Away from the back-and-forth of the campaign trail, thousands of students are taking part in pro-Palestinian encampment-style protests at more than 50 university campuses across the US

Hello, and welcome to the Guardian’s brand new US election newsletter.

Here’s what you need to know …

1. Trump’s mouth gets him further into debt

Donald Trump already owes $454m as a result of his civil fraud case in New York, and has been ordered to pay $88.3m to E Jean Carroll over a defamation lawsuit. Given Trump struggled to find the money for the former, the last thing he needed was to be fined $9,000 in his New York criminal trial, after he attacked witnesses online. Could the judge give him jail time if he does it again?

2. Biden’s banter bus

“The 2024 election is in full swing and yes, age is an issue,” Joe Biden said at the White House Correspondents’ Association dinner on Saturday. “I’m a grown man running against a six-year-old.” The joke continued Biden’s transition from grownup-in-the-room to Burn King in Chief, with the president and his campaign increasing their mocking attacks on Trump’s golf game, finances and mental aptitude.

Could student protesters turn the 2024 election?

Tensions on university campuses, already high as a wave of pro-Palestinian encampment-style protests sweeps the US, got even higher overnight.

The protests, which have seen students pitch tents or occupy buildings at Columbia, Harvard, the University of Pennsylvania and others, began as an effort to get universities to ditch investments in companies which provide weapons and equipment to the Israeli military.

  • Snot FlickermanEnglish
    1•2 months ago

    Forgive me on the details, re: Garland. I have cancer and the meds make my memory and mind go a little wonky sometimes. I’m pretty sure you understood what I meant, despite the mistake.

    1. Impeachment isn’t the same as a criminal investigation, and Garland still waited two years until the ex-President had become so criminally belligerent. He could have started on day one, and he chose not to.

    2. We simply don’t agree on “the consequences of doing it.” You think it’s a lot more dangerous than I do, it’s as simple as that. I don’t think prosecuting criminals for crime is really that hard of an issue when the whole point of this damn system is for these folks to represent us and our interests. Sorry that we disagree on the far reaching consequences. “You get no credibility to me from simply yelling it must be different without being part of the change and accepting the consequences.” Okay, we both see different consequences unfolding, so obviously I am accepting the consequences and you’re being fucking obtuse. The fact that you view this as “Only I am smart enough to know the consequences” speaks loudly of how condescending you’ve been this whole time. You have also failed to detail these far reaching consequences that are so fucking dangerous.

    3. Sorry I don’t have a plan. I have cancer and meds that cost $18.3K a month without insurance. You want me to be in charge of the plan? I’m in my forties and have cancer in a country that’s happy to let me die. I’m about to be a fucking statistic in “youth” cancer deaths. I’ve got my own fucking problems. I’m a voting citizen and I get to voice my opinion. I’m not required to hop and skip out of the fucking cancer ward to save the world.

    4. “You understand that you and I and everyone alive right now has enjoyed almost 50 years of some of the highest standard of living on the planet.” Yes I do understand that after WWII we were the only country that hadn’t had our infrastructure bombed to living fuck-all and we were in a unique position to get a stranglehold on the world economy, and that included Reagan supporting coups in South America to get friendly dictators installed so we could exploit the living shit out of them for our gain. I don’t exactly feel good about that history, and frankly, neither should you. It was a fluke on the worldwide stage and our shithole country is spiraling into stagnation because we never had a plan beyond exploiting the third world. We’re losing that high standard of living right the fuck now, despite the Democrats “doing the right thing.” Amazon is literally about to sue the NLRB out of existence! Literally fuck-none of that has anything to do with Presidential immunity other than proving we need to be able to prosecute Presidents for crimes like that. I don’t care how great our quality of life has been if it’s been at the expense of other countries and their democracies. America isn’t the center of the fucking universe. The amount of times it has been abused is too god damned high.

    All I hope is that if Trump wins, your defense of doing it “the right way” comes back to haunt you when the brownshirts come for us all. Having chosen the “lawful good” path won’t save you once Trump is in charge.

