Election News
Right-Wing Nationalist Parties Dominate European Parliament Elections
Early exit polls from the European Parliament elections on Sunday show voters punishing ruling leftist parties and throwing unprecedented support behind right-wing nationalist parties, most notably in France, where disastrous results for French President Emmanuel Macron’s coalition forced him to dissolve the National Assembly and call snap elections.
Voting to elect the European Union’s regional lawmakers for the next five-year term ended with the last remaining polls in Italy, as surging far-right parties dealt a body blow to two of the bloc’s most important leaders: French President Emmanuel Macron and German Chancellor Olaf Scholz.
Official results were anticipated shortly after Italian polling booths closed at 11 p.m., marking the end of a four-day marathon election in 27 EU member countries. The European Union’s early estimate indicated that right-wing nationalist parties had achieved significant gains in the European Parliament.
Marine Le Pen victorious
In France, Marine Le Pen’s National Rally party dominated the polls to the point where Macron dissolved the national parliament and called for new elections, posing a significant political risk because his party could suffer further losses, jeopardizing the remainder of his presidential term, which expires in 2027.
Le Pen was delighted to accept the task. “We’re ready to turn the country around, ready to defend the interests of the French, ready to put an end to mass immigration,” she added, repeating the rallying cry of numerous far-right politicians in other countries celebrating significant victories.
Macron recognized the thud of loss. “I’ve heard your message, your concerns, and I won’t leave them unanswered,” he said, adding that calling a quick election only strengthened his democratic credentials.
In Germany, the most populous country in the 27-member bloc, forecasts showed that the AfD would overcome a string of controversies surrounding its top candidate to grow to 16.5%, up from 11% in 2019. In comparison, the combined result of the three parties in Germany’s ruling coalition barely exceeded 30%.
Rise of Right-Wing Nationalists
Scholz’s dismal fate meant that his long-standing Social Democratic party dropped behind the right-wing Alternative for Germany, which soared to second place. “After all the prophecies of doom, after the barrage of the last few weeks, we are the second strongest force,” a joyful AfD leader Alice Weidel exclaimed.
The four-day polls in the 27 EU countries were the world’s second-largest exercise in democracy, trailing only India’s recent election. Finally, the growth of the right-wing nationalists was even more surprising than many analysts projected.
The French National Rally crystallized it, with over 30%, or roughly twice as much as Macron’s pro-European centrist Renew party, which is expected to reach 15%.
Across the EU, two major and pro-European parties, the Christian Democrats and the Socialists, remained dominant. The extreme right’s gains came at the expense of the Greens, who were anticipated to lose approximately 20 seats and drop to sixth place in the legislature. Macron’s pro-business Renew faction also suffered significant losses.
For decades, the European Union, founded on the defeat of Nazi Germany and fascist Italy, relegated the hard right to the political outskirts. With its impressive performance in these elections, the far right might potentially play a significant role in issues ranging from migration to security and climate.
Leftist Parties Decimated
Former EU leader and current Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk defied the trend, defeating Law and Justice, the national conservative party that controlled Poland from 2015 to 2023, and driving it even more to the right. According to one poll, Tusk’s party received 38% of the vote, while his fiercest rival won 34%.
“Of these large, ambitious countries, of the EU leaders, Poland has shown that democracy, honesty and Europe triumph here,” Tusk stated to his backers. “I am so moved.” He said, “We showed that we are a light of hope for Europe.”
Germany, a traditional stronghold for environmentalists, exemplified the Greens’ defeat, with their vote share expected to decline from 20% to 12%. With further defeats predicted in France and elsewhere, the Greens’ defeat might have an impact on the EU’s overall climate change policies, which remain among the most progressive in the world.
The center-right Christian Democratic group of EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, which had already reduced its green credentials before the polls, prevailed in Germany with over 30%, handily defeating Scholz’s Social Democrats, who slumped to 14%, trailing just the AfD.
“What you have already set as a trend is all the better – strongest force, stable, in difficult times, and by a long distance,” von der Leyen told her German fans via video link from Brussels.
In addition to France, the far right, which concentrated its campaign on migration and crime, was predicted to make substantial gains in Italy, where Premier Giorgia Meloni was expected to consolidate her position.
Return to Nationalism
Voting in Italy proceeded late into the evening, and many of the 27 member states had yet to release forecasts. Nonetheless, previously available data reinforced earlier predictions: the elections will push the bloc to the right, reshaping its destiny. This might make it more difficult for the EU to adopt legislation, and decision-making in the world’s largest trading bloc could become paralyzed at times.
