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      Obama reportedly warns Biden over strength of Trump 2024 challenge

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      Barack Obama has reportedly warned Joe Biden about how strong a challenge Donald Trump will be in their second election battle in 2024, should Trump win the Republican nomination next year as expected.Polling now shows Trump and Biden closely matched for a second presidential contest.At a private White House lunch with Biden in June, Obama also “promised to do all he could to help the president get re-elected”, the Washington Post reported. Citing two sources familiar with the meeting, the Post said Biden welcomed the offer of help from the man under whom he was vice-president between 2009 and 2017.Biden, the newspaper said, “is eager to lock down promises of help from top Democrats, among whom Obama is easily the biggest star, for what is likely to be a hard-fought re-election race”.Trump faces unprecedented legal jeopardy including 78 criminal charges, over hush-money payments, retention of classified information and his attempt to overturn Biden’s election victory in 2020.He is expected also to face election subversion charges in Georgia but his grip on the Republican primary has only tightened with each legal reverse. In Republican polling, Trump enjoys leads of more than 30 points over his nearest rival, the hard-right governor of Florida, Ron DeSantis.In 2020, Biden beat Trump by more than 7m ballots and conclusively in the electoral college, a result Trump refused to accept, stoking chaos culminating in the deadly US Capitol attack.Biden and Obama’s relationship has been the subject of widespread reporting and speculation, not least over whether Obama thought Biden should mount a third run for the Democratic nomination in 2020.As a US senator from Delaware, Biden crashed and burned in the primaries of 1988 and 2008, the latter won by Obama, 19 years Biden’s junior. The two men then formed an effective partnership through eight years in power.In 2020, as Biden sought to become the oldest ever president via a campaign based on the need to save “the soul of the nation” from Trump, Obama withheld his memoirs, potentially awkward for his vice-president, until the race was run. But he also long withheld his endorsement.After Biden overcame a rocky start to surge to the nomination, in large part with the support of African American voters, Obama helped drive home his success.Tensions have reportedly remained. For one striking example, the authors Jonathan Martin and Alex Burns described, in their book This Will Not Pass, how Biden, now 80, told one adviser: “I am confident that Barack is not happy with the coverage of this administration as more transformative than his.”Among major challenges, Biden has faced the Covid pandemic, strong economic headwinds, a US body politic under attack from Trump’s extremist Republican party, and the need to marshal global support for Ukraine in its war with Russia. Despite widely acknowledged successes, his popularity ratings remain stubbornly low.Eric Schultz, an Obama adviser, did not comment to the Post about the June lunch.“We place a huge emphasis on finding creative ways to reach new audiences, especially tools that can be directly tied to voter mobilization or volunteer activations,” Schultz told the paper. “We are deliberate in picking our moments because our objective is to move the needle.”A Biden campaign spokesperson, TJ Ducklo, said: “President Biden is grateful for [Obama’s] unwavering support, and looks forward to once again campaigning side-by-side … to win in 2024 and finish the job for the American people.” More

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      ‘Bidenomics’ is working – which means Biden and the Democrats may win too | Robert Reich

