Trump threatens to jail adversaries in escalating rhetoric ahead of pivotal debate

Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump arrives for a campaign event at the Central Wisconsin Airport on September 07, 2024 in Mosinee, Wisconsin. (AFP)
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Updated 08 September 2024
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Trump threatens to jail adversaries in escalating rhetoric ahead of pivotal debate

  • Trump’s message represents his latest threat to use the office of the presidency to exact retribution if he wins a second term
  • Trump has repeatedly defended those who have been jailed for crimes including violent attacks on law enforcement
  • Trump also warned, as he has in previous rallies, that the 2024 election could be the nation’s last

MOSINEE, Wisconsin: With just days to go before his first — and likely only — debate against Vice President Kamala Harris, former President Donald Trump posted a warning on his social media site threatening to jail those “involved in unscrupulous behavior” this election, which he said would be under intense scrutiny.
“WHEN I WIN, those people that CHEATED will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the Law, which will include long term prison sentences so that this Depravity of Justice does not happen again,” Trump wrote, again sowing doubt about the integrity of the election, even though cheating is incredibly rare.
“Please beware,” he went on, “that this legal exposure extends to Lawyers, Political Operatives, Donors, Illegal Voters, & Corrupt Election Officials. Those involved in unscrupulous behavior will be sought out, caught, and prosecuted at levels, unfortunately, never seen before in our Country.”
Trump’s message represents his latest threat to use the office of the presidency to exact retribution if he wins a second term. There is no evidence of the kind of fraud he continues to insist marred the 2020 election; in fact, dozens of courts, Republican state officials and his own administration have said he lost fairly.
Just days ago, Trump himself acknowledged in a podcast interview that he had indeed “lost by a whisker.”
While Trump’s campaign aides and allies have urged him to keep his focus on Harris and make the election a referendum on issues like inflation and border security, Trump in recent days has veered far off course.
On Friday, he delivered a stunning statement to news cameras in which he brought up a string of past allegations of sexual misconduct, describing several in graphic detail, even as he denied his accusers’ allegations. Earlier, he had voluntarily appeared in court for a hearing on the appeal of a decision that found him liable for sexual abuse, turning focus to his legal woes in the campaign’s final stretch.
Earlier Saturday, Trump had leaned into familiar grievances about everything from his indictments to Russia’s meddling in the 2016 election as he campaigned in one of the most deeply Republican swaths of battleground Wisconsin.
“The Harris-Biden DOJ is trying to throw me in jail — they want me in jail — for the crime of exposing their corruption,” Trump claimed at an outdoor rally at Central Wisconsin Airport, where he spoke behind a wall of bullet-proof glass due to new security protocols following his July assassination attempt.
There’s no evidence that President Joe Biden or Harris have had any influence over decisions by the Justice Department or state prosecutors to indict the former president.
Trump has eschewed traditional debate preparation, choosing to holding rallies and events while Harris has been cloistered in a historic hotel in downtown Pittsburgh, working with aides since Thursday.
Harris has agreed so far to a single debate, which will be hosted by ABC.
At the rally, Trump outlined his plans to “Drain the swamp” — a throwback to his winning 2016 campaign message as he ran as an outsider challenging the status quo. Though Trump spent four years in the Oval Office, he vowed anew to “cast out the corrupt political class” if he wins again and to “cut the fat out of our government for the first time, meaningfully, in 60 years.”
As part of that effort, he repeated his plan, announced Thursday, to create a new “Government Efficiency Commission” headed by Elon Musk that will be charged with conducting “a complete financial and performance audit of the entire federal government” to root out waste.
After again maligning the Congressional committee that investigated the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the nation’s capitol by his supporters after his election loss in 2020, Trump told the crowd of thousands that he would “rapidly review the cases of every political prisoner unjustly victimized by the Harris regime” and sign their pardons on his first day back in office.
Trump has repeatedly defended those who have been jailed for crimes including violent attacks on law enforcement.
And he said he would “completely overhaul” what he labeled “Kamala’s corrupt Department of Injustice.”
“Instead of persecuting Republicans, they will focus on taking down bloodthirsty cartels, transnational gangs, and radical Islamic terrorists,” he said.

