Subcommittee will look into alleged campaign violations and sexual misconduct by Republican who admitted to lying
The question of Joe Biden‘s 2024 plans hangs over the issues conference, as Democrats wait to see when the president will officially announce his reelection campaign.
Biden declined to make those plans official last night as he spoke at the conference, but repeatedly expressed the need to “finish the job that needs to be done”.
Continue reading...Tennessee lawmaker Paul Sherrell faced fierce criticism for ‘grotesque suggestion’ in southern state with history of lynchings
A Tennessee Republican lawmaker apologised after suggesting “hanging by a tree” could be added to a bill concerning methods of execution in the state.
Paul Sherrell, a state representative from Sparta, made the suggestion on Tuesday, during discussion of an amendment which would allow execution by firing squad in Tennessee.
Continue reading...Bipartisan panel will look into alleged misconduct by Republican congressman who has admitted to lying about his résumé
The House ethics committee has opened an investigation into George Santos, the Republican lawmaker who admitted to lying about his résumé in his campaign to represent part of New York City’s suburbs in Congress’s lower chamber.
A bipartisan statement from the committee’s GOP chair, Michael Guest, and the Democratic ranking member, Susan Wild, said the panel voted to create a subcommittee to look into alleged misconduct by Santos.
Continue reading...The president celebrated in a speech his party’s successes so far in his first term while House Democrats eye regaining the chamber
Joe Biden delivered a rallying cry to fellow Democrats on Wednesday, offering a glimpse of the president’s likely re-election message as he prepares to officially announce his plans for 2024.
Speaking at House Democrats’ annual issues conference in Baltimore, Maryland, Biden celebrated Democrats’ legislative accomplishments over his first two years in office but told his allies that they still have more work to do.
Continue reading...Report on mysterious health ailment that affected US government workers clashes with conclusion by panel of scientists last year
A review by US intelligence agencies could not conclude that a foreign adversary was behind “Havana syndrome,” a mysterious health ailment that affected US government workers overseas, the Washington Post reports.
The determination in a report authored by seven intelligence agencies clashes with a conclusion reached by a panel of expert scientists last year, which found pulsed electromagnetic energy and ultrasound could be behind the mysterious symptoms that include headaches, nausea and ringing in the ears – which in some cases has grown debilitating for those affected.
Seven intelligence agencies participated in the review of approximately 1,000 cases of “anomalous health incidents,” the term the government uses to describe a constellation of physical symptoms including ringing in the ears followed by pressure in the head and nausea, headaches and acute discomfort.
Five of those agencies determined it was “very unlikely” that a foreign adversary was responsible for the symptoms, either as the result of purposeful actions — such as a directed energy weapon — or as the byproduct of some other activity, including electronic surveillance that unintentionally could have made people sick, the officials said. They spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe the findings of the assessment, which had not yet been made public.
Continue reading...Signature policy at risk as conservatives argue president does not have authority to lessen debt burden
Good morning, US politics blog readers. Joe Biden’s plan to provide some student debt relief to tens of millions of Americans will be before the supreme court today, which will hear two cases brought by conservatives challenging the proposal. There’s no telling how the court – which is composed of six conservative justices and three liberals – will rule on the petitions, which argue the president does not have the legal authority to provide relief. But a ruling striking the program down or limiting it would be a major loss for the White House. We may get a sense of which way the justices are leaning in today’s oral arguments.
Here’s what else is going on today:
Republicans in the House of Representatives will vote on a bill that would bar retirement funds from sustainable investing.
The House select committee on competition with the Chinese Communist party will hold its first hearing during the primetime TV hour, at 7 pm eastern time.
Biden is heading to Virginia Beach, Virginia, where he’ll speak about his efforts to lower healthcare costs.
Continue reading...Move comes after Florida governor lashed out at theme park’s protest of law restricting sexual orientation discussion in schools
The Republican governor of Florida, Ron DeSantis, has signed a bill that wrests control of Walt Disney World’s self-governing district, in a move seen as punishing the company for its opposition to his so-called “don’t say gay” law.
“Today the corporate kingdom finally comes to an end,” he said at the bill signing in Lake Buena Vista in his trademark bullish style. “There’s a new sheriff in town, and accountability will be the order of the day.”
Continue reading...Democrats and Republicans in Senate and House have pledged to hold hearings on crash that has sparked major pollution fears
Treasury secretary Janet Yellen has made a surprise visit to Kyiv, where she’s underscoring Washington’s continued support for Ukraine one year after Russia invaded.
We at the Guardian have a separate live blog with all the latest Ukraine news, which you can follow along here.
Continue reading...Ronna McDaniel says loyalty pledge by primary candidates should be a ‘no-brainer’ for party’s presidential hopefuls
The Republican National Committee’s chairperson has said that all GOP primary candidates should sign a pledge promising to support the eventual party nominee if they wish to participate in the presidential debates.
Ronna McDaniel, the RNC’s leader since 2017, told CNN in an interview Sunday that even though the debate criteria have not yet been released, the loyalty pledge should nevertheless be a “no-brainer” for the party’s presidential hopefuls.
Continue reading...Country’s capacity to generate renewable energy shot up last year, producing enough electricity to power 64m households
A new report by Climate Central shows how US capacity to generate renewable energy shot up last year – and surprisingly, red states lead the nation in solar and wind power production.
