The End of the Cold War: The Case for a Democratic Leader to Remain in Washington Two Years After the Reionization of the 1988 Presidential Referendum

Biden made a number of points in the speech that was hosted by the Democratic National Committee and not the White House. It was different from the Democrats’ focus on economic recovery, which was the main focus of the closing message.

The environment the White House is looking at doesn’t match the dynamics that caused huge losses for the Republicans in 1994. It is possible that that will hold, it is just tied to the construct Biden has identified.

It is easy to see that the tally is a requiem to the past, since officials are clear eyed about the battles that loom in divided government. The majority of Republicans on those lists were reelected. The Republicans will be joined by a new class of people who, in flipping districts, Biden won two years earlier, effectively securing their narrow, four seat majority.

“It’s been back and forth with them ahead, us ahead, them ahead – back and forth,” Biden said last week. I think that we will see one more shift back to our side in the closing days.

Democrats once again scramble to zero in on a message to blunt GOP momentum, a reality amplified by differing views inside the party of where that message should actually land, despite the fact that there is a consensus inside the party of where that message should actually land.

There will be a determination on whether that optimism is correct in 14 days. Biden thinks voters will decide if Democratic power will stay in Washington two years.

It’s a question that’s been asked repeatedly, whether that will hold, particularly in a home stretch in which undecided voters historically break with the party out of power.

“We’ve managed to suck ourselves back into our own circular firing squad,” one Democratic campaign official said. “It was never as good as people seemed to think it was (at the end of the summer), and it’s not as bad as some are acting now. It can be if we don’t pull it together.

The weight of that history, not to mention the acute headwinds created by economic unease that continues to rank first among voter concerns in poll after poll, aren’t lost on Biden or his advisers.

Even before Trump’s lackluster campaign launch, Biden had made clear to close advisers that he viewed the former president’s grip on his party as easing – along with his relevance. It’s an idea that several people doubt, and Democrats are skeptical after a number of near-death moments.

Advisers say he will hit the road for larger campaign events after weeks of smaller official events designed to highlight legislative accomplishments.

What Biden has to Give for the Democrats: Implications of the Suppressed Recovery from the First Two Months of a Deep Economic Downturn

Analysts expect the third quarter GDP report to show robust growth after two quarters of contraction due to a steady downward trajectory in gas prices for the last two weeks.

Officials acknowledge their deficit on the economy, despite cornerstone legislative achievements and a historically fast recovery from the pandemic-era downturn, isn’t going to flip over the course of 14 days.

But given the close correlation between gas prices and Democratic electoral prospects over the course of the last several months, they see an opportunity to at least make some gains – or fight to a draw – with undecided voters or those weighing whether to vote at all in the closing days.

But it’s one that officials say has been laid bare in a particularly acute manner by Republicans in recent weeks, whether on abortion, popular programs like Social Security and Medicare, or proposals to undo many of the individual provisions enacted by Biden that consistently poll in the favor of Democrats when taken in isolation.

Biden has also spent the last several weeks attempting to highlight individual issues officials see as key motivators to base voters they need to turn out in a big way to counter clear Republican enthusiasm, whether on abortion rights or Biden’s actions to cancel student loans for some borrowers.

The burst of optimism among Democrats after a late summer string of major legislative wins and energy driven by the Supreme Court’s decision to strike down Roe vs. Wade was viewed by many inside the West Wing as overly optimistic.

The structural dynamics defining House races, in part due to redistricting, have long made holding onto an already exceedingly narrow majority a tall task. Republicans have grown more aggressive in their spending targets in recent days, as they see a map expansion and environment that is growing more favorable by the day

All Democrats in battleground Senate races are polling very close to each other. Even if Democrats decide to break away from each other, there is still a pathway to hold onto the Senate.

It’s nothing new for Biden not to have the confidence of his party. His previous two presidential campaigns failed early and his 2020 effort was in disarray until a win in the South Carolina Primary saved his White House hopes. Heading into the midterms, the conventional wisdom was that Biden’s low approval ratings and raging inflation would deal him a devastating blow. But the Republican red wave never came and Democrats added a seat to their narrow Senate majority – even if the White House’s relief did obscure the liability it will face from a radical GOP-controlled House with investigative powers.

The false reality that Trump spun over his baseless claims about a stolen election and the scores of election deniers carrying the Republican flag only validated Biden’s warnings in the midterm campaign that democracy is on the ballot – even if most voters appear more concerned with the high cost of feeding their families than the somewhat esoteric debates about the state of the nation’s founding values.

