Donald Trump is running against Joe Biden. But he keeps bringing up another Democrat: Jimmy Carter

This combination of photos shows former President Donald Trump, from left, President Joe Bien and former President Jimmy Carter. (AP Photo)
Short Url
Updated 29 April 2024
Follow

Donald Trump is running against Joe Biden. But he keeps bringing up another Democrat: Jimmy Carter

  • Carter and Trump actually share common ground. Both were Washington outsiders who won the presidency, each fueled by voter discontent with the establishment
  • But unlike Carter, Trump never accepted defeat. He falsely claimed the 2020 election was stolen and is accused of instigating violent efforts to overturn Biden's victory

ATLANTA: As Donald Trump campaigns for a return to the White House, he often reaches back more than 40 years and seven administrations to belittle President Joe Biden by comparing him to 99-year-old Jimmy Carter.

Most recently, Trump used his first campaign stop after the start of his criminal hush money trial in New York to needle the 46th president by saying the 39th president, a recently widowed hospice patient who left office in 1981, was selfishly pleased with Biden’s record.
“Biden is the worst president in the history of our country, worse than Jimmy Carter by a long shot,” Trump said in a variation of a quip he has used throughout the 2024 campaign, including as former first lady Rosalynn Carter was on her deathbed. “Jimmy Carter is happy,” Trump continued about the two Democrats, “because he had a brilliant presidency compared to Biden.”
It was once common for Republicans like Trump to lampoon Carter. Many Democrats, including Presidents Bill Clinton and Barack Obama, kept their distance for years, too, after a roiled economy, energy shortages and an extended American hostage crisis led to Carter’s landslide defeat in 1980. The negative vibes waned, though, with the passage of time and reconsideration of Carter’s legacy as a political leader, Nobel laureate and global humanitarian.
That leaves some observers, Democrats especially, questioning Trump’s attempts to saddle Biden with the decades-old baggage of a frail man who closed his public life last November by silently leading the mourning for his wife of 77 years.
“It’s just a very dated reference,” said pollster Zac McCrary, whose Alabama-based firm has worked for Biden. “It’s akin to a Democrat launching an attack on Gerald Ford or Herbert Hoover or William McKinley. It doesn’t signify anything to voters except Trump taking a cheap shot at a figure that most Americans at this point believe has given a lot to his country and to the world.”
Trump loyalists insist that even a near-centenarian is fair game in the rough-and-tumble reality of presidential politics.
“I was saying it probably before President Trump: Joe Biden’s worse than Jimmy Carter,” said Georgia resident Debbie Dooley, an early national tea party organizer during Obama’s first term and a Trump supporter since early in his 2016 campaign. Dooley said inflation under Biden justifies the parallel: “I’m old enough to remember the gas lines under President Carter.”




President Jimmy Carter, left, and Sen. Joseph R. Biden Jr., greet Biden supporters at a reception in Wilmington, Delaware on Feb. 20, 1978. (AP)

Any comparison, of course, involves selective interpretation, and Trump’s decision to bring a third president into the campaign carries complications for all three –- and perhaps some irony for Trump, who, like Carter, was rejected by voters after one term.
Trump’s campaign did not respond to a request for comment about his comparisons; Biden’s campaign was dismissive of them.
“Donald Trump is flailing and struggling to land coherent attacks on President Biden,” spokesman Seth Schuster said.
Carter remains at home in Plains, Georgia, where those close to him say he has kept up with the campaign. Biden is unquestionably the closest friend Carter has had in the White House since he left it. Biden was a first-term lawmaker from Delaware when he became the first US senator to endorse Carter’s underdog campaign. After he won the White House, Biden and first lady Jill Biden visited the Carters in Plains. They saw a grieving Carter privately before Rosalynn Carter’s funeral in Atlanta last year.
Like Carter, Biden is seeking reelection at a time when Americans are worried about inflation. But today’s economy is not the same as the one Carter faced.
The post-pandemic rebound, fueled by stimulus spending from the US and other governments, has been blamed for global inflation. The Federal Reserve has raised interest rates in response.
But the effective federal funds rate is 5.33 percent right now, while the benchmark was above 17 percent for a key period before the 1980 election. Rates for a 30-year mortgage are about half what they were at the peak of Carter’s administration; unemployment is less than half the Carter peak. The average per-gallon gas price in the US, topping $3.60 this month, is higher than the $3 peak under Trump. It reached $4.50 (adjusted for inflation) during Carter’s last year in office.
Carter and Trump actually share common ground. They are the clearest Washington outsiders in modern history to win the presidency, each fueled by voter discontent with the establishment.
A little-known Georgia governor and peanut farmer, Carter leveraged fallout from Vietnam and the Watergate scandal. Trump was the populist businessman and reality TV star who pledged to “Make America Great Again.” Both men defy ideological labels, standing out for their willingness to talk to dictators and isolated nations such as North Korea, even if they offered differing explanations for why.
Carter cautioned his party about underestimating Trump’s appeal, and the Carters attended Trump’s 2017 inauguration. Jimmy Carter, however, openly criticized Trump’s penchant for lies. After Carter suggested Russian propaganda helped elect Trump over Democrat Hillary Clinton in 2016, Trump began to insult Carter as a failure.




