Most voters doubt Biden’s physical, mental fitness to be president, Trump’s ability to act ethically: poll
Most American voters have little confidence that President Biden possesses the physical and mental fitness required to serve another term in the White House, while a similar majority is concerned that former President Trump would not act ethically if elected, according to a new poll. The Pew Research Center survey released on Wednesday shows that most American voters do not appear happy with a Biden-Trump rematch just six months ahead of the presidential election. The survey shows that roughly 15% of voters are extremely or very confident that Biden has the physical fitness needed to do the job of president, with 20% being somewhat confident and approximately 65% of respondents saying they have little or no confidence. Just 21% are extremely or very confident in Biden’s mental fitness to act as president, according to the survey, with 16% somewhat confident, and 62% having little or no confidence. NEW POLL REVEALS HOW VOTERS’ VIEWS ON ABORTION HAVE CHANGES AS DEMS SEEK TO MAKE ISSUE A CENTRAL 2024 THEME Trump garnered more confidence from respondents regarding both physical and mental fitness, with roughly 36% saying they are extremely or very confident he is physically fit for office, 24% somewhat confident, and 40% with little or no confidence. As far as being mentally fit, 38% were extremely or very confident in the former president, 14% were somewhat confident, and 48% had little or no confidence. Biden continued a streak of public gaffes on Wednesday, when he appeared to read a script instruction off a teleprompter during remarks at a trade union conference in Washington, D.C. “Imagine what we could do next. Four more years, pause,” he said before laughing as the audience began chanting, “Four more years.” Just one day earlier, Biden was mocked for inadvertently claiming that he could not be trusted over former President Trump. TRUMP CUTS INTO BIDEN’S LEAD AMONG DEMOGRAPHIC TRADITIONALLY DOMINATED BY DEMS: POLL “I don’t know why we’re surprised by Trump. How many times does he have to prove we can’t be trusted?” Biden said. More voters favored Biden when it came to his ability to act ethically in office, with 34% being extremely confident compared to 26% for Trump. About 59% said they have little or no confidence that the former president can act ethically if elected. Despite this broad criticism of both Biden and Trump, the survey found that the presidential race remains a virtual tie, with 49% of registered voters favoring or leaning toward voting for Trump, while 48% support or lean toward Biden. Trump is currently standing trial in New York City for allegedly falsifying business records related to hush money payments to adult film actress Stormy Daniels in the final days of the 2016 campaign. Trump has denied wrongdoing. Trump also faces separate state and federal charges of alleged election interference, and federal charges for allegedly retaining classified documents. Fox News Digital’s Lindsay Kornick contributed to this report.
NYPD responds to AOC, says officers ‘have to teach’ anti-Israel mobs the ‘consequences of their actions’
Students who formed an encampment at Columbia University in New York City, in protest of Israel’s war against Hamas in Gaza, were met with the full force of the New York Police Department after the school reversed course to allow law enforcement personnel on campus. The decision prompted backlash from Democratic Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and ignited a tiff between the lawmaker and the police force online. “Good SAT scores and self-entitlement do not supersede the law,” NYPD Chief John Chell wrote in a tweet early Thursday morning. “Columbia decided to hold its students accountable to the laws of the school,” he added. “I am sure you would agree that we have to teach them these valuable life skills.” The comment came after Ocasio-Cortez complained Wednesday that Columbia made “the horrific decision to mobilize NYPD on their own students.” UT-AUSTIN PRESIDENT DEFENDS SHUTTING DOWN ANTI-ISRAEL PROTESTS: ‘OUR RULES MATTER AND THEY WILL BE ENFORCED’ The students are protesting Israel’s war in Gaza, which has resulted in tens of thousands of Palestinian deaths. Fox News Digital reached out to Ocasio-Cortez’s office for additional comment, but a response was not immediately received. On Thursday, the NYPD responded to AOC, applauding the school for holding its students “accountable” for “the consequences of their actions.” “Truly amazing! Columbia decided to hold its students accountable to the laws of the school. They are seeing the consequences of their actions. Something these kids were most likely never taught,” Chell wrote Thursday. COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY MOVES TO HYBRID LEARNING ON MAIN CAMPUS AMID ANTISEMITIC PROTESTS He continued: “Secondly, I was with those ‘units’ last Thursday that you describe as having, ‘the most violent reputations.’ These ‘units’ removed students with great care and professionalism, not a single incident was reported.” And, “The only incidents that day on campus were the student’s hateful anti-Semitic speech and vile language towards our cops.” The police chief also urged the lawmaker to “rethink” her comments and thank the NYPD officers. “I am sure you agree any hateful speech is unacceptable. You should rethink your comments to a simple thank you to the NYPD and hate has no place in our society,” he wrote, adding: “Lack of accountability = consequences.” COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY ANTI-ISRAEL PROTESTERS: 5 DRAMATIC MOMENTS FROM A WEEK OF CHAOS “Hate from anyone, anywhere has no place in our city and country,” Chell concluded. NYPD Deputy Commissioner Kaz Daughtry also weighed in, pointing to how the protests are impacting other students at the school. “Everyone has a Constitutional right to protest, it’s one of the pillars our great democracy is built on. But kids also have a right to go to school without being harassed, threatened, intimidated or assaulted,” Daughtry wrote. The deputy commissioner added: “There is nothing ‘horrific’ about protecting the safety of Columbia’s young students who are just trying to go to school. We’ve said it time and time again, the NYPD will always protect and defend your right to protest but just because you hold a sign while you’re threatening, harassing, intimidating and assaulting people doesn’t give you a free pass from criminal conduct.” ANTI-ISRAEL CAMPUS PROTESTERS MAKE DEMAND OF ADMINISTRATORS, VOW TO STAY PUT UNTIL UNIVERSITIES MEET IT “Being anti-Semitic and spewing hate to kids will never ever be tolerated in our city. Our officers are the best and most highly trained law enforcement professionals in the world. Everyday, they have to endure insults, threats, and hate speech merely because the uniform they wear as they try to keep the peace and protect everyone’s rights,” his tweet continued. The NYPD deputy commissioner also encouraged Ocasio-Cortez to visit Columbia and to walk through the campus to see the protest. “I promise our officers will, like always, do their job, and protect you like they have protected everyone on campus regardless of what your political beliefs are. We’ll also take a report if you feel threatened,” he concluded. On Wednesday, Ocasio-Cortez, who has publicly expressed her support for the protests – which she has described as “peaceful” – criticized the school’s decision to call for law enforcement officers to help restore order on campus. “Not only did Columbia make the horrific decision to mobilize NYPD on their own students, but the units called in have some of the most violent reputations on the force,” she tweeted. “NYPD had promised the city they wouldn’t deploy SRG [Strategic Response Group] to [the] protests.” Columbia continued to negotiate with students to clear the encampment after there were over 100 students arrested, but the several failed attempts have been mostly fruitless. Columbia University averted another confrontation between students and police earlier Wednesday as the school extended the negotiations to reach an agreement on clearing an encampment through a midnight deadline that University President Minouche Shafik had set on Tuesday. The school extended negotiations for another 48 hours. Police said 133 protesters were taken into custody at the New York university this week. The Associated Press contributed to this report.
‘Deeply biased’: India reacts to US report citing human rights violations
India said the report reflects a poor understanding of India and it attaches no value to it.
SC to pronounce verdict tomorrow on petitions seeking 100% EVM-VVPAT verification
SC to pronounce verdict tomorrow on petitions seeking 100% EVM-VVPAT verification
Tennessee House tables bill that would have banned consideration of reparations
Tennessee’s Republican-dominant House on Wednesday spiked legislation that would have banned local governments from paying to either study or dispense money for reparations for slavery. The move marked a rare defeat on a GOP-backed proposal initially introduced nearly one year ago. It easily cleared the Republican-controlled Senate last April, but lawmakers eventually hit pause as the House became consumed with controversy over expelling two Black Democratic lawmakers for their participating in a pro-gun control protest from the House floor. That protest followed a deadly elementary school shooting in Nashville. Interest in the reparations bill emerged again this year, just as lawmakers and GOP Gov. Bill Lee were in the process of finalizing the removal and replacement of every board member of the state’s only publicly-funded historically Black public university, Tennessee State University. That sparked more outrage among critics who contend that Tennessee’s white GOP state leaders have long refused to trust Black local leaders. SCHOOL CHOICE PROPONENT WARNS TENNESSEE REPUBLICANS AFTER SCHOOL CHOICE BILL FAILS: ‘THEY WILL LOSE THE WAR’ As the TSU fallout increased, House members appeared hesitant to hold a potentially explosive debate over reparations. The bill was briefly debated on the House floor last week but support remained unclear. “The idea of studying reparations doesn’t take anything from you,” Democratic Rep. Larry Miller, who is Black and from Memphis, said during the short House debate. “What’s inside of you to say, ‘Look, we can’t study our history. We can’t even talk about our history, you can’t even use your local tax dollars to study it.’ That is so antiquated.” Ultimately, House leaders waited until the final week of the session to return to the measure. But as Republican Rep. John Ragan, the bill’s sponsor, approached the front of the House to begin his opening remarks, another Republican requested that the body “table” his proposal — a move that would effectively kill it for the year. Nearly 30 Republicans joined House Democrats in tabling the bill, including Republican House Speaker Cameron Sexton. Ahead of the vote, Ragan maintained his bill was needed, arguing that reparations advocates want to “take money from our grandchildren’s pockets as a judgement for someone else’s great-great-grandfather’s actions.” “Is it right to say that the faults of a small percentage of long-past generations must be borne by all of today’s Americans? No. It’s never right to punish an innocent person for an act committed by another,” Ragan said Wednesday. Under House rules, no other lawmakers were allowed to speak during the vote. “We decided move on, go accomplish some other stuff,” Sexton later told reporters. “You can always come back.” Tennessee lawmakers began seriously considering banning the consideration of reparations only after the state’s most populated county, which encompasses Memphis, announced it would spend $5 million to study the feasibility of reparations for the descendants of slaves and find “actionable items.” The decision by Shelby County leaders was prompted by the fatal beating of Tyre Nichols by officers in January 2023. Yet the idea to ban reparations has been floated in other states. A Florida Republican lawmaker proposed a constitutional amendment this year that would have banned state or local governments from paying reparations, but the measure didn’t pass. A Missouri Republican introduced a bill that would ban any state or local government entity from spending on reparations based on race, religion, gender identity, sexual orientation or economic class. It hasn’t advanced to date. Meanwhile, other states have willingly moved to study reparations, including California, New Jersey and Vermont.
Dems attack Johnson over impassioned Columbia speech condemning anti-Israel student activists
Top Democrats are pouncing on House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., after he gave an impassioned speech condemning the anti-Israel protests on Columbia University’s campus. “Why would I ever listen to a man that thinks he should have more say over my body than I do? NEXT,” Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., wrote on X under a photo of Johnson at Columbia. She responded to a report about students heckling Johnson, “Good, he’s trying to take all their reproductive rights away.” Johnson and several New York House Republicans – Reps. Nicole Malliotakis, Anthony D’Esposito, and Mike Lawler – visited with Jewish students on the Manhattan Ivy League campus on Thursday after days of demonstrations left them fearing for their own safety. COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY MOVES TO HYBRID LEARNING ON MAIN CAMPUS AMID ANTISEMITIC PROTESTS The speaker denounced the “mob” of pro-ceasefire activists who set up an encampment on the Columbia campus as well as the faculty and staff aiding them. Those protesters loudly booed Johnson’s remarks on Thursday, to which at one point he shot back, “Enjoy your free speech.” New York’s Democratic Governor Kathy Hochul accused Johnson of politicizing the demonstrations in comments to reporters in Albany, according to Politico. “A speaker worth the title should really be trying to heal people and not divide them, so I don’t think it adds to anything,” Hochul said. “It seems to me there’s a lot more responsibilities and crises to be dealt with in Washington…I’d encourage the speaker to go back and perhaps take up the migrant bill, the bill to deal with closing the borders, so we can deal with the real crisis that New York has.” COLUMBIA SETS DEADLINE FOR AGREEMENT WITH PROTESTERS, THREATENS ‘ALTERNATIVE OPTIONS’ FOR CLEARING PROTESTERS Rep. Ilhan Omar, D-Minn., whose daughter was arrested at the Columbia encampment earlier this week, went a step further and said Johnson was putting people’s lives in danger. “It is not surprising that he would go out to Columbia University and stir up really more anger and hate and endanger the lives of young people who are at the encampment at Columbia University,” she told MSNBC. The speaker’s office told Fox News Digital in response to the attacks, “Speaker Johnson spoke to students at Columbia University because Governor Hochul and other officials in New York have completely failed in their duty to protect Jewish students and combat the rise of antisemitism in their party. We wish it hadn’t been necessary.” OMAR’S DAUGHTER DECRIES ‘HYPOCRISY,’ SAYS ANTI-ISRAEL STUDENTS ARE ‘100% TARGETED’ AFTER SUSPENSION AND ARREST CLICK HERE TO GET THE FOX NEWS APP His appearance at Columbia came as officials on both sides of the aisle condemned the demonstrations, which have forced the university to partially move classes online. Similar protests have cropped up at colleges across the country, including at Yale University, where a Jewish student said they were hit in the eye with a flag pole during an anti-Israel event. “The college campus used to be the place for respectful debate, for the differences of opinion and the free marketplace of ideas to be discussed. That is not what is happening here,” Johnson told the activists on Thursday. “You’re intimidating and shouting down people you disagree with. You cannot censor and silence viewpoints you disagree with. That is not American. You do not understand what it means to respect the First Amendment.”
