Elon Musk

Subterms

    More stories

    • 125 Shares129 Views

      in US Politics

      Jeff Bezos, Mark Zuckerberg and other business leaders congratulate Trump

      by

      Business leaders were swift to offer their congratulations to Donald Trump on his election victory, less than four years after they criticized him for his role in the January 6 insurrection.Some of tech’s business leaders, including Amazon’s Jeff Bezos, Meta’s Mark Zuckerberg and Apple’s Tim Cook all publicly congratulated Trump for his win.“Big congratulations to our 45th and now 47th President on an extraordinary political comeback and decisive victory,” Bezos said in a statement. “No nation has bigger opportunities.”“Congratulations to President Trump on a decisive victory. We have great opportunities ahead of us as a country,” Zuckerberg wrote on Threads. “Looking forward to working with you and your administration.”“Congratulations President Trump on your victory! We look forward to engaging with you and your administration,” Cook wrote on Twitter/X.The influential Business Roundtable, a powerful lobbying group with more than 200 members, who are the chief executives of companies such as JPMorgan, Walmart, Google and Pepsi, said in a statement: “Business Roundtable congratulates President-elect Donald Trump on his election as the 47th President of the United States.”“We look forward to working with the incoming Trump Administration and all federal and state policymakers,” the group said.Billionaire Mark Cuban, who endorsed Kamala Harris, was one of the first to congratulate Trump just after 1am ET.“Congrats @realDonaldTrump. You won fair and square,” Cuban wrote. “Congrats to @elonmusk as well.”Elon Musk, Trump’s highest-profile business backer, celebrated with a post on X declaring victory for himself. “It is morning in America again,” he wrote. Trump has floated giving Musk an influential role in his administration.The reaction presents a stark contrast to how the leaders responded to Trump after the 2020 election. Cook had called the insurrection “a shameful chapter in our nation’s history”, while Zuckerberg said: “I believe the former president should be responsible for his words.”Bezos, meanwhile, had congratulated Joe Biden for his victory four years ago with a post. “Unity, empathy and decency are not characteristics of a bygone era,” he said on Instagram, posting a picture of Biden and Kamala Harris.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionIt’s something of an about-face that was seen leading up to the election. Trump had started to brag that executives such as Google’s Sundar Pichai and Zuckerberg were calling him, seemingly trying to rebuild relationships that had been strained during Biden’s presidency.Bezos has had a particularly fraught relationship with Trump. But in October the Bezos-owned Washington Post chose not to endorse any candidate in the US presidential election. The Post had planned to endorse the vice-president.While coalitions of former executives had endorsed Harris, and said that many CEOs were probably going to vote in support of her, the business community appears poised to transition to a second Trump term. By Wednesday afternoon, US stock markets were soaring on news of Trump’s victory.Read more of the Guardian’s 2024 US election coverage

      How to watch Kamala Harris’s concession speech

      Trump wins the presidency – how did it happen?

      With Trump re-elected, this is what’s at stake

      Tracking abortion ballot measures More

    • 238 Shares139 Views

      in US Politics

      The Guardian view on the return of President Trump: a bleak day for America and the world | Editorial

      by

      This is an exceptionally bleak and frightening moment for the United States and the world. Donald Trump swept the electoral college and is on course to take the popular vote – giving him not merely a victory, but a mandate. If many voters gambled on him in 2016, they doubled down this time. Presented with a choice between electing the first black, female president on a promise of a sunnier future, and a racist, misogynist, twice-impeached convicted felon hawking hatred and retribution, they picked Mr Trump.The stark divide between two Americas persists. But polls did not predict the scale of this victory. Only one president has previously won two non-consecutive terms. In 2021, Mr Trump seemed briefly to have lost his own party. Now he has increased his vote share across the country and multiple groups of voters. This – even more than the two assassination attempts en route – will convince him of his invincibility.No party has kept the White House when so many voters have felt the US is going in the wrong direction. As vice-president, Kamala Harris was shadowed by incumbency when electors wanted change. Under Joe Biden, the US economy had a remarkable recovery. But it didn’t feel that way, and people voted accordingly. Mr Trump positioned himself as the change candidate.Ms Harris ran a polished but truncated campaign: Mr Biden’s refusal to pass the torch sooner looks all the worse today. Yet the Democrats need to look deeper. Despite the stakes, many Democratic voters failed to turn out. There is a gender gap, but 52% of white women still voted for Mr Trump. Latino men, in particular, moved towards him: the racial divide remains stark, but may be closing somewhat while the educational gap expands. Many voters relish Mr Trump’s willingness to break the system, because they feel it is already broken for them.Prejudice encouraged voters to see Mr Trump as a more effective leader than Ms Harris, along with a wrongful conflation of authoritarianism and strength. Many of his voters prioritised the economy. But they still knew they were picking a would-be autocrat who has vowed mass deportations and retribution against political opponents and journalists; who was described by his former top military commander as “fascist to the core”; who tried to overturn the will of the people in 2020 and sparked an armed insurrection.We are not going back. But what lies ahead looks worse. His fact-light, erratic, nakedly transactional approach won’t change. This time he has control of the Senate and very possibly the House of Representatives; a blank cheque from the supreme court; and a renewed faith in his supremacy and in pandering to voters’ basest instincts. There will be few “adults” to restrain him. His victory address offered a vision of a court rather than a cabinet, with Elon Musk as a new American oligarch. He tactically repudiated the Project 2025 roadmap, but expect his supporters to pursue their programme.Expect, too, the rollback of LGBTQ+ rights and the pardoning of the January 6 rioters. He does not need to fulfil every promise to do more than enough. Easily avoidable diseases could run rampant without an actual ban on vaccines. He does not have to deport millions to destroy families and foment racial hatred. Tariffs threaten trade war and higher prices at home.Ukraine faces being strong-armed into a bad deal with Vladimir Putin. In Israel, Benjamin Netanyahu, who just sacked his defence minister and rival, Yoav Gallant, will be celebrating. Across the world, the far right is emboldened; US allies are rightly anxious. Mr Trump’s pledge to withdraw from climate accords and bolster fossil fuels would end all hope of keeping global heating to below 1.5C, experts believe.An already treacherous world is becoming more so. For many in the US and beyond, the overwhelming emotion today will be despair. But the decision must be to recommit to defending democracy and all of those imperilled by Mr Trump’s return.

