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      Joe Biden defends human rights record ahead of Saudi visit

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      Joe Biden defends human rights record ahead of Saudi visitPresident says he will not avoid rights issues but skirts commitment to discuss Khashoggi murder00:47Joe Biden has defended his imminent trip to Saudi Arabia, saying he will not avoid human rights issues on the final leg of his Middle East tour, despite refusing to commit to mentioning the murder of the dissident journalist Jamal Khashoggi when he meets the kingdom’s crown prince.Speaking during a news conference with the interim Israeli prime minister, Yair Lapid, in Jerusalem on Thursday, the US leader said his stance on Khashoggi’s killing was “absolutely” clear.US intelligence services concluded last year that Khashoggi’s 2018 killing at the Saudi consulate in Istanbul was approved by the powerful heir to the throne, Mohammed bin Salman. On the campaign trail, the president vowed to turn the conservative Gulf kingdom into a “pariah state”, but the turmoil in global oil markets unleashed by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has forced a U-turn.“I have never been quiet about talking about human rights,” the president said. “The reason I am going to Saudi Arabia though, is much broader, it’s to promote US interests.“And so there are so many issues at stake, I want to make clear that we can continue to lead in the region and not create a vacuum; a vacuum that is filled by China and/or Russia.”Biden embarked on his first visit to the region as president with engagements in Israel on Wednesday, a trip dominated by the threat posed to the region by the growing military capabilities of Iran and its proxies around the Middle East.Joe Biden arrives in Middle East at time of rapid changeRead moreThe Biden administration hopes that Israel’s new relationships with several Arab states – including a gradual warming of ties with Saudi Arabia, which vies with Tehran for regional hegemony – will strengthen a fledgling regional alliance against Iran.After a cursory meeting with Palestinian leaders in Bethlehem on Friday, the president will fly to the Saudi city of Jeddah with the aim of convincing Gulf oil producers to increase supply, as well as lobbying for fully integrating Israel into the emerging regional defence architecture.Iran was top of the agenda for Israeli officials on the second day of Biden’s visit, during which the president pledged that the US was prepared to use “all elements of its national power” to deny Iran nuclear weapons.The “Jerusalem declaration”, a joint communique issued by Biden and Lapid after their meeting, reaffirmed an “ironclad” US commitment to Israel’s security, as well as Israel’s right to defend itself.The two countries, however, continue to disagree on the utility of rescuing the landmark nuclear deal with Iran, abandoned by Donald Trump in 2018. Talks to revive the accord began in April 2021, but have made little progress.The Islamic Republic could still be prevented from enriching uranium to the level needed to manufacture a nuclear bomb, Biden said, and “Diplomacy is the best way to achieve this outcome”, although the US is “not going to wait forever”.Lapid, on the other hand, said: “The only thing that will stop Iran is knowing that if they continue to develop their nuclear programme, the free world will use force.”The Jerusalem declaration offered little to the Palestinians other than a brief reaffirmation of Biden’s commitment to a two-state solution to the conflict. Israel made no mention of the peace process, instead promising to improve the economy and quality of life for the 5 million people living in the occupied Palestinian territories.Biden has declined a request for an audience from the family of the Palestinian-American journalist Shireen Abu Aqleh, who the US state department concluded was accidentally killed by the Israeli army in May.The family, who accused Biden’s administration of siding with Israel by not calling for a criminal investigation, have instead been invited for talks in Washington. Protests demanding justice for Abu Aqleh are planned for Friday morning outside a US-funded hospital in East Jerusalem which Biden is scheduled to visit.Palestinian expectations for Biden’s trip to Bethlehem are low; Washington has not pressured Israel to return to the peace process, nor moved to curb Israeli settlement building in the occupied West Bank.The administration has also not fulfilled a promise to reopen a US mission to the Palestinians in Jerusalem, which was closed by Trump after he recognised the divided city as Israel’s capital in 2017.TopicsJoe BidenBiden administrationIsraelSaudi ArabiaJamal KhashoggiPalestinian territoriesIrannewsReuse this content More

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      Democratic voters say Biden could be doing a lot more for the climate crisis

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      Democratic voters say Biden could be doing a lot more for the climate crisisA Pew survey found more Americans favor stricter environmental laws and regulations – even at an economic cost More than 80% of Democrats think the government is not doing enough to tackle the climate crisis, according to a large nationwide survey that found younger voters across both parties are most frustrated with the pace of political action on green issues.Overall, Americans are largely split along party lines in how they view Joe Biden’s record on pressing climate and environmental challenges like clean water and air quality, according to the Pew Research Center survey of more than 10,000 adults.Just 15% of Republicans think the president’s climate policies are taking the country in the right direction compared with 79% of Democrats.Global dismay as supreme court ruling leaves Biden’s climate policy in tattersRead moreBut worryingly for Biden, whose popularity among his own party has fallen steeply according to recent polls, almost two-thirds of those broadly supportive Democrats think he could be doing a lot more to tackle the climate crisis. As it stands, the US is unlikely to meet its pledges to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, as Biden’s climate legislation has been stonewalled by fossil fuel friendly Democratic senator Joe Manchin of West Virginia and the entire Republican party.The political stagnation is shocking given that 71% of those polled by Pew said their community had suffered an extreme weather event in the past year. This included severe floods or storms (43%), heatwaves (42%), droughts or water shortages (31%), large wildfires (21%), and shoreline erosion due to rising sea levels (16%). Overall, more than eight in ten of those affected by extreme weather believe the climate crisis contributed to the event.The survey was conducted over the first week of May – before the supreme court’s monumental decision limiting the Environmental Protection Agency’s authority to set standards and emissions. In another sign that the conservative justices do not reflect the views of most Americans, Pew found that 72% of Americans favor requiring energy companies to use more renewable sources such as wind and solar, while 68% support linking corporate taxes to carbon emissions.The results are an indication of Biden’s struggle to translate rhetoric – he has called climate change “the existential threat to human existence as we know it” – into tangible action. Any hopes of passing significant climate legislation could be essentially snuffed out within weeks if the Republicans come out on top in the November midterms, with dire long-term implications for people suffering