Wednesday, Jan 15th
Last update11:58:04 PM GMT
Political Glance
A handful of Senate Democrats are said to be leaving the door open to voting for Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to become the next Health and Human Services secretary.
As preparations for confirmation hearings begin to take shape, multiple sources say Sens. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and John Fetterman (D-Pa.), in particular, are at least considering voting for Kennedy, noting shared critiques on heavy corporate influence over food and a desire to promote a less chemical-laden country.
The unprecedented hearing will take place 10 days before Trump is to be sworn in as the 47th president of the United States.
He is not likely to face incarceration, however. Judge Juan Merchan wrote in his Friday order that he agreed with prosecutors that time behind bars was no longer practical, and signaled that he may choose to impose no punishment at all.
Joe Biden has bestowed the second highest civilian medal on the Democratic congressman Bennie Thompson and the Republican former congresswoman Liz Cheney, who led the bipartisan congressional investigation into the deadly 6 January 2021 insurrection at the US Capitol by Donald Trump supporters intent on overturning his election defeat by Biden.
Trump, who takes office again on 20 January after winning November’s election, has said the leaders of that committee, which published its conclusions in December 2022 after a series of high-profile public hearings, should be jailed, not rewarded.
Allies and aides to Donald Trump should be increasingly concerned by Elon Musk’s proximity to and influence on the US president-elect, the Yale historian and bestselling author Timothy Snyder said.
“Trump is a little guy, and Musk is a big guy when it actually comes to having money,” Snyder said. “And I think if you were a friend of Trump, you would be worried.”
The author of bestsellers including On Tyranny (2017) and On Freedom (2024) was speaking to the Guardian about issues including his work in Ukraine, where he has teamed up with the Star Wars actor Mark Hamill to raise funds to buy robots to clear landmines laid by Russian invaders.
But as Trump prepares to take power in Washington, and promises new policy on US support for Ukraine most expect to heavily favor Vladimir Putin and Russia, Snyder also considered what the coming Trump administration may mean closer to home.
An American man who absconded after being sentenced to prison for his role in the US Capitol riot is now seeking political asylum in Canada, as he hopes for a pardon when Donald Trump returns to the White House.
Antony Vo, 32, was sentenced to nine months behind bars and ordered to report to a federal prison on 14 June 2024, but instead he fled to Canada.
More than 1,500 people have been charged in connection with the January 6 assault on Congress, which sought to disrupt certification of Joe Biden’s election victory.
Vo, from Indiana, was convicted at a jury trial in Washington of four counts of entering a restricted building and disorderly conduct related to his actions.
“I knew Canada has a history of being welcoming to refugees, from Vietnam war draft-dodgers to the people who hid Edward Snowden in Hong Kong,” he told AFP.
Roberts laid out his concerns in an annual report released after a year where the nation’s court system was unusually enmeshed in a closely fought presidential race, with then-Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump attacking its integrity as he faced criminal charges for which he denied wrongdoing.
Trump won the election following a landmark Supreme Court immunity decision penned by Roberts that led to criticism from Democrats like President Joe Biden.
Trump is now readying for a second term as president with an ambitious agenda, elements of which are likely to be legally challenged and end up before the court whose conservative majority includes three justices appointed by Trump during his first term.
Jimmy Carter, the former US president who died at age 100 on Sunday, will be honored with a state funeral before being laid to rest in his hometown of Plains, Georgia, next to his wife, Rosalynn.
The state funeral for Carter will be held in Washington DC on Thursday, 9 January. The date has also been declared a national day of mourning in the United States.
In addition to the state funeral, there will be a public service in Atlanta, the capital of Carter’s home state, following which the former president will be buried in a private service in Plains, where he died.
The longest-lived president, Carter died on Sunday, two years after entering hospice care. Most of the nation saw the former president for the last time at Rosalynn Carter’s funeral last year.
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