Politics

President Biden Meets in Bethlehem With Abbas,  Supports Two-State Solution 

The US president gave no details on what his administration would do to help make a Palestinian state a reality 

 US President Joe Biden’s meeting with Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas in the West Bank didn’t take him to Ramallah, the headquarters of the Palestinian Authority, but instead to Bethlehem, just a few miles south of Jerusalem.  

President Biden’s meeting with Abbas on Friday at the Presidential Compound in Bethlehem lasted about 75 minutes. 

Biden offered his support for a two-state solution to the Palestinians’ conflict with Israel but gave no details on what his administration would to do to make a Palestinian state become a reality. 

Standing next to Abbas and addressing reporters, President Biden said the Palestinians require a political path toward peace with Israel, even if a two-state solution to the conflict appears far off. 

“There must be a political horizon that the Palestinian people can actually see or at least feel. We cannot allow the hopelessness to steal away the future,” President Biden said. 

The 87-year-old Abbas said that the Palestinians “look forward” to US efforts to “stop settlements and settler violence” and to an end to the “expulsion of Palestinians from their land.” 

“The key to peace begins with recognizing the state of Palestine,” Abbas said. 

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WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The U.S. House Judiciary Committee will take up proposed legislation that would ban certain assault weapons, the panel said on Friday, citing a string of recent mass shootings across the United States that have killed 42 people.

The committee will meet on Wednesday to mark up the bill, which “would ban the sale, import, manufacture or transfer of certain semi-automatic weapons,” it said in a statement.

(Reporting by Susan Heavey; Editing by Raissa Kasolowsky)

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By Richard Cowan and Rose Horowitch

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – President Joe Biden and other top Democrats are pushing to make abortion a central issue as they try to retain control of the U.S. Congress in November elections. But on the ground, some of the party’s most vulnerable incumbents are downplaying the issue.

From Maine to Arizona, several Democratic incumbents instead are emphasizing bread-and-butter issues like national security and job creation as they battle to retain their seats in the Nov. 8 midterm elections.

Many are trying to survive in districts that have become more Republican as a result of 2020 redistricting by heavily Republican state legislatures.

In the northwest corner of Ohio, Representative Marcy Kaptur is emphasizing the populist themes she has campaigned on since 1982 as she faces the toughest race of her career.

In campaign appearances, Kaptur is talking about reining in CEO pay and raising wages for blue-collar workers. Abortion “is not something she’ll be talking about,” according to a person familiar with the race, who asked not to be identified to talk frankly about it.

That’s not what Biden and other Democratic leaders envisioned after the Supreme Court overturned its Roe v. Wade decision that guaranteed a nationwide right to abortion.

“This fall, Roe is on the ballot,” he said in a White House speech after the June 24 decision.

VOTERS SHIFT ATTENTION?

The court’s decision was cheered by Republicans who have worked for decades to roll back abortion rights.

But it is less popular with the public.

Some 55% of Americans believe abortion should be legal in all or most cases, according to a June Reuters/Ipsos poll.

Some analysts say the court’s decision could help Democrats shift voters’ attentions away from inflation and the lingering COVID-19 pandemic.

U.S. voters historically have treated mid-term elections, which occur halfway through a president’s four-year term, as an opportunity to rein-in the president’s party. This time around that would mean punishing Democrats by electing more Republicans.

But abortion could turn that formula on its head in 2022.

“If the focus is on a decision by the Republican-dominated Supreme Court, the Democrats will appear less as a power that needs to be balanced,” said Paul Sracic, a political science professor at Youngstown State University in Ohio.

In Washington, Democrats are pushing abortion rights to the fore. The House of Representatives has repeatedly passed legislation that would establish abortion rights by law, but those bills have been blocked by Republicans in the Senate that is split 50-50 between the two parties. At least 60 votes are needed to advance most legislation.

Back home, some endangered Democrats are talking about the issue with voters.

In New Jersey, Representative Tom Malinowski has posted a dozen abortion rights messages on Twitter in the three weeks since the court’s decision.

Residents of the suburban, Republican-leaning district largely support abortion rights, said Ross Baker, a political science professor at Rutgers. “These people tend to be influenced by very abrupt changes to social policy,” he said.

But voters in some battleground districts tell Reuters that the economy, not abortion, was their top concern.

Public opinion polls put the economy at the top of voters’ worries. Crime, guns and immigration are among the issues that follow, with abortion even further down the list.

In south Texas, Henry Cuellar, the only Democrat in the House to vote against abortion rights legislation last year, narrowly defeated a liberal challenger in a Democratic primary who was backed by abortion rights groups. The longtime conservative Democrat’s campaign messages since then haven’t mentioned the issue.

Likewise, Democrats Tom O’Halleran of Arizona and Jared Golden of Maine have barely campaigned on the issue, according to a Reuters review of campaign material.

In eastern Virginia, Representative Elaine Luria decried the Supreme Court decision on Twitter as “a blow to women’s rights.” But recent campaign messages have emphasized her work to boost military spending and investigate the Jan. 6, 2021 attack on the U.S. Capitol.

Analysts caution that the issue could fade closer to Election Day as other events capture voters’ attention.

“We can’t be sure whether it will remain a highly salient issue four or five months from now,” Sracic said.

(Reporting by Richard Cowan and Rose Horowitch; Editing by Andy Sullivan and Aurora Ellis)

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SIOUX FALLS, S.D. (AP) — Gov. Kristi Noem had pledged to “immediately” call a special legislative session to “guarantee that every unborn child has a right to life in South Dakota” if the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade. But nearly three weeks after that ruling, the first-term Republican remains unusually quiet about exactly what she wants lawmakers to pass.

