US Politics

Trump calls FBI, DoJ ‘vicious monsters’ in first rally since Mar-a-Lago searchFormer president also calls Joe Biden’s Philadelphia address the ‘most vicious, hateful, divisive speech’02:19Speaking in Pennsylvania on Saturday, at his first rally since the FBI searched Mar-a-Lago for top-secret material taken from the White House and since Joe Biden used a primetime address to warn that Republicans were assaulting US democracy, Donald Trump lashed out. Democracy is under attack – and reporting that isn’t ‘violating journalistic standards’ | Robert ReichRead moreThe former president said: “The FBI and the justice department have become vicious monsters, controlled by radical-left scoundrels, lawyers and the media, who tell them what to do.”Trump nominated the FBI director, Christopher Wray, in 2017.Biden spoke outside Independence Hall in Philadelphia, a site with tremendous resonance in US history, on Thursday night.Presenting a “battle for the soul of the nation”, he said: “This is a nation that rejects violence as a political tool. We are still, at our core, a democracy. Yet history tells us that blind loyalty to a single leader and the willingness to engage in political violence is fatal in a democracy.”In Wilkes-Barre on Saturday night, Trump called Biden’s remarks “the most vicious, hateful, and divisive speech ever delivered by an American president”.The former president was appearing in support of Mehmet Oz, the Republican candidate for US Senate, and Doug Mastriano, the candidate for governor.Oz, a TV doctor, is struggling against the lieutenant governor, John Fetterman. On Saturday night, Trump called the Democrat “a socialist loser”. He also claimed without evidence that Fetterman, who recently suffered a stroke and whose health has been mocked by the Oz campaign, used illegal drugs.“Fetterman supports taxpayer-funded drug dens and the complete decriminalization of illegal drugs, including heroin, cocaine, crystal meth, and ultra lethal fentanyl,” Trump said. “By the way, he takes them himself.”Trump also said: “Fetterman may dress like a teenager getting high in his parents’ basement, but he’s a raging lunatic hell-bent on springing hardened criminals out of jail in the middle of the worst crime wave in Pennsylvania history.”Mastriano is a supporter of Trump’s lie that Biden’s 2020 election victory was the result of electoral fraud. The candidate has compared the January 6 assault on the US Capitol to the Reichstag fire, the event in Berlin in 1933 which propelled Adolf Hitler to power. He has also been photographed wearing the uniform of a Confederate soldier.Biden’s speech continues to resonate. In Philadelphia, he spoke against a dramatic, deep-red background. Republicans protested, some saying the speech was too political to be delivered amid the trappings of the presidency, including attendant US Marines.On Sunday, Tiffany Smiley, the Republican candidate for Senate in Washington state, was asked on CNN’s State of the Union if she believed Biden won the 2020 election fairly and legitimately – a question now asked of most Republican candidates for state and national office.Smiley said she did. But she also said she was “extremely disappointed” with the speech in Philadelphia, “because unity is not conformity. And I think President Biden got that really, really mixed up”.Michael McCaul, a Republican congressman from Texas, told ABC’s This Week: “If this was a speech to unify the American people, it had just the opposite effect. It basically condemned all Republicans who supported Donald Trump in the last election. That’s over 70 million people.”More than 81 million voted for Biden. In his speech, the president said he wanted “to be very clear, very clear up front: not every Republican, not even a majority of Republicans, are Maga [pro-Trump] Republicans … [who] represent an extremism that threatens the very foundations of our republic.”In Wilkes-Barre, Trump told his audience that under Biden, they were “enemies of the state”. Of Biden, he said: “He’s an enemy of the state, you want to know the truth.”Of the FBI search at Mar-a-Lago, Trump said: “It was not just my home that was raided last month. It was the hopes and dreams of every citizen who I’ve been fighting for.”Calling the search “one of the most shocking abuses of power by any administration in American history” and “a travesty of justice”, he said: “They’re trying to silence me and more importantly they’re trying to silence you. But we will not be silenced, right?”Investigators recovered thousands of documents, including more than 100 with classified and top-secret markings. A Trump-appointed judge is considering Trump’s request for the appointment of a court official to review the documents for any covered by executive privilege.Trump won Pennsylvania in 2016, one success in a string of usually Democratic states which fueled his victory over Hillary Clinton. But Biden won it in 2020, its call four days after election day putting him in the White House. As the 2022 midterms approach, Biden is due back in the state on Monday, the Labor Day holiday, for an event in Pittsburgh.Trump in increasing legal peril one month on from Mar-a-Lago searchRead moreReporters in Pennsylvania for Trump’s rally found support for the former president over the Mar-a-Lago search. Roy Bunger, 65, told the New York Times the Biden administration was “deliberately targeting” Trump “to keep him from running again”.But there are signs that Trump’s endorsement will not be enough to help Oz win a Senate seat Republicans have targeted in their attempt to take back the chamber. Larry Mitko voted for Donald Trump in 2016. He told the Associated Press he would not back Oz, “No way, no how.”Mitko said he did no feel like he knew the celebrity heart surgeon, who narrowly won his May primary with Trump’s backing. Mitko said he would vote for Fetterman, with whom he has been familiar with since Fetterman was mayor of nearby Braddock.“Dr Oz hasn’t showed me one thing to get me to vote for him,” he said. “I won’t vote for someone I don’t know.”TopicsDonald TrumpUS midterm elections 2022US politicsUS CongressRepublicansPennsylvanianewsReuse this content More

Democracy is under attack – and reporting that isn’t ‘violating journalistic standards’Robert ReichBiden gave a rare primetime address on the most important challenge facing America – and the media coverage was just more he-said/she-said reaction Joe Biden’s message Thursday evening was clear. American democracy is under attack.This was a rare primetime address on the most important challenge facing the nation.But the media treated the speech as if it were just another in an endless series of partisan vollies instead of what it was – a declaration by the president of the United States that America must choose between democracy and authoritarianism.The major networks didn’t broadcast the speech.Friday’s media coverage of the speech was just more he-said/she-said reaction.The New York Times quoted the Republican House minority leader, Kevin McCarthy, as claiming Democrats are the ones “dismantling Americans’ democracy”.The Times failed to point out that McCarthy’s claim is a lie. Nor did it state that McCarthy himself was one of 139 House Republicans who voted to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election even after the attack on the Capitol.The same Times article quoted Ronna McDaniel, the chair of the Republican National Committee, as calling Biden “the divider in chief” and accusing him of exhibiting “disgust and hostility towards half the country”. But there was no mention of McDaniel’s role in advancing Trump’s “big lie”.The Times characterized a more general Republican objection to Biden’s speech – that he “was maligning the 74 million people” who voted for Trump in 2020. But the Times didn’t mention that Trump has illegally refused to concede the election.It is dangerous to believe that “balanced journalism” gives equal weight to liars and to truth-tellers, to those intent on destroying democracy and those seeking to protect it, to the enablers of an ongoing attempted coup and those who are trying to prevent it.Two Sundays ago, CNN’s Brian Stelter, host of the show Reliable Sources, put it well:“It’s not partisan to stand up for decency and democracy and dialogue. It’s not partisan to stand up to demagogues. It’s required. It’s patriotic. We must make sure we don’t give platforms to those who are lying to our faces.”Not incidentally, that was Stelter’s last show on CNN.On Friday, CNN White House reporter John Harwood said:“The core point [Biden] made in that political speech about a threat to democracy is true. Now, that’s something that’s not easy for us, as journalists, to say. We’re brought up to believe there’s two different political parties with different points of view and we don’t take sides in honest disagreements between them. But that’s not what we’re talking about. These are not honest disagreements. The Republican party right now is led by a dishonest demagogue.”Harwood went on to say:“Many, many Republicans are rallying behind his lies about the 2020 election and other things as well. And a significant portion – or a sufficient portion – of the constituency that they’re leading attacked the Capitol on January 6. Violently.”Shortly after making these remarks, Harwood announced he was no longer with CNN.A source told Dan Froomkin of Press Watch that CNN had informed Harwood last month that he was being let go. That was despite his long-term contract with the network. The source also said that Harwood had used his last broadcast to “send a message”.Why must we wait until some of America’s ablest journalists are sacked before they are willing and able to tell America the truth?It is not “partisan” to explain what Trump and his anti-democracy movement are seeking.It is not “taking sides” to point out that the Trump Republicans are trying to establish an authoritarian government in America.It is not “violating journalistic standards” to tell the unvarnished truth about what America is facing today.In fact, a failure to call out the Trump Republicans for what they are – liars, enablers, and accessories to crimes against the constitution – itself violates the most basic canons of journalistic ethics.“Balanced journalism” does not exist halfway between facts and lies.
