Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis wasted no time in attacking former President Donald Trump in Wednesday night’s Republican debate, calling Trump out for refusing to participate in the event.
The debate had barely begun when DeSantis used his first opportunity to speak to take a shot at the former president.
“Donald Trump is missing in action,” said the Florida Republican. “He should be on this stage tonight. He owes it to you to defend his record where they added $7.8 trillion to the debt that set the stage for the inflation that we have.”
His comments drew applause from the audience.
DeSantis’ zing is a shift from the way he usually tiptoes around the subject of Trump. For months, he routinely defended Trump ― as Trump attacked him.
The former president may not have been onstage for Wednesday’s debate, but he looms over everything. He remains the party’s standard-bearer despite being impeached twice and currently facing four separate indictments.
As the GOP debate continued, DeSantis’ super PAC blasted out an email taking another swipe at Trump, suggesting he’s scared to face DeSantis.
“Trump Is Too Weak and Too Afraid to Debate Ron DeSantis,” the email from Never Back Down reads.
“Trump attacks DeSantis daily via email and social media – but he’s too afraid to do it in person on the debate stage because he knows he can’t defend his record on issues like COVID and Fauci, spending and debt, and draining the swamp,” the email reads.
“Trump used to mock Democrats who were too afraid to face their opponents on the debate stage,” it continues. “Now it’s Trump who is too afraid to debate.”
2024 GOP presidential hopeful Mike Pence on Monday called out his former boss Donald Trump over the latter’s decision to skip next week’s Republican primary debate in California.
Trump will instead reportedly host a rally with striking autoworkers in Detroit, seizing on an opportunity to gather further support for his presidential bid.
But Pence told CBS News the former president’s intention to stay out of yet another primary debate is a “missed opportunity” for him to show Republicans his policy priorities.
“I think it’s a missed opportunity for Donald Trump and I think it’s a missed opportunity for Republican voters,” Pence told CBS’s Robert Costa. “Look, this country is in a lot of trouble. Joe Biden has weakened America at home and abroad and I think the former president, just like all the rest of us vying for the Republican nomination, owe it to the American people to express what our agenda will be for turning this country around.”
The former vice president said Trump isn’t committed to pushing a conservative agenda this time around, pointing to some of his recent comments that strict abortion bans are a losing strategy.
“I’m pro-life, I don’t apologize for it but Donald Trump even this last weekend said that a heartbeat bill that passed in Florida was a terrible mistake and even blamed losses in the ’22 midterm elections on the fact that we overturned Roe v. Wade,” Pence said.
Trump told NBC’s “Meet the Press” in an interview broadcast Sunday that the six-week abortion ban that 2024 GOP presidential hopeful and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis signed was a “terrible mistake” — comments that drew heat from several Republicans. Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds (R) said, “It’s never a ‘terrible thing’ to protect innocent life” without referring to Trump by name.
Despite this, Trump remains the runaway favorite for the race with over 56% of those surveyed, according to an average of GOP primary polls compiled by FiveThirtyEight.
Instead of debating his GOP opponents next week, Trump is planning a 500-person rally in Detroit with autoworkers and other members of building trade unions who aren’t on strike but who generally lean more conservative.
Trump also skipped the first Republican primary debate in Milwaukee last month, saying his commanding lead in the race meant he had no reason to show up and prop up his opponents. He instead appeared in a pretaped interview with Tucker Carlson that ran on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter, while the debate was underway.
The upcoming GOP debate is scheduled for next Wednesday and will be hosted by Fox Business and Univision in Simi Valley.
So far, six candidates have qualified to appear on the stage, according to Axios. This includes Pence, DeSantis, entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy, former United Nations Ambassador Nikki Haley, former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie and Sen. Tim Scott (S.C.).
Musician Eric Clapton helped raise money at a fundraiser for fellow vaccine critic Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s 2024 campaign for the Democratic presidential primary ticket on Monday.
The Rock and Roll Hall of Famer entertained Kennedy and donors at a private home in Los Angeles’ posh Brentwood neighborhood where tickets began at $3,300 and went up to $6,600 for some face time with Kennedy, according to TMZ.
After the event, RFK Jr.’s campaign said it had raised a combined $2.2 million for the Democratic long shot’s campaign and its independent PAC.
Kennedy, the son of assassinated presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Sr., celebrated Clapton as a figure of unity at the backyard concert.
In a statement on his website, he thanked The Yardbirds rocker “for bringing his musical artistry and rebellious spirit to my gathering.”
“Eric sings from the depths of the human condition,” he wrote. “If he sees in me the possibility of bringing unity to our country, it is only possible because artists like him invoke a buried faith in the limitless power of human beings to overcome any obstacle.”
Eric Clapton performed at a fundraiser for Democratic presidential primary candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. on Monday.
Team Kennedy, Kennedy24.com
Though neither Kennedy’s call for bipartisanship nor Clapton’s performance mentioned vaccines, both men are outspoken critics of coronavirus shots.
In 2020, Clapton collaborated with singer Van Morrison, another open vaccine skeptic, on the anti-lockdown song “Stand and Deliver,” in which they compared COVID safety protocols to slavery.
Kennedy has spent the last two decades peddling widely debunked disinformationabout vaccines, which he has claimed cause autism, allergies, cancer and other ailments in children.
The activist-turned-politician was banned from Instagram for spreading COVID misinformation in 2021, and this July, he called himself “the first person censored by the Biden administration” when Republicans invited him to testify before the House Judiciary Committee’s Subcommittee on the Weaponization of the Federal Government.
While Kennedy is polling far behind President Joe Biden in the race for the Democratic presidential nomination, his numbers are not insignificant.
According to a HarrisX/Harris poll sponsored by the Harvard University Center for American Political Studies released last week, Kennedy trails Biden 15% to 60%.
Earlier this summer, American Values 2024, the political action committee arm of Kennedy’s campaign, reported raising $16 million in June and July.
Meanwhile, Biden raised $72 million for his reelection bid between his April campaign announcement and the end of the second fiscal quarter in June.
