US Politics

Betrayal: The Final Act of the Trump Show by Jonathan Karl review – a tyrant’s last stand The ABC News correspondent offers a sobering glimpse of a man unfit to govern and the chaos wreaked by an ego unable to grasp its own ineptitudeA statue in the US Capitol honours Clio, the marmoreal muse of history. Floating above the political fray, she rides in a winged chariot that allegorically represents time and has a clock for its wheel. Looking over her shoulder as she writes in a stony ledger, she tracks events in serene retrospect. The journalists who nowadays report on happenings in Washington work at a more frantic, flustered tempo, racing to catch up with the chaos of breaking news. Jonathan Karl, a correspondent for ABC News, seems to be permanently breathless. In Betrayal, he runs for cover during an emergency lockdown at the White House, with grenades detonating in the distance. He is roused after midnight by the announcement of Trump’s Covid diagnosis; later, he has to rush to the hospital, ditch his car and scramble into place before the presidential helicopter lands on a strip of road that is suddenly “the centre of the broadcast universe”. And on 6 January Karl keeps up a live commentary as the Capitol is invaded by a mob determined to lynch Vice-President Mike Pence – reviled as a “pussy” by Trump because he refused to overturn Biden’s victory – on a makeshift gallows.‘Pence was disloyal at exactly the right time’: author Jonathan Karl on the Capitol attackRead moreThe Capitol was designed as a classical temple consecrated to democracy, which is why Clio is at home there: picture the Parthenon on steroids, topped by the dome of Saint Peter’s Basilica. In Betrayal, however, it is the set for a mock-heroic battle between thugs in horned helmets wielding fire extinguishers as weapons and politicians who prepare to fight back with ceremonial hammers torn from display cases and a sword left over from the civil war. Aghast and incredulous, Karl exhausts his supply of synonyms; this final act of the expiring Trump regime is nuts, weird, crazy, kooky and bonkers.Worse follows when crackpot conspiracy theorists gather to explain to Trump how the election was rigged. One sleuth contends that wireless thermostats made in China for Google reprogrammed voting machines in Georgia. A shadowy figure called Carlo Goria blames an Italian company and its “advanced military encryption capabilities”; Trump had two government departments investigate this claim, although the picture in Goria’s Facebook profile identifies him as the deranged scientist played by Peter Sellers in Dr Strangelove. Numerous high-level functionaries shiftily justify themselves by telling Karl that the main concern of the administration was to control or at least frustrate its chief executive. During the Black Lives Matter unrest, Trump ordered out the troops to impose martial law on Washington. His wily secretary of defence, Mark Esper, deployed an army unit, but confined it to a fort outside the city. The ruse was a pacifier; rather than calming the streets, Esper’s aim was “to quell the dangerous and dictatorial urgings of his commander in chief”. Our prime minister may be a clown, but for four years the US had an outright lunatic as its president.Like all reality TV, what Karl calls “the Trump show” is the product of fantasy and fakery; its star is an existential fraud who admits his unease by referring to himself in the third person. “You must hate Trump,” says Trump when Bill Barr, his previously compliant attorney general, rebuffs his lies about a stolen election. He then says: “You must hate Trump” a second time, making it an exhortation as much as an accusation. He can’t command love and suspects that he doesn’t deserve it: will hatred do as a second best? Elsewhere, Trump re-enacts for Karl an exchange with his sullen adolescent son. “Do you love your dad?” he wheedles, as needy as a black hole. “Uh, I don’t know,” grunts Barron. “Too cool,” remarks the paterfamilias, frozen out.Karl’s anecdotes offer some sharp insights into Trump’s compulsions. He fawns over autocratic thugs such as Putin because he is himself a weakling. While demanding “total domination” of demonstrators outside the White House, he is hustled to safety in a fortified basement, which prompts an internet wit to nickname him “bunker bitch”. As a populist, he cares only about popularity and purchases it with tacky giveaways; while in hospital with Covid, he sends lackeys to distribute “cartons of M&M’s emblazoned with his signature” to the fans outside. When Karl prods him to denounce the riot at the Capitol, he fondly recalls that “magnificently beautiful day” and grumbles that the fake news didn’t give him “credit” for attracting such a large crowd. Negotiating with Karl over his attendance at the White House correspondents’ dinner, where the president usually delivers a jocular speech, Trump asks: “What is the concept? Am I supposed to be funny up there?” Yes, the psychotic shtick of this would-be dictator is dictated by whatever audience he is playing to.When the counting of electoral votes resumed late at night on 6 January, Karl notes that the senators picked their way into the chamber through splintered wood, shattered glass and a surf of ransacked documents, with the stink of pepper spray lingering in the air; the bust of President Zachary Taylor had been smeared “with a red substance that appeared to be blood”. In a poem about the statue of Clio written in 1851, President John Adams regretted that she had to listen to “the conflicting jar/ Of ranting, raving parties”. Adams didn’t know the half of it. Perhaps Clio’s marble pallor reflects her state of mind: she must be appalled by what she has recently had to record in her open book.TopicsHistory booksObserver book of the weekUS Capitol attackDonald TrumpUS politicsreviewsReuse this content More

