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      Booker makes a stand against Trump – and doesn’t stop for 25 hours

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      “Would the senator yield for a question?” asked Democratic leader Chuck Schumer.Senator Cory Booker, who on a long day’s journey into night had turned himself into the fighter that many Democrats were yearning for, replied with a wry smile: “Chuck Schumer, it’s the only time in my life I can tell you no.”But Schumer wasn’t taking no for an answer. “I just wanted to tell you, a question, do you know you have just broken the record? Do you know how proud this caucus is of you? Do you know how proud America is of you?”New Jersey’s first Black senator had just shattered the record for the longest speech in Senate history, delivered by South Carolina’s Strom Thurmond, an arch segregationist who filibustered for 24 hours and 18 minutes against the Civil Rights Act of 1957.In the normally sombre Senate chamber, around 40 Democrats rose to their feet in effusive applause. A few hundred people in the public gallery, where the busts of 20 former vice-presidents gazed down from marble plinths, erupted in clapping and cheering and whooping. The senator took a tissue and mopped perspiration from his forehead.Since Booker’s obstruction did not occur during voting on any bill it was not technically a filibuster. But it marked the first time during Donald Trump’s second term that Democrats have deliberately clogged up Senate business.Indeed, after 72 days in which Democrats have appeared lame and leaderless, Booker stood up and did something. He said his constituents had challenged him to think differently and take risks and so he did. In an attention economy so often dominated by the forces of Maga, his all-nighter offered a ray of hope in the darkness.Some Democrats have desperately tried to be authentic with cringeworthy TikTok videos such as a “Choose Your Fighter” parody. Booker, by contrast, went old school: one man standing and talking for hour after hour on the Senate floor in a display of endurance reminiscent of a famous scene in the 1939 film Mr Smith Goes to Washington starring Jimmy Stewart.It had all begun at 7pm on Monday when, wearing a US flag pin on a dark suit, white shirt and black tie as if dressed for the funeral of the republic, Booker vowed: “I rise tonight with the intention of getting in some good trouble. I rise with the intention of disrupting the normal business of the United States Senate for as long as I am physically able.“I rise tonight because I believe sincerely that our country is in crisis … These are not normal times in America and they should not be treated as such in the United States Senate. The threats to the American people and American democracy are grave and urgent, and we all must do more to stand against them.”What followed was a tour de force of physical stamina. The 55-year-old, who played tight end for Stanford University’s American football team, asked a Senate page to take away his chair so he was not tempted to sit down, which is barred by the Senate rules. The chair could be seen pushed back against a wall.Above Booker the words “Novus Ordo Seclorum” – a Latin phrase meaning “a new order of the ages” or “a new order of the centuries” – were inscribed in the Senate chamber above a relief depicting a bare chested hero wrestling a snake.Booker leaned on his desk and sipped from a glass of water. He shifted from foot to foot or paced to keep the blood circulating in his legs. He wiped away sweat with a white handkerchief. He plucked a tissue from a blue-grey tissue box, blew his nose and dropped it into a bin. He persisted.Alexandra De Luca, vice president of communications at the liberal group American Bridge, tweeted: “I worked for Cory Booker on the campaign trail and (and I say this with love) that man drinks enough caffeine on a normal day to stay up 72 hours. This could go a while.”Booker may also be a great advert for veganism. He could be jocular, bantering with old friends in the Senate about sport and state rivalries. He could be emotional, his voice cracking and his eyes on the verge of tears, especially when a letter from the family of a person with Parkinson’s disease reminded him of his late father.He could also be angry, channeling the fury of those who feel their beloved country slipping away. Yet to the end his mind was clear and his voice was strong. This was also a masterclass in political rhetoric, which Schumer rightly praised for its “crystalline brilliance”.There were recurring themes: Trump’s economic chaos and rising prices; billionaires exerting ever greater influence; Elon Musk, the world’s richest man, slashing entire government programmes without consent from Congress and inflicting pain on children, military veterans and other vulnerable groups.Booker read dozens and dozens of letters from what he called “terrified people” with “heartbreaking” stories. As the day wore on, he quoted from a fired USAid employee who told a devastating story of broken dreams and warned: “The beacon of our democracy grows dim across the globe.”The senator also warned of tyranny: Trump disappearing people from the streets without due process; bullying the media and trying to create press corps like Vladimir Putin or Recep Tayyip Erdoğan; seizing more executive power and putting democracy itself in grave peril.A few times he inverted former president John F Kennedy’s famous phrase to warn that today it’s no longer “ask not what your country can do for you. It’s what you can do for Donald Trump.”He acknowledged that the public want Democrats to do more. But he insisted that can only go so far and, as during the civil rights movement, the American people must rise up. He frequently referred to a “moral moment” and invoked the late congressman John Lewis, famed for causing “good trouble”.“This is not who we are or how we do things in America,” Booker said. “How much more can we endure before we, as a collective voice, say enough is enough? Enough is enough. You’re not going to get away with this.”The Senate chamber contains 100 wooden desks and brown leather chairs on a tiered semicircular platform. For most of the marathon nearly all the seats were empty and only a handful of reporters were in the press gallery.But Democrat Chris Murphy accompanied Booker throughout his speech. “We’ve passed the 15-hour mark,” Booker observed. “I want to thank Senator Murphy because he’s been here at my side the entire time.”Other Democrats took turns to show up in solidarity, asking if Booker would accept a question. He agreed, reading from a note to ensure he got the wording right: “I yield for a question while retaining the floor.”Occasionally he would quip: “I have the floor. So much power, it’s going to my head!”Just after 10.30am Schumer, the minority leader, told Booker: “Your strength, your fortitude, your clarity has just been nothing short of amazing and all of America is paying attention to what you’re saying. All of America needs to know there’s so many problems, the disastrous actions of this administration.”They discussed Medicaid cuts before Booker responded: “You heaped so many kind things on me. But never before in the history of America has a man from Brooklyn said so many complimentary things about a man in Newark.”Angela Alsobrooks, the first Black senator from Maryland, entered the chamber, caught Booker’s eye and raised a clenched fist in a shared act of resistance.As Booker approached the 24-hour mark, most Senate Democrats took their seats and Democrats from the House of Representatives, including minority leader Hakeem Jeffries, sat or stood in the chamber. The public and press galleries swelled.Booker once again channelled Lewis, the civil rights hero. “I don’t know what John Lewis would say, but John Lewis would do something. He would say something. What we will have to repent for is not the words and violent actions for bad people, but the appalling silence and inaction of good people. This is our moral moment.”As Booker closed in on Thurmond’s record, Murphy noted that this speech was very different. “Today you are standing not in the way of progress but of retreat,” he told his friend.Booker commented: “I could break this record of the man who tried to stop the rights upon which I stand. I’m not here, though, because of his speech; I’m here despite his speech. I’m here because as powerful as he was, the people were more powerful.”Even when the record was beaten he carried on. “I want to go a little bit past this and then I’m going to deal with some of the biological urgencies I’m feeling,” he said.Finally, after 25 hours and four minutes, Booker declared: “This is a moral moment. It’s not left or right. It’s right or wrong. Madam President, I yield the floor.”Again the chamber erupted in cheers and Democrats mobbed their new unofficial leader. No one who was there will ever forget it. Booker had delivered a vivid portrait of a great nation breaking promises to its people, betraying overseas allies and sliding off a cliff towards authoritarianism. He had also made a persuasive case that an inability to do everything should not undermine an attempt to do something.His was a primal scream of resistance. More

