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      Democrats sift through shutdown’s ashes after resistance finally breached

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      More than 42 days ago, beleaguered congressional Democrats employed a tactic they were not known for using – refusing to fund the government unless their demands, in this case, an extension of tax credits that lowered costs for Affordable Care Act health plans, were met.Fast forward to Wednesday evening, and the federal government is back open, the Democrats’ resistance breached by the combined forces of Congress’s Republican majorities and a splinter group of Democratic senators who provided just enough votes to get a funding bill past the chamber’s filibuster.The minority party’s lawmakers are now sifting through the ashes of what wound up being the longest government shutdown in history. Though it was the Republicans whose demands fueled other recent funding lapses, this one ended just like those did: with the minority party winning no concessions from the party in power.And yet, many Democrats are calling it a win anyway, arguing it gave them an opportunity to prove to voters that, despite accusations to the contrary, they are still capable of putting up a fight in Donald Trump’s Washington.“I hope that people in America will see those of us who are willing to stand, and hold the line for them,” said Pennsylvania congresswoman Summer Lee.Nor do they plan to let the issue rest any time soon.“These are choices that are being made,” said Wesley Bell, who may after next year be the only Democratic congressman in Missouri, if the state’s Republican-friendly gerrymander is allowed to stand.“[Republicans] have the majorities in the House, Senate and the presidency, and if they wanted to address the skyrocketing health care costs, they have the ability to do it, and they have a willing partner in Democrats,” he said.The spending standoff was a turnaround from months that the party spent seeing its priorities mauled by the ascendant Republican government, enabled by a conservative-dominated supreme court. The country’s main foreign aid agency was closed, droves of federal workers were fired or urged to resign, the premier federal health program for poor and disabled Americans was downsized and tax cuts directed at businesses and the wealthy were extended forever.Democratic-aligned groups succeeded in getting millions of people to take to the streets in protests nationwide against what they saw as Trump’s executive overreach, but the brutal realities of their poor showing in the 2024 election were unavoidable. Democratic lawmakers had few avenues in Congress to block Trump’s policies, and the supreme court repeatedly turned back legal challenges to his orders.Then Congress was asked to extend the government’s funding authorization beyond the end of September, when it was set to expire, and Democrats saw their chance to issue an ultimatum. The current Affordable Care Act tax credits, which were created under Joe Biden, were to expire at the end of the year, and they wanted them extended. They also wanted the cuts to Medicaid reversed, and an undoing of Trump’s use of rescissions to slash congressionally approved funding.It was strategic ground to make a stand, for Democrats had long put healthcare at the center of their pitch to voters. In the end, all they got in the deal that reopened the government was a promise from John Thune, the Senate majority leader, to hold a vote on a bill to reauthorize the credits. There’s no telling if enough Republicans will support it to pass the chamber, if House Republican leaders would allow it to come up for a vote, or if Trump would sign it.The party may have reaped rewards that are less tangible. Polls consistently showed voters putting more blame on the GOP for the shutdown than the Democrats. Last week, the party swept off-year elections in several states, in part by flipping voters who had turned out for Trump last year.The choice of tactics nonetheless disquieted some in the party. As the shutdown went on, Trump moved to halt payments of the government’s largest food aid program, while federal workers missed paychecks.North Carolina congressman Don Davis, one of six Democrats who voted for the funding bill that ended the shutdown in the House of Representatives, said tales of hardship from his constituents convinced him it was time to end the standoff.“I had a person, a constituent, talking to me, literally in tears. That’s not what I want,” he said. Republicans in North Carolina’s senate recently passed a new congressional map that will make his district more difficult to win next year.All signs point to the reauthorization of government funding being merely a lull in the larger war over healthcare in the United States.The funding bill Congress passed keeps the government open only through January, meaning Democrats could issue another set of demands for their votes then. Just before the House voted to restart funding on Wednesday evening, Democratic minority leader Hakeem Jeffries made clear the party was not letting this defeat deter them.“We will stay on this issue until we get this issue resolved for everyday Americans,” he said. More

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      Trump signs funding bill to end longest US government shutdown

