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      New Trump January 6 court filing highlights perils of possible JD Vance vice-presidency

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      When the next electoral vote is certified on 6 January next year, Vice-President Kamala Harris will play a critical role – whether or not she’s the winner of the presidential contest. It’s a role that vice-presidents have routinely played throughout history: certifying the results of the election for a seamless transfer of power.The same might not be true for the election after that. In the most consequential line of the vice-presidential debate last week, the Republican nominee, JD Vance, refused to say that Donald Trump lost the 2020 election and then pressed by moderators, declined to answer whether he would refuse to certify the vote this year if he had that power. (His opponent, Tim Walz, said in a clip that’s now been spliced for campaign ads: “That is a damning non-answer.”)The troubling nature of the answer was compounded less than 24 hours after the debate when the US district judge Tanya Chutkan unsealed a redacted version of the special counsel Jack Smith’s brief against Trump in the federal election interference case laying out new evidence of how the former president attempted to steal the election.In striking detail, the brief laid out how Trump made Vice-President Mike Pence a target of his angry supporters on January 6, how the Secret Service was forced to whisk him away to a secure location, and how Pence went on to certify the election after the violence had subsided.Under the US constitution, the vice-president has few specific powers. Walz and Vance debated last week about foreign policy, reproductive rights, immigration and other policies that the next administration will influence, though their role in any of it will be limited. But the constitution does spell out that the vice-president is the president of the Senate and is in charge of certifying the election results, and Vance, unlike Pence, has said multiple times that he would not have certified the vote in 2020.“I would have asked the states to submit alternative slates of electors and let the country have the debate about what actually matters and what kind of an election that we had,” Vance said on a venture capitalist’s podcast in September. He made similar comments before he was tapped by Trump to be on the ticket, saying during an ABC News interview that he would have liked to see the certification of the 2020 election handled differently.The contrast between Vance leaving the door open to question election results, and the depiction of Pence’s role on January 6 laid out in the Smith indictment, is stark.According to Smith, Pence stood strong despite Trump’s pressure and threats. He told Trump he had seen no evidence of election-determining fraud and repeatedly tried to convince Trump to accept the valid results. Trump’s pressure campaign did not let up – he and his co-conspirators used “deceit”, lying to Pence that there was evidence of significant fraud and lying to the public that Pence had the ability to reject electoral votes and send them back to the state legislatures.Even after Trump tweeted: “Mike Pence didn’t have the courage to do what should have been done to protect our Country and our Constitution,” supporters started chanting “Hang Mike Pence!” and the Secret Service had to evacuate the vice-president to a secure location, Pence maintained that the Electoral Count Act didn’t allow him to legally reject the valid electoral votes.Although the riots on January 6 delayed certification for approximately six hours, the House and Senate resumed their joint session at 11.35pm, according to the brief, and at 3.41am, Pence announced the certified results of the election in favor of Joe Biden.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionIt’s not exaggeration to say that US democracy survived past January 2021 because of Pence. Had he refused to certify the vote, the peaceful transfer of power would not have occurred, and the chaos and violence probably would have continued.But Vance has already proved himself more eager to capitulate to Trump’s demands – despite previously condemning the former president, he’s transformed into a Maga acolyte who is in some ways “more Trump than Trump”, according to one retired Republican party operative. And he has explicitly said that he would have acted differently from Pence on the day Congress meets to certify the election.Trump is not currently president, so Vance won’t be able to refuse to certify and wreak havoc in January. But if Trump wins a second term, Vance will be in charge of certifying the vote after the 2028 election. Trump has now said multiple times that Americans “won’t have to vote any more” if he wins this year. It’s not far-fetched to think about what might happen if Trump and Vance refused to cede control of the White House in 2028. More

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      in US Politics

      John Oliver on VP debate’s ‘civility’: ‘Etiquette is kind of beside the point’

