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      Biden ‘doing just fine’ after testing positive for Covid, White House says

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      Biden ‘doing just fine’ after testing positive for Covid, White House saysAshish Jha, coronavirus response coordinator, and physician Kevin O’Connor say president contracted BA.5 variant Joe Biden is “feeling well” and “doing just fine” after testing positive for Covid, the White House coronavirus response coordinator said.Joe Biden’s mild Covid symptoms are improving, doctor saysRead moreAppearing on CBS’s Face the Nation, Ashish Jha said: “So it is the BA.5 variant, which is about 80% of infections. But thank goodness, our vaccines and therapeutics work well against it, which is why I think the president’s doing well.“I checked in with his team late last night. He was feeling well. He had a good day yesterday. He’s got a viral syndrome, an upper respiratory infection … and he’s doing just fine.”The White House later released a letter in which Biden’s physician, Kevin O’Connor, said the president’s “predominant symptom now is a sore throat”.O’Connor also said Biden had completed a third full day of treatment with Paxlovid, which would continue and was “experiencing no shortness of breath at all”.Biden’s positive test was announced on Thursday. At 79, the president is the oldest ever inaugurated. He is also, as he said, double-vaccinated and double-boosted and has access to the best possible care.On Sunday the transportation secretary, Pete Buttigieg, told CNN’s State of the Union he knew Biden was still working “because on Thursday I got a call from the White House about something on transportation that he had asked me to follow up on”.Buttigieg also wished Biden “a speedy path back to 100%”.Jha was asked if the White House “will continue to make disclosures if [Biden] has long-term symptoms from this infection”.“Absolutely,” he said. “You know, we think it’s really important for the American people to know how well the president’s doing, which is why we have been so transparent, giving updates several times a day, having people hear from me directly, hear directly from his physician.“And obviously if he has persistent symptoms, if any of them interfere with his ability to carry out his duties, we will disclose that early and often.“But I suspect this is going to be a course of Covid that we’ve seen in many Americans who have been fully vaccinated, double-boosted, getting treated with those tools in hand. You know, the president has been doing well, and we’re gonna expect that he’s going to continue to do so.”Jha also suggested cities seeing high case rates, including New York, Phoenix and Miami, might consider re-instituting indoor mask mandates.“Masks work, right? They clearly slow down transmission. So in areas of high transmission, I think it’s very prudent for people to be wearing masks indoors, especially if they’re in crowded, poorly ventilated spaces. That’s what the [Centers for Disease Control and Prevention] recommends. And I think that’s a very important and effective way of reducing transmission, protecting yourself as well.“You know, in terms of mandates, that’s something that we’ve always felt strongly should be done by local officials, mayors, governors, local health officials, and we’re seeing different officials take different tactics. And I think that’s actually appropriate given that we have a very diverse country with different transmission patterns and and willingness to kind of engage in-in wearing masks.”Jha was also asked about monkeypox, which on Saturday the World Health Organization declared a “public health emergency of international concern”. Would the Biden administration declare a pandemic?“Pandemics are declared by the World Health Organization,” Jha said, “and I actually applaud the World Health Organization for declaring that public health emergency of international concern. We are seeing outbreaks that are out of control in many, many parts of the world. It’s very important that we get our arms around this thing.“In the US right now, we’re looking at public health emergency as something that [the health department] might … invoke but it really depends on what does that allow us to do. Right now we have over 2,000 cases, but we have ramped up vaccinations, ramped up treatments, ramped up testing, and we’re going to continue to look at all sort of policy options. Right now, we think we can get our arms around this thing but obviously if we need further tools we will invoke them as we need them.”Jha said he thought monkeypox could be contained.Monkeypox declared global health emergency by WHO as cases surgeRead more“The way we contain monkeypox is we have a very simple, straightforward strategy on this, which is: make testing widely available. We have done that. And now testing is far more frequent and common.Answering the charge that the US was caught flat-footed by monkeypox, Jha said: “What I would acknowledge is that when we started two months ago, we had a limited supply of vaccines. We have obtained more than any other country, probably more than every other country combined. We have acted swiftly.”Asked if people should be concerned about another infectious disease, polio, which has been detected in New York, Jha said: “There is a lot of surveillance that we do for polio, there’s wastewater surveillance that goes on, we are not seeing outbreaks of polio elsewhere.“This one case has heightened everybody’s surveillance. But … CDC and the Department of Health of New York are doing an investigation to try to understand more, but I do not expect polio to become more widespread in the country, again, because so many Americans are vaccinated against this.”TopicsJoe BidenUS politicsOmicron variantCoronavirusBiden administrationDemocratsnewsReuse this content More

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      Joe Biden tests positive for Covid and has ‘mild symptoms’, White House says

