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      Bernie Sanders suggests he may support primary challengers against Manchin and Sinema

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      Bernie Sanders suggests he may support primary challengers against Manchin and SinemaProgressive Vermont senator believes ‘there’s a very good chance’ Democrats will face challenges over their filibuster stance Bernie Sanders has said he may consider supporting primary challengers against colleagues Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema, the two Democrat holdouts in debate over whether to amend the filibuster to pass voting rights legislation.The progressive Vermont senator told reporters on Tuesday that he believes “there is a very good chance” that Manchin, a West Virginia Democrat, and Sinema, a Democrat from Arizona, will face primary challenges because of their stance on the filibuster.He said home-state voters would be disappointed that the pair have refused to support changing Senate rules to overcome a Republican filibuster against major voting legislation while also balking at the massive, Biden-backed spending and social plan known as Build Back Better.When asked if he would consider backing such primary challengers, Sanders replied, “Well, yeah.”Sanders, an independent who caucuses with Senate Democrats, didn’t elaborate on his comment, but it is unusual for senators to suggest they would be willing to campaign against colleagues from their own party.Sanders’s sentiments also lay bare progressives’ growing frustrations with the more conservative senators, Manchin and Sinema, whom the left has blamed for stalling many of Biden’s top legislative priorities.Manchin and Sinema say they support the legislation but are unwilling to change Senate rules to muscle the legislation through the chamber over Republican objections. With a 50-50 split, Democrats lack the 60 votes needed to overcome the Republican filibuster.Manchin is expected to deliver a floor speech on Wednesday afternoon outlining his position on changing chamber rules to allow voting rights legislation to move forward. Yesterday he countered Sanders’s comments, saying he would not be bothered by a primary challenger.“I’ve been primaried my entire life. That would not be anything new for me,” he said Tuesday, when asked about fellow Democrats urging voters not to back him in a primary. “I’ve never run an election I wasn’t primaried. This is West Virginia, it’s rough and tumble. We’re used to that. So bring it on.”Sanders remains one of the nation’s leading progressive voices after strong Democratic presidential primary bids in 2016 and 2020 – and is still popular enough nationally to potentially affect Senate primaries around the country.Manchin and Sinema are not up for re-election until 2024, but both could face serious primary challengers then. Democratic representative Ruben Gallego of Arizona, who has sharply criticized Sinema for not supporting the voting rights legislation, has not ruled out launching a challenge against her.Manchin and Sinema are also experiencing some external pressure as they resist efforts to change the filibuster to pass voting rights legislation. Emily’s List, the progressive group that backs female candidates who support abortion rights and has deep ties to Democrats, said it would withhold its endorsement from Sinema because of her stance on filibuster reform.“Our mission can only be realized when everyone has the freedom to have their voice heard safely and freely at the ballot box,” Emily’s List’s president, Laphonza Butler, said in a statement released on Tuesday.Naral Pro-Choice America, which supports abortion rights and is also influential in top Democratic circles, released its own statement suggesting it would no longer support or endorse Manchin or Sinema because of their stances on the legislation.The voting rights legislation in question is the Freedom to Vote: John R Lewis Act, which civil rights activists say is vital to safeguarding American democracy as Republican-led states pass new restrictive voting laws. It would make election day a national holiday while ensuring access to early voting and mail-in ballots – both of which have become especially popular during the Covid-19 pandemic. The package also seeks to let the justice department intervene in states with a history of voter interference, among other changes.
      Associated Press contributed to this report
      TopicsBernie SandersDemocratsUS voting rightsUS politicsnewsReuse this content More

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      Schumer insists Senate will vote on voting rights bill ‘win, lose or draw’ – live

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      Key events

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      White House launches ‘beta’ version of website to order Covid tests

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      Trump’s attorney general Barr to publish book

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      Senate will vote on voting rights ‘win, lose or draw,’ Schumer says

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      Schumer files cloture on Democrats’ voting rights bill

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      Senate majority leader Chuck Schumer argued Democrats have an obligation to do everything possible to pass voting rights legislation, despite the high likelihood of failure because of Republican filibustering.
      “If Republicans choose to continue their filibuster of voting rights legislation, we must consider and vote on the rule changes that are appropriate and necessary to restore the Senate and make voting rights legislation possible,” Schumer said in his floor speech.

