Evelyn Reynolds

Donald Trump has suggested he would use the FBI and justice department to go after political rivals should he return to the White House next year in a move which will further stoke fears of what a second period of office for Trump could mean.Trump made the comments during an interview with the Spanish-language television network Univision. The host Enrique Acevedo asked him about his flood of legal problems saying: “You say they’ve weaponized the justice department, they weaponized the FBI. Would you do the same if you’re re-elected?”“They’ve already done it, but if they want to follow through on this, yeah, it could certainly happen in reverse,” Trump replied. “They’ve released the genie out of the box.“When you’re president and you’ve done a good job and you’re popular, you don’t go after them so you can win an election. They’ve done indictments in order to win an election. They call it weaponization,” Trump added. “But yeah they have done something that allows the next party, I mean if somebody, if I happen to be president and I see somebody who’s doing well and beating me very badly, I say go down and indict them, mostly they would be out of business. They’d be out. They’d be out of the election.”Prosecuting political rivals is a hallmark of authoritarian regimes and Trump’s remarks are the most candid public revelations so far of the anti-democratic power he would bring to a second term as president.The former New Jersey governor Chris Christie, who is challenging Trump but has lagged in the polls, said the remarks were alarming. “This is outrageous,” he said on CNN on Thursday evening.He also warned that unlike Trump’s first presidential term, there would not be lawyers and other officials around Trump to stop his most authoritarian pushes. Trump allies are already preparing an effort to install far-right attorneys in the federal government who can back up Trump’s fringe ideas.“You had good folks like Bill Barr who were keeping him on the rails and stopping him from doing stuff like this at the justice department,” Christie said. “Nobody as good and decent and honest as Bill Barr is gonna agree to be Donald Trump’s attorney general if he ever becomes president again.”The comments also drew rebuke from a CNN panel on Friday morning, which implored Americans not to shrug off Trump’s remarks.Even before Trump’s Univision interview aired on Thursday, the former secretary of state Hillary Clinton said Trump was clearly telegraphing an authoritarian agenda if he returns to the White House and compared him to Adolf Hitler.“Trump is telling us what he intends to do. Take him at his word,” she said on ABC’s The View.“Those aren’t flippant ‘ha-ha funny’ remarks,” Phil Mattingly, CNN’s chief White House correspondent said on air on Friday. “That’s insane.” Elie Honig, the network’s chief legal analyst, agreed and said Americans should “take him at his word”. “If he says he’s gonna do this, I believe him.”Trump is the overwhelming frontrunner in the Republican race for the 2024 nomination and no rival has yet emerged to seriously challenge him. In recent national polls against Joe Biden, Trump has also frequently been shown to be ahead – unnerving many Democrats.He faces a suite of lawsuits in key swing states, including Colorado, Minnesota and Michigan, seeking to bar him from running because of his responsibility for the January 6 attack on the Capitol. The suits argue that section 3 of the 14th amendment bars anyone who previously took an oath to the United States from holding office if they have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the US constitution.The Minnesota supreme court ruled this week that the state could not block him from appearing on the primary ballot, but left the door open to future challenges.Part of the reason the challengers are bringing these cases is because of the threat a second Trump presidency poses to the US constitution.“The dangers are not merely theoretical. We saw what happened on January 6 2021 and if he’s allowed back into power that might be child’s play compared to what he’ll do in the future,” Ron Fein, the legal director for Free Speech for People, a left-leaning group behind several of the challenges, told the Guardian last week.The Washington Post reported earlier this month that Trump and his allies were already discussing how to use the justice department to prosecute and exact revenge against people who have spoken out against Trump, including former attorney general Bill Barr and his former chief of staff John Kelly.He is also reportedly considering invoking the Insurrection Act on his first day in office, should he win, which would allow him to deploy the military against domestic protesters.Trump faces four separate criminal cases, including two different federal ones dealing with his handling of classified documents and his efforts to overturn the election. Both of those cases were brought by Jack Smith, a justice department special counsel appointed by the attorney general, Merrick Garland, to insulate the cases from political pressure.If Trump wins the election, he would almost certainly fire Smith if the investigation is still ongoing, or pardon himself if he has been convicted. More

