The Schild und Schwert Festival [Shield and Sword Festival] took place over the weekend in the town of Ostritz in Saxony. Ahead of the event, a court in Dresden, east Germany, imposed a ban on the sale of alcohol and possession of alcohol in order to prevent violence erupting, Deutsche Welle reported.
On Friday [June 21], the day the festival began, Saxony Police revealed that they had confiscated Around 4,200 liters (1,109 gallons) of beer from the white supremacists attending the event, with a further 200 liters also seized on the Saturday. The force continually tweeted images of their officers seizing alcohol during the festival.
“The alcohol ban at the meeting/event site of the Neo-Nazi meeting in Ostritz has been consistently enforced by our forces since yesterday,” the force tweeted on June 22. “Alcoholic beverages are taken off before entering the premises.”
Predicting that some neo-Nazis would attempt to purchase more alcohol once they were at Ostritz, local residents took it upon themselves to stock up on hundreds of crates of beer from a local store.
“The plan was devised a week in advance. We wanted to dry the Nazis out,” Ostritz activist, Georg Salditt, told the Bild newspaper (via BBC). “We thought, if an alcohol ban is coming, we’ll empty the shelves at the Penny [supermarket].”
On the same weekend as the music festival were two counter-protests in the town, as well as a Peace Festival commemorating the 100th anniversary of the local soccer team.
Michael Kretschmer, Saxony’s state premier, praised the initiative of the locals and the demonstrations against the neo-Nazis. “I am very impressed with how in such a small town…the citizens stand up to make it clear that right-wing extremists are not wanted here,” Kretschmer told the DPA news agency.
Around 600 people are reported to have attended the neo-Nazi festival, with numbers dropping slightly by the second night.
In total, police said they dealt with 32 crimes over the weekend, including 16 violations of assembly law and 10 people allegedly displaying anti-constitutional organizations.
A 33-year-old bassist from a right-wing band playing at the festival was also arrested after changing into a balaclava mid-way through his performance, an offence under the country’s anti-mask laws which prevent people from covering their faces in public.
Context: The Hatch Act bars federal employees from engaging in political activity that could influence the results of an election while operating in their official capacity. The Office of Special Counsel, a civil service watchdog, determined earlier this month that Conway violated the Hatch Act by “disparaging Democratic presidential candidates while speaking in an official capacity during television interviews and on social media,” and recommended she be removed from office.
What they’re saying:
Following the release of the OSC report, House Oversight Chairman Elijah Cummings said in a statement: “Trump should terminate Ms. Conway’s employment immediately in light of these dozens of violations of federal law. Allowing Ms. Conway to continue her position of trust at the White House would demonstrate that the President is not interested in following the law.”
The White House, meanwhile, has dismissed the allegations: “OSC’s draft report is based on multiple fundamental legal and factual errors, makes unfair and unsupported claims against a close adviser to the president, is the product of a blatantly unfair process that ignored statutory notice requirements, and has been influenced by various inappropriate considerations.”
The big picture: Conway would be the fourth current or former White House official to be subpoenaed by a Democratic committee in 2019. The others are former White House counsel Don McGahn, former deputy counsel Annie Donaldson and former communications director Hope Hicks.
The comedic timing of this strip fits the tone of the show perfectly, right down to Stan putting a quarter in the meter after ramming it through the wall.
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A jaguar cools off in the pool of the Bordeaux-
Pessac Zoo in Pessac, south-western France,
during an ongoing heatwave across Europe
Photograph: Mehdi Fedouach/AFP/Getty Images. #zoo #animals #jaguar #france #Europe #PessacZoo https://www.instagram.com/p/BzRJ6ezApWg/?igshid=18vkbmksd6f6f
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