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    US election officials quit at higher rates in 2020 than other cycles, study shows

    A new study confirms what election experts have been warning about for years: increased harassment and threats following the 2020 election have led election officials to quit at higher rates than in previous election cycles.The study, conducted by the Bipartisan Policy Center and using data on more than 18,000 chief election officials across the 50 states, found that while turnover in election offices had been steadily increasing since 2004, election officials have left their jobs at higher rates since the 2020 election – with turnover increasing from 28% in 2004 to 39% in 2022.While election worker turnover has increased across the country, the problem is especially pronounced in larger cities. In jurisdictions with more than 100,000 voting-age residents, the turnover rate of election officials has reached close to 46%, the study found. Before 2020, election workers in large jurisdictions typically quit their jobs at a steady rate of 35%.According to a separate 2022 survey, about 20% of election workers from smaller communities reported harassment, while close to 70% of officials in larger cities faced harassment – with the threats particularly acute in swing states.Long before the 2020 election, persistent underfunding and an ageing workforce drove turnover in the field of election administration; the increasingly complexities of the job, including the requirement that officials have cybersecurity expertise, has also increased pressure.Spikes in threats and harassment can often be traced directly to Trump and his allies’ claims of fraud and meddling by Democrats. In a 2023 report, the Guardian found that a deluge of violent threats against election officials in Maricopa county, Arizona, had originated from the false claim that the 2020 election was stolen from Trump. New laws implemented by states after the 2020 election to limit external funding for election offices and withdraw from the bipartisan voter registration management program Electronic Registration Information Center (Eric) further deprive election officials of resources.Critically, the study found, head election administrators vacating positions overseeing large jurisdictions were likely to be replaced by administrators with, on average, 11 years of experience in the field.The high rate of turnover means that some of the officials administering the presidential election will have less experience leading elections and could lack the institutional knowledge that helps in an increasingly complicated role.The concern is reflected in reporting by the Guardian, which has covered numerous examples of election offices plagued by high turnover, threats and harassment. In some cases, high turnover has led to real human error, as in Luzerne county, Pennsylvania, where high-profile mistakes have fueled conspiracy theories about election administration.“It has become the expectation that if somebody walks into this office, they’re not going to be here long term,” Emily Cook, Luzerne county’s election director, told the Guardian last month. “You kind of just document everything that you can, prepare as best as you can, at least in my opinion. Learn as much from whoever’s sitting here while they’re here. And we can keep moving forward.” More

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    Trump’s latest attempt to delay criminal trial in hush-money case fails

    A New York appeals court judge on Tuesday rejected Donald Trump’s latest bid to delay his hush-money criminal trial while he fights a gag order, clearing the way for jury selection to begin next week.Justice Cynthia Kern’s ruling is yet another loss for Trump, who has tried repeatedly to get the trial postponed.Trump’s lawyers had wanted the trial delayed until a full panel of appellate court judges could hear arguments on lifting or modifying a gag order that bans him from making public statements about jurors, witnesses and others connected to the hush-money case.The presumptive Republican nominee’s lawyers argue the gag order is an unconstitutional prior restraint on Trump’s free speech rights while he’s campaigning for president and fighting criminal charges.“The first amendment harms arising from this gag order right now are irreparable,” Trump lawyer Emil Bove said at an emergency hearing on Tuesday in the state’s mid-level appeals court.Bove argued that Trump shouldn’t be muzzled while critics, including his former lawyer and fixer Michael Cohen and the adult film star Stormy Daniels, routinely assail him. Both are key prosecution witnesses.Steven Wu, the appellate chief for the Manhattan district attorney’s office, said there is a “public interest in protecting the integrity of the trial”.“This is not political debate. These are insults,” Wu said of Trump’s statements.The trial judge, Juan M Merchan, issued the gag order last month at the urging of Manhattan prosecutors, who cited Trump’s “long history of making public and inflammatory remarks” about people involved in his legal cases.Merchan expanded the gag order last week to prohibit comments about his own family after Trump lashed out on social media at his daughter, a Democratic political consultant, and made false claims about her.It’s the second of back-to-back days for Trump’s lawyers in the appeals court.On Monday, Lizbeth González, an associate justice, rejected the defense’s request to delay the 15 April trial while Trump seeks to move his case out of heavily Democratic Manhattan.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionTrump’s lawyers framed their gag order appeal as a lawsuit against Merchan. In New York, judges can be sued to challenge some decisions under a state law known as Article 78.Trump has used the tactic before, including against the judge in his civil fraud trial in an unsuccessful last-minute bid to delay that case last fall and again when that judge imposed a gag order on him.Trump’s hush-money criminal case involves allegations that he falsified his company’s records to hide the nature of payments to Cohen, who helped him bury negative stories during his 2016 campaign. Cohen’s activities included paying Daniels $130,000 to suppress her claims of an extramarital sexual encounter with Trump years earlier.Trump pleaded not guilty last year to 34 felony counts of falsifying business records. He has denied having a sexual encounter with Daniels. His lawyers argue the payments to Cohen were legitimate legal expenses.Trump has made numerous attempts to get the trial postponed, leaning into the strategy he proclaimed to TV cameras outside a February pretrial hearing: “We want delays.” More

