Critics of U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris are claiming she lacks the qualifications and skills to be president, saying she is a beneficiary of policies that aim to boost diversity, equity and inclusion in the American workplace. But supporters of policies that aim to include previously marginalized groups say Harris has earned her place. VOA’s Anita Powell reports from Washington.
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new york — Donald Trump asked a federal court late Thursday to intervene in his New York hush money criminal case, seeking a pathway to overturn his felony conviction and indefinitely delay his sentencing scheduled for next month.
Lawyers for the former president and current Republican nominee asked the federal court in Manhattan to seize the case from the state court where it was brought and tried, arguing that the historic prosecution violated Trump’s constitutional rights and ran afoul of the U.S. Supreme Court’s recent ruling on presidential immunity.
Trump’s lawyers said moving the case to federal court following his May 30 conviction will give him an “unbiased forum, free from local hostilities” to address those issues. If the case is moved to federal court, Trump lawyers wrote, they will then seek to have the verdict overturned and the case dismissed. If it remains in state court, with sentencing proceeding as scheduled, it could amount to election interference, they said.
“The ongoing proceedings will continue to cause direct and irreparable harm to President Trump — the leading candidate in the 2024 Presidential election — and voters located far beyond Manhattan,” Trump lawyers Todd Blanche and Emil Bove wrote in a 64-page U.S. District Court filing.
Trump was convicted in state court in Manhattan of 34 counts of falsifying business records related to a payment to bury affair allegations that threatened to cloud his 2016 presidential run. Even if the case isn’t moved to federal court, the potential delay caused by litigation surrounding Trump’s effort could give him a critical reprieve as he navigates the aftermath of his criminal conviction and the homestretch of his presidential campaign.
Separately, the state court judge who presided over the trial, Juan M. Merchan, is weighing Trump’s requests to postpone sentencing until after Election Day, November 5, and to overturn the verdict and dismiss the case in the wake of the Supreme Court’s immunity decision.
The high court’s July 1 ruling reins in prosecutions of ex-presidents for official acts and restricts prosecutors in pointing to official acts as evidence that a president’s unofficial actions were illegal.
Trump’s lawyers argue that in light of the ruling, jurors in the hush money case should not have heard such evidence as former White House staffers describing how the then-president reacted to news coverage of the deal to pay hush money to porn actor Stormy Daniels.
Trump’s lawyers had previously invoked presidential immunity in a failed bid last year to get the hush money case moved from state court to federal court. A federal judge rejected that request, clearing the way for Trump’s historic trial in state court.
U.S. District Judge Alvin Hellerstein rejected Trump’s claim that allegations in the hush money indictment involved official duties, writing in July 2023, “The evidence overwhelmingly suggests that the matter was a purely a personal item of the president — a cover-up of an embarrassing event.”
“Hush money paid to an adult film star is not related to a president’s official acts. It does not reflect in any way the color of the president’s official duties,” Hellerstein added.
A message seeking comment was left with the Manhattan district attorney’s office, which prosecuted the case.
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savannah, georgia/washington — Kamala Harris vowed a tougher approach to migration along the U.S. southern border and said she would not withhold weapons to Israel, in her first interview with a major news organization since becoming the Democratic nominee for president.
In the interview with CNN anchor Dana Bash, Harris sought to show she is in command of the issues and give Americans a sense of her policy positions with little more than two months until Election Day on November 5.
Harris said she would renew a push for comprehensive border legislation that would tighten migration into the United States and vowed to “enforce our laws” against border crossings.
“We have laws that have to be followed and enforced, that address and deal with people who cross our border illegally, and there should be consequence,” Harris said.
She also hewed closely to President Joe Biden’s strong support of Israel and rejected calls from some in the Democratic Party that Washington should rethink sending weapons to Israel because of the heavy Palestinian death toll in Gaza.
She said she supports a strong Israel but “we must get a deal done” to get a cease-fire in the Gaza conflict.
“No, we have to get a (cease-fire and hostage) deal done,” Harris said when asked if she would withhold weapons to Israel. She has been Biden’s vice president since the start of his administration.
Abbas Alawieh, a co-founder of the Uncommitted National Movement that has protested against Biden’s policy, expressed frustration over Harris’ response on Gaza.
“If the vice president is interested in a cease-fire, she must support an immediate stop to sending the fire,” Alawieh said.
Harris, joined by her vice presidential running mate, Minnesota Governor Tim Walz, also said she would like to add a Republican to her cabinet if she wins the election.
“I think it’s important to have people at the table when some of the most important decisions are being made that have different views, different experiences. And I think it would be to the benefit of the American public to have a member of my cabinet who was a Republican,” she said.
Surging in polls
Since becoming the Democratic candidate for president last month, Harris has surged in the polls, brought in hundreds of millions of dollars in campaign donations, and had a series of forceful campaign speeches.
She leads Trump 45% to 41% in a Reuters/Ipsos poll published on Thursday that showed the vice president sparking new enthusiasm among voters.
Some critics suggested she might be less polished in unscripted settings like a TV interview, but she appeared to make no major mistakes on Thursday.
Harris defended her and Biden’s handling of inflation, saying they inherited a pandemic-ravaged economy that she said Trump had mismanaged. She said much work had been done to lower prices but that “prices are still too high.”
