Joe Biden says US will offer ‘rock solid and unwavering’ support to Israeli government as Tel Aviv mounts counterattack
The White House and other US politicians voiced their support for Israel on Saturday after attacks from Hamas stunned the world.
Joe Biden said he spoke to Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, on Saturday, assuring him that the American government is “ready to offer all appropriate means of support to the government and people of Israel”.
Continue reading...Legal woes that would destroy most candidates have become a defining feature of his campaign – and some say it might work
The blue suit, white shirt, red tie and American flag pin looked familiar. So did the TV cameras following every move and reporters hanging on every word. So did the wild hand gestures as he unleashed a torrent of incendiary rhetoric about the elites supposedly out to get him.
But this was not Donald Trump at one of his rollicking campaign rallies in middle America. This was the former US president standing outside a New York courtroom, with uniformed officers looking on, during a civil fraud trial accusing him of grossly inflating the value of his businesses.
Continue reading...Kennedy is set next week to transform his Democratic presidential run into an independent campaign
Robert F Kennedy Jr, the attorney, conspiracy theorist and political gadfly set to next week transform his run for the Democratic presidential nomination into an independent campaign, was announced on Friday as a speaker at an event staged by the hard-right Conservative Political Action Conference, or CPAC.
“Robert F Kennedy Jr has a unique voice in advocating for the defunding of the weaponised bureaucracy and ensuring the constitutional right of medical freedom,” said the CPAC chair, Matt Schlapp.
Continue reading...In an interview on CNN the former senator and secretary of state also called the ex-president ‘an authoritarian populist’
Supporters of Donald Trump may need to be “deprogrammed” as if they were cult members, Hillary Clinton said.
“Sadly, so many of those extremists … take their marching orders from Donald Trump, who has no credibility left by any measure,” the former first lady, senator, secretary of state and Democratic nominee for president told CNN.
Continue reading...Nancy Marks tells court on Long Island she and congressman submitted campaign finance reports embellished with fake loan
The ex-treasurer for US congressman George Santos pleaded guilty Thursday to a fraud conspiracy charge and implicated the indicted New York Republican in a scheme to embellish his campaign finance reports with a fake loan and fake donors.
Nancy Marks, who was a close aide to Santos during his two congressional bids, entered the plea at a federal courthouse on Long Island, where she was a longtime political operative and bookkeeper for multiple candidates.
Continue reading...Lawyers say ‘allegedly improper’ behavior by president falls within ‘outer perimeter’ of duties and is protected from prosecution
Lawyers for Donald Trump have urged a federal judge to dismiss the criminal case over his efforts to overturn the 2020 election results, advancing a sweeping interpretation of executive power that contends that presidents cannot face prosecution for any conduct they engaged in while in office.
The request to throw out the indictment, handed up earlier this year by a federal grand jury in Washington, amounts to the most consequential court filing in the case to date and is almost certain to precipitate a legal battle that could end up before the US supreme court.
Continue reading...Joaquin Castro urged fellow House members to reject Republican calls for US military action to stem flow of fentanyl from Mexico
A progressive US congressman from Texas has asked his legislative colleagues to join him in condemning some American conservatives’ calls to invade Mexico – ostensibly to do battle with drug cartels there.
Joaquin Castro says he intends to file a resolution in the US House as soon as Friday reaffirming the federal government’s “commitment to respecting the sovereignty of Mexico and condemning calls for military action without Mexico’s consent and congressional authorization”.
Continue reading...President’s latest approval brings total debt cancellation under his administration to $127bn for nearly 3.6 million people
President Joe Biden has announced an additional 125,000 people have been approved for student debt relief in a total of $9bn.
Biden’s latest approval brings the total approved debt cancellation under his administration to $127bn for nearly 3.6 million Americans, the White House said in a statement.
Continue reading...Rights groups to rally outside event, calling on corporations to cut ties with American Legislative Exchange Council
A broad coalition of opponents to the rightwing corporate agenda of the American Legislative Exchange Council (Alec) will hold a rally on Wednesday night outside a glitzy gala event to celebrate the secretive group’s 50th anniversary.
Environmentalists, gun reform campaigners, union leaders and voting rights activists will protest outside the $750-a-ticket event at the National Portrait Gallery in Washington DC, calling on corporations to cut ties with Alec – a tax-exempt group behind a slew of regressive state laws including the stand your ground gun legislation, right-to-work labor policies and so-called critical infrastructure protections that criminalize protest against fossil fuel polluters.
Continue reading...Letitia James calls former president’s appearance at civil trial a ‘political stunt’ and a ‘fundraising stop’
The New York attorney general, Letitia James, told reporters on Wednesday that “the Trump show is over” as the third day of the former US president’s civil fraud trial wrapped up in Manhattan.
James and Trump both returned to the trial a day after Trump ran afoul of the judge by denigrating a key court staffer in a social media post.
Continue reading...Jim Jordan confirms his run while Steve Scalise, House majority leader, reportedly sounds out support
Steve Scalise of Louisiana and Jim Jordan of Ohio emerged as leading contenders to succeed Kevin McCarthy as speaker of the US House of Representatives, after the Californian was brutally removed by his own Republican party on Tuesday.