RYE, N.H. — As Robert F. Kennedy Jr. tries to unseat President Joe Biden in the 2024 Democratic primaries, the anti-vaccine conspiracy theorist is finding support from an unlikely source: Republicans.
Kennedy has sat down for an extended interview with former Fox News host Tucker Carlson. He has hired Republicans for his campaign, including a sitting member of the New Hampshire legislature. His long shot bid to defeat an incumbent from his own party is a frequent topic of glee on conservative talk radio.
And on Wednesday night, Scott Brown, a former Republican senator from Massachusetts, hosted Kennedy for one of his “No BS” barbecues — making him the first non-Republican afforded that privilege.
“It’s an honor,” Brown said as he introduced Kennedy to an overflow crowd of some 500.
His invitation raised eyebrows in both parties.
“I have no idea why Scott Brown as a Republican would be hosting a Democrat,” said Steve Duprey, a former Republican National Committee member from New Hampshire. “Is it just an attempt to bolster Kennedy and hurt Biden? Who knows.”
The New Hampshire Democratic Party chair said that’s the obvious reason Republicans are supporting Kennedy, and that Kennedy is happy to take their help.
“In my many decades of experience with New Hampshire primaries, I’ve never seen a Democratic candidate chase after registered Republicans this hard,” Ray Buckley told HuffPost. “The truth is that RFK is anti-vax, pro-conspiracy theory, and this campaign is bankrolled by a Trump donor. None of that aligns with the Democratic Party. Seems like he’s running in the wrong primary.”
Brown, who hosted his political gatherings for GOP candidates in 2016 and now again in this election cycle, said people deserved a chance to hear Kennedy’s views.
“If somebody wants to speak to voters in New Hampshire, they should have a place to do it,” he told HuffPost, adding that he was not just trying to weaken Biden to make it easier for a Republican to beat him. “I have a relationship with the Kennedy family, obviously, going back to long before I was a U.S. senator … If he wants to come, I’m happy to have him.”
Democratic presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. appears at former Republican Sen. Scott Brown’s “No BS” barbecue campaign gathering in New Hampshire on Wednesday night.
Scott, though, opened up the question-and-answer part of Kennedy’s appearance by asking him if he would run as an independent if the Democratic National Committee “jammed” him by making it difficult for him to win delegates for the nomination. Such a move could hurt Biden in the general election by siphoning off Democratic votes.
“If they jam me, I’m going to look at every option,” Kennedy said, to applause.
Kennedy, who is 69, the son of an assassinated presidential candidate and the nephew of an assassinated president, saw a brief surge in the polls when he announced his candidacy this spring. Since then, though, his numbers have fallen dramatically, and he is now more popular with Republican voters than he is with Democrats.
Indeed, on a number of issues, Kennedy is far more in line with the Trump wing of the Republican Party than he is with the Democratic Party.
Kennedy has said he opposes U.S. support for Ukraine, which continues to fight Russia’s invasion that began in early 2022. That coincides with most supporters of Donald Trump, who after Vladimir Putin launched his attack on Ukraine, called the Russian dictator a “genius” for having done so.
Kennedy said in a recent interview that he supports a nationwide abortion ban — although he soon afterward released a statement saying that he did not.
And closest to the hearts of many “MAGA” Republicans, Kennedy has for decades been an opponent of childhood vaccines, and of late, has been a vocal critic of the COVID-19 vaccines. More recently, he claimed that the disease was engineered to be less lethal to Chinese and Jewish people.
His view on vaccines was one of the things that Karen McLaughlin, 52, said she liked about Kennedy. The two-time Trump voter drove an hour through the rain from Nashua to hear him in person. “He’s the only Democrat I’d consider,” she said as she waited in the line to be “wanded” by the Kennedy campaign’s private security.
“So far, I like what I hear,” said Mike Sears, who is 54 and also a two-time Trump voter, as he waited in the magnetometer line outside the farmhouse Brown uses for his political meet-and-greets.
The pro-Trump nature of much of the audience became clear when Kennedy began his remarks by pointing out all the things that Americans have in common, such as the desire for a good education and health care.
“Drain the swamp!” shouted out a voice from the front rows, repeating a favorite Trump slogan.
Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) on Tuesday took an apparent dig at President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump over their ages, saying the role of commander in chief “is not a job for someone that’s 80.”
Biden, the Democratic incumbent, would be 86 by the end of a potential second term, while Trump would be 82 by that time.
In a new interview, DeSantis said age is an “absolutely legitimate concern” for voters as we head into the 2024 presidential election cycle.
“The presidency is not a job for someone that’s 80 years old,” DeSantis told “CBS Evening News.”
DeSantis explained the position requires someone who can perform at 100%.
“We need an energetic president,” he said.
The Florida Republican added that he believes the Founding Fathers would have revisited the issue had they known of the aging country’s leadership and placed an age limit on many of those high-level positions within the government.
“I think Americans — if Biden’s the Democrat nominee, I’m the Republican nominee — I think there’s going to be a lot of Americans that are going to want to see a generational passing of the torch,” he said.
DeSantis, 44, though, has so far failed to garner momentum nationally and in the Republican primary where he is trailing Trump, the GOP front-runner, by nearly 40 percentage points in an average of national polls compiled by FiveThirtyEight.
Still, while Biden has sought to embrace his age, even making jokes about it during appearances across the country, it remains an area of concern for Americans.
In a Wall Street Journal poll conducted last month, 73% of respondents said Biden is too old to run for reelection. Only 47% of respondents said Trump, who is just three years younger than Biden, is too old to launch a White House bid.
But Democrats have continued to stand behind Biden.
California Gov. Gavin Newsom (D), who was thought to have White House ambitions, dismissed those suggestions.
“The train has left the station,” Newsom told The New York Times. “We’re all in. Stop talking. He’s not going anywhere. It’s time for all of us to get on the train and buck up.”
Former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), 83, who has announced she will seek reelection to her House seat next year, has also defended Biden despite the concerns about his age, predicting he will serve another term.