Jeremi Suri, history and public affairs professor at the University of Texas at Austin, said Harris came across as knowledgeable and a “consensus builder” in the interview but she could have had “more concrete and specific answers” on what she would do on her first day as president.
Harris has moved more toward the center on some issues from the time she ran for president in 2020 until she took over from Biden last month as the Democrats’ choice to face Republican former President Donald Trump in the election.
She has toughened her position on migration along the southern U.S. border with Mexico. She also no longer wants a ban on fracking, an energy production method that employs many people in Pennsylvania, one of a handful of swing states that could decide the election.
When asked about her policy shifts, Harris said: “My values have not changed.”
Harris dismissed a comment from Trump in which he questioned whether she was a Black American. “Same old tired playbook,” she said. “Next question, please.”
Trump, in a post on Truth Social, responded to the interview by saying: “I look so forward to Debating Comrade Kamala Harris and exposing her for the fraud she is.” Trump often falsely refers to Harris as a Marxist.
Though she has taken questions from journalists on the campaign trail and been interviewed on TikTok in recent days, she had, until Thursday, not done a one-on-one interview with a major network or print journalist since Biden ended his reelection campaign on July 21 and endorsed her.
Bash, who co-moderated the June 27 debate between Trump and Biden that ultimately led to the president’s departure from the race, conducted the interview in Savannah, Georgia, as Harris and Walz were on a campaign bus tour.
Harris widens lead over Trump with boost from women, Hispanics, Reuters/Ipsos poll finds.
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The Affordable Care Act, also known as “Obamacare,” has increased health care access for millions of Americans, but it’s not clear what the future of the program will be under the next president. Neither the Harris nor the Trump campaign has provided details on its vision for the ACA, but voters are watching closely. VOA’s Veronica Balderas Iglesias has the story. (Camera and Produced by: Veronica Balderas Iglesias)
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In this close US presidential race, the Southern state of Georgia is one of a handful of states that may decide the outcome. VOA Correspondent Scott Stearns reports on what the campaigns are doing in Georgia and how they hope to carry this key swing state.
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Washington — The White House welcomed on Tuesday the rescue of an Israeli hostage abducted October 7 by Hamas and said a Gaza cease-fire deal is being finalized.
But even if an agreement is reached, a truce is unlikely to extend beyond the six weeks of phase one of the three-phase deal. The next U.S. administration will still inherit the role of managing tensions in the region.
Since becoming the Democratic presidential nominee, Vice President Kamala Harris has aimed to strike a balance between reaffirming U.S. support for Israel and advocating for Palestinian humanitarian needs — in essence, signaling a continuation of President Joe Biden’s policies on the Israel-Hamas war and, more broadly, the Middle East.
Harris summed up her position in her acceptance speech as the Democratic presidential nominee at the party’s convention in Chicago.
“President Biden and I are working to end this war such that Israel is secure, the hostages are released, the suffering in Gaza ends, and the Palestinian people can realize their right to dignity, security, freedom and self-determination,” she said.
Democrats are enthusiastic about Harris, even though she has not yet laid out her own policies. And unlike Biden, a longtime member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, most of Harris’ exposure to foreign policy was during her tenure as vice president.
Not having “foreign policy baggage” might benefit Harris in the eyes of Democratic voters, said Natasha Hall, senior fellow with the Middle East Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.
Hall pointed out that in October 2002, Biden was one of 77 senators who gave President George W. Bush the authority to use force in Iraq, a decision that eventually became a liability for Biden, much as his staunch support for Israel has become the most divisive issue in his own party.
Adviser’s influence
Those looking to see whether Harris’ Mideast policy will diverge from Biden’s can look to her national security adviser, Phillip Gordon, who is expected to remain in the role if she is elected. He would be the principal adviser to the president on all national security issues, including foreign policy.
“Phil Gordon is the type of adviser that colors in the lines,” Hall told VOA. “He’s the kind of person that I think very much is sort of old-fashioned American foreign policy.”
Gordon was against ousting Iraqi President Saddam Hussein from power in 2003. He chronicled American efforts to overthrow leaders in the Middle East in his 2020 book, “Losing the Long Game: The False Promise of Regime Change in the Middle East.”
“The U.S. policy debate about the Middle East suffers from the fallacy that there is an external American solution to every problem, even when decades of painful experience suggest that this is not the case,” he wrote. “And regime change is the worst ‘solution.'”
Such an outlook would make a Harris administration “very, very cautious to deal assertively with Iran,” said Jonathan Rynhold, head of the Political Studies Department at Israel’s Bar-Ilan University.
From an Israeli perspective, however, Harris’ direct involvement in the administration’s recent decision to deploy more military assets to the Middle East to deter Iran is good news, Rynhold told VOA.
“If that is the policy that she goes on to adopt, then that crosses the minimal threshold of what Israel needs on Iran,” he said. “It may not be what Israel desires, which is a more forceful approach, but it is not a passive one.”
Current Harris aides have told VOA that Harris she intends to stay on the path that Biden has laid out: working beyond a cease-fire toward a two-state solution without sacrificing Israel’s security.
Harris’ former national security adviser while she was in the Senate, Halie Soifer, agreed.
