Hochul has ‘very cordial’ call with Trump following combative press conference with AG James
New York Gov. Kathy Hochul says she called President-elect Trump on Thursday to “reaffirm” the pair can work together in areas like infrastructure where the state relies on federal funding. The call came a day after Hochul and Attorney General Letitia James held a combative press conference where James vowed to “fight back once again” against a Trump administration and defend the rights of New Yorkers and the rule of law. “It was a very cordial call, and listen, I said I’ll work with anybody,” Hochul said, at a post-election political event in Puerto Rico Friday, per Politico. She said it was an appropriate courtesy to congratulate the winner of an election. “I basically just reaffirmed there are areas we can work together, like infrastructure, where we rely on federal money, and he seems to share my priorities.” TRUMP HATING NY ATTORNEY GENERAL LETITIA JAMES VOWS WAR WITH PRESIDENT-ELECT IN DIVISIVE NEWS CONFERENCE New York relies on federal funding via the CHIPS and Science Act for its semiconductor plant near Syracuse, the future of which was thrown into doubt after Speaker Mike Johnson said Republicans would likely repeal the law, although he later walked back the comment. The Micron semiconductor plant could bring 50,000 jobs to Central New York, per Politico. The state also plans to extend the Second Avenue Subway in Manhattan and Hochul says she underlined the importance of federal funding for the MTA and upgrading Penn Station, the busiest transit hub in the country that has become a haven for the city’s homeless population. Hochul previously called it a “hell hole.” The plan to expand Penn Station would involve demolishing city blocks and could cost nearly $17 billion, according to the New York Post. The plan would run in tandem with the completion of the $16 billion Gateway Project involving the construction of a new tunnel linking New York and New Jersey and refurbishing existing century-old Penn tracks that were badly damaged by Superstorm Sandy in 2012. “I want Penn Station to be something that we’re all proud of. I said it can be beautiful. And he agreed,” she said of Trump. FORMER AIDE TO NEW YORK GOV HOCHUL, WHO IS ACCUSED OF BEING CHINESE SPY, WENT ON A TOUR OF THE WHITE HOUSE Federal funding for the MTA could hinge on support for Trump, while Hochul has floated implementing congestion pricing to help boost MTA coffers by $1 billion, but Trump previously vowed to terminate congestion pricing. The controversial proposal was shelved by Hochul over the summer weeks before it was expected to be implemented. The plan would impose $15 tolls on vehicles entering Lower Manhattan. The MTA received more than $15 billion in COVID-19 funding. At Trump’s Bronx rally in May, the president-elect vowed to “save” his home city and “turn it around very, very quickly.” But Hochul also said she would be “unrelenting in protecting the rights of New Yorkers.” On Wednesday, following Trump’s election win, Hochul and James vowed to protect New Yorkers against attacks on abortion, civil rights, immigration, gun control and LGBTQ rights. Prior to the election, Hochul said that if New Yorkers voted for Trump and the GOP, “you’re anti-woman, you’re anti-abortion, and basically you’re anti-American because you have just trashed American values and what our country is all about.” Fox News’ Greg Wehner contributed to this report.
‘Jab Congress mazboot hogi, desh…’ PM Modi’s scathing attack on Aghadi bloc in Akola rally
Prime Minister Narendra Modi highlighted the past two terms of the BJP government in the centre and said that now the government is set to begin building an additional 3 crore homes for the underprivileged.
‘BJP-RSS want to destroy Constitution, we will keep protecting it’: Rahul Gandhi in Jharkhand
Addressing a public gathering here today, Rahul Gandhi urged people to bring back JMM-led alliance to power. He said Congress and its allies will continue to work for protecting the Constitution.