Harris honored by support from disgruntled Republicans

Harris campaign spokesperson Sarafina Chitika responded to his comments with a statement warning that, if Trump is reelected, he will “use his unchecked power to prosecute his enemies and pardon insurrectionists who violently attacked our Capitol on January 6.”
Both Harris and Trump have been frequent visitors to Wisconsin this year, a state where four of the past six presidential elections have been decided by less than a percentage point. Several polls of Wisconsin voters conducted after Biden withdrew showed Harris and Trump in a close race.
Democrats consider Wisconsin to be one of the must-win “blue wall” states. Biden, who was in Wisconsin on Thursday, won the state in 2020 by just under 21,000 votes. Trump carried it by a slightly larger margin, nearly 23,000 votes, in 2016.
As Trump was campaigning, Harris took a short break from debate prep to visit Penzeys Spices in Pittsburgh’s Strip District, where she bought several seasoning mixes. One customer saw the Democratic nominee and began openly weeping as Harris hugged her and said, “We’re going to be fine. We’re all in this together.”
Harris said she was honored to have endorsements from two major Republicans: former Vice President Dick Cheney and his daughter, Liz Cheney, the former Wyoming congresswoman.
“People are exhausted, about the division and the attempts to kind of divide us as Americans,” she said, adding that her main message at the debate would be that the country wants to be united.
“It’s time to turn the page on the divisiveness,” she said. “It’s time to bring our country together, to chart a new way forward.”
Trump held his rally in the central Wisconsin city of Mosinee, with a population of about 4,500 people. It is within Wisconsin’s mostly rural 7th Congressional District, a reliably Republican area in a purple state.

Senseless ramblings

During his speech, he railed against Harris in dark and ominous language, claiming that if the woman he calls “Comrade Kamala Harris gets four more years, you will be living (in) a full-blown Banana Republic” ruled by “anarchy” and “tyranny.”
Trump also railed against the administration’s border policies, calling the Democrats’ approach “suicidal” and accusing them of having “imported murderers, child predators and serial rapists from all over the planet.”
Many studies have found immigrants, including those in the country illegally, commit fewer violent crimes than native-born citizens. Violent crime in the US dropped again last year, continuing a downward trend after a pandemic-era spike.
He dismissed warnings from US officials about ongoing Russian attempts to spread disinformation ahead of November’s election, including an indictment this past week that alleged a media company linked to six conservative influencers was secretly funded by Russian state media employees.
“The Justice Department said Russia may be involved in our elections again,” Trump told the crowd. “And, you know, the whole world laughed at it this time.”
Among those in the crowd was Dale Osuldsen, who was celebrating his 68th birthday Saturday at his first ever Trump rally. He hopes a second Trump administration will take on “cancel culture” and bring the country back to its “foundational past.
“We’ve had past administrations say they want to fundamentally change America,” Osulden said. “Fundamentally changing America is a bad thing.”
Many supporters embarked on hours-long drives from across Wisconsin to see Trump speak. Some came from even further.
Sean Moon, a Tennessee musician who releases MAGA-themed rap music under the stage name, “King Bullethead,” blasted his songs from a truck in the event parking lot. As a musician, he said Trump rallies approximate the experience of a raucous concert.
“Trump is a rockstar,” Moon said. “He’s incredible. People see he represents them and the deep state trying to kill him and take him out. But he’s standing strong, and he stands for the normal person.”
Democrats have relied on massive turnout in the state’s two largest cities, Milwaukee and Madison, to counter Republican strength in rural areas like Mosinee and the Milwaukee suburbs. Trump must win the votes in places like Mosinee to have any chance of cutting into the Democrats’ advantage in urban areas.
Republicans held their national convention in Milwaukee in July and Trump has made four previous stops to the state, most recently just last week in the western Wisconsin city of La Crosse.
Harris and her running mate, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, last month filled the same Milwaukee arena where Republicans held their national convention for a rally that coincided with the Democratic National Convention just 90 miles away in Chicago. Walz returned Monday to Milwaukee, where he spoke at a Labor Day rally organized by unions.


