Category Archives: Democrats

Trump under criminal investigation for potential violations of Espionage Act – live

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FBI was seeking evidence about whether the mishandling of documents violated three criminal statutes, search warrant shows

Further evidence that things are looking up for Democrats: Joe Biden’s approval rating is above 40 percent for the first time since early June, per RealClearPolitics’ polling average:

Democratic House speaker Nancy Pelosi condemned attacks by Donald Trump and other Republicans on the FBI following their search this week of the former president’s Mar-a-Lago club in Florida.

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Progressive Ilhan Omar wins closer-than-expected House primary in Minnesota

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Democrats select progressive Becca Balint for Vermont House seat while Trump-backed candidate nominated for Wisconsin governor

Minnesota congresswoman Ilhan Omar, a member of the select progressive group in the House of Representative dubbed the Squad, eked out a closer-than-expected Democratic primary victory on Tuesday night against a centrist challenger who questioned the incumbent’s support for the “defund the police” movement.

The evening went far smoother for another progressive, Becca Balint, who won the Democratic House primary in Vermont – positioning her to become the first woman representing the state in Congress.

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Oklahoma lawmakers urge pause amid fears innocent man to be executed

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Bipartisan group calls for new hearing over lack of evidence in case of Richard Glossip, 59, as state rushes to speed up executions

A letter signed by 61 Oklahoma lawmakers – most of them pro-death penalty Republicans – has been sent to the state’s attorney general calling for a new hearing in the case of Richard Glossip, a death row inmate scheduled to be executed next month.

Forty-four Republican and 17 Democratic legislators, amounting to more than a third of the state assembly, have written to John O’Connor pleading for the new hearing.

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Landmark US climate bill will do more harm than good, groups say

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Bill makes concessions to the fossil fuel industry as frontline community groups call on Biden to declare climate emergency

The landmark climate legislation passed by the Senate after months of wrangling and weakening by fossil-fuel friendly Democrats will lead to more harm than good, according to frontline community groups who are calling on Joe Biden to declare a climate emergency.

If signed into law, the Inflation Reduction Act of 2022 (IRA) would allocate $369bn to reduce America’s greenhouse gas emissions and invest in renewable energy sources – a historic amount that scientists estimate will lead to net reductions of 40% by 2030, compared with 2005 levels.

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White House warns of ‘intensifying impacts of climate change’ as Biden tours flood-hit Kentucky – live

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On Joe Biden’s visit to flood-ravaged eastern Kentucky today he is not just viewing the effects through the lens of a disaster needing federal assistance but also through the lens of the climate crisis that is making events like this more intense, more common and more deadly, in America and around the world.

White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre addressed the issue in her media briefing aboard Air Force One en route to Lexington with the US president and first lady Jill Biden a little earlier.

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Democrats celebrate as climate bill moves to House – and critics weigh in

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Bernie Sanders calls climate measures a ‘very modest step forward’ and Republicans denounce the bill altogether

Democrats celebrated the much-delayed Senate passage of their healthcare and climate spending package, expressing hope that the bill’s approval could improve their prospects in the crucial midterm elections this November.

The bill, formally known as the Inflation Reduction Act, passed the Senate on Sunday in a party-line vote of 51-50, with Vice-President Kamala Harris breaking the tie in the evenly divided chamber.

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Senate passes $739bn healthcare and climate bill after months of wrangling

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Inflation Reduction Act will reduce planet-heating emissions and lower prescription drug costs – and give Biden a crucial victory

Senate Democrats passed their climate and healthcare spending package on Sunday, sending the legislation to the House and bringing Joe Biden one step closer to a significant legislative victory ahead of crucial midterm elections in November.

If signed into law, the bill, formally known as the Inflation Reduction Act, would allocate $369bn to reducing greenhouse gas emissions and investing in renewable energy sources. Experts have estimated the climate provisions of the bill will reduce America’s planet-heating emissions by about 40% by 2030, compared with 2005 levels.

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Senate Democrats given green light to vote on $430bn climate and tax bill

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Senate arbiter rules bill can bypass filibuster and be passed with simple majority, setting stage for ‘vote-a-rama’ next week

US Senate Democrats on Saturday were set to push ahead on a bill that would address key elements of President Joe Biden’s agenda, tackling climate change, lowering the cost of energy and senior citizens’ drugs and forcing the wealthy to pay more taxes.

A Senate rulemaker determined that the lion’s share of the $430bn bill could be passed with only a simple majority, bypassing a filibuster rule requiring 60 votes in the 100-seat chamber to advance most legislation and enabling Democrats to pass it over Republican objections, majority leader Chuck Schumer said in a statement.

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Democrats reach deal to pass major climate bill after Sinema says yes – as it happened

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Amy Weirich, a Memphis prosecutor with a checkered record who is best known for cracking down on a woman just for trying to register to vote, has lost her re-election bid. As Sam Levine reports:

Amy Weirich, the Memphis prosecutor who stirred national outrage for bringing criminal charges against a Black woman for trying to register to vote, has lost her re-election bid.

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Hungary’s far-right PM Viktor Orbán speaks at CPAC summit – as it happened

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Griner has been sentenced to nine years in prison, Bloomberg reports:

A court in Russia has found Brittney Griner, an Americans women’s basketball star, guilty of drug smuggling, Reuters reports.

