Business

Subterms

    More stories

    • 175 Shares129 Views

      in US Politics

      Voters may at last be coming round to Biden’s sunny view of the economy

      by

      Joe Biden has spent most of his presidency insisting to Americans that the economy is on the right track. Poll after poll has shown that most voters do not believe him. That may be changing.After months of resilient hiring, better-than-expected economic growth and a declining rate of inflation, new data shows that Americans are becoming upbeat about the US economy, potentially reversing the deep pessimism Biden has struggled to counter for much of the past three years.That trend could reshape campaigning ahead of November’s presidential election, in which Biden is expected to face off against Donald Trump, the frontrunner for the Republican nomination. Experts believe the president’s case for a second term will benefit from more optimistic views of the economy – but the hangover from the inflation wave that peaked a year and a half ago presents Republicans with a potent counterattack.“Over the last couple of years, people have been feeling the most pain on day-to-day spending, on things like groceries and gas prices and prescription drugs. And, fortunately, those prices are beginning to come down, which gives Democrats a stronger hand than we had just a few months ago,” said Adam Green, co-founder of advocacy group the Progressive Change Campaign Committee.“For a campaign that says that they want to finish the unfinished business of the Biden presidency, our polling shows that it’s perfectly OK to acknowledge that there has been pain, and there’s more business to do,” said Green.He added that the Biden campaign should “really focus the voters’ attention on the forward-looking agenda of one party wanting to help billionaires and corporations, and the Democratic party wanting to challenge corporate greed and bring down prices for consumers”.Biden has been unpopular with voters, according to poll aggregator FiveThirtyEight, even as employment grew strongly and the economy avoided the recession that many economists predicted was around the corner. While it’s not the only factor, pollsters have linked voters’ disapproval with Biden to the wave of price increases that peaked in June 2022 at levels not seen in more than four decades, and which have since been on the decline. An NBC News poll released this month showed Biden trailing Trump by about 20 points on the question of which candidate would better handle the economy, a finding echoed by other surveys.But new data appears to show Americans believe the economy has turned a corner. Late last month, the Conference Board reported its index of consumer confidence had hit its highest point since December 2021, while the University of Michigan’s survey of consumer sentiment has climbed to its highest level since July of that year.View image in fullscreen“The people who give positive views of the economy, they tend to point to, the unemployment rate is low, and they also point to that inflation is down from where it was,” said Jocelyn Kiley, an associate director at Pew Research Center, whose own data has found an uptick in positive economic views, particularly among Democrats.Trump and his Republican allies have capitalized on inflation to argue that Biden should be voted out, though economists say Biden’s policies are merely one ingredient in a trend exacerbated by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, and global supply chain snarls that occurred as a result of Covid-19. Nikki Haley, the former South Carolina governor who is the last major challenger to the former president still in the race has said the economy is “crushing middle-class Americans”.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionBut voters’ improving views of the economy could blunt those attacks ahead of the November election, where the GOP is also hoping to seize control of the Senate from Biden’s Democratic allies and maintain their majority in the House of Representatives. Lynn Vavreck, an American politics professor at the University of California, Los Angeles, said Trump might have to fall back to tried-and-true tactics from his 2016 victory over Hillary Clinton, such as promising to institute hardline immigration policies.“The economy is growing. People don’t really say that they feel good about it, but if you’re gonna load up your campaign on those people’s feelings, I feel like that’s a little risky,” said Vavreck, who has studied how economic conditions can affect presidential campaigns.“You could do that, and that would be a bit of a gamble, or you could find an issue on which you believe you are closer to most voters than Joe Biden, that is not about the economy, and you could try to reorient the conversation around that issue.”There is already evidence that harnessing outrage over the flow of undocumented immigrants into the United States is key to Trump’s campaign strategy. The former president’s meddling was a factor in the death of a rare bipartisan agreement in Congress to tighten immigration policy in exchange for Republican votes to approve assistance for Ukraine and Israel’s militaries.With the economy humming along, Trump is apparently nervous that the US economy could enter a recession at an inconvenient moment. “When there’s a crash, I hope it’s going to be during this next 12 months because I don’t want to be Herbert Hoover,” he said in an interview last month, referring to the US president who is often blamed for the Great Depression that began 95 years ago.Even though the rate of inflation has eased, albeit haltingly, prices for many consumer goods remain higher than they were compared with when Biden took office, which his opponents can still capitalize on, said the Republican strategist Doug Heye.“Consumers go to the grocery store, and they spend money, and they’re upset with what things cost, and that should always be what they’re talking about,” Heye said.While Biden has been quick to take credit for the strong hiring figures during his administration, polls show that hasn’t landed with voters. In recent months, the White House has shifted strategy, announcing efforts to get rid of junk fees and accusing corporations of “price gouging”.Evan Roth Smith, head pollster for the Democratic research firm Blueprint, said that lines up with his findings that voters care less about job growth and more about the fact that everything costs more.“Voters just felt a prioritization mismatch between what they were experiencing, the kind of pressures they were under, which isn’t that they didn’t have jobs, it’s that they couldn’t pay their bills,” Smith said.“Makes all the sense in the world that if the White House and president and the Biden campaign are touting this stuff, that they are going to make headway, and are making headway with voters in getting them to feel like Joe Biden in the Democratic party do understand.” More