EU legislators, who serve five-year terms in the 720-seat Parliament, have a vote on matters ranging from financial regulations to climate and agriculture policy. They approve the EU budget, which funds objectives such as infrastructure projects, farm subsidies, and aid to Ukraine. They also have a veto over appointments to the powerful European Commission.
These elections come at a critical time for voter confidence in a group of around 450 million people. The coronavirus epidemic, an economic downturn, and an energy crisis fueled by Europe’s largest land dispute since World War II have all shook the EU during the last five years. However, political campaigns frequently focus on topics of significance in specific countries rather than broader European objectives.
Since the last EU election in 2019, populist or ight-wing parties have led governments in three countries: Hungary, Slovakia, and Italy, and they are part of ruling coalitions in Sweden, Finland, and, soon, the Netherlands. Polls show that populists have an advantage in France, Belgium, Austria, and Italy.
“Right is good,” Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, who heads a staunchly nationalist and anti-migrant administration, told reporters after casting his vote. “To go right is always preferable. “Go right!”
Source: AP
President Joe Biden on Thursday told supporters I’m not going anywhere” to a crowd gathered for a July Fourth barbecue on the White House South Lawn Thursday. His comments come after his disastrous debate with former President Donald J. Trump.
President Biden is facing a growing sense that he may have just days to make a persuasive case that he is fit for office before Democratic support for him completely evaporates.
In a Wednesday night meeting with Democratic governors, Biden acknowledged that he needs to get more sleep and limit evening events so he can turn in earlier to be rested for the job, according to three people familiar with the meeting, who also spoke on condition of anonymity.
One person said the president joked that his health was fine, it was his brain that had challenges.
California Gov. Gavin Newsom, who was in the meeting, was asked Thursday by the Associated Press about the idea that Biden wants to limit events after 8 p.m. and responded: “He did that with a smile on his face. It was more of a rhetorical framework of just being fit and rested.”
Newsom, who was campaigning for Biden in western Michigan, added, “I like when a president acknowledges they’re human.”
Biden at a make of break moment
In an interview with a Wisconsin radio station that aired Thursday, Biden argued that much more than his own political future was in jeopardy, saying: “The stakes are really high. I know you know this. For democracy, for freedom … our economy, they’re all on the line.”
The interview on the Earl Ingram Show on the Civic Media Radio Network, taped Wednesday, was the part of a media and public events blitz that the Democratic president and his staff have acknowledged as a make-or-break moment.
At the July Fourth barbecue, President Biden welcomed military families formally from a lectern, but then went over to personally greet the crowd for a few moments.
He suddenly grabbed a microphone and stood in the center of the grass, explaining that there were thousands of people waiting to come into the party and he needed to duck back inside because the grounds were locked down as long as he was out there.
The president is scheduled to campaign in Wisconsin on Friday and sit for an interview with ABC’s George Stephanopoulos that will air as a prime-time special that night.
He plans to be in Philadelphia on Sunday and hold a full news conference during the NATO summit in Washington next week.
It is not a given that his campaign will survive even that long if he does not deliver a strong showing on ABC. Discussions that were once a whisper around who should step into his place should he bow out are growing louder.
For now, President Biden is not ready to walk away and he has communicated that in conversations with Democratic governors, close allies and staffers from his campaign.
Source: AP
Hunter Biden Sues Fox News Over Explicit Images Featured In A Streaming Series
Hunter Biden Sues Fox News Over Explicit Images Featured In A Streaming Series
President Joe Biden has booked his first television interview since his disastrous debate with former President Trump last week, which prompted many in his party to wonder whether he should be the Democratic nominee.
On Friday at 6:30 p.m. ET, ABC will carry portions of George Stephanopoulos’ interview with Biden on “World News Tonight with David Muir.” The extended interview will appear Sunday on “This Week with George Stephanopoulos.”
Biden | ABC Image
Biden Has Scheduled His First Interview After His Shaky Debate Performance
During last week’s CNN debate, Biden struggled to finish sentences and frequently appeared bewildered while Trump spewed forth falsehoods, raising serious concerns about Biden’s age and capacity to serve a second term.
The interview is a significant coup for ABC News and a watershed moment for Biden following his halting debate performance. Although Biden has made multiple public appearances since the debate, he has read prepared statements at each venue.
This will be his first unscripted appearance since the debate. Several White House supporters have publicly and privately urged Biden to quickly hold a live interview or news conference to allay concerns about the president’s understanding.
ABC did not immediately reply to a request for comment on whether it intends to publish the entire unedited interview version. Due to time limits, networks typically trim down programming interviews.
Biden | Rolling Stone Image
Biden Has Scheduled His First Interview After His Shaky Debate Performance
Biden’s last significant interview was with David Muir in Normandy last month. He earlier spoke with CNN’s Erin Burnett on May 8 and Time magazine’s Massimo Calabresi on May 28.