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      Until recently, I assumed that Joe Biden would get a second term despite worries about his age because most Americans find Trump so loathsome.But I’ve underestimated Bidenomics. It’s turning out to be the most successful set of economic policies the United States has witnessed in a half-century.It may not only give Joe another term but also give Democrats control over both houses of Congress. It may even put the nation on the path to widely shared prosperity for a generation.New economic data last week showed that inflation cooled to 3% in June, down from over 9% last year, and close to the Fed’s goal of 2%.And as inflation has subsided, real wages – that is, what paychecks will buy – have finally risen.Meanwhile, economic growth has accelerated. Consumer spending is solid. Consumers expect the economy to continue to do well.Inflation is coming down without a crash landing, in large part because the Fed’s rate increases – designed to slow the economy, stop wage growth and cause higher unemployment – are being offset by Bidenomics’ massive public investments in infrastructure, semiconductors, wind and solar energy, and manufacturing.This isn’t all. The Biden administration has added three other critical ingredients: the threat (and, in some cases, reality) of tough antitrust enforcement, a pro-labor National Labor Relations Board, and strict limits on Chinese imports.Taken together, these policies are beginning to alter the structure of the American economy in favor of the bottom 90%.In recent decades, the Fed has been in charge of evening out the business cycle, but no one has taken charge of altering the structure of the economy so that the poor and working middle class get a larger share of the gains.This restructuring has been difficult to achieve for the simple reason that the monied interests don’t want it.In Republican circles, the monied interests have preached the snake oil of supply-side economics, which legitimized giant tax cuts going mostly to the rich and large corporations.Those tax cuts – under Reagan, George W Bush and Trump – exploded the federal debt, fueled giant profits in the biggest firms and financial institutions, and stoked a surge in billionaire wealth but did literally nothing for average working people. Nothing trickled down.In Democratic circles, the monied interests have used neoliberalism – which has called for deregulation, privatization, free trade and the domination of finance over the economy.This orthodoxy pervaded the Clinton and Obama administrations. (I won’t bore you with my war stories, but trust me.)The result was similar to that of supply-side economics: wealth surged to the top, but average working people remained stuck in the mud.In contrast to both supply-side economics and neoliberalism, the Biden administration is focused on altering the structure of the economy.Over the past year, manufacturing construction in hi-tech electronics, which the administration has subsidized through Chips and the Inflation Reduction Act, has quadrupled.Tens of billions in infrastructure spending has been funneled to the states for road, water system and internet upgrades.More clean-energy manufacturing facilities have been announced in the last year than in the previous seven combined.Biden understands that these investments must translate into high-paying jobs, which often require unions.“When I think climate, I think jobs … union workers are the best workers in the world,” he said in a recent speech on what he has called Bidenomics.The monied interests don’t want unions, of course. The narrow congressional majority that got these bills passed rolled back some of the labor conditions that originally accompanied the tax credits and grants.Moreover, much of the funding is pouring into so-called “right-to-work” states that make it exceedingly difficult to unionize.But a buoyant economy strengthens the hand of workers, making it easier to unionize – which helps explain the ubiquitous labor action this summer.Voters may not yet understand Bidenomics, but it’s probably not necessary that they do in order for Biden and the Democrats to benefit.If Bidenomics continues to alter the structure of the economy in ways that help the vast majority, voters will give Biden another term and reward Democrats with both houses of Congress.And if Bidenomics is successful, it will make the American economy both stronger and fairer in years to come.I’m betting on it.
      Robert Reich, a former US secretary of labor, is professor of public policy at the University of California, Berkeley, and the author of Saving Capitalism: For the Many, Not the Few and The Common Good. His new book, The System: Who Rigged It, How We Fix It, is out now. He is a Guardian US columnist. His newsletter is at robertreich.substack.com More

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      Federal jury reconvenes to consider charging Trump over January 6 insurrection – live