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      Cory Booker’s anti-Trump speech on Senate floor enters 21st hour – live

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      Cory Booker, the Democratic senator from New Jersey, has now spoken for 21 hours on the Senate floor in opposition to the Trump administration.Booker has used his speaking slot to decry the Trump administration’s spending cuts, its attempt to abolish the Department of Education, the president’s attempts to bypass the judicial system and the removal of people from the US who speak out against the administration.He began his speech at 7pm ET on Monday night and will pass the 21-hour mark at 4pm on Tuesday. Booker has had help from Democratic colleagues, who have been asking him questions that have allowed him to have a break without yielding the floor.Booker is getting close to the all-time Senate record. In 1957, Strom Thurmond spoke for 24 hours and 18 minutes to filibuster the Civil Rights Act of the same year.During a Fox News interview this afternoon, Elon Musk made a last-minute appeal to Wisconsin voters in support of state supreme court candidate Brad Schimel.“A judge race, election in Wisconsin will decide whether or not the Democrats can gerrymander Wisconsin in order to remove two House seats from Republican to Democrat,” Musk said. “If you know people in Wisconsin, call them right now.”Republicans including Musk and President Donald Trump have backed Schimel, a former state attorney general, in hopes of turning the 4-3 supreme court conservative. Musk traveled to Wisconsin over the weekend, where he handed out $1m checks to two voters.A Pennsylvania man has filed a lawsuit against Elon Musk claiming the billionaire reneged on payments promised to canvassers during the 2024 election, the New York Times reports.Filed as a class action against Musk and his super PAC, the suit alleges Musk failed to pay the claimant $20,000 he was owed for collecting signatures.Musk told Pennsylvanians he’d pay $100 to those willing to sign petitions supporting free speech and gun ownership rights, and $47 for each signatory recruited, an amount raised to $100 in the final days of the election.Thousands are tuning in to watch Cory Booker hold the Senate floor as his marathon speech against the “grave and urgent” danger posed by the Trump administration closes in on the 22-hour mark.Just before 5pm ET more than 71,500 were watching along from Booker’s live feed on Youtube. Meanwhile, several news organizations, including AP, PBS, CBS – and of course the Guardian – had feeds of their own. Others tuned in through C-SPAN.Booker began speaking on Monday evening, vowing to remain on the Senate floor as long as he was “physically able”. His speech has already become one of the longest in Senate history.“These are not normal times in our nation,” Booker said as he launched into his speech. “And they should not be treated as such in the United States Senate. The threats to the American people and American democracy are grave and urgent, and we all must do more to stand against them.”National security leaders, including White House national security adviser Mike Waltz, conducted government business over personal Gmail accounts, the Washington Post reports.The Post cites documents it reviewed and interviews with three US officials that showed members of Donald Trump’s National Security Council had used the commercial email service, which is less secure than Signal, the service Waltz and other Trump administration officials used to coordinate a bombing attack on Yemen last week.“A senior Waltz aide used the commercial email service for highly technical conversations with colleagues at other government agencies involving sensitive military positions and powerful weapons systems relating to an ongoing conflict,” the Post reports. “While the NSC official used his Gmail account, his interagency colleagues used government-issued accounts, headers from the email correspondence show.”It continues: “Waltz has had less sensitive, but potentially exploitable information sent to his Gmail, such as his schedule and other work documents, said officials, who, like others, spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe what they viewed as problematic handling of information. The officials said Waltz would sometimes copy and paste from his schedule into Signal to coordinate meetings and discussions”We’ve been watching today as New Jersey senator Cory Booker enters his 21st hour of speaking during a marathon address designed to “disrupt” the “normal business of the United States Senate for as long as” he is physically able. Here’s what else is going on across the country.

