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      From abortion to January 6: where each Republican candidate in the debate stands on big issues

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      Republicans vying for the 2024 party nomination are set to take the stage in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, on Wednesday night for the first debate of the primary season.The candidates will certainly throw punches at each other and at Donald Trump, who has a significant lead in polls but is skipping the debate. But it’s also a chance for each candidate to present their policy agenda and voice their stance on key voter issues such as abortion and aid to Ukraine.Here’s where each candidate in Wednesday’s debate stands on issues such as abortion, immigration, the economy and continued aid to Ukraine.Ron DeSantisAbortion: DeSantis has supported bills restricting access to abortion – including a six-week ban in his own state of Florida – but has stopped short of saying he would support a federal ban.Economy: In a recently released economic plan, DeSantis said he would cut individual taxes and slash government spending. He also pushed for “American energy independence” and a rollback of electric vehicles.Immigration: As governor, DeSantis has enacted some of the country’s strictest laws against undocumented immigrants, including asking hospital patients to prove their legal status. He also made the controversial move to use public funds to send newly arrived migrants to Martha’s Vineyard in a political stunt. As president, he said he would eliminate the visa lottery and limit “unskilled immigration”.Foreign policy: He opposes additional US involvement in Ukraine and has pledged to reduce economic ties with “communist China” and said the US would no longer “kowtow to Wall Street”.January 6: DeSantis said it was “unfortunate” but “not an insurrection”.More: The current governor of Florida and a former congressman was widely expected to be Trump’s main primary challenger. But his favorability among Republicans has taken many hits, starting with a glitchy Twitter Spaces event hosted by Elon Musk. He has frequently touted his opposition to gender-affirming care for trans people and other public health measures such as mask mandates.Vivek RamaswamyAbortion: Ramaswamy told a crowd at the Iowa State Fair he is “unapologetically pro-life”. But his campaign earlier confirmed he would not back a national abortion ban.Economy: The biotech entrepreneur wants to “unshackle” the energy sector, saying the US should abandon its climate goals to drive down energy costs and boost its GDP. He is also in favor of some corporate and individual tax cuts.Immigration: Ramaswamy said he wants to deport “universally” and end birthright citizenship for children of undocumented immigrants, who would then be required to apply to become a citizen.Foreign policy: Ramaswamy has criticized US aid to Ukraine, saying it is strengthening Russia’s alliance with China.January 6: Ramaswamy condemned Trump the week after the January 6 attack but has walked back his criticism since then. Responding to a question for an Atlantic profile about what truly happened that day, Ramaswamy said: “I don’t know.” He has defended ex-president Trump across his four indictments.More: Time magazine labeled Ramaswamy a “breakout candidate”. The political outsider has steadily climbed the polls since launching his long-shot bid as an “anti-woke” patriot.Tim ScottAbortion: Scott, an evangelical Christian, is staunchly anti-abortion and said he would support a national 15-week ban.Economy: Scott supports tax cuts and stronger economic competition with China. As a senator, Scott championed legislation establishing “opportunity zones”, which are meant to increase economic development in low-income areas by incentivizing private investment, though critics say residents may not benefit from gentrification.Immigration: He is in favor of a wall along the US southern border to curb illegal migration and drug trafficking.Foreign policy: He broadly supports continued US aid to Ukraine and said Biden has not done enough. But some conservatives think he’s soft on China.January 6: Scott said he doesn’t believe the 2020 election was stolen and does not blame Trump for the violence at the Capitol.More: The South Carolina senator, who is the only Black Republican in the Senate, is an outspoken critic when it comes to teaching kids about race and gender in schools and has said: “America is not a racist country.”Nikki HaleyAbortion: The only woman on the debate stage, Haley is anti-abortion but has also called a federal abortion ban “unrealistic”.Economy: Haley wrote in an op-ed that she opposes raising the national debt limit and would “veto spending bills that don’t put America on track to reach pre-pandemic spending levels”.Foreign policy: The former US ambassador to the United Nations under Trump, Haley has labeled the Chinese Communist party an “enemy” and criticized Trump for trying to befriend the Chinese president, Xi Jinping.Immigration: Haley has vowed to tighten security at the US-Mexico border and add 25,000 patrol agents, as well as require companies to verify employees’ status online – which she signed into law in South Carolina as governor.January 6: Haley has called January 6 a “terrible day” and said Trump “went down a path that he shouldn’t have” in an interview with Politico.Chris ChristieAbortion: He has said he would not support a federal abortion ban.Economy: The former New Jersey governor has targeted “excessive government spending” as the reason for inflation and floated cuts to social security, including Medicare.Foreign policy: Christie, who has aligned himself with the hawkish, tough-on-China-and-Russia camp, visited the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, in a surprise trip earlier this month to affirm his support for continued US aid.Immigration: Christie said “immigrants are pouring over the border” in an attack against Trump’s campaign promise to build a border wall.January 6: Christie, who was in the running to be Trump’s VP after dropping out of the 2016 presidential race, is now Trump’s loudest critic. He broke with Trump over the January 6 Capitol attack, calling Trump a “coward” for not joining rioters.Mike PenceAbortion: The former vice-president, an evangelical Christian, is the loudest anti-abortion candidate and has condemned his opponents for refusing to back a six-week abortion ban.Economy: Pence has said his top priority is boosting the US economy and has called on the Fed to ditch its dual mandate – keeping employment high and inflation low – to focus solely on reducing inflation. He has also advocated for cutting social security benefits.Foreign policy: Pence has advocated for continued US aid to Ukraine and met with Volodymyr Zelenskiy during a surprise visit in June.Immigration: He has blasted the Biden administration’s immigration policy, describing a “stampede” from Central and South America, and has vowed to finish the border wall that began under Trump.January 6: Pence has campaigned heavily on his refusal to aid Trump in his effort to stop the certification of electoral results and has repeatedly condemned his ex-boss for his role in the Capitol attack.Doug BurgumAbortion: Burgum signed a law banning nearly all abortions in North Dakota but said he would not support a national ban.Economy: The governor of North Dakota, who is also a wealthy businessman, has touted North Dakota’s record as an energy-producing state and said he would prioritize growing the country’s tech and energy sectors.Foreign policy: Winning the “cold war with China” is a key pillar of Burgum’s message to voters.Immigration: Burgum said Biden hasn’t done enough to secure the US-southern border and supports stricter restrictions on migration.January 6: Burgum called for a stop to the violence at the Capitol on January 6 but said he thinks it’s time to “move on”.Asa HutchinsonAbortion: As governor of Arkansas, Hutchinson signed a near-total abortion ban and said he would support a national ban.Economy: He has floated extreme measures to balance the federal budget and reduce debt including cutting the federal non-military workforce by 10%.Immigration: Hutchinson supports harsh restrictions on immigration.Foreign policy: He said he would not cut economic ties with China but has advocated for more aggressive action to counter China’s threat against Taiwan. Politico describes Hutchinson’s foreign policy as a “compassionate internationalism” of the past.January 6: He said January 6 “disqualifies” Trump from running for president. More

