Number of Ultrarich Hits All-Time High as Someone Dies From Hunger Every 4 Seconds

"Those with the power and money to change this must come together to better respond to current crises and prevent and prepare for future ones," a coalition of charities asserted.

A mother holds her malnourished baby at a hospital in Baidoa,

 Somalia on September 3, 2022. (Photo: Ed Ram/Getty Images)

BRETT WILKINS

September 20, 2022

As a new analysis revealed that the global ranks of the superrich soared to a record number, a coalition of charity groups said Tuesday that hundreds of millions of people around the world are hungry—and that someone starves to death every four seconds.

"This is about the injustice of the whole of humanity."

At least 238 international and local charities from 75 countries signed an open letter noting that "a staggering 345 million people are now experiencing acute hunger, a number that has more than doubled since 2019."

"Despite promises from world leaders to never allow famine again in the 21st century, famine is once more imminent in Somalia," the signers stated. "Around the world, 50 million people are on the brink of starvation in 45 countries."

The letter—which was timed to coincide with the annual meeting of the United Nations General Assembly in New York—asserts that "the global hunger crisis has been fueled by a deadly mix of poverty, social injustice, gender inequality, conflict, climate change, and economic shocks, with the lingering impacts of the Covid-19 pandemic and the crisis in Ukraine further driving up food prices and the cost of living."

"Those with the power and money to change this must come together to better respond to current crises and prevent and prepare for future ones," the signatories argued.




The number of those with the most money grew to a record number last year.

According to an analysis published Tuesday by Credit Suisse, there were 218,200 ultra-high net worth (UHNW) people in the world in 2021, an increase of 46,000 from the previous year. The share of the world's wealth held by the richest 1% of people also increased from 44% to 46% last year.

Credit Suisse said there were 62.5 million U.S. dollar millionaires on Earth, and that all the wealth in the world added up to $463.6 trillion, while attributing what one of the report's authors called the "explosion of wealth" to soaring home and stock values.

A separate report published in July by letter signatory Oxfam revealed that profits from soaring food prices have enriched billionaires around the world by a collective $382 billion.

Meanwhile, Sumaya, a 32-year-old mother of four living in a camp for internally displaced people in Ethiopia's Somali region, lamented her family's dire situation in the charity groups' letter: "No water, no food, a hopeless life."

"Above all, my children are starving," she said. "They are on the verge of death. Unless they get some food, I'm afraid they will die."

Last week, Oxfam published a report underscoring how the climate emergency is exacerbating extreme hunger. The report examined 10 of the world's worst climate hot spots, where 18 million people are on the brink of starvation.

Mohanna Ahmed Ali Eljabaly of the Yemen Family Care Association, which also signed the charities' letter, said that "it is abysmal that with all the technology in agriculture and harvesting techniques today we are still talking about famine in the 21st century."

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"This is not about one country or one continent and hunger never only has one cause. This is about the injustice of the whole of humanity," she continued. "It is extremely difficult to see people suffering while others sharing the same planet have plenty of food."

"We must not wait a moment longer to focus both on providing immediate lifesaving food and longer-term support," Elhjabaly added, "so people can take charge of their futures and provide for themselves and their families."

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Polluters must pay, says UN chief, urges taxes to help climate victims


World leaders address the 77th Session of the United Nations General Assembly at U.N. Headquarters in New York City

Tue, September 20, 2022
By Michelle Nichols

UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) -U.N. chief Antonio Guterres on Tuesday urged rich countries to tax windfall profits of fossil fuel companies and use that money to help countries harmed by the climate crisis and people who are struggling with rising food and energy prices.

Addressing world leaders at the 193-member U.N. General Assembly, the climate activist secretary-general stepped up his attacks on oil and gas companies, which have seen their profits explode by tens of billions of dollars this year.

"The fossil fuel industry is feasting on hundreds of billions of dollars in subsidies and windfall profits while household budgets shrink and our planet burns," he said.

"Polluters must pay," he added.

While Guterres again pushed developed countries to tax the fossil fuel windfall profits, this time he also used his platform to spell out where the money should be spent.

"Those funds should be redirected in two ways: to countries suffering loss and damage caused by the climate crisis; and to people struggling with rising food and energy prices," he told the annual gathering of world leaders in New York.

Britain has passed a 25% windfall tax on oil and gas producers in the North Sea, while the European Union plans to raise more than 140 billion euros to shield consumers from soaring energy prices by taxing windfall profits from oil companies and electric generators. U.S. Democratic lawmakers have discussed a similar idea, though it faces long odds in a divided Congress.

While these plans focus on redirecting windfall profits to domestic consumers, the secretary general advocated for a tax that would be directed to the world's most climate vulnerable countries, which have been embracing the idea.

He also said multilateral development banks "must step up and deliver" and that helping poor countries adapt to worsening climate shocks "must make up half of all climate finance."

Guterres added: "Major economies are their shareholders and must make it happen."

The secretary general also broadened his criticism of oil and gas companies to enabling industries that he said helps keep carbon pollution growing, such as banks and other financial institutions that invest in those companies and the public relations and advertising industries.

"Just as they did for the tobacco industry decades before, lobbyists and spin doctors have spewed harmful misinformation," Guterres said. "Fossil fuel interests need to spend less time averting a PR disaster – and more time averting a planetary one."

(Reporting by Michelle Nichols; Additional reporting by Valerie Volcovici in Washington; Editing by Jonathan Oatis and Aurora Ellis)

UN Chief Blasts PR Industry for Spearheading Big Oil's Propaganda Machine

"Just as they did for the tobacco industry decades before, lobbyists and spin doctors have spewed harmful misinformation," said U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres.

United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres speaks during the 77th session of the United Nations General Assembly in New York City on September 20, 2022. (Photo: Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images)

KENNY STANCIL

September 20, 2022

During his wide-ranging plea for fundamental change delivered Tuesday at the 77th session of the United Nations General Assembly, U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres denounced public relations and advertising firms for enabling the fossil fuel pollution currently destroying the planet.

