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  • Six takeaways from campaign fundraising filings by Trump, Haley, Santos and more | CNN Politics

    Six takeaways from campaign fundraising filings by Trump, Haley, Santos and more | CNN Politics



    CNN
     — 

    Former President Donald Trump’s criminal indictment helped jolt his fundraising. GOP presidential candidate Nikki Haley faces questions about her campaign math. Embattled New York Rep. George Santos refunded more contributions than he took in. And some – but not all – of the Democratic Party’s most vulnerable Senate incumbents have stepped up their fundraising ahead of tough 2024 election fights.

    Here’s a look at a few takeaways from new first-quarter campaign filings covering the first three months of 2023:

    Trump raised about $14.4 million for his main campaign committee in the first quarter of this year – with donations spiking at the end of March as news broke of his indictment by a Manhattan grand jury.

    The new filings suggest that the former president’s legal troubles have helped him politically and financially as he makes a third bid for the White House. But the amount only captures the start of what the campaign said was a fundraising surge that continued into the beginning of the second quarter.

    Even so, Trump’s first-quarter haul lagged behind the pace he had set in earlier campaigns.

    Earlier this month, Haley;s campaign publicized what it boasted as a strong haul for her 2024 presidential bid: The former South Carolina governor had raised “more than $11 million in just six weeks,” according to a campaign release.

    But official filings with the Federal Election Commission on Saturday night show that the campaign appears to have double-counted money routed among Haley’s fundraising committees, overstating the topline figure.

    The three committees connected to Haley raised a total of $8.3 million – still a sizable showing for a first-time presidential candidate but not the figure publicly touted by the former UN ambassador’s campaign.

    Fundraising serves as one benchmark of support for a campaign, and candidates are often eager to tout big numbers in advance of their official filings with federal regulators.

    In an email to CNN on Sunday, Haley campaign spokesman Ken Farnaso defended the $11 million figure, saying the accounting mirrored how other candidates have previously described their fundraising.

    Other candidates have sought to present their campaign filings in the most favorable light. Trump’s campaign, for instance, touted a $9.5 million haul during the first six weeks of his campaign. But, in that window, only about $5 million flowed into the joint fundraising committee that powers his political operation.

    Embattled Rep. George Santos’ campaign refunded more contributions than it took in during the first three months of the year, according to a campaign report the New York Republican filed Saturday.

    The freshman congressman from Long Island received $5,333 in contributions during the first quarter and refunded more than $8,000 in donations. It’s highly unusual for a sitting member of Congress to report a net loss on a fundraising report.

    By contrast, another first-term congressman, Republican Anthony D’Esposito, who represents a neighboring district, reported more than $670,000 in receipts during the first quarter, including more than $300,000 from political action committees and other lawmakers’ campaign committees.

    Santos, who has lied about his education, work history and family background, faces a House ethics inquiry, along with local and federal investigations into his finances.

    His campaign reported $25,000 in remaining cash as of March 31 and $715,000 in debt – which Santos has described as personal funds he loaned to his successful 2020 effort for New York’s 3rd Congressional District.

    (How Santos, who in 2020 reported a $55,000 salary and no assets when he ran unsuccessfully for Congress, amassed the money to fund his campaign two years later remains one of the biggest questions surrounding his political rise.)

    Last month, Santos formally filed paperwork for a 2024 reelection bid, but it followed a demand from the FEC that he declare his intentions after he crossed a fundraising threshold that required him to file a statement of candidacy.

    Some of his fellow Republicans have urged the scandal-plagued congressman to resign or not seek reelection. Last month, when asked by CNN whether he intended to run again, Santos responded, “Maybe.”

    In the closely watched race to succeed California Sen. Dianne Feinstein, Rep. Adam Schiff outraised the rest of the Democratic field, bringing in $6.7 million during the first quarter – topping the nearly $4.5 million raised by Rep. Katie Porter and roughly $1.3 million collected by Rep. Barbara Lee.

    Schiff also led the field in available cash, ending March with more than $24.6 million stockpiled in his campaign account.

    Porter, who transferred nearly $11 million from her House campaign into her Senate account this year, had more than $9.4 million in cash still available on March 31. Lee trailed with a little more than $1.1 million in available cash.

    Feinstein, who at 89 is the oldest sitting senator, has announced she will not seek reelection next year – although she is facing calls from some Democrats to retire now after being sidelined with shingles since early March.

    Last week, she asked to be temporarily replaced on the Senate Judiciary Committee while she continues her recuperation.

    In Arizona, the leading Democratic candidate for Senate, Rep. Ruben Gallego, outraised independent incumbent Sen. Kyrsten Sinema, bringing in nearly $3.8 million to his opponent’s $2.1 million.

    Sinema, who changed her affiliation from Democrat late last year, continues to caucus with her former party. She has not formally declared an intention to seek a second term. But she has the resources to compete in what could be a costly, three-way general election battle for the seat. She ended March with nearly $10 million in available cash to Gallego’s $2.7 million.

    Mark Lamb, an Arizona sheriff aligned with Trump, this month became the first major Republican candidate to enter the race, but he won’t file his first fundraising report until July.

    Democratic Sen. Sherrod Brown of Ohio – who is seeking a fourth term in what will be one of the most closely watched contests of the 2024 cycle – raised more than $3.5 million in the first quarter, up from the roughly $333,000 he collected during the last three months of 2022.

    Several Republicans have lined up to challenge Brown, including Cleveland businessman Bernie Moreno and former state Sen. Matt Dolan, whose family owns the Cleveland Guardians Major League Baseball team.

    Saturday’s filings show Dolan collecting $3.3 million – most of which he loaned his campaign. Moreno joined the race in April, after the first-quarter fundraising period had ended.

    Brown is one of three Democratic senators who are up for reelection next year in states won by Trump in 2020.

    Montana Sen. Jon Tester, another Democratic incumbent facing a tough reelection battle in a Republican state, raised $5 million in the first quarter and had $7 million stockpiled as of March 31.

    In deep-red West Virginia – a state Trump won by nearly 40 points in 2020 – Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin has not yet declared whether he will seek a third full term in 2024. He pulled in just $370,000 in the first quarter but was sitting atop a $9.7 million war chest of available cash as of March 31.

    West Virginia Rep. Alex Mooney, the first major Republican to enter the Senate race, collected roughly $500,000 in the first quarter.

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  • Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp says GOP can’t be ‘distracted’ by Trump investigations if it wants to win in 2024 | CNN Politics

    Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp says GOP can’t be ‘distracted’ by Trump investigations if it wants to win in 2024 | CNN Politics



    CNN
     — 

    Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp has a message for his fellow Republicans looking to win back the White House: “We cannot get distracted.”

    “We have to tell people, No. 1, what we’re for. No. 2, that we’re going to be focused on the future and what we’re going to do for the voters in our state or the American people. And then, No. 3, we have to do a simple thing: We have to win,” Kemp told CNN’s Jake Tapper Sunday on “State of the Union.”

    The governor’s remarks came a day after he’d told donors at a Republican National Committee retreat in Nashville that the GOP needed to move on from the 2020 presidential election. In his speech, Kemp offered a thinly veiled dig at former President Donald Trump and his continued election grievances, without naming him, saying, “Not a single swing voter will vote for our nominee if they choose to talk about the 2020 election being stolen.”

    Trump, currently seen as the front-runner for the 2024 Republican nomination, has repeatedly argued since leaving office that Republicans cannot succeed – either at the ballot box or legislatively – if they turn a blind eye to the past. But candidates who backed his false election claims did poorly in the midterm elections last fall in key swing states Trump will need to win back the White House in 2024.

    Trump is also under a cloud of legal woes. In New York, a hush money payment to an adult-film star shortly before the 2016 election has resulted in his indictment by a Manhattan grand jury over his alleged role in the scheme. And in Atlanta, a select grand jury has investigated efforts by Trump and allies to overturn his election loss in Georgia in 2020.

    “I can’t control what the judicial branch is doing or what a local prosecutor is doing in many ways, but what we can control … is what we’re focused on,” Kemp said Sunday.

    “If we get distracted and talk about other things that the Democrats want to talk about, like these investigations – regardless of what you think about the politics of those – if we get distracted every day and let the media just talk about that, that only helps Joe Biden,” he added. “It does not give us a path for Republicans to win.”

    Asked by Tapper if Trump was unelectable nationwide, Kemp demurred.

    “That’s for the people to decide,” he said.

    Tension between Trump and Kemp has been simmering for years. When Kemp refused to overturn Biden’s 2020 win in Georgia, Trump made the governor his No. 1 enemy, publicly railing against him throughout 2021 and recruiting former US Sen. David Perdue to challenge Kemp in a GOP primary. Through it all, Trump failed to draw Kemp into a fight, and the governor won his 2022 primary overwhelmingly before handily defeating Democratic opponent Stacey Abrams in the November general election.

    Kemp said Sunday that Republicans will need to draw a distinction with what he referred to as “the disaster of the Biden administration” to win next year, pointing to border security, high inflation and energy policy.

    “I think we’re going to have a lot of good candidates that, if they focus on those things, we have got a great chance of winning the White House in 2024,” the governor said.

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  • Opinion: Top secrets come spilling out | CNN

    Opinion: Top secrets come spilling out | CNN

    Editor’s Note: Sign up to get this weekly column as a newsletter. We’re looking back at the strongest, smartest opinion takes of the week from CNN and other outlets.



    CNN
     — 

    In 1917, British analysts deciphered a coded message the German foreign minister sent to one of his country’s diplomats vowing to begin “unrestricted submarine warfare” and seeking to win over Mexico with a promise to “reconquer the lost territory in Texas, New Mexico and Arizona” if the US entered the world war. When it became public, the Zimmerman Telegram caused a sensation, helping propel the US into the conflict against Germany.

    “Never before or since has so much turned upon the solution of a secret message,” wrote David Kahn in his classic 1967 history of secret communications, “The Codebreakers.” The Germans had taken great pains to keep their intentions confidential, and the codebreakers in London’s “Room 40” had to do a lot of work to decipher the telegram.

    Their efforts stand in stark contrast to the ease with which secrets came tumbling out of a Pentagon intelligence network when 21-year-old Massachusetts Air National Guard cyber specialist Jack Teixeira allegedly posted hundreds of documents on a Discord chatroom known as “Thug Shaker Central.” The disclosures likely won’t start a war, but they could prove extremely damaging to the US and several of its allies, including Ukraine.

    Teixeira is one of more than one million people who have Top Secret clearance. “The Pentagon has already started taking steps to limit the number of people who have access to such sensitive information,” wrote Brett Bruen, a former US diplomat and Obama administration official. “But much more can be done. … Why do so many people, especially those working short stints in government, have access to information that can shape the fate of nations and their leaders?”

    Writing in the Financial Times, Kori Schake saw “some good news.”

    “While specific details will be incredibly valuable to Russia and other adversaries, these are not bombshell revelations: journalists had already reported Ukrainian ammunition running low; peace talks between Moscow and Kyiv were never likely; allies have long been aware that the US eavesdrops on them; and the disparaging assessment of Ukraine’s forthcoming offensive may prove no more accurate than previous predictions were.” These will not prove as damaging as the Edward Snowden and Chelsea Manning disclosures.

    But, she warned, “Technology making data ever more portable, distribution more global and communications more bespoke will make it easier to amass information and distribute it — either privately or publicly.”

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    In less than a week, the two Democrats expelled from the Tennessee House for their participation in a gun control protest were sent back to office by local officials.

    Writing for CNN Opinion, Rep. Justin Pearson noted, “This should be a chastening moment for revanchist forces in Tennessee’s legislature and across the country. Over the long haul, the undemocratic machinations employed to oust us from office are destined to fail. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. once famously said that the moral arc of the universe bends toward justice. Events this week demonstrated, more than ever, that this is indeed the case…”

    “Over two-thirds of Americans — including four out of 10 Republicans — support the kind of common sense gun safety laws that Rep. Jones, Rep. Johnson and I were protesting in favor of, in the wake of the senseless March 27 Covenant School massacre.”

    “And yet, calls for common sense gun reform measures fall on deaf ears in our legislature where a Republican supermajority is wildly out of step with most people’s values.”

    The politics of gun control have shifted, argued Democratic strategist Max Burns. The NRA’s internal struggles have weakened its influence while Democrats in office, who once feared touching the issue of guns, are increasingly speaking out. And they are making some progress in enacting new state laws, Burns noted.

    “The American people decisively support Democratic proposals for addressing the scourge of gun violence. Political watchers who criticized Democrats for talking too much about abortion during the 2022 midterm elections later ate crow after that once-dreaded culture war topic topped the list of voter concerns nationally…

    “Biden and the Democrats have the rare opportunity to build yet another winning coalition out of an issue once viewed as political poison.”

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    On Friday, the Supreme Court issued an order that temporarily ensured access to a key drug used in many medication abortions. The move gave the justices more time to consider the issue after a Texas federal judge suspended the US Food and Drug Administration’s approval of the abortion pill 23 years ago.

    “If abortion opponents are successful, access to the pill — reportedly used in more than half of abortions in the United States — will be severely undercut,” wrote Michele Goodwin and Mary Ziegler.

    “Beyond the dangerous precedent this sets for challenges to other important FDA-approved drugs that some political factions don’t like, the case is an alarming expression of the way right-wing activists are using junk science to bypass the will of the American public and restrict abortion…”

    “There are no grounds for challenging mifepristone’s approval, especially 23 years after the fact. The drug received extensive review — more than four years — before FDA approval. Moreover, claims that mifepristone threatens the health of those who take it are unfounded. The drug has a better safety record for use than Viagra and penicillin. Notably, it was available and used for years without incident in Europe.”

    In 1986, Nicholas Daniloff, the Moscow bureau chief for US News & World Report, was seized by Soviet authorities and locked up in Lefortovo prison. He was the last American journalist to be arrested in Russia before last month’s detention of Wall Street Journal correspondent Evan Gershkovich, who like Daniloff, speaks Russian fluently. Gershkovich has been charged with espionage but US officials have concluded that he was “wrongfully detained.”

    As David A. Andelman noted, Daniloff’s detention in prison lasted for 13 days before he was put under house arrest and then eventually swapped for an accused Soviet spy. In a conversation with Andelman, Daniloff recalled his reaction when he was imprisoned. “I felt claustrophobic, and I felt like I wanted to get out of there immediately. Of course, there was no chance of that. The door slams, and you have all these thoughts and feelings that run through you, and then you settle down and you realize you’re going to be hanging around that cell for some time.”

    Gershkovich’s family in Philadelphia received a letter, handwritten in Russian, from the reporter Friday.

    “I want to say that I am not losing hope,” he noted. “I read. I exercise. And I am trying to write. Maybe, finally, I am going to write something good.”

    The Amazon series “The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel” returns this month for its fifth and final season — and David Perry is here for it. The series brings back memories of visiting his grandparents Irma and Mordy in their “tiny rent-controlled Greenwich Village apartment,” an experience that helped shape his Jewish identity.

    “As a Jewish historian,” Perry wrote, “I worry about the tension between preserving the memory of past hardships while not locking our entire history into a tale of oppression. The moments of peace and joy are as vital as the moments of violence. In fact, it’s the periods of peace, of success, of interfaith community, that reveal the terrible truth about the violence: it wasn’t inevitable. People could have made different choices…”

    “A show like ‘The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel’ lets me revel in my personal New York Jewish heritage while also getting a little break from all the worry. It’s a warm, funny, sexy, extremely Jewish …. comedy that hits me straight in my glossy childhood memories. That isn’t to say the show isn’t also problematic — it most certainly is.”

    In the latest installment of CNN Opinion’s “Little Kids, Big Questions” series, 10-year-old Ronan wonders if animals are capable of being smarter than humans. With the help of the John Templeton Foundation, which is partnering on the project, the answer came from Jane Goodall, world renowned for her work with chimpanzees.

