https://www.cityandstateny.com/articles/politics/campaigns-elections/new-york-city-purged-voters-2016-it-wasnt-mistake.html

In anticipation of voting in the April 19, 2016, presidential primary in New York, Kathleen Menegozzi checked her registration online. The Brooklyn resident, a registered Democrat since 2008, learned three weeks before the election that she had been struck from the rolls. Another Brooklyn Democrat, Casey James Diskin, who first joined the party in 2012, discovered five days before the primary that he was not registered at all.

In Manhattan, Michael Hubbard, a Democrat since 2015, checked his status online 17 days before planning to vote, only to find that he too was no longer registered. Meanwhile, in Queens, Benjamin Leo Gersh, who also had been a registered Democrat since 2015, checked on his voter status, and saw two weeks before the primary that he too had been purged.

Then-New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman would eventually reveal that they were among 200,000 New York City voters who had been illegally wiped off the rolls and prevented from voting in the presidential primary. But by January of 2017, when Schneiderman announced that he would intervene in a federal lawsuit against the New York City Board of Elections, along with the U.S. Department of Justice, the news fell on deaf ears.

The announcement had come just seven days after President Donald Trump’s inauguration. Although it was the first time the total number of purged voters had been disclosed, the media was consumed with a different statistic: the crowd size at Trump’s inauguration. At the same time, a snowballing narrative that Russia had hacked the U.S. election would overshadow the indisputable fact that a domestic government agency had committed election fraud.

The lack of media attention was in stark contrast to the recent barrage of headlines about a right-wing push to purge eligible voters from the rolls. Much of the media ignored New York’s proven case of election fraud, perhaps because it had been facilitated by Democrats, and not by Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach, a Republican with a national profile for championing stricter voter ID legislation.

Schneiderman’s lawsuit, which was initially launched by a coalition of three voter rights groups, never went to trial – the New York City Board of Elections didn’t even try to dispute the attorney general’s findings. “The New York City Board of Elections got caught with their hand in the cookie jar,” said Jose Perez, general counsel for one of the plaintiffs, Latino Justice PRLDEF.

In October of 2017, the city’s elections board quietly settled the lawsuit by admitting it broke federal and state election laws. It agreed to a vague list of reforms in a consent decree, including that it “overhaul its voter registration and list maintenance procedures, adequately train relevant staff, submit to regular monitoring of its voter registration and list maintenance activities, and review every registration cancelled since July, 1, 2013.”

But given the magnitude of the malfeasance, especially the extent to which board members – at every level – were accused of knowingly violating state and federal election laws, the settlement was a slap on the wrist.

The three original plaintiffs – Common Cause New York, Latino Justice PRLDEF and The Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights under the Law – praised the settlement as a triumph for New York voters, even though none of them could provide details about what exactly had changed to prevent the city Board of Elections from illegally purging voters again.

“This important victory sets forth a course correction in New York City,” The Lawyers Committee and Latino Justice said in a joint statement. “Today’s settlement represents an important victory for the future of New York City elections,” echoed Susan Lerner, the executive director of Common Cause New York.

Despite the so-called “victory,” the matter was swept under the rug. The press accepted at face value that Schneiderman had imposed an effective penalty for the crime. But a year after the lawsuit’s conclusion, there’s scant evidence the city Board of Elections has done nearly enough to clean up its act – and there’s little sign that the Democrats who control much of New York have the political will to reform how elections are run in the state.

The Empire State was a big prize in the 2016 primary’s delegate race. New York offered the country's second-highest total of Democratic delegates (291) and fourth-highest total (95) of Republican delegates. New York is not a winner-take-all state: Delegates to the nation conventions are awarded proportionally by congressional district.

The primary was also a turning point in the Democratic presidential race, and the 73 delegates up for grabs in New York City were crucial to winning the state.

