WASHINGTON: Facing growing criticism over a massive security failure, the US Secret Service on Monday vowed to cooperate with an independent review after a shooter was allowed to open fire on Donald Trump.
The 78-year-old former president was injured but survived an assassination attempt at a campaign rally in Pennsylvania on Saturday, a brazen attack that shocked a nation already deeply polarized ahead of the November election.
“The Secret Service is working with all involved federal, state and local agencies to understand what happened, how it happened, and how we can prevent an incident like this from ever taking place again,” the agency’s director Kimberly Cheatle said in a statement.
“We understand the importance of the independent review announced by President (Joe) Biden yesterday and will participate fully,” Cheatle added.
Trump was speaking at a rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, when multiple bangs rang out.
He clutched his ear, with blood visible on his ear and cheek, then ducked to the floor as Secret Service agents swarmed onto the podium, surrounding him and rushing him to a nearby vehicle.
The shooter and a bystander were killed, and two spectators injured.
Newly surfaced video backs up reports from witnesses that they had called out to police and physically pointed at the shooter as he lay on the roof preparing to open fire, the Washington Post reported Monday.
The shots targeting Trump rang out 86 seconds after the first audible attempts to warn the police, the Post said, citing an analysis it did of video clips from the scene of the attack.
Biden ordered a full review of the security at the rally, as well as at this week’s Republican National Convention in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, where Trump will be crowned the party’s presidential nominee.
He also ordered Secret Service protection for independent candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr., an environmental lawyer and long-time vaccine skeptic who has no chance of winning in November, but whose candidacy could potentially sway close contests in key swing states.
The Secret Service faces intense scrutiny over how a gunman aiming an assault rifle was able to take position on a roof some 500 feet (150 meters) from one of the most protected political figures on the planet.
With Trump set to star at the convention, Cheatle said the agency was working to toughen security.
The Secret Service designs plans for major events “to respond to a kinetic security environment and the most up-to-date intelligence,” her statement said.
Earlier in the day, Trump had called for Secret Service protection for Kennedy “in light of what is going on in the world today.”
“Given the history of the Kennedy Family, this is the obvious right thing to do!” Trump wrote on his Truth Social web site.
Kenedy’s uncle, President John F. Kennedy, was assassinated in Dallas, Texas in 1963. Five years later, the candidate’s father, Robert, was shot to death in Los Angeles while on the campaign trail.
The US Secret Service is responsible for the safety of the president, vice president and former presidents, and their families, as well as major election candidates and visiting foreign heads of state.
Secret Service agrees to independent probe over Trump shooting
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Secret Service agrees to independent probe over Trump shooting
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- The Secret Service faces intense scrutiny over how a gunman aiming an assault rifle was able to take position on a roof some 500 feet (150 meters) from one of the most protected political figures on the planet
Polls show Republicans are more likely than Democrats to have a favorable opinion of Robert F. Kennedy Jr.
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- While some polls earlier in the year put Kennedy’s support in the double digits, support now hovers in the mid-single digits in most recent polls
- Kennedy is scheduled to speak in Phoenix on Friday, just days after his running mate openly discussed the possibility that he could drop out and endorse Trump
WASHINGTON: Republicans are more likely than Democrats to have a favorable opinion of Robert F. Kennedy Jr., recent polls show, as allies of Donald Trump urge the independent presidential candidate to drop out and endorse the former Republican president.
Kennedy’s support appears to have declined in recent polls as he struggles to find his political lane in a race reshaped by the departure of Democratic President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris’ nomination in his place. The developments have left relatively narrow room for Kennedy’s presence — or potential departure — to make a difference in the election outcome. Recent polls don’t give a clear indication that Kennedy’s presence in the race has an outsized impact on support for either major-party candidate.
While some polls earlier in the year put Kennedy’s support in the double digits, support now hovers in the mid-single digits in most recent polls. It’s unclear if Kennedy would get even that level of support in the general election, since third-party candidates frequently don’t live up to their early poll numbers when voters actually cast their ballots.
Kennedy is scheduled to speak in Phoenix on Friday “about the present historical moment and his path forward,” just days after his running mate openly discussed the possibility that he could drop out and endorse Trump.
