US Politics

State of the Union: a moment of unity dissolves into partisan feuding Democrats and Republicans come together to condemn Putin – then it’s back to politics as usualVladimir Putin, the president of Russia, has managed to do what Joe Biden could not: bridge the partisan divide and bring, however fleetingly, the US Congress together.Many Democrats and Republicans who attended the US president’s first State of the Union address, on Tuesday night, wore yellow and blue in solidarity with Ukraine, with some holding miniature Ukrainian flags.And when Biden discussed the world-shaking events of the past week – this will inevitably be remembered as his Ukraine speech, irrespective of inflation and other domestic concerns – the chamber rose as one to applaud time and again.Putin “thought he could divide us at home in this chamber and this nation”, said Biden, wearing a dark suit, white shirt and blue tie. “He thought he could divide us in Europe as well. But Putin was wrong. We are ready, we are united and that’s what we did: we stayed united.”It was not a subject that Biden expected or wanted to be talking about even a few weeks ago. The man who gives a portrait of President Franklin D Roosevelt pride of place in the Oval Office now finds himself pivoting from New Deal FDR to wartime FDR, from sweeping economic reforms to facing down an unhinged European despot.Russia’s unprovoked attack on Ukraine meant that Biden’s 62-minute speech was addressing not only the chamber on Capitol Hill and the nation but the world, even as bombs fell on Ukrainian cities. Some in Europe remain frustrated that the US has not done more to cow Putin. The president found himself cast in the role of what some still quaintly call “leader of the free world”.State of the Union takeaways: Biden talks tough on Putin and touts Covid progressRead more“We are inflicting pain on Russia and supporting the people of Ukraine,” Biden said of withering sanctions. “Putin is now isolated from the world more than ever.”He promised to defend “every inch” of Nato territory.But Biden being Biden, infamous for his gaffes, all did not go smoothly. In a slip of the tongue, he said Putin would never gain the hearts and souls of the “Iranian” people when he meant Ukrainian.Curiously and ominously, the 79-year-old deviated from his prepared remarks to ad lib: “He has no idea what’s coming,” and finished the speech with a clenched fist and: “Go get him!”With Russia’s nuclear deterrent forces on high alert, this was no time for a repeat of President Ronald Reagan’s “We begin bombing in five minutes” quip.But Uncle Joe is stronger when it comes to bedside manner. There was a grace note of reassurance for Americans who have genuinely been discussing the possibility of a third world war. “I know the news about what’s happening can seem alarming to all Americans,” he said.“But I want you to know, we’re going to be OK, we’re going to be OK. When the history of this era is written, Putin’s war on Ukraine will have left Russia weaker and the rest of the world stronger,” said Biden to a standing ovation.01:16Democrats and Republicans united in approval of Biden’s plan to close American airspace to all Russian flights and build a dedicated taskforce to go after the crimes of oligarchs. “We are joining with our European allies to find and seize your yachts, your luxury apartments, your private jets. We are coming for your ill-begotten gains.”They united again in a tide of emotion as Oksana Markarova, the Ukrainan ambassador to the US, stood in the public gallery, whispering “thank you” with tears in her eyes, right hand on heart, left hand clutching a mini flag. Markarova was a guest of the first lady, Jill Biden, and travelled in the presidential motorcade from the White House to Capitol Hill.For a moment it was the 20th century again, when partisan differences seemed small compared to the external, existential threat of the Soviet Union. There is nothing so unifying as a common foe.Then came a jarring gear shift. When Biden moved to the domestic area, and took a swipe at the Donald Trump administration’s tax cuts for the rich, Republicans erupted in booing. For a moment, it was almost a surprise, but then not really: the bloodsport of daily politics had resumed.So it was that later, when Biden talked about security at the US-Mexico border, two far-right Republican House members, Lauren Boebert and Marjorie Taylor Greene, shouted “Build the wall!” as if trying to conjure Trump’s ghost from the depths. A Democrat snapped: “Sit down.”And when Biden made reference to flag-draped coffins returning from Afghanistan, Boebert heckled: “You put them in, 13 of them!” – a reference to the 13 US personnel who died during the evacuation. Democrats booed loudly in response.But when Biden spoke of crime and declared: “The answer is not to defund the police,” both sides united in cheering again while Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez laughed rather than clapped and her fellow progressive Ilhan Omar sat stony-faced.The president’s Build Back Better agenda has stalled but he pushed some of its components. Likewise he warned that voting rights were “under assault”. His nemesis on both counts, the Democratic Senator Joe Manchin of West Virginia, sat between the Republicans Mitt Romney and Roger Wicker in an extravagant gesture of bipartisanship