      Do you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a response of up to 300 words by email to be considered for publication in our letters section, please click here. More

    • 113 Shares139 Views

      in US Politics

      Trump and Musk-fueled falsehoods and threats backdrop US election

      by

      Americans went to the polls on Tuesday against a backdrop of misinformation – much of it suspected of originating in Russia – as the FBI warned of fake videos and non-credible threats of terrorism aimed at disrupting the US presidential election and discouraging voting.These tensions were stoked by Donald Trump supporters, and the former US president himself. Elon Musk, the world’s richest man and Trump’s most vocal surrogate, tweeted a video of support that appeared to reference the far-right QAnon ideology.The video, showing footage of the January 6 insurrection and featuring Van Halen’s song Jump as a soundtrack, came after an earlier social media post from the entrepreneur that repeated elements of the debunked Pizzagate conspiracy from the 2016 presidential election.“The hammer of justice is coming,” read that earlier post.The flood of untruths was fed by Trump on Tuesday as he falsely claimed he had a “big lead” in opinion polls while casting doubt on the reliability of voting machines. Having already baselessly claimed that there was Democratic “cheating” in Pennsylvania, the Republican nominee said it was “an outrage” that it took so long to count votes in swing states.The former president also took liberties with the truth in an early election day video on his Truth Social platform. In an apparent reference to transgender boxers, the video featured Trump complaining that “men could beat up women and win medals” – a supposed example of how American values had collapsed under Joe Biden’s presidency, which the Republican has tied to his Democratic opponent, Kamala Harris.The disinformation and false statements from the Trump campaign came as voting in one key battleground state, Georgia, already faced disruption following what appeared to fake bomb threats against at least two polling stations.The threats were made against polling stations at Etris Community Center and Gullatt elementary school in Union City, on the outskirts of Atlanta, according to Fulton county police. Union City’s population is nearly 90% Black, according to the US Census Bureau, fuelling suspicions that the threats were aimed at disrupting a cohort expected to mainly vote for Harris.Brad Raffensperger, Georgia’s Republican secretary of state, told journalists that the “non-credible” threats came from Russia.“We identified the source, and it was from Russia,” he said, saying he believed that the source had been a Russian troll farm.“They’re up to mischief, it seems, and they don’t want us to have a smooth, fair and accurate election,” he added. “Anything that can get us to fight amongst ourselves – they can count that as a victory.”The bomb threats followed a warning from the Office of the Director of National Intelligence [ODNI] on Monday that Russia, Iran and China were involved in efforts at election disruption but that Russia was “the most active threat”.“Influence actors linked to Russia in particular are manufacturing videos and creating fake articles to undermine the legitimacy of the election, instill fear in voters regarding the election process, and suggest Americans are using violence against each other due to political preferences, judging from information available to the IC [intelligence community],” an ODNI statement said.“These efforts risk inciting violence, including against election officials. We anticipate Russian actors will release additional manufactured content with these themes through election day and in the days and weeks after polls close.”In line with that statement, the FBI on Tuesday dismissed a video – made to look like a news clip and purporting to emanate from the bureau – advising Americans to “vote remotely” due to a “high terror threat” at poling stations.“This video is not authentic and does not accurately represent the current threat posture or polling location safety,” the bureau said.It also disavowed a separate video falsely depicting a political rigging voting among prison inmates.In a statement, the FBI said there were “two instances of its name and insignia being misused in promoting false narratives surrounding the election,” USA Today reported.The second video features a fake FBI press release alleging that officials at five prisons in Pennsylvania, Georgia and Arizona rigged voting among inmates and conspired with a political party. “This video is also not authentic, and its contents are false,” the FBI said.Read more of the Guardian’s 2024 US election coverage

      When do polls close?

