Up First from NPR - Maui Recovery, Georgia Election Interference, Alabama Redistricting

Episode Date: August 14, 2023

Recovery continues in Maui after America's deadliest fire in more than 100 years. Georgia prosecutors to present evidence in election interference case. A federal court reviews Alabama's new congressional map.Want more comprehensive analysis of the most important news of the day, plus a little fun? Subscribe to the Up First newsletter.Today's episode of Up First was edited by Krishnadev Calamur, Kevin Drew, Ally Schweitzer, Ben Swayse, and Allison Woelfle. It was produced by Mansee Khurana, Claire Murashima, and Lilly Quiroz. Our technical director is Zac Coleman, with engineering support from Carleigh Strange.Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoicesNPR Privacy Policy

At least 96 people are dead and a city is destroyed by the country's deadliest fire in a hundred years. I've never seen this before. How does Lahaina recover? I'm Steve Inskeep with Leila Fadl and this is Up First from NPR News. Remember this phone call? I just want to find 11,780 votes. It's at the center of a case that a Georgia grand jury hears this week. Does it mean a fourth indictment for Donald Trump? And judges are reviewing Alabama's new congressional map

after it couldn't get the U.S. Supreme Court to further weaken the Voting Rights Act. They'll decide whether this new map actually represents Black voters fairly. Stay with us. We've got the news. You need to start your day. This message comes from NPR sponsor Organic Valley, a co-op of small organic family farms. Farmer Tyler Webb shares what being a steward of his land means to him. When I think of land stewardship, it's taking the opportunity to like slowly walk through your farm. To listen. To look for ways to work in harmony with our environment, with our ecosystem. Discover Organic Valley Dairy at ov.coop slash ethically sourced.

Now, our change will honor 100 years of the Royal Canadian Air Force and their dedicated service to communities at home and abroad. From the skies to our change, this $2 commemorative circulation coin marks their storied past and promising future. Find the limited edition Royal Canadian Air Force $2 coin today. The death toll from Maui's wildfires is now at 96 people and rising. That's one of the numbers that gives a sense of the scale of this disaster. And here's another. 2,700 homes and buildings were destroyed. The community of Lahaina was at the center of the destruction,

and access to the burned area has been limited. Until now, NPR's team in Maui got a look at the damage for the first time. And NPR's Lauren Summer is there now. Good morning, Lauren. Good morning. So we just recounted the death toll, the physical damage from these wildfires, the country's deadliest in the last century, but you're there. Describe for me what that looks like, feels like. Yeah, one of the first things that hits you is just the smell. I mean, walking around, there's a charred smell that kind of burns your nose. And it's fair to say that most of Lahaina itself is raised to the ground. I mean, producer Janaki

Mehta and I drove just above Front Street, which is the heart of the downtown, and the buildings are gone. We saw burned out cars, downed power lines. It's clear that this fire burned extremely fast and hot. It was fueled by those extreme winds. And the hills around town that didn't burn are still covered in dry grass, you know, about knee high. So it's clear there was a lot of flammable material. So for those people who did survive, so much is lost. How are they holding up? Is there power, water? Right. There's a number of centers around where residents are gathering to get supplies. We visited one where residents can get a hot meal. You know, there were stacks of bulk goods, bottled water, diapers, bags of dog food.

We talked to folks who said the supply has gotten better in the last few days, in part because there's been a network of volunteers, you know, caravanning supplies up here. But there are still neighborhoods without power or drinkable water. At this point, are people able to go back and assess the damage on their homes, their property? Yeah, we met one resident who lost his home, Chris Arnold. He and his family, including five puppies, escaped the fire with just minutes to spare. He said there were embers raining down on them as they left. Their neighborhood is still barricaded, but one of his kids returned to look through the remains of their house. He actually showed us a picture on his phone of what they found. It was

