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      Ex-NFL star Herschel Walker posts baffling video promoting US Senate run

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      Ex-NFL star Herschel Walker posts baffling video promoting US Senate runCritics seize on Build Back Better criticisms from controversial candidate nonetheless endorsed by Donald Trump Herschel Walker has Donald Trump’s endorsement in the race for US Senate in Georgia but the former NFL star may be struggling to counter fears from some Republicans that he could damage the party’s chances of taking back a seat lost in 2020, and with it the Senate itself.Twitter permanently suspends Marjorie Taylor Greene’s personal account Read moreIn December, the former University of Georgia and Dallas Cowboys running back admitted he does not have a college degree – having repeatedly said that he did.Then, as January began, Walker posted to social media a short but to some bafflingly phrased video.Under the message “a few things to think about as we start the New Year”, Walker attacked policy priorities championed by Democrats including Raphael Warnock, Georgia’s first Black senator who will defend his seat in November.“Build Back Better,” he said, referring to Joe Biden’s domestic spending plan, which targets health and social care and the climate crisis.“You know I’m always thinking: if you want to build back better, first you probably want to control the border, because you want to know who you’re building it for and why. Then you probably want to protect your military, because they’re protecting you against people in other countries that don’t like you.”He then shifted to a broader goal, popular among progressives.“Defunding the police? Bad idea. You want to fund the police so that they have better training, better equipment to protect the law of the land, because you don’t want people doing whatever they want to do.”Then he shifted back again.“Build Back Better. You probably want to become energy independent. Otherwise you’re going to depend on other countries for your livelihood. Build Back Better. You probably want something written, like law of the land, stating that all men are to be treated equal. Oh! We have the constitution. So you probably want to put people in charge who’s going to fight for the constitution.“Just thinking. God bless you.”Burgess Owens, a Republican congressman from Utah who once played safety for the New York Jets and the Oakland Raiders, said Walker “represents what the American dream is all about: hard work, strong character, and love for our great country. I am honored to endorse Herschel for Senate and look forward to working with him!”But critics said the video – and a similarly rambling Fox News appearance – was evidence of Walker’s unsuitability for office.To some, such evidence has piled up ever since Walker signaled a shift into politics. Last summer, the Associated Press said “hundreds of pages of public records tied to Walker’s business ventures and his divorce, including many not previously reported, shed new light on a turbulent personal history that could dog his Senate bid”.The documents, the AP said, “detail accusations that Walker repeatedly threatened his ex-wife’s life, exaggerated claims of financial success and alarmed business associates with unpredictable behavior”.The day Donald Trump’s narcissism killed the USFLRead moreThe AP also reported that Walker “has at times been open about his long struggle with mental illness, writing at length in a 2008 book about being diagnosed with dissociative identity disorder, once known as multiple personality disorder”.The report also quoted the Republican governor of Georgia, Brian Kemp, who said that while Walker “certainly could bring a lot of things to the table … as others have mentioned, there’s also a lot of questions out there”.In the matter of Walker touting a college degree he does not hold, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported that the false claim was made on a campaign website, “in an online biography advertising Walker’s book, at a campaign rally … and even during his introduction this year at a congressional hearing”.In a statement, Walker said: “I was majoring in criminal justice at UGA when I left to play in the USFL my junior year. After playing with the New Jersey Generals” – a team Trump owned – “I returned to Athens to complete my degree, but life and football got in the way.”TopicsRepublicansUS midterm elections 2022GeorgiaUS politicsUS SenateUS CongressUS domestic policynewsReuse this content More