      Voters are casting their ballots in Wisconsin and Florida in elections that may prove a symbol of Donald Trump’s popularity and Elon Musk’s clout.

      Elon Musk’s so-called “department of government efficiency” is finalizing its shuttering of the US Agency for International Development, ordering the firings of thousands of local workers and US diplomats and civil servants assigned to the agency overseas.

      Thousands of Health and Human Services (HHS) employees across the country are being dismissed as the Trump administration began implementing its controversial workforce reduction plan. The plan could see 10,000 staff removed from the department.

      The firings at HHS have included staff who were working on the Food and Drug Administration’s bird flu response, Reuters reports.

      Congressman Jerry Nadler, a New York Democrat, has issued a statement strongly condemning the Trump administration for cancelling $400m in federal grants and contracts to Columbia Universitybecause of what it alleged was the college’s repeated failure to protect students from antisemitic harassment.

      US attorney general Pam Bondi announced that she has directed federal prosecutors to seek the death penalty for Luigi Mangione, the man accused of murdering UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson outside a Manhattan hotel in December.

      Republican House speaker Mike Johnson failed to block a bipartisan effort to change House rules to allow new parents in Congress to vote remotely after the birth of a child. The proxy vote resolution has been led by Anna Paulina Luna of Florida and Democratic congresswoman Brittany Pettersen of Colorado.
      Cory Booker, the Democratic senator from New Jersey, has now spoken for 21 hours on the Senate floor in opposition to the Trump administration.Booker has used his speaking slot to decry the Trump administration’s spending cuts, its attempt to abolish the Department of Education, the president’s attempts to bypass the judicial system and the removal of people from the US who speak out against the administration.He began his speech at 7pm ET on Monday night and will pass the 21-hour mark at 4pm on Tuesday. Booker has had help from Democratic colleagues, who have been asking him questions that have allowed him to have a break without yielding the floor.Booker is getting close to the all-time Senate record. In 1957, Strom Thurmond spoke for 24 hours and 18 minutes to filibuster the Civil Rights Act of the same year.First lady Melania Trump spoke at the International Women of Courage Award ceremony on Tuesday where she spoke about courage as “a strength that is based in love”.Trump, during a rare public appearance at the state department, recognized eight women from around the world for bravery, including an Israeli woman who was held hostage by Hamas. She said:
      I have harnessed the power of love as a source of strength during challenging times. Love has inspired me to embrace forgiveness, nurture empathy and exhibit bravery in the face of unforeseen obstacles.
      Congressman Jerry Nadler, a New York Democrat, has issued a statement strongly condemning the Trump administration for cancelling $400m in federal grants and contracts to Columbia Universitybecause of what it alleged was the college’s repeated failure to protect students from antisemitic harassment.The administration announced on Monday that a federal antisemitism taskforce is also reviewing more than $255m in contracts between Harvard University and the federal government, as well as $8.7bn in grant commitments to Harvard and its affiliates.“I strongly condemn former President Trump’s latest attacks on higher education cloaked under the guise of fighting antisemitism,” Nadler said in his statement on Tuesday.
      Withholding funding from Columbia and, potentially, Harvard will not make Jewish students safer … Make no mistake. Trump’s actions are not rooted in genuine concern for combatting hate.
      Nadler noted that the president’s record “is stained by praise for neo-Nazis, Holocaust deniers, and white nationalists”, adding:
      I call on our nation’s universities to reject President Trump’s demands and to fight back against these hostile acts. If necessary, these issues must be litigated in federal court to put an end to the illegal and unconstitutional actions taken by the Trump Administration.
      From Sam Levine in New York and Ashley Spencer in Daytona Beach, Florida:Andrew Julius, a veteran, cast his vote for Josh Weil, a Democrat, at the John Dickerson Community Center on Tuesday in a special election to determine who will replace Mike Waltz, the US national security adviser.
      I’m actually a fan of Josh Weil. I listened to him talk. I actually went to one of his town halls a couple of weeks ago at the church and I was like, all right, he seems like an educated person. He’s a teacher, level headed, doesn’t have those crazy conspiracy thoughts.
And so I felt comfortable saying, okay, I can vote for this guy instead of not voting at all.
      A former sonar technician in the navy, Julius said he was concerned over the recent disclosure that top Trump administration officials had used Signal to communicate about sensitive bombing plans in Yemen. He said:
      I had a top secret security clearance with my job in the Navy because I was a sonar tech. So we had to have a security clearance, and if I would have done just a fraction of a mistake or what was done with this whole Signal-gate fiasco, I would have been court martialed. I would have been court martialed, kicked out of the Navy, lost rank, lost pay.