Trump faces Supreme Court immunity test as ‘hush money’ trial continues
Former United States President Donald Trump faces legal tests in New York and Washington on Thursday in two separate cases that hang over his campaign to return to the Oval Office in the November election. In New York, the third day of witness testimony is to be held in a historic criminal trial, the first against a US president. Tabloid publisher David Pecker is again expected to take the stand as prosecutors seek to paint a picture of a coordinated effort to influence the 2016 presidential election through malfeasance. But Trump’s attention may be elsewhere with the US Supreme Court set to consider whether Trump can be prosecuted or claim immunity in a federal case related to his efforts to overturn the 2020 election results. Trump had requested permission to skip the New York trial for the day to sit in on the Supreme Court session, but the request was denied. “We have a big case today,” Trump told construction workers in Manhattan during a brief campaign stop before the day’s court proceedings. “The judge isn’t allowing me to go.” In New York, Trump has been charged with 34 felony counts of falsifying business documents related to payments made to adult film star Stormy Daniels. The falsification charges concern the alleged mislabelling of repayments that Trump made to his lawyer Michael Cohen, who had paid $130,000 to Daniels in return for her silence over an alleged sexual encounter with Trump. For the felony charges to stick, prosecutors must persuade the jury that the misrepresentations were done with the intent to commit or cover up another crime. In opening statements on Monday, prosecutors focused primarily on what they described as an illegal effort to “undermine the integrity” of the 2016 presidential election, in which Trump defeated former Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton. Prosecutor Matthew Colangelo called the payments to Daniels “election fraud, pure and simple”. On Monday, prosecutors called their first witness, Pecker, former publisher of the National Enquirer tabloid and a longtime friend of Trump’s. They questioned Pecker on a “catch and kill” agreement reached between Trump and the publisher. Under the agreement, the tabloid would buy potentially politically damaging stories about Trump and prevent them from being published. Pecker recounted an August 2015 meeting with Cohen and Trump in which he was asked “to help the campaign”. He agreed to be the “eyes and ears” of the campaign, Pecker testified. Pecker said he agreed to help Trump’s political ambitions through both the catch and kill scheme as well as through publishing positive stories about Trump and negative stories about his competitors. He called the agreement “highly, highly confidential”. The defence has argued that Trump did nothing illegal to justify the felony charges. It has stressed that catch and kill practices and hush money payments are not in and of themselves illegal. His lawyers have so far portrayed Trump as a businessman and public figure seeking to protect himself and his family from public allegations. Legal observers say it will be up to prosecutors to fully articulate the exact laws Trump sought to violate with the payments and provide the evidence needed to support that claim. The stories purchased and stifled by American Media, the owner of the National Enquirer, included claims by model Karen McDougal that she had an affair with Trump. The company has acknowledged it paid McDougal $150,000 to acquire and kill the story. Trump has denied the affair. American Media also paid a Trump Tower doorman $30,000 for a story claiming Trump had fathered a child out of wedlock. On Tuesday, prosecutors also called on Judge Juan Merchan to punish Trump for violating a gag order that bans him from talking publicly about potential witnesses in the case. Trump’s lawyers said Trump was only responding to claims about him in the social media posts in question. Trump himself took to Truth Social during a break in the trial to criticise the judge. “Everybody is allowed to talk and lie about me, but I am not allowed to defend myself?” Trump wrote. Merchan has yet to make a decision on whether Trump’s posts were indeed in violation of the gag order. Supreme Court arguments The New York case is one of four criminal cases filed against Trump, and it is the only one expected to finish before the presidential election, in which Trump is set to face President Joe Biden in a rematch of their 2020 race. In Washington, DC, Trump faces federal charges related to allegations he conspired to overturn the 2020 election results in his final days in office. The Supreme Court will decide whether and to what extent a former president enjoys presidential immunity from criminal prosecution for conduct alleged to involve official acts during his tenure in office. The determination will have a major impact on how the federal case will proceed, but it is unlikely to have any bearing on the New York case. In Georgia, Trump faces state charges related to an alleged campaign to pressure elections officials to change the state’s vote count in the 2020 presidential election. He faces a separate federal criminal case in Florida related to classified documents he allegedly removed from the White House. Adblock test (Why?)
