06 November 22
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A top Ukrainian official shared with The Daily Beast an underground plan to take back key territory stolen by Vladimir Putin eight years ago.
Tamila Tasheva, the official responsible for the plan to take back Crimea and kick Russia out, told The Daily Beast she is looking to the battlefield and an underground network of informants in Crimea to help.
Tasheva has long believed the “main mechanism” for kicking Russia out will depend on political factors and diplomacy with allies. But as the invasion has raged into its ninth month and Ukraine has begun to gain momentum in counteroffensives, the military component of the Crimea takeover is upon the Ukrainian government.
The “main mechanism of deoccupation” is the “political and diplomatic way,” Tasheva told The Daily Beast in an exclusive interview this week. “But of course we also in this strategy of deoccupation, we also [talk] about another mechanism of deoccupation including, of course, military components of deoccupation.”
Ukraine’s intelligence services have told her they believe Ukraine will be able to seize Crimea by the spring or summer of 2023, Tasheva said. But she thinks it might happen sooner.
“General Budanov also mentioned that we could deoccupy the territory of Crimea at the end of spring 2023 and maybe in summer,” Tasheva said, referring to Kyrylo Budanov, Ukraine’s top military intelligence official. “It’s really my belief that we return Crimea back to Ukraine in a shorter period of time.”
The Zelensky administration’s optimism about liberating Crimea underlines the dramatic shift in momentum in the war over recent months. Global leaders who fretted that Kyiv would fall to Russia in a matter of days after Russia’s invasion are now watching Ukrainians make stunning gains on the battlefield. The strategy has now shifted from talk of clawing back territory Russia has taken this year to taking back territory Russia took in 2014, including Crimea.
“We understand that the situation dramatically changed after the full scale invasion,” Tasheva said, noting that victory for Ukraine lies in pushing Russia out with its 2022 and 2014 gains in mind. “We have had a war in Ukraine for more than eight years, and it has not started on Feb. 24 this year, but eight years ago with the occupation of Crimea.”
The timeline for Ukraine to try to retake Crimea is unclear, Tasheva pointed out. But with the Ukrainian military forcing Russia to retreat from multiple pockets of Ukraine, the prospect is closer than ever before.
“I don’t know at this moment and maybe… nobody… [has] really concrete data when we deoccupy Crimea,” Tasheva said. “But it’s a shorter period than we expected one year ago.”
The retaking of Crimea by Ukraine would be a major blow to Moscow. For Putin, losing Crimea would be personal, and could threaten his political legitimacy in Russia, especially considering his popularity ratings surged when he seized Crimea in 2014, according to Angela Stent, a former national intelligence officer for Russia and Eurasia at the National Intelligence Council.
“This is one of his claims to legitimacy,” Stent told The Daily Beast. “One of the major claims is that he restored Crimea to its rightful place. If Crimea were now to be taken by the Ukrainians, then that would be a huge blow to his own legitimacy.”
“The concern would be what the next kind of escalation might be from Russia,” Stent said.
Already, following numerous attacks on Russian military entities in Crimea, Russia has intensified assaults on Ukrainian infrastructure, knocking out Kyiv’s water and power supplies. These attacks show Putin is likely raging about incursions into Crimea, according to Stent.
“Putin senses—and the people around him—the reality that their army really is doing very badly… therefore, you have this intensification of the strikes on infrastructure,” Stent said.
If Ukraine tries to kick Russia out of Crimea, it could run the risk of giving Putin a way to galvanize support domestically for the war, warned John Herbst, the former U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine.
“A little bit of caution is in order,” Herbst told The Daily Beast. “A serious Ukrainian offensive in Crimea might enable Putin to rally support at home for his misbegotten war.”
Tasheva’s confidence about planning a Crimea takeover comes as signs emerge that Russia could be preparing to retreat from Kherson, which would be a necessary precursor to going after Crimea, she said.
Russian forces seized Kherson in the early days of the war. It sits just north of Crimea and represents a key component of Putin’s dreams to create a “land bridge” from Russia to Crimea, which has been crucial to supplying troops and pushing northwards into Ukraine.
And although Russian forces were able to take Kherson—in part by using Crimea as a launchpad—it’s now Moscow’s only major stronghold on the western side of the Dnieper River.
Tasheva acknowledged that booting Russia from Kherson should come before going after Crimea.
“We understand it’s really connected—deoccupation of Crimea—connected to the situation in the battlefield, in the southern part of Ukraine, especially deoccupation of Kherson,” Tasheva said.
Some of Russia’s foothold is starting to crumble, according to U.S. officials and reports from the ground. A Russian-installed administrator for the region said Thursday that Russia may abandon the region soon.
“Most likely, our troops will leave for the left-bank part of the Kherson region,” Kirill Stremousov, the Russian-installed deputy chief for the region, told Solovyov-Live.
Videos have emerged from Ukraine showing Russian flags had been taken down from the regional administration building in Kherson, according to Russian war correspondent Sasha Kots.
For Ben Hodges, the former commander of the U.S. Army in Europe, Russia’s fate is all but sealed, given Russia’s poor logistics and Ukraine’s methodical approach.
“As long as we continue to provide them with what they need, to me this is irreversible. The Russians cannot stop it,” Hodges said. “The only thing that they’re able to do right now is murder innocent people.”
But although there’s promise in Kherson, roadblocks remain. Rains in recent days have made the approach muddy and slow for Ukrainians, The Washington Post reported. Ukraine’s military said last week that Russia had moved up to 1,000 troops into the region.
Despite reports of a potential Russian retreat, Ukrainian progress on the battlefield has been slight, The White House said Friday.
“The lines… have been pretty well static over the last few days, not much movement,” White House National Security Council Coordinator John Kirby said on a call in response to a question from The Daily Beast. “We continue to see that the Ukrainians are making some incremental progress in the south.”
The White House declined to comment on Ukraine’s prospects of taking back Crimea.
And although the timing is up in the air on when Kyiv will make the move, one thing is clear: Kyiv’s plan includes cutting the peninsula off completely from Russia once Zelensky’s forces kick Russia out, according to Ukrainian military intelligence. Budanov indicated in an interview that a key bridge that connects Crimea to Russia, the Kerch bridge, will be taken out once Crimea is deoccupied.
“The Crimean bridge is the symbol that will be destroyed. When Crimea returns, this bridge will cease to exist,” Budanov said.
Concerns remain that Russia might interpret an attempt to retake Crimea as an invasion of Russian territory, particularly as Moscow has been hinting it might use nuclear weapons if its territory is threatened.
Tasheva doesn’t buy it.
Russia is “nuclear blackmailing,” Tasheva said, adding that she thinks kicking Russia out of territory it illegally annexed is not cause for escalation.
European leaders in particular have expressed concerns to Tasheva about Russia escalating over Crimea attacks. But for those who are worried, Tasheva stressed it’s not just about taking back territory from Russia. It’s about saving civilians, Crimean Tatars, and Ukrainians from Russia’s brutality.
“To deoccupy Crimea, it’s not an escalation. It’s our way for a liberation,” Tasheva told The Daily Beast. “When I speak with some of my friends or colleagues in European Union, for example, and when they asked me about escalation and about nuclear blackmailing and what we must do with it, and maybe Ukraine must do some compromises… we always say no. No compromise.”
“Because it’s not only about territory, because Russians during the years of occupation persecute people,” she added.
Tasheva and her team have their work cut out for them. In preparation for liberating Crimea and then reintegration, they have begun working with an “underground” network of human rights activists, non-governmental organizations, and dedicated civilians in Crimea who can help when the time comes, Tasheva said.