      When will we know the result?

      Where is abortion on the ballot?

      Senate and House races to watch

      How the electoral college works

      Everything you need to know More

    • 150 Shares199 Views

      in US Politics

      Musk-linked Pac accused of targeting Jewish and Arab Americans in swing states

      by

      A political action committee (Pac) linked to Elon Musk is accused of targeting Jewish and Arab American voters in swing states with dramatically different messages about Kamala Harris’s position on Gaza, a strategy by Trump allies aimed at peeling off Democratic support for the vice-president.Texts, mailers, social media ads and billboards targeting heavily Arab American areas in metro Detroit paint Harris as a staunch ally of Israel who will continue supplying arms to the country. Meanwhile, residents in metro Detroit or areas of Pennsylvania with higher Jewish populations have been receiving messaging that underscores her alleged support for the Palestinian cause.Those aimed at Arab American populations claim Harris will “ALWAYS stand with Israel” and “stand up against Hamas and radical terrorists in Gaza”. Another notes that she has a Jewish husband, and describes the pair as “America’s pro-Israel power couple”.

      Don’t miss important US election coverage. Get our free app and sign up for election alerts
      Meanwhile, texts and mailers sent to heavily Jewish areas claim “two faced Kamala stands with Palestine”, picturing her in front of a Palestinian flag. A Pennsylvania ad asked: “Why did Kamala Harris support denying Israel the weapons needed to defeat the Hamas terrorists who massacred thousands? And why did Harris show sympathy for college protesters who are rabidly antisemitic?”The different ads, produced by the Future Coalition Pac, can be viewed in Google’s ad transparency center.“They are stirring up and trying to create trouble,” Mark Brewer, a Michigan elections attorney and former head of the state’s Democratic party, told the Guardian. Messages depicting Harris as pro-Israel or having a Jewish husband in Michigan “are not designed to help her – they’re designed to hurt her”.Metro Detroit has the largest Arab American population in the US per capita, until this election a solidly Democratic voting bloc that helped boost the party in the divided swing state. But the Trump campaign has made inroads with the groups as frustration mounts over the Biden administration’s support for Israel in its bombardments of Gaza and Lebanon.Another Musk Pac is separately facing legal action and backlash for mistreating canvassers, including failing to pay them.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionMany mailers and billboards are from Future Coalition, which was established in July. In its Federal Election Commission (FEC) paperwork, the Pac claims its ads are in support of Harris, despite the fact that those in Michigan clearly aim to sabotage her. The only funding it recorded was a $3m contribution from the Musk-funded Building America’s Future non-profit.One billboard from the group in a heavily Arab American Michigan area is more open about its aims: it states that the Democratic US Senate candidate Elissa Slotkin, who is Jewish and in a tight race with her GOP counterpart, is “more focused on arming Israel than helping your family”.But some people in Arab American areas around Detroit report receiving up to five text messages a day from unidentified senders touting Harris’s alleged support for Israel. The FEC does not require organizations sending political texts to identify themselves, Brewer said, which he called “a real problem and a big loophole”. The FEC in 2002 ruled that identification in text messages was not required in part because the messages of character limits on the messages.The same Pac is producing purportedly pro-Harris ads targeting Pennsylvania on issues unrelated to Gaza, one of which reads: “Imagine a world where the American Dream has no borders,” and features a photo of migrants at the US border. More

    • 175 Shares169 Views

      in US Politics

      Which celebrities have endorsed Kamala Harris and Donald Trump? Here are the biggest names