an urn with the ashes of his oldest son who passed away and a piece of pottery that he made. Yeah, it meant everything in the world and to his mom, especially that being her favorite piece and the urns the ashes which we thought were all gone oh my gosh being able to recover that for themselves out of the ashes of this fire this is just the start of what will be a long recovery for so many people what do people need as they shift from trying to survive to trying to move forward i think a big question is just how fast this community can rebuild, right, and come back together. Arnold actually works in the insurance industry,

and he's concerned that people won't know what they're entitled to from insurance companies. With the amount of time that it's going to take to rebuild this town and the planning, there's going to be a couple years most people's insurance policies aren't going to cover additional living expenses for a couple years, so we need a couple of years. Most people's insurance policies aren't going to cover additional living expenses for a couple of years. So we need a lot of help. You know, we were actually talking to Arnold on the road above town. The sun was setting. It was just this bright orange sky over the gray rubble below us. And when it got dark, it was black because there were no lights from the buildings below anymore. That's, I've never seen this before.

You know, but Arnold did spot a few lights below. He called it a few sparkles of light. And, you know, I think that glimpse is what's keeping people going. That's NPR's Lauren Sommer in Lahaina. Lauren, thank you. I'm sure we'll be hearing from you more in the days ahead. Yeah, thanks so much. Today, a grand jury meets to consider a case of election interference in Georgia. Fulton County District Attorney Fawny Willis is said to be considering charges against more than a dozen people, one of whom is Donald Trump, who tried to stay in office after his election defeat in 2020. Some of his most blatant efforts centered

on Georgia, where Trump urged officials to, quote, find enough extra votes for him to win the state by exactly one vote. If the grand jury indicts him, it would be the fourth criminal case against the ex-president. Joining us now is Georgia Public Broadcasting's Stephen Fowler, who has been following the grand jury process. Good morning. Good morning. So, Stephen, what do we know about the likely timing of a grand jury decision in Georgia? Well, people have been anticipating this decision for a while.

This is the end of a two-week period the district attorney flagged as times where staff would work remotely, judges wouldn't schedule trials, and the courthouse is under extra security, even removing chairs in some public waiting areas, along with barricades, street closures, and a crush of TV cameras camped outside waiting for action. So how do we know it's in the next 48 hours? Well, there are two separate grand juries that meet, one on Mondays and Tuesdays, one on Thursdays and Fridays. Some witnesses, like Georgia's former Lieutenant Governor Jeff Duncan, said they're testifying behind closed doors on Tuesday, meaning prosecutors should start presenting their case today. Plus, Willis has presented complicated racketeering cases like this before, and it's taken about two days to get through because of the sheer number of people and alleged crimes that are included. So when you say racketeering, for me that evokes images of the mafia and other

large criminal enterprises. How would this apply to the failed effort to overturn Georgia's elections? Good question. Georgia's Racketeer, Influenced, and Corrupt Organizations Act is similar to the federal act that was designed to go after organized crime. There's a narrow list of these things called predicate acts that show a pattern of racketeering activity. That's things like theft, homicide, and kidnapping, but also actions like witness intimidation, false statements, and forgery that can lead to a RICO violation, that could apply here. And Georgia law is more expansive than federal law, meaning attempting, asking, or intimidating someone to do one of those activities can also get you charged. So instead of multiple charges against multiple people and multiple trials independently, RICO allows the DA to paint

this broad narrative and show how things are connected and create this criminal enterprise narrative, in this case, that hinges around Donald Trump pressuring officials to fraudulently subvert election results. So remind us, what are some of the plot points in the aftermath of 2020 that prosecutors could argue broke the law? Well, there are a few main buckets based on public court documents and the work of a previous special investigative jury, Layla. We've got hearings where Trump allies falsely told lawmakers they could pick their own presidential electors, a plan that saw 16 Republicans falsely claim to be the state's official electors, the effort to unlawfully copy election data from a rural Georgia county, and a pressure campaign against sitting officials