In this photo released by The White House, former President Jimmy Carter, center left, and former first lady Rosalynn Carter, center right, pose for a photo with President Joe Biden, right, and first lady Jill Biden at the home of the Carter's in Plains, Georgia, on April 30, 2021. (AP)

Unlike Carter, Trump never accepted defeat. He falsely claimed the 2020 election was stolen, then promoted debunked theories about the election that were repeated by supporters in the mob that stormed the US Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, as Congress convened to certify Biden’s victory. Trump left Washington the morning Biden took office, becoming the first president since Andrew Johnson in 1869 to skip his successor’s inauguration.
Carter conceded to Republican Ronald Reagan, attended his inauguration, then returned to Georgia. There, he and Rosalynn Carter established The Carter Center in 1982. They spent decades advocating for democracy, mediating international conflict and advancing public health in the developing world. They built houses for low-income people with Habitat for Humanity. Jimmy Carter was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2002.
Many historians’ judgment of Carter’s presidency has softened.
He is credited with deregulating much of the transportation industry, making air travel far more accessible to Americans, and creating the Department of Energy to streamline and coordinate the nation’s energy research. He negotiated the Camp David peace deal between Egypt and Israel. He diversified the federal judiciary and executive branch. He appointed the Federal Reserve chairman, Paul Volcker, who, along with Reagan, would get credit for the economic growth of the 1980s. Carter was the first president to raise concerns about rising global temperatures. And it was Carter, along with his diplomatic team, who negotiated the release of American hostages in Tehran, though they were not freed until minutes after Carter’s term expired.
Biographies, documentaries and news coverage across Carter’s 10th decade have reassessed that record.
By 2015, a Quinnipiac University poll found 40 percent of registered voters viewed Carter as having done the best work since leaving office among presidents from Carter through George W. Bush. When Gallup asked voters last year to rate Carter’s handling of his presidency, 57 percent approved and 36 percent disapproved. (Trump measured 46 percent approval and 54 percent disapproval at the time, the first retroactive measure Gallup had conducted for him.)
“There has long been a general consensus of admiration for Carter as a person — that sentiment that he was a good and decent man,” said Amber Roessner, a University of Tennessee professor who studies collective public memory and has written extensively on Carter. The more recent conclusions about Carter as a president, she added, suggest “we should consider Carter’s presidency as a lens to think about reevaluating about how we gauge the failure or success of any administration.”
How that plays into Biden’s rematch with Trump, Roessner said, “remains to be seen.”
Regardless, the ties between the 39th and 46th presidents endure, whatever the 45th president might say. When the time comes for Carter’s state funeral, Trump is expected to be invited alongside Carter’s other living successors. But it will be Biden who delivers the eulogy.


US restricts food, metal imports on Uyghur forced labor concerns

Updated 23 November 2024
Follow

US restricts food, metal imports on Uyghur forced labor concerns

  • Goods wholly or partially made by the sanctioned firms will be restricted from entering the US, says the Department of Homeland Security
  • China is accused of incarcerating over 1 million Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities in Xinjiang, although officials strongly deny this

WASHINGTON: The United States said Friday that it is barring imports from dozens more China-based companies — ranging from businesses in the metals to food industries — citing worries over forced labor.
Officials are adding around 30 entities to the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act entity list, meaning that goods wholly or partially made by these firms will be restricted from entering the United States.
The new additions bring the total number on the list to 107, said the Department of Homeland Security.
The reason is that the companies were found to either source materials from China’s northwestern Xinjiang region or work with its local government “to recruit, transfer, and receive workers, including Uyghurs, out of Xinjiang,” said the US Trade Representative’s office.
Beijing has been accused of incarcerating over one million Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities in a network of detention facilities in Xinjiang, although officials strongly deny this.

