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      Biden says sending cluster bombs to Ukraine was ‘difficult decision’ – live

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      From 3h agoKahl says there are two primary reasons behind the decision to include cluster munitions in this latest weapons aid package to Ukraine.One is the “urgency of the moment”, he says. Ukraine is in the midst of its counteroffensive which has been difficult because the Russians had six months to dig into defensive belts in the east and the south.
      We want to make sure that the Ukrainians have sufficient artillery to keep them in the fight in the context of the current counter offensive, and because things are going a little slower than some had hoped.
      Here is the video of Pentagon official Colin Kahl speaking earlier today on the Biden administration’s decision to sent cluster bombs to Ukraine:Kahl told reporters that the “urgency of the moment” demanded it, but also said: “We want to make sure that the Ukrainians have sufficient artillery to keep them in the fight in the context of the current counteroffensive, and because things are going a little slower than some had hoped.”Democratic presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr has joined the growing list of lawmakers and human rights groups condemning the Biden administration for its decision to send cluster munitions to Ukraine.
      “Cluster bombs are munitions so horrific for civilians that more than a hundred nations have signed an international treaty banning them. Now the Biden administration is preparing to send them to Ukraine,” Kennedy Jr tweeted on Friday.
      Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskiy has hailed the new US defense package which includes cluster munitions.In a tweet on Friday, Zelenskiy said:
      “A timely, broad and much-needed defense aid package from the United States. We are grateful to the American people and President Joseph Biden @POTUS for decisive steps that bring Ukraine closer to victory over the enemy, and democracy to victory over dictatorship.
      The expansion of Ukraine’s defense capabilities will provide new tools for the de-occupation of our land and bringing peace closer.”
      In an interview with CNN host Fareed Zakaria on Friday, president Joe Biden said that his decision to provide Ukraine with cluster munitions was a “difficult decision.”
      “It was a very difficult decision on my part. And by the way, I discussed this with our allies, I discussed this with our friends up on the Hill,” Biden said, adding, “The Ukrainians are running out of ammunition.”
      “This is a war relating to munitions. And they’re running out of that ammunition, and we’re low on it and so, what I finally did, I took the recommendation of the Defense Department to – not permanently – but to allow for this transition period, while we get more 155 weapons, these shells, for the Ukrainians.”
      Despite over 100 countries having outlawed the munitions under the Convention on Cluster Munitions, the US and Ukraine are not signatories.
      “They’re trying to get through those trenches and stop those tanks from rolling. But it was not an easy decision,” Biden said, adding, “We’re not signatories to that agreement, but it took me a while to be convinced to do it.”
      “But the main thing is they either have the weapons to stop the Russians now – keep them from stopping the Ukrainian offensive through these areas – or they don’t. And I think they needed them.”
      Here is an animation on how cluster bombs work:As the Guardian’s Léonie Chao-Fung reports in her explainer piece on the weapon, “Cluster bombs, like landmines, pose a risk to civilians long after their use. Unexploded ordinance from cluster bombs can kill and maim people years or even decades after the munitions were fired.”For the full explainer, click here:Minnesota’s Democratic representative Ilhan Omar has issued a condemnation of the Biden administration’s decision to send cluster bombs to Ukraine, saying, “Instead of dealing cluster munitions, we should be doing everything in our power to end their use.”The statement continued:
      “Cluster munitions are illegal under international law. A total of 123 countries have ratified the convention to ban their use under all circumstances—including nearly all our allies.
      “It’s not hard to understand why. Because cluster bombs scatter multiple small bombs over a large area, they kill civilians both during an attack and after. I was recently in Vietnam where I heard firsthand how innocent civilians continue to be killed by US cluster munitions a full fifty years after the conflict ended. Tens of thousands of explosives are found every year there.
      “We have to be clear: if the US is going to be a leader on international human rights, we must not participate in human rights abuses. We can support the people of Ukraine in their freedom struggle, while also opposing violations of international law. (In fact, the innocent victims of the cluster munitions will almost exclusively be Ukrainian civilians).”
      Here’s a recap of today’s developments:
      The US will send cluster munitions to Ukraine as part of a new $800 military aid package, the Pentagon has confirmed. The package will include Dual-Purpose Improved Conventional Munitions (DPICMs), also known as cluster munitions, armored vehicles and air defense missiles. Ukraine has been asking for cluster munitions for months, but US officials have been hesitant as the weapons can kill indiscriminately over a wide area, threatening civilians.
      The White House said it had postponed the decision over whether to send the controversial weapons “for as long as we could” because of the risk of civilian harm from unexploded ordnance. National security adviser Jake Sullivan told reporters that American cluster munitions had a “dud” rate of below 2.5%, which he described as far below Russia’s cluster munition dud rate.
      Human rights groups have condemned Joe Biden’s approval to send cluster munitions to Ukraine. At least 149 civilians were killed or injured worldwide by the weapon in 2021, according to the Cluster Munition Monitor. Biden also faced a backlash from within his own Democratic party.
      Ukraine’s counteroffensive is “slower than we hoped”, the US undersecretary of defense for policy, Colin H Kahl, said. He said one of the primary reasons behind the decision to send cluster munitions was because of the “urgency of the moment”, adding that the weapons would be delivered “in a timeframe that is relevant for the counteroffensive”.
      The US added 209,000 new jobs in June as hiring slowed amid signs that the economy is cooling. The rise was the weakest gain since December 2020, but the increase was also the 30th consecutive month of jobs gains, and the unemployment rate ticked down to the historically low rate of 3.6%.
