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      Protests as rightwing Charlie Kirk activist group makes final campus tour stop

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      Turning Point USA, the influential rightwing college group founded by Charlie Kirk, has brought Kirk’s message to a campus with a long history of leftwing activism two months after his death.An event at the University of California, Berkeley, on Monday evening marked the chaotic last stop of the American Comeback tour, which Kirk had just begun at the time of his death at Utah Valley University. In the aftermath of Kirk’s fatal shooting, the events have come to serve as memorials, with prominent conservative speakers, including JD Vance, highlighting the staggering impact the controversial rightwing influencer’s death has had on American politics.Since Kirk’s killing in September, allegedly by a 22-year-old gunman, Donald Trump has sought to use the incident to attack Democrats, liberal groups and donors. The president has warned of an “enemy within” while he and allies have launched attacks on political opponents, actions that scholars have described as authoritarian and anti-Democratic.Meanwhile, people have been fired or disciplined from their jobs over comments, or perceived commentary, about Kirk’s killing or the beliefs he publicly espoused.The Berkeley event, hosted by the campus’s TPUSA chapter, featured Rob Schneider, the comedian and actor who has become a champion of conservative causes, and Christian author Frank Turek. It was met with a large protest as hundreds of demonstrators gathered outside Zellerbach Hall on Monday evening.People shouted “Fascists out of Berkeley” and carried signs with slogans such as “We won the war, why are there still Nazis” and “No safe space for fascist scum”, and Palestinian flags. Meanwhile, dozens of police officers gathered around an entrance, clearing a path for people to enter, and helicopters circled overhead.View image in fullscreenThere were at least three arrests during the protests, including two people detained after a violent altercation, the Daily Californian reported.There was anxiety on campus ahead of the event, said Sophie Mason, a freshman who stopped by the protest after class and said it was the “talk of the town”.“There was a lot of tension. People were worried,” she said.Two hours after the event started, the crowd outside showed no signs of tiring. They briefly broke into chants of “fuck Charlie Kirk.”Protesters at times focused on the large showing of law enforcement, yelling “CHP go home” in reference to the California Highway Patrol team assembled at the frontline of the demonstration.Dozens of officers stood blocking a throughway to the building where the TPUSA event was under way, some with body mounted cameras.Earlier Monday morning, police arrested four students for alleged vandalism after they attempted to hang a large cardboard bug on a gate ahead of the event, Berkeley’s campus newspaper the Daily Californian reported.UC Berkeley, known as the birthplace of the campus free speech movement of the 1960s, has hosted controversial events before. In 2017, thousands of students protested the scheduled appearances of the rightwing provocateur and former Breitbart editor Milo Yiannopoulos and the conservative commentator Ann Coulter. Both events were ultimately cancelled, but the city saw violent clashes between opposing groups of protesters.Monday night’s event, which the Berkeley chapter of TPUSA described as an opportunity to “be a part of the movement built on Charlie’s legacy”, was sold out. The chapter has more than doubled since Kirk’s death, organization leadership have said.Given the campus history of protest, Monday night’s demonstrations felt normal, said Tyara Gomez, a third-year student. Although this one had far more police officers, she said.The protest was largely peaceful but was marked by tense moments. A crowd appeared to accost a man who shouted a racial slur, and circled protesters. There were clashes between demonstrators and counter-demonstrators and attendees, and fears of gun violence. Early on, as the crowds reached their peak, a car drove by, seemingly broadcasting the sound of gunshots, sending dozens of people fleeing while others crowded behind concrete pillars, unsure whether a shooting was taking place.Among them was Mayte, who did not feel comfortable sharing her last name and was visiting with her boyfriend. Mayte crammed behind a the concrete structure with her dog and several other people as the vehicle passed. “You can’t tell if its fireworks or gunshots. It’s scary,” she said.She had felt compelled to watch the demonstration, which was as much a protest against TPUSA as it was against Trump and his agenda. “It’s sad what’s happening. I’m the daughter of immigrants.”Mason, the freshman, said she was perplexed why Turning Point USA had chosen to host the event at the famously liberal campus, but that she was pleased to see the turnout. “I’m glad a lot of people came together and showed up.” More

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      Trump news at a glance: Senate passes funding package to end shutdown after Democrats break ranks