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    US historians file brief with supreme court rejecting Trump’s immunity claim

    Fifteen prominent historians filed an amicus brief with the US supreme court, rejecting Donald Trump’s claim in his federal election subversion case that he is immune to criminal prosecution for acts committed as president.Authorities cited in the document include the founders Alexander Hamilton, James Madison and John Adams, in addition to the historians’ own work.Trump, the historians said, “asserts that a doctrine of permanent immunity from criminal liability for a president’s official acts, while not expressly provided by the constitution, must be inferred. To justify this radical assertion, he contends that the original meaning of the constitution demands it. But no plausible historical case supports his claim.”Trump faces four federal election subversion charges, arising from his attempt to overturn his defeat by Joe Biden in 2020, fueled by his lie about electoral fraud and culminating in the deadly attack on Congress of 6 January 2021.He also faces 10 election subversion charges in Georgia, 34 charges over hush-money payments in New York, 40 federal charges for retaining classified information, and multimillion-dollar penalties in civil cases over tax fraud and defamation, the latter arising from a rape allegation a judge called “substantially true”.Despite such unprecedented legal jeopardy, Trump strolled to the Republican nomination to face Biden in November and is seeking to delay all cases until after that election, so that he might dismiss them if he returns to power. His first criminal trial, in the New York hush-money case, is scheduled to begin next Monday.Despite widespread legal and historical opinion that Trump’s immunity claim is groundless, the US supreme court, to which Trump appointed three justices, will consider the claim.Oral arguments are scheduled for 25 April. The court recently dismissed attempts, supported by leading historians, to remove Trump from ballots under the 14th amendment, passed after the civil war to bar insurrectionists from office.In a filing on Monday, the special counsel Jack Smith urged the justices to reject Trump’s immunity claim as “an unprecedented assault on the structure of our government”.Seven of the 15 historians who filed the amicus brief are members of the Historians Council on the Constitution at the Brennan Center for Justice, a progressive policy institute at New York University law school.Holly Brewer, a professor of American cultural and intellectual history at the University of Maryland, said: “When designing the presidency, the founders wanted no part of the immunity from criminal prosecution claimed by English kings.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotion“That immunity was at the heart of what they saw as a flawed system. On both the state and national level, they wrote constitutions that held all leaders, including presidents, accountable to the laws of the country. St George Tucker, one of the most prominent judges in the new nation, laid out the principle clearly: everyone is equally bound by the law, from ‘beggars in the streets’ to presidents.”Other signatories to the brief included Jill Lepore of Harvard, author of These Truths, a history of the US; Alan Taylor of the University of Virginia, author of books including American Revolutions, about the years of independence; and Joanne Freeman of Yale, author of The Field of Blood, an influential study of political violence before the civil war.Thomas Wolf, co-counsel on the brief and director of democracy initiatives at the Brennan Center, called Trump’s immunity claim “deeply un-American”, adding: “From the birth of the country through President Clinton’s acceptance of a plea bargain in 2001 [avoiding indictment over the Monica Lewinsky affair], it has been understood that presidents can be prosecuted.“The supreme court must not delay in passing down a ruling in this case.” More

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    Liz Truss says in book Queen told her to ‘pace yourself’, admits she didn’t listen