      “It’s really concerning that no one has even taken responsibility like, hey, we messed up. That was a mistake. We shouldn’t have done that,” he added.The district is solidly Republican, and the GOP candidate, Randy Fine, is still the favorite to win. But recent polling has shown that the race may be closer than expected, prompting some Republican skittishness.Republican House speaker Mike Johnson tried – and failed – to block a bipartisan effort to change House rules to allow new parents in Congress to vote remotely after the birth of a child.The House, in a 206-222 procedural vote, fell short of the votes needed to adopt a rule that included language blocking a proxy vote resolution led by Republican congresswoman Anna Paulina Luna of Florida and Democratic congresswoman Brittany Pettersen of Colorado.“If we don’t do the right thing now, it’ll never be done,” said Luna, who gave birth to her son in 2023.Pettersen, with a diaper over her shoulder and her four-month-old son in her arms, pleaded with House colleagues. “It is unfathomable that in 2025 we have not modernized Congress,” she said. “We’re asking you to continue to stand with us.”Elon Musk’s cost-cutting team is finalizing the dismantlement of the US Agency for International Development, ordering the firings of thousands of local workers and US diplomats and civil servants assigned to the agency overseas, two former top USAID officials and a source with knowledge of the situation said on Tuesday.On Friday, Congress was notified that almost all of USAID’s own employees were being fired by September, all of its overseas offices shut, and some functions absorbed into the state department.The latest move by Musk’s so-called “department of government efficiency” will in effect eliminate what is left of the agency’s workforce.The Trump administration has fired staff who were working on the Food and Drug Administration’s bird flu response as part of its mass layoffs at the Department of Health and Human Services, Reuters reports.Among those fired today were leadership and administrative staff at the FDA’s Center for Veterinary Medicine, the news agency writes, citing a source.The center’s Veterinary Laboratory Investigation and Response Network tests raw pet food for bird flu. In recent weeks, the FDA has issued several pet food recalls after detecting bird flu contamination.The move will bring operations at the laboratory network to a halt, the source told Reuters.As egg prices have reached record highs, about a third of American consumers have stopped buying them in response to the rising costs, a new study suggests.According to research from Clarify Capital, 34% of Americans have stopped purchasing eggs as prices for the breakfast staple are becoming less affordable. On average, these consumers say they won’t begin buying eggs again until costs come down to $5 or less for a carton.The report compared the average price of eggs across all US states, observing a significant jump in 2018, when the average was $1.49. In 2025, that figure is sitting at about $5.18.The study found that nearly 95% of Americans have noticed the significant rise in egg prices, with shoppers reporting their perceived average as $7 a dozen. The average American said they would stop buying eggs when prices hit $8 a dozen.A comedian whose skit for White House reporters was canceled for fear of upsetting Donald Trump skewered the journalists who dropped her in a biting late-night talk show routine mocking their perceived subservience to the president.“I thought when people take away your rights, erase your history and deport your friends, you’re supposed to call it out. But I was wrong,” Amber Ruffin said during a brief appearance Monday on NBC’s Late Night With Seth Meyers.
      Glad to find that out now, because if they had let me give that speech, ooh baby… I would have been so terrifically mean.
      Ruffin was dropped at the weekend from the 26 April White House Correspondents’ Association (WHCA) dinner when the group decided its “focus is not on the politics of division”.As a comedy writer for Meyers and host of her own chat show on Peacock, Ruffin has frequently mocked or criticized Trump and his actions.When asked about more possible dismissals in the federal government, White House press secretary, Karoline Leavitt, said:
      “The President has given the responsibility to his Cabinet secretaries to hire and fire at their respective agencies, and they reserve that right. You saw the Secretary of Health and Human Services announced more layoffs today. This is all part of the administration’s effort for a mass reduction in force in the federal bureaucracy here in Washington DC, to save American taxpayers money.”
      Ashley Spencer reports on the ground from Florida:At the Church of Christ in Daytona Beach, voters lined up to vote in Florida’s special election to replace Rep. Mike Waltz after he was appointed Trump’s national security advisor. At the church, Trump bumper stickers dotted the parking lot. But the campaign for Democratic candidate Josh Weil had a more robust table set up with flyers and resources than that of Republican Randy Fine, who is favored to win.“Calling all immigrants or noncitizens ‘illegal’ or calling them ‘criminals’ is insane,” said Victor Valentin, who volunteered for a political campaign for the first time and on behalf of Weil. “I’m a Hispanic man from Puerto Rico, and those are my fellow Hispanic folks also. These are great people that come here to work hard. They come here to educate their kids.”Meanwhile, a Fine campaign volunteer wore a shirt with Trump’s mugshot that said Never Surrender. The former Democrat said he supported Trump and key ally Elon Musk. “I want him to do what he’s trying to do,” he said of Musk. “Anybody who’s not happy with him is either brainwashed or a crook.”California attorney general Rob Bonta sent letters to 15 insurance companies reminding them that under AB 571, they cannot deny, cancel, or increase premiums on malpractice insurance for medical providers who offer abortion, contraception, or gender-affirming care in California.The letter sent to insurers requests proof of compliance, and Bonta also issued a general industry alert.“California has been and remains committed to protecting the right to choose and the right of individuals to access necessary medical care,” said Bonta. “Licensed providers that offer reproductive and gender-affirming care too often face significant obstacles in securing malpractice insurance — the California Legislature passed, and the Governor signed into law, AB 571 to tear down those barriers.”Leavitt was asked about the error regarding a Salvadoran national with protected legal status who was deported to El Salvador last month, despite his legal protections. The Trump administration acknowledged in court that his deportation was due to an “administrative error”.
      “The error you’re referring to was a clerical error,” Leavitt said on Tuesday. “It was an administrative error. The administration maintains the position that this individual, who was deported to El Salvador and will not be returning to our country, was a member of the brutal and vicious MS-13 gang.” More