Two months ago, Biden traveled to Philadelphia where he delivered an urgent rebuke of those who were aligned with Trump’s efforts to undermine democracy.

But the essence of the Trump message exists in direct contradiction to Biden’s logic. The voters who love their country when their party win are the ones who see the Democrats as anti-American. These dueling understandings of what America actually means are at the core of the current, great political struggle that will not just play out next Tuesday, but in the 2024 election and beyond.

Biden told voters that the fate of the soul of America lies with them and they have the power to decide.

Elections should be about more than one thing. Voters can walk and chew gum at the same time. But the harsh truth is this: In Washington, where just a glimpse of the towering Capitol dome reminds politicians and their media chroniclers of the January 6 horror, the threat to democracy feels visceral.

The concept of self-government isn’t the only thing that makes the gut check issue different in the heartlands of Pennsylvania and Arizona. The basic kind of feeding a family is what it is. This is an election more about the cost of a cart full of groceries or the price of a gallon of gasoline than America’s founding truths.

The Price of Everything Was Better During Trump, And What We Are Saying About Them: A Reflection from a Democrat Candidate Strong

Retiree Patricia Strong told CNN the price of everything was better during Trump, and she was looking forward to retirement.

The Federal Reserve has raised its short-term borrowing rate after stock markets have tanked, as well as Americans with credit card debt. The low unemployment rate is one of the most important aspects of the Biden economy and it could be in danger due to the Fed’s strategy.

The current election and its legions of anti-democratic Republican candidates could cause political damage that is beyond repairing, if Biden is correct in his argument.

In the midyear elections, Democrats won the Senate and the Republicans took control of the House. Voters hoping for a return to the normal Biden had promised after the health issues and inflation challenges weren’t very fond of the president. They did not trust a GOP still controlled by Trump to fix things.

He said that this is no ordinary year. I would like you to think about the moment we are in. In a typical year, we’re often not faced with the question of whether the vote we cast will preserve democracy or put us at risk. But this year we are.”

The Biden White House: Why he won’t have to deal with high prices for the 21st and 2020 economic cycles, and why he hasn’t

Biden has also been talking about high prices. Billions of dollars of spending in his domestic agenda will help lower the cost of health care, lift up working families and create millions of jobs, according to his pitch. That may be the case, but things that could happen in the future can’t ease the pain being felt now.

Throughout history, inflation has often been a pernicious political force that breeds desperation in an electorate and seeds extremism as a potential response. That’s why politicians fear it so acutely and why it is so curious that the Biden White House initially didn’t take the surge of prices that seriously, repeatedly insisting that this was a “transitory” problem caused by Covid-19.

The president renewed his call for national unity in front of a still violence-scarred Capitol, while he was in office. A defeated former president of the US refused to accept the results of the 2020 election and that’s what put American democracy under attack.

“He has abused his power and put the loyalty to himself before loyalty to the Constitution. And he’s made the Big Lie an article of faith in the MAGA Republican Party – a minority of that party,” Biden said, being careful not to insult every GOP voter as he did when referring to “semi-fascism” earlier this year.

He has stayed away from such a formulation since then, recognizing that it provided ammunition to Republicans looking to justify their continued adherence to Mr. Trump’s lies about 2020. The White House press secretary was reminded of the president’s comments before he spoke on Wednesday night, and asked if he expected the elections to be legitimate. That is a yes, she said.

Biden also hinted at a lack of understanding of Trump’s MAGA supporters, who have embraced his anti-democratic, populist, nationalist appeal to mainly White voters, which grew out of a backlash to the first Black presidency of Barack Obama. The 44th president has been excoriating Trump and defending democracy on the campaign trail.

“This intimidation, this violence against Democrats, Republicans and non-partisan officials just doing their jobs, is the consequence of lies told for power and profit, lies of conspiracy and malice, lies repeated over and over to generate a cycle of anger, hate, vitriol and even violence,” Biden said. The future of our nation depends on honesty, so in this moment we have to confront the lies.

Even though he believed that Americans would reject the menacing forces he described, Biden did not think it would happen. The address was delivered by Biden after the Speaker’s husband was attacked by a man who claimed to be a right-wing conspiracy theorist.

Biden noted that most Americans and even most Republicans wouldn’t resort to violence. He claimed that those who would have had the largest influence.

“I believe the voices excusing or calling for violence and intimidation are a distinct minority in America,” Biden said. “But they’re loud and they are determined.”