Partisan appeal
In recent months, Americans overall have been split in their views of Kennedy, 70, the son of former US Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy.
About as many people had a favorable as unfavorable view of Kennedy, according to a July AP-NORC poll that was conducted before Biden dropped out of the presidential race last month. That marks a decline from February, when more had a positive than negative view of Kennedy, and about 3 in 10 did not have an opinion.
In the most recent poll, about 2 in 10 US adults didn’t know enough about Kennedy to give an opinion.
Republicans were significantly more likely than Democrats and independents to have a favorable view of Kennedy. And those with a positive impression of Kennedy were more likely to also have a favorable view of Trump (52 percent) than Harris (37 percent).
Kennedy also struggled to endear himself to political independents. Although he is running as an independent presidential candidate, polling shows about 4 in 10 independents did not know enough to form an opinion. Those who did were divided equally between favorable and unfavorable opinions.
The base of support
Kennedy’s appeal largely rested on being an alternative to the match-up many Americans dreaded when Biden was facing Trump in a rematch of the 2020 election won by Biden. A Pew Research Center poll from July found that about half of voters who were supporting Kennedy said the main reason they backed him was because he was neither Biden nor Trump, compared with about 3 in 10 who listed Kennedy’s characteristics or policies.
Harris’ move to the top of the Democratic ticket may have further harmed Kennedy’s prospects. An August Pew poll suggested that Harris has gained support at Kennedy’s expense. She appears to have received the support of some women and non-white voters who previously were considering Kennedy.
About that family name
Kennedy’s initial appeal was largely focused on his family name and his relation to other famed Kennedys, including his father and his uncle, former President John F. Kennedy. CNN polling conducted last summer when RFK Jr. was running for the Democratic nomination found that many Democrats said they’d consider supporting him because of the Kennedy name or his family connections. Many members of the Kennedy family endorsed Biden before he withdrew from the race.
John F. Kennedy remains the most highly rated former president in Gallup’s retrospective approval ratings, and his appeal crosses party lines. Nine in 10 Americans approve of how Kennedy, a Democrat, handled his job as president, according to data from last summer, with Democrats, independents and Republicans in agreement.
News of Robert Kennedy’s potential withdrawal comes a little over a week since a New York judge ruled that he should not appear on the ballot in the state because he listed a “sham” address on nominating petitions. Kennedy has appealed, but has faced several similar challenges around the country.
RFK Jr. questioned in NY court over signature collectors who concealed his name on petitions
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- Testifying in a trial over a lawsuit that seeks to keep Kennedy off New York’s ballot, he acknowledged that his campaign submitted thousands of signatures gathered by a subcontractor despite knowing that some of its canvassers used deceptive tactics
MINEOLA, New York: Robert F. Kennedy Jr. faced questions in a New York court Thursday about how his presidential campaign handled revelations that some people gathering signatures to get him on the state ballot concealed his name on the petitions and used other deceptive methods.
Kennedy’s virtual appearance from an office in California came a day after his campaign announced that he will speak Friday about “his path forward.” The announcement fueled speculation that he could drop out of the race and support former President Donald Trump, the Republican nominee.
Testifying in a trial over a lawsuit backed by the Democratic National Committee that seeks to keep Kennedy off New York’s ballot, he acknowledged that his campaign submitted thousands of signatures gathered by a subcontractor despite knowing that some of its canvassers used deceptive tactics.
The lawsuit alleges, among other claims of fraud, that the top of some petition sheets had been folded down, so the names of Kennedy and his vice presidential running mate, Nicole Shanahan, could not be seen, and only their little-known electors were visible.
“I suppose I’m ultimately responsible for everything that happens in the campaign,” Kennedy said on the witness stand, pointing out that he wasn’t abreast of every detail involved in the subcontractor’s balloting efforts.
When asked if he was ultimately responsible for the decision to submit the signatures, he said “Yes.”
