MADISON, Wisconsin: President Joe Biden, fighting to save his endangered reelection effort, used a highly anticipated TV interview Friday to repeatedly reject taking an independent medical evaluation that would show voters he is up for serving another term in office while blaming his disastrous debate performance on a “bad episode” and saying there were “no indications of any serious condition.”
“Look, I have a cognitive test every single day,” Biden told ABC’s George Stephanopoulos, referring to the tasks he faces daily in a rigorous job. “Every day, I’ve had tests. Everything I do.”
Biden made it through the 22-minute interview without any major blunders that would inflict further damage to his imperiled candidacy, but it appeared unlikely to fully tamp down concerns about his age and fitness for another four years and his ability to defeat Donald Trump in November.
It left Biden in a standoff against a not-insignificant faction of his party with four months to go until Election Day, and with just weeks until the Democratic National Convention. The drawn-out spectacle could benefit Biden’s efforts to remain in the race by limiting the party’s options to replace him. But it also could be a distraction from vital efforts to frame the 2024 race as a referendum on Trump.
During the interview, Biden insisted he was not more frail than he was in 2020. He said he undergoes “ongoing assessment” by his personal doctors and they “don’t hesitate to tell me” if something is wrong.
“Can I run the 100 in 10 flat? No. But I’m still in good shape,” Biden said.
As for the debate, “I didn’t listen to my instincts in terms of preparing,” Biden said.
Biden suggested that Trump’s disruptions — while standing just a few feet from him — had flustered him: “I realized that, even when I was answering a question and they turned his mic off, he was still shouting and I let it distract me. I’m not blaming it on that. But I realized that I just wasn’t in control.”
Asked how he might turn the race around, Biden argued that one key would be large and energetic rallies like the one he held Friday in Wisconsin. When pressed that Trump routinely draws larger crowds, the president laid into his opponent.
“Trump is a pathological lair,” Biden said, accusing Trump of bungling the federal response to the COVID pandemic and failing to create jobs. “You ever see something that Trump did that benefited someone else and not him?”
Biden also insisted he was the “most qualified” to lead Democrats against Trump, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee.
The interview, paired with a weekend campaign in battleground Wisconsin and Pennsylvania, was part of Biden’s rigorous effort to course correct from his debate performance last week. But internal party frustrations continued to fester, with one influential Democratic senator working on a nascent push that would encourage the president to exit the race and Democrats quietly chatting about where they would go next if the president drops out — or what it would mean if he stays in.
“It’s President Biden’s decision whether or not he remains in the race. Voters select our nominee and they chose him,” said California Rep. Ro Khanna, a member of the Biden campaign’s national advisory board that works as a gathering of his top surrogates. “Now, he needs to prove to those voters that he is up to the job and that will require more than just this one interview.”
Still, in Wisconsin, Biden was focused on proving his capacity to remain as president. When asked whether he would halt his campaign, he told reporters he was “completely ruling that out” and said he is “positive” he could serve for another four years. At a rally in front of hundreds of supporters he acknowledged his subpar debate performance but insisted, “I am running, and I’m going to win again.”
“I beat Donald Trump,” a forceful Biden said, as the crowd gathered in a local middle school cheered and waved campaign signs. “I will beat him again.”
Biden, relying on a teleprompter for his remarks, attacked his presumptive Republican challenger almost immediately, laying into Trump by pointing out that the former president once said that “George Washington’s army won the revolution by taking control of the airports from the British.”
Amid laughter, Biden continued, “Talk about me misspeaking.”
In his speech, Biden tried to flip the questions swirling about his age, asking the crowd whether he was “too old” to have passed gun legislation, created jobs and helped ease student loan debt — while suggesting he’d do more in a second presidential term.
The interview with ABC could be a watershed moment for Biden, who is under pressure to bow out of the campaign after his rocky debate performance against Trump ignited concern that the 81-year-old Democrat is not up for the job for another four years.
While private angst among Democratic lawmakers, donors and strategists is running deep, most in the party have held public fire as they wait to see if the president can restore confidence with his weekend travel and his handling of the interview.
