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  • GOP hopeful Vivek Ramaswamy finds some fans in a very Trumpy place | CNN Politics

    GOP hopeful Vivek Ramaswamy finds some fans in a very Trumpy place | CNN Politics

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    West Palm Beach, Florida
    CNN
     — 

    They wore Trump hats and Trump T-shirts and cheered wildly when former President Donald Trump took the stage to fireworks. But at the Turning Point Action conference in West Palm Beach, Florida, some of the conservative attendees said they had a little space in their hearts for Vivek Ramaswamy – the GOP newcomer running a longshot presidential primary bid against Trump, whom he has promised to pardon if it comes to that.

    What they told CNN they liked most was the way Ramaswamy comes across on TV. The 37-year-old extremely wealthy pharmaceutical entrepreneur has never held public office, but he’s quick and assertive, and has become a frequent guest on cable news and conservative YouTube channels. He’s best known for denouncing “wokeness,” which he says has infected American corporations and investment banks that influence them.

    Karen Colby – standing next to the sequin-packed “Trump Girl Shop” booth featuring “Theresa’s Concealed Carry Handbags.” – said she’d recently seen Ramaswamy on TV. “I forget what he was actually saying, but I said, ‘Dang, I really like him. I like him a lot,’” said Colby, a Republican from Broward County, Florida. “I like his values. I like what he says. I like his no-nonsense attitude. … If he does not earn the position of president, I would love to see him as vice president. President Trump: if you’re listening, choose Vivek.”

    In Republican primary polls, Ramaswamy is competitive with seasoned politicians, though still in single figures and far behind Trump. CNN did not encounter a Turning Point attendee who had something nice to say about former Vice President Mike Pence, who many saw as having betrayed Trump by certifying the 2020 election results. The pro-Trump crowd did not like former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, who has been critical of the former president. And though Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis was popular at the conference last year, he’s now fallen out of favor with this crowd amid his challenge to Trump, according to Turning Point spokesperson Andrew Kolvet.

    Former President Donald Trump, who took the stage as fireworks were set off, remained the clear favorite.

    But that didn’t kill their appetite for one of DeSantis’s signature issues: “wokeness.” And on that subject, they found a lot to like in Ramaswamy, who wrote a book called “Woke Inc.: Inside Corporate America’s Social Justice Scam.” His argument is that corporations make statements about liberal social values and climate change at the expense of their profits, and that that is bad for investors and consumers.

    Dolan Bair, a student at Wheaton College in Illinois, found Ramaswamy’s argument convincing. He thought a lot of big companies “push more liberal agendas,” and “maybe the government should not allow them to hold their liberal values over their consumers and their employees.”

    Dolan Bair, center, said he found liberal values too pervasive in society.

    Sure, Apple and Google were private companies, he said, but they’re so large he couldn’t avoid them. He could buy a different beer than Bud Light but there wasn’t a good option for a non-woke search engine.

    Bair believed gay people had been treated unfairly, even imprisoned, in the past. “But at what point does Pride Month go away?” he asked. “When does when does Pride Month become two months? When does it become Pride Year?” CNN asked how a Pride Year – with more rainbow merchandise at Target, for instance – would affect him personally. “They could be using their money to go into R&D for better products, or lowering their product prices,” he said, echoing an argument made by Ramaswamy.

    Sam Mathew said he agreed with Ramaswamy's call to include gender issues in his platform.

    Sam Mathew was the most ardent Ramaswamy supporter CNN found, decked out in merch bearing the campaign’s slogan, “Truth.” “I like the way Vivek delivers the message on how to bring the country together by following the truth,” Mathew said. What did he mean by truth? “Truth, basically, to me, is exposing the lies,” he said.

    Ramaswamy campaigns on “10 truths,” starting with “God is real,” and “There are only two genders.” CNN asked Mathew why the gender issue was so important, given the scale of national and global problems. “If you don’t have a base, where there’s a man and a woman – and if you’re confusing the young generation with a third gender, or a fourth gender, or a fifth gender – then the whole concept of humanity is lost,” Mathew said.

    Mathew, an Indian American like Ramaswamy, immigrated to the US in the late 80s and went to college in Michigan. Back then, he saw hardly any other Indians in his neighborhood. Mathew knew racism existed. But since the Obama administration, he said, there was too much focus on race from elites. He felt liberal social values were being “pushed” through “constant bombarding” from news media, teachers’ unions, and universities. “I don’t know much about what is being taught, but from what I hear, it’s mostly telling Black kids that White people are bad, in simple terms,” Mathew said.

    In the conference’s presidential straw poll, Trump won 86% of votes. When attendees were asked for their second choice, Ramaswamy got 51%.

    As Trump was about to take the stage at the conference, CNN got a text from Kolvet, the Turning Point spokesperson, asking if If there was interest in an interview with Ramaswamy, a man who has raised his profile with his openness to all media – from network TV to niche podcasts. Shortly before the interview began, Ramaswamy got an email from Jordan Peterson asking him to come for another podcast chat. Peterson is a Canadian psychology professor best known for his opposition to what he calls “cultural Marxism” and his advice to young men that they stand up straight and clean their rooms.

    In his interview with CNN – as he has in many, many other venues – Ramaswamy went to his central point and said wokeness was a “symptom of a cultural cancer” that was filling a hole in the hearts of people who had lost their national identity.

    “I think the way we win is by taking a long, hard look in the mirror and ask ourselves who we really are as individuals – it is not just our race, it is not just our sexual identity or our gender, it is not just our political affiliation,” Ramaswamy said. “Ask ourselves, ‘Who am I as an individual?’ I’m not riding some tectonic plate of group identity. I am me. You are you,” he said.

    “I think the right way to deal with what I view as the last final burning embers of racism is to let that quietly burn out rather than trying to put that fire out by accidentally throwing kerosene on it,” Ramaswamy said.

    Images of Trump, left, and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, right, covered with messages written on sticky notes at the Turning Point Action conference.

    Turning Point had set up a wall with three-foot cardboard cutouts of all the candidates’ faces, and invited conference-goers to write what they thought of each on sticky notes. On Ramaswamy’s face, most views had been positive – “the future,” “unite us plz,” “Vivek have my children,” “Trump’s VP.”

    But there was a dark side: two messages had white nationalist references. On one, a Star of David crossed out with the word “soon.” On the other, “1488,” which combines code for a slogan about protecting White children with code for “Heil Hitler.”

    Ramaswamy said he had not seen the notes or ever heard of the 1488 meme. He knew racism still existed and had experienced it. But people faced a choice, he said, whether to “wallow” in it.

    When CNN pointed out the notes to Kolvet, the Turning Point spokesperson, he took them down.

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  • Key lawmakers granted access to Biden, Trump and Pence classified documents | CNN Politics

    Key lawmakers granted access to Biden, Trump and Pence classified documents | CNN Politics

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    CNN
     — 

    Top lawmakers on Capitol Hill who oversee the intelligence community finally have been granted the ability to look over the classified documents found improperly in the homes of President Joe Biden, former President Donald Trump and former Vice President Mike Pence, three sources familiar with the matter tell CNN, ending a months-long standoff between Congress and the administration.

    The members of the “Gang of Eight”, which includes the House and Senate leaders from each party as well as the chairs and ranking members of the House and Senate intelligence committees, are privy to the most sensitive classified information. They began to get the documents last week.

    A source familiar with the process tells CNN the Gang of Eight began getting access to Biden, Pence and Trump’s classified documents “in a rolling production” last week. The Biden administration is giving the group access to the documents “in tranches” and not all at once, according to the source.

    For several months, leaders of the intelligence committees have been pushing for more information about the kinds of documents found, offering harsh criticism for the lack of information they received early on.

    The argument from top lawmakers on the Senate Intelligence Committee has been that they needed to understand the contents and extent of the documents found at each residence in part to understand the potential damage that could be unfurled if the documents had fallen into the wrong hands and if proper mitigation protocols had been followed.

    In January, Intelligence Chairman Mark Warner, a Democrat from Virginia, and Vice Chairman Marco Rubio, a Republican from Florida, blasted the administration for the lack of transparency over the documents and what they were.

    “We simply want to know what was this information,” Rubio said at the time. “What (were) these materials that they had? So that we can make an honest assessment when they provide us a risk assessment, of whether or not they’ve taken the proper mitigation if any was necessary.”

    Warner, in recent weeks, had an at-times heated phone conversation with Deputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco on the lack of congressional access to the classified documents found in the possession of Biden, Trump and Pence, two sources familiar with the call tell CNN.

    Warner and Rubio have applied considerable public pressure on the DOJ to grant access to the documents.

    Republican Rep. James Comer, chair of the House Oversight Committee, told Fox News Tuesday morning, “it is very disappointing that it has taken the government this long to allow the Gang of Eight to have access” to the classified documents.

    Punchbowl was first to report that that administration has begun giving the Gang of Eight access to the documents.

    This story has been updated with additional information.

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  • We are already in the food fight portion of the GOP primary | CNN Politics

    We are already in the food fight portion of the GOP primary | CNN Politics

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    A version of this story appeared in CNN’s What Matters newsletter. To get it in your inbox, sign up for free here.



    CNN
     — 

    The 2024 Republican presidential primary is not fully underway as yet and already we are in the food fight phase.

    A super PAC supporting former President Donald Trump tried to smear Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis with pudding, seizing on a report, which the governor denies, about his eating habits to make a point about Social Security and Medicare.

    The ad itself is gross. And it drew a super PAC supporting DeSantis off the sidelines to air an ad of its own wondering why Trump was going after the Florida governor.

    For the record, neither DeSantis nor Trump currently say they will touch safety net benefits, but both have a past of suggesting they could.

    I talked to CNN chief national affairs correspondent Jeff Zeleny by email about the Trump/DeSantis dynamic, the role of deep-pocketed super PACs and what else is going on in this nascent primary campaign.

    WOLF: We are nine months away from the first primaries and not all of the top candidates have even declared their candidacies. But there’s some super PAC mudslinging. What’s happening and what do we need to take from all of this?

    ZELENY: A new season of attack ads has begun, with allies of Donald Trump and Ron DeSantis firing some of the first direct shots of the young presidential campaign. Now is the time to define your opponent – whether you’re an announced candidate (Trump) or expected to be one soon (DeSantis) – and begin pointing out potential vulnerabilities. Not surprisingly, the opening volley was about Social Security and Medicare and highlighting old comments about promising to reform the entitlement programs.

    WOLF: Super PACs can’t technically coordinate with campaigns. DeSantis doesn’t technically have a campaign. How is that working exactly?

    ZELENY: The Florida governor isn’t planning on jumping into the presidential race until May or June – after the legislative session is over – so until then, a group of deep-pocketed allies are coming to his defense. The super PAC, which is called Never Back Down, is effectively a campaign in waiting, complete with pollsters and political strategists of all varieties. Federal election law prohibits coordinating with the campaign, but when there isn’t an official campaign, that formality becomes far easier.

    WOLF: Do other Republican candidates have deep pocketed super PACs? Who are the other players to watch?

    ZELENY: Not nearly as deep, no, but most major Republican candidates have at least some type of super PAC assistance. Former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley has some support – and is seeking more – as are other potential candidates. One likely presidential contender, Sen. Tim Scott, has one financial advantage that makes him stand apart from his rivals: He has more than $20 million left over in his campaign account from last year’s Senate race, which he can use on his presidential race. That’s a head start most of his rivals can only dream of.

    WOLF: Trump and DeSantis have been shadowboxing around each other for some time. Can we assume this is a prelude to a much more bruising fight in the making? What does this say about GOP unity heading into the primaries?

    Zeleny: GOP unity? That will come later – or that’s the hope of top Republican officials – but the bruising season of define-your-opponent is underway. The Trump-DeSantis feud has long been simmering, but their springtime exchanges are almost certainly quaint, compared to what’s likely to come.

    WOLF: What do we know about where these super PAC ads are running? Are they focused on specific types of voters or is this simply an effort to get attention from us in the media?

    ZELENY: For now, most of the ads are running on cable television and sports. The Make America Great Again group, which supports Trump, has been running ads for weeks now seeking to define DeSantis in a negative light. You have likely seen some of these, which begin with the ominous: “Think you know Ron DeSantis? Think again.”

    WOLF: Are there any changes in how you think super PACs will operate this year and how they’ll be involved in the campaign?

    ZELENY: With every passing election cycle, super PACs play a more prominent role. It’s easier to raise money – without the federal limits imposed upon candidates. If the early months of the year are any indication, the 2024 campaign will push the limits even more, with outside groups far more important than political parties or, in some cases, even the candidates themselves.

    WOLF: Are there any early conclusions we can draw about how Trump’s indictment by the Manhattan DA on criminal charges has affected his campaign? Has it impacted his popularity among Republican voters? Affected his fundraising?

    ZELENY: Early conclusions are often risky ones, but the Trump campaign insists the indictment has been a fundraising boost. It certainly has rallied many Republicans around him – or at least unified them in opposition to the indictment – but it may be far too soon to say whether this will continue to be the case. He faces potential criminal action in Georgia, for his role in trying to overturn the election results, as well as at least two federal investigations.

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  • No. 2 Senate Republican to endorse Tim Scott for president | CNN Politics

    No. 2 Senate Republican to endorse Tim Scott for president | CNN Politics

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    CNN
     — 

    South Dakota Sen. John Thune, the No. 2 Senate Republican, plans to endorse South Carolina Sen. Tim Scott’s bid for the 2024 GOP presidential nomination, according to two sources familiar with the plans.

    Scott, who has already filed his candidacy with the Federal Election Commission, will formally kick off his campaign Monday in North Charleston, South Carolina, and Thune is expected to deliver the opening prayer at the event, the sources said.

