Pence to officially enter presidential race today
Former vice-president Mike Pence will later today file paperwork to officially enter the presidential race, ahead of his public launch scheduled for Wednesday in Iowa, the Associated Press reports.
Pence, who served under Donald Trump but fell out with him when the former president pressed him to take part in his plans to disrupt the transfer of power to Joe Biden, will publicly kick off the campaign in Des Moines, Iowa on Wednesday with the release of a video and an in-person event.
Key events
Pence makes presidential bid official
Former vice-president Mike Pence has officially entered the 2024 presidential race, pitting him against his former boss Donald Trump and a host of other candidates including Florida governor Ron DeSantis for the Republican party’s nomination.
The Federal Election Commission’s website shows Pence and his campaign committee, Mike Pence for President located in Carmel, Indiana, officially registering today. The former vice-president will publicly announce the bid on Wednesday in Des Moines, Iowa.
Donald Trump’s lawyers are at the justice department today to argue to top officials that the former president should not be charged over the classified documents found at Mar-a-Lago, the Washington Post reports.
The attorneys at the meeting include John Rowley and James Trusty, who last month sent a letter to attorney general Merrick Garland, asking for a meeting and complaining about the investigation into Trump, which is led by special counsel Jack Smith.
According to the Post, it’s unclear who at the justice department they are meeting today. While it’s not unusual for lawyers of people being investigated to seek a meeting with prosecutors before they decide on filing charges, the attorney general usually does not take part in such meetings, the Post reports.
Pence to officially enter presidential race today
Former vice-president Mike Pence will later today file paperwork to officially enter the presidential race, ahead of his public launch scheduled for Wednesday in Iowa, the Associated Press reports.
Pence, who served under Donald Trump but fell out with him when the former president pressed him to take part in his plans to disrupt the transfer of power to Joe Biden, will publicly kick off the campaign in Des Moines, Iowa on Wednesday with the release of a video and an in-person event.
Trump lawyers visit justice department as special counsel mulls charges over documents – report
CBS News reports that attorneys for Donald Trump are today visiting the justice department as special counsel Jack Smith nears a decision on whether to bring charges over the classified documents found at his Mar-a-Lago resort:
BREAKING: Trump’s lawyers just spotted by @CBSNews entering the Justice Department, per @RobLegare who is on site… comes as sources tell me the special counsel is moving toward a charging decision in the classified documents case
— Robert Costa (@costareports) June 5, 2023
Sources tell @CBSNews that Trump’s lawyers are expected to raise concerns about how prosecutors have handled atty-client questions during the grand jury but there is no sign the special counsel is going to waver from how he and his team have handled the crime-fraud exception…
— Robert Costa (@costareports) June 5, 2023
The Guardian reported last week that Evan Corcoran, a lawyer for the former president, was waved off by Trump’s associates when he asked to search his office at Mar-a-Lago for classified documents, and instead only checked a storage room. When federal agents last August searched the property, the office was one of the areas where the classified documents were found.
In normal times, the ex-governor of a solidly red state would be expected to mount a competitive challenge for the GOP’s presidential nomination.
Not this year, apparently. Former Arkansas governor Asa Hutchinson, who has criticized Donald Trump more harshly than most others on the campaign trail, is nowhere in the polls. Here’s what he had to say about that, and his chances for appearing in the first GOP presidential debate scheduled for 23 August, in an interview with Fox Business:
Fox Business’ Cheryl Casone: “Right now RealClearPolitics has you polling at just about 0.4%. Are you confident that you’re gonna have a spot on the stage for this first debate?”
2024 GOP candidate Asa Hutchinson: “Our polling numbers show higher than that … I will be there.” pic.twitter.com/ydCeerqAnr
— The Recount (@therecount) June 5, 2023
CNN may have deemed Nikki Haley prominent enough to warrant her own town hall, but it’s still tough out there for any Republican trying to take down Donald Trump.
Just take a look at this chart from poll aggregator FiveThirtyEight. Trump is at 53.9% support, compared to Ron DeSantis’s 21.1% – and that’s just for second place. The aggregator has Haley at a depressing 4.5%, below Mike Pence, Trump’s former vice-president who he has fallen out with.
Here’s the moment from the CNN town hall last night when Nikki Haley made her position on a national abortion ban clear – as mud:
CNN’s @jaketapper: “If a six-week [abortion] ban theoretically came to your desk, would you sign it?”