“You’ll see 15 months from now Joe Biden reelected as president of the United States with great pride,” she said.
Bash provided a stern fact check for Ramaswamy on Sunday morning’s “State of the Union,” when she tried to get the political newcomer to defend his comments about the lawmaker, who became the first black woman to represent her state in Congress when she was elected in 2018.
“You know, I’m sure, the KKK was responsible for more than a century’s worth of horrific lynchings, rapes, murders of Black people,” she said. “How, in any way, are the views you’re talking about comparable to the views and atrocities committed by the KKK?”
On Friday, Ramaswamy lashed out at Pressley over 2019 remarks in which she said the Democratic Party doesn’t “need any more brown faces that don’t want to be a brown voice.”
Republican presidential hopeful Vivek Ramaswamy, a businessman, speaks at an event in St. Clair Shores, Michigan, earlier this month. On Friday, he compared Democratic Rep. Ayanna Pressley to one of the “modern grand wizards of the modern KKK.”
Paul Sancya via Associated Press
Ramaswamy tried to rewrite his comments, telling Bash he only said Ku Klux Klan leaders would be “proud” of Pressley.
After Bash reminded Ramaswamy he was misquoting himself, the former biotech businessman tried to link Pressley’s words to the “spirit” of the white supremacist terrorist organization.
“I think it is the same spirit to say that I can look at you and based on just your skin color, that I know something about the content of your character, that I know something about the content of the viewpoints you’re allowed to express,” he said.
“For Ayanna Pressley to tell me that because of my skin color I can’t express my views, that is wrong. It is divisive. It is driving hate in this country. This is dividing our country to the breaking point,” he added.
While he eventually agreed that the KKK’s reign of terror was “obviously wrong,” Ramaswamy called for an “open and honest discussion” of race, claiming there is “a gap between what people will say in private today and what they will say in public.”
“I think we need to have real, open, honest, raw conversation as Americans,” he said. “That is our path to national unity. And there are many Americans today who are deeply frustrated by the new culture of anti-racism, that’s really racism in new clothing, and we need to have that debate in the open.”
Pressley’s team responded to Ramaswamy in a fundraising email on Saturday, writing, “We typically don’t engage in these bad-faith attacks but yesterday a line was crossed.”
“A GOP candidate referred to Ayanna as ‘a modern grand wizard of the KKK’ because she speaks out against racial injustice,” it went on. “This is backwards and harmful, but that is the point.”
Political candidates are already raising money off of Donald Trump’s mug shot, an early indicator of how the stunning image of a former president getting arrested is being used in an attempt to enrich campaigns.
Trump made the seemingly unprecedented choice to use his own mug shot for digital fundraising after his arrest Thursday on charges that he tried to subvert the 2020 presidential election results in Georgia. In his first tweet since Jan. 8, 2021, the former president blasted out the photo with a link to his website, where supporters are asked to “make a contribution to evict Crooked Joe Biden from the White House and SAVE America during this dark chapter in our nation’s history.”
Trump’s campaign plastered the mug shot on beer koozies, mugs and T-shirts that say, “NEVER SURRENDER!”
Trump’s mug shot, the first resulting from his many legal troubles, also appeared Friday in a fundraising plea from Sen. Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.) that promises to direct “all defense pledges” to Trump’s campaign, despite the fine print stating that her joint-fundraising account gets to keep $99 of every $100 raised — a division of fundraising spoils that isn’t uncommon. Blackburn’s campaign did not respond to a request for comment about the fundraising tactic.
Democrats, however, may end up using the image just as much or more than Republicans to argue that Trump’s four criminal indictments make him unfit for office.
“Both parties are going to use Trump’s mug shot to raise money,” Mike Nellis, the founder of Authentic, a Democrat-focused digital marketing and fundraising agency, told HuffPost. “It’s catnip for online donors, for both the left and the right. No doubt about it.”
The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, the fundraising arm of House Democrats, used the mug shot Friday in a fundraising appeal with the subject “Donald Trump ARRESTED” from a sender labeled “BREAKING NEWS.” (If you’re lucky enough not to be on any of these lists, then know the over-the-top nature of political fundraising emails is nothing new.)
“Both parties are going to use Trump’s mug shot to raise money. It’s catnip for online donors, for both the left and the right.”
– Mike Nellis, a digital fundraiser for Democrats
A representative with the DCCC told HuffPost that Democrats have been fundraising off of Trump for ages, often with good results. Both sides have successfully monetized Trump’s earlier indictments and impeachments.
But given the fierce competition for online donors during the slow end-of-summer weeks and the uniquely evocative nature of Trump’s mug shot, there’s likely to be an onslaught of new appeals from across the political spectrum.
“Both sides have incentive to keep using it in fundraising appeals,” said Jake Sticka, a partner at Rising Tide Interactive and digital advertising consultant for Democrats. “On the right, it conjures up the resentments that Trump has long trafficked in that were the bedrock of a lot of his previous appeals,” he added, referencing Trump’s penchant for proclaiming himself the victim. “I think it plays right into their general fundraising strategy.”
And for Democrats, “it does a lot to crystallize the criminality that folks see in the former president,” he said.
“It’s an iconic photo that voters should prepare to see quite a bit over the next 18 months,” Sticka added. “To the extent that in a year from now we’re going to be talking about Trump’s crimes, no photo does a better job of succinctly communicating that in a visual fashion.”
Asked whether they will advise clients to use the image, both Nellis and Sticka said it depends on the specific client and their message. “For somebody who’s running in a more conservative district, I’m unlikely to recommend using it,” Nellis said.
Sticka said Democrats should avoid the temptation to “respond to every little thing that Trump says.”
Despite Trump’s liberal use of his own image to bolster his presidential campaign, Trump adviser Chris LaCivita threatened others against doing the same, even though it’s very unlikely the Trump campaign would have legal grounds to prevent it.
