Politics

BUDAPEST (Reuters) – U.S. and Hungarian conservatives must join forces in 2024 elections to “take back” institutions in Washington and Brussels from liberals who threaten western civilization, Prime Minister Viktor Orban said on Thursday.

Orban, a Hungarian nationalist who was addressing a conservative gathering in Dallas, also said the United States needs a strong leader to negotiate a peace deal for Russia to end the war in Ukraine, Hungary’s neighbor.

“Only a strong leader can negotiate peace,” Orban said, speaking to the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC), a prominent U.S. political organization. “We need a strong America with a strong leader.”

Orban didn’t specifically refer to former U.S. President Donald Trump, who has hinted publicly that he will seek the presidency again in 2024. Trump has endorsed over 100 conservative candidates ahead of this year’s mid-term U.S. elections.

But Orban and Trump had warm relations and the Hungarian leader endorsed Trump ahead of the 2020 U.S. vote. Before the CPAC conference, he wished Trump success in a video message.

As with Trump in the United States, Orban has been widely criticized in Europe. Leaders of the European Union, of which Hungary is a member, have said he has undermined democracy with measures that restrict immigration and give his government control over the media and non-governmental organizations.

Orban, who was re-elected for a fourth consecutive term in April, said the stakes are high for 2024. In addition to the U.S. election, Europeans will vote on European Parliament seats that year.

“These two locations will define the two fronts in the battle for western civilization,” Orban said.

Calling himself “an old fashioned freedom fighter,” Orban said Hungary and his government were “under the siege of progressive liberals.”

He said progressives seek to separate western civilization from its Christian roots. His government’s fierce anti-immigration stance, pro-family policies and rejection of gender ideology resist those efforts, he added.

“This war is a culture war,” Orban said. “We have to revitalize our churches, our families, our universities and our community institutions.”

In a speech last month, Orban said that in contrast to Western Europe, where locals mixed with non-European immigrants, Hungary was not a “mixed-race” country. His words drew condemnation from the United States, the European Union, Jewish groups and academics.

A few days later Orban backtracked, saying sometimes he said things in a way “that can be misunderstood.”

He told CPAC that those who accused him or his government of racism were “idiots.” He said his government had adopted a “zero tolerance” policy on racism and antisemitism.

“Accusing us is fake news,” he added.

(Reporting by Krisztina Than. Edited by Paulo Prada)

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(Reuters) – Kari Lake, a former news anchor who has embraced former President Donald Trump’s false claims of voter fraud, has been projected to win the Republican nomination for Arizona governor, according to Edison Research.

Lake has promised to try to enact a slew of election measures if elected in November’s general election, including eliminating vote-counting machines and banning voting by mail.

Edison Research projected Lake’s victory late on Thursday.

(Reporting by Joseph Ax, editing by Ross Colvin, Alistair Bell and Susan Heavey)

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WASHINGTON (Reuters) – U.S. President Joe Biden will meet Thursday with labor leaders and CEOs from General Motors, Carrier and Kaiser Permanente to discuss the economic impacts of the drug, climate and tax bill recently introduced by Democrats, a White House official said.

(Reporting by Heather Timmons; Editing by Daniel Wallis)

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In the thick of Kansas’ contentious debate over abortion rights, the anonymous text messages arriving on the eve of the big referendum this week seemed clear enough. “Voting YES on the Amendment will give women a choice.”

The only problem: It was a lie, transmitted by text message Monday, a day before voters were to decide a ballot amendment seen as the first test of voter sentiment after the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe vs. Wade. Voters in the conservative state with deep ties to the anti-abortion movement ended up rejecting the measure.

“We’ve certainly seen dirty tricks, but never this level of deception aimed to make people vote the opposite way than they intend to,” said Davis Hammet, president of Loud Light, a youth voter registration and engagement organization in Kansas.

The misleading texts sent to Kansas Democrats highlights the growing problem of political disinformation sent by automated text message, a ubiquitous communication system that presents new opportunities for those who would attempt to deceive voters.

To be sure, ballot initiatives are often confounding — sometimes by design, so voters will support a measure they actually oppose.

But text messages are emerging as an increasingly popular means of spreading disinformation about voting and elections. That reflects a broader embrace of texting by political campaigns and organizations, a trend that accelerated when the pandemic forced campaigns to find new ways to engage with voters.

