But the midterm results have emboldened a White House that has long prepared for this moment. Republicans secured much smaller margins than anticipated, and aides to President Joe Biden and other Democrats believe voters punished the GOP for its reliance on conspiracy theories and Donald Trump-fueled lies over the 2020 election.

They see it as validation for the administration’s playbook for the midterms and going forward to focus on legislative achievements and continue them, in contrast to Trump-aligned candidates whose complaints about the president’s son played to their most loyal supporters and were too far in the weeds for the average American. The Democrats retained control of the Senate, and the GOP’s margin in the House is expected to be the slimmest majority in two decades.

“If you look back, we picked up seats in New York, New Jersey, California,” said Mike DuHaime, a Republican strategist and public affairs executive. “These were not voters coming to the polls because they wanted Hunter Biden investigated — far from it. They were coming to the polls because they were upset about inflation. They’re upset about gas prices. They’re upset about what’s going on with the war in Ukraine.”

But House Republicans used their first news conference after clinching the majority to discuss presidential son Hunter Biden and the Justice Department, renewing long-held grievances about what they claim is a politicized law enforcement agency and a bombshell corruption case overlooked by Democrats and the media.

“From their first press conference, these congressional Republicans made clear that they’re going to do one thing in this new Congress, which is investigations, and they’re doing this for political payback for Biden’s efforts on an agenda that helps working people,” said Kyle Herrig, the founder of the Congressional Integrity Project, a newly relaunched, multimillion-dollar effort by Democratic strategists to counter the onslaught of House GOP probes.

Inside the White House, the counsel’s office added staff months ago and beefed up its communication efforts, and staff members have been deep into researching and preparing for the onslaught. They’ve worked to try to identify their own vulnerabilities and plan effective responses. But anything the House seeks related to Hunter Biden, who is not a White House staffer, will come from his attorneys, who have declined to respond to the allegations.

Rep. James Comer, incoming chairman of the House Oversight Committee, said there are “troubling questions” of the utmost importance about Hunter Biden’s business dealings and one of the president’s brothers, James Biden, that require deeper investigation. He said they were examining the president, too.

“Rooting out waste, fraud and abuse in the federal government is the primary mission of the Oversight Committee,” said Comer, R-Ky. “As such, this investigation is a top priority.”

Republican legislators promised a trove of new information this past week, but what they have presented so far has been a condensed review of a few years’ worths of complaints about Hunter Biden’s business dealings, going back to conspiracy theories raised by Trump.

Hunter Biden joined the board of the Ukrainian gas company Burisma in 2014, around the time his father, then vice president was helping conduct the Obama administration’s foreign policy with Ukraine. Senate Republicans have said the appointment may have posed a conflict of interest, but they did not present evidence that the hiring influenced U.S. policies, and they did not implicate Joe Biden in any wrongdoing.

Republican lawmakers and their staff for the past year have been analyzing messages and financial transactions found on a laptop that belonged to Hunter Biden. They long have discussed issuing congressional subpoenas to foreign entities that did business with him, and they recently brought on James Mandolfo, a former federal prosecutor, to assist with the investigation as general counsel for the Oversight Committee.

The difference now is that Republicans will have subpoena power to follow through.

“The Republicans are going to go ahead,” said Tom Davis, a Republican lawyer who specializes in congressional investigations and legislative strategy. “I think their members are enthusiastic about going after this stuff … there are a lot of unanswered questions. Look, the 40-year trend is parties under-investigate their own and over-investigate the other party. It didn’t start here.”

White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre dismissed the GOP focus on investigations as “on-brand” thinking.

“They said they were going to fight inflation, they said they were going to make that a priority, then they get the majority and their top priority is actually not focusing on the American family, but focusing on the president’s family,” she said.

Even some newly elected Republicans are pushing back against the idea.

“The top priority is to deal with inflation and the cost of living. … What I don’t want to see is what we saw in the Trump administration, where Democrats went after the president and the administration incessantly,” Rep.-elect Mike Lawler of New York said on CNN.

Hunter Biden’s taxes and foreign business work are already under federal investigation, with a grand jury in Delaware hearing testimony in recent months.

While he never held a position on the presidential campaign or in the White House, his membership on the board of the Ukrainian energy company and his efforts to strike deals in China have long raised questions about whether he traded on his father’s public service, including reported references in his emails to the “big guy.”

Joe Biden has said he’s never spoken to his son about his foreign business, and nothing the Republicans have put forth suggests otherwise. And there are no indications that the federal investigation involves the president.

Trump and his supporters, meanwhile, have advanced a widely discredited theory that Biden pushed for the firing of Ukraine’s top prosecutor to protect his son and Burisma from the investigation. Biden did indeed press for the prosecutor’s firing, but that was a reflection of the official position of not only the Obama administration but many Western countries and because the prosecutor was perceived as soft on corruption.

House Republicans also have signaled upcoming investigations into immigration, government spending and parents’ rights. White House Chief of Staff Ron Klain, Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, Attorney General Merrick Garland and FBI Director Chris Wray have been put on notice as potential witnesses.

Rep. Jim Jordan of Ohio, incoming Judiciary Committee chairman, has long complained of what he says is a politicized Justice Department and the ongoing probes into Trump.