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      The longest US government shutdown in history ended on Wednesday after more than 42 days, following the House of Representative’s passage of a bill negotiated by Republicans and a splinter group of Democrat-aligned senators.The compromise sets the stage for government operations to return to normal through January, while leaving unresolved the issue of expiring tax credits for Affordable Care Act, or Obamacare health plans, which most Democrats demanded be extended in any deal to reopen the government.After it was unveiled over the weekend, the Senate approved the compromise on Monday, and the House followed suit two days later by a margin of 222 in favor and 209 against, with two not voting. Donald Trump signed the bill on Wednesday night, saying “we’re sending a clear message that we will never give in to extortion, because that’s what it was … the Democrats tried to extort our country”.Six Democrats broke with their party to vote for the bill: Adam Gray of California, Tom Suozzi of New York, Marie Gluesenkamp Perez of Washington, Don Davis of North Carolina, Henry Cuellar of Texas and Jared Golden of Maine. Two Republicans, Thomas Massie of Kentucky and Greg Steube of Florida, voted against it.“The Democrat shutdown is finally over thanks to House and Senate Republicans,” House Republican leadership said in a statement.“There is absolutely no question now that Democrats are responsible for millions of American families going hungry, millions of travelers left stranded in airports, and our troops left wondering if they would receive their next paycheck.”In remarks on the House floor shortly before the vote, the Democratic minority leader Hakeem Jeffries had pledged to continue to press for the subsidies’ extensions.“This fight is not over. We’re just getting started,” he said. “Either Republicans finally decide to extend the Affordable Care Act tax credits this year, or the American people will throw Republicans out of their jobs next year and end the speakership of Donald J Trump once and for all. That’s how this fight ends.”The spending standoff was the biggest battle between congressional Democrats and Republicans since Trump returned to the White House earlier this year. It resulted in unprecedented disruptions to government services, with the Trump administration ordering cuts to commercial air travel across the country, and the first-ever halt to the largest federal food aid program.Reeling from their election defeats last year, Democrats had seized on an end-of-September expiration of government funding to make a stand on healthcare, a signature issue of the party over the past decade and a half. The Obamacare tax credits were created during Joe Biden’s presidency, and lowered premiums for enrollers of plans bought under the law.Democrats wanted them extended as part of any deal to continue government funding. The party made other demands as well, including curbs on Trump’s use of rescissions to slash money Congress had previously authorized and an undoing of cuts to Medicaid which Republicans had approved earlier in the year. But as the battle went on, it became clear that an extension of the subsidies was the main objective.Republicans, who control both the House and the Senate, counter-offered with a bill to fund the government through the third week of November, without any spending cuts or major changes to policy. They passed the measure through the lower chamber with only a single Democrat in support, but the minority used the Senate’s filibuster to block its passage there.The shutdown began on 1 October, resulting in around 700,000 federal workers being furloughed. Hundreds of thousands of others, from active duty military to law enforcement to airport security screeners, remained on the job without pay.Russell Vought, the White House office of management and budget director known for his hostility towards the federal workforce, seized on the funding lapse to order further layoffs of government employees. He also cut funding for infrastructure projects in states that voted for Kamala Harris last year.Though Trump ordered military members be paid in a move that many experts called likely illegal, other federal workers missed paychecks. Food banks began reporting increased demand as the shutdown went on, with the need worsening after the White House halted payments under the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or food stamps, citing the government funding lapse.Last week, Sean Duffy, the transportation secretary, ordered a cutback in flights at US airports, saying air traffic controllers were facing unprecedented strain after weeks of unpaid work. Widespread flight cancellations were reported in the days that followed.In the Senate, most Democrats remained onboard with the party’s strategy for weeks. Senate majority leader John Thune held 14 votes on the GOP funding measure, but only three members of the minority caucus ever broke ranks to support it.In early November, Democrats swept off-year elections, winning gubernatorial elections in Virginia and New Jersey by significant margins, as well as voter approval for new congressional maps in California that will help the party’s candidates.Democratic leaders said the wins vindicated their strategy in the funding fight, a statement Trump echoed, saying “the shutdown is a big factor” in the GOP’s poor performance. He began pressing Republican senators to scrap the filibuster, which would have negated the 60-vote threshold spending legislation needs to clear in the chamber, where the GOP holds 53 seats.Meanwhile, a small group of moderate members of the Senate Democratic caucus had been negotiating a compromise to end the shutdown. It ended up funding the government through January and undoing the layoffs the Trump administration had ordered after the shutdown began.But it included no additional funding for the Affordable Care Act tax credits – instead, Thune agreed to allow a vote on the issue by mid-December. There’s no telling if it will win the GOP support needed to pass, and Mike Johnson, the Republican House speaker, has not said he will put any legislation up for a vote.Despite howls of outrage from both House and Senate Democrats, the Senate passed it with 60 votes on Monday: eight from lawmakers in the Democratic caucus, and the rest from Republicans.Yet the fight over the ACA subsidies is unlikely to be over. Enrollers in the plans received notices of premium increases in November because of the tax credits’ expiration. One study predicted they would rise by an average of 26%, potentially bringing them to levels unaffordable to many.With government funding expiring again at the end of January, Democrats could use the opportunity to again demand the subsidies be extended.“Dozens of House Republicans have been claiming over the last few weeks that they know that is something that needs to be addressed,” Jeffries said in a Tuesday interview with CNN.“And now we’re going to have to see some action or whether it was just talk from these House Republicans because Democrats are going to continue to stay in the arena as it relates to dealing with the healthcare crisis that Republicans have visited on the American people.” More

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      Trump calls Epstein emails a Democratic deflection after correspondence alleges president ‘knew about the girls’ – live

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      In a post on Truth Social, the president has addressed the batch of emails released by House Democrats on the oversight committee.“The Democrats are trying to bring up the Jeffrey Epstein Hoax again because they’ll do anything at all to deflect on how badly they’ve done on the Shutdown,” Trump wrote. “There should be no deflections to Epstein or anything else, and any Republicans involved should be focused only on opening up our Country, and fixing the massive damage caused by the Democrats!”Arizona Democrat Adelita Grijalva was sworn in by Mike Johnson, the US House speaker, on Wednesday, ending a seven-week standoff that prevented the incoming congresswoman from taking her seat and clearing the path for a vote to release the Jeffrey Epstein files.House Democrats burst into applause on the House floor when Grijalva took the oath of office during a ceremonial swearing-in, shortly before the chamber was poised to take up legislation that would end the longest federal government shutdown in US history. The ceremony comes 49 days after Grijalva won a late September special election to succeed her father, the longtime congressman Raúl Grijalva, who died in March.Grijalva’s arrival does more than narrow the already razor-thin Republican majority. She has vowed to become the 218th and final signature on a discharge petition that would automatically trigger a House floor vote on legislation demanding the justice department release additional files on deceased sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.