      CSPAN
      (@cspan)
      .@SenSchumer: “If Republicans choose…their filibuster of voting rights legislation we must consider and vote on the rule changes that are appropriate and necessary to restore the Senate and make voting rights legislation possible.” pic.twitter.com/gbmNQZKMS9

      January 18, 2022

      But as of now, Schumer does not have the votes necessary to change the filibuster, as Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema remain opposed to doing so.
      Because of the 50-50 split between Democrats and Republicans in the Senate, Schumer needs the support of every member of his caucus to reform the filibuster.

      4.39pm EST

      16:39

      White House launches ‘beta’ version of website to order Covid tests

      The Biden administration has launched the “beta” version of its website to order free, at-home coronavirus tests.
      The site, CovidTests.gov, includes a link to a US Postal Service form that allows Americans to request four tests to be shipped to their homes.
      White House press secretary, Jen Psaki, said the site will officially launch tomorrow morning and noted there may be some glitches until then.
      “CovidTests.gov is in the beta phase right now, which is a standard part of the process typically as it’s being kind of tested,” Psaki said at her daily briefing.
      “Every website launch, in our view, comes with risk. We can’t guarantee there won’t be a bug or two, but the best tech teams across the administration and the postal service are working hard to make this a success.”
      The Biden administration has already ordered 1bn free at-home coronavirus tests to be distributed to Americans as the country confronts the highly transmissible Omicron variant.

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      at 4.48pm EST

      4.15pm EST

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      Trump’s attorney general Barr to publish book

      Martin Pengelly

      William Barr, Donald Trump’s second attorney general and perceived hatchet man until he split from the former president over his lies about election fraud, has a book deal. More

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      'Do not celebrate. Legislate': Martin Luther King family on voting rights – video

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      The family of Martin Luther King Jr has called for the passage of a law to protect voters from racial discrimination, while the vice-president, Kamala Harris, said the right to vote in the US was ‘under assault’. As part of the annual MLK Day peace walk, the King family and more than 100 national and local civil rights groups strode across the Frederick Douglass Memorial Bridge urging the Democrats to pass the bill in the US Senate

      Harris warns voting rights ‘under assault’ as family and activists honor MLK More

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      Corporate sedition is more damaging to America than the Capitol attack | Robert Reich