On Friday, Garland appointed a special counsel to oversee the Justice Department’s investigation into the presence of classified documents at Trump’s Florida estate as well as key aspects of a separate probe involving the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection and efforts to undo the 2020 election.

Trump, in a speech Friday night at his Mar-a-Lago estate, slammed the development as “the latest in a long series of witch hunts.”

Of Joe and Hunter Biden, he asked, “Where’s their special prosecutor?”

Matt Mackowiak, a Republican political strategist, said it’s one thing if the investigations into Hunter Biden stick to corruption questions, but if it veers into the kind of mean-spirited messaging that has been floating around in far-right circles, “I don’t know that the public will have much patience for that.”

The post House GOP pushes Hunter Biden probe despite thin majority appeared first on News Agency nabakhabar.

By almost any standard, this is a surprising overperformance by Democrats (or underperformance by Republicans, depending on how you look at it). But more than a week past Election Day, the shock has subsided a bit, leaving room to move on from racehorse politics to a more substantive discussion of what the next two years of American politics will look like.

By dint of their position in the White House and Senate, Democrats are going to hold onto most of the power in D.C., so it’s worthwhile to focus on what the next two years have in store for the Democratic Party in particular. On this front, there are several interesting and important questions about how the next two years will play out. Five are at the top of my mind: (1) Will Joe Biden run for reelection? (2) What will happen to Democratic leadership in Congress? (3) What parts of their agenda will Democrats be able to pass? (4) Is there a chance for Democrats to make any bipartisan deals? (5) Will progressives and moderates fight or find unity?

The next two years will likely feature a few bumps for Democrats. But if Joe Biden runs for reelection as I expect him to, and once the contests for Democratic leadership in the House have concluded, Democrats will be on a glide path toward party unity.

Will Biden Run in 2024?

Joe Biden has been running for president for the past 35 years. Ever since his first doomed bid for the 1988 Democratic nomination, Biden has imagined himself as the leader of the free world. In 2020, he finally realized that vision when he toppled Donald Trump. And now that Biden has finally achieved his life’s ambition, he has to determine if he is satisfied with one term as president or if he wants another.

Ambitious political animals like Biden don’t just give up on the dreams of their own accord. There is only really one reason I can see Biden choosing not to run for reelection: his health. Biden will be 81 by the time of the 2024 election, and it’s not hard to imagine him having a serious health incident that inhibits his ability to perform the duties of the president. And even if that doesn’t happen, there still could be a viral moment that is perceived as evidence that Biden is too old and feeble to be president. In either situation, Biden could face enough political, familial, or physical pressure to pass the presidential baton.

Barring that, though, I find it unlikely that Biden will retire early. The strong Democratic performance in the midterms gave Biden a new lease on life. If he faces any internal party pressure to resign, Biden can just point to the party’s midterm success as proof that he’s the right guy to continue leading the party. Biden says he’ll make his official decision “early next year.” We’ll have to wait and see, but my instinct is that the decision’s already been made.

Democratic Leadership in Congress

On Thursday, Nancy Pelosi announced that she would be stepping down from her position as leader of the House Democrats, ending 20 years in the top role. The decision is bound to set off a scramble for power within the Democratic conference. It remains to be seen exactly what Pelosi’s longtime deputies—Steny Hoyer from Maryland and James Clyburn from South Carolina—plan to do. If they decide to retire from leadership alongside Pelosi, which seems likely, it will usher in a new generation of Democratic leadership.

No matter what Clyburn and Hoyer decide, however, competition for jobs up and down Democratic leadership will be fierce, unpredictable and incredibly difficult to follow for those who don’t already know the players.

Just consider the fight for minority leader: In corner A, we have Hakeem Jeffries, an ally of Pelosi’s who is currently the #5 Democrat in the House. But Jeffries is despised by some on the left for forming Team Blue PAC, which was designed to protect Democratic incumbents from being primary, but which progressives saw as a way to stymie progressive insurgents. In corners, B and C are Hoyer and Clyburn, who may decide that they’re not ready to step down alongside Pelosi and that it’s their time to lead the conference. In corner, D is the candidate that the progressive wing of the caucus will likely enlist to compete with the more moderate (or “corporate,” as his detractors call him) Jeffries.

My money would be on Jeffries: He’s already in leadership, and he has allies across the conference. He’s also young and Black, representing a sharp break from the 80-something-year-olds who currently lead the party. But in reality, exactly how this will play out is anybody’s guess. The race will be complex, will rely on hundreds of relationships and personalities and will be tough to follow. And the same is true for the other top Democratic spots: whip, caucus chair, caucus vice chair, Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee chair and on down the list

Again, exactly how these fights will play out depends on what Hoyer and Clyburn decide to do. If they step down, there will be a scramble for their leadership posts. And even if they stay, they may still face competition from younger upstarts who decide that now is their moment. In any case, it will be worth becoming familiar with whoever comes out on top in these leadership fights, because they will likely be pivotal figures within the Democratic Party for years to come.

Meanwhile, over in the Senate, machinations are much less exciting and less complicated. Chuck Schumer is going to hold onto his job as Majority Leader. And his top deputies — Dick Durban and Patty Murray — will hold onto their jobs too.