      Treasury secretary Janet Yellen has arrived in Beijing on a four-day trip that aims to tame spiralling tensions between the world’s two largest economies, particularly over trade and the hi-tech chip industry. She will meet senior Chinese officials including the premier, Li Qiang, and former vice-premier and economics tsar Liu He, who is seen as close to China’s president, Xi Jinping, in her first day of talks on Friday.
      The team led by special counsel Jack Smith has indicated a continued interest in a chaotic meeting that took place in the Oval Office in the final days of the Trump administration, according to a CNN report. Investigators have reportedly questioned several witnesses before the grand jury and during interviews about the meeting, which took place about six weeks after Donald Trump lost the 2020 election.
      James Comer, chair of the house oversight committee, requested a Secret Service briefing after cocaine was found at the White House over the weekend. In a letter to Secret Service director, Kimberly Cheatle, the Kentucky Republican said his committee is “investigating the details surrounding the discovery of cocaine in the White House”.
      Florida governor Ron DeSantis said he plans to participate in the first Republican presidential debate in August, whether or not Donald Trump attends. “I’ll be there, regardless,” DeSantis said. Trump, who continues to be frontrunner in the GOP race, has not officially said whether he will skip the debate.
      The Biden administration’s approval of the transfer of cluster munitions to Ukraine has sparked concern from human rights groups and some congressional lawmakers over the weapon’s ability to harm civilians, especially children, long after their use.At least 38 human rights organizations have publicly opposed the transfer of cluster munitions to Ukraine, according to the Hill.Sarah Yager, the Washington director at Human Rights Watch, said cluster bombs were already “all over” Ukraine and it is “not a good enough excuse for the United States to be sending more”. She added:
      Legislators, policymakers and the Biden administration will probably think twice when the pictures start coming back of children who have been harmed by American-made cluster munitions.
      Eric Eikenberry, the government relations director at Win Without War, said the adminstration’s argument that cluster munitions could help Ukraine advance and stop the Russian bombings was “speculative”.He dismissed “the idea that these are going to be a huge boon, the counteroffensive is going to jet forward and we’re going to save lives in the aggregate because these are going to be the wonder weapons that flip the battlefield in our favor and takes Russian artillery out of commission.”Here’s a clip of Joe Biden’s national security adviser, Jake Sullivan, who laid out the case for providing cluster munitions to Ukraine ahead of the Pentagon’s announcement.Kahl says it is too early to judge how the Ukrainian counter offensive is going “because we are at the beginning of the middle”.The counteroffensive is “slower than we had hoped” but the Ukrainians have a lot of combat power left, Kahl says.He says the majority of the Ukrainian combat power “has not been brought to bear”.
      What you’re seeing across the east and the south is the Ukrainians deliberately probing for weak spots.
      The real test will be when they identify weak spots or create weak spots and generate a breach, how rapidly they’re able to exploit that with the combat power that they have in reserve, and how rapidly the Russians will be able to respond.
      He says he believes the Ukrainians are doing their best but that the Russians “were more successful in digging in more deeply that perhaps was fully appreciated”.Kahl does not specify how many rounds of cluster munitions that will be transferred to Ukraine.He says the US has “hundreds of thousands that are available at this dud rate”, and that it believes that it has the ability to flow them into Ukraine to “keep them in the current fight” and to “build this bridge”. Providing cluster munitions to Ukraine “gives them an extra arrow in their quiver”, Kahl says.He says it is important for the Ukrainians to have a mix of capabilities, and that there is no one silver bullet.On the subject of a timeline, he says he is going to be “a little circumspect” for operational security reasons, and that the US has been “pretty cautious about talking about specific timelines”. He adds:
      The one thing I will say is they will deliver in a timeframe that is relevant for the counter offensive.
      Secondly, Kahl says the US has substantially increased the production of 155m rounds, and that allies have also invested in their defense industrial base.But the reality is that “we’re going to need to build a bridge to the point at which that capacity is sufficient, on a month to month basis, to keep the Ukrainians in the artillery fight”, he says.He says he is “as concerned about the humanitarian circumstance” as anybody” but that the “worst thing for civilians and Ukraine is for Russia to win the war”.Kahl says there are two primary reasons behind the decision to include cluster munitions in this latest weapons aid package to Ukraine.One is the “urgency of the moment”, he says. Ukraine is in the midst of its counteroffensive which has been difficult because the Russians had six months to dig into defensive belts in the east and the south.
      We want to make sure that the Ukrainians have sufficient artillery to keep them in the fight in the context of the current counter offensive, and because things are going a little slower than some had hoped.
      The Ukrainian government has assured the US of the “responsible use” of DPICM, including that it will not use the rounds in civilian-populated urban environments, Kahl says.Ukraine has also committed to post-conflict mining “to mitigate any potential harm to civilians”, he says.He says Washington will work with Kyiv to “minimize the risks associated with the decision” to supply cluster munitions.Kahl says Russian forces have been using cluster munitions “indiscriminately” since the start of its war in Ukraine. By contrast, Ukraine is seeking DPICM rounds “in order to defend its own sovereign territory”.The US will be sending Ukraine its “most modern” dual-purpose improved conventional munition (DPICM) cluster munitions with “dud” rates to be under 2.35%, Kahl says.He compares that to the cluster munitions used by Russia across Ukraine, which he says has dud rates of between 30% and 40%.The undersecretary of defense for policy, Colin H Kahl, is speaking at a press briefing at the Pentagon.The US will send a new weapons aid package worth about $800m, that will include 155m artillery rounds, including Dual-Purpose Improved Conventional Munitions, and 105mm artillery rounds.Also included in the new package are additional munitions for Patriot air defence systems and ammunition for High Mobility Artillery Rocket systems, additional Stryker armoured personnel carriers, precision aerial munitions, demolition munitions and systems for obstacle clearing and various spare parts and operational sustainment equipment. More

