Right wing trying to ‘kill me’ to harm father’s presidency, Hunter Biden says in interview – live

Joe Biden has released a statement taking credit for the labor market’s continued strength, which was illustrated earlier this morning when new government data showed robust hiring in November and the unemployment rate ticking down slightly.

“The economy created 199,000 jobs in November, for a total of over 14 million jobs since I took office. That’s more than 14 million additional Americans who know the dignity and peace of mind that comes with a paycheck,” Biden said.

“On my watch we have achieved better growth and lower inflation than any other advanced country. A year ago, forecasters said it couldn’t be done,” he continued, while acknowledging the political toll taken by the wave of price increases felt by Americans since he took office in 2021. Economists view that inflation as driven by a number of factors, including rebounding demand as Covid-19 ebbed, supply chain problems and the disruptions caused by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022.

“I know prices are still too high for too many Americans. So my top economic priority is to lower costs for hardworking Americans. I’m doing everything in my power to bring down prescription drug costs, health insurance premiums, and utility bills,” the president said.

Biden’s polls have been underwater for nearly two years, which many analysts view as a consequence of the price hikes. In his statement, the president argued that Republicans would make the economy worse: “Instead of fighting to lower costs for middle-class families, Republicans in Congress are fighting to raise prescription drug costs and increase profits for Big Pharma. They’re fighting to lower taxes for the wealthiest Americans and large corporations that have earned record profits in recent years. Congressional Republicans are fighting to cut Medicare and Social Security. That’s just wrong.”

Hunter Biden gave a rare interview to the musician Moby that was released today, in which he says Republicans and their allies in the media are trying to demonize him to harm the presidency of his father, Joe Biden.

“What they’re trying to do is they’re trying to kill me, knowing that it will be a pain greater than my father could be able to handle, and so therefore destroying a presidency in that way,” Hunter Biden said, according to HuffPost.

The president’s son published a memoir in 2021 but has otherwise avoided granting interviews as federal prosecutors amped up their investigations of him, and Republicans seized on his legal troubles to make the thus-far unproven claim that his father was corrupt.

Biden told Moby he felt sorry for some of his antagonists in Congress, particularly Marjorie Taylor Greene, the rightwing Republican congresswoman who displayed explicit images of him at a committee hearing.

“I realized that it’s not about me. And then the second thing that I realized is that these people are just sad, very, very sick people that have most likely just faced traumas in their lives,” Biden said. “They’ve decided that they are going to turn into an evil that they decide that they’re going to inflict on the rest of the world.”

Good morning, US politics blog readers. Yesterday evening, the news broke that prosecutors had indicted the president’s son Hunter Biden on nine tax charges, adding to his legal troubles that intensified over the summer, when a plea deal to resolve a federal investigation against him collapsed. The most immediate implications of the indictment may well be felt by Joe Biden, who is embarking on a re-election campaign while saddled with already worringly low approval ratings.

Republicans have for years alleged that the now-president corruptly benefited from Hunter and other family members’ overseas business dealings, but have yet to turn up any evidence proving it. Nonetheless, the GOP-controlled House of Representatives may next week vote to formally begin an impeachment inquiry against the president, which would give them a high-profile platform to air their allegations against him. Speaking of Congress, Biden’s proposal for a security package to aid Israel and Ukraine and fund some new border security measures remains tied up in a substantial logjam, despite his insistence that the money – particularly to fund Kyiv’s defense – is a top priority. We’ll see if there’s any movement on that today.

Here’s what else is going on:

• The president is heading to Las Vegas to promote the infrastructure bill he oversaw passage of two years ago, with a speech planned for around 6pm eastern time.

• The UN security council is expected to vote today on urging an immediate ceasefire in the war in Gaza, which the United States has in the past opposed. Follow our live blog for the latest news.

• The US labor market remains strong, according to newly released data that showed employers adding 199,000 jobs in November, and the unemployment rate dropping to 3.7%.