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Post by Webster on May 28, 2024 16:22:52 GMT -5
(The Guardian) Biden enlists January 6 police officers to campaign in swing states as reports of Democratic 'freakout' over poor polling emergeWith less than six months to go until the 5 November presidential election, Politico has published yet another report about Democrats being nervous about Joe Biden’s chance for re-election against Donald Trump. That the president is unpopular, and has been for year, is practically old news, but his allies have more recently been rattled by successive waves of polls showing him trailing Trump in most of the swing states he will need to win. Citing anonymous sources, Politico reports that some Democrats are in “freakout” mode over Biden’s chances, with the president facing persistent public concerns about his handling of issues as varied as inflation, immigration, and the relative unpopularity of his running mate Kamala Harris. The Biden campaign has plenty of cards up its sleeve, including reminding voters of the violence at the Capitol on January 6, and Trump’s role in instigating it. Three police officers who fought the insurrectionists will soon be hitting the road to campaign for Biden in battleground states, and warn voters that Trump would pose a threat to the country’s democracy, if he returned to the White House. Democrats' anxiety over Biden's chances rises after Trump gains fundraising edge - reportThe latest development rattling Democrats is the edge in fundraising that Donald Trump gained over Joe Biden last month, Politico reports. The former president’s fundraising last month was $25m more than Biden, Politico reports, though the Democrat maintains his edge in cash on hand. The story is otherwise full of alarming quotes from nameless Democratic insiders warning that Biden’s in a far weaker position than he should be, especially considering the stakes of this election. From one Democratic operative Politico describes as being in touch with the White House: This isn’t, “Oh my God, Mitt Romney might become president.” It’s “Oh my God, the democracy might end.”And a Democratic adviser: The list of why we “could” win is so small I don’t even need to keep the list on my phone.The response from Biden campaign spokesman Kevin Munoz: The work we do every day on the ground and on the airwaves in our battleground states — to talk about how President Biden is fighting for the middle class against the corporate greed that’s keeping prices high, and highlight Donald Trump’s anti-American campaign for revenge and retribution and abortion bans — is the work that will again secure us the White House.
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Post by Webster on May 28, 2024 16:53:18 GMT -5
(The Guardian) The Biden campaign has enlisted a trio of police officers who fought the rioters that attacked the Capitol on January 6 as campaign surrogates. Washington DC police officer Daniel Hodges and former Capitol Police officers Harry Dunn and Aquilino Gonell will make their first appearance on behalf of the campaign in Arizona, the Arizona Republic reports. “If I can tell that story a million times, I will. If I can do that, I’ll just be doing my part to save democracy,” Dunn told CNN in an interview. The former officer ran for Congress in Maryland as a Democrat, but last week lost his primary:
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Post by Webster on May 28, 2024 17:12:48 GMT -5
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Post by Webster on May 28, 2024 17:13:40 GMT -5
(The Guardian) Joe Biden and Kamala Harris will hold a joint rally in Philadelphia tomorrow, their campaign announced this morning. Biden often visits the most populous city in Pennsylvania, a swing state vital to his re-election hopes. However, campaigning there alongside his vice-president is somewhat rare, as Biden and Harris usually hold separate events. The campaign did not offer details of the rally’s venue, or attendees.
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Post by Webster on May 28, 2024 17:16:05 GMT -5
(The Guardian) Democrats plan to nominate Biden virtually to ensure access to Ohio ballot - reportThe Democratic Party has decided to virtually nominate Joe Biden prior to its scheduled convention in late August, in order to ensure the president appears on the ballot in Ohio, CBS News reports. The decision will not affect plans for the convention, which is scheduled for 19 to 22 August in Chicago, but is necessary to meet a 7 August deadline to certify Ohio’s ballots. The Buckeye State was once viewed as winnable by Democratic candidates, but has tilted towards Republicans in recent elections, and the Biden campaign is not expected to bank on carrying it this year. CBS News reports that the virtual nomination, which comes after Biden and his running mate Kamala Harris were nominated virtually in 2020 due to the Covid-19 pandemic, will be formalized at a meeting of party officials next week. Here’s more: Ohio Republican Gov. Mike DeWine has recalled state legislators for a special session this week to try to change state ballot requirements. Talks between Democrats and Republicans before the regularly scheduled session ended in Columbus failed to reach a deal. “Ohio is running out of time to get Joe Biden, the sitting president of the United States, on the ballot this fall,” DeWine said last week. “Failing to do so is simply unacceptable. This is ridiculous. This is (an) absurd situation.”
The Democrats are scheduled to hold their convention Aug. 19-22, meaning the president’s formal nomination would miss the current Ohio deadline.
