List of All Articles with Tag 'politics'

A group of Republican members of Congress are invoking Noah’s Ark and an obscure legal theory to defend Texas governor Greg Abbott’s controversial floating border wall in the Rio Grande, after the Justice Department sued the state and claimed the barrier violates federal law. On Wednesday, a delegation led by US Representative Jodey Arrington of Texas, alongside the Texas Public Policy Foundation, filed an amicus brief in federal court, arguing the Department of Justice is mistaken to argue that the 1,900-mile Rio Grande, the fourth largest river in North America, is a navigable waterway under the definition of federal regulations. The brief argues that an 1870 court case defines navigable waterways as those used in interstate or international commerce. “Indeed, if one takes the Book of Genesis literally, then the entire world was once navigable by boats large enough to carry significant amounts of livestock,” the brief reads. “Under the federal government’s theory, these anecdotes would render any structure built anywhere in Texas an obstruction to navigation subject to federal regulation.” Last month, echoing the arguments from Mr Abbott, Representative Arrington argued that Texas is under “invasion” by drug cartels, so the US Constitutional authorises emergency, military-style action like deploying national guardsmen and building border barriers without federal permission. “The sovereign states created the federal government,” he said, “not the other way around. When the states entered into that social contract of the Constitution of the United States, they may have ceded some of their authority to the central government but they didn’t surrender their sovereignty.” Legal experts told The Independent that this interpretation of the Constitution’s “Invasion Clause” is mistaken and has previously been struck down in federal immigration cases. Last month, the Biden administration sued Governor Abbott, arguing his plan to install thousands of feet of saw-tipped border barriers in the middle of the Rio Grande violating the federal Rivers and Harbors Act by failing to seek permission to build from the US Army Corps of Engineers. The river barrier is also facing a state lawsuit from a river guide named Jessie Fuentes. “You’ve taken a beautiful waterway and you’ve converted it into a war zone,” he told The Independentlast month. Other Texas members of Congress have criticised the border barriers, arguing they are putting already vulnerable migrants at greater risk of death or serious injury. “Today was eye-opening,” Rep Sylvia Garcia of Texas wrote on X this week during a border visit, sharing a video of the orange buoys used in the Rio Grande which are separated with blade saw-like barbed disks. “Seeing the barbaric, inhumane, and ungodly practices in my home state of Texas. This is beyond politics and crosses a line into human rights violations.” Read More Greg Abbott slammed by Texas lawmakers for ‘cruel’ floating border barriers with ‘chainsaw devices’ How governor Greg Abbott is using an obscure ‘invasion’ legal theory for a border power grab in Texas Buoys, razor wire, and a Trump-y wall: How Greg Abbott turned the Rio Grande into an immigration ‘war zone’ Up-close look at buoys with saw-like barbed metal used in Rio Grande Greg Abbott slammed for ‘cruel’ floating border barriers with ‘chainsaw devices’ Texas separates migrant families, detaining fathers on trespassing charges in latest border move

House Republicans are still scrambling to find a path forward with less than two months until the government runs out of funding, as the right wing of the GOP conference is still insisting it needs to see more spending cuts in order to support a series of bills to avert a government shutdown.

Republicans are vowing to continue their investigations related to President Joe Biden's son, Hunter, after Attorney General Merrick Garland announced Friday he is appointing a special counsel to oversee the ongoing criminal probe.

