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      For US democracy to survive, it needs progressives like Sanders and AOC | Judith Levine

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      In France, more than 200 candidates dropped out of their races to consolidate the left-center vote and defeat the extreme right. In Israel, Labor and the leftwing Meretz party are merging to offer “a real alternative to the path of the failed and dangerous government”.And in the US, the Democrats are on a death march behind the zombie Joe Biden, more worried about looking disunited than winning the election.They are disunited – and that may be their last hope. If they’re going to try to save democracy, Biden’s stated campaign goal, they must look to the faction they’ve distanced themselves from: the left. And if the left cares about democracy, it needs to get onboard with the Democrats.The only excitement that the Democrats have generated since Barack Obama’s presidency has come from its further-left members: people such as Bernie Sanders, the Vermont independent senator, and erstwhile Democrat; Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, the New York City representative; and Jamie Raskin, the left-of-center Maryland representative, who brilliantly orchestrated Donald Trump’s impeachment for attempting to overturn the election.Yet the party establishment is intent on sidelining its progressive wing. Before the 2020 elections, the Democratic congressional campaign committee changed its rules to cut business ties with any consultant who worked with primary challengers – who were coming, not coincidentally, from the left. The party has sat on its hands as the rightwing American Israel Public Affairs Committee (Aipac) pours $100m into defeating seven members of Congress’s progressive “Squad” because of their vocal opposition to Israel’s war on Gaza.All this effort represents a suicidal denial of the politics of the Democratic base. More than three-quarters of Democrats oppose the war. As many as 750,000 presidential primary voters chose “uncommitted”, “no preference” or a blank ballot to protest against Biden’s unconditional support for Israel. In early June, the Nation predicted that the uncommitted delegates, a substantial number of them from the battleground states of the upper midwest, would be a critical constituency at the Democratic convention. If Biden finally throws in the towel, that faction will become much more critical.Pundits are calling the trouncing of Jamaal Bowman, the progressive Democratic incumbent from New York’s congressional district 16, a sign of Democratic voters’ swing to the center, even though it was money from the right – Aipac’s $15m to his moderate primary opponent – that defeated him. Yet elsewhere in New York state, progressives, including socialists, running as Democrats handily fought off primary challenges, thanks not to the Democratic party but to the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) and the Working Families party (WFP).A 2022 Pew poll found that Democrats under 30 view socialism positively at twice the rate as they favor capitalism. In fact, all Democrats under 65 – Black and brown people more than white, women more than men, poor more than rich – have a better opinion of socialism than of capitalism.While the Republicans cede all power to the radical right, the Democrats, since Bill Clinton’s “triangulation” of the party in the 1990s, have clung to the middle. By simultaneously marginalizing the left and depending on its votes, the party has courted only mistrust and cynicism from the social justice movements whose ideas, in milder form, they eventually co-opt.The problem is not just that the Democrats snub progressives. The progressives are carrying on as if no more were at stake in this election than in the last one, when a lot was at stake. Jill Stein and Cornel West, presidential candidates of the Green party and the People’s party, respectively, keep campaigning – and sparring with one another – knowing that they might scrape off enough votes to give the election to Trump.Since the debate, both are sounding delusional. “Biden’s dropping out, Trump is on his way to jail. I could be the last one standing constant and consistent,” West told the talkshow host Tavis Smiley. On the media circuit, Stein is describing the exchange as “zombie versus psychopath”, proof of the two-party system’s dysfunction – and claiming a surge of support for her campaign. Surge or not, Stein is on the ballot in five swing states; according to Politico, she could determine who wins.In spite of the animosity, progressives and progressive organizations – MoveOn, Lean Left, the DSA, the WFP – continue to pitch in. Most of the people I’ve met making get-out-the-vote phone calls for whatever mediocre candidate the Democrats put on the ballot come from the old, New, Labor, feminist, anti-war or antiracist left. The Democratic party needs the left.And as much as the Democrats need the left, the left needs democracy. In June 2020, under Trump’s orders, national guard troops in riot gear fired teargas and rubber bullets at citizens peacefully protesting George Floyd’s murder in Washington’s Lafayette Park so that the president could have his picture taken holding up a Bible in front of a church. When Trump lectured governors to “dominate” – arrest, prosecute, jail and “do retribution” to – demonstrators in their cities, only the Illinois Democrat JB Pritzker, whose name has been floated to replace Biden on the ticket, objected.In an extraordinary move, Trump’s defense secretary, along with other active and retired military officers, condemned the deployment of the military against non-violent domestic protest. The next time, surrounded by vetted loyalists, Trump will not be constrained.For the people who braved Covid and the cops, it’s more than distasteful to canvass for the party that named its reform bill after Floyd, then spent hundreds of millions to put more cops on the streets. West and Stein are right: unlike parliamentary systems, where parties large and small represent proportionate popular support within government, the US electoral duopoly fails democracy. But the duopoly is what we’ve got. And this time, the greater of two evils is far eviler than the lesser.Overlapping crises – a US supreme court that has (most recently) coronated all past and future presidents, and the flameout of the already sputtering Democratic nominee – have muddled the rescue of democracy with the election of Democrats. If they win, they’re unlikely to do better than resuscitate the white supremacist minority-ruled oligarchy we have now.Still, the prospect of Trumpian fascism ought to stir our fealty to the good old American oligarchy we call democracy. If the left values democracy, it must help the Democrats. And if the Democrats prevail, they must look to the left to make democracy worthy of its name.
      Judith Levine is a Brooklyn journalist and essayist, a contributing writer to the Intercept and the author of five books More