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      On the latest Last Week Tonight, John Oliver ripped into those praising the “civility” of last week’s vice-presidential debate between JD Vance and Tim Walz. “Etiquette is kind of beside the point” when the stakes include immigrant rights and women’s bodily autonomy, he contended.“It’s like reading a ransom note and going, ‘This cursive is just so lovely. Look at the capital Y in ‘You have 24 hours before he dies.’ There are still some people who were raised right,’” he quipped.Oliver tore into Vance’s refusal to say, when asked directly, that Donald Trump lost the 2020 election. In what Walz called “a damning non-answer”, Vance deflected with: “I’m focused on the future.”“‘I’m focused on the future’ is one of the most generic store-brand fuckboy deflections there is,” Oliver fumed. “It’s no wonder Tim Walz broke the fourth wall there like he was in Abbott Elementary. Because ‘I’m focused on the future’ is what you say when you want to change the subject. If not, you just answer the question.”Oliver also touched on special counsel Jack Smith’s 165-page report detailing the ways Trump and his cohort attempted to overturn the 2020 election, “reminding us yet again of the ridiculous steps he took to avoid leaving office”. According to the document, Trump allegedly told people in the White House he knew he had lost but that he would “fight like hell” anyway.“But it super matters if you lost,” Oliver countered. “It’s kind of the main thing that matters. That is the most unsettling thing you could possibly overhear if you work at the White House.”The report also notes that Trump muted his lawyer Sidney Powell during a phone call “when she was outlining her bogus fraud claims” and called her ideas crazy.“If I ever found out that I lied so badly that Donald Trump muted the call to say this is some crazy shit, you would never see me again,” Oliver laughed. “I would walk directly into the ocean.”Jokes aside, Oliver reminded: “None of this is theoretical. If he loses next month, there is every reason to believe Trump will dispute the results again and Vance has made it clear he’s got no problem with that. And that alone should be disqualifying.“For all the talk this week about his civility at the debate, let’s not forget: deep down [Vance] is the same colossal dipshit who spews rightwing hate with distressing ease and continues to defend the ‘big lie’ that the last election was stolen,” he continued. “It is all tremendously bleak, which is why – to borrow a phrase I heard recently – I’m focused on the future, specifically one in which in four weeks’ time, Trump hopefully loses this fucking election.”In his main segment, Oliver looked into how a routine traffic stop for “non-safety violations” can become a terror, with law enforcement disproportionately targeting people of color. Traffic stops are “the most common law enforcement interaction in America”, with police pulling over an average of 50,000 people in a day in the US.Those interactions can turn deadly: since 2017, armed police have killed at least 813 people in routine traffic stops, the vast majority of them Black. “We’ve all seen the videos of high-profile killings,” said Oliver, referring to the police shootings of Philando Castile, Daunte Wright and others, recorded by bystanders or police body-cams. “The horror of those videos should be seared into our collective consciouses by now.”Because of this pattern, for Black motorists, “driving comes with a constant undercurrent of fear”, said Oliver.He noted that there are legitimate safety reasons to pull over some drivers – someone driving too fast or recklessly, for instance, but no driver should worry about a traffic stop and “also have to worry about being harassed or potentially killed”.Such risks are not the product of a few bad apples in law enforcement, said Oliver; it’s “the inevitable result of deliberate decisions that have turned traffic stops into a systemic issue”.Oliver ticked through documentation of how police departments incentivize traffic stops as a means of funding, and encourage officers to apply deeply subjective criteria to pulling people over. Such “pretextual stops” basically equate to “shaking people down to see what crimes fall out”, he said.As an aside, he played an old PSA featuring characters from the musical Cats encouraging people to drive safely, lest their children become nothing but “memories”. “Let me just say this,” said Oliver. “That musical is an abomination. If there is ever a day that Andrew Lloyd Webber has no haters, that means that I am dead and so, by the way, is Patti LuPone.”On a more serious note, Oliver encouraged a full-stop end to pretextual stops and eliminating non-safety-related traffic stops. Such measures have already been adopted at the local level in Ann Arbor, Michigan, and Philadelphia – where, after eight months, traffic stops were cut in half, meaning 12,000 fewer Black drivers were pulled over. He also advocated for decriminalizing minor traffic offenses (such as broken tail lights) and making data on traffic stops public, including the race of those pulled over – “frankly fucking incredible that it’s not already happening”, he noted.While some of these measures may be politically difficult, when it comes to non-safety-related traffic stops, “doing fewer of them for bullshit reasons should be a pretty easy sell”. More

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      Harris embarks on media blitz and tries to edge out Trump in key swing states