Attorney General Merrick Garland announced that he granted the US attorney investigating President Joe Biden’s son Hunter Biden special counsel status. Mr Garland announced that David Weiss, who has served as the US Attorney for Delaware since 2018, would serve as special counsel and he had informed relevant members of Congress about the nomination. The move is a shift from July when Mr Weiss informed Congress that he had not requested special counsel designation for his investigation into the president’s son. But on Tuesday, Mr Weiss requested such status. “I have concluded that it is in the public interest to appoint him as special counsel,” Mr Garland said on Friday. “This appointment confirms my commitment to provide Mr. Weiss all the resources he request.” Mr Weiss had previously been investigating Hunter Biden since 2019. Mr Garland and the Department of Justice allowed Mr Weiss to stay on board as US attorney when Mr Biden took office in 2021 to continue his investigation of Mr Biden. In July, Mr Biden looked set to enter into a plea deal for unpaid taxes and lying on a federal application for a firearm. Republicans, including former president Donald Trump, had decried the agreement as a sweetheart deal. Many Republicans argued that the younger Mr Biden received preferential treatment because he is the president’s son despite the fact that Mr Trump nominated Mr Weiss and Republicans in the Senate voted to confirm him in 2018. Then in late July, Mr Biden pleaded not guilty to two of the charges after the presiding judge questioned whether the deal would prohibit the federal government from prosecuting him for other crimes he might have committed in the future. The White House referred to remarks from Mr Garland and the Justice Department when asked by The Independent. Mr Garland said that Mr Weiss’s office would not be subjected to day-to-day supervision but would have to comply with regulations, procedures and policies of the Justice Department. Mr Weiss would also be mandated to write a report of his investigation once it concludes. “ As with each special counsel who has served since I have taken office, I am committed to making as much of his report public as possible, consistent with legal requirements and department policy,” he said. “Today's announcement affords the prosecutors agents and analysts working on this matter, the ability to proceed with our work expeditiously and to make decisions indisputably guided only by the facts and the law.” Mr Garland’s announcement comes the same day that former president Donald Trump’s legal team appeared in court in Washington, DC and earned a win as US District Judge Tanya Chutkan ruled that a protective order against Mr Trump would only apply to sensitive material such as jury transcripts, witness interview records and other documents. Mr Trump faces charges for his attempts to overturn the 2020 presidential election after a federal grand jury indicted him in response to a presentation from Special Counsel Jack Smith’s office. Mr Garland nominated Mr Smith to investigate Mr Smith to investigate Mr Trump. In addition, the attorney nominated Robert Hur to investigate classified documents found in locations associated with President Biden earlier this year. Read More Hunter Biden’s plea deal appears at risk of falling apart. What happens next? Hunter Biden pleads not guilty to two tax charges after court chaos around deal with prosecutors Attorney General Garland will appoint special counsel in Hunter Biden probe Utah man killed after threats against Biden believed government was corrupt and overreaching Utah man suspected of threatening President Joe Biden shot and killed as FBI served warrant

Attorney General Merrick Garland announced Friday that the Trump-appointed US attorney who is investigating Hunter Biden has been given "special counsel" status.

Alabama Republican SenatorTommy Tuberville no longer possesses any property in the state he represents, according to a report. The Washington Post reported that the lawmaker has sold the last of his properties in Alabama – Tiger Farms LLC, which sits in Macon and Tallapoosa counties just outside of Auburn – for just over $1m. Property records show that he has owned a $3m home in Santa Rosa Beach, Florida, for around 20 years. He also owns a condo in Washington that he and his wife purchased for $750,000 in 2021. The former Auburn University head coach recently sold one Florida condo for $850,000 and bought another for $825,000, the Post reported. The Independent has reached out to Mr Tuberville’s office for comment. Mr Tuberville’s office maintained to the Post that the senator’s primary residence is a home in Auburn. “Coach has purchased and invested in real estate for decades,” Mr Tuberville’s communications director told the outlet. “Coach has owned the property in Santa Rosa Beach for two decades – he bought it while he was coaching at Auburn. He goes there upon occasion if he has a free weekend. It is within driving distance of Auburn. I’m sure many senators have vacation homes.” The spokesperson said that the senator purchased his current Auburn residence for his son when his son was a student at Auburn. “After his son graduated, he moved out. After Coach retired from coaching, Coach moved into the Auburn house.” Despite this claim, the Tubervilles actually bought the house nine months after his son Tucker graduated from Auburn University in 2016, according to his LinkedIn profile. When Mr Tuberville served as the head coach of University of Cincinnati’s football team from 2013 through 2016, Tucker then worked for his father at the school from May through December 2016 after he graduated. Tuberville’s other son, Troy, did not start at Auburn until 2018 and graduated in 2021. After being presented with these details, Mr Tuberville’s communications director backtracked and told the Post that the house was purchased after Tucker graduated from college: “His son lived at the Auburn house briefly and then Coach moved there afterward.” “The Auburn property is his primary residence — although his job requires him to be in Washington four days a week when the Senate is in session,” the communications director added. Under the US constitution, a senator must live in the state they are elected to serve. “No Person shall be a Senator…who shall not, when elected, be an Inhabitant of that State for which he shall be chosen,” it states. Mr Tuberville isn’t the only member of Congress to face questions around their residency. Arizona Democratic Rep Ruben Gallego was under fire earlier this year after Politico exposed that he claimed both his DC property and his Arizona property as his primary residence. Similarly, Rep Ryan Zinke, the former Trump administration interior secretary, fell under scrutiny when he ran for congress in Montana in 2022 and his wife put her primary residence as California. Read More GOP senator holding up military promotions claims Ukraine ‘can’t win’ in war with Russia Pentagon warns of disruptions as Army, Marines both lack confirmed leaders for first time Manchin, Tuberville introduce college sports bill to standardize NIL rules, regulate collectives Pentagon warns of disruptions as Army, Marines both lack confirmed leaders for first time Who are Trump’s six alleged co-conspirators in the 2020 election probe case? Biden rejects Trump decision to move Space Force from Colorado to Alabama