      by

      It is debatable what effect celebrity endorsements have on voters, but candidates always welcome them. Here are the highly contrasting groups of A-listers who have endorsed Kamala Harris and Donald Trump:Kamala HarrisBeyoncéView image in fullscreenThe music megastar spoke at a Harris rally in her hometown of Houston just days ago. To the 30,000-strong crowd, Beyoncé said: “I’m not here as a celebrity, I’m not here as a politician. I’m here as a mother … Imagine our daughters growing up seeing what’s possible with no ceilings, no limitations. …We must vote, and we need you.”Taylor SwiftView image in fullscreenThe pop phenom endorsed the Democratic nominee just minutes after the presidential debate in September between Harris and Trump. In an Instagram post published to her 283 million followers, Swift said: “I will be casting my vote for Kamala Harris and Tim Walz in the 2024 presidential election … I think she is a steady-handed, gifted leader and I believe we can accomplish so much more in this country if we are led by calm and not chaos.”Bruce SpringsteenView image in fullscreenAt a Harris rally last month in Philadelphia, “the Boss” performed his 1978 The Promised Land and said: “Now, I understand folks have different opinions about things, but this election is about a group of folks who want to fundamentally undermine our American way of life … On November 5, I’m casting my vote for Kamala Harris and Tim Walz – and I urge all of you who believe in the American dream to join me.”Stevie WonderView image in fullscreenThe legendary singer endorsed Harris at the Democratic national convention (DNC), saying: “This is a moment to tell your children where you were and what you did. … When we stand between history’s pain and tomorrow’s promises, we must choose courage over complacency.” The 74-year old also appeared in a Harris ad alongside filmdirector Spike Lee.Willie NelsonView image in fullscreenCountry-music original “outlaw” Nelson, 91, performed at Harris’s Houston rally where Beyoncé spoke. Wearing a colorful Harris-Walz shirt, Nelson rallied the crowd with: “Are we ready to say Madame President?”Oprah WinfreyView image in fullscreenThe billionaire multimedia executive and former talkshow host was a star of the DNC. Winfrey, who previously endorsed Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton and Joe Biden, swooped in, saying: “Soon, and very soon, we’re going to be teaching our daughters and sons about how this child of an Indian mother and a Jamaican father, two idealistic, energetic immigrants … grew up to become the 47th president of the United States.”Julia RobertsView image in fullscreenIn a new ad last month, the enduring Hollywood A-lister urged the spouses of male supporters of Donald Trump to vote for Harris, saying: “In the one place in America where women still have a right to choose, you can vote any way you want and no one will ever know … Remember, what happens in the booth, stays in the booth. Vote Harris-Walz.” Kerry WashingtonView image in fullscreenWashington once played the White House communications director on the ABC TV show Scandal. She campaigned for Harris last month in Wisconsin. “You here in Wisconsin have the capacity to save the soul of this country, to really stand between us and a man who has said that he wants to be a dictator on day one, to stand between us and a man who said he wants generals more like Hitler’s generals,” Washington said to a gathering of Black women.Julia Louis-DreyfusView image in fullscreenThe Veep star endorsed Harris by making a distinction between her fictional vice-presidential character, Selina Meyer, and Harris. Dreyfus said to MSNBC: “Now, I do want to say one thing about the character I play on Veep… I play a very, shall we say, almost narcissistic, sociopathic, mega-maniacal type of person … I am not a Kamala Harris type. I am possibly much more like someone from the other party whose name I shall not even utter.”Jennifer LopezView image in fullscreenJennifer Lopez took to the rally stage in Las Vegas on Thursday to endorse Harris. In a 13-minute speech, Lopez, who is Puerto Rican, railed against comedian Tony Hinchcliffe’s racist remarks about Puerto Rico at Trump’s Madison Square Garden rally last weekend in New York. She said: “It wasn’t just Puerto Ricans that were offended that day, it was every Latino in this country, it was humanity and anyone of decent character … There is no candidate in the history of the presidency that is more qualified and there is no job that Kamala Harris can’t do.”EminemView image in fullscreenThe Detroit rapper and longtime critic of Donald Trump told a Harris rally in his home town: “I don’t think anyone wants an America where people are worried about retribution, of what people will do if you make your opinion known. I think Vice-President Harris supports a future for this country where these freedoms and many others will be protected and upheld.”Megan Thee StallionView image in fullscreenAn early endorser, the rapper spoke in Atlantain July, saying: “I want to start off by saying: hotties for Harris.” Performing a compilation of hit songs, the 29-year-old singer said: “We about to make history with the first female president, the first Black female president.”Bad BunnyView image in fullscreenThe Puerto Rican music star leapt onto Instagram straight after Hinchcliffe’s racist remarks.He posted about Harris criticizing Trump over his handling of relief efforts after Hurricanes Irma and Maria that devastated the island territory in 2017, where she said: “I will never forget what Donald Trump did and what he did not do when Puerto Rico needed a caring and a competent leader.”Samuel L JacksonView image in fullscreenAddressing a rally of more than 20,000 people in Atlanta last month, the Hollywood A-lister said that Harris is “running on a proven track record of fighting for the people, standing up to bullies, protecting the most vulnerable and taking on the toughest fights… That’s the kind of president I can stand behind.”Magic JohnsonView image in fullscreenThe former basketball star rallied for Harris in Flint, Michigan, saying: “I’m here because I’ve known Kamala for over 20 years. Cookie [his wife] and I supported her run for attorney general back in the state of California, her run for senator, and now we support her as the vice-president but now the biggest moment for all of us, November 5, we have to do all we can to elect Kamala Harris as the next president of the United States.”UsherView image in fullscreenThe rapper said in Atlanta that he is endorsing Harris “because she fights for everyone’s rights, for freedom, and it doesn’t matter where you [are] from … She has a vision for our country that includes everyone, a vision