Jim Jordan says he plans to speak with the 20 Republicans who did not vote for him
With Sidney Powell pleading guilty, Thursday’s developments mark a significant win for Fulton county district Fani Willis who delivered a 41-count indictment against ex-president Donald Trump and his operatives earlier this year.
Here are the six counts Powell pleaded guilty to:
Continue reading...Lindsey Graham, who said he wants to see Gaza ‘levelled’, among bipartisan group expected to visit Israel, Saudi Arabia and Egypt
A bipartisan congressional delegation will visit the Middle East on Friday in a high-profile gesture of support for Israel following the Hamas attacks, it was reported on Thursday.
Among the group’s most prominent members is the Republican senator Lindsey Graham, who has prompted outrage in some quarters with his aggressive criticism of Hamas combined with a seeming lack of regard for Palestinian civilian lives, saying he wants to see Gaza flattened.
Continue reading...House Republicans unable to break impasse as Jim Jordan vows to press on with candidacy despite opposition
The leaderless House was plunged deeper into chaos on Thursday after Republicans refused to coalesce around a speaker and a plan to empower an interim speaker collapsed.
Angry and exhausted, the House Republican conference left a pair of tense closed-door sessions no closer to breaking the impasse that has immobilized the House for a 17th day. The party’s embattled nominee for speaker, congressman Jim Jordan, the Donald Trump loyalist who led the congressional effort to overturn the 2020 presidential election and now chairs the House judiciary committee, had vowed to press ahead with his bid to ascend to the post.
Continue reading...Fundraising email from Florida congressman said ‘Rinos are working with radical Democrats … to block Jim Jordan’
The Florida Republican representative Matt Gaetz has issued an apology over a fundraising email sent out allegedly without his team’s approval.
On Wednesday, Gaetz apologized for an email “sent by a vendor without my team’s approval” and said that “it should have never been sent”.
Continue reading...Tally showed 22 members of his own party opposing him, including four Republicans who supported Jordan a day earlier
The House of Representatives again failed to elect a new speaker on Wednesday, after the hard-right congressman Jim Jordan failed to win the gavel in the second round of voting.
The second vote tally showed 199 Republicans supporting Jordan and all 212 Democrats supporting their leader, Hakeem Jeffries of New York. Twenty-two Republicans opposed Jordan on Wednesday, leaving him far short of the 217 votes needed to ascend to the speakership. Because of Republicans’ razor-thin majority in the House, Jordan can only afford four defections within his party and still become speaker.
Continue reading...Republican hardliner’s bid hangs in the balance but ally Scott Perry says loss of votes is part of what he calls fight to change status quo
Despite the seemingly stiff opposition against him becoming speaker of the House, Jim Jordan told reports he is not in favor of empowering Patrick McHenry to take the job:
Note that McHenry is also a Republican.
Continue reading...Congresswoman Debbie Lesko, from Arizona, says ‘it is hard to get anything done’
A Republican congresswoman has said she will not run for re-election next year, claiming “DC is broken”.
Debbie Lesko, from Arizona, said in a statement that traveling to Washington each month had also proven difficult.
Continue reading...Twenty Republicans oppose hard-right congressman in first round of voting following historic ouster of Kevin McCarthy
The House of Representatives was unable to elect a new speaker on Tuesday, as the hard-right congressman Jim Jordan of Ohio struggled to win the gavel following the historic ouster of the Republican Kevin McCarthy earlier this month.
In the first round of voting, 20 Republicans opposed Jordan, while 200 Republicans supported the judiciary committee chair. The result left Jordan far short of winning the speakership, given that he can only afford four defections within his conference and still capture the gavel. All 212 House Democrats supported Hakeem Jeffries of New York, giving the Democratic leader more votes than Jordan.
Continue reading...At least 30 people reportedly arrested, with protestors accusing Israeli government of planning genocide
Leftwing US Jewish groups gathered outside the White House on Monday to urge the Biden administration to pressure Israel into dropping its plans for a military invasion of Gaza and instead declare an immediate ceasefire.
Accusing Benjamin Netanyahu’s government of planning “genocide”, several hundred volunteers from campaign groups IfNotNow and Jewish Voice for Peace chanted slogans, carried placards and sang ancient Jewish songs in protest of what they said was an immoral response to the deadly assault on 7 October by the Palestinian group Hamas that killed at least 1,400 Israelis.
Continue reading...Thirteen lawmakers call on Biden administration to facilitate de-escalation and send humanitarian aid into Gaza
A group of prominent progressive US lawmakers introduced a resolution on Monday calling for a ceasefire in the fast-escalating conflict between Israel and Hamas that has resulted in a death toll in the thousands, as fears grow that the war could spiral into a wider regional conflict.
The two-page resolution, brought by 13 Democratic members of Congress, urges the Biden administration to “immediately call for and facilitate de-escalation and a ceasefire to urgently end the current violence” as well as to “promptly send and facilitate the entry of humanitarian assistance into Gaza”.
Continue reading...The former Texas congressman’s long-shot 2024 bid has come to an end, but he has no regrets – and he insists Trump’s nomination is not inevitable
Will Hurd wanted to be the most powerful man in the world. Like so many candidates before him, he knew the loneliness of the long distance runner criss-crossing Iowa and New Hampshire in a quest for votes that might make him president of the United States. But it was not be.