    In a new memoir, Liz Truss recounts the advice she was given by Queen Elizabeth II when they met in September 2022 to confirm Truss as Britain’s new prime minister, the 15th and as it turned out last, to serve under Elizabeth II.“Pace yourself,” the 96-year-old queen said – a suggestion Truss admits she failed to heed after the queen died, leaving Truss unsure if she could cope.Truss later introduced radical free-market policies that crashed the British economy and saw her ejected from office just 49 days after winning an internal Conservative party vote to succeed Boris Johnson, making her the shortest-serving prime minister of all.“Maybe I should have listened” to the queen, Truss writes.Replaced in Downing Street by Rishi Sunak, Truss still sits as an MP for South West Norfolk. Just 48, she has increasingly sought to carve out a prominent position on the hard right of British politics and turned her sights on the US, in particular its rightwing thinktanks and lucrative speaking circuit.Truss’s book, Ten Years To Save The West, will be published in the US and UK next week.Though Truss writes that the book is less a memoir than a manifesto for her continuing participation in global politics, it does contain extensive descriptions of her time as an MP, a member of successive Conservative cabinets, a minister of state, foreign secretary and finally, briefly as prime minister.Of her historic meeting with the late queen at Balmoral in Scotland in September 2022, Truss says the 96-year-old monarch “seemed to have grown frailer” since she had last been in the public eye.“We spent around 20 minutes discussing politics,” Truss writes. “She was completely attuned to everything that was happening, as well as being typically sharp and witty. Towards the end of our discussion, she warned me that being prime minister is incredibly aging. She also gave me two words of advice: ‘Pace yourself.’ Maybe I should have listened.”Elsewhere, Truss often writes of struggling with the pressures of high office, including an instance in Spain when she was foreign secretary in which motorcade delays saw her “beginning to lose my rag … on account of constant travel and pressure”, causing her to try to get out of her official car to “remonstrate with police”.That episode was quelled, Truss writes, with an intervention by her staff and “a cooling off period at a sherry bar”.But when the queen died so soon after Truss had become her 15th and final prime minister, Truss writes, the news, though widely expected after the monarch’s health had deteriorated, still came “as a profound shock” to Truss, seeming “utterly unreal” and leaving her thinking: “Why me? Why now?”Insisting she had not expected to lead the UK in mourning for the death of a monarch nearly 70 years on the throne and nearly 100 years old, Truss says state ceremony and protocol were “a long way from my natural comfort zone”.Other prime ministers, she writes without naming any, may have been better able to provide “the soaring rhetoric and performative statesmanship necessary”. She herself, she writes, predominantly felt profound sadness.Truss describes carrying out duties including giving a Downing Street speech about the queen’s death and having a first audience with King Charles III. A subsequent Buckingham Palace meeting between the King and his prime minister was widely noted for its stilted nature – Charles being heard to mutter: “Back again? Dear oh dear”. But Truss says their first official meeting made her feel “a bizarre sense of camaraderie between us, with both starting out in our new roles and having to navigate unfamiliar territory”.As the UK went into mourning, so Truss watched on television with her family as the queen’s coffin was brought from Balmoral to Edinburgh. Truss describes being “suddenly overwhelmed by the emotion of it all”, and breaking down “into floods of tears on the sofa”.“Once again,” she writes, “the grief was mixed with a feeling of awe over the sheer weight of the event, and the fact that it was happening on my watch.”That watch turned out to be shorter than anyone could have expected. But after a period out of the public eye Truss has re-emerged, especially in the US where Donald Trump is seeking to return to the White House as a far-right Republican.Last April, she delivered the Margaret Thatcher Freedom Lecture at the Heritage Foundation in Washington DC. This February, in Maryland, she spoke at the Conservative Political Action Conference or CPAC, telling a pro-Trump audience the Anglo-American right “need[s] a bigger bazooka” to take on its leftwing enemies.At that event, Truss stirred controversy by appearing with far-right figures, including the former Trump White House counselor Steve Bannon and allies of the Hungarian prime minister, Viktor Orbán.Truss announced her book in September last year, saying she would use it to “share the lessons” of her time in government, in which she claimed often to have been “the only conservative in the room”, fighting a supposedly authoritarian left.In the event, she repeatedly blames the so-called “deep state” for her failures, from being excluded from meetings with Trump when Boris Johnson was prime minister to her own short-lived spell in that role.Popular on the US right, the deep state conspiracy theory holds that a permanent government of bureaucrats and operatives exists to thwart the ambitions of populist leaders. Bannon is one of its chief propagators. He has, however, said it is “for nut cases”. More

