Tonight:
The trans ban rocks the military.
Uprising in Jerusalem.
And…
The global gag rule on the ground:
— The Treasury Department is sanctioning 13 senior officials
connected to the Venezuelan government.
Treasury also threatened more, quote, "strong and swift" economic sanctions
if President NicolĆ s Maduro goes ahead with Sunday's vote to rewrite the constitution.
Venezuelan opposition groups began a 48-hour nationwide strike against the plan,
blocking off streets with garbage, tree branches and other objects.
The Kremlin responded to new sanctions passed by the House of Representatives,
calling the measure, quote,
"an extremely unfriendly act" and "sad news" for U.S.-Russian relations.
President Putin's spokesman warned of possible retaliation,
but also said Russia would hold off on a response until the sanctions become law—
which requires President Trump's sign-off.
Ohio executed Ronald Phillips today—
the state's first execution since January 2014,
when it took Dennis McGuire 26 minutes to die.
State officials had put executions on hold since then,
as they tried to obtain new lethal injection drugs,
but there were no reports of complications today.
Phillips was given the death penalty
for the 1993 rape and murder of his girlfriend's 3-year-old daughter.
Police in Minneapolis will now have to activate their body cameras during every call for service,
or any activity that officers initiate themselves.
The policy goes into effect Saturday.
It comes after an officer shot and killed Justine Damond,
who had called 911 to report a possible sexual assault.
Neither officer who responded had his body camera turned on at the time of the shooting.
— What good is a camera if it is not being used when it may be needed the most?
— The Florida Fish and Wildlife Commission
has identified the men who dragged a live shark behind a boat in a video that's sparked widespread outrage.
The names were withheld pending an ongoing investigation,
but authorities say it isn't clear if the men broke any laws.
Washington is in the grips of the most intense fights over health care in eight years—
and it hasn't been going great for the ruling Republicans.
So this morning,
President Trump changed the subject in typical fashion,
sending out a raft of harsh tweets
announcing a total ban on trans people serving in the military.
The move upends a careful process begun during the Obama administration
to figure out how to integrate trans men and women into the fighting forces.
Two years ago,
Secretary of Defense Ash Carter announced
that the Pentagon would look for a way to end its ban on trans personnel.
In June of last year,
the Defense Department released a study from the RAND Corporation,
finding that thousands of transgender people were probably already serving,
and that allowing them to do so openly wouldn't have a big impact on cost or readiness.
With those findings in hand,
Carter officially ended the ban—
and said the DOD would pay for medical transitions for trans personnel.
Pentagon officials have admitted they had no idea that today's reversal was coming.
Neither did the ranks of trans soldiers and officers currently in uniform.
— At every level of the military,
there is complete confusion about
what the President's announced ban on transgender service members
will actually mean.
Will it lead to the expulsion of the thousands of trans people on active duty,
permanently disqualify trans cadets working toward commission from the military academies,
or bring back the days of "Don't Ask Don't Tell"?
No one really knows.
I asked the Pentagon for comment,
but Director of Defense Press Operations Captain Jeff A. Davis
said he knew nothing more than what was on the President's Twitter.
He released a statement referring all questions to the White House
and promising clarification later on.
Sue Fulton is a former army captain who's advocated for LGBT service members.
She's the first openly gay member of the board of West Point,
and she told me she feels the ban is a betrayal of the the principle
that all qualified people should be able to serve:
— I'll tell you what's interesting:
the service members are reacting with alarm.
But what's even more interesting is we're hearing over and over
that their chain of command,
the commanders, officers, and NCOs above them,
are outraged.
They are reassuring the service members, "We will fight for you."
They are reassuring the service members that policy isn't made with a tweet.
These soldiers have been downrange with their buddies who came out last year as transgender,
and they will have each others backs—
because that's what troops do.
— The military is the number one employer of transgender people in the U.S.,
and if they're discharged, the departures could impact units across the military's missions.
I spoke with Cathrine Schmid,
a transgender officer on active duty in the army,
who stressed that she was speaking with us as a private citizen.
