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    If a four-year-old can pronounce a name correctly, so can a politician | Arwa Mahdawi

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    Zohran Mamdani, the democratic socialist who is likely to be New York City’s next mayor, became a household name this year – but that doesn’t mean Andrew Cuomo knows how to pronounce it. The disgraced former New York governor, who is running as an independent candidate against Mamdani in the mayoral election next month, has repeatedly mispronounced “Mamdani”, even causing Zohran to spell it out for him during a debate in June. And Cuomo isn’t alone: Kathy Hochul, the current governor of New York, has also butchered Mamdani’s name, and White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt has called the politician “Zimdami”.I’ve mispronounced plenty of people’s names; struggling with an unfamiliar word is perfectly understandable. During a recent chat with Zeteo founder Mehdi Hasan, Mamdani said as much himself, noting he isn’t bothered if someone initially gets his name wrong. “What’s inexcusable, however, is the repeated intentional mispronunciation,” Mamdani stressed. More importantly, he said, his experience is far from unique: “This is the experience of so many … There are so many of us who are seen as if we are forever others.”Kamala Harris, who gave Mamdani a half-hearted endorsement last month, would certainly know what he means. Conservatives have long taken great pleasure in othering the former vice-president. “Kamala? Kamala? Kamala-mala-mala? I don’t know. Whatever,” David Perdue, who was then a Republican senator, said during a campaign rally in 2020. Perdue is now Trump’s ambassador to China, a job he’s clearly earned through diplomacy and respect for other cultures.Of course, Trump himself repeatedly mispronounced “Kamala” while running against her. Although, to be fair, he does have trouble getting his mouth to work properly and has botched basic words like “origins” (oranges in Trumpspeak) and “suspected”. Still, hard to give Trump the benefit of the doubt when, at a campaign rally last July, he said: “I couldn’t care less if I mispronounce [Kamala], I couldn’t care less.”As someone with a “difficult” name, I’ve met plenty of Trumps in my lifetime. People have no trouble pronouncing names like Tchaikovsky but act as if “Arwa Mahdawi” is beyond them. You know what’s funny, though? None of my four-year-old daughter’s friends have any trouble with it: they call me “Arwa” with zero issue. Pretty sure they could all pronounce Mamdani as well. It’s a sad state of affairs when preschoolers are more respectful than politicians. Arwa Mahdawi is a Guardian columnist

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      Kamala Harris’s election memoir shows just how deluded the Democrats still are | Nesrine Malik

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      Watching the Kamala Harris presidential campaign unfold last year, I remember thinking, and writing, about how striking it was that she had been rehabilitated almost overnight into a political titan. Authoritative accounts of her before that moment portrayed a lo-fi vice-president, who, even according to people who had worked to get her there, had “not risen to the challenge of proving herself as a future leader of the party, much less the country”. Another striking feature of her campaign was how it leaned into vibes and spectacle rather than substance, or building faith in Harris as a clean break from an unpopular and visibly deteriorating Joe Biden. Her new book, 107 Days, a memoir of the exact number of days she had to win the presidency, goes a long way in explaining why that was. In short, Harris – and those around her, including supportive media parties – got high on their own supply.This was not the intention, but 107 Days is a hilarious book. The kind of “you have to laugh or else you’ll cry” type of hilarity. As the second Trump administration unfolds in ever-more disastrous ways, Harris and the other timeline that was possible had she won take on a calamitous, mythical quality. Here she comes, alerting us to the fact that her defeat was no fateful tragedy, but a farce. There was no hidden, better version of Harris that was muzzled and limited by circumstance. There was only a woman with a formidable lack of self-awareness and a propensity to self-valorise.The book reveals a politician who is all about the machinery of politics, rather than one with conviction spurred by a sense of duty, or a coherent and specific set of values that differentiate her. The “not a thing that comes to mind” answer she gave when asked during the campaign if there was anything she would have done differently to Biden was not caution, but the truth. There is no sign here that she would have liked to meaningfully diverge on Gaza, for example, other than to introduce more parity in the rhetoric of compassion. Or any indication that she would have liked to grasp the nettle on economic policy and make more of her accusation that Donald Trump’s economic agenda “works best if it works for those who own the big skyscrapers”.This dearth of a unique Harris agenda explains why she often seemed so vague, skittish and rambling. How does she receive the news she will be the candidate? By reminding herself (and us) that she had the best “contact book” and “name recognition”, as well as the “strongest case”. She tries to cloak her ambition, saying “knew she could” be president, but only because she “wanted to do the work. I have always been a protector.” It’s fine to have ambition to be the president of the United States! Every cardinal dreams of becoming pope, as Cardinal Bellini of Conclave said. Even he did himself, to his shame, when he lamented upon the discovery of his ambition: “To be this age and still not know yourself.”My abiding feeling reading was: oh God, this was all just as bad as it looked. The celebrity-packed campaign roster was not, in fact, panicked desperation, but the preference of the candidate and her team. They thought that such a range of characters would show that Harris was “welcoming everyone into the campaign” – as if the power of celebrity could do the unifying work of coalition-building, rather than her own programme and politicking. The immersion in the filmic, the celluloid of US politics is so complete that there is a line about Jon Bon Jovi performing for her and it being a good omen, because he performed for a candidate who won in The West Wing. The media loved her. “And behold,” Harris quotes a Washington Post writer, praising her approach to Gaza, “she had her boat through the impossible strait.” Jon Favreau said Harris was “a sight to behold” at the Democratic convention.I lost count of the number of descriptions of crowds exploding, roaring, on fire. The audience applause to Harris’s Saturday Night Live appearance was some of the loudest ever heard. She replays her greatest hits, revealing a politician captured by the reverie of rapturous self-selecting crowds and buzzy studios, fatally unable to connect to the voters outside the bubble, who had soured on the Democrats and were checking out, or voting for Trump.View image in fullscreenBiden pops up often, a self-involved and petty figure, snapping at her heels and distracting her. But she is loyal, she tells us – often. So loyal that she couldn’t disparage him in the way that people needed her to (“People hate Joe Biden!” she is told by a senior adviser). But not so loyal that she doesn’t more artfully disguise that she wants you to know the man was a real drag who mentioned her too late in his speeches, and then called her before her big debate with Trump to unsubtly threaten her if she bad-mouthed him. But what is most telling, and alarming, is what she reveals about the Democratic establishment, and therefore what hope there is of an awakening among its ranks. One that could pose a meaningful challenge to Trump now, and Trumpism in the future. The 107 days were short, but they were a concentration of a process in which the party and its candidate had to dig deep quickly to unearth the most compelling and defining vision for the American people. The result was to take no risks, offer continuity and scold dissenters as Trump enablers, but with style. It wasn’t enough, and will never be.The answer to the question “what went wrong” isn’t “we didn’t have enough time” to establish Harris. It was that Harris, even now, with all the time to reflect and be honest with herself, is a politician who invests too much in presentation, and entirely exculpates herself of failures because she was dealt a bad political hand. What can you say besides, “to be this age and still not know yourself”.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotion