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      Trump’s shadow hangs over Republican debates even as he refuses to attend

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      Donald Trump’s rivals for the Republican presidential nomination reacted in mostly muted fashion to his declaration that he will skip all the party’s primary debates, not just the first in Milwaukee on Wednesday.Trump’s team have strategized that as the overwhelming frontrunner, the former president would gain little from appearing on stage with his many rivals. At the same time, his legal team are probably wary Trump may be tempted to wade into subject matter at the heart of proliferating legal cases against him.Andrew Romeo, a spokesperson for Ron DeSantis, Trump’s closest if distant rival, insisted: “No one is entitled to this nomination, including Donald Trump. You have to show up and earn it.”But while Trump is betting that not showing up will not hurt him with voters – and that his son Donald Trump Jr will prove an effective media surrogate in Milwaukee – DeSantis has a pressing need to earn support. With his campaign widely seen to be tanking, the hard-right Florida governor will take the stage in Wisconsin on Wednesday with serious work to do.In a Sunday night post to his online platform, Truth Social, Trump cited a CBS News poll that gave him a 46-point national lead. Bragging of “legendary numbers”, he said: “The public knows who I am and what a successful presidency I had … I WILL THEREFORE NOT BE DOING THE DEBATES!”Fox News will host the first debate. Executives have reportedly beseeched Trump to attend. On Monday, CNN reported that an unnamed Trump adviser said the former president could still participate in a later debate, but also that Trump has long been against participating in the second scheduled debate, at the Ronald Reagan library in California next month.Trump, 77, faces 91 criminal charges under four indictments arising from his first run for president, in 2016; his attempt to stay in power after losing to Joe Biden in 2020; and his actions after leaving the White House.The charges concern hush-money payments to a porn star, federal and state election subversion, and retention of classified documents. Trump also faces civil cases concerning his business affairs and defamation linked to an allegation of rape. Trials are due during the primary next year.Despite it all, Trump enjoys huge leads in national and key state polls. On Sunday, the national poll by CBS News showed Trump with a whopping 62% support to 16% for DeSantis and other challengers trailing. On Monday, NBC News and the Des Moines Register gave Trump a 23-point lead over DeSantis in Iowa, the first state to vote. Among evangelical Christians, a key voting bloc, the thrice-married, adjudicated rapist led by 27.On Saturday, it was reported that Trump had already recorded the interview with the former Fox News host Tucker Carlson he plans to use as counter-programming to the Milwaukee debate.Among Trump’s Republican rivals, notwithstanding a warning from the rank outsider Will Hurd that “kissing his butt is not going to help you win”, reaction to Trump’s debate avoidance plans remained muted at best.Mike Pence, formerly vice-president to Trump, echoed the chairperson of the Republican National Committee when he told ABC News: “One thing I realised about him is it’s not over till it’s over. So I’m actually still hoping he shows up.”skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionBut observers expect his father’s absence to recalibrate the dynamics of the debate, DeSantis becoming top dog on stage and therefore the top target for takedowns even from Chris Christie, the former New Jersey governor who has built his campaign in opposition to Trump and who has called the former president a coward for skipping debates.On Monday, Vivek Ramaswamy, the biotech entrepreneur who has gone from wide outsider to contender for second place, aimed a warmup barb at DeSantis when he said: “We don’t need another career politician beholden to the donor class sitting in the White House. Cronyism leads to corruption. The choice for GOP primary voters: Do we want Super Pac puppets? Or patriots who speak the TRUTH?”According to Axios, James Uthmeir, DeSantis’s new campaign manager, used a memo to donors and supporters to warn that the Milwaukee debate would be other candidates’ “biggest chance yet to grab headlines by attacking the governor, so we know they will try their best”.Uthmeir also offered a touch of optimism.“We all know why our competitors have to go down this road,” he said. “Because this is a two-man race for the Republican nomination between Governor DeSantis and Donald Trump.” More

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      Pence won’t say if criminal conviction should rule Trump out as president