      A new batch of emails released by House Democrats on the oversight committee seemed to suggest that Donald Trump was aware of Jeffrey Epstein’s conduct. In the three emails released, Epstein apparently told his accomplice Ghislaine Maxwell that Trump “spent hours” at his house with one of Epstein’s victims. In two other emails to author Michael Wolff, Epstein wrote that “of course he knew about the girls”, referring to the Trump. According to the exchanges, Epstein also solicited Wolff’s advice about how he should handle Trump discussing their friendship in an interview with CNN. “I think you should let him hang himself,” Wolff writes. “If he says he hasn’t been on the plane or to the house, then that gives you a valuable PR and political currency.”

      Later, the committee’s Republican majority countered by releasing its own tranche of 23,000 documents, accusing Democrats of “cherrypicking” the memos “to generate clickbait”. The GOP members also insisted the redacted victim that the late sex-offender refers to in his emails was actually one of his most prominent accusers – Virginia Giuffre.

      At the White House today, the press secretary, Karoline Leavitt, said that the new correspondence released today “proves absolutely nothing other than the fact that President Trump did nothing wrong”. She repeated Republicans’ claims that Giuffre was the unnamed victim. “She maintained that there was nothing inappropriate she ever witnessed, that President Trump was always extremely professional and friendly to her,” Leavitt added.

      For his part, Trump labelled the move by Democrats as “deflection” for their performance during the record-breaking government shutdown. In a post on Truth Social, the president wrote: “There should be no deflections to Epstein or anything else, and any Republicans involved should be focused only on opening up our Country, and fixing the massive damage caused by the Democrats!”

      The Epstein investigation is likely to receive revived interest as the House prepares to return from recess and vote on a bill to reopen the federal government, as Mike Johnson is set to swear in representative-elect Adelita Grijalva after seven weeks of waiting. The soon-to-be Democratic lawmaker is set to be the 218th signature needed on a discharge petition, a procedural tool that would force a vote on the House floor to release the full tranche of Epstein investigation records.