      Nesrine Malik is a Guardian columnist More

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      Donald Trump says Charlie Kirk has died after being shot at university event – latest updates

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      Charlie Kirk, a Trump ally and rightwing activist, has been shot and killed at an event at Utah Valley University in Orem, Utah, on Wednesday. Here’s what we know so far:

      Kirk, 31, died after being shot during a presentation on campus. Donald Trump first announced the death in a Truth Social post.

      Donald Trump wrote: “The Great, and even Legendary, Charlie Kirk, is dead. No one understood or had the Heart of the Youth in the United States of America better than Charlie. He was loved and admired by ALL, especially me, and now, he is no longer with us. Melania and my Sympathies go out to his beautiful wife Erika, and family. Charlie, we love you!”

      Campus police are investigating the incident. The university said the suspect is not in custody. A person arrested earlier has been released and is no longer a suspect.

      Kirk, the executive director of Turning Point USA (TPUSA), was shot at about 12.10pm local time while appearing at an event. In video posts circulating on social media, Kirk can be seen getting struck while speaking and sitting beneath a tent. Kirk was there as part of the American Comeback tour, which is hosted by the TPUSA chapter at Utah Valley. Video footage shows students on campus running away from the sound of gunshots.

      Kirk was about 20 minutes into a presentation when a shot was fired from a nearby building, the university told CNBC. The university has said a “single shot” was fired towards Kirk.

      Political leaders in the US immediately condemned the attack. Joe Biden, the former US president, tweeted: “There is no place in our country for this kind of violence. It must end now. Jill and I are praying for Charlie Kirk’s family and loved ones.”

      Senior Democrats and Republicans also condemned the shooting. Gavin Newsom, Josh Shapiro, Chuck Schumer and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez were among Democrats who condemned the attack. JD Vance, Pam Bondi, Kristi Noem and Pete Hegseth paid tribute to Kirk and asked the public to pray for him.

      The House speaker, Mike Johnson, told reporters in the Capitol: “Political violence has become all too common in American society. This is not who we are. It violates the core principles of our country.”

      In an internal email to staff members that was posted online on Wednesday, the Turning Point USA COO, Justin Streiff, said: “It is with a heavy heart that we, the Turning Point USA leadership team, write to notify you that earlier this afternoon Charlie went to his eternal reward with Jesus Christ in Heaven … However, in the meantime, Turning Point USA and Turning Point Action will be closed for business until Monday, the 15th – likely longer.”