New York requires independent candidates to gather petitions with 45,000 signatures from potential voters to get on the ballot in the general election. Kennedy’s campaign ultimately managed to gather nearly three times that many on top of those gathered by the subcontractor. But an April complaint from a voter and a May New York Times article raised concerns about whether some people signing the petitions knew which candidate they had been asked to support.
Kennedy’s staff was concerned, too. The day after the Times article was published, Kennedy’s campaign manager and daughter-in-law, Amaryllis Kennedy, said in an email to other staff that the questionable petitions gathered by the contractor should not be used.
“We’re obviously pulling all of the petitions they’ve submitted and won’t use any of them as they are likely rife with other hidden errors, buried there to disqualify us once submitted,” she wrote.
According to court documents, the campaign sued the subcontractor, arguing it had to pay them even though none of the signatures were usable. Kennedy said in news interviews at the time that no petitions from the subcontractor were submitted.
But he acknowledged during his testimony that that’s not what actually happened.
Instead, the campaign weeded out around 800 pages — containing 8,000 signatures — with visible creases indicating they’d been folded, putting them in two bankers boxes labeled “fraud box.”
The campaign created an affidavit intended to “cure” the remaining petitions by having the canvassers affirm in writing that they hadn’t committed fraud and submitted over 12,000 signatures from the subcontractor as evidence of New York voters wanting to see him on the ballot.
Lawyers for the plaintiffs however produced at least one example of a creased page that was submitted to the state instead of ending up in the “fraud box.” They also argued, and Kennedy acknowledged, that some canvassers had also verbally misrepresented what the signatures were for — for example, increasing candidate ballot access generally.
The subcontractor did not immediately respond to a phone message and an email request for comment.
A judge in a separate legal challenge has already barred Kennedy from appearing on New York’s ballot, though he has appealed. That suit had argued that Kennedy’s petitions were invalid because they listed him as living in New York when he actually resides in California with his wife, “Curb Your Enthusiasm” actor Cheryl Hines. An appeals court is scheduled to hear arguments next week in that case.
Kennedy is facing similar ballot challenges in several other states from Democrats and their allies.
Quit the ‘cult’, anti-Trump Republicans plead at DNC
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- Geoff Duncan, the former lieutenant governor of Georgia where Trump sought to overturn the results of the 2020 election, slammed Trump as "a direct threat to democracy”
- Former White House communications director Stephanie Grisham described her ex-boss Trump as a liar with “no empathy, no morals and no fidelity to the truth”
- John Giles, Republican mayor of Mesa, Arizona, told the convention his party “has been kidnapped by extremists and devolved into a cult: the cult of Donald Trump”
CHICAGO: While Democratic luminaries including the Obamas enthusiastically support Kamala Harris for US president at their party’s convention, an unlikely band of rebels is joining the effort: Republicans urging fellow conservatives to ditch Donald Trump.
The message is nothing new — several Republicans have spoken out against Trump over the years. But their presence at this week’s carefully orchestrated Democratic confab has amplified the call for conservatives and independents to reconsider their election choice in November.
“Let me be clear to my Republican friends at home watching,” Geoff Duncan, the former lieutenant governor of Georgia where Trump sought to overturn the results of the 2020 election, said Wednesday from the convention stage.
“If you vote for Kamala Harris in 2024 you’re not a Democrat, you’re a patriot,” he boomed.
Slamming the recently convicted — and twice-impeached — former president as “a direct threat to democracy,” Duncan said he was aiming his remarks at the millions of Republicans and independents he knows are “sick and tired of making excuses” for Trump.
“These days our party acts more like a cult, a cult worshipping a felonous thug,” said Duncan.
Multiple Republicans have offered similar messages in Chicago, as the Harris campaign seeks to peel off as many Republicans and independent voters as possible in an election that is going down to the wire.
Former White House communications director Stephanie Grisham, who had close access to Trump, took the stage Tuesday slamming her ex-boss as a liar with “no empathy, no morals and no fidelity to the truth.”
“I saw him when the cameras were off. Behind closed doors, Trump mocks his supporters, he calls them basement dwellers,” she said.
Grisham, who was also first lady Melania Trump’s chief of staff, mentioned how she had gone from “a true believer” to a disaffected close adviser who wanted out, and recalled a turning point during the 2021 US Capitol riot by Trump supporters.
