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Rep. Michael McCaulMichael Thomas McCaulRepublican taps CNN reporter to investigate Biden's Afghanistan withdrawal Blinken grilled in first hearing since Afghanistan withdrawal Sunday shows preview: Biden issues new vaccine mandates; House committee marks up .5T reconciliation bill MORE (R-Texas) has hired a formerCNN journalist to serve as an investigatorforthe House Foreign Affairs Committee as it probes President BidenJoe BidenNewsom easily beats back recall effort in California Second senior official leaving DHS in a week Top Republican: General told senators he opposed Afghanistan withdrawal MORE's withdrawal of troops from Afghanistan this summer.

The journalist, Ryan Browne,has workedfor CNNsince 2015 covering the Pentagon and international security matters. He has reported from countries across the Middle Eastand was embedded as a contractor adviser to the Afghan National Army from 2011 to 2013 before joining CNN.

"I look forward to putting together a comprehensive, independent and facts-driven investigation,Browne said in a statement issued through McCaul's office.

It is crucial we discover what led to the chaos of the emergency evacuation, and examine the administrations failed efforts to evacuate all American citizens, green card holders, local allies and other vulnerable Afghans fearing reprisals from the Taliban," he added.

McCaul and other Republicans grilled Secretary of State Antony BlinkenAntony BlinkenTop Republican: General told senators he opposed Afghanistan withdrawal Overnight Defense & National Security Details of Trump's final days prompt call to fire Milley Senate lawmakers let frustration show with Blinken MORE on Monday about the troop withdrawal.McCaul,the top Republican on the Foreign Affairs Committee, said he appreciated Blinkentestifying butaddedthe secretary "once again provided us with little to no new information."

What we saw in Afghanistan was a systemic failure of the federal government that led to the chaos and horrific devastation,McCaul said in the statement.That resulted in the death of 13 American service members and the abandonment of American citizens, green card holders, and our Afghan partners in a country controlled by a brutal terrorist organization."

Blinken defended the Biden administration's response, including its failure to predict how quickly the Taliban would overtake the county after the U.S. withdrawal.

Nothing I or anyone else saw indicated a collapse of the government and the security forces in 11 days, Blinken told lawmakers. This unfolded more quickly than we anticipated, including in the intelligence community.

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Republican taps CNN reporter to investigate Biden's Afghanistan withdrawal | TheHill - The Hill

The right-wing backlash against the coronavirus vaccines has forced Republican politicians to make an agonizing choice. On the one hand, public health and public opinion both militate strongly in favor of vaccination. On the other hand, a vocal segment of their own base demands resistance.

Most have tried to navigate the fine line between these competing pressures by formally endorsing the vaccine as a personal choice while loudly standing up for the rights of vaccine refusers. Ron DeSantis, the partys leading choice to lead it should Donald Trump decide not to run, exemplifies the careful balance. On Monday, DeSantis announced tough new measures to punish any city or county in Florida that requires its public employees to receive a vaccine, with a $5,000 fine per infraction.

At his press conference, DeSantis stood beside a man who claimed the vaccine changes your RNA, a completely false anti-vaxx talking point. You could tell DeSantis knew this immediately. As soon as the line was uttered, he looked down at the ground, then nervously thrust his left hand into his pocket. His careful work to frame the issue entirely as a matter of rights was suddenly going up in flames:

After this uncomfortable moment, DeSantis still had a choice. He had a turn to speak afterward, and could have explicitly denounced the dangerous, paranoid nonsense that had just been circulated with his imprimatur. But to do so would have been to alienate a crucial constituency. The DeSantis game is to bring along anti-vaxxers without explicitly attaching himself to their most toxic beliefs. They could babble about RNA and Bill Gates all they wished offstage; onstage, the message would be relentlessly focused on the abstract issue of peoples rights.

The forces that brought DeSantis and his party to this pitiable position were roughly twofold. First, the Republican Party has developed a growing skepticism of scientific authority over time. Fifty years ago, Republicans actually trusted scientists more than Democrats did, but the conservative movements attacks on science (especially the varieties of science that implied the need for regulation of pollution or consumer goods) hardened into an institutionalized skepticism; the first COVID skeptics out of the gate were disproportionately drawn from climate-science skeptics.

Second, Trumps panicked response to the coronavirus was to deny it altogether. Once Trump decided the pandemic was a hoax designed to sabotage his reelection, his followers embraced that view, from which it naturally followed that every measure putatively aimed at containing the pandemic was described as unnecessary or harmful.

