After Canada’s Liberal Party lost a terrible by-election, a Liberal MP became the first current member of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s caucus to call for him to step down.

Liberal MP Wayne Long said they needed new leadership “for the future of our party and the good the country.” “The voters have spoken loud and clear, and they want a change,” Mr. Long said from his seat in the New Brunswick legislature.

Long’s comment comes after the Liberals lost a seat in Toronto they had held since 1993 in a terrible by-election on Monday. Mr. Long has been an MP since 2015 and has said in the past that he will not be running for office again.

The National Post says that Ken McDonald, an MP from Newfoundland, responded to all of Mr. Long’s emails with “well said!”

In the past few days, other former Liberal leaders have also asked Mr. Trudeau to step down. Kate McKenna was one of them. From 2015 to 2019, she was Mr. Trudeau’s environment minister.

This party isn’t just about one person. “It’s about the values it stands for and making Canadians’ lives better,” Ms. McKenna said in a statement that she gave to the Associated Press.

It’s time for new ideas, new energy, and a new boss. The prime minister has a lot to be proud of. Christy Clark, who used to be the Liberal Premier of British Columbia, said something similar to the Toronto Star on Thursday.

“He doesn’t have the pull with voters he once had,” Ms. Clark said of the prime minister. “More importantly, he isn’t even able to motivate some of the people in the country who are most likely to vote for his party.”

Support for Trudeau Diminishing

There are a lot of reasons why Mr. Trudeau’s support has dropped a lot, including the rising cost of living. According to a new study by Ipsos for Global News, as many as 68% of Canadians want Mr. Trudeau to step down.

Also, there are more calls for Prime Minister Justin Trudeau to step down, but a new poll shows that the Liberal Party is already too far gone for his exit to save it. The Angus Reid Institute released a poll on Monday that showed most people were already disappointed with the Liberal Party, no matter who was in charge.

An poll found that getting rid of the unpopular prime minister might not help the party’s chances in the elections.

There are a lot of polls that show that most Canadians are already planning to vote against the Liberals. An earlier this month study by Abacus Data found that support for the Liberal Democrats was so low that the party could end up in an unheard-of fourth place in the House of Commons.

During the same time period, an Ipsos study found that 68% of people wanted Trudeau to step down as prime minister.

But Angus Reid interviewers focused on the 37% of Canadians who were still “thinking about” voting Liberal in the next election. If you asked people what was most likely to keep them from voting Liberal, only 31% said it was because they didn’t like Trudeau.

48% of those who weren’t sure were Liberal because the party “hasn’t made progress on issues I find important.”

The poll also found that the Liberal Party’s luck would probably get even worse if it was given to one of Trudeau’s likely replacements.

Freeland and Mark Carney?

According to the poll, 12 people could take over as Liberal leader. The least likely was Carolyn Mulroney, who was a cabinet member under Ontario Premier Doug Ford. The most likely was Deputy Prime member Chrystia Freeland.

Only two names were slightly more appealing than Trudeau, even among people leaning Liberal: Freeland and Mark Carney, who used to be governor of the Bank of Canada according to the National Post.

The people who were not Dominic LeBlanc, Mark Miller, or Mélanie Joly were more likely to scare away Liberal voters who knew what they were doing.

“Overall, it looks like even a new leader would not be able to win over swing voters in the near future,” the institute wrote.

Trudeau’s personal popularity helped the Liberals win the election in 2015, but for more than a year now, he’s been bad for the party’s electoral prospects.

Trudeau’s personal approval rate is at an all-time low. The Angus Reid Institute’s Trudeau Tracker last showed that only 28% of people approved of him, while 66% did not. He’s also constantly losing popularity polls to Pierre Poilievre, which didn’t happen with Andrew Scheer and Erin O’Toole when they were Conservative leaders before.

According to the Angus Reid Institute study, the Liberals have reached the point where they can no longer avoid losing the next election by calling for a new leader.

It’s important to note that the study was done before the shocking results of the byelection in Toronto–St. Paul’s were known. On Monday, a Conservative candidate who wasn’t well known won a Toronto riding that had been one of the Liberals’ strongest seats for 31 years.

One person who watched said that the results showed that the Liberals could lose every single riding in the country in the next general election.

Source: AP, National Post

In today’s economy, inflation is the public enemy number one. Americans are fed up with the high cost of living, and former President Donald Trump promises to assist.

However, 16 Nobel Prize-winning economists warn that Trump’s policies will not only fail to address inflation but will exacerbate the problem.