To that end, Sen. Mark Warner reached out to fellow senators throughout this week to discuss whether to ask Biden to exit the race, according to three people familiar with the effort who requested anonymity to talk about private conversations. The Virginia Democrat’s moves are notable given his chairmanship of the Senate Intelligence Committee and his reputation as a lawmaker supportive of Biden who has working relationships with colleagues in both parties. Warner’s effort was first reported by The Washington Post.
The strategy remains fluid. One of the people with knowledge of Warner’s effort said there are enough Senate Democrats concerned enough about Biden’s capacity to run for reelection to take some sort of action, although there was yet no consensus on what that plan would be. Some of the Democratic senators could meet as soon as Monday on how to move forward.
The top Democrats on House committees are planning to meet virtually Sunday to discuss the situation, according to a person familiar with the gathering granted anonymity to talk about it.
Meanwhile, at least four House Democrats have called for Biden to step down as the nominee, with Rep. Mike Quigley of Illinois joining Massachusetts Rep. Seth Moulton, Texas Rep. Lloyd Doggett and Arizona Rep. Raúl Grijalva in pushing for an alternative. While not going that far, Massachusetts Gov. Maura Healey said in a carefully worded statement Friday that Biden now has a decision to make on “the best way forward.”
“Over the coming days, I urge him to listen to the American people and carefully evaluate whether he remains our best hope to defeat Donald Trump,” Healey said.
There were also a few signs of discontent at Biden’s campaign rally Friday, with one supporter onstage waving a sign that read “Pass the torch Joe” as the president came out. His motorcade was also greeted at the middle school by a few people urging him to move on.
But others were pleased. Rebecca Green, a 52-year-old environmental scientist from Madison, said she found Biden’s energy reassuring. “We were just waiting for him to come out strong and fighting again, the way we know he is,” she said.
Many Democratic lawmakers, who are hearing from constituents at home during the holiday week, are deeply frustrated yet split on whether Biden should stay or go. Privately, discussions among the House Democrats flared this week as word spread that some of them were drafting public letters suggesting the president should quit the race.
Yet pushback from other House Democrats was fierce.
“Any ‘leader’ signing a letter calling for President Biden to drop out needs to get their priorities straight and stop undermining this incredible actual leader who has delivered real results for our country,” said Rep. Frederica Wilson, D-Fla., an influential member of the Congressional Black Caucus.
Biden appears to have pulled his family closer while attempting to prove that he’s still the Democrats’ best option for competing in November’s election.
The ubiquitous presence of Hunter Biden in the West Wing since the debate has become an uncomfortable dynamic for many staffers, according to two Democrats close to the White House who requested anonymity to discuss the sensitive matter.
For many staffers, the sight of Hunter Biden, just weeks after his conviction on felony gun charges, taking a larger role in advising his father has been unsettling and a questionable choice, they said.
Biden’s reelection campaign is pushing ahead with aggressive plans despite the uncertainty. It plans to pair his in-person events with a fresh $50 million ad campaign this month meant to capitalize on high viewership moments like the Summer Olympics that begin in Paris on July 26.
Biden, Vice President Kamala Harris, first lady Jill Biden and second gentleman Doug Emhoff are scheduled to travel to every battleground state this month, with Biden in Pennsylvania on Sunday. In a memo released Friday, the campaign also emphasized that Biden would participate in “frequent off-the-cuff moments” –- once a hallmark of the gregarious, glad-handling politician’s career that have dwindled throughout his presidency.
For Biden, every moment now is critical to restoring the lost confidence stemming from his shaky performance in Atlanta last week. Yet the president continued to make slipups that did not help that effort.
In a hastily organized gathering with more than 20 Democratic governors Wednesday evening, Biden acknowledged he needs to sleep more and limit evening events so he can be rested for the job, according to three people granted anonymity to speak about the private meeting.
In trying to explain away those comments, White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre stressed that Biden “works around the clock” but that he “also recognizes the importance of striking a balance and taking care of himself.”
Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear, who attended the meeting, said Biden “certainly engaged with us on complicated matters.”
“But then again, this is something that he needs to not just reassure Democratic governors on, but he needs to reassure the American people,” Beshear said.