A surge in anti-democratic rhetoric had made it difficult for Biden and his team to make a decision on whether to give a speech on democracy. But the attack on Paul Pelosi deeply alarmed Biden and his top advisers; the shocking home intrusion and attack on Pelosi landed the 82-year-old in the hospital for surgery and he has since been recovering from a skull fracture, among other injuries.

I don’t know how you can care about democracy when you deny the existence of a win. The only way you could win is either you win or the other guy cheated,” he said at the event, held in an oceanfront backyard of a mansion in Golden Beach, Florida.

Election Monitoring After Meacham: An Investigation of the Biden Campaign During the October 2020 Insights into U.S. Senator Mark Levinson

Biden was seen carrying a book by historian Jon Meacham this week that explores how Abraham Lincoln faced threats to democracy during the Civil War.

The Republican tactics that might intimidate voters in the name of election monitoring were raised by Mr. Biden. A federal judge in Arizona this week restricted a group that had been planning to operate near polling places from taking photos of voters, openly carrying firearms and posting information about voters online.

This will be the first election since the events of January 6th when a mob broke into the U.S. Capitol. I wish I could say the assault on our democracy was over that day. But I can’t.

More than a thousand Republican candidates questioned and at times denied the results of the 2020 election despite evidence to the contrary, according to a monthslong New York Times investigation. There is a litmus test that Mr. Trump must meet to support Republican candidates.

A nation worn down by crises and economic angst is voting for a president who is likely to solidify its divides than promote unity.

People freely choosing their leaders, and those leaders accepting the results, are what sets the country on a fresh path.

But the final hours of this midterm campaign laid bare the polarized electoral environment, the specter of political violence and the possibility of disputed races – all of which have raised the stakes of the first nationwide vote since former President Donald Trump tried to overturn the 2020 election and have augured an acrimonious two years to come.

The Republicans won the House with a mere four seat advantage on the backs of candidates who were hardly fans of former President Donald Trump. Several districts voted for Biden.

The economy and cost of living are the most important issues for voters who are still waiting for the restoration of normal after a once-in-a-century epidemic that Biden promised in 2020, according to polls.

The run-up to the congressional elections has shown the depth of the nation’s self-estrangements in a political era in which both sides seem to think victory for the other is akin to losing their country.

Tuesday looks set to be a tough day for Biden. The president did not spend the final hours of the campaign battling to get vulnerable Democrats over the line in a critical swing state. The safe place for his low approval ratings was Maryland, a state that is home to many Democrats. While he did stump for Pennsylvania Senate nominee John Fetterman over the weekend, the venue of his final event encapsulated his drained political juice as he contemplates a 2024 reelection campaign.

“I think it’s going to be tough,” Biden told reporters. “I think we’ll win the Senate and I think the House is tougher,” he said, admitting life would become “more difficult” for him if the GOP takes control of Congress.

On the eve of an election in which he isn’t on the ballot, Trump was focused on himself, even as he claimed he did not want to overshadow Republican candidates. The rally was for a GOP Senate candidate in Ohio, and Trump used it as an opportunity to make a bunch of false claims about America’s future. And he laid the groundwork to proclaim he is the victim of totalitarian state-style persecution if he is indicted in several criminal probes into his conduct.

The worst kept secret in politics is that Trump plans to seek another term in the White House, and he will give a huge announcement at his Mar-a-Lago resort on November 15. The turbulence of our time is emphasized by the fact that a twice-impeached president, who left office in disgrace after legitimizing violence as a form of politics, has a good chance of winning.

Nancy Pelosi recalled the moment of trauma she felt when she was told by the police that her husband had been attacked with a hammer, as the shadow of violence hung over American policies. She condemned certain Republicans for joking about it, in an exclusive interview with CNN.

There is a party in our democracy that believes the outcome of the election, and mocks the violence that occurs. That has to stop,” Pelosi said.

In an exclusive interview with CNN, Kevin McCarthy, the likely next speaker, blamed Democrats for the constant political rhetoric as he laid out his aggressive agenda, targeting border security and relentless investigations. Some members of the conference are already calling for Biden to be impeached.

“We will never use impeachment for political purposes,” McCarthy told CNN’s Melanie Zanona. “That doesn’t mean if something rises to the occasion, it would not be used at any other time.”

And Wisconsin Sen. Ron Johnson, who says he’s in line to be chairman of the permanent subcommittee on investigations if he wins reelection and Republicans take the Senate, said he’d use the power granted him, in what is likely to be a very narrowly decided election, to further crank up the partisan heat in Washington.

