Biden, Joseph R Jr

Subterms

    Latest story

    175 Shares24 Views

    Trump May Get His ‘Big Beautiful Bill,’ but the G.O.P. Will Pay a Price

    by

    And so will many voters.There will be many short- and long-term consequences if Republicans succeed in passing President Trump’s signature policy bill, as they aim to do before the July 4 holiday, David Leonhardt, the director of the Times editorial board, tells the national politics writer Michelle Cottle in this episode of “The Opinions.”Trump May Get His ‘Big Beautiful Bill,’ but the G.O.P. Will Pay a PriceAnd so will many voters.Below is a transcript of an episode of “The Opinions.” We recommend listening to it in its original form for the full effect. You can do so using the player above or on the NYT Audio App, Apple, Spotify, Amazon Music, YouTube, iHeartRadio or wherever you get your podcasts.The transcript has been lightly edited for length and clarity.Michelle Cottle: I’m Michelle Cottle and I cover national politics for Times Opinion. So with the July 4 weekend looming, I thought we’d talk about a different kind of fireworks: that is, President Trump’s “big, beautiful bill” and as always, I hope the air quotes there are audible for everybody.But that bill looks like it is on track for passage. From Medicaid cuts to tax breaks for the rich, it is a lot. Thankfully with me to talk about this is David Leonhardt, the fearless director of the New York Times editorial board, who has some very pointed thoughts on the matter. So let’s just get to it. David, welcome.David Leonhardt: Thank you, Michelle. It’s great to be talking with you.Cottle: I’m so excited, but warning to all: We are recording on Monday midday and even as we speak, the Senate is brawling its way through to a final vote. So the situation is fluid and could change the details by the time you all hear this.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

    More stories

    • 163 Shares66 Views

      in Elections

      Trump Won by Turning Out Voters and Building a Diverse Coalition, Report Finds

      by

      A new Pew Research Center study found that 85 percent of President Trump’s 2020 supporters came out to vote for him again, a better rate than Democrats pulled off.One of the most robust studies of the 2024 election shows that President Trump’s return to the White House was powered more heavily by his ability to turn out past supporters than by winning over Democratic voters, even as he built one of the most diverse coalitions in Republican Party history.The new report, released on Thursday from Pew Research Center, offers some of the most detailed analysis yet of what actually happened last fall, in particular how infrequent voters broke for Mr. Trump over former Vice President Kamala Harris.In the end, the math was simple and significant: A larger share of voters who supported Mr. Trump in the 2020 election — 85 percent — showed up to vote for him again in 2024. Ms. Harris earned the support of just 79 percent of former President Joseph R. Biden’s 2020 voters.The analysis showed that 5 percent of Mr. Biden’s voters flipped to Mr. Trump, while only 3 percent of Mr. Trump’s 2020 voters flipped to Ms. Harris.But the bigger factor was turnout: 15 percent of Mr. Biden’s voters did not vote at all in 2024, Pew found.Tony Fabrizio, who was the lead pollster for the Trump campaign, said the new report validated the campaign’s strategic successes.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

    • 163 Shares106 Views

      in Elections

      Juneteenth Goes Uncelebrated at White House as Trump Complains About ‘Too Many’ Holidays

      by

      President Trump made no statement about the federal holiday that commemorates the end of slavery in the United States, other than saying there were too many like it. Lesser occasions routinely garner official proclamations.Juneteenth, the holiday that marks the end of slavery in the United States, has been celebrated at the White House each June 19 since it was enshrined into law four years ago. But on Thursday, it went unmarked by the president — except for a post on social media in which he said he would get rid of some “non-working holidays.”“Soon we’ll end up having a holiday for every once working day of the year,” Mr. Trump said in mangled syntax, not mentioning Juneteenth by name nor acknowledging that Thursday was a federal holiday. “It must change if we are going to, MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN!”Karoline Leavitt, the White House press secretary, indicated to reporters earlier in the day that she was not aware of any plans by Mr. Trump to sign a holiday proclamation. In the past week alone, he’d issued proclamations commemorating Father’s Day, Flag Day and National Flag Week, and the 250th anniversary of the Battle of Bunker Hill — none of which are among the 11 annual federal holidays.In response to a reporter’s question about Juneteenth, Ms. Leavitt acknowledged that Thursday was “a federal holiday,” but noted that White House staff had shown up to work during a briefing that focused primarily on the matter of whether Mr. Trump would order strikes on Iran.Mr. Trump, who has often used holidays as an occasion to advance his political causes and insult critics and opponents on social media, chose the occasion of Juneteenth instead to float the idea of reducing the number of federal holidays, claiming that they are costing businesses billions of dollars. While most federal employees get those holidays off, private businesses have the choice to close or remain open. Juneteenth commemorates June 19, 1865, the day when a Union general arrived in Galveston, Texas, nearly two and a half years after President Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation, to finally inform enslaved African Americans there that the Civil War had ended and that all enslaved people had been freed. Months later, the 13th Amendment was ratified, abolishing slavery in the final four border states that had not been subjected to Lincoln’s order.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