Republican Party elites found anti-vaxx sentiment embarrassing and unhelpful. Most of them have endorsed the vaccine as a choice, with varying levels of enthusiasm. Yet they have found themselves stuck with an anti-vaxx core too large to risk alienating. This has set off the same kind of finely parsed calculation that they employed to respond to various Trumpian outrages.

Their answer has always been to find a way to avoid defending the indefensible and instead change the question to the excesses of the other side. Was Trumps recorded confession of sexual assault morally acceptable? Who knows? But they did know that Hillary Clintons socialist schemes werent. Was it okay for Trump to strong-arm a foreign government into ginning up a scandal against his opponent? That didnt matter the real issue was the unfairness of the impeachment proceedings, held in a basement, and so forth.

DeSantis had perfected the art of anti-anti-anti-vaxx politics. He had given the jab his official endorsement, yet day after day he sent signals that he would defend the rights of anti-vaxxers. If necessary, DeSantis would trample traditional conservative principles to do so. Conservative Republicans normally respect freedom of contract, but DeSantis used his power to prohibit cruise lines from requiring their passengers be vaccinated. Conservative Republicans also dont generally treat government employment as a sacrosanct right, but here he was insisting, We are gonna stand for the men and women who are serving us. We are gonna protect Florida jobs. Nor do they generally approve of state authority overriding local control of schools, unless that authority is being used to prohibit mask requirements.

The gambit works in theory, as long as everybody can stay on message. The problem with the theory is that hardly anybody actually cares about the abstract principles that DeSantis is claiming to defend. The idea that bodily autonomy trumps personal responsibility, property rights, and local control is a hierarchy of values invented for this circumstance. (My body, my choice is not a notable Republican slogan.) The real point is to signal political solidarity with anti-vaxxers, to show that he believes their views are deserving of respect.

The trouble is that his message that anti-vaxxers have a legitimate point of view has the effect of legitimizing their message. Whats more, getting the anti-vaxxers to stick to the approved talking points is tricky, given the notorious difficulty kooks have with message discipline. Putting a kook in front of a microphone and asking him not to share with the world the evidence of the dubious conspiracy hes uncovered is to demand an unrealistic level of impulse control.

Once a political partys percentage of kooks has risen above a certain threshold, its no longer practical to kick them out. They must instead be placated. It is a constant process of papering over distinctions to avoid an internal schism that would enrage the kooks. The Republican Party didnt set out to position itself with vaccine skeptics. But they have found themselves, once again, standing shoulder to shoulder with the absurd, looking down at their feet and pretending it isnt happening.

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DeSantis and the Agony of the Anti-Anti-Anti-Vaxx Republican - New York Magazine

Im old enough to remember when the Republican party stood for limited government and Ronald Reagan thundered Government is not the solution to our problem, government is the problem.

Todays Republican party, while still claiming to stand for limited government, is practicing just the opposite: government intrusion everywhere.

Republican lawmakers are banning masks in schools. Iowa, Tennessee, Utah, Texas, Florida, Arkansas, Oklahoma, Arizona and South Carolina are prohibiting public schools from requiring students wear them.

Republican states are on the way to outlawing abortions. Texas has just banned abortions after six weeks of pregnancy, before many women even know theyre pregnant. Other Republican states are on the way to enacting similar measures.

Republican lawmakers are forbidding teachers from telling students about Americas racist past. State legislatures from Tennessee to Idaho are barring all references to racism in the classroom.

Republican legislators are forcing transgender students to play sports and use bathrooms according to their assigned gender at birth. Thirty-three states have introduced more than 100 bills aimed at curbing the rights of transgender people.

Across the country, Republican lawmakers are making it harder for people to vote. So far, theyve enacted more than 30 laws that reduce access to polling places, number of days for voting and availability of absentee voting.

This is not limited government, folks. To the contrary, these Republican lawmakers have a particular ideology, and they are now imposing those views and values on citizens holding different views and values.

This is big government on steroids.

Many Republican lawmakers use the word freedom to justify what theyre doing. Thats rubbish. What theyre really doing is denying people their freedom freedom to be safe from Covid, freedom over their own bodies, freedom to learn, freedom to vote and participate in our democracy.