worsening heatwaves, droughts, floods and other impacts in the US and overseas.Yet the need for urgent transformative political action could not be clearer. The US was battered by 20 separate billion-dollar climate and weather disasters in 2021, one of the most catastrophic climate years on record, which led to at least 688 deaths, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (Noaa).After a myriad of dangerous backward steps under Donald Trump, climate action was expected to be a top priority of the Biden administration after the US rejoined the Paris climate agreement and passed a major infrastructure bill with funding for adaptation and renewables.But Biden’s Build Back Better bill, championed as the most aggressive action ever proposed to combat global heating, has been sunk by the opposition of Manchin, who holds a crucial swing vote in an evenly split US Senate.Democrats still hope to scramble about $300bn in clean energy spending in a separate bill before the Senate begins its summer recess in August, after which focus will switch to midterm elections that are expected to go badly for the party. But there is no guarantee Manchin will agree to this, given his objections to support for electric vehicles and a reluctance to do anything that sidelines fossil fuels, an industry in which he is personally invested in via a coal trading company.“If there’s people that don’t want to produce more fossils, then you got a problem,” Manchin said on Monday, citing fears that reduced oil production will further add to inflation.Scientists have said the world must cut emissions in half this decade if disastrous heating is to be avoided, and there is little chance this will happen without swift action from the US. Biden’s administration is now reportedly contemplating allowing various polluting projects, such as a gas pipeline in West Virginia, as well as oil drilling in the Gulf of Mexico and Alaska, in return for Manchin’s support to bolster renewable energy.This previously unthinkable trade-off by the White House has dismayed climate activists already critical of Biden’s call for increased oil production to bring down gasoline prices and his failure to meet a campaign promise to halt fossil fuel leases on public land.“Locking in decades of deadly, planet-heating fossil fuels is an outrageous trade that negates the benefits of an ever-weaker climate bill,” said Brett Hartl, government affairs director at the Center for Biological Diversity. “Pandering to Manchin has proven disastrous, and continuing to do so will have catastrophic consequences.”Despite Manchin’s fear mongering, according to the Pew survey 53% of Americans believe stricter environmental laws are worth any associated cost to the economy – though this is down from 65% in 2019. On this issue, the partisan divide is actually widening: three-quarters of Republicans say stricter environmental laws would hurt jobs and the economy – up 20 percentage points from 2019. Among Democrats, only 21% have a negative view of stricter environmental laws and regulations, up from 14% in 2019.There is some common ground across the political divide. The vast majority of Americans (90%) say they favor planting a trillion or so trees to absorb carbon emissions to help mitigate greenhouse gas emissions, and 79% favor tax credits to encourage businesses to develop technology to capture and store carbon.But despite record high fuel prices Biden, and whoever succeeds him in the Oval Office, has an uphill battle persuading Americans to give up gas-guzzling cars. Pew found that 55% of people oppose phasing out new gasoline cars and trucks by 2035.TopicsClimate crisisBiden administrationJoe BidenDemocratsUS politicsnewsReuse this content More

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      Biden in Israel as poll shows support for re-election bid at new low – as it happened

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      More bad news for Joe Biden on the polling front, where a mere 18% of respondents to a new Yahoo News/YouGov poll said he should run for re-election in 2024 and 64% said he should step back in favour of another Democratic candidate.Among Democrats, 41% said Biden should not run again, against 35% who still wanted him as president. The result was worse than the same poll in May, when 25% of respondents said Biden should run for a second term. Among Democrats then, the figure was 49%.Biden’s favourability rating remains stuck in the mid- to upper-30s – not good by any measure.The Yahoo/YouGove poll also contained bad news for Biden’s vice-president, Kamala Harris, who was supported by just 19% of Democrats and Democratic-leaning independents to run in Biden’s stead – behind doubty campaigners “someone else” (20%) and “not sure” (30%).Biden has said he will run again but he is already the oldest president ever inaugurated and will turn 82 shortly after the 2024 election. He has also faced his fair share of crises in his short time in office, from the economic and physical effects of the coronavirus pandemic to the threat to democracy posed by his Republican opponents, and from the chaotic withdrawal from Afghanistan to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and its effects on gas prices, food supplies and more.Such a roster of challenges would, it seems fair to say, challenge most non-Biden candidates the Democrats might be able to find.Here’s Ross Barkan with more:Joe Biden is deeply unpopular. But can Democrats find an alternative for 2024? | Ross BarkanRead morePresident Joe Biden is in Israel, where he reaffirmed Washington’s commitment to one of its top allies. Meanwhile, back home, another month of sky-high inflation data rocked the Democratic leadership and caused a key senator to warn he may not be on board for big spending bills as long as prices keep increasing.Here’s what else happened today:
      Biden saw support for his re-election plummet in a poll that said a mere 18 percent of respondents would back him in 2024.
      A suspect was arrested in the case of a girl who had to travel from Ohio to Indiana for an abortion after being raped, refuting the doubts of Ohio’s Republican attorney general.
      The main Senate candidates in Georgia brought in boatloads of money last quarter, though Democrat Raphael Warnock raised the most.
      Michigan’s Democratic governor moved to stop other states from trying to arrest people who travel there for abortions.
      The chair of the January 6 committee dropped more hints of its cooperation with the department of justice, which could potentially charge former president Donald Trump with a crime.
      Shortly after the supreme court overturned Roe v. Wade last month, the story of a 10-year-old girl who was forced to travel from Ohio to neighboring Indiana for an abortion after being raped went viral.Ohio was one of the states whose law greatly restricting access to abortions took effect after the court ruling, and news of the girl’s ordeal sparked outrage over its consequences. However, the story had its doubters, chief among them the state’s Republican attorney general Dave Yost, whom the Columbus Dispatch reports gave interviews questioning whether the story happened at all.It did indeed, the Dispatch reported today, with police arresting a 27-year-old man who confessed to twice raping the child. From their story:.css-knbk2a{height:1em;width:1.5em;margin-right:3px;vertical-align:baseline;fill:#C70000;}Gershon Fuentes, 27, whose last known address was an apartment on Columbus’ Northwest Side, was arrested Tuesday after police say he confessed to raping the child on at least two occasions. He’s since been charged with rape, a felony of the first degree in Ohio.
