Category Archives: US Politics

Biden to release 15m barrels from strategic reserve in effort to tamp down gas prices – as it happened

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Move is president’s attempt to mitigate concerns over the economy as midterms approach

Donald Trump in 2021 asked a group of people whether a Jewish documentary filmmaker was “a good Jewish character”, according to a video of the former president that was released as part of footage that was subpoenaed by the House special committee investigating the January 6 insurrection, the New York Times reports.

The interaction was recorded by documentary filmmaker Alex Holder at an event at Trump’s New Jersey golf club in May 2021. Trump, speaking to several people, was responding to a woman’s comment about “Jews who didn’t vote for you”.

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Biden implores US oil companies to pass on record profits to consumers

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President announces release of 15m barrels of oil from strategic reserve as he fights to keep gas prices in check before midterms

Joe Biden has called on oil companies to pass on their massive profits to consumers as he announced the release of 15m barrels of oil from the US strategic petroleum reserve.

Biden is fighting to keep gas prices in check ahead of November’s midterms. He blamed Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine for the global spike in oil prices and said his administration was doing all it could to keep prices in check.

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Jury acquits Russian analyst of lying to FBI in Trump dossier case

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This was the third case brought by special counsel John Durham in FBI’s own investigation into Russian collusion claims

A jury on Tuesday acquitted a thinktank analyst accused of lying to the FBI about his role in the creation of a discredited dossier about Donald Trump.

The case against Igor Danchenko was the third and possibly final case brought by special counsel John Durham as part of his investigation into how the FBI conducted its own investigation into allegations of collusion between the 2016 Trump campaign and the Kremlin.

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‘Cold war narratives’: why Miami’s Cuban Americans remain staunch Republicans

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Republican politics centering on opposition to Cuba’s late dictator Fidel Castro continue to resonate in Florida, even as they have faded in the rest of the US

It was a rainy Tuesday morning in South Florida, and two men in their 80s were deep into conversation and cafecito at the iconic Versailles Cuban Bakery in Miami.

Born in Cuba and now retired, the pair – who would only give their first names Manuel and Juan – have lived in the area for more than 60 and 20 years, respectively. And when asked about their political stance, they shy away from the Republican label many of their neighbors proudly embrace and instead simply describe themselves as deeply anti-communist.

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Georgia Senate contender Herschel Walker fails to show for key debate – live

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Major retailers will begin selling hearing aids over the counter without a prescription and at a much lower cost, as part of a new Biden administration rule that take effect today.

“Starting today, hearings aids are now on store shelves across the country — for thousands of dollars less than they previously cost,” the White House said in a fact sheet on Monday.

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Steve Bannon: justice department urges six-month prison term in contempt case

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Former Trump strategist found guilty of criminal contempt of Congress for ignoring subpoena from Capitol attack committee

Steve Bannon should be sentenced to six months in prison and a $200,000 fine for “his sustained, bad-faith contempt of Congress”, the justice department said in a legal filing on Monday.

Bannon, the former Donald Trump White House strategist, was found guilty on two counts of criminal contempt of Congress in July for ignoring a subpoena from the US House committee investigating the January 6 attack.

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Arizona governor candidate refuses to say if she will accept midterms result

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Kari Lake, who has echoed Trump’s claims the 2020 election was stolen, refuses three times to answer when pressed on CNN

The Republican gubernatorial nominee in Arizona, Kari Lake, refused to say whether she would accept the results of the election if she loses in November.

Lake, a former Phoenix-area news anchor, has made denying the 2020 election results that her preferred candidate Donald Trump lost a pillar of her campaign. She has said she wouldn’t have certified the 2020 vote that the former president lost – and which the Democratic victor Joe Biden won in Arizona by just over 10,000 votes, saying the election was “corrupt, rotten”.

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Whistleblower Trump Media executive says firm violated federal securities laws

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Will Wilkerson, co-founder of Trump’s media company, also alleges that ex-president pressured executives to give shares to Melania

The co-founder of Donald Trump’s beleaguered social media company has turned whistleblower, alleging the firm violated federal securities laws and that the former president pressured executives to hand over lucrative shares to his wife.

Will Wilkerson, a former Trump Media and Technology Group executive, has told the US government’s financial watchdog that the company’s bid to raise more than $1bn via an investment vehicle known as a special purpose acquisition company (Spac), relied on “fraudulent misrepresentations … in violation of federal securities laws.”

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Republican Adam Kinzinger: election deniers won’t ‘go away organically’

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January 6 committee member speaks days after panel voted to subpoena Trump and says ex-president ‘required by law to come in’

Election deniers are not “going to go away organically”, and if they are ever to vanish, US voters must signal “that truth matters” beginning with the upcoming midterms, according to a Republican member of the congressional committee investigating the January 6 attack on the Capitol.

Adam Kinzinger’s latest remarks on the baseless insistence by Donald Trump’s allies that fraudsters denied him a second term in the Oval Office and handed the 2020 election to Joe Biden came Sunday, days after the House January 6 select committee unanimously moved to subpoena the former president’s testimony over his knowledge of the deadly Capitol attack.

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Paul LePage: is Maine ready to welcome back the ‘Trump before Trump’?

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The Republican ex-governor was known for his offensive, belligerent attitude – but this time, he says he’s reformed

In the late summer of 2016, Drew Gattine received a surprising voicemail. The sender was Paul LePage, then the governor of Maine, and he called Gattine “a little son-of-a-bitch socialist cocksucker”.

Amid the inevitable media frenzy that followed, LePage lamented not having the opportunity to engage Gattine, a Democrat in the Maine house of representatives, in a duel. Rather than follow in the footsteps of Alexander Hamilton, who pointed his gun in the air when he dueled Aaron Burr in 1804, LePage told reporters, “I would point it right between his eyes, because he is a snot-nosed little runt.”.

