Today in US politics
That’s it from me today. Here’s what happened in US politics on this relatively sleepy Friday:
The Senate is continuing to negotiate over a supplemental funding package to provide aid to Ukraine and money for border security. The secretary of homeland security, Alejandro Mayorkas, met with senators on Capitol Hill today as the talks continue. However, the House has already adjourned for its holiday recess, so it is unclear how a spending package could pass both chambers of Congress before the end of the year.
Negotiators are reportedly hoping to reach a deal on the package as early as Sunday, but it will likely take more time to draft text of a bill. That text will then be closely scrutinized by lawmakers of both parties as well as immigrant rights groups.
The jury in Rudy Giuliani’s defamation trial resumed its deliberations today, but jurors have not yet reached a decision on what damages the former Trump lawyer should pay to the former Georgia election workers Ruby Freeman and her daughter Shaye Moss. Freeman and Moss’s lawyer argued that Giuliani substantially damaged their reputations by spreading lies about them related to Donald Trump’s efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election.
The New York Times reported that the supreme court justice Neil Gorsuch took just 10 minutes to sign off on Justice Samuel Alito’s opinion overturning Roe v Wade in 2022. The Times reports: “Justice Alito appeared to have pregamed it among some of the conservative justices, out of view from other colleagues, to safeguard a coalition more fragile than it looked.”
The blog will be back on Monday for more updates from Washington.
Updated
Following a 90-minute meeting with the secretary of homeland security, Alejandro Mayorkas, this morning, one of the Democratic negotiators in the immigration talks, Senator Chris Murphy of Connecticut, expressed optimism about the direction of the negotiations.
“It’s a very aggressive goal to get this on the floor next week, but there’s a lot of good faith in that room,” Murphy said, per Punchbowl News. “There are still disagreements. We continue to work at it.”
Meetings are expected to continue this afternoon and into the weekend, as the Senate hopes to hold a vote next week on a supplemental funding package.
Congress has taken steps to restrict public access to records related to UFOs, the Guardian’s Richard Liscombe reports:
If the truth about UFOs is out there, the American government doesn’t want you to see it yet.
Just months after US space agency Nasa appointed a research director of unidentified anomalous phenomena, and promised more transparency about what it knows, the US Congress has acted to throttle the flow of information that ultimately reaches the public.
Measures to create a presidential commission to review UFO records, and to order the Department of Defense to declassify certain “records relating to publicly known sightings of unidentified aerial phenomena (UAP)”, were stripped from the sweeping defense policy bill that passed Congress on Thursday with bipartisan support.
What was left were provisions ordering the National Archives to collect reports of “unidentified anomalous phenomena, technologies of unknown origin and nonhuman intelligence”, but giving various government departments broad authority to keep the records secret.
Read the Guardian’s full report:
While many hard-right Republicans remain staunchly opposed to sending more money to Ukraine, one prominent Democrat warned that their rhetoric risked empowering dictators.
In response to Volodymyr Zelenskiy’s visit to Washington earlier this week, congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene, a hard-right Republican of Georgia, accused the Ukrainian president of “begging for your money”.
No sweeter Christmas gift to Vladimir Putin than statements like this.
— Steny Hoyer (@RepStenyHoyer) December 15, 2023
Our inaction warms the heart of dictators and despots across the globe. https://t.co/ILXgPJI9To
“How much money will Washington spend to slaughter an entire generation of young Ukrainian men as Washington fights it’s proxy war with Russia?” Greene said Tuesday. “Shame!”
Congressman Steny Hoyer, a Democrat of Maryland and the former House majority leader, responded to the comment today, attacking Greene for promoting the interests of Russian President Vladimir Putin.
“No sweeter Christmas gift to Vladimir Putin than statements like this,” Hoyer said. “Our inaction warms the heart of dictators and despots across the globe.”
Joe Biden will “have an LBJ moment” and decide not to run for re-election next year, the leftwing academic and independent presidential candidate Cornel West has predicted.
“I’m not even sure whether I’ll be running against Biden,” West told Politico. “Biden – I think he’s going to have an LBJ moment [and] pull back.”
West was referring to the moment on 31 March 1968 when Lyndon B Johnson, in office since the assassination of John F Kennedy in November 1963, announced that he would not seek re-election.
Already the oldest president ever sworn in, Biden is 81 and would be 86 at the end of a second term. In polling, clear majorities say he is too old.
Read the Guardian’s full report:
In a moment of levity before the holidays, comedian Conan O’Brien visited the White House press briefing room and chatted with reporters.
“They won’t let me take questions,” O’Brien joked. “But, boy, I have the answers to everything.”
O’Brien explained that he was visiting the White House because he is a “huge history buff slash nerd” who has toured the building a number of times.
Watch the full clip:
"They won't let me take questions, but boy I have the answers to everything."