This week Hurd called it a day after a campaign that failed to make much of a splash. Indeed, arguably his biggest headline came in July when he declared, “Donald Trump is running to stay out of prison,” and was roundly booed at the Iowa Republican Party’s Lincoln Dinner. Unrepentant, Hurd told them: “Listen, I know the truth is hard.”
Continue reading...National security adviser says deployment of USS Eisenhower is to send message that ‘no group should seek to exploit the situation’
Joe Biden’s national security adviser Jake Sullivan toured the US Sunday morning shows to sell White House policy on the conflict between Israel and Hamas as Israeli forces massed on the border ahead of an expected ground incursion into Gaza amid a deepening humanitarian crisis there and fears over the conflict spreading.
Responding to an Axios report that Iran warned Israel through the United Nations that it will intervene if the Israeli operation in Gaza continues, Sullivan told ABC’s “This Week” that he could not confirm it.
But, he said, the US is “concerned” about the conflict spreading. “We see a real risk of escalation on the northern border and that is why President Biden has been so clear and so forceful in saying that no state and no group should seek to exploit the situation to their advantage or should escalate the conflict.”
The deployment of the USS Eisenhower from the US to the region is “to give additional capacity to respond to any contingency and also to send a clear message of deterrence that no one should get involved in this, no one should escalate this”, he added.
Rightwing speakership contender says he thinks he has 217 votes needed to win despite group who say they will not support him
The rightwing congressman Jim Jordan is seeking to shore up support for his bid to succeed Kevin McCarthy as House speaker, with plans to appear on the House floor early this week to try to sway Republican members of Congress who signaled in a secret ballot vote they will not support his bid.
Jordan, a staunch ally of Donald Trump, claimed in a brief interview with Politico he believes he will get the 217 votes required to secure the speakership in a vote he wants to happen on Tuesday.
Continue reading...Queer people of color are frequently overlooked in the fight for equality, but inroads into the corridors of power are being made
On the 60th anniversary of the 1963 march on Washington this summer, a few Black queer advocates spoke passionately before the main program about the ongoing struggle for LGBTQ+ rights. As some of them got up to speak, the crowd was still noticeably small.
Hope Giselle, a speaker who is Black and trans, said she felt the event’s programming echoed the historical marginalization and erasure of Black queer activists in the civil rights movement.
Continue reading...Rightwing attorney general holds off crowded field and will replace Democrat John Bel Edwards, who has served two terms
Attorney General Jeff Landry, a rightwing Republican backed by Donald Trump, has won the Louisiana governor’s race, holding off a crowded field of candidates.
The win is a major victory for the Republican party as they reclaim the governor’s mansion for the first time in eight years. Landry will replace current governor John Bel Edwards, who was unable to seek re-election due to consecutive term limits.
Continue reading...At event in Iowa, governor conflates Palestinian civilians with Hamas, the terrorist group that attacked Israel a week ago
Republican presidential candidate and Florida governor Ron DeSantis has rejected accepting Palestinian refugees from Gaza to the US, speaking at a campaign rally in the US midwest on Saturday.
“We cannot accept people from Gaza into this country as refugees,” he said. “If you look how they behave … not all of them are Hamas but they are all antisemitic, none of them believe in Israel’s right to exist.”
Continue reading...The chaos in the House may have devastating outcomes for the people of Ukraine, some experts warn
As he excoriated Kevin McCarthy over his leadership of the House Republican conference last week, hard-right congressman Matt Gaetz accused the then speaker of cutting a “secret side deal” with Joe Biden to provide additional funding to Ukraine amid its ongoing war against Russia.
“It is becoming increasingly clear who the speaker of the House already works for, and it’s not the Republican conference,” Gaetz, who represents a solidly Republican district in Florida, said in a floor speech at the time.
Continue reading...Israel and Gaza explode, Ukraine asks for more help and other predicaments demand US attention while Republicans quarrel among themselves
The US’s closest ally in the Middle East is reeling from what many call its “9/11” and now a humanitarian disaster looms in Gaza. Winter is approaching in Ukraine, which needs urgent supplies to maintain its counteroffensive against Russia. From China’s expansive ambitions, to coups in Africa, to the climate crisis, the world is crying out for leadership.
But on Capitol Hill in Washington, Republicans can’t find one. Friday marked the 10th day of paralysis as the party struggles to elect a speaker of the House of Representatives to replace the ousted Kevin McCarthy. This after majority leader Steve Scalise won a closed-door vote but abandoned his run because he lacked enough support to win on the House floor.
Continue reading...Party still faces issue of how to reunite their fractious majority and prove to skeptical US public that they are capable of governing
The US House of Representatives will remain leaderless into a second week as Republicans continue to confront a familiar conundrum: how to unite their fractious majority and prove to a skeptical US public that they are a party capable of governing, not just funneling rightwing outrage and culture war rhetoric.
More than a week after a cadre of discontented Republicans deposed their own speaker, Kevin McCarthy, the conference is still deeply divided over who should replace him with no one candidate seemingly able to garner enough support to end the squabbling.
Continue reading...This blog is now closed. House remains without speaker as Jordan only has a backing of 152 Republican members
Georgia’s Republican representative Austin Scott criticized certain Republicans whom he said “like to go on the TV and are not necessarily negotiating for anything other than TV time.”
Speaking to CNN following yesterday’s closed-door meetings, Scott, who is not supporting Jim Jordan, added, “It makes us look like a bunch of idiots.”
Continue reading...