    • 163 Shares199 Views

      in US Politics

      With business empire on brink of abyss, tycoon Trump recasts himself as victim

      by

      From Trump Tower on Fifth Avenue to the Trump Building on Wall Street, the Trump World Tower by the United Nations to the Trump International overlooking Central Park, Donald Trump has stamped his name in golden letters on skyscrapers across New York City.This real estate empire was the springboard for Trump’s ascent from tabloid fodder to reality TV stardom, and ultimately the presidency, all built on his self-projected image as America’s most famous businessman.While the reality of Trump’s business acumen – and the true extent of his wealth – have long been questioned, on Friday a New York judge forever tarnished his gilded image, finding Trump and his allies guilty of frauds that “shock the conscience” and a “lack of contrition and remorse borders on pathological”.Trump was ordered to pay $354.9m and was banned from leading a New York business for three years after a court found that he and his associates fraudulently overstated his net worth. The Trump Organization was wrenched from his family’s control – and its future looks far from certain.For decades, the former president has portrayed himself as a brash, bronzed, brilliant businessman who ruled the Manhattan skyline. Whether lecturing Apprentice contestants, charming voters, or bragging to fellow world leaders, he could point to more than a dozen Trump-branded towers as evidence of all he had achieved.Trump is “the archetypal businessman – a dealmaker without peer”, with a name “synonymous with the most prestigious of addresses”, according to his own company: the “very definition of the American success story”.View image in fullscreenBut Judge Arthur Engoron’s ruling is a shocking blow to this image. The same buildings which once embodied the former president’s fame and fortune will, for years, remain supervised by court-appointed monitors. For now, Trump has lost control of the corporation which once provided a stage for his persona.And yet, just as he is separated from his business empire, his political machine is gearing up to propel him back into the Oval Office.Trump has marched closer to the Republican nomination amid – not despite – these legal woes. He has tried to utilize this trial, and the others he faces, to bankroll his comeback campaign. They amount to politicized “witch-hunts”, he tells loyal supporters, suggesting that they, rather than he, are the true targets.Minutes after Trump left the first day of his civil fraud trial in October, his machine sent out a fundraising email. “I just left the courthouse,” it began, claiming that politicians were “weaponizing the legal system to try and completely destroy me” and requesting contributions “of ANY amount – truly, even just $1 – to peacefully DEFEND our movement from the never-ending witch hunts”.View image in fullscreenOver 11 weeks in a Manhattan courtroom, the Trump Organization was publicly exposed to forensic scrutiny for the first time. This is a business that says it has “set new standards of excellence”, affording Trump “the designation of arguably being the preeminent developer of luxury real estate” in the world. Engoron took an altogether different view.Before the trial had even started, he ruled that the former president had committed fraud for years by exaggerating the value of his assets.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionNow, having heard the evidence, Engoron has imposed an eyewatering financial penalty. How Trump foots this bill is an open question. While his fortune has been pitted at around $2.3bn, the majority of this is tied up in the very business empire at the heart of this case.The money is still coming in. Trump has proven to be a highly effective fundraiser. His campaign raised about $44m in the second half of last year. His legal battles appear to have provided an additional boost.View image in fullscreenBut beyond his race to regain the presidency, Trump is now grappling with legal penalties that could destroy the personal cash pile he has said is at his disposal. Even before Friday’s decision, he had been ordered to pay $83.3m to E Jean Carroll. The former president claimed in a deposition last year to have “substantially in excess” of $400m – a huge sum, but one that would be wiped out by these bills.But this process has a long way left to run. “There’s enough uncertainty that it’s not an immediate concern,” said Gregory Germain, professor of law at Syracuse University. Trump, who has already appealed Engoron’s initial ruling, and is widely expected to do the same with this decision.View image in fullscreenOn the campaign trail and social media, in the courtroom and the inboxes of supporters, the former president has repeatedly pledged to fight what he argues is a gross injustice. On Friday Trump once again attacked the “tyrannical Abuse of Power” he claims is arrayed against him and the “liquid and beautiful Corporate Empire that started in New York, and has been successful all around the world.”In November, the American people will deliver their verdict on whose story they believe. More

    • 225 Shares179 Views

      in UK Politics

      UK recession – live: Reeves says Britain trapped in cycle of ‘decline’ as Sunak’s economy pledge ‘in tatters’