    “One of the attributes of intelligence is the ability to think and solve problems. In the early 1960s, I was told that this was unique to humans, and only we could use and make tools, only we had language and culture,” Goodall said. “But more and more research has proved that many animals are excellent at solving problems. Many use tools, and many show cultural differences. Some scientists believe that whales and dolphins are communicating with what may be a real language.”

    “Although the difference between humans and other animals is simply one of degree, our intellect really is amazing. …bees can count and do math, and that just shows how much we still have to learn about animal intelligence. But humans can calculate the distance to the stars.”

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    Earlier this month, a Texas jury convicted Daniel Perry of murder for fatally shooting a Black Lives Matter protester in 2020. The jury deliberated for 17 hours and decided Perry’s action couldn’t be excused under the state’s “stand your ground” law. Prosecutors argued Perry had instigated the incident and they introduced into evidence messages that suggested the shooting was not a spur-of-the-moment act but a premeditated one.

    On the evening of the jury verdict, Fox News host Tucker Carlson criticized the decision and told viewers he had invited Texas Gov. Greg Abbott on the show to ask if he would consider pardoning Perry. Others on the right called for Abbott to issue a pardon, and the governor soon responded with an announcement that he would do just that, as long as the Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles recommended that Perry should be granted one.

    “Trial verdicts are determined by judges and juries,” wrote Dean Obeidallah. “What Abbott is doing is not just wrong, it’s dangerous. His pardon, when it comes, is not what the rule of law looks like.”

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    Two of the likeliest candidates for president in 2024 haven’t officially committed yet.

    President Joe Biden says he intends to run again but has delayed making a formal announcement. And Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis is making all the moves a presidential contender usually makes, including hawking his new book and visiting New Hampshire, but he hasn’t joined fellow Republicans including former President Donald Trump, former UN Ambassador Nikki Haley and former Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson in declaring.

    “DeSantis, who was neck and neck with the former president just a few months ago, may have lost a step or two in more recent polling. But his track record of successful governance in Florida should force GOP voters to think long and hard about what version of their party they want to put forward,” observed Patrick T. Brown.

    “A third Trump presidential nomination would indicate that Republican primary voters may prefer style over substance. But if they are serious about not just making liberals mad but advancing actual policy, GOP voters should consider other names, starting with the Florida governor.”

    Even without an official announcement by the president, wrote Julian Zelizer, the Biden-Harris campaign is very much under way. “By choosing to lie low while Republicans are gearing up for 2024, Biden is employing his version of what has become known as the ‘Rose Garden Strategy,’ whereby the incumbent campaigns by focusing on the business of being president and showing voters that he is the responsible figure in the race.”

    “The president’s understated strategy makes room for Republicans to stoke chaos, tear each other apart and make unforced errors while he remains above the fray for as long as possible. This strategy makes the GOP the focus of the election, allowing Biden to reinforce his message from 2020: do voters want someone who will govern and act in a serious manner or do they want a circus?”

    Gene Seymour: I am betting on Cousin Greg. But I am not a serious person (Spoiler alert)

    Frida Ghitis: Amid fallout of Macron-Xi meeting, another world leader tries his luck

    Michael Bociurkiw: How the battle for Bakhmut exposed Russia’s ‘meat-grinder’

    Peggy Drexler: Sen. Dianne Feinstein’s dilemma is a reminder of this universal question

    Christopher Howard: The overlooked problem with raising the retirement age for Social Security

    Elliot Williams: The justice system Trump and other white-collar defendants see is different than what most accused criminals get

    Phoebe Gavin: The hard lessons I learned the first time I was laid off

    Meg Jacobs: ‘Air’ celebrates those who do the hard work and get rewarded

    AND…

    Jill Filipovic recently took a domestic flight in South Africa. “Passengers and airport staff alike were friendly and polite. The airplane seat offered enough room for both of my legs and both of my arms. We took off on time and landed early. My shoes stayed on the whole time I was at the airport.”

    It was a vivid reminder of what’s possible in air travel — and of what’s usually lacking.

    Take the security system: “More than 20 years after Sept. 11, 2001, only passengers who pay for the privilege can avoid removing their shoes and laptops from their bags by submitting their personal information ahead of time and undergoing background checks.”

    Filipovic added, “Admittedly, I do pay — I don’t want to wait in a long security line, walk my stocking feet through a metal detector and have to un- and re-pack the MacBook I’ve carefully crammed into my carry-on. But the existence of pay-to-play shorter-line security options like Clear and TSA Pre-Check make clear that it is indeed possible to pre-screen a critical mass of passengers to avoid the morass of cranky people trying to pull on their shoes while re-packing their electronics.”

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  • Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp urges Republicans to move on from election fraud claims: ‘2020 is ancient history’ | CNN Politics

    Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp urges Republicans to move on from election fraud claims: ‘2020 is ancient history’ | CNN Politics



    CNN
     — 

    Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp on Saturday urged his fellow Republicans to move on from the 2020 presidential election, offering a thinly veiled dig at former President Donald Trump and his continued election grievances.

    Without naming Trump, Kemp’ said at a private Republican National Committee donor retreat in Nashville that “not a single swing voter in a single swing state will vote for our nominee if they choose to talk about the 2020 election being stolen.”

    “To voters trying to pay their rent … make their car payment … or put their kids through college … 2020 is ancient history,” Kemp said, according to his prepared remarks, which were obtained by CNN’s Jake Tapper.

    Trump, who announced his reelection campaign last fall, has repeatedly argued since leaving office that Republicans cannot have a successful future – either at the ballot box or legislatively – if they turn a blind eye to the past.

    Tension between Trump and Kemp has been simmering for years. When Kemp refused to overturn Joe Biden’s 2020 win in Georgia, Trump made the governor his No. 1 enemy, publicly railing against him throughout 2021 and recruiting former US Sen. David Perdue to challenge Kemp in a GOP primary. Through it all, Trump failed to draw Kemp into a fight, and the governor won his 2022 primary overwhelmingly before handily defeating Democratic opponent Stacey Abrams in the November general election.

    Also in the midterm elections, candidates who backed Trump’s false election claims did poorly in key swing states the former president will need to win back the White House in 2024.

    Further complicating Trump’s bid is a cloud of legal woes. In New York, a hush money payment to an adult-film star shortly before the 2016 election has resulted in his indictment by a Manhattan grand jury over his alleged role in the scheme – the first time in American history that a current or former president faces criminal charges.

    And in Atlanta, a select grand jury has investigated efforts by Trump and allies to overturn his election loss in Georgia in 2020.

    Kemp made direct mention of these investigations Saturday, according to his prepared remarks, calling the probes distractions that could take the Republican Party off course and away from issues voters care about.

    “Being distracted by what is happening at the Manhattan and Fulton County district attorney offices is not going to win us back the White House in 2024,” Kemp said. “The media and Democrats would love nothing more than for us to talk about this from sun-up to sundown until next November.”

    “But here’s the truth: Fani Willis and Alvin Bragg’s investigations into allegations of the past don’t help hardworking Americans battling high grocery prices, growing pain at the gas pump or violent crime plaguing their neighborhoods,” he continued, referring to the district attorneys of Fulton County, Georgia, and Manhattan respectively.

    “In fact, the person they help the most is Joe Biden.”

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  • DeSantis, on cusp of presidential campaign, defies national abortion sentiments with signing of six-week ban | CNN Politics

    DeSantis, on cusp of presidential campaign, defies national abortion sentiments with signing of six-week ban | CNN Politics



    CNN
     — 

    Floridians woke up Friday morning to discover Gov. Ron DeSantis had signed into law a six-week abortion ban overnight, meeting behind closed doors with a select group of invited guests to give final approval to a bill that had just passed the state legislature earlier in the day.

    In backing a six-week ban, DeSantis fulfilled a campaign pledge to block abortion after the detection of a heartbeat – just before he is expected to launch his 2024 presidential bid. But as he inches toward a national campaign, DeSantis, who rarely sidesteps cultural clashes, has also become oddly muted on abortion since the fall of Roe v. Wade and has avoided laying out a federal platform before jumping into the race.

    Speaking Friday morning to an overwhelmingly pro-life audience at Liberty University, a deeply conservative Baptist college in Virginia, DeSantis didn’t mention the bill he had signed the night before.

    The late-night private signing also stood in stark contrast to the celebratory event exactly a year prior, when DeSantis, surrounded by women and children and in front of hundreds of onlookers, enacted a 15-week abortion ban at a Orlando-area megachurch as news cameras captured the scene.

    The six-week ban “is going to cause a lot of problems for him,” said Amy Tarkanian, the former chairwoman of the Republican Party in Nevada, where voters have cemented abortion protections in the state constitution. “And I’m pro-life, but I can see the writing on the wall.”

    The US Supreme Court decision last June that ended a federal right to abortion access has throttled the national political landscape, energizing Democrats and leaving Republicans grasping for a message that can blunt the fallout. The latest harbinger of trouble for the GOP came last week from Wisconsin, a presidential swing state where liberals took control of the state Supreme Court in an election fought over the future of abortion access.

    But with DeSantis on the verge of entering the GOP presidential primary – for which abortion is often a litmus test for candidates – Republican state lawmakers delivered their leader a political victory, flexing their super majorities in both Florida chambers to swiftly push through the new restrictions. The law will take effect if the state Supreme Court overturns its past precedent protecting abortion access, which is widely expected. When that happens, Florida, once a sanctuary for Southern women whose states had made it difficult to legally end a pregnancy, will become one of the hardest states in the country to obtain an abortion.

    In an early sign of how Democrats intend to paint DeSantis, White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre in a statement called Florida’s bill “extreme and dangerous” and said it “is out of step with the views of the vast majority of the people of Florida and of all the United States.”

    A Republican fundraiser close to the governor’s political operation told CNN that the six-week ban would play “great in primary,” where DeSantis would face former President Donald Trump, who appointed three of the justices that voted to overturn Roe v. Wade, but acknowledged it was “not good in general” election.

    “But you got to get to the general,” the adviser added.

    In the year following the Supreme Court ruling in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, Democrats have rattled off a series of victories built in part on voters mobilized by abortion. In solidly red Kansas, voters last year blocked a referendum that would have amended the state constitution to make abortion illegal. In key states like Pennsylvania and Nevada, Democrats pummeled Republican Senate candidate over their views on abortion – with great success, as the party held the US Senate. In battlegrounds like Arizona and Michigan, Democratic gubernatorial candidates won by vowing to lift longstanding state abortion bans that predated the Roe decision.

    Whether the issue continues to animate general voters remains to be seen, but opinions on the Dobbs decision do not appear to have shifted. A Marquette Law School poll last month found two-thirds of voters opposed the ruling, nearly identical to the results in its survey following the November midterms.

    Amid the national outcry to the SCOTUS decision, the typically outspoken DeSantis has remained uncharacteristically reserved on the topic. Unlike other issues, like eliminating college diversity programs and curbing legal protections for the media, he has elevated with staged news conferences and frequent messaging on conservative media, DeSantis has offered vague commitments to protect life but repeatedly declined to say where Florida should draw the line on abortion access.

    In his lone debate last year against Democratic gubernatorial opponent Charlie Crist, DeSantis wouldn’t say what abortion restrictions he would pursue if reelected for a second term. Asked at a March news conference if he supported exceptions for victims rape and incest, DeSantis called it “sensible” and said he would “welcome pro-life legislation,” then quickly pivoted to another topic.

    DeSantis signed the bill at 10:45 p.m. ET Thursday in a closed-door ceremony after returning from a political event in Ohio, a rare-late night action by a governor who often times his actions to maximize exposure.

    “I can’t speculate on his mental processes and what he decides to speak on,” said John Stemberger, president of Florida Family Policy Council, a conservative Christian organization that supported the bill. “I’m concerned not with words but with action and he is a man of action.”

    Some Republican operatives believe DeSantis is better positioned than others to stave off primary attacks from the right without alienating swing voters. In a series of posts on Twitter, Jon Schweppe, director of policy and government affairs at the conservative American Principles Project, suggested that by supporting some exceptions for rape and incest, DeSantis would neutralize a key Democratic talking point.

    “What moves voters the most? What did Democrats spend $500M talking about in the 2022 midterms? EXCEPTIONS,” Schweppe said. “Voters want exceptions for rape, incest, and the life of the mother. That’s the most important issue. Outside those exceptions, voters are fairly pro-life.”

    Schweppe had previously raised the alarm that “Republicans need to figure out the abortion issue ASAP” after last week’s defeat of a conservative judge in the Wisconsin Supreme Court race.

    The exceptions offered by Florida’s proposed six-week ban, though, are limited to 15 weeks after conception and require victims of rape and incest to show a police report or other evidence of their assault to obtain an abortion. Similarly, two doctors would have to sign off that a mother’s health is at serious risk or a fetal abnormality is fatal before a woman can end a pregnancy after 15 weeks.

    Bill McCoshen, a veteran GOP consultant in Wisconsin, acknowledged that Democrats have campaigned effectively on abortion there in recent races. But he said it will be harder to attack DeSantis on abortion in his state, where the current law, passed in 1849 and reinstated after the fall of Roe, bars abortion without exceptions.

    “To voters here, the perception of his answer will be that it’s better than the 1849 law,” McCoshen said. “If he signs that law, that will be an improvement of the law that’s here. It may not be as middle of the road as some states, but it’s better than what we currently have in many people’s minds.”

    Still unclear, though, is how DeSantis will navigate new pressures from conservative voters, many of whom will expect their next nominee to use the powers of the presidency to end abortion nationwide. DeSantis, who has not yet declared but is laying the groundwork for a campaign, has so far not faced any questions about what abortion restrictions he would pursue if elected to the White House.

    It’s a question that has already tripped up one potential rival for the nomination. A day after sidestepping a question earlier this week, Republican Sen. Tim Scott said on Thursday that it should be up to states to “solve that problem on their own” – but also said he would sign a federal 20-week ban if it reached his desk.

    Nor has DeSantis weighed in on the ongoing legal saga surrounding mifepristone, one of the drugs that has been used safely for more than 20 years to provide abortions via medication.

    “Right now, DeSantis represents his state and he has to be the voice of his state, but this is a tightrope he has to walk if he’s serious about running for president,” Tarkanian, the Nevada Republican said. “A lot of people don’t even realize they’re pregnant at seven weeks and if you’re pro-choice that’s a scary thought.”

    Katie Daniel, the state policy director for Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America, said Republican candidates risk looking inauthentic if they try to obfuscate their position on abortion. She pointed to Pennsylvania Senate candidate and celebrity doctor Mehmet Oz, who during the GOP primary called abortion “murder” at any stage but in the general election said he supported exceptions for rape, incest or if the mother’s life is at risk. Later, in a debate, Oz said, “I want women, doctors, local political leaders” to decide the issue at the state level.

    “Our message to candidates is define yourself or other candidates will define it for you and you’re not going to like their version of you,” Daniel said. “The ostrich strategy of burying your head in the sand is not going to work.”

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  • Senate Republicans confront 2024 primary challenges and Trump’s influence | CNN Politics

    Senate Republicans confront 2024 primary challenges and Trump’s influence | CNN Politics



    CNN
     — 

    Kari Lake – the unapologetic supporter of former President Donald Trump and vanquished candidate for Arizona governor – privately made a trip to National Republican Senatorial Committee headquarters in February where she discussed the prospects of shaking up the map and running for Senate.

    But Lake, who has faced blowback over pushing baseless accusations of election fraud, was given this suggestion from NRSC officials: Shift to more effective messaging and away from claims about a stolen election, according to sources familiar with the matter.

    The meeting, which was described as a positive one, focused on how Senate bids often turn on issues that are different than governor’s races, multiple sources said. Top Republicans quietly acknowledge Lake could become a frontrunner if she runs in the primary, hoping to steer her towards a viable campaign if she mounts one, even as Arizona’s Pinal County sheriff is expected to soon jump into the race while independent Sen. Kyrsten Sinema actively prepares a reelection bid herself.

    And that’s just one state.