    Thune had previously encouraged Scott to enter the contest, pushing him to visit the early-voting state of Iowa and telling CNN in March that his colleague would be “a great candidate.”

    “He’s really well thought of and respected,” Thune said. “I think he’d be a really interesting candidate for president in a field that … could be fairly open.”

    Scott, the only Black Republican in the Senate, joins a growing GOP field looking to challenge President Joe Biden as he seeks a second term.

    Former President Donald Trump is making a third run for the White House. Former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley, who appointed Scott to his Senate seat a decade ago, launched her campaign in February. Others in the GOP race include former Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson, tech entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy and talk radio host Larry Elder.

    Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis is also expected to enter the contest this week.

    Scott launched a presidential exploratory committee in April, emphasizing his evangelical faith, his race and his experience growing up as the son of a single mother. He defined his personal ethos as one of “individual responsibility” and said his approach to politics was guided by the belief that the US is “the land of opportunity and not the land of oppression.”

    Thune isn’t the only Republican who has spoken positively of Scott’s strengths in a presidential race. Speaking to CNN’s Jake Tapper on “State of the Union” on Sunday, Louisiana Sen. Bill Cassidy called Scott a “pretty formidable candidate.”

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  • Trump on tape: Here’s what it means and what’s next | CNN Politics

    Trump on tape: Here’s what it means and what’s next | CNN Politics

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    CNN
     — 

    Former President Donald Trump’s history of making inappropriate or questionable comments on tape got another chapter on Wednesday with fresh revelations from his post-White House life.

    The latest example emerged from CNN’s exclusive reporting that federal prosecutors have an audio recording of Trump acknowledging he held onto a classified Pentagon document after leaving office. The tape seems unlikely to dent his political position as the frontrunner for the GOP nomination in 2024. But it could have real consequences in the legal limbo where he lives.

    Most people recall the “Access Hollywood” tape of Trump using vulgar language to argue that “stars” can grab women. The emergence of that tape just before the 2016 election didn’t hurt him politically. But he later defended that statement as true, “unfortunately or fortunately,” in a video deposition, and jurors in New York recently found him liable for sexual abuse after the deposition was played back to them.

    And then there’s the recording of him asking election officials in Georgia to “find” votes to help him change the results of the 2020 presidential election. Those efforts to overturn President Joe Biden’s win in the Peach State are part of an ongoing investigation.

    This latest tape could also end up as part of a criminal case. The recording is in the possession of the Department of Justice special counsel Jack Smith, who’s investigating the retention of national defense information. Smith’s investigation has shown signs of nearing its end, although it hasn’t resulted in any criminal charges.

    So why is this revelation so significant?

    “First of all, prosecutors love tapes,” CNN senior legal analyst Elie Honig, a former federal prosecutor, told Jake Tapper on “The Lead” Wednesday.

    “If you have a subject on tape, that’s his own words, that’s his own voice. The defense can’t say, well, some witness is fudging the truth.”

    The recording of the July 2021 meeting, which CNN has not listened to but was described by multiple sources, seriously undercuts Trump’s longstanding argument that he mentally declassified material he took with him from the White House. It also adds his Bedminster club to the potential locations where Trump had classified documents after leaving office.

    The recording of the meeting captures the sound of paper rustling, sources said, though it is not clear if it was the actual document in question. That raises questions about exposure of the document since attendees at the meeting included people who did not have security clearances that would have allowed them to access classified information, sources said.

    Smith has focused on the meeting as part of the criminal investigation into Trump’s handling of national security secrets, and prosecutors have asked witnesses about the recording and the document before a federal grand jury, CNN’s Katelyn Polantz, Paula Reid and Kaitlan Collins reported.

    In response to the report, a Trump campaign spokesman said “leaks” are meant to “inflame tensions” around Trump.

    The recording also recalls the chaos at the end of his presidency. On the tape, sources tell CNN, Trump points to a classified Pentagon document to try to refute the idea that Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Mark Milley had been trying to stop him from starting a war with Iran.

    In July 2021, journalist Susan Glasser had reported that, near the end of Trump’s presidency, Milley had raised concerns about Trump trying to strike Iran and had told the Joint Chiefs to ensure Trump issued no illegal orders and that he be informed if there was any concern.

    That New Yorker story outraged Trump. On the tape, he mentions the document, which he said came from Milley, in response to that story – arguing that if others could see it, it would discredit Milley, sources said. (The document Trump references was not produced by Milley, CNN was told.)

    The document’s existence is hardly unusual. The Joint Chiefs of Staff has a directorate focused on developing and proposing strategies and plans for the chairman, and another that provides guidance about current plans and operations to commanders throughout the force.

    “You could pick any country and scenario and there is likely a contingency plan,” a US official told CNN’s Haley Britzky.

    It is even less unusual for Milley to have briefed Trump on those plans, the official added. As chairman of the Joint Chiefs, Milley’s job is to advise and brief the president on his military options as commander in chief.

    “That does not mean that Gen. Milley is a warmonger,” Beth Sanner, a former deputy director of National Intelligence who was involved with intelligence briefings during her career, said on CNN. “Quite the opposite. I spoke to him many times during my role as an intelligence official, and he absolutely did not want to go to war with Iran.”

    CNN’s report on the recording also includes the incredible development that investigators have questioned Milley, who is still the nation’s top general.

    The most important thing here could be Trump’s acknowledgment that the document is classified, contradicting his argument that he had the unilateral power to declassify things and take them from the White House.

    During a CNN town hall in New Hampshire earlier this month, CNN’s Kaitlan Collins asked Trump if he had shown anyone classified documents to anyone.

    “Not really,” he told her, adding, “Let me just tell you, I have the absolute right to do whatever I want with them.”

    He had said that any classified documents he had were declassified, which is apparently contradicted by the audio recording.

    As CNN reported, Trump’s comments on the tape suggested he wanted to share the information but was aware of limitations on his ability post-presidency to declassify records, two of the sources said.

    The documents case is hardly the only legal matter hanging over Trump.

    The former president, and the country he wants to lead again, needs a color-coded calendar to keep track of all the legal developments involving him – and help separate potential trials and appeals from upcoming debate and primary dates.

    Besides the ongoing investigations into the aftermath of the 2020 election, here’s what else is looming over Trump.

    • His criminal trial in New York, which stems from the investigation into his alleged role in a hush money scheme, will coincide with March primary contests.
    • More immediately, there’s an October 2023 trial for the New York attorney general’s $250 million lawsuit against Trump, his eldest children and the Trump Organization. The Trump Organization was already convicted of criminal tax fraud in December.

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  • Anita Dunn, Biden’s brawler-in-chief, looks to 2024 | CNN Politics

    Anita Dunn, Biden’s brawler-in-chief, looks to 2024 | CNN Politics

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    CNN
     — 

    Anita Dunn saw an opportunity with “Dark Brandon.”

    The liberal meme, created by Joe Biden’s most online fans as a play on the right-wing “Let’s Go Brandon” code bashing the president, depicts a grinning Biden with red lasers shooting out of his eyes. After Dunn, Biden’s top messaging and communications adviser, became aware of the meme, she brought it to the president – and they jumped on an opportunity to go on the offensive in the never-ending social media meme wars.

    He’s nodded to Dark Brandon in official speeches, aides have shared the image on social media, and his 2024 campaign is selling $32 T-shirts emblazoned with his online alter-ego. While it’s a minor part of his repertoire, it shows how Dunn – a longtime Democratic operative and Biden confidante – has used her influence to engage in the kind of street brawling needed to combat perceptions of the aging president and the challenge ahead as he seeks a second term.

    “It fits well with who she is, which is a f**k-sh*t-up-brawler. It’s not a coincidence that the stuff that came behind Dark Brandon was very much in line with Anita’s way of seeing the world,” Rob Flaherty, the White House’s director of digital strategy, told CNN.

    CNN spoke to more than a dozen current and former White House and administration officials, lawmakers and Democratic strategists – many of whom requested anonymity to speak freely – who paint a picture of Dunn as a deeply loyal aide with a big-picture view of Biden’s strategy – with a hand in nearly all aspects of his political life.

    Her instincts for brawling are now directly intertwined with the president’s political fortunes, as she bolsters an already expansive role as a presidential adviser with steering 2024 messaging from the White House. For a president who relies on a very tight circle of trusted advisers, sources say Dunn has emerged as a powerful chief political communicator, a key strategist and someone who will fight on his behalf. She takes these responsibilities on with a combination of deep experience and Biden’s trust.

    While sources both inside and outside the White House say no communicator is better prepared for the moment than Dunn, her messaging task ahead is massive: A high-profile candidate of Biden’s age has never run before, and the president is facing low approval ratings after two years in the White House, which could be a drag on his reelection campaign. With Biden widely expected to face a familiar, but powerful, foe in former President Donald Trump, the mission facing Biden’s advisers is to find a message that can resonate enough with voters to beat Trump again.

    Just a third of Americans (33%) say that Biden winning in 2024 would be a step forward or a triumph for the country, per a May CNN poll conducted by SSRS. Voters also have serious questions about Biden’s age – he’s 80 now, and would be 86 at the end of a potential second term. Recent Washington Post/ABC News polling indicates that nearly two-thirds of respondents feel that Biden lacks the mental sharpness (63%) or is not in good enough physical health (62%) to serve effectively as president.

    Those poll numbers mean that Dunn’s most important task ahead is to help the president communicate to an unconvinced American public why he deserves a second term. And that has given her a White House portfolio that is virtually unparalleled.

    “The circle is small and isn’t exactly expanding anytime soon. That makes voices like Anita’s carry a significant amount of weight,” a Biden adviser said.

    Ostensibly, Dunn’s White House role centers around messaging, political strategy, oversight and crisis communication on the key issues facing the White House.

    “Like the rest of the senior staff, Anita works to act on the strategies and agenda President Biden assigns for her portfolio,” White House spokesman Andrew Bates said.

    She’s in close touch with Cabinet secretaries, members of Congress, outside groups and prospective candidates. A former Hill aide, Dunn is keenly aware of congressional dynamics, but her work inside the Obama White House has shaped her views on how to approach the daily challenges confronting the president.

    “She has this perch where she spans the overall strategic plan for (Biden) and for the White House, and also communicates outward with the political apparatus of the (Democratic National Committee) and the campaign and tries to keep the entire Joe Biden enterprise swimming in the same direction,” a White House aide said.

    She’s also playing an active role in Biden’s reelection campaign strategy, with multiple sources familiar with the dynamic indicating she is spearheading 2024 political messaging from the White House and coordinating with senior campaign staff.

    A former White House senior adviser put it more bluntly: When it comes to 2024, “she’s running everything.”

    Pressed in an interview with CBS News on how she will balance those two roles, Dunn declined to comment, citing the Hatch Act.

    “I’m going to be here at the White House serving the people,” she said. “I’m a White House employee, and I have a government job, and I will continue to do my government job.”

    For an incumbent president running for reelection, there is no commodity more valuable than time, especially time spent in front of the cameras, with an audience of critics looking for signs of fatigue. And with Biden officially jumping into the 2024 race, it’s expected that his current pace of activity will continue for the foreseeable future – using the bully pulpit to highlight key policies at the White House, visiting battleground states to showcase his accomplishments and traveling abroad to meet world leaders. That makes everything he says – and how and where he says it – part of an implicit reelection campaign.

    Dunn – in concert with a tight circle of aides, including White House chief of staff Jeff Zients, deputy chiefs of staff Jen O’Malley Dillon and Bruce Reed, senior adviser Mike Donilon, and counselor to the president Steve Ricchetti – is key to making those decisions and how to communicate them.

    For instance, Dunn was central to a recent decision to frame the president’s age as a sign of wisdom and experience.

    “It’s a legitimate thing to raise the question of age,” Biden told donors at a recent campaign fundraiser. “I hope what I’ve been able to bring to this job, and will continue to bring, is a little bit of wisdom.”

    His explicit use of that framing had Dunn’s fingerprints all over it – part of Bidenworld’s effort to mitigate a weakness by tying it to legislative accomplishments that supporters believe have little precedent over the past several decades.

    Multiple sources told CNN that Dunn has been a decision-maker for campaign issues such as staffing, announcement timing, headquarters location and selecting campaign leadership.

    She’s also recently been involved in strategically elevating the profile of Vice President Kamala Harris, making it clear internally that the West Wing needs to do a better job at bolstering Harris heading into the campaign, a source familiar with the dynamic said.

    Dunn is expected to remain in her White House role but continue to advise Biden on 2024 matters, multiple sources said, with campaign manager and former White House staffer Julie Chavez Rodriguez leading the charge from the campaign side.

    It’s a similar model to how former President Barack Obama’s top advisers coordinated between the West Wing and the campaign, and not unusual.

    “You want a strategist like Anita at the White House. Reelects are about organizing, ground game, targeting digital and ads and messages to particular audiences. It is a game of execution,” said Jennifer Palmieri, a longtime Democratic strategist who served as communications director during the Obama administration after Dunn.

    “The most important messaging that people will judge the president on is the job he is doing at the White House,” Palmieri said.

    Dunn’s deep loyalty and instinct to fight has also raised eyebrows outside the White House. TJ Ducklo, a 2020 Biden campaign aide who resigned from his White House role after privately threatening a reporter weeks into the administration, is expected to play a role in the 2024 campaign, a decision that has been publicly defended in a rare on-the-record statement from Dunn. (That reporter later called for Ducklo’s redemption.)

    “TJ made a mistake, took responsibility for it, and paid a price,” Dunn said in her statement – in her personal capacity – to Politico’s “West Wing Playbook” last month.

    One former senior White House adviser, however, called that an “unforced error” by Dunn. The former adviser asked for anonymity to speak freely without retribution.

    Her allegiance to Ducklo, the adviser said, “leaves the president vulnerable and exposed to unnecessary criticism and charges of hypocrisy.”

