(WASHINGTON) — CIA Director Bill Burns will soon travel to Europe to meet with Middle Eastern officials as part of an ambitious push to lock down an agreement that would free all of the hostages kidnapped during Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack on Israel that are still being held inside of Gaza in exchange for a prolonged cessation of hostilities, according to U.S. officials familiar with the plans.
The officials said Burns will speak with counterparts from Israel as well as Qatar and Egypt — two countries that have worked as intermediaries between Hamas and other nations since the conflict began. The United States has designated Hamas as a terrorist group.
Various proposals have been discussed during recent weeks, and while officials declined to share specific contours of any deal currently under consideration, they expressed confidence that the release of all detainees in Gaza could be secured by a single diplomatic agreement.
While negotiators still face significant hurdles, the officials’ view that such a deal could be achieved is significant because it was previously believed that some of the hostages in Gaza were held by other groups outside of Hamas’ control and that the terrorist organization may be unwilling to relinquish captured Israeli soldiers.
Roughly 130 hostages are still imprisoned in Gaza, including as many as six Americans, according to the Israeli and U.S. governments.
The conflict, now the deadliest between the warring sides since Israel’s founding in 1948, shows no signs of letting up soon and the brief cease-fire in November that allowed for over 100 hostages to be freed from Gaza remains a distant memory.
The negotiations will also include securing the return of remains of the dozens of dead hostages the Israeli government says are being held in Gaza, according to the officials. The FBI is investigating the deaths of at least two Americans whose bodies are also believed to be inside the enclave.
Burns, who has emerged as the de-facto leader of the Biden administration’s part in the hostage negotiations, has journeyed for face-to-face talks with Israel and other mediators at least two times before.
Before he took the helm of the CIA, Burns spent decades working in foreign diplomacy, serving as ambassador to Jordan and Russia as well as assistant secretary of state overseeing the Middle East.
His latest engagement comes at a potentially sensitive time. This week, Israeli media broadcast an audio recording said to capture Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu slamming Qatar’s role in the negotiations and calling its ties to Hamas problematic.
Qatar responded by saying it was “appalled” by the comments. The Israeli government has neither confirmed nor denied the tape’s authenticity.
U.S. officials have downplayed the impact the spat between the countries may play in negotiations and maintain that Qatar continues to serve as a crucial partner in the process.
Any deal would likely allow for the hostages to be released in waves similar to the stipulations of a previous agreement reached in late November, which ultimately saw 105 hostages freed over the course of a weeklong pause in hostilities.
The staggered release allows nongovernmental groups to more safely manage the exodus of captives from Gaza and permits Hamas to maintain a sense of leverage through the agreed-upon duration of the truce, but it also amplifies the risk that an agreement in principle will fall apart when it’s put into practice.
Secretary of State Antony Blinken and other high-level U.S. officials tried to extend the previous ceasefire, but after a seven-day stretch of hostage releases, Hamas fired on Israel again.
Netanyahu swiftly ordered combat operations restarted at full throttle and accused Hamas of reneging on its promise to release all captive women and children.
U.S. officials acknowledge that a new agreement would likely require a substantially longer window in order to play out, increasing the possibility that any deal could go awry.
(WASHINGTON) — The U.S. and Iraq will begin formal talks in coming days that officials say could lead to the eventual withdrawal of American troops in the country, a major milestone in the years-long effort by the two countries to fight the Islamic State.
The decision to move forward with the discussions, known as the Higher Military Commission, comes just days after Iranian-backed forces in Iraq launched a barrage of missiles on a U.S. base, injuring at least four service members and one Iraqi.
Several defense officials, speaking on condition of anonymity in order to discuss sensitive details, said the latest attack on U.S. forces in Iraq didn’t factor into the decision and that negotiations probably would have started sooner had the Israeli-Hamas war not begun.
Since last fall, some 60 attacks have been launched on U.S. forces in Iraq and more than 90 in Syria, as Iranian-backed militants blame the U.S. for its support of Israel.
There are still about 2,500 American troops serving in Iraq and 900 in Syria to prevent a resurgence of the Islamic State.
U.S. officials also declined to say how soon troops might leave, if they do at all.
“We are going to — together with our Iraqi partners — help determine the shape of the future U.S. military presence in Iraq, and at the same time, ensure an Iraqi lead enduring defeat” of the Islamic State, said a senior defense official, speaking on condition of anonymity.
“But beyond that, we won’t speculate,” the official said.
