Outside the major international sporting events, i.e. the Olympics and the football World Cup, the US presidential election may well lay claim to being the greatest show on Earth. Every four years, it captures the world’s attention (sometimes even its imagination) unlike any other electoral race, and due to the particulars of the election schedule, we can now see it more or less dominate the news agenda for the entire year in which the election is held. When the race is as close as the one this year between Donald Trump, representing the Republican party on the ticket for the third time in a row, and vice president Kamala Harris, representing the Democrats, it makes for an even more engrossing contest. Harris and Trump spent the closing stretch of the race crisscrossing the country  - the ‘battleground states’ this time are spread across the vast landscape - to rally voters in the states that matter most. They tried to stay focused on a clear and concise closing message - although the Republican let slip on a few occasions in a manner that would’ve counted for major gaffes in any other politician’s CV. With him, there is no telling though.  As usual, each side has invested massively to drive up turnout in the final early voting period, coinciding with the campaign's finish line. And in this critical phase, the flow of misinformation intensified By general consensus, he results on Election Day will come down to seven ‘battleground states’: Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, North Carolina, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin. Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump have visited them the most. Together, these states are likely to deliver the Electoral College votes needed for the winning candidate to get a majority of 270. But they are proving impossible to predict, with the candidates running almost neck-and-neck in all of them. Nate Silver, the polling guru, writing in the New York Times over the weekend, asserts that in an election where the seven battleground states are all polling within a percentage point or two, “50-50 is the only responsible forecast”. With the US handling of the Israel-Hamas war and conflict in the Middle East looming over the White House race this time, many American Muslim voters — most of whom backed President Joe Biden four years ago — have been wrestling with voting decisions. After US support for Israel left many of them feeling outraged and ignored, some are turning their backs on the Democrats. For voters in swing states like Georgia, which Biden won in 2020 by fewer than 12,000 votes, the weight of such decisions can be amplified. Read: How AP has declared US election results since 1864 In 2020, among Muslim voters nationally, about two-thirds supported Biden and about one-third supported Trump, according to AP VoteCast. That Biden support has left many feeling betrayed or even guilty. The reasons behind what is essentially a choice for the American electorate becoming a global hot button issue every four years, with stakeholders seemingly spread in every corner of the world, are many-faceted. What is common among them all is that they each derive from the US hegemony that still prevails in the world today.  That means as the world’s most powerful nation, which is only one component of its hegemony, America is uniquely placed to involve itself in global hotspots, and frequently does so. As the world’s richest nation, or at least its biggest economy, the number of people looking in its direction for reasons of trade alone far outnumber any other nation. The occupant of the White House is often described as ‘the leader of the free world’, positioning itself as the world’s leading democracy, as well as its leading defender of democracies. Last but by no means least, the cultural hegemony or ‘soft power’ that America established over the course of the 20th century means that events in the American cultural or political calendar attract global interest, and this election is no different.  This time, Trump is looking to overcome another historic candidate, after Hillary Clinton in 2016. As the daughter of a Jamaican father and an Indian mother, both highly respected academics in the liberal bastion of Berkeley, Kamala Harris represents an even more historic candidacy than Clinton. Seeking to become the first woman (among other things) to be elected president in US history, her great strength may lie in women, who are expected to outnumber men at the polling booths, buoyed by a number of issues deemed endangered under Trump, including reproductive rights.  Read more: ChatGPT being used to influence US elections, alleges OpenAI As the hours trickle down to the closing of the first polls on Election Day in America, all eyes were on Pennsylvania - a traditionally Democrat stronghold that Trump memorably flipped in 2016, but lost in 2020 in his loss to Biden. This time again, the Keystone State’s votes in the electoral college may prove decisive in deciding his fortunes. And the fortunes of the world’s premier democracy, that in this intervening period has been caught up in a culture war between new, emerging, diverse forces, and an old vanguard not quite willing to let go. It’s all on the line, in what some are calling ‘the most consequential presidential election in history.’ May the best candidate win.  Enayetullah Khan is Editor-in-Chief of UNB and Dhaka Courier. 

