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      Democrats agree Biden had to act on immigration – but they’re split over his asylum order

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      Democratic mayors, governors and members of Congress from the south-west to the north-east stood beside Joe Biden at the White House, when he unveiled an executive order temporarily sealing the US-Mexico border to most asylum seekers – the most restrictive immigration policy of his presidency.“We must face a simple truth,” the US president said. “To protect America as a land that welcomes immigrants, we must first secure the border and secure it now.”Those around him agreed, applauding the directive as a welcome, if belated, step. Yet for many Democrats not in attendance, the moment marked an astonishing retreat from just four years ago, when the president campaigned on dismantling the incendiary immigration policies of Donald Trump.Most Democrats accept that Biden had to do something to address an issue that has become one of his biggest political vulnerabilities. But the party, once united in furious opposition to Trump’s asylum clampdown, now finds itself divided over his course of action, split on both the substance of the policy and the wisdom politics.Biden is once again campaigning for the presidency against Trump, but the political climate has changed demonstrably.Unprecedented levels of migration at the south-west border, fueled by poverty, political upheaval, climate change and violence and amplified by incendiary Republican rhetoric, have rattled Americans. Polls show border security is a top – sometimes the top – concern among US voters this election season.The action, designed to deter illegal border crossings, was an attempt by the Biden administration to confront those concerns. But it also invited unwelcome comparisons to his predecessor, whose policies he was accused of “reviving” in a legal challenge brought last week by the American Civil Liberties Union.“It violates fundamental American values of who we say we are – and puts people in danger,” said Vanessa Cárdenas, the executive director of America’s Voice, an immigration advocacy organization. “It’s part of a trap that the Democrats are falling into – they’re buying the narrative the right is pushing on immigration.”For three years, Republicans have accused Biden of ignoring mounting concern over the south-west border, which they falsely claim is under “invasion”. But as the humanitarian situation has worsened, he has also been confronted by criticism from Democratic mayors and governors pleading for more federal help managing the record number of people arriving in their cities and states, especially during peaks in 2022 and 2023.Biden moved to act unilaterally after Republicans blocked – at Trump’s behest – an attempt to pass a bipartisan bill to restrict asylum. Congress also rejected a multibillion-dollar budget request from the White House for additional resources to manage the situation, raising questions about how authorities will enforce the new rule.Supporters of Biden’s latest policy, including border-state and swing-state Democrats, say the action will deter illegal immigration by encouraging people to seek asylum in an “orderly” manner at legal ports of entry. Even if the rule is blocked by the courts, they are ready to make the case to voters that Biden took decisive action when Republicans would not.“We all want order at the border,” said New York representative Tom Suozzi, a Democrat who flipped a House seat in a special election earlier this year after campaigning on more border security. “The American people want us to deal with immigration.”But progressives, immigration-rights advocates and some Hispanic leaders say that the new order not only suspends long-standing guarantees that anyone who reaches US soil has the right to seek asylum, it undermines American values. The president’s embrace of punitive policies, they argue, risks losing the support of key parts of his coalition.Biden knew the order would infuriate corners of his party – he addressed them directly in his White House remarks earlier this month, saying the goodwill of the American people was “wearing thin”.“Doing nothing is not an option,” he said. “We have to act.”But advocates and progressives say he can do more to protect undocumented immigrants who have lived in the country for decades, some for nearly their entire lives.They are urging Biden to use his bully pulpit to move the immigration fight beyond the border by using his presidential authority to shield more immigrants from deportation and create avenues for them to work legally. The White House is reportedly considering a future action that would protect undocumented spouses of American citizens from deportation.Last week the Biden campaign released a new ad marking the 12th anniversary of Daca – the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program established by the Obama White House in 2012 – as the Democrat runs for re-election and looks for ways to shore up support from Latino voters.The program provides temporary work permits and reprieves from deportation for hundreds of thousands of Dreamers, people brought without permission to the US as children.In the “Spanglish” ad, Dreamers tout a recent move by the Biden administration to extend health care coverage to Daca recipients while warning that Trump has threatened to end the program.“Ultimately, Congress needs to act to reform our immigration system,” Cárdenas said. “But until then, we need Biden doing everything he can to show that he still believes what he promised he would do when he came into office.”skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionBiden’s policy, which took effect immediately, seeks to deter illegal immigration by temporarily blocking people who cross the US border outside lawful ports of entry from claiming asylum, with some exceptions. The order lifts when daily arrests for illegal crossing from Mexico fall to 1,500 per day across a seven-day average. The last time crossings fell below that threshold was in 2020, when the Covid-19 pandemic halted migration.The number of illegal border crossings has fallen in recent months, due in part to stepped-up Mexican enforcement and seasonal trends. But officials say the level is still elevated, and worry the trend could reverse as the weather cools and a new Mexican president takes power weeks before the November election.Despite its failure, the bipartisan border security deal, negotiated with the blessing of the White House, underscored just how far to the right the immigration debate in Washington has shifted.The legislation included a wishlist of Republican border security demands aimed at keeping people out. Absent were any long-sought Democratic aspirations of expanding pathways to citizenship and work visas for the millions of undocumented people living in the US. Instead, Democrats tied the border deal to a foreign aid package opposed by conservatives.“That changed the contours of what had been a widely understood immigration framework,” said Theresa Cardinal Brown, immigration policy director at the Bipartisan Policy Center, adding: “I’m not sure what the consensus or compromise border solution is anymore.”On the campaign trail, Democrats hope to capitalize on Republican resistance to the border deal by casting Trump as unserious about addressing illegal immigration at the border, his signature issue. But it may prove difficult for Biden to make inroads on what has long been one of the country’s most polarizing political issues.Polls consistently show deep public disapproval of how Biden has handled the border, with voters giving Trump, who has also faced sharp criticism for his immigration plans, a wide advantage.A CBS News poll found broad public support for the president’s executive order, including among Republicans, but they also believed illegal border crossings were more likely to fall under Trump than Biden.And a new Monmouth University poll last week found Biden’s standing practically unchanged by the action, with roughly half of Americans – 46% – saying it did not go far enough, compared with 31% who said it was about right. Just 17% said the order went too far.On Wednesday, a coalition of immigrant-advocacy groups led by the ACLU sued the Biden administration over the directive.“By enacting an asylum ban that is legally indistinguishable from the Trump ban we successfully blocked, we were left with no choice but to file this lawsuit,” said Lee Gelernt, an attorney for the ACLU.The administration anticipated legal challenges. “We stand by the legality of what we have done,” the secretary of homeland security, Alejandro Mayorkas, said in a Sunday interview with ABC, adding that he would have preferred for Congress to act.Last week, a group of 18 progressive members of Congress sent a letter to Mayorkas asking the administration to reconsider the asylum rule on the grounds that it “puts asylum seekers at grave risk of unlawful removal and return to harm”.Despite their disappointment, Biden’s Democratic critics say Trump – who has said undocumented immigrants “poison the blood of our country” and is planning a sweeping mass-deportation campaign in a potential second term – would be far more dangerous.“The more American voters focus on the anti-immigrant, extremist policies that the right is pushing, the more they’re going to reject that vision,” Cárdenas said. But, she added: “Americans want to know, what’s the plan? What’s the strategy? What’s the vision? And I think it will serve Biden and Democrats better if they have an answer to the question of what it is they are for.” More