Robert Reich, a former US secretary of labor, is professor of public policy at the University of California, Berkeley and the author of Saving Capitalism: For the Many, Not the Few and The Common Good. His new book, The System: Who Rigged It, How We Fix It, is out now. He is a Guardian US columnist. His newsletter is at robertreich.substack.com
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Leonard Leo: the secretive rightwinger using billions to reshape AmericaMarble Freedom Trust, advocacy group headed by Leo, has received vast $1.6bn donation to push conservative causes As the US supreme court justice Clarence Thomas prepared to take questions from members of the rightwing legal advocacy group the Federalist Society, a few years back, he turned to the moderator.Thomas joked that the nondescript man in the blue suit and white shirt was the “No 3 most powerful person in the world”, and then fell about laughing. The target of the judge’s mirth, Leonard Leo, grinned and remarked: “God help us.”Biden’s stern warning on extremism shows the rose-colored glasses are offRead moreYet both men understood at that moment in 2018 just how influential Leo was, in ways that few Americans knew. Most had never even heard of Leo, even though he was at that time instrumental in maneuvering Donald Trump to reshape the court on which Thomas sits, and so deliver one of its most politically sensitive rulings of recent times by overturning the right to abortion.Leo, a 56 year-old whose opposition to abortion is rooted in his Catholic faith, remains an obscure figure to much of the US public, even after revelations that he heads a political group that has received an astonishing $1.6bn donation to push conservative causes, including election manipulation ahead of this year’s midterm votes.Earlier this month the New York Times revealed that the money, said to be one of the largest single contributions to a political pressure group, arrived in a circuitous route from a figure who is equally obscure to most Americans: Barre Seid.Seid, who has spent tens of millions of dollars funding conservative and libertarian organisations, donated an entire company last year to a newly founded political advocacy group run by Leo, the Marble Freedom Trust. Marble sold the firm, the Chicago electronics manufacturer Tripp Lite, this year for $1.6bn, according to tax records.The roundabout process has prompted speculation Seid was sidestepping tax on the sale to maximize the funding for Leo.The Marble Freedom Trust has already distributed nearly a quarter of a billion dollars, including $153m to the Rule of Law Trust to push the appointment of conservative judges. That still leaves more than $1bn to fund political causes close to Leo’s heart, including his interest in helping Republican officials manipulate elections ahead of the midterm vote and the next presidential ballot.Leo defended the injection of a huge amount of “dark money” into the political process by claiming it merely levels the playing field against Democrats funded by liberal billionaires.“It’s high time for the conservative movement to be among the ranks of George Soros, Hansjörg Wyss, Arabella Advisors and other leftwing philanthropists, going toe-to-toe in the fight to defend our constitution and its ideals,” he said in a statement.Leo’s close relationship with Thomas goes back to 1991 when he worked to gather evidence to support the judge during his confirmation hearing for the supreme court.Leo went on to work for the Federalist Society, founded in 1982 to counter what conservatives claimed was liberal dominance of US courts and law schools. He rose to become the society’s co-chair and oversaw the rise in its influence at the expense of the more liberal American Bar Association, in part through the effectiveness of his fundraising to back conservative judicial nominees.As the conservative lawyer Ed Whelan wrote six years ago in the National Review: “No one has been more dedicated to the enterprise of building a supreme court that will overturn Roe v Wade than the Federalist Society’s Leonard Leo.”In 2005, George W Bush nominated Harriet Miers, his deputy chief of staff, for a vacant seat on the supreme court. She was widely regarded as a weak candidate in any case, but when conservatives turned on her, and Miers withdrew, Leo saw to it that she was replaced by a figure far more acceptable to the right and opponents of abortion, Samuel Alito.Senator Sheldon Whitehouse, one of the most outspoken critics of dark money’s influence on politics, told the Guardian earlier this year that was a turning point.“It was at that point that the grip of this little donor elite and Leo, its Federalist Society operative, really took hold. Justice Samuel Alito was the product of that and he has proven himself on the court as being a faithful workhorse for that dark money corporate rightwing crew,” he said.New opportunities presented themselves with Trump’s election in 2016.Leo drew up a list of 11 potential supreme court nominees to help Trump, a man who had previously claimed to be pro-choice, woo conservative and evangelical voters by committing to nominate justices who were hostile to abortion rights.After Trump’s victory, Leo took time away from the Federalist Society to work as an advisor to the president. All three of those eventually seated on the US’s highest court during Trump’s tenure and who voted to overturn Roe v Wade – Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh and Amy Coney Barrett – were named on the list Leo drew up during the campaign.Now Leo has turned his attention to pushing conservative moves to manipulate elections in favour of Republicans through the Honest Elections Project, a recent addition to a web of interlinked groups funded with dark money, including from the libertarian Koch brothers.Among other things, Leo is pushing a contentious legal theory that the US constitution gives state legislatures the power to decide how to run elections without intervention from the courts. The Honest Elections Project has made multiple legal submissions on the issue with the aim of removing the power of state courts to block gerrymandering and voter suppression measures to manipulate elections.Earlier this year, Leo told the Washington Post that in using dark money for political ends he is not doing anything that has not been done before.“Let’s remember that in this country, the abolitionist movement, the women’s suffrage movement, the American Revolution, the early labor movement, the civil rights movement of the 1950s and 1960s were all very much fueled by very wealthy people and oftentimes wealthy people who chose to be anonymous. I think that’s not a bad thing. I think that’s a good thing,” he said.TopicsUS politicsRepublicansAbortionnewsReuse this content More

Interview‘I want to work with everyone’: Alaska’s history-making new congresswomanMaanvi Singh in Anchorage Mary Peltola, the first Alaska Native elected to Congress, having defeated former vice-presidential nominee Sarah Palin, is a relentless coalition builderAhead of her astonishing victory this week in a special election to fill Alaska’s sole congressional seat, Mary Peltola was delighted to get recognized at Costco. “I was approached by some people to do a selfie,” she laughed.It seemed like months of traversing the state for meet-and greets was paying off. “I am getting recognized more.”Wind in Democrats’ sails as Sarah Palin humbled in Alaska special electionRead moreNow, people all over the US are learning her name. Peltola, who is Yup’ik Eskimo, will make history as the first Alaska Native to represent the state in Congress, and as the first Democrat to hold the seat in nearly 50 years.On Wednesday, she prevailed over the Trump-endorsed former vice-presidential nominee Sarah Palin and Republican party-backed Nick Begich III – in a state that favoured Trump by 10 points in 2020. She will serve out the remainder of the late Republican congressman Don Young’s term.A former state legislator and fisheries manager, Peltola campaigned as a relentlessly amicable coalition builder. “I want to work with everyone and anyone who is a reasonable person to find solutions to Alaska’s challenges,” she said.In a race where Palin’s celebrity – and her self-described “right-winging, bitter-clinging” attack