Attention to the Unseen

John Hendrickson writes: At Joe Biden’s rally in Madison, Wisconsin, this afternoon, the men and women who had crammed into a middle-school basketball gym dutifully clapped, yelled words of support, and waved signs bearing the president’s name. But when it came time to chant “Four more years,” they sounded as if they were merely going through the motions. Most of the attendees I spoke with said they were more committed to the Democratic Party than its 81-year-old leader. Some told…

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Politico reports: One of Joe Biden’s high-profile campaign surrogates is publicly urging him to consider exiting the presidential race. Massachusetts Gov. Maura Healey, a member of Biden’s national campaign advisory board who earlier this spring headlined a big-dollar fundraiser for him in Boston, said in a statement Friday that he should “carefully evaluate whether he remains our best hope to defeat Donald Trump.” Biden “saved our democracy in 2020 and has done an outstanding job over the last four years,”…

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  The Guardian reports: The shock election of Masoud Pezeshkian as Iran’s new president is as much a testimony to his personality as to his politics. A former heart surgeon and health minister, he came across in the many presidential TV debates as a man of great personal integrity and humility, desperate to bring the country together after it had been divided domestically and abroad. In the end, it will only be his opponents’ fear of his continued popularity that…

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Patrick Boucheron, Antoine Lilti et al write: For the first time since the second world war, the far right is at the gates of power in France. As historians from differing political backgrounds who share an attachment to democratic values and the rule of law, we cannot remain silent in the face of an alarming prospect that we still have the capacity to resist. Despite a superficial makeover, the National Rally (RN) remains fundamentally the successor and heir of the…

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Julian Zelizer writes: If President Joe Biden decides to withdraw from the election, Democrats need not fear — they have a ticket in front of them that can still defeat presumptive Republican nominee Donald Trump. Not only would a ticket with Kamala Harris as president and Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer as her running mate have the best odds of getting the party through this moment of crisis, but also the potential to excite voters and produce a historic outcome. To…

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Elaina Plott Calabro writes: When Ron Klain admitted to me a year ago that the White House could have worked harder to elevate Kamala Harris’s profile, he didn’t know that the Democratic Party, and perhaps American democracy itself, would soon be riding on her readiness to be president. But perhaps he should have. It was July 2023, and while interviewing President Joe Biden’s former chief of staff in his law office in downtown Washington, D.C., I’d asked if the administration…

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CNN reports: Amid the ongoing fallout from Joe Biden’s debate performance, talk in many top Democratic circles has already moved to who Kamala Harris’ running mate would be. That’s how certain a widening group of leading party officials, operatives and donors are that the president’s slow start to salvage his campaign just won’t work, with several close allies skeptical that he is up to the reelection campaign he has pledged to stay in, based on CNN’s conversations with two dozen…

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The Washington Post reports: Sen. Mark R. Warner (D-Va.) is attempting to assemble a group of Democratic senators to ask President Biden to exit the presidential race, according to two people with direct knowledge of the effort. Warner is telling Democratic senators that Biden can no longer remain in the election in the wake of his faltering debate performance, according to the people familiar with private conversations who spoke on the condition of anonymity to speak freely. Warner has told…

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CNBC reports: President Joe Biden is facing an uprising from some his own party’s wealthy donors, including an heiress to the Disney family fortune, who say they will no longer fund the Democratic Party until Biden drops out of the presidential race following his disastrous debate performance. Abigail Disney, granddaughter of Roy O. Disney, who co-founded The Walt Disney Co., told CNBC on Thursday that she plans to withhold donations to the party she has funded for years until Biden…

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Axios reports: Former President Trump on Friday disavowed the Heritage Foundation’s Project 2025, which has sparked widespread news coverage about policy plans for a potential second Trump administration. Why it matters: Project 2025 has long annoyed Trump and his top campaign officials, despite the deep links and allies shared by the two entities. Lately, Democrats have been attacking Project 2025 as a proxy for the stakes of defeating “MAGA Republicans.” Trump’s disavowal comes two days after Heritage Foundation president Kevin Roberts drew outrage from Democrats…

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The Guardian reports: Shortly after 3.30am on Friday, as Nigel Farage was finally elected to Westminster at the eighth time of asking, the Reform UK leader stood to deliver a speech that was fully intended to interrupt Labour’s euphoric celebrations elsewhere. Having played a large part in the implosion of Conservative support, Reform would now be targeting Labour voters, the new member for Clacton said. “We’re coming for Labour – be in no doubt about that.” Vowing to build a…

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Olivia Nuzzi reports: President Joe Biden walked before a row of flags and took his place at a lectern stamped with the presidential seal. A few feet in front of him, thin panes of teleprompter glass, programmed with prewritten remarks, were positioned to meet his stare as he spoke into a microphone that would carry his voice through a soundsystem. His White House press secretary looked on. So did several senior White House officials. Anxiety clung to the humid summer…

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The Daily Beast reports: Joe Biden’s week from hell was punctuated on the Fourth of July, with sources revealing he told Democratic governors behind closed doors that he, the most powerful politician on the planet, has asked his advisers to no longer schedule events that begin later than 8 p.m. It’s a bombshell revelation, first reported by The New York Times, that further calls into question Biden’s fitness and position atop Democrats’ presidential ticket. Biden has been adamant since his…

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