Noem, widely considered a potential 2024 presidential candidate, isn’t the only GOP governor with national ambitions who followed up calls for swift action with hesitance when justices ended the constitutional right to abortion that had been in place for nearly 50 years.

In Arkansas, which like South Dakota had an abortion ban immediately triggered by the court’s ruling, Gov. Asa Hutchinson has said he does not plan to put abortion on the agenda of next month’s special session focused on tax cuts. And in Florida, Gov. Ron DeSantis, a top potential White House contender also running for reelection, has shied away from detailing whether he will push to completely ban abortions despite a pledge to “expand pro-life protections.”

Noem has given no indication of the date, proposals or whether a special session will even happen to anyone beyond a small group of Statehouse leaders. When asked whether the governor still plans to call lawmakers back to the Capitol, her office this week referred to a June statement that indicated it was being planned for “later this year.”

It’s a change of tack from when the Supreme Court’s decision first leaked in May and the governor fired off a tweet saying she would “immediately call for a special session to save lives” if Roe was overturned. The enthusiasm placed Noem, the first woman to hold the governor’s office in South Dakota, in a prominent spot in the anti-abortion movement.

However, as the abortion ban became reality last month, Noem kept her plans a secret besides saying “there is more work to do” and pledging “to help mothers in crisis.”

Some conservatives in the South Dakota Legislature wanted to take aggressive action, including trying to stop organizations or companies from paying for women to travel out of state for an abortion, changing the criminal punishment for performing an abortion and possibly clarifying state law to ensure the ban didn’t affect other medical procedures.

Republican state Sen. Brock Greenfield said many South Dakota lawmakers attending the state party’s convention on June 24, the same day as the Supreme Court ruling, expected Noem would call them back to Pierre this week for a special session, but “obviously that hasn’t come to fruition.”

“It might not be a bad idea to just let the dust settle and proceed very carefully, very strategically as we go forward,” said Greenfield, a former executive director of the state’s most influential anti-abortion group, South Dakota Right to Life.

The caution reflects the evolving landscape of abortion politics, as Republicans navigate an issue that threatens to divide the party while giving Democrats a potential election-year boost.

Nationwide polling conducted by The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research before the Supreme Court ruling to overturn Roe showed it was unpopular, with a majority of Americans wanting to see the court leave the precedent intact. Subsequent polling since the ruling showed that a growing number of Americans, particularly Democrats, cited abortion or women’s rights as priorities at the ballot box.

In political battleground states, some other prominent GOP governors — including possible White House contenders — haven’t charged to enact abortion bans.

Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan has said he considers the abortion question settled in his state, pointing to a 1991 law that protects abortion rights. However, he has resisted efforts by the Democratic-controlled legislature to expand abortion access.

Virginia’s Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin, also considered a potential presidential contender, wants lawmakers in the politically divided General Assembly to take up legislation next year, saying he personally would favor banning most abortions after 15 weeks of pregnancy.

During an online forum with abortion opponents he said he would “gleefully” sign any bill “to protect life” but acknowledged that Virginia’s political reality might require compromise.

“My goal is that we … in fact get a bill to sign,” he said. “It won’t be the bill that we all want.”

In the wake of South Dakota banning abortions, Noem took a softer approach on the issue by launching a website for pregnant women. She even seemed warm to the idea of pushing for state-backed paid family leave.

Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, who is in a closely watched gubernatorial race with Democrat Beto O’Rourke, took a similar approach to the high court ruling that could make it the most populous state to ban abortions. He issued a statement saying Texas “prioritized supporting women’s healthcare and expectant mothers” and pointed to efforts to expand programs for women’s health as well as fund organizations that dissuade women from having an abortion.

States with the nation’s strictest abortion laws, such as Texas and South Dakota, also have some of the worst rates of first-trimester prenatal care, as well as uninsured children in poverty, according to an AP analysis of federal data.

South Dakota Right to Life’s current executive director Dale Bartscher suggested Noem’s action in a special session could be part of a turn in strategy: “An entirely new pro-life movement has just begun — we stand ready to serve women, the unborn and families.”

He said he had been communicating with the governor’s office on her plans but declined to detail them.

But Noem in recent weeks has faced questioning for her stance that the only exception to the state’s abortion ban should be to save the life of a mother, even if she has been raped, became pregnant through incest or is a child.

It’s also not clear where she stands on some conservative lawmakers’ desire to target organizations and companies that are helping women leave the state to access abortion services — a proposition that could undermine Noem’s efforts to attract businesses to the state.

Brockfield warned that a special legislative session could result in “a whole lot of arguments over whether we’re going too far, or whether we haven’t gone far enough.”

At the same time, abortion rights protesters have shown up at Noem’s campaign office and named her in chants decrying the state’s ban. They see momentum growing for an effort to restore some abortion rights in the state through a 2024 ballot measure, pointing out that South Dakota voters in 2006 and 2008 rejected Republican state lawmakers’ efforts to ban the procedure.

“I’ve lived in this state my whole life and I’ve never seen people show up to protest for this issue like they have in recent weeks,” said Kim Floren, who helps run an abortion access fund called Justice Empowerment Network.

The fund has also been strategizing for a special session, including hiring legal representation and planning protests in Pierre, Floren said.

Their desires may be dismissed in South Dakota’s Statehouse, where Republicans hold 90% of seats, but abortion rights advocates say there is a fresh urgency in alerting voters to the potential impact of the state abortion ban.

“We’re going to see people die,” said Callan Baxter, president of the South Dakota chapter of the National Organization for Women. “We’re going to see some real life consequences and the exposure is going to have a big impact legislatively going forward.”

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Associated Press reporters Sarah Rankin in Richmond, Virginia; Brian Witte in Annapolis, Maryland; and Andrew DeMillo in Little Rock, Arkansas, contributed.