Biden says ‘staying in the race’ as he scrambles to save candidacy, braces for ABC interview
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Biden says ‘staying in the race’ as he scrambles to save candidacy, braces for ABC interview
- In front of roughly 300 supporters at a Wisconsin middle school, Biden again acknowledged his subpar debate last week
- Interview with ABC’s George Stephanopoulos expected to be intensive and probing
At least 10 killed in Afghanistan attack, interior ministry says
- The nature of the attack was not immediately clear
The nature of the attack was not immediately clear.
China urges ICC to take ‘objective’ position after Netanyahu arrest warrant
- Warrants for Benjamin Netanyahu and his former defense minister Yoav Gallant ‘for crimes against humanity and war crimes’
- China, like Israel and the United States, is not a member of the International Criminal Court
BEIJING: China urged the International Criminal Court on Friday to remain objective and fair after it issued an arrest warrant for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
“China hopes the ICC will uphold an objective and just position (and) exercise its powers in accordance with the law,” foreign ministry spokesman Lin Jian said at a regular press conference in response to a question about the court’s warrant for Netanyahu.
The ICC issued warrants for Netanyahu and his former defense minister Yoav Gallant on Thursday “for crimes against humanity and war crimes” committed between October 8, 2023, and May 20 this year.
It said there were “reasonable grounds” to believe the pair bore “criminal responsibility” for using starvation as a method of warfare and intentionally attacking civilians.
Netanyahu denounced the move as anti-Semitic and the court’s accusations as “absurd and false.”
China, which like Israel and the United States is not a member of the ICC, said it “supports any efforts by the international community on the Palestinian issue that are conducive to achieving fairness and justice and upholding the authority of international law.”
Lin also accused the United States of “double standards” in response to a question about the US opposition to the court’s pursuit of Netanyahu, but its support for a warrant against Russian leader Vladimir Putin.
“China consistently opposes certain countries only use international law when it suits them... and engaging in double standards,” Lin said.
US President Joe Biden has condemned the warrants against Israeli leaders, calling them “outrageous.”
COP29 host urges collaboration as deal negotiations enter final stage
- Sweeping plan that would see rich nations pledge to hand over hundreds of billions of dollars to help poorer countries grapple with the worsening impacts of global warming
BAKU: COP29 climate summit host Azerbaijan urged participating countries to bridge their differences and come up with a finance deal on Friday, as negotiations at the two-week conference entered their final hours.
World governments represented at the meeting in the Caspian Sea city of Baku are tasked with agreeing a sweeping plan that would see rich nations pledge to hand over hundreds of billions of dollars to help poorer countries grapple with the worsening impacts of global warming.
Economists have said developing countries need at least $1 trillion annually by the end of the decade, but wealthy nations have so far been resisting. Negotiations have also been clouded by uncertainty over the role of the United States, the world’s top historic greenhouse gas emitter, ahead of climate skeptic President-elect Donald Trump’s return to the White House.
“We encourage parties to continue to collaborate within and across groups with the aim of proposing bridging proposals that will help us to finalize our work here in Baku,” the COP29 presidency said in a note to delegates on Friday morning.
It said a new draft deal would be released at midday in Baku, in the hopes of a deal by the end of the day.
Past COPs have traditionally run over time.
Division and discontent over the negotiations have already spilled into the open, after a fresh deal draft was released by the presidency on Thursday that offered two vastly different options that left no-one happy.
Although the 10-page document was slimmed to less than half the size of the previous versions issued at the summit, it avoided stating the total funds countries would aim to invest each year, leaving the space marked with an “X.”
It also reflected big divisions over issues such as whether funds should be offered as grants or loans, and the degree to which different types of non-public finance should count toward the final annual goal.
“I hope they find the sweet spot with this next iteration,” said Li Shuo, director of the China Climate Hub at the Asia Society, a veteran observer of COP summits. “Anything other than that may require rescheduling flights.”
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres returned to Baku from a G20 meeting in Brazil on Thursday, calling for a major push to get a deal and warning that “failure is not an option.”