Peter Thiel, the tech billionaire who supported Donald Trump in 2016 and sunk millions more into underperforming Maga candidates in subsequent election cycles, has confirmed rumors that he is stepping away from 2024 political funding.In an interview with the Atlantic, Thiel said voting for Trump “was like a not very articulate scream for help” and that things had not turned out the way he had hoped when he donated $1.25m to Trump and Trump-affiliated political funds eight years ago.“There are a lot of things I got wrong,” he said. “It was crazier than I thought. It was more dangerous than I thought. They couldn’t get the most basic pieces of the government to work. So that was – I think that part was maybe worse than even my low expectations.”Thiel told the magazine that Trump had called him earlier this year to solicit $10m – the same amount that he had donated to Blake Masters, a former protege who campaigned and lost a Senate bid in Arizona last year, and JD Vance, the author of Hillbilly Elegy who won an Ohio Senate seat.When Thiel turned down Trump’s request, he said the former president told him that “he was very sad, very sad to hear that”. He later heard that Trump had insulted him to Masters, calling him a “fucking scumbag”.Thiel, a co-founder of PayPal and the big-data analytics firm Palantir whose fortune is estimated at between $4bn and $9bn, said that while he was not planning to donate in this cycle, “there’s always a chance I might change my mind”. He added that his husband “doesn’t want me to give them any more money, and he’s right”.He also said that he knew political candidates are “going to be pestering me like crazy”.The Atlantic profile sheds light on why Thiel, sometimes described as a techno-libertarian, had become a political donor at all.He explained that in early 2016, when a jury sided with Terry Gene Bollea, AKA Hulk Hogan, in an invasionof privacy lawsuit against Gawker Media – an action Thiel had funded – he read it as a sign that Trump could win.Ten days before Trump’s political coronation at the Republican national convention that year, Trump’s son Don Jr called to ask if Thiel wanted to speak from the platform. He agreed, he told the magazine, in part because he favored candidates with pessimistic slogans.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotion“If you’re too optimistic, it just shows you’re out of touch,” he said. “‘Make America great again’ was the most pessimistic slogan of any candidate in 100 years, because you were saying that we are no longer a great country. And that was a shocking slogan for a major presidential candidate.”Thiel also sounded off on diversity initiatives – calling them “very evil and it’s very silly” – and his interest in life-extension, a common theme among tech billionaires. “I should be investing way more money into this stuff,” he said. More

In early October, Beverly Sharp addressed a table of poll workers, elections officials and activists gathered in rural Adams Township, Michigan, with a prayer.“Father, we thank you for this opportunity to meet together to discuss things, and to agree if we agree, and if we disagree, [to be] friendly,” said the longtime poll worker.It was a plea lodged in earnest ahead of an unprecedented election year.Hillsdale county – where Adams is located – has been roiled by election conspiracy theories since the 2020 election, and officials say a growing rightwing movement is now stoking fears of political violence ahead of the 2024 election.Across the county, where 73% of voters supported Donald Trump in 2020, questions of election denialism and far-right politics have split the community. A faction of the Hillsdale county GOP, dubbed the “America First Republicans”, split off from more traditional conservatives following the January 6 Capitol riot, when Trump and his allies tried to overturn his election loss.In October, the group appointed a new chair: David Stone, the former leader of the Michigan-based Christian Hutaree Militia.“The [election] next year will be really bad,” said Adams Township clerk Suzy Roberts, who is tasked with running the town’s elections.Roberts took office in May, ousting a conspiracy theory-touting clerk in a recall election that also removed a far-right supervisor from the township board in hopes of bringing stability to the politically fractious community following a series of alarming incidents.A former member of America First Republicans told the Guardian in April that she had faced slurs, harassment, and threats after she left the group – prompting her to file a police report.Sharp, who is 93 and campaigned for the May recall, described a harrowing encounter at a township meeting with a member of the America First Republicans in 2020. “He shouted, ‘You stupid F-ing women,’” said Sharp, and followed her and another longtime poll worker “all the way out into the parking lot”.The chair of the far-right group, Stone, said he opposed harassment and was unaware of threatening behavior by members. When asked about his past involvement with the Hutaree Militia – and community members concerned about militia activity in general – Stone pointed to his acquittal in a federal sedition case in 2012.“Anybody who’s got a problem with Hutaree Militia, why don’t you sit down and look and see what an acquittal means,” said Stone. “We’re 11 years past that, and people are still trying to drag this out.” The case followed an FBI sting which the prosecution claimed had found evidence the Hutaree were planning an armed revolt. Citing insufficient evidence of a concrete plan, a federal judge dismissed the sedition and conspiracy charges, leaving Stone with a weapons violation.The threat to elections in Hillsdale county is now twofold. While tensions in the community devolved into open hostility following the last presidential election, the infrastructure for elections administration has also been crumbling for years.Stephanie Scott, the election clerk who Roberts was elected to replace, spent much of her time in office casting doubts on the results of the 2020 election. She was stripped of her right to administer elections by Michigan’s secretary of state after she refused to submit voting machines for routine maintenance.Scott’s actions in office earned her national attention and support from conspiracy theorists like former Overstock.com CEO Patrick Byrne, who was part of Trump’s inner circle and peddled the president’s false claims about the 2020 election. Scott’s attorney, Stefanie Lambert, faces charges in connection with an alleged effort by Trump allies to illegally access voting machines in 2020.Voters in the conservative town – many of whom themselves questioned the 2020 election results – became exasperated with the divisive politics on the township board, and voted by 406-214 to oust Scott in May. In the same election they also removed township supervisor Mark Nichols, who supported Scott’s actions, and replaced him with township supervisor Randy Johnson. (Scott did not agree to an interview and did not answer questions for this story.)Since Roberts took over, things have gotten better.