Chuck Schumer and Lizzo made appearances before the presidents talked onstage in event that widens fundraising lead over Trump
Joe Biden and his Democratic predecessor, Barack Obama, headlined a star-studded fundraiser with Bill Clinton on Thursday that organizers said raised more than $25m for the US president’s re-election campaign.
Such a haul, which Politico called an “NYC money bomb”, will widen Biden’s lead over Donald Trump in fundraising for the November election.
Continue reading...Tone in parts of Israeli media borders on contempt, as prime minister’s growing friction with Biden linked to US abstention
The Israeli prime minister’s handling of relations with the Biden administration, which led the US on Monday to decline to veto a ceasefire resolution at the UN security council, has been greeted by sharp criticism by Israeli commentators.
After the US abstention, prominent columnists across the Israeli media condemned Benjamin Netanyahu’s growing friction with the US president, Joe Biden.
Continue reading...Top Democrats urge Netanyahu to abandon planned assault days after Israeli leader rejected similar request by Antony Blinken
Senior US Democrats on Sunday increased pressure on Israel’s prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu to abandon a planned offensive into the southern Gaza city of Rafah, where more than 1 million Palestinians are sheltering.
Two days after a similar call by US secretary of state, Antony Blinken, was rejected by the Israeli leader, vice-president Kamala Harris said that the Joe Biden White House was “ruling out nothing” in terms of consequences if Netanyahu moves ahead with the assault.
Continue reading...As the ex-president fans the flames of violence, experts and insiders say November will be a brutal test for US democracy
A bloodbath. The end of democracy. Riots in the streets. Bedlam in the country. Donald Trump has made apocalyptic imagery a defining feature of his presidential election campaign, warning supporters that if he does not win – and avoid criminal prosecution – America will enter its death throes.
The prophecies of doom, repeated ad nauseam at rallies and on social media, have raised fears that the former president is making an electoral tinderbox that could explode in November. While there has been much commentary assessing the implications of a Trump win, some experts warn that a Trump defeat could provide an equally severe stress test of American democracy.
Continue reading...Ex-special counsel speaks to New Yorker about stunning criticism he’s received for doing a duty he felt he owed to the US
The former special counsel who investigated Joe Biden’s handling of classified documents has said he is stunned at “the level of vitriol” that greeted him across the US’s political spectrum after he declined to prosecute the president yet portrayed him in a report as an “elderly man with a poor memory”.
“I knew it was going to be unpleasant” taking on the investigation, Robert Hur told The New Yorker in a lengthy interview Friday, more than a week after he appeared at a congressional hearing in which both Democrats and Republicans heavily criticized him. “But the level of vitriol – it’s hard to know exactly how intense that’s going to be until the rotten fruit is being thrown at you.”
Continue reading...Press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre says Biden’s thoughts are with princess’s family ‘during this incredibly difficult time’
The Joe Biden White House has expressed sympathy and support to the Princess of Wales after her announcement that she is being treated for cancer.
Biden’s press secretary, Karine Jean-Pierre, wished Catherine a full recovery at a Friday press briefing.
Continue reading...States including Texas, Louisiana and Florida say federal government lacks authority to broadly deny permits
Sixteen US states, including Texas, Louisiana and Florida, have filed a lawsuit to challenge the US federal government’s ban on approving applications to export liquefied natural gas, the office of Texas attorney general Ken Paxton said on Thursday.
The lawsuit argues the federal government lacks the authority to broadly deny those permits.
Continue reading...Draft resolution loosens linkage between Gaza ceasefire and hostage release as US tries to claw back leadership on issue at UN
Washington’s draft UN security council resolution on Gaza marks a shift in the US position, but it is a nuanced shift, retaining the linkage between a ceasefire and hostage release while loosening that linkage and emphasising that an immediate end to hostilities is the priority.
The primary focus for now is the hostage negotiations underway in Qatar, which are moving into high gear again, with the CIA and Mossad chiefs, William Burns and David Barnea, expected to fly into Doha on Friday.
Continue reading...Senate majority leader reportedly rejects request from Israeli prime minister to address Senate Democratic caucus
Since being elected speaker of the House last year, the Republican Mike Johnson has emerged as one of Donald Trump’s most prominent defenders on Capitol Hill, and today is no exception – even when it comes to the former president’s recent comment that Jews who vote for Democrats “hate” Israel and their religion.
Asked about it at a press conference, Johnson said he understands where Trump is coming from:
Continue reading...Amanda Zurawski, who nearly died waiting for procedure, says Trump will inflict ‘chaos’ in remarks released by Biden camp
After Donald Trump voiced support for a 15-week national abortion ban, Joe Biden’s presidential campaign released an angry response from a Texas woman who nearly died due to that state’s anti-abortion measures, enduring a “nightmare” she said Trump created.
“My family has been forever altered by the nightmare that Donald Trump created by overturning Roe,” Amanda Zurawski said.