Outside the major international sporting events, i.e. the Olympics and the football World Cup, the US presidential election may well lay claim to being the greatest show on Earth. Every four years, it captures the world’s attention (sometimes even its imagination, although that is becoming increasingly rare) unlike any other electoral race, and due to the particulars of the election calendar, we can now see it more or less dominate the news agenda for the entire year in which the election is held. When the race is as close as the one this year between Donald Trump, representing the Republican party on the ticket for the third time in a row, and vice president Kamala Harris, representing the Democrats, it makes for an even more engrossing contest. Harris and Trump are crisscrossing the country to rally voters in the states that matter most. They’re trying — with varying degrees of success — to stay focused on a clear and concise closing message. At the same time, each side is investing massive resources to drive up turnout for the final early voting period. And in these critical days, the flow of misinformation is intensifying. This time, the results on Election Day will come down to seven ‘battleground states’: Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, North Carolina, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin. Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump have visited them the most. Together, these states are likely to deliver the Electoral College votes needed for the winning candidate to get a majority of 270. Nate Silver, the polling guru, writing in the New York Times, said that in an election where the seven battleground states are all polling within a percentage point or two, “50-50 is the only responsible forecast”. That is how close it is this time. With the US handling of the Israel-Hamas war and conflict in the Middle East looming over the White House race this time, many American Muslim voters — most of whom backed President Joe Biden four years ago — have been wrestling with who to cast their vote for this time. Read: When polls close in battleground states on Election Day After US support for Israel left many of them feeling outraged and ignored, some seek a rebuff of the Democrats, including by favouring third-party options for president. Others grapple with how to express their anger through the ballot box amid warnings by some against another Trump presidency. For voters in swing states like Georgia, which Biden won in 2020 by fewer than 12,000 votes, the weight of such decisions can be amplified. In 2020, among Muslim voters nationally, about two-thirds supported Biden and about one-third supported Trump, according to AP VoteCast. That Biden support has left many feeling betrayed or even guilty. The reasons behind what is essentially a choice for the American electorate becoming a global hot button issue every four years, with stakeholders seemingly spread in every corner of the world, are many-faceted. What is common among them all is that they each derive from the US hegemony that still prevails in the world today. That means as the world’s most powerful nation, which is only one component of its hegemony, America is uniquely placed to involve itself in global hotspots, and frequently does so. As the world’s richest nation, or at least its biggest economy, the number of people looking in its direction for reasons of trade alone far outnumber any other nation. The occupant of the White House is often described as ‘the leader of the free world’, positioning itself as the world’s leading democracy, as well as its leading defender of democracies. This of course has also extended, controversially, to propagating democracy in other parts of the world, even at the barrel of a gun, with the overall record being mixed at best. Last but by no means least, the cultural hegemony or ‘soft power’ that America established over the course of the 20th century means that events in the American cultural or political calendar attract global interest. Having said that, what is also not deniable is that the gap between America and the rest of the world has been closing, with a new, multipolar order set to emerge on the horizon. US hegemony persisted through the bipolar era that emerged in the aftermath of World War II, and lasted till the disintegration of the Soviet Union. The unipolar era that followed has completely flipped the script in its manifestation, heralding a world of democratic backsliding, and capitalism beset by crises. Accordingly, despite its leading position, US power and influence around the world today are in relative decline. Read more: Harris and Trump focus on Sunbelt states during final weekend push for votes Throughout 2023, and in fact going back further, we saw the Biden administration deploy all the levers at its disposal, to impress upon the now deposed Awami League government that it needed to deliver a free-and-fair election, and by doing so return the country to the path of democracy. But in a sign of America’s relatively diminished stature, the government here was able to successfully resist these attempts and hold another farcical vote on January 7. One of the most salient features of the interim government in Dhaka is the almost unanimous show of support it has received from Western governments, particularly Washington. Yet a nagging concern among Bangladeshis has been whether a changeover in Washington may occasion a change in their Bangladesh policy as well. A tweet by Trump on Thursday, incorporating Indian talking points about the situation here, probably serves as the strongest indication yet, that such an expectation is not at all unfounded. But in choosing how to react to it, the IG will do well to also remember the limits on American power in this day and age. And instead of wedding itself to the result one way or another, the IG must forge ahead with its resolve undiminished.  

Vice President Kamala Harris said that she believes that Donald Trump "is a fascist” after his longest-serving chief of staff said the former president praised Adolf Hitler while in office and put personal loyalty above the Constitution. Harris seized on comments by former chief of staff John Kelly, a retired Marine Corps general, about his former boss in interviews with The New York Times and The Atlantic published Tuesday warning that the Republican nominee meets the definition of a fascist and that Trump, while in office, suggested that the Nazi leader “did some good things.” Harris bets her policies can attract Latino voters while Trump touts his time as president to them Speaking at a CNN town hall Wednesday night, Harris said they offer a window into who the former president “really is” and the kind of commander in chief he would be. When asked if she believed that Trump is a fascist, Harris replied twice, “Yes, I do.” Later, she brought it up herself, saying Trump would, if elected again, be “a president who admires dictators and is a fascist.” The Democratic presidential nominee said Kelly's comments, less than two weeks before voters will decide whether to send Trump back to the Oval Office, were a “911 call to the American people” by the former chief of staff. They were quickly seized by Harris as part of her closing message to voters as she works to sharpen the choice at the ballot box for Americans. “I believe Donald