(WASHINGTON) — Russia will attempt to influence the 2024 presidential election in favor of a past preferred candidate, according to U.S. officials who briefed reporters on election threats on Tuesday
“We have not observed a shift in Russia’s preferences for the presidential race from past elections, given the role the U.S. is playing with regard to Ukraine and broader policy toward Russia,” according to an Office of the Director of National Intelligence official.
The official did not mention any specific candidate by name, despite reporters pressing for a name.
During the 2016 election, the intelligence community assessed Russia attempted to influence the U.S. election in favor of candidate Donald Trump.
Officials from a vast swath of federal agencies said that Russia is taking a “whole of government approach” to influence the election that includes the presidential race, congressional races and public opinion, according to officials.
“We anticipate them to increase their activities as we get closer to the election,” according to the ODNI official.
The Justice Department on Tuesday released information about a Russian influence campaign related to the Ukrainian war, which officials pointed to as an example of how the U.S. says Russia is hoping to influence the election.
Russia seeks to “undermine electoral integrity and amplify domestic divisions.”
“To accomplish this, Moscow is using a variety of approaches to bolster its messaging and lend an air of authenticity to its efforts,” the official said. “Russian influence actors are planning to overtly use social media to amplify narratives, to sway U.S. public opinion in U.S. swing states, and diminish U.S. support for Ukraine.”
The campaigns and candidates have been kept abreast of these efforts, according to officials.
China and Iran are also make up the “big three” of threat actors the intelligence community is focusing on.
“Russia is the preeminent threat. Iran is a chaos agent and China is holding in the presidential race,” the ODNI official said.
China, according to U.S. officials, is taking a wait-and-see approach and may not attempt to influence the outcome of the presidential race “but we are monitoring the possibility of down ballot influence activities,” as they did in 2022.
They are also focusing on their data collection on U.S. social media platforms.
Iran is seeking to sow “chaos” in the United States, official said.
“Iran seeks to stoke social divisions and undermine confidence in the US democratic institutions around the elections. Iran has demonstrated a long standing interest in exploiting U.S. political and social tensions for a variety of means, including social media. In particular, we are monitoring Iranian actors who are seeking to exacerbate tensions with Israel,” according to an ODNI official.
(NEW HAVEN, Conn.) — A new report released by Yale Law School and Yale School of Medicine criticizes the often-cited Cass Review on gender-affirming care for transgender youth, commissioned by the National Health Service (NHS) in the United Kingdom.
The review, released in April, was performed by Dr. Hillary Cass, a former president of the Royal College of Pediatrics and Child Health, amid a rise in referrals to NHS’ gender services. Her review – which calls for more research, more support, and more caution around gender-affirming care – has been cited in the NHS decision to restrict the prescribing of puberty-pausing medications, also known as puberty blockers, to children and young people under 18 years old in the U.K.
In the U.S., gender-affirming care remains a hot-button issue in the political and medical arenas. At least 25 states have enacted restrictions on care for transgender youth since 2022, according to the Human Rights Campaign.
The Cass review was cited in recent, successful legislative efforts in Indiana to uphold a 2023 law that prohibited physicians from providing “gender transition procedures” to anyone younger than 18 years old, with certain medical exceptions.
The Yale report – which states it was authored by a team of researchers and clinicians that has “86 years of experience working with 4,800 transgender youth,” and “has published 278 peer-reviewed studies, 168 of which are related to gender-affirming care” – takes issue with several aspects of the Cass Review in their critique, saying that it “obscures key findings, misrepresents its own data, and is rife with misapplications of the scientific method.” It also accuses the Review of speculating about data on transgender patients, and criticizes certain statements made in the Review about concern over gender care referrals, early medical intervention, and more.
Yet despite being cited in the NHS decision to restrict prescribing puberty blockers to minors, the Yale report notes that the Cass Review does not recommend a ban on trans youth care. It also notes that it consistently makes recommendations that are in line with international gender-affirming medical care guidelines by the World Professional Association for Transgender Health (WPATH) and the Endocrine Society, a professional medical organization that is “dedicated to providing the field of endocrinology with timely, evidence-based recommendations for clinical care and practice,” according to its website.
In response to an ABC News request for comment, the team that authored the Cass Review said in a statement that the research that “underpins” the Review’s findings “looked at 237 papers from 18 countries, providing information on a total of 113,269 children and adolescents,” and was subject to peer review.
“In making her recommendations, Dr. Cass had to rely on the currently available evidence and think about how the NHS can respond safely, effectively, and compassionately,” the Review team told ABC News.