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      Sweltering weather has left swaths of the US baking. A ‘heat tsar’ could help, experts say

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      Record-breaking temperatures. Millions under heat alerts. Hikers dying on hot trails.As large swaths of the US bake under sweltering heat, some advocates and officials say the Biden administration should consider appointing a “heat tsar” to manage a response.The Earth saw its two hottest days in recorded history this week as parts of the south-west roasted, and as a stretch of the south endured a brutal heat dome that was parked over Texas for weeks.Heat kills more Americans than any other form of extreme weather. The threat is increasing amid the climate crisis and will accelerate, especially if the world doesn’t urgently stop burning fossil fuels.In response, Phoenix, Arizona; Los Angeles, California; and Miami-Dade county, Florida have all appointed chief heat officers – or “heat tsars” – over the past three years, as have at least six global cities.“It’s been very valuable for us in the city to have a permanent office dedicated to heat,” Kate Gallego, the mayor of Phoenix, whose administration created the nation’s first-ever office of heat response and mitigation in 2021, helmed by chief heat officer David Hondula. “Before, it wasn’t always clear who was in charge.”Rising temperatures have been brutal in Phoenix, the hottest city in America. Last year, Maricopa county reported 425 heat-associated deaths, a 25% increase from the previous year.It’s a trend affecting regions across the US, leaving governments scrambling to prepare. A federal body could help them share best practices, said Gallego.“We have probably 30 ideas about how to respond to heat,” she said. “If New Orleans already knows 25 of them but they benefit from five new ones, that could be incredible. It’s the same for mayors in Texas, who have lost too many lives already.”Gallego says that such a federal body could be helpful for historically temperate regions like the Pacific north-west, where hundreds died in a record-breaking 2021 heat dome.She recalled rare floods in Phoenix in 2014, her first year in office.“We didn’t have huge expertise in responding to flooding, but the federal government does, and they were able to provide consulting through Fema that helped me understand where to get an emergency supply of sandbags, for instance, or what tools are available if your fire station gets flooded,” she said.Traditionally hot regions also sorely need more federal support, said Jane Gilbert, who has served as Miami-Dade county’s first chief heat officer since May 2021. That support is needed with collecting data on deaths and injuries to capture the true toll of heat waves.“Heat could be the cause of … cardiac arrest, of a worker falling off a ladder, a psychotic break in a homeless person, of kidney failure in an outdoor worker, but it’s not necessarily coded as heat-related, so we don’t have good data on emergency department visits, hospitalizations, and deaths,” she said, adding that federal officials could help compile research and convene experts to navigate the problem.The Biden administration has taken steps to improve heat preparedness. Last summer, it unveiled Heat.gov, an interagency heat-focused website. The site, which tools such as heat index guides, a heat and health tracker, and a climate and health forecast, has improved communication between federal agencies and local officials, Gilbert said.While the National Weather Service has traditionally based heat alerts on how often certain thresholds are crossed in certain areas, for instance, it is beginning to consider health impacts of heat, thanks to input from the CDC, she said. To kick off these efforts, it’s piloting a program this summer in Miami-Dade county that lowers heat alert thresholds. Heat advisories will be issued at 105F (40.5C) instead of the previous level of 108F, and excessive heat warnings will be issued at 110F (43C) instead of 113F (45C) – changes Gilbert said could help keep people safe.But Juley Fulcher, health and safety advocate at consumer advocacy non-profit Public Citizen, said while Heat.gov has produced useful tools, it has not led to policy changes or increased material support.“Interagency actions in Washington, have a history of not functioning as well as we might like them,” she said. “If there is that kind of concerted effort, there has to be some concerted funding put toward it [and] you can’t just take somebody who has a job that takes up 100% of their time and say, ‘here’s 20% more work to do.’”skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionA heat-focused office could see ongoing policies through to completion, she said. For years, Fulcher has pushed for a federal rule to protect workers from heat, which her organization found could save hundreds of lives each year. The Occupational Safety and Health Administration began creating the rules in 2021, but the process could take “a couple of years” to finish, she said. A heat office could ensure the rule’s completion is a priority, and could go even further to protect workers, distributing more educational materials to employers and conducting more research on risks.Federal officials could help boost preparedness in other ways too, said Gallego, the Phoenix mayor. Currently, she is pressuring the Federal Emergency Management Agency to make heat eligible for the same relief available after other disasters like hurricanes – something a heat tsar could also see through.Without those formal structures, said Gilbert, officials’ responses may be less sophisticated. Until her role was created, Miami-Dade’s response to extreme heat mirrored plans for extreme cold.“With the unsheltered population, it was about getting people into shelters overnight when it’s coldest, but with heat, the biggest time of day that we need to worry about is from noon to 7pm,” she said. Now, responders are focused on getting people into daytime cooling centers, and are being trained to distribute cold packs and cooling towels.In another example, Cecilia Sorensen, director of the Global Consortium on Climate and Health Education at Columbia University, said that amid the Pacific north-west’s unprecedentedly deadly 2021 heat dome, the region had no disaster protocol plan for heat.“They activated their only disaster protocol, which was related to earthquakes,” she said. “That got all the right people on the phone to be able to coordinate, but that’s an example of … unpreparedness.”Sorensen agreed that municipalities need help responding, but added that a new office or “tsar” might not be the answer.“Each geographic area is is very unique,” she said. “And so much of the work to really prepare communities to be resilient involves engagement of community members and other stakeholders, and I don’t think the federal government can really convene at that level.”Instead, she suggests that officials focus on boosting existing bodies that can support municipalities. In 2021, the Biden administration established the Office of Climate Change and Health Equity within the US Department of Health and Human Services. But a lack of congressional funding and authorization has left it without full-time staff or funding, she said.“We should fund the office that’s supposed to be doing this work, rather than creating a whole new system in the executive branch,” she said.But Gallego said heat is an urgent enough threat to warrant its own office.“It’s time that the federal government had a new tool to address heat. Our entire planet is experiencing climate change and we need to adapt to that fact,” she said. “If the federal government created a one stop location for heat, they could save so many lives.” More

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      How do Democrats fight back against the US supreme court? – podcast

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      As the dust settled on last week’s judgments from the conservative-led bench, progressives voiced their anger at what they see as a lack of determination from the Biden administration to counteract the supreme court and its most extreme decisions.
      This week, Jonathan Freedland speaks to the Guardian US columnist Moira Donegan about what progressives want Joe Biden to do now

      How to listen to podcasts: everything you need to know More

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      The Big Break: Ben Terris on his portrait of Washington after Trump

