Move to 15 January puts first votes of GOP primary a little more than six months away
Iowa Republicans announced on Saturday that their presidential caucuses will be held on 15 January – the federal holiday honoring Martin Luther King Jr.
The move puts the first votes of the 2024 election a little more than six months away, as Republicans try to reclaim the White House.
Continue reading...Critics say party that touted its law-and-order credentials now intent on wrecking institutions that get in Donald Trump’s way
When Merrick Garland was nominated to the US supreme court by Barack Obama, Republicans refused to grant him a hearing. Now that Garland is the top law enforcement official in America, the party seems ready to give him one after all – an impeachment hearing.
Republicans on Capitol Hill are moving up a gear in a wide-ranging assault on the justice department and the Federal Bureau of Investigation that would have been unthinkable before the rise of Donald Trump. The party that for half a century claimed the mantle of law and order has, critics say, become a cult of personality intent on discrediting and dismantling institutions that get in Trump’s way.
Continue reading...Oklahoma superintendent Ryan Walters decried for comments on 1921 massacre in which hundreds were killed by white mobs
The state official in charge of Oklahoma’s schools is facing calls for impeachment, after he said teachers should tell students that the Tulsa race massacre was not racially motivated.
In a public forum on Thursday, Ryan Walters, Oklahoma’s state superintendent of public instruction, said teachers could cover the 1921 massacre, in which white Tulsans murdered an estimated 300 Black people, but teachers should not “say that the skin color determined it”.
Continue reading...Florida first lady outlines Ron DeSantis’s hardline rightwing agenda in video accusing progressives of ‘coming after our kids’
Vowing not to let progressives “impose an agenda” on American children and their mothers, Casey DeSantis outlined the hardline rightwing agenda her husband has imposed on Florida and now wants to impose on America.
The Florida first lady did so in a new video for Mamas for DeSantis, a group supporting Governor Ron DeSantis’s campaign for the Republican presidential nomination.
Continue reading...Former US president’s ‘body man’ appears in Miami court on charges relating to classified documents found at resort
Walt Nauta is facing six federal charges, including conspiracy to obstruct justice, corruptly concealing a document or record, and making false statements.
That’s fewer than the 37 federal charges Donald Trump is facing, but both men are named in the indictment brought last month by special counsel Jack Smith. You can read it below:
Continue reading...Former British prime minister says in interview that Trump ‘played an important role’ in arming Ukraine and set an example
On his recent visit to the US, Boris Johnson “reminded” Donald Trump he “actually played an important role” in supporting and arming Ukraine against its Russian invaders, the former British prime minister said, adding that British aid to Kyiv was “enabled” by Trump’s example.
Johnson made the claim about the notoriously pro-Russian former president – and brushed off mention of Trump’s impeachment for blocking military aid to Ukraine – in an interview on One Decision, a podcast hosted by Sir Richard Dearlove, a former chief of the British intelligence service MI6, and the journalist Julia Macfarlane. The episode was released on Thursday.
Continue reading...White House press secretary urges Republicans to act to protect US communities after latest spate of gun violence
The Washington Post reports that the cocaine discovered at the White House was found on the ground floor in an area where visitors leave their cellphones.
White House employees can give tours of the building, usually on evenings and weekends, and part of the security protocol involves having visitors leave their cellphones in a locked box. As the for the cocaine, the Post adds that “Authorities are trying to find the person who left it at the White House.”
Continue reading...Official GOP account deletes tweet featuring Liberian flag, which has single white star where Stars and Stripes has 50
The Republican party was embarrassed when a tweet from its official account celebrating Independence Day featured the wrong flag.
The tweet read: “247 years ago, our forefathers told Ol’ King George to get lost! Happy Independence Day from the GOP!”
Continue reading...Former New Jersey governor speaks out after bizarre video from Florida’s governor and ‘juvenile’ nicknames from the ex-president
An escalating feud between the two main rivals for the Republican presidential nomination is akin to a “teenage food fight”, another challenger, former New Jersey governor Chris Christie, said on Sunday.
He made the comment after the campaign of Ron DeSantis, the rightwing Florida governor who has slipped in the polls to Donald Trump, released a “homophobic” video attacking the former president for his previous support of the LGBTQ+ community.
Continue reading...Bus with 41 people, including 11 children who were with families, was welcomed by collective of faith and immigrants’ rights groups
Another bus carrying asylum seekers arrived in downtown Los Angeles from a Texas border city early on Saturday, the second such transport in less than three weeks.
The bus, which arrived at about 12.40pm at Los Angeles’s Union Station from Brownsville, Texas, held 41 people including 11 children who were with their families, according to a statement from the Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights in Los Angeles (Chirla).
Continue reading...US president lays out ‘economic vision centered around three key pillars’, giving a glimpse at a key piece of his 2024 campaign
Twenty years have passed since the United States invaded Iraq, and the country has dropped substantially in priority among Washington’s foreign policy concerns.
At the White House and in the halls of Congress, you are much more likely to hear about China, Russia and its invasion of Ukraine, or the perennial issue of Iran than about America’s relations with Baghdad. But it’s worth remembering that before he became vice-president under Barack Obama, or president 12 years later, Joe Biden played a major role in getting Congress to approve America’s invasion of Iraq.
Biden did vastly more than just vote for the war. Yet his role in bringing about that war remains mostly unknown or misunderstood by the public. When the war was debated and then authorized by the US Congress in 2002, Democrats controlled the Senate and Biden was chair of the Senate committee on foreign relations. Biden himself had enormous influence as chair and argued strongly in favor of the 2002 resolution granting President Bush the authority to invade Iraq.
