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After months of resisting efforts by Democratic allies to get him to take a harder line with Israel for its conduct in the war in Gaza, President Biden this week made what may be his most significant statement to date.

For the first time, he threatened to cut off the flow of certain types of weapons if Israel doesnt heed American warnings specifically, if it launches a planned invasion of Rafah that the Biden administration worries could lead to even more extensive civilian casualties.

Its a dicey decision, both politically and foreign policy-wise, from a man without many good options right now.

But in some ways, its been a long time coming. And at the very least it reflects the direction Bidens party has been headed in for months.

An outpouring of support for Israel after Hamass Oct. 7 massacre quickly gave way to liberal skepticism about how Israel had prosecuted its military response. And over the past six months, weve seen the lefts shift away from Israel continue mostly unabated.

Perhaps the most often cited manifestation of that is in the relative sympathies toward Israelis and Palestinians. Democrats had for years drifted toward the Palestinians, with a Gallup poll in early 2023 showing Democrats sympathizing more with them for the first time in the 21st century.

Oct. 7 briefly changed that, but since then, polling from the Economist and YouGov has shown a steady and pretty consistent move toward the Palestinians. About 4 in 10 Americans say their sympathies are about equal between the sides, but those saying they sympathize more with the Israelis has dropped from 34 percent in mid-October to 15 percent today.

About twice as many Democrats chose the Israelis as chose the Palestinians in October; today, Democrats who pick a side choose the Palestinians by double digits.

Weve seen an even bigger shift when it comes to the root of Bidens announcement this week: the idea that Israel is going too far.

In late October, more Democrats (39 percent) said Israels military response was either about right or not harsh enough than said it was too harsh (33 percent).

But Democrats have again shifted steadily away from Israel. Today, a majority of Democrats (54 percent) say its response has been too harsh 30 points more than those who say its been about right or not harsh enough.

Just because people regard Israels actions as too harsh, of course, doesnt mean they necessarily desire a hard line or cutting off aid. But there, too, weve seen Democrats gradually adopt a more skeptical position.

While in early November, Democrats favored maintaining the same levels of Israel aid or increasing it by around a 2-to-1 margin, polls over the past month show a plurality of Democrats now want it decreased.

That number crept as high as 48 percent in an early April poll nearly half of Democrats wanting less money for Israel.

ABC News-Ipsos polling last week showed a similar shift. It asked whether the United States was doing too much to support Israel. The biggest shift away from Israel since January? Among those who described themselves as somewhat liberal. They went from 35 percent saying we were doing too much for Israel in January to 48 percent now.

(Its valid to ask whether people truly know what genocide entails, and Americans tend to apply that label pretty broadly. But it would at least seem to reflect significant unease about how far Israel has gone.)

Given all of that, you begin to see how even a historically pro-Israel Democrat like Biden might come around to a more forceful posture. Hes not actually threatening to reduce the total level of aid; just cutting off offensive weapons that could be used in an incursion into Rafah.

That turn may be in line with a growing segment of his party, but Biden still risks losing the support of key Democratic-leaning constituencies or the broader electorate.

Even these polls, after all, show that scaled-back support of Israel is a minority position with the broader public.

The ABC-Ipsos poll showed 38 percent overall said we were doing too much to support Israel. And the most recent Economist polling shows only about one-third overall say Israels response has been too harsh (34 percent) and that we should decrease aid (34 percent).

The question now is whether Bidens warning will have the desired effect and help tamp down the growing consternation on the American left or whether it will just lead to even more choices among fraught options.

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Biden's Israel red line, and the Democratic Party's shift away from Israel - The Washington Post

WICHITA Mike McCorkle relies heavily on three key issues in his run to knock House Speaker Daniel Hawkins out of office: protecting womens reproductive rights, expanding Medicaid and especially how McCorkle thinks Hawkins has failed to listen to his constituents.

McCorkle, a Democrat running for a seat in the Kansas Houses 100th District, is focusing his campaign on grassroots tactics. Since his initial run against Hawkins in 2022, hes garnered support from local politicians, members of Women for Kansas and John Carlin, Kansas 40th governor from 1979-1987 and archivist of the United States from 1995-2005.

McCorkle said its hard to believe Hawkins has been reelected five times since he first won the 100th District seat in 2012.

