United States of America eSeries: 'America can function'

'America can function'

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June 25, 2021

Stephen Collinson and Caitlin Hu

'America can function'

"China lied and Americans died."

With those words, Elise Stefanik, the number three Republican in the House of Representatives, showed her party's plan to put the origins of the pandemic at the center of next year's midterm elections. Republicans are calling on Democratic Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi to hold hearings on whether the virus was naturally transmitted from animals to humans or leaked out of a lab in Wuhan in China. They want to paint Democrats as defending the ruling Chinese Communist Party by not being more active in punishing Beijing for the virus.

One Republican lawmaker at a news conference beneath the Capitol Dome on Thursday laid out an important argument that explains why the pandemic's origin is so important. "It's been over a year. Why does it matter? It matters for public health. It matters for national security. It matters because (of) how we address the next pandemic," said Rep. Mariannette Miller-Meeks of Iowa, who is a physician.

The question of whether Covid-19 escaped a Wuhan lab boiled among conservative conspiracy theorists for months, but recently leaped into the mainstream: President Joe Biden tasked US intelligence agencies with investigating the question, and there is scrutiny on whether the virus could have been manipulated for extra transmissibility. But there's also a risk that politics has already corrupted investigations.

Stefanik's comments point to the highly politicized nature of the inquiry. "House Republicans want justice for the American people, we want transparency for the American people and accountability for the American people for the more than 600,000 Americans who lost their lives," said Stefanik, a Donald Trump acolyte. By piling the blame for every aspect of the disaster on China, the GOP is clearly seeking to whitewash the ex-President's disastrous mishandling of the crisis. While Trump's team did vital work in funding vaccine development, the question of how Covid-19 started hardly explains away why he denied, downplayed and politicized the virus once it reached US shores.

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More than 700 unmarked graves were found at a former school in Canada.

The Dutch Prime Minister wants Hungary out of the European Union.

And Taiwan's foreign minister says it "needs to prepare" for military conflict with China.

Meanwhile in America, at least 99 people are missing in a condo collapse in Florida.

A federal judge blocked government debt relief payments to farmers of color.

And former New York Mayor and Trump lawyer Rudy Giuliani was suspended from practicing law in the state.

An intense search and rescue effort is underway in Florida after part of a 12-story residential building collapsed early Thursday in the town of Surfside. At least 99 people are still unaccounted for, including citizens of at least four foreign countries — Uruguay, Venezuela, Argentina and Paraguay. Above, security camera footage inside one resident's apartment shows debris falling before that side of the building collapsed.

An aerial view reveals the the devastating scale of the collapse.

'America can function'

Biden with a bipartisan group of senators outside the White House on Thursday.

Is America functional yet?

Republican Sen. Susan Collins of Maine didn't hold back about a rare bipartisan deal on infrastructure reached between her party and Biden's Democrats on Thursday. "It sends an important message to the world … that American can function, that we can get things done," Collins said.

We might not go that far, given the crisis of democracy ravaging the United States. But other than emergency bills on Covid-19, hardly anyone can remember the last time Republicans and Democrats teamed up behind a president's political priority to spend more than $1 trillion.

Biden himself appeared in front of the West Wing with the group of senators that brokered the deal. "This reminds me of the day when we used to get an awful lot done in Congress," the former senator from Delaware said.

The photo op made an important statement. Biden had insisted that he could reach across America's political chasm to get a deal — a promise that elicited scoffs from most Washington swamp dwellers. To get there, he had to take an ax to his own expansive vision for infrastructure, which included home health care and education spending. The final agreement mainly covers traditional measures, like roads and bridges, broadband and coastal defenses. Yet Biden did get there, leading by example after pleading with Americans estranged from one another after the Trump era to treat each other like neighbors rather than adversaries.

Still, this isn't all going to bring a divided nation back together — though a deal on bipartisan police reform after the murder of George Floyd still seems possible. And progressives aren't impressed; they are seeking a simultaneous $6 trillion spending bill as the condition of using their votes to push the infrastructure deal through tiny Democratic majorities. That demand could scare Republicans away and scupper the entire pact.

But for now, Biden can look voters in the eye and tell them he kept his word. Given the bitter US political climate, that's already an achievement.

'It is a sad day for media freedom in Hong Kong and around the world'

Biden on Thursday responded to the closure of the Hong Kong tabloid Apple Daily, calling it a "sad day for media freedom" around the world. "People in Hong Kong have the right to freedom of the press. Instead, Beijing is denying basic liberties and assaulting Hong Kong's autonomy and democratic institutions and processes, inconsistent with its international obligations. The United States will not waver in our support of people in Hong Kong and all those who stand up for the basic freedoms all people deserve," he said.

Thanks for reading.

On Friday, Biden meets Afghan President Ashraf Ghani at the White House. US Vice President Kamala Harris visits the US-Mexico border. EU leaders gather to talk economics at the Euro Summit in Brussels.

On Saturday, expect Pride marches around the world. The US State Department will fly the Progress Pride flag for the first time ever.

On Sunday, polls open in Paris for the second round of regional elections. EU member states are expected to lift coronavirus travel restrictions for tourists from eight countries, including the United States.