“We have a clerk that we can work with now,” said Abe Dane, the Hillsdale county chief deputy clerk whose office was temporarily tasked with running Adams Township elections after the state stripped Scott of her duties. “From that standpoint, it’s been a great improvement.”But the transition has its own challenges. Roberts is rushing to learn and implement new statewide elections policies ahead of 2024 while continuing to push back against false conspiracy theories. Videos have circulated on a local YouTube channel, alleging fraudsters in state government are sabotaging elections, while voting machines communicate with foreign countries on the internet.To run local elections, new clerks must learn to work with Michigan’s voter rolls and become fluent in policies governing voter registration, overseas voters, and absentee voting. On top of that, Michigan recently passed a constitutional amendment creating an early voting period and allowing people to permanently vote absentee – a move that will expand voting access but has administrators scrambling to implement the new rules.To make matters more complicated, Roberts said that parts of her office’s budget were in disarray when she came onboard. At a 9 October township meeting, Roberts alleged Scott was responsible for the “mess,” saying: “It has caused a lot of turmoil.” (Scott denied that the issues came from her tenure as clerk).Even basic logistical questions such as how to run early voting have become the source of controversy and misinformation, officials said.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionThe Adams Township board agreed to have local voters cast their early ballots at a single county-wide location shared with other towns rather than open up a separate voting location to limit extra work. But Scott loudly objected in a speech that a local rightwing group posted to YouTube, claiming the measure would compromise the security of elections.“You guys just sold out Adams Township,” she said.Scott has continued to attend township meetings, and she and her allies have decried “centralized elections”, invoking a conspiracy theory that state officials want to have fewer elections hubs so they can more easily rig the elections and accusing local officials of aiding that scheme.And those meetings have continued to be fraught.Gail McClanahan, who organized the recall campaign, said she was confronted by a handful of rightwing activists after a recent township board meeting. As she tried to leave, McClanahan said the group blocked her path threateningly. “They all four stood there, and I had to go out around,” said McClanahan, adding that they were “mouthing off” at her.McClanahan’s experience prompted Johnson, the new town supervisor, to warn attendees at the next township meeting to stay civil.“I would like to bring up a topic that really should never even have to be spoken,” he said in early October. “This is a public meeting. You should be able to come here, and be able to just listen to what’s said, voice your opinion, and when you leave that door you should be able to go home in peace.”While new policies are a hassle for elections officials and poll worker, the specter of violence is what keeps them up at night.Roberts said that currently the only safety net for her and the female poll workers she’s responsible for is if their husbands show up. She’s hoping the township will make more concrete security arrangements ahead of the 2024 elections.Until then, some officials are taking matters into their own hands.Dane, the Hillsdale county chief deputy clerk, has already developed an ad-hoc system for safety. He keeps a video call with law enforcement open throughout the day and carries an 800 megahertz radio while visiting municipal polling places in case he needs to immediately reach the police while in the field. And he’s sent along an emergency response document to the precincts for local poll workers.But the emergency protocols cover things like “inclement weather and power outages”, said Dane – nothing for if people “come in and unplug tabulators or threaten poll workers”.In May, Johnson told the Guardian he had received an anonymous call from someone who called him “dirty words” and told him he knew where he lived. Since then, Johnson’s wife Kitty says, they regularly receive threats. She didn’t want to get into detail, but called them “weird, crazy, scary calls”.“I said, ‘Randy, you know, you’re out of town a lot, and I’m getting a little bit worried about being here alone,’” she said. The couple installed a fortified fence around their property. More

Tuesday was a big night for the Democrats, with big wins in some unexpected places: Ohio, Virginia and Kentucky. Abortion rights advocates were celebrating, their hopes lifted ahead of next year’s presidential election, despite some gloomy polls for Joe Biden. Republicans, meanwhile, like the presidential candidates who took to the debate stage on Wednesday, are reeling.