unlikely to charm liberals.It was another sign that the more things change, the more they stay the same in the theatre of the State of the Union. For the first time in its history, two women – Vice-President Kamala Harris and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi – sat behind the president.As members of Congress from each side cheered or jeered each punchline, five supreme court justices and military men worked hard to remain still and expressionless.Senators and representatives were physically distanced on the floor and in the public gallery but face masks were gone – a hopeful sign of time healing all. “Let’s use this moment to reset,” Biden pleaded. “Let’s stop looking at Covid-19 as a partisan dividing line and see it for what it is: a God-awful disease. Let’s stop seeing each other as enemies, and start seeing each other for who we really are: fellow Americans.”Putin, not Biden, might achieve that end. The president’s approval rating is dismal and there is no guarantee this primetime address will do anything to arrest the decline.Was it a speech for the ages, with a ringing phrase that will define this moment of global peril? Perhaps not. But it will have made millions of people in America and around the world grateful that the man at the podium was not Donald Trump.TopicsState of the Union addressThe US politics sketchJoe BidenUS politicsDemocratsRepublicansUkraineRussiafeaturesReuse this content More

Tackling inflation is ‘top priority’, says Biden in State of the Union addressPresident acknowledges ‘too many families are struggling’ as climbing prices hit him in polls Getting runaway prices in America under control is “my top priority” Joe Biden told Congress on Tuesday in his first State of the Union address.Soaring inflation – now at a 40-year high – has hurt Biden in the polls and the US president bluntly acknowledged “too many families are struggling to keep up with the bills. Inflation is robbing them of the gains they might otherwise feel”.Tell us: how are rising US prices changing the way you shop, work and live ?Read moreThe US has added 6.6m jobs since Biden took office and the unemployment rate has dropped to 4%, down from a pandemic high of 14.8% in April 2020. But soaring inflation has overshadowed his economic successes, rising at an annual rate of 7.5% over the year through January.Biden said he would cut energy costs, the price of prescription drugs, and childcare in the US while ​​increasing competition between companies and making sure “corporations and the wealthiest Americans start paying their fair share”.“Economists call it ‘increasing the productive capacity of our economy’. I call it building a better America,” said Biden.Biden’s plans face heavy headwinds. On Tuesday, oil prices spiked again, passing $100 a barrel again as the war in Ukraine escalated. The rise will further increase costs for US consumers who are already paying high prices at the pump due to Covid 19-related issues. The average gallon of gas in the US was $3.61 as of 1 March, compared with $2.72 a gallon one year ago.Many of Biden’s initiatives will also struggle to pass in a deeply divided Washington as the US heads into midterm elections this November, with polling suggesting Republicans could take control of Congress.TopicsJoe BidenInflationUS politicsEconomicsUS economyDemocratsnewsReuse this content More

Biden bans Russian aircraft in US airspace and vows to go after oligarchsBiden says DoJ taskforce will stop ‘crimes of Russian oligarchs’Moves will further isolate Vladimir Putin, president says Joe Biden announced on Tuesday night that the US is banning Russian aircraft from its airspace and pledged to go after Russian oligarchs in retaliation for the invasion of Ukraine.Biden said the moves would further isolate Vladimir Putin. “The Ruble has lost 30% of its value,” he said. “The Russian stock market has lost 40% of its value and trading remains suspended. Russia’s economy is reeling and Putin alone is to blame.”State of the Union: Joe Biden pledges to make Putin pay for Ukraine invasionRead moreBiden said the US Department of Justice was assembling a dedicated taskforce to go after “the crimes of Russian oligarchs. We are joining with our European allies to find and seize their yachts, their luxury apartments, their private jets. We are coming for their ill-begotten gains,” he said.The announcements are the latest in a series of sanctions against Russia and follows similar actions by Canada and the European Union this week.Biden offered an ominous warning that without consequences, Putin’s aggression wouldn’t be contained to Ukraine.