The statement continued, “The body of research on gender care for children and young people was strikingly poor compared to other areas of child and adolescent healthcare where life changing interventions are given, meaning there is not a reliable evidence base upon which to make clinical decisions, or for children and their families to make informed choices.”
Spike in gender service referrals
The Cass Review repeatedly claims that the increase of referrals for gender-affirming care in the U.K. was “exponential,” and that social acceptance of transgender identities is unlikely to be the sole explanation for the rise.
“While it certainly seems to be the case that there is much greater acceptance of trans identities, particularly among younger generations, which may account for some of the increase in numbers, the exponential change in referrals over a particularly short five-year timeframe is very much faster than would be expected for normal evolution of acceptance of a minority group,” Cass states.
In their report, Yale researchers counter that the increase in referrals to the U.K.’s Gender Identity Service is not exponential, and points to Cass’s own data on referrals, which they say actually shows the number of referrals plateaued, and then decreased starting in 2017. A graph included in the Cass Review that shows a spike from 2021 to 2022 in child and adolescent referrals for gender dysphoria is accompanied by a note that states there is “a strong possibility that there was double counting” of referrals during the time period.
“While there certainly is an increase in referrals, describing this increase as ‘exponential’ is a serious error that fuels concern that the Review is too often more interested in subjective polemics than in scientific accuracy,” the Yale report says.
Research quality on gender-affirming care
The Cass Review also criticized the evidence supporting the need for gender-affirming care. It concluded that “while a considerable amount of research has been published in this field, systematic evidence reviews demonstrated the poor quality of the published studies, meaning there is not a reliable evidence base upon which to make clinical decisions, or for children and their families to make informed choices.”
Yale experts counter in their report that the Cass Review’s “recommendations are informed by a flawed concept of evidence.” It says the Review “fails to recognize the nuances of evidence quality measures”; that it “does not follow established standards for evaluating evidence and evidence quality”; that it “casually discusses evidence quality and does not define it, contravening standard practice in scientific evaluations of medical research”; and that it “fails to contextualize the evidence for gender-affirming care with the evidence base for other areas of pediatric medicine.”
“If high-quality evidence were a prerequisite for medical care, we would all be worse off,” the Yale report further states. “Moderate, low, and very low-quality evidence,” as defined by what the report says is “one of the most widely accepted frameworks for determining evidence quality,” and “informs necessary, high-value care at every stage of life.”
The Cass Review team states in an online FAQ that “the approach to the assessment of study quality was the same as would be applied to other areas of clinical practice – the bar was not set higher for this Review.”
A subsequent clarification in the FAQ further states: “The same level of rigor should be expected when looking at the best treatment approaches for this population as for any other population so as not to perpetuate the disadvantaged position this group have been placed in when looking for information on treatment options.”
Early intervention concerns
The Yale report also takes issue with what it calls “unfounded speculation” in the Cass Review that “social transition and puberty-pausing medications may cause harm by putting youth onto a medical path.” It further notes instances in which they assert the Cass Review “expresses concern that early supportive interventions, such as social transition and puberty-pausing medications, lock young people into irreversible care.”
For example, while stating that for some young patients, the “best outcome” will be gender transitioning, the Review also argues that “those who had socially transitioned at an earlier age and/or prior to being seen in clinic were more likely to proceed to a medical pathway,” and that “the vast majority of people started on puberty blockers proceed from puberty blockers to masculinizing/feminizing hormones” – an “altered trajectory, culminating in medical intervention which will have life-long implications.”
The Cass Review also cautions that young people who transition before they experience life as the gender with which they do not identify “may have no frame of reference to cause them to regret or detransition, but at the same time they may have had a different outcome without medical intervention and would not have needed to take life-long hormones.”
“It is completely unscientific and inappropriate to expect a young person, regardless of their gender identity, to ‘try out’ life as a gender they do not identify with – as the Review supposes transgender youth should,” the Yale report states. It further says that “The Review’s own data show that most referred patients are never subsequently referred to pediatric endocrinology and even fewer receive medical interventions.”
The Yale report argues that continuing care isn’t necessarily cause for alarm or concern, and that “The Review does not consider the most likely explanation for why most youth who receive early, supportive interventions continue onto gender-affirming hormone therapy: that they are indeed transgender.”
“It is not social transition and puberty-pausing medications that drive a persistent transgender identity,” the Yale report asserts. “It is a transgender identity that drives social transition and subsequent medical interventions.”