Are the most powerful figures in our country going after the first two years of the campaign? The story of two paradoxes in the 2016 presidential race

There’s something magical about democratic elections, when differences are exposed in debates and fierce campaigns. There was an expectation that both sides would abide by the verdict of the people.

It is best to bet that voters want another White House fight between Trump and Biden in the foreseeable future. There is no guarantee that this will happen by the end of the year because of politics and major events in the months to come.

A new CNN/SSRS poll shows that 6 in 10 Republicans and GOP-leaning independents want their party to nominate someone other than Trump in 2024. A similar slice on the other side hopes for a nominee other than Biden.

Whether voters want it or not, the race is on. Potential rivals and donors in early money chases take into account the strengths of the contender to make their decisions. Trump is already a declared candidate, although he could use a relaunch after a tepid start, and Biden is giving every sign he plans on running, suggesting he’ll let the country know for sure early in the new year.

One of the emerging paradoxes in the upcoming race was shown in the poll. Even though they are the most powerful figures in their parties, both Biden and Trump seem oddly vulnerable at the start of the two-year campaign, and could face complications from a shifting political environment, outside factors or age.

It seems that Trump’s appeal is waning. Voters turned away from his brand in both national elections as a result of his fatigue caused by the disastrous mid-terms election that many of his candidates were running in. The toughest test for Trump’s talent for skirting accountability is coming from twin special counsel probes. And some Republicans are looking elsewhere. The CNN poll shows that when GOP voters are asked who they’d prefer, 47% have an alternative in mind. They pick Florida Gov Ron. DeSantis, who is untested on a national stage but already looms as a big threat to the former president.

The president is in better shape than Trump is at the end of the year. Some 25% of Democrat-aligned voters didn’t want him to be their nominee. 40% is now the figure. And among those who want someone else, 72% say they’ve got no one particular in mind, further bolstering the advantage a sitting president usually has against a primary challenger.

Republican politics may, or may not, be at a moment of transition. How things shake out over the next few months will be critical to the future of Trump. More and more Republicans are saying that it is time to move on from the failed candidates of the ex-president.

And Trump’s dinner with extremists with a record of antisemitism like White supremacist Nick Fuentes and rapper Kanye West at Mar-a-Lago is bolstering their arguments that his general election viability is damaged beyond repair. Trump’s so-far lackluster campaign, which looks like it was declared to make it easier for him to portray criminal probes into his conduct as persecution, isn’t convincing anyone so far.

Ironically, voters who disdained Trump-style circus politics and election denialism will get more of it since the smaller-than-expected GOP majority means acolytes of the ex-president, like expected House Judiciary Chairman Jim Jordan of Ohio and Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia, will have significant sway. The new Republican-run House represents, in effect, a return to power of Trumpism in a powerful corner of Washington. Kevin McCarthy will be in a lot of danger if he gets the speakership, because he made many concessions to the right-wingers.

The CNN polls show that the lowest point for a candidate is 38%, and that is opening the way for an anti-Trump candidate. But another big field could splinter opposition to the ex-president among untested potential foes.

Biden is getting closer to giving Americans a new piece of history, a reelection campaign from a president who is over 80. His success in staving off a Republican landslide in the midterms has quelled some anxiety among Democrats about a possible reelection run. Biden is the strongest card because he has already beaten Trump. He couldn’t play that card if Trump fades or another potential GOP nominee emerges. The current president is roughly half his age.

Facing a dramatically narrowed path to passing legislation next year the White House has begun to zero in on potential openings that the Republicans have the potential to create.

Officials acknowledged the sweeping legislative wins of President Joe Biden’s first two years, several of which were clinched with bipartisan support and significant work with a small number of Senate Republicans, will be near impossible to replicate given the control and ideological makeup of the Republican-led House.

What can we do next? A wait-and-see approach to bipartisan bipartisan negotiations in 2020, from New York to the White House

A weak speaker and a nihilistic pro-Trump faction in the wider GOP threaten to produce a series of spending showdowns with the White House – most dangerously over the need to raise the government’s borrowing authority by the middle of the year, which could throw the US into default if it’s not done.

The incoming lawmakers representing New York are seen by the Democrats as their top targets in their efforts to regain the House in 2024 and the White House believes they will be under more pressure than other Republicans to reach bipartisan deals.

“When you have Republicans representing Biden districts heading into a presidential election cycle, there’s no question it adds a different element in terms of their approach – and ours,” a senior administration official said.