      Columbus police were made aware of the girl’s pregnancy through a referral by Franklin County Children Services that was made by her mother on June 22, Det. Jeffrey Huhn testified Wednesday morning at Fuentes’ arraignment. On June 30, the girl underwent a medical abortion in Indianapolis, Huhn said. While Yost had plenty to say when the story first broke, the Dispatch reported he kept his comments following the arrest brief:.css-knbk2a{height:1em;width:1.5em;margin-right:3px;vertical-align:baseline;fill:#C70000;}Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost questioned the validity of the account during an appearance on Fox News this week.
      Yost, a Republican, told Fox News host Jesse Watters that his office had not heard “a whisper” of a report being filed for the 10-year-old victim.
      “We have regular contact with prosecutors and local police and sheriffs — not a whisper anywhere,” Yost said on the show.
      Yost doubled down on that in an interview with the USA TODAY Network Ohio bureau on Tuesday, saying that the more time passed before confirmation made it “more likely that this is a fabrication.”
      “I know the cops and prosecutors in this state,” Yost said. “There’s not one of them that wouldn’t be turning over every rock, looking for this guy and they would have charged him. They wouldn’t leave him loose on the streets … I’m not saying it could not have happened. What I’m saying to you is there is not a damn scintilla of evidence.”
      On Wednesday, once news of the arraignment of the Columbus man accused in the child’s rape came, Yost issued a single sentence statement:
      “We rejoice anytime a child rapist is taken off the streets.”10-year-old rape victim forced to travel from Ohio to Indiana for abortionRead moreThe Associated Press reports a third arrest has been made related to allegations officials mishandled election equipment in a Colorado county after the 2020 election.The case centers around Tina Peters, the clerk of Mesa county who last month lost her bid to be the Republican nominee for the position of top election official in Colorado. The AP reports that her election manager turned herself in earlier this week.Here’s more from the report:.css-knbk2a{height:1em;width:1.5em;margin-right:3px;vertical-align:baseline;fill:#C70000;}Sandra Brown, who worked for Mesa County Clerk Tina Peters, turned herself in Monday in response to a warrant issued for her arrest on suspicion of conspiracy to commit criminal impersonation and attempting to influence a public servant, said Lt. Henry Stoffel of the Mesa County Sheriff’s Office. The arrest was first reported by The Daily Sentinel newspaper.
      Peters and her chief deputy, Belinda Knisley, are being prosecuted for allegedly allowing a copy of a hard drive to be made during an update of election equipment in May 2021. State election officials first became aware of a security breach last summer when a photo and video of confidential voting system passwords were posted on social media and a conservative website.
      Peters, who has become a hero to election conspiracy theorists, following the lead of former President Donald Trump, lost her bid to become the GOP candidate for Colorado secretary of state last month.
      Peters is charged with three counts of attempting to influence a public servant, criminal impersonation, two counts of conspiracy to commit criminal impersonation, one count of identity theft, first-degree official misconduct, violation of duty and failing to comply with the secretary of state.The Guardian’s Sam Levine has previously covered the saga around Peters:Election denier Tina Peters loses Colorado primary for top poll officialRead moreJill Biden’s questionable phrasing during a speech earlier this week has resulted in an apology from the first lady, Erum Salam reports:Jill Biden has apologized for remarks in a speech to the civil rights and advocacy organization UnidosUS in which she likened the diversity of Latino Americans to breakfast tacos.Speaking in Texas on Monday, the first lady said: “The diversity of this community – as distinct as the bodegas of the Bronx, as beautiful as the blossoms of Miami and as unique as the breakfast tacos here in San Antonio, is your strength.”Amid condemnation of the statement, the National Association of Hispanic Journalists said: “We are not tacos. Our heritage as Latinos is shaped by various diasporas, cultures and food traditions. Do not reduce us to stereotypes.”Biden’s press secretary, Michael LaRosa, responded: “The first lady apologizes that her words conveyed anything but pure admiration and love for the Latino community.”Republicans, however, were quick to seize on the remarks.The Texas governor, Greg Abbott, tweeted: “Breakfast tacos? This is why Texas Hispanics are turning away from the Democratic party.”‘We are not tacos’: Jill Biden criticized over Latino Americans remarkRead moreThe Guardian’s David Smith has the latest on whether the January 6 committee’s hearings will lead to Trump facing a criminal prosecution:Donald Trump is facing growing legal peril as the House January 6 committee lays out a case that appears increasingly geared to making a criminal prosecution all but inevitable.The panel’s seventh hearing on Tuesday argued that Trump instigated an attack on the US Capitol that was premeditated rather than spontaneous and that he cannot hide behind a defence of being “willfully blind”.The committee also sought to show an explosive convergence between Trump’s interests and those of far-right extremist groups, although critics said the case fell short of direct collusion.Even so, the late revelation that Trump had tried to contact a person talking to the committee about potential testimony – raising the prospect of witness tampering – was only likely to compound pressure on the Department of Justice to investigate the former president.Trouble for Trump as committee makes case Capitol attack was premeditatedRead moreChair of the January 6 committee Bennie Thompson has revealed a bit more about the body’s interactions with the justice department as it turns up more and more evidence of potentially criminal misconduct by Donald Trump around the time of the 2020 election.At yesterday’s hearing, the House committee revealed that Trump had contacted a former witness who was working with the panel. Here’s what Thompson had to say about that:CNN’s @mkraju on Trump calling witnesses: “Is it your opinion that there’s enough evidence to say that there was an attempt to intimidate these witnesses?”1/6 Cmte Chair Thompson (D-MS): “It’s highly unusual … that’s why we …put that in the hands of the Justice Department.” pic.twitter.com/hizi9wi4Wa— The Recount (@therecount) July 13, 2022
      He also talked about what of the committee’s evidence the justice department was most interested in:Bennie Thompson told us that DOJ is only interested in J6 panel’s witness testimony over fake electors issue. He said they are in talks with DOJ over establishing a process for them to come in and review the records. “That’s right,” he said when it was just about fake electors— Manu Raju (@mkraju) July 13, 2022
      President Joe Biden is in Israel right now but in an interview with the country’s Channel 12 broadcaster filed at the White House before his departure, he weighed in on the issues facing one of Washington’s top allies in the Middle East.The president kept the door open to using military force to stop Iran from getting a nuclear weapon, but said that would only be done as a “last resort”:EXCLUSIVE @POTUS interview with @N12News: committed to keeping IRGC on the foreign terrorist organizations list even if it kills the deal; willing to use force “as last resort” pic.twitter.com/jWjLO0SVQz— Yonit Levi (@LeviYonit) July 13, 2022
