Happy Monday and welcome back to On The Money. I’m Sylvan Lane, and here’s your nightly guide to everything affecting your bills, bank account and bottom line.
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THE BIG DEAL—Stocks jump as Trump prepares to return to White House: Stocks closed with gains Monday after President TrumpDonald John TrumpState Department revokes visa of Giuliani-linked Ukrainian ally: report White House Gift Shop selling ‘Trump Defeats COVID’ commemorative coin Biden says he should not have called Trump a clown in first debate MORE announced that he would be discharged from Walter Reed hospital later in the day.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average jumped 466 points, or 1.7 percent, and the S&P 500 increased 60 points, or 1.8 percent. The tech-heavy NASDAQ performed even better, with a 257-point increase, or 2.3 percent.
Trump, who announced Friday that he has COVID-19, said he’d return to the White House, where he will continue to receive medical attention from a full team of medical professionals.
His announcement came before the stock market closed at 4 p.m.
Trump departed Walter Reed National Military Medical Center shortly after 6:30 p.m.
The background: Trump’s apparent eagerness to downplay the severity of the virus raised questions as to what led to the decision.
His tweet announcing his discharge urged people not to be “afraid” of the virus that has killed more than 210,000 Americans, and comes a day after he drew criticism for taking a drive to wave to supporters outside the hospital instead of staying isolated.
Trump’s diagnosis has also cast a shadow on the stock market, which had been bracing for volatile election aftermath and a potential Joe BidenJoe BidenState Department revokes visa of Giuliani-linked Ukrainian ally: report Biden says he should not have called Trump a clown in first debate Biden inquired about calling Trump after coronavirus diagnosis MORE presidency.
LEADING THE DAY
IRS extends deadline for non-filers to register for stimulus payments: The IRS announced Monday that it is extending the deadline for people who aren’t typically required to file tax returns to register for their coronavirus relief payments.
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The agency said it is moving the deadline for non-filers to use an IRS web tool from Oct. 15 to Nov. 21, giving people an extra five weeks to submit their information.
“We took this step to provide more time for those who have not yet received a payment to register to get their money, including those in low-income and underserved communities,” IRS Commissioner Charles Rettig said in a statement.
The Hill’s Naomi Jagoda tells us what it means here.
Under legislation enacted in late March, most Americans are eligible for one-time payments of up to $1,200 per adult and $500 per child. The vast majority of eligible Americans received their payments earlier this year.
Reaching non-filers has been a challenge for the IRS as it has worked to get the stimulus payments to everyone who is eligible.
Non-filers typically have very low incomes.
Top Fed official warns failure to pass more COVID-19 relief could slow recovery: Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago President Charles Evans says that a failure of the White House and Congress to approve more coronavirus stimulus funding could reignite “recessionary dynamics” that will hinder the recovery from the recession.
In a Monday speech, Evans said another economic rescue package “will play an enormously powerful role” in helping struggling households and businesses survive until the coronavirus pandemic is under control. He added that sufficient relief, including support for state and local governments, would help unemployment fall from 7.9 percent as of September to 4 percent by 2023.
Without further aid, Evans warned, “recessionary dynamics will gain more traction and lead to a slower trajectory back to maximum employment.”
I explain why here.
Evans’s warning is the latest attempt from top Fed officials to nudge the White House and Congress closer to a long-sought deal on a follow-up to the $2.2 trillion Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act that President Trump signed in late March.
Economists credit the CARES Act with shielding the U.S. from some of the economic blow at the onset of the pandemic through expanded and enhanced unemployment benefits, direct payments to U.S. households, emergency loans to small businesses and aid to state and local governments.
But the pace of the recovery has slowed notably as much of that aid expired and washed out of the economy over the summer.
GOOD TO KNOW
A watchdog group on Monday called for President Trump’s top trade adviser to be fired for violating a law that bans federal employees for engaging in political activity in their professional capacity.
Wayne LaPierre, the longtime head of the National Rifle Association (NRA), is under investigation by the IRS on suspicion of criminal tax fraud, the Wall Street Journal reported Monday.
New York Times: “Tidjane Thiam made Credit Suisse profitable again. But the Swiss rejected him as an outsider, and a sudden scandal took him down.”
