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Donald Trump is set to give a press conference for the first time since his debate with Kamala Harris on Tuesday.
He’ll speak to reporters at his golf course in Rancho Palos Verdes, California, a wealthy community near Los Angeles.
Continue reading...Trump says he won’t debate Harris but claims he won the matchup; Harris tells North Carolina crowd that Americans should see another one
In an interview with the Financial Times, Leonard Leo, the conservative activist who was involved in the effort to build the current rightwing supermajority on the supreme court, says he will spend $1b to fight liberal cultural influence in the United States.
“We need to crush liberal dominance where it’s most insidious, so we’ll direct resources to build talent and capital formation pipelines in the areas of news and entertainment, where leftwing extremism is most evident,” Leo told the FT in a rare interview.
“Expect us to increase support for organisations that call out companies and financial institutions that bend to the woke mind virus spread by regulators and NGOs, so that they have to pay a price for putting extreme leftwing ideology ahead of consumers.”
As the United States approaches a critical election, I can’t sit quietly as Donald Trump – perhaps the most serious threat to the rule of law in a generation – eyes a return to the White House. For that reason, though I’m a Republican, I’ve decided to support Kamala Harris for president.
Trump failed to do his duty and exercise his presidential power to protect members of Congress, law enforcement and the Capitol from the attacks that day. He failed to deploy executive branch personnel to save lives and property and preserve democracy. He just watched on television and chose not to do anything because that would have been contrary to his interests. Trump still describes that day as beautiful. And as for those subsequently convicted of committing crimes, he describes them as hostages.
Any discussion about fidelity to the rule of law has to include Trump’s 34 state felony convictions, his state civil financial judgment of libel based on sexual abuse, as well as the pending federal elections interference case, not to mention the recently dismissed federal documents case that Special Counsel Jack Smith is continuing to pursue. Standing alone, these charges, convictions and judgments show that Trump is someone who fails to act, time and time again, in accordance with the rule of law.
To be fair, I have spoken with Trump only once. I do not really know him. It is telling, however, that several senior officials who worked for him in the White House now refuse to support him, including his vice president, chief of staff, defense secretary and national security adviser. Their unwillingness to endorse their former boss is an indictment of his character at a level equal to his many, many criminal indictments.
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Russia has accused both presidential candidates of using Vladimir Putin’s name as part of a domestic political fights, saying: “we really, really don’t like it”.
Presidential spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on Wednesday that the US was hostile and negative towards Russia, Reuters reports, and the Kremlin hoped that candidates would drop such references to Putin.
Continue reading...Trump recently gave garbled answer to question on childcare, while Vance said extended family should help out
With the Republican presidential ticket led by Donald Trump and his running mate JD Vance recently drawing scrutiny over their answers to questions about how they would address the high cost of childcare in the US, the far-right Project 2025 manifesto offers some suggestions to them.
The plan calls for shifting funding for childcare to in-home family care because it claims children who go to childcare are more likely to suffer from anxiety, depression and neglect.
Continue reading...Harris campaign seeks to press advantage on powerful motivator, especially in states with abortion on the ballot
As Kamala Harris and Donald Trump prepare to meet on the debate stage in Philadelphia, the battle over abortion rights has vaulted to the center of the 2024 presidential election campaign, the first since the supreme court’s decision overturning Roe v Wade.
At the party’s convention last month, Democrats spotlighted the harrowing stories of women placed in medical peril as a result of post-Roe abortion bans in their states. Last week, the Harris campaign launched a 50-stop “reproductive freedom” bus tour across several battleground states, kicking off in Trump’s “back yard”, miles from the former president’s Mar-a-Lago residence in south Florida.
Continue reading...Republican vice-presidential candidate was criticized for tone-deafness after comments at campaign rally in Arizona
America’s ideological split over gun control has spilled over into the presidential campaign after JD Vance, the Republican vice-presidential nominee, voiced regret that school shootings had “become a fact of life” in the US.
Vance’s comments – in the wake of the latest deadly shooting, at Apalachee high school in Georgia – ignited a political row after Democrats depicted them as evidence of a lack of empathy while Republicans claimed the remarks had been taken out of context.
Continue reading...This blog is now closed. Here is our full story on US conservative influencers saying they are ‘victims’ of a Russian disinformation campaign.
Half of gen-Z voters said they will vote for Kamala Harris in November, according to a new NBC News poll published today.
The poll shows one-third of gen-Z voters said they plan to vote for Donald Trump, and 1 in 10 said they do not plan to vote in the presidential election.
Continue reading...Democratic nominee references record of prosecuting traffickers of guns, drugs and humans across the border
This evening, Kamala Harris will give her first sit-down interview since launching her presidential campaign, and will be joined by her running mate, Tim Walz. The Guardian’s Robert Tait takes a look at what we can expect from the hotly anticipated encounter:
Kamala Harris on Thursday will give her first major interview since becoming the Democratic presidential nominee in what is being seen as a key test of her credibility after a prolonged honeymoon that has seen her surge ahead of Donald Trump in opinion polls.
The 21-second video shows Trump laying a wreath at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier and several snippets of Trump joining Gold Star family members at gravesites of their loved ones in a part of the cemetery known as Section 60.
‘We lost 13 great great people, what a horrible day it was,’ Trump says over somber music. ‘We didn’t lose one person in 18 months and then they took over the disaster, the leaving of Afghanistan.’
