Pelosi criticises Biden for late end to campaign

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Japan’s newly installed Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba has renewed a pledge to build up his country’s military and deepen its alliance with the United States under President-elect Donald Trump.

Ishiba, who made the comments at an annual troop review held at Camp Asaka in the Tokyo suburbs, said the security environment surrounding Japan and the international community has significantly worsened due to escalating tensions with China, Russia and North Korea.

He pledged to reinforce Japan’s military power.

“As we face the most severe and complex security environment, I will balance and strengthen Japan’s diplomacy and security,” Ishiba said in his speech before hundreds of troops gathered for the ceremony.

The Japan-U.S. alliance is the lynchpin for achieving this, Ishiba said, pledging to elevate Japan’s ties with the United States and work closely with Trump as they agreed during a brief telephone conversation Thursday.

Ishiba pledged to pursue an ongoing military buildup plan adopted by his predecessor, Fumio Kishida, which calls for a counter-strike capability with long-range cruise-missiles, a break from its self-defense only principle.

Ishiba said he will pursue strengthening of command system to improve operation between Japanese and U.S. troops.

After its devastating defeat in World War II, Japan had prioritized economic recovery over defense under its war-renouncing constitution but has steadily strengthened its defense capability over the past years.

Jon Favreau, a host of the political podcast “Pod Save America” and former Barack Obama speechwriter, has revealed that the Biden team received internal polling months before the election indicating that Donald Trump would win in a landslide in a head-to-head contest against President Biden.

Favreau spoke in a new episode of “Pod Save America” about how Biden officials consistently told the media that their internal polling showed that President Biden was ahead of Donald Trump, and that the strong internal polling was part of the reason Biden wanted to stay on as the 2024 Democratic presidential candidate.

“Then we find out when the Biden campaign becomes the Harris campaign, that the Biden campaign’s own internal polling at the time when they were telling us he was the strongest candidate, showed that Donald Trump was going to win 400 electoral votes,” Favreau said.

If Donald Trump had faced Biden in the election and won with more than 400 electoral votes, it would have been the biggest win against an incumbent since Ronald Reagan’s 1980 victory against Jimmy Carter.

NBC and CNN are projecting that Democrat Jacky Rosen will win re-election to the U.S. Senate in Nevada.

Rosen has defeated Republican Sam Brown but her victory has come after the chamber had already been lost to the Republicans.

Currently the Republicans hold 52 seats against the Democrats 46 seats with two seats, Pennsylvania and Arizona, yet to be called.

The Republicans have flipped three Senate seats in this election so far, and the Democrats have flipped none.

Currently the Republicans hold 212 sets in the U.S. House and the Democrats hold 204. 218 seats are required for control of the chamber.

Far-right Republican strategist, pardoned felon and longtime Trump advisor Roger Stone has issued a stark warning to Donald Trump: don’t trust his former secretary of state and CIA director Mike Pompeo.

“Neocons have positioned themselves to get highly influential roles within the second Trump administration and this sinister fifth column has the potential to be more harmful to Trump’s America First agenda than his leftist opinion within the Democrat Party,” Stone wrote on his website.

The post specifically criticised Mike Pompeo, who some believe will be part of Trump’s new cabinet and former United Nations Ambassador- and 2024 Presidential aspirant- Nikki Hayley.

According to anonymous sourcing the role Pompeo would most likely take is as secretary of defence.

Mike Pompeo served as secretary of state from April 2018 to January 2021 under Donald Trump, having previously served as the director of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA).

Robert F. Kennedy Jr, the former independent presidential candidate, is reviewing candidate resumes for the top jobs at the U.S. government’s health agencies in Donald Trump’s new administration, a former Kennedy aide and a source familiar with the matter told Reuters on Friday.

Kennedy, of the famed political family, has been asked to recommend appointees for all regulatory health agencies, including the Department of Health and Human Services and the Food and Drug Administration, said Del Bigtree, who was director of communications for Kennedy’s campaign and remains close to the former candidate.

A source familiar with the matter, who declined to be identified, echoed that Kennedy had taken on that role.

In August, Kennedy, an environmental lawyer who has spread misinformation about vaccines, ended his presidential campaign and endorsed Trump in exchange for a role in Trump’s administration focused on public health.

Kennedy says he is not anti-vaccine but for more rigorous testing of vaccines.

While he is looking for individuals to fill administration jobs, Kennedy could himself still take an official position in Trump’s administration or serve in an advisory capacity, according to Bigtree.

Howard Lutnick, co-chair of Trump’s transition team, told CNN before Tuesday’s presidential election, however, that Kennedy was “not getting a job for HHS.”