The newly-targeted companies make goods ranging from agricultural to aluminum products, along with polysilicon materials.
They also mine and process metals like copper, gold and nickel, the USTR statement added.
Among them are companies tied to Chinese electric vehicle battery manufacturer CATL and China-linked Gotion too, a bipartisan US congressional committee noted on Friday.
Earlier this year, the House Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party and others flagged CATL and Gotion’s ties to two businesses, Xinjiang Nonferrous and Xinjiang Joinworld.
Both were included in the latest update.
The committee’s chairman John Moolenaar and other lawmakers released a statement saying: “While we are pleased with this initial step, we remain concerned that CATL and Gotion’s supply chains are deeply tied to the Xinjiang region.”
The rule comes into effect on November 25.
“Companies should not secure unfair advantages by exploiting workers,” said US Trade Representative Katherine Tai.
“We will enforce our laws to address forced labor and prevent companies that violate workers’ rights from benefiting from the US market,” she added in a statement.
The Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act was signed into law in 2021.
 


Trump plans to assemble investigative teams to look into 2020 election, Washington Post reports

Updated 23 November 2024
Follow

Trump plans to assemble investigative teams to look into 2020 election, Washington Post reports

WASHINGTON: US President-elect Donald Trump plans to assemble investigative teams at the Department of Justice to search for evidence in battleground states that fraud tainted the 2020 election, the Washington Post reported on Friday, citing a source.
Trump, who won the 2024 election but lost the 2020 election to President Joe Biden, has falsely claimed that he lost the 2020 election due to extensive voter fraud, a view shared by millions of his supporters.
Trump was indicted last year on federal charges for his attempts to overturn the election. The charges stemmed from an investigation by Special Counsel Jack Smith.
The Washington Post, citing two people close to Trump’s transition team, reported that Trump plans to fire the entire team that worked with Smith.


Dutch court weighs a lawsuit against arms sales to Israel

Updated 23 November 2024
Follow

Dutch court weighs a lawsuit against arms sales to Israel

  • Opening the case at the court in The Hague, Judge Sonja Hoekstra noted: “It is important to underline that the Dutch State does not contest the gravity of the situation in Gaza, nor is the status of the West Bank”

THE HAGUE: Pro-Palestinian groups took the Dutch state to court on Friday, urging a halt to arms exports to Israel and accusing the government of failing to prevent what they termed a genocide in Gaza.
The NGOs argued that Israel is breaking international law in Gaza and the West Bank, invoking, among others, the 1948 UN Genocide Convention.
“Israel is guilty of genocide and apartheid” and “is using Dutch weapons to wage war,” said Wout Albers, a lawyer representing the NGOs.
“Dutch weapons are killing children every day in Palestine, including my family,” said Ahmed Abofoul, a legal adviser to Al-Haq, one of the groups involved in the suit. Israel furiously denies accusations of genocide as it presses on with the offensive in Gaza.
Opening the case at the court in The Hague, Judge Sonja Hoekstra noted: “It is important to underline that the Dutch State does not contest the gravity of the situation in Gaza, nor is the status of the West Bank.”
“Today is about finding out what is legally in play and what can be expected of the state if the state can be expected to do more or act differently than it is currently acting,” she added.
She acknowledged this was a “sensitive case,” saying: “It’s a whole legal debate.”
The lawyer for the Dutch State, Reimer Veldhuis, said the Netherlands has been applying European laws in force for arms exports.
Veldhuis argued the case should be tossed out.
“It is unlikely that the minister responsible will grant an arms export license to Israel that would contribute to the Israeli army’s activities in Gaza or the West Bank,” said Veldhuis.
The case comes one day after another court based in The Hague, the International Criminal Court, issued arrest warrants for Israel’s prime minister and former defense minister.

