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      ‘Fraud is fraud’: Georgia aims to ban AI deepfakes in political campaigns

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      When wrangling legislation, sometimes it’s best to sound out a problem in front of you.In Georgia, it sounds like the state senator Colton Moore. But it only sounds like Colton Moore.Todd Jones, a Republican state representative who chairs the Georgia house committee on technology and infrastructure innovation, has proposed legislation outlawing the use of artificial intelligence deepfakes in political communication. To illustrate the point, Jones presented a deepfake video to the judiciary committee using an AI image and audio of Moore and Mallory Staples, a former Republican congressional candidate who now runs a far-right activist organization, the Georgia Freedom caucus.The video uses an AI tool to impersonate the voices of Moore and Mallory falsely endorsing passage of the bill. The video contains a continuous disclaimer at the bottom citing the text of the bill.Moore and Mallory oppose the legislation.The AI impersonation of Moore says: “I would ask the committee: how is using my biometric data, like my voice and likeness, to create media supporting a policy that I clearly don’t agree with the first amendment right of another person?”The video continues: “The overwhelming number of Georgians believe the use of my personal characteristics against my will is fraud, but our laws don’t currently reflect that. If AI can be used to make Colton Moore speak in favor of a popular piece of legislation, it can be used to make any one of you say things you’ve never said.”Brad Thomas, the Republican co-sponsor of the bill and co-author of the video, said he and his colleagues used commonly available tools to create the video.“The particular one we used is, like, $50. With a $1,000 version, your own mother wouldn’t be able to tell the difference,” he said.The pace of advancement of visual AI generative tools is years ahead of the legislation needed to prevent abuses, Thomas said: “Cinematography-style video. Those individuals look absolutely real, and they’re AI-generated.”The bill passed out of committee on an 8-1 vote.Moore is not popular in Georgia’s legislative circles. His peers in the state senate threw him out of the Republican caucus in September, accusing him of making false statements about other conservatives while he was advocating fruitlessly for a special session to remove the Fulton county prosecutor Fani Willis from office.Last week, Moore was permanently barred from the Georgia house chamber after rhetorically attacking the late speaker at a memorial service being held on the house floor.Through the Georgia senate press office, Moore declined to comment.In social media posts, Moore has voiced opposition to this bill, which he said is an attack on “memes” used in political discourse, and that satire is protected speech.Staples, in newsletters to her supporters, cited the federal conviction of Douglass Mackey last year as an example of potential harms. Mackey, also known as the alt-right influencer “Rickey Vaughn”, sent mass text messages in November 2016 encouraging Black recipients to “vote by text” instead of casting a real vote, with the texts claiming they had been paid for by the Clinton campaign.Federal judges rejected Mackey’s first amendment arguments on the ground that the communications amounted to acts of fraud which were not constitutionally protected. Mackey was sentenced in October to serve seven months.House bill 986 creates the crimes of fraudulent election interference and soliciting fraudulent election interference, with penalties of two to five years in prison and fines up to $50,000.If within 90 days of an election, a person publishes, broadcasts, streams or uploads materially deceptive media – defined as appearing to depict a real individual’s speech or conduct that did not occur in reality and would appear to a reasonable person to be authentic – they would be guilty of a felony, as long as the media in question significantly influences the chances for a candidate or referendum to win, or confuses the administration of that election. Thus, it would also criminalize using deepfakes used to cast doubt on the results of an election.Deepfakes entered the 2024 election at its start, with an AI-generated audio call featuring Joe Biden telling New Hampshire voters not to vote. After the call, the Federal Communications Commission announced a ban on robocalls that use AI audio. But the Federal Elections Commission has yet to put rules in place for political ads that use AI, something watchdog groups have been calling for for months. Regulations are lagging behind the reality of AI’s capabilities to mislead voters.In the absence of federal elections rules for AI content, states have stepped in, filing and, in several instances, passing bills that typically require labels on political ads that use AI in some way. Without these labels, AI-generated content in political ads is considered illegal in most of the bills filed in states.Experts say AI audio, in particular, has the ability to trick voters because a listener loses context clues that might tip them off that a video is fake. Audio deepfakes of prominent figures, such as Trump and Biden, are easy and cheap to make using readily available apps. For less well-known people who often speak publicly and have a large volume of examples of their voices, like speeches or media appearances, people can upload these examples to train a deepfake clone of the person’s voice.Enforcement of the Georgia law might be challenging. Lawmakers struggled to find ways to rein in anonymous flyers and robocalls spreading misinformation and fraud ahead of elections long before the emergence of AI.“I think that’s why we gave concurrent jurisdiction to the attorney general’s office,” Thomas said. “One of the other things we’ve done is allow the [Georgia bureau of investigation] to investigate election issues. Between the horsepower of those two organizations, we have the highest likelihood of figuring out who did it.”Lawmakers are only just starting to get at the implications of AI. Thomas expects more legislation to emerge over the next few sessions.“Fraud is fraud, and that’s what this bill is coming down to,” Thomas said. “That’s not a first amendment right for anyone.”Rachel Leingang contributed reporting More

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      Skeptical America’s ‘Katespiracies’ fixation goes beyond a reasonable doubt

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      For a while, the “Katespiracies” were the most fun people have had on the internet in a long time.The whereabouts of the Princess of Wales after her planned abdominal surgery and subsequent recovery were not particularly high stakes, and so many reveled in the threads and group chats as the “what ifs” got wilder – the theories both more specific and more incredible at the same time.Some postured that Catherine had been replaced with a body double, had been photoshopped into photos not just now but for months, or maybe treated unjustly by an increasingly sinister Prince William. Or: could it be that the princess was dead?The royals did not help their own case. With each vague and defensive correspondence from Buckingham Palace confirming Catherine was actually fine and on track for a recovery by Easter, the online world doubled down.