A coalition of progressive groups on Monday launched an initiative to make the case that the tax code is too favorable to the wealthy after The New York Times’s bombshell report on President Trump’s taxes.
Voters consider the economy their top issue in the presidential election, according to newly released Gallup polling.
The CEOs of Google, Facebook and Twitter are set to testify before the Senate later this month, spokespeople for the companies confirmed to The Hill on Monday.
Regal Cinemas, the nation’s second-largest theater chain, will close its doors across the country as the film industry continues to be hard hit by the coronavirus pandemic.
Op-Ed: Adriana Kugler, a professor at Georgetown University, argues why Congress must take “swift action” or have a worse jobless rate this winter”
The CEOs of Google, Facebook and Twitter are set to testify before the Senate later this month, spokespeople for the companies confirmed to The Hill on Monday.
The appearance before the Senate Commerce Committee will be the second time that top tech executives appear before Congress this year, following this summer’s major hearing before a House antitrust subcommittee.
Google’s Sundar Pichai, Facebook’s Mark ZuckerbergMark Elliot ZuckerbergHillicon Valley: CEOs of Google, Facebook and Twitter to testify before Senate | European Union police agency warns of increase in cybercrime | Twitter to remove posts hoping for Trump’s death CEOs of Google, Facebook and Twitter to testify before Senate Trump’s luck finally runs out MORE and Twitter’s Jack Dorsey will appear before the powerful Senate committee on Oct. 28, just days before the general election.
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The hearing set to focus on Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, which is considered the bedrock of the modern internet.
The 1996 law, which has come under increased scrutiny since President TrumpDonald John TrumpState Department revokes visa of Giuliani-linked Ukrainian ally: report White House Gift Shop selling ‘Trump Defeats COVID’ commemorative coin Biden says he should not have called Trump a clown in first debate MORE targeted it in an executive order in May, gives internet companies immunity from lawsuits for content posted on their sites by third parties and allows them to make “good faith” efforts to moderate content.
The threat of having that protection revoked has increasingly been proposed as a cudgel to compel platforms to make changes by lawmakers, especially ones on the right.
The hearing, which will also address data privacy and media consolidation, comes after Democrats initially resisted efforts to subpoena the CEOs.
The Commerce Committee voted unanimously to authorize subpoenas for the three executives last week. All three CEOS agreed to testify voluntarily.
Nevada’s former state treasurer says she’s considering a run against Sen. Dean HellerDean Arthur HellerOn The Trail: Democrats plan to hammer Trump on Social Security, Medicare Lobbying World Democrats spend big to put Senate in play MORE (R-Nev.) in 2018, the latest in a number of Democrats showing interest in taking on the vulnerable Republican.
“I’m evaluating the race,” Kate Marshall told the Nevada Independent in a Tuesday interview.
Heller is considered the most vulnerable GOP senator up for reelection next year and the only one running in a state that Democratic nominee Hillary ClintonHillary Diane Rodham ClintonWhite House accuses Biden of pushing ‘conspiracy theories’ with Trump election claim Biden courts younger voters — who have been a weakness Trayvon Martin’s mother Sybrina Fulton qualifies to run for county commissioner in Florida MORE carried in 2016. Senate Democrats will largely be on defense in the 2018 midterm elections, protecting 25 seats, while Republicans only need to defend nine.
Marshall served as state treasurer from 2007 to 2015. She unsuccessfully ran in a 2011 congressional special election, as well as for Nevada secretary of State in 2014.
Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto (D-Nev.), who won a competitive open seat race last year, is reportedly backing Marshall.
Asked if she met Senate Minority Leader Charles SchumerChuck SchumerOvernight Health Care: US showing signs of retreat in battle against COVID-19 | Regeneron begins clinical trials of potential coronavirus antibody treatment | CMS warns nursing homes against seizing residents’ stimulus checks Schumer requests briefing with White House coronavirus task force as cases rise Schumer on Trump’s tweet about 75-year-old protester: He ‘should go back to hiding in the bunker’ MORE (D-N.Y.) about a possible campaign, Marshall demurred.
“It’s a comprehensive process, and I am still reviewing,” she said.
Rep. Dina Titus (D-Nev.) is also considering a run against Heller, saying in a recent interview that she’s spoken to some people about a potential Senate campaign.