      He also drew a line between himself and fellow Democrats who criticize aid to Israel and claim it’s an apartheid state:More from exclusive @POTUS interview with @N12News: voices in the Democratic Party calling Israel an apartheid state are “few, and they are wrong” pic.twitter.com/CkX3XRkRSL— Yonit Levi (@LeviYonit) July 13, 2022
      Biden will on Friday travel to Saudi Arabia, but he made clear he does not expect that country to normalize relations with Israel anytime soon:Normalisation between Israel and Saudi Arabia “will take time” @POTUS to @N12News: pic.twitter.com/4GBnv92B0A— Yonit Levi (@LeviYonit) July 13, 2022
      Steve Bannon, a former top advisor to Donald Trump, has tried again and again to delay his trial on contempt of Congress charges for ignoring a subpoena from the January 6 committee.The Guardian’s Hugo Lowell reports that his latest bid has failed:New: Former Trump strategist Steve Bannon makes new motion to delay his contempt of Congress trial date of July 18 — noting Jan. 6 committee’s mention of him at hearing yesterday. Judge Nichols though said he could seat jury and then assess if trial needed to be delayed.— Hugo Lowell (@hugolowell) July 13, 2022
      A brief look at Bannon’s attempts to stay out of the courtroom:Bannon suffers setback as judge rejects delaying contempt of Congress trialRead moreCongress held two hearings today on the impact of last month’s landmark supreme court decision overturning the constitutional right to abortion, in which advocates for and against the procedure made their case to House and Senate lawmakers.Here are some highlights:A Missouri lawmaker worried the state’s regulations would mean doctors and women alike would face jail for seeking out the procedure:MI State Sen. @MalloryMcMorrow (D) on impact of Roe’s reversal if a 1931 law making abortion a felony “with no exception for age, rape, or incest” goes into effect:“Not only would doctors and medical professionals be sent to jail, but so too would countless women and girls.” pic.twitter.com/obFeJBkjLv— The Recount (@therecount) July 13, 2022
      And a Georgia state representative said the burden of abortion bans would hit Black women and racial minorities the hardest:“Our criminal legal system is really good at locking up Black and brown folks and … will likely believe Karen, but not believe Keisha when she says she had a miscarriage.”— Georgia State Rep. Shannon (D) on women who have miscarriages mistakenly being prosecuted for abortions pic.twitter.com/Wb7SlDKXbi— The Recount (@therecount) July 13, 2022
      Anti-abortion lawyer Erin Hawley, wife of Republican senator Josh Hawley, batted away pro-abortion talking points:Sen. Josh Hawley’s (R-MO) wife Erin Hawley, who worked with the state of Mississippi on Dobbs v. Jackson, asked how the anti-abortion movement is pro-women:“Babies can be female as well, so it’s definitely pro-women in that sense.” pic.twitter.com/4GPzNbvQUR— The Recount (@therecount) July 13, 2022
      As did Roger Marshall, Kansas’s Republican Senator:“Members will imply today that carrying a baby to term is more dangerous than an abortion. So, using their logic, should we abort every baby? Should we stop all childbearing?”— Sen. Roger Marshall (R-KS) during hearing on abortion rights following Roe v. Wade reversal pic.twitter.com/R194o94XJo— The Recount (@therecount) July 13, 2022
      More bad news for Joe Biden on the polling front, where a mere 18% of respondents to a new Yahoo News/YouGov poll said he should run for re-election in 2024 and 64% said he should step back in favour of another Democratic candidate.Among Democrats, 41% said Biden should not run again, against 35% who still wanted him as president. The result was worse than the same poll in May, when 25% of respondents said Biden should run for a second term. Among Democrats then, the figure was 49%.Biden’s favourability rating remains stuck in the mid- to upper-30s – not good by any measure.The Yahoo/YouGove poll also contained bad news for Biden’s vice-president, Kamala Harris, who was supported by just 19% of Democrats and Democratic-leaning independents to run in Biden’s stead – behind doubty campaigners “someone else” (20%) and “not sure” (30%).Biden has said he will run again but he is already the oldest president ever inaugurated and will turn 82 shortly after the 2024 election. He has also faced his fair share of crises in his short time in office, from the economic and physical effects of the coronavirus pandemic to the threat to democracy posed by his Republican opponents, and from the chaotic withdrawal from Afghanistan to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and its effects on gas prices, food supplies and more.Such a roster of challenges would, it seems fair to say, challenge most non-Biden candidates the Democrats might be able to find.Here’s Ross Barkan with more:Joe Biden is deeply unpopular. But can Democrats find an alternative for 2024? | Ross BarkanRead moreJoe Biden has said the US is committed to Israel’s security, on arriving in Tel Aviv for the first leg of a three-day visit to the Middle East, a trip focused on deepening the majority Jewish state’s ties with the Arab world as the region faces a common foe in Iran.The president was greeted by the Israeli president, Isaac Herzog, and caretaker prime minister, Yair Lapid, on Air Force One’s arrival at Ben Gurion airport on Wednesday afternoon, fist-bumping rather than shaking hands with Israeli officials on the tarmac over what the White House said was concern over rising Covid cases.Ahead of Biden’s trip, senior Israeli officials briefed reporters that the two countries will issue a broad-ranging communique titled the “Jerusalem Declaration”, which will take a tough stance on Iran’s nuclear programme, and reaffirm Israel’s right to defend itself.In his opening remarks, Biden recalled that his first visit to the country had been as a young senator in 1973, just a few weeks before the Yom Kippur war with Egypt and Syria broke out. At that time, Israel and imperial Iran were still allies, and Egypt and Jordan were still hostile to the majority Jewish state.“We’ll continue to advance Israel’s integration into the region and the relationship between the US and Israel is deeper and stronger in my view than it’s ever been,” the president said.Air Force One will make a first direct flight from Israel to Saudi Arabia amid efforts to build a relationship between the Jewish state and the conservative Gulf kingdom, which does not officially recognise Israel’s existence.Full story:Biden commits to Israel’s security as he embarks on Middle East tourRead moreAnother sentence has been handed down against a January 6 rioter, in this case a Maryland man who pled guilty to charges related to striking a police officer with a lacrosse stick that had a Confederate battle flag attached.He was ordered to serve five months in prison, according to the AP: .css-knbk2a{height:1em;width:1.5em;margin-right:3px;vertical-align:baseline;fill:#C70000;} U.S. District Judge Christopher Cooper also sentenced David Alan Blair, to 18 months of supervised release after his prison term and ordered him to pay $2,000 in restitution, said William Miller, a spokesman for the U.S. Attorney’s office for the District of Columbia.