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      Corporate sedition is more damaging to America than the Capitol attackRobert ReichKyrsten Sinema receives millions from business and opposes progressive priorities. Republicans who voted to overturn an election still bag big bucks. Whose side are CEOs on? Capitalism and democracy are compatible only if democracy is in the driver’s seat.The US supreme court to Americans: tough luck if you get Covid at work | Robert ReichRead moreThat’s why I took some comfort just after the attack on the Capitol when many big corporations solemnly pledged they’d no longer finance the campaigns of the 147 lawmakers who voted to overturn election results.Well, those days are over. Turns out they were over the moment the public stopped paying attention.A report published last week by Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington shows that over the past year, 717 companies and industry groups have donated more than $18m to 143 of those seditious lawmakers. Businesses that pledged to stop or pause their donations have given nearly $2.4m directly to their campaigns or political action committees (Pacs).But there’s a deeper issue here. The whole question of whether corporations do or don’t bankroll the seditionist caucus is a distraction from a much larger problem.The tsunami of money now flowing from corporations into the swamp of American politics is larger than ever. And this money – bankrolling almost all politicians and financing attacks on their opponents – is undermining American democracy as much as did the 147 seditionist members of Congress. Maybe more.The Democratic senator Kyrsten Sinema – whose vocal opposition to any change in the filibuster is on the verge of dooming voting rights – received almost $2m in campaign donations in 2021 even though she is not up for re-election until 2024. Most of it came from corporate donors outside Arizona, some of which have a history of donating largely to Republicans.Has the money influenced Sinema? You decide. Besides sandbagging voting rights, she voted down the $15 minimum wage increase, opposed tax increases on corporations and the wealthy and stalled on drug price reform – policies supported by a majority of Democratic senators as well as a majority of Arizonans.Over the last four decades, corporate Pac spending on congressional elections has more than quadrupled, even adjusting for inflation.Labor unions no longer provide a counterweight. Forty years ago, union Pacs contributed about as much as corporate Pacs. Now, corporations are outspending labor by more than three to one.According to a landmark study published in 2014 by the Princeton professor Martin Gilens and Northwestern professor Benjamin Page, the preferences of the typical American have no influence at all on legislation emerging from Congress.Gilens and Page analyzed 1,799 policy issues in detail, determining the relative influence of economic elites, business groups, mass-based interest groups and average citizens. Their conclusion: “The preferences of the average American appear to have only a minuscule, near-zero, statistically non-significant impact upon public policy.” Lawmakers mainly listen to the policy demands of big business and wealthy individuals – those with the most lobbying prowess and deepest pockets to bankroll campaigns and promote their views.It’s probably far worse now. Gilens and Page’s data came from the period 1981 to 2002: before the supreme court opened the floodgates to big money in the Citizens United case, before Super Pacs, before “dark money” and before the Wall Street bailout.The corporate return on this mountain of money has been significant. Over the last 40 years, corporate tax rates have plunged. Regulatory protections for consumers, workers and the environment have been defanged. Antitrust has become so ineffectual that many big corporations face little or no competition.Corporations have fought off safety nets and public investments that are common in other advanced nations (most recently, Build Back Better). They’ve attacked labor laws, reducing the portion of private-sector workers belonging to a union from a third 40 years ago to just over 6% now.They’ve collected hundreds of billions in federal subsidies, bailouts, loan guarantees and sole-source contracts. Corporate welfare for big pharma, big oil, big tech, big ag, the largest military contractors and biggest banks now dwarfs the amount of welfare for people.The profits of big corporations just reached a 70-year high, even during a pandemic. The ratio of CEO pay in large companies to average workers has ballooned from 20-to-1 in the 1960s, to 320-to-1 now.Meanwhile, most Americans are going nowhere. The typical worker’s wage is only a bit higher today than it was 40 years ago, when adjusted for inflation.But the biggest casualty is public trust in democracy.In 1964, just 29% of voters believed government was “run by a few big interests looking out for themselves”. By 2013, 79% of Americans believed it.Corporate donations to seditious lawmakers are nothing compared with this 40-year record of corporate sedition.A large portion of the American public has become so frustrated and cynical about democracy they are willing to believe blatant lies of a self-described strongman, and willing to support a political party that no longer believes in democracy.As I said at the outset, capitalism is compatible with democracy only if democracy is in the driver’s seat. But the absence of democracy doesn’t strengthen capitalism. It fuels despotism.The true meaning of 6 January: we must answer Trump’s neofascism with hope | Robert ReichRead moreDespotism is bad for capitalism. Despots don’t respect property rights. They don’t honor the rule of law. They are arbitrary and unpredictable. All of this harms the owners of capital. Despotism also invites civil strife and conflict, which destabilize a society and an economy.My message to every CEO in America: you need democracy, but you’re actively undermining it.It’s time for you to join the pro-democracy movement. Get solidly behind voting rights. Actively lobby for the Freedom to Vote Act and the John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act.Use your lopsidedly large power in American democracy to protect American democracy – and do it soon. Otherwise, we may lose what’s left of it.
      Robert Reich, a former US secretary of labor, is professor of public policy at the University of California at Berkeley and the author of Saving Capitalism: For the Many, Not the Few and The Common Good. His new book, The System: Who Rigged It, How We Fix It, is out now. He is a Guardian US columnist. His newsletter is at robertreich.substack.com
      TopicsUS politicsOpinionUS political financingRepublicansDemocratsUS CongressHouse of RepresentativesUS SenatecommentReuse this content More

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      Mike Pence equates voting rights protections with Capitol attack

