Category Archives: Republicans

Republican Josh Hawley’s anti-abortion arguments echoed in Alabama IVF case

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Arguments that led to Alabama supreme court ruling that embryos are ‘extrauterine children’ similar to Missouri senator’s in 2013 case

Anti-abortion arguments made in the recent controversial Alabama supreme court decision, which led to the shut down of in vitro fertilization (IVF) in nearly half of the state’s clinics, echo those made by the Republican US senator Josh Hawley.

The Missouri lawmaker made similar arguments in 2013 and when he worked on the legal team arguing the “Hobby Lobby” case on contraception before the US supreme court.

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Wisconsin ethics panel calls for felony charges against Trump fundraising group

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Commission says Save America Joint Fundraising Committee evaded campaign finance laws in effort to oust Trump foe

Donald Trump’s legal woes continue in Wisconsin, where the state’s ethics commission has recommended felony charges against Trump’s Save America Joint Fundraising Committee for its alleged role in a plot to bypass campaign finance limits.

Trump is already facing 91 felony charges in criminal cases across multiple states related to his political and business dealings. The newest allegations in Wisconsin were first reported on Friday by the news site WisPolitics.

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Ex-FBI informant charged with lying about Bidens arrested again

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Alexander Smirnov, who claims to have Russian intelligence links, taken into custody after meeting at lawyers’ offices in Las Vegas

The former FBI informant who is charged with lying about a multimillion-dollar bribery scheme involving Joe Biden’s family was again taken into custody in Las Vegas, two days after a judge released him, his attorneys said.

Alexander Smirnov was arrested during a meeting on Thursday morning at his lawyers’ offices in downtown Las Vegas. The arrest came after prosecutors appealed the judge’s ruling allowing 43-year-old Smirnov, who holds dual US-Israeli citizenship, to be released with a GPS monitor ahead of trial. He is charged with making a false statement and creating a false and fictitious record.

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Britain’s ‘deep state’ thwarted my plans, Liz Truss tells US far-right summit

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Former Conservative PM, whose tenure lasted 50 days, tells CPAC she fell victim to UK’s ‘establishment … its bureaucrats and lawyers’

Liz Truss, the former British prime minister, spoke at a far-right conference in America on Wednesday, styling herself as a populist who took on America’s equivalent of the “deep state” in her own country.

Truss was among the headline speakers at this week’s Conservative Political Action Conference at the National Harbor in Maryland. CPAC is billed as the biggest annual gathering of conservatives in the US but has in recent years embraced Donald Trump’s brand of nativist-populism.

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White House could use federal law to control US-Mexico border crossings

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Biden administration considering using immigration law used by Trump after Republicans rejected a negotiated immigration bill

The White House is considering using provisions of federal immigration law repeatedly tapped by Donald Trump to unilaterally enact a sweeping crackdown at the southern border, according to three people familiar with the deliberations.

The administration, stymied by Republican lawmakers who rejected a negotiated border bill earlier this month, has been exploring options that Joe Biden could deploy on his own without congressional approval, multiple officials and others familiar with the talks said. But the plans are nowhere near finalized and it’s unclear how the administration would draft any such executive actions in a way that would survive the inevitable legal challenges. The officials and those familiar with the talks spoke to the Associated Press on condition of anonymity to comment on private White House discussions.

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Nikki Haley says she believes embryos created through IVF are ‘babies’

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Former UN ambassador and Republican presidential candidate expresses support for Alabama supreme court ruling

The Republican presidential candidate Nikki Haley has spoken in response to the recent supreme court ruling out of Alabama, revealing that she believes embryos created through IVF are “babies”.

In a new interview with NBC, the former UN ambassador expressed support for the Friday ruling by Alabama’s supreme court that deemed that frozen embryos are “children”.

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Russia adds Republican senator Lindsey Graham to ‘terrorists and extremists’ list

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South Carolina lawmaker is one of more than 12,000 individuals on list kept by Russia’s state financial monitoring agency

The Republican senator Lindsey Graham, a key ally of Donald Trump, has been added to a list of “terrorists and extremists” kept by Russia’s state financial monitoring agency.