    “It’s in direct contradiction to the president’s own values and integrity and the standards that he himself demanded of everybody in the White House,” the former adviser said.

    A current White House aide fired back.

    “The president has values. Taking responsibility when you have done wrong means a lot. So does forgiveness,” that aide said.

    Dunn, 65, is one-half of a Washington power couple at the epicenter of Bidenworld – husband Bob Bauer is the president’s personal attorney and the lead attorney handling the special counsel investigation into classified documents found at Biden’s private office and residence. Yet she has risen from roles in the Jimmy Carter White House to the Senate to building public affairs powerhouse SKDK to the 2008 Obama campaign entirely on her own, sparked by her intense preparation.

    “She made preparation her friend,” said veteran Democratic operative Minyon Moore, who has known Dunn for decades.

    “Every time she walks in a room, she’s probably more prepared than most of her counterparts. And I think that’s how she was able to tackle the business very early, because they knew she had done her homework. They knew she could think through many layers. She was smart as heck. And so, you want a person like Anita in the room,” Moore said.

    Dunn operates largely behind the scenes – actively eschewing Washington’s social scene, social media and most television appearances.

    Her loyalty to Biden was cemented when she was among a small group of advisers working toward a potential 2016 presidential run, Biden wrote in his 2017 memoir, “Promise Me, Dad.” Though he ultimately decided against running, Dunn’s encouragement solidified a strong level of trust, multiple people close to her say.

    Dunn joined Biden’s 2020 campaign as a senior adviser and is widely credited for helping turn the tide of Biden’s political fortunes in that campaign’s Democratic primary after she was tapped to lead the operation following a fourth-place showing in the Iowa caucuses.

    She encouraged a sharper messaging posture from her desk in the center of the campaign “bullpen” workspace.

    When Biden arrived in the White House, Dunn briefly joined the administration as a senior adviser before returning to SKDK in August 2021, the temporary nature of her service allowing her to skirt disclosure of a cadre of investments and high-profile clients.

    She continued to advise Biden informally and rejoined the White House in May 2022 in a permanent capacity, a move requiring multimillion-dollar financial disclosures.

    Dunn’s omnipresence in Biden’s orbit has been just as clear in the period when she was out of the White House as when she’s been in. She was a constant presence on conference calls or in visits to the White House.

    “The president trusts her counsel – and there’s good evidence as to why,” one adviser said, pointing to her central role in his path to the presidency, loyalty during Biden’s 2016 deliberations and her work inside the West Wing.

    Over her career, Dunn has developed a reputation as an aggressive messaging tactician with strict discipline.

    She’s led White House messaging efforts on legislative accomplishments, seeking to highlight the legislation’s tangible impacts on real Americans, though some Democrats argue the White House has not done enough to sell those measures to the public.

    “What she tries to do is find the connective tissue,” said a senior administration official, who talks to Dunn regularly. “There’s nobody in government that has a better big picture perspective of what’s going on.”

    Multiple colleagues suggested Dunn can inspire a certain level of anxiety in her subordinates – demanding a high level of results and keeping the receipts – while also being seen as a supportive mentor. At the White House, Dunn is known for leading a weekly meeting known as “Fridays at 5,” a 5 p.m. in-person convening that is met with both eye-rolling (given its timing) and appreciation. It includes the entire communications staff, from interns to press assistants to the highest levels. Dunn will lead shout-outs at the beginning of each meeting, identifying achievements and often spotlighting junior staff.

    “It’s really emblematic of Anita,” the White House aide said. “The fact that she took it upon herself to establish this very expansive view of who’s on the communications team across the entire White House and set a weekly meeting where those people get direct exposure to her, as the senior adviser to the president, is really neat.”

    Dunn’s counsel isn’t only valued inside the White House walls – Democratic Sen. Amy Klobuchar, who ran against Biden for president in 2020, regularly seeks her advice.

    “She’s someone that you feel like you can trust and she’s going to have your back. And I think that’s why she’s been such a trusted adviser to President Biden,” the Minnesota senator told CNN, saying that Dunn has been a key messaging coordinator for her Senate colleagues in advancing Biden’s policies.

    That intense loyalty to the president is ultimately why Dunn has been given such a powerful role inside Biden’s political operation.

    “The people that were there and believed in him when he was counted out hold a unique bond and trust with the president. That relationship, with her obvious expertise, means she’s empowered to do what she needs to do,” a former colleague said.

    “Few people have the experience and discipline to keep their eye on the ball like she does. She’s not distracted, and she knows what messages are going to land, even if the pundits disagree,” the former colleague added.

    This story has been updated with additional details.

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  • Hurd says he won’t sign GOP presidential debate pledge | CNN Politics

    Hurd says he won’t sign GOP presidential debate pledge | CNN Politics

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    CNN
     — 

    Former Texas Rep. Will Hurd, who announced his 2024 Republican presidential campaign earlier Thursday with an anti-Donald Trump message, said he won’t sign the Republican National Committee’s pledge to back the party’s ultimate nominee in order to participate in primary debates.

    “I won’t be signing any kind of pledges, and I don’t think parties should be trying to rig who should be on a debate stage,” he told CNN’s Kaitlan Collins Thursday evening.

    “I am not in the business of lying to the American people in order to get a microphone, and I’m not going to support Donald Trump. And so I can’t honestly say I’m going to sign something even if he may or may not be the nominee,” he added.

    Hurd joins a crowded field looking to challenge Trump, the front-runner for the nomination, and he admitted it’ll be “difficult for a dark-horse candidate like me.”

    An undercover CIA officer before entering politics, Hurd has been outspoken in his criticism of Trump following his indictment on federal charges over alleged mishandling of classified documents. Asked if the former president, who has pleaded not guilty to all charges, betrayed the country, Hurd said, “100% he did.”

    Hurd told Collins that if the allegations are true, “It’s slapping the men and women who put themselves in harm’s way every single night in order to keep us safe.”

    Hurd launched his campaign earlier in the day calling for “common sense.”

    “This is a decision that my wife and I decided to do because we live in complicated times and we need common sense,” he said on CBS earlier Thursday morning.

    “There are a number of generational defining challenges that we’re faced with in the United States of America – everything from the Chinese government trying to surpass us as the global superpower, the fact that inflation is persistent at a time when technologies like artificial intelligence is going to upend every single industry, and our kids, their scores in math, science and reading are the lowest they’ve ever been in this century,” the former congressman said.

    “These are the issues we should be talking about. And to be frank, I’m pissed that we’re not talking about these things,” Hurd added in the CBS interview.

    Besides Trump, Republican presidential contenders also include Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, former Vice President Mike Pence, South Carolina Sen. Tim Scott, former United Nations Ambassador Nikki Haley, former Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson, former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum, tech entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy, Miami Mayor Francis Suarez and conservative talk radio host Larry Elder.

    “Too many of these candidates in this race are afraid of Donald Trump,” Hurd said on CBS of the GOP primary field.

    Hurd added that, if elected to the White House, he would not pardon Trump should the former president be convicted, adding that he thought it was “insane” that other candidates were open to the idea.

    Ramaswamy has committed to pardoning Trump if he’s elected president. Haley, Suarez and Elder have also suggested they would be inclined to do so.

    Hurd was a rare Republican critic of Trump during his time in Congress from 2015 to 2021. Representing a swing district in Texas that covered the largest stretch of the US-Mexico border of any congressional seat, he opposed Trump’s border wall and argued it was less effective than other forms of border security.

    Hurd was one of four House Republicans in 2019 to vote in support of a resolution condemning Trump’s racist tweets targeting four Democratic congresswomen of color. He also authored a New York Times op-ed in 2018 arguing that Trump was being manipulated by Russian President Vladimir Putin. Despite his outspoken criticism, Hurd said in 2019 that he would vote for Trump the following year were he to be the GOP nominee.

    Hurd had been fueling speculation about a potential presidential run with trips to early-voting primary states in recent months. Hurd was in New Hampshire last week and told local station WMUR 9 he was evaluating whether his candidacy would have a path to the GOP nomination. In January, he spoke at the annual meeting of the New Hampshire Republican Party – the same event where Trump kicked off his 2024 campaigning. Hurd also visited Iowa for the Faith and Freedom Coalition’s spring event that included several other 2024 GOP hopefuls.

    Hurd was the only Black Republican in the House when he announced in 2019 that he would not seek reelection and instead pursue opportunities outside government to “solve problems at the nexus between technology and national security.” Hurd served in the CIA for almost a decade before coming to Congress. As a congressman, he served on the House Intelligence Committee, which is charged with oversight of the US intelligence community.

    Hurd first ran for Congress in 2010, losing to Quico Canseco in a runoff for the GOP nomination. Four years later, Hurd defeated Canseco, by then a former congressman, in another primary runoff before narrowly unseating Democratic Rep. Pete Gallego in the general election. He was narrowly reelected in 2016 and 2018, defeating Gallego and Democrat Gina Ortiz Jones, respectively.

    This story has been updated with Hurd’s interview on CNN.

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  • Biden faces key test as end of fundraising quarter looms | CNN Politics

    Biden faces key test as end of fundraising quarter looms | CNN Politics

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    CNN
     — 

    President Joe Biden is racing to boost his campaign war chest as the end of the fundraising quarter approaches Friday, marking the first major test of his campaign’s ability to generate the cash and enthusiasm needed to compete against Republicans in 2024.

    In the closing days of the quarter, the campaign is ramping up its push for grassroots donors, including enlisting former President Barack Obama to tape a video with Biden to help drive small-dollar donations, CNN has learned, along with hosting a slew of down-to-the-wire, high-dollar fundraisers.

    Biden’s campaign is highly attuned to how closely their early fundraising numbers will be examined for signs of the campaign’s operational strength and enthusiasm. Aides have tightly guarded the state of Biden’s campaign haul, refraining from publicly laying out a fundraising target for the second quarter or providing an early read on how much they raised in the opening days of the president’s reelection bid.

    Campaign advisers insist they’ll have the money to run a successful campaign. Jeffrey Katzenberg, a co-chair of Biden’s campaign, told CNN in an interview Wednesday that he’s growing more confident about their ability to exceed the $1 billion Biden raised in 2020.

    “There’s no question whatsoever that he will have all of the resources to run a highly competitive campaign at or above the level of four years ago,” Katzenberg said. “The enthusiasm, the support, the loyalty is at a 10.”

    Yet even Biden’s supporters acknowledge that the headwinds he faces in his overall campaign – including dampened enthusiasm and concern over his age – will influence his effort to raise as much as $2 billion for his reelection effort. Some donors have expressed anxiety over a slow start to the money race.

    “Not a lot of people are engaging right now. They’re like, ‘We’re gonna give. We’re gonna support him,’ but people aren’t as engaged in the 2024 operation right now,” one Biden campaign bundler told CNN.

    Katzenberg, who will be on hand at fundraisers in Chicago and New York this week, argued Biden isn’t facing the same time crunch to raise money compared to his 2020 run when he faced a competitive Democratic primary.

    “He’s not on the same path that he was four years ago. There are no primaries. The urgency and the timeline is simply not the same,” he said. “Our fundraising efforts are actually being very strategic and thoughtful about when you can activate people. And you want to activate them at the point when they are ready to actually give, and that is always around very specific moments and around urgency.”

    Biden’s campaign has yet to name a national finance director, a role tasked with overseeing the overall fundraising effort, prompting frustration among some donors who wanted to see a more formal structure from the outset. The campaign’s fundraising apparatus has largely been driven by the Democratic National Committee in the opening months of the campaign.

    When the president announced his reelection campaign in April, the campaign declined to provide figures for first-day or first week fundraising – as some candidates, including Biden in 2019, do when jumping into the race to demonstrate (and generate) excitement.

    One person familiar with the matter said the Biden campaign’s fundraising after the video announcement was “nothing special.” A separate source familiar with the matter said the reelection campaign’s fundraising has been stable since launch date and in line with the Biden team’s projections.

    “The campaign will share its fundraising numbers when we submit our FEC filing next month,” said Kevin Muñoz, a Biden campaign spokesperson. “We are encouraged by the strong response we are seeing from donors and our grassroots supporters, including a significant number of new donors since 2020 that support the President’s agenda for restoring democracy, freedom, and growing the economy by growing the middle class.”

    “While MAGA Republicans duke it out over extreme, divisive, and unpopular policies in their primary, we are ensuring that we have the resources needed to run an aggressive, winning campaign,” Munoz added.

    The Biden campaign declined to share its own fundraising target for this quarter, but campaign manager Julie Chavez Rodriguez told CNN in an interview earlier this month she believes the campaign will show “strong momentum and energy.”

    “Folks are gonna want to try to poke holes at anything that they can, but I think that, you know, we’ll continue to show just strong momentum and energy,” Chavez Rodriguez said.

    Biden’s second quarter fundraising haul will likely be compared to that of his recent predecessors.

    When he announced his reelection in 2011, Obama burst out of the gate with a hefty second quarter fundraising haul of $86 million for the reelect and DNC, a record-setting figure for that time. Obama announced his reelection bid in the same fundraising quarter as Biden but had a three week lead on Biden’s entry into the 2024 race.

    Biden, never a prolific fundraiser, raised $21.5 million in his first quarter in the 2020 campaign, a figure that was surpassed by newcomer South Bend Mayor Pete Buttigieg.

    How much money Biden and his team can raise in these early stages of the campaign could dictate how his campaign apparatus ultimately looks. So far, Biden’s team had made only a few hires and has relied in large part on the DNC, including for office space as they search for a headquarters building in Wilmington, Delaware.

    DNC fundraising officials organized a summit for top donors and supporters in the days after the launch, an effort to reengage some of the highest contributors from his 2020 bid.