Donald Trump notched a win in the fight over a protective order in the 2020 election case as the judge ruled that some of the evidence that will be provided to him in the pre-trial discovery process won’t be restricted from dissemination if it’s not deemed “sensitive” by the government. US District Judge Tanya Chutkan on Friday that the protective order will only apply to sensitive materials such as grand jury transcripts, witness interview records, and other documents that could identify witnesses or be used to poison the pool of potential jurors who will be responsible for deciding the ex-president’s fate when he goes on trial next year. Special Counsel Jack Smith’s office had asked her to impose a more restrictive order which would have applied to any and all materials provided to Mr Trump’s defence team in discovery, while Mr Trump’s attorneys had asked for her to allow the former president leave to talk about non-sensitive materials, citing his ongoing campaign for the Republican nomination in next year’s presidential election. Prosecutors had made the request for a broad protective order with the aim of preventing Mr Trump from poisoning the jury pool ahead of his expected trial next year, citing statements by the ex-president’s legal team which they said indicated a desire to try the case “in the press”. But Judge Chutkan, a former defence attorney and a nine-year veteran of the federal bench who was nominated by then-president Barack Obama and confirmed by a unanimous Senate vote in 2014, rejected the prosecution’s preferred language on the grounds that Mr Trump’s conduct with regard to the non-sensitive discovery is still governed by his release conditions and the rules of the court. More follows...

Supporters of former president Donald Trump heckled former vice president Mike Pence as a “traitor” as he visited the Iowa State Fair in Des Moines on Thursday. A video from Iowa Starting Line showed a fellow fairgoer at the former vice president for not being a true Christian. “Pence is a traitor every day,” she said. “Anybody who says they have a higher power, uses those words, he is not a Christian when you say higher power. We don’t buy it as believers, Pence. You are far from a Christian.” Trump supporters have long loathed Mr Pence - who indeed campaigns heavily on his staunch Christian beliefs - for his refusal to overturn the 2020 presidential election results on January 6. During the riot at the US Capitol, some supporters yelled “Hang Mike Pence.” Last week a grand jury handed down an indictment against Mr Trump for his attempts to overturn the 2020 presidential election results. The indictment detailed how Mr Pence took “contemporaneous notes” in the days between the 2020 election and the January 6 riot. The indictment says that Mr Pence repeatedly told Mr Trump that he did not think he had the authority to overturn the election results. On 1 January 2021, Mr Trump reportedly told Mr Pence he was “too honest.” Mr Pence has since been selling merchandise with the words “too honest” and has repeated that he did not have authority to nullify the election results. But he has struggled in his campaign for the 2024 Republican nomination for president. He consistently polls in the single digits and has not raised as much money as either Mr Trump or Florida Gov Ron DeSantis. Mr Pence said that enough people donated to his campaign from enough states for him to participate in the first Republican debate in Wisconsin later this month, Fox News reported. Read More Trump fumes about Jack Smith’s January 2024 date for Jan 6 trial ahead of hearing on protective order – latest Prosecutors seek Jan. 2 trial date for Donald Trump in his 2020 election conspiracy case

The Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States is probing a secretive company that has been buying up land around a key Air Force base in California, sources familiar with the matter and a California lawmaker told CNN.

When President Joe Biden came to this must-win US House district in New York just a few months ago, he did something that privately enraged members of his own party.

The Biden administration will announce on Friday its first major investment to kickstart the US carbon removal industry -- something energy experts say is key to getting the country's planet-warming emissions under control.

Ukraine backers on Capitol Hill are itching for President Joe Biden to step up his case for why the US should send more money to Ukraine in its fight against Russia, as warning bells sound about the American public's support for Kyiv.