2024 GOP candidate Nikki Haley: “I will answer that when you ask Kamala and Biden if they would agree to 37 weeks, 38 weeks, 39 weeks. Then I’ll answer your question.” pic.twitter.com/d98A6QKtkh
— The Recount (@therecount) June 5, 2023
Her waffling was yet another indication of how Republicans are now struggling with the decision by their conservative appointees on the supreme court to overturn Roe v Wade last year. Though the party has for years pledged to curb abortion access, now that they finally have the legal clearance to do so, they’re finding out that it’s not exactly a winning prospect among voters. Just ask all the GOP candidates who did not get elected in last November’s midterm election.
Though there’s no shortage of alternatives, polls consistently show Donald Trump as the most popular candidate for the Republican presidential nomination. As the Guardian’s Peter Stone reports, those familiar with his rhetoric and proposals are deeply worried about what a second term in the White House would mean for America:
As Donald Trump begins another campaign for the presidency, his extremist rhetoric and lies about the 2020 election signal that in a second term, Trump would attempt to thwart the rule of law at the justice department and other agencies in an effort to expand his power and attack critics.
Former DoJ officials, some Republicans and academics say that if Trump becomes the Republican nominee and is elected again in 2024, he would most likely appoint officials who would reflexively do his bidding, target dissenters he deems part of the “deep state” and mount zealous drives to rein in independent agencies.
Donald Ayer, a former deputy attorney general during the George HW Bush administration, told the Guardian: “Of all the many reasons Donald Trump’s candidacy should be rejected out of hand, none is more important than his utter disdain for the rule of law – the idea that we are a society governed by rules and not by the will of one person.”
When she announced her campaign, Nikki Haley made headlines by calling for mental competency tests for politicians over 75 years old.
Joe Biden and Donald Trump are both past that age, but, like many other Republicans, Haley has mostly directed the criticism at the sitting president.
Here she is on Fox News, implying that Biden wouldn’t make it through another four years in office:
2024 GOP candidate Nikki Haley:
“A vote for President Biden is actually a vote for President Harris. We are running against Kamala Harris … Every liberal knows it, they know it’s Kamala Harris that’s gonna end up being president if Joe Biden wins this election.” pic.twitter.com/gvdYfw3IUH
— The Recount (@therecount) June 5, 2023
Democrats accuse Haley of ‘Maga agenda’
As Nikki Haley made her pitch to Republican voters last night, Democrats sought to remind the public that the former UN ambassador is not as different from Donald Trump as she may say.
“Haley spent an hour and a half doubling down on her Maga agenda – reminding Americans she supports a national abortion ban and ending Social Security and Medicare as we know it,” said Rhyan Lake, a spokesperson for the Democratic National Committee (DNC). “Take it from Team Haley – her extreme, anti-freedom candidacy is just as Maga as the rest of the 2024 GOP field.”
In the town hall, Haley attempted to distance herself from Trump and the January 6 insurrection at the US Capitol, saying, “He thinks it was a beautiful day; I think it was a terrible day.” But the DNC noted she has endorsed election denying Republicans across the country, including Nevada’s Adam Laxalt, and New Hampshire’s Don Bolduc, both failed Senate candidates.
Haley attacked Trump and Ron DeSantis for “not being honest” about the sustainability of social security and medicare, two major government aid programs. But the DNC said she has embraced cuts to the programs proposed by Paul Ryan, a former Republican speaker of the House. “Haley has been shamelessly campaigning to end Social Security and Medicare as we know it — which would hurt hard working families and seniors across the country.”
Haley stays vague on abortion, attacks Trump, DeSantis at town hall
Good morning, US politics blog readers. We heard more from presidential candidate Nikki Haley at a CNN-hosted town hall last night, who, like all Republicans not named Donald Trump, has a tough hill to climb to overcome the party’s frontrunner for the nomination. She criticized both the former president (also her ex-boss, since she worked as his UN ambassador) and Ron DeSantis, the Florida governor who is viewed as the next-best contender. But in some ways, Haley is more like Trump than she lets on. Pressed about her stance on abortion, she wouldn’t say what sort of restrictions on the procedure she would support, only that she’d aim to get some sort of legislation through Congress. That sounds a lot like the former president, who has demurred on saying whether he’d sign a national ban. Expect to hear more reactions to Haley’s town hall appearance as today goes on.
Here’s what else is going on today:
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Joe Biden will host Denmark’s prime minister Mette Frederiksen at the White House at 1.30pm eastern time, then Super Bowl Champions the Kansas City Chiefs three hours later.
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White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre will talk to reporters, who will talk back to her, at 1.45pm.
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There were no survivors from a plane that crashed in Virginia on Sunday after flying over Washington DC’s restricted airspace, causing the military to scramble jets and a sonic boom heard across the region.