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      Biden touts efforts to boost electric vehicles at Detroit auto show – as it happened

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      Self-confessed “car guy” Joe Biden is about to take the podium at the Detroit motor show to tell Americans why they should be buying electric vehicles.The president, who owns a vintage Corvette, has set what the White House calls “a bold goal” for electric vehicles to make up 50% of all vehicles sold in the US by 2030. Biden is in Detroit touting the Inflation Reduction Act, the marquee spending bill he signed last month that includes incentives for buying electric vehicles, as part of a larger strategy to lower America’s carbon emissions.President Biden’s Inflation Reduction Act makes it easier and cheaper to purchase an electric or fuel-cell vehicle – new or used – through tax credits for consumers.Learn more at https://t.co/KTCwt5Tmue.— The White House (@WhiteHouse) September 13, 2022
      While we await Biden’s words, here’s the White House factsheet, which says that since Biden took office last year, companies have invested nearly $85bn in manufacturing electric vehicles, batteries, and EV chargers in the US.The number of electric vehicles sold in that time has almost tripled, the handout claims.But there are concerns that his plans to build a nationwide network of charging stations will leave behind disadvantaged and lower income areas and communities of color.Read more:Is Biden’s goal to build charging stations for electric cars leaving low-income areas behind?Read morePresident Joe Biden struck a triumphant note in a Detroit speech where he promoted his administration’s efforts to revitalize manufacturing and get Americans behind the wheel of electric vehicles. Meanwhile, the January 6 committee has signaled it will resume public hearings later this month, and potentially share more of its evidence with justice department investigators looking into the attack on the Capitol.Here’s what else happened today:
      House Speaker Nancy Pelosi expressed optimism that Democrats would gain, not lose, seats in the chamber in the November midterms, despite widespread expectations that voters will elevate the Republicans into the majority.
      Donald Trump disavowed his former vice-president Mike Pence, saying he would not choose him as a running mate again, according to a soon-to-be-published book obtained by The Guardian.
      FBI agents paid a visit to prominent Trump ally and pillow mogul Mike Lindell, seizing his cellphone and questioning him in a fast food restaurant’s drive-thru lane.
      Biden called Britain’s King Charles III and expressed condolences over the death of the queen. It remains unclear if the president will meet Charles III or new prime minister Liz Truss when he heads to London for the queen’s funeral.
      Florida’s Republican senator Marco Rubio co-sponsored a bill to ban abortions nationwide after 15 weeks, in what could help his Democratic challenger Val Demings as she looks to energize pro-abortion sentiment among voters.
      Amtrak has begun canceling long-distance routes ahead of a possible rail strike that could begin within days, Axios reports.Unions and freight rail companies are negotiating furiously to prevent the strike, which would be the first in three decades and worsen supply chains that have been plagued by delays and manpower and equipment shortages over the past two years as the United States has bounced back from the pandemic.“While we are hopeful that parties will reach a resolution, Amtrak has now begun phased adjustments to our service in preparation for a possible freight rail service interruption later this week,” Amtrak said, according to Axios.“Such an interruption could significantly impact intercity passenger rail service, as Amtrak operates almost all of our 21,000 route miles outside the Northeast Corridor (NEC) on track owned, maintained, and dispatched by freight railroads. These initial adjustments include canceling all Long Distance trains and could be followed by impacts to most State-Supported routes.”The negotiations between the railroad companies and 12 unions are complex and have drawn in the Biden administration. Here’s the latest from the Associated Press:.css-knbk2a{height:1em;width:1.5em;margin-right:3px;vertical-align:baseline;fill:#C70000;}Members of one union rejected a tentative deal with the largest U.S. freight railroads Wednesday while three other unions remained at the bargaining table just days ahead of a strike deadline, threatening to intensify snarls in the nation’s supply chain that have contributed to rising prices.
      About 4,900 members of the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers District 19 voted to reject the tentative agreement negotiated by IAM leadership with the railroads, the union said Wednesday. But the IAM agreed to delay any strike by its members until Sept. 29 to allow more time for negotiations and to allow other unions to vote.
      Railroads are trying to reach an agreement with all their other unions to avert a strike before Friday’s deadline. The unions aren’t allowed to strike before Friday under the federal law that governs railroad contract talks.
      Government officials and a variety of businesses are bracing for the possibility of a nationwide rail strike that would paralyze shipments of everything from crude and clothing to cars, a potential calamity for businesses that have struggled for more than two years due to COVID-19 related supply chain breakdowns.Joe Biden’s inclination for optimism was on full display in Detroit, but he was outdone today by his Democratic colleague House speaker Nancy Pelosi, who insisted in an interview with Punchbowl News that the party was poised to gain – not lose – seats in the chamber in the midterms.