      by

      Hunt insists plan to bring inflation down is working despite 4 per cent increaseFor free real time breaking news alerts sent straight to your inbox sign up to our breaking news emailsSign up to our free breaking news emailsBritain is trapped in a cycle of decline and Rishi Sunak’s pledges to boost the economy are now “in tatters”, Labour’s shadow chancellor Rachel Reeves has warned, as the UK fell into recession.The Office for National Statistics (ONS) revealed on Thursday a 0.3 per cent decline in gross domestic product (GDP) between October and December 2023.The gloomy official figures mean the economy entered a technical recession, as defined by two or more quarters in a row of falling GDP, for the first time since amid the pandemic in the first half of 2020.The news deals a blow to the prime minister, who has promised to grow the economy as one of his five priorities, especially after most economists were only forecasting a 0.1 per cent decline in GDP.In comments Labour suggested were “out of touch”, chancellor Jeremy Hunt said low economic growth is “not a surprise”, but added that the UK must “stick to the plan – cutting taxes on work and business to build a stronger economy” despite tough times for many families.Show latest update 1708007931Rachel Reeves insists Labour’s plans to grow economy differ significantly from government’sRachel Reeves rejected suggestions that Labour’s economic plans to grow the economy were not much different from the government’s.Asked at a press conference about the plans, the shadow chancellor said: “I reject entirely that there is little difference between what Labour and the Conservatives offer.“We have got a comprehensive plan for growth that has been drawn up with business.”She pointed to planning reforms, as well as plans to invest in a £7.3bn national wealth fund, and new publicly owned energy company, Great British Energy, among the steps Labour had set out in its plans.Andy Gregory15 February 2024 14:381708006791Public services ‘on their knees’, says Rachel ReevesLabour’s Rachel Reeves said public services are “on their knees” and need an immediate injection of cash.The shadow chancellor said: “I do recognise that our public services are under huge pressure – unlike perhaps the Conservatives do – which is why I said there does need to be an immediate injection of cash into our public services.”She added: “If our economy had grown at the rate of other OECD countries these last 14 years, our economy would be £150bn bigger, worth £5,000 for every family in the UK and we would have tens of billions of pounds of additional tax receipts which we would be able to invest in our public services.“That’s why it’s so important that we grow our economy.”Andy Gregory15 February 2024 14:191708005894Tory former chancellor says room for tax cuts in BudgetTory former chancellor Lord Lamont said he thought there was room for tax cuts in the March Budget.He told BBC Radio 4’s World at One: “I do think tax cuts have to be responsible. I think there is probably some headroom that has been created by very strong growth in tax revenues, particularly as a result of the freezing of the tax thresholds for such a long period.“There may be some headroom. I think looking longer term though, any tax cuts have to be matched by tight control of public spending, probably financed by reductions in public spending.”On the outlook for the UK after it slipped into recession, Lord Lamont said: “I think people ought to be realistic about this. We have an almost perfect storm. We are coming through it, I think there is light at the end of the tunnel now and we just need to hold our nerve.”Andy Gregory15 February 2024 14:041708003569What does Britain being in a recession mean?While a severe recession typically causes unemployment to rise, Britain’s technical recession serves more as an indicator of the pressure households and firms are already under – and as a blow to the government’s promises to boost economic growth.The gloomy economic data is also likely to ramp up pressure on the Bank of England to start cutting interest rates from their 14-year high of 5.25 per cent, given the threat to the wider economy from painfully high borrowing costs.You can read more about what the latest economic data means below:Andy Gregory15 February 2024 13:261708001718Reeves defends Starmer’s handling of antisemitism rowRachel Reeves has defended Keir Starmer’s handling of the antisemitism row that engulfed Labour this week, saying he had not let her down.The senior frontbencher said Labour would have taken action over comments made by Azhar Ali and Graham Jones “sooner” if it had known about them and the party had intervened “swiftly”.She also told a press conference in central London: “I only returned to the shadow cabinet because I was sure of Keir Starmer’s commitment to that (rooting out antisemitism) and he hasn’t let me down, he hasn’t let the Jewish community down, and it is right that both of them have been suspended.“In terms of the vetting procedure, my understanding is that this was a private meeting, not a Labour Party meeting, and the recording was released much later.“Obviously if we’d have known about these things we would have taken action sooner.“We can’t see everything everywhere, but when we do see evidence of antisemitism, we act swiftly to ensure the highest standards and rightly so amongst our MPs and amongst our parliamentary candidates.”Kate Devlin, Politics and Whitehall Editor15 February 2024 12:551708000189Recession figures ‘don’t paint true picture of suffering’ in UK, poverty campaigner warnsSimon Francis, co-ordinator of the End Fuel Poverty Coalition, said of the new fuel poverty figures: “Even these terrible figures don’t paint the true picture of the suffering in households across the UK.“They exclude millions of homes in certain energy performance categories and also don’t include many people who actually get a Warm Home Discount to help with their bills.“The numbers of households paying more than 10 per cent of their income on energy is truly shocking, far exceeding previous estimates.”And he said: “The reality is that household energy debt is now at record levels, millions of people are living in cold, damp homes and children are suffering in mouldy conditions.“The wider impact of high energy bills is also clear to see with households having to cut back on spending so much that the UK has now entered a recession.”Andy Gregory15 February 2024 12:291707998996Hunt says his Budget will focus on ‘prioritising economic growth’ – after fall into recessionJeremy Hunt has insisted his upcoming Budget will be focused on “prioritising economic growth”, after being questioned about rumours he could cut public sector spending to fund lower taxes, as the government seeks to garner political favour with voters ahead of a general election.Asked about the reports by Sky News, Mr Hunt said he would not break with convention and speak about the Budget in the weeks preceding it.But the chancellor did hint at his preference for tax cuts, suggesting that countries with “lighter taxes” did “tend to grow faster”.He added: “But I would only cut taxes in a way that was responsible, and I certainly wouldn’t do anything that fuelled inflation just when we are starting to have some success in bringing down inflation.”Andy Gregory15 February 2024 12:091707997592UK is ‘most certainly’ in a recession, says shadow chancellorRachel Reeves said the UK was “most certainly” facing a recession, after attempts to play down fears from the chancellor.At a press conference, Labour’s shadow chancellor said: “These were worse numbers than economists were predicting. This is a recession. “But we didn’t need to get these numbers for us to know that families are struggling through an enormous cost of living crisis and businesses are struggling as well.“As [former Marks and Spencer chair] Stuart Rose said on the radio this morning, if it quacks like a recession, it is a recession and this is most certainly a recession.” More

