Vladimir Putin has described Donald Trump as a “bullied” and “brave man” after his monumental political comeback. Meanwhile, three states, including America’s most populous, are making moves to protect liberal policies from the next administration.
Friday 8 November 2024 02:00, UK
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As the sun set on Howard University in Washington DC a group of women gathered on a grassy patch in the centre of campus.
They held hands in a wide circle and sang hymns, many wiping tears from their faces.
They had just watched a concession speech given by Kamala Harris. Many had been at the university the night before, hoping to witness America electing its first female president.
“I don’t think she could have done anything differently,” one said, “she ran a good campaign, I just think misogyny and racism is deep rooted in America.”
Another lay the blame at the door of President Biden.
“Unfortunately I think if he’d have gone sooner, she would have had more chance to tell her story and establish herself,” another said.
In Democratic Party circles, the inquest had begun even before Harris spoke. Not only had she been defeated in all seven of the key swing states, the map showed rightward shifts across the country. Questions about what went wrong for the campaign and the Democratic Party are at fever pitch.
David Plouffe, a senior campaign adviser for Harris, posted on X: “It was a privilege to spend the last 100 days with Kamala Harris… We dug out of a deep hole but not enough.”
Many are reading that deep hole as one left by Joe Biden, who some say didn’t leave his vice president enough time to make her pitch to the nation known. Plouffe has since deleted his entire X account.
Others wondered whether President Biden’s ego had led to him to cling to power too long. Had the man who once pledged to be a transition candidate been so intoxicated by the heady heights of the Oval Office that he couldn’t bear to step aside?
Democratic strategist Hilary Rosen told Sky News she didn’t “think this was so personal towards Kamala Harris”.
“The campaign miscalculated the importance of the economy as a central message,” she said.
“I think they thought it was going to be a referendum on Donald Trump and a referendum on abortion. And those two calculations, I think, had them underplay what we know voters’ key issue was, which is the economy.”
President Biden spoke in the Rose Garden, paying tribute to Harris’s campaign and promising a peaceful transition of power to president elect Donald Trump.
But his speech will probably be remembered as much for what he didn’t say. There was no introspection about the loss, no answers offered for why it was such a bruising defeat.
Brett Bruin, former White House director of global engagement who worked under Barack Obama, said: “I can’t help but think back to what President Obama said after his first defeat at the congressional level. He acknowledged it was a shellacking.
“We didn’t hear that from President Biden. This has been part of the problem throughout his presidency, it’s part of the reason why Biden and Harris were so unsuccessful when it came to popularity – they didn’t acknowledge the problems, they didn’t address the problems. I wonder when the Democratic Party are going to say, we have to change.”
This post is written by our US colleague, NBC’s politics reporter Ben Kamisar…
Trump’s victory Tuesday was powered in part by support from men amid a significant gender gap — and the unofficial results of two ballot questions in Florida provide an interesting contrast.
The amendment aiming to create a right to an abortion before fetal viability or to protect the health of the mother received about 55% of the vote. But in a state that requires 60% to pass a constitutional amendment, it fell short.
Meanwhile, an amendment establishing a constitutional amendment to “preserve forever fishing and hunting” secured 67% of the vote, according to an unofficial tally from the Florida secretary of state’s office, leading it to be enshrined into law.
Democrats had been hopeful that energy surrounding the abortion amendment could help them overperform in a state that’s been drifting rightward in recent years. Instead, the measure failed, their statewide candidates lost, and one of the only forthcoming changes to the state constitution after this election will be enshrining the right to fish and hunt.
Susie Wiles is a “huge asset” to Donald Trump, his running mate JD Vance has said.
Congratulating the new White House chief of staff, Vance also said Wiles was a “really good person”.
Wiles is widely credited within and outside Trump’s inner circle for running his well-executed campaign.
Her hire is Trump’s first major decision as president elect and one that could be a defining test of his incoming administration, as he must quickly build the team that will help run the federal government.
Donald Trump has said one of his first priorities upon taking office in January will be to make the border “strong and powerful”.
In an interview with our partner network NBC News, the president elect said: “We obviously have to make the border strong and powerful and, and we have to – at the same time, we want people to come into our country.
“And you know, I’m not somebody that says, ‘No, you can’t come in.’ We want people to come in.”
For context: American’s immigration policy was the centrepiece of Trump’s re-election bid, with the president elect vowing a vast immigration crackdown.