Detransitioning and regret
The Cass Review asserts that “the percentage of people treated with hormones who subsequently detransition remains unknown due to the lack of long-term follow-up studies, although there is suggestion that numbers are increasing.”
However, in the Review’s audit of 3,306 patients who were discharged from the U.K. Gender Identity Service (GIDS), fewer than 10 patients transitioned back to their birth-registered gender – which Yale researchers note is “a ‘detransition’ date of 0.3%.”
The Yale report also states that it is “exceedingly rare that an individual would later determine that they are not transgender” after receiving clinical transgender care and support. “A person who regrets receiving care may continue to identify as transgender; another who stops medications may not experience regret, and one who stops identifying as transgender may not regret receiving medical care,” the report says.
A report in JAMA Pediatrics noted by the Yale report found that 1% of youth who received gender-affirming medications in the study re-identified with their assigned sex at birth.
In another study noted in the Yale report, this one in the LGBT Health journal, 82.5% of those surveyed “reported familial pressure, social pressure, employment difficulty, inability to access care, and financial reasons” as the reason they presented themselves as their sex assigned at birth.
(NEW YORK) — The ongoing scorching heat in the West caused a road to buckle in Washington this week while at least a dozen California cities broke all-time high-temperature records.
A heat wave enveloping much of the nation has been especially sweltering on the West Coast, where some areas have experienced multiple days of triple-digit weather that has turned deadly.
More than 70 million people are under heat alerts in the West as a scorching heat wave continues.
In Oregon, the Multnomah County Medical Examiner’s Office reported Monday that it is investigating at least four suspected heat-related deaths since the state of emergency was declared on July 5 amid dangerously hot temperatures.
Those who perished in the soaring heat included an 87-year-old man, a 75-year-old man and a 64-year-old man, all living in the Portland area, the medical examiner’s office said. A 33-year-old man was taken to a Portland hospital from outside Multnomah County, and also died from a suspected heat-related illness.
The temperature hit 101 degrees in Portland on Monday and 104 degrees in Eugene and Salem, Oregon, according to the National Weather Service (NWS). All three cities set new daily high-temperature records, the weather service said.
Portland is forecast to see its fourth straight day of triple-digit weather on Tuesday, where thermometers are expected to climb to 105 degrees, according to the NWS.
Road buckles in Washington
In Washington, extreme temperatures caused State Route 111 in Skagit County to buckle on Monday, creating potentially dangerous conditions for drivers, according to the Washington State Department of Transportation.
“Our crews were dispatched and found that the concrete panels under the asphalt had buckled due to the heat,” Madison Sehlke, a spokesperson for the Washington State Department of Transportation, told ABC affiliate station KOMO in Seattle.
Washington saw temperatures on Monday climb to the high 90s in some areas. In Olympia, the temperature hit 99 degrees on Monday, breaking a daily record set in 2010, according to the National Weather Service. Seattle also broke a daily temperature record on Monday when the temperature reached 91 degrees, according to the NWS.
Excessive heat warnings in most of California
The entire state of California was either under an excessive heat warning or a heat advisory on Tuesday.
Palm Springs, which set an all-time heat record on Sunday when the temperature peaked at 124 degrees, was forecast to reach 121 degrees on Tuesday, according to the NWS.
A long-duration heat wave is expected to continue through this week in California’s Central San Joaquin Valley.
Fresno is forecast on Tuesday to see its seventh straight day of temperatures hitting 105 degrees or higher, Andy Bollenbacher of the NWS office in Hanford, California, told ABC News.
Bollenbacher said the record for consecutive days of 105 degrees or higher in Fresno is 14. He said the extended forecast shows a temperature in Fresno of 105 degrees or higher lasting through at least Sunday.
The temperature on Tuesday in Fresno is forecast to hit 109 degrees, Bollenbacher said.
Death Valley, California, remains the hottest spot in the nation. At 11 a.m. local time on Tuesday, the temperature in Death Valley was 112 degrees and forecast to reach 128, according to the NWS.
The highest temperature ever recorded in Death Valley was 134 degrees set in 1913, which is also the highest temperature ever recorded on Earth, according to the NWS.
At least 12 cities in California have seen all-time heat records broken since Saturday, including Redding in Northern California which hit 119 degrees on Monday and Dagget in Southern California which reached 118 on Sunday, according to the National Weather Service.
Dangerous heat to drag on in Arizona
Oppressive heat is forecast to continue through the remainder of the week in Arizona, where an excessive heat warning was extended for the Phoenix metro area.