“The Princess of Wales has returned home to Windsor to continue her recovery from surgery. She is making good progress,” a Kensington Palace spokesperson said back in January. “The prince and princess wish to say a huge thank you to the entire team at the London Clinic, especially the dedicated nursing staff, for the care they have provided.”When the Associated Press noted that a photo of Catherine and her children had been doctored, presumably manipulated by the princess herself, the frantic cycle of speculation only escalated.For many it felt like a break from reality and a news cycle dominated by war and politics, and an exercise in collective creativity. It was Twitter/X at its funniest, and the common person working towards a common goal. (That, and the Timothée Chalamet meme.)Then, suddenly, it got dark.A video was released this week by the Sun of Catherine and William shopping near their home. The metadata confirmed the location and timing. In a normal world, this would be enough to slow the rumor mill. But of course, it wasn’t. Internet sleuths kept sleuthing.Why were the Christmas decorations still up in March? She didn’t look exactly like herself, did she? Why were all these videos so damn blurry?It was proof that nothing would satiate the hive mind in the post-truth world, a world where people are fed an onslaught of information, much of it true, some of it manufactured, and some of it somewhere in between. And when people are primed to believe something is false, there’s little one can do, short of maybe meeting the princess in person, that will put an end to the doubt.That matters far beyond what may – or may not – be going on with Britain’s future queen.The US is currently battling a deep distrust in institutions that, while fallible and constantly evolving, are actually founded in the public good – from the Department of Justice to the CDC. That distrust, paired with the ease of proliferating conspiracy theories, has made the ability to have civic discourse, or to report the truth, increasingly difficult. It gives way not to the most likely explanation, or the most fact-based – but the one that most fits with the narrative the court of public opinion has cultivated.There are many depressing versions of Katespiracies that hound Americans in the political world. For example: Ashley Biden’s (fake) diary, QAnon and pretty much anything to do with Anthony Fauci. How do you convince people who believe these hoaxes – which have been disproven many times over, that the real threat to their lives is losing critical social safety nets or birth control, herd immunity, or public education?It is true that the world is rife with misinformation, and blindly trusting those in power has never been a good idea. The royal family, specifically, has a long history of scandal and secrecy. And public institutions, similarly, owe us transparency and clarity.Yet three months of speculation on Catherine is a sign that healthy doubt and questioning can be easily replaced by the inability to accept any truth at all. In the absence of information, on any subject, we’ve now seen what can happen when the court of public opinion takes over the conversation. Even when the facts emerge, there’s a possibility that it will no longer matter. More

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      Netanyahu told Senate Republicans Gaza strategy would remain unchanged – as it happened

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      The Senate’s Democratic leader, Chuck Schumer, indicated he rejected a request from the Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, to address his lawmakers today.“When you make these issues partisan, you hurt the cause of Israel,” Schumer told reporters when asked if he turned down Netanyahu. US media outlets report that prime minister wanted to talk to Democratic senators during a closed-door meeting.Last week, Schumer, the highest-ranking Jewish elected official in the United States, broke with Netanyahu and called on Israel to hold new elections. He criticized the prime minister for the high civilian death toll in Gaza, and said Netanyahu was among a group of politicians and groups who were undermining efforts to implement a two-state solution to the crisis between Israel and Palestine.Texas has experienced a case of judicial whiplash, after the supreme court yesterday allowed its law giving police the power to arrest suspected illegal border crossers to go into effect. But just hours later, a federal appeals court blocked it again, and the matter seems set for further legal wrangling that may well wind up before the US supreme court at some point in the future. Back in Washington DC, the Democratic Senate majority leader, Chuck Schumer, indicated that he turned down a request from the Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, to address his lawmakers, warning that support for the country should not become “partisan”. But Republican senators were happy to hear from Netanyahu, who said the prime minister told them he had no plans to change his military strategy in Gaza.Here’s what else happened:
      House Republicans pressed on with the impeachment investigation of Joe Biden, while Democrats attacked their witnesses’ credibility, and one showed up in a Vladimir Putin mask.
      A Georgia judge allowed Donald Trump to appeal his ruling last week that prosecutor Fani Willis could stay on the election subversion case against him, but only if the special counsel Nathan Wade leaves.
      The Republican House speaker, Mike Johnson, said he understood where Trump was coming from when he accused Democratic Jews of hating Israel and their religion – comments that drew accusations of antisemitism.
      Biden announced new rules that could dramatically slash emissions from passenger cars and trucks to fight the climate crisis.
      A special election in California to replace the former House speaker Kevin McCarthy appears headed to a runoff between two Republicans, likely to Johnson’s chagrin.
      In an address to Senate Republicans, the Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, said he had no plans to change his military strategy in Gaza, Reuters reports.Netanyahu spoke to Republicans via videolink at their behind-closed-door lunch today, days after Chuck Schumer, the chamber’s Democratic majority leader, broke with him and called for new elections in Israel.“He’s going to do what he said he’s going to do. He’s going to finish it,” the Republican senator Jim Risch said after hearing from Netanyahu.Here’s more, from Reuters:
      Wednesday’s meeting underscored the politicization of Washington’s Israel policy. Netanyahu has long been aligned with Republicans, who accused Schumer of seeking to “overthrow” the Israeli leader.
      “We asked … him for an update and we got it on the war, on the release of the hostages and in the efforts to defeat Hamas. We told him Israel has every right to defend themselves and he said that’s exactly what they continue to do,” Senator John Barrasso said.
      Democratic leaders have been grappling with divisions in their party over the humanitarian catastrophe in Gaza five months into a war that began with attacks on Israel by Hamas militants on Oct. 7.
      …
      Risch, the top Republican on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, said Netanyahu had addressed civilian casualties and the need to get more aid into Gaza. He said Netanyahu was “very supportive” of plans to build a temporary pier and bring in aid by sea.
      “He’s very sensitive to the fact that every civilian casualty is a very unfortunate event,” Risch said.
      Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell said Netanyahu had made a presentation and then taken questions from senators.
      “I made it clear to him, that it’s not the business of the United States to be giving a democratic ally advice about when to have an election or what kind of military campaign they may be conducting,” McConnell told reporters.