    • 150 Shares169 Views

      in US Politics

      Inside tech billionaires’ push to reshape San Francisco politics: ‘a hostile takeover’

      by

      In a way, it’s a story as old as time: ultra-wealthy figures pouring a flood of money into city politics in an effort to shape the way it is run.Still, the political-influence machine that tech billionaires and venture capitalists have recently built in San Francisco stands out for its size and ambition. A new analysis of campaign filings, non-profit records and political contributions by the Guardian and Mission Local reveals the extent of this network, which is using its financial and organizational muscle to push the famously progressive city into adopting policies that are tougher on crime and homelessness, and more favorable to business and housing construction.In the past six years, prominent tech and venture capital leaders – including the hedge fund manager William Oberndorf, the billionaire investor Michael Moritz, the cryptocurrency booster Chris Larsen, the PayPal co-founder David Sacks, the Y Combinator CEO, Garry Tan, and the Pantheon CEO, Zachary Rosen – have invested at least $5.7m into reshaping San Francisco’s policies, according to the analysis of public data. Because not all of their donations are publicly disclosed, the sum of their contributions may be far higher.In a solidly Democratic city, they have joined forces with traditional business and real estate elites in an effort to oust some of its most progressive leaders and undo its most progressive policies.To achieve those goals, they have created a loose network of interlocking non-profits, dark money groups and political action committees – a framework colloquially known as a “grey money” network – that allows them to obscure the true scale of their involvement in San Francisco’s municipal politics.View image in fullscreenThe three major groups in this network – NeighborsSF, TogetherSF and GrowSF – have pulled in more than $26m in contributions since 2020, according to campaign finance and tax records, more than $21m of which they have spent on various political issues.“They’re using multiple layers of organizations to hide the sources of their money, and to hide how much they’re spending,” said Jim Stearns, a political consultant with decades of experience in San Francisco politics and a critic of the groups.“This is a $20bn hostile takeover of San Francisco by people with vested real estate and tech interests, and who don’t want anyone else deciding how the city is run,” he said, referring to the combined wealth of the most prolific new donors.Billionaires’ increasing involvementIn its storied history, San Francisco has always seen tycoons seek influence over city business. In the 2010s, the tech investor Ron Conway played a crucial role in the election of the mayor Ed Lee and was a major factor in the ascent of the current mayor, London Breed, after Lee died in office in 2017 . But the entry of a libertarian billionaire class into local politics is new, said political operatives and people who have been targeted by them. So are the vast amounts of wealth created in the most recent tech boom that these figures can tap into.View image in fullscreenPolitical observers trace the newcomers’ involvement to 2018, when a special election brought Breed to power. Their engagement grew as progressive candidates won a number of narrow but surprising victories in 2019, including the district attorney office and several seats in San Francisco’s legislative body, the board of supervisors. But, those observers say, their political participation really intensified during the pandemic, when frustrations over rising visible homelessness, a sharp increase in petty crime and fentanyl-related overdose deaths, and an economic downturn in the city boiled over.“There is a growing sense … that the city’s progressive political class has failed its citizens,” Moritz, the billionaire investor and a former journalist, wrote in a May 2023 feature for the Financial Times. “Online discourse about San Francisco’s ‘doom loop’, a downward economic and social spiral that becomes irreversible, feels less like hyperbole by the day. Even for a city that has always managed to rebuild after flattening financial and geological shocks, San Francisco – emptier, deadlier, more politically dysfunctional – seems closer to the brink than ever.”The priorities of these deep-pocketed figures have varied. Oberndorf, the hedge fund manager, had been a long-time charter school advocate and major Republican party donor. Larsen, the crypto investor, has been a strong backer of expanding police ranks and surveillance capabilities. Tan, the Y Combinator CEO, has pushed for business policies favorable to crypto, artificial intelligence and autonomous cars.Broadly, though, they maintain that San Francisco needs a tougher approach to homelessness and drug problems, a more punitive approach to crime, and a climate more friendly to business and housing construction. Some have called for centralizing more power in the office of the mayor.In past years, several of these operatives have set up organizations to advance policy on those issues – non-profit organizations, so-called dark money groups, political action committees and even media outlets.View image in fullscreenDogged reporting by Bay Area outlets has previously exposed some of the money flowing into these groups. But their structure makes it difficult to easily uncover all sources of donations. Political action committees, or Pacs, are required to name their major donors. But the so-called dark money groups, which are technically civic leagues or social welfare groups, were formed under the 501(c)4 section of the tax code, and do not have to disclose donors or political contributions. Since the 2010 supreme court ruling Citizens United v Federal Election Commission relaxed regulation around political donations, 501(c)4 groups have exponentially increased their involvement in political donations, to the tune of at least $1bn by 2019 nationwide, according to ProPublica reporting.However, the Guardian and Mission Local’s analysis of financial records shows several of the organisations donating money to one another, and several groups sharing personnel, addresses and donors. And it reveals the sheer financial deluge they are spending ahead of the 2024 elections.Complicated contributionsAmong the most prominent and resourced groups in this network is Neighbors for a Better San Francisco Advocacy, which was founded by Oberndorf, and an affiliated 501(c)4 started by the longtime San Francisco real estate lobbyist Mary Jung, among others. Oberndorf sits on the board of directors of the dark money group.NeighborsSF says it is committed to improving public safety, public education and quality of life in the city, backing what it calls “pragmatic” and “responsible” groups and candidates. The group has funded publicity campaigns for moderate candidates and bankrolled other 501(c)4s working to advance related issues.NeighborsSF has been primarily funded by a handful of extremely wealthy donors from the tech and real estate worlds. Campaign contribution data from the San Francisco Ethics Commission and state election disclosures show that Oberndorf has poured more than $900,000 over the years into the 501(c)4s. The group’s biggest donor, Kilroy Realty, a southern California-based firm with major holdings in downtown office property and highly desired parcels in the South of Market district, has given $1.2m since 2020. The dynastic real estate investor Brandon Shorenstein has contributed $899,000 through his family’s real estate firm. Larsen has donated at least $300,000. Moritz donated $300,000 in 2020 alone.View image in fullscreenMoritz is one of the most prominent players in