 


How COP29 outcome may impact countries most affected by climate change

Updated 22 November 2024
Follow

How COP29 outcome may impact countries most affected by climate change

  • UN Climate Change Conference in Baku brought together policymakers, researchers and environmentalists from 200 countries
  • Discussions covered energy transition, climate finance, loss and damage funding and environmental cost of geopolitical tensions

BAKU, Azerbaijan: The 2024 United Nations Climate Change Conference concluded in the capital of Azerbaijan on Friday with climate activists, world leaders and investors reflecting on climate change’s global impacts and the urgent need for actionable solutions.

This year’s event emphasized financing mechanisms, particularly to alleviate the suffering of vulnerable nations, and especially the developing countries most affected by climate change.

COP29 — the 29th Conference of the Parties under the United Nations climate organization UNFCCC — ran from Nov. 11 to 22 and brought together policymakers, researchers, and environmentalists from 200 countries.

A dominant theme was energy transition, as fossil fuel emissions remain the biggest driver of global warming.

The UN reports that burning coal, oil, and gas accounts for more than 75 percent of global greenhouse gas emissions and roughly 90 percent of all carbon dioxide emissions.

“War creates a climate crisis not just where it happens; it pollutes air, water, and land,” said one of the participants at COP 29. (AN photo by Abdulrahman bin Shalhoub)

Policymakers argued that reducing reliance on traditional fuels and adopting modern energy solutions could significantly shrink the global carbon footprint and bring the world closer to net-zero targets.

The University of Exeter’s Global Carbon Budget recently projected total CO2 emissions to rise from 40.6 billion metric tons in 2023 to 41.6 billion in 2024.

COP29 has been called "the finance COP," referring to the significance of funding to put an end to the rapid increase of global temperatures. (AN photo by Abdulrahman bin Shalhoub)

Sharing his perspective on the COP29 negotiations and the change he hopes to see, climate activist Philip McMaster, known on social media as SustainaClaus, told Arab News he is campaigning for a a healthier environment for children.

“The message of SustainaClaus is ‘Make childhood great again.’ Why? Because we all had a childhood before,” he said on the sidelines of the conference. “It was either great or not, but it was a very important period of time, and that is what these negotiations should be about: how we make the world a better place for the next generations.”

He added: “I hope to see global change.”

DID YOUKNOW?

• In the first week of COP29, as a step to foster sustainable energy, Saudi Arabia signed an executive program with Azerbaijan, Uzbekistan, and Kazakhstan to strengthen collaboration on renewable energy development.

• The COP29 agenda included energy transition, finance, urbanization and Article 6.

• Climate finance was the main topic discussed in Baku, along with the need to raise funds for vulnerable nations.

Military activity also emerged as a significant environmental threat. Olga Lermak, communications lead at Greencubator, a Ukraine-based cleantech accelerator, noted the ecological devastation caused by war.

“War creates a climate crisis not just where it happens; it pollutes air, water, and land,” she said.

Harmony among people is a top priority to maintain a healthier environment, according to some activists. (AN photo by Abdulrahman bin Shalhoub)

Ukraine accounts for 35 percent of Europe’s biodiversity, including 70,000 plant and animal species, according to the World Wide Fund for Nature. Among its endangered animals are the sandy blind mole-rat, the Russian desman, and the saker falcon.

The country’s ongoing conflict with Russia has caused significant damage to that biodiversity, according to Lermak.

“I hope that the negotiations held here bring great solutions, something that will help us to move forward,” she said. “I hope it is not just conversations, not just talking, but real action after this.”

Opinion

This section contains relevant reference points, placed in (Opinion field)

Another key issue debated at COP29 was loss and damage funding — addressing “unavoided” damage caused by climate change in the most vulnerable countries as well as “unavoidable” damage such as that caused by rising sea levels. Investment in emissions reduction was one of the key solutions put forward for dealing with unavoided damage.

Researchers from the International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis and the Euro-Mediterranean Center on Climate Change estimate that the loss and damage needs of vulnerable countries will amount to between $130 billion and $940 billion in 2025 alone.

Gloria Bulus, team lead at Nigeria’s Bridge that Gap Initiative, emphasized that beyond highlighting loss and damage, there must also be a focus on delivering investment and implementing concrete solutions.