“We really work with people underground—with activists, with lawyers… with ordinary Crimeans—who now live in Crimea,” Tasheva said.
The work of sharing information outside of Crimea has been difficult since 2014. But it has grown incredibly sensitive and dangerous in recent months, according to those working with locals to share information with advocacy organizations about human rights abuses, political prisoners, Russian detention centers, and torture.
“The situation has obviously become extremely difficult since February in terms of access to the peninsula, as far as reaching out to and speaking with activists and others who are in Crimea,” Dave Elseroad, the Head of Advocacy for Human Rights House Foundation, which works to advance freedom of expression, assembly, and association in Crimea and across Eastern Europe, the Western Balkans, and the Caucasus, told The Daily Beast. “It’s certainly risky for them.”
It’s a gamble for those who choose to share information about the Russian occupation, so most of it must be done secretly so it’s obscured from Moscow, since Russia has systematically quashed freedom of expression and assembly in Crimea, and particularly discriminates against the Crimean Tatar community, according to Elseroad.
Four organizations that the Human Rights House Foundation works with “have informal networks” and “are still operating across the peninsula,” Elseroad said.
The list of tasks and horrors that Ukraine has to confront in Crimea is seemingly endless. There have been reports of enforced disappearances, torture, extrajudicial punishment, and forced conscription with Russia. There are also reports of Russian authorities placing Crimean dissidents in psychiatric institutions.
Crimean Tatars, a group Ukraine recognized last year as an indigenous people, have been one of the most vocal groups opposed to Russia’s occupation. Russia’s crackdown against them has been relentless, activists say.
And as Russia’s occupation continues, the list of human rights abuses is only growing.
“We’re seeing a significant increase in number of individuals who are being disappeared,” Elseroad told The Daily Beast. “The situation got progressively worse over the years… since 2022, it’s gone from bad to worse.”
As the fog of war grips Ukrainian forces, for Crimeans, kicking Russia out is existential.
“We fight for our people… it’s not only territory,” Tasheva said. “It’s also about values, values of freedom, values of human rights.”
Daylight Saving Time. (photo: Getty Images/The Atlantic)
It’s the most wonderful day of the year!
I may be a standard-time stan, but I’m no monster. I feel for the die-hard fans of DST. With the push of a button, or the turn of a dial, most Americans will be cleaving an hour of brightness out of their afternoons, at a time of year when days are already fast-dimming. Leaving work to a dusky sky is a bummer; a pre-dinner stroll cut short by darkness can really be the pits.
But if we all put aside our differences for just a moment, we can celebrate the fact that this weekend, nearly all Americans—regardless of where they sit on the DST love-hate spectrum—will be blessed with a 25-hour day, and that freaking rocks. If we must live in a dumb world where the dumb clocks shift twice a dumb year, let’s at least come together on the objective greatness of falling back.
I don’t want to minimize the nuisance of the time shift. Toggling back and forth twice a year is an absolute pain, and many Americans cheered when the Senate unanimously passed a proposal earlier this year to move the entire U.S. to permanent daylight saving time. But Katy Milkman, a behavioral scientist at the University of Pennsylvania and the host of the podcast Choiceology—who, by the way, loathes the end of DST—told me we can all reframe the autumn clock change “as a windfall.” Sunday will contain a freebie hour to do whatever we like. Rafael Pelayo, a sleep specialist at Stanford, will be spending his at the farmers’ market; Ken Carter, a psychologist and self-described morning person at Emory University, told me he might chill with an extra cup of coffee and his cats. I’m planning to split my minutes between a nap and Paper Girls (the graphic novel, not the show).
An hour isn’t enough time to learn a new language or cure cancer, or even to watch the entire season finale of The Rings of Power. But a little wiggle room could help kick-start a new habit, such as a gym routine, Milkman said, especially if you make a plan, tell a friend, and stick to it. Above all, she said, “do something to bring you joy.”
Falling back, to me, is its own joy: It recoups a springtime loss, and resets the clocks to the time that’s always suited me best. It’s wicked hard to fall asleep when the light lingers past 8 or 9 p.m. I also struggle to get out of bed without a hefty dose of morning light, which has been scarce in the past few weeks. Going out for my prework run has meant a lot of stumbling around and using my phone as a crummy flashlight. If and, God willing, when we ditch the status quo, I maintain that permanent standard time >>>> permanent daylight saving time. (So maybe it’s not terrible that the DST-forever bill is now stalled in the House.)
And I gotta say, the science (pushes glasses up nose) largely backs me and my fellow standardians up. Several organizations, including the American Academy of Sleep Medicine, have for years wanted to do away with DST for good. “Standard time is a more natural cycle,” Pelayo told me. “In nature we fall asleep to darkness and we wake up to light.” When people spend most of their year out of sync with these rhythms, “it reduces sleep duration and quality,” says Carleara Weiss, a behavioral-sleep-medicine expert at the University at Buffalo. The onset of DST has been linked to a bump in heart attacks and strokes, and Denise Rodriguez Esquivel, a psychologist at the University of Arizona College of Medicine, told me that our bodies may never fully adjust to DST. We’re just off-kilter for eight months.
For years, some researchers have argued that perma-DST would cut down on other societal woes: crime, traffic accidents, energy costs, even deer collisions. But research on the matter has produced mixed or contested results, showing that several of those benefits are modest or perhaps even nonexistent. And although sticking with DST might boost late-afternoon commerce, people might hate the shift more than they think. In the 1970s, the U.S. did a trial run of year-round DST … and it flopped. (Most of Arizona, where Rodriguez Esquivel lives, exists in permanent standard time; she told me it’s “really nice.”)
Returning to the proper state of things won’t be without its troubles. Next week will have its missed meetings, fumbled phone calls, and general grumpiness. Although springing forward is usually tougher, “fallback blues,” Weiss told me, are absolutely a thing. The change-up may be extra hard on parents of very young kids, overnight workers, and people who don’t have a safe place to sleep. “It’s a very confusing time for our brain,” Rodriguez Esquivel told me. “Just be kind to yourself.” That’s why I’ll be having two breakfasts on Sunday: one when my body says it’s time, and one when the clock does. Carter told me it doesn’t hurt to be extra accommodating of others, too. “I try to keep quiet this time of year,” he said. “It doesn’t annoy me very much. But I’m secretly amused by people like you.”
Realistically, many of us will just end up snoozing right through the bonus hour. Which is totally fine. I’m considering that plan, too. The only losers in that scenario will, alas, be my cats. They do not follow the clock changes, legislation be damned; a 25-hour day is to them a scourge if it means that I sleep in, and breakfast arrives a full hour late. In that event, they, unlike me, will eat when the clock decrees, and not a minute sooner.
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(photo: Lokman Vural Elibol/Anadolu Agency/Getty Images)
Q & A with Kurt Braddock about how rhetorical strategies can lead to violence.
According to a new poll by the Washington Post and ABC News, about 88 percent of US adults from across the political spectrum are concerned about political violence around the midterm elections. Of the 1,005 people surveyed, 63 percent said they were very concerned about politically-motivated violence — not a surprising statistic given the rise in public antisemitic speech, a foiled plot to attack synagogues in New Jersey, and a physical attack on Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi’s husband Paul last week.
Pelosi’s alleged attacker apparently wrote hundreds of blog posts with far-right messages and memes containing conspiracy theories about Jewish people, Black people, and Democrats, the Post reported last week. Threats against New Jersey synagogues, made in the wake of celebrities Kanye West (now known as Ye) and basketball player Kyrie Irving espousing antisemitic conspiracy theories and hate speech added to a general atmosphere of fear and unease.