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      Joe Biden tests positive for Covid and has ‘mild symptoms’, White House saysPress chief says Biden, 79, who has had two boosters, is taking antiviral Paxlovid, while first lady Jill Biden has tested negative Joe Biden tested positive for Covid on Thursday, underscoring the persistence of the highly contagious virus as new variants challenge the nation’s efforts to resume normalcy after two and a half years of pandemic disruptions.White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said that Biden was experiencing “mild symptoms” and has begun taking Paxlovid, an antiviral drug designed to reduce the severity of the disease.Biden to unveil $37bn proposal to tackle crime, including 100,000 more policeRead moreShe said Biden “will isolate at the White House and will continue to carry out all of his duties fully during that time.“He has been in contact with members of the White House staff by phone this morning, and will participate in his planned meetings at the White House this morning via phone and Zoom from the residence.”Biden, 79, is fully vaccinated, after getting two doses of the Pfizer coronavirus vaccine shortly before taking office, a first booster shot in September and an additional dose March 30.In a letter released by the White House, Kevin O’Connor, the president’s physician, described Biden’s symptoms as mild.“Mostly rhinorrhea (or runny nose) and fatigue, with an occasional dry cough, which started yesterday evening,” O’Connor wrote. He noted that he anticipates that “he will respond favorably” to Paxlovid, as “most maximally protected patients do”.First lady Jill Biden has tested negative, according to her office. The first lady is in Detroit for an event at a local school. Before the event started, Biden briefly addressed news of her husband testing positive for Covid.“My husband tested positive for Covid. I talked to him just a few minutes ago. He’s doing fine, he’s feeling good,” she said. “I tested negative this morning. I am going to keep my schedule.”The president was scheduled to deliver a speech on gun violence in Pennsylvania on Thursday. That trip has been cancelled, and he is expected to stay at his home in Wilmington, Delaware, for the weekend.While this is Biden’s first bout of coronavirus, multiple members of his administration have contracted the virus. Vice-president Kamala Harris had Covid in April, and Xavier Becerra, the secretary of health and human services, and Antony Blinken, the secretary of state, both tested positive in May.Coronavirus cases in the United States have been on the rise once again as the contagious BA.5 variant has become the dominant strain. The US has been recording as many as 150,000 new Covid cases a day, according to Johns Hopkins University.In her statement, Jean-Pierre said that the White House will provide a daily update on Biden’s status “as he continues to [work] in isolation”.TopicsJoe BidenUS politicsCoronavirusnewsReuse this content More

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      January 6 hearings return to recount 187 minutes of chaos at the Capitol

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      January 6 hearings return to recount 187 minutes of chaos at the CapitolCapitol attack committee plans to provide detailed account of insurrection and suggests this will not be final hearing The January 6 committee is returning to primetime. The House select committee investigating the Capitol insurrection will hold its eighth and final – for now, at least – public hearing on Thursday night.Like the first hearing, Thursday’s event will take place in the evening, as the panel seeks to capture the widest possible audience for its presentation. The first hearing, which was held last month, was watched by at least 20 million people.The eighth hearing will detail the 187 minutes that passed between the start and the end of the insurrection on that winter afternoon in 2021, as a mass of Donald Trump’s more extreme supporters overran the US Capitol in a vain attempt to disrupt the congressional certification of Joe Biden’s victory in the November 2020 presidential election.Democrat Elaine Luria, who will co-lead the Thursday hearing with fellow panel member and Republican Adam Kinzinger, said the committee will provide a “minute-by-minute” account of the insurrection, as Trump failed to quell the violence that left several people dead.“He didn’t act. He had a duty to act. So we will address that in a lot of detail,” Luria said Sunday. “And from that, we will build on the information that we provided in the earlier hearings.”One central committee member, Democratic chair Bennie Thompson, will not be attending the hearing in person. Thompson tested positive for coronavirus on Monday, but will chair the hearing remotely, a committee aide said.Two former Trump White House aides who resigned shortly after January 6, Matthew Pottinger and Sarah Matthews, are expected to testify on Thursday.Pottinger served in the Trump administration for four years and resigned as a deputy national security adviser, while Matthews was a White House press aide.When she announced her resignation last year, Matthews expressed dismay about the events of January 6, and she has continued to criticize Trump.After former White House aide Cassidy Hutchinson appeared before the select committee last month, Matthews came to her defense, even as some of Trump’s allies dismissed the shocking testimony as “hearsay”.“Anyone downplaying Cassidy Hutchinson’s role or her access in the West Wing either doesn’t understand how the Trump [White House] worked or is attempting to discredit her because they’re scared of how damning this testimony is,” Matthews said on Twitter at the time.Anyone downplaying Cassidy Hutchinson’s role or her access in the West Wing either doesn’t understand how the Trump WH worked or is attempting to discredit her because they’re scared of how damning this testimony is.— Sarah Matthews (@SarahAMatthews1) June 28, 2022
      Hutchinson’s testimony is expected to feature prominently in the Thursday hearing. In her appearance before the committee, Hutchinson, a former adviser to Trump chief of staff Mark Meadows, painted a damning picture of an increasingly chaotic White House led by a president determined to hold on to power, even after he was repeatedly told he had fairly lost the election, including by his own attorney general, William Barr.According to Hutchinson, Trump was aware that some of his supporters were armed on January 6, yet he still encouraged them to march to the Capitol after he spoke at a rally near the White House.Hutchinson also provided a secondhand account of Trump grabbing for the steering wheel of a vehicle in a desperate attempt to go to the Capitol with his supporters, having said at the rally “I’ll be there with you”. Instead he returned to the White House.01:42Some of Hutchinson’s testimony relied on comments she heard from Pat Cipollone, Trump’s former White House counsel. Cipollone privately spoke to the January 6 investigators shortly after Hutchinson testified, and the committee is expected to show more of his interview during the Thursday hearing.The committee had also hoped to gather more information from the US Secret Service before the Thursday hearing, about Trump and Pence’s movements on the day, but that effort is proving far more difficult than anticipated. After receiving a subpoena for all agency communications on January 5 and 6, the Secret Service turned over just one text message to the select committee, an aide to the panel confirmed.The committee has promised to continue collecting information from important witnesses as it works to compile a comprehensive report on the Capitol attack by this fall, and additional hearings are still possible later in the summer.“There is no reason to think that this is going to be the select committee’s final hearing,” a committee aide said Wednesday. “The multi-step plan, overseen and directed by the former president, to overturn the results of the election and block the transfer of power couldn’t be clearer from the information that we’ve laid out. We expect that [the panel] is going to continue telling that story.”TopicsJanuary 6 hearingsUS Capitol attackUS politicsDonald TrumpJoe BidennewsReuse this content More

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      ‘The world is counting on us’: Biden vows to tackle climate ‘emergency’ – as it happened

