Kamala Harris? Val Demings? Democrats speculate but no single candidate will be able to satisfy all the interest groups and sectors of the party
It doesn’t matter who Joe Biden picks as his running mate – somebody will be disappointed.
The former vice-president and de facto Democratic presidential nominee on Tuesday said he would make a selection in the first week of August.
Continue reading...The presumptive Democrat presidential nominee is picking a path through the perilous politics of the economy and the climate crisis
Faced with a disgruntled climate voter during the primary season who wanted him to be tougher on the oil and gas industry, Joe Biden shot him one of his infamous “why don’t you go vote for someone else” responses.
But that was six months ago.
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From me and Joan E Greve:
Mayor Jenny Durkan said that federal law enforcement sent to Seattle have left, less than a week after being deployed. In an interview with MSNBC, Durkan said that Trump was “doing a dress rehearsal for martial law” in her city.
.@DHSgov notified me that federal forces deployed to Seattle have demobilized & left. The President’s actions to target Democratic cities with federal forces is chilling and increased violence in Portland, Seattle & other cities - exactly what the President intended.
Continue reading...The national security adviser, Robert O’Brien, has tested positive for the coronavirus, but the White House insisted there was “no risk” of Donald Trump being exposed.
Related: Texas hospital forced to set up 'death panel' as Covid-19 cases surge
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Shortly before he departed on Air Force One from Morristown Municipal Airport en route to Washington, Donald Trump announced that he will not be throwing out the ceremonial first pitch before a Red Sox-Yankees game at Yankee Stadium next month due to scheduling conflicts.
“Because of my strong focus on the China Virus, including scheduled meetings on Vaccines, our economy and much else, I won’t be able to be in New York to throw out the opening pitch for the @Yankees on August 15th,” he wrote on Twitter. “We will make it later in the season!”
Because of my strong focus on the China Virus, including scheduled meetings on Vaccines, our economy and much else, I won’t be able to be in New York to throw out the opening pitch for the @Yankees on August 15th. We will make it later in the season!
The news website ProPublica has published a database containing complaint information for thousands of New York City police officers days after a federal judge paused the public release of such records.
The Associated Press reports:
ProPublica posted the database Sunday, explaining in a note to readers that it isn’t obligated to comply with judge Katherine Polk Failla’s temporary restraining order because it is not a party to a union lawsuit challenging the release of such records.
Deputy managing editor Eric Umansky said ProPublica requested the information from the city’s police watchdog agency, the Civilian Complaint Review Board, soon after last month’s repeal of state law that for decades had prevented the disclosure of disciplinary records.
Continue reading...Nonpartisan organisation Bread for the World says Yoho agreed to step down following incident with congresswoman
A nonpartisan Christian organisation that seeks to end hunger says it has asked for and received the resignation of Republican congressman Ted Yoho from its board of directors, following what it called his “verbal attack” on Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.
Democrat congresswoman Ocasio-Cortez had accused Yoho of using a vulgar and sexist insult while upbraiding her during a confrontation last Monday on the steps of the Capitol. Yoho maintained he did not use the words cited, though a reporter who witnessed the incident confirmed the language as she described it.
Continue reading...The White House chief of staff, Mark Meadows, and treasury secretary Steven Mnuchin were on Capitol Hill on Saturday, for talks with aides to Senate Republicans over the next coronavirus relief package.
Related: 'Nobody’s ever seen anything like this': how coronavirus turned the US election upside down
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Among real storms blowing around the US today, hurricanes are approaching Texas and Hawaii while a tropical storm heads for the Caribbean. The Associated Press is keeping watch here.
Among other kinds of storm, the kinds that blow themselves out on Twitter, the billionaire entrepreneur Elon Musk and his partner, the musician Grimes, appear to have had a public argument about pronouns.
Related: Explain it to me quickly: did Elon Musk and Grimes really name their baby X Æ A-12?
Miami Dade county has now recorded more than 100,000 cases of Covid-19 since the start of the pandemic. According to the Miami Herald, there were 3,424 new cases reported on Saturday. The county’s population is around 2.7 million.
Continue reading...Congresswoman condemned ‘violent language against women’ after Ted Yoho berated her on the House steps on Monday
Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s outrage over a Republican lawmaker’s verbal assault broadened into an extraordinary moment on the House floor on Thursday as she and other Democrats assailed a sexist culture of “accepting violence and violent language against women” whose adherents include Donald Trump.
A day after rejecting an offer of contrition from Republican congressman Ted Yoho for his language during this week’s Capitol steps confrontation, Ocasio-Cortez and more than a dozen colleagues cast the incident as all-too-common behavior by men, including the president and other Republicans.
Continue reading...The New York congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez said the insults a Republican colleague was heard saying to her on the steps of the US Capitol on Monday are part of a larger problem faced by all women.
The Hill reported that Ocasio-Cortez was confronted by the Florida Republican congressman Ted Yoho. He apparently said she was 'disgusting' for saying of spiking gun violence in New York this month 'is a problem of a diseased society, which neglects its marginalized people … policing is not the solution to crime'.
Speaking on the House floor on Thursday morning, Ocasio-Cortez said: 'In front of reporters, Representative Yoho called me, and I quote, a "fucking bitch"'
Latest data shows virus hitting Republican heartlands as well as key battleground states
“I said it’s going away – and it is going away,” a defiant Donald Trump claimed about Covid-19 on 3 April, when about 300,000 cases of the virus had been reported across the country.
At the time, Trump was enjoying a brief surge in approval ratings. But the virus obviously did not go away – more than 3.8m cases have now been reported, and latest polls show that Trump may pay the price for his handling of the crisis in the November elections.