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      How the US supreme court could be a key election issue: ‘They’ve grown too powerful’

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      “Look at me, look at me,” said Martha-Ann Alito. “I’m German, from Germany. My heritage is German. You come after me, I’m gonna give it back to you.”It was a bizarre outburst from the wife of a justice on America’s highest court. Secretly recorded by a liberal activist, Martha-Ann Alito complained about a neighbour’s gay pride flag and expressed a desire to fly a Sacred Heart of Jesus flag in protest.This, along with audio clips of Justice Samuel Alito himself and a stream of ethics violations, have deepened public concerns that the supreme court is playing by its own rules. The Democratic representative Jamie Raskin has described a “national clamour over this crisis of legitimacy” at the court.A poll last month for the progressive advocacy organisation Stand Up America suggests that the supreme court will now play a crucial role in voters’ choices in the 2024 election. Nearly three in four voters said the selection and confirmation of justices will be an important consideration for them in voting for both president and senator in November.Reed Galen, a co-founder of the Lincoln Project, a pro-democracy group, said: “The idea that these guys act as if they are kings ruling from above, to me, should absolutely be an issue. It was always Republicans who said we hate unelected judges legislating from the bench and we hate judicial activism. That’s all this stuff is.”View image in fullscreenPublic trust in the court is at an all-time low amid concerns over bias and corruption. Alito has rejected demands that he recuse himself from a case considering presidential immunity after flags similar to those carried by 6 January 2021 rioters flew over his homes in Virginia and New Jersey. Justice Clarence Thomas has ignored calls to step aside because of the role his wife, Ginni, played in supporting efforts to overturn Donald Trump’s loss to Joe Biden in 2020.Ethical standards have been under scrutiny following revelations that some justices failed to report luxury trips, including on private jets, and property deals. Last week Thomas, who has come under criticism for failing to disclose gifts from the businessman and Republican donor Harlan Crow, revised his 2019 form to acknowledge he accepted “food and lodging” at a Bali hotel and at a California club.These controversies have been compounded by historic and hugely divisive decisions. The fall of Roe v Wade, ending the nationwide right to abortion after half a century, was seen by many Democrats as a gamechanger in terms of people making a connection between the court and their everyday lives.There are further signs of the debate moving beyond the Washington bubble. Last week, the editorial board of the Chicago Sun-Times newspaper argued that, since the court’s own ethics code proved toothless, Congress should enact legislation that holds supreme court justices to higher ethical standards. The paper called for the local senator Dick Durbin of Illinois, who is chair of the Senate judiciary committee, to hold a hearing on the issue.Maggie Jo Buchanan, managing director of the pressure group Demand Justice, said: “It’s important to keep in mind that, even though debate among members of Congress would lead you to believe that court reform is a polarising issue, it really isn’t. For years we have seen broad bipartisan support for basic supreme court reforms such as ethics.“A broad bipartisan consensus exists that they’ve grown too powerful, that they have too much power over laws and regulations. That’s shared among nearly three-fourths of Americans, including 80% of independents, so the demand is there and this isn’t something where it’s Democrats versus Republicans in the sense of real people. The American people want change and want to check the judiciary.”Congressional Democrats have introduced various bills including one to create an independent ethics office and internal investigations counsel within the supreme court. Broader progressive ideas include expanding the number of seats on the court or limiting the justices to 18-year terms rather than lifetime appointments.But such efforts have been repeatedly thwarted by Republicans, who over decades impressed on their base the importance of the court, ultimately leading to a 6-3 conservative majority including three Trump appointees.This week Senate Republicans blocked the ​​Supreme Court Ethics, Recusal, and Transparency Act, legislation that would require the court to adopt a binding code of conduct for all justices, establish procedures to investigate complaints of judicial misconduct and adopt rules to disclose gifts, travel and income received by them that are at least as rigorous as congressional disclosure rules.In response, Christina Harvey, executive director of Stand Up America, said its “nearly 2 million members are fired up and ready to continue advocating for supreme court reform – in Congress and at the ballot box”.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionBut Galen of the Lincoln Project worries that Democrats lack the necessary aggression to capitalise on the issue. “[Senate majority leader Chuck] Schumer and Durbin are not change agents. They consider themselves institutionalists and they continue to call themselves that. They’re in a place where they can’t possibly conceive of something like that. Democrats are just afraid of their own shadow.”That principle might apply to the US president himself. The 81-year-old, who served in the Senate for 36 years, is reluctant to call out justices by name or call for sweeping reforms of the court, although he is making its decision to end the constitutional right to abortion a centrepiece of his campaign.Ed Fallone, an associate law professor at Marquette University Law School said: “I don’t know that Joe Biden is the politician to try and benefit from this issue. Biden has always presented himself as an institutionalist and more of a centrist than many segments of the Democratic party.“There’s a real risk here for Biden because, if he does try to get political advantage from the public’s growing concern about the supreme court, it seems to conflict with his message that we should all respect the court system and the judicial system and the Trump prosecutions and the various legal problems of former Trump advisers. It seems difficult to reconcile telling the public to respect the judicial system with also embracing the idea that the very top of the system is flawed and needs reform.”Fallone added: “You will see other Democrats seize on this issue and start to push it, in particular those who are are going to try to energise the left side of the base, maybe not necessarily for this election, but maybe anticipating Biden might lose and starting already to look ahead to the following election.”Other argue that, competing for voter attention with the cost of living, immigration and other issues, the supreme court will ultimately fade into background noise.Henry Olsen, a senior fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center thinktank in Washington DC, said: “The middle of the country, the independents and the swing voters do not care about the supreme court, and I don’t think any effort by Democrats or the media bringing up these things about Alito or Thomas is going to register or motivate those people. It motivates partisans. It doesn’t motivate swing voters on either side.”Read more: The supreme court’s decisions this week
      US supreme court strikes down federal ban on ‘bump stock’ devices for guns
      US supreme court unanimously upholds access to abortion pill mifepristone
      US supreme court sides with Starbucks in union case over fired employees More