      While the news of the Epstein email drop dominated the day, the House is set to vote on a funding bill to finally reopen the federal government today. Republican leaders, as well as Trump, expect the bill to pass. The extension would extend government funding at current levels through January 2026, along with three year-long provisions that will fund programs at the Department of Veterans Affairs, the USDA and the FDA, and legislative branch operations. It would also reinstate all fired workers that were let go during the shutdown and guarantee back pay for those furloughed.
      At 4pm ET, we can expect the House to reconvene after more than 50 days of recess, and for the Republican speaker, Mike Johnson, to swear in representative-elect Adelita Grijalva.Johnson has staved off the ceremony for the soon-to-be Arizona Democrat for weeks while the government shutdown continued. She’s expected to be the final, and 218th, signature needed to force a vote on the House floor for the full release of the Epstein files.Earlier, CNN reported that top Trump administration officials were planning to meet today to discuss the discharge petition that would force a vote on the House floor to release the complete Epstein files.According to CNN’s source, the planned meeting would include the US attorney general, Pam Bondi; the deputy attorney general, Todd Blanche; Kash Patel, the FBI director; and Lauren Boebert, a Republican Colorado congresswoman and a Trump loyalist who has signed on to the effort for the records to be released.In the White House briefing room, the press secretary, Karoline Leavitt, appeared to confirm the meeting, branding it as the latest example of the administration’s commitment to “transparency”.My colleague Adam Gabbatt has put together a helpful timeline of some of the most significant developments in the Epstein saga that continues to dog the administration. Starting in 2019, when Epstein was charged with federal sex-trafficking crimes, and taking us up to the batch of Epstein’s emails released today that suggest Trump knew about the late financier’s conduct.In a post on Truth Social, the president has addressed the batch of emails released by House Democrats on the oversight committee.“The Democrats are trying to bring up the Jeffrey Epstein Hoax again because they’ll do anything at all to deflect on how badly they’ve done on the Shutdown,” Trump wrote. “There should be no deflections to Epstein or anything else, and any Republicans involved should be focused only on opening up our Country, and fixing the massive damage caused by the Democrats!”Ahead of the House preparing to vote on a Senate-passed bill to reopen the government, Democrats in the lower chamber held a press conference on the steps of the Capitol.“Republicans control the House, the Senate and the presidency,” said the House minority leader, Hakeem Jeffries. “They own the mess that has been created in the United States of America.”Today’s legislation includes none of the healthcare provisions that Democrats made a centerpiece of their fight with the GOP when the government shut down. After some senators in the Democratic caucus broke ranks and voted to pass the bill, much of the party slammed their decision.Today, Jeffries offered more fighting words:
      We work for the American people as we stand on the Capitol steps, ready to continue this battle on the House floor, a battle that we waged week after week after week, and that will continue regardless of the outcome … We’ll continue to fight to stand up for the Affordable Care Act and an extension of the tax credits. We’ll continue to fight for your hospitals. We’ll continue to fight for your nursing homes.
      As the House prepares to vote on a funding bill that would end the longest government shutdown on record, the American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE) has sent a letter to lawmakers in the lower chamber urging them to pass the legislation.“Passing this bill will reopen the government and allow federal employees to return to the work of serving the American people. It will ensure safety and security for our vital transportation systems,” wrote Daniel Horowitz, legislative director of the largest union representing federal workers.The AFGE argues that Senate-passed resolution includes several provisions beneficial for civil servants affected by the shutdown. This includes ensuring back pay to furloughed workers, reinstating those terminated from their positions by wide-scale reductions in force when the government shuttered, and preventing further layoffs while the continuing resolution keeps agencies open through January.Leavitt said that she hadn’t spoken to the president about whether he believes that Andrew Mountbatten Windsor, the former prince, should sit for an interview with congressional lawmakers on the House oversight committee, after they requested his cooperation in their ongoing investigation into Jeffrey Epstein.Responding to question about the validity of the emails released by House oversight Democrats, Leavitt responded plainly. “These emails prove absolutely nothing other than the fact that President Trump did nothing wrong,” the press secretary said. “Jeffrey Epstein was a member at Mar-a-Lago until President Trump kicked him out because Jeffrey Epstein was a pedophile and he was a creep.”Leavitt repeated Republicans’ statements identifying the redacted name in the batch of emails as Virginia Giuffre. “She maintained that there was nothing inappropriate she ever witnessed, that president Trump was always extremely professional and friendly to her,” Leavitt reiterated, of the outspoken victim of Epstein’s abuse, who died by suicide earlier this year.Leavitt is spending most of her opening remarks blaming Democrats for the longest shutdown on record, as the House prepares to vote on a bill to reopen the government.“The Democrats’ weakness and their unwillingness to buck the fringe members of their party dragged this harmful shutdown on for seven weeks and inflicted massive pain on to the American public,” she said.The White House briefing has begun, and we’ll bring you the latest from Karoline Leavitt as she’ll face questions from reporters.Dominating the news of the day: a small batch of emails released by House Democrats on the oversight committee in which the disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein said that Donald Trump “spent hours” at his home in an email to Ghislaine Maxwell – the late sex offender’s accomplice.In one of the email chains in the larger tranche released by the House oversight committee, Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor (formerly known as Prince Andrew) appeared to tell Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell, “I can’t take any more of this,” in March 2011 after a newspaper said they would be running a story about the trio.In the email chain, Maxwell was initially forwarded the press inquiry from the Mail on Sunday from somebody named Mark Cohen, who told her: “FYI, following up on my email of this morning. Again, I have no intention of responding unless you direct otherwise.”After the email was forwarded from Maxwell to Epstein, and then from Epstein to somebody listed as “The Duke” on 4 March 2011, Andrew appears to respond: “What? I don’t know any of this. How are you responding?”Epstein responds: “Just got it two minutes ago. I’ve asked g [sic] lawyers to send a letter. Not sure … it’s so salcisous [sic] and ridiculous, im [sic] not sure how to respond, the only person she didn’t have sex with was Elvis.”Andrew then appears to reply to Epstein, saying:
      Please make sure that every statement or legal letter states clearly that I am NOT involved and that I knew and know NOTHING about any of these allegations. I can’t take any more of this my end. More

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      Top House Democrats vow to oppose shutdown bill over healthcare funding

