Mary C. Curtis: Lawmakers Divided on COVID Relief Bill & Trump Impeachment Trial

Featured at WCCB Rising

CHARLOTTE, NC — As former President Donald Trump’s impeachment trial plays out in the Senate, the House is working on a $1.9 trillion dollar COVID relief bill which includes $1,400 stimulus checks.

But lawmakers are divided on who should be eligible for those direct payments and whether to include an increase to the minimum wage.

WCCB Political Contributor talks about what’s at stake.

You can catch Mary C. Curtis on Sunday nights at 6:30 PM on WCCB Charlotte’s CW discussing the biggest issues in local and national politics and also giving us a look at what’s ahead for the week.

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Feb102021 TAGS: , , , ,

Mary C. Curtis: COVID Relief Bill And Increased Vaccine Rollout

Featured at WCCB Rising

CHARLOTTE, N.C. — Efforts continue on another COVID-19 stimulus for millions of struggling Americans. President Biden already meeting with both democrats and republicans this week to talk about his $1.9 trillion plan.

Senate democrats ready to move forward, saying the danger is not doing too much, it’s doing too little.

Political contributor Mary C. Curtis joins Rising to talk about the COVID-19 relief plans in Washington.

You can catch Mary C. Curtis on Sunday nights at 6:30 PM on WCCB Charlotte’s CW discussing the biggest issues in local and national politics and also giving us a look at what’s ahead for the week.

You can also check out Mary’s podcast ‘Equal Time.’

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Feb032021 TAGS: , , , , ,

POLITICAL WRAP: New Impeachment Attorneys for Fmr. Pres. Trump; COVID Stimulus Talks

Featured at WCCB Charlotte

CHARLOTTE, N.C. – Five of former President Trump’s impeachment defense attorneys are off the case, a little more than a week before the Senate Trial beg

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Jan312021 TAGS: , , ,

Black Issues Forum: Biden’s racial equity platform; Tubman on the $20

Featured at PBS

Black Issues Forum Analysts Mary C. Curtis, Addul Ali, and Steve Rao give their takes on Pres. Biden’s approach to racial inequity, and plans to put Harriet Tubman on the $20 bill.

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Jan302021 TAGS: , ,

No surprise, American Catholics are as split as the nation over Biden

Featured at Roll Call

At the memorial service on the eve of Inauguration Day for the hundreds of thousands of Americans who have died from COVID-19, it was symbolic and fitting that a prayer was offered by Cardinal Wilton Gregory. It was a reminder that the other half of the presidential ticket made history in 2020.

While Kamala Harris’ groundbreaking vice presidency has garnered most of the attention, Joseph R. Biden Jr. also is only the second Roman Catholic president of the United States, with John F. Kennedy’s ascension as the first coming 60 years ago.

Gregory’s words that night provided comfort to a mourning nation: “Our sorrow unites us to one another as a single people with compassionate hearts. May our prayer strengthen our awareness of our common humanity and our national unity at a time when harmony is a balm that seeks to comfort and strengthen us as a single people facing a common threat that is no respecter of age, race, culture, or gender.”

But his brief address that night emphasizing “common humanity” and “national unity” did not mention something Gregory himself acknowledged in an interview with Religion News Service, a subject the first African American to hold that rank in the Roman Catholic Church was well-equipped to voice: “The Catholic Church exists within society. … It is supposed to be a source of renewal, conversion. But we are Catholics who live in the American environment, and therefore we share some of the very same problems that the wider society does: racism, inequality, a lack of opportunity.”

It was a divide that I’ve felt throughout my life, as a cradle Catholic with 16 years of Catholic education under my belt. I spent my elementary years in an all-Black school taught by an order of nuns founded in Baltimore by a Black woman and a French priest in 1829 to educate Black children, and high school and college at predominantly white Catholic institutions, never far from reminders of my race and my place in the church. My experiences, good and bad, loomed as large and real as the sacraments.

Read the rest atRoll Call
Jan282021 TAGS: , ,

Mary C. Curtis: President Biden’s Executive Orders

Featured at WCCB Rising

CHARLOTTE, NC — In his first week, President Joe Biden has signed a series of executive orders on covid-19, immigration reform, climate change and racial equality.

This as the Senate pushes ahead with the impeachment trial of Former President Trump.

WCCB political contributor Mary C. Curtis discusses the measures the president has taken so far.

You can catch Mary C. Curtis on Sunday nights at 6:30 PM on WCCB Charlotte’s CW discussing the biggest issues in local and national politics and also giving us a look at what’s ahead for the week.

