border wall, the military, and nuclear weapons. we will speak to pulitzer prize winning journalist david cay johnston. then we go to new hampshire where polls open in the nation's first presidential primary. why weurnout tells me are going to win here in new hampshire. why we are going to win the , and whyc nomination we are going to defeat the most dangerous president in the modern history of america donald trump. amy: i monday night, senator bernie sanders spoke at a massive rally of over 75 hundred people in new hampshire. we will go to new hampshire for the latest on the state's primary. all of that and more, coming up. welcome to democracy now!, democracynow.org, the war and peace report. i'm amy goodman. popolls have opened in new hampshire for the first primary of the election season. on monday night, vermont senator bernie sanders held a massive rally and concert at the university of new hampshire in durham, attended by over 7000 people. >> the reason we are going to win is the american people, no matter what their political views may be, are sick and tired of a president who is a , who isical liar running a corrupt administration , who is a bully and a vindictive person, who is a sexist, a xenophobe, a homophobe, and a religious bigot. amamy: meanwhile, the campaigngf senator amamy klobuchar has picd up the endorsements of three major newspapers in new hampshire as the minnesota senator hopes for a stronger result after placing fifth in the iowa caucuses. the campaigns of senator sanders and former south bend, indiana, mayor pete buttigieg have called for a partial recanvass in iowa after results showed sanders winning the popular vote, but buttigieg narrowly edging him out in the delegate count. meanwhile, audio has leaked of 2020 presidential candidate former new york city mayor mike bloomberg depending the use of stop and frisk in 2015 at the aspen institute. we'll have more on new hampshire later in the broadcast. from coronavirus has now topped 1000 with 42,000 confirmed cases. monday was the deadliest day yet as 108 people succumb to the disease in mainland china. inin the city ofof tianjin, thousands of people were ordered to quarantine after an outbreak linked to a shopping m ml infected over 30 people. meanwhilile, newly identified cases in hong g kong are raising fears the disease could be spread through pipes after two cases were identified in the same apartment buildlding. senate minority leader chuck schumer is calling on all 74 federal inspectors general to investigate tellier should-based firings of whistleblowers or witnesses who report presidential misconduct. two days after his impeachment acquittal last week, trump fired two key figures from the house impeachment proceedings. the national security council's lieutenant colonel alexander vindman and u.s. ambassador to the european union gorordon sondland. attorney general william barr confirmed monday the justice department will review information provided by president trump's personal attorney rudy giuliani that he gathered from ukrainian sources about former vice president joe biden and his son hunter. senator lindsey graham first sharared the news s on c cbs's e thee natioion" on sunday. the justice department charged four chinese military members over the hacking of credit monitoring agency equifax monday. the 2017 breach affected around 147 million americans, whose personal data was stolen, including social security numbers, birth dates, and driver's license information. attorney general wililliam barr said china was responsible for state-sponsored computer intrusions. the salvadoran congress is condemning what they call an attempted coup d'etat after president nayib bukele stormed the legislative assembly sunday accompanied by heavily armed soldiers and police officers. bukele is demanding lawmakers vote to approve a $109 million loan to equip military and law enforcement personnel. the president addressed his supporters at a rally in el salvador sunday. > if those shameless peopople don'tt approve the plan of territorial control this week, we will summon you again here on sunday. saying, god, you asked me for patitients wilill sublet those without shshame don't want to work. a one-year-old baby of organizer marissa kapoho was to take ash was taken but has since been released. police say the activists were arrested for illegally possessing weapons and accused them up along to communist groups. critics warn such attacks on activists around -- are on the rise. local media reporting police have hundreds of arrest warrants for other activists. in more news from the philippines, the government is moving to shut down the country's leading broadcast network. in ireland, a stunning victory in the general election in which the party won the popular vote. the final count of the vote revealed today sinn fein took 37 parliamentary seats, making just one seat behind center-right party fianna fail. the party, which originally formed as