“It’s going to be interesting. I’m thinking about it,” Titus told KNPR, a Nevada NPR affiliate station. “Some people have talked to me about the possibility. It’s a hard decision.”
If she passes on a Senate bid, Titus said she’ll run for reelection to her safe House seat and said that she’s starting to gain “clout” in the lower chamber.
Other Democrats who have been floated as potential contenders are freshman Reps. Jacky Rosen (D-Nev.) and Ruben Kihuen (D-Nev.).
Denouncing a “rigged” system that favors corporations over middle-class Americans, Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) said in a “must-watch” speech on Wednesday that any reform of the U.S. corporate tax code must force big businesses to “substantially increase” the amount of federal tax they pay.
Warren’s address at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C. “staked out the left-wing position on corporate tax reform,” Politico said, an issue Congress is expected to take on in 2016. She lambasted three proposals currently getting attention on Capitol Hill, including one supported by President Barack Obama.
“When I look at the details, I see the same rigged game—a game where Congress hands out billions in benefits to well-connected corporations, while people who really could use a break…are left holding the bag.” —Sen. Elizabeth Warren
She described that “deemed repatriation” plan—which would allow U.S. companies to pay less tax on profits generated abroad if that money is repatriated to the U.S.—as “a giant wet kiss for the tax dodgers who have already parked $2.1 trillion overseas.”
“When I look at the details, I see the same rigged game,” she said, “a game where Congress hands out billions in benefits to well-connected corporations, while people who really could use a break…are left holding the bag.”
Warren pushed back on corporate claims that U.S. taxes are too high, citing a White House study that found companies’ contribution to government tax revenue had dropped from $3 out of every $10 in the 1950s to $1 out of every $10 today.
“Only one problem with the over-taxation story: It’s not true,” she said. “There is a problem with the corporate tax code, but that isn’t it. It’s not that taxes are far too high for giant corporations, as the lobbyists claim. No, the problem is that the revenue generated from corporate taxes is far too low.”
For example, a recent analysis by the coalition Americans for Tax Fairness showed that drug giant Pfizer, in a bid to justify a Big Pharma mega-merger that would allow it to dodge taxes through what’s known as a corporate inversion, had dramatically overstated its corporate tax rates and was in fact paying just a fraction of what it claimed.
As Common Dreams has previously reported, America’s Fortune 500 companies are notorious for “playing by different rules” when it comes to the federal tax system—adept at manipulating that system to avoid paying even a dime in tax on billions of dollars in U.S. profits.
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The Huffington Post reports: “With Washington enamored by the idea of reforming the U.S. tax code in a bid to jump-start economic growth—a top priority of business interests—Warren’s proposal represents one of the few offered to date by a top elected official that would significantly increase corporations’ tax bills.”
Meanwhile, the Wall Street Journal suggested that Warren’s entry into the debate “may put pressure on Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton to either side with her or with Mr. Obama.”
As Politico reports, Clinton “has supported higher corporate taxes, but has mentioned the subject little yet on the campaign trail during this presidential run…Bernie Sanders, Clinton’s closest competitor for the Democratic nomination, has been more vocal about collecting more money from corporations.”
In the end, Warren said, “what this tax battle is really about” is fairness.
“Who does this country work for?” she declared. “Is it just for the rich and the powerful, those who can hire those armies of lobbyists and lawyers? Or can we make this country work for millions of hard-working people?”
“This isn’t a fair fight,” she concluded. “The corporate giants are lined up to make sure tax changes tilt their way. America’s working families don’t have a zillion-dollar PR team to counter the false claim that corporate taxes are too high. Small businesses don’t have a zillion-dollar lobbying organization to fight back against tax giveaways for giant corporations.”
Watch the full speech below:
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Shows of unity and community-led vigils organized by Planned Parenthood and their allies are being held nationwide on Saturday in response to recent high-profile massacres as well as the broader cultural crisis that matches the unchecked proliferation of guns and the epidemic of mass shootings with the ways in which hateful rhetoric aimed at specific groups of people is infecting life in the United States.
