It is 4pm in Washington DC. Here is a wrap-up of the day’s key events:
The House speaker, Mike Johnson, has pledged that he is going to make “all the January 6th tapes available to all Americans.” “Today, I am keeping my promise to the American people and making all the January 6th tapes available to ALL Americans,” he tweeted on Friday.
Rosalynn Carter, the 96-year-old former first lady, is in hospice care at home in Plains, Georgia. A statement released by her office on Friday afternoon said: “She and President Carter are spending time with each other and their family. The Carter family continues to ask for privacy and remains grateful for the outpouring of love and support.”
The Florida governor and Republican presidential candidate Ron DeSantis has criticized San Francisco over its street cleanup for the Apec summit and Joe Biden’s bilateral meeting with Chinese president Xi Jinping earlier this week. “Xi Jinping’s coming to town, and what do they do? They get the poop off the sidewalk, they … clear the homeless, they stop the drugs, they stop the crime,” said DeSantis.
Thirteen Republicans have supported a resolution to expel George Santos from the House of Representatives. Meanwhile, Santos, who has been charged with fraud, said: “The one thing I never knew was that the process in Congress was dirty. I will continue to fight for what I believe in and I will never back down.”
Democrats in New Hampshire still see Joe Biden as the party’s best shot to hold the White House, according to a new poll from CNN. Although Biden’s name will not appear on the state’s primary ballots, 65% of New Hampshire Democrats said they will write in Biden’s name, while 10% said they will vote for Minnesota’s Democratic representative Dean Phillips.
The White House has condemned a tweet from Elon Musk that endorsed an antisemitic conspiracy theory that Jewish communities “push hatred against whites”. “We condemn this abhorrent promotion of antisemitic and racist hate in the strongest terms, which runs against our core values as Americans,” the White House said.
Following the suspension of Donald Trump’s gag order in his ongoing New York fraud trial, Trump’s team resumed its attacks against the trial’s presiding judge Arthur Engoron’s law clerk, Allison Greenfield. Jason Miller, a senior adviser to Trump, went after Greenfield on X, denouncing her as a “Democrat operative and hack”.
Donald Trump himself has also gone after Allison Greenfield following the gag order’s suspension. In a post on Truth Social, Trump denounced Greenfield as “politically biased and out of control”.
That’s it from me, Maya Yang, as we wrap up the blog for today. Thank you for following along.
House speaker Mike Johnson has pledged that he is going to make “all the January 6th tapes available to all Americans”.
“Today, I am keeping my promise to the American people and making all the January 6th tapes available to ALL Americans,” he tweeted on Friday.
Rosalynn Carter, the 96-year-old former first lady, is in hospice care at home in Plains, Georgia.
A statement released by her office on Friday afternoon said:
“Former First Lady Rosalynn Carter has entered hospice care at home. She and President Carter are spending time with each other and their family. The Carter family continues to ask for privacy and remains grateful for the outpouring of love and support.”
Several pro-ceasefire demonstrators were arrested at Fox News’s headquarters in New York City as Gaza protests spread.
The Guardian’s Gloria Oladipo reports:
More protests demanding a ceasefire in Gaza were under way in the US on Friday morning, with police breaking up crowds and arresting demonstrators in various locations.
Such demonstrations come as recent polling shows that US public support for Israel is dropping, while the Hamas authorities in Gaza reported on Friday that more than 12,000 Palestinians, overwhelmingly civilians and mostly women and children, had now been killed since Israel declared war on Hamas in October.
New York police on Friday arrested pro-Palestine supporters who occupied the headquarters of News Corp, the media company that owns the Fox News channel and the Wall Street Journal and New York Post newspapers, according to clips posted on social media.
Dozens of demonstrators gathered in the News Corp lobby, chanting, “Shame” and “Fox News … you can’t hide. Your lies cover up genocide.”
For the further details, click here:
Florida governor and Republican presidential candidate Ron DeSantis has criticized San Francisco over its street cleanup for the Apec summit and Joe Biden’s bilateral meeting with Chinese president Xi Jinping earlier this week.
“I look to see what’s going on in San Francisco the last couple of days. The city is in squalor, there’s poop on the streets, there’s people using drugs, people getting mugged …
But then Xi Jinping’s coming to town, and what do they do? They get the poop off the sidewalk, they … clear the homeless, they stop the drugs, they stop the crime,” said DeSantis.