“Yes, indeed,” she told Punchbowl when they asked if she thought the party’s majority would grow in the November 8 election.Let’s unpack the many reasons that statement appears improbably. First of all, it’s a reflection of how much the political climate is thought to have shifted in the Democrats’ favor over the past few months. Declining gas prices, the supreme court’s overturning of national abortion access and Biden’s legislative wins are all believed to have energized Democratic voters, while on their part, Republicans have chosen some weaker nominees for key races.But history is against Pelosi. As The Guardian’s Joan E Greve has reported, the party holding the White House has only gained seats in the House in two midterms, and Pelosi personally experienced the ruinous 2010 election that saw Democrats lose 63 seats in the lower chamber and end her speakership for eight years. She may well be poised to endure that again – poll aggregator FiveThirtyEight gives the GOP a very good shot at returning to the majority next year in the House, though the Senate may be harder to conquer. Nonetheless, analysts generally believe that the political developments over the past few months are meaningful for Democrats, and while Republicans may win the House, their gains won’t be enormous, and certainly not comparable to 2010.Here’s what Republican National Committee chairwoman Ronna McDaniel had to say about Biden’s visit to Detroit, which she described as a stop on his “failure tour”:“Whether it’s handing out tax credits for luxury electric vehicles or bailing out the wealthy’s debts, Biden and Democrats are leaving hardworking Americans behind. Democrats will be driven out of office in November because they put their left-wing special interests ahead of Americans struggling to fill grocery carts and gas tanks.”“American manufacturing is back, Detroit is back, America is back,” Biden declared at the conclusion of his speech in Detroit, where he touted the benefits of legislation passed to repair infrastructure and promote electric vehicles.The speech at the Detroit Auto Show hit familiar talking points for the president as he attempts to convince voters to re-elect Democrats in the upcoming midterm elections and preserve their majorities in Congress. Among these were his recent legislative successes, including the $1 trillion measure Democrats and some Republicans in Congress approved last year to overhaul the nation’s infrastructure. In his speech, he announced that he had authorized funding from that law for 35 states to build electric vehicle charging stations.Beyond being the center of the auto industry, Michigan is among the more crucial states to Biden’s political fortunes. It’s a perennial swing state that Biden narrowly won in the 2020 election, and its Democratic governor Gretchen Whitmer will also be on the ballot in November as she stands for second term against Republican challenger Tudor Dixon. Biden appeared at the show along with the governor, and spent much of his speech shouting out other Michigan Democrats, while closing on a note of triumph. “Folks, we’re proving it’s never, ever, ever a good bet to bet against the American people, never never, never. You just gotta remember who we are.”In the ongoing legal wrangling over documents seized by the government from Mar-a-Lago, The Guardian’s Richard Luscombe reports that the justice department is sounding the alarm over an order preventing them from reviewing the materials.Donald Trump’s lawyers are causing “irreparable harm” to the government and public by delaying the investigation into his hoarding of highly classified documents at his Florida mansion, the US Department of Justice said.The claim came in a strongly worded court filing urging a district judge, Aileen Cannon, to reconsider her ruling last week granting Trump’s request for an independent “special master” in the case.The Department of Justice argued that the order stops it continuing its review of thousands of documents, some reportedly containing details of a foreign power’s nuclear secrets, seized during an FBI search of Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort in Palm Beach last month.Mar-a-Lago documents: Trump delaying tactics causing ‘irreparable harm’ – DoJRead moreSelf-confessed “car guy” Joe Biden is about to take the podium at the Detroit motor show to tell Americans why they should be buying electric vehicles.The president, who owns a vintage Corvette, has set what the White House calls “a bold goal” for electric vehicles to make up 50% of all vehicles sold in the US by 2030. Biden is in Detroit touting the Inflation Reduction Act, the marquee spending bill he signed last month that includes incentives for buying electric vehicles, as part of a larger strategy to lower America’s carbon emissions.President Biden’s Inflation Reduction Act makes it easier and cheaper to purchase an electric or fuel-cell vehicle – new or used – through tax credits for consumers.Learn more at https://t.co/KTCwt5Tmue.— The White House (@WhiteHouse) September 13, 2022
      While we await Biden’s words, here’s the White House factsheet, which says that since Biden took office last year, companies have invested nearly $85bn in manufacturing electric vehicles, batteries, and EV chargers in the US.The number of electric vehicles sold in that time has almost tripled, the handout claims.But there are concerns that his plans to build a nationwide network of charging stations will leave behind disadvantaged and lower income areas and communities of color.Read more:Is Biden’s goal to build charging stations for electric cars leaving low-income areas behind?Read moreCall it a magical mystery tour… migrants being sent on buses from Texas to New York by the lone star state’s governor Greg Abbott in protest at Joe Biden’s immigration policies are being moved on to Florida.That’s according to Fox 5 New York, which interviewed the city’s commissioner of immigration Manuel Castro on its Good Day New York show on Wednesday.New York City officials claim that many of the migrants who are being bused from Texas did not want to go to New York so they are helping them get to other states. https://t.co/KFbzJyMs4N— Fox5NY (@fox5ny) September 14, 2022
      Castro says many of those arriving from Texas don’t want to be there, and have ties elsewhere:.css-knbk2a{height:1em;width:1.5em;margin-right:3px;vertical-align:baseline;fill:#C70000;}Many want to go to places like Florida, where the largest community of Venezuelans live.