Continue reading...The president headed to Nevada, Arizona and Texas to appeal to voters, saying that Donald Trump ‘despises Latinos’
Joe Biden is on a three-day western US election campaign swing through Nevada, Arizona and Texas with a focus on personally appealing to Latino voters, saying they are the reason he defeated Donald Trump in 2020 and urging them to help him do it again in November.
“I need you back,” he told several dozen supporters packed into a local Mexican restaurant in Phoenix, Arizona. And in an interview with the Spanish-language broadcaster Univision he blasted Trump as someone whose hardline policies and biased rhetoric are hostile to Hispanic voters.
Continue reading...Nikki Haley gains votes despite dropping out of Republican race as Trump-backed candidate wins Ohio Republican Senate primary
Donald Trump and Joe Biden swept up more delegates in Tuesday’s primary elections as they set their sights on a rematch in November.
Trump and Biden picked up wins in Arizona, Illinois, Kansas and Ohio. Trump also won the Republican primary in Florida, where the Democrats are not holding a primary.
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Israel’s PM says he does not see an alternative to a ground attack on Gaza’s southern city, in a sign of widening disagreement with the US president
The Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, has said he remains determined to carry out a ground invasion of Gaza’s southern city of Rafah – where many displaced Palestinians are sheltering – despite the misgivings of US president Joe Biden.
Netanyahu told lawmakers on Tuesday he had made it “supremely clear” to the US president “that we are determined to complete the elimination of these battalions in Rafah, and there’s no way to do that except by going in on the ground”.
Continue reading...Retired generals Mark Milley and Frank McKenzie, who oversaw evacuation of Afghanistan, said it was poorly planned
The top two US generals who oversaw the evacuation of Afghanistan as it fell to the Taliban in August 2021 blamed the Biden administration for the chaotic departure, telling lawmakers on Tuesday that it inadequately planned for the evacuation and did not order it in time.
The rare testimony by the two retired generals publicly exposed for the first time the strain and differences the military leaders had with the Biden administration in the final days of the war. Two of those key differences included that the military had advised that the US keep at least 2,500 service members in Afghanistan to maintain stability and a concern that the state department was not moving fast enough to get an evacuation started.
Continue reading...Primaries are being held in Arizona, Florida, Illinois, Kansas and Ohio – get up to speed with all the live results as they happen
Five states – Arizona, Florida, Illinois, Kansas and Ohio – are holding their presidential nominating contests on Tuesday, with Florida holding only a Republican primary. Donald Trump and Joe Biden expect to sail to victory in their respective parties, growing their delegate counts in a march toward this summer’s conventions, where they will officially secure their parties’ nomination.
Here are the live results from the five presidential primaries.
Continue reading...This live blog is now closed. For more on Trump’s bond efforts, you can read our full report:
Donald Trump’s lawyers have asked the appeals court to delay posting the bond to cover the $454m fraud judgment against him until his appeal of the case is over.
The former president’s lawyers filed notices of appeal late last month challenging Judge Arthur Engoron’s 16 February verdict that he lied about his wealth as he grew the real estate empire that launched him to stardom and the presidency.
Continue reading...Republican candidate insists at Ohio rally that Biden had beaten ‘Barack Hussein Obama’ in elections that never took place
Joe Biden tore into Donald Trump’s mental stability at a dinner in Washington DC on Saturday – just as the former president was making verbal gaffes at a campaign rally in Ohio as well as, during remarks on the economy and auto industry, predicting a “bloodbath” for the country if he met defeat in November’s election.
Trump, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, confused the crowd at an appearance in Vandalia by insisting that Biden had beaten “Barack Hussein Obama” in elections nationally that never took place.
Continue reading...The success of this agile grassroots group underlines the discontent over the war – and represents a warning for Democrats
People in Michigan, and across the country, had been protesting for months over the Gaza war and the US government’s role in it, marching in the streets, showing up at the president’s public events, and pressuring their elected officials to support a ceasefire.
But it didn’t seem as though Joe Biden was listening to a groundswell of Democrats who opposed the war and US media coverage of the protests, and of the war itself, seems to be waning, too.
Continue reading...A collection of more than 7,000 letters will form a publicly accessible digital archive that offers a window to the past
In the week that Ireland turns everything green and celebrates its diaspora, a new online archive has given voice to the human cost paid by generations of emigrants.
More than 7,000 letters from emigrants to North America spanning four centuries have been collected and digitised, giving poignant insight into the homesickness, tribulations, and occasional triumphs, of those who crossed the Atlantic.
Continue reading...Democrat Chris Van Hollen says Biden must cease giving arms to Israel until it lifts restrictions on aid and does more to protect lives
Joe Biden should use his leverage and the law to pressure Israel to change how it is prosecuting the war in Gaza, the Democratic senator Chris Van Hollen said.
Van Hollen, a Maryland Democrat, is among a group of senators urging Biden to stop providing Israel with offensive weapons until it lifts restrictions on the delivery of food and medicine into Gaza, where children are now dying of hunger and famine looms.
Continue reading...