      The aftershocks from Republican insurgents’ historic ouster of Kevin McCarthy as House speaker, and his subsequent resignation from Congress, continue to reverberate, notably in the race to replace him in his central California district.Vince Fong, a Republican California assemblyman, currently leads the official vote count after the Tuesday special election to replace McCarthy. But he does not appear to have won the 50% support necessary to avoid a runoff, meaning Fong will have to stand in May against whoever comes in second place. That is on course to be his fellow Republican Mike Boudreaux, with the Democratic candidate, Marisa Wood, trailing in third place – not much of a surprise, considering McCarthy’s former district is considered California’s most Republican.However that race ultimately turns out, the biggest loser last night may have been the Republican House speaker, Mike Johnson, who is trying to pass legislation with a tiny majority. Had Fong won, it would have given the speaker a sorely needed vote, but now he’ll have to wait till May to see McCarthy’s replacement seated.McCarthy’s decision to resign after being ousted from Republican leadership – which came a year after Nancy Pelosi left House Democratic leadership – comes amid a period of turnover in Golden State politics. The longtime Democratic US representatives Anna Eshoo, Tony Cárdenas and Grace Napolitano have also announced plans to step down.Two weeks after California’s primary, the race to replace Eshoo in her Bay Area district remains exceptionally close. Just two votes separate the Democratic candidates Evan Low, a state assemblyman, and Joe Simitian, a Santa Clara county supervisor, with ballot counting ongoing. The winner will advance to the November general election and face the Democrat Sam Liccardo, the former mayor of San Jose.Chuck Schumer’s public criticism of the Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, and his call for the country to hold elections came after months of deliberations, the Democratic Senate leader revealed to the New York Times this weekend.“I said to myself, ‘This may hurt me politically; this may help me politically.’ I couldn’t look myself in the mirror if I didn’t do it,” Schumer, who represents New York, said in an interview. He added that the point of his speech “was to say you can still love Israel and feel strongly about Israel and totally disagree with Bibi Netanyahu and the policies of Israel”.Schumer noted he spent about two months working on his speech, writing multiple drafts of an address intended to make clear he believed Netanyahu is “the fount of the problems”.The Senate leader has faced considerable criticism for his public break with Netanyahu, most notably from Republicans. Here’s more on that:The rift between the top Senate Democrat, Chuck Schumer, and the Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, became public suddenly, amid continuing reports of terrible humanitarian conditions in Gaza. Here’s the latest on that, from the Guardian’s Peter Beaumont:The accusation by the UN and other humanitarians that Israel may be committing a war crime by deliberately starving Gaza’s population is likely to significantly increase the prospect of legal culpability for the country, including at the international court of justice.Amid reports that the Israel Defense Forces are hiring dozens of lawyers to defend against anticipated cases and legal challenges, the charge that Israel has triggered a “man-made famine” by deliberately obstructing the entry of aid into Gaza is backed by an increasing body of evidence.Already facing a complaint of genocide from South Africa at the ICJ, the UN’s top court – including an allegation that senior Israeli political officials have incited genocide in public statements – Israel is also the subject of a provisional emergency ruling by the court ordering it to admit life-saving aid to Gaza.The Senate’s Democratic leader, Chuck Schumer, indicated he rejected a request from the Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, to address his lawmakers today.“When you make these issues partisan, you hurt the cause of Israel,” Schumer told reporters when asked if he turned down Netanyahu. US media outlets report that prime minister wanted to talk to Democratic senators during a closed-door meeting.Last week, Schumer, the highest-ranking Jewish elected official in the United States, broke with Netanyahu and called on Israel to hold new elections. He criticized the prime minister for the high civilian death toll in Gaza, and said Netanyahu was among a group of politicians and groups who were undermining efforts to implement a two-state solution to the crisis between Israel and Palestine.Pete Aguilar, chair of the House Democratic caucus, said that Donald Trump “doesn’t belong anywhere near the Oval Office” following the ex-president’s comments that there will be a “bloodbath” in the US if he loses the election.Aguilar said:
      He represents a clear and present danger to democracy. His comments over the weekend …should be taken both literally and seriously … Donald Trump would sacrifice our way of life in a heartbeat if he thought that it could bring him political power. He doesn’t belong anywhere near the Oval Office and don’t just take our word for it – the former VP, his former chief of staff, his former defense secretary, and his former secretary of state all agree.
      Here are more details from Punchbowl News on Chuck Schumer’s reported refusal to allow Benjamin Netanyahu to address the Senate Democratic caucus:According to Schumer, having Netanyahu address the caucus would “not be helpful to Israel”, Punchbowl News reports.The Senate majority leader, Chuck Schumer, has declined a request from the Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, to address the Senate Democratic Caucus, Punchbowl News reports.According to the outlet, Schumer said these conversations should not happen “in a partisan manner”.Netanyahu is scheduled to address Senate Republicans virtually during their lunch meeting today.Last week, Schumer sparked backlash from Republican leaders and Netanyahu’s Likud party after he called for new elections in Israel and criticized Netanyahu’s leadership.Since October, Israel’s war on Gaza has killed more than 31,000 Palestinians while forcibly displacing 2 million survivors across the narrow strip.Texas has experienced a case of judicial whiplash, after the supreme court yesterday allowed its law giving police the power to arrest suspected illegal border crossers to go into effect. But just hours later, a federal appeals court blocked it again, and the matter seems set for further legal wrangling that may well wind up before the supreme court at some point in the future. Back in Washington DC, Republicans pressed on with their impeachment investigation into Joe Biden, despite revelations that a key source for their unproven allegations received information from Russian intelligence. At a hearing of the House oversight committee, Democrats hammered the credibility of the GOP’s witnesses, and one lawmaker made the point by showing up in a Vladimir Putin mask.Here’s what else is happening:
      A Georgia judge allowed Donald Trump to appeal his ruling last week that prosecutor Fani Willis could stay on the election subversion case against him, but only if special counsel Nathan Wade leaves.
      The Republican House speaker, Mike Johnson, said he understood where Trump was coming from when he accused Democratic Jews of hating Israel and their religion – comments that drew accusation of antisemitism.
      Joe Biden announced new rules that could dramatically slash emissions from passenger cars and trucks to fight the climate crisis.