the political wing of the ira, focused their campaign on social issues, including housing, homelessness, and health care. this is mary lou mcdonald, president of sinn fein. >> it is a big statement of change. this is no longer a two-party system. people want a different type of government. the people have great confidence. amamy: turkish and syrian forces clashed in northwestern syria as tensions rise following the killing of five turkish troops by syrian forces monday. nearly three quarters of a million people have fled the area since the fighting escalated in december. the u.n. is warning the ongoing attacks in idlib province are crcreating a humananitarian didr that c could lead to famine e ie region. the u.n. is also warning that the massive swarms of locusts devastating crops in a number of east african countries could become thehe worst infesestatioe region has seen in decades. countries that have already been affected or are e at risk are kenynya, somalia, ethiopia, uganda, south sudan, eritreaea, and djibouti. experts say higher temperatures and heavier rainfall due to the climate crisis are leading to worse locust swarms. a small swarm can work its way through enough food to feed 35,000 people in just a single day. in canada, 47 people were arrested while protesting and solidarity with land defenders ashey were rated by canaan police. prprotesrs aroun canada blockaded ports, railway and her sitesf transptation. thblockade aecected ,000 ra passengs andrevented 200 frght trai from travelin indinous actists havbeen a protrted batt to protectheir la from th consuction otranscana's 40mile, $4 billili coastal gaslk pipeli.. e seattlcity couil voted monday tbar someesidenti evicons duri winter nths. socialiscity couilmember hama sawant sponsorethe bill ifnacted, itould probit mostvictionsn the mohs of dember thrgh februy, thgh t thenitial bl propos longer b period. in arizo, the coractor hed build aortion otrump's u.-mexico rder walhas begun deroying aacred tono 'odhaburial se. nument hl is pary located withinhe rooselt reservation st of thborder tn of keville,rizona. e site w once us for ligious remonies and its cultur signifince trac back huneds of yrs. sincconstrucon of thborder wallegan at e arizonborder inugust, cstructiocrews have also been ripping out saguaros and other protected cactus varieties, as well as pumping g scarce water resource. a south dakota senate committee has deferred action on house bill 1057, effectively killing the controversial anti-transgender legislation. the bill would have criminalized doctors for providing transition-related healthcare to trans youth. the "no" vote came after a sustained campaign against the bill led by transgender activists and youth. to see our coverage of this story with the aclu's chase strangio and the oscar-nominated trans director yance ford, go to democracynow.org. manhattan district attorney cyrus vance says he is considering reopening the investigation into malcolm x's murder, over half a century after the civil rights leader was murdered in 1965. the announcement came just days after the release of a new netflix documentary titled "who killed malcolm x?," which sheds new light on the case. and party duke goes -- and puerto rico has struck a deal with bondholders to shed about 24 billion dollars from its general obligation debt. the deal announced sunday by rico's financial oversight committee will cut the island's outstanding debt from $35 billion to about $11 billion. the agreement will still need to be approved by the puerto rican legislature. they filed bankruptcy in 2017 to attempt to restructure $129 billion in debt and pension -- and the board is an unelected board that runs much of puerto rico's economic affairs and for years has been plagued by corruption allegations. and those are some of the headlines. this is democracy now!, democracynow.org, the war and peace report. i'm amy goodman. juan: and i'm juan gonzalez. welcome to all of our listeners and viewers from around the country and around the world. our before we begin with top story, can you talk about what is happening puerto rico with the issue of the debt? >> this is interesting. i'm reading the articles that have come out in the last couple of days about this and it is being portrayed as a victory for puerto rico lowering its debt. but what i read of the actual details of the plane is quite the opposite. the island -- you cannot pay back debt for which you don't have money to pay. the entire debt of $70 billion has been questionable. in fact, the control board had offered these b bondholders only about 29 percent to 30% on the dollar. now they are getting with this be -- i mucheader better deal. this is a victory for some of the bondholders, especially the vulture funds because the control board had actually said billion,ed at least $6 the most recent data puerto rico, was actually illegally issued. that is the money the vulture funds came i in and hedge funds grabbed and 