“We, the undersigned, are deeply concerned about the risks of a second Trump administration for the US economy,” the economists said in their Tuesday letter, which Axios first reported.

Trump Would Make America’s Inflation Crisis Worse, 16 Nobel Economists Warn

The letter, spearheaded by renowned economist Joseph Stiglitz, stated that there are legitimate concerns that Trump’s plan may “reignite” inflation.

The academics specifically point to Trump’s “fiscally irresponsible budgets” and nonpartisan studies from the Peterson Institute, Oxford Economics, and Allianz, which conclude that the Trump program, if implemented, will boost inflation.

According to the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget, Trump has approved $8.4 trillion in new 10-year borrowing during his term, about twice as much as President Joe Biden has thus far.

Not only does Trump want to extend his 2017 tax cuts, which the Congressional Budget Office estimates will cost over $5 trillion, but the former president also told CEOs in a closed-door meeting that he wants to lower corporate tax rates even further.

However, lowering taxes risks speeding up an economy at a time when the Federal Reserve is working hard to slow it down to combat inflation.

“The outcome of this election will have economic repercussions for years, if not decades,” the economists wrote in their letter. “We believe that a second Trump term would have a negative impact on the US’s economic standing in the world and a destabilizing effect on the US’s domestic economy.”

The Stiglitz-led letter did not directly mention Trump’s trade or immigration plans, but several mainstream economists worry they will also be inflationary.

Trump has asked for higher tariffs on China and all other trading partners, which Moody’s Analytics predicts will destroy jobs and increase inflation. Trump claims that tariffs will save jobs while punishing China for trade abuses that both parties are fed up with.

Biden has maintained the vast majority of Trump-era tariffs while recently lifting some tariffs on China but in a more targeted manner.

Some economists also fear that Trump’s intentions to undertake an immigration crackdown, including record deportations, will overheat the labor market and raise consumer prices.

In their letter, the 16 Nobel laureates expressed concern about the rule of law and stability if Trump is elected president again.

“Among the most important determinants of economics success are the rule of law and economic and policy certainty,” according to the letter. “Donald Trump and the vagaries of his action and policies threaten this stability and the US’s standing in the world.”

Beyond Stiglitz, the letter was signed by Robert Shiller, who notably predicted the mid-2000s housing bubble, Paul Romer, former World Bank head economist, and George Akerlof, the husband of US Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen.

Trump Would Make America’s Inflation Crisis Worse, 16 Nobel Economists Warn

Economists, on the other hand, praised Biden’s economic efforts, stating that his substantial investments in infrastructure, manufacturing, and climate will reduce long-term inflationary pressures and facilitate the transition to sustainable energy.

“While each of us has different views on the particulars of various economic policies,” the letter’s authors said, “we all agree that Joe Biden’s economic agenda is vastly superior to Donald Trump’s.”

In response, Trump’s team slammed economists and blamed Biden for soaring inflation.

“The American people don’t need worthless out-of-touch Nobel Prize winners to tell them which president put more money in their pockets,” Karoline Leavitt, the Trump campaign’s national press secretary, said CNN. “Americans know we cannot afford four more years of Bidenomics, and when President Trump is back in the White House, he will reimplement his pro-growth, pro-energy, pro-jobs agenda to bring down the cost of living and uplift all Americans.”

To be sure, both economists and Nobel Prize recipients have a crystal ball.

And voters give Trump stronger scores for the economy.

According to CNN’s Harry Enten, the average of surveys shows that Trump is leading Biden by 18 points in inflation and 13 points in the economy.

In a May ABC News/Ipsos poll, more than 80% of respondents said the economy and inflation were major factors in their vote, with Trump leading Biden by 14 points on both subjects.

Trump Would Make America’s Inflation Crisis Worse, 16 Nobel Economists Warn

Voters have expressed worries about Biden’s economic policies. In a late April CNN poll, only 34% of Americans supported Biden’s economic policy, and even fewer (29%) supported Biden’s stance on inflation.

However, other analysts are concerned about what Trump’s ideas may imply for the economy.

Last week, Moody’s Analytics warned that if Republicans win power in November, a toxic combination of higher tariffs, fewer immigrants, and tax cut-fueled stimulus will force inflation to reaccelerate, unemployment to rise beyond 5%, and the US economy to enter a recession.

In contrast, Moody’s discovered that if Biden wins and Congress is divided, the Fed will decrease interest rates, inflation will return to normal, and the US economy will avoid a recession.