reshaping San Francisco. Since 2020, he has donated more than $336m towards various causes in the city, both social and political, according to a recent Bloomberg report.In addition to his contributions to NeighborsSF, Moritz seeded $3m for TogetherSF Action, a 501(c)4 that is most famously known for a flashy, sarcastic poster campaign decrying the city’s fentanyl crisis and campaigns for expanding the power of the mayor. The group has an affiliated non-profit, TogetherSF, that serves as a volunteering hub. According to incorporation filings with the state of California, Moritz occupies key positions with both organizations, which also share personnel with NeighborsSF. Moritz has also sunk $10m into the San Francisco Standard, a startup news publication in the city run by Griffin Gaffney, a co-founder of TogetherSF.The third big player is GrowSF, a dark money group run by Sachin Agarwal, an alum of Apple, Twitter and Lyft, and Steven Buss, formerly of Google and Amazon. Tan is a member of its board. GrowSF has several affiliated Pacs and says it endorses “common sense” candidates as an alternative to “far-left” elected officials.Campaign contribution filings show that major donors include Agarwal’s father, Aditya Agarwal, as well as Larsen ($100,000), Tan ($25,000) and Pantheon’s Rosen, a tech investor who launched the controversial pro-market-rate development group YIMBY California. GrowSF has received tens of thousands of dollars from NeighborsSF over the years, according to federal tax filings.Follow the moneyThrough varying alliances, the groups have exerted their influence on debates that go to the heart of San Francisco policy. Among the first was the February 2022 recall of three members of the San Francisco school board, whom voters ousted from office over frustrations with the slow reopening of district schools during the pandemic, a controversial proposal to rename school sites, racially charged tweets by one of the members, and changes to the testing requirements for admission to the city’s only selective academic public high school, Lowell.The campaign to unseat the members raised more than $2m, more than 20 times the $86,000 the school board members gathered to fight off the challenge, according to campaign contribution filings.The billionaire charter school backer Arthur Rock was the single largest donor to the SFUSD recalls, giving $500,000. But NeighborsSF Advocacy came in a close second, directing $488,800 into political action committees supporting the recall effort.Separate from NeighborsSF, state disclosures show, Sacks gave $75,000 to Pacs supporting the school board recall, and the Y Combinator founding partner Jessica Livingston donated $45,000. Tan, Agarwal and Buss respectively gave $25,000, $10,000 and $5,000 to a cluster of political action committees bankrolling the school board recall efforts for each specific board member.NeighborsSF was also key to the successful recall of the progressive district attorney Chesa Boudin in 2022. A former deputy public defender and the son of convicted “new left” militants, Boudin was elected DA in 2019 on a promise to reduce mass incarceration and police misconduct. The pushback against his policies was immediate.Over 15 months, Boudin’s opponents raised $7.2m for the campaign supporting his ouster, more than twice the $2.7m collected by the anti-recall effort, campaign finance data compiled by Mission Local has shown.View image in fullscreenMost of these donations were channelled through NeighborsSF. The group contributed $4m of the $7.2m raised by the campaign, Mission Local reporting established, with the California Association of Realtors coming in a distant second at $458,000 in donations.State campaign finance records also show a $68,000 contribution to the recall campaign by GrowSF’s political action committee.There have been other victories. In 2022, GrowSF backed the successful candidacy of Joel Engardio, a former SF Weekly staff writer and former GrowSF leadership member, for supervisor through its Pac. GrowSF contributed more than $92,000 in support of Engardio’s campaign, per state campaign finance data. Since being elected, Engardio has promoted policies including increased police staffing, harsh penalties for narcotics offenses, building market-rate housing and sweeps of homeless camps.The Pac also spent at least $15,400 supporting the campaign of Matt Dorsey, a former head of communications at the San Francisco police department, for a full term as supervisor. And it spent at least $15,569 supporting Brooke Jenkins, Boudin’s successor and a supporter of the recall campaign, when she ran for re-election.It’s a “longer-term, widespread, deliberate strategy”, said Aaron Peskin, the progressive president of San Francisco’s board of supervisors. “They’re propping up innumerable 501(c)4s that are doing everything from mounting political attack campaigns to infiltrating dozens of long-term neighborhood groups … Why would you say no if someone knocked on your door to organize Saturday neighborhood cleanups?”Towards 2024With key successes under its belt, this network is gearing up to play a major role in the 2024 elections, which will determine control of the San Francisco board of supervisors and the Democratic county central committee.GrowSF is among the main drivers behind aggressive efforts to oust two progressive supervisors: Dean Preston, who represents the Haight, Hayes Valley and the Tenderloin districts, and Connie Chan, whose district includes the Inner and Outer Richmond neighborhoods.The group has set up separate “Dump Dean” and “Clear Out Connie” Pacs targeting the supervisors. GrowSF has raised at least $300,000 for its anti-Preston campaign, which has run attack ads falsely accusing him of opposing affordable housing. Larsen, Tan and a number of Y Combinator partners all have donated to GrowSF’s effort, according to San Francisco ethics commission campaign finance data.View image in fullscreenTan, who is known for his massive Twitter blocklist and recently faced ire for wishing a slow death upon progressive supervisors on the platform, has personally pledged $50,000 to oust Preston. He is publicly soliciting more donations.In addition to the board of supervisors races, GrowSF is backing a slate of moderate Democrats running to replace progressives on the Democratic county central committee, which makes endorsements for the Democratic party. Several of these moderate candidates are also running for supervisor, and while contributions to the supervisorial race are capped, there’s no limit to donations for the DCCC.The moderates have collectively raised about $1.16m, about four times as much as the progressive candidates.In light of the bruising national political landscape in 2024, San Francisco’s proverbial “knife fight in a telephone booth” may seem inconsequential. But the political network erected with the aid of libertarian tech money has already demonstrated its power to chill San Francisco’s progressive politics. So far, not one progressive candidate has thrown their hat in the ring to challenge London Breed.Peskin, who has long been eyed as a potential mayoral candidate, told Politico in January that the tech money backing moderate candidates has made it hard for progressives to fight back. It was one reason, he said, why he is leaning against getting into the race.The success of these political campaigns in one of the US’s most progressive cities could inspire similar efforts in cities around the country, Peskin warned.“There’s a sense by these guys that they are the tip of the spear,” he said. “If you can take on liberal/progressive thought in politics in San Francisco, you can do it anywhere.”This story was published in collaboration with Mission Local, an independent San Francisco non-profit news site More