      We’re helping them get to their actual final destination. We’re doing our best.The move probably isn’t going to go down too well with Florida’s hardline Republican governor and frequent Biden critic Ron DeSantis, who likes what he sees coming out of Texas and has been mulling his own plan to bus undocumented Cuban migrants from Florida to Washington DC.“All states and all cities have a role to play here, not just New York and Chicago and other places,” Castro told Fox 5. Joe Biden plans to nominate career diplomat Lynne Tracy, who is currently serving in Armenia, as the next US ambassador to Russia, CNN says.Tracy has experience of Moscow, having served there as deputy ambassador from 2014 to 2017. She would be the first woman in the role, the network said.The Biden administration hopes to get her in place swiftly to replace John Sullivan, who stepped down earlier this month. But the timing of her arrival and official nomination will depend on Russia agreeing to accept her as ambassador at a time of huge tension between Washington and Moscow as the war in Ukraine continues. Typically, the host country will approve the name of an ambassador pick before they are officially nominated through a process called agrément. The US has already given Tracy’s name to the Russians to begin that process, two sources told CNN.While we’re on the subject of November’s midterm elections, Martin Pengelly has this look at how Democrats got the matchup they wanted – an extremist, Trump-supporting election denier – as their Republican opponent for a New Hampshire Senate seat:A far-right Republican who backs Donald Trump’s election fraud lie and has vowed to decertify results in 2024 will be the GOP candidate for US Senate in New Hampshire.Don Bolduc, a retired special forces general who has said he suffered from PTSD and a traumatic brain injury, edged out Chuck Morse, the state senate president, to face the incumbent Democrat, Maggie Hassan, in November.Most if not all forecasters called the race for Bolduc before Morse conceded.The primary was the last in a series that have seen Republicans select candidates aligned with Trump, causing some to fear damage to their chances of winning the Senate in November.Bolduc, 61, has echoed Trump’s lie about election fraud in his defeat by Joe Biden. He has also questioned whether the FBI should be abolished following its search of Trump’s Florida estate, which turned up a cache of classified documents.Though Bolduc has courted Trump, he has not won an endorsement. Trump did call Bolduc a “strong guy”.Last October, Bolduc spoke to the New Yorker. He said he thought his “values and principles as an American, and the constitution, which I served for 33-plus years in the military, was safe with President Trump”, and that Trump’s appeal stemmed from the (notoriously reading-averse) former president’s reading and understanding of the constitution.He also said “there was a tremendous amount of fraud” in 2020, adding: “I very much believe it and I think it exists, and I think it happens and it’s been happening for a long time in this country. When you try to steal the presidency, a lot of people are going to go, ‘OK, wait a minute. What the hell’s going on here?’”Read more:Republican backer of Trump’s big lie wins New Hampshire Senate primaryRead moreFlorida Republican Marco Rubio has emerged as a co-sponsor of Lindsey Graham’s nationwide 15-week abortion ban bill, providing Democratic hopeful Val Demings new ammunition as she challenges for his Senate seat in November.Rubio’s campaign has not said why he’s signed on to the controversial and extreme bill, which has confused and angered many congressional Republicans. Senate minority leader Mitch McConnell says he’s sure his members would prefer to leave the issue to the states. But Rubio’s overall position on abortion is clear. Talking to a Christian group in south Florida earlier this month, he said an unborn child’s rights outweighed those of the mother and that, in an apparent contradiction to his position on the Graham bill, “The state legislatures will decide [the] law.” “I would rather be right and lose an election than [be] wrong,” he said, according to ABC10 Miami.He may get his wish, at least the losing the election part, if Demings has her way. The former Orlando police chief and US congresswoman is a vocal pro-choice advocate and has slammed Rubio’s position.“It’s outrageous to mandate what a woman can and can’t do with their bodies,” she says in a televised campaign message.“I know something about fighting crime, Senator Rubio. Rape is a crime. Incest is a crime. Abortion is not.”Polling by RealClearPolitics gives Rubio, a former candidate for the Republican presidential nomination, a narrow lead over Demings.President Joe Biden is set to proclaim his administration’s efforts to boost the electric car business with a speech at the Detroit Auto Show set for 1:45 pm eastern time. Meanwhile, the January 6 committee has signaled it will resume public hearings later this month, and potentially share more of its evidence with justice department investigators looking into the attack on the Capitol.Here’s what else has happened today so far:
      Donald Trump disavowed his former vice-president Mike Pence, saying he would not choose him as a running mate again, according to a soon-to-be-published book obtained by The Guardian.
      FBI agents paid a visit to prominent Trump ally and pillow mogul Mike Lindell, seizing his cellphone and questioning him in a fast food restaurant’s drive-thru lane.
      Biden called Britain’s King Charles III and expressed condolences over the death of the queen. It remains unclear if the president will meet Charles III or new prime minister Liz Truss when he heads to London for the queen’s funeral.
      Let’s check in with Joe Biden, who has arrived at the Detroit Auto Show.He’s set to deliver “remarks highlighting the electric vehicle manufacturing boom in America” at 1:45 pm eastern time according to the White House, but is first getting a look at the latest models from America’s automakers.Biden is a vintage Chevrolet Corvette owner, and CNN caught him behind the wheel of the latest model:Biden at the Detroit Auto Show pic.twitter.com/54IMxuUnfO— Kate Sullivan (@KateSullivanDC) September 14, 2022
      Here he is checking out Ford’s new electric offerings:The Mustang Mach-E. “0 to 60 in three seconds,” Biden said. “3.5, but who’s counting?” Bill Ford replied. pic.twitter.com/yctQP3c9LX— Josh Wingrove (@josh_wingrove) September 14, 2022
      Why does Biden care so much about electric cars? In part because the Inflation Reduction Act, as the marquee spending bill he signed last month is known, includes incentives to try to get more Americans to buy the vehicles, as part of a larger strategy to lower America’s carbon emissions. The other reason is that Biden is a “car guy”, as he likes to describe himself.Electric cars to solar panels: tax breaks in Biden’s climate law for AmericansRead more More

