House passes Israel security bill, but its prospects are grim
Yesterday evening, the Republican-led House of Representatives passed a bill to provide Israel with security assistance as it presses on with its invasion of Gaza and conflict with Hamas. But the measure is not expected to be considered by the Senate, and has attracted a veto threat from Joe Biden over provisions rescinding money from the IRS tax authority and driving up the US budget deficit.
Democrats are instead holding out for a larger package that would, as Biden has requested, pay for more military aid to Ukraine and improved border security in addition to aiding Israel, while also avoiding cuts to White House priorities like improving the IRS’s ability to crack down on tax cheats. Such a measure is expected to attract some support from Senate Republicans, most notably Mitch McConnell, who has remained a champion of Ukraine even as polls show many other Republicans are growing wary of paying for the country’s defense against Russia.
Back to the House vote, it was 226 to 196 in favor of passage, with all but two Republicans present voting yes and all but 12 Democrats in attendance voting against it. Several of the Democrats who voted for the bill had previously attacked it as inappropriately partisan, including Florida’s Debbie Wasserman Schultz, who said she nonetheless decided to support it due to her connection to Israel:
I urged many of my colleagues to vote against this bill because of the horrendous precedent it set and the urgent need to pass the full emergency supplemental proposed by President Biden.
— Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (@RepDWStweets) November 2, 2023
For me, as a Jew, as a Zionist and as the representative of a large Jewish community, I personally needed to cast my vote to stand by Israel, the homeland of the Jewish people, in this moment of crisis.
— Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (@RepDWStweets) November 2, 2023
I will continue to work closely with the White House, the Senate and bipartisan colleagues in the House to ensure America provides vital humanitarian aid and security assistance for our allies in Israel, Ukraine, and Taiwan.
— Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (@RepDWStweets) November 2, 2023
Key events
Joe Biden has arrived in Lewiston, Maine, site of a mass shooting last week that left 18 people dead.
He is currently visiting Schemengees Bar and Grille, one of two locations where army reservist Robert Card opened fire:
Biden is expected to meet with first responders in Lewiston, as well as survivors of the attack and family members of the victims, before heading to Rehoboth Beach, Delaware for the weekend.
In the weeks since the killings, reports have emerged that people who knew Card tried to sound the alarm about his behavior. Here’s more on that:
First openly gay cabinet secretary Buttigieg condemns House speaker Johnson’s anti-LGBTQ+ statements
Transportation secretary Pete Buttigieg, the first openly gay man to serve in a US president’s cabinet, condemned Republican House speaker Mike Johnson for his history of making anti-LGBTQ+ statements.
In an interview with CNN, Buttigieg said, “I will admit it’s a little bit difficult driving the family minivan to drop our kids off at daycare, passing the dome of the Capitol knowing the speaker of the House, sitting under that dome, doesn’t even think our family ought to exist.”
Here’s more from Buttigieg:
“It’s a little bit difficult…to drop our kids off at daycare, passing the dome of the Capitol, knowing that the Speaker of the House…doesn’t even think our family ought to exist.”
— Transportation Sec. Pete Buttigieg condemns Speaker Johnson’s anti-LGBTQ comments and views pic.twitter.com/HAGkX5U8kK
— The Recount (@therecount) November 3, 2023
Johnson has a long history of disparaging same-sex couples, including in 2004, when he wrote a newspaper op-ed saying homosexuality was “inherently unnatural”. Since being elected speaker last month, he has avoided making similar statements, telling Fox News commentator Sean Hannity in an interview that he “genuinely love[d] all people regardless of their lifestyle choices.”
“Go pick up a Bible off your shelf and read it – that’s my worldview”, he added. Here’s some further reading on that:
With Chuck Schumer saying he will ignore a House Republican bill to give Israel military assistance while cutting funding to the IRS, it seems likely Senate Democrats will soon propose a measure that lines up with Joe Biden’s demands.
The president last month asked lawmakers to approve aid to both Israel and Ukraine, and money for border security. At a press conference earlier today, the Democratic House minority leader Hakeem Jeffries said that proposal would be welcomed by his lawmakers:
“We’ll look at any bipartisan product that comes out of the Senate in good faith.”
— Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY), when asked how House Democrats would respond to a Senate Israel aid bill that includes changes to border policy and asylum laws pic.twitter.com/yhuaJVoL4k
— The Recount (@therecount) November 3, 2023
The bigger question is what Republican House speaker Mike Johnson will do with it, and whether it would have the votes to pass Congress’s lower chamber, where a growing faction of GOP members are opposed to aiding Ukraine.