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      Kamala Harris has embarked on a week-long media blitz, hurtling from TV studios and late-night shows to podcast interviews as she seeks to gain an edge over Donald Trump in the US election’s key battleground states that remain nail-bitingly close.The vice-president’s decision to face a raft of largely friendly media outlets came as the campaigns entered the final 30 days. More than 1.4 million Americans have already cast their ballots in early voting across 30 states.The Democratic nominee’s whirlwind media tour has been carefully crafted for maximum reach and minimum risk. Harris has talked to the CBS News show 60 Minutes, along with the popular podcast Call Her Daddy.On Tuesday she hits the media capital, New York, for appearances on ABC News’s daytime behemoth The View and the Howard Stern Show, followed by a recording with late-night host Stephen Colbert.The first of a flurry of comments from Harris was put out by 60 Minutes on Sunday before a full broadcast on Monday. Harris will appear alone, after Trump declined to be interviewed by the election special which has been a staple of US election coverage for more than half a century.In a short clip released by 60 Minutes, Harris was asked whether the Biden-Harris administration had any sway over the actions of Benjamin Netanyahu, the hardline prime minister of Israel who appears not to listen to Washington. Asked whether the US had a “real close ally” in Netanyahu, she replied: “With all due respect, the better question is: do we have an important alliance between the American people and the Israeli people? And the answer to that question is yes.”Since Harris’s meteoric propulsion as Democratic presidential nominee after Joe Biden stepped aside, her relative avoidance of press or TV interviews has become a point of contention on the campaign trail. Republican leaders and pundits on Fox News routinely accuse her of being media-shy.This week’s blitz is designed to counter that impression, while reaching large audiences focused on demographic groups which will be central to Harris’s chances of winning in November. Call Her Daddy is Spotify’s most-listened to podcast among women, while The View is the number one ranked daytime talk show with 2.5 million average viewers, again heavily weighted towards women.Meanwhile Colbert’s show on CBS is the highest rated late-night talk show attracting large numbers of younger viewers aged 18 to 49 – another critical demographic on Harris’s target list.Harris’s running mate, the Democratic governor of Minnesota Tim Walz, is also making his own media scramble which began on Sunday, with him entering less comfortable territory on Fox News Sunday. He was questioned about the pro-abortion law that he signed in his state, and also asked to clarify the occasions on which he has misrepresented his record.That included a comment that he had carried weapons in war when he had not, and his classifying the treatment that he and his wife received to have a child as IVF when it was in fact a different type of fertility treatment.At last week’s vice-presidential debate Walz recognised his missteps, calling himself a “knucklehead”.Walz told Fox News Sunday: “To be honest with you, I don’t think American people care whether I used IUI or IVF, what they understand is that Donald Trump would resist these things. I speak passionately … I will own up when I misspeak and when I make a mistake.”As the contest enters its final month, the Guardian’s latest tracker of opinion polls shows Harris up on Trump by three percentage points nationally. In the more telling test of the seven battleground states that will decide the outcome, though Harris is ahead in five of them, the margin remains essentially too close to call.Both candidates and their running mates are speeding up their frantic dash around the seven states: Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, North Carolina, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin. Harris and Walz will be in Arizona this weeks, where early voting begins on Wednesday.On Thursday, the Democratic ticket will gain extra ballast when former president and campaigning superstar Barack Obama kicks off a round of stump appearances in the all-important swing state, Pennsylvania. He will begin in Pittsburgh, and will then travel across the country on Harris’s behalf, campaign aides have said.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionTrump was scheduled to hold a rally in Juneau, Wisconsin, on Sunday afternoon, a day after he made a pointed return to the fairgrounds in Butler, Pennsylvania, where he came close to being assassinated on 13 July. Trump and his younger son Eric used the occasion to spread the baseless claim that the Democrats had been behind the attempt on his life.“They tried to kill him, it’s because the Democratic party can’t do anything right,” Eric Trump said. Billionaire Elon Musk also appeared on stage.On Sunday, Mike Johnson, the Republican speaker of the US House, was asked by ABC News’s This Week whether such comments were responsible amid mounting fears of political violence in the build up to the 5 November election. Johnson sidestepped the question, saying he had not heard the full speeches.The speaker also notably refused to answer whether Trump had lost the 2020 election, in the wake of Trump’s ongoing lies that he was the actual victor. “This is the game that is always played by the media with leading Republicans, it’s a gotcha game, and I’m not going to engage in it,” Johnson said.The former president’s wife, Melania Trump, sat down for an interview with the Fox News host Maria Bartiromo. She was asked given how close her husband had come to being shot in Butler whether she trusted the top officials of the FBI, CIA and other federal agencies who “appeared to be against President Trump and yourself from day one”.Melania Trump replied: “It’s hard to say who you really trust. You want to, but it’s always a question mark.”Melania Trump, who is promoting her book, Melania, also spoke about her pro-abortion stance which she revealed in the volume. She said her husband had always known her convictions.“He knew my position and my beliefs since the day we met, and I believe in individual freedom. I want to decide what I want to do with my body. I don’t want government in my personal business,” she said. More