    The Arizona race is one of several landmines that Republican leaders are navigating as they work behind the scenes to avoid a repeat of the 2022 debacle that saw weaker candidates emerge from contested primaries – only to peter out and collapse in the general election and hand Democrats a 51-49 Senate majority. Several of those candidates were backed by Trump as the NRSC – run at the time by Florida Sen. Rick Scott – opted to stay away from Republican primaries.

    Now, the NRSC – run by Sen. Steve Daines of Montana – has taken a much more hands-on approach to primaries, actively working on candidate recruitment and vetting. And the committee is weighing whether to spend big bucks in primaries to help root out weaker candidates, a move that risks setting up a clash with hard-right candidates aligning themselves with Trump.

    “You need to learn from your past mistakes,” South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham, a close Trump ally, told CNN. “If you don’t make adjustments, doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different outcome, it’s insanity.”

    Privately, Daines has spoken multiple times with Trump and has been in touch with his eldest son, Donald Trump Jr., while national Republicans point to the NRSC’s early endorsement and fundraising for Rep. Jim Banks in the Indiana Senate race as an example of how the party’s warring wings can try to avoid messy primaries.

    The goal, GOP sources say, is to keep Trump aligned with Republican leadership – even as the former president has furiously attacked Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell in the aftermath of the Capitol attack on January 6, 2021, and as the Senate GOP leader has stayed silent amid the former president’s indictment on 34 felony charges in New York. Daines, however, has been vocal in his defense of Trump.

    “I have a very good relationship with the president. We talk, and it’s no secret we’ve been friends for a long time,” Daines told CNN when asked about the Senate races. “And he provides great insights. And I also provide my thoughts as well. And we have open lines of communication.”

    Daines added: “Wherever we can find common ground is a good thing.”

    That relationship could be put to the test in key battleground states. In West Virginia, Republican leaders are preparing to close ranks behind Gov. Jim Justice, who is seriously weighing a run for the seat occupied by Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin. A Justice bid would put him against Rep. Alex Mooney, who had won Trump’s backing in a competitive House race in the last cycle but now has the support of the conservative Club for Growth’s political arm.

    In Pennsylvania, Doug Mastriano – the controversial candidate who lost a bid for governor last fall but had the support of Trump in the primary – says he’s “still praying” on whether to mount a bid for the Senate, something Republicans in Washington fear. The NRSC plans to put its muscle behind the potential candidacy of David McCormick, the hedge fund executive who narrowly lost the Pennsylvania Senate GOP primary in 2022, according to Republican sources who view him as their best bet at picking up the seat next year.

    “I haven’t decided yet on 2024. I’m thinking about it,” McCormick told CNN. “You run for office … because you think you have something to contribute. You think it’s a moment where you might be able to serve, and if you lose, that motivation doesn’t necessarily go away.”

    And in Montana, Rep. Matt Rosendale, a member of the hard-right House Freedom Caucus, is weighing a run in a race that could put him up against two other potential candidates viewed by senior Republicans as more electable – Montana attorney general Austin Knudsen and businessman Tim Sheehy – against Democratic Sen. Jon Tester. Rosendale attended an event last Tuesday in Mar-a-Lago following Trump’s arraignment in New York, a sign one Trump adviser saw as an effort to secure an endorsement ahead of a potential bid.

    Rosendale told CNN he’s in no rush to make a decision.

    “We’re just taking a nice slow time to let the people in Montana decide who they want to replace him with,” Rosendale said of Tester. “I feel very sure he will be replaced.” He added that Daines “is my senator” and that “I see him regularly.”

    Tester contended that the Republican nominee makes little difference to him.

    “I think the person who runs against me is the person McConnell chooses,” Tester said. “Whoever that is, I don’t think it matters much: Same election.”

    Top Republicans say they will have to make key strategic decisions on how to engage in some of these races – or whether to stay out altogether, as they might in Ohio as party leaders view the emerging field as full of electable candidates against Democratic Sen. Sherrod Brown.

    If they come in too aggressively, it could prompt blowback and rally the right behind a potentially weaker candidate. But if they disengage, they could see their favored candidate struggle to gain traction.

    In Wisconsin, Republican officials are urging Rep. Mike Gallagher to run, though he could face a potential primary there as well, as former Senate candidate Eric Hovde and others weigh a run. Gallagher, who is chairing a House panel focused on China, said of a potential run against Democratic Sen. Tammy Baldwin: “I’m not thinking about it at present,” citing his legislative work and family commitments. But he left the door open.

    “I’d never conceived of this as a long-term thing; I don’t think Congress should be a career,” Gallagher said, adding: “I’m going to weigh all those factors and see where I can make the best impact.”

    In interviews with roughly a dozen top senators, nearly all of them agreed they need to be hyper-focused this cycle on helping candidates who can win not only a primary election, but a general election — repeatedly referencing “candidate quality” as their 2024 motto.

    Texas Sen. John Cornyn, a member of Senate GOP leadership and former NRSC chairman, has long had to contend with primary fights between the party establishment and activist base – battles that had effectively cost them the chance at the Senate majority in the 2010 and 2012 election cycles, in addition to 2022.

    “It never goes away,” Cornyn said of the primary complications. “Republicans need to make up their mind. Do we want to win, or do we want to lose? And I think that it’s that simple, and I think people are tired of losing.”

    Yet some on the right are warning against party leaders picking and choosing their candidates – including Scott, who defends his hands-off approach in the last cycle.

    “I believe the citizens of the state ought to pick,” Scott said, adding: “A lot of these weaker candidates often are the ones who actually win. I was not the establishment candidate.”

    Scott’s fellow Florida Republican, Marco Rubio, was not backed by the NRSC in the 2010 election cycle. But he galvanized the GOP base and defeated Charlie Crist, who later became a Democrat.

    “I’m not a big believer that you can determine who the weaker candidate is. A lot of people up here then would not have been their choice,” Rubio told CNN. “Obviously there might be some exceptions here or there, but generally the NRSC should be engaged in helping whoever the Republican nominee is to win the general election.”

    Unlike the last cycle — when the McConnell-aligned Senate Leadership Fund and the Rick Scott-run NRSC clashed publicly over the approach to expanding the Senate map — this time, the two committees are largely aligned. Republicans are betting that their preferred chances will vastly improve with the help of big donors and nationwide fundraising – and potentially an aggressive ad campaign in the primary to derail weaker opponents.

    “As we look across the country and look at different traces, it’s pretty straightforward,” Daines said. “We want to see candidates who can win a primary election and also win a general.”

    The map heavily favors the GOP – with 23 Democratic and independent seats in cycle compared to just 11 Republicans facing re-election. But Republicans, burnt by their past failures, are well aware that defeating an incumbent is a difficult task and could grow more challenging in a presidential election year, especially in swing states if Trump is the nominee. Behind the scenes, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer is trying to limit Democratic retirements.

    And Michigan Sen. Gary Peters, chairman of the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, was skeptical that a more aggressive GOP intervention from Washington would solve Republican woes.

    “I’m not sure who the Republicans will put forward as their nominees, but normally the folks who get to determine who the nominee is are the voters in those individual states in the primaries,” Peters said in an interview. “If we look at what happened last cycle, those primary voters tended to pick highly flawed candidates, and I expect that will happen again.”

    The fight for the seat occupied by Sinema has quickly emerged as the messiest affair – for both parties.

    Sinema’s recent change in party identification — switching from a Democrat to an independent — poses a fresh challenge that party leaders will have to navigate, as it could set up an unpredictable three-way race. Sinema has not yet said if she will run again, but she has been raising enormous sums in preparation for a potential bid and has been meeting with strategists and advisers to map out plans for a possible campaign.

    And Democratic leaders are worried that backing a fellow Democrat in the primary could end up alienating Sinema and potentially lead her to caucus with the GOP, forcing them to stay neutral for now.

    “She’s a very effective legislator,” Schumer, who so far is neutral in the race, said when asked about Sinema recently.

    On the GOP side, several candidates who tried — and failed — to win statewide races last cycle are also complicating that strategy, making it a key source of anxiety among many top Republicans and the Senate committees, according to Republican sources.

    Those candidates include Lake and the 2020 Senate GOP nominee, Blake Masters, two of the most Trumpian candidates who lost last year. Both Lake and Masters garnered enormous support among the GOP base for leaning into 2020 election denials and the populist ideals that Trump touted throughout his presidency. Masters has discussed a potential 2024 Senate bid with several Republicans, though it’s unclear whether he will run, GOP sources say.

    Lake met with the NRSC for roughly an hour in February and is expected to meet with them again in the coming weeks, sources familiar with the meeting told CNN. The issue of focusing on claims of a stolen election was one point discussed at the meeting, the sources said.

    “The point that has been brought up, which Kari knows, is that the issue sets are different from a governor’s race. She knows you can’t run on that because it’s not something, as a senator, that you can fix,” a source close to Lake said, referencing her rhetoric around stolen elections. “The conversation was more about how the issues are different between a governor’s race and a Senate race.”

    Senior Republicans acknowledge that her ultimate decision on whether to enter the race could freeze out other candidates, particularly those wanting to run in the same lane, with the source close to Lake saying establishment-minded Republicans have been reaching out to her about a potential run. The source said Lake has a 200,000-plus donor list she could pull support from and believes she would have “widespread support” if she decides to run.

    But many in the top ranks are skeptical about her chances.

    “If you take a look at the race, where Sen. Sinema is probably going to take some of the right, left and center, it’s going to make for a difficult path for a Republican in that state in any scenario,” North Carolina Sen. Thom Tillis told CNN. “The party there is, I think, set on Lake if she decides to run with it, but, I mean, we just have to see how well she performs.”

    Tillis added that, given the “three-way race dynamic,” Lake “is not going to be able to make a lot of headway there.”

    Cornyn said of Lake: “Her recent track record doesn’t indicate that she would be successful. We need candidates who can broaden their appeal beyond the base and win a general.”

    Masters, meanwhile, has quietly reached out to some advisers about what another Senate run would look like and has spoken with some senior GOP officials about a 2024 run.

    Other potential GOP candidates include Pinal County Sheriff Mark Lamb, who is expected to announce a Senate run as soon as this week and is viewed favorably by some top Republicans, according to GOP sources. Abe Hamadeh, formerly the Republican nominee for Arizona attorney general, is also weighing a run. And both Lamb and Hamadeh met recently with NRSC officials, but they have not met directly with Daines, according to a source familiar with the meetings.

    Two other Republicans, Jim Lamon and Karrin Taylor Robson, are also considering jumping into the race, sources familiar with the matter say. Lamon and Robson, who ran in 2022 for Senate and governor respectively, did not receive Trump’s support.

    Robson recently met with the NRSC, and many within the GOP committee “like her and see her as a quality candidate,” a source familiar with the meeting said. Lamon has not yet met with the NRSC, but is expected to set up a meeting in the coming months.

    Arizona’s Senate primary is not until August 6, 2024, and the filing deadline to enter is April 8, 2024 — giving them a long runway to decide whether or not to run — further complicating GOP leadership’s calculus on how to navigate the race dynamics.

    “I just think we’re, we’re more likely to get people elected if they’re focused on the future, as opposed to focusing on what happened in 2020,” Sen. Mitt Romney, a Republican of Utah, said when asked about a potential Lake candidacy. “I think the American people have made their judgment about the election and want to move on. So, let’s talk about the future and where we’re headed, and if we’ve got a candidate that is consumed with his or her past, it’s most likely a losing candidate.”

    Caroline Wren, a senior adviser to Lake, told CNN, “There’s no doubt Kari Lake is a formidable force in the Republican party right now, but she’s still focused on her lawsuit in Arizona,” referring to her efforts to dispute her loss in the governor’s race.

    Rubio said that Lake could be a strong Senate candidate, despite her shortfall last year.

    “She was a very competitive candidate. I think I trust the Republican voters in Arizona to pick the nominee,” Rubio said. “I don’t think Washington should be stepping in to do it.”

    But Democrats believe that a Lake candidacy will only bolster their chances, even if Sinema decides to run.

    Rep. Ruben Gallego, the Arizona Democrat running for his party’s nomination in the Senate race, suggested to CNN he was praying for a Lake candidacy.

    “I’m a practicing Catholic – so I have these votive candles for different things,” Gallego said. “I have a special candle for Kari Lake to jump in.”

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  • Biden tells officials he’s ‘definitely running’ but formal announcement could wait for summer | CNN Politics

    Biden tells officials he’s ‘definitely running’ but formal announcement could wait for summer | CNN Politics



    CNN
     — 

    President Joe Biden often envisions what he could accomplish with a second term, advisers and allies who speak with him say, but he has expressed no urgency to formally launch a campaign to win another four years in office.

    The president has not settled on a campaign manager, narrowed down whether a headquarters would be placed in Philadelphia or Wilmington, Delaware, or selected a date to make a reelection bid official.

    Long known for stretching out major decisions – including several times as a senator when he was weighing a run for president – Biden is offering up one final wait for Democrats as they look ahead to next year’s vote.

    “In what I think is the unlikely chance that he ultimately decides not to run this time, he will need to do so soon enough that other candidates can get into the field to be competitive,” said Delaware Democratic Sen. Chris Coons, the president’s close friend and ally. “I am encouraging him to run, and I think he will run. But he will make that decision on his timeline, not mine.”

    The President has been notoriously deliberate over the course of decades in public office, often putting off major decisions until the 11th hour. But holding off on making a reelection announcement is rooted in far more practical considerations, aides say, first and foremost of which is focusing on governing matters such as raising the debt ceiling and avoiding getting drawn into the political fray a moment sooner than he must.

    “He’s not ambivalent about serving a second term, but he’s in no rush to be a candidate again,” a longtime Democratic adviser, who has worked closely with Biden over the years, told CNN. “What’s the upside?”

    That question came into sharp view this week, given how former President Donald Trump dominated the conversation and commanded outsize attention with his arraignment on criminal charges in New York. And the Democratic Party has largely coalesced behind Biden, particularly since the midterm elections last fall, and know the lack of a serious primary threat offers him “the ability to move on his own time,” a senior White House official said.

    Biden has told several elected officials in private conversations that he’s in – “I am definitely running,” he told one person a few weeks ago, according to that person – but he has been less forthcoming on timing.

    April had for a while been seen as a likely timeline for announcing his candidacy, given that it comes four years after he jumped into the race in 2019. And as vice president, he joined then-President Barack Obama in opening a reelection campaign in April 2011.

    The timing of a Biden announcement is now more likely to be the summer rather than spring, three Democratic officials say, with a target date still not determined.

    “President Biden has been clear that he intends to run, and his focus is on finishing the work he’s doing for American families: continuing to bring manufacturing back from overseas, further cutting the deficit by having rich special interests pay their fair share, and standing up for fundamental rights like the freedom to choose,” White House spokesman Andrew Bates told CNN. “There has never been a timeframe for any announcement.”

    Outside of interviews, Biden has remained mostly silent about his reelection plans.

    That made two nods he gave recently to a likely run more notable. During an event handing out national Arts and Humanities medals at the White House last month, Biden said certain people were “ready to run” and, noting novelist Colson Whitehead’s two Pulitzer Prizes, said he was “kind of looking for a back-to-back myself.”

    The allusions were hardly lost on anyone in the East Room, many of whom were ardent supporters of Biden’s last presidential bid and are eager to back a campaign for a second term.

    For other observers, including some in touch with the president that week, the asides also felt like subtle brushback against those who still question whether he actually plans to run again.

    Signs of a pending campaign have been hard to miss.

    Biden has spent the opening months of the year traveling the country to promote the accomplishments of the first half of his term at events that could easily be confused for campaign stops. He has intensified his attacks on Republicans, including taking aim at anti-LGBTQ laws in Florida championed by Gov. Ron DeSantis, a likely contender for the GOP nomination. And a string of moves on immigration, crime and energy have bolstered Biden’s image as a moderate while angering some liberals for appearing to back off his prior promises.

    Anita Dunn, at left, senior advisor to President Joe Biden who is part of the team working on Biden's reelection strategy, is seen the US Capitol on July 22, 2021 in Washington, DC.

