US Politics

California is pursuing an ambitious plan to pay off the entirety of unpaid rent from low-income tenants who fell behind during the pandemic, in what could constitute the largest ever rent relief program in the US.The state’s governor, Gavin Newsom, is negotiating with legislators and said the $5.2bn plan would pay landlords all of what they are owed while giving renters a clean slate.If successful, the rent forgiveness plan would amount to an extraordinary form of aid in the largest state in the US, which has suffered from a major housing crisis and severe economic inequality long before Covid-19.An estimated 900,000 renters in California owe an average of $4,600 in back rent, according to a recent analysis. Without aggressive protections and relief, experts say the state would experience a tsunami of evictions and a dramatic worsening of its homelessness crisis. Even with restrictions on evictions in place since March 2020, vulnerable renters have continued to be pushed out of their homes while out of work and unable to pay the high costs of rent in the state.Federal eviction protections are due to expire at the end of June, as are California’s regulations which applied to more renters. Lawmakers, who are currently negotiating over the state’s roughly $260bn operating budget, are debating whether to extend the restrictions on evictions beyond June. The vast majority of people who have applied for relief have not yet received funds, according to state officials, which is why tenant groups are pushing for protections to remain in place.“The expectation for people to be up and at ’em and ready to pay rent on 1 July is wholeheartedly unfair,” said Kelli Lloyd, a 43-year-old single mother, to the Associated Press. She said she had not worked consistently since the pandemic began in March 2020.Lloyd, a member of the advocacy group Alliance of Californians for Community Empowerment, is supposed to pay $1,924 a month for a two-bedroom, two-bathroom rent-controlled apartment in the Crenshaw district of south Los Angeles. But she said she was $30,000 behind after not working for most of the last year to care for her two children as daycare centers closed and schools halted in-person learning.That debt will probably be covered by the government. But Lloyd said she recently lost a job at a real estate brokerage and had yet to find another one. She is worried she could be evicted if the protections expire.“Simply because the state has opened back up doesn’t mean people have access to their jobs,” she said.Meanwhile, in the wine country area of Sonoma county, property manager Keith Becker told the AP that 14 tenants are more than $100,000 behind in rent payments. It’s put financial pressure on the owners, who Becker says have “resigned themselves to it”. He argued that the eviction protections should end. The $5.2bn fund to pay off people’s rent comes from multiple federal aid packages approved by Congress. Jason Elliott, a senior counselor to Newsom on housing and homelessness, said that figure appeared to be more than enough to cover all rent debts in the state.But the state has been slow to distribute that money, and it is unlikely it can spend it all by 30 June. A report from the California department housing and community development showed that of the $490m in requests for rental assistance through 31 May, just $32m has been paid. That does not include the 12 cities and 10 counties that run their own rental assistance programs.“It’s challenging to set up a new, big program overnight,” said assemblyman David Chiu, a Democrat from San Francisco and chair of the assembly housing and community development committee. “It has been challenging to educate millions of struggling tenants and landlords on what the law is.”While employment among middle- and high-wage jobs has exceeded pre-pandemic levels, employment rates for Californians earning less than $27,000 a year are down more than 38% since January 2020, according to Opportunity Insights, an economic tracker based at Harvard University.“The stock market may be fine, we may be technically reopened, but people in low-wage jobs, which are disproportionately people of color, are not back yet,” said Madeline Howard, senior attorney for the Western Center on Law and Poverty.Some housing advocates are asking the state to keep the eviction ban in place until the unemployment rate among low-wage workers has dropped to pre-pandemic levels. It is similar to how state officials would impose restrictions on businesses in counties where Covid-19 infection rates were higher while those with lower infection rates could reopen more quickly. More

A US military training document has described the political philosophy of socialism – a relatively mainstream term in politics around the world – as a “terrorist ideology” akin to neo-Nazism.The document, which was obtained by The Intercept news website, was used in the US navy. It was entitled: Introduction to Terrorism/Terrorist Operations, and aimed at some members of the navy’s internal police, the outlet reported.On one page of the document, in a section titled Study Questions, the question is asked: “Anarchists, socialists and neo-Nazis represent which terrorist ideological category?”The news is likely to come as a surprise to some of the increasingly popular mainstream US politicians who identify as democratic socialists, such as the former presidential candidate and Vermont senator Bernie Sanders and the star of the Democratic party’s left, New York congresswoman Alexandra Ocasio-Cortez.Though socialism has long been demonized in the US, especially during the 1930s and the cold war, it has in recent years become more popular especially among young people. One poll last year found that slightly more Democrats viewed socialism favorably than they did capitalism. More

