US sanctions Brazil's Supreme Court justice overseeing trial against Trump ally Bolsonaro
De Moraes oversees the criminal case against Bolsonaro, who is accused of masterminding a plot to stay in power despite his 2022 election defeat to current President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva.
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Toronto Star
41 minutes ago
- Toronto Star
North Carolina Senate race sets up as a fight over who would be a champion for the middle class
RALEIGH, N.C. (AP) — Democrats still in the dumps over last year's elections have found cause for optimism in North Carolina, where former Gov. Roy Cooper jumped into the race for that state's newly open seat with a vow to address voters' persistent concerns about the challenges of making ends meet. Even Republicans quietly note that Cooper's candidacy makes their job of holding the seat more difficult and expensive. Cooper had raised $2.6 million for his campaign between his Monday launch and Tuesday, and more than $900,000 toward allied groups.
Winnipeg Free Press
41 minutes ago
- Winnipeg Free Press
North Carolina Senate race sets up as a fight over who would be a champion for the middle class
RALEIGH, N.C. (AP) — Democrats still in the dumps over last year's elections have found cause for optimism in North Carolina, where former Gov. Roy Cooper jumped into the race for that state's newly open seat with a vow to address voters' persistent concerns about the challenges of making ends meet. Even Republicans quietly note that Cooper's candidacy makes their job of holding the seat more difficult and expensive. Cooper had raised $2.6 million for his campaign between his Monday launch and Tuesday, and more than $900,000 toward allied groups. Republicans, meanwhile, are hardly ceding the economic populist ground. In announcing his candidacy for the Senate on Thursday, Republican National Committee Chair Michael Whatley credited President Donald Trump with fulfilling campaign promises to working Americans and painted Cooper as a puppet of the left. Still, Cooper's opening message that he hears the worries of working families has given Democrats in North Carolina and beyond a sense that they can reclaim their place as the party that champions the middle class. They think it's a message that could help them pick up a Senate seat, and possibly more, in next year's midterm elections, which in recent years have typically favored the party out of power. 'I'm Roy Cooper. And I know that today, for too many Americans, the middle class feels like a distant dream,' the former governor said in a video announcing his candidacy. 'Meanwhile, the biggest corporations and the richest Americans have grabbed unimaginable wealth at your expense. It's time for that to change.' Cooper's plainspoken appeal may represent just the latest effort by Democrats to find their way back to power, but it has some thinking they've finally found their footing after last year's resounding losses. 'I think it would do us all a lot of good to take a close look at his example,' said Larry Grisolano, a Chicago-based Democratic media strategist and former adviser to President Barack Obama. Whatley, a former North Carolina GOP chairman and close Trump ally, used his Thursday announcement that he was entering the race to hail the president as the true champion of the middle class. He said Trump had already fulfilled promises to end taxes on tips and overtime and said Cooper was out of step with North Carolinians. 'Six months in, it's pretty clear to see, America is back,' Whatley said. 'A healthy, robust economy, safe kids and communities and a strong America. These are the North Carolina values that I will champion if elected.' Still, the decision by Cooper, who held statewide office for 24 years and has never lost an election, makes North Carolina a potential bright spot in a midterm election cycle when Democrats must net four seats to retake the majority — and when most of the 2026 Senate contests are in states Trump won comfortably last November. State Rep. Cynthia Ball threw up a hand in excitement when asked Monday at the North Carolina Legislative Building about Cooper's announcement. 'Everyone I've spoken to was really hoping that he was going to run,' said the Raleigh Democrat. Democratic legislators hope having Cooper's name at the top of the ballot will encourage higher turnout and help them in downballot races. While Republicans have controlled both General Assembly chambers since 2011, Democrats managed last fall to end the GOP's veto-proof majority, if only by a single seat. Republican strategists familiar with the national Senate landscape have said privately that Cooper poses a formidable threat. The Senate Leadership Fund, a GOP super PAC affiliated with Senate Majority Leader John Thune, wasted no time in challenging Cooper's portrayal of a common-sense advocate for working people. 'Roy Cooper masquerades as a moderate,' the narrator in the 30-second spot says. 