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      The Republicans’ new party platform is scary – because it can win | Dustin Guastella and Bhaskar Sunkara

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      The new Republican platform was released yesterday. Some liberal journalists – the opinion-makers of what has been called the Democrats’ “shadow party” – dismissed the new platform as a “joke”. They’re wrong. The Republican party platform is scary. Not because it rolls out the usual litany of conservative policy preferences, but precisely because of where it breaks from that orthodoxy.The new party platform is scary, because it can win.Remember, the Republican party did not release a platform in 2020. Presumably, many in the party had not yet accepted that Trumpism was not an aberrant virus but instead the new normal for conservative politics. But in 2024 party leaders, billionaire donors, and rightwing media have embraced Donald Trump without reservation. The new platform reflects his political formula: moderate, at least rhetorically, on abortion; double down on immigration; and reject the small-government Republican tradition.In addition to the ex-president’s signature anti-immigrant positions, consider the following changes: the drafters have dropped the party’s longstanding commitment to cut “entitlements” and now say that Republicans “will not cut one penny” from social security or Medicare. The platform also does not mention reducing the national debt, opting instead for vague language about slashing “wasteful spending”. The platform endorses an industrial policy to make the US the “Manufacturing Superpower”. The platform rails against the “unfair trade deals” and politicians who “sold our jobs and livelihoods to the highest bidders overseas”. And there is a new commitment to “rebuild our cities and restore law and order”.Most strikingly, the platform does not mention any national abortion ban, only opposition to “late-term abortion”. The platform describes itself as “a return to common sense” and Trump has distanced himself from the radical framing of the Heritage Foundation’s Project 2025.In US politics, platforms typically don’t mean much, and both Democrats and Republicans tend to throw together broad programs designed to triangulate between appeasing ideologues and appealing to swing voters. But platforms can be consequential if they signal a genuine break from past orthodoxy, and if legislators take them seriously. Given the sudden advocacy of platform positions from several leading Republican figures such as JD Vance and Marco Rubio, the new Republican platform does not seem like window dressing.This is the new core of the Republican party’s appeals: moderate on certain cultural issues and economic issues. That can win against a feeble Democratic party that is too busy wrestling over who their nominee should be to promote a second-term agenda. (“Let’s Finish the Job” says Joe Biden, in a recent ad, with no indication what that job is.)Democrats seem to have tricked themselves into thinking that the voting public’s general rejection of the US supreme court’s Dobbs decision means that polarization around abortion will catapult them to victory. They seem to think that because Ron DeSantis lost by making his campaign all about “wokeness”, voters really don’t mind corporate DEI language. They seem to think that because the Republican party is unwilling to follow through on the populist economics presented in their 2016 and 2024 platforms, voters will laugh off those promises. And, of course, they underestimate the degree to which inflation has soured voters on the president and the Democrats.Much was made in the lead-up to 2016 about the civil war within the Republican party between “Never Trump” conservatives and the Steve Bannon populist wing of the party. Moderate figures like Joe Scarborough and Colin Powell left the party in opposition to their presumptive candidate, while Marco Rubio said that Trump’s nomination would “fracture the party and be damaging to the conservative movement”. Far from crippling the Republican party, however, Trump brought it back to power. And in office, he reassured establishment figures by coupling largely symbolic protectionist measures with the deregulation and tax cuts for the wealthy that one would have expected from a Mitt Romney administration.And now, instead of moving the Republican party to the radical right, Trump, on key issues like abortion, is at least theoretically moving his party closer to the center. Indeed, the Republican platform appears to be a winning one. Yet while the Republican party is offering a relatively coherent program, Democrats are all over the place, with a nominee unable to effectively communicate with the American people and no unifying theme other than opposition to Trump. Rather than running on the Biden administration’s oversight of job growth in distressed areas and its new industrial policy, liberals seem content to do battle on the cultural front.This discursive failing has allowed common sense policies that are more reflective of the governing practice of today’s Democratic party – from defending the social safety net to growing manufacturing jobs – to become rebranded as the bread-and-butter of the Republican party.In power, it’s likely that Trump will once again betray his working-class supporters and govern like a typical business conservative, because he is utterly committed to more tax cuts and weakening trade unions. He’s promised his richest political donors whatever they want if they help him get back in power. As a result, we’ve seen billionaires lining up to shower him with cash.Yet Trump has displayed surprising political discipline lately. While the Democrats bicker among themselves about Biden’s fitness, Trump is only now beginning to spend big money in swing states like Wisconsin – where he is already leading in the polls.This is a side of Trump we haven’t previously seen; he is campaigning to win in a dangerously coherent way. If progressives don’t wake up and offer an appealing alternative, Trump might do more than rule through the courts and through executive orders – he might forge a long-lasting, majoritarian movement.
      Dustin “Dino” Guastella is a research associate at the Center for Working Class Politics and director of operations for Teamsters Local 623 in Philadelphia
      Bhaskar Sunkara is the president of the Nation, founding editor of Jacobin, and author of The Socialist Manifesto: The Case for Radical Politics in an Era of Extreme Inequalities More