SOURCE – (CNN)

(CTN News) – Legal challenges to President Joe Biden’s student debt reduction attempts have resurfaced, and recent verdicts are negative for his new repayment plan.

On Monday evening, district courts in Kansas and Missouri blocked sections of the new SAVE income-driven repayment plan, which was established last summer to provide borrowers with more reasonable payments and a shorter deadline for loan forgiveness.

The first lawsuit was filed in March in Kansas by 11 GOP state attorneys general, while the second was filed in April in Missouri by seven GOP state attorneys general. In both cases, the plaintiffs asked the courts to prohibit the SAVE plan and the loan forgiveness that comes with it, claiming that the relief exceeds the administration’s power.

The district court opinions issued on Monday were different, but both dealt a blow to the SAVE plan. Kansas Judge Daniel Crabtree ordered that new SAVE measures, such as decreased monthly payments, cannot be adopted while the legal process moves forward.

Impact on Student Debt Borrowers

Missouri Judge John Ross found that the plan’s provision to eliminate student debt for students with original sums of $12,000 or fewer, who qualified within 10 years, is now also barred.

Education Secretary Miguel Cardona decried the rulings on Monday, stating that “the Department of Justice will continue to vigorously defend the SAVE Plan.”

“Republican elected officials and special interests sued to block their own constituents from being able to benefit from this plan – even though the Department has relied on the authority under the Higher Education Act three times over the last 30 years to implement income-driven repayment plans,” Cardona wrote.

“While we continue to review these rulings, the SAVE plan still means lower monthly payments for millions of borrowers – including more than 4 million borrowers who owe no payments at all, and protections for borrowers facing runaway interest when they are making their monthly payments,” said the attorney general.

Here’s what borrowers need to know about the verdicts.

Borrowers with student loans who have previously enrolled in SAVE can continue paying the payments outlined in the plan. However, the additional measures slated to take effect on July 1 — such as halving undergraduate borrowers’ payments and providing forgiveness credit for periods of deferment and forbearance — have been blocked.

Here’s why. Kansas’ Crabtree decided in favor of the attorneys general, citing the SAVE plan’s monthly payment cap and shorter forgiving period as “overreaching any generosity Congress has authorized before.”

However, Crabtree determined to keep SAVE components that had already gone into effect since the plaintiffs failed to demonstrate how they were harmed by parts of the plan that were already in existence.

For example, in June 2023, the Education Department disclosed its proposal to cap monthly payments and a shorter period for forgiveness, giving attorneys general time to fight the plan.

“All of this is to ask why: if these parts of the SAVE Plan promised an irreparable harm to plaintiffs, why didn’t they move to enjoin the SAVE Plan before they took effect?” Crabtree wrote.

However, with regard to the new SAVE measures slated to take effect on July 1, Crabtree decided that the plaintiffs succeeded in demonstrating injury because there was no delay in contesting the plan’s unimplemented elements, and any future remedies would be irreversible.

Rather than reversing or changing any SAVE provisions that have already been implemented, Crabtree chose to freeze any additional measures that have yet to be implemented until the court renders a final ruling.

While thousands of students have already received student loan forgiveness through the SAVE provision, which eliminates debt for borrowers with original sums of $12,000 or less, no new borrowers will be eligible for relief for the time being.

Missouri’s Ross issued a different ruling on SAVE. Missouri’s contention that the plan will hurt student-loan firm MOHELA due to reduced revenue has standing, considering the Supreme Court had rejected Biden’s first attempt at sweeping debt relief last summer.

Regarding the fate of SAVE, Ross concluded that while SAVE’s previously implemented components can continue, any future student loan forgiveness through the plan is prohibited.

He wrote that Congress did not account for the scope of loan forgiveness under SAVE, and as a result, the attorneys general have “a ‘fair chance’ of success on the merits on their claim that the Secretary has overstepped its authority by promulgating a loan forgiveness provision as part of the SAVE program.”

He also stated that even without student debt forgiveness, other elements such as lower payments and limited interest accrual will benefit borrowers. Because the attorneys general could not adequately show why the other clauses should be barred, Crabtree stated that he would only issue a preliminary injunction on debt cancellation.

Cardona announced on Tuesday that the Justice Department will appeal the rulings.

According to White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre, the Education Department will continue to enroll more Americans in SAVE. The plan offers benefits such as $0 payments for those earning $16 per hour or less, lower monthly payments for millions more borrowers, and protection from runaway interest for those making monthly payments.

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