— CSPAN (@cspan) December 15, 2023
WATCH: @ConanOBrien visits the White House Press Briefing Room. pic.twitter.com/QZq4vt2j7s
Border deal could be announced this weekend, report says
A Senate deal to overhaul border policies could be unveiled as early as Sunday, sources told Semafor. But it remains unclear how quickly senators can compile the text of a bill, which will be closely scrutinized by immigration groups.
One of the chief negotiators, Senator Kyrsten Sinema of Arizona, told reporters that they were “making progress” in their talks and would hold more meetings this afternoon and over the weekend.
The Senate majority leader, Democrat Chuck Schumer, has already indicated he wants to hold a vote on a supplemental funding package next week, and he has delayed the chamber’s holiday recess to accommodate a potential vote.
Congressman Steny Hoyer, a Democrat of Maryland and the former House majority leader, is imploring the House speaker, Republican Mike Johnson, to call the chamber back to session if the Senate passes a supplemental funding package.
In a letter sent to Johnson today, Hoyer argued the House must act swiftly if the Senate reaches a deal on Ukraine aid and border policy changes.
“As Members return to their districts for the holidays and the people of Ukraine and Israel continue to wait anxiously for supplemental aid, I write to urge you to call the House back within 72 hours of the Senate passing legislation to provide additional assistance to our allies,” Hoyer wrote.
“We ought to have secured these vital resources for our allies months ago. There is no cause that demands the attention of this Congress more than the preservation of democracy, freedom, and our national defense.”
So far, Johnson has shown little interest in calling members back from their holiday recess, saying yesterday: “The House will not wait around to receive and debate a rushed product.”
The US supreme court has refused to overturn an Illinois ban on assault weapons and high-capacity ammunition, Michael Sainato reports:
The court rejected the request, made by a gun shop and a national gun rights group in an appeal of a lower court’s decision not to allow a preliminary injunction to block the law.
A previous injunction request was also denied by the supreme court in May 2023. As is customary, the justices did not comment on their denial of the injunction.
The latest request came from a firearms retailer owned by Robert Bevis in Naperville and the National Association for Gun Rights.
In November 2023, a US appeals court upheld the Illinois assault weapons ban, rejecting appeals that challenged the law by claiming it violated the second amendment of the US constitution.
Read the Guardian’s full report:
Today so far
Here’s where the day stands so far:
The Senate is continuing to negotiate over a supplemental funding package to provide aid to Ukraine and money for border security. The secretary of homeland security, Alejandro Mayorkas, was spotted on Capitol Hill today as the talks continue. However, the House has already adjourned for its holiday recess, so it is unclear how a spending package could pass both chambers of Congress before the end of the year.
The jury in Rudy Giuliani’s defamation trial resumed its deliberations today, as jurors weigh what damages the former Trump lawyer should pay to Georgia election workers Ruby Freeman and her daughter Shaye Moss. Freeman and Moss’ lawyer argued that Giuliani substantially damaged their reputations by spreading lies about them related to Donald Trump’s efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election.
The New York Times reported that supreme court Justice Neil Gorsuch took just 10 minutes to sign off on Justice Samuel Alito’s opinion overturning Roe v Wade in 2022. The Times reports: “Justice Alito appeared to have pregamed it among some of the conservative justices, out of view from other colleagues, to safeguard a coalition more fragile than it looked.”
The blog will have more coming up, so stay tuned.
The secretary of homeland security, Alejandro Mayorkas, was seen leaving Capitol Hill after meeting with senators to continue talks over a potential deal on border policy changes.
The cabinet secretary did not answer reporters’ questions as he left the Capitol, per Punchbowl News, so it is unclear what (if any) progress was made in the negotiations.
Gorsuch took 10 minutes to approve Dobbs abortion opinion – report
The conservative supreme court justice Neil Gorsuch took just 10 minutes to approve without changes a 98-page draft of the opinion that would remove the federal right to abortion that had been guaranteed for nearly 50 years, the New York Times reported.
According to the paper, Samuel Alito, the author of the opinion in Dobbs v Jackson, the case that struck down Roe v Wade, from 1973, circulated his draft at 11.16am on 10 February 2022.
Citing two people who saw communications between the justices, the Times said: “After a justice shares an opinion inside the court, other members scrutinise it. Those in the majority can request revisions, sometimes as the price of their votes, sweating sentences or even words.
“But this time, despite the document’s length, Justice Neil M Gorsuch wrote back just 10 minutes later to say that he would sign on to the opinion and had no changes.”
Three other conservatives – Clarence Thomas, Amy Coney Barrett and Brett Kavanaugh – signed on in the following days.
Read the Guardian’s full report:
As the Senate continues to negotiate over a potential deal on Ukraine aid and border policy changes, Congress did manage to pass one substantial bill this week.