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By Patricia Zengerle and David Shepardson

WASHINGTON (Reuters) -Voting in the Senate on a bill to boost the U.S. semiconductor industry and improve competitiveness with China could begin as early as Tuesday, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer has been telling lawmakers, a source familiar with the issue said on Thursday.

The source said the bill would include, at a minimum, billions of dollars in subsidies for the semiconductor industry and an investment tax credit to boost U.S. manufacturing.

Lawmakers hope to pass the legislation and send it to the White House for President Joe Biden to sign into law before they leave Washington for their annual August recess.

The planned legislation would be a pared-down version of a bill the Senate passed in June 2021 that included $52 billion for chip subsidies and authorized another $200 billion to boost U.S. scientific and technological innovation to compete with China.

But that bill never became law. The House of Representatives never took it up, instead passing its own version in February similar to the Senate’s measure but also includes a number of trade proposals.

The overall plan – a priority for the Biden administration – more recently faced a new hurdle in the Senate, where it will need Republican support to move ahead.

Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell said on Monday that if Democrats pursue a separate partisan social spending, tax and climate bill, it “will certainly crowd out our ability” to move ahead the bipartisan chips and China competition measure.

Backers of the bill said its passage was essential for national security. Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin issued a statement urging Congress to act. “Weapon systems employed on the battlefields of today and emerging technologies of tomorrow depend on our access to a steady, secure supply of microelectronics,” he said.

The comments about Schumer’s plans were consistent with what Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo told Reuters on Wednesday. She said lawmakers appeared to be moving to carve off the $52 billion in semiconductor chips manufacturing subsidies from the larger bill.

A shortage of chips has disrupted the automotive and electronics industries, forcing some companies to scale back production. Many companies think the shortage will last at least until late 2023.

(Reporting by Patricia Zengerle, Richard Cowan and David Shepardson; additional reporting by Mike Stone; writing by Patricia Zengerle; editing by Chris Reese and Leslie Adler)

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DETROIT (AP) — A suburban Detroit man sued Thursday to try to disqualify Republican Ryan Kelley from the Michigan governor’s race, saying he should be declared an insurrectionist whose votes won’t count.

Kelley faces misdemeanor charges for his role in the riot at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021. The lawsuit says the western Michigan man’s participation makes him ineligible for office under the U.S. Constitution.

The 14th Amendment states that anyone who has “engaged in insurrection or rebellion” against the U.S. and has taken an oath to support the Constitution cannot hold a state office.

Kelley took an oath in 2019 when he was a planning commissioner in Allendale Township, according to a lawsuit filed on behalf of Lee Estes.

“Whether it’s Ryan Kelley or anyone else that was illegally at the Capitol trying to overturn the will of the people, there needs to be accountability,” said Lonnie Scott of Progress Michigan, a Democratic group supporting the lawsuit.

The Michigan Republican Party noted that the lawsuit was filed by attorney Mark Brewer, former head of the state Democratic Party.

“This extreme attempt will fail and will help us elect a Republican governor to put an end to the disaster Gretchen Whitmer and Joe Biden have been for Michigan,” GOP chairman Ron Weiser said.

Kelley is among five candidates in the Republican primary on Aug. 2. The winner will face Whitmer in November.

Kelley, a supporter of former President Donald Trump, has acknowledged that he was at the Capitol during the riot but said he didn’t go inside. He has pleaded not guilty to disruptive conduct, injuring public property and entering restricted space without permission.

Polls showed he appeared to get a boost after his June arrest.

The lawsuit seeks to have election officials disregard any votes for Kelley and tell voters that they can cast another ballot if they have voted for him in the primary with an absentee ballot.

In May, an attempt to have Republican Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene barred from the Georgia ballot under the 14th Amendment failed. She said she wasn’t aware of plans to storm the Capitol or disrupt the electoral count through violence.

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Follow Ed White at http://twitter.com/edwritez

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WASHINGTON (AP) — The House Jan. 6 committee’s investigation of the aftermath of the 2020 presidential election and the events leading up to the U.S. Capitol insurrection is raising questions about former President Donald Trump’s role and whether he committed crimes.

The various schemes and talking points that witnesses have revealed also highlight what a president has the authority to do.

Government and legal experts say the bigger question is: Can further limits be put on presidential authority to make sure there are no repeats of 2020 in future administrations?

WHAT LAWS FORM THE BASIS FOR THE PRESIDENTIAL POWERS IN QUESTION?

There are two primary ones: the Insurrection Act, first enacted in 1792, and the National Emergencies Act of 1976.

The Insurrection Act is a long-standing presidential power that gives the president wide latitude to use military forces to stop a rebellion or domestic violence. The act allows the use of military forces, which are normally barred by the Posse Comit­atus Act from joining in civilian law enforce­ment actions.

Elizabeth Goitein, senior director of the liberty and national security program at the Brennan Center for Justice, said the insurrection “in my opinion” could have been the catalyst for the president to invoke the act and bring in the military to escort congressional lawmakers out of the proceedings for their safety. “That doesn’t mean Donald Trump would have been the president, but it would have thrown a wrench in the works,” she said.

Under the NEA, dozens of statutory authorities become available to any president when national emergencies are declared. They include everything from severe weather responses to civil disorder. Congress can vote to terminate the declaration, but if the president vetoes, a two-thirds supermajority is required to overcome the veto.

“The statute itself doesn’t say what an emergency is. It leaves it up to the president,” said Chris Edelson, assistant professor of government at American University. “That means an unscrupulous president can use it” for ill purposes. It is up to Congress to rein in the president, he said.

WHAT ISSUES WERE RAISED AT THE LAST HEARING?