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      Justice department won’t pursue criminal contempt charge against Merrick Garland – as it happened

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      The justice department on Friday told House speaker Mike Johnson that it will not pursue criminal contempt of Congress charges against attorney general Merrick Garland.This is according to a letter reviewed by Reuters.On Wednesday, the House voted on Wednesday to hold Garland in contempt of Congress for refusing to turn over audio recordings of Joe Biden’s interview with special counsel Robert Hur.Garland has defended the justice department, saying that officials have done everything they could to provide information to the investigative committees about Hur’s classified documents investigation into Biden.Here’s a wrap-up of the day’s key events:
      The justice department on Friday told House speaker Mike Johnson that it will not pursue criminal contempt of Congress charges against attorney general Merrick Garland. This is according to a letter reviewed by Reuters. On Wednesday, the House voted on Wednesday to hold Garland in contempt of Congress for refusing to turn over audio recordings of Joe Biden’s interview with special counsel Robert Hur.
      The supreme court has ruled 6-3 in favor of a challenge to a federal ban on gun ‘bump stock’ devices. The vote was 6-3, with liberal justices Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan and Ketanji Brown Jackson dissenting.
      In her dissent against the supreme court’s ruling on bump stocks, liberal justice Sonia Sotomayor said: “When I see a bird that walks like a duck, swims like a duck, and quacks like a duck, I call that bird a duck.” She adds that the “majority’s artificially narrow definition hamstrings the government’s efforts to keep machine guns from gunmen like the Las Vegas shooter.”
      Joe Biden released a statement in light of the supreme court’s latest decision on bump stocks, saying: “Today’s decision strikes down an important gun safety regulation. Americans should not have to live in fear of this mass devastation.”
      Vice president Kamala Harris has released the following statement in response to the supreme court’s ruling on bump stocks: “Weapons of war have no place on the streets of a civil society… Unfortunately, today’s supreme court ruling strikes down this important, commonsense regulation on devices that convert semiautomatic rifles into weapons that can fire hundreds of bullets per minute.”
      Chuck Schumer, the Democratic Senate majority leader, has criticized the ruling on bump stocks and called the supreme court “even further to the right of Donald Trump.” Bump stocks have played “a devastating role in many of the horrific mass shootings in our country,” Schumer said in a statement responding to the ruling.
      The National Association for Gun Rights celebrated the decision on bump stocks and called on the supreme court to issue similar rulings in cases involving “ghost guns” and pistol braces. “The ATF has wandered so far out of its lane for so long, it can’t even find the road any more,” said Dudley Brown, the association’s president.
      March for Our Lives has issued a statement in response to the supreme court’s decision, calling it a “misguided and deadly decision.” It went on to add: “While this ruling rests fundamentally on an interpretation of statutes, not the second amendment, its consequences will be deadly. The supreme court has effectively given mass shooters the easy ability to turn any event or public space into a war zone and mass grave.”
      That’s it as we wrap up the blog for today. Thank you for following along.Louisiana’s Republican representative Garret Graves will not be running for re-election, he announced on Friday.In a statement, Graves, who has represented the state’s 6th district since 2015, said:
      “After much input from constituents, consultation with supporters, consensus from family, and guidance from the Almighty, it is clear that running for Congress this year does not make sense. It is evident that a run in any temporary district will cause actual permanent damage to Louisiana’s great representation in Congress.”
      Democrats are seizing on Donald Trump’s ‘horrible city’ remark about Milwaukee for ads. Robert Tait reports for the Guardian:US Democrats have seized on Donald Trump’s dismissal of Milwaukee as “a horrible city” by trumpeting the unflattering description on advertising hoardings – a month before the city in the swing state of Wisconsin hosts the Republican national convention, where the former president is set to be the party’s presidential nominee this November.Trump reportedly made the comment in a meeting with congressional Republicans in Washington on Thursday, his first return to Capitol Hill since extremist supporters broke into Congress on 6 January 2021, to try to stop Joe Biden’s victory over him.Republican party figures found themselves scrambling to contain the fallout from a political own goal over a city purposely chosen to host the convention on 15-18 July, because Wisconsin is expected to be key to the outcome of the 2024 election.For the full story, click here:The justice department on Friday told House speaker Mike Johnson that it will not pursue criminal contempt of Congress charges against attorney general Merrick Garland.This is according to a letter reviewed by Reuters.On Wednesday, the House voted on Wednesday to hold Garland in contempt of Congress for refusing to turn over audio recordings of Joe Biden’s interview with special counsel Robert Hur.Garland has defended the justice department, saying that officials have done everything they could to provide information to the investigative committees about Hur’s classified documents investigation into Biden.March for Our Lives has issued a statement in response to the supreme court’s decision on bump stocks, calling it a “misguided and deadly decision.”It went on to add:
      “While this ruling rests fundamentally on an interpretation of statutes, not the second amendment, its consequences will be deadly. The supreme court has effectively given mass shooters the easy ability to turn any event or public space into a war zone and mass grave…
      While this decision is egregious, dangerous, and out of touch, we can’t say we’re surprised. The NRA spent $2 million to help place ideological extremists on the bench that have done nothing but bend over backward to serve the gun lobby. The recent audio recordings of the Justices depict exactly what we already knew – that they are extreme, ultra-conservative, partisan, and rely on their own personal beliefs to make decisions rather than settled constitutional jurisprudence.”
      Elizabeth Warren, the Democratic senator of Massachusetts, has called on Congress to ban bump stocks following the supreme court decision, which she said “enables mass shooters to inflict carnage”.Kamala Harris, who earlier released a statement criticizing the ruling on bump stocks, said the court was “rolling back” on “important progress” to prevent gun violence in America.Republicans and Democrats alike have targeted Wisconsin as a must-win state in November’s poll.Joe Biden won it by a margin of about 21,000 votes in the 2020 election, although Donald Trump challenged some vote tallies in his drive to prove that the election had been “stolen”.Trump scored a narrow win in the state in the 2016 election, a result that played a crucial role in his victory over Hillary Clinton.Milwaukee is on the western shore of Lake Michigan, north of Chicago and east of the state capital of Madison, and is a minority white, largely industrial city that votes Democratic, with a long history of racial segregation laws against Black residents. African Americans make up almost 39% of the population, with about 20% Hispanic or Latino.In a tacit admission of the potential self-harm inflicted, Steven Cheung, a Trump campaign spokesman, described the reporting of the comment as “total bullshit”.“He never said it like how it’s been falsely characterized as,” Cheung posted on X, insisting that Trump had been referring to crime and election issues.Democrats have seized on Donald Trump’s dismissal of Milwaukee as “a horrible city” by trumpeting the unflattering description on advertising hoardings, a month before the city in the swing state of Wisconsin hosts the Republican National Convention.Trump reportedly made the comment in a meeting with congressional Republicans in Washington on Thursday, his first return to Capitol Hill since extremist supporters broke into Congress on 6 January 2021.Republican party figures found themselves scrambling to contain the fallout from a political own goal over a city purposely chosen to host the convention on 15-18 July, because Wisconsin is expected to be key to the outcome of the 2024 election.Trump and Biden are running neck and neck in the state, according to numerous polls.The remark calling Milwaukee horrible drew immediate condemnation from Democrats. Republicans – recognising the extent of the possible damage – initially denied the comment had been made, before trying to soften the blow by putting it in various contexts.In a graphic sign of the high stakes, the Democratic election machine swiftly commissioned several billboards to be erected in Milwaukee, the local newspaper the Journal Sentinel reported.One featured picture of Trump next to an image of the X post that broke the story. “TRUMP TO HOUSE REPUBLICANS: ‘Milwaukee, where we are having our convention, is a horrible city’.” it read.The other had the incriminating quote next to a picture of the former president against a red background.Ten billboards are planned to be placed throughout the city in the run-up to the convention to maximise the words’ effect.Here’s how the justices voted in the supreme court’s decision to strike down a federal ban on bump stocks:The ruling was 6-3, with the court’s liberal justices dissenting from the conservative majority’s decision.Chuck Schumer, the Democratic Senate majority leader, has criticized the ruling on bump stocks and called the supreme court “even further to the right of Donald Trump”.Bump stocks have played “a devastating role in many of the horrific mass shootings in our country,” Schumer said in a statement responding to the ruling.
      The far-right Supreme Court continues their unprecedented assault on public safety by reversing the commonsense guidance issued in 2018 by the ATF … Sadly it’s no surprise to see the Supreme Court roll back this necessary public safety rule as they push their out of touch extreme agenda.
      He added that he warned the Trump administration at the time that “the only way to permanently close this loophole is through legislation.” Schumer added:
      Senate Democrats are ready to pass legislation to ban bump stocks but we will need votes from Senate Republicans.
      The National Association for Gun Rights celebrated the decision on bump stocks and called on the supreme court to issue similar rulings in cases involving “ghost guns” and pistol braces.“The ATF has wandered so far out of its lane for so long, it can’t even find the road any more, ” said Dudley Brown, the association’s president.
      The ATF has gone rogue in assuming lawmaking authority that it does not have with pistol brace rules, homemade firearms, who a gun dealer is, etc, and they must be reined in. More