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      Harry Reid obituary

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      Harry Reid obituaryVeteran Nevada senator who shepherded and protected Obamacare on its difficult passage into law During a long, combative career in US political life, Harry Reid, who has died aged 82, made his most telling contribution as Democrat majority leader in the Senate. There, in 2010, he pushed through and then vigorously defended President Barack Obama’s groundbreaking healthcare reforms.Given the huge strength of Republican feeling against “Obamacare”, the president needed a streetfighter to drive his measures through to the statute book – and Reid was the man for the job. Quietly spoken but toughened by a hard early life and years spent swimming in the shark-infested waters of Nevada politics, he fought through the deeply polarised atmosphere that surrounded Obama’s health reforms to shepherd the Affordable Care Act through the Democrat-controlled Senate.Just as importantly, he defended that landmark piece of legislation – which aimed to extend health insurance to more than 30 million uninsured people – against repeated attempts at derailment by a Republican-controlled House of Representatives. In particular, he orchestrated Senate resistance to House amendments that would have emasculated Obamacare, and in 2013 brokered a deal that ended a partial government shutdown engineered by Republicans in protest at the legislation. Obamacare aside, in Washington Reid was a centrist Democrat, and for the liberal wing of the party far less dependable than his firebrand counterpart in the House, Nancy Pelosi. He was opposed to abortion, supported the 1991 Gulf war, and at first backed George W Bush’s 2003 invasion of Iraq, although in 2007 he came out against the second conflict there. He also raised more than a few hackles when he observed that Obama had been helped in his presidential campaign because he was “light-skinned”.But Reid survived that problem, as he survived so many others on the road to his elevated position in the Senate, and Obama acknowledged the early encouragement that Reid had given to his presidential aspirations. To the Democrats, he was a usefully blunt, outspoken scrapper who was happy to tackle the Republicans head on – and was prepared to publicly call Bush a “liar” and a “loser”. Although a pragmatist, he would not cut deals with the Republican leadership on what he saw as vital issues. “I know my limitations,” he once said. “I haven’t gotten where I am by my good looks, my aesthetic ability, my great brain or my oratorical skills.” Reid’s strengths were his sheer energy and political shrewdness, honed during a long rise to the top from difficult beginnings. He was born in Searchlight, Nevada, a tiny, searingly hot former gold-mining town in the Mojave desert, in a shack that had no toilet or hot water. Until the 1950s, Searchlight was best known for a notorious brothel called the El Rey, where it was said that Reid’s mother, Inez (nee Jaynes), did the laundry. His father, Harry Sr, was a miner and an alcoholic; in 1972 he shot himself.There was no high school in Searchlight, so Reid had to stay with relatives 40 miles away in Henderson, outside Las Vegas, where he went to high school at Basic Academy. His lucky break came there in the burly shape of Mike O’Callaghan, the school’s football and boxing coach. Young Reid was tough: he boxed as a middleweight and played on the football team. “I’d rather dance than fight, but I know how to fight,” he said later.An ambitious young man, he graduated from Utah State University, where he became a Mormon. He went to Washington DC and found a job with the US Capitol police, who are charged with protecting Congress, while he worked for a law degree at George Washington University. From there he returned to Nevada to become a prosecutor and, shortly after his father’s suicide, married Landra Gould, the daughter of Jewish immigrants.He soon became involved in Democratic politics, first in Henderson and then statewide. By 1968 he was a member of the state assembly and in 1970 was asked by his high school mentor, O’Callaghan, to run with him. O’Callaghan was elected governor of the state and Reid became his lieutenant governor.In 1974 he ran for the Senate, but was narrowly beaten by Ronald Reagan’s friend Paul Laxalt. In 1975 he stood, again unsuccessfully, for mayor of Las Vegas, a city dominated by gambling, tourism and entertainment.From 1977 to 1981 he was chair of the Nevada Gaming Commission, a job that was to be the making of him. When he was offered a bribe of $12,000 by Jack Gordon, the Las Vegas gambling and prostitution operator, Reid tipped off the FBI. At the moment when Gordon produced the money, FBI agents rushed in; he was sentenced to six months in prison. In 1981, a bomb was found under Reid’s car, which he always blamed on Gordon’s heavies. After that, the more respectable elements of the US gambling industry supported Reid, although his opponents repeatedly tried to tar him with suggestions of ethical violations.In 1982 he was elected to the House of Representatives from the Las Vegas district, and served there until 1986, when he entered the Senate for the first time. He was re-elected easily in 1992, but six years later was nearly beaten in a high-spending campaign that his Republican opponent, John Ensign, a man with casino connections, freely conceded was “nasty”. Nonetheless, Reid and Ensign eventually became good friends as Nevada’s two senators.By 2004, when Reid’s time for re-election came around again, Nevada’s population had grown so fast that many of his constituents had never heard of their senior senator. So Reid raised a lot of money for a campaign to make himself known. He became the leader of the Democratic minority in the Senate in 2005 after Tom Daschle failed to be re-elected, and after the 2006 election – when the Democrats benefited from the unpopularity of the Iraq war and the mishandling of the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina – he was confirmed as the Democrats’ majority leader, serving in that role until 2015.He retired from the Senate as minority leader by not seeking re-election in 2016, following injuries in an accident with exercise equipment in his home. In 2018 he revealed that he had been diagnosed with pancreatic cancer.Reid was known in Washington for his terse manner. In a tribute to him in 2019, Obama joked: “Even when I was president, he would hang up on me.” Shortly before his death, Las Vegas’s airport was renamed after him.Reid is survived by Landra and by their four sons and one daughter. Harry Mason Reid, politician, born 2 December 1939; died 28 December 2021TopicsUS politicsNevadaUS SenateUS healthcareBarack ObamaobituariesReuse this content More