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      in Elections

      January 6 committee plans to hold new public hearing this month – live

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      The January 6 committee has accumulated reams of evidence and testimonies in its investigation into the attack on the Capitol, but one outstanding question has been what will happen to it all. Will the evidence be shared with federal prosecutors? What about the lawyers of people facing charges over the attack?The lawmakers in the committee gathered behind closed doors yesterday for their first meeting in more than a month, and Politico has reported a few details about where they were on these questions. “I think now that the department of justice is being proactive in issuing subpoenas and other things, I think it’s time for the committee to determine whether or not the information we’ve gathered can be beneficial to their investigation,” the committee’s chair Bennie Thompson said.Indeed, the justice department has recently issued a flurry of subpoenas to associates of Donald Trump as part of its investigation into the attack on the Capitol, and the January 6 committee seems to be aware that some of what it has found in its own, separate investigation could be useful to them. However, that could also open the door for attorneys of people defending charges over the attack to get access to the committee’s evidence as well.Either way, expect to be hearing a lot more from the committee later this month. Thompson said the lawmakers are eyeing September 28 as the date to resume their hearings, according to Politico.Senator Lindsey Graham’s proposal to ban abortion after 15 weeks nationwide was excoriated by Democrats and downplayed by Republicans after it was introduced yesterday.But pro-abortion sentiment isn’t unanimous among Democrats in the chamber. National Review reports that Joe Manchin, the conservative Democratic senator representing West Virginia, reiterated his support for banning abortion after 20 weeks, noting he’d voted for such a measure in the past. As for Graham’s more stringent proposal, Manchin said he was “very interested” in it. As long as Democrats control the Senate, Graham’s measure probably won’t even be put up for a vote. And even if Republicans did gain control, they’d need to find 60 votes to overcome an inevitable filibuster from Democrats before the bill could pass.Yesterday should have been a rough day for the Biden administration. It started off with the government releasing new inflation data that was worse than expected, and ended with a massive sell-off on Wall Street. Both developments should have been potent fodder for Republicans aiming to convince voters that inflation was the fault of Biden and the Democrats ahead of the November midterms. Instead, much of yesterday’s news cycle was dominated by Republican senator Lindsey Graham’s proposal for federal restrictions on abortion, which are controversial with many voters, including in the GOP.Politico has published a rundown of the own goal scored by the senator and the unexpected reprieve it won for Democrats from the disquieting economic news:.css-knbk2a{height:1em;width:1.5em;margin-right:3px;vertical-align:baseline;fill:#C70000;}So obvious was the apparent ill-timing of the bill’s introduction that one White House aide said a Republican lobbyist friend joked that Graham appeared to be working for the Biden administration. Other aides suggested that the comments continued a Democratic winning streak that started mid-summer and began to imagine holding onto both houses of Congress.
      “Dems might need to send gift baskets and champagne to Graham and other Republicans for their selfless act of service today,” another Democratic official told POLITICO.
      The immediate response to Graham’s legislation, which would not just establish a ban on abortion after 15 weeks of pregnancy but also allow states to keep and pass more restrictive laws, was a microcosm of the way abortion politics has wholly upended the midterm sprint.
      It’s not as if the images out of the White House were pristine. Live TV coverage of Biden’s speech was bracketed by large red arrows signifying the stock market’s downward trajectory. The more Biden talked about how the legislation would help the economy, the more the markets tumbled. By the closing bell, Wall Street had suffered its worst day since June 2020, with the Dow dropping more than 1,250 points.
      But Democrats, who have been on the defensive for months over stubbornly high inflation, felt once again revitalized in trying to fend off GOP-led initiatives to restrict abortion rights. Virtually every Senate candidate quickly issued statements excoriating Graham’s bill and asking their Republican opponents whether they would sign off on it.Biden has said he will attend the funeral of Elizabeth II, but it remains unclear if he will meet with new prime minister Liz Truss or King Charles III.White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre did not shed much light on the matter today, The Washington Post reports:Asked if Biden will be meeting with new King Charles III or new British prime minister Liz Truss while he’s in London, @PressSec says: “I don’t have an update on who he’s going to be meeting or anything like that.” She notes this morning’s call between the president and the king.— Matt Viser (@mviser) September 14, 2022
      President Joe Biden called Britain’s King Charles III today and offered his condolences on the death of Queen Elizabeth II, the White House announced.Here’s the full readout from the Biden administration:.css-knbk2a{height:1em;width:1.5em;margin-right:3px;vertical-align:baseline;fill:#C70000;}President Joseph R. Biden, Jr. spoke today with King Charles III to offer his condolences on the passing of Queen Elizabeth II. The President recalled fondly the Queen’s kindness and hospitality, including when she hosted him and the First Lady at Windsor Castle last June. He also conveyed the great admiration of the American people for the Queen, whose dignity and constancy deepened the enduring friendship and special relationship between the United States and the United Kingdom. President Biden conveyed his wish to continue a close relationship with the King.Elizabeth II passed away last week, and her coffin has just arrived in the Palace of Westminster in London to lie in state. The Guardian is running a live blog with the latest events, which you can read below.Queen Elizabeth’s coffin arrives at Palace of Westminster to lie in state – latest updatesRead moreBusy times for the feds, it seems. FBI agents reported to the drive-thru lane of a Minnesota Hardee’s to question and seize the cellphone of Mike Lindell, a prominent Trump ally and 2020 election denier who is also known for his company MyPillow, which makes… pillows. The Guardian’s Richard Luscombe explains what they were looking for:Mike Lindell, the pillow salesman who became an enthusiastic mouthpiece for Donald Trump’s lie about a stolen election, has said he was forced to hand his phone to FBI agents who surrounded him at a fast-food drive-through.The incident happened on Tuesday as Lindell, chief executive of My Pillow, was in line at a branch of Hardee’s in Mankato, Minnesota, his home town, following a hunting trip.“Cars pulled up in front of us, to the side of us, and behind us and I said those are either bad guys or the FBI,” the conspiracy theorist said on his internet show, the Lindell Report. “Well, it turns out they were the FBI.”Lindell said the agents questioned him about Tina Peters, a fellow election denier facing criminal charges in Colorado for tampering with voting machinery as a county clerk, and who in June lost a Republican primary to become the state’s top election official.My Pillow CEO Mike Lindell has phone seized by FBI at fast-food outletRead moreIn June, federal investigators issued a subpoena for surveillance footage from inside Mar-a-Lago and obtained a hard drive in response, according to a newly revealed portion of the warrant authorizing last month’s search of Donald Trump’s resort by the FBI.The detail was redacted from the warrant released by a federal judge last month, but the Associated Press reports that the justice department asked for it to be released after Trump’s lawyers publicly revealed the subpoena’s existence.Here’s more from the AP about the possible significance of the subpoena for surveillance footage:.css-knbk2a{height:1em;width:1.5em;margin-right:3px;vertical-align:baseline;fill:#C70000;}The newly visible portions of the FBI agent’s affidavit show that the FBI on June 24 subpoenaed for the footage after a visit weeks earlier to Mar-a-Lago in which agents observed 50 to 55 boxes of records in the storage room at the property. The Trump Organization provided a hard drive on July 6 in response to the subpoena, the affidavit says.
      The footage could be an important piece of the investigation, including as agents evaluate whether anyone has sought to obstruct the probe. The Justice Department has said in a separate filing that it has “developed evidence that government records were likely concealed and removed from the Storage Room and that efforts were likely taken to obstruct the government’s investigation.”The January 6 committee has accumulated reams of evidence and testimonies in its investigation into the attack on the Capitol, but one outstanding question has been what will happen to it all. Will the evidence be shared with federal prosecutors? What about the lawyers of people facing charges over the attack?The lawmakers in the committee gathered behind closed doors yesterday for their first meeting in more than a month, and Politico has reported a few details about where they were on these questions. “I think now that the department of justice is being proactive in issuing subpoenas and other things, I think it’s time for the committee to determine whether or not the information we’ve gathered can be beneficial to their investigation,” the committee’s chair Bennie Thompson said.Indeed, the justice department has recently issued a flurry of subpoenas to associates of Donald Trump as part of its investigation into the attack on the Capitol, and the January 6 committee seems to be aware that some of what it has found in its own, separate investigation could be useful to them. However, that could also open the door for attorneys of people defending charges over the attack to get access to the committee’s evidence as well.Either way, expect to be hearing a lot more from the committee later this month. Thompson said the lawmakers are eyeing September 28 as the date to resume their hearings, according to Politico.Good morning, US politics blog readers. After weeks of quiet, congress members investigating the January 6 attack have reconvened with plans to hold a new public hearing later this month, and potentially share evidence with the justice department. That would set the stage for the insurrection at the Capitol to remain in the public eye in the lead up to the November midterms, where a slew of Trump-supporting Republicans are on the ballot.Here’s what else is happening today:
      President Joe Biden is traveling to Michigan for an appearance promoting electric vehicles at the Detroit auto show.
      Federal health officials including CDC director Rochelle Walensky will testify about the response to Monkeypox before the Senate health committee.
      Donald Trump has ruled out picking his former vice-president Mike Pence as his running mate, a soon-to-be published book obtained by The Guardian reveals. More