🚨🚨🚨🚨🚨🚨🚨🚨🚨🚨🚨 If you are a campaign, PAC , scammer and you try raising money off the mugshot of @realDonaldTrump and you have not received prior permission …WE ARE COMING AFTER YOU you will NOT SCAM DONORS
“If you are a campaign, PAC, scammer and you try raising money off the mug shot of @realDonaldTrump and you have not received prior permission … WE ARE COMING AFTER YOU you will NOT SCAM DONORS,” tweeted LaCivita, whose boss has done far sketchier things to bring in money.
Trump’s campaign website features a “Personal Note from President Donald J. Trump” beneath his conspicuously placed mug shot: “Today, at the notoriously violent jail in Fulton County, Georgia, I was ARRESTED despite having committed NO CRIME,” it reads, before asking donors to contribute in increments of up to $3,300 — the maximum individual donors are allowed to give to a single campaign.
“I was pretty disgusted at Chris Christie and his racist comment towards Vivek Ramaswamy,” Greene said during a discussion on Right Side Broadcasting Network at the event, hosted by Fox News, in Milwaukee. “He compared him with Obama. I honestly thought that was pretty racist.”
Christie, the former governor of New Jersey, called out his rival on stage after the entrepreneur basically recycled a line used by former President Barack Obama.
Greene: I was pretty disgusted by Chris Christie and his racist comment towards Vivek Ramaswamy… He compared him to Obama. I thought that was pretty racist pic.twitter.com/iz41OgJVqh
“Who the heck is this skinny guy with a funny last name and what the heck is he doing in the middle of this debate stage?” Ramaswamy had said.
Obama famously called himself a “a skinny kid with a funny name who believes that America has a place for him, too,” during the 2004 Democratic National Convention keynote speech when he was running for the U.S. Senate.
Christie pointed that out, saying: “I’ve had enough already tonight of a guy who sounds like ChatGPT.”
“The last person in one of these debates … who stood in the middle of the stage and said, ‘What’s a skinny guy with an odd last name doing up here?’ was Barack Obama,” Christie said. “And I’m afraid we’re dealing with the same type of amateur.”
Greene attended the debate as a surrogate for Donald Trump, who was absent.
Ramaswamy has been loudly pro-Trump on the campaign trail and repeatedly defended him at Wednesday’s event. Christie, on the other hand, was the former president’s most vocal critic on the stage.
Greene apparently wasn’t fazed about actual racism and bigotry when she spoke last year at the America First Political Action Conference in Orlando, Florida, organized by prominent white nationalist Nick Fuentes; when she told two Muslim colleagues in Congress to “go back to the Middle East”; when she falsely claimed Obama is a Muslim and “opened up our borders to an invasion by Muslims,”; and when she told supporters that undocumented immigrants are “replacing your jobs and replacing your kids in school and, coming from all over the world, they’re also replacing your culture.”
In a New York Times opinion piece, Sununu touted his status as the “governor of the first-in-the-nation primary state” and said he wanted to narrow the field to unite voters away from the former president and endorse “the best alternative to Trump.”
Sununu wrote that a debate victory for the participants on Wednesday in Milwaukee hinges on going after the former president, who is shackled by four indictments.
“To win, they must break free of Mr. Trump’s drama, step out of his shadow, go on offense, attack, and present their case. Then they need to see if they can catch fire this fall — and if they can’t, they need to step aside, because winnowing down the field of candidates is the single best chance to stop Mr. Trump,” said Sununu, a frequent critic of Trump.
“Too much is at stake for us to have wishful candidacies,” he added. “While the other Republican candidates are running to save America, Mr. Trump is running to save himself.”
Sununu complimented the “compelling stories” of Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy and Sen. Tim Scott of South Carolina but said they have to be willing to confront Trump. He praised Chris Christie’s boldness in criticizing Trump but recommended that the former New Jersey governor widen his message.
He pointed out New Hampshire’s role as a harbinger for securing the nomination ― the victor in the GOP primary there has won the nomination in each contest over the past 20 years.
“Once the voters of Iowa and New Hampshire are presented a clear alternative to Mr. Trump, his path forward darkens, and the Republican Party’s future begins to take shape,” he wrote. “The rest of the country needs to see not just that the emperor has no clothes, but that the Republican Party is able to refocus the conversation where it needs to be, on a nominee dedicated to saving America.”
Sununu has been a frequent critic of Trump. He recently said Trump drones on about his legal grievances in public instead of telling supporters how he’ll solve the country’s problems, “which is what all the other candidates are doing.”
Sununu also went after some Trump disciples who heckled former Vice President Mike Pence recently in New Hampshire. “Angry, unhinged Trump supporters? I don’t think anyone’s surprised to see it,” Sununu told CNN in an interview.
New Hampshire Gov. Chris Sununu, pictured at an NRA event in April 2023, wants to narrow the GOP field to defeat front-runner Donald Trump.
HOLLY SPRINGS, N.C. — A man who plans to run for governor in 2024 on the Libertarian ticket was arrested twice this week.
Authorities accuse Shannon Bray, 51, of assaulting his wife and threatening to kill her. He is also accused of growing marijuana inside his Holly Springs home.
On Friday, WRAL News called Bray several times with a request for comment. He did not answer.
The Wake County Libertarian party sent WRAL News a statement on Friday about Bray’s charges.
“We’re following the case closely,” the statement reads. “We believe in an individual’s right to due process and a fair trial, and will believe for the truth to be highlighted.”
Police arrested Bray and charged him with assault on a female, communicating threats and manufacturing marijuana. On Thursday, Bray was arrested for violating his domestic violence protective order.
On Thursday, Holy Springs police were contacted about violations of Bray violating his protective order obtained by his wife. Police got an arrest warrant and served it on him Thursday.
On Monday, police said Bray’s wife flagged down officers to report Bray was at the home and alert them to outstanding warrants. When officers arrived at the home, they placed Bray under arrest and were made aware of marijuana growing equipment, harvesting marijuana, and marijuana plants in and around the home.