“The vice president and the president have supported U.S. military assistance to Israel, not just for the existing agreement that we have with Israel,” said Soifer, who is now the CEO of the Jewish Democratic Council of America. “But also an increase this year because of their security needs,” she told VOA
Generational and personal background
Biden’s generation, with a more visceral sense of the Holocaust, views Israel as a tiny democracy surrounded by hostile Arab powers. People of Harris’ generation and younger see Israel for what it is today: a thriving democracy and the region’s top military power. While Biden and Harris may share the same goal for Israel’s security, there’s not the same emotional resonance, Rynhold said.
Younger Americans “don’t remember a time when Jews and Israel were extremely vulnerable,” he said. “So they don’t have a same sense of that continuing vulnerability that President Biden really has.”
And for the president, Israel is integral to the story of America’s role in the world.
“America is there to prevent the Holocaust. America is there to support democracies, and Israel is central to his way of understanding that role,” Rynhold said.
If elected, Harris would become the first person to hold the highest office in the land whose parents are both immigrants. Barack Obama’s father was born in Kenya, and Donald Trump’s mother was born in the U.K. Harris’ father came from Jamaica and her mother, from India.
Unlike Biden, who often underscores that he is a Zionist, a loaded term often viewed with scorn in many parts of the world, Harris may be more sensitive to views from the Global South.
In a 2018 speech to an Indian American group, Harris spoke fondly of childhood visits to the home of her maternal grandfather, P.V. Gopalan, describing him as someone who had fought for “freedom and for justice and for independence.”
“She is aware of how the rest of the world may feel about the Middle East, about neocolonialism, neoimperialism,” Hall said. “I really hope that she has the opportunity to bring those experiences to bear if she becomes the president.”
But it’s hard to tell what a Harris doctrine would eventually look like.
“What she says now is directed to winning an election and keeping the Democratic Party together,” Rynhold said.
And since the party is evenly split between those sympathetic to Israel and those sympathetic to the Palestinians, she must express platitudes, he said.
“And that’s what she has done.”
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White House officials welcomed the rescue of an Israeli hostage held by Hamas Tuesday and said they are finalizing a Gaza cease-fire deal. But even if an agreement is reached, a future U.S. administration will still inherit the problem of managing tensions in the Middle East. White House Bureau Chief Patsy Widakuswara looks at potential U.S. policy under Vice President Kamala Harris should she win the November presidential election.
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Immigration is one of the top issues for U.S. voters this November as they decide who will occupy the White House. The difference in policy between the two presidential candidates is stark. VOA’s senior Washington correspondent, Carolyn Presutti, begins our story at a dusty desert stop in Arizona. Video: Adam Greenbaum
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WASHINGTON — Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump used the third anniversary on Monday of the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan to try to pin the chaotic pullout on his Democratic rival for the White House, Kamala Harris.
Trump participated in a wreath-laying ceremony at Arlington National Cemetery honoring the 13 servicemembers killed during the U.S. exit, then later in Detroit blamed Harris, the vice president, and President Joe Biden for what he termed a “catastrophic” withdrawal.
“Caused by Kamala Harris, Joe Biden, the humiliation in Afghanistan set off the collapse of American credibility and respect all over the world,” Trump said in an address to the National Guard Association of the United States.
It was the latest attempt by Trump and his campaign to raise doubts about Harris’ fitness to serve as commander-in-chief as the Nov. 5 election draws near and comes after Harris last week proclaimed herself ready to lead the nation’s armed forces.
The U.S. troop pullout and evacuation of U.S. and allied officials, citizens and Afghans at risk of Taliban retribution saw crowds of desperate Afghans trying to enter Kabul airport and men clinging to aircraft as they taxied down runways in August 2021.
An Islamic State suicide bomber killed 13 U.S. servicemembers and more than 150 Afghans outside an airport gate.
Harris’ campaign said the fault lay with Trump’s tenure as president.
“The Biden-Harris administration inherited a mess from Donald Trump,” said Ammar Moussa, a Harris spokesperson. “Trump wants America to forget that he had four years to get out of Afghanistan but failed to do it.”
The Biden administration was following a withdrawal commitment and timeline that the Trump administration had negotiated with the Taliban in 2020.
A review released by the U.S. State Department in 2023 found fault with both the Trump and Biden administrations in the run-up to the withdrawal.
In recent weeks, Trump and his running mate, Senator JD Vance, also have sought to turn Democratic vice presidential candidate Tim Walz’s decades of service into a political vulnerability. Former military service is often a key selling point for candidates in U.S. political campaigns.
The Republicans have accused Walz of exaggerating his rank in the Army National Guard, where he served for 24 years. Walz has described himself as a retired command sergeant major, one of the highest noncommissioned officer positions in the Army. While he achieved that rank, he did not meet the requirements to retire with that title.
The Harris campaign deleted a reference this month to Walz’s rank as a “command sergeant major” on its website. The campaign also now says Walz “misspoke” in 2018 during his gubernatorial campaign in Minnesota when he referred to “weapons of war, that I carried in war.” Walz was never deployed to a war zone.
Trump, 78, never served in the military. Though he was of draft age during the Vietnam War, he received four student deferments and a health-related one after he received a diagnosis for bone spurs in his feet.