In the most recent hearing, former White House counsel Pat Cipillone discussed a rancorous meeting in which Trump’s outside legal team brought a draft executive order to seize the states’ voting machines. In his testimony Cipollone said the plan was a terrible idea. It had been floated before.

“You can’t preemptively seize voting machines. If there was a reason to do so, you need a court order,” Edelson said.

At the same meeting, there were a range of theories pushed, including invoking martial law. It was an idea Trump adviser Michael Flynn had floated before, along with seizing the voting machines.

WHAT ABOUT MARTIAL LAW?

Under the Insurrection Act the president can call on the military in certain circumstances, but they are intended to support civilian law enforcement. One example was the use of the military during the 1992 Los Angeles riots. Under martial law the military takes over the function of the civilian government.

Martial law, said Goitein, “gives me nightmares” because the law is unsettled. “The whole concept of martial law, there’s not even an agreed upon definition of what it is,” she said.

ARE THERE GUARDRAILS TO PREVENT FUTURE PRESIDENTS FROM ABUSING POWER?

The House passed the Protecting Our Democracy bill last year and sent it to the Senate. The legislation would prevent presidents from pardoning themselves, strengthen reporting requirements for campaigns, and clarify and enhance criminal penalties for campaigns that accept foreign information sought or obtained for political advantage.

The Senate has taken no action on the proposal. Without congressional action, the questions over presidential power and its expansiveness remain open. “The Constitution assumes that checks and balances work. If the president goes too far, Congress will rein him in,” said Edelman.

In Trump’s case, Congress has not shown an appetite for doing that.

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Follow AP’s coverage of the Jan. 6 committee hearings at https://apnews.com/hub/capitol-siege.

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ANNAPOLIS, Md. (AP) — Former President Donald Trump and Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan aren’t waiting until 2024 to fight over the future of the Republican Party.

Approaching the final months of his second term, Hogan is encouraging GOP voters to rally behind gubernatorial candidate Kelly Schulz, who served as labor secretary and commerce secretary in his administration. Trump, however, is backing Dan Cox, a state legislator who has said President Joe Biden’s victory shouldn’t have been certified, called former Vice President Mike Pence a “traitor” and sought to impeach Hogan for his pandemic policies.

The dynamics have turned next week’s GOP primary for governor into a proxy battle between Trump and Hogan, who are offering vastly different visions of the party’s future as they eye presidential runs in 2024. Hogan, who is prevented from seeking reelection because of term limits, is one of Trump’s most prominent GOP critics and has urged the party to move on from his divisive brand of politics. Trump, meanwhile, has spent much of his post-presidency lifting candidates who embrace his election lies.

“It’s difficult not to see this primary between Hogan-endorsed Kelly Schulz and Trump-endorsed Dan Cox in a broader context of national Republican politics,” said Mileah Kromer, an associate professor of political science at Goucher College in Towson, Maryland.

Whoever emerges from the GOP primary will face steep hurdles in a state that represents one of the best opportunities this year for a Democrat to take back a governor’s mansion. Democrats outnumber Republicans 2-1 in the state, but Hogan was able to win two terms by pledging to cut taxes, emphasizing bipartisanship and not being afraid to challenge Trump.

A poll last month by the Sarah T. Hughes Center for Politics at Goucher, The Baltimore Banner and WYPR found Schulz and Cox in a close race, with Cox at 25% and Schulz at 22% — within the poll’s margin of error of plus or minus 4.8 percentage points. Forty-four percent of Republican voters were undecided.

Two other Republicans are also in the race: Robin Ficker, a former state lawmaker who was a well-known sports heckler, and Joe Werner, an attorney.

The winner will take on the candidate who prevails in a crowded Democratic race that includes former U.S. Labor Secretary Tom Perez, bestselling author Wes Moore, Maryland Comptroller Peter Franchot and former U.S. Education Secretary John King.

The competing visions for the Republican Party were evident as GOP voters cast early ballots in the primary.

Republican Jeff Conley, 68, said he’s disappointed with the party’s current trajectory and voted for Schulz as a mark of his support for Hogan.

“I have been a Republican all my life, and the Trump people have hijacked the party, and I want it back,” Conley said. “Love Larry Hogan. I’d like to see him run and be president and bring a bunch of people with him who are reasonable and can get along.”

Christine Cirone, 50, however, said she voted for Cox, citing his opposition to abortion as well as an unsuccessful lawsuit he filed over Hogan’s COVID-19 policies. Trump’s endorsement, she said, was also an important factor in her vote.

“He’s an America First patriot. That’s exactly why I voted for him,” Cirone said at an early voting center in Annapolis.

Democrats have sought to meddle in the race to boost Cox’s standing in the primary, a tactic the party has used in other states this midterm season in the hopes of facing an easier opponent in the general election.

The Democratic Governors Association paid more than $1 million to broadcast an ad that emphasizes Cox’s conservative credentials, calling him “too close to Trump” and asserting that he will protect the Second Amendment “at all costs.”

“The math is easy,” Schulz said at a news conference with Hogan last month in front of Maryland’s Capitol to denounce the ad. “Spend a million now and save $5 million by not having to face me in the general election.”

She said Republican voters were “savvy” enough to recognize that “the best candidate is somebody that can win in November.”

Cox described the news conference as evidence his opponent is worried.

“It’s proof, I think, that we’re winning,” Cox told reporters. “The people of Maryland want change.”

Hogan has left open the possibility of running for the White House in 2024. He said last weekend on NBC’s “Meet the Press” that he believes voters are tired of the extremes in both parties and that there’s “growing demand for exactly what we’ve done in Maryland over the last eight years.”