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      Harry Reid, who led Senate Democrats for 12 years, dies at 82

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      Harry Reid, who led Senate Democrats for 12 years, dies at 82Nevada senator helped to pass Obama’s Affordable Care ActReid called Trump ‘the worst president we’ve ever had’ Harry Reid, who emerged from the unforgiving political landscape of Las Vegas, Nevada, to lead the Senate Democrats for 12 turbulent years, died on Tuesday at age 82. Reid died Tuesday, “peacefully” and surrounded by friends “following a courageous, four-year battle with pancreatic cancer,” Landra Reid said of her husband.Tributes for the late Senator poured in after the news of his death, led by president Joe Biden, who called him a “great American”.A son of Searchlight, Nevada, Harry never forgot his humble roots. A boxer, he never gave up a fight. A great American, he looked at challenges and believed it was within our capacity to do good — to do right.May God bless Harry Reid, a dear friend and a giant of our history.— President Biden (@POTUS) December 29, 2021
      The Democratic Senate majority leader Chuck Schumer called Reid “one of the most amazing individuals I’ve ever met”.“He was tough-as-nails strong, but caring and compassionate, and always went out of his way quietly to help people who needed help,” Schumer said in a statement.Steve Sisolak, the governor of Nevada, said that calling Reid “a giant” failed to “fully encapsulate all he accomplished on behalf of the state of Nevada and for Nevada families. There will never be another leader quite like Senator Reid.”Ex-Senate majority leader Harry Reid on UFOs: ‘We’re at the infancy of it’Read moreFormer president Barack Obama said he’d written a letter to Reid at the request of his wife, Landra, near the end of Reid’s life. He posted the letter on Twitter, which read: “You were a great leader in the Senate, and early on you were more generous to me than I had any right to expect. I wouldn’t have been president had it not been for your encouragement and support, and I wouldn’t have got most of what I got done without your skill and determination.”“Most of all, you’ve been a good friend,” he added.When Harry Reid was nearing the end, his wife Landra asked some of us to share letters that she could read to him. In lieu of a statement, here’s what I wrote to my friend: pic.twitter.com/o6Ll6rzpAX— Barack Obama (@BarackObama) December 29, 2021
      Reid’s reputation as a quiet leader with a sometimes quick temper was reinforced by decades of hard-fought legislative wins, including the passage of Obama’s Affordable Care Act, an economic stimulus package following the 2007-08 recession and the Dodd-Frank financial reforms.But his policy legacy was marred in some eyes by his push in 2013 to alter Senate rules to make it easier to confirm Obama’s judicial nominees, a move that paved the way for Donald Trump’s controversial supreme court nominees to be confirmed by a simple majority.Reid defended the tactic to the end.“They can say what they want,” he told the New York Times Magazine in December. “We had over 100 judges that we couldn’t get approved, so I had no choice. Either Obama’s presidency would be a joke or Obama’s presidency would be one of fruition.”Reid’s sometimes defiant bluntness was forged by a childhood in Searchlight, Nevada, a desert crossroads where his father was a gold miner and his mother did laundry for the brothels. The family home had no indoor toilet, hot water or telephone and the town had no high school, so Reid boarded with relatives 50 miles away.Reid and his wife, Landra, met as students at Utah State University, where they converted to Mormonism. In the 1960s the couple moved to Washington DC, where Reid enrolled at George Washington University law school and worked six days a week on the police force patrolling the Capitol, where he would later climb the heights of political power.First, the amateur boxer had to come up through the harsh terrain of Nevada politics, defined by Las Vegas, the state’s casino interests and the presence of organized crime.At the end of her husband’s four-year stint as Nevada gaming commissioner in 1981, Landra Reid found an explosive device in the family station wagon. As Senate majority leader decades later, his chief of staff told the New Yorker, Reid still weighed conflicts by reflecting: “No one is going to kill me over this.”Multiple Republicans bore scars from tangling with Reid. During the 2012 presidential race between Obama and Mitt Romney, Reid announced on the floor of the Senate that Romney had not paid taxes in 10 years: an unfounded and ultimately debunked claim spurred by Romney’s refusal to release a full set of tax returns.Asked if he regretted the charge, Reid said: “Romney didn’t win, did he?”Trump found his way into a war of insults with Reid after the New York developer, then a candidate, criticized Hillary Clinton’s health. Reid replied that Trump was in no position to criticize because he “is 70 years old, he’s not slim and trim, he brags about eating fast food every day”. Trump then mocked Reid for an exercise accident a year earlier that had blinded the senator in one eye.In December, Reid called Trump “amoral” and “the worst president we’ve ever had”.Trump had reason to resent Reid. So well-oiled was Reid’s political machine in Nevada that the state bucked national demographic trends in 2016 to reject Trump. In 2018, voters threw out incumbent Republican senator Dean Heller.Efficacy behind the scenes became a trademark for Reid, who won loyalty from colleagues for his willingness to bestow credit and cede the limelight.“I know my limitations,” Reid told the New Yorker in 2005, the year he took leadership of the Democrats in the Senate. “I haven’t gotten where I am by my good looks, my athletic ability, my great brain, my oratorical skills.”Reid is survived by his wife, five children and 19 grandchildren. Asked in March last year what he thought of Washington since his retirement, Reid shrugged: “I just shake my head is all I can do.”Reid in May 2018 revealed he’d been diagnosed with pancreatic cancer and was undergoing treatment.Less than two weeks ago, officials and one of his sons, Rory Reid, marked the renaming of the busy Las Vegas airport as Harry Reid international airport.Agencies contributed reportingTopicsNevadaDemocratsUS SenateUS CongressUS politicsnewsReuse this content More