“Throughout our history we’ve learned this lesson: when dictators do not pay a price for their aggression, they cause more chaos,” Biden said. “They keep moving. And, the costs and threats to America and the world keep rising.”On Sunday, the EU and Canada announced they were closing their airspace to Russian airlines and private planes owned by wealthy Russians.Russia’s largest airline, Aeroflot, on Monday said that it had suspended flights to New York, Washington, Miami and Los Angeles through Wednesday because of Canada’s decision.No US airlines fly to Russia, though a few flights to India pass through Russian airspace. American Airlines routes its lone flight between Delhi and New York to avoid Russian airspace. FedEx and UPS both fly over Russia, although they announced this weekend that they were suspending deliveries to that country.European airlines fly over Russia far more often than their US counterparts. Before the war, about 600 flights to or from Europe passed through Russian airspace, according to aviation data firm Cirium.Aviation experts say Russia derives a sizable amount of money from fees that it levies to use its airspace or land at its airports.The ban would come on top of a wide range of sanctions the US, Europe and other countries have imposed on Russia that are expected to hammer its economy including cutting off Russian banks from the Swift international banking system, preventing the Russian central bank from deploying its international reserves, and freezing the assets of people close to Putin.Wires contributed to this reportTopicsJoe BidenRussiaUkraineUS politicsEuropeAirline industrynewsReuse this content More

Six of Donald Trump’s lawyers subpoenaed by Capitol attack panelThe panel is targeting documents and testimony from Cleta Mitchell, Kurt Olsen, Katherine Freiss, Phillip Kline, Kenneth Chesebro and Christina Bobb The House select committee investigating the January 6 Capitol attack has issued new subpoenas to lawyers for Donald Trump suspected to be involved in efforts to stop the certification of Joe Biden’s 2020 election victory.The subpoenas – authorized hours before Biden’s first State of the Union address – targeted documents and testimony from Cleta Mitchell, Kurt Olsen, Katherine Freiss, Phillip Kline, Kenneth Chesebro and the pro-Trump One America News host Christina Bobb.“The select committee is seeking information about attempts to disrupt or delay the certification of electoral votes and any efforts to corruptly change the outcome of the 2020 election,” said Bennie Thompson, the chairman of the panel.Rudy Giuliani poised to cooperate with January 6 committeeRead more“The six individuals we’ve subpoenaed today all have knowledge related to those matters and will help the select committee better understand all the various strategies employed to potentially affect the outcome of the election,” Thompson said.The subpoenas reflect the panel’s focus on Trump’s schemes to stop Biden’s certification from taking place, so that the former president’s associates could buy time to co-opt state legislatures to send Trump slates of electors to return him to office.The Guardian previously reported that Trump was himself intimately involved in the scheme and called the Trump “war room” set up in the Willard hotel in Washington the night before the Capitol attack to discuss ways to stop Biden’s certification from happening entirely.The Trump operatives involved in the Willard operation included Bobb, who joined the legal team at the hotel led by Trump’s former attorney Rudy Giuliani and another Trump lawyer, John Eastman.The select committee said they subpoenaed Bobb as she was also involved in drawing up a draft executive order that would have directed federal agencies to seize voting machines in states Biden narrowly won over Trump on the basis of claims of election fraud.Mitchell was subpoenaed, the panel said, after she appeared to have contacts with GOP lawmakers and participated in the infamous phone call when Trump pressured Georgia’s secretary of state Brad Raffensberger to “find” votes to reverse his loss in the state.The select committee also ordered documents and testimony from Freiss, a Trump lawyer who the panel said played a role in drawing up the draft executive order to seize voting machines.The Guardian reported that one version of the draft executive order was reviewed by Trump at a December 2020 White House meeting, and then verbally agreed to appoint Sidney Powell, another Trump attorney and conspiracy theorist, as special counsel to probe election fraud.Olsen pressured the justice department to open an investigation into election fraud, according to an interim Senate judiciary committee report released last year.Olsen also helped to draw up a draft executive order for Trump that would have directed the justice department to “take voter action” and, citing documents on file with the panel, had multiple calls with Trump on 6 January, the select committee said.Kline convened a meeting with 300 state legislators in an attempt to encourage them to sign a letter urging Mike Pence, then the vice-president, to delay the certification.Chesebro actively promoted legal theories within the Trump campaign supporting the use of slates of bogus electors in states the former president lost, the select committee chairman said in his subpoena letter.TopicsUS Capitol attackDonald TrumpHouse of RepresentativesUS politicsnewsReuse this content More