Yesterday, the House passed an $886bn defense policy bill in a vote of 310-118, sending the legislation to Joe Biden’s desk. The Senate had easily passed the bill a day earlier, in a vote of 87-13.
The legislation includes the largest pay raise for troops in more than two decades and represents a funding increase of about 3% compared to the prior year.
The bill’s passage caps off months of conflict between the House and the Senate, after the two chambers passed very different versions of the bill. The proposal initially passed by the House included controversial provisions aimed at restricting transgender troops’ access to gender-affirming healthcare and blocking the Pentagon’s reimbursement policy for service members who travel to get an abortion.
Those policies were stripped out of the bill to get it passed through both chambers of Congress, angering the hard-right Republicans who had pushed for their inclusion.
“You almost feel like a parent who’s sent a child off to summer camp and they came back a monster,” congressman Matt Gaetz, a hard-right Republican of Florida, said of the final bill. “That’s what we’ve done. This bill came back in far worse shape.”
Jury continues to deliberate in Giuliani defamation case
The jury is still deliberating in a federal case to determine how much Rudy Giuliani should have to pay two Georgia election workers he spread lies about after the 2020 election.
The jury started deliberating around 1:30 pm yesterday and went home at five. They returned this morning at 9 a.m. In total, they’ve now deliberated for around 5.5 hours.
The press room here is still packed. While she’s waiting for the jury, U.S. District Judge Beryl Howell is moving through her docket. Several of the cases are scheduling matters in January 6 cases.
During one case, Howell was confused, and slightly incredulous, to learn about the term “ghost bus,” a right-wing conspiracy theory about January 6.
Updated
Senator John Fetterman, a Democrat of Pennsylvania who has been celebrated on the left for his anti-establishment persona, has attracted criticism from progressives over his staunch support of Israel amid the war in Gaza.
Speaking to NBC News about his views, Fetterman reiterated that he does not identify as a progressive and stood by his position on Israel.
“I’m not a progressive,” Fetterman told NBC News. “I just think I’m a Democrat that is very committed to choice and other things. But with Israel, I’m going to be on the right side of that.”
Fetterman also emphasized the urgent need to pass an aid package for Ukraine and Israel, even if it means making significant concessions to Republicans on immigration policy.
“Progressives better do that because we can’t leave Israel — we can’t sell them out, and we can’t sell Ukraine out, and we have to deliver on this,” Fetterman said. “I just would very much like to get a deal to deliver this critical aid.”
A Punchbowl News reporter spotted the secretary of homeland security, Alejandro Mayorkas, and some White House staffers arriving on Capitol Hill this morning. Their presence in the Capitol indicates the Senate negotiations over border policies are continuing in earnest today:
DHS Secretary Mayorkas & WH staff arrive at Senate for border talks pic.twitter.com/JxawFl7UPA
— Andrew Desiderio (@AndrewDesiderio) December 15, 2023
After Senate Republicans blocked one version of the supplemental funding package last week, members called on Joe Biden to become more actively engaged in the talks over immigration reform.
“The commander in chief — if there’s a deal to be made — is going to have to get involved in the negotiations,” Senator Lindsey Graham, a Republican of South Carolina, said on Tuesday. “It’s his job above all others.”
House Republicans voted on Wednesday to formally authorize the impeachment inquiry into Joe Biden, even though they have uncovered no proof that the president financially benefited from his family’s business dealings. Some right-wing media figures appear to have grown weary of the investigation, the Guardian’s Richard Luscombe reports:
Several figures at Fox News, a usually reliable mouthpiece for most Republican party initiatives in Washington DC, have shown signs of “impeachment fatigue”, appearing to question the motivation of the vote to authorize an impeachment inquiry that Biden himself has condemned as “a baseless political stunt that even Republicans in Congress admit is not supported by facts”.
Peter Doocy, Fox’s White House correspondent, was among the most vocal, telling viewers that “Republicans are still trying to connect” money that the president’s son, Hunter Biden, earned overseas to accounts controlled by Joe Biden.
“The House oversight committee has been at this for years, and they have so far not been able to provide any concrete evidence that Joe Biden personally profited from his son Hunter’s overseas business,” Doocy said.
“But they are going to try again with this impeachment inquiry.”
Read the Guardian’s full report:
Republicans are skeptical supplemental funding package can be passed quickly
Despite signs of progress in the Senate negotiations over a supplemental funding package, some Republicans are skeptical that a bill can be passed quickly.
For one thing, the House has already adjourned for its holiday recess, and the speaker, Republican Mike Johnson, has shown little interest in calling members back.
In addition to those logistical concerns, at least one Republican senator has indicated he wants to see some assurance that the House will pass the bill as well before the Senate votes on it.
“As we’ve seen recently, just because the speaker supports something doesn’t mean the House will go along with it,” Senator John Cornyn, a Republican of Texas, told Punchbowl News.