      Republicans invited two witnesses to today’s House oversight committee hearing: Tony Bobulinski and Jason Galanis, both former business associates of Hunter Biden.But only Bobulinski could actually show up, since Galanis is currently incarcerated for securities fraud.Bobulinski, meanwhile, has his own checkered past, one that the committee’s top Democrat Jamie Raskin made note of at the hearing:House Republicans have long clamored for Hunter Biden to appear before them.And while the president’s son did consent to a behind-closed-doors interview, NBC News reported that his lawyer last week told Republicans: “Mr Biden declines your invitation to this carnival side show.”So the oversight committee today left an empty seat with a placard reading “Mr Biden”, perhaps hoping he would make another surprise appearance:House Republicans appear to be pressing on with their impeachment inquiry into Joe Biden’s alleged corruption, even as they have yet to turn up evidence that the president benefited from his family members’ overseas business dealings.They’re also dealing with the fallout from revelations that an informant crucial to their case received information from Russian intelligence. But as the House oversight committee gathered for their latest hearing in the investigation, Democratic lawmaker Jared Moskowitz sought to remind them by showing up in a Vladimir Putin mask: More

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      Texas woman denied abortion decries ‘cruelty’ of Trump 15-week ban proposal

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      After Donald Trump voiced support for a 15-week national abortion ban, Joe Biden’s presidential campaign released an angry response from a Texas woman who nearly died due to that state’s anti-abortion measures, enduring a “nightmare” she said Trump created.“My family has been forever altered by the nightmare that Donald Trump created by overturning Roe,” Amanda Zurawski said.In June 2022, five rightwing US supreme court justices – three appointed by Trump – overturned Roe v Wade, the ruling that had guaranteed abortion rights at the federal level since 1973.The court’s Dobbs v Jackson ruling returned abortion rights to individual US states, allowing Republican-run states like Texas to impose severe restrictions.Zurawski, from Austin, sued the state of Texas after nearly dying during pregnancy, having at first been denied an abortion.“I nearly died because my doctor could not give me the care I needed,” she said on Wednesday, “and my ability to have children in the future has been forever compromised by the damage that was caused.”In post-Dobbs elections, Republican threats to reproductive rights have proved an effective campaign issue for Democrats. The Biden campaign has duly made protecting abortion rights a central part of its platform.As Trump campaigns to return to the White House, he must consider how loudly he can boast of his role in bringing down Roe while courting women, moderates and independents.His campaign previously denied reports that he had expressed support for a national ban at 16 weeks, which it called “fake news”.But on Tuesday, Trump told WABC radio, from New York: “We’re going to come up with a time – and maybe we could bring the country together on that issue.“The number of weeks now, people are agreeing on 15. And I’m thinking in terms of that. And it’ll come out to something that’s very reasonable. But people are really, even hardliners are agreeing … 15 weeks seems to be a number that people are agreeing at.”Polling shows most Americans believe abortion should be legal through the initial stages of pregnancy. According to an Associated Press-NORC poll last June, about half of US adults say abortions should be permitted at 15 weeks.Trump told WABC: “All the legal scholars on both sides agree: it’s a state issue. It shouldn’t be a federal issue, it’s a state issue.”He also said he supported exceptions for cases of rape, incest or threats to the life of the mother, because: “Here’s the problem, you have to win elections. And otherwise, you’d be right back where you started.”In her statement, Zurawski criticised press coverage of Trump’s remarks, saying: “Trump isn’t ‘signaling’, he isn’t ‘suggesting’, he isn’t ‘leaning toward’ anything – he is actively planning to ban abortion nationwide if he’s elected, inflicting the same cruelty and chaos I’ve experienced on the entire country.“We cannot allow that to happen.”The Associated Press contributed reporting More

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      ‘I need you back’: Biden visits western states in effort to firm up Latino vote

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      Joe Biden is on a three-day western US election campaign swing through Nevada, Arizona and Texas with a focus on personally appealing to Latino voters, saying they are the reason he defeated Donald Trump in 2020 and urging them to help him do it again in November.“I need you back,” he told several dozen supporters packed into a local Mexican restaurant in Phoenix, Arizona. And in an interview with the Spanish-language broadcaster Univision he blasted Trump as someone whose hardline policies and biased rhetoric are hostile to Hispanic voters.“This guy despises Latinos,” he told the TV channel. Biden was making appearances in Arizona on Wednesday then heading to Texas on Thursday, three weeks after he was at the Texas-Mexico border to talk about immigration in a region where Democrats have had some disappointing results in recent elections.Biden said the upcoming presidential election isn’t a referendum on him but a choice between “me and a guy named Trump” who campaigns by accusing people coming to the US from Mexico of being rapists and, in recent weeks, saying that migrants are “poisoning the blood of our country”.Biden said Hispanic unemployment is the lowest it has been in a long time because of his policies, highlighted administration initiatives to help small businesses and reduce gun violence, and criticized Trump for wanting more tax cuts for rich people.“He wants to get rid of all the programs we put together,” Biden said.Democrats’ latest efforts are crucial as key parts of Biden’s base, such as Black and Hispanic people, have become increasingly disenchanted with his performance in office.In an AP-NORC poll conducted in February, 38% approved of how Biden was handling his job. Nearly six in 10 Black people (58%) approved, compared with 36% of Hispanic people. Black people are more likely than white and Hispanic people to approve of Biden, but that approval has dropped in the three years since Biden took office.In Reno, Nevada, on Wednesday, the US president said he and Trump have a “different value set” and added: “I never heard a president say the things that he has said.”Nevada is among the roughly half-dozen battlegrounds that will determine the next president, and Washoe county is the lone swing county in the state.“We’re going to beat him again,” Biden said of Trump.Afterward, Biden flew to Las Vegas to promote his administration’s housing policies. In Phoenix on Wednesday, he will discuss his support of the computer chip manufacturing sector.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionTuesday’s appearances coincided with the launch of Latinos con Biden-Harris (Spanish for “Latinos with Biden-Harris”).Biden noted that Trump recently said migrants are “animals” and not people, and that the presumptive Republican nominee for the White House this November has pledged to carry out mass deportations.“We have to stop this guy, we can’t let this happen,” Biden said. “We are a nation of immigrants.”The Republican National Committee accused Democrats of taking the Hispanic community for granted.“Republicans will continue receiving with open arms thousands of Hispanics that are moving to our party, disappointed with Democrats and their policies, and will be fundamental to Republican victories all over the country in 2024,” said Jaime Florez, the party’s director of Hispanic outreach.The Associated Press contributed reporting More