So what do the results mean for 2024? Should Republicans rethink their message on abortion? And why is it that despite Donald Trump spending the week in court on trial for fraud, it’s Joe Biden who’s suffering in the polls?
Jonathan Freedland is joined by Tara Setmayer and Simon Rosenberg to discuss it all.

How to listen to podcasts: everything you need to know More

Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson has revealed that multiple political parties approached him last year to see if he would run for US president, after a poll revealed 46% of Americans would support his campaign.Appearing as the first guest on Trevor Noah’s new Spotify podcast What Now?, the actor and former WWE wrestler said a 2021 poll of 30,000 American adults led to “the parties” contacting him to ask if he was interested in running at the end of 2022.“That was an interesting poll that happened and I was really moved by that,” Johnson said. “I was really blown away and I was really honoured. I’ll share this little bit with you: at the end of the year in 2022, I got a visit from the parties asking me if I was going to run, and if I could run.“It was a big deal, and it came out of the blue,” he added. “It was one after the other, and they brought up that poll, and they also brought up their own deep-dive research that would prove that should I ever go down that road [I’d be a real contender]. It was all very surreal because that’s never been my goal. My goal has never been to be in politics. As a matter of fact, there’s a lot about politics that I hate.”However, Johnson, who has described himself as a “centrist” and “political independent” and publicly endorsed US president Joe Biden’s 2020 campaign, has openly shared his interest in running in the past. In 2016 he told GQ: “I can’t deny that the thought of being governor, the thought of being president, is alluring.” A year later he told Variety the 2024 presidential campaign was a “realistic consideration”.His sitcom Young Rock even hinges around him running for US president in 2032, with Johnson playing his future self as he gives interviews about moments in his early life that structure every episode.Responding to the aforementioned poll in 2021, Johnson wrote on Instagram: “I don’t think our Founding Fathers EVER envisioned a six-four, bald, tattooed, half-Black, half-Samoan, tequila drinking, pick up truck driving, fanny pack wearing guy joining their club – but if it ever happens it’d be my honour to serve you, the people.”But last year he seemed to have changed his mind, telling CBS Mornings it was “off the table” because of his duties as a parent of three daughters, who are now aged 22, seven and five.“The most important thing to me is being a daddy, number one, especially during this time, this critical time in my daughters’ lives,” he said.On Noah’s podcast, Johnson said his job as a wrestler often took him away from his eldest daughter, Simone, “and I don’t want that for my little ones now”.“That was one of my primary discussions with the parties, who were ultimately like, ‘Yeah, but the other ones have done it like this’,” he added.Johnson didn’t rule out running in the future, telling Noah: “If that’s ultimately what the people would want, then of course I would consider it.” More

Maga Republican and fierce Trump supporter Marjorie Taylor Greene and leftwing Democratic firebrand Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez have found common ground in freeing Australian WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange.The pair are among 16 members of the US Congress who have written directly to president Joe Biden urging the United States to drop its extradition attempts against Assange and halt any prosecutorial proceedings immediately.The group warns continuing the pursuit of Assange risks America’s bilateral relationship with Australia.“It is the duty of journalists to seek out sources, including documentary evidence, in order to report to the public on the activities of the government,” the letter to Biden, first reported by Nine newspapers, states.“The United States must not pursue an unnecessary prosecution that risks criminalising common journalistic practices and thus chilling the work of the free press. We urge you to ensure that this case be brought to a close in as timely a manner as possible.”Assange remains in Belmarsh prison in London as he fights a US attempt to extradite him to face charges – including under the Espionage Act. The charges are in connection with the publication of hundreds of thousands of leaked documents about the Afghanistan and Iraq wars, as well as diplomatic cables, in 2010 and 2011.
