More stories

  • in

    Mike Johnson unveils complex plan for Israel and Ukraine aid as pressure rises

    Mike Johnson, the US House speaker, has unveiled a complicated proposal for passing wartime aid for Israel, Ukraine and Taiwan, rejecting pressure to approve a package sent over by the Senate and leaving its path to passage deeply uncertain.The Republican speaker huddled with fellow GOP lawmakers on Monday evening to lay out his strategy to gain House approval for the funding package. Facing an outright rebellion from conservatives who fiercely oppose aiding Ukraine, Johnson said he would push to get the package to the House floor under a single debate rule, then hold separate votes on aid for Ukraine, Israel and Taiwan and several foreign policy proposals, according to Republican lawmakers.However, the package would deviate from the $95bn aid package passed by the Senate in February, clouding its prospects for final passage in Congress.Johnson has faced mounting pressure to act on Joe Biden’s long-delayed request for billions of dollars in security assistance. It’s been more than two months since the Senate passed the $95bn aid package, which includes $14bn for Israel and $60bn for Ukraine.The issue gained new urgency after Iran’s weekend missile and drone attack on Israel. Congress, however, remains deeply divided.Johnson has declined to allow the Republican-controlled House to vote on the measure. The senate passed it with 70% bipartisan support and backers insist it would receive similar support in the House, but Johnson has given a variety of reasons not to allow a vote, among them the need to focus taxpayer dollars on domestic issues and reluctance to take up a Senate measure without more information.As the House has struggled to act, conflicts around the globe have escalated. Israel’s military chief said on Monday that his country will respond to Iran’s missile strike. And Ukraine’s military head over the weekend warned that the battlefield situation in the country’s east has “significantly worsened in recent days”, as warming weather has allowed Russian forces to launch a fresh offensive.Meanwhile, Joe Biden, who is hosting Petr Fiala, the Czech prime minister, at the White House, called on the House to take up the Senate funding package immediately. “They have to do it now,” he said.Hakeem Jeffries, the top House Democrat, also put pressure on Johnson and pledged in a letter to lawmakers to do “everything in our legislative power to confront aggression” around the globe, and he cast the situation as similar to the lead-up to the second world war.“The gravely serious events of this past weekend in the Middle East and eastern Europe underscore the need for Congress to act immediately,” Jeffries said. “We must take up the bipartisan and comprehensive national security bill passed by the Senate forthwith. This is a Churchill or Chamberlain moment.”In the Capitol, Johnson’s approach could further incite the populist conservatives who are already angry at his direction as speaker.Marjorie Taylor Greene, a Republican Congresswoman from Georgia, is threatening to oust him as speaker. As she entered the closed-door Republican meeting on Monday, she said her message to the speaker was: “Don’t fund Ukraine.”The GOP meeting was filled with lawmakers at odds in their approach to Ukraine: Republican defense hawks, including the top lawmakers on national security committees, who want Johnson to finally take up the national security supplemental package as a bundle, are pitted against populist conservatives who are fiercely opposed to continued support for Kyiv’s fight.On the right, the House Freedom Caucus said Monday that it opposed “using the emergency situation in Israel as a bogus justification to ram through Ukraine aid with no offset and no security for our own wide-open borders”.The Associated Press contributed reporting More

  • in

    Trump’s hush-money trial: key takeaways from the first day

    Donald Trump struggled through the opening day of his New York criminal trial on Monday as the jury selection process formally got under way in Manhattan in the first criminal trial of a current or former US president.Trump has pleaded not guilty to 34 counts of falsifying business records in trying to cover up hush-money payments to an adult film star that influenced the 2016 election.Trump himself did little during his time in the courtroom of the New York supreme court judge Juan Merchan. But the eventual proceeding showed the momentous nature of the case and highlighted Trump’s divisiveness.Here are the takeaways of day one of “People v Donald Trump”:Seating jury could take weeksLegal experts widely expected that seating a jury in the Trump case – 12 jurors and six alternates – was going to be a difficult and lengthy process as Trump’s lawyers and prosecutors in the Manhattan district attorney’s office.But moving through the first 100 or so potential jurors showed just how tricky the “voir dire” process could be: more than half of the group told the judge they could not be impartial and were excused immediately.The voir dire process involves each potential juror reading their responses to a 42-point questionnaire and the judge reading out to the jurors the people who might serve as witnesses or otherwise come up at trial.The potential jurors’ reactions toward Trump were varied. One man smiled when he saw Trump. Another woman giggled and put her hand over her mouth, looking at the person seated next to her with raised eyebrows. And one of the potential jurors, who was excused, said leaving the courtroom: “I just couldn’t do it.”Trump’s lawyers are looking for a so-called “holdout juror” who could be partial to Trump and not convict on any of the counts – and thereby hang the jury for a mistrial.The process also appeared to tire out Trump. Before the jury selection began in the afternoon, Trump often appeared to nod off.Trump was stuck with judge despite delay tacticsTrump tried one more time before jury selection began to have the judge recuse himself from presiding in the case, claiming Merchan had conflicts of interest and had shown indications of bias that meant he could not be fair.The judge addressed two of Trump’s main complaints – and dismissed them summarily.In the first instance, the judge rejected Trump’s complaints about an interview he did with the Associated Press because he did not talk about Trump’s case, meaning the judge’s statements did not “reasonably or logically” reflect bias.And in the second instance, the judge said a podcast interview his daughter did in 2019, in which he said he disliked politicians using Twitter, similarly did not reflect bias against any party.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionProsecutors score two additional winsThe Manhattan district attorney, Alvin Bragg, had some partial wins on Monday morning, after Merchan allowed them to admit into evidence materials that would bolster their case that Trump’s falsification of records was to influence the 2016 election.The judge had previously ruled that prosecutors could not use as evidence the actual tape of Trump’s infamous Access Hollywood tape, as well as a video of Trump referencing the Access Hollywood tape in a deposition in an unrelated case.But Merchan allowed prosecutors to admit into evidence the full transcript of the Access Hollywood tape, which means the infamous Trump quote that he could assault women and “grab them by the pussy” can be read to the jury at trial.The judge also allowed prosecutors to use an email chain in which the former Trump aide Hope Hicks forwarded the transcript to another former Trump aide, Kellyanne Conway, asking if the tape was Trump’s voice. Conway then asked the ex-Trump lawyer Michael Cohen who was doing damage control.Trump could yet be held in contemptTrump left the courtroom after the first day of his criminal trial with another cloud hanging over his head: whether he will be found in contempt for violating a gag order that prohibited from assailing potential trial witnesses.The former president was recently hit with an expanded gag order after he went after the judge’s daughter, alleging that her work doing campaign work for Democratic political candidates meant the judge was conflicted.But prosecutors asked Merchan to impose a $3,000 fine on Trump for attacking two potential trial witnesses – Stormy Daniels, the adult film star at the centre of the criminal case, and his ex-lawyer Cohen – and warning him that future violations could result in jail.The matter was scheduled for arguments at a 23 April hearing. Merchan promised to address the alleged gag order violations but said he did not want to get into it on Monday because they had several hundred potential jurors waiting. More