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    New York appeals judge rejects Trump’s request to delay hush-money trial

    A New York appeals court judge has rejected former President Donald Trump’s request to delay his 15 April hush-money criminal trial while he fights to move the case out of Manhattan.The decision came Monday, a week before jury selection was set to start.Trump’s lawyers had argued at an emergency hearing that the trial should be postponed while they seek a change of venue to move it out of heavily Democratic Manhattan.Trump was ready on Monday to sue the judge in his New York hush-money case a week before the start of the much-anticipated trial, the New York Times reported, detailing yet another attempt by the former president to delay legal proceedings against him.Citing court records indicating the filing of sealed documents and two unnamed sources with knowledge of the matter, the paper said the aim was to delay trial and challenge a gag order imposed by the judge.“Mr Trump’s unorthodox move – essentially an appeal in the form of a lawsuit – is unlikely to succeed, particularly so close to trial,” the paper said.Facing 34 criminal charges related to hush-money payments to Stormy Daniels, an adult film star who claimed an affair with him, Trump has pleaded not guilty.He has repeatedly attacked the judge in the case, Juan Merchan, and members of his family, alleging political bias.The trial is set for Manhattan next Monday and will be the first criminal trial involving a former US president.Trump, the Times said, was also expected to ask an appeals court to move the trial out of Manhattan, his home borough before his post-presidency move to Florida but a heavily Democratic area.That gambit was also deemed unlikely to succeed.Harry Litman, a US attorney turned law professor and commentator, said: “Trump’s latest desperate move of personally suing Merchan in the appellate division is reminiscent of his initial gambit in Palm Beach [Florida], where judge [Aileen] Cannon permitted him to take the whole action off track [in his classified information case].“But won’t happen here. Imagine if a criminal defendant could do this … ”skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionThe Times said the suit would be an Article 78 action, under New York laws that can be used to challenge state agencies and judges.Trump faces 54 other criminal charges: 40 in Florida, over his retention of classified information after leaving office, and 14 over his attempt to overturn the 2020 election – 10 in Georgia and four in Washington DC.Trump also faces multimillion-dollar penalties in two civil cases, both in New York, one concerning tax fraud and the other for defamation arising from a rape allegation a judge called “substantially true”.Denying all wrongdoing and claiming political persecution, Trump is attempting to delay all cases against him until after the presidential election in November.If he were to defeat Joe Biden and return to the White House, he could ensure the dismissal of federal charges in the classified information case and in four charges of election subversion. State charges would be tougher to deal with.In the New York hush-money case, Merchan last week denied an attempt to delay trial until the US supreme court rules on Trump’s claim of immunity regarding any act committed in office, lodged in his federal election subversion case.Merchan has also rejected one call to recuse himself and is thought overwhelmingly likely to reject another. More

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    Trump to sue judge in effort to avert hush-money trial – as it happened