In Phoenix, the temperature is expected to peak at 117 degrees on Tuesday and remain above 109 degrees through at least Monday, according to the NWS. Lake Havasu City is forecast to hit 120 degrees on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday before cooling down to 117 on Friday and 110 on Sunday, according to the NWS.
A 50-year-old man hiking in the Grand Canyon died after being found unresponsive over the weekend, marking the third death in the national park within the last three weeks.
A man was unresponsive when he was found on the Bright Angel Trail in the Grand Canyon about 100 feet from the trailhead on Sunday, according to the Grand Canyon Regional Communications Center.
NPS said temperatures on exposed parts of the trail can reach over 120 degrees in the shade.
Las Vegas expected to break consecutive hot-day record
Just days after recording its hottest day ever, Las Vegas is aiming to break another record: consecutive days of 110 degrees or higher.
The NWS is forecasting high temperatures of 114 to 118 degrees for the rest of this week, putting Las Vegas in a position to break the current record of five straight days of 110 degrees or higher.
Las Vegas has a 90% chance of breaking its all-time record for consecutive days of 110 degrees or above, meteorologist Matt Woods of the NWS office in Las Vegas told ABC News.
Tuesday’s temperature in Las Vegas is forecast to reach 117, making it the seventh straight day it surpassed the 110-degree mark, Woods said.
Las Vegas’ record of 10 consecutive days of 110-degree weather was set in 1961 and tied in July 2023.
“Tomorrow through Saturday we have a 90% chance of reaching a 110,” Woods said. “So it’s very likely we’re going to shatter the record.”
On Sunday, Las Vegas reached 120 degrees, breaking the record for the city’s hottest day ever.
Hot weather in other parts of the nation
By this weekend, the record heat will move into the Rockies, where cities like Denver, Colorado, and Rapid City, South Dakota, could see record highs.
Numerous cities along the East Coast are forecast to hit the century mark or get close.
In Washington, D.C., the temperature hit 98 degrees on Tuesday afternoon and is forecast to reach 96 degrees on Wednesday. Philadelphia hit 94 degrees on Tuesday afternoon. Further south, the temperature Tuesday afternoon in Richmond, Virginia, climbed to 95 degrees and it was 94 in Charlotte, North Carolina, according to the NWS.
(NEW YORK) — Gold bars and hundreds of thousands of dollars in cash the FBI found in Sen. Bob Menendez’s home were not given to him as a bribe, a defense attorney insisted Tuesday during closing arguments in the New Jersey senator’s federal corruption trial.
While waving his arms and pacing in front of the jury box, the defense attorney, Adam Fee, used a sarcastic tone to mock the government’s case as “cherry-picked nonsense.”
Fee accused prosecutors of “fudging” the facts and said the story they told about Menendez is false and insufficient to convict.
“The only honest verdict I submit here is to acquit him on each count,” Fee told the jury during closing arguments Tuesday in the Manhattan federal courthouse. “His actions were lawful, normal and good for the country.”
Prosecutors painted a much different picture of Menendez, whom they accused of corruption on a “massive scale” and of selling his office to businessmen willing to pay.
“The buck stops here. Thousands upon thousands of bucks stop here. It’s time to hold him responsible,” prosecutor Paul Monteleoni said as he wrapped his closing argument on Tuesday.
While Fee said he would not blame jurors for believing “something fishy” was going on after they saw multiple photographs of the nearly $500,000 seized from Menendez’s home stuffed in boots, jackets and bags, he urged the jury to resist a “knee-jerk” reaction.
“The story the prosecutors tell is that it is so weird … it is so inherently unusual and suspicious that Bob must have known it was a bribe,” Fee said. “That is false.”
The defense insisted Menendez hoarded cash because of his father’s experience in Cuba and that it was “common” for his wife to have gold.
The defense also attempted to exploit a weakness in the government’s case: the lack of direct evidence linking Menendez to bribe payments.
“What text, what email, what document suggests to you that that story is credible?” Fee asked the jury. “They have not supplied to you any compelling evidence for the theory they have offered you.”
Prosecutors claimed the cash, gold and a luxury convertible were all bribes from Menendez’s co-defendants, Fred Daibes and Wael Hana, and accused the senator of using his power to benefit the New Jersey businessmen and foreign governments.
All three defendants have pleaded not guilty to their charges.
Closing arguments for Daibes and Hana are expected to follow on Wednesday.
(WASHINGTON) — Iranian government actors are seeking to “take advantage” of pro-Palestinian protests in the United States, according to the director of National Intelligence, including providing financial support to some protesters.