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      Bernie Moreno: the Trump-convert firebrand targeting Ohio Senate seat

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      Bernie Moreno won a convincing victory in the Republican Senate primary in Ohio on Tuesday night ensuring that the firebrand rightwinger goes up against the Democrat Sherrod Brown in the vital race.Moreno’s victory sees the Trump-backed politician become the party’s standard-bearer against Brown in a contest that could decide control of the US Senate.But it also cast light on a controversial Democratic strategy of supporting extremist Republican candidates in party nomination races out of a belief they are easier to beat in the general election – thus upping the odds of a Democratic win, but also running the risk that those extremists could actually get elected.At 57, Moreno is to his supporters the American Dream made flesh: a Colombia-born, Florida-raised car dealer turned powerful populist Republican voice.He is not, his lawyer insists, the author of a years-old post from his email account to the Adult Friend Finder website, seeking “young guys to have fun with” and “men for 1-on-1 sex”.That scandal broke in the last days of the Ohio Senate primary but did not derail Moreno, who before gaining Trump’s backing voiced pro-LGBTQ+ views. A former intern (and donor) said he wrote the website post as an “aborted prank”.Moreno may meanwhile have been boosted by an attack ad, backed by a group linked to Senate Democrats, that called him “too conservative for Ohio” and “too aligned” with Donald Trump.The idea was to present the incumbent Democratic senator, Sherrod Brown, with an opponent easily portrayable as too extreme for Ohio. Such tactics have worked elsewhere, even in Republican states and particularly when linked to threats to reproductive rights, a profitable issue for Democrats since the conservative-dominated US supreme court removed the federal right to abortion.Ohio, however, has trended sharply right since Trump entered politics and critics said Democrats were playing with fire.On Saturday, in Dayton, Trump staged a fiery rally. On Tuesday, Moreno scorched to victory, belying close poll results to beat Matt Dolan, a state senator backed by Mike DeWine, the Republican governor, and Frank LaRose, the sitting secretary of state.“We have an opportunity now,” Moreno said. “We have an opportunity to retire the old commie.”That was an appropriately Trumpian insult to Brown, a populist Democrat first elected in 2007 but now seen as vulnerable as Republicans seek to retake the Senate.Brown said: “The choice ahead of Ohio is clear: Bernie Moreno has spent his career and campaign putting himself first, and would do the same if elected. I’ll always work for Ohio.”Moreno said: “I want to thank President Trump for all he did for me, for this campaign, for his unwavering support, for his love of this country. I don’t think I’ve ever seen someone who loves this country the way he does.”It was a predictable display of fealty to a presumptive Republican presidential nominee who faces 14 criminal charges arising from his attempt to overturn his defeat by Joe Biden in 2020, culminating in the deadly January 6 attack on Congress.Trump also faces 40 criminal charges over retention of classified information and 34 over hush-money payments to an adult film star. In civil cases, Trump is struggling to pay one multimillion-dollar bond, having been found liable for fraud, after paying another arising from a rape allegation a judge called “substantially true”.Like many Republicans, Moreno was once against Trump. In 2016, as Trump surged to the nomination, Moreno called him a “lunatic” and a “maniac”, bent on “a hostile takeover” of the party.Now, like almost all Republicans, Moreno says Trump should return to power.“It’s going to be a tough next seven months,” Moreno said on Tuesday. “But we’re going to win this race in November, we’re going to retake the United States Senate, we’re going to have President Trump in the White House, we’re going to get the ‘America First’ agenda done.”Aspects of that agenda Moreno has pushed on the campaign trail include providing “absolutely no more money for Ukraine, period” in its war with Russia and “restor[ing] the integrity of our elections”, a nod to Trump’s electoral fraud lie.But Moreno also presents a danger to Brown because he will campaign on similar, blue-collar issues.Before election day, Moreno defended Trump’s controversial prediction of a “bloodbath” if he loses to Biden in November, saying it was a reference to American industrial decline.“This is America First territory,” Moreno told the rightwing network Newsmax, appearing with JD Vance, Ohio’s other US senator and a Republican populist too.“Ohio knows, because … what’s happened in Lorain and Youngstown and Dayton and Cleveland and Columbus, once great, thriving cities, our industries have seen a bloodbath of disaster there so they understand … [Trump’s] comment, because they know what it’s like to have their dad, their grandfather lose their job that got shipped overseas. They’re not going to be fooled.”On Tuesday night, he covered similar territory.“People say I’ve lived the American dream,” Moreno said. “Started my tiny little car dealership with nothing. So, that’s not really, in my mind, what I view as the American Dream.”Singling out his father-in-law, he said: “Dennis went to high school in Hobart, Indiana … graduated from high school, reported to work at US Steel … Goes to work there, was able to buy a home, buy a car, raise three kids, send them to good schools in safe communities and he’s able now to retire debt free. That’s the American dream. That’s what’s under assault. And that’s where we’re gonna get back.”Commentators highlighted the battle to come.Citing Moreno’s remarks about an American Dream now out of reach for many, Matt Lewis, a conservative columnist, said: “If he campaigns like this for the next eight months, Sherrod Brown’s in trouble.”Rachel Bitecofer, a Democratic strategist, said: “Ohio, Maga extremist Bernie Moreno supports a national abortion ban. Pass it on.” More

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      Trump’s latest campaign strategy: co-opt Biden’s claims about the threat to democracy

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      View image in fullscreenOn the cusp of the election year, Donald Trump made a decision: knowing Joe Biden would structure his campaign around the threat Trump poses to US democracy, Trump would use the same line back at Biden.It was an unlikely bet, given that Trump is facing 88 criminal charges for his efforts to overturn the 2020 election. But Trump started laying out that message last summer, sprinkling into his speeches the idea that the US president was “grossly incompetent” and that such incompetence posed a threat to democracy. As charges rolled in against the former president, none of them lodged by Biden himself, he added the claim that Biden was also using his power to shut down his opponent, threatening democracy by engaging in “election interference”.As 6 January 2024 approached, three years after the insurrection, Trump ramped up his attempt to turn one of his liabilities against his opponent. On the 2024 campaign trail, Trump falsely claims to be a savior of democracy and, with increasing harshness, says Biden is the threat.At a rally in Ohio this month, Trump predicted an end to US democracy if he doesn’t win the race.