    One tool the campaign hopes to leverage early on in their efforts is a joint fundraising agreement between the campaign, DNC and state Democratic parties, consolidating efforts to raise money early in the race and allow individual donors to contribute up to $929,600 to the Biden Victory Fund.

    The president has spent the past two weeks crisscrossing the country for campaign cash. He raised roughly $5 million in one day of events with California Gov. Gavin Newsom during a two-day swing through California’s Bay Area last week, a source familiar with the events said.

    As the end of quarter approaches, the president is headlining five fundraisers in the span of three days, tapping into high-dollar donors in Chevy Chase, Maryland, New York City and Chicago, where the billionaire Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker is hosting an event.

    First lady Dr. Jill Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris have also hit the fundraising circuit as well. Harris brought in $1.25 million for the Biden Victory Fund at the LGBTQ Leadership Council Gala in New York City earlier this week, a source familiar with the fundraiser said.

    The campaign also is leaning on its top surrogates this week to mobilize grassroots donors, including the Obama-Biden fundraising video rolling out on social media on Thursday.

    A campaign official argued the Obama-Biden duo is “an effective pairing” to push for small-dollar donors and represented “some of our best performing content from 2020.” Obama and Biden had lunch together at the White House on Tuesday.

    “He is throwing a marker down and saying, ‘Do not mistake, I am 100% in on supporting Joe Biden’s presidency,’” Katzenberg said of the Obama push. “As invaluable as his time is on the fundraising here, his endorsement, enthusiasm and continued support, friendship, loyalty. That’s what this about.”

    Former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, the chair of the campaign’s National Advisory Board and a prolific fundraiser herself, is hosting a call with other advisory board members Thursday to encourage them to tap into their donor networks in the closing days of the quarter, a campaign official said.

    And advisory board members including Sens. Cory Booker, Amy Klobuchar, Chris Murphy, and Raphael Warnock as well as New Mexico Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham and a handful of members of Congress – Reps. Chrissy Houlihan, Sara Jacobs, and Lauren Underwood — are also expected to assist via e-mails, texts, and online fundraising.

    The campaign is hoping to galvanize online donations after Biden raised $700 million online during the 2020 cycle. White House digital strategy director Rob Flaherty, who ran the 2020 campaign’s digital operation, is expected to join the campaign this summer with an eye in part towards boosting online fundraising.

    Campaign advisers say they’ve seen positive signs about in the number of new donors drawn to the campaign, with one strategist saying, “The donor base right out of the box is expanded.”

    The campaign has sought to use moments like former President Donald Trump’s CNN Town Hall and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis’ Twitter launch snafu to expand their donor network, though the official declined to say specifically how much was raised as part of those efforts.

    Along with about a dozen fundraiser events headlined by the president, Chavez Rodriguez, her deputy, Quentin Fulks, and Democratic National Committee Executive Director Sam Cornale spent part of this month traveling the country to meet with top donors, local Democratic officials and other supporters in an effort to stir up enthusiasm and build fundraising momentum.

    Still, among the donor class, there is a certain malaise – a combination of fundraising fatigue, the lack of a specific Republican opponent as a motivator and a general lack of enthusiasm for Biden’s candidacy.

    Some Biden allies predict the president will have little trouble fundraising if Trump emerges as the Republican nominee, believing the former president is a strong motivator for donors and voters alike.

    But that message and the sentiment behind it belie an overall weariness among those being asked to dig deeper into their pockets.

    “There was fatigue during the midterms because you had this battle to save the country in 2020. People feel like the fundraising has just never stopped,” said one Democratic fundraiser, adding that any usual “cooling-off period” never arrived.

    “It’s just constant. And every quarter is the most important quarter,” the fundraiser said.

    Uncertainty in the Republican primary field could also hold back fundraising at this stage in the election, with nearly two months before candidates face off in the first GOP debate and more than six months before primary voters cast their first ballots.

    “Ultimately, the campaign is relying on one big thing above all else: They’re relying on Trump or DeSantis or someone who’s just so unpalatable being the nominee. That’ll drive everything,” the fundraiser predicted.

    John Morgan, one of a handful of donors to attend last week’s White House state dinner for Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, told CNN he’s looking to hold a fundraiser for Biden in the fall.

    “The money is going to pour in – and if Trump is the nominee, it will pour in by double because Republicans will be writing checks too,” Morgan predicted.

    “Everybody was panicked last time but then he got the nomination, and he raised a billion dollars, and if Trump is the nominee, he might raise two billion,” Morgan said.

    The average minimum price to attend one of Biden’s first dozen fundraising events, a Democratic fundraiser said, is approximately $25,000 per person, with the average event raising between $1.5 to $2 million.

    Biden has used these events to test drive and sharpen a 2024 message, seeking to reframe concerns about his age.

    “It’s a legitimate thing to raise the question of age,” Biden told donors at a May fundraiser at the Manhattan apartment of former Blackstone executive Tony James. “I hope what I’ve been able to bring to this job, and will continue to bring, is a little bit of wisdom.”

    Biden has also worked to cater his message to donors who want face time with their candidate.

    “People want his time, which is much more difficult this time around,” compared to when he was a candidate in 2020, one bundler said.

    Ahead of one of this week’s fundraising events, an expected attendee told CNN he had to warn his colleagues who are attending their first Biden fundraiser to manage expectations: “It’s gonna be cool no matter what. You get to shake hands with the president and take a photo with him. We’re all excited for that. But, you know, he is not Barack Obama. He’s not Bill Clinton. He’s not George W. Bush,” the attendee said.

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  • Attorney disciplinary committee recommends Rudy Giuliani be disbarred for 2020 election legal work | CNN Politics

    Attorney disciplinary committee recommends Rudy Giuliani be disbarred for 2020 election legal work | CNN Politics

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    CNN
     — 

    An attorney disciplinary committee has recommended Rudy Giuliani be disbarred in Washington, DC, for his efforts on behalf of then-President Donald Trump to overturn the 2020 election results.

    The committee, which weighs cases of legal ethics and attorney misconduct in the District of Columbia, issued the report and recommendation on Giuliani on Friday following a lawyer misconduct hearing for Giuliani in December that functioned like a trial.

    “He claimed massive election fraud but had no evidence of it,” the committee wrote. “By prosecuting that destructive case Mr. Giuliani, a sworn officer of the Court, forfeited his right to practice law. He should be disbarred.”

    The panel’s recommendation is not final; the case against Giuliani still must be considered by DC’s Board on Professional Responsibility and by the DC court of appeals.

    The committee specifically criticized Giuliani for dishonesty following the 2020 election and what they called “calculated” attempts to undermine trust in elections, when he falsely claimed in a Pennsylvania federal court there had been election fraud that could overturn Joe Biden’s win of the state.

    “Mr. Giuliani has not acknowledged or accepted responsibility for his misconduct. To the contrary, he has declared his indignation over being subjected to the disciplinary process,” the committee wrote in its report. “We are convinced that a sanction must be enhanced to ensure that it adequately deters both Respondent (Giuliani) and other attorneys from acting similarly in the future.”

    The three-person committee, comprised of two attorneys and a member of the public, was unanimous in recommending Giuliani be disbarred.

    Ted Goodman, a political adviser to Giuliani, called the report a “great injustice,” and said “the decision-makers at the DC Bar Association are nothing more than an arm of the permanent regime in Washington.”

    Giuliani’s attorneys had argued to the committee that he had a reasonable basis to believe the claims in litigation were true and that he was relying on what others working with the Trump campaign told him about the fraud allegations.

    Giuliani, the former top federal prosecutor in Manhattan and a lawyer for Trump, is also facing an attorney ethics review in New York. His law license at this time is temporarily suspended, marking a substantial downfall for the once highly regarded American political and legal figurehead.

    “We have considered in mitigation Mr. Giuliani’s conduct following the September 11 attacks as well as his prior service in the Justice Department and as Mayor of New York City. But all of that happened long ago,” the report said on Friday. “The misconduct here sadly transcends all his past accomplishments.”

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  • With the rise of AI, social media platforms could face perfect storm of misinformation in 2024 | CNN Business

    With the rise of AI, social media platforms could face perfect storm of misinformation in 2024 | CNN Business

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    New York
    CNN
     — 

    Last month, a video posted to Twitter by Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis’ presidential campaign used images that appeared to be generated by artificial intelligence showing former President Donald Trump hugging Dr. Anthony Fauci. The images, which appeared designed to criticize Trump for not firing the nation’s top infectious disease specialist, were tricky to spot: they were shown alongside real images of the pair and with a text overlay saying, “real life Trump.”

    As the images began spreading, fact-checking organizations and sharp-eyed users quickly flagged them as fake. But Twitter, which has slashed much of its staff in recent months under new ownership, did not remove the video. Instead, it eventually added a community note — a contributor-led feature to highlight misinformation on the social media platform — to the post, alerting the site’s users that in the video “3 still shots showing Trump embracing Fauci are AI generated images.”

    Experts in digital information integrity say it’s just the start of AI-generated content being used ahead of the 2024 US Presidential election in ways that could confuse or mislead voters.

    A new crop of AI tools offer the ability to generate compelling text and realistic images — and, increasingly, video and audio. Experts, and even some executives overseeing AI companies, say these tools risk spreading false information to mislead voters, including ahead of the 2024 US election.

    “The campaigns are starting to ramp up, the elections are coming fast and the technology is improving fast,” said Jevin West, a professor at the University of Washington and co-founder of the Center for an Informed Public. “We’ve already seen evidence of the impact that AI can have.”

    Social media companies bear significant responsibility for addressing such risks, experts say, as the platforms where billions of people go for information and where bad actors often go to spread false claims. But they now face a perfect storm of factors that could make it harder than ever to keep up with the next wave of election misinformation.

    Several major social networks have pulled back on their enforcement of some election-related misinformation and undergone significant layoffs over the past six months, which in some cases hit election integrity, safety and responsible AI teams. Current and former US officials have also raised alarms that a federal judge’s decision earlier this month to limit how some US agencies communicate with social media companies could have a “chilling effect” on how the federal government and states address election-related disinformation. (On Friday, an appeals court temporarily blocked the order.)

    Meanwhile, AI is evolving at a rapid pace. And despite calls from industry players and others, US lawmakers and regulators have yet to implement real guardrails for AI technologies.

    “I’m not confident in even their ability to deal with the old types of threats,” said David Evan Harris, an AI researcher and ethics adviser to the Psychology of Technology Institute, who previously worked on responsible AI at Facebook-parent Meta. “And now there are new threats.”

    The major platforms told CNN they have existing policies and practices in place related to misinformation and, in some cases, specifically targeting “synthetic” or computer-generated content, that they say will help them identify and address any AI-generated misinformation. None of the companies agreed to make anyone working on generative AI detection efforts available for an interview.

    The platforms “haven’t been ready in the past, and there’s absolutely no reason for us to believe that they’re going to be ready now,” Bhaskar Chakravorti, dean of global business at The Fletcher School at Tufts University, told CNN.

    Misleading content, especially related to elections, is nothing new. But with the help of artificial intelligence, it’s now possible for anyone to quickly, easily and cheaply create huge quantities of fake content.

    And given AI technology’s rapid improvement over the past year, fake images, text, audio and videos are likely to be even harder to discern by the time the US election rolls around next year.

    “We’ve still got more than a year to go until the election. These tools are going to get better and, in the hands of sophisticated users, they can be very powerful,” said Harris. He added that the kinds of misinformation and election meddling that took place on social media in 2016 and 2020 will likely only be exacerbated by AI.

    The various forms of AI-generated content could be used together to make false information more believable — for example, an AI-written fake article accompanied by an AI-generated photo purporting to show what happened in the report, said Margaret Mitchell, researcher and chief ethics scientist at open-source AI firm Hugging Face.

    AI tools could be useful for anyone wanting to mislead, but especially for organized groups and foreign adversaries incentivized to meddle in US elections. Massive foreign troll farms have been hired to attempt to influence previous elections in the United States and elsewhere, but “now, one person could be in charge of deploying thousands of thousands of generative AI bots that work,” to pump out content across social media to mislead voters, Mitchell, who previously worked at Google, said.

    OpenAI, the maker of the popular AI chatbot ChatGPT, issued a stark warning about the risk of AI-generated misinformation in a recent research paper. An abundance of false information from AI systems, whether intentional or created by biases or “hallucinations” from the systems, has “the potential to cast doubt on the whole information environment, threatening our ability to distinguish fact from fiction,” it said.

    Examples of AI-generated misinformation have already begun to crop up. In May, several Twitter accounts, including some who had paid for a blue “verification” checkmark, shared fake images purporting to show an explosion near the Pentagon. While the images were quickly debunked, their circulation was briefly followed by a dip in the stock market. Twitter suspended at least one of the accounts responsible for spreading the images. Facebook labeled posts about the images as “false information,” along with a fact check.

    A month earlier, the Republican National Committee released a 30-second advertisement responding to President Joe Biden’s official campaign announcement that used AI images to imagine a dystopian United States after the reelection of the 46th president. The RNC ad included the small on-screen disclaimer, “Built entirely with AI imagery,” but some potential voters in Washington D.C. to whom CNN showed the video did not spot it on their first watch.

    Dozens of Democratic lawmakers last week sent a letter calling on the Federal Election Commission to consider cracking down on the use of artificial intelligence technology in political advertisements, warning that deceptive ads could harm the integrity of next year’s elections.

    Ahead of 2024, many of the platforms have said that they will be rolling out plans to protect the election’s integrity, including from the threat of AI-generated content.

    TikTok earlier this year rolled out a policy stipulating that “synthetic” or manipulated media created by AI must be clearly labeled, in addition to its civic integrity policy which prohibits misleading information about electoral processes and its general misinformation policy which prohibits false or misleading claims that could cause “significant harm” to individuals or society.