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      Top progressive urges Biden to focus on Build Back Better despite Manchin blow

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      Top progressive urges Biden to focus on Build Back Better despite Manchin blowJayapal calls on president to continue work on social spending plan and to use executive actions to get around senator’s rejection

      Kamala Harris charts own course as VP amid intense scrutiny
      Pramila Jayapal, a leading House progressive, has urged Joe Biden to continue focusing on his Build Back Better social spending legislation and to use executive actions as a way to work around public rejection by a key senator, Joe Manchin.Why the collapse of Biden’s Build Back Better would be a major blow to the climate fightRead moreWriting in the Washington Post, the chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus said it would soon release a plan for actions including lowering costs, protecting family healthcare and tackling the climate crisis.“The progressive caucus will continue to work toward legislation for Build Back Better, focused on keeping it as close to the agreed-upon framework as possible,” Jayapal wrote.Manchin, a centrist Democrat from West Virginia, rejected Build Back Better last Sunday. With the Senate split 50-50, his dramatic move seemed to doom the bill.It also threatened to scuttle hundreds of billions of dollars in funding for measures to meet climate goals and prompted Goldman Sachs to lower its forecasts for US economic growth.Manchin has expressed concerns about climate proposals and extensions to monthly child tax credit payments.“Taking executive action will also make clear to those who hinder Build Back Better that the White House and Democrats will deliver for Americans,” Jayapal wrote.On Fox News Sunday, the Maryland Democratic senator Ben Cardin was asked about Republican hopes, as voiced by the Senate minority leader, Mitch McConnell, that Manchin might switch parties – a move which would hand the Senate to the GOP. Manchin has said he hopes there’s still room for him in Democratic ranks.“The Democratic party is proud of having a broad tent,” Cardin said. “We have people with different views.”Cardin also claimed that under Chuck Schumer, of New York, Democrats had “been able to keep unity among all 50 of the Democratic senators”.That claim is at least questionable in current circumstances but Cardin also said: “We were able to pass the American Rescue Plan, we were able to deal with the … debt cap in our country, we were able to get a lot of things done.“There’s absolutely room in our party for Joe Manchin, Elizabeth Warren [a progressive senator from Massachusetts] and everyone in between, with different views, [and] Bernie Sanders.”Sanders, a self-described democratic socialist from Vermont, is an independent but caucuses with the Democrats. He reacted furiously to Manchin’s move last week.“We were very proud of our caucus,” Cardin insisted, “and the fact that we had diversity in our caucus, and Joe Manchin is very much welcomed in the Democratic party.”Asked about Manchin’s move against Build Back Better, Vice-President Kamala Harris told CBS’s Face the Nation: “The stakes are too high for this to be, in any way, about any specific individual.”She also said the White House was not giving up on the legislation.Republicans are united in opposition to the bill. Schumer has said the chamber will vote on a package in early 2022. The White House has said conversations with Manchin will continue. Biden has said he and Manchin are “going to get something done”.TopicsHouse of RepresentativesBiden administrationJoe BidenUS SenateUS politicsnewsReuse this content More