Ireland’s anti-immigration right eyes election gains
- After recession and economic slowdown from 2008, immigration surged again following the coronavirus pandemic
- Some 20 percent of Ireland’s 5.4-million population is now foreign-born
Dublin: The Dublin office of lawyer Malachy Steenson doubles as his election campaign headquarters. Outside is an Irish tricolor and a sign reading: “Take back our nation.”
Inside, Steenson summarised his platform for the November 29 vote. “We need to close the borders and stop any more migrants coming in,” he told AFP.
Ireland is one of the few European Union members without any large established far-right party. But for the first time, immigration has become a frontline election issue.
Steenson, white-haired and 61, is part of an emerging group of ultra-nationalist politicians who performed well at local elections this year and now aim to gain a foothold in parliament.
Elected to Dublin City Council in June, he is running as an independent in the inner-city Dublin Central constituency that is now one of Ireland’s most ethnically diverse.
Most mainstream parties have spent much of the campaign bickering over solutions to Ireland’s acute housing shortage.
But for Steenson, migrants and asylum-seekers are exacerbating that crisis.
“If you import people who are going to sit around on welfare in accommodation that should be available to Irish nationals you’re just creating a bigger problem,” he said.
Ireland’s economy has attracted immigrants since the 1990s when eye-popping growth earned it the “Celtic Tiger” moniker.
After recession and economic slowdown from 2008, immigration surged again following the coronavirus pandemic, plugging job vacancies in booming tech, construction, and hospitality sectors, as well as health care.
Some 20 percent of Ireland’s 5.4-million population is now foreign-born. Official data showed a population increase fueled by migration of around 100,000 in the year to April 2024 — the largest since 2007.
But rapid demographic growth has heaped pressure on housing, services and infrastructure strained by lack of investment, fanning anti-migrant sentiment and hitting still largely favorable attitudes to immigration.
“Immigration is on everyone’s minds,” said Caroline Alwright, a fruit and vegetable stall-owner on Moore Street, a historic city-center market which has become a multicultural meeting place for different nationalities.
“A lot of people will vote for independent candidates, they see what is going on in this country,” said Alwright, 62, a veteran trader nicknamed by customers the “Queen of Moore Street.”
“This street has gone downhill, the country is being robbed blind with money given to people doing nothing on welfare,” she added, gesturing toward a group of Eastern European Romani.
In Kennedy’s pub across the constituency several punters also murmured discontent.
“The buses are full of foreigners, I would vote for anyone saying ‘Ireland is full’ and promising to do something about it,” said Mick Fanning, 74.
Around 110,000 Ukrainians have arrived in Ireland since Russia’s full-scale invasion in 2022, one of the highest numbers per head of population in the EU.
Meanwhile asylum applications have surged to record levels since 2022, with this year’s figures driven by a fourfold increase in people arriving from Nigeria.
The large inflow and the housing crisis has prompted the government to stop providing accommodation to all asylum seekers last year.
That forced hundreds of single male applicants to sleep rough in tents, sparking hostile reactions from some anti-migrant locals.
Ireland has also seen a spike in arson attacks on buildings rumored or earmarked to provide reception centers for asylum seekers.
Last year the largest riot seen in Dublin for decades was triggered by a knife attack on children by an Irish national of immigrant origin.
At the other end of the ward, students at Dublin City University were supportive of immigration.
“We are not full, that’s a closed mindset,” said Carla Keogh, 19, a teaching student.
“If we look into our own past, Irish people left to find help and support in other places, as humans we need to open ourselves up.”
The ultra-nationalist vote is fragmented by micro parties and independents, with few, if any, expected to make an electoral breakthrough.
Anti-immigration votes will rather channel toward moderate independents “who are more outspoken on migration” than more radical options, said political scientist Eoin O’Malley, from Dublin City University.
Most mainstream parties have also pledged to tighten up the asylum system.
The number of arrivals from Ukraine dropped this year after the government slashed allowances and accommodation benefits for newly arrived refugees.
“We were called fascists, racists, far-right, when we proposed the same things two years ago, when in fact we are none of those things,” said Steenson who self-describes as a nationalist.