Hogan has criticized Cox for organizing buses to Washington for the “Stop the Steal” rally that preceded the Jan. 6 insurrection at the U.S. Capitol by a violent mob of Trump supporters. Cox has said he didn’t go to the Capitol and left before the rioting began.

In a tweet he later deleted, Cox called Pence a “traitor” for refusing to go along with Trump’s demands not to certify the 2020 election, though he later expressed regret for using the word.

Trump has offered strong support for Cox while referring to Hogan and Schulz as RINOs, or Republicans In Name Only, a term of derision for those considered insufficiently loyal to the former president.

“More importantly, Dan will end Larry Hogan’s terrible RINO reign by defeating his ‘Never Trump’ successor, another low-energy RINO, Kelly Schulz,” Trump said in a statement Tuesday.

Hogan expressed doubts about whether this year’s gubernatorial primary reflected a proxy battle between himself and the former president.

“It’s about two different candidates and two different philosophies,” Hogan said after casting a ballot for Schulz last week.

Hogan said Schulz was the only Republican candidate able to build on his accomplishments and keep a Democrat out of the governor’s mansion.

“The other candidates in the Republican primary just have no chance whatsoever to run a competitive race,” he said.

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Follow AP for full coverage of the midterms at https://apnews.com/hub/2022-midterm-elections and on Twitter at https://twitter.com/ap_politics.

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ATLANTA (AP) — Republican Herschel Walker’s $6.2 million in fundraising looked impressive when unveiled Wednesday, until Democrat Raphael Warnock rolled out his $17.2 million total a half-hour later.

The dueling Senate campaign numbers underlined two truths. Georgia is again going to be one of the most expensive races to run for office in 2022, and Democrats are building a strong fundraising advantage.

Like Warnock, Democrat Stacey Abrams heavily outraised incumbent Republican Brian Kemp in the race for governor, collecting almost $50 million compared to the $31 million Kemp has brought in over a longer period. Abrams and Warnock plan to run closely linked campaigns, echoing many of the same themes.

Warnock is one of several Democratic Senate incumbents in swing states who is trying to cling to their seat amid President Joe Biden’s deep unpopularity. Republicans had long dominated statewide races until Georgia helped elect Biden to the presidency and enabled Democrats to control the Senate by electing Warnock and fellow Democrat Jon Ossoff in a January 2021 runoff.

The period topped the January-March stretch when Warnock raised almost $13.6 million, which his staff said was the most ever raised by a U.S. Senate candidate in the first quarter of an election year.

Warnock, also pastor of the church once led by the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., is already spending heavily to fend off Walker. The incumbent’s cash in the bank actually fell from $25.6 million in March to $22.2 million in June as Warnock spent more than $20 million even while the election remains months away.

That’s, in part, because the Democrat is already under heavy attack. The National Republican Senatorial Committee and its associated nonprofit One Nation spent $3.3 million against Warnock in about a month ending in mid-June.

Walker’s campaign also spent all that it raised in the quarter, with its cash on hand falling below $7 million.

Both campaigns are raising money nationwide. Walker, backed by former President Donald Trump and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, says he got 70,000 donations from all 50 states in the April-June quarter. Walker has raised more than $20 million in less than a year. Warnock has now raised more than $80 million for his reelection, saying he received contributions from 258,000 donors.

Walker is mostly working to tie Warnock to Biden, hoping that will lead voters to reject Warnock over high gas prices and inflation.

“Sen. Warnock has done more for Joe Biden than Georgia…,” Walker said in a statement. “Georgia deserves a Senator that will work for them – not Washington insiders.”

Warnock has been trying to address rising prices, pushing a federal gas tax holiday, a $35-a-month price cap on insulin, and proposing that states should be allowed to use federal COVID-19 relief money to temporarily roll back sales taxes on some goods. He’s also attacked Walker as unfit to serve, noting Walker has lied about graduating from college and exaggerated his business success and has frequently stumbled on the stump.

“Herschel Walker has spent his campaign misleading the people of Georgia about his record and making bizarre and false claims,” said Warnock campaign manager Quentin Fulks. “While he keeps showing the people of Georgia he isn’t ready to represent them, we’ll keep working hard to show the people of Georgia that Reverend Warnock is fighting for them and they have a clear choice this November.”

Walker announced a wave of new staff members Monday, most with broad national Republican experience, in an effort to beef up a campaign that coasted through a Republican primary based in part of adoration of Walker’s past as a University of Georgia football demigod.

The move came as Walker took hits for his position that the United States does not need to do anything about air pollution or carbon dioxide emissions because China is a worse polluter.

“Since we don’t control the air our good air decided to float over to China’s bad air so when China gets our good air, their bad air got to move,” Walker said Saturday. “So it moves over to our good air space. Then now we got we to clean that back up.”

Walker has been making similar remarks for months, but they came under new scrutiny after the Walker campaign kicked a reporter out of the Saturday event being hosted in a public park in Gainesville. That’s another example of a Walker campaign that has often shielded the candidate from all but friendly questions.

Warnock became Georgia’s first Black U.S. senator after winning a special election in 2020 to fill the unexpired term of Republican Sen. Johnny Isakson, who stepped down because of failing health. Isakson died in December.

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Follow Jeff Amy on Twitter at http://twitter.com/jeffamy.

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Excerpts from recent editorials in the United States and abroad:

July 12

The Washington Post says the Jan. 6 hearings show that lies can kill

“Big protest in D.C. on January 6th,” President Donald Trump tweeted in December of 2020. “Be there, will be wild!” His supporters listened.

This week’s hearing by the House select committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol underscored the connections between key Trump associates and right-wing militia groups along with others who participated in the insurrection. The “unhinged” six-hour meeting in advance of Jan. 6, filled with expletives and shouting so loud it could be heard outside the closed Oval Office, remains disturbing as ever. So does the draft executive order presented to the president that would have authorized the Defense Department to seize all voting machines. More alarming still is the revelation that lawyer Sidney Powell believed she had been appointed special counsel, another part of that plan.

