Author: chicagoinquirer

by Darlene Superville, Chris Megerian and Aamer Madhani KALAMAZOO, Mich. — Michelle Obama challenged men to support Kamala Harris ‘ bid to be America’s first female president, warning at a rally in Michigan on Saturday that women’s lives would be at risk if Donald Trump returned to the White House. The former first lady described the assault on abortion rights as the harbinger of dangerous limitations on healthcare for women. Some men may be tempted to vote for Trump because of their anger at the slow pace of progress, Obama said, but “your rage does not exist in a vacuum.”…

by Keiran Smith and Ayaka Mcgill APIA, Samoa — Commonwealth countries adopted Saturday their first ocean declaration during their summit held for the first time in the Pacific island nation of Samoa as calls from some of Britain’s former colonies for reparatory justice for the trans-Atlantic slave trade grew louder. The Apia Ocean Declaration was announced during the closing session of the 27th Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting, or CHOGM, and calls on all 56 Commonwealth nations to protect the ocean in the face of severe climate, pollution and overexploitation. More than half the Commonwealth members are small countries like…

by Steve Peoples NEW YORK — Progressive Democrats warn Kamala Harris risks losing the support of a small but significant portion of her political base unless she changes her campaign’s closing message — and its messengers — immediately. Specifically, several progressive leaders believe that the Democratic nominee has been too focused on winning over moderate Republicans in recent days at the expense of her own party’s passionate liberals. And they say that Harris’ closing message, which is increasingly centered on Republican Donald Trump and the threat he poses to U.S. democracy, ignores the economic struggles of the nation’s working class.…

by Colleen Long, Darlene Supperville and Nadia Nathan HOUSTON — Vice President Kamala Harris will team up with Beyoncé on Friday for a rally in solidly Republican Texas aimed at highlighting the perilous medical fallout from the state’s strict abortion ban and putting the blame squarely on Donald Trump. It’s a message intended to register far beyond Texas in the political battleground states, where Harris is hoping that the aftereffects from the fall of Roe v. Wade will spur voters to turn out to support her quest for the presidency. Harris will also be joined at the rally by women…

by Alan Rappeport The United States and Europe are close to finalizing a plan to provide Ukraine with a $50 billion loan backed by Russia’s frozen central bank assets by the end of the year, Treasury Secretary Janet L. Yellen said on Tuesday. An announcement of the loan could come this week as finance ministers and central bank governors convene in Washington for the annual meetings of the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank. American and European policymakers have been negotiating for months over how to use Russia’s central bank reserves, most of which are being held in Europe,…

Julie Carr Smyth COLUMBUS, Ohio — Former Ohio Gov. Bob Taft, scion of one of the state’s best-known Republican families, threw his support Sunday behind Democratic Sen. Sherrod Brown in his hotly contested reelection race against GOP nominee Bernie Moreno. Taft, 82, made known his intention to vote for Brown over Moreno, a Donald Trump-backed Cleveland businessman, in a letter to the editor of the Dayton Daily News. The grandson of “Mr. Republican” Robert A. Taft Sr. and great-grandson of William Howard Taft, the only person in American history to have been president and chief justice of the United States,…

by Andrew Goudsward WASHINGTON – A U.S. judge on Friday made public more evidence collected by prosecutors in the federal criminal case accusing former President Donald Trump of attempting to overturn his defeat in the 2020 election. The hundreds of pages, many of which were blanked out and marked “sealed,” include material referenced in a sweeping court filing from Special Counsel Jack Smith made public earlier this month that argued that Trump, the Republican presidential candidate in this year’s election, is not immune from the remaining allegations in the case. The filings unsealed on Friday included excerpts of interviews conducted…

by Nandita Bose and Jarrett Renshaw LA CROSSE, Wisconsin – Billionaire Mark Cuban chided fellow billionaire and Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump on Thursday for his proposal to issue fresh tariffs on most Chinese goods, arguing it will be Americans who will pay the bill, not the Chinese. Cuban appeared with Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris in Wisconsin on Thursday and is set to hold a town hall for her on Saturday in Phoenix before heading to Michigan. He wasn’t the only billionaire on the campaign trail: Tesla CEO Elon Musk was in Pennsylvania on Thursday mobilizing Trump voters ahead…

by James Oliphant NEW YORK – Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump tried to poke fun at his opponent Democrat Kamala Harris and embattled New York Mayor Eric Adams while touching upon his own legal troubles in a somewhat light-hearted speech at a charity gala on Thursday. “It’s really a pleasure (to be) anywhere in New York without a subpoena for my appearance,” Trump told the gathering at the Waldorf-Astoria hotel in New York City. The annual Al Smith dinner, which benefits Catholic charities, is a New York bipartisan tradition that attracts the city’s elite and extends back almost 80 years.…

By Jeff Mason and Sarah Marsh BERLIN -President Joe Biden urged the West on Friday to sustain its support for Ukraine against Russia’s full-scale invasion as Kyiv faces a bleak winter and a looming U.S. presidential election raises worries about the strength of Washington’s own resolve. Biden was speaking to reporters before holding closed-door talks with ally German Chancellor Olaf Scholz during a swansong one-day trip to Berlin to discuss matters ranging from Ukraine to the expanding conflict in the Middle East. “As Ukraine faces a tough winter, we must, we must sustain our resolve,” Biden said in a statement.…