‘The election is a vote not for democracy, but for autocracy’
NewsFeed If the rights of minorities are not being protected, then claims of democracy are fraudulent, journalist and professor Amitava Kumar said of India’s ongoing elections. Published On 25 Apr 202425 Apr 2024 Adblock test (Why?)
US TikTok’s future in jeopardy as Biden signs ban bill: What’s next?
The US Senate has overwhelmingly approved a bill that would ban TikTok unless its Chinese owner, ByteDance, divests from the video-sharing app in nine months amid concerns that the company poses a national security threat. TikTok has denied the Chinese government could access users’ data and has dubbed the bill, which was passed by a 79-18 vote, as unconstitutional. The bill was attached to a measure to provide a $95bn emergency aid package for Ukraine, Israel and Taiwan. President Joe Biden has said he will sign it into law on Wednesday. What do we know about the TikTok ban, and what happens next? Why the ban on TikTok? How will it impact TikTok? ByteDance bought the popular karaoke app Musical.ly and relaunched it as TikTok in 2017. It is one of the fastest-growing apps in the US, and has 150 monthly subscribers, more than half of them ages 18-34. In 2023, the platform boasted more than one billion monthly active users globally and a revenue of $120bn, of which $16bn comes from the US. The app’s growing influence has drawn the attention of spy agencies and US lawmakers who have expressed fear that TikTok might share users’ data with the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), a claim the company has denied. The data, some say, could also be used by China to spread misinformation that could harm the democratic process. “For years, we’ve allowed the Chinese Communist Party to control one of the most popular apps in America. That was dangerously shortsighted,” said Senator Marco Rubio, the top Republican on the US Senate Select Committee on Intelligence. “A new law is going to require its Chinese owner to sell the app. This is a good move for America.” In December 2022, the US Congress banned the use of the app on any federally issued device or network. Several other countries have followed suit, imposing curbs on the use of TikTok in government offices. India banned the app in 2020, when there were 200 million subscribers in the wake of border skirmishes. The widely popular app has also been accused of pushing pro-Palestine content – a claim the company has denied. TikTok’s young users (ages 16-24) in the US, who form 60 percent of its total users, sympathise with Palestine, the company said last November. TikTok’s executives have been grilled during multiple congressional hearings. In March of last year, the company’s Chief Executive Shou Zi Chew assured lawmakers that TikTok had taken steps to safeguard user data. The company has also invested $1.5bn to store TikTok in the US, and Oracle, a US-based multinational corporation, would provide the cloud and storage services for the project. It has also taken measures to separate its US operations from its Chinese parent company. China’s Foreign Ministry has said that the US allegations were not backed by evidence and the ban would undermine fair competition. Several Chinese tech firms have been blacklisted by the US amid a war over the internet and technology between Washington and Beijing. Last week, Apple said Beijing had ordered it to remove Meta Platforms’ WhatsApp and Threads from its App Store in China over Chinese national security concerns. If ByteDance refuses to divest the company, the app would lose access to app stores, web hosting and network providers. Until the nine-month deadline, TikTok will remain active in the US. The US president can grant an extension of the deadline for 90 more days if the company is seen as progressing on the terms set in the law. What can TikTok do now? While TikTok is able to operate in the US, for now, the company executives and attorneys will have to fight on legal grounds. “This unconstitutional law is a TikTok ban, and we will challenge it in court. We believe the facts and the law are clearly on our side, and we will ultimately prevail. The fact is, we have invested billions of dollars to keep US data safe and our platform free from outside influence and manipulation,” TikTok said in a statement on Wednesday. TikTok is set to challenge the bill on First Amendment grounds and TikTok users are also expected to again take legal action. A US judge in Montana in November blocked a state ban on TikTok, citing free speech grounds. The US Constitution guarantees the right to free speech under the First Amendment. The American Civil Liberties Union said banning or requiring divestiture of TikTok would “set an alarming global precedent for excessive government control over social media platforms … If the United States now bans a foreign-owned platform, that will invite copycat measures by other countries.” Senator Ron Wyden, a Democrat, said he was concerned the bill “provides broad authority that could be abused by a future administration to violate Americans’ First Amendment rights”. In 2020, former US President Donald Trump attempted to legislate his own TikTok ban, but he has somewhat done a reversal on banning the popular social media app while campaigning for another term in office. On Monday, Trump posted on his Truth Social platform: “Just so everyone knows, especially the young people, Crooked Joe Biden is responsible for banning TikTok.” [embedded content] Adblock test (Why?)
DNA Exclusive: Check LSS score of Jitin Prasada, BJP candidate from Uttar Pradesh’s Pilibhit
Prasada quit the Congress and joined BJP in June 2021.