‘‘Those at the highest levels of government must stop invoking fear, using racist language, and encouraging reprehensible behavior,’’ he said at the National Press Club. ‘‘As a country, we finally must say that enough is enough. That we are done with the hateful rhetoric. That we are done with the mass shootings. That we are done with the white supremacists, domestic terrorists who are terrorizing our country and fighting against everything America stands for.’’

In his first major speech in the nearly two weeks since President Trump called his Baltimore district a ‘‘rat and rodent infested mess’’ where ‘‘no human being would want to live,’’ Cummings did not directly address the comments but called for decency.


Cummings repeated his invitation for Trump to visit his congressional district, which includes parts of Baltimore as well as Baltimore and Howard counties, where ‘‘the richest of the rich live.’’

Cummings said the state of the nation inspired a conversation with his 10-year-old niece over the weekend.

“Uncle Elijah, are they going to put us in cages?” he said she asked. ‘‘Are they going to put is in cages?’’ he repeated. ‘‘That’s coming from a 10-year-old. We are better than that!’’

Washington Post

Archbishop raps Trump, then regrets singling him out

Archbishop Gustavo Garcia-Siller of San Antonio, one of the nation’s highest-ranking Mexican American Catholic leaders, was in shock Saturday when he heard about the shooting in El Paso that killed at least 22. He said there was ‘‘no justifiable explanation for such scenes of horror.’’

But what was clear to the archbishop, who recently supported migrants and asylum seekers, was that President Trump’s ‘‘invasion’’ rhetoric against Hispanics, language echoed in a manifesto police believe was posted by the alleged gunman, helped create a climate that led to the tragedy.


He said on Twitter that Trump — a very weak and ‘‘poor man’’ — had caused ‘‘Too much damage already’’ and his rhetoric had ‘‘destroyed’’ lives. Pleading for gun control so that more lives would not be ‘‘wasted in vain,’’ Garcia-Siller had another request for Trump:

‘‘President stop hate and racism, starting with yourself.’’

On Tuesday, Garcia-Siller, who deleted his tweets mentioning the president earlier in the day, apologized for singling out Trump, but maintained that hateful rhetoric and the violence that comes from it must be extinguished. ‘‘I regret that my recent Tweet remarks were not focused on the issues but on an individual,’’ he said in a video posted to Facebook.

Washington post

Warren seeks overhaul of government’s farm subsidies

Democratic presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren proposed a complete overhaul of the government subsidies for farmers, replacing the system with what she called a supply management system. The plan comes as the 2020 Democratic field descends on Iowa for an annual state fair in the first presidential-contest state.

The Massachusetts senator proposed replacing the $10 billion subsidies system with one under which the government would offer to buy products in the form of a loan until farmers are able to secure better prices from private purchasers. The government would store the products in reserves and would release the supply in and out of the market to stabilize consumer prices and farmers’ incomes.

‘‘By making this shift, we can raise farm incomes and reduce taxpayer expenditures,’’ Warren wrote in a Medium blog post. ‘‘We can break the stranglehold that giant agribusinesses have over our farm economy.”


To address overproduction, farmers could bid land into conservation programs and out of production. The USDA would issue payouts based on the environmental benefit the land could provide.

Warren is beginning a four-day swing through Iowa, where farmers have been suffering as a result of falling commodity prices, losses from flooding, and President Trump’s trade war with China.

Bloomberg news