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      Donald Trump’s former vice-president, Mike Pence, refused to say if Trump should be barred from returning to the White House if he is convicted on any of 91 criminal charges against him.“I think that he’s to be left to the American people,” Pence told ABC’s This Week, on Sunday. “Let’s have the former president have his day in court. Let’s maintain a presumption of innocence.”Trump faces charges concerning federal and state election subversion, retention of classified information and hush-money payments to a porn star. He also faces civil cases involving defamation, alleged rape and his business affairs, contributing to a schedule of trials in the election year.Nonetheless, he leads polling by wide margins nationally and in key states.On Sunday, ahead of the first debate in Milwaukee on Wednesday, CBS News released a new poll. Among Republicans, a whopping 62% picked Trump to just 16% for Ron DeSantis, the hard-right Florida governor in second place. Pence received 5% support, placing fourth.Pence and other qualifiers for the debate – a contest Trump will skip for an interview with Tucker Carlson – have backed a Republican National Committee pledge requiring support for the nominee.On ABC, Pence was asked about the case of James Traficant, an Ohio Democrat who in 2002 became one of only five people ever expelled from the US House after being convicted on corruption charges. Then a congressman from Indiana, Pence voted for that expulsion.Pence’s host, Jon Karl, asked: “Would you hold that same standard for the White House?”Pence said: “I would tell you that it is the function of the Congress to determine membership where there’s ethical violations and I remember the Traficant case from 20 years ago, it was really quite outrageous.“But if you’re saying would I apply that to my former running mate in this race, look, I think that he’s to be left to the American people. Let’s have the former president have his day in court. Let’s maintain a presumption of innocence and in this matter, and any other matter that unfolded this week here in Georgia” – a reference to Trump’s state-level election subversion case – “but I’ve said many times, I would have preferred that these matters be left to the judgment of the American people.“No one’s above the law. But with regard to the president’s future, my hope is when we get to that debate stage, and I’m still kind of hoping maybe he’ll come, is that we can really have a debate about the challenges facing the American people.”Elsewhere, the former Arkansas governor turned Trump critic Asa Hutchinson said he had qualified for the debate and would sign the pledge. Insisting that Trump would not be the nominee, Hutchinson refused to say what he would do if he were.Speaking from Des Moines, Iowa, Hutchinson told CNN’s State of the Union: “I am pleased to announce that we have met … the polling criteria and now we have met the 40,000 individual donor criteria. We submitted to the RNC 42,000 individual donors and I’m delighted.”FiveThirtyEight.com puts Hutchinson at 0.7% support – to 53.7% for Trump.“I’ll sign the pledge,” Hutchinson said. “I’m confident Donald Trump is not going to be the nominee of the party. And I’ve always supported the nominee. So I’m gonna sign the pledge.”skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionPressed on whether he would support the man who sought to overturn the 2020 election and incited the deadly January 6 attack on Congress, Hutchinson repeated: “I’m going to support the nominee of the party. I do not expect it to be Donald Trump. And that I’m sure question will come up in the debate, so stay tuned for that.”’Conviction would not disqualify Trump from the presidency. But some say the US constitution might.Hutchinson said: “You can’t be asking us to support somebody that’s not perhaps even qualified under our constitution. I’m referring to the 14th amendment. A number of legal scholars said that [Trump] is disqualified because of his actions on January 6.”The 14th amendment says: “No person shall be a senator or representative in Congress, or elector of president and vice-president … who, having previously taken an oath … to support the constitution of the United States, shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same … ”Hutchinson said: “There would have to be a separate lawsuit that would be filed, in which there would be a finding that the former president engaged in insurrection, and that would disqualify him. That’s one avenue. The other way would be that if a specific state made that determination on their own … Either way … I think it’s a serious jeopardy for Donald Trump.”Trump’s longtime leading challenger, DeSantis, has long been falling back. No dominant alternative has emerged but Hutchinson insisted his party was not risking a repeat of 2016, when voters did not coalesce around one alternative to Trump.“I don’t see that happening,” Hutchinson told CNN. “First of all, it’s really early. I talked to voters in Iowa and New Hampshire and they’re gonna be late deciding, and that’s why you’re gonna see in Iowa, where Trump’s numbers come down first, it will be here.“… This debate is important … this is really a reduced number [of candidates] from 2016 with eight or nine on the stage. We’ll see who else qualifies for it but the voters are gonna be able to lock in on it, make decisions, and they’re not gonna be in a hurry to move. So everybody needs to be patient, including the media, and let this unfold over the next three or four months.“The right alternative to Donald Trump will surface.” More