On Sunday, police responded to the home about allegations of domestic violence. Officers did not have a basis to make an arrest. Police said…
Vice President Kamala Harris declared that she’s “worried” about voter turnout as she appeared to knock Republicans for “unapologetically” proposing and passing laws that make voting difficult.
In an interview with MSNBC host the Rev. Al Sharpton posted Saturday, Harris weighed in on whether she’s concerned about turnout especially among Black people ahead of the 2024 presidential election.
“I am always concerned about turnout, whatever election we are talking about. Because let us — in a moment where we thank everybody for what they did to turn out in 2020 — appreciate that it takes an effort to turn out to vote,” said Harris, who remarked on “obligations” of those working multiple jobs and taking care of children.
The vice president went on to explain that people who have the “most at stake” in the election are often those who are least likely to have the luxury of taking time out from their day to cast a ballot.
“I’m worried about it because I also know that there has been a lot of effort and laws that have been passed to try and make it more difficult for people to vote,” she later said.
“I mean, can you imagine, Rev? In the United States of America, we went through all these fights — the March on Washington, John Lewis, all that — and these so-called leaders who are so bold as to unapologetically propose and pass laws to make it more difficult for the American people to vote. The gall,” she added.
The “rush to restrict voting access after the 2020 election has waned somewhat this year,” the Brennan Center for Justice noted in a June report, although it still has hit “near record highs.”
There have been at least 13 restrictive voting laws enacted this year, which “surpasses the total number of restrictive laws enacted in any year in the last decade except 2021,” the center said.
“I do worry that we have to do everything we can to remind people of why it’s important and also fight against those people who are trying to make it difficult,” Harris said of voting.
Watch more of Harris’ interview with Sharpton below.
“He’s a completely self-centered, self-possessed, self-consumed, angry old man,” Christie told CBS News’ Robert Costa, who had asked him for “the truth on Trump.”
“And he doesn’t care about anyone else other than him,” the former New Jersey governor added in an interview that aired Sunday. “And if he were ever to become president again, I’ll take him at his word. He said, ‘I am your retribution.’ Well, he’s not our retribution, Bob. He will be his own retribution.”
Christie, a Trump ally turned vocal critic, said his “breaking point” was when the former president first claimed without evidence that the 2020 election had been stolen from him.
“That moment was the breaking point for me, and to me, there’s no turning back,” Christie added.
Asked about his previous support for Trump, Christie denied that he was a flip-flopper, and said there was “100% no chance” he would support Trump again.
“I’m no different today than I was when I supported him in 2016,” he said. “He’s the one who kept classified documents against the law. That lied to his lawyers and lied to the government.”
Trump is a completely self-centered, self-possessed, self consumed, angry old man, and he doesn’t care about anybody else other than himself.
If he becomes the President again, he will not be our retribution. He will be his own retribution. pic.twitter.com/239uOKtslc
Trump, who leads the Republican pack for the 2024 presidential nomination, has been criminally indicted three times this year. He was indicted in New York over an alleged hush money scheme to influence the 2016 election.
He was also charged with dozens of federal felonies over his handling of classified documents after leaving office and his alleged obstruction of the subsequent investigation. Last week, he was charged with four counts in connection to his attempt to overturn the 2020 election.
On Thursday, President Joe Biden posted a video to Twitter (now rebranded as X) as his alter-ego, “Dark Brandon.” In the short clip, Biden takes a sip from a mug, then utters: “I like my coffee dark.”
He places the mug on a table in front of him, revealing it features a “Dark Brandon” meme complete with laser beam eyes. The mugshave been for sale on Biden’s 2024 presidential campaign website since he announced his run for reelection in April.
It should be noted that the “Dark Brandon” meme is typically used by the left to celebrate Biden’s successes.
Although Biden’s brief clip doesn’t offer any more info, it just happened to be posted to Twitter on the same day as former President Donald Trump’s arraignment at a federal courthouse in Washington, D.C., for charges related to his efforts to overturn the 2020 election results.
Trump announced in November 2022 that he plans to run for president again in the 2024 election, despite his coup attempt.
Due to the timing of Biden’s “Dark Brandon” clip, many observers speculated it was a direct diss aimed at Trump and his cohorts.
People say he should make a statement about the indictments/ arraignments. This is the statement. 🤣
For those who are unfamiliar with the “Dark Brandon” meme, here’s a quick rundown free of any fiddle-faddle.
In 2021, the phrase “Let’s go, Brandon!” became shorthand among Trump supporters for aiming the F-bomb at Biden, per NPR. Then, in 2022, Trump supporters created a series of “Dark MAGA” memes that occasionally showed Trump with blue laser beams for eyes. Captions accompanying Dark MAGA memes typically call for Trump to take revenge on his political enemies.
The left quickly co-opted the “Dark MAGA” meme with the “Dark Brandon” meme, featuring Biden with red laser beam eyes, meant to represent the president’s feisty side. It is typically used by Biden supporters to tout his policy wins.
And it seems Biden’s campaign has decided to fully embrace this rascal alter ego. In April, “Dark Brandon” made an appearance at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner, and “Dark Brandon” T-shirts, mugs, hats and tote bags have been available for purchase on his reelection website.
Aja Romano, a culture reporter for Vox who’s written about the Dark Brandon meme, said Bidens’ embrace of the meme is helping him appear much cooler and more exciting.
“Biden’s embrace of the Dark Brandon meme shows not only an awareness of the meme and what it represents to many of his followers, but self-awareness of how the meme livens and rejuvenates his public persona,” Romano told NPR.
Romano added to the outlet: “Especially as he gears up for a difficult reelection, look for him to lean even more into the ‘Dark Brandon’ meme on social media as a way of galvanizing supporters online.”
Republicans and their allies are still circling the wagons around Donald Trump, the front-runner for the 2024 GOP presidential nomination, after the former president was indicted (again) on Tuesday, this time for conspiring to steal the 2020 election.
“President Trump did nothing wrong!” Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio), who voted to overturn the legitimate election results on Jan. 6, 2021, posted online.
Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.), who played a key role on Jan. 6 in supporting Trump’s effort to steal the election, called the indictment “the latest effort to stop Trump from running against Biden.”
Declaring that she would vote for Trump “even if he’s in jail,” Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.), in her usual glossomanic paranoid style, called Trump’s indictment “a communist attack on America’s first amendment to vote for who THE PEOPLE want for President.”
Did Trump really do “nothing wrong?” Is this all just an effort “to stop Trump from running against Biden”? Have the communists attacked the First Amendment right to vote? (Don’t ask about that last one.) These arguments all have the same premise: that what Trump did in the run-up to and on Jan. 6, 2021, was totally legal and fine.
Let’s take that to its logical end point.
Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) believes that Trump “did nothing wrong” when he allegedly conspired to steal the 2020 election.
Jeff Swensen via Getty Images
Let’s assume that come Nov. 5, 2024, Trump has defeated President Joe Biden to reclaim the presidency by a slim margin across a number of swing states. Biden, as it is in his right, challenges the outcome in the courts. He also invents a complicated series of lies to explain how the election was stolen from him.
Biden, in this hypothetical, has “a right, like every American, to speak publicly about the election and even to claim, falsely, that there had been outcome-determinative fraud during the election and that he had won,” to quote the indictment of Trump.
Similarly, according to Trump’s indictment, he is “also entitled to formally challenge the results of the election through lawful and appropriate means, such as by seeking recounts or audits of the popular vote in states or filing lawsuits challenging ballots and procedures.”
But what Republicans also find to be legal and fine is, apparently, if Biden then conspired to overturn the election by using those lies about election fraud to pressure elected officials and Electoral College representatives to change popular vote totals, decertify election results and submit fraudulent documents to Congress that claim the loser of the election actually won.
It would be legal, according to Republicans, for a high-profile Democrat working as a lawyer at Biden’s behest to promote false information about election fraud to, say, the Michigan state legislature in an effort to get them to certify the election for Biden even if he, hypothetically, lost the state in 2024.
“They seem to think that it would be legal and fine for Biden to pressure elected officials to change vote totals, organize phony electors and for Harris to unilaterally steal the election for Biden.”
Let’s say that Biden lost Michigan by, I don’t know, 11,779 votes. While his lawyer presented lies to the state legislature with the aim of tricking them into certifying the election for Biden, the president called up Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson, a Democrat, and presented those same lies while pressuring her to “find” exactly 11,780 votes. This is totally legal, Republicans would say, since Trump did exactly this to Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger.
And if Benson, or Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, a Democrat, didn’t go along with this, Biden could then summon the speaker of the Michigan House of Representatives to the White House to pressure them to open an investigation into invented election fraud theories. He and his lawyer could then continue to push the Michigan state legislature to investigate fraud as part of a campaign to decertify the election results. Biden’s lawyer could push the legislature to “pass a joint resolution” that says that “the election is in dispute.” After all, Trump did this to the Michigan state legislature leadership in 2020.
At the same time, if Biden lost Arizona by around 10,000 votes, both he and his lawyer could also pressure, say, Arizona Gov. Katie Hobbs, a Democrat, to refuse to certify the election. They would present all of their lies, even if they conceded that: “We don’t have the evidence, but we have lots of theories.” This would be fine, as Trump did something similar to Arizona House Speaker Rusty Bowers.
President Joe Biden could legally direct Vice President Kamala Harris to unilaterally declare him the winner of the 2024 election, even if he lost, according to the logic of Republicans mad about Trump’s indictment.
Win McNamee via Getty Images
Biden could also, through a series of lawyers and political consultants, organize electors in select states that he lost to submit false certifications to Congress claiming that he was the actual winner of the Electoral College votes in those states.
He could then tell Vice President Kamala Harris to cite these fake elector certifications as reason to not count the Electoral College votes of enough states to provide himself the victory.
Since Republicans do not believe that any of this rises to an illegal conspiracy, it would therefore be legal for Harris to do as Biden says and unilaterally declare him the winner — even though he lost.
Now, none of this is actually possible because Democrats, including Biden, and a small group of Republicans voted in 2022 to reform the Electoral Count Act to prevent the submission of phony elector slates and specify the vice president’s role as solely ceremonial. Most Republicans, however, opposed this reform. And in defending Trump today, they seem to think that it would be legal and fine for Biden to pressure elected officials to change vote totals, organize phony electors and for Harris to unilaterally steal the election for Biden.
This is the logic that Republicans defending Trump have laid out.
WASHINGTON — Sen. John Fetterman (D-Pa.) said a rematch between President Joe Biden and Donald Trump in the 2024 election in Pennsylvania would be “closer” than some might expect, though he still believes Biden holds an edge in the hypothetical contest.
The freshman Democratic senator addressed the race for the GOP nomination, Trump, and life in the Senate since his bout with depression in a rare sit-down with reporters in his congressional office on Monday.
“Donald Trump can’t beat President Biden in Pennsylvania but, assuming it will be President Trump, it’s going to be closer,” Fetterman said of the current Republican presidential front-runner.
“Trump has to perform above his ceiling,” he explained, adding that the former president is still very popular in the state. “You still see Trump signs everywhere in Pennsylvania, and you have to respect Trump’s strength.”
Trump won Pennsylvania’s 20 electoral votes in 2016 by a narrow margin but lost the state resoundingly to Biden in 2020. Democrats are looking to repeat that kind of performance next year, especially with blue-collar voters in deep-red counties.
Fetterman said no other GOP presidential candidate stands a better chance against Biden than Trump, including Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis. He cast DeSantis as extreme, citing his staunch anti-abortion stance and his focus on waging culture wars, including over transgender rights.
“There’s no way Ron DeSantis could win Pennsylvania,” the senator said. “Watching DeSantis turn into [former Wisconsin Gov. and 2016 GOP presidential candidate] Scott Walker and get liquidated by Trump’s machine, I respect Trump in terms of how formidable he would be in Pennsylvania.”
Fetterman spoke with the help of an iPad that transcribed the conversation with Capitol Hill reporters in real time, helping compensate for auditory processing difficulties caused by his stroke over a year ago.