  • in

    ‘The speaker has to move quickly’: White House urges Mike Johnson to pass aid for Ukraine and Israel – as it happened

    The White House “will not accept” any bill put forward by Republicans in the US House that only provides additional funding to Israel, in the wake of Iran’s attack on Saturday, and does not include aid for Ukraine, the press secretary just said.The US House speaker, Mike Johnson, said on Sunday that he will aim to advance a bill for wartime aid to Israel this week but did not clarify whether Ukraine funding would be part of the package.The White House wants a bipartisan $95bn national security bill that is languishing in the House to be passed, which includes fresh funding for Israel, Ukraine, Taiwan and other allies.White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said at the media briefing in the west wing moments ago that “the Speaker has to move quickly” to “get this on the floor” of the chamber for a vote.If Republicans put forward a bill that only offers extra funding for Israel, the White House will not support it (although such a bill would be unlikely to pass the Democratic-controlled Senate anyway).“We would not accept a standalone,” Jean-Pierre said.Hello again, it’s been a lively day in US politics with news coming from the White House, the Supreme Court and Capitol Hill. We’re closing this blog now. We still have live coverage of the first day of the first ever criminal trial of a former US president as Donald Trump attends court in New York, where jury selection is underway in the hush money case involving Stormy Daniels. You can read that blog here.We’ll be back on Tuesday. All in the one blog this time we’ll plan to have action from Day 2 of the Trump trial, oral arguments at the Supreme Court over alleged insurrectionists accused of obstruction of an official proceeding when they tried to stop the congressional certification of Joe Biden’s presidential election victory, on January 6, 2021, and now-President Biden’s trip to his hometown of Scranton on the first visit of a three-day campaign swing through the crucial battleground state of Pennsylvania.Here’s what happened today:
    The White House “will not accept” any bill put forward by Republicans in the US House that only provides additional funding to Israel and not also Ukraine, press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said. “The Speaker has to move quickly” to put the a bipartisan bill already passed by the Senate onto the floor of the House for a vote, she said.
    “We do not want a war with Iran,” national security spokesman John Kirby said at the White House press briefing. He said the US is not involved with any Israeli decision now about how to respond after Iran sent drones and missiles hurtling towards Israel on Saturday, with almost all of them shot down.
    Supreme court justice Clarence Thomas was absent from the court in Washington DC on Monday – with no explanation, as the court issued a ruling and heard oral arguments. This is highly unusual. Thomas, 75, also was not participating remotely in arguments, as justices sometimes do when they are ill or otherwise can’t be there in person.
    The US supreme court on Monday allowed a Black Lives Matter activist to be sued by a Louisiana police officer injured during a protest in 2016 in a case that could make it riskier to engage in public demonstrations, a hallmark of American democracy. In declining to hear DeRay Mckesson’s appeal, the justices left in place a lower court’s decision reviving a lawsuit by the Baton Rouge police officer, John Ford, who accused him of negligence after being struck by a rock during a protest sparked by the fatal police shooting of a Black man, Alton Sterling, by white officers.
    Joe Biden is preparing for a three-day election campaign swing through Pennsylvania from Tuesday, after Donald Trump campaigned there on Saturday, two days before his criminal trial was due to begin in New York.
    Czech prime minister Petr Fiala has now arrived in the Oval Office.Before his departure from Prague on Sunday, Fiala told reporters that during his visit to the US he will focus on security cooperation, the Middle East, and aid to Ukraine, the White House pool reports.Fiala said he would address the issue of further support for Ukraine in any talks he has with US officials. The White House today is urging the US House to bring a stalled bill to the floor for a vote that provides fresh aid to Ukraine and Israel.
    I will try to convince our American friends that this help and support is absolutely necessary,” Fiala said of more aid for Ukraine in its desperate fight back against Russia more than two years after the much larger neighbor invaded.
    Other topics will include economic relations and nuclear energy. Although the American firm Westinghouse has dropped out of the bid for the completion of a Czech power plant, the Czech Republic would still like to cooperate with the US on the supply of nuclear fuel for Czech power plants, and development of small modular reactors.Announcing Fiala’s travel to the US, the Czech Government Office pointed to a symbolic significance of his visit, as the Czech Republic commemorates the 25th anniversary of its accession to NATO.The arrival of the prime minister of the Czech Republic, Petr Fiala, at the White House has been delayed, as it was due to be happening by now.The White House pool report notes that Fiala began his visit to Washington today with an unannounced meeting with the director of the CIA, William Burns.“At the beginning of my working visit, I am heading for a meeting with the director of the CIA,” Fiala himself revealed on X. The heads of the Czech intelligence services, including the head of the Czech civilian counterintelligence service, the Security Information Service (BIS) Michal Koudelka and Military Intelligence Service commander Jan Beroun are accompanying Fiala in Washington.Last month Fiala announced that BIS discovered a Kremlin-financed network that spread Russian propaganda and wielded influence across Europe, including in the European Parliament.At the center of the network was a Voice of Europe news site based in Prague, which tried to discourage Europeans from sending more aid to Ukraine. Some European politicians cooperating with the news site were apparently paid by Russians. Fiala and Biden met in Warsaw in February 2023.Top House Democrat and New York Democratic congressman Hakeem Jeffries is also urging Speaker Johnson to bring the bipartisan aid bill that covers Ukraine and Israel to the floor for a vote.It was passed by the Senate in February and since then has been stalled as Johnson battles hard right Republican colleagues who oppose more aid to Ukraine.Jeffries’ wish posted yesterday has not been granted:But earlier on Monday Jeffries sent a letter to his caucus spelling out the need to support Ukraine as well as Israel, Reuters reports.
    The gravely serious events of this past weekend in the Middle East and Eastern Europe underscore the need for Congress to act immediately. We must take up the bipartisan and comprehensive national security bill passed by the Senate forthwith,” Jeffries wrote.
    Ukraine appealed again to allies on Monday for “extraordinary and bold steps” to supply air defenses to help defend against waves of Russian airstrikes that have targeted its energy system in recent weeks.But underscoring the deep party divide in Washington, a letter released on Monday urging an immediate vote on the Senate bill was signed by 90 House Democrats and just one Republican.House Speaker Mike Johnson is expected to decide this week on how he will handle Joe Biden’s long-delayed request for billions of dollars in security assistance for Ukraine, Israel and the Indo-Pacific, Reuters reports.More than two months after it passed the Senate, the push for the $95bn aid package, which includes $14 billion for Israel as well as $60 billion for Ukraine, gained new urgency after Iran’s weekend missile and drone attack on Israel despite fierce opposition in the deeply divided Congress.Johnson has declined to allow the Republican-controlled House to vote on the measure that the Senate passed with 70% bipartisan support in February.Backers insist it would receive similar support in the House, but Johnson has given a variety of reasons not to allow a vote, among them the need to focus taxpayer dollars on domestic issues and reluctance to take up a Senate measure without more information.Republican House aides said on Monday Johnson had not yet indicated his plans for security assistance, after discussing it with national security committee leaders late on Sunday and planning more talks with members on Monday.The White House “will not accept” any bill put forward by Republicans in the US House that only provides additional funding to Israel, in the wake of Iran’s attack on Saturday, and does not include aid for Ukraine, the press secretary just said.The US House speaker, Mike Johnson, said on Sunday that he will aim to advance a bill for wartime aid to Israel this week but did not clarify whether Ukraine funding would be part of the package.The White House wants a bipartisan $95bn national security bill that is languishing in the House to be passed, which includes fresh funding for Israel, Ukraine, Taiwan and other allies.White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said at the media briefing in the west wing moments ago that “the Speaker has to move quickly” to “get this on the floor” of the chamber for a vote.If Republicans put forward a bill that only offers extra funding for Israel, the White House will not support it (although such a bill would be unlikely to pass the Democratic-controlled Senate anyway).“We would not accept a standalone,” Jean-Pierre said.Joe Biden said a little earlier on Monday that he wants to prevent the conflict in the Middle East, where Israel is waging war in Gaza and fending off Iranian attacks, from spreading more widely, Agence France-Presse reports.