Continue reading...House majority whip James Clyburn called on Sunday for both voting rights legislation and an infamous bridge in Alabama to be named after John Lewis.
Related: Trump equates support for Confederate flag with Black Lives Matter
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Donald Trump has broken his silence on the passing of John Lewis with a tweet posted moments ago.
“Saddened to hear the news of civil rights hero John Lewis passing,” he wrote. “Melania and I send our prayers to he and his family.
Saddened to hear the news of civil rights hero John Lewis passing. Melania and I send our prayers to he and his family.
Joe Biden will run campaign ads during Donald Trump’s eagerly awaited interview with Fox News Sunday tomorrow – to go a bit Friends for a second, that being The One In Which Trump Says Biden Wants To Defund The Police And Chris Wallace Says Hang On A Minute, Not So, And Trump Gets A Little Testy.
Related: Trump clashes with Fox News interviewer over false claim about Biden
Related: 'The virus doesn't care about excuses': US faces terrifying autumn as Covid-19 surges
Continue reading...John Lewis, the civil rights hero and Democratic congressman, has died at the age of 80. In 1965 he headed a march across the Edmund Pettus bridge in Selma, Alabama, and was knocked to the ground and beaten by police. The incident, along with other beatings during peaceful protests, brought attention to racial oppression in the US south. 20 years later he recalled the events for the documentary series Eyes on the Prize for Washington University in St Louis
The White House will not allow the CDC to testify at next week’s hearing fo the Committee on Education and Labor about how to safely reopen schools.
Virginia representative Bobby Scott joined other lawmakers Friday in speaking out against the Trump administration’s efforts to block theCDC from appearing before the committee.
A judge on Friday ruled the Trump administration cannot block a California program that caps carbon emissions from the transportation sector.
The cap and trade program aims to improve air quality and allows California companies to trade emissions credits with companies in Quebec. The administration sued to block it, saying it intrudes on the federal government’s foreign policy authority – particularly its withdrawal from environmental treaty the Paris agreement.
Continue reading...Joe Biden is polling well ahead of Donald Trump, potentially putting more states in play – but complacency has been banished
Less than four months out from the November election, the Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden has been consistently polling ahead of Donald Trump.
The president’s approval numbers remain underwater, and Democrats believe they can seriously compete in traditionally red states including Texas, as Trump faces sustained criticism for his handling of the coronavirus pandemic and the economic crisis linked to it, as well as the ongoing anti-racism protests against police brutality.
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We’ll be shutting down the blog shortly. Here’s a look at today’s top news lines:
Donald Trump was wearing a black mask as he walked down the entryway of Walter Reed medical center accompanied by hospital staff, marking the first time he has been seen wearing a protective face covering in public.
The president did not stop to take questions from the White House pool before turning down a hallway. His meeting with injured troops and staff is closed to the press.
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Houston mayor Sylvester Turner has appeared on CBS’s Face The Nation to discuss the Covid-19 outbreak in his city. He says staffing at the city’s hospital is a particular problem.
“If we don’t get our hands around this virus quickly, in about two weeks our hospital system could be in serious, serious trouble,” he says. “... We can always provide additional beds, but we need the people, the nurses and everybody else, the medical professionals to staff those beds. That’s the critical point right now.”
New Jersey’s Democratic governor, Phil Murphy, has appeared on NBC’s Meet The Press. New Jersey has been one of the worst-hit states in the US during the early stages of the coronavirus pandemic, and he says a national strategy is needed to combat Covid-19.
“This thing is lethal,” he says. “New Jersey’s paid an enormous price. We’ve [had] 13,000 confirmed fatalities from Covid-19. We’re starting to see small spikes in reinfection from folks coming back from places like Myrtle Beach and as well as in Florida, other hotspots.
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The White House is set to host its largest event since the start of the coronavirus pandemic with tonight’s Salute to America. Hundreds of chairs and tables have been set up on the South Lawn, where Trump will deliver a speech he says will celebrate American heritage. An administration spokesperson says social distancing “will be observed” and face masks will be offered but not mandatory.
Trump was first inspired to stage a mass display of pop and power on America’s birthday when attended the Bastille Day military parade as the guest of French president Emmanuel Macron back in 2017. An initial 2018 push to stage a parade that would have seen soldiers marching and tanks rolling down the streets of Washington was scuttled amid accusations that he was politicizing an important holiday, emulating displays in authoritarian countries and wasting taxpayers’ money.
President Donald J. Trump and First Lady Melania Trump, along with the Department of Interior, will host the 2020 Salute to America on the South Lawn of the White House and Ellipse on Saturday, July 4. In addition to music, military demonstrations, and flyovers to honor our Nation’s service members and veterans, the President will deliver remarks that celebrate our independence and salute our amazing heritage. The evening will culminate with a spectacular fireworks display over the National Mall.
For 4 July, in the summer of protests over the killing of George Floyd, a picture gallery from Jameelah Nuriddin and Erin Hammond.
The eight images capture a giant 200-year-old flag, a young black woman with a giant afro, and various postures combining the pledge of allegiance and black power poses. They are accompanied by a manifesto that mirrors the preamble to the US constitution, written by Nuriddin, who is also the model in the series:
Related: Imagine a 'New America': reclaiming the American flag – in pictures
Continue reading...Donald Trump was given a written briefing months ago about intelligence suggesting Russia offered bounties for attacks on US forces in Afghanistan, multiple US media have reported on Monday night. The president said on Sunday he was not told of the allegations because the information was not “credible”.
The New York Times quoted two sources as saying details were included in a daily intelligence briefing the president received in late February. CNN said an official with direct knowledge told them it was included in the briefing – a written document – briefing “sometime in the spring”.
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