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      US House Democrat blasts Trump for using ‘antisemitism’ to attack universities

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      The representative Jerry Nadler of New York has slammed Donald Trump’s crackdown on American universities in the name of fighting antisemitism, saying that withholding federal funding from schools will “not make Jewish students safer”.In a statement issued on Tuesday, the Democratic representative said he condemned Trump’s “latest attacks on higher education cloaked under the guise of fighting antisemitism”.“Once again, the president is weaponizing the real pain American Jews face to advance his desire to wield control over the truth-seeking academic institutions that stand as a bulwark against authoritarianism,” Nadler said.Last month, the Trump administration pulled $400m in federal grants and contracts from Columbia University over what it alleged to be the college’s failure to protect students from antisemitic harassment on campus tied to the pro-Palestinian campus protests of the last 18 months.Several weeks later, the university agreed to a series of changes put forth by the Trump administration as a pre-condition for restoring the funding.In recent weeks, the Trump administration has warned at least 60 other universities of possible action over alleged failure to comply with federal civil rights laws regarding antisemitism. On Monday, it announced a review of $9bn in federal contracts and grants awarded to Harvard University, over similar allegations that it failed to address issues of antisemitism on campus.In his statement on Tuesday, Nadler said that “withholding funding from Columbia and, potentially, Harvard will not make Jewish students safer”.“Cutting funding to programs that work to cure cancer and make other groundbreaking discoveries will not make Jewish students safer,” he said. “Impounding congressionally appropriated funding will not make Jewish students safer.”“Trump’s ‘review’ is part of a larger effort to silence universities and intimidate those who challenge the Maga agenda,” the representative added, describing it as “a dangerous and politically motivated move that risks stifling free thought and academic inquiry”.Nadler continued: “Make no mistake. Trump’s actions are not rooted in genuine concern for combatting hate. If Trump were truly committed to fighting antisemitism, he would not have crippled the Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights, the only agency specifically tasked with enforcing anti-discrimination laws at our nation’s educational institutions.”The administration’s campaign to weaken universities perceived as bastions of leftism, along with Columbia’s apparent willingness to accept Trump’s terms for restoring funding, has prompted anxiety that academic freedom in the US is facing an unprecedented crisis.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotion“We cannot allow Trump’s authoritarian tactics to prevail – this is not the America we want to live in, nor is it the America we need,” Nadler’s statement said.He urged US universities to reject demands from the Trump administration and to “fight back against these hostile acts”. Experts have pointed out that Columbia had strong grounds to sue in order to stop the cuts, and have expressed surprise that the university opted not to pursue them.“If necessary, these issues must be litigated in federal court to put an end to the illegal and unconstitutional actions taken by the Trump administration,” Nadler said. More

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      Capitol Hill hearing on ‘censorship industrial complex’ under Biden based on ‘fiction’, says expert

