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      Biden voices ‘deep concerns’ over Ukraine escalation in call with Putin – live

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      Key events

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      3.48pm EST

      15:48

      Capitol attack committee warns Meadows of potential contempt charge

      3.09pm EST

      15:09

      White House urges Putin to embrace ‘de-escalation and diplomacy’ toward Ukraine

      1.35pm EST

      13:35

      White House: Biden confronted Putin over Ukraine troop escalation

      1.30pm EST

      13:30

      Today so far

      1.03pm EST

      13:03

      One of suspected killers of Jamal Khashoggi held in Paris

      12.36pm EST

      12:36

      Biden-Putin summit ends after two hours

      12.10pm EST

      12:10

      Biden to speak with European leaders after Putin summit

      Live feed

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      Show key events only

      4.38pm EST

      16:38

      The White House has released a readout of Joe Biden’s afternoon call with French President Emmanuel Macron, German Chancellor Angela Merkel, Italian Prime Minister Mario Draghi and British Prime Minister Boris Johnson.
      “President Biden briefed leaders on his call with President Putin, in which he discussed the serious consequences of Russian military action in Ukraine and the need to de-escalate and return to diplomacy,” the White House said.
      “The leaders underscored their support for Ukraine’s sovereignty and territorial integrity, as well as the need for Russia to reduce tensions and engage in diplomacy. They agreed their teams will stay in close touch, including in consultation with NATO allies and EU partners, on a coordinated and comprehensive approach.”

      4.18pm EST

      16:18

      The Guardian’s Martin Pengelly and David Smith report:
      Mark Meadows’ attorney, George Terwilliger, wrote in a letter on Tuesday that a deposition would be “untenable” because the 6 January select committee “has no intention of respecting boundaries” concerning questions that Donald Trump has claimed are off-limits because of executive privilege.
      Executive privilege covers the confidentiality or otherwise of communications between a president and his aides. The Biden administration has waived it in the investigation of 6 January. Trump and key allies entwined in events leading up to the storming of the Capitol, around which five people died, have invoked it.
      Terwilliger also said he learned over the weekend that the committee had issued a subpoena to a third-party communications provider that he said would include “intensely personal” information.
      In an interview on the conservative Fox News network, the attorney added: “We have made efforts over many weeks to reach an accommodation with the committee.”
      But he said the committee’s approach to negotiations and to other witnesses meant Meadows would withdraw cooperation.

      3.48pm EST

      15:48

      Capitol attack committee warns Meadows of potential contempt charge

      The House select committee investigating the Capitol insurrection has warned Mark Meadows that lawmakers will move forward with holding him in criminal contempt if he does not appear for his scheduled deposition tomorrow.
      Meadows, who previously served as Donald Trump’s chief of staff, indicated earlier today that he would no longer cooperate with the committee’s investigation.
      The chair and vice-chair of the select committee, Democrat Bennie Thompson and Republican Liz Cheney, warned Meadows of the potential contempt charge in a new statement.

      January 6th Committee
      (@January6thCmte)
      Mark Meadows has informed the Select Committee that he does not intend to cooperate further despite his apparent willingness to provide details about the January 6th attack, including conversations with President Trump, in the book he is now promoting and selling.

      December 7, 2021

      “Mark Meadows has informed the Select Committee that he does not intend to cooperate further with our investigation despite his apparent willingness to provide details about the facts and circumstances surrounding the January 6th attack, including conversations with President Trump, in the book he is now promoting and selling,” Thompson and Cheney said.
      The two lawmakers noted investigators have many questions and requests for Meadows that do not fall under potential executive privilege claims, including “voluminous official records stored in his personal phone and email accounts”.
      “Tomorrow’s deposition, which was scheduled at Mr. Meadows’s request, will go forward as planned,” Thompson and Cheney said.
      “If indeed Mr. Meadows refuses to appear, the Select Committee will be left no choice but to advance contempt proceedings and recommend that the body in which Mr. Meadows once served refer him for criminal prosecution.”

