Election 2024 live: Spike Lee and Samuel L Jackson join Harris rally, while Trump calls US ‘garbage can for the world’

Actor Nick Offerman released a music video last week encouraging people to get out and vote for Kamala Harris.

In the video, a group of children reacts to finding out that one of their grandparents instead spent the day “smokin’ weed and watchin’ porn” instead of saving democracy. They are not happy and take vengeance on grandpa.

Responding to online haters a week later, Offerman wrote on X: “If you are replying to this with hatred and homophobia, you’re making my point for me. I vote for the party of acceptance and equal rights for all. #VoteBlue.”

Enjoy the video below:

Kamala Harris is taping an interview with Shannon Sharpe, three-time Super Bowl champion (with the Denver Broncos and Baltimore Ravens), for his podcast Club Shay Shay.

The interview will air on Monday.

Recent guests include John Legend, Fat Joe, and Mark Cuban.

Here’s a clip of John Legend discussing reproductive rights and the role of Donald Trump in overturning Roe v Wade in the context of when his wife, model Chrissy Teigen miscarried.

A group of wealthy conservatives have funneled $140 million to a series of organizations that could work to support GOP efforts to challenge the 2024 presidential election results.

Hobby Lobby founder David Green and Wisconsin shipping billionaires Richard and Elizabeth Uihlein are among those making sizeable donations to these groups, The Wall Street Journal reports.

Katie Hawkinson has the story.

Democratic Rep Jamie Raskin, ranking member of the House Committee on Oversight and Accountability, and Senator Ron Wyden, chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, have written to Attorney General Merrick Garland calling on him to appoint a special counsel to investigate possible violations of the Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA) by Jared Kushner, son-in-law and former senior White House advisor to ex-President Donald Trump.

In a statement released today, they say that as part of investigations launched last Congress by House and Senate Democrats, Senate investigators have uncovered that since the end of the Trump administration through mid-2024, Kushner’s firm Affinity Partners has received as much as $157m in fees from foreign clients. This includes $87m from the Saudi government.

In that time, the firm has generated no return on investment, paid zero earnings to investors, and invested only a small fraction of the funds it received from the sovereign wealth funds of Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and the United Arab Emirates.

They argue that public reports indicate that Kushner remained politically active throughout that time period, particularly on matters of US foreign policy related to the Middle East.

“While on the Saudi government’s payroll, Mr Kushner is simultaneously serving as a political consultant to former President Trump and acting as a shadow diplomat and political advisor to Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Salman and other foreign principals. Despite being engaged in plainly political activities, Mr Kushner has not made FARA disclosures to DOJ related to the millions of dollars he receives annually by entities owned and controlled by the governments of Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Qatar,” Raskin and Wyden wrote.

“The scale of these undisclosed foreign payments to Mr Kushner coupled with the national security implications of his apparent ongoing efforts to sell political influence to the highest foreign bidder are unprecedented and demand action from DOJ.”

Individuals acting on behalf of foreign entities must register with the DOJ or will have violated federal law.

The lawmakers included a list of political activities engaged in by Kushner during the time he was being paid:

• Advising the Saudi Crown Prince on US foreign policy;
• Advising former President Trump and his presidential campaign;
• Selling geopolitical advisory and political advocacy services to foreign government clients through his private equity fund;
• Arranging meetings on foreign policy with the Qatari prime minister on US soil;
• Engaging in political fundraising in support of Trump’s campaign; and
• Influencing members of Congress on domestic and foreign policy.

Eric Garcia writes:

A new batch of polls for the swing states from various outlets dropped on Wednesday evening, to mixed reactions.

Some Democrats and even some Republicans have taken to discarding polls overall and looking at early voting numbers instead, since people in swing states like Nevada, Georgia, North Carolina and Wisconsin have already begun to cast their ballots. But this is an imprecise science, since it only reveals party registration. Plenty of registered Republicans may not pull the lever for Trump, and vice versa.

Uncertainty is probably the worst part of the final days before an election, especially in a coin-flip election. Voters want certainty, even if it is a result they would not like, as it gives them a chance to gird themselves.

But while The Independent can’t necessarily offer a crystal ball, Inside Washington might be able to offer one early indicator of how the races will swing.

Continue reading...

Donald Trump still fails to understand or admit that tariffs on imported goods mean higher prices for American consumers buying imported goods and businesses that rely on imported components.

These higher prices are framed as a national sales tax by Democrats.

Here’s what the former president wrote on Truth Social this afternoon:

I am NOT proposing a National Sales Tax, as the Democrats say in their Advertisements against me. Dems know what they are saying is a blatant lie. I am proposing tariffs on other countries that take advantage of us, hardly a NST. These tariffs are paid for by the abusing country, NOT THE AMERICAN CONSUMER. They do not cause inflation, and will MAKE AMERICA RICH AGAIN!

The Daily Show tore into Fox News anchor Brian Kilmeade on Wednesday, after the broadcaster tried to defend Donald Trump in the wake of reporting that he allegedly praised Adolf Hitler in the White House.

“He obviously has frustration, and I could absolutely see him going out, ‘You know what? It would be great to have German generals [that] actually do what we asked them to do,’” Kilmeade told panelists on Fox & Friends. “Knowing that, maybe not fully being cognizant of the third rail of German generals were Nazis and whatever. But he was frustrated with the slowdown.”

“Did you just ‘whatever’ the Holocaust?” Daily Show host Michael Kosta asked during a segment on the controversy.

Josh Marcus reports.

Former President Donald Trump has repeatedly claimed that Pennsylvania has 500,000 fracking jobs, but reports indicate that the figure is closer to a tenth of that.

Gustaf Kilander looks at the numbers.