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      ‘Slick talker’ v ‘sincere and truthful’: swing-state voters respond to VP debate

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      ‘Walz came across as passionate, sincere and truthful’Walz was rushing and appeared to want to discuss complex issues with depth but didn’t have enough time to delve into some of the points. He had more substance and came across as more sincere than Vance, who was slick, polished and said little of consequence.I would have liked to hear more about how, exactly, Trump and Vance want to build on federal land. For example, if they plan to use land in Montana or Michigan for housing, and I have family in North Carolina and Alabama, how would that be useful to me? I would also like to have heard Vance [being] questioned about how tax breaks for the rich are going to help people on a fixed income like me, or middle-class families like those of my grown children.My favorite moment was when Walz directly addressed the audience in his closing remarks. It came across as passionate, sincere and truthful. I voted for Biden last time and this time I will vote for the Harris-Walz ticket with enthusiasm.– Catherine, 76, part-time consultant in international aid and development, North Carolina‘Vance presented himself to be a slick talker’I voted for Biden-Harris in the last election and will vote for Harris-Walz this year. Vance presented himself to be a slick talker – which I was very apprehensive about because it allowed him to chameleon his way throughout the debate and he did on many instances, making Trumpism seem palatable and humane.Walz was more grounded and refused to display any outrage at what Vance said and this I think was his strong point. Instead, Walz was more polite and sometimes to a fault because he could have pounced on Vance during those instances. Walz talked more about his plans and accomplishments as Minnesota governor to solve the country’s domestic problems, something I wish voters paid attention to – especially healthcare.The final question regarding whether Trump-Vance would accept the results of the upcoming election, I believe, was the moment that had the most tension. It presented the starkest difference between the two. Vance still refuses to accept Trump’s defeat in 2020 and did not express his thoughts if the upcoming election does not go their way.
      – Wilfredo Lukban, 59, retired physician, Doylestown, Pennsylvania‘Vance and Walz were better than the presidential candidates in the last debate’It was a very civil policy-driven debate. I voted for Trump in the last election, would have voted for RFK before he dropped out but now am planning on voting for Trump. Vance and Walz both presented themselves better than the presidential candidates did in the last debate. Vance, especially, impressed with his speaking ability. It was the first time I’d heard him speak for so long. Came away feeling like Vance had a slight edge over Walz. Possibly his youth biased me towards him as well.Wish the discussion on energy had gone on longer. Vance briefly mentioned nuclear power but Walz didn’t engage with it. Vance addressing abortion was what I wish Republicans in government and Trump had been saying all along. Just because we care about the unborn doesn’t mean we’re unsympathetic to women in difficult situations. There’s room for compromise. – IT worker in his mid-20s, Arizona‘How can anyone say that Vance won the debate?’How can anyone say that Vance won the debate when he out and out lied numerous times? A smooth but completely gaslit answer is just appalling. Not to mention the times he just flat out didn’t answer the questions, just came up with gobbledy-gook.And how in the name of all that’s holy can you win a vice-presidential debate if you can’t admit that Trump lost the 2020 election? Why are you even allowed to run for office if you’re so completely out of touch with reality?
      – David, 70, photographer, North Carolina‘Vance showed his gentle side, was polished and sharp’View image in fullscreenVance did a great job of showing the public his gentle side, was polished and sharp on the subject matter. Walz was too folksy, didn’t admit to not being in China when he said he was. Too fumbly and forever taking notes.[I would have liked] specifics on how both parties will grow the economy. Especially considering the almost four years of restricting inflation. I really liked the civility throughout the debate.I almost kicked over the TV when the moderators started factchecking Vance. I thought that wasn’t allowed in this debate. Three against one, just like in the presidential debate. I voted for Donald Trump in the last two elections. Will vote for him in this one, simply because four more years of Democratic policy will do even more harm. – Rod, 70s, Wisconsin‘Neither candidate had specific answers as to how to fix some problems’No doubt Vance was a slick debater, showing his previous debate skills. Neither candidate had much substance or specific answers as to how to fix some of the problems. I wanted to see more about social security and how to keep the country from going bankrupt. Generations after mine will find it difficult to live on social security, let alone have benefits. I don’t want to see social security go bankrupt in my lifetime and possibly see benefits decrease. Everyone knows there is an issue, but neither party has a plan they are willing to discuss.In 2020 I was a staunch Republican worried about what Biden would do and believed the hype from Trump, which is why I voted for