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    Bernie Sanders dismisses Republicans’ ‘horrific’ calls for Zelenskyy to resign

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    Independent US senator Bernie Sanders has dismissed as “horrific” claims that Ukraine’s president Volodymyr Zelenskyy may have to resign after a diplomatic meltdown in the Oval Office with Donald Trump.Sanders’ comments, in an interview with NBC’s Meet The Press on Sunday morning, served as a retort to pro-resignation remarks from his fellow US senator Lindsey Graham, which in turn had been affirmed by the Republican House speaker Mike Johnson.“I think that is a horrific suggestion,” Sanders told NBC’s Kristen Welker in the interview. “Zelenskyy is leading a country, trying to defend democracy against an authoritarian dictator, [Vladimir] Putin,” the Russian dictator whose forces invaded Ukraine in February 2022.“I think millions of Americans are embarrassed, are ashamed that you have a president of the United States who says Ukraine started the war, that Zelenskyy is a dictator,” Sanders continued, referring to Trump. “He’s got it exactly backwards.“The people of Ukraine have lost tens of thousands of soldiers, their cities are being bombed as we speak. Our job is to defend the 250-year tradition that we have of being the democratic leader of the world, not turn our backs on a struggling country that is trying to do the right thing.”The comments from Johnson came after Zelenskyy’s contentious meeting on Friday at the White House with Trump and JD Vance. As part of a deal with the US involving minerals in Ukraine, Zelenskyy had sought security guarantees from the US as Ukraine defended itself from Russia’s invasion. That prompted the US vice-president to accuse Zelenskyy of not being grateful enough for US aid – and for the US president to ask Zelenskyy to leave the White House without the minerals deal being signed.Trump is the not first US president during Ukraine’s war to accuse him of being ungrateful for the US military’s assistance.In October 2022, citing four sources familiar with the exchange, NBC News reported that then president Joe Biden lost his temper in a phone call with Zelenskyy in which he told Zelenskyy he had authorized another $1bn in assistance for Ukraine – to which Zelenskyy responded by listing the additional help he needed.NBC reported that Zelenskyy issued a statement praising the US for its aid after that call with Biden. And, in an Twitter/X post on Saturday, Zelenskyy thanked the US and Trump “for all the support … during these three years of full-scale invasion”.Nonetheless, on ABC’s This Week on Sunday, US secretary of state Marco Rubio accused Zelenskyy of undermining Friday’s talks by failing to “contain himself” trying to “Ukraine-splain on every issue”.“I hope this could all be reset,” Rubio said.Meanwhile, on Meet the Press on Sunday, Johnson told host Kristen Welker that “something has to change” with Zelenskyy.“Either he needs to come to his senses and come back to the table in gratitude or someone else needs to lead the country to do that,” Johnson said.Johnson claimed Zelenskyy should have shown gratitude and thanks to the US in the meeting and argued the push for US mineral rights in Ukraine as part of a peace agreement is “a win for everyone” that will give the US minerals it needs and Ukraine a level of security.On CBS’s Face the Nation, Johnson’s fellow Republican congressman Mike Turner, the chairperson of the House intelligence committee, added: “Instead of taking that win, Zelenskyy turned it into a debate on American security guarantees [on the] peace negotiations.”Turner also said: “[Zelenskyy] needs to not have this precondition of American security guarantees, which are not coming.”The derailed meeting incited pro-Ukraine protests around the US. And leaders across Europe, along with the prime ministers of Canada, Australia and New Zealand, posted messages of support for Ukraine.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotion“For three years now, Ukrainians have fought with courage and resilience. Their fight for democracy, freedom and sovereignty is a fight that matters to us all,” Canadian prime minister Justin Trudeau wrote on X after the White House meeting. “Canada will continue to stand with Ukraine and Ukrainians in achieving a just and lasting peace.”Only 4% of Americans say they support Russia in its invasion of Ukraine, according to the results of a CBS poll published on Sunday.Notably, though, only a slim majority of Americans say they support Ukraine: 52%. And a large minority – 44% – say they do not support either Russia or Ukraine.Speaking to Face the Nation on Sunday, Democratic US senator Mark Kelly of Arizona said Zelenskyy was “cornered” and “bullied” in the Oval Office on Friday during what was “a sad day for our country”.“It was a dumpster fire of diplomacy,” Kelly said.Alaska’s Lisa Murkowski was one Republican US senator who condemned the Trump administration over the way Friday’s meeting with Zelenskyy unfolded.In an X post, she called the meeting a “shocking conversation”.“I know foreign policy is not for the faint of heart, but right now, I am sick to my stomach that the administration appears to be walking away from our allies and embrace Putin, a threat to democracy and US values around the world.”Republican US senator James Lankford, for his part, said he disagreed with calls for Zelenskyy to resign.“I’m not interested in calling on the resignation of other world leaders,” Lankford told Meet the Press. “Quite frankly, I think that would spiral Ukraine into chaos right now.” More

