Closing summary
Florida governor Ron DeSantis ruffled some feathers in the Republican party by saying he would oppose further military aid to Ukraine ahead of his widely expected presidential run, and referring to Russia’s invasion as a “territorial dispute”. His comments were rejected by Florida’s Republican senator Marco Rubio but indicate the widening divide in the GOP over continued American aid to Kyiv. Meanwhile, the Republican House oversight committee chair James Comer appeared on Fox News to give an update on his committee’s investigation into Joe Biden and his family’s business practices – but was greeted with skepticism.
Here’s what else happened today:
Two more years for George Santos? The Republican congressman and admitted liar has filed the initial paperwork to stand for re-election.
DeSantis did not always oppose aid to Ukraine, it turns out.
Democratic senator Elizabeth Warren wants answers from Silicon Valley Bank’s former CEO about his advocacy for financial sector deregulation and the role it played in the bank’s collapse.
Roger Wicker, the top Republican on the Senate foreign relations committee, decried “isolationists” (who could he be referring to?) after a Russian plane crashed into an American drone.
The Senate will on Thursday begin the process of repealing the legal authorization for the invasion of Iraq.
Joe Biden yesterday infuriated environmental groups by approving a massive oil drilling project in a protected area of Alaska, despite promising to fight climate change as president. Here’s the Guardian’s Oliver Milman with a look at why the project is so dangerous for the climate, and the reasons Biden may have decided to okay it:
Joe Biden continues to confound on the climate crisis. Hailed as America’s first “climate president”, Biden signed sweeping, landmark legislation to tackle global heating last year and has warned that rising temperatures are an “existential threat to humanity”. And yet, on Monday, his administration decided to approve one of the largest oil drilling projects staged in the US in decades.
The green light given to the Willow development on the remote tundra of Alaska’s northern Arctic coast, swatting aside the protests of millions of online petitioners, progressives in Congress and even Al Gore, will have global reverberations.
There are more than 600m barrels of oil available to be dislodged by ConocoPhillips over the next 30 years, effectively adding the emissions of the entire country of Belgium, via just one project, to further heat the atmosphere.
The scale of Willow is vast, with more than 200 oilwells, several new pipelines, a central processing plant, an airport and a gravel mine set to enable the extraction of oil long beyond the time scientists say that wealthy countries should have kicked the habit, in order to avoid disastrous global heating.
Bloomberg Government reports that the Senate will this week begin the process of repealing the legal authorization for the Iraq war passed more than two decades ago.
The Authorization for Use of Military Force Against Iraq Resolution of 2002 allowed America and its allies to invade Iraq and topple its leader Saddam Hussein, a conflict that many in Washington now regard as a mistake. The Senate’s Democratic leader Chuck Schumer says the first vote on undoing the resolution will come Thursday:
NEWS: #Senate Leader #Schumer says 'this is the week' chamber to begin dismantling #AUMF used 2 decades ago to invade #Iraq
— Nancy Ognanovich (@NOgnanovich) March 14, 2023
Schumer expresses confidence Senate will repeal war authorization as 20-year anniversary of Iraq nears next week
1st procedural vote expected Thursday
After an American drone was downed over the Black Sea following a collision with a Russian plane, the top Republican on the Senate foreign relations committee has warned against downplaying the threat posed by Moscow.
“This incident should serve as a wake-up call to isolationists in the United States that it is in our national interest to treat Putin as the threat he truly is,” Roger Wicker said in a statement, according to NBC News:
Sen Wicker, the top GOPer on Senate Armed Services, in a stmt on the Russia vs US drone incident: "This incident should serve as a wake-up call to isolationists in the United States that it is in our national interest to treat Putin as the threat he truly is.” pic.twitter.com/XjysoFUX3v
— Frank Thorp V (@frankthorp) March 14, 2023
Updated
Democratic senator Sherrod Brown knows his Republican colleagues well. Politicians on the right have plenty of theories as to why the Silicon Valley Bank collapse happened, but few are mentioning a lack of regulation.