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      After weeks of false starts and failed votes, a procedural vote passed in the US Senate with a 60-40 tally, as seven Democrats and one independent joining all Republicans to advance a compromise deal that would fund most federal agencies through January.The bill now passes to the House, which is expected to vote on the measure on Wednesday.The Democratic caucus has aimed anger at the defectors, and with top Senate Democrat Chuck Schumer, who now faces calls to resign as minority leader.“Senator Schumer is no longer effective and should be replaced,” said congressman Ro Khanna, who represents the Silicon Valley region of California. “If you can’t lead the fight to stop healthcare premiums from skyrocketing for Americans, what will you fight for?”When asked Monday if he supported the Senate agreement to end the government shutdown, Trump said he would “abide by the deal”, calling it “very good.”Senate advances funding package expected to end longest US government shutdownThe Senate on Monday advanced a funding package that is expected to bring to a close the longest government shutdown in US history, after a coalition of Democrats broke from their party and voted with Republicans, in a move that has enraged many in their caucus.Read the full storyTrump threatens BBC with $1bn legal action over edit of speech in documentaryThe president threatened legal action against the BBC and welcomed the resignations of two of its most senior figures after a campaign against the broadcaster that reached fever pitch over criticism that its flagship documentary programme in 2024 used a misleading edit of a Trump speech.Lawyers for the US president said that the BBC must retract the Panorama documentary by Friday or face a lawsuit for “no less” than $1bn (£760m), according to US media outlets who cited the letter. The BBC has confirmed it had received a letter and said it will respond in due course.Read the full storyUS supreme court rejects call to overturn decision legalizing same-sex marriageThe justices, without comment, turned away an appeal from Kim Davis, the former Kentucky court clerk who refused to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples after the high court’s 2015 ruling in Obergefell v Hodges.Davis’ lawyers repeatedly invoked the words of Justice Clarence Thomas, who alone among the nine justices has called for erasing the same-sex marriage ruling.Read the full storyHegseth says six people killed in two new attacks on alleged drug boatsThe Trump administration’s defense secretary said: “These vessels were known by our intelligence to be associated with illicit narcotics smuggling, were carrying narcotics, and were transiting along a known narco-trafficking transit route in the Eastern Pacific.”However, Washington has yet to make public any concrete evidence that its targets were smuggling narcotics or posed a threat to the US.Read the full storyUS supreme court to decide if states can accept late-arriving mail ballotsThe case, Watson v Republican National Committee, involves a challenge to a Mississippi law that allows ballots to count if they are received within five business days of election day.Election officials in Mississippi, citing longstanding precedent, argue that a voter has cast their ballot on or before election day the moment a ballot is postmarked in the mail, and that how it gets to an election office after that is an administrative issue.Read the full storyWhat else happened today:

      Donald Trump chastised overwhelmed air traffic controllers, cast blame and doubt in response to poor economic indicators and claimed that increased access to food stamps had put “the country in jeopardy”, in an exclusive interview on Fox News Monday evening.

      The BBC’s editing of Trump’s January 6 speech caused controversy – but what did he really say?

      Ghislaine Maxwell, Jeffrey Epstein’s longtime associate and co-conspirator who is serving a 20-year prison sentence for sex-trafficking crimes, is reportedly preparing a “commutation application” for the Trump administration to review, according to new allegations from a whistleblower shared with House Democrats.

      The United States has sent $7.5m to the government of Equatorial Guinea, one of the world’s most repressive and corrupt regimes, to accept noncitizen deportees from the US to the West African nation, according to a leading congressional Democrat, current and former state department officials and public government data.

      Thailand has suspended the implementation of a peace agreement with neighbouring Cambodia after a landmine blast injured two Thai soldiers near the border, escalating tensions between the neighbours who clashed in July. Trump helped broker a peace deal between the two southeast Asian nations, after a five-day border conflict.

      The US has announced a partial suspension of sanctions on Syria after a historic meeting in Washington DC between its new leader, Ahmed al-Sharaa, and Donald Trump.
      Catching up? Here’s what happened 9 November. More

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      Senate approves package that would end the longest government shutdown in US history – as it happened

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      Our live coverage is ending for the day. Thanks for reading along with us. Here is a summary of the key developments from today:

      The US Senate approved a package on Monday that would end the longest government shutdown in US history. The 60-40 vote passed with the support of nearly all of the chamber’s Republicans and eight Democrats, who unsuccessfully sought to tie government funding to health subsidies that are due to expire at the end of the year. The bill now passes to the House, which is expected to vote on the measure on Wednesday. House Speaker Mike Johnson urged lawmakers to start returning to Washington “right now,” given shutdown-related travel delays.

      The House’s top Democrat, Hakeem Jeffries, said that Chuck Schumer should stay in place as leader of the party – despite calls from progressive members of the caucus for him to step down. When asked by a reporter at a press conference today if the Jeffries viewed Schumer “as effective and should he keep his job”, the congressman from New York responded with “yes and yes”. More here.

      Donald Trump said he returned to the supreme court on Monday in a push to keep full payments in the federal Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (Snap) frozen during the government shutdown, bringing uncertainty to the roughly 42 million Americans who rely on the food aid. The move comes after a federal appeals court ruled on Friday that the Trump administration needs to fully fund Snap food aid payments.

      Rudy Giuliani and Mark Meadows, both close former political allies of Donald Trump, are among scores of people pardoned by the president over the weekend for their roles in a plot to steal the 2020 election. The maneuver is in effect symbolic, given it only applies in the federal justice system and not in state courts, where Giuliani, Meadows and the others continue facing legal peril. More here.

      Ghislaine Maxwell, Jeffrey Epstein’s longtime associate and co-conspirator who is serving a 20-year prison sentence for sex-trafficking crimes, is reportedly preparing a “commutation application” for the Trump administration to review, according to new allegations from a whistleblower shared with House Democrats. Democrats on the House judiciary committee announced on Monday that they had received information from a whistleblower that indicates that the British former socialite, 63, is working on filing a commutation application. More here.

      Donald Trump has threatened legal action against the BBC and welcomed the resignations of two of its most senior figures after a campaign against the broadcaster that reached fever pitch over criticism that its flagship documentary programme in 2024 used a misleading edit of a Trump speech. Lawyers for the US president said that the BBC must retract the Panorama documentary by Friday or face a lawsuit for “no less” than $1bn (£760m), according to US media outlets who cited the letter. The BBC has confirmed it had received a letter and said it will respond in due course. More here.