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      ‘Blitz primary’: the scenario that could turn replacing Biden into a ‘riveting spectacle’

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      In the morass in which the Democratic party now finds itself over Joe Biden’s troubled presidential candidacy, a prominent narrative is that the party is confronted by two dire options: an aged and weakened Biden stumbles on to November, or he stands down, igniting an acrimonious and chaotic scramble for his replacement.Either way, Donald Trump wins.Over the past few days, however, energy has been building around a third, more optimistic solution. Advocates of this alternative model believe it could reinvigorate Democrats by putting the spotlight on young fresh talent, inspire the country with a powerful articulation of the party’s values and, critically, prevent Trump from returning to the White House bent on unleashing a full-blown attack on American democracy.The idea is being floated by a loose affiliation of Democratic party stalwarts, including former senior government officials and elected representatives, major donors, and current party officeholders. They are calling their plan the “blitz primary”– a quickfire, tightly controlled selection process that would culminate with a younger successor to Biden being nominated at next month’s Democratic national convention.“The question is: how can we flip this disaster into something remarkable?” said Ted Dintersmith, a venture capitalist and entrepreneur who is a leading proponent of the blitz primary idea. “What would totally shift the national narrative, turning bad options into an opportunity?”Dintersmith, who in 2012 was appointed by Barack Obama to represent the US at the UN general assembly, estimates that about 70 prominent individuals have participated in the search for an alternative. Discussions have focused on how to move beyond the crisis in which the Democratic party has been propelled by Biden’s lamentable performance in last month’s presidential debate which has sown doubt both about the president’s mental acuity and his electability.The blitz primary is posited on Biden voluntarily stepping down as the party’s nominee and playing an active role in the process. With his involvement, a shortlist of five to eight younger candidates would be identified, drawn from the Biden administration, Democratic state governors and other rising stars of the party.Names mentioned include Vice-President Kamala Harris; Governors Gretchen Whitmer of Michigan, Gavin Newsom of California, and Andy Beshear of Kentucky; the US senator from Georgia, Raphael Warnock; and Biden cabinet members such as the commerce secretary, Gina Raimondo, and the transportation secretary, Pete Buttigieg.View image in fullscreenA controversial aspect of the blitz primary model is that Harris would be required to compete on equal terms – there would be no anointing her as Biden’s heir. Allan Katz, the former US ambassador to Portugal under Obama who has helped frame the blueprint, said that if she emerged as the nominee she would do so “as a much stronger, much better candidate than if the nomination was just handed to her”.The younger generation of leaders would be introduced to the nation through a series of televised town halls running up to the convention in Chicago on 19 August. Moderators would be selected for their dynamic ability to attract large primetime audiences especially of younger voters, snatching back the media limelight from Trump.Oprah Winfrey, Michelle Obama, the historian Doris Kearns Goodwin, and even Taylor Swift have been floated as fantasy interlocutors.“It would increase the number of Americans actually paying attention,” said Rosa Brooks, a key advocate of the blitz primary who held senior positions in both the Obama and Bill Clinton administrations and was a volunteer policy adviser for Biden’s 2020 campaign. She added: “For delegates it would be a chance for them to see how the candidates performed in front of the American people – because in the end this is about finding a candidate who is most likely to defeat Trump.”Brooks pointed out that under party rules, if and when Biden agreed to withdraw he would release his 3,904 delegates who would then be free to pick a new nominee of their choice. Under the blitz primary formula, a vote would be staged before the Chicago convention to avoid the risk of an ugly and bruising spectacle at the event itself.Selection would be by ranked choice voting. Delegates would vote only once, but list all candidates in order of preference.View image in fullscreenContenders would then be eliminated one by one, and their votes redistributed to those remaining, in a process that could be staggered over several days for maximum TV suspense and exposure. That would have the dual benefit of increasing public engagement, as well as ensuring that the final winner would have very broad appeal.“It would be a riveting spectacle,” Brooks said. “It would be a way of getting people focused on the issue and the fact that the Democrats are not, in fact, a one-person party.”Blitz primary advocates report that the model has proven to be popular among those they have tested it against. Brooks said that she has had private conversations with senior Biden administration officials who expressed support.“People in very senior positions within the administration have said to us privately, ‘Thank you, we’re glad you’re doing this. We need Biden to withdraw and we need some better process,’” Brooks said.The architects of the blitz primary have no illusions about how difficult it would be to achieve – not least because the entire plan rests upon Biden agreeing to quit the race. So far he has shown no sign of doing that, stating in interviews and an open letter that he intends to stick it out.“It’s a very long shot, I know, as there are a whole bunch of things that have to line up,” Dintersmith said. “But our party is bursting with creative talent, and we have the ability to transform the election, energize the country, and come out of this in a better place as a nation than we are today.”Brooks said: “We are up against a failure of imagination and courage – a failure to see that there are other possibilities if we are willing to move quickly and be creative. There are risks associated with that, of course, but there is a huge risk with the current approach – the risk of an autocrat determined to destroy democracy getting back into the White House.” More