The Legislative Agenda

Legislatively, Democrats will be stuck. Any hope they had of building on the past two years and passing more of their agenda died when it became clear that Republicans would take control of the House. But this setback could play to Democrats’ benefit in an electoral sense, as they won’t be allowed to overplay their hand and pass an unpopular progressive agenda. If, for instance, Joe Manchin hadn’t put the brakes on the $2.4 trillion Build Back Better legislation that passed the House, Democrats would likely have faced much more backlash in the midterms for forcing through a massive spending package. With the House in Republican hands, Democrats need not worry about getting out over their skis and enacting an electorally unpopular agenda.

That said, it’s not as if Democrats won’t be able to do anything. With Democratic control of the Senate, Biden will be able to keep churning out judicial appointments and fill the federal bench with more progressive and diverse judges. Similarly, he could continue to sign executive orders (with occasionally dubious constitutionality) pushing progressive priorities, as he did when he canceled billions of dollars of student debt. There are plenty of other things Biden could try to do with his presidential pen: On the progressive wish list are changing cannabis’s category so that it’s no longer a Schedule I drug, making more Americans qualify for federal benefits by changing how poverty is calculated, restricting oil drilling on federal lands and so on.

But the president can only do so much alone. Ultimately, if Democrats want to pass any legislation, they’ll need some level of bipartisan support to do so.

Chances for Bipartisanship

During his time in Congress and as vice president, Joe Biden earned a reputation as a bipartisan dealmaker. He made a point of befriending colleagues across the aisle—to the extent that progressives attacked him during the presidential primary for the friendships, he forged in the 1970s with racist and segregationist senators. During the first two years of his presidency, Biden has managed to get bipartisan support for several major pieces of legislation, including bills on gun safety, infrastructure and semiconductor investments. Though his bipartisan bona fides certainly took a few hits when he labeled his Republican opponents as “semi-fascist,” Biden is still, at heart, a guy who likes a good old-fashioned compromise.

This is why I’m moderately confident that Democrats and Republicans will at least attempt to come together on some bipartisan legislation. It’s unlikely that they’ll make deals on any particularly contentious issues of the day, such as immigration or healthcare, but some policy spheres have enough overlap that some bills may find their way through the House and Senate.

Three policy areas, in particular, have the potential for compromise. The first is addressing the threat posed by China. The semiconductor bill passed earlier in the year is one example of this kind of legislation, and it’s not hard to imagine Congress passing more bills to invest in domestic manufacturing of technology, strengthen the non-China supply chain, further restrain trade with China, force TikTok to split from its Chinese owner, Bytedance, or support Taiwan militarily.

The second area where Republicans and Democrats may come together is on restraining “big tech.” Populists on both sides of the aisle, from Republican Senator Josh Hawley to Democratic Senator Elizabeth Warren, believe America’s major technology companies are exerting a nefarious influence on Americans. While their diagnoses for exactly what’s wrong can diverge (Democrats are generally worried about dis- and misinformation, while Republicans are more concerned with censorship and biased content moderation), both sides of the aisle have expressed concern about the monopoly power of companies such as Facebook, Apple and Amazon, and policymakers have been moving legislation through the Senate to address some of these concerns.

The third area with potential for bipartisanship is criminal justice issues. The libertarian-leaning right often is sympathetic to reforms in policing and criminal justice. Further, Republicans and Democrats were able to pass the First Step Act, a bipartisan bill championed by Republican Senator Tim Scott and signed by President Donald Trump in 2018, which made several reforms to federal prisons and criminal sentencing and instituted programs to reduce recidivism. Perhaps there’s room on this front for a Second Step.

Also, some contentious policy areas may unexpectedly command bipartisan support. Immigration is a polarizing issue, but maybe there’s room for the GOP to moderate and sign a Dream Act into law in exchange for more funding for border security. Or maybe populists will come together to ban congress members from trading stocks. There’s also the chance that smaller or less flashy bills could make it through, such as reforming the permitting process (a pet project of Joe Manchin’s and something Republicans could seemingly get on board with) or making it easier to open a bank account (an issue on which Republican Tim Scott and Democrat Catherine Cortez Masto have worked together). In other words, despite the tenor of politics, I wouldn’t count out the possibility of bipartisanship completely.

Polarization or Party Unity?

There’s no getting around the fact that the upcoming fights for Democratic leadership in the House are very likely to be contentious. And if I am wrong and Joe Biden decides not to run for reelection, the presidential primary is also likely to be a fierce battle between moderate and progressive wings of the party.

But once the leadership team is in place, and if Biden announces his reelection campaign, there’s reason to believe that Democrats will be relatively unified over the next two years. With Republicans taking control of the House and likely launching investigations that Democrats see as spurious, Trump running for president and DeSantis entering the national scene, Democrats will have no shortage of foils on the right.

Furthermore, Democrats saw last week that running against the GOP is actually a pretty good strategy for winning elections. With the stakes so high heading into 2024—many Democrats see a second Trump or a DeSantis presidency as a threat to the country’s very existence—the party will find it morally and electorally necessary to tamp down internal squabbles and unify against the GOP. The fact that Republicans are going to hold the House will make this even easier, because Democrats won’t really have any chance of passing a positive agenda, meaning there won’t be fights over how far to push their legislative goals.