    YouTube has a manipulated media policy that prohibits content that has been “manipulated or doctored” in a way that could mislead users and “may pose a serious risk of egregious harm.” The platform also has policies against content that could mislead users about how and when to vote, false claims that could discourage voting and content that “encourages others to interfere with democratic processes.” YouTube also says it prominently surfaces reliable news and information about elections on its platform, and that its election-focused team includes members of its trust and safety, product and “Intelligence Desk” teams.

    “Technically manipulated content, including election content, that misleads users and may pose a serious risk of egregious harm is not allowed on YouTube,” YouTube spokesperson Ivy Choi said in a statement. “We enforce our manipulated content policy using machine learning and human review, and continue to improve on this work to stay ahead of potential threats.”

    A Meta spokesperson told CNN that the company’s policies apply to all content on its platforms, including AI-generated content. That includes its misinformation policy, which stipulates that the platform removes false claims that could “directly contribute to interference with the functioning of political processes and certain highly deceptive manipulated media,” and may reduce the spread of other misleading claims. Meta also prohibits ads featuring content that has been debunked by its network of third-party fact checkers.

    TikTok and Meta have also joined a group of tech industry partners coordinated by the non-profit Partnership on AI dedicated to developing a framework for responsible use of synthetic media.

    Asked for comment on this story, Twitter responded with an auto-reply of a poop emoji.

    Twitter has rolled back much of its content moderation in the months since billionaire Elon Musk took over the platform, and instead has leaned more heavily on its “Community Notes” feature which allows users to critique the accuracy of and add context to other people’s posts. On its website, Twitter also says it has a “synthetic media” policy under which it may label or remove “synthetic, manipulated, or out-of-context media that may deceive or confuse people and lead to harm.”

    Still, as is often the case with social media, the challenge is likely to be less a matter of having the policies in place than enforcing them. The platforms largely use a mix of human and automated review to identify misinformation and manipulated media. The companies declined to provide additional details about their AI detection processes, including how many staffers are involved in such efforts.

    But AI experts say they’re worried that the platforms’ detection systems for computer-generated content may have a hard time keeping up with the technology’s advancements. Even some of the companies developing new generative AI tools have struggled to build services that can accurately detect when something is AI-generated.

    Some experts are urging all the social platforms to implement policies requiring that AI-generated or manipulated content be clearly labeled, and calling on regulators and lawmakers to establish guardrails around AI and hold tech companies accountable for the spread of false claims.

    One thing is clear: the stakes for success are high. Experts say that not only does AI-generated content create the risk of internet users being misled by false information; it could also make it harder for them to trust real information about everything from voting to crisis situations.

    “We know that we’re going into a very scary situation where it’s going to be very unclear what has happened and what has not actually happened,” said Mitchell. “It completely destroys the foundation of reality when it’s a question whether or not the content you’re seeing is real.”

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  • Pro-Chinese online influence campaign promoted protests in Washington, researchers say | CNN Politics

    Pro-Chinese online influence campaign promoted protests in Washington, researchers say | CNN Politics

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    CNN
     — 

    A Chinese marketing firm likely organized and promoted protests in Washington last year as part of a wide-ranging pro-Beijing influence campaign, according to new research.

    The Chinese firm also used a network of over 70 fake news websites to promote pro-China content in an example of the more aggressive efforts by pro-China operatives to influence US political debate in recent years, according to security firm Mandiant, which analyzed the activity.

    One of the protests was against a US government ban on goods produced in China’s Xinjiang region, where US officials have accused the Chinese government of systematic repression of the Uyghurs. The other protest was on the sidelines of a June conference on international religious freedom, Mandiant said.

    One of the protests only attracted roughly a dozen people but it showed the scope and ambition of the pro-China efforts.

    The hired protesters, who included self-proclaimed musicians and actors in the Washington, DC, area, apparently had no idea they were being enlisted in a pro-China influence campaign, the Mandiant researchers said.

    The campaign backed by the Chinese firm, Shanghai Haixun Technology Co., Ltd., is “intended to sow discord in US society,” Ryan Serabian, a senior analyst at Mandiant, told CNN.

    In both cases, protesters carry placards and chant slogans about racial discrimination and abortion in the US. Haixun, the Chinese firm, distributed videos of the protesters online to further the influence campaign, according to Mandiant.

    Shanghai Haixun Technology did not respond to a request for comment.

    Liu Pengyu, a spokesperson for the Chinese Embassy in Washington, said he was unaware of the details of the research. “China has always adhered to non-interference in other countries’ internal affairs,” Liu said in an email to CNN.

    The Washington Post first reported on the Mandiant research.

    In the runup to the 2016 US presidential elections, Russian operatives used social media to organize protests on American soil as part of Moscow’s election interference, according to US intelligence officials. Such divisive tactics are no longer confined to the Russians, according to election security experts.

    During the 2022 US midterm elections, pro-China propagandists showed signs of engaging in “Russia-style influence activities” that stoke American divisions, FBI officials told reporters last year. The FBI pointed to Facebook’s shutdown of accounts originating in China that posted memes mocking President Joe Biden and Republican Sen. Marco Rubio of Florida.

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  • Democratic Rep. Ro Khanna announces he won’t seek California Senate seat, endorses Rep. Barbara Lee | CNN Politics

    Democratic Rep. Ro Khanna announces he won’t seek California Senate seat, endorses Rep. Barbara Lee | CNN Politics

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    Washington
    CNN
     — 

    Democratic Rep. Ro Khanna of California announced Sunday that he won’t enter the competitive Democratic primary to fill retiring Sen. Dianne Feinstein’s senate seat in the Golden State, electing to endorse Democratic Rep. Barbara Lee instead.

    “I have concluded that despite a lot of enthusiasm from Bernie [Sanders’] folks, the best place, the most exciting place, action place, fit place, for me to serve as a progressive is in the House of Representatives,” Khanna told CNN’s Jake Tapper on “State of the Union.”

    “And I’m honored to be co-chairing Barbara Lee’s campaign for the Senate and endorsing her today. We need a strong anti-war senator and she will play that role.”

    The Democratic field to fill Feinstein’s seat also includes Reps. Adam Schiff and Katie Porter, who announced their bids earlier this year. Khanna had previously expressed interest in running for the vacant seat.

    Lee, who announced her bid last month, is a member of the House Democratic leadership, serving as co-chair of the Democratic Steering Committee, and she was the former chair of the Congressional Black Caucus.

    Throughout her time in Congress, Lee has served as the co-chair and whip of the Progressive Caucus. And before coming to Washington, she spent several years serving in the California state legislature.

    If elected, Lee would be the sole Black female senator serving in the Congress and only the third in US history.

    Lee, Khanna said Sunday, is a “unique voice. She was the lone vote against the endless war in Afghanistan. She stood up so strongly against the war in Iraq. She worked with me in trying to stop the war in Yemen, the War Powers Resolution. And frankly, Jake, representation matters. We don’t have a single African American woman in the United States Senate.”

    Currently, Lee is at a disadvantage compared to her well-funded rivals. She had just $52,000 in cash on hand entering 2023, according to FEC filings, while Schiff had more than $20 million stockpiled at the end of the year and Porter had more than $7.4 million.

    Under California’s primary system, all candidates run on the same ballot, with the top two candidates, regardless of party, advancing to the general election.

    This story has been updated with additional information.

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  • Klobuchar says Biden and McCarthy should negotiate over budget, not debt limit | CNN Politics

    Klobuchar says Biden and McCarthy should negotiate over budget, not debt limit | CNN Politics

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    CNN
     — 

    Democratic Sen. Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota said Sunday that she believes President Joe Biden should sit down with House Speaker Kevin McCarthy and negotiate Republicans’ proposed spending cuts, but she insisted those talks should be in relation to the federal budget – not raising the debt limit.

    “Of course, President Biden should sit down with Speaker McCarthy,” Klobuchar told CNN’s Dana Bash on “State of the Union” ahead of the House’s expected vote this week on McCarthy’s bill to raise the debt limit. “But let me put an idea out there. The proposal that McCarthy has put forward, that belongs in the budget. … Our main goal right now is to make clear that we are going to avoid default.”

    “They should start those negotiations now,” the senator added.

    McCarthy introduced a proposal last week to raise the nation’s $31.4 trillion debt limit by an additional $1.5 trillion in exchange for cuts to domestic spending programs across the board.

    But Biden and his top advisers have said they will not negotiate a debt ceiling increase and will only accept a clean proposal to raise the nation’s borrowing limit.

    The US hit its debt ceiling in January and can’t continue to borrow to meet its obligations unless Congress raises or suspends it. The Treasury Department is avoiding default – which would happen this summer or early fall – by using a combination of cash on hand and “extraordinary measures,” which should last at least until early June, Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said in January.

    A breach of the US debt ceiling risks sparking a 2008-style economic catastrophe that could wipe out millions of jobs and set America back for generations, Moody’s Analytics has warned.

    McCarthy said Sunday he believes he will secure the necessary votes to pass his debt limit bill, telling Fox News, “We will hold a vote this week, we will pass it and send it to the Senate.”

    The California Republican also repeatedly criticized Biden over his refusal to negotiate a debt limit plan. The White House has attacked the GOP debt limit proposal as a nonstarter and something that would take the country to a “totally irresponsible” debt default.

    “I’m beginning to wonder about the words that he says and the thoughts that he’s using, because the idea that he won’t even negotiate for more than 80 days, he is now putting the country in default. We are the only ones being responsible and sensible about this,” McCarthy said.

    Meanwhile, Klobuchar, in her interview Sunday, also addressed concerns regarding the continued absence of her Senate colleague Dianne Feinstein, who is recovering from shingles. The California Democrat’s absence has kept her party from advancing certain Biden judicial nominees out of the Judiciary Committee, on which she serves.

    “She has served our country well. She has said she’s coming back. And we await her return,” Klobuchar said when asked whether she agrees with Democrats who have called on Feinstein to resign.

    Feinstein’s return, Klobuchar said, would “resolve the problem” over the holdup in moving certain nominations through the Judiciary panel.

    Klobuchar added, however, that “at some point, when we have debt ceiling votes and the like, there may be another consideration that she will have to make with her family.”

    With Biden preparing to launch his reelection campaign this week, Klobuchar said the president will have an “incredibly strong record” to run on, ignoring concerns raised over his age.

    “He is a steady hand, when you look at what’s out there right now, with Donald Trump and what we’re hearing again. People don’t want that chaos back again,” she said.

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  • Sanders brushes aside concerns about Biden’s age: ‘Age is one thing. I think experience is another’ | CNN Politics

    Sanders brushes aside concerns about Biden’s age: ‘Age is one thing. I think experience is another’ | CNN Politics

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    Washington
    CNN
     — 

    Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders on Sunday brushed aside concerns about President Joe Biden’s age following the president’s reelection bid announcement, saying “Age is one thing. I think experience is another.”

    The independent senator, who, at 81, is a year older than Biden, told CNN’s Dana Bash on “State of the Union” that “if you believe in democracy – you want to see more people vote, not fewer people vote, I think the choice is pretty clear. And that choice is Biden.”

    Sanders, who caucuses with Democrats in the Senate, endorsed Biden’s reelection bid last week, and the president is likely to enjoy an easy path to the 2024 Democratic nomination. Author Marianne Williamson and anti-vaccine activist Robert F. Kennedy Jr. are challenging him in the primary, but no major Democratic candidates are expected to join them.

    But at 80, Biden is the nation’s oldest president. Polls have consistently reflected concern about his age, even among Democrats.

    Although there are clear moments when Biden is visibly slower physically than he was, dozens of aides, administration officials and members of Congress who’ve spent time with him have relayed stories to CNN about how thorough and demanding he is in meeting after meeting.

    Sanders, who is up for reelection 2024 but has yet to detail his plans, said Sunday that the key for Democrats to hold the White House rests in a stronger focus on “working-class issues.”

    The party, he said, has “got to make it clear that we believe in a government that represents all, not just the few. Take on the greed of the insurance companies, the drug companies, Wall Street, all the big money interests, and start delivering for working-class people.”

    “You do that,” he said, “I think Biden is going to win in a landslide.”

    Biden conceded earlier this month that he “took a hard look” at his own age as he contemplated whether to seek reelection.

    “(The American electorate is) going to see a race, and they’re going to judge whether or not I have it or don’t have it. I respect them taking a hard look at it. I take a hard look at it as well – I took a hard look at it before I decided to run, and I feel good, I feel excited about the prospects,” Biden said when pressed on his age during a joint news conference alongside South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol at the White House.

    “With regard to age, I can’t even say I guess how old I am. I can’t even say the number – it doesn’t register with me,” he joked.

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  • Voting rights advocates in the South emboldened by Supreme Court win | CNN Politics

    Voting rights advocates in the South emboldened by Supreme Court win | CNN Politics

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    CNN
     — 

    With a sense of relief that the conservative Supreme Court did not use a major Alabama redistricting case to further gut the Voting Rights Act, civil rights advocates and election attorneys are preparing for a new flood of redistricting litigation lawsuits challenging political maps – especially in the South – they say discriminate against minorities.

    In the 5-4 case decided Thursday, Alabama must now draw a second majority-Black US congressional district after Republicans were sued by African American voters over a redistricting plan for the 27% percent Black state that made White voters the majority in six of the seven districts.

    The six White majority districts are represented by Republicans; the Black majority district is represented by a Democrat.

    “I don’t think it’s going to stop Republicans from drawing racist maps,” Aunna Dennis, executive director of the voting rights group Common Cause, told CNN. “But I think that this empowers those of us pushing back and fighting that.”