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      As House Republican leaders move to hold a vote on legislation to reopen the US government, top Democrats vowed on Tuesday to oppose the bill for not addressing their demand for more healthcare funding.Democrats have for weeks insisted that any measure to fund the government include an extension of tax credits for Affordable Care Act health plans, which were created under Joe Biden and due to expire at the end of the year, sending premiums for enrollees higher.With Donald Trump’s encouragement, Congress’s Republican leaders refused, sparking a spending standoff that resulted in the longest government shutdown in US history. But the Democrats’ resolve cracked earlier this week, when a splinter group in the Senate joined with the GOP to craft a compromise bill that reauthorizes government funding through January, without extending the tax credits.The Senate passed that legislation on Monday evening, and the House of Representatives is expected to vote on it on Wednesday afternoon. The House rules committee will consider the bill on Tuesday evening, setting the stage for it to come to the House floor on Wednesday.Top House Democrats oppose it, with the minority leader, Hakeem Jeffries, calling it a “partisan Republican spending bill that continues to gut the healthcare of the American people.“It’s our expectation that the House will vote at some point tomorrow and House Democrats will strongly oppose any legislation that does not decisively address the Republican healthcare crisis,” Jeffries told CNN on Tuesday.The House’s largest ideological caucus, the centrist New Democrat Coalition, has announced its opposition to the measure.“While New Dems always seek common ground, our coalition remains united in opposition to legislation that sacrifices the wellbeing of the constituents we’re sworn to serve,” chair Brad Schneider said.“Unfortunately, the Senate-passed bill fails to address our constituents’ top priorities, doing nothing to protect their access to healthcare, lower their costs or curb the administration’s extreme agenda.”The sentiment appears much the same in the Congressional Progressive caucus, where chair Greg Casar called the measure “a betrayal of millions of Americans counting on Democrats to fight for them”.The Democratic opposition threatens to make for a tight vote for the Republican speaker, Mike Johnson, who has kept the House out of session for more than 50 days inan attempt to pressure Senate Democrats into caving to the GOP’s demands.With a 219-member majority assuming full attendance, Johnson can only afford to lose two votes on the bill, and the Kentucky representative Thomas Massie is likely to vote no.But Democrats may have their own defectors. Maine’s Jared Golden, who last week announced he would not seek another term representing a district that voted for Trump last year, was the only Democrat in September to vote for a Republican funding bill that did not extend the tax credit. Marie Gluesenkamp Perez, whose Washington state district is similarly friendly to the president, also expressed her support for that bill.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionBoth lawmakers’ offices did not immediately respond to a request for comment on how they would vote on the Senate’s compromise.The compromise bill cleared the Senate on Monday evening by 60 votes, the minimum it needed to overcome the chamber’s thresholds for advancement. All Republicans supported the measure’s passage except for Rand Paul of Kentucky, along with eight moderate members of the Democratic caucus, several of whom were recently re-elected, or serving their final terms in office.That group was composed of Jeanne Shaheen of New Hampshire, Tim Kaine of Virginia, Dick Durbin of Illinois, John Fetterman of Pennsylvania, Maggie Hassan of New Hampshire, Catherine Cortez Masto of Nevada, Jacky Rosen of Nevada and Angus King of Maine, an independent who caucuses with the party.While they did not win an extension of the tax credits, the group claimed credit for getting the Republican Senate majority leader, John Thune, to agree to hold a vote by mid-December on extending the subsidies. However, it remains to be seen if enough Republicans will support its passage, and Johnson has not agreed to put the issue to a vote in the House.Though the Senate minority leader, Chuck Schumer, did not back the bill publicly, Shaheen told Fox News on Monday that the group “kept leadership informed throughout” their talks. Progressive organizations who backed Schumer’s strategy during the shutdown have now turned on him, for allowing the compromise to come together.Indivisible announced plans to support Democratic candidates in primaries who oppose Schumer remaining as the party’s leader, and MoveOn joined in the calls for him to bow out.“It is time for Senator Schumer to step aside as minority leader to make room for those who are willing to fight fire with fire when the basic needs of working people are on the line,” MoveOn Political Action’s executive director, Katie Bethell, said. More

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      Democratic candidate for Congress criticizes deal to end shutdown – which her mother voted to advance

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      A Democratic congressional candidate who posted to social media criticism of the bipartisan deal that looks set to end the government shutdown omitted to mention that her mother was among the party’s rebel senators who voted to approve it.Stefany Shaheen, who is seeking to represent New Hampshire in the US House of Representatives, said in the post to X that she “cannot support this deal when [House] Speaker [Mike] Johnson refuses to even allow a vote to extend health care tax credits”.Jeanne Shaheen, her mother and a US senator of New Hampshire, was one of seven Democrats to break ranks with party leadership on Sunday night and vote to advance a funding bill that will end the 40-day shutdown without securing guarantees for healthcare subsidies. Those seven were joined by an independent who caucuses with Democrats.“Clearly we had different approaches here,” Stefany Shaheen said in an interview Monday, reported by the New York Times, after questions arose over her post. “I can’t speak for her. I think she did what she believes is right.”The deal, which extends government funding until 30 January, contains only the promise of a vote on a healthcare bill in the Senate next month, not an extension of tax credits for the Affordable Care Act (ACA) that helps keep premiums low, which had been a key Democratic negotiating position.The elder Shaheen, a senator since 2009, said in a statement that she stood by her decision. “This was the only deal on the table. It was our best chance to reopen the government and immediately begin negotiations to extend the ACA tax credits,” she said.The post by her daughter condemning the deal but leaving out her mother’s involvement drew a swift and predictable backlash on social media, mediaite.com reported.“Your mom just ruined your career,” one user on X posted, while another said: “We don’t vote for the children of traitors”.In her post, Stefany Shaheen, a mother of four children whose campaign biography describes her as a “passionate advocate for groundbreaking medical research and a successful entrepreneur and business leader”, said improving healthcare was “the cause of my life”.In a section of her website about why she is running for Congress during the 2026 midterm elections, Shaheen wrote that she knew “it’s not enough to just get mad” when Donald Trump is “crushing medical research, and Republicans [are] slashing Medicaid, and healthcare for kids, seniors, and veterans – all to give big tax breaks to billionaires and corporations”.According to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, about 15 million people will lose healthcare by 2034 because of Medicaid and ACA marketplace cuts pushed through by Republicans; an additional 4.2 million people will lose marketplace cover if premium tax credits are not extended, one possible consequence of the vote by Shaheen’s mother and the other Democratic rebel senators.Jeanne Shaheen and another Democrat who voted yes, Dick Durbin of Illinois, have already announced they will be retiring instead of fighting for re-election next year. None of the other five, Catherine Cortez Masto (Nevada), John Fetterman (Pennsylvania), Margaret Wood Hassan (New Hampshire), Tim Kaine (Virginia), and Jacky Rosen (Nevada), must face voters until November 2028.Angus King (Maine) also voted yes as an independent who caucuses with the Democrats. More