The preparations for the months ahead are still in the early stages. The focus is still to close out the last days of unified power in Washington, DC, by securing the passage of the annual defense policy bill and the bipartisan spending agreement that includes new funding for the war in Ukraine.

McCarthy, after the meeting, told reporters he “can work with anyone,” but noted the new Republican majority clinched in the midterms signaled “America likes a check and balance.”

But the continued uncertainty across Washington about McCarthy’s pathway to the speakership has tacitly created another reason for what serves as somewhat of a wait-and-see posture in terms of engaging House Republicans.

The effort to connect Biden, who has been in the Senate for 36 years and knows what it’s like to have the smallest priorities back home for elected officials, to rank-and-file members from both parties, will move forward after two years of searching.

As the landscape has closed the door on the Democrat only legislative pathway that led to the American Rescue Plan and his 700 billion economic and climate law, those efforts take on a new level of salience.

“The option is get absolutely nothing done or find a way to make this work,” a House Democrat told CNN. It isn’t easy to split the inevitable, and at times probably insane, partisan warfare from the areas we can get stuff done, but I can see two years of nothing appealing to someone like Biden.

The preparation that is under way will lead to outreach from the White House. A senior White House official said that each member of the White House’s legislative affairs team is charged with getting in touch with a list of members and committees.

“We’re content to let them shoot at one another at the moment,” a senior administration official said. The way we approach the importance of these relationships has a record and is driven by the president. That will certainly be reflected in the next Congress.”

A pair of those incoming New York Republicans – Reps.-elect Anthony D’Esposito and Michael Lawler – said they both see an opportunity to work with the White House to pass legislation, though they have yet to hear from the White House.

D’Esposito said House Republican leaders have assured him they understand the need for bipartisanship to hold onto the majority in 2024 and “that there are going to be times where perhaps the members from Long Island have to put their vote in support of things that are going to deliver for Long Island.”

The defeated House Democrats campaign chief said that everyone had the power when there was a small majority. “The objective should be to make sure that we are working as a conference to pass legislation that the conference can get behind and that has the best chance of passing the Senate and being signed by the White House.”

One House Republican told CNN that he gets the focus of both the hard right group of House Republicans and the former president. “But we go nowhere without our freshmen – and while I’m not sure they’ll use it, that creates very real leverage.”

The Speaker of the House can control what legislation is considered for a vote in the chamber, even if the White House is able to get enough Republicans to buck their party. Recent House GOP leaders have attempted to stick close to an unofficial idea that nothing should move forward without a “majority of the majority” in support of the measure, though the approach was often scrapped in times of crisis or must-pass legislative moments.

A senior White House official wouldn’t say whether the White House would try and strike bipartisan agreements with Republican leadership or try and peel off moderate Republicans through the use of discharge petitions.

The Ex-President’s Ways and Means Committee: After a Week in the Life of a Murder, and Now That’s the Day a Republican Repped Joe Biden

If Trump did break the law, as the evidence of insurrection against him in the HouseJanuary 6 committee shows, it also creates an even more profound dilemma. A failure to prosecute him would set a precedent that puts ex-presidents above the law.

The culmination of the committee’s work marks a shift in history when Americans faced a choice whether to accept or reject Trump’s attempt to overrule their voice and the chain of peaceful protest.

The committee is looking at three potential and rarely tried criminal charges against the former president, including insurrection, obstruction of an official proceeding and conspiracy to defraud the federal government, sources told CNN last week. The committee has weighed the referrals against Trump allies who were involved in the fake election scheme and whether to take action against them. And Schiff said on Sunday the panel would also consider possible ethics and legal sanctions against others, including Republican lawmakers who defied committee subpoenas.

The panel is expected to be wiped out next month by an incoming Republican House majority featuring scores of lawmakers who voted not to certify the last presidential election and who still whitewash that day of infamy nearly two years later.

But before then, the panel is expected to release its final report on Wednesday. A meeting on Tuesday of the House Ways and Means Committee could be a potential embarrassment for the ex-president because it is likely to discuss what to do with his tax returns.

In its highly produced hearings, the committee – with its seven Democrats and two Republicans who split with their own party to take part – painted scenes of horrific violence and intense efforts by Trump to steal Joe Biden’s presidency.