that supports small businesses, invests in our health, in our communities, and gives everyone a chance to get ahead.”LizzoView image in fullscreenAnother Detroit native, the music star joined Harris there last month, jabbing at Trump’s comment that if Harris wins, the “whole country will end up being like Detroit”. Lizzo fired back: “Proud like Detroit; resilient like Detroit. We’re talking about the same Detroit that innovated the auto industry and the music industry, so put some respect on Detroit’s name.”Tyler PerryView image in fullscreenThe producer and actor endorsed Harris in Atlanta, Georgia last month, saying: “I stand here, full-throated, with my full chest, begging you, imploring you: let’s get out and make Kamala Harris the 47th president of the United States.” Perry also spoke of the exonerated Central Park Five men whom Donald Trump once urged to be executed, saying: “I’ve watched him, from the Central Park Five to Project 2025 … and what I realized is that in this Donald Trump America, there is no dream that looks like me.”Arnold SchwarzeneggerView image in fullscreenThe Terminator actor and former Republican governor of California endorsed Harris just days ago, saying: “I will always be an American before I am a Republican.” He said that if Trump wins, “it will just be four more years of bullshit with no results that makes us angrier and angrier, more divided, and more hateful”.LeBron JamesView image in fullscreenThe four-time NBA champion endorsed Kamala Harris just days ago by posting a video showing racist, anti-Hispanic comments made by both Trump and Hinchcliffe. In his caption, the Los Angeles Laker wrote: “What are we even talking about here?? When I think about my kids and my family and how they will grow up, the choice is clear to me. VOTE KAMALA HARRIS!!!”Cardi BView image in fullscreenCardi B, who previously defended Harris from political misogyny, spoke at her rally in Milwaukee on Friday. She revealed that she wasn’t going to vote – until Harris leapt in. “She changed my mind completely. I did not have faith in any candidate until she joined the race,” she said, adding of her own story: “Just like Kamala Harris, I too have been the underdog. I’ve been underestimated, my success belittled and discredited…Women have to work 10 times harder, perform 10 times better, and still, people question us, how we got to the top.” She called Trump a business “hustler” who doesn’t “believe women deserve rights.”Donald TrumpHulk HoganView image in fullscreenThe former wrestler who once endorsed Barack Obama has thrown his support behind Trump. Hogan told the Republican national convention that “as an entertainer”, he tried to stay detached from politics but he could “no longer stay silent” due to “everything that’s happened to our country over the past four years”, adding: “We never had it better than the Trump years.”Elon MuskView image in fullscreenThe world’s richest man has been something of an “October surprise”, jumping up and down at Trump rallies and, allegedly illegally, handing out $1m checks to supporters. The owner of X, Tesla and SpaceX is donating $75m to America Pac, his pro-Trump political action committee. At one rally, Musk said: “I’m dark, gothic Maga” – Trump’s Make America Great Again slogan.Kid RockView image in fullscreenIn an interview with Rolling Stone in May, the singer expressed his support for Trump, saying: “You think I like Trump because he’s a nice guy? … I’m not electing the deacon of a church. That motherfucker likes to win. He likes to cheat in his fucking golf game. I want that guy on my team. I want the guy who goes: “I’m going to fight with you.”YeView image in fullscreenIn February, Ye, formerly known as Kanye West, who visited Trump in the Oval Office during his presidency, was asked by paparazzi whether he still supports Trump. The rapper, who endorsed Trump in 2016, said: “Yeah, of course, it’s Trump all day.”Jon VoightView image in fullscreenThe 85-year-old actor, who was awarded the National Medal of Arts in 2019 by Trump, has long expressed his support for the former president. “I’ve been the most outspoken supporter of Donald Trump in Hollywood,” Voight said in an interview with Variety in July. “I’ve been saying he’s the answer, the only answer,.”Mel GibsonView image in fullscreenLast month, the Braveheart actor was asked by a camera operator about who he was voting for, and he replied that Trump was “a good guess”. He said of Harris: “I know what it’ll be like if we let herin. And that ain’t good. Miserable track record. No policies to speak of. She’s got the IQ of a fence post.”Dr PhilView image in fullscreenThe television personality Phil McGraw appeared at Trump’s Madison Square Garden rally. He said: “Lord knows he doesn’t need me to stand up for him. He’s tough as an old army boot. He’s got lots of enemies, different groups that are scared, and between them, they have impeached him, indicted him, raided him, railroaded him, shot him and sued him. And where is he? He is still standing.”Dennis QuaidView image in fullscreenThe actor campaigned for Trump in Coachella valley, California, last month. Quaid, who played Ronald Reagan in a recent eponymous biopic as well as Bill Clinton in the 2010 film The Special Relationship, said that Trump is “my favorite president of the 21st century.”Roseanne BarrView image in fullscreenThe comedian endorsed Trump by describing him in 2013 as someone who “wraps his arms around us”, as well as a “mother bear”. In April, Barr posted a skit online in which she appeared to mock E Jean Carroll, the writer whom Trump was found liable by a New York civil court of sexually abusing. In the skit, Barr pretended to accuse Joe Biden of raping her 26 years ago in Bergdorf Goodman, in a parody of Carroll’s claim against Trump.Russell BrandView image in fullscreenIn an episode of his Stay Free with Russell Brand podcast in June, the actor and comedian expressed his support for the former president by saying: “They act as if a vote for Donald Trump is almost like you’re directly voting for Armageddon … But I’m starting to think that no, a greater threat to democracy is this kind of technological feudalism, that tells you that it cares about you and that it’s protecting vulnerable people, all the while increasing censorship, increasing the funding of wars, increasing the division between ordinary Americans.”Buzz AldrinView image in fullscreenThe second man to walk on the moon, the 94-year old former astronaut announced his endorsement for Trump last month, saying: “Under the first Trump administration, I was impressed to see how human space exploration was elevated, made a policy of high importance again…I believe the nation is best served by voting for Donald J Trump.” More