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      From 2h agoDonald Trump’s multiplying legal troubles are taking a toll on his campaign finances as he spends more and more on lawyers, the New York Times reports.Trump’s Pac, Save America, has less than $4m in its account, down from the $105m it began last year with, the Times reports, citing federal records. So bad have its finances become that it has requested back $60m that it sent to a pro-Trump Super Pac, Make America Great Again Inc, which was supposed to spend the money on television ads.Since the start of the year, Trump has been indicted by Manhattan district attorney Alvin Bragg on state charges of falsifying business records, and by special counsel Jack Smith for breaking federal law by allegedly keeping classified documents at his Mar-a-Lago resort, and by conspiring to keep them out of the hands of government archivists.Trump has been told Smith may bring new charges against him related to his involvement in the January 6 insurrection, while, in Georgia, Fulton county district attorney Fani Willis said she will announce indictments in her investigation of Trump and his allies’ attempt to overturn the 2020 election sometime before September. The stage is set for Trump to continue paying huge legal fees for months, but he has one good thing going for him: his massive lead among Republican presidential candidates, which potentially could alleviate some of the damage done if he has to pullback on campaign spending.Here’s more on his dire finances, from the Times:
      The super PAC, which is called Make America Great Again Inc., has already sent back $12.25 million to the group paying Mr. Trump’s legal bills, according to federal records — a sum nearly as large as the $13.1 million the super PAC raised from donors in the first half of 2023. Those donations included $1 million from the father of his son-in-law, Charles Kushner, whom Mr. Trump pardoned for federal crimes in his final days as president, and $100,000 from a candidate seeking Mr. Trump’s endorsement.
      The extraordinary shift of money from the super PAC to Mr. Trump’s political committee, described in federal campaign filings as a refund, is believed to be larger than any other refund on record in the history of federal campaigns.
      It comes as Mr. Trump’s political and legal fate appear increasingly intertwined. The return of money from the super PAC, which Mr. Trump does not control, to his political action committee, which he does, demonstrates how his operation is balancing dueling priorities: paying lawyers and supporting his political candidacy through television ads.
      Save America, Mr. Trump’s political action committee, is prohibited by law from directly spending money on his candidacy. When Save America donated $60 million last year to Mr. Trump’s super PAC — which is permitted to spend on his campaign — it effectively evaded that prohibition.
      It is not clear from the filing exactly when the refund was requested, but the super PAC did not return the money all at once. It gave back $1 million on May 1; $5 million more on May 9; another $5 million on June 1; and $1.25 million on June 30. These returns followed Mr. Trump’s two indictments this year: one in Manhattan in March, and one last month in federal court.
      The White House is currently a much quieter place than usual, since Joe Biden is on vacation in Delaware. But someone is manning its Twitter account, and has opted this morning to troll Republican senator Tommy Tuberville.You may remember him for his ongoing blockade of military promotions over the Pentagon’s moves to assist service members in obtaining abortions. Yesterday, he insisted his campaign was not hurting military readiness:To which the White House has responded:The 2024 election will also decide control of the Senate, where Republicans are currently viewed as having a good shot at retaking the majority.Joe Biden’s allies can afford to lose only one seat in the chamber, but three Democrats representing red states will be up for re-election: Joe Manchin of West Virginia (who has not said if he will run again), Jon Tester of Montana and Sherrod Brown of Ohio (both of whom say they will run again). All face tough roads to keeping their seats.Then there’s the possibility that the GOP could oust a Democrat representing a swing state, such as Wisconsin. Democratic senator Tammy Baldwin is up for re-election there, but in something of a setback for Republicans, Tom Tiffany announced today that he has decided to run for re-election in the House of Representatives rather than challenge Baldwin, as some in the GOP hoped he would do:Joe Biden and Donald Trump are tied in a New York Times/Siena College poll released today, while the president has consolidated his support among Democrats.A caveat before we get into the numbers: the November 2024 election is more than a year away, and will likely be decided by a handful of swing states, particularly Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, Georgia and Arizona. So for all the headlines this poll might generate, keep in mind that things can change dramatically between then and now.Back to the Times/Siena data, it finds Biden and Trump tied with 43% support if the presidential election were held today. But it also indicates many Democrats have gotten over their hesitancy towards Biden. Last year, two-thirds wanted a different candidate, but now, that number has dropped to about half.Here’s more on the numbers, from the Times:
      Still, warning signs abound for the president: Despite his improved standing and a friendlier national environment, Mr. Biden remains broadly unpopular among a voting public that is pessimistic about the country’s future, and his approval rating is a mere 39 percent.
      Perhaps most worryingly for Democrats, the poll found Mr. Biden in a neck-and-neck race with former President Donald J. Trump, who held a commanding lead among likely Republican primary voters even as he faces two criminal indictments and more potential charges on the horizon. Mr. Biden and Mr. Trump were tied at 43 percent apiece in a hypothetical rematch in 2024, according to the poll.
      Mr. Biden has been buoyed by voters’ feelings of fear and distaste toward Mr. Trump. Well over a year before the election, 16 percent of those polled had unfavorable views of both Mr. Biden and Mr. Trump, a segment with which Mr. Biden had a narrow lead.
      “Donald Trump is not a Republican, he’s a criminal,” said John Wittman, 42, a heating and air conditioning contractor from Phoenix. A Republican, he said that even though he believed Mr. Biden’s economic stewardship had hurt the country, “I will vote for anyone on the planet that seems halfway capable of doing the job, including Joe Biden, over Donald Trump.”
      To borrow an old political cliché, the poll shows that Mr. Biden’s support among Democrats is a mile wide and an inch deep. About 30 percent of voters who said they planned to vote for Mr. Biden in November 2024 said they hoped Democrats would nominate someone else. Just 20 percent of Democrats said they would be enthusiastic if Mr. Biden were the party’s 2024 presidential nominee; another 51 percent said they would be satisfied but not enthusiastic.