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      Trump airs list of false grievances at Florida rally: ‘We don’t eat bacon any more’

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      Donald Trump returned to the campaign trail in Florida on Tuesday night, hurling insults at Joe Biden and airing a litany of familiar grievances, but declining to name a running mate for November’s general election.The former president and presumptive Republican nominee was speaking to a crowd of several hundred supporters at his golf club in Doral, a western suburb of Miami, keeping them waiting in 90F heat for a freewheeling monologue that began more than an hour later than scheduled.There was speculation that he might use his first public appearance since last month’s debate with the president to announce Florida senator Marco Rubio, who was present, as his vice-presidential pick, six days ahead of the Republican national convention (RNC) in Milwaukee.Instead, Trump delivered a rambling 75-minute speech that included a succession of attacks on Biden and his faltering debate performance, which has raised questions among Democrats on whether the 81-year-old president was robust enough for a second term of office.He seized on the post-debate turbulence that has prompted calls from some senior Democrats for Biden to step down and nominate Kamala Harris.“The radical left Democratic party is divided in chaos, and having a full scale breakdown all because they can’t decide which of their candidates is more unfit to be president, sleepy, crooked Joe Biden or laughing Kamala,” he said, repeating previous derogatory terms for the pair.“Despite all the Democrat panic this week, the truth is it doesn’t matter who they nominate because we are going to beat any one of them in a thundering landslide.”Trump has kept a lower than usual profile in the days since the debate, a strategy an aide described as designed to allow Democrats to tear into each other following Biden’s dismal debate performance.His remarks on Tuesday were notable for adding the vice-president’s name to numerous attacks on Biden policies, and sprinkling in mentions of both Rubio and Byron Donalds, a Republican Florida congressman also believed to be on Trump’s shortlist for vice-president.Otherwise, it was a standard Trump stump speech, full of evidence-free claims that his 2020 election defeat was fraudulent; baseless accusations that overseas nations were sending to the US “most of their prisoners”; and a laughable assertion that a gathering of supporters numbering in the hundreds was really a crowd of 45,000.It also touched on the surreal. Biden, he insisted, had raised the price of bacon four-fold.“We don’t eat bacon any more,” Trump said.Electric cars, he said, “cheated” the US public because drivers had to stop for three hours to recharge their vehicles after every 45 minutes of driving. And, in an echo of one of the more bizarre debate exchanges with Biden over who was the better golfer, he challenged his White House successor to 18 holes over the Doral course while granting a 10-stroke concession.“It will be among the most watched sporting events in history, maybe bigger than the Ryder Cup or even the Masters,” Trump said, pledging $1m to a charity of Biden’s choosing if he lost.Returning to politics, Trump assailed Democrats for tax rises he said they wanted to impose; criticized Biden for the US military’s chaotic 2021 withdrawal from Afghanistan; and promised to build an “iron dome” missile defense system for the US, if he was elected in November.Perhaps worn down by the energy-sapping humidity, the crowd appeared mostly subdued, including yawns in the bleachers behind him as Trump drew to a close with slow music playing, and others tapping disinterestedly on their phones.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionHis campaign had touted the possibility of Trump announcing a vice-presidential pick on Tuesday, but in the end his only reference to the post was suggesting that Rubio might or might not still be in the Senate to vote to allow Nevada waitresses to keep their tips untaxed.There was no mention of Ohio senator JD Vance, or North Dakota governor Doug Burgum, other Republicans said to be on the shortlist. Trump will rally again on Saturday in Pennsylvania, close to the Ohio border, with Vance expected to be a speaker.Earlier on Tuesday, Democrats, on a Biden campaign call featuring first lady Jill Biden, and previewing Trump’s Doral rally, mocked him for his low-key approach since the debate.“I hope he hasn’t exhausted himself with all the golf that he’s been playing,” Texas congresswoman Veronica Escobar said.“Speaking of staying off the campaign trail, Trump has been hiding a lot recently, not just from voters and from the press, but from Project 2025.“Donald Trump tried to pretend that he had nothing to do with Project 2025 despite the fact that it was written for him by the people who know him best. And yesterday, his campaign preview of the RNC platform, was just as unhinged and extreme as Trump himself. They left out some of the most unpopular specifics that we know they support.“As usual, they’re trying to hide the ball from the American public.”Trump, in his speech Tuesday, avoided mention of Project 2025 or his policy on abortion. More