    • 188 Shares179 Views

      in US Politics

      When Trump says he’s going to ‘protect’ women, he means ‘control’ them | Arwa Mahdawi

      by

      Could Republicans take away a woman’s right to a credit card?“Hello, I’d like a line of credit, please.”“Well, before we can even consider that, are you married? Are you taking a contraceptive pill? And can your husband co-sign all the paperwork so we know you have a man’s permission?”That may not be an exact rendition of an actual conversation between a woman and a US bank manager in 1970, but it’s close enough. Before the Equal Credit Opportunity Act (ECOA) was passed in 1974, it was considered good business practice for banks to discriminate against women. It didn’t matter how much money she had – a woman applying for a credit card or loan could expect to be asked invasive questions by a lender and told she needed a male co-signer before getting credit. All of which severely limited a woman’s ability to build a business, buy a house or leave an abusive relationship.Then came the ECOA, which was signed into law 50 years ago on Monday. Banking didn’t magically become egalitarian after that – discriminatory lending practices are still very much an issue – but important protections were enshrined in law. A woman finally had a right to get a credit card in her own name, without a man’s signature.When things feel bleak – and things feel incredibly bleak at the moment – it is important to remember how much social progress has been made in the last few decades. Many of us take having access to a credit card for granted, but it’s a right that women had to fight long and hard for. Indeed, the ECOA was passed five years after the Apollo 11 mission. “Women literally helped put a man on the moon before they could get their own credit cards,” the fashion mogul Tory Burch wrote for Time on the 50th anniversary of the ECOA being signed.If feels fitting that such an important anniversary is so close to such an important election. While we must celebrate how far we’ve come, it’s also important to remember that progress isn’t always linear. Rights that we have taken for granted for decades can, as we saw with the overturning of Roe v Wade, be suddenly yanked away.Is there any chance that, if Donald Trump gets into power again, we might see Republicans take away a woman’s right to her own credit card? It’s certainly not impossible. Trump’s entire campaign is, after all, about taking America back. The former president has also cast himself as a paternalistic protector of women.“I’m going to do it, whether the women like it or not,” Trump said at a rally on Wednesday. “I’m going to protect them.”Of course, we all know what “protect” really means in this context: it means “control”. Should he become president again, Trump and his allies seem intent on massively expanding the power of the president and eliminating hard-won freedoms. Conservative lawmakers and influencers want to control a woman’s access to reproductive healthcare. They want to control the sorts of books that get read and the type of history that gets taught. They want to control how women vote. They want to control whether a woman can get a no-fault divorce. They might not take away women’s access to credit, but they will almost certainly try to chip away at a woman’s path to financial independence.Elon Musk denies offering sperm to random acquaintancesA recent report from the New York Times alleges that he wants to build a compound to house his many children and some of their mothers. “Three mansions, three mothers, 11 children and one secretive, multibillionaire father who obsesses about declining birthrates when he isn’t overseeing one of his six companies: It is an unconventional family situation, and one that Mr Musk seems to want to make even bigger,” the Times notes. Apparently, in an effort to do this, he has been offering his sperm to friends and acquaintances. Musk has denied all this. This joins a growing list of sperm-based denials. Over the summer, he denied claims in the New York Times that he’d volunteered his sperm to help populate a colony on Mars.Martha Stewart criticises Netflix film that ‘makes me look like a lonely old lady’The businesswoman was also upset that director RJ Cutler didn’t put Snoop Dogg on the soundtrack: “He [got] some lousy classical score in there, which has nothing to do with me.”JD Vance thinks white kids are pretending to be trans so they can get into collegeLike pretty much everything the vice-presidential candidate says, this is insulting and nonsensical. Rather than having advantages conferred on them, trans people in the US are subject to dehumanizing rhetoric and laws that want to outlaw their existence. Meanwhile, it is well-documented that there are plenty of privileged children whose parents spent a lot of money so their kids could pretend to be athletes to get into college.What happened to the young girl captured in a photograph of Gaza detainees?The BBC tells the story of a young girl photographed among a group of men rounded up by Israeli forces. In her short life, Julia Abu Warda, aged three, has endured more horror than most of us could imagine.Pregnant Texas teen died after three ER visits due to medical impact of abortion banNevaeh Crain, 18, is one of at least two Texas women who have died under the state’s abortion ban.Sudan militia accused of mass killings and sexual violence as attacks escalateThe war in Sudan, which has displaced more than 14 million people, is catastrophic – particularly for girls and women. In a new report, a UN agency said that paramilitaries are preying on women and sexual violence is “rampant”. And this violence is being enabled by outside interests: many experts believe that, if it weren’t for the United Arab Emirates’ alleged involvement in the war, the crisis would already be over. The UAE, you see, is interested in Sudan’s resources. Meanwhile, the Guardian reported back in June that UK government officials have attempted to suppress criticism of the UAE for months.The week in pawtriarchyYou’ve almost certainly heard of the infinite monkey theorem: the idea that, given all the time in the world, a monkey randomly hitting keys on a typewriter would eventually produce the complete works of Shakespeare. Now, two Australian mathematicians have declared the notion im-paw-ssible. Indeed, they only found a 5% chance that a single monkey would randomly write the word “bananas” in their lifetime. Meanwhile, the Guardian notes that Shakespeare’s canon includes 884,647 words – none of them “banana”. More