We’ve already seen some progressive Democrats start to circle the wagons. Elizabeth Warren, for instance, published an opinion essay in The New York Times saying that “this [midterm] electoral success belongs to Mr. Biden”—a man she was pillorying just three years ago for being insufficiently progressive. None of this is to say that Democrats will find complete unity and all intraparty disputes will evaporate, but most fights will either not take place at all or will happen behind the scenes. The unity will look especially stark when compared with the intraparty feuds that are barreling toward the GOP.

A Caveat About Political Punditry

The tight margins in both the Senate and the House mean that there is a good chance of something unexpected happening and changing the course of American politics. A political scandal, a rogue progressive or conservative, a stubborn moderate or any number of political surprises could all upset the apple cart. And the election in Georgia, though it won’t decide control of the Senate, will determine how much breathing room Democrats have to lose support from moderate senators such as Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema.

In other words, everything that happens is contingent on the personalities and incentives of hundreds of politicians and the quirks of political fate. It would be foolish to assume we know exactly how the next two years of politics will play out. But it would also be foolish not to try, given all that’s at stake.

The post What’s Next for the Democrats? appeared first on News Agency nabakhabar.

Democrats have already won control of the Senate, securing 50 seats with a runoff in Georgia next month that could give President Joe Biden’s party an additional seat. The GOP came into the election needing to gain a net of just five seats for House control.

Nearly a week after the midterm elections, Republicans were closing in on the majority, giving conservatives leverage to blunt Biden’s agenda and spur a flurry of investigations. But a slim numerical advantage will pose immediate challenges for GOP leaders and complicate the party’s ability to govern.

The full scope of the party’s majority may not be clear for several more days — or weeks — as votes in competitive races are still being counted. Still, the party was on track to achieve 218 with seats in California and other states still too early to call.

Even barely achieving 218, though, means Republicans will likely have the narrowest majority of the 21st century. It could rival 2001, when Republicans had just a nine-seat majority, 221-212 with two independents. That’s far short of the sweeping victory Republicans predicted going into this year’s midterm elections, when the party hoped to reset the agenda on Capitol Hill by capitalizing on economic challenges and Biden’s lagging popularity.

Instead, Democrats were able to largely blunt an expected big GOP election, holding on to moderate, suburban districts from Virginia to Minnesota and Kansas. The results could complicate House GOP leader Kevin McCarthy’s plans to become speaker as some conservative members have questioned whether to back him or have imposed conditions for their support.

The narrow margins have upended Republican politics and prompted finger-pointing about what went wrong. Some in the GOP have blamed Donald Trump for the worse-than-expected outcome. The former president, who is expected to announce a third White House bid on Tuesday, lifted candidates during this year’s primaries who struggled to win during the general election.

Despite its underwhelming showing, the GOP will still see its power in Washington grow. Republicans will take control of House committees, giving them the ability to shape legislation and launch probes of Biden, his family and his administration.

There’s particular interest in investigating the overseas business dealings of the president’s son Hunter Biden. Some of the most conservative lawmakers have raised the prospect of impeaching Biden, though that will be much harder for the party to accomplish with a tight majority.

Any legislation that emerges from the House could face steep odds in the Senate, where the narrow Democratic majority will often be enough to derail GOP-championed legislation.

With such a slim majority in the House, there’s a potential for legislative chaos. The dynamic essentially gives an individual member enormous sway over shaping what happens in the chamber. That could lead to particularly tricky circumstances for GOP leaders as they try to win support for must-pass measures that keep the government funded or raise the debt ceiling.

The GOP’s failure to notch more gains was especially surprising because the party went into the election benefiting from congressional maps that were redrawn by Republican legislatures. History was also on Republicans’ side: The party that holds the White House had lost congressional seats during virtually every new president’s first midterm of the modern era.

In the first national election since the Jan. 6 insurrection, one Republican who was outside the Capitol on the day of the mob attack, Derrick Van Orden, won a House seat. He won a seat long held by Democrats in Wisconsin.

Republican candidates pledged on the campaign trail to cut taxes and tighten border security. GOP lawmakers also could withhold aid to Ukraine as it fights a war with Russia or use the threat of defaulting on the nation’s debt as leverage to extract cuts from social spending and entitlements — though all such pursuits will be tougher given how small the GOP majority may end up being.

As a senator and then vice president, Biden spent a career crafting legislative compromises with Republicans. But as president, he was clear about what he viewed as the threats posed by the current Republican Party.

Biden said the midterms show voters want Democrats and Republicans to find ways to cooperate and govern in a bipartisan manner, but also noted that Republicans didn’t achieve the electoral surge they’d been betting on and vowed, “I’m not going to change anything in any fundamental way.”

The president was also blunt in assessing his party’s dwindling chances, saying Monday of the House, “I think it’s going to be very close, but I don’t think we’re going to make it.”

The post GOP on cusp of retaking House control with slim majority appeared first on News Agency nabakhabar.

In the most heartening news for Democrats, John Fetterman flipped Pennsylvania’s Republican-controlled Senate seat that’s key to the party’s hopes of maintaining control of the chamber. It was too early to call critical Senate seats in Wisconsin, Nevada, Georgia and Arizona that could determine the majority. In the House, Democrats kept seats in districts from Virginia to Kansas to Rhode Island, while many districts in states like New York and California had not been called.