Joe Biden was facing a huge setback on Tuesday as one of his top priorities, a set of reforms to protect voting rights and shore up American democracy, barrelled towards defeat in Congress.Progressives accused Biden of failing to use his bully pulpit to champion the sweeping legislation, which aims to safeguard elections against attacks by former president Donald Trump and his allies.“OK I have reached my WTF moment with Biden on this,” tweeted Ezra Levin, co-executive director of the grassroots movement Indivisible. “Is saving democracy a priority for this administration or not?”The Senate was due to hold a procedural vote on whether to start debate on the For the People Act, a significant near-900-page overhaul of voting and election law that the White House has described as a “cause” for Biden.But in chamber split 50-50, the bill was poised to fall at the first hurdle. Sixty votes are required to overcome a procedural rule known as the filibuster and there was no prospect of 10 Republicans crossing the floor to join Democrats in advancing the legislation.The For the People Act is seen as a crucial counterweight to hundreds of voting bills introduced by Republican-controlled states, many of which include measures that would make it harder for Black people, young people and poor people to vote. Fourteen states had enacted 22 of these laws by mid-May, according to the Brennan Center for Justice.Biden has spoken passionately about the need to defend democracy but despite his penchant for bipartisanship he has been unable to move the needle. Levin, a former congressional aide, drew a contrast with Barack Obama, who organised a debate with Republicans about his signature healthcare law, and Bill Clinton, who gave 18 speeches to promote a North American free trade agreement.Because of one man’s lie, Republicans are now doing the dastardly act of taking away voting from millions of AmericansHe added: “Democracy is under threat. Fascism is rising. Time is running out. It’s time for the president to get off the sidelines and into the game, or we’re all going to lose.”Obama has also sounded the alarm. Speaking on a call with grassroots supporters, he said: “We can’t wait until the next election because if we have the same kinds of shenanigans that brought about [the insurrection on] 6 January, if we have that for a couple more election cycles, we’re going to have real problems in terms of our democracy long-term.”Democrats’ goals include expanding early voting in elections for president and Congress, making it easier to vote by mail – a tool used by record numbers during the coronavirus pandemic – and improving the transparency of certain campaign contributions. They are also aiming to remove party bias from the once-a-decade drawing of congressional districts.Democrats also accuse Republicans of seeking to reduce polling hours and locations and drop boxes, and tightening voter ID laws, as a direct response to Trump’s lie that the 2020 election was stolen by voter fraud.In remarks on the Senate floor on Tuesday, Chuck Schumer, the Democratic majority leader, likened Trump to “a petulant child”.“Because of one man’s lie, Republicans are now doing the dastardly act of taking away voting from millions of Americans … making it much harder for them to vote, and many, many, many will not,” Schumer said.“From Georgia to Montana, from Florida to Iowa, Republican state legislatures are conducting the most coordinated voter suppression effort in 80 years.”These state houses are making it easier to own a gun than to vote, Schumer said.“Republican legislatures are making it harder to vote early, harder to vote by mail, harder to vote after work. They’re making it a crime to give food or water to voters waiting in long lines. They’re trying to make it harder for Black churchgoers to vote on Sunday.“And they’re actually making it easier for unelected judges and partisan election boards to overturn the results of an election, opening the door for some demagogue, a Trumpian-type demagogue, maybe he himself, to try and subvert our elections in the very same way that Trump tried to do in 2020.”Republicans argue the For the People Act would infringe on states’ rights and that state measures are needed to stop fraud, even though there is no evidence of widespread such problems. Mitch McConnell, the Republican minority leader, dismissed the bill as a “partisan power grab” in his own speech on the Senate floor.Although the outcome of Tuesday’s vote was a foregone conclusion, there is still suspense around two subplots with wider implications.The bill was co-sponsored by 49 Democratic and independent senators. The sole holdout was Joe Manchin, a conservative Democrat from West Virginia who has expressed opposition to the legislation and declined to say if he would support the procedural motion to debate it.If, as expected, Manchin did fall into line, it would intensify pressure for Democrats to abolish the filibuster so legislation can be debated and passed by a simple 51-vote majority – with Vice-President Kamala Harris holding the tie-breaking vote. But Manchin and some colleagues have deep reservations about doing so.Kyrsten Sinema, a Democratic senator from Arizona, wrote in the Washington Post: “The filibuster compels moderation and helps protect the country from wild swings.”She said she welcomed a full debate, “so senators and our constituents can hear and fully consider the concerns and consequences”.Biden held talks with Manchin and Sinema at the White House on Monday, aware the congressional stalemate threatens to stall his agenda. Manchin told reporters at the Capitol on Tuesday: “We had a very good conversation, very respectful … We’ve just got to keep working.”Both sides are looking for political advantage ahead of next year’s midterm elections, where Republicans hope to win back the House and Senate. More