South Korea’s mountain of plastic waste shows limits of recycling
- South Korea says that it recycles 7% of its plastic waste, compared to about 5%-6% in the US
SEOUL: South Korea has won international praise for its recycling efforts, but as it prepares to host talks for a global plastic waste agreement, experts say the country’s approach highlights its limits.
When the talks known as INC-5 kick off in Busan next week, debate is expected to center around whether a UN treaty should seek to limit the amount of plastic being made in the first place.
South Korea says that it recycles 73 percent of its plastic waste, compared to about 5 percent-6 percent in the United States, and the country might seem to be a model for a waste management approach.
The bi-monthly MIT Technology Review magazine has rated South Korea as “one of the world’s best recycling economies,” and the only Asian country out of the top 10 on its Green Future Index in 2022.
But environmental activists and members of the waste management industry say the recycling numbers don’t tell the whole story.
South Korea’s claimed rate of 73 percent “is a false number, because it just counts plastic waste that arrived at the recycling screening facility — whether it is recycled, incinerated, or landfilled afterward, we don’t know,” said Seo Hee-won, a researcher at local activist group Climate Change Center.
Greenpeace estimates South Korea recycles only 27 percent of its total plastic waste. The environment ministry says the definition of waste, recycling methods and statistical calculation vary from country to country, making it difficult to evaluate uniformly.
South Korea’s plastic waste generation increased from 9.6 million tons in 2019 to 12.6 million tons in 2022, a 31 percent jump in three years partly due to increased plastic packaging of food, gifts and other online orders that mushroomed during the pandemic, activists said. Data for 2023 has not been released.
A significant amount of that plastic is not being recycled, according to industry and government sources and activists, sometimes for financial reasons.
At a shuttered plastic recycling site in Asan, about 85km south of Seoul, a mountain of about 19,000 tonnes of finely ground plastic waste is piled up untreated, emitting a slightly noxious smell. Local officials said the owner had run into money problems, but could not provide details.
“It will probably take more than 2-3 billion won ($1.43 million-$2.14 million) to remove,” said an Asan regional government official. “The owner is believed unable to pay, so the cleanup is low priority for us.”
Reuters has reported that more than 90 percent of plastic waste gets dumped or incinerated because there is no cheap way to repurpose it, according to a 2017 study.
NO CONCRETE GOALS
South Korean government’s regulations on single-use plastic products have also been criticized for being inconsistent. In November 2023, the environment ministry eased restrictions on single-use plastic including straws and bags, rolling back rules it had strengthened just a year earlier.
“South Korea lacks concrete goals toward reducing plastic use outright, and reusing plastic,” said Hong Su-yeol, director of Resource Circulation Society and Economy Institute and an expert on the country’s waste management.
Nara Kim, a Seoul-based campaigner for plastic use reduction at Greenpeace, said South Korea’s culture of valuing elaborate packaging of gifts and other items needs to change, while other activists pointed to the influence of the country’s petrochemical producers.
“Companies are the ones that pay the money, the taxes,” said a recycling industry official who declined to be identified because of the sensitivity of the issue, adding that this enabled them to wield influence. “The environment ministry is the weakest ministry in the government.”
The environment ministry said South Korea manages waste over the entire cycle from generation to recycling and final disposal.
The government has made some moves to encourage Korea Inc. to recycle, including its petrochemical industry that ranks fifth in global market share.
President Yoon Suk Yeol said at the G-20 summit on Tuesday that “efforts to reduce plastic pollution must also be made” for sustainable development, and that his government will support next week’s talks.
The government has changed regulations to allow companies like leading petrochemical producer LG Chem to generate naphtha, its primary feedstock, by recycling plastic via pyrolysis. SK Chemicals’ depolymerization chemical recycling output has already been used in products such as water bottles as well as tires for high-end EVs.
Pyrolysis involves heating waste plastic to extremely high temperatures causing it to break down into molecules that can be repurposed as a fuel or to create second-life plastic products. But the process is costly, and there is also criticism that it increases carbon emissions.
“Companies have to be behind this,” said Jorg Weberndorfer, Minister Counsellor at the trade section of the EU Delegation to South Korea.
“You need companies who really believe in this and want to have this change. I think there should be an alliance between public authorities and companies.”