“In recent weeks, Iranian government actors have sought to opportunistically take advantage of ongoing protests regarding the war in Gaza, using a playbook we’ve seen other actors use over the years,” DNI Avril Haines said in a statement. “We have observed actors tied to Iran’s government posing as activists online, seeking to encourage protests, and even providing financial support to protesters.”
This is all part of Iran’s efforts to influence “our democratic process” according to Haines.
“The freedom to express diverse views, when done peacefully, is essential to our democracy, but it is also important to warn of foreign actors who seek to exploit our debate for their own purposes,” Haines said.
During the spring and into the summer, pro-Palestinian protesters have protested on college campuses and in other places.
“Iran is becoming increasingly aggressive in their foreign influence efforts, seeking to stoke discord and undermine confidence in our democratic institutions, as we have seen them do in the past, including in prior election cycles,” she said. “They continue to adapt their cyber and influence activities, using social media platforms and issuing threats. It is likely they will continue to rely on their intelligence services in these efforts, as well as Iran-based online influencers, to promote their narratives.”
In the 2020 election cycle Iranian actors sent spoof text messages around purporting to be the Proud Boys.
(SEATTLE) — A Seattle mom who lost her 3-year-old son in a drowning incident has now established a nonprofit organization dedicated to saving lives through water safety education, legislation and increasing equitable access to swimming lessons.
Chezik Tsunoda created “No More Under” to increase awareness about drowning dangers and to offer access to swim lessons after her son Yori Tsunoda died in 2018.
In 2018, Tsunoda took Yori on a playdate with someone they knew from the preschool he attended, who happened to have a pool in their backyard. When they got to the pool, she said everybody just jumped in.
Yori slipped beneath the surface of the pool, the mom told ABC News. Tsunoda said that kids and adults were all around the pool when they noticed Yori floating face down. He was unresponsive when pulled out of the water, but first responders were able to revive him with CPR and transfer him to Seattle Children’s Hospital where medics pronounced him dead.
According to Dr. Ben Hoffman, President of the American Academy of Pediatrics, drowning is the leading cause of death for children ages 1 to 4 years old. He also said drowning is 100% preventable.
Wanting to bring awareness to water safety and stop needless drownings, Tsunoda founded No More Under in 2019, a year after Yori died.
“We are really dedicated to saving lives through education, legislation and providing access and equity in aquatics,” Tsunoda said. “We’re out handing out water watcher badges, stickers and coloring books that just remind everyone to be safe.”
The organization has been providing swim lessons for the last three years in partnership with YMCAs and local city pools, Tsunoda said, teaching more than 5,000 lessons.
“If you talk about drowning, people turn their heads,” Tsunoda said. “Imagine if we normalized and took some of the shame away from this and really had some understanding of what we can do to save all of these lives. I feel like Yori is changing the world.”
(HANOVER, N.H.) — The death of a Dartmouth College student and fraternity member has prompted a hazing investigation, police said.
Won Jang, 20, was reported missing Sunday afternoon, having been last seen the prior night by the docks of the Connecticut River on the school’s New Hampshire campus.
Search and rescue teams found his body offshore Sunday evening.
His cause of death has not yet been determined, but police said they do not suspect foul play.
Hanover Police Chief Charles Dennis said in an interview with New Hampshire ABC affiliate WMUR they are investigating whether hazing played a role in the student’s death.
“There is some evidence of alcohol involved, certainly from witnesses and talking with things like that. Again, that’s all part of our investigation,” Dennis said. “We did receive an anonymous email this morning through the college that there may be some hazing involved, so we certainly will look into that aspect, too.”
Friends of Jang said he had attended a social gathering by the river that night thrown by his fraternity and a sorority, and that alcohol had been present, according to student newspaper The Dartmouth.
Jang, a biomedical engineering major from Middletown, Delaware, was a member of Beta Alpha Omega, according to the fraternity’s website.
In January, Beta Alpha Omega was subject to disciplinary action for an undisclosed incident, The Dartmouth reported.
Spokespeople for the college and the fraternity did not immediately respond to a request for comment from ABC News.
One of Jang’s friends, Kledian Marinaj, told WMUR he was an “amazing guy” who always had “a smile on his face.”
“I had just been talking to him to make plans to grab a meal sometime,” Marinaj said. “Of course, I was very upset when I first got the news, so I met up with friends around here, and we went on a walk, talking about all the great things about Won, about how he makes jokes and makes people laugh.”