Here’s GOP House speaker Kevin McCarthy drawing a line between the Biden administration’s policies, inflation, the Federal Reserve’s rate hikes to stop the price growth and the bank’s collapse:
Biden’s reckless spending caused record inflation and rapid interest rate hikes that broke family budgets and banks too. We must restore fiscal sanity.
— Kevin McCarthy (@SpeakerMcCarthy) March 14, 2023
Writing in the Daily Mail, former vice-president Mike Pence blamed the right’s familiar boogeymen, such as “California’s donor class,” “woke projects fighting climate change” and “left-wing priorities”. Here’s more from Pence:
But SVB is not solely responsible for misallocating its resources on left-wing priorities; the Biden administration actively encouraged them to do so. Rather than ensuring the strength of our banking system, Biden ordered bank regulators to push an environmental agenda. At the time of SVB’s collapse, the Federal Reserve was rolling out its latest climate-risk guidelines.
Keep in mind that Pence is apparently planning to run for president.
Patrick McHenry is the Republican chair of the House financial services committee, and in an interview with Punchbowl News yesterday, he took a more measured view of the Biden administration’s actions. “They currently have the tools, and they‘ve used them appropriately to resolve two banks,” McHenry said. “They acted swiftly and boldly, and I’ve told them more than once that bold action I will absolutely support if it is in the interest of the financial system and in the interest of the American people.”
As you might expect, the downfall of Silicon Valley Bank has become the subject of a partisan blame game in Washington.
Progressives such as Democratic House lawmaker Ro Khanna, whose district includes SVB’s headquarters in Santa Clara, California, blamed a bill passed in 2018 with Republican and some Democratic support for weakening regulations that could have prevented the bank’s collapse.
Here he is, talking to MSNBC:
Rep. Ro Khanna (D-CA), who represents Silicon Valley, says Silicon Valley Bank's collapse is due in part to the fact that “they lobbied to weaken the Dodd-Frank restrictions … to exempt them from the regulations that could have prevented this crisis.” pic.twitter.com/WSeRaVs6qB
— The Recount (@therecount) March 14, 2023
Many Democrats now say they’d like to see those regulations restored. But Sherrod Brown, the Democratic leader of the Senate banking committee, has a reality check for them.
“I’m less hopeful that Congress will do that because I’ve seen the influence of the bank lobby and Wall Street, and in the end, Ohio workers always pay for this when they get their way,” Brown, who represents the midwestern state, told Bloomberg Television.
“Republicans aren’t going to move anything,” he added in a separate interview. Instead, he’s calling on the Federal Reserve to stop increasing interest rates and to act unilaterally to increase scrutiny of financial institutions.
Washington’s efforts to protect the US financial system from bank failures may have just become more complicated, after data indicated inflation slowed but remained high last month. The Guardian’s Lauren Aratani explains why these numbers matter:
Price rises slowed again in February as the annual rate of inflation eased but the report has been overshadowed by a banking crisis ahead of next week’s meeting of the Federal Reserve.
Prices in February were 6% higher than a year ago, down from an annual rate of 6.4% in January and significantly lower than the 9.1% peak of inflation seen in June. Between January and February, prices rose 0.4% as prices increased in sectors including housing and food.
While February saw the continuation of a downward trend in the 12-month inflation rate, the core prices – which excludes volatile food and energy prices – increased by 0.5% in February compared with a 0.4% monthly gain in January.
Joe Biden will today announce an executive order cracking down on illegal firearms sales, which has been cheered by gun control groups. The Guardian’s David Smith has more on the effort:
Joe Biden will announce on Tuesday that he is ordering the attorney general, Merrick Garland, to crack down on gun sellers who break the law, “moving the US as close to universal background checks as possible”, the White House said.
The president will speak in Monterey Park, California, meeting victims’ families and community members devastated by a mass shooting that claimed 11 lives and injured nine other people in January.