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      If you were a pollster, would you ever bet on elections? How about your clients’ elections? How about betting your clients would lose? For Sean McElwee, the wunderkind behind the liberal polling group Data for Progress, the answer was all the above.McElwee had clients including the 2022 Senate campaign of John Fetterman, in Pennsylvania. McElwee placed multiple bets on the midterms, including that Fetterman would lose. Fetterman’s organization became displeased. Following its victory, it severed ties with McElwee. It was just the beginning of a dramatic downfall heightened by the pollster’s connections to the pandemic-prevention advocate Gabe Bankman-Fried, whose billionaire brother Sam Bankman-Fried’s crypto empire collapsed in scandal around election day.The rise and fall of Sean McElwee is one of many storylines in a new book The Big Break: The Gamblers, Party Animals and True Believers Trying to Win in Washington While America Loses its Mind. For the author, the Washington Post reporter Ben Terris, the individuals he profiles tell a collective story about DC processing the fallout from the Trump years.“Nobody knew what the world was going to be like post-Trump,” Terris says, adding: “If there is a post-Trump.”To explore that world, he turned to Democratic and Republican circles: Leah Hunt-Hendrix, an oil heiress turned funder of progressive causes, whose conservative grandfather HL Hunt was reportedly the world’s wealthiest man; Matt and Mercedes Schlapp, a Republican power couple whose fortunes crested after Matt decided to stick with Trump in 2016; Ian Walters, Matt’s protege until political and personal differences ruptured the friendship; Robert Stryk, a cowboy-hatted lobbyist who parlayed Trump connections into a lucrative career representing sometimes questionable clients; and Jamarcus Purley, a Black staffer for the Democratic senator Dianne Feinstein who lamented the impact of George Floyd’s murder and the pandemic on Black Americans including his own father, who died. Disenchanted with his boss, Purley lost his job in disputed circumstances and launched an unconventional protest in Feinstein’s Capitol office, after hours.Terris is a reporter for the Post’s Style section, which he characterizes as strong on features and profiles. He can turn a phrase, likening Fetterman to “a Tolkien character in Carhartt”, and has an ear for the telling quote. Once, while Terris was covering the Democratic senator Jon Tester, from Montana, in, of all places, an organic pea field, nature called. A staffer asked: “Can the senator’s penis please be off the record?” Terris quips that he’s saving this for a title if he ever writes a memoir.His current book is “sort of a travelog, not a memoir”, Terris says. “I tried to keep myself out of the book as much as I could. I wanted the reader to feel like they knew Washington, knew the weirdos, the odd scenes … the backrooms, poker games, parties.”Hunt-Hendrix’s Christmas party is among the opening scenes. Attendees include her aunt Swanee Hunt, a former ambassador to Austria. Hunt-Hendrix aimed to make her own mark, through her organization Way to Win.“She’s very progressive,” Terris says, “trying to unwind a lot of projects, in a way, that her grandfather was all about. To me, it was fascinating, the family dynamics at play.”Just as fascinating was her “figuring out how to push the [Democratic] party in the direction she believed it should go in – a more progressive direction than some Democrats pushed for. It told the story of Democratic party tensions – money and politics, the idea of being idealistic and also super-wealthy … All of these things made for a very heady brew.”On the Republican side, Stryk went from running a vineyard to savoring fine wine in a foreign embassy, thanks to his connection to Trump. Stryk joined the campaign in 2016. When Trump won, Stryk celebrated on a patio of the Four Seasons hotel in DC. A dog sniffed his crotch. When its owner apologized, Stryk found she worked for the New Zealand embassy, which was having difficulty reaching Trump. It was Stryk’s lucky break.“He was in a position to connect New Zealand to Trump,” Terris says. “He got a phone number and was off to the races, a sideshow guy making major deals … $5m with the Saudis, that kind of thing.”When Russia launched its invasion of Ukraine last year, Stryk was in Belarus, exploring a potential relationship with that country’s government. He had to make his way home via the Baltics.“One of the themes of the book is that the Donald Trump era allowed a bunch of sideshow characters to get out on the main stage,” Terris says. “Stryk is a great example of that.”Others distanced themselves – eventually. Terris sees the rupture between Matt Schlapp and Ian Walters as illustrative. As head of the American Conservative Union, Schlapp presided over CPAC, the annual conservative conference, with Walters his communications director. As Schlapp welcomed fringe elements to CPAC – from Trump to Matt Gaetz to Marjorie Taylor Greene – Walters felt increasingly repelled.“It’s an interesting tale of a broken friendship,” Terris says. “It also helps the reader understand how did the Republican party get to where it is now – where are the fault lines, why one way over another.”The 2020 election was the point of no return. Schlapp stayed all-in on Trump, supporting his claim of a stolen election even in a graveside speech at the funeral of Walters’s father, the legendary conservative journalist Ralph Hallow.“We have to take confidence that he would want us, more than anything else, to get beyond this period of mourning and to fight,” Schlapp is quoted as saying. Walters and his wife, Carin, resigned from the ACU. Ian remained a Republican but marveled at the bravery of the whistleblower Cassidy Hutchinson in the January 6 hearings.As for Schlapp, he faced scandal late last year. Assisting with the Senate campaign of the ex-football star Herschel Walker, when Schlapp arrived in Georgia, he allegedly groped a male campaign staffer.“I had to go back into my reporting and ask, were there signs of this?” recalls Terris. “Could I run through all of this [with] the alleged victim over the phone? I did. I ran a bunch of questions by Matt – he never answered.”There was another last-minute controversy. McElwee’s polls proved inaccurate. Another red flag was his ties to Gabe Bankman-Fried, whose brother was arrested in December. Reports of McElwee’s gambling made clients wonder where their money was going. Senior staff threatened to resign. McElwee stepped down.“All of a sudden, it was national news in a way I was not prepared for,” Terris says.Can anyone be prepared for what comes next in Washington?“Donald Trump proved you can win by acting like Donald Trump,” Terris says. “There are a lot of people that learned from him – mostly in the Republican party, but [also] the Democratic party – how to comport yourself in Washington, what you can get away with. People’s confidence is broken, politics is broken, relationships.”Can it all be restored?“Nobody knows yet how to do it. It’s not the same thing as normal. Maybe that’s fine. Maybe normal led to Donald Trump.”
      The Big Break is published in the US by Twelve More

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      McCarthy says Trump ‘stronger today than in 2016’ after doubting his ability to win earlier – live