‘Keying your own car’: Democrat hits out at Tlaib for State of the Union responseMichigan progressive says speech will support Biden but Josh Gottheimer calls it ‘massively counterproductive’ A planned response to Joe Biden’s State of the Union address on Tuesday night by Rashida Tlaib, a progressive Democrat from Michigan, highlighted a rift in the party.Pandemic, war and a rocky economy loom large over Biden’s first state of the unionRead moreThe president will speak to Congress and the nation from the Capitol. The Republican rebuttal will be delivered by Kim Reynolds, governor of Iowa.Tlaib will also respond, for the Working Families party. It will not be the only Democratic response: Collin Alred of Texas will speak for the Congressional Black Caucus.One moderate Democrat, Josh Gottheimer of New Jersey, said Tlaib’s decision to speak was “like keying your own car and slashing your own tires”.Tlaib said: “Despite some sensational coverage, it’s simple: I’m giving a speech about supporting President Biden and his Build Back Better agenda for the people.”Build Back Better, valued at $1.75tn and meant to improve health and social care and address the climate crisis, passed the House with moderate support. But it stalled in the Senate, opposed by Joe Manchin of West Virginia and Kyrsten Sinema of Arizona.Biden’s State of the Union address will be overshadowed by the Russian invasion of Ukraine. But he is expected to reframe his domestic ambitions. Tlaib will highlight the cost of not passing Build Back Better.The Working Families party was formed in 1998 by unions and other groups. It aims to “build our own party on top of the two-party system in the United States”, sometimes running candidates in Democratic primaries, seeking to build “the multiracial movement we need to win the America we deserve”.On Monday, Maurice Mitchell, the party’s national director, said: “Obstructionist Republicans and a handful of corporate Democrats have ground Washington to a standstill while child poverty spikes and costs continue to rise for housing, healthcare and childcare.“It doesn’t have to be this way.”Gottheimer played a prominent role in negotiations over Build Back Better and Biden’s $1.2tn infrastructure plan, which passed with Republican support.He is scheduled to participate in his own event after the State of the Union, a “Problem Solvers Perspective” streamed on Facebook by No Labels, a group founded in 2010 to provide “a rebellious but constructive third force in American government”, aiming to “break the gridlock and dysfunction that is destroying our democracy”.Gottheimer told Axios Tlaib’s speech would be “massively counterproductive”.He added: “This only highlights the real tension between the socialist far left and the common-sense moderate wing, which is focused on crime, costs, tax cuts and affordability and turning the page on Covid.”Filemon Vela, a Texas Democrat, said it was “astonishing” that the “radical left continues to promote a Democratic death wish, and sees no problem relegating our party to the permanent minority”.Tlaib said Americans should “look past the headlines and hear progressives’ vision for working with the president and Congress to deliver for our residents”.Biden will deliver his first State of the Union with his approval rating at new lows and with Republicans favoured to re-take the House in November.TopicsState of the Union addressRashida TlaibUS politicsDemocratsnewsReuse this content More

Barr book reveals Trump’s secret to a ‘good tweet’: ‘just the right amount of crazy’Ex-president made remark to his attorney general, according to William Barr’s forthcoming memoir Donald Trump told William Barr, his attorney general, that the secret to a “good tweet” was “just the right amount of crazy”.William Barr uses new book to outline case against Trump White House runRead moreThe detail from Barr’s forthcoming memoir leaked out on Monday, via Josh Dawsey of the Washington Post.The Post, the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal have reported on the contents of One Damn Thing After Another: Memoirs of an Attorney General, which will be published on 8 March.Barr’s title is taken from a description of the job by Ed Levi, appointed by Gerald Ford after the Watergate scandal.Some critics responded to the news that Barr says Trump is unqualified to be president and defends his own handling of the Russia investigation by wondering if the world really needs one book after another by former Trump aides bent on self-justification.Barr, for example, describes a tumultuous Oval Office meeting on 1 December 2020, at which he refused to back Trump’s lie about electoral fraud in his defeat by Joe Biden. On the page, the former attorney general says he tried to resign.But the resignation offer is not described in books by Bob Woodward and Robert Costa (Peril) and Jonathan Karl (Betrayal), which otherwise closely mirror Barr’s description of the meeting.Barr did quit nearly two weeks later, on 14 December.Maggie Haberman of the New York Times, a reporter who had a direct line to Trump during his time in power, has her own Trump book coming out in October.She said the revelations so far from Barr showed that “the cabinet member/person of stature most loved by Maga has become the latest person in a long string who worked for Trump to say he’s unfit”.Dawsey tweeted the tidbit about Trump’s tweets, tweeting: “One bit from Barr book: Trump told his former attorney general the ‘secret of a really good tweet’ was ‘just the right amount of crazy’.”Trump used Twitter as his primary means of communication but he has been suspended from it since the deadly Capitol riot, which happened after he told supporters to “fight like hell” in service of his lie about voter fraud in his election defeat by Biden.The Post reported that Barr and White House lawyers developed a system for dealing with Trump’s more extreme – or “legally problematic” – ideas, such as using an executive order to end citizenship for people born in the US to undocumented parents.The lawyers, Barr writes, “operated like a tag team, so that neither of us would provoke too much of the president’s ire at one time”.“We referred to this as choosing who would ‘eat the grenade’,” Barr says.TopicsBooksPolitics booksWilliam BarrDonald TrumpTrump administrationTwitterUS politicsnewsReuse this content More