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      Ghislaine Maxwell eyeing commutation, whistleblower tells House Democrats

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      Ghislaine Maxwell, Jeffrey Epstein’s longtime associate and co-conspirator who is serving a 20-year prison sentence for sex-trafficking crimes, is reportedly preparing a “commutation application” for the Trump administration to review, according to new allegations from a whistleblower shared with House Democrats.Democrats on the House judiciary committee announced on Monday that they had received information from a whistleblower that indicates that the British former socialite, 63, is working on filing a commutation application. They also said Maxwell had been receiving special treatment at federal prison camp Bryan in Texas – the minimum-security facility she was transferred to earlier this year.Congressman Jamie Raskin, the ranking member and top Democrat on the House judiciary committee, stated in a news release that the prison’s warden was also “helping” Maxwell “copy, print, and send documents” to support her bid for clemency.The exact content of this “commutation application” was unclear, Raskin added.Raskin states that according to the whistleblower, Maxwell has been receiving “customized” meals that are “personally delivered” to her cell, and that the warden has “personally arranged” private meetings for Maxwell and her visitors. The visits allegedly include providing a “special cordoned-off area” for visitors to arrive, as well as “an assortment of snacks and refreshments for her guests”.Maxwell’s visitors were also reportedly permitted to bring computers, which, Raskin described in the news release as an “unprecedented action by the Warden given the security risk and potential for Ms Maxwell to use a computer to conduct unmonitored communications with the outside world”.In one alleged instance, the whistleblower said that when phone lines went down for other inmates, Maxwell was given specific instructions about who she should tell her contacts to call and how those personnel would then connect to relay the call to Maxwell.The whistleblower further reportedly told the House Democrats that when Maxwell wanted to review and edit documents “quickly”, she “essentially used” the warden as her “personal secretary and administrative assistant”. The news release states that Maxwell’s correspondents would email documents directly to the warden, who would provide them to Maxwell, “who would review and edit them and provide them back to the Warden to scan and provide to the original sender”.Other privileges allegedly granted to Maxwell also include time to “play with” a service dog – a perk that the news release states is not “ordinarily allowed” –   as well as private after-hours access to the prison exercise area.Maxwell’s attorney did not immediately respond to a request for comment from the Guardian regarding the whistleblower’s claims.In a statement to the Guardian, Abigail Jackson, a spokesperson for the White House, said that “the White House does not comment on potential clemency requests”.“As President Trump has stated, pardoning Ghislaine Maxwell is not something he has thought about,” Jackson added.Over the weekend, reports surfaced that Maxwell told friends and family in emails from prison that she was “much happier” at the Texas facility than her previous prison.In August, Maxwell was moved from a low-security prison in Tallahassee, Florida, to the minimum-security camp in Texas, where most of the inmates are serving time for non-violent offenses and white-collar crimes. The transfer, which experts described as “unprecedented”, occurred just days after she was interviewed about the Epstein case by the deputy attorney general, Todd Blanche – who also previously served as Donald Trump’s personal lawyer.That interview came as the Trump administration was facing mounting pressure to release more documents related to the Epstein investigation and amid intense speculation around the president’s own personal ties to the disgraced financier and convicted sex offender, who was found dead in a New York jail in 2019 while awaiting prosecution on sex-trafficking charges.In the news release on Monday, Raskin also announced that he had sent a letter to Trump demanding answers about the whistleblower’s allegations, and also called on the president to reject Maxwell’s commutation request.“You should not grant any form of clemency to this convicted and unrepentant sex offender,” Raskin wrote in the letter. “Your Administration should not be providing her with room service, with puppies to play with, with federal law enforcement officials waiting on her every need, or with any special treatment or institutional privilege at all.”Raskin requested that Blanche appear for a public congressional hearing to discuss the revelations and also posed three questions to Trump.Raskin asked whether Trump had discussed a potential commutation, or any form of presidential clemency, for Maxwell with Blanche or others; whether he had directed Blanche or anyone else in the administration to provide Maxwell with the transfer to the prison camp, or to give her favorable and preferential treatment in prison; and lastly whether Maxwell, her attorneys, family or representatives have made any promises to Trump or his attorneys.Raskin has asked for a response to the questions by 24 November.In another statement on Monday, Democratic representative Robert Garcia, the ranking member of the committee on oversight and government reform, called on Republican House speaker Mike Johnson and Republican representative James Comer, who chairs the oversight committee, to “publicly oppose a commutation or pardon by President Trump.“Ghislaine Maxwell is a convicted sex offender who helped Jeffrey Epstein commit atrocities and rape against women and girls for decades,” Garcia said. “For months, we have been warning the American people that Trump’s Department of Justice is providing her with unprecedented benefits as a prisoner, including moving her to a less restrictive facility.“Thanks to brave whistleblowers and our partners on the judiciary committee, we have more evidence that Maxwell is seeking a pardon or commutation,” he added.In October, the US supreme court declined to hear an appeal from Maxwell on her sex-trafficking conviction. More