Tass, the state-run news agency, first reported the move by Rosfinmonitoring, which allows authorities to freeze Russian bank accounts, though in Graham’s case is likely to be chiefly symbolic.

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‘I refuse to quit’: Nikki Haley declares no fear of retribution from Trump

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‘I feel no need to kiss the ring,’ says Republican candidate as she turns up rhetorical heat ahead of South Carolina primary

A defiant Nikki Haley on Tuesday declared no fear of retribution from Donald Trump as she persists in her efforts to compete against the frontrunner for the Republican nomination, saying: “I feel no need to kiss the ring.”

Haley approaches the South Carolina primary on Saturday, her home state where she was previously governor, a long way behind Trump but turning up the rhetorical heat.

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Wisconsin adopts new legislative maps, giving Democrats chance to win state

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Governor’s signature marks end of long fight over legislative lines and greatly reduces the Republican bias baked into current maps

The Wisconsin governor, Tony Evers, has signed into law a pair of new state legislative maps, undoing a Republican gerrymander that has shaped Wisconsin politics for more than a decade and giving Democrats a chance at winning control of the state in future elections.

“It’s a new day for Wisconsin,” said Evers at a press conference on Monday to cheers from a room of anti-gerrymandering activists.

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Trump launches gold high top sneaker line a day after $350m court ruling

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‘Never Surrender High-Tops’ cost $399 and arrive on the market just after judge hands former US president huge penalty

Donald Trump has launched his own sneaker brand, a day after a New York judge ordered him to pay $354.9m in penalties for fraudulently overstating his net worth to dupe lenders.

“I’ve wanted to do this a long time,” the former US president said, as he unveiled what he called the first official Trump footwear at Sneaker Con in Philadelphia, a gathering that bills itself as the “The Greatest Sneaker Show on Earth.”

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Donald Trump banned from running businesses in New York for three years – live

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Arthur Engoron ordered Trump to pay more than $350m in fines and barred him from running New York businesses for three years

Fulton County district attorney Fani Willis’ father took the stand now, testifying about threats she faced at the home he lived in with her in 2019 and 2020, before she moved to a new place after people outside her house called her slurs and threatened her there.

John Floyd, Willis’ dad, was asked about her romantic relationships and how often he saw people she had dated, including special prosecutor Nathan Wade. He said he hadn’t met Wade until 2023, and a previous boyfriend he saw often in earlier years was a disc jockey. (Previous testimony from a former friend of Willis claimed the two started dating much earlier than they’d claimed.)

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FBI informant charged with lying about Bidens’ role in Ukraine business

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Alexander Smirnov falsely said executives linked to energy firm Burisma paid Joe and Hunter Biden $5m each in 2015 and 2016, prosecutors say

An FBI informant has been charged with lying to his handler about ties between Joe Biden, his son Hunter and a Ukrainian energy company.

Alexander Smirnov falsely told FBI agents in June 2020 that executives associated with the Ukrainian energy company Burisma paid Hunter and Joe Biden $5m each in 2015 and 2016, prosecutors said on Thursday.

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House Republicans will hold hearing with Robert Hur over Biden report

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Hur investigated president’s mishandling of classified papers after his vice-presidency and raised questions about his ‘poor memory’

House Republicans will hold a public hearing next month with special counsel Robert Hur, who investigated Joe Biden’s mishandling of classified documents after his vice-presidency, as the White House counsel reportedly wrote to the attorney general attacking Hur’s commentary on the US president’s memory as a violation of federal policy.

The House judiciary committee, chaired by rightwing Republican Jim Jordan, will hear testimony from Hur on 12 March, two unnamed people familiar with the plans told the Associated Press on Thursday. The White House declined to comment on the plans.