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In September, a cross-party delegation of Australian MPs, which included former deputy prime minister Barnaby Joyce, teal independent Monique Ryan, Greens senators David Shoebridge and Peter Whish-Wilson, conservative Alex Antic and Labor’s Tony Zappia, travelled to America to meet with US representatives over Assange’s case.The group hoped to gain support from American lawmakers in their bid to have the pursuit of Assange dropped ahead of Anthony Albanese’s official visit to Washington.Since coming to power, the Albanese government has been more forward than its predecessors in pushing for Assange’s freedom, but so far the Biden government has rebuffed the calls.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionAlbanese confirmed he raised Assange’s case again during his meeting with Biden at the White House last month, but Assange’s brother, Gabriel Shipton, urged the Australian government to increase the pressure.Shipton told Guardian Australia: “If this government can get back Cheng Lei from China, why is he so impotent when it comes to Julian and the USA?”With Assange’s avenues for legal appeal against the US extradition diminishing, his supporters fear for his life. More

West Virginia’s Democratic senator Joe Manchin has announced that he will not seek re-election in the Senate.In a statement released on Thursday, Manchin, who has held his Senate seat since 2010, said:
“After months of deliberation and long conversations with my family, I believe in my heart of hearts that I have accomplished what I set out to do for West Virginia. I have made one of the toughest decisions of my life and decided that I will not be running for re-election to the United States Senate, but what I will be doing is traveling the country and speaking out to see if there is an interest in creating a movement to mobilize the middle and bring Americans together.
To the West Virginians who have put their trust in me and fought side by side to make our state better – it has been an honor of my life to serve you. Thank you.
Every incentive in Washington is designed to make our politics extreme. The growing divide between Democrats and Republicans is paralyzing Congress and worsening our nation’s problems. The majority of Americans are just plain worn out…
Public service has and continues to drive me every day. That is the vow that I made to my father 40 years ago, and I intend to keep that vow until my dying day.”
In the statement announcing he would end his Senate career, Joe Manchin said “I will not be running for re-election to the United States Senate, but what I will be doing is traveling the country and speaking out to see if there is an interest in creating a movement to mobilize the middle and bring Americans together.”That line stoked speculation he could launch a third-party presidential run next year, perhaps with the help of centrist group No Labels. Democrats have been fretting over that possibility for months, as a Manchin candidacy could swing voters away from Joe Biden, whose re-election campaign has been dogged by worrying poll numbers.At the Capitol, Politico says some of Manchin’s counterparts don’t believe he has presidential ambitions:There are two main Republicans vying for West Virginia’s Senate seat, which Democrat Joe Manchin just said he would not stand for again.The first is governor Jim Justice, who in 2017 left the Democratic party and joined the GOP at a rally for Donald Trump. “Senator Joe Manchin and I have not always agreed on policy and politics, but we’re both lifelong West Virginians who love this state beyond belief, and I respect and thank him for his many years of public service,” Justice said in a statement after Manchin’s announcement.The second is Alex Mooney, a fifth term House lawmaker representing the northern half of the state. He is what he had to say about Manchin’s departure:The state’s primary elections are scheduled for 14 May of next year.Minutes after Joe Manchin announced he would not run for re-election, Ohio’s Democratic senator Sherrod Brown made a veiled reference to the West Virginia senator’s decision:Brown represents Ohio, which has supported Republican candidates in the past two presidential elections, albeit by a much smaller percentage than West Virginia. With Manchin gone and almost certain to be replaced by a Republican, Brown’s victory next year is essential if the party has any chance of staying in the majority in the Senate.Following Joe Manchin’s decision not to seek re-election, the Cook Political Report has changed its rating of the race to “solid Republican”.That’s the same rating given to Senate races in other deep-red states like Nebraska, Tennessee and Wyoming:In the 2020 election, West Virginia voted more than 68% for Donald Trump, his second biggest-margin of victory after Wyoming.Joe Manchin first arrived in the Senate in 2010 after a stint as West Virginia’s governor, but the peak of his political power came in the first two years of the Biden administration.Democrats held a 50-seat majority in the Senate those two years, meaning the party had to vote unanimously on legislation that Republicans would not support. While Manchin backed most of Joe Biden’s agenda, he flexed his muscles in the negotiations over Build Back Better, an expansive plan to fight climate change and invest in a host of social programs that the president wanted approved.Manchin opposed several of its measure, including continuing the expanded child tax credit that was credited with cutting child poverty in half in 2021. Arizona’s Kyrsten Sinema, then a member of the Democratic party, also rejected tax changes to offset some of the bill’s costs. Negotiations over the legislation dragged all through 2021 and into 2022, and appeared to have stalled completely by that summer.Then, suddenly, Manchin and the Senate’s Democratic leader Chuck Schumer announced they had reached an agreement on a different bill called the Inflation Reduction Act, which included some measures to fight climate change and lower prescription drug costs, but lacked some of Build Back Better’s most expansive proposals.For climate activists who blamed the West Virginia senator and coal businessman for defanging attempts to lower America’s carbon emissions, it was a surprising change in course. Here’s more from the Guardian’s Oliver Milman’s piece from last year analyzing Manchin’s role in the agreement:
Climate advocates reacted with surprise and delight to Joe Manchin’s decision to back a sweeping bill to combat the climate crisis, with analysts predicting the legislation will bring the US close to its target of slashing planet-heating emissions.