      A higher share of Democrats, 26 percent, expressed enthusiasm for the notion of Vice President Kamala Harris as the nominee in 2024.
      Joe Biden is taking a summer vacation after several months in which things seemed to increasingly come together for the American president. Over the weekend, the Guardian’s David Smith looked at this administration’s recent hot streak – as well as the challenges he faces in the year to come:It was the word that the far right of the Republican party most wanted to hear. Kevin McCarthy, speaker of the House of Representatives, said this week his colleagues’ investigations of Joe Biden are rising to the level of an “impeachment” inquiry.Republicans in Congress admit that they do not yet have any direct evidence of wrongdoing by the US president. But, critics say, there is a simple explanation why they would float the ultimate sanction: they need to put Biden’s character on trial because their case against his policies is falling apart.Heading into next year’s presidential election, Republicans have been readying a three-pronged attack: crime soaring in cities, chaos raging at the southern border and prices spiralling out of control everywhere. But each of these narratives is being disrupted by facts on the ground: crime is falling in most parts of the country, there is relative calm at the border and inflation is at a two-year low.Donald Trump’s legal problems may be formidable, but as the Guardian’s Martin Pengelly reports, so, too, is his popularity among Republicans:Fani Willis, the district attorney of Fulton county, Georgia, is “ready to go” with indictments in her investigation of Donald Trump’s election subversion. In Washington, the special counsel Jack Smith is expected to add charges regarding election subversion to 40 counts already filed over the former president’s retention of classified records.Trump already faces 34 criminal charges in New York over hush-money payments to the porn star Stormy Daniels. Referring to Trump being ordered to pay $5m after being found liable for sexual abuse and defamation against the writer E Jean Carroll, a judge recently said Carroll proved Trump raped her. Lawsuits over Trump’s business affairs continue.Yet a month out from the first debate of the Republican presidential primary, Trump’s domination of the field increases with each poll.Donald Trump’s multiplying legal troubles are taking a toll on his campaign finances as he spends more and more on lawyers, the New York Times reports.Trump’s Pac, Save America, has less than $4m in its account, down from the $105m it began last year with, the Times reports, citing federal records. So bad have its finances become that it has requested back $60m that it sent to a pro-Trump Super Pac, Make America Great Again Inc, which was supposed to spend the money on television ads.Since the start of the year, Trump has been indicted by Manhattan district attorney Alvin Bragg on state charges of falsifying business records, and by special counsel Jack Smith for breaking federal law by allegedly keeping classified documents at his Mar-a-Lago resort, and by conspiring to keep them out of the hands of government archivists.Trump has been told Smith may bring new charges against him related to his involvement in the January 6 insurrection, while, in Georgia, Fulton county district attorney Fani Willis said she will announce indictments in her investigation of Trump and his allies’ attempt to overturn the 2020 election sometime before September. The stage is set for Trump to continue paying huge legal fees for months, but he has one good thing going for him: his massive lead among Republican presidential candidates, which potentially could alleviate some of the damage done if he has to pullback on campaign spending.Here’s more on his dire finances, from the Times:
      The super PAC, which is called Make America Great Again Inc., has already sent back $12.25 million to the group paying Mr. Trump’s legal bills, according to federal records — a sum nearly as large as the $13.1 million the super PAC raised from donors in the first half of 2023. Those donations included $1 million from the father of his son-in-law, Charles Kushner, whom Mr. Trump pardoned for federal crimes in his final days as president, and $100,000 from a candidate seeking Mr. Trump’s endorsement.
      The extraordinary shift of money from the super PAC to Mr. Trump’s political committee, described in federal campaign filings as a refund, is believed to be larger than any other refund on record in the history of federal campaigns.
      It comes as Mr. Trump’s political and legal fate appear increasingly intertwined. The return of money from the super PAC, which Mr. Trump does not control, to his political action committee, which he does, demonstrates how his operation is balancing dueling priorities: paying lawyers and supporting his political candidacy through television ads.
      Save America, Mr. Trump’s political action committee, is prohibited by law from directly spending money on his candidacy. When Save America donated $60 million last year to Mr. Trump’s super PAC — which is permitted to spend on his campaign — it effectively evaded that prohibition.
      It is not clear from the filing exactly when the refund was requested, but the super PAC did not return the money all at once. It gave back $1 million on May 1; $5 million more on May 9; another $5 million on June 1; and $1.25 million on June 30. These returns followed Mr. Trump’s two indictments this year: one in Manhattan in March, and one last month in federal court.
      Good morning, US politics blog readers. The wait continues to find out whether special counsel Jack Smith will indict Donald Trump over his involvement in the January 6 insurrection, and there are signs this morning a decision could come soon. CNN spotted grand jurors arriving at a federal courthouse in Washington DC where they’re considering evidence in the case, but there’s no telling when a decision could come.Signs that Trump could be charged have been mounting. Last week, the former president said he had received a target letter from Smith, a step typically taken before someone is indicted. And yesterday, Trump said he expected charges to be filed “any day now”. But the winding legal saga has yet to dent his standing in the GOP, or even in the presidential race at large. New polling from the New York Times shows him crushing every other Republican candidate in the presidential nomination race, and tied with Joe Biden in the general election.Here’s what else is happening today:
      Kamala Harris is heading to Orlando to address the 20th Women’s Missionary Society of the African Methodist Episcopal Church Quadrennial Convention at 2.15pm eastern time. We’ll keep an eye open if she reiterates her criticism of Florida’s new Ron DeSantis-backed school curriculum, which implies that slavery wasn’t so bad.
      Biden, meanwhile, continues his beach vacation in Delaware. He has no public events scheduled.
      Alabama lawmakers are raging over Biden’s decision to cancel US Space Command’s planned move to the state, Punchbowl News reports. The decision came amid Republican senator Tommy Tuberville’s ongoing blockade of military promotions in protest of the Pentagon’s abortion policy. More