During the melee caused when the ex-president’s mob smashed their way into the Capitol, a Capitol Police officer spilled her blood. The mother and her daughter were working as election workers in Georgia when they received racist threats after Rudy Giuliani accused them of vote stealing. Rusty Bowers, the outgoing Republican speaker of the Arizona state House, testified that Trump’s calls for him to meddle with the election were “foreign to my very being.”

Often, it was Republicans – some who were with Trump in the West Wing on January 6 – who courageously testified about his assault on the Constitution, including Cassidy Hutchinson. The ex-aide to White House chief of staff Mark Meadows recalled, “It was unpatriotic. It was not American. We were watching the Capitol building get defaced over a lie.”

It was clear from the beginning that the panel believed that Trump was in the middle of a conspiracy to steal the election. With that in mind, it would be surprising if the 45th president, who earned his second impeachment over the insurrection, was not referred to the DOJ for the possibility of criminal action.

Furthermore, the committee contended in its hearings that Trump also helped to plot a nefarious scheme to use fake electors to subvert the election in Congress. When those efforts failed, after then-Vice President Mike Pence refused to wield powers he did not have, the committee argued that Trump called a mob to Washington and incited a vicious attack on the Capitol. The committee members argued that he was disrespectful to his duty to protect Congress, the Constitution and the rule of law by not taking action as the violence raged.

“This is someone who in multiple ways tried to pressure state officials to find votes that didn’t exist. On Sunday, the chair of the House Intelligence Committee and a member of January 6 said on CNN that this was someone who tried to interfere with a joint session, even threatening a mob to attack the Capitol. If that isn’t a crime, then I don’t know what it is.

Do you really care about the events of January 6? An apology to Cheney and DOJ during a congressional hearing on Trump’s 2020 campaign

Will a perception that Trump is being hounded by any referrals help him in his failed 2020 campaign?

Do Americans really care about the events that happened nearly two years ago, when inflation was high, and there was a once-in-a-century outbreak of swine flu?

At one of the hearings, Cheney said that every American should consider this. Is there a president who will ever trust him with any position of authority, even if he isn’t willing to make the choices he made during the violence of January 6?

The failure of many of her fellow Republicans to acknowledge Cheney’s conduct suggests that her sacrifice in the House GOP may not have been worth it. The public was riveted by the hearings, even if there was little reason to think they would have as much of an impact on them as they did on President Richard Nixon. Today’s polarized times and the power of conservative media to distort what really happened on January 6 may help explain this dichotomy.

Still, Americans rejected many of Trump’s midterm candidates in swing state races who had amplified his false claims of 2020 election fraud, suggesting some desire to protect American democracy.

It is impossible to quantify how the committee’s work affected voters in November. But it kept evidence of Trump’s insurrection in the news all this year, even as the ex-president launched a new campaign seen by many observers as a way to cast the probes into his conduct as politically motivated persecution. As pro- Trump Republicans escalate their efforts to distort the events of the attack on the Capitol, this is even more valuable.

The committee undertook a massive investigation to find out what happened. Huge amounts of evidence, a huge amount of witnesses being identified,” former federal prosecutor Shan Wu told CNN’s Pamela Brown on “CNN Newsroom” on Saturday.

“I think it’s the detail that accompanies the referrals themselves and the report that will give a roadmap to DOJ. DOJ has been kind of late to this party and they are playing catch-up but that detail could be very helpful to them and will put a lot of pressure on them as well.”

If nothing else, future generations will be able to judge the determination of the panel members, especially its two Republicans, and the courage of witnesses who told the truth to try save democracy.

GOP Rep. Adam Kinzinger, who, like Cheney, served on the committee in defiance of his party and will not be returning to Congress, explained his actions in seeking to hold Trump to account in his retirement speech on the House floor last week.

The Illinois Republican said democracy is being challenged by authoritarianism in a world where a lie is Trump’s truth.

If elected leaders do not search for a way out, this great experiment will fall into the ash heap of history.

Keeping on by a thread: What the insurrection at the Capitol can teach us about our democracy and the future of the United States

The Senate passed federal elections legislation for the first time on Thursday as a result of a government spending package.

The electoral reform measure which was passed in September by the House will be included in the spending bill.

For years, legal scholars have worried the law was poorly written and in need of clarification, and former President Donald Trump and his allies targeted the law’s ambiguities in their attempts to overturn the 2020 election.

The law regarding the presiding officer of the joint session of Congress, as it currently stands, allows the vice president to interfere with the counting of electoral votes, but in the time after voting ended in 2020, Trump and his team argued that the vice president had the power to do that.