Arab America decides as Trump and Harris remain tied in final stretch of election race

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Arab America decides as Trump and Harris remain tied in final stretch of election race

  • Recent Arab News/YouGov survey revealed Arab American frustration with US policy in the Middle East
  • In swing states with large concentrations of Arab Americans, their votes have become as valuable as gold dust
JONATHAN GORNALL

LONDON: They are in a minority of about 1 percent.

In the US census carried out in 2020 — the first that specifically sought information about MENA origins — just 3.5 million of America’s 334 million citizens reported being of Middle East and North African descent.

But as Americans go to the polls today to select their next president, that 1 percent is poised to have a 100 percent impact on one of the most important US elections for a generation.

No one would suggest that this is a homogeneous group. Culturally, historically and linguistically, being “Arab” is an umbrella term for peoples as diverse as the 22 nations that comprise the League of Arab States.

But as an exclusive Arab News/YouGov survey revealed last month, in the run-up to the 2024 US presidential election all Arab Americans have been united — in grief and outrage and in disappointment at the performance of the current US administration over the shocking events that have taken place in Gaza and Lebanon over the past year.

The survey also found that Arab Americans were preparing to vote in unprecedented numbers — underscoring just how important their swing-state vote will have been today for Kamala Harris and Donald Trump.

What the survey also revealed, however, is that Arab Americans have been divided over which of the two main candidates to vote for.

This explains the last-minute efforts to woo the Arab American vote by both Harris and former President Donald Trump.

Right up to the wire, the election race has been too close to call, which is why in the crucial swing states that happen to be home to the largest concentrations of Arab Americans, their votes have become like gold dust.

On Sunday Harris was in Detroit, announcing: “I am honored to have the support of many Arab American leaders who represent the interests and the concerns of the Arab American community.”

She also made sure to repeat a line she has delivered frequently during the campaign as she sought to distance herself from association with the perception that the Biden administration had failed to hold Israel in check over the past year.

“The level of deaths of innocent Palestinians is unconscionable,” she said.

The Arab News/YouGov survey revealed the extent to which traditional Arab American support for the Democratic Party has ebbed away over the Palestine issue.

In October, Harris met community leaders in Flint, Michigan, in a clear attempt to make the point that, although she served as his vice president, she is not Biden.

But some community leaders declined the invitation to meet Harris, and not everyone who took part in a virtual meeting with Harris’ national security adviser, Phil Gordon, was reassured by the overture.

Ali Dagher, a Lebanese-American community leader who did not attend the meeting, described Harris’ outreach to the Arab community as “too little, too late.”

Both campaigns have been very aware that of all seven battleground states, the result in Michigan appears to have been the most finely balanced, and on Friday it was Trump’s turn to assure the 200,000 Arab American voters in the state there that he was on their side.

In messages found on billboards along Michigan’s highways, Trump portrayed himself as pro-peace in the Middle East, while casting Harris as pro-Israel. Skeptics saw it as a curious flight of fancy for a man whose record as president was entirely pro-Israel, and not all of them were falling for it.

“We’re not naive about what he means for our community,” Rexhinaldo Nazarko, executive director of Michigan advocacy group the American Muslim Engagement and Empowerment Network, told the BBC.

Nazarko and doubtless many other Arab Americans have not forgotten Trump’s 2017 “Muslim ban,” his recognition of Jerusalem as the capital of Israel and his Abraham Accords, widely perceived in the Arab world as favoring Israel and patronizing Palestinians.

Regardless, several influential Arab Americans have declared for Trump, including Amer Ghalib, the mayor of Hamtramck, near Detroit. He has said his decision to endorse the former president was “a combination of both disappointment and hope” — disappointment with Biden’s handling of the Middle East situation and “hope that some change will bring peace to the Middle East, and we found President Trump is so determined about that.”

However, one of the latest polls of American voters suggests that Harris is beginning to pull ahead of Trump in five of the crucial seven swing states.

But it is in the three remaining swing states where the election is likely to be won and lost — including in Michigan, where the two candidates are neck-and-neck with exactly 47 percent of the vote each.

This echoes almost precisely the result of the Arab News/YouGov poll, which was published last week, and which also found that the Arab American vote is virtually polarized. Asked which candidate they were most likely to vote for, 45 percent said Trump, while 43 percent opted for Harris.