2012, 2014. now they will get money back. in fact, puerto rico has to not only pay $11 billion over 20 years, but it has to put up $3.8 billion up front. in other words, as soon as you sign the deal, you have to get the bondholders $3.8 billion in cash. the vulture funds are now making out with this most of amy: explain what those are. >> the ones who came in and swooped of debt at the very end -- in the last three years when puerto rico really was issuing debt that everyone knew it could never repay. the vulture funds came in and as the value of the bonds dropped dramatically, they scocooped up the debt at very low prices. to what theyarly did in argentina and greece and other countries that went into financial collapse. itit seems to me this new settlement -- again, it is only a settlement for $35 billion of debt. there is still another 35 billion dollars and bondholders and another $50 billion owed to the pension funds that still has to be resolved. this is a win, seems to me, not only for the bondholders, but specifically for the vulture funds. the legislature puerto rico still has to vote on this and we will see what happens but those who portray this as a victory for puerto rico are not really paying attention to the details of the agreement. amy: we will continue to cover this in the days to come. juan: president trump unveiled his 2021 budget request monday, proposing massive cuts to medicaid and food stamps while increasing spending on the military and his border wall. the $4.8 trillion budget would slash environmental protection agency spending by more than a quarter, while allocating $18 billion for trump's newly established space force. trump is also requesting billions more for nuclear weapons, including a new submarine-launched nuclear warhead. experts and democratic lawmakeks warn that increasing the nuclear stockpile will increase the likelihood of nuclear war and defy international agreements. amy: democrats are expected to reject the budget, which proposes steep cuts to global health programs and eliminating public service loan forgiveness, a program that cancels the student debts of public workers after they've made 10 years of payments. this is the fourth time trump has tried to end the program. it also cuts $182 billion from the supplemental nutrition assistance program, snap, in part by significantly increasing requirements for americans receiving foodstamps. congressmember barbara lee tweeted monday -- "trump's immoral budget is full of reckless and cruel cuts to health care, education, housing, basic food assistance and more. all while funneling billions to a xenophobic boarder wall. congress must and will reject it." well, for more, we go to rochester, new york, where we're joined by journalist david cay johnston. winner of a pulitzer prize for his reporting. david, welcome back to democracy now! can you talk about the significance of this almostdented budget with $50 billion or so going to nuclear weapons, more nuclear weapons with the border wall $2 billion, and these devastating cuts to medicaid and food stamps? want endless wars , dirty air, and you think that the poor and hungry in america are getting too good of a deal, this is a budget for you. that is exactly what this budget is about. donald trump in n his inaugural address that he would be the champion of the forgotten man. everything he did would be about the forgotten man. well, you forgot about thehe forgotten man as soon as s he walked off thehe dais. in this budget to proposes not only all of this additional money for nuclear weapons and for the border wall, but he wants to cut the environmental protection agency's budget by more than one fourth. he wants to cut the budget of the army corps of engineers by more than one fit. and that matters because the daikon levee system that was built in the united states is the heartland of the country and many of the dams and other facilities that the army corps is responsible for is falling apart anand proving inadequate because of climate disruption with these massive floods along these daikon s systems to cut te budget for that is just nuts unless you want, of course, again informing and large part of the center of the united states. going after food assistance is absolutely displaying what is really going on here. donald trump said he was going to drain the swamp. he has turned washington into a paradise for the wall street swamp monsters that he told voters he was going after. it is clear his idea of draining the swamp is getting rid of hard-working serious people who are trying to make america better, and replacing them with people who want to mind the economy and extract money from those down below because lots of billionaires feel they don't have enough money. juan: david, i want to ask about the tax cut proposal of trump's. we are seeing this movie repeatedly now over the last 50, 60 years of american history, the reagan administration cut taxes and created massive