Vance served in the Marine Corps for four years as a combat correspondent and was deployed to Iraq for roughly seven months. His position mainly involved writing reports of military activity for public dissemination and at times interacting with the media.
Harris has not served in the military.
Harris told CNN in 2021 that she was the last person in the room with Biden when he decided to pull U.S. forces from Afghanistan and end America’s longest war. She also said that she was comfortable with Biden’s decision, but it remains unclear what role she played in the discussion.
Both Biden and Harris released statements marking the anniversary on Monday.
“These 13 devoted patriots represent the best of America, putting our beloved nation and their fellow Americans above themselves and deploying into danger to keep their fellow citizens safe,” Harris said.
Asked Monday why Biden and Harris weren’t marking the anniversary of the Abbey Gate attack as Trump did at Arlington National Cemetery, White House national security spokesman John Kirby told reporters that Trump had been personally invited by the family members and he called it one way to honor the fallen.
“Another way is to continue to work,” Kirby said. “Maybe not with a lot of fanfare, maybe not with a lot of public attention, maybe not with TV cameras, but to work with might and main every single day to make sure that the families of the fallen and of those who were injured and wounded, not just at Abbey Gate, but over the course of the 20-some odd years that we were in Afghanistan, have the support that they need.”
Also Monday, House Speaker Mike Johnson announced that Congress will posthumously honor the 13 service members by presenting their families with the Congressional Gold Medal next month. It’s the highest civilian award that Congress can bestow.
Some information for this article came from The Associated Press.
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chicago — The social media platform X has made a change to its AIchatbot after five secretaries of state warned it was spreading election misinformation.
Top election officials from Michigan, Minnesota, New Mexico, Pennsylvania and Washington sent a letter this month to Elon Musk complaining that the platform’s AI chatbot, Grok, produced false information about state ballot deadlines shortly after President Joe Biden dropped out of the 2024 presidential race.
The secretaries of state requested that the chatbot instead direct users who ask election-related questions to CanIVote.org, a voting information website run by the National Association of Secretaries of State.
Before listing responses to election-related questions, the chatbot now says, “For accurate and up-to-date information about the 2024 U.S. Elections, please visit Vote.gov.”
Both websites are “trustworthy resources that can connect voters with their local election officials,” the five secretaries of state said in a shared statement.
“We appreciate X’s action to improve their platform and hope they continue to make improvements that will ensure their users have access to accurate information from trusted sources in this critical election year,” they said.
Grok is available only to subscribers of the premium versions of X. But the five secretaries of state who signed the letter said election misinformation from Grok has been shared across multiple social media platforms, reaching millions of people. Grok continued to repeat the false information for 10 days before it was corrected, the secretaries said. The platform did not respond to a request for comment.
The change promoting a link to an official voting website does not seem to address Grok’s ability to create misleading AI-generated images related to elections. People have been using the tool to flood the platform with fake images of candidates, including Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump.
Grok debuted last year for X premium and premium plus subscribers and was touted by Musk as a “rebellious” AI chatbot that will answer “spicy questions that are rejected by most other AI systems.”
Social media platforms have faced mounting scrutiny for their role in spreading misinformation, including about elections. The letter also warned that inaccuracies are to be expected for AI products, especially chatbots such as Grok that are based on large language models.
Since Musk bought Twitter in 2022 and renamed it to X, watchdog groups have raised concerns over a surge in hate speech and misinformation being amplified on the platform, as well as cuts to the staff that had been moderating content.
Experts say the moves represent a regression from progress made by social media platforms attempting to better combat political disinformation after the 2016 U.S. presidential contest and could precipitate a worsening misinformation landscape ahead of this year’s November elections.
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madison, wisconsin — Green Party presidential candidate Jill Stein will remain on the ballot in the crucial swing state of Wisconsin after the state Supreme Court decided on Monday not to hear a Democratic challenge seeking to oust her.
Democrats are concerned that third-party candidates could draw votes away from Vice President Kamala Harris and help Republican Donald Trump win Wisconsin. The presence of independent and third-party candidates on the ballot could be a deciding factor in a state where four of the last six presidential elections have been decided by between 5,700 votes and about 23,000 votes.
The court decided against hearing the challenge brought by David Strange, an employee of the Democratic National Committee, who sought to oust Stein from the ballot. The court did not explain its reasoning.
“We determine that the petitioner is not entitled to the relief he seeks,” the court said in its unsigned order.
Strange argued that the Green Party can’t nominate presidential electors in Wisconsin because the party does not have any state officeholders or legislative candidates authorized to nominate presidential electors.
The Green Party and Republicans countered that the party met all of its legal requirements, and that Stein should be allowed to remain on the ballot.
Michael White, co-chair of the Wisconsin Green Party, called the complaint a “mark of fear by the Democratic Party” and hailed the court’s decision not to consider it.
“It was an inevitable conclusion because the complaint had no merit to begin with and we knew that,” he said.
However, White said the attention generated by Democrats attempting to knock Stein off the ballot motivated Green Party members.
Democratic National Committee spokesperson Adrienne Watson called the decision “disappointing” and said the Green Party should not be on the ballot.
Stein last appeared on the Wisconsin ballot 2016, when she won just over 31,000 votes — more than Trump’s winning margin of just under 23,000 votes. Some Democrats have blamed her for helping Trump win the state and the presidency that year.