      3.30pm EST

      15:30

      National security adviser Jake Sullivan described the summit between Joe Biden and Vladimir Putin as a “useful meeting,” although he declined to characterize the Russian leader’s remarks during the discussion.
      “He can speak for himself,” Sullivan said of Putin, noting that the Russian president was “direct and straightforward” in his conversation with Biden.
      “This was a real discussion. It was give and take. It was not speeches,” Sullivan said. “It was back and forth. President Putin was deeply engaged.”

      3.16pm EST

      15:16

      National security adviser Jake Sullivan said Joe Biden will speak with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy on Thursday, after the US president held a virtual summit with Vladimir Putin today.
      Sullivan said the White House does not believe that Putin has yet made a decision about whether to approve an invasion of Ukraine, as Russia builds up its troop presence along the border.
      “What President Biden did today was lay out very clearly the consequences if he chooses to move,” Sullivan said of the summit.
      “I will look you in the eye and tell you, as President Biden looked President Putin in the eye and told him today, that things we did not do in 2014, we are prepared to do now,” Sullivan added, referring to the US response to the Russian annexation of Crimea.

      3.09pm EST

      15:09

      White House urges Putin to embrace ‘de-escalation and diplomacy’ toward Ukraine

      The White House press secretary, Jen Psaki, is now holding her daily briefing with reporters, and she is joined by national security adviser Jake Sullivan.
      Sullivan provided more details on Joe Biden’s virtual summit with Vladimir Putin this morning, saying the US president was “direct and straightforward” with the Russian leader.
      The president warned Putin that the US would respond with “strong economic measures” if Russia invaded Ukraine, Sullivan said.
      The national security adviser added that Biden urged his Russian counterpart to embrace “de-escalation and diplomacy” toward Ukraine rather than continuing to build up a military presence along the border.

      2.47pm EST

      14:47

      The Republican National Committee criticized Joe Biden’s foreign policy agenda after the US president’s virtual summit with Vladimir Putin this morning.
      “Biden’s weak leadership on the international stage has emboldened our enemies and shaken our allies’ trust,” RNC chair Ronna McDaniel said in a statement.
      “While claiming to be tough on Russia, Biden gifted Putin the Russian Nord Stream 2 pipeline while simultaneously embarking on a job-killing crusade against the U.S. energy industry. Today’s meeting underscores how Biden’s weak global leadership, Afghanistan disaster, and failure at our border is emblematic of his America last agenda.”
      In its readout of the summit, the White House said Biden “voiced the deep concerns of the United States and our European Allies about Russia’s escalation of forces surrounding Ukraine and made clear that the U.S. and our Allies would respond with strong economic and other measures in the event of military escalation”.

      2.16pm EST

      14:16

      Edward Helmore

      Donald Trump’s plan to launch “Truth Social”, a special purpose acquisitions backed social media company, early next year may have hit a roadblock after US regulators issued a request for information on the deal on Monday.
      The request from the SEC and the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority for information from Digital World Acquisition Corp (DWAC), a blank-check SPAC that is set to merge with Trump Media & Technology Group, comes as a powerful Republican congressman, Devin Nunes, announced he was stepping out of politics to join the Trump media venture as CEO.
      The twin developments set the stage for a major political battle over Truth Social, a platform that purportedly plans to challenge Twitter and Facebook, social platforms that have banned or curbed the former president over his involvement in stoking the 6 January Capitol riot.

      1.51pm EST

      13:51

      About 200 officers have left the US Capitol police since the 6 January insurrection, according to the force’s inspector general.
      Giving testimony before a Senate committee hearing, Michael Bolton also said the Capitol police had not done enough to improve its practices in the 11 months since the attack.

      CSPAN
      (@cspan)
      Sen. @RoyBlunt: “How many officers have left the department since January the 6th?”U.S. Capitol Police IG Bolton: “I believe it’s around 200 or so.” pic.twitter.com/IvTBDRsLrv

      December 7, 2021

      Bolton also said that out of “200 security enhancements” the department told him it would make, “only 61 of those items have supporting documentation to support that those enhancements have occurred”.
      The Senate Rules Committee hearing was also notable for a suggestion from Shelley Moore Capito, a Republican senator for West Virginia, that Congress should conduct large-scale drills, in the same way many US schools are forced to, in case of an active shooter.