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      Biden has concluded his remarks in Massachusetts, where he spoke at the site of a former coal-fired power plant in Somerset that will be turned into a cable manufacturing facility for the offshore wind industry. “This Congress, not withstanding the leadership of that men and women that are here today has, failed in its duty,” Biden said. “So let me be clear: climate change is an emergency. And in the coming weeks I’m going to use the power I have as president to turn these words into formal, official government actions for the appropriate proclamations, executive orders and regulatory power that the president possesses.”“Again, it sounds like hyperbole, our children and grandchildren are counting on us,” he continued. “If we don’t keep it below 1.5 degrees centigrade, we lose it all. You don’t get to turn it around. And the world is counting on us.”Declaring “the world is counting on us,” President Joe Biden announced actions to address climate change and blamed Republicans in Congress for not doing their part to keep temperatures from rising to even more disastrous levels. At the Capitol, lawmakers heard an address from Ukraine’s first lady asking for more weapons to fight off the Russians, while senators are weighing a bill to codify same-sex and interracial marriage rights.Here are some of the highlights from today:
      A bipartisan group of senators announced a deal on reforming loopholes in the electoral college that Donald Trump tried to exploit in the lead-up to the January 6 insurrection.
      Rudy Giuliani, an attorney to Trump, has lost his appeal against a subpoena from a Georgia grand jury.
      Trump called a top Republican lawmaker in Wisconsin recently and pressed him to decertify the results of the 2020 election in the state.
      Rusty Bowers, the speaker of Arizona’s House of Representatives who testified before the January 6 committee last month, has been kicked out of the Republican party.
      John Fetterman, the Democratic nominee for Senate in Pennsylvania, gave his first interview since suffering a stroke.
      As he described his experience with pollution during the speech in Massachusetts, Biden made a surprising allusion to having cancer, which he hasn’t mentioned in the past.Biden was describing growing up near petroleum refineries, and how his mother would have to use her car’s wipers to get oil off the windshield when the weather would get cold. “That’s why I and so damn many other people I grew up have cancer”, Biden said. At 79 years old, questions about Biden’s fitness to serve as president are not new, and he’s followed his predecessors’ practice in sharing health updates from his doctor. In the most recent summary from November of last year, there was no indication Biden had cancer or any other major health issues. The closest it came was noting that “several localized non-melanoma skin cancers” were removed before he became president.The White House has outlined the steps Biden plans to take to fight climate change, which do not include the emergency declaration some of his Democratic allies have called on him to make.These include the creation of the first-ever Wind Energy Area in the Gulf of Mexico, which would cover 700,000 acres and generate enough electricity for three million homes, as well as steps to spur further wind developments off the Atlantic coast and Florida’s Gulf Coast. The Federal Emergency Management Agency will also spend $2.3 billion on infrastructure to make Americans more resilient to heat waves, floods, droughts, wildfires and other climate-driven disasters. There are also plans to help people pay for cooling costs.Biden has concluded his remarks in Massachusetts, where he spoke at the site of a former coal-fired power plant in Somerset that will be turned into a cable manufacturing facility for the offshore wind industry. “This Congress, not withstanding the leadership of that men and women that are here today has, failed in its duty,” Biden said. “So let me be clear: climate change is an emergency. And in the coming weeks I’m going to use the power I have as president to turn these words into formal, official government actions for the appropriate proclamations, executive orders and regulatory power that the president possesses.”“Again, it sounds like hyperbole, our children and grandchildren are counting on us,” he continued. “If we don’t keep it below 1.5 degrees centigrade, we lose it all. You don’t get to turn it around. And the world is counting on us.”Biden has taken Republicans in Congress to task for failing to pass legislation to fight climate change.“My message today is this: since Congress is not acting as as it should, and these guys here are,” he said, gesturing to Democratic lawmakers in attendance, before continuing, “We’re not getting many Republican votes. This is an emergency, an emergency, and I will look at it that way.”He repeated his pledge to “use my executive power to combat climate crisis in the absence of congressional action.”Republicans have indeed been unreceptive to his administration’s attempts to fight climate change and spur investment in green technology. However, Democrats were hoping to use their dominance in the House and the Senate’s reconciliation procedure to pass some proposals fighting climate change unilaterally – until Joe Manchin said last week he wouldn’t support them.President Joe Biden has started his speech in Massachusetts, where he’s set to announce measures to fight climate change after his legislative agenda to address US emissions stalled.“I come here today with a message,” Biden said as his speech began. “As president, I have a responsibility to act with urgency and resolve when our nation faces clear and present danger. And that’s what climate change is about. It is literally, not figuratively, a clear and present danger. The health of our citizens and our communities is literally at stake.”The January 6 committee will hold its last scheduled hearing tomorrow, though its investigation continues. The Guardian’s Hugo Lowell reports on the latest development in the Secret Service’s allegedly accidental deletion of text messages from the time of the attack:The Secret Service turned over just one text message to the House January 6 committee on Tuesday, in response to a subpoena compelling the production of all communications from the day before and the day of the US Capitol attack, according to two sources familiar with the matter.The Secret Service told the panel the single text was the only message responsive to the subpoena, the sources said, and while the agency vowed to conduct a forensic search for any other text or phone records, it indicated such messages were likely to prove irrecoverable.House investigators also learned that the texts were seemingly lost as part of an agency-wide reset of phones on 27 January 2021, the sources said – 11 days after Congress first requested the communications and two days after agents were reminded to back up their phones.Secret Service turned over just one text message to January 6 panel, sources sayRead moreA bipartisan group of senators has just announced a deal to reform the procedure for counting electoral votes in order to prevent the sort of meddling that former president Donald Trump tried to pull off on January 6.The lawmakers have agreed to two bills that would reform the Electoral Count Act of 1887, which governs how electoral votes are counted following a presidential election. Citing ambiguities in the law, Trump and his attorneys pushed his vice president Mike Pence to disrupt the counting of electoral votes that showed he lost the 2020 election, sparking calls for the 135-year-old law to be reformed.“Through numerous meetings and debates among our colleagues as well as conversations with a wide variety of election experts and legal scholars, we have developed legislation that establishes clear guidelines for our system of certifying and counting electoral votes for President and Vice President. We urge our colleagues in both parties to support these simple, commonsense reforms,” the group of 16 senators said in a joint statement.The first bill is called the Electoral Count Reform and Presidential Transition Improvement Act, and would fix ambiguities in the existing law while clarifying when an incoming administration can access federal resources.The Enhanced Election Security and Protection Act is the second proposal, and would up criminal penalties against people convicted of intimidating or threatening candidates, voters and poll workers, require election records to be preserved, help the US Postal Service deal with mail-in ballots and reauthorize for five years a commission that works with states to improve their voting practices.