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      Ron DeSantis calls Trump supporters ‘listless vessels’ in Republican broadside

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      His presidential campaign widely seen to be listing badly, Ron DeSantis fired a broadside at supporters of Donald Trump on Saturday, calling them “listless vessels”.“A movement can’t be about the personality of one individual,” DeSantis told the Florida Standard.“The movement has got to be about what are you trying to achieve on behalf of the American people and that’s got to be based in principle, because if you’re not rooted in principle, if all we are is listless vessels that’s just supposed to follow … whatever happens to come down the pike on Truth Social every morning, that’s not going to be a durable movement.”Truth Social is Trump’s social media platform, set up when he was suspended from mainstream platforms after the January 6 attack on Congress.Running for re-election under four criminal indictments and 91 separate charges, Trump nonetheless dominates the Republican primary, leading polling by as much as 40 points nationally and by wide margins in key states.DeSantis, the hard-right governor of Florida, has long been established as the strongest challenger. But amid campaign firings and reported financial struggles, that status has begun to erode, with the former New Jersey governor Chris Christie and the entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy creeping up in polling.Trump is set to skip the first Republican debate, in Milwaukee on Wednesday, in favour of an interview with the former Fox News host Tucker Carlson.Responding to DeSantis’s remarks to the Florida Standard, Trump aides sought to link the governor to the Democrat Trump beat for the presidency in 2016.“DeSantis goes full-blown Hillary [Clinton] and call[s] MAGA supporters ‘listless vessels,’” Steven Cheung wrote.A spokesperson for a Trump-aligned fundraising committee, Maga Inc, made explicit the claimed connection to remarks by Clinton which Trump successfully weaponised.“To Hillary Clinton, Trump supporters are ‘deplorables’. To Ron DeSantis, they are ‘listless vessels’,” Karoline Leavitt said. “The truth is, Trump supporters are patriots. DeSantis must immediately apologize for his disgraceful insult.”DeSantis’s spokesperson, Bryan Griffin, said the governor was referring to supporters of Trump in Congress, not among voters.“The dishonest media refuses to report the facts,” Griffin wrote. “Donald Trump and some congressional endorsers are ‘listless vessels’. Why? Because Trump and DC insiders feel he is entitled to your vote.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotion“… That’s why Ron DeSantis will be showing up on Wednesday night to debate, and Donald Trump will not.”The Florida Standard is a conservative website run by a young Republican, Will Witt, to whom DeSantis has regularly granted interviews.In the passage of the interview in question, the governor repeatedly targeted “establishment Republicans” and “Rinos”, meaning “Republicans in name only”.“I think that we have a stream in our party that views supporting Trump as whether you are a Rino or not,” he said. “And so you could be the most conservative person since sliced bread, unless you’re kissing his rear end, they will somehow call you a Rino.”DeSantis also said “there’ll be people who are huge Trump supporters, like in Congress, who have like incredibly liberal leftwing records that [are] really just atrocious and … then you have other people like [Texas] congressman Chip Roy, who’s endorsed me, [Kentucky] congressman Thomas Massie, these guys have records of principle.“… Ultimately, a movement can’t be about the personality of one individual. The movement has got to be about what are you trying to achieve on behalf of the American people and that’s got to be based in principle, because if you’re not rooted in principle … all we are is listless vessels.” More