dog energy – loomed large in the media and in voters’ minds, Peltola would often bring up her warm relationship with Palin. She’d talk about how both she and Palin were pregnant at the same time, while Peltola was serving as a legislator and Palin was governor. “Our teenagers are just a month apart,” she said. Before Palin left to campaign as Republican John McCain’s running mate in the 2008 elections, she bequeathed Peltola her backyard trampoline.Resolute nicenessPeltola was born in 1973, the year that Young was elected to office, and her father was a friend of the late congressman. While Young – a bombastic character with a taxidermy-stuffed office, a reputation for making racist and sexist jokes and a zeal for oil – was very much a contrast to Peltola, in demeanour and philosophy, voters in Anchorage nonetheless said they shared a sense of pragmatic bipartisanship.In 2010, Peltola helped to run the write-in campaign for Lisa Murkowski, the Republican senator with an independent streak now fighting for her political life after she voted for Trump’s impeachment.First elected to the state legislature in 1998, Peltola built a reputation for resolute niceness. She helped build the Bush Caucus – a bipartisan group of legislators representing the most rural and remote parts of the state – and showed a knack for winning over even her most conservative colleagues to advance policies on natural resource management and infrastructure.Peltola’s own politics diverge from the Republicans she is often willing to work with. In the US House race, she was the only candidate who endorsed abortion rights. “Alaska Natives have a history of forced sterilisation against their knowledge or consent,” she said. “People should have to build their families the way, when and how they choose. And for that to be infringed on is very troubling.”A majority of Alaskans support the right to choose – and after the supreme court decision to revoke the constitutional right to abortion access, the issue has energized voters in the Last Frontier as it has in other parts of the country.Peltola’s policies on climate adaptation also reflect the nuanced realities of Alaska – a state whose economy is intricately entwined with the oil and gas industry and whose people live at the Arctic edge of the climate crisis. Alaska is losing glacier ice faster than anywhere else in the world. “In the near term, we are tied to oil and gas. And in the near term, that is how we are paying our bills as Alaskans,” Peltola said. But “I have seen firsthand the effects of climate change across Alaska. We had over 250 wildfires this summer before June, we had the largest tundra fire we’ve ever seen in May.” Fisheries and salmon stock, which many Alaskans depend on for sustenance, are suffering, she added.Her platform focused on investment in renewable energy and a gradual transition for Alaska’s economy.A focus on bipartisanship could pay offIt remains unclear if Peltola’s moderate way will pave her path to victory in November when she’ll be running again in the race to serve the next full, two-year term in Congress. Alaska’s ranked-choice voting system, which the state tried for the first time with the special election, could be shaped as much by Alaskans’ scepticism about Palin as their support for Peltola.But in a state that tends to elect a Republican but where the majority of voters declare no party preference, her focus on bipartisanship could pay off.“We all have to help each other out if we’re going to survive. That’s the fundamental nature of Alaskans,” said Ivan Moore, an Anchorage-based pollster who has been tracking Peltola’s rise in Alaska politics. “We can be political assholes, just like everywhere else. But when push comes to shove, when it’s life and death, Alaskans will help each other. And I think Mary tapped into that.”“She speaks in a language that connects people,” said Shirley Mae Springer Staten, 76, an Anchorage-based arts educator who supported Peltola. “There’s a new wave of unkindness in politics these days, and I like that Mary Peltola pushes against that.”News of her victory this week came on Peltola’s 49th birthday – a “GOOD DAY”, she tweeted shortly after the elections division released preliminary results.Now more people know who she is. But she’s sticking with what works. “Support a regular Alaskan,” is the slogan.TopicsAlaskaDemocratsUS politicsSarah PalinClimate crisisinterviewsReuse this content More

Thanks to bad electoral laws, Detroit will soon have no Black members of CongressDavid DaleyIf we’re to avoid a future in which the nation’s largest Black-majority city lacks representation that looks like most of its citizens, we need electoral reform Detroit has been represented by at least one Black member of Congress since 1955. That’s four years before Berry Gordy founded Motown Records, three years before Ozzie Virgil became the first person of African descent to play for the Detroit Tigers, and 17 years before General Motors hired its first Black automotive designer in 1972.Now that long, proud run is nearing an end. After this November’s elections, Detroit – nearly 80% Black, the largest percentage, by far, of any major American city – will probably be left without any Black representation in the House of Representatives. An era that covered parts of eight decades, and the careers of heavyweights such as Representatives John Conyers and Carolyn Cheeks Kilpatrick will close.New legal filings paint Trump as a flailing liar surrounded by lackeys | Lloyd GreenRead moreHow is this possible? This is a story about redistricting, good intentions and unintended consequences, about population loss and suburban growth. It’s about the cold, unforgiving math of our political system, and the way overcrowded primaries divide votes and distort outcomes. And it points to the electoral reforms we desperately need – especially ranked-choice voting, but also an end to single-member congressional districts – if we’re to avoid having the nation’s largest Black majority city lacking representation that looks like the majority of its citizens.Let’s start here: every congressional map in the nation gets redrawn every 10 years, post-census, to account for population changes. When Michigan’s maps were redrawn in 2011, Republicans held the pen and sought to create as many Republican-leaning districts as they could get away with.Any gerrymander involves two key tools: cracking and packing – the art of either spreading the other side’s voters thinly across many districts, or packing them into as few as possible. In Michigan, Republicans packed Black voters – who tend to vote for Democrats – into two wildly contorted, even snake-like districts, then carved the Detroit suburbs into a pinwheel of whiter, Republican-friendlier seats.Michigan’s 13th (56% Black) and 14th (57% Black) districts overwhelmingly elected Black representatives to Congress for much of the decade, usually with 80% or more of the vote and little organized opposition. The 2011 Republican gerrymander worked as expected, however – and, with so many Democratic voters packed into those two seats, Republicans held nine of the 14 seats in this Democrat-leaning swing state for several consecutive election cycles. The state legislature, drawn with the same intent, also produced reliable Republican majorities, even when Democrats won more votes.Frustrated citizens, recognizing correctly that their votes didn’t really matter, demanded a fairer approach to redistricting. In 2018, 61% of Michiganders supported an amendment to the state constitution that would take the line-drawing power away from politicians and put it in the hands of an independent citizen commission that included voices representing many ethnicities, ideologies and geographic backgrounds.The members of that citizen panel did a tremendous job. They held public hearings across the state, worked openly and transparently, consulted experts on the Voting Rights Act – and drew the fairest and most equitable state legislative and congressional districts that Michigan has seen in several decades. Non-partisan experts graded the maps highly for partisan fairness and competitiveness. This fall, the party that wins the most votes will, in almost every likelihood, win the most seats.Yet this decade Michigan lost one of its