Trump stoked Covid in red states – but there are blue anti-vaxxers tooRobert ReichAmong my neighbors in the bluest region of the bluest county of the bluest state in America, many don’t trust big pharma or the government – or simply choose to put themselves first Is there a relationship between Covid and politics? Sure seems so.Michigan leads US in Covid case count, accounting for one in 10 new casesRead moreBy the end of October, 25 out of every 100,000 residents of counties Donald Trump won by wide margins had died from Covid. That was more than three times higher than the Covid death rate in heavily Biden counties, of 7.8 per 100,000.Counties where Trump received at least 70% of the vote had an even higher average Covid death toll than counties where Trump won at least 60%.Presumably, this is because Trump counties also have the highest unvaccinated rates in the US. Almost every reliably blue state now has a higher vaccination rate than almost every reliably red state.There are some obvious reasons why Trump voters have been hesitant to get vaccinated. Trump politicized the issue – making the jab a hallmark of his peculiar form of rightwing populism. He and Fox News spread false rumors and conspiracy theories about the vaccine. By the time Trump finally called on people to get vaccinated, the damage was already done.In other words, it’s the same trifecta of rightwing media, inadequate education and rejection of science that gave us Trump in the first place.But this isn’t the whole story, because the US as a whole trails every other advanced country in the rate of vaccinations. Why?In recent weeks I’ve discovered that several anti-vaxxers live around me – in the bluest region of the bluest county of the bluest state in America. I’ve known several for years. They are well-informed and well-educated. But they’re as opposed to getting a shot as any Trump anti-vaxxer.Some are ex-hippies, now in their late 60s and early 70s, who regard their bodies as “sacred” and don’t want anything or anyone to “invade” it.One, who grows her own food and lives by herself in a cabin not far from here, told me she didn’t want anything going into her body that she didn’t control. When I asked whether she had been vaccinated against smallpox, measles, diphtheria, tetanus and whooping cough, she told me she assumed so but had been too small to have had knowledge or control.Others – also in their late 60s and early 70s – don’t trust big pharma. They see Pfizer, Moderna and Johnson & Johnson as greedy global corporations in search of people to exploit and tax havens to park their exorbitant profits.“Why in hell would I trust a fucking thing Pfizer says or does?” one of them asked me.None of these people trusts the government. Their generation (which is also mine) came to political consciousness during the Vietnam war – a time when the American flag became an emblem of fascism, particularly in lefty coastal enclaves. They now believe the government has been so corrupted by big money that they don’t trust agencies charged with protecting the public.I’m sympathetic to their distrust of both big pharma and big government. But this doesn’t mean the science is wrong.One of them referred me to a 2017 study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association which found that about a third of the drugs approved by the US Food and Drug Administration between 2001 and 2010 had safety problems after reaching the market.I checked and he’s correct. But he left out a critical fact: as soon as the FDA discovered the problems it forced manufacturers to pull the drugs or issue warnings.Deep down, I think these blue anti-vaxxers are motivated by something different from mere distrust. When I pointed out that they could well be endangering others (including me), they remained unmoved.When I suggested that their concerns, however valid, had to be weighed against the public’s overall interest in conquering this epidemic, they said they didn’t care.My conclusion: They’re infected not by Covid but by a narcissism that refuses even to consider the risks and costs they’re imposing on others.Has living through Covid made me a hypochondriac? I asked some experts | Maeve HigginsRead moreI can’t say for sure that Trump anti-vaxxers share this narcissism, although the leader of their cult surely does. And, of course, my sample size was so small I can’t even generalize to all blue anti-vaxxers.If we blame Trump and the culture that produced him for the relatively low rate of vaccinations in the US, we’re missing a character trait that may offer a fuller explanation.This trait is found among Democrats and independents in blue America as well as Republicans in Trumpland. In fact, I think it’s been near the core of the American personality since before the founding of the nation – a stubborn, selfish, me-first individualism.