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      We are on the road for democracy and justice | Bernie Sanders

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      I will be doing town meetings in Omaha, Nebraska, this Friday night and Iowa City, Iowa, on Saturday morning. Further, in the coming weeks and months, I and other progressives will be holding grassroots events from coast to coast.Why, at this moment, are we doing town meetings around the country – especially in conservative areas? The answer is obvious.Trumpism will not be defeated by politicians inside the DC beltway. It will only be defeated by millions of Americans, in every state in this country, coming together in a strong, grassroots movement which says no to oligarchy, no to authoritarianism, no to kleptocracy, no to massive cuts in programs that working people desperately need, no to huge tax breaks for the richest people in our country. And that’s what these events are about.Further, there are a number of congressional districts where Republicans won by only a small number of votes. With the Republican party in the House having only a three-vote majority we can defeat draconian, anti-working-class legislation if just two Republican members of Congress vote no. And they will vote no if we rally their constituents to demand that they vote no.Can Trumpism be defeated? Absolutely! But, if we’re going to make that happen, we need to know exactly what we’re up against and how we can best go forward. Here’s just some of what we need to know:Trumpism has an unlimited amount of money to throw into its efforts. Elon Musk, the wealthiest man on earth, put more than $270m into Trump’s campaign, a tiny portion of his fortune. Other multibillionaires will join Musk in spending whatever it takes.Trumpism has significant control over large parts of the media from which millions of Americans get their information. Fox and Musk’s platform X, among others, are not normal media outlets. Their basic function is not to cover the “news” but to spread rightwing extremist ideology.Trumpism is utilizing the concept of the “big lie” in a way that has never, in this country, been seen. Day after day, blatantly dishonest statements and conspiracy theories are propagated – and repeated over and over and over again.Trumpism does not believe in democracy or the rule of law. Trump recently posted: “He who saves his Country does not violate any Law.” In other words, Trump believes that he can do anything he wants for any reason. He can ignore Congress or the courts. He is above the law.But, while Trump consolidates power into his own hands, there is another reality going on.Today, 60% of Americans live paycheck to paycheck; millions are earning starvation wages; 85 million are uninsured or under-insured; young people are unable to afford the cost of college; 25% of seniors live on $15,000 a year or less; we have the highest rate of childhood poverty of almost any major country on earth, and we have a major shortage in low-income and affordable housing.Oh, and by the way, we’re losing the struggle against the climate crisis – an existential threat to the future of the planet.And here’s the kicker. While Trump moves us away from democracy, while the middle class continues to decline, the wealthiest people in the country have never ever had it so good. Today, the three major oligarchs, Musk, Jeff Bezos and Mark Zuckerberg, are worth $905bn – that is more wealth than the bottom half of American society – 170 million people. And, incredibly, since Trump’s election their wealth has grown by $217bn.Our struggle, the American people’s struggle, is to protect democracy and the rule of law. Equally important, we must end oligarchy and create an economy that works for all, not just the few. We are the wealthiest country on earth and AI, robotics and other new technologies will only make our country wealthier. It is absurd, unjust and inhumane that virtually all of that new wealth being created goes to the people who need it the least.While Trump now “floods the zone” and occupies most of the political oxygen, it is imperative that we never lose sight of the progressive vision – a nation and world based on human cooperation and compassion, not greed and a “survival of the fittest” mentality. What we are fighting for is not “utopian”, or unachievable. Much of it already exists in other countries, and poll after poll shows that it is exactly what the American people want.In the richest country in the history of the world we must establish that:

      Healthcare is a human right and must be available to all regardless of income.

      Every worker in America is entitled to earn a decent income. We must raise the minimum wage to a living wage and make it easier for workers to join unions.