    The majority opinion – written by Chief Justice John Roberts, who was joined by the court’s three liberals and, in most parts, by Justice Brett Kavanaugh – effectively maintained the status quo around how courts should approach Voting Rights Act lawsuits that allege a legislative map discriminates by race.

    By letting old precedent around the Voting Rights Act to stand in the case, called Allen v. Milligan, the Supreme Court has likely emboldened voting rights advocates to bring cases they previously thought would have been doomed.

    Several election law attorneys and voting rights advocates have suggested to CNN they believe the decision could have a ripple effect across the South, in states like Louisiana, Georgia, Mississippi and Texas where cases claiming Section 2 violations are already working through the courts.

    According to the Democracy Docket, a liberal-leaning voting rights media platform that tracks election litigation, there are 31 active federal cases involving Voting Rights Act redistricting claims similar to those in the Alabama case.

    “I suspect that there are a number of states with lawyers who were considering filing a lawsuit similar to the Milligan lawsuit, but they held off because the prospects of how everyone thought Milligan would go were so dim. But now, you’re going to have a whole range of suits filed,” said Alabama voting rights attorney J.S. “Chris” Christie, who filed one of the two lawsuits that were before the justices in the Milligan case.

    “Some of those will win, and some of them won’t. All redistricting suits are not the same,” Christie said, noting that Kavanaugh did not join an important part of Roberts’ opinion, depriving that section of a majority.

    Still, he said, “Lawyers who file these types of lawsuits are going to be encouraged and are going to pursue those cases aggressively, knowing that the Voting Rights Act precedents are there.”

    The ruling was a shock. The right-leaning high court, sometimes in decisions penned by Roberts himself, had been on a spree of landmark rulings over the last several years that had whittled down the scope of the Voting Rights Act. And in the flurry of emergency litigation last year ahead of the 2022 midterms, the Supreme Court repeatedly put on hold lower court rulings – including in the Alabama case – that would have ordered the redrawing of political maps ahead of last year’s elections, helping Republicans to narrowly reclaim the US House.

    That meant that, at least in Alabama, the election was carried out under a redistricting plan that the Supreme Court has now affirmed to be likely unlawful.

    “The fact remains that the Supreme Court previously allowed the same map that they just determined unconstitutionally, and systemically diluted Black votes be used in the 2022 election,” the Congressional Black Caucus said in a statement.

    In Alabama, lower courts said early last year that the state’s congressional map likely violated the Voting Rights Act by diluting Black voting power. The courts ordered it redrawn in a way that was expected to produce a second majority-Black district, which would have shifted the partisan makeup of the state’s congressional delegation from 6-1 to 5-2.

    But, in February 2022, the Supreme Court put those decisions on hold until the justices could hear and decide the case themselves.

    At the heart of the dispute in the Alabama case was the way that, under longstanding Supreme Court precedent, race was used to determine if a map violated Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act, which prohibits voting procedures “not equally open to participation by members” of a protected class, like racial minorities. Alabama was putting forward an argument for a supposedly “race-blind” approach to VRA redistricting compliance, that if endorsed, would have defanged the provision.

    Already, the Supreme Court led by Roberts had gutted a separate provision of the VRA that required certain jurisdictions (including Alabama and other states in the South) with a history of racially discriminatory voting policies to get federal approval for the maps that they drew.

    The Supreme Court’s emergency move last year to allow the Republican-drawn Alabama map to stay in place had cascading effects in lawsuits across the country.

    Some cases, like a challenge brought to Alabama’s state legislative redistricting plan, were put on hold.

    In a Georgia case that concerned both the congressional and state legislative redistricting plans, a federal judge said that the plaintiffs were likely to succeed in at least some of the districts they were challenging, but he declined to grant the preliminary injunction, in part citing the Supreme Court’s emergency order.

    The Supreme Court, meanwhile, also froze a lower court order in a legal challenge brought against Louisiana’s congressional map that made similar arguments as the Milligan case, as Louisiana legislators had drawn just one majority-Black district of the six districts in the 33% percent Black state.

    The justices paused the case, where a federal judge was preparing to redraw the Louisiana map if the Republican lawmakers refused to do so, and said they were taking up the lawsuit but putting it on hold until the Milligan case was decided.

    Now the challengers’ lawyers in that case are anticipating that the Supreme Court will send it back to lower courts, where they were poised to prevail under the approach to VRA redistricting cases that the justices have now left undisturbed.

    Cases in Texas, Mississippi and elsewhere that inched ahead while the Milligan case was pending will go to trial without the threat that the challengers would need to prove their case under a drastically different Section 2 standard.

    “If anything, we no longer need to make adjustments that we had potentially been preparing for because the state of the law remains unchanged,” said Texas Civil Rights Project attorney Sarah Chen, whose group is involved in several challenges to Texas maps, including a lawsuit over Galveston County’s redistricting plan.

    “The Supreme Court did not endorse the radical changes proposed by Alabama in their arguments, the same changes that are also endorsed by opposing counsel in this Galveston redistricting matter,” Chen added.

    While challenges to statewide maps are what get the most national attention, the ruling’s effect on how the VRA is applied to local races like county commission elections and school board seats “is really going to impact voters’ everyday lives,” according to Christie, the Alabama voting rights attorney, who said that Thursday’s opinion will be “huge” in a newly filed challenge to a county commission map in the state.

    “Attorneys who file these types of lawsuits are going to be encouraged to pursue these cases knowing that the VRA precedent is there,” he said.

    Even before they get into a courtroom, voting rights advocates see the Milligan ruling as valuable for discouraging state and local map drawers from diminishing the political power of communities of color, as it squelched expectations that the Supreme Court was about to make VRA challenges more difficult to bring.

    “I am disappointed in today’s Supreme Court opinion but it remains the commitment of the Secretary of State’s Office to comply with all applicable election laws,” Alabama Secretary of State Wes Allen, the defendant in the Alabama case, said in a statement after the ruling.

    In North Carolina, voting rights advocates had been reeling from a major defeat with the state Supreme Court recently ruling that North Carolina courts couldn’t police partisan gerrymandering. (Litigation over the state’s congressional plan is also before the Supreme Court in a legal dispute that does not concern the Voting Rights Act). They are finding a silver lining in that, thanks to Thursday’s ruling, the GOP legislators will be redrawing North Carolina’s political maps knowing Voting Rights Act protections for minority voters remain in force.

    “We would hope that they would really take this decision to heart that they would make a genuine good faith effort to comply with Section 2,” said Hilary Harris Klein, the senior counsel for voting rights with the Southern Coalition for Social Justice.

    Thursday’s ruling, said Deuel Ross, the deputy director of litigation at the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, “puts state legislatures and local redistricting bodies on notice that the Voting Rights Act is here to stay and if they deny communities of color the representation they deserve, that they will face lawsuits.”

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  • Whistleblowers say IRS recommended far more charges, including felonies, against Hunter Biden | CNN Politics

    Whistleblowers say IRS recommended far more charges, including felonies, against Hunter Biden | CNN Politics

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    CNN
     — 

    Two whistleblowers told Congress that IRS investigators recommended charging Hunter Biden with attempted tax evasion and other felonies, which are far more serious crimes than what the president’s son has agreed to plead guilty to, according to transcripts of their private interviews with lawmakers.

    The IRS whistleblowers said the recommendation called for Hunter Biden to be charged with tax evasion and filing a false tax return – both felonies – for 2014, 2018 and 2019. The IRS also recommended that prosecutors charge him with failing to pay taxes on time, a misdemeanor, for 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018 and 2019, according to the transcripts, which were released Thursday by House Republicans.

    It appears that this 11-count charging recommendation also had the backing of some Justice Department prosecutors, but not from more senior attorneys, according to documents that the whistleblowers provided to House investigators.

    In a deal with prosecutors announced earlier this week, Hunter Biden is pleading guilty to just two tax misdemeanors.

    The allegations come from Gary Shapley, a 14-year IRS veteran, who oversaw parts of the Hunter Biden criminal probe, and an unnamed IRS agent who was on the case nearly from its inception. Shapley approached Congress this year with information that he claimed showed political interference in the investigation. He and the entire IRS team were later removed from the probe.

    “I am alleging, with evidence, that DOJ provided preferential treatment, slow-walked the investigation, did nothing to avoid obvious conflicts of interest in this investigation,” Shapley told lawmakers.

    David Weiss, the Trump-appointed US attorney in Delaware who oversaw the Hunter Biden criminal probe, eventually reached a plea deal where the president’s son will plead guilty to two misdemeanors for failing to pay taxes on time. The plea agreement will also resolve a separate felony gun charge, if Hunter Biden abides by certain court-imposed conditions for a period of time.

    Hunter Biden isn’t pleading guilty to any felonies, and he wasn’t charged with any tax felonies. CNN reported that prosecutors are expected to recommend no jail time. He is scheduled to appear in federal court in Delaware on July 26.

    It isn’t uncommon for there to be internal disagreements among investigators over which charges to file against the target of an investigation, much like the disagreements that the IRS whistleblowers described. CNN reported last year that some FBI and IRS investigators were at odds with other Justice Department officials over the strength of the case, and that there were discussions over which types of charges were appropriate and whether further investigation was needed.

    Sources familiar with the criminal probe told CNN in April that prosecutors were still actively weighing a felony tax charge against Hunter Biden. And it is common for prosecutors to strike deals with defendants where they plead guilty to a small subset of the possible charges they could’ve faced.

    The Justice Department probe into Hunter Biden was opened in November 2018, and was codenamed “Sportsman.” According to Shapley’s testimony, federal investigators knew as early as June 2021 that there were potential venue-related issues with charging Hunter Biden in Delaware. Under federal law, charges must be brought in the jurisdiction where the alleged crimes occurred.

    If the potential charges couldn’t be brought in Delaware, then Weiss would need help from his fellow US attorneys. He looked to Washington, DC, where some of Hunter Biden’s tax returns were prepared, and the Central District of California, which includes the Los Angeles area where Hunter Biden lives.

    But Shapley told the committee that the US attorneys in both districts wouldn’t seek an indictment.

    A second whistleblower, an IRS case agent who also testified to the committee but hasn’t been publicly identified, also told lawmakers that this is what happened. He agreed that Weiss was “was told no” when he tried to get the cooperation of the US attorneys in in DC and Los Angeles, who are Biden appointees.

    Hunter Biden’s eventual plea agreement was filed in Weiss’ jurisdiction, in Delaware.

    Shapley contends in his interview that Attorney General Merrick Garland was not truthful when he told Congress that Weiss had full authority on the investigation.

    Shapley recounted a meeting on October 7, 2022, where, according to Shapley’s notes memorializing the meeting, Weiss said, “He is not the deciding person on whether charges are filed” against Hunter Biden. This undermines what Weiss and Garland have publicly said about Weiss’ independence on the matter.

    Shapley also testified to committee investigators that it was during this October 2022 meeting that he learned for the first time that Weiss had requested to be named as a special counsel, but was denied.

    In testimony to Congress in March, Garland said Weiss was advised “he is not to be denied anything he needs.”

    Regarding the claims of political interference with the Hunter Biden criminal probe, Weiss told House Republicans in a recent letter that Garland granted him “ultimate authority over this matter, including responsibility for deciding where, when, and whether to file charges.”

    After the transcripts were released Thursday, spokespeople for the US attorney’s offices in DC and Los Angeles issued near-identical statements reiterating that Weiss “was given full authority to bring charges in any jurisdiction he deemed appropriate.” The Justice Department echoed those comments in a statement saying Weiss “needs no further approval” to bring charges wherever he wants.

    The whistleblowers also allege that at multiple key junctures, investigators were thwarted in their efforts because prosecutors were concerned about interfering in the 2020 presidential election.

    In 2020, IRS investigators sought to conduct search warrants and take other overt steps. But according to Shapley, several weeks before the election, in September 2020, a Justice Department prosecutor questioned the optics of searching Hunter Biden’s residence and Joe Biden’s guest home.

    Later that year, other planned searches were delayed because then-President Donald Trump was refusing to concede and was continuing to contest the results.

    Republicans have slammed the plea agreement Hunter Biden struck as a “sweetheart deal,” and said it amounted to “a slap on the wrist.”

    House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Jason Smith said earlier Thursday that the transcripts reveal “credible whistleblower testimony alleging misconduct and abuse” at the Justice Department that “resulted in preferential treatment for the president’s son.”

    The Missouri Republican highlighted the whistleblowers’ allegations that the Justice Department “overstepped” in their efforts to intervene in the Hunter Biden criminal probe.

    “The testimony … details a lack of US attorney independence, recurring unjustified delays, unusual actions outside the normal course of any investigation, a lack of transparency across the investigation and prosecution teams, and bullying and threats from the defense counsel,” Smith said.

    Democrats on the committee said the transcripts were “a premature and incomplete record” of what happened with the Hunter Biden probe and accused the GOP of a “stunning abuse of power.”

    Hunter Biden’s lawyer pushed back in a statement Friday against the whistleblowers claims, saying it was “preposterous and deeply irresponsible” to suggest that federal investigators “cut my client any slack” during their “extensive” five-year probe.

    “A close examination of the document released publicly yesterday by a very biased individual raises serious questions over whether it is what he claims it to be,” attorney Chris Clark said. “It is dangerously misleading to make any conclusions or inferences based on this document.”

    Shapley, the IRS supervisor-turned-whistleblower, told House lawmakers that Justice Department prosecutors denied requests to look into messages allegedly from Hunter Biden where he used his father as leverage to pressure a Chinese company into paying him.

    “I am sitting here with my father and we would like to understand why the commitment made has not been fulfilled,” according to a document Shapley gave to Congress, which quotes from texts that are allegedly from Hunter Biden to the CEO of a Chinese fund management company.