"Fossil fuel interests need to spend less time averting a PR disaster—and more time averting a planetary one."

"Our world is addicted to fossil fuels," said Guterres. "We need to hold fossil fuel companies and their enablers to account."

"That includes the banks, private equity, asset managers, and other financial institutions that continue to invest and underwrite carbon pollution," he continued. "And it includes the massive public relations machine raking in billions to shield the fossil fuel industry from scrutiny."

"Just as they did for the tobacco industry decades before, lobbyists and spin doctors have spewed harmful misinformation," Guterres added, echoing the findings of a yearslong U.S. congressional probe and recent warnings from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. "Fossil fuel interests need to spend less time averting a PR disaster—and more time averting a planetary one."

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Jamie Henn, director of Fossil Free Media, welcomed Guterres' speech, saying in a statement that "the secretary general's address to the U.N. General Assembly is his most important speech of the year."

"The fact that he used it to directly call out PR and advertising agencies," said Henn, "is a big freaking deal."

Guterres' speech follows the publication of the latest "F-List" report by Fossil Free Media's Clean Creatives campaign. The report details the relationships between nearly 240 public relations and advertising companies and their fossil fuel industry clients.

"For decades, Big Oil has known of the devastating health and climate impacts of fossil fuels and partnered with advertising agencies and PR firms to create a multi-billion dollar campaign to mislead and confuse the public, downplay the urgency of the climate crisis, and overstate the work they have done to find a solution," states the report.

Although global greenhouse gas emissions must be halved by 2030 to have a chance of limiting temperature rise to 1.5ºC above preindustrial levels, "every major oil and gas company is currently planning to continue their expansion of fossil fuel production," the report points out. "Their business plans will ensure that the climate emergency continues, with worsening impacts particularly affecting poor and vulnerable people worldwide."

The report continues:

Fossil fuel advertising and PR does not match business reality. Shell has admitted that their "operating plans and budgets do not reflect Shell's Net-Zero Emissions target" that is widely featured in their advertising. In 2020 and 2021, 80% of Chevron advertisements mentioned sustainability, while only 1.8% of their capital spending went to non-oil and gas projects.

These ads are creating legal and reputational risk for agencies. Over 1,800 cases are pending worldwide related to climate action, many of them focused on misleading advertising. Both Shell and BP have been rebuked by regulators in the Netherlands and U.K., respectively, demanding that they end campaigns that mislead the public.

Now, fossil fuel advertisements have been banned in France, and bans are being considered many places elsewhere. There has never been a better time to drop fossil fuel clients.

Praising Guterres' remarks, Henn noted that "just a couple of years ago, hardly anybody was talking about the role of PR and ad agencies in driving the climate crisis—now it's being highlighted on one of the most important stages in the world."

"With this sort of spotlight, there's no way the public relations industry can keep shirking responsibility for their climate footprint," he added. "If agencies want to maintain any sort of ethical or moral reputation, it's time to come clean and drop their fossil fuel clients."

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UN chief: World is ‘paralyzed’ and equity is slipping away

By EDITH M. LEDERER

1 of 8

United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres addresses the 77th session of the General Assembly at U.N. headquarters Tuesday, Sept. 20, 2022. (AP Photo/Mary Altaffer)

UNITED NATIONS (AP) — In an alarming assessment, the head of the United Nations warned world leaders Tuesday that nations are “gridlocked in colossal global dysfunction” and aren’t ready or willing to tackle the challenges that threaten humanity’s future — and the planet’s. “Our world is in peril — and paralyzed,” he said.

Speaking at the opening of the General Assembly’s annual high-level meeting, Secretary-General Antonio Guterres made sure to emphasize that hope remained. But his remarks reflected a tense and worried world. He cited the war in Ukraine and multiplying conflicts around the world, the climate emergency, the dire financial situation of developing countries and setbacks in U.N. goals for 2030 including an end to extreme poverty and quality education for all children.

LATEST NEWS– Live updates: UN General Assembly

He also warned of what he called “a forest of red flags” around new technologies despite promising advances to heal diseases and connect people. Guterres said social media platforms are based on a model “that monetizes outrage, anger and negativity.” Artificial intelligence he said, “is compromising the integrity of information systems, the media, and indeed democracy itself.”

The world lacks even the beginning of “a global architecture” to deal with the ripples caused by these new technologies because of “geopolitical tensions,” Guterres said.

His opening remarks came as leaders from around the planet reconvened at U.N. headquarters in New York after three years of pandemic interruptions, including an entirely virtual meeting in 2020 and a hybrid one last year. This week, the halls of the United Nations are filled once more with delegates reflecting the world’s cultures. Many faces were visible, though all delegates are required to wear masks except when speaking to ward off the coronavirus.

Guterres made sure to start out by sounding a note of hope. He showed a video of the first U.N.-chartered ship carrying grain from Ukraine — part of the deal between Ukraine and Russia that the United Nations and Turkey helped broker — to the Horn of Africa, where millions of people are on the edge of famine It is, he said, an example of promise and hope “in a world teeming with turmoil.”

He stressed that cooperation and dialogue are the only path forward — two fundamental U.N. principles since its founding after World War II. And he warned that “no power or group alone can call the shots.”

“Let’s work as one, as a coalition of the world, as united nations,” he urged leaders gathered in the vast General Assembly hall.

It’s rarely that easy. Geopolitical divisions are undermining the work of the U.N. Security Council, international law, people’s trust in democratic institutions and most forms of international cooperation, Guterres said.

“The divergence between developed and developing countries, between North and South, between the privileged and the rest, is becoming more dangerous by the day,” the secretary-general said. “It is at the root of the geopolitical tensions and lack of trust that poison every area of global cooperation, from vaccines to sanctions to trade.

Before the global meeting was gaveled open, leaders and ministers wearing masks to avoid a COVID-19 super-spreader event wandered the assembly hall, chatting individually and in groups. It was a sign that that despite the fragmented state of the planet, the United Nations remains the key gathering place for presidents, prime ministers, monarchs and ministers.