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      Florida’s attacks on academic freedom just got even worse | Moira Donegan

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      Ron DeSantis’s presidential campaign is flailing: the Florida governor, once considered a formidable contestant for the Republican nomination, is polling at a pathetic 14.8% among the Republican contenders. His camp is struggling to raise money, and the candidate’s public appearances have revealed him to be interpersonally unpleasant – coming off stiff, judgmental and creepy.At the Iowa state fair last week, DeSantis was caught on video telling a little girl, who was clutching a fairground treat, “that’s probably a lot of sugar”. The governor, a man so joyless that he scolded a child for eating candy, was later the subject of a taunting banner flown over one of his events: “Be Likable, Ron!”But just because DeSantis will not become president doesn’t mean that his constituents in Florida will be relieved of the policies he put in place there while trying to draw national attention to himself. In a years-long campaign that now seems destined to end with a third-place finish in Iowa, DeSantis reshaped Florida in his image, pursuing culture-war fights that he hoped would grab media attention and convince Republican primary voters that he was hurting their most hated enemies.Among these was the seizure and restructuring of New College of Florida, a public liberal arts college in Sarasota that was long known in the state for its curious students, eclectic faculty and countercultural bent. DeSantis overhauled the college’s board of trustees, appointing his own loyalists. The man newly in charge of New College is Christopher Rufo, a rightwing influencer known for whipping up moral panics. He’s been given a mandate to make the school conservative, bringing the curriculum in line with the governor’s ideological preferences, and reshaping it in the image of Hillsdale College, a private conservative Christian school in Michigan.Now Rufo has escalated his attacks on New College, transforming a board of trustees meeting into an ideologically driven attack on academic freedom – and eliminating the school’s gender studies department.Last Thursday’s trustees meeting was supposed to be mostly about the college’s quest to hire a new president: three far-right candidates were interviewed earlier that day. The meetings were already tense. New College’s students and faculty, along with staff, alumni and many ordinary Floridians, are appalled at what is being done to the school. The candidate interviews were livestreamed, but they had to be conducted in a secure separate building, cordoned off by police tape. When the board met in public in front of an audience, the proceedings became so contentious that four different onlookers were removed by police.For his part, Rufo seems to be courting this controversy. Like DeSantis, his is a politics of contempt, made up largely of sneering attempts to elicit an outraged reaction from his victims. At the board meeting, he brought up the proposal to eliminate gender studies abruptly, without advance notice to the full board, and without allowing any time for public comment. When student and faculty trustees – including Grace Keenan, the student body president, and Amy Reid, the director of the gender studies program – pointed out that the proposal violated procedures required by Florida state law, Rufo, who appeared at the meeting on Zoom, bulldozed through anyway. When Reid spoke movingly in defense of her program and its importance to students, Rufo could be seen in mute on the projector screen above her, laughing.Rufo’s own plans for the school are vague. Earlier in the meeting, he and his fellow DeSantis appointees had voted to overhaul the college’s course load, so as to require students to take courses in fields he designated using the Greek words “logos” and “technos”. It’s unclear what these terms are supposed to signify, or how exactly Rufo is translating them: “logos” is often interpreted as “word” but “technos” can mean either “technology”, “art” or “skill”. But perhaps the old-timeyness of the ancient Greek is all that Rufo is really going for: like much of the modern right, and indeed like DeSantis himself, he is solemn only in his style, and merely peevishly cruel in his substance.More to the point might be the fact that the end of New College’s gender studies department mirrors the broader project of Rufo’s boss, the terminally unlikable Ron. DeSantis has long been modeling his governorship of Florida on the rule of the autocratic Hungarian prime minister Viktor Orbán, a darling of the American right who hosted 2023’s Conservative Political Action Conference, or CPAC. DeSantis’s “don’t say gay” ban on LGBTQ+ content in instruction for K-12 students was an imitation of an Orban-backed law banning “gay propaganda” anywhere minors might see it; the destruction of the gender studies program at New College follows Orban’s ban on gender studies programs in 2018.But DeSantis’s attacks on education go beyond the strictly defined gender studies field. Florida’s 2023 high school social studies curriculum advances the insultingly reductive lie that “slaves developed skills” that could be used “for personal benefit”. The attempt is to twist historical fact to legitimize a brutal and unjust racial hierarchy, and the same could be said of DeSantis’s attack on gender studies: to render natural and right what is in fact unnatural, constructed and violent.For his part, Rufo framed the attack on gender studies at New College in flippant, even blase terms: “The best universities, when they have programs that do not fit in with the mission … make hard calls to discontinue those programs.”Thanks to Rufo, New College is no longer among Florida’s best universities. And the “mission” Rufo was assigned to pursue there had less to do with scholarly integrity than with DeSantis’s culture-war fight-picking and presidential aspirations. It is a mission that is doomed to fail. Students and faculty at New College, however, are the ones who will suffer the consequences.
      Moira Donegan is a Guardian US columnist More