    Iran launched an unprecedented aerial attack against Israel, and we launched an unprecedented military effort to defend it. Together with our partners, we defended that attack.
    The United States is committed to Israel’s security. We’re committed to a ceasefire that will bring the hostages home and prevent the conflict from spreading beyond what it already has,” Biden said as he met Iraq’s visiting prime minister.
    Biden was referring to those kidnapped by Hamas militants in their deadly October 7 attack on Israel.Biden has promised “ironclad” support for Israel but also urged it to “think carefully and strategically” before launching a response against Iran that could trigger a wider war.The US president said he was “also committed to the security of our personnel and partners in the region, including Iraq.”Iraq’s prime minister Mohammed Shia al-Sudani was visiting the White House for talks on the presence of US troops in Iraq as part of an anti-jihadist coalition.National security spokesman John Kirby, at the White House press briefing, is reluctant to expand on Joe Biden’s advice to Israel at the weekend to “be careful” in its approach to any response to Iran’s attack on Saturday night.But there is an air that the US believes Israel’s broadly successful defense against the unprecedented Iranian assault at the weekend, where hundreds of missiles and drones were intercepted by the Jewish state and allies, is a satisfactory outcome in itself.“We do not want a war with Iran,” Kirby said. He said the US is not involved with any Israeli decision now about how to respond.However he talked in graphic terms about the US activities in shooting down incoming Iranian missiles and drones on Saturday as they approached Israel, both with US fighter jets in the air and from US destroyer ships at sea.“We will do what we have to do to defend Israel,” he said, adding that the US “does not want a wider conflict.”Israel has said it will respond, but without any details yet. Western leaders are urging restraint. Iran’s attack was retaliation for an Israeli attack on Iranian targets in Syria earlier this month.A little earlier, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken also said Washington did not want any escalation, but would continue to defend key ally Israel.The White House press briefing is underway. Press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre has just greeted the media in the west wing and now national security spokesman John Kirby is speaking on international affairs.Kirby is speaking now about Iran’s attack on Israel on Saturday night and he’s pushing back on any idea that Iran knew it wouldn’t hit home with any of the drone weapons or cruise missiles that it launched and that it designed the assault to fail.He said the attack “was defeated thanks to our preparations…and Israel’s remarkable defense system.”Kirby said the extent of the US’s intervention in Israel’s defense was unprecedented, and that Iran had fired so many weapons at Israel because it knew many would be repelled but hoped a maximum number would get through.He’s now talking up the wide defensive coalition and said “Iran failed.”Fifteen prominent historians filed an amicus brief with the US supreme court earlier this month, rejecting Donald Trump’s claim in his federal election subversion case that he is immune to criminal prosecution for acts committed as president.Authorities cited in the document include the founders Alexander Hamilton, James Madison and John Adams, in addition to the historians’ own work.Trump, the historians said, “asserts that a doctrine of permanent immunity from criminal liability for a president’s official acts, while not expressly provided by the constitution, must be inferred. To justify this radical assertion, he contends that the original meaning of the constitution demands it. But no plausible historical case supports his claim.”Trump faces four federal election subversion charges.The supreme court will hear arguments on Trump’s immunity claim, despite widespread legal and historical opinion that the claim is groundless. Fuller report from my colleague, Martin Pengelly here.Donald Trump’s federal criminal trial for his efforts to overturn the 2020 election results had been due to take place in Washington, DC, in March and the government, prosecuting, had asked for it to begin in January of this year.But here we are in April, with the New York criminal trial going ahead (being blogged here) and no dates for any of the other three cases in which Trump is a defendant.This as the US Supreme Court prepares to hear arguments from the former president that he is immune from prosecution.Trump pleaded not guilty last August to charges filed in federal district court in Washington that he conspired to defraud the United States, conspired to obstruct an official proceeding, obstructed an official proceeding and engaged in a conspiracy against rights.My colleague Hugo Lowell writes that the supreme court’s eventual ruling in Fischer v United States, in which it’s hearing oral arguments tomorrow, will indicate whether the obstruction charge under section 1512 of title 18 of the US criminal code can be used against Trump, and could undercut the other general conspiracy charges brought against the former president by the special counsel, Jack Smith.The court could also end up by extension invalidating many convictions against rioters involved in the January 6 Capitol attack. The obstruction statute has been the justice department’s primary weapon to hold accountable those involved in the violence of that day.With Clarence Thomas absent from court today, observers will be watching keenly to see if he joins the bench on Tuesday for Fischer.Clarence Thomas is the oldest of the justices on the bench of the US supreme court, at age 75.The staunch conservative has had previous absences for health reasons, but no reasons have been given for his not being present today during the session in the marbled edifice in Washington DC.Oral arguments were being heard today and a ruling was made. Chief Justice John Roberts announced that Thomas wasn’t present.He has been embroiled in controversies in relation to accusations of unethical conduct and unfair partisan political links.NBC News reports:“Often when a justice is not present for oral arguments, the court will give a reason, including instances when there is a health issue.In February of last year, conservative Justice Neil Gorsuch was not present for an argument, and the court said he was feeling “under the weather.”When Thomas himself was hospitalized in 2022, the court disclosed that he had an infection and was being treated with antibiotics.”The US supreme court on April 25 will hear arguments in the unprecedented claim by Donald Trump that he has absolute immunity from prosecution in the federal criminal case over his efforts to overturn the 2020 election results.Progressive advocacy group MoveOn is petitioning for the conservative supreme court associate justice Clarence Thomas to recuse himself from that case.The group argues that: “It’s clear that the supreme court will play a central role in this year’s presidential election at a time when the public holds the historically lowest opinion of the court’s integrity. For the supreme court to consider these cases with any impartiality, it’s critical that justices with conflicts of interest recuse themselves. That applies first and foremost to Justice Clarence Thomas, whose own wife played a role in Trump’s efforts to overturn the 2020 elections.”The group goes on to argue that: “Thomas has a longstanding history of conflicts of interest. It’s crucial that we raise the pressure now and demand that Justice Thomas recuse himself from this case immediately!”With Trump on trial from today in Manhattan on the New York hush money case (being live blogged here), in the federal case on 2020 election interference we don’t yet have a date for trial. The case is basically on hold until the supreme court rules on the matter of immunity, putting in grave jeopardy the prospect of that trial starting before the next election in November.The US supreme court is due to hear arguments in an important case on Tuesday that involves defendants charged with crimes in relation to the 6 January 2021 insurrection at the US Capitol in Washington – and has implications for Donald Trump.Associate justice Clarence Thomas’s absence from court today now has people wondering what will happen tomorrow.Oral arguments will be presented in the case of Fischer v United States. Former police officer Joseph Fischer has been charged in connection with the January 6 invasion of congress by a mob of Trump supporters, accused of assaulting a serving police officer, disorderly conduct and, crucially, obstruction of a congressional proceeding.This allegedly happened when rioters, who had been egged on by Trump at a rally near the White House just before they breached the US Capitol, aimed to stop the official certification by a joint session of congress of Joe Biden’s 2020 presidential election victory over Trump. Amid the violence, the certification was delayed but took place in the early hours of the following day after the Capitol had been cleared.Fischer, as the learned Scotusblog explains, has asked the supreme court to throw out the charge that he obstructed an official proceeding, arguing that the law that he was charged with violating was only intended to apply to evidence tampering.More than 300 other January 6 defendants have been charged with violating the law and also features in federal criminal charges brought against Trump by special counsel Jack Smith for the former Republican president’s efforts to overturn his 2020 election loss to Biden, who is seeking re-election to a second term as the Democratic nominee this November. More