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      US issues 40 subpoenas about Trump’s failed bid to overturn the 2020 election

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      US issues 40 subpoenas about Trump’s failed bid to overturn the 2020 electionThe justice department has cast a wide net seeking tips on efforts by Donald Trump and his allies to submit alternatives slates of fake electors The US Justice Department has issued about 40 subpoenas over the past week seeking information about efforts by Donald Trump and his allies to overturn the 2020 election, the New York Times reported on Monday.Trump backed failed campaign coup against Kushner, Navarro book saysRead moreBoris Epshteyn, a longtime Trump adviser, and Mike Roman, a campaign strategist for Trump, had their phones seized last week as evidence, the Times said, citing people familiar with the situation.Dan Scavino, Trump’s former social media director, was also among those who were subpoenaed, according to the paper, which said the group included low-level aides as well as senior advisers.An attorney for Scavino did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Reuters, while Reuters was unable to contact Roman and Epshteyn.The subpoenas seek information on a failed bid by the former president and his allies to overturn the results of the 2020 election by submitting alternative slates of fake electors.The inquiry is also looking at the assault on the US Capitol on 6 January 2021 by Trump supporters.Some of the subpoenas also seek information on Trump’s Save America political fundraising group, which the Times said was a new line of inquiry by the justice department.TopicsUS elections 2020US Capitol attackDonald TrumpUS politicsnewsReuse this content More

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      Doug Mastriano prayed for Trump to ‘seize the power’ before Capitol attack