The U.S. had been working with Iraq in 2014 to take back territory from the Islamic State and deployed troops there to train and advise Iraqi security forces to ensure ISIS doesn’t regain control.
But Iran, Iraq’s powerful eastern neighbor, holds significant sway over the Iraqi government and the Shiite militias that are nominally under Iraqi government control.
After the Israeli-Hamas war broke out last fall, U.S. forces found themselves under increased threat of attack by Iranian-backed militias in the country.
For its part, the continued presence of U.S. troops in Iraq and strikes against Iranian-backed militants has been a flash point for Iraqi lawmakers. Iraq’s foreign minister said in a statement that it wants to “formulate a specific and clear timetable that specifies the duration of the presence of international coalition advisors in Iraq.”
Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said any decision to “transition” the U.S.-led coalition mission will hinge upon three factors — the threat of the Islamic State, operational and environmental requirements, and the capabilities of Iraqi security forces.
“The United States remains committed to a secure, stable, and sovereign Iraq,” he wrote.
Sunday’s attack on U.S. troops at the sprawling Iraqi airbase in western Iraq involved 17 ballistic missiles and rockets and was launched from inside Iraq, according to three U.S. officials.
While the majority of the projectiles were blocked, two ballistic missiles were able to get through U.S. air defenses, the officials said.
(WASHINGTON) — While highlighting new and ongoing infrastructure investments across the country, President Joe Biden on Thursday continued to praise the recent GDP report that found the nation’s economy grew at a 3.3% annual pace — much more rapid than expected — and he gave credit to Americans for an economy that has exceeded expectations.
“Thanks to the American people, America now has the strongest growth, the lowest inflation rate of any major economy in the world. It’s because of you,” he said at an event in Superior, Wisconsin.
The GDP report released Thursday found that in addition to the economy growing at an unexpectedly brisk pace, inflation has eased — showing Americans’ willingness to spend freely in the face of high interest rates and price levels. The latest data marked the sixth straight quarter where the GDP had grown at an annual pace of 2% or more.
Biden took a victory lap for overcoming predictions that a recession would happen since he came into office and the constant headlines warning one was around the corner. With a chuckle, he read the optimistic headlines on the strong fourth quarter.
“Here’s this morning’s headlines from the Wall Street Journal and other papers: ‘U.S. shatters expectations.’ Second headline: ‘The U.S. economy boomed in 2023.’ Third: ‘U.S. economy grew at a shocking pace.’ I love the ‘shocking pace’ bit,” Biden said. “But my favorite is from the Wall Street Journal: ‘What recession? Growth ended accelerating in 2023.'”
As Biden gears up for the general election, he also emphasized how Americans are finally starting to feel better about the state of the economy, which will be a key issue for voters in November. He credited his policies for reaching an auspicious point with the economy.
“Just last week, we saw the biggest jump in 30 years and how positive consumers are feeling about the economy. Things are finally beginning to sink in,” he said. “We passed a lot of really good legislation. We knew it was going to take time for it to begin to take hold, but it’s taken hold now in turning the economy around.”
And while he touted his successes, Biden also criticized former President Donald Trump over his recent comments that the former president hoped the economy would crash on Biden’s watch.
Earlier this month, Trump said in an interview with Lou Dobbs that he wanted the economy to crash in the next year because “I don’t want to be Herbert Hoover.”
Biden questioned, “can you believe it?”
“Well, he said he’s hoping … it happens soon while I’m still president. That’s what he’s hoping for,” Biden said.
Though progress is being made, Biden said, “we obviously have more work to do, but we’re making real progress.”
(WASHINGTON) — Immigration, one of the most politically divisive and complex matters in the U.S. for decades, is emerging as a top issue in the 2024 election.
Look no further than Iowa and New Hampshire, two early-voting states thousands of miles from the southwest border.
Voters there ranked immigration nearly as important as the economy when asked which issue mattered most in deciding how to vote in the Republican presidential contests.
“I think overall the most important thing to me is securing the borders, national security,” Bill Collins of Bedford, New Hampshire, told ABC News at a polling place on Tuesday.
Border security was a centerpiece of Donald Trump’s successful 2016 campaign, and he is now repeating those messages (and in many cases going further than he did eight years ago, accused of echoing Hitler in saying immigrants are “poisoning the blood of our country”) to energize and unite his supporters against what Republicans have dubbed “Biden’s border crisis.”