What level of uncertainty does this bring for you personally?
— Very little is ever certain, in my job field.
We have to be prepared to roll with the punches, so to speak.
One thing the military has taught me
is how to deal with uncertain situations and carry on with what I need to do.
— How do you think this is going to affect various units and the military as a whole?
— There are thousands of us spread throughout the service.
We have helicopter pilots, we have drill sergeants,
we are represented in every aspect of military service.
As is well known, we can't afford to lose thousands of troops.
If we are declared to be unfit to serve,
then the military as a whole will be worse off without us.
— And what do you think is next for you?
— If I am not performing my duties, then I'm just proving them right.
And so, my current attitude is that I am resolved
to fulfill my responsibilities, to perform my duties,
as a non-commissioned officer in the United States Army,
and to carry on until such time as I receive new marching orders.
— Just 40 minutes after tweeting out the trans ban,
Trump returned to Twitter to rain fire on one of his favorite new targets—
his own Attorney General, and ardent supporter,
Jeff Sessions.
Trump lashed out at Sessions for not firing acting FBI Director Andrew McCabe,
who Trump thinks is in the pocket of "Crooked Hillary."
This just a day after telling the world he was disappointed in Sessions,
and two days after calling him, quote, "beleaguered."
You'd think Sessions would've thrown in the towel by now.
But there are good reasons why he might not want to.
Alexandra Jaffe explains.
— Here's the thing about beleaguered Jeff Sessions:
he's actually the President's most successful cabinet secretary—
even after getting caught lying about his contacts with Russia.
In less than five months on the job,
he's revived the War on Drugs,
rolled back certain Obama-era LGBTQ protections,
and gotten tougher on illegal immigration.
The latest example:
Yesterday, the Justice Department announced
localities seen as sanctuary cities wouldn't be eligible for some federal funds.
Another promise achieved.
Sessions has so much momentum
that former Obama administration officials are really concerned:
— One of the things that strikes me is that
Jeff Sessions has been able to be extremely effective
even while operating under a cloud of suspicion.
But it hasn't slowed him down.
He's been able to turn the department around,
change litigating positions on extremely important cases,
and redirect federal prosecutors in ways that are ultimately not going to make us safer,
but are going to balloon our federal prison population.
— These have been priorities for Sessions, an ultra-conservative immigration hardliner,
for his entire career.
— Every one of our citizens,
no matter who they are or where they live,
has the right to be safe in their homes and in their communities—
safe from gangs, and rapists, and carjackers, and drug dealers.
— So why would he ever willingly give that opportunity up?
Trump could, of course, just fire Sessions—
there's been a lot of talk about that here in D.C.
The thinking is that Trump's endgame is to axe Sessions
and replace him with someone who will fire Bob Mueller,
the special counsel leading the Russia investigation.
Sessions can't, because he recused himself from everything related to the inquiry.
But any new, friendlier, AG Trump would appoint
would need Senate approval.
And the first question at that nominee's confirmation hearing would be:
"Will you commit to preserving the independence of the Russia investigation?"
Even with a Republican majority,
no candidate would get confirmed without making that promise.
And you may have heard the term "recess appointment" thrown around—
a way for the President to circumvent the entire confirmation process while Congress is on break.
That wouldn't work, either—
because Congress could use procedural moves to avoid going into recess in the first place.
Democrats are already hinting they'd do just that.
So if Trump fired Sessions,
he'd probably be stuck with an acting Attorney General—
the current Deputy, Rod Rosenstein,
who appointed the special counsel in the first place.
Could Trump fire him?
Sure.
But that would be so politically dangerous that even a reckless president—
even Donald Trump—
would pay a steep political price for even trying it.
— Members of Congress have moved to strengthen a funding ban that targets abortion across the globe,
by including it in a foreign aid bill that they sent to the House floor this week.
The measure would shore up the Trump administration's so-called "global gag rule."
It's a policy that prohibits American aid dollars from going to any health organization
that advocates, studies or even mentions a need for safe abortion.