      We must have the best public educational system in the world, from childcare to vocational training, to graduate school – available to all.

      We must address the housing crisis and build the millions of units of low-income and affordable housing that we desperately need.

      We must create millions of good paying jobs as we lead the world in combating the existential threat of climate change.

      We must abolish all forms of bigotry.
      Not only must we continue to fight for a nation based on the principles of economic, social, racial and environmental justice, we must also lead the effort against Trump‘s reactionary legislative agenda.In the coming weeks the Republicans in Congress will be bringing forward a major piece of legislation, a “reconciliation” bill, that encapsulates the value system of greed and their obedience to oligarchy. It is the economic essence of Trumpism.At a time of unprecedented income and wealth inequality, this legislation will provide trillions of dollars in tax breaks to the richest people in our country. It will make the rich even richer. At a time when the working class of this country is struggling to put food on the table and pay for housing, this legislation will make savage cuts to Medicaid, housing, nutrition, education and other basic needs. It will make the poor even poorer.We cannot allow this to happen. This legislation is enormously unpopular. It is exactly what the American people do not want. It must not be passed by Congress.It must be defeated and we can defeat it.This is a perilous moment in American history. Let us go forward together.

      Bernie Sanders is a US senator, and chair of the health education labor and pensions committee. He represents the state of Vermont and is the longest-serving independent in the history of Congress More

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      ‘It’s a constant weight’: Americans struggle with record credit card debt

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      US credit card debt reached a record $1.17tn in the third quarter of 2024, growing from $770bn in the first quarter of 2021 and the share of active credit card holders making just minimum payments rose to 10.75%, the highest percentage ever in data going back to 2012.The Guardian spoke with individuals around the US about their experiences and issues with credit card and other personal debt. They requested to remain anonymous for privacy concerns about personal finances.Angela, a 42-year-old teacher in Virginia, explained she and her husband had struggled with paying off about $20,000 in credit card debt accrued mostly from paying medical bills not covered by her health insurance from infertility issues.“The medicines, procedures, and travel all hit us hard,” she said. “It just piles up and it piles up and you have to miss a payment because something else in life happens, and or you don’t make the payment you want to make, and it just starts to kind of snowball on you.”The debt has made it difficult to save anything and is always looming on her.“It’s a constant weight in the back of my mind which clouds all my little joys,” said Angela. “With inflation, cost of living rising, and life, I have struggled to pay down the debt. We do less, stress about what we can spend on or can afford.”A 54-year-old woman in Ohio said she lost her job in 2024 and was not approved for unemployment benefits because she was classified as a subcontractor, adding to debt she already had from medical bills and home repairs.“I’m now unable to pay them, and I can’t find a job due to a tight market and most likely age discrimination,” she said. “My debt has escalated to the equivalent of half my typical annual income. This and the inability to find a job have left me with no choice but to remain in a very unhappy, toxic, romantic relationship.”A 35-year-old software engineer in Los Angeles, California, said she accrued significant personal debt putting herself through engineering school at the age of 29, but despite making a salary of over $100,000 a year, she still struggles with paying it off and keeping up with bills.“I’m now facing huge interest rates and can barely pay down principal balances,” they said. “Student loans only covered my rent. If additional student loans existed for people in situations like mine, I wouldn’t have needed to charge so much to my credit cards.”This week the senators Bernie Sanders and Josh Hawley introduced a bill to cap credit card interest rates to 10% for the next five years, which Trump has claimed he would support. The average credit card interest rate is 28.6%, despite banks being able to borrow from the Federal Reserve at less than 4.5%.About 82% of all US adults have at least one credit card, with the average about four credit cards per US consumer, according to Experian, and the average household has over $21,000 in credit card debt.A 69-year-old retiree in Moody, Alabama, said she lived check to check on social security and had had no choice but to rely on credit card debt for food, bills and other living expenses.“I am constantly stressed about money,” she said, adding it had created anxiety, depression and sleeping issues.A 47-year-old teacher in Mesa, Arizona, said he had fallen into debt trying to provide for a family of four, and covering the funeral costs for his mother, even as he said he had been “working my car to the bone for gig work to pick up the slack”.A 72-year-old in California said she only made a little over $1,200 a month from social security, but more than half of it went toward a debt consolidation payment.“Money is always an issue with me, I’m currently keeping my debt at bay with loans out of what little I have for retirement, but still losing about half my monthly income to debt repayment that I wish I could be saving for a home.”A 53-year-old in Connecticut explained he had fallen into significant credit card debt after losing his small business due to the pandemic shutdowns, from barely ever using credit cards to maxing out several, even after finding a job, which was difficult at his age.“The pay was a fraction of what my business was pulling in and at this point, I maxed out the credit cards as I didn’t have a lot of credit on them to begin with. I have since taken out two personal loans and got a third credit card. All of them are maxed out,” they said. “I’ve gained 60lb, my hair has been falling out, and I can’t sleep more than four hours a night.”Money owed on revolving debt grew 52.5% to $645bn, from a decade low of $423bn in second quarter 2021, according to a report by the Philadelphia Federal Reserve.Twenty-three per cent of Americans with less than $25,000 annual income have no bank account. Forty-six per cent of Americans with annual incomes between $50,000 and $99,999 carried a credit card balance, while low-income Americans were more likely to predominantly use buy now, pay later, payday or pawn shop loans, with average annual interest rates of payday loans at 400%, with many much higher.According to data from the US Federal Reserve, 6% of Americans used a payday loan in 2023, up 1% from 2022, with users more likely to be low-income, Black and Hispanic adults, and adults with a disability.David, a 57-year-old gig worker and educator in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, said he first took out a payday loan about six years ago when he lived in Oklahoma and had just started a new job and needed a loan to bridge the gap between paychecks.He said he was offered more money for the loan than he asked for, and as he made payments, the lender frequently offered to extend him more credit.“They report every late payment, every non-payment to the collection agencies, and I got into a merry-go-round, in over my head, and it wrecked my credit score,” said David. “There’s no negotiating, settling, or anything like that with payday lenders.”He said the collection tactics included calling his place of employment, calling the references on his initial loan application, to demand payment from him, which continued to grow with high interest rates and added fees. The length of time and impact it had on him had given him major depression and suicidal thoughts, he said.“They’re so predatory on very vulnerable people,” he added. “I can’t even get my own apartment without a co-signer. It’s just humiliating.” More