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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Ilhan Omar: Lauren Boebert’s ‘Jihad Squad’ bigotry is ‘no laughing matter’
Colorado Republican apologises for remarks in home district
Minnesota Democrat demands action from party leaders
How the threat of political violence is growing across US
Islamophobic remarks by Lauren Boebert are “no laughing matter”, Ilhan Omar said, demanding action from congressional leaders – after the Colorado Republican said sorry. Why Republicans are embracing Kyle Rittenhouse as their mascotRead more“Saying I am a suicide bomber is no laughing matter,” the Minnesota Democrat tweeted. “[House Republican leader] Kevin McCarthy and [Speaker] Nancy Pelosi need to take appropriate action, normalising this bigotry not only endangers my life but the lives of all Muslims. Anti-Muslim bigotry has no place in Congress.”Boebert made the remarks in her home district. To laughs and whoops, she joked about encountering Omar, one of the first Muslim women elected to Congress, in an elevator on Capitol Hill.“I see a Capitol police officer running to the elevator,” she said. “I see fret all over his face, and he’s reaching, and the door’s shutting, like I can’t open it, like what’s happening. I look to my left, and there she is. Ilhan Omar.“And I said, ‘Well, she doesn’t have a backpack, we should be fine.’ We only had one floor to go. I said, ‘Oh look, the Jihad Squad decided show up for work today.’”That was a reference to the “Squad”, a group of prominent House progressives of which Omar is a member. Boebert, a far-right Trump ally and controversialist, has also used the term on the floor of the House.In response, Omar said: “Fact. This buffoon looks down when she sees me at the Capitol, this whole story is made up. Sad she thinks bigotry gets her clout.“Anti-Muslim bigotry isn’t funny and shouldn’t be normalised. Congress can’t be a place where hateful and dangerous Muslims tropes get no condemnation.”In the face of widespread condemnation, Boebert apologised “to anyone in the Muslim community I offended with my comment about Representative Omar”.She also said she had “reached out to [Omar’s] office to speak with her directly. There are plenty of policy differences to focus on without this unnecessary distraction”.Democratic House leaders including Pelosi indicated that was not enough.“Racism and bigotry of any form, including Islamophobia, must always be called out, confronted and condemned in any place it is found,” they said in a joint statement.“Congresswoman Boebert’s repeated, ongoing and targeted Islamophobic comments and actions against … Ilhan Omar are both deeply offensive and concerning … we call upon Congresswoman Boebert to fully retract these comments and refrain from making similar ones going forward.”The statement also condemned as “outrageous” McCarthy “and the entire House Republican leadership’s repeated failure to condemn inflammatory and bigoted rhetoric from members of their conference”.Can the Republican party escape Trump? Politics Weekly Extra – podcastRead moreAnother far-right Republican, Paul Gosar of Arizona, was recently formally censured for tweeting a video in which he was depicting killing Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York, another leading progressive, and threatening Joe Biden.Only two Republicans voted for censure: Liz Cheney of Wyoming and Adam Kinzinger of Illinois, who both broke with the pro-Trump wing over the Capitol attack.On Friday, Kinzinger called Boebert “trash” and said: “I take sides between decency and disgusting.”Perhaps alluding to McCarthy’s silence on controversies involving pro-Trump figures, he wrote: “Ask some of the normal members when they last talked to Kevin? Been a while for most.”On Friday evening another pro-Trump extremist, Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia, tweeted that she “just got off a good call” with McCarthy.“We spent time talking about solving problems not only in the conference, but for our country,” she said. “I like what he has planned ahead.” TopicsIlhan OmarDemocratsUS politicsUS CongressHouse of RepresentativesIslamophobiaRepublicansnewsReuse this content More