Gloria Bulus, team lead at Nigeria’s Bridge that Gap Initiative. ( AN photo by Abdulrahman bin Shalhoub)

“We are expecting a lot to be (invested) in terms of the loss and damage, so that it goes beyond the speeches,” she said.

Highlighting some of the pressing environmental challenges her country is facing, Bulus expressed her hope for “fair” negotiations.

“Negotiations have been very slow for us,” she said. “What we want is action. What we want is an outcome that favors people, where we have renewable energy transition.”

Among other steps, COP29 promised to secure “the highest ambition outcome possible,” proposing that wealthier countries contribute $250 billion annually to developing nations to support their efforts in tackling climate change.
 

 


UK car wash owners trafficked thousands of people from Middle East to Europe

Dilshad Shamo and Ali Khdir pleaded guilty at Cardiff Crown Court for their roles in a human trafficking ring. (Supplied)
Updated 22 November 2024
Follow

UK car wash owners trafficked thousands of people from Middle East to Europe

  • Migrants from Syria, Iraq, Iran offered different tiers of service
  • Dilshad Shamo and Ali Khdir trafficked 100 people per week in trucks, ships and by plane

LONDON: Thousands of people from the Middle East were trafficked into Europe through a vast people smuggling network based out of a British car wash.

In an operation that at times resembled a travel agency, people from Syria, Iraq and Iran were offered different tiers of service to be smuggled into Europe by various routes. 

Two men pleaded guilty in a UK court on Friday to charges related to their roles in the people smuggling ring.

The UK’s National Crime Agency said Dilshad Shamo, 41, and Ali Khdir, 40, operated from the unlikely location of a car wash in Caerphilly, a town in Wales.

They were arrested in April 2023 after they had been placed under surveillance as part of an investigation that found they were trafficking about 100 people a week over a period of two years, the BBC reported.

 

 

The men used messaging and social media apps to advertise their services with videos from people who had made the journeys.

One video shows a man hidden in the back of a truck with other migrants.

“Lorry route agreement, crossing agreement with the knowledge of driver,” he says. “Here we have men, women and children. Thank God the route was easy and good.”

Another video shows a family traveling by plane. “We are very happy … this is the visa, may God bless him, we are really happy,” the migrant says.

Shamo and Khdir offered three tiers of service, the lowest being smuggling people into Europe by foot or vehicle; the next by cargo ships or yachts; and the highest level arranged travel by plane. 

The smuggling routes went through Turkiye, Belarus, Moldova and Bosnia and ended in Italy, Croatia, Romania, Bulgaria, Slovenia, Germany and France. The NCA said many of the migrants continued to the UK.

Payment was made using informal “hawala” money transfers through brokers based in Iraq and Istanbul.

Once a deposit was made, Shamo and Khdir would receive a message and arrange for the migrants to be transported by their specified route or timeframe. The two men used WhatsApp to communicate with people smugglers across Europe.

The NCA said they were part of a larger organized crime group and could have made hundreds of thousands or millions of pounds that is unlikely to be recovered, the BBC reported.

“Ali Khdir and Dilshad Shamo were leading a double life,” NCA Branch Commander Derek Evans said. “While on the surface they seemed to be operating a successful car wash, they were actually part of a prolific people smuggling group moving migrants across Europe and taking thousands in payment.

 

 

“We worked painstakingly to piece together their movements to prove their important roles in a group, from advertising their services through videos to boasting of successful trips on messaging groups.”

The UK’s Minister for Border Security and Asylum Angela Eagle said criminals like Khdir and Shamo put countless lives at risk by smuggling vulnerable people in a “shameless attempt to make cash.”

She added: “We are taking action against the people smuggling gangs and will stop at nothing to dismantle their networks and bring justice to the system.”

Shamo and Khdir pleaded guilty 10 days into their trial at Cardiff Crown Court and will be sentenced at a later date.

UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer made smashing people smuggling gangs a key pledge of his election campaign earlier this year.

He has vowed to treat traffickers like terrorists and announced a new Border Security Command with additional powers to track human traffickers and shut down their bank accounts.

Politicians in the EU are battling to stem public anger at rising immigration with more than 380,000 illegal border crossings made into the EU in 2023.

Many fear that if conflicts in the Middle East escalate, Europe could face a steep rise in illegal migration similar to 2015 at the height of the Syrian Civil War.