“I don’t think you’re going to have another election in this country, if we don’t win this election … certainly not an election that’s meaningful,” he said.The “threat to democracy” retort was Trump’s latest attempt at rebranding the truth, a practiced part of his effort to create an alternate reality for his disciples. In that mirror world, Trump is both the victim and the strongman, the only person who can drive out an underworld of deep-staters who control the country and have unjustly targeted him because he threatens their supposed dominance. The wealthy businessman casts himself as an everyman, the guy willing to say what others are thinking, no matter how uncouth.“Someone on his staff has made it clear that criticisms that he is anti-democratic are hurting his image,” Edward Schiappa, a humanities professor who researches argumentation, media influence and rhetorical theory at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, said in an email. “Rather than fix the image, or otherwise moderate any of his lies, he has resorted to the Pee-wee Herman strategy of: ‘I know you are but what am I?’” (Trump’s campaign did not respond to a request for comment for this story.)Trump’s previous efforts to shift blame by warping criticisms of himself are legion. Fake news, which once referred to untrue articles online that fooled readers, became a retort to media critical of Trump. Not paying taxes makes him “smart”. Efforts to hold him accountable are “witch-hunts” or a “hoax”. After being called out for racist words and actions, he claimed to be “the least racist person anywhere in the world” – this, despite a track record of dehumanizing language aimed at immigrants. “Believe me,” a man whose political career runs on a stack of falsehoods often tells his audiences.The seeds of these falsehoods culminated in the biggest lie he has attempted to get his followers, and in turn the American public, to believe: that he won an election he lost. That claim reverberates in all he does on the campaign trail in his attempt to return to the White House.Trump’s attempt to cast himself as pro-democracy also coincides with more authoritarian language, saying he would be a dictator for a day and vowing to go after his political opponents, whom he called “vermin”. He called those arrested for storming the US Capitol “hostages” rather than acknowledging the crimes they committed.Jennifer R Mercieca, a professor specializing in political rhetoric at Texas A&M University, said she would have expected Trump to double down on his “dictator for a day” messaging rather than fall into this back-and-forth with Biden over who’s better for democracy.“It’s very interesting and, in fact, a sign of weakness that Donald Trump is allowing Joe Biden to define this election as democracy versus autocracy,” Mercieca said.Trump’s consistent base doesn’t need his new line about threats to democracy in order to vote for him; in fact, the far right of the Republican party, Trump’s most ardent followers, favor some degree of authoritarianism. This inclination was on display at CPAC in February, where the far-right activist Jack Posobiec praised the insurrection and called for overthrowing democracy, though he later attempted to walk back the comments as partly satirical.“Welcome to the end of democracy. We are here to overthrow it completely,” Posobiec said. “We didn’t get all the way there on January 6, but we will endeavor to get rid of it.”For that Trump-loving core group, being a Trump supporter is part of their core identity, Schiappa said. When Trump repeats a claim over and over, like that the 2020 election was stolen, it becomes part of that self-identity, making their beliefs and attitudes hard to charge, he said.It’s an argument technique called “tu quoque”, essentially attacking an opponent’s argument by pointing out a hypocrisy, but it’s more understandable as the kind of language you’d hear in a match of playground finger-pointing, not in a presidential election.“Through sheer repetition, aided by conservative news media, he has persuaded a group of devoted followers that what he speaks is true,” Schiappa said. “It is similar to how a cult works in the sense that his followers are deeply invested in him – emotionally and for their own sense of identity. This combination leads a minority of Americans, who are sufficiently unmotivated or unable to consider alternative sources, to believe claims that rational adults know are false.”Beyond that group for whom Trump is a part of their identity, his ability to sway beliefs is weaker. So who is this argument for? Given the democracy message’s lack of needed appeal to his base, it would seem Trump is seeking out a less radical voter by starting to proclaim himself a savior of democracy.But, Schiappa noted, “outside of self-identified conservatives, no, I do not think Trump’s assertions that Biden represents a threat to democracy has much influence”.Mercieca said it could be for donors, some of whom eschew Trump’s authoritarian rhetoric.“I think they don’t want to give money to somebody who says they’re going to end democracy,” she said. “They still probably legitimately recognize that democracy is actually a better environment for business than autocracy.”A timeline of key moments for Trump’s “threat to democracy”
      March 2023
      In a speech to the Conservative Political Action Conference, Trump calls on the audience to “complete the job” by sending him back to the White House so he can “reclaim our democracy”.
      April 2023
      Biden launches his re-election campaign with a video that frames his bid around freedom, equality and democracy. It includes imagery from the insurrection and calls out “Maga extremists”.
      A few days later, Trump speaks to a crowd at a rally in New Hampshire and references the launch video: “He states he’s running because Trump and Maga pose a threat to democracy. Can you believe it? Maga is Make America Great Again, right? No threat there. No.
      “It’s Biden who poses the threat to democracy because he is grossly incompetent, has no idea what he’s doing, and basically he doesn’t have a clue and that’s a very bad position to put our country in. Our country’s in a very dangerous position right now.”
      June 2023
      The US justice department charges Trump with 37 felonies related to keeping classified documents after he left the White House (more charges are later added). At an arraignment in Miami on 13 June, Trump pleads not guilty.
      That night, he rails against the charges and Biden, outside Trump National Golf Club in New Jersey.
      “This day will go down in infamy,” Trump says. “And Joe Biden will forever be remembered as not only the most corrupt president in the history of our country, but perhaps even more importantly, the president who together with a band of his closest thugs, misfits and Marxists tried to destroy American democracy. But they will fail and we will win bigger and better than ever before.”
      August 2023
      The special counsel Jack Smith spends much of 2023 working on an investigation into Trump’s efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 election, culminating in a grand jury indicting Trump on 1 August 2023.
      At an Alabama Republican dinner on 4 August, Trump calls the indictment a “sham” with “fake charges”.
      “We’re not the ones trying to undermine American democracy,” Trump says. “We are the ones fighting to save our democracy. We’re fighting to save our democracy. This ridiculous indictment against us, it’s not a legal case. It’s an act of desperation by a failed and disgraced crooked Joe Biden and his radical-left thugs to preserve their grip on power.”
      Elsewhere, in Fulton county, Georgia, a grand jury hands up an indictment of Trump on 14 August in another election subversion case, centered on the swing state in 2020. The sprawling case includes Trump and many of his allies and involves state racketeering and conspiracy charges.