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      Ro Khanna: Brian Thompson killing was ‘horrific’ but people ‘aren’t getting care they need’

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      Progressive congressperson Ro Khanna has sympathy for murdered UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson – yet at the same time is not surprised that the killing reignited a national dialogue about inequities in the US healthcare system, he said in an interview Sunday.“It was horrific,” the California Democrat said on ABC This Week with respect to the slaying of Thompson, whose survivors include his widow and two sons ages 16 and 19. “I mean, this is a father we’re talking about – of two children, and … there is no justification for violence.“But the outpouring afterwards has not surprised me.”Khanna told the show’s host, Martha Raddatz, that he agreed with fellow liberal and US senator Bernie Sanders when he wrote recently on social media: “We waste hundreds of billions a year on health care administrative expenses that make insurance CEOs and wealthy stockholders incredibly rich while 85 million Americans go uninsured or underinsured. Health care is a human right. We need Medicare for all.”“After years, Sanders is winning this debate,” Khanna said, referring to the Vermont senator’s support for a single-payer national health insurance system seen in other wealthy democracies.While police have stopped short of offering a possible motive behind Thompson’s 4 December shooting death, the apparent targeted nature of the attack – as well as shell casings found at the scene of the killing displaying the words “delay”, “deny” and possibly “depose” have suggested it was maybe linked to the largely privatized US healthcare industry’s routine denial of payments to many Americans.Healthcare debt has emerged as a leading cause of bankruptcy in the US while for-profit health insurers such as UnitedHealthcare are among the country’s richest companies. Thompson, 50, who lived near UnitedHealthcare’s headquarters in Minnesota, commanded a salary of $10m annually before a gunman wearing a mask shot him dead outside a hotel in Manhattan as he prepared to attend a meeting with investors of his company.Many greeted news of Thompson’s death not with sympathy but with mockery. A widely shared example of the sentiment was a social media post from Columbia School of Social Work’s Anthony Zenkus, which read: “Today, we mourn the death of United Healthcare CEO Brian Thompson, gunned down…. wait, I’m sorry – today we mourn the deaths of the 68,000 Americans who die needlessly each year so that insurance company execs like Brian Thompson can become multimillionaires.”Khanna on Sunday said his status as a member of the US House has not immunized him from absurd insurance battles.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionThough he acknowledged it paled in comparison to people with cancer, heart disease and diabetes being denied coverage while they battle for their lives, Khanna said: “I, as a congressperson had UnitedHealthcare deny a prescription for a nasal – a $100 pump spray, and I couldn’t get them to reverse this. So imagine what ordinary people are dealing with.”Khanna said some modest steps that the US could take to begin addressing healthcare inequities in the country is to cap out-of-pocket costs while also requiring the private insurers relied on by many Americans “to cover anything” that Medicare would.Medicare is the public US health insurance program for those older than 65 and people who are disabled.“We have to understand people with cancer, with heart disease, with diabetes, with insurance aren’t getting the care that they need. They’re getting stuck with huge medical bills.” More