    Taken together, the portrait is of a candidate-in-waiting. Yet Biden has put off making a final decision about running again, and the time frame for a potential announcement – never set in stone – appears to be extending further into the year.

    Last year, senior advisers to Biden discussed launching the reelection campaign early in the new year, and some members of Biden’s family, too, are said to have favored an announcement as early as February. But that once-debated aspirational timeline has come and gone. Now, sources say, a reelection announcement taking place even by the end of April doesn’t appear guaranteed.

    So far, the stretched-out timeline doesn’t appear to be worrying Democrats, at least outwardly.

    “I have no doubt President Biden will run again and will win,” said Rep. Brendan Boyle, a Pennsylvania Democratic congressman who has long been a booster of Biden running, attended his very first fundraiser in April 2019 in Philadelphia on the day he launched and who hosted Biden a few weeks ago in his district for the official release of the budget. “As far as when he exactly officially announces his reelection campaign, I couldn’t care less. It’s meaningless.”

    Obama formally launched his reelection campaign in April 2011. George W. Bush filed official papers to run for reelection in May 2003 but didn’t begin actively campaigning until much later. Donald Trump declared his intention to run again the day he entered office in 2017.

    President Barack Obama (R) holds a meeting with Vice President Joe Biden in the Oval Office of the White House April 14, 2011 in Washington, DC.

    All of those presidents’ reelection bids were considered givens. While Biden has said from the get-go that he intends to run again, he faces perpetual misgivings over his advanced age and soft approval ratings. In a CNN Poll conducted by SSRS released Thursday, just a third of Americans said Biden deserves to be reelected, with a majority in his own party saying they would like to see someone else as the Democratic nominee for president next year.

    One person familiar with internal deliberations said a reason there is not a great sense of urgency is because potential Republican presidential candidates, too, have been slow to launch their campaigns. So far, the only major GOP candidates to have formally declared runs have been Trump, former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley and former Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson.

    Sources also said Biden feels that as an incumbent president, without any serious primary challengers, he has more time to make a final decision. And some close to Biden suggest there is political upside to waiting.

    “Why not just let the Republicans try to out-crazy each other for a little while?” asked one former White House official.

    As Democrats wait for Biden to officially declare a bid for a second term, some crucial decisions for the party remain in limbo. Among those is the location for the 2024 Democratic National Convention, as well as where a Biden reelection campaign would be headquartered – both decisions that need final sign-off from the President himself. He is said to personally favor a Wilmington, Delaware, base for his reelection campaign, though there has been active talk of centering it in Philadelphia as well.

    Inside the White House, deputy chief of staff Jen O’Malley Dillon and senior adviser Anita Dunn – in consultation with other senior Biden aides – have been running point on preparations for a reelection campaign.

    Multiple sources said that names that have emerged for potential senior roles on the campaign include Jenn Ridder, national states director for Biden’s 2020 campaign, and Sam Cornale, executive director of the Democratic National Committee. Preston Elliott, Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer’s former campaign manager, Julie Chavez Rodriguez, director of White House Office of Intergovernmental Affairs, and Quentin Fulks, Georgia Sen. Raphael Warnock’s ex-campaign manager, are also said to be up for possible senior jobs.

    Other names in the mix include Emma Brown, Arizona Sen. Mark Kelly’s former campaign manager, Roger Lau, deputy executive director at the DNC, Addisu Demissie, former campaign manager for New Jersey Sen. Cory Booker’s 2020 presidential campaign, Mitch Stewart, founding partner of 270 Strategies, and Rob Flaherty, director of digital strategy at the White House.

    Other top Democratic strategists who have been approached for jobs on the campaign declined to sign on, citing personal or professional reasons. And Biden himself hasn’t engaged deeply on the staffing for the senior levels of his potential campaign – another sign that an announcement, at least for now, appears to remain in the distance.

    Many of Biden’s longest-serving and most trusted advisers are expected to remain at the White House for the duration of the campaign, setting up a potentially awkward dynamic for any campaign manager. There is a general expectation that at least one of Biden’s longtime advisers would transfer from the White House to a campaign job, but it remains to be seen whom that would be.

    Other recently departed White House officials, including former chief of staff Ron Klain and ex-communications director Kate Bedingfield, have also suggested they are prepared to assist the campaign.

    At the handful of Democratic fundraising events the president has held over the past month, he has made only vague allusions to reelection.

    “We have a real choice in this election – unrelated to me, unrelated to me – between the Democrats and Republicans and what they stand for and what they’re about,” Biden said in Las Vegas, careful not to run afoul of federal rules barring fundraising before officially declaring his candidacy.

    Even as those around the president wait for an official 2024 decision, there is an air of inevitability about an eventual announcement. Those close to the White House have pointed to some of Biden’s recent policy decisions that have tacked to the center as sending an important signal that his mind is all but made up.

    Earlier this year, Biden blindsided many Democratic lawmakers when he announced that he would not veto legislation to block a controversial Washington, DC, crime bill that critics had painted as being weak on crime. The Biden administration has also rolled out a number of tough proposals aimed at curbing the entry of migrants at the US southern border, to the dismay of many Democratic lawmakers and immigration activists.

    A number of other domestic policy announcements aimed at eliminating so-called “junk fees” and lowering the price of insulin – all moves considered to have broad appeal – have also signaled to Biden allies a pivot to reelection mode.

    first lady jill biden saenz intvw

    Hear what first lady thinks about Biden’s reelection plans

    But that air of inevitability is also creating jitters among some Democrats, who worry that an unexpected scenario in which Biden decides not to seek a second term would spell disaster for the party.

    “Because there’s no clear backup plan. There’s no one else to get fired up about,” said one Democratic congressman. “It’s not like you see anybody else lining up in the wings to really to take him on.”

    Biden himself, along with his wife, have said in interviews they intend to mount another campaign barring unforeseen events.

    Yet both have given themselves some room to back away.

    “It’s Joe’s decision,” the first lady told CNN’s Arlette Saenz during a trip to Africa earlier this year. “And we support whatever he wants to do. If he’s in, we’re there. If he wants to do something else, we’re there too.”

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  • Robert F. Kennedy Jr. files paperwork to run for president as a Democrat | CNN Politics

    Robert F. Kennedy Jr. files paperwork to run for president as a Democrat | CNN Politics



    CNN
     — 

    Environmental lawyer and anti-vaccine activist Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has filed paperwork with the Federal Election Commission to run for president in 2024 as a Democrat.

    The filing was confirmed Wednesday by his campaign treasurer, John E. Sullivan.

    The 69-year-old is the son of former New York senator, US attorney general and assassinated 1968 presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy and the nephew of the late President John F. Kennedy.

    Kennedy Jr. is a longtime vaccine skeptic. He has promoted discredited claims linking vaccines and autism and founded the anti-vaccine organization Children’s Health Defense. He has also railed against the coronavirus vaccine and has criticized the federal government’s handling of the pandemic.

    In 2019, three members of his family – his sister Kathleen Kennedy Townsend, brother Joseph P. Kennedy II and niece Maeve Kennedy McKean – forcefully denounced his anti-vaccine views in a Politico Magazine op-ed, arguing that he was “part of a misinformation campaign that’s having heartbreaking – and deadly – consequences.”

    In 2022, Kennedy Jr. invoked Nazi Germany in an anti-vaccine speech at the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, DC. The previous year, Instagram took down his account “for repeatedly sharing debunked claims about the coronavirus or vaccines.”

    Kennedy had tweeted last month that he was considering a presidential run.

    “If it looks like I can raise the money and mobilize enough people to win, I’ll jump in the race,” he said.

    His tweet also pointed supporters to his website: “Let Bobby know you want to see his leadership in the White House,” the site says while asking for donations.

    As an environmental lawyer, Kennedy worked with a group that led the Hudson River cleanup. He also worked for the Natural Resources Defense Council and co-founded an environmental law firm.

    Should he go through with his presidential bid, Kennedy would be the latest in a long line of family members to enter politics.

    His sister Kathleen served as the lieutenant governor of Maryland from 1995 to 2003. His brother Joseph was a congressman from Massachusetts from 1987 to 1999. And more recently, his brother Chris Kennedy was an unsuccessful candidate for governor of Illinois in 2018.

    The last Kennedy to hold elected office was his nephew former Massachusetts Rep. Joe Kennedy III, who lost a Democratic Senate primary in 2020. (He is now the US special envoy for Northern Ireland.) Caroline Kennedy, the daughter of former President Kennedy, is currently the US ambassador to Australia.

    The 2024 Democratic presidential race is only beginning to take shape, with President Joe Biden expected to announce his bid for a second term. Author Marianne Williamson launched a second long-shot campaign for the Democratic presidential nomination last month.

    On the Republican side, former President Donald Trump jump-started the race for the party nomination, announcing his third bid for the White House last year. Former United Nations Ambassador Nikki Haley, former Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson and entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy are also in the race, while other well-known contenders, including Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and former Vice President Mike Pence, are weighing bids of their own.

    This story has been updated with additional information.

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  • Democrats optimistic about saving abortion access in Wisconsin after liberal’s state Supreme Court win | CNN Politics

    Democrats optimistic about saving abortion access in Wisconsin after liberal’s state Supreme Court win | CNN Politics



    CNN
     — 

    The victory of a liberal judge in Tuesday’s Wisconsin Supreme Court election marks a significant political realignment toward the left in a crucial swing state, potentially closing the door on an era of Republican dominance with issues such as abortion rights at stake.

    With liberals now poised to effectively control the seven-judge court, Democrats are newly optimistic about saving abortion access in the state, establishing a firewall against any Republican challenges to the 2024 elections and potentially redoing GOP-drawn state legislative and congressional maps. That combination of issues proved a potent force in a race that attracted massive turnout and spending.

    And as they did in last year’s midterms in some places around the country, Democrats, once again, appear to have capitalized on a broad backlash to the US Supreme Court’s overturning of Roe v. Wade and a base still energized by the specter of another Donald Trump presidency.

    Republican-supported Daniel Kelly lost the technically nonpartisan contest to Democratic-backed Janet Protasiewicz, who will begin a 10-year term this summer, effectively flipping control of the divided bench to liberals. Conservative Justice Patience Roggensack’s retirement opened the seat, triggering a contentious race that attracted national attention – and donor dollars. It was the most expensive state judicial election in the country ever.

    “Anger about Roe hasn’t dissipated. Fear for our democracy remains. Voters are still alarmed by the MAGA extremism of candidates like Dan Kelly. And if this race is an early bellwether – we can safely say that Republicans didn’t learn their lesson in 2022,” said Sarah Dohl, the chief campaigns officer for Indivisible, a progressive advocacy group.

    Wisconsin has emerged as one of the country’s most competitive political fronts, with ground that’s expected to again be hotly contested in next year’s presidential and Senate races. But the state government – outside the governor’s office – has been bossed by Republicans. Since defeating GOP Gov. Scott Walker more than four years ago, Democratic Gov. Tony Evers has vetoed roughly 150 bills and been hamstrung in pursuing large parts of his own agenda. Now, GOP policy gains at the state level – most notably its crushing of public sector labor unions – are in doubt.

    In the years before Trump’s emergence, the Wisconsin GOP ran roughshod over state politics and sought to export its national playbook around the country. Walker entered the 2016 GOP presidential primary as an early favorite, pitching his state as a model for the nation. But like so many others in that year’s Republican field, he never got off the blocks as Trump thundered to the nomination.

    That fall, Trump shattered the Democratic illusion of a “blue wall” in the Upper Midwest, defeating Hillary Clinton by fewer than 25,000 votes in the Wisconsin general election.

    But Trump’s victory also triggered a backlash – and a mini Democratic resurgence at the state level.

    Evers was first elected governor during the 2018 Democratic wave. He won a second term last year. And though Republican Sen. Ron Johnson held his seat in 2022, Trump had lost the state two years earlier by a little more than 20,000 votes. His false allegations of 2020 election fraud infuriated Democrats, along with many swing voters, and ultimately in this year’s Wisconsin Supreme Court race hobbled Kelly, who faced blowback for his role in advising GOP officials in their efforts to hatch a fake electors scheme

    And while the court could find itself ruling on election laws again, abortion may the most immediate battle to reach the justices.

    The state’s high court is expected to decide a lawsuit challenging an 1849 law that bans nearly all abortions, which had been dormant for decades but snapped back into place with last year’s US Supreme Court ruling. Protasiewicz, Wisconsin Democrats and allied groups such as Planned Parenthood, NARAL Pro-Choice America and Emily’s List all worked to frame the race as another referendum on abortion rights.

    “For over a decade, anti-choice ideologues have held their iron grip on Wisconsin’s highest court, leaving voters hungry for change,” NARAL president Mini Timmaraju said in a statement. “Judge Janet’s resounding victory comes as abortion access faces an onslaught of attacks by extremist state courts determined to tear up our rights at every step.”

    Victory for abortion rights activists follows a similar result in neighboring Michigan, which voted last fall to enshrine abortion and other reproductive rights into the state constitution while reelecting Democratic women to its three most powerful executive offices. Those results continued a streak of successes for Democrats who dug in hard on the issue – a political winner in many swing states and legislative districts.

    Kelly, the conservative in Wisconsin, was coy about how he would rule on a slate of potential hot-button cases, but his past writings and work for anti-abortion groups allowed Protasiewicz, who signaled her skepticism about the ban, to attack him on the issue. Her past comments also suggest a new day’s dawning for the labor community and Democrats seeking to upend the state’s skewed legislative maps.

    “Everything from gerrymandering to drop boxes to Act 10 may be revisited to women’s right to choose,” Protasiewicz told Wisconsin Radio Network in February. (Act 10 eliminated collective bargaining for most public sector employees.)

    And with another presidential election on the horizon, her willingness to consider attempts to roll back or reverse restrictive voting laws or regulations could have clear national implications.

    The state’s voter ID laws, put in place by Republicans, are among the strictest in the country. Wisconsin’s high court played a pivotal role in the outcome of the 2020 election, rejecting a Trump lawsuit aimed at invalidating Joe Biden’s victory – but only by a 4-3 margin with one conservative justice siding with the liberals.

    In the event of another challenge like that, Democrats would now only need their allies to hold the line to prevent a similar bid.

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  • Erdogan’s political fate may be determined by Turkey’s Kurds | CNN

    Erdogan’s political fate may be determined by Turkey’s Kurds | CNN

    Editor’s Note: A version of this story first appeared in CNN’s Meanwhile in the Middle East newsletter, a three-times-a-week look inside the region’s biggest stories. Sign up here.


    Abu Dhabi, UAE
    CNN
     — 

    Turkey’s persecuted pro-Kurdish party has emerged as a kingmaker in the country’s upcoming election, playing a decisive role that may just tip the balance enough to unseat two-decade ruler Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

    In a key setback to the Turkish president and leader of the Justice and Development Party (AK Party), the pro-Kurdish Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP) last month announced that it would not put forward its own presidential candidate, a move analysts say allows its supporters to vote for Erdogan’s main rival.

    “We are facing a turning point that will shape the future of Turkey and (its) society,” said the HDP in a statement on March 23. “To fulfill our historical responsibility against the one-man rule, we will not field a presidential candidate in (the) May 14 elections.”

    It is a twist of irony for the Turkish strongman, who spent the better half of the past decade cracking down on the party after it began chipping away at his voter base. Its former leader Selahattin Demirtas has been in prison for nearly seven years and the party faces possible closure by a court for suspected collusion with the militant Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) and affiliated groups. But its influence may nonetheless determine the course of Turkey’s politics.

    The HDP’s decision not to field a candidate came just three days after head of the Republican People’s Party (CHP) Kemal Kilicdaroglu, Erdogan’s main rival, visited the party’s co-chairs. He told reporters that the solution to Turkey’s problems, “including the Kurdish problem” lies in parliament,” according to Turkish media.

    Kilicdaroglu, who represents the six-party Nation Alliance opposition bloc, is the strongest contender to run against Erdogan in years. And while the HDP hasn’t yet announced whether it will put its weight behind him, analysts say it is the kingmaker in the elections.