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      Florida wants to let a rightwing group teach history to children. This is appalling | Nancy Jo Sales

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      In July, the Florida department of education announced that it had approved the use of content by PragerU Kids for the coming school year. PragerU Kids was recently described by Time magazine as “a resource for schools”. But it is only a “resource” because the state of Florida has deemed it so. PragerU is not an actual university. It has no accreditation. It is a conservative media company whose goal since its founding in 2009 has been to spread rightwing ideology to adults and children.And it has been incredibly successful at doing that. PragerU’s latest annual report says that the company’s self-described “edutainment” videos racked up more than 1.2bn views in 2022, with more than 7bn since its founding. Its content has been mostly available online, particularly on Facebook and YouTube, but now it is making its way into US classrooms with the promise of fighting the so-called “woke agenda”.PragerU makes no secret of its agenda. Its co-founder, Dennis Prager – a conservative radio talkshow host and writer who has been attacking progressive causes since the 1980s – was recently glib in responding to claims that PragerU “indoctrinates kids”. “Which is true,” Prager said in a speech to the conservative “parental rights” group Moms for Liberty. “We bring doctrines to children. That is a very fair statement. I said, ‘But what is the bad of our indoctrination?’”PragerU Kids’ cartoon videos for children as young as kindergarten age not only soft-pedal the history of slavery, racism, colonialism and police brutality – they show sympathy for them. In one video, Leo and Layla Meet Christopher Columbus, Columbus tells young Leo and Layla: “Slavery is as old as time and has taken place in every corner of the world … Being taken as a slave is better than being killed, no?”Another PragerU Kids video describes George Floyd, who was murdered by the Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin in 2020, as a “Black man who resisted arrest”. Another features a cartoon version of the Black American educator and author Booker T Washington comforting white children by saying, “Future generations are never responsible for the sins of the past.” To which his young listener responds: “OK, I’ll keep doing my best to treat everyone well and won’t feel guilty about historical stuff.”Another video says that British colonialism transformed India “in many positive ways”.PragerU Kids’ videos for teens often focus on sexuality and gender, promoting traditional gender roles in ways that could be considered anti-feminist. In one, How to Embrace Your Femininity, a young blond woman with perfect hair and makeup tells viewers: “Most gender stereotypes exist because they reflect the way that men and women are naturally different. And those differences aren’t bad … So don’t let anyone tell you it’s bad to fit stereotypes. Those people are just trying too hard to be cool.”And climate change denial? A PragerU video for kids compares pushing back against the science of the climate crisis to Jews in the Warsaw ghetto uprising who fought the Nazis. As they say, you can’t make this stuff up. It’s perhaps no coincidence that the initial funding for PragerU came from the Wilks brothers, petroleum industry billionaires.It wouldn’t be a stretch to call this content rightwing propaganda, which the state of Florida has now all but legitimized as suitable learning materials for kids. This isn’t surprising in a state with a governor, Ron DeSantis, who has staked his political career on fighting “wokeness”. Alarmingly, however, Florida may be just the first of other states to follow in adopting PragerU’s anti-progressive materials. The company is now reportedly going through the process of being approved as an education “resource” in other states. Which is next? Texas? Oklahoma? And how many more after that?American education has never been perfect. I can remember, as a teenage girl growing up in Florida in the 1970s, being frustrated by the fact that my public high school curriculum included almost nothing on the history of women in the US – which hasn’t changed so very much since then. It was also appalling how little time we spent on the history of slavery, the history of Native people or the contributions of people of color to our society, which schools still fail to teach.But the adoption of PragerU Kids content by a state’s department of education is something on another level. This is admittedly indoctrination, propaganda full of lies and half-truths specifically designed to manipulate and mold young minds to serve a rightwing political agenda. You could argue that this has always been the problem – a problem that critical race theory and its proponents have been trying to combat and change.The reaction against this has been swift and severe, and the embrace of PragerU Kids could be just be one of the many unseemly moves we’ll be seeing in the continued fight to finally teach the truth in American schools.
      Nancy Jo Sales is the author, most recently, of Nothing Personal: My Secret Life in the Dating App Inferno More