      Federal prosecutors recommended sentencing Blair to eight months in prison followed by three years of supervised release.
      Blair’s attorney, Terrell Roberts III, asked for a sentence of probation.
      Blair, 27, left his home in Clarksburg, Maryland, and started driving to Washington, D.C., after the riot erupted at the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021. Shortly before 6 p.m., Blair encountered a line of Metropolitan Police Department officers on the Capitol’s West Lawn and refused to heed their commands to leave the area, prosecutors said.
      A police officer’s body camera captured Blair walking in front of the police line and yelling, “Hell naw. Quit backing up. Don’t be scared. We’re Americans.”
      Blair was arrested after he pushed his lacrosse stick against an officer’s chest.
      The officer responded to the push by striking Blair three times in the head with a baton, drawing blood and giving him a concussion, according to Blair’s attorney.The race for the Senate seat in Georgia currently occupied by Democrat Raphael Warnock is among those considered pivotal to deciding who controls the chamber following November’s midterm elections, and the incumbent seems to be prevailing, at least when it comes to money.As the Associated Press reports, Warnock raised $17.2 million in the second quarter running from April through June, much more than the $6.2 million Republican Herschel Walker brought in.From the AP’s report:.css-knbk2a{height:1em;width:1.5em;margin-right:3px;vertical-align:baseline;fill:#C70000;}The dueling Senate campaign numbers underlined two truths. Georgia is again going to be one of the most expensive races to run for office in 2022, and Democrats are building a strong fundraising advantage.
      Like Warnock, Democrat Stacey Abrams heavily outraised incumbent Republican Brian Kemp in the race for governor, collecting almost $50 million compared to the $31 million Kemp has brought in over a longer period. Abrams and Warnock plan to run closely linked campaigns, echoing many of the same themes.
      Warnock is one of several Democratic Senate incumbents in swing states who is trying to cling to their seat amid President Joe Biden’s deep unpopularity. Republicans had long dominated statewide races until Georgia helped elect Biden to the presidency and enabled Democrats to control the Senate by electing Warnock and fellow Democrat Jon Ossoff in a January 2021 runoff. More

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      Biden’s Hyperbolic Fawning Before the CIA

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      Joe Biden is deeply unpopular. But can Democrats find an alternative for 2024? | Ross Barkan

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      Joe Biden is deeply unpopular. But can Democrats find an alternative for 2024?Ross BarkanFor now, Biden is emboldened. No prominent Democrat will cross him and he will feel especially motivated if Trump is back on the campaign trail The Democrats find themselves with a 2024 conundrum. Joe Biden, the party’s standard-bearer, is widely disliked. A new poll found that a 64% of Democrats would want a candidate other than Biden to seek the nomination in two years. Rapid inflation has eaten away at the 79-year-old president’s popularity and he is viewed as increasingly out of touch, a vestige of another era that many voters want to leave behind.At the same time, Biden will easily win a Democratic primary if he runs again. Sitting presidents are rarely forced aside. The top candidates in a hypothetical primary don’t want to take him on – almost all of them ruled out the idea of waging a direct challenge. This is understandable, since no single governor or senator has the ability to defeat Biden, one-on-one. Democrats look warily to examples like Ted Kennedy, who ran a primary against President Jimmy Carter and was soundly beaten. Carter went on to lose the general election, in 1980, to Ronald Reagan.What should be done? In an ideal world, Biden would recognize that he’ll turn 82 shortly after election day in 2024. There are plenty of Americans who are vigorous at that age, but none of them are governing large states or nations. Biden could fully deliver on the promise of his 2020 campaign that he would defeat Donald Trump and be a bridge to the next generation of Democrats. In not seeking another term, he could declare victory on a host of matters, like overseeing much-needed infrastructure funding and finally ending the war in Afghanistan. There are plenty of American presidents who have done less than Biden in one term.If Biden decides against another term, there will be a healthy open primary for the nomination. One problem for the Democrats is that the obvious frontrunner will be Biden’s vice-president, Kamala Harris. Though his poll numbers are slipping, Biden can still make the credible case that he can defeat Donald Trump a second time if Trump chooses to run again. Harris’s polling numbers are as frail as Biden’s, and she ran a very poor campaign for the presidency in 2019. Harris is simultaneously well-positioned to defeat any Democrat who takes her on, and is poorly suited for a general election, where she’d carry all the baggage of the Biden years without being able to summon the memory of Barack Obama, who Biden served with for eight years. A Kamala Harris 2024 campaign, for Democrats, could end up the worst of all worlds.Ideally – and this would not happen, because Harris is ambitious – Democrats would find a way to hold an open primary without any of the candidates tied directly to the Biden administration. Beyond Biden, there are a growing number of Democrats across America who could be viable in a general election against Trump or Florida’s governor, Ron DeSantis, the most politically potent Republican hovering around 2024 right now. If they win re-election, Georgia senator Raphael Warnock and Michigan’s governor, Gretchen Whitmer, could be top contenders, having won multiple times on forbidding swing turf. Warnock would be particularly strong as a charismatic Black candidate – he was a prominent pastor – with the potential to recreate Obama’s multiracial coalition. Colorado’s governor, Jared Polis, assuming he survives his 2022 re-election campaign, is another purple-state Democrat who would be an intriguing national candidate, having made a name for himself by defying liberals on unpopular Covid restrictions.Part of Harris’s weakness is that, as a California senator, she was never battle-tested in a state where Democrats don’t dominate. Both JB Pritzker, the governor of Illinois, and Gavin Newsom, the governor of California, have the Harris problem: they run states where Republicans are increasingly impotent. As executives, they can argue, unlike legislators, they have to make tough decisions each day that affect millions of people. Pritzker is attempting to be a national leader on gun control and Newsom is taking on DeSantis directly, running ads in Florida promoting California as a place that won’t infringe on abortion rights and meddle in the classroom.Progressives don’t have the equivalent of a Bernie Sanders, who is not going to run again. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is unlikely to run in 2024, when she will just turn 35, the age to be legally president. Like Ocasio-Cortez, Ro Khanna, a former Sanders campaign co-chair, is in the House, which is a historically tough place to mount a successful presidential bid. Both, though, could be strong future candidates, particularly if they win Senate seats.For now, Biden is emboldened. No prominent Democrat will cross him and he will feel especially motivated if Trump is back on the campaign trail. Biden and Trump crave a rematch, even though each political party would be better off if both men moved on.