Opinion polls show that a majority of both Democrats and Republicans support universal background checks that would reveal whether a person is a convicted criminal or domestic abuser before allowing them to buy a gun. But with Republicans in control of the House of Representatives, there is little hope of Congress heeding Biden’s pleas to pass legislation.
The day so far
Florida governor Ron DeSantis ruffled some feathers in the Republican party by saying he would oppose further military aid to Ukraine ahead of his widely expected presidential run, and referring to Russia’s invasion as a “territorial dispute”. His comments were rejected by Florida’s Republican senator Marco Rubio but indicate the growing divide in the GOP over American aid to Kyiv. Meanwhile, the Republican House oversight committee chair James Comer appeared on Fox News to give an update on his committee’s investigation into Joe Biden and his family’s business practices – but was met with skepticism.
Here’s what else has happened today so far:
Two more years for George Santos? The Republican congressman and admitted liar has filed the initial paperwork to stand for re-election.
DeSantis did not always oppose aid to Ukraine.
Democratic senator Elizabeth Warren wants answers from Silicon Valley Bank’s former CEO about his advocacy for financial sector deregulation and what role it played in the bank’s collapse.
George Santos has also taken a page out of Nikki Haley’s book and is proposing legislation that would force the president to take a mental competency test.
Haley, Donald Trump’s former UN ambassador who is running for the GOP’s presidential nomination next year, has proposed making anyone over 75 pass a mental competency test in order to serve in the White House. Trump and Joe Biden are both over that age.
Santos is more direct: his legislation would force the current president to take a test, by the start of next year.
“Regardless of political affiliation, this should be a common sense and bipartisan agreement that when a man or a woman becomes President, they submit to an annual cognitive evaluation,” Santos, an admitted fabulist, said in a statement.
“Physical examination results are publicly released throughout their time in office, and a thorough cognitive assessment should also be included, and failure to comply will result in no federal funds being obligated or expended for official travel.”
George Santos moves closer to filing for re-election
George Santos, the Republican congressman who has admitted to telling many lies in his successful run for office last year, filed paperwork that would allow him to stand for a second term representing his district, the New York Times reports.
The lawmaker’s filing of a statement of candidacy with the Federal Election Commission does not mean Santos will necessarily run again, according to the Times, but does let him raise money for campaign expenses. Ever since Santos’s fabrications were revealed by the newspaper shortly after his election victory in a Democratic-leaning New York district, the congressman has faced calls to resign from his own constituents and lawmakers from both parties.
He’s resisted those calls, but is also at the center of several investigations, including a House ethics committee inquiry and a sexual harassment allegation.
Florida isn’t the only place seeing conservative infighting today.
James Comer, the Republican chair of the House oversight committee, went on Fox News today to talk about the latest developments in his investigation into the Biden family’s business practices – and was given surprisingly skeptical treatment from interviewer Bill Hemmer:
House Oversight Committee Chair James Comer: “Now there’s a new name that’s emerged, and they are a Biden.”
— The Recount (@therecount) March 14, 2023
Fox News’ Bill Hemmer: “It’s been five years, and what do we have for it? Five years — long time to be investigating.” pic.twitter.com/6m2AzydwNL
Fox News’ Bill Hemmer: “Again: five years investigating — nothing just yet. James Comer, thank you for your time today.” pic.twitter.com/iMt3BGgPxx
— The Recount (@therecount) March 14, 2023
Earlier today, Comer announced the Treasury had agreed to hand over some suspicious activity reports generated by the Bidens and their associates.
Florida's Rubio rejects DeSantis comments on Ukraine
Marco Rubio, Florida’s Republican senator, disagreed with governor Ron DeSantis’s characterization of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine as a “territorial dispute” in a radio interview.
The comments to conservative host Hugh Hewitt underscore the divide within the GOP over Washington’s support to Kyiv, which has the support of most Democrats.