      The White House lowered its flag to half-staff in Kirk’s honor.
      Former presidents Barack Obama and Joe Biden, and the former vice-president Kamala Harris, have all condemned the fatal shooting of Charlie Kirk in posts on social media.While the motive of the person who shot Kirk remains unknown, as police hunt for a suspect, all three Democrats argued that political violence must be condemned.“We don’t yet know what motivated the person who shot and killed Charlie Kirk, but this kind of despicable violence has no place in our democracy,” Obama wrote. “Michelle and I will be praying for Charlie’s family tonight, especially his wife Erika and their two young children.”“There is no place in our country for this kind of violence. It must end now,” Biden wrote on social media. “Jill and I are praying for Charlie Kirk’s family and loved ones.”“I am deeply disturbed by the shooting in Utah”, Harris wrote before news of Kirkj’s death was announced by Donald Trump. “Doug and I send our prayers to Charlie Kirk and his family. Let me be clear: Political violence has no place in America. I condemn this act, and we all must work together to ensure this does not lead to more violence.”The newly installed flag on the north lawn of the White House was lowered to half-staff on Tuesday afternoon, after Donald Trump announced the death of Charlie Kirk, who was fatally shot while debating students at Utah Valley University on Tuesday.Trump wrote on social media that he was ordering all American flags to be lowered across the country until Sunday evening.A spokesperson for Utah Valley University, Ellen Treanor, tells the Guardian: “A suspect was in custody, but they are no longer a suspect.”In a statement, Treanor added:
      It is with the tremendous sadness and shock that Charlie Kirk, who was invited by the student group TPUSA, was shot at about 12:20 when he began speaking at his planned event on the Utah Valley University Orem Campus. Kirk was immediately transported by his security team to a local hospital.
      Campus was immediately evacuated. Campus is closed and classes have been canceled until further notice. We are asking those still on campus to secure in place until police officers can safely escort them off campus.
      The incident is currently being investigated by four agencies: Orem Police, UVU Police, FBI, and Utah Department of Public Safety.
      Among those coming to terms with the fatal shooting of Charlie Kirk on Wednesday is the progressive streamer, Hasan Piker, who was scheduled to debate Kirk at Dartmouth College in two weeks.On his Twitch live stream, Piker expressed horror at the shooting, and urged his followers not to celebrate it, but told viewers to stop writing in to tell him to wear a bulletproof vest or hire security for his public appearances.“I don’t have any security,” Piker told his viewers. “It shouldn’t be like this.” He went on to argue that only gun control could prevent mass shootings.“In a moment like this, a reasonable government would say: ‘Alright, enough is enough,’” Piker said. “If we had a responsible government and not a bunch of fucking psychopaths running the show,” he added, the US would already have had serious gun control following the massacre at at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut in 2012.“I need to really reconsider the way I do everything outside, for the forseeable future,” Piker said.“Before people say: ‘Wear a bulletproof vest,’ again, he got shot in the neck,” Piker said. “A bulletproof vest would not have saved Charlie Kirk.”“The only thing that could have potentially saved Charlie Kirk,” he added, “was if our administrations, prior to this one and this one as well, actually had reasonable gun control as a policy position, in the aftermath of, I don’t know, a hundred other school shootings.”The House speaker, Mike Johnson, told reporters in the Capitol a few minutes ago: “Political violence has become all too common in American society. This is not who we are. It violates the core principles of our country.”Writing on his social network, Donald Trump just announced the death of Charlie Kirk.Trump wrote:
      The Great, and even Legendary, Charlie Kirk, is dead. No one understood or had the Heart of the Youth in the United States of America better than Charlie. He was loved and admired by ALL, especially me, and now, he is no longer with us. Melania and my Sympathies go out to his beautiful wife Erika, and family. Charlie, we love you!
      A White House correspondent for the New York Post reports that she just spoke with Donald Trump on the phone about Charlie Kirk.“He’s not doing well,” Trump told Diana Nerozzi. “It looks very bad.”She then asked Trump how he was feeling. He replied: “Not good. He was a very, very good friend of mine and he was a tremendous person.”Videos circulating on social media showed an attender at the student event on Wednesday asking Charlie Kirk: “Do you know how many transgender Americans have been mass shooters over the last 10 years?”In response, Kirk said: “Too many,” as the crowd clapped.In a follow-up question, the attender asked: “Do you know how many mass shooters there have been in America over the last 10 years?”Kirk replied: “Counting or not counting gang violence?”Seconds later, Kirk could be seen struck in the neck as he falls back in his chair.A spokesperson for Utah Valley University has retracted an earlier claim that a suspect in the shooting of Charlie Kirk, the conservative activist, is in custody.In a statement provided to Deseret News in Utah, university spokesperson Scott Trotter said: “We can confirm that Mr Kirk was shot, but we don’t know his condition. The suspect is not in custody. Police are still investigating Campus is closed for the rest of the day.”Trotter told the New York Times that police had taken someone into custody earlier but have determined that he was not the gunman.Kirk’s event in Utah today was the first of a 15-stop tour at universities across the country. Titled “The American Comeback”, the 31-year-old activist was due to speak at Colorado State University on 18 September.

      Charlie Kirk, a Trump ally and rightwing activist, has been shot at an event at Utah Valley University on Wednesday.

      The university said in a statement that Kirk was taken away by his security. Law enforcement have told the AP he is in hospital and in a critical condition.

      Campus police are investigating the incident. There are some conflicting reports about the detainment status of the suspect.

      Donald Trump has asked for prayers for Kirk. Trump wrote on Truth Social: “We must all pray for Charlie Kirk, who has been shot. A great guy from top to bottom. GOD BLESS HIM!”

      Kirk, the executive director of Turning Point USA (TPUSA), was shot at about 12.10pm local time while hosting an event. In video posts circulating on social media, Kirk can be seen getting struck while speaking and sitting beneath a tent. Kirk was there as part of The American Comeback Tour, which is hosted by the TPUSA chapter at Utah Valley. There is also video footage of students on campus running away from the sound of gunshots.

      Kirk was about 20 minutes into a presentation when shots were fired from a nearby building, the university told CNBC. The university has said a “single shot” was fired towards Kirk.

      FBI director Kash Patel has said that his agency is “closely monitoring” the situation.

      The shooting sparked immediate condemnation from Republicans and Democrats. Gavin Newsom, Josh Shapiro and Chuck Schumer condemned the attack. JD Vance, Pam Bondi, Kristi Noem and Pete Hegseth paid tribute to Kirk and asked the public to pray for him.

      Spencer Cox, Utah’s governor, said that he has been “briefed by law enforcement following the violence directed at Charlie Kirk during his visit to Utah Valley University today.” Cox added that “those responsible will be held fully accountable,” and uged “Americans of every political persuasion” to condemn the shooting. He offered his prayers to Kirk, his family and all those affected.