      Donald Trump asked the US Supreme Court on Monday to throw out a jury’s finding in a civil lawsuit that he sexually abused writer E Jean Carroll at a Manhattan department store in the mid-1990s and later defamed her. Trump’s lawyers argued in a lengthy filing with the high court that allegations leading to the $5 million verdict were “propped up” by a “series of indefensible evidentiary rulings” that allowed Carroll’s lawyers to present “highly inflammatory propensity evidence” against him.
      The US Senate approved a compromise on Monday that would end the longest government shutdown in US history.The 60-40 vote passed with the support of nearly all of the chamber’s Republicans and eight Democrats, who unsuccessfully sought to tie government funding to health subsidies that are due to expire at the end of the year.The bill now passes to the House, which is expected to vote on the measure on Wednesday.House Speaker Mike Johnson urged lawmakers to start returning to Washington “right now,” given shutdown-related travel delays.“We have to do this as quickly as possible,” said Johnson, who has kept the House out of session since mid-September, when the House passed a bill to continue government funding.The Senate is advancing a plan to reopen the government through January, which would bring the longest shutdown in history to a close after a small group of Democrats struck a deal with Republicans.Should the plan pass, the shutdown could last a few more days as members of the House, which has been in recess since mid-September, return to Washington to vote on the legislation.Democratic senators Catherine Cortez Masto, Dick Durbin, John Fetterman, Maggie Hassan, Tim Kaine, Jackie Rosen and Jeanne Shaheen again voted in favor. Senator Angus King, an independent who votes with Democrats, also voted yes.The Senate will soon finalize its vote on a bill to end the government shutdown after a series of procedural votes and votes related to amendments.If the bill is approved, the measure will then head to the House for a vote before it is sent to Donald Trump’s desk to be signed.Democratic senators Catherine Cortez Masto, John Fetterman, Dick Durbin, Maggie Hassan, Tim Kaine, Angus King (an independent), Jackie Rosen and Jeanne Shaheen voted with Republicans to advance the bill.MoveOn, a liberal group that has encouraged Democrats to hold firm in their demands, is calling on Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer to step down from his role after some Democrats joined with Republicans to work to end the government shutdown, according to a statement sent to The Guardian.“With Donald Trump and the Republican Party doubling health care premiums, weaponizing our military against us, and ripping food away from children, MoveOn members cannot accept weak leadership at the helm of the Democratic Party,” said MoveOn political action executive director Katie Bethell.“Americans showed a growing surge of support for Democrats who fought back—both at the ballot box last week and peacefully in the streets last month,” Bethell added. “Inexplicably, some Senate Democrats, under Leader Schumer’s watch, decided to surrender. It is time for Senator Schumer to step aside as minority leader to make room for those who are willing to fight fire with fire when the basic needs of working people are on the line.”The Senate has blocked a Democratic effort to extend the expiring tax credits that make health insurance coverage more affordable for millions of Americans.Senator Tammy Baldwin led an effort to try and extend current law for one year. It was blocked as part of a party-line vote.“My Republican colleagues are refusing to act to stop health care premiums from doubling for over 20 million Americans,” the senator from Wisconsin said. “I just can’t stand by without a fight.”No Republican spoke against her failed effort, though Senate Majority Leader John Thune, of South Dakota, has promised a Senate vote later this year on a tax credit extension.Donald Trump criticized Senate minority leader Chuck Schumer during an interview with Fox News, saying he “went too far” in trying to challenge Republicans.“He thought he could break the Republicans, and the Republicans broke him,” Trump said.Schumer led the Democrats’ weeks-long stand against reopening the government without an extension of tax credits that lower premiums for Affordable Care Act (ACA) health plans.“We have good policy, they [Democrats] have bad policy,” Trump said.The Senate is currently taking a series of procedural votes to finalize the deal between Republicans and some Democrats that would end the government shutdown.After Donald Trump criticized air traffic controllers for refusing to work without pay during the 41-day government shutdown and promised $10,000 bonuses to those who did not take time off, he was asked where the funds would come from.“I don’t know,” Trump said during an interview on Fox News. “I’ll get it from someplace.”“I always get the money from someplace,” he added. “Regardless, it doesn’t matter.”During an interview on Fox News that aired Monday, Donald Trump criticized Obamacare, calling it “horrible health insurance at a very high price.”The president said he wants to replace it with a system where government funds go directly into individual accounts for people to buy their own plans. He said this system could be called “Trumpcare.”