The Democratic contender defeated Republican Gerry Leonard to win the state’s first congressional district
The Democrat Gabe Amo defeated Republican Gerry Leonard to win Rhode Island’s first congressional district seat Tuesday, becoming the state’s first Black candidate elected to Congress.
The former White House aide succeeds David Cicilline, a former Democratic representative, who stepped down this summer to become president and CEO of the Rhode Island Foundation.
Continue reading...House of delegates still too close to call as Republican governor Glenn Youngkin’s goal of full control of legislature slips away
Virginia Democrats appeared to be on track to retain their majority in the state senate on Tuesday, depriving Republican governor Glenn Youngkin of a legislative trifecta that would have allowed him to swiftly enact his policy agenda.
Two hours after polls closed in Virginia, where all 140 seats of the state legislature were up for grabs, the house of delegates remained too close to call. Virginia Republicans still hoped to keep their majority in the lower chamber, even as their goal of taking full control of the legislature slipped away.
Continue reading...House speaker says in clip he and son use Covenant Eyes, which bills itself as a tool that ‘helps you live porn-free with confidence’
Mike Johnson, the hardline conservative and outspoken Christian who was elected House speaker in October, has raised eyebrows after he admitted using an app which bills itself as a tool to help people “quit porn”.
A year-old clip posted online over the weekend showed Johnson discussing how he and his son use Covenant Eyes, an app which tracks users’ phone and computer use, to monitor each others’ online activity.
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Gaza’s health ministry in the Hamas-controlled territory says more than 10,000 Palestinians have been killed there since 7 October.
We have a separate live blog covering the conflict, and you can follow it here:
Continue reading...Polls continue to show both presidential frontrunners ‘as tied as tied can be’, with third-party candidates tying for a distant third
Americans are one year away from a presidential election that’s shaping up to be a historically unpopular rematch between the oldest ever sitting president, Joe Biden, a Democrat, and his Republican predecessor, the twice-impeached, serially indicted Donald Trump.
With less than 10 weeks to go before Iowa’s caucuses launch the 2024 Republican nominating contest, much can still change. As it stands, the country appears to be hurtling toward an election few Americans want – but that might be one of the most consequential in modern US history.
Continue reading...Bad news for Florida governor’s campaign, with favorability falling throughout 2023 and a GOP debate scheduled for Wednesday
Five Republican legislators in Florida have switched their endorsements from rightwing governor Ron DeSantis to former US president Donald Trump before a key party nomination debate in Miami next week.
The move is another boost to Trump – who remains dominant in the 2024 Republican race – and a blow to DeSantis, whose once highly anticipated bid for the White House has recently floundered badly. All recent polling has shown Trump with a strong lead over his rivals and DeSantis being edged out of second place by the former US ambassador to the United Nations, Nikki Haley.
Continue reading...Michigan Democrat is only Palestinian American in Congress and warns Biden voters ‘will remember in 2024’
Michigan Democratic congresswoman Rashida Tlaib, the only Palestinian American member of Congress, has released a video accusing Joe Biden of supporting the “genocide of the Palestinian people”.
Tlaib has been a withering critic of Biden’s staunch backing of the Israeli war against Hamas in Gaza and the White House refusal to listen to demands from some progressive Democrats to back calls for a ceasefire.
Continue reading...Jamie Raskin says it was ‘an easy call’ because Santos hasn’t been convicted of a crime, though he faces 23 federal criminal charges
Thirty-one Democrats voted not to expel the Republican lawmaker George Santos from the US House of Representatives because he has not been convicted of any crime and to eject him would set a dangerous precedent for Republicans to expel their ideological opponents, a leading congressman said.
“For me this was an easy call,” said Jamie Raskin of Maryland, a law professor and influential progressive who sat on the January 6 committee and was lead manager in Donald Trump’s impeachment for inciting the attack on Congress.
Continue reading...Led by House speaker Mike Johnson, Republican plan passes Thursday 226-196 as Biden threatens veto
The US House of Representatives on Thursday passed a Republican plan to provide $14.3bn in aid to Israel as it fights Hamas, despite Democrats’ insistence it has no future in the Senate and the White House’s promise of a veto.
The measure passed 226-196, largely along party lines, with most Republicans supporting the bill and most Democrats objecting.
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Israel’s conflict with Hamas continues as its troops push deeper into the Gaza Strip.
We have a separate live blog covering it, and you can read it here:
Continue reading...The lying representative from New York retained his seat with fewer than two-thirds of the chamber supporting the resolution
A vote to expel Republican lawmaker George Santos from the US House of Representatives failed on Wednesday when fewer than two-thirds of the chamber supported the resolution, preserving Republicans’ narrow 221-212 majority.
Santos on Friday pleaded not guilty to a 23-count federal indictment accusing him of crimes including laundering funds to pay for his personal expenses, illegally receiving unemployment benefits and charging donors’ credit cards without their consent.