      Updated
      at 1.58pm EST

      1.35pm EST

      13:35

      White House: Biden confronted Putin over Ukraine troop escalation

      Joe Biden voiced “deep concerns” about the escalation of Russian forces surrounding Ukraine during his call with Vladimir Putin today, according to a summary of the conversation published by the White House.
      The call took in a “range of issues”, the White House said, including the Ukraine situation and ransomware.
      From the White House:

      President Biden voiced the deep concerns of the United States and our European allies about Russia’s escalation of forces surrounding Ukraine and made clear that the US and our allies would respond with strong economic and other measures in the event of military escalation.
      President Biden reiterated his support for Ukraine’s sovereignty and territorial integrity and called for de-escalation and a return to diplomacy. The two presidents tasked their teams to follow up and the US will do so in close coordination with allies and partners.
      The presidents also discussed the US-Russia dialogue on strategic stability, a separate dialogue on ransomware, as well as joint work on regional issues such as Iran.

      This is Adam Gabbatt, taking over from Joan for a little while.

      Updated
      at 1.45pm EST

      1.30pm EST

      13:30

      Today so far

      Here’s where the day stands so far:

      Joe Biden and Russian President Vladimir Putin held a virtual summit that lasted roughly two hours. The meeting comes as Putin has built up Russia’s troop presence along the country’s border with Ukraine, raising concerns of a potential invasion.
      Biden is speaking with several European leaders this afternoon to provide an update on his conversation with Putin. The White House said Biden will speak with French President Emmanuel Macron, German Chancellor Angela Merkel, Italian Prime Minister Mario Draghi and British Prime Minister Boris Johnson.
      Mark Meadows, the former chief of staff to Donald Trump, is no longer cooperating with the House select committee investigating the Capitol insurrection. Meadows’ attorney said the panel wanted the former official to discuss matters over which Donald Trump has claimed executive privilege, although lawmakers have rejected the legitimacy of the former president’s claims.

      The blog will have more coming up, so stay tuned.

      1.16pm EST

      13:16

      The White House has shared a photo of Joe Biden’s virtual summit with Russian President Vladimir Putin this morning, which wrapped up about an hour ago.
      The photo shows the US president, accompanied by secretary of state Antony Blinken and national security adviser Jake Sullivan, in the Situation Room.
      “.@POTUS held a secure video call with President Putin of Russia today to discuss a range of topics in the US-Russia relationship, including our concerns about Russian military activities on the border with Ukraine, cyber and regional issues,” the White House said on Twitter. More

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      Republican Devin Nunes to quit Congress and head Trump’s social media platform

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      Republican Devin Nunes to quit Congress and head Trump’s social media platformCalifornia congressman has claimed without evidence that social media companies seek to censor Republicans Devin Nunes, the California congressman and close ally of Donald Trump, will be retiring from the US House of Representatives next year to join Trump’s new social media venture.The Republican congressman, who represents a rural California district, announced his retirement from the House on Monday, writing in a letter to constituents that he was leaving his position to pursue a “new opportunity to fight for the most important issues I believe in”.Shortly after, Trump Media & Technology Group announced Nunes would become the company’s chief executive in January.Republican Devin Nunes to leave Congress and run Trump’s social media venture – liveRead moreIn a statement, Nunes said: “The time has come to reopen the internet and allow for the free flow of ideas and expression without censorship.”Nunes, 48, has served as a congressman since 2003. He was a member of the intelligence committee during Donald Trump’s first impeachment and emerged as one of Trump’s staunchest defenders in the House.Nunes has long been a critic of major social media companies. The congressman has repeatedly claimed without evidence that platforms have been trying to censor Republicans.In 2019, he filed a lawsuit against Twitter over mocking tweets from two parody accounts, “Devin Nunes’ Mom” and “Devin Nunes’ Cow”. In the lawsuit, Nunes claimed he had endured “an orchestrated defamation campaign, one that no human being should ever have to bear and suffer in their whole life”. The suit also accused Twitter of censoring “viewpoints with which it disagrees”.The parody accounts pretending to be the congressman’s cow and his mother mocked him over revelations that his family had moved its farm to Iowa from California even as he used his agricultural roots as part of his campaign in central California.Later, the Trump justice department subpoenaed Twitter for information related to a parody account that criticized Nunes, federal court records revealed – even though a judge ruled that the representative could not sue the social media company for defamation.Earlier on Monday, the blank-check company that aims to take Trump Media & Technology Group public acknowledged that two regulatory agencies are scrutinizing the $1.25bn deal.Digital World Acquisition, which is often referred to by its trading symbol, DWAC, said it was cooperating with “the preliminary, fact-finding inquiries” by the Securities and Exchange Commission and the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority.TopicsUS CongressDonald TrumpRepublicansUS politicsnewsReuse this content More