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      Mike Pence equates voting rights protections with Capitol attackEx-vice-president says Democratic push to expand voter access and 6 January effort to overturn the election are both ‘power grabs’ Mike Pence has equated Democratic efforts to pass voting rights protections with the 6 January attack on the US Capitol, writing in a staggeringly misleading and inaccurate op-ed that both were “power grabs” which posed a threat to the US constitution.Guns, ammo … even a boat: how Oath Keepers plotted an armed coupRead moreAs vice-president to Donald Trump, Pence refused to overturn the 2020 election, rebuffing pressure to reject valid slates of electors at the Capitol on 6 January 2021.Such an effort would have amounted to a coup d’état, the rightful winner of the presidential election – Joe Biden – denied the Oval Office.Some rioters chanted “Hang Mike Pence” as they roamed the halls of Congress. Others erected a gallows outside.Fight to VoteSign up for the Guardian’s Fight to Vote newsletterBut in the Washington Post on Friday, Pence argued that Democratic proposals to expand voter access – such as requiring mail-in ballot drop boxes, loosening voter ID requirements and allowing for same-day registration and voter access – were just as unconstitutional as an attempt to upend constitutional procedure with violence.The other Democratic proposal Pence said was akin to the Capitol siege was a proposal to restore a key piece of the Voting Rights Act of 1965 that required places with a history of voting discrimination to get changes approved by the federal government before they go into effect.“Their plan to end the filibuster to allow Democrats to pass a bill nationalizing our elections would offend the founders’ intention that states conduct elections just as much as what some of our most ardent supporters would have had me do one year ago,” Pence wrote.“The notion that Congress would break the filibuster rule to pass a law equaling a wholesale takeover of elections by the federal government is inconsistent with our nation’s history and an affront to our constitution’s structure.”The characterization was inaccurate. The US constitution explicitly gives Congress a role in setting the rules for federal elections.Article I, Section IV reads: “The Times, Places and Manner of holding Elections for Senators and Representatives, shall be prescribed in each State by the Legislature thereof; but the Congress may at any time by Law make or alter such Regulations.”Pence also falsely wrote that Democratic proposals would require states to adopt “universal mail-in voting”, a term typically used to describe the process in states like Colorado and Washington that automatically mail ballots to registered voters.Legislation proposed by Democrats would require states to allow anyone who wants to vote by mail to be able to request a ballot, but would impose no requirement that states automatically send them to all voters.The former vice-president has previously downplayed the Capitol attack by saying there was too much focus on “one day in January”. In his column for the Post, he said: “Lives were lost and many were injured.”Seven people, law enforcement officers among them, died in connection with the attack. More than 100 officers were injured.More than 700 people have been charged in connection with the attack. On Thursday, 11 members of the Oath Keepers militia were charged with seditious conspiracy.Democrats charge that elections laws passed in Republican-run states since 6 January 2021 seek to restrict voting by groups liable to vote Democratic, African Americans prominent among them.Biden has spoken forcefully on the issue, saying federal voting rights protections are needed to counter such racist moves. Republicans have protested the president’s rhetoric.Republican legislators have also sought to make it easier to overturn election results, while Trump allies seek to fill key elections posts from which they would control the counting of votes in future elections.‘Breeding grounds for radicalization’: Capitol attack panel signals loss of patience with big techRead moreVoting rights bills proposed by Democrats would increase protections for election officials who have faced an unprecedented wave of harassment over the last year. They would also prevent partisan actors from removing elections officials without cause and make it easier for voters to go to court to ensure valid votes are not rejected.In short, Democrats aim to put in place legal standards to guarantee that no other vice-president is put in the position Pence was on 6 January 2021.While Biden has made a strong push in support of the voting rights legislation, its prospects look dim. Kyrsten Sinema and Joe Manchin, staunch defenders of the filibuster, the 60-vote rule required to advance most legislation in the Senate, said on Thursday they would not vote to amend the requirement.Because no Republicans support doing away with the filibuster, the Democratic voting rights bills cannot pass right now.TopicsUS voting rightsThe fight to voteMike PenceUS Capitol attacknewsReuse this content More

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      Kyrsten Sinema blocks filibuster reform as Biden continues ‘fight’ for voting rights – video

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      US president Joe Biden said he was not sure if his administration could push voting rights legislation through Congress, but he would continue fighting to change the law. ‘I don’t know if we can get it done,’ he said to reporters. ‘But I know one thing, as long as I have a breath in me … I am going to be fighting to change the way these legislatures are moving.’ Earlier, Democratic Senator Kyrsten Sinema reaffirmed she would not support any change to the filibuster rules, effectively killing her party’s hope of passing the most sweeping voting rights protections in a generation.

