Janell Byrd-Chichester

Former Director, Thurgood Marshall Institute at the NAACP Legal Defense Fund; former Chief of Staff at the Federal Housing Finance Agency.

[Headquarters @HQNewsNow]

Trump response to school shooting: “We have to get over it”

JD Vance response to school shooting: “This is a fact of life”

[Janell Byrd-Chichester @JByrd_DC]

@InsideWithPsaki @ahornbrook @jrpsaki @MSNBC @IamMinyon beautiful job you did on @InsideWithPsaki explaining the story behind the upcoming @DemConvention !!! Excellent!👏👏👏

[Janell Byrd-Chichester @JByrd_DC]

Today, VP Harris and Gov. Walz got the endorsement of the United Auto Workers! Harris gave a great speech on the importance of Unions! @TheLastWord played it in its entirety!

[Headquarters @HQNewsNow]

Vice President Harris: When you know what you stand for, you know what to fight for. We stand for the people. We stand for the dignity of work. We stand for justice. We stand for equality. And we will fight for all of it

[Leslie Proll @LeslieProll]

Thank you Madam @VP for continuing to call on Congress to pass voting rights legislation AND for selecting VP candidate who signed MN Voting Rights Act & bill restoring voting rights to ppl w/felony convictions. This is a pro-voting ticket that will save democracy. #FreedomToVote

[Nick Knudsen 🇺🇸 @NickKnudsenUS]

The Harris-Walz campaign just dropped their first Tim Walz video, introducing him to America.

Please watch and share widely!!

[America Matters Media @usamattersmedia]

BREAKING: This montage of a few of Tim Walz’ best moments is going viral to show off who Tim Walz is and what he is about. Retweet so all Americans see Tim’s best hits.

[Leslie Proll @LeslieProll]

Today is 59th Anniversary of Voting Rights Act.

#KamalaHarris VP pick has strong record supporting voting rights. In May, Tim Walz signed MN Voting Rights Act--state version of John Lewis bill--into law. In 2023, he restored voting rights to ppl w/felony convictions.

Let's go!

[Janell Byrd-Chichester @JByrd_DC]

@LeslieProll Add Rucho v. Common Cause (2019) to that list, holding there is nothing the Court can do about extreme and widespread partisan gerrymandering, which is a direct threat to democracy and fundamentally undermines the principle of one person, one vote.

[Bill Scher @billscher]

Just stupefying that Democrats are losing

[Chris D. Jackson @ChrisDJackson]

Flashback: https://t.co/bvYIn59D8n

[Janell Byrd-Chichester @JByrd_DC]

@djrothkopf @jahimes @jahimes I disagree with your MSNBC statement that support for Biden derives from loyalty. Rather, it is driven by a belief that he has been and will continue to be a very effective president, and there is no plan to identify a new unity candidate that is not extremely high-risk.

[Janell Byrd-Chichester @JByrd_DC]

https://t.co/GgW6tZlfeb

[Stacey Abrams @staceyabrams]

It’s time to stop the Joe Biden doom loop.

President @JoeBiden has the integrity, moral character and record needed to beat Donald Trump in November.

Read my piece for @ajc: https://t.co/4SovkS06Um

[Jackie Singh @HackingButLegal]

#Project2025 #HeritageFoundation

[Stephanie Jones @StephanieJ_DC]

Looking forward to the political press spending the next two weeks bombarding us with 24/7 non-stop coverage of Biden's masterful performance at his hour-long press conference.

While hectoring Trump to hold a comparable press conference and demanding he step down if he doesn't.

[Senator Adam Schiff @SenAdamSchiff]

Today’s Supreme Court decision on Donald Trump’s immunity claim is far worse than anything I imagined...

Effectively giving a president immunity for any crimes committed while in office as long as that president can plausibly claim the action was taken in some form of official capacity.

It must now be presumed that the president, as king, is immune from accountability.

The rule of law applies to everyone except the most powerful person on Earth.

It would be difficult to overstate how much this opinion shifts the balance of power away from Congress and towards the presidency, and how unshackled a corrupt president will now be. The Court gives the president absolute power, and it will corrupt him, absolutely.

As Justice Sotomayor says so powerfully, this new immunity ‘now lies about like a loaded weapon’ for any President that wishes to place his own interests, his own political survival, or his own financial gain, above the interests of the Nation.’

The Court holds that when a president acts within his ‘core’ authority, he is fully immune.

And when he acts outside his core authority, but in an official capacity, the presumption of immunity is so strong as to be nearly absolute.

Even if he acts in a purely personal capacity, and the Court majority gives no indication of when that would be, his statements while acting officially may not be used as evidence, and his motives may not be questioned.

Having taken up a case they never should have, having waited until the last day to issue the opinion, having known it was the defendant’s strategy to deny justice by delaying it, the Court now remands the case for further proceedings of indeterminate length, ensuring there will be no accountability for Trump’s insurrectionist crimes before the election.

During his abortive coup attempt, Trump told his acting attorney general and other top Justice Department officials to ‘just say that the election was corrupt and leave the rest to me and the Republican congressmen.’

Now the Supreme Court says he is immune from ordering his Justice Department to lie, and the evidence of his malice, his very words, may not be used as evidence against him.

Under this ruling, a president can order the assassination or jailing of their political rival, and be immune. They can take a bribe in exchange for an official act, and still be immune. They can organize a military coup to hold onto power, and still be immune. If that sounds mad, that’s because it is.

This is a day that will live in legal infamy.

When justices on the Court that bears Roberts’ name, paid back their appointment by a corrupt president with an opinion that provides immunity to all corrupt presidents, and weakened our democracy and the rule of law for the ages.

Our only remedy is the ballot box, a new congress, and a new Court — that has more reverence for the Constitution than the lust for power.

[Leslie Proll @LeslieProll]

When we opposed John Roberts' nomination to SCOTUS, it was his record on democracy we were most concerned about. Almost two decades in, he has now authored the two most democracy-destroying decisions of the modern era.

2013: Shelby County v. Holder
2024: Trump v. United States

[Janell Byrd-Chichester @JByrd_DC]

We need immediate widespread public protests of today's Supreme Court presidential immunity decision.
The future of the nation is at stake.

[Janell Byrd-Chichester @JByrd_DC]

@DrPhil Shameful.

[Janai Nelson @JNelsonLDF]

We could unpack this one for days.