    The message continues: “Tell the director that I would like to resolve this now before it gets out of hand. And now means tonight.” The message goes onto say, “I will make certain that between the man sitting next to me and every person he knows and my ability to forever hold a grudge that you will regret not following my direction. I am sitting here waiting for the call with my father.”

    The second, unnamed IRS whistleblower also testified to lawmakers about this alleged WhatsApp message, saying prosecutors questioned whether they could be sure Hunter Biden was telling the truth that his father was actually in the room in the messages. The unnamed whistleblower testified that they did not know whether the FBI investigated the message.

    Shapley told House investigators that a Justice Department attorney insisted that the FBI not ask directly about Joe Biden when doing interviews. But the FBI did manage to ask one key witness about Joe Biden, and Shapley said the witness told investigators that some suggestions of the president’s involvement were overstated.

    An email sent among business partners of Hunter Biden said an equity stake should be held “for the big guy,” an apparent reference to Joe Biden, who was vice president at the time. But one of the associates told the FBI that it was probably just “wishful thinking or maybe he was just projecting” that Joe Biden would get involved if he did not run for president in 2016.

    Joe Biden has repeatedly denied having any involvement in his son’s overseas business dealings, where he made millions of dollars from China, Ukraine and other countries. House Republicans have used their oversight probes to look for evidence that Joe Biden was actually involved.

    This story has been updated with additional developments.

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  • Koch network raises more than $70 million, launches new anti-Trump ads in early voting states | CNN Politics

    Koch network raises more than $70 million, launches new anti-Trump ads in early voting states | CNN Politics

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    CNN
     — 

    The influential network associated with conservative billionaire Charles Koch has collected more than $70 million for political races, the group announced Thursday, as it gears up to help shape the outcome of next year’s contests up and down the ballot and encourage Republican voters to bypass former President Donald Trump in the White House nomination fight.

    Americans for Prosperity Action has pledged to back a single contender in the GOP presidential primary for the first time in its history. It has not yet announced whom it will support, but the group could dramatically reshape the Republican field by deploying its vast resources and standing army of conservative activists on behalf of a single candidate.

    The sums raised by the group will help advance those efforts. The lion’s share of the total announced Thursday came from two organizations affiliated with Koch: $25 million from his Kansas-based industrial conglomerate Koch Industries, and another $25 million from Stand Together, a nonprofit he founded, AFP Action spokesman Bill Riggs confirmed.

    The New York Times first reported the fundraising total.

    The group is also launching new digital spots, shared first with CNN, that cast Trump as a candidate Republicans can’t risk supporting in 2024.

    “Instead of making (President Joe) Biden answer for his reckless progressive agenda, Trump makes the debate about indictments, personal grievances and the election he lost,” one 30-second spot, titled “The Choice,” says.

    The second, called “Unelectable,” describes Trump as a serial loser who caused Republicans to lose the House, Senate and the White House. “If Donald Trump is the GOP nominee, we could lose everything,” the narrator says.

    The ads will run in Iowa, New Hampshire, South Carolina and Nevada, officials said.

    “President Trump continues to fight against the swampy D.C. insiders who would love nothing more than to have an establishment puppet they can control in the White House,” Trump spokesman Steven Cheung said in an email. “No amount of dirty money from shady lobbyists and mysterious donors will ever stop the America First movement, and that’s why President Trump continues to dominate poll after poll — both nationally and statewide. We welcome this fight.”

    AFP Action on Thursday also announced its first US House endorsements of the cycle, saying it will back Republican Reps. Juan Ciscomani of Arizona, Young Kim of California, Zach Nunn of Iowa and John James of Michigan, along with former GOP Rep. Yvette Herrell of New Mexico.

    In addition to attempting to stir doubts about Trump among the GOP faithful, network officials have said part of their 2024 strategy is to bring more general election voters into the GOP primary process to alter the outcome of early contests.

    Americans for Prosperity already has reached out to 1.4 million potential new Republican and swing voters in nearly a dozen states, officials said.

    In a statement to CNN earlier this month, Americans for Prosperity CEO Emily Seidel said the group’s voter interactions have demonstrated to it that many Trump supporters are “receptive to arguments that he is a weak candidate, his focus on 2020 is a liability, and his lack of appeal with independent voters is a problem.”

    “That tells us that many Republicans are ready to move on, they just need to see another candidate step up and show they can lead and win,” she added.

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  • US Supreme Court faces ‘outright defiance’ from Alabama | CNN Politics

    US Supreme Court faces ‘outright defiance’ from Alabama | CNN Politics

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    A version of this story appeared in CNN’s What Matters newsletter. To get it in your inbox, sign up for free here.



    CNN
     — 

    It was a legitimate surprise when the conservative-dominated US Supreme Court ordered Alabama’s conservative-dominated state government last month to redraw its congressional map and include either a second majority-Black congressional district or something quite close to it.

    It may be equally surprising that Alabama appears to have said no.

    Instead of simply complying with the Supreme Court’s order in the Allen v. Milligan case, Alabama’s legislature redrew the congressional map to lower the Black voting-age population in the existing Democratic seat held by Rep. Terri Sewell from about 55% to just over 50% and then increased a second district’s Black population percentage to about 40%.

    The new map approved by Alabama’s legislature and governor will go before federal courts for review in August, so this story is far from over.

    And it will combine with fights over congressional maps in other states, especially New York, in such a way that control of the House could very much be at stake.

    Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey, a Republican, seemed to defend the legislature’s insolence in the face of the federal courts’ orders when it approved the new map Friday.

    “The Legislature knows our state, our people and our districts better than the federal courts or activist groups,” she said in a statement.

    CNN’s Dianne Gallagher noted in her report that the old congressional map was invalidated by a three-judge federal district court panel that included two judges nominated to the bench by former President Donald Trump.

    They concluded the plan by which Alabamians selected their congressional delegation in 2022 likely violated the Voting Rights Act because Black voters have “less opportunity than other Alabamians to elect candidates of their choice to Congress.”

    Before the 2022 midterm election, the US Supreme Court had tabled action on Alabama’s map, which helped Republicans win the barely there four-seat House majority they currently hold.

    Gallagher and CNN’s Tierney Sneed wrote last month that the Allen v. Milligan decision could have consequences for other states and reignite a series of lawsuits in multiple states.

    “Outright defiance of the Supreme Court’s order,” is how Janai Nelson, president of the NAACP Legal Defense Fund, described the new map to CNN’s Dana Bash Monday.

    “In this moment, it is up to our federal courts to protect Black voters and also to protect their own authority here,” she later added.

    The background here is that Alabama’s population is about 27% Black, but the Black population in the state is focused on a number of counties that are overwhelmingly African American – an area known as the state’s Black Belt, although it is named for the area’s fertile soil. The interest of giving the voters of the Black Belt, many of whom are Black, representation in Congress, is all over the Supreme Court’s decision.

    Coincidentally, earlier this year, President Joe Biden named Alabama’s Black Belt, site of many key moments in the Civil Rights Movement, as a National Heritage Area.

    To Nelson, the math suggests that since Black Alabamians represent about a quarter of the state’s population, they should get representation from more than one of the seven lawmakers representing Alabama in Congress.

    But the issue is larger than simple math since Alabama, both historically and currently, is marked by polarized voting conditions.

    “This is a mandate by civil rights laws to make sure that there’s fairness in our systems, that Black voters and other voters who have been historically discriminated against have an opportunity to have representatives who will speak to their interests and give voice to their concerns,” she said.

    Alabama had asked the Supreme Court to essentially nullify Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act, something many court watchers thought the conservative majority was primed to execute.

    But Chief Justice John Roberts and Justice Brett Kavanaugh joined liberals on the court to throw out the Alabama map.

    The Supreme Court also rejected out of hand the idea that the Gulf Coast area represents a community of interest on par with the Black Belt. The new map, according to the state attorney general’s office, still tries to keep the Gulf Coast community together in a single district.

    In a statement, the attorney general’s office argued the new map is fair and complies with the principles of the Voting Rights Act and seeks to unite the Black Belt counties.

    The other political story here is that, like most congressional districts nationwide, not one of the districts in which Alabamians voted in the 2022 midterm elections was even relatively competitive. The only winning candidate who got less than two-thirds of the vote was the Democrat, Sewell. And she still got more than 63% of the heavily Democratic district.

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  • Who is Alvin Bragg, the Manhattan DA leading the historic criminal case against Trump? | CNN Politics

    Who is Alvin Bragg, the Manhattan DA leading the historic criminal case against Trump? | CNN Politics

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    CNN
     — 

    Alvin Bragg, a former New York state and federal prosecutor, drew national attention when he made history as the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office’s first Black district attorney. Now, he is back in the spotlight after a grand jury voted to indict Donald Trump following a yearslong investigation into the former president’s alleged role in a hush money scheme.

    The indictment was unsealed Tuesday as Trump was arraigned in a Manhattan criminal court, unveiling the 34 felony criminal charges of falsifying business records made against the former president.

    In Bragg’s first comments following the arraignment, he called the charges the “bread and butter” of his office’s work.

    “At its core, this case today is one with allegations like so many of our white collar cases,” he said.

    Bragg inherited the probe from his predecessor, Cy Vance, who began the investigation when Trump was still in the White House.

    Trump, who pleaded not guilty to the charges, cast Bragg’s case as political and called for his resignation in a speech Tuesday evening.

    “I never thought anything like this could happen in America, never thought it could happen,” Trump said. “The only crime that I have committed is to fearlessly defend our nation from those who seek to destroy it.”

    In March, Trump announced on social media, ahead of any details from Bragg’s office, that he anticipated he would be arrested within days in connection with the investigation. The Manhattan district attorney’s office declined at the time to comment on the former president’s remarks.

    The high-profile case relates to a $130,000 payment made by Trump’s former personal attorney Michael Cohen to adult film star Stormy Daniels days before the 2016 presidential election in exchange for her silence about an alleged affair with Trump a decade prior. Trump has continuously denied having an affair with Daniels.

    The indictment is historic, marking the first time a former US president and major presidential candidate has ever been criminally charged.

    In the lead-up to Bragg’s decision, sources told CNN that city, state and federal law enforcement agencies in New York City had been discussing how to prepare for a possible Trump indictment, with the former president having called on his supporters to protest if he were to be arrested.

    Discussions between the New York Police Department and the FBI also have focused on the possibility of increased threats against Bragg and his staff from Trump’s supporters in wake of an indictment, sources told CNN. Bragg said in an email to staff earlier in March that his office will “not tolerate attempts to intimidate our office or threaten the rule of law in New York.”

    Bragg has aggressively pursued Trump and other progressive priorities so far in his tenure, including not prosecuting some low-level crimes and finding alternatives to incarceration.

    Before Bragg’s swearing-in last year, he had already worked on cases related to Trump and other notable names in his role as a New York state chief deputy attorney general.

    He said he had helped sue the Trump administration more than 100 times, as well as led a team that sued the Donald J. Trump Foundation, which resulted in the former president paying $2 million to a number of charities and the foundation’s dissolution.

    Bragg also led the suit against disgraced film producer Harvey Weinstein and his company, which alleged a hostile work environment.

    The Harvard-educated attorney previously served as an assistant US attorney in the Southern District of New York, worked as a civil rights lawyer and as a professor and co-director of the New York Law School Racial Justice Project, where he represented family members of Eric Garner, who died in 2014 after being placed in an unauthorized chokehold by a then-police officer, in a lawsuit against the City of New York seeking information.

    Bragg emerged the winner in a crowded Democratic primary in the summer of 2021 to lead the coveted Manhattan District Attorney’s Office, for which Vance had announced earlier that year he would not seek reelection. While campaigning, he often spoke about his experience growing up in Harlem, saying he was once a 15-year-old stopped “numerous times at gunpoint by police.”

    “In addition to being the first Black district attorney, I think I’ll probably be the first district attorney who’s had police point a gun at him,” he said during a victory speech, following his historic election to the office. “I think I’ll be the first district attorney who’s had a homicide victim on his doorstop. I think I’ll be the first district attorney in Manhattan who’s had a semi-automatic weapon pointed at him. I think I’ll be the first district attorney in Manhattan who’s had a loved one reenter from incarceration and stay with him. And I’m going to govern from that perspective.”

    Bragg ran as a reformer, releasing a memo just days after taking office detailing new charging, bail, plea and sentencing policies – a plan that drew criticism from police union leaders. He said his office would not prosecute marijuana misdemeanors, fare evading and prostitution, among other crimes.

    This story has been updated with additional developments.

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  • The 10 Senate seats most likely to flip in 2024 | CNN Politics

    The 10 Senate seats most likely to flip in 2024 | CNN Politics

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    CNN
     — 

    Opportunity is ripe for Republicans to win back the Senate next year – if they can land the candidates to pull it off.

    The GOP needs a net gain of one or two seats to flip the chamber, depending on which party wins the White House in 2024, and it’s Democrats who are defending the tougher seats. Democrats hold seven of the 10 seats that CNN ranks as most likely to flip party control next year – and the top three are all in states former President Donald Trump carried twice.

    But this spring’s recruitment season, coming on the heels of a midterm cycle marred by problematic GOP candidates, will likely go a long way toward determining how competitive the Senate map is next year.

    National Republicans got a top pick last week, with Gov. Jim Justice announcing his Senate bid in West Virginia – the seat most likely to flip party control in 2024. (Rankings are based on CNN’s reporting, fundraising figures and historical data about how states and candidates have performed.) But Justice appears headed for a contentious and expensive primary. And in many other top races, the GOP hasn’t yet landed any major candidates.

    Democrats, meanwhile, are thankful that most of their vulnerable incumbents are running for reelection, while a high-profile House member has largely cleared the field for one of their open Senate seats.

    Pollster asked Democrats who they like for 2024. Here’s what he found

    The unknown remains West Virginia Sen. Joe Manchin. Responding to Justice’s candidacy, Manchin – who has said he’ll decide about running by the end of the year – had this to say to CNN about a potentially messy GOP primary: “Let the games begin.”

