Ballot Battle: Senate Republicans not only blocked the voting rights bill passed by the House, they also prevented any debate about it.

  All 50 Democrats supported the bill called the “For the People Act,” including West Virginia’s fence-straddling Joe Manchin, but it requires 60 votes to escape a Republican filibuster. So it died.

  “In the fight for voting rights, this vote was the starting gun, not the finish line,” said Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer of New York. “We will not let it go. We will not let it die. This voter suppression cannot stand.”

  The bill was intended to protect voting rights as Republican-led states impose new restrictions that civil rights groups fear will suppress the vote for minorities and non-Republicans. The bill included tough new ethics rules and an end to partisan gerrymandering of congressional districts to favor a state’s majority party. The act would also expand early voting, make Election Day a federal holiday, and make it easier to vote by mail.

  Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell on the floor yesterday described the voting bill as “The Democrats’ transparently partisan plan to tilt every election in America permanently in their favor.”

  President Biden wrote on Twitter, “We can’t sit idly by while democracy is in peril — here, in America.” He said, “We need to protect the sacred right to vote and ensure ‘We the People’ choose our leaders, the very foundation on which our democracy rests.”

  As the Republicans blocked the voting rights bill and state legislatures curb voting, one of the biggest Democratic super PACs has announced that it plans to inject $20 million into voting rights initiatives ahead of the 2022 election cycle. 

  Priorities USA says it will deploy digital voter information campaigns to help people steer their way around voting restrictions passed into law by Republicans in at least 16 states. The target is primarily black and Latino voters in campaigns that will also provide voting tools like text message reminders to register to vote or request an absentee ballot.

Viral News: As many as 150 million Americans have been fully vaccinated against Covid-19, but the US will fall short of President Biden’s goal of vaccinating 70 percent of adults by the 4^th of July, the White House admits.

  Seventy percent of Americans age 30 and up have already received at least one shot. And a total of at least 177.3 million people have had a shot.

  As of this morning, 602,465 Americans are dead of Covid-19. The people dying are “overwhelmingly” unvaccinated, Dr. Anthony Fauci told CNN’s Jake Tapper. He said, “The thing that’s so painful, Jake, as a physician, a scientist and a public health person that I am, is that that’s entirely avoidable.” 

Get a Lawyer: New York prosecutors are climbing the rungs of the Trump organization toward a possible indictment of the former President.

  They have advised Trump’s former bodyguard Matthew Calamari, who’s now the chief operating officer, his son Matthew Jr., the current chief of security, that they should get their own lawyers outside the Trump organization. The Calamaris are suspected of not reporting benefits of employment on their income taxes, including housing and cars.

  The focus of the investigation is on the suspicion that Trump lied about the value of his properties to get loans and lower taxes. Matthew Calamari is suspected of knowing something about that, as is Trump’s chief financial officer, Allen Weisselberg, who is reported to be uncooperative with investigators. 

  Matthew Calamari joined the company as a bodyguard in 1981. His son joined the security team in 2011, the same year he graduated from high school.  

  The Calamaris have lived rent-free in Trump luxury apartment buildings. Calamari Jr., said in a 2018 divorce deposition that “it was a corporate apartment, so we didn’t have rent.”

  New York City, meanwhile, is pushing back on the Trump lawsuit over severing their golf club contract with Trump. A city spokesman said, “Donald Trump directly incited a deadly insurrection at the US Capitol. You do that, and you lose the privilege of doing business with the City of New York. It’s as simple as that.”

Neither Nor: In the changing world of understanding gender and sexual identity, at least 1.2 million nonbinary adults live in the United States, according to a study by The Williams Institute, a research center focused on sexual orientation, gender identity law, and public policy.

  “Nonbinary” is the term for people who identify as neither male nor female. The singer Demi Lovato, for instance, says she’s nonbinary.

  The phenomenon skews toward the young. The study found that 76 percent of nonbinary adults are between ages 18 and 29.

The Obit Page: Mark Peel, a genius Los Angeles Chef who worked at the renowned Chez Panisse in Berkeley, Wolfgang Puck’s Spago in Beverly Hills, and was a founder of the renowned Campanile restaurant and La Brea Bakery next door, has died at age 66.

  Peel worked with the freshest ingredients, new ideas, and presented his food casually. “It should look disheveled,” he said. “A little messy. As if it fell from heaven.”

The Spin Rack: Former New York cop Eric Adams leads in the Democratic primary for mayor with 31.7 percent of the vote. He needs 50 percent. — Singer Britney Speers appears in court today in an effort to lift the conservatorships controlled by her father. — The Daily Beast reports that while in office President Trump asked advisers whether anything  could be done about “Saturday Night Live” and late night comedians who skewered him. In one message Trump wrote, “I do believe that the 100% one-sided shows should be considered an illegal campaign contribution from the Democrat Party.” —Speaking withVariety, the creators of the HBO Max animated adult series Harley Quinn revealed that a scene depicting Batman performing oral sex on Catwoman was blocked by DC Entertainment because “heroes don’t do that.”

  Catwoman is reported to have said, “Batman is my hero.” 

-30-