Strange had challenged a Wisconsin Elections Commission decision in February to grant the Green Party ballot access. The commission did so because a candidate from the party won more than 1% of the vote in a statewide race in 2022, meeting a requirement under the law. Sheryl McFarland got nearly 1.6% of the vote while finishing last in a four-way race for secretary of state.
The Wisconsin Elections Commission is scheduled to meet Tuesday to certify which candidates can appear on the ballot. Democrats are also challenging the placement of independent candidate Cornel West on the ballot. A Republican National Committee employee is challenging independent Shiva Ayyadurai’s candidacy.
The Wisconsin Supreme Court kept Green Party presidential candidate Howie Hawkins off the ballot in 2020 after the elections commission deadlocked on whether he filed proper nominating signatures.
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Since 2020, Asians Americans have been the fastest-growing group of eligible voters in the U.S., according to Pew Research Center. In 2022, California had the most eligible Asian American voters in the U.S., followed by New York and Texas. From Houston, Texas, Elizabeth Lee has more on the potential and challenges of the Asian American vote.
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Republican vice presidential candidate JD Vance said Sunday that he won’t impose a federal abortion ban in the United States if he and Donald Trump win the White House. Meanwhile, the Democratic presidential ticket of Kamala Harris and Tim Walz keeps pushing its messaging for reproductive rights and announced record-breaking campaign donations. VOA’s Veronica Balderas Iglesias has the details.
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TAIPEI, Taiwan — Former U.S. ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley said on a visit to Taiwan Saturday that an isolationist policy isn’t “healthy” and called on the Republican Party to stand with her country’s allies, while still putting in good words for the party’s nominee, Donald Trump.
Haley, who ran against Trump for the Republican presidential nomination, told reporters in the capital, Taipei, that supporting U.S. allies, including Ukraine and Israel, is vital. She underscored the importance of Taiwan, which Beijing claims as its territory, to be brought under control by force if necessary.
“I don’t think the isolationist approach is healthy. I think America can never sit in a bubble and think that we won’t be affected,” she said.
While the U.S. doesn’t formally recognize Taiwan, it is the island’s strongest backer and main arms provider. However, Trump’s attempt to reclaim the presidency has fueled worries. He said Taiwan should pay for U.S. protection in an interview with Bloomberg Businessweek published in July and dodged answering the question of whether he would defend the island against a possible Chinese military action.
When Haley shuttered her own bid for the Republican nomination, she did not immediately endorse Trump, having accused him of causing chaos and disregarding the importance of U.S. alliances abroad. But in May she said she would be voting for him, while making it clear that she felt her former boss had work to do to win over voters who supported her.
On Saturday, she spoke in Trump’s favor. She said that having previously served with Trump’s administration, “we did show American strength in the world,” pointing to their pushback against China and their sanctioning of Russia and North Korea, among other efforts.
“I think that all of that strength that we showed is the reason that we didn’t see any wars, we didn’t see any invasions, we didn’t see any harm that happened during that time. I think Donald Trump would bring that back,” she said.
Trump has claimed that if elected, he would end the conflict in Ukraine before Inauguration Day in January. But Russia’s United Nations ambassador said he can’t. Trump’s public comments have varied between criticizing U.S. backing for Ukraine’s defense and supporting it, while his running mate, Sen. JD Vance, has been a leader of Republican efforts to block what have been billions in U.S. military and financial assistance to Ukraine since Russia invaded in 2022.
Concerns among Ukraine and its supporters that the country could lose vital U.S. support have increased as Trump’s campaign surged.
Haley criticized Trump’s rival, U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris, saying she would “do exactly” what President Joe Biden had done. She said Harris was part of his administration when the Taliban took over Afghanistan in 2021, when Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022 and when the Hamas-Israel war broke out last year.
“She was in the situation room right next to Joe Biden. She was there making the exact same decisions. Those decisions have made the world less safe,” she said.
Haley added that while the Republicans and Democrats may not currently concur on much, they agree on “the threats of China,” adding that Taiwan is now looking “to make sure that if China starts a fight with them, that they are prepared to make sure that they can fight back.”
She said her party should stand with the country’s allies and make sure that U.S. shows strength around the world. She also said any authoritarian regime and “communists” harming or hurting other free countries should be a personal matter to the U.S.
“We don’t want to see communist China win. We don’t want to see Russia win. We don’t want to see Iran or North Korea win,” she said.
Haley met Taiwanese President Lai Ching-te during this week’s trip. She called for more international backing for the self-ruled island, a coordinated pushback against China’s claims over it, and for Taiwan to become a full member of the United Nations.
Taiwan’s Defense Ministry said Saturday that 38 warplanes and 12 vessels from China were detected around the island during a 24-hour period from Friday morning. Thirty-two of the planes crossed the middle of the line of the Taiwan Strait, an unofficial boundary that’s considered a buffer between the island and mainland.
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Robert F. Kennedy Jr. announced his endorsement of former President Donald Trump, the Republican presidential nominee, on Friday. VOA’s Carolyn Presutti reports from Glendale, Arizona, where the two politicians campaigned together for the first time.