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      Joe Biden and the Democrats’ dilemma – podcast

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      Since Joe Biden’s stumbling performance in a TV debate with Donald Trump, some Democrats have expressed concern about his suitability to be in the race. “Voters have been voicing concerns about his age for a long time now,” senior political reporter for Guardian US Joan E Greve tells Helen Pidd. “If Democrats were going to have this argument about potentially replacing Biden on the ballot, it probably needed to happen a while ago.” What chance is there that Biden will step aside? And is it a risk to the Democrats if he does? More

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      Kamala Harris underscores support for Biden at Las Vegas rally: ‘He is a fighter’

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      Kamala Harris doubled down on her support of Joe Biden on Tuesday, describing the embattled president as a “fighter” as she warned Donald Trump would turn the country from a democracy into a dictatorship if he is re-elected to the White House in November.The vice-president, speaking at a campaign event in Nevada, alluded to Biden’s struggles since his calamitous debate performance last month. “We always knew this election would be tough, and the past few days have been a reminder that running for president of the United States is never easy,” Harris said.“But the one thing we know about our president, Joe Biden, is that he is a fighter. He is a fighter, and he is the first to say, when you get knocked down, you get back up.” An audience member shouted back: “Yes, we all know.”Harris spoke shortly after a seventh House Democrat, Mikie Sherrill, publicly called on Biden to step aside. “I realize this is hard, but we have done hard things in pursuit of democracy since the founding of this nation. It is time to do so again,” Sherrill posted on Twitter/X.Voters face the “most existential, consequential and important election of our lifetime”, Harris warned during her speech at the Las Vegas event focused on Asian American, Native Hawaiian and Pacific Islander (AANHPI) communities.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionThe first person of south Asian descent to serve as vice-president, Harris noted that Trump “consistently incites hate”, including towards the AANHPI communities. “Someone who vilifies immigrants, who promotes xenophobia, someone who stokes hate, should never again have the chance to stand behind a microphone,” she added.Harris is at the forefront of the Biden-Harris campaign’s effort to reach out to Asian American voters, and on Tuesday spoke about her mother, Shyamala Gopalan, a cancer research scientist who left India at age 19 to study in California. “My mother had two goals in her life: to raise her two daughters and to end breast cancer,” Harris said. “My mother never asked anyone’s permission to pursue her dreams.”Harris is scheduled to address a town hall in Philadelphia on Saturday hosted by an advocacy group focused on mobilizing Asian American voters. “We need to make sure that AA and NHPI voices are heard at the ballot boxes around our country, just as we need to make sure that those voices are represented in all levels of government,” Harris said in a video released by the campaign on Tuesday. “Asian Americans must be in the rooms where the decisions are being made.” More

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      Biden speaks at Nato summit amid concerns over his 2024 campaign – live