    “It was a carefully crafted political discourse,” Hisyar Ozsoy, deputy co-chair of the HDP and a member of parliament from the predominantly Kurdish province of Diyarbakir, told CNN. “We are not going to have our own candidate, and we will leave it to the international community to interpret it the way they wish.”

    Experts say the crackdown on the HDP is rooted in the threat it poses to Erdogan politically, as well as its position as one of the main parties representing Turkey’s Kurds, an ethnic minority from which a separatist militant movement has emerged.

    The party and the Kurdish people have had a complicated relationship with Erdogan. The leader courted the Kurds in earlier years by granting them more rights and reversing restrictions on the use of their language. Relations with the HDP were also cordial once, as Erdogan worked with the party on a brief peace process with the PKK.

    But ties between Erdogan and the HDP later turned sour, and the HDP fell under a sweeping crackdown aimed at the PKK and their affiliates.

    Kurds are the biggest minority in Turkey, making up between 15% and 20% of the population, according to Minority Rights Group International.

    It is unclear if the HDP will endorse Kilicdaroglu, but analysts say that the deliberate distance may be beneficial for the opposition candidate.

    The accusations against the HDP place it in a precarious position during the elections. It currently faces a case in Turkey’s Constitutional Court over suspected ties to the PKK, which is designated as a terrorist group by Turkey, the United States and the European Union. Knowing it may be banned at any moment, its candidates are running under the Green Left Party in parliament.

    If the opposition is seen as allying with the HDP, Erdogan’s AK Party may use its influence in the media to discredit it as being pro-PKK, said Murat Somer, a political science professor at Koc University in Istanbul and author of Return to Point Zero, a book on the Turkish-Kurdish question in Turkey.

    The HDP’s threat to Erdogan’s hold on power became apparent after the June 2015 election, the first general election it participated in. It won 13% of the seats, denying the ruling AK Party its majority for the first time since 2002. Erdogan, however, called a snap election five months later, which led to a drop in the HDP’s support to 10.7%, as well as the restoration of the AK Party’s overall majority.

    “They are a kingmaker in these elections because the HDP gets about half of the votes of the Kurdish population in Turkey,” said Somer, adding that the other, more conservative Kurdish voters have traditionally voted for Erdogan’s AK Party. And last month, the Free Cause Party (HUDA-PAR), a tiny Kurdish-Islamist party announced support for Erdogan in the elections. The party has never won seats in parliament.

    The HDP knows that its position is key to the outcome of next month’s vote, but that it’s also in a delicate situation.

    “We want to play the game wisely, and we need to be very careful,” said Ozsoy, adding that the party wants to avoid a “contaminated political climate” where the elections are polarized “between a very ugly ultra-nationalist discourse against Kilicdaroglu and others.”

    The party was founded in 2012 with a number of aims, said Ozsoy, one of which was “peaceful and democratic resolution of the Kurdish conflict.”

    Somer said that the party was seen to be “an initiative” of the PKK, which later led to a heavy government crackdown on it in the name of counterterrorism.

    Its former leader Demirtas remains an influential figure.

    The Turkish government has been trying to link the HDP to the PKK but has so far failed to prove “a real connection,” said Asli Aydintasbas, a visiting fellow at the Brookings Institution in Washington, DC.

    A post-Erdogan Turkey may give some breathing space to the Kurds and Kurdish-dominated parties in Turkey, Aydintasbas told CNN, noting that many Kurdish voters have recently left Erdogan’s camp. “For HDP, this is more than just an ideological choice,” she said. “It’s a matter of survival.”

    Ozsoy says his party understands what’s at stake, not only for Turkey’s Kurds but for all its minorities.

    “We are aware of our responsibility here. We are aware of our role. We know we are in a kingmaker position,” the HDP lawmaker said.

    Two women arrested for not wearing hijab following ‘yogurt attack’

    Two women were arrested in Iran for failing to wear the hijab in public, after a man threw a tub of yogurt at them at a store in the city of Shandiz on Thursday, according to Mizan News Agency, the state-run outlet for Iran’s judiciary.

    • Background: A video and report published by the Mizan News Agency showed footage of the man approaching one of the unveiled women and speaking to her before he grabs a tub of yogurt and throws it, hitting both women on the head. The video appears to show a male staff member removing the man from the store. The two women were arrested, as well as the man who threw the yogurt, according to local media.
    • Why it matters: Iranians have taken to the streets in protest for several months against Iran’s mandatory hijab law, as well as other political and social issues across the country. The Iranian government has continued to crack down on the protests, and on Saturday, Iran’s Ministry of Interior said that the “hijab is an unquestionable religious necessity.”

    Oil prices surge after OPEC+ producers announce surprise cuts

    Oil prices spiked Monday after OPEC+ producers unexpectedly announced that they would cut output. Brent crude, the global benchmark, jumped 5.31% to $84.13 a barrel, while WTI, the US benchmark, rose 5.48% to $79.83. Both were the sharpest price rises in almost a year. The collective output cut by the nine members of OPEC+ totals 1.66 million barrels per day.

    • Background: The reductions are on top of the 2 million barrels per day (bpd) cuts announced by OPEC+ in October and bring the total volume of cuts by OPEC+ to 3.66 million bpd, equal to 3.7% of global demand. In a note Sunday, Goldman Sachs analysts said the move was unexpected but “consistent with the new OPEC+ doctrine to act pre-emptively because they can, without significant losses in market share.”
    • Why it matters: The White House pushed back on the cuts by OPEC+. “We don’t think cuts are advisable at this moment given market uncertainty – and we’ve made that clear,” a spokesperson for the National Security Council said. “We’re focused on prices for American consumers, not barrels.” In October, OPEC+’s decision to cut production had already rankled the White House. US President Joe Biden pledged at the time that Saudi Arabia would suffer “consequences.” But so far, his administration appears to have backed off on its vows to punish the kingdom.

    Iran blames Israel for the killing of second IRGC officer, vows to respond

    A second Iranian Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) officer died following an attack in Syria on Friday, according to Iranian state media on Sunday. Iranian state media said the Iranian military adviser died after an Israeli attack near the Syrian capital Damascus left him wounded. The attack also killed another IRGC officer. In a tweet on Sunday, Iranian government spokesman Ali Bahadori Jahromi said the alleged Israeli attack wouldn’t go unanswered. Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Nasser Kanaani said on Sunday that Iran has the right to respond to “state terrorism.”

    • Background: The Friday airstrike hit a “site in the Damascus countryside,” Syrian state news agency SANA said. Israel declined CNN’s request for comment on reports of airstrikes near Damascus on Friday, saying its military doesn’t comment on reports in the foreign media. Iranian influence has grown in Syria since a civil war broke out in the country more than a decade ago, with the IRGC building a substantial presence as “advisers” to the Syrian armed forces.
    • Why it matters: The Israeli military declined to comment, but it has previously claimed responsibility for attacks it has described as Iranian-linked targets in Syria. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said at a cabinet meeting Sunday: “We are exacting a high price from the regimes that support terrorism, beyond Israel’s borders. I suggest that our enemies not err. Israel’s internal debate will not detract one iota from our determination, strength and ability to act against our enemies on all fronts, wherever and whenever necessary.”

    Iranian-American comedian Maz Jobrani, who has been touring the Middle East, spoke to CNN’s Becky Anderson about his support for the protests in his homeland, saying that he used his standup comedy platform to highlight the “brutality against the Iranian people.”

    “It was an opportunity for me to say, ‘let’s keep fighting,’” he said.

    Watch the interview here.

    An Iranian state news outlet is gloating at what it sees as the demise of the US dollar.

    IRNA recreated a popular meme to mark China and Brazil’s decision to reportedly ditch the US dollar as an intermediary in trade, citing the Chinese state news outlet, China Daily. It shows two men representing China and Brazil posing in front of a grave labelled “USD.”

    The meme was pinned to the top of IRNA’s Twitter page, and was met with laughter and ridicule. “Dream on,” said another user, pointing to the dollar’s use as the main reserve currency around the world.

    China Daily said that the agreement was part of “the rising global use of the Chinese renminbi.” It would reportedly enable China and Brazil to conduct trade and financial transactions using local currencies instead of the dollar.

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  • In 2024 Republicans may complete a historic foreign policy reversal | CNN Politics

    In 2024 Republicans may complete a historic foreign policy reversal | CNN Politics



    CNN
     — 

    The GOP in 2024 is moving toward a reprise of its most consequential foreign policy debate ever in a presidential primary. Only this time, the results may be reversed.

    The 1952 GOP presidential nomination fight proved a turning point in the party’s history, when Dwight Eisenhower, a champion of internationalism and alliance with Europe to contain the Soviet Union, defeated Sen. Robert Taft, a skeptic of international alliances who wanted to shift America’s focus from defending Europe toward confronting communist China.

    A similar divide is opening within the GOP now. In a distant echo of Taft, former President Donald Trump and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, the race’s two front-runners have both declared that defending Ukraine against Russia is not an American “vital interest” and “distracts” (as DeSantis put it) from the more important challenge of confronting China. Other likely 2024 candidates, such as former Vice President Mike Pence and former UN Ambassador Nikki Haley, come closer to upholding the Eisenhower position that the US must remain steadfast in protecting Europe against Russian aggression – and insisting that abandoning Ukraine would embolden China and other potential US adversaries.

    After Eisenhower’s landmark victory over Taft in 1952, every Republican presidential nominee over the next six decades – a list that extended from Richard Nixon through Ronald Reagan to George W. Bush, John McCain and Mitt Romney – identified more with the internationalist than isolationist wing of the party.

    But Trump broke that streak when he won the nomination in 2016 behind a message of brusque economic nationalism and skepticism of international alliances. Now, the GOP appears on track for a 2024 nomination fight which may demonstrate that Trump’s rise has lastingly shifted the party’s balance of power on foreign policy – and ended the long era of GOP internationalism Eisenhower’s victory began.

    The fact that DeSantis unveiled his views about Ukraine in a statement to Fox News host Tucker Carlson, a fierce opponent of American engagement with allies, underscored the governor’s determination to court Trump’s base with his provocative remarks. After several days of intense criticism from Republican internationalists, DeSantis retreated last week from his description of the war as a “territorial dispute” and called Russian President Vladimir Putin “a war criminal,” much harsher language than Trump has ever used. But DeSantis, in his interview with British journalist Piers Morgan for another Fox outlet, also reiterated his skepticism of open-ended US support for Ukraine. “I just don’t think that’s a sufficient interest for us to escalate more involvement,” the governor said.

    Even with his qualifying statements last week, DeSantis’ skeptical posture toward Ukraine shows the magnetic pull that Trump has exerted on his party, tugging it away from the Eisenhower tradition.

    “Trump-ism is the dominant tendency in Republican foreign policy and it’s isolationist, its unilateralist, its amoral,” said Richard Haass, president of the Council on Foreign Relations and former director of policy planning at the State Department under George W. Bush. The “traditional institutional approach to the world [which was] … the dominant Republican approach since World War II … has clearly been eclipsed for now,” said Haass, who also held foreign policy positions in the Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush administrations.

    Ivo Daalder, president of the Chicago Council on Global Affairs and former US permanent representative to NATO under Barack Obama, agrees. The fact that both 2024 GOP front-runners are expressing a broad skepticism about US engagement abroad, he said, raises the possibility that Republican “internationalists have not only lost in ’16 and ‘20” when Trump headed the GOP ticket, “but have lost the party forever.”

    The 1952 presidential election, by contrast, was the moment when GOP internationalists seemed to win the party forever. Leading into World War II, the party had been closely split between an internationalist wing determined to counter Adolf Hitler and imperial Japan and an isolationist faction resistant to entanglement in the intensifying confrontation with fascism, especially in Europe. The divide was both ideological and geographic, pitting generally more moderate internationalist East Coast Republicans (many of them tied to Wall Street and international finance) against more conservative isolationist forces centered in the small towns and small businesses of the Midwest and the far West.

    The Japanese surprise attack that triggered the US entry into World War II ended the political viability of a purely isolationist stance.

    “After Pearl Harbor there was no way to be a strict isolationist and a national political [figure],” said Joyce Mao, an associate professor of history at Middlebury College and author of the book “Asia First,” which recounts the GOP foreign policy debates of that era.

    After World War II, Republican internationalists joined with Democratic presidents Franklin Roosevelt and Harry Truman to build the international institutions meant to prevent another global war: the United Nations, the Marshall Plan to economically rebuild Europe and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization to militarily defend it from the Soviet Union. Eisenhower, who had organized the Allied invasion of Europe on D-Day in 1944, was firmly in that camp and, in fact, returned to Europe in January 1951 to serve as NATO’s first supreme commander.

    But Robert Taft led a block of “old guard” congressional Republicans that remained much more skeptical of European commitments. Taft, a senator from Ohio and the son of former Republican president William Howard Taft, had generally opposed American aid to Europe before Pearl Harbor and even after the war he pushed to reduce the Marshall Plan and voted against the creation of NATO. Like many of the Republicans who initially resisted involvement in World War II, Mao noted, Robert Taft in the post-war period tried to separate himself both from that isolationist past and the contemporary priorities of GOP internationalists like Eisenhower by arguing for an “Asia First” foreign policy that would shift resources and emphasis from defending Europe to confronting the Communists who had seized control of China.

    “Eisenhower was viewed by Taft and his colleagues as much too moderate,” Mao said. “His European focus was deemed by that conservative wing of the party as much too similar to the liberal Democrats. If this was going to be a moment for conservatism to reassert itself not only against liberalism but also against the moderates in the Republican Party, China provided an ideal plank” to do so.

    All these strains culminated in the landmark battle for the 1952 GOP presidential nomination. Taft, the Republican Senate leader, was a passionate favorite of conservatives. Eisenhower, still in Europe as NATO supreme commander, was in many respects a reluctant candidate. But as Stephen Ambrose showed in his classic biography, Eisenhower felt compelled to run largely from fear that Taft would lead the US out of NATO, while simultaneously risking a catastrophic war in China. (Eisenhower was also deeply disenchanted with Truman’s leadership.) Eisenhower resigned his NATO position, returned to the US, mobilized enough support from the GOP’s internationalist wing to beat Taft at the 1952 Republican convention, and then decisively won the presidency that November. “Eisenhower became president precisely because he did not trust this version of isolationism in Taft,” said Peter Feaver, a Duke University political scientist who served as a senior adviser for strategic planning on the National Security Council under George W. Bush.

    Both as a general election candidate and as president, Eisenhower tried to minimize his public conflicts with his party’s “old guard.” But he unmistakably steered the party (and the nation) toward acceptance of American global leadership within a robust international system of alliances. With only modest variation, that became the dominant foreign policy ideology of the GOP for the next 60 years under Presidents Richard Nixon, Gerald Ford, Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush. Late in that period, George W. Bush offered a different emphasis by stressing unilateral American action over coordination with allies, but even he emphasized the need for the US to remain engaged with the world. “It’s a pretty unbroken streak,” said Geoffrey Kabaservice, author of “Rule and Ruin,” a history of the struggles between GOP conservatives and moderates.

    Taft-like isolationism, coupled with nativist opposition to immigration and protectionist opposition to free trade, first resurfaced as a major force in the GOP with the long-shot presidential campaigns of conservative commentator Patrick J. Buchanan in 1992 and 1996. Two decades later, Trump revived that same triumvirate of isolationism, protectionism and nativism – what scholars sometimes call “defensive nationalism” – in his winning drive for the 2016 GOP nomination.

    Though some traditional GOP internationalists had hoped that Trump in office might moderate those impulses, as president he barreled down all those roads, repeatedly clashing with traditional allies. Now, DeSantis’ choice to echo Trump in devaluing Ukraine – following the calls from so many House conservatives to reduce the US commitment there – is deflating another hope of the GOP’s beleaguered internationalist wing: that Trump’s ascent represented a temporary detour and the party would snap back to its traditional support for international engagement once he left office.