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Mark Esper, a former defense secretary under Donald Trump, told CNN that he hoped the reported altercation between the former president’s staff and an official at Arlington national cemetery was investigated, while saying that the grounds should never be used for “partisan political purposes”:
Esper served under Trump from 2019 until shortly after the 2020 election, when Trump fired him. The former defense chief has since decried Trump as a “threat to democracy”.
Continue reading...Republican vice-presidential candidate criticizes ‘leaders on the left’ and Randi Weingarten in 2021 clip
JD Vance, the Republican vice-presidential candidate and US senator from Ohio, attacked teachers who do not have children in newly resurfaced remarks from 2021.
In the resurfaced clip, Vance, who was speaking at a forum held by the Center for Christian Virtue, attacks “leaders on the left” and Randi Weingarten, the president of the American Federation of Teachers, for not having children.
Continue reading...Amid close race, Harris to go on tour in Georgia as Trump surrogate insists state’s governor will back ex-president
As Kamala Harris and Donald Trump brace themselves for what promises to be an ugly and bruising sprint to the finishing line in November, both presidential candidates’ campaigns are turning their sights back on the handful of desperately close swing states where the battle is likely to be decided.
Georgia is coming into view as a critical battleground for both leaders as they struggle to gain voters’ attention in an epochal election. On Wednesday, the vice-president will travel from the White House to southern Georgia to hold her first campaign event in the state with her recently anointed running mate and former high school football coach, Minnesota governor Tim Walz.
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Now comes Pat Ryan, who represents a New York battleground district in the House of Representatives.
He hit out at Donald Trump for his reported insults towards military veterans, then obliquely referenced the newfound optimism Democrats are feeling since Joe Biden ended his bid for a second term:
These last few weeks have felt like a new day in America, when we are waking up, rising up, patriots, to demand a president who does not just treat our veterans with respect, but everyone with respect.
We do not retreat, we are the United States of America, we lead!
Continue reading...Teresa Woorman takes moment in limelight in her stride after cameras cut to her during Oprah Winfrey speech
When the cameras panned over from Oprah Winfrey calling out “childless cat ladies” at the Democratic national convention, they landed on an unsuspecting woman who nodded along to Winfrey’s words and prompted plenty of reactions online – and a response from the woman herself.
During Winfrey’s speech on Wednesday, the cameras awkwardly cut to the audience member Teresa Woorman, a delegate from district 16 in Maryland.
Continue reading...Former president addresses delegates amid reports Oprah Winfrey is expected to make an appearance
Kamala Harris’s campaign raised four times as much money last month than Donald Trump’s campaign, Reuters is reporting, citing federal disclosures filed late on Tuesday.
The Harris campaign told the Federal Election Commission it raised $204m in July, compared to $48m reported by Trump’s main fundraising group.
Continue reading...Trump to hold rally in north-east while Harris tours through west of what election forecaster calls ‘tipping point’ state
The US presidential candidates Donald Trump and Kamala Harris will hold dueling campaign events this weekend in the critical political battleground state of Pennsylvania.
The former president was due to hold a Saturday rally in Wilkes-Barre in the north-east of the state, while the vice-president is on a bus tour of western Pennsylvania starting in Pittsburgh on Sunday, before the Democratic national convention kicks off on Monday in Chicago.
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Joe Biden is expected to jump on the phone later today with the leaders of Qatar and Egypt amid a glimmer of progress towards a deal for a ceasefire deal in Gaza, including the return of remaining hostages, according to a report.
An Axios reporter has posted about this, citing a source with knowledge of the situation.
Continue reading...VP nominees to face off on 1 October as Vance challenges Walz to an earlier debate in September
JD Vance, the Republican vice-presidential nominee, has accepted an invitation by CBS to debate Tim Walz, his Democratic counterpart, on 1 October after initially appearing to hedge.
Vance, Donald Trump’s running mate, also said he was accepting another invitation from CNN to debate Walz on 18 September, although it was unclear whether the Democratic nominee had agreed to the challenge.
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Donald Trump’s campaign has made a slew of new hires as he looks to get his footing against Democrat Kamala Harris, including bringing Corey Lewandowski, who managed part of his 2016 run, on to its leadership team.
Other hires on the team include Washington Times columnist and communications strategist Tim Murtaugh, political consultant Alex Bruesewitz and Taylor Budowich and Alex Pfeiffer, both of whom are associated with the Make America Great Again Super Pac.
Continue reading...Amid a faltering campaign, Republican VP hopeful claims pair are ‘uncomfortable in their own skin’
Republican vice-presidential hopeful JD Vance lashed out at Kamala Harris and Tim Walz during a whirlwind tour of political shows on Sunday as he attempted to seize back momentum to his own faltering campaign.
The Ohio senator claimed the pairing on the Democratic presidential ticket were “uncomfortable in their own skin” over their policy positions ahead of November’s election.
Continue reading...Microsoft appears to confirm that alleged hackers with ties to Iran sent email from ‘account of a former senior adviser’
Donald Trump said that only “publicly available information” had been stolen by a hack of his campaign for the presidency as he pinned the dramatic theft on the Iranian government.
The news of an alleged hack emerged amid reports from the news website Politico that it had begun getting emails from an anonymous account with internal documents from the Trump campaign, including a vetting dossier on his running mate JD Vance.
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