Winning House 100 means removing your current speaker, which would be good for most Kansans since he supports extreme minority agendas, McCorkle said during a meet and greet campaign event Saturday in Wichita. Hes out of touch with House 100 and a majority of Kansas in general.

McCorkle referenced Hawkins unwillingness to hold a hearing on Medicaid expansion for years and said that, when Hawkins did, it was a joke.

Hes a friendly guy on a personal level, but hes just some kind of bipolar person who can be friendly person (to) person but yet still say its OK that 150,000 people dont have adequate health care, which is wrong, McCorkle said.

Vowing to protect womens reproductive freedom, McCorkle criticized Hawkins pro-life stance.

I expect House 100 voters to confirm their disappointment with his actions against women by voting for change, he said.

McCorkle also pointed to Hawkins 99% corporate donor list.

During the 2022 cycle, Hawkins received thousands of dollars in support from various companies and entities, notably Koch Industries, the NRA and the National Association of Insurance and Financial Advisors of Kansas.

Which begs the question: Who does he really represent? McCorkle said.

Hawkins spokeswoman did not respond to email and phone requests seeking comment for this story.

In McCorkles first run for the 100th District in 2022, he received 3,808 or 40% of votes, while Hawkins secured 5,641 votes.

McCorkle also ran for Kansas 27th District in the Kansas State Senate in 2020. Republican opponent Gene Suellentrop beat McCorkle with double the votes 26,296 to McCorkles 13,143.

Despite the losses, McCorkle said these past races elevate his 2024 attempt at unseating Hawkins. He cited his increased name recognition, experience and amount of volunteers.

More than 60 supporters congregated Saturday in downtown Wichita at the fundraiser for McCorkle including Carlin.

Now retired and in his mid-80s, Carlin resides in northern Kansas, but he said he drove to Wichita to support McCorkle.

The fact that Im coming ought to say something in itself because I dont travel very much, Carlin said.

Carlin, who served as House speaker from 1977 to 1979, said he knows exactly what power the speaker has.

Mike is not running against somebody that voted wrong: (Hawkins) engineered all this crap, Carlin said. Seriously, the speaker of the House makes all the appointments, the committees, the chairs, controls the agenda. Nothing comes up on the floor unless the speaker (allows it).

Carlin said the turnout for the constitutional amendment on abortion in August 2022 could work in favor of McCorkles campaign.

(The issue of abortion) motivates a lot of people. I mean, you look at campaigns across the country right now, not just in Kansas, that issue motivates and wins a lot of elections, Carlin said.

McCorkle and other supporters said they think the energy of this election cycle is different.

Its a much broader support and much, much better-coordinated community, McCorkle said. And so we just have a really good synergy.

Jonathan Jones, deputy executive director of the Kansas Democratic Party, said electing moderate candidates like McCorkle is one step to breaking up Kansas Republican supermajority, which produces legislation that Gov. Laura Kelly vetoes.

I feel lucky at the end of the veto session that we succeeded in sustaining those deals, Jones said. Im tired of feeling lucky. I want to do everything we can to make sure we know whats going to happen, that we can give the governor as much power as we possibly can for her last two years in the cycle.

Born and raised in Wichita, McCorkle said he enjoyed a safe secure childhood near Seneca and Harry. He attended public schools throughout his youth and, in his senior year of high school, enlisted in the Army in 1976.

During his 13 years of service, he worked on 14 photo and intelligence analyst assignments, including volunteering for Desert Storm.

Following his military service, McCorkle lived and worked abroad. The candidate has done various work from being a manager to a machinist. In 2019, he returned to his home city to take care of his parents.

Id been watching these elections from abroad for years, and I kept thinking, Man, we just got a crisis of citizenship, McCorkle said. And so, I resolved that when I came back I would just get involved.

McCorkle said he initially wanted to help a candidate, not be a candidate.

And, of course, no one would run, and so I ended up being the name on the ballot against Suellentrop, which was a steep learning curve, McCorkle said. Nonetheless, (I) made some allies, and this third time, we got a good group of strong allies, people that want to work together, and I believe were gonna get it right.

Correction: Mike McCorkle served in the military for 13 years. An earlier version of this story incorrectly stated his years of military service.