Tweets about #solidarity OR #StandWithPP
A week ago Friday, a lone gunman, identified as Robert Dear, is suspected of being the person who shot and killed three people at a Planned Parenthood clinic in Colorado Springs, Colorado. And this week, fourteen people were murdered during an employee holiday party in the town of San Bernadino, California. The husband and wife couple who carried out those murders, Syed Rizwan Farook and Tashfeen Malik, were later killed by police officers during a shootout.
“Our thoughts and prayers are with the victims of these terrible tragedies, and we are resolved to stop this from happening again,” said Dawn Laguens, executive vice president of Planned Parenthood Federation of America. “It’s not enough to denounce the tragedy without also denouncing the poisonous rhetoric that fueled it. Instead, some politicians are continuing to stoke it, which is unconscionable — going so far as to try and pass legislation further blocking access to health care just days after the tragedy in Colorado Springs.”
As it urged people to rally together in solidarity in their communities nationwide on Saturday, Planned Parenthood Action said on its website that one of the keys lessons of the tragedy in Colorado is that words matter and hateful rhetoric does, in fact, fuel violence. “We are calling for an end to the inflammatory rhetoric that has vilified and fueled attacks not only against Planned Parenthood and abortion providers, but also against Black, immigrant, refugee, and LGBTQ communities,” the group said.
At an event in Colorado honoring the three victims who lost their lives in the clinic shooting—35-year-old mother Jennifer Yurie Ah King Markovsky; 29-year-old father Ke’Arre Stewart; and 44-year-old police officer and father Garret Swasey—Cecile Richards, the president of Planned Parenthood, spoke out against the recent violence and its hateful source. “Enough is enough,” Richards said.
Offering his support on Saturrday, presidential candidate Sen. Bernie Sanders tweeted, “In these difficult times, against vitriolic Republican rhetoric, we must protect a woman’s right to choose.”
Hillary Clinton, also running for president, showed her commitment to the cause by stating, “Women deserve access to the health care they need—without interference, intimidation, or violence.”
Meanwhile, in its statement, the ACLU expressed solidarity with Planned Parenthood and all those defending the rights of women to safely access—and providers to safely provide—abortion and other healthcare services.
“Today,” said executive director Anthony Romero, “the ACLU joins Planned Parenthood and a number of other organizations in a National Day of Solidarity to stand up against violence against our communities. It’s time for us to fight back against the violence and hateful rhetoric against abortion providers, immigrants, refugees, Muslims, the transgender community, the Black community and others. Enough is enough. Please join us in standing up for American values and protesting discrimination and prejudice.”
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A U.S. military attack that killed nearly a dozen Iraqi soldier allies was a “mistake,” Defense Secretary Ash Carter admitted on Saturday.
“These kinds of things happen when you’re fighting side by side as we are,” Carter told reporters of Friday’s airstrike near Falluja, which killed an estimated 10 people.
One U.S. military official told CBS that the attack was reportedly made in coordination with Iraqi forces, and that bad weather could have been a factor in the accident. “The folks on the ground who we were communicating with were closer to the targeting area than we understood,” the official said.
Calls for Michigan Governor Rick Snyder’s ouster—and arrest—are growing after internal emails showed that his high-level staffers were aware of lead poisoning in Flint’s public water supply six months before the administration declared a state of emergency.
According to the newly-released emails, which were obtained by NBC News, Snyder’s chief of staff at the time, Dennis Muchmore, wrote to an unnamed high-level health department staffer: “I’m frustrated by the water issue in Flint.”
“These folks are scared and worried about the health impacts and they are basically getting blown off by us (as a state we’re just not sympathizing with their plight),” Muchmore wrote in the email, according to journalists Stephanie Gosk, Kevin Monahan, Tim Sandler and Hannah Rappleye.
“I really don’t think people are getting the benefit of the doubt,” wrote Muchmore. “Now they are concerned and rightfully so about the lead level studies they are receiving.”
But it was not until this week that Snyder declared a state of emergency, following in the footsteps of the city’s mayor. “The health and welfare of Flint residents is a top priority and we’re committed to a coordinated approach with resources from state agencies to address all aspects of this situation,” Snyder said on Tuesday.
Following the resignation of Michigan’s top environmental official, as well as sustained community demands, the Department of Justice announced this week it is launching an investigation into the water crisis.
Many hold Snyder directly culpable for the emergency itself, and note his role in the Detroit water crisis.