    “Trump-ism has to be taken seriously,” as a long-term force in GOP thinking about the world, Haass said. The foreign policy center of gravity in the Republican Party, he added, has moved toward “a much more pinched or minimal American relationship with the world, [with] not a lot of interest in contributing to global responses to challenges like climate change or pandemics.”

    Even before DeSantis qualified his comments in the interview with Morgan, Feaver believed the Florida governor was trying to find a position on Ukraine somewhere between Trump’s undiluted skepticism and the unreserved support of Sens. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina and Mitch McConnell of Kentucky. But, Feaver said, by including such inflammatory language as “territorial dispute” in his initial comments, DeSantis demonstrated the risks of pursuing such a strategy of “triangulation.”

    “Triangulation is a risky game because if you get the language off, you may commit yourself in a campaign to a line that makes no sense when you are governing,” Feaver said. “This is one of the hardest problems for newcomers and challengers when they are campaigning for president. By giving applause lines that work for the narrow segments of ideologically hardened factions that they are trying to win over for the primary, they can lock themselves into policy positions that are not sound when they actually win.”

    As an example, Feaver said DeSantis’ insistence that the US should shift more attention from countering Russia to containing China – an argument he repeated with Morgan – was illogical because “abandoning Ukraine assists China’s most significant ally, Russia.” Haley made a similar case in her recent Wall Street Journal article criticizing DeSantis (though not by name) for his comments to Carlson. “It’s naive to think we can counter China by ignoring Russia,” Haley wrote.

    Daalder points out another logical flaw in the updated “Asia First” arguments from DeSantis and Trump. “If the US were to abandon its allies in Europe … our allies in Asia are going to ask, ‘What’s to say they are not going to do the same with regards to China?’” Daalder said. “By demonstrating your willingness to stand up to Russia you are also strengthening the view that in Asia that when it comes to it that we will be there to help them.”

    But polls leave no doubt that both prongs of the modern Robert Taft position – that the US should reduce its commitment to Europe-focused international alliances and harden its resistance to China – have a substantial base of support in the contemporary Republican coalition. In a Gallup poll released earlier this month, by a lopsided margin of 76% to 12%, Republican voters were more likely to identify China than Russia as the principal US adversary in the world. (More Democrats picked Russia than China.) Polls have also found a steady decline in Republican support for US aid to Ukraine: polls this year by both the Pew Research Center and Quinnipiac University found that the share of GOP voters who believe the US is doing too much now equals the combined percentage who think it is doing too little or the right amount. (Quinnipiac found big majorities of Democrats and independents still believe the US is doing the right amount or not enough.)

    The latest Chicago Council on Global Affairs annual survey also tracks a broader retreat from the world among GOP voters. In that poll, conducted last November, the share of Republicans who said the US should take an active role in world affairs fell to 55% – the lowest the survey has ever recorded. Underscoring that erosion, a slight majority of Republicans in the poll said the costs of an active US international role now exceed the benefits.

    Opinions in the GOP about whether the US should do more or less in Ukraine don’t vary much along lines of education or age, the Pew poll found. But generally, these surveys show that the turn away from global leadership is most powerful among two distinct groups of Republicans: those who are younger, and those who lack college degrees. While a solid three-fifths of Republicans with a college degree in the Chicago Council poll said the benefits of US leadership exceed the costs, for instance, a majority of non-college Republicans disagreed. Younger Republicans were also much more likely than those over 60 to say the costs exceed the benefits.

    It’s probably no coincidence that those two groups – Republicans without a college degree and those who are younger – have consistently registered as Trump’s strongest supporters in early polls about the 2024 race.

    Trump is signaling that in a second term he will likely push even further in an isolationist and protectionist direction. John Bolton, Trump’s former national security adviser, has said he believed the former president came close to withdrawing the US from NATO and would likely do so if elected to a second term. Trump certainly hinted at that possibility in a recent campaign video in which he declared, “we have to finish the process we began under my administration of fundamentally reevaluating NATO’s purpose and NATO’s mission.” Trump has also said he would impose a four-year plan “to phase out all Chinese imports of essential goods, everything from electronics to steel to pharmaceuticals.” That would be a wrenching change in the global economy.

    In all these ways, Trump is promising to fulfill Robert Taft’s vision from seven decades ago – and to erase Eisenhower’s lasting victory in setting the GOP’s direction. DeSantis does not appear to have decided to jump entirely on that Trump train – but neither is he lying down on the tracks to stop it. With these two men far ahead of any potential rival, it seems highly likely that the GOP in 2024 will continue to move away from Eisenhower-style international cooperation toward a volatile compound of isolationism and unilateralism. And that could generate enormous turbulence across the globe.

    Trump’s first term, as Daalder noted, was a chaotic time for the international order and traditional US alliances. But “If an isolationist leader gets elected president in 2024,” Daalder added, “you haven’t seen nothing yet.”

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  • Trump leans into extremism at first 2024 rally as legal woes mount | CNN Politics

    Trump leans into extremism at first 2024 rally as legal woes mount | CNN Politics



    CNN
     — 

    Donald Trump is igniting his White House bid at a moment of unprecedented peril in the criminal investigations against him – a confluence that could send America into a new political and legal collision.

    Trump’s wild rhetoric at his first official 2024 campaign rally Saturday previewed the divisive national moment ahead should he be indicted in any of multiple criminal probes. As he whipped up a demagogic fervor in Waco, Texas, to try to secure a new presidency dedicated to “retribution,” Trump’s extremism – laced with suggestions of violence – left no doubt he would be willing to take the country to a dark place to save himself.

    Yet Trump’s chilling warnings that the Biden administration’s “thugs and criminals” have created a “Stalinist Russia horror show” by “weaponizing” justice against him also spelled electoral danger for a GOP hurt by his authoritarianism in recent elections. An extraordinary prolonged character attack on Ron DeSantis, in which Trump depicted his biggest potential rival of 2024 tearfully begging for his endorsement in 2018, demonstrated the political firestorm the Florida governor will have to deal with if he jumps into the White House campaign.

    Even with the ex-president’s reputation for hyperbole and inflammatory rhetoric, such demagoguery has never previously been heard in the first official rally of any modern American election campaign.

    Meanwhile, House committee chairs eager to appeal to the Trump base are increasing their efforts to use the power of their Republican majority to thwart Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s inquiry into Trump – even before it releases any possible indictment or evidence. House Oversight Chair James Comer told CNN’s “State of the Union” on Sunday that the GOP moves were justified because the investigation into Trump’s alleged role in a hush money scheme to pay an adult film actress was based purely on politics.

    “This is the, for better or worse, leading contender for the Republican nomination of the presidential election next year, as well as a former president of the United States,” the Kentucky Republican told Jake Tapper.

    Many legal experts have questioned whether the potential Bragg investigation will produce the strongest of cases against Trump, who’s also facing several other probes over his actions around the 2020 election and his handling of classified documents. (Trump, who maintains he’s done nothing wrong, so far has not been charged in any of the criminal probes against him.)

    And given the greater national impact of those other investigations, a possible attempt to use a business accounting violation in this yearslong hush money case to suggest a possible violation of campaign finance law could be especially controversial. Yet Comer’s comments also created the implication that an ex-president or White House candidate could be protected from investigation even if they had committed a criminal offense. This gets to the core of the possible cases against Trump: Would failing to investigate him and charge him, if the evidence justifies such a step, mean an ex-president is above the law? Or would some attempts to call him to account risk subjecting him to a level of scrutiny that other citizens might not face?

    Comer and House Judiciary Chairman Jim Jordan, who were among the three committee chairs writing to Bragg this weekend with intensifying demands for his testimony, won a warm shout-out from Trump at his rally in Texas, reflecting the way the new House GOP is acting as a political tool for the ex-president and his radical campaign. Bragg responded to the chairmen in a statement saying it was not appropriate for Congress to interfere with local investigations and vowed to be guided by the rule of law. He was backed up this weekend by nearly 200 former federal prosecutors who wrote a letter denouncing efforts to intimidate him.

    The grand jury in the Trump case is expected to reconvene on Monday, following a week of rampant public speculation over whether Bragg would call more witnesses and whether the case was sufficiently serious to merit the potential first indictment ever of an ex-president. Trump falsely predicted earlier this month that he would be arrested last Tuesday – a move that fired up an effort by his allies to intimidate Bragg. But the week came and went without any indictment news.

    CNN reported last week that the district attorney’s office was trying to determine whether to call back Trump’s former lawyer and fixer, Michael Cohen, to refute the testimony provided by attorney Robert Costello, who appeared at the request of Trump lawyers – or to call an additional witness to buttress its case before the grand jurors consider a vote on whether to indict the former president.

    The escalating confrontation over Bragg’s inquiry came as other investigations around Trump seemed to be nearing their own conclusions.

    In a totally separate case on Friday, Trump’s primary defense attorney, Evan Corcoran, appeared before a grand jury in Washington, DC, that is hearing evidence over the ex-president’s handling of classified documents at his home in Florida, including possible obstruction of justice when the government tried to get those documents back. Prosecutors have made clear in court proceedings that are still under seal that they believe Trump tried to use Corcoran to advance a crime.

    Former FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe told CNN’s Erin Burnett on Friday that Corcoran’s appearance represented a serious development for Trump. “That is an unprecedented thing that we’re seeing, and Evan Corcoran is in a position to provide unbelievably damaging testimony against him,” he said.

    Besides looking into the documents issue, special counsel Jack Smith is investigating Trump’s conduct around the 2020 election – which even this weekend the former president again falsely claimed he had won – and in the run-up to the attack on the US Capitol on January 6, 2021.

    In another probe related to the 2020 election, a district attorney in Georgia said at the end of January that decisions were “imminent” in the investigation into Trump’s attempts to overturn President Joe Biden’s victory in the key swing state. CNN reported last week that prosecutors are considering bringing racketeering and conspiracy charges.

    Charges in any one of these investigations would test the strength of the country’s political and judicial institutions, given that an ex-president and current presidential candidate is involved. And the fact that Trump is showing such willingness to inflame the country’s politics in his own defense makes this a deeply serious moment for the nation.

    Trump’s fiery rally in Waco pulsated with falsehoods about the 2020 election and his one-term presidency and misrepresented the legal cases against him. Coming a day after he warned in a social media post about “death and destruction” if he is indicted, his speech boiled with conspiracy theories and personal resentments – rhetoric that is especially dangerous in the aftermath of January 6. It wasn’t lost on observers that his event coincided with the 30th anniversary of a law enforcement raid on a cult compound in Waco that’s seen on the far right as a symbol of government overreach, although the campaign maintained the location had been chosen for convenience.

    The ex-president has often used extremist speeches to try to get more time in the limelight or more attention, whether from adoring onlookers or outraged critics. It is too early to judge how well his tactic is working in the 2024 campaign and as his legal plight seems to worsen. To date, there have been no big protests of the kind Trump has repeatedly called for. The price his supporters could pay for turning violent has also been demonstrated by the hundreds of convictions of those who invaded the Capitol more than two years ago after his big Washington rally. So there is at least the possibility that while Trump remains widely popular with his GOP base, his angry rhetoric lacks the power that it once did.

    But it is also clear after this first campaign rally that Trump, who is still leading the Republican pack for 2024, has crossed a new political line. He is painting a picture of a decrepit and powerless nation – plagued by corruption, rigged elections and the criminal manipulation of the law against his supporters – that is far more extreme than the “American carnage” he invoked in his inaugural address in 2017.

    “The abuses of power that are currently with us at all levels of government will go down as among the most shameful, corrupt and depraved chapters in all of American history,” Trump said, lashing the US as a “third world banana republic.”

    “Either the deep state destroys America, or we destroy the deep state,” he said at one point.

    And while Trump’s intent is to shock, history suggests that authoritarians seeking power follow exactly the same playbook of populist nationalism – discrediting free elections, demonizing the legal system and taking aim at vulnerable sectors of society – that Trump is pioneering in his new campaign.

    His rally was also notable for the fact that it was almost totally dominated by his grievances and complaints, which may well hint at a sense of foreboding over his legal position. “Every piece of my personal life, financial life, business life and public life has been turned upside down and dissected like no one in the history of our country,” Trump said.

    This raises a question of whether he’s offering a message, rooted in his obsessions, that a majority of Republican voters would actually want to sign up for, even those who considered his presidency a success. In 2016, Trump emerged as an unlikely but highly skilled vehicle for the conservative grassroots, much of which felt patronized by politicians and left behind in a wave of globalization that sent millions of blue-collar jobs overseas.

    DeSantis may be trying something similar in 2024. In the early moves of his yet-to-be-declared campaign, the Florida governor has positioned himself as the champion of conservative voters who believe their way of life is under attack from liberals and multiculturalists pushing a “woke” ideology. One of the key questions of the GOP primary campaign will be whether this approach could appeal to more Republican voters than Trump’s incessant attempts to portray investigations into him as a symptom of a wider attack by a corrupt government on his followers.

    But ahead of yet another potentially pivotal week, Trump is proving that he will not turn away from the defining tactic of his political career: subjecting the country’s institutions to ever more intense and unprecedented stress tests.

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  • Biden, DOJ won’t assert privilege in Trump deposition in lawsuit brought by fired FBI official | CNN Politics

    Biden, DOJ won’t assert privilege in Trump deposition in lawsuit brought by fired FBI official | CNN Politics



    CNN
     — 

    The Justice Department said Friday that neither it nor the Biden White House would assert certain privileges in depositions of former President Donald Trump and FBI Director Christopher Wray that have been ordered in a lawsuit brought by an ex-FBI official whose termination Trump pushed for when he was president.

    The new filing from the Justice Department in the lawsuit brought by former FBI official Peter Strzok is the latest example of the Biden administration having to weigh the protections of the presidency against the extraordinary legal cases related to President Joe Biden’s predecessor.

    Strzok’s lawsuit alleges that Trump’s political agenda prompted his firing and that the Justice Department broke the law in publicly releasing texts he had exchanged with former FBI lawyer Lisa Page. The texts revealed that Page and Strzok – who both worked on the Trump-Russia probe when it was in its early stages – had expressed anti-Trump sentiments and that they were engaged in a romantic, extramarital affair. Trump repeatedly called for Strzok’s ouster before he was terminated in 2018. Page has also brought her own lawsuit over the release of texts.

    The Justice Department had sought to quash the subpoenas of Trump and Wray, but was unsuccessful, with DC District Judge Amy Berman Jackson ruling that both men had to sit for depositions. Jackson’s ruling, which she issued after a sealed hearing in February, also said the depositions must be limited to less than two hours and that they must focus on a narrow set of issues in the case.

    When the Justice Department was seeking to quash the subpoenas, it had indicated that the presidential communications privilege could limit what questions Wray could answer about his communications with Trump concerning the matters in dispute in the lawsuit. Jackson ordered the DOJ to indicate by late March whether Biden would assert privilege in the depositions and Friday’s filing indicated the administration would not engage in a privilege fight.

    “The Executive Office of the President will not assert the Presidential Communications Privilege, and Defendants will not assert the Deliberative Process Privilege, with respect to the authorized topics,” the filing said. It added that a representative of Trump was made aware of the ruling ordering the depositions and said that “Former President Trump has not requested an assertion of privilege over any of the information within the scope of the authorized deposition.”

    The department, however, signaled in the filing that it still might appeal Jackson’s order, with a footnote stating that “Defendants expressly reserve their rights to seek further review of this Court’s February 23, 2023 decision.”

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  • Vice President Kamala Harris hires Stephanie Young to be new senior adviser | CNN Politics

    Vice President Kamala Harris hires Stephanie Young to be new senior adviser | CNN Politics



    CNN
     — 

    Stephanie Young, a veteran Democratic aide, has been tapped to be Vice President Kamala Harris’ new senior adviser to focus on messaging and outreach.

    Young’s role is a new position for the vice president’s office, meant to take a birds-eye approach to manage Harris’ overall communications platform and political engagement but not fill the role of a day-to-day communications director. Her second communications director in two years, Jamal Simmons, departed the office around New Year’s for family reasons. The role still has not been filled.