“The prospect of large-scale violence in the near future is entirely plausible,” warns a new study that looks into the chances of political violence. Ed Pilkington digs into it:One in five adults in the United States, equivalent to about 50 million people, believe that political violence is justified at least in some circumstances, a new mega-survey has found.A team of medical and public health scientists at the University of California, Davis enlisted the opinions of almost 9,000 people across the country to explore how far willingness to engage in political violence now goes.They discovered that mistrust and alienation from democratic institutions have reached such a peak that substantial minorities of the American people now endorse violence as a means towards political ends. “The prospect of large-scale violence in the near future is entirely plausible,” the scientists warn.A hardcore rump of the US population, the survey recorded – amounting to 3% or by extrapolation 7 million people – believe that political violence is usually or always justified. Almost one in four of the respondents – equivalent to more than 60 million Americans – could conceive of violence being justified “to preserve an American way of life based on western European traditions”.Most alarmingly, 7.1% said they would be willing to kill a person to advance an important political goal. The UC Davis team points out that, extrapolated to US society at large, that is the equivalent of 18 million Americans.One in five US adults condone ‘justified’ political violence, mega-survey findsRead moreJohn Fetterman, the Pennsylvania lieutenant governor and Democratic candidate for US Senate, has said he has “nothing to hide” about his health after suffering a stroke, and expressed confidence he can beat the celebrity doctor Mehmet Oz in a race key to deciding control of the chamber in November.“I would never be in this if we were not absolutely, 100% able to run fully and to win — and we believe that we are,” Fetterman told the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette in his first interview since suffering the stroke in May.The Post-Gazette reports: “Mr Fetterman, 52, said he has ‘no physical limits’, walks four to five miles every day in 90-degree heat, understands words properly and hasn’t lost any of his memory. He struggles with hearing sometimes, he said, and may ‘miss a word’ or ‘slur two together’, but he said it doesn’t happen often and that he’s working with a speech therapist.”Fetterman enjoys consistent poll leads over Oz and has dramatically outraised him, despite Oz attracting the endorsement of Donald Trump.You can read the interview here.Pete Buttigieg fended off a Republican who used a transportation hearing to ask if Joe Biden’s cabinet had discussed using the 25th amendment to remove the president from office, saying: “I’m glad to have a president who can ride a bicycle.”The transportation secretary was appearing in front of the House transportation committee on Tuesday. Amid discussion of policy, the Texas representative Troy Nehls decided to go in a more partisan direction.“We now see the mainstream media questioning President Biden’s mental state, and for good reason,” Nehls said. “Sadly, he shakes hands with ghosts and imaginary people, and he falls off bicycles. Even at the White House Easter celebration, the Easter Bunny had to guide him back into his safe place.”Aides stood behind Nehls, showing blown-up pictures.Biden, 79, fell off his bike in Delaware last month, to considerable glee on the right.He told reporters: “I’m good.”But with the president beset by domestic and international crises, some compared his awkward moment with one in 1979, when Jimmy Carter, who would turn out to be a one-term Democratic president, was attacked by a rabbit while fishing from a boat.Nehls asked: “Have you spoken to cabinet members about implementing the 25th amendment on President Biden?”Buttigieg, a keen cyclist himself, said: “First of all, I’m glad to have a president who can ride a bicycle. And, I will look beyond the insulting nature of that question and make clear to you that the president of the United States …”Nehls interrupted.Buttigieg said, “Of course not,” then said Biden was “as vigorous a colleague or boss as I have ever had the pleasure of working with”.‘Glad to have a president who can ride a bicycle’: Buttigieg dismisses Republican claims about Biden’s healthRead moreWe’re expecting a major speech from Joe Biden soon on his efforts to fight climate change, which Congress lacks the votes to deal with. That doesn’t mean lawmakers aren’t busy; they’ve heard an address from Ukraine’s first lady asking for more weapons to fight off the Russians, and senators are weighing a bill to codify same-sex and interracial marriage rights.Here’s what has happened today so far:
      Rudy Giuliani, an attorney to former president Donald Trump, has lost his appeal against a subpoena from a Georgia grand jury.
      Trump called a top Republican lawmaker in Wisconsin recently and pressed him to decertify the results of the 2020 election in the state.
      Rusty Bowers, the speaker of Arizona’s House of Representatives who spoke to the January 6 committee last month, has been kicked out of the Republican party.
      Former president Donald Trump’s legal adviser Rudy Giuliani will have to talk to a Georgia grand jury sometime next month after his legal challenge against a subpoena failed, the Associated Press reports.Earlier this month, the grand jury in Fulton county, which includes Atlanta, subpoenaed Giuliani and other members of Trump’s legal team as part of their probe into his campaign’s efforts to overturn the 2020 election results in the state, where voters chose Joe Biden.Giuliani challenged the subpoena, but as the AP reports, he didn’t seem to put much effort into the appeal, failing to show up for a court hearing where he could explain why he shouldn’t have to testify.The grand jury has also summoned Lindsey Graham, a Republican senator from South Carolina, who has been challenging his subpoena.Georgia grand jury subpoenas Trump lawyers over effort to overturn electionRead moreGetting the Respect for Marriage Act through the Democratic-led House of Representatives is one thing, but could it pass the Senate? From what reporters on Capitol Hill are saying today, it doesn’t seem impossible.The bill won the votes of all Democrats as well as 47 Republicans when it passed Congress’s lower chamber yesterday. Assuming Democrats unanimously support it in the Senate, it would need the support of 10 Republicans to overcome the inevitable filibuster blocking its passage. According to CNN, several Republican senators have already said they’d vote for it:Thom Tillis, GOP senator from NC, told me he “probably will” support bill to codify same-sex marriage. Bill might get 60 votes, GOP senators say. Vote timing in Senate is unclear.— Manu Raju (@mkraju) July 20, 2022
      Thune told me he will take a “hard look” at bill“But if and when (Schumer) brings a bill to the floor we’ll take a hard look at it. As you saw there was pretty good bipartisan support in the House yesterday and I expect there’d probably be the same thing you’d see” in Senate— Manu Raju (@mkraju) July 20, 2022
      Asked about some of his fellow Republicans saying a vote on same-sex marriage is just a messaging exercise, Rob Portman told me: It’s an “important message,” and said: “I think this is an issue that many Americans, regardless of political affiliation, feel has been resolved.”— Manu Raju (@mkraju) July 20, 2022
      Congress is working on a lot of bills at the moment as the Democratic majority tries to make the most of the time remaining before November’s midterm elections, in which they could lose control of one or both chambers. Yesterday, Lois Beckett reports that the House passed a measure to codify same-sex and interracial marriage rights – which are currently protected by a supreme court ruling that could be overturned:The US House has passed a bill protecting the right to same-sex and interracial marriages, a vote that comes amid concerns that the supreme court’s overturning of Roe v Wade could jeopardize other rights.Forty-seven House Republicans supported the legislation, called the Respect for Marriage Act, including some who have publicly apologized for their past opposition to gay marriage. But more than three-quarters of House Republicans voted against the bill, with some claiming it was a “political charade”.All 220 House Democrats supported the bill, which is expected to be blocked by Republican opposition in a politically divided Senate.US House passes bill to protect right to same-sex and interracial marriageRead more More

