Reuters
US House readies vote on funding bill as Trump urges shutdown threat
By Moira Warburton and Andy Sullivan
September 19, 20241:44 AM GMT+6Updated 2 hours ago
Item 1 of 4 U.S. Speaker of the House Mike Johnson (R-LA) speaks to the press following a morning Republican Conference meeting, prior to a House vote on a stopgap spending bill that would extend government funding for six months and require Americans to provide proof of citizenship when they vote, on Capitol Hill in Washington, U.S., September 18, 2024. REUTERS/Anna Rose Layden
[1/4]U.S. Speaker of the House Mike Johnson (R-LA) speaks to the press following a morning Republican Conference meeting, prior to a House vote on a stopgap spending bill that would extend government funding for six months and require Americans to provide proof of citizenship when they vote, on… Purchase Licensing Rights, opens new tab Read more
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WASHINGTON, Sept 18 (Reuters) – The Republican-controlled U.S. House of Representatives was set to vote on a bill to fund the government and impose new voter registration rules, as Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump urged lawmakers to force a partial government shutdown if they don’t get their way.
The vote comes less than two weeks before current government funding runs out and Democrats who hold a majority in the Senate have voiced opposition to House Speaker Mike Johnson’s plan, which would extend funding for six months and require people to provide proof of citizenship to register to vote.
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Congress must pass spending legislation before the start of the new fiscal year on Oct. 1 to avoid furloughing thousands of federal workers and shutting down a wide swath of government operations just weeks before the Nov. 5 election.
Spurred by Trump’s false claims about election fraud, House Republicans say the bill is a necessary step to prevent people living in the country illegally from voting.
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Trump said Thursday that Republicans should force a government shutdown if Congress does not pass their voting bill, claiming falsely that tens of thousands of nonqualified people have registered to vote.
“BE SMART REPUBLICANS, YOU’VE BEEN PUSHED AROUND LONG ENOUGH BY THE DEMOCRATS,” he wrote on social media.
Democrats say the Republican bill would drive down voter participation and would not improve election security. Noncitizens are already prohibited by law from voting in federal elections, and the practice, like other forms of voting fraud, is exceedingly rare. A 2017 study found 30 possible instances of noncitizens voting out of more than 25 million ballots cast.
It is not clear whether Republicans will even muster enough support to pass the bill out of the House. With a narrow 220-211 majority, Republicans have few votes to spare and some have said they will vote against it.
“I certainly hope that it passes,” House Speaker Mike Johnson said on CNBC.
House Republicans have spent much of the past two years paralyzed by infighting, and Johnson shelved a vote on the package last week due to lack of support.
Democrats questioned whether Johnson would actually go ahead with the vote on Wednesday afternoon. “We’ll see if this vote gets called. We’ve been down this road before,” Representative Pete Aguilar said at a news conference.
Even if the bill clears the House this time, it is certain to be rejected by the Senate, leaving the two chambers at odds with less than two weeks before government funding expires.
Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell on Tuesday appeared to show little enthusiasm for the fight, saying his party would likely be blamed if Congress allows the government to shut down shortly before the election.
“I’m for whatever avoids a government shutdown,” he told reporters.
Congress faces an even more critical deadline on Jan. 1, by which time lawmakers will have to raise the nation’s debt ceiling or risk defaulting on more than $35 trillion in federal government debt.
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Reporting by Andy Sullivan, Moira Warburton and Richard Cowan; Editing by Scott Malone, Jonathan Oatis and Nick Zieminski
November 5, 20249:16 AM GMT+6Updated 4 hours ago
Item 1 of 2 Oct 20, 2024; Austin, Texas, USA; Joe Rogan talks to fans in the paddock at the Formula 1 Pirelli United States Grand Prix at Circuit of the Americas. Mandatory Credit: Aaron E. Martinez-Imagn Images/File Photo
[1/2]Oct 20, 2024; Austin, Texas, USA; Joe Rogan talks to fans in the paddock at the Formula 1 Pirelli United States Grand Prix at Circuit of the Americas. Mandatory Credit: Aaron E. Martinez-Imagn Images/File Photo Purchase Licensing Rights
WASHINGTON, Nov 4 (Reuters) – Popular podcaster Joe Rogan, who recently interviewed Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump for nearly three hours, said on Monday he has endorsed the former president in the race to the White House.
Trump faces Democratic Vice President Kamala Harris in the Nov. 5 U.S. election in what polls show to be a tight race. Harris has got multiple celebrity endorsements.
“For the record, yes, that’s an endorsement of Trump,” Rogan said on X while posting a clip of his interview with billionaire Elon Musk, who has also endorsed Trump. Rogan said in his post that Musk made the “most compelling case for Trump.”
Trump’s recent interview with Rogan lasted about 3 hours and was released on YouTube and Spotify in late October. The two discussed a range of topics and the interview got over 45 million views on YouTube.
The former president criticized Rogan in August on Truth Social, his social media platform, after the podcaster praised then-independent candidate Robert Kennedy Jr. Kennedy has since pulled out of the race and endorsed Trump. Trump later called Rogan a “good guy.”
Trump and Harris have courted voters with appearances on podcasts, in addition to more traditional rallies and media interviews.
