World

Ro Khanna says he’s looking at the Senate. His allies are talking about the White House.

Published

4 years ago

March 28, 2023

Rep. Ro Khanna said on Wednesday that he’s weighing a Senate bid in California.

But recent moves have sparked a new round of speculation among Democrats in several key states that the California congressman continues to have his eye on a higher office.

Khanna has retained consultants who are veterans of New Hampshire’s primary and Nevada’s. He paid one Iowa firm as well, before the Democratic National Committee made plans to revoke the state’s first-in-the-nation status. He’s also begun to more forcefully draw contrasts with potential political rivals, chief among them transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg.

Those close to Khanna say he’s keeping his options open ahead of a potential presidential run in 2028 or beyond. But others in his orbit are talking about an even more compressed timeline: running in 2024 if President Joe Biden decided not to.

“I think he would be a great United States senator,” said Mark Longabaugh, a Democratic strategist whose firm did media consulting for Khanna last year. “But I also think, should Biden decide not to run, I think he’s a very plausible candidate for president of the United States. So I think that those decisions are yet to be made.”

Khanna, for his part, denied in an interview that he would go for the White House should Biden ultimately forgo a reelection bid, saying “I’ll rule that out definitively.” He has also said he would support Biden if he were to run. More immediately, he has begun talking openly about a possible run for the Senate as his next step, as other California Democrats formally and informally announce their own bids.

“There are a lot of Bernie [Sanders] supporters and progressives who have reached out to me to encourage me to look at the race and what I’ve told them is I will do so over the next few months,” Khanna told POLITICO of a Senate bid.

But despite his protestations otherwise, some consultants whose firms have worked with the congressman in early primary states say they have a different impression about the extent of his political ambitions.

“I would just have to assume that while Ro has been incredibly interested in the great state of Iowa for a number of reasons, that perhaps it had to do with laying the groundwork for any potential future national bids,” said Stacey Walker, the former Iowa campaign co-chair for Sanders and founder of the Iowa-based firm Sage Strategies, which Khanna paid $8,000 last year. “If President Biden didn’t seek reelection, his name would have to be on the list of top contenders. That’s Stacey Walker speaking.

Just before and during the 2022 campaign cycle, Khanna showered money far afield from his district in Silicon Valley — and even his would-be Senate territory. He paid $22,000 last year to Sanders’ former New Hampshire state director, Shannon Jackson; $25,000 to the Sanders-founded progressive group Our Revolution for digital advertising; and $8,000 each to political firms in Nevada and Iowa. Walker said the payment to the Iowa firm was for help setting up meetings with labor leaders in the state.

Jackson, who is close to Sanders, said he has been working with Khanna to help him build relationships with Sanders activists nationally as well as in states such as New Hampshire. He said Khanna “is not running in 2024,” but “[f]arther down the line, I believe he is one of the progressives who can build on Bernie’s work in the future.”

Khanna, meanwhile, said his payments to the Nevada firm were related to “building support in the Latino community around the country around a new economic patriotism, particularly focused on the Southwest.”

POLITICO has previously reported on Khanna making preparations for a future presidential run. The congressman has said his semi-regular travels to key presidential states help him commandeer a media spotlight on the issues he wants to discuss. But his moves evince the national ambitions of a politician who finds himself at a political crossroads. And what stands out now is that those with ties to him are openly floating the congressman as a potential contender if Biden doesn’t run even as other Democrats with higher ambitions have fallen in line following the midterm elections.

Khanna is seen as one of the leaders of his party’s progressive wing — a relative newcomer on the scene who has broad appeal and formidable skills. At 46, he is comfortable in liberal circles, Silicon Valley boardrooms and even Fox News, where he is ensconced as a regular. He has traveled the country campaigning in blue and red states alike on “economic patriotism.”

Khanna has also shown a willingness to take on members of his own party, including potential Democratic primary rivals. Most notably, as Southwest Airlines’ holiday season meltdown left some 15,000 flights canceled, Khanna dinged Buttigieg, a potential future presidential primary competitor and frequent target of Sanders supporters, tweeting that the Transportation secretary should take a tougher tack with the airlines. “The Department of Transportation’s job is not to be buddy-buddy with airlines,” Khanna said.

Dan Kanninen, a Democratic operative and veteran of multiple Democratic presidential campaigns, said Khanna’s criticism of Buttigieg represented a proxy war between two likely future leaders in the party.

“Some folks say ‘well, this is about Iowa, and about Pete winning Iowa,’” Kanninen said. “Maybe there’s some of that. But I don’t think it’s score-settling. I think it’s more forward-looking: ‘He’s a rival, and we’re trying to hurt a rival.’”