Perhaps most consequential is the news, shared by Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) at the end of Tuesday’s hearing that Mr. Trump recently tried to call an unnamed witness in the House’s investigation. This troubling outreach to a witness, along with the rest of Mr. Trump’s conduct, deserves further probing.

The committee’s focus Tuesday, however, was on how the then-president’s words inspired his followers to violent action. At least one pro-Trump group moved up plans for a rally later in January to the 6th; the Proud Boys and the Oath Keepers coordinated with the help of longtime ally Roger Stone to honor Mr. Trump’s wishes; conservative influencers promoted the protest as a “red wedding,” a “Game of Thrones” reference that invokes mass slaughter. Most important, text messages showed that Mr. Trump’s exhortation to march to Capitol Hill was planned rather than spontaneous — and that those involved in coordinating the rally sought to conceal this intention, because they knew it would get them into trouble.

Congress heard from one of the protesters who illegally entered the Capitol. He came to D.C. because Mr. Trump told him to; he marched to the Capitol because Mr. Trump told him to; he left, after so many hours, because finally after 187 minutes of silence Mr. Trump told him to. “I feel like I had horse blinders on,” he said. “I was locked in the whole time.”

The Jan. 6 committee has shown that Mr. Trump knew better: His closest advisers, his in-house lawyers, his own Justice Department told him there was no evidence of the widespread voter fraud he alleged. Many of his supporters, though, did not know better at all — because they trusted a president who cares nothing for truth. Mr. Trump relished in the effect his words had on his supporters. A responsible president would have used that power to restore our shared reality, but he used it lead his followers further into delusion. A responsible Republican Party would, today, also fight for the facts rather than resist efforts to find them.

These lies matter — to democracy, and to individual people. They can wound, the way they did when a crowd pushed, kicked and sprayed with chemicals a police officer who, Rep. Jamie B. Raskin (D-Md.) explained on Tuesday, will now never return to the force. They can kill; at least seven people lost their lives in connection with the violence of Jan. 6. Brad Parscale, the former Trump campaign manager, said after the attacks that he felt guilty for helping his boss win in 2016.

“If I was Trump and knew my rhetoric killed someone,” he wrote to his colleague Katrina Pierson. Ms. Pierson replied, “It wasn’t the rhetoric.” “Katrina,” he answered, “Yes it was.”

ONLINE: https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2022/07/12/jan-6-hearing-trump-lies-dangerous/

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July 8

The New York Times argues that Biden must act now to protect abortion rights

Barely two weeks have passed since the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, and already chaos reigns. Several states are moving to ban abortion almost completely, abortion-rights proponents are challenging those bans in court and in some cases, judges have been asked to issue injunctions that could, for a time, prevent the bans from going into effect.

Doctors across the country, including in places where abortion is legal, are confused about what is and isn’t allowed — even when the life of a patient may be at stake. Patients are equally confused and panicked, and in some cases, their health is being put in danger.

President Biden, responding to harsh criticism from his own party that his administration has not done enough to defend abortion rights, on Friday signed an executive order to help protect access to reproductive health care. In his remarks, Mr. Biden made a plea for Americans to elect a Congress that would vote to codify the rights once guaranteed by Roe v. Wade. He is correct that it will be a long political fight to restore the constitutional right that the Supreme Court took away with its decision in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization.

At the same time, the Biden administration has an immediate duty to protect public health and the rights Americans still have. There are several steps the federal government can take now, with laws that are already on the books, to fortify abortion services in states where they are legal, support doctors facing legal and logistical quandaries and help women who may need to cross state lines or secure abortion pills online. The executive order signed Friday does little more than direct the health and human services secretary to look for ways to better enforce these existing laws, and report back.

The need for action is clear, from years of research on how abortion access affects women’s health. One recent study estimated that denying abortions in the United States would lead to an increase in deaths of pregnant women by more than 20 percent overall, and by more than 30 percent for Black women — and that’s not counting the deaths that can result from unsafe abortions. While not all abortions will be denied in the new landscape, and how abortion pills will be regulated could play an important role, the public health consequences of overturning Roe could be severe.

The most urgent step for the federal government to take is to ensure access to medication abortion, the most common method of abortion, according to preliminary data from the Guttmacher Institute. In a strong public statement in defense of abortion rights, Attorney General Merrick Garland underlined his commitment to “work with other arms of the federal government that seek to use their lawful authorities to protect and preserve access to reproductive care.” He noted, in particular, the Food and Drug Administration’s authority over abortion drugs. States may not ban these drugs “based on disagreement with the F.D.A.’s expert judgment,” he said.

The F.D.A. should follow the attorney general’s lead and say, unequivocally, that the agency’s approval of and regulatory decisions around prescription drugs, including abortion pills, pre-empt any state-level regulations or statutes. That argument will almost certainly be challenged in court, but there is precedent to support it. When Massachusetts tried in 2014 to ban Zohydro, an F.D.A.-approved prescription painkiller, the move was struck down in a federal district court based on the F.D.A.’s pre-emptive powers.

The F.D.A.’s pre-emptive authority should be acknowledged by states that support abortion rights as well. At least 30 states, including some Democratic-led ones, have chosen to regulate abortion pills more tightly than the F.D.A. does. Some require a physician to dispense the pills, even though the F.D.A. allows other qualified health professionals to do so. Others require in-person appointments, even though the F.D.A. allows telehealth consultations. The F.D.A. should insist that those strictures be removed, and that guidelines be consistent with federal ones.