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      Biden overturns Trump decision on US space command headquarters location

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      Joe Biden has decided to keep US space command headquarters in Colorado, overturning a last-ditch decision by the administration of his presidential predecessor Donald Trump to move it to Alabama while also ending months of politically fueled debate, according to senior federal officials.The officials said Biden was convinced by the head of space command, Gen James Dickinson, who argued that moving his headquarters now would jeopardize military readiness. Dickinson’s view, however, was in contrast to air force leadership, who studied the issue at length and determined that relocating to Huntsville, Alabama, was the right move.The officials spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss the decision ahead of the announcement.The president, they said, believes that keeping the command in Colorado Springs would avoid a disruption in readiness that the move would cause, particularly as the US races to compete with China in space. And they said Biden firmly believes that maintaining stability will help the military be better able to respond in space over the next decade. Those factors, they said, outweighed what the president believed would be any minor benefits of moving to Alabama.Biden’s decision is sure to enrage Alabama lawmakers and fuel accusations that abortion politics played a role in the choice. The location debate has become entangled in the ongoing battle between the US senator Tommy Tuberville and the defense department over the move to provide travel for troops seeking reproductive healthcare.Tuberville, an Alabama Republican, opposed the policy and has blocked hundreds of military promotions in protest.The US officials said the abortion issue had no effect at all on Biden’s decision. And they said the president fully expected there would be different views on the matter within the defense department.Formally created in August 2019, the command was temporarily based in Colorado. And air force and space force leaders initially recommended it stay there. But in the final days of his presidency, Donald Trump decided it should be based in Huntsville.The change triggered a number of reviews.Proponents of keeping the command in Colorado have argued that moving it to Huntsville and creating a new headquarters would set back its progress at a time it needs to move quickly to be positioned to match China’s military space rise. And Colorado Springs is also home to the air force academy, which now graduates space force guardians, and more than 24 military space missions, including three space force bases.Officials also argued that any new headquarters in Alabama would not be completed until sometime after 2030, forcing a lengthy transition.Huntsville, however, scored higher than Colorado Springs in a federal government accountability office assessment of potential locations and has long been a home to some of the earliest missiles used in the nation’s space programs, including the Saturn V rocket. It is home to the army’s space and missile defense command.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionAccording to officials, the air force secretary, Frank Kendall, who ordered his own review of the matter, leaned toward Huntsville, while Dickinson was staunchly in favor of staying put. The officials said the defense secretary, Lloyd Austin, presented both options to Biden.The decision was good news for Colorado lawmakers.“For two and a half years we’ve known any objective analysis of this basing decision would reach the same conclusion we did, that Peterson space force base is the best home for space command,” Colorado’s Democratic US senator John Hickenlooper said in a statement. “Most importantly, this decision firmly rejects the idea that politics – instead of national security – should determine basing decisions central to our national security.”Colorado’s other Democratic US senator, Michael Bennet, said the decision “restores integrity to the Pentagon’s basing process and sends a strong message that national security and the readiness of our armed forces drive our military decisions”. More

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      The surest sign that Donald Trump is back? Ivanka is being seen in public with him | Arwa Mahdawi