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      From 6h agoThe impacts of the supreme court’s ruling in Moore v Harper extend to redistricting, and beyond.Its most immediate effect is to preserve longstanding norms over state courts’ ability to weigh in on legislatures’ actions when it comes to federal elections, as the Guardian’s Sam Levine reports:
      The 6-3 decision in Moore v Harper is a blow to North Carolina Republicans who had asked the court to embrace the so-called independent state legislature theory – the idea that the US constitution does not allow state courts to limit the power of state legislatures when it comes to federal elections. Such a decision in the case would have been a major win for Republicans, who control more state legislatures than Democrats do. Some of the conservative justices on the court had urged the bench to embrace the idea.
      “We will have to resolve this question sooner or later, and the sooner we do so, the better,” Justice Samuel Alito wrote in a dissent at an earlier stage in the case that was joined by Neil Gorsuch and Clarence Thomas. “If the language of the elections clause is taken seriously, there must be some limit on the authority of state courts to countermand actions taken by state legislatures when they are prescribing rules for the conduct of federal elections.”
      The court’s decision means that state courts can continue to weigh in on disputes over federal election rules. State courts have become increasingly popular forums for hearing those disputes, especially after the US supreme court said in 2019 that federal courts could not address partisan gerrymandering.
      But Michael McDonald, a University of Florida political science professor focusing on American elections, sees broader implications in the justices’ rejection of the fringe independent state legislature (ISL) theory, which Republican lawmakers from North Carolina has asked them to endorse in the case:Here’s more from Sam on the case:A New York appeals court has ordered that Ivanka Trump be dismissed from a civil fraud case filed by New York attorney general Letitia James against Donald Trump, the Trump Organization and three of his adult children.James’ lawsuit, filed last September, accused Trump of lying from 2011 to 2021 about the value of his properties, including his Mar-a-Lago estate and Trump Tower penthouse, as well as his own net worth, to receive favorable loans. The lawsuit alleged that Trump’s children were involved in a conspiracy to commit the crimes.The lawsuit seeks at least $250m in damages from the former president, his sons Donald Jr and Eric, his daughter Ivanka, the Trump Organization and to stop the Trumps from running businesses in New York.The appellate division in Manhattan, in today’s unanimous ruling, dismissed the claims brought against Ivanka Trump by James, noting that those claims were barred by New York’s statute of limitation. It said:
      The allegations against defendant Ivanka Trump do not support any claims that accrued after February 6, 2016. Thus, all claims against her should have been dismissed as untimely.
      The appeals court has returned the case to the state supreme court judge presiding over the case to determine whether the claims against the other defendants should be limited.A trial is scheduled to begin 2 October.Republican presidential hopeful Nikki Haley has said “what’s happening with the Uyghurs is disgusting” after her rival, Francis Suarez, appeared not to have heard of the persecuted Chinese minority group.Haley, during a foreign policy speech about China in Washington, said:
      We promised never again to look away from genocide, and it’s happening right now in China. And no one is saying anything because they’re too scared of China.
      Part of American foreign policy should always be that we fight for human rights for all people. And what’s happening with the Uyghurs is disgusting. And the fact that the whole world is ignoring it is shameful.
      Republican House speaker Kevin McCarthy has insisted that Donald Trump is “stronger today than he was in 2016”, hours after he appeared to question whether the former president was the strongest GOP nominee to win the 2024 election.McCarthy, in an interview with Breitbart News, said:
      As usual, the media is attempting to drive a wedge between President Trump and House Republicans as our committees are holding Biden’s DoJ accountable for their two-tiered levels of justice.
      He pointed to a Morning Poll published today that showed Trump with a three-point lead over Joe Biden in a hypothetical head-to-head match. McCarthy said:
      Just look at the numbers this morning – Trump is stronger today than he was in 2016.
      It comes after he was asked, in an interview earlier today with CNBC, whether Trump could win an election despite all his legal troubles. McCarthy replied:
      Yeah he can … the question is, is he strongest to win the election? I don’t know that answer.
      Investigators from special counsel Jack Smith’s office are set to interview Georgia’s secretary of state, Brad Raffensperger, in Atlanta, as part of the federal investigation into efforts by Donald Trump and his advisers to overturn the 2020 election results.Raffensperger’s interview, first reported by the Washington Post, will be his first with US justice department investigators.Smith’s office subpoenaed Raffensperger back in December, but NBC News reports that the move was for documents and not for him to appear or testify in person.In a phone call after the 2020 election, Trump demanded Raffensperger “find” the votes needed for him to win Georgia – a state Joe Biden won by nearly 12,000 votes.Trump told Raffensperger:
      All I want to do is this. I just want to find 11,780 votes, which is one more than we have. Because we won the state.
      A new federal law that requires employers to provide accommodations to pregnant and postpartum employees took effect on Tuesday, providing protections to millions of eligible people.The Pregnant Workers Fairness Act requires that employers with more than 15 workers provide “reasonable accommodations” to people who are pregnant, postpartum or have a related medical condition, NBC News reported.The legislation covers accommodations for a myriad of pregnancy-related conditions including morning sickness, pregnancy loss and postpartum depression.Examples of possible accommodations include being able to sit and drink water, having flexible hours and having uniforms that fit properly, according to information from the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission.Accommodations could also include time off for childbirth recovery and time to access an abortion, the 19th News reported.Under the act, a pregnant employee can request accommodations from their employer, with both parties having a discussion on if the accommodation can be granted.Read the full story here.Kamala Harris is out with a statement cheering the supreme court’s decision in the Moore v Harper case out of North Carolina, but acknowledging that more must be done to safeguard voting rights across the United States.Here are the vice-president’s thoughts:
      Voting is the bedrock of our democracy. Today’s decision preserves state courts’ critical role in safeguarding elections and protecting the voice and the will of the American people. We know that more work must to (sic) be done to protect the fundamental right to vote and to draw fair maps that reflect the diversity of our communities and our nation. The President and I will keep fighting to secure access to the ballot box, but we cannot do this alone. We continue to call on Congress to do their part to protect voters and our democracy and pass the John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act and the Freedom to Vote Act.