'But he's just another radical, D.C. liberal in disguise.' Cooper, a former state legislator who served four terms as attorney general before he became governor, has never held an office in Washington. Still, Whatley was quick to link Cooper to national progressive figures such as New York Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, former Vice President Kamala Harris and Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders. Whatley accused Cooper of failing to address illegal immigration and of supporting liberal gender ideology. He echoed the themes raised in the Senate Leadership Fund ad, which noted Cooper's vetoes in the Republican-led legislature of measures popular with conservatives, such as banning gender-affirming health care for minors and requiring county sheriffs to cooperate with federal immigration officials. 'Roy Cooper may pretend to be different than the radical extremists,' Whatley said. 'But he is all-in on their agenda.' Cooper first won the governorship in 2016, while Trump was carrying the state in his first White House bid. Four years later, they both carried the state again. Cooper, who grew up in a small town 60 miles (96.6 kilometers) east of Raleigh, has long declined requests that he seek federal office. He 'understands rural North Carolina,' veteran North Carolina strategist Thomas Mills said. 'And while he's not going to win it, he knows how to talk to those folks.' As with most Democrats, Cooper's winning coalition includes the state's largest cities and suburbs. But he has long made enough inroads in other areas to win. 'He actually listens to what voters are trying to tell us, instead of us trying to explain to them how they should think and feel,' said state Sen. Michael Garrett, a Greensboro Democrat. In his video announcement, Cooper tried to turn the populist appeal Trump made to voters on checkbook issues against the party in power, casting himself as the Washington outsider. Senior Cooper strategist Morgan Jackson said the message represents a shift and will take work to drive home with voters. 'Part of the challenge Democrats had in 2024 is we were not addressing directly the issues people were concerned about today,' Jackson said. 'We have to acknowledge what people are going through right now and what they are feeling, that he hears you and understands what you feel.' Pat Dennis, president of American Bridge 21st Century, a group that conducts research for an initiative called the Working Class Project, said Cooper struck a tone that other Democrats should try to match. 'His focus on affordability and his outsider status really hits a lot of the notes these folks are interested in,' Dennis said. 'I do think it's a model, especially his focus on affordability.' 'We can attack Republicans all day long, but unless we have candidates who can really embody that message, we're not going to be able to take back power.' ___ Beaumont reported from Des Moines, Iowa.
Winnipeg Free Press
41 minutes ago
- Winnipeg Free Press
Key things to know about how Elon Musk has boosted hard-right figures in Europe
ROME (AP) — Elon Musk may have tumbled from political grace in Washington, D.C., but as he seeks to build a new political party, his power on X — where he commands the most popular account — remains unchecked. Musk is a kingmaker on the platform he acquired in 2022 for $44 billion. He has used his influence to cultivate hard-right politicians and insurgent activists across Europe. A retweet or reply from Musk can lead to millions of views and tens of thousands of new followers, according to an Associated Press analysis of public data. That fact has not been lost on influencers who have tagged Musk persistently, seeking a reply or a retweet. It has also fueled concerns in Europe about foreign meddling — not from Russia or China, but from the United States. 'Every alarm bell needs to ring,' Christel Schaldemose, a vice president of the European Parliament who works on electoral interference and digital regulation, told AP. The Associated Press analyzed more than 20,000 posts, which were compiled by Bright Data, over a three-year period from a sample of 11 European figures who had significant interactions with Musk and frequently promote a hard-right political or social agenda. These case studies are not meant to be representative of a broad universe; rather they showcase the ways in which Musk's engagement can have an impact on local influencers that share his views. Musk has sweeping power to direct attention on X Since acquiring Twitter in October 2022, Elon Musk's followers have more than doubled, to over 220 million. No other large account has shown such high or consistent growth. The result: If Musk's X account is his megaphone, it has gotten a lot bigger since he took over — a change that has global implications. The accounts Musk has been promoting are part of a growing global alliance of nationalistic parties and