him. Little did we know how badly Trump would mangle the Covid epidemic and give tax cuts to the wealthy. He has yet to admit how bad his Covid was. I’m tired of all the lies Trump and Vance spread that cause the discourse in this country. Neither party has all the answers, but we need the Republican party to allow bipartisan solutions. I blame the rightwing facet of the party for much of the division in our country, and I never thought I would say that. I will vote for Harris this year. – Annette, retired, Arizona‘I’d have liked to know how both candidates propose to fund their programs’I was impressed at how well both candidates held their composure. They both appear like they could truly work in a bipartisan atmosphere. I do wish that Walz would have answered the few questions he danced around but all in all I think the debate was on point and informative. Both candidates proposed their plans yet did so with very little detail. With a budget deficit of $35tn I would like to know how they propose to fund these programs.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionI was sharing this experience with my father-in-law, a retired master carpenter who worked many hard and long hours to live the American dream. We both have a great love for our country and the constitution. In short, watching this debate were two blue-collar, working-class men concerned about the future of our country.I voted for Trump in the past. I felt we needed someone who wasn’t a career politician. Electing the same old political leaders has given us root rot. The effects one day may be devastating. I will vote for Trump again this year. Under his presidency our economy was in recovery and there were unprecedented steps taken towards peace in other hostile countries. – Britton Ramsey, 54, welder, Wisconsin‘I wanted to see Walz be more aggressive towards Vance’The debate overall was incredibly boring. I wanted to see Walz be more aggressive towards Vance. It was obvious from the beginning that the Harris campaign had leashed Walz because the only times he came alive were when he got to speak about progressive initiatives in Minnesota.I think that’s a sign the Harris campaign should move more to the left. I’ve begrudgingly voted for the Democratic candidate for president in every presidential election since I could start voting in 2012. They frequently disappoint me by capitulating to the right too often but there are no other viable options yet.– Devon, 31, web developer, Lansing, Michigan‘Both candidates addressed the big issue of this country: division’I thought Vance killed it. On issues besides 6 January, he effectively dismantled Walz’s arguments – while not being a huge jerk about it. I think that he clarified the Trump campaign’s plans on everything much better than Trump ever can. Walz did the same. He really clarified the ticket’s ideas in a respectful manner. If only these two guys were running for president!I think both candidates addressed the big issue of this country: division. The people who watched that debate saw Vance and Walz shake hands and talk to each other after the debate. They didn’t scream at each other.We all have the same problems – just different ways of solving them. Your Republican neighbor does not want the rights of women and democracy as a principle to burn, and your Democrat cousin does not want communism installed, and doesn’t want to kill all the babies in utero. This debate proved that.There were some bad parts to the debate, like Vance dodging January 6, and Walz saying the Trump campaign was going to go with Project 2025; but for the most part, it was very constructive.I wish there [had been] a longer segment on abortion rights. Both sides need to explain their stance more clearly. As a Catholic, I am pro-life; I’m trending towards Vance’s position and understand Walz’s objections.I’m currently undecided on who to vote for. I am a registered Republican, but I don’t exactly like Trump. We were relatively prosperous [under him], but I think he causes scandal. A clarification of what the Harris campaign plans to do on abortion may make me consider Harris if her position is close to the Trump ticket, or even more pro-life. However, given that she seems to be much more radical than she says she is, I would not vote for her. – William, 19, student, Pennsylvania‘Complaints about against-the-rules factchecking highlight how reliant the Trump campaign is on misinformation’I voted for Joe Biden in the last election and will be voting for Harris this year.I think it was great to have the debate to get to know the candidates better, and I appreciated how respectful they both were to each other. I think it highlights how unmanageable Donald Trump actually is, and it makes me wonder why Republican party leadership has allowed him to continue to be the face of the party.Walz was calm, clear and definitely was able to talk about his experience leading a government. JD Vance came off as all rhetoric, and he looked foolish for having been so against Trump in the past and now [being] his running mate.They actually covered the issues I wanted to hear about: energy, healthcare and foreign policy. I wish they had spent less time on immigration.My favorite moment was when JD Vance got fact-checked about the Haitian immigrant comments and the moderators said they are here legally, and JD Vance claimed that the rules were that they weren’t going to be fact-checked. I think it highlights how reliant the Trump campaign is on misinformation, and when you take that away, what are they left with? – Emma, 26, Wisconsin More