Years ago, the Republican party had a coherent idea about limiting the role of government and protecting the rights of the individual. I disagreed with it, as did much of the rest of America. But at least it was honest, reasoned and consistent. As such, Republicans played an important part in a debate over what we wanted for ourselves and for America.

Today, Republican politicians have no coherent view. They want only to be re-elected, even if that means misusing government to advance a narrow and increasingly anachronistic set of values intruding on the most intimate aspects of life, interfering in what can be taught and learned, risking the publics health, banning whats necessary for people to exercise their most basic freedoms.

This is not mere hypocrisy. The Republican party now poses a clear and present threat even to the values it once espoused.

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Republicans once called government the problem now they want to run your life - The Guardian

Event Recap ByAngie Gou on Sep 14, 2021 at 5:51 pm

Elizabeth Prelogar giving her opening statements before the Senate Judiciary Committee during her nomination hearing.

Elizabeth Prelogar, President Joe Bidens nominee to be solicitor general, sat through a swift nomination hearing on Tuesday afternoon. Appearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee, she was met with strong praise from Democrats, limited pushback from Republicans, and few questions overall.

From Bidens inauguration on Jan. 20 until her nomination to the position of solicitor general on Aug. 11, Prelogar served as acting solicitor general. Due to a quirk in the Federal Vacancies Reform Act, she had to step down from her acting role while the Senate considers her nomination to hold the position on a permanent basis. The solicitor general represents the federal governments interests before the Supreme Court and is sometimes known as the 10th justice because of the influence that the job carries.

Two Republicans homed in on the solicitor generals office for reversing the governments legal position in a number of cases since the change in administrations. Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, quoted from a Bloomberg Law article that the Biden administration is on track to reverse the governments position in more cases before the Supreme Court than the Justice Department did during the first full high court term of Donald Trumps presidency. Grassley questioned Prelogar on whether continuing in a similar vein would pose challenges to the offices credibility.

With Prelogar as its acting head, the office changed the positions held by the Trump administration in high-profile cases such as California v. Texas (in which the office defended the Affordable Care Act), Cedar Point Nursery v. Hassid (in which the office sided with union organizers in a clash with property owners), and Terry v. United States (in which the office supported sentencing reductions for certain crack-cocaine offenders). Both Grassley and Sen. Tom Cotton, R-Ark., criticized Prelogar for her role in the shifting positions.

Prelogar affirmed that each change in position was taken after careful consideration. She noted that the office sought views from all federal agencies with stakes in each case being considered to understand the interests of the government, and it asked for recommendations from government litigators to ensure that the office reached its best understanding of the law. We have a very well-established process in the solicitor generals office of soliciting views far and wide, she said. Luckily I did not have to sit there on my own and try to figure it out.

Prelogar has received broad support from throughout the legal community, including in a letter endorsing her nomination from former solicitors general from both Democratic and Republican administrations. If confirmed by the Senate, she would be the second woman to hold the job on a permanent basis.

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Prelogar sails through nomination hearing with only mild Republicans critiques - SCOTUSblog

Californias recall election has understandably dominated headlines, but there are two other gubernatorial elections this November that might tell us more about the national environment: Virginia and New Jersey.

To be sure, President Joe Biden carried both of these states by double-digit margins in 2020, and neither state has been terribly hospitable to Republicans since former President Trump won the 2016 election. But in recent weeks, Bidens approval rating has taken a sizable hit as the situation in Afghanistan has deteriorated and the delta variant of COVID-19 has complicated his efforts to steer the country out of the pandemic. In fact, Bidens approval rating has fallen to about its lowest point (about 46 percent), while his disapproval rating is up to 49 percent, according to FiveThirtyEights presidential approval tracker. The upshot is that Bidens worsening ratings could improve the GOPs chances of winning these gubernatorial races, particularly in Virginia, which is a more competitive state than New Jersey and doesnt have an incumbent seeking reelection. Here is the state of play in these two elections a little less than two months before November:

Virginia has looked like a blue state recently because Biden won the state by 10 percentage points and Democrats have won 13 consecutive statewide races dating back to 2012, but its really more of a purple state with a bluish hue. In 2017, Democratic Gov. Ralph Northam won the state by 9 points in a Democratic-leaning political environment with an unpopular Republican president in office. But now with a somewhat unpopular Democrat in the White House, the pendulum could swing back enough to give Virginia Republicans a real chance at victory.