      Shortly before shots rang out, Kirk tweeted: “WE. ARE. SO. BACK. Utah Valley University is FIRED UP and READY for the first stop back on the American Comeback Tour.”
      Charlie Kirk is in critical condition at a hospital, after being shot at a speaking event at Utah Valley University, a law enforcement official tells the Associated Press.The university said earlier that a suspect was in custody, and the college campus has closed, and classes have been cancelled.Eva Terry, another Deseret News reporter who was also at the event, described the direction of the shot, saying: “It looks like it came from the middle to the right side of the audience.Describing the suspect, Terry said: “It looks like he was an older gentleman, probably in his late 50s to 60s, wearing what looks like a worker’s uniform.”Kirk was being asked a question about mass shootings when he was shot in the neck, according to eyewitnesses.Speaking to the Guardian, Deseret News reporter Emma Pitts who was at the event said: “He was on the second question and it was regarding mass shootings and the person he was debating had asked about if he knew how many mass shootings had involved a transgender shooter to which Kirk responded. Then he asked how many mass shootings had been in total in the last couple of years, I believe.“And then before he could even answer, we heard a gunshot and we just saw Charlie Kirk’s neck turn to the side and it appeared that he had been shot in the neck. There was blood, immediately a lot of blood,” Pitts added.“After the shots were fired, everyone immediately took to the ground … we were just trying to stay hidden. I don’t know how quickly it was, probably within a minute, everyone started running away … Since then the university has been completely evacuated,” said Pitts.Utah Valley University, based in Orem about 40 miles south of Salt Lake City, has closed its campus and is cancelling classes “until further notice”, according to statement.“Police are investigating. Leave campus immediately,” the university added.We’re also hearing from several leading Democrats across the country, condemning the shooting at Utah Valley University.Pennsylvania governor Josh Shapiro said in a post on X that “the attack on Charlie Kirk is horrifying and this growing type of unconscionable violence cannot be allowed in our society.” Shapiro added that “Political violence has no place in our country.”Similarly, California governor Gavin Newsom described the shooting as “disgusting, vile, and reprehensible.”On Capitol Hill, Senate minority leader Chuck Schumer said that he was “praying” for Kirk and his family, while echoing statements denouncing political violence.Alongside the president, several members of his cabinet have offered their prayers to Charlie Kirk, the conservative activist and Turning Point founder, who was shot during a speaking engagement at Utah Valley University.Vice-president JD Vance asked his followers to “say a prayer for Charlie Kirk, a genuinely good guy and a young father”, and attorney general Pam Bondi wrote that “FBI and ATF agents are on the scene. PRAY FOR CHARLIE.”Meanwhile, Kristi Noem, secretary of the Department for Homeland Security, said that she and her husband “are lifting up Charlie, Erika, and their family in our prayers right now”.Defense secretary Pete Hegseth added that Kirk was “an incredible Christian, American, and human being”. More

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      Kamala Harris announces she will not run for governor of California

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      Kamala Harris, the former vice-president and 2024 Democratic presidential nominee, announced on Wednesday that she will not run for governor of California – a highly anticipated decision that leaves the contest to lead the country’s largest blue state wide open.“For now, my leadership – and public service – will not be in elected office,” Harris said in a statement, ending months of speculation about her political future after losing the 2024 presidential election to Donald Trump.“I look forward to getting back out and listening to the American people, helping elect Democrats across the nation who will fight fearlessly, and sharing more details in the months ahead about my own plans,” she added.Harris, 60, who previously served as California’s attorney general and US senator, had been exploring a run for the state’s top job since leaving the White House in January. But, she said in the statement, “after deep reflection, I’ve decided that I will not run for governor in this election”. The decision does not rule out a future run for public office, including a third bid for the White House, after unsuccessful campaigns in 2020 and 2024.Among the other possibilities Harris is exploring is starting a non-profit or leading a policy thinktank, said a personal familiar with her thinking. Allies said she would be a sought-after surrogate and fundraiser ahead of the 2026 midterms.“I think we can expect her to continue to invigorate the younger generation who really vibed off of her energy, her authenticity, and, you know, her willingness to talk about things that you don’t normally talk about when you’re on the campaign trail,” said the California congresswoman Sydney Kamlager-Dove, one of the Democrats Harris spoke with in recent months as she weighed a run for governor.Harris’s looming decision had in effect paralyzed the race to replace Gavin Newsom, the term-limited Democratic governor, with early polling suggesting she was Californians’ top choice. The Harris-less race to lead California will now take place in a political landscape dramatically reshaped by her loss to Trump in November, which plunged the party into a period of paralysis and soul-searching.In the months since, the Democratic base has grown increasingly furious with its old guard, demanding fresh leadership and a more combative approach to what they view as Trump’s increasingly authoritarian agenda.In a nod to the discontent roiling her party, and the country, Harris said: “We must recognize that our politics, our government, and our institutions have too often failed the American people, culminating in this moment of crisis. As we look ahead, we must be willing to pursue change through new methods and fresh thinking – committed to our same values and principles, but not bound by the same playbook.”While the decision was disappointing to supporters eager to see Harris square off again with Trump during the final years of his term, Harris had given few signals that she was deeply excited by the prospect of leading the state from the governor’s perch in Sacramento. The months-long slog to next year’s contest would have forced Harris to grapple with her role in Democrats’ losses in November, which has already drawn criticism from corners of the party eager for leaders to step aside and make space for a new generation of candidates.The crowded field of Democrats running for governor in California is so far made up of long-serving or well-known political leaders, including Xavier Becerra, the former attorney general of California who served with Harris in Biden’s cabinet as the secretary of health and human services; Antonio Villaraigosa, the former Democratic mayor of Los Angeles; the state’s lieutenant governor, Eleni Kounalakis, who is close friends with Harris; and the former representative Katie Porter.The most prominent Republicans in the race are Chad Bianco, the sheriff of Riverside county, and Steve Hilton, the former Fox host and former adviser to then UK prime minister David Cameron. Ric Grenell, a longtime Trump ally, has also toyed with the idea of running.In a statement, Villaraigosa commended Harris’s leadership and said that her decision “reflects her continued commitment to serving at the highest levels of government”.Becerra described Harris’s decision as an “important turning point for her and our state” that would reshape the “race for governor, but not the stakes”.“California needs a governor who will treat the cost of living crisis like the emergency it is, and who will stand up to the chaos and corruption of the Trump White House,” he said in a statement.Meanwhile, Newsom, who came up in San Francisco politics with Harris, also praised the former vice-president. “Kamala Harris has courageously served our state and country for her entire career,” he said.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotion“Whether it be as a prosecutor, attorney general, senator, or vice-president she has always kept a simple pledge at the heart of every decision she’s made: For the People. Grateful for her service and friendship – and looking forward to continuing the fight in whatever the future might hold for her.”Republicans – some of whom had been eager to elevate Harris as the face of the Democratic party – nevertheless touted her decision as a political victory for the president.“Kamala Harris’s political career is over thanks to President Trump,” said Kollin Crompton, a spokesperson for the Republican Governors Association, adding, perhaps prematurely: “Americans across the country can sigh in relief that they won’t have to see or hear from Kamala Harris any longer.”Harris had maintained a relatively low profile since she returned home to Los Angeles, offering few clues about her political future. She remained mostly out of view as protests erupted in response to the Trump administration’s immigration raids in Los Angeles earlier this summer. In a statement issued after Trump ordered national guard troops deployed Los Angeles, she said that protest was “a powerful tool” and said she supported the “millions of Americans who are standing up to protect our most fundamental rights and freedoms”.She has been selective about when to weigh in against the Trump administration’s actions. Earlier this year, Harris delivered a sharp speech in which she warned that the US was witnessing a “wholesale abandonment of America’s highest ideals” by the US president.On Wednesday, Harris vowed to remain politically engaged.“We, the People must use our power to fight for freedom, opportunity, fairness, and the dignity of all,” she said. “I will remain in that fight.”Dani Anguiano contributed to this report More

