DeSantis and other GOP 2024 prospects target public health officials with political attacks
CNN
Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis' warning this week of a "Faucian distopia" offered the latest glimpse at how ambitious Republicans eyeing 2024 presidential bids are increasingly targeting public health officials as they attempt to grow their national brands in front of conservative audiences.
"It is very important that we say unequivocally no to lockdowns, no to school closures, no to restrictions and no to mandates," DeSantis told the crowd at a conservative state policy conference in Utah on Wednesday. The approaches by DeSantis and other potential GOP 2024 contenders frequently mirror former President Donald Trump's downplaying of the pandemic and right-wing television networks -- poised to play a central role in the next GOP presidential primary race -- that have criticized Dr. Anthony Fauci, opposed government mandates and raised questions about the effectiveness of vaccines.
Amid Democrats’ shock and bickering over how much to respond to President Donald Trump is a deeper question rippling through leaders across the Capitol and across the country: How much should they rely on the same institutional and procedural maneuvers they used during the first Trump term, and how much are they willing to wield their own wrecking balls?
A real estate agent in Omaha, Nebraska, got an unexpected houseguest this week – a hungry opossum who ate the Tuxedo Chocolate Mousse Cake she recently bought from Costco.
A young man from an isolated Indigenous tribe who approached a riverine community in Brazil’s Amazon returned voluntarily to his people less than 24 hours later, Brazilian authorities said.
Top Trump administration officials are set to meet with senior Russian officials to begin talks aimed at ending the war in Ukraine, according to multiple sources.
A call to an anonymous tip line set off a chain of events that helped thwart a potential Valentine’s Day mass shooting in Indiana, authorities say.
The tragedy has the city reevaluating how it connects homeless families with shelters amid fears federal support for people in or on the precipice of homelessness could wane as the Trump administration pushes to slash spending.
In less than a month in office the Trump administration has simultaneously dismantled foreign aid programs that support fragile democracies abroad and put on leave federal workers who protect US elections at home in a move that current and former officials say abandons decades of American commitments to democracy.
A 5.0 magnitude earthquake was detected in western Texas Friday night, according to the United States Geological Survey.
Sen. Mitch McConnell was a generational force for the Republican Party — using procedural tactics and political will to stymie much of former President Barack Obama’s agenda, hand President Donald Trump key first-term political victories and deliver a 6-3 conservative Supreme Court majority. Now he’s the odd man out.
The Trump administration is forcing out senior leadership at the National Archives and Records Administration in a major shakeup, according to a source familiar. President Donald Trump has been highly critical of the archives since the agency asked the Department of Justice to investigate Trump’s mishandling of classified documents after he left office.
Colorado prosecutors on Friday argued additional charges against James Craig, a dentist accused of fatally poisoning his wife, as new details were revealed in court about how he allegedly tried to get a fellow inmate to kill a detective on the case.
One week into the Trump administration, Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem issued a directive that the Federal Emergency Management Agency should stop sending money to non-governmental organizations that she characterized as helping “illegal aliens.”
The morning after the mass resignation of prosecutors sparked a crisis inside the Trump Justice Department, acting Deputy Attorney General Emil Bove led a meeting with the Justice Department’s public integrity section. His message: they had to choose one career lawyer to file a dismissal of the corruption charges against New York City Mayor Eric Adams, according to three people briefed on the meeting.