Trump is a danger to the well-being and security of the United States of America," she said, saying the American people deserve a president who maintains “certain standards," which include “certainly not comparing oneself, in a clearly admiring way, to Hitler.” She added that if reelected, Trump would no longer be tempered by people who would “restrain him” from his worst impulses. Earlier Wednesday, Harris repeated her increasingly dire warnings about Trump’s mental fitness and his intentions for the presidency. “This is a window into who Donald Trump really is, from the people who know him best, from the people who have worked with him side by side in the Oval Office and in the Situation Room,” Harris told reporters outside the vice president's residence in Washington. The comments from Kelly, the retired Marine general who worked for Trump in the White House from 2017 to 2019, built on past warnings from former top Trump officials as the election enters its final two weeks. Kelly has long been critical of Trump and previously accused him of calling veterans killed in combat “suckers” and “losers.” His new warnings emerged as Trump seeks a second term vowing to dramatically expand his use of the military at home and suggesting he would use force to go after Americans he considers “enemies from within.” “He commented more than once that, ‘You know, Hitler did some good things, too,’” Kelly recalled to the Times. Kelly said he would usually quash the conversation by saying “nothing (Hitler) did, you could argue, was good,” but Trump would occasionally bring up the topic again. In his interview with The Atlantic, Kelly recalled that when Trump raised the idea of needing “German generals,” Kelly would ask if he meant “Bismarck’s generals,” referring to Otto von Bismarck, the chancellor who oversaw the unification of Germany. “Surely you can’t mean Hitler’s generals,” Kelly recalled asking Trump. To which the former president responded, “Yeah, yeah, Hitler’s generals.” Trump said on his Truth Social media platform that Kelly had “made up a story” and went on to heap insults on his former chief of staff, including that Kelly's “toughness morphed into weakness.” Trump’s campaign also denied the accounts. Campaign spokesman Steven Cheung said Kelly had “beclowned himself with these debunked stories he has fabricated" and, after Harris' statement, accused the Democratic candidate of sharing "outright lies and falsehoods.” Chris Sununu, New Hampshire's Republican governor and onetime Trump critic, said Kelly's comments did not change his plans to vote for the former president. “Look, we’ve heard a lot of extreme things about Donald Trump, from Donald Trump. It's really par for the course,” the governor told CNN. “Unfortunately, with a guy like that, it’s kind of baked into the vote at this point.” Some of the former president's supporters in swing states responded to Kelly's comments with a shrug. “Trump did his four years, and we were in great shape. Kelly didn’t have anything good to say about Trump. He ought to have his butt kicked," said Jim Lytner, a longtime advocate for veterans in Nevada who served in the Army in Vietnam and co-founded the nonprofit Veterans Transition Resource Center. Harris said Wednesday that Trump admired Hitler's generals because he “does not want a military that is loyal to the United States Constitution, he wants a military that is loyal to him. He wants a military who will be loyal to him personally.” Polls show the race is tight in swing states, and both Trump and Harris are crisscrossing the country making their final pitches to the sliver of undecided voters. Harris' campaign has spent considerable time reaching out to independent voters, using the support of longtime Republicans such as former Rep. Liz Cheney and comments like Kelly's to urge past Trump voters to reject his candidacy in November. Harris’ campaign held a call with reporters Tuesday to elevate the voices of retired military officials who highlighted how many of the officials who worked with Trump now oppose his campaign. “People that know him best are most opposed to him, his presidency,” said retired Army Brig. Gen. Steve Anderson. Anderson said he wished Kelly would fully back Harris over Trump, something he has yet to do. But retired Army Reserve Col. Kevin Carroll, a former senior counselor to Kelly, said Wednesday that the former top Trump official would “rather chew broken glass than vote for Donald Trump.” Before serving as Trump's chief of staff, Kelly worked as the former president's secretary of homeland security, where he oversaw Trump's attempts to build a wall along the U.S.-Mexico border. Kelly was also at the forefront of the administration's crackdown in immigration policy that led to the separation of thousands of immigrant parents and their children along the southern border. Those actions made him a villain to many on the left, including Harris. After Kelly left the Trump administration and joined the board of a company operating the nation's largest detention center for unaccompanied migrant children, Harris wrote during her 2019 run for president that he was “the architect” of the administration’s "cruel child separation policy. Now he will profit off the separation of families. It’s unethical. We are better than this.” When she was in Miami for a primary debate in June 2019, Harris was also one of a dozen Democratic presidential candidates who visited the detention center south of the city and protested against the administration’s harsh treatment of young migrants. In his interview with the Times, Kelly also said Trump met the definition of a fascist. After reading the definition aloud, including that fascism was “a far-right authoritarian, ultranationalist political ideology and movement characterized by a dictatorial leader,” Kelly concluded Trump “certainly falls into the general definition of fascist, for sure.” Kelly added that Trump often fumed at any attempt to constrain his power, and that “he would love to be” a dictator. “He certainly prefers the dictator approach to government,” Kelly told the Times, adding later, “I think he’d love to be just like he was in business — he could tell people to do things and they would do it, and not really bother too much about whether what the legalities were and whatnot.” Kelly is not the first former top Trump administration official to cast the former president as a threat. Retired Army Gen. Mark A. Milley, who served as Trump’s chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told Bob Woodward in his recent book “War” that Trump was “fascist to the core” and “the most dangerous person to this country.” And retired Gen. Jim Mattis, who worked as secretary of defense under Trump, reportedly later told Woodward that he agreed with Milley’s assessment. Throughout Trump's political rise, the businessman-turned-politician benefited from the support of military veterans. AP VoteCast found that about 6 in 10 military veterans said they voted for Trump in 2020, as did just over half of those with a veteran in the household. Among voters in this year’s South Carolina Republican primary, AP VoteCast found that close to two-thirds of military veterans and people in veteran households voted for Trump over former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley, Trump's toughest opponent in the 2024 Republican primary.