      Ross Barkan is a New York-based journalist
      TopicsJoe BidenOpinionDemocratsUS elections 2024US politicscommentReuse this content More

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      January 6 hearings: Trump tried to contact witness, Cheney says – live

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      Hi there, it’s Maanvi Singh – taking over the blog for the next few hours. John Bolton, the former national security advisor, had an interesting reaction to today’s revelations. In response to CNN anchor Jake Tapper’s reflection that “one doesn’t have to be brilliant to attempt a coup”, Bolton responded that he disagrees, “as somebody who has helped plan” coups. Jake Tapper: “One doesn’t have to be brilliant to attempt a coup.”John Bolton: “I disagree with that. As somebody who has helped plan coup d’etat, not here, but other places, it takes a lot of work.” pic.twitter.com/REyqh3KtHi— Justin Baragona (@justinbaragona) July 12, 2022
      After the hearing concluded, Capitol insurrectionist Stephen Ayres approached some of the law enforcement officers who defended the building on January 6 and were present for today’s proceedings.Ayres was seen shaking hands with Aquilino Gonell, a US Capitol Police sergeant who was beaten during the insurrection and can no longer work in law enforcement because of his injuries.But one of the law enforcement officers who spoke to Ayres, former Metropolitan police department officer Michael Fanone, said he was unmoved by the man’s remorse.“That apology doesn’t do shit for me. I hope it does shit for him,” Fanone told the AP.I asked MPD office Fanone if he accepts Ayers apology and he said: “That apology doesn’t do shit for me, I hope it does shit for him.” https://t.co/iEvjkYotDa— Farnoush Amiri (@FarnoushAmiri) July 12, 2022
      In a bizarre, angry and “unhinged” White House meeting on 18 December 2020, outside advisers to Donald Trump screamed insults at presidential aides who were resisting their plan to seize voting machines and name a special counsel in pursuit of Trump’s attempt to overturn the election.The meeting – which the House January 6 committee in its public hearing on Tuesday described as a “heated and profane clash” – was held between those who believed the president should admit he lost the election to Joe Biden, and a group of outsiders referred to by some Trump advisers as “Team Crazy”.They included Trump’s personal lawyer, Rudy Giuliani; the retired lieutenant general Michael Flynn, Trump’s former national security adviser; and a lawyer for his campaign team, Sidney Powell.In testimony to the House January 6 committee played at the hearing, Giuliani said that at the meeting he had called the White House lawyers and aides who disagreed with that plan “a bunch of pussies”.Eric Herschmann, a White House lawyer, said that Flynn “screamed at me that I was a quitter and kept standing up and turning around and screaming at me. I’d sort of had it with him so I yelled back, ‘Either come over or sit your effing ass back down.’”Trump allies ‘screamed’ at aides who resisted seizing voting machines, January 6 panel hearsRead moreCommittee member Jamie Raskin, who co-led today’s hearing with Stephanie Murphy, condemned Donald Trump’s actions on January 6 in his closing statement.“American carnage: that’s Donald Trump’s true legacy. His desire to overthrow the people’s election and seize the presidency, interrupting the counting of electoral college votes for the first time in American history, nearly toppled the constitutional order and brutalized hundreds and hundreds of people,” Raskin said.“The Watergate break-in was like a cub scout meeting compared to this assault on our people and our institutions.”Raskin argued that the most important element of the January 6 hearings is determining what actions can be taken now to prevent similar violence in the future.“The crucial thing is the next step — what this committee, what all of us will do to fortify our democracy against coups, political violence and campaigns to steal elections away from the people,” Raskin said.“We need to defend both our democracy and our freedom with everything we have to declare that this American carnage ends here and now.”In her closing statement, Liz Cheney also shared additional footage from Pat Cipollone’s interview with the committee behind closed doors on Friday.In the clip, Cipollone said that he and a number of other senior White House officials were urging Donald Trump to call off the insurrection on January 6.“I felt it was my obligation to continue to push for that. And others felt it was their obligation as well,” Cipollone said.Asked whether it would have been possible for Trump to make some kind of public statement shortly after the insurrection started to call off the violence, Cipollone said yes, it would have been possible. Trump refused to do so for hours.Cheney noted that Cipollone’s testimony will feature prominently in the committee’s hearing next week, which is expected to focus on Trump’s actions and words as the insurrection unfolded.Liz Cheney, the Republican vice-chair of the January 6 committee, said that Donald Trump himself tried to contact one of the witnesses in the investigation.According to Cheney, the witness, who has not yet been publicly revealed as a participant in the committee’s investigation, declined the call.Instead, the witness informed their lawyer about Trump’s attempted call. The lawyer then informed the January 6 committee, who passed the information along to the justice department.“Let me say one more time: we will take any efforts to influence witness testimony very seriously,” Cheney said.Cheney warned at the last hearing that at least two witnesses had been contacted by Trump allies urging them to stay loyal to the former president in their testimony to the committee.Those efforts raise questions about potential witness tampering, which could open Trump and his allies up to criminal charges.Jason Van Tatenhove, a former spokesperson for the far-right extremist group Oath Keepers, said the Capitol insurrectionists had planned “an armed revolution” on January 6.He noted that the insurrectionists set up a gallows for Mike Pence, as the vice-president oversaw the congressional certification of Joe Biden’s victory in the 2020 election.“I mean, people died that day,” Van Tatenhove said. “This could have been the spark that started a new civil war, and no one would have won there.”Capitol insurrectionist Stephen Ayres said his life has changed significantly since January 6. He lost his job and had to sell his house, in addition to pleading guilty to a federal charge.“It changed my life — not for the good. Definitely not for the better,” Ayres said. Asked how he feels when he sees Donald Trump continuing to peddle lies about widespread fraud in the 2020 election, Ayres said, “It makes me mad because I was hanging on every word.”Stephen Ayres, who participated in the Capitol insurrection and has pleaded guilty to one federal charge of disorderly conduct inside a restricted building, said he closely followed Donald Trump’s lies about the 2020 election over social media.Liz Cheney, the Republican vice-chair of the January 6 committee, asked Ayres whether it would have made a difference to him if he knew that Trump had no evidence of widespread fraud in the election.