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Vice President Kamala Harris reaffirmed support for Israel in her Democratic National Convention acceptance speech. Pro-Palestinian delegates say they will push to condition U.S. military aid to Israel. White House Bureau Chief Patsy Widakuswara reports from the convention in Chicago, Illinois.
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Chicago — Hundreds of pro-Palestinian delegates were sidelined at the Democratic National Convention that ended with Vice President Kamala Harris reaffirming her support for Israel.
“The people of Israel must never again face the horror that a terrorist organization called Hamas caused on October 7,” she said in her speech accepting the party’s presidential nomination Thursday evening.
As anti-war protesters filled the streets throughout the week, 270 pro-Palestinian Democrats calling themselves “cease-fire delegates” signed a petition demanding Harris, if she’s elected, enact an arms embargo on Israel.
The unheeded petition was pushed by leaders of the “Uncommitted” movement, which garnered hundreds of thousands of votes in Democratic primaries across the nation.
These delegates staged a sit-in outside Chicago’s United Center, the convention’s venue, to protest the Democratic National Committee, who denied a speaking request for Tanya Haj-Hassan, a pediatric doctor who treats wounded children in Gaza.
The DNC, according to Uncommitted National Movement spokesperson Layla Elabed, didn’t want Harris to be “overshadowed.”
Asked by VOA for a reaction to Elabed’s claim, the Harris campaign said, “There have been a number of speakers who have spoken about the war in Gaza and the need to secure a cease-fire and hostage deal.”
Uncommitted delegates
Elabed spoke to VOA on behalf of the 30 “Uncommitted” delegates who voted present in the nomination roll call. That’s less than 1% of the roughly 4,700 delegates who voted for Harris.
The pro-Palestinian group, however, was given a speaking opportunity Monday in a panel event outside of the convention.
Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison, a Muslim sympathetic to the Palestinian cause who spoke on the panel, was given time at the convention main stage on Wednesday. However, he did not mention Gaza in his speech.
The war in Gaza is “not the topic that I would decide” to speak about, Ellison told VOA before his speech, indicating that pragmatism is key to affect change within the party.
“I’m not one of those people who believe that we vote for perfection. What we vote for is conversation,” he said.
Party platform supports Israel
As the convention kicked off, Democrats voted to adopt the party’s platform that recommitted support for Israel, a cease-fire for hostage release deal and the two-state solution.
Pro-Palestinian delegates tried to include language backing enforcement of laws that ban giving military aid to individuals or security forces that commit gross violations of human rights.
“What we are asking is that our tax dollars not be used to kill men, women and children. This is not a controversial demand and is actually more aligned with our Democratic values,” Elabed said.
Compared to Biden, Harris appears to offer more sympathy for Palestinian suffering, repeating Thursday of the “devastating” situation in Gaza over the past 10 months.”
“So many innocent lives lost. Desperate, hungry people fleeing for safety, over and over again,” she said in her convention speech. “The scale of suffering is heartbreaking.”
But policy-wise she signaled continuity from the current administration.
“President Biden and I are working to end this war such that Israel is secure, the hostages are released, the suffering in Gaza ends, and the Palestinian people can realize their right to dignity, security, freedom and self-determination,” she said in her speech to thunderous applause.
Harris’ current and former aides say her Israel policy is unlikely to diverge from President Joe Biden. Halie Soifer, national security adviser to Harris while she was in the Senate, said that the vice president has always been a “strong supporter of the U.S.-Israel relationship,” while upholding humanitarian values.
“She does not want to see the suffering of innocent civilians, nor do the vast majority of Americans and Jewish Americans,” said Soifer, who is now CEO of Jewish Democratic Council of America.
“We don’t have to view it through binary lens,” she told VOA. “We support both.”
Not discouraged
Uncommitted delegates say they’re not discouraged.
Inga Gibson, a delegate from Hawaii, a state where seven out of 31 delegates are uncommitted, said she has made “tremendous progress” with her fellow delegates.
“I found that a lot of people are really with us on this issue, but they don’t know where to begin or how to get involved,” she told VOA.
She and other uncommitted delegates gave out keffiyehs, “Democrats for Gaza” flyers and “No More Bombs” pins. The pro-Palestinian symbols are emblematic of a key area of disagreement among Democrats – how much support to give to Israel.
Pro-Israel delegates say it should not create division within the party.
“We can all do better to try to understand the complications of the conflict,” Andrew Lachman, a delegate from California told VOA. “We’re all concerned about the civilians of Gaza, but we’re also concerned about the people of Israel and their safety and security.”
Polls show an increasing number of Americans want their leaders to reduce support for Israel. Some say Harris missed an opportunity.
As a former prosecutor, Harris can and should strictly enforce laws and suspend weapons even to allies who violate international or U.S. law, said Nancy Okail, president and CEO of the Center for International Policy, a left-leaning think tank.
“She could make clear this doesn’t just apply to their misuse by Israel to cause disproportionate civilian harm in Gaza, but to their misuse by Netanyahu’s extremist government to dispossess and abuse Palestinians in the occupied West Bank,” she told VOA.
Turning protest into agenda
Scholars of social movements say it takes time and work to turn protests into a political agenda. Elisabeth Clemens, a sociologist from the University of Chicago, said that includes building coalitions, negotiating and compromising.