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      2024 book review: the what-ifs of an election that took US closer to autocracy

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      Donald Trump is on a roll. The “big, beautiful bill” is law. Ice, his paramilitary immigration force, rivals foreign armies for size and funding. Democrats stand demoralized and divided. 2024: How Trump Retook the White House and the Democrats Lost America, by Josh Dawsey, Tyler Pager and Isaac Arnsdorf, is a book for these times: aptly named, deeply sourced.Kamala Harris declined to speak. Joe Biden criticized his successor in a brief phone call, then balked. Trump talked, of course.“If that didn’t happen … I think I would’ve won, but it might have been a little bit closer,” he says of the assassination attempt in Butler, Pennsylvania, which set the race alight.Yet 2024 is about more than the horse race. It also chronicles how the elites unintentionally made Trump’s restoration possible, despite a torrent of criminal charges against him, 34 resulting in convictions, and civil lawsuits that saw him fined hundreds of millions of dollars.“Trump always drew his strength from decades of pent-up frustration with the American democratic system’s failures to address the hardships and problems the people experienced in their daily lives,” Dawsey, Pager and Arnsdorf write.“In 2024, [Trump’s] supporters saw institutions stacked against them … leading them to identify viscerally with his legal ordeal, even though they had not experienced anything like it before.”Dawsey is a Pulitzer prize winner, working political investigations and enterprise for the Wall Street Journal. Pager covers the White House for the New York Times. Arnsdorf was part of the Washington Post team that won a Pulitzer for coverage of the assassination attempt.Dawsey and Pager are Post alumni. With Arnsdorf, they capture the aspirations and delusions of Trump and the pretenders to his Republican throne, of Biden and Harris too.“In the weeks after the election, Biden repeatedly told allies that he could have won if he’d stayed in the race,” 2024 reports, “even as he publicly questioned whether he could have served another four years.”Really? Biden’s approval rating fell below 50% in August 2021 and never recovered. From October 2023, he trailed Trump. A year out, the authors reveal, Barack Obama warned his former vice-president’s staff: “Your campaign is a mess.”Biden’s aides privately derided Obama as “a prick”.“They thought he and his inner circle had constantly disrespected and mistreated Biden, despite his loyal service as vice-president.”As for Harris, Dawsey, Pager and Arnsdorf report that she “knew that the race would be close, but she really thought she would win”.Despite that, David Plouffe, a senior Harris adviser, admitted post-election that internal polls never showed her leading.“I think it surprised people because there were these public polls that came out in late September, early October, showing us with leads that we never saw,” he said. Harris’s debate win never moved the needle.Dawsey, Pager and Arnsdorf contend that the outcome was not foreordained. Rather, they raise a series of plausible-enough “what-ifs”. One is: “If the Democrats got clobbered, as expected, in the 2022 midterms, and Joe Biden never ran for re-election.”Except, by early 2022, according to This Shall Not Pass, a campaign book published that year, Biden saw himself as a cross between FDR and Obama.A telephone conversation between Biden and Abigail Spanberger, a moderate congresswoman now the Democratic candidate for governor in Virginia, captures Biden’s self-perception.“This is President Roosevelt,” Biden begins, before thanking Spanberger for her sense of humor.She replies: “I’m glad you have a sense of humor, Mr President.”Back to 2024. Biden bristled at being challenged. Pushback risked being equated with disloyalty. His closest advisers were either family members or dependent on him for their livelihoods. He lacked social peers with incomes and personages of their own.Mike Donilon, a longtime aide, tells the authors: “It was an act of insanity by the Democratic leadership to have forced Biden out.“Tell me why you walked away from a guy with 81m votes … A native of [swing-state] Pennsylvania. Why do that?”Because Biden’s debate performance was a gobsmacking disaster. He also found navigating the stairs of Air Force One difficult and needed prompts to find the podium. In May 2025, Biden announced that he had been diagnosed with stage-four prostate cancer – a disclosure that came after 2024 went to press.The authors of 2024 pose Republican hypotheticals too. One: “If Trump never got indicted, or if Republicans didn’t respond by rallying to him, or if the prosecutions were more successful.”Ron DeSantis, Florida’s governor, demonstrated a lack of nerve. Glaringly, he failed to use the initial E Jean Carroll trial, over the writer’s allegation that Trump sexually assaulted her, to bolster his presidential ambitions. DeSantis didn’t dispatch his wife, Casey DeSantis, to Manhattan to offer daily thoughts and prayers for the plaintiff, or for Melania Trump. If you want to be the man, first you’ve got to beat the man.Another hypothetical: “If Trump and Biden didn’t agree to an early debate …”That question hangs over everything.Trump’s pronouncements leave Dawsey, Pager and Arnsdorf anxious. After the 2022 midterms, he mused about terminating the constitution. Later, on the campaign trail, he spoke openly of being a “dictator for a day”. When he was back in the West Wing, reporters asked: “Are you a dictator on day one?” “No,” he replied. “I can’t imagine even being called that.”Dawsey, Pager and Arnsdorf then catalog Trump’s unilateral actions on that first day, including stripping political opponents of security clearances. Later that month, he commenced his vendetta against law firms he deemed to be enemies. In February, Trump barred the Associated Press from the White House press pool unless the news agency referred to the Gulf of Mexico as the “Gulf of America”.2024 contains no mention of Hungary’s Viktor Orbán. Perhaps it should have made space. Hungary’s leader is an autocrat in all but name, an elected leader who has removed freedoms regardless. Republicans adore him.

