Trump announces SoftBank will make $100 billion investment in the US

(NEW YORK) — In a final lame-duck push, the Senate will attempt to pass legislation aimed at providing full Social Security benefits to millions of Americans this week.

Majority Leader Chuck Schumer said in floor remarks Monday he’d push for a vote on the Social Security Fairness Act before the week is out.

“We will vote and every Senator will choose. Where are you? Do you stand on the side of public retirees who deserve their benefits, or bungle this golden opportunity by blocking this bill?” Schumer said in a floor speech.

The closely-watched legislation repeals provisions that limit the ability of some retirees who also collect pensions from claiming social security benefits. Among those impacted are retirees who at one time worked as firefighters, teachers, postal worker, a police officer, or in other public sector jobs. A provision that limits the benefits allotted to those workers’ surviving spouses would also be eliminated.

The legislation already passed the House with overwhelming bipartisan support in November, but Congress would need to act this week to avoid having to restart the process of passing the legislation in the new year.

The bipartisan bill has 62 Senate cosponsors, all but ensuring that it would have the necessary 60 votes it needs to overcome the Senate filibuster and pass.

It has strong advocates on both sides of the aisle.

“It is unfair to penalize Americans who have taught our children, protected our streets, and ran into burning buildings,” Sen. Bill Cassidy, the top Republican on the Senate’s Health Education Labor and Pensions Committee, said in a post on X earlier this month.

But there is some concern among Republicans about the cost of the bill and the increased strain it could put on the already underfunded Social Security trust fund.

The nonpartisan Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget has estimated that the bill would increase the deficit by $196 billion and increase the rate at which the Social Security trust fund becomes insolvent.

As a result, there could be challenges on the floor that limit the ability to expedite passage of this bill. And there’s certainly a time crunch to consider.

The Senate isn’t short on things to accomplish during this last week of the lame-duck session. It is currently working to process the must-pass National Defense Authorization Act. Senators must also approve a government funding bill before the end of the week if they wish to avert a shutdown.

If the Social Security Fairness Act is challenged in a way that slows the process of its passage, the Senate may run short on time to get this done.

It is not yet known when the Senate will vote on this legislation.

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(PHOENIX) — President Joe Biden was in Arizona on Friday to apologize to Native Americans for the federal government forcing Indian children into boarding schools where the White House said they were abused and deprived of their cultural identity.

Departing the White House Thursday, Biden said he was going to Arizona “to do something that should have been done a long time ago.”

He said he would make “a formal apology to the Indian nations for the way we treated their children for so many years.”

The White House called his trip to Gila River Indian Community outside Phoenix — his first to Indian Country as president — “historic.”

Officials said he will discuss the Biden-Harris administration’s record of delivering for tribal communities, including keeping his promise to visit the swing state, which is happening close to Election Day.

“The president also believes that to usher in the next era of the Federal-Tribal relationships we need to fully acknowledge the harms of the past,” the White House said. 

“For over 150 years, the federal government ran boarding schools that forcibly removed generations of Native children from their homes to boarding schools often far away. Native children at these schools endured physical, emotional, and sexual abuse, and, as detailed in the Federal Indian Boarding School Investigative Report by the Department of the Interior (DOI), at least 973 children died in these schools,” the White House said.

“The federally-run Indian boarding school system was designed to assimilate Native Americans by destroying Native culture, language, and identity through harsh militaristic and assimilationist methods,” it said.

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(WASHINGTON) — John Kelly, a former four-star Marine general and former chief of staff to former President Donald Trump, hammered his old boss in a stunningly public fashion on Tuesday — just two weeks before Election Day.

Kelly, who had previously refrained from discussing his time in the White House so openly, said in expansive interviews with The New York Times that Trump’s discussion of using the military against the “enemy within” — who, in Trump’s words included Democratic foes — pushed him to come forward.

“And I think this issue of using the military on — to go after — American citizens is one of those things I think is a very, very bad thing — even to say it for political purposes to get elected — I think it’s a very, very bad thing, let alone actually doing it,” Kelly said.