Nearly 150 heads of state and government are on the latest speakers’ list, a high number reflecting that the United Nations remains the only place not just to deliver their views but to meet privately to discuss the challenges on the global agenda -- and hopefully make some progress.

The 77th General Assembly meeting of world leaders convenes under the shadow of Europe’s first major war since World War II — the conflict between Russia and Ukraine, which has unleashed a global food crisis and opened fissures among major powers in a way not seen since the Cold War.

At the top of that agenda for many: Russia’s Feb. 24 invasion of Ukraine, which not only threatens the sovereignty of its smaller neighbor but has raised fears of a nuclear catastrophe at Europe’s largest nuclear plant in the country’s now Russia-occupied southeast.

Leaders in many countries are trying to prevent a wider war and restore peace in Europe. Diplomats, though, aren’t expecting any breakthroughs this week.

The loss of important grain and fertilizer exports from Ukraine and Russia has triggered a food crisis, especially in developing countries, and inflation and a rising cost of living in many others. Those issues are high on the agenda.

At a meeting Monday to promote U.N. goals for 2030 — including ending extreme poverty, ensuring quality education for all children and achieving gender equality — Guterres said the world’s many pressing perils make it “tempting to put our long-term development priorities to one side.”

But the U.N. chief said some things can’t wait — among them education, dignified jobs, full equality for women and girls, comprehensive health care and action to tackle the climate crisis. He called for public and private finance and investment, and above all for peace.

The death of Britain’s Queen Elizabeth II and her funeral in London on Monday, which many world leaders attended, have created last-minute headaches for the high-level meeting. Diplomats and U.N. staff have scrambled to deal with changes in travel plans, the timing of events and the logistically intricate speaking schedule for world leaders.

The global gathering, known as the General Debate, was entirely virtual in 2020 because of the pandemic, and hybrid in 2021. This year, the 193-member General Assembly returns to only in-person speeches, with a single exception — Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy.

Over objections from Russia and a few allies, the assembly voted last Friday to allow the Ukrainian leader to prerecord his speech because of reasons beyond his control — the “ongoing foreign invasion” and military hostilities that require him to carry out his “national defense and security duties.”

The U.S. president, representing the host country for the United Nations, is traditionally the second speaker. But Joe Biden is attending the queen’s funeral, and his speech has been pushed to Wednesday morning.

___
Edith M. Lederer is chief U.N. correspondent for The Associated Press and has been covering international affairs for more than half a century. For more AP coverage of the U.N. General Assembly, visit https://apnews.com/hub/united-nations-general-assembly.

War, climate, famine... In world beset by turbulence, nations' leaders gather at UN

Facing a complex set of challenges that try humanity as never before, world leaders gather at the United Nations this week under the shadow of Europe’s first major war since World War II — a conflict that has unleashed a global food crisis and divided major powers in a way not seen since the Cold War. FRANCE 24's International Affairs Commentator Douglas Herbert gives his perspective.

At UN, leaders confront COVID’s impact on global education
By BIANCA VÁZQUEZ TONESS and JOCELYN GECKER

yesterday

1 of 5

Nobel Peace Prize laureate Malala Yousafzai speaks during the Transforming Education Summit at United Nations headquarters, Monday, Sept. 19, 2022. (AP Photo/Seth Wenig)

With COVID-related school disruptions setting back children around the world, activists implored world leaders Monday to prioritize school systems and restore educational budgets slashed when the pandemic hit.

The summit on transforming education, held at the U.N. General Assembly ahead of the annual leaders’ meeting, called on the world’s nations to ensure that children everywhere from sub-Saharan Africa to the United States don’t fall too far behind.

“Seven years ago, I stood on this platform hoping that the voice of a teenage girl who took a bullet in standing up for her education would be heard,” said Nobel Peace Prize Laureate Malala Yousafzai, a U.N. messenger of peace. “On that day, countries, corporates, civil society, all of us committed to work together to see every child in schools by 2030. It is heartbreaking that halfway through that target date, we are facing an education emergency.”

Nigerian youth activist Karimot Odebode was more pointed. “We demand you take responsibility,” Odebode told the General Assembly. “We will not stop until every person in every village and every highland has access to an education.”

The percentage of 10-year-old children in poor and middle-income countries who cannot read a simple story increased to an estimated 70% — up 13 percentage points since before the pandemic shuttered classrooms, according to a report from the World Bank, UNESCO, UNICEF and other aid organizations.

Will the world’s leaders do enough to help their youngest citizens learn to read and gain the other skills they need to thrive? It will require addressing systemic problems that existed before the pandemic, dignitaries and students say. Countries will need to increase spending, change policies to increase access for girls and disabled students, and modernize instruction to stress critical thinking rather than rote memorization.

“This is a once-in-a-generation opportunity for us to radically transform education,” U.N. Deputy Secretary-General Amina Mohammed told reporters ahead of the education summit at U.N. headquarters in New York. “We owe it to the coming generation if we don’t want to witness the emergence of a generation of misfits.”

A closing statement from the United Nations after the full-day meeting said 130 countries had committed to “rebooting their education systems” and taking action to end the learning crisis. It was unclear what that meant specifically. Countries were asked to commit to devoting at least 20% of their national budgets to education.

The education minister for the Central African Republic, Aboubakar Moukadas-Noure, said his country slashed education spending to 0.25 percent of the national budget during the pandemic to shift resources to the health crisis. He said the country has since increased education spending to 17% and will invest in teacher training with assistance from the World Bank and the French government.

When COVID-19 closed schools around the world in spring 2020, many children simply stopped learning — some for months, others for longer. For many, there was no such thing as remote learning. More than 800 million young people around the world lacked internet access at home, according to a study by UNICEF and the International Telecommunication Union in December 2020.

More recent studies underscore the pandemic’s lasting effects. “The learning losses from COVID were enormous,” Mohammed said.