    • 125 Shares189 Views

      in US Politics

      ‘Out of control’: Congresswoman sounds alarm over ‘unchecked’ gambling boom

      by

      America’s “unchecked” gambling boom risks exacerbating a nationwide mental health crisis, according to a congresswoman pushing for federal government support. The industry is pushing back hard.Operators must be held “accountable” for rising addiction rates, Andrea Salinas told the Guardian, after lawmakers proposed legislation that – if approved – would provide tens of millions of dollars in funding to help those affected.Sports betting is “proliferating like never before”, she said. “Rather than try to put the genie back in the bottle, let’s make sure we have the research and the treatment before it does become out of control.”The supreme court struck down a decades-old law in 2018 that had banned sports betting across much of the nation. The market is now legal in 38 states, attracting billions of dollars in wagers every month. Its rapid growth has coincided with a spike in addiction cases, according to clinicians, counsellors and campaigners.Diverting taxes already raised on sports wagers towards compulsive gambling support services would make “the entire industry healthier”, said Salinas, a Democrat representing Oregon’s sixth district. “I, as much as anybody, enjoy the recreation of gambling, in a fun casino. When done, like everything, in moderation, it’s fun, right?“But the access to these applications for sports betting has taken us in a direction that is harmful. Nearly 7 million Americans are struggling with the gambling addiction.”The Grit (Gambling addiction Recovery, Investment and Treatment) Act, proposed this month by Salinas and the Democratic senator Richard Blumenthal, is pinned around the federal sports excise tax. Receipts from the tax, which dates back to the early 1950s, have surged in recent years as the legal market expanded; it raised an estimated $271m last year.Under the proposed law, half of the revenues raised by the tax would be set aside for gambling addiction treatment, prevention and research. Taxes would not rise and the funds for treatment would go through an existing federal grant program.Researchers have identified close links between gambling addiction and other mental health disorders, like alcoholism. “If we let this go unchecked, this could be one of the sources” of an escalating mental health crisis, said Salinas. “We would be ignoring an upstream problem that we could start to address.”Keith Whyte, executive director of the National Council on Problem Gambling, which has been pushing for the Grit Act, has said it would “significantly bolster” addiction prevention, research and treatment resources.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionBut gambling operators are against the proposal. “Our industry’s growth means that there’s never been more attention paid to, or money invested in, problem gambling support than there is today,” Chris Cylke, senior vice-president at the American Gaming Association, said.Suggesting the Grit Act would “give criminals a leg up”, Cylke argued that the excise tax – upon which it is based – should be repealed. “Today, this antiquated policy puts the nascent legal market at a competitive disadvantage against offshore illegal operators, who do not pay any taxes and prey on vulnerable customers.”Advocates for greater compulsive gambling support criticised the “predictable, shortsighted objection” of operators. “The gambling sector can no longer reasonably expect to evade external responsibility,” said Derek Webb, founder of the Campaign for Fairer Gambling. “The Grit Act is our best chance to save lots of lives by doing what’s responsible, fair and inevitable.”But Salinas is braced for a long campaign to pass the Grit Act. Politicians in Washington and beyond “aren’t really paying attention” to gambling addiction rates, she said. Congress is “not doing a lot of substantive work right now. So, yeah, it could take a while.” More