      2024 is published in the US by Penguin Random House More

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      I chaired the FCC. The 60 Minutes settlement shows Trump has weaponized the agency | Tom Wheeler

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      It is time to unfurl the “Mission Accomplished” banner at the Federal Communications Commission (FCC). Paramount Global, the parent of CBS Television, has agreed to pay $16m to settle a lawsuit brought by Donald Trump over the editing of a 60 Minutes interview with Kamala Harris. Presumably, the FCC can now cease its slow-walking of the Paramount-Skydance Media merger.Just two days after the president took office, the agency’s new chair, Brendan Carr, inserted the FCC into the issues in the Trump lawsuit that alleged “news distortion”. As the New York Post headlined: “Trump’s FCC pick Brendan Carr says ‘60 Minutes’ editing scandal could affect Paramount-Skydance merger review.”That lawsuit was filed in the final week of the 2024 presidential campaign under the Texas Deceptive Trade Practices Act, a statute historically used against false advertising. The case was filed in a single-judge federal district court that one legal publication characterized as “a favored jurisdiction for conservative legal causes and plaintiffs”. CBS characterized the case as “without merit”.The 60 Minutes broadcast aired in October; the day before, a different excerpt had appeared on Face the Nation. Soon after, the Center for American Rights – a group that describes itself as “a public interest law firm dedicated to protecting Americans’ most fundamental constitutional rights” – filed a complaint at the FCC alleging CBS had engaged in “significant and substantial news alteration”. The complaint was dismissed as seeking “to weaponize the licensing authority of the FCC in a way that is fundamentally at odds with the First Amendment”. Immediately upon becoming the FCC chair, Carr reversed that decision and ordered a formal proceeding on the matter (but let stand the dismissal of a complaint against a local Fox station over its 2020 election coverage).The election of Trump and the installation of a Trump-appointed FCC chair transformed the Paramount/CBS merger from a review of the public interest merits of the transfer of broadcast licenses into a broader question that included the 60 Minutes editing. Carr told an interviewer: “I’m pretty confident that the news distortion complaint over the 60 Minutes transcript is something that is likely to arise in the context of the FCC review of that transaction.”The formal paperwork for FCC approval of the license transfers was submitted 10 months ago, on 6 September 2024. Now that the lawsuit has been settled, it will be interesting to see how quickly the FCC acts.The CBS case is just one example of the tactical leverage the Trump FCC regularly exerts over those it regulates. Carr, who wrote the FCC chapter in the “Project 2025” Maga blueprint, has not been shy about using this authority to achieve such political goals.Even before formally assuming the FCC chair position, Carr began exercising chair-like authority to advance the Maga agenda. This began with a letter to the CEOs of Alphabet (Google and YouTube), Meta (Facebook and Instagram), Microsoft and Apple alleging: “you participated in a censorship cartel … [that is] an affront to Americans’ constitutional freedoms and must be completely dismantled.” Going beyond traditional FCC authority, he threatened: “As you know, Big Tech’s prized liability shield, Section 230, is codified in the Communications Act, which the FCC administers.” Carr suggested he might investigate whether those editorial decisions were made in good faith.Recently, Carr conditioned the approval of Verizon’s acquisition of Frontier Communications on Verizon agreeing to drop its corporate diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) policies. Continuing his anti-diversity efforts, he launched an investigation into Comcast Corporation because it promotes DEI as “a core value of our business”.In his pre-FCC chair days, Carr championed press freedom. In a 2021 statement, he wrote: “A newsroom’s decision about what stories to cover and how to frame them should be beyond the reach of any government official.” Once he became Trump’s FCC chair, however, he not only picked up on the 60 Minutes matter, but also launched an investigation into the public broadcasters NPR and PBS “regarding the airing of … programming across your broadcast member stations”.The FCC’s regulatory authority directly covers about one-sixth of the American economy while also affecting the other five-sixths that rely on the nation’s communications networks. What was once an independent, policy-based agency has been transformed into a performance-based agency, using any leverage it can discover or invent to further the Trump Maga message.