    • 200 Shares169 Views

      in US Politics

      Can democracy survive now the world’s richest man has it in his sights? | George Monbiot

      by

      This is what happens when successive US governments fail to tackle inequality. While millions of people live in poverty, a handful grow unimaginably rich. Wealth begets wealth, and they acquire political power to match. It was inevitable that one of them – now the richest man on Earth – would launch what looks like a bid for world domination.A vote for Donald Trump next week is a vote for Elon Musk. Just as Trump is using Musk, Musk could be using Trump as a springboard to perhaps even greater power than the US president can wield. Musk’s secret conversations with Vladimir Putin, reported by the Wall Street Journal last week, and his contacts with other extremist world leaders, suggest a pattern of power-seeking that could be even more alarming than the prospect of a second Trump presidency.Trump, if he wins, will do to the nation what Musk did to Twitter: the US will be e-Muskulated. What this means is that those with the power to swarm, harass and crush people who do not share their noxious ideology will be unleashed.Elon Musk claims to be a “free speech absolutist”. But his absolutism seems to extend only to his allies. Since he bought Twitter and renamed it X, the platform has complied with 83% of requests by governments for the censorship or surveillance of accounts. When the Turkish president, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, demanded the censorship of his opponents before the last general election, the platform obliged. When Indian government officials asked it to remove a hostile BBC documentary, X did as they asked, and later deleted the accounts of many critics of the prime minister, Narendra Modi.Last month, X blocked links to a dossier about Trump’s running mate, JD Vance, and suspended the account of the journalist who revealed it. Musk has sued organisations that criticise him. Because the most vicious and antisocial people – racists, antisemites, misogynists, homophobes, even outright Nazis – have been reinstated and often boosted, millions of other users have been driven from the platform, their own free speech diminished. Musk’s own posts are reportedly amplified a thousandfold by a boutique algorithm. Free speech absolutism? My left foot.Now he has bent his immense wealth, power and blatant double standards to a frantic effort to get Trump elected. Some of his tactics – cash rewards and cash prizes – look to me like attempts to buy votes and interfere in an election. His lawyers were able to prevent him having to attend court this week for a hearing challenging these tactics: another privilege of wealth. He has used his X account to spread rampant misinformation on Trump’s behalf, giving him many millions of dollars’ worth of advertising. He has poured $118m into his pro-Trump super Pac (political action committee).What would the world’s richest man gain from the e-Muskulation of US – and perhaps global – politics? He would gain what capital has sought since workers acquired the vote: the truncation of democracy. Democracy is the problem capital keeps trying to solve. Why? Because it ensures that workers have rights and fair wages; that the living world has some (though never enough) protections; that we cannot be ripped off, poisoned and robbed without restraint.Capitalism has used two powerful tools to try to solve its problem: fascism and neoliberalism. But now, though drawing on both those ideologies, it reverts to an older and cruder mode: oligarchy. Why, the billionaires might wonder, should they rely on intermediaries to wield political power? After all, in every other sphere, the world bows to them, not to their concierges. This, I think, is where Musk and some of his fellow tech authoritarians have been heading.A Trump victory would allow Musk to escape the regulators with which he is often in conflict. In fact, if he takes up Trump’s offer of running a government efficiency commission, Musk becomes his own regulator, able to erase the rules that make the difference between a good society and barbarism.But Trump’s election might also permit even greater opportunities. Musk controls key strategic and military assets, such as SpaceX satellite launchers and the Starlink internet system. As Ukraine discovered to its cost last year, he can switch them off at whim. The kind of decision-making powerful states deploy has been privatised. The Kremlin is reported to have asked him to withhold Starlink access from Taiwan, as a favour to the Chinese government. Terrestrial broadband operators claim that Starlink could interfere with and degrade their own systems. Starlink has refuted this. It is not hard to see how his power could grow to the point at which governments feel obliged to do as he demands.He might not look the part. Villains bent on world domination are meant to be suave, laconic, self-possessed. Musk dresses like an attention-hungry teenager and behaves accordingly. Yet he has been equipped with the means to multiply his power beyond any that a plutocrat has wielded in the democratic era.For decades now, the centrist pact with capital has worked as follows: we might seek half-heartedly to improve the lives of people at the bottom, but we will do almost nothing to hold down those at the top. As a short-term tactic it worked: Rupert Murdoch and other members of the plutocrats’ trade union struck an uneasy truce with Tony Blair, Bill Clinton and their ilk. But the long-term result is that the ultra-rich became so wealthy that they could present a direct threat to sovereign nations, even to the most powerful nation of all. Some of us have spent decades warning that this was the likely outcome: appeasement makes your opponents more powerful. But our governments claimed they were simply being “pragmatic”: it didn’t matter how rich some people became, as long as the lot of the poor improved.Decades of studies, some of which were summarised 15 years ago in The Spirit Level by Kate Pickett and Richard Wilkinson, show what nonsense this is. A highly unequal society, whatever its absolute levels of wealth and poverty, is devastating for social outcomes, for wellbeing, cohesion and democracy. But “pragmatism” prevailed, and turned out not to be pragmatic at all. The slippage from democracy to oligarchy should surprise no one.So now we face a generalised e-Muskulation: of public life, of trust, of kindness, of mutual aid, of a world in which the poor could aspire to something better, and in which all of us could aspire to a healthy living planet. Governments that have not yet fully succumbed must do what should have been done long ago: make the poor richer, and the very rich poorer.