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      ‘It’s who they are’: gun-fetish photo a symbol of Republican abasement under Trump

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      ‘It’s who they are’: gun-fetish photo a symbol of Republican abasement under TrumpThomas Massie’s incendiary picture, days after a deadly school shooting in Michigan, seemed carefully calibrated to provoke It is a festive family photo with seven broad smiles and a Christmas tree. But one other detail sets it apart: each member of the Massie family is brandishing a machine gun or military-style rifle.Outcry after Colorado sheriff’s office tweets photo of Santa getting handgun permitRead moreThe photo was tweeted last week by Thomas Massie, a Republican congressman from Kentucky, with the caption: “Merry Christmas! PS: Santa, please bring ammo.”A few days earlier, a school shooting in Michigan left four teenagers dead and seven people injured after a 15-year-old student allegedly went on a rampage.Massie’s post earned widespread condemnation but was also seen as indicative of a performative, provocative brand of Republican politics, calculated to go viral, “own the libs” – that is, provoke outrage on the left – and contribute to the outsized influence of supporters of Donald Trump.“Here his family’s got guns under a Christmas tree just after four kids were killed,” said Elaine Kamarck, a former official in the Clinton administration. “The guy’s abominable but that’s what’s happening to the Republican party. They’re flat-out nuts. There’s a piece of the Republican party that now supports violence.”Recent examples include Paul Gosar, a congressman from Arizona, posting an animated video that depicted him killing Democratic congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and attacking Joe Biden. All but two Republicans in the House refused to vote to censure him.Last month, Congresswoman Lauren Boebert made anti-Muslim remarks about Ilhan Omar. Boebert claimed she and a member of her staff were taking a lift at the US Capitol when she saw an alarmed police officer running toward them. She said she turned to her left and spotted the Minnesota Democrat standing beside them.“Well, she doesn’t have a backpack. We should be fine,” Boebert recalled saying, to laughter. “And I said, ‘Oh, look, the jihad squad decided to show up for work today.’”Omar urged House leaders to discipline Boebert. But Kevin McCarthy, the Republican leader, downplayed the incident and defended Boebert, insisting she had apologised both publicly and personally.Omar responded on CNN on Sunday: “McCarthy is a liar and a coward. He doesn’t have the ability to condemn the kind of bigoted Islamophobia and anti-Muslim rhetoric that are being trafficked by a member of his conference.”She added: “This is who they are. And we have to be able to stand up to them. And we have to push them to reckon with the fact that their party right now is normalizing anti-Muslim bigotry.”Such incendiary antics are set to continue on Tuesday when Gosar is joined by Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia, Louie Gohmert of Texas and Matt Gaetz of Florida at a press conference to decry the treatment of people arrested in connection with the 6 January attack on the US Capitol. Republican extremists have sought to portray the rioters as patriots.Each tossing of a verbal grenade commands more airtime than moderate Republicans receive going about legislative business, ensuring that Trump loyalists continue to dominate the national conversation. Taylor Greene, appearing on rightwing ideologue Steve Bannon’s podcast, boasted recently: “We are not the fringe. We are the base of the party.”Kamarck, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution in Washington, pointed to the recent congressional testimony of Facebook whistleblower Frances Haugen, who described how the platform’s model rewards those who shout the loudest.“What we know from the whistleblower at Facebook is that the more dramatic, the more outrageous the picture, the more it grabs you,” Kamarck said. “The more it’s violent, the more clicks it’ll get. That’s what their algorithms are trained to do.”Massie’s gun fetish post now has more than 80,000 likes on Twitter.Kamarck said: “This guy wants to solidify a base, get campaign contributions from pro-gun people. This is simply unforgivable. There’s just no way that the majority of Americans agree with this kind of rabid, pro-gun stance, even people who are hunters and pro-gun people.”With historical trends suggesting Republicans will win back the House next year, McCarthy appears determined to become speaker, meaning he cannot afford to alienate Trump or the most radical members of his caucus.Kamarck added: “Kevin McCarthy is just the lowest of the low. He has decided that he has to placate a base which is very dangerous, which is violent and calls people to commit violent acts, and we’ve never had anybody like that. Kevin McCarthy thinks if he can hold all these crazy people in his caucus, he can be speaker.”The dangerous shift in Republican ranks was on display recently when Kyle Rittenhouse, who was 17 when he killed two people at an anti-racism protest in Kenosha, Wisconsin, argued that he acted in self-defence and was acquitted on all charges.Rittenhouse was invited to Trump’s estate in Florida, elevated to heroic status by rightwing media and feted by Republicans. Taylor Greene even sponsored a bill to award him a congressional gold medal.Ilhan Omar: McCarthy a ‘coward’ for not condemning Islamophobic commentsRead moreLarry Jacobs, director of the Center for the Study of Politics and Governance at the University of Minnesota, said: “Within the Republican party, there’s a battle for leverage in terms of winning primaries and influencing primaries. Then you’ve got Donald Trump.“He’s sitting there as a kind of monarch waiting for his subjects to come and pledge their fealty to him and one way to do it is to be the tough man to promise to take to the barricades to defend the 2020 election results, as Donald Trump sees it.”He added: “We’re into the kind of outrage culture in the Republican party. There’s almost a competition as to who can be more outrageous, more vicious and threatening. It’s a race to the bottom.“It’s a completely bonkers political party. This is one of the most dysfunctional and dangerous political parties in the democratic world. You’ve got Hungary, you’ve got Austria. There are places where you’ve had a surge on the right and I would say this is comparable. And maybe even a further extreme, if you look at what elected members of the US Congress are saying and doing.”TopicsRepublicansUS politicsDonald TrumpnewsReuse this content More