As the candidates entered the New York race, Clinton was leading Sanders by 209 pledged delegates. Although The New York Times, the Daily News and Newsday had endorsed Clinton, the momentum was with Sanders, who had come off seven straight primary wins. By April 2016, Sanders had narrowed Clinton’s initial 60-point lead with voters nationally, to 10 points, and appeared to be gaining on her. However, a Sanders victory in New York had been deemed a long shot, based on Clinton’s formidable support by the local Democratic Party establishment. “If endorsements and electoral history are any guide – and usually they are – Hillary Clinton has New York in the bag,” the Observer reported in October 2015.

Americans sure know how to play for keeps.

They say that this was experiment, that doesn't mean they told the truth. The person that wrote the article stated that it "was likely too small..." however, the media at the time noticed it and tried to link Roy Moore to the activity of "Russian Bots," which was actually an American Company. So it most definitely did have some impact or the media would have never picked up on it in the first place.

Also what from that RT and Daily Caller articles are false?

I'm kind of at a loss as to why you seem to be calling this not interference when they spend a significant amount of money on just one race. It's interference when Russia alleged does it but not when Democrats do it? Would you feel the same if Republicans did it?

All in all you are just making excuses and applying double standards.

Hey it's the fact denier. The one excuses a company making fake russian bot accounts because they said it was an experiment.

You got me scurred brah.

All you have proven is that fake news and reputable sources only matter when it suits you.

You move the goalposts wherever you want them to be.

Lol. Cool story bro.

One would think you would be more concerned about contributors to a website, that you love to cite are promoting fake news.

I mean you seem to be concerned about fake news and reputable sources, except when you aren't.

https://www.nydailynews.com/news/politics/ny-pol-ocasio-cortez-pelosi-rules-package-congress-paygo-20190102-story.html

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is ready to take a stand — against her own party.

When Democrats take over the House on Thursday the New York Rep.-elect will vote against a rules package that includes a pay-as-you-go provision, requiring all new spending be offset with either budget cuts or tax increases.

The “paygo” provision would make implementing progressive programs such as Medicare for All or tuition-free college harder, experts warn. The rule requires a three-fifths supermajority vote to raise individual income taxes on the bottom 80% of Americans.

Ocasio-Cortez joined Rep.-elect Ro Khanna (D-Calif.) in voicing opposition to the proposal on Wednesday.

“Tomorrow I will also vote No on the rules package, which is trying to slip in #PAYGO,” she tweeted. PAYGO isn’t only bad economics, as @RoKhanna explains; it’s also a dark political maneuver designed to hamstring progress on healthcare+other leg.”

Presumptive House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) has voiced interest in restoring “paygo” in recent months, drawing heat from liberals.

Ocasio-Cortez supports Pelosi’s bid for speaker, but has cautioned that she’s not afraid to go against the party to stand by her ideals.

Pelosi spokesman Drew Hammill responded to criticism by saying that a vote against the House Democrats’ rules bill “is a vote to let Mick Mulvaney make across the board cuts, unilaterally reversing Democratic initiatives and funding increases.”

Mulvaney is the White House acting chief of staff and President Trump’s former budget chief.

Pelosi, in a statement about the rules bill, touted “paygo” as an improvement over the GOP “cutgo,” which “pretends tax cuts pay for themselves.”

At least 16 others Dems would have to vote against the rules package to block its passage.

While defenders argue “paygo” is a logical way to rein in spending, opponents believe the practice is nothing more than a way to handicap progressive programs.

“Do NOT vote for “PayGo” in the rules package,” former Clinton administration secretary of labor Robert Reich warned lawmakers on Wednesday. “It’s a brainless Republican idea that tax cuts or mandatory spending increases must be offset by tax increases or mandatory spending cuts. Totally disables fiscal policy,”

The rules package also includes sweeping changes that would make the text of bills public for 72 hours before a vote, requires annual ethics training for lawmakers and creates a select committee on climate change.

While the paygo provision won’t have much of an effect while Republicans control the Senate and the White House, progressives would like to see Pelosi move away from the policy as soon as possible.