The West Virginia senator, who has made millions from his ownership of a coal-trading company, had seemingly thwarted Joe Biden’s hopes of passing meaningful climate legislation – only to reveal on Wednesday his support for a $369bn package to support renewable energy and electric vehicle rollout.
The move by the centrist Democrat shocked many of Manchin’s colleagues, who despaired after more than 18 months of seemingly fruitless negotiations with the lawmaker, a crucial vote in an evenly divided Senate.
“Holy shit,” tweeted Tina Smith, a Democrat from Minnesota. “Stunned, but in a good way.”
Should the bill pass both chambers of Congress and be signed by Biden, it will be the biggest and arguably first piece of climate legislation ever enacted by the US. The world’s largest historical carbon polluter has repeatedly failed to act on the climate crisis due to missed opportunities, staunch Republican opposition and the machinations of the fossil fuel lobby.
The climate spending, part of a broader bill called the Inflation Reduction Act, “has the potential to be a historic turning point” said Al Gore, the former vice-president.
Joe Manchin’s decision not to seek re-election makes Democrats’ quest to preserve their majority in the Senate even more difficult.Manchin was one of three Democratic senators representing red states who are facing voters next year, and the party is not viewed as having a strong replacement candidate in West Virginia, a deeply Republican state.The focus now shifts to Montana’s Jon Tester and Ohio’s Sherrod Brown, both of whom have said they will stand again, but face difficult paths to victory. There is also the question of whether Kyrsten Sinema, an independent who caucuses with Democrats, will stand again in purple state Arizona, or if she will be replaced by a Democrat. The GOP may also launch offensives against incumbent Democratic senators in swing states Nevada, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin, and try to win the open Senate seat in Michigan.Even if Democrats fail in West Virginia but win all the other races, they could still lose their Senate majority. That best-case scenario would give the party only 50 seats, one short of a majority, and control of the chamber would come down to whether Joe Biden wins re-election, or is replaced by a Republican.Israel’s decision to allow hours-long pauses to its bombing campaign in Gaza is “heartless” and falls far short of what is necessary to protect civilian life in the territory, said Congresswoman Cori Bush, a Missouri Democrat who is the lead sponsor of a ceasefire resolution.The White House said on Thursday that Israel has agreed to four-hour daily humanitarian pauses in its bombardment of northern Gaza, part of a negotiated deal to allow aid and assistance to flow to the enclave’s increasingly desperate population of 2.3 million.“How dare we treat humans in that way,” Bush said, her voice rising with anger. “How dare we be so careless and so inhumane and heartless to decide that four hours is enough time to get you some stuff so that you can live a little bit longer until the bombs hit. How dare we? How dare we treat humans as if we don’t understand what it’s like to be human.”“That’s not the way,” Bush added. “We don’t want four hours. We don’t want 16 hours. We don’t want 22 hours. We want a ceasefire now.”The Israeli military has said it has not agreed to a ceasefire but that it will continue to allow “tactical, local pauses” to let in humanitarian aid. It comes as Biden administration officials push Israel to agree for a longer stoppage in the fighting as part of an effort to free the hostages held by the militant group.Asked about the prospect of a formal ceasefire on Thursday, Biden said that there was “no possibility” at the moment.His response angered a group of veterans gathered with Bush on Capitol Hill to call for an end to the hostilities. Drawing on their own recollections of war in Afghanistan and Iraq, they said peace and security could only be won through diplomacy.Shaking with anger, Brittany Ramos DeBarros, a combat veteran and former army captain, addressed Biden directly.“Mr President, you are the commander in chief of one of the most powerful militaries on the face of this planet in the history of the world,” she said. “How can you be so powerful and so weak as to say that you are incapable of negotiating peace?”Bush was also joined by congresswomen Summer Lee of Pennsylvania and Delia Ramirez of Illinois, who are among the 18 Democratic sponsors of the ceasefire legislation.Bush vowed to keep up the pressure on the White House to advocate for a ceasefire.“If that is his position today, there is also a this afternoon and a tonight. There is a tomorrow. There is a Saturday and a Sunday,” she said. “I expect that there will be change. There will be change because … the people that elected this president are screaming out saying we want a ceasefire now.”In response to the announcement from West Virginia’s Joe Manchin that he will not seek Senate re-election in 2024, the National Republican Senatorial Committee said:
“We like our odds in West Virginia.”