Two weeks out from Election Day, the crisis in the Middle East is looming over the race for the White House, with one candidate struggling to find just the right words to navigate its difficult cross-currents and the other making bold pronouncements that the age-old conflict can quickly be set right. Vice President Kamala Harris has been painstakingly — and not always successfully — trying to balance talk of strong support for Israel with harsh condemnations of civilian casualties among Palestinians and others caught up in Israel's wars against Hamas in Gaza and Hezbollah in Lebanon. Harris seeks to win over Republicans uneasy about Trump with visits to Midwestern suburbs Former President Donald Trump, for his part, insists that none of this would have happened on his watch and that he can make it all go away if elected. Both of them are bidding for the votes of Arab and Muslim American voters and Jewish voters, particularly in extremely tight races in the battleground states of Michigan and Pennsylvania. Harris over the weekend alternately drew praise and criticism over her comments about a pro-Palestinian protester that were captured on a widely shared video. Some took Harris' remark that the protester's concerns were “real” to be an expression of agreement with his description of Israel’s conduct as “genocide.” That drew sharp condemnation from Israel’s former ambassador to the U.S., Michael Oren. But Harris' campaign said that while the vice president was agreeing more generally about the plight of civilians in Gaza, she was not and would not accuse Israel of genocide. A day earlier, the dynamics were reversed when Harris told reporters that the “first and most tragic story” of the conflict was the Oct. 7 Hamas attack last year that killed about 1,200 Israelis. That was triggering to those who feel she is not giving proper weight to the deaths of the more than 41,000 Palestinians who have been killed in Gaza. Trump, meanwhile, in recent days has participated in interviews with Saudi-owned Al-Arabiya and Lebanese outlet MTV, where he promised to bring about peace and said “things will turn out very well” in Lebanon. In a post on his social media platform Monday, he predicted a Harris presidency would only make matters in the Mideast worse. “If Kamala gets four more years, the Middle East will spend the next four decades going up in flames, and your kids will be going off to War, maybe even a Third World War, something that will never happen with President Donald J. Trump in charge,” Trump posted. “For our Country’s sake, and for your kids, Vote Trump for PEACE!” Harris' position is particularly awkward because as vice president she is tethered to President Joe Biden’s foreign policy decisions even as she’s tried to strike a more empathetic tone to all parties. But Harris aides and allies also are frustrated with what they see as Trump largely getting a pass on some of his unpredictable foreign policy statements. “It’s the very thoughtful, very careful school versus the showboat,” said James Zogby, founder and president of the Arab American Institute, who has endorsed Harris. “That does become a handicap in these late stages when he’s making all these overtures. When the bill comes due they’re going to walk away empty-handed, but by then it’ll be too late.” The political divisions on the campaign trail augur potentially significant implications after Election Day as powers in the region, particularly Israel's Benjamin Netanyahu, closely eye the outcome and the potential for any shifts to U.S. foreign policy. A new AP-NORC poll finds that neither Trump nor Harris has a clear political advantage on the situation in the Middle East. About 4 in 10 registered voters say Trump would do a better job, and a similar share say that about Harris. Roughly 2 in 10 say neither candidate would do a better job. There are some signs of weakness on the issue for Harris within her own party, however. Only about two-thirds of Democratic voters say Harris would be the better candidate to handle the situation in the Middle East. Among Republicans, about 8 in 10 say Trump would be better. In Michigan, which has the nation’s largest concentration of Arab Americans, the Israel-Hamas war has profound and personal impacts on the community. In addition to many community members having family in both Lebanon and Gaza, Kamel Ahmad Jawad, a metro Detroit resident, was killed while trying to deliver aid to his hometown in southern Lebanon. The war’s direct impact on the community has fueled outrage and calls for the U.S. to demand an unconditional cease-fire and impose a weapons embargo on Israel. Although both parties have largely supported Israel, much of the outrage and blame has been directed at Biden. When Harris entered the race, many Arab American leaders initially felt a renewed sense of optimism, citing her past comments and the early outreach efforts of her campaign. However, that optimism quickly faded as the community perceived that she had not sufficiently distanced her policies from those of Biden. “To say to Arab Americans, ‘Trump is going to be worse’ — what is worse than having members of your family killed?” said Rima Meroueh, director of the National Network for Arab American Communities. “That’s what people are saying when they’re asked the question, ‘Isn’t Trump going to be worse?’ It can’t be worse than what’s happening to us right now.” Future Coalition PAC, a super PAC backed by billionaire Elon Musk, is running ads in Arab American communities in Michigan focused on Harris’ support for Israel, complete with a photo of her and her husband, Doug Emhoff, who is Jewish. The same group is sending the opposite message to Jewish voters in Pennsylvania, attacking her support for the withholding of some weapons from Israel — a Biden administration move to pressure the longtime U.S. ally to limit civilian casualties. Harris spokesperson Morgan Finkelstein cast Trump's approach toward the Middle East as part of a broader sign that "an unchecked, unhinged Trump is simply too dangerous — he would bring us right back to the chaotic, go-it-alone approach that made the world less safe and he would weaken America.”