      If the supreme court had ruled in favor of Republicans in a major election law case decided today, it would have represented a “truly horrible” blow to American democracy, a congressman from North Carolina, the state at the heart of the decision, said in an interview.Speaking to the Guardian’s US politics live blog, Wiley Nickel, a first-term Democratic House representative from the Raleigh area, said that while the decision handed down might represent a victory in the battle against partisan gerrymandering, he still expects Republicans who control North Carolina’s state legislature to proceed with redrawing congressional maps to their advantage.“We had something truly horrible that didn’t happen and it would have been the beginning of the end of democracy in America if the court had sided with Tim Moore in the Moore v Harper case,” Nickel said, referring to the Republican speaker of the state’s House of Representatives whose name was on the supreme court case.But because the US supreme court has now ruled against North Carolina’s Republicans and declined to endorse a fringe theory that could have prevented state courts from weighing in on federal election rules, “It’ll mean that we have a check with the courts and with our constitution … it just moves us on to the next stage of the fight to make sure that we get fair maps in this next election.”Nickel was elected last year after North Carolina’s supreme court struck down a GOP-drawn congressional map and replaced it with one that produced a 7-7 split between Republicans and Democrats in the state’s delegation following the midterm election. While Democrats still lost control of the US House, that ruling was one of many factors that helped the party’s lawmakers across the country perform better than expected.In North Carolina, the GOP has since taken the majority on its top court, which, together with the party’s control of the House and Senate, will allow it to move forward with a partisan gerrymander of the state’s congressional districts.Nickel expects that the boundaries of his district, which leans slightly Republican, will remain pretty much the same, but other Democratic congressional representatives may be at risk.“It goes back to our state legislature and they’re going to draw maps and it’s going to be, I think, bad overall for Democrats,” he said. How bad it is will be yet another factor determining whether Joe Biden’s allies are able to retake control of the House in the next election, set for November 2024.In the long run, Nickel supports federal legislation to end partisan gerrymandering, but acknowledges that among the current crop of Republicans in the House, “The majority of them right now, if anything, they’re going in the opposite direction.”He takes some solace from another supreme court ruling released earlier this month that maintains parts of the Voting Rights Act and could help Democrats hang onto some districts in North Carolina and elsewhere in the south. Nickel also noted that if the Tar Heel State’s Republicans push too hard to make maps that disadvantage Democrats, it raises the chances a legal challenge against them will succeed.“Every single time we talk about maps in North Carolina, the real question is, how greedy are they going to get? And if they get too greedy, the state courts, federal courts are going to get involved,” he said.The third “Florida Man” in the race for the Republican presidential nomination, Miami’s mayor Francis Suarez, suffered an embarrassment during an interview with a conservative radio host when he was asked about the plight of the oppressed Uyghurs, a Muslim minority in China.“The what?” Suarez replied when asked by the presenter Hugh Hewitt if he would be talking about them during his campaign, reported by the Miami Herald.“The Uyghurs,” Hewitt repeated.“What’s a Uyghur?” Suarez asked.“OK, we’ll come back to that. You gotta get smart on that,” Hewitt said.“What did you call it, a Weeble?” Suarez asked at the conclusion of the 15-minute conversation.In a later tweet, Hewitt called Suarez’s interview “pretty good for a first conversation”, apart from the “huge blind spot” on the Uyghurs.In a statement, Suarez claimed he had merely misheard. “Of course, I am well aware of the suffering of the Uyghurs in China,” he claimed.“China has a deplorable record on human rights and all people of faith suffer there. I didn’t recognize the pronunciation my friend Hugh Hewitt used. That’s on me.”You can listen to the interview here.Speaking of Donald Trump and 2024, Kevin McCarthy made a curious comment this morning in an interview with CNBC.Asked if he thought Trump could win an election despite all his legal troubles, the Republican House speaker replied, “Yeah he can … the question is, is he strongest to win the election? I don’t know that answer. But can … anybody beat Biden? Yeah, anybody can beat Biden. Can Biden beat other people? Yes, Biden can beat them.”Make of that what you will. Here’s the full clip:During his campaign swing through New Hampshire, Ron DeSantis was asked about his views on the January 6 insurrection.Donald Trump has repeatedly insulted DeSantis, who is his closest rival for the Republican presidential nomination next year, but that apparently isn’t enough to earn the Florida’s governor’s condemnation of the former president’s involvement in the attack on the Capitol:Nancy Pelosi, the former speaker of the House, has also praised the supreme court’s ruling in Moore v Harper.Posting to Twitter, Pelosi said:
      Today, the Supreme Court rejected a fringe, far-right assault on a sacred pillar of American Democracy: the right to vote.
      With its ruling in Moore v. Harper, the Court refused the MAGA Republicans’ radical theory and reaffirmed our Founders’ vision of checks and balances.
      The White House has responded to the supreme court’s ruling in Moore v Harper, calling it a “critical” move for voting rights.White House spokesperson Olivia Dalton said the “extreme” legal theory would have let politicians undermine the will of the people.Florida governor Ron DeSantis, at a campaign event in Hollis, New Hampshire, also vowed to tear down Washington’s traditional political power centers, AP reports.Asked about people who had voted twice for Donald Trump because of promises to “drain the swamp” in the nation’s capital, DeSantis replied:
      He didn’t drain it. It’s worse today than it’s ever been.
      He said he would take power out of Washington by instructing cabinet agencies to halve the number of employees there, adding:
      I want to break the swamp.
      Florida governor Ron DeSantis has vowed to succeed where Donald Trump failed and to “actually” build the wall between the US and Mexico, as the two held dueling campaign events in New Hampshire.DeSantis, at a town hall in Hollis, spoke about his new immigration policy proposal which includes calling for ending birthright citizenship, finishing the border wall and sending US forces into Mexico to combat drug cartels, AP reports.He said:
      We’re actually going to build the wall. A lot of politicians chirp. They make grandiose promises and then fail to deliver the actual results. The time for excuses is over. Now is the time to deliver results and finally get the job done. More