Bigtree said Trump wanted to see Kennedy’s ideas for reducing chronic illness produce results within two years, especially in U.S. children.

Kennedy last week said he would recommend fluoride be removed from public water supplies, falsely claiming on X the chemical is associated with numerous health issues including bone fractures and cancer.

The American Dental Association says the decades-old intervention reduces tooth decay by more than 25% in adults and children.

“President Trump is giving him two years to show success,” Bigtree said.

“President Trump is keenly interested in the selections that Bobby Kennedy thinks would get the job done.”

Kennedy will recommend scientists and doctors who “don’t have any conflicts of interest with the pharmaceutical industry when it comes to the departments that are going to be dealing with drugs and vaccines,” Bigtree said.

Bigtree, an anti-vaccine activist, is chief executive of MAHA Action, a new organization named after Kennedy’s Make America Healthy Again pledge that Bigtree said would also propose appointees to Kennedy.

Kennedy is being assisted by daughter-in-law Amaryllis Fox Kennedy, his former campaign manager, and investor Omeed Malik, the source familiar with the matter said.

From Reuters

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Reuters reports that prominent investors Scott Bessent and John Paulson have emerged as the leading candidates for the key role of US Treasury Secretary, according to two people close to Trump, and a donor.

King Charles and Donald Trump are unlikely pen pals. The two men have opposing views on manmade climate change, immigration, and civility, for starters.

But one thing Charles learned from his mother was when to pinch his nose. For 70 years, the late Queen’s talent for soft diplomacy led her a merry dance through meetings with despots and undesirables. Now it is the turn of her son to cosy up to a tricky character, in the name of the British national interest.

Read the full story here

Boris Johnson has suggested that Donald Trump would “certainly” do a trade deal with the UK.

The former prime minister said the US president-elect is offering “economic hope” but that the Government would be “too pathetic” to try to secure a deal.

Sir Keir Starmer’s Government is making efforts to smooth over tensions with Trump, who has said he wants to increase tariffs on goods imported from around the world by 10 per cent, rising to 60 per cent on items from China.

Writing in the Daily Mail, Johnson said the US stock market is “surging” following Trump’s victory and that “investors can see that by deregulation […] Trump is offering economic hope”.

The former prime minister added: “What about the threat of tariffs on China and others, you say. Well, he said that last time – and ended up doing a free trade deal with Beijing.

“Donald Trump would certainly do a free trade deal with the UK too – though I expect the Starmer Government is too pathetic to try.”

Trump vowed during his campaign that he would tax all goods imported into the US if he won back the White House, saying he thought “tariff” was “the most beautiful word in the dictionary”.

Donald Trump’s transition team has prepared executive orders and proclamations on withdrawing from the Paris climate agreement and shrinking the size of some national monuments to allow more drilling and mining, the New York Times reported on Friday.

Trump is also expected to end a pause on permitting new natural gas export terminals, and revoke a waiver that allows California and other states to have tighter pollution standards.

Some people on the transition team are discussing moving the headquarters of the Environmental Protection Agency out of Washington, the report said, citing people involved in the discussions.

The official Palestinian news agency said on Friday that Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas has spoken to Donald Trump on the phone, congratulating him on winning the presidential elections and saying he is looking forward to working with him to achieve a “just and comprehensive” peace.

Elon Musk joined a congratulatory call between Donald Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on Wednesday, according to media reports.

During the 25-minute call, Trump told Zelensky he would support Ukraine, without providing details, while Musk said he would continue to support the country with his Starlink satellites, Axios reported, citing unidentified sources.

Musk owns SpaceX, which provides Starlink satellite communication services that are vital for Ukraine’s defense effort, but his statements have sometimes angered Kyiv since Russia invaded its neighbour in 2022.

Zelensky was telling Trump how important the satellites had been for internet service during the war when Trump said Musk was with him and put the billionaire on the line, the Washington Post reported.

Trump and Musk were at Mar-a-Lago, Trump’s Palm Beach residence and club, when the call took place.

News of the call comes as Trump moves closer to choosing his top advisers and cabinet members. Trump has said he would offer Tesla CEO Musk, the world’s richest man, a role in his administration promoting government efficiency.

Zelensky was among the first leaders to congratulate Trump, who has been critical of US military and financial support for Ukraine in its war with Russia.

US Defence Secretary Lloyd Austin spoke with the new Israeli defence minister Israel Katz on Friday for the first time since Katz took office.

“Secretary Austin reaffirmed the United States’ ironclad commitment to Israel’s security and support for its right to defend itself,” a Pentagon readout of the call said.