“I want, instead of going to the insurance companies, I want the money to go into an account for people, where the people buy their own health insurance,” Trump told Fox’s Laura Ingraham.He added: “It’s so good, the insurance will be better. It’ll cost less. Everybody’s going to be happy. They’re going to feel like entrepreneurs, they’re actually able to go out and negotiate their own health insurance, and they can use it only for that reason.”President Donald Trump asked the US supreme court to review the $5m verdict that found he sexually abused writer E Jean Carroll at a Manhattan department store in the mid-1990s and later defamed her.In a filing, Trump’s lawyers argued that allegations leading to verdict were “propped up” by a “series of indefensible evidentiary rulings” that allowed Carroll’s lawyers to present “highly inflammatory propensity evidence” against him.Carroll, a former Elle magazine columnist, accused Trump of attacking her around 1996 in a Bergdorf Goodman department store dressing room. Trump first denied her claim in June 2019, telling a reporter that Carroll was “not my type” and had concocted the story to sell her memoir What Do We Need Men For?He repeated his comments in an October 2022 Truth Social post, leading to the $5m verdict, though the jury did not find that Trump had raped Carroll.Trump’s supreme court petition describes Carroll’s sexual assault allegations as “facially implausible” and “politically motivated,” and calls on the justices to intervene and overturn several evidentiary rulings that he claims tainted the trial.The United States has sent $7.5m to the government of Equatorial Guinea, one of the world’s most repressive and corrupt regimes, to accept noncitizen deportees from the US to the West African nation, according to a leading congressional Democrat, current and former state department officials and public government data.The money sent to Equatorial Guinea is the first taken from a fund apportioned by Congress to address international refugee crises – and sometimes to facilitate the resettlement of refugees in the US – that has instead been repurposed under the Trump administration to hasten their deportation.According to government data, the sum from the Migration and Refugee Assistance (MRA) emergency fund was sent directly to the government of Equatorial Guinea, whose president, Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo, has been in power for the last 46 years, and who is accused along with his son, Nguema Obiang, the vice-president, of embezzling millions of dollars from the impoverished nation to fuel their lavish lifestyles.Read the full story by The Guardian’s Andrew Roth and Joseph Gedeon: Donald Trump said that Republican House member Marjorie Taylor Greene had “lost her way” with her criticism of the administration’s focus on foreign policy.“I don’t know what happened to Marjorie. She’s a nice woman, but I don’t know what happened. She’s lost her way, I think,” Trump told reporters earlier today.“But I have to view the presidency as a worldwide situation, not locally. I mean, we could have a world that’s on fire, where wars come to our shores very easily, if you had a bad president,” Trump added.“I haven’t lost my way. I’m 100% America first and only!” Greene told CNN’s Kaitlan Collins, according to an X post.Earlier today, Greene criticized Trump for hosting Syrian interim President Ahmed al-Sharaa at the White House, instead of focusing on domestic issues like health care.The Senate is expected to vote on the government funding bill Wednesday at around 5pm, CBS reports.Senate majority leader John Thune set up a series of six to eight votes, with the process slated to begin after remarks from top appropriators Patty Murray and Susan Collins.If approved, the House will have to return and adopt the deal before it is sent to President Trump’s desk to be signed.Earlier today, when Donald Trump was asked if he supported the Senate agreement to end the government shutdown, he said he would “abide by the deal.”“If it’s a deal I heard about, that’s certainly, you know, they want to change the deal a little bit, but I would say so,” he told reporters in the Oval Office. “I think based on everything I’m hearing, they haven’t changed anything, and we have support from enough Democrats, and we’re going to be opening up our country.”“I’ll abide by the deal,” he added. “The deal is very good.”The Trump administration is working with Switzerland on a deal to lower tariffs, the president told reporters earlier today, but he did not provide any details.“We’re working on a deal to get their tariffs a little bit lower,” Trump said in the Oval Office. “I haven’t said any number, but we’re going to be working on something to help Switzerland along. We hit Switzerland very hard. We want Switzerland to remain successful.”On tariffs, Trump added: “We’re working on them, and some others, and we’re working on others to increase them a little bit, too.”Sources told Bloomberg that Switzerland could secure a 15% tariff on its exports to the US. The European country has been scrambling to secure a trade agreement after Swiss imports were hit by a 39% tariff rate in August, among the highest duties levied in his global trade reset.A deal may be concluded within the next two weeks, Bloomberg reports.After the US Senate secured enough votes to pass a compromise bill reopening the federal government – with seven Democrats and one independent joining Republicans in support – Democratic senator Tim Kaine defended his decision in an interview, as the agreement didn’t include guarantees to extend enhanced Affordable Care Act subsidies.“There was no path to any fix on health care with the government closed,” Kaine told MSNBC’s Katy Tur. “So I supported the Democratic position in this from the very beginning until [the] middle of last week.”“We had no path forward on health care because the Republicans said, we will not talk about health care with the government shut down,” he added. “And we had Snap beneficiaries and those relying on other important services who were losing benefits because of the shutdown, so no path to a health care fix, Snap beneficiaries suffering.”Donald Trump said he returned to the supreme court on Monday in a push to keep full payments in the federal Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (Snap) frozen during the government shutdown, bringing uncertainty to the roughly 42 million Americans who rely on the food aid.The move comes after a federal appeals court ruled on Friday that the Trump administration needs to fully fund Snap food aid payments.Today’s move marks the second time administration officials have asked the federal appeals court to block a judge’s order that it distribute November’s full monthly food stamp benefits amid the federal government shutdown.The Trump administration argued that lower court orders requiring the full funding of Snap wrongly affect ongoing negotiations in Congress about ending the shutdown.The high court is expected to rule on Tuesday. More

