Scoop: House Dems briefing Biden team on tech antitrust report
06 October 2020
House Judiciary Democrats will brief Joe Biden's team today on their findings from a year-long tech antitrust investigation, a source familiar with the matter confirmed to Axios.
Why it matters: Democrats and Republicans both agree that big tech giants need to be reeled in, but often disagree on the means to do so. Looping the Biden team in signals House Democrats want the policy recommendations in their report to get plenty of attention in a potential Biden administration.
Context: The House Judiciary Committee's antitrust report is expected to come out this week, but has been beset by partisan disagreements and complicated by information the committee received from Facebook late last week.
- One Hill source told Axios the process is still bipartisan. Still, one GOP source characterized the rollout, with its eleventh-hour snags, as a disaster for Democrats.
- Republicans have said they agree with many conclusions the majority has drawn about the conduct and size of big tech companies like Google, Apple, Amazon and Facebook, but take issue with some of the remedies Democrats are suggesting.
- Republicans are also hoping to see in the committee's report something about tech being biased against conservatives — a long-shot request, as Democrats dispute the premise.
The bottom line: House Judiciary Democrats are forging ahead with their report, but it is yet to be seen how the last-minute partisan jockeying will affect the finished product.
Transcripts show George Floyd told police "I can't breathe" over 20 times
Section2Newly released transcripts of bodycam footage from the Minneapolis Police Department show that George Floyd told officers he could not breathe more than 20 times in the moments leading up to his death.
Why it matters: Floyd's killing sparked a national wave of Black Lives Matter protests and an ongoing reckoning over systemic racism in the United States. The transcripts "offer one the most thorough and dramatic accounts" before Floyd's death, The New York Times writes.
The state of play: The transcripts were released as former officer Thomas Lane seeks to have the charges that he aided in Floyd's death thrown out in court, per the Times. He is one of four officers who have been charged.
- The filings also include a 60-page transcript of an interview with Lane. He said he "felt maybe that something was going on" when asked if he believed that Floyd was having a medical emergency at the time.
What the transcripts say:
- Floyd told the officers he was claustrophobic as they tried to get him into the squad car.
- The transcripts also show Floyd saying, "Momma, I love you. Tell my kids I love them. I'm dead."
- Former officer Derek Chauvin, who had his knee on Floyd's neck for over eight minutes, told Floyd, "Then stop talking, stop yelling, it takes a heck of a lot of oxygen to talk."
Read the transcripts via DocumentCloud.