seats in Congress to faster-growing states. Detroit’s population has plunged; the 2020 census recorded 10.5% fewer residents than the one a decade earlier. Some of that decline could be attributed to Black residents moving from Detroit to nearby suburbs. The Voting Rights Act experts retained by the commission produced a study showing that there was enough “crossover” or coalition voting in metro Detroit that Black voters could still elect a member of their own choosing even if the overall Black voting-age population was less than 50%.But those experts missed something crucial. Black voters, along with white crossover voters, might still elect a Black candidate in the general election. Yet a primary election in a Black political stronghold, where several strong candidates might seek office and divide votes, could be something else entirely. Black voters, in that case, could be punished for producing multiple candidates and having to choose among them.This shouldn’t have been a theoretical concern. It’s exactly what happened in the 2018 primary. Four Black candidates – including the Detroit city council president, a state senator, a former state representative, and Conyers’s son – earned 55.6% of the primary vote between them. Rashida Tlaib ultimately won the race with just 31.2% of the vote, defeating Brenda Jones, the council president, by 900 votes.The same thing happened in the Democratic primary this year. Eight of the nine candidates for the new 13th district seat were Black. They divided 71.7% of the vote. The winner, Shri Thanedar, captured Michigan’s last-remaining Black seat with 28.3% of the vote.There’s a better way to do this – one that would allow more Black candidates to run without fears of dividing the vote, provide fair representation to the communities represented by Tlaib and Thanedar, and also guarantee that more votes mean more seats.If Michigan adopted ranked-choice voting (RCV) for primary elections, and required any winner to earn at least 50% support, there would be no spoilers. RCV works much like an instant runoff; if no one earns 50% on the first round, the last-place candidates are eliminated and second choices come into play. This would allow multiple Black candidates to run without fear of vote splitting. And while Thanedar, for example, assured Black voters he would be their representative too, RCV would have pushed him to campaign more within Black communities and work for second choices, rather than best a deeply divided field with a mere 28% plurality victory.Better still, we could end gerrymandering altogether and fix one of the core problems in our politics if we moved from single-member congressional districts to larger, multi-member seats, under a plan currently before Congress called the Fair Representation Act. Under this measure, Michigan, for example, would have the same 13 members of Congress – but they would be elected from districts of five, four and four members. A five-member district with metro Detroit and its suburbs at its heart would probably elect at least two Black Democrats, Tlaib (one of only two Muslims in Congress) and perhaps as many as two Republicans.Under a more proportional system such as this, communities of color and communities that include diverse political perspectives are not pitted against one another. Instead, everyone receives representation according to the number of votes they earn. The side with the most votes would receive the most seats, but everyone would have a voice. This would put an end to our poisonous zero-sum, winner-takes-all politics, in which politicians cater to their base, by providing strong new incentives for leaders to talk to every voter and work together in Washington.It’s outrageous that Detroit lacks any Black representation in Congress. But it’s an outrage that makes clear how damaging plurality primaries and single-member districts have become. Detroit’s story shows how the imbalances and vote-rigging that plague our voting system distort and interfere with equitable representation – and the harm they create for voters who ought to be able to choose among candidates without fearing that their community will lose representation altogether. Fortunately, it’s an outrage that can be fixed.
David Daley is the author of Ratf**ked: Why Your Vote Doesn’t Count and Unrigged: How Americans Are Battling Back to Save Democracy. He is a senior fellow at FairVote
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Trump in increasing legal peril one month on from Mar-a-Lago search The photo released by the justice department of materials seized at his resort sends a message: the time for frivolity is overThe photo tells it all. There is the overabundance of the carpet in Mar-a-Lago, Donald Trump’s Florida resort, with its elaborate floral design presumably intended to suggest taste and luxury but merely signaling excess.There is the tackiness of the cheap gilded frames stuck in a box on the right of the picture, an echo of the golden skin plastered all over Trump Tower in Manhattan. In the front frame, the ego of the owner rings out – it is a Time magazine cover from 2019 showing Trump’s Democratic presidential challengers, Joe Biden among them, peering enviously at him as he sits in the Oval Office.FBI materials seized from Trump’s Mar-a-Lago home included 90 empty foldersRead moreAnd then there is the stuff that truly matters: the six folders of documents strewn across the floor marked “Secret/SCI” or “Top Secret/SCI”. Immediately, the papers point the viewer in a very different direction: this image is not about excess or tackiness or ego; it is about secrecy, danger, illegality.The photo is to be found appended to the 36-page court filing released by the Department of Justice (DoJ) on Tuesday in its battle with Trump over classified records. Attachment F displays some of the confidential documents that the FBI discovered during their hotly contested search of Mar-a-Lago earlier this month.The picture encapsulates not only Trump’s disdain for democratic norms and laws, but also the thickening legal peril that is now closing in on him. It is carefully composed, allowing the viewer just enough legible detail to draw deductions.Here is a document stamped 9 May 2018 – the day after Trump announced he had pulled the US out of the Iran nuclear deal, as Bloomberg noted. Here’s another White House document marked “Secret, Limited Access”, dated 26 August 2018.Was that classified because that was the day after Trump’s nemesis, Senator John McCain, died? Or was there some other reason to explain its “NOFORN” designation – not for the eyes of any foreign national?Trump tried to belittle the importance of the photograph. “Terrible the way the FBI threw documents haphazardly all over the floor (perhaps pretending it was me that did it!)” he fulminated on his Truth Social social media network.But his trademark flippant-dismissive tone might not suffice on this occasion. Not when on Friday the most detailed itinerary yet of the materials seized at Mar-a-Lago was unsealed, showing that it included 103 classified documents, including 13 marked “Top Secret”, as well as 90 folders that were classified or marked for return to the White House staff secretary or a military aide but which were mysteriously empty.And not when another document in the DoJ photo contains the four devastating letters: HCS-P. That signifies that the document contains intelligence gathered from clandestine human sources – often spies or informants working undercover. Such “Humint” must be exceptionally closely guarded for the safety of America’s own people.That was the message the DoJ wanted to transmit in releasing the photo: the time for frivolity is over.“We now know that some of the information recovered was labeled in a way that could indicate it was derived from confidential human sources,” Andrew McCabe, the former FBI deputy director under both Barack Obama and Trump, told the Guardian.