National wind and solar capacity grew 16% compared to 2021. All told, renewables generated enough electricity to power 64m American households. The report comes as the Biden administration starts to make billions of dollars available for renewable energy projects. The administration has committed to decarbonizing the grid completely by 2030 and getting the US to net zero emissions by mid-century.
Continue reading...While Antony Blinken spoke highly of Ukraine’s will to fight in his interview with ABC News, he declined to say whether he thought the war would still be raging this time next year.
Here’s more from his appearance:
Continue reading...At issue is whether a protection afforded by the constitution applies to ‘informal’ fact-finding by members of Congress
A federal appeals court appeared skeptical on Thursday of the justice department’s interpretation of US Congress members’ immunity from criminal investigations and whether it allowed federal prosecutors to access House Republican Scott Perry’s phone contents in the January 6 investigation.
The department seized Perry’s phone in the criminal investigation last year and was granted access to its contents by a lower court, until Perry appealed the decision on the grounds that the speech or debate clause protections barred prosecutors from seeing his messages.
Continue reading...The derailment of a train carrying toxic chemicals in East Palestine, Ohio has become a political football, but now we have an idea of what may have caused it: an overheating wheel bearing. Here’s more from the National Transportation Safety Board’s just-released interim report:
Crew members on the freight train that derailed in Ohio earlier this month, unleashing a huge blaze and spreading dangerous chemicals, tried to slow and stop the train after seeing an alert about an overheating wheel bearing, but it came off the tracks, according to an interim report released on Thursday by the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB).
Continue reading...Former president heading to East Palestine, Ohio, after loosening safety regulations for rail operators
Transportation secretary Pete Buttigieg will visit East Palestine, Ohio on Thursday, Politico reports.
He’ll receive an update from the National Transportation Safety Board, which is investigating the freight derailment that spilled toxic chemicals in the community, according to the report, which cites a person familiar with his plans.
Continue reading...Comments from right wing are business as usual – but could signal future political battles to come if US to keep sending aid to Ukraine
For Joe Biden to safely visit Ukraine, the White House spirited him out of the country in the middle of the night and made reporters traveling with him swear a temporary oath of secrecy – none of which could protect the president from attacks by Republicans.
The journey was only complicated further by an unexpected announcement. In a speech marking a year since he sent his armies over Ukraine’s borders in an ill-fated attempt to take Kyiv, Russian president Vladimir Putin announced his country would no longer participate in the last nuclear arms control treaty with the United States still standing, and accused the west of posing an existential threat to his country.
Continue reading...Speaking before a crowd of thousands in the gardens of Warsaw’s Royal Castle, Joe Biden hailed the resilience of Ukraine’s people and the benevolence of Poland and other western allies in helping fend off the Russian invasion.
“Autocrats only understand one word: no.” Biden said. “No, you will not take my country. No, you will not take my freedom. No, you will not take my future. I’ll repeat tonight what I said last year at the same place. A dictator bent on rebuilding an empire will never be able to ease the people’s love of liberties. Brutality will never grind down the will of the free. Ukraine will never be a victory for Russia, never.”
Continue reading...Ex-Maryland governor tells Meet the Press: ‘I care about making sure we have a future for the Republican party’
The danger of splitting anti-Trump Republicans and helping the former president win the nomination again “would be a pretty good reason to consider not running” for the White House in 2024, the former Maryland governor Larry Hogan said.
“I don’t care that much about my future in the Republican party,” Hogan told NBC’s Meet the Press on Sunday. “I care about making sure we have a future for the Republican party.
Continue reading...Bills are part of religious right’s post-Roe strategy, with most prevalent ones relating to age verification of sex-related websites
A wave of proposed legislation pushed by Republicans across the US at the state level is aimed at outlawing aspects of sexuality that could have a huge impact on Americans’ private lives and businesses.
Opponents to the laws before legislatures in various states say the planned new legislation could spawn prosecution of breast-pump companies in Texas for nipples on advertising, or a bookstore might be banned from selling romance novels in West Virginia, or South Carolina could imprison standup comics if a risque joke is heard by a young person.
Continue reading...A year after the conflict began, the consensus against Russian aggression has held but alarm bells are ringing in Congress
Vladimir Putin has proven adept at exploiting the US political divide, so the solid bipartisan consensus behind arming Ukraine over the past year may well have come as a surprise to him. The question one year into the war is: how long can that consensus last?
Two weeks before the first anniversary of the full-scale invasion on 24 February, a group of Trump-supporting Republicans led by Matt Gaetz introduced a “Ukraine fatigue” resolution that, if passed, would “express through the sense of the House of Representatives that the United States must end its military and financial aid to Ukraine, and urges all combatants to reach a peace agreement”.
Continue reading...Glenn Youngkin blocks bill passed in Democratic-led state senate to ban search warrants for menstrual data on tracking apps
The Republican governor of Virginia, Glenn Youngkin, appears to have thwarted an attempt to stop law enforcement obtaining menstrual histories of women in the state.
A bill passed in the Democratic-led state senate, and supported by half the chamber’s Republicans, would have banned search warrants for menstrual data stored in tracking apps on mobile phones or other electronic devices.
Continue reading...