Read more from the original source:
Democrat hopes to unseat Kansas House speaker with focus on reproductive rights, Medicaid expansion Kansas ... - Kansas Reflector

In summary

From prohibiting non-disclosure agreements in bill negotiations to protecting utility ratepayers, bills keep dying this year despite lawmakers refusing to say no when it came time to vote. Is it time for the rules to change?

Among the most controversial bills that died this spring was a measure prompted by allegations that Gov. Gavin Newsom secured a lucrative benefit for a billionaire supporter by exempting his restaurants from a minimum wage increase.

Newsom dismissed the allegations as absurd, but KCRA 3 reported that the public might never get a full accounting of what happened because participants to the bill negotiations signed non-disclosure agreements (NDAs) that threatened them with legal action if they spoke about the issue.

The controversy prompted a bill banning NDAs for legislative negotiations, but the bill died last month even though only one Democratic member of the Assembly Committee on Elections voted against it. It failed because five other Democrats on the committee didnt vote.

As CalMatters revealed in April, not voting is a common practice for California legislators. Last year, at least 15 bills died due to lack of votes instead of lawmakers actually voting no to kill them. So far this year, a database at CalMatters Digital Democracy indicates that at least 12 bills have died because lawmakers declined to vote.

Insiders say its a way for legislators to be polite to colleagues and perhaps avoid a no vote on their own legislation. But critics say its also a way for legislators to dodge responsibility for their decisions.

Some will say that those bills were tough votes for lawmakers, said Mike Gatto, a former Democratic legislator from Los Angeles. But one must remember that the whole reason why the public elects these lawmakers is for them to take tough votes.

The Legislatures bill-tracking website doesnt distinguish whether a legislator declined to vote, was absent or if the lawmaker announced they were formally abstaining from voting. Now, with the launch of Digital Democracy, the public has easy access to video and transcripts that show just how often legislators are present in hearings and even engage in discussion, sometimes highly critical of the legislation, before staying silent during the call for a vote. Some legislators say the practice should be changed.

I think it is appropriate for legislators to basically vote yes or vote no, Santa Ana Democratic Sen. Tom Umberg, a former federal prosecutor, recently told CBS News for a story done in collaboration with CalMatters. But, you know, that is the system that we have. Should we change it? Probably.

Assembly Speaker Robert Rivas and Senate President Pro Tem Mike McGuire didnt respond to CalMatters requests to discuss whether the Legislatures rules on voting should change.

Among the bills that died recently from California Democrats not voting were several involving public safety issues. They include a bill that would have prohibited sexually violent predators from being released into communities unless they had a place to live. Another would have increased penalties for property crimes. A third would have made it harder for police to charge people with a crime for filing false complaints against officers.

Another bill that died for lack of votes would restrict the controversial practice of gas and electric utilities from using ratepayer money for political lobbying. Senate Bill 938 was in response to a Sacramento Bee investigation last summer that revealed SoCalGas charged at least $36 million to ratepayers for political lobbying to oppose California policies aimed at addressing the climate crisis.

Environmentalists and utility watchdog groups were outraged, arguing that ratepayers bills should only reflect the cost to deliver electricity or gas to their homes. They said shareholders should foot the bill for political lobbying.

But Sen. Dave Min, a Democrat from Irvine, saw his bill to ban the practice fail in April before the Senate Energy, Utilities and Communications Committee. The committee has 18 members, so the bill needed at least 10 yes votes to advance. In two separate votes, six members of the committee declined to vote. When combined with Republicans no votes, the abstentions were enough to kill Mins bill.

At its April 16 hearing, Democratic Sens. Bill Dodd of Napa and Angelique Ashby from Sacramento questioned whether the legislation would help consumers since lobbying costs represent a small fraction of a utilitys expenses. In the end, they both declined to vote.

Joining them were fellow Democrats Josh Newman, Anna Caballero, Susan Rubio and the committees chairperson, Steven Bradford. Dodds office was the only one to respond to CalMatters interview request.

I respect the author and his intent with the bill, but there were unanswered questions about the impact it would have on grants for fire prevention activities, Dodd said in an emailed statement. So I reserved voting yes or no until those questions were answered.

Several legislators who helped kill the bill banning NDAs from legislative negotiations were also present during that hearing.