The amount of time school buildings were closed because of COVID-19 varied widely around the world. At the extreme, schools in parts of Latin America and South Asia were closed for 75 weeks or longer, according to UNESCO. In parts of the United States, including cities such as Chicago and Los Angeles, schools operated remotely from March 2020 through most of the 2020-2021 school year.

There also were huge variations in the availability and quality of remote learning. In some countries, students stuck at home had access to paper packets, or radio and television programs, or almost nothing at all. Others had access to the internet and video conferences with teachers.

The estimated learning delays on average ranged from over 12 months of school for students in South Asia to less than four for students in Europe and Central Asia, according to an analysis by consulting firm McKinsey & Company.

Most of the world’s classrooms are now back open, but 244 million school-age children are still out of school, UNESCO Director-General Audrey Azoulay said during the summit, citing data from the U.N. education agency. Most of those children — 98 million — live in sub-Saharan Africa, followed by Central and Southern Asia, in a reminder of the deep inequalities that persist in access to education, she said.

In many places, money is the key ingredient for stemming the crisis, if not fully reaching the leaders’ lofty goal of “transforming education.”

“Instead of being the great enabler, education is fast becoming the great divider,” U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres told the General Assembly, calling on governments to make education financing a priority. “It is the single most important investment any country can make in its people and its future.”

On average wealthy countries invest $8,000 a year per school-aged child, compared to upper middle income countries, like some in Latin America, that invest $1,000 per year, according to a report from UNESCO and Global Education Monitoring. Lower income countries allot roughly $300 a year and some poor countries, just $50 a year per student.

Rich countries should also step up spending, said Guterres. In recent years, Germany, France and the United States have given the most international aid towards education in low-income countries, according to a 2021 Center for Global Development report. The United States invested more than $1.5 billion annually from 2017-2019, according to the report based on the most recent available data.

European Union countries will increase their international aid for education, said Jutta Urpilainen, European Commissioner for International Partnerships for the European Commission. Plans include devoting 13% of the European Union’s partnership budget and 10% of its humanitarian budget to help low-income countries improve education quality, “empower” teachers and help develop relevant skills. Urpilainen didn’t specify exactly how much spending would increase.

As top dignitaries urged individual countries to prioritize their youngest citizens, it was some of the youngest attendees at the summit who aired the most skepticism towards any prospect of change. After all, the U.N. lacks any authority to force countries to spend more on schooling.

Yousafzai urged countries to devote 20% of their budgets toward education. “Most of you know what exactly needs to be done,” she said. “You must not make small, stingy and short-term pledges.”

___

The Associated Press education team receives support from the Carnegie Corporation of New York. The AP is solely responsible for all content. Follow Bianca Vázquez Toness on Twitter at http://twitter.com/biancavtoness and Jocelyn Gecker at http://twitter.com/jgecker

‘Serial’ host: Evidence that freed Syed was long available


1 of 5

Adnan Syed, center, the man whose legal saga spawned the hit podcast "Serial," exits the Cummings Courthouse a free man after a Baltimore judge overturned his conviction for the 1999 murder of high school student Hae Min Lee, Monday, Sept, 19, 2022, in Baltimore. (Jerry Jackson/The Baltimore Sun via AP)


BALTIMORE (AP) — The creator of a true-crime podcast that helped free a Maryland man imprisoned for two decades in a murder case said that she feels a mix of emotions over how long it took authorities to act on evidence that’s long been available.

In a new episode of the “Serial” podcast released Tuesday, a day after Adnan Syed walked out of court following the vacating of his murder conviction, host Sarah Koenig noted that most or all of the evidence cited in prosecutors’ motion to overturn the conviction was available since 1999.

“Yesterday, there was a lot of talk about fairness, but most of what the state put in that motion to vacate, all the actual evidence, was either known or knowable to cops and prosecutors back in 1999,” Koenig said in concluding the new episode. “So even on a day when the government publicly recognizes its own mistakes, it’s hard to feel cheered about a triumph of fairness. Because we’ve built a system that takes more than 20 years to self-correct. And that’s just this one case.”

She argued that the case against Syed, which was featured on the first season of “Serial” in 2014, involved “just about every chronic problem” in the system, including unreliable witness testimony and evidence that was never shared with Syed’s defense team.

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On Monday, Circuit Court Judge Melissa Phinn in Baltimore ordered Syed’s release after overturning his conviction for the 1999 murder of high school student Hae Min Lee, Syed’s ex-girlfriend. Syed was 17 at the time of Lee’s slaying and has always maintained his innocence.

At the behest of prosecutors who had uncovered new evidence, Phinn ordered that Syed’s conviction be vacated as she approved the release of the now-41-year-old.

Phinn ruled that the state violated its legal obligation to share evidence that could have bolstered Syed’s defense. She ordered Syed to be placed on home detention with GPS location monitoring. The judge also said the state must decide whether to seek a new trial date or dismiss the case within 30 days.

The Baltimore prosecutor’s office filed a motion last week to vacate Syed’s conviction, a filing that Koenig described as a “firework” coming from the same office that asked a jury to convict Syed more than two decades ago.

“The prosecutors today are not saying Adnan is innocent. They stopped short of exonerating,” she said. “Instead they’re saying that ‘back in 1999, we didn’t investigate this case thoroughly enough. We relied on evidence we shouldn’t have and we broke the rules when we prosecuted. This wasn’t an honest conviction.’”

Noting High Stakes of Midterms, Jayapal Says, 'Trump Is a Fascist. Period.'

"We have to reject this dangerous movement across the country in November—our democracy depends on it," warns the Washington Democrat.

Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.) walks up the steps at the U.S. Capitol on Thursday, June 16, 2022. (Photo: Tom Williams/CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Images)

JESSICA CORBETT

September 20, 2022

Congresswoman Pramila Jayapal pulled no punches Monday night while highlighting the threat that former President Donald Trump and his right-wing movement pose to U.S. democracy and the American people.

"Donald Trump is a fascist. Period," the Washington Democrat tweeted just seven weeks before this year's midterm elections. "We have to reject this dangerous movement across the country in November—our democracy depends on it."