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Jan272021 TAGS: , , , ,

POLITICAL WRAP: President Trump 2nd Impeachment Trial; COVID Rollout Improvement Efforts

Featured at WCCB Charlotte

CHARLOTTE, N.C. – The Senate plans to begin former President Trump’s trial next month.

The article will be presented Monday, and Senators will be sworn in as jurors Tuesday.

Our political contributor Mary C. Curtis has more on this in the video above, along with the latest on efforts to improve the COVID vaccine rollout.

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Jan242021 TAGS: , , , ,

Local News Roundup: NC Delegation Reacts To Biden Inauguration; Trump Pardons Hayes; Search For Council Member Mitchell Replacement

Featured at WFAE

Friday, Jan. 22, 2021

On the next Charlotte Talks Local News Roundup …

Former President Donald Trump issued dozens of pardons on his last full day in office Tuesday. North Carolinians were included in that number, like Robin Hayes, the former chair of North Carolina’s Republican Party and former congressman from North Carolina’s 8th District, who pleaded guilty last year to lying to the FBI. Trump also pardoned Waxhaw’s Carl Andrews Boggs and Charlotte’s Patrick Lee Swisher. We’ll discuss.

Last week, we talked about the resignation of longtime City Councilman James “Smuggie” Mitchell, who left his post on council because of a conflict with his new job as a part owner of a Charlotte construction company. This week, City Council began accepting applications to replace the at-large council member. The process is scheduled to be completed Feb. 1 with the announcement of Mitchell’s replacement.

The months-long look into North Carolina Sen. Richard Burr’s insider trading allegations has been dropped by the Department of Justice. Burr has consistently denied the allegations. We’ll catch you up on what’s happened.

As the U.S. surpasses 400,000 deaths to the coronavirus, vaccines in North Carolina are ramping up. Dr. Mandy Cohen, the NC DHHS Secretary, said this week that 450,000 people have been vaccinated in North Carolina so far. What’s ahead on vaccinations in North Carolina and in Mecklenburg County (where this week we had our first pediatric death at the hands of the virus)? We’ll have an update.

Mike Collins and our roundtable of reporters delve into the week’s top news on the Charlotte Talks Local News Roundup.

Guests:
Steve Harrison, WFAE’s political reporter
Nick Ochsner, WBTV’s executive producer for investigations & chief investigative reporter
Mary C. Curtis, columnist for Rollcall.com, host of the Rollcall podcast “Equal Time” and contributor at WCCB-TV
Claire Donnelly, WFAE health reporter

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Jan222021 TAGS: , , ,

Some losers win a different prize; some are lost forever. What awaits Trump?

Featured at Roll Call

When you lose something precious, something valuable — the big prize — you don’t have to get stuck with the “loser” label forever. Life and politics are full of examples of broken hearts and smashed dreams, and also examples of those who managed to rewrite their legacies in meaningful ways that benefited themselves and society.

Donald Trump has proved that he is not the kind of person given to reflection or remorse and would seem the last character capable of earning redemption. He slinked out of the White House on Wednesday, burdened with grievances, two impeachments and “what-ifs,” beating an early retreat before Joe Biden and Kamala Harris were sworn in. But it’s not too late for him to learn something he has not so far in his 74 years.

Though he predicted four years ago that an America without his leadership would crumble, it was Trump who brought a vision of “American carnage” to life. The lasting image is of his supporters storming the U.S. Capitol, attacking democracy itself, and of a COVID-19 death toll passing 400,000, Americans mourned not by him but by Biden and Harris on inauguration eve with a solemn and soulful service the country needed.

But Trump’s Wikipedia entry doesn’t have to start with the word “disaster,” not if he looks away from his red-carpet exit to pay attention, even with his notoriously short attention span, to how others have conducted themselves when confronted with power and influence slipping through their fingers.

Read the rest atRoll Call
Jan212021 TAGS: , , , , , ,

Inauguration Day And The Days Ahead For Biden, Trump And America

Featured at WFAE

The American tradition of a peaceful transfer of power from president to another will take place after undergoing a violent test of its strength.

The nation’s capital is a fortress after the deadly events of two weeks ago by a crowd that was whipped up by the outgoing President Trump, who – true to form – is breaking with norms and snubbing the incoming President Biden.

Awaiting Biden in the Oval Office are some of the heaviest challenges to face a new president: a pandemic that has killed hundreds of thousands of Americans, economic headwinds and balancing unity with the reckoning Trump is bound to face as an ex-president.

GUESTS

Mary C. Curtis, Roll Call columnist and host of the “Equal Time” podcast (@mcurtisnc3)

Michael Kruse, POLITICO, senior staff writer (@michaelkruse)

Read the rest atWFAE
Jan202021 TAGS: , , ,
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