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      in US Politics

      Trump falsely claims Helene victims had no federal help despite Biden-Harris sending $20m in aid – live

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      As Joe Biden visits the wreckage of Hurricane Helene, Donald Trump has been baselessly suggesting that the administration has ignored Republican victims and that federal aid is scarce because funds are being given to immigrants.“They’re dying, and they’re getting no help from our federal government because their money has been spent on people that should not be in our country,” Trump told his supporters.The Biden-Harris administration said that the government has provided $20m in “flexible, upfront funding” and deployed 5,000 federal personnel to aid in recovery.Donald Trump repeated lies about the Biden administration’s hurricane response, going so far as to claim that the president and vice-president were “stealing” Fema funds to give to immigrants.“They stole the Fema money like they stole it from a bank so they could give it to their illegal immigrants that they want to have vote for them this season,” he said.Trump and his allies have been repeatedly claiming that Fema is out of money because it allocated funds to help communities receiving an influx of immigrants at the border.Alejandro Mayorkas, the homeland security secretary, did warn that Fema is underfunded for the remainder of hurricane season. That’s in part because the stop-gap government funding bill did not contain enough funding for Fema, which is facing a $2bn deficit.Fema’s Shelter and Services Program allocated $300m during the 2024 fiscal year to help communities “offset the costs of providing food, shelter and other supportive services after receiving an influx of migrants”. That’s a small fraction of the agency’s overall budget. For 2025, it has requested a total of $33.1bn.At his rally, Trump also claimed he “had the best four years with hurricanes”.During his tenure …

      Trump imposed a hiring freeze at the National Weather Service, resulting in more than 200 of vacancies within the agency that predicts and oversees extreme weather warnings. The Washington Post reported in 2017: “Some of those Weather Service vacancies listed in the document, obtained by the Sierra Club through a Freedom of Information Act and shared with The Washington Post, were in locations that would be hit by the major hurricanes that barreled through the Gulf of Mexico and Caribbean.”

      Trump falsely claimed that Hurricane Maria’s death toll was being inflated by his Democratic rivals. In fact, studies suggest that far more people died than the official death toll suggested at the time. A report by the Harvard TH Chan School of Public Health estimates up to 4,600 people were killed.

      In 2021, a report by the housing department’s office of the inspector general found that Trump administration delayed more than $20bn in hurricane relief aid for Puerto Rico after Hurricane Maria.