The Pennsylvania Democrat seems to be taking his own approach to life in the Senate after being hospitalized for depression. He often eschews suits in favor of shorts and a hoodie on his way to Senate votes, though, given the warm summer months, he has traded in the hoodie for a short-sleeve, button-down shirt.
Monday’s sit-down seemed to mark a shift in Fetterman’s media strategy. Embracing conversations with reporters, both in formal settings and in more informal interactions in the Senate hallways, is something he hasn’t done much before.
Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) released a new plan on Tuesday to “rip wokeness from the military” to juice enlistment. But when confronted with data suggesting that wokeness isn’t a major factor keeping Americans from joining the armed forces, the presidential candidate claimed that most opponents of “wokeness” can’t actually define the term.
“Not everyone really knows what wokeness is,” DeSantis told CNN host Jake Tapper after Tapper told him that “wokeness” placed well below the most common reasons people have for not enlisting, which include the fear of dying or suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder. “I mean, I’ve defined it, but a lot of people who rail against wokeness can’t even define it.”
DeSantis made the comments during his first taped sit-down interview with a mainstream news outlet, an effort to broaden his base of support in his stalled presidential bid against former President Donald Trump.
The 15-minute exclusive with CNN was preempted by the news that Trump is expecting his third criminal indictment, this one related to the special counsel probe into the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol attack, according to a post that Trump shared Tuesday afternoon on Truth Social.
DeSantis didn’t take the news as an opportunity to attack Trump — instead, he defended him.
“This country is going down the road of criminalizing political differences, and I think that’s wrong,” DeSantis said before describing earlier charges brought against Trump by Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg as flimsy and politically motivated.
“Alvin Bragg stretched the statue in Manhattan to be able to try to target Donald Trump. Most people, even people on the left, acknowledge if that wasn’t Trump, that case would not have likely been brought against a normal civilian,” DeSantis said.
Trump has not been as reluctant to go after DeSantis. Earlier this month, he derided the Florida governor for overusing the word “woke” to describe liberal ideology. “Half the people can’t even define it,” Trump said in Iowa.
DeSantis later defined “woke” to an NBC journalist as “a form of cultural Marxism” that’s about “putting merit and achievement behind identity politics, and it’s basically a war on the truth.”
Earlier in the day in South Carolina, DeSantis had rolled out a five-point military plan that would bar transgender members from serving in line with their gender identities. The plan would also do away with diversity and inclusion programs and courses that teach “critical race theory,” causes that DeSantis has promoted as governor and that he blames for slowing down military recruiting.
“People want to join the military because they think it’s something different,” he said on CNN, “and I think some of the civilian leaders in the military are trying to have the military mimic corporate America, academia. That’s ultimately not going to work.”
North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum (R) announced Monday that he will send donors a $20 gift card if they donate $1 to his presidential campaign.
“People are hurting because of Bidenflation, and giving Biden Economic Relief cards is a way to help 50,000 people until we get in office and fix this crazy economy for everyone!” Burgum tweeted Monday. “Get yours here,” the tweet continued with a link to his campaign donation site.
The linked WinRed site once again blames President Joe Biden, along with the Democratic Party, for hurting American families, while asking donors to fill out their personal information and provide credit card details.
In a separate tweet, Burgum doubled down on the gift card offer: “When it comes to providing economic relief to the American people, I’m not messing around!”
The unusual move has given rise to some legal concerns, Politico reported.
The wealthy Republican governor, a former CEO at a software company, launched his presidential campaign last month but has little name recognition compared to many of his GOP opponents — who include former President Donald Trump and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis.
Burgum, along with the other GOP presidential candidates, must receive at least 40,000 donations, including at least 200 dispersed among 20 different states, to qualify for the GOP debate on Aug. 23.
The North Dakota governor has held his seat since 2016. In April, he signed a ban on abortions at six weeks without exceptions for instances of rape or incest.
In May, he approved a bill banning pronoun policies in schools and requiring teachers to tell a student’s parent or guardian if the student identifies as transgender. He’s signed seven other anti-trans bills since January but maintains that he will not sign a federal abortion ban if elected.
Burgum also claimed on NBC News’ “Meet the Press” on Saturday that he wants to stay away from “every culture war topic” such as abortions, book bans and transgender legislation throughout his campaign and if elected.
“I’m comfortable with those battles happening at the state level because if people don’t like them they’ve got an opportunity to get engaged and try to change that. At the federal level it’s not anything I’m going to be pushing because I believe in freedom and liberty,” Burgum told NBC journalist Chuck Todd on Saturday.
Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.), a leading progressive who has achieved national fame as one of the managers of former President Donald Trump’s second impeachment, said Friday he would not run for his home state’s open Senate seat, arguing that his role in the House was too crucial to give up.
Raskin would’ve been one of the leading candidates in the race to replace retiring Sen. Ben Cardin (D-Md.), if not necessarily an outright favorite. The two major contenders for the seat are now Prince George’s County Executive Angela Alsobrooks and Total Wine co-founder-turned-Rep. David Trone (D-Md.)
“I am profoundly grateful not only to those who have encouraged me on this exciting path but also to those from all over Maryland who have strongly encouraged me to run for the U.S. Senate seat being left vacant by Senator Ben Cardin,” Raskin wrote in a lengthy statement. “If these were normal times, I am pretty sure that this is what I would be announcing now. But these are not normal times and we are still in the fight of our lives for democratic institutions, freedom and basic social progress in America.”
Raskin is now the ranking Democrat on the House Oversight Committee, where he worked to battle Committee Chair James Comer’s (R-Ky.) efforts to investigate President Joe Biden and Biden’s son Hunter. He has also worked with the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee to hire summer fellows who help work on congressional campaigns and has become a sought-after campaign surrogate.
Raskin would’ve been the clear favorite of progressive institutions in the Democratic primary, while Alsobrooks and Trone are largely seen as mainstream liberals.