Meanwhile, President Joe Biden is facing rancor within his own party as Democratic leaders in New York and Illinois are being forced to deal with the fallout from busloads of migrants being sent to their cities by Texas GOP Gov. Greg Abbott amid a historic influx of border crossings.
“In his entire administration, it has eclipsed everything else,” said Muzaffar Chishti, a senior fellow at the nonpartisan Migration Policy Institute.
Migrant encounters at the U.S.-Mexico border reached a record high of 302,000 in December and apprehensions hit historic peak of 2.2 million in fiscal year 2022. Over 100,000 migrants have been transported to cities like Washington, Los Angeles and New York.
Images of migrants lining the streets in Manhattan or Chicago helped shift perceptions of the issue from a far-away problem to a daily close-reminder of border tumult, making it even more potent than in prior cycles.
“This is where it’s different from any other chapter in our history,” Chishti said.
“When you have an organic absorption of migrants in society, it doesn’t get noticed. But when you have sudden, dramatic groups of people showing up then it becomes a different kind of problem,” Chishti added.
Polls show immigration is a major political vulnerability for Biden. He has just an 18% approval rating on the issue, the lowest for any president since ABC News and the Washington Post began asking the question in January 2024.
An ABC News/Ipsos survey conducted last November, one year out from Election Day, showed Republicans were generally more trusted to do a better job than Democrats when it came to handling immigration. At the same time, nearly a third of U.S. adults said they didn’t trust either party to effectively deal with the issue.
Biden’s apparent shift
Biden campaigned as Trump’s foil on immigration, promising to put an end to controversial policies like those that led to families being separated at the border. Shortly after he entered office, he sent a bill to Congress, he said, to “restore humanity and American values to our immigration system.”
But now, amid relentless attacks from critics for his handling of the border, he is entertaining negotiations with Republicans on a compromise immigration bill in exchange for unlocking urgent aid to Ukraine. While hosting mayors at the White House last week, Biden said he is open to “massive changes” to solve the problem at the border, including reforms to asylum laws.
Some congressional Democrats have already aired frustrations with the administration, though no bill text has been released or announced. The Congressional Hispanic Caucus, led by Rep. Nanette Diaz Barragán, called on Biden to “reject Trump-era immigration policies” being pursued by Republicans, saying it’s “unconscionable that the President would consider going back on his word to enact what amounts to a ban on asylum.”
Biden’s apparent shift “appeals to moderates and independents in the electorate but does risk alienating more progressive members of the party,” said Louis DeSipio, a political science and Chicano-Latino professor at UC Irvine.
“Biden’s on a tightrope with this issue,” DeSipio said. “It’s the first time in quite a while that Democrats have had this level of internal division over immigration.”
While a bipartisan deal could deflate the GOP’s talking point that Biden hasn’t sufficiently tackled the issue, there’s the looming question of whether it will happen at all. Trump has urged Republicans not to accept whatever is worked out between Senate negotiators and the Biden administration. House Speaker Mike Johnson, who speaks to Trump frequently on the issue, has said he doesn’t believe now is the time for comprehensive reform. Instead, Johnson has said Biden should use executive action to address the border.
“It’s an issue that Republicans are going to run on but not legislate on,” said Douglas Rivlin, the senior communications director at America’s Voice, a progressive immigration advocacy group.
Biden and the White House are pushing back on Republicans signaling opposition.
“They have to choose whether they want to solve a problem or keep weaponizing the issue to score political points against the president,” Biden said last week.
According to reporters in the room, when asked if the border was secure, Biden replied, “No.” He also said “no” when asked if his administration’s policies have caused any of the problems.
Some immigration activists have accused Biden and Democrats of letting Republicans take control of the narrative.
“Time and time again, what I keep seeing in our polling and in our research is that Americans are just not hearing from Democrats,” said Beatriz Lopez, the deputy director with the Immigration Hub.
Lopez said the group urged the Biden’s team to not cede too much ground in border negotiations to GOP demands, and instead refocus on rebuilding its coalition and reminding voters what’s at stake in 2024.
“You’re not going to win by out-Republican the Republicans,” Lopez said. “You’re going to win by leaning into good pragmatic solutions, reminding people of our shared values and countering the anti-immigrant rhetoric. That’s the formula.”
Trump ramps up anti-immigrant rhetoric
Trump appears even more emboldened this campaign on a number of issues, with immigration at the forefront.