“On January 6 I asked Melania if we could at least tweet that while peaceful protest is the right of every American, there’s no place for lawlessness or violence,” Grisham said.
“She replied with one word: ‘No.’“
Grisham resigned that day, “because I love my country more than my party,” she said, to loud applause, adding that Harris “has my vote.”
John Giles, mayor of Mesa, Arizona, and a self-described “lifelong Republican” who claims late senator John McCain as his hero, was equally blunt.
He told the convention his Republican Party “has been kidnapped by extremists and devolved into a cult: the cult of Donald Trump.”
Giles’s message to Americans like him who are in the political middle: “John McCain’s Republican Party is gone, and we don’t owe a damn thing to what’s been left behind.”
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Organizers aired a video Wednesday showing former Trump voters explaining why they were flipping to Harris.
“I made a grave mistake,” Florida voter Rich Logis said via video about how he had jumped headlong into Trump’s MAGA movement. “But it’s never too late to change your mind,” Logis said.
Olivia Troye, a former counter-terrorism adviser for Trump’s vice president Mike Pence, addressed the convention, while high-profile Republican never-Trumper Adam Kinzinger, an ex-congressman, takes the stage Thursday, the closing night.
Trump frequently assails such critics as traitors to the cause, and it remains unclear how persuasive they will be.
David Urban, a Republican adviser to Trump’s 2016 campaign, dismissed any substantial impact.
But he told CNN the appearance by Georgia’s Duncan “may give people permission to vote for Kamala Harris” in the state.
‘The answer is no’: Pro-Palestinian delegates say their request for a speaker at DNC was shut down
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- After failing to get a slot for a Palestinian American speaker at the DNC, members of the “Uncommitted” movement staged a sit-in outside the convention venue
- The sit-in outside Chicago’s United Center has exposed cracks in a Democratic Party that otherwise has rallied around the Harris campaign
CHICAGO: Leaders of an “Uncommitted” movement, which garnered hundreds of thousands of votes in Democratic primaries across the nation in protest of the Israel-Hamas war, have been negotiating for weeks to secure a speaking slot for a Palestinian American at the Democratic National Convention this week.
The negotiations stalled late Wednesday when leaders with the Uncommitted National Movement say a Democratic National Committee official called and delivered a firm response: “The answer is no.”
The leader, Abbas Alawieh, an “Uncommitted” delegate to the convention and co-founder of the movement, described the call as shocking after weeks of talks that he felt were positive. In response, he and other delegates decided to stage a sit-in outside Chicago’s United Center, where the convention is being held. They spent the night on the sidewalk on Wednesday, and vowed to remain until their request was granted or the convention ended Thursday night.
“When we ran out of options — doing everything we can and working from the inside, when we ran out of options as uncommitted delegates, we just sat down,” Alawieh said in an interview Thursday.
The Harris campaign declined to comment.
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The sit-in outside the United Center has exposed cracks in a Democratic Party that otherwise has rallied around the Harris campaign that has energized the vast majority of party members this week.
The news that the DNC had denied the request of a Palestinian American speaker, just a day after featuring the parents of an Israeli American hostage held by Hamas, ignited fresh criticism from some on the left. The politically powerful United Autoworkers Union, which has endorsed Vice President Kamala Harris’ presidential campaign, said the party “must allow a Palestinian American speaker to be heard from the DNC stage tonight.”
Cook County, where Chicago and the convention is located, holds the largest population of Palestinian Americans in the country.
The party, however, has not budged. The Senate’s top Democrat shrugged off the potential political impact of the sit-in outside the convention. New York Sen. Chuck Schumer recalled Harris saying when protesters interrupted her at a recent rally in Michigan that their disruptions might be benefiting Republican Donald Trump.
“She said, ‘Be quiet unless you want to elect Trump,’” Schumer told a small group of reporters on Thursday, ahead of the convention’s final evening.
“We believe we need unity, and there’s overwhelming — I have never seen such unity,” he said. “A small handful of people does not represent close to even a sliver of where the Democratic Party is right now.”