“There’s a chance that information was collected from people who are working on behalf of the US overseas, including potentially CIA sources. You are literally talking about people’s lives.”On 8 August, when dozens of FBI agents fanned through Mar-a-Lago bearing a search warrant issued by a federal judge, Trump lashed out. . “These are dark times for our nation,” he said, describing the legally authorised search as a “raid” and portraying it as a blatantly political attack akin to one of those “broken, Third-World Countries”.He added: “Nothing like this has ever happened to a President of the United States before.”Unusually for Trump, that last statement was correct. Never has a US president been subject to an involuntary search of their home by federal agents pursuing evidence in a criminal investigation.Over the past four weeks a cascade of information has been released that tells the other side of the story. It transpires that the unprecedented nature of the FBI search was posited on the even more unprecedented behavior of the 45th president of the United States.Trump has been archivally challenged, to coin a phrase, for many years. The roots of his refusal to abide by normal rules relating to documents stretch back at least to his refusal to disclose his own tax returns during the 2016 presidential campaign – a resistance to accepting public access to his personal papers that is the mirror image of his current claim that presidential records from his time in the White House belong to him.Ruth Ben-Ghiat, a New York University history professor who is author of Strongmen: Mussolini to the Present and publisher of the Lucid newsletter about threats to democracy, says this blurring of public and private is central to his autocratic style of leadership.“For Trump, records are not just documents. They are a measure of control – leverage over enemies and over his inner circle. This kind of leader doesn’t recognize the division between public and private. They have a proprietary mode of exercising power in which everything is theirs.”By June 2018 such proprietary behavior was expressing itself in the White House. Politico reported that Trump was routinely tearing up official records rather than filing them for safekeeping in the National Archives as he was legally obliged to do.White House aides were left desperately attempting to tape the documents back together – a farcical vignette of government in the Trump era. After he was forced out of the White House, many presidential papers were received by the archives in similarly torn-up condition.Documents that weren’t ripped up were often hoarded. Stephanie Grisham, a senior White House aide, described the pattern to the Washington Post.At the end of each day boxes would be carried upstairs to the White House residence. “They would get handed off to the residence and just disappear.”Grisham gave a memorable insight into the chaotic wiring of Trump’s mind, rendered in physical form through the contents of the boxes. “There was no rhyme or reason – it was classified documents on top of newspapers on top of papers people printed out of things they wanted him to read. That was our filing system.”Since the Mar-a-Lago search Trump has pleaded innocence, acting like the schoolboy who mumbles denials as he sucks brazenly on a stolen lollypop. “They could have had it anytime they wanted – and that includes LONG ago. ALL THEY HAD TO DO IS ASK,” Trump spluttered.Over the past month, however, it has become abundantly clear that the archivists did ask – over and over and over again. They began asking for boxes of documents, in fact, even before Trump quit the White House, and carried on doing so throughout 2021.On 18 January this year, Trump finally returned 15 boxes from Mar-a-Lago. Just like the jumbled contents Grisham described, they contained a mishmash of newspaper clippings, handwritten notes, memos, dinner menus, letters, a cocktail napkin, briefing papers – the archival equivalent of a yard sale.They also contained records that confirmed the archivists’ worst fears. Tucked among the bric-a-brac were 184 classified documents, including 25 marked “Top Secret” and several with the chilling HCS human intelligence stamp indicating that lives were potentially at risk.It did not end there.Federal investigators who were brought in to investigate the matter became convinced that Trump was still hiding stuff. A grand jury subpoena was issued in May demanding the return of any classified document, and on 3 June three FBI agents and a DoJ official visited Mar-a-Lago to take possession of a further 38 classified documents, including 17 marked “Top Secret”, that Trump professed to have just discovered.During that visit a Trump lawyer signed a sworn certification that stated – on Trump’s personal authorization – that “a diligent search” had been conducted of all boxes brought from the White House. “Any and all” of the documents that were subject to the subpoena had been handed over and there were “no other records stored in any private office space or other location”.The FBI remained suspicious. Maybe it was because, when the agents were taken to look around the storage room at Mar-a-Lago, they were pointedly forbidden from opening or looking inside any of the White House boxes.Maybe it was the surveillance footage captured outside the storage room, which the FBI obtained under a separate subpoena, which reportedly showed employees going in and out of the space that was supposed to have been secured.Or maybe it was because the DoJ has had a rich network of informants operating within Mar-a-Lago. Prosecutors have hinted strongly that they did, referring in the affidavit released last week to “a significant number of civilian witnesses” whose identities needed protecting.That in turn might help explain why the justice department eventually came to the end of its tether and at the highest level – that of US attorney Merrick Garland – decided to press the button on the Mar-a-Lago search. After all, if the US government could so easily extract insider information from Trump’s sanctuary, what was preventing foreign governments doing the same?“Mar-a-Lago is not Donald’s home, it’s a social club,” said Michael Cohen who, as Trump’s longtime lawyer until 2018 when he pleaded guilty to tax evasion and other offenses, knows what he is talking about. “There are thousands of people who are members and, along with their guests, come and go from the premises at will. The premises are unsecured and no place for top secret documents.”McCabe, the former deputy director of the FBI, also knows what he is talking about. “Mar-a-Lago is a spy’s dream. It’s a public place, easy to get into. A determined trained intelligence officer could get themselves in and likely get an audience with the former president who had access to the utmost sensitive secrets that we have.”The full horror may never publicly be known of what lies inside the more than 320 classified documents that have been recovered from Mar-a-Lago since January. Some of the items listed in the property receipt the FBI compiled after the 8 August search are intriguing: what do the “handwritten notes” contain?Others are titillating and alarming in equal measure, such as listing 1A – “info re: President of France”. Rolling Stone reported this week that Trump has bragged to associates that he has knowledge, some of it gleaned through US intelligence, of Emmanuel Macron’s illicit love life – though it is not clear whether that has any relevance.But above all, there were the staggering 55 top secret documents in total that were retrieved from Mar-a-Lago, some with HCS and NOFORN markings. As an unnamed source familiar with the search told the Washington Post, the stash contained “among the most sensitive secrets we hold”.All of this leaves several burning questions. Could any of this hyper-sensitive material already have found its way into the wrong hands?Again, we don’t know, other than that the director of national intelligence is reviewing the Mar-a-Lago documents to assess their possible impact on national security. One critically obvious but unstated issue is whether undercover agents will need to be relocated to guard their lives.Then there is the overriding puzzle: what, if anything, was Trump intending to do with the documents and why has he gone to such tortuous lengths to hold on to them? Cohen, who watched Trump’s antics up close for many years, thinks he knows the answer.