United States Politics and Government

Subterms

    More stories

    • 100 Shares179 Views

      in Elections

      Trump Seeks to Delay Jan. 6 Civil Cases

      by

      The former president’s lawyers told the judge overseeing the proceedings it would be unfair to put on a defense now because it might reveal his strategy for the criminal case on related charges.Lawyers for former President Donald J. Trump asked a judge on Tuesday night to pause a group of civil lawsuits seeking to hold him accountable for the violence at the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, until after his federal criminal trial connected to the same events was over.The request by the lawyers to pause the civil cases was the latest example of Mr. Trump trying to pit his multiple legal matters against one another in an effort to delay them. In the past several weeks, the former president and his lawyers have managed to gum up each of the four criminal cases he is facing, sometimes by persuading judges that the timing of the various proceedings were in conflict with one another.In their request for a pause in the civil cases, Mr. Trump’s lawyers told Judge Amit P. Mehta, who is overseeing the proceedings, that it would be unfair to the former president to be forced to defend himself against the suits at this point. They said that in so doing, he might reveal his strategy for defending himself against related criminal charges brought against him by the special counsel Jack Smith.“Given the substantial overlap in factual and legal allegations between these cases and the D.C. criminal case,” the lawyers wrote, there is “a substantial risk that proceeding in this matter now will expose the defense’s theory to the prosecution in advance of trial.”The lawyers added, “This would prejudice President Trump’s ability to effectively defend himself in both these civil cases and the special counsel criminal matter.”In the months after Jan. 6, a half-dozen lawsuits were filed against Mr. Trump by members of Congress and police officers who served at the Capitol that day, accusing him of inciting the mob that stormed the building. The lawsuits, which all are being heard in Federal District Court in Washington, have sought unspecified financial damages from Mr. Trump.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

    • 138 Shares179 Views

      in Elections

      Iowa Passes Bill to Make Returning After Deportation a State Crime

      by

      Iowa lawmakers passed a bill on Tuesday that would make it a crime to enter the state after being deported or denied entry into the United States. The passage puts the Midwestern state on track to join Texas in enforcing immigration outside the federal system.The Iowa bill, which passed on the same day that the Supreme Court allowed Texas to enforce a new law empowering police officers to arrest unauthorized migrants, now goes to the desk of Gov. Kim Reynolds, a Republican, who said she planned to sign it.“President Biden and his administration have failed to enforce our immigration laws and, in doing so, have compromised the sovereignty of our nation and the safety of its people,” Ms. Reynolds said Tuesday evening in a statement. “States have stepped in to secure the border, preventing illegal migrants from entering our country and protecting our citizens.”Iowa Democrats, who have lost power over the last decade and are vastly outnumbered in the Legislature, mostly opposed the legislation but were powerless to stop it.“This bill is a political stunt and a false promise that doesn’t contain the needed resources,” State Senator Janice Weiner, a Democrat from the Iowa City area, said when her chamber debated the measure. “It’s a gotcha bill.”The bill would make it a misdemeanor for someone to enter Iowa if they were previously deported, denied entry to the United States or had left the country while facing a deportation order. In some cases, including if the person had certain prior convictions, the state crime would become a felony. Iowa police officers would not be allowed to make arrests under this legislation at schools, places of worship or health care facilities.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

    • 138 Shares199 Views

      in Elections

      Congressional Leaders Strike Deal on Final Spending Bill Ahead of Shutdown

      by

      Lawmakers resolved disputes over Department of Homeland Security funding, paving the way for an agreement. But they may still be unable to meet a Friday deadline to avert a brief partial shutdown.Congressional leaders said on Tuesday morning that they had reached an agreement on the final package of spending legislation to fund the federal government through the fall, though it was unclear whether they would be able to pass it in time to avert a brief partial shutdown over the weekend.House Republicans, Senate Democrats and the White House had been at loggerheads over funding levels for the Department of Homeland Security. For days, they had been litigating disagreements that threatened to imperil the spending package that also funds the Pentagon, the State Department and other agencies. They are facing a midnight deadline on Friday to pass the measure and avert a lapse in funding.A breakthrough on Monday night, in which Democrats and Republicans were able to agree to homeland security funding levels for the rest of the fiscal year, allowed negotiators to finalize their deal.“An agreement has been reached” that will enable Congress to fund the government through Sept. 30, Speaker Mike Johnson said in a statement. “House and Senate committees have begun drafting bill text to be prepared for release and consideration by the full House and Senate as soon as possible.”Still, the delay in striking the deal could pave the way for a brief lapse in government funding over the weekend. It will take congressional staff time to draw up text of the bill, which wraps six spending measures into a sizable piece of legislation.House Republicans have demanded that Mr. Johnson abide by an internal rule that allows lawmakers 72 hours to consider the text of a bill before they vote on it, though previous House leaders have at times abandoned that guidance.And any number of senators may create procedural hurdles for the bill’s passage and demand votes on proposed changes or object to its quick consideration. Those tactics could push final passage past 12:01 on Saturday morning, when funding is set to expire.Late last year, Mr. Johnson chopped the spending process in half, creating two partial government shutdown deadlines instead of one, in an effort to avoid asking members to take a single vote on a huge catchall to fund the entire government, which Republicans have objected to repeatedly.Earlier this month, lawmakers were able to negotiate and pass a six-bill $460 billion spending package that just barely met the first deadline on March 8, and are now repeating the process — this time haggling over funding for more politically fraught agencies — before the second deadline at the end of this week. More