But others in the party said the attacks on the secretary were unfair and unfounded.

“Buttigieg literally was way ahead of the curve on this — months and months and months ahead of the curve, and to most consumers, Pete Buttigieg is a fucking hero,” said John Anzalone, Biden’s longtime pollster.

Khanna denied that his criticism of the Department of Transportation was done with an eye on politics. “I don’t think it has anything to do with Buttigieg,” he said. “Whoever the Department of Transportation secretary was, I would have said the same thing.”

Still, Khanna, who is well-connected among the activist left, likely knows tweaking Buttigieg carries with it a certain cachet. Asked about where all this is leading — a 2028 bid and a face-to-face primary debate with Buttigieg, perhaps? — Khanna didn’t close the door to a run at that time.

“We need to have a message of new economic patriotism that brings a production renaissance in America,” he said. “I believe that the message I’m articulating is the message that the Democratic Party should adopt post-President Biden’s eight years.”

World

Voters deliver historic rebuke to Trump as Democrats win House and Senate

Published

1 week ago

November 5, 2026

News Staff

By Joseph Ax, Brad Heath and Jason Lange

Democrats seized control of both the Senate and House on Tuesday (US time), scoring sweeping victories in Republican strongholds for the first time in generations as tens of millions of voters delivered a scathing rebuke to President Donald Trump.

Voters in conservative bastions who had propelled the president to his second term in office just two years ago swung dramatically toward Democrats, fueled by deep frustration over the unpopular war with Iran, anxiety over the high cost of living and anger at Trump’s stewardship of the country.

Kansas elected its first Democratic senator since the Great Depression nearly a century ago. In South Carolina, a state that Trump carried by nearly 18 points in 2024, Democrats turned aside his hand-picked Senate candidate.

And in Texas, the biggest Republican state, Democrats ended a decades-long losing streak in seismic fashion, winning a Senate seat and ousting three-term Governor Greg Abbott.

The results will usher in a new era of divided government in Washington, following two years in which the Republican-controlled Congress rarely exercised its power to rein in Trump.

Once seated in January, Democrats are expected to use their power to investigate Trump’s administration, family and allies and demand concessions on major legislation. The Democratic Senate can block Trump’s nominees, including any US Supreme Court justices should a vacancy arise.

“There is now a generational remake of the Senate map that is going to change America,” said Chuck Schumer, the party’s Senate minority leader. “Americans voted for change, and now Democrats must deliver.”

Trump, who is barred by the US Constitution from seeking a third term, has exercised an iron grip on his party for most of the last decade. But the new balance of power in Washington may accelerate his lame-duck status, as attention turns toward the 2028 presidential race and potential successors begin competing for political influence in a post-Trump world.

Despite worries from Democrats that Trump might seek to overturn the election results, as he did in 2020, the president accepted the outcome, congratulating Democrats in an interview with Fox News. He also said he would work with Democrats on issues such as immigration, though he threatened to veto any “insane” bills they passed.

rnz

World

Cold case solved: DNA links serial killer Ted Bundy to 1974 murder of Utah teen

Published

2 weeks ago

October 29, 2026

News Staff

A Utah cold case tied to notorious serial killer Ted Bundy has been solved.

Fifty-two years to the day her body was found, detectives closed the investigation into the murder of 17-year-old Melissa Ann Smith. DNA evidence identified Bundy as the killer, investigators revealed Tuesday.

Smith’s body was found by hunters in a wooded area bordering Salt Lake and Summit counties on 27 October, 1974. The investigation into her murder has remained open since that day, until now.

A recent break in a Utah County cold case is being attributed to the resolution. Investigators say the same DNA profile used to identify Bundy as the killer of Laura Ann Aime was used to solve Smith’s murder.

Developments in that case brought the Smith investigation back to the surface and helped resolve the decades-old mystery, Summit County Sheriff Kacey Bates said.

Tuesday’s announcement was hinted at by Utah County investigators in April, when they announced the closure of the Aime cold case, which was tied to Bundy. At the time, a UCSO detective said the DNA profile used to link Bundy to the murder had been shared with other departments, with the hope that it could lead to closing more cases.

Bundy, who is confirmed to have killed and assaulted women across Washington, Oregon, Colorado, Utah and Florida between 1974 and 1978, confessed to 28 murders but is believed to be responsible for hundreds of deaths.

He was executed by electric chair in Florida in 1989.