“Donald intended to use the documents to extort the US government and prevent an indictment and conviction. In essence: a get out of jail free card.”Which brings us to the third pressing question: will Trump be indicted? Certainly, the peril of a criminal prosecution now looms large.The DoJ has made clear in recent filings that it feels it has evidence of obstruction of a federal investigation. He also faces possible indictment under the Espionage Act, which punishes unauthorized retention or disclosure of national security information, and a third law prohibiting mishandling of sensitive government records.“There’s no question what he had, there’s no question where he had it,” McCabe said. “We now know there was some reason to believe the Trump team was potentially misrepresenting things and lying to the FBI, so this is very serious.”McCabe says the investigation into such a prominent political figure who has indicated he might stand in the 2024 presidential election is fraught with peril. “You could appear as though you were conducting some sort of political retaliation, and we are absolutely not that kind of nation.”But, then again, there are perils the other way too. McCabe looks back on his own interactions with Trump and is struck by the high price of inaction.In March 2018 he was fired from the FBI two days before he was due to retire, having been the target of Trump’s constant attacks. McCabe had incurred the president’s wrath by approving an FBI investigation into possible obstruction of justice relating to Trump’s earlier dismissal of FBI director James Comey.McCabe, who has since had his dismissal rescinded, told the Guardian that “it’s clear from the decisions that I made, or was part of, when I was in government, that I believe very strongly that the decision not to investigate can be as impactful and as political as the decision to investigate.”If prosecutors are staved off because the subject is a politician who might be running for office, McCabe said, “or because they’ve said nasty things about us – then we actually have given in to politicization. And we’ve begun to create a class of citizens in this country who are above the law.”TopicsDonald TrumpUS politicsfeaturesReuse this content More

Correspondent abruptly leaves CNN after calling Trump a ‘demagogue’ John Harwood is out as the company’s new head signals shift away from liberal-leaning political coverage A White House correspondent for CNN – whose new leader wants the channel to adopt what he considers a more politically neutral voice to its coverage – has departed the network after calling Donald Trump “a dishonest demagogue” on the air.John Harwood announced his exit from CNN on his Twitter account Friday, a day after he spoke favorably of a nationally televised speech by Joe Biden in which the president said that Republican forces loyal to his Oval Office predecessor, Trump, imperiled American democracy.“The core point [Biden] made in that political speech about a threat to democracy is true,” Harwood said on CNN after the address, which was in primetime. “Now that is something that is not easy for us as journalists to say.”“We’re brought up to believe there’s two different political parties with different points of view, and we don’t take sides in honest disagreements between them. But that’s not what we are talking about. These are honest disagreements. The Republican party right now is led by a dishonest demagogue.”By midday Friday, the 65-year-old Harwood tweeted that he was out at CNN.personal news:today’s my last day at CNNproud of the workthanks to my colleaguesi’ve been lucky to serve the best in American media – St. Petersburg Times, WSJ, NYT, the NBC family, CNNlook forward to figuring out what’s next— John Harwood (@JohnJHarwood) September 2, 2022
“Personal news: Today’s my last day at CNN,” said Harwood, who added that he has been “lucky” to serve other prominent American media outlets like the St Petersburg Times, Wall Street Journal, New York Times and NBC. “Proud of the work. Thanks to my colleagues.“Look forward to figuring out what’s next.”CNN didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment on whether Harwood’s departure was motivated by his remarks supporting Biden’s speech and criticizing Trump. Network officials instead issued a statement saying, “We appreciate John’s work covering the White House, and we wish him all the best.”Harwood had two years still left on his contract at CNN when he announced his exit, veteran media reporter Dylan Byers said later Friday.According to the Hollywood Reporter, which cited an anonymous source with insight into the situation, Harwood learned “last month” that he was out at the channel.New leadership took over at CNN in April, having been appointed by its owners, Warner Brothers Discovery. CNN chief Chris Licht – who inherited his post after Jeff Zucker’s departure in February – has been open about wanting to tone down its shows’ opinions and return to an older school, straighter and in his interpretation less overtly liberal style of reporting.Harwood’s exit comes after the 21 August departure of Brian Stelter, host of CNN’s media affairs show, Reliable Sources, which was canceled after 30 years on the airwaves.Stelter was doggedly criticized by conservative viewers over his coverage of the Trump administration, which – among many other things – tried to sow doubt about the validity of the results in the 2020 election that he lost to Biden.Stelter, on his last show, also invoked the word “demagogue” as he verbally rebuked CNN’s new brass.“It is not partisan to stand up to demagogues,” said Stelter, who also reportedly had multiple years left on his CNN contract at the time of his departure. “It’s required – it’s patriotic.”Harwood joined CNN in January 2020, about a year before Trump supporters mounted a deadly attack on the US Capitol in a desperate attempt to prevent the congressional certification of the former president’s electoral defeat to Biden.Before that, he was the chief Washington DC correspondent for CNBC, where in 2019 he drew significant attention for another remark that was critical of Trump and his Republican supporters.Harwood at that time had said that Trump and the Republicans who buoyed him to the Oval Office in 2016 were “fundamentally broken”, making them particularly challenging to cover for journalists who operated in good faith.TopicsCNNTelevision industryTV newsUS politicsReuse this content More

Joe Biden delivered a brief and impromptu speech seemingly targeting Donald Trump as “a threat to Democracy”. Responding to a question from a reporter on whether “all Trump supporters are a threat to this country”, Biden said he does not consider any Trump supporter to be a threat. “I do think that anyone who calls for the use of violence, fails to condemn violence when it’s used, refuses to acknowledge when an election has been won, insists upon changing the way in which you count votes, that is a threat to democracy and everything we stand for,” Biden said. “Everything we stand for rests on the platform of democracy.” Biden continued by saying that those who voted for Trump in 2020 “weren’t voting to attack the Capitol, they weren’t voting for overruling the election. They were voting for a philosophy he put forward.”The comments came after Biden shifted his tone in a primetime address last night, directly calling out Trump and his allies, saying “democracy is under assault”. Here’s a quick summary of what happened today:
Joe Biden implicitly criticized Donald Trump for threatening democracy, saying that anyone who fails to condemn violence is a threat. Both Biden and Trump will be in Pennsylvania this weekend rallying for candidates in their respective parties.
Gina McCarthy, Biden’s top climate adviser, is stepping down in less than two weeks. The White House announced that John Podesta, former top adviser to Bill and Hillary Clinton, will be senior clean energy adviser to Biden.
The US Bureau of Labor Statistics released data today that showed 315,000 jobs were added to the US economy in August. Biden celebrated the numbers, saying “American has some really good news going into Labor Day weekend”.
As Trump heads back onto the campaign trail for Republican candidates, there are rumblings about a potential 2024 bid from the former president. Son-in-law Jared Kushner said in an interview that Trump has been thinking about it, while a former Trump White House official predicted that Trump will bow out after raising cash for his campaign.
