vaccination rates in the U.S. have also fallen behind other countries — some of which have relied on Russia and China to vaccinate large swaths of its population (see Mongolia). And most recently, in light of the rise of the Delta variant, the World Health Organization and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention have split on whether fully vaccinated people should continue to wear masks to prevent infection.  A medical worker tests an Israeli youth for coronavirus at a basketball court turned into a coronavirus testing center in Binyamina, Israel, Tuesday, June 29, 2021. Israel's prime minister is urging the country's youth to get vaccinated as coronavirus case numbers have crept up in recent days due to a localized outbreak of the Delta variant. (AP Photo/Ariel Schalit) | - "World Health Organization officials, concerned about the easing of precautions meant to stop the spread of the coronavirus even as the most contagious variant to date has emerged, have urged even fully vaccinated people to continue wearing masks and to keep taking other measures to prevent infection," the New York Times's Roni Caryn Rabin reports. "Asked on Monday about the new cautions expressed by the W.H.O. — the world's largest public health organization — a C.D.C. spokesman pointed to the existing guidance and gave no indication it would change."
- "The rise of new variants 'makes it even more urgent that we use all the tools at our disposal to prevent transmission,' including consistent use of both vaccination and public health and social measures, Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, the director-general of the W.H.O., said at a news briefing on Friday."
The rise in transmission of the delta variant spurred a number of countries reimposing lockdowns and other restrictions, our colleague Erin Cunningham reports: "The new curbs on travel and daily life stretched from Australia and Bangladesh to South Africa and Germany, where authorities over the weekend set new limits on travelers from "virus-variant zones" such as Portugal and Russia." Some models predict the variant will cause a surge in the U.S. come the fall: "One influential model, produced by the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation at the University of Washington, predicts a modest overall surge in cases, hospitalizations and deaths this fall. Scott Gottlieb, a former head of the Food and Drug Administration, said Sunday that a fall surge could occur even if 75 percent of the eligible population is vaccinated," our colleagues Ariana Eunjung Cha, Karla Adam, Ben Guarino, and Lenny Bernstein report. - "But experts think that most damage will occur in localized pockets where large numbers of people have declined to be vaccinated or have not gained access to the shots."
- "At a briefing by the White House Covid-19 Response Team on Tuesday, Anthony S. Fauci, the nation's top infectious-disease specialist, said 'there is a danger — a real danger — that if there is a persistence of a recalcitrance to getting vaccinated, that you could see localized surges, which is the reason why I want to emphasize what all four of us have said: All of that is totally and completely avoidable by getting vaccinated.'"
The biggest problem groups?: "Resistance is greatest among younger people. Just 38.3 percent of those ages 18 to 29 have been vaccinated, according to federal research released Monday. Across all age groups, people living in counties with high rates of poor and uninsured people and less access to computers and the Internet were less likely to be vaccinated, the research showed," per Ariana, Karla, Ben and Lenny. | | | From the courts HAPPENING TODAY: "A grand jury in Manhattan filed criminal indictments Wednesday against former president Donald Trump's company and its longtime chief financial officer, according to two people familiar with the indictments," our colleagues Shayna Jacobs, Josh Dawsey, David A. Fahrenthold, and Jonathan O'Connell report. - "The indictments against the Trump Organization and its CFO, Allen Weisselberg, will remain sealed until Thursday afternoon, leaving the specific charges against them unclear. Earlier Wednesday, people familiar with the case said the charges were related to allegations of unpaid taxes on benefits for Trump Organization executives."
- "Weisselberg is expected to surrender Thursday morning at the office of Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus R. Vance Jr. (D), two people familiar with the plan said. He is expected to be arraigned later in the day in front of a state court judge. The Trump Organization will also be arraigned, represented in court by one of its attorneys."
- "The criminal charges against the Trump Organization and Weisselberg are the first to result from the investigations by Vance and New York Attorney General Letitia James (D) and represent a dramatic turn in the long-running probes."