If elected, Trump has said he plans to crack down severely on both legal and illegal immigration. He has vowed to carry out the “largest domestic deportation in American History” and to sign an executive order ending birthright citizenship — both of which would face significant legal challenges, if not practically impossible to implement.
He’s not only gone so far as to suggest migrants are “poisoning the blood of our country,” more recently he’s describing migrants coming to the border as dangerous people coming from “insane asylums” being emptied out around the world. CNN reported earlier this year that his campaign could provide no evidence to back up his claims.
But his message of an immigrant “invasion” appears to be resonating among some Republicans.
Debbe Magee, a Trump supporter, cited the border as her most important issue while attending one of his rallies in New Hampshire.
“We’re not safe,” Magee said.
DeSipio said Trump, both during his presidency and in the years since, has “captured the fear of the change that was coming to the country” with migration over the past few decades and amplified it.
“It has resonated with Republicans since 2016, and now increasingly with some independents and some Democrats,” DeSipio said, though he noted it could do more harm than good among independents and moderates.
Proving the GOP’s embrace of Trump’s proposals, there was little daylight between him and his GOP rivals on how to approach the issue if elected.
While the issue helped to first propel Trump into the White House, it wasn’t as successful in 2018 or 2020. Trump and other Republicans made a migrant caravan moving toward the U.S. a rallying cry in 2018, though Democrats flipped control of the House with a net gain of more than 40 seats. In the 2020 election, immigration issues were largely overshadowed by the COVID-19 pandemic and economy.
But as the 2024 race increasingly turns to a likely rematch between Trump and Biden, Trump is going all in criticizing his chief rival on his management of the border.
“We have millions and millions of people flowing into our country illegally,” Trump said in his New Hampshire victory speech. “We have no idea who the hell they are. They come from prisons and they come from mental institutions. And it’s just killing our country.”
Republican presidential candidate, former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley delivers remarks at her primary-night rally at the Grappone Conference Center, Jan. 23, 2024, in Concord, N.H. (Brandon Bell/Getty Images)
(WASHINGTON) — Former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley faced a growing chorus of calls from former President Donald Trump’s allies and other top Republicans to suspend her White House campaign in the wake of her double-digit loss to Trump in New Hampshire’s primary.
But she’s fighting on, she says, with weeks to go — and weeks to try to change her standing in the polls — before the next major primary, in her home state of South Carolina on Feb. 24.
“Nikki Haley took on the political elites when she ran for governor of South Carolina, and she’s ready to do the same thing again,” Haley campaign spokeswoman Olivia Perez-Cubas said in a statement rolling out two new ads in South Carolina. “South Carolina voters elected Nikki twice thanks to her conservative record of creating jobs, cutting taxes, and combating illegal immigration. They know that Nikki will always fight for them—not the D.C. establishment.”
The new ads — part of a $4 million buy in the state — look to tout Haley’s record during her six years as South Carolina’s governor and contrast her with both President Joe Biden and Trump, the two likeliest 2024 nominees despite polls before the nominating race showing that voters liked the idea of other choices.
“Biden — too old. Trump — too much chaos. A rematch no one wants. There’s a better choice for a better America. Her story started right here, America’s youngest governor, a conservative Republican. And boy did she deliver,” a narrator in one of the new ads says. “Nikki Haley will cut taxes, close the border and defeat the Chinese Communist threat.”
With two rallies this weekend, her campaign has also repeatedly touted the spree of primaries on March 5 — dubbed Super Tuesday — as another chance after her home state for Haley to make a splash in the nominating race.
“We’re going to bring that fight to South Carolina, and you’re gonna see us on the airwaves, in mailboxes, at people’s doors, on the phones. Not just South Carolina,” Mark Harris, the lead strategist with the main pro-Haley super PAC, told reporters on Wednesday. “And then moving on to Super Tuesday — California, Texas, Virginia, Vermont, Massachusetts, Maine, all of these states that have good aspects to them.”
Of note, according to Haley’s allies, are the states where non-Republicans can cast ballots in the Republican primary (with some restrictions) and potentially boost her appeal to anti-Trump, independent and more moderate voters.
Still, that confidence flies in the face of the available polling on the primary path forward and the opinions of many Republican lawmakers and power brokers. Trump himself lashed out on Tuesday night after Haley claimed momentum in New Hampshire, despite losing.
“She’s doing like a speech like she won,” he said. “She didn’t win. She lost.”