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      What to know about the Hunter Biden investigation and what it means

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      Hunter Biden, the son of President Joe Biden, will plead guilty to two counts of misdemeanor tax crimes and accept a deal with prosecutors related to a separate illegal firearm possession charge. The charges and plea deal, which authorities announced in a court filing on Tuesday, will end a five-year criminal investigation into Biden.The case has already resulted in a political uproar as Republicans, fresh off Donald Trump’s second criminal indictment, express outrage over the plea deal and appear eager to redirect public attention to Hunter Biden. The agreement between 53-year-old Biden and authorities will likely mean he avoids any jail time, as well as set up a frequent talking point for the 2024 presidential election.Here is a breakdown of the charges against Hunter Biden:What is the Hunter Biden investigation?The justice department has been looking into Hunter Biden’s personal and business dealings for years, launching an investigation into him as far back as 2018. Hunter Biden issued a statement in 2020 acknowledging that the US attorney’s office in Delaware informed his legal counsel that investigators were looking into his tax affairs, while stating he was confident he handled his affairs “legally and appropriately”.The investigation, which was led by Trump-appointed US attorney for Delaware David Weiss, looked into a range of Biden’s activities that included his role in foreign businesses – such as his seat on the board of Ukrainian energy company Burisma, a frequent source of rightwing criticism. Investigators interviewed witnesses and looked through financial documents, with the probe looming in the background for years.Ultimately the investigation narrowed down to two main issues: Biden’s failure to pay income taxes on time and a charge related to lying on a firearm application form. Prosecutors charged Biden on 20 June, while simultaneously announcing that he would enter a plea deal that will likely not result in jail time.What are the tax charges against Hunter Biden?Biden pleaded guilty to two counts of wilful failure to pay federal income tax. The two misdemeanor charges relate to Biden failing to pay taxes for the years 2017 and 2018, according to a statement from Weiss’s office, despite owing more than $100,000 each year. (He paid these back taxes in 2021, following the opening of the investigation.)What is the gun charge against Hunter Biden?Investigators also charged Biden with one count of illegally possessing a firearm, stating that he violated a law that prohibits people who use or are addicted to controlled substances from owning a gun. Biden has publicly detailed his struggles with substance abuse, including alcohol and crack cocaine, while explicit photos of him on drugs have circulated for years. He stated on a handgun application in 2018 that he was not using drugs, according to the New York Times, which prosecutors allege was a lie.Biden will not plead guilty to the firearm charge, but instead will enter into a Pretrial Diversion Agreement that typically means an individual avoids prosecution if they meet certain conditions.What are the political implications of the Hunter Biden charges?The charges against Hunter Biden, and the plea deal will mean he likely avoids any jail time, have immediately riled up Republicans who have long made unsubstantiated accusations that the president’s son is part of an international criminal conspiracy. Almost immediately after the charges were announced, numerous Republican lawmakers and rightwing commentators criticized the justice department for not seeking harsher punishment for Biden.Former president Donald Trump posted on his Truth Social network that the plea deal was the work of the “corrupt Biden DOJ” and was a “traffic ticket”. The House Oversight Committee chairman, James Comer, who is leading Republican lawmakers’ separate inquiry into Hunter Biden, alleged: “Biden is getting away with a slap on the wrist” and vowed to continue his committee’s investigation. Ohio Republican congressman Jim Jordan simply tweeted: “DOUBLE STANDARD OF JUSTICE.”Republicans have long attempted to use Hunter Biden as a counterpoint to the various criminal investigations facing Trump, claiming that the Biden administration is somehow covering up the president’s son’s crimes or engaging in corruption. The charges against Hunter Biden also notably come one week after Trump was arraigned in a Florida courthouse after facing a 37-count indictment related to his handling of classified documents. Unlike Biden, who has never held public office and faced misdemeanor charges, the more serious felony counts against Trump could carry significant jail time and complicate his 2024 presidential election campaign.How has the president responded to his son’s plea deal?Meanwhile, the White House on Tuesday issued a brief statement through a spokesperson on the charges against Biden. “The President and First Lady love their son and support him as he continues to rebuild his life. We will have no further comment,” the statement said. The Biden administration has been preparing for possible charges against the president’s son for months, as Republicans appear intent to once again make Hunter Biden a focal point during the election. More

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      Biden’s inner circle: who’s who in the president’s 2024 bid for re-election?

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      Joe Biden, who early into his presidency said he intended to seek a second term, formally announced he was running for re-election in April, exactly four years after he entered the 2020 presidential race.The president has swiftly assembled a mix of trusted advisers on a campaign team that paints a picture of his 2024 strategy, which includes engaging Latino communities and touting his first-term achievements.Here’s a look at the key players in Biden’s inner circle.Top campaign namesJulie Chávez Rodríguez, campaign managerBiden picked Chávez Rodríguez, a senior adviser and assistant to the president, to steer his re-election campaign. Chávez Rodríguez was a deputy campaign manager on the Biden-Harris ticket and oversaw the campaign’s outreach to Latino voters. She is the granddaughter of the late labor leader Cesar Chavez, who founded the powerful United Farm Workers of America union, and attended labor rallies at a young age.She also served as state director for the then California senator Kamala Harris and held senior roles on Harris’s 2020 presidential campaign. She became the highest-ranking Latina in the Biden-Harris administration as director of the White House Office of Intergovernmental Affairs. She served in a number of roles under former president Barack Obama, including as a director of domestic policy.Quentin Fulks, deputy campaign managerFulks, who served as campaign chief for the Georgia senator Raphael Warnock’s re-election bid in 2022, joined Biden’s 2024 team as principal deputy campaign manager. He also helped run JB Pritzker’s 2018 campaign for governor of Illinois and then served as a senior adviser.Fulks, who is Black, said in an interview with the Associated Press that growing up in a majority white town in rural Georgia helped him understand what Democrats needed to win votes in conservative-majority states, speaking of Warnock’s successful re-election bid.Kevin Muñoz, pressMuñoz, a former White House spokesperson who oversaw its messaging on the Covid-19 pandemic, is helping manage the press office on Biden’s re-election campaign as it makes key hires months after formally taking shape. He previously served as a campaign spokesperson for Biden’s 2020 presidential campaign, leading efforts in Nevada and Florida, according to LinkedIn.Chávez Rodríguez told CNN in March that Muñoz, who frequently made appearances speaking Spanish, is someone who can “figure out how to best identify the issues and communicate those in English and in Spanish”.Jill BidenThe first lady, Jill Biden, encouraged her husband to seek a second term. According to the president’s senior advisers, he will often consider her opinion before making final decisions on official matters. She is also expected to play a large role on the campaign trail as Biden faces backlash for his family. A career educator, she offers a perspective over GOP fights about book bans and other policies in schools, and has served as a connection to suburban voters, particularly women.“She is really effective in talking about how the Biden agenda is good for moms, for women, for working women,” Kate Bedingfield, a former White House communications director and 2020 deputy campaign manager, told Politico.Kamala HarrisVice-President Kamala Harris will play a significant role in Biden’s re-election campaign as his running mate. At 58, Harris is decades younger than Biden, 80, whose age has been a concern among some voters, and could face more scrutiny on the campaign trail as the person second in line for the presidency.Harris, who defended abortion following the supreme court’s decision to overturn Roe v Wade, is also expected to help shore up support over reproductive rights, a top issue among voters. Harris is the highest-ranking woman in the current administration and the first person of Black and Asian descent to hold the vice-presidency. She was previously attorney general of California and was later elected senator.Trusted White House officials who steered Biden’s 2020 campaignJen O’Malley DillonO’Malley Dillon was the campaign manager for Biden’s 2020 presidential bid. She joined the campaign in March 2020 from her post as campaign chief for Beto O’Rourke after he withdrew from the race and led a historic effort to win voters amid the pandemic shutdown.She joined the Biden-Harris administration as deputy chief of staff, along with a slate of top 2020 campaign advisers, including Chávez Rodríguez, who is leading Biden’s re-election bid.Jeff Zientsskip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionZients, who has been Biden’s chief of staff since January, served as co-chair of the transition in 2020. Zients, whom Biden picked to oversee the White House Covid-19 response, served a number of roles during the Obama administration, including as director of the national economic council.Earlier this year, Axios reported that Zients called members of Biden’s cabinet to tell them if they wanted to resign, they should do it now, because the cabinet would play a key role in touting the president’s first-term achievements on the 2024 trail.Anita DunnThe veteran campaign strategist Anita Dunn, one of Biden’s closest advisers, had begun planning for his campaign before he officially filed for re-election. Dunn is leading Biden’s 2024 messaging from the White House, where she serves as a senior adviser, but is working closely with the president’s re-election team, according to CNN.Dunn previously served as White House communications director under Barack Obama and is credited with crafting media strategies across several campaigns. She was a senior adviser on Biden’s 2020 campaign and worked at the White House temporarily to help craft the president’s agenda before returning to her political consulting firm, SKDK. She rejoined the Biden administration last April ahead of the 2022 midterms.Mike DonilonAs chief strategist of Biden’s 2020 campaign, Donilon helped shape the message that guided Biden to victory over Donald Trump. Donilon, now a senior adviser to the president, has worked with Biden since the 1980s and served in the Clinton and Obama administrations.Donilon has worked on six presidential campaigns and helped secure dozens of Democratic gubernatorial and congressional victories.Steve RicchettiRicchetti, counselor to the president, is one of Biden’s most loyal advisers, having joined his vice-presidential staff in 2012. He was Biden’s campaign chair in 2020 and previously encouraged him to run in 2016. Ricchetti, a former congressional lobbyist, has held numerous roles in the Obama and Clinton administrations.Ricchetti was one of the White House officials picked to lead the negotiations over the debt ceiling with the House speaker, Kevin McCarthy, and shepherded the trillion-dollar bipartisan infrastructure deal past last-minute disagreements. He also helped Biden negotiate a lucrative book deal and tour, according to the New York Times.Bruce ReedReed, who advised Biden on technology policy during his 2020 campaign, is a White House deputy chief of staff and is expected to remain in his administration role while advising the president on his re-election bid.He also served as chief of staff to Biden when he was vice-president, from 2011 to 2013, succeeding Ron Klain. He served as a deputy campaign manager for Bill Clinton and later worked in his administration as director of the domestic policy council.Other key namesValerie Biden OwensBiden’s younger sister, Valerie Biden Owens, has played a key role throughout the president’s political career, serving as a senior adviser to his 2020 campaign. She managed Biden’s seven consecutive runs for the US Senate, as well as his first presidential campaign in 1988.Ron KlainKlain, who stepped down from his role as White House chief of staff earlier this year, is one of Biden’s most trusted advisers and worked as a top aide on his 2020 campaign. He previously served as chief of staff to Biden when he was vice-president, a job he also held during the Clinton administration, to Al Gore. Before Biden officially announced he was running for re-election, Klain said Biden had the best shot among Democrats at beating Donald Trump. More