You have to be something of a masochist to want to get into politics – and Zack Weiner is an unapologetic masochist. Last week, the 26-year-old, who is running for a place on the city council in New York, was something of a nonentity: he had zero name recognition and his campaign had raised just over $10,000 (£7,200), most of which he had donated himself.Perhaps the most notable thing about Weiner was the fact his dad is the co-creator of the kids’ TV show Dora the Explorer. But that changed when a video of a man engaged in consensual sadomasochism was posted on Twitter by an anonymous account that claimed the man was Weiner. On Saturday, the New York Post ran a story about the video, complete with salacious screengrab. Pretty soon it made international headlines.Why would anyone care about the sex life of an unknown twentysomething running for local office? Well, because a lot of people are pervs, for one thing. But the main reason the story has become so popular is because of how Weiner responded. Instead of going on the defensive, he owned it. His own campaign manager was the one who tipped off the New York Post about the video and Weiner told the paper that he is a “proud BDSMer”, who has nothing to be ashamed of.“Whoops. I didn’t want anyone to see that, but here we are,” Weiner later wrote on Twitter. “Like many young people, I have grown into a world where some of our most private moments have been documented online. While a few loud voices on Twitter might chastise me for the video, most people see the video for what it is: a distraction.”Weiner’s response to the video is almost identical to a plotline from the TV show BillionsThe frank and dignified way in which Weiner handled this episode has, quite rightly, earned him a lot of praise. It is, in many ways, a masterclass in how to respond to revenge porn.There was some speculation that the video was a publicity stunt. Releasing a sex tape of yourself in order to kickstart a political career might once have been unthinkable, but in today’s attention economy it is all too plausible. Donald Trump taught the world that any idiot can get into politics as long as you find a way to keep your name in the headlines.Then there’s the fact that Weiner’s response to the video is almost identical to a plotline from the TV show Billions. “I’m a masochist,” the character Chuck Rhoades announces in a press conference after a political rival threatens to leak pictures of him enjoying sadomasochistic sex in an attempt to derail his campaign for state attorney general for New York. Rhoades’s speech is a huge success: he goes on to win the election.So is it possible that Weiner’s campaign, inspired by Billions, might have leaked the video itself? Absolutely not, Joseph Gallagher, Weiner’s campaign manager, told me. He added, for good measure, that neither he nor Weiner, who is also an actor and screenwriter, had ever watched the TV show. The reason he flagged the video to the Post, he clarified, was in order to control the narrative and get ahead of the story. Which makes sense.Ultimately, what’s important is the fact that, as Weiner pointed out, a generation of young people who have documented every part of their lives are starting to enter politics. Revenge porn, which has already helped derail the political career of the former congresswoman Katie Hill, is going to become a common political weapon. And I suspect female politicians will have a far harder time surviving the weaponisation of their personal lives than men. More