      After his booking in Fulton county, Trump brings up his common line that the charges are “election interference” but doesn’t mention Biden by name – the case is not brought by the US justice department, but by the local prosecutor Fani Willis.
      “What they’re doing is election interference. They’re trying to interfere with an election. There’s never been anything like it in our country before,” he says. “This is their way of campaigning, and this is one instance, but you have three other instances. It’s election interference.”
      September 2023
      Biden makes remarks a couple times that call out Trump as a threat to democracy and pins his re-election campaign on preserving US democracy, just as his 2020 election was.
      “Let there be no question: Donald Trump and his Maga Republicans are determined to destroy American democracy,” Biden says at a New York fundraiser. “And I will always defend, protect and fight for our democracy.”
      In an Arizona speech framed around democracy issues later that month, Biden calls out the Maga agenda but doesn’t mention Trump by name much. He doesn’t mention the charges against Trump, which come in part from Biden’s justice department.
      “This Maga threat is a threat to the brick and mortar of our democratic institutions,” Biden says in Arizona.
      In response to the speech, Trump’s campaign spokesperson Steven Cheung gives NBC News a now familiar response: “The radical-left Democrats, now led by crooked Joe Biden, are the greatest threat to democracy the United States of America has ever faced.”
      November 2023
      In Colorado, a trial is under way that seeks to boot Trump from the ballot there, citing the 14th amendment as its basis. The amendment’s third clause disqualifies Trump from holding the White House again, the filers argue, because he engaged in insurrection while he was an officer of the US. The case will eventually end up in the US supreme court, after Colorado becomes the first state to decide Trump is disqualified from appearing on the state’s ballot, based on the amendment.
      In a speech in Iowa on 18 November, Trump brings up the cases now in several states that seek to keep him from returning to high office, calling them an “election-rigging ballot-qualification scam”.
      “Our opponents are showing every day that they hate democracy,” he says. “They’re trying every illegal move they can to try and steal this election because they know that in a free and fair fight against President Trump and crooked Joe Biden, Biden doesn’t have a shot. He’s going to be going down into his basement again. He’s going to be hiding.”
      December 2023
      On the campaign trail throughout the US, Trump keeps bringing up the democracy argument, solidifying its place in this election’s stump speech for the former president.
      The third anniversary of 6 January is on the horizon, a date that Biden is expected to use to drive home his points that his re-election protects democracy from the threat posed by Trump and his followers.
      In Iowa on 2 December, Trump says: “Biden and his radical left allies like to pose as standing up as allies of democracy. Joe Biden is not the defender of American democracy, Joe Biden is the destroyer of American democracy.”
      His speech to the New York Young Republicans on 9 December is perhaps his most extensive broadside at Biden over democracy issues yet. He’s not a threat to democracy, he says – he will “save democracy”. Biden is the threat, and the claims that Trump is the threat are a “hoax”. The media is part of the hoax, too, and is using it to deflect from the left’s “monstrous abuses of power”.
      “We call it now the threat-to-democracy hoax because that’s what it is. These guys are so good with misinformation, disinformation, it’s a slight difference,” Trump says.
      The lines Trump uses to attack Biden on democracy issues come out with a bit more clarity after a few months of him using them here and there while campaigning: “Biden is the real threat to democracy for two simple reasons. He’s corrupt, and he’s incompetent, grossly competent. But we have to fight Democrat misinformation at every corner if the Republican party is to survive.”
      Back on the campaign trail in New Hampshire, on 16 December: “We’re engaged in a righteous crusade to liberate this nation from a corrupt political class that is waging war on American democracy like never before.”
      On 17 December, in Nevada: “Joe Biden is a threat to democracy. They’re weaponizing law enforcement for high-level election interference because we’re beating them so badly in the polls.”
      In the Nevada speech, Trump brings up one of the terms he has effectively turned on its head, depriving it of its previous meaning: fake news. It used to refer to stories published by sham outlets that were patently fake, but for years now, Trump has been using it to refer to media he doesn’t like. “We have some great journalists and reporters, but mostly, for the most part, they’re corrupt and fake. Hence the term fake news. That was a good one. We have a lot of good ones,” he says.
      On 19 December, the Colorado supreme court rules that Trump is disqualified from the ballot because of the 14th amendment.
      In an Iowa speech that same day, Trump again calls Biden a threat to democracy.
      “It’s no wonder crooked Joe Biden and the far-left lunatics are desperate to stop us by any means necessary,” he says. “They’re willing to violate the US constitution at levels never seen before in order to win this election. Joe Biden is a threat to democracy. It’s a threat.”
      January 2024
      On the eve of the insurrection’s anniversary, Biden delivers a speech going deep on democracy issues, saying a “determined minority” is doing all it can to “destroy our democracy”. Trump won’t condemn political violence, Biden says. He pledges that democracy is our “sacred cause” that he will protect.
      “This is the first national election since [the] January 6 insurrection placed a dagger at the throat of American democracy,” Biden says.
      In a response to Fox News Digital after the speech, Trump uses his practiced line: “Because of his gross incompetence, Joe Biden is a true threat to democracy.”
      In the weeks following the 6 January anniversary, Trump keeps up his rhetoric about democracy.
      Back on the campaign trail, Trump tells supporters at an Iowa rally that a vote for him is a vote to “reclaim our democracy from crooked Joe Biden and the entire criminal class in our nation’s capital”.
      “It’s never happened, the weaponization of justice like they’re doing right now,” Trump says. “The DoJ is very corrupt. What they’re doing is very corrupt. People aren’t going to take it. Joe Biden is a threat to democracy. He’s weaponizing law enforcement for a high-level election interference.”
      After a court hearing about his claim of presidential immunity from prosecution, he says that the justice department’s cases against him, playing out now during an election year where he’s a candidate, are the “real threat to democracy”.
      At a New Hampshire rally again later that month, he says the prosecutions of his actions are more akin to what happens in “banana republics, third-world countries”.
      “Joe Biden is a threat to democracy. That’s what it is. He’s a threat to democracy,” Trump tells the crowd. “What he’s doing there is so bad, it’s a Pandora’s box. It can happen the other way. And when it happens the other way, it’s going to be a terrible thing, too. And that’s not a threat. That’s just the way life is. That’s the way life works. It doesn’t have to be me. It could be anybody else.”