    Donald Trump will sue the judge overseeing his hush money trial, which is over allegations that Trump forged financial records in an attempt to cover up a sex scandal, the New York Times first reported.The latest lawsuit from Trump is a last-minute attempt to delay the trial, which is set to begin 15 April in New York City.According to the Times, Trump’s legal team has now filed an action against Judge Juan Merchan, though the lawsuit itself is not public.Two sources with knowledge on the suit told the Times on Monday that Trump’s attorneys are asking an appeals court to delay the trial and also attacking a gag order that Merchan placed on Trump.Merchan previously denied Trump’s request to delay the trial until the US supreme court reviews his claims around presidential immunity involving a separate criminal case.That concludes today’s US politics live blog.Here’s what happened today:
    Biden announced several student loan forgiveness proposals during remarks in Madison, Wisconsin. One of his biggest proposals will cancel debt for those with more than $20,000 in interest or anyone who started paying off student loans more than two decades ago.
    Former vice-president Mike Pence criticized Trump’s stance on abortion, calling it a “slap in the face” to the anti-abortion movement. In a lengthy post to Twitter/X, Pence said that Trump had previously sent Roe v Wade “to the ash heap” by securing supreme court judges who were anti-abortion, but criticized his “retreat” from “pro-life Americans” with his latest decision.
    Jake Sullivan will host a meeting at the White House on Monday for families of US hostages held in Gaza, Punchbowl News reported. The latest meeting comes amid ongoing attempts to bring hostages home.
    Trump indicated that he will sue the judge overseeing his hush money trial in New York City, the New York Times first reported. Trump is accused of forging financial records to cover up a sex scandal. The trial is set to begin 15 April.
    Senator Lindsey Graham denounced Trump’s position on abortion and vowed to continue advocating for a 15-week abortion ban. In a statement Monday, Graham said he “respectfully [disagrees]” on Trump’s stance that abortion is an issue of states’ rights.
    Thank you for following along.Vice-president Kamala Harris said that Trump would sign off on a national abortion ban, when asked about Trump’s statement that abortion access should be left up to the states.While talking with reporters before boarding Air Force 2, Harris said:
    Let’s all be very clear – if he were to be put back in a position where he could sign off on a law, he would sign off on a national abortion ban. Let’s be very clear about that.
    From CBS News:Americans – and the rest of the world – are keeping an eye on the state of the US presidential race. Almost every day multiple new polls emerge and they nearly all agree – this race is close. Two more polls came on Monday, one (from I&I/TIPP) had Joe Biden up by three points, while the other (from Emerson) had Trump winning by one.Go back a little further and over the last nine polls Biden has been winning in five of them, three of them had Trump ahead and one was a tie. The overall average still has Trump slightly ahead by just 0.3 points. That seems to represent a pattern of the last few weeks – Biden is ticking very slowly up. Of course, the vagaries of the US election system and its electoral college mean the polls are no straight predictor of a winner. Trump has (recently) been stronger in core battleground states.Pence blasts Trump’s abortion positionFormer vice-president Mike Pence has blasted his old boss’s position on abortion, saying that it is a “a slap in the face” of many anti-abortion campaigners.The Hill reports that Pence tweeted in the wake of Trump saying the issue should be decided by individual states – a blow to those who hoped he might back some form of more national ban.“President Trump’s retreat on the Right to Life is a slap in the face to the millions of pro-life Americans who voted for him in 2016 and 2020,” Pence wrote in his post, before praising the steps their administration took to further the anti-abortion effort.Pence tweeted: “By nominating and standing by the confirmation of conservative justices, the Trump-Pence Administration helped send Roe v. Wade to the ash heap of history where it belongs and gave the pro-life movement the opportunity to compassionately support women and unborn children.”Biden commented on attempts from Republican lawmakers and the US supreme court to end his loan forgiveness program.“But then some of my Republican friends and elected officials [in] special interest sued us. And the supreme court blocked us,” Biden said, as the crowd booed.“But that didn’t stop us,” Biden added.Read about the supreme court’s actions against student loan forgiveness here:Biden’s student loan forgiveness proposals have already gotten a nod of endorsement from top Democrats.Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont called the proposals a “big deal”, emphasizing that millions of Americans face “outrageous [levels] of student debt”.Biden announced several major actions with regards to student loans during his speech.Biden said his administration will propose a new rule to cancel up to $20,000 in interest for people who owe more than when they began paying their off loan.Biden will also cancel student debt for those who started paying their student loans more than two decades ago.“This relief can be life-changing,” Biden said.Biden has begun his remarks on student loan forgiveness, discussing the impact that it has on millions of Americans.