2 h. ago CNN analyst says Trump looking at ways to outlaw Democratic party

Concerns rise after White House calls opposition party an ‘extremist organisation’

Politics

13 h. ago Americans have 400 days to save their democracy | Timothy Garton Ash

I never thought I’d see fear spread so far and fast. Next year’s midterm elections are now crucial for the Democratic party – and for democrats everywhereI return to Europe from the US with a clear conclusion: American democrats (lowercase d) have 400 days to start saving US democracy. If next autumn’s midterm elections produce a Congress that begins to constrain Donald Trump there will then be a further 700 days to prepare the peaceful transfer of executive power that alone will secure the future of this republic. Operation Save US Democracy, stages 1 and 2.Hysterical hyperbole? I would love to think so. But during seven weeks in the US this summer, I was shaken every day by the speed and executive brutality of President Trump’s assault on what had seemed settled norms of US democracy and by the desperate weakness of resistance to that assault. There’s a growing body of international evidence to suggest that once a liberal democracy has been eroded, it’s very difficult to restore i...

Politics

7 d. ago Wisconsin legislative feud erupts in public with lawmaker accused of threatening fellow legislators

A Wisconsin legislator has left the state Assembly's Democratic caucus after being accused by fellow party members of threatening to kill three lawmakers

Events

9 d. ago Japan PM Shigeru Ishiba to resign amid fallout from disastrous elections

Public broadcaster says prime minister has made decision to avoid divide within his Liberal Democratic partyJapan’s prime minister, Shigeru Ishiba, is to resign less than a year after taking office, throwing the country’s politics into turmoil and setting in motion a potentially messy contest to replace him as leader of the ruling Liberal Democratic party (LDP).The softly spoken centrist has presided over two disastrous elections since being elected to lead the LDP last autumn. In October, the party and its junior coalition partner Komeito lost their majority in the lower house and met the same fate in upper house elections this July. Continue reading...

Politics

2 w. ago Martin Smyth was an MP of ‘integrity and Christian principle’, service told

The former Ulster Unionist MP for South Belfast and Orange Order grand master died last week at the age of 94.

Politics

2 w. ago Democrats in damage control crisis as Gaza famine worsens and public turns on party support for Israeli offensive

The response to two very different interviews with Democrats linked to the party’s unpopular 2024 position on Gaza reveals much about 2028, writes John Bowden

Politics

3 w. ago Democratic leaders withdraw measure clarifying the party position on the Israel

The Democratic National Committee leadership has withdrawn a measure that would have clarified the party’s position on the Israel-Hamas war

Politics

3 w. ago The Guardian view on protests in Serbia: a battle for democracy that the EU must not ignore | Editorial

An authoritarian crackdown on mass demonstrations in an EU candidate country requires a stronger response from BrusselsDuring a summer in which European leaders have focused on shuttle diplomacy with Donald Trump over trade and Ukraine, they have maintained a discreet silence regarding another crisis in Europe’s east. For more than nine months, mass student-led protests in Serbia have been challenging the authoritarian rule of Aleksandar Vučić, who has been in office as prime minister and president for 11 years. Up to now, Brussels has largely opted to look away.The catalyst for some of the largest demonstrations in Serbia’s history was the collapse of a newly renovated railway station roof in the country’s second city, Novi Sad, leading to the deaths of 16 people. The disaster was widely attributed to entrenched fraud and corruption presided over by Mr Vučić’s ruling Serbian Progressive party, and swiftly became the spark for a movement for democratic reform. The students are deman...

Events

3 w. ago The Democrats are in deep trouble in the US – and Labour is on the way to joining them | Nesrine Malik

When millions of once-loyal supporters become disillusioned with a party, there can only be one result: electoral disasterThe measure of a political party’s failure lies not in how many agnostics and opponents it fails to convert, but in how many loyalists it fails to preserve. The endorsement of new, unnatural voters – Latinos in the US for Donald Trump, or Tories voting for Labour for the first time – might deliver big electoral swings but is ultimately not sticky. And these votes are only meaningful if the bedrock is solid. That bedrock is the people who consistently show up, no matter what, from generation to generation, for a party. And the Democrats are losing them.In extensive research published last week tracking voter registration, the New York Times identified an alarming pattern. The Democratic party has been “haemorrhaging” voters since way before election day. In the states that track voter registration by political party, Democrats lost to Republicans in all of them in...

Politics

3 w. ago Zohran Mamdani leads in fundraising for New York City mayoral contest

The Democratic nominee far outpaces former governor Andrew Cuomo and embattled incumbent Eric AdamsZohran Mamdani pulled in almost double the funds of his nearest rivals for New York City mayor between early July and mid-August, as the candidates prepare for the crucial post Labor Day push to the November poll.New York’s City’s campaign finance board said on Saturday that the democratic socialist, who won the Democratic party nomination in June against former state governor Andrew Cuomo, raised $1,051,200, with an average donation of $121 recorded equally from donors in and outside the state. Continue reading...

Politics

3 w. ago Labour Party membership falls by almost 200,000 in five years

Figures published on Thursday showed the party’s membership was 333,235 at the end of last year – well down on its 532,046 members at the end of

Politics

4 w. ago Republicans want to rig the midterm elections. Will they succeed? | Moira Donegan

The Republican party has already shown that its commitment to democratic elections is paper thinIf one mark of an autocratic regime is the meaningfulness of elections, you can make an argument that the United States has been backsliding away from a properly democratic form of government for a long time. In 2013’s Shelby county decision, the US supreme court gutted the 1965 Voting Rights Act, clearing the way for states to impose a slew of restrictions on the franchise that were previously banned as part of an effort to prevent the re-establishment of Jim Crow; voting quickly became more burdensome and onerous in many Republican-controlled states.Three years before, in Citizens United, the same court declared that corporate money counted as political speech, thereby opening the floodgates on money in politics in ways that allowed the rich to distort public discourses ahead of elections. Donald Trump memorably tried to interfere with the 2020 census so that it would count as few of th...

Politics