Vice President Kamala Harris tested negative on Monday for COVID-19, six days after she tested positive for the virus, and has been cleared to return to the White House on Tuesday. Harris press secretary Kirsten Allen said Harris, who was prescribed the antiviral treatment Paxlovid last week, was negative on a rapid antigen test. Allen said Harris would continue to wear a “well-fitting mask while around others” in accordance with Centers for Disease Control and Prevention guidelines until through her tenth day after her positive test. Also Read: Harris positive for Covid-19, Biden not a close contact CDC guidance allows people to leave isolation on the sixth day after they tested positive, as long as they wear a mask around others. The White House exceeds those guidelines, requiring a negative rapid test before people who have been infected are allowed to return to the complex.    

Vice President Kamala Harris tested positive for COVID-19 on Tuesday, the White House announced, underscoring the persistence of the highly contagious virus even as the U.S. eases restrictions in a bid to return to pre-pandemic normalcy.  Neither President Joe Biden nor first lady Jill Biden was considered a “close contact” of Harris in recent days, said the vice president’s press secretary, Kirsten Allen. Harris had been scheduled to attend Biden’s Tuesday morning Presidential Daily Brief but was not present, the White House said. She had returned Monday from a weeklong trip to the West Coast. The last time she saw Biden was the previous Monday, April 18. “I have no symptoms, and I will continue to isolate and follow CDC guidelines,” Harris tweeted. “I’m grateful to be both vaccinated and boosted.” After consulting with her physicians, Harris, 57, was prescribed and is taking Paxlovid, the Pfizer antiviral pill, her office said late Tuesday. The drug, when administered within five days of symptoms appearing, has been proven to bring about a 90% reduction in hospitalizations and deaths among patients most likely to get severe disease. Biden phoned Harris Tuesday afternoon to make sure she “has everything she needs” while working from home, the White House said. Also Read: Does Kamala Harris have children? Many eager to know Harris, received her first dose of the Moderna COVID-19 vaccine weeks before taking office and a second dose just days after Inauguration Day in 2021. She received a booster shot in late October and an additional booster on April 1. Fully vaccinated and boosted people have a high degree of protection against serious illness and death from COVID-19, particularly from the most common and highly transmissible omicron variant. Harris’ diagnosis comes a month after her husband, Doug Emhoff, recovered from the virus, as a wave of cases of the highly transmissible omicron subvariant has spread through Washington’s political class, infecting Cabinet members, White House staffers and lawmakers including House Speaker Nancy Pelosi. Sens. Ron Wyden, D-Ore., and Chris Murphy, D-Conn., tested positive on Tuesday. Allen said Harris would follow Centers for Disease Control and Prevention guidelines “and the advice of her physicians.” It was not immediately clear whether she is being prescribed any antiviral treatments. The White House has put in place strict COVID-19 protocols around the president, vice president and their spouses, including daily testing for those expected to be in close contact with them. Biden is tested regularly on the advice of his physician, the White House has said, and last tested negative on Monday. “We have a very contagious variant out there,” said White House COVID-19 coordinator Dr. Aashish Jha on Tuesday. “It is going to be hard to ensure that no one gets COVID in America. That’s not even a policy goal.” He said the administration’s goal is to make sure people don’t get seriously ill. Jha added that despite the precautions it is possible that Biden himself will come down with the virus at some point. Also Read: Kamala Harris makes history “I wouldn’t say it’s just a matter of time, but of course it is possible that the president, like any other American, could get COVID,” he said. “There is no 100% anything.” Psaki said she “would not expect” any changes to White House protocols. After more than two years and nearly a million deaths in the U.S., the virus is still killing more than 300 people a day in the U.S., according to the CDC. The unvaccinated are at a far greater risk, more than twice as likely to test positive and nine times as likely to die from the virus as those who have received at least a primary dose of the vaccines, according to the public health agency. Harris’ diagnosis comes as the Biden administration is taking steps to expand availability of the life-saving Paxlovid, reassuring doctors that there is ample supply for people at high risk of severe illness or death from the virus. In addition to her husband’s diagnosis, Harris was identified as a “close contact” after her communications director tested positive on April 6. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention defines “close contact” with an infected person as spending 15 minutes or more with them over a 24-hour period. The CDC says people with “close contact” do not need to quarantine if they are up to date on their vaccines but should wear well-fitting masks around other people for 10 days after the contact.    