According to CNN, the interview with ABC will be his fourth major televised interview in 2024. Biden has conducted fewer interviews than his prior predecessors.
SOURCE – (CNN)
US President Joe Biden has responded to attacks about his age, telling supporters in a furious speech that he will win re-election in November. This follows a bad debate performance that raised concerns about his candidacy.
“I know I’m not a young man, to state the obvious,” he said at a rally in the crucial state of North Carolina on Friday, one day after struggling in the televised duel with his Republican challenger, Donald Trump.
“I don’t walk as smoothly as I used to…”I don’t debate as well as I used to,” he admits. “But I know what I do know, I know how to tell the truth [and] I know how to do this job.”
Joe Biden, 81, said he felt in his “heart and soul” that he could serve another term as a cheering throng in Raleigh yelled, “four more years”.
While issues about Joe Biden’s age are not new, his weak performance on the debate stage, which included verbal blanks, a scratchy voice, and some difficult-to-follow responses, alarmed several Democrats and created new concerns about his campaign.
Mr Biden’s campaign has maintained that the country’s oldest presidential contender is still capable of serving another term. Despite his dismal performance, campaign organizers stated another nominee would not replace him.
“Absolutely not,” Mia Ehrenberg, a Biden campaign spokesperson, responded to concerns about whether Joe Biden would withdraw his candidacy.
While numerous campaign surrogates, including Vice President Kamala Harris, confessed to reporters that the president tripped during the debate, they reaffirmed their support for the older statesman and emphasized that his responses were more meaningful than Mr Trump’s.
“The president might have lost the debate on style, but he won it on facts, decency, and the ideas people think are important in this country,” campaign co-chair Mitch Landrieu said on CNN the morning after the debate.
In the days afterward, many senior Democrats and Biden supporters have made additional efforts to defend the former president’s performance and allay liberal concerns.
Former President Barack Obama, still one of the party’s most popular icons, remarked that “bad debate nights happen”.
“This election is still a choice between someone who fought for ordinary folks his entire life and someone who only cares about himself,” Obama said. He continued by stating that Trump is “someone who lies through his teeth for his own benefit”.
However, Democratic concerns about Joe Biden are far from allayed.
Party leaders, political operators, and those close to the president who talked with the BBC‘s Katty Kay described a worried party concerned about the strength of their candidate.
Nancy Pelosi, the former Democratic House Speaker, stated that “from a performance standpoint, it wasn’t great”. Other Democrats, including Biden’s former communications director Kate Bedingfield, described the debate as “a really disappointing debate performance”.
Democratic contributors who talked anonymously to various media sources were more blunt, with one calling the performance “disqualifying”.
“The only way it could have been worse was if he had fallen from the stage. “Big donors are saying… he needs to go,” one Democratic operative told the Financial Times.
On Friday, the New York Times editorial board urged Mr. Biden to drop out. It urged Democrats to “acknowledge that Mr Biden can’t continue his race, and create a process to select someone more capable to stand in his place” .
Mr. Trump, however, staged his own rally in Virginia mere hours later, hailing a “big victory” in the debate, which CNN reported was watched by 48 million people on television and millions more online.
“Joe Biden’s problem is not his age,” Trump, 78, added. “It is his competence. He’s quite incompetent.
The former president dismissed suggestions that Biden will withdraw from the race, claiming he “does better in polls” than other Democrats, including California Governor Gavin Newsom and Vice President Kamala Harris.
Despite concerns raised by certain media pundits, early indications suggest that there has been “no change” in polls following the discussion, according to Washington Post columnist Philip Bump on BBC R4’s Today program.
Later in the program, pollster Frank Luntz stated that there might not be a big change in voters’ intentions because most Americans have already decided who they will vote for later this year.
However, early polls show that American voters saw Mr Trump as the overwhelming winner.
A post-debate poll conducted by liberal pollster Data for Progress revealed that 62% of potential voters who saw or read about the debate believed Trump won. Only 30% of those polled by the progressive polling company said Mr Biden won the debate.
Until more polling is done, fundraising could indicate sustained excitement for Joe Biden’s candidacy; a large shift in that direction could pose a serious challenge to Democrats.
In an apparent effort to demonstrate its continued momentum, the Biden campaign announced that the president had raised $14 million from fundraisers in recent days.
From the Thursday debate until Friday evening, it was reported that Joe Biden had raised more than $27 million for his campaign.
Joe Biden is reportedly expected to meet with other donors on Saturday. He has planned fundraisers in the affluent New York Hamptons and Red Bank, New Jersey.
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