Jayapal's comments came in response to New York Times reporting that "Trump appeared to more fully embrace QAnon on Saturday, playing a song at a political rally in Ohio that prompted attendees to respond with a salute in reference to the cultlike conspiracy theory's theme song."

As MSNBC opinion columnist Zeeshan Aleem wrote Tuesday:

Trump is pivoting from keeping a calculated distance from QAnon conspiracy theory adherents to openly embracing them—and encouraging them to see him as a messiah-like figure. There's a clear political motive behind it. Trump is trying to mobilize supporters who are most likely to do illicit, violent things to help return him to office.

On his Truth Social platform last week, Trump reposted an image of himself wearing a "Q" lapel pin, overlaid with "The Storm is Coming" and the "WWG1WGA." The acronym is a QAnon catchphrase that stands for "Where we go one, we go all," and the storm is, as The Associated Press puts it, a reference to "Trump's final victory, when supposedly he will regain power and his opponents will be tried, and potentially executed, on live television." The QAnon conspiracy theory holds that Trump's secret mission is to uncover a secret cabal of satan-worshipping Democratic pedophiles—a cause that requires him to return to the White House.

While Trump—who faces multiple ongoing legal investigations—is widely expected to run for president again in 2024, for the next several weeks, his movement is focused on key congressional and state races.

The ex-president was in Ohio last weekend to support Republican U.S. Senate candidate J.D. Vance—one of 195 candidates on the ballot in November who have fully embraced Trump's "Big Lie" that Democrats stole the 2020 presidential election, according to a recent FiveThirtyEight analysis.

FiveThirtyEight found that along with the election-denying GOP nominees for the U.S. House and Senate as well as governor, secretary of state, and attorney general, there are 61 so-called "doubters" and 115 candidates who have declined to clarify their position. Notably, those numbers don't include the state legislative candidates who also back the Big Lie—and as Common Dreams reported Monday, government watchdogs are warning that the Republican takeover of state legislatures in recent years could lead to a right-wing rewrite of the U.S Constitution.

In recent weeks, numerous top Democrats—including Jayapal, Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.), and President Joe Biden—have issued fresh warnings about the threat that Trump-aligned Republicans and their Make America Great Again (MAGA) movement pose.

"We are at a precipice and we're counting on the American people to come through—and I have hope that people will realize that we have to turn this clock back," Jayapal said on MSNBC earlier this month.

After Biden delivered a prime-time address on the danger of Trump and his allies at the beginning of September, polling suggested the majority of Americans agree. One survey found that 58% percent of respondents—including a quarter of Republicans—think the MAGA movement "is threatening America's democratic foundations."

Echoing his earlier speech, Biden declared during a Democratic National Committee reception last week that "those who love this country—Democrats, Independents, mainstream Republicans—we got to be stronger, more determined, more committed to saving American democracy than the extreme MAGA Republicans are to destroying American democracy. We have to organize, we have to mobilize, and we have to vote. Get out and vote."

Lawmakers including Jayapal on Tuesday marked National Voter Registration Day by encouraging Americans to make sure they are all set to participate in the upcoming elections.

"From the damage done to our voting rights in Shelby County v. Holder to the flagrant lies that led to January 6, our democracy is in crisis," tweeted Rep. Barbara Lee (D-Calif.). "Do your part to preserve our democracy by registering to vote."

While the country's current democratic crisis has generated fear, it has also inspired hope, as illustrated by an interview with David Becker and Major Garrett, co-authors of the new book The Big Truth—about Trump's 2020 election lies—published Tuesday by Vanity Fair.

"We are in a perilous moment in American democracy. And it is easy to focus on those who failed to stand up for democracy when given the opportunity, and we do in the book," said Becker, an elections expert. "But what's also sometimes somewhat harder is to note the large numbers of people who have stood up, and often at great personal peril to themselves, often at great political peril to themselves, often at physical peril to themselves and their families."

Garrett, a journalist, told Vanity Fair that "what gives me optimism is the longevity of our country. We have stared into abysses before and pulled back from them."

"100,000 people in 2020 signed up to be poll workers for the first time, jumping into a breach of a situation that was not familiar to them. Not because they were going to get paid, not because they were going to be lionized in their community. Not because they were going to get a promotion. But because it mattered at a very basic civic level of accountability and participation," he noted. "And I'm gonna bank our country's future on their optimism."

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Ad spending shows Dems hinging midterm hopes on abortion

By STEVE PEOPLES and AARON M. KESSLER

yesterday


People protest following the Supreme Court's decision to overturn Roe v. Wade in Washington, June 24, 2022. Democrats are pumping an unprecedented amount of money into advertising related to abortion rights, underscoring how central the message is to the party in the final weeks before the November midterm elections. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin, File)


WASHINGTON (AP) — Democrats are pumping an unprecedented amount of money into advertising related to abortion rights, underscoring how central the message is to the party in the final weeks before the November midterm elections.

With the most intense period of campaigning only just beginning, Democrats have already invested more than an estimated $124 million this year in television advertising referencing abortion. That’s more than twice as much money as the Democrats’ next top issue this year, “character,” and almost 20 times more than Democrats spent on abortion-related ads in the 2018 midterms.

The estimated spending figures, based on an Associated Press analysis of data provided by the nonpartisan research firm AdImpact, reveal the extent to which Democrats are betting their majorities in Congress and key governorships on one issue. That’s even as large majorities of Americans think the country is heading in the wrong direction and the economy is in poor condition.

The advertising numbers also reveal just how sharply Republicans have shied away from abortion in their paid advertising in the weeks since the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, a decades-long goal of the GOP. (The AdImpact data captures every single time a campaign ad is aired on TV, and estimates a cost associated with those airings.)

Since the high court’s decision in June to eliminate the constitutional right to abortion, roughly 1 in 3 television advertising dollars spent by Democrats and their allies have focused on abortion. Much of the spending is designed to attack Republicans on the ballot this fall who have long opposed abortion rights and are currently engaged in a state-by-state push to restrict abortion rights or outlaw the practice altogether.