Legal experts across the political spectrum debunked that reading of the law, but Trump’s pressure campaign still led to the powder keg that erupted at the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, when chants of “Hang Mike Pence!” rang through the halls of Congress.

The measure will raise the requirements for objecting to a state’s slate of electors. As it stands now, it takes just one member of the House and one senator to challenge a state’s electors and send both chambers into a potentially days-long debate period, even without legitimate concerns.

Legal experts and many lawmakers had said it was imperative to get this certification update done before the next Congress, and especially before the 2024 presidential cycle heats up. A bipartisan group of senators, led by Sens. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., and Susan Collins, R-Maine, spent much of 2022 negotiating the changes.

“We’re holding on by a thread,” said Manchin of the legislation recently, at an event hosted by the National Council on Election Integrity. “As a very, very thin thread of democracy.”

It would be incorrect to think that the report is the final chapter of the insurrection. Instead, it represents another test: for the justice system, for elected officials and for the American people. How each responds to the report will determine whether the insurrection at the Capitol was a wake-up call or, as the committee put it, “a precedent, and invitation to danger, for future elections.”

These reports capture public attention for their revelations. The Church Committee report, made public in the 70’s, exposed a lot of wrongdoing within the intelligence community, such as assassination attempts, drug experiments, and domestic espionage. It led to Gerald Ford issuing an executive order barring political assassinations but also broke the veil of confidentiality that had allowed operatives to act in crazy ways.

Reports often found eager audiences, in part for their explosive revelations but also in part for their style. The Starr Report showed a peek through the keyhole of the president’s sexual relationships and his efforts to hide them. It became a bestseller. As did the 9/11 Commission Report, which presented the details of the terror attacks and their causes in such captivating detail that it not only sold briskly, but it was a finalist for the National Book Awards. (The report on the Attica prison uprising, written for a state-level commission in 1972, was also a finalist for the prestigious prize.)

The Reagan administration’s illegal arms-for-hostages deals that funneled money to rebel groups in Nicaragua despite a congressional prohibition initially resulted in a number of resignations, indictments and convictions. But waning public interest and a flurry of presidential pardons allowed some implicated government officials to not only walk free but to return to high-profile careers within the Republican Party and conservative movement. The Iran-Contra cover up has been completed, the special prosecutor said, following the pardons.

For the January 6 commission, this is a real danger. Trump has said that if he’s reelected, he’d consider pardoning those who were involved in the insurrection.

In her newly released testimony, Hutchinson reflected on her journey to becoming one of the star witnesses of the hearing. Her first two depositions were an exercise in evasion as she followed her lawyer’s instructions to say that she could not remember a lot of what the committee asked. The problem for Hutchinson was that she had clear memories of many of the events that took place on that day and she was not able to remember them.

She realized she had failed the mirror test, when in a character-defining moment she realized that she wasn’t proud of who she was. “I was disappointed in myself,” she told the committee. I was frustrated with myself. To be blunt, I was kind of disgusted with myself. I became somebody I never thought that I would become.”

The Uproar Around Jack Biden and the House-Born-Infeld-Second-Renaissance Crisis

The uproar would be so bad that it’s reasonable to ask if the case that Jack Smith would bring would even have a chance of success in court.

The war in Ukraine has the potential of spillover into NATO- Russia conflict and will test taxpayers willingness to keep sending billions of dollars to support foreigners’ dream of freedom. As he leads the West in this crisis, President Joe Biden faces ever more overt challenges from rising superpower China and alarming advances in the nuclear programs of Iran and North Korea.

As Democrats head into the minority under a new generation of leaders, government shutdowns are more likely than bipartisanship. The GOP is vowing to investigate the business ties of the president’s son, Hunter Biden, and the crisis at the southern border. The GOP could suffer, however, if voters think they overreached – a factor Biden will use as he eyes a second term.

In the Senate, the Democrats expanded their majority in the last election. The chamber has split their time at 50-50 in their favor. The president will travel to Kentucky this week to explore how bipartisanship and effective governance can be achieved. He’ll take part in an event also featuring Republicans, including Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, to highlight the infrastructure package that passed with bipartisan support in 2021.

Source: https://www.cnn.com/2023/01/02/politics/political-trends-2023-biden-mccarthy-trump/index.html

The fate of Attorney General Merrick Garland when he is convicted of inciting an insurrection and hoarding classified documents

Attorney General Merrick Garland could shortly face one of the most fateful decisions in modern politics: whether to indict Trump over his attempt to steal the 2020 election and over his hoarding of classified documents.