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      There’s a decent chance that, come January 2025, Donald Trump will either be in the White House or in a prison cell. Last November, my money was on the prison cell. The Florida governor, Ron DeSantis, was the Republicans’ golden boy and Trump was experiencing a major slump; for one thing, he had a mindboggling number of legal problems to deal with.He seemed to have lost his last crumbs of credibility: an embarrassing number of candidates he’d backed were defeated in the midterms, making the former president look like a loser and causing his allies to turn on him. “TRUMPTY DUMPTY” crowed the once-loyal New York Post on its front page. “Trump has no political skills left,” a Trump campaign insider said in messages seen by the Guardian. “His team is a joke. The ship is sinking.”First offboard that sinking ship? Ivanka Trump. The entrepreneur and women’s empowerment champion has always excelled in putting her own interests first. As soon as it seemed as if her dad had gone from a powerbroker to a liability, she fled to Miami with her family and kept a low profile. When Trump officially announced that he would be running for the 2024 nomination, Ivanka made sure that everyone knew she was staying out of it. “I do not plan to be involved in politics,” she said in a statement. She also skipped the official announcement at Mar-a-Lago.Several months on, the political landscape looks drastically different. DeSantis has gone from being feted as the future of the Republican party to being the butt of many jokes. His far-right policies may play to some voters’ fascist fantasies, but his creepy demeanour and Disney villain laugh have rendered him unelectable. There has been report after report about his odd behaviours – like consuming chocolate pudding cups with his fingers and eating “like a starving animal who has never eaten before”. DeSantis is off-putting, even to extremists.Trump, meanwhile, is back on top of the polls. A New York Times/Siena College poll published this week found that 71% of Republican voters still stand with the former president amid the multiple investigations he’s facing. That’s partly because many of them don’t seem to believe his many legal troubles are a big deal: 91% of people who have Fox News as their main source of information don’t think the former president committed serious crimes, the poll revealed. In any case, Trump is trouncing his competition and has a 37% lead over DeSantis. He’s the clear favourite for the Republican nomination.The biggest sign that Trump’s fortunes may be reversing, however? Ivanka and Jared Kushner, the most fair-weather of family, are now being seen in public with Trump again. “They’ve been spotted more frequently this summer,” one top campaign strategist told Vanity Fair. “They’ve made it clear they’re supportive. They pop into meetings to say hi.” The pair also set tongues wagging after they showed up at a recent screening of the child-trafficking movie Sound of Freedom that Trump hosted at his Bedminster golf club.Vanity Fair’s sources didn’t mince their words about why they reckon the power couple are suddenly so family-oriented. “Now that the president is 40 points ahead, of course Jared is pretending he’s involved,” a former Trump administration official told the outlet. “If he’s president again, Jared needs to protect his turf, especially in the Middle East.” We can’t have anyone else claiming the Middle East now, can we?One imagines that Ivanka also wants to protect her turf and finish what she started in 2017. The former first daughter had big dreams, after all. She was going to be the first female president! She was going to run the World Bank! She was going to empower every woman in the world, starting with herself! And then democracy got in the way.Unfortunately for Trump, democracy is still in the way. He may be the Republican favourite, but he still has to battle his way through numerous lawsuits and face off against Joe Biden (the presumptive Democratic nominee) to regain his place on the world stage. I won’t even begin to speculate about whether he might be able to pull that off, but I can tell you this: if you want to know how close Trump is to regaining power don’t look at the polls, look at Ivanka. If she’s keeping her distance, he’s in trouble. But if she’s cosying up to her dad? Then we’re all in a lot of trouble. More

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      Trump increases Republican primary lead despite swirling legal peril