    The anti-tax Club for Growth’s political arm has already committed to spending $10 million to back West Virginia Rep. Alex Mooney in the GOP primary. And tensions between the club, which has turned against Trump, and more establishment Republicans could become a feature of several top Senate races this cycle, especially with the National Republican Senatorial Committee weighing more aggressive involvement in primaries to weed out candidates it doesn’t think can win general elections.

    In the 2022 cycle, most of Trump’s handpicked candidates in swing states stumbled in the general election. But the former president picked up a key endorsement this week from NRSC Chair Steve Daines. The Montana Republican has stayed close with Trump, CNN has previously reported, in a bid to ensure he’s aligned with leadership.

    Democrats defending tough seats have previously used GOP primaries to their advantage. Manchin survived in 2018 in part because his opponent was state Attorney General Patrick Morrisey. That wasn’t an accident. Democrats had spent big attacking one of his primary opponents to keep him out of the general election.

    Last year’s midterms underscored that candidates really do matter after Republicans failed to harness favorable national winds in some key races. In a presidential year, the national environment is likely to loom large, especially with battleground states hosting key Senate races. It will also test whether some of the last remaining senators who represent states that back the opposite parties’ presidential nominees can hold on.

    President Joe Biden, who carried half of the states on this list in 2020, made official last week that he’s running for reelection. The GOP presidential field is slowly growing, with Trump still dominating most primary polling. It’s too early to know, however, what next year’s race for the White House will look like or which issues, whether it’s abortion or crime or the economy, will resonate.

    So for now, the parties are focused on what they can control: candidates. Even though the 2024 map is stacked in their favor, Republicans can’t win with nobody. But there’s plenty of time for would-be senators to get into these races. Some filing deadlines – in Arizona, for example – aren’t for nearly another year. And there’s an argument to be made that well-funded or high-profile names have no reason to get in early.

    Here’s where the Senate map stands 18 months from Election Day.

    Incumbent: Democrat Joe Manchin

    joe manchin 2024 senate race

    Sen. Joe Manchin isn’t one to shy away from attention – and he’s getting plenty of it by keeping everyone guessing about his reelection plans. Assuming he runs, Democrats will have a fighting chance to defend this seat in a state Trump carried by 39 points in 2020. The senator has repeatedly broken with the White House – on Biden’s first veto and the White House’s debt ceiling stance, for example.

    Without Manchin, Democrats know West Virginia is all but lost. Manchin raised only $371,000 in this year’s first fundraising quarter, which ended March 31, and Republicans are already attacking him, with One Nation – the issue advocacy group aligned with Senate GOP leader Mitch McConnell – launching an ad campaign tying him to the Inflation Reduction Act. (The senator went on Fox News last week and threatened to back a repeal of his own bill.) Still, Manchin has nearly $10 million in the bank, as well as outside cover from Democratic-allied groups.

    Republicans will likely be spending quite a lot of time and money attacking each other in the primary. The Club for Growth’s political arm is backing House Freedom Caucus member Alex Mooney, while Gov. Jim Justice will likely have backup from GOP party leaders. The wealthy governor, who was first elected as a Democrat before switching parties in 2017, has high name ID and is close with Trump. Mooney also has Trumpian credentials, having won a member-on-member House primary last year with the former president’s endorsement. The congressman is already attacking the governor in an ad as “Liberal Jim Justice,” using imagery of his opponent in a face mask.

    Incumbent: Democrat Jon Tester

    jon tester 2024 senate race

    Democrats got welcome news with Sen. Jon Tester’s announcement that he’s running for a fourth term – and that he raised $5 million in the first quarter (more than a million of which came from small-dollar donors). Tester is running in Trump country – Montana backed the former president by 16 points in 2020 – but like Manchin he has a well-established brand to draw on, which includes breaking with Biden when he needs to. (Tester also voted for a GOP resolution to roll back a Biden administration ESG investing rule, which prompted the president’s first veto.) The GOP field is still taking shape. Republicans are interested in retired Navy SEAL Tim Sheehy, a businessman with the potential to self-fund, and state Attorney General Austin Knudsen.

    Another potential candidate is Rep. Matt Rosendale, who lost to Tester in 2018 after winning the GOP nomination with the help of the Club for Growth, which has recently been at odds with Trump. Rosendale made a telling appearance at Mar-a-Lago in April for Trump’s post-indictment speech after snubbing the former president’s pick for House speaker in January when he didn’t back Kevin McCarthy. The congressman hasn’t said yet whether he’s running, but he raised only about $127,000 in the first quarter of the year – well short of what he’d need for a competitive Senate bid.

    Incumbent: Democrat Sherrod Brown

    sherrod brown 2024 senate race

    Sen. Sherrod Brown is the only Democrat to win a nonjudicial statewide race in Ohio over the past decade, so the big question for 2024 is whether he can defy expectations again in his red-trending state. Trump has twice carried the Buckeye State by 8 points, and his handpicked candidate, JD Vance, defeated Democrat Tim Ryan by about 6 points in last year’s Senate race despite the Republican’s campaign struggles.

    Brown is much more of an institution in Ohio than Ryan, and he’s built up relationships not just among White working-class communities but urban centers too. He raised $3.6 million in the first quarter of the year. Two wealthy Republicans are in the race to try to take him on – businessman Bernie Moreno, whom Trump has praised, and state Sen. Matt Dolan, whose family owns the Cleveland Guardians baseball team. Both men ran for Senate in 2022, but Moreno dropped out ahead of the primary. Dolan, who ran as a moderate conservative less than enthralled with Trump and his election lies, finished third in a crowded field. Rep. Warren Davidson and Ohio Secretary of State Frank LaRose could also jump into this year’s GOP race.

    Incumbent: Independent Kyrsten Sinema

    kyrsten sinema 2024 senate race

    Arizona has the potential to be one of the most interesting races this cycle, but a lot depends on whether Democratic-turned-independent Sen. Kyrsten Sinema runs for reelection. Democratic Rep. Ruben Gallego, who’s running to her left, outraised the incumbent $3.8 million to $2.1 million in the first quarter. Sinema has a clear cash-on-hand advantage – nearly $10 million to Gallego’s $2.7 million.

    Earlier this month, Pinal County Sheriff Mark Lamb became the first major Republican to enter the race, leaning into a law enforcement message. But the filing deadline isn’t until next April, so there’s still plenty of time for others to jump in. Some Republicans are anxious about the potential entry of Kari Lake, last year’s losing gubernatorial nominee, who still maintains she won. She’d likely be popular with the base in a state that’s become a hotbed of election denialism, but her candidacy could pose a serious risk for the party in a general election. The NRSC recently pushed her to move away from election conspiracy theories, CNN reported.

    Former attorney general nominee Abe Hamadeh and Karrin Taylor Robson, who lost last year’s gubernatorial primary to Lake, have also met with NRSC officials, CNN reported. Also in the mix could be Republican businessman Jim Lamon, who lost the party nod for the state’s other Senate seat last year. Republicans would like to see Sinema run because she and Gallego would likely split the vote on the left. But they’ve got their work cut out from them in landing a candidate who can appeal to the GOP base without alienating the general electorate in a state that narrowly backed Biden in 2020.

    Incumbent: Democrat Jacky Rosen

    jacky rosen 2024 senate race

    Democratic Sen. Jacky Rosen is, as expected, running for reelection, touting her middle-class roots and bipartisan legislative wins in an announcement video in April. “Nevada is always a battleground,” the senator says – a reminder that Democrats don’t want to take this state for granted. Rosen was first elected in 2018 – a midterm year – by 5 points. Last fall, her Democratic colleague, Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto, defeated former state Attorney General Adam Laxalt by less than a point.

    The state tends to get bluer in presidential years, but Biden and Hillary Clinton both carried it only by about 2 points. Republicans don’t yet have a major name in the race, but they’re watching two defeated candidates from last year – Army veteran Sam Brown, who lost the GOP Senate nod, and attorney April Becker, who lost a bid for a redrawn House seat.

    Incumbent: Democrat Tammy Baldwin

    tammy baldwin 2024 senate race

    Sen. Tammy Baldwin announced earlier this month that she’s running for a third term, giving Democrats an automatic advantage for now over Republicans, who have no declared candidates in this perennial battleground state. Baldwin raised $2.1 million in the first quarter, ending with nearly $4 million in the bank.

    Establishment Republicans have expressed strong interest in Rep. Mike Gallagher. Even Rep. Tom Tiffany, who recently bought Senate web domain names, told the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel that he thought his fellow congressman should run. But there’s little sign that Gallagher, the chair of the new House select committee on the Chinese Communist Party, is interested. Two businessmen with the ability to tap into or raise significant resources could be in the mix – Eric Hovde, who lost the GOP Senate nomination in 2012, and Scott Mayer. And then there’s controversial former Milwaukee County Sheriff David Clarke, who could draw support in a GOP primary but seriously complicate a general election for Republicans.

    Democrats are feeling good about the recent state Supreme Court election, which the Democratic-backed candidate won by 10 points, flipping control of the bench to liberals. Still, the competitiveness of this state – which Biden carried by about half a point after Trump had won it by a similar margin four years earlier – shouldn’t be underestimated.

    Incumbent: Democrat Debbie Stabenow (retiring)

    debbie stabenow 2024 senate race

    Rep. Elissa Slotkin has mostly cleared the Democratic field of major rivals in the race to succeed retiring Democrat Debbie Stabenow in another Midwestern battleground state. A few less-known names are in, and actor Hill Harper – of “The Good Doctor” and “CSI: NY” – could throw his hat in the Democratic ring, but it’ll be hard to rival Slotkin’s fundraising. She brought in about $3 million in the first quarter.

    On the GOP side, State Board of Education member Nikki Snyder announced her campaign in mid-February, but she hadn’t raised much money by the end of the first quarter. Former Rep. Peter Meijer could run, but his vote to impeach Trump would likely kill his prospects of winning the nomination – unless it were a heavily splintered primary field. Other possible GOP names include businessman Kevin Rinke and former Detroit Police Chief James Craig, who finished second and sixth, respectively, in last year’s gubernatorial primary. (Craig was a write-in candidate after failing to make the ballot because of invalid signatures.)

    Michigan Democrats did well last year – retaining the top three executive offices and flipping the state legislature – and they feel optimistic about their chances in the state in a presidential year. Still, Biden only won the state by less than 3 points. And while Slotkin has experience winning tough races, a lot may depend on whom the GOP nominates and which way the national winds are blowing next year.

    Incumbent: Democrat Bob Casey

    bob casey 2024 senate race

    Democrats breathed another sigh of relief when Sen. Bob Casey, who disclosed a prostate cancer diagnosis earlier this year, announced that he was running for a fourth term. A former state auditor general and treasurer and the son of a two-term governor, Casey is well known in the Keystone State. He most recently won reelection by 13 points against a hard-line congressman who had tied himself closely to Trump.

    This year, national Republicans are eyeing former hedge fund executive Dave McCormick, who lost the GOP nomination for Senate last year, as a top-tier recruit. Upon Casey’s reelection announcement, McCormick immediately attacked him, saying in a statement that a vote for Casey was “a vote for Biden and [Senate Majority Leader Chuck] Schumer.” The wealthy Republican has been on tour promoting his new book, “Superpower in Peril: A Battle Plan to Renew America,” and has hired staff but has yet to launch a campaign.

    And consternation remains among national Republicans that losing 2022 gubernatorial nominee Doug Mastriano could jump into the race. An election denier who lost by 15 points last fall, Mastriano could jeopardize the race for Republicans. His candidacy would likely inspire a concerted effort by national Republicans to defeat him in the primary.

    Incumbent: Republican Ted Cruz

    ted cruz 2024 senate race

    Texas and Florida – both in a far different category of competitiveness compared with the rest of the states on this list – are trading places this month. GOP Sen. Ted Cruz is running for reelection after passing on another presidential bid. He raised $1.3 million in the first quarter – relatively little for a massive, expensive state – and ended March with $3.3 million in the bank. He’s proved to be a compelling boogeyman for the left, with Democrat Beto O’Rourke raising millions to try to unseat him in 2018, ultimately coming up less than 3 points short.

    After a gubernatorial loss last year, O’Rourke hasn’t made any noise about this race. But Democratic Rep. Colin Allred, who raised about half a million dollars in the first quarter, is looking at it. State Sen. Roland Gutierrez, who represents Uvalde, is also weighing a bid, the San Antonio Express-News reported. Still, unseating Cruz in a state Trump won by nearly 6 points in 2020 will be a tall order.

    Incumbent: Republican Rick Scott

    rick scott 2024 senate race

    Sen. Rick Scott has a history of close elections – he was first elected in 2018 by a fraction of a point following two prior narrow wins for governor. But GOP Sen. Marco Rubio and Gov. Ron DeSantis won commanding victories last fall, suggesting the state is getting redder.

    Democrats don’t seem to have a major candidate as yet, but whoever opposes Scott is likely to use his controversial policy proposal – released last year during his NRSC chairmanship – against him. Scott’s plan had originally proposed sunsetting all federal programs every five years, but the senator later added a carve-out for Medicare and Social Security amid backlash from his own party. His most immediate headache could come in the form of intraparty attacks along those lines – and others.

    Attorney Keith Gross has launched a primary challenge, alluding in his announcement video to Scott’s tenure as the head of a hospital chain company that the Justice Department investigated for health care fraud. While the company pleaded guilty to fraudulent Medicare billing, among other things, and paid $1.7 billion in fines, Scott wasn’t charged with a crime. It’s unclear how much of his own money Gross, who previously ran for office in Georgia as a Democrat, would put into a campaign.

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