      Sinema says no to filibuster reform and scuttles Democrats’ voting rights hopes More

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      Sinema says no to filibuster reform and scuttles Democrats’ voting rights hopes

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      Sinema says no to filibuster reform and scuttles Democrats’ voting rights hopesArizona senator says she will not support filibuster changesSinema’s floor speech condemned by voting rights activists Kyrsten Sinema publicly and bluntly reaffirmed she would not support any change to the filibuster rules on Thursday, effectively killing her party’s hope of passing the most sweeping voting rights protections in a generation.Sinema speaks out against filibuster reform after House sends voting rights bill to Senate – liveRead moreSinema took to the Senate floor around noon on Thursday and said she would not support any changes to the filibuster, the Senate rule that requires 60 votes to advance legislation.“While I continue to support these [voting rights] bills, I will not support separate actions that worsen the underlying disease of division infecting our country,” said Sinema, a first-term Democrat from Arizona.“We must address the disease itself, the disease of division, to protect our democracy, and it cannot be achieved by one party alone. It cannot be achieved solely by the federal government. The response requires something greater and, yes, more difficult than what the Senate is discussing today.”Sinema’s speech comes at an extremely perilous moment for US democracy. Republican lawmakers in 19 states have enacted 34 new laws, according to the Brennan Center for Justice, that impose new voting restrictions. They have also passed a slew of bills that seek to inject more partisan control into election administration and the counting of votes, an unprecedented trend experts are deeply concerned about and call election subversion. Many of those measures have been passed in state legislatures on simple majority, party-line votes.For months, Sinema and fellow Democrat Joe Manchin have staunchly defended the filibuster, which stands as the major hurdle to voting rights reform. No Republicans support either the voting rights bills or changing the rules of the filibuster, so Democrats cannot do anything unless both senators are on board.Chuck Schumer, the Democratic leader in the Senate, has pledged a vote on the measure and rule changes by Monday, a public holiday to celebrate the civil rights leader Martin Luther King.The opposition is also a major blow to Joe Biden, who gave a speech in Atlanta on Tuesday calling on Democrats to support the bill. Sinema gave the speech about an hour before Biden traveled to the Capitol to meet Democrats to urge them to support rule changes.“I hope we can get this done but I’m not sure,” Biden said after his meeting with Democrats on Thursday.“Like every other major civil rights bill that came along, if we miss the first time, we can come back and try it a second time. We missed this time. We missed this time,” he added.Manchin released his own statement on Thursday afternoon confirming he would not vote to change the filibuster.“For those who believe that bipartisanship is impossible, we have proven them wrong. Ending the filibuster would be the easy way out. I cannot support such a perilous course for this nation when elected leaders are sent to Washington to unite our country by putting politics and party aside,” he said.The White House press secretary, Jen Psaki, said the White House would continue to fight for voting rights legislation, but declined to offer any specifics. “We’re gonna keep fighting until the votes are had,” she said.Civil rights leaders quickly denounced Sinema after her speech on Thursday.“History will remember Senator Sinema unkindly. While she remains stubborn in her ‘optimism’, black and brown Americans are losing their right to vote,” said Martin Luther King III, the son of the civil rights leader. “She’s siding with the legacy of Bull Connor and George Wallace instead of the legacy of my father and all those who fought to make real our democracy.”“Arizonans value leaders who can compromise and work across the aisle, but let me be clear: the filibuster is non-negotiable. Indivisibles, like myself, worked tooth-and-nail to get Sinema elected in 2018 – we made calls, registered voters and knocked on doors in the 120F weather,” said Signa Oliver, an activist with the Arizona chapter of Indivisible, a grassroots group.“We know the weight of this trifecta, and we will not sit idly by as Sinema lets our hard work and the prospect of a better country for all wither so she can be branded a bipartisan leader.”Jared Huffman, a Democratic congressman from California, tweeted: “Shame on you.”Mitch McConnell, the Republican leader in the Senate, praised Sinema’s speech as an act of “political courage” that could “save the Senate as an institution”, according to the Associated Press.For months, Democrats have championed two bills, the Freedom to Vote Act and the John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act. The former measure would overhaul federal election rules to set baseline requirements for voter access. It would require 15 days of early voting, as well as same-day and automatic registration. It also includes provisions that make it harder to remove election officials without justification, and would make it easier for voters to go to court to ensure their votes aren’t thrown out.The latter bill would require states where there is repeated evidence of recent voting discrimination to get changes approved by the federal government before they go into effect. It updates and restores a provision of the 1965 Voting Rights Act, that was struck down by the supreme court in 2013.The US House passed a mega-bill on Thursday morning that combined both of those measures into a single bill. It was a procedural move to allow the Senate to quickly hear and debate the measure.TopicsUS SenateThe fight to voteUS voting rightsDemocratsUS politicsUS CongressJoe BidennewsReuse this content More