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      UK commentator detained by ICE after Israel criticism to be released, family says

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      The family of British political commentator Sami Hamdi, who was detained by US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) in late October while on a speaking tour in the US, say he is set to be released and will be able to “return home soon”.“The government has agreed to release Sami,” the family said in a statement on Monday. “He will be able to return home soon insha’Allah.”Hamdi was detained on 26 October at San Francisco international airport. At the time, the Council on American-Islamic Relations (Cair) said his detention appeared to be in retaliation for the Muslim political commentator’s criticism of Israel while touring the US, calling it a “blatant affront to free speech”, and called for his release.Later on 26 October, the Department of Homeland Security spokesperson, Tricia McLaughlin, said that Hamdi’s visa had been revoked and that he was in “ICE custody pending removal”.“Under President Trump, those who support terrorism and undermine American national security will not be allowed to work or visit this country,” McLaughlin said.In a separate statement that same day, the state department said that the US “has no obligation to host foreigners who support terrorism and actively undermine the safety of Americans. We continue to revoke the visas of persons engaged in such activity”.The Guardian reported last month that the US officials appeared to be referencing remarks Hamdi made following the 7 October 2023 Hamas attacks on Israel, as on 27 October, the DHS shared a video clip by the pro-Israel group Memri, in which Hamdi was recorded saying that Palestinians should “celebrate their victory” and asked if they had felt “euphoria” over what had taken place.Hamdi later sought to clarify his remarks. In another speaking engagement several days after the Hamas attacks he said: “We don’t celebrate blood lust, we don’t celebrate death and we don’t celebrate war” adding that “what Muslims are celebrating is not war, they’re celebrating the revival of a cause – a just cause – that everybody thought was dead, this is an important distinction … I don’t celebrate war, I don’t celebrate death.”In an interview with the Guardian in late October, Hamdi’s wife called the allegations against her husband “outrageous” and said the videos were “edited in a way to frame Sami in a horrible light and produced by an organization that is very well known to be anti-Muslim, anti-Arab, Islamophobic and out there to target people who are speaking up against the genocide against Palestinians”.On Monday, the California chapter of Cair, whose legal team has been representing Hamdi in court along with attorneys from the Muslim Legal Fund of America and The HMA Law Firm, confirmed in a statement that Hamdi had accepted an offer to leave the US voluntarily.They added that the immigration charging document filed “in his case alleged only a visa overstay – after the government revoked his visa without cause and without prior notice – and never identified any criminal conduct or security grounds”.“This agreement establishes that the government does not consider Hamdi a danger to the community or to national security,” Cair said.The Department of Homeland Security did not immediately respond to a request from comment from the Guardian. More

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      Democratic candidate for Congress criticizes deal to end shutdown – which her mother voted to advance

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      A Democratic congressional candidate who posted to social media criticism of the bipartisan deal that looks set to end the government shutdown omitted to mention that her mother was among the party’s rebel senators who voted to approve it.Stefany Shaheen, who is seeking to represent New Hampshire in the US House of Representatives, said in the post to X that she “cannot support this deal when [House] Speaker [Mike] Johnson refuses to even allow a vote to extend health care tax credits”.Jeanne Shaheen, her mother and a US senator of New Hampshire, was one of seven Democrats to break ranks with party leadership on Sunday night and vote to advance a funding bill that will end the 40-day shutdown without securing guarantees for healthcare subsidies. Those seven were joined by an independent who caucuses with Democrats.“Clearly we had different approaches here,” Stefany Shaheen said in an interview Monday, reported by the New York Times, after questions arose over her post. “I can’t speak for her. I think she did what she believes is right.”The deal, which extends government funding until 30 January, contains only the promise of a vote on a healthcare bill in the Senate next month, not an extension of tax credits for the Affordable Care Act (ACA) that helps keep premiums low, which had been a key Democratic negotiating position.The elder Shaheen, a senator since 2009, said in a statement that she stood by her decision. “This was the only deal on the table. It was our best chance to reopen the government and immediately begin negotiations to extend the ACA tax credits,” she said.The post by her daughter condemning the deal but leaving out her mother’s involvement drew a swift and predictable backlash on social media, mediaite.com reported.“Your mom just ruined your career,” one user on X posted, while another said: “We don’t vote for the children of traitors”.In her post, Stefany Shaheen, a mother of four children whose campaign biography describes her as a “passionate advocate for groundbreaking medical research and a successful entrepreneur and business leader”, said improving healthcare was “the cause of my life”.In a section of her website about why she is running for Congress during the 2026 midterm elections, Shaheen wrote that she knew “it’s not enough to just get mad” when Donald Trump is “crushing medical research, and Republicans [are] slashing Medicaid, and healthcare for kids, seniors, and veterans – all to give big tax breaks to billionaires and corporations”.According to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, about 15 million people will lose healthcare by 2034 because of Medicaid and ACA marketplace cuts pushed through by Republicans; an additional 4.2 million people will lose marketplace cover if premium tax credits are not extended, one possible consequence of the vote by Shaheen’s mother and the other Democratic rebel senators.Jeanne Shaheen and another Democrat who voted yes, Dick Durbin of Illinois, have already announced they will be retiring instead of fighting for re-election next year. None of the other five, Catherine Cortez Masto (Nevada), John Fetterman (Pennsylvania), Margaret Wood Hassan (New Hampshire), Tim Kaine (Virginia), and Jacky Rosen (Nevada), must face voters until November 2028.Angus King (Maine) also voted yes as an independent who caucuses with the Democrats. More