The four Democratic Assemblymembers on the elections committee who declined to vote on the NDA ban are Marc Berman of Cupertino, Steve Bennett of Oxnard, Akilah Weber of La Mesa and Matt Haney of San Francisco. Evan Low of Cupertino, whos running for Congress, was absent for the hearing. The absence is recorded on the Legislatures tally of votes the same as the lawmakers who stayed silent. None of them responded to interview requests.

It was a controversial bill in part because it dealt with a scandal about the governor that broke in February when Bloomberg News reported that the Panera Bread chain appeared to be exempt from a new law that raised the states minimum wage to $20 for fast food workers. In the Bloomberg investigation, sources said the Newsom administration sought the exemption to benefit a billionaire Panera Bread franchise owner who is a major Newsom donor.

Learn more about legislators mentioned in this story.

Mike McGuire

Democrat, State Senate, District 2 (Santa Rosa)

Bill Dodd

Democrat, State Senate, District 3 (Napa)

Angelique Ashby

Democrat, State Senate, District 8 (Sacramento)

Anna Caballero

Democrat, State Senate, District 14 (Merced)

Susan Rubio

Democrat, State Senate, District 22 (West Covina)

Josh Newman

Democrat, State Senate, District 29 (Fullerton)

Thomas Umberg

Democrat, State Senate, District 34 (Santa Ana)

Steven Bradford

Democrat, State Senate, District 35 (Inglewood)

Dave Min

Democrat, State Senate, District 37 (Irvine)

Matt Haney

Democrat, State Assembly, District 17 (San Francisco)

Marc Berman

Democrat, State Assembly, District 23 (Palo Alto)

Evan Low

Democrat, State Assembly, District 26 (Cupertino)

Robert Rivas

Democrat, State Assembly, District 29 (Salinas)

Vince Fong

Republican, State Assembly, District 32 (Bakersfield)

Steve Bennett

Democrat, State Assembly, District 38 (Oxnard)

Akilah Weber

Democrat, State Assembly, District 79 (La Mesa)

After KCRA revealed that negotiators working on the minimum wage bill were required to sign NDAs, Republican Assemblymember Vince Fong introduced the bill to ban the practice for legislative negotiations. Labor groups opposed the bill, and business groups were split. Fong, who is running for Congress, didnt return a request for comment.

During the hearing, Assemblymembers Berman and Weber spoke with the bills author, but still declined to vote.

This is an extremely important bill that deals with a very important issue, Weber said in the hearing. She also suggested the bill was drafted too quickly and she had questions about whether or not the bill was too broad.

Gatto, a former Democratic Assemblymember, said it was especially galling that lawmakers refused to vote on the non-disclosure agreement bill, given the legislation itself involves the sanctity of the (legislative) process.

It just feels dirtier somehow, Gatto said.

See more here:
How California Democrats killed a controversial bill without a vote - CalMatters

After eight years leading the Oregon State Treasury, Tobias Read says hes ready to bring a steady hand to the Secretary of States Office.

With two political scandals that led to then-Secretary of State Kate Brown becoming governor after John Kitzhaber resigned in 2015, and Secretary of State Shemia Fagan stepping down last year, and the death of former Republican Secretary of State Dennis Richardson in 2019, Oregon has had six secretaries of state and two acting secretaries over the past decade. Read, a Beaverton Democrat who is term-limited as treasurer, contends hes the states best choice as an experienced administrator to run the office that oversees Oregons elections, audits state government and administers state archives.

Weve gotten to a spot where the office I think has suffered from turnover, and theres really important stuff coming campaign finance reform, to potential ranked choice voting, to just the misinformation and violence that we see in other places and to some extent in Oregon, he said. We can step right in and restore some confidence and capacity in that office and Im well-prepared to do that.

Read will face four other Democratic candidates in the primary: state Sen. James Manning of Eugene, retired attorney Jim Crary, inventor Dave Stauffer and retired electrical engineer Paul D. Wells. The Capital Chronicle is profiling frontrunners Read and Manning and running answers to written questions from the candidates who responded.

Read represented Beaverton in the state House from 2007 until 2017, when he began his first term as treasurer. He ran for governor in 2022, coming in second to now-Gov. Tina Kotek in the Democratic primary.