Here’s what the senator had to say:
Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL) rejects Gov. Ron DeSantis' (R-FL) claim that Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is a “territorial dispute”:
— The Recount (@therecount) March 14, 2023
“It’s not a territorial dispute … anymore than ... if the United States decided that it wanted to invade Canada or take over the Bahamas.” pic.twitter.com/uOMzzHw8vr
Democratic senator Elizabeth Warren has sent a letter to Silicon Valley Bank’s (SVB) former president and CEO Greg Baker demanding answers about his involvement in rolling back financial regulations in 2018.
Warren and other progressive Democrats have blamed the weakening five years ago of parts of the 2010 Dodd-Frank Act, which tightened requirements on banks after the global financial crisis, for playing a part in SVB’s collapse last week. In her letter, Warren cast Baker as a cheerleader for loosening the regulations, which led to the bank’s collapse:
Despite your assurances to Congress that SVB was sufficiently protected from risk because of your various efforts, it is now clear that SVB was wholly unequipped to independently assess its business’s risk. SVB failed – while its Chief Risk Officer position sat vacant for eight months as its financial standing deteriorated – because it failed to address two key risks: concentration in your client base, and rising interest rates. This is a failure of “Banking 101” – what one analyst called “sheer incompetence.” Had SVB been subject to Dodd-Frank rules undone by EGRRCPA the bank would have been required to maintain stronger liquidity and capital requirements and conduct regular stress tests that would have required SVB to shore up its business to weather the type of stress it experienced last week. But because you fought to exempt SVB from those stronger rules, the bank was in a much weaker position to withstand the bank run.
Warren asked Baker for his response by 28 March.
While financial markets appear to have stabilized (for now) after last week’s collapse of Silicon Valley Bank, the legal and political fallout is unlikely to resolve itself for a long time. Reuters reports that the first of what will probably be many lawsuits has been filed against the shuttered institution:
SVB Financial Group and two top executives have been sued by shareholders over the collapse of Silicon Valley Bank, as global stocks continued to suffer on Tuesday despite assurances from the US president, Joe Biden.
The bank’s shareholders accuse the SVB Financial Group chief executive, Greg Becker, and chief financial officer, Daniel Beck, of concealing how rising interest rates would leave its Silicon Valley Bank unit “particularly susceptible” to a bank run.
The proposed class action was filed on Monday in the federal court in San Jose, California.
It appeared to be the first of many likely lawsuits over the demise of Silicon Valley Bank (SVB), which US regulators seized on 10 March after a surge of deposit withdrawals.
It’s a blast from the past courtesy of CNN, which dug up a 2015 interview with then-congressman Ron DeSantis, who sounded fine with arming Ukraine.
At the time, Ukraine was fighting Russian-backed separatists in a chunk of its east, while DeSantis was on his second term representing Florida in the House of Representatives.
Here’s a clip of the interview with conservative radio host Bill Bennett that CNN found:
Audio: DeSantis previously strongly supported arming the Ukrainians in 2015: “We in the Congress have been urging the president, I’ve been, to provide arms to Ukraine. They want to fight their good fight. They’re not asking us to fight it for them.”
— andrew kaczynski (@KFILE) March 14, 2023
pic.twitter.com/JD3lqaG5Ec
Ukraine’s cause has created unlikely alliances and rivalries across Washington – and the United States at large. The Guardian’s David Smith spoke to country music star Brad Paisley, who has lately become a champion of Kyiv:
Wearing white cowboy hat, black suit and black tie, country singer and guitar virtuoso Brad Paisley strode on stage in the East Room of the White House before a bipartisan audience.
It was a Saturday night and, fittingly, he began the 40-minute set playing his hit song American Saturday Night – but with an amended lyric. “I had to change the second line because it mentioned Russia, and I don’t do that any more,” he explained.
When Paisley delivered its substitute – “There’s a Ukrainian flag hanging up behind the bar” – no one applauded louder than Joe Biden in the front row.