West Virginia’s Democratic senator Joe Manchin has announced that he will not seek re-election in the Senate.In a statement released on Thursday, Manchin, who has held his Senate seat since 2010, said:
“After months of deliberation and long conversations with my family, I believe in my heart of hearts that I have accomplished what I set out to do for West Virginia. I have made one of the toughest decisions of my life and decided that I will not be running for re-election to the United States Senate, but what I will be doing is traveling the country and speaking out to see if there is an interest in creating a movement to mobilize the middle and bring Americans together.
To the West Virginians who have put their trust in me and fought side by side to make our state better – it has been an honor of my life to serve you. Thank you.
Every incentive in Washington is designed to make our politics extreme. The growing divide between Democrats and Republicans is paralyzing Congress and worsening our nation’s problems. The majority of Americans are just plain worn out…
Public service has and continues to drive me every day. That is the vow that I made to my father 40 years ago, and I intend to keep that vow until my dying day.”
Iowa’s Republican governor Kim Reynolds said that “it feels good to get in the game” after endorsing Florida’s Republican governor Ron DeSantis for president. The Associated Press reports:After seven months of hosting Republican presidential candidates in Iowa, Gov. Kim Reynolds said it “feels good to get in the game” with her endorsement of of Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis. But the popular Iowa governor declined to say whether other candidates should concede and throw their support behind him as well, even as she acknowledged that a wider field could advantage former President Donald Trump. “At some point, if we don’t narrow the field, it’s going to be hard to … maybe, you know, that helps Trump,” Reynolds said in an interview with The Associated Press. “But I think that is for them to decide.”In making the endorsement earlier this week, Reynolds broke with a longstanding tradition of Iowa governors staying neutral in their party’s presidential contests, the first in the GOP nomination calendar…Still, Reynolds said DeSantis is best poised for victory in the general election, a race she doesn’t think Trump can win without attracting voters beyond his base. DeSantis “won in demographics that Republicans have never really won in Florida,” she said. More

Joe Manchin’s decision not to seek re-election makes Democrats’ quest to preserve their majority in the Senate even more difficult.Manchin was one of three Democratic senators representing red states who are facing voters next year, and the party is not viewed as having a strong replacement candidate in West Virginia, a deeply Republican state.In the 2020 election, West Virginia voted more than 68% for Donald Trump, his second-biggest margin of victory after Wyoming. After Manchin’s announcement on Thursday, the Cook Political Report has changed its rating of the 2024 race to “solid Republican” – the same it has given to Senate races in other deep-red states like Nebraska, Tennessee and Wyoming.The focus now shifts to Montana’s Jon Tester and Ohio’s Sherrod Brown, both of whom have said they will stand again, but face difficult paths to victory. Brown, whose victory next year is essential if his party wants any chance of staying in the majority in the Senate, reacted almost immediately to Manchin’s announcement, tweeting: “It’s never been more clear that we need to win in Ohio.”There is also the question of whether Kyrsten Sinema, an independent who caucuses with Democrats, will stand again in purple state Arizona, or if she will be replaced by a Democrat. The GOP may also launch offensives against incumbent Democratic senators in swing states Nevada, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin, and try to win the open Senate seat in Michigan.Even if Democrats fail in West Virginia but win all the other races, they could still lose their Senate majority. That best-case scenario would give the party only 50 seats, one short of a majority, and control of the chamber would come down to whether Joe Biden wins re-election, or is replaced by a Republican. More