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Barack Obama to campaign for Mandela Barnes in Wisconsin Senate race

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Barnes, who would be the first Black senator from Wisconsin, is looking to unseat Republican Ron Johnson

Barack Obama, who twice won Wisconsin by large margins, will travel to the battleground state in the final weeks of the current midterm elections, seeking to boost Mandela Barnes, the young lieutenant governor looking to unseat the Republican Ron Johnson in a key US Senate contest.

Barnes would be the first Black senator from Wisconsin. He held early leads over Johnson but the Republican, a prominent figure on the GOP hard right, has surged back. This week, a Marquette University Law School poll showed Johnson in the lead.

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Democrats suggest shifting weapons from Saudi Arabia to Ukraine

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Democrats call for suspension of transfer of Patriot missiles in wake of ‘turning point’ in relationship with Saudis

Democrats on Capitol Hill have suggested transferring US weapons systems in Saudi Arabia to Ukraine and suspending a planned transfer of Patriot missiles to Riyadh in the wake of what they call a “turning point” in Washington’s relationship with the kingdom.

Ro Khanna, a Democratic congressman from California who is a leading supporter of a weapons freeze, said he believed that “at the very least” Congress would move to halt the transfer of Patriot missiles to the kingdom, and probably pause other defense initiatives.

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Anger as DeSantis eases voting rules in Republican areas hit by hurricane

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Executive order makes voting easier in Florida’s Lee, Charlotte and Sarasota counties but not in Democratic Orange county

Governor Ron DeSantis has made voting easier in certain Florida counties battered by Hurricane Ian – but only Republican-leaning ones.

DeSantis signed an executive order on Thursday that eases voting rules for about 1 million voters in Lee, Charlotte and Sarasota counties, all areas that Hurricane Ian hit hard and that all reliably vote Republican.

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Donald Trump considers testifying before January 6 panel

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Sources tell Guardian ex-president may choose to appear before Capitol attack committee after Thursday vote to subpoena him

Donald Trump is considering testifying in front of the House January 6 committee, which this week concluded a dramatic hearing establishing what it says is his culpability for the deadly Capitol attack by voting to subpoena the former president.

On Friday, sources close to Trump confirmed to the Guardian that he may choose to appear before the congressional panel. Such an appearance would set up an unprecedented, high-stakes political event.

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FBI was reportedly warned agents were ‘sympathetic’ to Capitol rioters – as it happened

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The Oath Keepers were mentioned repeatedly at yesterday’s January 6 hearing, and Politico reports their lawyers have attempted to make that an issue as they stand trial for seditious conspiracy – without success:

Investigators with the January 6 committee are looking into communications between a Secret Service agent and the Oath Keepers militia group, one of the most violent actors during the attack on the Capitol, NBC News reports:

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A California measure would tax the rich to fund electric vehicles. Why is the governor against it?

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Proposition 30 would raise up to $5bn annually to help buy zero-emission cars, trucks and buses; Newsom calls it a ‘Trojan horse’

Two years ago, California’s governor, Gavin Newsom, issued an executive order banning the sale of new gas-powered vehicles by 2035.

This year, he’s opposing a ballot measure to fund the transition to electric vehicles – siding with Republicans and against fellow Democrats, environmental groups, firefighters and labor unions.

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Capitol attack panel votes to subpoena Trump – ‘the central cause of January 6’

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The committee expressed it had ‘no doubt’ the ex-president led the effort to overturn the election

A congressional panel has voted to compel Donald Trump to testify under oath after naming the former president as the “central cause” of the deadly attack on the US Capitol on January 6.

The House of Representatives select committee investigating last year’s riot voted unanimously on Thursday to subpoena Trump for testimony and documents in what may prove a mostly symbolic gesture given time constraints and his likely legal resistance.

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Jan 6 hearing updates: panel votes to subpoena Donald Trump – as it happened

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The bipartisan group of House lawmakers investigating the January 6 insurrection has started what is expected to be its last public hearing, where lawmakers are set to focus on Donald Trump’s actions during the attack.

Follow this blog for coverage of the hearing as it happens. A live video feed of the session will be embedded above.

The United States and Saudi Arabia are waging a war of words over the Opec+ oil production cut and Washington’s claim Riyadh has aligned itself with Russia.

The New York attorney general has warned Trump and his business are taking steps to undermine her lawsuit against them, and asked a judge to step in.

Social security recipients are getting a big increase in monthly payments – but only because inflation is so high.

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Trump privately admitted he lost 2020 election, top aides testify

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Alyssa Farah and Cassidy Hutchinson tell January 6 panel former president acknowledged he had been defeated by Joe Biden

Donald Trump privately admitted to losing the 2020 election even as he worked to undermine and change the results, according to two top aides who testified before the January 6 committee.

During the ninth and possibly final hearing, the committee investigating the January 6 insurrection shared new testimony from Alyssa Farah, a former White House aide, who said that a week after the election was called in favor of Biden, Trump was watching Biden on the television in the Oval Office, and said: “‘Can you believe I lost to this effing guy?’”

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For the love of cars: will steep gas prices stall Democrats’ midterm hopes?

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Economy in focus: America has a love affair with cars – but soaring prices are causing a rift. In the midwest, Adam Gabbatt asks voters what they think

The Henry Ford museum, in Dearborn, Michigan, is a tribute to America’s obsession with the motor vehicle.

The sprawling complex, set across 12 acres, is home to early examples of the Ford Model T, the mass-produced, affordable vehicle that set the US on the path of a car-dominant culture, as well as other era-defining vehicles right up to today.

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