Category Archives: US Politics

Pro-Israel Pac pours millions into surprise candidate in Maryland primary

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United Democracy Project backing Sarah Elfreth, even with Harry Dunn, former US capitol officer, as fellow Democrat in House race

A pro-Israel lobby group has dropped millions into a Maryland congressional race as tensions remain high over the war in Gaza.

The primary race in the third congressional district, which will be held on Tuesday, has attracted national interest thanks to the candidacy of one Democrat in particular: Harry Dunn. A former US Capitol police officer, Dunn and his colleagues won praise for their actions defending lawmakers against a violent mob of Donald Trump’s supporters on January 6. In his New York Times bestselling memoir, Standing My Ground, Dunn recounted how the insurrectionists repeatedly used the N-word as they attacked him and other Black officers.

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Former US town clerk and her lawyer charged for allegedly accessing 2020 voter data in hunt for fraud

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Stephanie Scott and Stefanie Lambert charged for promoting ‘baseless conspiracies’ and showing ‘disregard for voter privacy’

Michigan’s attorney general announced charges against a former township clerk and a lawyer who had supported attempts to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election, alleging they accessed voting systems without authorization in a search of fraud.

Stephanie Scott and her attorney, Stefanie Lambert, were charged on Wednesday with multiple felonies, including unauthorized access to a computer and using a computer to commit a crime.

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Georgia will allow Trump to challenge order keeping Fani Willis on election interference case

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Appeals court said it would allow Trump to challenge decision not to disqualify Willis over relationship with her deputy

The Georgia state court of appeals on Wednesday said it would consider an appeal from Donald Trump of an order allowing Fani Willis, the district attorney, to continue prosecuting his election interference case in Fulton county.

In a one-page order, the appeals court said it would allow Trump to challenge the decision not to disqualify Willis over her relationship with Nathan Wade, a special prosecutor she hired to lead the Trump case. Scott McAfee, the trial judge overseeing the case, ruled in March that Willis could stay on the case as long as Wade resigned. Wade subsequently resigned the same day McAfee issued his decision.

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Republican candidate loses US House primary in victory for pro-Israel lobbyists

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John Hostettler of Indiana, whom pro-Israel groups deemed ‘antisemitic’, loses to Mark Messmer, who led opponents with 40% of vote

Republican John Hostettler has lost his House primary in Indiana, delivering a victory to pro-Israel groups who sought to block the former congressman from returning to Washington. The groups attacked Hostettler as insufficiently supportive of Israel at a time when criticism of Benjamin Netanyahu’s government has hit new highs because of the war in Gaza.

When the Associated Press called the eighth district primary race at 7.49pm ET, less than an hour after the last polls closed in Indiana, Mark Messmer led his opponents with 40% of the vote. Messmer, the Indiana state senate majority leader, will advance to the general election in November, which he is heavily favored to win because of the district’s Republican leanings. The victor will replace Republican congressman Larry Bucshon, who announced his retirement earlier this year.

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House set to vote on Marjorie Taylor Greene effort to remove Mike Johnson

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Far-right congresswoman has spearheaded effort to oust fellow Republican as speaker but motion to vacate widely expected to fail

The House is expected to vote this week on a motion to remove Republican Mike Johnson as speaker, but the effort, spearheaded by hard-right congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene, faces virtually no chance of success.

Greene announced on Wednesday that she would move forward with forcing a vote on Johnson’s removal this week, following through on a threat she first issued in late March. Greene has consistently attacked Johnson for advancing bills that have attracted widespread bipartisan support, such as the government spending proposal approved in March and the foreign aid package signed into law last month.

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Clyburn hits out at Trump over Gestapo comment: ‘Incredible but not surprising’

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Democrat says country is going off track after Trump compares Biden administration to Germany’s fascist secret police

Senior congressional Democrat James Clyburn has responded to remarks made by Donald Trump at a private event on Saturday in which he compared the Biden administration with the Gestapo secret police in fascist Germany, saying it was “incredible but it’s not surprising”.

The 83-year-old South Carolina Democrat added that Trump “is given to hyperbole on every subject that he ever approaches … The country got off track after that 1876 election and we are approaching the same kinds of elements today.”