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      US Senate rejects Bernie Sanders effort to block arms sales to Israel

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      The US Senate has blocked legislation that would have halted the sale of some US weapons to Israel, which had been introduced out of concern about the human rights catastrophe faced by Palestinians in Gaza.Senator Bernie Sanders had introduced what are called joint resolutions of disapproval, seeking to block the Biden administration’s recent sale of $20bn in US weapons to Israel.Moves to advance three resolutions all failed, garnering only about 20 votes out of the chamber’s 100 members, with most Democrats joining all Republicans against the measures.The Senate was to vote later on Wednesday on two other resolutions that would stop shipments of mortar rounds and a GPS guidance system for bombs.Sanders introduced the measures in September as Israel continued its assault on Gaza – which has killed at least 43,000 people.“Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s extremist government has not simply waged war against Hamas – it has waged war against Palestinians,” Sanders said a press conference held on Tuesday ahead of the vote.“Much of what’s been happening there has been done with US weapons and American taxpayer support,” Sanders continued, adding that the US has provided more than $18bn in military aid to Israel and delivered more than 50,000 tons of armaments and military equipment.“The United States of America is complicit in these atrocities. This complicity must end.”The Sanders-led effort to stop the flow of arms to Israel came after the country failed to meet the US-imposed deadline of 12 November to increase humanitarian aid and allow at least 350 trucks into Gaza a day. Despite Israel’s failure, the US took no action.Under US law, military assistance must not be given to foreign security forces that have committed human rights violations. However, the Biden administration has largely refused to stop the transfer of weapons to Israel, despite persistent accusations of war crimes from human rights experts.Senator Elizabeth Warren had vocalized support for the resolutions and condemned the Biden administration for not taking action against Israel for failing to meet its deadline for aid into Gaza.“The failure by the Biden administration to follow US law and to suspend arms shipments is a grave mistake that undermines American credibility worldwide,” Warren said in a statement. “If this administration will not act, Congress must step up to enforce US law and hold the Netanyahu government accountable through a joint resolution of disapproval.”It is not the first time Sanders has led such an effort, and this one was not expected to pass. But backers hoped significant support in the Senate would encourage Israel’s government and Joe Biden’s administration to do more to protect civilians in Gaza.The Democratic senator Jeff Merkley, who co-sponsored the resolutions, said he opposed the transfer of offensive weapons used for bombing, which has “produced massive deaths, massive injuries, massive destruction”.“I stand before you today as someone who has spent a lifetime advocating for Israel’s economic success and for their security in a very difficult part of the world,” Merkley said, adding: “But the Netanyahu government has taken policies that are out of sync with American values.”More than 65% of housing, schools and healthcare facilities have been destroyed by Israeli forces, according to UN data. All 12 universities in the territory have been damaged or destroyed, according to Wafa, the Palestinian news agency. The UN also estimates that about 90% of Gaza’s 2.3 million Palestinians have been displaced. Humanitarian groups on the ground have reported malnutrition and starvation and global food security experts say famine in northern Gaza is imminent.A spokesperson from Oxfam, a British non-governmental organization that has been providing aid to the displaced in the region, said: “The Senate must vote to finally end arms transfers to Israel, as we see the crisis continue to escalate with warnings of imminent famine and entire communities being permanently erased in North Gaza governorate.“Israel is blocking humanitarian aid, and is meanwhile using US weapons in attacks that have killed thousands of children, aid workers, and journalists, destroyed schools, hospitals, vital infrastructure for clean water and more, and displaced hundreds of thousands of Palestinians in Gaza, where there is nowhere safe.”It has been more than a year since Hamas’s surprise and deadly attacks last 7 October. Negotiations for a ceasefire and hostage deal between Israel and Hamas have repeatedly failed.AFP and Reuters contributed reporting More