    • partial_accumen
      2•2 months ago

      Forgive me on the details, re: Garland. I have cancer and the meds make my memory and mind go a little wonky sometimes. I’m pretty sure you understood what I meant, despite the mistake.

      First, I’m very sorry to hear about your cancer, and I hope your treatment ends soon with your cancer in remission. I’m crossing my fingers for you.

      Go fuck yourself, I’ve got my own fucking problems. I’m a voting citizen and I get to voice my opinion, chucklefuck. I’m not required to hop and skip out of the fucking cancer ward to save the world.

      Second, you go fuck yourself. You’re doing it again where you’re doubling down on this being someone else’s problem to solve. Sure you have a voice and an opinion, and instead of facing the truths of what you’re proposing you’re saying it someone else’s responsibility to come up with a perfect solution and implement it. I’m confident you’ll be there at the conclusion of said plan calling out how shitty it was because it didn’t do everything. Yes, you have cancer, are you’re trying to use that as a free pass to stand on a hill of moral superiority by pointing out a problem and calling everyone else assholes for not solving it to your liking? Those close to me that have (or have had) cancer told me when they found out they had cancer they didn’t want to be pitied and treated differently. They wanted to be treated just like everyone else that didn’t have cancer. I’m going to show you respect and assume you’re the same.

      If you want me to pull my punches and let your weak arguments stand unopposed because you have cancer, just let me know. I’ll respect that choice of yours too.

      We simply don’t agree on “the consequences of doing it.” You think it’s a lot more dangerous than I do, it’s as simple as that. I don’t think prosecuting criminals for crime is really that hard of an issue when the whole point of this damn system is for these folks to represent us and our interests.

      I agree we are in different places on where the end result of this would be. The problem isn’t so much convicting the criminal today, its what that conviction does to the office of the President forever into the future. I’m not saying this to say we shouldn’t do something, but that it isn’t about the orange guy today, its about what it means to everyone else after he’s convicted.

      The fact that you view this as “Only I am smart enough to know the consequences” speaks loudly of how much of a condescending ass you’ve been this whole time.

      Nope, not “only I”. Apparently all of the leaders of our government for the last 50 years too.

      Sorry I don’t have a plan. I have cancer and meds that cost $18.5K a month without insurance. You want me to be in charge of the plan?

      In charge? No, a participant? Yes. No one is asking you to lead the team, but if you want to play the game you’ve at least got to be on the field, not just a spectator in the stands.

      “You understand that you and I and everyone alive right now has enjoyed almost 50 years of some of the highest standard of living on the planet.”

      Yes I do understand that after WWII we were the only country that hadn’t had our infrastructure bombed to living fuck-all and we were in a unique position to get a stranglehold on the world economy

      I’m not talking about post-WWII Truman era. I’m talking about Nixon and his crimes. Thats what we were talking about.

      and that included Reagan supporting coups in South America to get friendly dictators installed so we could exploit the living shit out of them for our gain. I don’t exactly feel good about that history, and frankly, neither should you. It was a fluke on the worldwide stage and our shithole country is spiraling into stagnation because we never had a plan beyond exploiting the third world.

      I don’t feel good about that, but thats a different argument that doesn’t have anything to do with Trump or Nixon.

      We’re losing that high standard of living right the fuck now, despite the Democrats “doing the right thing.” Amazon is literally about to sue the NLRB out of existence!

      And Starbucks tried to do something similar being anti-union, and got smacked down. We now have unions at Starbucks locations all over the place. If you look, you’ll always find ugly battlefields. I’m not telling you to stop looking, but understand the battle isn’t over, and it could result in a win for the good guys like when Starbucks lost against unions, like when Jim Johns lost against the FTC this week and unilaterally destroyed predatory companies from using Non-compete agreements. source

      All I hope is that if Trump wins, your defense of doing it “the right way” comes back to haunt you when the brownshirts come for us all. Having chosen the “lawful good” path won’t save you once Trump is in charge.

      So you want the worst to happen if you lose an argument? How does that help anyone?

      I’d ask what you see the alternative is to avoid that, but we’ve been over that. You only point out problems and not even any elements of solutions.