Late-night host gives justice, under fire over undisclosed donations, 30 days to accept offer, which includes a tour bus
The late-night talkshow host John Oliver has offered to pay Clarence Thomas $1m annually – as well as give him a $2m tour bus – if the Republican judge resigns from the US supreme court.
Oliver made the proposal on Sunday’s episode of his HBO show Last Week Tonight, saying the supreme court justice had 30 days to accept or it would expire.
Continue reading...Governor’s signature marks end of long fight over legislative lines and greatly reduces the Republican bias baked into current maps
The Wisconsin governor, Tony Evers, has signed into law a pair of new state legislative maps, undoing a Republican gerrymander that has shaped Wisconsin politics for more than a decade and giving Democrats a chance at winning control of the state in future elections.
“It’s a new day for Wisconsin,” said Evers at a press conference on Monday to cheers from a room of anti-gerrymandering activists.
Continue reading...Michigan representative tells state voters to pick ‘uncommitted’ option over White House support for Israel’s strikes on Gaza
The progressive US congresswoman Rashida Tlaib has called on her fellow Michigan Democrats to vote “uncommitted” in the state’s presidential primary election – at the expense of the party’s incumbent, Joe Biden – in late February.
Appearing in a video posted to X on Saturday by Listen to Michigan, a political campaign to encourage the state’s voters to vote “uncommitted” in the 27 February primary, Tlaib justified her stark display of displeasure with Biden by alluding to Israel’s military strikes on Gaza, which local authorities say have killed nearly 29,000 Palestinians since last October.
Continue reading...‘He didn’t understand lack of civility. He didn’t understand attacking another person,’ says Patti Davis of former US president
The daughter of former president Ronald Reagan has hit out at contemporary White House politics, saying she thinks her late father would be “appalled” by the personal tenor of current political discourse.
“I think he’d be appalled … it was just more civilized,” Patti Davis told NBC’s Meet the Press on Sunday. “He didn’t understand lack of civility. He didn’t understand attacking another person. … He didn’t understand cruelty. And that’s what we’re dealing with now.
Continue reading...Kathy Hochul says law-abiding businesspeople have ‘nothing to worry about’ after question on state’s commercial climate
The New York governor has told business owners in her state that there is “nothing to worry about” after Donald Trump was fined $355m and temporarily banned from engaging in commerce in the state when he lost his civil fraud trial Friday.
In an interview on the New York radio show the Cats Roundtable with the supermarket billionaire John Catsimatidis, Kathy Hochul sought to quell fears in some quarters that the penalties handed to Trump for engaging in fraudulent business practices could chill the state’s commercial climate.
This article was amended on 18 February 2024 to correct a misspelling. An earlier version referred to “venal” rather than “venial” sin.
Continue reading...Retreat from Avdiivka deals military blow and hands initiative to Putin as war’s second anniversary looms
Volodymyr Zelenskiy issued a desperate plea for fresh arms on Saturday as his army commanders announced that Ukrainian troops were pulling out of the key eastern city of Avdiivka, handing Moscow its first major military victory since last May, just days before the second anniversary of the Russian invasion.
Ukraine’s leader told the Munich Security Conference that the slowing of weapons supplies was having a direct impact on the frontline and was forcing Ukraine to cede territory.
Continue reading...Former president’s business fortune risks slipping from his grasp after ruling, while he marches closer to the Republican nomination
From Trump Tower on Fifth Avenue to the Trump Building on Wall Street, the Trump World Tower by the United Nations to the Trump International overlooking Central Park, Donald Trump has stamped his name in golden letters on skyscrapers across New York City.
This real estate empire was the springboard for Trump’s ascent from tabloid fodder to reality TV stardom, and ultimately the presidency, all built on his self-projected image as America’s most famous businessman.
Continue reading...Arthur Engoron ordered Trump to pay more than $350m in fines and barred him from running New York businesses for three years
Fulton County district attorney Fani Willis’ father took the stand now, testifying about threats she faced at the home he lived in with her in 2019 and 2020, before she moved to a new place after people outside her house called her slurs and threatened her there.
John Floyd, Willis’ dad, was asked about her romantic relationships and how often he saw people she had dated, including special prosecutor Nathan Wade. He said he hadn’t met Wade until 2023, and a previous boyfriend he saw often in earlier years was a disc jockey. (Previous testimony from a former friend of Willis claimed the two started dating much earlier than they’d claimed.)
Continue reading...The Internationalists details how the president was determined to leave a country in which 2,324 US troops were killed since 2001
Joe Biden is “privately defiant” that he made the right calls on the US withdrawal from Afghanistan in summer 2021, a new book reportedly says, even as the chaos and carnage that unfolded continues to be investigated in Congress.
“No one offered to resign” over the withdrawal, writes Alexander Ward, a Politico reporter, “in large part because the president didn’t believe anyone had made a mistake. Ending the war was always going to be messy.”
Continue reading...Alexander Smirnov falsely said executives linked to energy firm Burisma paid Joe and Hunter Biden $5m each in 2015 and 2016, prosecutors say
An FBI informant has been charged with lying to his handler about ties between Joe Biden, his son Hunter and a Ukrainian energy company.
Alexander Smirnov falsely told FBI agents in June 2020 that executives associated with the Ukrainian energy company Burisma paid Hunter and Joe Biden $5m each in 2015 and 2016, prosecutors said on Thursday.