“I do not believe this is a rush to war,” Biden said a few days before the vote. “I believe it is a march to peace and security. I believe that failure to overwhelmingly support this resolution is likely to enhance the prospects that war will occur …”
Continue reading...2024 presidential hopeful schedules event in competition with Donald Trump speech to Republican women
Ron DeSantis’s presidential campaign is struggling in the crucial state of New Hampshire and may have made the situation worse by scheduling an event on Tuesday in competition with a speech by Donald Trump to Republican women, prompting one prominent strategist to call the move “stupid”, Politico reported.
“It’s the worst strategic move he has exhibited thus far,” the New Hampshire Republican strategist, Mike Dennehy, told the website. “It’s just stupid, actually. You don’t take on the New Hampshire Federation of Republican Women.”
Continue reading...Republican presidential candidates attacked trans people and the LGBTQ+ community at a gathering of the religious right last week
Americans are “frustrated and anxious”, lamented former vice-president Mike Pence. The country is “in a precarious position” assessed North Carolina’s lieutenant governor Mark Robinson. And Glenn Jacobs, a former professional wrestling star and current mayor of Knox county, Tennessee, declared that “these are hard times”.
What could be the cause of such hardship? To the Republican presidential candidates who spoke in Washington DC on Friday at a major gathering of the religious right, the culprit was American society’s acceptance of transgender people and the broader LGBTQ+ community.
Continue reading...Former vice-president hails Dobbs decision as ‘historic victory’ but says it didn’t go far enough and urges a nationwide abortion ban
Despite their unpopularity with the American public, former Republican vice-president and 2024 White House hopeful Mike Pence doubled down Sunday on his hard-line support of staunch abortion restrictions, saying: “We just can’t rest or relent until we restore the sanctity of life.”
Pence – in an interview on Fox News Sunday – made clear that he viewed bringing the elimination of abortion “to the center of American law” as both essential and “a winning issue” for the Republican party trying to wrest back control of the Oval Office.
Continue reading...Ex-president lashes out at prosecutors and tells conservative audience that his two indictments are a ‘great badge of courage’
Republicans’ enduring loyalty to Donald Trump was on vivid display at a conservative conference this weekend, convened just two weeks after the former president was indicted on 37 federal charges related to his alleged mishandling of classified documents.
Addressing this year’s Road to Majority conference Saturday, Trump lashed out against federal prosecutors, who have accused the former president of intentionally withholding classified documents from authorities and obstructing justice in his efforts to keep those materials concealed. Trump, who could soon face additional charges in Washington and Georgia, told the friendly crowd that he considered each of his two indictments so far to be “a great badge of courage” as he ran to unseat Democratic incumbent Joe Biden.
Continue reading...Former president says he considers the two indictments a ‘great badge of courage’ during a speech at the Road to Majority conference
Donald Trump has derided the substantial federal charges against him, downplaying the numerous legal threats he faces while attacking Joe Biden for allegedly having “weaponized” the department of justice for political gain.
Speaking on Saturday at the Road to Majority conference in Washington, hosted by the right-wing evangelical Faith and Freedom Coalition, Trump said he considered each of the two indictments he has received so far to be a “great badge of courage”.
Continue reading...Supreme court’s overturning of Roe v Wade sparked a slew of state-level restrictions but anti-abortion stance has proved a vote-loser
In the months since the supreme court voted to overturn Roe v Wade last year, the effects of the court’s decision in Dobbs v Jackson Women’s Health Organization have become clear. Over a dozen states across the country have passed legislation limiting or outright banning access to abortions, severely restricting reproductive rights for millions of people and threatening to imprison abortion providers.
But as Republicans have pushed through these bills, voters have also taken every opportunity to rebuke them in elections – leading to defeats in midterms and emerging as one of the GOP’s largest vulnerabilities.
Continue reading...President announces executive order to boost access to contraception as Republicans call for national restrictions
Joe Biden on Friday put reproductive rights squarely in the middle of his 2024 re-election campaign as the US president hosted a rally based around defending abortion rights, notched three high-profile endorsements from groups dedicated to the issue, and announced an executive order aimed at boosting access to contraception.
The moves came in stark contrast to the Republican field of candidates, many of whom were attending the Faith & Freedom Coalition annual conference in Washington DC.
Continue reading...Former vice-president calls for federal 15-week ‘minimum’ ban in contrast to Trump who suggested issue cost party votes
Speaking one year since the US supreme court removed the federal right to abortion, Mike Pence said candidates for the 2024 Republican presidential nomination should stand firm on the electorally unpopular issue and take a hard line on bringing in national limits.
“For me, for our campaign, we’re going to stand where we’ve always stood, and that is without apology for the right to life,” the former congressman, Indiana governor and vice-president to Donald Trump told Politico.
Continue reading...Former CIA officer and Texas congressman pitches himself as moderate alternative to current crop of primary contenders
Former Texas congressman Will Hurd, a onetime CIA officer and fierce critic of Donald Trump, announced on Thursday that he’s running for president, hoping to build momentum as a more moderate alternative to the Republican primary field’s early front-runner.
Hurd, who made the announcement on CBS Mornings, served three terms in the House through January 2021, becoming the chamber’s only Black Republican during his final two years in office. He said in a video launching his White House bid that the “soul of our country is under attack,” reminiscent of Democrat Joe Biden’s slogan about the 2020 race being a “battle for the soul of the nation.”
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