(WASHINGTON) — After Joe Biden’s disastrous debate, Democrats worried about the president’s chances in November are mired in a debate of their own: shut up or shout louder.
Biden, whose decades-long career in Democratic politics has let him rack up chits across the party, has his fair share of defenders, both those who are personally allied with him and others who are worried about his chances but believe criticism of him is damaging to the party’s inevitable nominee.
But other Democrats argue his performance against former President Donald Trump was catastrophic enough that a messy conversation over his staying in the race is worth it if it means forcing him out and putting up a supposedly more electable candidate in November.
The infighting takes the “Democrats in disarray” cliché to a stratospheric level and lays bare a bitter and fundamental disagreement over what counts as messaging discipline, particularly as Republicans fall in line behind a 34-times convicted felon, twice-impeached former president in Donald Trump.
“I do not think that words can adequately describe the fury and frustration that literally every Democrat, whether a professional one or a rank-and-file voter, feels right now that Donald Trump and the Republicans, despite the lawlessness, the criminality and the radicalism, are pretty much escaping scot-free right now, while our dysfunction plays out in the limelight,” Democratic strategist Jon Reinish told ABC News
Congress’ return from recess on Monday amplified Democrats’ intraparty feud, setting off a flood of statements from lawmakers who could no longer avoid the question on the lips of virtually every reporter in Washington. Underscoring the tension surrounding the infighting, House Democrats huddled behind closed doors Tuesday, with cellphones left at the door — ostensibly to prevent real-time leaking to the salivating press corps.
Biden’s backers were vociferous in their defense of the president, pointing to his 2020 victory and subsequent accomplishments to hammer his critics.
“Joe Biden and [Vice President] Kamala Harris defeated Donald Trump in 2020 and they are the Democratic ticket that will do so again this year. Any ‘leader’ calling for President Biden to drop out needs to get their priorities straight and stop undermining this incredible actual leader who has delivered real results for our country,” said Florida Rep. Frederica Wilson.
Other Democrats were less dismissive of Biden’s halting debate performance but said that the criticism could be damaging to the president in the scenario he ends up as the party nominee — effectively helping Trump in the process.
“The drip, drip, drip of public statements of no confidence only serve to weaken a President who has been weakened not only by the debate but also by the debate about the debate,” Rep. Ritchie Torres, N.Y., wrote in X. “Weakening a weakened nominee seems like a losing strategy for a presidential election. The piling-on is not so much solving a problem as much as it is creating and compounding one.”
Biden has forecasted a strategy to reingratiate himself with voters worried about his age (81 years old). An unpromoted appearance on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” Monday, after a Friday interview with ABC News’ George Stephanopoulos, indicated a more muscular media strategy is underway, while the president plans to ramp up his travel to swing states.
He is also taking a more aggressive stance toward even hypothetical critics, swatting away speculation that congressional leadership will join the growing chorus of voices calling for him to drop out of the presidential race.
“He basically called them punks on national TV,” said one informal adviser to Biden’s campaign.
The plan so far has done little to blunt the Democratic furor, with some party members viewing the interview with Stephanopoulos as further evidence that Biden should suspend his campaign. But some strategists said he at least bought himself time to get off the mat.
“They are executing on a plan, and I think the president deserves that folks take a beat, and let’s see. They’re trying to restore confidence. Let’s take a beat and let this plan play out,” Democratic strategist Karen Finney told ABC News last week.
Others are less forgiving.
“Biden set up a debate on his terms, on his home field, and he utterly and totally failed in the most spectacular failure in presidential debate history. He failed. Now, there’s no way he can win. So yeah, we’ve got to do this,” the informal adviser said of the push to get Biden to remove himself from the 2024 ticket.
Virtually every Democrat who said they wanted Biden off the ticket described the current situation as painful, pointing to Biden’s legislative achievements and a general admiration of his character.
But the prospect of a Trump victory looms large in the heads of some party members, overriding any goodwill there is for Biden in favor of supplanting him on November ballots.
“I feel like there’s an opportunity,” one source familiar with the Biden campaign’s strategy said of the talk of Biden’s replacement. “What is painful for some could be exciting for others. And I would just say, like I tell my kids, things have to get messy before they get clean.”
One Democratic pollster sneered at Biden’s defenders, saying talks about the president’s status as the party’s likely nominee were inevitable after the debate, especially with Democrats boasting a deep bench of rising stars.