deficits that then when bill clinton finally came in office, he was immediately hit -- yet to do something about the deficit. then when george ew bush was in office, he cut the taxes dramatically and we had the financial meltdown that led to president obama came in having again to deal with this massive deficit, now we're seeing trump -- the trump administration, the current republicans in congress, during the same thing. now he wants to extend certain tax cuts in his proposal. could you talk about that? >> what trump is proposing to do is provide a little sop to middle-class families by increasing the child tax credit, extending it into the future when it is scheduled to expire. but continuing his fundamental policy, whicich is massive tax cuts for people at the very top. people with multimillion dollar annual incomes. househoholdsnd 1000 have incncomes of over $2 millin a year. we have people in america like mike bloomberg who make multiple billions of annual income. and he is proposing that we can afford all of this because he is projecting what my children referred to as happy go magic land thinking about the budget. each year that trump has been in office, three years he has been in office, economic growth has gone from here to here to hear. it is slowing down. but he projects it is going to go like this, which is just not going to happen. nobody believes that. but i claiming it will go like this, he says the federal budget deficit, roughly $1 trillion a year now, member, trump told us he would pay off the federal doesif you got eight years by projecting this economic growth that nobody sees happening and when it is actually declining, he is able to argue the federal good -- budget deficit wilill go down, l of the p projections show they will go like this but everybody outside the administration. so as my children said when they were little, happy go magic land thinking. amy: let's turn to president trump speaking monday about increasing spending on nuclear weapons. pres. trump: and we are taking good care of our military. we are increreasing spending on our nuclear progogram because we have no chchoice because of what china is d doing, what russia is doing inin particular. so we have a very big nunumber n for that. at the same time, rusussia and china b both want to negotiate with us to stop this craziness of spending billilions and billions of dollars on nuclear weapons. but the only way, until we have that agreement, the only thing i can do is create i far the strongest nucleaear force anywhe in the world, which as you know, over the last three years we much upgraded our nuclear. we have the superfast missiles, tremendous number of the superfast. we call ththem superfast. amy: david cay johnston? in spaceis just out year. this is like a lot of things that donald says in the 32 years almost that i have known him. he just make s stuff up. while there are little pieces of truth in there, this is just all nonsnsense. we have more than enough nuclear capacity to kill everybody in the planet r repeatedly. we have more than enough for mutually assured instruction, which goes by the acronym mad because it is meaningful, and this is trump simply not understanding the world. the man has no real capacity to understand things posted he claims to be the world's greatest expert on at least 23 subjects. but as various people in the white house have leaked out, when asked something, he turns out to know absolutely nothing. by the way, he is very well. in a new hbo show called "avenue five," a takeoff on trump's claim he could shoot somebody on fifth avenue and nothing would happen to him. amy: he has also promised, as he cuts food support children, $18 billion for a new space force. >> yeah, do we want to militarize space? this is an incredibly nutty idea. we have the united states air force t that is perfectly capabe of dealing with our programs, along with nasa. if we e want to spend more money to go explore the heavens, i personally am in favor of that. it has a cost to it, though, and you have to bear the cost. what trump wants to do is a free lunch. he wants to s say the richest people in americica, we will lor your taxes, the big corporations turn huge profits and pay no taxes, and then we are going to spend all of this additional money on things which are discscretionary stop we can chce to d do them or not do them. and at the same time, we are to say to children and families that are going to food pantries and food kitchens constantly, you know, you have got too much. it is really a remarkable position. it is very clear the republican party y policies that donanald p is reflecting herere boil down o this -- the reason the american economy is not doing better is the rich don't have enough in the way to get more to the rich is to take it from the p poor, e didisabled, from children, from the elderly. that is, from those people who have little capacity to fight back. juan: this whole issue of once again the