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      Biden unveils extreme heat plan – but doesn’t declare climate emergency

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      Biden unveils extreme heat plan – but doesn’t declare climate emergencyInitiatives are aimed at helping salvage the president’s tattered climate agenda after Joe Manchin delivered a major blow last week Facing the disintegration of his climate agenda as ferocious heatwaves hit large parts of the world, Joe Biden has unveiled a new plan to push billions of dollars to US cities and states to help them cope better with extreme heat.The president stopped short, however, of declaring a climate emergency.Biden outlined the new actions in a speech on Wednesday at a former coal plant in Massachusetts, which is now part of an offshore windfarm project.“As president, I have a responsibility to act with urgency and resolve when our nation faces clear and present danger,” Biden said. “And that’s what climate change is about. It is literally, not figuratively, a clear and present danger. The health of our citizens and our communities is literally at stake.”02:45The initiatives are aimed at helping salvage the president’s tattered climate agenda, which has endured a torrid month.Last week, Joe Manchin, a West Virginia Democratic senator who owns a coal company, appeared to rule out supporting a new clean energy bill, seemingly dooming it in the evenly split Senate.The blow arrived just two weeks after the conservative-dominated supreme court restricted the ability of the federal government to curb emissions from power plants.Biden, speaking from a lectern set up on a rock pile to an audience that included Democratic legislators, said: “Climate change is literally an existential threat to our nation and to the world. So my message today is this: since Congress is not acting as it should – and these guys here are, but we’re not getting many Republican votes – this is an emergency. An emergency. And I will look at it that way.”Alarm as fastest growing US cities risk becoming unlivable from climate crisisRead moreBiden’s actions include $2.3bn in funding to help communities prepare for heatwaves, droughts and floods, new guidance that allows the federal government to help provide cooling centers and air conditioning, and new planned offshore wind energy leases for the Gulf of Mexico coast.“Right now, there are millions of people suffering from extreme heat at home so my team is also working with the states to deploy $385m right now. For the first time, states will be able to use federal funds to pay for air conditioners in homes, set up community cooling centres in schools where people can get through these extreme heat crises.”The stakes of inaction on the climate crisis have been made starkly apparent this week, with more than 100 million Americans in grip of a dangerous heatwave that has pushed temperatures as high as 115F (46C) in parts of the country.Elsewhere, disastrous wildfires have strafed France, Spain and Portugal, and the UK has endured its first ever recorded day of 40C heat.The White House said the heatwaves showed the climate crisis is a “clear and present danger” to the US.Climate campaigners hoped Biden would declare a climate state of emergency. Karine Jean-Pierre, the White House press secretary, said that wouldn’t happen on Wednesday but added that the option is “still on the table”.The lack of such a declaration, or any sweeping ban of oil and gas drilling on public lands, is unlikely to satisfy those who have called for more vigorous action.“Biden must declare a climate emergency, ban crude oil exports and halt new fossil fuel infrastructure, including pipelines and export terminals,” said Wenonah Hauter, executive director of Food & Water Watch.“The clock is rapidly ticking towards inevitable, irreversible climate catastrophe. There is no more time to lose.”Some Democrats have urged the president to declare a national emergency, which would allow him to block crude oil imports or direct the military to work on renewable energy production.“For too long we have been waiting for a single piece of legislation, and a single Senate vote, to take bold action on our climate crisis,” a group of senators including the leading progressives Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren, wrote to Biden this week.“As a result, we urge you to put us on an emergency footing and aggressively use your executive powers to address the climate crisis.”But it is unclear whether such an extraordinary use of presidential powers, normally used in a military context, would survive if challenged in the rightwing-dominated supreme court, or if it would be enough to make a significant dent in planet-heating emissions.“Declaring a climate emergency doesn’t lower any emissions,” conceded Sheldon Whitehouse, a Democratic senator from Rhode Island. “You have to move on to acting like it’s a climate emergency, and I’m looking forward to those steps.”Biden may take further action this week by directing new regulations to cut pollution from cars, trucks and power plants.But the window of opportunity to avoid disastrous climate change is rapidly closing.Scientists have said the world must slash emissions in half this decade, and phase them out entirely by 2050, if catastrophically worse heatwaves, floods, drought and other climate impacts are to be averted. The US will fall about halfway short of such a goal absent any significant congressional action, even with presidential orders, analysts have forecast.“President Biden cannot do it alone,” said Heather Zichal, chief executive of the American Clean Power Association. “We urge Congress to get back to the table and come to a consensus on clean energy provisions that our country so desperately needs.”Biden’s remarks on Wednesday were attended by political allies including John Kerry, the special presidential envoy for climate; Massachusetts senators Warren and Ed Markey; Whitehouse of Rhode Island and Massachusetts congressmen Jake Auchincloss and Bill Keating.The president promised executive actions in the coming weeks. “When it comes to fighting climate change, I will not take no for an answer. I will do everything in my power to clean our air and water, protect our people’s health, to win the clean energy future.”In an unexpected digression, he also recalled growing up in Claymont, Delaware, near polluting oil refineries. “You had to put on your windshield wipers to get literally the oil slick off the window. That’s why I and so damn many other people I grew up have cancer.”The White House released a health summary from Biden’s doctor last November that said: “He has had several localized, non-melanoma skin cancers removed with Mohs surgery before he started his presidency.”Climate activists applauded Biden’s pledge to do more to tackle global heating but some lamented the lack of an emergency declaration.“President Biden’s announcements, while welcome, don’t even scratch the surface of what’s needed and what communities suffering most are demanding,” said Collin Rees, US program manager at Oil Change International. “Biden’s climate legacy hangs in the balance – we’re in desperate need of bold leadership, not tinkering around the edges while the world burns.”Varshini Prakash, executive director of the youth-led Sunrise Movement, added: “Young people are tired of receiving scraps from our government. President Biden must immediately declare a climate emergency, and do everything in his executive power to confront the climate crisis.”TopicsJoe BidenUS politicsExtreme weatherClimate crisisnewsReuse this content More