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      “It’s a pleasure to host you in this milestone year,” Biden said.He highlighted the strength of the alliance and progress since he took office.“Today, Nato is better resourced than it ever has been. I want to pause on this because it’s significant,” he said. More Nato allies now are now paying dues – 2% of their GDP – than ever before.Joe Biden is now taking the stage for his address.“History was watching,” when leaders first came together to sign the Nato treaty in 1949, Biden began.Nato leaders have been emphasising that a record number of members, 23 out of 32, now meet a commitment first agreed 10 years ago to spend 2% of GDP on defence. Trump has repeatedly complained that smaller Nato countries do not “pay their dues” and this year threatened not to defend any country that was “delinquent”.More recently, allies of Trump have argued that if elected again the Republican would demand a reorientation of Nato where European countries would be asked to increased defence spending further, while the US focuses more on China.But such is the size of the US defence budget – $860bn, two-thirds of the total of all Nato members – that it would be difficult for European countries to replace a significant reallocation of resources from a Trump White House and to continue supporting Ukraine at the existing level of about €40bn a year.On Monday Mike Johnson, the speaker of the House of Representatives and a leading Trump ally, said that while Republicans valued the military alliance and would stand by member countries in preventing conflict, “we also believe that Nato needs to be doing more”.Jens Stoltenberg, the Nato secretary general, started by highlighting the history of Nato.“Our alliance was created by people who have lived through two devastating world wars,” he said. The alliance is “one for all and all for one”, he added.He also noted that Nato’s alliance was “never a given”.The event tonight is taking place at the Mellon Auditorium, where the Nato treaty was first signed in 1949.A highlight reel showing clips from the end of the second world war and the cold war, featuring clips from John F Kennedy, Ronald Regan and finally Joe Biden is playing before Biden takes the stage.Joe Biden walked on stage, along with Nato allied leaders and Jens Stoltenberg, the Nato secretary general.All eyes will be on the president tonight as he fights to redeem his political prospects and convince skeptics that he can win the election.The president has said that his performance at the summit, which is commemorating 75 years of the transatlantic alliance and his work at the summit, will be a good way to judge his capabilities.Today’s speech is especially high stakes. Biden is reeling from a disastrous performance at the presidential debates, and this speech will be his first major public address since then. The public will be watching closely for any flubs.Biden is likely to highlight his foreign policy record – and his administration’s commitment to strengthening Nato. Donald Trump, meanwhile, has emphasized an “America First” approach and said that he would not defend Nato members if the came under attack. He has also questioned the amount of aid the US has provided to Ukraine in its defense against Russia’s invasion.Mikie Sherrill, a representative of New Jersey is the seventh congressional Democrat to ask Biden to step down.“I realize this is hard, but we have done hard things in pursuit of democracy since the founding of this nation. It is time to do so again,” she wrote in a statement.The White House clarified on Monday that Joe Biden has not seen a neurologist outside of his annual physicals, following a heated exchange between the president’s press secretary and journalists seeking an explanation for why a Parkinson’s disease specialist visited the White House eight times in as many months.In an evening letter the White House physician, Kevin O’Connor, said the specialist, Kevin Cannard, has been a neurology consultant to the White House medical unit since 2012. He said Cannard had visited multiple times a year since then, and that the neurologist was chosen for his breadth of experience and expertise.“Seeing patients at the White House is something that Dr Cannard has been doing for a dozen years,” O’Connor wrote. “Dr Cannard was chosen for this responsibility not because he is a movement disorder specialist, but because he is a highly trained and highly regarded neurologist here at Walter Reed and across the Military Health System, with a very wide expertise which makes him flexible to see a variety of patients and problems.”He added that Cannard was the neurologist who had examined Biden for his three annual physicals since becoming president.Biden’s last medical examination in February had not shown “any cerebellar or other central neurological disorder, such as stroke, multiple sclerosis, Parkinson’s or ascending lateral sclerosis, nor are there any signs of cervical myelopathy”, O’Connor wrote.The letter, which O’Connor said he was releasing with the permission of both Biden and Cannard, followed intense speculation about the president’s cognitive powers following last month’s stumbling performance in a debate with Donald Trump in Atlanta, in which he repeatedly appeared confused and lost his train of thought.Later today, Joe Biden will be speaking at the Nato summit in Washington, DC. Dan Sabbagh and Andrew Roth report:World leaders flew into Washington DC on Tuesday for a two-day Nato summit where they are expected to agree to enhanced military support for Ukraine against a backdrop of questions about Joe Biden’s mental sharpness.Britain’s new prime minister, Keir Starmer, and Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, were among those arriving at the US capital amid a warning that Russia could step up missile strikes on Ukraine this week, repeating a barrage that killed at least 38 on Monday.The summit is expected to agree to a fresh package of military aid for Ukraine, including at least four additional Patriot air defence systems and progress on supplying F-16 fighters, to help Kyiv better fend off devastating Russian attacks.Concerns about Biden and his ability to defeat Trump hang over the summit, given Trump’s past scepticism about Nato and uncertainty about whether he would be willing to continue to supply large volumes of military aid.Nato leaders have been emphasising that a record number of members, 23 out of 32, now meet a commitment first agreed 10 years ago to spend 2% of GDP on defence. Trump has repeatedly complained that smaller Nato countries do not “pay their dues” and this year threatened not to defend any country that was “delinquent”.More recently, allies of Trump have argued that if elected again the Republican would demand a reorientation of Nato where European countries would be asked to increased defence spending further, while the US focuses more on China.Democrats in Washington continued to scramble over the party’s prospects in November as focus remained on Joe Biden’s ability to lead and keep the White House. But no groundswell has formed against the president, and it appeared most Democrats would remain quiet while Biden stayed on the ticket.Here’s what has happened so far today:
      After a Senate Democrats lunch meeting, Democrats tried to avoid most direct questions about Biden, with some saying they were united in defeating Trump, sidestepping Biden’s role in that. Majority Leader Chuck Schumer and Senator John Fetterman both reiterated they were with Biden, but it was far from a universal view. Vermont senator Peter Welch said “we’ve got a ways to go” to find a consensus.
      The White House defended against repeated questions about Biden’s health and mental acuity, and the White House’s candor (or lack thereof) on these issues, in a press briefing. Karine Jean-Pierre, the White House press secretary, said Biden is committed to serving a full four years again and is physically and mentally able to, according to his medical team. Several questions revolved around Parkinson’s disease, with reporters pressing over why Biden has not been screened for it. Jean-Pierre said his medical team doesn’t believe testing is warranted.
      House Democrats left a meeting this morning about Biden’s fate downtrodden, with many not giving comment to waiting reporters. Some key players – like the Congressional Black Caucus and Representative Alexandria Ocasio Cortez – stood by Biden. But one representative, Steve Cohen of Tennessee, said that not only is the party not on the same page about Biden, but they are “not even in the same book”.
      Biden and House speaker Mike Johnson both confirmed they will meet at some point this week with Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskiy with the Nato summit in town.
      Coming up today, Biden is expected to speak at Nato, while Trump is expected to hold a rally in Florida, a return to the campaign trail after acting more subdued after Biden’s debate performance.
      Senate Democrats were tightlipped leaving their weekly lunch, after an hours-long discussion about the viability of Biden’s candidacy. Few wanted to speak to reporters, save for Senator Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut, who stressed Democrats were firmly united behind the goal of defeating Donald Trump.Of course, the question is whether Biden is the candidate that can do that.Senator John Fetterman of Pennsylvania, one of the president’s most vocal supporters following his debate, believes he is, though he appeared to acknowledge his view was not universally held among his colleagues. “He’s our guy,” Fetterman told reporters.Senate majority leader Chuck Schumer deflected questions about Biden’s ability to win the White House in November, repeating three times: “I’m with Joe.”Just like this morning, several senators dodged reporters, darting to the Senate floor to vote or ducking onto the elevator.Senator Debbie Stabenow, the Michigan Democrat who is retiring at the end of the year, declined repeatedly to say whether some Democrats had called on Biden to exit the race. So far no Democrats have said so publicly.Calling the meeting a “private family discussion” she said Biden had been “the best president Michigan has ever had” but would not say what the best path forward was for the party. “It’s in his hands,” she said, apparently in reference to the president.A reporter, trying a different tack, asked her about speculation that Michigan’s governor, Democrat Gretchen Whitmer, could be Kamala Harris’s running mate on a very hypothetical Democratic ticket. “Wouldn’t that be exciting,” she said whimsically.Through the senators’ reticent, clipped commentary, it was clear they were still searching for a consensus. Surrounded by a scrum of reporters, Vermont senator Peter Welch said: “We’ve got a ways to go.”Karine Jean-Pierre, the White House press secretary, said the decision to call in to MSNBC and call donors this week was Biden’s because he wants to talk directly to the American people.“He’s on fire, he’s ready to go,” she said. “He wants to get out there.”Biden wants to do more appearances and talk to the press more to prove he can continue to do the work of the presidency, she said.She said Biden is accustomed to being counted out, with people saying several times in past elections that he couldn’t win, pointing to the 2020 election.Fighting past those claims is the “quintessential Joe Biden story,” she said, concluding the press briefing.Did Biden watch the debate himself? Biden said during an ABC interview with George Stephanopoulos last week that he didn’t think he did.Karine Jean-Pierre, the White House press secretary, said she had not followed up with Biden on this but intended to.“I’m sure he’s seen clips,” she said. “It’s getting around-the-clock coverage, right, from all of you.”The White House said Joe Biden is committed to serving a full four years if he wins in November.Karine Jean-Pierre, the White House press secretary, said a comment that Biden made about how his health was good, “it’s just my brain,” was a joke.“He was making a lighthearted joke as he was speaking off the cuff,” she said. “You know the president, he likes to joke a lot. He’s the same guy who says, I know I look 40.”She also has been defending against repeated questions over Biden’s health and neurological exams, particularly as it relates to concerns of Parkinson’s disease that some in the press have raised.Karine Jean-Pierre, the White House press secretary, is defending against calls from some members of Congress for Biden to end his re-election bid or saying they are concerned about his ability to beat Trump in November.She noted the hundreds of members of Congress who had stood beside Biden as the nominee.“We do want to turn the page. You heard me say this last week. We want to get to the other side of this. We want to continue doing the work, and that’s what the president’s going to do,” she said.A White House press briefing is under way, with the White House confirming that Joe Biden will meet with the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy.You can stream the press briefing live on YouTube.A new poll has some Democrats fretting over the drag Biden could have on Democrats in close races, an ongoing worry in swing districts about the lower-ticket races that could be in jeopardy if voters defect from Democrats or stay home in November.The poll of Wisconsin voters commissioned by the AARP after the presidential debate shows a shocking gap between Biden’s support and support for Tammy Baldwin, the Democrat running for US Senate there. Baldwin grabbed 50% of voters compared to Republican Eric Hovde’s 45%.But Biden is trailing, with 38% to Trump’s 44%.It’s just one poll – it’s always good to keep that in mind. But this is the same voters polled on Baldwin and Biden, and the gap has Democrats concerned. More