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      Blinken visit seeks to ease fraught US relationship with China

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      In a long-awaited visit, the US secretary of state is due to arrive in China this week, where he is expected to meet with senior officials in an attempt to stabilise the fraught relationship between the two superpowers.The buildup to Antony Blinken’s China visit has been marred by a series of tense exchanges. On Wednesday Qin Gang, China’s foreign minister, told Blinken in a phone call that the US should stop interfering in China’s internal affairs. Qin also said that the US should respect China’s concerns on the “Taiwan issue”.Daniel Kritenbrink, the US state department’s top diplomat for east Asia, later told reporters that he did not expect “some sort of breakthrough or transformation” in the US-China relationship, according to Reuters.Kritenbrink added: “We’re coming to Beijing with a realistic, confident approach and a sincere desire to manage our competition in the most responsible way possible.”Last week the US conceded that China had been spying on the US from Cuba since at least 2019. The White House had initially denied reports that China had struck a multibillion-dollar deal with Cuba to eavesdrop on the US.News of the eavesdropping unit had threatened to derail Blinken’s visit –which had already been postponed from February, when an alleged Chinese spy balloon was shot down in US air space, bursting hopes for a rapprochement building on President Xi Jinping’s face-to-face meeting with President Joe Biden in November.Blinken, who will be in China on 18-19 June, will be the highest ranking US official to visit the country since Biden took office.The visit comes at a low point in US-China relations. Beijing has repeatedly accused the US of engaging in double standards and a “new cold war mentality” when it comes to trade sanctions and export controls.In recent days Chinese state media has published several articles throwing cold water on the prospects of dialogue. On Tuesday, one commentator for the state broadcaster CCTV wrote: “Since the start of the year, America has been a bit vicious with regards to China.“Every time they say they want to meet, the US is keen to play tricks on China, creating the illusion that the US is eager to communicate. At the same time, it has repeatedly tested and provoked China’s bottom line,” wrote Yuyuan Tantian, the CCTV-affiliated blogger.Jessica Chen Weiss, a professor of China and Asia-Pacific studies at Cornell University, said that she didn’t expect “major breakthroughs” from the visit. “Given the current levels of mistrust and tension in the relationship, a good outcome would be a better understanding of each side’s concerns and red lines as well as modest progress on areas of overlapping interest,” such as the economy, climate change and “the resumption of people-to-people interactions post-Covid”.Jonathan Ward, author of The Decisive Decade, a book about US competition with China, said that the state of US-China relations pointed to a “dangerous future ahead”.“I don’t think any particular meeting is going to change the structural problem in the US-China relationship,” Ward said. “The broader picture is that the Chinese Communist party has a clear strategy to become a leading economic power, and the US has only woken up to this very recently.”Outside of formal diplomacy, Beijing has opened the door to western businesspeople. In May, Elon Musk visited China, meeting foreign minister Qin and other senior officials. And Bill Gates, who tweeted on Wednesday that he had arrived in Beijing, is reported to be meeting Xi on Friday.It has not yet been confirmed if Blinken will also meet with the Chinese president. More