Moderate Dem’s top aide resigns after lawmaker’s comments on ‘formerly male’ athletes
A top aide to Rep. Seth Moulton, a moderate Democrat from Massachusetts, has reportedly resigned after the lawmaker’s recent comments about transgender athletes and the left’s tolerance for dissenting views. Moulton has faced a barrage of criticism from progressives after he used the issue of transgender athletes in school sports to illustrate his complaint that liberals showed little capacity for dissent in an interview with The New York Times. Hours after the interview was published, his campaign manager Matt Chilliak resigned, according to the Boston Globe. The report did not cite a reason, and Moulton’s campaign would not comment on personnel matters. HOUSE LEADERS MOVE QUICKLY TO CONSOLIDATE POWER IN SHOW OF CONFIDENCE FOR REPUBLICAN MAJORITY Fox News Digital reached out to Chilliak for confirmation. The Democratic operative posted on X shortly after Trump won the election in the early hours of Wednesday morning, “Millions of Americans today showed that they hate immigrants and transgender people more than they fear fascism.” Moulton had told the Times, “Democrats spend way too much time trying not to offend anyone rather than being brutally honest about the challenges many Americans face.” “I have two little girls, I don’t want them getting run over on a playing field by a male or formerly male athlete, but as a Democrat I’m supposed to be afraid to say that,” he said. ‘GOT OUR A–ES KICKED’: DEMS PRIVATELY FRET ABOUT LOSING HOUSE AFTER GOP VICTORY IN WHITE HOUSE, SENATE The congressman responded to the backlash in a statement to Fox News Digital: “I stand firmly in my belief for the need for competitive women’s sports to put limits on the participation of those with the unfair physical advantages that come with being born male.” “I am also a strong supporter of the civil rights of all Americans, including transgender rights. I will fight, as I always have, for the rights and safety of all citizens. These two ideas are not mutually exclusive, and we can even disagree on them,” Moulton said. “Yet there are many who, shouting from the extreme left corners of social media, believe I have failed the unspoken Democratic Party purity test. We did not lose the 2024 election because of any trans person or issue. We lost, in part, because we shame and belittle too many opinions held by too many voters and that needs to stop. Let’s have these debates now, determine a new strategy for our party since our existing one failed, and then unite to oppose the Trump agenda wherever it imperils American values.” HERE ARE THE MOST TALKED-ABOUT CANDIDATES FOR TOP POSTS IN TRUMP’S ADMINISTRATION LGBTQ rights group Mass Equality said Moulton’s comments in the Times “have further compounded our community’s sense of vulnerability.” “[T]he Congressman’s remarks were both harmful and factually inaccurate,” the group said. Massachusetts state lawmaker John Moran wrote on X, “No, Seth Moulton, the only thing we here in Massachusetts shouldn’t be afraid to say is that you should find another job if you want to use an election loss as an opportunity to pick on our most vulnerable. Weak!” He’s not the only Democratic lawmaker blaming their party for wearing political blinders after the 2024 elections, however. Rep. Ritchie Torres, D-N.Y., wrote on X, “There is more to lose than there is to gain politically from pandering to a far left that is more representative of Twitter, Twitch, and TikTok than it is of the real world. The working class is not buying the ivory-towered nonsense that the far left is selling.”
Boy who sleeps on his mother’s grave in Gaza
[unable to retrieve full-text content] Palestinian boy Zein Yousef has been sleeping at his mother’s grave since she was killed in an Israeli attack in Gaza.
Nearly 380,000 people displaced by South Sudan floods, UN says
A surge in malaria is reported in several states and is overwhelming the health system, according to a UN agency. Flooding in South Sudan has displaced more than 379,000 people, according to a United Nations update that warned about a surge in malaria. Aid agencies have said the world’s youngest country, highly vulnerable to climate change, is in the grip of its worst flooding in decades, mainly in the north. The floods have affected about 1.4 million people, the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) said on Friday, across 43 counties and the disputed Abyei region, which is claimed by both South Sudan and Sudan. It added in a statement that more than 379,000 people were displaced in 22 counties and in Abyei. “A surge in malaria has been reported in Jonglei, Unity, Upper Nile, Northern Bahr el Ghazal, Central Equatoria and Western Equatoria states – overwhelming the health system and exacerbating the situation and impact in flood-hit areas,” the UN agency said. Since gaining independence from Sudan in 2011, South Sudan has been plagued by chronic instability, violence and economic stagnation as well as climate disasters such as drought and floods. More than 1.6 million children malnourished The World Bank said last month that the latest floods were “worsening an already critical humanitarian situation marked by severe food insecurity, economic decline, continued conflict, disease outbreaks, and the repercussions of the Sudan conflict“, which has seen several hundred thousand people pour into South Sudan. More than seven million people are food insecure in South Sudan and 1.65 million children are malnourished, according to the UN’s World Food Programme. The country faces a further period of political paralysis after the president’s office announced in September yet another extension to a transitional period agreed to in a 2018 peace deal, delaying elections by two years to December 2026. South Sudan has vast oil resources but the vital source of revenue was decimated in February when an export pipeline was damaged in neighbouring war-torn Sudan. Adblock test (Why?)