The day so far
There appears to be a shift in sentiment towards Israel’s invasion of Gaza in Washington DC, particularly among Senate Democrats. A group of 13 lawmakers has signed on to a joint statement calling for a humanitarian pause in Israel’s ongoing invasion to root out Hamas, and in a visit to Tel Aviv, secretary of state Antony Blinken made a similar request. The Senate now seems to be on a collision course with the House, which last night passed a bill to send Israel military assistance while also slashing funding to the IRS tax authority. That’s a nonstarter for Democrats, and their Senate leader Chuck Schumer says the measure won’t be considered in the chamber, while minority leader Mitch McConnell also seems uncomfortable with it.
Here’s what else has happened today so far:
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Next Tuesday is election day for off-year contests, including in Ohio, where voters will be asked to protect abortion access in the state constitution, and Virginia, where Democrats hope to defang Republican governor Glenn Youngkin.
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George Santos will run for re-election next year, even if he is expelled from the House, he told CNN.
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Got questions about Israel and Palestine? The Guardian has answers.
Martin Pengelly
Proceedings are done for the day in the Trump Organization civil fraud trial in New York, where Eric Trump testified again.
Here’s a taste of Lauren Aratani’s report:
Eric Trump, one of the two sons trusted to run Donald Trump’s real estate empire, testified on Friday that he was not involved with the financial documents a judge has ruled to be fraudulent, in a trial that threatens to hobble his family’s business.
In a second day on the witness stand, the former US president’s second son said he relied on outside accountants and lawyers to check financial documents. His older brother Donald Trump Jr made the same argument in his testimony earlier this week.
Prosecutors presented evidence that showed Eric Trump had signed off on documents that estimated the value of trophy properties such as the Trump Seven Springs estate north of New York City and the Trump National Doral golf club in Florida.
That undercut his testimony on Thursday that he knew nothing about those estimates, which Judge Arthur Engoron found were fraudulently inflated to win favorable terms from lenders and insurers.
And here’s Lauren’s report in full.
And here’s some further reading, by me, about the Trump boys’ tactics in court:
Martin Pengelly
Thirty-one Democrats voted not to expel the Republican lawmaker George Santos from the US House of Representatives because he has not been convicted of any crime and to eject him would set a dangerous precedent for Republicans to expel their ideological opponents, a leading congressman said.
“For me this was an easy call,” said Jamie Raskin of Maryland, a law professor and influential progressive who sat on the January 6 committee and was lead manager in Donald Trump’s impeachment for inciting the attack on Congress.
Santos “hasn’t been convicted of anything yet, and he has not been convicted of anything in our ethics process”, Raskin told Mother Jones.
“The history is very telling. We’ve expelled five people in the history of the US House of Representatives. Three of them were Confederate traitors and the other two had other federal criminal convictions.”
James A Traficant, an Ohio Democrat, was the last House member to be expelled, in 2002 and after being convicted of crimes including conspiracy to commit bribery, obstruction of justice and racketeering. After seven years in jail, he attempted to run for re-election.
Raskin continued: “For us to take the step of expelling someone who had not been convicted of anything would be a really dangerous manoeuvre, especially with the Republicans in control of the House.”
Read on:
And also, as a footnote, some recommended reading, in the form of the great David Grann on the curious case of James A Traficant, for the New Yorker. This is just a taste – you really owe it to yourself to buy Grann’s book of New Yorker pieces, The Devil and Sherlock Holmes: Tales of Murder, Madness and Obsession, before today is through…
Martin Pengelly
George Santos, the New York fabulist, part-time drag enthusiast, accused fraudster and congressman, told CNN earlier he would “absolutely” run for re-election next year even if he is expelled from Congress over his criminal charges.
Santos survived an expulsion vote, over 23 federal criminal charges to which he pleaded not guilty, on a motion brought by members of his own party this week. He could face another such vote after a House ethics committee investigation concludes later this month.
Here’s his conversation with the great corridor-haunter himself, Manu Raju, CNN chief congressional correspondent:
Raju: “So, if they expel you, and then they put someone else in the seat, you’re going to run in 2024?
Santos: “Absolutely.”
Raju: “Uh-huh. Can you win a primary, given of all these things that are lined up against you…”
Santos: “Yes. Yes.”
Raju: “… and the general election?”
Santos: “Well…”
Raju: This is a Biden-leaning district. And you have all these issues against you.
Santos: “Could I have won the general election last time? Nobody said I could. But I survived.”
Raju: “It was a different situation.”
Santos: “No, I understand. But elections are tricky. There’s no predetermined outcome.
Raju: “Your voters thought they were electing one person.”
Santos: “Manu, nobody elected me…”
Raju: “And that wasn’t true.”