People in the United States received nearly 6 billion political texts in 2021, according to an analysis by RoboKiller, a mobile phone app that lets users block text and voice spam. That’s after a steady rise throughout the 2020 election that saw political spam texts increase by 20% a month.

“There’s been an explosion of political text messages since 2020 and since then the political messages have stuck around,” said RoboKiller’s vice president, Giulia Porter.

Two days after the 2020 election, thousands of anonymous texts were sent to supporters of then-President Donald Trump, stating that election officials in Philadelphia were rigging the vote. The text urged the recipients to show up where ballots were being counted to “show their support” for Trump.

The anonymous texts were later linked to a texting company run by one of Trump’s top campaign officials.

The same year, someone used text messages to spread false rumors of a national COVID-19 lockdown. Federal officials later blamed a foreign government for trying to stoke fear and division.

Text messages can offer specific advantages over social media when it comes to disseminating misinformation without leaving tracks, according to Darren Linvill, a Clemson University professor who researches disinformation techniques.

People also view text messages in a different way than social media, Linvill said. Social media is designed to reach the widest audience possible, but text messages are sent to particular phone numbers. That suggests the sender knows the recipient in some way and is specifically targeting that person.

“People aren’t as used to distrusting information on a text message,” Linvill said. “It’s more personal. Someone out there has your phone number and they’re reaching out to touch you with this information.”

While large social media companies have had varying success in curbing misinformation on their platforms, text messages are unmoderated. Because they aim for maximum exposure, disinformation campaigns using social media are easier to spot, study and expose, while text messages are private, one-to-one communications.

Software allowing groups to send hundreds or thousands of texts using fake numbers makes it even more difficult to find out the identity of the sender.

The texts sent in Kansas used a messaging platform made by Twilio, a San Francisco-based communications company. Twilio would not identify the customer who sent the texts, but a spokesman said the sender had been suspended from its service for violating its rules on disinformation.

The ballot amendment asked Kansans to decide on a proposed change to the state constitution that would clear the way for its Republican-controlled Legislature to more strictly regulate or ban abortion. A “yes” vote would have supported amending the constitution to remove the right to abortion. A “no” vote opposed amending the state constitution, maintaining a right to abortion.

Lindsay Ford, the associate director of a Kansas nonprofit voter engagement group called The Voter Network, noted that the texts came at a critical time, when someone looking to manipulate voters might have the best chance of succeeding.

“This is when voters who aren’t super engaged start to pay attention, in the last couple of days before the election,” Ford said. “So if they’re looking for something and haven’t seen information anywhere else and that was the first or only text they received, I can see how that could lead people down the wrong path.”

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By Patricia Zengerle

WASHINGTON (Reuters) -The U.S. Senate approved on Wednesday Finland and Sweden’s accession to NATO, the most significant expansion of the 30-member alliance since the 1990s as it responds to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

The Senate voted 95 to 1 to support ratification of accession documents, easily surpassing the two-thirds majority of 67 votes required to support ratification of the two countries’ accession documents.

“This historic vote sends an important signal of the sustained, bipartisan U.S. commitment to NATO, and to ensuring our Alliance is prepared to meet the challenges of today and tomorrow,” U.S. President Joe Biden said in a statement.

Sweden and Finland applied for NATO membership in response to the Feb. 24 invasion. Russia has repeatedly warned both countries against joining the alliance.

NATO’s 30 allies signed the accession protocol for them last month, allowing them to join the U.S.-led nuclear-armed alliance once its members ratify the decision.

At that point, Helsinki and Stockholm were able to participate in NATO meetings and have greater access to intelligence, but were not protected by Article Five, the NATO defense clause stating that an attack on one ally is an attack against all.

The accession must be ratified by the parliaments of all 30 North Atlantic Treaty Organization members before Finland and Sweden can be protected by the defense clause.

Ratification could take up to a year, although it has already been approved by a few countries, including Canada, Germany and Italy.

Senators from both parties strongly endorsed membership for the two countries, describing them as important allies whose modern militaries already worked closely with NATO.

“The qualifications of these two prosperous, democratic nations are outstanding and will serve to strengthen the NATO alliance,” said Democratic Senator Bob Menendez, chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee, urging support before the vote.

Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer invited the ambassadors and other diplomats from Finland and Sweden to the Senate to watch the vote.

Republican Senator Josh Hawley was the lone no vote. Republican Senator Rand Paul voted present.