Democrats need to admit that inflation is real – or voters will turn on themAndrew GawthorpeInflation is an issue of real concern to many Americans. It’s also a chance for Democrats to name and shame price-gougers Inflation is rapidly becoming a problem for the Democratic party and President Joe Biden. They need to get a grip on it before it imperils their wider agenda and sinks their chances of keeping control of Congress in the midterm elections next year. As they think about how to address it, one thing is certain: what they’ve been doing so far isn’t working. A recent poll found that two-thirds of Americans disapprove of how Biden is handling inflation, and the same number consider the issue “very important” in their evaluations of his presidency. Among those Americans concerned about the state of the economy, nearly nine in 10 ranked inflation as a reason why. Clearly something has to change.But inflation, a complicated product of economics and mass psychology, is also devilishly difficult to understand, and even more difficult to control. Presidents have few tools to tame it, and the ones they do have can backfire. The inflation of the 1970s crippled Gerald Ford’s presidency and was doing the same to Jimmy Carter until he opted for an extreme cure – installing a chair of the Federal Reserve who dramatically raised interest rates, stopping inflation but also plunging the economy into a deep recession which handed the White House to Ronald Reagan. These experiences left inflation with a reputation as a presidency-killer, with either the disease itself or the medicine taken to combat it ultimately killing the patient.Despite this, Democratic party elites have been slow to take the latest round of inflation as seriously as they should. American policymakers have not had to deal with levels of inflation as high as this for 30 years, and it shows. Many latched on to the message that inflation was “transitory”, a temporary consequence of the economy revving back into high gear as the country emerged from the coronavirus pandemic. Some liberals have even lashed out at those warning about rising prices, characterizing their concerns as an attempt to undermine support for Democrats’ plans to spend more to advance social welfare and combat climate change.Whatever the economic merits of the argument – and many economists still expect inflation to start falling soon – this response has been politically toxic. Democrats risk appearing out of touch on an issue of profound concern to many Americans. In order to change tack, they need to communicate to voters that they feel their pain and that they’re fighting to make things better.There are already signs that Democrats from the president on down are starting to get it. Biden recently gave a speech on the topic and announced the release of 50m barrels of oil from the US strategic petroleum reserve, an attempt to bring down gas prices at the pump. He also pointed the finger at oil companies for charging consumers high prices even as the wholesale price of oil has dropped over the past few weeks.But Democrats should also be doing more to point the finger at the businesses who are helping to foment the problem. The Wall Street Journal reports that companies in many different sectors are using this inflationary spike as a cover to raise prices faster than their costs, essentially betting that consumers won’t object when they already see prices rising all around them. According to the report, nearly two out of three big, publicly traded US companies have seen larger profit margins this year than in the same period in 2019. Inflation might be hurting consumers, but it’s a boom year for corporate America.Democrats ought to use all the tools of government to highlight and combat these abuses. As Biden has been finding out, public anger over inflation tends to be directed towards the incumbent president – and the only way to survive might be to redirect it at a more appropriate target. The presidential bully pulpit can be used to highlight corporate abuses and regulatory investigations, such as the one already announced by the FTC into the oil and gas sector, can hold industries to account and combat potentially illegal practices. Nor should Democrats stop there. They control both houses of Congress and should consider holding congressional hearings to name and shame particularly egregious price-gougers.Whether any of these measures will actually serve to lower prices is an open question. But the only responsible thing to do is try. Corporate price rises risk kicking off an inflationary spiral in which the initial reasons for rising prices become secondary to a general feeding frenzy, and anything that can be done to discourage it is healthy. Administration actions might also serve to dampen consumers’ expectations of future inflation, which will reduce the risk of a spiral. Because the media narrative is driven by inflation that has already happened, reassurance remains important even after prices have begun to stabilize.But even if we shouldn’t hold our breath for these actions to actually slow the rate of price increases, it’s important to show leadership on this issue for the simple reason that it’s what worried voters want and deserve. To be seen to be acting and pointing a finger at those to blame is smart politics, especially if this bout of inflation does indeed prove to be transitory and prices begin to fall next year.Meanwhile, corporate America has to decide if it really wants to undermine the Democrats and risk handing stewardship of the economy back to the party of Donald Trump. With the modern Republican party increasingly the party of incompetence and ignorance, self-restraint might be the better option. As Democrats should seek to remind the price-gougers, profiting less now will help everyone mightily down the road.
Andrew Gawthorpe is a historian of the United States at Leiden University, and host of the podcast America Explained