Continue reading...Colorado congressman Ken Buck will not seek re-election saying party must ‘project to the public what the truth is’
A leading conservative congressman announced his retirement, in large part because his Republican party “continues to rely on this lie that the 2020 election was stolen”.
“I have decided I’m not going to seek re-election,” Ken Buck of Colorado told MSNBC on Wednesday, after news that Kay Granger of Texas, the longest-serving Republican congresswoman, will also step down next year.
Continue reading...However, Republican senator Lindsey Graham says, Israel should be ‘smart’ and try to limit casualties ‘the best they can’
The US should place “no limit” to civilian casualties Israel might inflict in Gaza in response to the Hamas terror attacks of 7 October, a senior Republican senator said.
Speaking to CNN, Lindsey Graham of South Carolina was asked: “Is there a threshold for you, and do you think there should be one for the United States government, in which the US would say, ‘Let’s hold off for a second in terms of civilian casualties?’”
Continue reading...Nancy Mace and Marjorie Taylor Greene among those accused of hypocrisy over efforts to gut landmark Inflation Reduction Act
At least a dozen Republican members of Congress have welcomed clean energy investment flowing to their electorates following Joe Biden’s landmark climate bill, even as they launch fresh attempts to dismantle the legislation.
The group of conservative lawmakers, including the House of Representatives members Nancy Mace, Clay Higgins and Marjorie Taylor Greene, have all recently praised the arrival of new renewable energy, battery or electric vehicle jobs in their districts even after voting against last year’s Inflation Reduction Act (IRA), which was loaded with incentives for clean energy projects.
Continue reading...One of the first policy actions under the new speaker Mike Johnson is a partisan bill despite Joe Biden’s request for $106bn in joint aid
Republicans in the US House of Representatives on Monday introduced a plan to provide $14.3bn in aid to Israel by cutting funding for the Internal Revenue Service, setting up a showdown with Democrats who control the Senate.
In one of the first major policy actions under new House speaker Mike Johnson, House Republicans unveiled a standalone supplemental spending bill only for Israel, despite Joe Biden’s request for a $106bn package that would include aid for Israel, Ukraine and border security.
Continue reading...Departure could help Republican candidates but DeSantis and Haley, as well as Ramaswamy and Christie, still hugely trail Trump
Mike Pence’s surprise withdrawal from the Republican presidential nomination race on Saturday is part of natural winnowing of the crowded field, rivals of the former vice-president said Sunday – and one that could help their quest of candidates to wrestle the nomination from overwhelming frontrunner Donald Trump.
“In the end, the race is narrowing, which everyone said it would,” said former New Jersey governor Chris Christie, one of Trump’s fiercest Republican critics and one of four who have qualified for a third TV debate next month in Miami that may not have included Pence, who, he told CNN’s State of the Union, had run “a tough race, a good race”.
Continue reading...Donald Trump’s daughter could appear on witness stand in New York civil fraud trial as early as next week
George Santos has been a target of protesters and hecklers from practically the day he arrived in the Capitol, and there were plenty of those waiting for him as he departed federal court this morning:
Santos was there to enter a “not guilty” plea to a slate of new federal charges, and learn he would stand trial on the allegations on 9 September.
Continue reading...Louisiana congressman told audience at 2013 anti-abortion event Americans should live by 250-year-old religious and moral values
Before entering elected office, Mike Johnson, the new Republican speaker of the US House, praised “18th-century values” and told an audience that Americans should live by them when it came to morality and religion.
In video footage of a forum hosted in 2013 by Louisiana Right to Life, an anti-abortion group, Johnson, a devout Baptist and then an attorney for rightwing groups and causes, is asked about the “condition of conscience” in Europe and Canada regarding abortion policy.
Continue reading...The previously little-known rightwinger from Louisiana shows all the hallmarks of the ex-president’s voice
After engineering this month’s unceremonious defenestration of the hapless Kevin McCarthy, some far-right Republicans openly dreamed of installing their hero Donald Trump to replace him as speaker of the House of Representatives.
Trump himself, meanwhile, suggested that only Jesus Christ was certain to be elected to the role – apparently overlooking practical concerns of presumed unavailability.
Continue reading...Louisiana congressman known as ‘Maga Mike’, elected House speaker Wednesday, is staunch Trump supporter and election denier
The Louisiana congressman Mike Johnson, whom Republicans in Congress elected as their speaker after more than three weeks of leaderless chaos, played a key role in Donald Trump’s attempts to subvert the results of the 2020 election.
Johnson amassed enough support to win the speakership because of his allegiance to Trumpian ideals, earning him the nickname on the far right of “Maga Mike”. A litmus test of sorts for the speakership was alignment with rightwing views, including believing in a stolen election, though the firebrand approach of failed speaker candidate Jim Jordan soured moderate members, despite his election-denying bonafides.
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