The Democrats’ unprecedented investment in abortion messaging on TV this year through Sept. 18 is larger than the Republican Party’s combined national investment in ads relating to the economy, crime and immigration.

“With less than 60 days until the election, we refuse to stand by while out-of-step, anti-choice Republicans try to control our bodies and our futures and simultaneously lie about it to voters,” said Melissa Williams, executive director of Women Vote!, an outside group that has invested more than $4 million in abortion-related ads this year. “We are ensuring that each voter knows the candidates that stand with them and against them in protecting this right.”

The Democrats’ overwhelming focus on abortion may not be surprising given the reversal of Roe v. Wade and the wave of Republican-backed abortion bans in more than a dozen states that followed. But the strategy still marks a sharp departure from the party’s focus in recent years on former President Donald Trump and other issues like the economy, education and health care.

In the 2018 midterm elections, for example, Democrats spent less than $6 million on abortion-related television advertising. That’s compared to the $51 million that Democrats invested in Trump-related ads, $49 million on health care and $46 million on education, according to AdImpact.

Jessica Floyd, president of American Bridge, a Democrat-allied super PAC running abortion-related advertising in Arizona, Georgia, Nevada and Pennsylvania, described abortion as “the ultimate health care issue” for women and families. The Supreme Court decision and the subsequent Republican push to ban abortion in some states, she said, represent “an actual rolling back of rights, which is unprecedented.”

“It’s a very powerful motivator,” Floyd said. “It flies in the face of everything we know voters care about — especially the voters who will decide this election.”

Television advertising data reveals that Republicans, too, have invested millions of dollars in abortion messaging. But most of those ads ran during the primary phase of the campaign this spring and summer as Republican candidates touted their anti-abortion credentials. The number of Republican ads aired referencing abortion has gone down each month since May.

As the calendar has shifted to the fall general election, the gulf between Democratic and Republican spending on abortion ads has grown even wider. So far this month, for example, Democrats and their allies have aired more than 68,000 ads on TV referencing abortion — more than 15 times as many as their Republican counterparts. They’ve spent an estimated $31 million on such ads compared with the GOP’s outlay of only $2.8 million. That’s even as Republican leaders such as GOP Chair Ronna McDaniel acknowledged in a recent interview that her party cannot allow Democrats to control the narrative on abortion.

“It’s very clear that that’s the only thing that Democrats have to run on, right? They don’t run on a good economy. They can’t run on community being safer. They can’t run on education,” McDaniel said. “So what are they going to do? They’re going to make everything about abortion, which means we’re going to have to talk about it as Republicans do.”

Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., irked Republican leaders last week by proposing a national ban on abortions at 15 weeks of pregnancy. It was the kind of legislation Republicans on Capitol Hill have supported for several years. But this year, it was viewed as an unwelcome reminder to voters just eight weeks before Election Day that some Republicans in Congress hope to adopt national abortion restrictions if given the chance.

McDaniel encouraged Republicans instead to go on offense on abortion by highlighting Democrats’ resistance to any limitations, a position she argued is out of step with most voters. And while Republican leaders and candidates are increasingly making that argument when asked, the party has yet to devote many resources to the issue in the one place most voters hear from GOP candidates: their screens.

Democrats, meanwhile, have released a new wave of abortion-related ads targeting statewide Republican candidates across North Carolina, New Mexico, Minnesota, Arizona, Colorado and Florida. Abortion is also a regular topic for state legislative candidates in competitive districts in California and Florida. Republican House candidates are under attack for opposing abortion rights in congressional districts in upstate New York, Connecticut, Michigan and Indiana.

In some cases, Republican candidates are being hit with multiple abortion-related ads running simultaneously on their local television stations.

One of them is Wisconsin’s Republican candidate for governor, Tim Michels, who has been the focus of abortion-related attack ads from three groups so far this month, including his opponent, Democratic Gov. Tony Evers. Each of the three ad campaigns features Michels confirming that he opposes abortion rights even in cases of rape or incest.

“Is that the divisive radical you want as your governor?” the narrator asks in one ad produced by the Evers campaign.

Michels’ campaign did not respond to a request for comment.

It’s much the same in Nevada, where Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto is considered one of the most vulnerable Democratic incumbents in the nation. This month, at least two anti-Republican groups and the Cortez Masto campaign itself were running abortion-related ads against GOP challenger Adam Laxalt.

Cortez Masto’s campaign featured a doctor saying that Republicans are trying to interfere with women’s health care decisions.

“For doctors like me, it is our job to make sure women have the support they need to make decisions that are right for them. But Adam Laxalt disagrees,” the doctor says on one ad.

In an op-ed last month, Laxalt tried to push back against the flood of abortion-related advertising against him.

“Cortez Masto and her allies are spending millions of dollars in campaign ads trying to ... make you believe in a falsehood that I would support a federal ban on abortion as a U.S. senator, or that I am somehow ‘anti-woman’ because I value, support and defend life at all stages,” he wrote. “For my entire adult life, I have held the view that the Supreme Court should return the issue of abortion to the people and let them decide the issue on a state-by-state basis.”

Abortion has been a big focus in Nevada’s Senate contest so far, but other elections have seen far more abortion-related advertising.

The AdImpact data shows that the most TV ads aired this year referencing abortion took place in the Pennsylvania and Arizona Senate races, followed by gubernatorial contests for Illinois, Georgia and Wisconsin. (The now-defeated Kansas constitutional amendment ballot measure, while a unique election, also saw some of the most ads.)

Georgia’s Democratic nominee for governor, Stacey Abrams, ran an ad campaign for much of August into September attacking Republican Gov. Brian Kemp, using the words of several women speaking directly to the camera.

“He supports a total ban, even if I’m raped, a victim of incest,” the women say. Another woman is almost crying when she says, “Under Kemp, I could be investigated and imprisoned for a miscarriage.”