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‘A core threat to our democracy’: threat of political violence growing across USRepublicans’ muted response to Paul Gosar’s behavior has intensified fears about where incendiary rhetoric may lead Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez stood on the House floor and implored her colleagues to hold Paul Gosar accountable for sharing an altered anime video showing him killing her and attacking Joe Biden.“Our work here matters. Our example matters. There is meaning in our service,” Ocasio-Cortez said in her speech last week. “And as leaders in this country, when we incite violence with depictions against our colleagues, that trickles down into violence in this country.”House Republicans heard Ocasio-Cortez’s impassioned plea and responded with a collective shrug. All but three Republican members voted against censuring Gosar and stripping him of his committee assignments, while every House Democrat supported the resolution.The Gosar incident served as the latest data point in an alarming trend in American politics. In a year that began with a deadly insurrection at the US Capitol, lawmakers have seen a sharp rise in the number of threats against them. Republicans’ muted response to Gosar’s behavior has intensified fears about the possibility of more political violence in America in the months to come.Jackie Speier, the Democratic congresswoman who spearheaded the effort to censure Gosar, warned that Republicans’ refusal to hold him accountable could have dangerous repercussions.“If you are silent about a member of Congress wanting to murder another member of Congress, even in a ‘cartoon’, you are inciting violence,” Speier told the Guardian. “And if you incite violence, it begets violence.”That cycle is already playing out in the halls of Congress. The US Capitol police reported earlier this year that the agency had seen a 107% increase in threats against members compared with 2020. The USCP chief, Tom Manger, has said he expects the total number of threats against members to surpass 9,000 this year, compared with 3,939 such threats in 2017.Some of those threats have been on vivid display in the past month. In addition to Gosar’s violent video, the 13 House Republicans who voted in support of the bipartisan infrastructure bill earlier month have received threatening messages.Representative Fred Upton of Michigan publicly shared one such message, in which a man called the Republican congressman a “fucking piece of shit traitor”. “I hope you die. I hope everybody in your fucking family dies,” the man said in the message.And those kinds of threats are not reserved solely for members of Congress. Election workers and school board members also say they are receiving more violent messages. According to an April survey commissioned by the Brennan Center for Justice, nearly one in three election officials are concerned about their safety while on the job.Stephen Spaulding, senior counsel at the government watchdog group Common Cause, described such violent tactics as “a core threat to our democracy”.“The threat of violence is really to intimidate people from doing their jobs and upholding their oath of office,” Spaulding said. “When you start having these violent episodes enter the system, it is totally counter to the way that we are supposed to engage in open and fair debate about policy issues in this country.”There are already signs that fears over personal safety are pushing lawmakers out of office. When the Republican congressman Anthony Gonzalez announced in September that he would not seek re-election, he said his vote to impeach Donald Trump for inciting the insurrection had affected the lives of his family members.Gonzalez told the New York Times that, at one point earlier this year, uniformed police officers had to escort him and his family through the Cleveland airport because of security concerns.“That’s one of those moments where you say, ‘Is this really what I want for my family when they travel, to have my wife and kids escorted through the airport?’” Gonzalez said.Even though threats are affecting their own caucus members, House Republicans rejected the opportunity to send a message by voting to censure Gosar. Instead, the House minority leader, Kevin McCarthy, attacked the censure resolution as a Democratic “abuse of power” and suggested he would award Gosar with “better committee assignments” whenever Republicans regain control of the chamber.“He’s got a number of radical extremists in his caucus that are very effective communicators to the right fringe, and he can’t really rein them in because reining them in means they will attack him,” Speier said. “You might as well put a brass ring in Kevin McCarthy’s nose because they’re pulling him around.”Dr Joanne Freeman, a Yale history professor and author of The Field of Blood: Violence in Congress and the Road to Civil War, warned that McCarthy’s response to Gosar’s behavior may encourage similar incidents in the future.After all, there are other historical examples of lawmakers being rewarded for violent behavior, Freeman noted. After Congressman Preston Brooks attacked Senator Charles Sumner with a cane over his anti-slavery views in 1856, he resigned from the House but was then quickly re-elected by South Carolina voters.“He’s going to be rewarded for it in some ways, and because of that, there will be others that follow in that model,” Freeman said. “It’s a moment that shows how far party is above government and above institutions of government and above institutional stability.”While acknowledging the possibility of future violence within Congress, Freeman added that the Gosar incident could also provide an opportunity for a course correction in political discourse.“We’re in a moment of extreme contingency, and indeed things might become much worse,” Freeman said. “But during that kind of moment of extreme contingency where anything can happen, those are also moments where it’s possible to make positive change.”For Speier, Gosar’s behavior served as a reminder of how far some of her colleagues have strayed from their duties to constituents. The California congresswoman, who announced her retirement last week, urged fellow members to focus on advancing policy rather than spewing violent rhetoric to raise money and rack up retweets.“I love this institution. It’s such a privilege to serve,” Speier said. “We’re given the opportunity to fashion legislation to make lives better for the American people. And that’s what we should be doing.”TopicsAlexandria Ocasio-CortezRepublicansUS CongressUS politicsnewsReuse this content More