To avoid any confusion and to ensure access to the Ohio ballot, DNC officials say the party’s rules and bylaws subcommittee plans to vote next Tuesday to recommend to the full body that the president and vice president be nominated virtually. Officials noted this is similar to what occurred in 2020, when Mr. Biden and Harris had to be nominated virtually after the pandemic severely curtailed the meetings of the party’s quadrennial convention. “Joe Biden will be on the ballot in Ohio and all 50 states, and Ohio Republicans agree. But when the time has come for action, they have failed to act every time, so Democrats will land this plane on our own,” DNC Chairman Jaime Harrison said in a statement. “Through a virtual roll call, we will ensure that Republicans can’t chip away at our democracy through incompetence or partisan tricks and that Ohioans can exercise their right to vote for the presidential candidate of their choice.”
A DNC official said that despite the virutal nomination, the Chicago convention “will continue to serve as an important convening event for Democrats across the country.”
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Post by Webster on May 29, 2024 16:14:35 GMT -5
(The Guardian) Biden and Harris head to Philadelphia to rally Black voters amid persistently dismal approval ratingsDays after Donald Trump appeared in New York City’s South Bronx neighborhood in an effort to build support with Black and Hispanic voters, Joe Biden and Kamala Harris will hold a joint rally in Philadelphia this afternoon to launch their own outreach effort, Black Voters for Biden-Harris, targeted at African Americans. It is the latest event by the Democratic duo aimed at re-engaging with the racial group that was crucial to their 2020 election victory, and is expected to be similarly vital to their prospects of winning re-election in November. In recent weeks, Biden has met with the plaintiffs in a landmark desegregation ruling and assailed Trump before a prominent civil rights group – all signs of a concentrated effort to ensure the allegiance of Black voters with the election less than six months away. And yet, familiar challenges for the president remain. New polling from Gallup released yesterday showed his public approval rating is at 39%, which is not the worst it has ever been, but certainly not good. Biden campaign accuses Trump of 'anti-Black agenda'With Joe Biden and Kamala Harris set to debut their outreach effort to Black voters at a joint rally in Philadelphia today, their re-election campaign accused Donald Trump of merely paying lip service to African Americans. “To no surprise, the Trump campaign has no real outreach or engagement plan to reach Black voters. Unlike our campaign, Trump believes that he does not need to put in any effort to earn the support of Black America,” the Biden-Harris campaign said in a statement that accused Trump of “running on an anti-Black agenda”. “Trump used his time in the Oval Office to make life worse for Black America, and if reelected, he will go to enormous lengths to undermine and hurt Black communities by repealing Obamacare and ripping away health care from millions of Black Americans, continue to divide the nation by emboldening white supremacists, and support policy that works to widen the racial wealth gap. And even if he did have a positive agenda for Black Americans, he doesn’t have the resources or support to tell it.”
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Post by Webster on May 29, 2024 16:15:56 GMT -5
(The Guardian) There is no reason to think that Donald Trump will perform particularly well in November in the South Bronx, a diverse and impoverished neighborhood in New York city. But Trump went there anyway last week, in a perhaps quixotic attempt to rally Black and Hispanic supporters. The Guardian’s Ed Pilkington was on the scene: Even for a man known for his bombast, Donald Trump’s foray into one of the poorest, most diverse and staunchly Democratic parts of America, New York city’s South Bronx, on Thursday night was an offensive move of breathtaking audacity.
He held his rally in the crucible of hip-hop, where 95% of the population is Black or Hispanic and where 35% live below the poverty line. Being Trump, he declared it a historic success.
“When I woke up this morning I wondered whether it will be hostile or will it be friendly. It was a lovefest!” he said towards the end of his 90-minute speech.
Just a few blocks away from Crotona Park – the location of Trump’s first campaign rally in New York state since 2016 – is the congressional district of his nemesis, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. Trump notoriously told AOC to “go back” to the country where she came from – a bold line to take with a woman born in the Bronx. Yet despite arriving in a New York borough that is home to some of his fiercest critics in the Democratic party, Trump strode onto the platform on a balmy evening as though he were returning to his own personal playground. “Right here in the Bronx, I’m thrilled to be back in the city I grew up in, the city I spent my life in,” he said.
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Post by Webster on May 29, 2024 16:31:16 GMT -5
(The Guardian) Abandon Biden, a campaign to encourage voters to reject the president for his support of Israel’s invasion of Gaza, says it will protest at his rally in Philadelphia. “We will protest Biden’s visit to Philadelphia, calling on all Americans to reject genocide. We must take this stand and ensure that genocide is never again on the ballot,” said Rabiul Chowdhury, the campaign’s co-chair. The campaign singled out recent Israeli attacks on the southern Gaza city of Rafah, which the White House yesterday said do not cross the red lines it has set on Israel’s actions.