    • 125 Shares199 Views

      in Elections

      U.S. Defense Secretary Praises NATO Allies for Commitment to Ukraine

      by

      Despite doubts about further U.S. aid, the American defense secretary told a meeting of Kyiv’s backers that the fight against Russia “remains one of the great causes of our time.”With additional American aid still in doubt, Defense Secretary Lloyd J. Austin III on Tuesday called for “creative, adaptable and sustainable ways” to continue arming Ukraine and praised European allies who were trying to bolster Kyiv’s military as the war against Russia entered a critical stretch.Mr. Austin, in Germany for the start of a semiregular meeting of nearly 50 nations who are supplying Ukraine’s forces, said that allies would “dig deeper to get vital security assistance to Ukraine.” He singled out Denmark, France, Germany and Sweden for recent donations of weapons and noted the Czech Republic’s efforts to provide 800,000 artillery shells — the first tranche of which could arrive on the battlefield within weeks.Germany’s defense minister, Boris Pistorius, said Berlin would send Ukraine 10,000 rounds of badly needed artillery shells, 100 armored infantry vehicles and transport equipment in a new infusion of support worth 500 million euros, about $544 million.“Things are progressing sometimes in small steps, sometimes in larger steps, but the main thing is the constant supply of ammunition,” Mr. Pistorius told journalists in Germany, according to local news reports.The United States remains the single largest donor of military support to Ukraine, and last week, Washington pledged an additional $300 million of air defense missiles, artillery rounds and armor systems. The latest package also included attack missiles with a range of about 100 miles that dispense clusters of small munitions and can do damage over a wide area, though they are still at least a week from arriving.Yet Ukrainian forces are expected to burn through the new American aid within a few weeks, and it is unlikely that the Biden administration will be able to send much more unless Republicans in Congress agree to a $60 billion emergency spending plan to ship additional weapons to Ukraine and bolster armament production in the United States.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

    • 113 Shares119 Views

      in Elections

      R.B.G. Award Organizer Cancels Ceremony After Fallout Over Honorees

      by

      The Opperman Foundation said it would “reconsider its mission” but did not say whether those selected, including Elon Musk and Rupert Murdoch, would still receive the award.The organizer behind an honor named for Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, a lifelong champion of women’s rights and liberal causes, is canceling the award ceremony scheduled for April after facing blistering criticism from her family and friends over several of this year’s planned recipients.Justice Ginsburg helped establish the award in 2019, the year before she died. It was originally intended for “women who exemplify human qualities of empathy and humility,” but four of the five intended recipients this year are men. Among them are Elon Musk, the tech entrepreneur who frequently lobs tirades at perceived critics; Rupert Murdoch, the tycoon whose empire helped give rise to conservative news media; and Michael R. Milken, the financier who was a face of corporate greed in the 1980s and served nearly two years in prison before becoming a philanthropist.“The last thing we intended was to offend the family and friends of R.B.G.,” Julie Opperman, the chairwoman of Dwight D. Opperman Foundation, which awards the prize every year, said in a statement on Monday. She added: “The foundation is not interested in creating controversy. It is not interested in generating a debate about whether particular honorees are worthy or not.”Ms. Opperman explained that the reason for including men as recipients this year was to reflect and uphold Justice Ginsburg’s “teachings regarding equality.” The foundation “did not consider politics” but focused on selecting leaders who “have made significant contributions to society,” she said.Before the foundation released the statement, the children of Justice Ginsburg had demanded that their mother’s name be removed from the prize, which until this year was called the Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg Woman of Leadership Award.Her daughter, Jane C. Ginsburg, a law professor at Columbia, said the choice of winners this year was “an affront” to the values the justice stood for.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