      George Monbiot is a Guardian columnist More

    • 163 Shares199 Views

      in US Politics

      US judge returns lawsuit against Elon Musk’s $1m voter scheme to state court

      by

      A federal judge on Friday denied an attempt by America Pac – the political action committee founded by Elon Musk to support Donald Trump’s campaign for a second presidency – to move to federal court a civil suit brought by the Philadelphia district attorney over a daily $1m prize draw for registered voters.The lawyers for Musk and his America Pac had argued that the lawsuit, which is seeking to halt the sweepstakes in the battleground state of Pennsylvania, needed to be resolved in federal court as it referenced the 5 November presidential election.But the presiding US district judge Gerald Pappert disagreed with that contention in a five-page opinion, writing that the motivations of the Philadelphia district attorney, Larry Krasner, were irrelevant – and that his office had the power to bring the case in state court.“Having now considered the parties’ submissions, the court grants the motion and remands the case back to the Court of Common Pleas,” it said.The civil suit that names both Musk and America Pac alleges that a petition asking registered voters in battleground states to submit their address, phone number and emails in exchange for $47, as well as to enter a daily $1m prize draw, was a lottery scheme that was illegal under state law.The petition has separately attracted scrutiny from the US justice department, which warned America Pac that the lottery violated federal law as it in effect amounts to paying people to register to vote. But the civil suit was the first legal action taken to stop the scheme.As the petition asks people to pledge their support to the US constitution’s first and second amendments – big causes for Republicans – it is widely seen by election law experts as illegally encouraging Trump supporters to register to vote in swing states. In a close election, turnout by voters for the former president could tip the result.

      Don’t miss important US election coverage. Get our free app and sign up for election alerts
      The suit also accuses Musk and America Pac of violating state consumer protection laws by deploying deceptive or misleading statements. For instance, Krasner contends that winners are not random, as advertised, because multiple winners have been people who showed up at Trump rallies.Musk’s defenders say it is simply a contest open to registered voters. In theory, they say, Democrats registered to vote in battleground states can complete the petition and have a chance to win the $1m lottery.The petition is perhaps the most public of the various strategies employed by America Pac to bolster Trump’s candidacy. The Super Pac now leads the crucial get-out-the-vote operation on behalf of the Trump campaign as Musk searches for more ways to help the former president return to the Oval Office.The ground game effort has suffered from some setbacks. The Guardian has previously reported that tens of thousands of Trump voters might not be reached after America Pac’s internal systems flagged that 20 to 25% of door knocks reported in Arizona and Nevada may have been fraudulent. More