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      Senate Republicans block bill that establishes right to IVF across the US

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      Senate Republicans have defeated a bill that would have established a federal right to in vitro fertilization, a piece of legislation that Democrats forced to the floor on Thursday as part of an election-year effort to contrast their approach to reproductive rights with that of the party across the aisle.The bill, the Right to IVF act, would have overwritten any state efforts to restrict the right to IVF as well as seeking to make the treatment more affordable and accessible, including for US military service members and veterans.The legislation was introduced by Senators Patty Murray of Washington state, Cory Booker of New Jersey and Tammy Duckworth of Illinois, and the bill was not expected to pass, given that most legislation needs at least 60 votes to advance in the Senate.Instead, Democrats hoped to get Republicans on the record opposing an infertility treatment that is widely popular among Americans. They deployed a similar strategy last week, when Democrats held a vote on a bill that would have guaranteed a nationwide right to contraception – which, like IVF, is very popular. That bill, the Right to Contraception act, also failed.“Last week, every senator was put on the record as to whether they will defend the right to contraception. And despite Republicans’ words about supporting birth control, their actions – voting against the Right to Contraception act – spoke louder,” Murray said in a speech from the Senate floor on Thursday. “Today, we are putting Republicans on the record on another issue families across the country are deeply concerned about: the right to IVF.”The Louisiana senator Bill Cassidy, a Republican, denounced the bill, which he said was motivated by “political purposes”.“This is not serious legislation,” Cassidy said. “It was not brought through the committee process. It is a political process.”Because IVF typically involves creating embryos that may not be implanted in a woman’s uterus or may go unused after genetic testing, some anti-abortion campaigners have long opposed IVF. However, the US abortion wars have rarely focused on IVF.Then, in February, the Alabama state supreme court ruled that frozen embryos created through IVF are legally “extrauterine children” – a decision that endorsed the tenets of so-called fetal personhood, promoted by a US movement that seeks to endow embryos and fetuses with full legal rights and protections. The ruling led many IVF providers in Alabama to temporarily pause their operations, which created chaos and triggered backlash across the country.Still, anti-abortion activists have continued to gain ground in their battle on IVF. On Wednesday, the Southern Baptist Convention, the largest Protestant group in the US, voted at its annual meeting to condemn IVF. With its nearly 13 million members and enormous political influence, the Southern Baptist Convention’s rejection of IVF signaled a turning point in the debate over IVF. Although evangelical Protestants have largely supported IVF, the vote suggests that the anti-abortion movement is successfully making the case that opposition to abortion necessitates opposition to IVF.“This is not the end of our fight for family building for all. We will continue until everyone in this country has access to the family building options they need and the availability of IVF is guaranteed in all 50 states,” Barbara Collura, president and CEO of Resolve: The National Infertility Association, said in a statement Thursday, after the failed Senate vote. “Introducing this bill was already a big win for advocates of increasing access to fertility treatments. Our work led to this comprehensive legislation, and we are not giving up.” More