      An internal report from the Federal Emergency Management Agency also found that it failed to properly prepare for hurricane season.
      In a review of Trump’s record responding to natural disasters, E&E also found a discrepency in aid in the aftermath of Hurricane Michael, which primarily affected Florida; and Hurricane Maria, which devastated Puerto Rico and the US Virgin Islands.
      On March 9, 2019, Trump signed an order directing FEMA to pay 100 percent of most disaster costs in Florida. As a result, FEMA paid roughly $350 million more than it would have without Trump’s intervention, according to an E&E News analysis.
      But less than two months earlier, Trump threatened to veto a disaster-aid measure in Congress that would have FEMA pay 100 percent of all disaster costs in Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands after Hurricane Maria killed more than 3,000 people.
      According to Florida governor Ron DeSantis’s book, Trump said: “They love me in the Panhandle … I must have won 90 percent of the vote out there. Huge crowds. What do they need?”The voting habits of residents did play into Donald Trump’s decision-making about disaster relief when he was president, reports E&E News.The outlet interviewed Mark Harvey, Trump’s senior director for resilience policy on the National Security Council, who revealed that the former president refused to approve disaster aid for California after deadly wildfires in 2018.From E&E:
      But Harvey said Trump changed his mind after Harvey pulled voting results to show him that heavily damaged Orange County, California, had more Trump supporters than the entire state of Iowa.
      ‘We went as far as looking up how many votes he got in those impacted areas … to show him these are people who voted for you,’ said Harvey, who recently endorsed Vice President Kamala Harris alongside more than 100 other Republican former national security officials.
      California’s governor Gavin Newsom, reacted to the report on Twitter/X, calling it a “glimpse into the future” if Trump is re-elected.Joe Biden, meanwhile, wrote: “You can’t only help those in need if they voted for you. It’s the most basic part of being president, and this guy knows nothing about it.”As Joe Biden visits the wreckage of Hurricane Helene, Donald Trump has been baselessly suggesting that the administration has ignored Republican victims and that federal aid is scarce because funds are being given to immigrants.“They’re dying, and they’re getting no help from our federal government because their money has been spent on people that should not be in our country,” Trump told his supporters.The Biden-Harris administration said that the government has provided $20m in “flexible, upfront funding” and deployed 5,000 federal personnel to aid in recovery.“His competition that night? He cannot be president. He cannot be president of the United States,” Donald Trump said of JD Vance’s vice-presidential opponent, Tim Walz.“How good did JD Vance do the other night?” Trump added, praising his running mate as the crowd descended into a cheers of “JD! JD!”“I drafted the best athlete,” Trump continued.Donald Trump pledged to bring back drilling in the Alaska arctic wildlife refuge if he becomes president.Trump said:
      We would have supplied the entire Asian continent. We would have supplied Asia. We would have supplied everybody. But we’ll have it redone very quickly … I actually got it approved in Congress as part of …the biggest tax cuts in history for this country. I got that approved in Congress. We got ANWR [Alaska National Wildlife Refuge] so they didn’t kill it in Congress, and I don’t think they ever could. So we’ll get it back very quickly. It’s going to be back very fast.
      Trump added:
      And it would have been great for Alaska but it would have also … been great for our country but we’ll have it approved very quickly.
      In 2021, Trump’s administration auctioned off portions of ANWR to oil drillers but failed to attract much bidders.Donald Trump has switched his attacks on Joe Biden, calling him “the worst foreign policy president”.The former president then went on to say: “We have to be too big to rig” before going on to repeat the falsehood that the 2020 presidential election was rigged.The crowd, highly energized, descended into a chant of “Trump! Trump! Trump!”Donald Trump has walked on stage to Lee Greenwood’s God Bless the USA.“We’re going to make America great again,” Trump said in his opening remarks before launching into a tirade against Kamala Harris, calling her a slew of names including “Lying Kamala”.Donald Trump is scheduled to hold a rally shortly in Saginaw, Michigan.Stay tuned as we bring you the latest updates.Here are some images coming through the news wires of Hurricane Helene and its aftermath across the country:The Biden administration has provided nearly $4m directly to individuals and families in need of critical financial assistance, White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said onboard an Air Force One gaggle as the president was en route to Tallahassee, Florida.She went on to add:
      Yesterday, we announced that the president approved 100% federal cost share for emergency response activities in Florida and Georgia, as well as Tallahassee [Tennessee] and North Carolina. This means that the federal government will cover 100% of the costs associated with things like debris removal, first responders, search and rescue, shelters, and mass feeding.
      This latest announcement builds the president’s previously approved requests for major disaster declarations from the governors of Florida and Georgia, which unlocked additional assistance for residents on their road to recovery. More

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      JD Vance takes victory lap and mocks Tim Walz over debate gaffe