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      Biden to make Wednesday climate address as dangerous heat grips US and world – as it happened

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      President Joe Biden will outline his next steps to tackle climate change in an address in Somerset, Massachusetts on Wednesday, the White House announced. “The president will deliver remarks on tackling the climate crisis and seizing the opportunity of a clean energy future to create jobs and lower costs for families,” according to a statement.The president may use the trip to declare the national climate emergency The Washington Post reports his administration has been mulling. Reuters quotes a White House official as saying, “We are considering all options and no decision has been made.”President Joe Biden plans an address on climate change tomorrow, where he may announce new executive orders to curb US emissions after his attempts to achieve reductions via legislation stalled in Congress. However, he won’t declare a climate emergency, at least not yet.Here’s what else happened today:
      The January 6 committee will continue with its hearing planned for the Thursday prime-time TV hour despite its chair Bennie Thompson testing positive for Covid-19.
      The second day of Steve Bannon’s trial got underway in Washington.
      The Secret Service has lost for good text messages from 5 and 6 January 2021, when the US Capitol was attacked. The National Archives is demanding an investigation.
      Ukraine’s first lady Olena Zelenska is in Washington for meetings with the Biden administration and an address to Congress on Wednesday.
      Nancy Pelosi’s reported trip to Taiwan has prompted a warning from China.
      There are at least 120 Republicans election deniers running for office, according to an analysis by FiveThirtyEight.
      A small explosion and fire occurred at Hoover Dam, but was quickly contained.
      Following today’s revelation that the Secret Service deleted text messages from the January 6 attack and the day before, The Guardian’s Hugo Lowell reports that National Archives is now demanding an investigation:The US National Archives has asked the Secret Service to conduct an internal investigation over “erased” text messages from the day before and the day of the Capitol attack, according to a letter sent to the agency’s records management officer on Tuesday.The request marks the latest escalation of the matter after the watchdog for the Secret Service, the Department of Homeland Security inspector general, notified Congress he had sought the texts only to be told they no longer existed.In the letter sent to the Secret Service records officer, reviewed by the Guardian, the National Archives requested the agency launch an internal review and report within 30 calendar days if it finds any texts were “improperly deleted”.Secret Service told to begin an inquiry into erased January 6 text messagesRead moreJackson Women’s Health Organization, Mississippi’s only abortion clinic and the subject of the supreme court case that overturned Roe v. Wade last month, has given up its legal battle to continue operating.Reuters reports that the clinic was making a last-ditch legal effort before the state supreme court to get it to halt Mississippi’s almost total ban on abortions, but threw in the towel after the clinic’s owner sold the building. Its fate seemed sealed earlier this month after a judge rejected the clinic’s petition to halt the ban, which went into effect following last month’s ruling by the US supreme court in the case Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization.Mississippi’s only abortion clinic to close after judge leaves state law in forceRead moreUkraine’s first lady Olena Zelenska is in Washington for meetings at the White House and an address to Congress. As you can see above, she’s already met Joe and Jill Biden.Here’s what Zelenska had to say about the visit after meeting with secretary of state Antony Blinken:Feels strange – not to hear any sirens. At the @FLOTUS invitation, I arrived to the USA to discuss our needs in the fight against the aggressor. It is also the topic of the meeting with @SecBlinken. His position remains the same: independent 🇺🇦 will exist much longer than Putin. pic.twitter.com/dTUA8QtFk9— Олена Зеленська (@ZelenskaUA) July 19, 2022
      Tomorrow, she will address senators and House representatives in the Capitol. In a letter to lawmakers, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said, “We hope that all Members will take advantage of this important and timely opportunity to hear directly from First Lady Zelenska, to learn more about the terrible toll of the Russian invasion and to express our gratitude to the people of Ukraine for their fight for Democracy.”Meanwhile in Washington, a group of House Democrats was arrested in front of the supreme court after staging a demonstration in support of abortion rights.Multiple members of Congress, including @AOC, being arrested by Capitol Police for blocking traffic outside the Supreme Court in abortion rights demonstration: pic.twitter.com/fysQN1oBAw— Andrew Solender (@AndrewSolender) July 19, 2022
      Here’s where they’re being corralled. The group also includes the assistant House speaker, Katherine Clark. pic.twitter.com/2jNIRB2WtU— Andrew Solender (@AndrewSolender) July 19, 2022
      Members arrested:Dean, Velasquez, Lee, Speier, Clark, Jacobs, Ocasio-Cortez, Tlaib, Andy Levin, Carolyn Maloney, Adams, Watson Coleman, Escobar, Bush, Schakowsky, Omar & Pressley.w/ @OrianaBeLike https://t.co/pR0b0sve5u— Andrew Solender (@AndrewSolender) July 19, 2022
      Last week, the Democratic-led House approved legislation that protected abortion access nationwide, after the supreme court overturned Roe v. Wade and allowed states to ban the procedure. However, there’s no sign the legislation will be able to overcome a Republican filibuster in the Senate.House approves legislation to protect abortion access across US Read moreA small explosion and fire broke out but was quickly extinguished at Hoover Dam, which is at the center of the western United States’s massive drought.touring the #hooverdam and heard an explosion #fire pic.twitter.com/1tjWuNWBaZ— Kristy Hairston (@kristynashville) July 19, 2022