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      Massie’s gun collection: ‘They shouldn’t be in the hands of civilians’

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      Massie’s gun collection: ‘They shouldn’t be in the hands of civilians’Analysis: furore continues over ‘Christmas card’ by US Congressman of group holding military weapons It is the Christmas card that has sent shockwaves across the world – and provided a chilling reminder of the size and type of weapons that are perfectly legal to own and carry in large parts of the US.An analysis by the Guardian indicates the guns in the photograph published by the Republican congressman Thomas Massie are military grade and – in some cases – similar to those used in recent notorious deadly incidents.The furore began on Sunday when Massie posted on Twitter a picture of himself and what appear to be members of his family, smiling and posing with an assortment of weapons, just days after four teenagers were killed in a shooting at a high school in Michigan.He wrote: “Merry Christmas! PS Santa, please bring ammo.”The tweet provoked an immediate response – with other Republicans criticising him for his insensitivity.Yet Kentucky law allows people aged over 21 to possess and carry guns – and no permit or licence is required for rifles, shotguns or handguns, according to the National Rifle Association.The calibre and range of the weapons on display horrified one expert. Philip Ingram, a former British military intelligence officer, told the Guardian: “There is no way in a modern society these weapons should be in hands outside law enforcement or the military … They are designed for one purpose: to kill people.” The weapon held by Massie, bottom left, has been identified as an M60 machine gun, first developed for the US military in the late 1950s and which, with its belt-fed ammunition, became one the best known weapons of the Vietnam war.A collector’s item, the M60 is relatively hard to buy on the open market, with sales prices estimated by some auctioneers at $69,000 or more.Machine guns made since 1986 are banned in the US – but US federal law allows any weapons that were registered before 1986 to be traded on an approved basis. According to Calibre Obscura, a military blogger and weapons expert, the other guns in the photograph are almost certainly semi-automatics, meaning an owner has to squeeze the trigger each time they want a shot to be fired.At the front, to the left of Massie, a woman is holding an Uzi, the Israeli submachine-gun, which can fire up to 600 rounds a minute.Massie’s wife, Rhonda, appears to be holding a Thompson M1SB, most likely a replica of the second world war submachine-gun, sold by its original manufacturer in the US.In the back row, other family members appear to be holding, from left to right, a Spanish military rifle, a Belgian rifle, and two AR-15s – the AR stands for ArmaLite, the original manufacturer. One of the most popular semi-automatics available in the US, its sales have soared over the last decade. An AR-15 was taken by Kyle Rittenhouse on his notorious trip to Kenosha, Wisconsin, last year, which saw him kill two people and injure a third as he roamed the streets acting as a self-described militia, following public protests after police shot a black man in the back. Rittenhouse was found not guilty last month after a jury concluded that he had acted in self-defence.Giffords Law Center, which campaigns against gun violence, said official US figures showed that 726,951 machine guns remain listed as in legal circulation. Over the weekend, Massie was condemned by political opponents, particularly for releasing the Christmas family picture days after the shooting at Michigan’s Oxford high school by a 15-year-old that left four dead. “I promise not everyone in Kentucky is an insensitive asshole,” said John Yarmuth, a Kentucky Democratic congressional representative.TopicsUS gun controlRepublicansKentuckyUS CongressUS politicsanalysisReuse this content More

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      ‘Time is running out’: can Congress pass a voting rights bill after months of failure?