  • in

    Homicides in major US cities falling at ‘one of fastest rates ever’ – report

    Homicides in major US cities are falling at likely “one of the fastest rates of decline ever recorded”, a crime analysis has found.Jeff Asher of AH Datalytics, a New Orleans-based data-analytics company focused on criminal justice, education and the non-profit sector, discussed that finding with the Wall Street Journal on Monday after combing through quarterly data recently released by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI).“There’s just a ton of places that you can point to that are showing widespread, very positive trends,” Asher told the Journal.In the company’s sample of almost 200 cities with varying population sizes, murder was down by 20.8% from the period beginning in January through the end of March of this year when compared with the same time period in 2023, as Asher wrote in a recent Substack post on the subject.Furthermore, in some prominent cities like Washington DC, New Orleans, Las Vegas, Cleveland, Milwaukee, Detroit, Columbus, Nashville and Philadelphia, murder is down by more than 30%.Asher’s company’s analysis is based on the FBI’s Uniform Crime Reporting program, which collects data from local law enforcement agencies across the country. Because participation in the program is voluntary, not all crime is reported, so experts caution it’s not a complete picture.Additionally, FBI data from 2023 will not be audited nor made official until about October. And 2024 data will not be audited and made official until about October 2025.Nonetheless, the preliminary figures reflect particularly heartening news for the US because they suggest that murder had already “plummeted” in 2023 “at one of the fastest declines ever recorded”, according to what Asher wrote in a Substack post late last year.Updated preliminary information suggests those numbers are again falling this year – but at an even faster clip, setting up a return to levels pre-dating the Covid-19 pandemic, when the US experienced a spike in violent crime.The early available statistics also mirror a decline in homicides seen in the 1990s.“Nationally, you’re seeing a very similar situation to what you saw in the mid-to-late 90s. But it’s potentially even larger in terms of the percentages and numbers of the drops,” Asher said.Asher has made it a point to say that even a substantial decline in homicides still involves a collection of “hundreds or thousands of tragedies” for families across the US. But he has said the data paints a picture that is “as encouraging” as can be given that grim reality.It’s not just murder rates that have fallen.Asher said with the exception of motor vehicle theft, all crimes – such as violent crimes, defined as “murder and non-negligent manslaughter, rape, robbery and aggravated assault” and property crime, defined as “burglary, larceny-theft, motor vehicle theft and arson” – were down “a considerable amount” in 2023 compared with 2022.At the end of 2023, Asher wrote: “Americans tend to think that crime is rising, but the evidence we have right now points to sizable declines this year (even if there are always outliers). The quarterly data in particular suggests 2023 featured one of the lowest rates of violent crime in the United States in more than 50 years.”Crime has been a principal theme in Republican campaign messaging in recent years. Earlier this year, Donald Trump said without evidence that undocumented immigrants were producing increases in violent crime.“You know, in New York, what’s happening with crime – is it’s through the roof. And it’s called ‘migrant’,” the former president and presumptive 2024 Republican nominee said at a rally in Michigan in February.A 2024 Pew research poll reported “a majority of Americans (57%) [believe] the large number of migrants seeking to enter the country leads to more crime”.Yet national data fails to support Trump’s claim or the public’s stubborn preconceptions that crime is eternally on the rise.Asher wrote: “Tell your friends and family because they probably think crime is surging nationally. And in this case, they’re almost certainly wrong.” More

  • in

    Nikki Haley takes new job at ultra-conservative thinktank

    Nikki Haley, who was Donald Trump’s last remaining challenger for the Republican presidential nomination until she dropped out of the race in March, has a new job.The former South Carolina governor has accepted a role with the Hudson Institute, a Washington DC-based, ultra-conservative thinktank specializing in foreign policy affairs.She will become the institute’s Walter P Stern chairperson, a post named for Hudson’s former chairperson who died in 2022. Haley served as US ambassador to the UN during Trump’s presidency and is the fourth member of his administration to join Hudson.Former attorney general William Barr did so in 2020, and ex-secretary of state Mike Pompeo as well as former transportation secretary Elaine Chao did so the following year.“When our policymakers fail to call out our enemies or acknowledge the importance of our alliances, the world is less safe,” Haley said in a statement from Hudson announcing her appointment. “That is why Hudson’s work is so critical.“They believe the American people should have the facts and policymakers should have the solutions to support a secure, free, and prosperous future. I look forward to partnering with them to defend the principles that make America the greatest country in the world.”The statement did not detail what Haley’s responsibilities will be, whether the position is salaried, or if she will be required to work from Hudson’s Washington DC headquarters.“It is fitting that Nikki has taken on this title. She is a courageous and insightful policymaker and these qualities are vital in making Hudson the powerhouse policy organization it is today,” said Sarah May Stern, the chairperson of the board of trustees that governs Hudson.Previous prominent Hudson figures have included Henry Kissinger, the late veteran diplomat and Nobel peace prize winner; Dan Quayle, who served as vice-president to George HW Bush from 1989 to 1993; and Alexander Haig, White House chief of staff in the administrations of Richard Nixon and Gerald Ford, then secretary of state for Ronald Reagan from 1981 to 1982.Haley, who received Hudson’s global leadership award in 2018 for her work at the UN, would appear a good fit for the institute, which has demonstrated strongly pro-Ukraine and pro-Israel positions in recent months.In contrast to Trump’s America First policies advocating little US involvement in overseas conflicts and affairs, Haley staunchly promoted a robust US foreign policy in her time at the UN.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionHer relationship with Trump turned sour after she declared her candidacy for their party’s presidential nomination. And unlike others who dropped out before her, she has declined to endorse the former president’s return to the White House.Analysts say her position makes her an unlikely candidate to be Trump’s vice-presidential pick despite her enduring popular with large numbers of Republican voters.“It is now up to Donald Trump to earn the votes of those in our party and beyond who did not support him, and I hope he does that,” Haley said during a short concession speech in Charleston, South Carolina, in March.“While I will no longer be a candidate, I will not stop using my voice for the things I believe in.” More