It was a moment that illustrated Paisley’s engagement with Ukraine’s fight for survival and, before a gathering of governors from blue and red states, his efforts to bridge political divides. The 50-year-old from West Virginia, a three-time Grammy winner, describes himself as hard to categorise but optimistic that America can move beyond what has been called a cold civil war.
In what may be another consequence of the growing rift within the GOP over supporting Ukraine, Semafor reports activists calling for more aid to Kyiv are having trouble getting a meeting with House speaker Kevin McCarthy.
“That’s a shame because we wanted very much to thank him for all of the assistance which Ukraine is receiving from the United States and also explain what is the price of the Ukrainian victory in 2023 and why this would have the geopolitical implications on China, which definitely is the top priority for him given from his public interviews which we were hearing on Fox News just yesterday,” said board member Olena Halushka of the Anti-Corruption Action Center in Ukraine.
Together with other Ukrainian activists, Halushka said they’d reached out to members of Congress who are showing resistance to their cause, but with no luck.
“We sent requests to many of the most skeptical voices, but unfortunately we didn’t receive any feedback or confirmation,” she said.
Semafor reports a spokesman for McCarthy did not respond to a request for comment.
Here’s Ron DeSantis’s full statement outlining his position on Ukraine, as posted by Tucker Carlson:
Florida Governor @RonDeSantisFL answers our Ukraine questionnaire:
— Tucker Carlson (@TuckerCarlson) March 14, 2023
“While the U.S. has many vital national interests – securing our borders, addressing the crisis of readiness within our military, achieving energy security and independence, and checking the economic, cultural,… https://t.co/1I2elVi6hI
Other big Republican names responded to the Fox News commentator’s questionnaire, including Texas governor Greg Abbott, South Dakota governor Kristi Noem, former vice president Mike Pence and, of course, Donald Trump.
Trump, DeSantis, Carlson align on Ukraine, but remain at odds
It was unlikely an accident that Florida’s Republican governor Ron DeSantis declared his opposition to arming Ukraine on Tucker Carlson’s Fox News show. The commentator is a Ukraine foe and with about three million viewers a night, perhaps the most popular one in American media. DeSantis’s position on the issue was revealed in a questionnaire Carlson sent to him and other potential 2024 presidential contenders, with the host reading their responses on air. You can watch that moment here:
Ron DeSantis responds to questions from Tucker Carlson about Ukraine and clarifies his position:
— Washington Free Beacon (@FreeBeacon) March 14, 2023
"We cannot prioritize intervention in an escalating foreign war over the defense of our own homeland" pic.twitter.com/PlcN2Odbb0
DeSantis’s stance aligns himself with Donald Trump, the presumed Republican frontrunner who also opposes aid to Ukraine. But the former president’s relationship with Carlson has become awkward lately, thanks to messages from Fox News employees released as part of a lawsuit.
“I hate him passionately,” Carlson said of Trump in one of the messages.
Eyeing 2024, DeSantis comes out against Ukraine aid
Good morning, US politics blog readers. Last night, Florida’s Republican governor and all-but-declared 2024 presidential contender Ron DeSantis said he was opposed to further American aid to Ukraine, via a statement read on the air by Fox News commentator Tucker Carlson. The decision aligns DeSantis with his rival Donald Trump, who is seen as the frontrunner for the GOP’s presidential nomination next year, but creates daylight between him and many other Republicans who say backing Kyiv is a national security priority. With Democrat Joe Biden a staunch friend of Ukraine, the governor’s stance makes clear the potential consequences if the GOP retakes the White House next year. We’ll see if anyone else in the party weighs in on DeSantis’s decision today.
Here’s what else is happening:
Biden will sign an executive order today to crack down on illegal gun sellers. He’ll make the rule official in Monterey Park, California, site of a January mass shooting in which 11 people were killed.
The Treasury will turn over some suspicious transaction records about the Bidens to James Comer, the House Republican leading the investigations into the president and his family.
New inflation data showed price growth slowing last month but still remaining potent, potentially complicating the response to the collapse of Silicon Valley Bank.
Updated