The agency should also take immediate steps to loosen constraints on medication abortion that experts have long said are unnecessary. For example, the two-drug cocktail commonly used for a medication abortion is approved for up to 10 weeks of pregnancy in the United States, but the World Health Organization has deemed it safe for up to 12 weeks. And as reporting by The Atlantic has noted, the pills have been used safely even later than that.

Likewise, the F.D.A. requires pharmacies to obtain certification to dispense one of the two pills, a policy that isn’t used in other countries and impedes access. To this end, federal officials should also support the drugmaker GenBioPro in its Mississippi lawsuit challenging other restrictions; the F.D.A.’s public support would help, as would the Justice Department’s involvement in the case.

The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services should also make clear, publicly, that all hospitals receiving federal funds for Medicare and Medicaid (meaning nearly all hospitals and clinics) are required to provide all F.D.A.-approved drugs and that emergency departments are bound by the Emergency Medical Treatment and Labor Act, which requires medical professionals to provide the necessary treatment in a medical emergency.

Both the Medicaid agency and Health and Human Services should make clear — again, unequivocally — that the emergency treatment law applies to abortion when a pregnancy is life-threatening and that they will enforce it. (The Hyde Amendment, a legal provision that prohibits the use of federal funds for abortion, also has a provision for rape, incest and medical emergencies that still applies to federally funded health centers.) Doctors faced with an ectopic pregnancy or miscarriage — which can turn deadly if fetal tissue remains in the body for too long — might be less afraid to act if they were reminded that inaction is still a crime, and if they knew that the federal government would support them.

Other federal agencies also have roles to play. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention can aggressively monitor and publicize the illnesses and deaths in states where abortion is no longer available. As America’s leading public health agency, the C.D.C. has an obligation not only to continue studying the harm to public health caused by limits on abortion access but also to speak publicly about the intention to do so. The Federal Trade Commission can make clear that anyone who tries to sell fake abortion medications, online or anywhere else, will be prosecuted.

It’s true, as administration officials have said, that there are no easy solutions to the fight over abortion rights that Americans are now engaged in; even among those who favor reproductive rights, there is little consensus about the best solution. It’s also true that any action the administration takes may prompt litigation. But given the grave threat to public health, failing to act is not an option.

ONLINE: https://www.nytimes.com/2022/07/08/opinion/abortion-pills-policy.html

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July 11

The Wall Street Journal believes that Donald Trump can’t stay out of the limelight, which is exactly where Democrats want him

Donald Trump’s whisperers are saying he may soon announce his plans to run for President in 2024, and Democrats are keeping their fingers crossed that he does. Since his surprising victory in 2016, Mr. Trump has been the main cause of Democratic electoral success.

All the usual signs say this should be an excellent election year for Republicans, perhaps an historic one. Inflation is 8.6%, gasoline is $4.50 a gallon, mothers can’t get baby formula, crime is rising, 401(k) values are falling, and rogue nations are on the march around the world.

The polls show some 75% of the public thinks the country is moving in the wrong direction. President Biden’s job approval rating is under 38% in the Real Clear Politics composite index, and 33% in the latest Siena/New York Times survey. That’s Mariana Trench depth for presidents, and it typically signals a midterm rout for the party in power.

This all means that if the record of Mr. Biden and Democrats in Congress is the dominant issue in November, the GOP should regain control of the House and Senate. To put it more starkly, less than four months before Election Day it would take surprising events or political malpractice for the GOP to lose.

Enter Mr. Trump, who may announce his presidential candidacy before the midterms, which we can’t recall a major candidate doing. The former President’s advisers say he may do this so soon because he doesn’t like the attention other potential candidates are getting.

That’s especially true of Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, who seems poised to win his re-election campaign by “a lot,” as Mr. Trump might say. Mr. Trump would like to pre-empt the field, freeze GOP donors, and show his dominance over the GOP in 2022 with an eye on 2024.

That would thrill Democrats, who are eager to change the subject from inflation and the Biden record. They timed their Jan. 6 committee hearings for mid-2022 to remind everyone about Mr. Trump’s behavior and wrap him around GOP candidates.

That won’t matter in safe GOP districts, but it could work in the swing House districts and states where Democrats won their majority in 2018 as suburban voters wanted a check on Mr. Trump’s chaotic governance. If the main issue in November is GOP fealty to Mr. Trump’s claims that the 2020 election was stolen, Democrats might have a chance to hold Congress. Republicans would have to play defense rather than focus on the Biden- Nancy Pelosi – Chuck Schumer record.

This is what cost the GOP the two Georgia Senate seats in January 2021 as Mr. Trump dampened GOP turnout by telling voters the presidential race was stolen. The two incumbent GOP Senators should have been making the case to check Mr. Biden and the left. Mr. Trump is in danger of repeating the Georgia mistake by focusing almost entirely on the last election rather than this one.

Mr. Trump’s meddling in primaries has already hurt GOP chances of taking back the Senate. His vendetta against Doug Ducey kept the Arizona Governor from running for the Senate, though Mr. Ducey would have been the strongest candidate against Sen. Mark Kelly.

Mr. Trump’s preferred candidates in key states are struggling or close in the polls despite the favorable GOP trends. Mehmet Oz is trailing left-wing Democrat John Fetterman in Pennsylvania. Herschel Walker is a rookie candidate showing his inexperience in Georgia. and Rep. Ted Budd is barely ahead in North Carolina. As in 2010, Democrats could prevail against a slate of weak GOP candidates.

It’s possible that voter unhappiness with the Democrats may be so strong that it swamps any concern with Mr. Trump, who after all will not be on the ballot. Glenn Youngkin was able to win the statehouse in Virginia in part because Mr. Trump largely stayed out of the race.