  • in

    Trump used to scold felons who wanted to vote. Now he could be in the same spot | Sidney Blumenthal

    The People of the State of New York v Donald J Trump will conclude, according to long-established court procedure. The former US president’s defense attorney will make a closing argument. He will assert that his client is not guilty of the charges of bribery and business fraud to manipulate the 2016 election. Judge Juan Merchan will issue his instructions to the jurors. They will deliberate. When they emerge, the foreperson will read the verdict in open court. If Trump is found guilty, Merchan will adjourn to a later date for sentencing.If Trump is found guilty on all 34 felony counts, he could theoretically face a maximum of 136 years in prison. Post-conviction, the major question would be whether his sentencing involves actual imprisonment, probation, a fine, or some combination, along with various parole arrangements. To be sure, Trump would then almost certainly file an appeal, but this would not forestall his immediately incurring certain civil disabilities. Above all, he would instantly lose his right to vote.The first former president ever to be convicted of a crime would also be the first disenfranchised felon to be nominated by a major party. In this current electoral cycle, Trump has managed to pass himself off as a normal candidate despite separate juries finding him to be a rapist and a fraudster. But those were civil cases. A criminal verdict may crack Trump’s aura of magical legal invincibility intrinsic to his image as a strongman.In the grand ritual of election day 2024, surrounded by the clicking cameras of the press corps, assuming he is still out on appeal, Trump could tag along with his wife Melania, a naturalized citizen, to the polls in Palm Beach, but he could not enter a voting booth. He could not vote for himself, or anyone else, for any office.“There are a wide range of punishments because the statute doesn’t have any mandatory ones,” Joshua Dratel, the past president of the New York State Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers, told me.“He could go to jail. Probation is a possibility. He could get fined. The judge could sentence him to a fine, then put him on supervision – probably not likely. He could get one to three years. He could get four months in jail and a fine. If he got four months, then he’d have a work release application ready to go, then supervised for a few months. There’s no minimum time he’d have to serve. Then he might do a couple of days, a week or two, depending on the application. But that would be after appeal. If he would testify and lie on the stand that would generate a jail term. If he appeals, the judge stays the sentence.”Trump’s appeal of a conviction would likely postpone the imposition of a sentence into 2025. “The likelihood is that he’ll stay out pending appeal,” says Dratel. “In the state system it takes months and months even before a brief is filed – probably 2025. The trial should end by the middle of May. His brief wouldn’t be filed until the election. He might file it just for political purposes. But the action still wouldn’t be before the election. Then he has a second level of appeal to the court of appeals.”At no point, of course, would Trump, if re-elected, have the authority to pardon himself over a conviction in state court.If Trump were ever to serve time at New York’s Rikers Island jail, where the former treasurer of the Trump Organization, Allen Weisselberg, is currently serving a five-month sentence, there would be a further restriction on his liberty. It would be a bad hair day. The New York state department of corrections states: “No skin tanning or coloring or hair coloring products.” Hairspray (non-aerosol) is permitted only for female inmates.In January, Trump declared that New York state did not “have a case” against him in his civil financial fraud case, in which he was found guilty and fined $454bn, plus interest, and has posted a $175m bond. That bond, apparently from a dubious source, may be disqualified, and is under review by New York attorney general Letitia James. She has scheduled a hearing for 22 April, a week after the New York trial is to start.Trump’s bond may be a flimsy cover for a house of cards. If the bond is rejected, and Trump does not file a new acceptable bond, the attorney general will immediately commence judgment enforcement, including the attachment of all identified Trump brokerage accounts and bank accounts, and issue writs of attachment seizing sums owed to Trump by third parties (his pension as president, for instance, rents owed under rental agreements, sums owed in connection with the Saudi LIV golf tournament, etc).Judgment enforcement actions against one or more Trump properties are also possible, though it is unlikely that these steps would go all the way to foreclosure. The attorney general would also likely begin discovery in support of judgment enforcement, deposing Trump and other senior personnel about the whereabouts of his assets and any encumbrances. Assets taken by the attorney general would be escrowed pending final disposition of any Trump appeal.James may also depose the man who posted the suspicious Trump bond. It was ponied up by Don Hankey, a car loan shark who runs the Knight Specialty Insurance Company, the largest shareholder of the Axos Bank, which has lent Trump more than $500m since he has left the presidency. Now, Hankey has told Reuters that he has no idea of the source for the bond’s collateral. “I don’t know if it came from Donald Trump or from Donald Trump and supporters,” he said. Then who?This further unraveling of Trump’s fraud may go on at the same time as the jury hears the evidence and witnesses in his election interference trial.The only precedent for a convicted felon running for president is a figure who was nothing like Trump. Eugene V Debs, leader of the Socialist party, was jailed for delivering an anti-war speech in 1918 against US involvement in the first world war. He received 1m votes in the 1920 election and was pardoned by its winner, the Republicanpresident Warren G Harding, who greeted the released Debs at the White House the day after Christmas in 1921.Harding extended commutations to 23 other anti-war dissidents who had been jailed. But he also issued a statement drawing a line: “The Department of Justice has given no recommendation in behalf of the advocates of sabotage or the destruction of the government by force, and the President let it be known he would not consider such cases.” Harding’s policy stands as a marker against Trump’s pledge if he has a second term to pardon violent January 6 convicts.Trump, like Debs, would be stripped of his right to vote. After conviction in a New York court, his disenfranchisement would instantly apply under law in Florida, where he is registered, having moved his residence there in September 2019. In Florida, Trump would be considered “convicted” regardless of an appeal, according to the Florida court of appeals in the 1988 case of Burkett v State.According to data from the Sentencing Project, Trump would join the approximately 1.15 million Floridians who cannot vote because of a felony conviction. Under draconian Florida law, 935,000 Floridians have completed their sentences but are still denied the vote because they are unable to afford the court fines and other fees the state requires felons to pay before reinstating their voting rights. In 2020, when Michael Bloomberg contributed to the Florida Rights Restoration Coalition to help pay their fines, Trump railed: “It’s a total criminal act. It’s a felony.”In the early days of ramping up his misbegotten presidential primary campaign, Florida governor Ron