    Harris’ image has been under intense scrutiny since taking office. The vice president has been the target of snubs from both Democrats and Republicans, who’ve criticized her performance in various rounds of negative stories. It’s led to an often defensive messaging strategy from the office, with aides focused on protecting the vice president and the White House sharing social media posts depicting how in lockstep she is with President Joe Biden. Allies of Harris have complained that she’s under the spotlight more than any other modern day vice president, a reality that often appeared to catch the administration off guard in the beginning of its tenure.

    A White House official said Young’s role would mirror that of an inner circle senior counselor meant to be at the nexus of political engagement and messaging. CNN previously reported that a possible restructuring has remained underway for months to give Harris what several involved feel is a much needed role of senior counselor, in absence of a communications director.

    The vice president’s chief of staff Lorraine Voles announced Young’s new position in an email to staff Friday afternoon.

    “In her new role, she will advise the Vice President on messaging and manage communications. Having previously served in the public engagement team of the Obama Administration, Stephanie will also leverage her previous experience to inform the outreach strategy and efforts of the office,” Voles wrote in the email obtained by CNN.

    Young’s new role will likely prove useful as Biden is expected to launch a bid for reelection in the coming months, with Harris at his side. Young will join the office after serving as the Executive Director of When We All Vote, a voting initiate launched by former first lady Michelle Obama. Young also worked for the Obama White House, House Democratic Leadership and the Congressional Black Caucus.

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  • Biden kicks off ‘Invest in America’ tour next week | CNN Politics

    Biden kicks off ‘Invest in America’ tour next week | CNN Politics



    CNN
     — 

    As he gears up for a likely reelection campaign, President Joe Biden on Tuesday will kick off a three-week tour to highlight the impact of his signature legislative accomplishments as the impacts of those laws begin to be felt around the country, according to a White House official.

    The “Invest in America” tour will see Biden, Vice President Kamala Harris, first lady Jill Biden and nearly a dozen Cabinet members hit more than 20 states – including key battleground states like Georgia, Nevada and Pennsylvania – over the next three weeks.

    The tour is the White House’s most coordinated, concerted push to date to accomplish what White House officials see as their central task this year: implementing legislation and making sure Americans know what Biden has accomplished. Polling published last month indicated the White House has its work cut out: 62% of Americans said they believe Biden has accomplished “not very much” or “little or nothing,” according to a Washington Post/ABC News poll.

    Biden will make his first of multiple stops on Tuesday with a visit to a semiconductor manufacturer in Durham, North Carolina, which has announced plans to build a $5 billion chips manufacturing facility that will create 1,800 new jobs, spurred on by passage of the CHIPS and Science Act, which incentivizes domestic semiconductor manufacturing.

    Other Cabinet secretaries and top White House officials will highlight the effects of other pieces of legislation in the tour’s first week: Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg will highlight airport safety and infrastructure projects in Arkansas, Texas and Oklahoma; Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo will visit fiber optic cable manufacturers in North Carolina; and Biden’s infrastructure coordinator Mitch Landrieu will highlight electric vehicle manufacturing in Tennessee, among others.

    Harris, who is traveling to Africa next week, will make stops when she returns to highlight the growth of domestic manufacturing, the official said. The first lady, a community college teacher, is expected to highlight workforce training programs.

    “From shovels hitting the ground on new infrastructure projects made possible by the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, to new electric vehicle manufacturing facilities as a result of the Inflation Reduction Act, to communities benefitting from high-speed internet because of the American Rescue Plan, to new semiconductor fabs thanks to the CHIPS and Science Act, the tour will highlight how the President’s Investing in America agenda is growing the economy from the middle-out and bottom-up, not top down,” the White House said in a statement.

    Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen, Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack, Education Secretary Miguel Cardona, Interior Secretary Deb Haaland, Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Michael Regan and Small Business Administration Administrator Isabel Guzman are expected to travel as part of the three-week tour.

    The tour coincides with a two-week congressional recess in April and will also include stops with members of Congress.

    Biden will head to North Carolina a day after convening a meeting of his “Invest in America” Cabinet, which is comprised of key Cabinet officials working to implement the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, the CHIPS and Science Act, the Inflation Reduction Act and the American Rescue Plan.

    Biden and his Cabinet will highlight the direct and indirect impacts of those laws – including private sector investments spurred on by pieces of legislation – and the impact on state and local economies at each stop.

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  • With Trump facing legal peril, DeSantis steps out and sharpens attacks | CNN Politics

    With Trump facing legal peril, DeSantis steps out and sharpens attacks | CNN Politics



    CNN
     — 

    Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis has stylized himself as a political brawler willing to take on all comers, from Disney and the corporate media to high school students wearing masks.

    But his brewing battle with Donald Trump was for months a one-sided affair.

    That changed this week when DeSantis for the first time leaned into the burgeoning rivalry in earnest. In public remarks, DeSantis goaded the former president’s legal troubles and invited comparisons between their leadership style and character. He doubled down by granting a lengthy interview to Piers Morgan, a noted Trump supporter-turned-critic, and didn’t push back as the British television host assailed the former president as untruthful and intensely jealous of his one-time ally’s political success.

    The two laughed over Trump’s attempts to nickname DeSantis.

    “You can call me whatever you want,” DeSantis said in an excerpt of the interview published in the New York Post, “just as long as you also call me a winner.”

    DeSantis until now has mostly brushed off questions about his 2024 aspirations even as he makes moves toward a likely campaign for president. The noticeable shift in approach comes as the extraordinary legal troubles surrounding Trump have intensified in recent days, with the possibility of an indictment hanging over the former president and bringing unprecedented uncertainty to the looming GOP nominating contest.

    It also follows a coordinated campaign by Trump’s allies over the weekend to pressure potential Republican rivals to stand by the former president as a Manhattan grand jury considers evidence related to a hush-money payment scheme to adult film star Stormy Daniels.

    Other Republican presidential contenders came to Trump’s defense by leveling accusations at Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg, the Democrat readying a decision on whether to indict Trump. Former Vice President Mike Pence, who is still weighing a bid, told ABC News, “It just feels like a politically charged prosecution here.” Businessman Vivek Ramaswamy, a longshot candidate, called the grand jury probe “a textbook case of politicizing prosecutorial power.” And former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley said it was “more about revenge than justice.”

    DeSantis, though, opted to poke the bear, telling a Panama City, Florida, crowd on Monday that he doesn’t “know what goes into paying hush money to a porn star to secure silence over some type of alleged affair.” Hours later, with Trump surrogates publicly fuming on social media, DeSantis stood by the quip during his interview with Morgan. He went on to tout the no-nonsense management of his administration, pandemic response and 19-point victory last fall – encouraging a contrast with Trump’s chaotic four years in office that culminated with a loss to Joe Biden.

    It was enough for Morgan to declare in the New York Post that the Florida governor had “finally taken the gloves off,” and Trump and his allies responded as if that was the case. Trump adviser and spokesman Jason Miller tweeted that DeSantis “has finally shown his true colors. An establishment Never Trumper who despises the MAGA base and was faking it the entire time.”

    Yet DeSantis’ criticism of Trump remained mostly implicit and shrouded in subtext – an uncharacteristically reserved counter punch for a political figure who once cosplayed as a “Top Gun” pilot to drive home the point he will “never back down from a fight” and ended his reelection campaign by suggesting he was created by God to be a fighter.

    Morgan’s frequent attempts to bait DeSantis into attacking Trump – at one point comparing their relationship to Frankenstein and Frankenstein’s monster – were mostly met with familiar dodges. DeSantis suggested that is unlikely to change even as he and Trump appear headed for a collision course.

    “If I were to run, I’m running against Biden,” DeSantis said. “Like (Trump and DeSantis) are competing for the Republican, potentially, I get that, but ultimately you know the guy I’m gonna focus on is Biden because I think he’s failed the country. I think the country wants a change. I think they want a fresh start and a new direction and so we’ll be very vocal about that.”

    Trump, meanwhile, has for weeks escalated attacks on DeSantis, characterizing the governor and former ally as ungrateful, disloyal and a mediocre political talent boosted by Florida’s sunshine. On Monday, Trump leveled a series of personal attacks against DeSantis and elevated a photo that suggested DeSantis had behaved inappropriately with teenage girls while teaching history in Georgia in his early 20s, an image the former president previously shared on social media.

    “It gets to the point where you’re a candidate by default and you have to engage,” one DeSantis adviser told CNN. “The governor can’t afford to be marginalized from the get go. He clearly made the calculus it was time to push back.”

    Even as DeSantis sharpens his critiques of Trump, he is pivoting elsewhere toward the former president as he inches closer to a bid for the White House. He has so far avoided outlining any significant policy differences between himself and his former ally-turned-future rival. Instead, DeSantis has ditched some long-held beliefs in favor of adopting Trump’s more populist leanings.

    Once an outspoken proponent of arming Ukraine as a member of Congress, DeSantis recently characterized Russia’s aggression in Eastern Europe as a “territorial dispute,” aligning himself with Trump. (After considerable blowback from his party, DeSantis told Morgan his words had been “mischaracterized” and clarified he believed “Russia was wrong to invade.”)

    Earlier this month, he asserted, “We’re not going to mess with Social Security as Republicans,” a clear break from his days as a tea party Republican who supported privatization of Social Security and raising the retirement age to 70. Trump recently declared that entitlement programs shouldn’t be included in federal budget negotiations.

    In his recent travel to early nominating states, DeSantis has also fashioned his likely candidacy on many of the most animating pillars of Trump’s first run for president, including immigration, attacking the media and questioning the security of elections. His moves against so-called “wokeness” in society are the ripples from Trump’s 2016 gripes against political correctness.

    DeSantis’ advisers and allies believe the chief challenge for DeSantis is not differing himself from Trump on policy, but demonstrating to Republican primary voters that he can be more effective at enacting a platform. Trump, without the baggage, as some have offered.

    Or, as Trump recently put it, “Whatever I want, he wants.”

    To many Republican primary voters, Trump and DeSantis are viewed as politically aligned, leaving voters with a choice centered on electability and less on policy differences. In a recent CNN poll of potential GOP voters, 40% say they would most likely back Trump and 36% would vote for DeSantis. No other candidate reached double digits.

    “What the Republican voters are going to look at at the end of the day is where is our best chance of winning because both men resonate with Republican voters on policy,” Chris Ager, the chairman of the New Hampshire Republican Party, told CNN in a recent interview. “If the policies are both good, then who has the best chance of winning and implementing them again? I think that’s going to be a bigger factor in many decisions.”

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  • Your Trump questions answered. Yes, he can still run for president if indicted | CNN Politics

    Your Trump questions answered. Yes, he can still run for president if indicted | CNN Politics

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



    CNN
     — 

    Could he still run for president? Why would the adult-film star case move before any of the ones about protecting democracy? How could you possibly find an impartial jury?

    What’s below are answers to some of the questions we’ve been getting – versions of these were emailed in by subscribers of the What Matters newsletter – about the possible indictment of former President Donald Trump.

    He’s involved in four different criminal investigations by three different levels of government – the Manhattan district attorney; the Fulton County, Georgia, district attorney; and the Department of Justice.

    These questions are mostly concerned with Manhattan DA Alvin Bragg’s potential indictment of Trump over a hush-money payment scheme, but many could apply to each investigation.

    The most-asked question is also the easiest to answer.

    Yes, absolutely.

    “Nothing stops Trump from running while indicted, or even convicted,” the University of California, Los Angeles law professor Richard Hasen told me in an email.

    The Constitution requires only three things of candidates. They must be:

    • A natural born citizen.
    • At least 35 years old.
    • A resident of the US for at least 14 years.

    As a political matter, it’s maybe more difficult for an indicted candidate, who could become a convicted criminal, to win votes. Trials don’t let candidates put their best foot forward. But it is not forbidden for them to run or be elected.

    There are a few asterisks both in the Constitution and the 14th and 22nd Amendments, none of which currently apply to Trump in the cases thought to be closest to formal indictment.

    Term limits. The 22nd Amendment forbids anyone who has twice been president (meaning twice been elected or served part of someone else’s term and then won his or her own) from running again. That doesn’t apply to Trump since he lost the 2020 election.

    Impeachment. If a person is impeached by the House and convicted by the Senate of high crimes and misdemeanors, he or she is removed from office and disqualified from serving again. Trump, although twice impeached by the House during his presidency, was also twice acquitted by the Senate.

    Disqualification. The 14th Amendment includes a “disqualification clause,” written specifically with an eye toward former Confederate soldiers.

    It reads:

    No person shall be a Senator or Representative in Congress, or elector of President and Vice-President, or hold any office, civil or military, under the United States, or under any state, who, having previously taken an oath, as a member of Congress, or as an officer of the United States, or as a member of any State legislature, or as an executive or judicial officer of any State, to support the Constitution of the United States, shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof.

    Potential charges in New York City with regard to the hush-money payment to an adult-film star have nothing to do with rebellion or insurrection. Nor do potential federal charges with regard to classified documents.

    Potential charges in Fulton County, Georgia, with regard to 2020 election meddling or at the federal level with regard to the January 6, 2021, insurrection could perhaps be construed by some as a form of insurrection. But that is an open question that would have to work its way through the courts. The 2024 election is fast approaching.

    If he was convicted of a felony – reminder, he has not yet even been charged – in New York, Trump would be barred from voting in his adoptive home state of Florida, at least until he had served out a potential sentence.

    First off, there’s no suggestion of any coordination between the Manhattan DA, the Department of Justice and the Fulton County DA.

    These are all separate investigations on separate issues moving at their own pace.

    The payment to the adult-film actress Stormy Daniels occurred years ago in 2016. Trump has argued the statute of limitations has run out. Lawyers could argue the clock stopped when Trump left New York to become president in 2017.

    It’s also not clear how exactly a state crime (falsifying business records) can be paired with a federal election crime to create a state felony. There are some very deep legal dives into this, like this one from Just Security. We will have to see what, if anything, Bragg adds if he does bring an indictment.

    Of the four known criminal investigations into Trump, falsifying business records with regard to the hush-money payment to an adult-film actress seems like the smallest of potatoes, especially since federal prosecutors decided not to charge him when he left office.

    His finances, subject of a long-running investigation, seem like a bigger deal. But the Manhattan DA decided not to criminally charge Trump with regard to tax crimes. Trump has been sued by the New York attorney general in civil court based on some of that evidence.

    Investigations in Georgia with regard to election meddling and by the Justice Department with regard to January 6 and his treatment of classified data also seem more consequential.

    But these cases are being pursued by different entities at different paces in different governments – New York City; Fulton County, Georgia; and the federal government.

    “I do think that the charges are much more serious against Trump related to the election,” Hasen said in his email. “But falsifying business records can also be a crime. (I’m more skeptical about combining that in a state court with a federal campaign finance violation.)”

    One federal law enforcement source told CNN’s John Miller over the weekend that Trump’s Secret Service detail is actively engaged with authorities in New York City about how this arrest process would work if Trump is ultimately indicted.

    It’s usually a routine process of fingerprinting, a mug shot and an arraignment. It would not likely be a public event and clearly his protective detail would move through the building with Trump.

    New York does not release most mug shots after a 2019 law intended to cut down on online extortion.

    As Trump is among the most divisive and now well-known Americans in history, it’s hard to believe there’s a big, impartial jury pool out there.

    The Sixth Amendment guarantees “the right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the State and district wherein the crime shall have been committed.”

    Finding such a jury “won’t be easy given the intense passions on both sides that he engenders,” Hasen said.

    A Quinnipiac University poll conducted in March asked for registered voters’ opinion of Trump. Just 2% said they hadn’t heard enough about him to say.

    The New York State Unified Court System’s trial juror’s handbook explains the “voir dire” process by which jurors are selected. Those accepted by both the prosecution and defense as being free of “bias or personal knowledge that could hinder his or her ability to judge a case impartially” must take an oath to act fairly and impartially.