“We shouldn’t hinder ourselves from the start,” Ocasio-Cortez added.

Looks like the plucky future of the Democratic party isn't afraid to vote against her party when she thinks they are wrong.

Who is this David Emery guy?

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/12/31/us/waymo-self-driving-cars-arizona-attacks.html

CHANDLER, Ariz. — The assailant slipped out of a park around noon one day in October, zeroing in on his target, which was idling at a nearby intersection — a self-driving van operated by Waymo, the driverless-car company spun out of Google.

He carried out his attack with an unidentified sharp object, swiftly slashing one of the tires. The suspect, identified as a white man in his 20s, then melted into the neighborhood on foot.

The slashing was one of nearly two dozen attacks on driverless vehicles over the past two years in Chandler, a city near Phoenix where Waymo started testing its vans in 2017. In ways large and small, the city has had an early look at public misgivings over the rise of artificial intelligence, with city officials hearing complaints about everything from safety to possible job losses.

Some people have pelted Waymo vans with rocks, according to police reports. Others have repeatedly tried to run the vehicles off the road. One woman screamed at one of the vans, telling it to get out of her suburban neighborhood. A man pulled up alongside a Waymo vehicle and threatened the employee riding inside with a piece of PVC pipe.

In one of the more harrowing episodes, a man waved a .22-caliber revolver at a Waymo vehicle and the emergency backup driver at the wheel. He told the police that he “despises” driverless cars, referring to the killing of a female pedestrian in March in nearby Tempe by a self-driving Uber car.

“There are other places they can test,” said Erik O’Polka, 37, who was issued a warning by the police in November after multiple reports that his Jeep Wrangler had tried to run Waymo vans off the road — in one case, driving head-on toward one of the self-driving vehicles until it was forced to come to an abrupt stop.

His wife, Elizabeth, 35, admitted in an interview that her husband “finds it entertaining to brake hard” in front of the self-driving vans, and that she herself “may have forced them to pull over” so she could yell at them to get out of their neighborhood. The trouble started, the couple said, when their 10-year-old son was nearly hit by one of the vehicles while he was playing in a nearby cul-de-sac.

“They said they need real-world examples, but I don’t want to be their real-world mistake,” said Mr. O’Polka, who runs his own company providing information technology to small businesses.

At least 21 such attacks have been leveled at Waymo vans in Chandler, as first reported by The Arizona Republic. Some analysts say they expect more such behavior as the nation moves into a broader discussion about the potential for driverless cars to unleash colossal changes in American society. The debate touches on fears ranging from eliminating jobs for drivers to ceding control over mobility to autonomous vehicles.

“People are lashing out justifiably," said Douglas Rushkoff, a media theorist at City University of New York and author of the book “Throwing Rocks at the Google Bus.” He likened driverless cars to robotic incarnations of scabs — workers who refuse to join strikes or who take the place of those on strike.

“There’s a growing sense that the giant corporations honing driverless technologies do not have our best interests at heart,” Mr. Rushkoff said. “Just think about the humans inside these vehicles, who are essentially training the artificial intelligence that will replace them.”

The emergency drivers in the Waymo vans that were attacked in various cases told the Chandler police that the company preferred not to pursue prosecution of the assailants.

In some of their reports, police officers also said Waymo was often unwilling to provide video of the attacks. In one case, a Waymo employee told the police they would need a warrant to obtain video recorded by the company’s vehicles.

Officer William Johnson of the Chandler Police Department described in a June report how the driver of a Chrysler PT Cruiser wove between lanes of traffic while taunting a Waymo van.

A manager at Waymo showed video images of the incident to Officer Johnson but did not allow the police to keep them for a more thorough investigation. According to Officer Johnson’s report, the manager said that the company did not want to pursue the matter, emphasizing that Waymo was worried about disruptions of its testing in Chandler.

The battle between man and machine has begun.