Tensions over the war in Gaza have at times escalated outside the convention center this week, as thousands marched through Chicago demanding a ceasefire. A smaller group of activists clashed with police outside the Israeli Consulate on Tuesday night, leading to 56 arrests.
Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison, a Muslim Democrat, spoke Wednesday at the convention and praised Harris for saying “we need a ceasefire and an end to the loss of innocent lives in Gaza and to bring hostages home.” In an interview Thursday, he said that “not only is the content of the message important, the messenger is also important.”
“A Palestinian-American sharing his or her story, calling for ceasefire and release of all hostages, and calling everyone to support the ticket against fascism would be powerful,” Ellison said on social media Thursday.
Many other Democratic leaders urged the party to reconsider the request. In a statement, California Rep. Ro Khanna said that “the Democratic Party, which aspires to be the party of human rights, must not in 2024 perpetuate this erasure of the Palestinian story.”
When asked at a roundtable discussion Thursday whether he agreed with the “Uncommitted” delegates’ demand to add a Palestinian American speaker to the DNC lineup, Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson said, “Yes, of course.”
“We’re talking about thousands of babies and elderly people being brutalized by an act of war,” said Johnson. “You have to have a voice that can call for peace as well as the releasing of hostages.”
According to Alawieh, the “Uncommitted” movement provided a number of potential Palestinian Americans who could speak at the convention, including Georgia State Rep. Ruwa Romman.
Romman on Thursday released a draft of the speech she said she planned to deliver if asked. In it, she calls for electing Harris, defeating Donald Trump — and outlines demands for a ceasefire and to “end the killing of Palestinians, free all the Israeli and Palestinian hostages.”
Earlier this week, activists were granted unprecedented space at the convention to hold a forum addressing the plight of Gaza residents, who have been under Israeli bombardment since Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack and its taking of hostages, as well as to share deeply personal stories about family members lost in the conflict. The panel was viewed as an olive branch from the Harris campaign, with hopes that other requests might be fulfilled later in the week.
The convention has officially made Harris the Democratic Party’s presidential nominee, with the vast majority of the nearly 4,000 delegates enthusiastically casting their votes for her.
But those calling for a ceasefire in the Israel-Hamas war — among other demands, such as an arms embargo on Israel — believe they will have an outsized influence in the November election, now just over 70 days away.
Michigan, one of the key swing states, has the largest percentage of Arab Americans in the country. The UAW, which hosted Harris at a union hall event earlier this month, also has its largest membership base in Michigan. In a statement, the leader of the state Democratic Party, Lavora Barnes, said “a Palestinian American should have a speaking role Thursday night so that their voices can be heard — all of our delegates are part of our Michigan Democratic Party family.”
Through Thursday, Democrats on their way into the convention stopped by the sit-in. Rep. Cori Bush, a member of the progressive congressional group known as the “Squad,” who lost her primary earlier this month, stopped to mingle with “Uncommitted” delegates.
“We are Democrats. We are a part of this party. And we are just saying, ‘hear us because it matters,’” said Bush.
North Korea slams US sale of Apache helicopters to South Korea as ‘provocative’
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SEOUL: North Korea’s foreign ministry denounced a US planned sale of Apache helicopters to South Korea, state media KCNA said on Friday, vowing to take additional steps to bolster its self-defense.
The Pentagon said on Monday that the US State Department has approved the potential sale of Apache helicopters and related logistics and support to South Korea for an estimated $3.5 billion.
An unnamed senior official in charge of foreign news at North Korea’s foreign ministry issued a press statement on Thursday criticizing the sale plan as a move to aggravate tension, alongside ongoing annual military drills by the allies.
“This is a reckless provocative act of deliberately increasing the security instability in the region,” the official said, according to KCNA.
The official accused Washington of escalating military confrontation, “disturbing the military balance and thus increasing the danger of a new conflict” in the region by supplying lethal weapons to its allies and friends.
Pyongyang’s “strategic deterrence will be further strengthened to protect the national security and interests and the regional peace,” the statement said, pledging to steadily conduct military activities to boost self-defense.