individuals united in common cause to halt migration, overturn progressive policies and promote an absolutist vision of free speech, which has rattled the foundation of a trans-Atlantic bond that guided U.S. and European relations for over eight decades. Several of the accounts AP analyzed belong to people who have faced allegations of illegal behavior in their own countries. Tommy Robinson, an anti-immigrant agitator in the U.K., was sentenced in October to 18 months in prison for violating a court order blocking him from making libelous allegations against a Syrian refugee. Bjoern Hoecke, a politician from Germany's Alternative for Deutschland (AfD) party, was convicted last year of knowingly using a Nazi slogan in a speech. Italian vice premier Matteo Salvini was acquitted in December of allegations he illegally detained 100 migrants aboard a humanitarian rescue ship Among the others examined by AP: Alice Weidel, who helped lead Germany's Alternative for Deutschland (AfD) party to its best electoral showing this year; Eva Vlaardingerbroek, a Dutch influencer known as the 'shieldmaiden of the far-right'; Naomi Seibt, a German activist dubbed the 'anti-Greta Thunberg' now living in what amounts to political exile in Washington DC; Rubén Pulido and Foro Madrid, both associated with Spain's populist Vox party; and Fidias Panayioutou, a politician from Cyprus who has also advocated for Musk's companies. These accounts collectively gained roughly 5 million followers from the time Musk took over Twitter in October 2022 through January of this year. Most saw triple-digit percentage increases in their followers — as high as 920%, or in one case of a tiny account exploding over that time, topping 6,000%. Even some accounts that grew more steadily on their own saw their follower counts sharply begin rising once Musk started interacting with them. Similarly, on days Musk interacted with a post, the number of views the account got soared — in most cases, accruing two to four times as many views, with a few seeing boosts 30 or 40 times their normal daily viewership. More established players in Musk's orbit — like Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, whose ruling Brothers of Italy party has neo-fascist roots — benefit less when Musk interacts with them on X, AP found. Attention seekers know that getting Musk to engage can be transformative Musk's dominance creates a strong incentive for people to get Musk to engage with their content. Naomi Seibt, a German climate skeptic, pinged Musk nearly 600 times over the past three years. Musk finally engaged in June 2024, when he asked her to explain why the Alternative for Germany (AfD) party is so controversial in Germany. Since then, Musk has replied to, quoted or tagged Seibt more than 50 times, and her followers have grown by more than 320,000 since Musk took over the platform. On days Musk interacted with Seibt, her posts, on average, got 2.6 times as many views. 'I didn't intentionally 'invade' Elon's algorithm,' Seibt told AP. 'Obviously Elon has a lot of influence and can help share a message even with those who are usually glued to the legacy media, particularly in Germany.' Musk's online influence has real-world political and financial impact Alice Weidel, who helps lead the Alternative for Germany (AfD) party, saw her daily audience surge from 230,000 to 2.2 million on days Musk interacted with her posts on X. After Musk hosted a livestream with Weidel on X, vice president JD Vance broke protocol and met her in Munich. Weidel's party, which is fighting a lawsuit to block the German government's decision to designate it as an extremist group, went on to secure its best electoral showing ever. Musk has also used X to advocate for the leader of Italy's hard-right League party, Matteo Salvini. On days Musk interacted with Salvini's account, average views were more than four times higher than usual. Now serving as vice premier, Salvini has urged his government to move ahead with controversial contracts for Starlink and pushed back against European efforts to regulate content on X. And Musk has a friend in Brussels: Fidias Panayiotou — a 25-year-old social media influencer from Cyprus. Before winning a surprise seat in the European Parliament last year, the Cypriot spent weeks on a quest to get Elon Musk to hug him. In January 2023, his wish came true. Their embrace went viral. Since taking office, Panayiotou has praised X on the floor of the European Parliament, pushed back against regulations that impact the platform, and credited Musk with sparking his call to fire 80% of EU bureaucrats. Musk, evidently, was pleased. 'Vote for Fidias,' he wrote on X. 'He is smart, super high energy and genuinely cares about you!' Monday Mornings The latest local business news and a lookahead to the coming week. The endorsement has been viewed 11.5 million times. —- Kessler reported from Washington —- Contact AP's global investigative team at Investigative@ or