DeSantis tried in 2023 to manufacture the bogus issue of disenfranchised felons illegally voting. He sent a specially designated task force of “election police” to arrest 20 people, some of whom had been previously informed by the state that their right to vote had already been restored.Fortunately for Trump, unlike the seemingly permanently disenfranchised class of Florida, he would be subject to New York law that would restore his voting rights after he finishes his sentence. He would not have to depend on the kindness of the Florida state board of executive clemency, headed by the man he has mercilessly derided as “Ron DeSanctimonious”.As a felon, Trump could run only for federal office. He would be disqualified to be a candidate for state office in every state but Maine and Vermont. Forty-eight states have laws that prevent a felon from holding elective office until they have been pardoned or receive clemency. Louisiana has a felony disqualification in its state constitution.Criminally convicted, Trump would lose more than his right to vote. In fact, he already has no right to possess a gun. Even before the New York trial, his right to have a firearm had been prohibited for more than a year. No person under felony indictment is permitted to receive a gun transported by interstate or foreign commerce.In September 2023, Trump visited a gun store in South Carolina, where the owner handed him a Glock pistol with his likeness and the words “Trump 45th” embossed on it. Trump admired the gun and said: “I want to buy one.” “President Trump buys a @GLOCKInc in South Carolina!” his spokesperson posted. Two hours later, he put out a new post: “President Trump did not purchase or take possession of the firearm. He simply indicated that he wanted one.”Trump promised the convention of the National Rifle Association in February of this year: “No one will lay a finger on your firearms.” He certainly will not touch one without a severe penalty. The average sentence for someone convicted of buying a firearm while under indictment is five years and four months. If Trump’s posturing as a wise-guy requires legal access to weapons, he has been emasculated since his indictment in March 2023.Criminal Trump, like the indicted Trump, would continue to be forbidden from owning or purchasing a firearm in the state of New York. If he is found guilty of only one felony, he could, after completing his sentence, apply for a Certificate of Relief from Civil Disabilities issued by a court or the New York state department of corrections and community supervision. But if he is found guilty of more than one felony, he would have to apply for a Certificate of Good Conduct. But that certificate usually does not cover restoration of gun rights. In the rare cases where it is granted, the waiting period is five years.That restoration would only apply in New York. As a Florida resident, Trump would have to show his New York certificate to Florida authorities, who would have to determine through their own process whether to recognize New York’s judgment.Criminal Trump’s travel would also be under supervision. How tight it would be would depend on the judge. His schedule could be monitored by a probation officer. “In his instance, his travel would likely not be circumscribed very much,” says Dratel. “The judge could put him on probation. He wouldn’t necessarily have more of a certain set of conditions than he has now. His bail would be continued. He would be released on his own recognizance. That would probably be maintained until his appeal is final.”Criminal Trump’s passport, however, could theoretically be revoked under state department regulations. Per 22 CFR § 51.60, if the state department receives a reference from law enforcement – say, a notice of his conviction by the New York court – that would trigger the process. Trump fits several categories that would almost certainly cause the denial of a passport for almost any other individual.As a convicted felon, he would be forbidden to depart the United States under penalty of a federal warrant of arrest, including a warrant issued under the federal Fugitive Felon Act. In two other outstanding cases – the January 6 insurrection case in Washington DC and the Espionage Act charges in Florida – he is the “subject of a subpoena received from the United States pursuant to 28 USC 1783, in a matter involving Federal prosecution for, or grand jury investigation of, a felony”. In the Georgia racketeering case, he is “the subject of an outstanding state or local warrant of arrest for a felony”.There would be yet another potential legal ground for denying Trump a passport: “The Secretary [of State] determines that the applicant’s activities abroad are causing or are likely to cause serious damage to the national security or the foreign policy of the United States.”Whether Trump’s passport would be revoked or not, his status as a felon who has not completed his sentence would exclude him from entry into most countries. Among them, in a lengthy list, criminal Trump would not be permitted into Britain, Canada, Japan, Israel, China or any European Union nation.If and when Trump eventually were to complete his sentence and have a passport, he could still face difficulty entering many places. As the Canadian government notes: “Even with a valid USA passport, an American with a felony record will often be considered criminally inadmissible to Canada and may be at substantial risk of a border denial.”Beset by indictments, in an April 2023 deposition in his financial fraud case, Trump called his “brand” the “most valuable asset I have”. “I became president because of the brand, OK,” Trump said. “I became president. I think it’s the hottest brand in the world.” Among the branded products he is now selling to meet his astronomical legal expenses are his mug shot from his Georgia case, sneakers, perfume, and his “USA Bible” for $60.Trump’s sycophants in the House Freedom Caucus have sought to distract from the inexorable approach of his New York trial with frantic gestures to burnish the brand. While, under Trump’s thumb, they have bottled up the Senate-passed omnibus bill for aid to Ukraine and Israel and solutions for the border, and stalled funding for the rebuilding of the Francis Scott Key Bridge in Baltimore, they have assiduously advanced a new bill: “To designate the Washington Dulles International Airport in Virginia as the ‘Donald J Trump International Airport’”.The Dulles airport is named after John Foster Dulles, President Dwight Eisenhower’s secretary of state, and as such is a monument to Ike as well. Replacing Dulles’ name with Trump’s can be seen as part of the Maga campaign to erase the Rino infamy – to usurp and replace the remnants of that older Republican party while retaining its name. The sponsors of the airport rebranding scheme, however, have failed to notice the unironic implication that Trump might be a flight risk.The House Democrats have responded to the “Donald J Trump International Airport” bill with a proposal of their own, a bill to rename a different and more appropriate institution: “To designate the Miami Federal Correctional Institution in Florida as the Donald J Trump Federal Correctional Institution.” It is a low-security facility located 90 miles from Mar-a-Lago.Being branded a felon is not branding as Trump explains it. It is not about selling memberships to Mar-a-Lago’s golf club or hawking Bibles. In the criminal justice system, Trump is the offender.
    Sidney Blumenthal, former senior adviser to President Bill Clinton and Hillary Clinton, has published three books of a projected five-volume political life of Abraham Lincoln: A Self-Made Man, Wrestling With His Angel and All the Powers of Earth More