This was a big surprise, especially as 40 percent of those polled described themselves as natural Democrats, only 28 percent as Republicans and 23 percent as independents.

The poll made clear just how many Arab Americans appear to have switched their allegiance from the Democrats to the Republicans in response to the disappointment engendered by the Biden administration’s handling of Israel and the catastrophe in Gaza.

It will soon be clear whether Harris has been able to shake off that association among Arab American voters.

Whether she has or not, and whoever will be heading for the White House in January following today’s vote, the 2024 presidential election is already a historic one for Arab Americans. Their wholehearted embrace of the US democratic process — on a scale far outweighing that of the American electorate overall — has been on an unprecedented scale, reflecting not only their concern for their familial homelands but also their engagement with the politics of America.

Because make no mistake: Although the world categorizes them as Arab Americans, they see themselves as American Arabs — and their stake in the country that can lay claim to being the world’s greatest melting pot of immigrants is as deeply embedded as any.

In 2023 Dearborn, Michigan, became the first Arab-majority city in America. The fact that it did, and that Michigan’s Arabs have been in a position to play such a vital role in the selection of America’s next president, is down to something as all-American as the Model T Ford — literally.

At the start of the 20th century there was nothing much other than farmland in and around Dearborn. In 1908 Henry Ford began producing his revolutionary Model T cars in Detroit, and among the first workers he hired on the production line were Arabs who had recently emigrated from Syria.

They were followed by others, chiefly from Palestine, Lebanon, Iraq and Yemen, who all settled in and around Dearborn, working for the gigantic Ford factory that grew up there, and where the company still has its headquarters today.

There have been 21 presidents since the first Arab immigrants began working on Ford’s Model T production lines in Michigan 116 years ago. When the last polls close in Michigan today at 9 p.m. Eastern Time, their descendants will have the satisfaction of knowing that in the race to become the 47th president of the United States they have been firmly in the driver’s seat.

Spain dreads more flood deaths as rain pounds Catalonia

Updated 04 November 2024
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Spain dreads more flood deaths as rain pounds Catalonia

  • The toll stands at 217 dead — almost all in the eastern Valencia region — with the country dreading the discovery of more corpses

VALENCIA: Rescuers plunged into inundated garages on Monday to find victims of Spain’s deadliest floods in a generation as fresh downpours sparked transport chaos in the northeastern region of Catalonia.
The toll stands at 217 dead — almost all in the eastern Valencia region — with the country dreading the discovery of more corpses as an unknown number of people remain missing.
National weather service AEMET announced the end of the emergency for Valencia but torrential rain struck Catalonia, where residents received telephone alerts urging the utmost caution.
Barcelona’s El Prat airport, Spain’s second busiest, said 50 flights were canceled or delayed and 17 diverted on Monday, while the city closed some flooded metro stations and regional trains were suspended.
Images on social media showed cars plowing through flooded roads in the Barcelona suburbs of Castelldefels and Gava and bare-footed travelers wading through water that had seeped into El Prat.
Spain also grappled with the aftermath of an extraordinary outburst of popular anger in which crowds heckled and hurled mud at King Felipe VI, Queen Letizia and Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez.
The Civil Guard has opened an investigation into the chaos in the ground-zero town of Paiporta that cut short their visit on Sunday, Interior Minister Fernando Grande-Marlaska told public broadcaster TVE.
He blamed “marginal groups” for instigating the violence where mud spattered the monarchs’ face and clothes and a window of Sanchez’s car was broken.


The incident underscored growing anger at the authorities’ preparation for and reaction to the catastrophe.
Experts have questioned the warning systems that failed to alert the population in time and the speed of the response.
“They were saying ‘alert for water’, but they should have said it was a flood,” Teresa Gisbert, 62, told AFP in the destroyed town of Sedavi, saying she had “lost everything.”
Thousands of soldiers, police officers, civil guards and firefighters spent a sixth day distributing aid and clearing mud and debris to find bodies.
But relief works only reached some towns days after the disaster and in many cases volunteers were the first to provide food, water, sanitation and cleaning equipment.
“We shouldn’t romanticize it: the people saved the people because we were abandoned,” said Jorge, 25, a resident of the town of Chiva where the royals canceled their visit on Sunday.
Divers on Monday concentrated their search for missing bodies in garages and a multi-story car park in the town of Aldaia.
The storm caught many victims in their vehicles on roads and in underground spaces such as car parks, tunnels and garages where rescue operations are particularly difficult.
Local authorities in Valencia extended travel restrictions for another two days, canceled classes and urged residents to work from home to facilitate the work of the emergency services.