Kemp spokesperson Tate Mitchell pushed back against the accuracy of the ads, charging that “Stacey Abrams and her campaign are lying in an effort to scare people and distract voters from her dangerous agenda for Georgia.”

Democrats in several swing states are aggressively leaning in to some leading Republicans’ opposition to abortion exceptions in cases of rape, incest or the life of the mother at risk.

Cliff Schecter, a veteran Democratic ad maker and founder of Blue Amp Strategies, said Democrats are “messaging much better around abortion” this year.

“It’s not just liberal women anymore, or even moderate women. It’s conservative women who are horrified by this,” Schecter said of the new abortion restrictions being implemented across the country. “It’d be malpractice not to focus on it.”

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Peoples reported from New York.

GOP’s election-year standing with independents at risk

By THOMAS BEAUMONT

yesterday

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Sarah Motiff, from politically competitive Columbia, County, Wisconsin, works from home in Columbus, Wis., on Sept. 13, 2022. The 52-year-old city council woman and political independent says testimony that Republican Wisconsin Sen. Ron Johnson's office offered a fake slate of Wisconsin electors for the 2020 election "put a bad taste in my mouth." She is among independent voters nationally who have drifted toward supporting Democrats this fall. (AP Photo/Thomas Beaumont)


COLUMBUS, Wis. (AP) — Sarah Motiff has voted for Sen. Ron Johnson every time his name appeared on the ballot, starting in 2010 when the Wisconsin Republican was first elected as part of the tea party wave. Fond of his tough views on spending, she began the year planning to support his reelection again.

She became skeptical this summer as the House committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol insurrection reported his office discussed giving then-Vice President Mike Pence certificates with fake presidential electors for Donald Trump from Wisconsin and Michigan, part of a broader push to overturn Joe Biden’s victory. Johnson has downplayed the effort and the certificates were never given to Pence, but Motiff, a political independent, wasn’t convinced.

“I’m not going to lie when I say I’ve had some concerns about some of the reports that have come out,” the 52-year-old nonpartisan city councilwoman from Columbus, Wisconsin, said. “It just put a bad taste in my mouth.”

Nudged further by the June U.S. Supreme Court decision invalidating a woman’s constitutional right to an abortion, Motiff is opposing Johnson and supports his Democratic challenger, Lt. Gov. Mandela Barnes, in one of the most fiercely-contested Senate races this year.

“Which was really a hard decision for me because I do think he’s done good things in the past,” Motiff said of Johnson. “But this is pretty damaging.”

Motiff’s evolution represents the challenge for Republicans emerging from a tumultuous summer, defined by the court decision, high-profile hearings on former President Donald Trump’s actions during the insurrection and intensifying legal scrutiny of his handling of classified information and efforts to overturn the election. Now, a midterm campaign that the GOP hoped would be a referendum on President Joe Biden and the economy is at risk of becoming a comparison of the two parties, putting Republicans in an unexpectedly defensive position.

In politically-divided Wisconsin where recent elections have been decided by a few thousand votes, the outcome could hinge on self-described independent voters like Motiff.

“Having former President Trump so prominently in the news in so many ways makes it easier for Democrats to frame the midterm as a choice between two competing futures as opposed to a referendum on the Democrat governance,” said Republican pollster Whit Ayres. “That’s hurting Republicans. It’s distracting from the referendum message and allowing more of a focus on a choice of two different parties.”

That tension is playing out in Columbia County, Wisconsin, a constellation of tidy small towns surrounded by rolling dairy farm country, all within commuting distance of Madison.

Statewide, top-of-the-ticket candidates have won by barely a percentage point in the past three elections. Trump won Columbia County by a little more than 500 votes out of 33,000 cast in 2020.

In interviews with more than a dozen independent voters here over two days last week, many were rethinking their support of the GOP this fall.

Steve Gray, a self-described Republican-leaning independent “but never a Trump fan,” opposed the June court decision, because he backs abortion rights. But the 61-year-old school maintenance manager also resented what he saw as an unwelcome political power play by out-of-power Republicans.

“Trump stacked the Supreme Court. We all knew he wanted to overturn Roe,” said Gray, of small-town Rio, where Trump won by two votes in 2020. “That decision was a partisan hand grenade Trump threw into this election.”

The court decision “upended the physics of midterm elections,” said Jesse Stinebring, a pollster advising several Democratic campaigns.

It gave voters the rare opportunity to judge a policy advance backed by the minority party, distracting them from a pure up-or-down vote on majority Democrats, he said.

“The backlash from a political perspective isn’t directed at the traditional party in power, but is actually reframed in terms of this Republican control of the Supreme Court,” Stinebring said.

The decision made Dilaine Noel’s vote automatic.

The 29-year-old data analytics director for a Madison-area business said she had never affiliated with either party.

Despite her grievances about Democrats’ warring moderate and liberal wings, her support for abortion rights gave her no choice than to vote for the party’s candidates this fall.

“By default, I have to move in that direction,” said Noel, from small-town Poynette in the Wisconsin River valley. “I’m being forced to.”

Mary Percifield is a lifelong independent voter who says the abortion decision motivated her to vote Democratic because she worries the court might overturn other rights.

“A right has been taken away from us,” the 68-year-old customer service representative from Pardeeville, said. “I question if a woman’s right to vote will be taken away. A woman’s right for birth control.”

Independent voters who lean neither Democrat nor Republican nationally preferred Biden over Trump, 52% to 37% in 2020, and preferred Democrats over Republicans in U.S. House races by a similar margin in the 2018 midterms, according to AP VoteCast. Independents who lean neither Democrat nor Republican made up 5% of the 2020 electorate and 12% in 2018.

Independents had moved toward Republicans by early this year, seeking answers on the economy, said Republican pollster David Winston, a senior adviser to House Republican Leader Kevin McCarthy. But they have drifted back toward Democrats as efforts by GOP leaders to focus on the economy have clashed with Republican attacks on the Justice Department and Trump’s continuing complaints about the 2020 election.