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Democrats rally to Biden’s defense over response to pro-Palestinian student protests

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Republicans accuse president of weak response, but prominent Democrats claim he ‘has been very strong from the beginning’

Some Democrats rallied to the defense of Joe Biden on Sunday as the president came under increased criticism over his response to pro-Palestinian student protests and his handling of Israel’s war on Gaza.

Republicans have seized on Biden’s response to the protests, which have seen more than2,000 people arrested around the country, accusing him of a weak response. But prominent Democrats, including Biden re-election campaign co-chairperson Mitch Landrieu, the former mayor of New Orleans, claimed the president “has been very strong about this from the beginning”.

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‘It’s just not hitting like it used to’: TikTok was in its flop era before it got banned in the US

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I used to be an avid user of TikTok, but the algorithm serves much less delight and serendipity than it used to

TikTok is facing its most credible existential threat yet. Last week, the US Congress passed a bill that bans the short-form video app if it does not sell to an American company by this time next year. But as a former avid user whose time on the app has dropped sharply in recent months, I am left wondering – will I even be using the app a year from now?

Like many Americans of my demographic (aging millennial), I first started using TikTok regularly when the Covid-19 pandemic began and lockdowns gave many of us more time than we knew how to fill.

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Will the US campus protests harm Biden – and benefit Trump?

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Rightwing media have seized on campus protests to portray the president as weak. Will it have an impact in November?

At the height of the tensions on US campuses this week, with Republicans gleefully seizing on student unrest as an election issue that could propel Donald Trump back into the White House, Joe Biden tried to steer a middle path.

Weighing the democratic right to peaceful protest and the political necessity to stem disruption, Biden declared that “order must prevail”.

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Star Wars’ Mark Hamill hails ‘Joe-B-Wan Kenobi’ after White House meeting

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Actor brings force of Hollywood to trumpet Biden’s legislative record in briefing that both delighted and bemused journalists

“You will never find a more wretched hive of scum and villainy.” But enough about Washington. The Star Wars actor Mark Hamill, who once saw off gangsters at a fictional spaceport, came to the US capital on Friday for a meeting with Joe Biden.

Quite why he was in the Oval Office, and what was talked about, remained something of a mystery. A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away Biden was riding high in the opinion polls but now, perhaps, he is in need of added star power.

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Congressman Henry Cuellar in court accused of receiving $600,000 in bribes

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Texas Democrat says he and his also accused wife are innocent amid claims they took money from Azerbaijan and Mexican bank

The US justice department on Friday accused the Democratic congressman Henry Cuellar and his wife, Imelda Cuellar, of accepting about $600,000 in bribes in exchange for influencing policy in favor of Azerbaijan and a Mexican bank.

The Cuellars had made their first appearance before a federal magistrate judge in Houston by the afternoon, but it was not clear how they pleaded. Earlier, the congressman, who has represented a swath of Texas’s border with Mexico in the US House since 2005, issued a statement denying unspecified “allegations” against him.

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Experts dismiss Kristi Noem’s ‘dubious’ claim to have met Kim Jong-un

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South Dakota governor says she met North Korean dictator in same book in which she describes killing her dog

The South Dakota governor, Republican vice-presidential hopeful and self-confessed dog-killer Kristi Noem’s bizarre claim in a new book to have met the North Korean dictator Kim Jong-un has been dismissed by experts as “dubious” and not “conceivable”.

The Dakota Scout first reported Noem’s claim, which is in her forthcoming book, No Going Back: The Truth on What’s Wrong With Politics and How We Move America Forward.

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‘Enough with the gaslighting’: Harris responds to Trump’s insistence that he doesn’t back national abortion ban – live

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Vice-president calls abortion access a ‘fundamental freedom’ in Florida as state’s six-week ban takes effect

Greene wrapped up the press conference by demanding, essentially, that Mike Johnson resign or be fired:

What I’m calling on is, like my colleague here said, Mike Johnson … can pray about it, think about it all weekend, do the right thing and resign, giving our conference time to elect a new leader, a new speaker of the house. He should reject the endorsement of Hakeem Jeffries and the entire Democrat leadership team. That is not an endorsement that any Republican speaker should ever want or embrace. And this vote will be called next week, and I would just want to urge all our colleagues to prepare for it. It’s the right thing to do for America. It’s time to clean house and get our conference in order and get ready to support President Trump’s agenda. God willing, he wins in November and we take back full power here in Washington in January.