“A lot can’t repay for even decades after being [out of] school,” Biden said.“Too many people feel the strain and stress … because even if they get by, they still have this crushing, crushing debt,” he addedBiden added that student debt also negatively impacts the local economy, as many people are unable to afford homes.Biden’s remarks on student loan forgiveness are set to begin shortly in Madison, Wisconsin.Stay tuned for updates!More Democrats have warned that Trump will sign a national abortion ban if elected president in 2024.Elizabeth Warren said Trump bragged he’s “proudly the person responsible” for overturning Roe.“He’d sign a national abortion ban as president, & his allies plan to get it done even without Congress,” the Massachusetts senator added.Chuck Schumer, the Senate majority leader, noted that Trump’s stance on abortion has frequently changed, alluding that it could become more hard line.The White House has not been briefed on the date of Israel’s invasion of Rafah, Reuters reports.State department spokesperson Matthew Miller said on Monday that the White House has not received a date for the military operation after Israel’s Benjamin Netanyahu said that a day has been chosen.Miller emphasized that the US does not support an invasion of Rafah, where many people in Gaza are currently displaced amid the ongoing genocide in the territory.Jake Sullivan will host a meeting at the White House on Monday for families of US hostages held in Gaza, Punchbowl News reported.The national security adviser will also meet with Israeli opposition Yair Lipid, who is visiting Washington this week.Earlier today, White House spokesperson John Kirby said that Hamas is currently considering a deal that could release more hostages and lead to a six-week ceasefire.Trump’s position on abortion sparked a myriad of reactions from both sides of the political aisle. On Monday, Trump said that abortion is an issue of states’ rights, refusing to back a 15-week abortion ban that is popular amid Republicans.Democrats have warned that Trump will sign a national abortion ban, further limiting reproductive rigts. Meanwhile, anti-abortion advocates and GOP members have publicly criticized Trump for refusing to support an national limit.Biden squarely blamed Trump “for creating the cruelty and the chaos that has enveloped America since the Dobbs decision”.Here’s what else has happened today:
    Biden is on route to Madison Wisconsin, where he will deliver remarks on his latest student loan forgiveness plan. White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said that Biden will continue “fighting on behalf of borrowers” despite pushback from “Republican officials”.
    Trump has indicated that he will sue the judge overseeing his hush money trial in New York City, the New York Times first reported. Trump is accused of forging financial records to cover up a sex scandal.
    The White House announced that Hamas is reviewing a proposal that could lead to the release of hostages and a six-week ceasefire amid the ongoing genocide in Gaza.
    Ahead of Biden’s speech on student loans, Jean-Pierre said that Biden will continue to pursue student loan forgiveness despite pushback from “Republican officials”.“While we can’t prevent them from filing lawsuits against this plan, the president will never stop fighting on behalf of borrowers,” Jean-Pierre said.Republican states have previously tried to fight Biden’s attempts to wipe student loan debt, even falsely claiming that they would be financially impacted by the loan forgiveness scheme.Jean-Pierre had choice words for Trump and Senate Republicans about abortion following Trump clarifying his position.Jean-Pierre blamed Republicans for “extreme abortion bans” happening in GOP-led states, during Monday’s gaggle.“The only reason that extreme abortion bans are now in effect all over the country is because of the judges the previous president and Senate republicans put in the court,” Jean-Pierre said.“The only reason that women are being [denied] life saving and even unrelated procedures and turned away from emergency rooms…is because of the judges the previous president and Senate republicans put in the court,” she added.Jean-Pierre added that bans on IVF, a consequence of the Alabama state supreme court ruling, are because of judges selected by Trump.“We need to be clear eyed here,” Jean-Pierre added, regarding the potential impact on reproductive rights if Trump is elected.White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre is hosting a gaggle aboard Air Force One, as Biden travels to Wisconsin to give remarks on student loan forgiveness.Stay tuned for further updates.Donald Trump will sue the judge overseeing his hush money trial, which is over allegations that Trump forged financial records in an attempt to cover up a sex scandal, the New York Times first reported.The latest lawsuit from Trump is a last-minute attempt to delay the trial, which is set to begin 15 April in New York City.According to the Times, Trump’s legal team has now filed an action against Judge Juan Merchan, though the lawsuit itself is not public.Two sources with knowledge on the suit told the Times on Monday that Trump’s attorneys are asking an appeals court to delay the trial and also attacking a gag order that Merchan placed on Trump.Merchan previously denied Trump’s request to delay the trial until the US supreme court reviews his claims around presidential immunity involving a separate criminal case. More

