CDC pleads with Americans to stay home on Thanksgiving
‘The safest way to celebrate Thanksgiving this year is at home with members of your household,’ said the leader of a CDC task force. An estimated 55 million Americans had planned to travel for the holiday, according to AAA Travel.
Faced with a seemingly unstoppable surge in coronavirus infections, officials at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on Thursday urged Americans to avoid travel for Thanksgiving and to celebrate only with members of their immediate households — a message sharply at odds with a White House eager to downplay the threat.
The plea, delivered at the first CDC news briefing in months, arrived as many Americans were packing their bags for one of the most heavily traveled weeks of the year. It is the first time that the agency has warned people away from traditional holiday celebrations.
“The safest way to celebrate Thanksgiving this year is at home with members of your household,” said Erin Sauber-Schatz, who leads the agency’s community intervention and critical population task force. She urged Americans to reassess plans for the coming week.
longer lives there. MiamiDade state prosecutors recently launched an investigation into his candidacy, sources with knowledge of the investigation told the Miami Herald.
When asked about the pending investigation and why the Palmetto Bay address was listed on his sworn candidate-qualifying documents, he referred all questions to Miami attorney William Barzee. Barzee confirmed to a reporter that he had been retained by Rodriguez but declined to discuss the details of the case.
As part of their probe, Miami-Dade prosecutors could review several key sworn documents that
Alex Rodriguez provided to the Florida Division of Elections, including a candidate-oath form and a financial-disclosure form.
In Florida, candidates must sign an oath that lists their residency, but the oath doesn’t cite the penalties for lying, and no one actively checks to make sure candidates are qualified to run for a given office.
The county supervisors of election don’t play a role in enforcing the rule, as their offices are “ministerial, not investigative,” deputy Miami-Dade County elections supervisor
Suzy Trutie said this week.
Complaints of possible fraud should instead be directed to the MiamiDade State Attorney’s Office, the Miami-Dade Commission on Ethics and Public Trust or the Florida Elections Commission.
Questions have also been raised about his ties to the Republican Party.
Rodriguez was a registered Republican when he voted in the 2018 midterm elections and changed his status to no-party affiliation in June, the same month that he qualified to run in the 2020 election.
Florida law requires any candidate who is seeking the nomination of any political party to be a registered member of such political party for at least one year before the general election takes place.
Alex Rodriguez, however, did not run as a partisan candidate. He filed as a no-party candidate, which means the absence of a party.
In a video message shortly after conceding the race, the incumbent Democrat, Jose Javier Rodrí
guez, expressed alarm at the influence that the third candidate had on the outcome of the race and called for an investigation.
“Democracy requires transparency,” Rodríguez said in the video. “In order to achieve that, I believe this election requires a full investigation so that those who may have violated the law are held to account and so that such tactics are not used in future elections.”
WHISPERS IN THE NEIGHBORHOOD
The story behind Rodriguez’s candidacy is filled with unanswered questions and contradictions, and those close to him have taken note of the secrecy surrounding his purported political aspirations.
When his candidacy came to light in October news reports, his neighbors were curious.
One of his neighbors said he asked him about the campaign and Rodriguez responded: “No, that’s not me. There are a lot of people named Rodriguez.”
When asked about it again, Rodriguez changed his story.
“Later, he said he didn’t mean to cause any trouble,” said Richard Ogden, 75.
Another neighbor, who asked not to be named, said Rodriguez first told him the news articles were not about him but later said, “I’m not really running.”
Rodriguez’s next-door neighbor, 47-year-old George Jisko, laughed when a reporter asked him about his neighbor’s aspirations.
“We talk about girls, we talk about football and the Miami Dolphins,” said Jisko, who travels from the Czech Republic to spend winters in Boca Raton. “I didn’t know he was a politician in Miami.”