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Post by Webster on May 29, 2024 21:32:33 GMT -5
(The Guardian) Biden tells rally 'we're going to make Donald Trump a loser again'Biden has taken the stage. “It’s good to be almost home,” the president told the crowd. “I used to live down the road a little bit,” referencing his former home in Scranton, Pennsylvania, where he grew up. “Because Black Americans voted in 2020, Kamala and I are president and vice-president of the United States. Because you voted, Donald Trump is the defeated former president,” Biden said. His next line was met with cheers from the crowd: “With your vote in 2024, we’re going to make Donald Trump a loser again.” ‘Do you remember when the pandemic hit?’Biden calls on the crowd to recount the 2020 Covid-19 pandemic when “20 million people were out of work, when businesses and schools shut down, and emergency rooms were overwhelmed. Black folks were hit harder than anyone else.” Biden took a jab at former president Trump, who he said absolved himself of responsibility for the pandemic and how it was handled. “When I came to office, I promised we’d do everything we can to get us through that pandemic. And that’s what we did. That folks, was a promise made and a promise kept.”
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Post by Webster on May 29, 2024 21:34:55 GMT -5
(The Guardian) Biden vows to put racial equality at the center of everything and have an administration “that looks like America”. He lists the things he’s done to achieve this, including: --appointing the first Black supreme court justice, Ketanji Brown Jackson --appointing more Black women to the federal circuit courts than all other presidents combined --keeping unemployment and the racial wealth gap at a record-low --cutting the gap of home appraisals between communities of color and white communities --removing lead pipes and the legacy of pollution in communities adjacent to industrial facilities, which are disproportionately inhabited by people of color --increasing access to affordable high-speed internet --protecting and expanding Obamacare
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Post by Webster on May 29, 2024 21:36:11 GMT -5
(The Guardian) Joe Biden has wrapped up his speech in Philadelphia aimed at mobilizing Black voters, where he made plain that without their support, it was unlikely that he would return to the White House after November’s election. “I’m still optimistic, but I need you,” Biden said in his address, which was delivered at private preparatory school Girard College. His one question for Black voters: “Are you with me?” The crowd stood up as they shouted back: “Yes.” As he has done in many of his speeches since the start of the year, the president singled out Donald Trump for attack, accusing him of not believing in “honesty, decency and treating people with respect”. See the moment here:
Verna Hutchinson-Toler, a 75-year-old voter from Bucks County, Pennsylvania, said that she came out in support of Biden because she’s passionate about “voter registration as a social determinant of health.” As a chaplain at the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, Hutchinson-Toler has seen patients who are the victims of gun violence, which has fueled her advocacy for gun control. “Personally I feel his track record has been amazing,” she said about Biden’s crack down on unserialized firearms known as ghost guns.
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Post by Webster on May 31, 2024 17:02:59 GMT -5
(The Guardian) Biden campaign calls Trump 'confused, desperate and defeated' after post-conviction speechJoe Biden’s re-election campaign has responded to Donald Trump’s speech in New York, calling him “unhinged” and saying he is worried only about himself. Here’s what communications director Michael Tyler had to say: America just witnessed a confused, desperate and defeated Donald Trump ramble about his own personal grievances and lie about the American justice system, leaving anyone watching with one obvious conclusion: this man cannot be president of the United States. Unhinged by his 2020 election loss and spiraling from his criminal convictions, Trump is consumed by his own thirst for revenge and retribution. He thinks this election is about him. But it’s not. It’s about the American people: lowering their costs, protecting their freedoms, defending their democracy. That’s what Joe Biden and Kamala Harris are fighting for. Donald Trump is sowing chaos, attacking the rule of law and fighting for the only thing in the world he gives a damn about: Donald Trump.
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Post by Webster on May 31, 2024 17:08:51 GMT -5
(The Guardian) Biden outlines new Israeli proposal for ceasefire in GazaJoe Biden, in a speech from the White House, moved on to the situation in the Middle East. He said his negotiators and the foreign policy intelligence community have been “relentlessly” focused for the past several months not just on a ceasefire in Gaza – which he said would “inevitably be fragile and temporary” – but on a “durable end of the war”. Biden said Israel has offered a “comprehensive new proposal” that has been transmitted by Qatar to Hamas, and that the deal is “an opportunity to prove” whether Hamas really mean it when they say they want a ceasefire. The new proposal has three phases, Biden said. The first phase would last for six weeks and include “a full and complete ceasefire, withdrawal of Israeli forces from all populated areas of Gaza”, the release of a number of hostages (including women, elderly, wounded) and the release of hundreds of Palestinian prisoners, as well as the release of American hostages. Under the first phase, Biden said, civilians would be able to return to their homes and neighbourhoods in all areas of Gaza, including in the north. Some 600 trucks carrying humanitarian aid would be delivered to Gaza every single day, and aid would be safely and effectively distributed to those who need it. During that first phase, Israel and Hamas would negotiate the arrangements to get to phase two – “a permanent end to hostilities”, Biden said. Phase two would be in exchange for the release of all remaining living hostages, including male soldiers, and that Israeli forces withdraw from Gaza, Biden said. -- As long as Hamas lives up to its commitments, a temporary ceasefire will become – in the words of the Israeli proposal – the cessation of hostilities permanently.Phase three would involve a major reconstruction plan for Gaza, and any final remains of hostages who have been killed would be returned to teir families.