Why Republicans are embracing Kyle Rittenhouse as their mascotCongress members float the idea of offering the 18-year-old internships as experts say their use of him is ‘a very dangerous thing’ Wearing suits and ties, the two men give the camera smiles and thumbs up. One is Donald Trump, former president of the United States. The other is Kyle Rittenhouse, who killed two people at an anti-racism protest. And behind them is a framed photo of Trump meeting the North Korean dictator Kim Jong-un.The mesmerizing tableau emerged from the ex-president’s Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida earlier this week. It was, in effect, the coronation of Rittenhouse as a future star of the rightwing media, Republican party and “Make America great again” (Maga) movement in their crusade against liberalism.A historian of white power reacts to the Rittenhouse verdict: ‘a bonanza for the far-right’Read more“Kyle Rittenhouse has become the poster child for a general feeling among some in this country that White America is under siege,” Eddie Glaude, chairman of the department of African American studies at Princeton University, wrote in the Washington Post. “Rittenhouse defended himself, this argument goes, and White America must do the same.”Rittenhouse was 17 last year when he travelled 20 miles from his home in Antioch, Illinois, to Kenosha, Wisconsin, where racial justice protests had been held since the shooting of a Black man, Jacob Blake, by a white police officer.Rittenhouse joined others who said they wanted to protect private property. Armed with an AR-style semiautomatic rifle, he shot and killed two people and wounded a third. In court he argued that he fired in self-defense after he was attacked and in fear for his life.When a jury acquitted Rittenhouse on all charges earlier this month, progressive activists urged fresh debate on gun safety and vigilantism. But Republican members of Congress wasted no time in lionising Rittenhouse as a victim turned hero.Madison Cawthorn of North Carolina, Matt Gaetz of Florida and Paul Gosar of Arizona floated the idea of offering Rittenhouse an internship in their offices on Capitol Hill. Marjorie Taylor Greene of Florida trumped them by sponsoring a House bill to award Rittenhouse a congressional gold medal for protecting the community of Kenosha.Not to be outdone, Ron DeSantis, the governor of Florida tipped as a potential presidential candidate in 2024, declared: “Kyle Rittenhouse did what we should want citizens to do in such a situation: step forward to defend the community against mob violence.”And in light of Rittenhouse’s meeting with Trump at Mar-a-Lago, it would come as no surprise if the now 18-year-old is given a speaking slot at next year’s Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) or a future Republican National Convention (RNC).Kurt Bardella, an adviser to the Democratic National Committee, said: “It’s very clear that they’re trying to make him their mascot. Any time that your mascot is someone who thought that it was an acceptable form of protest to show up at a political event with an AR-15, that is glorifying violence. And that’s a very dangerous thing to prop up and promote.”In the week of Rittenhouse’s acquittal, all but two House Republicans refused to censure Gosar for posting an animated video that depicted him killing Democratic congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and attacking Biden.Bardella, a former Republican congressional aide and spokesperson for rightwing Breitbart News, added: “It is a pattern. These aren’t isolated incidents. One is following the other and it’s not an accident and it’s not a coincidence. It’s a deliberate strategy.”The sanctification of Rittenhouse, who was photographed in a bar before his trial with apparent members of the far-right Proud Boys, fits a tried and trusted playbook. Mark and Patricia McCloskey, a white couple in St Louis who pointed guns at Black Lives Matter protesters marching past their house, addressed last year’s RNC a day before Rittenhouse opened fire in Kenosha.Mark McCloskey is now running for the US Senate in Missouri and welcomed Rittenhouse’s acquittal by stating: “Liberals want to defund the police and prevent you from defending yourself, your family, your home, and your businesses. I will never stand for that. I stood for Kyle Rittenhouse and his right to self-defense.”Nicholas Sandmann, a high school student from Kentucky who sued media outlets for their depiction of his interaction – wearing a Maga cap – with a Native American activist on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial in Washington also came to personify grievances on the right.And the pro-Trump mob that stormed the US Capitol on 6 January in an attempt to block certification of Joe Biden’s election has received similar treatment. Taylor Greene visited accused insurrectionists in what she called the “patriot wing” of a Washington prison, condemning its conditions as she tweeted: “I have never seen human suffering like I witnessed last night.”Trump himself has praised Ashli Babbitt, a Capitol rioter fatally shot by police, as “a truly incredible person” and recorded a video to mark what would have been her 36th birthday in what many regard as an effort to turn her into a martyr.Each cause célèbre is typically magnified by conservative media. On Monday more than 5m viewers watched Rittenhouse interviewed by Tucker Carlson, the Fox News opinion host’s biggest audience since the night of the 6 January attack.Carlson told viewers: “During the course of our long conversation, Kyle Rittenhouse struck us as bright, decent, sincere, dutiful and hardworking … exactly the kind of person you would want many more of in your country. He’s not especially political. He never wanted to be the symbol of anything.” He also described Rittenhouse as a “sweet kid”.In the interview, Rittenhouse claimed that he had been “extremely defamed” during the case, fuelling speculation that he will take legal action against the media and politicians. Sandmann urged him to do so, writing in the Daily Mail: “The parallels between me and Kyle Rittenhouse are impossible not to draw … The attacks on Kyle came from the national news media, just as they came for me.”Other Fox News presenters have revelled in an opportunity to “own the libs”. Laura Ingraham tweeted: “The Left is going wild. Enjoy,” ahead of a show captioned: “Kyle and the liberal mind.” Sean Hannity interviewed Trump, who after meeting Rittenhouse made the provocative claim: “He should not have had to suffer through a trial. He should never have been put through that.”Such comments imply resistance to a leftwing tyranny that assails individual rights, such as the right to bear arms. Dan Cassino, a political scientist at Fairleigh Dickinson University and author of Fox News and American Politics: How One Channel Shapes American Politics and Society, said: “This is where the energy in the party is.“If you ask people on the right or look at rightwing media, they’ll tell you all the people Kyle Rittenhouse shot were criminals, they were terrible, they were going to kill everybody and these people are heroes for standing up, especially for using their second amendment rights.“That’s a big part of this narrative, that having guns allows you to stand up to disorder and is a necessary thing to do in order to protect your community. It’s not Kyle Rittenhouse himself: he was protecting his community, and that’s what the second amendment is about as far as they’re concerned.”But the normalisation of violence represented by Trump’s remarks at rallies, Gosar’s tweet and Rittenhouse’s valorisation is likely to be politically polarising, firing up the Maga base but turning off certain constituencies in elections.Larry Jacobs, director of the Center for the Study of Politics and Governance at the University of Minnesota, said: “The challenge for Republicans who are running in competitive seats is, is that who you want? He’s a guy who is not cheered by a lot of people, including suburban and better educated women. The idea of people running around with automatic weapons in street? That doesn’t really excite them.“I expect the Trumpians to grab on to him, bring him out, have him smile and wave and say a few things. But I think the candidates may be more selective.”TopicsRepublicansKyle RittenhouseUS politicsfeaturesReuse this content More