Experts believed that New Hampshire offered Haley one of her best chances of actually winning a state primary given its law allowing independents to participate in the Republican race. She also had no other anti-Trump candidate to compete against after former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie left the race, and she won the endorsement of popular Republican Gov. Chris Sununu, a vocal Trump critic.
But Haley lost New Hampshire by about 11 points, though she pointed out that that was an improvement over the thorough romping by Trump in last week’s Iowa caucuses, where he won by more than 30 points.
Next up is South Carolina in February, where Trump currently has a 37-point lead in 538’s polling average.
“This race is far from over,” Haley said on Tuesday night. “There are dozens of states left to go.”
But her defeats so far and challenges ahead have even other Trump skeptics lining up behind the former president — and urging more Republicans to do the same.
“I have seen enough. To beat Biden, Republicans need to unite around a single candidate, and it’s clear that President Trump is Republican voters’ choice,” declared Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, who had said last year that “I think President Trump’s time has passed him by.”
Haley is currently ruling that out, but some strategists expect that she won’t make it to South Carolina’s primary next month, particularly since a big loss in her home state could be a black mark on her electoral record.
“She will test her efforts and realize she is gonna get blown out of the water in her home state. I’ve been through a tough presidential campaign there with McCain. New Hampshire is a beanbag toss by comparison,” said New Hampshire GOP strategist Mike Dennehy, who worked on the late Arizona Sen. John McCain’s 2000 and 2008 presidential campaigns.
“She simply is not ready for what’s coming her way in a state dominated by a conservative Republican establishment,” he said.
On Wednesday night, Haley, though, continued campaigning, addressing a crowd of roughly 500 people in North Charleston, South Carolina, where she touted her performance in the New Hampshire primary, and responded to Trump’s comments from the previous night.
“We got out there, and we did our thing, and we said what we had to say. And then Donald Trump got out there and just threw a temper tantrum. He pitched a fit,” she told the crowd. “He was he was insulting. He was doing what he does, but I know that’s what he does when he’s insecure. I know that’s what he does when he is threatened, and he should feel threatened without a doubt.”
At the event, Haley also said her campaign had raised $1 million since her concession speech Tuesday night.
“Do you know by the way that we have raised a million dollars since I gave that speech last night online in small dollars?” she asked the audience, who responded with applause.
(WASHINGTON) — Maine’s Supreme Court has dismissed an appeal from Secretary of State Shenna Bellows, who requested last week for the high court to consider her earlier decision to bar former President Donald Trump from the state’s primary ballot under the 14th Amendment.
Maine’s top trial court had just days earlier deferred ruling on her landmark decision, which had been appealed by Trump’s team, until after the U.S. Supreme Court settled a similar 14th Amendment case from Colorado, ordering that the challenge would go back down to Bellows for reconsideration after the nation’s highest court had their say.
Bellows filed an appeal of that decision to the Maine Supreme Court so that it might speed up the judicial process ahead of the state’s primary date, but the Court on Wednesday declined to hear the challenge because the Maine Superior Court’s decision was not a “final” judgment, just a deferment.
“Because the appeal is not from a final judgment, we dismiss the appeal as interlocutory and not justiciable,” the seven-justice Court wrote in a 19-page decision.
“Requiring a final judgment in this situation serves the interests of justice; enhances administrative and judicial efficiency; averts our issuance of what would likely be, at least in some part, an advisory opinion; and it allows for true and effective decision-making when the matter is ripe,” the decision reads.
Trump’s campaign billed the dismissal as a victory on Wednesday night, calling it a “disenfranchisement effort” that was “soundly rejected by Maine’s Supreme Court.
President Joe Biden delivers his State of the Union address, Tuesday, Feb. 7, 2023, on the House floor of the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C. (Official White House Photo by Adam Schultz)
(WASHINGTON) — President Joe Biden invited Kate Cox, the Texas woman who was denied an emergency abortion by the state’s Supreme Court in December, to be a guest at the State of the Union, the White House announced Wednesday.
Cox, 31, left the state to get an abortion after the Texas Supreme Court overturned a lower court ruling that would have allowed her to get an abortion for a pregnancy with a severe anomaly.
Cox spoke with President Joe Biden and Jill Biden in a private conversation on Sunday. The president and first lady thanked Cox “for her courage in sharing her story and speaking out about the impact of the extreme abortion ban in Texas,” White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre told reporters.
Jean-Pierre said Cox accepted the invitation.
Jean-Pierre said Cox’s story is “incredibly powerful, devastating, and it speaks to the moment that we are in now when we talk about women having the right to make these deeply personal decisions about their health care that was taken away by the Supreme Court.”