“They didn’t watch the debate, or they’re in or they’re now in the cult,” the person said. “You can’t have watched that debate and seen a man in his early 80s who already is the oldest president to ever serve, and would be by far the oldest president ever reelected, and say that there aren’t serious concerns when there are alternatives. And that’s the other thing that makes it really, really obnoxious.”
The disagreement is particularly pronounced as Republicans walk in lockstep behind Trump, who is set to be coronated as his party’s nominee at the GOP convention next week.
Republican concerns over Trump’s leadership of the party have persisted since he launched his first campaign in 2015. Incidents like the infamous Access Hollywood tape, the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection and a disappointing 2022 midterm cycle fueled speculation over if the party would move on, all to no avail. And now, dissent is scarce.
“I don’t know that it’s Teflon, per se, everybody sees the flaws and the warts. It’s the fact that there’s a large part of the party that is captivated by his message and his presumed ability to beat Joe Biden,” said GOP strategist Bob Heckman.
The dynamic marks a distillation of the two modern parties — one riven with disagreements over ideology and what counts as “electable,” and another remade in the image of its de facto leader, with policy debates largely papered over by Trump’s outsized sway and critics’ denouncements largely diminished to a grumble.
After the debate, that leaves Democrats as the party beset by endless infighting, leaving some lamenting the parties’ clashing strategies.
“Democrats want to be right, Republicans only care about winning, and that’s the difference between these two nominations right now,” one battleground Democratic strategist said. “Donald Trump’s convicted on 34 counts, not a single Republican has said, ‘he should not be our nominee.’ And because our guy’s too old, we have a complete freak out in the party that’s now going on its eighth or ninth day.”
(NEW YORK) — Harvey Weinstein appeared in Manhattan criminal court on Tuesday, where prosecutors accused him of raping more women than those included in the previous prosecution of the disgraced movie producer.
Prosecutors told Judge Curtis Farber they have not yet decided whether to file additional charges against him, saying they are still evaluating allegations by women who came forward after Weinstein’s conviction was overturned on appeal in April.
“We believe the defendant forcibly raped and sexually abused women in Manhattan that fall within the statute of limitations,” Assistant District Attorney Nicole Blumberg said. “There were women in 2020 who were not ready to proceed with the legal process. They are now ready.”
Blumberg declined to give Farber a timeline for a decision on new charges, but said she would be ready for a new trial this fall.
Weinstein has denied all allegations of sexual misconduct, and his attorneys have expressed skepticism about any new accusers.
Defense attorney Arthur Aidala accused prosecutors of using delay tactics.
“They have a defendant, and now they’re out there looking for a crime,” Aidala said. “They’re out there with a hotline: 1-800-Get-Harvey.”
Prosecutors disputed this characterization by the defense.
“There’s certainly no delay tactic in the people’s case,” Blumberg said. “There were a number of women who came forward to indicate they were raped by the defendant.”
Weinstein, who wore a suit and tie with his head closely shaved, entered court in a wheelchair pushed by court officers.
Aidala said Weinstein has fluid in his lungs and heart, as well as issues with his spine and vision. His diabetes is “going through the roof” while he remains incarcerated, he added.
“He’s a sick man,” Aidala said. “He’s got little kids and he wants to get out.”
Farber admonished the defense during the hearing for making statements outside of court that prosecutors said were meant to intimidate Miriam Haley, a former production assistant who Weinstein was found guilty of sexually assaulting. Her attorney, Gloria Allred, has said Haley has not decided whether to participate in a re-trial of Weinstein. Without her, and absent any new charges, Weinstein would likely face no more than time served if a jury finds him guilty again.
Looking on during Tuesday’s hearing was Jessica Mann, who during Weinstein’s trial gave detailed testimony saying he repeatedly sexually assaulted her over the course of five years.
“Harvey at the time had every advantage over me. Given the immense physical stature of Harvey’s weight, height and ox-like strength — he used that physicality to trap me and prevent me from leaving,” Mann said at his sentencing in March 2020. “Harvey didn’t need to use a physical weapon to make me live in fear of the invisible gun to my head ready to be pulled if he felt in the mood.”
Weinstein’s conviction was thrown out in April after the New York Court of Appeals found the trial judge “erroneously admitted testimony of uncharged, alleged prior sexual acts against persons other than the complainants of the underlying crimes.” The court said that testimony “served no material non-propensity purpose” and “portrayed defendant in a highly prejudicial light.”
The Manhattan district attorney’s office said at the time it would retry Weinstein if the alleged victims were willing to come forward again.