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      Fani Willis, the district attorney of Fulton county, Georgia, is “ready to go” with indictments in her investigation of Donald Trump’s election subversion. In Washington, the special counsel Jack Smith is expected to add charges regarding election subversion to 40 counts already filed over the former president’s retention of classified records.Trump already faces 34 criminal charges in New York over hush-money payments to the porn star Stormy Daniels. Referring to Trump being ordered to pay $5m after being found liable for sexual abuse and defamation against the writer E Jean Carroll, a judge recently said Carroll proved Trump raped her. Lawsuits over Trump’s business affairs continue.Yet a month out from the first debate of the Republican presidential primary, Trump’s domination of the field increases with each poll.On Monday, the first 2024 survey from the New York Times and Siena College put Trump at 54% support. His closest challenger, Ron DeSantis, was at 17%. No one else – including Mike Pence, Tim Scott and Nikki Haley – was higher than 3%.DeSantis’s hard-right campaign is widely seen to be out of fuel and on a glide path to destruction. Trump dominates early voting states and in national averages leads the Florida governor by more than 30 points.Heading for trials in primary season, Trump denies wrongdoing and claims political persecution. But his chaos-agent campaign, which he has said he will not abandon even if convicted and sentenced, does not just threaten the national peace. It threatens his own party.Trump is demanding Republican support for impeaching Joe Biden over corruption allegations against Hunter Biden, the president’s surviving son.“Any Republican that doesn’t act on Democrat fraud should be immediately primaried and get out,” Trump told a rally in Erie, Pennsylvania, on Saturday.Republicans hold the US House, where impeachment would start, by just five seats. GOP members in Democratic areas seem likely to suffer at the polls next year.“If they’re not willing to do it,” Trump said, “we’ve got a lot of good, tough Republicans around. People are going to run against ’em, and people are going to win. And they’re going to get my endorsement every single time. They’re going to win ’cause we win almost every race when we endorse.”Factcheckers dispute that. Surveying the 2022 midterms, the New York Times said: “Mr Trump endorsed more than 250 candidates, and his 82% success rate is, on the surface, impressive. But the vast majority of those endorsements were of incumbents and heavy favorites to win.”The paper added: “In the 36 most competitive House races … Mr Trump endorsed candidates in five contests. All five lost.”Trump’s influence on key Senate races won by Democrats has been widely discussed.In Pennsylvania, Trump also called for conditioning aid to Ukraine in its war with Russia on White House cooperation with investigations of Hunter Biden. Trump’s own first impeachment was for withholding aid to Ukraine in an attempt to uncover dirt on the Bidens. Pundits noted the irony.“So much for denying the quid pro quo, as he did in 2019,” said Peter Baker, the Times’ chief White House correspondent.In that impeachment, Trump was acquitted when Republican senators stayed loyal, Mitt Romney of Utah the sole GOP vote to convict.Trump beat his second impeachment, for inciting the deadly attack on Congress on 6 January 2021, despite 10 House Republicans and seven senators voting to convict.Thousands have been arrested over the Capitol attack and hundreds convicted, some of seditious conspiracy. Smith, the special counsel, is homing in on indictments regarding Trump’s election subversion, though as the Guardian revealed, likely charges do not directly relate to January 6.In Fulton county, Willis, the district attorney, seems confident of winning convictions over attempts to overturn Biden’s win in Georgia.Speaking to WXIA, a CNN affiliate, she said: “I made a commitment to the American people – but most importantly the citizens of Fulton county – that we were going to be making some big decisions regarding the election investigation and that I would do that before 1 September 2023. I’m going to hold true to that commitment.“The work is accomplished. We’ve been working for two and half years. We’re ready to go.”Previous Trump indictments in New York and Washington have not fueled significant protests or violence. But in Atlanta, barriers surround the Fulton courthouse.“I think the sheriff is doing something smart in making sure that the courthouse stays safe,” Willis said. “I’m not willing to put any of the employees or the constituents that come to the courthouse in harm’s way.”In Georgia on Monday, a judge rejected Trump lawyers’ attempt to block use of a grand jury report in prosecutions and remove Willis from the case. In Florida, Carlos De Oliveira, the property manager at Mar-a-Lago, Trump’s estate, made his first court appearance in the classified records case. He did not enter a formal plea.In general election polling, Biden and Trump are closely matched.On Sunday, the former Arkansas governor Asa Hutchinson, a rank Republican outsider, told CBS it was “inappropriate” to float a pardon for Trump, as other candidates, DeSantis included, have done.Michael Cohen, Trump’s former lawyer who went to jail then turned on Trump, told MSNBC Trump’s likely nomination posed a genuine threat to the nation.“I’m your retribution,” Cohen said, quoting Trump’s message to supporters. “They’re indicting me, I’m protecting you, I’m the only one between you and them.“It’s right out of Mein Kampf, which allegedly Donald used to keep on his bedside table.”In 1990, Vanity Fair said Trump kept a book of Hitler’s speeches by his bed. Trump told the magazine it was Mein Kampf, Hitler’s autobiography. The friend who gave Trump the book said it was the speeches.Cohen continued: “This is not a joke. And to anybody who thinks for a quick second there’s no way he’s going to win, that was a pretty packed audience in Erie, Pennsylvania.” More

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      in US Politics

      Biden administration trials website for new student loan repayment scheme

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      The Joe Biden White House is launching a beta – or testing – website as part of its new income-driven student loan repayment plan, according to reports.The site, which CNN first reported on Sunday, comes as part of the president’s Saving on a Valuable Education (Save) plan, which was announced earlier this year after the supreme court struck down an earlier iteration of Biden’s student loan forgiveness plan.According to the website, Save can “significantly” lower monthly payment amounts as compared to other income-driven repayment plans.“Part of the president’s overall commitment is to improve the student loan system and reduce the burden of student loan debt on American families,” a senior Biden administration official told CNN. “The Save plan is a big part of that. It is important in this moment as borrowers are getting ready to return to repayment.”CNN reported that administration officials estimate the plan enrollment process for federal student loan borrowers takes about 10 minutes on the website. The network added that borrowers will only be required to apply once, unlike previous systems that required yearly applications.This plan is expected to be “much easier to use”, officials told CNN.“We will be able to show borrowers their exact monthly payment amount and give them the ability to choose the most affordable repayment plan for them,” the outlet reports one official saying.The full website is expected to launch in August, with officials telling CNN that borrowers who submit their applications during the beta period will not be required to resubmit them.The Save plan, which will go into full effect on 1 July 2024, increases the income exception from 150% to 225% of the poverty line. Additionally, the plan intends to cut payments on undergraduate loans in half and ensure that borrowers “never see their balance grow as long as they keep up with their required payments,” the education department said.Moreover, a single borrower making less than $15 an hour will not be required to make any payments, it added.The website’s unveiling comes after the supreme court in June ruled against a $430bn student debt forgiveness plan from the Biden administration which was associated with the 2003 Heroes Act.Congress passed the Heroes Act in the aftermath of the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on the US. But the supreme court ruled the act did not authorize Biden’s student debt forgiveness plan, dealing a blow to up to 40 million borrowers in the US.Biden then followed through on a promise to release a new relief plan under the Higher Education Act, which the supreme court’s ruling in June did not address. More