I fight for his agenda every single day, and that’s why I’m fighting here against my own Republican conference, to fight harder against the Democrats.

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Arizona Democrats to make final push to repeal near-total abortion ban

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Democrats pick up support of two Republicans to repeal 1864 law reinstated three weeks ago as governor is expected to ratify repeal

Arizona lawmakers are poised to repeal the state’s 160-year-old statue banning nearly all abortions.

The 1864 law, which was reinstated by the state’s supreme court three weeks ago, made abortion a central focus in the battleground state and galvanized Democrats seeking to enshrine abortion rights.

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Marjorie Taylor Greene to force vote on ousting Mike Johnson as speaker

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Extremist’s bid to remove House speaker appears certain to fail as Democratic leaders indicate they will table or kill motion

Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene announced on Wednesday that she would move to force a vote next week on removing her fellow Republican Mike Johnson as House speaker, even though the measure appears certain to fail.

“I think the American people need to see a recorded vote,” Greene said at a press conference. “And so next week, I am going to be calling this motion to vacate – absolutely calling it. I can’t wait to see Democrats go out and support a Republican speaker and have to go home to their primaries and have to run for Congress again.”

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US judges reject new Louisiana voting map with second majority-Black district

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Rejection by three-judge panel fuels new uncertainty about district boundaries as state prepares for congressional elections

A new congressional map giving Louisiana a second majority-Black House district was rejected on Tuesday by a panel of three federal judges, fueling new uncertainty about district boundaries as the state prepares for fall congressional elections.

The 2-1 ruling forbids the use of a map drawn up in January by the legislature after a different federal judge blocked a map from 2022. The earlier map maintained a single Black-majority district and five mostly white districts, in a state with a population that is about one-third Black.

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Dozens arrested at Columbia University as New York police disperse Gaza protest

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NYPD enters campus Tuesday evening to clear out academic building taken over by protesters earlier in the day

Hundreds of New York City police officers entered Columbia University on Tuesday evening to clear an academic building taken over by pro-Palestinian students the day before, as tensions surrounding the students’ campus encampment for Gaza have roiled the New York school for two weeks.

Live video images showed police in riot gear marching onto the upper Manhattan campus, the focal point of nationwide student protests opposing Israel’s war in Gaza.

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House Democratic leaders announce opposition to attempt to remove Johnson as speaker – live

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The top House Democrats, including minority leader Hakeem Jeffries, say they will oppose any attempt from far-right Republican to vacate Mike Johnson as speaker

Deputy White House press secretary Andrew Bates has condemned protesters’ usage of the word “intifada” and their takeover of a building on Columbia University’s campus, saying the action was “not peaceful”:

President Biden has stood against repugnant, Antisemitic smears and violent rhetoric his entire life. He condemns the use of the term ‘intifada,’ as he has the other tragic and dangerous hate speech displayed in recent days. President Biden respects the right to free expression, but protests must be peaceful and lawful. Forcibly taking over buildings is not peaceful – it is wrong. And hate speech and hate symbols have no place in America.

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Miami Grand Prix organizers stop plans for Trump fundraiser in luxury suite

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Trump associate Steven Witkoff allegedly planned to host a $250,000-a-head soiree at an upcoming Formula One race

Officials with the Miami Grand Prix recently halted a Donald Trump presidential campaign fundraiser being planned for the upcoming Formula One race, sending a cease-and-desist letter to its organizer.

A Miami Grand Prix representative notified Steven Witkoff, a close friend of Trump, that Witkoff would not be allowed to use a suite at the race to fundraise for the former president, the Washington Post first reported.

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Police enter Columbia in apparent bid to break up student occupation

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Images on TV show police on campus in New York after students take over Hamilton Hall building amid continuing protests

New York City police entered Columbia University on Tuesday evening in a reported effort to disperse the students who took over an academic building – and are facing expulsion – earlier in the day and those who have been encamped on school property for two weeks as tensions surrounding the pro-Palestinian demonstration escalated.

TV images showed police entering the elite university in upper Manhattan, which has been the focal point of student protests that have spread to dozens of schools across the US.

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