      Tom Wheeler was the chair of the Federal Communications Commission from 2013 to 2017 More

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      Paramount settles with Trump for $16m over ‘60 Minutes’ Kamala Harris interview

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      CBS parent company Paramount on Wednesday settled a lawsuit filed by Donald Trump over an interview broadcast in October, in the latest concession by a media company to the US president, who has targeted outlets over what he describes as false or misleading coverage.Paramount said it would pay $16m to settle the suit with the money allocated to Trump’s future presidential library, and not paid to Trump “directly or indirectly”.“The settlement does not include a statement of apology or regret,” the company statement added.Trump filed a $10bn lawsuit against CBS in October, alleging the network deceptively edited an interview that aired on its 60 Minutes news program with then-vice-president and presidential candidate Kamala Harris to “tip the scales in favor of the Democratic party” in the election. In an amended complaint filed in February, Trump increased his claim for damages to $20bn.CBS aired two versions of the Harris interview in which she appears to give different answers to the same question about the Israel-Hamas war, according to the lawsuit filed in a federal court in Texas.CBS previously said the lawsuit was “completely without merit” and had asked a judge to dismiss the case.The White House did not immediately respond to a Reuters request for comment. Edward A Paltzik, a lawyer representing Trump in the civil suit, could not be immediately reached for comment.Paramount said it also agreed that 60 Minutes would release transcripts of interviews with future US presidential candidates after they aired, subject to redactions as required for legal or national security concerns. A spokesperson for Paramount Chair Shari Redstone was unavailable for comment.The case entered mediation in April.Trump alleged CBS’s editing of the interview violated the Texas Deceptive Trade Practices-Consumer Protection Act, which makes it illegal to use false, misleading or deceptive acts in commerce.The settlement comes as Paramount prepares for an $8.4bn merger with Skydance Media, which will require approval from the US Federal Communications Commission.On the campaign trail last year, Trump threatened to revoke CBS’s broadcasting licence if elected.He has repeatedly lashed out against the news media, often casting unfavourable coverage as “fake news”.The Paramount settlement follows a decision by Walt Disney-owned ABC News to settle a defamation case brought by Trump. As part of that settlement, which was made public on 14 December, the network donated $15m to Trump’s presidential library and publicly apologised for comments by anchor George Stephanopoulos, who inaccurately said Trump had been found liable for rape.It also follows a second settlement by Facebook and Instagram parent company Meta Platforms, which on 29 January said it had agreed to pay about $25m to settle a lawsuit by Trump over the company’s suspension of his accounts after the 6 January 2021 attack at the US Capitol.Trump has vowed to pursue more claims against the media. More

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      Joe Biden and Kamala Harris attend funeral of slain Minnesota lawmaker

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      Democratic former Minnesota state house speaker Melissa Hortman was honored for her legislative accomplishments and her humanity during a funeral on Saturday that was attended by Joe Biden and Kamala Harris.The former president and vice-president were joined by more than 1,000 other mourners.Hortman was shot to death during a pair of attacks two weeks earlier by a man posing as a police officer. Minnesota’s chief federal prosecutor has called the killing an assassination. The shootings also left her husband, Mark, dead and a state senator and his wife seriously wounded.“Melissa Hortman will be remembered as the most consequential speaker in Minnesota history. I get to remember her as a close friend, a mentor and the most talented legislator I have ever known,” Minnesota’s governor, Tim Walz, said in his eulogy.Walz, who was Harris’s running mate in the 2024 White House election won by Donald Trump, added: “For seven years, I have had the privilege of signing her agenda into law. I know millions of Minnesotans get to live their lives better because she and Mark chose public service and politics.”Neither Biden nor Harris spoke, but they sat in the front row with Walz. Biden was also one of more than 7,500 people who paid their respects on Friday as Hortman, her husband and their golden retriever, Gilbert, lay in state in the Minnesota capitol rotunda in St Paul. Gilbert was seriously wounded in the attack and had to be euthanized. Biden also visited the wounded senator in a hospital.Dozens of current and former state legislators from both parties and other elected officials who worked with Hortman also attended.As House speaker, Hortman helped pass an expansive agenda of liberal initiatives such as free lunches for public school students along with strengthened protections for abortion and trans rights during a momentous 2023 legislative session. With the House split 67-67 between Democrats and Republicans this year, she yielded the gavel to a Republican under a power-sharing deal, took the title speaker emerita and helped break a budget impasse that threatened to shut down state government.Walz said Hortman – who was first elected in 2004 – saw her mission as “to get as much good done for as many people as possible”. And he said her focus on people was what made her so effective.“She certainly knew how to get her way – no doubt about that,” Walz said. “But she never made anyone feel that they’d gotten rolled at a negotiating table. That wasn’t part of it for her, or a part of who she was. She didn’t need somebody else to lose to win for her.”The governor said the best way to honor the Hortmans would be by following their example.“Maybe it is this moment where each of us can examine the way we work together, the way we talk about each other, the way we fight for things we care about,” Walz said. “A moment when each of us can recommit to engaging in politics and life the way Mark and Melissa did – fiercely, enthusiastically, heartily, but without ever losing sight of our common humanity.”A private burial for the Hortmans will be held at a later date.The Hortmans were proud of their adult children, Sophie and Colin Hortman, and the lawmaker often spoke of them.In a voice choked with emotion, Colin said his parents embodied the “Golden Rule”, and he read the prayer of St Francis, which his mother always kept in her wallet. He said it captures her essence. It starts: “Lord, make me an instrument of your peace.”After the service, Walz presented the children with US and Minnesota flags that flew over the state capitol on the day their parents were killed.The man accused of killing the Hortmans at their home in the Minneapolis suburb of Brooklyn Park on 14 June, and wounding Democratic state senator John Hoffman and his wife, Yvette, at their home in nearby Champlin, surrendered near his home the night of 15 June.Vance Boelter, 57, of Green Isle, remains jailed and has not entered a plea to charges that could carry the federal death penalty. More