“The source of the Flint Water Crisis leads directly to Gov. Rick Snyder and the fiscal austerity policies that he and his Republican colleagues have been pushing for years on Michigan residents,” said Lonnie Scott, executive director of Progress Michigan,” in a statement released Thursday. “Families in Flint were forced to drink lead-tainted water while the administration scoffed at their concerns and cries for help. An entire generation of Michiganders now face an uncertain future because of Republican cuts to essential and life-giving services.”
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The Republican governor appointed Flint emergency manager Darnell Earley who enforced the April 2014 decision to switch from the Detroit system to the Flint River to source water. In an angry letter to Snyder, filmmaker and Flint native Michael Moore wrote:
Moore, in fact, is circulating a petition calling on U.S. Attorney General Loretta Lynch to arrest Snyder for “corruption and assault.”
While Flint returned to the Detroit water system in October following public concern, the wide-spread lead poisoning can not be undone. According to the World Health Organization, “Young children are particularly vulnerable to the toxic effects of lead and can suffer profound and permanent adverse health effects, particularly affecting the development of the brain and nervous system.”
And there are already signs damage has been done. A study released in September by researchers at the nearby Hurley Children’s Hospital identified a “rise in blood lead levels of children less than 5 years old” living within two Flint Zip codes since the city began sourcing drinking water from the Flint River.
In a municipality that is 56 percent black and, according to the latest U.S. Census, one of the poorest cities in the country, community coalitions including “Water You Fighting For” charge that profound injustices lie at the root of the current crisis. As Moore noted, “To poison all the children in an historic American city is no small feat.”
Updates and commentary are being posted to Twitter:
#ArrestGovSnyder Tweets
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Illinois Gov. Bruce Rauner has been accused of “doubling down and holding Illinois citizens hostage with his austerity agenda” following his backing of Republican plan for a state takeover of the Chicago Public Schools.
With the move, unveiled on Wednesday, Rauner “launched a years-in-the-making all-out assault on the Chicago Teachers Union,” the Chicago Tribune reports, while Politico describes the school system as “the latest laboratory for an ambitious Midwestern governor trying push his anti-union agenda.”
Senate GOP Leader Christine Radogno defended the measure as a “lifeline” for a school system with an “abysmal” track record.
As WTTW reports, the proposal would allow for CPS, which faces a $500 million cash shortage, to declare bankruptcy. It would also allow, the Tribune adds, “the governor’s hand-picked State Board of Education chief to replace the mayor’s appointed school board until the district’s finances were deemed fixed. The state panel would have the power to negotiate a new teachers’ contract if none is reached in current talks, or oversee a union contract that could be broken if the district filed for bankruptcy.”
WBEZ adds:
Among the proposal’s critics—who also include embattled Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel and the CTU—is House Speaker Michael Madigan, who pointed to failures in another city which stripped local control away with the appointment of an emergency manager. “The disaster in Flint, Michigan, is a very timely example of how reckless decisions just to save a buck can have devastating consequences on children and families.”
“Republicans’ ultimate plans include allowing cities throughout the state to file for bankruptcy protection, which they admitted today would permit cities and school districts to end their contracts with teachers and workers—stripping thousands of their hard-earned retirement security and the middle-class living they have worked years to achieve,” Madigan’s statement added.
Ben Joravsky argues at the Chicago Reader that the plan is “a blatant attempt to use bankruptcy laws as a pretext to reward friends and punish enemies.”
That’s because “the governor, having declared CPS bankrupt, would get to preserve the contracts that enrich his pals—like the borrowing deals that pay outrageously high interest to bankers, while ripping up the contracts that benefit his enemies, like Chicago’s teachers,” Joravsky writes.
The plan was also swiftly denounced by the CTU in a statement issued Wednesday.
“This, and the governor’s agenda on a whole, is the reincarnation of the GOP-sponsored 1995 Amendatory Act that narrowed workers’ rights in CPS, muted parent voice and action, and cleared the way for the proliferation of private entities to siphon off public dollars for personal gain. This previous piece of legislation, the result of a Republican-controlled legislature and governor colluding with a Chicago mayor, left our district with mayoral control, unprecedented pension holidays and unchecked charter proliferation.