      He closes out the month in Las Vegas, reciting his stump speech about Biden being a threat to democracy because he’s both incompetent and also interfering with Trump’s re-election.
      “Incompetence is a gross threat to democracy,” Trump says.
      March 2024
      At a 2 March rally in Richmond, Virginia, days before Biden’s planned State of the Union address, Trump brings up the democracy line again, saying he’s no threat.
      “Joe Biden and his fascists that control him are the real threat to democracy in this country,” Trump says. “They are a big threat, and they are corrupt. They are a big threat. He is the one. They have the standard line: ‘Donald Trump is a threat to democracy.’ Some advertising agency wrote that down. I’m not a threat. I’m the one that’s ending the threat to democracy.”
      Biden issues his State of the Union address on 7 March, an energetic defense of Democratic values, where he never uses Trump’s name, instead referring to him as Biden’s “predecessor”.
      As expected, democracy is a cornerstone of the speech: Biden notes how democracy is under threat both in the US and around the world.
      “January 6 and the lies about the 2020 election, and the plots to steal the election, posed the gravest threat to our democracy since the civil war,” he says. “But they failed. America stood strong and democracy prevailed. But we must be honest, the threat remains and democracy must be defended.”
      Trump and his allies in Congress “seek to bury the truth about January 6”, the president says. But the moment calls for speaking the truth.
      “And here’s the simplest truth: you can’t love your country only when you win,” Biden says. “As I’ve done ever since being elected to office, I ask you all, without regard to party, to join together and defend our democracy.”
      On 9 March, both Biden and Trump hold rallies in Georgia. There, Trump responds to the State of the Union, calling it an “angry, dark, hate-filled rant” that wouldn’t bring the country together.
      “I’m going to bring it together,” Trump says. “He’s a threat to democracy. I will tell you, he’s a threat to democracy. Weaponize government. Weaponize the FBI. Weaponize the DoJ. He’s a threat to democracy for other reasons also. No 1, he’s grossly incompetent.”
      In a 16 March speech in Ohio, Trump derides the court cases he faces and again calls the January 6 rioters “patriots” and “hostages”.
      He warns that there will be a “bloodbath” if he loses the race, though his campaign later claims Trump was talking about the effects on the auto industry and the economy. Biden’s campaign says the comment was another sign of Trump’s threats of political violence, saying :“He wants another January 6.”
      In the speech, Trump starkly lays out what he thinks will happen if he loses the election: US democracy will end.
      “I don’t think you’re going to have another election in this country, if we don’t win this election … certainly not an election that’s meaningful,” he says.
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      US primary elections: Biden and Trump notch wins with surprises in store down ballot

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      Donald Trump and Joe Biden swept up more delegates in Tuesday’s primary elections as they set their sights on a rematch in November.Trump and Biden picked up wins in Arizona, Illinois, Kansas and Ohio. Trump also won the Republican primary in Florida, where the Democrats are not holding a primary.In Ohio, Illinois and Florida, the former South Carolina governor and presidential candidate Nikki Haley still captured a sizable fraction of the Republican vote, despite no longer being in the race.The president and former president had already won enough delegates to capture their parties’ presidential nominations, and most of their challengers have dropped out. Trump’s last Republican challenger, his former UN ambassador Nikki Haley, ended her presidential campaign after Super Tuesday. Biden’s long-shot challenger, the Democratic congressman Dean Phillips, dropped out as well.With the presidential nominating contests clinched, the candidates were focusing on campaigning in swing states they will need to win the general election in November.In recent days, Biden visited Arizona and Nevada, where he is looking to shore up the support of young and Latino voters who could be key to his re-election. Biden is touting economic policies and attacking Trump on immigration and abortion as he seeks to win over wavering voters and waning enthusiasm among groups that backed him in 2020.Democrats seeking to register frustration with Biden over his handling of the war in Gaza are urging supporters to vote for the self-help guru Marianne Williamson in Arizona – as she, unlike Biden, has called for a permanent ceasefire. Pro-Palestinian protesters in Ohio, meanwhile, are urging supporters to “Leave It Blank”.Trump, meanwhile, has continued to court controversy on the campaign trail amid ongoing legal troubles. He claimed that Jewish people voting for Democrats “hate their religion” and Israel, in an interview on Monday – drawing outrage. As he criss-crosses the country to rally supports and raise funds, he has also increasingly made the January 6 attack on the Capitol a cornerstone of his campaign, saluting rioters as heroes.In Illinois, Ohio, Illinois and California, a few key down-ballot races have been hotly contested.OhioIn Ohio, Bernie Moreno, whom Trump endorsed, has won the Republican US Senate primary, and will face the Democratic incumbent, Sherrod Brown, in November, the AP projects. Moreno, a wealthy former car dealer who has never held an elected office, was leading in polls ahead of election day, edging out the state senator Matt Dolan and the secretary of state, Frank LaRose.Dolan, whose family owns the Cleveland Guardians baseball team, had the backing of establishment Republicans, including the governor, Mike DeWine.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionMoreno’s candidacy had been weighed down by questions about his qualifications and lack of experience. Having espoused virulently anti-LGBTQ+ policies, he was also the subject of an Associated Press report that found his work email was used to create an account on an adult website seeking “men for 1-on-1 sex” in 2008. Moreno had denied the report.Republicans have targeted Brown’s seat as one they could flip in November – he is Ohio’s only statewide elected Democrat in a state that has moved dramatically to the right in recent years.IllinoisIn Illinois, the 82-year-old Democratic incumbent congressman Danny Davis will defend his seat in November after fighting off a progressive challenge, the AP projects. Davis was backed by the state’s governor, JB Pritzker, and the Chicago mayor, Brandon Johnson, but faced a tough challenge from the community organizer and gun-control advocate Kina Collins, a community organizer and gun control advocate.
      Biden v Trump: What’s in store for the US and the world?On Thursday 2 May, 8-9.15pm GMT, join Tania Branigan, David Smith, Mehdi Hasan and Tara Setmayer for the inside track on the people, the ideas and the events that might shape the US election campaign. Book tickets here or at theguardian.live More