The secretary of state is first in the line of succession if the governor leaves office which is how Brown initially became governor. Read said he doesnt view the office as a stepping stone and that he hopes to serve two full terms as secretary of state because hes driven by a desire to contribute to making the state a better place.

While the treasurer and secretary of state have different responsibilities, he said the offices are ultimately quite similar. Both involve overseeing large teams 213 full-time employees at the Treasury and 242 at the Secretary of States Office in the current two-year budget cycle and both roles are regulators and administrators.

It is about how to lead an agency and set a culture and make sure that were hiring the kinds of people who are committed to that mission and holding them accountable, and thats what Ive done for seven-plus years, Read said. At the risk of being a little bit flip about it, people have good data on me and my performance and my approach, and I dont imagine that changing, even as the office I hold hopefully does change.

As of early April, he had visited 24 of the 36 county clerks in Oregon and planned to visit the remainder to learn more about how elections are run on the ground and the challenges theyre facing. Throughout Oregon, and the rest of the U.S., local election officials have spent the past several years pushing back against unsubstantiated claims of voter fraud and misinformation about elections, spurred on by former President Donald Trump and his allies.

Read thinks there are relatively inexpensive ways to help voters who have lost trust in elections feel more confident. Washington County, where he lives, is one of several Oregon counties that use BallotTrax to send text messages to voters who opt in, letting them know when their ballots are in the mail, when theyve been received by the clerks office and when election workers have verified the signatures and prepared their ballot to be counted. Not all counties use the system because of its cost, and Read said that would be a good investment for the state to make.

Hes also interested in adopting the ballot ridealong program run in Californias San Benito County. The program, modeled off police ridealongs, allows residents to join election workers as they collect ballots from ballot boxes and return them to election offices.

Oregon has been a national leader in voting access and election turnout for decades, including being the first state in the nation to adopt automatic voter registration in 2015 and universal mail voting in 1998. But its been dinged in recent years for keeping closed partisan primaries and requiring voters to register three weeks before an election, while neighboring Washington and California have primaries that allow voters to choose anyone in a race and allow same-day voter registration.

Same-day registration was allowed in Oregon for a decade, but voters amended the state constitution to ban it after followers of the controversial Indian mystic Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh tried to register in droves to take over Wasco County government in 1984. Read said he doesnt see a chance at changing that law any time soon, but he is interested in a proposal he heard from one county clerk that would extend the statutory deadline to change party affiliation for a primary.

Making it easier for people to vote as they wish I think gives people, particularly people who are newly registered, newly arrived in Oregon, a positive experience, Read said. It means its much more likely theyre going to continue to vote.

Read also wants to speed up the offices investigations of election complaints, saying his work handling unclaimed property at the Treasury is a model for efficiency. The Legislature moved control of the states unclaimed property program from the Department of State Lands to the Treasury in 2019, and Read convinced lawmakers to give him more resources so that state workers could proactively return peoples unclaimed money to them without waiting for Oregonians, who in many cases didnt know they had uncashed checks, security deposits or forgotten bank accounts, to make a claim.

He said he has proven during his years as treasurer that he can advocate for department needs, including hiring more employees at the Treasury. That experience could prove critical as the Secretary of States Office oversees a transition to campaign finance limits ahead of the 2028 election.

When I got to Treasury, we joked that we were emaciated looking up at skinny, Read said. So we convinced the Legislature to give us the authority to do a pretty massive and historic expansion of the capacity of the investment division. They did that because we built a solid case and it has saved money for the entire state.

Read doesnt have specific programs he wants to audit, though he said everyone he talks to has an audit to recommend. What the state really needs, he said, is a clear plan for the Audits Division that avoids politics to focus on assessing risks and vulnerability, especially when it comes to programs that cost the state a lot of money and where lives are at stake.

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Democratic Oregon Treasurer Tobias Read wants to bring stability to Secretary of State's Office Oregon Capital ... - Oregon Capital Chronicle

A former senior official in President Joe Bidens administration and wife of the current U.S. national security adviser is launching a bid for Congress in New Hampshire, where she was born and raised.

Maggie Goodlander, the wife of National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan and a former top lawyer in Bidens administration who served as a deputy assistant attorney general at the Justice Department, on Thursday morning announced her candidacy for the open seat in New Hampshires Second Congressional District.