Santos: “Nobody elected me because I played volleyball or not. Nobody elected me because I graduated college or not.
“People elected me because I said I’d come here to fight the swamp, I’d come here to lower inflation, create more jobs, make life more affordable, and the commitment to America. That’s why people voted for anybody. To say that they voted based on anybody’s biography, I can beg you this. Nobody knew my biography. Nobody opened my biography who voted for me in the campaign.”
Unfortunately for Santos, once he got to Congress, lots of reporters did open his biography. And, explaining the volleyball reference, a lot of it turned out not to be true.
And that was before the criminal charges.
Shifting back to Israel’s ongoing invasion of Gaza, here’s Connecticut’s Democratic senator Chris Murphy on why he is now calling for a temporary pause in the fighting.
Murphy and 12 other Democratic senators signed onto a statement advocating for a “short-term cessation of hostilities” to get hostages out of Gaza and humanitarian aid in. He elaborates on the call, in an interview with MSNBC:
Sen. Chris Murphy (D-CT) explains why he’s calling for a “short-term cessation of hostilities” in Gaza:
“I simply believe that the current level of civilian casualties inside Gaza is too high, both from a moral perspective and a strategic perspective.” pic.twitter.com/6rMgr3cfjU
— The Recount (@therecount) November 3, 2023
Also happening next Tuesday are legislative elections in Virginia, where Republicans hope to take full control of Senate and empower GOP governor Glenn Youngkin to enact his agenda unimpeded. The Guardian’s Joan E Greve reports on how a Democratic congresswoman who conquered new territory for the party five years ago is working to help state-level candidates do the same:
As two dozen volunteers prepared to knock doors on an unseasonably warm afternoon in late October, Congresswoman Abigail Spanberger reminded them that their work helped flip her battleground House seat in 2018. She predicted it would pay off again for Virginia Democrats this year.
“It is how we have won in hard races across Virginia and across the country, and it is certainly why I feel confident that we are on the right path headed towards November 7,” Spanberger said, speaking to campaign volunteers in a sunny parking lot in Manassas.
Spanberger has played an active role in boosting Virginia Democrats’ hopes for election day, as the party looks to flip control of the house of delegates and maintain their majority in the state senate. The stakes are high: Republicans would achieve a legislative trifecta in Richmond if they take control of the state senate, allowing them to enact controversial policies like banning abortion after 15 weeks and limiting access to the ballot box.
With her carefully crafted political persona as a centrist Democrat, Spanberger may be the right person to deliver her party’s closing message in the final stretch of the campaign. In Manassas, Spanberger laid out her vision for how Virginia Democrats would succeed on 7 November, saying: “There is nothing more important than helping people believe that the policies and the government – whether it be in Richmond or on Capitol Hill – that they want is possible.”
The results on Tuesday could affect Spanberger’s own future as well; the congresswoman has reportedly told multiple people that she intends to run for governor in the battleground state. If she is successful, her victory would allow Democrats to take back the Virginia governorship, which is now held by Republican Glenn Youngkin, in 2025.
It’s not 2024 yet, but that doesn’t mean there aren’t any important elections happening this year. Indeed, next Tuesday is election day in several states nationwide for off-year contests over ballot initiatives, governor’s mansions and other key questions. Here’s the Guardian’s Alice Herman with some troubling news out of Ohio, where voters will decide on whether to protect abortion access in the state constitution:
Ohio’s Republican secretary of state quietly canceled the voter registrations of more than 26,000 voters in late September, less than two weeks before the deadline to register to vote in next week’s hotly contested abortion referendum in the state.
Voting rights advocates say the process lacked transparency and departed from Frank LaRose’s usual practice of alerting groups before removing registrations from the rolls. And it comes as LaRose campaigns hard against the 7 November constitutional amendment vote – when Ohio voters will decide whether to enshrine the right to abortion in the state constitution – as well as a vote on a separate measure to legalize marijuana.
“We are disappointed in the secretary of state’s office’s authorization of the voter purge while voting for the November election was already (and still is) under way,” Kayla Griffin, of the voting rights group All Voting is Local, said.
Voter list maintenance is a standard, legally required part of the election process, and many if not most of these registrations are for people who have moved away, died or long since stopped voting. The state issues alerts by mail to voters whose registration is flagged for removal, leaving the chance to update or confirm their registration before being kicked off the rolls.
But it’s unusual to remove voter registrations this close to an election given the risk of disenfranchising people who intend to vote but simply missed the memo that they had been flagged for removal. In fact, if this was a national election rather than a state-level contest, what LaRose’s office has done would have been illegal. The National Voter Registration Act prohibits elections offices from systematically removing voters from the rolls within 90 days of a federal election.