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      Republicans woo Joe Manchin as senator clashes with Democrats

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      Republicans woo Joe Manchin as senator clashes with DemocratsCentrist senator has rejected the idea of joining GOP but has indicated openness to being an independent For many Democrats, Joe Manchin has become an unshakeable problem. The centrist senator is at odds with other Democrats on everything from filibuster reform to climate policy, and he recently announced his opposition to the Build Back Better Act, the lynchpin of Joe Biden’s legislative agenda.But Republicans think Manchin now represents an opportunity to boost their numbers.As Democrats have leveled fierce criticism at the West Virginia senator in the past few days, Republicans have resurrected their campaign to recruit him to their party.The stakes of this charm offensive could not be higher. With the Senate split 50-50, Manchin’s party change would give Republicans the majority. If Republicans take control of the Senate, they would have the ability to block Biden’s nominees and quash Democratic bills.Speaking to the New York Times on Tuesday, the Senate minority leader, Mitch McConnell, reiterated his invitiation to Manchin to join the Republican caucus. “Obviously we would love to have him on our team,” McConnell said. “I think he’d be more comfortable.”Why the collapse of Biden’s Build Back Better would be a major blow to the climate fightRead moreThe Republican senator John Cornyn said he also texted Manchin on Tuesday to tell him: “Joe, if they don’t want you we do.”Cornyn told the NBC affiliate KXAN that he had not heard back from Manchin, but he said a change in Senate control would be “the greatest Christmas gift I can think of”.Manchin has not given any indication that he is seriously considering switching parties. In a Monday interview with West Virginia Radio, Manchin said he believed there was still room in the Democratic party for someone with his views.“I would like to hope that there are still Democrats that feel like I do,” Manchin said. “I’m socially – I’m fiscally responsible and socially compassionate.” He added: “Now, if there’s no Democrats like that, then they’ll have to push me wherever they want me.”Manchin has been even more pointed in the past when asked about his party identity. After a report emerged in October that he was seriously considering leaving the Democratic party, he dismissed the news as “bullshit”.But he acknowledged he had previously offered to change his party affiliation to “independent” if his views ever became an “embarrassment” for Biden or other Senate Democrats.“I said, me being a moderate centrist Democrat — if that causes you a problem, let me know and I’d switch to be independent,” Manchin said in October.At the time, none of Manchin’s Democratic colleagues took him up on the offer, although some may now be tempted to do so. When Manchin announced he would oppose Build Back Better, after he had already demanded major changes to the spending package to limit its size and scope, some congressional Democrats sounded ready to abandon their colleague.“It’s unfortunate that it seems we can’t trust Senator Manchin’s word,” Pramila Jayapal, the chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, said on Monday. “We’re not going to wait for one man to decide on one day that he’s with us, and on the other day that he’s not.”For McConnell, that is an opening to try to wrest back control of the Senate.“Why in the world would they want to call him a liar and try to hotbox him and embarrass him?” McConnell told the Times. “I think the message is, ‘We don’t want you around.’ Obviously that is up to Joe Manchin, but he is clearly not welcome on that side of the aisle.”TopicsJoe ManchinDemocratsRepublicansUS politicsUS SenateUS CongressfeaturesReuse this content More