That’s it for the live blog today. Thanks for reading.Bill Barr, former attorney general, think that Florida governor Ron DeSantis could be elected president if he runs in 2024.“I don’t know Ron DeSantis that well, but I’ve been impressed with his record down in Florida,” Barr told Bari Weiss on her podcast, “Honestly”.Though Barr was once a part of Trump’s band of loyalists, he has taken to lightly criticizing his former boss, who in turn referred to him as “slow and very boring”.Whether Barr is right ultimately depends on how much of a sway Trump still has over voters.DeSantis has posited himself as a potential successor to the Maga throne, bringing the flare of Trumpism without the baggage of investigations and the Capitol insurrection. Though he has not confirmed any presidential ambitions, Republican voters picked him as a second choice, behind Trump, in a theoretical 2024 election.Two of Donald Trump’s former lawyers appeared in federal court today to testify in front of a grand jury investigating the January 6 insurrection.Former White House counsel Pat Cipollone arrived at the courthouse first and was with the grand jury for over two hours, according to Reuters. Former White House deputy counsel Pat Philbin arrived at the courthouse shortly after and was also with the grand jury for over two hours. Cipollone and Philbin are the most high-profile witnesses the grand jury has seen. The grand jury is investigating the “fake electors” plot to send fake slates of electors to Congress to fraudulently inflate the number of electors in Trump’s favor, despite him losing the election.The Department of Veteran Affairs announced Friday that it will provide access to abortions to pregnant veterans and veteran beneficiaries. Abortions will be available for those whose life or health is endangered through their pregnancy or if it is a result of rape or incest. The rule will allow VA employees, “when working within the scope of their federal employment” to “provide authorized services regardless of state restrictions”. “This is a patient safety decision,” VA secretary Denis McDonough said in a statement. “Pregnant veterans and VA beneficiaries deserve to have access to world-class reproductive care when they need it most. That’s what our nation owes them.” New: The U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs “is taking steps to guarantee Veterans and other VA beneficiaries abortion-related care anywhere in the country. VA employees…may provide authorized services regardless of state restrictions.” https://t.co/ysv96U4FZT— Gabriella Borter (@gabriellaborter) September 2, 2022
Donald Trump will continue to flirt with a third White House run in 2024 in order to raise money but will ultimately choose not to mount a campaign, a Trump White House official predicts.In communications reviewed by the Guardian on Friday, the official said Trump would look to “Bring in the $$$ then bow out gracefully before announcing”.The 45th president, in office from 2017 to 2021, dominates polling of possible Republican nominees in 2024. He has amassed a significant campaign war chest and is generally held to have maintained his grip on his party despite being impeached twice, the second time for inciting the deadly January 6 attack on the US Capitol.On Thursday, senior Republicans sprang to Trump’s defense – and eagerly expressed their own sense of offense – when Joe Biden used a primetime address to outline the threat to American democracy posed by Trump and his supporters.Trump himself floated pardons – and official apologies – for January 6 rioters should he return to the White House. Lest anyone forget, nine deaths have been connected to the Capitol attack, including suicides among law enforcement officers.Regarding the former White House official’s prediction that Trump will not run, the Guardian recently reported the contrary view of a senior source close to Trump, who said Trump “has to” announce a 2024 campaign soon, to head off being indicted under the Espionage Act after the FBI search at Mar-a-Lago in August.That source indicated Trump needed to announce because politically it would be harder for the Department of Justice to indict a candidate for office than a former president out of the electoral running.Developments since then have in most eyes increased the likelihood of an indictment over Trump’s handling of classified records. But most observers believe an indictment is not likely until after the midterm elections on 8 November, given DoJ policy regarding avoiding politically insensitive moves close to polling day.Hugo Lowell has more:FBI materials seized from Trump’s Mar-a-Lago home included 90 empty foldersRead moreThe White House has announced that John Podesta will become senior advisor to US president Joe Biden for clean energy innovation and implementation, among other developments following the news earlier today that top climate advisor Gina McCarthy plans to step down.Podesta was White House chief of staff to Bill Clinton when he was president, a climate adviser to Barack Obama and – infamously as it became, chairman of Hillary Clinton’s 2016 presidential bid.Current deputy White House national climate advisor, Ali Zaidi will be promoted to assistant to the president and national climate advisor.The White House statement noted that: “In his new role, Podesta will oversee implementation of the Inflation Reduction Act’s expansive clean energy and climate provisions and will chair the president’s national climate task force in support of this effort.”Meanwhile, Zaidi will also be vice-chair of the national climate task force. Gina McCarthy will leave her current role on September 16.Biden expressed gratitude to McCarthy and said of his new appointees: “Under Gina McCarthy and Ali Zaidi’s leadership, my administration has taken the most aggressive action ever, from historic legislation to bold executive actions, to confront the climate crisis head-on. The Inflation Reduction Act is the biggest step forward on clean energy and climate in history, and it paves the way for additional steps we will take to meet our clean energy and climate goals. “We are fortunate that John Podesta will lead our continued innovation and implementation. His deep roots in climate and clean energy policy and his experience at senior levels of government mean we can truly hit the ground running to take advantage of the massive clean energy opportunity in front of us.”Podesta, 73, is a veteran Washington establishment insider and Democratic party stalwart. But he achieved infamy in the 2016 presidential election campaign when, as a result of a chain of mishaps, his email was breached.As the Guardian reported in late 2016, the blunder gave Kremlin hackers access to about 60,000 emails in Podesta’s private Gmail account. According to US intelligence officials, Moscow then gave the email cache to WikiLeaks. The website released them in October, and the email scandal dominated the news cycle and was exploited by Donald Trump, who went on to a shock victory over Hillary Clinton in the November election.The revelation gave further credence to a CIA finding that the Moscow deliberately intervened to help Trump.Here’s a summary of everything that’s happened so far today:
Off the heels of his eviscerating speech last night, Joe Biden is continuing to attack Donald Trump, saying today that anyone who fails to condemn violence “is a threat to democracy and everything we stand for”.
Biden touted the jobs figures that were released today that showed the US added 315,000 jobs in August, saying that “American workers are back to work”.
Gina McCarthy, Biden’s top climate adviser, is planning to step down in less than two weeks, according to the New York Times. McCarthy had privately expressed frustration with the pace of climate policy.