(Reporting by Patricia Zengerle; additional reporting by Rose Horowitch and Jarrett Renshaw; Editing by Grant McCool)

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NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) — Tennessee Republicans on Thursday will settle a nine-way primary in a reconfigured congressional district in Nashville they are hoping to flip, while Democrats will choose their nominee for governor in what could be a history-making bid to topple the GOP incumbent.

Two of three Democratic candidates for governor would be the state’s first Black Democratic nominee for that office; the third is a physician running for political office for the first time, spurred by Republican Gov. Bill Lee’s hands-off response to the COVID-19 pandemic. Lee is running unopposed and would have a strong advantage in a general election in a state that has not elected a Democrat to statewide office since 2006.

Redrawn congressional districts helped put Tennessee among the states where Republicans hope to flip a seat in a push to reclaim control of the U.S. House, providing the main drama in Tennessee’s Thursday primaries. Tennessee holds the only statewide elections nationally that day.

Nashville’s 5th Congressional District drew heavy interest from Republicans after GOP state lawmakers carved Democratic-tilted Nashville into three districts, favoring their party in each seat. The longtime incumbent in the 5th District, Democratic U.S. Rep. Jim Cooper, decided to retire, saying there was “no way” he could win reelection under the new redistricting maps. The new district favored Republican Donald Trump over Democrat Joe Biden by 12 percentage points in 2020.

In the other two Nashville-area districts, the Republican incumbents don’t have primary opponents. The new maps weight their districts in their favor.

In the 5th, state Sen. Heidi Campbell has no opponent in her Democratic primary and will take on the Republican winner in November. Two Democrats face off in the new 6th District, which includes more of Nashville, where Republican U.S. Rep. John Rose has a huge fundraising edge.

There is also a full slate of state legislative primary races. Additionally, Thursday is general election night for many local contests. The highlight of those is in Shelby County — which encompasses Memphis — where Republican District Attorney Amy Weirich faces a challenge from Democratic civil rights lawyer Steven Mulroy.

At least in Nashville, anyone who turns on a TV is more likely to see ads for a Republican running for the 5th Congressional District than a candidate for anything else.

Competing TV attacks — mostly run by generically named outside groups with mega-wealthy donors — are trying to sow doubt about the conservative resumes of the three top fundraising Republican candidates: former Tennessee House Speaker Beth Harwell, retired Tennessee National Guard Brig. Gen. Kurt Winstead and Maury County Mayor Andy Ogles.

Fellow GOP candidate Jeff Beierlein, who flew Blackhawk helicopters in the Army, bought TV ad time to decry the mudslinging. Other candidates in the race are Geni Batchelor, a retired small-business owner; former state legislative staffer Tres Wittum; Natisha Brooks, who runs a home-school academy; Timothy Lee, a paramedic; and Stewart Parks, a real estate businessman.

The election marks the first time voters get a say over a seat that had been subject to months of Republican political brokering.

Political infighting over the carefully crafted district — it meanders through six counties — led the state Republican Party to boot three candidates off the ballot, including Trump’s pick, former State Department spokesperson Morgan Ortagus. One of the booted candidates, video producer Robby Starbuck, is attempting a write-in campaign.

The governor, meanwhile, can relax on primary night. He avoided a Republican challenge. The last governor to enjoy an unopposed primary was Democratic Gov. Ned McWherter in 1990, said Tennessee legislative historian Eddie Weeks.

Democrats will be sorting out who will face Lee in November. Memphis City Councilmember JB Smiley Jr. or Memphis community advocate Carnita Atwater would be the first Black Democratic nominee for governor in the state’s history. Critical-care physician Jason Martin, who lives in Nashville, joined the race as a prominent critic of Lee’s pandemic response. Martin has decidedly outraised and outspent the next-highest fundraiser, Smiley.

Weeks said he could not find an African American nominee for governor, Democrat or Republican, in state history. Yet, he noted that in 1876, William Yardley, an African American Knoxville official later elected to the county court, ran as an independent when the Republican Party declined to nominate a candidate for governor. Democratic Gov. James Davis Porter won reelection that year.

Tennessee had a Black Democratic nominee for U.S. Senate as recently as 2020.

Lee, meanwhile, defeated a Democratic opponent by 21 percentage points in 2018. He goes into November with a huge fundraising edge and the power of incumbency.

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By Richard Cowan

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – A few Democrats in the U.S. Congress have begun to voice what many have mulled privately: whether President Joe Biden, the oldest person to ever occupy the Oval Office, ought to choose retirement over re-election in 2024.