Democrats also were successful in governors’ races, winning in Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania — battlegrounds critical to Biden’s 2020 win over Donald Trump. But Republicans held on to governors’ mansions in Florida, Texas and Georgia, another battleground state Biden narrowly won two years ago.

Votes were still being counted across the country, meaning Republicans could still emerge with control of both chambers of Congress. But there was no strong GOP surge, uplifting for Democrats who had braced for sweeping losses — and raised questions about the size of Republicans’ governing majority if they win the House.

Rep. Kevin McCarthy, the Republican poised to be House speaker if the GOP takes control of the chamber, was optimistic, telling supporters, “When you wake up tomorrow, we will be in the majority.” Democratic House Speaker Nancy Pelosi countered that her party would hold the chamber: “While many races remain too close to call, it is clear that House Democratic Members and candidates are strongly outperforming expectations across the country.”

The outcome of races for House and Senate will determine the future of Biden’s agenda and serve as a referendum on his administration as the nation reels from record-high inflation and concerns over the direction of the country. Republican control of the House would likely trigger a spate of investigations into Biden and his family, while a GOP Senate takeover would hobble the president’s ability to make judicial appointments.

Democrats faced historic headwinds. The party in power almost always suffers losses in the president’s first midterm elections, but Democrats bet that anger from the Supreme Court’s decision to gut abortion rights might energize their voters to buck historical trends.

In Pennsylvania, Fetterman had faced questions about his fitness for office after suffering a stroke just days before the state’s primary. But he nonetheless bested Republican Dr. Mehmet Oz in a major rebuke to Trump, whose endorsement helped Oz win the GOP’s hard-fought primary. Oz called Fetterman to concede the race Wednesday.

“I’m so humbled,” Fetterman, wearing his signature hoodie, told his supporters early Wednesday morning. “This campaign has always been about fighting for everyone who’s ever been knocked down that ever got back up.”

Democrats also held a crucial Senate seat in New Hampshire, where incumbent Maggie Hassan defeated Republican Don Bolduc, a retired Army general who had initially promoted Trump’s lies about the 2020 election being marred by widespread fraud that did not occur but tried to shift away from some of the more extreme positions he took during the GOP primary.

Also in Pennsylvania, Democratic Attorney General Josh Shapiro beat Republican Doug Mastriano to keep the governorship of a key presidential battleground state blue. Shapiro’s victory rebuffed an election denier who some feared would not certify a Democratic presidential win in the state in 2024.

Democrats Tony Evers in Wisconsin, Gretchen Whitmer of Michigan, Kathy Hochul of New York, Michelle Lujan Grisham of New Mexico and Janet Mills of Maine also repelled Republican challengers.

Incumbent Republican governors had some success. Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp won reelection, defeating Stacey Abrams in a rematch of their 2018 race. Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, two future possible Republican presidential contenders, beat back Democratic challengers to win in the nation’s two largest red states.

AP VoteCast, a broad survey of the national electorate, showed that high inflation and concerns about the fragility of democracy were heavily influencing voters. Half of voters said inflation factored significantly, with groceries, gasoline, housing, food and other costs that have shot up in the past year. Slightly fewer — 44% — said the future of democracy was their primary consideration.

Biden didn’t entirely shoulder the blame for inflation, with close to half of voters saying the higher-than-usual prices were more because of factors outside of his control. And despite the president bearing criticism from a pessimistic electorate, some of those voters backed Democratic candidates.

Democrats were betting on a midterm boost after the Supreme Court overturned the landmark Roe v. Wade ruling guaranteeing a constitutional right to an abortion — and there were signs the issue may have provided one.

Voters in reliably red Kentucky rejected a ballot measure aimed at denying any constitutional protections for abortion. That bucked the state’s Republican-led Legislature, which had imposed a near-total ban on the procedure and put the proposed state constitutional amendment on the ballot.

The result mirrored what happened in another red state, Kansas, where voters in August rejected changing that state’s constitution to let lawmakers tighten restrictions or ban abortions. Voters in the swing state of Michigan, meanwhile, voted to amend their state’s constitution to protect abortion rights.

VoteCast showed that 7 in 10 national voters said overturning Roe v. Wade decision from 1973 was an important factor in their midterm decisions. It also showed the reversal was broadly unpopular. About 6 in 10 say they are angry or dissatisfied by it, while about 4 in 10 were pleased. And roughly 6 in 10 say they favor a law guaranteeing access to legal abortion nationwide.

There were no widespread problems with ballots or voter intimidation reported around the country, though there were hiccups typical of most Election Days.

In the first national election since the Jan. 6 insurrection, some who participated in or were in the vicinity of the attack on the U.S. Capitol were poised to win elected office. One of those Republican candidates, J.R. Majewski, who was at the U.S. Capitol during the deadly riot and who misrepresented his military service, lost to Democratic Rep. Marcy Kaptur.

Democratic Reps. Abigail Spanberger and Jennifer Wexton held off spirited Republican challengers in Virginia districts the GOP had hoped to flip.

The 2022 elections are on track to cost a projected $16.7 billion at the state and federal level, making them the most expensive midterms ever, according to the nonpartisan campaign finance tracking organization OpenSecrets.