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      In New York, Zohran Mamdani showed how it’s done: ‘identity politics’ can win elections | Nesrine Malik

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      It is inevitable that too much will be laid on Zohran Mamdani’s head. So large is the vacuum on the left of politics that his victory will occupy an outsized space for progressives beyond New York City. And so, before I lay too much on his head myself, some caveats. New York is a specific place. It has a specific demographic and economic profile. And Mamdani is a man of a specific background, racial, political and religious. But with that out of the way, I think the successful practice of “identity politics” during his campaign offers some universal lessons.I put identity politics in quote marks because the term now means little that is universally agreed upon. Broadly, it has come to mean something derogatory, kind of in the same way that “wokeness” has. It increasingly has negative connotations: a political appeal to race or other markers of identity that is shallow, rooted in perpetual victimhood, focused only on representation and disconnected from material reality. Seen this way, identity politics is not about universal goals, such as lifting people out of poverty and so mobilising broad coalitions of voters, but simply about visibility.But identity politics as an organising political force has its origins in precisely the opposite idea. Coined by the Black feminist socialist organisation the Combahee River Collective in 1977, identity politics was defined as a path to a liberation that could only come about through the understanding that systems oppress many different people along the lines of their identity, and so could only be dismantled if all groups worked together. “We believe,” the collective declared, “that the most profound and potentially most radical politics come directly out of our own identity”, but that “we also often find it difficult to separate race from class from sex oppression because in our lives they are most often experienced simultaneously.”That “simultaneous experience” is what I am talking about here. Mamdani tapped into that. He rooted his campaign solidly in the experience of being a New Yorker, and how the city needed to be made more affordable, then expanded that to include all the ways in which different groups live that experience. He released campaigning videos in Urdu, Hindi, Spanish and Arabic, and consistently made all of them about a retail economic message: rent freezes, free buses, universal childcare, making New York a place to raise your children and build small businesses. Then he threw in a bespoke little twist. In his Arabic message he quipped that something more controversial than his political message is his belief that the knafeh, an Arab dessert, is better on Steinway Street in Queens than it is in New Jersey. Talk about hitting a sweet spot.Including the languages of underrepresented identities is an exercise in enfranchisement. He quoted the Arabic phrase ana minkum wa alaikum – “I am of you and for you” – in his victory speech, and named those “forgotten by the politics of our city”, the “Yemeni bodega owners and Mexican abuelas. Senegalese taxi drivers and Uzbek nurses. Trinidadian line cooks and Ethiopian aunties”.He combined that with being in the places that working-class people, many of whom are people of colour, occupy. Visiting those on the taxi ranks and working the late-night shifts, he forged a powerful metaphor of a city that is kept going by those who labour in the dark. And he drew that all together by bringing his own identity, as he himself put it, “into the light”. A Muslim who grew up in the shadows of Islamophobia, he suffered an outrageously racist campaign against him, but resisted the pressure to play down his identity in order to fit in, to succeed. “No longer will I live in the shadows,” he said.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionThose shadows are vast and, in this moment, encompass not only Mamdani, but huge swathes of people across all identities living under a regime of fear, economic struggle, deportations, suffocation of freedom of speech and an entire political establishment that has made bullying and cruelty its modus operandi. The coalition that Mamdani built, across all ethnicities, became about closing the yawning gap between people and power. In a revealing contrast to establishment Democrat politicians, when Mamdani was heckled last week over his position on Gaza, he did not say, as Kamala Harris did when she was heckled, “I’m speaking”. Mamdani smiled and said: “I want you to be able to afford this city too, my brother.”But there is something else about Mamdani’s approach that reveals how identity done right is generative. His is a politics that is forged and defined by being on the margins, but not as a single individual who wants to escape alone. Those who see their identity as a way to become part of an establishment that can then hold them up as exemplars of inclusive politics will always have limited appeal, and therefore limited success as changemakers. To see those margins, racial, economic and political, as spaces in which a majority can be mobilised, as spaces where people don’t want to hear about victimhood but justice, is to create coalitions and escape together. It is to reveal to the voting public that the problem is not particular racisms or prejudices, but an entire system that excludes all those who don’t have capital in all its forms.That message resonates with the college-educated white parents who are struggling with childcare costs, as well as the immigrant taxi driver struggling to pay rent. But above all, ironically, Mamdani exemplified the virtues of the American “melting pot”, a nation of immigrants at the sharp end of capitalism who together increasingly recognise all the ways in which the country is failing to live up to its ideals. All the ways in which Mamdani has been fought, not only by the right but by his own party, prove that American liberal politics has long lost its way in its service to capital and its preening approach to identity. What works in New York doesn’t necessarily map perfectly on to the rest of the US and beyond, but Mamdani’s win is a reminder that the people, whatever their identities, all want one thing – leaders who are of them, and for them.