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      Elizabeth Warren and Cory Booker test positive for Covid amid US Omicron surge

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      Elizabeth Warren and Cory Booker test positive for Covid amid US Omicron surge
      Massachusetts and New Jersey senators confirm they have both been vaccinated
      Fauci: Omicron ‘raging through the world’
      US senators Elizabeth Warren and Cory Booker have confirmed they have tested positive for Covid-19, as the US deals with another surge in cases and the emergence of the Omicron variant.Doug Ericksen, state senator who fought vaccine mandates, dies at 52Read moreWarren, a progressive Democrat who ran for the presidential nomination in 2020, tweeted that she was vaccinated, had received her booster shot and was experiencing mild symptoms in a breakthrough case of the virus.“Thankfully, I am only experiencing mild symptoms and am grateful for the protection provided against serious illness that comes from being vaccinated and boosted,” the Massachusetts senator wrote, using the occasion to also urge anyone not vaccinated to do so.Warren, 72, didn’t elaborate on where she might have contracted the virus but said she was regularly tested and had returned a negative result earlier this week.Her office did not respond to an email seeking comment.Booker, a Democratic senator for New Jersey who also ran for president in 2020, said in a statement on Sunday he had tested positive for Covid after feeling symptoms a day earlier.“Fortunately, my symptoms are relatively mild. I’m beyond grateful to have received two doses of vaccine and, more recently, a booster – I’m certain that without them I would be doing much worse. I encourage everyone who is eligible to get vaccinated and boosted,” he said.Warren was at the US Capitol this week along with other senators as Democrats sought to pass Joe Biden’s $1.75tn Build Back Better social and environment bill.That effort resulted first in delay and then, on Sunday, in fury, as the West Virginia senator Joe Manchin, a centrist and therefore key vote in the 50-50 chamber, said he would not support the bill.TopicsElizabeth WarrenUS politicsDemocratsUS SenateUS CongressCoronavirusnewsReuse this content More

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      White House rebukes Manchin after ‘no’ to Biden spending plan deals huge blow