According to CNN reports, US military officials are having informal discussions about how the Department of Defence would respond if Trump issued orders to deploy military troops domestically, or to fire apolitical civil servants and replace them with people loyal to him.

Defence officials told CNN that they were now “gaming out various scenarios” in readiness for when Trump takes the White House in January:

“We are all preparing and planning for the worst-case scenario, but the reality is that we don’t know how this is going to play out yet,” one defense official said.

Trump’s election has also raised questions inside the Pentagon about what would happen if the president issued an unlawful order, particularly if his political appointees inside the department don’t push back.

“Troops are compelled by law to disobey unlawful orders,” said another defense official. “But the question is what happens then – do we see resignations from senior military leaders? Or would they view that as abandoning their people?”

Professional wrestling magnate and former Small Business Administration director Linda McMahon is seen as the frontrunner to lead Donald Trump’s Department of Commerce, three sources briefed on the plans said on Friday.

McMahon is a major donor and was an early supporter of Trump when he first ran for the White House almost a decade ago. This cycle, Trump tapped her to co-lead a transition team formed to help vet staff and draft policy ahead of Tuesday’s election.

McMahon is the co-founder and former chief executive of the professional wrestling franchise WWE. She later served as director of the SBA, resigning in 2019, and went on to lead a pro-Trump spending group.

On Thursday, Trump announced that Susie Wiles, one of his two campaign managers, will be his White House chief of staff

A new UK ambassador to the US is expected to be appointed after Sir Keir Starmer cancelled Rishi Sunak’s appointment when he took office.

Sunak had named the former national security adviser Tim Barrow to the role, replacing Karen Pierce, who had been in the role since 2020 and is expected to remain so until January.

The Guardian reports that David Miliband, a former Labour leadership contender and brother to Energy Secretary Ed Miliband, Ashton, a Labour Peer, and Mandelson, a former architect of New Labour, have been on the shortlist for months.

In an interview with the New York Times, the former House Speaker and influential Democrat, Nancy Pelosi has said President Biden took too long to quit the presidential race and endorsed Kamala Harris too soon.

“Had the president gotten out sooner, there may have been other candidates in the race,” Pelosi said.

President Biden gave his endorsement to Ms Harris within the hour after he ended his campaign in July, following intense pressure from Democrats including Ms Pelosi.

“The anticipation was that, if the president were to step aside, that there would be an open primary,” she said.

“And as I say, Kamala may have, I think she would have done well in that and been stronger going forward. But we don’t know that. That didn’t happen. We live with what happened. And because the president endorsed Kamala Harris immediately, that really made it almost impossible to have a primary at that time. If it had been much earlier, it would have been different.”

There is no shortage of things to dissect about Donald Trump in the wake of his re-election. But, aside from politics, there is one facet of the President-elect’s numerous eccentricities that keeps cropping up: the unique hue of his skin. 

The soon-to-be leader of the free world has inspired fierce debate about his dedication to colouring himself increasingly intense shades of orange. In the run-up to the election, one theory, posed by photo editor Emily Elsie, suggested Trump’s tanning dependence may be stress-related.

In several widely shared Instagram stories featuring pictures of Trump gradually becoming more orange, Emily said: “I used to think the problem with Trump’s ‘skin tone’ was primarily an issue of photo retouching, aka a photographer’s choice in colour balancing. In a ‘cool’ light Trump’s bronzer is less intense. A slightly warmer tone makes Trump’s ‘skin tone’ go crazy and orange.

“But lately, I feel like something more psychological is happening. When Trump took office in 2017, he was significantly less orange… but as his term wore on, more bronzer was applied.”

Perhaps Trump’s ever darker tan is a form of psychological armour in the face of increasing public attention and criticism. In order to get to the bottom of the matter, we spoke to historians, psychologists and tanning experts about how he achieves his unique look – and why he insists on maintaining it in the face of mass ridicule and confusion. 

University of Glasgow sports historian Dr Fabiola Creed, who has conducted extensive research on tanning culture, has a few theories. 

Read the full story here

Immigration, tax cuts and a “drill, baby, drill” push for oil are among radical shifts in US policy that Donald Trump will aim to push through when he returns to the White House.

The president-elect has vowed to launch the largest deportation programme in US history, expand domestic oil production in the Arctic wildlife refuge and end the war in Ukraine in his first 100 days in office.

He has also pledged to renew tax cuts introduced in his first term, and warned he will slap tariffs on imports, which has sparked fears of a costly trade war.

But experts have cast doubt on whether he will be able to drive through such sweeping reforms in such a short space of time – or indeed whether he will be able to implement them at all given the scale of his agenda.

Read the full story here