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      ‘Time is running out’: can Congress pass a voting rights bill after months of failure?The president made it a key plank of his election campaign, but nearly a year on, voting rights reform remains elusive For years, Helen Butler has been on a mission to increase voter turnout, especially among Black voters, in Georgia and across the south. She’s used to the skepticism. People she meets wonder why they should bother, because their vote won’t matter. No matter who’s in office, longstanding problems won’t get solved.More recently, she’s pushed back on efforts by Georgia Republicans to make it harder to vote. She’s seen things like overly aggressive efforts to remove people from the voter rolls and the rapid consolidation of polling places.Last year, she listened as Joe Biden promised he would protect the right to vote if he was elected president. “One thing the Senate and the president can do right away is pass the bill to restore the Voting Rights Act … it’s one of the first things I’ll do as president if elected. We can’t let the fundamental right to vote be denied,” he said in July last year.Months later, Butler and other organizers had a breakthrough that had been years in the making. After years of investing in voter mobilization, turnout among Black voters surged in the November election, helping Joe Biden win a state long seen as a Republican stronghold. In January, Black voters came out again and helped Jon Ossoff and Raphael Warnock win two upset Senate bids, giving Democrats control of the US Senate.On the night he was elected president, Biden called out the Black voters who helped him capture the presidency, saying: “When this campaign was at its lowest – the African American community stood up again for me. They always have my back, and I’ll have yours.”And so, after Biden was inaugurated, Butler and many others expected that voting rights would be one of the first things the president and Democrats addressed.Instead, during the president’s first year in office, Butler has watched with dismay as Biden and Democrats have failed to pass any voting rights legislation. Meanwhile, Republicans in Georgia passed sweeping new voting restrictions, one of several places across the country that made it harder to vote.“It is disheartening, I can tell you, out of all the work we’ve put in to have fair elections, to get people engaged, and to have the Senate that will not act to protect the most sacred right, the right to vote, is unheard of,” Butler said.“[It] makes voters say ‘Did I vote for the right people? … you haven’t fought for me. Why should I fight to keep you in office in 2022?’”Democrats have been stymied by the filibuster, the Senate rule that requires 60 votes to advance most legislation. Republicans have used the rule to successfully block voting rights bills on four different occasions this year.Democrats need the support of all 50 senators to get rid of the rule, and two Democrats, Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema, are strongly opposed. Both senators have argued the rule forges bipartisan compromise, but many believe Republicans have weaponized it into a tool of obstruction and that protecting voting rights is an urgent enough issue to justify getting rid of the rule.There was already simmering frustration from voting advocateswho believe Biden has not taken strong action, especially as several states enacted sweeping new voting restrictions.That frustration is now turning into escalating alarm that time is running out to pass meaningful voting rights legislation ahead of the 2022 midterm elections, amid a crammed congressional agenda that is already backed up for December. More than 200 civic action groups urged Congress on Thursday to postpone its December recess until it passes voting rights legislation. “All of the experts and lawyers are telling us the same thing: time is running out. We are not out of time yet, but we are running out of runway to get this bill passed, get it signed into law, be able to clear any legal challenges and actually get it implemented for 2022,” said Tiffany Muller, the president and executive director of End Citizens United/Let America Vote, which strongly supports both bills.Senate Democrats are searching for a path forward around the filibuster, but appear increasingly likely to finish Biden’s first year in office without passing a voting rights bill.