Though incidents of direct, specific violence are rare, the risk feels heightened. But another critical element that creates an environment of fear and paranoia is oblique, veiled threats or acceptance of violence that public figures, including former President Donald Trump, make about their adversaries.
Stochastic terror — the idea that even if people in power don’t specifically call their followers to violence, by entertaining it as a legitimate tactic or by demonizing a political enemy on a platform capable of reaching millions of people, one of those millions will be inspired to violent action — provides a framework for understanding the current moment. But it’s impossible to know who’s going to perpetrate that violent act, where and how they’ll strike, or even who or what the target could be.
To explain the concept of stochastic terror, Vox spoke to Kurt Braddock, an assistant professor at American University’s school of communication. Braddock’s research focuses on how communication techniques influence social behavior, particularly in relation to violence. His book Weaponized Words: The Strategic Role of Persuasion in Violent Radicalization and Counter-Radicalization, explores the communications methods that contribute to radicalization, as well as techniques to combat radicalization and stochastic terror. Our conversation below is edited for length and clarity.
Ellen Ioanes:
Can you define political violence?
Kurt Braddock:
Political violence is a large category — researchers define it as any violence that’s politically motivated, but doesn’t include things like large-scale war. Oftentimes, when we talk about political violence, we use it as a catch-all term, usually to mean terrorism — violence against noncombatants, for the purposes of furthering a political goal or an ideological goal. So that can be something religious, it can be something purely political, it can be something related to a conspiracy theory, but we’re typically talking about violence or the threat of violence against noncombatants to achieve some sort of ideological goal.
Ellen Ioanes:
Is stochastic terror a uniquely American phenomenon?
Kurt Braddock:
Stochastic terrorism is not uniquely American. There have been cases abroad where similar situations have occurred. In one example, Brenton Tarrant, the Christchurch attacker, seems to have been motivated (in part) by fringe media figures who espoused ideas consistent with the “Great Replacement.”
Ellen Ioanes:
Part of this phenomenon is the atmosphere of violence — the feeling that we don’t know what could happen at any given moment. What’s the theory behind stochastic terror, why is it effective, and why does it need its own designation?
Kurt Braddock:
Stochastic terrorism or stochastic terror is a unique kind of phenomenon that we’ve only really seen emerge in recent years. Stochastic is a term related to statistics that’s meant to define processes that, individually, they’re absolutely impossible to predict when and where something happens.
The example that I always give is, if you’re sitting on your front porch, and you see dark storm clouds rolling in toward your neighborhood, you can be pretty confident that lightning is going to strike at some time in the next half hour, but you can never really predict when and where that’s going to happen. Stochastic terrorism is the same kind of idea, whereby an individual who you designate a stochastic terrorist, makes statements that seem to implicitly advocate the use of violence without actually directing it. It’s the kind of rhetoric that justifies or advocates the use of violence without directing it. The speaker gets this level of plausible deniability, where if somebody does carry out an attack, then they can say, “Well, I never actually directed them to do something.”
The stochastic element relates to the use of a mass mediated channel to broadcast these kinds of messages. Terrorism is a very low base rate phenomenon — typically a person’s likelihood of engaging in terrorism is a fraction of a fraction of one percent. But when you’re reaching millions and millions of people, you start to approach complete likelihood that at least one person will interpret what that person said as a call to violence.
We’re getting people acting on behalf of some of these ideas, although they’re not directly incited per actual legal standards for incitement, they are motivated by the language. There have been several cases where individuals have cited some of the statements that have been made by people like former President Donald Trump.
It’s important to note that stochastic terrorism, this indirect incitement, is not illegal. It’s protected by the First Amendment because the legal threshold for incitement to violence is so high. There’s a case, Brandenburg v. Ohio, where the Supreme Court ruled that for something to be incitement, there needs to be direction, and the incident needs to happen immediately after the direction. And stochastic terrorism doesn’t achieve either of those. So although the language does not meet the legal threshold for incitement, it nonetheless motivates people to actually engage in violence.
Ellen Ioanes:
To what extent does disinformation also play into it, in addition to having a large platform?
Kurt Braddock:
I think most of what we call stochastic terrorism has been initiated or has been motivated by deliberately spread disinformation — that demonizes others, that tags other individuals, usually political opponents, as mortal threats. And if you look at most models for violent radicalization or radicalization to terrorism, one of the steps in those processes usually involves perceiving the intended target as being a direct mortal threat to an individual’s survival. So the kinds of disinformation that are being spun about certain targets as being these threats to the United States, to election processes, to political parties, by spinning them as mortal threats, the individual who’s exposed to the message is much more likely to perceive that person as a threat and deserving of violence against them.
Ellen Ioanes:
This is an environment that also enables threats against election workers and others, where people are picking up the phone or getting on their Twitter account and making vile, upsetting threats and disrupting people’s lives. So how does that action play into stochastic terror?
Kurt Braddock:
Definitions for mobilized terrorism, that kinetic terrorism, include not just the performance of violence — it’s also the threat of violence against certain targets for political reasons. So when an individual has political enemies, who they peg as demons and as viable targets of aggression, that’s going to cause fear in those populations. So if we look at the standard definitions for terrorism, we can consider that to be almost a form of terrorism.
Now, the part that people have a tough time reconciling, and I think rightfully so because I consider the First Amendment to be sacrosanct, is that the language is actually protected. But just because the language is protected by the First Amendment doesn’t mean that it doesn’t have negative implications and doesn’t cause actual harm to people. It’s important not to conflate something being legal, with being not harmful.
Ellen Ioanes:
This phenomenon has had, I think, a demonstrable chilling effect on our political environment.
Kurt Braddock:
I think that a lot of times, that’s the goal — that by inciting people, even indirectly, against the kinds of ideas stochastic terrorists see as being divergent from their own, they’re trying to keep people quiet, because if they speak up too much, then the individual who has the platform of millions and millions of people just needs to say some indirect word or blow some dog whistle, and then they’ll have people at their doorstep.
Ellen Ioanes:
Are there any effective interventions, or is this just how the world is now?
Kurt Braddock:
It’s how the world is, but I think we do have tools to fight back against it. Something that I’ve studied, even outside the domain of stochastic terrorism is something called attitudinal inoculation — providing individuals with information about a persuasive attempt they’re going to face. So in the event of stochastic terrorism, what I might do is go to somebody and tell them, “Listen, I know you’re not violent, I know you have no intention of becoming violent. But there are these actors out there who are going to make certain statements that will justify violence against others, and they’re trying to get you to consider maybe engaging in violence.” Then you provide the target with different counter arguments against that particular idea or that particular course of action. There’s 60 years of research on this strategy, typically in health communication and more standard political communication.
If I provide someone with an inoculation message that undermines the strategy of this implicit incitement — if I get to those people and tell them about this particular strategy before they’re exposed to it, they’re much less likely to be influenced by it. I think this goes part and parcel with just a larger emphasis on media literacy in the United States. We are so media illiterate, not just kids who are kind of engaging with online content, disinformation, and conspiracy theories with nothing to defend themselves against it. But adults too, we need to help people do a better job of parsing apart ideas that they see online and recognizing when they’re being manipulated.
Ellen Ioanes:
It’s my sense that this is much more of a right wing phenomenon than it is a left wing phenomenon. Democratic political leaders are swift to denounce violence most of the time, whereas leaders on the right do not always do that explicitly.