The unity that bound Spain’s polarized politics when the tragedy struck started to fray as attention turned to those responsible for handling the crisis.
Far-right party Vox slammed Spain’s “failed” state, blaming Sanchez for the slow deployment of troops and “demonizing” volunteers. The hard-left Podemos demanded the resignation of the Valencia region’s conservative leader Carlos Mazon.
Sanchez has said now is not the time to scrutinize the management of the disaster during urgent rescue and reconstruction work.
The main opposition Popular Party urged the left-wing government to go further by declaring a national emergency and approving aid packages for individual citizens.
Storms coming off the Mediterranean are common during this season. But scientists have warned human-induced climate change is increasing the ferocity, length and frequency of extreme weather events.
“Politicians haven’t acted on climate change, and now we’re paying the consequences of their inaction,” environmental activist Emi, 21, told AFP in Chiva.


India’s Rajasthan state seeks Saudi investment with roadshow in Riyadh, Jeddah 

Updated 04 November 2024
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India’s Rajasthan state seeks Saudi investment with roadshow in Riyadh, Jeddah 

  • Rajasthan is aiming to double its state GDP to $350 billion in next five years
  • State seeks Saudi investment in engineering, food processing, agro-solutions 

NEW DELHI: The government of India’s Rajasthan state is seeking Saudi investment in its growing industries, its minister told Arab News on Monday as he leads an official delegation to meet investors and business leaders in the Kingdom. 

Rajasthan, India’s largest state by area, is gearing up to host a global investment summit in its capital Jaipur next month as part of the goal to double the state’s gross domestic product to $350 billion in the next five years. 

The summit is aimed at attracting international investors and fostering new partnerships in various sectors, including renewable energy, electric vehicles, infrastructure, startups and tourism. 

Ahead of the event, the state government has organized a roadshow in Riyadh and Jeddah this week to invite Saudi officials and business players to invest in Rajasthan. 

“Saudi Arabia is one of the largest and key economies in the West Asian region that is of immense significance to Rajasthan from the perspective of furthering trade and other partnerships,” Rajasthan’s Minister of State for Industry and Commerce K. K. Vishnoi, told Arab News. 

“The sectors that remain our key focus from the perspective of seeking Saudi investment include engineering, machinery and equipment, investment advisory, agro solutions, food processing and FMCG (fast-moving consumer goods) distribution, among others.” 

Rajasthan officials are scheduled to meet leading Saudi companies operating in these sectors, and will present the state’s strategic advantages while also offering key incentives to potential investors, he added. 

As part of his visit to the Kingdom, Vishnoi held talks on Monday with the Saudi Assistant Minister of Investment Ibrahim Yousef Al-Mubarak, according to a release issued by the state government. 

“The delegation will also extend an invitation to the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia to participate in the investment summit as a partner country,” it said. 

Saudi Arabia is India’s fifth-largest trading partner, with bilateral trade valued at about $43 billion in the 2023-2024 financial year, accounting for more than 4.5 percent of India’s total trade. 


Philippines to pursue sustainability, halal sector projects with Saudi businesses

Updated 04 November 2024
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Philippines to pursue sustainability, halal sector projects with Saudi businesses

  • Top Philippine, Saudi business bodies signed an agreement to boost trade ties last week
  • The memorandum is ‘significant milestone’ in Saudi-Philippine relations, commerce body says

MANILA: The Philippines is seeking new partnerships with Saudi Arabia in the sustainability and halal sectors, the Department of Trade and Industry said on Monday after the two countries’ top business bodies signed an agreement to enhance economic ties.

The Federation of Saudi Chambers and the Philippine Chamber of Commerce and Industry signed a memorandum of understanding in Riyadh last week, aimed at boosting trade and investment between the two countries.

“The collaboration sets the stage for ongoing exchanges that will drive sustainable growth across sectors,” the DTI said in a statement of the PCCI pact.