Pentagon allows US military contractors to fix weapons in Ukraine
US eases restrictions for a few contractors to work away from the front lines and says they won’t engage in combat. The United States is allowing a small number of American defence contractors to work inside Ukraine to maintain and repair Pentagon-provided weaponry, according to US officials. The US has been a key military backer of Ukraine, committing more than $60bn in security aid since Russia’s full-scale invasion in February 2022. But it has not permitted US military contractors to work in Ukraine, wary that it could be drawn into a direct conflict with Russia. US President Joe Biden made the decision in a significant policy shift before he leaves office in January, US media reported on Friday, before the November 5 presidential election, won by Donald Trump. Biden also plans to rush billions of dollars in security assistance to Ukraine before his term ends. Trump has criticised the scale of US military and financial support for Ukraine and has pledged to end the war with Russia quickly – without saying how. For the past two years, US and allied forces have been providing real-time maintenance advice using phones and tablets to communicate in encrypted chatrooms with Ukrainian forces. Officials said the Pentagon is allowing the contractors to go because some equipment – including F-16 fighter jets and Patriot air defence systems – require high-tech expertise to repair. Using the contractors, they said, will ensure the weapons are fixed quickly so Ukrainian forces can continue to use them in combat. The number of contractors would be small and located far from the front lines. They would not be engaged in direct combat, the officials said. The companies will be responsible for the safety of their employees. The restrictions have sometimes slowed down repairs and proven increasingly difficult as the US has provided Ukraine with more complicated systems, such as the F-16s and Patriot systems. A lot of equipment is not being used because it is damaged. In August, an F-16 jet crashed while repelling a Russian attack, killing its pilot. The policy change would move the Pentagon in line with the US Department of State and US Agency for International Development, which already have US contractors in Ukraine. The decision comes at a critical time in the conflict, as Russia makes more advances into Ukrainian territory. It is unclear, however, how sustainable the policy shift will be with so little time left in Biden’s administration. Trump takes office on January 20. President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has urged his Western allies to allow Ukraine to use long-range missiles to hit targets inside Russia and increase pressure on Moscow to end the war. Adblock test (Why?)
‘Misery and chaos’: GOP congressman-elect unleashes on Democrats for bringing ‘destruction’ to their cities
Newly elected GOP congressman-elect Abe Hamadeh revealed what went right for Republicans and what went wrong for Democrats in Tuesday’s election during a post-election victory interview with Fox News Digital. “The left always, this is why they hate me so much too, they literally called me a white supremacist, even though I’m the son of Syrian immigrants and I’ve got family who are all from everywhere and all type of colors,” Hamadeh told Fox News Digital, in his first interview since being elected, in response to Democrats on cable news post-election blaming Trump’s victory on “racism” and misogyny” rather than discussing specific policy issues. “They don’t know how to because they can’t accept the fact that their policies have failed the American people everywhere. It’s been implemented, like California and San Francisco, like in Chicago, like in New York City, name a successful Democrat-run city. You can’t because all they do is bring destruction, misery and chaos, and they’re trying to transform our country into something that it is not, something that looks like where some of my family comes from in Venezuela and we are not going to go to socialism or communism.” Democrats along with pundits in the media have repeatedly blamed racism and sexism as driving factors behind Trump’s victory despite Trump making historic gains with several minority groups. TRUMP CLINCHED A HIGHER PERCENTAGE OF MUSLIM VOTERS COMPARED TO JEWISH VOTERS IN RECENT ELECTION Hamadeh pointed to Trump’s success in bringing in more minority votes than other Republican candidates, despite the media narrative about racism. “President Trump was the one who was able to capture the most amount of minorities, Arab-Americans in Michigan. If you look at Jewish Americans and Black Americans, Hispanic voters, it was just truly remarkable and historical.” “Here in Arizona, you know, we’re still counting the votes, but I think President Trump’s margin is only going to grow and what a great American comeback. In regard to my race, it ties so much into my race, too, because, you know, I didn’t want to go to Washington, D.C. with Kamala Harris. So I’m proud that President Trump was able to secure this historic victory that we’re going to have, hopefully a united Republican government and we are going to pass that America First agenda that works for all Americans.” NEW YORK DEM