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      Clarence Thomas took additional trips funded by Harlan Crow, senator reveals

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      The US supreme court justice Clarence Thomas took at least three additional trips funded by the billionaire benefactor Harlan Crow that the conservative justice failed to disclose, the chair of the Senate judiciary committee said on Thursday.Crow, a Texas businessman and Republican donor, disclosed details about the justice’s travel between 2017 and 2021 in response to a judiciary committee vote last November to authorize subpoenas to Crow and another influential conservative, according to the committee chair, Senator Dick Durbin, a Democrat representing Illinois.“The Senate judiciary committee’s investigation into the supreme court’s ethical crisis is producing new information – like what we’ve revealed [on Thursday] – and makes it crystal clear that the highest court needs an enforceable code of conduct, because its members continue to choose not to meet the moment,” Durbin said.A supreme court spokesperson did not immediately respond to a request for comment, nor did a lawyer for Crow.Thomas has previously come under criticism for failing to disclose gifts from Crow. Most recently, Thomas last week belatedly revised his 2019 financial disclosure form to acknowledge that Crow had paid for his “food and lodging” at a hotel in Bali, Indonesia, and at a California club.But the recent filing by Thomas failed to disclose that Crow had paid for his travel by private jet related to the Bali and California trips, and an eight-day excursion on a yacht in Indonesia, omissions that were revealed on Thursday in a redacted document that Durbin’s office said contained travel itineraries where Crow had provided the justice with transportation.The document shows private jet travel in May 2017 between St Louis in Missouri, the state of Montana, and Dallas. It also shows private jet travel in March 2019 between Washington DC and Savannah, Georgia, and private jet travel in June 2021 between Washington DC and San Jose, California.Under pressure from criticism over ethics, following a series of rows focusing mainly on Thomas and Samuel Alito, the most conservative justices, the nine justices of the supreme court last November adopted their first code of conduct.However, critics and some congressional Democrats have said the code does not go far enough to promote transparency, continuing to leave decisions to recuse from cases to the justices themselves and providing no mechanism of enforcement.Earlier this week, the South Carolina senator Lindsey Graham, the top-ranking Republican on the Senate judiciary committee, said he would block Democrats’ attempts to pass an ethics bill to rein in the US supreme court.And the Democratic congresswomen Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez said the court had been “captured and corrupted by money and extremism”, provoking a “crisis of legitimacy” that threatens the stability of US democracy.Reuters contributed reporting More

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      Pelosi condemns Trump’s Capitol visit: ‘Returning to the scene of the crime’

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      Nancy Pelosi, the Democratic former House speaker, mounted a forceful denunciation of Thursday’s first visit to the US Capitol by Donald Trump since he incited a mob to attack it on January 6 2021, accusing him of returning with “the same mission of dismantling our democracy”.In remarks that triggered a fresh war of words between the pair, Pelosi said the former president’s visit to discuss strategy with congressional Republicans in advance of the election amounted to a symbolic return to the scene of a crime that he deliberately initiated.“Today, the instigator of an insurrection is returning to the scene of the crime,” Pelosi said in a statement. “January 6 was a crime against the Capitol, that saw Nazi and Confederate flags flying under the dome that Lincoln built.”She added: “It was a crime against the constitution and its peaceful transfer of power, in a desperate attempt to cling to power. And it was a crime against members, heroic police officers and staff, that resulted in death, injury and trauma that endure to this day.”Pelosi, whose office was overrun and defiled by invading Trump supporters in the assault, as rioters ran through the halls of Congress calling her name, added: “With his pledges to be a dictator on day one and seek revenge against his political opponents, Donald Trump comes to Capitol Hill today with the same mission of dismantling our democracy. But make no mistake – Trump has already cemented his legacy of shame in our hallowed halls.”Her furious broadside may have provided the fuel for outlandish comments attributed to Trump in his Thursday morning meeting with House Republicans.Jake Sherman, a reporter for the website Punchbowl, posted on X that Trump had digressed to talk about an imagined romantic relationship between Pelosi and himself, which he said had been suggested by one of the former speaker’s daughters, whom he did not identify by name.“Nancy Pelosi’s daughter is a wacko … her daughter told me if things were different Nancy and I would be perfect together. There’s an age difference, though,” Sherman quoted Trump as saying, adding that his words were “close to an exact quote”.The reported comments provoked an angry response from one Pelosi daughter, Christine Pelosi, also on X.“Speaking for all 4 Pelosi daughters – this is a LIE,” she wrote. “His deceitful, deranged obsession with our mother is yet another reason Donald Trump is unwell, unhinged and unfit to step foot anywhere near her – or the White House.”The Hill quoted a spokesman for Pelosi as saying: “That guy has clearly lost his marbles. Not that he had many to begin with.” More

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      US House votes to hold Merrick Garland in contempt of Congress