With his approval rating at 38% – and having held below 50% since May – the 79-year-old Biden has been damaged by bruising inflation and voter worries that he will not be able to meet the demands of the presidency in 2025. Last November, the White House said Biden plans to run again in 2024.

A pair of Democratic U.S. representatives from Minnesota have articulated the message clearly.

“The country would be well served by a new generation of compelling, well-prepared, dynamic Democrats to step up,” Democratic Representative Dean Phillips said in an interview last week with WCCO radio in Minneapolis.

Phillips lauded Biden’s decency and service, but added it is time for generational change.

Democratic Representative Angie Craig, who unlike Phillips faces a tough re-election on Nov. 8, on Tuesday said she is “in lock step and alignment” with Phillips, according to the Minnesota Post.

She may have been trying to better position herself with independent voters, according to some analysts.

But recent public opinion polls have found similar views among Democratic voters. A July New York Times/Siena College poll found that 64% of Democrats would like a new candidate in 2024, and a CNN poll last week found an even higher 75% of Democrats hold that view.

TRUMP FACTOR

Party activists normally rally around their president, especially if he is signaling seeking a second term. And they may do so if former President Donald Trump, 76, decides to run again in 2024, a possibility he has been flirting with publicly.

“The hunger for a new generation of leadership is showing. But the hunger to beat Trump will always matter more. Biden is still the only name on the list of Republicans or Democrats who’ve done it,” noted Matt McAlvanah, a former Obama administration and Senate leadership official.

A July Reuters/Ipsos poll found that one-third of Republican voters think Trump should not run again. Polls show Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, 43, gaining appeal among Republican voters.

White House officials did not immediately respond to requests for comment on Wednesday.

NO ‘READY ALTERNATIVE’

One aide to a veteran House Democrat said on Wednesday that Biden’s COVID-19 diagnosis last month kicked off a conversation among a half-dozen Democratic aides of varying political stripes about Biden’s future.

It was not clear whether they reflected their bosses’ sentiments, but the aide noted there was a general consensus that it would be “foolish” to dump Biden, given his strong win over Trump in 2020.

“It’s not like we have a ready alternative,” the aide added.

Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer and other prominent Democratic lawmakers have expressed their support for a Biden run in 2024.

Others are keeping their options open.

During a debate on Tuesday night between three Democrats vying for one House seat in New York, long-time Representative Carolyn Maloney said she didn’t believe Biden was running for re-election when asked whether she would support his candidacy. A day later she declared her support.

Her leading opponent, Representative Jerrold Nadler, said such questions are best left for after the Nov. 8 midterm elections, when Republicans are favored to win back majorities in at least one chamber of Congress.

The chatter comes as Biden points to a track record of legislative accomplishments. He signed a $1 trillion infrastructure bill in November, less than a year into his presidency, a sharp contrast with Trump who talked about infrastructure for four years but never won legislation.

Last month Biden signed the first major federal gun safety bill in three decades.

Now, Democrats in Congress are aiming to pass a record-setting investment in climate change mitigation and a program to reduce the costs of prescription drugs for the elderly, all the while coaxing companies and the wealthy to meet their tax obligations.

Ben LaBolt, a Democratic strategist and former spokesman for former President Barack Obama, said Democratic lawmakers should be focusing on those wins.

“It’s an odd time for that sort of chatter to happen when the administration is on the verge of some record accomplishments on many of the top issues facing the American people,” LaBolt said.

(Reporting by Richard Cowan, additional reporting by Jeff Mason; Editing by Scott Malone and Josie Kao)

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More specifically, one of the directives Biden will issue will allow states that have not outlawed abortion to apply for specific Medicaid waivers that would, in effect, help them treat women who have traveled from out of state.

“I wish I was with you in person, quite frankly,” Biden said. “But I’m getting there.”

Wednesday’s order is the latest in a series of executive actions from the Biden administration since the constitutional right to an abortion was eliminated in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization in June.

Near the end of Biden’s remarks, he once again called on Congress to codify Roe vs. Wade into law.

“If Congress fails to act, the people of this country need to elect senators and representatives who will restore Roe and protect the right to privacy, freedom and equality.”

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By Nandita Bose and Alexandra Alper

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – President Joe Biden said on Wednesday the Supreme Court and Republicans are clueless about the power of American women as he signed a second executive order aimed at protecting abortion rights.