Kurt Braddock:
If we just look at the data at the number of attacks that have occurred, the number of people who’ve been arrested for plots, the number of individuals who have actually cited things that have been said by elected leaders, the right wing violence far outpaces left wing violence. That’s not to say that it hasn’t happened on the left. But if we look at raw numbers of how much it occurs, and even scarier, how often it seems that right wing public officials seem to be perfectly happy to use [it] as a persuasive communication strategy, it’s not even close.
I think that a lot of times these attacks are sanitized, and that allows for room for interpretation. If you look at the Pelosi attack, it took less than 12 hours for conspiracy theories to come out. If individuals look at what the attackers themselves say, which is often very indicative of their motivations, we’ll see an overlap between their reasons for the attack and the language used by some of their elected leaders and other political leaders that they admire. It’s almost verbatim. Once we see the A to B connection, I do think that the public would at least demand greater responsibility from their elected officials. And I think that’s the key — to recognize that this is being used as a political communication tool, and that we should demand federal responsibility from our elected leaders, right wing and left wing, especially right wing right now. Because what these things they’re saying — although we have every freedom to say whatever we want — these things have implications, and we need to see those implications.
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Pro-choice protesters take part in a Women's March outside the White House on 9 July 2022. (photo: Will Oliver/EPA)
An analysis of major companies’ donations, including Meta and Amazon, reveals donations to candidates calling for banning the procedure
But in the weeks and months that followed, Lilly continued to financially support Republican candidates and politicians who support bans on abortion across the country, including many who celebrated the reversal of Roe v Wade.
It was not alone.
A Guardian analysis of other major US companies’ political donations shows that those who suggested they would help female employees skirt statewide abortion bans, by offering to pay for out-of-state medical costs for those seeking abortions in states where the option was illegal, continued to financially back candidates who have called for abortion bans. They include Meta, the company that owns Facebook, Comcast, Citigroup, AT&T, and Amazon.
The analysis suggests that while some of America’s largest employers want to be seen as supporting reproductive health for their female workers and their families, the abortion issue has not affected their financial support for Republican candidates who have promised to further erode those workers’ reproductive rights.
Lilly made financial contributions to Texas state senators anti-choice Republicans Charles Schwertner and Charles Perry, and Texas state speaker Dade Phelan, who has said he does not see any need to change Texas’s current law, which forces women who have been raped to carry their pregnancies to term.
Since Roe was overturned, Lilly has also given financial donations to US senators Rand Paul, Oklahoma’s James Lankford, and Mike Crapo, among others who supported overturning abortion rights. The company did not respond to a request for comment.
Amazon, the second-largest private employer in the US, said it would cover out-of-state abortion travel for employees on its health care plan, but not contractors who make up most of its workforce.
But even as it vowed to help some of its female workers get access to abortion care, it continued to support Republican candidates like Bruce Westerman of Arkansas, who wrote in an op-ed for the Arkansas Democrat Gazette that the fight against abortion was “really just beginning”.
“We will always stand for the rights of the unborn until abortion is not only illegal in all 50 states, but unconscionable,” he wrote.
Amazon’s political action committee also gave donations to David Valadao, a California Republican who co-sponsored a “life at conception” act, which states that it would guarantee a right to life at the “moment of fertilization”, and Tony Gonzales, who has an A+ rating from anti-choice group Susan B Anthony List. Amazon did not respond to a request for comment.
AT&T, the US telecommunications company, has said it would cover the cost of travel for medical procedures within 100 miles of an employee’s home address because it values the health of its employees to make sure they can access “a full range of health care benefits when they need them”.
But the company has also supported dozens of Republican candidates since the 24 June decision to overrule Roe, including Texas’s Jodey Arrington, who has called abortion “a moral stain on the fabric of America” and supports a federal ban on abortion. It has also donated to Greg Steube, a Florida Republican who has said that, with Roe overturned “no misguided judicial decision can block states from applying murder and assault statutes to protect the unborn from abortion”. In Georgia, it supported Republican Andrew Clyde, who has said abortion should be “abolished entirely” except if the mother’s life is at risk, and Barry Loudermilk, who has tweeted the work of the pro-life community was “just beginning” after the Dobbs decision that overturned a federal right to abortion. In Maryland, AT&T supported Republican congressman Andy Harris, who said Dobbs had not created a crisis in healthcare, and Jack Bergman of Michigan who supports a federal ban on abortion.
An AT&T spokesperson said the company’s political action committee has “never based contribution decisions on a legislator’s position on abortion”.
The spokesperson added: “Our employee PACs contribute to candidates in both parties and focus on policies and regulations that are important to investing in broadband networks and hiring, developing and retaining a skilled workforce with competitive wages and benefits. It is inaccurate to assert that contributions to elected officials equate to supporting all of their policy positions.”
In the aftermath of Dobbs, Mark Zuckerberg’s Meta said it would reimburse travel expenses “to the extent permitted by law” for those who need to access out-of-state healthcare and reproductive services. But it also supported – among others – candidates like Don Bacon of Nebraska and Bob Latta of Ohio who co-sponsored a bill to ban abortions federally. A Meta spokesperson did not respond to a request for comment.
Citibank has said post-Dobbs that it would provide travel benefits to employees who need “access to adequate resources” but continued to support Republican candidates who support a national ban on abortion, like John Hoeven of North Dakota. It also donated to Jerry Moran of Kansas, who has said life begins at conception and “supports legislation protecting life at its earliest stages and in all conditions”.
Kara Findlay, head of corporate communications at Citi, declined to comment.
Comcast, the parent company of NBC Universal, has said it would support thousands of dollars of medically necessary travel expenses after Roe was overturned, but continued to make political donations to Republicans who support abortion bans, like Benjamin Cline of Virginia, who once proposed legislation that would mark the anniversary of the Roe v Wade decision as the “Day of Tears”, which would commemorate “59 million lives lost” due to abortion services being protected.
The company did not respond to a request for comment.
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Voting and churches. (photo: Juanjo Gasull/ProPublica/The Texas Tribune)
Churches in Texas invited Beto O’Rourke and Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick to speak to their congregations before the 2022 midterms, raising questions about the effectiveness of the Johnson Amendment.
The stops are part of a longstanding tradition for political candidates that often accelerates as Election Day nears.
Two Sundays ago, O’Rourke, a Democrat, and Patrick, a Republican, visited different churches where pastors praised them and allowed them to give speeches about the upcoming election. This was in violation of federal law, according to tax law experts. Known as the Johnson Amendment, the law bars tax-exempt organizations from intervening in political campaigns.
At St. Luke “Community” United Methodist Church in Dallas on the morning of Oct. 23, pastor Richie Butler introduced O’Rourke to his congregation as “the next governor of Texas.”
“He needs us to get him across the finish line,” Butler told parishioners.
O’Rourke then walked to the stage, where he gave a speech that would be familiar to those who have seen him on the campaign trail. He called for fixing the state’s electric grid and expressed alarm over the high rate of school shootings and gun violence.
“If our votes were not important, they would not be trying so hard to keep us from voting in this election, and our vote is how we overcome,” O’Rourke told the crowd.
The same morning, hundreds of miles away, pastor Steve Riggle introduced Patrick to his congregation at Grace Woodlands church north of Houston by saying the lieutenant governor is someone that “God has given us at the very top.”
“If the nation is to be saved, it’s going to take some leaders who, beyond their concern about being reelected, will stand for values that are critical to the future of this nation,” Riggle said. “Dan Patrick is one of those.”
Patrick then took the stage and cast the election in stark terms. “This is not a race between Republicans and Democrats,” he told the congregation. “This is a race about darkness and light. This is a race about power and principalities. And the devil is at full work in this country.”