Alsobrooks has attracted the support of much of the state’s political establishment, including Reps. Steny Hoyer and Kweisi Mfume. Trone, meanwhile, is relying on his immense personal wealth and ties to liberal groups to power his own campaign.
Maryland is a heavily Democratic state, and the winner of the Democratic primary is all but certain to win the general election.
The bestselling writer called out Trump’s many, many lies in a new 4-minute clip that he shared on YouTube Wednesday.
He captioned it: #DonaldTrumpLifetimeOfLies.
Winslow ripped Trump as nothing more than an “infomercial” and “five-decade-long marketing campaign” who used “salesman language” to manipulate supporters.
The author of multiple New York Times bestsellers also debunked many claims made by the former president, from his self-styled persona of a “great businessman” to his purported devout Christianity.
Winslow has been a vocal critic of Trump and his enablers since before the 2020 election, with his anti-Trump videos garnering millions of views.
Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who is running for the Democratic nomination for president, wants to stand out from ordinary politicians. So this week he posted a video of himself doing shirtless pushups in a parking lot — you know, as potential presidents do!
The 69-year-old son of Robert F. Kennedy and nephew of former President John F. Kennedy showed off his physique in a clip that has been viewed over 15 million times. “Get yourself in shape for a Kennedy Presidency!” he tweeted.
His workout in nothing but jeans at a Gold’s Gym in Venice Beach, California ― a mecca for muscleheads ― drew tons of favorable news coverage and served as an implicit contrast to 80-year-old Joe Biden, the oldest president in U.S. history.
It’s debatable whether American voters are longing for a set of rippling pecs in the Oval Office. But the prominent vaccine skeptic isn’t the first politician to flex their muscles as a way to boost their image or project strength to voters. For many politicians, displays of physical prowess can be a way to fend off questions about their age, set themselves apart in a crowded field, or even just make themselves seem more relatable or charismatic ― though it doesn’t necessarily work.
Does anyone remember the historic candidacy of John Delaney?
The former Democratic congressman from Maryland ran for president in 2020 and tried to distinguish himself from the crowded primary field in part by sharing videos of himself doing pushups and deadlifts in tight T-shirts. Delaney was jacked as hell. But it did nothing for his campaign. He ended his run just days before the Iowa caucuses.
The desire to be seen as a musclehead over an egghead isn’t limited to the younger congressional set. The longest-serving Republican senator in U.S. history, 89-year-old Chuck Grassley, has often played up his exercise habits in campaign ads.
In 2021, the Iowa Republican and then-44-year-old Sen. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.) did a 22-pushup demonstration ― though some might say they were half-pushups ― to raise awareness about suicide among military servicemembers. And in 2017, an 83-year-old Grassley challenged a much-younger reporter to a pushup contest and matched his number with 25.
But being buff doesn’t bring invincibility. After winning an eighth Senate term last year, Grassley broke his hip doing what he called “a stupid maneuver in my kitchen” that briefly put him in a wheelchair. The sprightly senator is back to taking stairs at the Capitol, but recently said he’s not yet running again.
This is not a new phenomenon. The late Sen. Strom Thurmond (R-S.C.), marked his 65th birthday by doing 101 pushups, then another for the photographers.
Bettmann via Getty Images
The president of the United States is another fan of proposing feats of strength when challenged over his age ― though he doesn’t follow through. In 2019, during a tense exchange with an Iowa voter who told the then-77-year-old he was too old for the presidency, Biden threw down the gauntlet.
“You want to check my shape, let’s do pushups together. Let’s run. Let’s do whatever you want to do,” Biden told the man, who was 83 himself and apparently did not take up the offer from the now-president, who has a stiffened gait and has tripped and fallen in public.
The same year, Biden jokingly said he would challenge Donald Trump to a pushup match. He even suggested wrestling a HuffPost reporterin response to a question about voters’ concerns over his health. “What the hell ‘concerns,’ man? You wanna wrestle?” (For the record: We’re still waiting, Mr. President).
Other politicians simply love to share videos of themselves working out, particularly new members of Congress.
In February, Rep. Jamaal Bowman (D-N.Y.) posted a video of himself bench-pressing 405 pounds, which is a lot. He told HuffPost at the time that his eventual goal was to do the same weight for two repetitions. (It’s called the House of Reps, after all.)
Rep. Sharice Davids (D-Kan.), then a member-elect, did pushups on Capitol Hill in 2018.
Susan Walsh/Associated Press
It’s not just dudes, either. In 2019, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) posted a video of herself doing pushups alongside a fellow member as a way to blow off steam between hearings. In February, conspiracy theorist Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) showed off some butterfly pull-ups, which look incredibly weird to anyone unfamiliar with CrossFit.
And never forget the, dare we say, iconic 2012 Time Magazine photo shoot of then-Republican vice presidential candidate Paul Ryan demonstrating some bicep curls in a backward hat with a moody blue backdrop, possibly some of the most awkward “gym bro” images of all time.
Of course, there are other ways to show your fixation on masculinity. Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) this year published a book titled “Manhood,” calling on American men “to stand up and embrace their God-given responsibility as husbands, fathers, and citizens.” The Missouri Republican argues masculinity isn’t so “inherently problematic” as liberals make it out to be. (The book doesn’t say how many pushups Hawley can do.)
As if to provide a counterpoint, Sen. Markwayne Mullin (R-Okla.) this week challenged a combative committee witness to an actual cage match. The witness, a union president who called Mullin a “greedy CEO” and a “clown,” did not accept the challenge within Mullin’s three-day time period, so the two will have to continue fighting with words. It’s probably an improvement on the historical way of settling disputes in the upper chamber: duels with pistols.
Of course, after pride comes the fall — particularly on Twitter. Even though he looks buff, Kennedy betrayed weakness in the face of Twitter users who wondered why he seemed to struggle to do only eight-and-a-half pushups in his video.
“I can do more than 10 pushups,” he assured them. “That was my last set.”
Then-Sen. Bill Nelson (D-Fla.) did 46 pushups in 2014 as part of a bet payoff over hockey.