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      Doug Mastriano prayed for Trump to ‘seize the power’ before Capitol attackThe Republican candidate for Pennsylvania’s governor spoke during a video call hosted by a Christian nationalist group member A week before the Capitol attack, on a video call organised by a member of a Christian nationalist group, a Pennsylvania state senator who is the Republican candidate for governor in the battleground state prayed that supporters of Donald Trump would “seize the power” on 6 January 2021.Doug Mastriano attended the pro-Trump rally in Washington that day, after which supporters, told by Trump to “fight like hell” to overturn his election defeat, stormed Congress in an attempt to stop certification of Joe Biden’s victory.The riot was linked to nine deaths, including suicides in the aftermath of the attack among law enforcement.‘You have to run’: Romney urged Biden to take down Trump, book saysRead moreMastriano denies crossing police lines at the Capitol and affiliations with Christian nationalist groups. He is now one of a number of Republican candidates for state positions with sway over elections who support Trump’s lie that his 2020 defeat was the result of voter fraud.Two months from election day, the polling website fivethirtyeight.com puts Mastriano just shy of seven points behind his Democratic opponent.Mastriano’s 6 January prayer, first reported by Rolling Stone on Friday, was delivered during a Zoom call, titled Global Prayer for Election Integrity, organised by what the magazine called “a prominent figure in the far-right New Apostolic Restoration movement”.As defined by Rolling Stone, “Christian nationalism is a central tenet of … NAR [which] emerge[ed] from charismatic Christianity (think: Pentecostalism) and is anchored in the belief that we are living in an age of new apostles and prophets, who receive direct revelations from the holy spirit.“NAR adherents hold that the end times are fast approaching and their calling is to hasten the second coming of Christ by re-fashioning the modern world in a biblical manner.”Mastriano is a US army veteran who once dressed up as a Confederate soldier. In his prayer, he listed historical events including the battle of Gettysburg in 1863 and the crash of United Airlines Flight 93, the plane which came down in a field in Pennsylvania on 9/11, after passengers attacked their hijackers.He said: “In 2001, while our nation was attacked by terrorists, a strong Christian man from Paramus, New Jersey, Todd Beamer, said, ‘Let’s roll.’“God I ask you that you help us roll in these dark times, that we fear not the darkness, that we will seize our Esther and Gideon moments. That … when you say, ‘Who shall I send?’ we will say, ‘Send me and not him or her’, we will take responsibility for our republic and not waver in these days that try our souls.“We’re surrounded by wickedness and fear and dithering and inaction. But that’s not our problem. Our problem is following your lead.”In the weeks before the Capitol attack, Mastriano was involved in failed attempts to overturn Trump’s defeat in Pennsylvania, the announcement of which confirmed Biden’s electoral college win.On the Zoom call, Mastriano displayed what he said were “letters that President Trump asked me this morning to send to [Senate Republican leader] Mitch McConnell and [House leader] Kevin McCarthy, outlining the fraud in Pennsylvania, and this will embolden them to stand firm and disregard what has happened in Pennsylvania until they have an investigation”.He also said: “We think about our elected officials in Pennsylvania who’ve been weak and feckless and we’ve handed over our power to a governor” – Tom Wolf, a Democrat – “who disregards the freedoms of this republic.“I pray that we’ll take responsibility, we’ll seize the power that we had given to us by the constitution, and as well by you providentially. I pray for the leaders and also in the federal government, God, on the sixth of January that they will rise up with boldness.”After the Capitol riot, when Congress reconvened, McCarthy was one of 138 Republican congressmen and nine senators who voted to object to results in Pennsylvania or Arizona or both.TopicsRepublicansChristianityUS Capitol attackDonald TrumpPennsylvaniaUS politicsnewsReuse this content More

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      New Mexico official first politician removed over January 6 attack

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      New Mexico official first politician removed over January 6 attackThis marks the first time since 1869 that a court removed an official for participating in an insurrection A New Mexico official was removed from elected office on Tuesday for his role in the January 6 siege on the US capitol, marking the first time a politician has lost their job for their involvement in the attack.Couy Griffin, one of three commissioners in Otero county in southern New Mexico, was immediately removed from his position and cannot hold elected office again, Francis Mathew, a district judge in Santa Fe, wrote in his ruling.The 14th amendment to the US constitution bars anyone who has participated in an insurrection from holding elected office. In June, Griffin was sentenced to 14 days in jail and a $3,000 (£2,604) fine for misdemeanor trespassing during the Capitol attack.“Mr Griffin’s crossing of barricades to approach the Capitol were overt acts in support of the insurrection, as Griffin’s presence closer to the Capitol building increased the insurrectionists’ intimidation by number,” Mathew wrote in his ruling. “Mr Griffin aided the insurrection even though he did not personally engage in violence. By joining the mob and trespassing on restricted Capitol grounds, Mr Griffin contributed to delaying Congress’s election certification proceedings.”Griffin told CNN he was “shocked” at the ruling and accused Mathew of being “tyrannical”.“I’m shocked. Just shocked,” Griffin said. “I really did not feel like the state was going to move on me in such a way. I don’t know where I go from here.”Earlier this year, Griffin sought to block Otero county, which voted overwhelmingly for Donald Trump in 2020, from certifying its official primary election results, citing concerns – which have been debunked – about voting machines.The state supreme court eventually ordered the three-member commission to certify the election, which it ultimately did with a 2-1 vote. Griffin was the lone holdout.“My vote to remain a ‘no’ isn’t based on any evidence, it isn’t based on any facts. It’s only based on my own gut feeling, my own intuition, and that’s all I need,” he said at the time.Tuesday’s decision marked a major win for watchdog groups that have sought to use the constitutional provision to block members of the US Congress who sought to prevent the delayed certification of Joe Biden’s victory in the 2020 election.Extremist supporters of Donald Trump caused the delay after invading the Capitol to try to prevent the certification. The insurrection is still under congressional and federal criminal investigation.An effort to remove Marjorie Taylor Greene, the far-right Georgia congresswoman, from the ballot failed earlier this year. A similar effort seeking the removal of Arizona representatives Andy Biggs and Paul Gosar, as well as Mark Finchem, a Republican running to be Arizona’s top election official, also failed.Tuesday’s decision marked the first time since 1869 that a court removed an election official for participating in an insurrection, Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington , a watchdog group that represented New Mexico citizens seeking to remove Griffin from office, said in a statement.“This decision makes clear that any current or former public officials who took an oath to defend the US Constitution and then participated in the January 6th insurrection can and will be removed and barred from government service for their actions,” Noah Bookbinder, the group’s executive director, said in a statement.TopicsUS newsFight to voteNew MexicoUS Capitol attackUS politicsnewsReuse this content More

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      January 6 committee assumes Mike Pence will testify, Jamie Raskin says