Continue reading...Willis and her special prosecutor Nathan Wade took the stand during a stormy hearing about the pair’s romantic relationship
On the first day of a heated hearing, the Fulton county district attorney Fani Willis and her deputy, special prosecutor Nathan Wade, took the stand, hoping to put an end to the allegations that their past relationship threatens the criminal case against Donald Trump and his allies in their attempts to overturn the 2020 election.
A defendant in the Trump case, Mike Roman, is seeking to have Willis and Wade disqualified, alleging their relationship constituted a conflict of interest. His lawyer attempted to prove Willis financially benefitted from her relationship with Wade.
Continue reading...Fulton county DA rejects accusations that relationship with Nathan Wade should lead to disqualification from election case
Fani Willis, the Fulton county district attorney, vehemently denied wrongdoing while testifying at a court hearing on Thursday as she rebutted accusations that her romantic relationship with a deputy prosecutor on the Georgia election interference case against Donald Trump meant she should be disqualified from the case.
The district attorney testified that her relationship with special prosecutor Nathan Wade started months after he was retained to work on the case, charging Trump over his efforts to overturn his 2020 election defeat in the state, and ended in summer 2023.
Continue reading...Hur investigated president’s mishandling of classified papers after his vice-presidency and raised questions about his ‘poor memory’
House Republicans will hold a public hearing next month with special counsel Robert Hur, who investigated Joe Biden’s mishandling of classified documents after his vice-presidency, as the White House counsel reportedly wrote to the attorney general attacking Hur’s commentary on the US president’s memory as a violation of federal policy.
The House judiciary committee, chaired by rightwing Republican Jim Jordan, will hear testimony from Hur on 12 March, two unnamed people familiar with the plans told the Associated Press on Thursday. The White House declined to comment on the plans.
Continue reading...House speaker also attacks Biden as unfit for office and plays down New York Democrat win; Democrats decry impeachment as ‘sham’
After the special counsel Robert Hur’s report, Mike Johnson says Biden is not fit to hold office.
“The DOJ is indicting one president with politically motivated charges and they are now carrying the water for another amid very similar allegations,” he said. “A man too incapable of being held accountable for handling classified information is certainly unfit for the Oval Office.”
Continue reading...Votes by Republican-dominated state assembly and state senate signal that the years-long battle may be finally drawing to a close
Wisconsin lawmakers voted on Tuesday to adopt legislative maps drawn by the Democratic governor, Tony Evers – inching the state closer to undoing the extreme gerrymander that has ensured Republican control of the state for more than a decade.
The pair of votes in the Republican-dominated state assembly and state senate are a sign that the years-long battle over Wisconsin’s legislative maps may be finally drawing to a close, giving Democrats a chance to win control of the state legislature in upcoming elections for the first time since 2012.
Continue reading...Pre-dawn vote comes amid growing doubts about fate of legislation in Republican-controlled House of Representatives
After weeks of setbacks and delays, the US Senate gave final approval to a $95bn wartime aid package for Ukraine, Israel and other American allies early on Tuesday morning, sending the bill to the Republican-controlled House where its fate is uncertain.
In a pre-dawn vote, the Senate passed the measure 70 to 29, easily clearing the 60-vote threshold needed to pass most legislation in the chamber. Nearly all Democrats and 22 Republicans approved the bill, which exposed deep divisions within the GOP over America’s responsibility to its allies and its role on the world stage.
Continue reading...Alejandro Mayorkas, rebuked by Republicans who voted against key immigration bill, first to face such punishment in over 150 years
The US House of Representatives has voted to impeach Alejandro Mayorkas, Joe Biden’s secretary of homeland security, on explicitly political charges related to conditions at the southern border as Republicans attempt to capitalize on the issue in an election year.
The evening roll call proved tight, with speaker Mike Johnson’s threadbare Republican majority and in the face of staunch Democratic opposition to impeaching Mayorkas, the first cabinet secretary facing charges in nearly 150 years.
Continue reading...Democrat Tom Suozzi and Republican Mazi Pilip battle to win New York district after expulsion of fabulist congressman
The replacement for George Santos, the disgraced Republican congressman, is set to be decided on Tuesday, as New Yorkers head to the polls in what has become a closely watched election nationwide.
Voters in Long Island, east of New York City, face a choice between Tom Suozzi, a Democrat who previously spent six years in Congress, and Mazi Pilip, a relatively unknown local politician, in an election that will impact Republican’s narrow majority in the House of Representatives.
Continue reading...Tom Cotton echoes fellow GOP senators, saying former president was ‘simply ringing the warning bell’
A leading Republican senator said Donald Trump was “simply ringing the warning bell” when he caused global alarm by declaring he would encourage Russia to attack Nato allies who did not pay enough to maintain the alliance, as Trump’s party closed ranks behind its presumptive presidential nominee.
“Nato countries that don’t spend enough on defense, like Germany, are already encouraging Russian aggression and President Trump is simply ringing the warning bell,” Tom Cotton of Arkansas, a former soldier, told the New York Times.
Continue reading...US defense secretary underwent non-surgical procedures for bladder issue and ‘cancer prognosis remains excellent’
The US defense secretary, Lloyd Austin, is expected to “resume his normal duties” on Tuesday, a day after he was admitted to a hospital for what the Pentagon described as an “emergent bladder issue”.
A statement issued by the Pentagon said Austin, 70, had undergone non-surgical procedures under general anesthesia to address the bladder issue. “We anticipate a successful recovery and will closely monitor him overnight,” the statement read.
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