He later added: ”I don’t even recognize the other party. It’s been taken over by communists and socialists.”
Tax law experts told ProPublica and The Texas Tribune that the pastors’ support of the candidates in their sermons violated the Johnson Amendment. The experts also raised concerns about what appeared to be the churches’ failure to give equal time to their opponents. O’Rourke is facing Republican Gov. Greg Abbott in the general election, and Patrick is being challenged by Democrat Mike Collier.
“Beto O’Rourke is introduced as the ‘next Governor of Texas,’ which highlights both that he is a candidate and one whom the church supports,” said Lloyd Hitoshi Mayer, a tax and election law expert at the University of Notre Dame. “And O’Rourke’s comments are a sales pitch for his candidacy. There is no indication that any opposing candidate has been given a similar opportunity, and, even if he had been, the favorable introduction of O’Rourke would still be across the line.”
St. Luke pastor Butler did not answer questions about Mayer’s assessment or whether the church had also invited Abbott to speak.
“Black churches have been important hubs for civic engagement and organization in the fight for social justice since Reconstruction,” Butler said in a statement. “The mixing of faith-based congregations and electoral engagement is not a new concept.”
O’Rourke did not respond to questions about the visit.
Sam Brunson, a law professor at Loyola University Chicago, said the language Riggle used while introducing the lieutenant governor was an “endorsement of Patrick by the pastor of a church acting in his capacity as pastor in the course of ordinary church meetings.”
Riggle said in an interview that his church did not endorse any candidate and that his introduction was focused on biblical values, not politics. He added that he believes the Johnson Amendment should be overturned.
“The government has no right, at any time, to, in any way, tell the church who it can have or who it cannot have to speak,” he said. “It can’t tell the church what it can preach on or not preach on. This is America, and we believe in a free church. Not one controlled by the government.”
Patrick did not respond to requests for comment or to emailed questions.
Last week, ProPublica and the Tribune reported about numerous apparent violations by church pastors who supported political candidates from the pulpit. A candidate endorsement is a “clear violation” under IRS rules. But the law itself is complex and can be vague, leaving gray areas that make identifying other violations more difficult. Below are answers about what it does and doesn’t do.
What is the Johnson Amendment?
In 1954, then-U.S. Sen. Lyndon Baines Johnson of Texas proposed an amendment to the U.S. tax code that prohibited nonprofits, including religious institutions, from involvement in political campaigns.
The amendment was uncontroversial at the time. It passed with bipartisan support and was signed into law by Republican President Dwight Eisenhower.
Though Johnson did not single out churches, religious organizations are subject to the law because they are nonprofit organizations. Violations can result in revocation of their tax-exempt status.
What does the Johnson Amendment prohibit?
Nonprofit organizations are barred from directly or indirectly participating in, or intervening in, “any political campaign on behalf of (or in opposition to) any candidate for elective public office.”
Contributions to political campaigns made on behalf of the tax-exempt organizations supporting or opposing a candidate also “clearly violate the prohibition against political campaign activity,” according to the IRS.
The IRS periodically produces lengthy guides that spell out the “facts and circumstances” the agency considers when determining whether political activity is allowable.
In some cases, such as pulpit endorsements, violations can be clearly identified. But violations can be harder to distinguish in other cases.
O’Rourke made another stop on Oct. 23 at The Chosen Vessel Cathedral in Fort Worth, where pastor Marvin L. Sapp introduced him to the crowd. “If y’all notice, nobody else came,” Sapp said. “But we recognize people that come to see about us.”
He then said O’Rourke would be in the lobby after the service to “meet and greet.”
“This situation is a close call,” Mayer said. He said the visit could be a violation because Sapp gave candidates a chance to meet with congregants on church property after the service.
Brunson said that if O’Rourke solicited votes or funds in the lobby it would likely be a violation.
In a statement, Sapp said he did not believe the visit was barred by the Johnson Amendment and pointed out that O’Rourke did not address parishioners during the service.
“I have been a pastor for 19 years and have never endorsed a candidate,” Sapp said. “I understand the parameters of the Johnson Amendment and do not violate them. While I believe in the inherent separation of church and state, I also believe in empowering marginalized communities, the African American community in particular, to participate in the democratic process.”
What does the Johnson Amendment allow?
Religious institutions are allowed to invite candidates to speak to their congregations.
But if one person is invited in their capacity as a candidate, everyone in the race must be given equal opportunity to address parishioners, according to IRS rules. Fundraising is also not allowed during the appearance and the church must maintain a “nonpartisan atmosphere,” the rules state.
“As long as all candidates are invited and there’s no endorsement, candidates can appear at a church and can even explain why the congregation should vote for them,” Brunson said.
While only inviting one candidate violates the law, enforcement is difficult.
“All sorts of houses of worship do this,” Ellen Aprill, an emerita tax law professor at Loyola Marymount University’s law school, said. “Think about the enormous amount of resources it would take for the IRS to enforce the ban and to do so in a way that avoids accusations of political favoritism.”
In some cases, a single politician can be invited to speak as long as they are not identified as a candidate.
On the evening of Oct. 23, Patrick attended a “Night to Honor Israel” event at Cornerstone Church in San Antonio.
Pastor John Hagee introduced Patrick. He avoided violating the prohibition on supporting a political candidate because he praised the lieutenant governor in his capacity as a current public official and did not mention his candidacy, Mayer said. The tax law expert added that Patrick also did not mention the upcoming election, voting or his candidacy.
Churches also can provide voter guides and have voter registration drives as long as they avoid showing preference for specific candidates. They can also weigh in on such issues and policies as abortion if they steer clear of targeting individual candidates. The Congressional Research Service acknowledged in 2013 that “the line between issue advocacy and campaign activity can be difficult to discern.”
Religious institutions have more flexibility in supporting or opposing ballot measures like bonds and referendums that don’t involve specific candidates.
In Michigan, Catholic churches have put up signs against a ballot measure that would enshrine the right to abortion access in the state constitution. They’ve also spoken out against the measure during sermons and sent campaign letters to parishioners urging them to oppose it.
The Detroit archdiocese told The Detroit News last month that IRS rules allow the church to participate in political activity related to the ballot proposal and that it would continue to follow the law “while remaining firm” in its advocacy efforts. Critics have accused the church of violating IRS rules.
Churches can be involved in noncandidate elections as long as such lobbying work is not “substantial,” which the tax code does not explicitly define, Mayer said.
Outside of official church functions or publications, pastors and other church leaders can endorse candidates and engage in political activity in their private capacity. A religious leader’s church affiliation can be identified in such an endorsement, as long as it’s clear that the church leader is not speaking on behalf of the institution.
How likely is the IRS to crack down on Johnson Amendment violators?
Not very.
In the 68 years since the Johnson Amendment became law, the IRS has only publicly acknowledged revoking the tax-exempt status of one church. (The Congressional Research Service said a second church lost its status, but its identity is unknown.)
In 1992, just four days before the presidential election, Branch Ministries in New York paid for ads in USA Today and the Washington Times attacking then-Arkansas Gov. Bill Clinton, a Democrat, who was challenging Republican President George H.W. Bush.
The ads started with the headline: “Christian Beware. Do not put the economy ahead of the Ten Commandments.” They claimed Clinton violated scripture by supporting “abortion on demand,” homosexuality and the distribution of condoms to teenagers in public schools. Clinton, the ads stated, was “openly promoting policies that are in rebellion to God’s laws.”
The revocation of the church’s tax-exempt status spurred a yearslong legal battle. In 2000, a U.S. appeals court ruled in favor of the IRS.