When New York Democratic Rep. Mondaire Jones was at the White House for the signing of the proclamation making Juneteenth a national holiday last week, he told President Joe Biden their party needed him more involved in passing voting legislation on the Hill. In response? Biden “just sort of stared at me,” Jones said, describing an “awkward silence” that passed between the two. For Jones, the moment was emblematic of what he and a growing number of Democratic activists describe as a lackluster engagement from Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris on an issue they consider urgent and necessary for the health of the democracy. Although the White House has characterized the issue as “the fight of his presidency,” Biden has prioritized his economic initiatives, measures more likely to win Republican support in the Senate. And he’s shown little interest thus far in diving into a messy debate over changing Senate rules to pass the legislation on Democratic votes alone. Read:Adams takes fragile lead in NYC Democratic mayoral primary But as Democrats’ massive election legislation was blocked by Republicans on Tuesday, progressives argued Biden could not avoid that fight much longer and must use all his leverage to find a path forward. The criticism suggested the voting debate may prove to be among Biden’s first major, public rifts with the left of his presidency. “President Obama, for his part, has been doing more to salvage our ailing democracy than the current president of the United States of America,” Mondaire said, referring to a recent interview in which the former president pushed for the legislation. The White House argues that both Biden and Harris have been in frequent touch with Democratic leadership and key advocacy groups as the legislation — dubbed the For the People Act — moved through Congress. Biden spoke out forcefully at times, declaring a new Georgia law backed by Republicans is an “atrocity” and using a speech in Tulsa, Oklahoma, to say he was going to “fight like heck” for Democrats’ federal answer, but he left negotiations on the proposal to Hill leaders. On Monday, in advance of the vote, Biden met with Sen. Joe Manchin, D.W.Va., at the White House to discuss both voting rights and infrastructure. But Biden didn’t use his clout to work Republicans, who have expressed staunch and unified opposition to any voting legislation, arguing Democrats are pushing an unnecessary federal takeover of elections now run by state and county officials. Biden spent much of the month focused on foreign policy during a trip to Europe, encouraging Americans to get vaccinated and selling his infrastructure plan to the American public. He tasked Harris with taking the lead on the issue, and she spent last week largely engaged in private meetings with voting rights advocates as she traveled for a vaccination tour around the nation. Those efforts haven’t appeased some activists, who argue that state laws tightening election laws are designed to make it harder for Black, young and infrequent voters to cast ballots. The best way to counter the state laws is with federal legislation, they say, and Biden ought to come out for a change in the Senate filibuster rules that require 60 votes to advance most legislation. “Progressives are losing patience, and I think particularly African American Democrats are losing patience,” said Democratic strategist Joel Payne, a longtime aide to former Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid. “They feel like they have done the kind of good Democrat thing over the last year-plus, going back to when Biden got the nomination, unifying support around Biden, turning out, showing up on Election Day.” “Progressives feel like, ’Hey, we did our part.′ And now when it’s time for the bill to be paid, so to speak, I think some progressives feel like, ’OK, well, how long do we have to wait?” Read:Voting ends, wait for results begins in NYC mayoral primary Still, there could be a silver lining for Democrats in the ongoing battle over voting rights: The issue is a major motivator for progressives and may serve to drive enthusiasm among Black voters as well, potentially driving engagement in a midterm year where Democrats are certain to face a tough political climate. Harris is expected to continue to meet with voting rights activists, business leaders and groups working on the issue in the states, and will speak out publicly on the issue aiming to raise awareness of new voting laws and to pressure Republicans to get on board with federal legislation. She watched the legislation fail to advance to debate on Tuesday, in her role as president of the Senate, and coming off the floor told reporters that she and Biden still support voting legislation and “the fight is not over.” Ezra Levin, co-executive director of Indivisible, a progressive grassroots group, said it’s been nowhere near the level of advocacy the public has seen on the infrastructure bill. “The president has been on the sidelines. He has issued statements of support, he’s maybe included a line or two in a speech here or there, but there has been nothing on the scale of his public advocacy for recovery for COVID relief, for roads and bridges,” Levin said. “We think this is a crisis at the same level as crumbling roads and bridges, and if we agree on that, the question is, why is the president on the sidelines?” White House aides push back against any suggestion the president and vice president haven’t been engaged on the issue, and say his laissez-faire approach to the negotiations is based partly on his experience as a senator and his belief that his involvement risks undermining a deal before it’s cut. But in private, White House advisers see infrastructure as the bigger political winner for Biden because it’s widely popular among voters of both parties, a White House official said. Passing a major infrastructure bill is seen within the White House as going further towards helping Democrats win in the 2022 midterms and beyond than taking on massive voting overhaul that had a slim chance of passage without a debate over filibuster rules, said the official, who requested anonymity to discuss internal talks. Embracing filibuster changes, in particular, risks undermining Biden’s profile as a bipartisan dealmaker and could poison the delicate negotiations around infrastructure, where the White House insists it still sees opportunity for bipartisan compromise. Read:US hits encouraging milestones on virus deaths and shots “He does have to preserve some negotiating power, and his brand probably does not compute with being at the tip of the spear on reforming the filibuster,” Payne acknowledged. Still, other Democrats say it’s time for Biden to get out front on the issue. Rep. Colin Allred, D-Texas, said the proposals Republicans are looking to pass in his home state are “more explicit and more dangerous than anything I’ve ever come across.” Allred said that the voting fight increases pressure on Biden to take the leadership on the filibuster fight. “We do need President Biden to make that a priority, because if you’re going to talk about supporting the underlying legislation, it really doesn’t matter if we don’t have way to get past the filibuster,” he said.