  • in

    Biden closes gap on Trump but third-party candidates pose danger, polls show

    Multiple new polls show Joe Biden strengthening slightly in the US presidential election, but suggest third-party candidates could present a risk to his chance of carrying the White House in November.According to a New York Times/Siena College poll released on Saturday, Biden has whittled down the four-point lead Donald Trump held in February, with Trump leading Biden 46% to 45% among registered voters.The narrowing of support for the candidates seven months before election day comes as Trump is likely to be largely off the campaign and fundraising trail for the next six weeks while he attends a criminal trial in New York over pre-2016 election hush money payments.Despite the narrowing of Trump’s lead that the New York Times poll found, the survey located a worrying issue for Democrats: some voters recalled Trump’s 2016-20 presidency, despite his capacity to sow divisiveness and chaos, as a time of economic prosperity and strong national security.Before 2020 election, only 39% of voters said that the country was better off after Trump took office – a figure that has risen in the intervening years with a Democrat in the White House.According to the New York Times, 42% now view Trump’s term as better for the country than the Biden administration, compared with 25% who say the opposite and an additional 25% saying Biden has been “mostly bad” for the country.Approval of Trump’s handling of the economy was also up 10% over the past four years.A separate study of 1,265 registered voters released on Sunday by I&I/Tipp showed Biden at 43% and Trump at 40% if no other choices are in the mix.Poll respondents were asked who they preferred in a two-candidate contest, with the option to chose “other” and “not sure” – options that both returned 9% of those polled. That 18% figure of the total vote, editor Terry Jones of Issues & Insights wrote, showed that Biden and Trump “are not opposing against one another in a vacuum”.Asked a follow-up question that added the independent candidates Robert F Kennedy Jr, an environmental lawyer and vaccine sceptic, the Harvard professor Cornel West, and the Green party figure Jill Stein, Biden took the greater hit to his support, leveling with Trump at 38%.With Kennedy at 11%, West at 2%, and Stein at 1%, Jones calculated that Kennedy’s presence siphoned off five points of Biden’s support to Trump’s two.“This is not surprising, given that RFK Jr is on most issues a traditional progressive leftist, which makes him indistinguishable from the current leadership of the Democratic party,” Jones wrote.According to the Kennedy campaign, the candidate and vice-presidential pick Nicole Shanahan currently have enough signatures to get on the ballots of just six states: Hawaii, Nevada, Utah, Idaho, North Carolina and New Hampshire.Earlier this month, third-party group No Labels announced it would not field a “unity ticket” candidate after reaching out to 30 potential people and raising $60m despite assessing that “Americans remain more open to an independent presidential run and hungrier for unifying national leadership than ever before”.The group said it would only offer a candidate if it could identify a candidate with a “credible path” to the White House.“No such candidates emerged, so the responsible course of action is for us to stand down,” it said.Kennedy, who has consistently denied his candidacy is in effect a “spoiler” to Democratic hopes of retaining the White House, is not the only worry for the party currently holding executive power.Polls are wildly conflicting. A recent Rasmussen survey found that Biden trails Trump regardless of third-party candidates.In a two-way contest between Biden and Trump, 49% of likely US voters said they would choose Trump, and 41% would vote for Biden. That was a marginal increase for Trump since February, when he led by six points.That same poll found 8% would vote for some other candidate, virtually matching the I&I/Tipp findings. More