During a four-year period that started in 2004, the IRS sent dozens of churches warning letters about political activity and initiated some audits. The result of the audits is unclear.
Then, in 2013, a scandal related to nonprofits that were not churches helped further dampen the agency’s enthusiasm for politically sensitive investigations, said Philip Hackney, a University of Pittsburgh law professor and former IRS official.
Congressional Republicans accused the agency of bias against conservative groups after the Treasury Department’s inspector general found that the agency had given extra scrutiny to Tea Party nonprofits seeking tax-exempt status. Two high-ranking IRS officials stepped down.
“They got burned badly as a result of being in that space,” Hackney said, adding that the incident led IRS leaders to be particularly “careful about how they tread in those waters.”
The IRS has not released data on enforcement of church political activity over the last decade and does not publicly confirm individual investigations.
But in response to a Freedom of Information Act request from ProPublica and the Tribune last year, the agency produced a severely redacted spreadsheet indicating the agency had launched inquiries into 16 churches since 2011. IRS officials shielded the results of the probes, and they have declined to answer specific questions.
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A cemetery in Namibia where German soldiers killed in the Battle of Waterberg are buried. (photo: Gianluigi Guercia/AFP)
The 59-year-old throws it back on the ground. “I’m thinking of all the women and children who died here,” he says.
He is standing on the site of the Battle of Waterberg where, on August 11, 1904, the German colonial army decimated Herero rebels who were fighting the colonists who had imposed their rule on the country and seized much of its land. The killings were part of a German campaign of collective punishment between 1904 and 1908 that is today recognised as the 20th century’s first genocide.
But his ancestors were not mere victims, he tells Al Jazeera: “This war was the first resistance to colonialism.”
Jephta was born in the village of Ombuyovakura in Namibia but lives in the United States now. He has a beard streaked with grey and speaks softly and thoughtfully. A poet and a deeply spiritual person, he believes passionately in justice for his people but also in reconciliation with the Germans who massacred tens of thousands of Herero, Nama and San, ethnic communities indigenous to the country then known as South West Africa.
"I have great respect for my grandparents and parents for the extraordinary efforts they took to protect us children from the transgenerational trauma wrought by the Genocide,” he wrote in 2020. "[D]uring their storytelling about the 1904 war, Herero men would never mention the genocide. They would only speak about the war of resistance."
German takeover
In 1884, after the Berlin Conference, which apportioned African lands to European powers, Namibia was taken over by the Germans. By the early 1900s, nearly 5,000 German settlers had arrived and ruled over some 250,000 Indigenous Africans. As German control grew, the rights and freedoms of the African peoples were rapidly diminished. The Hereros and other groups were systematically driven off their ancestral lands and assigned to so-called "reserves".
Africans who were deemed to have broken the law were flogged and sometimes hanged, and even German official records show numerous cases of white settlers given light sentences for committing rape and murder. This ongoing brutality, combined with the land issue, created widespread anger and resentment among the local populations.
By 1904, the Herero, under their leader Samuel Maherero, rose up against the German colonial invaders and, on January 12, several of their mounted soldiers attacked the town of Okahandja. More than 120 people, most of them German, were killed.
Soon the conflict grew, with the Herero initially being highly successful, sweeping through the poorly defended colonial settlements while the Germans struggled to organise their defence under their governor, Theodor von Leutwein. In June, the Kaiser removed him from battlefield command and appointed General Lothar von Trotha in his stead. He immediately instituted a military policy, not of pacification but of extermination. Soon the Herero were overwhelmed.
As dawn broke on that morning of August 11 on the Waterberg Plateau, some 50,000 or more Herero men, women and children woke to their simple huts being pounded by shells. The men rushed to fight the Germans, leaving their families behind where they were killed by a brigade of some 6,000 Schutztruppe (the official name of Germany's troops in the African territories of its empire). Although numerically weaker, the Germans had superior weapons - including Maxim machine guns and artillery - and quickly destroyed the Herero defence.
Early in the battle, the Herero fighters nearly overran the German artillery positions but Von Trotha ordered the machine guns brought forward. Their rapid fire drove the Herero back, and thousands were slaughtered. Those who survived fled east through a gap in the German defences into the harsh, waterless Kalahari desert, known as the Omaheke, where tens of thousands died. Many perished from thirst while others were rounded up and taken to concentration camps and used as slave labour.
“My grandmother told me about our people and their flight to the East and how our people perished, about the dispossession of their land and of their cattle and all the terrible things they experienced in the concentration camps,” Jephta says, looking around thoughtfully, as he adjusts his dreadlocks over the shoulder of his grey safari-style shirt in the warming day. The wind grows softer over the bone-white, swaying winter grass that carries his words.
‘A genocidal pursuit’
More than 500km (310 miles) away from Waterberg in the coastal town of Swakopmund, Anton von Wietersheim, a softly spoken, third-generation German Namibian, sits in his neat, almost nostalgically German-looking house. In his living room, the sun shines through the wide glass window. Over a cup of tea, he shares his family memories.
“My first ancestor in then-German South West Africa was an uncle of my father who settled on a farm near Windhoek in 1901. He was among the first settlers attacked during the Herero uprising and was killed on the second day of hostilities on the 13th of January, 1904.
“The German Empire sent reinforcements immediately after the start of the war, and my maternal grandfather - then 19 years old - was among those arriving in February 1904. He fought in battles against the Herero as well as the Nama, survived the war and remained in the colony as a farmer.
“I have great understanding for the uprising, and the surviving brother of my uncle said that it was not strange that the Herero were rising up because their land was taken, and the traders were ruthless. They took cattle in an unfair way. I can understand why that made them rise up, but the war eventually turned into a genocidal pursuit.”
As the Herero were rapidly defeated by Von Trotha’s forces, they had tried to reorganise while they fled, and they hoped their last stand at Waterberg would bring victory. But the Germans had planned well. They allowed the Herero to flee into the Omaheke and then Von Trotha placed troops to prevent the Herero from escaping the desert.
Jephta grew up not knowing the full extent of the horror endured by his forebears. It was only when he heard the story of his great-grandmother and her flight through the waterless Omaheke in an attempt to reach safety that he knew his life’s calling had been revealed. “My great-grandmother was too old and tired, and she was left behind. They left her under a tree to die. She died a death without dignity, and I wanted to understand her life,” he says.
The family was forced to make an impossible choice: to sacrifice her life in order to spare their own. The pain of that choice still echoes down the generations.
The Nama
It was in the flight through the desert that the German war against the Herero became a deliberate policy of ethnic cleansing. General Von Trotha ordered his troops to set up a line of outposts hundreds of kilometres long to prevent the Herero from turning back to their abandoned farms and villages, and he ordered others to prevent them from using waterholes.
On October 3, 1904, at the remote Osombo zo Windimbe desert waterhole, General von Trotha read out his infamous Vernichtungsbefehl, or Extermination Order:
“I, the great general of the German soldiers, send this letter to the Hereros. The Hereros are German subjects no longer. . . Any Herero found inside the German frontier, with or without a gun or without cattle, will be shot. I will no longer accept women and children. I will drive them back to their people or I will let them be shot at. Such are my words to the Herero people.”
The desperate, dying Herero wandered in search of refuge and of waterholes, many of them poisoned or sealed off by the Germans. Tens of thousands of people died. Finally, political outrage in Germany at this colonial inhumanity forced the Kaiser to telegraph Von Trotha to withdraw the order on December 8.