WARNS ‘VILIFYING VOTERS OF COLOR AS WHITE SUPREMACISTS’ PUSHES ‘THEM FURTHER INTO TRUMP’S CAMP’ Hamadeh told Fox News Digital that he knew going into Tuesday that he would win in his district and that Trump would win as well because they listened to the concerns of Arizona voters. “Nobody was happy with Joe Biden and Kamala Harris and this wide open border and the economy with the inflation crisis that we’re in. So, you know, I truly believed that we were going to win and it was a resounding victory for President Trump, winning the popular vote, winning the Electoral College, uniting so many different factions within the Republican Party.” Immigration and the economy, Hamadeh said, were the main drivers of voter turnout in Arizona. “It gives a combination of both, I think it was the open border chaos because for how many years has Joe Biden and Kamala Harris tried to gaslight the American people that they’re doing everything they can to secure our border, which was obviously a lie?”” Hamadeh said. “I mean, they literally have an open invitation to illegal immigrants coming across where fentanyl is being trafficked, sex trafficking. So I think people understood that inherently that President Trump did have a secure border and Kamala and Joe Biden, you see how quickly they destroyed it. It causes you to think that maybe having a president who actually wants to secure the border is pretty important.” On inflation, Hamadeh said that Arizona voters simply had to look at their grocery bill. “Arizona’s hit really hard with the inflation crisis and I know I know that money talks in many ways and they understand that President Trump had a booming economy,” Hamadeh said. “When you go to the grocery store now, it is so expensive, when you go to the checkout lane. So I do think it was a combination of the economy and the border.” “But also truly, I do think it was many people, if you look at what Elon Musk and so many other people who voted for Joe Biden in 2020 now came around to President Trump. I think they understood that the weaponization of the rule of law and attacking the First Amendment and our Constitution was a threat to our very foundation as a republic. So I do think people did understand that this moment required us to go back to some common sense sanity and to restore the America we love.”
All eyes on California as House majority still hinges on tight races
Congressional leaders are anxiously watching several outstanding races in the West as the battle for the majority in the House of Representatives continues. Most of those races are in California, where Republican incumbents are fighting to hold on to several seats, including districts around the Los Angeles metropolitan area. The Democratic stronghold was pivotal to House Republicans clinching the majority in 2022, and their leaders are looking for it to deliver again. “California’s got a lot of the outstanding races, and I’ve talked to each one of our incumbents who are in those 50/50 races — they’re all leading, by the way — but they feel like what is outstanding … are good areas for them,” House Majority Leader Steve Scalise, R-La., told “Fox & Friends” Friday. JOHNSON BLASTS DEM ACCUSATIONS HE VOWED TO END OBAMACARE AS ‘DISHONEST’ It’s a different story in New York, the other deep blue coastal state critical to the House GOP’s midterm success. Of the four sitting House Republicans projected to lose their seats, three were first-term GOP lawmakers from New York who got elected as part of a suburban backlash against big cities’ progressive crime policies. They were also expected to be some of the more vulnerable incumbents in Congress. SHUTDOWN STANDOFF LOOMS IN CONGRESS’ FINAL WEEKS BEFORE TRUMP’S RETURN TO WHITE HOUSE Scalise said he anticipated a four- to six-seat majority for Republicans when all the races were over, not a dissimilar scenario to the one the House GOP has grappled with for much of the 118th Congress. Ballots are being counted in other close races in Arizona, Oregon, Alaska, Nebraska and Iowa. House Democrats, who privately expressed dismay over their narrowing path to victory earlier this week, are also closely watching the western states for the final results. House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., pointed out that the election is still undecided. HOUSE LEADERS MOVE QUICKLY TO CONSOLIDATE POWER IN SHOW OF CONFIDENCE FOR REPUBLICAN MAJORITY “It has yet to be decided who will control the House of Representatives in the 119th Congress. We must count every vote and wait until the results in Oregon, Arizona and California are clear,” Jeffries said Thursday. “I am proud that the Democratic Party does not believe in election denial. Our democracy is precious, and it involves elevating public trust in our system of free and fair elections, not undermining it.” The first party to reach 218 seats will claim the House majority.
‘Wherever Congress govt is formed, that state becomes ATM for…’: PM Modi’s scathing attack on Congress at Akola rally
Ahead of upcoming Maharashtra assembly elections, Prime Minister Narendra Modi launched a scathing attack on the opposition Congress party during a rally in Akola, saying that “wherever the Congress government is formed, that state becomes ATM for Shahi Parivar”.