Joe Biden has issued high praise towards Mexican president Andrés Manuel López Obrador during their meeting amid Apec in San Francisco.
Speaking to Obrador in English, Biden said:
“We had dinner last night. I told you, you sat next to my wife. You were so captivating, I was worried she liked you more than she likes me now.”
George Santos has announced a press conference on 30 November at 8am.
In a tweet on Friday, Santos, who has been charged with fraud and is facing expulsion by several of his Republican colleagues, wrote:
My year from Hell. Running for office was never a dream or goal, but when the opportunity to do so came I felt the time to serve my country was now. Looking back today I know one thing, politics is indeed dirty, dirty from the very bottom up.
Consultants, operatives, the opposition, the party and more … the one thing I never knew was that the process in Congress was dirty. I will continue to fight for what I believe in and I will never back down. What the ‘ethics committee’ did today was not part of due process, what they did was poison a the jury pool on my on going investigation with the DoJ. This was a dirty biased act and one that tramples all over my rights.
Press conference November 30th at 8am on The Capitol steps, I encourage ALL members of the press to attend.
Meanwhile, Representative George Santos has not made a public statement about his fellow party members calling for his expulsion.
Instead, the New York congressman published a post on X about the need for Congress to “grow a spine” and ban Tik Tok.
Tik Tok has faced backlash in recent days from Jewish public figures over antisemitism on the app.
Here is an updated list of Republicans who support the resolution to expel Santos, from CNN:
Iowa representative Randy Feenstra publically said he will support a resolution to expel George Santos, another Republican joining the call for Santos’s removal.
In a post to X, formally known as Twitter, Feenstra said that he will support the resolution in light of Santos’ “illegal and unethical behavior” if Santos does not “do the right thing and resign”.
“Rep. George Santos has proven that his ethics do not align with what we expect from our leaders,” Feenstra said in a statement on X.
Democrats in New Hampshire still see Joe Biden as the party’s best shot to hold the White House, according to a new poll from CNN.
Although Biden’s name will not appear on the state’s primary ballots, 65% of New Hampshire Democrats said they will write in Biden’s name, while 10% said they will vote for Minnesota’s Democratic representative Dean Phillips. Nine per cent said they will vote for author Marianne Williamson.
CNN also reports, “Among adults in New Hampshire, Biden’s job approval rating (44% approve to 55% disapprove) and favorability (34% favorable, 53% unfavorable) remain in negative territory, and about two-thirds see the country as heading off on the wrong track.”
Moreover, only 42% approve of Biden’s handling of the economy while 40% approve of his handling of the ongoing war between Israel and Hamas.
The trial surrounding Donald Trump’s classified documents at his Mar-a-Lago resort is running about four months behind schedule.
The Guardian’s Hugo Lowell reports:
The US district judge Aileen Cannon put off setting a deadline for Trump to submit a notice about what classified information he intends to use at trial – currently set for May – until after a hearing next year that almost certainly precludes the pre-trial process from finishing in time.
Trump was indicted this summer with violating the Espionage Act when he illegally retained classified documents after he left office and conspiring to obstruct the government’s efforts to retrieve them from his Mar-a-Lago club, including defying a grand jury subpoena.
But the fact that Trump was charged with retaining national defense information means his case will be tried under the complex rules laid out in the Classified Information Procedures Act, or Cipa, which governs how those documents can be used in court.
At issue is the fact that the seven-stage Cipa process is sequential, meaning each previous section has to be completed before the case can proceed to the next section. A delay halfway through the process invariably has the net effect of delaying the entire schedule leading to trial.
For the full story, click here:
Donald Trump said that he wanted to go to the Capitol during the January 6 insurrection claiming that he would have been “very well recieved.”
According to new audio released from an interview between Donald Trump and political journalist and author Jonathan Karl two months after the insurrection, Trump said:
I was going to [go up to the Capitol] and then Secret Service said you can’t … I wanted to go back. I was thinking about going back during the problem to stop the problem, doing it myself. Secret Service didn’t like that idea too much … I would have been very well received.
Source: US Politics - theguardian.com