“Everything is suddenly back in the context of Trump,” Winston said in light of Trump’s prominent endorsement of Senate candidates and protests of the federal investigation into classified documents recovered from his Florida home. “It’s not that Democrats are gaining. It’s that Republicans over the summer were off talking about a variety of things. And independents are thinking, ‘If you’re not talking specifically about the problems that I’m concerned about, why am I listening?’”

Republicans remain optimistic about their chances in November, particularly about netting the handful of seats they need to regain the U.S. House majority. Inflation remains high and, despite a recent uptick, approval of Biden is still low for a party hoping to maintain its hold on power.

The economy remains the most effective message and one that breaks through others, GOP campaign officials say.

“Prices and things are so front-of-mind to people,” said Calvin Moore, the communications director for Congressional Leadership Fund, a superPAC supporting Republican U.S. House candidates. “It’s not just something that’s on the news. It’s something they are experiencing every day in their daily life. It’s something they face themselves every day when they go to the grocery store.”

A shift by independents is particularly meaningful in Wisconsin, as Republicans work to overtake Democrats’ one-seat majority in the Senate.

Johnson, among the most vulnerable Republicans running for reelection this fall, is locked in a tight race with Barnes, Wisconsin’s lieutenant governor. Of the most competitive Senate seats this year, his is the only one held by a Republican.

Though Johnson dismissed testimony about fake electors as staff work which never reached him, it reminded Christian Wood, an independent voter from Lodi, of Johnson’s opposition to certifying the election before Jan. 6. Johnson reversed course after the riot.

“It’s absolutely scary,” said Wood, who has often voted Republican. “To me that’s the most existential threat to our democracy. And to think he was even considering it makes him a non-starter.”

There’s time for an economic message to win out, but it will require news about Trump fading, GOP pollster Ayres said.

Meanwhile, Trump has a full schedule of fall campaign travel for candidates he has endorsed.

“Any distraction from that focus undermines the best Republican message,” he said.

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Associated Press writer Hannah Fingerhut in Washington contributed to this report.

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Follow AP for full coverage of the midterms at https://apnews.com/hub/2022-midterm-elections and on Twitter, https://twitter.com/ap_politics

With Griner in jail, WNBA players skip Russia in offseason

MIGHT RUSSIAN SANCTIONS HAVE ANYTHING TO DO WITH IT 

By DOUG FEINBERG

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WNBA star and two-time Olympic gold medalist Brittney Griner is escorted from a court room ater a hearing, in Khimki just outside Moscow, Russia, Aug. 4, 2022. President Joe Biden plans to meet at the White House on Friday, Sept. 16, with family members of Griner and Michigan corporate security executive Paul Whelan, both of whom remain jailed in Russia, senior administration officials told The Associated Press. (AP Photo/Alexander Zemlianichenko, File)


SYDNEY (AP) — Brittney Griner’s highly publicized legal woes in Russia and the country’s invasion of Ukraine has the top WNBA players opting to take their talents elsewhere this offseason.

For the past few decades, Russia has been the preferred offseason destination for WNBA players to compete because of the high salaries that can exceed $1 million – nearly quadruple the base salary of top WNBA players -- and the resources and amenities teams offered them.

That all has come to an abrupt end.

“Honestly my time in Russia has been wonderful, but especially with BG still wrongfully detained there, nobody’s going to go there until she’s home,” said Breanna Stewart, a Griner teammate on the Russian team that paid the duo millions. “I think that, you know, now, people want to go overseas and if the money is not much different, they want to be in a better place.”

Griner was arrested in February, then detained and later convicted on drug possession charges amid Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Griner was sentenced last month to nine years in prison.

Now, Stewart and other WNBA All-Stars, including Jonquel Jones and Courtney Vandersloot — who also have made millions of dollars playing in Russia — are going elsewhere this winter. All three played for Ekaterinburg, the same Russian team as Griner. That club won five EuroLeague titles in the past eight seasons and has been dominant for nearly two decades with former greats DeLisha Milton Jones and Diana Taurasi playing there.

Nearly a dozen WNBA players competed in Russia last winter and none of them are heading back this year.

After the World Cup tournament, Stewart is going to Turkey to play for Fenerbahçe. Top players can make a few hundred thousand dollars playing in Turkey, much less than their Russian salaries. Playing in Turkey also allows Stewart to be closer to her wife’s family in Spain.

“You want to have a better lifestyle, a better off-the-court experience, and just continue to appreciate other countries,” Stewart said.

Like Stewart, Vandersloot also isn’t headed back to Russia, choosing to play in Hungary where she obtained citizenship in 2016.

“I am Hungarian. I thought it would be special since I haven’t played there since I got the citizenship,” Vandersloot said.

The 33-year-old guard said a lot would have to change before she’d ever consider going back to Russia to play even though she has many fond memories of the Russian people.

“The thing about it is, we were treated so well by our club and made such strong relationships with those people, I would never close the door on that,” she said. “The whole situation with BG makes it really hard to think that it’s safe for anyone to go back there right now.”

Jones will be joining Stewart in Turkey, playing for Mersin. The 6-foot-6 Jones said she would consider going back to Russia if things change politically and Griner was back in the U.S.

The Griner situation also is weighing heavily on the minds of young WNBA players.

Rhyne Howard, the 2022 WNBA Rookie of the Year, is playing in Italy this winter — her first overseas experience. She said was careful when deciding where she wanted to play.

“Everyone’s going to be a bit cautious seeing as this situation is happening,” she said.

It’s not just the American players who are no longer going to Russia. Chicago Sky forward Emma Meesseman, who stars for the Belgium national team, had played in Russia with Stewart, Jones and Vandersloot. She also is headed to Turkey this offseason.

The WNBA has also been trying to make staying home in the offseason a better option for players. Commissioner Cathy Engelbert said at the WNBA Finals that top players could make up to $700,000 this year between base salary, marketing agreements and award bonuses. While only a select few players could reach that amount, roughly a dozen have decided to take league marketing agreements this offseason.

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AP Sports Writer Jay Cohen contributed to this story.