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      Democrats appear torn over Biden as concerns whether he can win deepen

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      After a day of private meetings on Capitol Hill, congressional Democrats appeared torn over whether Joe Biden should remain the party’s nominee, as concerns deepen over the 81-year-old president’s age, mental acuity and ability to win the White House for a second term.Lawmakers emerged from closed-door gatherings on Tuesday stone-faced, appearing uneasy about Biden’s path forward, even if most weren’t ready to publicly call on him to step aside. Asked if the party was on the same page after a House Democrats meeting, Representative Steve Cohen of Tennessee quipped: “We’re not even in the same book.”Senate Democrats offered a similarly assessment. “We’ve got a ways to go,” Senator Peter Welch of Vermont told reporters, after a lengthy caucus meeting over lunch on Tuesday afternoon.Hours after the House meeting, Representative Mikie Sherrill of New Jersey became the seventh congressional Democrat to call on Biden to step aside, a reflection of the deep disagreement with the party over how best to respond to Biden’s disastrous debate performance last month in which he appeared weak and confused while Donald Trump, 78, spewed a stream of unchecked lies.“The stakes are too high – and the threat is too real – to stay silent,” Sherrill said in a statement. “I realize this is hard, but we have done hard things in pursuit of democracy since the founding of this nation,” she said in a statement. “It is time to do so again.”Senate Democrats, meanwhile, have yet to prod the president to end his campaign, a move Biden himself has categorically and repeatedly ruled out.The president’s adamance that he would stay in the race, outlined in a letter to congressional Democrats on Monday, appeared to have forestalled – for now – a flood of widespread defections, and possibly even beat back some public criticism.“Right now President Biden is the nominee, and we support the Democratic nominee that will beat Donald Trump,” Representative Pete Aguilar of California, chairman of the House Democratic caucus, said at a news conference following the House Democrats meeting at the Democratic National Committee headquarters on Tuesday morning.Aguilar said it was incumbent upon the president to prove to voters that he was up to the task, “campaigning and hustling” across the country, while demonstrating his ability to square off with the press at a news conference, scheduled for Thursday, at the end of the Nato summit in Washington. Few Democrats were eager to talk to reporters, who lined the pavement, pelting lawmakers with questions, as fresh polling shows Biden falling farther behind Trump, the former president and presumptive Republican nominee viewed by the incumbent and his party as a singularly dangerous figure to American democracy. Most ignored the questions, some held a phone to their ear, and the Pennsylvania representative Summer Lee walked with headphones on, declining to stop.“Joe Biden is, will be and should be our nominee,” the Florida representative Debbie Wasserman Schultz, a former DNC chair, said tersely after the meeting.Biden’s closest allies were also eager to voice their support.“We’re ridin’ with Biden,” Representative James Clyburn repeated several times as he strode toward a waiting car. The South Carolina Democrat is credited with reviving Biden’s successful 2020 campaign against his presidential predecessor Trump – and is seen as one of the few people whose opinion on the matter could sway the president.“He’s our guy,” said Senator John Fetterman, the Pennsylvania Democrat who has emerged as one of Biden’s most vocal supporters in the days since the debate. “I’m with Joe,” Senate majority leader Chuck Schumer repeatedly said in response to any question about the president’s standing.Several prominent Democrats, including senior members of the Black and Hispanic caucuses, have joined Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez in voicing support for the president. On Tuesday morning, Representative Cori Bush, a Missouri Democrat facing a serious primary challenge, likened her fight for political survival to Biden’s and said the party must unite to defeat the influence of Trump-aligned “Maga Republicans”.Lori Trahan of Massachusetts, a member of House Democratic leadership, said she shared her constituents’ “real concerns” about Biden’s “ability to beat Donald Trump”, given that a second Trump presidency would “do irreparable damage to women and to our country”. Demanding the president “act with urgency to restore Americans’ confidence so we can win in November”, Trahan said she would do “everything in my power to help”.On Monday night Biden also held a private meeting with the Congressional Black caucus, a key support bloc representing voters who form a powerful part of Biden’s base, having fueled his surge to the Democratic nomination in 2020.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotion“You’ve had my back, and I’ll continue to have yours,” Politico reported Biden saying in the meeting. “I need you guys. They were wrong in 2020, 2022 [when Democrats did much better than expected in midterm elections] and now. With you guys, I know we can win this thing.”Congressional Hispanic caucus leaders, Nanette Barragán of California and Adriano Espaillat of New York, said on Monday: “We stand with President Biden and Vice-President Kamala Harris.“For the last year and a half, the Biden-Harris administration partnered with the Congressional Hispanic caucus’ initiative to take CHC on the Road. Through that initiative we have worked to empower Latino communities across the country.“We look forward to our continued partnership on the road and legislative wins to benefit the American people.”Prominent progressives have also rallied to the president’s side.“The matter is closed,” Ocasio-Cortez, told reporters outside the Capitol on Monday evening. “He had reiterated that this morning. He has reiterated that to the public. Joe Biden is our nominee. He is not leaving this race. He is in this race, and I support him.”In her re-endorsement of Biden she pointed to a lack of Republican calls for Trump to step aside, even after he was convicted on 34 criminal charges in his New York trial arising from hush-money payments made to an adult film star.Fellow progressives Pramila Jayapal from Washington state, Jasmine Crockett from Texas, and Ilhan Omar from Minnesota have joined Ocasio-Cortez in their support for Biden.On Monday, Ocasio-Cortez said Biden should “commit to the issues that are critically important to working people across this country.“If we can do that and continue our work on student loans, secure a cease-fire [in Israel’s war against Hamas], and bring those dollars back into investing in public policy, then that’s how we win in November.“That’s what I’m committed to, and that’s what I want to make sure that we secure.” More