      The embankment straddling the Nevada-Arizona border holds back Lake Mead, which has dropped to its lowest level since it was full 20 years ago due to drought and climate change. Reuters reports that the blaze at Hoover Dam had been extinguished before the local fire department arrived. It is unclear if the lake’s low water level played a role in the explosion, but authorities warn that the reservoir could soon hit “dead pool” levels, when water will no longer be able to flow downstream. Former New York City mayor Bill de Blasio has ended his bid for the Democratic nomination in the state’s 10th congressional district.It’s clear the people of #NY10 are looking for another option and I respect that. Time for me to leave electoral politics and focus on other ways to serve. I am really grateful for all the people I met, the stories I heard and the many good souls who helped out. Thank you all! pic.twitter.com/gpt6V6WLUf— Bill de Blasio (@BilldeBlasio) July 19, 2022
      De Blasio, who led America’s largest city for eight years and left office with low approval ratings, was trailing in polls to represent the district that includes part of the city in the U.S. House of Representatives.The Secret Service will tell Congress it doesn’t have any new texts to give to the House subcommittee investigating the January 6 insurrection, according to Washington Post reporter Carol Leonnig. MORE NEWWWS – @SecretService will tell Congress it doesn’t have any new texts from its agents around Jan 6 attack to provide. Anything not already turned over has been purged. Its gone.— Carol Leonnig (@CarolLeonnig) July 19, 2022
      The House committee set a deadline for today for the Secret Service to hand over deleted texts that were sent among agents, Donald Trump and Mike Pence on the day before and the day of the riot. Last week, the inspector general for the Department of Homeland Security notified the committee that texts from those days had been deleted. The explanation from the Secret Service for the deletions have shifted several times, from software upgrades to device replacements. From the Guardian’s senior reporter Nina Lakhani, who reports on climate justice: As attention focuses on the extreme temperatures scorching large swathes of Europe and the US, its worth drawing attention to other parts of the world where dangerous heat and drought have also been causing misery.In Monterrey, Mexico’s third largest city where temperatures above 100F are the norm throughout the summer, residents are enduring a second month of water rationing as three dams which supply households are almost dry. Authorities are turning on taps for only six hours per day, though some residents have gone without any running water for long spells, and are forced to spend hours every day lining up at communal taps. The national water authority has declared a state of emergency across the country because of drought.According to the North American Drought Monitor, 56% of Mexico is experiencing some level of drought with northern states like Nuevo Leon (home to Monterrey), Sonora, Chihuahua, and Coahuila particularly badly due to a combination of La Niña and global heating. Most of the country’s wheat is farmed in this northern belt, which is among three crops (along with maize and rice) that make up almost half the world’s calories. All three grains are vulnerable to extreme heat and drought, in large part because industrialised agriculture favors monocropping over crop diversity.This was a little reported consequence of the punishing spring extreme heatwave in India and Pakistan, where more than a billion people faced temperatures from 100 to 122F from late March to the end of June, a period of almost 100 days. As a result, wheat yields dropped by about 15%, compounding the shortages caused by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Livestock died across the subcontinent.The number of deaths so far attributed directly to the extreme spring heat is surprisingly low, just 90, compared to more than 1100 so far in Spain and Portugal, though this is likely at least partly down to issues with counting and reporting heat deaths. (Recent floods in India and Bangladesh have led to high death tolls, but this could be because such deaths are easier to count.) It’s the monsoon now in India, so temperatures have dropped significantly – it’s only 90F in Delhi today – but the humidity is very high. Humid heat is far more dangerous than dry heat, so the death toll could rise across the Asian subcontinent without anyone paying much attention.Read more about crop scientists in Mexico developing heat and climate resilient wheat varieties here:The race against time to breed a wheat to survive the climate crisisRead moreJoe Biden is not going to declare a climate emergency when he delivers an address on climate change in Somerset, Massachusetts tomorrow, according to the Associated Press. A source told the AP that while Biden is planning to announce steps the White House is taking to address climate change, he will not declare a climate emergency. President Biden is not going to issue an emergency climate declaration this week, according to an @AP source. https://t.co/PWfms6Eq0R— Chris Megerian (@ChrisMegerian) July 19, 2022
      Earlier today, the Washington Post reported that Biden was floating the idea of declaring an emergency after senator Joe Manchin effectively blocked a spending package that would have allocated billions toward addressing the climate emergency. Manchin told Democratic leaders last week that he does not support the package, ultimately striking down its chance of passage.It’s day two of Steve Bannon’s federal trial in Washington DC as he faces charges of contempt for Congress, ignoring subpoenas from the House select committee investigating the January 6 insurrection. A lawyer for Bannon has asked the judge to delay the trial by a month so the defense team can figure out what evidence they could offer. The judge, Carl J Nichols, denied his lawyer’s request, but said he may push back the start of opening arguments a day so both teams can organize themselves. Just in: Judge Carl Nichols denies Steve Bannon’s — latest — request to delay trial, this time by a month— Hugo Lowell (@hugolowell) July 19, 2022