He is now expected to mobilise agencies across the US government to help him deport a large number of immigrants.
By Ivor Bennett, Moscow correspondent
It was a classic curveball from Vladimir Putin.
Initially, the Kremlin played it cool. “No plans to congratulate Donald Trump,” it said, “the US is a hostile nation”.
But halfway through another one of Putin’s marathon Q&As, that suddenly changed.
It felt like the start of a courtship – an attempt by Russia’s president to rekindle their bromance.
He praised Trump’s bravery, and called him a real man. Flattery of a man who sees himself as a tough leader.
As for the claim Russia is “open to dialogue”? Read that as “call me”.
This was an overture from Putin, no doubt, but he doesn’t want to make the first move.
I think that’s because Moscow is still cautious about another Trump term. The first failed to live up to their expectations.
Despite warm words from Trump, sanctions increased and the US sent weapons to Ukraine.
So unlike 2016, Russia’s not popping any champagne corks just yet.
Democratic National Committee Chair Jaime Harrison has hit back after Bernie Sanders accused the Democrats of “abandoning working class people”.
Yesterday, the Vermont independent senator blamed the party’s failure to tackle economic inequality for Donald Trump’s victory.
“It should come as no great surprise that a Democratic Party which has abandoned working class people would find that the working class has abandoned them,” he wrote in an open letter.
“First, it was the white working class, and now it is Latino and Black workers as well.”
Mr Harrison says this was “straight up BS”.
“Biden was the most pro-worker president of my life,” he said.
“There are a lot of post-election takes and this one ain’t a good one.”
Kamala Harris’s plans would have “fundamentally transformed the quality of life and closed the racial wealth gap for working people across this country”.
For context: In 2016, Sanders ran a competitive race for the Democratic nomination against Hillary Clinton.
Some of his supporters claim he would have fared better against Trump had he won.
By Jake Levison, news reporter
In the aftermath of Donald Trump’s election win, some women have been advocating for a feminist movement originating from South Korea.
Trump has given mixed messages during his campaign on where he stands on abortion, but it was his three Supreme Court appointees who formed a majority that overturned Roe vs Wade in 2022 – stripping women of the legal right to seek an abortion.
His win has sparked some women to talk about joining the 4B movement – which would involve women cutting out sexual relationships with men as a protest against misogyny and oppression.
Social media interest in 4B spiked after Trump’s victory, with more than 50,000 mentions on X on 6 November from accounts in the US.
Since election day, posts mentioning 4B have potentially reached more than 45 million accounts.
To find out more about the movement and what’s behind it, read here…
Donald Trump has announced Susie Wiles as his White House chief of staff – making her the first female White House chief of staff in history.
In a statement, the president elect said Ms Wiles, who was his campaign manager, “helped him achieve one of the greatest political victories in American history”.
He also said she was “integral part” of both his 2016 and 2020 campaigns.
“Susie is tough, smart, innovative, and is universally admired and respected. Susie will continue to work tirelessly to Make America Great Again,” he said.
“It is a well deserved honour to have Susie as the first-ever female chief of staff in US history. I have no doubt that she will make our country proud.”
Kamala Harris failed to win over the home county of her running mate Tim Walz.
Before being elected governor, Walz lived in Mankato, in Minnesota, for 20 years.
But election results show that Trump defeated Harris there 49.6% to 48.3%.
Joe Biden beat Trump there 50.8% to 46.4% in 2020.
A judge has threatened to hold one of Trump’s former lawyers in civil contempt for failing to surrender his apartment and other belongings to two Georgia election workers he defamed and owes $148 million.
The property would partially satisfy a judgment in December awarded to Ruby Freeman and her daughter Wandrea Moss, who accused Giuliani of destroying their reputations through lies that they tried to help steal the 2020 election from Trump.
Rudy Giuliani served as an advisor to Trump in the 2016 and 2020 presidential campaigns.
Ms Freeman and her daughter say the former New York City mayor is resisting their collection efforts and ignoring questions about where his property is located.
At a hearing today, Judge Lewis Liman gave Giuliani until next week to hand over the property – and warned that he expected Ms Freeman and Ms Moss to ask that Giuliani be held in contempt if he does not cooperate.
Mr Giuliani told reporters after the hearing that he would turn over everything he was legally required to.
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