      Nesrine Malik is a Guardian columnist More

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      in US Politics

      Senate advances funding bill to end longest US government shutdown in history

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      The Senate on Sunday made significant progress towards ending the longest US government shutdown in history, narrowly advancing a compromise bill to reauthorize funding and undo the layoffs of some employees.But the measure, which resulted from days of talks between a handful of Democratic and Republican senators, leaves out the healthcare subsidies that Democrats had demanded for weeks. Most Democratic senators rejected it, as did many of the party’s lawmakers in the House of Representatives, which will have to vote to approve it before the government can reopen.“This healthcare crisis is so severe, so urgent, so devastating for families back home, that I cannot in good faith support this [resolution] that fails to address the healthcare crisis,” said Democratic Senator majority leader Chuck Schumer.The bill received exactly the 60 votes needed to advance in the Senate, with almost all Republicans voting in favor along with eight Democrats, many of whom are moderates or serving their final terms.“Republicans control the White House, the Senate and the House, and they made clear over a period of weeks, including just this week, that this was as far as they would go as part of the shutdown talks,” said New Hampshire’s Jeanne Shaheen, a member of the group who is retiring after next year.“This was the only deal on the table.”In the 40 days since the shutdown began when the government’s funding authorization expired on 1 October, the Senate’s Republican leader John Thune held 14 votes on a bill approved on a near party line vote by the Republican-controlled House of Representatives, which would have extended funding through most of November.But no more than three Democrats ever voted in the affirmative, denying it the support it needed to proceed. The minority party demanded that any funding legislation also extend tax credits that lower premiums for Affordable Care Act health plans, which were created under Joe Biden and expire at the end of the year.Thune maintained that he would be willing to negotiate over those subsidies, but only once the government was reopened.“After 40 long days, I’m hopeful we can bring this shutdown to the end,” he said shortly before the vote was held on Sunday evening.“From the precarious situation we’re in with air travel to the fact that our staff have been working without pay for a full 40 days now, all of us, Republicans and Democrats who support this bill know that the time to act is now.”The compromise legislation authorizes government funding through 30 January 2026 and undoes the firings of federal workers that the White House carried out after the shutdown began. It also guarantees retroactive pay for furloughed federal workers and those who stayed on the job during the shutdown, and prevents further layoffs through January. Included in the compromise are three appropriations bill that will authorize spending through the 2026 fiscal year for the departments of agriculture and veterans affairs, among others.The compromise does not resolved the issue of the Affordable Care Act premiums, which one study forecast would jump by an average of 26% if the tax credits were allowed to expire.As part of the deal, Thune said he would allow a vote on a bill to deal with the credits by the second week of December. But even if it succeeds, Republican House speaker Mike Johnson has said he will not put such a measure on the floor.The compromise bill will now need to be approved by the House and signed by Donald Trump, which may take days. After advancing the legislation, the Senate adjourned until Monday morning, leaving the timing of further voting on the matter up in the air.Johnson has kept the House out of session since 19 September, in a bid to force Senate Democrats to vote for the GOP spending bill. Shortly after the Senate’s procedural vote on the compromise succeeded, the House told lawmakers to expect votes this week.But all signs point to a stormy reception for the bill in the chamber, particularly among Democrats.“America is far too expensive. We will not support spending legislation advanced by Senate Republicans that fails to extend the Affordable Care Act tax credits,” Democratic House minority leader Hakeem Jeffries said. We will fight the GOP bill in the House of Representatives, where Mike Johnson will be compelled to end the seven-week Republican taxpayer-funded vacation.”Greg Casar, chair of the congressional Progressive Caucus, said: “A deal that doesn’t reduce health care costs is a betrayal of millions of Americans counting on Democrats to fight for them. Republicans want health care cuts. Accepting nothing but a pinky promise from Republicans isn’t a compromise – it’s capitulation.”Just before the Senate voted, Democratic congressman Ro Khanna called for Schumer to “be replaced”, saying he was “no longer effective”. “If you can’t lead the fight to stop healthcare premiums from skyrocketing for Americans, what will you fight for?”Relegated to the minority in both chambers of Congress by voters after last year’s elections, Democrats seized on the lapse in government funding to make a stand on healthcare, long a signature issue of the party.In the more than five weeks that followed, polls showed the public believe the GOP was more to blame for the shutdown than the Democrats, and last Tuesday, the party swept off-year elections, in what Democratic leaders called a validation of their strategy in the funding fight.The weeks of unfunded government have taken a toll across the United States. More than 700,000 federal workers were furloughed, and hundreds of thousands more made to work without pay, leading to increasingly long lines at food banks and other social services nationwide as the missed paychecks piled up.At the start of November, the Trump administration moved to pause payments from the federal government’s largest food aid program for the first time ever, prompting an ongoing court fight.Transportation secretary Sean Duffy last week ordered a nationwide reduction in commercial air travel, saying air traffic controllers were facing unprecedented strain. More than 2,500 flights were canceled on Sunday, and Duffy said capacity would be slashed further on Tuesday if funding was not restored. More