By late 1904, the Nama people, some of whom had been loosely allied to the Germans, to protect their own lands, had seen enough of the Europeans’ brutality and feared the growing hostility and open racism the white people were now showing towards them. Their most charismatic leader, Hendrik Witbooi, who was in his 70s, summoned a council of elders to hear reports of the atrocities.
Soon after, Witbooi called upon all the Nama to fight the Germans. Many clans responded, including those of another famous leader, Jacob Morenga, joining a war against the colonialists, killing prominent men, but sparing women and children.
The German soldiers struggled against heat, thirst and the constant strain of the Nama’s lightning raids. There were some 200 raids and skirmishes before Witbooi was mortally wounded in late 1905 by shrapnel in one of his attacks. He died three days later, and the Nama alliance fell apart. Soon after, the stragglers surrendered, and the Nama were rounded up, along with the last emaciated surviving Herero, and sent to concentration camps.
The family of Ida Hoffmann, a Nama activist whose ancestor was murdered by the Germans, has carried a gruesome story down the generations.
“The Germans also killed my great-grandfather’s daughter, Sara Snewe,” Ida says. “According to oral history that was carried for generations. Sara was pregnant at the time she was killed. The Germans then cut her open, took out the baby and killed it in cold blood.”
They still honour her memory at the desert grave where she was buried.
‘People died here’
Jephta remembers the story of his other great-grandmother on his mother’s side. “She was captured in the Omaheke after the extermination order was withdrawn and sent to Lüderitz to the concentration camp at Shark Island where they worked as slave labour. Most people died, but she was among the few who survived.”
He pauses thoughtfully. “That’s why I’m here today.”
Shark Island, a narrow peninsula in the harbour of the tiny seaside town of Lüderitz, a leftover settlement of German colonialism, was one of five concentration camps set up in the country, but it is the most notorious. Here, Nama and Herero people endured horrendous conditions. They erected makeshift shelters of blankets, rags and driftwood to try and protect themselves against the freezing wind and mist that blew off the southern Atlantic. They were given only a few hundred grams of food and there were no sanitary facilities, so their waste was left to decompose in the open, leading to disease running rampant, especially among the children. Women were raped. The sexual exploitation of African women was not only condoned, it was enthusiastically recorded. Many pornographic photographs of the women were turned into postcards and sent back to Germany.
Those who were strong enough - barely - were marched out to do forced labour on the harbour and on the nearby railroad. No one knows the exact number of people who were imprisoned in the camps. Records are haphazard or non-existent, but, where they were kept, they show thousands of deaths of Herero and Nama.
On a visit to Shark Island with Jephta, the wind blows cold and hard across the barren rocks that house a campsite and ablution blocks, empty that day, but clearly waiting for tourists to camp, oblivious of the site’s true history.
Jephta is visibly upset and finds it hard to speak. “This is where my ancestors were kept, historians call it a death camp. Somehow my great-grandmother survived, but most people died from starvation.”
Jephta gestures around him. “This is our Auschwitz, our Dachau. Is there a campsite in those places? No.
"This is a holy place. People died here and medical experiments were done on them. Their biggest fear was to go to the medical centre near here because they knew they wouldn’t come back alive. They used to boil human heads, and the women were forced to peel off the skin and scrape the flesh off with glass.”
There were other inhumane experiments. Many of the prisoners suffered from scurvy and doctors injected them with opium, arsenic and other substances to see how they might affect a disease that results from a lack of fresh food. They opened up the bodies of those who died as a result in order to see the effects of these experiments.
The skulls and other human remains were sent back to Germany where they were studied in pursuit of the racist pseudoscience of eugenics. Many of them ended up at the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute where Joseph Mengele, who would later conduct deadly medical experiments on prisoners at Auschwitz, studied in the early 1940s.
Land and memory
What happened to African people in Namibia was a brutal, and now nearly forgotten, harbinger of the Holocaust by the Nazis against the Jews and other groups in World War II.
But the memory of these events is contested in Namibia itself. The first real documentation of the genocide was in the famous “Blue Book" compiled by South African authorities in 1918 after they defeated the Germans in WWI. The Union of South Africa, a British colony at the time, invaded the German colony of South West Africa in 1915. After an initial defeat early in the war, they quickly overran the German forces who surrendered in July of the same year.
It estimates that some 65,000 Herero out of a population of 80,000 died, while some 10,000 Nama, about half the population, perished.
Some claim these statistics are inflated, while Jephta and other Herero activists believe the figures were far greater. “But what do the actual numbers matter?” he says. “It was the acts themselves that were genocidal.”
Nearly 120 years later, reconciliation between Germans and the Herero and Nama remains elusive. The vast majority of African peoples still live in poverty.
On the outskirts of the popular tourist town of Swakopmund, Jephta takes us to meet Lourens Ndura in a rundown settlement known as “DRC”. Rows and rows of simple houses, side by side with shacks, fill the desert spaces. There is hardly any vegetation, and the wind whips up sand across the bare streets. Lourens is dressed in a red union T-shirt, a memory of more prosperous days when he had a full-time job as a firefighter at a mine.
Drought and hunger forced Lourens to bring his family here 10 years ago, but no money has reached them from any agreement that is, anyway, still in limbo. “My great-grandfather was on Shark Island. The Germans have to pay for what they did because that is the wound that has been with us for a long, long time,” he says thoughtfully, but firmly. “Money is the only thing that can bring changes. We can buy land and animals.” He gestures around the makeshift tin shack that is the only home he can provide for his family. “We are living here like we are in a concentration camp.”
Land and memory are the twin strands that remain deeply intertwined today, for Herero and Nama peoples and German Namibians.
Jephta meets with Gerd Wolbling, a mild-mannered German Namibian farmer who owns a vast ranch of some 15,000 hectares (37,000 acres) near the site of the Battle of Waterberg. His family has owned the farm since 1907 and Gerd has grown up in the midst of the Herero people. He speaks Otjiherero fluently. His great-grandfather had three children with a Herero woman. “They were the half-brother and sisters of my grandfather. We still have a close relationship,” he says over coffee and a cold beer.
Still, the issue of land and the meaning of the country’s tortured history stand as a wall between him and Jephta. “Which past is more prevalent?” Gerd asks. “History is one people replacing the other. One hundred years before 1907, Hereros didn’t inhabit this land. We can’t make things right by giving the land back.”
Jephta listens carefully, not disputing Gerd’s claim about his ancestral lands, as they walk together past the cattle enclosure and through a field of pale winter grass. “Do you deny that there was a genocide,” he asks as they stand resting from the sun under a shady tree.
Gerd raises his hands to explain. “I don’t question the harm which was done to the OvaHerero people. They lost much of their land, most of their cattle, and let’s say half of their population.” Yet he denies there was a genocide. “There was not that intention, and the relationship to the Holocaust, to me, that is far-fetched.”
But in 1985, the United Nations’ Whitaker report classified what happened to the Herero and Nama people as a genocide. While in May 2021, the German government itself formally recognised what happened as genocide. In a joint declaration with Namibia, they pledged to pay the Namibian government 1.1 billion euros (more than $1bn) in aid in more than 30 years, stipulating that it should be spent in areas where the descendants of the victims of the atrocities now live.
‘One day we will get our land back’
Jephta and Ida, and many others, are deeply dissatisfied with this arrangement. “The Namibian Government’s almost unilateral negotiations with the German government is and remains unacceptable,” Ida says.
There has been much dissatisfaction in Namibia over the Namibian and German governments’ joint agreement, along with demands from Nama and Herero activists that the agreement be renegotiated, providing more money to the affected communities and involving them directly in discussions. In fact, neither government has yet signed the agreement. The Namibian government has indicated it wants further negotiations, while the German parliament has rejected more talks.