I know how to get things done and deliver for New Hampshire, Goodlander said in a statement. Ill be a workhorse for the people of the Second District and Ill never stop fighting for a freer and more just Granite State.

While not as well known nationally as her high-profile husband, Goodlander hails from a prominent New Hampshire family.

Her grandfather, Sam Tamposi, was a major player in state Republican politics. Her mother, Betty Tamposi, ran for the House in 1988 in the Second Congressional District but lost in the GOP primary.

The announcement is likely to elevate an already high-profile race to succeed longtime Democratic Rep. Annie Kuster in a blue-leaning, but competitive, district in a key general election battleground state.

Goodlander joins a burgeoning field of candidates aiming to succeed the six-term Kuster, who announced in late March that she would retire from Congress rather than seek re-election.

She could face plenty of scrutiny over Biden administration policies both domestic and international over her ties to Republicans, and over her residency. Goodlanders congressional campaign will also likely draw national attention to the New Hampshire race and possibly garner high-profile endorsements.

Goodlander joins a Democratic primary field that includes Colin Van Ostern, of Concord, and state Sen. Becky Whitley, of Hopkinton.

Whitley, a progressive Democrat who represents the Concord area in the State House, has served in the state Senate since 2020 and has pushed back on attempts to limit abortion rights in the state.

Van Ostern, who worked as Kusters campaign manager in 2010 during her first run for Congress, and who later won two terms as a New Hampshire executive councilor before losing in 2016 to Republican Chris Sununu in a race for governor.

Van Ostern launched his bid the day after Kusters retirement announcement and was endorsed by the incumbent a couple of weeks later.

Goodlanders entry into the race could potentially shift the landscape.

Eight Republicans, including 2022 Senate candidate Vikram Mansharamani and Lily Tang Williams, whos making her second straight bid for the congressional nomination, are running.

Goodlanders campaign announcement highlighted her roots in Nashua, the city her family has called home for over 100 years.

A video announcing her campaign also spotlights those roots, with Goodlanders mother explaining that she gave birth to Maggie after voting in Nashua on Election Day.

But for years, Goodlander and Sullivan have spent much of their time in the nations capital because of work.

The couple owns a home in Portsmouth, New Hampshire. While the port city on the New Hampshire Seacoast is located in the states First Congressional District, the geography wont prevent Goodlander from running in the Second District. The U.S. Constitution only mandates that a candidate must reside in the state in which they are running in, not the specific congressional district.

The most recent high-profile example of a Democratic congressional candidate in New Hampshire campaigning in a district outside their residence was six years ago, when Levi Sanders the son of Sen. Bernie Sanders ran in the First District even though he lived in the Second District.

Goodlanders campaign confirmed that the candidate is currently renting a home in Nashua.

In some ways, Goodlanders story mirrors that of Kuster, the woman shes trying to succeed in Congress. Kusters parents were prominent Republicans in New Hampshire, but she ran as a Democrat.

Goodlander, a Yale University and Yale Law School graduate, served as an intelligence officer in the U.S. Navy Reserve and worked as an adviser to late Senators Joe Lieberman and John McCain on the Senate Homeland Security and Government Affairs Committee.

She also served as a law clerk to Attorney General Merrick Garland during his tenure as chief judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia.

Goodlander married Sullivan nearly nine years ago when he was working as a foreign policy advisor to former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton during her 2016 presidential campaign. The couples wedding, attended by prominent political figures including Clinton, now-Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Sen. Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota, was a snapshot of the couples long history in Democratic politics.

Sullivan worked as Klobuchars chief counsel before serving as an adviser on Hillary Clintons 2008 Democratic presidential primary campaign and later on former President Barack Obamas general election presidential campaign.

He served as deputy chief of staff to Clinton during her years as Secretary of State in the Obama administration. After Clinton departed the administration, Sullivan became then-Vice President Bidens top security aide.

Sullivan then served as a top adviser on Clintons 2016 presidential campaign. Four years later, he was one of Bidens first appointments following the 2020 presidential election.

See more here:
On the Trail: Democrat Maggie Goodlander jumps into race to succeed Kuster - Concord Monitor