Spotify (SPOT.N), opens new tab said in March “The Joe Rogan Experience” had 14.5 million followers, almost triple the platform’s second most popular program. Rogan also has more than 19 million followers on Instagram and 18 million followers on YouTube.
A poll by YouGov last year found that 81% of his listeners are male and 56% are under 35 years old, a demographic that tends to support Trump over Harris.
Harris’ team had been in touch with Rogan’s program about a possible appearance but her campaign said in late October she will not appear on his podcast.
Rogan joins a list of celebrities like Musk and wrestler Hulk Hogan to have endorsed Trump.
Harris has a much bigger list of celebrity endorsements – ranging from basketball superstar Lebron James and actress Meryl Streep to comedian Chris Rock and former talk show host Oprah Winfrey. Superstar singers Beyonce and Taylor Swift have also endorsed her.
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Reporting by Kanishka Singh in Washington; Editing by Muralikumar Anantharaman and Raju Gopalakrishnan
By Kanishka Singh and Sheila Dang
November 5, 20249:52 AM GMT+6Updated 4 hours ago
WASHINGTON, Nov 4 (Reuters) – False or misleading claims by billionaire Elon Musk about the U.S. election have amassed 2 billion views on social media platform X this year, according to a report, opens new tab by non-profit group Center for Countering Digital Hate.
The platform is also playing a central role in enabling the spread of false information about the critical battleground states that will likely determine the outcome of the presidential race, election and misinformation experts said on Monday.
A spokesperson for X said the company’s Community Notes feature, which lets users add additional context to posts, is more effective at helping people identify misleading content than traditional warning flags on posts.
Since taking over the company formerly known as Twitter, Musk has curtailed content moderation and laid off thousands of employees. He has thrown his support behind former President Donald Trump, who is locked in an exceptionally close race against Democratic candidate Kamala Harris.
Musk’s massive reach with nearly 203 million followers helps enable “network effects” in which content on X can jump to other social media and messaging platforms such as Reddit and Telegram, said Kathleen Carley, a professor of computer science at Carnegie Mellon University and expert on disinformation. “X is a conduit from one platform to another,” she said.
At least 87 of Musk’s posts this year have promoted claims about the U.S. election that fact-checkers have rated as false or misleading, amassing 2 billion views, according to the Center for Countering Digital Hate’s report.
In Pennsylvania, one of the seven key swing states, some X users have seized on instances of local election administrators flagging incomplete voter registration forms that would not be processed, falsely casting the events as examples of election interference, said Philip Hensley-Robin, Pennsylvania executive director at Common Cause, during a press briefing on Monday.
Common Cause is a nonpartisan organization that promotes accountable government and voting rights.
Some X accounts implied “that there was voter fraud, when in fact, we know very clearly that election officials and election administrators in all of our counties were following the rules and … therefore only eligible voters are voting,” Hensley-Robin said.
Cyabra, a firm that uses AI to detect online disinformation, said on Monday that an X account with 117,000 followers played a key role in helping spread a fake video purporting to show Pennsylvania mail-in ballots for Trump being destroyed.
X’s spokesperson said the platform took action against many accounts that shared the video.
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Reporting by Kanishka Singh in Washington and Sheila Dang in Austin; Additional reporting by Stephanie Burnett; Editing by Lincoln Feast
By Reuters
November 5, 20244:36 AM GMT+6Updated 9 hours ago
- A person picks up a sticker while voters head to a polling station as Georgians turned out a day after the battleground state opened early voting, in Atlanta, Georgia, U.S., October 16, 2024. REUTERS/Megan Varner/File Photo Purchase Licensing Rights
WASHINGTON, Nov 4 (Reuters) – The top court in the battleground state of Georgia ruled on Monday that Cobb County cannot extend the deadline for counting about 3,000 absentee ballots that were sent out shortly before Election Day, handing a victory to the Republican National Committee and presidential candidate Donald Trump.
Siding with the RNC, the Georgia Supreme Court overturned a judge’s ruling extending the deadline until Friday in Cobb County, located in suburban Atlanta. The court decided that only absentee ballots that arrive by 7 p.m. ET on Tuesday (0000 GMT Wednesday) can be counted.
Civil rights groups had sued last week seeking to extend the deadline, arguing that the county violated state law by failing to promptly send out about 3,000 absentee ballots. County officials said they were overwhelmed by a surge in requests.
The Republican National Committee had argued that extending the deadline would violate state law.
“Election Day is Election Day – not the week after,” RNC Chair Michael Whatley wrote in a post on social media.
Cobb County is a large and racially diverse area in Atlanta’s northern suburbs. The county voted for Democrat Joe Biden over Trump by 14 percentage points in the 2020 election. Biden defeated Trump in Georgia in 2020.
A spokesperson for Cobb County did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The state high court ordered that ballots received after Election Day be separated from other ballots and set aside. Voters who did not receive an absentee ballot or did not have enough time to mail it can vote in person on Tuesday.
Georgia is one of seven closely contested states expected to decide the outcome of the race between Trump and Democratic Vice President Kamala Harris.
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Reporting by Andrew Goudsward; Editing by Scott Malone and Will Dunham
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