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OpinionDonald TrumpIt’s been easy to forget about Trump, but rightwing America has yet to shake him offEmma BrockesThe former president’s conspiracy theories have found a sympathetic audience on the internet Fri 24 Sep 2021 10.21 EDTLast modified on Fri 24 Sep 2021 16.00 EDTNo one showed up, relatively speaking, to the rally in Washington DC last weekend, an event organised in support of the 6 January “martyrs”. Riot fences went up; the national guard was on standby. The gathering, styled “Justice for J6” by organisers, was intended, they said, to draw attention to the plight of those who, after storming the Capitol building earlier this year, had been arrested but “not been charged with violence, not been accused of assaulting a police officer or destroying property”. The idea of “peacefully” tailgating on a violent insurrection is a conceptual stretch, but in any case, only about 200 demonstrators turned up. They were easily outnumbered by journalists and police.These numbers might have been more reassuring had they not been accompanied online by support from the man widely blamed for inciting them. In a statement on his website, Donald Trump – who is still banned from Twitter – referred to the 6 January rioters as “being persecuted so unfairly” for protesting at “the Rigged Presidential Election”. (The page has since been removed.) It was one of a flurry of statements made last week by the former president, now entirely unrestrained by the dignities of office, and in frank support of the people who stormed the US Capitol. “The Big Lie is the Presidential Election 2020,” he went on, before pivoting to blame the “Fake News Media” for destroying “our Country, both inside and out”.There was a time – millennia ago in political years – when Trump’s wacky syntax and random capitalisation might have been cause for, if not for amusement, exactly, then at least some degree of dismissal. Since the inauguration of President Biden in January, it has been relatively easy to convince oneself that his predecessor has gone away. Sealed up in Mar-a-Lago with various family members, Trump has remained largely absent from public life, surfacing on the 20th anniversary of September 11 this month to commentate on a novelty pay-per-view boxing match with Don Jr in Florida, but otherwise, for those not seeking him out, gone.The discovery that he has not in fact gone, but is still lurking on the internet disseminating conspiracy theories about the election, brings on the sick feeling you get two-thirds of the way into a horror movie, when a sense of calm is introduced prior to the biggest jump scare. Unlike the first time around, there is no possibility of laughing Trump off or assuming his idiocies won’t find a sympathetic audience. At the rally last week, two Republican congressional candidates addressed the group. A recent CNN poll found that 78% of Republicans didn’t believe that Biden legitimately won the presidency. Rightwing America, and therefore America as a whole, has yet to shake this guy off.And so a conversation is starting to take shape, in which the possibility – strengthening daily towards probability – that Trump will stand in the 2024 presidential election is being discussed with real alarm. Yet again, with Trump, there is a sense of surprise about the man that somehow persisted for the duration of his four years in office. In spite of all evidence to the contrary, I think I assumed when Trump lost that he might in large part be relieved to be out of a job he was so unqualified to do. But that assumes the workings of a more or less regular psychology, on the basis of which he would never have become president in the first place.Instead, he is creeping back into the spotlight unchastened. On Tuesday, Trump filed a lawsuit against the New York Times and Mary Trump, his niece, for leaking details of his tax returns. (His niece, knowing better than anyone how to hurt him, perhaps, released a statement in which she said “I think he is a loser, and he is going to throw anything against the wall he can. It’s desperation. As is always the case with Donald, he’ll try and change the subject.”) Meanwhile, a court date has been set in late August or early September 2022 for a hearing in the tax fraud trial of Allen Weisselberg, chief financial officer of Trump’s family business.These stains and public disputes would be enough to finish any other politician, but it has never been so with Trump. I have heard, this week, gloomy assessments from those on the left that the combination of Biden’s handling of troop withdrawals in Afghanistan, the lingering disaster of the pandemic, and even Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez wearing that dress to the Met Ball – “liberal hypocrisy” – will usher in a return of the man so many of us hoped never to hear from again. It doesn’t matter how credible the charge, or whether Trump caused the very problem he seeks to pin on opponents. He has a successful playbook, and given, among other things, his extremely poor impulse control, it seems highly possible he’ll use it again.