The agreement was a “significant milestone” in Saudi-Philippine relations and will be “a foundation for projects aligned with both countries’ goal(s) in sustainable development, trade expansion, and cultural ties,” it added.

The PCCI was part of a DTI-led delegation comprising government agencies and business leaders, whose mission to the Kingdom will conclude on Tuesday.

The mission was organized to promote the Philippines’ halal industry, as Manila has set out to expand it significantly. This includes doubling the number of its halal-certified products and services, raise 230 billion pesos ($4 billion) in investments, and generate around 120,000 jobs by 2028.

To achieve those goals, the Philippines is also working to tap into the global halal market — estimated to be worth more than $7 trillion — through new collaborations with countries in the Middle East, including Saudi Arabia.

“This is a good beginning where we can open the gate so that we could collaborate between two countries … we can restart and redevelop our business between the Philippines and Saudi Arabia,” Elsie Chua, business executive and co-chair of the Philippines-Saudi Business Council, told Arab News.

Chua said there were opportunities under the Saudi Vision 2030 plan, including in construction, food security and wellness.

“I can foresee we could reach not only in (halal) food … but also in cosmetics, etc.,” she said. “Next year, we will bring a bigger delegation to be led by our president of the PCCI … wherein we will also bring designers, architects as well as construction companies.”

Manila recorded a rise in Philippine-Saudi trade from 2022 to 2023. This followed President Ferdinand Marcos Jr.’s visit to Riyadh last October, during which a $4.26 billion investment agreement was signed with the Kingdom’s business leaders.


Germany’s top diplomat in Kyiv as Ukraine girds for impact of US election on the war

Updated 04 November 2024
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Germany’s top diplomat in Kyiv as Ukraine girds for impact of US election on the war

  • Germany is Ukraine’s second biggest weapons supplier after the US
  • Ahead of the US vote, Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky attempted to lock Ukraine’s Western supporters into a long-term “victory plan”

KYIV, Ukraine: Germany’s top diplomat arrived Monday in the Ukrainian capital Kyiv on an unannounced visit, in what appeared to be a show of European support for Ukraine on the eve of a US presidential election that could bring far-reaching changes in Washington’s policy toward Russia’s all-out invasion of its neighbor.
Germany is Ukraine’s second biggest weapons supplier after the US, and Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock vowed that Berlin’s backing would remain steadfast.
“Together with many partners around the world, Germany stands firmly by Ukraine’s side,” she said, German news agency dpa reported. “We will support the Ukrainians for as long as they need us so that they can continue on their path to a just peace.”
The war is at a critical moment for Ukraine, with the Russian army making creeping gains on the battlefield and another hard winter ahead after Russia relentlessly battered the Ukrainian power grid.
Ahead of the US vote, Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky attempted to lock Ukraine’s Western supporters into a long-term “victory plan,” including a formal invitation for Ukraine to join NATO and permission to use Western long-range missiles to strike military targets in Russia, but the response was disappointing for Kyiv officials.
Russia is using its superior numbers to heap pressure on Ukrainian positions along the front line. Ukraine’s top commander, Gen. Oleksandr Syrskyi, said Saturday his troops are struggling to hold back “one of the most powerful (Russian) offensives” of the war.
Russia is now adding to its offensive push what Western intelligence sources say is a force of about 10,000 North Korean combat troops sent by Pyongyang under a pact with Moscow.
That has deepened Zelensky’s frustration with Western help. On Saturday, he urged allies to stop “watching” and take steps before the North Korean troops reach the battlefield.
Zelensky said Kyiv knows at which Russian camps the North Korean troops are being trained but Ukraine can’t strike them without permission from allies to use the Western-made long-range weapons to hit targets deep inside Russia.
Baerbock arrived in Kyiv hours after debris from drones intercepted by air defenses fell in two districts of the city, starting small fires, officials said. No people or property were harmed, according to the head of the Kyiv city administration, Serhii Popko.
A Russian glide bomb attack on Sunday night injured 15 people in Kharkiv, Ukraine’s second-largest city in the northeast, regional police said.
Russia fired some 80 Shahed drones at Ukrainian cities overnight, Ukraine’s air force said.