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      White House rebukes Manchin after ‘no’ to Biden spending plan deals huge blow $1.75tn domestic spending plan all but dead in the waterSenator accused of ‘breach of commitment’ to presidentThe West Virginia senator Joe Manchin dealt a huge blow to Joe Biden on Sunday, saying “no” to the $1.75tn Build Back Better domestic spending plan. The White House issued a stinging rebuke in return, stoking a bitter war of words in a party sharply divided between moderates and progressives.Fauci: Omicron ‘raging through the world’ and travel increases Covid risksRead moreThe White House accused Manchin of going back on his word.“Senator Manchin’s comments this morning on Fox are at odds with his discussions this week with the president, with White House staff and with his own public utterances,” Jen Psaki, the press secretary, said in a statement.Adding to angry accusations of betrayal from leading progressives including Senator Bernie Sanders, Psaki said: “Weeks ago, Senator Manchin committed to the president, at his home in Wilmington, to support the Build Back Better framework that the president then announced. Senator Manchin pledged repeatedly to negotiate on finalising that framework ‘in good faith’.Citing work by Manchin on the proposed bill this week, Psaki said: “Senator Manchin promised to continue conversations in the days ahead, and to work with us to reach that common ground.“If his comments on Fox and written statement indicate an end to that effort, they represent a sudden and inexplicable reversal in his position, and a breach of his commitments to the president and [his] colleagues in the House and Senate.”Biden and Democrats said this week they would delay the bill until next year but the president vowed it would pass and said he would continue talking to Manchin.But on Sunday Manchin used an interview with Fox News Sunday to announce his withdrawal from such talks – a hugely provocative move in a party in which he and Kyrsten Sinema of Arizona, another centrist, have held up Biden’s agenda to huge progressive frustration.With the Senate split 50-50 and Republicans unanimously against, Manchin’s opposition means Build Back Better is all but dead in the water.Citing the cost of the plan and economic worries including inflation, the national debt and the Omicron coronavirus variant, Manchin said: “I’ve always said this … if I can’t go home and explain it to the people of West Virginia, I can’t vote for it.”“I cannot vote to continue with this piece of legislation. I just can’t. I’ve tried everything humanly possible. I can’t get there.”The host, Bret Baier, seemed surprised.“You’re done?” he asked. “This is a no?”Manchin said: “This is a no on this piece of legislation. I have tried everything I know to do.”01:04Manchin also issued a lengthy statement in which he cast the US debt as a spectre haunting all other concerns, domestic and foreign.“For five and a half months,” he said, “I have worked as diligently as possible, meeting with President Biden, [Senate] majority leader [Chuck] Schumer, [House] Speaker [Nancy] Pelosi and my colleagues on every end of the political spectrum to determine the best path forward despite my serious reservations.“I have made my concerns clear through public statements, op-eds and private conversations. My concerns have only increased as the pandemic surges, inflation rises and geopolitical uncertainty increases.“… Despite my best efforts, I cannot explain the sweeping Build Back Better act in West Virginia and I cannot vote to move forward on this mammoth piece of legislation.”Manchin cited a report by the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office which said that if the bill’s spending increases and tax cuts became permanent, $3tn would be added to its cost. Democrats criticised the report, which Republicans requested.Psaki rejected each claim in Manchin’s statement, and said: “Just as Senator Manchin reversed his position on Build Back Better this morning, we will continue to press him to see if he will reverse his position yet again, to honor his prior commitments and be true to his word.”On CNN’s State of the Union, Sanders listed Build Back Better provisions including investment to combat the climate crisis and improve health and social care.Republicans are shamelessly working to subvert democracy. Are Democrats paying attention? Read more“I’ve been to West Virginia,” he said. “And it’s a great state, beautiful, but it is a state that is struggling.“[Manchin] is going to have to tell the people of West Virginia why he’s rejecting what the scientists, the world is telling us, that we have to act boldly and transform our energy system to protect future generations from the devastation of climate change.“… I hope that we will bring a strong bill to the floor of the Senate and that Joe Manchin should explain to the people of West Virginia why he doesn’t have the guts to stand up to the powerful special interests.“… If he doesn’t have the courage to do the right thing for the working families of West Virginia in America, let him stand up and tell the whole world.”Analysts would counter that Manchin is the only Democrat in major office in a state which voted solidly for Donald Trump, cuts his cloth accordingly and could easily switch allegiance, putting the Senate back in Republican hands.In his statement, Manchin echoed Republican claims that Build Back Better is “socialist” in intent, saying: “My Democratic colleagues in Washington are determined to dramatically reshape our society.”Sanders, a self-identified democratic socialist, promised to make Manchin’s stance an election issue, saying: “I think … that right up to the 2022 election [we ask]: ‘Which party is prepared to do the right thing for the elderly, for the children?’“By the way, we talk about kids, I want everybody out there to know if Manchin votes no, those $300 tax credits that have gone a long way to reducing childhood poverty in America? They’re gone. That’s all. We cut childhood poverty by 40%, an extraordinary accomplishment. Manchin doesn’t want to do that.“Tell that to the struggling families of West Virginia.”In the 50-50 Senate, Manchin has gained huge power. He voted for coronavirus relief and a bipartisan infrastructure bill, big-ticket spending items. But he has opposed reform to the filibuster, the rule that requires a supermajority for most legislation, even in answer to Republican moves to restrict voting among Democrats.How a reboot of Trump’s Remain in Mexico plan isn’t the solution migrants are hoping forRead moreThe infrastructure bill was “decoupled” from Build Back Better to ensure passage through the Senate. Ayanna Pressley of Massachusetts, one of six House progressives who voted no on infrastructure despite assurances from Biden that he would get all senators on board for Build Back Better, refused to blame the president for Sunday’s disaster.“My lack and deficit of trust was about Senator Manchin,” she told CNN. “He’s continued to move the goalposts. He has never negotiated in good faith, and he is obstructing the president’s agenda, 85% of which is still left on the table. And in obstructing the president’s agenda, he is obstructing the people’s agenda.”Pressley was asked if Build Back Better might be split into smaller bills, to attract moderate Republicans.She said: “I remain focused on keeping the pressure on Senator Manchin, the White House using the full weight of this presidency to lean on this senator to show solidarity with this Democratic party and with the American people and to stop obstructing the president’s agenda, which is the people’s agenda.“This is a mammoth bill to address. Let’s get it done.”TopicsJoe ManchinBiden administrationJoe BidenDemocratsUS politicsUS SenateUS CongressnewsReuse this content More