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      The House voted on Wednesday to hold the attorney general, Merrick Garland, in contempt of Congress for refusing to turn over audio of President Joe Biden’s interview in his classified-documents case, Republicans’ latest and strongest rebuke of the justice department as partisan conflict over the rule of law animates the 2024 presidential campaign.The 216-207 vote fell along party lines, with Republicans coalescing behind the contempt effort despite reservations among some of the party’s more centrist members.“We have to defend the constitution. We have to defend the authority of Congress,” the House speaker, Mike Johnson, said at a press conference before the vote. “We can’t allow the Department of Justice and executive branch to hide information from Congress.”Garland is now the third attorney general to be held in contempt of Congress. Yet it is unlikely that the justice department – which Garland oversees – will prosecute him. The White House’s decision to exert executive privilege over the audio recording, shielding it from Congress, would make it exceedingly difficult to make a criminal case against Garland.The White House and congressional Democrats have slammed Republicans’ motives for pursuing contempt and dismissed their efforts to obtain the audio as purely political. They also pointed out that Jim Jordan, the GOP chair of the House judiciary committee, defied his own congressional subpoena last session.“This contempt resolution will do very little, other than smear the reputation of Merrick Garland, who will remain a good and decent public servant no matter what Republicans say about him today,” Jerry Nadler, a New York representative and the top Democrat on the judiciary committee, said during floor debate.Garland has defended the justice department, saying officials have gone to extraordinary lengths to provide information to the committees about the special counsel Robert Hur’s classified-documents investigation, including a transcript of Biden’s interview with him.“There have been a series of unprecedented and frankly unfounded attacks on the justice department,” Garland said in a press conference last month. “This request, this effort to use contempt as a method of obtaining our sensitive law-enforcement files, is just the most recent.”Republicans were incensed when Hur declined to prosecute Biden over his handling of classified documents and quickly opened an investigation. GOP lawmakers – led by Jordan and Representative James Comer – sent a subpoena for audio of Hur’s interviews with Biden during the spring. But the justice department only turned over some of the records, leaving out audio of the interview with the president.On the last day to comply with the Republicans’ subpoena for the audio, the White House blocked the release by invoking executive privilege. It said that Republicans in Congress only wanted the recordings “to chop them up” and use them for political purposes.Executive privilege gives presidents the right to keep information from the courts, Congress and the public to protect the confidentiality of decision-making, though it can be challenged in court.Administrations of both political parties have long held the position that officials who assert a president’s claim of executive privilege cannot be prosecuted for contempt of Congress, a justice department official told Republicans last month.An assistant attorney general, Carlos Felipe Uriarte, cited a committee’s decision in 2008 to back down from a contempt effort after then President George W Bush asserted executive privilege to keep Congress from getting records involving Vice-President Dick Cheney.Before Garland, the last attorney general held in contempt was Bill Barr in 2019. That was when the Democratic-controlled House voted to issue a referral against Barr after he refused to turn over documents related to a special counsel investigation into Trump.Years before that, the then attorney general, Eric Holder, was held in contempt related to the gun-running operation known as Operation Fast and Furious. In each of those instances, the justice department took no action against the attorney general.The special counsel in Biden’s case, Hur, spent a year investigating the president’s improper retention of classified documents, from his time as a senator and as vice-president. The result was a 345-page report that questioned Biden’s mental competence but recommended no criminal charges for the 81-year-old. Hur said he found insufficient evidence to successfully prosecute a case in court.In March, Hur stood by his no-prosecution assessment in testimony before the judiciary committee, where he was grilled for more than four hours by Democratic and Republican lawmakers.His defense did not satisfy Republicans, who insist that there was a politically motivated double standard at the justice department, which is prosecuting former President Donald Trump over his retention of classified documents at his Florida club after he left the White House.But there are major differences between the two investigations. Biden’s team returned the documents after they were discovered, and the president cooperated with the investigation by voluntarily sitting for an interview and consenting to searches of his homes.Trump, by contrast, is accused of enlisting the help of aides and lawyers to conceal the documents from the government and of seeking to have potentially incriminating evidence destroyed. More

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      White House won’t rule out commuting Hunter Biden sentence – as it happened