Ilhan Omar: Boebert is a ‘buffoon’ and ‘bigot’ for ‘made up’ anti-Muslim story‘Sad she thinks bigotry gets her clout,’ says Omar after Boebert claims to have joked about terrorism when sharing elevator The Minnesota Democrat Ilhan Omar called the Colorado Republican Lauren Boebert a buffoon, a bigot and a liar for claiming to have joked about terrorism when sharing an elevator in Congress.Trump photo with Rittenhouse reveals ‘Mount Trumpmore’ sculptureRead more“Fact,” Omar wrote on Twitter on Thursday. “This buffoon looks down when she sees me at the Capitol, this whole story is made up. Sad she thinks bigotry gets her clout.“Anti-Muslim bigotry isn’t funny and shouldn’t be normalised. Congress can’t be a place where hateful and dangerous Muslims tropes get no condemnation.”One of the first Muslim women elected to Congress, Omar is also a member of a prominent “Squad” of House progressives.Boebert is a first-term far-right Trump ally who consistently seeks controversy. Her connections to the deadly attack on the Capitol on 6 January remain under investigation.She made the comments about Omar in her home district over the Thanksgiving break.“Actually I have an Ilhan story for you,” Boebert told an audience, to laughter. “So, the other night on the House floor was not my first ‘Jihad Squad’ moment.“So I was getting into an elevator with one of my staffers. You know, we’re leaving the Capitol and we’re going back to my office and we get an elevator and I see a Capitol police officer running to the elevator. I see fret all over his face, and he’s reaching, and the door’s shutting, like I can’t open it, like what’s happening. I look to my left, and there she is. Ilhan Omar.“And I said, ‘Well, she doesn’t have a backpack, we should be fine.’The audience laughed and applauded.“We only had one floor to go,” Boebert continued. “I said, ‘Oh look, the Jihad Squad decided show up for work today.’”The audience whooped and applauded again.“Don’t worry,” said Boebert, “it’s just her staffers on Twitter that talk for her, she’s not tough in person. So … there’s a little bit of interactions with these folks.”The remarks raised calls for Boebert to face formal censure – as recently did Paul Gosar of Arizona, for tweeting a video which depicted him killing Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York, another prominent progressive, and threatening Joe Biden.Boebert’s reference to “the other night on the House floor” was to remarks in support of Gosar in which she called Omar “the Jihad Squad member from Minnesota” and repeated rightwing conspiracy theories about her.In response to those remarks, Omar called Boebert an “insurrectionist who sleeps with a pervert”, a reference to Boebert’s husband, who in 2004 pleaded guilty to public indecency and lewd exposure and spent time in jail. Omar also said Boebert “shamefully defecates and defiles the House”.In a statement on Friday, Edward Ahmed Mitchell, national deputy director of the Council for American-Islamic Relations (Cair), called Boebert’s remarks “digusting” and “merely the latest symptom of the anti-Muslim bigotry that has plagued the Republican caucus in the House for years”.“Leader [Kevin] McCarthy should repudiate Representative Boebert’s remarks,” Mitchell said, “and call on all Republican members of Congress to treat their American Muslim colleagues and constituents with the respect and decency everyone deserves.”‘Inciting violence begets violence’: Paul Gosar censured over video aimed at AOCRead moreBoebert later tweeted an apology “to anyone in the Muslim community I offended with my comment about Representative Omar”.She also said she had “reached out to her office to speak with her directly. There are plenty of policy differences to focus on without this unnecessary distraction.”Omar retweeted support from another member of the “Squad”, Cori Bush of Missouri.“Capitol Hill is a toxic work environment for Muslim members and staff,” Bush wrote, “when bigots routinely spew racist, Islamophobic vitriol unchecked and with no consequence.“Congresswoman Omar, we love you, and we pray for your well-being and protection from this despicable abuse.”TopicsIlhan OmarUS politicsRacenewsReuse this content More

