Weekly News Roundup - 3/1/24
Pressure grew for a ceasefire in Gaza, and Trump's hold on the GOP grew stronger.
Welcome to the ninth weekly news roundup of 2024. The archive for all weekly news roundups is here. If you notice stories or issues you’d like to see mentioned in these roundups, let me know. In 2024, the Border Stalkers Substack is featuring one news update a week, and one book a month, with weekly posts on each book. The book of the month schedule is here.
Big stories this week:
Protests against U.S. support for Israel's war in Gaza reached a new high point. A solid 13% of the vote in Michigan's Democratic primary for president voted "uncommitted" on Tuesday, protesting President Biden's Middle East policy. The intensity of the outrage over nearly 30,000 Palestinians killed since the Oct. 7 Hamas attack on Israel was given a visceral, horrifying specificity when a senior airman in the U.S. Air Force set himself on fire outside the Israeli embassy in Washington, D.C. As the flames engulfed the 25-year old Aaron Bushnell, he screamed "Free Palestine."
A decision by the Supreme Court to take the case involving Donald Trump's claims of presidential immunity, and to hear arguments in April, raised questions about whether Trump will face trial for the January 6, 2021 attempt to overthrow democracy before the fall elections.
Donald Trump moved closer to clinching the Republican nomination for president, with wins in South Carolina and Michigan, even as about a third of Republican primary voters continued to register a protest vote against him by supporting Nikki Haley.
Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, the 82-year old Kentucky Republican, announced he will leave his leadership post at the end of this year.
A partial shutdown of the government loomed once again, a result of Congress kicking the can down the road at the end of 2023 with a short-term solution rather than a year-long budget. But once again the Congress passed a short-term funding bill to move the goalposts a bit further down the road.
President Biden met with congressional leaders at the White House, where House Speaker Johnson's obstruction of aid for Ukraine was at the top of the agenda.
Alexei Navalny was laid to rest in Moscow.
Week in Review
Friday, Feb. 23
Donald Trump calls on the state of Alabama to "find an immediate solution to preserve the availability of IVF," in an attempt to triage a politically damaging ruling by that state's Supreme Court that found embryos to be a form of human life with legal protections.
At the Conservative Political Action Conference, one speaker calls for ending democracy and imposing Christian rule (even as some others on the right dismissed concerns about Christian nationalism as a "slander"). "Welcome to the end of democracy! We’re here to overthrow it completely. We didn’t get all the way there on January 6th, but we will endeavor to get rid of it and replace it with this right here,” said right-wing activist Jack Posobiec, holding up a small cross. There were also reports of neo-Nazis — who have tried to attend CPAC in years past but have been thrown out — in attendance with no repercussions. Trump, viewed as a "savior" by many in attendance, spoke at the conference on the final evening.
Saturday, Feb. 24
Trump wins the South Carolina primary, with around 60% of the vote. Former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley loses her home state, but also still wins 40% of the vote, a significant number that raises concerns for Trump's ability to win enough Republican voters in the fall election.
Sunday, Feb. 25
U.S. Air Force airman Aaron Bushnell, 25, pours gasoline over himself and then sets himself on fire in front of the Israeli embassy in Washington, D.C., while he cries out "Free Palestine." He is later pronounced dead. Bushnell, who livestreams his death, says he will "no longer be complicit in genocide."
Monday, Feb. 26
A majority of the Supreme Court appears skeptical of attempts by Republican legislatures in Florida and Texas to prevent social media companies from taking down content or making other decisions regarding what users can see or access. Both conservative and liberal justices, the Washington Post reports, seem to be of the view, during oral arguments, that "the First Amendment protects the right of Facebook and YouTube to rank and moderate posts on their platforms, just as newspapers can make editorial decisions and bookstores and theaters may choose which content to promote." A decision will be rendered later this year, likely in June. (I've written about this case multiple times, including here and here.)
Tuesday, Feb. 27
Donald Trump wins the Michigan Republican primary, with 68% to Nikki Haley's 27%. Michigan is also holding a caucus convention on Saturday, amid chaos in the state Republican party over a leadership fight. But the victory both moves Trump closer to the nomination while also continuing to raise questions about how much of the Republican electorate will refuse to support him in the fall election.
