January 14, 2024

Sunday,January 14, 2024. Annette’s News Roundup.

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Joe is always busy.

The war in Yemen.

For several days, the President has authorized attacks against sites in Yemen controlled by the Houthi militia.

He doesn’t need Congressional approval to do so since the actions were in response to Houthi attacks on ships in the Red Sea.

Here is what the law says.

On another matter …

The President spoke with historian Heather Cox Richardson.

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Kamala is always busy.

Remember the Divine Nine, the black sororities and fraternities that bring in the voters! The Vice President always supports that amazing history.

From the Vice President - Happy Founders' Day, @dstinc1913!

For 111 years, you have embodied your founding principles of scholarship and sisterhood. I look forward to seeing you continue your remarkable legacy of service, leadership, and excellence.

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Making it clear: the Presidential campaign is in full swing.

John Kerry to leave White House to assist Biden re-election campaign.

John Kerry, the United States’ special climate envoy and former secretary of state and presidential contender, plans to leave the Biden administrationlater this winter and switch to helping Joe Biden campaign to be re-elected to the White House, Kerry’s office said.

Kerry informed his staff earlier on Saturday after speaking with Biden this week, a spokesperson for Kerry told Reuters.

Politics news outlet Axios first reported the news about Kerry, 80, on Saturday.

Kerry was instrumental is helping to broker the 2015 Paris climate agreement, as well as the UAE consensus that calls for the transition away from fossil fuels reached in December at Cop28 in Dubai.

He believes that a second term in the White House for Biden would be the “single biggest” difference for progress in the climate crisis, Axios reported, initially citing a source close to the administration.

Kerry and Biden talked in the Oval Office earlier this week, after Kerry had attended the Cop28 global climate summit in Dubai late last year, and the climate envoy wants to promote the president’s climate action with a major role on the campaign trail for the 2024 election, the outlet further reported.

Kerry was named as a special envoy on the climate crisis soon after Biden won the 2020 presidential election, beating Donald Trump, and began forming his team during the transition period that November.

At the time, the Biden transition team said Kerry would “fight climate change full time” in the role, which for the first time would include a seat on the national security council, in an elevation of the importance of tackling the climate crisis and global heating.

As President Barack Obama’s secretary of state, succeeding Hillary Clinton in the role, Kerry played a prominent role in the international effort to craft the Paris climate agreement, which committed countries to reducing greenhouse gas emissions in order to avoid disastrous storms, heatwaves, flooding and other looming climate threats.

After leaving government in January 2017 as the Obama administration was replaced by the Trump administration, Kerry became sharply critical of President Trump’s dismantling of climate policies and the decision to remove the US from the Paris agreement. Biden re-entered the accord upon taking office in 2021.

Kerry ran for president in the 2004 election and won the Democratic nomination but was beaten by George W Bush that November, with the Republican president winning a second term.

His election campaign was badly damaged by a pro-Bush group that smeared Kerry’s military track record as a decorated Vietnam veteran who became an anti-war campaigner.

The group, Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, emerged in August 2004 as Kerry, then a Democratic senator from Massachusetts, was doing well in the polls against Bush, who had only a domestic spell in the Texas air national guard in comparison. The group set about trying to destroy Kerry’s reputation.

A Republican strategist, Chris LaCivita, who orchestrated the so-called “swift-boating” of Kerry, is now a senior aide to the Trump re-election campaign. (The Guardian).

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Will there be a deal that keeps the government open?

The Senate reached a bill to fund the government with bi-partisan support.

Congress plans to hold off government shutdown until March.

Congress plans to vote on legislation next week temporarily extending federal funding to March and avoiding a government shutdown on Friday, Axios has learned.

Why it matters: It will give lawmakers time to pass bills to fund the government through September in line with the spending levels House Republicans and Senate Democrats agreed to last weekend.

Driving the news: The stopgap spending measure, known as a continuing resolution (CR), will fund four departments until March 1 and the rest until March 8, according to a House Republican and another source familiar with the matter.

The deal will continue the "laddered" approach of the continuing resolution passed in November, which funded the first tranche of agencies until Jan. 19 and the second until Feb. 2.

House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) have agreed to overall spending levels for appropriations bills, but that legislation will take time to draft and pass both chambers.

The agreement among congressional leaders was first reported by Punchbowl News.

The state of play: The Senate, which typically takes longer to pass legislation than the House, has already taken steps to vote next week on the continuing resolution.

Johnson resisted saying publicly this week whether he would hold a vote on a continuing resolution as right-wing hardliners have called for a shutdown in lieu of significant border policy concessions from Democrats.

Republicans are expected to have a conference call on Sunday evening to discuss the plan for the week, both sources said.

• Text of the measure is also expected to be posted online Sunday evening, a Schumer spokesperson said.

What we're hearing: There had been disagreement between Republicans on the House Appropriations Committee and other GOP lawmakers on how long to fund the government, according to the House Republican.

• "The 'appropriators' wanted more time" in the hopes of appropriating more money for defense, the Republican told Axios, while others "wanted to keep the pressure on [with a] short extension."

• Conservatives who have expressed firm opposition to a continuing resolution, they added, "don't want to [vote for it] but they'll let us ... kicking and screaming along the way." (Axios).

What will the MAGA Speaker of the House do? Who knows but here is a hint.👇

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Today is one of those days.

Tomorrow is a sacred day.

Just not in Iowa at the Republican caucuses.

Donald Trump retains a commanding lead in the final Des Moines Register/NBC News/Mediacom Iowa Poll before Monday’s caucuses, with Nikki Haley sliding past Ron DeSantis into second place. 

The former president is the first choice of 48% of likely Republican caucusgoers, while former United Nations Ambassador Haley is at 20% and Florida Gov. DeSantis drops to 16%. No other candidate reaches double digits. 

The poll of 705 likely Republican caucusgoers was conducted Jan. 7-12 by Selzer & Co. It has a margin of error of plus or minus 3.7 percentage points. 

Trump arrived in Iowa yesterday.

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