“If a president can incite an insurrection and not be held accountable, then really there’s no limit to what a president can do or can’t do,” outgoing Illinois GOP Rep. Adam Kinzinger, a member of the select committee, said on CNN’s “State of the Union” Sunday.

I fear the future of his country if he is not guilty of a crime, because every future president can say, “Hey, here’s the bar.” And the bar is, do everything you can to stay in power.”

And who knows how long US and European voters will stomach high energy prices and sending billions of taxpayer cash to arm Ukraine if Western economies dip into recession this year.

It is hard to judge an economy. The feeling of wellbeing and economic anxiety became intertwined in the year 2022, when inflation and stock markets were at 40-year highs. The key question for 2023 will be whether the Federal Reserve’s harsh interest rate medicine – designed to bring down the cost of living – can bring about a soft landing without triggering a recession that many analysts believe is on the way.

Washington spending showdowns and potential government shutdowns could also pose new threats to growth. The economy will be outside any political leader’s capacity to control, but its state at the end of the year will play a vital role in an election that will define America, domestically and globally after 2024.

Two Years after the Capitol Insurrection: The U.S. Capitol Firefighter, Law Enforcement and Election Officials Who Made a Difference

Two years after the January 6, 2021, insurrection at the US Capitol, President Joe Biden wants to elevate the law enforcement and election officials who held firm against the most serious effort to prevent.

The president awarded the Presidential Citizens Medal to more than a dozen individuals – including law enforcement officers who were injured defending the Capitol, a Capitol Police officer who died the day after rioters stormed the building, officers who died by suicide after defending the Capitol, as well as elected officials and election workers who rejected efforts by former President Donald Trump to overturn the results of the 2020 election.

More than 140 law enforcement officials suffered physical injuries, and many are suffering from the effects of that day as well, as he acknowledged.

“History will remember your names. They will remember you for your courage. They’ll remember your bravery. They’ll remember your extraordinary commitment to your fellow Americans,” the president added.

During Friday’s ceremony, Biden did not directly acknowledge the history-making chaos on the House floor that has blocked Republican Leader Kevin McCarthy from the speakership the last four days. But as McCarthy has inched closer to garnering enough holdouts to secure his position as House Speaker following more than a dozen floor votes, the connection is unmistakable – and it’s something that Biden, himself, has previously acknowledged.

“How do you think this looks to the rest of the world? Things settled out for the first time in 100 years after the first time we were getting through the whole history related to January 6. It is a bad look and a bad thing. Before boarding the White House for a trip to Kentucky, Biden told reporters on the South lawn that he hopes they get their act together.

Source: https://www.cnn.com/2023/01/06/politics/joe-biden-january-6-anniversary/index.html

Two years after the January 6 riot: The case for a new president in the House of Representatives? Reply to Biden on Capitol Hill, urging Trump to renounce his presidency

Some of the players in the chaos on Capitol Hill played roles in the election denial that led to the January 6 riot. There were 15 people in Congress on January 6, 2016 who served as House Republican rebels who had frozen the new majority and its path to a speaker. Fourteen of those objected to electoral count. There are five rookies in the group. All of the candidates are 2020 election deniers and endorsed by Trump.

For Biden – who was described as “horrified, stunned, outraged,” as he watched the events unfold two years ago, according to one aide who was with him – it’s a complicated yet critical moment.

The individuals who testified to Congress about their actions surrounding the 2020 vote certifications and insurrection were honored with the medal. Despite his insistence on staying away from the Justice Department investigations and his general reluctance to wade in on the work of the House committee that investigated the riot, Biden has privately paid close attention to how things have played out.

In fact, one official noted, as Biden watched the Senate and House results closely on election night last year, he also made clear to aides he wanted updates on another set of races: secretary of state contests that pitted Democrats against Trump-backed supporters of the lie the 2020 election was fraudulent.

The Democrats won all of the races, even in Michigan, where they were defeated by a margin of victory. Benson was one of the officials honored for her efforts to maintain a fair election in 2020.

The election results were unexpected. The launch of Trump’s third run for the presidency was met with a collective shrug, even among most Republicans, and has staggered out of the gate. The key parts of Biden’s legislative agenda are already law, and many of them will begin to take effect in the months ahead.

But Biden gave a window into his view when he was asked about Trump at a news conference after the midterm elections, with the contention that the former president’s political movement remained very strong.

While there is progress in lowering the temperature within the country, the same people who drove the violence inside the Capitol two years ago are still at work.