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Kansas’s vote to protect abortion rights upends US midterm elections – as it happened

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Following her visit to Taiwan and China’s furious response, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has reiterated her commitment to standing up for the country and said it’s shared by lawmakers across the US Congress.

“Our Congressional delegation’s visit should be seen as a strong statement that America stands with Taiwan. We came to Taiwan to listen to, learn from and show our support for the people of Taiwan, who have built a thriving Democracy that stands as one of the freest and most open in the world,” Pelosi said in a statement after the trip.

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Democrats prepare for showdown over key spending and climate bill – as it happened

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Antony Blinken, secretary of state, said at global nonproliferation discussions at the United Nations today that a return to the 2015 nuclear deal remains the best outcome for the United States, Iran and the world.

Reuters is reporting that Blinken made a point to repeat a warning from the US that North Korea is preparing to conduct its seventh nuclear test.

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How Bernie Sanders and conservatives united against US semiconductor bill

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Vermont senator opposed ‘corporate welfare’ to firms paying huge salaries to executives – but Chips and Science Act passed Congress

When it comes to alliances in Washington, few are as unlikely as the common ground the democratic socialist senator Bernie Sanders briefly found with the Heritage Foundation and Americans for Prosperity, two architects of conservative policies across the United States.

Yet that is what happened this week when Sanders, a Vermont independent who caucuses with the Democrats, made a lonely and unsuccessful stand against a $280bn bill funding scientific research and, controversially, giving computer chip manufacturers financial incentives to build more production in the United States – one that rightwing groups also encouraged lawmakers to make.

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Lucas Kunce: ‘Populism is about everyday people coming together’

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Former US Marine with a progressive take on identity and masculinity hopes Missouri Democrats will pick him as their nominee for US Senate

Lucas Kunce thinks populism has been given a bad name. “It’s outrageous,” he says, “that people call the Josh Hawleys, the Eric Greitens, the Donald Trumps of the world populist. Populism is about everyday people coming together to have power in a system that’s not working for them. So do that, Josh Hawley. I mean, good Lord, what a charlatan.”

Kunce is running for the Democratic nomination for US Senate in Missouri, in the fight to take the state’s second seat in Washington, alongside Hawley. The primary is on Tuesday.

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House-passed assault weapons ban appears to be doomed in the Senate

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Bill would require support from at least 10 Senate Republicans, and it isn’t certain that all 50 Democratic senators are onboard

The assault weapons ban in America passed by the House appears set to be doomed in the Senate amid implacable Republican opposition to gun reform, even in the wake of a series of mass shootings in the US.

The legislation in the House, which would ban assault weapons for the first time since 2004, is interpreted as a sign that Democrats plan more aggressive gun violence prevention after a series of mass shootings using the military-derived weapons, including in Buffalo, New York, and Uvalde, Texas.

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DoJ reportedly preparing court fight to get Trump insiders to testify – live

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Prosectors expect former president to try to invoke executive privilege to prevent his ex-officials from speaking

An impassioned plea from a 12-year-old girl has gone viral after she spoke to West Virginia Republican lawmakers during a public hearing for an abortion bill that would prohibit the procedure in nearly all cases.

On Wednesday, Addison Gardner of Buffalo middle school in Kenova, West Virginia, was among several people who spoke out against a bill that would not only ban abortions in most cases but also allow for physicians who perform abortions to be prosecuted.

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Biden hails ‘most significant legislation to tackle climate crisis’ after Manchin says yes – live

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Joe Biden “was not involved” in negotiations over the newly announced Inflation Reduction Act, Joe Manchin has said, claiming credit instead for himself and his own aides.

In a press call Thursday morning that shed a little more light, but not very much, on how the bill came to be, the Democratic West Virginia senator said:

It was me and my staff. And then we worked with [Senate majority leader Chuck] Schumer’s staff. My staff was driving it. We wrote the bill. Schumer’s staff would look at it and we would negotiate, and we worked that through them.

President Biden was not involved.

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Manchin announces deal with Democrats on major tax and climate bill

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News of agreement breaks deadlock two weeks after conservative Democrat had appeared to kill off Biden’s climate agenda

Democrat Joe Manchin announced on Wednesday afternoon that he has reached a deal with the Senate majority leader, Chuck Schumer, on a domestic policy bill that would pay down national debt, cut energy costs and lower the cost of health insurance and prescription drugs, while supporting a “realistic” climate policy.

The development came almost two weeks after the West Virginia conservative senator had appeared essentially to kill off flagship climate action legislation when he came out against raising taxes on wealth Americans and refused to support more funding for climate action.

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‘Nancy, I’ll go with you’: Trump allies back Pelosi’s proposed Taiwan visit

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Mike Pompeo and Mark Esper support visit to ‘freedom-loving Taiwan’ but Biden concerned any trip would antagonise Beijing

Plans for Nancy Pelosi, the US House speaker, to visit Taiwan have prompted opposition from China and the American military but support from Republicans in Washington, including former members of the Trump administration.

Trump’s second secretary of defense, Mark Esper, told CNN: “I think if the speaker wants to go, she should go.”

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Trump speaks in Washington DC for first visit since leaving office – as it happened

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Joe Biden’s daily health bulletin is a good one, as he continues to recover from the Covid-19 infection announced last week.

The president has improved enough to be able to resume his regular exercise routine, according to a Tuesday morning update from physician Dr Kevin O’Connor, reported by the Associated Press.

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