    • 163 Shares159 Views

      in US Politics

      ‘We want everybody walking out’: UAW chief outlines mass strike for May 2028

      by

      Shawn Fain, the United Auto Workers president, criticized Donald Trump on Monday but declined to back Joe Biden as he reaffirmed plans to lead a general strike in the US in 2028.Speaking to union members at the UAW national political conference in Washington DC, Fain said it was time for union members to come together.“We have to pay for our sins of the past. Back in 1980 when Reagan at the time fired patco workers, everybody in this country should have stood up and walked the hell out,” Fain said. “We missed the opportunity then, but we’re not going to miss it in 2028. That’s the plan. We want a general strike. We want everybody walking out just like they do in other countries.”He reaffirmed ambitious plans to organize a general strike for 1 May 2028, coinciding with International Solidarity Day or May Day.The UAW rescheduled the expiration of their union contracts with the US’s big three automakers to align on this day in the contracts it reached late last year and has been encouraging other labor unions to schedule contracts to expire on this day to maximize the participation from workers across different industries.A general strike is a mass strike across various industries around similar demands or bargaining positions. In the US, they have been virtually non-existent in recent decades given the passage of the Taft-Hartley Act in 1947 that restricted secondary strikes and the decline of labor unions in the US since the 1970s.After successfully taking on the US auto companies, Fain has emerged as a potent political figure, courted by Trump and Biden.Fain also used his speech to criticize Trump, telling reporters that Trump “is as a person … pretty much contrary to everything we stand for”.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionBut the UAW has yet to formally endorse Biden, who was the first president to walk on a picket line with striking workers in September 2023. Fain told reporters the union will be holding formal discussions on an endorsement amid rumors that Biden may address the union in person later this week.
      Reuters contributed reporting More

    • 150 Shares119 Views

      in US Politics

      Fellow Republicans, it’s time to admit that the US economy isn’t bad

      by

      The Republican primaries are under way and – not surprisingly – the candidates have been ganging up on Bidenomics. Spoiler alert: they don’t like it. Fact check: they are wrong.To a man – and one woman – the Republican candidates all say that the US economy is bad and that Americans are struggling financially. They’re warning about sky-high deficits, over-the-top government spending and a potentially catastrophic level of national debt. They point out that interest rates are at a 20-year high and the costs of core things like food, gas and housing are significantly more than they were just a few years ago. They point to a downturn in manufacturing and falling small business confidence.“Bidenomics is crushing American families,” said the Republican candidate Nikki Haley. “We’re paying more for gas, groceries and other basic necessities.”“I’ll rip up Bidenomics on day one of my presidency,” the Florida governor and presidential challenger Ron DeSantis warned.Yes, prices and rates are up. But really? Is the economy so bad? I’m a Republican and a small business owner with hundreds of clients in many industries and honestly the economy isn’t that bad. In fact, it’s been really, really good.Just ask Donald Trump, who implicitly admitted this when he recently said he hoped for a “crash” and that it would “be in the next 12 months because I don’t want to be Herbert Hoover”.If you don’t believe me, just look at the numbers.Last quarter’s gross domestic product showed growth of 5.2%. That’s a number that dwarfs all other pre-Covid recovery numbers in recent memory. Unemployment is at a record low. Each month the economy is adding hundreds of thousands of new jobs. There are millions of more open jobs available today compared with 2019.Yes, prices are higher, but inflation is down from a 9% annual rate to about 3%, so whatever the Federal Reserve did to offset the treasury’s spending on fiscal programs seems to be working. The stock market is near all-time highs, as is household wealth. Credit card delinquency rates are lower than they’ve been for the past 30 years as are delinquencies on all loans across the banking system. Holiday retail sales were strong and online sales boomed. Plenty of capital is available for businesses that need it and corporations have more cash on hand than in any year before the pandemic.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionI speak to dozens of industry associations each year and here’s what I’m hearing: just about everyone had a good 2023. The CEOs of our major banks reported strong earnings, after taking into consideration special assessments and one-time charges. Retailers and restaurants have recovered from the pandemic. Convention traffic in Vegas is back to normal. There are almost as many travelers through the airports as there were before Covid. Businesses in the service industries recorded their 12th consecutive month of growth.Sure, there are struggles. Businesses in the real estate industry are challenged by high housing prices and a 13-year low in home sales. Manufacturing has been in contraction for the past 14 months. Media companies are flailing. Technology firms are struggling to find financing. The cost of capital is slowing down financing for small businesses. However, we live in a giant country. California’s economy is as large as that of the entire United Kingdom. North Carolina’s economy is bigger than Sweden’s. Texas’s is bigger than Canada’s. Not every business is going to be doing well in an economy this size. There will always be those that are struggling, be it because of their location, their industry, or the makeup of their customer and supplier base.There are plenty of things that could knock things off course in 2024. Wars. Oil prices. A terrorist attack. Another pandemic. If you want to find the bad in the economy you can do it. And that’s what all the Republican candidates are doing and fair enough, it’s an election year. It’s also true that Bidenomics may not be the reason behind our strong economy. But saying the US economy is bad just isn’t true no matter who you vote for. More