Trump lifted Republican Senate candidates to victory in Ohio and North Carolina. JD Vance, the bestselling author of “Hillbilly Elegy,” defeated 10-term congressman Tim Ryan, while Rep. Ted Budd beat Cheri Beasley, the former chief justice of the state Supreme Court.

Trump had endorsed more than 300 candidates across the country, hoping the night would end in a red wave he could ride to the 2024 Republican presidential nomination. After summoning reporters and his most loyal supporters to a watch party at his Mar-a-Lago club in Florida on Tuesday, he ended the night without a triumphant speech.

Nonetheless, the former president insisted on social media that he’d had “A GREAT EVENING.”

Biden, meanwhile, spent the night calling Democrats to congratulate them on their wins.

In governors’ races, the GOP faced unexpected headwinds in flipping the office in conservative Kansas, while Democrats were nervous about their prospects in the race in Oregon, typically a liberal bastion.

Despite their liberal history, states like Massachusetts, Maryland and Illinois have elected moderate Republican governors in the past. But the Republican candidates this year appeared to be too conservative in these states, handing Democrats easy victories.

Massachusetts and Maryland also saw historic firsts: Democrat Maura Healey became the first woman elected as Massachusetts governor, as well as the first openly lesbian governor of any state, and Wes Moore became the first Black governor of Maryland.

Healey bested Geoff Diehl in Massachusetts and Moore beat Dan Cox in Maryland, while Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker defeated state Sen. Darren Bailey. Bolduc, Cox and Bailey were among the far-right Republicans that Democrats spent tens of millions of dollars to bolster during the primaries, betting they would be easier to beat in general elections than their more moderate rivals.

The post Dems beating back GOP surge, but control of Congress unclear appeared first on News Agency nabakhabar.

Three of the six living presidents delivered dire closing messages Saturday in battleground Pennsylvania entering the final weekend of the 2022 midterm elections, but their words echoed across the country as millions of Americans cast ballots to decide the balance of power in Washington and in key state capitals. Polls across America will close on Tuesday, but more than 39 million people have already voted.

On Sunday, Biden was set to campaign in suburban New York, while Trump was headed to Florida.

“If you want to stop the destruction of our country and save the American dream, then on Tuesday you must vote Republican in a giant red wave,” Trump told thousands of cheering supporters as he campaigned Saturday in western Pennsylvania, describing the United States as “a country in decline.”

Earlier in the day, Biden shared the stage with former President Barack Obama in Philadelphia, the former running mates campaigning together for the first time since Biden took office. In neighboring New York, even former President Bill Clinton, largely absent from national politics in recent years, was out defending his party.

“Sulking and moping is not an option,” Obama charged. “On Tuesday, let’s make sure our country doesn’t get set back 50 years.”

Not everyone, it seemed, was on message as the weekend began.

Even before arriving in Pennsylvania, Biden was dealing with a fresh political mess after upsetting some in his party for promoting plans to shut down fossil fuel plants in favor of green energy. While he made the comments in California the day before, the fossil fuel industry is a major employer in Pennsylvania.

Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., chair of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, said the president owed coal workers across the country an apology. He called Biden’s comments “offensive and disgusting.”

Trump seized on the riff in western Pennsylvania, charging that Biden “has resumed the war on coal, your coal.”

The White House said Biden’s words were “twisted to suggest a meaning that was not intended; he regrets it if anyone hearing these remarks took offense” and that he was “commenting on a fact of economics and technology.”

Democrats are deeply concerned about their narrow majorities in the House and Senate as voters sour on Biden’s leadership amid surging inflation, crime concerns and widespread pessimism about the direction of the country. History suggests that Democrats, as the party in power, will suffer significant losses in the midterms.

Trump peeked ahead toward Florida as he campaigned in Pennsylvania, slapping at the state’s Republican governor, Ron DeSantis. After displaying recent presidential poll numbers on the big screens, Trump called DeSantis, a potential 2024 GOP rival, “Ron DeSanctimonious.”

Over and over on Saturday, Trump falsely claimed he lost the 2020 election only because Democrats cheated while raising the possibility of election fraud this coming week. In part, because of such rhetoric, federal intelligence agencies have warned of the possibility of political violence from far-right extremists in the coming days.

“Everybody, I promise you, in the very next — very, very, very short period of time, you’re going to be happy,” Trump said of another White House bid. “But first we have to win an historic victory for Republicans on Nov. 8.”

Biden’s Pennsylvania address was largely the same he has been giving for weeks — spotlighting a grab bag of his major legislative achievements while warning that abortion rights, voting rights, Social Security and Medicare are at risk should Republicans take control of Congress.

The president highlighted the Inflation Reduction Action, passed in August by the Democratic-led Congress, which includes several healthcare provisions popular among older adults and the less well-off, including a $2,000 cap on out-of-pocket medical expenses and a $35 monthly cap per prescription on insulin. The new law also requires companies that raise prices faster than overall inflation to pay Medicare a rebate.

But with a bigger and more energetic audience in his home state, Biden’s energy seemed lifted.

“We have to reaffirm the values that have long defined us,” Biden said of threats to democracy. “We are good people. I know this.” He added: “Get out and vote!”

The post Trump says US ‘in decline’; Biden has his own dire warning appeared first on News Agency nabakhabar.