Putinism is breeding in the heart of the Republican partyRobert ReichMake no mistake: Putin’s authoritarian neo-fascism has rooted itself in America. The cold war has already come home The world is frighteningly locked in a battle to the death between democracy and authoritarianism. On Sunday Vladimir Putin issued a new threat to the west – telling his defense minister and his top military commander to place Russia’s nuclear forces on alert.It is a new cold war.The biggest difference between the old cold war and the new one is that authoritarian neo-fascism is no longer just an external threat to America and Europe. A version of it is also growing inside western Europe and the US.It has even taken over one of America’s major political parties.The Trump-led Republican party does not openly support Putin, but the Republican party’s animus toward democracy is expressed in ways familiar to Putin and other autocrats.Trump Republicans continue to refuse to acknowledge the outcome of the 2020 election, claiming without evidence that it was “stolen” from Trump. In many states, on the basis of this big lie, they are making it more difficult for people who don’t share their beliefs to vote.In several states they are laying the groundwork for ignoring the popular vote altogether and throwing a future presidential election to Trump or another strongman. They have stopped even pretending to be the party of free speech: they are banning books from schools and prohibiting teachers from talking about America’s struggles against racism and homophobia.Putin’s attack on Ukraine, starting 24 February, and the attack by followers of Donald Trump on the United States Capitol on 6 January 2021 are different, of course, but they resemble one another in their contempt for democratic institutions and their attempts to justify violence by asserting a threat to a dominant racial or ethnic group.Each also represents the logical culmination of leadership by a dangerous narcissist who flagrantly lies about his intentions and his opponents and who sees the world only in terms of his personal power.Donald Trump has long admired Vladimir Putin who, evidence shows, personally authorized a secret spy agency operation to support a “mentally unstable” Trump in the 2016 US presidential election. Believing that a Trump White House would help secure Moscow’s strategic objectives, Russia’s spy agencies were ordered to use “all possible force” to ensure Trump’s victory.Again in the 2020 election, according to a recently unclassified report by the US office of the Director of National Intelligence, Putin authorized “influence operations” aimed at “supporting Trump” and “denigrating President Biden’s candidacy”.Presumably Putin supported Trump in 2016 and in 2020 in part because of Trump’s disdain for Nato. As president, Trump did all he could to undermine the organization, even suggesting the US should withdraw from it. Is it pure coincidence that once Trump was out of office and Nato remained intact, Putin attacked Ukraine?Defending democracy and standing up against authoritarian neo-fascism requires courage. In 2019, the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, refused Trump’s demand for help in rigging the 2020 election in the United States, even after Trump threatened to withhold money Congress had appropriated to help Ukraine resist Russian expansion.Today, Zelenskiy won’t be bullied by Putin. He turned down America’s offer to evacuate him, saying: “I need ammunition, not a ride.”Zelenskiy’s courage in the face of overwhelming brute force has fortified Ukrainians now defending their country against invaders.Contrast this with the toadies at the Republican National Committee who in February censured Republican representatives Liz Cheney of Wyoming and Adam Kinzinger of Illinois for participating in Congress’s select committee investigating the events of 6 January, and who called the attack on the Capitol “legitimate political discourse”.Also contrast Zelenskiy’s courage with most elected Republicans who still refuse to stand up to Trump. On Sunday, on national television, Senator Tom Cotton refused four times to condemn Trump for calling Putin “smart” and “savvy” and Nato and the US “dumb”.Make no mistake: Putin’s authoritarian neo-fascism has rooted itself in America.It may be possible to prevent Putin’s aggression from spreading to the rest of Europe. But it is not possible to win a cold civil war inside America without destroying the United States – another of Putin’s objectives when he ordered his spy agencies to help Trump.In the months and years ahead, those of us in the west who believe in democracy, the rule of law, human rights and truth, must do everything we can to win back our fellow countrymen to these same overriding values.
Robert Reich, a former US secretary of labor, is professor of public policy at the University of California at 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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