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      JD Vance took a self-proclaimed victory lap after his vice-presidential debate against the Democrat Tim Walz, appearing on Wednesday at a campaign rally in the crucial battleground state of Michigan.Vance told supporters in Auburn Hills that he thought the debate went “pretty well” on Tuesday, as snap polls showed viewers considered it to be a tie between the two vice-presidential candidates.Departing from the generally civil tone of the debate, Vance mocked Walz over his biggest gaffe of the night, in which the Democratic governor said he was friends with school shooters. (Walz seemingly meant to say he was friends with victims of school shootings.)“That was probably only the third or fourth dumbest comment Tim Walz made that night,” Vance said. “I’ve got to be honest, I feel a little bad for Governor Walz. And the reason I feel bad for him is because he has to defend the indefensible, and that is the record of Kamala Harris.”In his prepared remarks, Vance did not touch on his weakest moment in the debate, when he refused to acknowledge Donald Trump’s loss in the 2020 presidential race. But when Vance took questions from the media after his speech, a reporter did ask him about the exchange, and he again sidestepped the question.“The media is obsessed with talking about the election of four years ago. I’m focused on the election of 33 days from now because I want to throw Kamala Harris out of office and get back to commonsense economic policies,” Vance said.Vance then pivoted to discussing the issue of non-citizen voting, which has become a rallying cry among Trump and his supporters. Research has uncovered little evidence to substantiate Republicans’ concerns, as voting in a federal election is already illegal for non-citizens.“We’re going to talk about election integrity because I believe that every vote ought to count, but only the legally cast votes, and that’s why we fight for election integrity,” Vance said in Michigan.Vance focused most of his remarks on attacking Harris over her economic policy proposals, blaming her for the high inflation seen earlier in Joe Biden’s presidency and accusing her of avoiding tough questions about her record. Echoing comments he made during the debate, Vance referenced his background growing up in a low-income family in Ohio to relate to Americans struggling to pay their bills.“She’s afraid of interviews, so she doesn’t talk to people, and she doesn’t realize that her economic policies are making it harder on American families,” Vance said. “If you work hard and play by the rules, you ought to be able to afford a good life for your family, and that’s what Donald Trump and I are going to fight for every single day for the next four years.”Vance then linked Trump’s economic policies to his proposals on immigration, as the former president has called for the mass deportation of millions of undocumented immigrants. An analysis released on Wednesday by the American Immigration Council, an advocacy group, concluded that Trump’s mass deportation program could cost the federal government as much as $88bn a year on average.“The American media – and especially Kamala Harris and Tim Walz – they don’t want to talk about how this illegal immigration crisis is a theft of the American dream from American citizens,” Vance said. “Here’s the Donald Trump plan, and here’s the Donald Trump message to illegal aliens in this country: in six months, pack your bags because you’re going home.”Despite rehashing some of Trump’s most divisive talking points, Vance made a point to reach out to Democrats who may still be undecided in the election. Trump will probably need some of those voters’ support to carry Michigan, a state that Biden won by 3 points in 2020.“As a person who was raised by a couple of working-class, blue-collar Democrats, I want to say to every Democrat who’s watching at home [and] every Democrat who’s in this room: you are more than welcome in Donald Trump’s Republican party,” Vance said. “We’re the party of common sense. We’ve got a big tent, and you’re welcome in our movement.”And yet, when asked by a reporter how he and Trump would work to unite Americans in the face of political division if they win the election in November, Vance again lashed out against Harris.“Why do we have so much division, and why do we have so much rancor in this country’s political debate? It’s because Kamala Harris and her allies are trying to silence the American people rather than engage with them,” Vance said. “When you try to censor your fellow citizens, when you try to shut them up, you breed division and hatred.”Given Trump’s tendency to deploy personal insults and degrading nicknames against his political opponents, that explanation may not sit well with voters. Trump now has just one month left to convince Americans that he deserves another four years in the White House. More

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      Walz says Vance was ‘gaslighting’ public about Trump’s record in debate

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      The day after the only vice-presidential debate this year, Democrat Tim Walz called his Republican challenger, JD Vance, a “slick talker” who was trying to rewrite history and gaslight people about Donald Trump’s record.During a rally in York, Pennsylvania, Walz made his first public comments on the debate, which polls show was essentially a tie between the two vice-presidential candidates. The Minnesota governor was on a tour through the swing state on Wednesday.Walz said the two men “had a civil but spirited debate” and that he didn’t underestimate Vance’s debate skills.But, he added: “You can’t rewrite history and trying to mislead us about Donald Trump’s record. That’s gaslighting. That’s gaslighting, on the economy, reproductive freedom, housing, gun violence.”He brought up the question he posed to Vance during the debate about whether Trump lost the 2020 election. The Republican vice-presidential nominee dodged, saying he was focused on the future, which Walz called “a damning non-answer”.Every American should be able to answer that question simply, Walz said on Wednesday. He noted, as he did on the debate stage, that Mike Pence, Trump’s vice-president in his first term, isn’t on the ticket this year because he stood up for the election results in defiance of Trump.View image in fullscreen“With that damning non-answer, Senator Vance made it clear he will always make a different choice than Mike Pence made,” Walz said on Wednesday. “And as I said then, and I will say now, that should be absolutely disqualifying if you’re asking to be the vice-president.”He also dinged Vance for claiming Trump saved the Affordable Care Act, or Obamacare, when “he spent his entire presidency trying to eliminate it.”Walz said that he saw the debate as a way to speak directly to the American people as they decide whether to entrust him and Kamala Harris with the White House. Vance, on the other hand, “was speaking to an audience of one”, Walz said, referring to Trump.“Campaigns are supposed to be about giving a vision. And last night, you saw two very different visions for the future this country,” he said. More

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      Underwhelming Walz and a more presentable Vance: the VP debate – podcast

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      Joan E Greve and Leah Wright Rigueur discuss JD Vance and Tim Walz’s clash on the debate stage in New York City on Tuesday night. Although Walz gave a solid performance, it was described as underwhelming, while Vance attempted to reset his image and get on the front foot. Will this debate have moved the needle at all? And as the situation in the Middle East escalates, where do Trump and Harris stand on foreign policy?

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