Virginia prohibits elected governors from seeking consecutive terms, meaning Northam cant run again this year, but Democrats may have a slight incumbency advantage with nominee Terry McAuliffe: He previously won the governorship in 2013 when Barack Obama was president breaking a streak dating back to 1977 whereby the party in the White House lost the Virginia governors race. However, Republican nominee Glenn Youngkin has been able to use his personal wealth to stay even in the fundraising race with McAuliffe, who has a track record of raising huge sums. This means that the biggest challenge for Youngkin is not whether he can match McAuliffe in fundraising, but whether he can balance appealing to the GOP base without repelling suburban voters in the states metropolitan areas, which hell need to win statewide in November.

And the polls at this point suggest the race is pretty close. While McAuliffe has led every nonpartisan survey so far, his edge among likely voters has ranged from very competitive to not so competitive (anywhere from 2 to 9 points) since early August. Unfortunately, there hasnt been much polling released since Bidens approval rating dropped sharply in mid-to-late August, so its hard to know how much of a factor that might be, but we do have one high-quality poll from late August by Monmouth University that found McAuliffe ahead by just 5 points, 47 percent to 42 percent, among registered voters. Monmouths poll also showed how much turnout could matter in November, as its likely voter results had McAuliffe leading by 2 to 7 points. Our most recent poll, though, is an early-September survey conducted by WPA Intelligence on behalf of Youngkins campaign, and this survey found the race tied and Youngkin ahead by 2 points when progressive third-party candidate Princess Blanding was included as a choice. To be sure, internal polls should be taken with a grain of salt, but given Bidens recent drop in approval, it wouldnt be a shock if Youngkin were, in fact, running neck-and-neck with McAuliffe.

Its unclear whether Bidens drop in approval will stick, but another reason this race is a good proxy for the 2022 midterms is that the race has featured many of the same issues weve seen pop up lately in national politics. For instance, there have already been a number of conflicts over how best to combat the coronavirus, with McAuliffe backing vaccine and mask mandates and Youngkin opposed to such mandates even though he has said he wants people to get vaccinated and that those who want to wear masks should do so. Monmouths poll suggests, though, that most Virginians approve of the state requiring students, teachers and staff to wear masks at schools (67 percent), and a slim majority also backed vaccine mandates for children of all ages to attend school in person (52 percent), so this will be an early test of how much the different parties stances on handling the pandemic affects voters choices.

This election will also serve as an indication of how toxic Trumps brand remains in Virginia. Trump garnered only about 44 percent of Virginias vote in both 2016 and 2020 the lowest presidential vote shares for a Republican in the once-red state since 1968. Unsurprisingly, McAuliffe has repeatedly tried to connect Youngkin to the former president, including by attacking Youngkin over the Republican nominees calls for more voting restrictions following Trumps unfounded claims of election fraud, and by arguing that, like Trump, Youngkin isnt taking the coronavirus seriously.

Meanwhile, Youngkin has tried to hone in on critical race theory a decades-old academic concept that asserts the existence of systemic racism which has become a favorite boogeyman of conservatives. As such, Youngkin has promised to ban the teaching of critical race theory from Virginia schools (despite little evidence its actually being taught), which he hopes will hurt Democrats support in key suburban communities like Loudoun County, where there have been high-profile anti-critical race theory protests at school board meetings, though the county denies teaching the theory. And a Roanoke College poll from early August suggests that Virginian voters might be concerned about critical race theory. The poll found that slightly more Virginian voters (47 percent) familiar with critical race theory had an unfavorable view of it than a favorable view (40 percent). Youngkin has also argued that McAuliffe did a poor job of handling crime as governor and that the Democratic nominee has the support of groups that want to defund the police amid a national environment where violent crime rose in 2020. And it seems as if McAuliffe may view this as a potential weakness, as hes already run an ad featuring endorsements from law enforcement officials, who attacked Youngkin over proposed budget cuts that could reduce funding for public safety.

Ultimately, what happens in Virginia come November will be a test of just how blue the state is, with possible repercussions for the 2022 midterms. Should McAuliffe win despite Bidens sliding approval rating, that could signal that the Old Dominion really is the Blue Dominion. But if Youngkin wins, that would be evidence that Virginia remains competitive enough that, under favorable conditions, Republicans can still win statewide.

Meanwhile, in New Jersey, incumbent Democratic Gov. Phil Murphy is seeking a second term, but at this point, it seems that Murphys Republican opponent, former state Assemblyman Jack Ciattarelli, will need a lot more help from the national environment in order to defeat Murphy. New Jersey is a bluer state than Virginia Biden won it by about 16 points in 2020 and Murphy is a relatively popular incumbent.