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    Biden announces new plan to cancel student loans for 30m borrowers

    Joe Biden announced plans to cancel student loans for 30 million borrowers on Monday, the administration’s latest push on addressing student debt before the presidential election.The plan primarily targets borrowers who have accrued a high level of interest on their debt and those who have been in repayment for at least 20 years. Borrowers who face extreme economic hardship could also see some relief.The White House said that parts of the plan could begin to take effect in the early fall, at the earliest. In addition to a waiting period to receive public comment, the administration is expecting legal challenges from Republicans that could stall the plan from going into effect.Biden touted the new plan in a speech Monday afternoon in Madison, Wisconsin, where he said “too many people feel the strain and stress” of student loans.“Today, too many Americans, especially young people, are saddled with unsustainable debts in exchange for a college degree,” Biden said. “It’s a drag on our local economy.“Now, thanks to what we’re doing, that debt is no longer holding you back.The bulk of borrowers impacted by the plan will be those who owe more than their original balance because of accumulated interest. Borrowers who make under $120,000 a year, or married borrowers who make under $240,000, will automatically receive cancellation for the amount their balance has grown because of interest, up to $20,000. This cancellation will be automatic, and the administration estimates it will impact more than 25 million borrowers.The plan also targets borrowers who have held their debt for nearly 20 years. Borrowers who started repayment on their undergraduate debt on or before 1 July 2005 or their graduate school debt on or before 1 July 2000 will see the rest of their loans forgiven. The White House estimates about 2.5 million borrowers would be affected by this.Borrowers who are facing economic hardship and are at high risk of defaulting on their loans because of economic hardship in their daily lives, for example having medical debt or child care costs, may see their debt automatically cancelled under the plan.The administration is also trying to automatically enroll borrowers who are qualified for various forgiveness programs, including the Save plan and the Public Service Loan Forgiveness plan, but have not signed up for them. The White House estimates 2 million borrowers who could see their loans forgiven have not signed up for the programs.If the plan is executed, it would bring the total number of borrowers who have seen debt relief under Biden to 30 million.Though he had promised to cancel student debt during his 2020 presidential campaign, Biden has been fighting an uphill battle to try to address student debt after the supreme court last year blocked his big plan to cancel some debt for at least 43 million borrowers, including $20,000 in cancellation for some borrowers.After the supreme court’s decision, the White House’s student debt strategy has been to specifically target groups of borrowers for relief, especially those who have held debt for multiple decades and students who attended predatory for-profit schools.The White House also launched the Save (Saving on A Valuable Education) plan, a revamped income-driven repayment plan that allows borrowers to be on track for forgiveness if they pay a set portion of their income every month.Biden on Wednesday noted that “tens of millions of people’s debt was literally about to get cancelled”.“Then some of my Republican friends, elected officials and special interests sued us, and the supreme court blocked us. But that didn’t stop us,” he said. “I mean it sincerely, we continue to find alternatives past student debt repayments that are not challengeable.” More

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    Suspect arrested in arson attack on Bernie Sanders’ Vermont office

    Authorities say they have arrested an alleged arsonist accused of setting the US senator Bernie Sanders’ Burlington, Vermont, office on fire while staff worked inside – but investigators have yet to release details about a possible a motive.A justice department notification published on Sunday said Shant Soghomonian, 35, had been charged with using fire to damage the building but did not include any reason for his alleged actions.Soghomonian, who has also gone by the first name Michael, was listed as being from Northridge, California. He allegedly entered the building on Friday morning, went to the third floor where Sanders’ offices are situated, and sprayed the entry door with an accelerant.He then set fire to the door with a handheld lighter – all in view of a security camera that was recording video, the justice department said.Soghomonian then left through a staircase as the fire spread, damaging the door and triggering the sprinkler system. Several employees were in the progressive senator’s office at the time, though no injuries were reported.The Burlington police department said the fire engulfing the door and part of the vestibule had impeded “staff members who were working in the office” from exiting, which endangered their lives.In a statement to CNN, Sanders said: “I am deeply grateful to the swift, professional, coordinated efforts of local, state, and federal law enforcement in response to the fire at my Vermont office.” The independent senator who votes in line with Democrats added that he was grateful none of his staff had been injured while describing his office’s commitment to serve those in his home state of Vermont “during these challenging times”.If convicted, Soghomonian could face between five and 20 years in prison as well as up to a $250,000 fine, according to the justice department.While no motive has been advanced for Soghomonian’s alleged actions, the arson attack comes as implied threats of political violence are becoming a feature of the 2024 presidential and congressional elections.Politicians on both sides of the aisle have in recent months been subjected to anonymous calls to law enforcement that invite an armed, potentially forceful emergency response.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionIn early January, it was reported that at least three members of Congress had reported “swatting” incidents over the previous week, including Representative Brandon Williams of New York, Senator Rick Scott of Florida, and Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia, all Republicans.Maine’s Democratic secretary of state, Shenna Bellows, who ruled that Donald Trump should be ineligible to appear on the state’s 2024 primary ballot after the former president’s supporters attacked Congress on 6 January 2021, was also the target of a swatting call.The US supreme court later forced Bellows to reverse her decision. More