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Post by Webster on Jun 4, 2024 12:56:31 GMT -5
(The Guardian) Biden savages Trump as 'convicted felon' in aftermath of convictionJoe Biden went on the attack against Donald Trump last night, with a new and potentially potent weapon: his conviction on business fraud charges. At a campaign event in New York, the president described Trump as a “convicted felon”, and said, “This guy does not deserve to be president whether or not I’m running.” The remarks comes after months of polling that showed the president trailing his predecessor in surveys of the swing states that will determine the election. But all of those were conducted before a jury found Trump guilty of falsifying business records to conceal hush-money payments ahead of the 2016 election, a historic conviction that Biden’s campaign is clearly hoping will make voters turn their backs on the ex-president. Only a few polls have been released since the Thursday’s verdict, but they contain signs that Trump’s conviction has dented his support with independents, and the so-called “double haters” – people who like neither candidate. Both groups are seen as pivotal to determining the election, and we’ll see if the trend persists in the months of campaigning to come. Campaign in 'uncharted territory' after Trump conviction, Biden saysSpeaking to donors in White Plains, New York, Joe Biden yesterday said this year’s presidential campaign would be like no other, thanks to Donald Trump’s felony conviction. “Folks – the campaign entered uncharted territory last week. For the first time in American history, a former president that is a convicted felon is now seeking the office of the presidency,” Biden said. Not since 1892 has an incumbent president faced a challenge to a second term from a former president. However, until Trump, no American president, current or former, has ever been convicted of a crime. Speaking to donors at the event hosted by HBO chief executive Richard Plepler, Biden reiterated his argument that Trump would harm America’s democracy, if re-elected. “The threat Trump poses would be greater in a second term,” Biden said, describing his predecessor as “unhinged”. “Just listen to his rantings. He wants to, in his words, be a dictator in one day,” the president added.
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Post by Webster on Jun 6, 2024 19:06:03 GMT -5
(The Guardian) Trump says 'I would have every right to go after' adversaries if re-electedDays after a New York City jury found him guilty of 34 felony charges for falsifying his business records to conceal hush-money payments made ahead of the 2016 election, Donald Trump on Wednesday said he would have the power to retaliate against Joe Biden and other political adversaries, if he returns to the presidency. “Look, when this election is over, based on what they’ve done, I would have every right to go after them, and it’s easy, because it’s Joe Biden and you see all the criminality, all of the money that’s going into the family and him, all of this money from China, from Russia, from Ukraine,” Trump said in an interview with Fox News conservative commentator Sean Hannity. Trump appears to suggest he would pursue corruption charges against Biden. House Republicans have tried for years to prove that the president has profited illicitly from his family’s overseas business dealings, but have yet to turn up proof. Last year, they began the process of impeaching Biden, but have yet to bring the charges up for a vote, in part because they have not been able to find evidence to support them. Biden campaign says Trump 'visibly rattled following his felony conviction'In response to Donald Trump’s insistence that he could “go after” Joe Biden and other political adversaries if re-elected, the Democratic president’s campaign said it indicated that the former president was “visibly rattled” by his felony conviction last week. “Tonight in prime time, America saw Donald Trump consumed by rage and visibly rattled following his felony conviction; a man who has clearly snapped and whose candidacy is becoming more dangerous by the day,” said Michael Tyler, the Biden campaign’s communications director. He continued: Donald Trump is so consumed with personal grievance that he does not care who he hurts so long as Donald Trump benefits. That’s why he sicced a violent mob on the Capitol in an attempt to overturn the 2020 election he lost; that’s why he’s pledging to rule as a dictator and calling for a bloodbath; that’s why he thinks the extreme state level abortion bans he made possible are ‘a beautiful thing to watch’. It’s why the American people voted for Joe Biden over Donald Trump to begin with and why Trump can never step foot back in the Oval Office ever again.
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