After months of campaigning, election day finally came to New York on Tuesday, with a Democratic party primary vote likely to decide the city’s next mayor.Hundreds of thousands of people are expected to vote in the contest, with Eric Adams, a former police officer, leading the polls.But with ranked choice voting being used for the first time in a New York mayoral election, there is still plenty of hope for the other candidates, and with the official result not expected to be announced until July, plenty of time until New Yorkers learn the name of their next leader.Voting was slow at Dutch Kills high school, in Long Island City, on Tuesday morning, as a trickle of Queens residents arrived to cast their ballots, although with polls open until 9pm, and early voting having been in progress since 12 June, a large turnout was still expected.Min Kwon, 26, voted for Maya Wiley, a civil rights lawyer who has emerged as the leading progressive candidate in recent weeks.“Her stance on the police department, defunding it significantly, is one thing I really like about her,” Kwon said, adding that he supported Wiley’s positions on LGBTQ+ rights, housing rights and racial justice.Dianne Morales, a progressive former non-profit leader and fellow police critic, but whose campaign has been derailed by infighting, was his second choice.An election season that began with calls for at least partially defunding the New York’s police department has pivoted in recent weeks, as a spike in shootings swung the debate in the opposite direction and helped to propel Adams, a centrist who has criticized the “defund the police” movement, and supports the widely loathed stop-and-frisk policing tactic, to the top of the polls.Wiley has avoided using the term “defund the police”, but would cut at least $1bn from the NYPD’s budget – which was $5.8bn last year, its highest ever – and shift the money to social programs and mental health workers.Most candidates have pitched policies to attempt to curb police brutality, although they differ on how that would be achieved.“I don’t think the police force here in New York has to be as big as it is right now. Especially for the homeless situation, mental illness, or other things like that, there are other resources that we can divert police funds to to help that,” Kwon said.Kwon said when choosing his candidate he asked himself: “When do I actually feel safe when police are nearby? And I don’t feel safe when police are nearby, especially as a person of color.”About 800,000 people are expected to vote in the Democratic primary, according to the New York Times, which would be an increase from the last competitive mayoral primary in 2013. Given the leftward political leanings of the city, the winner of the primary will almost certainly win the election proper in November.Cali Howitt, 39, voted for Kathryn Garcia, a former sanitation commissioner for New York who has risen in the polls after being endorsed by the New York Times and the New York Daily News.“I like her experience,” Howitt said.“I feel like we need someone who is experienced even though we need a change from what we currently have, I want somebody in there that has experience in the government and knows how it runs, and isn’t coming out of nowhere basically.”Howitt selected Sean Donovan, a secretary of housing and urban development in the Obama administration, as her second choice – “for essentially the same reasons”, she said – and was pleased with the introduction of ranked choice voting.“I really like it because your vote counts even when your first person has been knocked out of the race,” she said.Andrew Yang, a tech entrepreneur and 2020 long-shot candidate for president, led the polls for weeks before Adams emerged as the top contender in May. The final polling suggest Adams has opened up a gap on his rivals, with Wiley, Garcia and Yang running close behind.Given the introduction of ranked choice, however, coupled with the use of mail-in ballots, it is likely to be some time before a victor is declared.On Tuesday night, the winner of the early voting and on-the-day ballots should be revealed, before mail-in vote counting, and then second-choice and potentially third, fourth and fifth-choice voting, continues.By 12 July, after months of electioneering, and weeks after primary day, New York City residents should finally know the identity of their next mayor. More