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      The White House has not ruled out a possible commutation for Hunter Biden after a jury found him guilty on three federal gun crimes.White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre, speaking to reporters on Wednesday on Air Force One, said:
      As we all know, the sentencing hasn’t even been scheduled yet.
      She said she had not spoken to Joe Biden about the issue since the verdict was delivered on Tuesday. The president has previously ruled out pardoning his son.“He was very clear, very upfront, obviously very definitive,” Jean-Pierre said of Biden’s remarks about a potential pardon.But on a commutation, “I just don’t have anything beyond that,” she added.Here’s a wrap-up of the day’s key events:
      The US has announced a new slew of sanctions on Russia over its military invasion of Ukraine. On Wednesday, the treasury and state departments announced sanctions targeting more than 300 targets including entities in Russia as well as in China, Turkey and the United Arab Emirates.
      Joe Biden has announced the reopening of the port of Baltimore after the Francis Scott Key Bridge collapsed in March, killing six construction workers. In a statement released via the White House, Biden said: “I made clear that my administration would move heaven and earth to reopen the port of Baltimore – one of our nation’s largest shipping hubs. Today, thanks to the tireless work by the men and women in the Unified Command, the full navigation channel is now open to all vessel traffic, allowing a full return of commerce to the port of Baltimore.”
      Republicans in Congress are vowing to block Democrats’ push to enforce a code of ethics in the supreme court after reports of justices, including Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito, accepting lavish gifts and travel opportunities. Lindsey Graham, the South Carolina senator and top Republican on the Senate judiciary committee, told NBC News that he will object to Democrats’ efforts to unanimously pass the bill.
      Rapper and singer Usher visited Capitol Hill on Wednesday and met with congressional leaders to focus on screening for type 1 diabetes. Speaking about his visit to reporters, Usher said: “It’s not my first time, won’t be my last time coming. Today I’m just talking about type 1 diabetes and early screening for type 1 diabetes.”
      Donald Trump is expected to meet with congressional Republicans in Washington DC this Thursday, as the GOP tries to present a united front ahead of the November elections. Trump is scheduled on Thursday to meet with House Republicans at the Capitol Hill Club, and then with Republican senators in the afternoon at the National Republican Senatorial Committee headquarters, according to reports.
      The White House has not ruled out a possible commutation for Hunter Biden after a jury found him guilty on three federal gun crimes. White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre, speaking to reporters on Wednesday on Air Force One, said: “As we all know, the sentencing hasn’t even been scheduled yet.”
      That’s it as we wrap up the blog for today. Thank you for following along.Hillary Clinton has publicly endorsed George Latimer, a moderate Democrat from Westchester ahead of a New York congressional primary.In a post on Twitter/X, Clinton wrote:
      With Trump on the ballot, we need strong, principled Democrats in Congress more than ever. In Congress, @LatimerforNY will protect abortion rights, stand up to the NRA, and fight for President Biden’s agenda-just like he’s always done. Make a plan to vote by June 25th!
      Multiple pro-Israel groups have also thrown their efforts into endorsing Latimer – who is running against New York congressman Jamaal Bowman – in attempts to unseat the progressive “squad” in Congress over their criticisms of Israel’s deadly war on Gaza.Rapper and singer Usher visited Capitol Hill on Wednesday and met with congressional leaders to focus on screening for type 1 diabetes.Speaking about his visit to reporters, Usher said:
      It’s not my first time, won’t be my last time coming. Today I’m just talking about type 1 diabetes and early screening for type 1 diabetes.
      Georgia’s Democratic senator Raphael Warnock was among the congressional members who met with Usher.In a post on Twitter/X, Warnock wrote:
      I’m so glad Usher could stop by my office to talk about the importance of screening for type 1 diabetes. Whether pushing to strengthen access to screening or to lower the exorbitant costs of insulin, I won’t stop fighting for people with diabetes in Georgia & across the nation.
      Hunter Biden’s latest federal conviction could boost his father against Donald Trump amid Trump’s claims that the justice department is unfairly rigged against him.Robert Tait reports for the Guardian:Trump, the former president and presumptive GOP presidential nominee, has pushed that line relentlessly to explain his conviction last month on charges related to the concealment of hush-money payments to a porn star to help him win the 2016 election.He has made the claim even though his prosecution was brought in a New York state court that is independent of the Department of Justice, which is overseeing 54 other criminal charges against him that have so far not come to trial.Hunter Biden, by contrast, was prosecuted and convicted under the authority of the justice department, which is part of his father’s administration – an inconvenient fact that weakens Republican claims that it has been turned into a political weapon in the president’s hands.The result, some observers say, is that Hunter’s conviction may help the president in a close race, even though the personal cost of his son’s troubles is heavy.Read the full story here:Donald Trump is expected to meet with congressional Republicans in Washington DC this Thursday, as the GOP tries to present a united front ahead of the November elections.Trump is scheduled on Thursday to meet with House Republicans at the Capitol Hill Club, and then with Republican senators in the afternoon at the National Republican Senatorial Committee headquarters, according to reports.Mike Johnson, the Republican House speaker, and Mitch McConnell, the Senate minority leader, are expected to attend.It will mark the first meeting between the former president and GOP lawmakers since he was found guilty in the hush-money trial.Here’s more on the latest slew of US sanctions against Russia over its military invasion of Russia.The package targets Chinese companies that have helped Russia pursue its war and raised the stakes for foreign financial institutions which work with sanctioned Russian entities.It also targets the Russian financial infrastructure in an attempt to limit the amount of money flowing in and out of the country.The announcement came shortly before Joe Biden arrived in Italy, where he and other G7 leaders are urgently looking at aiding Ukraine.Americans don’t have much faith in America right now. Or at least not in its institutions.In 2022, a Gallup poll found that Americans had experienced “significant declines” in trust in 11 of 16 major US institutions. The supreme court and the presidency saw the largest drops in public confidence – by 11% and 15%, respectively. Trust also fell in the medical system, banks, police, public schools and newspapers.Things didn’t improve in 2023: a follow-up poll found that levels of trust remained low, with none of the scores “worsening or improving meaningfully”.Public confidence waxes and wanes, but these numbers are notably bleak. Trust in institutions has “never been lower”, confirms Jeffrey Jones, a senior editor of the Gallup poll and the author of the 2022 report.This mistrust is not a one-time blip, a rough patch in an otherwise happy relationship between a country and its people. According to polling experts, it is partly the result of a decades-long effort by political leaders to erode public confidence in institutions such as science, media and government. And the consequences are serious. Not trusting the forces that govern their lives is detrimental to the health and wellbeing of individuals and communities, and makes the country less prepared to face a major crisis.“Trust is the grease that oils the gears and makes things work,” says Dr Marc Hetherington, professor of political science at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. “Without it, everything is more difficult.”But how did we lose this trust in the first place? And is there a way to get it back?Read the full story: Trust in US institutions has ‘never beenl ower’ – here’s why that mattersThe latest comments by Karine Jean-Pierre mark a shift in position from September, when she was asked if Joe Biden would “pardon or commute his son if he’s convicted.”The White House press secretary said at the time:
      I’ve answered this question before. It was asked of me not too long ago, a couple of weeks ago. And I was very clear, and I said no.
      A pardon is an expression of forgiveness of a criminal offense that restores some rights, such as voting, that a person loses upon conviction, AP reports.A commutation reduces a sentence but leaves the conviction intact.The White House has not ruled out a possible commutation for Hunter Biden after a jury found him guilty on three federal gun crimes.White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre, speaking to reporters on Wednesday on Air Force One, said:
      As we all know, the sentencing hasn’t even been scheduled yet.
      She said she had not spoken to Joe Biden about the issue since the verdict was delivered on Tuesday. The president has previously ruled out pardoning his son.“He was very clear, very upfront, obviously very definitive,” Jean-Pierre said of Biden’s remarks about a potential pardon.But on a commutation, “I just don’t have anything beyond that,” she added.Here’s more from House speaker Mike Johnson’s briefing with reporters earlier today.Johnson was asked if he has spoken to Donald Trump about committing to “respecting the American tradition of peaceful transfer” of power and not attempting another January 6-style insurrection. Johnson replied:
      Of course he respects that, and we all do, and we’ve all talked about it ad nauseam.
      Ahead of the Republican-led House’s vote to hold attorney general Merrick Garland in contempt for his decision to withhold audio recordings of Joe Biden’s interviews with special counsel Robert Hur, House speaker Mike Johnson said:
      The contempt of Merrick Garland is a very important principle here … We have to defend the constitution. We have to defend the authority of Congress. We can’t allow the Department of Justice, an executive branch agency, to hide information from Congress …
      And the best evidence as chairman [Jim] Jordan said, was the audio recordings because they provide critical insight in what that transcript itself cannot provide. We have to know if the transcript is accurate … The attorney general doesn’t get to decide whether he hides the tape, and that’s what will be determined here.”
      Although more Americans support than oppose Joe Biden’s latest immigration executive order, public opinion on whether the order was tough on illegal immigration remains mixed, according to a new Monmouth University poll.According to the poll, 40% of Americans are in favor of Biden’s executive order while 27% disapprove – and 33% of Americans have no opinion.The report also found that support is evenly spread across all partisan groups – 44% of Republicans, 40% of Democrats and 38% of independents are in favor. Republicans (29%) and independents (30%) are slightly more likely than Democrats (22%) to oppose this move.The House speaker, Mike Johnson, criticized Joe Biden’s immigration policies, telling reporters on Wednesday:
      The Biden border catastrophe continues in spite of his window dressing of the executive order.
      Johnson was referring to Biden’s latest executive order that limits asylum seekers from crossing the US-Mexico border.He added:
      Nothing’s changed, of course. In fact, many have argued that this increased the incentives for people to try to come and, you know, avail themselves of the welcome mat that the Biden administration has put forward.
      The US has announced a new slew of sanctions on Russia over its military invasion of Ukraine.On Wednesday, the treasury and state departments announced sanctions targeting more than 300 targets including entities in Russia as well as in China, Turkey and the United Arab Emirates.In a statement following the sanctions, the US treasury secretary, Janet Yellen, said:
      Today’s actions strike at their remaining avenues for international materials and equipment, including their reliance on critical supplies from third countries …
      We are increasing the risk for financial institutions dealing with Russia’s war economy and eliminating paths for evasion, and diminishing Russia’s ability to benefit from access to foreign technology, equipment, software and IT services.
      Joe Biden has announced the reopening of the port of Baltimore after the Francis Scott Key Bridge collapsed in March, killing six construction workers.In a statement released via the White House, Biden said:
      I made clear that my administration would move heaven and earth to reopen the port of Baltimore – one of our nation’s largest shipping hubs. Today, thanks to the tireless work by the men and women in the Unified Command, the full navigation channel is now open to all vessel traffic, allowing a full return of commerce to the port of Baltimore …
      Our hearts remain with the families of the victims of the bridge collapse, and we will continue to stand with the community throughout this period of recovery.
      Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez hit back at the supreme court in a recent roundtable discussion in which she accused it of being in a “crisis of legitimacy” following a series of scandals that have surrounded several justices.The Guardian’s Lauren Gambino reports:Speaking during a roundtable discussion on Capitol Hill, the New York Democratic representative accused the court of “delegitimizing itself through its conduct”.“A group of anti-democratic billionaires with their own ideological and economic agenda has been working one of the three co-equal branches of government,” she said.Sustained scrutiny of the justices prompted the court to adopt its first code of ethics last year, but it lacks any form of enforcement. Meanwhile, public confidence in the court has plummeted to near historic lows.In the two years since it overturned Roe v Wade, eliminating the constitutional right to abortion, a decision that sparked fierce political backlash from voters across the ideological spectrum, the court has been rocked by ethics scandals involving two of the bench’s most conservative justices, Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito.“The highest court in the land today has the lowest ethical standards,” said Jamie Raskin, a Democratic congressman from Maryland, and the ranking member of the House oversight committee, who joined Ocasio-Cortez in convening the discussion.For the full story, click here:In a press statement released ahead of the Senate vote, Democrats said:
      [The vote follows] a myriad of apparent ethical lapses by supreme court justices, which demonstrates the need for ethics reform.
      Last week, Justice Clarence Thomas belatedly admitted that some luxury vacation trips he took were paid for by Harlan Crow, a conservative billionaire donor.Those vacations included trips to Indonesia and a men’s club in California. Thomas’s admission comes more than a year after ProPublica first reported on the trips.Meanwhile, Justice Samuel Alito’s neutrality as a judge has been questioned in recent days after reports revealed that he said in a secret recording that one side of the US’s right-left divide has to prevail.Alito has also been at the center of several flag controversies, including an incident in which he appeared to fly an American flag upside down outside his home after the January 6 riots in 2021.Republicans in Congress are vowing to block Democrats’ push to enforce a code of ethics in the supreme court after reports of justices, including Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito, accepting lavish gifts and travel opportunities.Lindsey Graham, the South Carolina senator and top Republican on the Senate judiciary committee, told NBC News that he will object to Democrats’ efforts to unanimously pass the bill.Although the chair of the judiciary committee, Senate majority whip Dick Durbin, said that he plans to make a unanimous consent request, the Illinois Democrat did voice doubts over whether the legislation will pass.“I think I know the outcome, but we’re going to go through the exercise to make sure that both parties are in the record,” Durbin said.Meanwhile, Democratic representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez said at a recent roundtable discussion in Washington DC that the supreme court is in a “crisis of legitimacy” as a result of being “captured and corrupted by money and extremism”.Here are other developments in US politics:
      The Republican-lead House is scheduled to vote on whether to hold the US attorney general, Merrick Garland, in contempt for his decision to withhold audio recordings of Joe Biden’s interviews with special counsel Robert Hur.
      Joe Biden is travelling from Wilmington, Delaware, to Fasano, Italy, for the annual G7 summit.
      Hunter Biden has been found guilty on all three counts in his federal gun trial. More