    • 175 Shares112 Views

      in Elections

      Justice Dept. to Cut Gun-Sale Inspectors by Two-Thirds as It Moves to Downsize A.T.F.

      by

      The move is part of the Trump administration’s effort to defang and downsize the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.The Justice Department plans to slash the number of inspectors who monitor federally licensed gun dealers by two-thirds, sharply limiting the government’s already crimped capacity to identify businesses that sell guns to criminals, according to budget documents.The move, part of the Trump administration’s effort to defang and downsize the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, comes as the department considers merging the A.T.F. and the Drug Enforcement Administration. It follows a rollback of Biden-era regulations aimed at stemming the spread of deadly homemade firearms, along with other gun control measures.The department plans to eliminate 541 of the estimated 800 investigators responsible for determining whether federal dealers are following federal law and regulations intended to keep guns away from traffickers, straw purchasers, criminals and those found to have severe mental illness, according to a budget summary quietly circulated last week.Department officials estimated the reductions would reduce “A.T.F.’s capacity to regulate the firearms and explosives industries by approximately 40 percent” in the fiscal year starting in November — even though the staff cuts represent two-thirds of the inspection work force. The cuts are needed to meet the White House demand that A.T.F. cut nearly a third from its budget of $1.6 billion.News of the plan came as a shock to a work force already reeling from months of disruption. Several frontline agency staff members, who spoke on the condition of anonymity for fear of retribution, said the cuts would lead to hundreds of layoffs and effectively end the A.T.F.’s role as a serious regulator of gun sales, if they are not reversed by the White House or Congress.“These are devastating cuts to law enforcement funding and would undermine A.T.F.’s ability to keep communities safe from gun violence,” said John Feinblatt, the president of Everytown for Gun Safety, a nonprofit advocacy group founded by the former mayor of New York Michael R. Bloomberg. “This budget would be a win for unscrupulous gun dealers and a terrible setback for A.T.F.’s state and local law enforcement partners.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

    • 138 Shares102 Views

      in Elections

      Trump’s Trade and Tax Policies Start to Stall U.S. Battery Boom

      by

      Battery companies are slowing construction or reconsidering big investments in the United States because of tariffs on China and the proposed rollback of tax credits.Battery manufacturing began to take off in the United States in recent years after Congress and the Biden administration offered the industry generous incentives.But that boom now appears to be stalling as the Trump administration and Republican lawmakers try to restrict China’s access to the American market.From South Carolina to Washington State, companies are slowing construction or reconsidering big investments in factories for producing rechargeable batteries and the ingredients needed to make them.A big reason for that is higher trade barriers between the United States and China are fracturing relationships between suppliers and customers in the two countries. At the same time, Republicans are seeking to block battery makers with ties to China, as well as those that rely on any Chinese technology or materials, from taking advantage of federal tax credits. The industry is also dealing with a softening market for electric vehicles, which Republicans and Mr. Trump have targeted. The China-related restrictions — included in the version of Mr. Trump’s domestic policy bill passed by the House — would be very difficult for many companies to operate under. China is the world’s top battery manufacturer and makes nearly all of certain components.The Trump policy bill highlights a difficult dilemma. The United States wants to create a homegrown battery industry and greatly reduce its dependence on China — and many Republican lawmakers want to end it altogether. But China is already so dominant in this industry that it will be incredibly hard for the United States to become a meaningful player without working with Chinese companies.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