Vice President Kamala Harris and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi made history Wednesday as the first women — one of them Black and Indian American — to share the stage in Congress during a presidential address. President Joe Biden noted the historic development at the very opening of his address. After taking the podium, Biden greeted the two women standing behind him with a “Madam Speaker” and “Madam Vice President.” Also Read: Kamala Harris makes history He then declared, “No president has ever said those words — and it’s about time.” Biden delivered his first prime-time speech to a joint session of Congress on Wednesday night flanked by Pelosi and Harris, two California Democrats. The two began the night with another historic moment: An elbow-bump hello, a pandemic spin on the traditional handshake. Pelosi and Harris stood side by side behind the dais in the House chamber, chatting with each other and occasionally waving to lawmakers as the group waited for Biden to arrive. Also Read: Vice President Harris: A new chapter opens in US politics “It’s pretty exciting. And it’s wonderful to make history. It’s about time,” Pelosi said hours before the speech during an interview on MSNBC. Pelosi already knows what it feels like to sit on the rostrum in the House chamber and introduce a president for their speeches. She has sat there for several addresses by Presidents George W. Bush, Barack Obama and Donald Trump. Women’s advocates said seeing Harris and Pelosi seated together behind Biden will be a “beautiful moment.” But they noted that electing a woman to sit in the Oval Office remains to be achieved, along with the addition of an equal rights amendment to the Constitution. Biden helped usher the moment along by pledging to pick a woman for his running mate and selecting Harris, then a U.S. senator from California. “This is a great start and we have to continue to move forward to give women their equal due,” said Christian Nunes, president of the National Organization for Women. Pelosi made history by becoming the first female House speaker during Republican Bush’s presidency. He acknowledged the moment by noting during his address to Congress after Pelosi’s election that he had the privilege of being the first president to open with the words “madam speaker.” Pelosi, 81, reclaimed the powerful leadership post during Republican Trump’s presidency and sat behind him during his final two speeches to Congress, famously ripping up her copy of Trump’s remarks in 2020 as cameras continued to roll after he was finished addressing lawmakers. Harris, 56, made history last year when she became the first woman and first Black and Indian American person elected vice president. In her role as president of the Senate, she joins Pelosi to preside over the joint session of Congress. Debbie Walsh, director of the Center for American Women and Politics at Rutgers University, said Wednesday night will show men, women, boys and girls that women can attain and hold high-level positions and that they are as entitled to them as men are. Walsh also noted Biden’s promise to put a woman on his ticket, and pointed as well to the diversity of his Cabinet. She said Biden was likely to begin the speech by turning around to face Pelosi and Harris and feeling proud — not just personally, “but I also think proud for the country and proud for his party and I think he will clearly see the historic implications of this and the role that he played in making that happen.” “For all of us who care about women’s public leadership, we still look forward to the day when the person standing at the podium, in front, is a woman,” Walsh added. “But for now this is a particularly gratifying moment.” Harris’ office declined comment Wednesday on her historic role in the president’s address, preferring to let the moment speak for itself. Apart from the speech Wednesday, Harris and Pelosi have notched another first in U.S. and women’s history. They are first and second, respectively, in the line of presidential succession.

President Joe Biden convened leaders of the world’s most powerful countries on Thursday to try to spur global efforts against climate change, drawing commitments from Chinese President Xi Jinping and Russian President Vladimir Putin to cooperate on cutting emissions despite their own sharp rivalries with the United States. “Meeting this moment is about more than preserving our planet,” Biden declared, speaking from a TV-style set for a virtual summit of 40 world leaders. “It’s about providing a better future for all of us,” he said, calling it “a moment of peril but a moment of opportunity.” “The signs are unmistakable. the science is undeniable. the cost of inaction keeps mounting,” he added. Biden’s own new commitment, timed to the summit, is to cut U.S. fossil fuel emissions up to 52% by 2030. marking a return by the U.S. to global climate efforts after four years of withdrawal under President Donald Trump. Biden’s administration is sketching out a vision of a prosperous, clean-energy United States where factories churn out cutting-edge batteries for export, line workers re-lay an efficient national electrical grid and crews cap abandoned oil and gas rigs and coal mines. Japan, a heavy user of coal, announced its own new 46% emissions reduction target Thursday as the U.S. and its allies sought to build momentum through the summit. South Korea used the summit to say it would stop all public financing of new coal-fired power plants, an important step that climate groups hope will help persuade China and Japan to slow their own building and funding of coal power. The coronavirus pandemic compelled the summit to play out as a climate telethon-style livestream, limiting opportunities for spontaneous interaction and negotiation. The opening was rife with small technological glitches, including echoes, random beeps and off-screen voices. But the U.S. summit also marshaled an impressive display of the world’s most powerful leaders speaking on the single cause of climate change. China’s Xi, whose country is the world’s biggest emissions culprit, followed by the United States, spoke first among the other global figures. He made no reference to nonclimate disputes that had made it uncertain until Wednesday that he would even take part in the U.S. summit, and said China would work with America in cutting emissions. Also read: EU reaches major climate deal ahead of Biden climate summit “To protect the environment is to protect productivity, and to boost the environment is to boost productivity. It’s as simple as that,” Xi said. Putin, whose government has been publicly irate over Biden’s characterization of him as a “killer” for Russia’s aggressive moves against its opponents, made no mention of his feuding with Biden in his own climate remarks, a live presentation that also saw moments of dead air among production problems. “Russia is genuinely interested in galvanizing international cooperation so as to look further for effective solutions to climate change as well as to all other vital challenges,” Putin said. Russia by some measures is the world’s fourth-biggest emitter of climate-damaging fossil fuel fumes. The pandemic made gathering world leaders for the climate summit too risky. That didn’t keep the White House from sparing no effort on production quality. The president’s staff built a small set in the East Room that looked like it was ripped from a daytime talk show. Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris addressed the summit from separate lecterns before joining Secretary of State Anthony Blinken and White House climate envoy John Kerry at a horseshoe-shaped table set up around a giant potted plant to watch fellow leaders’ livestreamed speeches. The format meant a cavalcade of short speeches by world leaders, some scripted, some apparently more impromptu. “This is not bunny-hugging,” British Prime Minister Boris Johnson said of the climate efforts. “This is about growth and jobs.” The Biden administration’s pledge would require by far the most ambitious U.S. climate effort ever, nearly doubling the reductions that the Obama administration had committed to in the landmark 2015 Paris climate accord. The new urgency comes as scientists say that climate change caused by coal plants, car engines and other fossil fuel use is already worsening droughts, floods, hurricanes, wildfires and other disasters and that humans are running out of time to stave off most catastrophic extremes of global warming. But administration officials, in previewing the new target, disclosed aspirations and vignettes rather than specific plans, budget lines or legislative proposals for getting there. Biden excused himself in the midst of the first session for other duties, but planned to join a second session of the livestreamed summit later in the morning on financing poorer countries’ efforts to remake and protect their economies against global warming. Also read: FM: Bangladesh’s points to be on agenda of Biden's Climate Summit With the pledge from the United States and other emissions-cutting announcements from Japan, Canada, the European Union and the United Kingdom, countries representing more than half the world’s economy will have now committed to cutting fossil fuel fumes enough to keep the earth’s climate from warming, disastrously, more than 2.7 degrees Fahrenheit (1.5 degrees Celsius), the administration said. As of 2019, the last year before the pandemic, the U.S. had reduced 13% of its greenhouse gases compared with 2005 levels, which is about half way to the Obama administration goals of 26 to 28%, said climate scientist Niklas Hohne of Climate Action Tracker. That’s owing largely to market forces that have made solar and wind, and natural gas, much cheaper Biden, a Democrat, campaigned partly on a pledge to confront climate change. He has sketched out some elements of his $2 trillion approach for transforming U.S. transportation systems and electrical grids in his campaign climate plan and in his infrastructure proposals for Congress. His administration insists the transformation will mean millions of well-paying jobs. Republicans say the effort will throw oil, gas and coal workers off the job. They call his infrastructure proposal too costly. “The summit is not necessarily about everyone else bringing something new to the table — it’s really about the U.S. bringing their target to the world,” said Joanna Lewis, an expert in China energy and environment at Georgetown University. Political divisions in America that were exposed by Trump’s presidency have left the nation weaker than it was at the 2015 Paris accord. Unable to guarantee that a different president in 2024 won’t undo Biden’s climate work, the Biden administration has argued that market forces — with a boost to get started — will soon make cleaner fuels and energy efficiency too cheap and consumer-friendly to trash. Having the United States, with its influence and status, back in the climate game is important, said Lauri Myllyvirta, lead analyst at the Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air in Helsinki. But hoping the world will forget about the last four years seems like wishful thinking, he said. “There is too much of an impulse in the U.S. to just wish away Trump’s legacy and the fact that every election is now basically a coin toss between complete climate denial and whatever actions the Democrats can bring to the table,” he said.

Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina will deliver her speech virtually at the "Leaders Summit on Climate" on Thursday highlighting the climate-related challenges Bangladesh faces and the efforts it is undertaking. Prime Minister Hasina, also President of the Climate Vulnerable Forum (CVF), will address the inaugural session of the Summit titled "Raising Our Climate Ambition" with other global leaders, an official told UNB. US President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris will open the inaugural session of the two-day Summit at 6pm (Bangladesh Time). This session will underscore the urgent need for the world’s major economies to strengthen their climate ambition by the time of COP 26 to keep the goal of limiting warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius within reach. It will provide an opportunity for leaders to announce new steps to strengthen climate ambition.    United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres, US Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken and Special Presidential Envoy for Climate John Kerry will also join. Also read: FM: Bangladesh’s points to be on agenda of Biden's Climate Summit Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Chinese President Xi Jinping, Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga, Russian President Vladimir Puti, Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison, British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, German Chancellor Angela Merkel, Prime Minister, South Korean President Moon Jae-in and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan are among participants invited by the US President. The second session will be on "Investing in Climate Solutions."