Scalise is House majority leader, Jordan chair of the powerful judiciary committee. In the aftermath of McCarthy’s defeat, both were widely reported to be making calls and sounding out support. On Wednesday morning, speaking to reporters, Jordan confirmed his run.
Continue reading...Former House speaker tells colleagues he will not go for the job again; Republican Patrick McHenry takes over as temporary speaker
In brief comments to reporters after meeting with Republican lawmakers, Kevin McCarthy sounded fatalistic about surviving the motion to remove him as speaker of the House brought by far-right insurgents.
“If five Republicans go with Democrats, then I’m out,” McCarthy said.
Joe Biden’s son Hunter is set to be arraigned in a Delaware court on Tuesday in a politically fraught case that could unfold in the heat of the US president’s 2024 re-election campaign.
Hunter, 53, the first child of a sitting president to be indicted, is expected to plead not guilty to unlawfully possessing a gun as an illegal drug user and lying about his drug use on a background check form when he bought a Colt Cobra revolver in 2018.
Continue reading...Now-former speaker confirms he will not run again as Republicans plan to hold a vote for a new speaker next Wednesday
After leading a successful, bipartisan effort to avoid a government shutdown over the weekend, Kevin McCarthy on Tuesday was abruptly removed from his role as US House speaker, ousted by hard-right members of his own Republican party less than a year after his election.
The ousting of McCarthy represented the first time in US history that a speaker of the House has been removed from office, marking an ignominious end to a short and fraught tenure for the California Republican. It comes as Americans’ approval ratings of Congress and the federal government remain near historic lows, with a majority saying they have little or no confidence in the future of the US political system.
Continue reading...Far-right congressman files motion after expressing outrage at speaker’s bipartisan effort to avoid government shutdown
Congressman Matt Gaetz, a hard-right Republican of Florida, introduced a motion to remove Kevin McCarthy as House speaker on Monday, expressing outrage over the Republican leader’s successful efforts to avoid a government shutdown this weekend.
“I have enough Republicans where at this point next week, one of two things will happen: Kevin McCarthy won’t be the speaker of the House, or he’ll be the speaker of the House working at the pleasure of the Democrats,” Gaetz told reporters after he filed the motion. “I’m at peace with either result because the American people deserve to know who governs them.”
Continue reading...Mayor Eric Adams announced on Monday that abortion pill prescriptions would now be available by telephone or online
New York City public hospitals will now offer abortion care via telehealth, placing them among the first public health systems in the US to do so.
The city’s mayor, Eric Adams, announced on Monday that abortion pill prescriptions would now be available by telephone or online, adding that such access can happen from “the comfort of your home”.
Continue reading...Far right of Republican party split as congressman attacks House speaker for working with Democrats to avoid shutdown
Congressman Matt Gaetz continued to attack Kevin McCarthy on Monday over the House Republican speaker’s successful efforts to avoid a government shutdown, even as other hard-right lawmakers came to McCarthy’s defense.
Speaking on the House floor on Monday, Gaetz railed against McCarthy, accusing the speaker of cutting “a secret side deal” with Joe Biden to provide additional funding to Ukraine. The stopgap spending measure passed by Congress on Saturday, which extended government funding through November 17, did not include additional money for Ukraine, but members of both parties have called for a supplemental bill to address that omission. Biden said on Saturday that he did “fully expect the speaker will keep his commitment to the people of Ukraine” and soon pass a supplemental funding bill.
Continue reading...Doug Larsen and family killed shortly after taking off from Canyonlands airfield, about 15 miles north of Moab
A state senator from North Dakota, his wife and their two young children died when the small plane they were traveling in crashed in Utah, a senate leader said Monday.
Doug Larsen’s death was confirmed on Monday in an email that the Republican state senate majority leader David Hogue sent to his fellow senators and was obtained by the Associated Press.
Continue reading...Butler will be the only Black woman, and the first openly LGBTQ+ person to represent the state, serving in the chamber
Gavin Newsom, the California governor, has named Laphonza Butler, a Democratic strategist and former labor leader, to fill the Senate seat held by Dianne Feinstein, who died on Thursday.
The appointment fulfills Newsom’s pledge to appoint a Black woman to the Senate, while shirking calls to name Barbara Lee, a Black Bay Area congresswoman who is already running for the position in 2024.
Continue reading...Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez defends Democrat who set off fire alarm as key vote loomed, citing charges against New York opponent
Republicans calling for action against the New York Democrat Jamaal Bowman for triggering a fire alarm in a congressional office building as a vote loomed on a deal to avoid a government shutdown should “check their own values”, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez said, citing the lack of action against a GOP New Yorker, George Santos, after he was indicted for fraud.
“They are protecting someone who has lied to the American people, lied to the United States House of Representatives, lied to congressional investigators,” Ocasio-Cortez, widely known as AOC, told CNN’s State of the Union.
Continue reading...California Democrat says loss of Feinstein may have focused politicians on, ‘Let’s get the job done to keep government open’
The death of the California senator Dianne Feinstein may have helped inspire US lawmakers to avoid a federal government shutdown, the former House speaker Nancy Pelosi said.
Speaking on Sunday, to CNN’s State of the Union, the California Democrat mourned the loss of Feinstein and said: “Some of the senators said that maybe her departure and the sadness that went with us focused people more on, ‘Let’s get the job done to keep government open for the people.’”
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