“It is important for Americans to hear the harrowing stories that we’re hearing from women of their experiences across the country,” Jean-Pierre said.
The White House’s announcement of the call and invitation comes after the president and first lady — joined by Vice President Kamala Harris and the second gentleman — held a campaign rally on Tuesday in an effort to center abortion access in the 2024 election.
Cox’s fetus was diagnosed with trisomy 18, a condition described as incompatible with life.
The Texas mother of two had said she “desperately” wanted a chance to try for a third child but was in jeopardy of losing her uterus due to Texas’ abortion bans.
Cox was told by physicians that they could provide her with an induction of labor if the baby’s heart stopped beating, according to Marc Hearron, senior counsel at CRR. However, Cox — already a mother of a 3-year-old and a 1-year-old — had two cesarean deliveries and was told that an “induction carries serious risk of uterine rupture,” according to the lawsuit.
Cox said she was denied the safest form of abortion care for her — a dilation and evacuation procedure.
Cox’s condition became public when she filed an emergency lawsuit against the state of Texas seeking a temporary restraining order on Texas’ abortion bans in her case, so she could be provided with the abortion care she sought.
However, Cox decided to leave the state to get an abortion in the wake of the Texas Supreme Court ruling against her.
A separate ongoing lawsuit filed by 20 women against the state of Texas is challenging the state’s strict abortion bans. The state Supreme Court has not yet issued a decision on whether it will allow the legal challenge to continue.
(WASHINGTON) — President Joe Biden received a key 2024 endorsement on Wednesday from the United Auto Workers, with the union’s president using the occasion to savage Biden’s likely general election opponent, Donald Trump.
Shawn Fain announced UAW’s support for Biden’s reelection bid at their biannual conference in Washington, D.C.
“I know there’s some people that want to ignore this election,” Fain said. “They don’t want to have anything to do with politics. Other people want to argue endlessly about the latest headline or scandal or stupid quote. Elections aren’t about just taking your best friend for the job or the candidate who makes you feel good. Elections are about power.”
The backing of the Michigan-based UAW, with more than 400,000 members, could give Biden an edge in a key battleground state that has helped determine the last two political elections. He won Michigan by about 150,000 votes in 2020; Trump won it by about 10,000 votes four years earlier.
Biden also won the group’s endorsement in 2020, and it backed Hillary Clinton over Trump in 2016.
But Trump was successful in battlegrounds like Michigan and Ohio in that election cycle in part because of his ability to attract more union support than past GOP candidates: The UAW said at the time it believed one in four of its members likely voted for Trump based on surveys.
“The question is, who do we want in that office to give us the best shot of winning?” Fain said on Wednesday. “Who gives us the best shot of organizing? Who gives us the best shot of negotiating strong contracts? Who gives us the best shot of uniting the working class and winning our fair share once again?”
Biden, who has increasingly been gearing in public to face Trump in the general election, also delivered remarks. He thanked the union for its support and praised members for inspiring the labor movement with its strike last year against the Big Three auto makers.
“Let me just say, I’m honored to have your back and you have mine, that’s the deal,” Biden said. “It comes down to seeing the world the same way, it’s not complicated.”
Fain cast the 2024 race as a choice between Biden and Trump and didn’t mince words in his criticism of the former president. He specifically took issue with Trump’s handling of the union’s 2019 strike, arguing that Trump didn’t do a “damn thing” while UAW members confronted General Motors at plants across the U.S.
“Donald Trump is a scab,” Fain said. “Donald Trump is a billionaire, and that’s who he represents. If Donald Trump ever worked in auto plant, he wouldn’t be a UAW member — he’d be a company man trying to squeeze the American worker.”
Trump’s campaign did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Fain’s remarks, though Trump has previously dismissed Biden’s record on unions.
Last year, Biden joined UAW members striking in Michigan against General Motors, Ford and Stellantis on the picket line in a historic show of support for workers amid their contract negotiations with the auto giants for better wages and conditions.
“If our endorsements must be earned, Joe Biden has earned it,” Fain said on Wednesday.
Biden, who has touted himself as the most “pro-union” president, told members that union workers are central to his economic vision to build the economy from the middle out and bottom up.
“Together, we’re proving what I’ve always believed,” Biden said. “Wall Street didn’t build America, the middle class built America and unions built the middle class.”
He continued, “As long as I’m president, the working people are gonna get their fair share. … You deserve it.”