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      Prosecutor suspended by DeSantis says he’s a ‘weak dictator’ seeking attention

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      Ron DeSantis, the Republican governor of Florida, suspended the top prosecutor in Orlando on Wednesday, claiming “dereliction of duty” on crime. In return, the prosecutor said DeSantis, a candidate for the Republican presidential nomination, was a “weak dictator” acting undemocratically and for political reasons.Monique Worrell, the ninth judicial circuit state attorney, is the second Democratic prosecutor DeSantis has removed.Last year, the governor suspended Andrew Warren of Tampa over his supposedly “woke” agenda, including pledging not to enforce a 15-week abortion ban and supporting gender transition for minors. A legal battle over that decision continues.Speaking to reporters on Wednesday, Worrell said: “Elected officials are being taken out of office solely for political purposes … Under this tyranny, elected officials can be removed simply for political purposes and by a whim of the governor and no matter how you feel about me, you should not be OK with that.“This is simply a smoke screen for Ron DeSantis’ failing and disastrous presidential campaign. He needed to get back in the media in some positive way. That would be red meat for his base. And he will have accomplished that today.”Trailing Donald Trump in the Republican primary, and having recently replaced his campaign manager amid reports of a campaign in free-fall, DeSantis made his announcement about Worrell on a break from the presidential trail.“Worrell’s practices and policies have too often allowed violent criminals to escape the full consequences of their criminal conduct, thereby endangering the innocent civilians of Orange and Osceola counties,” DeSantis’s office said in a statement.In an executive order, DeSantis accused the second African American elected state attorney of “neglecting her duty to faithfully prosecute crime in her jurisdiction”.The 15-page order accused Worrell of allowing practices and policies that “systematically permitted violent offenders, drug traffickers, serious-juvenile offenders, and pedophiles to evade incarceration”.It alleged such practices and policies included “non-filing or dropping meritorious charges or declining to allege otherwise provable facts to avoid triggering applicable lengthy sentences, minimum mandatory sentences, or other sentencing enhancements, especially for offenders under 25 years old”.Worrell was also accused of overseeing low prison admission rates “for crimes involving lewd and lascivious behavior, which includes possession of child pornography and other sex crimes against children”.In his own news conference, DeSantis said that while prosecutors “do have a certain amount of discretion about which cases to bring and which not”, Worrell “abused that discretion”.DeSantis said he was nominating a former judge, Andrew Bain, to serve during Worrell’s suspension.Worrell told reporters: “If we are mourning anything this morning, it is the loss of democracy. I am your duly-elected state attorney for the ninth judicial circuit. Nothing done by a weak dictator can change that.“I am a fighter and I intend to fight. I will not be quiet. I will not sit down … I will continue to stand for democracy. I will continue to protect the rights of the disenfranchised. I am proud to tell you that this will not stop me from running for re-election. My re-election will continue.”Earlier this year, DeSantis and Worrell exchanged barbs over the case of Keith Moses, a 19-year-old believed responsible for the killings of three people, including a journalist and a nine-year old girl, in shootings in Orange county in March.According to reports, Moses’s criminal history includes eight felonies and 11 misdemeanor cases, all bar one having occurred while he was a juvenile. His only crime as an adult was possession of drug paraphernalia and cannabis, in 2021. Worrell’s office did not prosecute, due to the amount found.Following the shootings, DeSantis said Worrell’s office, which announced in May that it would seek the death penalty against Moses, “may have permitted this dangerous individual to remain on the street”.“You have to hold people accountable,” DeSantis said, adding: “[The] state attorney in Orlando thinks that you don’t prosecute people and that’s the way that you somehow have better communities. That does not work.”Worrell fired back, saying: “For this tragedy to be politicized, it’s shameful and we should all feel that way about it.“Painting a narrative that there’s something that prosecutors could have done to keep this individual off the streets is just not true.” More