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      A Capitol Hill hearing held to explore supposed government censorship under Joe Biden was based on a “fiction”, a leading expert on countering online disinformation told members of Congress on Tuesday.Nina Jankowicz, head of the American Sunlight Project, a pro-democracy organization, went on the offensive at a House of Representatives foreign relations subcommittee meeting held to examine the existence of an alleged “censorship industrial complex”, which Republicans claim was established to stifle rightwing views on social media, rather than combat foreign propaganda, as officially stated.Having been labeled a “spearhead” and “tsarina” of such efforts by the committee’s Republican chair, Bill Huizenga, Jankowicz – who briefly led the Department of Homeland Security’s disinformation unit under the Biden administration – said the hearing was being held at a time when Donald Trump was attempting aggressive free speech restrictions.“The premise of this hearing, the so called censorship industrial complex, is a fiction that has not only had profound impacts on my life and safety, but on our national security,” she said in her opening statement at a fractious hearing that exposed the width of the chasm between Republicans and Democrats on the issue.“More alarmingly, this fiction is itself suppressing speech and stymieing critical research that protects our country.“I want to acknowledge the irony that we’re having this discussion as we witness an assault on the first amendment we have not seen in decades. The Trump administration has directed far more egregious violations of our constitution than the imagined actions of the Biden administration on which this hearing is premised.”She singled out the detention and attempted deportation of Rumeysa Ozturk, a doctoral student at Tufts University, who wrote an opinion article critical of Israel’s bombardment of Gaza, which she compared to the actions of authoritarian regimes in Russia, Belarus and Hungary.Republicans have used their control of the House and Senate to stage a series of hearings in different congressional committees on the alleged existence of a censorship complex – whose name derives from the military industrial complex described by president Dwight Eisenhower in his farewell speech before leaving the White House in 1961. Opponents dismiss the notion as a conspiracy theory.The committee hearings have coincided with the Trump administration’s dismantling of safeguards designed to stop the spread of influence and disinformation in cyberspace by Russia in particular, but also widely attributed to China and Iran.Even before Trump returned to office, the Republican-controlled Congress declined last December to renew the mandate of the state department’s global engagement center (GEC), the leading government agency fighting Russian and Chinese propaganda.Huizenga, a representative from Michigan, called on two other witnesses, Matt Taibbi and Benjamin Weingarten, to support the Republican contention that the body had been subverted to instead suppress rightwing opinion in America.As evidence, Taibbi, a former Rolling Stone journalist who was among the recipients of the so-called “Twitter files” released by Elon Musk, the platform’s owner, to show evidence of alleged censorship, cited the case of Alex Berenson, a former New York Times journalist.Berenson had been expelled from platform following White House pressure after posting that the Covid-19 vaccine did not prevent infection or the virus’s transmission, Taibbi claimed.Weingarten, a senior fellow at the Claremont Institute, a rightwing thinktank, condemned the GEC as a “truth squad … designed to suppress any information that countered national policy and to identify people who may have had opinions that were controversial or unwanted as foreign inspire”.Democrats lined up to denounce the hearing as “hypocrisy” and “waste of taxpayers money” in light of the Trump administration’s attempts to deport foreign students who had expressed pro-Palestinian views, moves that Jankowicz said violated the US constitution first amendment, which protects free speech.Sydney Kamlager-Dove, the subcommittee’s ranking Democrat, said the hearing was “out of touch with the concerns of everyday Americans.“I’ve been to the state department, and I do have concerns about censorship – – censorship of the employees who are terrified to say the wrong thing, to say anything, or have the wrong word in their job title and be terminated by an administration that publicly relishes punishing people for their speech,” she said. “If we want to talk about censorship, we should begin with Trump’s unprecedented assault on the first amendment and rule of law.”Keith Self, a Republican representative from Texas, provoked anger among Democrats by appearing to liken the Biden administration’s anti-disinformation efforts to steps by the Nazi to construct public opinion in 1930s Germany.“A direct quote from Joseph Goebbels [the Nazi propaganda minister]: ‘It is the absolute right of the state to supervise the formation of public opinion,’ and I think that may be what we’re discussing here,” he said. 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      House revolt over Republican bid to stop new parents from voting by proxy