Stay tuned for more live updates.At the White House press briefing just now, press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre spoke on Joe Biden’s speech last night where he warned that Donald Trump and “MAGA Republicans” are a threat to democracy. “The president was trying to give the American people a choice: how do we move forward in this inflection point?” Jean-Pierre said. “When it comes to the soul of the nation, that is something the president has talked about for years… He has been concerned about where our democracy is going.” Responding to criticism that Biden’s speech was politically charged despite it being an official White House event, Jean-Pierre said that “standing up for democracy is not political”. “Denouncing political violence is not political. Standing up for freedom and rights is not political,” she said. “We don’t call any of that political. We see that as leadership and as presidential.” Jean-Pierre on Biden speech: “Standing up for democracy is not political. Denouncing political violence is not political. Standing up for freedom and rights is not political… We see that as leadership and as presidential.”— David Smith (@SmithInAmerica) September 2, 2022
Joe Biden delivered a brief and impromptu speech seemingly targeting Donald Trump as “a threat to Democracy”. Responding to a question from a reporter on whether “all Trump supporters are a threat to this country”, Biden said he does not consider any Trump supporter to be a threat. “I do think that anyone who calls for the use of violence, fails to condemn violence when it’s used, refuses to acknowledge when an election has been won, insists upon changing the way in which you count votes, that is a threat to democracy and everything we stand for,” Biden said. “Everything we stand for rests on the platform of democracy.” Biden continued by saying that those who voted for Trump in 2020 “weren’t voting to attack the Capitol, they weren’t voting for overruling the election. They were voting for a philosophy he put forward.”The comments came after Biden shifted his tone in a primetime address last night, directly calling out Trump and his allies, saying “democracy is under assault”. Gina McCarthy, Joe Biden’s top climate adviser, is stepping down on 16 September, the New York Times is reporting, citing people familiar with her plans.Rumors have swirled around her departure for months as McCarthy privately expressed frustrated with the “slow pace of climate progress” in the administration.McCarthy was an Environmental Protection Agency administrator during the Obama administration.In a press conference on the American Rescue Plan – the $1.9tn coronavirus stimulus package passed in March 2021 – Joe Biden celebrated today’s jobs report that said the US added 315,000 jobs in August. “We received more good news. American workers are back to work, earning more, manufacturing more, building an economy from the bottom up and the middle out,” Biden said. “We have created nearly 10m jobs since I took office. The fastest growth in all of American history.” Biden noted that the labor participation rate, or the number of people working or looking to work, is up and that more working-age women have come back to work. He also noted that gas prices have been going down over the last few weeks. “America has some really good news going into Labor Day weekend,” he said. Biden has been trying to emphasize the positive benefits to his stimulus package, particularly in light of claims from conservatives that it contributed to inflation. In his press conference, Biden emphasized that the stimulus created jobs, especially in manufacturing.A new Pew Research poll shows that opinions of the supreme court are more polarized than ever. Just 28% of Democrats and liberal independents have a favorable view of the court, versus 73% of Republicans and conservative independents.The gap is the largest since Pew started polling Americans on their opinion of the court. The court is also facing their lowest approval rating, with 48% of American having an unfavorable view of the court versus 49% with a favorable view.Today, 49% of Americans have a favorable view of the Supreme Court. Among partisans, just 28% of Democrats say they have a favorable view, while 73% of Republicans say the same. https://t.co/iLKP70pW4n pic.twitter.com/hqnVm0degr— Pew Research Center (@pewresearch) September 1, 2022
More Americans also believe the court is Republican/Conservative-leaning, with 49% of Americans saying they view they court as conservative versus 30% in August 2020.This Labor Day weekend kicks off the midterm election season which will put both the lasting sway of Donald Trump and Joe Biden’s presidency to the test with American voters.The primary election showed that the myth that the 2020 election was stolen from Trump is potent with voters: Many candidates who publicly questioned the election results won their primaries over the last few months.Now that these Trump-backed Republican candidates are in place heading into the general election, the test now shifts to how strong “Maga Republicans” – as Joe Biden put it Thursday night – are among the broader electorate.Pennsylvania is being seen as a key state to watch this midterm season. Trump is traveling to northeastern Pennsylvania this weekend to rally for two Republican candidates, Mehmet Oz and Doug Mastriano, who are running for US Senate and governor, respectively.Both candidates have vied themselves for Trump’s endorsement, but they are also trailing in the polls behind their Democratic opponents. Oz is eight points behind Democratic candidate John Fetterman, while Mastriano is seven points behind that state’s attorney general, Josh Shapiro.Oz, a one-time heart surgeon and celebrity television doctor, has had a particularly hard time convincing conservative voters that he is no longer attached to his liberal Hollywood persona. Oz “looks forward to President Trump talking to Pennsylvanians about the importance of fighting the radical, liberal agenda,” a spokesperson told Politico.New York City mayor Eric Adams released a joint statement with family and friends of 9/11 victims criticizing a Saudi-funded women’s golf tournament that is to be hosted at a Trump golf course in the city. “It is outrageous that the Trump Organization agreed to host a tournament with this organization while knowing how much pain it would cause New Yorkers,” Adams said. Last September, the FBI declassified documents related to 9/11 that revealed that the Saudi government provided logistical report to the attackers and helped fund the attacks.The tournament is scheduled to be held at Trump Golf Links, a Trump golf course in the Bronx, in October. Mayor Eric Adams quietly releases a statement online after meeting with the families of 9/11 victims about their opposition to a Saudi-backed golf tournament at the city-owned Trump Ferry Point course, h/t @maggieNYT: https://t.co/tOXL0OT1ep pic.twitter.com/ZghLXpd9Iv— Emma G. Fitzsimmons (@emmagf) September 2, 2022
Donald Trump is “obviously thinking about” running for president in 2024, Trump son-in-law Jared Kushner told Sky News in an interview Friday. “He hates seeing what’s happening in the country,” Kushner said. Though Trump has not officially announced a run in 2024, he and his allies have dropped plenty of hints that he is wanting to. On Thursday, Trump said that he would pardon the January 6 rioters if he were elected president again. Trump is, of course, facing multiple investigations into his business dealings as well as unauthorized retention of sensitive government documents.The US added another 315,000 jobs in August as the jobs market remained strong amid signs of a worsening economy.The US jobs market lost 22m jobs in early 2020 at the start of the pandemic but roared back after the Covid lockdowns ended. It has remained strong despite four-decade high rates of inflation and slowing economic growth. In July, the US unexpectedly added 528,000 new jobs, restoring employment to pre-pandemic levels.The unemployment rate ticked up to 3.7% in August from 3.5% in July but is still close to a 50-year low.The remarkable strength of the jobs market has spurred the Federal Reserve to sharply increase interest rates in the hopes of cooling the economy and bringing down prices.Last week the Fed chair, Jerome Powell, made clear the Fed intends to keep raising rates sharply as the central bank struggles to tamp down inflation. His speech triggered a meltdown on Wall Street, with the Dow Jones index losing 1,000 points. The latest jobs report is the last to be released before the Fed meets again in September.US added 315,000 jobs in August as strong market defies signs of worsening economyRead moreGood morning, and welcome to the Guardian’s US politics live blog. It’s 10 weeks before the midterms, and it’s starting to feel like it’s 2020 again. Both Donald Trump and Joe Biden are in Pennsylvania this weekend to rally for candidates in their respective parties.Donald Trump will go to Wilkes-Barre in northern Pennsylvania on Saturday support two Pennsylvania Republican candidates: Mehmet Oz (known as “Dr Oz”), who is running for US Senate, and Doug Mastriano, who is running for governor. Trump, despite intensifying investigation into alleged unauthorized retention of sensitive government documents, has also geared up his talk about the 2024 election, saying on Thursday that he would seriously consider full pardons for participants of the January 6 US Capital insurrection.Joe Biden, on the other hand, in turn delivered a speech last night from Philadelphia attacking Trump and “Maga Republicans”.“There’s no question that the Republican party today is dominated, driven and intimidated by Donald Trump and the Maga Republicans, and that is a threat to this country,” Biden said. “Maga Republicans are destroying American democracy.”Biden will travel further into Pennsylvania this weekend with a planned stop in Pittsburgh to continue pushing for Democratic candidates running in the state.Here’s what else we’re watching today:
The US added 315,000 jobs in August, a sign of continuing growth in the labor market despite high rates of inflation and slowing economic growth.
Biden is scheduled to discuss the American Rescue Plan on the heels of today’s jobs report release.
Former White House counsel Pat Cipollone and former deputy Patrick Philbin are appearing before a grand jury that is investigating the January 6 insurrection.
Stay tuned for more live updates. More