    • 125 Shares166 Views

      in Elections

      Pentagon Is Reviewing Deal to Equip Australia With Nuclear Submarines

      by

      The 2021 pact, meant to help counter China’s ambitions in the Asia Pacific, will be examined to ensure that it meets “America First criteria,” a U.S. official said.The Trump administration is reviewing whether a security pact between the United States, Britain and Australia meant to equip Australia with nuclear submarines is “aligned with the president’s America First agenda,” a U.S. defense official said on Wednesday.When the deal was reached under President Joseph R. Biden Jr.’s administration in 2021, it was billed as crucial for countering China’s growing military influence in the Asia Pacific. Now, its review appears to reinforce President Trump’s skeptical and transactional approach to longstanding alliances, including demands that allies spend more on their own defense.The Pentagon official said the review would ensure that the pact, known as Aukus, met “common-sense, America First criteria,” including ensuring that U.S. forces are at “the highest readiness,” that allies are doing their part, and that “the defense industrial base is meeting our needs.” The review was first reported by The Financial Times.Australia’s defense minister, Richard Marles, said both Australia and Britain had been notified about the review and that all three nations were still committed to the deal.“We’ve been aware of this for some time. We welcome it,” Mr. Marles said in a radio interview with ABC Melbourne on Thursday, Australia time. “It’s something which is perfectly natural for an incoming administration to do.”Australia sees the Aukus agreement as central to its defense strategy in the coming decades in a region increasingly shaped by China’s assertive military posturing. Nuclear submarines can travel much farther without detection than conventional ones can and would enable the Australian Navy to greatly extend its reach.Under the pact, Australia is scheduled to receive secondhand Virginia-class nuclear submarines from the United States in the 2030s while scaling up the capacity to build its own, using a British design. But there has been concern in both Washington and Canberra about whether the United States can build new submarines to replenish its fleet quickly enough for the older ones to be transferred to Australia.Elbridge Colby, the U.S. under secretary of defense for policy, said during his Senate confirmation hearing in March that he was skeptical about the pragmatic feasibility of the deal. The Financial Times reported that Mr. Colby was heading up the Pentagon review.“So if we can produce the attack submarines in sufficient number and sufficient speed, then great,” Mr. Colby said at the hearing. “But if we can’t, that becomes a very difficult problem.”Even before the review was announced, concern and anxiety had been building in Australia over whether it could continue to depend on its longstanding relationship with the United States, given the Trump administration’s treatment of allies.Mr. Marles, the Australian defense minister, said in the radio interview that he was confident the Aukus deal would proceed because “it’s in the interests of the United States to continue to work with Australia.”Michael D. Shear More

    • 100 Shares157 Views

      in Elections

      Trump Orders Investigation of Biden and His Aides

      by

      The executive order is the latest effort by President Trump to stoke outlandish conspiracy theories about his predecessor and question the legality of his actions in office.President Trump ordered his White House counsel and the attorney general on Wednesday to investigate former President Joseph R. Biden Jr. and his staff in Mr. Trump’s latest attempt to stoke outlandish conspiracy theories about his predecessor.In an executive order, Mr. Trump put the power and resources of the federal government to work examining whether some of Mr. Biden’s presidential actions were legally invalid because his aides had enacted those policies without his knowledge.The executive order came after Mr. Trump shared a social media post over the weekend that claimed Mr. Biden had been “executed in 2020” and replaced by a robotic clone, following a pattern of suggestions by the president and his allies that Mr. Biden was a mentally incapacitated puppet of his aides.The former president called such claims “ridiculous and false” in a statement on Wednesday after the order’s release.“Let me be clear: I made the decisions during my presidency,” he said. “I made the decisions about the pardons, executive orders, legislation and proclamations.”The order comes after disclosure in recent weeks that Mr. Biden, 82, had received a diagnosis of advanced prostate cancer and in the wake of renewed scrutiny of his health during his presidency.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