“Oh, definitely,” Ayres said. “Who knows? I may not have come down here then.” Ayres said Trump had gotten “everybody riled up” by telling his supporters to come to Washington on January 6, as Congress certified Joe Biden’s victory in the election.“We basically just followed what he said,” Ayres said.Asked when he decided to leave the Capitol on January 6, Ayres said he departed after seeing Trump’s tweet asking his supporters to leave the building. “Basically, when President Trump put his tweet out, we literally left right after that come out,” Ayres said. He added that he might have left before then if Trump had sent his tweet earlier.Jason Van Tatenhove, a former spokesperson for the far-right extremist group Oath Keepers, said he decided to leave the organization after he heard members suggest that the Holocaust wasn’t real. (That is, of course, a baseless lie.)“I can tell you that they may not like to call themselves a militia, but they are. They’re a violent militia,” Van Tatenhove told the January 6 committee.The Oath Keepers were one of several violent militia groups that helped orchestrate the violence on January 6, alongside the Proud Boys and the Three Percenters.Brad Parscale, a former senior campaign adviser to Donald Trump, said he felt “guilty” about helping him win election in the days after the Capitol insurrection.Parscale described Trump as “a sitting president asking for civil war,” in reference to his efforts to disrupt the congressional certification of Joe Biden’s victory.Responding to Parscale’s text message, fellow Trump adviser Katrina Pierson said, “You did what you felt right at the time and therefore it was right.”Parscale responded, “Yeah, but a woman is dead.” He later added, “If I was Trump and I knew my rhetoric killed someone.”Pierson replied, “It wasn’t the rhetoric.”“Katrina,” Parscale said. “Yes it was.”The committee identified 10 Republican House members who attended a White House meeting on December 21 to discuss options for overturning the results of the 2020 election.According to the committee, those members were:
      Brian Babin
      Andy Biggs
      Matt Gaetz
      Louie Gohmert
      Paul Gosar
      Andy Harris
      Jody Hice
      Jim Jordan
      Scott Perry
      Marjorie Taylor Greene (then a congresswoman-elect)
      In his closed-door testimony before the January 6 committee, Pat Cipollone, Donald Trump’s former White House counsel, applauded the actions of Vice-President Mike Pence on that violent day.Despite intense pressure from Trump and some of his allies, Pence refused to go along with the then-president’s plans to interfere with the congressional certification of Joe Biden’s victory.After the Capitol attack, Pence returned to the Senate chamber on January 6 to finish the certification process, clearing the way for Biden to take the oath of office.“I think the vice-president did the right thing. I think he did the courageous thing,” Cipollone told investigators on Friday.“I think he did a great service to this country. And I think I suggested to somebody that he should be given the Presidential Medal of Freedom for his actions.”Committee member Stephanie Murphy shared a draft tweet written by Donald Trump encouraging his supporters to march to the Capitol on January 6.“I will be making a Big Speech at 10AM on January 6th at the Ellipse (South of the White House),” the draft tweet says. “Please arrive early, massive crowds expected. March to the Capitol after. Stop the Steal!!”The draft tweet, obtained by the committee from the National Archives, was undated, but it was stamped with the words “president has seen”.”PRESIDENT HAS SEEN”@January6thCmte obtained drafted, unsent tweet. pic.twitter.com/yYg3sKFv96— CSPAN (@cspan) July 12, 2022
      Murphy said, “The evidence confirms that this was not a spontaneous call to action, but rather a deliberate strategy decided upon in advance by the president.”The committee also showed messages from some of the January 6 rally organizers indicating that they knew of the plans to march to the Capitol but kept them quiet.Rally organizer Kylie Kremer said in one message that Trump was just going to call for the march to the Capitol “unexpectedly”. The January 6 hearing resumed after a short break, and committee member Jamie Raskin shared additional information about collaboration between far-right extremist groups in the weeks leading up to the Capitol attack.Raskin displayed a Facebook post written by Oath Keepers leader Kelly Meggs on 19 December, the same day that Donald Trump sent a tweet encouraging his supporters to come to Washington on January 6 for a “wild” event.In the post, Meggs said he had organized an “alliance” between the Oath Keepers and two other far-right militia groups, the Three Percenters and the Proud Boys.“We have decided to work together and shut this shit down,” Meggs said in the post.Raskin said the committee had obtained phone records showing that Meggs spoke with Proud Boys leader Enrique Tarrio for several minutes later that afternoon.“The very next day, the Proud Boys got to work,” Raskin said. More

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      US military kills Islamic State leader in Syria airstrike

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      US military kills Islamic State leader in Syria airstrikeMaher al-Agal, said to be responsible for developing networks outside Iraq and Syria, was killed in a drone strike The US military killed a leader of the Islamic State on Tuesday in an airstrike in Syria, Joe Biden said.Maher al-Agal, identified by the Pentagon as one of the top five Islamic State leaders and the leader of the Islamic State in Syria, was killed in a drone strike in Jindayris in north-west Syria.“His death in Syria takes a key terrorist off the field and significantly degrades the ability of [the Islamic State] to plan, resource, and conduct their operations in the region,” the president said. “It sends a powerful message to all terrorists who threaten our homeland and our interests around the world. The United States will be relentless in its efforts to bring you to justice.”Suspected Islamist attack frees hundreds of prisoners in NigeriaRead moreUS Central Command said in a news release that an unidentified senior official in the Islamic State was also seriously injured in the strike that killed Agal.The Pentagon said an “initial review” indicated there were no civilian casualties, though it wasn’t possible to immediately confirm that information.Agal was “responsible for aggressively pursuing the development of Isis networks outside … Iraq and Syria”, according to US Central Command.The Islamic State at the height of its power controlled more than 40,000 sq miles stretching from Syria to Iraq and ruled over 8 million people.While the group’s territorial state collapsed in 2019, its leaders have turned to guerrilla tactics and been able to “efficiently restructure themselves organizationally”, according to the Washington-based Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, a nonpartisan thinktank.The strike on Agal comes months after the leader of the Islamic State, Abu Ibrahim al-Hashimi al-Qurayshi, killed himself during a raid of his hideout by American special forces.The Pentagon said Qurayshi blew himself up along with members of his family.TopicsIslamic StateUS militarySyriaUS politicsJoe BidenReuse this content More