The effects are already being felt in the African nation of Malawi,
where advocates say women need more access to the medical procedure.
— This song is part of a campaign to prevent deaths from unsafe abortion.
The procedure is illegal in Malawi,
so many women go to a local witch doctor, or try to abort at home.
When these women come down with infections and bleeding,
which happens often,
they come to the female ward.
The district hospital in Kasungu is the only one serving about 600,000 people.
— Sylvester Zimba is a nurse at the female ward of the hospital who specializes in post-abortion care.
— So what is an example of an object that you might find?
— So you're keeping their secret.
— The penalty for having an abortion is 14 years in prison.
But a proposed bill would decriminalize abortion
in cases of rape and incest, fetal anomaly, and mental health.
Chrispine Sibande, the National Director at IPAS,
a nonprofit that fights for safe abortion worldwide,
is leading the charge on the bill.
He says Donald Trump just made his job a lot harder:
— Three days into the Trump administration,
the President signed a policy that blocks money
to any international group that so much as mentions abortion.
Reproductive rights activists call it the "global gag rule."
Every Republican president since Ronald Reagan has enforced the policy,
but the Trump administration went much further:
the so-called gag rule affects all $8.8 billion of U.S. global healthcare assistance.
— But the opposition to Malawi's abortion bill has cheered Trump's support for the funding ban,
including these Christian activists:
— Pastor Nick Chakwera is a leading opponent of the bill.
— Many of the groups who stand to lose U.S. government funds
for, quote, "promoting" abortion
say they won't back down.
That includes the Family Planning Association of Malawi,
which runs birth control clinics across the country.
— So it's birth control,
it's antibiotics against sexually transmitted infections,
HIV treatment.
That all goes away.
— Yes.
— In Lilongwe, Malawi's capital, alone,
Mbendera estimates that 600,000 women will lose access to birth control because of the Trump policy.
Advocates know what's going to happen next:
Under the Bush-era gag rule,
abortion rates actually rose in sub-Saharan Africa.
— It will definitely increase the number of criminal abortions that will occur,
and therefore increase the number of patients that we have here,
and increasing the maternal mortality.
— So, less money for family planning groups,
if they choose to advocate for safe abortion, equals…
— More unwanted pregnancies.
More unplanned pregnancies.
More illegal abortions.
More maternal mortality rates.
— More women dying. — Yes.
— Sylvester Zimba, the nurse,
can barely keep up with the number of women who are already having unsafe abortions.
He knows it's about to get worse.
The gag rule isn't supposed to affect emergency care.
— But in May,
Zimba was told that because of the Trump administration's policy,
he was losing his USAID funding anyway.
— So when you hear the US government say, "This is a pro-life policy,"
what's your reaction?
— Fighting between Palestinian protesters and Israeli police
continued in East Jerusalem last night,
in the deadliest violence the city has seen in more than two years.
Early Tuesday morning,
Israeli authorities removed disputed metal detectors from outside al-Aqsa Mosque.
The installation of the censors almost two weeks ago
triggered mass demonstrations by Palestinians
and outrage across the Muslim world—
where they were seen as an attempt by Israel to assert control over one of Islam's most important holy sites.
But the protests have shown no signs of subsiding.
Jake Hanrahan has more from Jerusalem.
— As soon as the prayers finished here, in Jerusalem around al-Aqsa Mosque,
the police started firing stun grenades.
The protesters here, you can see them running—
it's absolutely chaos.
— In a conflict with no shortage of sensitivities,
there are few more delicate than those surrounding the al-Aqsa Mosque in East Jerusalem.
It's administered by the Palestinians, but access to the compound it's in,
which also contains the sacred Jewish site of Temple Mount,
is managed by Israel.
This isn't the first time it's seen violent clashes.
In 2000, former Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's controversial visit to the compound
escalated the tension that led to the Second Intifada.
It's against this historical backdrop
that Netanyahu ordered the installation of metal detectors
after two Israeli policeman were killed outside the Mosque on July 14th.