  • in

    Arizona abortion ruling is a win Kari Lake didn’t need in key Senate race

    On a recent Tuesday morning, at a retirement community on the western edge of Phoenix’s sprawling desert metropolis, Kari Lake beamed at the graying crowd and introduced her guest, the Montana senator Steve Daines, the Republican charged with winning back the party’s Senate majority in Washington.His presence sent the message that establishment Republicans were fully behind Lake, a former TV news anchor in Phoenix whose embrace of election denialism and fealty to Donald Trump made her a darling of his Maga movement but probably cost her the 2022 race for Arizona governor, a loss she has never formally conceded.Now, as the likely Republican nominee for an open Senate seat in Arizona, Lake, 54, is attempting something of a rebrand, vowing to be less “divisive” as she strains to win back the very voters she alienated with her scorched-earth campaign for governor two years ago.“Let me be clear, we win Arizona, we win the United States Senate,” Daines told attendees, a mix of local Republican officials and sun-seeking transplants. “It’s as simple as that.”The race, however, is not simple at all. The contest to replace Kyrsten Sinema, who left the Democratic party last year to become an independent before deciding not to seek re-election, is expected to be one of the most competitive – and expensive – of the election cycle.Lake’s likely opponent, the Democratic congressman Ruben Gallego, is also courting voters in the political center, softening the combative approach that made him popular with the constituents of his liberal Phoenix district. With just under seven months until election day, most surveys show Gallego, 44, with a narrow lead over Lake.The Senate race was roiled this week by the Arizona supreme court’s decision to uphold a territorial-era law that bans nearly all abortions in the state, all-but ensuring the issue will dominate the political debate in an electoral battleground with a strong libertarian bent.A court-the-center playbook has powered sweeping statewide victories for Democrats in the years since Trump won the 2016 election. Joe Biden won Arizona’s 11 electoral votes in 2020 while the state sent two Democrats to the Senate and elected a Democratic governor, Katie Hobbs, who defeated Lake in 2022.View image in fullscreenEven knowing the risks of running to the right in a purple state, Lake has not sought to distance herself from Trump – she has promised, as her first act in the Senate, to introduce legislation to “build the wall”. But she has attempted to move her message beyond her baseless claims of election fraud, despite ongoing litigation related to her effort to overturn her defeat in 2022. She has also sought to walk back her position on abortion, which she once called the “ultimate sin”.Meanwhile, Gallego, speaking to a crowd of retirees in the Phoenix suburb of Goodyear last week, is hoping his efforts to work across the aisle in Congress and a yet-to-be-unveiled roster of Republican and independent endorsements will end in a decisive victory.“We don’t have to explain to them who Kari Lake is,” Gallego said. “We have to explain to them who I am.”Democrats hope to harness outrage over the decision to allow enforcement of the pre-statehood abortion ban.On Friday Gallego appeared alongside Vice-President Kamala Harris at an event in Tucson to hammer Republicans for their anti-abortion record.The ruling was so seismic even staunchly anti-abortion Republicans like Lake raced to distance themselves. Meanwhile, fury over the 160-year-old law, which has not yet taken effect, amplified signature-gathering efforts to put abortion rights on the ballot this year, a move Democrats hope will mobilize young and otherwise disengaged liberal voters.Gallego, meanwhile, has made abortion rights a centerpiece of his Senate campaign since its onset. At the Goodyear event, the Democrat vowed as senator to abolish the Senate filibuster to codify Roe v Wade, which the supreme court overturned in 2022, eliminating the federal right to abortion.“If we believe it’s right, then we need to do everything we can to enshrine that right,” he said.Strategists in the state believe Lake will probably have a harder time than Gallego appealing to Arizona’s coveted slice of independent voters and moderates.“Congressman Gallego has to introduce himself to voters and talk about his legacy of service,” said Stacy Pearson, an Arizona-based Democratic strategist. “[Lake] has to convince voters that she was just kidding 12 months ago, and isn’t really supportive of a ban that predates light bulbs.“It’s hard for a candidate to shake off the stench of death after a statewide loss,” she added, “much less when that candidate was supporting the very abortion ban that has women’s hair on fire in Phoenix today.”View image in fullscreenLake, like Trump, has spent the days since the decision trying to find safe political ground on the abortion issue. She quickly denounced the 1864 law as “out of line” with the people of Arizona and called on the legislature to “come up” with a solution.But Democrats are unwilling to let voters forget Lake’s words from 2022, when she told a conservative podcast host: “I’m incredibly thrilled that we are going to have a great law that’s already on the books” and referred to the civil war-era ban by its number in Arizona state code.With a spotlight on her retreat, Lake on Thursday released a five-and-a-half-minute video. “The issue is less about banning abortion and more about saving babies,” she said, as she emphasized her support for policies that would support mothers and reduce taxes on families.On her website, Lake says she opposes a federal abortion ban.Lake’s spectacular jump from the anchor desk into the heart of Trumpworld politics shocked many viewers – and voters. And it is part of her pitch. In Sun City West, the ex-journalist told attendees they were being “lied to” by an “unAmerican” press corps. Instead, she asked them to trust her. After years of reporting across Arizona, Lake said she was uniquely qualified to represent the state.“I understand the people of Arizona probably better than anybody in politics right now in this state because I’ve had the opportunity to be invited into your homes to cover the big issues,” she said.Attendee Donna Burrell, 70, of Sun City Grand, said she was torn over who to support in the state’s Republican primary in July. Burrell had been leaning toward Lake’s main primary opponent, a conservative county sheriff, Mark Lamb, but Lake impressed her.“She didn’t seem so angry and in-your-face,” Burrell said. “When I came here today, I really liked her.”The Republican base is firmly behind Lake, who leads Lamb by a wide margin. But Mike Noble, a Phoenix-based pollster who is tracking public opinion on the race, predicted Lake would struggle to broaden her appeal, especially with independent voters, a significant share of whom, he said, place stolen election claims in the same category as the “earth is flat” conspiracy.Earlier this month, Lake chose not to defend her claims of a stolen election, asking an Arizona court to move directly to the damages phase of a defamation lawsuit. The case was brought by Maricopa county’s top election official, Stephen Richer, a Republican whom Lake accused of allowing fraud to taint the results of the 2022 gubernatorial election she lost, claims he said unleashed a barrage of threats against him and his family.Richer said Lake’s decision amounted to an admission that her “lies were just that: lies”. Lake said she conceded nothing and compared herself to Trump, casting them as twin victims of a legal system that will “ stop at nothing to destroy us”.On the campaign trail, Gallego presents himself to voters as a results-driven veteran committed to the defense of America’s democratic institutions.In Goodyear, he recalled being on the House floor when a mob of Trump supporters breached the US Capitol. He said his combat instincts kicked in and he began instructing lawmakers how to put gas masks on and prepare to fight if it came to that. Lake, he warned, was only fueling those forces.“You’re not a leader, if you’re exploiting people’s fear,” Gallego said. “That’s what she’s doing right now.”Meanwhile, Lake’s attempts to reconcile with Republicans she attacked during her 2022 race have been mixed. Outreach to Meghan McCain, the daughter of Senator John McCain, the popular Arizona Republican senator who died in 2018, was met with the response “no peace bitch”. At a campaign rally during her run for governor, she told the late senator’s supporters to “get the hell out”, a comment Lake later said was made “in jest”.And at the end of the event in Sun City West, a woman waved a piece of paper which she claimed provided evidence of ballot-rigging in the 2020 election. “I need your help,” she shouted as Lake and Daines quickly left the stage.At Gallego’s town hall, held earlier this month in a traditionally Republican part of Phoenix’s West Valley that has experienced soaring growth in the past decade, Democrats scrounged for extra seating to accommodate the crowd.“I was pleasantly, pleasantly surprised that we could get this big of a turnout in a very red part of the county,” said Barbara Valencia, a member of the local Democratic party who has known Gallego since the early days of his political career. She was confident Arizonans would gravitate toward Gallego the more they learned about his story – a Harvard-educated combat veteran raised by a single mother from Colombia.“He’s very grassroots, from the ground up,” she said.Since launching his campaign more than a year ago, Gallego has made his goal to visit every corner of the state, including each of Arizona’s nearly two dozen federally recognized tribal nations, to reach voters outside of the Phoenix metropolitan area. Before the West Valley event, Gallego visited leaders of the Kaibab Paiute Indian Tribe in northern Arizona, which required flying into southern Utah and driving two hours south.View image in fullscreenYet despite recent Democratic successes, Gallego must also contend with stormy presidential-year politics. Biden, who will be at the top of the ballot, is unpopular in Arizona, trailing Trump in several swing state surveys. Inflation has proven an intractable problem for the president, while his handling of record migration at the US-Mexico border has drawn bipartisan criticism.Some Democrats in the state are worried about the party’s outreach to Latino voters, a critical part of their electoral coalition that has shifted toward Trump in recent years.“We need to mobilize the Hispanic vote,” said Judy Phillips, a Democrat who attended Gallego’s town hall in Goodyear and is Hispanic. “If they don’t hear the good things from the candidates, they’re going to get sucked in by the lies.”But early indicators are on his side. A poll conducted by Noble’s firm in February, before Sinema bowed out of the race, found that Gallego led Lake by double digits with suburbanites, independents and Hispanic voters. Sinema has not made an endorsement in the Senate race.Arizona Republicans, Noble quipped, choose to nominate unpopular candidates who cannot win general elections “not because it is easy, but because it is hard”.At her event, Lake sought to scare off moderate Republicans from defecting with a warning about her opponent. Gallego, she said, was trying to “trick the people of Arizona” into believing he was a consensus-building, “middle-of-the-road” Democrat.“It couldn’t be further from the truth,” she said, citing his past criticism of Trump’s border wall. Daines, the Montana senator, chimed: “She’s not running against an astronaut, Mark Kelly. She’s not running against Kyrsten Sinema. She’s running against a true radical far-left activist.”Defining Gallego while also trying to change her own reputation in the state will require considerable resources, analysts say.“Lake’s miniscule war chest isn’t enough to really let that sink into voters,” said Barrett Marson, an Arizona-based Republican consultant. “She will need the help of national groups to really paint Ruben as a liberal lion.”Gallego’s campaign is already running biographical ads on local and cable TV, including one focused on his deployment to Iraq with a Marine Corps unit that sustained some of the highest casualties of the war. With his record, the Democrat is targeting the state’s large veteran population.It is an open question whether her support from Republicans in Washington will translate into a significant financial investment. But her core supporters are giving. Last week, Lake’s campaign announced that she raised what it claimed was a record $1m at a fundraising event at Mar-a-Lago, Trump’s Florida resort.View image in fullscreenIt is yet another sign, Marson said, that Lake and Trump “will live or die together” in Arizona this November.Gallego, meanwhile, announced that his campaign raised $7.5m in the first three months of 2024, a notable haul that leaves him with $9.6m cash on hand. Lake has yet to announce her first-quarter fundraising numbers, but the stakes are high. She began the year with much less money than Gallego and it remains unclear what, if any, damages she will have to pay in the defamation suit.Much can – and almost certainly will – change before election day. But as the contours of the high-profile Senate race come into focus, political observers now believe abortion will be a defining issue of the Arizona election. And here, they say, Gallego has the advantage.“We’ve got those crossover voters that will never register as Democrats but who are also not Maga,” said Pearson, the Democratic strategist, referring to Trump’s rightwing movement. “And this is an issue that takes those voters – Arizona’s defiant, libertarian, Republican voting bloc – and pulls them right over to the Democrats.” More