    • 125 Shares188 Views

      in Elections

      Justice Dept. Drops Biden-Era Push to Obtain Peter Navarro’s Emails

      by

      The department’s move is one of many recent actions taken to dismiss criminal and civil actions against Trump allies such as Mr. Navarro, the president’s trade adviser.The Justice Department has abruptly dropped its effort to force Peter Navarro, President Trump’s trade adviser, to turn over hundreds of his emails dating to the first Trump administration to the National Archives, according to a court filing on Tuesday.The decision to drop the civil lawsuit was disclosed in a one-page notice filed in Federal District Court in the District of Columbia. The department offered no explanation for the move, but it is one of many recent actions it has taken to dismiss criminal and civil actions taken against Trump allies.Mr. Navarro, 75, had long resisted the government’s request that he give the archives emails from his personal ProtonMail account relating to his role as a White House adviser, as required by the Presidential Records Act.Defiance is Mr. Navarro’s default. He served about four months in the geriatric unit of a federal prison in Miami after refusing to comply with a subpoena to appear before a congressional committee investigating his false claims about the 2020 election.In 2022, the Biden Justice Department sued Mr. Navarro, one of the main architects of Mr. Trump’s second-term tariff policy, to retrieve the communications. The lawsuit charged him with “wrongfully retaining presidential records that are the property of the United States, and which constitute part of the permanent historical record of the prior administration.”The lawsuit accused Mr. Navarro of using his private email account to conduct public work, including an effort to influence the White House response to the pandemic. Those emails were needed to preserve the historical record, officials at the archives said.Mr. Navarro unsuccessfully petitioned the Supreme Court to dismiss the suit last year.A federal magistrate judge earlier reviewed about 900 messages, determining that more than 500 were not presidential records. He ordered additional hearings to decide how many of the remaining 350-plus emails needed to be turned over to the government.Mr. Navarro’s lawyer did not immediately return a request for comment.Stanley Woodward, who represented Mr. Navarro in both his civil and criminal cases, recused himself after Mr. Trump appointed him in April to serve as associate attorney general. More

    • 138 Shares199 Views

      in Elections

      Trump Amplifies Another Outlandish Conspiracy Theory: Biden Is a Robotic Clone

      by

      President Trump reposted another user’s false claim that the former president had been “executed” in 2020 and replaced by a robotic clone.President Trump shared an outlandish conspiracy theory on social media on Saturday night saying former President Joseph R. Biden had been “executed in 2020” and replaced by a robotic clone, the latest example of the president amplifying dark, false material to his millions of followers.Mr. Trump reposted a fringe rant that another user had made on the president’s social media platform, Truth Social, just after 10 p.m. on Saturday. The White House did not respond to requests for comment on the post about Mr. Biden, whom Mr. Trump has targeted for criticism almost daily since the start of his second term.The president has blamed Mr. Biden for all manner of societal ills and assailed his mental acuity, including with the specious theory that Mr. Biden’s aides used an autopen to enact policies and issue pardons without Mr. Biden’s knowledge. (Mr. Trump has acknowledged that his administration uses the autopen system on occasion.)Mr. Trump has long had a penchant for sharing debunked or baseless theories online, but his embrace of conspiracies is not limited to social media. He has also elevated false claims inside the White House and surrounded himself with cabinet officials promoting such theories.Last month, while sitting next to the president of South Africa in the Oval Office, Mr. Trump claimed that white South African farmers were victims of mass killings and displayed an image intended to back up his assertion; the image was actually of the conflict in eastern Congo. Mr. Trump has falsely asserted that white South Africans are victims of genocide, even though police statistics do not show that white people in the nation are any more vulnerable than other groups.Mr. Trump’s first four years in the White House were filled with false or misleading statements — according to one tally, he made 30,573 of them, or 21 a day on average — and he repeatedly shared conspiracy theories in the lead-up to the 2024 election.A New York Times analysis of thousands of Mr. Trump’s social media posts and reposts over a six-month period in 2024 found that at least 330 of them described both a false, secretive plot against Mr. Trump or the American people and a specific entity supposedly responsible for it. They included suggestions that the F.B.I. had ordered his assassination and accusations that government officials had orchestrated the Capitol riot on Jan. 6, 2021.Mr. Trump’s repost of the robot conspiracy theory came a day after Mr. Biden told reporters that he was feeling good after beginning treatment for an aggressive form of prostate cancer. Mr. Trump has suggested that Mr. Biden’s diagnosis last month was not new and had been concealed from the public. More