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      DeSantis claims agents can tell traffickers from migrants in call for deadly force

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      The rightwing Florida governor and 2024 presidential hopeful Ron DeSantis has sparked controversy by outlining a hardline border policy of deadly force despite acknowledging that drug traffickers could be difficult to distinguish from migrants crossing into the US.DeSantis, whose ailing campaign has failed to cut into the lead of the Republican frontrunner, Donald Trump, said that under his direction as president, US law enforcement on the lookout for drugs would not mistakenly use lethal force on migrants because US agents would have “rules of engagement” similar to police or US forces in war zones like Iraq.In an NBC interview broadcast on Monday night, the Republican Florida governor was asked about a campaign-trail promise: “If cartels are trying to run product into this country, they’re going to end up stone-cold dead.”“How do you know you’re using deadly force against the right people?” his interviewer, Dasha Burns, asked.“Same way a police officer would know,” DeSantis said. “Same way somebody operating in Iraq would know.“You know, these people in Iraq at the time, they all looked the same. You didn’t know who had a bomb strapped to them. So those guys have to make judgments.”Data analysis by Mapping Police Violence, a non-profit, shows police killed at least 1,201 people in the US in 2022.John Pfaff, a law professor at Fordham University in New York, called DeSantis’s proposal “terrifying”.“That ‘same way in Iraq’ line is terrifying,” Pfaff wrote. “It’s an open embrace of any sort of false positive rate and the large-scale murder of innocent people. DeSantis really is really being quite openly murderous. (And imputing that same murderous indifference to police, as a compliment.)”Pfaff also pointed to a 2020 ruling in which conservatives on the US supreme court said the family of a 15-year-old Mexican boy shot dead by a US border patrol agent could not sue, because the shooting was a matter of national security.In Iraq, between the invasion in 2003 and the large-scale US withdrawal in 2011, American forces were often attacked with bombs either vehicle-borne, remote-controlled or carried or propelled by suicide bombers.The US defense department puts the US military and civilian death toll between 2003 and 2010 at 4,431. Iraq Body Count, a British non-profit, says 15,162, or 13%, of documented civilian deaths in Iraq from 2003 to 2011 were caused by US-led coalition forces.As a US navy lawyer, DeSantis deployed to Iraq in 2007, advising special forces. He has touted his military service, also at Guantánamo Bay in Cuba, saying it sets him aside from the rest of the Republican field.But he has struggled to make his mark on the primary, falling further behind Trump despite the former US president’s criminal indictments and other forms of legal jeopardy.Amid a widely reported campaign reset, the hard-right governor, who has targeted LGBTQ+ rights, the teaching of race in US history and other progressive priorities, also attempted to show a softer side. Joined by his wife, Casey, to discuss their children and life at home, DeSantis told NBC he was “really good” at making waffles, adding that his children “actually do like the eggs”, as well as macaroni and cheese from a box.With his children, he said, “I’m very even keeled, but if I do raise the voice a little bit, they do, they snap to attention.”On the campaign trail, DeSantis has faced fierce criticism after using violent imagery, including a promise to “start slitting throats” among federal workers once elected.Discussing his hardline border policy, DeSantis said his proposal to authorise lethal force against cartels would be “similar to like if you’re in the military.“You have rules of engagement. Anyone that’s hostile intent or a hostile act, which … cartels are, you know, you would then engage with lethal force.“I think these cartels are basically foreign terrorist organisations. They are responsible for killing more Americans on an annual basis than any other group or country throughout the entire world. And yet, this is just happening, and it’s happening in communities all across the United States.”Hardline rhetoric about the border and law enforcement is common among Republican candidates. In office, Trump reportedly wanted to bomb cartel facilities in Mexico but was blocked by aides.DeSantis continued: “It really hit me when I was down in Arizona. You know, most of the border doesn’t have a wall, of course, but there was parts where there was a wall. And these guys are working on the wall. I’m like, ‘What are you doin’?’ They’re like, ‘We’re repairing the hole the cartels cut through the steel beams.’“So if you see that happening, and they’ve got the satchel of fentanyl strapped to their back, you use deadly force against them, you lay them out, you will see a change of behaviour. You have to take the fight to the cartels; otherwise we’re going to continue to see Americans dying.” More