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      Elizabeth Warren denounces Biden administration over Gaza humanitarian situation

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      Elizabeth Warren, a leading progressive voice in the US Senate, has denounced the Biden administration’s failure to punish Israel over the dire humanitarian situation in Gaza and endorsed a joint resolution of disapproval in Congress.The amount of aid reaching the territory has dropped to the lowest level in 11 months, official Israeli figures show. The White House last month gave Israel an ultimatum of 30 days to improve conditions or risk losing military support. As the deadline expired on Tuesday, international aid groups said Israel had fallen far short.But the US state department announced it would not take any punitive action, insisting that Israel was making limited progress and was not blocking aid and therefore not violating US law. Warren condemned the Biden administration’s decision to continue supplying arms to its ally.“On October 13, the Biden administration told Prime Minister Netanyahu that his government had 30 days to increase humanitarian aid into Gaza or face the consequences under US law, which would include cutting off military assistance,” the Massachusetts senator said in a statement shared with the Guardian.“Thirty days later, the Biden administration acknowledged that Israel’s actions had not significantly expanded food, water and basic necessities for desperate Palestinian civilians. Despite Netanyahu’s failure to meet the United States’ demands, the Biden administration has taken no action to restrict the flow of offensive weapons.”For the first time on the issue, Warren threw her weight behind a joint resolution of disapproval, a legislative tool that enables Congress to overturn actions taken by the executive branch. Such a resolution must pass both the House of Representatives and the Senate.She added: “The failure by the Biden administration to follow US law and to suspend arms shipments is a grave mistake that undermines American credibility worldwide. If this administration will not act, Congress must step up to enforce US law and hold the Netanyahu government accountable through a joint resolution of disapproval.”Eight international aid groups have said that Israel failed to meet the US demands to improve access for assistance, while food security experts have said it is likely that famine is imminent in parts of Gaza.Antony Blinken, the secretary of state, told reporters on Wednesday that Israel had taken some steps to improve aid but they needed to be sustained to take effect. He called on Israel to rescind evacuation orders to allow those displaced by its operations to return home and to resume commercial trucking deliveries into Gaza.Biden has backed Israel since Hamas-led gunmen attacked the country in October 2023, killing 1,200 people and taking 250 hostages. Since then, more than 43,500 Palestinians, mostly civilians, have been killed in Gaza, with 2 million displaced people and much of the strip reduced to rubble.The president, whose term ends in January and who will be replaced by his predecessor Donald Trump, is facing growing dissent from Democrats over his handling of the war. Senator Chris Van Hollen of Maryland told Zeteo this week: “President Biden’s inaction, given the suffering in Gaza, is shameful. I mean, there’s no other word for it.”Bernie Sanders, an independent senator for Vermont, announced that next week he will bring joint resolutions of disapproval that would block the sale of certain weapons to Israel. “There is no longer any doubt that Netanyahu’s extremist government is in clear violation of US and international law as it wages a barbaric war against the Palestinian people in Gaza,” he said.And on Thursday, 15 members of the Senate and 69 members of the House announced efforts to press the Biden administration to hold members of the Netanyahu government – specifically, the finance minister, Bezalel Smotrich, and the national security minister, Itamar Ben-Gvir – and others accountable for the rise in settler violence, settlement expansion and destabilising activity in the West Bank. More

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      The Democrats must become an anti-establishment party | Robert Reich