    We’re getting way ahead of ourselves. He hasn’t been indicted, much less tried or convicted. Any indictment, even for a Class E felony in New York, would be for the kind of nonviolent offense that would not lead to jail time for any defendant.

    “I don’t expect Trump to be put in jail if he is indicted for any of these charges,” Hasen said. “Jail time would only come if he were convicted and sentenced to jail time.”

    The idea that Trump would ever see the inside of a jail cell still seems completely far-fetched. Hasen said the Secret Service would have to arrange for his protection in jail. The logistics of that are mind-boggling. Would agents be placed into cells on either side of him? Would they dress as inmates or guards?

    Top officials accused of wrongdoing have historically found a way out of jail. Former President Richard Nixon got a preemptive pardon from his successor, Gerald Ford. Nixon’s previous vice president, Spiro Agnew, resigned after he was caught up in a corruption scandal. Agnew made a plea deal and avoided jail time. Aaron Burr, also a former vice president, narrowly escaped a treason conviction. But then he left the country.

    That remains to be seen. Jonathan Wackrow, a former Secret Service agent and current global head of security for Teneo, said on CNN on Monday that agents are taking a back seat – to the New York Police Department and New York State court officers who are in charge of maintaining order and safety, and to the FBI, which looks for potential acts of violence by extremists.

    The Secret Service, far from coordinating the event as they might normally, are “in a protective mode,” Wackrow said.

    “They are viewing this as really an administrative movement where they have to protect Donald Trump from point A to point B, let him do his business before the court, and leave. They are not playing that active role that we typically see them in.”

    The New York Times published a report based on anonymous sources close to Trump on Tuesday that suggested he is, either out of bravado or genuine delight, relishing the idea of having to endure a “perp walk” in New York City. The “perp walk,” by the way, is the public march of a perpetrator into a police office for processing.

    “He has repeatedly tried to show that he is not experiencing shame or hiding in any way, and I think you’re going to see that,” the Times reporter and CNN political analyst Maggie Haberman said on the network on Tuesday night.

    “I do think there’s a part of him that does view this as a political asset,” said Marc Short, the former chief of staff to former Vice President Mike Pence, during an appearance on CNN on Wednesday. “Because he can use it to paint the other, more serious legal jeopardy he faces either in Georgia or the Department of Justice, as they’re politically motivated.”

    But Short argued voters will tire of the baggage Trump is carrying, particularly if he faces additional potential indictments in the federal and Georgia investigations.

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  • Ramen noodles and drained savings: FEC weighs allowing candidates to use political cash to pay themselves bigger salaries | CNN Politics

    Ramen noodles and drained savings: FEC weighs allowing candidates to use political cash to pay themselves bigger salaries | CNN Politics



    CNN
     — 

    When Nabilah Islam began running for Congress in the 2020 cycle, she said she quickly discovered the high price of her decision.

    “It was impossible for me to have a full-time job and wage a competitive campaign,” the Georgia Democrat recalled. So, she gave up her work as a campaign consultant, paused paying her student loans and went without health insurance – in the middle of a pandemic – because she could no longer afford to pay the premiums. She drained her savings to pay living expenses.

    “I was eating ramen and turkey sandwiches every day,” said Islam, who lost her bid for a House seat and now serves in the Georgia state Senate. “It was one of the hardest things I had ever done in my life.”

    Now, the Federal Election Commission is taking up a request that Islam lodged in 2021 to change some of the federal rules governing the use of political cash. At a hearing Wednesday, the regulators weighed boosting the amount of campaign money candidates can use to pay themselves while running for office. They also are considering whether to allow federal candidates to use donors’ money to underwrite health insurance premiums and other benefits.

    Although the FEC now allows candidates to use campaign funds to pay themselves a salary, the agency set strict limits. That salary is capped at the annual salary for the office they are seeking or their earnings in the year before they became a candidate, whichever is the lower amount.

    The limits are aimed at preventing candidates from enriching themselves at donors’ expense, but they also bar candidates who were unemployed or at home caring for children in the prior year from using contributors’ money to draw a candidate salary.

    Supporters of the change say it would make it easier for a broader spectrum of Americans to run for federal office, including full-time caregivers, students and people from working-class backgrounds. But critics question whether it would encourage grift.

    “The reality is that giving up your salary for a year or two to run for Congress is unsustainable for most working people,” said Liuba Grechen Shirley, a former House candidate and founder and CEO of the Vote Mama Foundation, which aims to overcome the obstacles mothers face in running for office. She supports the rule change.

    “We have to make it the norm that candidates pay themselves a livable wage, so that they can run for office because that’s how we start to change the system,” she told CNN in an interview this week.

    Running for Congress is a time-consuming and expensive enterprise. The average successful House winner in the 2022 midterms spent nearly $2.8 million in campaign funds, according to OpenSecrets, a nonpartisan organization that tracks political money.

    And members of Congress, as a group, are far wealthier than the general US population. An OpenSecrets analysis of congressional financial disclosures reports in 2020 found that more than half the people in Congress that year were millionaires.

    Although a record number of women serve in Congress, they still make up just over a quarter of total representation, according to the Center for American Woman and Politics (CAWP) at Rutgers University.

    Only about 28% of all candidates for the House in 2022 were women, said Kelly Dittmar, CAWP’s director of research, underscoring that the gender disparities start long before Election Day.

    “If you could tell a potential candidate that they would have greater financial security if they decided to wage a campaign for office, then it might increase the pool of candidates, including women,” Dittmar said.

    The limits don’t just affect women.

    Maxwell Frost rides an elevator on his way to be interviewed on a podcast in Orlando, Florida, on August 30, 2022.

    Florida Rep. Maxwell Frost, who last year became the first Gen Z candidate to win a congressional seat, told the commissioners he “put himself in a bad financial place” by seeking a House seat.

    The 26-year-old Democrat said he left his job at a gun-violence prevention organization to run for office but quickly realized that he couldn’t sustain campaigning and driving part-time for Uber as he had planned.

    Frost drew headlines late last year after a landlord denied his application to rent an apartment in Washington, DC, because of his low credit score.

    “I did overcome the odds,” he testified Wednesday. “But there are often consequences when you participate in a system that’s not set up for you.”

    The FEC, which is not likely to make a decision in the coming weeks, is considering a range of options.

    Among them: Allowing candidates to earn, on a pro-rated basis, up to 50% – or as much as 100% – of the federal office they are seeking, regardless of what they earned in the year before they launched their campaigns. Rank-and-file members of Congress earn $174,000 a year, with those in top leadership positions collecting more.

    Other options include allowing candidates to receive a salary that’s tied to a $15-an-hour rate or to the minimum wage set by federal or state law.

    So far, a range of individuals and organizations – including the campaign arms for House Democrats and Republicans – have expressed general support for a change, although they diverge on the specific remedies.

    Some Republicans on the panel, including Commissioner James “Trey” Trainor, questioned whether the agency is overstepping its bounds by weighing a rule change and should instead ask Congress to change the federal law that bars candidates from converting campaign contributions to personal use.

    Bradley Smith, a former Republican FEC commissioner, testified that the agency should be wary of going too far with “feel-good rule-making.”

    “Why not allow candidates to pay for haircuts, better clothes, better food to keep a candidate’s energy up and fundraising or recharging time at the country club, all of which could be helpful to a campaign?” he asked.

    The commission also is considering whether to allow candidates to begin drawing a donor-funded salary as soon as they file a statement of candidacy rather than waiting, as is currently required, for primary ballot deadlines, which vary widely by state.

    Frost, the freshman congressman from Florida, also urged the commission to allow candidates to continue drawing a campaign salary after the election as they wait for their salaries as officeholders to kick in.

    Although the FEC often deadlocks along partisan lines, the commission has signaled an openness to easing some rules for candidates in the past.

    In 2018, the agency opened the door to candidates using campaign contributions to pay for child care benefits, following a request from Grechen Shirley. She said she did so after trying for months to juggle care for her small children while running for a House seat in Long Island. “I would literally be nursing my son, while my daughter put hairclips in my hair, and I’d have my headphones on and would be dialing for dollars,” she said.

    To date, 59 federal candidates have used campaign dollars for child care, according to Vote Mama. The group now is pressing states around the country to extend the policy to state and local candidates.

    This year, 19 bills to do so have been introduced in 13 states, Grechen Shirley said.

    Last year, Islam, 33, made history by becoming the youngest woman and the first Muslim woman elected to the Georgia state Senate. Although she is not currently planning another run for Congress, she said she is determined to see federal policy change.

    “I’m very persistent,” she said. “No one should have to go through all that in order to run for office.”

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  • Trump’s legal team seeks to throw out special grand jury report on 2020 election interference in Georgia | CNN Politics

    Trump’s legal team seeks to throw out special grand jury report on 2020 election interference in Georgia | CNN Politics



    CNN
     — 

    Attorneys for former President Donald Trump have asked for a judge to toss the final report and evidence from a special grand jury in Georgia that spent months investigating efforts by Trump and his allies to overturn the 2020 election.

    Trump’s attorneys also are asking that a judge disqualify the Fulton County District Attorney’s office from overseeing the investigation, according to a new court filing.

    “President Donald J. Trump hereby moves to quash the SPGJ’s [special purpose grand jury’s] report and preclude the use of any evidence derived therefrom, as it was conducted under an unconstitutional statute, through an illegal and unconstitutional process, and by a disqualified District Attorney’s Office who violated prosecutorial standards and acted with disregard for the gravity of the circumstances and the constitutional rights of those involved,” Trump’s attorneys wrote in the filing.

    The motion to quash the special grand jury’s work and disqualify the district attorney’s office from pursuing any charges in the case is Trump’s first effort to intervene in the long-running investigation conducted by Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis, a Democrat. It signals the aggressive approach Trump’s attorneys are likely to take in fighting any potential charges Trump could face.

    So far, no one has been charged in Georgia.

    Willis’ office is considering bringing racketeering and conspiracy charges, CNN reported Monday.

    CNN has requested comment from the Fulton County District Attorney’s office.

    The wide-ranging objections by Trump’s attorneys cover a number of decisions by the judge who oversaw the grand jury, the conduct of the Fulton County district attorney and a variety of interviews last month by the special grand jury’s foreperson.

    A special grand jury investigating Trump and his associates concluded its work in December and a judge overseeing the panel made small slivers of the report public in February. After the partial release, a foreperson for the panel went on a media tour during which she indicated roughly a dozen individuals had been recommended for criminal charges.

    The foreperson, Emily Kohrs, declined to say whether the special grand jury recommended criminal charges for Trump, telling CNN last month: “There may be some names on that list that you wouldn’t expect. But the big name that everyone keeps asking me about – I don’t think you will be shocked.”

    Special grand juries in Georgia can issue subpoenas and collect evidence, such as documents and testimony, but they cannot issue indictments. Instead, they write a final report that includes recommendations on whether anyone should face criminal charges. Then it’s up to the district attorney to decide whether to seek indictments from the regularly seated grand juries.

    Trump’s attorneys raised objections to several issues related to the special grand jury process, including the series of interviews by the foreperson and a recent media interview with other members of the special grand jury, who spoke to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution anonymously.

    “The results of the investigation cannot be relied upon and, therefore, must be suppressed given the constitutional violations,” Trump’s attorneys argued in the new filing. “The foreperson’s public comments in and of themselves likewise violate notions of fundamental fairness and due process and taint any future grand jury pool.”

    Trump’s team also argued that Willis’ office should have been disqualified from overseeing the entire case when we she was blocked from investigating now-Georgia Lt. Gov. Burt Jones, a Trump ally who served as a fake elector after the 2020 election. They also took issue with the media interviews Willis has provided.

    “The resulting prejudicial taint cannot be excised from the results of the investigation or any future prosecution,” Trump’s attorneys wrote, adding that the media interviews “violate prosecutorial standards and constitute forensic misconduct, and her social media activity creates the appearance of impropriety compounding the necessity for disqualification.”

    Trump’s legal team raised objections as well with how Fulton County Superior Court Judge Robert McBurney oversaw the grand jury and interviews he provided after the panel’s work concluded. CNN was among the media outlets to interview McBurney.

    “The Supervising Judge made inappropriate and prejudicial comments relating to the conduct under investigation as well as potential witnesses invocation of the Fifth Amendment,” according to the Trump attorneys. “He improperly applied the law and subsequently denied appellate review while knowing his application of the law in that manner had vast implications on the constitutionality of the investigation.”

    They argued that McBurney was incorrect in determining the special grand jury was a criminal investigative body, a decision that weighed heavily with other judges who forced out-of-state witnesses to comply with subpoenas they received to appear before the panel.

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  • Voters of color are a big reason Trump leads the GOP primary | CNN Politics

    Voters of color are a big reason Trump leads the GOP primary | CNN Politics



    CNN
     — 

    Former President Donald Trump holds an average double-digit advantage over Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis in national 2024 Republican primary surveys. That, in itself, isn’t notable given Trump, the frontrunner, has been ahead of DeSantis (by far his nearest competitor or potential competitor) since polling began about the race.

    But what may surprise is how Trump is ahead. An average of CNN/SSRS and Quinnipiac University polls released this week reveals that Trump’s lead may, in large part, be because of his clear edge among potential Republican primary voters of color.

    Trump was up an average of 55% to 26% over DeSantis among Republican (and Republican leaning independent) voters of color in an average of the two polls.

    Among White Republican voters, the race was well within the margin of error: Trump’s 38% to DeSantis’ 37%.

    I should note the combined voter of color sample size of the CNN/SSRS and Quinnipiac University is about 200 respondents. This isn’t particularly large, but it’s more than large enough to say with a high degree of statistical confidence that Trump is ahead among them and that he is doing better among them than he is among White Republicans.

    The fact that Trump is doing considerably better among Republican voters of color than White Republicans flies in the face of the fact that many Americans view Trump as racist. I noted in 2019 that more Americans described Trump as racist than the percentage of Americans who said that about segregationist and presidential candidate George Wallace in 1968.

    But Trump’s overperformance with Republican voters of color makes sense in another way. The Republican primary race right down is breaking down along class lines just like it did during the 2016 primary.

    Trump’s base is made up of Republicans whose households pull in less than $50,000 a year. He led this group of voters by 22 points over DeSantis in our CNN poll. He trailed DeSantis by 13 points among those GOP voters making at least $50,000 a year. This is a 35 point swing between these two income brackets.

    Republican voters of color are far more likely than White Republicans to have a household income of less than $50,000 a year. According to the CNN poll, 45% of Republican voters of color do compared to just 28% of White Republicans.

    Trump’s lead among Republican voters of color comes at a time when they’re becoming a larger part of the party. During the Republican primary season in 2016, voters of color were 13% of Republican voters. Today, they’re closer to 18%.

    To put that into some perspective, White voters with a college degree are about 28% of Republican potential primary voters. Trump, of course, has historically struggled among well educated White voters, even within own party.

    While voters of color don’t make up nearly the same share of the Republican party as White voters with a college degree, the difference isn’t all that large. This means that if Trump ultimately does as well with Republican voters of color as the current polling indicates, it would be a good counterbalance for his weakness among White voters with a college degree.

    Trump doing better among Republican voters of color now is after he dramatically improved among all voters of color during the 2020 general election. While he still lost among them in 2020 by 45 points to Joe Biden in exit poll data, this was down from his 53-point loss in the 2016 election to Hillary Clinton. (Other data shows a similar improvement for Trump.)

    Trump’s improvement with voters of color occurred even as his margin among White voters declined between 2020 and 2016. In fact, Trump probably would have won the 2020 election had he had slightly less slippage among White voters between 2016 and 2020.

    Indeed, the Republican Party as a whole has been improving among voters of color. The party’s 38-point loss among that bloc for the House of Representatives in the 2022 midterms was a 5-point improvement from 2020. Its margin among White voters stayed the same in exit poll data.

    Put another way: The shift among voters of color from 2022 to 2020 could have provided the winning margin for Republicans to take back the House.

    The question going into 2024 is whether voters of color will continue their shift to the Republican Party and with Trump in particular. If they do, they could provide them both with a big boost.

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