Emma Brockes is a Guardian columnist
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Gig economyNew York City delivery workers win rights to better tips, bathrooms and moreA package of bills targeting app-based companies such as Grubhub and Doordash will also set minimum pay Kari PaulThu 23 Sep 2021 21.14 EDTLast modified on Thu 23 Sep 2021 21.31 EDTNew York City lawmakers have passed a historic package of bills to improve labor conditions for gig economy and food delivery workers.The first of its kind legislation, which targets app-based delivery companies such as Grubhub, Uber Eats, and Doordash, will set minimum pay, allow workers to keep more of their tips, and limit how far workers can be asked to travel for deliveries. It will also guarantee workers access to bathrooms – an issue that has long plagued people in the gig economy and has been exacerbated by Covid-19 restrictions.City council speaker Corey Johnson, speaking in a press conference following the vote on Thursday, said the package would give workers the “rights they deserve” and inspire future legislation.‘I don’t like being treated like crap’: gig workers aim to retool a system they say is riggedRead more“New York will now be the first city in the country to make sure delivery workers are not exploited – to make sure people are treated with dignity and respect, that they get their wages, and that they are not exploited by these multibillion dollar corporations,” he said.The legislation was written in collaboration with Los Deliveristas Unidos (LDU), a collective of mostly-immigrant app delivery workers that have long pushed for living wages, bathroom access, and the right to organize.It comes as Covid-19 has increased consumer reliance on delivery services, causing the sector to grow exponentially in the past year. Uber Eats, the food delivery segment of the ride-hailing company Uber, grew by 190% in 2020, adding 36,000 couriers in New York City alone.But the growing army of workers found themselves on the front lines of a pandemic with no health benefits and little job security. Many complain they are unable to access bathrooms and often cannot see or access the tips that customers add to orders.Excluding tips, the median hourly wage for delivery workers in New York City was $7.94 in 2020 according to a study from the Worker’s Justice Project. The hourly net pay when including tips was still below New York’s $15 minimum wage, at an average of $12.21.A spokesman from Grubhub said the company supported the bills, calling them “common-sense steps to support the delivery workers who work hard every day for New York’s restaurants and residents”.“Ensuring they receive a living wage and have access to restrooms isn’t just a good idea – it’s the right thing to do,” he said. DoorDash has also expressed support of the legislation.Cities are increasingly cracking down on the gig economy. Chicago sued food delivery apps in August for misleading consumers, restaurants, and workers – including “using consumer tips to pay itself rather than its drivers”. In June, San Francisco voted to cap delivery app fees charged to restaurants at 15%.But some of the companies targeted by these efforts are also fighting back. California in 2020 passed a law entitling drivers to benefits and better pay, which industry giants such as Uber quickly countered with their own bill exempting themselves from the legislation. Uber now plans to appeal after that bill, Prop 22, was ruled unconstitutional in August.Workers themselves are also making their own efforts, demanding the benefits afforded to full-time employees including better pay and the right to organize.Starting this week, contractors at Instacart have called on customers to boycott the app as they demand better working conditions. In June, Uber and Lyft drivers participated in a day-long strike to demand the right to organize.Worker advocates say the New York bills are a good start but do not address some broader concerns about the gig economy in the US, and that more comprehensive legislation on a national scale is needed.“This is an excellent step in the right direction, but I am concerned that a piecemeal approach to addressing these serious issues is going to take the wind out of the movement towards basic employment rights for these workers,” said Veena Dubal, a professor of employment law at University of California, Hastings.She added that delivery workers are at a very high risk of injury and should be entitled to workers’ compensation and healthcare when they are hurt on the job.“This is better than nothing in the short term, but lawmakers should not think by passing these bills they are doing enough,” she said.TopicsGig economyNew YorkUS politicsWorkers’ rightsnewsReuse this content More