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      A political disaster such as what occurred last Tuesday gains significance not simply by virtue of who won or lost, but through how the election is interpreted.This is known as the Lesson of the election.The Lesson explains what happened and why. It deciphers the public’s mood, values, and thoughts. It attributes credit and blame.And therein lies its power. When the Lesson of the election becomes accepted wisdom – when most of the politicians, pundits and journalists come to believe it – it shapes the future. It determines how parties, candidates, political operatives and journalists approach coming elections.What’s the Lesson of the 2024 election?According to exit polls, Americans voted mainly on the economy – and their votes reflected their class and level of education.While the US economy has improved over the last two years according to standard economic measures, most Americans without college degrees – that’s the majority – have not felt it.In fact, most Americans without college degrees have not felt much economic improvement for four decades, and their jobs have grown less secure.The real median wage of the bottom 90% is stuck nearly where it was in the early 1990s, even though the economy is more than twice as large now as it was then.Most of the economy’s gains have gone to the top.This has caused many Americans to feel frustrated and angry. Trump gave voice to that anger. Harris did not.The real lesson of the 2024 election is that Democrats must not just give voice to the anger, but also explain how record inequality has corrupted our system, and pledge to limit the political power of big corporations and the super-rich.The basic bargain in America used to be that if you worked hard and played by the rules, you’d do better, and your children would do even better than you.But since 1980, that bargain has become a sham. The middle class has shrunk.Why? While Republicans steadily cut taxes on the wealthy, Democrats abandoned the working class.Democrats embraced Nafta and lowered tariffs on Chinese goods. They deregulated finance and allowed Wall Street to become a high-stakes gambling casino. They let big corporations gain enough market power to keep prices (and profit margins) high.They let corporations bust unions (with negligible penalties) and slash payrolls. They bailed out Wall Street when its gambling addiction threatened to blow up the entire economy but never bailed out homeowners who lost everything.They welcomed big money into their campaigns, and delivered quid pro quos that rigged the market in favor of big corporations and the wealthy.Joe Biden redirected the Democratic party back toward its working-class roots, but many of the changes he catalyzed – more vigorous actions against monopolies, stronger enforcement of labor laws and major investments in manufacturing, infrastructure, semiconductors and non-fossil fuels – wouldn’t be evident for years. In any event, he could not communicate effectively about them.The Republican party says it’s on the side of working people, but its policies will hurt ordinary workers even more. Trump’s tariffs will drive up prices. His expected retreat from vigorous anti-monopoly enforcement will allow giant corporations to drive up prices further.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionIf Republicans gain control over the House as well as the Senate, as looks likely, they will extend Trump’s 2017 tax law and add additional tax cuts.As in 2017, these lower taxes will benefit mainly the wealthy and enlarge the national debt, which will give Republicans an excuse to cut Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid – their objective for decades.Democrats must no longer do the bidding of big corporations and the wealthy. They must instead focus on winning back the working class.They should demand paid family leave, Medicare for all, free public higher education, stronger unions, higher taxes on great wealth, and housing credits that will generate the biggest boom in residential home construction since the second world war.They should also demand that corporations share their profits with their workers. They should call for limits on CEO pay, eliminate all stock buybacks (as was the SEC rule before 1982) and reject corporate welfare (subsidies and tax credit to companies and industries unrelated to the common good).Democrats need to tell Americans why their pay has been lousy for decades and their jobs less secure: not because of immigrants, liberals, people of color, the “deep state”, or any other Trump Republican bogeyman, but because of the power of large corporations and the rich to rig the market and siphon off most of the economy’s gains.In doing this, Democrats should not retreat from their concerns about democracy. Democracy goes together with a fair economy.Only by reducing the power of big money in our politics can America grow the middle class, reward hard work and reaffirm the basic bargain at the heart of our system.If the Trump Republicans gain control of the House, they will have complete control of the federal government. That means they will own whatever happens to the economy and will be responsible for whatever happens to America.Notwithstanding all their anti-establishment populist rhetoric, they will become the establishment.The Democratic party should use this inflection point to shift ground – from being the party of well-off college graduates, big corporations, “never-Tumpers” like Dick Cheney and vacuous “centrism” – to an anti-establishment party ready to shake up the system on behalf of the vast majority of Americans.This is and should be the Lesson of the 2024 election.