Here, too, the most recent nonpartisan poll of the race comes from Monmouth University (in the schools home state), which found Murphy ahead of Ciattarelli by 16 points among registered voters in mid-August. In its two different likely voter scenarios, Monmouth gave Murphy a lead of 11 or 19 points. Moreover, the survey also found 54 percent of voters approved of Murphys job performance compared with only 36 percent who disapproved. But this poll was conducted before Bidens sharp downturn in approval, so its possible conditions may have shifted somewhat, although still probably not as much as in Virginia.

The only other recent poll weve seen comes from Republican outfit Fabrizio, Lee & Associates, which found Murphy ahead only by 1 to 2 points in a survey on behalf of the conservative Club for Growth PAC. And while the same caveats about internal polls in Virginia apply here, the result is far afield from nonpartisan polling, suggesting further polling is needed to see if the race has changed. (For instance, a June poll from Fairleigh Dickinson University found Murphy up 15 points.) In fact, a better indication that this race is competitive will be whether Club for Growth spends on behalf of Ciattarelli in the coming weeks.

And Ciattarelli could use some outside financial support, too. We havent seen new fundraising numbers since before the June primary, but Murphy led Ciattarelli by nearly $2 million and he also had a massive edge in fundraising by outside groups, as Murphys allies at New Direction for New Jersey raised $13.6 million, far more than the nearly $250,000 raised by Ciattarellis ally Fix NJ Now. Murphy might have had an even bigger financial advantage if he could self-fund, but hes accepted public financing for his campaign, which greatly limits personal spending. Still, Republicans are hoping to portray the wealthy former Goldman Sachs executive as an out-of-touch elite. Last month, for instance, the Republican Governors Association ran an ad criticizing Murphy for going on vacation at his Italian villa despite a surge in the delta variant of COVID-19. Meanwhile, Ciattarelli is a lifelong resident of the state, which he has tried to use to his advantage, arguing that hes the real New Jerseyan, since Murphy grew up in Massachusetts. As such, Ciattarellis first general-election ad attacked Murphy for a 2019 comment in which the governor said that if youre a one-issue voter and the tax rate is your issue, were probably not your state, which Ciattarelli argues is a sign Murphy is too rich to care about the state. Taxes could be an opening for Ciattarelli, too, as 32 percent of voters named property taxes as a key issue facing New Jersey in Monmouths poll.

Yet the same Monmouth poll found 41 percent of voters were especially concerned about COVID-19 their top issue in a list of more than 20 and Murphys handling of the pandemic has received positive reviews. The poll found 61 percent of voters felt he had done a good job of dealing with the coronavirus, while only 28 percent said hed done a bad job. Additionally, 46 percent of voters said they trusted Murphy more than Ciattarelli to handle the pandemic, compared with just 21 percent who preferred Ciattarelli on the issue (17 percent said theyd handle it equally well). Ciattarelli, for his part, has tried to dampen Murphys edge on handling COVID-19 by attacking the governor over nursing home deaths due to the disease.

But for Ciattarelli to have a real chance, he will have to win over a large chunk of the 37 percent of New Jerseyans who are independent voters, compared with the 39 percent who are Democrats and the 22 percent who are Republicans. And at this point, Murphy leads with independents, per Monmouth. Whether Ciattarelli will be able to make inroads with this group is unclear, too. The plurality of independent voters (37 percent) named COVID-19 as a top issue, which Murphy polls well on, and Ciattarelli, who once had a reputation as an old-school Republican in the state legislature, may alienate independent voters by doubling down on his partys Trumpist base. For instance, Ciattarelli opposes Murphys mask mandate for children in schools and has falsely stated that masks hinder childrens development, although Monmouths poll found 67 percent of New Jersey voters support their states mask mandate.

Of the two gubernatorial elections this fall, New Jersey is definitely the undercard event. Yet, while New Jersey is a bluer state than Virginia, Murphy would be the first Democratic governor to win reelection since Brendan Byrne in 1977. To stop Murphy from pulling this off, Ciattarelli likely needs Bidens standing to worsen and some of his attacks against Murphy to stick.

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Why A Republican Might Win In Virginias Governor Race, And How New Jerseys Race Could Get Tighter - FiveThirtyEight