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      Rahm Emanuel leads confirmed Biden nominees in late-night logjam break

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      Rahm Emanuel leads confirmed Biden nominees in late-night logjam breakEx-Obama chief of staff will go to Japan after deal for vote on Russia pipeline sanctions ends Republican Senate resistance The former Obama White House chief of staff and Chicago mayor Rahm Emanuel was among more than 30 ambassadors and other Biden nominees confirmed by the Senate early on Saturday. Trump condemned by Anti-Defamation League chief for antisemitic tropesRead moreThe Democratic leader, Chuck Schumer, broke a Republican-stoked logjam by agreeing to schedule a vote on sanctions on the company behind the Nord Stream 2 pipeline that will deliver natural gas from Russia to Germany.With many senators anxious to go home for the holidays, Schumer threatened to keep the Senate in for as long as it took to break a logjam on a number of diplomatic and national security nominees.Emanuel was confirmed to serve as ambassador to Japan by a vote of 48-21. Nominees to be ambassadors to Spain, Vietnam and Somalia were among those confirmed by voice vote after an agreement was reached to vote on Nord Stream 2 sanctions before 14 January.The confirmation process has proved to be frustrating for new administrations regardless of party. While gridlock isn’t new, the struggle is getting worse.Democrats have voiced concerns about holds Republican senators placed on nominees in order to raise objections about foreign policy matters that had little to do with the nominees in question. Holds do not block confirmation but they do require the Senate to undertake hours of debate.Positions requiring confirmation can go unfilled for months even when the nominations are approved in committee with the support of both parties.Biden officials acknowledge the president will end his year with significantly more vacancies than recent predecessors and that the slowdown of ambassadorial and other national security picks has had an impact on relations overseas.Ted Cruz, of Texas, held up dozens of nominees at state and treasury, over objections to the waiving of sanctions targeting the Nord Stream AG firm overseeing the pipeline project. The administration said it opposed the project but viewed it is a fait accompli. It also said trying to stop it would harm relations with Germany.Critics on the both sides of the aisle have raised concerns that the pipeline will threaten European energy security by increasing reliance on Russian gas and allowing Russia to exert political pressure on vulnerable nations, particularly Ukraine.Earlier in the week, Schumer demanded that Cruz lift all of his holds on nominees at the two departments as well as the US Agency for International Development, as part of any agreement on a Nord Stream 2 sanctions. Cruz said he was willing to lift holds on 16. The two sides traded offers on Friday.“I think there ought to be a reasonable middle ground solution,” Cruz said.“Let’s face it. There is little to celebrate when it comes to nominations in the Senate,“ said Senator Bob Menendez, chairman of the foreign relations committee.The New Jersey Democrat blamed Republicans for “straining the system to the breaking point” and depriving Biden of a full national security team, “leaving our nation weakened”.“Something’s going to happen in one of these places and we will not be there to ultimately have someone to promote our interests and to protect ourselves,” he said.Roy Blunt, a Missouri Republican, said some of the gridlock stemmed back to four years ago when Democrats, under Schumer, tried to stop many of Donald Trump’s nominees being confirmed in a timely manner.“Senator Schumer doesn’t have anything close to clean hands here,” Blunt said.Emanuel, also a former member of the House, was backed for the post in Tokyo at a time when Washington is looking to Asian allies to help push back against China.Detractors said they would not back him because of the shooting when he was mayor of Chicago of 17-year-old Laquan McDonald, who died when a police officer, Jason Van Dyke, fired multiple times.Emanuel’s handling of the case was criticized, especially as video was not released for more than a year. Van Dyke was convicted of second-degree murder and jailed. Four officers were fired.Biden nominated Emanuel in August. At his confirmation hearing in October, Emanuel said he thought about McDonald every day and that, as mayor, he was responsible and accountable.Eight Republicans voted with a majority of Democrats to confirm Emanuel. Three Democrats voted no: Ed Markey and Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, and Jeff Merkley of Oregon.TopicsBiden administrationUS foreign policyUS national securityRahm EmanuelUS politicsAsia PacificJapannewsReuse this content More