“We will do everything in our power to retry this case, and remain steadfast in our commitment to survivors of sexual assault,” a spokeswoman for Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg said in a statement.
Weinstein is expected back in court on July 19.
He is separately fighting a rape conviction in Los Angeles, where his defense attorneys argued he lacked a fair trial. He was sentenced to 16 years in prison in that case.
(WASHINGTON) — Congressional Democrats on Tuesday are gathering for a consequential day of closed-door meetings where the focus is expected to be largely on President Joe Biden’s viability as a candidate and the path for the party going forward.
House Democrats huddled Tuesday morning at the Democratic National Committee headquarters just steps from the U.S. Capitol.
In a sign of how sensitive the conversation was expected to be, lawmakers’ cellphones were collected at the door, presumably to prevent real-time leaks about the private discussion.
Members were asked by reporters if they still support Biden’s reelection bid as they entered the building. Many signaled they did, including former House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, Rep. Maxine Waters, Rep. Bennie Thompson and others.
Several Democrats denounced Project 2025, a sweeping plan to overhaul the federal government proposed by a conservative group closely aligned with former President Donald Trump, as they made their way inside.
Senate Democrats are set to hold their own conference meeting on Tuesday, which would mark the first time the senators have met since Biden’s poor debate performance against Donald Trump in late June that triggered panic among some in the party about his fitness to carry out the 2024 campaign and serve another four years.
The meetings come at a pivotal moment for Biden, as calls for him to step aside from the race mounted this past week even after he and the White House ramped up outreach to anxious Democrats as it went into damage control mode.
Biden defiantly pushed back on critics on Monday, first in a blunt letter to Democrats saying it’s time for such hand-wringing to end and then in a call to MSNBC’s Morning Joe in which he railed against “elites” challenging his capabilities.
“The bottom line is, we’re not going anywhere. I am not going anywhere!” Biden told MSNBC anchors Joe Scarborough and Mika Brzezinski.
The question now is whether Democrats fall in line behind Biden or whether questions about his candidacy continue to grow with the Democratic National Convention just weeks away.
So far, six Democrats have publicly said they do not support Biden as the nominee: Reps. Adam Smith, Angie Craig, Seth Moulton, Lloyd Doggett, Mike Quigley and Raul Grijalva.
“Any candidate for the highest office in our nation has a strong burden to bear,” Smith said in a statement on Tuesday. “That candidate must be able to clearly, articulately, and strongly make his or her case to the American people. It is clear that President Biden is no longer able to meet this burden.”
Several other senior House Democrats, besides Smith, privately told House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries on Sunday that they’re calling on Biden to exit the race, according to several sources with knowledge of the discussion. Jeffries did not express a position and said he would engage with the caucus throughout the week, according to one person on the call.
Biden on Monday met with Congressional Black Caucus virtually, two sources told ABC News. Black voters helped propel Biden to the White House in 2020 and are a critical voting bloc again in 2024. So far, no member of the Congressional Black Caucus has called on the president to step aside.
No Democratic senator has publicly called on Biden to withdraw from the race, but concerns have been raised by Sen. Mark Warner. Warner, who chairs the influential Senate Intelligence Committee, tried to assemble a group of Senate Democrats to discuss Biden’s path forward as early as Monday but the meeting didn’t take place.
Warner, in a statement on Tuesday, said “now is the time for conversations about the strongest path forward” given what is at stake in the November election.
“As these conversations continue, I believe it is incumbent upon the President to more aggressively make his case to the American people, and to hear directly from a broader group of voices about how to best prevent Trump’s lawlessness from returning to the White House,” Warner said.
Montana Sen. Jon Tester, one of the most vulnerable Senate Democrats up this cycle, similarly said that Biden needs to “prove” to him and voters that he’s up to the job.
Meanwhile, Sen. Joe Manchin, who became an independent earlier this year but still caucuses with Democrats, urged his colleagues to see how the coming days unfold before determining Biden’s future.
“The president has set a course of where he wants to go,” Manchin told ABC News Senior Congressional Correspondent Rachel Scott. “I think he has earned that right and he has a heck of a legacy right now with all the service he has. And just give it time.”
Manchin told reporters he believes the race is “winnable” for Biden.
“I have always said Trump is a threat to democracy,” he said. “You can’t call the race now. I mean, this is ridiculous. It’s early for people to get so excited. The bottom line is just wait until this week.”
This week, Biden will also be tested on the world stage as he hosts dozens of leaders in Washington for the 2024 NATO summit amid reports claiming U.S. allies have privately questioned his ability to lead.