      Bannon’s trial began yesterday with jury selection. Attorneys have narrowed the pool down to 22 prospective, with a final 12 needed, along with two alternatives.Ohio’s supreme court has struck down the state’s 15 congressional districts, saying they were so distorted in favor of Republicans that they violated the state constitution.In a 4-3 ruling, the court gave the state legislature 30 days to come up with a new map. If the legislature fails to come up with a new plan, a GOP-controlled commission would then have another 30 days. Any new map would be in effect for the 2024 elections. After striking down the initial map Republicans passed earlier this year, the Ohio supreme court declined to intervene again ahead of the state’s primary and block a revised map. The map they struck down Tuesday was that revised plan. The plan creates 10 Republican-leaning districts and five Democratic-leaning districts, the court noted. While all 10 GOP districts are solidly Republican, three of the five Democratic ones are highly competitive, meaning Republicans could win them in a strong year for the party. Projections show Democrats would most likely win four in the state’s congressional delegation, despite winning around 47% of the statewide vote.That split violates a provision in the state constitution that prohibits maps that “unduly favors or disfavors a political party or its incumbents.” Ohio voters overwhelmingly approved adding that language to the state constitution in 2018.“Comparative analyses and other metrics show that the March 2 plan allocates voters in ways that unnecessarily favor the Republican Party by packing Democratic voters into a few dense Democratic-leaning districts, thereby increasing the Republican vote share of the remaining districts,” the court’s majority wrote. “As a result, districts that would otherwise be strongly Democratic-leaning are now competitive or Republican-leaning districts.”The three judges who dissented argued that the majority opinion sought to use a system of proportional representation, which is not required under Ohio’s constitution.Tuesday’s ruling marks the seventh time the Ohio supreme court has struck down congressional and state legislative maps this cycle. Despite all of those rulings, all of the maps struck down passed by lawmakers will be in place for at least the 2022 elections.The Republican judge blocking her party from rigging electoral districtsRead morePresident Joe Biden plans an address on climate change tomorrow, during which he could declare a national climate emergency after his attempts to get legislation lowering America’s carbon emissions through Congress stalled.Here’s what else has happened so far today:
      The January 6 committee will continue with its hearing planned for the Thursday prime-time TV hour despite its chair Bennie Thompson testing positive for Covid-19.
      The Secret Service will turn over texts to the January 6 committee that were said to have been deleted.
      Nancy Pelosi’s reported trip to Taiwan has prompted a warning from China.
      There are about 120 Republicans election deniers running for office – at least, according to an analysis by FiveThirtyEight.
      President Joe Biden will outline his next steps to tackle climate change in an address in Somerset, Massachusetts on Wednesday, the White House announced. “The president will deliver remarks on tackling the climate crisis and seizing the opportunity of a clean energy future to create jobs and lower costs for families,” according to a statement.The president may use the trip to declare the national climate emergency The Washington Post reports his administration has been mulling. Reuters quotes a White House official as saying, “We are considering all options and no decision has been made.”120. That’s the number of Republican candidates who deny the results of the 2020 election and will be on the ballot this fall, according to an analysis by FiveThirtyEight, which notes that may not be the full count.Election denying is most common in House of Representatives and governorship races, and least in secretary of state and Senate contests, according to the analysis. It’s also hard to pin down the degree to which Republican politicians refuse to accept the validity of the results of the last presidential race, since many haven’t made their views known – which FiveThirtyEight concludes means some likely believe baseless theories about the outcome, but are keeping it to themselves.Finally, the analysis finds that election denying is no surefire path to victory. Candidates who rejected the theory have in fact won 54 percent of races against an election denier, versus 36 percent for the deniers themselves. Here’s what FiveThirtyEight has to say about that dynamic:.css-knbk2a{height:1em;width:1.5em;margin-right:3px;vertical-align:baseline;fill:#C70000;} In other words, questioning the results of the 2020 election might not be a surefire path to the nomination, but it hasn’t proven to be a dealbreaker for Republican voters, either. That speaks volumes as to the overall direction the Republican Party is moving in. More

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      To avert election disaster, Democrats need to run a fiercely pro-worker campaign | Steven Greenhouse

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      To avert election disaster, Democrats need to run a fiercely pro-worker campaignSteven GreenhouseYou won’t hear this on Fox News, but Biden did a terrific job lifting America out of the pandemic-induced downturn. The nation added 8.9m jobs during Biden’s first 18 months in office If the Democrats hope to avoid disaster in this November’s elections, they need to do a far better job making their case to working-class voters. Many blue-collar Americans are understandably upset about inflation, but it’s less understandable that they give higher marks on the economy to Republicans than to Democrats, considering that President Biden and the Democrats have done far more to boost the economy and help workers.You will hardly ever hear this on Fox News, but Biden and the Democrats pushed through an emergency rescue plan that did a terrific job lifting America’s economy out of the pandemic-induced downturn. They did such a good job that millions of workers moved to higher-paying employment as the nation added 8.9m jobs during Biden’s first 18 months in office – more than in any other president’s first 18 months.TopicsJoe BidenOpinionBiden administrationDemocratsUS unionsUS politicsWorkers’ rightsUS economycommentReuse this content More

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      in World Politics

      China Will Decide Who Wins the Fight: Russia or the West

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