“If Congress doesn’t get this done by the end of the year, it’s hard to see why the political will will be there later. What will have changed in January in February?” said Ezra Levin, a co-executive director of Indivisible, a grassroots groups that supports the bills. Distress is surging as Republicans in several states, including Texas, North Carolina, Georgia and Ohio, have passed distorted electoral maps that will lock in Republican advantages in Congress for the next decade.These maps show how Republicans are blatantly rigging elections Read moreMany of the new districts blunt the voting power of rapid population growth among Hispanic, Asian and Black voters, who tend to back Democrats, by grouping them into non-competitive districts.The voting rights bills stalled in Congress contain provisions that would limit, and in some cases halt, that kind of severe distortion, called gerrymandering. The bills would also stop many of the new restrictions states have passed this year and guard against similar restrictions in the future.Even if Democrats somehow find a way to pass a voting rights bill, they would face an uphill battle in trying to block already-enacted maps – as primary elections for those congressional seats up for grabs in next year’s midterms.The candidate filing period has already opened in Texas and is set to begin soon in North Carolina, noted Michael Li, a redistricting expert at the Brennan Center for Justice, making courts more reluctant to step in. Congress has made things “messier”, Li said, because it is harder to challenge maps after they go into effect and the electoral calendar is under way.“If the goal is to fix maps for 2022 … it’s becoming dangerously late in the game,” he said. Several provisions in the Freedom to Vote Act, one of the voting rights bills in limbo on Capitol Hill, also would require some states to make significant changes to the way elections are run.It requires states to offer same-day registration (not currently offered in 30 states), online voter registration (not offered in eight states). Election officials need time to implement those changes, and it will be harder on the eve of elections. If the legislation were enacted, states could probably pivot to implement changes and the more time they have , the smoother that will be, said Tammy Patrick, a senior adviser at the Democracy Fund, who specializes in election administration.“I think that it’s doable. But if we want to ensure that it’s done correctly and well, it’s going to take some time and definitely some resources. So the sands in the hourglass are slipping away,” she said.As the window to pass legislation closes, some voting rights activists say the White House is too passive.After Biden made his strongest signal to date of altering the filibuster, activists had high hopes for getting details on strategy during a 15 November meeting with Kamala Harris, whom Biden asked to lead the White House’s voting rights effort.Instead, Harris gave six minutes of remarks and then left staff to answer questions. Some attendees were upset and one, Cliff Albright, a co-founder of Black Voters Matter, told the Guardian of the meeting: “Nothing substantive came out of it, it was very frustrating.”Like Butler, Albright said he was concerned about the message to Black voters who turned out and helped elect Biden and Harris.“You’ve got people in the White House and friends of the White House that believe ‘if we get it done, people don’t care how long it took.’ I think that they’re dangerously mistaken,” he said. “People remember that you prioritized everything else above our interests.”TopicsUS voting rightsThe fight to voteUS politicsDemocratsRepublicansfeaturesReuse this content More