      Robert Reich, a former US secretary of labor, is a professor of public policy at the University of California, Berkeley, and the author of Saving Capitalism: For the Many, Not the Few and The Common Good. His newest book, The System: Who Rigged It, How We Fix It, is out now. He is a Guardian US columnist. His newsletter is at robertreich.substack.com More

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      Sweep of swing states rubs salt in Democrats’ wounds as Trump prepares to meet Biden

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      Donald Trump was declared the winner in Arizona early on Sunday, completing the Republicans’ clean sweep of the so-called swing states and rubbing salt in Democrats’ wounds as it was announced that the president-elect is scheduled to meet with Joe Biden at the White House on Wednesday to discuss the presidential handover.In a national campaign that was projected as being extremely close but he ended up winning handily, the result in Arizona gives Trump 312 electoral college votes, compared with Kamala Harris’s 226. The state joins the other Sun belt swing states – Nevada, Georgia and North Carolina – and the three Rust belt states of Michigan, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania in voting Republican. All were expected to be extremely competitive but all went for Trump, though by fairly close margins.Republicans also regained control of the Senate – they hold 53 seats to the Democrats’ 46 – and look likely to keep control of the House of Representatives, where 21 races remain uncalled but Republicans currently have a 212-202 advantage, giving them a “trifecta” – both houses of Congress as well as the presidency – that will allow them to govern largely unfettered for at least the next two years.The political realignment comes after a bruising election that has set the stage for the Democratic party to re-evaluate a platform that appeared to have been rejected by a majority of US voters. Trump also won the popular vote, the first time a Republican has done so since George W Bush in 2004 following the 9/11 attacks a few years before.At Biden’s request, Trump will visit the Oval Office on Wednesday, a formality that Trump himself did not honor in 2020 when he lost the presidency to Biden but refused to accept the results.In a speech last week, Biden said he would “direct my entire administration to work with his team to ensure a peaceful and orderly transition”.But as president-elect, Trump has reportedly yet to submit a series of transition agreements with the Biden administration, including ethics pledges to avoid conflicts of interest. The agreements are required in order to unlock briefings from the outgoing administration before the handover of power in 72 days’ time.The national security adviser, Jake Sullivan, said Biden will brief Trump on foreign policy on Wednesday, telling CBS Face the Nation: “The president will have the chance to explain to President Trump how he sees things.”Asked if Biden will ask legislators to pass additional aid for Ukraine before he leaves office, Sullivan said the president “will make the case that we do need ongoing resources for Ukraine beyond the end of his term”. Trump allies have said the incoming administration’s focus would be on peace not territory.View image in fullscreenSullivan also said that the international community needs “to increase pressure on Hamas to come to the table to do a deal in Gaza, because the Israeli government said it’s prepared to take a temporary step in that direction” because the group had told mediators, he said, it “will not do a cease-fire and hostage deal at this time”.The political fallout from Trump’s win continues to reverberate, not least in the Democratic camp. The Harris-Walz campaign is estimated to have spent $1bn in three months but is now reportedly $20m in debt.The Republican pollster Frank Luntz told ABC News’s This Week that whoever “told” Harris to focus on Trump during her presidential campaign had “committed political malpractice”.“We all know what Trump is,” Luntz said. “We experienced him for four years.”Progressive senator Bernie Sanders, who votes with Democrats, defended Harris’s campaign and refused to be drawn into further analysis on whether Biden should have stepped away from his re-election bid sooner.“I don’t want to get involved,” he told CNN. “We got to look forward and not in the back. Kamala did her very best. She came in, she won the debate with Trump. She worked as hard as she possibly could.”skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionView image in fullscreen“Here is the reality: the working class of this country is angry, and they have reason to be angry,” he added. “We are living in an economy today where people on top are doing phenomenally well while 60% of our people are living paycheck-to-paycheck.”Republicans, meanwhile, have not explained why Trump and many in the party argue last week’s election was free and fair but maintain the 2020 one was somehow rigged, despite every single lawsuit alleging fraud being rejected.Jim Jordan, the Republican chair of the the house judiciary committee, called Trump’s victory last week the “greatest political comeback”.On Friday, Jordan and fellow Republican representative Barry Loudermilk sent a letter to special counsel Jack Smith to demand that his office preserve records of the justice department’s prosecutions of Trump.Asked by CNN whether Trump would go after his political opponents, Jordan said: “He didn’t do it in his first term. The Democrats went after him and everyone understands what they did.”“I don’t think any of that will happen,” Jordan reiterated. “We are the party who is against political prosecution. We’re the party who is against going after your opponents using lawfare.”Byron Donalds, a Republican congressman from Florida, told Fox News that claims of a list were “lies from the Democratic left”.“I will tell you, this is not something that Donald Trump has ever spoken to, or he’s committed to, whatsoever. There’s no enemies list,” Donalds said. Trump has regularly referred to his political opponents as “the enemy within”. More