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      Ghislaine Maxwell eyeing commutation, whistleblower tells House Democrats

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      Ghislaine Maxwell, Jeffrey Epstein’s longtime associate and co-conspirator who is serving a 20-year prison sentence for sex-trafficking crimes, is reportedly preparing a “commutation application” for the Trump administration to review, according to new allegations from a whistleblower shared with House Democrats.Democrats on the House judiciary committee announced on Monday that they had received information from a whistleblower that indicates that the British former socialite, 63, is working on filing a commutation application. They also said Maxwell had been receiving special treatment at federal prison camp Bryan in Texas – the minimum-security facility she was transferred to earlier this year.Congressman Jamie Raskin, the ranking member and top Democrat on the House judiciary committee, stated in a news release that the prison’s warden was also “helping” Maxwell “copy, print, and send documents” to support her bid for clemency.The exact content of this “commutation application” was unclear, Raskin added.Raskin states that according to the whistleblower, Maxwell has been receiving “customized” meals that are “personally delivered” to her cell, and that the warden has “personally arranged” private meetings for Maxwell and her visitors. The visits allegedly include providing a “special cordoned-off area” for visitors to arrive, as well as “an assortment of snacks and refreshments for her guests”.Maxwell’s visitors were also reportedly permitted to bring computers, which, Raskin described in the news release as an “unprecedented action by the Warden given the security risk and potential for Ms Maxwell to use a computer to conduct unmonitored communications with the outside world”.In one alleged instance, the whistleblower said that when phone lines went down for other inmates, Maxwell was given specific instructions about who she should tell her contacts to call and how those personnel would then connect to relay the call to Maxwell.The whistleblower further reportedly told the House Democrats that when Maxwell wanted to review and edit documents “quickly”, she “essentially used” the warden as her “personal secretary and administrative assistant”. The news release states that Maxwell’s correspondents would email documents directly to the warden, who would provide them to Maxwell, “who would review and edit them and provide them back to the Warden to scan and provide to the original sender”.Other privileges allegedly granted to Maxwell also include time to “play with” a service dog – a perk that the news release states is not “ordinarily allowed” –   as well as private after-hours access to the prison exercise area.Maxwell’s attorney did not immediately respond to a request for comment from the Guardian regarding the whistleblower’s claims.In a statement to the Guardian, Abigail Jackson, a spokesperson for the White House, said that “the White House does not comment on potential clemency requests”.“As President Trump has stated, pardoning Ghislaine Maxwell is not something he has thought about,” Jackson added.Over the weekend, reports surfaced that Maxwell told friends and family in emails from prison that she was “much happier” at the Texas facility than her previous prison.In August, Maxwell was moved from a low-security prison in Tallahassee, Florida, to the minimum-security camp in Texas, where most of the inmates are serving time for non-violent offenses and white-collar crimes. The transfer, which experts described as “unprecedented”, occurred just days after she was interviewed about the Epstein case by the deputy attorney general, Todd Blanche – who also previously served as Donald Trump’s personal lawyer.That interview came as the Trump administration was facing mounting pressure to release more documents related to the Epstein investigation and amid intense speculation around the president’s own personal ties to the disgraced financier and convicted sex offender, who was found dead in a New York jail in 2019 while awaiting prosecution on sex-trafficking charges.In the news release on Monday, Raskin also announced that he had sent a letter to Trump demanding answers about the whistleblower’s allegations, and also called on the president to reject Maxwell’s commutation request.“You should not grant any form of clemency to this convicted and unrepentant sex offender,” Raskin wrote in the letter. “Your Administration should not be providing her with room service, with puppies to play with, with federal law enforcement officials waiting on her every need, or with any special treatment or institutional privilege at all.”Raskin requested that Blanche appear for a public congressional hearing to discuss the revelations and also posed three questions to Trump.Raskin asked whether Trump had discussed a potential commutation, or any form of presidential clemency, for Maxwell with Blanche or others; whether he had directed Blanche or anyone else in the administration to provide Maxwell with the transfer to the prison camp, or to give her favorable and preferential treatment in prison; and lastly whether Maxwell, her attorneys, family or representatives have made any promises to Trump or his attorneys.Raskin has asked for a response to the questions by 24 November.In another statement on Monday, Democratic representative Robert Garcia, the ranking member of the committee on oversight and government reform, called on Republican House speaker Mike Johnson and Republican representative James Comer, who chairs the oversight committee, to “publicly oppose a commutation or pardon by President Trump.“Ghislaine Maxwell is a convicted sex offender who helped Jeffrey Epstein commit atrocities and rape against women and girls for decades,” Garcia said. “For months, we have been warning the American people that Trump’s Department of Justice is providing her with unprecedented benefits as a prisoner, including moving her to a less restrictive facility.“Thanks to brave whistleblowers and our partners on the judiciary committee, we have more evidence that Maxwell is seeking a pardon or commutation,” he added.In October, the US supreme court declined to hear an appeal from Maxwell on her sex-trafficking conviction. More

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      Zohran Mamdani’s writer on crafting a historic victory speech: ‘In New York, inspiration is everywhere’