    • 213 Shares169 Views

      in US Politics

      Jamie Dimon thinks Trump was ‘kind of right’ about a lot of things. What? | Robert Reich

      by

      On Wednesday, speaking from the World Economic Forum’s confab in Davos, Switzerland, Jamie Dimon – chair and CEO of JPMorgan Chase, the largest and most profitable bank in the United States, and one of the most influential CEOs in the world – heaped praise on Donald Trump’s policies while president.“Take a step back, be honest,” Dimon said. Trump “was kind of right about Nato, kind of right on immigration. He grew the economy quite well. Tax reform worked. He was right about some of China. He wasn’t wrong about some of these critical issues.”What?Mr Dimon, take a step back, be honest.Kind of right about Nato? Trump wanted the US to withdraw from Nato – and may get his way if he becomes president again. This would open Europe further to Putin’s aggression.Kind of right on immigration? Even the conservative Cato Institute found that Trump reduced legal immigration but not illegal immigration. Trump refused to grant legal status to children of immigrants born in the United States or who grew up in the US. He banned Muslims from the US, and when the Muslim ban was found to be unconstitutional, banned people from Muslim countries. He fueled the flames of nativism by describing poorer nations as “shitholes” and has used terms redolent of Nazism to describe foreigners as “poisoning the blood” of Americans.Grew the economy quite well? In fact, under Trump the economy lost 2.9m jobs. Even before the pandemic, job growth was slower than it has been under Biden. The unemployment rate increased by 1.6 percentage points to 6.3%. The international trade deficit that Trump promised to reduce went up. The US trade deficit in goods and services in 2020 was the highest since 2008 and increased 40.5% from 2016. The number of Americans lacking health insurance rose by 3 million. The federal debt held by the public went up, from $14.4tn to $21.6tn.Tax reform worked? Trump’s tax cut conferred most of its benefits on big corporations and the rich, while enlarging the budget deficit. Giant banks and financial services companies got huge gains based on the new, lower corporate rate (21%), as well as the more preferable tax treatment of pass-through companies.If not for the Trump cuts – along with the Bush tax cuts and their extensions – federal revenues would keep pace with federal spending indefinitely, and the ratio of the debt to the national economy would be declining.Instead, these tax cuts have added $10tn to the debt since their enactment and are responsible for 57% of the increase in the debt ratio since 2001, and more than 90% of the increase in the debt ratio if the one-time costs of bills responding to Covid-19 and the Great Recession are excluded. Eventually, the tax cuts are projected to grow to more than 100% of the increase.Right about China? As the Brookings Institution found, Trump’s China policy only made China less restrained in pursuit of its ambitions. Confrontation has intensified, areas of cooperation have vanished, and the capacity of both countries to solve problems or manage competing interests has atrophied.Oh, and then there are the pesky matters of Trump’s seeking to overturn the results of the 2020 election, facing 91 criminal indictments, causing the US to be more divided than at any time since the Civil War, lying every time he opens his mouth, and planning to use the justice department for “vengeance” against his political enemies if elected again.Why is Jamie Dimon – the most influential CEO in America – spouting these talking points in favor of Trump?Because he thinks Trump has a good chance of becoming president, and Dimon wants to be in his good graces.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionAsked which candidate would be better for his business, Dimon said: “I have to be prepared for both. I will be prepared for both. We will deal with both.”Dimon knows that his support for Nikki Haley irked Trump.“Highly overrated Globalist Jamie Dimon, the CEO of JPMORGAN, is quietly pushing another non-MAGA person, Nikki Haley, for President,” Trump said in a post on Truth Social in late November. “I’ve never been a big Jamie Dimon fan, but had to live with this guy when he came begging to the White House. I guess I don’t have to live with him anymore, and that’s a really good thing.”So now, Dimon – like Republican lawmakers across the US, like too many other leaders of American institutions – feels it necessary to cave into the integrity-crushing intimidation of a Trump administration, and lick Trump’s backside.And when Dimon does this, you can bet many other CEOs and financial leaders will now follow his example.At a time in American history when the most influential leaders of the US need to stand up loudly and clearly for the rule of law, for democracy, for decency, and against Donald Trump, Dimon is leading the charge in the opposite direction.This is how fascism takes root and spreads.
      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