There are no signs that the impasse is being resolved swiftly.
“It seems,” Jephta says, “the [Namibian] government is again involved in secret negotiations while the people expressed publicly that the leaders of the affected communities must be involved.”
Many Herero and Nama feel that the majority government party, the South West Africa People’s Organisation (SWAPO), does not represent them and their peoples adequately, as their strongest support is among the Ovambo people in the northern half of the country. The government’s stance is that they represent all Namibians and that an agreement cannot be circumscribed by the approval of the Herero and Nama only.
Phanuel Kaapama, one of the Namibian government’s chief negotiators, told Al Jazeera that, at present, there is “a process of internal consultations, of consensus-building”.
Ruprecht Polenz, the German government’s special envoy, said in an email that “the Joint Declaration has been discussed in Namibia ever since [May 2021], often seen as controversial. The Federal Government is monitoring this discussion and awaiting the result.”
In the Waterberg, Jephta kneels down to pick up a handful of sand. He puts some of it in his mouth to bless it, the tradition his grandmother taught him, and throws the rest away.
For a long time, he is silent, then he stands up slowly. “I’m paying tribute, knowing my ancestors are here, reminding us that these places will always be remembered.”
Tears fill his eyes. He falls silent as he looks over the landscape beginning to shimmer in the late morning sun. Slowly he begins to speak again in his poet’s voice.
“The fate of history is hard to face. The Germans who defeated us own this space. They bought the land, but from who? We will fight for restoration, reparations, dignity. We were defeated but we are still strong. One day we will get our land back, our ancestral lands must be shared with us. This earth, the trees are speaking to me right now. I’m sensing in the wind, the spirits talking to me, saying: ‘Tell the story.’ I’m feeling the energy of those who perished, the wind of the unburied, the wind of resistance, birds singing, telling me something if I listen carefully.
“I don’t feel so much anger, but I feel my spirit connected to their spirit. There is no point in being angry,” he says.
“I feel honoured speaking to them.”
New York. (photo: CJ Wang)
The $4.2 billion bond act is the only statewide proposal on the ballot this year and comes 26 years after the last time New Yorkers approved a similar environmental-improvement plan.
The proposal is years in the making: A similar proposal fell by the wayside in 2020, when then-Gov. Andrew Cuomo pulled it from the ballot amid the uncertainty over the COVID-19 crisis.
But now, supporters — including environmental groups and Gov. Kathy Hochul — say the time is right to ask voters to approve the measure. Opponents, meanwhile, have raised concern about the costs.
Here’s what you need to know about Proposal 1 that appears on the back of your ballot:
What is the Clean Water, Clean Air, and Green Jobs Environmental Bond Act of 2022?
It’s a proposal to borrow up to $4.2 billion to pay for projects meant to improve the state’s environment, in hopes of preserving or bolstering natural resources and mitigating climate change.
If approved, the state would sell bonds covering the full amount and pay them back over several decades. From there, that money would be used on capital projects — big-ticket, long-term projects meant to boost the state’s environmental infrastructure.
The state Legislature already approved the plan, which allows the state to sell the bonds immediately after approval. But in order to sell the bonds, the state has to get approval from voters. That’s why you’re being asked to vote on it.
What kinds of projects are we talking about?
There’s not a specific list of projects right now; that will come later in the process and would be subject to the state’s processes for capital building or repairs.
But if the plan is approved, the money would be split up for specific purposes, according to the plan passed by Hochul and the state Legislature. They are:
- Climate change mitigation: Up to $1.5 billion, including at least $400 million for green building projects, $100 million for climate adaptation and mitigation projects, $200 million for cleaning air and water pollution in disadvantaged communities, and $500 million to purchase zero-emissions school buses.
- Restoration and flood-risk reduction: At least $1.1 billion, of which at least $100 million has to go to “coastal rehabilitation and shoreline restoration projects, and projects that address inland flooding.”
- Open-space land conservation and recreation: Up to $650 million, of which at least $300 million is flagged for land conservation, $150 million for preserving farmland, and up to $75 million for fish hatcheries.
- Water quality improvement and resiliency infrastructure: At least $650 million, including at least $200 million for wastewater infrastructure, $250 million for municipal stormwater improvements and up to $200 million for a variety of other water-related projects such as replacing lead service lines.
So the money could go toward things such as improvements to a water treatment plant, or projects that improve the water quality in the Hudson River. It could be used to bolster flood protections along New York City’s waterfront. It could be used to preserve land in the Catskills or Adirondacks.
There are endless options, but any projects would have to comply with the implementation plan Hochul and state lawmakers set into law. The projects will also have to be approved through the state’s existing process for allocating capital spending.
Who is supporting Proposal 1, and why?
There’s a broad coalition of environmental and labor organizations backing the proposal, including Environmental Advocates of New York, the American Lung Association and the New York State Laborers Organizing Fund. Collectively, they’re putting about $4 million into their efforts to get it passed.
They’re coalescing behind a slogan — “Vote Yes for Clean Water and Jobs” — and making the case that the bond act is a critical, once-in-a-generation opportunity to make badly needed environmental infrastructure improvements.
On Thursday, the groups held a rally along the Hudson River in Albany.
“Right now, we have one of the most aging sewer infrastructure systems, and this proposition will not only give us a chance to make a deposit on reversing that, but also create the jobs that are necessary and sustainable,” said Aaron Mair, director of the Adirondack Council’s Forever Adirondacks campaign.
Who is opposing Proposal 1, and why?
While there hasn’t been much by way of organized opposition, some on the conservative end of the political spectrum are opposed.
Most notably, that includes the state Conservative Party, the small-but-influential third party that often co-endorses Republican candidates.
Gerard Kassar, the party’s chair, says its opposition is largely grounded in fiscal conservatism, though he said the party is “certainly not fond” of all of the things the bond act could fund. He says it’s a bad time for the state to be borrowing money, particularly when inflation is high and interest rates are up.
“We are opposed to it because it's $4.2 billion in new debt,” Kassar said in an interview. “We are additionally opposed to it because there is money remaining from projects that were authorized but never conducted or completed from earlier environmental-oriented bond acts, so that money remains to be used first.”
What will I see on my ballot? And where will I see it?
In the vast majority of the state, Proposal 1 will be on the back of your ballot, ahead of any local ballot proposals — including three in New York City. (Nassau County voters can expect to see the proposal on the front of the ballot.)
Here’s what it will look like, word for word:
“To address and combat the impact of climate change and damage to the environment, the ‘Clean Water, Clean Air, and Green Jobs Environmental Bond Act of 2022’ authorizes the sale of state bonds up to four billion two hundred million dollars to fund environmental protection, natural restoration, resiliency, and clean energy projects. Shall the Environmental Bond Act of 2022 be approved?”
Will people actually flip their ballots?
Recent election data suggests that most will, but a still-significant number of voters won’t.
Take last year, when there were five statewide ballot proposals in New York. Of the 3.4 million people who cast a ballot, about 456,000 people didn’t cast a vote on Proposal 1, which would have made changes to the state’s redistricting process, according to state Board of Elections records. That means 13% of voters didn’t cast a vote on any of the ballot proposals — despite making the effort to head to the polls or vote absentee.
Jessica Ottney Mahar is the policy and strategy director for The Nature Conservancy. She’s helping lead the campaign in favor of Proposal 1.
A big part of their effort, she said, is “incessantly reminding” people to flip their ballot.
“It's a lot of education and reminding folks that the election isn't just about those top couple of races that make the news all the time,” she said.
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