An establishment US Republican Party politician secured a clear shot to become the US House of Representatives majority leader, but his likely ascent leaves the party’s ultra-conservative Tea Party wing out of the chamber’s top leadership jobs and fuming, as well as exposing deep fissures within the party.
House majority leader Eric Cantor suffered a stunning defeat to little-known college professor Dave Brat in the Virginia Republican primary, a race that underscored the rift within the party between establishment conservatives and further-right contenders pressing for no-compromise ideological stances.
Brat cast Cantor’s past positive comments about possible immigration changes as an “amnesty” for illegal immigrants — a characterization Cantor heatedly rejected — and turned it into a defining issue in the race.
Cantor said on Wednesday that he would step down as majority leader at the end of next month. He endorsed US Representative Kevin McCarthy as his successor. The No. 3 Republican in the House was set to take the No. 2 job in the House, after his sole rival — Texas Republican Pete Sessions — dropped his bid in the leadership fight on Thursday night.
Republicans sought to project an aura of unity, but failed to quiet conservative complaints that such quick party elections after Cantor’s defeat gave them little time to rally around an alternative who better reflects the right wing’s ideology and the emboldened Tea Party.
Votes are scheduled for Thursday next week for majority leader, the No. 2 job behind House Speaker John Boehner, and for majority whip, the No. 3 party post.
However, that may well not be the end of it. Several Republicans asserted that next week’s action would not quiet ambitious legislators or factions in the party caucus, and leadership contests after November’s US midterm elections could produce a brand-new lineup.
Cantor is the first House majority leader to lose his seat by being defeated in a party primary election since the post was created in 1899, according to Eric Ostermeier, research associate at the University of Minnesota’s Center for the Study of Politics and Governance.
MONEY MATTERS: Xi was to highlight projects such as a new high-speed railway between Belgrade and Budapest, as Serbia is entirely open to Chinese trade and investment Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic yesterday said that “Taiwan is China” as he made a speech welcoming Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) to Belgrade, state broadcaster Radio Television of Serbia (RTS) said. “We have a clear and simple position regarding Chinese territorial integrity,” he told a crowd outside the government offices while Xi applauded him. “Yes, Taiwan is China.” Xi landed in Belgrade on Tuesday night on the second leg of his European tour, and was greeted by Vucic and most government ministers. Xi had just completed a two-day trip to France, where he held talks with French President Emmanuel Macron as the
With the midday sun blazing, an experimental orange and white F-16 fighter jet launched with a familiar roar that is a hallmark of US airpower, but the aerial combat that followed was unlike any other: This F-16 was controlled by artificial intelligence (AI), not a human pilot, and riding in the front seat was US Secretary of the Air Force Frank Kendall. AI marks one of the biggest advances in military aviation since the introduction of stealth in the early 1990s, and the US Air Force has aggressively leaned in. Even though the technology is not fully developed, the service is planning
INTERNATIONAL PROBE: Australian and US authorities were helping coordinate the investigation of the case, which follows the 2015 murder of Australian surfers in Mexico Three bodies were found in Mexico’s Baja California state, the FBI said on Friday, days after two Australians and an American went missing during a surfing trip in an area hit by cartel violence. Authorities used a pulley system to hoist what appeared to be lifeless bodies covered in mud from a shaft on a cliff high above the Pacific. “We confirm there were three individuals found deceased in Santo Tomas, Baja California,” a statement from the FBI’s office in San Diego, California, said without providing the identities of the victims. Australian brothers Jake and Callum Robinson and their American friend Jack Carter
CUSTOMS DUTIES: France’s cognac industry was closely watching the talks, fearing that an anti-dumping investigation opened by China is retaliation for trade tensions French President Emmanuel Macron yesterday hosted Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) at one of his beloved childhood haunts in the Pyrenees, seeking to press a message to Beijing not to support Russia’s war against Ukraine and to accept fairer trade. The first day of Xi’s state visit to France, his first to Europe since 2019, saw respectful, but sometimes robust exchanges between the two men during a succession of talks on Monday. Macron, joined initially by EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, urged Xi not to allow the export of any technology that could be used by Russia in its invasion