Where this leaves Trump: "Trump himself is not expected to be charged this week, the people said, and no others in his orbit are expected to face imminent charges. But the indictments could mark a significant escalation in his legal problems — both by exposing his company to potential fines and by raising the pressure on Weisselberg. Prosecutors hope Weisselberg will offer testimony against Trump in exchange for lessening his own risk, according to another person familiar with the case." As of this morning: Weisselberg has surrendered to face charges, according to the New York Times. | | | On the Hill HOUSE VOTES TO CREATE COMMITTEE TO INVESTIGATE JAN. 6 ATTACK: "The House voted Wednesday to form a select committee tasked with investigating the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol, with nearly all Republicans opposing the legislation — a sign of the political challenges that face Democrats as they attempt to probe why thousands of President Donald Trump's supporters swarmed the building and tried to stop the certification of the 2020 presidential election," our Post colleague Karoun Demirjian reports. - Trust issues. "The 220-to-190 nearly party-line vote stands in contrast to a vote in May, when 35 House Republicans joined Democrats to back the creation of an independent commission to examine the root causes of the attack."
- "While that group of House Republicans was willing to embrace an outside panel of experts evenly weighted between GOP and Democratic appointees, most were wary of a select committee that would be firmly in the control of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's handpicked participants."
- On the other hand, "some Democrats say they fear [House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.)] may try to appoint his most incendiary members, conservatives who are also most likely to use their committee seats to defend Trump," Politico's Nicholas Wu and Sarah Ferris report. "That group includes [Reps. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.), Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.)] and Lauren Boebert (R-Colo.), all of whom many House Democrats say would seek to effectively sabotage the panel's work."
| A must watch: |  | | | | | | Outside the Beltway FLOTUS & POTUS HEAD TO SURFSIDE: "As the search for survivors of a Florida condo collapse enters its second week, rescue crews and relatives of those still missing are scheduled to meet with President Joe Biden Thursday, in a visit many are hoping will provide some measure of comfort to a devastated community," the Associated Press's Terry Spencer reports.
- "Biden and first lady Jill Biden plan to thank first responders and search and rescue teams. They also plan to meet with the families of victims, White House press secretary Jen Psaki said... Search crews going through the ruins found the remains of six people Wednesday, bringing the number of confirmed dead to 18. The number of residents unaccounted for stands at 145."
- The latest: "Two young sisters, 10-year-old Lucia and 4-year-old Emma Guara, were among the latest victims identified by Miami-Dade police after being found in the rubble of Champlain Towers South on Wednesday evening. They are so far the youngest victims identified since the building partially collapsed suddenly a week ago," the Miami Herald's Joey Flechas, Daniel Chang, David Goodhue, Bianca Padro Ocasio and Doug Hanks report. "Six bodies in total had been pulled from the rubble on Wednesday, Miami-Dade Mayor Daniella Levine Cava said, as rescue teams worked through the seventh day of scouring the site for survivors."
| | | At the Pentagon DONALD H. RUMSFELD DEAD AT 88: "Donald H. Rumsfeld, whose roles overseeing the U.S. invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq and efforts to transform the U.S. military made him one of history's most consequential as well as controversial Pentagon leaders, died June 29 at his home in Taos, N.M," our colleague Bradley Graham writes. "He was 88." - "Encores are hardly rare in the Washington merry-go-round, but Rumsfeld had the distinction of being the only defense chief to serve two nonconsecutive terms: 1975 to 1977 under [President Gerald Ford], and 2001 to 2006 under [President George W. Bush]," the New York Times' Robert D. McFadden writes.
- "He was also the youngest, at 43, and the oldest, at 74, to hold the post — first in an era of Soviet-American nuclear perils, then in an age of subtler menace by terrorists and rogue states."
- "The pugnacious businessman, bureaucrat and former lawmaker helped drag victims out of the burning Pentagon on September 11, 2001. The al-Qaeda attacks heralded the War on Terror and years of foreign entanglements that he directed and that ultimately ended his political career when they went sour," per CNN's Stephen Collinson and Paul LeBlanc. "His Washington legacy is dominated by the Iraq War."