Source: RNZ & CNN

World

Netanyahu touts Trump endorsement on eve of vote, suggests they may restart war on Iran

Published

3 weeks ago

October 27, 2026

News Staff

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu boasted of his endorsement from Donald Trump on the eve of Israel’s election, suggesting the two leaders could restart their war against Iran if he wins, after Trump said they should “finish the job”.

“US President Donald Trump has come with a friendship that has never existed before between an Israeli prime minister and an American president. And it is doubtful we will ever have such a friendly president again,” Netanyahu said in a televised appearance late on Sunday night. “He has another two years, and he says he is calling on you to vote for me.”

In his own social media post on Sunday, Trump, who launched the Iran war jointly with Netanyahu in February, said: “Vote for Bibi Netanyahu for Prime Minister, we have to finish the job that we started!”

Netanyahu said Trump was willing to take action “that would finally, finally, remove the Iranian threat”, but only as long as Netanyahu himself remains in power.

“And I have already instructed the Mossad and the IDF (military) to bring down this regime, to bring down this regime because that is the only way to put an end to this threat,” Netanyahu said, referring to Israel’s main intelligence service and military.

Asked for comment on Netanyahu’s remarks, White House Deputy Press Secretary Anna Kelly said: “As President Trump stated, Iran is in very bad condition, both economically and militarily, and the blockade will remain in full force and effect, with oil flowing in record numbers of barrels through the Hormuz Strait.”

“The United States will not be attacking Iran at any time prior to the midterm elections,” Kelly added via email, referring to the November 3 vote in the US.

Netanyahu’s leading opponent, centrist former military Chief of Staff Gadi Eisenkot, posted his own comments on social media, praising Trump as “a true friend of Israel”.

“I value his efforts and his commitment to Israel’s security, and I am confident that he will work in full cooperation with any leader chosen by the people.”

Former Israeli Defence Minister Benny Gantz (2nd-R) and former Israeli army chief of staff Gadi Eisenkot (R), both members of the current Israeli five-person war cabinet led by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, meet with the visiting US Secretary of State in Tel Aviv on February 8, 2024. (Photo by Mark Schiefelbein / POOL / AFP) — Former Israeli Defence Minister Benny Gantz (2nd-R) and former Israeli army chief of staff Gadi Eisenkot (R).

Mark Schiefelbein / POOL / AFP

Eisenkot accuses Netanyahu of fear-mongering

Tuesday’s vote, Israel’s first since the October 7, 2023, Hamas attacks, is the first chance for voters to deliver a verdict on the worst security failure in generations and the wars on multiple fronts that followed.

With Netanyahu already at the helm of the most right-wing government in Israeli history, politics have shifted even further to the right. Nearly all Jewish-led parties, including that of the hawkish Eisenkot, now oppose the “two-state solution” that underpinned decades of peace negotiations with the Palestinians.

But many voters say the divisive politics of Israel’s longest-serving leader make the country weaker. Polls suggest Netanyahu’s Likud Party will lose seats, potentially depriving his coalition of right-wing, far-right and ultra-Orthodox parties of its narrow majority.

Eisenkot and an array of opposition parties ranging from the rump of the centre-left to the right, also have no clear path to unseat him.

Netanyahu, 77, is an unrivaled master of political survival: the only time since 2009 that opponents managed to wrest him briefly from the premiership, it took four inconclusive elections within two years to get him out. He was back 18 months later.

Neither side planned major public events for Monday. But both posted on social media, drumming on the election’s major themes: for Netanyahu, that he is the only leader with the mettle to face down Israel’s enemies; for his opponents, that his divisive politics have weakened the country.

Netanyahu shared an AI-generated video on Monday of Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Mojtaba Khamenei, whose father Ali Khamenei was killed on the first night of US-Israeli strikes on Iran in February. Lying in a hospital bed, the younger Khamenei says his own vote would be “definitely not Bibi. Another term like this and I will be meeting my father sooner than expected.”

On Sunday Netanyahu posted a computer-generated photo of a mushroom cloud over Tel Aviv, saying Israel was in existential danger from Iran.

Eisenkot responded by accusing him of “relying on a campaign of fear-mongering, lies, and threats – including images of nuclear bombs in the heart of Tel Aviv. This time, it won’t work for him.”

Trump’s endorsement of Netanyahu carries its own political risks a week before a legislative election in which his own Republicans are seeking to hold onto power.

The Iran war is deeply unpopular in the United States, blamed for a surge in prices especially for fuel. Major fighting has been suspended for months after ceasefire negotiations held without Israeli participation.

Source: Reuters & RNZ