Addressing an overflow crowd of thousands at Montgomery High School in Rockville on Thursday, Biden said: “Your right to choose is on the ballot this year. The Social Security you paid for from the time you had a job is on the ballot. The safety of your kids from gun violence is on the ballot, and it’s not hyperbole, the very survival of our planet is on the ballot.”

“You have to choose,” Biden added. “Will we be a country that moves forward or a country that moves backward?”

The events, in the safely Democratic Washington suburbs, were meant to ease Biden into what White House aides say will be an aggressive season of championing his policy victories and aiding his party’s candidates.

He is aiming to turn months of accomplishments into political energy as Democrats have seen their hopes rebound amid the legacy-defining burst of action by Biden and Congress.

From bipartisan action on gun control, infrastructure and domestic technology manufacturing to Democrats-only efforts to tackle climate crisis and health care costs, Biden highlighted the achievements of the party’s unified but razor-thin control of Washington.

Republicans call Biden’s comments ‘despicable’

And he tried to sharpen the contrast with Republicans, who once seemed poised for sizable victories in November.

Biden on Thursday expanded on his effort to paint Republicans as the “ultra-MAGA” party — a reference to former president Donald Trump’s “Make America Great Again” campaign slogan — opposing his agenda and embracing conservative ideological proposals as well as Trump’s false claims about the 2020 election.

“What we’re seeing now is either the beginning or the death knell of an extreme MAGA philosophy,” Biden told donors at the fundraiser.

“It’s not just Trump, it’s the entire philosophy that underpins the — I’m going to say something, it’s like semi-fascism.”

“I respect conservative Republicans,” Biden said later. “I don’t respect these MAGA Republicans.”

The Republican National Committee called Biden’s comments “despicable.”

“Biden forced Americans out of their jobs, transferred money from working families to Harvard lawyers, and sent our country into a recession while families can’t afford gas and groceries,” said spokesperson Nathan Brand.

“Democrats don’t care about suffering Americans — they never did.”

The post Biden compares Republican ideology to ‘semi-fascism’ appeared first on News Agency nabakhabar.

In modern times, the party that holds the White House almost always takes a drubbing as one-third of U.S. Senate seats and the entire House of Representatives is up for grabs. The smart money, if there is such a thing in Washington, sees Republicans recapturing both houses later this year, and making a serious play for the White House in two years.

This, in part, explains why the current administration’s pro-environment rhetoric is run off the road by its pro-petroleum actions.

The post Democrats’ razor-thin majorities in both houses of Congress could vanish in November—so could much of President Biden’s environmental agenda! appeared first on News Agency nabakhabar.

The Senate Judiciary Committee kicks off Monday morning with a vote on whether to move Jackson’s nomination to the Senate floor. Democrats will then wind the nomination through the 50-50 Senate, with a final vote insight for President Joe Biden’s pick to replace retiring Justice Stephen Breyer.

After more than 30 hours of hearings and interrogation from Republicans over her record, Jackson is on the brink of making history as the third Black justice and only the sixth woman in the court’s more than 200-year history. Democrats — and at least one Republican — cite her deep experience in her nine years on the federal bench and the chance for her to become the first former public defender on the court.

The chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., said Thursday that the high regard for Jackson after a combative four days of hearings is “evidence of the strength that she brings to this nomination and the value that she will bring to the Supreme Court.”

The committee could deadlock on Monday’s vote, 11-11, meaning Democrats will have to spend additional hours on the Senate floor to “discharge” her nomination from the committee. While it won’t delay the process for long, it’s another blow for Democrats who had hoped to confirm Jackson with bipartisan support.

A deadlocked vote would be “a truly unfortunate signal of the continued descent into the dysfunction of our confirmation process,” said Delaware Sen. Chris Coons, a Democrat on the committee.

The committee hasn’t deadlocked on a nomination since 1991 when a motion to send the nomination of current Justice Clarence Thomas to the floor with a “favorable” recommendation failed on a 7-7 vote. The committee then voted to send the nomination to the floor without a recommendation, meaning it could still be brought up for a vote.

Either way, Democrats are ready to spend time on the discharge Monday afternoon, if necessary. The Senate would then move to a series of procedural steps before a final confirmation vote later in the week.

While none of the Republicans on the committee is expected to support Jackson, Democrats will have at least one GOP vote in favor on the floor — Maine Sen. Susan Collins, who announced last week that she will support the nominee. Collins said that even though she may not always agree with her, Jackson “possesses the experience, qualifications and integrity to serve as an associate justice on the Supreme Court.”

It’s unclear so far whether any other Republicans will join her. Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky set the tone for the party last week when he said he “cannot and will not” support her, citing GOP concerns raised in the hearing about her sentencing record and her support from liberal advocacy groups.

Collins and Sens. Lisa Murkowski of Alaska and Lindsey Graham of South Carolina were the only three to vote for Jackson when the Senate confirmed her as an appeals court judge last year. Graham said Thursday he won’t support her this time around; Murkowski says she’s still deciding.

Collins’ support likely saves Democrats from having to use Vice President Kamala Harris’ tiebreaking vote to confirm President Joe Biden’s pick, and Biden called Collins on Wednesday to thank her after her announcement, according to the senator’s office. The president had called her at least three times before the hearings, part of a larger push to win a bipartisan vote for his historic nominee.