 Former Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld (right) and Major General Geoffrey Miller (left) walk the grounds of the Abu Ghraib Prison on May 13, 2004. (STR/AFP via Getty Images) | | | | In the media HERE'S HOW HIS LEGACY IS BEING REMEMBERED ON THE LEFT: On being the architect of the Iraq War: "The only thing tragic about the death of Rumsfeld is that it didn't occur in an Iraqi prison," the Daily Beast's Spencer Ackerman writes. "Yet that was foreordained, considering how throughout his life inside the precincts of American national security, Rumsfeld escaped the consequences of decisions he made that ensured a violent, frightening end for hundreds of thousands of people." On how history will remember Rumsfeld: "Rumsfeld was the worst secretary of defense in American history. He was worse than the closest contender, Robert McNamara, and that is not a competition to judge lightly … Rumsfeld was the chief advocate of every disaster in the years after September 11. Wherever the United States government contemplated a wrong turn, Rumsfeld was there first," the Atlantic's George Packer writes. On the world Rumsfeld helped build: "Rumsfeld didn't lack belief, or conviction," the Intelligencer's Sarah Jones writes. "He believed in an exceptional America, he believed in the might and power of our armed forces, and he believed, too, that might and power are a kind of permission. A nation should do what it pleases if it can, as long as it's right — and Rumsfeld's America was always right. What kind of world did Rumsfeld's belief help build? On the occasion of his death, this is a question worth asking." | AND THE RIGHT: |  | | | | | | The campaign HOW BIDEN WON 2020: "Married men and veteran households were probably not the demographic groups that Democrats assumed would carry the party to victory over Trump in the 2020 election," the New York Times' Nate Cohn writes. "But Biden's apparent strength among traditionally moderate or even conservative constituencies, and especially men, is emerging as one of the hallmarks of his victory, according to new data from Pew Research." Here are some key takeaways, per NPR's Danielle Kurtzleben. - Suburban voters (especially White suburban voters) swung toward Biden.
- Men (especially White men) swung toward Biden.
- Women (especially White women) swung toward Trump.
- Hispanic voters swung toward Trump.
- Non-White voters leaned heavily toward Biden.
"The data suggests that the progressive vision of winning a presidential election simply by mobilizing strong support from Democratic constituencies simply did not materialize for Biden," Cohn writes. - "While many Democrats had hoped to overwhelm Trump with a surge in turnout among young and non-White voters, the new data confirms that neither candidate claimed a decisive advantage in the highest turnout election since 1900."
- Long story short: "Many voters simply didn't like Trump and wanted to vote against him," per our colleague Philip Bump.
🔮2022 Forecast: "The data signals that Democrats' strength with Hispanic voters has eroded," Kurtzleben writes. - But it also suggests that Hispanic voters and suburban Whites, "already major focuses for both parties, will continue to be so in 2022, with Republicans trying to cement their gains among Hispanics (and regain suburban voters), while Democrats do Hispanic outreach and try to hold onto the suburbs."
| | | Viral HERSTORY: "As Pride Month draws to a close, Kataluna Enriquez has an extra-special reason to celebrate," the HuffPost's Curtis M. Wong writes. "The 27-year-old on Sunday beat out 21 other contestants for the title of Miss Nevada in Las Vegas. This fall, she'll be the first openly transgender woman to compete for the title of Miss USA." #FREEBRITNEY CONTINUES: "A judge has shot down Britney Spears' request to have her father removed from her conservatorship — at least for now," Variety's Elizabeth Wagmeister reports. - "New court documents that were filed by the Los Angeles Superior Court on Wednesday show that the judge has denied a months-old request by Spears' attorney, Samuel Ingham III, to remove her father, Jamie Spears, as her sole conservator. These documents are not in direct response to last week's hearing, where Spears gave an explosive testimony; though Spears delivered a powerful 24-minute statement, the judge cannot make any ruling based on what she said as she still has yet to file a petition to terminate her conservatorship."
- "However, it's significant that the document was signed by Judge [Brenda] Penny on June 30 — after the singer's explosive testimony where she told the judge that her conservatorship was 'abusive.'"
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