Jawad Siam is a prominent Palestinian activist.
He's been coming to the site of the Mosque for days now to protest.
Despite the removal of the metal detectors,
Jawad and thousands of Palestinians like him say they'll continue to protest.
— Netanyahu ignored warnings from senior security officials not to install the metal detectors,
egged on by Israel's right-far-right coalition and keen to deflect from a personal political scandal.
After backtracking,
many Israelis are wary of appearing to give in to the Palestinians' demands.
Netanyahu now faces a backlash even from his own party.
— Do you think it was a mistake for Netanyahu to decide to remove the metal detectors?
— The Palestinians say it's about the Israelis trying to control them, and not about security.
— There is a lot that divides Palestinians, but they've been united by this crisis.
Netanyahu's latest demand
that all visitors to the Mosque must be searched before they can enter
is likely keep people on the streets.
— I'm a truck driver for Price Chopper right now, it's a local company.
I'm gonna have my breakfast coffee, and then I'm gonna go.
Don't forget to brush your teeth before you go to bed.
I don't think you're going to be going to bed before Mommy leaves.
Make sure you help Jeff clean up and put everything away.
I'll miss you.
Bye, honey!
Love you.
I leave the house at 9, I clock-in at 10.
Drivers can work 14 hours on-duty, 11 hours driving.
They can send me a really long dispatch, or I could do a bunch of short ones.
I became a truck driver because I was a 19-year-old single mom.
Trucking has provided me with financial stability.
It has made me a financial provider for my son.
I would say being local is almost harder on the driver than over-the-road,
because when you're over-the-road,
all there is to do is sleep when you're not working,
so it's real easy to get your rest.
When you're local, your family's expecting you.
But you have an obligation to get your rest before you drive this massive vehicle.
And then there are the people who think,
because I'm a female, I have it easy,
which is not true.
When I was in a sleeper cab for a different company,
I was outside the produce market and the manager of the receiver was saying,
"You must get so lonely in that truck, how about you come out to dinner with me,"
"and you can use my house to shower if you want."
I declined, and I had to keep going back there.
Because I declined, he wouldn't unload my trailer.
He'd make me sit there and wait, and make me the last truck.
We're heading to the warehouse.
We're going to drop it in a door so that the warehouse workers can unload it.
They're going to clean up the trailer,
it's gonna go back in the line to be filled again for another dispatch.
There's really no one to call at 3 in the morning.
All you have is a radio.
That's one bad thing about working nights,
but everyone knows that driving the truck is easier at night.
It's open roads.
I don't know about the future.
Drones are never going to be delivering the palates of food.
That's not happening.
It's not gonna apply in my lifetime.
I know our lifestyle, and we're not going to be able to advance if I lose this, so...
My license is my resume.
I treat it seriously, I take the job seriously.
It's a good feeling, having a career.
No one's gonna stop me from giving my son the life he deserves.
I'll find a way.
— Oh my gosh.
— This is cool.
— Arcade Fire consistently delivers.
It's strong.
I hear the ABBA.
— I think it's great.
Now more than ever, it reminds me of "Dancing Queen."
But whatever.
That's a good song, and this is a good song,
and it's a solid song.
— Is this Cheap Trick?
— He's been really nice to us, Alice.
— Now, it's hard to, like, judge the music,
because you're thinking of the man, and he's…
a fine human being.
He's come a long way.
— This, to me, I didn't mind.
It seemed high-level.
There is some cool lyrics in there, when you can understand them.
It was buried a little bit, but…
— Who is it?
— Shabazz Palaces.
— Shabazz Palaces?
That's a cool name, shit.
"So c'mon down to Shabazz Palaces Chevrolet."
— It's cool, it's heavy on the "Five Years" Bowie, you know?
I never know how I feel about those kind of things.
We try not to go that far, as far as they went, with that.
— I like a record with passion.
And this definitely has passion.
I almost thought it was "Five Years," though.
— It's still "Five Years."
— Still "Five Years."
— That's VICE News Tonight for Wednesday, July 27th.
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