“Finding a way forward that almost never gets all the way to where the protesters hoped it would get but is nevertheless an important change,” she told VOA.
And on an issue as complicated as the Middle East peace process, there are different pressures exerted on multiple sides.
“American domestic politics only garners a slice of that,” she said.
Elabed said they’re in for the long game.
“Our strategy is not to abandon the Democratic Party, but to essentially revolutionize the Democratic Party and listen to its core base.”
For now, the vice president is their best bet.
“I don’t care what you think, you need to win to have power,” Ellison said. “Harris, the numbers are up everywhere. The chances for success are higher.”
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washington — Robert F. Kennedy Jr., an independent presidential candidate with a famous political pedigree but whose bid was overshadowed by a brain worm and a dead bear, has announced the suspension of his campaign, endorsing the Republican Party’s nominee, former President Donald Trump.
“In my heart, I no longer believe I have a realistic path to an electoral victory,” Kennedy said to a group of reporters and supporters in Phoenix. “I am not terminating my campaign. I am simply suspending it,” he added, explaining he did not want to help Vice President Kamala Harris, the Democratic Party’s nominee.
In 10 states where he could be a spoiler, Kennedy said he would have his name removed, but it would stay on the ballot in others where he said supporters could safely vote for him without risk of aiding the Democrats.
On Thursday, Kennedy filed paperwork withdrawing from the ballot in Arizona, one of the swing states likely to determine the outcome of November’s presidential election.
“My joining the Trump campaign will be a difficult sacrifice,” Kennedy told a crowd in Phoenix, Arizona. But, he added, it will be worthwhile if he gets a chance in a Republican administration to end what he contends is a wave of chronic diseases among America’s children.
“In an honest system, I believe I would have won the election,” said Kennedy, alleging that the mainstream media censored him while the Democratic Party thwarted his access to the ballot in numerous states.
He said Trump’s promise to negotiate an end to Russia’s war on Ukraine “alone would justify my support for his campaign.”
Kennedy stepped off the podium after 50 minutes, taking no questions.
He was expected to appear at a Trump rally later in the day in neighboring Glendale.
“I want to thank Bobby, that was very nice,” Trump said about Kennedy’s endorsement before heading to Arizona.
Famous name
A 70-year-old environmental lawyer, Kennedy labeled himself a political outsider despite his lineage. He entered the presidential race as a longshot Democratic Party candidate before dropping that bid last October and announcing he would mount an independent campaign.
With a surname almost synonymous with the Democratic Party (he is the nephew of President John. F. Kennedy and son of former U.S. Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy, both of whom were assassinated in the 1960s), RFK Jr. began his campaign polling in the low double digits in some states.
Many in the extended Kennedy family expressed embarrassment and denounced their relative’s campaign after he dropped out of the Democratic Party, choosing instead to support the reelection of President Joe Biden, who dropped out of the race and was replaced by Harris last month.
Kennedy on Friday likened Harris’ move to the top of the Democratic ticket to “a palace coup.”
The shakeup in the Democrats’ lineup further eroded support for Kennedy, who had benefited from those unenthused about a rematch of the 2020 election between Biden and Trump.
“The more voters learned about RFK Jr. the less they liked him. Donald Trump isn’t earning an endorsement that’s going to help build support, he’s inheriting the baggage of a failed fringe candidate. Good riddance,” said Democratic National Committee senior adviser Mary Beth Cahill in a statement following Kennedy’s announcement.
Fringe appeal
Kennedy, labeled a conspiracy theorist by his critics, appealed to some anti-establishment voters attracted by his contrarian foreign policy and long-standing campaign against vaccines. But he faced mainstream disdain and even ridicule.
In May, Kennedy said a “brain fog” he suffered a decade ago was caused by a parasitic worm that had eaten part of his brain.
Kennedy more recently was the target of late-night TV comedians and social media satire after he revealed that he had dumped a dead bear cub in New York City’s Central Park in 2014 as a prank.
A magazine article in July alleged Kennedy had molested a family babysitter decades ago. Asked about the allegation on a podcast, he said he was “not a church boy” and had “many skeletons” in his closet.
“Third-party candidates often lose steam as the election approaches, but Kennedy’s trajectory has been particularly ignominious,” noted Nate Silver, a statistician and prominent election forecaster, in a Substack posting on Thursday.
“In three-way polls against Biden and Trump, he initially polled at 10 or 11 percent, then gradually faded to 8 (save for a bounce just after Biden’s awful debate). In the Trump-Harris matchup, though, he’s dropped to about 4 percent.”
Trump has offered to “enlist” him in a second administration, Kennedy said on Friday.
Trump, the previous day, acknowledged he had spoken with Kennedy several times but not recently.
Trump told CNN Tuesday that he would “be open” to Kennedy playing a part in his administration if Kennedy dropped his presidential bid and endorsed the Republican nominee.
Kennedy’s running mate, Nicole Shanahan, suggested in an interview Tuesday that Kennedy would do “an incredible job” as the secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services.
Kennedy has claimed that agencies under HHS, such as the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the Food and Drug Administration and the National Institutes of Health, have been captured by corporate interests, making them predators on the American public.