    • 125 Shares199 Views

      in Elections

      Chinese Magnate Admits to Making Straw Donations to N.Y. Politicians

      by

      Mayor Eric Adams was among those who received illegal donations from Hui Qin, a Chinese businessman, a person familiar with the federal case said.A Chinese business titan pleaded guilty on Monday to federal charges that he made more than $10,000 in straw donor contributions to political candidates — including, a person familiar with the case said, to a New York congressman and Mayor Eric Adams.Hui Qin, 56, of Old Westbury, N.Y., who was once listed on Forbes magazine’s list of billionaires, ran a now-defunct entertainment business called SMI Culture. But he has been in federal custody since the fall, when he was arrested at an apartment he kept at the Plaza Hotel in Manhattan on charges of using fake identification.Hui QinImaginechinaMr. Qin asked others to contribute to political campaigns of his choosing, and he agreed to reimburse them, in 2021 and 2022, according to prosecutors. The other figures who received donations were Representative Andrew Garbarino of Long Island and Allan Fung, a former mayor of Cranston, R.I., who ran for Congress, the person familiar with the case said. Both are Republicans, while Mr. Adams is a Democrat.Mr. Qin concealed his activities from the officials he was raising money for, according to a criminal complaint filed in the case. As a result, they unwittingly filed false reports.Breon S. Peace, the U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of New York, said in a statement that Mr. Qin had admitted to “engaging in a brazen web of deception” that spread lies to the authorities overseeing elections.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

    • 150 Shares199 Views

      in Elections

      Serbian Leader Says Kushner Deal Is Not an Effort to Influence Trump

      by

      After news reports that Jared Kushner plans to redevelop a site in Belgrade bombed by NATO in 1999, Serbian politicians clashed over whether the deal was appropriate.The president of Serbia on Monday batted away any suggestion that he might have intentionally tried to steer a valuable real estate project in Serbia’s capital to Jared Kushner, Donald J. Trump’s son-in-law, in an effort to influence Mr. Trump should he return to the White House.“I died laughing,” the Serbian leader, Aleksandar Vucic, said at a rally, referring mockingly to news reports that Mr. Kushner was close to an agreement to invest $500 million in redeveloping a high-profile site in central Belgrade, the capital. “I read in some papers that I used this for a political influence on Trump, that corrupted America or someone in America. I am a miracle. It is incredible what all I can do.”Mr. Kushner, who was a senior White House adviser under Mr. Trump, has teamed up with a second former Trump aide, Richard Grenell, on the plan.The tentative agreement between the Kushner team and the Serbian government would grant Mr. Kushner’s investment firm a 99-year lease, at no charge, and the right to build a luxury hotel and apartment complex and a museum on the site of the former headquarters of the Yugoslav Ministry of Defense in Belgrade, which was bombed by NATO in 1999.News of the proposal provoked strong objections on Monday from opposition party leaders in Serbia during a meeting of the parliament.Opposition party leaders said they had not been properly informed of the plan and called it inappropriate that an American company owned by a Trump family member would be allowed to earn profits off a site that a United States-led coalition bombed 25 years ago.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

    • 150 Shares199 Views

      in Elections

      Kennedy Family, Sans R.F.K. Jr., Poses With Biden at the White House

      by

      Under normal circumstances, a visit by the Kennedy family to the White House on St. Patrick’s Day — a storied political family with Irish roots, hosted by a president of Irish heritage — might not be particularly newsworthy. But this year, the gathering had an undertone of family drama and political repudiation. Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is running an independent bid to supplant President Biden, breaking with the Democratic Party and with many members of his family, who have condemned his campaign as “dangerous.”They have also pointedly backed Mr. Biden. On Sunday, Kerry Kennedy — one of Mr. Kennedy’s sisters — posted a picture of the family on X at the White House with Mr. Biden. “President Biden, you make the world better,” she wrote. Mr. Biden responded to the post: “From one proud Irish family to another — it was good to have you all back at the White House.”Among the other Kennedy family members in attendance was Joseph P. Kennedy III, the U.S. special envoy to Northern Ireland. Robert F. Kennedy Jr’s presidential run has put him at odds with his family even as he repeatedly invokes their shared legacy on the campaign trail, and leans on Kennedy nostalgia. Mr. Kennedy, 70, an environmental lawyer, gained notoriety during the pandemic when his longstanding skepticism about vaccines and embrace of political conspiracy theories came to the fore.Mr. Kennedy had his own message for the Biden White House on St. Patrick’s Day: A complaint, shared in an email from his campaign Sunday morning, that his request for Secret Service protection had been once again denied. The Secret Service protects major candidates for president, but it is up to the homeland security secretary in consultation with a congressional panel to determine who qualifies. Mr. Kennedy, who is the son of the former attorney general and Senator Robert F. Kennedy and a nephew of former President John F. Kennedy, also appeared Sunday on The Volpe Report, a Pennsylvania public-access podcast, where he discussed the 60th anniversary of a speech his father made in Scranton — the birthplace of Mr. Biden. More