Trump, too, visited Michigan last September just a day after Biden to try to woo auto workers and union members. He delivered a speech at a non-unionized plant.
In that speech, Trump repeated his pitch for economic nationalism, calling himself the only candidate who wants to protect American labor — which was a key pledge in his previous campaigns.
He also attacked Biden for the federal government’s environmental regulation push on tailpipe pollution, which would encourage more electric vehicle manufacturing — while also raising the concerns of auto workers like those in the UAW. Biden has said he wants to invest in the auto industry to spur more electric vehicle use to address climate change.
Trump took a darker view.
“You’re all on picket lines and everything, but it doesn’t make a damn bit of difference what you get because in two years — you’re all going to be out of business,” he said in September. “You’re not getting anything. What they’re doing to the auto industry in Michigan and throughout the country is absolutely horrible and ridiculous.”
ABC News’ Lalee Ibssa and Soo Rin Kim contributed to this report.
(WASHINGTON) — “I don’t get too angry, I get even,” former President Donald Trump sniped on Tuesday night during his New Hampshire victory speech shortly after his former U.N Ambassador Nikki Haley, whom he’d just beaten by double digits, vowed to fight on against him for the 2024 Republican nomination.
“Who the hell was the imposter that went up on the stage before and like claimed a victory? She did very poorly,” Trump said at his election watch party in Nashua, New Hampshire, after it became clear that he had fended off Haley’s challenge in the state where, so far, she has polled the best and where her allies had once predicted a “landslide.”
“She’s doing like a speech like she won,” Trump continued. “She didn’t win. She lost.”
That tone was a stark difference from his election night speech last week in Iowa, where he won a majority of the vote against three rivals but went on to praise his opponents, complimenting them on running good campaigns.
Two of those three hopefuls, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy, quickly ended their White House bids and endorsed Trump. But not Haley. And on Tuesday night, she boasted of improving on the number of votes she got in Iowa (19%) compared to New Hampshire (43%).
Next up, she said, is South Carolina’s primary a month away.
“South Carolina voters don’t want a coronation. They want an election. And we’re going to give them one,” she said. “Because we are just getting started.”
Haley, as Trump noted, has not yet won a primary or in the caucuses and polls show she faces huge challenges in winning over GOP voters elsewhere in the country. He currently leads her by more than 30 points in South Carolina, according to 538.
On Tuesday night, though, she called herself a “fighter” and said there was still a contest to be had between them, even as other leading Republicans increasingly consolidate behind Trump and President Joe Biden has indicated they are essentially already running against one another.
Trump was visibly angry in his speech at Haley for vowing to stay in the race as he argued she has no viable pathway to victory.
His remarks — and his sometimes thinly veiled attacks, like suggesting there were reasons Haley could be “under investigation” — were emblematic of the frustrations within his campaign at Haley for refusing end her bid and unite around the front-runner as his aides argue she won’t achieve success in the next early states.
Haley decided not to participate in the Nevada Republican Party’s caucuses on Feb. 8 and instead chose to partake in the state-run primary two days prior, meaning she won’t garner any delegates in the state.
Trump and his campaign have already starting seizing on that decision, accusing her of being “scared” and preemptively claiming victory in Nevada.
Looking toward South Carolina, Haley’s home state, her chances are — right now — hardly better, Trump’s team says. In addition to his polling lead there, he has earned endorsements from South Carolina’s governor, its two senators and seven of eight members of the state’s Republican congressional delegation as well as many statewide officials.
Trump even highlighted his South Carolina backing in his New Hampshire victory speech, touting the fact that South Carolina Sen. Tim Scott, whom Haley initially appointed, endorsed him over her.
“You must really hate her,” Trump said, turning to Scott on stage.
“Oh, I just love you,” Scott quickly rebutted.
Haley’s team pushed back on Trump’s speech about her on Tuesday, with communications director Nachama Soloveichik saying in part: “Two states have now voted in the presidential race, and Donald Trump barely received half of the vote – not exactly a ringing endorsement for a former president demanding a coronation.”
“His angry rant was filled with grievances and offered the American people nothing about his vision for our country’s future,” Soloveichik said.
But there is likely more criticism coming her way in the next few weeks from the former president and his allies.
Trump campaign senior advisers warned ahead of the New Hampshire primary that unless Haley left the race after losing in the state, she should be ready “to be absolutely demolished and embarrassed in her home state of South Carolina.”