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      in US Politics

      We bailed out the banks but we’re not prepared to bail out the planet

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      Like many other politicians, Joe Biden talks a good game about the need to tackle global heating. Climate change is an “existential threat”, the US president said last week, as America sizzled amid record-breaking temperatures.Biden had to do something in response to what António Guterres, the UN secretary general, described as the boiling of the planet. The White House announced a series of measures – such as improved access to drinking water and planting more trees – in response to what has been the hottest month on record.To Biden’s critics, this is fiddling while Rome burns. They say he should be declaring a climate emergency, which would allow him to block new fossil fuel projects without congressional approval. As it is, Biden has showed a marked reluctance to take this step. There are clearly limits to what the US government is prepared to do to counter this “existential threat”.It is a similar picture in the UK, where the Conservative party’s surprise victory in the Uxbridge and South Ruislip byelection was in large part due to the plans by London’s Labour mayor, Sadiq Khan, to expand the ultra-low emission zone (Ulez) to the capital’s outer boroughs.Put simply, the Ulez seeks to improve London’s air quality by placing a charge on the use of older petrol and diesel vehicles, which tend to be not just the most polluting but also the most likely to be owned by poorer households already struggling with Britain’s cost of living crisis.The byelection defeat clearly rattled the Labour leader, Sir Keir Starmer. “We are doing something very wrong if policies put forward by the Labour party end up on each and every Tory leaflet,” he said. “We’ve got to face up to that and learn the lessons.”In their different ways, recent events in the US and the UK show just how difficult it will be to put the global economy on a saner and more sustainable course.Problem number one is that politicians struggle to think beyond the next election. Biden is running for re-election next year, and Starmer wants to end a run of four successive defeats for Labour. The temptation to put off tough decisions to another day is powerful.That’s because of problem number two: the lack of consensus about what needs to be done and over what time period change needs to happen. What’s needed is for Democrats and Republicans in the US and Labour and the Conservatives in the UK to announce that they are jointly signed up to a course of action that will extend well beyond one presidential or parliamentary term. The failure to forge a bi-partisan approach provides an incentive for parties to look for short-term political gain, even when doing so risks longer-term harm.There’s a reason for that, namely that some of the policies required have upfront costs that make them unpopular for those that find them hard to bear. Telling a key worker who can only afford an ageing diesel car that they will have to pay £12.50 a day to drive to their job is never going to be easy, especially in a period when living standards are being squeezed. There is no getting away from the fact that the Ulez expansion is a regressive tax and, as Khan has found, changes that make hard-up people even worse off breed anger, and that anger will inevitably find a political outlet.So problem number three is that there are a lot of poor people in the UK and the US. And problem number four is that not nearly enough is being done to help these people make the green transition. For that to happen, there would need not just to be a recognition of the link between global heating and grotesque levels of inequality, but a willingness to do something about it.In the developed west, this means using the financial firepower of the state to reduce the number of losers from the green transition. In developing countries, it means transfers of both money and technical knowhow, so that countries that need growth as part of their anti-poverty programmes minimise the use of fossil fuels. Meeting the “existential” threat that Biden talks about requires action not just in the UK or the US but in China, India and other emerging countries, too. Climate action on a global scale will be costly.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionThat brings us to problem number five. The change from one economic paradigm to another – the creative destruction that the political economist Joseph Schumpeter talked about – is hard because it requires those who have invested in existing industries to recognise that the game is up. This transition can be prolonged if those wedded to the status quo have invested huge sums and wield enormous power, as is the case with the fossil fuel industry.The solution to these problems lies ultimately in the hands of politicians such as Biden, because they alone have the power to remove barriers to change.As the rapid responses to the global financial crisis of 2007-09 and the Covid pandemic proved, governments can act speedily, collectively and decisively if the crisis is deemed big enough. When the banks were facing their existential crisis in 2008, money was created to bail them out and prevent a second Great Depression. In 2020, economies were effectively put on a war footing.Should the same approach be adopted in the fight against climate change? Yes. Is there any sign of this happening? Not on the scale required. Effectively, this is like the 1930s, when there was resistance to meeting the threat of fascism. Then, as now, what was needed was rapid rearmament. Then, as now, what we’re getting is a failure to do what needs to be done. More