“I love the idea of giving him some sort of role in some sort of major three-letter entity or whatever it may be and let him blow it up,” the Republican nominee’s son, Donald Trump Jr., told a conservative radio talk show on Wednesday.
‘Spoiler’ for MAGA?
Democratic National Committee adviser Ramsey Reid argued in a memo released Friday that Kennedy’s role from the beginning had been to serve as a “spoiler” who would help Trump by drawing votes away from the Democratic candidate.
“He was recruited into the race by MAGA Republicans like Steve Bannon, his candidacy was propped up by Trump’s largest donor, and he parroted MAGA attacks on President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris,” Reid said.
On Thursday, at the Democratic National Convention in Chicago, some delegates looked forward to Kennedy’s withdrawal from the race.
Montana delegate Mary Jo O’Rourke, whose father worked for RFK Jr.’s father in the Justice Department, told VOA she is a devotee of the Kennedy family, but it is time for the former Democrat “to go home and enjoy the rest of his life.”
Kennedy had initially been viewed as siphoning more votes from Biden than Trump, but recent polls indicated he was appearing to attract more voters who would otherwise be inclined to cast a ballot for the Republican nominee.
Of those who supported Kennedy in July, 4 in 10 shifted to Harris (compared with 2 in 10 who switched to Trump), according to Pew Research Center polling released last week.
Most voters, as the election day approaches, “go back to their parties. They’re not looking for an independent candidate. They’re looking to vote for one of the two likely winners,” John Fortier, a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, told VOA.
In a tight election in the half dozen or so swing states that will tip the balance of the electoral vote count, the presence or absence of a third party or independent candidate on the ballot could determine the overall outcome.
The victor of the U.S. presidential race must win 270 electoral votes, with each state’s allocation equal to the number of senators and representatives it has in the Congress. It is possible for a candidate to receive the most total votes but lose the electoral vote count and thus the presidency.
Kennedy told reporters on Friday he could still win if the Electoral College vote for Trump and Harris ends up tied at 269. In that case, members of the new Congress would select the president in early January.
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washington — At least three journalists were arrested in Chicago this week while covering protests during the Democratic National Convention.
On Tuesday night, a small group of pro-Palestinian protesters gathered outside the Israeli Consulate in Chicago. The demonstration intensified, with protesters and police clashing and protesters charging the police line.
More than 70 people were arrested, according to the Chicago chapter of the National Lawyers Guild. At least three journalists were among those arrested.
Sinna Nasseri, a freelance photographer who was arrested that night, said the situation was chaotic.
“There was just pandemonium,” Nasseri told VOA. “There was really nowhere to go. Everyone was really tight together, and I was just photographing and was grabbed and handcuffed.”
The other two journalists arrested that night were independent photojournalists Olga Fedorova and Josh Pacheco. All three journalists were held by police for about nine hours and charged with disorderly conduct.
Fedorova and Pacheco did not reply to VOA’s requests for comment.
Press advocates condemn arrests
Several press freedom groups condemned the journalists’ arrests.
“It’s really important that law enforcement distinguishes between journalists and protesters and does not charge journalists for engaging in newsgathering activities,” Katherine Jacobsen, the U.S. and Canada program coordinator at the Committee to Protect Journalists, told VOA. Jacobsen added that she hopes police drop the charges against the three journalists.
Reporters Without Borders (RSF) condemned the incident.
“At best, this shows a lack of professional diligence on the part of the police. At worst, it’s a gross disregard for the First Amendment,” Clayton Weimers, executive director of RSF’s Washington bureau, said in a statement.
Chicago Police Superintendent Larry Snelling said three journalists were arrested for not complying with officers’ orders when police began moving in to arrest protesters who had attacked police, CBS News reported.
But Nasseri, who was on assignment for the German outlet Zeit, told VOA that it was impossible to hear what police were saying.
“I showed them my press identification, and they didn’t care,” he said. “It was sort of a baffling situation.”
Pacheco also told the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker that orders from police were unclear.
“The police are saying they ordered a dispersal three times and warned of a mass arrest, which did not happen, and even if it did, there was no way to hear it,” Pacheco said. “They weren’t using megaphones. There were just random police officers screaming different orders.”
Some of Pacheco and Fedorova’s equipment was also damaged in the incident, according to the Tracker.
‘Simply doing their jobs’
Fedorova’s lawyer, Steven Baron, told the Tracker that Fedorova and the other journalists were “simply doing their jobs as reporters.”
“We are disappointed that the City of Chicago chose to sweep the First Amendment under the rug with its heavy-handed tactics against working journalists,” Baron said.
The Chicago arrests are part of a broader pattern in the United States. Across the country, police have arrested reporters at protests more than 30 times in 2024 alone, according to the Tracker.
“The Chicago police officers who arrested and charged the journalists covering Tuesday’s protest either didn’t have clear directives — or didn’t follow them — when it comes to codified protections of the press in the First Amendment and their right to cover the news,” Kirstin McCudden, vice president of editorial for Freedom of the Press Foundation, which runs the Tracker, told VOA.
Nasseri, who works for outlets including The New Yorker, The New York Times and Vogue, said he has a court date scheduled in late September.
“I think it’ll be interesting to fight this,” he said. “I’m very happy to fight this on behalf of my colleagues and myself and the First Amendment.”
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