Trump’s next campaign stop is in Phoenix, scheduled to deliver remarks at an Arizona Republican Party event on Friday.
The next day, Trump is set to hold another caucus rally in Las Vegas, differentiating himself from Haley by campaigning in Nevada despite the fact that he’s essentially the only candidate left running in the caucuses. Nevada, however, may be a battleground in the general election.
The Haley campaign has committed to staying in the race through Super Tuesday on March 5, focusing their attention on “open or semi-open primaries,” in 11 of the sixteen states, where non-Republicans can vote, with some restrictions, as Haley pushes to sway independent and more moderate voters to try to cut into Trump’s lead.
Her team claims they see “significant fertile ground” in the campaign calendar ahead.
The Haley campaign has also pointed to Trump’s legal battles which have pulled him off the trail as another argument as to why she should remain in the race.
He denies all wrongdoing and has pleaded not guilty in his four criminal cases.
Earlier this week, Trump narrowly avoided a legal political collision course when a New York judge delayed his E. Jean Carroll civil defamation trial — allowing him to campaign in New Hampshire instead of going back to the courthouse for his testimony.
With two major rulings set to decide the trajectory of his court challenges — pending U.S. Supreme Court decisions on whether he can be taken off state primary ballots based on the 14th Amendment and whether presidential immunity protects him from his criminal election subversion case — Trump is expected to continue to juggle his legal schedule and political schedule throughout his election cycle.
Still, Trump has maintained a consistent message that the legal battles he faces are one of the major reasons he’s vying for another presidential term — contending that his fight against the charges is really a fight on behalf of his movement against government overreach.
Prosecutors, however, have cast him as illegally holding onto government secrets and seeking to interfere with democracy, among other accusations.
ABC News’ Abby Cruz and Nicholas Kerr contributed to this report.
(WASHINGTON) — Texas Sen. John Cornyn, considered a top contender to succeed Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, joined over half of Republicans in the chamber in endorsing Trump following the former president’s victory over Nikki Haley in Tuesday’s New Hampshire primary.
In a reversal, Cornyn in a statement on X called on his party to consolidate support around a single candidate, Trump, after the double-digit win.
“I have seen enough. To beat Biden, Republicans need to unite around a single candidate, and it’s clear that President Trump is Republican voters’ choice,” Cornyn said.
The X statement comes eight months after Cornyn expressed skepticism that Trump could be an effective candidate in a call with Texas reporters.
“I think President Trump’s time has passed him by and what’s the most important thing to me is we have a candidate who can actually win,” Cornyn said in the May call.
Cornyn had changed his tune Wednesday, telling reporters he now likes Trump’s chances compared to President Joe Biden’s polling.
“I think it’s important to unify behind the candidate, and I respect the voter’s choice in Iowa and New Hampshire,” Cornyn said. “I think you’ll see that repeated in South Carolina as well.”
Nebraska Sen. Deb Fischer also joined the ranks of lawmakers backing Trump.
“It’s time for Republicans to unite around President Donald Trump and make Joe Biden a one-term President,” Fischer said on X.
More than 100 Republicans in the House of Representatives are backing Trump. That includes all members of the GOP leadership.
Speaker Mike Johnson on Tuesday night called out members of his party who have yet to endorse the former president.
“It’s now past time for the Republican Party to unite around President Trump so we can focus on ending the disastrous Biden presidency and growing our majority in Congress,” he said on X.
At least two major players in the Senate continue to hold out on Trump: House Minority Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky and House Minority Whip John Thune of South Dakota.
McConnell dodged questions about his decision to withhold an endorsement at the GOP’s weekly press conference Tuesday.
“I don’t have any announcement to make on the presidential election … And in fact, as you may recall — I have stayed centrally out of it,” McConnell said. “And I have not changed my mind about that. I’ll let you know.”
Trump previously called for a primary challenger to close McConnell ally Thune, who won re-election anyway in 2022. Like Cornyn, Thune and Wyoming Sen. John Barrasso, who endorsed Trump in early January, are viewed as likely options of successors to McConnell.
Thune endorsed South Carolina Sen. Tim Scott before Scott dropped out of the race.
But Scott threw his support behind Trump shortly before New Hampshire.
Speaking on Trump’s behalf at the former president’s victory rally post-New Hampshire, Scott delivered remarks reminiscent of Cornyn’s statement, calling on his party to come together.
“It’s time for the Republican Party to coalesce around our nominee and the next president of the United States, Donald Trump,” he said.