to change the outcome, including the infamous call between Trump and Georgia's Republican Secretary of State, Brad Raffensperger, where the then president said this. So, look, all I want to do is this. I just want to find 11,780 votes, which is one more than we have, because we won the state. There are a lot of things that happen in the months after 2020, and we should know more later this week. Georgia Public Broadcasting's Stephen Fowler. Thank you, Stephen. Thank you. A court hearing that begins today could help determine which party controls Congress after next year's election. Federal judges are reviewing whether Alabama's Republican-controlled legislature diluted the power of black voters with a new congressional map. From a state legislature that is persistent,

this case follows Alabama's failed effort to persuade the Supreme Court to further weaken the landmark Voting Rights Act. NPR's Hansi Lo Wong has been covering this story and joins us now. Good morning. Good morning. So remind us what Alabama's congressional map has to do with voting rights of Black people. Well, the map Alabama used for last year's midterm elections, a panel of three federal judges ruled that map needs to be replaced to get in line with Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act. The judges said Alabama needs to increase the number of voting districts where Black voters have a realistic opportunity to elect their preferred U.S. House candidates. Instead of one, there should be two of those opportunity districts, the judges said.

And this week's hearing is focusing on the new map passed by the Republican-controlled legislature just last month. It has one district where Black Alabamians who are old enough to vote make up just over 50% of eligible voters and another district that's about 40% Black. Okay, so one district that's just over 50% Black, another that's about 40% Black. Okay, so one district that's just over 50% Black, another that's about 40%. How's the court likely to view that? Likely not well, because the ruling by the three-judge panel, which I should note was upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court, says because voting in Alabama is so racially polarized, if you want to have two opportunity districts for black voters, they will need to be two districts where black eligible voters make up the majority or something quite close to it. And about 40 percent is not close enough based on what the court has found earlier in this case.

So does that earlier ruling then give us a preview to how the court might rule this time? Yes, very likely so. You know, I've been following court filings before the hearing, and they show this three-judge panel is probably going to strike down this latest map. And these judges will likely assign experts appointed by the court to draw a new map instead. And you know what's unusual is that Alabama said it's not planning to bring any evidence or try to make any arguments that the legislature's map has two districts that are in line with the court's order. You know, it's instead it's been signaling that it's planning to appeal this case and try to get it back in front of the U.S. Supreme Court. OK, but hasn't the Supreme Court already ruled on this case?

It has. And it basically said the lower court's ruling is right. But Alabama Republicans seem to think their new map can maybe flip at least one justice's vote to get a different ruling from the Supreme Court. But, you know, I've been talking to voting rights experts and they think this is really unlikely to happen. You know, I talked to Peyton McCrary, a former historian in the Justice Department's Civil Rights Division, who now teaches at the George Washington University. And the way McCrary sees it, what Alabama is doing here is continuing a long history of the state just looking for every possible way not to follow a federal court's order when it comes to the voting rights of people of color. Alabama has been wasting people's time for decades trying to do things that are unlikely to prevail.

And it's doing so yet again. OK, so whatever this new voting map in Alabama ends up looking like, it will have a big impact on the next Congress, right? Yeah. We're talking about majority black districts that are likely to vote for Democratic candidates. So Alabama could end up with two Democrats in the U.S. House. And there could be more Democratic pickups in House races in Louisiana and Georgia, depending on how similar redistricting lawsuits in those states pan out. NPR's Hansi Lo Wang, thank you. You're welcome. And that's Up First for Monday, August 14th. I'm Leila Faldin.

And I'm Steve Inskeep. Up First is produced by Masi Khurana and Claire Murashima. Our editors are Krishna Dev Kalimer, Kevin Drew, Ali Schweitzer, Ben Swayze, and Alice Wolfley. Our director is Lily Quiroz. Our technical director is Zach Coleman with engineering help from Carly Strange. Join us tomorrow.

And thanks for listening to Up First. You can find more in-depth coverage of the stories we talked about today and much more on NPR's Morning Edition. That's the radio show I host with Stephen Skeap, Michelle Martin, and A. Martinez. Find Morning Edition and your NPR stations at stations.npr.org or turn on your radio.