“There’s no reason for us to rush to pass something that’s dead on arrival in the House.”
But House passage of a funding bill is far from guaranteed, even if Republicans win some concessions on immigration policies. Dozens of hard-right House Republicans remain adamantly opposed to additional Ukraine aid, which could jeopardize the bill’s passage.
Updated
Abortion rights supporters in Florida hope to enshrine the right to terminate a pregnancy in the state constitution by approving a ballot measure next year. Republican voters may be key to realizing that goal, Joseph Contreras reports for the Guardian:
More than 150,000 registered Republican voters in Florida have now signed a petition calling for a constitutional amendment that would guarantee a woman’s right to an abortion up to the point of a fetus’s viability, which is generally considered to be around the 24th week of pregnancy.
The effort is a no-brainer, according to Miami-born Republican Carlos Lacasa.
“How can my party be so vigorous in its defense of the right to bear arms yet not defend a woman’s right to make decisions about her own healthcare?” says the son and grandson of Cuban immigrants who fled communism under Fidel Castro in the early 1960s.
“I believe in small government, and morality cannot be legislated without an overwhelming consensus of the governed – and there is no such consensus on this issue.”
In supporting this effort, Lacasa will break ranks with the state’s rightwing governor, Ron DeSantis, and his allies in the Florida legislature who have sharply limited access to abortions in the state in the last two years, encouraged in part by the supreme court overturning Roe v Wade.
Read the Guardian’s full report:
The jury in Rudy Giuliani’s defamation trial will continue its deliberations today, as they weigh what damages the former Trump lawyer should pay to Ruby Freeman and her daughter Shaye Moss.
Freeman and Moss’ lawyer argued that Giuliani substantially damaged their reputations by spreading lies about them related to Donald Trump’s efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election.
The lawyer, Michael Gottlieb, has asked the jury to award Freeman and Moss at least $24m each to “send a message” to others who might consider similar election schemes.
“They say when someone shows you who they are, believe them. Mr Giuliani has shown us over and over and over again that he will not take our clients names out of his mouth,” Gottlieb said yesterday.
“Facts do not and will not stop him. He’s telegraphing that he will do this again. Believe him.”
Read the full report from the Guardian’s Sam Levine:
A federal appeals court is expected to consider Friday whether Donald Trump’s former White House chief of staff, Mark Meadows, charged by Fulton county prosecutors over his role in efforts to overturn the 2020 election in Georgia, should see his criminal case transferred from state to federal court.
Meadows has so far been unsuccessful in his removal efforts. The US district judge Steve Jones denied the motion in September and Meadows challenged the decision to the US court of appeals for the eleventh circuit, which scheduled oral arguments for 9am.
The appeal before judges William Pryor, Robin Rosenbaum and Nancy Abudu – George W Bush, Obama and Biden appointees – marks possibly the final chance for Meadows to have his case transferred, a move that would give him key advantages at trial as well as affect the case against Donald Trump.
Read more of the Guardian’s report:
Senate eyes Ukraine vote as House adjourns
The Senate majority leader, Democrat Chuck Schumer, said yesterday that negotiators had made “good progress” in their talks regarding a supplemental funding package aimed at providing aid to Ukraine and reforming immigration policy.
“The plan is for the Senate to act as soon as we are ready to move forward on the supplemental,” Schumer said yesterday.
“We hope to come to an agreement. But no matter what, members should be aware that we will vote on a supplemental proposal next week.”
The timeline will force senators to delay their planned holiday recess, although Schumer did not provide a specific schedule for next week.
Even if the Senate can get a funding bill passed, it would still need to pass the House, which adjourned yesterday for its own holiday recess and is not expected to return to session until the new year.
Despite the apparent progress in the Senate, the House speaker, Republican Mike Johnson, has indicated he will not call members back from their recess even if a supplemental funding bill passes the upper chamber.
Johnson said yesterday, “While that work should continue, the House will not wait around to receive and debate a rushed product.”
Since I became Speaker in late October, I have clearly and consistently told the White House and Leader Schumer that we must secure our own border before we secure another country’s.
— Speaker Mike Johnson (@SpeakerJohnson) December 14, 2023
For some reason, the Biden Administration waited until this week to even begin negotiations…
Here’s what else is happening today:
Hungary blocked the EU from approving a €50bn aid package to Ukraine. The move came hours after EU leaders agreed to open membership talks with Ukraine.
Republicans named Nassau County legislator Mazi Melesa Pilip as their nominee to replace George Santos in the House. The special election has been scheduled for 13 February.
A federal appeals court will consider a request from Mark Meadows, Donald Trump’s former chief of staff, to move his case from state to federal court. Meadows has been charged by Fulton county prosecutors over his role in efforts to overturn the 2020 election results in Georgia.