But that was a rare exception, and Mr. Trump typically can’t help himself. He wants to be the center of attention all the time, and the media are all too happy to oblige. All the more now when his preoccupation is overcoming the stigma of his defeat in 2020 by sticking to his stolen-election line. If Republicans fall short of the gains they expect in Congress, he’ll blame them. If they do well, he’ll claim credit.

Which brings us back to this week’s Siena/New York Times poll. For all of its bad news for Mr. Biden, he still beats Mr. Trump 44%-41% in a theoretical 2024 presidential rematch. What does it say that Joe Biden, the least popular President in modern times, still beats Donald Trump?

ONLINE: https://www.wsj.com/articles/donald-trump-and-the-midterms-democrats-ron-desantis-11657576122

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July 13

The Los Angeles Times says its time to declare a public health emergency for abortions

The Biden administration should declare a public health emergency to ensure everyone in the U.S. has access to abortion medication.

It doesn’t matter that the Supreme Court ruling overturning Roe vs. Wade is not the equivalent of a disease outbreak or a bioterrorism attack (although it does feel like the latter). Abortion care is healthcare, and the court’s June decision in Dobbs vs. Jackson Women’s Health Organization has empowered state legislatures to cut off people in half the country from that care.

According to legal advocates, if Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra declared a health emergency under the Public Readiness and Emergency Preparedness Act it would allow drugs to be used that mitigate the emergency regardless of state laws banning their use. In this case, that would be medication abortion pills, mifepristone and misoprostol, that have been approved for use during the first 10 weeks of pregnancy by the Food and Drug Administration for more than two decades. This declaration is not about freeing up federal money, but shielding providers and pharmacists for prescribing or dispensing abortion medication in states that have banned abortions.

Even a declaration that only allows out-of-state providers to prescribe and mail pills to people in states where abortion is banned would greatly expand access. The declaration doesn’t need to exempt providers in the states that have banned abortion in order to help people in those states. The key point here: The federal act cannot override state bans on abortion procedures — just on abortion medication. But since more than half of abortions in the U.S. are done by medication, that would have a huge impact on abortion access in a country now riven by current or pending abortion bans in more than half the states.

And here is the public health emergency: being forced to carry to term an unwanted pregnancy. Abortion has long been a safe procedure — much safer than pregnancy. An amicus brief filed in the Dobbs case by the American Medical Assn., the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists and nearly two dozen other medical groups notes that the risk of death associated with childbirth is “approximately 14 times higher than any risk of death from an abortion.”

Even if a woman doesn’t die in childbirth, she faces mental and physical health risks from pregnancy, labor and delivery, such as stress upon the body and gestational diabetes and other complications. Being forced to give birth only adds stress. The authors of the brief argue that evidence indicates being denied an abortion can have a detrimental effect on women’s mental health.

And for poor people and those of color, mortality rates connected to pregnancy are even higher. “Nationwide, Black women’s pregnancy-related mortality rate is 3.2 times higher than that of white women, with significant disparities persisting even in areas with the lowest overall rates and among women with higher levels of education,” according to the brief.

These troubling facts are more than enough justification to declare a public health emergency. This decision will probably invite legal action from states with abortion bans arguing the administration has overstepped. But that shouldn’t stop the Biden administration from immediately taking this important and powerful step. The grim reality is that the Biden administration can’t issue an executive order overturning the Supreme Court’s ruling overturning the Roe decision. The president can’t make this go away like it was all a bad dream. But he can and should do everything in his power to protect abortion access.

ONLINE: https://www.latimes.com/opinion/story/2022-07-13/its-time-to-declare-a-public-health-emergency-for-abortion

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July 7

The Guardian says that now is the time to act to address the global food crisis

Hunger is stalking the world. Seven years ago, the United Nations vowed to eradicate it by 2030. Yet the number of people affected globally reached 828 million last year, and an unprecedented number – 345 million – are currently experiencing acute food insecurity, the U.N. has warned.

COVID-19 and the climate emergency had seen that tally rise from 135 million people before the pandemic to 276 million by early this year, reflecting a 55% increase in the Food and Agriculture Organization’s food price index since May 2020. “We thought it couldn’t get any worse,” said David Beasley, head of the World Food Programme.

But the war in Ukraine has exacerbated increases in freight and fertiliser costs due to rising fuel prices, and has blocked ports; Ukraine and Russia previously accounted for almost a third of global wheat exports – though the U.S. alleges that Moscow is trying to sell stolen grain in Africa. And many middle-income countries have already spent large parts of their reserves due to the pandemic.

Even in wealthier countries, the cost of living crisis is seeing more parents going hungry to feed their children. In low-income countries, where people already spend two-fifths of their income on food, rising prices are truly deadly. Around 2.3 billion people face moderate or severe difficulty obtaining enough to eat, and in parts of Ethiopia, Somalia, South Sudan, Yemen and Afghanistan, sections of the population are enduring catastrophic levels of hunger. The repercussions – in social unrest and political violence – are already being seen in some countries.

Though G7 leaders pledged an extra $4.5bn to tackle the food crisis last month, that was just a fraction of the $28.5bn that experts say is needed (and the U.K., of course, has cut aid spending overall). Food aid can bring a wealth of problems; the U.N. Development Program has recommended cash transfers in many cases. Beyond that, a substantive shift in global agricultural policies is needed. Countries should redirect domestic support towards sustainable farming and nutritious foods, reducing their reliance on imports. Others, notably the U.S., should prioritize grain for human consumption over biofuels. Above all, action must be taken urgently. It may already be too late to save some lives. We must prevent more being lost.

ONLINE: https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2022/jul/07/the-guardian-view-on-the-global-food-crisis-no-time-to-lose

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