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      January 6 committee assumes Mike Pence will testify, Jamie Raskin saysCongressman says of former vice-president, ‘I would assume he is going to come forward and testify voluntarily’ The January 6 committee assumes the former vice-president Mike Pence will testify before it, a panel member said on Sunday.Trump calls FBI, DoJ ‘vicious monsters’ in first rally since Mar-a-Lago searchRead more“I would assume he is going to come forward and testify voluntarily,” Jamie Raskin, a Democratic congressman from Maryland, told CBS’s Face the Nation.Raskin also said Ginni Thomas, a rightwing activist married to the supreme court justice Clarence Thomas, “has relevant testimony to render [and] should come forward and give it”.After the 2020 election, Ginni Thomas contacted Republicans in Arizona and Wisconsin, pushing them to overturn Joe Biden’s victories in the key swing states.Members of the January 6 committee including Liz Cheney, the vice-chair and one of two Republicans on the panel, have said Thomas could face a subpoena. But none has been forthcoming.Clarence Thomas was the only justice to say Donald Trump should not have to surrender records to the committee as it investigates Trump’s attempt to overturn his 2020 defeat and the deadly attack on Congress it inspired.It subsequently emerged that Ginni Thomas was in contact with the Trump White House as it attempted to nullify electoral results in key states.Pence presided over the certification of electoral college results at the Capitol on 6 January 2021, which the mob Trump told to “fight like hell” was attempting to stop.Pence refused to stop certification, as advisers to Trump claimed he could. Some rioters chanted “Hang Mike Pence” and erected a gallows. The vice-president narrowly escaped contact with some who breached the Capitol.In testimony to the January 6 committee, Cassidy Hutchinson, a former White House staffer, said Trump told senior aides Pence “deserved” such treatment.Sticking to his lie that Biden’s win was the result of electoral fraud, Trump said this week the 2020 election should be re-run.Raskin – a professor of constitutional law – told CBS: “Well, first, if he’s saying that the election should be rerun, which is something he’s been saying from the beginning, that’s totally outside of the constitution.“There is no procedure for the military just to seize the election machinery and run a new election, which is one of the things that [Trump’s] disgraced former national security adviser Michael Flynn was pushing and we know was part of the January 6 plot.“And look, more than 60 courts rejected every claim of electoral fraud and corruption which Donald Trump advanced. He’s had the benefit of more than 60 courts, including eight courts where he appointed the judges to office, look[ing] at all those claims, and they were all rejected. It was rejected in the states and he lost the election.”Raskin was also asked about Republican anger over Biden’s primetime address in Philadelphia on Thursday, in which the president warned that Trump and his supporters posed a threat to American democracy.Raskin said: “Two of the hallmarks of a fascist political party are one, they don’t accept the results of elections that don’t go their way, and two, they embrace political violence.“And I think that’s why President Biden was right to sound the alarm this week about these continuing attacks on our constitutional order from the outside by Donald Trump and his movement.”TopicsMike PenceJanuary 6 hearingsUS politicsUS Capitol attackDonald TrumpnewsReuse this content More

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      ‘A white nationalist pyramid scheme’: how Patriot Front recruits young members