President Biden hosts a meeting of congressional leaders at the White House to discuss funding the government. House Speaker Mike Johnson comes under pressure, in an "intense" meeting, to allow the House to vote on sending more military aid to Ukraine, which would gain more than a majority of votes and pass if he were to stop blocking it.
Wednesday, Feb. 28
The Supreme Court says it will hear the case over Trump's claims of presidential immunity in April. "If the Court does not issue an opinion until late June, are we really going to see the trial court put Trump on trial during the general election season (or even during the RNC convention)? I find this very hard to believe," writes Rick Hasen. "Early on, I called this federal election subversion case potentially the most important case in this Nation’s history. And now it may not happen because of timing, timing that is completely in the Supreme Court’s control. After all, this is the second time the Court has not expedited things to hear this case. This could well be game over."
Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-KY — who has led one of the two parties in the Senate for longer than any other lawmaker in U.S. history — announces he will step down from party leadership at the end of this year. The 82-year old Republican, Senate Republican leader since 2007, has faced questions about his health in the last year after freezing up on two different occasions in front of the news media. There was speculation that his stepping down will free McConnell to use his last several months as leader to ensure Congress sends military aid to Ukraine without having to worry about the political ramifications for himself. But ultimately, his departure means the removal of "the final backstop against a complete Trumpification of the GOP."
Hunter Biden, the president's son, testifies in private to the House Oversight and House Judiciary committees in a joint meeting. Hunter Biden had pressed for the testimony to be public, but Republicans refused.
Texas sees the second-largest wildfire in state history, as dry conditions and high winds kindle a blaze hundreds of square miles wide in the Panhandle, the northeast corner of the state.
Thursday, March 1
President Biden and Donald Trump both travel to the U.S. Mexico border, showing attention to the issue of illegal immigration, which has become a top issue of concern to American voters.
Israeli troops fire on a crowd of Palestinians desperate for food, during a chaotic stampede of people trying to pull aid off a convoy. More than 100 Palestinians are killed, though it's not known how many died from gunfire. The incident brings the total number of Palestinians killed during Israel's invasion of the Gaza Strip to more than 30,000.
Congress approves a short-term government funding bill.
The IRS announces an effort to go after more than 25,000 people who make more than $1 million a year and who have not paid income taxes going back to 2017, and another 100,000 people making between $400,000 and $1 million annually who also have not paid taxes. The IRS is under a directive not to increase audit rates for those making less than $400,000 a year.
Brazil's finance minister proposes a global tax on the super rich to crack down on tax havens which are set to deprive governments around the world of nearly $5 trillion in revenue over the next decade. Billionaires currently use tax havens to bring their effective tax rate to between 0% and 0.5%, the Tax Observatory has found.
A transcript of Hunter Biden's interview with House lawmakers from Wednesday is released.
Friday, March 2
Thousands of Russians lined the streets outside a church in Moscow where funeral services were held for Alexei Navalny, the Russian dissident who died in prison on Feb. 16. Navalny's family did not receive his body from authorities until hours before the funeral. There was pressure on hearse operators to refuse to transport the body. Russians were concerned that anyone who stood outside the church would be targeted by police. But large crowds gathered anyway, some chanting, "Russia will be free!"
Interesting Reads
After 4 Months of War, Biden and Netanyahu Are on Different Timetables, by Peter Baker and Isabel Kershner for The New York Times
Trump’s plan to use Judge Cannon to block Judge Chutkan and avoid trial by Katelyn Polantz for CNN
Airman who set self on fire grew up on religious compound, had anarchist past By Emily Davies , Peter Hermann and Dan Lamothe for The Washington Post
The Spy War: How the C.I.A. Secretly Helps Ukraine Fight Putin By Adam Entous and Michael Schwirtz for The New York Times
Nazis mingle openly at CPAC, spreading antisemitic conspiracy theories and finding allies by Ben Goggin for NBC News
A New Orleans magician says a Democratic operative paid him to make the fake Biden robocall by Alex Seitz-Wald for NBC News