The former general held nothing back, arguing that Trump could fit the bill of a “fascist.”

“Well, looking at the definition of fascism: It’s a far-right authoritarian, ultranationalist political ideology and movement characterized by a dictatorial leader, centralized autocracy, militarism, forcible suppression of opposition, belief in a natural social hierarchy,” he told The Times.

“So, certainly, in my experience, those are the kinds of things that he thinks would work better in terms of running America,” he added.

Kelly went on to explain that Trump had said he wanted generals like those that Adolf Hitler had, a comment that Kelly found shocking and told the former president not to repeat.

The remarks from Kelly, while astounding coming from a veteran who attained such a high ranking in uniform, is just the latest to come from a former senior official in Trump’s administration.

Mark Milley, a retired Army general and former chair of the Joint Chiefs of Staff under Trump, told journalist Bob Woodward that Trump is a “fascist to the core.”

“He is the most dangerous person ever. I had suspicions when I talked to you about his mental decline and so forth, but now I realize he’s a total fascist. He is now the most dangerous person to this country,” he said.

Mark Esper, Trump’s former defense secretary, said earlier this month that he feared Trump would use the military against his domestic critics and that he would likely have fewer guardrails in a hypothetical second term.

“My sense is his inclination is to use the military in these situations whereas my view is that’s a bad role for the military. It should only be law enforcement taking those actions,” Esper said on CNN.

“I think President Trump has learned, the key is getting people around you who will do your bidding, who will not push back, who will implement what you want to do. And I think he’s talked about that, his acolytes have talked about that, and I think loyalty will be the first litmus test,” he added.

Trump throughout his tenure has also praised authoritarians, including boasting of Russian President Vladimir Putin and Chinese leader Xi Jinping’s intelligence, calling North Korean strongman Kim Jong Un “tough” and heaping praise on Hungarian leader Viktor Orban.

Trump’s campaign has hit back at the former officials, including going after Kelly on Tuesday.

“John Kelly has totally beclowned himself with these debunked stories he has fabricated because he failed to serve his President well while working as Chief of Staff and currently suffers from a debilitating case of Trump Derangement Syndrome,” spokesperson Steven Cheung said in a statement.

“President Trump has always honored the service and sacrifice of all of our military men and women, whereas Kamala Harris has completely disrespected the families of those who gave the ultimate sacrifice, including the Abbey Gate 13,” he added, referencing the 13 service members killed during the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan.

The latest eye-popping comments from Kelly come as early voting is already underway and Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris fight for a small but significant slice of undecided voters.

The Harris campaign on Wednesday morning seized on Kelly’s comments, rolling out Republican former military leaders to both hammer Trump and underscore the seriousness of Kelly’s surprisingly public remarks.

“I had the honor of working aside him, and I know him speaking out this way was no small step for him,” said Kevin Carroll, who served as senior counsel to Kelly when he was Homeland Security secretary under Trump.

Brig. Gen. Steve Anderson mocked the fact that Trump “couldn’t qualify to be in the military — he has 34 felony convictions — so, how can we have the commander-in-chief be in charge of a military that he couldn’t possibly join?”

Harris’ campaign warned that voters should listen to those who have worked alongside Trump while he was president.

“The people who know him best are telling us Trump is unhinged and pursuing unchecked power that would put us all at risk. We should all listen,” Harris campaign spokesperson Ian Sams said in a statement.

However, national debate over Trump’s character has raged largely unabated since 2015, leaving Republicans skeptical the latest comments will make an impact with voters.

GOP pollster Robert Blizzard said it’s “hard to believe this is going to be the ‘ah, gotcha now’ moment for Democrats.”

“I have a difficult time believing there is a single voter that doesn’t have a hard and fast opinion on Donald Trump. They’ve come to that conclusion themselves, and I can’t imagine these people, who the average voter has never heard of, change that opinion,” added a former senior Trump administration official.

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