The order asks the federal health department to consider allowing Medicaid funds to be used to help facilitate out of state travel for abortions. Like Biden’s first order signed in July, it is meant to address the recent Supreme Court decision to end the nationwide constitutional right to abortion.

It is expected to have limited impact, as Republicans in U.S. states push a wave of laws restricting abortion, access to medication and funding for such services.

The president’s actions come a day after Kansas voters rejected one such effort, to remove abortion protections from the state’s constitution. The vote was a resounding win for the abortion rights movement in the first statewide electoral test since the Supreme Court ruling.

“I don’t think the court has any notion for that matter or the Republican party for that matter…how women are going to respond. They don’t have a clue about the power of American women,” Biden said. “Last night in Kansas they found out.”

He called the Kansas result a “decisive victory” and said voters in the state sent a “powerful signal” that makes clear politicians should not interfere with the fundamental rights of women.

“This fight is not over and we saw that last night in Kansas,” Biden said. The Supreme Court “practically dared women in this country go to the ballot box and restore the right to choose,” that it had just stripped away, Biden said.

Last month, Biden said the Supreme Court, which is weighted 6-3 with conservative judges, was “out of control” after ruling in June to overturn Roe v Wade, ending a half-century of protections for women’s reproductive rights. His first order in early July directed the federal government’s health department to expand access to medication abortion and ensure that women who travel for abortions are protected.

The latest action builds on those measures. But like the first one it remains vague about how those goals can be achieved. It asks the Health and Human Services Department to consider using funds including Medicaid, the federal and state funded insurance program it oversees, to support low-income women traveling out-of-state for abortion services, a senior administration official said.

It calls on Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra to consider inviting states to apply for Medicaid waivers when treating patients who cross state lines for reproductive health services, the official said, without giving additional details.

The Hyde Amendment, a Congressional measure, states that Medicaid will not pay for an abortion unless the woman’s life is in danger or the pregnancy resulted from rape or incest, making the effectiveness of the order uncertain.

It also directs the department to ensure health-care providers comply with federal non-discrimination laws when offering such services and orders it to collect data to measure the impact of the ruling on maternal health, the official added.

The president signed the order at the first meeting of the interagency task force on reproductive healthcare access, which was formed in July.

Senate Democrats rejected Biden’s call to lift the chamber’s “filibuster” rule requiring 60 of the 100 senators to agree on most legislation to allow them to pass a law establishing a national right to abortion.

In the evenly divided Senate, U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris can cast a tie-breaking vote.

Since then Biden has pivoted to urging voters to elect more Democrats to Congress in the Nov. 8 midterm elections, when Republicans are favored to win back a majority in the House of Representatives and perhaps also the Senate. He reiterated his appeal to voters on Wednesday.

Democrats hope the issue may help drive voters to the polls in November.

Protecting abortion rights is a top issue for women Democrats, Reuters polling shows. More than 70% of Americans think the issue should be left to a woman and her doctor.

On Tuesday, Biden’s Justice Department sued Idaho to block a state law that it said imposes a “near-absolute ban” on abortion, marking its first legal challenge to state abortion laws since the Supreme Court ruling.

(Reporting by Nandita Bose, Jeff Mason and Alexandra Alper in Washington; Editing by Scott Malone, Leslie Adler and Diane Craft)

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WASHINGTON (Reuters) -The Congressional Budget Office said on Wednesday it has estimated that a $430 billion drugs, energy and tax bill proposed by Senate Democrats would result in a net decrease in the deficit of $101.5 billion over a decade.

The crucial cost estimate https://www.cbo.gov/system/files/2022-08/hr5376_IR_Act_8-3-22.pdf from the nonpartisan fiscal referee agency shows only about one-third of the $300 million in deficit reduction touted https://www.democrats.senate.gov/imo/media/doc/inflation_reduction_act_one_page_summary.pdf by the bill’s Democratic sponsors. But it does not include the effect of additional receipts expected from increased Internal Revenue Service enforcement activity.

The CBO estimates that extra revenue at about $204 billion over 10 years, but said it could not include that in its overall cost estimate due to its congressional guidelines.

The CBO said the bill would cut the deficit by $17.9 billion in fiscal 2023, but would increase deficits somewhat from fiscal 2024 though 2027, while cutting deficits again from 2028, with a $42.6 billion deficit reduction in 2031.

(Reporting by Eric Beech and David Lawder in WashingtonEditing by Costas Pitas and Matthew Lewis)

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