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      An attempt by Republican leaders to stop new parents from voting by proxy sparked a bipartisan mutiny in the House of Representatives on Tuesday, during which a small group of GOP lawmakers joined with all Democrats to obstruct a key procedural motion and paralyze the chamber.The revolt was the first legislative setback Republicans have faced since Donald Trump returned to the White House with the GOP holding a slim majority in Congress’s lower chamber. It also delayed consideration of House speaker Mike Johnson’s legislative agenda for the week, which included a bill to stop federal judges from issuing nationwide injunctions – as several have done for Trump’s executive orders – and to require proof of citizenship to vote.Fueling the split was an attempt by the Republican Anna Paulina Luna and the Democrat Brittany Pettersen to force consideration of a measure allowing new parents to temporarily designate someone else to vote in their place. House leaders attempted an unusual parliamentary tactic to prevent the proposal from going forward, but were blocked by the votes of all 213 Democrats and nine Republicans.“I think that today is a pretty historical day for the entire conference. It’s showing that the body has decided that parents deserve a voice in Washington,” Luna said after the vote, though it remains unclear when the chamber will consider allowing proxy voting.Cradling her infant son, Pettersen referred to a fellow lawmaker who just announced she was pregnant: “I’m really excited to think that she will not go through what we went through on trying to make sure that we’re representing our constituents and taking care of our baby.”“It’s all worth it – changing Congress for the better,” the Colorado lawmaker added.The House’s then Democratic leadership allowed lawmakers to vote remotely after Covid broke out, but Republicans ended that policy after they took control of the chamber two years ago. In an interview with National Public Radio last week, Johnson described himself and the GOP as “pro-family” but said he opposed a return of proxy voting.“We want to make it as easy as possible for young parents to be able to participate in the process,” the speaker said. “But proxy voting, in my view, is unconstitutional.”Pettersen and Luna had managed to attract 218 signatures, including 12 Republicans, to a discharge petition, which forces a vote on a bill even if leadership objects. In response, GOP lawmakers on Friday inserted language blocking the petition in a rule that would have to pass the House in order to begin consideration of the bills targeting nationwide injunctions and requiring proof of citizenship to vote.“Congress is defined as ‘act of coming together and meeting’. I’ve never voted by proxy, because I believe it undermines the fabric of that sacred act of convening,” said the Republican Virginia Foxx, the chair of the rules committee, who added she feared the measure would pave the way for a return of universal proxy voting if Democrats retake control.“I know there’s a new laptop class in America that seems to operate increasingly in a virtual space, but that’s simply not a fact of life for most American workers, and I believe Congress should live by that standard.”Elected in 2022 to a Florida gulf coast district, Luna was a member of the far-right House Freedom caucus, but reportedly left on Monday after several of her counterparts backed leadership’s efforts to block her petition. In a speech on the House floor, Luna called herself “one of the most conservative members of this body” but said she viewed the issue as important enough to risk upending the House’s business for the week.“For almost two years now in this cause, I’ve met with leadership, and I’ve exhausted all tools in my legislative toolkit to to be able to bring this to the floor,” she said. “For a while we’ve had the majority, and we’ve had the ability to bring legislation to the floor on election integrity and also to call out rogue judges, and yet they chose at this point in time to tie this discharge petition killer to this rule that would also permanently paint me and the members supporting it.”The episode was reminiscent of the infighting that gripped the House GOP during Joe Biden’s presidency, which climaxed when a small group of Republicans collaborated with the Democrats to oust Kevin McCarthy as House speaker.Democratic lawmakers, who are still reeling from their party’s underwhelming performance in last November’s elections, broke into applause in the House chamber after the rule was voted down. The House then announced that no further votes were expected for the remainder of the week, though Pettersen said that her petition must be voted on by Thursday, raising the possibility that lawmakers will reassemble. More

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      Cory Booker holds marathon Senate speech to warn of Trump’s ‘harmful’ policies

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      Cory Booker, the Democratic US senator from New Jersey, has embarked on a marathon speech on the Senate floor to warn of what he called the “grave and urgent” danger that Donald Trump’s presidential administration poses to democracy and the American people.Booker began his speech at 7pm on Monday night and passed the 20-hour mark with barely a break in speaking at 3 pm on Tuesday afternoon.“I rise with the intention of disrupting the normal business of the United States Senate for as long as I am physically able,” Booker said near the start of his speech. “I rise tonight because I believe sincerely that our nation is in crisis.”Booker said that he has heard endless stories of “pain and fear” from constituents who are both Democrats and Republicans due to the Trump administration’s policies.“Institutions that are special in America, that are unique in our country are being recklessly – and I would say unconstitutionally – affected, attacked and even shattered,” Booker said.“In just 71 days the president of the United States has inflicted so much harm on Americans’ safety, financial stability, the core foundations of our democracy and even our aspirations as a people for, from our highest offices, a sense of common decency.“These are not normal times in America and they should not be treated as such. I can’t allow this body to continue without doing something. The threats to America’s democracy are grave and urgent.”Booker’s speech is not technically a filibuster as he is not trying to run down the Senate’s time to prevent a piece of legislation from passing.Instead, he has used his speaking slot to decry the Trump administration’s spending cuts, its attempt to abolish the Department of Education, the president’s attempts to bypass the judicial system and the removal of people from the US who speak out against the administration.Booker’s speech has been supported with reams of quotes from speeches by the late American politicians John McCain and John Lewis, as well as excerpts from newspaper articles.Some of the senator’s fellow Democrats have helped support him during his monologues, with several asking questions that have allowed Booker to have a break without yielding the floor.The Democratic Senate minority leader, Chuck Schumer, was the first to pose a question to his New Jersey colleague, and he praised Booker for his “strength and conviction”.“You’re taking the floor tonight to bring up all these inequities that will hurt people, that will so hurt the middle class, that will so hurt poor people, that will hurt America, hurt our fiscal conditions, as you document,” Schumer said in his own question to Booker.“Just give us a little inkling of the strength – give us a little feeling for the strength and conviction that drive you to do this unusual taking of the floor for a long time to let the people know how bad these things are going to be.”At one point, Booker spoke about the need for bipartisanship and mentioned a recent dinner he had with Ted Cruz, the arch-conservative Republican senator from Texas. Cruz is no stranger to marathon speeches, having spoken for more than 21 hours in 2013 in an attempt to filibuster an expansion of Medicaid eligibility. At one point, Cruz read from Green Eggs and Ham, the Dr Seuss children’s book.Around his 20th hour of speaking, Booker offered an apology to his fellow Democrats for the current political climate, saying: “I confess that I’ve been inadequate. That the Democrats have been responsible for allowing the rise of this demagogue.”Booker is getting close to the all-time Senate record. In 1957, Strom Thurmond spoke for 24 hours and 18 minutes to filibuster the Civil Rights Act of the same year. More