It is expected that all 50 Democrats will support Jackson, though one notable moderate Democrat, Arizona Sen. Kyrsten Sinema, hasn’t yet said how she will vote.

The post Senate panel to vote on Jackson nomination to Supreme Court appeared first on News Agency nabakhabar.

In Tuesday’s marathon hearing, Republicans aggressively questioned Jackson on the sentences she has handed down to sex offenders in her nine years as a federal judge, her advocacy on behalf of terror suspects at Guantanamo Bay, her thoughts on critical race theory and even her religious views. At one point, Republican Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas read from children’s books that he said are taught at her teenage daughter’s school.

The post Defending her record, Jackson back for 3rd day of hearings appeared first on News Agency nabakhabar.

The proposed top tax rate would revert to 39.6% on couples earning more than $450,000, and there would be a 3% tax on wealthier Americans making beyond $5 million a year. For big businesses, the proposal would lift the 21% corporate tax rate to 26.5% on incomes beyond $5 million.

In all, the tax hikes are in line with Biden’s own proposals and would bring about the most substantive changes in the tax code since Republicans with then-President Donald Trump slashed taxes in 2017. Business and anti-tax groups are sure to object. But Democrats are pressing forward.

Rep. Richard Neal, D-Mass., the chairman of the tax-writing Ways & Means Committee, said that taken together, the proposals would “expand opportunity for the American people and support our efforts to build a healthier, more prosperous future.”

It’s a daunting moment for Biden and his allies in Congress as they assemble the massive package that is destined to become one of the largest singles measures considered in some time, if ever. The president’s “build back” agenda includes spending on child care, health care, education and strategies to confront climate change. It is a sweeping undertaking, on part with the Great Society or New Deal.

One Democratic senator vital to the bill’s fate says the cost will need to be slashed to $1 trillion to $1.5 trillion to win his support.

Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., also cautioned there was “no way” Congress will meet the late September goal from House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., for passage given his current wide differences with liberal Democrats on how much to spend and how to pay for it.

“I cannot support $3.5 trillion,” Manchin said Sunday, citing in particular his opposition to a proposed increase in the corporate tax rate from 21% to 28% and vast new social spending. “We don’t have the need to rush into this.”

Democrats have no votes to spare if they want to enact Biden’s massive “Build Back Better” agenda, with the Senate split 50-50 and Vice President Kamala Harris the tiebreaker if there is no Republican support. Democratic congressional leaders have set a target of Wednesday for committees to have the bill drafted.

The White House welcomed the preliminary tax plan, which “makes significant progress towards ensuring our economy rewards work and not just wealth,” said deputy press secretary Andrew Bates.

“This meets two core goals the President laid out at the beginning of this process — it does not raise taxes on Americans earning under $400,000 and it repeals the core elements of the Trump tax giveaways for the wealthy and corporations,” he said in a statement.

The proposal was pitched as potentially raising some $2.9 trillion — but that’s a preliminary estimate. That would go a long way toward paying for the $3.5 trillion legislation. The White House is counting on long-term economic growth to be sparked by the legislation to generate an additional $600 billion to make up the difference.

Much of the revenue raised would come from the higher taxes on corporations and the highest earners — more than $450,000 for married couples filing jointly, to 39.6% from the current 37%.

Pressed repeatedly about a price tag he could support, Manchin said, “It’s going to be $1, $1.5 (trillion).” He suggested the range was based on a modest rise in the corporate tax rate to 25%, a figure he believes will keep the U.S. globally competitive.

But Sen. Bernie Sanders, the Vermont independent who chairs the Senate Budget Committee and is helping craft the measure, noted that he and other members of the liberal flank in Congress had initially urged an even more robust package of $6 trillion.

“I don’t think it’s acceptable to the president, to the American people or to the overwhelming majority of the people in the Democratic caucus,” Sanders said. He added: “I believe we’re going to all sit-down and work together and come up with a $3.5 trillion reconciliation bill which deals with the enormously unmet needs of working families.”

The current blueprint proposes billions for rebuilding infrastructure, tackling climate change and expanding or introducing a range of services, from free prekindergarten to dental, vision and hearing aid care for older people.

Manchin voted last month to approve a budget resolution that set the figure, though he and Sen. Kyrsten Sinema, D-Ariz., have expressed reservations about the topline amount. All of it would be paid for with taxes on corporations and the wealthy.

Congressional committees have been working hard this month on slices of the 10-year proposal in a bid to meet this week’s timeline from Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., to have the bill drafted. Pelosi is seeking a House vote by Oct. 1, near the Sept. 27 timeline for voting on a slimmer infrastructure plan favored by moderate lawmakers.

Manchin, who in an op-ed earlier this month urged a “strategic pause” on the legislation to reconsider the cost, described the timing as unrealistic. He has urged Congress to act first on the $1 trillion bipartisan infrastructure bill already passed by the Senate. But liberal Democrats have threatened to withhold their support until the $3.5 trillion spending bill is passed alongside it.

Manchin spoke on CNN’s “State of the Union,” NBC’s “Meet the Press” and ABC’s “This Week.” Sanders was on CNN and ABC.

The post Democrats seek corporate, wealthy tax hikes for $3.5T plan appeared first on News Agency nabakhabar.