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      Biden destroyed Harris bid by staying in race too long, top adviser says in book

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      Joe Biden “totally fucked us” by leaving it too late to drop out of the 2024 US presidential election, a former top campaign aide to Kamala Harris has told the authors of a new book.David Plouffe, who was manager of Barack Obama’s winning 2008 campaign and a senior adviser in his White House, was drafted in to help Harris’s bid for president after the declining Biden withdrew from the race last summer.Harris’s 107-day sprint against Donald Trump was “a fucking nightmare”, Plouffe is quoted as saying by authors Jake Tapper and Alex Thompson in Original Sin: President Biden’s Decline, Its Cover-up, and His Disastrous Choice to Run Again. A copy was obtained by the Guardian.“And it’s all Biden,” Plouffe adds, reflecting on the former US president’s decisions to run for re-election and then to cling on for more than three weeks after a catastrophic debate performance against Trump raised questions about his mental acuity and age. “He totally fucked us.”Plouffe, along with some other former Obama staffers, has previously been critical of Biden and his role in the Democratic defeat. In the wake of Harris’s loss he posted a message on X – formerly known as Twitter – that the Harris campaign had begun in a “deep hole”. He later deleted his account.The book describes how Plouffe had received calls from donors worried about Biden’s diminishing energy, cognitive skills and ability to deliver a speech. He in turn pressed the White House and Democratic party if they felt sure that the then president could win another election and was repeatedly told he could.But Tapper, chief Washington correspondent for CNN, and Thompson, a national political correspondent for Axios, spoke to around 200 people for the book, including members of Congress and White House and campaign insiders. Some had been sounding the alarm about Biden’s mental acuity and about desperate efforts by his close staff and allies to hide the extent of his deterioration.One senior aide, who quit the White House because they did not think Biden should run, admits to the authors that “we attempted to shield him from his own staff so many people didn’t realize the extent of the decline beginning in 2023”.“I love Joe Biden. When it comes to decency, there are few in politics like him. Still, it was a disservice to the country and to the party for his family and advisers to allow him to run again.”A prominent Democratic strategist says of Biden’s determination to seek re-election: “It was an abomination. He stole an election from the Democratic party; he stole it from the American people.”Original Sin is one of several eagerly awaited books about the 2024 election and an alleged White House conspiracy.Biden, 82, seemingly tried to preempt its revelations last week with media appearances on BBC Radio 4’s Today program and ABC’s talkshow The View. Biden has signed with Creative Artists Agency for representation and hired communications strategist Chris Meagher to help burnish his public reputation.But the 27 June 2024 debate in Atlanta was no anomaly, the book argues. Since at least 2022 Biden has been increasingly prone to lose his train of thought and struggle to remember the names of top aides. His speeches can be incoherent and difficult to hear. When he proved incapable of delivering a two-minute video address without stumbling, aides filmed him with two cameras so the edit would be less obvious.Original Sin tells how prominent figures tried to intervene in various ways. Obama visited the White House in 2023 and warned Biden: “Just make sure you can win the race.”Ari Emanuel, a Hollywood powerbroker and significant Democratic donor, yelled at longtime Biden ally Ron Klain: “Joe Biden cannot run for re-election! He needs to drop out! He can’t win! What’s the plan B?” Klain admitted there was no plan B.And Chuck Schumer, the Democratic leader in the Senate, confronted the president after the debate last July at his home in Rehoboth, Delaware, and appealed to his desire to preserve his legacy. He warned Biden that, he if stayed in the race and lost to Trump then 50 years of “amazing, beautiful work goes out the window. But it’s worse than that – you will go down in American history as one of the darkest figures.”On their way out, the book reports, Biden put his hands on Schumer’s shoulders and told him: “You have bigger balls than anyone I’ve ever met.”Biden stepped aside on 21 July and quickly endorsed Harris, but it was too late, the authors contend. He had already helped usher in the fate that he most wanted to avoid: the return of Trump to the White House. More