Such is the tenor of our times that the first thing I did before embarking on the docuseries Philly DA: Breaking the Law (BBC Four) was research its subject, Larry Krasner. Because there has to be a catch, right? An eight-hour film about a civil rights defence lawyer winning a landslide victory to become the first progressive district attorney in a notoriously conservative, corrupt city just doesn’t scan. A chronicle of him fighting ceaselessly for genuine change from within? No. Not in 2021. I’ve been here before. I want to be forearmed against the big reveal. So I searched. For the charges of fraud, revelations of – oh, I don’t know – historical sexual assault. That’s normally it, isn’t it? Maybe child abuse, to match the high – remember, it was not just a simple victory, but a landslide! – with the low. I put nothing past 2021, nothing at all.But his record, as far as any awfulness is concerned, is like the Bellman’s map – a complete and perfect blank. Hard as it is to believe, Philly DA is a film about a good, not perfect man surrounding himself with good, not perfect people and trying to make a difference in a far from perfect world.The film’s makers, Yoni Brook, Ted Passon and Nicole Salazar, follow Krasner from 2017, when he was elected to the position – the election field was opened up by the arrest and indictment of the then DA on 23 counts of bribery (he resigned and pleaded guilty to one of them) – until halfway through 2020. The additional challenges of Covid are not covered by the film, and it ends with the protests about the murder of George Floyd inserted presumably last minute, slightly awkwardly but understandably, under the credits. Almost certainly, they started from a pro-Krasner position and, human nature being what it is, more than two years embedded with him and his team had its effects. There is a warmth running throughout and, of course, their access remains entirely in Krasner’s gift and could have presumably been withdrawn at any time no matter how publicly his commitment to transparency had been proclaimed.Nevertheless, Philly DA does not stray into hagiography. It is made clear Krasner is neither alone nor the Messiah, but was elected as part of a growing nationwide movement of people with progressive, reformist beliefs moving into prosecutorial positions they have tended to avoid (or been prevented from entering by the non-progressives already there). His inexperienced team’s missteps – notably losing control of the media narrative when they purge the office of the previous administration’s employees in what becomes known as “the Snow Day Massacre” – are on display. The problems caused by his unwillingness to smile, to gladhand just a little, to play retail politics and lubricate grinding wheels of the system where he can are noted. In episode six, for example, during a particularly antagonistic period between the old and new guard and between public concerns and the DA office’s attitude to the establishment of safe injection sites for drug users, his ally Councilwoman Maria Quinon-Sanchez threatens to withdraw her support if he cannot find it in himself to give just a little (he does).The trio of film-makers marshal a lot of material consistently well. Each instalment looks primarily at one subject, while continuing to tie it into the wider drive to change the policy of mass incarceration and break the harmful habits of career lifetimes among the remaining old guard. It fills in the city’s history while examining the result. It also looks at the effects of cash bail (which effectively criminalises people for being poor), the need for radical overhaul of a stunningly abstruse and uncompassionate juvenile system, the discovery of “damaged goods” files (secret records of police officers deemed too untrustworthy to testify in their own cases – wiped from employees’ computers but unearthed in hard copy in the archives).There’s also the need for probation reform, the pressures of standing against the death penalty and the growing frustration among the activists who helped Krasner get elected and for whom, perhaps, no pace of change was ever going to be fast enough.Transcending the directorial workmanship and production values, however, is the simple sight of unfashionable – which is to say good, ideologically informed but practically executed – work being done on behalf of the disfranchised, the powerless, the underserved. It is deeply thrilling to watch. An unfamiliar feeling stirs, and rises higher with each episode. The feeling is hope. “I don’t want to run for anything else,” says Krasner. “This is just an opportunity to do things that are really just about getting it right.” And remember, I checked ahead – you can enjoy it. Please do. More

When the Republican Party ousted Liz Cheney from a leadership position, it exposed a major ideological divide within the current GOP. That caused some people, including prominent Republicans, to suggest there might be a third party in the making.

Most commentators and political scientists have dismissed that idea, observing the inevitability of U.S. politics remaining a two-party system.

But my research finds circumstances are better now for a third-party insurgency than at any time over the past century. Though there is no way to predict precisely when a third party will emerge, the situation is in fact ripe for a third party to challenge what has become a Donald Trump-controlled Republican Party.

My research also finds that the most successful third parties in U.S. politics don’t typically rise to dominance but instead challenge the major parties enough to force them to change course.

A brief history of US third parties

In my 2018 book, “The Demise and Rebirth of American Third Parties,” I explain that the strength of third parties since the American Civil War has been closely related to how polarized the two major parties have been. When the major parties are highly polarized, larger groups of voters end up being not represented by either one, and the intense contention between them also increases political dissatisfaction.

The Democratic and Republican parties were extremely polarized for a half-century after the Civil War. During this period, third parties were aggressive and strong.

Their goal, however, was not to attempt multiparty democracy, as some hope for today.

Supporting poor farmers and opposing business monopolies, the Greenback Party shook up electoral politics in the 1870s and 1880s, winning widespread support, especially across the Midwest. The Populist Party, which was also a party supporting poor farmers, was even more successful in the 1890s. It collapsed by 1900, but during its brief existence it threatened the Democratic Party to the degree that the Democrats eventually adopted many Populist stands and made leading Populist William Jennings Bryan their presidential candidate.