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      In his victory speech after winning the New York mayoral election last week, Zohran Mamdani came out swinging.The speech included, among other dramatic flourishes, a reference to the socialist titan Eugene Debs, shoutouts to the city’s “Senegalese taxi drivers and Uzbek nurses”, tributes to Jawaharlal Nehru and Fiorello La Guardia, sprinkles of Arabic – and it was all delivered with the cadence and command of a hip-hop emcee. Many who were listening could not help but wonder: how the hell did he pull that off?A healthy portion of the credit should go to Julian Gerson, the speechwriter on the Mamdani campaign who typifies the young, leftwing lieutenants powering this insurgent operation – a 29-year-old outer-borough dweller (in his case, Brooklyn) with unerring message discipline. He is especially unabashed when it comes to the words he puts in his boss’s mouth that draw inspiration from socialist greats and the multicultural city that the Mamdani campaign holds dear.“When this campaign has sung the most is when it feels like a love letter to New York,” Gerson told the Guardian.To write the victory speech, Gerson began working a week in advance, collaborating with Mamdani and his campaign consultant Morris Katz on overarching themes, before locking himself in his apartment until he had a draft ready for Mamdani to review on the Saturday before the election. (Mandani never saw a draft of the concession speech, which Gerson said was “not fun to write”.) “Push yourself to think of speechwriting as more than just the written word,” he said Mamdani told him – which is to say the 34-year-old Muslim and Indian Ugandan state assemblyman was already thinking about the space his victory would occupy in the annals of history. Gerson threw out a couple names he hoped to quote in the speech – and recalls Mamdani responding: “‘OK, but can you make sure to quote Eugene Debs?’ And I was like, ‘Actually, he’s already on the list.’”Gerson, the son of a Texas-born mediator with strong ties to the local Democratic scene and a Belgian NYU professor, did most of his growing up in the West Village and attended the prestigious Dalton school in Manhattan. One early exposure to professional writing came when his father, Stéphane, published a book about his younger brother Owen dying in a rafting accident at age eight. “It was a very formative, very hard part of my childhood that taught me how to express myself through the written word,” said Gerson, who gave notes on early drafts.View image in fullscreenGerson got his start in politics as a high school summer intern in Mike Bloomberg’s New York mayoral administration. For university, he went to Middlebury College in Vermont, where he served as the communications director for the Middlebury College Democrats. After graduation, he worked for Manhattan congressman Jerry Nadler – whom he commends for his bravery leading the first impeachment of Donald Trump and for voting against the Iraq war – and did a two-year stint ghostwriting for New York governor Kathy Hochul.Gerson joined the Mamdani campaign in March as political director, soliciting endorsements from elected officials across the state while working with Mamdani to deepen his relationship with a panoply of constituents across the city. “A lot of that was figuring out, how do we get him into parts of Black New York? How do you have him speaking with gay and trans New Yorkers?” Those ground-level experiences wound up supplying Gerson with steady fodder for speeches that would pull straight from the communities Mamdani was courting.For the victory speech, Gerson found the opening Debs quote – “I can see the dawn of a better day for humanity,” also cribbed by Martin Luther King – inside William Safire’s speech compendium titled Lend Me Your Ears: Great Speeches in History. The quote comes from a speech made when the labor organizer and perennial Socialist party candidate was sentenced to prison in 1918 for denouncing the US’s involvement in the first world war. “That’s it!” Gerson recalls saying when he came upon it.It was in many ways inevitable that the speech would draw comparisons to Barack Obama’s 2008 presidential victory address in Chicago’s Grant park, widely regarded as one of the greatest orations in modern American history. He called it “a formative memory of what a speech can mean and how it can speak to people”, he said. “It was the only speech I really read in depth before I started writing.”Like Obama’s speechwriters, some of whom Gerson said he spoke to for advice, Gerson enjoys the benefit of writing for a deft multimedia performer. In the days leading up to election night, Gerson subbed in for Mamdani to give his voice a break. “At a certain point I would get into it and try to give a performance, and it’s crazy how different and how much better the speech is when you have somebody who just has this innate talent for knowing when to pause, knowing which syllables to emphasize. The most successful speechwriter-principal relationships are those where it’s close to a partnership, where they engage with the material really intensively and make it theirs.”Obama’s many rhetorical imitators in the Democratic party – US senator Jon Ossoff of Georgia, Pennsylvania governor Josh Shapiro – latch on to his pentecostal intonations in their public speaking. But Mamdani, who once pursued a rap career under the name Mr Cardamom and who still psyches himself up for work by playing Many Men by 50 Cent (a vocal critic of Mamdani’s plan to tax the rich), embraces the language and swagger of hip-hop. The kiss-off he delivered to rival Andrew Cuomo in his victory speech – wishing him “only the best in private life” while quoting his father, Mario, the former New York governor, without attribution (“A great New Yorker once said that while you campaign in poetry, you govern in prose”) – was a mic-drop moment straight out of a New York rap cypher.“We all know Mr Cardamom exists in the world,” Gerson said. “But when you’re in the midst of a campaign, you have to shave off parts of your life. First goes exercise, then reading, then grocery shopping – until you’re hoping you just make it to election day with laundry. Cultural consumption shrinks too, but music can still fill the liminal space.”View image in fullscreenGerson works in his own musical tastes, too. For a May rally, he drew inspiration from a song by the Chilean American electronic musician Nicolas Jaar’s band Darkside, using a Spanish lyric: si no funciona, no me diga si no funciona (translation: “if it doesn’t work, don’t tell me that it works”) – to set the tone for the rally speech Mamdani gave last month assailing Trump’s agenda. The campaign’s impulse to tie its populist ideas to musical references is a throwback to the community building and social activism that gave rise to hip-hop’s birth in the Bronx.Mamdani’s victory speech was not a universal hit, of course. CNN pundit Van Jones was among the critics who took issue with a speech he described as “sharp” and combative. “I think he missed a chance tonight to open up and bring more people into the tent,” Jones said.Gerson makes no apologies. “In response to Van Jones: this campaign and this mayoralty will absolutely be inclusive to every single New Yorker. Zohran had that final line in his long list of thank yous where he said: ‘Many of you voted for me, others of you did not and many didn’t vote at all – and I want to be the mayor for each of you.’ To New Yorkers, there’s a genuine eagerness to serve and prove that we’re going to follow through and that this is going to be a great four years.’”Mamdani and Gerson wanted New Yorkers to come away from the victory speech feeling as if they would also have an important part to play in the new administration, and that no suggestion was too small. That includes an Arabic line that made it into Gerson’s final draft – ana minkum wa ilaykum, which can translate to “I am of you and for you.” ” One of the “uncles” in Mamdani’s Astoria neighborhood pitched it to Mamdani while he was there shooting a campaign video in Arabic.“When you’re looking for inspiration, you have to look everywhere,” Gerson said. “Fortunately, we live in New York, inspiration is everywhere, and people are loud and eager to share it.” More