Ten months into his presidency, Joe Biden’s poll numbers are, by any measure, lukewarm. According to the latest figures, taken on November 24, only 43% of Americans approve of his performance in office, while a majority think he is not doing a good job. In a week when he announced that he is planning to run for the presidency again in 2024, these are surely not the numbers he is hoping for.

There are a number of explanations for Biden’s low approval rating, but some context is useful. While he is recently polling lower than his three Democrat predecessors at this point in their presidency, Barack Obama, Bill Clinton and Jimmy Carter were not faced with a pandemic in an era of dangerously toxic partisanship.

Also, the storming of the Capitol in January 2021 by violent supporters of the outgoing president, Donald Trump, ensured that Biden’s ascension to power later that month took place at a time when American democracy appeared to be in peril.

Connecting with the 47% of the public who had voted for his opponent was always going to be difficult – not least as the election outcome was – and still is – contested by many influential officeholders.

Bearing this tumultuous start in mind, there are some factors in particular that may help to explain where Biden has found himself politically. The point at which his poll numbers crossed from positive to negative was just before the final withdrawal date for US troops from Afghanistan in late August 2021.

Afghan evacuees at the US airbase in Ramstein, Germany. Many Americans think the withdrawal from Afghanistan was badly botched.
EPA-EFE/Ronald Wittek

While the president’s position on America’s presence in the region was no secret – and most of the public were in favour of bringing the troops home – the bloody and chaotic reality of how this played caused shock both at home and abroad.

Pandemic partisanship

In the ensuing weeks, Biden’s poll numbers continued to slide. But Afghanistan was not the only source of voter dismay. Despite campaign-trail promises and concerted presidential efforts to get COVID under control, the pandemic has raged on. The public health and economic toll have remained substantial as a hefty 40% of the population (aged 12 and over) have not yet been vaccinated.

Some Americans may never get on board with the science. One route to surmount this obstacle was to introduce vaccine mandates for federal workers, associated contractors and employees of large companies. Such a solution brought its own set of problems, as government mandates do not sit well with Americans.

Most unfortunately for the president, and arguably through no fault of his, COVID is a polarising issue. It has become possible to find out a person’s political leanings based on their adherence – or lack thereof – to wearing a mask.

Pandemic partisanship has allowed Biden’s opponents to make political hay with the situation. After 22 months of disruption, it is easy for voters to forget that COVID began and rapidly spiralled out of control during the Trump presidency. His was an administration that showed zero interest in planning for distant risk. As a result, his successor inherited a monumentally challenging public health crisis.

The US government’s mandates requiring certain workers to get vaccinated has been deeply divisive.
EPA-EFE/Justin Lane

This has been continually exacerbated by pushback from various opponents keen to score political points with their conservative base. Governors in some Republican states, for example, have rejected Biden’s vaccine policies, refusing to implement mandatory vaccinations or testing.

The result is a continuing pandemic, fearful citizens, and the ongoing politicisation of a public health emergency. Additionally, the disappointing economic recovery is damaging to the president as the anticipated bounce-back has to date not materialised sufficiently to turn the tide of unemployment and rising inflation.

Family squabbles

Added to the president’s political headaches are problems in his own party. Democrat family squabbles are nothing new, but Biden has to spend precious political capital on reining in frisky progressives while dealing with the disproportionate influence of specific conservative individuals. West Virginia Senate representative Joe Manchin showed his power in the 50/50 deadlocked Senate by challenging the central tenet of Biden’s climate agenda, on the eve of the COP26 summit in Glasgow. The result was a US president heading to a crucial climate conference with an agenda undermined by a recalcitrant member of his own party.

Presenting as a moderate Democrat was always going to bring challenges for Biden. On one level, it is a sensible strategy as traditionally, voters tend to veer to the centre at general election time. Clearly many did, as the centrist Democrat won with 51% of the vote. However, the flipside of such an approach is that the middle-of-the-road position may satisfy nobody.

Hence, in his early days in office, Biden tacked to the left of his traditional position on certain issues including climate, immigration and committing to trillions in expenditure, which pleased progressives and showed, however fleeting, party unity.

The political challenges facing Biden remain daunting. He leads a deeply divided country that has been unable to unite in a crisis. Fake news abounds and undermines civil discourse. It is difficult to imagine how any president might fare well in the polls under such circumstances. A less centrist leader that Biden could make the situation worse. His 51% disapproval rating still equates with 43% approval. Under the circumstances, this constitutes a political glass that is (almost) half full. But it will need to be fuller if he really does plan to run in 2024. More