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      ‘Crooked bastards’: Trump attacks US media in foul-mouthed speech

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      Trump attacks media and Mark Milley in foul-mouthed Mar-a-Lago speech Insults to press and chairman of joint chiefs of staff recall barbs while Trump was in power In remarks to diners at his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida on Saturday night, Donald Trump called the American media “crooked bastards” and Gen Mark Milley, the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, a “fucking idiot”.Trump double negative: Twitter sees proof positive of no electoral fraudRead moreThe meandering, foul-mouthed speech to Turning Point USA, a group for young conservatives, was streamed by Jack Posobiec, a rightwing blogger and provocateur.The insult to the press recalled barbs while Trump was in power, including calling reporters and editors “fake news” and the “enemy of the people”, attacks many in the media regarded as dangerous, inviting political violence.“The country is at a very important, dangerous place,” Trump said, amid familiar lies about his defeat in the 2020 election, which he says was the result of electoral fraud.“We have no press. The press is so corrupt. We don’t have a press. If there is a good story about us, a good story about any of the people that are Republicans, conservatives, they make it a bad story. And if it’s a bad story they make it the worst story in history. It is the most dishonest group of people.”Trump claimed to have transformed Americans’ views of the press, saying “when I first announced I was running in 2015 they had a 94%-95% approval rating. And right now they have a lower approval rating than Congress.“I consider that to be a great honor because they are a bunch of very dishonest, crooked bastards.”The remark met with laughter.As with most of Trump’s claims, his claim about media approval ratings could be debated.In 2015, the year Trump ran for the White House, Gallup said 40% of Americans “had ‘a great deal’ or ‘a fair amount’ of trust and confidence in the mass media to report the news fully, accurately and fairly”.In 2019, midway through Trump’s presidency, Suzanne Nossel, chief executive of PEN America, told the Guardian his attacks on the press were “insidious” and “aimed to intimidate … a kind of dragging-through-the-mud effort, a character assassination … and it’s alarming”.In 2021, the year Trump left office, Gallup said 21% of Americans had “a great deal” or “quite a lot” of confidence in newspapers. For TV news, the figure was 16%. For Congress, it was 12%.Trump insulted Milley as part of a long complaint about Joe Biden’s handling of the US withdrawal from Afghanistan. Impersonating the general’s gravelly voice, Trump said: “I’ll never forget Milley saying to me, ‘Sir, sir. It’s cheaper to leave the equipment than to bring it.’Mark Milley, US general who stood up to Trump, founders over Kabul strikeRead moreTrump said he asked: “You think it’s cheaper to leave it there so they can have it than it is to fill it up with a half tank of gas and fly it into Pakistan or fly it back to our country?“‘Yes, sir, we think it’s cheaper, sir.’“That’s when I realized he was a fucking idiot.”Trump regularly complains about Milley, particularly over his portrayal in bestselling books as a key figure in efforts to contain Trump at the end of his time in power.Trump’s penchant for swearing is well-known, to the extent that his four-year presidency prompted soul-searching among some US media outlets about which words could properly be printed.The Guardian has long had few such scruples.TopicsDonald TrumpNewspapersUS politicsRepublicansNewspapers & magazinesnewsReuse this content More

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      Bob Dole, former US senator and presidential nominee, dies aged 98 – video obituary

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      Bob Dole, the long-time Kansas senator who was the Republican nominee for president in 1996, has died at the age of 98. Born in Russell, Kansas in 1923, Dole served in the US infantry in the second world war, suffering serious wounds in Italy and winning a medal for bravery.
      In 1976 he was the Republican nominee for vice-president to Gerald Ford, in an election the sitting president lost to Jimmy Carter. Two decades later, aged 73, Dole won the nomination to take on Bill Clinton, to whom he lost. More