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      January 6 panel to examine Trump’s ties to extremist groups in latest hearing – live

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      The January 6 committee was originally expected to hold another hearing on Thursday detailing Donald Trump’s response to the insurrection as it unfolded.But a committee aide said yesterday that the panel would hold only one hearing this week, and members are instead expected to reconvene next week.The aide said the delay was meant to give committee members an opportunity to review “new and important information” that has been received “on a daily basis” as the hearings unfold.But the committee has not provided any further details about the next hearing, which could be the panel’s last hearing for the time being.Donald Trump’s former top strategist, Steve Bannon, suffered heavy setbacks in his contempt of Congress case on Monday after a federal judge dismissed his motion to delay his trial, scheduled for next week, and ruled he could not make two of his principal defences to a jury.The flurry of adverse rulings from District of Columbia district judge Carl Nichols – a Trump appointee – marked a significant knock back for Bannon, who was charged with criminal contempt after he ignored a subpoena last year from the House January 6 select committee investigating the attack on the US Capitol by extremist Trump supporters in 2021.Nichols refused in federal court in Washington DC, to delay Bannon’s trial date set for next Monday, saying that he saw no reason to push back proceedings after he severely limited the defences that the former Trump aide’s lawyers could present to a jury.The defeats for Bannon stunned his lead lawyer, David Schoen, who asked, aghast: “What’s the point of going to trial if we don’t have any defences?”Read the Guardian’s full report:Bannon suffers setback as judge rejects delaying contempt of Congress trialRead moreToday’s January 6 hearing is expected to feature clips from the select committee’s interview last week with Pat Cipollone, who served as Donald Trump’s White House counsel.Cipollone met with investigators behind closed doors for more than eight hours on Friday, after he was subpoenaed by the committee last month.Jamie Raskin, who will co-lead today’s hearing with Stephanie Murphy, said Cipollone corroborated key elements of the testimony already heard by the committee. That includes the testimony from Cassidy Hutchinson, a former aide to Trump’s White House chief of staff, Mark Meadows.“Cipollone has corroborated almost everything that we’ve learned from the prior hearings,” Raskin told NBC News today. “I certainly did not hear him contradict Cassidy Hutchinson. … He had the opportunity to say whatever he wanted to say, so I didn’t see any contradiction there.”Hutchinson’s explosive testimony at a committee hearing last month included detailed descriptions of Trump’s outrage on January 6 and in the weeks leading up to the Capitol attack, as he peddled lies about widespread fraud in the 2020 election.According to Hutchinson, Trump was informed that some of his supporters were carrying weapons on January 6 and still told them to march to the Capitol, as lawmakers met to certify Joe Biden’s victory in the election. Hutchinson said that Trump planned to go to the Capitol with his supporters and tried to grab for the steering wheel of his car when his team told him that he would instead return to the White House after his speech on January 6.Ex-White House aide delivers explosive public testimony to January 6 panelRead moreAn aide to the January 6 committee said the members would focus on a meeting held on 18 December 2020, with Donald Trump and members of his legal team, including Rudy Giuliani and Sidney Powell.At that point, there was a growing schism within Trump’s inner circle between those who believed it was time for the president to accept his electoral defeat and those who pushed even more radical actions such as seizing voting machines or appointing a special counsel to investigate the election.Hours after the meeting, Trump sent a tweet that Murphy perceived as a “siren call” to militia groups that 6 January 2021 would be the “last stand” in a sprawling effort to overturn the results of an election he lost.“Big protest in DC on January 6th,” Trump wrote in that December tweet. “Be there, will be wild!”The tweet was a “pivotal moment that spurred a change of events including a pre-planning by the Proud Boys”, the aide said.Capitol attack panel to examine role of far-right groups in January 6 violenceRead moreGreetings from Washington, live blog readers.The House select committee investigating the January 6 attack on the Capitol will hold its next public hearing this afternoon.The panel will examine Donald Trump’s links to far-right extremist groups like the Proud Boys and the Oath Keepers, whose members participated in the January 6 insurrection.Committee members have said the hearing will particularly focus on Trump’s 19 December tweet urging his supporters to come to Washington for a “wild” event on 6 January, the day that Congress was scheduled to certify Joe Biden’s victory in the 2020 election.Committee member Stephanie Murphy, who will lead today’s hearing alongside Jamie Raskin, said Sunday that Trump’s tweet served as a “siren call” to far-right extremists.“People will hear the story of that tweet and then the explosive effects it had in Trump world and specifically among the domestic violence extremist groups, the most dangerous political extremists in the country at that point,” Raskin said on Sunday.The hearing will get under way at 1pm ET, so stay tuned.Here’s what else is happening today:
      The Senate judiciary committee is holding a hearing on the end of Roe. The lieutenant governor of Illinois, Juliana Stratton, will testify alongside four other witnesses.
      Biden is meeting with the Mexican president, Andrés Manuel López Obrador. The two leaders will discuss “their visions for North America and their efforts to address global challenges such as food security, continued cooperation on migration, and joint development efforts”, per the White House.
      The White House will host the Congressional Picnic this afternoon. After the picnic, Biden will fly from Washington to Jerusalem.
      The blog will have more updates and analysis coming up. More