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      in Elections

      Trump pardons Giuliani, Meadows and others over plot to steal 2020 election

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      Rudy Giuliani and Mark Meadows, both close former political allies of Donald Trump, are among scores of people pardoned by the president over the weekend for their roles in a plot to steal the 2020 election.The maneuver is in effect symbolic, given it only applies in the federal justice system and not in state courts where Giuliani, Meadows and the others continue facing legal peril. The acts of clemency were announced in a post late on Sunday to X by US pardon attorney Ed Martin, covers 77 people said to have been the architects and agents of the scheme to install fake Republican electors in several battleground states, which would have falsely declared Trump their winner instead of the actual victor: Joe Biden.Those pardoned include Giuliani and Sidney Powell, former lawyers to Trump, and Meadows, who acted as White House chief of staff during his first term of office. Other prominent names include Jenna Ellis and John Eastman, attorneys who advised Trump during and immediately after the election that Biden won to interrupt Trump’s two terms.“Let their healing begin,” Martin said in the post, in which he thanked Trump, the attorney general, Pam Bondi, and her deputy, Todd Blanche, for “allowing me … to achieve your intent”.Martin is a staunchly conservative ally of the president said to be behind the “weaponization” of the justice department and a push to “bully, prosecute, punish and silence” Trump’s political foes and critics, including the recent indictments of the former FBI director James Comey, New York attorney general, Leticia James, and former national security adviser John Bolton.The pardons extend Trump’s efforts to rewrite the aftermath of the 2020 election and failed efforts to deny Biden the White House. On his first day back in office in January, Trump issued “full, complete and unconditional” presidential pardons for more than 1,500 people involved in the 6 January 2021 attack on Congress, in which five people died and many others, including law enforcement officers, were injured during a desperate attempt by his supporters to keep him in office.Many of those listed in Martin’s pardon document, which it specifically states “does not apply to the president of the United States”, were involved in legal cases and investigations in numerous states that Biden won, including Georgia, Arizona, Michigan, Michigan, Wisconsin and Nevada.The pardons, like those for the 6 January rioters, are “full, complete and unconditional” – and apply only in federal court, making them “largely symbolic”, according to the New York Times.Proceedings against some of the individuals are still active at state level, including in Georgia, where an election interference case against an initial 19 defendants, including Trump, has stalled due to the disqualification of the Fulton county prosecutor, Fani Willis.Ellis joined Powell and another Trump lawyer, Kenneth Chesebro, in taking a plea deal in the Georgia case in 2023. Addressing the court in tears, she admitted a felony count of aiding and abetting false statements and writings.Chesebro was disbarred in New York earlier this year for his involvement, Ellis’s Colorado law license was suspended for three years, and efforts to disbar Powell failed because a panel in Texas ruled her misdemeanor convictions in Georgia were neither serious nor intentional.Giuliani also received severe consequences as leader of the plot to keep Trump in office. He was banned from practicing law in New York and Washington DC. He was ordered to pay almost $150m to two Georgia election workers he defamed. And the former New York City mayor was also caught up in defamation trials involving two voting machine manufacturers, Dominion and Smartmatic.Meadows, meanwhile, failed to persuade the supreme court to move the Georgia election case to federal court and pleaded not guilty last year to criminal charges in Arizona, where he was among 18 indicted defendants.Trump’s proclamation, dated 7 November, described efforts to prosecute those accused of aiding his efforts to cling to power as “a grave national injustice perpetrated on the American people” and said the pardons were designed to continue “the process of national reconciliation”,The White House did not immediately respond to an email seeking comment on Monday.The Associated Press contributed to this report More