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      ‘A white nationalist pyramid scheme’: how Patriot Front recruits young members The rightwing group’s workings resemble a media production company more than a classic neo-Nazi group, researchers sayIn June, police in Idaho arrested 31 members of the white nationalist group Patriot Front packed into the back of a U-Haul near a Coeur d’Alene Pride event. The group had planned to riot during the LGBTQ+ celebrations, authorities said, and carried riot gear, a smoke grenade, shin guards and shields.Trump sought to mount ‘armed revolution’, militia ex-spokesman saysRead moreThe mass arrest not only revealed the names of members of an extremist group that had long worked to keep those hidden, it provided extremist experts with new insight into how the group is meticulously planning, financing, organizing and publicizing armed demonstrations at public events that celebrate diversity.Patriot Front’s fundraising and mobilizing efforts, those experts say, reveal a corporate-style organization that more resembles a media production company with satellite offices than a classic neo-Nazi group.“No other white supremacist group operating in the US today is able to match Patriot Front’s ability to produce media, ability to mobilize across the country, and ability to finance,” says Morgan Moon, investigative researcher with the ADL Center on Extremism. “That’s what makes them a particular concern.”When white nationalism meets media productionPatriot Front was founded after the 2017 Unite the Right Rally in Charlottesville by Thomas Rousseau, a former member of the small, neo-Nazi group Vanguard America.Disaffected members of Vanguard America left to join Rousseau’s organization, and for two years, primarily stickered college campuses and dropped banners with slogans like “Reclaim America” over highway overpasses.In the 18 months after the January 6 insurrection at the Capitol, many anti-government extremist groups, like the Proud Boys, Oathkeepers and Three Percenters, have lain low. But Patriot Front has geared up. The group has made unpermitted demonstrations its “bread and butter”, says Moon, making sure each event is heavily publicized on social media.Since last December, the group has organized five such flash demonstrations. Two of them – the event in Idaho and a contentious march along Boston’s Freedom Trail on the Fourth of July holiday – resulted in national media attention.At the rallies, Rousseau typically addresses the crowd, urging onlookers to rise up physically and “reclaim your country”.To capture different angles of a rally, several camera operators circulate and shoot video while members wear body-worn cameras, according to Jeff Tischauser, senior research analyst at the Southern Poverty Law Center. Then, the media team edits the footage and circulates a video package on alt-tech platforms like Gab, Odyssey and Telegram.Afterward, Patriot Front’s social media team monitors the group’s mentions, shares news coverage on private servers, and tells members which social media accounts to harass, Tischauser says.The video packages are specifically designed toward attracting a younger audience, says Stephen Piggott, program analyst with Western States Center, a Portland-based non-profit that promotes inclusive democracy. And while other far-right and white nationalist groups are engaging in meme culture and recruiting people online, the group has been effective at attracting young radicals and getting them off their laptops and into the streets, he adds.Throughout its propaganda, the group is careful to craft an image that will appeal to younger users, promoting the “idea of a young warrior” and becoming the “warrior elite”, says Moon, the ADL researcher. The group emphasizes fitness, diet and training and often holds paramilitary drills before demonstrations.Also attractive to young recruits is the premium the group puts on anonymity. Banner drops and mural defacing typically happen after dark, and members keep their faces covered. Internal chats show members using code names. At protests, Rousseau is typically the only person whose face is shown.‘A white nationalist pyramid scheme’Undergirding Patriot Front’s activities is a rigid, top-down hierarchy, researchers say.Rousseau is at the head. Lieutenants run departments of the group, including media production, recruitment and online security. Fifteen regional network directors organize local and national activities, and supervise members.Once recruits become members, they are required to attend monthly roundups, hit a weekly activism quota, and show up to demonstrations, according to Moon. If they don’t, Rousseau expels them from Patriot Front.Internal chats obtained by extremist experts show members complaining about the ongoing expenses they incur paying for stickers, stencils and other mandatory propaganda materials, which Rousseau charges them for.Rousseau charges members a premium for Patriot Front propaganda material, Tischauser said, adding that network directors are expected to push members to purchase flyers to go on several flyering runs a month. “In this sense, Patriot Front is close to a white nationalist pyramid scheme,” Tischauser notes.The tightly organized structure enables Patriot Front to be responsible for up to 14 hate incidents a day, according to the ADL. Under the direction of network directors, Patriot Front members defaced 29 murals honoring Black history, LGBTQ+ pride, migrant history and police shooting victims, said Tischauser.Patriot Front did not respond to a request for comment.‘It lifted the veil a bit’Recent events have somewhat disrupted the group’s carefully constructed image. Earlier this year, the leftwing non-profit Unicorn Riot leaked the group’s internal audio and chats, which helped investigators discover the identity of the national team, regional directors and many other members. And following the arrest in Coeur d’Alene, all 31 names of arrested members were broadcasted and published in local media outlets, along with their mugshots.“They got kind of the opposite of what they wanted: they weren’t able to disrupt the LGBTQ Pride events, and they got a whole lot of mainstream media attention,” Piggott said.The Idaho arrests also exposed that their members flew into the state from different parts of the country, Piggott added. “It lifted the veil a bit. They may not have the numbers they say they have.”Still, civil rights groups are increasingly concerned about violence breaking out at flash demonstrations. During Patriot Front’s unpermitted rally in Boston this July, for example, members of the group allegedly assaulted a Black artist and activist, Charles Murrell.Murrell did not respond to an interview request.The ADL, the Western States Center and other civil rights groups have urged the Department of Justice to launch a comprehensive investigation into the group, arguing that some of its activities could violate federal legislation.“More must be done to hold the group accountable and ensure they do not continue to intimidate historically marginalized communities,” the organizations wrote in a letter to the US attorney general, Merrick Garland.“This is particularly true at a time when Patriot Front is becoming increasingly emboldened and coordinating its activity at a national level, targeting specific locations across the country,” they added. “The Department of Justice may indeed be the only entity able to address these concerns effectively.”TopicsUS newsUS Capitol attackUS politicsThe far rightIdahofeaturesReuse this content More

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      in Elections

      House select panel asks Newt Gingrich to testify in effort to overturn election

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      House select panel asks Newt Gingrich to testify in effort to overturn electionThe former Republican House speaker is believed to have repeatedly contacted White House aides about fake electors The House January 6 select committee on Thursday asked former Republican House speaker Newt Gingrich to testify about his repeated contacts with White House aides in Donald Trump’s efforts to overturn the 2020 election results, even in the evening after the Capitol attack had taken place.The request to Gingrich was for voluntary cooperation – though the select committee showed it now appears to believe he was involved in a potential conspiracy planned ahead of time to lay the groundwork that would lead to reversing Trump’s defeat on January 6.Ginni Thomas lobbied Wisconsin lawmakers to overturn 2020 election Read moreCongressman Bennie Thompson, the committee chair, said in a letter to Gingrich that investigators were interested in him counseling Trump aides to make TV ads about debunked election fraud conspiracies to pressure state legislators into decertifying Biden electors.The letter detailed that it had communications that showed he tried to liaise with former Trump White House chief of staff Mark Meadows and former Trump White House counsel Pat Cipollone about the fake elector scheme, asking whether anyone was coordinating Trump slates to Congress so that he could be declared the winner.The select committee noted that Gingrich then furthered that effort as he emailed Meadows at 10.42pm on January 6 – hours after the Capitol attack had already largely concluded and Congress was preparing to confirm Biden’s win – asking whether there were “letters from state legislators about decertifying electors”.“Surprisingly, the attack on Congress and the activities prescribed by the Constitution did not even pause your relentless pursuit. On the evening of January 6, you continued to push efforts to overturn the election results,” the letter said.The select committee stopped short of issuing a subpoena to Gingrich, but also asked him to preserve his communications with Trump, the White House and the Trump legal team led by Rudy Giuliani and John Eastman, as well as anyone else connected to January 6.TopicsJanuary 6 hearingsDonald TrumpRudy GiulianiUS Capitol attackNewt GingrichnewsReuse this content More