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Ukraine’s war effort already affected by block on $60bn US aid, says Nato chief

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Jens Stoltenberg believes Congress will finally vote for package but meanwhile Russian forces are advancing near Avdiivka

The US failure to vote through a fresh military aid package for Ukraine is already having an impact on the battlefield, Nato’s secretary general has warned at the end of a defence ministers’ meeting.

Jens Stoltenberg said he still believed Congress would eventually approve the stalled $60bn (£50bn) package, but his cautious remarks came as Nato officials warned Russia was making “significant gains” near the frontline town of Avdiivka.

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Wisconsin lawmakers adopt new legislative maps that could undo gerrymandering

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Votes by Republican-dominated state assembly and state senate signal that the years-long battle may be finally drawing to a close

Wisconsin lawmakers voted on Tuesday to adopt legislative maps drawn by the Democratic governor, Tony Evers – inching the state closer to undoing the extreme gerrymander that has ensured Republican control of the state for more than a decade.

The pair of votes in the Republican-dominated state assembly and state senate are a sign that the years-long battle over Wisconsin’s legislative maps may be finally drawing to a close, giving Democrats a chance to win control of the state legislature in upcoming elections for the first time since 2012.

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US Senate approves $95bn aid package for Ukraine, Israel and Taiwan

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Pre-dawn vote comes amid growing doubts about fate of legislation in Republican-controlled House of Representatives

After weeks of setbacks and delays, the US Senate gave final approval to a $95bn wartime aid package for Ukraine, Israel and other American allies early on Tuesday morning, sending the bill to the Republican-controlled House where its fate is uncertain.

In a pre-dawn vote, the Senate passed the measure 70 to 29, easily clearing the 60-vote threshold needed to pass most legislation in the chamber. Nearly all Democrats and 22 Republicans approved the bill, which exposed deep divisions within the GOP over America’s responsibility to its allies and its role on the world stage.

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US House impeaches Biden homeland security secretary in historic vote

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Alejandro Mayorkas, rebuked by Republicans who voted against key immigration bill, first to face such punishment in over 150 years

The US House of Representatives has voted to impeach Alejandro Mayorkas, Joe Biden’s secretary of homeland security, on explicitly political charges related to conditions at the southern border as Republicans attempt to capitalize on the issue in an election year.

The evening roll call proved tight, with speaker Mike Johnson’s threadbare Republican majority and in the face of staunch Democratic opposition to impeaching Mayorkas, the first cabinet secretary facing charges in nearly 150 years.

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Long Island votes on replacement for disgraced Republican George Santos

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Democrat Tom Suozzi and Republican Mazi Pilip battle to win New York district after expulsion of fabulist congressman

The replacement for George Santos, the disgraced Republican congressman, is set to be decided on Tuesday, as New Yorkers head to the polls in what has become a closely watched election nationwide.

Voters in Long Island, east of New York City, face a choice between Tom Suozzi, a Democrat who previously spent six years in Congress, and Mazi Pilip, a relatively unknown local politician, in an election that will impact Republican’s narrow majority in the House of Representatives.

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Rand Paul filibusters over Senate’s $95bn foreign aid package – as it happened

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Kentucky senator who opposes the aid package has indicated he will use every tool at his disposal to delay the final vote

The House majority leader, Republican Steve Scalise of Louisiana, will return to Capitol Hill tomorrow after undergoing cancer treatment in recent weeks.

The House speaker, Republican Mike Johnson of Louisiana, welcomed Scalise back with a tweet noting that the majority leader was now in remission.

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Republicans say Trump call for Russia to attack Nato allies was just fine, actually

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Tom Cotton echoes fellow GOP senators, saying former president was ‘simply ringing the warning bell’

A leading Republican senator said Donald Trump was “simply ringing the warning bell” when he caused global alarm by declaring he would encourage Russia to attack Nato allies who did not pay enough to maintain the alliance, as Trump’s party closed ranks behind its presumptive presidential nominee.

“Nato countries that don’t spend enough on defense, like Germany, are already encouraging Russian aggression and President Trump is simply ringing the warning bell,” Tom Cotton of Arkansas, a former soldier, told the New York Times.

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