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      Senate Republicans consider joining Democrats to oppose Trump over tariffs

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      On the eve of Donald Trump’s so-called “liberation day” for tariffs, a handful of Senate Republicans are debating whether to defy the president and join Democrats to stop the US from imposing levies on Canadian imports.The resolution, offered by the Democratic senator Tim Kaine of Virginia, would terminate the emergency order that Trump is using to justify tariffs against Canada, citing the flow of fentanyl across the US’s northern border. The vote is largely symbolic – the House is not expected to take up the measure – but several defections would amount to a rare and notable rebuke of the president by his own party.Senator Susan Collins, a Republican of Maine, which shares a border with Canada, told reporters on Monday night that imposing tariffs on Canada was a “huge mistake” that would cause major “disruption in the economies of both countries”. The senator, one of the few Republicans with a history of breaking ranks, indicated her support for the “intent” of the resolution and suggested that she would likely lend her vote as well.Senator Rand Paul, a Republican from Kentucky, has co-sponsored the legislation. Meanwhile, several other Republican senators, including Thom Tillis of North Carolina, have expressed concern over the impact of tariffs on Canadian goods, set to go into effect on 2 April.Republican leaders on Tuesday were racing to keep their senators in line, as Trump moves quickly to upend the global trading system. In a post on his social media platform, Truth Social, Trump lashed out at Kaine, who was Hillary Clinton’s running mate in 2016, and delivered an all-caps demand that Senate Republicans vote to keep the national emergency in effect so we can “finish the job”.“Don’t let the Democrats have a Victory,” Trump wrote. “It would be devastating for the Republican Party and, far more importantly, for the United States.”In an interview with the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation on Tuesday, Kaine said Trump’s tariffs on Canada amounted to the “largest sales tax ever in the history of the United States” and were based on claims of a “fake” emergency at the northern border. The senator pointed to recent congressional testimony by Trump’s director of national intelligence, Tulsi Gabbard, who cited fentanyl as a top threat to US national security but acknowledged that Canada was not a significant source of trafficking into the country.“It is an invented rationale to allow the president to do what he wants to do, which is use tariffs to collect revenues so that he can use that revenue to pay for a big tax cut for the rich,” Kaine said. He was hopeful a strong bipartisan show of support “could have an effect on curbing the president’s behavior”.A vote on the resolution could come as early as Tuesday afternoon, but may happen on Wednesday as Senator Cory Booker, Democrat of New Jersey, delivers a marathon speech on the floor to protest – and draw attention to – the Trump administration’s tumultuous opening months.In the CBC interview, Kaine said he was still working to get the support of all 47 Democrats, while indicating that he expected to win a handful of Republican votes.Trump – a self-described “tariff man” who believes levies are the answer to many economic woes – is also challenging Republican orthodoxy on free trade, leaving a handful of GOP senators torn between swallowing a policy they disagree with or opposing the president.He has moved aggressively to slap tariffs on allies, neighbors and top trading partners, provoking retaliation and shaking global markets. Trump has said he would roll out the new tariffs on Wednesday, claiming the taxes on imports from other countries will “liberate” Americans from their reliance on foreign goods.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionFears of a global trade war have hurt consumer confidence and caused wild swings in the stock markets. They have also hurt Americans’ assessment of Trump’s job performance as it relates to the economy, once one of his biggest strengths. Just four in 10 Americans have a positive view of Trump’s handling of the economy and trade, according to a poll from the Associated Press-Norc Center for Public Affairs Research.Meanwhile, Americans are increasingly concerned about the implementation of sweeping tariffs on foreign goods, according to a survey conducted recently for the Guardian.House Republican leaders have pre-empted any effort to reverse Trump’s controversial tariffs on Canada, as well as Mexico and China, by slipping language into their stopgap funding bill, which passed earlier this month. The provision effectively removed the House’s ability to undo the tariffs by terminating Trump’s declaration of a national emergency.The Senate majority leader, John Thune, has argued that tariffs are an important negotiating tool Trump can use to combat fentanyl traffic into the US. He said this week that the case for tariffs remains “the same”. He was expected to publicly urge Senate Republicans to oppose Kaine’s resolution in a floor speech on Tuesday, according to the Daily Caller. More