The current divisions within the Republican Party most closely mirror those found within the GOP in the early 1900s. The party was then divided between a reactionary wing, headed by House Speaker Joseph Cannon, which was pro-business and conservative; and a more progressive wing led by Teddy Roosevelt, which was being largely marginalized. The progressive wing supported political reforms, including requiring the major parties to nominate their candidates through primary elections instead of having party bosses choose them, and promoted economic reforms such as having child labor laws and business regulations.

Teddy Roosevelt and Hiram Johnson were running mates on the 1912 Progressive Party presidential ticket.
Collection of Oakland Museum of California

In 1912, the progressive wing split from the Republican Party and formed the Progressive Party, which became one of the most successful third parties in American history, inventing modern election campaigning through the use of mass media and
pushing both major parties to support progressive reforms.

While this move undermined the Republicans’ electoral prospects in the short term – even Cannon lost his House seat – it nevertheless also helped usher in progressive reforms that pushed the Republican Party toward becoming more moderate, including nominating moderate Charles Evans Hughes for president in 1916 in hopes of reuniting the warring factions in the party.

Then, starting in the 1920s, when the Democratic and Republican parties became less polarized and began compromising more with each other, third parties, including the Progressives, all but disappeared from American politics. The only strong third parties that remained were in a few states, like the Farmer-Labor Party in Minnesota and Wisconsin Progressives. By the mid-1940s, Farmer-Labor joined the Democratic Party, and the Wisconsin Progressives returned into the fold of the Republican Party. In Minnesota, the Democratic Party is still called the Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party.

Once polarization reemerged, however, starting around 1968, third parties began slowly rising again and gaining greater public support.

Will history repeat itself?

Today, both major parties have become highly polarized, though the Republican Party has moved much farther to the right than the Democrats have shifted to the left. Anti-Trump Republican politicians likely have no future in their party today.

Because of their fervent opposition to the Democratic Party, moderate Republican voters effectively lack any major party to vote for.

With the Libertarian Party remaining focused more on ideological purity than capitalizing on changing political opportunities, circumstances are ripe for a moderate conservative party to emerge.

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The Republican Party has left few options for the center right. Even mildly critical voices within the GOP, such as Cheney’s and others’, have been marginalized, especially at the state level. Moderate conservative voters are dissatisfied with their party’s capitulation to Trump and his allies – a capitulation made despite Trump’s declining favorability numbers among Republican voters.

All this adds to the likelihood of a moderate conservative party emerging. If it does, and if it follows historical patterns, this new party will likely not seek mass appeal. Rather, it will target voters who are moderate conservatives, independents and anti-Trumpers.

The new party could gain strategic advantages by fielding candidates in local and state elections in more moderate places where some Republican candidates have nevertheless chosen to follow their party to the extreme. Like-minded anti-Trump donors may see the possibility of success and fund their efforts.

Any third party that forms might not last long. The Progressive Party existed for less than a decade, for example. But by strategically winning the votes of moderate conservatives and thereby undermining Republicans’ electoral goals, even if briefly, a new third party could stop the GOP from hurtling farther down an extreme and undemocratic path. More