“Now,” their statement adds, “instead of rejecting failed policy, the governor is doubling down and holding Illinois citizens hostage with his austerity agenda, which is why we continue to call for a tax on millionaires and the wealthy, for big banks to return money stole through toxic swap deals, and for a tax increment financing (TIF) surplus declared immediately.”
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A new review of four decades of science has come to this conclusion: organic agriculture has a key role to play in feeding the world.
To analyze the body of research, author John Reganold, Regents Professor of Soil Science and Agroecology at Washington State University, and doctoral candidate Jonathan Wachter compared conventional and organic farming using the metrics of productivity, environmental impact, economic viability, and social well-being.
“Thirty years ago, there were just a couple handfuls of studies comparing organic agriculture with conventional. In the last 15 years, these kinds of studies have skyrocketed,” Reganold said.
In terms of productivity, they found that organic yields averaged 10 to 20 percent less than conventional—but that’s not always the case.
“In severe drought conditions, which are expected to increase with climate change, organic farms have the potential to produce high yields because of the higher water-holding capacity of organically farmed soils,” Reganold said.
Furthermore, as food system reform advocates like Food First’s Eric Holt Gimenez have said, there’s already more than enough food being produced for the world—low yields are not the root of hunger.
“If you look at calorie production per capita we’re producing more than enough food for 7 billion people now, but we waste 30 to 40 percent of it,” Reganold said. “It’s not just a matter of producing enough, but making agriculture environmentally friendly and making sure that food gets to those who need it.”
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On environmental impact, organic agriculture, which now accounts for one percent of global agricultural land, is the winner, as it supports more biodiversity, creates less water pollution and greenhouse gases, and is more energy efficient. On top of that, organically managed soils can hold more carbon and can reduce erosion.
Comparing the two using the economic metric, organic is the winner again, because consumers are willing to pay more. And while both approaches have drawbacks in terms of the social well-being metric, organic still has the edge because of less exposure to chemicals for communities and farm workers.
Still, Reganold and Wachter write that “no single approach will safely feed the planet. Rather, a blend of organic and other innovative farming systems is needed.”
But to make that happen, policy changes are needed. Reganold explains in a Union of Concerned Scientists blog post:
The new study was published online Wednesday in the journal Nature Plants.
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The suicide rate among active-duty service members increased in 2019, the Pentagon said Thursday, adding to fears that feelings of isolation due to the coronavirus may push those figures higher.
The Defense Department’s second annual report on suicide found there were 342 active-duty suicides last year, a rate of 25.9 per 100,000 service members. The previous year the rate was 24.8, and before that it was 21.9.
Suicide rates in the National Guard and Reserve remained stable in 2019.
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Overall, 498 service members died by suicide last year.
The report comes as the Army worries about the increase in suicides since March, when many people were told to stay home due to COVID-19 and the Pentagon began to limit movement of forces.
The Associated Press first reported that military suicide deaths since early spring were up as much as 20 percent compared with the same period in 2019.
Among Army active-duty troops, that increase was around 30 percent, with 114 suicides as of Aug. 31, compared to 88 last year.
Suicides peaked in July with 35, CNN found.
Following the report’s release, Army Secretary Ryan McCarthyRyan McCarthyOVERNIGHT DEFENSE: Suicide rate among active troops rises | Armed Services head predicts budget fight Suicide rate among active duty troops increases as COVID-19 raises new fears Overnight Defense: Trump’s battle with Pentagon poses risks in November | Lawmakers launch Fort Hood probe | Military members can’t opt out of tax deferral MORE and Army Chief of Staff Gen. James McConville said in a statement that the service is working to improve access to behavioral health care “in the face of additional stress of a pandemic.”
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When asked if COVID-19 is affecting military suicides, Defense Suicide Prevention Office Director Karen Orvis said it was too early to tell.
“The department is closely monitoring the potential impacts of the pandemic on death by suicide within the military population,” she said. “Caution should be used when examining changes in suicide counts across time, as counts do not account for changes in population size or provide enough time for essential investigations to determine cause of death.”
Overall, enlisted men under the age of 30 are of greatest concern, as they accounted for about 61 percent of all suicides last year, Orvis said.
Personally owned firearms, not military issued weapons, were the primary cause of death, she said.