On his first day at the White House, Joe Biden earned praise for following through on several campaign promises, committing the US to strict climate goals and a greener future. Now, nearly six months into his presidency, several of those commitments are being put to the test, and already, many are falling apart.A court last week ruled that the Biden administration did not have the authority to unilaterally pause oil and gas lease sales across the US. The decision came alongside news that congressional bargaining over Biden’s climate and infrastructure bill is hitting a wall with Republicans and the administration is now considering a slimmed-down version.Together, the developments are compounding a list of worries by environmentalists. Many fear Biden’s promises on climate may turn out to be more talk than action.“We aren’t seeing the fight and the grit that gives us the full hope,” said Jeremy Nichols, climate and energy program director of WildEarth Guardians. “There’s something to be said about posturing and sending the message that you are for real, these aren’t just words, that these are values, and they are going to fight for them and build the right level of support to get things across the finish line.”Last week’s ruling on new oil and gas lease sales, handed down by a Trump appointee, Judge Terry Doughty of the US district court for the western district of Louisiana, creates a major hitch for Biden’s climate action plan. Louisiana’s attorney general and 12 other states originally filed the suit against the Biden administration’s leasing pause, arguing it would harm their states economically. Most of those states heavily rely on the sale of oil and gas and subsidies for the industry.“I think it’s legally wrong,” said Drew Caputo, vice-president of litigation for lands, wildlife and oceans at Earthjustice. “Every presidential administration has delayed or cancelled lease sales. The Trump administration last year delayed offshore oil leases because of the pandemic and changes in the market. There were no complaints, literally, and it was an unremarkable thing because that kind of thing happens all of the time.”Of the judge’s ruling, a spokesperson for the interior department said: “We are reviewing the judge’s opinion and will comply with the decision. The Interior Department continues to work on an interim report that will include initial findings on the state of the federal conventional energy programs, as well as outline next steps and recommendations for the Department and Congress to improve stewardship of public lands and waters, create jobs, and build a just and equitable energy future.” The agency said the interim report will be released in early summer.Drilling on public lands accounts for nearly a quarter of all greenhouse gas emissions in the country. In one of his first acts as president, Biden issued an executive order that paused new onshore and offshore federal fossil fuel lease sales in order to let the administration study the future of the practice and its climate repercussions.Now, however, it’s unclear how strongly the administration plans to fight the injunction and whether the Department of Justice will counter in courts – a silence that is frustrating environmental groups. The White House did not return a request for comment.“We don’t know ultimately if the interior [department] is going to appeal or what they are going to do. Worst case scenario is that leasing has to resume,” said Randi Spivak, public lands program director at the Center for Biological Diversity. “He did promise to end federal leasing and we’re going to hold him to it.”So far, the Biden administration’s record on the climate crisis has felt out of step with his messaging. In March, Biden agreed to advance a New Mexico lease sale that was viewed as an 11th hour move by the Trump administration. The justice department later agreed to go to court and back Trump’s decision to grant oil and gas leases on federal land across Wyoming and Montana.Another decision, to allow leases in Alaska’s north slope known as the Willow project, is seen by many as a political maneuver aimed at winning Democratic voters. Alaska’s Republican senator Lisa Murkoswki is set to face a tough re-election next year.The theme of inconsistent messaging continues with Biden’s initial $2tn infrastructure plan. Last week, 11 Republicans moved to back a $1tn bipartisan deal, half the original price tag and investment progressives and climate activists were promised.Some groups and progressive lawmakers have come out against the compromise. Earlier this month, the Democratic US representative Martin Heinrich of New Mexico tweeted: “An infrastructure package that goes light on climate and clean energy should not count on every Democratic vote.” On 16 June, the presidents and CEOs of several environmental groups, including the former Obama White House chief of staff John Podesta, sent a joint letter to the House speaker, Nancy Pelosi; Senate majority leader, Chuck Schumer; and their Republican counterparts, urging “bold, ambitious and swift measures to tackle the climate crisis”.“The stakes are enormous,” they wrote. “Failure to act at the scale that science and justice require will mean more health and environmental costs for individuals, communities and taxpayers, and more lives and communities devastated and destroyed by wildfires, extreme weather events, infectious diseases, and the deterioration of ecosystems that we depend on for food, employment, and recreation.”Through the infrastructure bill, Biden had promised a commitment to climate action that would involve new green job creation, a transition to renewable energy, and new investments in environmental justice communities. A White House advisory committee just last month announced initial recommendations for tackling pollution near disenfranchised neighborhoods – with many proposals relying on the significant revenue stream first promised by Biden’s infrastructure bill.Still, Biden has experienced notable success with other climate and environmental promises. He recommitted the US to the Paris climate agreement, revoked permits for the Keystone XL pipeline (setting the stage for the Canadian power company to terminate construction this month), and suspended oil and gas leases in Alaska’s Arctic national wildlife refuge.Separately, federal agencies in recent months have also moved to restore clean water protections stripped by Trump, review soot pollution rules, and repeal and replace a decision to allow roads built through Alaska’s Tongass national forest; they also held the country’s first offshore wind lease sale. Green groups consider all those actions to be wins.“We aren’t pessimistic at this moment, but we are searching a little bit and we are hoping we see things happen,” Nichols said. “Really we want to see something that strikes at the heart of the fossil fuel industry and makes clear this administration does not view the fossil fuel industry as any kind of a friend.” More